Not Random

It's not random; it's targeted and malicious.

Canada Customs

Canada Customs has become a law unto itself and even Harper & Co. seem afraid to tackle this mob. the only thing that sends a chill up a custom's evil spine is the Charter, and now Harper takes away the option for the little guy to fight back.

He thinks some mean spirited attack ads during the Super bowl will change how people vote, nope, Nada, not a chance.

Canada is a corporate state.

Canada is a corporate state.

face it - Quebec Independence is the only thing that can save the citizens of Canada from state tyranny.

Anyone see the court ruling where a father was forbidedden to see his son after the mother refused to tell him she had his son - they had stopped seeing each other - and traded the baby to another couple without the father's knowledge and then a judge in Saskatchewan (total hick ville) told the father to stay away from his own child which he was never told existed until it was traded...oh and the kicker the "adoptive" parents are suing the father for child supprt!

i kid u not, check it out...

comments where most posters get it...

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070129.wcustody0129/CommentStory/National/home

story

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070129.wcustody0129/BNStory/

charter

While I have no doubt that defending charter rights is an imortant process and I abhore Harpers gutting of court funding, I do wonder if these dollars should in fact be used by private corperations. They do after all stand to gain in some cases large profits from a court ruling. I certainly believe private citens should have funds available when they feel thier rights have been infringed upon. Harpers actions in cutting this program are dispicable. But again i wonder if the same pots of money should be used by private businesses.

Court Challenge Program

So Little Sisters wanted the rest of us to pay their legal bills. How nice. Since this issue was an matter for the gay community perhaps the question should be asked, why don't they pony up, especially considering this community has a greater amount of disposable income than other segments of society. If Little Sisters' issue is an important one for the gay community they will rally to their aid--but don't expect sympathy and tax dollars from the rest of us so they can import smut.

Let's distinguish "claims" from "rights"...

A Charter right is not a right until it is recognized as such by the courts. Otherwise, it is just a claim to a Charter right. Since anyone can claim to have a Charter right with respect to almost anything, it's not clear to me what privileges one person's claim to be paid out of the public purse over another's. The business in question operates for profit and is not a public service. The same court which decides what is a right and what is not, has decided that this matter does not raise sufficient public interest to merit a free ride. Court decides, it's over. You want to litigate, you pay like everybody else. What's to complain?

Is it OK to pay for

Is it OK to pay for litigation with monies stolen from the public under NAFTA rules and a whole slew of crooked deals, like the sale of BC Rail, waters, health records, forests etc. to multinationals, so they can take the loot out of the country.

I buy the occasional 6-49 ticket, not because I need, or want that money, but so that I could start lawsuits against the governments for giving away publicly owned properties and denying the owners even the rights to find out what the crooks have signed away. Anybody who wants to find out, receives a pile of blank pages, to "preserve the privacy rights competitive advantage of the corporations", by denying the rights of the owners the properties were stolen from.

It will, most likely, never happen, but there's no harm spending the odd 2 bucks to try.

Ed Deak.

Why is it so expensive?

Before we argue who pays for these challenges, let us remember that the entire court system needs overhauling!
The Pickton case is a good example of how in the name of fairness we spend billions, to prove what is already obvious.
Lawyers make a great living wasting time for days arguing about nothing, the time-table of the courts allow only a few hours a week of actual proceedings to happen.
When the revolution comes (and it will) we need to drop all that gentleman-british BS, and bring criminal cases to justice in weeks instead of in years!
About the Pickton case, obviously some relatives will feel the case should be about their missing person, However with 6 cases up for judgment already, enough already! the guy will get his punishment! It is not that important which crime he hangs for (so to speak).

Consider the Economics

Civil litigation is very expensive, and perhaps this is not always such a bad thing. Little Sisters estimates that to fight the current legal battle with Canada Customs would have costed them around $1 million. While it is difficult to put a price on Charter Rights, perhaps we should think a little bit more about the economics of these challenges. What the Supreme Court is in a sense saying is that the rights being infringed here are not significant enough to warrant public funding for the challenge. Maybe we need to think a lot more about the actual value of rights and whether a challenge like the one that Little Sisters wants to launch is worth the $1 million they would have to pay, plus the presumably $1 million or more that the federal government would pay defending the suit. Is the fight over some gay/lesbian literature/porn worth over $2 million? Perhaps it is, I do not really know, but it is a question that people should seriously consider. With that $2 million how many affordable housing spaces could be built? How much medicine could be purchased for HIV/AIDS sufferers in Africa? What should we value more? Homes for all Canadians? Medicine for all people of the world? Or the right to import gay/lesbian materials without inteference from customs?

kudos to the tories for

kudos to the tories for cutting funding to these special interest groups. nothing wrong with them per se, but they should all be funded privately. this is a can of worms opened by the pathetic liberals under trudeau the fart and perpetrated by chretien the idiot in his quest for power. hopefully they'll keep up the good work.
'Quebec Independence is the only thing that can save the citizens of Canada from state tyranny.' good riddance.

How about corporate

How about corporate litigations, like the crime wave of the NAFTA, etc. etc are also paid from the public's pocket in the form of higher prices and as "tax deductible business expenses"

Do you think the worst form of special interests, the big and especially multinational business, pays anything from their so called "own pockets" ? They don't have any because they always transfer costs on the public in a hundred different ways.

The cost of all products, litigations, office buildings, the corporate jets, Jimmy's yachts and trips, and all so called "investments" all come out of the pockets of the taxpayers, in various ways.

Too hard to understand ???????? Try to get into business and you'll find out how "deep" your pocket really is.

Ed Deak.

Only thr Rich!

I guess Harper believes that it is only the rich who get to have Charter rights.

Eliot writes about funding

Eliot writes about funding special interest groups. were you aware that folks like the Frazer Institute who rails against other special interest groups got a deal on their mailing privilages, as a special interst group?

