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Why is the top US spy alliance afraid of Trump?

By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 01.02.2025

America’s Five Eyes partners – Canada, Britain, Australia, and New Zealand – fear that US President Donald Trump’s deep state crackdown and spy apparatus overhaul could destabilize their intelligence network, reports The Wall Street Journal.

What’s driving their concerns?

Free Riders

  • Trump may see Five Eyes as a bloated racket exploiting US resources, per the WSJ. The US spends nearly $100 billion on intelligence – 10 times more than the other four combined.

Russia Collusion Hoax

  • Five Eyes were entangled in the Trump-Russia collusion narrative, largely pushed by US intelligence.
  • The FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane probe, later debunked, was triggered by an Australian tip in 2016.
  • Britain’s GCHQ may have wiretapped Trump during his 2016 campaign, as the White House suggested in 2017.
  • Trump hasn’t directly targeted Five Eyes lately, but their unease suggests they have plenty to hide.

What Triggered the Panic?

  • The “world’s most powerful spy alliance” sounded the alarm as Trump’s intelligence picks, Kash Patel and Tulsi Gabbard, near confirmation in Congress.
  • Gabbard, nominated for director of National Intelligence, vowed to fight weaponized intelligence, citing Iraq War lies and the Russia collusion hoax.
  • Patel, set to lead the FBI, pledged to curb overseas operations and increase transparency.

February 1, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Deception | , , , , | Leave a comment

The Authoritarian Legacy of Justin Trudeau

By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | January 6, 2025

After nearly a decade in office, after attempts at photogenic diplomacy and tearful apologies, Justin Trudeau is stepping down as Canada’s Prime Minister, leaving behind a legacy as divisive as it is dramatic. To some, he was the poster child for progressive leadership, a leader who championed climate action and diversity while bringing Canada into the global spotlight. To others, he was an over-polished politician whose tenure was defined by censorship, economic mismanagement, and the weaponization of state power against his own citizens. His resignation marks the end of an era—one defined as much by lofty rhetoric as by policies that left a deep mark on civil liberties and public trust.

So, what’s Trudeau’s Canada after nearly ten years? A land of progressive aspirations or a dystopian Pinterest board?

Censorship: The Friendly Autocrat Edition

Few things capture Trudeau’s tenure better than his government’s legislative war on free speech. Let’s start with the dynamic duo of digital overreach:

Bill C-10: “Regulating the Unregulatable”

The saga of Bill C-10 began innocently enough. Trudeau’s government framed the bill as a noble effort to modernize the Broadcasting Act. After all, the law hadn’t been updated since 1991, back when Blockbuster was thriving and the internet was just a nerd’s dream. The goal, they said, was to “level the playing field” between traditional broadcasters and streaming giants like Netflix and YouTube.

Sounds fair, right? Not so fast.

The devil was in the details—or the lack thereof. The bill gave Canada’s broadcast regulator, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), sweeping authority to police online content. Originally, user-generated content like vlogs, TikTok dances, or indie films were supposed to be exempt. However, midway through the legislative process, Trudeau’s government quietly removed those exemptions. Suddenly, your cat video could be classified as “broadcast content,” giving bureaucrats the power to decide whether it met Canadian cultural standards.

Critics, including legal scholars and digital rights groups, raised the alarm. They argued that the bill’s language was so vague it could allow the government to dictate what Canadians saw, shared, or created online. The specter of state-controlled algorithms choosing what gets promoted on platforms was too close to censorship for comfort.

But the government dismissed the concerns, painting critics as alarmists. In Trudeau’s Canada, wanting clear limits on government power apparently made you a conspiracy theorist.

Bill C-36: Hate Speech or Debate Killer?

Not content to merely oversee what Canadians could create, Trudeau’s administration went a step further with Bill C-36, a supposed weapon against online hate speech. If Bill C-10 was about controlling the medium, this bill was about controlling the message.

What Did It Do?

  • Reintroduced a controversial section of Canada’s Human Rights Act, allowing people to file complaints over online hate speech.
  • Allowed courts to impose hefty fines and even jail time for offenders.
  • Gave the government the power to preemptively penalize individuals suspected of potentially committing hate speech—a sort of Minority Report approach to thought crime.

The problem? The bill’s definition of “hate” was so expansive that it could potentially criminalize unpopular or offensive opinions. The bill didn’t just target clear-cut incitements to violence; it targeted anything deemed likely to expose individuals to “hatred or contempt.” Critics feared that “hatred or contempt” could mean anything from political dissent to sharp critiques of government policies.

Even more alarming was the prospect of a “snitch culture.” The bill encouraged private citizens to report each other for suspected hate speech, potentially turning disagreements into legal battles.

David Lametti, Trudeau’s Justice Minister, defended the bill, claiming it struck the right balance between free expression and protection from harm. But when legal experts and civil liberties groups united in opposition, it became clear that balance was not the government’s strong suit.

The Financial Freeze Heard ‘Round the World

The Freedom Convoy protest of 2022

The Freedom Convoy—the moment when Canada went from polite protests and Tim Hortons to frozen bank accounts and police crackdowns.

