Time to "Go Trudeau" on Anarchists

Why is it that when my meter runs out, I get a $25 ticket.. but if I kill someone I am subject to life imprisonment?

The answer is obvious.

As a society, we impose penalties that seek to match the relative severity of the crime.. staying too long at your meter seems a little less severe than killing someone.

But the problem is that while some examples are very obvious, in the justice system, much of our sentencing is subjective, and, I daresay, ideological.

Witness the change in how we deal with impaired driving..  at one time it was the stuff of amusing jokes an anecdotes, and now, with the assistance of our courts, we have seen it as sufficiently weighty to suspend the application of our civil freedoms, submitting to periodic arrest and detention without due cause in order to answer that evil.

So then, today, we read on CBC News that the Greenpeace activists who broke into private property and climbed up smoke stacks and cranes to further their cause were fined $2,000.00.

It is worth while thinking about that, and even reading the article a second time to note that "Greenpeace Alberta spokesman Mike Hudema, who was not directly involved in the protest, said the activists knew they might face charges. "They were willing to take that risk," he said.

In other words, "We realize that the penalties are paltry and pose little effective deterrence in our effort to ignore the law to make our point, so we are happy to break it."

As further explained by Hudema in the article:

Hudema said the protesters should be commended for their actions and hopes the attention will lead to less oil sands development.

What this basically means is that the penalties being imposed are grossly inadequate to deter the behavior it is aimed at, and that, worse, the suggestion is that by ignoring the law they are able to further their cause.

There is no other description for this behavior but domestic terrorism.

And when we blithely ignore the throngs of punks breaking windows and burning police cars - and worse, support them and encourage them, we are asking for those efforts to become more severe and more dangerous.

The essence of democracy is that change is accomplished through the democratic process.

The Greenpeace zealots are free to vote for the Green Party to make their point - and if sufficient numbers of Canadians support them, change will be accomplished.

But that's not good enough for them.

Democracy is a hindrance to their effort and they feel no compunction in breaking the law to undermine the democratic process.

To paraphrase Abraham Lincoln, it is important to stand against these efforts to make clear that "democracy is not an absurdity."

Time to say, "enough".

In the larger picture, domestic terrorism results in significantly more negative impact on the broader society than the current social evil darlings of impaired driving, child pornography and drug trafficking.

Time to start treating it as such.

As unusual as it may seem for a conservative blogger, we need to take the lead of Pierre Elliot Trudeau.  Watch the video.  Watch a leader who doesn't shy away from the press and who serves back to them their own ignorant babble - a Liberal leader clearly frustrated with even then, an exceedingly liberal media.

This exchange during the FLQ crisis is worth reconsidering today as we see, more and more, a tendency to condone those who would seek to undermine democracy:

Trudeau: Yes, well there are a lot of bleeding hearts around who just don't like to see people with helmets and guns. All I can say is, go on and bleed, but it is more important to keep law and order in the society than to be worried about weak-kneed people who don't like the looks of ...



Ralfe: At any cost? How far would you go with that? How far would you extend that?


Trudeau: Well, just watch me.


Ralfe: At reducing civil liberties? To that extent?


Trudeau: To what extent?


Ralfe: Well, if you extend this and you say, ok, you're going to do anything to protect them, does this include wire-tapping, reducing other civil liberties in some way?


Trudeau: Yes, I think the society must take every means at its disposal to defend itself against the emergence of a parallel power which defies the elected power in this country and I think that goes to any distance. So long as there is a power in here which is challenging the elected representative of the people I think that power must be stopped and I think it's only, I repeat, weak-kneed bleeding hearts who are afraid to take these measures.