Well I know an individual

Well I know an individual who is fighting the Firearms Act on Charter issues, he can only do it because most firearm owners donate their own money to help him. So if you believe in the cause donate to those fighting it.

Who're donating to

Who're donating to multinational lumber companies to fight for unlimited raw log exports under NAFTA rules?

The taxpayers of BC, who own the logs, but get no benefits, paying through their stupid noses, by voting for the crooks who bring in such laws.

When will the faithful get it into their limited mental capacities that the corporations are always use public funds, for everything.

Ed Deak.

I agree with Colin; I think

I agree with Colin;

I think it is best that a group of like- minded individuals whether they be Gay,... or Gun Owners ..or Gay Gun Owners ...or whatever,....pass the hat around and fund their own like-minded legal issues. I think that works best in everyone's interests.

The Fatal Flaw is when one defers control to the other side, in this case it was Big Brother aka Gov't vs Little Sisters .

Has anyone really read the Charter(...or the BC Human Rights Act)? Much of these "RIGHTS " are simply No- Brainers. The rest of them have no "Charter Police " running around who enforce the Charter...its up to the given "wronged" party to interpret they have actually been wronged, and decide if they wish to pursue so-called justice on this front.

Charter etc. = a Gov't issue ??? ....yet a Gov't -funded defence for the plaintiff which is ALSO effectively suing the Gov't as a defendant ...talk about Conflict- of- Interest meets SOL for the plaintiff in many of these types of cases.

MENTOR #1 " Why would anyone want a Lawyer ? ...I want to win, I don't want to lose... !!! "

MENTOR #2 ( Who taught us in firearms and also a well - known environmentalist ) " The best way to deal with Gov't is to EMBARASS them on the given issue.

Don't make the deadly mistake that they actually know what they, Gov't , are doing. We have a Charter..."oh boy!!!" morphs to "so what???" and in fact it may eventually be used against us by Gov't .

I rest my case...N/C.

Real Constitutional (v. "Charter") Rights

I have been following the L.S. case because I have a case of my own -
http://www.m-f-d.org/pdf/2005-11-12_open_letter_bcla.pdf - which I believe
addresses far more fundamental and consequential issues. Canada Customs in my view is an easy target, but not necessarily a worthy adversary. With the Internet, stopping printed materials at the border seems to me to be pointless, so I wonder why the legal and judicial communities have made so much of this case. Could it be that the judges and the lawyers have another agenda?

The day after the L.S. judgement came down I received a call from a lawyer for the B.C. Attorney General. He called to encourage me to schedule a "Summary Trial" to deal with the "public interest" issue I had raised in my Statement of Claim (filed January 2) against the A.G. and other government defendants, and he said that the judgement in the L.S. case, in which his own agency had participated as an intervenor, had raised the bar for prospective public interest litigants and that he would be relying on it in court.

Having read it I see nothing that concerns me. Indeed I believe it will actually assist me. At this point I have no lawyer, and have never had the assistance of any lawyer throughout several years of very challenging litigation. I will be seeking public interest status and "advance" or
"interim" costs because a) I don't believe self-represented litigants with cases that challenge the establishment ever get a fair hearing from the judges, and b) mine is a case that raises a spectrum of issues, some of which I believe are both unique and of a constitutional nature.

Ironically even with a funding order I am not very confident that any law firm in B.C. will touch this case, for fairly obvious reasons. If the legal community is truly interested in pursuing issues of a constitutional nature through public interest litigation then it can demonstrate that by getting involved in cases like mine that truly challenge the establishment.

this is not a gay rights issue

Or a special interest group issue. It's a freedom of expression issue. If you can't understand that then there's no point even trying to discuss it further.

Maestro:

You disappoint me by suggesting justice only belongs to those who can afford it. You seem brighter than that.

Stump: Clarification SVP

Stump:

With all due respect...please point out WHERE you interpreted that in my comments......ie that I am claiming justice only belongs to those that can afford it.

RIGHT HERE

writes maestro, to which Stump responds:

Hard not to agree with that part of Stump's point.

The implication being that if you can't get enough jingle in your chapeau then access to the courts just ain't for you.

Elementary

the quote in question

What about if the issue is one involving homelessness, or migrant workers, or something similar where the like-minded people don't have the $$$ to mount a court challenge?

The Real $$$ Issue

The problem with basing any discussion of access to justice on the existing legacy, and in this Little Sister’s is a classic example, is the presumption that money is what it is all about.

I was told by someone at the bookstore that the costs to date, for which I presume they may be liable, are in the range of $300,000. I am now going to proceed down the same path by asking a B.C. Supreme Court judge to recognize that my case is a public interest one and to grant me funding.

Given the figures we have heard, that sounds like one is getting a blank cheque from one’s fellow citizens. In fact that’s not my purpose. First I want recognition of the public interest nature of my case. And secondly, I want enough money to get some help working on the more difficult legal issues, especially the constitutional arguments. (In addition, my courtroom experience to date has convinced me that the judges do not believe that they are obliged to provide impartial adjudication when self-represented litigants are facing politically powerful parties.)

But therein lies another conundrum. If I’m not going to get a blank cheque, how will I entice any lawyer to take on the entire legal establishment?

The judges themselves, including notably (and recently) Beverley McLachlin, have stated very emphatically that the vast majority of citizens cannot afford the costs of pursuing their legal rights in the Canadian justice system. Well, duh! Then it isn’t a justice system, is it?

The problem is a profound one, and only when the most senior members of the judicial and legal establishments have the courage to acknowledge its true nature, will there be any prospect of a resolution.

When people "can not afford"

When people "can not afford" a very important public service, it is no longer a public service, but a privatized business. The same for healthcare.

In other words, democracy is dead, because its first purpose is "equality before the law" and this doesn't exist, sold to the multinational mafia in taxcuts.

