Mar. 3, 2007: Bud Talkinghorn & Security

Re: SCOC, Security Certificates, Maher Arar, Terrorists, CBC, Politicized Media

Three strikes and security is out

Talk about synergy. We have the Supreme Court disallowing indefinite detention of high risk terrorist suspects. The biographies of these suspects makes for interesting reading. Sprinkled amongst them are connections to various al-Qaeda affiliates in North Africa (e,g, Moroccans, Algerians, Egyptians). None are Canadian citizens, while most have visted or trained in Afghanistan. Following that court decision, up almost immediately was the opposition's voting down two more security measures. Now terrorist suspects who are thought to be within days of carrying out their attacks can no longer be detained and questioned without criminal charges being brought. Nor can material suspects to these plots be hauled in for questioning.

The case of indefinite detention without evidence given to suspects is a sad occurence. It smacks of a police state, but this measure is taken in the face of a hidden enemy. Al-Qaeda has planted sleeper cells throughout the Western world. Many of these sleepers have advanced educations and are invisible to all intents and purposes. A fairly recent al-Qaeda cell broken up in Pakistan contained a cardiologist, a teacher, and two professional engineers. They were only a week away from a horrendous plot to massacre hundreds. An insidious enemy with new tactics (think 9/11) must be dealt with differently. Especially as The Charter means we can't deport these people--another Supreme Court interpretation. [Brought to you by a mainly Liberal-larded appointment process -- FHTR]

The opposition's demand that the other security provisions be stricken was nothing but political opportunism. Both the NDP and the Liberals had to "whip" their caucuses to get the right vote numbers. Still one Liberal voted for the extension, and four others by not attending the vote, while Irwin Cotler, the former Justice Minister, abstained. He later told the press, "There was no need for this revision. It has never been abused in the years the laws were implemented. It is a necessary measure." However the majority saw the gains in the ever-growing Muslim voting bloc. Without going into elaboration, let's just say that many of that community harbour paranoid conspiracy theories. Also a huge amount of denial persists about what is being perpertrated in the name of their faith. Whatever party plays to that paranoia best gets their votes.

Stephen Harper said it succinctly after the vote. "This decision will come back to haunt the Liberals." I believe that will be true; especially should a major terrorist attack occur before an election. No mealy-mouthed spin doctoring will cover up their vote mongering over security. They proved that the combined leftist parties can hobble the Conservatives, but at what cost to Canada?

© Bud Talkinghorn--If Al-Qaeda could vote in Canada it would be hard for them to decide which left-wing party represent the greatest number of "useful fools". Probably the NDP. Unfortunately, they are perpetual losers in elections, so the Liberals would get them by default.


Related post: scroll down for: Mar. 1, 2007: Security: Domestic terror wins big -- "CSIS has identified over 50 terrorist groups operating on Canadian soil and over $256 million have been identified by FINTRAC in 2005/2006 as having possible links to terrorism."

frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/2007/03/
mar-1-2007-security-domestic-terror.html


Court considers strict bail conditions of terror suspect , Andrew Duffy, CanWest, Ottawa Citizen, March 01, 2007

www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=
82b6421f-365d-4659-8886-46c2290a8db8&k=29511

OTTAWA - Accused al-Qaida terrorist Mohamed Harkat says his bail conditions are so strict he fears his release has also imprisoned his wife and mother-in-law, one of whom must be with him every minute of the day - even in public washrooms. [....]

On May 23, 2006, Federal Court Judge Eleanor Dawson, citing unnecessary government delays in Harkat's security certificate case, ordered him released. But she imposed some of the strictest conditions in Canadian history.

Under terms of his release, Harkat must wear an electronic monitoring device that allows authorities to track his movements and he must be in the company of his wife, Sophie, or mother-in-law, Pierrette Brunette, at all times.

He is allowed three, four-hour excursions each week that must be approved in advance by the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). He is not allowed to leave Ottawa, nor visit the airport, train station, bus depot or any car rental agency. He is not allowed to use a computer or cellphone. His mail is searched and his phone is tapped by federal authorities. [....]

