The top job of the Prime Minister is to unify our country; he has failed on all acccounts. What we have now is a response to his inability to admit over 30% of Canadians even exist. HE is to blame for the fallout. Nobody else.
As you said, 70% of the population agree with, and a 90% is double vaxxed. You can't please all the people. 35% voted for him, yet he has 70% support. Yes, he handled this terribly by allowing the "protest" to take root in Ottawa, thus enabling all these other ridiculous protests. His error was in not taking action the Sunday night of the first weekend and putting a stop to it. That is his failure and his legacy, and he must resign.
IMHO, Trudeau, rightly, decided not to talk to the "protesters". I'm fine with that. But by doing nothing else in the following 18 days, while allowing an occupation of the national capital, and numerous border blockades he abdicated his responsibility to the country. Action should have been taken on the Sunday night of the first weekend to remove the protest. We can point all the political fingers we want, and you could just as easily argue that Trudeau did nothing in Ottawa to make the Ford campaign look bad (note the CPC look bad in every light for this). The mayor of Ottawa (now resigned) begged for help and got nothing. The protesters wanted to talk to Trudeau. That made it his problem. he ignored them. The problem didn't go away but got significantly worse. It took him almost 3 weeks to act. That's not leadership; that's incompetence.
Trudeau's inaction on the first weekend enabled every other protest across the country; no one doing anything until the American's got angry. By then, we were a global laughing stock and a risk as a trading partner.
I've hated Trudeau since SNC; that's where we learned about his lapses in judgment. But in the end, if you allow your national capital to be occupied, are you really still a functioning country? But he did. There are a whole lot of "leaders" who failed miserably in this crisis. IMHO, the worst offender was the guy at the top...so he must go.
Agree, in the early days the comments were excellent but now they are degrading into FB territory. I suspect at some pint they may simply turn them off. If for no other the volume is too much to keep up with.
Re-reading my comment, I should add, “starting to” meaning quite a few comments are good but the volume means it hard to read them all and any political, well don't need to expand on that point 😆
"when a convoy of truckers came to town advertising their plain intention to depose the prime minister and install themselves in the government"
Jesus, where do you get this stuff? Can you cite your source on this? I mean, the reps for the convoy have been saying repeatedly that all they are asking for is the end of the mandates and passports, and occasionally throw on the reference to tracking citizens.
Here. How about we check in with a person journaling the events and statements of people, including interviewing the actual spokespeople from the convoy. A journal-er, if you will: https://youtu.be/JK4KEK7lrNE
@24:33: Question: "For the people who are still saying that this convoy's stated objective is to overthrow the government, ..., what do you have to say to those people?"
Answer: "We don't live in a third world dictatorship, although it sometimes seems that way right now. We'll have an election, whenever the next election comes, and that's when it will be decided. This is exclusively about removing the mandates and passports, and the tracking app, and getting our freedoms back. ... But no, it's exclusively just this. There's no ambition to overthrow any government."
So, why are you still saying things like this? Where did it come from? I've watched their press conferences and official statements and not a word about overthrowing the government and installing themselves? I mean, WTF? Can you cite any source?
If you want to understand why this won't go away, and the repeated misinformation in the media, (I note that National Post is listed among them -- but not The Line), he continues:
"And that's also why, if you've noticed, we've kinda kept the politics out of this. We haven't made it a partisan thing. We've had people from different parties reach out to us and make overtures and we've said, 'Great, but the Liberal government is in power. We know there are people in the Liberal Party on our side. We know there's another 30 Liberal -- I know from people on the inside of the Liberal Party who have spoken to me -- there's another 30 Liberal MPs that want to follow the initial three, and are really, really ticked off with Justin Trudeau and his response, cause they're embarrassed, right. This is going to be their legacy."
"Like, look at it this way. You [David Freiheit] live in Quebec, right. We've both grown up in Canada with this baggage of Quebec separatism and Alberta doesn't like Quebec, and the West doesn't like Ontario -- well, everyone hates Ontario, right? -- but that's been the baggage that we've had."
"And the very first day I was here, I couldn't believe it -- you must have seen this too -- I went to the end of the park behind Parliament Hill and I followed this massive line of tens of thousands of people crossing over into Ontario from Quebec holding Quebec flags and Canadian flags, going up to Parliament Hill to meet their brothers from Alberta. They started hugging each other. I got a couple of pictures of guys -- one guy has a sign that says 'Freedom' and another guy next to him, his sign says 'Liberte'. They couldn't speak to each other but they said, 'Come, let's have a picture and hug each other, whatever.' "
"We went into the Tim Hortons. One of our team ... one of my friends went to Tim Hortons. She came back and she said, 'I couldn't believe it. I was in line and there were these two guys -- two truckers -- clearly they know each other 'cause they didn't just meet each other in line. They were talking, and joking, and laughing, and whatever. But they were using Google Translate, 'cause one was from Quebec and the other one was from Saskatechewan."
"So this is what happens when the media and politicians get out of the way. We all unify and we respect each others' differences and we, in fact, embrace them. It's been the most beautiful experience, and I never ever thought I would see this in Canada. It's been amazing."
And, I'll add, if you bother to watch even a fraction of the 100+ hours of life streamed footage, unedited, that is exactly what is happening. Ottawalks, Zot, and others do a good job of observational videos. Viva Frei (David Freiheit) does an amazing job of walking around for 3-4 hours each time and asking people where they are from, what they are doing there, and what they have to say. It's an amazing display of journal-ish type activities.
You might watch the first 55 minutes for the interview, and they maybe watch the rest for more of the walking around and journal-izering. There's some more interesting tidbits in there, including @43:58 with Q&A about injunction and working with the city. Notably, the convoy is working with the mayor on moving trucks to ensure flow of traffic and he makes corrections to the narrative about the court injunction on noise, noting the province lost almost everything they asked for except for prohibition on certain types of horns in certain areas, which they are respecting.
Like, where is all of this information in the media. Or, if you want to claim he's lying, where is the review of the injunction to see what it actually says and what the province had asked for?
You know, because these sorts of fact matter a lot more than repeating innuendo, rumours, and narratives that come off as sounding like propaganda. Here's an interesting one. Did you know the founders and leaders of the convoy are a Metis woman and a Jewish man? Sounds like just the two to be breaking out the swastikas, eh?
Are you actually unaware of the Memorandum of Understanding that was apparently signed by 320 000 people? This is the preamble. If you want I can post the MoU so that you can see the whole thing. (Canada Unity has taken it down, I guess because it doesn’t fit the current narrative.)
In this case the parties are “THE PEOPLE OF CANADA”, the “SENATE OF CANADA”, and “THE GOVERNOR GENERAL OF CANADA”, the highest authorities representing the Federal Government. The matter to be discussed and agreed upon is this; The Senate of Canada and the Governor General, combined referred to as the Federal Government are to uphold and enforce all Canadian and International Human Rights Laws that are clearly laid out in the MOU or “RESIGN their lawful positions of authority Immediately”.
By having the Senate of Canada and the Governor General of Canada sign this MOU into action, they agree to immediately cease and desist all unconstitutional, discriminatory and segregating actions and human rights violations. It calls for an immediate instruction to all levels of the Federal, Provincial, Territorial and Municipal governments to not only stop but furthermore waive all SARS-CoV-2 (and not limited to SARSCoV-2 subsequent variations) fines that have been issued and imposed upon its citizens, institutions, and private enterprises. Further, to immediately re-instate all employees in all branches of all levels of governments and not limited to promote the same to the private industry and institutional sectors employees with full lawful employment rights prior to wrongful and unlawful dismissals. Lastly it instructs all levels of government and private Sector that the Illegal use of a Vaccine Passport to cease and desist immediately.
"Tamara Lich, working with trucker Chris Barber from Swift Current Saskatchewan, started a fundraising campaign on social media that raised several hundred thousand dollars within days of its ‘GoFundMe’ page launch."
“We have a massive team behind us now. We are going to roll across Canada. They are going to go to Parliament Hill and sit there and protest, peacefully of course until these mandates are lifted,” said Ms. Lich, an oil and gas worker from Medicine Hat Alberta."
There was nothing on the GoFundMe page about any MOU, overthrowing government, or putting themselves in the government. Once it started to get traction, apparently Ms. Lich asked Benjamin Dichter to take on a role as spokesperson for the movement and listed on the GoFundMe page. He was the one interviewed on Tucker Carlson on January 28 where he reiterated the objectives which were about the mandates, and objected to the phone tracking.
By way of contrast, the Canada Unity group formed sometime in 2021 apparently, by James and Sandra Bauder. They apparently created that MOU in 2021 and got the signatures, and "delivered" it to the Senate on December 10, 2021. You can watch the video of that "delivery" on December 10 from a BitChute video published December 12, 2021: https://www.bitchute.com/video/V75ZgJaZmB7H/
They since replaced it with a "Bear Hug 2.0" in support of the "Convoy for Freedom 2022", which has both a manifesto and Code of Conduct aligned with the Freedom Convoy 2022 goals, but notably at the bottom of the manifesto says, "In support of Convoy for Freedom 2022." https://canada-unity.com/bearhug/
Apparently some people from Canada Unity assisted in organizing some of the truckers across Canada, in support of the Convoy for Freedom 2022, and that's where the confusion appears to have started.
So,
1. I'm not aware of, and cannot find any reference to, Canada Unity ever officially representing the Freedom Convoy 2022. It was never on the GoFundMe page and I cannot find any announcement by Tamara Lich or Ben Dichter that the convoy was ever represented by Canada Unity. I can't even find them referencing Canada Unity at all, though I certainly cannot rule out that they've referred to them or talked to them.
2. Further, the support by Canada Unity of Freedom Convoy 2022 was not tied to their MOU, which predated the convoy. Their support "Bear Hug 2.0" is aligned with the stated goals.
They state: "It has come to the attention of Canada Unity that the Memorandum Of Understanding (herein referred to as MOU) does not reflect the spirit and intent of the Freedom Convoy Movement 2022 ... We are immediately withdrawing the MOU as we do not want any unintended interpretations to continue. "
I've noted the many news articles that either innocently or intentionally confused the two movements, or the support of the convoy by Canada Unity.