In 2022, when truckers and their supporters descended on Ottawa to protest COVID-19 mandates, Trudeau didn’t meet them with dialogue or even his trademark smile-and-wave. Instead, he dusted off the Emergencies Act, something no prime minister had dared touch before. Overnight, financial institutions became Trudeau’s personal enforcers, freezing accounts of protesters and anyone who dared to support them.

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, Trudeau’s second-in-command at the time and a walking, talking LinkedIn connection to global elites, eagerly played bad cop. Under her direction, the financial clampdown turned Canada’s banking system into a political weapon. It wasn’t lost on critics that Freeland’s cozy ties to global financiers made the whole thing look like an international crackdown on dissent.

And what of the precedent? Trudeau’s message was clear: disagree with the government, and you might lose access to your life savings. It was a masterclass in how to turn financial systems into handcuffs, leaving civil liberties in tatters.

The Media Muzzle: Subsidizing Obedience

Also on the chopping block was journalistic independence. Trudeau’s government rolled out legislation forcing media outlets to register with a government body to qualify for funding. On the surface, this was marketed as a lifeline for struggling journalism. Because nothing says “press freedom” like reporters dependent on government handouts, right? It’s a classic move: offer financial aid with one hand and hold the leash with the other.

Critics were quick to point out the slippery slope. When the same entity paying the bills also sets the rules, the line between journalism and government PR gets blurry fast. Trudeau, of course, framed this as support for democracy, but the result was a media landscape nervously eyeing its next paycheck while tiptoeing around criticism of its benefactor.

Big Brother Gets a Twitter Account

Then came the surveillance. Under Trudeau’s watch, Canadian intelligence agencies dramatically expanded their social media monitoring. Initially, this was framed as a necessary tool against extremism. But “extremism,” much like “disinformation,” is a flexible term in the hands of those in power. Activists and protest groups—voices traditionally central to democratic discourse—suddenly found themselves under the microscope.

Imagine logging onto X to vent about a new housing policy, only to realize your tweet has been flagged by a government algorithm. The message was clear: dissent might not be illegal, but it was certainly inconvenient.

Disinformation: The Government’s New Buzzword

Trudeau’s pièce de résistance was his crusade against “disinformation.” This word became the Swiss Army knife of excuses, used to delegitimize critics and corral public opinion. Do you have a bone to pick with government policies? Disinformation. Questioning pandemic mandates? Disinformation. Unimpressed with Trudeau’s latest photo op? You guessed it—disinformation.

To hammer the point home, his administration launched a series of public awareness campaigns, ostensibly to educate Canadians about the perils of online misinformation. These campaigns, dripping with paternalistic condescension, often blurred the line between fact-checking and outright propaganda. The subtext was unmistakable: dissent, even if rooted in genuine concerns, was a threat to national cohesion.

Canada’s New Normal: The Fear of Speaking Freely

The cumulative effect of these policies wasn’t subtle. Everyday Canadians began censoring themselves, not out of respect for others but out of fear of stepping on the wrong bureaucratic toes. Content creators hesitated to tackle divisive topics. Activists wondered whether their next rally would land them on a government watchlist. What was once a robust marketplace of ideas began to resemble a sparsely stocked shelf.

And yet, Trudeau’s defenders remain loyal, arguing that his policies were noble attempts to safeguard society. However, as history has repeatedly shown, the road to censorship is paved with the promise of safety, but its destination is a society too scared to speak.

The Legacy of Controlled Speech

So what’s the verdict? Is Trudeau a misunderstood guardian of democracy, or is he the wolf who prowled under the guise of a shepherd? It’s hard to champion inclusivity and diversity when fewer voices are allowed to join the conversation. Canada may someday reckon with the full implications of these policies, but the damage is already visible.

And as Canadians tiptoe around their digital platforms, one question remains: how free is a democracy where everyone whispers?

January 6, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

H-1B Visas: A Lesson from Canada

By Laura Rosen Cohen | Brownstone Institute | January 2, 2025

President Trump has been very busy lately, driving leftist and Liberal Canadians utterly out of their minds by wickedly and hilariously trolling Prime Minister Justin Trudeau while simultaneously threatening a massive 25% tariff on the Canadian auto industry. With a solitary few taps of fingers on his phone, Trump cornered Canada by brewing an artisan Trumpian “threat to start some conversation” online. It went something like this: “Nice auto industry you got there. Would be a real shame if something happened to it!”

This “conversation starter,” which could also be rightly characterized as an existential death blow to the Canadian auto industry, forced Prime Minister Trudeau to hastily jet down to Mar-a-Lago. There, he unceremoniously flopped in his mission to mitigate damages, which has since been followed by the pilgrimage of several other notable Trudeau lightweights to continue the conversation. Maybe Mr. Wonderful will have better luck. 

You could be forgiven if you thought the main lessons learned from this episode are that Canadians have a very fragile sense of humor, and that they bristle at being reminded how fully dependent the Canadian economy is on America. All of that is, of course, true. But if you thought that was the main event, you’d be wrong. The two main takeaways are that any industry that is being protected will, at some point, have an economic and policy moment of reckoning, along the lines of Herbert Stein: If something cannot go on forever, it will stop. And the second lesson is that it will likely play out in part, in real time on X. The Trump-Trudeau show, however, is just a shiny bauble. The real policy landmine in America is immigration, both legal and illegal.

