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CANADA FREEDOM CONVOY Open Thread Updates: Ottawa Declares State of Emergency

CANADA FREEDOM CONVOY Open Thread Updates: Ottawa Declares State of Emergency

Coward Ottawa mayor: “Clearly, we are outnumbered and we are losing this battle. This has to be reversed – we have to get our city back.”

Looks like the gubmint has had enough of the freedom-loving Canadian truckers. How dare these people to want the government to leave them alone and do away with stupid mandates.

Cowards.

Watson is such a weasel:

Speaking to Canadian radio station CFRA, Mr Watson said the protesters were behaving increasingly “insensitively” by continuously “blaring horns and sirens, [setting off] fireworks and turning it into a party”.

“Clearly, we are outnumbered and we are losing this battle,” he said, adding: “This has to be reversed – we have to get our city back.”

The mayor did not give specific details about what measures he might impose, but police said on Sunday that they would step up enforcement, including possible arrests of those seeking to aid the protesters.

A state of emergency will give the city additional powers, including access to equipment required by frontline workers and emergency services.

I will update this thread as the news comes out.

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Comments

Okay. Change of tactics. Simply don’t deliver anything anywhere in Canada. Just stay at home and watch a hockey game.

    Precisely. Go Full Solidarity and implement a national strike. Methinks Trudeau is going to have a tough time rounding up enough scabs and fan-boys to drive the rigs.

      smalltownoklahoman in reply to MarkJ. | February 7, 2022 at 9:46 am

      Hmmm, maybe. But I have to ask: do you think he will find enough scabs and fan-boys to keep himself and his government comfortable and functional?

      Marie Bethamn in reply to MarkJ. | February 7, 2022 at 11:04 am

      Yes, Solidarność is the template for this protest. Where is Lech Walesa and why hasn’t any reporter sought him out for comment?

      LibraryGryffon in reply to MarkJ. | February 7, 2022 at 11:34 am

      And would there be enough rigs for them to drive? I don’t know what proportion of the Canadian fleet is privately owned. Would the government seize all the privately-owned trucks too?

        Yep. For the good of the collective.

        It’s quite simple to temporarily disable a rig so that a seized vehicle can’t be operated. Take key parts off of them and store them somewhere. A simple circuit breaker or two would do. Can that be defeated? Sure, if you have an auto parts store in your back pocket.

        Back in the days of jeeps in the military it was a good idea to take the rotor out and put it in your pocket when you parked yours if you wanted it to still be there when you got back. Not having keyed ignition switches they were very easy to steal without such precautions.

It is amazing that this could be over and life could go back to normal if they would simply lift the mandates. But since PJT is just like his real father, he will continue his dictatorship over his country.

    Off-topic, but I am curious because I’ve never heard this before. Who allegedly *is* his “real father”?

      Russ from Winterset in reply to UJ. | February 7, 2022 at 9:41 am

      Fidel Castro

        Yep. Look at photos of side by side and you’ll see a resemblance, Justin was also a pallbearer at Castro’s funeral.

        Margaret certainly got around; after she divorced Pierre she was even a groupie with the Rolling Stones for a while.

        The Gentle Grizzly in reply to Russ from Winterset. | February 7, 2022 at 9:45 am

        Meme, or an actual fact?

          Russ from Winterset in reply to The Gentle Grizzly. | February 7, 2022 at 10:02 am

          Hasn’t been proven yet. Like “Webb Hubbell is Chelsea Clinton’s real father”, nobody has submitted to a DNA test.

          But it’s definitely plausible. Justin’s mom was sort of an international version of The Town Bike.

          As Russ said, not definitively proven but it’s plausible. Both Pierre and Margaret had affairs. Castro made them both look like amateurs in that department (he had 11 officially-acknowledged children and who knows how many more unacknowledged ones). But Castro and the Trudeaus did get along personally. Besides looking at photos of both of them over the years, it’s a timing issue as well. In April 1971, Pierre and Margaret took a personal trip and visited multiple islands in the Caribbean; all but one of them was disclosed to the media, and that visit was April 13. Eight and half months later, on Christmas Day, Justin was born. So that’s you get “Fidel is Justin’s real dad”.

          That being said, the only reason Justin is where he is today is because of his last name.

          Zoolander?