But, the difference between these movements has been well-established for weeks. That MOU never had anything to do with the convoy, nor did it directly have to do with Canada Unity support of the convoy. It never represented the convoy.
Once again, the media got it wrong. One might forgive that as an innocent mistake a few weeks ago, but for The Line to be perpetuating such misinformation or disinformation still today is not forgivable. At a minimum, the press have a duty and obligation to understand what they are talking about before reporting on it. They also have a duty to correct past mistakes. Without it, they lack any integrity.
This is why people now have little trust in mainstream media anymore. I had hoped The Line with its stated goals (yes, by them, not some other organization) of "No Bullshit" would not repeat bullshit such as this, if in fact the reference here was with respect to that MOU. Shame on The Line. Do better.
Edit: I've also discovered that Canada Unity had a small convoy to Ottawa called the "Convoy of Freedom" in October 2021, and noted the reversal of wording in their names. I've updated and organized the above info here: https://adnausica.substack.com/p/protesting-the-pretext-of-the-protests
You explain my confusion as a consequence of the failure of the media (including The Line). From what you have written, I would say that the bulk of the blame for this lays with the Convoy organizers.
Your comment, “I can’t even find them referencing Canada Unity” is very telling. You, I, the media and the leadership of the convoy would reasonably assume that a good number of the members of the convoy will have supported the MoU with their signature.
If the leaders knew that a significant portion of their convoy was travelling to Ottawa with an understanding of goals and methods different from their own, they had an obligation to clarify. By not clearly disassociating themselves from the MoU, they allowed their own stated goals and those of Canada Unity to be conflated by everyone paying attention.
The confusion among the protest crowd led to the Governor General’s office being inundated with phone calls.
The official response was, “The Office of the Secretary to the Governor General has received a high volume of calls and emails in recent days related to the protest. Due to this high volume, we are aware of the long wait times and appreciate the public’s patience,” spokesperson Josephine Laframboise said in a short email statement.”
If the people who support the protest did not know that their leaders didn’t support the MoU, then why would anyone expect that anyone else should know that?
That Canada Unity has changed its tune so that it aligns with the present narrative (only a week ago when the blockade in Ottawa was already in its second week) does not negate the reality that a whole lot of protesters went to Ottawa with the intent of getting rid of the Prime Minister. Suggesting that because it is not in the convoy leaders’ manifesto does not make that untrue, particularly when that leadership failed to clarify that their goals differed from those of Canada Unity’s MoU.
What you are describing is a purity test, arguably combined with omnipotence.
How exactly was the Convoy for Freedom 2022 supposed to be aware of every belief or activity of every supporter, especially when they were initially just a couple of people trying to organize the convoy and logistics. It snowballed very quickly. How were they even supposed to know about Canada Unity, or that Canada Unity supported them, or that Canada Unity had this prior MOU, or that people unrelated to their convoy organization efforts were calling the Governor General?
People act independently. If a pickpocket robbed from people lining the roads in support, would you blame that on the convoy?
My comment "I can't even find them referencing Canada Unity" is indeed very telling. It is telling that as far as I can see, the Convoy for Freedom 2022 organizers didn't know anything about Canada Unity. They had their objectives plainly on the GoFundMe and described them in their Public Relations.
I find it quite strange to put blame on them for the media's misrepresentation, and for them to do the media's job to correct things that should have been fact checked in the first place. Even I had no idea until this morning that people were claiming that the Convoy for Freedom 2022 had original objectives of overthrowing the government, when I read it in the article here. I've watched the information from the organizers since the beginning and never saw anything remotely close. The closest I've heard is individual people claiming that Trudeau should resign, but again that is not a stated policy of the organization.
Most of the focus has been on the nonsense about swastika flag (with professional photographer in tow) and confederate flag, which also have nothing to do with the convoy.
I find it rather unfortunate that people make this sort of bad argument. Just pick the outcome you want, then fling metaphorical poo at the opposition and see what sticks.
If it is that easy, then please let us all know the things you support. It should be no problem to turn people against them for anybody who wants to do that. Just get some bad person or bad group to support it, then say, "Hey they didn't disavow themselves of these bad people supporting them (that they didn't know about) fast enough and therefore they are bad too."
Heh. Metaphorical poo. I think I'll have to use that phrase more.
Edit: I mention in my prior comment that this has been "confusion". As I state there, "One might forgive that as an innocent mistake a few weeks ago, but for The Line to be perpetuating such misinformation or disinformation still today is not forgivable. "
Blame is a rather pointless concept here. Ultimately the press is responsible for what it writes, whether in late January or mid-February. Even if for some reason we want to blame the Convoy for Freedom 2022 group for the media's misunderstanding of Canada Unity's support as representing their movement, or the prior MOU as being part of it, there's been plenty of time to recognize that confusion, and certainly note that it has not been part of the actual objectives, even as noted by Canada Unity who took down the MOU a week ago to avoid ongoing confusion.
It was a mistake by the media then, and has not been part of the stated objective of the Convoy for Freedom 2022 ever. To continue the mistake now cannot be attributed to the convoy group. I can at least see where this article gets it from now, but it was not true then and there is no case for continuing the misinformation now. The Line should be more responsible about checking their facts.
What money and follow it where? Do you have a link. I don't work for the CRA and can't go into people's personal bank accounts.
You imply that you have "followed the money", so why don't you just post a link to your source material, and tell us your interpretation for what it means.
Or, is it that you have no idea, haven't followed any money yourself, and are just throwing out random ideas to see what might stick. If you have evidence, present it. If not, then your comment is not contributing anything to the discussion.
Can you provide a link or share with us how you know this. Are you a forensic investigator? Have you looked at data? Are you reading a report from somewhere? Where is this claim coming from? Who is drawing from which funds?
That seems rather odd given that the GoFundMe money that they did disperse, about $1.4 million according to the Freedom Convoy 2022 spokesperson, was frozen by TD Bank immediately without any request and hasn't given out any funds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK4KEK7lrNE
If there is a fund that people are drawing on, why hasn't it been frozen? If you know about it, that means the bank, police, and government should know about it.
Or, are you just saying "follow the money" because you have no idea yourself? So far you haven't presented any evidence or links. I seem to recall you asking other people to do that. Do you not hold yourself to the same standard?
Would you care to share your proper research? That would help.
How have I not been doing my own? I've literally searched through websites, archive.org, tweets, Youtube, GoFundMe, GiveSendGo, news articles. I've presented the links to what I've found and directly quoted them. How is this no proper research? What should I do differently?
Maybe if you show me your research I can learn to do better. But you aren't showing it. You sent a link only to one newspaper article written by Chet Singh, PhD, a professor at Trent University, and he makes the same mistake that I already documented was a confusion between two different groups. I provided my links to source material and I don't see any in his article. He just claims they are the same.
I want to challenge people to think for themselves. Read the source material. It's no "my" truth. I'm not claiming truth. I'm claiming evidence of what appears to be true, and I keep saying over and over to please correct me on any link, citation, or source that you think is wrong and why. But you haven't done that.
Do you believe that Canada Unity and Freedom Convoy 2022 are the same people, or coordinated organizers here? Why do you think they are related? What evidence do you have other than the uncited claim of another person who doesn't appear to have any evidence of it either and probably confused them because of similar names and common interest in vaccine mandates.
Please, if you have "proper" research to correct me, I really do want to see it. Why won't you share it with us?
So, the movement at the Alberta border, and the Windsor border, are not the same group with the same objectives or methods. You can hear it right from the spokesperson's mouth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK4KEK7lrNE
See, this is the problem. The critics of the Ottawa protest don't seem to be getting their information from the protestors, or sourcing their information from legal documents. The goals and approach for the Convoy for Freedom 2022 had been on the GoFundMe since the start (now taken down) and the spokesman, Ben Dichter, has been making interviews, and the organizers have been holding press conferences about their positions and correcting untrue narratives.
Even former premier, and the only living signatory of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Brian Peckford is part of the team and held a press conference with Lich yesterday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoMyyXRmR8U
So, let's look at your loaded questions:
"Do you not think that Ottawa police have been reticent to move these people out because they love their protest?"
I don't understand the question. Are you saying the police love the protest? I'm sure some do. A few appear to have resigned over being asked to do what they believe is unconstitutional.
"Do you also think mindless protesters ..."
Ah, sounds like this is about to be a good faith question.
"... shutting down our economy is ok as a protest goal."
That isn't the goal of the Ottawa protest led by the Convoy for Freedom 2022, and those border blockades are not from the same group. I think that separate approach is risky; it certainly forces a resolution and the approach used by the authorities can make them look even more authoritarian, and the unity of the working class in the blockade can certainly signal to population that their apathy is hurting working class people. But, it can also backfire. So, risky.
But, I don't find it worse than the economic harms caused by overreaching lockdowns, mandates, and passports that all hurt the economy and without evidence of their effectiveness toward public health goals. (Or should I say, "mindless politicians shutting down our economy" to keep with the hyperbolic theme?)
"Do you think the call by a vast majority of Canadians for govt's to get tough is over reach by these huge portions of our population?"
I'm not sure of what poll you are referring to with the "vast majority" and with respect to getting tough on what exactly? Do you means specifically the Windsor crossing? Certainly that isn't overreach; that's inevitable regardless of the cause being protested for, and everybody expected that.
- "Two-thirds of Canadians believe it’s time to drop COVID-19 restrictions and begin living with the virus,"
- "56 per cent of Canadians say the unvaccinated should not be pressured into getting the shot"
- "45 per cent of Canadians believe that now is the time for chief medical officers and health officials to stand back."
And, as I pointed out multiple times before, these mechanism of mandates are in direct contradiction to the Health Canada risk management plan, the vaccine manufacturers risk management plans in their product monographs, the NACI recommendations to the federal government, the World Health Organization, and health policy orgs. https://adnausica.substack.com/p/who-keeps-on-trucking?r=p061j
"Do you ever think that the original MOU might have incited those with violence on their mind to join in and bury themselves inside the main protest group?"
By "original MOU" do you mean the one from a completely different group long before this one even formed or before the mandate policy was put in place from with the movement emerged? That one?
