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Hamas invaded Israel 2023

  • Thread starter Thread starter McG
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How and where are you getting “insurrection” in any of this? That’s literally a violent existential threat to the continuity and lawful authority of the state entirely.


No they don’t. There’s a strongly firewalled operational independence of police, for a lot of good reasons. If you want to understand why, start looking at countries where that’s not the case.



In a certain way they can be, but again that would be through the Police Service Boards that protect that independence. Same question to you that I’ve posed to others: do you want our elected federal government to be able to tell police forces specifically what to do to enforce particular laws in particular cases?

Remember also that there‘a a big difference between forcibly dispersing a crowd, many of whom may be engaged in nothing more than Charter-protected (if reprehensible) expression, and investigating and charging individuals within said crowd who cross a criminal line. We have a well-enshrined right to march around for a few hours and be loud and annoying to express views on a cause. The courts accept some inconvenience to others as part of this. You need more discrete criminal behaviour to start using coercive force and prosecute.

I know I’m just a cop who gears up and does public order work sometimes, so my opinion on society writ large carries little weight. I just urge you to step back from the specific cause of these specific protests for a moment and remember that everything we’re discussing has massive ramifications for how we express ourselves and exercise our rights on any other subject.

The primary job of the Government is to maintain the integrity of the state. The Police are one element of the unitary state, just as the Forces, the Bureaucracy and the Courts exist as elements of the State.

The Government runs the State and all its elements. The Government is answerable to the democratically elected representatives of the people sitting in Parliament.

Parliament is supreme and sovereign.
 
The primary job of the Government is to maintain the integrity of the state. The Police are one element of the unitary state, just as the Forces, the Bureaucracy and the Courts exist as elements of the State.

The Government runs the State and all its elements. The Government is answerable to the democratically elected representatives of the people sitting in Parliament.

Parliament is supreme and sovereign.
All of that is correct but I don’t see how any of it falsifies any of what I’ve said, nor how any of it applies to the situation at hand.

The Police Service Boards I’ve described are creations of provincial legislation governing policing, and high of course is drafted and passed by provincial legislatures per the powers granted under the Constitution Act. Nothing about the way legislatures have chosen to set the system up in anyway abrogate their Parliamentary supremacy.
 
All of that is correct but I don’t see how any of it falsifies any of what I’ve said, nor how any of it applies to the situation at hand.

The Police Service Boards I’ve described are creations of provincial legislation governing policing, and high of course is drafted and passed by provincial legislatures per the powers granted under the Constitution Act. Nothing about the way legislatures have chosen to set the system up in anyway abrogate their Parliamentary supremacy.

Point taken but...

Just because authority is delegated it does not absolve the politicians of responsibility nor does it remove their ability to direct action.
 
Point taken but...

Just because authority is delegated it does not absolve the politicians of responsibility nor does it remove their ability to direct action.
While no admirer of JT and his government, one could argue that the tweets are really all they can do for provincial and municipal policing issues.

I can imagine the howls that would occur if he enacted an EA on this, or otherwise stepped outside the Federal arc.
 
The EA would come into discussion here if, say, outside of the context of money laundering or terrorist financing, the federal government were to decide to use emergencies powers to try to inhibit protest financing. Given that the conversation thus far has focused on the physical protests and certain probable hate crimes carried out within them, it’s not a comparison that gets us anywhere useful. We also haven’t seen any of these protests last for more than a few hours or try to sustain an encampment or blockade of an urban centre. So, we’re a long way away from there being meaningful comparables.
Exactly. I thought EA wasn’t/shouldn’t have been necessary in Ottawa, had it been dealt with appropriately at the tactical level (OPS) from the outset, but the situation degraded enough that some thought it was. Machs nichs.

I don’t think the current sit requires the EA, as you say @brihard, but I can’t help wondering what a FINTRAC sniff of some of those associated behind the scenes of these more recent demonstrations would discover? That could reasonably be supported by existing legislation, so it’s not like it could be done without the EA.
 
Point taken but...

Just because authority is delegated it does not absolve the politicians of responsibility nor does it remove their ability to direct action.

