GD's Political Animal: November 2022

Wednesday, November 30, 2022

Alberta government introduces sovereignty bill

Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act | Alberta.ca:

Accessed Nov. 30, 2022 - "Bill 1 has been introduced to allow Alberta to fight harmful federal laws and defend the constitutional federal-provincial division of powers. Bill 1: Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act would defend Alberta’s interests by giving us a legal framework to fight federal laws or policies that negatively impact the province.

"If passed, the act will be used to push back on federal legislation and policy that is unconstitutional or harmful to our province, our people and our economic prosperity. This may include overreach and interference in areas our government considers provincial jurisdiction such as firearms, energy, natural resources and COVID healthcare decisions.

"The act would give Alberta a legislative framework and democratic approach for defending the federal-provincial division of powers while respecting Canada's constitution and the courts....

What the act does

"If passed, the Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act will only be used when Alberta’s legislative assembly debates and passes a motion that identifies a specific federal program or piece of legislation as unconstitutional or causing harm to Albertans.

"Government will ensure all constitutional and legal requirements are met before steps are taken to respond. Government will respect court decisions if a response is challenged successfully in court.

What the act doesn't do

If passed, the Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act:

will not allow Alberta to defy Canada’s constitution
will not allow Alberta to separate from Canada
will not allow Cabinet to issue unconstitutional orders-in-council, including giving instructions that are outside of provincial jurisdiction to provincial entities
will not allow Cabinet to give instructions to private individuals or corporations that aren’t provincial entities, to violate federal law

How the act will be used

"If the act is passed, a democratic process will be used.... Any minister introduces a motion for a resolution to use the act. The motion identifies a federal matter deemed unconstitutional or causing harm to Alberta, and proposes measures Cabinet should take in response.... MLAs debate the motion and then vote for or against it. If a majority of MLAs vote in favour of the motion, the resolution is passed....

"Cabinet reviews proposed next steps to make sure the proposed actions are constitutional and legal.... Cabinet may instruct provincial entities to take steps in response to the recommendations in the resolution. Entities might include provincial agencies.... Cabinet, working with the relevant minister, can amend any enactments, including legislation, orders or regulations."

Tuesday, November 29, 2022

Canadian Anti-Hate Network loses libel suit

Jon Kay's legal victory exposes Canadian Anti-Hate Network's anti-conservative agenda | National Post - Jamie Sarkonak:

November 24, 2022 - "A recent decision by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has given Canadians yet another reason to question the federal government’s relationship with the Canadian Anti-Hate Network (CAHN). On Nov. 10, the court dismissed a defamation lawsuit launched by lawyer Richard Warman, also a board member of CAHN. Warman sued journalists Jonathan and Barbara Kay for tweets that criticized CAHN’s links to the Antifa movement in the United States, which has been covered by C2C Journal and The Federalist (the Kays did not name Warman himself in their tweets). In the end, the judge ruled that the tweets weren’t defamatory, which meant the Kays wouldn’t be liable.

"Even if the tweets did meet the legal threshold to be considered defamatory, the Kays would have been saved by the legal defences available. The judge said that the statements made had the benefit of being true, noting that, 'CAHN did in fact assist Antifa and that the movement has been violent'.... Additionally, the judge concluded the defence of fair comment could apply, meaning the opinions expressed by the Kays could be reasonably drawn from the known facts.... The judge noted that even 'Warman’s evidence was that he and CAHN were part of the Antifa movement,' and its 'muscular resistance' and 'physical disruption' were known to two other board members.

"The decision tells us two things: that there are members of CAHN who are willing to use the legal system to silence its critics, and that there is a relationship between CAHN and the Antifa movement. It’s yet another indicator that the Government of Canada — particularly the Department of Canadian Heritage — should distance itself from the organization.

"CAHN has received government funding in the past, including a grant of $268,400 to participate in an 'anti-racism action program' from October 2020 to March 2022. The grant agreement, obtained through an access to information request, shows that the money was used to hire additional staff members, facilitate workshops, write articles about hate groups (CAHN covers everyone from far-right neo-nazis to conservative-leaning school board candidates) and engage on social media.

"A 'recommendation for ministerial approval' form (also obtained through an access to information request) ... described the expected outcomes: 'This project will increase the organization’s capacity to counter online hate by hiring four team members to carry out the monitoring of extreme-right groups, report on their activities and file complaints with law enforcement ... and will share information through 10,000 Facebook and Twitter followers.' Reporting citizens to police wasn’t an expectation written into the final grant agreement, but it’s concerning that paying a third-party group to investigate people for the purpose of initiating criminal investigations was on the table in the first place....

"In March 2022 — the month the government grant was set to expire — Canadian Heritage created an advisory group to help it craft its online censorship legislation. Among the appointees was Bernie Farber, chair of the CAHN.... The recommendations were released on June 15, 2022. A couple weeks later, the Government of Canada and CAHN launched an 'anti-hate toolkit' for use in schools — a project that was supported by the Canadian Heritage grant. The toolkit’s focus was on far-right radicalization (it should be noted that far-left radicalization and Islamic radicalization, which have also been problems in Canada, were not mentioned in it).

"Among other things, the toolkit outlined problematic behaviours in students that should be reported to teachers and corrected, including displaying the Red Ensign (Canada’s former flag), the use of various memes and supporting unsavoury politicians like former U.S. president Donald Trump.... The toolkit is very much a political document that primarily targets the far-right. But in doing so, it goes after mild traditionalism, classical liberal stances on social policy and mainstream conservative values, as well....

"[CAHN] is a politically motivated group that is now recognized by a court to be associated with Antifa, and has no qualms about accusing mainstream conservatives of being racist and using the legal system to try to silence them. It’s free to advocate for whatever it wants, but the federal government shouldn’t be using the group to push fundamentally illiberal views on the limits of free speech in a free and democratic society."

MP Dane Lloyd Grills Canadian Anti-Hate Network for Hate Hoax against Freedom Convoy, Clyde Do Something, Apr. 28, 2022:

Monday, November 28, 2022

Protests in China against Zero Covid regime

Protesters call for Xi to resign amid unprecedented unrest over China's COVID-19 measures | CBC News - Thomson Reuters:

November 27, 2022 - "Protesters angered by strict COVID-19 measures called for China's powerful leader to resign, a rare rebuke as authorities in at least eight cities struggled to suppress demonstrations Sunday that represent a rare direct challenge to the ruling Communist Party.

"The wave of civil disobedience is unprecedented in mainland China since President Xi Jinping assumed power a decade ago, as frustration mounts over his signature zero-COVID policy nearly three years into the pandemic.... The protests — which began Friday and have spread to cities including the capital, Beijing, and dozens of university campuses — are the most widespread show of opposition to the ruling party in decades.

Police using pepper spray drove away demonstrators in Shanghai who called for Xi to step down and an end to one-party rule, but hours later people rallied again in the same spot. Police again broke up the demonstration.... In a video of the protest in Shanghai verified by The Associated Press, chants against Xi, the most powerful leader since at least the 1980s, and the Chinese Communist Party sounded loud and clear: 'Xi Jinping! Step down! CCP! Step down!' People also held up blank sheets of paper as an expression of protest.
A large crowd also gathered in the southwestern metropolis of Chengdu, according to videos on social media, where they also held up blank sheets of paper and chanted: 'We don't want lifelong rulers. We don't want emperors,' a reference to Xi, who has scrapped presidential term limits.
At the campus of Beijing's Tsinghua University, a large crowd gathered, according to images and videos posted on social media. Some people also held blank sheets of paper.
In the central city of Wuhan, where the pandemic began three years ago, videos on social media showed hundreds of residents take to the streets, smashing through metal barricades, overturning COVID-19 testing tents and demanding an end to lockdowns.
Other cities that have seen public dissent include Lanzhou in the northwest, where residents on Saturday overturned COVID-19 staff tents and smashed testing booths, posts on social media showed. Protesters said they were put under lockdown even though no one had tested positive.

"The current protests erupted after a fire broke out Thursday, killing at least 10 people in an apartment building in the city of Urumqi in the northwest, where some have been locked in their homes for four months. That prompted an outpouring of angry questions online about whether firefighters or people trying to escape were blocked by locked doors or other restrictions. Urumqi officials abruptly held a news conference on Saturday to deny that pandemic measures had hampered escape and rescue efforts.