Hey, any protest or movement will always attract bad elements within, from troublemakers to agent provocateurs. Does that mean that protests should never happen? I mean, crime has apparently dropped in Ottawa downtown as a result, compared to, say, the destructive riots in the U.S. in 2020 that killed many people and billions of dollars of damages. This is about as tame a protest can get with this many people supporting it.
"Violence ONLY begets violence. In the event of violence, threat of violence, disengage and inform an officer. Be kind and respectful towards you fellow Canadians & International supporters
We are working with the police and other local authorities to help ensure public safety, we ask that all individuals be on their best behavior while spreading the message of unity, love & forgiveness. It is time to take back & heal our country for these & future generations.
The Canada Unity Freedom Convoy Condemns ALL Hate Symbols. Individuals who are expressing messages of HATE and division are NOT members of the BearHug movement. Those individuals DO NOT represent the Values and Code of Conduct by BearHug Participants."
And as a reminder, that is not the Convoy for Freedom 2020 group who are leading the protest. That is a different group who adapted their prior efforts to support the current protest.
"Matt Gurney said there were some "hard men" in the Ottawa group when he surveyed the group. Do you think they are just anti vaxxers."
Well, Matt's pre-crime spidey-sense to read a book by its cover aside -- not to negate that such people exist or that he may be accurate -- as I say above, any protest about anything attracts some fringe elements. What does that have to do with the actual protest movement though? There's nothing in their objectives about being mean looking, or "hard men", or anti-vax. Most of them are vaccinated.
I'm just not clear on your points here. It sounds like standard strawmanning, that there are fringe elements afoot, who haven't actually done anything yet apparently -- but they look mean so watch out! -- and therefore the whole protest is a problem?
Is that it? Forget the stated objectives. Forget the actual actions. Forget working with the police and mayor to keep emergency lanes open, forget the goals to remain peaceful and respectful, forget they are cleaning the streets, and removing snow and ice. Forget the constant misrepresentation and disinformation in the media. Forget the desecration of the war memorial by the city putting a fence around it. Forget the veteran coming out and removing that fence. Forget all of the hugging, and love, and people coming together in unity to celebrate freedom and stand up to the government mandates.
Forget all of that and just pay attention to somebody that a journalist -- who has even a fully admitted bias against the protests -- thinks some people he say look like troublemakers and might, at some point in the future, do something bad. Really? OK. You are entitled to your opinion. I just don't see any really critical thinking behind any of these thoughts that hold any value. It just sounds more like curmudgeony "get off my lawn" stuff to me. Maybe I'm missing something?
I have no idea what Blacklock is ... apparently you do. I don't like Rebel News and don't watch it. I've only ever seen a handful of clips over the years.
I am a scientist. That means to understand something I need to investigate it first. Look at what one side says and then the other, and what sources they use. I then present my findings with citations and links.
Incidentally, I only started the "blog" because I kept re-writing the same things over and over with the same citations and links. It was easier to just write it once, then point people to it. You'll note it is free and open and I haven't monetized it at all.
Is this the way you have conversations with everybody in your life? You just dismiss everything that disagrees with your pre-defined position. You don't give counter-arguments or counter-evidence, you just make claims with no references, ask others to provide evidence while you provide none, and instead of addressing the evidence, you just attack the person?
I mean, you've never commented on any of the sources I've provided that I can see. Have you read them? If yes, then what is wrong with them? If you haven't, then why do you continue to put forward a position you know there is evidence against that you won't bother to look at?
Is it that you don't believe you can ever be wrong about anything? How do you check? What do you do to question your own beliefs to make sure you are correct? If you don't bother checking whether you are right or wrong, why do you comment at all and put forward claims that you've never checked? Is there no evidence that you'd ever accept as being wrong?
I mean, I didn't know about the Unity Canada MOU so I thought maybe I was wrong and they did make such claims. So I looked up the Unity Canada MOU, read about it, read the claims, and presented my investigation results which shows the mistake of linking them. It's all there for people to inspect, including you.
I don't get it. Do you just expect people to accept your word for things? You ask for people to investigate things and when we do and present the evidence, you don't like the conclusion and just dismiss it. Do you not care about being right or wrong about things? Are you just trolling? Are you bored?
You clearly spend the time to make comments, so why not spend that time trying to actually convince people of things by presenting evidence for them. That might change minds, including mine. You could be helpful. I don't understand why you are wasting so much of your own precious time with no evidence to convince anybody of anything. I just don't get it.
I'd never heard of them. Based on your commentary and mention of Rebel, I had assumed I'd find they were some conservative or fringe "right wing" outlet, but I can't tell from a superficial look.
This actually throws a wrench in my hypothesis why you are being so adamant in your assertions without evidence in your own support and no responses to evidence opposed to your beliefs. I've been thinking maybe it is standard ingroup/outgroup psychology (aka, "tribalism") and your "tribe" is something like "Liberal supporters" or "far left" or something like that. Certainly that would cause you to forgo reasoned conversation and replace it with "Anything my tribe says is true because We are the good ones" and "Anybody who disagrees is in the other extremist bad tribe and what they say is wrong because they are evil".
It's an unfortunate evolutionary hold-over that we still have this psychological tendency, usually created and reinforced by "us vs them" rhetoric. Even our nearest cousins, chimpanzees, have this ingroup/outgroup behaviour. We just fling metaphorical poo now. Once in that tribal state, it's hard to reconsider one's own beliefs that are so intimately tied to the tribal beliefs, and the instinct to "protect the tribe" becomes more important than critical thinking. (Search Realistic Behaviour Theory and the Robbers Cave Experiment if you want a good summary.)
But, this Blacklock's Reporter thing doesn't look tribal to me, unless it's there and not readily apparent. Maybe it is, in which case maybe tribalism is the explanation for your positions.
For the sake of reference, I have no specific political leaning. I've voted for different parties in the last 5 elections. I've voted for the Liberals probably as a plurality, and possibly majority. I've voted NDP and I think I only ever voted Conservatives once, and not with Harper. I did vote Liberal under Justin Trudeau, however. But, I don't think I could stomach that again. I don't really like any of the leaders.
So your attempted ad hominem doesn't really work here. I get news sources from across the spectrum. I like Ground.News which shows the whole spectrum, biases, and blind spots. You might give it a try. (No, I have no financial ties to them.)
Thanks. To be fair, I only looked it up because I had tracked the official messaging from the convoy and there was nothing like this, and it sounded like some random Twitter nonsense.
What makes me sad is that it took maybe 30 minutes of web search and Wayback Machine between learning of this MOU and understanding the mistake. I didn't even have to ask the organisers for a comment or confirmation of who the organisers were.
That's sad to me because it means the press either don't care to check facts or that they want to intentionally mislead, or some combination. They didn't even bother to ask anyone.
I know the legacy media is dying a slow death, but failing basic checking just accelerates it.
I have seen what lies beneath the Lines bias in their writing so plainly and I see the underlying dislike for those who value freedom. They believe because they are writers that they have knowledge of many things but writing is suppose to be a journey of truth. This is not that. Unfortunately they do not give refunds to hear their bias and blah, blah, blah. They keep your money whether you read it or not. You should know they are the mainstream media by the fact they look no further than the press release from JT on the pandemic. They don't write truth or they would know the studies say that closing borders, giving more boosters, wearing masks, is no longer needed as the virus will infect us all anyway and we will all have natural immunity. They do not promote truth, they promote Trudeau's propaganda. They are all mainstream media writers all they know is what they are told. They call it journalism, I call it blaspheme, bias and mostly just straight BS.
I understand what you are saying. Many people have been complaining about modern media for decades, perhaps putting a reference point with Chompsky's "Manufacturing Consent" to Matt Taibi's "Hate Inc".
I think that what people want is to hear information from multiple points of view and decide for themselves. This is why people like Joe Rogan are so popular, because he treats his audience like they are intelligent enough to hear opposing views, or even one view, and not turn into mindless robots just repeating what is said.
By contrast, "corporate" or "mainstream" media think their job is decide what is true -- or more importantly what is "good" for people to know -- and lead the audience to that belief by crafting the facts to fit a narrative, like journalism is about creating Pablum to be spoon-fed to the infantile minds of their viewers.
I think it was Brian Stelter at CNN who complained that CNN had backroom "factcheckers" and professional production to present information to the audience, while Joe Rogan was just "winging it". That reveals the elitist thinking alone. Joe is doing the fact checking in the open, transparently. He asks guests, "But is that true, because ...". It's not exactly a debate forum, but it isn't cherry-picked and pre-digested Pablum.
Canada's Viva Frei is similar. While he has his own biases he is open about it and downplays that he doesn't know, that he's not giving advice, and most importantly he interviews and asks people what they think, while live streaming and unedited, especially on the streets of Ottawa in the past few weeks. He even interviewed counter-protestors in live stream. No narrative to convey. He wants the counter-protestors to have a voice and to tell their views in their own words, on camera, without attempting to speak for them.
I recall this sort of approach when I was younger was called journalism, because they were journaling what people were doing and believed. Now apparently a journalist means somebody with a journalism degree and/or works for a corporate media outlet, and targets their craft toward conveying a narrative. Somewhere along the line, fitting a narrative to the facts to humanize the story became fitting the facts to a narrative to lead people to desired points of view.
My hope has been that The Line is trying to get away from that, hence its independence from corporate media and tag line about "rejecting bullshit". In my opinion, it has been hit and miss, but recognizing its on a shoestring budget so far, so what we mostly get is personal opinions of the founders and guest authors. It does have a risk of become a vanity blog, but I have hope for it. I have to have hope.