          Come on, get with the program. The bastards father was Commie Castro, clear as daylight.

    smalltownoklahoman in reply to oldvet50. | February 7, 2022 at 9:52 am

    Governments almost never willingly give up power once they have taken it. Canadians not only have to oust Truedipsh*t but also elect into office those who will hold true to promises of ending the mandates and returning life to the way it was prelockdown.

      hold true to promises of ending the mandates and returning life to the way it was prelockdown

      Even if they end the mandates they say they will be retaining the emergency powers, so nothing will really change.

Canadian truckers are giving the entire world a lesson.
Maybe if (almost 2 years ago) we all had done what they’re doing today, things would have played out differently.

    henrybowman in reply to Exiliado. | February 8, 2022 at 12:59 am

    Civilized people tend not to decide that someone is a liar or a fool until they have collected enough data points to make it incontrovertible. Two years is about what it took with the likes of Fauci and Wallensky, who at the outset, gave every indication of knowing what they were doing.

At the very least, stop delivering fuel to Ottawa. If the city is going to seize the truckers’ fuel, let that be all the fuel the city gets.

The mayor isn’t a coward, declaring state of emergency isn’t an act of fear it is a prelude to forcibly ending the protests.

Canada doesn’t have a 1st amendment, and even in this country emergency powers aren’t defined particularly well or narrowly.

What this move is is not cowardly it is fascistic though.

    Subotai Bahadur in reply to Danny. | February 7, 2022 at 8:02 pm

    Yeah, most people do not realize how literally un-American Canadians are. Remember, their concept of governance came from the side that lost our Revolutionary War.

    First, they are a parliamentary government. In such a government, sovereignty and power resides in the Commons side of parliament, not any document or set of principles. The Prime Minister can do anything including concentration camps with a majority vote in Commons. They are not really a “free people” as we consider it.

    Second, the closest thing they have to a Bill of Rights [or constitutional restrictions on the powers/activities of government] is the 1982 version of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Note it is the 1982 version. Parliament changes it at will. There are no absolute rights for Canadian citizens/subjects. And the Charter contains provisions that allow the government to suspend it in whole or part at will. There is no judicial review of government actions, nor an equivalent of Marbury -v- Madison.

    Just theoretically of course, the absence of a controlling due process limitation on the actions of a government that can impose deadly force takes you towards a saying by Clausewitz: “Der Krieg ist eine bloße Fortsetzung der Politik mit anderen Mitteln.“. There is something in Chapter 3 of Sun-Tzu that may also be applicable.

    Subotai Bahadur

      While mostly right keep in mind the only effective measure against tyranny is voters not wanting it. If Hillary had won in 2016 we would more than likely have that now because it would be a Democrat Supreme Court rubber stamping whatever Biden or a Democrat governor wants despite our constitution.

      That said having a system like Canada’s does make the slide a lot easier when voters start sliding into support for authoritarianism, but don’t forget how close we came to that (50k voters in three states in 2016 is all that stood between us and being Canada or Australia).

    henrybowman in reply to Danny. | February 8, 2022 at 1:06 am

    In this country, emergency powers aren’t defined AT ALL.
    There is no martial law or emergency power over citizens defined in the US constitution. None.
    In all the state constitutions with which I am familiar, “emergency powers” extend only to powers of the governor to ensure the continuation of government operation — that is, he has extraordinary powers over government officials, employees, and materiel… not the general public.
    Every one of the “health mandates” issued by the various governors exceeded their constitutional powers. We argued that here in Arizona, and won by default.
    I assume Canada has some such thing, as their people have always been subjects, not sovereigns.

      Emergency Powers exist in this country for a short list I could do

      1. Forcing religious communities that believed war to be a sin to pray for American victory in war (WW2 Supreme Court upheld that under grounds of emergency)

      2. Internment based on fear that some members of a community of American Citizens weren’t loyal despite concession by the government that most were loyal (WW2, Japanese Americans; actual reason for internment racism, legal justification emergency, legal basis it was upheld emergency)

      3. Revocation of writ of habeus corpus (Civil War, again emergency)

      4. Placing a politician in prison for being against a war the United States chose to enter and stating why in an op ed (First World War, famous case “you can’t yell fire in a crowded building” came from that case)

      Endless cases were state and U.S. Supreme court permitted government action due to emergency in this century from war on terror policies establishing the national security state to covid measures.