This brings us to the H-1B visa issue in America, which is currently being “debated,” right in front of our eyes on X. On the surface, it seems to be a relatively simple philosophical debate; are you in favor of bringing in foreign workers for the jobs that Americans allegedly cannot do? Or do you favor policies that incentivize hiring Americans? Battle lines are even being drawn among conservative thought leaders and MAGA-adjacent personalities like Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy, and others.

The public divide seems to be about being in favour of skilled immigration, or being anti-immigrant. But this framing is a distraction. The real issue, of course, is how writer Lee Smith puts it, which is that “… H-1B matters because it’s an effect of the core issue — indeed the reason DJT is POTUS — a political and corporate establishment that has waged a half-century long campaign to destroy the American middle class.”

Bingo. And this is where it behooves the Trump administration to learn from the failed Canadian experience with our H-1B visa equivalent: the Temporary Resident Permit or TRP.

Officially, the TRP gives status to non-citizens or permanent residents (the last step before citizenship) to be legally in Canada for a temporary purpose. This can include international students, tourists, or foreign workers. (The TRP does not apply to visa-exempt countries.)

Unofficially, the TRP is a literal cash cow for Canadian universities, and a veritable backdoor to get into Canada via an increasingly shifty diploma mill industry which contains a possible human trafficking element. There are also endless social media accounts that shamelessly explain how to game the system and remain in Canada. Plenty of Canadian corporations have benefitted from the influx of cheap labour, so much so that the Trudeau government has been forced to eat its hat on the TPR program and put new limitations in place, and not just on the TPR program but immigration in general. But the “temporary” population of Canada is now close to 10% of the Canadian population, and Canada has no real plan to get TPR permit holders to go home or to dissuade them from seeking asylum.  Unsurprisingly, the temporary population simply doesn’t want to leave.

The final, glaring issue with both the H-1B and TRP is the undeniable fact that they are gateways to North America’s robust anchor baby (“birth tourism”) industry. In Canada, birth tourism, aided and abetted by almost nonexistent enforcement has added extra layers of stress to Canada’s already fiscally unsustainable socialized medical system.

“Temporary” programs in both Canada and America rarely benefit their existing populaces. More often than not, they habitually displace and punish the middle class. That’s a feature and not a bug. The H-1B acts in a similar fashion for skilled, white-collar workers. Moreover, as Milton Friedman famously said, “There is nothing more permanent than a temporary government program.” Here’s hoping the incoming Trump administration takes heed of Canada’s abject failure to rein in its permanent “temporary” population and reigns in the policies that more often than not, discriminate, decimate, and impoverish the native citizenry.

January 2, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics | , | Leave a comment

US Report Reveals Push to Weaponize AI for Censorship

By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | December 19, 2024

For a while now, emerging AI has been treated by the Biden-Harris administration, but also the EU, the UK, Canada, the UN, etc., as a scourge that powers dangerous forms of “disinformation” – and should be dealt with accordingly.

According to those governments/entities, the only “positive use” for AI as far as social media and online discourse go, would be to power more effective censorship (“moderation”).

A new report from the US House Judiciary Committee and its Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government puts the emphasis on the push to use this technology for censorship as the explanation for the often disproportionate alarm over its role in “disinformation.”

We obtained a copy of the report for you here.

The interim report’s name spells out its authors’ views on this quite clearly: the document is called, “Censorship’s Next Frontier: The Federal Government’s Attempt to Control Artificial Intelligence to Suppress Free Speech.”

The report’s main premise is well-known – that AI is now being funded, developed, and used by the government and third parties to add speed and scale to their censorship, and that the outgoing administration has been putting pressure on AI developers to build censorship into their models.

What’s new are the proposed steps to remedy this situation and make sure that future federal governments are not using AI for censorship. To this end, the Committee wants to see new legislation passed in Congress, AI development that respects the First Amendment and is open, decentralized, and “pro-freedom.”

The report recommends legislation along four principles, focused on preserving American’s right to free speech. The first is that the government cannot be involved when decisions are made in private algorithms or datasets regarding “misinformation” or “bias.”

The government should also be prohibited from funding censorship-related research or collaboration with foreign entities on AI regulation that leads to censorship.

Lastly, “Avoid needless AI regulation that gives the government coercive leverage,” the document recommends.

The Committee notes the current state of affairs where the Biden-Harris administration made a number of direct moves to regulate the space to its political satisfaction via executive orders, but also by pushing its policy through by giving out grants via the National Science Foundation, once again, aimed at building AI tools that “combat misinformation.”

But – “If allowed to develop in a free and open manner, AI could dramatically expand Americans’ capacity to create knowledge and express themselves,” the report states.

December 19, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Canadian Doctor Fights for Free Speech at Supreme Court Over Covid Censorship

By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | December 13, 2024

A Canadian doctor who was censored for discussing Covid topics during the pandemic is taking her legal battle to the country’s Supreme Court, in a bid to have free speech restrictions imposed on her finally removed.

Dr. Kulvinder Kaur Gill made the decision after the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled to uphold three “cautions” she received for tweets opposing what she considered to be harmful Covid lockdowns, published in August 2020.

These cautions were issued by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) in February 2021. The state’s medical regulator in 2020 warned medical professionals that the opinions they express should be in line with whatever the government or public health institutions decide is the correct information.