I think it has been getting better, especially with Matt getting off to Ottawa and Jen off to Alberta, and seeing first hand instead of being informed by the above "Pablum" media reports. Those articles are among the best I've seen here. Yes, perhaps still slanted with a bias, but that's hard to avoid. Even Rogan and Frei wear their biases on their sleeves. But, I'm seeing real observation happening, multiple sides being presented, and context given to people conveying their own messaging in their own words. I know I give Matt and Jen a hard time in the comments, but that's because I believe in them that they can do this; that they can actually become what they claim to be about "no bullshit". If not, there's little hope left for fixing the disaster of modern Canadian press except for abandoning it completely. The whole of Canadian media is getting upstage by livestreaming cameras and ex-lawyers doing vlogs from his car, who gets interviews with the spokespeople because he is fair: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK4KEK7lrNE
I am a big Matt Taibi and Joe Rogan fan. I listen to both of these people and the reason I do is because I like discussion and different perspectives. Sitting in a constant proliferation of manufactured consent causes the brain to shrink and allows silos of biased opinion (not news or fact) to stagnate ones brain. It becomes exceedingly apparent when those who are mainstream news makers and watchers speak out. They just regurgitate the required monologue of fiction that is aired and think they own the facts. They seem to need their facts made for them, as they have not the ability to decipher different views and try and decide for themselves where the truth lies. Usually its somewhere in the middle. I enjoy your perspective as its lived experience and information that has not been digested for you. Its a refreshing and far more interesting read. I must check out Viva Frei, thanks for sharing. PS The Line producers are mainstream media reporters. That's why the hit and misses. They do not go beyond the limits of the mainstream narrative and to look past it, takes some digging and looking outside the box. Truth is difficult to decipher and harder to make out when your opinions are non negotiable. I too have seen great articles on here but the bias is apparent as I suppose is mine but I am willing to change my view depending on the information I am shown. I need to see facts, to believe them. Not partials stories meant to spread biased information that create a narrative instead of allowing the story to unfold. Many in the mainstream media have the conclusion already drawn up before they go out to report on a story. They call it journalism but it is nothing even resembling it.
They also created a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that they tried to deliver to the Senate on December 10, 2021. Here, you can watch a video of the small group, posted on December 12, 2021: https://www.bitchute.com/video/V75ZgJaZmB7H/
The Freedom Convoy 2022 was created by Tamara Lich shortly after January 15. You can read her Twitter history here: https://twitter.com/Tamara_MVC
Her Twitter seems to be locked out now, but it well documented the history. Tamara is Metis, and in the video refers to working with other First Nations to get support. She even refers to talking to "clan mothers" and the host jokes, "Not Klu Klux Klan mothers ..." and she says "no, no, no, no, no" and laugh at the joke. At @10:50 she says, "So this is bringing people together of all walks of life, all races, all religions, and it is really heartwarming to see the Canadian spirit is alive and well."
Tamara is Metis. Ben (BJ) Lichter, whom she later brought on to help, is Jewish. The article you link calls him a white nationalist. He's a Jewish man who attends a Synagogue. The article you link provides no link or source for calling him that.
There is no evidence of any link between Canada Unity and Freedom Convoy 2022. Nothing on any of the Freedom Convoy 2022 public information mentions Canada Unity or the Bauders at all, at any point, that I could ever find. I even searched their Twitter and couldn't find anything. Canada Unity appears to "support" the effort but is not directly involved, having written a manifesto and Code of Conduct that roughly aligns with them: https://canada-unity.com/bearhug/
At the bottom it mentions some other people involved with Canada Unity, Jason LaFace and Justine Peters. But I also note they get the name wrong, referring at the bottom of it as "Convoy for Freedom 2022" which appears to mix up their own prior "Convoy for Freedom" with Tamara Lich's effort named "Freedom Convoy 2022". This confusion of names seems to be where the press gets it all wrong.
I've read your link with your evidence, and I investigated it's claims and link to actual source material showing the mistake the article's author makes.
Do you not believe that they could have mistaken these groups? Is it not even possible in your mind? Why is that mistake impossible to you? It seems pretty obvious and easy mistake to me given the similar convoys and names months apart. They don't even claim to be related, and Canada Unity even noted the confusion on the MOU page.
They make me sick to my stomach and to think we have to pay them with our tax dollars to propagate for Trudeau and his corrupt and insidiously ideological Government.
Pick whatever protest movement you agreed with in the last 20 years and imagine these powers being used against them.
We are all here ostensibly because Trudeau and Biden didn’t want to let unvaxxed truckers cross the border anymore. The rule has prevented no covid deaths but it has created this. We should not lose sight of the fact that this is why we are all here.
Does anyone in the entire country actually believe that any guns found weren't planted by the RCMP? The only difference is whether you think that was a good thing to do.
It sets out the confounding dilemma that many of us share: we don't want to promote an unreasonably heavy-handed federal government, but on the other hand, jeez, some of these guys have gone way too far.
The Line's work is very impressive. I'm upping my subscription from monthly to annual.
What can we do now that we couldn't before? For starters, two main things. 1. The act sets up a watchdog to shut down the alt-right / American funding of this insurrection. That is long-term important. 2. The act tells the big-rig blockaders to get out of Dodge or they can say goodbye to trucking as way of life because 1) their vehicle insurance will be cancelled and 2) their business bank accounts will be frozen. I for one did not see these initiatives coming. To me -- and, I would wager, to most of the bleating sheep in the Ottawa streets -- they were completely unanticipated. I see them as BRILLIANT!
Yes and I hear Hillary is looking at a few years in the pen her self. My god folks we have some Democraps in Canada! Writing on "the Line"! Grab your keys truckers and jump on a back hoe as with these Democrap lovers a shovel will not be big enough. Heck you might want to get a drag line! There is Piles of bull scat coming out over here.
The comments, which used to be worth reading (whether I agree or disagree is neither here nor there) are really mostly abusive rubbish at this point. That’s a shame.
Radio poll this morning (I live on the Left Coast) suggests 81% of people oppose Trudeau invoking the Emergencies Act - and most out here are Green/NDP supporters. Maybe the 19% who support it are our politicians and journalists.
The whole process thus far with the protest getting out of hand falls in the lap of Ottawa and Trudeau. Borders should be open - period and that was being done BEFORE this invocation. What REALLY gets my goat is that now there is the claim that 'foriegn money is funding this issue' yet when 'foreign money' supports pipeline blockades, Idle no more, highway blockades against oil/gas/any development then that 'foreign money' is just fine. Where is the logic there? I am very concerned about the future of Canada if we allow this left wing extreemisim to continue from the Liberal govenment with their NDP sidekicks. This protest could have been solved by better planning adn a simple face to face with Trudeau but ...NOOO we had to make it a crisis.
It is "curiouser and curiouser" that the police did not have a plan when the convoy stated to all manner of public media that they were coming to Ottawa & would be looking to shut down government somehow using the GG & the Senate. That, in itself, I think shows American organization that does not understand that these two institutions are only ceremonial in Canada, not like the US Senate. The fact that police did not enforce even simple bylaws in the City of Ottawa is particularly curious and unsettling.
I was working on Parliament Hill 52 years and one thing was clear: invoking emergency powers instantly takes much of the oxygen out of adult, democratic debate. Hopefully, Justin Trudeau’s tardy timing and the lack of violence so far will mean less drama today. However, the very language we’re using now—foreign money, emergency, fascists, threat to our democracy—threatens civil discourse and healthy scepticism
"So rather than try to pass judgment on the wisdom of the entire decision, which is frankly something we're going to need to reflect on further, we want to try and pull out some specific elements of this, and walk you through what we think it means."
I’m sure that, like many of us, we were awaiting your report on these new developments. Today’s was just an appetizer; can’t wait for the rest of this week.
After the first day of the protest Trudeau had every ability to end it when ever he wanted and he refused to do so. This is all on his shoulders no matter how you, the mainstream media to which you are all members of, try to defend his horrific actions and his putting in the Emergency Act.
When we had the "Shut Down Canada" for a month where they stopped all trains which carry much of our products and caused economic damage, and damage for a longer time, was there any "Emergency Act" brought in? No, in fact our great brave Trudeau said "dialogue" is necessary. So those foreign protesters brought in by the bus loads, and Canadian protesters were left to cause havoc. No one ceased their foreign funded bank accounts calling their stand off an "insurrection"! The Trudeau Government, all by itself, has done more harm to our economy than any protest anywhere could ever do. We should have brought in the "Emergency Act" to remove the pathetic excuse for a Government that keeps shuttering our Parliament and destroying any democracy or freedom we once had. Now we are doomed to utter tyranny and the media has been aiding this all the way along.
The top job of the Prime Minister is to unify our country; he has failed on all acccounts. What we have now is a response to his inability to admit over 30% of Canadians even exist. HE is to blame for the fallout. Nobody else.
As you said, 70% of the population agree with, and a 90% is double vaxxed. You can't please all the people. 35% voted for him, yet he has 70% support. Yes, he handled this terribly by allowing the "protest" to take root in Ottawa, thus enabling all these other ridiculous protests. His error was in not taking action the Sunday night of the first weekend and putting a stop to it. That is his failure and his legacy, and he must resign.
IMHO, Trudeau, rightly, decided not to talk to the "protesters". I'm fine with that. But by doing nothing else in the following 18 days, while allowing an occupation of the national capital, and numerous border blockades he abdicated his responsibility to the country. Action should have been taken on the Sunday night of the first weekend to remove the protest. We can point all the political fingers we want, and you could just as easily argue that Trudeau did nothing in Ottawa to make the Ford campaign look bad (note the CPC look bad in every light for this). The mayor of Ottawa (now resigned) begged for help and got nothing. The protesters wanted to talk to Trudeau. That made it his problem. he ignored them. The problem didn't go away but got significantly worse. It took him almost 3 weeks to act. That's not leadership; that's incompetence.
Trudeau's inaction on the first weekend enabled every other protest across the country; no one doing anything until the American's got angry. By then, we were a global laughing stock and a risk as a trading partner.
I've hated Trudeau since SNC; that's where we learned about his lapses in judgment. But in the end, if you allow your national capital to be occupied, are you really still a functioning country? But he did. There are a whole lot of "leaders" who failed miserably in this crisis. IMHO, the worst offender was the guy at the top...so he must go.
Matt & Jen, thank you for all of your hard work over the past few weeks reporting on this mess. It has been hard to keep up at times.
As a new subscriber, it is a bit disheartening seeing some of the comments folks leave on these articles.
Anyways, keep up the good work. It is very much appreciated
Agree, in the early days the comments were excellent but now they are degrading into FB territory. I suspect at some pint they may simply turn them off. If for no other the volume is too much to keep up with.