It literally does exactly that if there‘a a legal separation of powers, which in Canada there is. There is no mechanism for the PM, Cabinet, a Premier, or any legislature to direct or command specific police operations. That’s a feature of the system, not a bug.

I don’t think the current sit requires the EA, as you say @brihard, but I can’t help wondering what a FINTRAC sniff of some of those associated behind the scenes of these more recent demonstrations would discover? That could reasonably be supported by existing legislation, so it’s not like it could be done without the EA.

So, FINTRAC doesn’t ‘sniff’ per se; they aren’t proactive intelligence collectors. They bring in info through mandatory transaction threshold reporting, and through proactive disclosures of Suspicious Transaction Reports by financial institutions and other institutions regulated under PCMLTFA. They have decent analytical horsepower, and when certain criteria are met they can disclose financial info to either security intelligence agencies or to police. They aren’t equipped to practively probe in order to open new taps of data.

I was the warrant writer for a great file that started from FINTRAC STRs of some suspicious deposits. I used their info to establish my grounds to get court issued production orders for more comprehensive banking records directly from the banks. In that case it’s because I had grounds to believe an offence had been committed. Comparably, CSIS could get their own warrants for such records from banks under the CSIS act but I’m not clear on what their threshold is, save that there would need to be an articulable belief at some level of a threat to national security. None of us here would be hearing about any NS side stuff though, that would be quiet and invisible to the public until such time as something went to criminal charges and court.
 
I like a lot of latitude for freedom of expression, and don't want to see anyone taken up for that. I like almost as much latitude for protest, subject to not interfering with the rights of others to go where they please and expect to not be physically harmed. These protests are useful: they are in support of a view which is somewhat in the "protected" class of things and people, whereas the truck convoy was not, so we will be reminded where the threshold for public response really is set. Also, we will be able to compare this behaviour to all the outbursts and demonstrations of right-wing extremists for scope, scale, and responses.
 
This country was never bound by a single history. I can assure you that what I learned in school as a Franco ontarien differed somewhat from what you learned.
Franco-Canadians don't really exist. I know you exist as an individual. And the Constitution pays lip service to your theoretical existence. But you don't really. Case in point:
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Until 1982, Canada attempted the assimilation of all Francos (and Indians too). It tried really hard, but it kinda failed, thanks in part to the Catholic Church. Post-1982, Canada carries out cultural disintegration via multiculturalism. The intended result is the same, except the Anglos are now also being erased. But! It is succeeding, at last.

Point is, there was a dual history, and it kept both nations alive, despite the ruling one's hostility. When the Francos gave up, they quickly got assimilated. Same fate is in store for Anglo Canada, and Quebec too, unless they change course.

That dual history is why I keep harping on the necessity for Canada to become a proper confederation to survive, otherwise it will always be conflicted between its irreconcilable identities, and attempt, even suicidally (as it does since 1982) to destroy the weaker one. Greater separation between the two nations would allow them to maintain their respective single history while still cooperating like good comrades.
Like what? Or is it a bit of a course correction? Acknowledging some uncomfortable truths about our history is actually better than pretending it isn’t real
No, there is so much that is amazing and exceptional and great about the history of Western civilization and we barely learn any of it, focusing on platitudes before quickly moving on to grievance politics.

Kids learn to hate their country much earlier than they learn it was our British Empire that abolished slavery at a global scale. In fact, they never learn that unless they have a particular, personal penchant for history.

There really isn't room for nuance when teaching millions of differently-abled and differently-interested kids. Either you teach them their elders were good or you teach them they were bad. What you teach those kids, btw, is also what you teach newcomers.

Critical theories have their place, but that's not being forced on kids (up to 25) who've never known anything other than school, and eat up anything they're told. @RangerRay
Can you define this monstrosity a bit more? Hard to comment unless one knows how you define it.
I don't want to list examples, because it's been done upthread already, in fact this whole conversation is in reference to one such example (domestic violence between foreign ethnic groups), and doing so would just result in endless nitpicking that essentially amounts to burying one's head in the sand. But I think generally speaking, the regime of anarcho-tyranny is inevitable on this path. Western Europe and the USA demonstrate pretty well what advanced degeneration looks like. Going further on this topic would also excessively derail the thread, but I'd be happy to entertain it in DMs.
 
