Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Saturday, February 18, 2012

The Last Word: Government's law agenda in disorder

The Twitterverse erupted with such fury yesterday that a Canadian politician was briefly the number two target on the planet.

Public Safety Minister Vic Toews (@TellVicEverything) was besieged with thousands of followers posting every tiny detail of their lives to protest his Internet snooping bill.

It was a fun display of social media in full mocking attack mode.

But there’s something Vic Toews really needs to know beyond what a lot of followers had for lunch. His government’s law agenda is in disorder.

Never mind the big picture of an omnibus crime bill out of step with public opinion. Polls show a preference for prevention and rehabilitation over this government’s fixation on punishment and imprisonment.

Or that mandatory prison sentences will turn jails into a kindergarten criminal school for minor offenders. Six months for growing six marijuana plants? Three years for a kid caught holding a loaded gun? Where’s the logic in that?

Yet the loudest public backlash was reserved for this week’s lawful access bill, which would give police invasive Internet surveillance powers without a warrant.

It was introduced the day before the Conservatives killed off the federal long gun registry for being too intrusive. How ironic.

Toews initially framed it as a choice between bill supporters and child porn sympathizers. Then he told me he’d never said any such thing. Which, of course, is simply not true, as Commons video proved:



He then misnamed the bill as a warrantless child porn crackdown, glossing over the fact it will allow the police infiltration of any suspicious Internet user without a judge’s consent.

What’s worse, the need for it has never been articulated. Police can’t list a single case of a child porn producer escaping justice because of the existing warrant requirement.

To their credit, members of the Conservative caucus and the Prime Minister sensed big problems with the bill very quickly and Toews was forced to surrender it to a parliamentary committee for a make-over.

But a bill cannot be satisfactorily amended if it’s not needed in the first place. It should simply die on the order paper.

And if telling Vic Toews everything about his off-side lawmaking offends the minister, well, I’ll just deny saying it tomorrow.

Original Article
Source: powerplay CTV 
Author: Don Martin 

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