That included lockdowns, which Gill openly criticized early on, and continues to believe were ineffective in dealing with the pandemic. Besides her opinion, Gill also offered what her legal counsel says is “ample evidence” to CPSO to support her stance on the ineffectiveness of lockdowns.

As for the cautions, the doctor believes CPSO used them to censor her right to free expression, guaranteed by Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Twitter, where she posted her thoughts on the situation developing in 2020, has in the meantime become X, and this social platform is now supporting her by covering the legal costs, as she continues her effort to appeal against CPSO-imposed speech restrictions.

Those costs amounted to $6,000 as the lower court ruled to uphold the regulator’s decisions that targeted Gill in 2021.

Gill expressed her gratitude to X and Elon Musk for the support, and provided links about the details of the case in a post, saying that to “first do no harm” as a physician meant opposing lockdowns – and that this triggered a 5-year “unjust journey” for her.

“The growing overreach of regulators into monitoring the speech of professionals on social media has become a matter of national concern to the public, which loses the benefit of hearing a variety of opinions when professionals’ speech is chilled out of fear of punishment,” Gill’s lawyer Lisa Bildy said in a statement.

According to Bildy, her client spoke against lockdowns and other harmful Covid-era mandates aligning evidence-based concerns and her conscience – rather than obeying CPSO’s “edict” to align with whatever the authorities decided were the right measures.

December 14, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

COVID-19 Injection Mandates Devastated Healthcare Workers’ Well-Being

By Nicolas Hulscher, MPH | Courageous Discourse | December 13, 2024

A new study by Chaufan et al, titled COVID-19 Vaccination Decisions and Impacts of Vaccine Mandates: A Cross-Sectional Survey of Healthcare Workers in British Columbia, Canada, has just been uploaded to the MedRxiv preprint server. They found that COVID-19 injection mandates took a massive toll on the well-being of healthcare workers:

Goal: To document the experience and views on mandated vaccination of healthcare workers in British Columbia.

Methods: Between May and July of 2024, we conducted a cross-sectional survey of healthcare workers in British Columbia. We recruited participants through a snowball sampling approach, including professional contacts, social media, and word-of-mouth.

Results: Close to half of respondents, with 16 or more years of professional experience, were unvaccinated, and most had been terminated due to non-compliance with mandates. As well, and regardless of vaccination status, most respondents reported safety concerns with vaccination and felt unfree to make their own vaccination choices, yet did not request exemptions due to high rejection rates by employers. Most of them also reported experiencing anxiety or depression, with about one fourth considering suicide, as a result of mandates. Nevertheless, most unvaccinated workers reported satisfaction with their choices, although they also reported significant, negative impacts of the policy on their finances, their mental health, their social and personal relationships, and to a lesser degree, their physical health. In contrast, within the minority of vaccinated respondents, most reported being dissatisfied with their vaccination decisions, as well as having experienced mild to serious post vaccine adverse events, with over half within this group reporting having been coerced into taking further doses, under threat of termination, despite these events. Further, a large minority of all respondents reported having witnessed underreporting or dismissal by hospital management of adverse events post vaccination among patients, worse treatment of unvaccinated patients, and concerning changes in practice protocols. Nearly half also reported their intention to leave the healthcare industry.

Discussion: Our findings indicate that in British Columbia, mandated vaccination in the healthcare sector had an overall negative impact on the well-being of the labour force, on the sustainability of the health system, on patient care, and on ethical healthcare practice. Findings resemble those of a similar study in the province of Ontario, with perhaps the most salient difference being that in British Columbia the policy was implemented at the provincial, rather than the healthcare establishment, level, leaving no room for individual establishments to opt out.

One of the most shocking findings from this study is that employer vaccination mandates led to suicidal thoughts in 23.5% of healthcare workers and depression/anxiety in 81.4%. This is likely because 80.1% of the respondents were terminated from their job for refusing experimental injections and subsequently suffered negative impacts on their finances, mental health, social and personal relationships, and physical health. These results suggest that vaccine mandates are likely a major contributing factor to the record-high depression rates observed since 2021:

The findings of this study confirm that vaccine mandates should never be implemented again, anywhere in the world, under any circumstances. As the authors concluded, the policy of mandated vaccination “failed on several fronts – scientific, pragmatic, and ethical.” Compensation is highly warranted for all individuals who refused to comply with mandates and were unethically terminated.

Nicolas Hulscher, MPH

Epidemiologist and Foundation Administrator, McCullough Foundation

December 14, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

Canadian mayor fined for LGBT thought crime of refusing to bend over

By Rachel Marsden | RT | December 13, 2024

The mayor of the Canadian township of Emo (pop: 1,204), which borders the US state of Minnesota, has to personally pay an LGBTQ group $5,000 for injury to their self-respect. And that’s on top of the $10,000 that the town has to fork over.

According to official documents, the drama started in 2020 when Borderland Pride, a Canadian non-profit group, requested that the town officials officially recognize Pride Month in June of that year. The town had done so in previous years, but reportedly decided to amend their proclamations policy – which had yet to be adopted when this latest request came through. So the group’s request was rejected in a 3-2 council vote that year.