      You are right it isn’t in the Constitution. Not all laws are, but we have tons of precedent going back to the Civil War establishing that there are emergency powers. Sometimes courts rule that emergency powers have been exceeded, or that the emergency justification is not valid but don’t delude yourself emergency powers do exist in American law.

        lichau in reply to Danny. | February 8, 2022 at 2:45 pm

        Repetition of an unconstitutional act does not make it constitutional.

          Danny in reply to lichau. | February 9, 2022 at 10:16 am

          Supreme Court has the final say over if something is constitutional, all of those examples saw the inside of the supreme court and got upheld, so yes emergency powers are a real thing in this country.

This is Leviathan using its power. The government will not give in to what it considers to be ‘militant normals’ acting uppity. Leviathan uses its power in a slow orderly fashion which people come to accept because it is orderly. For ‘normals’ to break free of this power and control, they must act disorderly which will inconvenience a great many other ‘normals’. A change in tactics will be needed on the part of the truckers. If the State can incite violence in some fashion, media and the political class will use this as a ‘see we told you so’ moment. The State wants all this to end like the Tea Party did.

Yep- the “supply chain” to the city could get REALLY thin if they start bullying.

Trudeau & gang turning Ottawa into Ottawauschwitz?

Time for Canadian truckers to park their rigs…..perpendicular to the flow of traffic and on major highways leading into the cities.

IMO, the truckers have raised awareness and highlighted their concerns. The better course now is to disburse back home and then simply go Gault for a month or two. That would have the benefit of continuing to reinforce the message offer opportunities through alt media to make further PR updates and get their members out of karma way. When govt deploys a show of force the next step is using that force. Better to avoid a direct confrontation, for now.

    scooterjay in reply to CommoChief. | February 7, 2022 at 3:25 pm

    Leave the rigs before going Galt. Stop the engine of the world.

      CommoChief in reply to scooterjay. | February 7, 2022 at 3:54 pm

      Maybe the trailers but not the rigs. Just take those home and park them for a few weeks or months. Removing that many trucks from the supply system will have an impact. Particularly if a show of solidarity is made by fleet drivers and even normal, everyday Canadian workers for a week or more.

      Since Rona is such a threat who can blame folks for sitting at home and waiting for the emergency to end before returning to work. Particularly, healthcare workers, grocery store workers, convince store clerks, warehouse employees, refinery workers, sewage and sanitation workers…..

Mr. Mayor, why not just talk to your citizens conducting this protest and see if you can come to an agreement. They are protesting because of your overbearing COVID policies, and imposing overbearing policing policies without addressing their grievances is not going to end well.

    DelightLaw1 in reply to ArmyStrong. | February 7, 2022 at 11:46 am

    When you are “outnumbered” – his own words – by the opposition, it might be a clue it’s time to surrender. Speaks volumes that that is never even an option these tyrants consider.

    Subotai Bahadur in reply to ArmyStrong. | February 7, 2022 at 7:44 pm

    Rulers talking to citizens??? That is the most un-Canadian thing in the world. The purpose of citizens is to submit.

    At least in Leftist World.

    Subotai Bahadur

It is Atlas Shrugged time. All aggrieved parties, all across the planet, should just stop. We can win in 3 days if the will is there.

    scooterjay in reply to E Howard Hunt. | February 7, 2022 at 3:27 pm

    Trucks as barricades, twelve abreast across all lanes. Drivers go Galt. The question at this point is who will emerge as Kip and as his Ma?

This YouTube report by the truckers’ spokesmen explains what happened over the weekend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3D3sYDMNiD4

The main points are:

one. the police are in a position to resolve the disputes and their actions are having zero negative effects.

two: this is a political struggle and will have to be addressed by the politicians. The establishment resistance is already caving around the world and in Canada.

Watch this video. There are no trannies, blue-haired soy boys, nor butch lesbians leading this resistance. No shouting, no violence…. Just well-informed and articulate spokesmen. You will know everything you need to know in 13 minutes. Freelancer Marcel Irnie is doing a great job reporting on this. He also does an excellent podcast.

Resident Canadian here. The fuel seizure was symbolic for the media and an intimidation attempt. Truckers in the area have posted indicating that they have more than adequate fuel and supplies.

    alaskabob in reply to daniel_ream. | February 7, 2022 at 11:32 am

    Soon symbolic will be replaced with something with force. As mandates around the world face and shown to have been damaging….The State must still be obeyed. The health and welfare of the people are only of secondary interest.

