Do we need protection from those who would attack us? Of course we
do. We already have that protection. The laws we have work just fine,
when they work. But to make them work requires that CSIS and the Mounties
have the resources to do their work. But when you have a government that
is more afraid of a deficit than of terrorism, those institutions are
unable to do their job.
Bill C-51 is part of a carefully
orchestrated campaign to stoke fear, in the expectation that fear will
shift votes in Mr Harper's direction in October.
C-51 sets up the framework for a secret police in the service of the government.
It gives CSIS the power to "disrupt" what they might deem to be a terrorist plot. Sure, a judge must sign an order permitting CSIS to do this, but once they have that order, they can do whatever they think is necessary. C-51 does not indicate any limits.
It criminalises intent. But intent is the eyes and imagination of the beholder. Anyone who is opposed to the government of the obviously intends to get rid of it, if possible. So who will decide at what point that intent is criminal, and that therefore I should be arrested?
It criminalises unlawful protest. But lawful protest is that which has permit. If a permit is withheld, then your protest is unlawful. So who decides whether to give you a permit or not? Clearly, if the authority that grants the permit doesn't like the point of your protest, they can withhold the permit and automatically make you a criminal.
Those who shrug off the dangers of C-51 either don't know or have forgotten that the secret police forces we think of as the worst ever, the Gestapo and the KGB, both operated within the law. They were give the legal authority to do what they did.
Sunday, February 22, 2015
Anti-terrorism and Bill C-51
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Time (Some rambling thoughts)
Time 2024-12-08 to 11 Einstein’s Special Relativity (SR) says that time is one of the four dimensions of spacetime. String theory claims t...
-
John Cunningham. The Tin Star (Collier’s, December 4, 1947) The short story adapted for High Noon . As often happens, the movie retains v...
-
Noel Coward The Complete Short Stories (1985) Coward was a very clever writer. All of these stories are worth reading, but few stick ...
-
Today we remember those whom we sent into war on our behalf, and who gave everything they had. They gave their lives. I want to think ab...
No comments:
Post a Comment