On the other hand, now we live in a "competitive market economy", which means that the biggest pigs have the legal right to push the others away from the trough.

The short name for this system is fascism.

Ed Deak.

'Charter of Rights and Freedoms"

Canada doesn't have a Charter, it has a pseudocharter that is not even fit for bumwad. It begins with the fantasy of of Gawd being involved with human rights (thereby relegating non-believers to non-citizenship). That wasn't enough for the zealots however, and they invented the "notwithstanding" clause. Just in case some wit does win a Supreme Court Ruling, the ruling wacko just has to say "Notwithstanding Notwithstanding Notwithstanding" and the offensive little right goes back to where it came from.

Of course, we as the citizenry of a democracy could use our power to ensure the rights of minorities and majorities are protected.

Good Riddens

I am glad the Tories toasted this court challenges program because it was administered by a board that would never authorize funds for fathers who felt they were not treated fairly, yet would defend every challenge that they felt was good like transvestites, or radical feminists, or whatever goofy, flaky cause other than the legitimate ones. The only thing to do was to toast the lot of them.
Hopefully they can toast the Canadian Wheat Board, the CRTC, the CBC, change everything I say.
We have to get all the BS off the table in order to deal with the largest problem of all. Man Made Global Warming. This is a handful of BS to defeat.
But the increased dialog will be helpful to the logical side of the debate.

If you really want to stop global warming

stop pumping out hot air.

Stump: Re FUNDING

Stump:

Re FUNDING $$$

Sorry, but that issue tends to bounce back as a "societal blank -cheque" with an infinite fund everyone should be allowed to dip into, whether they be rich, poor, homeless, migrant, etc. etc.

It effectively ends up into relativity arguments.

There may be a poor person with an issue relevant to them and their peers
that may have legal costs pegged at $100,000.

Then you may get a middle class person, say earning $50,000 per year, with an important issue whose legal costs amount to approx. $1,000,000.

Where do we draw the line on who we fund, how much we fund it , and why we fund it ?

When it's Gov't (our?)funds...to fund cases vs the Gov't, and unless it's a slam dunk....the Gov't has the greater resources and most assuredly will use them. If the Gov't gives you $1 towards legal costs against them, be assured they are ready, willing and able to spend $10 or more against you for every $1 they give you if need be.

Also....Time is always on their(Gov't= us?) side, but rarely on the plaintiffs(us?).

Everyone needs their civil rights protected

The Charter protects you too, even though you don't deserve it.

I suggest you read Dietrich Bonhoeffer - his testimony might just set you straight.

We now have the spectacle of a Prime Minister paying lip service to environmentalism when he really believes the whole business of global warming is just a socialist plot.

He sounds a lot like you Ron - both toasted...and disingenuous.

Without financial help, the only people with civil rights in this country will be Harper's rich friends. How can you expect to be treated with respect in your own country when you have no respect for your fellow citizens?

Maestro

We aren't funding groups, we are protecting everyone's civil rights. Surely I don't have to explain that to you is the same simplistic language I used with Ron Erwin. Anecdotes are, as always, worthless. The principle and the process are both priceless so one shouldn't be surprised that there is a public cost attached to them both. Perhaps you should read Bonhoeffer too. Certainly the Prime Minister ought to.

Money is the problem, not the solution

It seems to me that the argument as to whether we should or should not have a large (or unlimited) pool of money available for certain plaintiffs – if they can prove their issues are essential to the “public interest” – is perhaps missing the point. Why should plaintiffs with such a case not be able to adequately argue the case themselves before a competent and impartial court? Perhaps the problem with the justice system is not a deficit in money, but a deficit in competence and integrity.

ChrisB.....There's no

ChrisB.....There's no deficit in money, because the banks are pumping it out endlessly, every day, to be used as weapons of colonization and expropriation of properties and rights, anywhere on Earth.

What we have is a deficit in human decency, exemplified by our friend Ron on this blog, empowered by fraudulent ideological and economic scriptures, designed for the building of aristocracies.

The textbook definition of economics is: "The science for the management and distribution of scarce resources"

Does anybody know any economic theory that came anywhere near this definition?

Using fraudulent figures, they all degenerated into aristocratic dictatorships.

Ed Deak.

the charter's a joke.

the charter's a joke. trudeau's everlasting middle finger salute to everyone that wasn't as left as he was. put the justice system in the hands of the liberal-appointed supreme court. protect the scumbags while the victims suffer through acquittals based on 'technicalities' and constitutional blather. unfortunately it's here to stay and he's laughing eternally.

Let's raise taxes and have a gay rights' parade!

couldn't agree more, El. Trudeau -the french prancing toad. Now we're (canada) the poster child of political correctness. Convicts get protected while victims families stand by and watch murderers get 5 year prison sentences. thanks to pierre. the charter protects you, Alcib, and you and your svend robinson-sympathising friends. thanks for making canada the gay frollicking pc nation it became under the liberals.

Ted Tweak

Nice you've got a friend Elliot - must have been lonely for you.

So Mr Ted Tweak, and you too Elliot, which of the Charter Rights are you prepared to give up, surrender and forego?

The fundamental freedoms perhaps:
freedom of conscience and religion;
freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;
freedom of peaceful assembly; and
freedom of association.

Or perhaps the right to vote; the freedom to move to any part of the country; the freedom to be protected by the law, to not be subject to unreasonable search and seizure and to not be deprived of such rights only in accordance with strict procedures of law.

Maybe you're not in favour of
the fact that every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability.

Perhaps you're against the aboriginal rights sections of the Charter. Or maybe you just don't like the fact that minorities have used the Charter and its provisions to actually begin to share in some of the rights and privileges that the majority in this country would like to keep just for themselves.