Thanks for the insight, Rob! Interesting to hear that the earlier discussions / comments were excellent. Ah well, guess I missed out on that party.
Re-reading my comment, I should add, “starting to” meaning quite a few comments are good but the volume means it hard to read them all and any political, well don't need to expand on that point 😆
"when a convoy of truckers came to town advertising their plain intention to depose the prime minister and install themselves in the government"
Jesus, where do you get this stuff? Can you cite your source on this? I mean, the reps for the convoy have been saying repeatedly that all they are asking for is the end of the mandates and passports, and occasionally throw on the reference to tracking citizens.
Here. How about we check in with a person journaling the events and statements of people, including interviewing the actual spokespeople from the convoy. A journal-er, if you will: https://youtu.be/JK4KEK7lrNE
@24:33: Question: "For the people who are still saying that this convoy's stated objective is to overthrow the government, ..., what do you have to say to those people?"
Answer: "We don't live in a third world dictatorship, although it sometimes seems that way right now. We'll have an election, whenever the next election comes, and that's when it will be decided. This is exclusively about removing the mandates and passports, and the tracking app, and getting our freedoms back. ... But no, it's exclusively just this. There's no ambition to overthrow any government."
So, why are you still saying things like this? Where did it come from? I've watched their press conferences and official statements and not a word about overthrowing the government and installing themselves? I mean, WTF? Can you cite any source?
If you want to understand why this won't go away, and the repeated misinformation in the media, (I note that National Post is listed among them -- but not The Line), he continues:
"And that's also why, if you've noticed, we've kinda kept the politics out of this. We haven't made it a partisan thing. We've had people from different parties reach out to us and make overtures and we've said, 'Great, but the Liberal government is in power. We know there are people in the Liberal Party on our side. We know there's another 30 Liberal -- I know from people on the inside of the Liberal Party who have spoken to me -- there's another 30 Liberal MPs that want to follow the initial three, and are really, really ticked off with Justin Trudeau and his response, cause they're embarrassed, right. This is going to be their legacy."
"Like, look at it this way. You [David Freiheit] live in Quebec, right. We've both grown up in Canada with this baggage of Quebec separatism and Alberta doesn't like Quebec, and the West doesn't like Ontario -- well, everyone hates Ontario, right? -- but that's been the baggage that we've had."
"And the very first day I was here, I couldn't believe it -- you must have seen this too -- I went to the end of the park behind Parliament Hill and I followed this massive line of tens of thousands of people crossing over into Ontario from Quebec holding Quebec flags and Canadian flags, going up to Parliament Hill to meet their brothers from Alberta. They started hugging each other. I got a couple of pictures of guys -- one guy has a sign that says 'Freedom' and another guy next to him, his sign says 'Liberte'. They couldn't speak to each other but they said, 'Come, let's have a picture and hug each other, whatever.' "
"We went into the Tim Hortons. One of our team ... one of my friends went to Tim Hortons. She came back and she said, 'I couldn't believe it. I was in line and there were these two guys -- two truckers -- clearly they know each other 'cause they didn't just meet each other in line. They were talking, and joking, and laughing, and whatever. But they were using Google Translate, 'cause one was from Quebec and the other one was from Saskatechewan."
"So this is what happens when the media and politicians get out of the way. We all unify and we respect each others' differences and we, in fact, embrace them. It's been the most beautiful experience, and I never ever thought I would see this in Canada. It's been amazing."
And, I'll add, if you bother to watch even a fraction of the 100+ hours of life streamed footage, unedited, that is exactly what is happening. Ottawalks, Zot, and others do a good job of observational videos. Viva Frei (David Freiheit) does an amazing job of walking around for 3-4 hours each time and asking people where they are from, what they are doing there, and what they have to say. It's an amazing display of journal-ish type activities.
You might watch the first 55 minutes for the interview, and they maybe watch the rest for more of the walking around and journal-izering. There's some more interesting tidbits in there, including @43:58 with Q&A about injunction and working with the city. Notably, the convoy is working with the mayor on moving trucks to ensure flow of traffic and he makes corrections to the narrative about the court injunction on noise, noting the province lost almost everything they asked for except for prohibition on certain types of horns in certain areas, which they are respecting.
Like, where is all of this information in the media. Or, if you want to claim he's lying, where is the review of the injunction to see what it actually says and what the province had asked for?
You know, because these sorts of fact matter a lot more than repeating innuendo, rumours, and narratives that come off as sounding like propaganda. Here's an interesting one. Did you know the founders and leaders of the convoy are a Metis woman and a Jewish man? Sounds like just the two to be breaking out the swastikas, eh?
Are you actually unaware of the Memorandum of Understanding that was apparently signed by 320 000 people? This is the preamble. If you want I can post the MoU so that you can see the whole thing. (Canada Unity has taken it down, I guess because it doesn’t fit the current narrative.)
In this case the parties are “THE PEOPLE OF CANADA”, the “SENATE OF CANADA”, and “THE GOVERNOR GENERAL OF CANADA”, the highest authorities representing the Federal Government. The matter to be discussed and agreed upon is this; The Senate of Canada and the Governor General, combined referred to as the Federal Government are to uphold and enforce all Canadian and International Human Rights Laws that are clearly laid out in the MOU or “RESIGN their lawful positions of authority Immediately”.
By having the Senate of Canada and the Governor General of Canada sign this MOU into action, they agree to immediately cease and desist all unconstitutional, discriminatory and segregating actions and human rights violations. It calls for an immediate instruction to all levels of the Federal, Provincial, Territorial and Municipal governments to not only stop but furthermore waive all SARS-CoV-2 (and not limited to SARSCoV-2 subsequent variations) fines that have been issued and imposed upon its citizens, institutions, and private enterprises. Further, to immediately re-instate all employees in all branches of all levels of governments and not limited to promote the same to the private industry and institutional sectors employees with full lawful employment rights prior to wrongful and unlawful dismissals. Lastly it instructs all levels of government and private Sector that the Illegal use of a Vaccine Passport to cease and desist immediately.
Ah, you have confused the "Canada Unity" group with the Convoy for Freedom 2022 Group.
The Freedom Convoy 2022 group was started by Tamara Lich after the January 15 mandates requiring truckers be vaccinated to cross the border: https://thenationaltelegraph.com/national/truckers-headed-to-ottawa-for-vaccine-mandate-showdown
"Tamara Lich, working with trucker Chris Barber from Swift Current Saskatchewan, started a fundraising campaign on social media that raised several hundred thousand dollars within days of its ‘GoFundMe’ page launch."
“We have a massive team behind us now. We are going to roll across Canada. They are going to go to Parliament Hill and sit there and protest, peacefully of course until these mandates are lifted,” said Ms. Lich, an oil and gas worker from Medicine Hat Alberta."
There was nothing on the GoFundMe page about any MOU, overthrowing government, or putting themselves in the government. Once it started to get traction, apparently Ms. Lich asked Benjamin Dichter to take on a role as spokesperson for the movement and listed on the GoFundMe page. He was the one interviewed on Tucker Carlson on January 28 where he reiterated the objectives which were about the mandates, and objected to the phone tracking.
By way of contrast, the Canada Unity group formed sometime in 2021 apparently, by James and Sandra Bauder. They apparently created that MOU in 2021 and got the signatures, and "delivered" it to the Senate on December 10, 2021. You can watch the video of that "delivery" on December 10 from a BitChute video published December 12, 2021: https://www.bitchute.com/video/V75ZgJaZmB7H/
Apparently they had started a protest plan in December 2021 called "Bear Hug" which had to do with a protest in Ottawa following their failure to deliver that MOU. They've since removed the page but you can see some of the comments in the Wayback Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20220124153157/https://canada-unity.com/category/bear-hug/
They since replaced it with a "Bear Hug 2.0" in support of the "Convoy for Freedom 2022", which has both a manifesto and Code of Conduct aligned with the Freedom Convoy 2022 goals, but notably at the bottom of the manifesto says, "In support of Convoy for Freedom 2022." https://canada-unity.com/bearhug/
Apparently some people from Canada Unity assisted in organizing some of the truckers across Canada, in support of the Convoy for Freedom 2022, and that's where the confusion appears to have started.
So,
1. I'm not aware of, and cannot find any reference to, Canada Unity ever officially representing the Freedom Convoy 2022. It was never on the GoFundMe page and I cannot find any announcement by Tamara Lich or Ben Dichter that the convoy was ever represented by Canada Unity. I can't even find them referencing Canada Unity at all, though I certainly cannot rule out that they've referred to them or talked to them.
2. Further, the support by Canada Unity of Freedom Convoy 2022 was not tied to their MOU, which predated the convoy. Their support "Bear Hug 2.0" is aligned with the stated goals.
3. Canada Unity removed the MOU from their website on Feb 8, noting the confusion: https://canada-unity.com/mou/
They state: "It has come to the attention of Canada Unity that the Memorandum Of Understanding (herein referred to as MOU) does not reflect the spirit and intent of the Freedom Convoy Movement 2022 ... We are immediately withdrawing the MOU as we do not want any unintended interpretations to continue. "
I've noted the many news articles that either innocently or intentionally confused the two movements, or the support of the convoy by Canada Unity.
But, the difference between these movements has been well-established for weeks. That MOU never had anything to do with the convoy, nor did it directly have to do with Canada Unity support of the convoy. It never represented the convoy.
Once again, the media got it wrong. One might forgive that as an innocent mistake a few weeks ago, but for The Line to be perpetuating such misinformation or disinformation still today is not forgivable. At a minimum, the press have a duty and obligation to understand what they are talking about before reporting on it. They also have a duty to correct past mistakes. Without it, they lack any integrity.
This is why people now have little trust in mainstream media anymore. I had hoped The Line with its stated goals (yes, by them, not some other organization) of "No Bullshit" would not repeat bullshit such as this, if in fact the reference here was with respect to that MOU. Shame on The Line. Do better.