It’s not like this particular policy amendment was high priority, particularly at the height of the Covid fiasco, since they barely had any requests anyway. This one group alone represented half of all of the town’s requests for declarations, proclamations, or flag displays from April 2019 to April 2020.

Their request for the town to fly the rainbow flag for a week, and to send the group photos of it with the town’s officials for use on social media, reportedly wasn’t considered since the town didn’t even have a flagpole.

So here comes a complaint by the group to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal – which was decided on November 20, 2024.

The role of such tribunals across Canada is to deal exclusively with complaints about discrimination on the basis of prohibited factors like race, religion, age, gender, sexual orientation, marital status, and criminal convictions. Because if actual courts had to deal with things like this, they’d be clogged up like a frat house toilet after Frosh Week. If the complainant can prove that there was at least a 50 percent chance of discrimination on one of these bases, then it can order cash awards and other remedies. So step right up! Take a spin! Win cash and prizes!

In the case of Borderland Pride against the Township of Emo, the tribunal accepted at face value that the council didn’t consider hanging the flag because of its lack of a flagpole. It did however note that the flag could have been “displayed” somewhere else other than on a flagpole. But it stopped short of ordering the mayor to walk around with it like a Superman cape.

The tribunal also accepted that two of the three council votes against issuing the Pride Month proclamation occurred in good faith and were merely the result of not wanting to adopt any proclamations before the new policy governing them was put into place. It was only the mayor’s “no” vote that was problematic.

During the council meeting in question, after discussing what they should do with the Pride flag display request in the absence of a flagpole, but before the vote against the Pride Month proclamation, Mayor Harold McQuaker said, “There’s no flag being flown for the other side of the coin… there’s no flags being flown for the straight people.”

Uh oh, here’s comes the forbidden-thinking patrol!

The tribunal ruled that the mayor’s comment was “dismissive of Borderland Pride’s flag request and demonstrated a lack of understanding of the importance to Borderland Pride and other members of the LGBTQ2 community of the Pride flag” and constitutes discrimination.

Suddenly, because of the mayor’s pro-heterosexual comments, it must mean that he hates gays. So it’s decided that “on the preponderance of evidence,” the rejection of the Pride proclamation was, more likely than not, the end-result of the mayor’s homophobia, and couldn’t be because he aligned with the other two Council “no” votes on the need for the policy amendment to deal with it first.

“I don’t hate anybody,” he said. “We just don’t have a flagpole at our town hall,” McQuaker recently told the Toronto Sun. But cognitive deviance is cognitive deviance, and like a colon polyp, best to nip it in the bud so there’s zero risk of it ever potentially developing into systemic cancer.

So here come the experts to tell the tribunal about how malignant this mayor’s thinking already is.

According to Dr. Emily Saewyc, an LGBTQ specialist who testified at the hearing, research suggests that “anti-LGBTQ rhetoric by President Trump, Vice-President Pence, and members of Trump’s cabinet during his presidency visibly increased the amount of hate and violence” towards these minorities. Or, you know, maybe people are just fed up with having special interest agenda shoved down their throats in make-work projects for activists at a time when citizens of all stripes are facing common and federating hardships. She then attempted to draw a parallel with the “homophobic and hateful social media posts about Borderland Pride and the LGBTQ2 community” after the vote – as though people would have been cheering the LGBTQ cause had the mayor not been such a bigot and supported Pride Month.

Right, because the key to people embracing wokeism is just to firehose even more of it into the public domain. Guess she hasn’t heard about the impact on brands like Bud Light and Jaguar after going woke. Or the public outcry after the Paris Olympics opening ceremony featuring what many interpreted as being a tranny wreck version of the Last Supper.

Borderland Pride wanted the tribunal to allow it to choose a week for the Township to have 2020 Pride Month now, and to force it to hold Pride Month every June going forward. It refused. But it did order Mayor McQuaker to attend a sort of re-education camp. Within 30 days, he has to provide Borderland Pride with proof that he’s completed the province’s human rights training course.

McQuaker has basically told the tribunal to shove it, refusing to pay or take the course, calling it “extortion,” according to the Toronto Sun.

All of this is the sort of blueprint that demonstrates exactly how special interest agendas end up hijacking the most basic aspects of daily life, through relentless activist browbeating that has a chilling effect on anyone who fails to passionately cater to their sacred cows.

December 13, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

Five Eyes Urges Broader Censorship Under “Protect the Children” Campaign

By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | December 12, 2024

A network facilitating spy agencies’ intelligence-sharing between the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, known as Five Eyes, has its sights set on encryption, and proceeding from that, also online anonymity.

Even more online censorship would also not be a bad idea – these are some of the highlights from the first public-facing paper the organizations behind this group have published.

We obtained a copy of the paper for you here.

And Five Eyes is not above promoting its ultimate and much more far-reaching goals by using the good old “think of the children” – the paper’s title is, Young People and Violent Extremism: A Call for Collective Action.

Both it and an accompanying press release choose to consider online encryption as merely a tool used by criminals. At the same time, the paper is ignoring the fact that the entire internet ecosystem, from communications to banking and everything in between, requires strong encryption both for privacy, and security.

But, Five Eyes focuses only on communications, which they vaguely refer to as online environments, and ones that can allow sex offenders access to children, they also mention extremists, and equally vaguely, “other” malign actors.