Except I was taught that. In particular in the context of the French Indian wars.

Sure but I would argue it has more to do with ignoring indigenous history as a whole in the first place and not a concerted effort to rewrite their history.
I am going through my daughters recent experiences at elementary and High School, they are whitewashing FN history being taught to remove any potentially negative associations. FN culture is a huge part of ever subject now. Funny enough my oldest was dating a FN guy from the Reserves and even they were rolling their eyes at the stuff being taught. Before we used to belittle them, now we are putting them onto a pillar they can't climb. Much better to teach a warts and all course about how things were.
 
It literally does exactly that if there‘a a legal separation of powers, which in Canada there is. There is no mechanism for the PM, Cabinet, a Premier, or any legislature to direct or command specific police operations. That’s a feature of the system, not a bug.

OK. Conceding my ignorance. When everything goes to hell in a handbasket, who is in charge?
 
Something like this?

The Emergencies Act (French: Loi sur les mesures d'urgence) is a statute passed by the Parliament of Canada in 1988 which authorizes the Government of Canada to take extraordinary temporary measures to respond to public welfare emergencies, public order emergencies, international emergencies and war emergencies. The law replaces the War Measures Act passed in 1914. It asserts that any government action continues to be subject to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Canadian Bill of Rights.

Under the Emergencies Act, the Cabinet of Canada can declare a national emergency in response to an urgent and critical situation that cannot be dealt with by any existing law, and either is beyond the capability of a province to deal with it or threatens the sovereignty of Canada. Before declaring a national emergency, the federal cabinet must consult with provincial cabinets. In the case of a public welfare or public order emergency where the effects of the emergency are confined to, or occur principally in, one province, the Emergencies Act cannot be used if the provincial cabinet does not indicate that the situation is beyond the capacity of the province to deal with it.[1] Once an emergency is declared, it is subject to confirmation by the House of Commons and Senate.

Under the Emergencies Act, the Governor in Council (i.e., the federal cabinet) may declare that an emergency exists.[25] The emergency must be a "national emergency", which means an "urgent and critical situation of a temporary nature" that either "(a) seriously endangers the lives, health or safety of Canadians and is of such proportions or nature as to exceed the capacity or authority of a province to deal with it, or (b) seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada and that cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada".[22][26]

See, the way I read things is that under the Emergencies Act the Government of the Day suspends normal operations for the duration of the Emergency and exerts direct control over events.

And I would suggest that that is the baseline organization of our society.
 
Something like this?
You’ve quoted a law; I meant can you give me an example of the sort of situation/emergency you imagine. You can’t start with the law; you need the fact set to apply the law to.


See, the way I read things is that under the Emergencies Act the Government of the Day suspends normal operations for the duration of the Emergency and exerts direct control over events.

And I would suggest that that is the baseline organization of our society.

No, that’s not what it means and not what we saw happen the one time it was actually invoked. The EA allows for certain types of emergencies to be proclaimed, and emergency regulations enacted to meet the perceived danger. There are tight constraints on how long those emergency regulations can rest in place without Parliamentary approval, and there are various other requirements including the post-event emergency commission. For example, during Convoy the EA did not result in supplanting of normal police command relationships. Those carried on under the existing legal structure and using the Incident Command System model. Eventually an OPS/OPP/RCMP unified command was established, but that wasn’t because of the EA, it was because Ottawa ditched its deadweight police chief. The EA had no impact on the command of police operations. It just enabled ad hoc regulations on financial restrictions, commandeering tow services, etc. Normal
Government operations by no means ceased; they were just an ugly helmet fire (and had been for a while).
 
When I was growing up, my high school history curricula glossed over mentions of things that made Canada look bad.
Or anything good. In the 50/60's Canada's contributions to the First and Second World Wars were ignored, let alone Korea.
 
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