Edit: I've also discovered that Canada Unity had a small convoy to Ottawa called the "Convoy of Freedom" in October 2021, and noted the reversal of wording in their names. I've updated and organized the above info here: https://adnausica.substack.com/p/protesting-the-pretext-of-the-protests
You explain my confusion as a consequence of the failure of the media (including The Line). From what you have written, I would say that the bulk of the blame for this lays with the Convoy organizers.
Your comment, “I can’t even find them referencing Canada Unity” is very telling. You, I, the media and the leadership of the convoy would reasonably assume that a good number of the members of the convoy will have supported the MoU with their signature.
If the leaders knew that a significant portion of their convoy was travelling to Ottawa with an understanding of goals and methods different from their own, they had an obligation to clarify. By not clearly disassociating themselves from the MoU, they allowed their own stated goals and those of Canada Unity to be conflated by everyone paying attention.
The confusion among the protest crowd led to the Governor General’s office being inundated with phone calls.
https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/governor-generals-office-inundated-by-protest-supporters-demanding-the-pm-be-fired
The official response was, “The Office of the Secretary to the Governor General has received a high volume of calls and emails in recent days related to the protest. Due to this high volume, we are aware of the long wait times and appreciate the public’s patience,” spokesperson Josephine Laframboise said in a short email statement.”
If the people who support the protest did not know that their leaders didn’t support the MoU, then why would anyone expect that anyone else should know that?
That Canada Unity has changed its tune so that it aligns with the present narrative (only a week ago when the blockade in Ottawa was already in its second week) does not negate the reality that a whole lot of protesters went to Ottawa with the intent of getting rid of the Prime Minister. Suggesting that because it is not in the convoy leaders’ manifesto does not make that untrue, particularly when that leadership failed to clarify that their goals differed from those of Canada Unity’s MoU.
What you are describing is a purity test, arguably combined with omnipotence.
How exactly was the Convoy for Freedom 2022 supposed to be aware of every belief or activity of every supporter, especially when they were initially just a couple of people trying to organize the convoy and logistics. It snowballed very quickly. How were they even supposed to know about Canada Unity, or that Canada Unity supported them, or that Canada Unity had this prior MOU, or that people unrelated to their convoy organization efforts were calling the Governor General?
People act independently. If a pickpocket robbed from people lining the roads in support, would you blame that on the convoy?
My comment "I can't even find them referencing Canada Unity" is indeed very telling. It is telling that as far as I can see, the Convoy for Freedom 2022 organizers didn't know anything about Canada Unity. They had their objectives plainly on the GoFundMe and described them in their Public Relations.
I find it quite strange to put blame on them for the media's misrepresentation, and for them to do the media's job to correct things that should have been fact checked in the first place. Even I had no idea until this morning that people were claiming that the Convoy for Freedom 2022 had original objectives of overthrowing the government, when I read it in the article here. I've watched the information from the organizers since the beginning and never saw anything remotely close. The closest I've heard is individual people claiming that Trudeau should resign, but again that is not a stated policy of the organization.
Most of the focus has been on the nonsense about swastika flag (with professional photographer in tow) and confederate flag, which also have nothing to do with the convoy.
I find it rather unfortunate that people make this sort of bad argument. Just pick the outcome you want, then fling metaphorical poo at the opposition and see what sticks.
If it is that easy, then please let us all know the things you support. It should be no problem to turn people against them for anybody who wants to do that. Just get some bad person or bad group to support it, then say, "Hey they didn't disavow themselves of these bad people supporting them (that they didn't know about) fast enough and therefore they are bad too."
Heh. Metaphorical poo. I think I'll have to use that phrase more.
Edit: I mention in my prior comment that this has been "confusion". As I state there, "One might forgive that as an innocent mistake a few weeks ago, but for The Line to be perpetuating such misinformation or disinformation still today is not forgivable. "
Blame is a rather pointless concept here. Ultimately the press is responsible for what it writes, whether in late January or mid-February. Even if for some reason we want to blame the Convoy for Freedom 2022 group for the media's misunderstanding of Canada Unity's support as representing their movement, or the prior MOU as being part of it, there's been plenty of time to recognize that confusion, and certainly note that it has not been part of the actual objectives, even as noted by Canada Unity who took down the MOU a week ago to avoid ongoing confusion.
It was a mistake by the media then, and has not been part of the stated objective of the Convoy for Freedom 2022 ever. To continue the mistake now cannot be attributed to the convoy group. I can at least see where this article gets it from now, but it was not true then and there is no case for continuing the misinformation now. The Line should be more responsible about checking their facts.
What money and follow it where? Do you have a link. I don't work for the CRA and can't go into people's personal bank accounts.
You imply that you have "followed the money", so why don't you just post a link to your source material, and tell us your interpretation for what it means.
Or, is it that you have no idea, haven't followed any money yourself, and are just throwing out random ideas to see what might stick. If you have evidence, present it. If not, then your comment is not contributing anything to the discussion.
Can you provide a link or share with us how you know this. Are you a forensic investigator? Have you looked at data? Are you reading a report from somewhere? Where is this claim coming from? Who is drawing from which funds?
That seems rather odd given that the GoFundMe money that they did disperse, about $1.4 million according to the Freedom Convoy 2022 spokesperson, was frozen by TD Bank immediately without any request and hasn't given out any funds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK4KEK7lrNE
If there is a fund that people are drawing on, why hasn't it been frozen? If you know about it, that means the bank, police, and government should know about it.
Or, are you just saying "follow the money" because you have no idea yourself? So far you haven't presented any evidence or links. I seem to recall you asking other people to do that. Do you not hold yourself to the same standard?
Would you care to share your proper research? That would help.
How have I not been doing my own? I've literally searched through websites, archive.org, tweets, Youtube, GoFundMe, GiveSendGo, news articles. I've presented the links to what I've found and directly quoted them. How is this no proper research? What should I do differently?
Maybe if you show me your research I can learn to do better. But you aren't showing it. You sent a link only to one newspaper article written by Chet Singh, PhD, a professor at Trent University, and he makes the same mistake that I already documented was a confusion between two different groups. I provided my links to source material and I don't see any in his article. He just claims they are the same.
I want to challenge people to think for themselves. Read the source material. It's no "my" truth. I'm not claiming truth. I'm claiming evidence of what appears to be true, and I keep saying over and over to please correct me on any link, citation, or source that you think is wrong and why. But you haven't done that.
Do you believe that Canada Unity and Freedom Convoy 2022 are the same people, or coordinated organizers here? Why do you think they are related? What evidence do you have other than the uncited claim of another person who doesn't appear to have any evidence of it either and probably confused them because of similar names and common interest in vaccine mandates.
Please, if you have "proper" research to correct me, I really do want to see it. Why won't you share it with us?
So, the movement at the Alberta border, and the Windsor border, are not the same group with the same objectives or methods. You can hear it right from the spokesperson's mouth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK4KEK7lrNE
See, this is the problem. The critics of the Ottawa protest don't seem to be getting their information from the protestors, or sourcing their information from legal documents. The goals and approach for the Convoy for Freedom 2022 had been on the GoFundMe since the start (now taken down) and the spokesman, Ben Dichter, has been making interviews, and the organizers have been holding press conferences about their positions and correcting untrue narratives.
Even former premier, and the only living signatory of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Brian Peckford is part of the team and held a press conference with Lich yesterday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoMyyXRmR8U
So, let's look at your loaded questions:
"Do you not think that Ottawa police have been reticent to move these people out because they love their protest?"
I don't understand the question. Are you saying the police love the protest? I'm sure some do. A few appear to have resigned over being asked to do what they believe is unconstitutional.
"Do you also think mindless protesters ..."
Ah, sounds like this is about to be a good faith question.
"... shutting down our economy is ok as a protest goal."
That isn't the goal of the Ottawa protest led by the Convoy for Freedom 2022, and those border blockades are not from the same group. I think that separate approach is risky; it certainly forces a resolution and the approach used by the authorities can make them look even more authoritarian, and the unity of the working class in the blockade can certainly signal to population that their apathy is hurting working class people. But, it can also backfire. So, risky.
But, I don't find it worse than the economic harms caused by overreaching lockdowns, mandates, and passports that all hurt the economy and without evidence of their effectiveness toward public health goals. (Or should I say, "mindless politicians shutting down our economy" to keep with the hyperbolic theme?)
"Do you think the call by a vast majority of Canadians for govt's to get tough is over reach by these huge portions of our population?"
I'm not sure of what poll you are referring to with the "vast majority" and with respect to getting tough on what exactly? Do you means specifically the Windsor crossing? Certainly that isn't overreach; that's inevitable regardless of the cause being protested for, and everybody expected that.
With respect to the Ottawa protest, the overreach in question usually refers to the vaccine mandates, passports, and the tracking of Canadians by their government. On those topics, the vast majority of Canadians seem to agree: https://nationalpost.com/news/two-thirds-of-canadians-ready-to-drop-covid-19-restrictions
- "Two-thirds of Canadians believe it’s time to drop COVID-19 restrictions and begin living with the virus,"
- "56 per cent of Canadians say the unvaccinated should not be pressured into getting the shot"
- "45 per cent of Canadians believe that now is the time for chief medical officers and health officials to stand back."
And, as I pointed out multiple times before, these mechanism of mandates are in direct contradiction to the Health Canada risk management plan, the vaccine manufacturers risk management plans in their product monographs, the NACI recommendations to the federal government, the World Health Organization, and health policy orgs. https://adnausica.substack.com/p/who-keeps-on-trucking?r=p061j
"Do you ever think that the original MOU might have incited those with violence on their mind to join in and bury themselves inside the main protest group?"
By "original MOU" do you mean the one from a completely different group long before this one even formed or before the mandate policy was put in place from with the movement emerged? That one?
Hey, any protest or movement will always attract bad elements within, from troublemakers to agent provocateurs. Does that mean that protests should never happen? I mean, crime has apparently dropped in Ottawa downtown as a result, compared to, say, the destructive riots in the U.S. in 2020 that killed many people and billions of dollars of damages. This is about as tame a protest can get with this many people supporting it.