The Canadian Security Intelligence Service alleges Harkat travelled to Afghanistan in the early 1990s and developed a relationship with al-Qaida lieutenant Abu Zubayda.

I'm afraid most of us experience a failure to empathize ... but that's not nice ... and we must be nice useful fools ... and we have the courts to help ... somebody. Harkat could leave Canada but he has such influential supporters here that he'll do fine right here, whatever the majority of Canadians might want.



Related to Bud's next post: Disturbing reality buried
Fear of causing offence and wilful blindness will only end the day innocent Canadians die -- or How many would Behead PM Harper? How many Canadian Muslims, that is.

calsun.canoe.ca/News/Columnists/Corbella_Licia/
2007/02/18/3642930-sun.html

www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/
viewtopic.php?p=16093&highlight=
&mforum=elwoodpdowd#16093


Muslim-Canadian attitudes: A most inconvenient truth

CBC recently commissioned Environics to do a survey of Muslim-Canadian and other Canadians' attitudes. On The National, CBC doled out their predictable multicultural Pollyanna-ish conclusions. "Look", it bannered, "Fully 73% of Muslims condemn the actions of the 17 Muslim-Canadian terrorist suspects." 73%, wow! What a strong majority! On their website, they trot out the words of some Muslim sociology prof, Haideh Moghissi, to baldly state, "That figure of 12% who thought mass murder of their fellow citizens was justified doesn't warrant attention." Oh, really? And the 15% who weren't sure? What are we to make of them? Your neighbour's family is mindlessly slaughtered, but 27% of the neighbourhood either applauds or is uncertain as to their feelings about it. Reason for deep concern or not?

Licia Corbella from The Calgary Sun was concerned, nay horrified, by these numbers. She wrote a column on it (Feb. 18, 2007). That 27% of respondents can't unequivocally see the sheer wickedness of this aborted plot is chilling information indeed. Even taking the margin of error into consideration on the humanitarian side, that still means a minimum of 47,000 Muslims are sympathizers with the terrorist suspects. It makes the citizens of the fictional prairie town in "The Little Mosque on the Prairie" sound not bigoted, but prudent. Periodically we have the reports of radical mosques in Toronto and Vancouver preaching jihad, to chew on. What the combined information shows is that, like similar polls in Britain and the Netherlands, there is naked hatred of Western standards of democracy and social equality. That much of this animosity is held by second generation Muslim-Canadians is doubly frightening. They are the invisible snakes in our multicultural New Jerusalem garden.

The omission of the negative side to this poll is typical of CBC. As with the old time Marxists, the facts make no impact. Even that the CBC headquarters was one of the targets of the terrorist suspects cannot shake their blindered view of our failed immigration policy. Only their success in social engineering could explain why they released these poll statistics in the first place. Ordinarily, any poll that exposes their failed ideological stance is buried. An example was the recent poll showing the Conservatives on a steep upward movement. Maybe they did report it, but not the day it came out. I never saw it and I was looking for it that day.

As for the supposed 73% who condemned terrorism, how many simply gave the answer that wouldn't mark them as religious psychopaths? This poll wasn't asking what their favourite cereal was. One can hope that these disturbing results are being absorbed by our lenient IRB and the present government. How many kissing cousins of Ahmed Ressam can we tolerate in our midst? Canadians, wake up and smell the cordite.

© Bud Talkinghorn


Related: The Toronto Star article referencing Maher Arar is no longer available: [Frost Hits the Rhubarb Aug. 28 - Sept. 3, 2007 -- Re: Arar ... Ex-consul grilled over what he knew, when, Sep1. 1, 2005]

However, it is available here:

Ex-consul grilled over what he knew, when
Last witness to testify at inquiry
Taxpayers to foot $8 million plus bill , by MICHELLE SHEPHARD, STAFF REPORTER - Toronto Star, Sept. 1, 2005

www.ymlp.com/pubarchive_show_mess
age_iframe.php?montrealmuslimnews+4913

Original link:

www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=
thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=
1125526233255&call_pageid=968332188774&col=
968350116467&DPL=IvsNDS%2f7ChAX&tacodalogin=yes

[....] Portions of a censored government report, released at the inquiry only yesterday, make the claim that Arar told a consular official he was beaten with an electric cable while detained in Syria. That contradicts statements by the consul, Leo Martel, that he was never aware of the abuse.