"Three years after COVID-19 emerged, China is the only major country still trying to stop transmission of COVID-19. Its "zero COVID" strategy has suspended access to neighbourhoods for weeks at a time. Some cities carry out daily virus tests on millions of residents.... People who are quarantined at home in some areas say they lack food and medicine. The ruling party faced public anger following the deaths of two children whose parents said anti-virus controls hampered efforts to get medical help.

"China defends its COVID-19 policies as life-saving and necessary to prevent overwhelming the health-care system. Officials have vowed to continue with it despite the growing public pushback and its mounting toll on the world's second-biggest economy."

Sunday, November 27, 2022

Emergencies Act inquiry showed Liberal contempt for citizens

Liberals make a mockery of Canadian democracy | National Post - Rex Murphy:

What both the invocation of the Emergencies Act and the inquiry show is how contemptuous this government is of its citizens

November 25, 2022 - "The inquiry into the use of the Emergencies Act is in its sixth week, which, it may be useful to note, is about five times longer than the act itself was in force. Hold in mind that the act was actually only half-passed. It got through the Singh-Trudeau House of Commons.... But it never made it to the Senate — a requirement of its legitimacy, all too soon forgotten — being conveniently called down before it could be questioned or challenged there....

"It should be more than curious that it takes six weeks to hear how and why the government went to its most extreme measure, when most likely it was a decision made in a single day by a handful of senior ministers, the wizard advisers in the PMO, and of course the high sage himself, the prime minister. Well, even after six weeks, I’m still stuck on the most basic two points.

"An Ottawa street was tied up — Wellington — for a few weeks. Inconvenient, annoying — yes, but all of Ottawa wasn’t put in some sort of civic hibernation with this protest. But let us grant that it was an emergency in or for Ottawa. Name any other capital city in the country, never mind any full province or territory, that felt any impact whatsoever. Ninety-nine per cent of the country went about its business as usual. This stretched-out inquiry seems very little interested in the raw question of how a limited protest in Ottawa got so easily designated a national emergency....

"In the past couple of days we heard some really weird stuff from the government ministers. 'How many tanks are you asking for?'.... Tanks? For a peaceful protest?... They say now it was just a 'joke' ... but considering the language they have used about the convoy — the talk of Nazis and supremacists and 'foreign sources' and 'terrorists' — I am extremely dubious that when that question was first put forward, it was with a chuckle or two. And is it so far from Trudeau’s chatter about a 'fringe minority' that should not to be tolerated, to delusive fears requiring a full military response?

"To a normal mind, the parked trucks on Wellington Street was not a replay of the Normandy landings. But the pervasive immaturity of the Trudeau cabinet, and himself, and the taste for show that characterizes both, suggest they had an appetite for a heroic role and the drama associated with 'saving democracy.' And the lure of /War Measures Act — The Sequel/ was too strong to resist.

"Consider Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland’s Churchillian resolve: 'I will never support negotiating with those who hold our democracy hostage.' A sentence that reveals she’s a hero in her own movie. Where was this deplorable hostage holding? Was Parliament stormed? The Speaker hauled off to the cab of a truck? Were MPs rounded up? Were militias surrounding the Commons? Or the Cottage?.... Freeland’s 'courageous' declaration was pure nonsense and fantasy. Canadian democracy was never, not for a minute, being held 'hostage.' Except, ironically, for the period of the Emergencies Act....

"Justice Minister David Lametti in his turn at the inquiry — an inquiry whose purpose, as statutorily required, is to determine if invoking the Emergencies Act was justified — was less than Windex clear: He really couldn’t divulge anything about what led to the decision due to solicitor-client privilege. Asked if cabinet had received a legal opinion about the invocation of the act, he said he could not confirm or deny that....

"I am beginning to wonder which is the more empty, the more theatrical — the invocation of the Emergencies Act, or this dubious shell of an inquiry. It started with 'honk trauma' and has wound down with a splay of non-answers, claims of 'cabinet confidentiality' on the very issues for which it was called, wildly inflated talk of an 'occupation' and a comedy club routine about tanks. What both the invocation and the inquiry show is how contemptuous this government — in particular all its chief ministers — are of ordinary, typical members of the Canadian citizenry. They are not holding democracy 'hostage,' but they are doing a good job of making a mockery of it."

Saturday, November 26, 2022

Majority of US Covid deaths among the vaccinated

With the Covid-vaccinated now accounting for the majority of Covid deaths, the Kaiser Foundation says that "we can no longer say this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated."

Covid is no longer mainly a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Here’s why. | Washington Post - McKenzie Beard, Health 202:

November 23, 2022 - "It’s no longer a pandemic of the unvaccinated. For the first time, a majority of Americans dying from the coronavirus received at least the primary series of the vaccine.

"Fifty-eight percent of coronavirus deaths in August were people who were vaccinated or boosted, according to an analysis conducted for The Health 202 by Cynthia Cox, vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation. It’s a continuation of a troubling trend that has emerged over the past year.... In September 2021, vaccinated people made up just 23 percent of coronavirus fatalities. In January and February this year, it was up to 42 percent, per our colleagues Fenit Nirappil and Dan Keating.

"'We can no longer say this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated,' Cox told The Health 202.... Cox, like many experts, says she’s not surprised by the ratio shift. There are a few reasons:

At this point in the pandemic, a large majority of Americans have received at least their primary series of coronavirus vaccines, so it makes sense that vaccinated people are making up a greater share of fatalities.
Individuals at greatest risk of dying from a coronavirus infection, such as the elderly, are also more likely to have received the shots.
Vaccines lose potency against the virus over time and variants arise that are better able to resist the vaccines, so continued boosters are needed to continue to prevent illness and death.
The BA.5 omicron subvariant became dominant in July and consistently accounted for the majority of new coronavirus infections across the United States until earlier this month. The highly transmissible strain fueled a surge of new infections, reinfections and hospitalizations throughout the summer.

"It’s still true that vaccinated groups are at a lower risk of dying from a covid-19 infection than the unvaccinated when the data is adjusted for age..... Let’s take a look at deaths in August, when the highly contagious BA.5 variant reached its peak: That month, unvaccinated people aged 6 months and older died at about six times the rate of those who had received their primary series of shots.... Unvaccinated people over the age of 5 had about 8 times the risk of dying from a coronavirus infection than those who received a booster shot.... Unvaccinated people 50 and up had 12 times the risk of dying from covid-19 than adults the same age with two or more booster doses.

Friday, November 25, 2022

Trudeau government won't say why it used Emergencies Act

Trudeau government won't share secret legal basis for invoking Emergencies Act | Toronto Sun - Brian Lilley:

November 24, 2022 - "Justice Minister David Lametti admitted Wednesday that the Trudeau government didn’t use the legal definition to decide to invoke the Emergencies Act — they used their own reasons, but you can’t see them. This is the opposite of what the legislation calls for and flies in the face of what the inquiry is really all about.

"Yet, time and again on Wednesday, Lametti cited solicitor-client privilege and refused to answer questions on the guiding legal or intelligence reasons for invoking the act. As justice minister, Lametti is the government’s lawyer and he’s saying he can’t reveal his advice unless the government allows it to be released.

"Justice Paul Rouleau tried to gently press Lametti on this issue, asking how he could understand and pass judgment on the legal basis of invoking the Emergencies Act when the government was not forthcoming on the legal rationale. 'I guess the answer is we just assume they acted in good faith in application of whatever they were told,' Rouleau said. 'I think that’s fair,' Lametti replied.

"Fair for the government, not fair to Rouleau or to the Canadian public. The main question for the Emergencies Act inquiry in Ottawa is supposed to be whether the Trudeau government was justified in using the emergency legislation. The text of the Emergencies Act legislation is clear, and strict, on what constitutes a public order emergency, which is the kind the Liberals invoked.

"Section 3 of the act states that a national emergency is one that 'cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada'... [S]ection 16 says that a public order emergency is one 'that arises from threats to the security of Canada.' The act [defines] what constitutes a threat to the security of Canada as a threat that 'has the meaning assigned by section 2 of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act'....

