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Thailand Paid $45 Million in COVID Vaccine Injury Claims, While U.S. Has Paid $0

By Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D. | The Defender | March 15, 2022

Thailand’s National Health Security Office (NHSO) as of March 8 has paid 1.509 billion baht (the equivalent of $45.65 million) to settle COVID-19 vaccine injury compensation claims.

The payouts were made to 12,714 people, including family members of some people who died as a result of the vaccine.

An additional 891 claims are pending. A total of 15,933 claims have been filed since the start of the compensation program on May 19, 2021. Of the 2,328 complaints that were rejected, 875 are being appealed.

The figures released on March 9 represent a continued increase in claims approved by Thailand’s NHSO. As of Dec. 26, 2021, only 8,470 claims had been approved for compensation.

The vaccines being administered in Thailand are primarily the British-Swedish AstraZeneca vaccine, and the Chinese-made Sinovac vaccine.

Thailand’s vaccine injury compensation program is an example of a “no-fault compensation program.”

As reported by The Defender in December 2021, “no-fault” refers to a measure put in place by public health authorities, private insurance companies, manufacturers and/or other stakeholders to compensate individuals harmed by vaccines.

Such programs allow a person who has sustained a vaccine injury to be compensated financially, without having to attribute fault or error to a specific manufacturer or individual.

No-fault compensation schemes are one of three options used by various countries to handle vaccine injury claims.

The other two options include allowing vaccine-injured people to sue private-sector actors, such as vaccine manufacturers or their insurers, or to place the full financial burden on the patient.

In the case of Thailand, the compensation scheme sets forth the following payout categories:

  • For cases of death or permanent disability, each family receives 400,000 baht ($11,928).
  • Those who sustained a disability that affects their livelihood or who lost a limb receive 240,000 baht ($7,157).
  • For other injuries or illnesses sustained as a result of COVID vaccination, a maximum of 100,000 baht ($2,982) is paid out.

For the third category of claims, the specific amount awarded is contingent on the level of damages found to have been caused by the vaccine, as well as the financial state of the patient.

When the compensation fund was set up in 2021, Dr. Jadej Thammatacharee, the NHSO’s secretary-general, stated the available funds would total 100 million baht ($2.98 million), but that initial budget already has been exceeded many times over.

Thailand’s “no-fault” system makes it easy to secure compensation, at least when compared to similar schemes in the U.S. and other western countries.

Claims can be submitted by the individuals in question, or their families, at the hospital where they were vaccinated, at provincial health offices, or at NHSO regional offices. Moreover, claims can be entered up to two years after the adverse effects first occur.

Any individual claiming injury or side effects can file a claim for initial financial aid to provide an unspecified amount to claimants prior to confirmation that the injuries resulted from the vaccine.

If it is later determined the adverse effects were not a result of the vaccine, the claimants are entitled to keep this initial financial payout.

The turnaround time on claims also appears to be quick, when compared to the U.S. and several other countries.

The Bangkok Post reported that 13 panels across Thailand meet on a weekly basis to consider compensation claims. Those that are approved are paid within five days. Rejected claims can be appealed directly to the NHSO secretary-general within 30 days.

Available figures from the Thai authorities do not break down the number awarded claims for deaths, serious injuries and disabilities, or other injuries and adverse effects.

However, according to information provided by Thailand’s Department of Disease Control (DDC), as of Oct. 24, 2021, three deaths were linked to COVID vaccination.

According to Chawetsan Namwat, the DDC’s director for emergency health hazard and disease control, two of these deaths were a result of thrombosis. The other death came after the onset of a severe allergic reaction and shock following the administration of the vaccine.

Of the 842 deaths that were investigated up until that date, 541 were found to be “coincidental events,” including cardiovascular disease, stroke, pulmonary embolism, blood infections, lung inflammation, lung cancer and breast cancer.

For an additional 66 deaths, it was inconclusive whether the vaccine led to the fatalities — with 47 of these individuals also having been diagnosed with cardiovascular disease.

A further 41 deaths were categorized as “unclassified,” as there was not enough information available to make a determination regarding whether the deaths were linked to the vaccines.

According to a Feb. 18 briefing from healthdata.org, COVID-19 was the 13th most common cause of death in the country for the preceding week, behind such causes as chronic kidney disease, liver cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, diabetes mellitus and road injuries.

Ischemic heart disease and stroke were recorded as the top two causes of death in Thailand during the same period.

U.S. remains ‘stuck’ at one approved vaccine injury claim since November 2021

As previously reported by The Defender, as of Nov. 1, 2021, only one COVID vaccine injury claim had been approved for compensation by the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP).

As of today, the figure remains at one — a claim which has not yet been paid. No new claims were compensated in the interim.

As reported by the CICP:

“As of March 1, 2022, the CICP has not compensated any COVID-19 countermeasures claims.

“Six COVID-19 countermeasure claims have been denied compensation because the standard of proof for causation was not met and/or a covered injury was not sustained.

“One COVID-19 countermeasure claim, a COVID-19 vaccine claim due to an anaphylactic reaction, has been determined eligible for compensation and is pending a review of eligible expenses.”

Last week, U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) introduced the Countermeasure Injury Compensation Amendment Act to help expedite claims by those injured by COVID vaccines.

The bill would amend the CICP to improve responsiveness, create a commission to examine the injuries directly caused as a result of COVID countermeasures and allow those whose claims have been previously rejected to resubmit claims for new consideration.

With only one claim approved for compensation and six claims denied, the CICP has a backlog of approximately 7,050 claims, with 4,097 claims alleging injuries or death from COVID vaccines, and an additional 2,959 claims alleging injuries or death from other COVID countermeasures.

Since 2010, a total of 7,547 compensation claims have been filed with the CICP. Only 41 were deemed eligible for compensation; still fewer (30) were actually compensated.

Notably, as of the March 4 release of Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) data, a total of 1,168,894 adverse effects following COVID vaccination have been reported, including 25,158 deaths and 46,515 cases of permanent disability.

Historically, VAERS has been shown to report only 1% of actual vaccine adverse events.

CICP was established under the aegis of the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness (PREP) Act of 2005. The PREP act was developed to coordinate the response to a “public health emergency.”

The law is scheduled to remain in place until 2024.

CICP differs from another U.S. federal vaccine compensation program, the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP), which was established after the passage of the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986.

VICP, however, covers only those vaccines routinely administered to children and to pregnant women. To help fund the program, those vaccines are subject to a federal 75-cent excise tax.

To date, more than 8,400 VICP claims have been settled, out of more than 24,000 petitions, with a total of $4.6 billion issued in settlements.