Heck, the fringe elements are rejected, even by the Canada Unity organization who had that MOU: https://canada-unity.com/bearhug/
"Violence ONLY begets violence. In the event of violence, threat of violence, disengage and inform an officer. Be kind and respectful towards you fellow Canadians & International supporters
We are working with the police and other local authorities to help ensure public safety, we ask that all individuals be on their best behavior while spreading the message of unity, love & forgiveness. It is time to take back & heal our country for these & future generations.
The Canada Unity Freedom Convoy Condemns ALL Hate Symbols. Individuals who are expressing messages of HATE and division are NOT members of the BearHug movement. Those individuals DO NOT represent the Values and Code of Conduct by BearHug Participants."
And as a reminder, that is not the Convoy for Freedom 2020 group who are leading the protest. That is a different group who adapted their prior efforts to support the current protest.
"Matt Gurney said there were some "hard men" in the Ottawa group when he surveyed the group. Do you think they are just anti vaxxers."
Well, Matt's pre-crime spidey-sense to read a book by its cover aside -- not to negate that such people exist or that he may be accurate -- as I say above, any protest about anything attracts some fringe elements. What does that have to do with the actual protest movement though? There's nothing in their objectives about being mean looking, or "hard men", or anti-vax. Most of them are vaccinated.
I'm just not clear on your points here. It sounds like standard strawmanning, that there are fringe elements afoot, who haven't actually done anything yet apparently -- but they look mean so watch out! -- and therefore the whole protest is a problem?
Is that it? Forget the stated objectives. Forget the actual actions. Forget working with the police and mayor to keep emergency lanes open, forget the goals to remain peaceful and respectful, forget they are cleaning the streets, and removing snow and ice. Forget the constant misrepresentation and disinformation in the media. Forget the desecration of the war memorial by the city putting a fence around it. Forget the veteran coming out and removing that fence. Forget all of the hugging, and love, and people coming together in unity to celebrate freedom and stand up to the government mandates.
Forget all of that and just pay attention to somebody that a journalist -- who has even a fully admitted bias against the protests -- thinks some people he say look like troublemakers and might, at some point in the future, do something bad. Really? OK. You are entitled to your opinion. I just don't see any really critical thinking behind any of these thoughts that hold any value. It just sounds more like curmudgeony "get off my lawn" stuff to me. Maybe I'm missing something?
I have no idea what Blacklock is ... apparently you do. I don't like Rebel News and don't watch it. I've only ever seen a handful of clips over the years.
I am a scientist. That means to understand something I need to investigate it first. Look at what one side says and then the other, and what sources they use. I then present my findings with citations and links.
Incidentally, I only started the "blog" because I kept re-writing the same things over and over with the same citations and links. It was easier to just write it once, then point people to it. You'll note it is free and open and I haven't monetized it at all.
Is this the way you have conversations with everybody in your life? You just dismiss everything that disagrees with your pre-defined position. You don't give counter-arguments or counter-evidence, you just make claims with no references, ask others to provide evidence while you provide none, and instead of addressing the evidence, you just attack the person?
I mean, you've never commented on any of the sources I've provided that I can see. Have you read them? If yes, then what is wrong with them? If you haven't, then why do you continue to put forward a position you know there is evidence against that you won't bother to look at?
Is it that you don't believe you can ever be wrong about anything? How do you check? What do you do to question your own beliefs to make sure you are correct? If you don't bother checking whether you are right or wrong, why do you comment at all and put forward claims that you've never checked? Is there no evidence that you'd ever accept as being wrong?
I mean, I didn't know about the Unity Canada MOU so I thought maybe I was wrong and they did make such claims. So I looked up the Unity Canada MOU, read about it, read the claims, and presented my investigation results which shows the mistake of linking them. It's all there for people to inspect, including you.
I don't get it. Do you just expect people to accept your word for things? You ask for people to investigate things and when we do and present the evidence, you don't like the conclusion and just dismiss it. Do you not care about being right or wrong about things? Are you just trolling? Are you bored?
You clearly spend the time to make comments, so why not spend that time trying to actually convince people of things by presenting evidence for them. That might change minds, including mine. You could be helpful. I don't understand why you are wasting so much of your own precious time with no evidence to convince anybody of anything. I just don't get it.
Edit: I've looked up "Blacklock's". Do you mean this: https://www.blacklocks.ca/about-us/
I'd never heard of them. Based on your commentary and mention of Rebel, I had assumed I'd find they were some conservative or fringe "right wing" outlet, but I can't tell from a superficial look.
This actually throws a wrench in my hypothesis why you are being so adamant in your assertions without evidence in your own support and no responses to evidence opposed to your beliefs. I've been thinking maybe it is standard ingroup/outgroup psychology (aka, "tribalism") and your "tribe" is something like "Liberal supporters" or "far left" or something like that. Certainly that would cause you to forgo reasoned conversation and replace it with "Anything my tribe says is true because We are the good ones" and "Anybody who disagrees is in the other extremist bad tribe and what they say is wrong because they are evil".
It's an unfortunate evolutionary hold-over that we still have this psychological tendency, usually created and reinforced by "us vs them" rhetoric. Even our nearest cousins, chimpanzees, have this ingroup/outgroup behaviour. We just fling metaphorical poo now. Once in that tribal state, it's hard to reconsider one's own beliefs that are so intimately tied to the tribal beliefs, and the instinct to "protect the tribe" becomes more important than critical thinking. (Search Realistic Behaviour Theory and the Robbers Cave Experiment if you want a good summary.)
But, this Blacklock's Reporter thing doesn't look tribal to me, unless it's there and not readily apparent. Maybe it is, in which case maybe tribalism is the explanation for your positions.
For the sake of reference, I have no specific political leaning. I've voted for different parties in the last 5 elections. I've voted for the Liberals probably as a plurality, and possibly majority. I've voted NDP and I think I only ever voted Conservatives once, and not with Harper. I did vote Liberal under Justin Trudeau, however. But, I don't think I could stomach that again. I don't really like any of the leaders.
So your attempted ad hominem doesn't really work here. I get news sources from across the spectrum. I like Ground.News which shows the whole spectrum, biases, and blind spots. You might give it a try. (No, I have no financial ties to them.)
Thanks. To be fair, I only looked it up because I had tracked the official messaging from the convoy and there was nothing like this, and it sounded like some random Twitter nonsense.
Now that I realize it was more substantial misinformation, I've re-written it into an article: https://adnausica.substack.com/p/protesting-the-pretext-of-the-protests?r=p061j
What makes me sad is that it took maybe 30 minutes of web search and Wayback Machine between learning of this MOU and understanding the mistake. I didn't even have to ask the organisers for a comment or confirmation of who the organisers were.
That's sad to me because it means the press either don't care to check facts or that they want to intentionally mislead, or some combination. They didn't even bother to ask anyone.
I know the legacy media is dying a slow death, but failing basic checking just accelerates it.
I have seen what lies beneath the Lines bias in their writing so plainly and I see the underlying dislike for those who value freedom. They believe because they are writers that they have knowledge of many things but writing is suppose to be a journey of truth. This is not that. Unfortunately they do not give refunds to hear their bias and blah, blah, blah. They keep your money whether you read it or not. You should know they are the mainstream media by the fact they look no further than the press release from JT on the pandemic. They don't write truth or they would know the studies say that closing borders, giving more boosters, wearing masks, is no longer needed as the virus will infect us all anyway and we will all have natural immunity. They do not promote truth, they promote Trudeau's propaganda. They are all mainstream media writers all they know is what they are told. They call it journalism, I call it blaspheme, bias and mostly just straight BS.
I understand what you are saying. Many people have been complaining about modern media for decades, perhaps putting a reference point with Chompsky's "Manufacturing Consent" to Matt Taibi's "Hate Inc".
I think that what people want is to hear information from multiple points of view and decide for themselves. This is why people like Joe Rogan are so popular, because he treats his audience like they are intelligent enough to hear opposing views, or even one view, and not turn into mindless robots just repeating what is said.
By contrast, "corporate" or "mainstream" media think their job is decide what is true -- or more importantly what is "good" for people to know -- and lead the audience to that belief by crafting the facts to fit a narrative, like journalism is about creating Pablum to be spoon-fed to the infantile minds of their viewers.
I think it was Brian Stelter at CNN who complained that CNN had backroom "factcheckers" and professional production to present information to the audience, while Joe Rogan was just "winging it". That reveals the elitist thinking alone. Joe is doing the fact checking in the open, transparently. He asks guests, "But is that true, because ...". It's not exactly a debate forum, but it isn't cherry-picked and pre-digested Pablum.
Canada's Viva Frei is similar. While he has his own biases he is open about it and downplays that he doesn't know, that he's not giving advice, and most importantly he interviews and asks people what they think, while live streaming and unedited, especially on the streets of Ottawa in the past few weeks. He even interviewed counter-protestors in live stream. No narrative to convey. He wants the counter-protestors to have a voice and to tell their views in their own words, on camera, without attempting to speak for them.
I recall this sort of approach when I was younger was called journalism, because they were journaling what people were doing and believed. Now apparently a journalist means somebody with a journalism degree and/or works for a corporate media outlet, and targets their craft toward conveying a narrative. Somewhere along the line, fitting a narrative to the facts to humanize the story became fitting the facts to a narrative to lead people to desired points of view.
My hope has been that The Line is trying to get away from that, hence its independence from corporate media and tag line about "rejecting bullshit". In my opinion, it has been hit and miss, but recognizing its on a shoestring budget so far, so what we mostly get is personal opinions of the founders and guest authors. It does have a risk of become a vanity blog, but I have hope for it. I have to have hope.
I think it has been getting better, especially with Matt getting off to Ottawa and Jen off to Alberta, and seeing first hand instead of being informed by the above "Pablum" media reports. Those articles are among the best I've seen here. Yes, perhaps still slanted with a bias, but that's hard to avoid. Even Rogan and Frei wear their biases on their sleeves. But, I'm seeing real observation happening, multiple sides being presented, and context given to people conveying their own messaging in their own words. I know I give Matt and Jen a hard time in the comments, but that's because I believe in them that they can do this; that they can actually become what they claim to be about "no bullshit". If not, there's little hope left for fixing the disaster of modern Canadian press except for abandoning it completely. The whole of Canadian media is getting upstage by livestreaming cameras and ex-lawyers doing vlogs from his car, who gets interviews with the spokespeople because he is fair: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK4KEK7lrNE
Very well said - thank you!