"This legislation, and section 2 of the CSIS Act, are written in very plain language that is simple for any Canadian to understand. The [CSIS] act lays out four key areas that meet this definition of threats to Canada’s national security: Espionage or sabotage, foreign influenced activities detrimental to the interests of Canada, the threat or use of acts of serious violence for the purpose of achieving a political, religious or ideological objective, and attempts to overthrow the government.

"We know that [none of] the RCMP , the OPP nor the Ottawa Police thought invoking the Emergencies Act was necessary. We also know that the official report by CSIS said that the convoy protests did not meet the legal threshold set out by law on any of the four points. When CSIS director David Vigneault was asked why his agency said that the legal threshold wasn’t met but he still advised invoking the act, he said the justice department lawyers briefed him. When asked what they said, solicitor-client privilege was [again] invoked....

"When Parliament passed the Emergencies Act in 1988, the goal was to ensure there were limits on the use of extraordinary powers by any future government. They wrote in clear instructions and clear definitions as a public assurance that the act would not be a political tool. By using a legal basis and definitions not found in the act, the Trudeau government is making a mockery of Parliament’s intentions and the efforts of the inquiry they called to pass judgment on their actions."

Thursday, November 24, 2022

Liberals wanted to use army against Convoy

Trudeau cabinet minister proposed using army, tanks to take back Ottawa streets | Toronto Sun - Brian Lilley:

November 23, 2022 - "Soldiers, with tanks, on our streets — I didn’t make this up. It’s instead what two Liberal cabinet ministers were talking about as a way to deal with the trucker’s convoy earlier this year.

"This revelation came through text messages between Justice Minister David Lametti and Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino submitted into evidence at the Emergencies Act inquiry. On Feb. 2, Lametti expressed frustration to Mendicino about how long the convoy had been set up in downtown Ottawa. 'You need to get the police to move. And the CAF if necessary. Too many people are being seriously adversely impacted by what is an occupation,' Lametti wrote.

Tienanmen Square, Beijing, 1989. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

"The request from Lametti was in no way a joke. He was asking the minister of public safety, the solicitor general of Canada, to direct the police and use the military to break up the convoy protest if necessary.

"We don’t use the army to subdue political protest in Canada. But Mendicino, an experienced MP and cabinet minister, and the former crown prosecutor, simply replied asking how many tanks. 'How many tanks are you asking for?” Mendicino asked. 'I reckon one will do!!,' was Lametti’s reply.

"To Lametti, this is just playful banter between colleagues. But Canadians should see this for what it is, the two most powerful members of cabinet, when it comes to law-enforcement, discussing using the military to quell a political protest, including the use of tanks. Resorting to the 'it was just a joke' defence shouldn’t sit well with anyone.

"Even if we ignore what Lametti would like us to believe is just bad humour with the quip about tanks, he was still advocating for using the military against a civilian protest. He also said in several texts to Mendicino and other politicians that he wanted them to get police moving. That should be extremely worrisome even if it’s not surprising coming from Lametti. He claimed in his testimony to know that politicians cannot direct police, yet he tried to do just that multiple times. He should know the military is not a solution to civilian protest but he requested it.

"Lametti you may recall is the man who was appointed attorney general after Jody Wilson-Raybould refused to interfere in a criminal prosecution for political reasons. Lametti obviously had no issue with what the Prime Minister wanted and was granted the job. He then dismissed calls for an investigation into the Prime Minister saying Trudeau had assured everyone he had done nothing wrong. Is this a man you can trust to apply the law properly or fairly?

"We also learned from Wednesday’s testimony that while yes, indeed, the government did use a wider, broader definition of what constitutes a threat to the national security of Canada, you can’t see it. Lametti was asked about this issue multiple times by both commission council and under cross examination but simply claimed solicitor-client privilege.

"The government has made it clear to the inquiry investigating the use of the Emergencies Act that they used a broader definition not found in the law, but they have no intention of sharing it with the public, or the inquiry."

Tuesday, November 22, 2022

Dependence on gov't erodes trust in legacy media

Canadians' trust in the legacy media has been eroded by the latter's growing dependence on government, writes Canadian News Hall of Fame member Mark Bonokoski.

The continuing decline of the traditional media landscape | True North - Mark Bonokoski:

November 21, 2022 - "The newspaper industry, seemingly forever the epicentre of the world’s news gatherers, survived the upstart of radio in the 1920s and the television era of the 1950s, but fell flat on its face when confronting the competition of the Internet. The Internet has all but delivered a coup de grace on the newspaper business — leading to shrinking budgets, shrinking staff counts, a shrinking number of existing newspapers, and the shrinking number of actual newspaper pages... And now the worst news of today? Legacy journalists are no longer trusted or respected because government bailouts have tainted their reputations....

“'The Internet has created a world of unlimited choice and been a gift to consumers and innovators,' said the Macdonald-Laurier Institute’s (MLI) Peter Menzies, once a Canadian newspaper executive. 'But Canada’s news industry providers have suffered losses of audience engagement and advertising revenue.'

"As Menzies put it, 'Canada is on the cusp of making most of its journalists permanently dependent on the federal government. This is evolving directly through tax relief and subsidy funds and indirectly through offshore tech companies compelled by legislation. While this may permit some of the legacy news organizations to continue to survive financially, this new connection to politicians is eroding public trust in both government and news organizations'....

"The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has ensured that certain levels of Canadian content (which is heavily subsidized due to low domestic market demand) are carried by licensed broadcasters. The CRTC enforces foreign ownership restrictions on currently regulated media – radio and television – through its licensing process. In order to obtain a CRTC licence, a broadcaster must be more than 50% owned by Canadians and its board must be made up of a majority of Canadians.

"'Canada’s news industry has been unable to adapt to technological change,' said Menzies. 'In the case of print, the collapse of concentrated ownership led to even greater concentration of ownership, which has resulted in more than $200 million in annual public subsidies and tax credits. Some of these were initially intended as temporary measures to assist companies trying to transition into the digital age. But as companies fail to do so, these subsidies and credits are becoming permanent.'

"'Making matters worse, each appears to be oblivious to the impact that it has on the others,' said Menzies. “The CRTC, for instance, is creating an artificial oversupply of news products by forcing many broadcasters to employ reporters and dedicate airtime to news, as if their local radio station is the sole possible vehicle through which people may obtain the information they seek.'

"Canada is currently in the process – through Bill C-11 (Online Streaming Act) – of defining the Internet as broadcasting and putting it within the jurisdiction of the CRTC, which will allow it to control citizens’ viewing and listening choices as it does with cable, satellite, and over-the-air broadcasting. Bill C-18, meanwhile, intends to divert advertising revenue from Facebook and Google to legacy media and more legislation involving control of speech on the Internet has been promised through an Online Harms Act to patrol citizens’ speech.

"'So long as government appears prepared to sustain legacy news operations through subsidy and dependence on offshore tech company revenue, there will be less room in the market for the revitalization it needs,' wrote Menzies.... 'Postmedia newspapers in Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon, and Regina are subsidized, none of them have their own reporters in the Parliamentary Press Gallery. Yet Western Standard, which refuses to be dependent on government, does have a reporter in the Parliamentary Press Gallery. Similarly, Blacklock’s Reporter, which has built an independent subscription-based reporting service in Ottawa, must compete against subsidized competition. The same can be said of The Line, which focuses on commentary and prefers to be independent.' True North would be a fourth example."

Monday, November 21, 2022

Trudeau stars at Emergencies Act inquiry this week

Six weeks of testimony at Canada's Emergencies Act inquiry will culminate this week with an appearance by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Trudeau went all in against the Freedom Convoy. This week, it’s on him to explain why | Politico - Maura Forrest:

November 20, 2022 - "In a rare showing this week, Canada’s prime minister will publicly defend his decision to invoke never-before-used emergency powers to end a weekslong occupation of the nation’s capital last winter. Justin Trudeau’s highly anticipated testimony will cap six weeks of hearings at a public inquiry that has witnessed extraordinary disclosures of the inner workings of police and government during the protest, which culminated in the Feb. 14 invocation of the Emergencies Act.