The small number of approved compensation claims and the slow review process has recently led to calls for the modernization of vaccine compensation programs in the U.S.

Other western countries appear to have developed similarly cumbersome compensation procedures.

For instance, Australia’s newly established no-fault vaccine compensation system was described as “intentionally complex and narrowly targeted.”

Canada, which also only recently established a no-fault compensation program, as of Dec. 16, 2021, had approved fewer than five of 400 claims filed. More recent data from Canada’s Vaccine Injury Support Program is unavailable as of this writing.

Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D., is an independent journalist and researcher based in Athens, Greece.

© 2022 Children’s Health Defense, Inc. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of Children’s Health Defense, Inc. Want to learn more from Children’s Health Defense? Sign up for free news and updates from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and the Children’s Health Defense. Your donation will help to support us in our efforts.

March 17, 2022 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

This doctor’s alarming observations are sufficient to halt the COVID vaccines in the US

By Steve Kirsch | March 9, 2022

Overview

On March 5, “A Midwestern Doctor” (who I will abbreviate as “AMD”) published a long Substack article that meticulously chronicled his/her observations of adverse events (AEs) associated with the COVID vaccine. This is very rare as most doctors are too busy to do such an analysis. Based on the observation of this one doctor alone, the critical event rates are high enough to justify that the vaccines should be immediately halted based on safety concerns.

Background

AMD has to hide his/her identity or he/she will be fired. That’s how the medical system is designed: if you speak against the system, you lose your job. Period.

So to make things easier, I’ll assume AMD is a man.

The AEs documented by AMD were partly from his own patients, but mostly related by people who AMD directly knows. So no more than one step removed: a direct friend of a direct friend.

The results of his analysis (from the Conclusion section of the article):

  1. Critical Injuries: 41
  2. Severe Injuries: 39
  3. Significant Reactions: 32

In AMD’s history, there were no critical injuries for all other vaccines combined. Zero.

But the important part was this statement:

Typically when a drug has between 10-100 critical injuries reported to the FDA, they strongly look at pulling it from the market or giving it a blackbox warning.  I thus feel these vaccines are not being held to the adverse reporting standard we expect.

In other words, based on just the data AMD directly collected, the vaccine exceeds the stopping condition.

The numerator and denominator

AMD used more than his own patients: he also used friends of his friends.

AMD’s cases were split: 60% reached out to him with stories and 40% was due to his outreach.

How confident is he that every single case was vaccine related? For half of these cases, there was an extremely strong time correlation or other factors, so he’s extremely confident of a causality link. For the other half of the cases, the causality is extremely likely.

Because his sample includes only the direct friends of his friends, he estimates that the “denominator” in his case is less than 100,000 to be conservative (the average person has around 150 to 250 friends so this is quite conservative). There will be fewer than this due to overlap, but again, we aren’t trying to get to an exact number, just a rough engineering estimate.

AMD’s extended friend pool consists of a mix of vaxxed and unvaxxed people in our calculation. Since he’s a doctor, his mix of vaxxed patients will be higher than others so this may skew our extrapolation to be on the high side, but we are just trying to do a ballpark estimate of what the national rates might look like.

Let’s extrapolate that out to a population of 200M people who are over 18 years old and vax eligible. We’d have to multiply his numbers by 2,000 to get a lower bound on the number of events expected. This isn’t strictly accurate since AMD’s friend base is older and the AEs in the older group would not occur at the same rate as the younger group. So again, not trying to get a a super precise estimate since it isn’t needed as we’ll soon see.

So we have 41*2000 = a minimum of 82,000 estimated critical events caused by the vaccine in our crude estimate.

This is within a factor of 2 of the minimum of 150,000 deaths I’ve previously estimated for the vaccine (using over a dozen different methods). So it appears we were right in that our estimate was conservative. And our crude extrapolation also is well within numbers previously determined so it serves as a crude sanity check that the numbers reported by AMD were “reasonable.”

Comparing with our 10 to 100 critical event stopping condition, we find:

82,000 >> 10 to 100

The stopping condition for the vaccine is met not only from AMD’s direct observations alone (even adjusting a factor of 2 for causality doubts), but also for our conservative (and very crude) estimate of the total number of critical events in the US. QED.

Finally, let’s be clear: I am not claiming that we can extrapolate a single anecdote to an entire population to get an accurate rate estimate. I am only claiming that AMD’s observations alone justify halting the vaccines and that any extrapolation of that number to the entire population based on any reasonable assumptions shows that the stopping condition is exceeded by a large margin.

What other doctors are seeing

AMD polled his colleagues to see if they were seeing the same thing.

  1. 30% confirmed they were
  2. 70% said they either saw nothing at all and/or didn’t want to talk about it

He attributes the 70% seeing nothing as them not being aware of the possibility that the vaccines could be unsafe so any adverse reactions are immediately discounted and discarded; they don’t register.

Therefore, even if we further discount our calculation of 82,000 by 70% in the belief that these rates seen by AMD are inflated, the number critically harmed (24,600) is still way over our stopping threshold and that’s really the only thing I wanted to show.

The Pfizer Phase 3 clinical trial

AMD noted that when the shots were administered, people quickly discovered a high rate of anaphylaxis.

He asked, “How could the clinical trial not have found that?”

Indeed. Anaphylaxis wasn’t mentioned at all in the Phase 3 trial report despite the fact that it is life threatening.

It wasn’t mentioned in the 6 month follow up study either. That study would have included reactions of the placebo cohort who got the vaccine.

Anaphylaxis occurs at 2.47 events per 10,000 doses so there should have been around 10 events observed for the full-vaccinated treatment group (44,000 doses) and a similar number of events when the placebo group was vaccinated.

So we should have seen 21 anaphylaxis events on average yet there were none reported. This is extremely unlikely to happen by chance.

How does Pfizer explain that? This is, of course, a rhetorical question as nobody is going to ask them that question and they don’t have to answer it. That’s just the way it works in medicine. You are not allowed to ask questions like this. It’s “science.” We are teaching our kids to believe whatever the drug companies tell them and not ask questions.

One other “highlight”

This comment at the very end of AMD’s article deserves special mention:

Or as another commenter here wrote: I was a Midwestern nurse last year after the gene therapy roll out. Was a case mgr did discharge planning. Saw 10-12 side effects Daily. Everything you shared and more. 2 cases of amnesia ( one was a healthy anesthesiologist). 1 girl in her twenties with blood in her tears. Had to leave that job.

A girl with blood in her tears?!?! When was the last time you saw that?

Notes

In his writeup, AMD made the case write ups deliberately vague in order to protect patient confidentiality.