The censored report was written by an unnamed government official about a conversation the official had on Feb. 8, 2004, with Martel, Canada's former consul in Damascus.

[....] Martel, the only Canadian official to meet Arar while he was in Syria, was the last witness to appear before the inquiry. Lawyers will present their public summary reports to the inquiry later this month, after which O'Connor will write an interim report. [....]

Even though the report concerned Arar's case, a government spokesperson said yesterday it had been censored on the grounds of privacy concerns, since Martel asserted the information concerned Nureddin. [....]

Search: Muayyed Nureddin

Feb. 28, 2007: Security, the Spin, Another Private Foundation

It has irritated me that, while repeatedly mentioning that PM Harper apologized to Mayer Arar, there was virtually no exploration of whether torture actually occurred, that is, proof other than Arar's word, and the mainstream media have been his champion. Nor was there any questioning of, if torture occurred, what went wrong under the previous administration(s), nor exploration of how this might have occurred, why Arar was under surveillance, nor discrepancies, and there were discrepancies. None of this has been explored by journalists, at least from what I read or listened to from the usual suspects. It is as though Arar's troubles were the current government's fault.

A world of Maher Arars
Why won't the U.S. admit Maher Arar's innocence? It may be fear of precedent. Tales of other suspects seized and sent abroad to face torture are beginning to come to light in Europe. This week, those stories helped bring down the Italian government. And as Doug Saunders reports, this could be just the beginning. , Doug Saunders, Globe and Mail, Saturday, Feb. 24, 2007

www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/
RTGAM.20070224.wararus0224/
BNStory/International/home

Note: PM "Harper apologizes to Arar for torture in Syria" -- Actually, he apologized on behalf of Canada. What occurred, whatever it was, occurred under a previous administration but apologies customarily come from whoever is PM when the issue is settled (Or said to be settled, considering that there may yet be a sequel, imho).

Does it serve the BCE/Globe and Mail/CBC political purpose to muddy the waters concerning Arar? While propagandizing for him, there is much missing, as the next article will detail.



Paid $10.5-million ... taken at his own word

What really happened to Maher Arar? Maher Arar received the largest government settlement in Canadian history. Even after an inquiry, the public should ask, why? Kevin Steel, Feb. 26, 2007

www.westernstandard.ca/website/ind
ex.cfm?page=article&article_id=2333

Excellent. Read this one closely.

The problem is, Arar's claims of physical torture have gone largely unchallenged. The Canadian media has been eager to report every dramatic detail and columnists write as if the allegations are established fact. But even though the Arar commission wrote that he had been tortured, it did little to substantiate the 34-year-old wireless technology consultant's assertions. [....]

When compared to the recommendations outlined in the Istanbul Protocol, the Toope Report can only be characterized as inadequate. For instance, the Protocol emphasizes the creation of a medical report by a physician with expertise in documenting physical abuse. But no such medical report appears to have been created .... Toope relied on an oral interview with Doug Gruner, a doctor who Amnesty International, which had politically lobbied for Arar, had recommended--hardly an independent expert. As for expertise, [....]

The Protocol stresses the selection of an unbiased physician, but Toope makes no effort to establish Gruner as unbiased and actually notes Gruner is also working for another political activist. [....]

Search: why Canadian police were suspicious of him back in 2001 , whipped with a two-inch-thick electrical cable , an experienced consular official , Martel , Even after Arar was released, he did not speak of beatings., Stephen Toope, president of the left-leaning Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, was appointed as fact-finder , rapporteur of the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances , al Qaeda teaches them to make a claim of torture , Manual on the Effective Investigation and Documentation of Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, otherwise known as the Istanbul Protocol , The credibility of Arar's allegations of physical torture , gone unchallenged , to obtain any documentation establishing Maher's whereabouts , produced none.