The act gave authorities broad new powers they used to freeze the bank accounts of protesters, ban travel to protest sites, prohibit people from bringing children to protests and compel tow trucks to clear out vehicles blocking Ottawa streets.... The public inquiry must determine whether Trudeau was justified in using the act. To date, it has heard and seen considerable evidence casting doubt on the Liberal government’s decision.

"Police agencies have testified the emergency powers weren’t necessary to end the protest of pandemic public health measures. Senior government officials were shown to have harbored doubts. And perhaps most damaging to the government’s case was a revelation last week that Canada’s national intelligence agency did not find the protests posed a threat to Canada’s security. In the final week of hearings, it will fall to Trudeau and several of his ministers and senior staff to prove their case....

"The act, passed in 1988, had never been used and is intended only for national emergencies that can’t be resolved by other means. Its predecessor, the War Measures Act, was most recently used by Trudeau’s father, former prime minister Pierre Trudeau, in response to a series of terrorist attacks by a militant Quebec independence movement in 1970.

"In February, the opposition Conservatives called the Emergencies Act an 'unprecedented sledgehammer' that was unnecessary to end the protests. Civil liberties groups also claim the Liberals overstepped."

Trudeau defends vaccine mandates, Emergencies Act, CBC Radio, June 24, 2022:

Sunday, November 20, 2022

CERB abuses cost Canadian taxpayers $5 billion

Mistaken CERB payments cost taxpayers $5.3 billion | Western STandard - Matthew Horwood:

Nov. 20, 2022 - "Mistaken payments of $2,000 monthly pandemic benefit cheques cost the federal government at least $5.3 billion, records show. It's the largest sum disclosed to date under the Canada Emergency Response Benefit program....

"According to Blacklock's Reporter, cabinet in an Inquiry Of Ministry tabled in the House said it knew of at least 2.5 million people who successfully applied for benefits they did not deserve. The figure represented 28% of the 8.9 million who received payments.

"Parliament passed the Canada Emergency Response Benefit Act on March 25, 2020 just two weeks after the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic. The Act paid $2,000 a month to jobless tax filers.

"Parliament budgeted the program at $24 billion. Costs instead totaled $81.6 billion, including the $5.3 billion know to be paid to undeserving applicants. The Inquiry said ineligible recipients included 1,890,059 people already receiving federal benefits like Employment Insurance. Another 611,080 were disqualified by the Canada Revenue Agency for reasons such as failing to previously file t"axes.

"Canadians in Privy Council Office polling said cheating was commonplace under the program. 'Several expressed frustration at what they felt to be lack of oversight related to the distribution of financial supports through the pandemic, believing ineligible individuals had been able to receive financial assistance,' said a May 16 report.

"The Revenue Agency said it was flooded with tips by informants naming suspected cheaters. 'This past year the National Leads Centre processed over 60,000 leads with the increase being attributable to COVID-19 benefits,' said a March 23 report Management Of Leads. It was double the normal volume.

"Suspected fraud was reported by banks within weeks of the program’s launch, the Commons finance committee was told last Dec. 8. 'We started to receive suspicious transaction reports,” testified Barry MacKillop, deputy director of the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre."

Cracking Down on CERB Fraud Will Take Some Time | CBC News, May 14, 2020:

Saturday, November 19, 2022

Privy Council used its own definition of "emergency" to recommend Emergencies Act

Canda's Emergencies Act explicitly defers to the country's intelligence agancy, CSIS, in determining a 'public order emergency,' and CSIS determined that the Freedom Convoy was not such an emergency. However, the Privy Council used its own definition instead in order to recommend that the Act be invoked.

Memo advising PM to invoke Emergencies Act admitted its interpretation was 'vulnerable': docs | CBC News - Catharine Tunney:

November 18, 2022 - "The memorandum to the prime minister suggesting the government invoke the Emergencies Act for the first time in Canadian history acknowledged its interpretation of a national security threat could be challenged, the inquiry reviewing that decision heard Friday. The Privy Council Office document — entered into evidence at the Public Order Emergency Commission Friday — was sent on the afternoon of Feb. 14.... The government announced its decision to invoke the act just after 4:30 p.m. ET that same day.

"'PCO notes that the disturbance and the public unrest is being felt across the country and beyond the Canadian borders, which may provide further momentum to the movement and lead to irremediable harms — including to social coercion, national unity and Canada's international reputation,' it reads. '"In PCO's view, this fits with the statutory parameters defining threats to the security of Canada, though this conclusion may be vulnerable to challenge'.... Eight months later, the memorandum's author, Clerk of the Privy Council Janice Charette, defended her advice....

"The question of whether the federal government met the legal threshold to invoke the Emergencies Act is one of the most important ones on the commission's plate.... Under the law, cabinet must have reasonable grounds to believe a public order emergency exists — which the Act defines as one that 'arises from threats to the security of Canada that are so serious as to be a national emergency.' [Clerk of the PCO] Janice Charette told the Emergencies Act inquiry that there is a broader definition of a threat of violence than the one identified by CSIS, and it was this broader definition that led to her recommending the PM invoke the Emergencies Act.

"The act defers to the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) definition of such an emergency — which includes serious violence against people or property, espionage, foreign interference or an intent to overthrow the government by violence. The commission has seen evidence showing the director of CSIS didn't believe the self-styled Freedom Convoy constituted a threat to national security according to the definition in CSIS's enabling law. Charette said she weighed CSIS's assessment but said it was the combination of the economic and public safety impacts of the protests that, in her view, constituted a public order emergency.

"Deputy Clerk Nathalie Drouin — who, before coming to PCO, was the deputy minister at the Department of Justice — told the commission she believed the situation met the threshold. 'The threat had grown beyond the ability to end the blockades in a sustainable and durable way; extraordinary resources were required to clear Windsor, which diverted the blockade to Bluewater, raising concerns about the number of resources available,' said a document summarizing Drouin's interview with the commission in September....

"The document also showed PCO was becoming increasingly frustrated with the police response. Drouin 'recalled losing hope that local police forces in Ottawa and Windsor were capable of executing their operational plans as time went on and no concrete police actions materialized,' said the interview summary.

"The commission has [also] seen an email RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki sent to Public Safety Marco Mendicino the night before the government invoked the Emergencies Act last February. Lucki wrote that she didn't think police had exhausted all available tools to end the ongoing occupation of downtown Ottawa by protesters who had been demanding an end to COVID-19 restrictions. Charette testified Friday that if the head of the RCMP felt the Emergencies Act should not have been invoked, she could have told her."

Friday, November 18, 2022

AB premier fires Alberta Health Services board

Smith fires 11-member AHS board, replaces them with lone administrator | True North - Rachel Emmanuel: -

November 17, 2022 - "Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has made good on her promise to rehaul Alberta Health Services’ (AHS) leadership and has fired 11 members of the department’s board. On Thursday afternoon, Smith announced the board was replaced with administrator Dr. John Cowell, a role he’s held before....

Cowell has been charged with reducing ambulance, emergency room and surgical wait times and developing long-term reforms through consultations with front-line workers.

"Smith said he will be a full-time administrator and will report directly to her and Health Minister Jason Copping.

"Cowell said the public may be skeptical, but urged that he hopes to contribute to a better healthcare experience. 'I am ready to get to work on behalf of Albertans, building a better system to support patients needing care. I look forward to working with the AHS team, and taking tangible actions to drive much-needed change,' he said....

"Health Minister Jason Copping said the government must act quickly. He said the government wants to provide all scheduled surgeries within a reasonable time, but it will likely need until 2024 to get back on track....

"A June survey from the Alberta Medical Association found that 84% of respondents believe wait times in Alberta emergency departments are 'fairly' or 'very' long. Respondents reported waiting up to five hours for care....

"On Monday, the government announced that Dr. Deena Hinshaw had been fired as Alberta’s chief medical health officer and replaced with Dr. Mark Joffe.

Thursday, November 17, 2022

US Senate votes to end pandemic emergency

Bipartisan Senate Votes to End Biden's Pandemic Emergency | Townhall - Rebecca Downes:

November 16, 2022 - "On Tuesday night, the Senate voted in a bipartisan fashion of 62-36 to end President Joe Biden's pandemic emergency, with Sens. Ben Sasse (R-NE) and Raphael Warnock (D-GA) not voting.