Since encrypted platforms provide anonymity, the spies from the five countries (who refer to the state of affairs as, “a large degree of anonymity”) don’t like that either – and again link it to negative scenarios, such as “radicalization to violence.”

The paper is not specific on the exact mechanisms that would ramp up online censorship, but mentions both governments and the tech industry; the first category should “strengthen legislative support for law enforcement,” while the other is urged to “take greater responsibility for the harm done on their platforms.”

Gaming platforms Discord, Instagram, Roblox as well as TikTok are singled out as “seemingly innocuous” – but the way Five Eyes sees it, they make violent extremism content “more accessible.”

The “whole-of-society response” is the proposed solution to the problem of radicalization of minors in these countries. And the documents vow the alliance will continue working with “government agencies, the education sector, mental health and social well-being services, communities and technology companies.”

“It is important to work together early as once law enforcement and security agencies need to become involved, it is often too late,” the paper warns.

And so, a network whose members are likely, in one capacity or another, behind many of the existing attacks on online encryption and anonymity – has now come out as the campaign’s supposedly “latest recruit.”

December 12, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , , | Leave a comment

Kiev reveals terms of $20 billion US loan

RT | December 9, 2024

The Ukrainian government has approved the terms of a conditional agreement with the US Federal Financing Bank (FFB) for a 40-year loan of $20 billion which will be backed by profits from frozen Russian state assets.

It’s part of a broader $50 billion G7 loan deal, which includes a separate $20 billion EU commitment, and $10 billion to be split by G7 members Britain, Japan and Canada.

The money will be transferred to the Facilitation of Resources to Invest in Strengthening Ukraine Financial Intermediary Fund, established by the World Bank on October 10, “for the sake of the state,” a resolution issued by Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers on Friday stated.

The transfer will be based on a Certificate Purchase Agreement between Ukraine, the FFB, and the US Agency for International Development (USAID), along with a loan guarantee and repayment agreement between Ukraine and USAID.

Under the deal, Ukraine’s Finance Ministry will issue a certificate of indebtedness to the FFB, guaranteed by USAID, the government resolution said.

The loan, which has an annual interest rate of 1.3% plus the current average rate for one-year US Treasury bills, will be repaid using interest earned from immobilized Russian sovereign assets.

The US and its allies froze an estimated $300 billion in assets belonging to the Russian central bank following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022. In June, G7 members pledged a $50 billion loan for Kiev, with the frozen Russian assets to be used as collateral, to help Kiev buy weapons and rebuild damaged infrastructure. The agreement was finalized in October.

Moscow has repeatedly denounced the asset freeze as “theft” and argued that tapping into these funds would be illegal and set a dangerous precedent. The Russian Finance Ministry has warned that it will initiate retaliatory measures mirroring the West’s actions against resources of Western investors held in the country.

The latest move is part of the current US administration’s last-minute strategy to bolster Kiev’s war effort, which includes a new $725 million military aid package to Kiev and another round of sanctions against Russia. It comes as uncertainty grows over Washington’s commitments under the upcoming presidency of Donald Trump, particularly after US House Speaker Mike Johnson dismissed President Joe Biden’s request to include $24 billion in additional aid to Ukraine in a government funding bill last week.

December 9, 2024 Posted by | Corruption | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

US, Canadian universities hire Israeli firms to curb pro-Palestinian protests, report says

Press TV – December 7, 2024

A report by an Israeli newspaper reveals that several universities across the United States and Canada have engaged Israeli-linked security firms to suppress pro-Palestinian protests on their campuses.

The report by the Yedioth Ahronoth highlights that following Donald Trump’s election campaign, during which he promised to penalize institutions that didn’t adequately control “radicals and Hamas supporters,” many universities sought Israeli security companies for assistance in managing protest activities.

The City University of New York (CUNY), a significant site for protests in the past year, has recently signed a contract worth $4 million with Strategy Security Corp., owned by Yosef Sordi, a former New York City police officer with professional training in Israel.

The report also draws attention to the involvement of Israeli security firms in violent confrontations that occurred in May at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Protesters stated that personnel from Magen Am, a company with Israeli military ties, were aggressive in their actions during the demonstrations.

UCLA confirmed that the firm worked alongside local police to manage the protests, with the company receiving $1 million in return.

Additionally, the Contemporary Services Corporation (CSC), which has a specific division in Israel, has been contracted to oversee demonstrations at various US university campuses.

In Montreal, Concordia University has engaged two Israeli security firms: Percentage International and Moshav Security Consulting.

In April, Columbia University students and faculty staged a sit-in opposing Israel’s genocidal actions in Gaza, demanding the administration cut ties with Israeli universities and divest from companies supporting the occupation.

As police intervened and arrested dozens of protesters at US universities, similar demonstrations spread to universities across France, the UK, Germany, Canada, and India, as protesters expressed solidarity with their American counterparts and called for an end to the war on Gaza.

Israel’s ongoing genocidal war on Gaza has killed over 44,664 people, most of them women and children, since October 7, 2023.

Last month, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former war minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel is also facing a genocide case at the International Court of Justice due to its genocidal campaign in Gaza.