Reader feedback

Check out this comment on what is happening in Melbourne, Australia mirrors what was described in this article. She explains “doctors are very worried about what they’re seeing from the jabs but keeping quiet to save their jobs.” Makes perfect sense. A doctor’s first duty is to his/her family. I see this all the time. This is why the doctors I talk to stay quiet. I don’t blame them.

Another reader wrote this:

 Steve,

I love your work. The physician in the Midwest is right. I am a practicing ophthalmologist in the southeast and have come across multiple catastrophic side effects from the shots. I have been sounding the alarm to my friends and colleagues for over a year. Most of these think I am crazy.

It started last year in roughly March when I walked into a patient’s preposition room to have a mom sign a consent. She apologises to me that she had trouble writing for she had just recently had a stroke. I told her I was glad she was here then asked if she knew what the cause was. “It was that shot” she said. She was in the hospital that night. I then went to the OR and told my CRNA the story. She proceeded to tell me her friends daughter died (39) died with a pulmonary embolus 1 month after getting one. I told this to one of my partners who said his friend was in the hospital with myocarditis after having a shot.

I also know of a physician in a nearby practice dropping dead at 52 with a heart attack. He had recently been vaccinated according to his front desk.

I also know of 3 breast cancer diagnosis after vaccinations as well as a transverse myelitis and a brain stem glioma. All of these had been vaccinated but I cannot say that these were caused by the shots.

One of my parent’s good friend’s son in law died suddenly from a heart attack at 39. He was also recently vaccinated.

In my own practice, I have 3 patients with side effects. 1 with increased intracranial pressure . Almost immediately after the second Pfizer dose the patient started experiencing headaches. I saw the child about a week after and she had swollen optic nerves.

A second had uveitis roughly 2 weeks after the first dose.

A third patient had a “spontaneous “ vitreous hemorrhage within 2 weeks of a dose.

There are some others I know of too…

If I mention these to most doctors, they just look at me with blank stares. I have been ridiculed, reprimanded and threatened for just telling physicians my observations.

These need to be stopped yesterday.

Summary

Based on the number of just this one physician’s observations, the vaccines should be immediately halted.

AMD is not an isolated data point. He discovered that 30% of his colleagues are seeing similar things.

I can also personally confirm that speaking confidentially with other physicians (who fear retribution such as loss of medical licenses if they speak out), that AMD is hardly alone. The doctors I know have never before needed to report an event to VAERS in the past and this year have had 20 and 1,000 case reports to make. They won’t talk to the FDA about what they see because they don’t want to have their licenses revoked.

As AMD’s case shows, the medical community makes it impossible for these doctors to speak freely and tell what they know. Doctors are forced to hide in the shadows to tell their story or simply remain silent.

The days of colleagues having open friendly discussions to resolve conflicts are gone. The medical community now uses fear and intimidation techniques to silence any scientific dissent. For example, in Canada, an entire university ganged up on Dr. Byram Bridle to discredit him for speaking out. Would any of the University of Guelph faculty debate him? Of course not! No chance. Some faculty members even signed the joint faculty letter denigrating him without even reading the document he wrote. In their mind, Professor Bridle was wrong and they didn’t even have to bother to take the time to understand his position.

In California today, the legislature is seeking to further empower the medical boards to remove the license of any physician who speaks out against the vaccines. It is a top down dictatorship with the Medical Boards holding all the cards. They are not accountable to anyone. They will not be questioned. In many cases, the doctors who are having their license revoked don’t even know who is examining them and are not allowed to question the authorities on the record. So the boards cannot be held accountable for their actions.

Even though the evidence is clear that these vaccines are harmful and should be stopped, we, as a society, are doing the opposite today with vaccine mandates requiring people to be boosted or be fired. We are requiring doctors like AMD to keep their mouths shut.

There is even a US government form now so you can turn in any doctor who challenges the official narrative. Basically, the government is asking us to be spies to help them eliminate people who disagree with the narrative.

Someone isn’t telling you the truth here, and it isn’t A Midwestern Doctor.

You should be upset. Very upset. This is unconscionable.

Unfortunately, no public health official in America wants to talk about it, and the mainstream press isn’t going to cover it either.

March 11, 2022 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

Canadian banks champion WEF-proposed Digital IDs

By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | March 8, 2022

As Canada’s digital ID plans move closer, the Canadian Banking Association (CBA) is pushing for a national digital identification system. In a recent whitepaper, the World Economic Forum also argued for dystopian-sounding digital IDs, which could be used to decide who gets access to services, adding that banks should lead the way.

Plastic cards and paper licenses are an outdated technology that should be replaced with a digital identification system, says president and CEO of the Canadian Bankers Association, Neil Parmenter.

The CBA published a white paper in 2018 titled “Canada’s Digital ID Future – A Federated Approach,” where it outlined how Canada can transition from the current system to a digital identification system.

The white paper claims: “The advantages to the federated digital ID system are clear for Canada. Unlike a centralized identity framework that puts the control of identity under one key player, a federated identity system leverages multiple systems, eliminating reliance on a single service provider. In other words, there is no single point of control or failure that can compromise the entire system. A federated model would also align with Canada’s federal structure by creating linkages between provincial and federal government identity management systems.”

A lot of information could be stored in someone’s digital ID, including biometric data, driver’s license, financial tools, and healthcare information. Other data that could be added include vaccine status, criminal record, credit score, and gun license status.

In its report, the World Economic Forum said that banks should spearhead digital identity projects.

“Canada’s strong financial institutions must play a key role. The World Economic Forum stated in its report financial institutions should champion efforts to build digital ID systems and lead the creation and implementation of identity platforms,” reads the white paper.

Parmenter reiterated that the WEF recommended financial institutions because they are “highly regulated and trusted.” He added that they have “advanced cybersecurity and privacy technology and they have the infrastructure to operate provincially and nationally.”

Canada was recently criticized for freezing the bank accounts of civil liberties supporters.

March 9, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Leave a comment

GoFundMe admits violence allegation from Mayor was enough to shut down speech

By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | March 8, 2022

GoFundMe said it shut down the Freedom Convoy’s fundraising page because the office of the mayor told executives that the protesters were committing “violent” acts, according to testimony during a House of Commons public safety committee hearing last week.

The admission raises the alarm on the issue of how the mere accusation of violence is enough to get speech shut down.

During the hearing, GoFundMe lawyer Kim Wilford said that the company had “reached out” to Ottawa’s mayor Jim Watson’s office about the Freedom Convoy.

The mayor’s office told GoFundMe that there were “reports of harassment, violence, damage occurring.”

“Based on this credible information we made informed decisions that this campaign no longer complied with our terms of service and we removed it from the platform,” Wilford said.