[A similar resulution was passed by the Senate 48-47 on a strictly party-line vote in March 2022, but failed to pass in the House of Representatives. - gd]

"The Biden administration's Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) had extended the emergency last month, which will last at least until January 11. That extension came less than a month after the president himself said during a '60 Minutes' interview that 'the pandemic is over."

"Not only did every Republican senator vote to get rid of the emergency -- other than Sasse, who did not vote -- so did 12 Democrats, as well as Sen. Angus King (I-ME), who caucuses with the Democrats.

"The resolution was brought forward by Sen. Roger Marshall, M.D. (R-KS), who on the Senate floor referenced the president's remarks. It's not merely the hypocrisy that is an issue though, as the senator highlighted in his speech.

"'It was this government-imposed state of emergency that justified their continued lockdowns of small businesses and schools; that justified their mask and vaccine mandates, including a military vaccine mandate that has resulted in the removal of more than 8,000 active-duty troops; that justified President Biden and Congressional Democrats spending binge, increasing the total amount of government spending by more than $9 trillion since February 2021 and lighting the fire for record inflation; that the president has used as justification to extend the payment pause and cancel up to $10,000 in outstanding federally held student loan balances, and even a more generous $20,000 for [a] Pell Grant recipient,' Marshall highlighted. 'Congress must take the responsible action of reigning in this massive expansion of government and restore Americans fundamental rights by terminating the COVID-19 national emergency declaration,' he continued to note.

"Negative reactions came from beyond just the White House.... State Sen. Nina Turner (D-OH), who ran multiple times for Congress in which she couldn't even make it past the primary, tweeted at the senators in question. It wasn't made clear what she plans to do, other than tweet at them "we see you'.... MSNBC's Mehdi Hasan ... reacted with an angry face emoji to news that Marshall brought forth the resolution. The senator responded with an emoji of his own."

Wednesday, November 16, 2022

California voters approve flavored vaping ban

California's Vaping Flavor Ban Could Be Lethal | Reason - Jacob sullum:

November 16, 2022 - "The campaign for Proposition 31, a ballot initiative that Californians approved by a wide margin last week, urged voters to 'protect kids from candy-flavored tobacco.' That slogan packed an impressive amount of dishonesty into five words.

"The initiative's main target was nicotine vaping products, which do not contain tobacco and were already legally restricted to adults. Proposition 31 decrees that adults may not buy such products in flavors other than tobacco, thereby undermining the most promising harm-reducing alternative to cigarettes.

"Proposition 31 was a referendum on S.B. 793, a 2020 law that restricts 'characterizing flavors' in 'tobacco products.' California counterintuitively defines 'tobacco product' to include 'an electronic device that delivers nicotine,' whether or not the nicotine is derived from tobacco. Under S.B. 793, 'the taste or aroma of tobacco' is the only 'characterizing flavor' that can legally be added to vaping products. That rule ... will ... discourage smokers from switching to a far less hazardous source of nicotine....

"The bill's author, state Sen. Jerry Hill (D‒San Mateo), declared that the industry 'wants to keep killing people with its candy-, fruit-, mint- and menthol-flavored poison.' Contrary to those warnings, there is no evidence that nicotine vaping products are 'killing' anyone. In fact, they are much less dangerous than cigarettes.... According to a 2018 report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 'Laboratory tests of e-cigarette ingredients ... suggest that e-cigarettes are likely to be far less harmful than combustible tobacco cigarettes.' The British Royal College of Physicians likewise says 'vaping isn't completely risk-free but is far less harmful than smoking tobacco.'

"The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) acknowledges vaping's potential to reduce smoking-related deaths. 'E-cigarettes, as a general class, have markedly less risk than a combustible cigarette product,' says Brian King, director of the FDA's Center for Tobacco Products. The FDA nevertheless seems determined to ban nicotine vapes in flavors other than tobacco, the same policy that California has adopted....

"According to survey data, three-quarters of adult vapers prefer the flavors that California has banned. A 2022 study asked 851 vapers how they would respond if the government banned the flavors they prefer. While 29 percent said they would switch to whatever flavors were still allowed, 28 percent said they 'would find a way' to obtain forbidden flavors, which suggests that California-style bans could drive consumers toward potentially dangerous black-market options; 17 percent said they would 'stop vaping and smoke instead,' which would expose them to a potentially deadlier risk; and 13 percent said they were not sure....

"Last year in the American Journal of Public Health, 15 prominent tobacco researchers warned that ... 'While flavor bans could reduce youth interest in e-cigarettes, ... 'they could also reduce adult smokers' vaping to quit smoking.' Supporters of California's ban were so focused on portraying themselves as righteous protectors of children that they did not even acknowledge this danger. The consequences may prove lethal."

"Why California Wants to Ban Vaping," The Truth about Vaping, Apr. 13, 2015:

Tuesday, November 15, 2022

Saskatchewan asserts sovereignty over resources

Province Introduces The Saskatchewan First Act | Government of Saskatchewan (press release):

November 1, 2022 - "Today the government introduced The Saskatchewan First Act to confirm Saskatchewan's autonomy and exclusive jurisdiction over its natural resources....

"'This historic legislation will help protect our economic growth and prosperity from intrusive federal policies that encroach upon our legislative sovereignty,' Justice Minister and Attorney General Bronwyn Eyre said. 'It is time to draw the line and assert our constitutional rights.'

"The Act amends the Constitution of Saskatchewan to clearly confirm Saskatchewan's sovereign autonomy and asserts Saskatchewan's exclusive legislative jurisdiction under the Constitution of Canada over a number of areas, including:

the exploration for non-renewable natural resources;
the development, conservation and management of non-renewable natural and forestry resources; and,
the operation of sites and facilities for the generation and production of electrical energy.

"A strong Saskatchewan means a strong Canada," Eyre said. "This legislation asserts that the constitutional doctrine of interjurisdictional immunity applies to exclusive provincial legislative jurisdiction the same way it applies to exclusive federal jurisdiction."

"This Act will also create an Economic Impact Assessment Tribunal that will define, quantify, and report on the economic repercussions of federal initiatives on provincial investment and Saskatchewan projects, businesses and people.

"For more information, contact: Noel Busse, Justice and Attorney General.... Email: cpjumedia@gov.sk.ca."

https://www.saskatchewan.ca/government/news-and-media/2022/november/01/province-introduces-the-saskatchewan-first-act

Monday, November 14, 2022

Lessons from the Emergencies Act inquiry, week 4

Emergencies Act inquiry shows we can't be selective on civil liberties | Financial Post - Joe Oliver:

November 8, 2022 - "The Rouleau Commission has now heard sworn testimony that the Freedom Convoy was not foreign funded and did not constitute a threat to democracy and that the Emergencies Act was not needed or asked for by any police force. That reflects very poorly on the prime minister. The act’s invocation was the worst peacetime assault on civil liberties since Pierre Trudeau’s use of the War Measures Act during the FLQ crisis 52 years ago — when a Quebec cabinet minister was assassinated [after the act was invoked - gd] and a British trade commissioner held hostage.

"Yet restricting the rights of 38 million Canadians has not attracted the widespread outrage it merits because the blue-collar protesters it targeted are widely viewed with disdain, including by much of the mainstream media. This selective indifference is both distressing and dangerous. Suspending civil liberties because of a peaceful protest that went on too long sets a low bar that puts everyone’s freedom at risk....

"Conventional opinion can change, sometimes swiftly and radically, and governments’ electoral interests shift with the political landscape. This is especially true of a self-righteous woke government led by a prime minister who deliberately sows divisions based on his own ideological and partisan preferences. So there may come a time when those whose opinions are currently in the ascendant may need the Charter’s protection. Our view of the Emergencies Act should not be governed by our admiration of or scorn for the protestors. The Charter is meant to protect speech of all kinds from all sources....

"We are learning a lot from the Commission hearings, which were mandated by the Emergencies Act to determine, among other things, whether its invocation met the legal threshold, including that the 'national emergency … cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.' In deciding this, the fact that existing legislation was not relied on is irrelevant. Otherwise, incompetence or deliberate inaction could be used to invoke the Act anytime a government found it convenient.