Hyeena, I've never once posted a single comment about either Svend Robinson or his friends, gay or otherwise.

What exactly are you talking about?

Perhaps you'd prefer this kind of a 'justice' system boys

From behind the firewall at the NYTimes, just for you:

February 1, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
A Death in Destrehan
By BOB HERBERT

Destrehan, La.

On the afternoon of Oct. 7, 1974, a mob of 200 enraged whites, many of them students, closed in on a bus filled with black students that was trying to pull away from the local high school. The people in the mob were in a high-pitched frenzy. They screamed racial epithets and bombarded the bus with rocks and bottles. The students on the bus were terrified.

When a shot was heard, the kids on the bus dived for cover. But it was a 13-year-old white boy standing near the bus, not far from his mother, who toppled to the ground with a bullet wound in his head. The boy, a freshman named Timothy Weber, died a few hours later.

That single shot in this rural town about 25 miles up the Mississippi River from New Orleans set in motion a tale of appalling injustice that has lasted to the present day.

Destrehan was in turmoil in 1974 over school integration. The Supreme Court’s historic desegregation ruling was already 20 years old — time enough, the courts said, for Destrehan and the surrounding area to comply. But the Ku Klux Klan was still welcome in Destrehan in those days, and David Duke, its one-time imperial wizard, was an admired figure. White families in the region wanted no part of integration.

When black students were admitted to Destrehan High, they were greeted with taunts, various forms of humiliation and violence. Some of the black students fought back, and in the period leading up to the shooting there had been racial fights at a football game and inside the school.

While the Weber boy was being taken to a hospital, authorities ordered the black students off the bus and searched each one. The bus was also thoroughly searched. No weapon was found, and there was no evidence to indicate that the shot had come from the bus. The bus driver insisted it had not come from the bus, but from someone firing at the bus.

One of the black youngsters, a 16-year-old named Gary Tyler, was arrested for disturbing the peace after he talked back to a sheriff’s deputy — one of the few deputies in St. Charles Parish who was black. It may have been young Tyler’s impudence that doomed him. He was branded on the spot as the designated killer.

(Later, at a trial, the deputy, Nelson Coleman, was asked whose peace had been disturbed by Mr. Tyler’s comments. “Mine,” he replied.)

Matters moved amazingly fast after the shooting. Racial tension gave way to racial hysteria. A white boy had been killed and some black had to pay. Mr. Tyler, as good a black as any, was taken to a sheriff’s substation where he was beaten unmercifully amid shouted commands that he confess. He would not.

It didn’t matter. In just a little over a year he would be tried, convicted by an all-white jury and sentenced to death by electrocution.

The efficiency of the process was chilling. Evidence began to miraculously appear. Investigators “found” a .45-caliber pistol. Never mind that there were no fingerprints on it and it turned out to have been stolen from a firing range used by the sheriff’s deputies. (Or that it subsequently disappeared as conveniently as it was found.) The authorities said they found the gun on the bus, despite the fact that the initial search had turned up nothing.

The authorities found witnesses who said that Mr. Tyler had been the gunman. Never mind that the main witness, a former girlfriend of Mr. Tyler’s, was a troubled youngster who had been under the care of a psychiatrist and had a history of reporting phony crimes to the police, including a false report of a kidnapping. She and every other witness who fingered Mr. Tyler would later recant, charging that they had been terrorized into testifying falsely by the police.

A sworn affidavit from Larry Dabney, who was seated by Mr. Tyler on the bus, was typical. He said his treatment by the police was the “scariest thing” he’d ever experienced. “They didn’t even ask me what I saw,” he said. “They told me flat out that I was going to be their key witness. ... They told me I was going to testify that I saw Gary with a gun right after I heard the shot and that a few minutes later I had seen him hide it in a slit in the seat. That was not true. I didn’t see Gary or anybody else in that bus with a gun.”

Mr. Tyler was spared electrocution when the Supreme Court declared Louisiana’s death penalty unconstitutional. But in many ways he has in fact paid with his life. He’ll turn 50 this year in the state penitentiary at Angola, where he is serving out his sentence of life without parole for the murder of Timothy Weber.

More culture of entitlement

Alcibiades Story,

Doesn’t 2+2 equal 4 any longer? According to the story you submitted 2+5 equals 5. Makes sense ? No, and neither does the story you submitted.. To start with the story is about Americans, and their Constitution. I always marvel when you guys will pick some part of the American law that suits your cause, but literally sh!t your pants if someone suggests they favor the Americans right to bear arms, don’t you see how hypercritical you characters are.
Same goes true when Elliot ,Maestro state their feelings or points of view, you guys jump all over them like bird dogs, its as if you guys think your the only ones who have an entitlement to a point of view, and those "others" have no entitlement.
My opinion regarding the Charter, you have a beef with the law(Charter) fight your own battles with your own funding.

Putting "justice" in context

The emotional response that this story naturally elicits doesn't illuminate the issues that we should be discussing. Realistically the Canadian Charter wasn't intended, and wasn't needed, to protect us from this kind of injustice.

As an experienced litigant against what I consider to be high-handed, arrogant, and even criminal conduct on the part of the "authorities", I have yet to see how our precious Charter is going to assist me. I have freedom of expression, as this post demonstrates, and that is most certainly a good thing. But can I get the material evidence of the case I am pursuing before a competent, impartial adjudicator? Will the Charter help me do that? It appears not.

The Charter is not the Canadian Constitution. So what exactly is our constitution, and what does it really guaranty? I'm still working on finding out the answer to that question, and I hope as part of the process that I can give the Supreme Court of Canada an opportunity to answer it.