However, most of the 197 arrested protesters have been charged with mischief. The two people who were arrested for uttering threats and carrying a concealed weapon were not part of the actual convoy, according to Blacklock’s Reporter.

Watson’s office claimed that before meeting with GoFundMe, on Feb. 3, fights had already broken out, residents were being harassed and masks were being ripped off citizens.”

CPC MP Doug Shipley said during the hearing, that all MPs were “given briefings” about the protests, but “nowhere ever did I see in any of the reports shared that there was violence, threatening behavior and damage and destruction.”

Canada’s Minister of Public Safety, Marco Mendicino, countered by claiming that the lack of criminal charges “doesn’t mean it [violence] did not happen.”

March 8, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Leave a comment

Reflections on War, Injections, and Terror at This Crossroads in History Part I

By Professor Anthony Hall | Global Research | March 7, 2022

In late February the international news cycle moved between two very important focuses. One addressed controversies in Canada. The other continues to highlight events unfolding primarily in Russia, Ukraine, and the USA. While different in many ways, both stories have many-faceted worldwide implications.  

Both involve configurations of power and intrigue that overlap in crucial ways. Both involve conflicts with profound life-and-death implications. Both conflicts highlight that humanity and our civilizational inheritances are at a crossroads.

At this parting of the ways, the most well-travelled autobahn looming up ahead points towards tyrannies far more extreme than anything we have known in history so far.

Whatever highway we follow, it seems there is no escaping the onslaught of new forms of aggressive warfare that are fast pushing humanity into a jagged collision with high-tech weaponry capable of unprecedented destruction. To say we are living in dangerous times is a gross understatement.

Will humanity be subjected to even greater extremes of outright militarization? Will we continue to be assaulted by a novel array of overt and covert tactics aimed at radically re-engineering society as well as the very genetic attributes of the human genome? Will human beings continue to be reconfigured to advance the conditions of our decline into submissive enslavement? Will we continue to be subject to litanies of media lies, strategies of behavior modification, and unregulated medical experiments aimed at merging our biological persons with aspects of digital technology?

See this and this.

Some common themes wind through the convoluted array of unregulated assaults that menace humanity’s very survival in anything like the God-given form we inherited from nature. Powerful enemy forces are exploiting for their own self-interested advantage, our credulousness, naivety, and susceptibility to programs of mind control. The goal of the master class, it seems, is to modify our behavior so we can be better integrated into a world of pervasive robotization.

Enslavement With the Help of Digital IDs Combined with Cashless Transactions

Right now in the Western countries’ onslaughts of psychological warfare are integral to the military showdown initiated in Eurasia.

While experts in “perception management” are using the media to lure the public into single-minded condemnation of Russia, our attention is being drawn away from stunning revelations coming to light in our midst.

The disclosures underway illuminate the role of COVID Officialdom in forcing on us through mandates and other coercive techniques, highly lethal and injurious medical procedures. These procedures have been purposely designed to induce pathogenic outcomes and depopulation agendas. Throughout Europe and North America, dramatic increases in all-cause rates of death are being reported especially by life insurance companies and funeral homes.

One result is that Pfizer and Moderna investors are “running for the exit.” Former BlackRock investment advisor, Edward Dowd, has sounded the alarm on Moderna and Pfizer “as sinking ships that investors need to abandon.”

See this.

The bad news for the vaccine companies and their notoriously negligent regulators is compounded by the fact that their indemnification is threatened.

The companies and their regulators can be sued if it can be demonstrated that they have lied about their products. Indeed, they have lied on an epic scale and continue to do so. The evidence is clear that the inadequately-tested medical injections advertised as “safe and effective” are no such thing. Now there are headlines proclaiming, “Pfizer and Moderna are modern versions of Enron.”

See this and this. 

As blanket coverage of the Ukrainian conflict dominates the media, the next stage in the insidious COVID con is being executed with blitzkrieg speed. The objective is to rush humanity into a privatized system of universalized and standardized Digital ID before most people have an opportunity to get informed on the fuller implications.

The growing contingent of people devoted to principled non-compliance to the myriad COVID frauds must resist allowing the COVID hucksters to advance their diabolical agenda. The COVID con men and women must be forced to back away from their attempt at making sweeping appropriations and instrumentalizations of yet more elements of our private information. We need to hold the line against slick kleptocrats seeking total control of everything through digital invasion and theft of the little that remains of our personal realms.

Included in the Digital ID con job is the creation of a new type of One World digital currency presently being rushed into existence by the private central banks holding membership in the Swiss-based Bank of International Settlements (BIS). This process is being pushed ahead in partnership with the dystopian World Economic Forum (WEF).

Recently Klaus Schwab, the WEF’s founder, bragged that more than one-half of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Canadian cabinet is infiltrated with WEF insiders. Chrystia Freeland, the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, is one of them.

In fact Freeland is currently a prominent member of the WEF’s governing body of trustees. As shall become clear, Freeland is emblematic of the abundant conflicts-of-interest and round-the-clock lies that have come to characterize the Liberal Party during the time of Trudeau’s denigration of public office in Canada.

See this, this, this and this. 

A pervasive system of social credit scoring is taking shape with the rush to entrench in many jurisdictions a transnational system of Digital IDs. The other necessary element is our willingness to go along with the creation of a single digital currency. The new system requires the consolidation of a One World megabank that is meant as a key element in the so-called Great Reset.

The advancement of a system of total surveillance and total control requires the termination of all cash transactions. Hence our insistence on continuing the conduct of business through the circulation of cash must be an expression of our principled non-compliance.

The merger of Digital ID together with the replacement of cash transactions would give central authorities the ability to cut off our “freedoms,” including, for instance, even our capacity to buy food. The entrapment of people in digital enclosures would put the vast majority of humans in a virtual penitentiary of unmitigated top-down authority.

See this.

A Matter of Life or Death for Russia

The creation of a social credit dystopia is being pushed rapidly forward under the cover of wall-to-wall coverage devoted to Russia’s intervention in Ukraine. According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Russian troops are intervening with the goal of “demilitarizing and denazifying Ukraine.”

It is also thought that Putin intends to dismantle about fifteen US biological warfare labs. The Pentagon sponsors of these “research facilities” for mass murder would have us believe they are engaged in a “Biologic Threat Reduction Program.”

In his memorable speech of 24 Feb., Putin claims that the Russian mission in Ukraine, “is not a plan to occupy the Ukrainian territory.” The Russian government asserts that its actions in Ukraine are necessary for the protection of the Russian Mother Country. Over many years Putin has been stressing the themes that the Russian Armed Forces are now acting upon.