December 7, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Solidarity and Activism | , , , | Leave a comment

Canada helps Israel in broadening its definition of ‘anti-Semitism’

By Ramona Wadi | MEMO | November 26, 2024

Once again, anti-Semitism was the catchphrase for political rhetoric denouncing the protest in Montreal against NATO’s complicity with Israel’s genocide. NATO delegates met in Canada for the 70th annual session of its Parliamentary Assembly, and protesters called for Canada’s withdrawal from the organisation, even as Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that the country is on track to increase its military spending, which NATO has established as two per cent of the country’s GDP.

“We need to commit ourselves every day to NATO and the principles that keep us safe in this uncertain world,” said Trudeau, acting as if former colonial powers were not responsible for “this uncertain world” and, along with Israel, the genocide in Gaza.

Activists at the protest thought otherwise, of course. As the gathering outside the meeting turned violent, Israeli and mainstream media were swift to label the protest as “anti-Semitic”, as did Trudeau. Montreal’s police, however, said that they did not receive reports of anti-Semitic violence or hate crimes. Mayor of Montreal Valerie Plante condemned the violence, but said that she did not believe that the protest was anti-Semitic.

The protest was organised by Divest for Palestine and the Convergence of Anti-Capitalist Struggles, with the purpose of exposing NATO’s complicity with Israel’s genocide.

However, as Israel increasingly targets any criticism of its actions as “anti-Semitism”, Trudeau followed suit.

“As a democracy, as a country that will always defend freedom of speech, it’s important for people to be able to go out and protest and express their anger, their disagreements in free and comfortable ways,” he declared. “But there is never any room for anti-Semitism, for hatred, discrimination, for violence.”

Canada’s Defence Minister Bill Blair took a similar position. “Those behaviours are unacceptable and we can condemn them, and in particular the hatred and anti-Semitism that was on display, in the strongest possible terms.”

According to reports in Israeli media, a protestor referenced the “Final Solution” which was a Nazi euphemism for the Holocaust.

What stands out is the discrepancy in responses to two different scenarios – Israel’s internationally-approved genocide and a protest against NATO – which showed clearly that the latter’s manifestation of violent action, directed against a transatlantic military alliance, was deemed to be more disturbing than Israel’s systematic destruction of Gaza and the Palestinian people.

Besides this discrepancy, Israel is also extending the “anti-Semitic” label to include any form of protest directed even at organisations that are not Jewish, but prioritise allegiances to Zionism and Zionist colonial violence. The target audience of the protest in Montreal was clearly the NATO delegates.

NATO members have supported Israel’s genocide through purchasing the occupation state’s military technology (“as field-tested against Palestinian civilians”) and also by selling weapons to Israel. Since 2017, Israel has also benefited from its permanent official mission established in NATO headquarters in Brussels. In January 2023, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog at NATO headquarters, noting that,

“NATO and Israel have worked together for almost 30 years.”

Calling out NATO’s complicity in genocide is not anti-Semitic by any stretch of the imagination. Trudeau has confirmed recently that Canada will abide by the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. What message is Trudeau sending to the Canadian public about his government picking and choosing what part of colonial violence it deems worthy of support, while vilifying protestors for drawing attention to government-level hypocrisy?

November 27, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , , | Leave a comment

The Games of the ICC

By Christopher Black – New Eastern Outlook – November 26, 2024

On November 21, the prosecutor of the ICC announced that a three-judge panel has finally made a decision on his May 2024 application for an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu.

A warrant for his arrest and that of his former Defence Minister, Gallant, has been issued. If an indictment has been drawn up, which should precede an arrest warrant, we are not told and none appears on the ICC website.

Many are celebrating the arrest warrant against Netanyahu and Gallant.  But, while there is no doubt that they deserve to be held to account by the Palestinians and the world for the crimes they have and continue to commit in Palestine, Lebanon, Syria and Iran, they are not charged with the crime of genocide, even though they are charged with inflicting mass starvation on the people of Gaza, nor the supreme war crimes of aggression for their continued illegal occupation of Palestinian lands and the brutal suppression of the Palestinian resistance to that occupation. Nor are they charged for their aggression against the sovereign nations of Lebanon, Syria and Iran, which crimes they openly brag about and which are recognised by the entire world, but not, it seems, by the prosecutor or judges of the ICC.

Further, as people calm down in their cheering, they must realise that the ICC has also issued arrest warrants for a leader of Hamas, Mohammed Diab Ibrahim Al-Masri whose alleged war crimes are nothing more than echoes of Israeli propaganda about the Palestinian armed resistance to the brutal occupation of Palestinian lands and the brutal oppression by the occupation forces of the Palestinian people.

Where is the charge of Genocide?

Netanyahu and Gallant are charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity for mass starvation and targeting the civilian population with aerial attacks, and mass attacks by Israeli armoured and other forces.

The ICC press release states,

“Each bear criminal responsibility for the following crimes as co-perpetrators for committing the acts jointly with others: the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare, and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts.”

“The Chamber also found reasonable grounds to believe that Mr Netanyahu and Mr Gallant each bear criminal responsibility as civilian superiors for the war crime of intentionally directing an attack against the civilian population.”

But these charges also amount to acts of genocide, so why are they not charged with genocide? And why has no indictment been issued? Only the prosecutor and the judges can explain, and they do not.