"Assume for a moment the Emergencies Act did not exist. Can anyone seriously argue the government would have been powerless to remove trucks illegally parked on the streets of Ottawa … forever? To ask the question is to answer it. The legal test clearly was not met.

"Other evidence shows how egregious the prime minister’s actions were. He instigated the Freedom Convoy by belatedly imposing a mandatory vaccine on truckers last January. Rather than reaching out and listening, as he has done with other protest groups, he exacerbated the conflict by demonizing protesters as racist radicals and falsely accusing them of violent criminal activity. His cabinet colleagues searched for extreme language used by truckers and falsely claimed the police had requested the Emergencies Act.

"He ignored imminent resolution of the standoff right before invoking the act, tried to narrow the mandatory hearing’s mandate, appointed Justice Paul Rouleau, who had worked as a Liberal staffer and donated to the Liberal Party, presumably in hopes he would be friendly, asked the RCMP for retroactive approval and falsely claimed he requested the current hearings when in fact they were mandated by statute. It is a damning litany of misinformation, missteps, cynical opportunism, snobbery, pique and evasion of responsibility.

"His unjustified suspension of civil liberties has tainted the prime minister’s moral authority to govern. Perhaps the commission will open Canadians’ eyes to the inequity and risk of taking away fundamental rights from people regarded as disagreeable."

Sunday, November 13, 2022

Judge strikes down Biden's student loan bailout

Biden's Student Loan Forgiveness Plan Is Unconstitutional, Says Federal Judge | Reason - Elizabeth Nolan Brown:

November 11, 2022 - "A federal judge has ruled unconstitutional President Joe Biden's plan to forgive student loan debt. In a decision issued yesterday, U.S. District Judge Mark T. Pittman ruled in favor of plaintiffs Myra Brown and Alexander Taylor. Brown has student loans but is entirely ineligible for Biden's forgiveness program because her loans are privately held. Taylor has loans but is ineligible for the full $20,000 in debt relief. The Job Creators Network Foundation sued on their behalf, arguing that Biden's bailout plan violated the Administrative Procedure Act (which requires a period of public comment) and that the Department of Education lacks the authority to implement the program.

"Pittman found that the program did not violate administrative procedure. Instead, he found that the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act of 2003 ("HEROES Act") — which Biden used to justify his move — does not actually 'provide the executive branch clear congressional authorization to create a $400 billion student loan forgiveness program.' Bident's student debt relief plan 'is thus an unconstitutional exercise of Congress's legislative power and must be vacated.' 'In this country, we are not ruled by an all-powerful executive with a pen and a phone,' Pittman wrote in his decision....

"In a statement yesterday, Job Creators Network Foundation President Elaine Parker said Biden's bailout 'would have done nothing to address the root cause of unaffordable tuition: greedy and bloated colleges that raise tuition far more than inflation year after year while sitting on $700 billion in endowments. We hope that the court's decision today will lay the groundwork for real solutions to the student loan crisis'....

"The Department of Justice has filed an appeal, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said yesterday. More than 26 million people have already applied for student loan forgiveness, she said, and the Biden administration will keep their information 'so it can quickly process their relief once we prevail in court.'

"The Job Creators Network Foundation suit is one of several cases challenging the program. These include a lawsuit from six Republican-led states and one from the Cato Institute. 'Cato's suit joins at least six others, with plaintiffs making various claims of harm,' noted Neal McCluskey, director of Cato's Center for Educational Freedom, in a blog post. 'The ultimate aim of all the suits, though, is the same: To stop a move that is not only patently unconstitutional, but will inflict many painful costs on society.'

"'The constitutional issue is straightforward: The Constitution gives the power of the purse to Congress, but in declaring that it would forgive up to $20,000 in loans for households making below $250,000 a year, the Biden administration essentially created about $400 billion in new spending,' McCluskey wrote late last month."

Friday, November 11, 2022

Anti-lockdown governor scores big win in Florida

Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida known nationally for his opposition to Covid lockdowns and mandates, was re-elected this month with a 19-point margin of victory.

DeSantis Delivers in Huge Win for the Anti-Lockdown Cause | Brownstone Institute - Michael Senger:

November 11, 2022 - "'A huge re-election victory vindicates his pandemic policies,' writes the Wall Street Journal. 'With runaway win, DeSantis’s political career becomes supercharged,' writes the New York Times. 'Ron DeSantis is the new Republican Party leader,' declares Fox News. 'Florida’s governor turned his coronavirus policies into a parable of American freedom,' observes the Atlantic.

"As well they should. The self-perpetuating lockdowns, mandates, and state of emergency that were imposed across much of the world in response to Covid-19 were a totalitarian aberration incompatible with the values of constitutional democracy. Resisting those mandates wasn’t just a parable of American freedom — it was American freedom.

"Unlike some leaders such as South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, DeSantis didn’t initially see through the lockdowns. But he was one of the few political leaders to quickly and publicly recognize his error, vowing that Florida 'will never do any of these lockdowns again.' Where DeSantis really stands out, however, is in his wholehearted embrace, from that point forward, of the anti-lockdown movement in its entirety.

"He’s consulted and hosted roundtable discussions with prominent anti-lockdown activists and scientists including Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Dr. Martin Kulldorff, and Dr. Sunetra Gupta, and appointed Dr. Joseph Ladapo, a strong opponent of Covid mandates, as his Surgeon General. DeSantis and his team became active within the anti-lockdown movement on social media, and he frequently voiced strong opposition to Covid mandates in his speeches, such as during his State of the State address:

Florida has become the escape hatch for those chafing under authoritarian, arbitrary and seemingly never-ending mandates and restrictions. Even today, across the nation we see students denied an education due to reckless, politically-motivated school closures, workers denied employment due to heavy-handed mandates and Americans denied freedoms due to a coercive biomedical apparatus.

These unprecedented policies have been as ineffective as they have been destructive. They are grounded more in blind adherence to Faucian declarations than they are in the constitutional traditions that are the foundation of free nations.
Florida is a free state. We reject the biomedical security state that curtails liberty, ruins livelihoods, and divides society. And we will protect the rights of individuals to live their lives free from the yoke of restrictions and mandates.

"DeSantis’s staunch support for the anti-lockdown cause may be explained, in no small part, by the fact that he remains one of the world’s only major political figures to publicly share his belief that the Chinese Communist Party played a key role in influencing the global response to Covid-19:

The [W]est did a lot of damage to itself by adopting some of these policies, which have proven to not work to stop the spread, but to be very economically destructive. I do think there was an information operation angle to this, where they really believed that if they could get these other countries to lock down, and they were willing to do some propaganda along the way, particularly in Europe, that ultimately would help China. And I think it has helped China.

"For this, DeSantis effectively became the face of the anti-lockdown movement in the United States. It was a bold political gamble ... and it drew the consternation of lockdown supporters, media and political elites across the country.

"But it paid off big. DeSantis won the race for reelection with a 19-point margin of victory—the widest victory margin in a Florida gubernatorial election since 2002. Even more telling, DeSantis’s odds to win the 2024 presidential election soared by more than 10 percentage points, making him the new frontrunner in the presidential race.

"The outsized significance of DeSantis’s victory isn’t so much in the victory itself, which was predicted, or even the margin of that victory. The real significance is that DeSantis outperformed by a wide margin at the same time the Republican Party underperformed across the rest of the country. This unique outperformance vindicates whatever DeSantis did differently [from] the rest of the GOP. And without a doubt, what DeSantis is best known for is his wholehearted embrace of the anti-lockdown movement."

https://brownstone.org/articles/desantis-delivers-win/

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Emergencies Act no help in clearing AB blockade

Alberta received no federal help to deal with protest blockade last winter: inquiry | CityNews Ottawa - Laura Osman & Marie-Danielle Smith, Canadian Press:

November 10, 2022 -"Senior civil servants from Alberta and Ontario left the impression at a public inquiry Thursday that Ottawa was not keen to come to their aid to deal with protest blockades last winter.... Neither of the bureaucrats from those provinces felt the use of the [Emergencies Act] was necessary, and in Alberta, the inquiry heard, the legislation wasn't useful at all.... The public inquiry is tasked with determining whether the federal government was justified in triggering the legislation for the first time since it became law in 1988.