The explanation of this military operation as an act of self-defense depends on a historical analysis highlighting the decades-long campaign to strangle Russia in a boa constrictor’s grip of NATO’s aggressive militarism. The core agreements enabling the end of the Cold War have been violated by the patterns of NATO’s expansion since 1991.

NATO has been ingesting former Soviet republics into a US-backed militarized zone of organized anti-Russia zealotry. As Putin warned again and again over recent years, the US goal of transforming Ukraine into yet another militarized enemy of Moscow established a “red line,” a “matter of life or death” for Russia.

See this.

“The Controversies in Canada” will be the object of a followup article by Professor Anthony Hall

March 7, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

International nuclear watchdog passes resolution on Ukraine

RT March 3, 2022

In a resolution passed on Thursday by its board of directors, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reportedly “deplored” Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia has denounced the document, calling it politicized and factually incorrect.

The resolution, which is yet to be published, apparently calls on Russia to allow the Ukrainian authorities to resume control of its nuclear sites. Moscow says the assertion that they are not already in control is incorrect.

There were claims that Russian troops had occupied the site of the destroyed Chernobyl nuclear power plant as they moved from Belarus towards Kiev. The Russian Defense Ministry has denied them, stating that Ukrainian guards remained in control of the facility.

On March 1, Reuters gave a preview of the draft of the damning resolution, which was penned by Poland and Canada on behalf of Ukraine.

The news of the resolution’s passage, with just two votes having been cast against it at the session of the 35-member board, was welcomed by Ukraine. Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba claimed in a tweet that it showed the world was “united against Russia’s actions, which threaten Ukraine and all of Europe.”

Russia’s representative at the IAEA, Mikhail Ulyanov, blasted the document, claiming it contained “intentional politically motivated lies and mistakes.” In particular, the assertion that the Ukrainian authorities were not in control of the nation’s nuclear sites was wrong, the official said in a series of tweets.

Moscow was satisfied that “countries whose populations taken together exceed a half of the mankind refused to support the resolution,” Ulyanov added.

China has confirmed that it voted against the resolution. Its representative, Wang Qun, said the document “obviously” overstepped the agency’s mandate to monitor nuclear security, and that by adopting the resolution, it had undermined the IAEA’s position as a professional, non-political organization.

The diplomat complained that some nations had “forcibly pushed” the draft and rejected suggestions submitted by other board members about how to improve the document.

Earlier on Thursday, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi confirmed to journalists that all safety precautions the agency had taken in Ukraine remained intact.

March 3, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Nuclear Power | , , , | Leave a comment

UKRAINE: SEIZED BY GLOBALISTS – CANADIAN INVOLVEMENT – CIA, FREELAND

Amazing Polly | October 10, 2019

I discuss how *G.Soros* & Canada are pivotal to the Globalist takeover of Ukraine. This seems to involve the CIA in its capacity as part of an underground international Intelligence Apparatus which I believe was set up during & after WW2 in Project RUSTY.

I have the BEST audience on the internet! and I want to thank you all for your support & comments. If you would like to send a financial contribution so that I can keep doing this work, please click the following link or go to my website, amazingpolly.net

I also focus on the major role Canadians have played in Ukraine.. There’s a lot going on here, so grab a pen. :)

NOTE: the photo I say is of Oleh Havrylyshyn is not him. I put in the wrong file. more…

I have the BEST audience on the internet! and I want to thank you all for your support & comments. If you would like to send a financial contribution so that I can keep doing this work, please click the following link or go to my website, amazingpolly.net

References:

Chrystia Freeland Macleans: https://www.macleans.ca/news/liberal-mp-chrystia-freeland-this-time-not-on-the-economy-but-on-ukraine/

Anti Trump Freeland Macleans: https://www.macleans.ca/politics/what-if-donald-trump-has-a-point-with-chrystia-freeland/

The World According to Soros: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1995/01/23/the-world-according-to-soros

Halyna Freeland and Soros: https://www.kyivpost.com/article/content/ukraine-politics/qa-the-ukrainian-legal-foundation39s-halyna-freela-1344.html

Soros & Ukraine: http://willzuzak.ca/lp/soros01.html

US caused Orange Revolution: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa

Orange Revolution aftermath: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122584545

NYT Clinton Pinchuk: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/21/us/politics/hillary-clinton-presidential-campaign-charity.html

Zelensky Pinchuk Kuchma together again: https://www.unian.info/politics/10581132-zelensky-s-adviser-pinchuk-helps-to-persuade-kuchma-to-re-join-minsk-talks.html

European Dev Bank, ..

March 1, 2022 Posted by | Corruption, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , | Leave a comment

Canadian Strongman sending troops to Russian border

RT | February 22, 2022

Canada is boosting its military presence at Russia’s border and sanctioning Russian sovereign debt, parliamentarians and companies, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced on Tuesday, citing what he said was an “invasion” of Ukraine.

Up to 460 members of the Canadian Armed Forces will head to the Baltic country of Latvia, which shares a border with Russia, to join the 540 Canadian troops already stationed there.

A frigate of the Royal Canadian Navy is also headed to the area, accompanied by one or more CP-140 Aurora spy planes, Ottawa has announced.

Trudeau’s government has banned Canadians from buying Russian sovereign debt and having any financial dealings with Donetsk or Lugansk, which Ottawa sees as part of Ukraine. Canada has also blacklisted Russian parliamentarians who voted in favor of recognizing the two Donbass republics as independent, as well as Russian banks, military contractors and companies.

“Canada and our allies will defend democracy. We are taking these actions today to stand against authoritarianism,” Trudeau said. “The people of Ukraine, like all people, must be free to determine their own future.”

He is currently governing under the Emergency Act, which he invoked last week – for the first time in Canadian history – in order to crack down on a trucker protest against his Covid-19 mandates.

Ottawa’s sanctions and troop deployments are following the lead of Washington, which announced both measures earlier on Tuesday. US President Joe Biden has ordered around 800 US troops currently in Italy to reposition in the Baltic states, while sending eight F-35 jets from Germany to Eastern Europe and 32 Apache attack helicopters to Poland from their bases in Germany and Greece.

On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized the two breakaway regions as independent states, citing Kiev’s purported refusal to implement the provisions of the Minsk agreements and accusing Ukraine of preferring violence to negotiating with them on autonomy.

February 22, 2022 Posted by | Militarism | | Leave a comment

The Ugly Face of Trudeau Regime Tyranny in Canada’s Capital

By Stephen Lendman | February 21, 2022

According to local media reports, Trudeau regime storm troopers arrested 191 nonviolent freedom-fighting truckers and supporters through Sunday.

Towing removed 57 vehicles.

