Critics of the government fear that they will use threat of ISIS to mute any criticisms about expanding CSIS’ powers while also not increasing any oversight, transparency or accountability for it or other national security agencies. The government claims that any such measures would be “duplicative,” which is risible.
Tag Archives: Terrorism
Roundup: Warnings about changes to the CSIS Act
Stephen Blaney has confirmed that the government will table a bill next week to enhance CSIS’ powers to better combat terrorism, in order to enhance cooperation with our Five Eyes allies, and to enhance the anonymity for CSIS informants. Never mind that the Supreme Court ruled that those sources already have adequate protections, and the fact that the lawyer for Mohamed Harkat warns that the inability to cross-examine this kind of testimony is dangerous. Former Privacy Commissioner Chantal Bernier also warns that rushing into these kinds of changes could have longer-term human rights consequences. But terrorists!
Roundup: The SCC hears the assisted suicide case
The Supreme Court of Canada heard the arguments in the assisted suicide case yesterday, where the BC Civil Liberties Association’s disabled lawyer smashed the arguments of disability groups warning of a “slippery slope,” where the government put forward arguments in favour of a blanket ban that the Justices could scarcely believe, and the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada’s lawyer made specious comparisons to capital punishment. In all, it was a fascinating day at the Court, and we’ll see what decision comes down in a few months’ time. Carissima Mathen gives her recap and analysis to Power Play here.
Roundup: Assisted suicide heads to the SCC
With the Supreme Court challenge to assisted suicide laws heading to the Supreme Court tomorrow, here’s a look at some of the other countries’ laws in that regard. Carissima Mathen gives us a primer on the assisted suicide case going before the Supreme Court this week.
Roundup: 28 instances, fewer charges
The RCMP say they have disrupted or intervened in 28 instances where people have been involved in high-risk travel, be it people returning after fighting with radicals abroad or when they plan on heading over. No word on how many people have had their passports revoked, and there have apparently been no new names added to the no-fly list, and there have been very few charges under anti-terror legislation. The government will likely try to use this low figure to say that we need even more anti-terror laws, and yet it makes one wonder about the actual scope of the problem. Andrew Coyne wonders about the threat that ISIS poses to Canada directly, and if people should be shrugging it all off. (Spoiler alert: no).
Roundup: The problem with political copyright changes
The government doubled down on their leaked plans to change copyright laws to give political parties unfettered access to using news clips in political ads, and accused media outlets of essentially “censoring content” by not broadcasting ads that have material that was taken without permission or compensation. Shelly Glover then went on to misquote copyright law expert Michael Geist to justify the position, leaving everyone to wonder just what exactly they hope to accomplish by picking this fight with the press and with broadcasters, especially after leaking a cabinet document to do so. Paul Wells parses the government’s reasons for this move, and what the unintended consequences will be.
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QP: Major network censorship!
Despite it being a Thursday, none of the major leaders were present in the Chamber for QP. Yay accountability! Megan Leslie kicked off by asking about radicalized Canadians who were not stopped before they left the country. Stephen Blaney said that there were 63 investigations underway covering over 100 individuals, and why didn’t the NDP support their anti-terrorism legislation. Leslie asked why they were relying on US intelligence for these radicals, but Blaney gave a non sequitur about supporting the mission in Iraq. Leslie turned to the Ebola crisis, to which Rona Ambrose assured her of all the ways in which Canada was contributing. Libby Davies carried on asking about the Ebola vaccine and reiterated the tale of the intellectual property concerns, but Ambrose assured her that the supply that was given to the WHO did not have those concerns and it was up to them to decide what to do with it. Davies quoted a WHO release stating that the commercializations of the vaccine was held by that U.S. company. Ambrose, somewhat exasperated, insisted that they were two completely different issues, and the intellectual property on the donated doses belonged to Canada. Ralph Goodale asked about the plans to stuff things like copyright changes into the budget bill. Kevin Sorenson insisted that Goodale wait until the bill was tabled. Goodale blasted the plans to change those copyright plans so that news clips can freely been used in political ads, calling it “expropriation without compensation.” Shelly Glover said she wouldn’t comment on rumours or speculation, but gave an excuse about networks censoring content. No, seriously. The round closed with Dominic LeBlanc giving the same question in French, and Glover repeating as well.
Roundup: Not an imminent threat
The heads of CSIS and the RCMP went to committee to say that while ISIS is not an imminent threat to Canada, we have to be vigilant about domestic terrorism threats. Well, sure. And then Stephen Blaney talked about arresting these people and throwing them behind bars, because you know, due process and stuff. Blaney also said that they won’t be implementing exit controls, because those belong to totalitarian countries – but they do share entry data with the Americans, which is a de facto exit control system because if one enters one country, they had to exit the other. But that’s not totalitarian. Incidentally, the government has also announced funding for a bunch of new studies on finding the root causes of domestic terrorism and radicalization. And here Pierre Poilievre assured us that the root cause of terrorism is terrorists.
Roundup: Live from New York…
Stephen Harper is in New York to attend the UN, so of course that means he’ll speak to American media and reveal things he wouldn’t here at home. So we learned that President Obama has asked for more support in Iraq than we have committed at present, but he won’t say anything more than that, other than “we haven’t out” anything as to what we might send. He also started waxing about something that sounded awfully close to the need to find the “root causes” of radicalizing youth. Harper even said that our deficit figures are smaller than expected, though his Wall Street Journal interviewer did challenge the methodology on some of his claims about just how great our economy is performing. He even made some claims about immigrant voters, which can be disputed once you drill down into the numbers. Suffice to say, it’s more than you get here at home, which remains a problem.
Roundup: The Tabulator gong show
Over in the New Brunswick election last night, their new Tabulator machines which were supposed to deliver election results faster all pretty much fried and turned into a big gong show, with missing ballots and unreadable results, while the company who was contracted out to run the machines didn’t answer calls. With no results being trustworthy, parties began demanding manual recounts, and with a virtual tie result, the final results likely won’t be clear in the morning. And so, let this once again be a lesson that paper ballots should always be used with manual counts because that’s the only tried and true way with actual accountability.