More on another Foundation

I thought the fact that the one investigating came from the Trudeau Foundation; yet Trudeau's son Sacha Trudeau was one of the ones supporting one or more of the ones picked up on security certificates was intriguing. What, exactly, is the Trudeau Foundation for, the one Canadian taxpayers kicked $125,000,000 into ... in honour of something or another?


A "Private" Foundation for "advanced research in the humanities and the human sciences"

Frost Hits the Rhubarb -- or you may find it here but it would not come up for me this morning. I posted it but it did not exist ... this morning. Try Frost Hits the Rhubarb Dec. 5, 2006

Dec. 5, 2006: Ring around the rosie ...

Caveat emptor: Please note that, even as I was putting this up, the first link developed some strange extra marks ... maybe normal, maybe Gremlins.


Based on the Liberal leadership fest, yesterday, Dec. 4, 06, I posted "CTV interrupts convention coverage to interview Alexandre Trudeau in Havana". Intrigued, I searched and found the following; you might be similarly intrigued.

Table of Contents [....]

[Naturally, some information goes astray.]

Search:

Sacha Trudeau - Security Certificates
Missing history and screen capture

Trudeau takes up cause of hunger strikers held on security certificates

www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/story.ht
ml?id=c0c9c837-6ed5-4864-83e0-72fce4c6603f&k=4724

Filmmaker Alexandre Trudeau [Sacha] has come to the defence of two security detainees now on a hunger strike for improved conditions, appealing to federal Justice Minister Irwin Cotler to intervene on their behalf.

Frost Hits the Rhubarb December 11, 2006
Dec. 11, 2006: Propinquity

It's wonderful how the concerns of various groups coalesce ... or appear to ... academe , "doing good" for students , academics , mentors , foundations , mining , mining engineering , investment banking , bank profits , taxpayer money

First, some background and / or related items, then the current news below those items -- Street race: Now TD vies for the prize

re: Toronto Dominion Bank, TD Securities, Frank McKenna and ranging over Falconbridge, CVRD, mining and energy, oil sands, Air Canada, AIM funds, Cheung Kong and its partners, Deutsche Bank and Bilfinger Burger, Anglo-Swiss miner Xstrata PLC, Toronto-Dominion advisory deals, equity deals and more


Background

Dec. 5, 2006: Ring around the rosie ...

frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/2006
/12/dec-5-2006-ring-around-rosie.html

Scroll down to this section: The Pierre Trudeau Foundation - Scholar in Mining Engineering Grant -- Global Citizenship - Canadian Taxpayers' Contribution

Sacha Trudeau on Global Citizenship , UBC Report, Nov 3, 2006, Public Affairs, UBC / University of British Columbia [....]

Not exactly how it all began, my son, but moving in that direction , a bit of Memory Lane from Industry Canada, 2002 [....]

modern technology network

[....] Update 2:....

More Background

The halls of academe , CVRD Brazil , Trudeau Foundation Mining Engineering Grant , UBC Mining engineering , internships in Brazil at CVRD , Vancouver-based Teck Cominco Ltd. , Xstrata , Falconbridge and Inco , Noranda , Sumitomo , and more [....]

There is much more on that foundation, should you check.


Frost Hits the Rhubarb Sept. 21, 2006: Crying Wolf or ... what?

Al Shukrijumah, Adnan G. , tbk.com -- The Terrorism Knowledge Base

frosthitstherhubarb.blogspot.com/
2006_09_17_archive.html

[....] Bit by bit, the al-Qaeda operative allegedly managed to pilfer approximately 180 pounds of nuclear material from the university - - enough to build several radiological bombs.[xv]

CFP article: Al-Quaeda' "hidden arsenal"

www.forumsvibe.com/elwoodpdowd/view
topic.php?t=359&mforum=elwoodpdowd