One thing I have concluded is that investing huge sums of money, public or otherwise, in cases that are relatively trivial, while countless important cases languish, will not achieve anything productive. That's probably the real reason that the Court Challenges program has been shut down and the Supreme Court decided against funding for Little Sister's.

alcib; fyi; all of those

alcib; fyi; all of those rights were already there under the bill of rights of 1960. PLUS we had property rights, which trudeau the communist eliminated. the best moment in the election campaign last year was when martin the dithering idiot thought he would score by accusing harper of not respecting the charter. harper countered by saying in fact he would add property rights to it. ko in the first round. the platitudinal liberal fools never mentioned the word again.

Elliot - you don't know what you're talking about

And you can't express yourself without sounding like an idiot.

The Charter of Rights has given minorities and individuals far more protections than they ever had from Diefenbaker's Bill of Rights.

If you know anything about the evolution of the law since the passage of the Charter you wouldn't make such an uniformed statement.

Then again, know you, you probably would!

woody - you could have figured this out for yourself

The point is simply that, without some kind of protection against self-incrimination and legal railroading (which the case cited from the States illustrates); the justice "system" ends up taking advantage of the weak and the poor - as in the Timothy Weber story.

That's why, as in the extant case, it's important that the legal system should provide financial means so that poor people and minority interests (as in the Little Sisters Case) are not prevented from availing themselves of their Charter protections.

The Charter also contains a guarantee of equality before the law - a principle which means something only if the poor are not prevented (by virtue of their financial state) from accessing the protections of the law.

That is the whole point behind the article Woody.

As to how Elliot is responded to, I categorically deny that I don't deal with Elliot fairly: when he posts rude and offensive comments and ad hominem attacks I merely copy his own words back at him in his own words. You can check it out.

When Elliot decides he actually wants a rational debate he knows exactly how to start one.

I've seen others blocked from posting on this site that have been far less offensive than Elliot is in the normal course of events and reflected in his postings over the months.

How he gets away with it is a mystery to me.

In the last 24 hours we've lost one of the most useful contributors to this site over an incident that management hasn't even seen fit to advise readers about.

I have no sympathy whatever for Elliot.

Quote:In the last 24 hours

I missed it. Which thread? What happened to whom?

love you too g. you're a

love you too g. you're a real beauty!

G WEST-- CHARTER OF CRIMINAL RIGHTS

There you go G West, just as I stated earlier, Elliot is not entitled to make a comment without being ridiculed. . Why didn’t you chastise ChrisB for his opinion.? You can’t, can you ,because you know what he says is factual. Well said and well put ChrisB.
The charter is a travesty, a joke a waste of paper, better yet put it on a roll toilet paper. the only one who have benefitted and will continue, are fringe groups ,religions and their nutty followers.
The sooner the implantation of Property rights into the Charter the better , it’s the only part the average person will derive any benefit from. I don’t care how you cut it G West, ths country was far better off before 1982.
Regarding your comment to Elliot that, (The Charter of Rights has given minorities and individuals far more protections than they ever had from Diefenbaker's Bill of Rights.)
The only individuals that have benefitted are killers , rapist, pedophiles that were set free to do their deeds again, due to a technicality, in regards to the eccentric Trudeaus charter.

Thanks El

Try actually using your knowledge and intelligence and stop throwing mud pies. You're too lod for that stuff. If you just want to play silly games then stick to sports.

errata

Nightbloom
Appears Coyote has been banned, permanently.
Moreover, not temporarily as Truman was.

For what reason? Good question. No explanation has been provided to Tyee readers by the management - to this point at least.

What few details are known can be found on the Glavin/Cohen/Solidarity thread. Best I can do on short notice.

errata

In my post just before the one above the intended word was 'old' not lod -- sorry Elliot, I was in a hurry.

No woody - you miss the point entirely

Of course Elliot is entitled to make a comment any time. But if all he ever does is call people he doesn't agree with idiots and morons I'm just going to post that stuff right back at him.

Not my words, but his.

Woody

That question about who's better off now than prior to 1982: You might want to ask Native peoples, women, religious minorities, women in subservient working roles, homosexuals, women and minorities working in male dominated workplaces; people who are more than 65 years old....immigrants, refugees…..And that’s just a start.

I could go on.

Yesss!!!!

Awwwright:

Woody, G West et al are here

Count me in !!!!

Charter rights

At the risk of sounding like a broken record...

If you should go to where ever you can find a copy of the charter, and you read it slowly, you will see a list of things that are guarenteed as rights.

In that document there is an item which says something along the line of "NOT WITHSTANDING ANY..."

That little clause was inserted for the good of the monarch of this country and parliment, which jointly and severally OWN you outright. And any rights you have are there at the pleasure of parliment and whatever majesty that happens to be on some throne and might be the figure head of the day.

Many people in this country decry the US for their harsh and unpopular with us stands. And see the exercise of personal rights as guarenteed in their constitution. A document they hold near and dear because unlike our country, THEIRS is controlled by the people, despite any appearance voter apathy gives it.

Canadians are really thinking that the charter guarentees some sort of personal rights and liberties. Well get that rubbish out of your head. In fact, it may interest you to note that your MP's and MLA's are there at the pleasure of the crown and represent the government toward you and not the other way round. They are not there to represent you as much as they are there to represent government, whether they are a governing party or not.

Maybe that's why politicians don't listen to you. Ya think?

i've been involved in the

i've been involved in the justice system for the past 16 years. my experience has been that most people don't really realize how much power is granted to the judges by the charter. sometimes that's a good thing, but too often not. criminals have definitely benefitted from trudeau's desire to live forever. i'm not even sure he realized how his platitudinal doctrine would affect canadians.
as for coyote; it was bound to happen eventually. he gets carried away when he drinks his dandelion wine.