I am a big Matt Taibi and Joe Rogan fan. I listen to both of these people and the reason I do is because I like discussion and different perspectives. Sitting in a constant proliferation of manufactured consent causes the brain to shrink and allows silos of biased opinion (not news or fact) to stagnate ones brain. It becomes exceedingly apparent when those who are mainstream news makers and watchers speak out. They just regurgitate the required monologue of fiction that is aired and think they own the facts. They seem to need their facts made for them, as they have not the ability to decipher different views and try and decide for themselves where the truth lies. Usually its somewhere in the middle. I enjoy your perspective as its lived experience and information that has not been digested for you. Its a refreshing and far more interesting read. I must check out Viva Frei, thanks for sharing. PS The Line producers are mainstream media reporters. That's why the hit and misses. They do not go beyond the limits of the mainstream narrative and to look past it, takes some digging and looking outside the box. Truth is difficult to decipher and harder to make out when your opinions are non negotiable. I too have seen great articles on here but the bias is apparent as I suppose is mine but I am willing to change my view depending on the information I am shown. I need to see facts, to believe them. Not partials stories meant to spread biased information that create a narrative instead of allowing the story to unfold. Many in the mainstream media have the conclusion already drawn up before they go out to report on a story. They call it journalism but it is nothing even resembling it.
I count myself as lucky that we all have "your truth:...whatever it might be.
Ah, thanks for providing the link. See, we can clear this up quickly.
That article is mixing up Canada Unity and Freedom Convoy 2022, which are two different groups, as I wrote about above and here: https://adnausica.substack.com/p/protesting-the-pretext-of-the-protests?r=p061j
The article you link to says, "The convoy was conceived by James Bauder". James Bauder and Sandra Bauder created Canada Unity in 2021. They had a small "Convoy of Freedom" that arrived in Ottawa on October 6, 2021, which also aimed to end vaccine passports, apparently: https://www.pembroketoday.ca/2021/10/05/canada-unity-convoy-rolling-through-the-ottawa-valley-tonight/
They also created a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that they tried to deliver to the Senate on December 10, 2021. Here, you can watch a video of the small group, posted on December 12, 2021: https://www.bitchute.com/video/V75ZgJaZmB7H/
The Freedom Convoy 2022 was created by Tamara Lich shortly after January 15. You can read her Twitter history here: https://twitter.com/Tamara_MVC
You can watch a video interview from January 22: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YATLJuopMc
Her Twitter seems to be locked out now, but it well documented the history. Tamara is Metis, and in the video refers to working with other First Nations to get support. She even refers to talking to "clan mothers" and the host jokes, "Not Klu Klux Klan mothers ..." and she says "no, no, no, no, no" and laugh at the joke. At @10:50 she says, "So this is bringing people together of all walks of life, all races, all religions, and it is really heartwarming to see the Canadian spirit is alive and well."
Tamara is Metis. Ben (BJ) Lichter, whom she later brought on to help, is Jewish. The article you link calls him a white nationalist. He's a Jewish man who attends a Synagogue. The article you link provides no link or source for calling him that.
There is no evidence of any link between Canada Unity and Freedom Convoy 2022. Nothing on any of the Freedom Convoy 2022 public information mentions Canada Unity or the Bauders at all, at any point, that I could ever find. I even searched their Twitter and couldn't find anything. Canada Unity appears to "support" the effort but is not directly involved, having written a manifesto and Code of Conduct that roughly aligns with them: https://canada-unity.com/bearhug/
At the bottom it mentions some other people involved with Canada Unity, Jason LaFace and Justine Peters. But I also note they get the name wrong, referring at the bottom of it as "Convoy for Freedom 2022" which appears to mix up their own prior "Convoy for Freedom" with Tamara Lich's effort named "Freedom Convoy 2022". This confusion of names seems to be where the press gets it all wrong.
The Freedom Convoy 2022 that is currently situated in downtown Ottawa created a Not-for-Profit org on January 30: https://strategis.ic.gc.ca/app/scr/cc/CorporationsCanada/fdrlCrpDtls.html?corpId=13726851&V_TOKEN=null&crpNm=freedom%202022&crpNmbr=&bsNmbr=
Notice the names. No Bauders. No LaFace or Peters. No overlap at all with Canada Unity at all. No reference to them overlapping.
I've already written about this with all of these links so that I don't have to keep re-writing them, but you refuse to read or look at the evidence: https://adnausica.substack.com/p/protesting-the-pretext-of-the-protests?r=p061j
I've read your link with your evidence, and I investigated it's claims and link to actual source material showing the mistake the article's author makes.
Do you not believe that they could have mistaken these groups? Is it not even possible in your mind? Why is that mistake impossible to you? It seems pretty obvious and easy mistake to me given the similar convoys and names months apart. They don't even claim to be related, and Canada Unity even noted the confusion on the MOU page.
They make me sick to my stomach and to think we have to pay them with our tax dollars to propagate for Trudeau and his corrupt and insidiously ideological Government.
Pick whatever protest movement you agreed with in the last 20 years and imagine these powers being used against them.
We are all here ostensibly because Trudeau and Biden didn’t want to let unvaxxed truckers cross the border anymore. The rule has prevented no covid deaths but it has created this. We should not lose sight of the fact that this is why we are all here.
Does anyone in the entire country actually believe that any guns found weren't planted by the RCMP? The only difference is whether you think that was a good thing to do.
I don't believe that for one second. In fact, I find it utterly absurd speculative nonsense.
Deep appreciation for this dispatch!
It sets out the confounding dilemma that many of us share: we don't want to promote an unreasonably heavy-handed federal government, but on the other hand, jeez, some of these guys have gone way too far.
The Line's work is very impressive. I'm upping my subscription from monthly to annual.
Great precedent for when terrorists attack our pipelines and railways. Liberal cheerleaders need to remember they won't always be in charge.
It's also interesting that *now* we're concerned about foreign funding. Tides foundation, call your office.
What can we do now that we couldn't before? For starters, two main things. 1. The act sets up a watchdog to shut down the alt-right / American funding of this insurrection. That is long-term important. 2. The act tells the big-rig blockaders to get out of Dodge or they can say goodbye to trucking as way of life because 1) their vehicle insurance will be cancelled and 2) their business bank accounts will be frozen. I for one did not see these initiatives coming. To me -- and, I would wager, to most of the bleating sheep in the Ottawa streets -- they were completely unanticipated. I see them as BRILLIANT!
Yes and I hear Hillary is looking at a few years in the pen her self. My god folks we have some Democraps in Canada! Writing on "the Line"! Grab your keys truckers and jump on a back hoe as with these Democrap lovers a shovel will not be big enough. Heck you might want to get a drag line! There is Piles of bull scat coming out over here.
The comments, which used to be worth reading (whether I agree or disagree is neither here nor there) are really mostly abusive rubbish at this point. That’s a shame.
Radio poll this morning (I live on the Left Coast) suggests 81% of people oppose Trudeau invoking the Emergencies Act - and most out here are Green/NDP supporters. Maybe the 19% who support it are our politicians and journalists.
"Radio poll"? What is that?
For that matter, what is "radio"?
The whole process thus far with the protest getting out of hand falls in the lap of Ottawa and Trudeau. Borders should be open - period and that was being done BEFORE this invocation. What REALLY gets my goat is that now there is the claim that 'foriegn money is funding this issue' yet when 'foreign money' supports pipeline blockades, Idle no more, highway blockades against oil/gas/any development then that 'foreign money' is just fine. Where is the logic there? I am very concerned about the future of Canada if we allow this left wing extreemisim to continue from the Liberal govenment with their NDP sidekicks. This protest could have been solved by better planning adn a simple face to face with Trudeau but ...NOOO we had to make it a crisis.
Exactly.
It is "curiouser and curiouser" that the police did not have a plan when the convoy stated to all manner of public media that they were coming to Ottawa & would be looking to shut down government somehow using the GG & the Senate. That, in itself, I think shows American organization that does not understand that these two institutions are only ceremonial in Canada, not like the US Senate. The fact that police did not enforce even simple bylaws in the City of Ottawa is particularly curious and unsettling.
One query - why is this Trudeau"s fault?
I was working on Parliament Hill 52 years and one thing was clear: invoking emergency powers instantly takes much of the oxygen out of adult, democratic debate. Hopefully, Justin Trudeau’s tardy timing and the lack of violence so far will mean less drama today. However, the very language we’re using now—foreign money, emergency, fascists, threat to our democracy—threatens civil discourse and healthy scepticism
Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act to bolster his support from those voters who stand with Trudeau. It's all about optics.
"So rather than try to pass judgment on the wisdom of the entire decision, which is frankly something we're going to need to reflect on further, we want to try and pull out some specific elements of this, and walk you through what we think it means."
This beautiful sentence speaks volumes.
I’m sure that, like many of us, we were awaiting your report on these new developments. Today’s was just an appetizer; can’t wait for the rest of this week.
After the first day of the protest Trudeau had every ability to end it when ever he wanted and he refused to do so. This is all on his shoulders no matter how you, the mainstream media to which you are all members of, try to defend his horrific actions and his putting in the Emergency Act.
When we had the "Shut Down Canada" for a month where they stopped all trains which carry much of our products and caused economic damage, and damage for a longer time, was there any "Emergency Act" brought in? No, in fact our great brave Trudeau said "dialogue" is necessary. So those foreign protesters brought in by the bus loads, and Canadian protesters were left to cause havoc. No one ceased their foreign funded bank accounts calling their stand off an "insurrection"! The Trudeau Government, all by itself, has done more harm to our economy than any protest anywhere could ever do. We should have brought in the "Emergency Act" to remove the pathetic excuse for a Government that keeps shuttering our Parliament and destroying any democracy or freedom we once had. Now we are doomed to utter tyranny and the media has been aiding this all the way along.
In the case you're referring to, the people involved in those blockades own the land. Not so in this case.
Stick with your ideological view and your manure spreaders. I leave that to the farmers, not the media or the ideologues.