The Ottawa police tweeted that operations continue “to remove all vehicles parked” near parliament Hill.

According to interim police chief Steve Bell:

“We will continue to work through the night, through the coming day and/or days until” streets are cleared.

As of Sunday, 103 peaceful protesters, threatening no one, face phony charges, including mischief and obstructing police.

According to Ottawa mayor Jim Watson, (illegally) seized vehicles may be sold instead of returning them to their rightful owners.

Defying the rule of law, Watson falsely claimed the right to “confiscate…vehicles and sell them (sic),” adding:

“I want to see them sold. I don’t want (them) return(ed).”

So-called investigations of police state violence against peaceful protesters assure coverup and denial whitewashing ahead.

Bell signaled what’s coming by claiming that police on horseback didn’t trample anyone.

Two protesters “collided” with horses, he said, falsely blaming the injured for police state violence.

Saying “no one (was) seriously injured (by) police actions. Safety is our priority” ignored trampling, beating, pepper-spraying and other violence against peaceful protesters by Trudeau regime goon squads.

Draconian actions flagrantly breached Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedom.

Trudeau regime tyranny abolished it.

The Ottawa Police Service (OPS) also tweeted:

“If you are involved in this protest, we will actively look to identify you and follow up with financial sanctions and criminal charges.”

A Freedom Convoy 2022 statement said:

“The use of more force will only be used to punish people, and not preserve or establish order.”

Commenting on Trudeau regime police state tactics, GOP Senator Rand Paul said the following:

“The Emergency edict that Trudeau has done in Canada allows him to do some horrendous things.”

“It allows him to stop travel, allows him to detain people without trial.”

Separately, Paul tweeted:

“Canada became Egypt…ruled by emergency edict that allows prohibition of public assembly, travel, and the commandeering of private companies without your day in court.”

Last week, Canadian Law Professor Ryan Alford condemned Trudeau’s “power grab.”

At a time when no national emergency exists, an invented one alone, Alford stressed that “not a single violent incident” justified Trudeau’s abuse of power.

He “failed to meet the requirements for invoking the Emergencies Act.”

“His doing so is clearly unconstitutional.”

Over the weekend, US Rep. Yvette Herrell said she’ll “introduc(e) legislation (to) temporarily grant asylum to innocent Canadian protesters who are being persecuted by their own government.”

“We cannot be silent as our neighbors to the north are treated so badly.”

At this time, constitutional law in Canada is null and void.

Trudeau regime tyranny replaced it.

A Final Comment

On February 23, US truckers comprising the People’s Convoy will depart from Adelanto Stadium in southern California for Washington, DC.

They’ll be joined by “frontline doctors, lawyers, first-responders, former military servicemen and women, students, retirees, mothers, fathers and children – on this peaceful and law-abiding transcontinental journey toward the east coast.”

Their mission is all about “freedom and unity…restor(ing) accountability…lifting (draconian) mandates and ending a state of emergency when none exists.

Organizations involved in the freedom-fighting mission include:

The Unity Project

The America Project

Advocates for Citizens’ Rights

US Freedom Flyers

The American Foundation for Civil Liberties & Freedom

Faith groups from every spectrum

Independent journalists are accompanying the truckers to report accurately on their peaceful, law-abiding mission.

It’s being assisted by retired military personnel and security experts.

At this time, arrival in Washington is expected on March 5.

ThePeople’sConvoy.org is the official website of the mission for accurate information.

The Truckers’ Declaration states the following:

“We the People of the United States, in Order to restore our once perfect Union, re-establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense of all, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty, do ordain and establish the restoration movement of The People’s Convoy for the United States of America.”

“WE DEMAND THE DECLARATION OF NATIONAL EMERGENCY CONCERNING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC BE LIFTED IMMEDIATELY AND OUR CHERISHED CONSTITUTION REIGN SUPREME.”

“WE ARE THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND WE STAND TOGETHER UNDER THE BANNER OF FREEDOM – FREEDOM IS THE ONE THING THAT UNITES US ALL.”

“LIBERTY FLOWS THROUGH ALL OF OUR VEINS.”

Trudeau regime tyranny suggests what likely awaits the People’s Convoy in Washington on arrival or in the days that follow.

The choice of freedom-loving people everywhere is unambiguous.

Eliminate draconian health and freedom-destroying mandates or they’ll eliminate us.

February 21, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Solidarity and Activism, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Canadian MP CENSORED For Pointing Out WEF’s Corrupt Influence Over Trudeau Regime

By Jamie White | Infowars | February 19, 2022

A Canadian MP was shut down in Parliament Saturday after bringing up the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) influence over Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet.

Conservative MP Colin Carrie pointed out how WEF founder Klaus Schwab once bragged that his Young Global Leaders group had “penetrated” Trudeau’s government before he was abruptly cut off by the speaker of the House of Commons.

“I had a constituent who wanted me to ask a qustion about outside interference to our democracy. Klaus Schwab is the head of the World economic Forum and he bragged how his subservice WEF has ‘infiltrated governments around the world’, he said that his organization had penetrated more than half of Canada’s cabinet,” Carrie stated.

“In the interest of transparency, could the member please name which Cabinet ministers are on board with the WEF’s agenda? My concern is -” Carrie continued before the Speaker abruptly cut him off, calling the “audio” of his remarks “really, really bad.”

At that point, New Democratic Party (NDP) MP Charlie Angus accused Carrie of spreading “disinformation” for simply asking about this disturbing relationship between Trudeau and the WEF.

The fact is, Carrie’s remarks are 100% accurate.

WEF founder Klaus Schwab is on video bragging that his organization “penetrated” Prime Minister Trudeau’s government:

Trudeau himself has met with the WEF founder numerous times over the years as Prime Minister, with Schwab even once bragging that Trudeau was more loyal to the WEF than to Canada.

https://twitter.com/TheNo1Waffler/status/1493702862471323661

Additionally, several members of Trudeau’s Cabinet are openly associated with the WEF, such as Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, who serves as a governing member of the globalist body’s board.

Rather than openly discuss the clear conflicts of interest related to Trudeau’s relationship with the World Economic Forum, the liberal wing of Parliament instead resorted to their typical authoritarian method of censorship and gaslighting.

Remember, the WEF is the organization that claimed “you will own nothing, and you’ll be happy” as part of its Great Reset “Fourth Industrial Revolution” initiative.

February 20, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

The Fall of Canada, The Danger in the US

Understanding Martial Law

By Dr Naomi Wolf | February 19, 2022

The world has watched, in pain, as images of police violence from Ottawa, and of a bid for Canadian tyranny (that I would ever write those words!) are flashed around the world.