      I am convinced that Ottawa will be the last province to end the mandates. They will hold out as long as they can. It is Canada’s DC. Canadian politicians are every bit as much in China’s back pocket as are America’s. The truckers will win.

        British Columbia is pretty hard-core still, and Quebec isn’t a bastion of freedom either. What makes Ontario interesting is that plenty of federal employees live in Quebec, particularly Gatineau which is right across the border, and commute to Ottawa. On the other hand, there’s a provincial election coming up in Ontario later this year and the current Premier, Doug Ford, may start loosening things up to try to save his electoral hide.

        As an aside, there’s a city that straddles the Alberta/Saskatchewan border and when Saskatchewan started enacting policies related to buying alcohol and pot (ie. proof of vaccination, please), that city basically said, forget us trying to enforce that because everyone will just go to the Alberta side and we have better things to do.

          Interesting. I guess it boils down to how long the provincial leaders want to avoid facing their voters while angering them further with their useless police intimidation which isn’t working. I think it is easier for the provinces to get out now than later.

          My parents immigrated to the US from Quebec so I am familiar with the Quebecois culture. I find it hard to believe that they will put up with this. I would think that Ottawa impose any mandates on anything would meet strong resistance in Quebec, if not by politicians than with the cynical citizens.

          BC is being confronted by their biggest minority, Chinese immigrants who “didn’t leave China for Chinada”. That’s tough nut for the elites to crack and I believe they will be among the first to cave.

          Nobody believes in these mandates. The citizens get it. The leadership is trying to hold on to power by intimidation and they will lose in the end. The last to cave will suffer the most. Just my opinion. It’s a political problem that will require a political solution and there is only one that will work: surrender. The opposition party is blowing a generational opportunity and are probably just as corrupt as anyone.

        The Province of Ottawa has pretty much been in a state of emergency for about 2 years now. The govt has been using emergency powers that whole time and have never been forced to explain to their legislature or a court why those ‘temporary’ measures have been anything but.

    AnAdultInDiapers in reply to daniel_ream. | February 7, 2022 at 1:53 pm

    Symbolic seizure of peoples’ means of warmth and hot food.

    That is, frankly, fucking atrocious.

Comanche Voter | February 7, 2022 at 12:38 pm

You lose control of the serfs, things start to get out of hand.

Canada’s Tiananmen Square moment.

Will freedom, liberty, and democracy prevail or will left-wing tyranny?

    After using that analogy several times myself, I’ve been giving that a lot of thought and am finding problems with that analogy. The main problem is that Chinese culture places little value in human life which contrasts with Canadian and American culture. The Tiananmen Square crackdown effectively ended the freedom protest because their wasn’t that much freedom to begin with and it wasn’t institutionalized in their laws.

    I think the better analogy is the Britain’s Jallianwala Bagh massacre which galvanized world-wide opinion against the British in India’s struggle for independence.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jallianwala_Bagh_massacre

    I also recall a scene in the movie “Gandhi” where Indians fighters were blockading British troops and as the British troops beat them one row at a time, the row behind them just steps up to get beaten. Eventually, the British gave up for lacking the stomach to continue.

    I doubt these protests will take us there since popular opinion has already turned against governments across the globe but it might be threatened in a desperate move near the end. I can certainly see this in the US if just to exact revenge before they lose. These are desperate and crazy people.

      henrybowman in reply to Pasadena Phil. | February 7, 2022 at 5:56 pm

      I distinctly remember (though I cannot currently locate) a Gandhi quote explaining that nonviolent resistance was productive against England only because they possessed a common underlying morality (in their case, a Christian morality), and that nonviolence would have been totally ineffective against an enemy without the same moral compunctions.

      It will be interesting to see where Ottawa falls on this spectrum. For me, DC is not even a question any longer.

        WISteve in reply to henrybowman. | February 7, 2022 at 10:04 pm

        Indeed. The DC pols were delivering raw meat in the sandwiches for the National Guard troops from neighboring PA sent to their aid. DC and Ottawa are both controlled by Marxist/leftist pols without souls.