G West says Don't call a cop, call the Constitution

G West this is who you stated the charter has help,

And I say, go ask these people how Trudeaus charter. has protected them.
The Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC) estimates that more than 500 women have Gone missing in the last 20 years.
The two dead passengers on the Queen of the North. (Crew refuse to talk citing their rights)
All the dead Women from Vancouver east end. (People refuse to talk citing their rights)
All the home less in this country. (A new phenomena since 1982)
Mental ill persons living on the street (another phenomena since 1982)
BC Legislation police raids ,Lawyers attempting to twarth charges with unconstitutional maneuver. As I stated before this manuver has has freed killers , rapist, pedophiles . I could go on.

You also stated, women and minorities working in male dominated workplaces.
You lost me on this remark.

Alci:

Alci:

Interesting your previous comment

" Anecdotes are, as always, worthless "

and then thou bringest in the NY Times Feb.1 /2007 article ie " an anecdote" By BOB HERBERT which as someone else noted is in the U.S. .....even though it appears you are stretching a " sky -is -falling-or -will- be- falling " type of bow that we better have our own CANADIAN Charter,.... Dammit !!!! or we'll become like a minority of U.S. citizens were 30+ years ago.

Huhhh ???

(I'm sure someone out there in cyber sapce sees the connection...rhetorically-anecdotally speaking, that is.)

Maybe some of the usual TYEE suspects should seek clarification of what someone meant or implied FIRST before asking (again) to borrow a jackhammer to scrape the egg off the old facial epidermis.

PS Actually , Alci...anecdotes may also be considered real-life practical examples and applications of the Law...aka " Precedents "....et al, so one doesn't tread the same unfortunate path already trodden and waste one's own time and $$$'s. Learn from, don't repeat.

N/C

Were guest here, not the owners.

I wasn’t going to comment on the demise of the Coyote , but ,I have to assume that the Tyee would have corresponded with him to discuss, discourage, or caution him to what ever it was that apparently got their attention. Some times people forget, we don’t own this site, were only guest here.

Trudeau-sky's Charter

Re Canadian Charter: circa 1982

Ole P.Herr Trudeau had horsehsoes up the ying yang. Joe Clark , via his early 1980's election screw up , is the one who should at least get an asterisk * and thus "some" credit for the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

What mighta been eh??? if P Herr stayed in retirement from the PMO. Joe maybe could've "cut and pasted" the best portions of the US version and applied it North of the 49 th parallel.

The Canadian Charter is simply Trudeau attempting to leave a legacy so we can look at him as less an old - hippy a - hole than he really was.

Trudeau puts forth this warm and fuzzy Charter document and makes us feel we have a much better , much more democratic country where the rights of the individual are protected.

Certain "Freedoms" are more by default,in double -negative mode.... ie not allowed to discriminate on the basis of certain criteria ie religion,race, age, etc....versus simply stating a given FREEDOM OF X ....FREEDOM OF Y etc. etc.

Section 16 of the Charter "Offical Languages"....how many times is a certain Canadian Province specifically mentioned over and over (NO ...it's NOT Quebec)

Has anyone seen the Charters' Section 24(1)" ENFORCEMENT "

" Anyone, whose rights and freedoms as guaranteed by this Charter have been infringed or denied may apply to a court of competent jurisdiction to obtain such remedy as the court consider appropriate and just in the circumstances "

.....So, the Charter is telling me that if I think someone is breaking "the Charter law" in such a way that I feel my rights and freedoms as outlined in the Charter are violated , THEN I am allowed to go to court !!!....Gee thanks Trudeau. I wonder what would happen if we didn't have that Charter provision called Enforcement. Dammit, Bill C-68 , another Federal LIEberal legal stunt, really hooped us on that enforcement count.

So.....I am "allowed" by the Charter to go to court re: self- perceived Charter violations..., but unless it overlaps in a sense that involves the Crown...ie Criminal matters...I am the one SOL and $$SOL.

This implies ," de facto ", that there are NO "Charter Enforcement Police", they are probably too busy handing out Bilingual speeding tickets .

So if my neighbour's FRENCH poodle insults my ENGLISH Bulldog ...I am allowed to take it to court...unless the FRENCH poodles owner , my neighbour,is also a Judge,which could make it interesting if he thinks there is a Charter case or not, as a reasonable interpretation of Section 16 gives them that power.

Laws etc. are always good,on paper, as they provide a GREAT false sense of security till the shit hits the fan and its YOUR turn ,...

Did I finally win something?

maestro asked,
Section 16 of the Charter "Official Languages"....how many times is a certain Canadian Province specifically mentioned over and over (NO ...it's NOT Quebec)

Answers, the province, New Brunswick , 7 times. What my prize? A pierre pissed stain toilet seat? How and where do I claim my prize?

first of all, maestro

Herbert's story is a report of a factual situation, not an anecdote. It describes the consequences of a justice system where the idea of equality has no currency at all. These demonstrable facts can be confirmed and compared with other similar events that involve the interface between minority groups and the law.

An anecdote is a little tale you tell when you relate that 'someone in my family said such and so'....and has no verifiable content or meaning outside of your, or my own (if it were my anecdote) circle. Therefore, it is meaningless and of only passing significance from which little of permanent, legal or moral use can be inferred. Oxford puts it this way:

‘Things unpublished; secret or hitherto unpublished details of history; may be and amusing or striking narrative: originally an item of gossip.’

Need I say more?

woody

Without the Charter, the whole concept of native land and treaty settlement would have been impossible; without the charter the challenge of equal pay for women in all kinds of industries (telecommunications is just one example - the Bell case) would have been moot. The idea of forced retirement is subject to charter challenge; the notion that French Canadians can send their children to French language schools outside Quebec is another idea impossible without the Charter.

Access of women to jobs and employment which have been traditionally male dominated (or female dominated) is also a possibility because of the charter. Freedom of information legislation would be assailed without the charter.

The other points you bring up are non sequiturs relative to this debate.

If you want more details on Coyote's banning you should go to the Glavin/Cohen/Solidarity thread. The information - all that I've been given (and I got it privately - not from David Beers) is posted there.