As usual, I hate to be Cassandra; but the chessboard ahead is all too clear. On Feb 12, 2022, I warned, during an appearance on Steve Bannon’s WarRoom, that we all must all now brace for a period during which the powers that now clearly seek to enslave our planet, and subdue our human species, will be broadcasting scenes of civil society mayhem, and of shocking violence against protesters.

I also predicted that there would be food shortages and other economic harms that would be blamed on the protesting truckers, and I warned too that people should print out their bank and any liquid asset records, as there would be cyberattacks on financial institutions and the freezing of accounts. All of that, of course, took place in the week that followed.

I recently received a kind note on social media thanking me for my bulletins about the near future as it helped people, the writer explained, to stave off shock and disorientation. I have often spoken about how tyrants rely on just these effects of shock and disorientation to “tenderize” a targeted population, so I will keep alerting you all to the near future, as unpleasant as that task can be.

So in this essay I wish to explain, especially to Canadians, what martial law really is, and how very dangerous it is, since many leaders there, especially Parliamentarians, appear to be in the treacherous “hangover” state of thinking that they still inhabit the old world that died when Justin Trudeau declared emergency law. I also wish to warn what happens historically at this moment in the decline of a formerly democratic nation, and what the murder of Canadian democracy — at least for now — means to the rest of the world.

Parliamentarians in Canada do not seem to understand that now their former colleague, Justin Trudeau, can arrest not just truckers, whose lawful protest has been declared illegal, but also the Parliamentarians themselves. This is, sadly, the next step in this kind of drama, historically. It is an extraordinarily dangerous sign that Parliament is not seated. When the Australian Parliament was suspended, by the time they reconvened, their powers had been dramatically curtailed. Tyrants seek to normalize the convening of Parliaments as “optional” or to suspend normal Parliamentary processes long enough to hollow out a legislative body’s deliberative powers, and to ensure that when and if a Parliament (or a Congress, for that matter) meets again, it will be merely a ceremonial assembly.

Parliamentarians in Canada also do not seem to understand that “dictator” is no longer rhetorical. A member of Parliament was shushed when he cried out this epithet, but the fact is that this is not a slur at this point. Justin Trudeau is by definition now in fact a dictator.

At this stage in history, you do not go back to a previous state of civil society order without arrests, though hopefully you can do so without civil war. Historically, when a would-be dictator has reached this point in the suspension of democratic processes and has sought this level of a power grab, his arrests of the opposition’s leaders, on trumped-up charges, come next. Also arrested at this point are labor leaders, outspoken members of the clergy, and independent journalists and editors.

Beware the word “incitement”; the next stage is an edict that casts criticism of what Trudeau is doing, as a crime, or an act of violence.

At this stage in history, too, the identity of the security forces are at issue. Who are these frighteningly gas-masked, uniformed, extremely violent men represented as police in the streets of Ottawa? For that matter, who are the masked, black-uniformed, extremely violent men represented as police beating the protesters in Paris, a week ago?

It is not easy to get police and military to enforce violence upon their own people, their own neighbors and community members. A real danger at this point in the overthrow of a democracy (for that is what happened in Canada in this past week) is the deployment of militias accountable not to the people but to the newly minted dictator. This happened in Italy when Mussolini sought control, in Germany when the National Socialists sought power, and so on. Remember that there are mercenary armies around the world, such as those run by Xe, formerly Blackwater, for hire; remember that the Southern border of the United States is wide open and many observers have reported a massive influx of young adults of military age traveling alone . With an open border in North America, a mercenary army can flow not just into Canada, if permitted by border guards directed by a would-be dictator; they can also flow into strategic points in the United States.

But Parliamentarians and heads of provinces in Canada should be aware that those violent entities in the streets of Ottawa may be loosed against them, as well as against other hapless citizens trying to make use of their Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, of course, guarantees freedom of speech and expression, peaceful protest, and assembly.  The Charter of Rights and Freedoms also guarantees Canadians the right to a democracy itself, so what Justin Trudeau has done is unlawful on its face. Canadians, any Canadians, according to the Charter, can take him to court for having suspended their democracy unlawfully.

There is also the criminal charge at stake. Justin Trudeau may well be guilty of an act of treason, which is defined in Canadian law as preparing to levy war against Canada, which is what I personally see in the Ottawa livestreams; and treason in Canadian law is also defined in other broad ways, including this: “(a) uses force or violence for the purpose of overthrowing the government of Canada or a province”;

“High treason

  • 46 (1) Every one commits high treason who, in Canada,
    • (a) kills or attempts to kill Her Majesty, or does her any bodily harm tending to death or destruction, maims or wounds her, or imprisons or restrains her;
    • (b) levies war against Canada or does any act preparatory thereto; or
    • (c) assists an enemy at war with Canada, or any armed forces against whom Canadian Forces are engaged in hostilities, whether or not a state of war exists between Canada and the country whose forces they are.
  • Marginal note: Treason

    (2) Every one commits treason who, in Canada,

    • (a) uses force or violence for the purpose of overthrowing the government of Canada or a province;
    • (b) without lawful authority, communicates or makes available to an agent of a state other than Canada, military or scientific information or any sketch, plan, model, article, note or document of a military or scientific character that he knows or ought to know may be used by that state for a purpose prejudicial to the safety or defence of Canada;
    • (c) conspires with any person to commit high treason or to do anything mentioned in paragraph (a);
    • (d) forms an intention to do anything that is high treason or that is mentioned in paragraph (a) and manifests that intention by an overt act; or
    • (e) conspires with any person to do anything mentioned in paragraph (b) or forms an intention to do anything mentioned in paragraph (b) and manifests that intention by an overt act.”

What I must share with sincere regret is that at this point in history, it is a situation of either “arrest or be arrested.” I am not advocating; simply describing a consistent pattern in history.

At this point in a power grab, either Parliamentarians and patriotic heads of the military peacefully arrest an out-of-control leader who has sought to overthrow a democracy, or else they must be aware that history shows that their own arrests may be nigh.

I also note that we down South of the Canadian border are far from safe. It is alarming that our own President has not spoken out against Justin Trudeau’s militaristic power grab, or against his violence against peaceful protesters using their lawfully protected freedoms of speech and assembly. It is even more alarming that the Biden administration is seeking to extend our own state of emergency.

The COVID-19 State of Emergency in the US was declared almost two years ago, at the start of the pandemic; now that the virus is “endemic”, against all science and reason the State of Emergency has been extended.