"A convoy of 1,000 vehicles of all types drove to Coutts, Alta., on Jan. 29 to protest provincial and federal COVID-19 health restrictions, blocking the highway in both directions and halting the movement of trade. The Liberal government invoked the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14, the same day RCMP in Alberta moved in to arrest protesters in Coutts. The prime minister ... Justin Trudeau held a consultation with premiers before invoking the act, and notes taken by political staffers and submitted to the public inquiry detail their comments and concerns. Handwritten notes taken by aides in the Prime Minister's Office and Saskatchewan government say former Alberta premier Jason Kenney worried that triggering the emergency legislation would be a 'very serious provocation' and a 'net negative'....

"Marlin Degrand, the assistant deputy minister in the Alberta solicitor general's office, told the commission earlier Thursday that RCMP had the power to clear the convoy from the border, but it didn't have the co-operation it needed to get the job done.... Alberta looked all over the province, in British Columbia and Saskatchewan and even the United States, but tow companies refused to help.... The province opted against declaring a state of emergency to try and force tow operators to help, and instead asked for federal help in a formal letter on Feb. 5.

"The Liberal government never officially responded to that request, but did draft a letter to turn Alberta down on Feb. 12, the commission learned. The undelivered letter said the province had all the legal authority it needed to deal with the protest. Degrand said he would agree that Alberta didn't need any more legal authority; what it lacked were the tow trucks....

"On Feb. 21, [federal Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill] Blair texted [Alberta Municipal Affairs Minister Rick] McIver to tell him that the Emergencies Act was effective at addressing the tow truck issue. 'You were too late and did the wrong thing,' McIver responded, telling the minister that by the time the state of emergency was invoked the Coutts blockade was already over."

Thursday, November 10, 2022

China accused of election interference in Canada

The government of China has been accused of funding the campaigns of 11 candidates in Canada's 2021 federal election.

Trudeau still inexplicably blasé about China's interference in Canada's elections | Ottawa Citizen - Terry Glavin:

Nov. 9, 2022 - "Twelve years ago, the warning came from Richard Fadden, then the director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. At least two provincial cabinet ministers and several municipal politicians were more or less puppets of the People’s Republic of China, he said.... For his trouble, Fadden was traduced and roundly denounced as a fear-monger.... Ever since, intelligence agency officials have routinely shouted into the void about foreign interference in federal elections and public policy — and this week, another bombshell, this time from Global News’ investigative reporter Sam Cooper.

"For several months, the Trudeau government has been sitting on briefing notes from CSIS setting out how Beijing quietly funded 11 candidates in the 2019 federal election and placed operatives on campaign staff. The $250,000 operation was run from China’s Toronto consulate. The effort went on to place operatives in the offices of several members of Parliament....

"Everything’s under control, Trudeau said Monday. 'There are already significant laws and measures that our intelligence and security officials have to go against foreign actors operating on Canadian soil.' But that’s not what Canada’s national security and intelligence agencies say.... Only last week, the House Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs heard that Canada’s intelligence agencies don’t even have 'the tools to understand the threat'.... CSIS director general for Intelligence Assessments Adam Fisher told the committee: 'Our act was designed in 1984 and it has not had significant changes or amendments.' What’s necessary is a total 'rethink' about how these threats are dealt with.

"Beijing doesn’t behave like Moscow in the Cold War days, and its bench strength and impact far exceeds the Kremlin’s contemporary disinformation operations. In Canada, the Chinese Communist Party focuses on 'working within the system to corrupt it, compromising officials, elected officials and individuals at all levels of government, within industry, within civil society, using our open and free society for their nefarious purposes.' And Beijing has ... been so successful that even a modest foreign agents’ registry law remains hung up in the Senate, thanks mainly to Trudeau-appointed senators led by the effusively Beijing-friendly Sen. Yuen Pau Woo.

"It was owing mainly to sponsorship of that same foreign-agents registry law in the House of Commons that Metro Vancouver Conservative MP Kenny Chiu was targeted in an elaborate disinformation campaign during last year’s federal election. Chiu ended up losing the riding of Steveston—Richmond East, home to a large population of Chinese-diaspora voters, to the Liberal candidate.... An investigation by the Atlantic Council’s Forensic Research Lab found that ... 'China-linked actors took an active role in seeking to influence the September 20, 2021 parliamentary election in Canada, displaying signs of a coordinated campaign to influence behaviour among the Chinese diaspora voting in the election.' The Atlantic Council’s findings confirmed the results of a study by Canada’s own DisinfoWatch organization.

"By 2019, Beijing’s influences had become so normalized in Canada that John McCallum, the Chrétien-era cabinet minister and disgraced ambassador to China (he’d been forced to resign for taking Beijing’s side in the detention of Huawei’s Meng Wanzhou on a U.S. extradition warrant) openly admitted to the South China Morning Post that he’d been inviting Chinese officials to influence the outcome of the 2019 federal election to the Liberals’ advantage. "The Conservative Party sought a CSIS investigation into McCallum’s conduct, but there was the small problem of the inadequacy of Canada’s foreign-influence laws....

"The CSIS briefings revealed by Cooper at Global News this week were made available to the Prime Minister’s Office in January. Among the briefings’ more disturbing contents was evidence that Beijing sought economic data from the ridings of MPs who voted to adopt a motion in February last year declaring that China’s brutal persecution of the minority Muslim populations of Xinjiang amounted to genocide. Trudeau and his ministers absented themselves from the vote, which passed 266-0....

"The Conservatives were targeted by Beijing-aligned forces in the 2021 elections because party leader Erin O’Toole had authorized the development of a robust China policy, founded on the advancement of human rights and securing Canada’s interests against Xi Jinping’s strong-arm and blackmail tactics.... 'It’s clear that Beijing spread disinformation in the 2021 federal election campaign through proxies that negatively affected Conservative campaigns in several ridings.… We now find out that CSIS has concluded that Beijing corrupted political financing laws and interfered in the 2019 election,' Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong said Tuesday. 'The biggest victim of these PRC intimidation and interference operations is the Chinese community themselves."

Wednesday, November 9, 2022

Pfizer more than triples its Covid vaccine price

After announcing record profits, Pfizer is increasing the price of its Covid vaccine by 300-400%.

A slap in the Pface: Pfizer chief boasts to investors that Covid will continue to be a 'multi-billion dollar franchise for many years to come' — as firm prepares to stick 10,000% markup on its vaccine | Daily Mail - Cassidy Morrison Senior:

November 8, 2022 - "Pfizer’s chief financial officer has described the Covid pandemic as a 'multi-billion dollar franchise' — and expects profit to continue. David Denton told investors in an earnings call last week his company's vaccine and antiviral would still be 'relevant for many years to come'....So far Pfizer has reaped about $80 billion in yearly revenue from sales of Covid vaccines and the antiviral drug Paxlovid.

"The company announced last month it will triple the price of its shot to up to $130 per dose next year — a far cry from the roughly $19 to $30 per dose that the government paid. Some experts estimate each individual shot to cost just $1.18 to make — meaning the new price represents a 10,000 per cent markup.

"Analysts speculate that the move was made so Pfizer could still meet its target of $32 billion of projected vaccine revenue this year. Critics say that the decision shows the firm's greed. Peter Maybarduk, director of access to medicines at Public Citizen, told DailyMail.com ... that the firm has already made an 'obscene' amount of money, and will be ok if they do not meet revenue projections that were likely inflated anyways....

"Pfizer was an early winner during the pandemic when it became the first company to get a Covid-19 vaccine approved for the US market. Subsequent vaccine mandates for healthcare workers and the military further drove up sales of vaccines. The company projects $102 billion in total revenue this year with the vaccine and its antiviral Paxlovid - more than double the company's yearly revenue in 2019 ($40.9 billion) and 2020 ($41.7 billion).

"Julia Kosgei, policy advisor to the The People's Vaccine Alliance said: 'Experts have estimated that Pfizer's vaccine costs just $1.18 per dose to make... Charging $130 per dose would represent a markup of more than ten thousand per cent. This is daylight robbery'....