Alci:

If you wish to engage in Kojak -like hair-splitting, that's your RIGHT , whether Trudeau entrenched it in the Charter of Rights or not. If its cathartic....see if you can bill MSP

Fully aware of anecdotes so-called meaning.

HERBERTS story could be deemed an anecdote..were you there ?...do you trust the reporting???...was it peer reviewed for facts.???

One mans' Anecdotes = anothers____???

So if someone tells me something that makes sense ,...or is telling me something that happened, the fact that it wasn't formally reported by an accredited journalist means its not credible...correct?

NO

I'll try again. An anecdote is a little story we tell among friends and neighbours - it may or may not be true and cannot be verified.

Herbert's story is a recitation of fact that anyone can verify in a variety of ways.

Anecdotes are the stuff of fairy tales and gossip. They have little or no impact outside of mild amusement and a few moments of light diversion. Like almost everything you post unfortunately.

The fact something you hear makes sense to you or me has absolutely no currency in a general discussion about such things as rights before the law or the necessity for all citizens to be treated with equity relative to the legal system.

Anecdote written by reporters or journalists would be no more valuable than your little stories, or mine – as the experience of Jayson Blair and the New York Times clearly illustrates.

Woody:

Woody:

You are close...but I counted " 9 " count em " NINE " times was New Brunswick mentioned in the Canadian Charter .

Your prize...well since it was a 1/2 - assed correct answer, you get 1/2 the toilet seat.

However, you want a Pierre pissed stained " Limited Edition " version ...no, that's a TRICK QUESTION,...I think he musta squated when he peed. If not, he probably missed the toilet every time nature called anyway. He saved the best for BC anyway.

Let's march to victoria and demand equality of outcomes for all!

before the charter we had parliamentary supremacy -the people made law. Now lawyers make law. Judges also 'make' law, when in fact there job is to interpret law. Equal pay for women is a good thing, but why can't a community decide what is good for it? why can't a community decide how it wants to live, or even how fast it wants to progress?

bottom line: democracy is preferable to lawyer-ocracy.

Alci:

Whatever, Alci, whatever.

We are getting past Kojak's afro and into the frontal lobes ....and this Anecdote versus ___??? dead horse won't win the Triple Crown no matter how many times its beaten.

You seem to be the only one even remotely interested in this "anecdote" exercise.

To each their own.

Perhaps follow G West's cue...explore and debate the Charter.

New Brunswick missing 2x

maestro I can find it 7 times only in my book , maybe this is why they sold me a copy so cheap, they screwed me out of New Brunswick 2 times in section “16" the rotters. My constitutional rights have been violated. Could this be one of those public funded Supreme court challenge cases, hmm, I wonder?

Hyeena is correct

Hyeena, gotta say I agree with everything you said, I gotta go, night all.

Anyone see this last night???

I wonder if anyone saw this show last night on GLOBAL TV (yeah , I know , part of the CanWest media empire)

It was called "STAMP FISHERY: LOSS OF A DREAM".

It dealt with the collapse of the East Coast fisheries , the impact on the people , and , of course EI.

Earlier on this "Little Sisters" topic, various charter provisions were discussed, such as " mobility " etc.

The Global TV show most certainly made me think of "equality"

The EI paid out for Newfoundlanders was $33 MILLION in 1971 , went up to $880
MILLION in 1988 then up to $1.1 BILLION by 1999.

The EI program had evolved whereby the area constituents had a minimum requirement established by Gov't to make them eligible for EI...The theory was Welfare was looked down upon, but EI was socially acceptable.

This Work to qualify for EI became so entrenched that it was not only accepted, it became D-E-M-A-N-D-E-D and the politicians interviewed, which included MP's , MLA's , Ex-Minister John Crosbie ,Mayors and Premiers made it clear they capitulated to "demand" = "feeling of their constituent's entitlement" to EI , and continued regardless of whether the politicians agreed with it or not.

Fish processing plants were purposely built in towns to create more jobs, so more EI eligibility could be provided, but due to overfishing many of these have closed.

It got to the point that the common view was that if they lived there, they ALSO had every RIGHT to continue to live there, the antithesis of mobility... ie EI funded "rooted and permanent" residency

My thinking is , with respect to the Charter " why is this going on "?

THEN I reviewed the Charters " Mobility Rights " provision SECTION 6 (4)

" Subsection (2) and (3)do not preclude any law program or activity that has as its object the amelioration in a province of conditions of individuals in that province who are socially or economically disadvantaged if the rate of employment in that province is below the rate of employment in Canada "

What makes this rather interesting is that this Newfie EI program had not only expanded dramatically from 1971 -1988 ,an almost 30- fold increase,.. but one wonders if the SECTION 6 of the Charter was a means to entrench the East Coast EI status - quo with a more generic wording within the Charter.

Perhaps this subtle inclusion of Section 6 in the Charter was simply an even subtler means to continue to buy East Coast votes ???

Watching this show, I was both disgusted and saddened at what has happened . People are paid to pick up rocks and other make -work projects so they can qualify for EI. As the local priest implied , the peoples spirituality is being bought or sold out.

Thus, is it possible we can be authors of our own artifically induced economic demise, and via the Charter, claim ....no, actually DEMAND equal treatment to the same degree our East Coast countrymen are recieving ?

This could get real interesting, once a real precedent has already been set. Can this section of the Charter be changed? Not very easily, highly doubtful...too politically volatile.

However, A family member in Alberta said the Oil Patch would collapse if it wasn't for the Newfies who used their mobility provisions and moved their to work.

Put (i) the GLOBAL TV Show last night and (ii) the Charter's SECTION 6 provision together and see if you come to the same conclusion.

Woody:

Woody:

No problem...