        I was hoping the farmers who joined in the peaceful protests might leave calling cards on the front lawns and homes of the Ottawa Police Chief and the commanders of those tough guys stealing fuel from peaceful protestors:
        —Ever seen how far a side-discharge manure spreader can fling the poop?
        –Or just how foul the black water out of a hog confinement pit smells? You can smell that stuff for miles after they pump out the pits and spray it on to fields with high pressure hoses. If that gunk gets onto brick or concrete you will play heck getting the stink out. Every time it rains you will smell it, even months later.
        –That would be a shame if they happened to fertilize their front yards, wouldn’t it?

It is hard to imagine what legal authority the police have to seize fuel.

That should be something the courts strike down.

I also understand people being angry and or upset if there are parties and horn blowing throughout the night while people are trying to sleep. Assuming that those reports are true, (and they very well may not be) we don’t see any benefit for the truckers and supporters by ticking people off and denying them sleep. The noise at night will turn some of the population against them.

    Morning Sunshine in reply to gitarcarver. | February 7, 2022 at 4:53 pm

    I have heard that the honking follows the city noise ordinance – from 8pm-8am it is “quiet” with the horns.

      The truckers said they had an accord with each other, but residences are claiming the horn blowing is not only from 8 AM – 8 PM. There was supposed to be a hearing on the issue today in response to a class action suit against the truckers:

      Quote:

      Ottawa lawyers Paul Champ and Emilie Taman filed the statement of claim Friday, arguing that for the 6,000 residents in the immediate vicinity of the protest “the non-stop blaring horns have caused unbearable torment in the sanctity of their own homes.” The lawyers also asked for an injunction to stop the horn use.

      But a lawyer defending three of the for organizers named in the lawsuit asked for the adjournment and said the truckers had been negotiating to limit their horn use to between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.

      Alberta lawyer Keith Wilson of the Calgary-based Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedom, called case one of “national importance.”

      “The truckers have an accord amongst themselves that the horns will not sound between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m.” Wilson said at the virtual hearing before Ontario Superior Court Justice Hugh McLean.

      Champ argued the noise that would still go on for 12 hours a day could still cause “irreparable hearing damage” and asked for a temporary injunction. McLean refused, in part because he said he didn’t know how he could “craft an enforceable order.” Usually, the right for someone to enjoy their homes without interference is covered by criminal law, not civil law, the judge said.

      The case will be back in court Monday afternoon. Unquote

      https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/truck-convoy-counter-protests-at-city-hall-class-action-lawsuit-adjourned-until-monday/ar-AATvozA

    henrybowman in reply to gitarcarver. | February 7, 2022 at 6:00 pm

    It’s become an SOP government game — do something they damn well know is illegal, knowing the courts will drag out any eventual relief far beyond the time that the victims could gain practical benefit from it. A fait accompli, followed by a long-delayed slap on the wrist.

“we are losing this battle.”–seriously, the mayor is characterizing this as a battle?–unlike his american neighbors in portland for example who actually had blm/antifa thugs burning, looting, comitting assaults(especially against the police) etc and our public officials did nothing–they were in a battle for real and yet this mayor sees horns, fireworks, noise, as a battle? justification for a “state of emergency?”

come on

If it was Occupy Wall Street or BLM, they would provide tents and catering.

Wow — look at all those famously unarmed and nice Canadian cops!

Unless you challenge the State, then it’s a Tianamen Square re-enactment.

Reminds me of the old Soviet Union and East Germany labor revolts which hastened the fall of worldwide communism.

“Coward Ottawa mayor: “Clearly, we are outnumbered and we are losing this battle. This has to be reversed – we have to get our city back.”

Not yo city, ofay.

The police should realize that when you pick sides you don’t get to play for both sides. We supported the blue when it was BLM vs the police but this is a different day and I’m getting tired of the police “doing their jobs” and making it hard on working class people because some elected official is pissed.

    henrybowman in reply to r2468. | February 7, 2022 at 5:41 pm

    “The blue” is irrelevant. There is no such thing. If your local officials work for you, then so will the police. If they work against you, then so will the police. The relevant perspective is “mercenaries.”

      Sidetracked. I’ve been thinking back on my interactions with the police over the last 25 years and so far the police aren’t looking too good. The police are annoying and arrogant.

I’ve read the police have threatened to arrest any private citizen bringing supplies (food or fuel) to the truckers. So now a cop can dictate to whom I can give a sandwich? Communist red China must be so proud. God help us all.