But aside from pointing out the obvious compromise made by the ICC, to placate its critics about its inaction over Israeli crimes by laying charges yet not laying the most serious charge, the one that should be laid, we have this phrase underlined above which needs to be considered, the phrase, “jointly with others.” 

Israel’s Partners in Crime Untouched

Who are the “others”? The ICC coyly refuses to say, hoping no one will ask the question. But the answer is clear: the USA, the EU, UK, France, Canada and the rest, who all give military aid and support to Israeli to carry out these crimes and have made themselves co-belligerents in this murderous war against the peoples of the Middle East, and are its partners in crime.  The leaders of those nations must also be charged and warrants issued for their arrest. They are equally culpable under international law. But they are not charged. So that, in his defence, Netanyahu, if he is ever brought before this tribunal, can argue the defence of selective prosecution, that is, he can ask, “why am I charged but not the co-conspirators, the co-actors who supported and encouraged my crimes. It is not just to charge me if they are not going to be charged.”

He would be right to use that defence, and perhaps the prosecutor has arranged it so that Netanyahu and Gallant now have that defence available to them.

Political Purpose of the Warrants

But we know that Netanyahu will never be arrested and face a trial at this so-called world court. The Americans immediately came to his defence and denounced the action of the ICC. They have to because if Netanyahu is ever before the judges of the ICC, they fear the facts about their role in the crimes against the Palestinians and the others will be revealed in all their detail and depravity. The British, the French, and the Canadians will have their dirty crimes exposed as well. None of the allies of Israel want Netanyahu arrested and tried. So he will not be. The ICC knows this.

So why was the warrant finally issued after so long a delay, after so much political interference was exerted by Britain, the US, the French and others to prevent the ICC from issuing charges?

We can only speculate, as we are not privy to the phone calls between Mr. Khan and the various governments involved in these crimes, and how it was all arranged, but it was a political decision of a political prosecutor of a political tribunal.

One reason can be to improve the image of the ICC, to make it look like it is doing something, while, in effect, nothing is done to change the situation for the Palestinians, the Lebanese, the Iranians, and the Syrians. It will placate some who support the Palestinians, who think the ICC is a real court, and perhaps it is hoped that this will reduce the street protests across Europe and elsewhere. No need now the ICC will say, we have acted, and you can go home now.

The ICC attempts to justify its charges against Russia

But there is another reason, and that is to trick people into thinking the ICC is some real arbiter of international justice and therefore the arrest warrants the ICC issued against President Putin and others are valid and should be acted upon.

The ICC has issued warrants of arrest of a series of Russian officials over the past few months; we suppose to keep the pot boiling, each as absurd as the one before it.

On 17 March 2023, the ICC issued warrants for Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, and Ms Maria Alekseyevna Lvova-Belova, Commissioner for Children’s Rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation. Based on the Prosecution’s applications of 22 February 2023, Pre-Trial Chamber II considered that there are reasonable grounds to believe that each suspect bears responsibility for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, in prejudice of Ukrainian children.

The absurdity of these charges and warrants, based solely on Kiev propaganda about Russia’s attempts to save the lives of children, is manifest. It is also clear that they did not charge President Putin with aggression because there has been none, and so they decided to use the most emotive charge possible to inflame public opinion against Russia. In other words, the ICC became an active tool of NATO in its war against Russia.

On 5 March 2024, the ICC issued warrants of arrest for Sergei Ivanovich Kobylash, a Lieutenant General in the Russian Armed Forces who at the relevant time was the Commander of the Long-Range Aviation of the Aerospace Force, and Viktor Nikolayevich Sokolov, an Admiral in the Russian Navy, who at the relevant time was the Commander of the Black Sea Fleet for the war crime of directing attacks at civilian objects, the war crime of causing excessive incidental harm to civilians or damage to civilian objects, and the crime against humanity of inhumane acts. None of these allegations are based on any facts or any investigation and meant to be propaganda.

On 24 June 2024, the ICC issued warrants of arrest Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov, in the context of the situation in Ukraine for alleged international crimes committed from at least 10 October 2022 until at least 9 March 2023 for the same reasons, war propaganda, to justify the continuance of the war against Russia.

Ukraine leadership given immunity from prosecution for its crimes

The ICC has not charged anyone in the illegitimate government of Ukraine for any of its crimes against the civilian population of Ukraine in the Donbass oblasts from 2014 to today, nor for its gratuitous attacks on the civilian population of Russia. It has been given immunity from prosecution.

The only legitimate prosecutors are the Palestinians, Lebanese, Iranians and Syrians for Israeli crimes committed against them.

So, all those celebrating and cheering the warrants issued against Netanyahu and Gallant should think carefully about what they are doing. Yes, those two are war criminals. Yes, they should be held accountable, but to the Palestinians and the Lebanese, the Syrians and Iranians. They are the ones who should be issuing warrants for their arrest, who should make them stand trial before the tribunals of those nations, as well as the leaders of the USA and the other nations who are parties to the Israeli crimes not this political farce called the ICC which is not a world court, which is not an independent judicial body capable of rendering justice, but a political tool of the West, used by the West for its own political and strategic reasons and objectives. The world is tired of the games of the ICC. The people of the world want real justice.

Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto. He is known for a number of high-profile war crimes cases and recently published his novel Beneath the Clouds. He writes essays on international law, politics and world events.

November 26, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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