"Contracts signed by the government to secure billions of doses of vaccines at no cost to Americans will run out soon, shifting the cost of purchasing shots to health insurance companies.... Pfizer’s move to hike up the cost of each Covid shot for the private health insurance market likely would not affect people with private insurance or those enrolled in the government healthcare programs Medicare and Medicaid. Health plans typically cover the costs of vaccines. But people paying out of pocket may be forced to pay more for a Covid shot than the cost of a flu shot, which can range in price from around $50 to $95.

"Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla told investors last Tuesday: ‘With regard to our COVID-19 products, while their sales may fall from our expected 2022 levels of approximately combined $55 billion, we believe our COVID-19 franchises will remain multibillion-dollar revenue generators for the foreseeable future which should serve as a buffer for any unforeseen challenges with other products in our portfolio.’"

Tuesday, November 8, 2022

CSIS warned of violence if Emergencies Act used

Canada's intelligence agency, CSIS, warned the federal government on February 13 that using the Emergencies Act to suppress the Freedom Convoy could provoke violence. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the Act the next day.

CSIS warned Trudeau government invoking Emergencies Act could spark radicalization, violence | National Post - Christopher Nardi & Ryan Tumilty:

November 7, 2022 - "Canada’s spy agency warned the federal government [that] invoking the Emergencies Act could further radicalize Canadians engaged in convoy protests, and push some towards violence. The information is contained in an undated report from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) that was presented at the Emergencies Act (EA) inquiry on Monday. It surfaced during Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens’s testimony about the blockade of the Ambassador Bridge last winter, part of several protests against pandemic restrictions.

"The document reveals that the day before the Trudeau government invoked the act on Feb. 14 in response to the Freedom Convoy protests across the country, CSIS warned the government that it could have significant and far-reaching collateral consequences. 'CSIS advised that the implementation of the EA would likely galvanize the anti-government narratives within the convoy and further the radicalization of some towards violence,' reads the document. It adds that the phenomenon was already noticed when Ontario declared a provincial state of emergency days earlier.

"The document also says CSIS warned that invoking the act could also undermine confidence in government. 'CSIS advised that the invocation of the EA by the federal government would likely leads to the dispersing of the convoy within Ottawa but would likely increase the number of Canadians who hold extreme anti-government views and push some towards the belief that violence is the only solution to what they perceive as a broken system and government,' reads the document.

"Canada’s spy agency reiterated its concerns about a potential increase in violence during an undated meeting after the act was invoked on Feb. 14."

Monday, November 7, 2022

Police had doubts about using Emergencies Act

Three Canadian police forces -- Ottawa, Ontario, and RCMP -- doubted that the Emergencies Act needed to be used to against the Freedom Convoy.

Three police forces had doubts about use of Emergencies Act | Globe and Mail - Marieke Walsh & Marsha McLeod:

October 25, 2022 - "Documents tabled at the Emergencies Act inquiry reveal a discrepancy between RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki’s public defence of the sweeping legislation and her private advice to the government that the police had 'not yet exhausted all available tools' when the act was invoked. Commissioner Lucki delivered that assessment to Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino’s office just after midnight on Feb. 14 – only hours before Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the act.

"The e-mail adds to a growing body of evidence from police forces, presented to the inquiry, that challenges the federal government’s argument that the act was needed to end more than three weeks of protests that threw the country’s capital into chaos.... The Ottawa police and the Ontario Provincial Police have already told the inquiry that they did not need the act to get the protests under control....

"Mr. Mendicino played down the significance of Commissioner Lucki’s comments on Tuesday and dismissed the suggestion he ignored her advice, saying the government listened to an 'array of advice' at the time. He added that her advice to the government before invoking the act doesn’t change subsequent testimony to a parliamentary committee on Feb. 25, after the protests ended, where she said it gave police 'the tools that we needed to get the job done quickly.' Mr. Mendicino told reporters in Ottawa that the government also consulted the provinces on its decision to invoke the act....

"Commissioner Lucki sent her Feb. 14 e-mail to Mr. Mendicino’s chief of staff, Mike Jones. In it, she said her team was in discussions with the Justice Department to give input on the act. She also gave examples of additional policing powers that could be 'useful' if the act was invoked. But at the end of her e-mail she said 'we have not yet exhausted all available tools that are already available through the existing legislation.' Charges could be laid under existing powers, she said, and the province had just enacted its emergency powers which would 'help in providing additional deterrent tools to our existing toolbox.'

"The RCMP did not provide a statement on Tuesday addressing the discrepancy between Commissioner Lucki’s public comments after the protests ended and private advice to government in advance of the emergency declaration.... But other police agencies have said it was not crucial and despite early dysfunction within the Ottawa police service, a plan to end the protests had been developed just before Mr. Trudeau made the emergency declaration.

"The Ontario Provincial Police told the commission at the beginning of the public hearings two weeks ago that the act was not needed. In testimony on Friday, retired OPP officer Carson Pardy, who was chief superintendent during the February protests, said the act helped but was not necessary. For example, he said officers already had the authority to tow and seize vehicles and prevent people from going into the protest zone.

"And this week, interim Ottawa police chief Steve Bell said while the Emergencies Act was very helpful, it wasn’t needed. 'In the absence of the invocation of the Emergencies Act, the OPS, the OPP and the RCMP, as part of a unified command, were going to clear the protests,' he said. For example, separate evidence presented through an interview summary of Ottawa police Superintendent Robert Bernier said he told commission lawyers that police had secured tow trucks before the act was invoked....

"On Tuesday the commission was also told that the OPP, RCMP and the top civil servant in Mr. Mendicino’s department had struck a potential deal but the government backed out just before the act was invoked.... According to evidence tabled Tuesday, on Feb. 10 then-deputy minister of public safety Rob Stewart asked OPP Inspector Marcel Beaudin for an urgent meeting to talk about the possibility of 'federal-level engagement with the protesters.' By the next day, a proposal was developed. The document, tabled at the commission, suggested a police liaison would provide protest leaders with a written commitment to a meeting with government at a later date. By Feb. 13, the deal had fallen apart. That day, Mr. Stewart told the inspector he was unable to secure a commitment from the government to meet with protesters, according to a summary of an interview Insp. Beaudin gave to the commission."

Sunday, November 6, 2022

UK Medical Adviser wants to destroy tobacco industry

Chris Whitty: The smoking industry must be destroyed | The Telegraph:

November 3, 2022- "The cigarette industry should be destroyed for the benefit of public health, Prof Sir Chris Whitty, the UK Government’s Chief Medical Adviser has said. Sir Chris, who is also Chief Medical Officer for England, warned that smokers faced an appalling death, and said ministers are currently considering whether to bring in new policies to limit smoking.

"An independent review by Dr Javed Khan, which was published in June, recommended that the Government enact measures to ensure England was smoke-free by 2030, which could include stronger taxation, and limiting further where people can light-up. However the Government has not yet said which recommendations it will follow.

"Speaking at a symposium on medical ethics held by the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine, Sir Chris said: “Smoking is the biggest driver that we could easily deal with in the sense of the inequalities we see across the UK. It is an appalling way to die, it kills people in multiple ways. Everyone in this room I suspect would agree that getting smoking down to zero and destroying the cigarette industry should be an aim of public health, and I would say that very categorically.'

"Sir Chris said that there was a 'legitimate point' about adults being allowed to make their own choices, but warned that governments often faced lobbying from vested interests. But he said it was important for the state to intervene in industries that were based on addiction. 'Where the current Government has decided to go into these markets has not yet been decided, and that’s going to be up to the ministers who are currently in post,' he added....

"In 2019, the Government set an objective for England to be smoke-free by 2030, meaning only five per cent of the population would smoke by then. But the Khan review found that without further action, England will miss the smoke-free 2030 target by at least seven years, and the poorest areas in society will not meet it until 2044

"Dr Khan’s recommendations include raising the legal age of smoking each year until nobody can buy tobacco, and banning smoking in many public areas, such as outside of hospitals and in the majority of new social housing."

Read more: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/11/03/chris-whitty-smoking-industry-must-destroyed/

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