This situation – that the United States is operating under emergency powers – is the biggest underreported story of the century to date. Emergency law means that President Biden has powers he does not have under non-emergency law; specifically, the COVID-19 emergency powers acts, extended eight times already, give HHS powers that it did not have before. President Biden declared a year ago the:

“Continuation of the National Emergency Declared by Proc. No. 9994

Notice of President of the United States, dated Feb. 24, 2021, 86 F.R. 11599, provided:

[…] For this reason, the national emergency declared on March 13, 2020, and beginning March 1, 2020, must continue in effect beyond March 1, 2021. Therefore, in accordance with section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)), I am continuing the national emergency declared in Proclamation 9994 concerning the COVID–19 pandemic.

This notice shall be published in the Federal Register and transmitted to the Congress.”

And the current declaration by President Biden, as of this past week, that the Emergency Act must be extended, is about an Act that is open-ended in duration.

What this declaration does, going around Congress, is to continue to allocate billions of dollars to HHS, which billions in effect flow to constituencies to create a massive economic incentive for stakeholders to keep the drama of the pandemic, including forcible masking, pressure for vaccine passports, the possibility of closing businesses again, and all the misery of the past two years, ongoing forever. A state of emergency also allows the President to update the next Emergency Powers act in the future, with the kinds of suspension of democratic processes that we saw further North.

We are in a highly precarious situation in the US, when it comes to the restoration of the rule of law.

Sorry for this bleak bulletin, but this is where we are in the world. What is happening in Ottawa and in Paris is two to three weeks ahead of what will be attempted against us in the United States.

Washington State’s Board of Health tried to pass a regulation to create a detention camp for those exposed to a contagious disease; fierce citizen pressure, including from readers of my site DailyClout.io, stopped that action.

Then New York State under emergency law tried to pass the same kind of regulation. They will not stop coming at us.

Boards of Health are exactly what are empowered to do whatever is deemed necessary by — Boards of Health, under the COVID-19 Emergency Powers Act. They are our Trojan horse. If we are to be brought to our knees here in the US currently, it will be via these bland-sounding agencies and the master agency, HHS.

Beware of the focus now moving to “mental health”, as empowering Boards of Health with detention powers, with a focus of policing mental health, means that your and my dissident commentary can lead to our being entangled by these hyper-empowered and now-lawless entities in the near future.

In every direction, the WEF has staked its alumni and speakers in national leadership roles, or, as in Boston, at the helm of local leadership; in every direction, they are cracking the totalitarian whip via “health” or in Canada, via the “emergency” of lawful peaceful protest.

The people’s mass noncompliance, the leadership of the opposition in taking on tyrants, and hopefully too the people’s quickly-mastered knowledge of their own Constitution, their own Charter of Rights, and their own legislative processes, alone can save us all.

The image of the great conflict of the 60s was of a young woman placing a daisy in a rifle barrel. The image of our great conflict, is that of scores of truckers on their knees, in the snow, praying, surrounded by unidentifiable standing thugs.

We have been here before. God have mercy on us; and as for us men and women, may we only remember in time that we are free people.

February 20, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , , , | Leave a comment

How the Charter of Rights let Canada down

BY YUAN YI ZHU | UNHERD | FEBRUARY 18, 2022

If Canada has a sacred cow, akin to the NHS in the UK, it is the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms — a constitutional bill of rights added to our constitution in 1982. As a national symbol, it is more popular than the national flag, the national anthem, and even hockey. Many Canadians can barely imagine that other, more benighted, lands might also have put some fundamental rights down in writing.

This would normally be harmless enough. Canada is after all a young nation, and nations need symbols. But the Charter, though full of admirable sentiments, has also infantilised Canadian politics and public discourse. A vague document full of broad promises coupled with important qualifications (rights are subject to limits as “can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society”) and exceptions (judicial interpretations of rights may be subject to legislative override under s. 33, the notwithstanding clause), it has enabled generations of Canadian judges to act as supreme legislators by interpreting it in all sorts of creative ways, striking down disfavoured legislation at a whim.

Only a few months ago, for instance, a Canadian court ruled that it was unconstitutional to require prospective schoolteachers to pass a basic maths test — the Charter, you see, forbids this, because equality rights something-something. No policy of any importance is implemented without the courts, and usually the Supreme Court of Canada, chiming in, which suits politicians admirably because they can fob awkward issues to the judges in that way.

This is where the Canadian trucker protests come in. Earlier this week, the Trudeau government invoked the Emergencies Act to stop these protests, which have now lasted for almost two months. The Emergencies Act, which replaced the bluntly but honestly named War Measures Act in 1988, gives the power to the Governor-in-Council (in practice the Cabinet) to declare an emergency. Once an emergency is declared, the government can impose a host of drastic measures by executive fiat, subject to parliamentary review within seven days.

The measures the Canadian government have imposed make for uneasy reading, whatever your view on the trucker protests. They not only make it illegal to participate in or travel to the protests, but also to give money to any protester or to provide them with car insurance — while making it legal to freeze their bank accounts without a court order. In effect it makes it impossible for many of them to earn their livelihoods, or simply to live (Canada being such a large country, large parts of it are unliveable without an automobile, and driving legally requires car insurance). They also give the government the power to force tow truck drivers to provide their services to the government. Breach of these regulations carries a maximum of five years’ imprisonment.

The international reaction was distinctly queasy. Even outlets such as the New York Times, hardly the natural ally of protesters against Covid restrictions, saw those measures for what they were: a “temporary suspension of civil liberties”. But the Times quickly backed down after being bombarded with tweets by Canadian journalists and politicians angry with that description.

Bob Rae, Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations who was once one of Canada’s leading politicians, tweeted out the following representative gem:

The Preamble to the Emergencies Act states clearly that it is subject to the Charter of Rights. Contrary to what the NY Times has stated, civil liberties have not been suspended in Canada. Get a grip. – BOB RAE, TWITTER

But by any definition, freezing someone’s assets without due process is a violation of civil liberties. Likewise depriving people of their livelihoods or taking away people’s right to refuse to perform work for the government. You may think that these violations are justified, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are violations.

But Canadians’ grasp of the constitutional facts have been so atrophied by decades of unthinking Charter worship that many are no longer able to think about rights independently of it, to see that rights do not begin and end with a piece of paper with an impressive title. Just because the emergency decrees pay lip service to the Charter doesn’t make them any less rights-violating.

Ultimately, the best protection for rights is not any particular piece of legislation, but a robust societal consensus in their favour, as well as active thinking and discussion about their parameters. Through the Charter, Canadians have gained a constitutional guarantee for certain rights formulated in abstract terms, but may have lost much of the cultural wherewithal necessary to sustain a broader culture of rights. Would-be constitutional tinkerers in the United Kingdom and elsewhere might want to take note.

February 19, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

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