I know you can count,

ONE Leftie
TWO Leftie

.... (= All the real NDP ers left in BC).

et al

Yeah, maybe you got a bad copy...

Or perhaps it was a rough -draft proof read by a LIEberal Finance Minister..most of them couldn't past " Cinq " anyway...

PS Maybe see what you can get for it on E- Bay.

woody: errata

Woody:

Sorry, I meant to say re: Federal LIEberal Finance Ministers...

...most of them couldn't COUNT past "Cinq" anyway...

Hyeena and Woody

Since you and the Woodrow are so enamored of 'community standards' you both might want to read a fun little short story by Shirley Jackson.

It's called The Lottery and you can find it online - right here:

http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/lotry.html

You won't even have to actually buy a collection of short stories that includes it.

Enjoy.

We're not guests

We're not the audience exclusively. We're also the product. The readers are the product too, sold to advertisers by the click (clique? LOL). The advertisers are the customer.

And we provide ourselves for free. It's the best deal in town to get others to provide your content.

Unless what Coyote said left the Tyee with the threat of legal action he (or anyone else) should not be censored. If they are censored we should be told why and for what.

Quote:...left the Tyee with

That's a valid opinion, but that's not what we agreed to when we signed up. We all agreed to abide by certain rules. Those are the grounds upon which Tyee editors can take ameliorative action.

Guest only

Stump said,

If your so concerned about censorship why didn’t you voice your concerns when Ron Irwin was requested to leave, I don’t recall you sounding any alarms at that time, why now? Tyee is not my ship to navigate, which ever direction it goes has no consequences on anybody, but its self.
There was life before the Tyee, there will be life after. As I stated earlier were only guest here.

Ron's gone?

I guess I hadn't noticed.

Unless he said something libelous I'd defend his right to post too.

Also, where are these rules? I'll have to have another look.

Here it is

Which this non-lawyer reads to mean you have to be violating a law to warrant censorship. It's unfortunate that you only ever see that info when you sign up.

Of course they have the "we reserve the right" clause right underneath that, so I stand by my other comment... "the power of the press, belongs to those that have one."

Worth reiterating that we ARE NOT just the audience. We are also content providers for this site.

Re: Coyote

When I heard of Coyote's being banned via G. West's post....I went back to the last Coyote posts...which were on the Cohen article (still active on THE TYEE).

I surmise the ethereal ideological free speech argument was trumped by the TYEE via a bit of legal pragmatism. Things get posted by we commentators , which the TYEE has to then assess and edit
AFTER the fact, unlike say print media where the gatekeeping is done prior(BEFORE) to publication (PUBLIC-ation).

A lot can get posted before THE TYEE parties catch up to it...and I don't envy those entrusted in this task.

THE TYEE's Mr. Beers bio makes it clear he has past experience in these matters. I will presume , by these past experiences, those at THE TYEE can make pretty good and often expeditious "after the fact" judgement calls as to what crosses the various societal "legal" lines, and more importantly, what actions and INactions that could have them dragged into Court,and often via past precedents.

This TYEE " Little Sisters " topic, ironically, involves the Charter, which is a double - edged sword...and another individual or group of individuals ( besides the Little Sisters )may take issue what is posted and file a complaint based on the Charter or the BC Human Rights Code etc.

WE may see it as simply free speech issue, but THE TYEE may see it as legally compromising based on THEIR PROFESSIONAL experience, (as opposed to our somewhat " amateur status ").

As Woody said, we are simply guests.

It would be unfortunate if we lost THE TYEE due to such a possibility.

You don't know what you're talking about maestro

The offending post, whatever it said, was removed completely. I have it from good authority, from someone whose judgment I trust, that it was typical Coyote but neither libelous nor anti-Semitic. I did not read it myself.

I do know that if someone hadn't heard privately about the circumstances that no one here would have been the wiser. Otherwise, the editors have provided no explanation of any kind.

You might think that's fair and open treatment; in my view, it is not. David Beers' thoughts on the matter have only been brought to the readers’ attention because I posted them - with Coyote's permission.

Ron Erwin posts to this site all the time. He uses the label IAMC.

This is a free speech issue, no matter what you might like to call it.

Stump - There's also the

Stump - There's also the part about being respectful of other participants, etc. It wasn't strictly about violating laws, it was about maintaining a respectful and civil virtual environment for dialogue.

Gwest - I don't know the particulars of this instance, because I wasn't following the thread. But I will say that, based on the irrational ruckus and complete loss of perspective it caused the last time (the fella had a track record), I can't blame the editors for being discreet about their ameliorative action(s).

What was that stuff about him being interviewed on the radio - It would be interesting to hear what the guy sounds like in person.

One more time

Since it seems some posters aren't completely familiar with the new paradigm.

Worth reiterating that we ARE NOT just the audience. We are also content providers for this site.

Your comments are worth money to this site.

Hi nightbloom

If anything but respectful and civil dialogue was deleted, there would be far, far fewer posts (and readers).

Free speech can and is offensive at times. Pretty hard to have one without the other.

Quote:Free speech can and is

But seldom constructively so.

G West:

Gee G West....I am " somewhat offended " by your last post.

I seem to recall I was the first to jump to Coyote's defence ... check the Cohen topic.

re: your comment of "typical Coyote"...well if not mistaken, I think that I did catch a glimpse of it before it was removed. "Typical" can mean many things, but if one had a remote handle on what crosses the legally -compromising line it may have been, in someone's opinion, that someone else is the one whose ass may be in a sling via the posted comment..thus its THEIR call ,not yours, nor mine..etc. etc.

Unless you are the UBER n' ALMIGHTY EDITOR who had a son born about 2,000 years ago and know Moses personally, I think I may have a valid complaint. Hmmm???

Why can't you just perhaps sit on your laurels and brownie points for bringing Coyote's issue to our attention, and give us food for thought, which is what much oftHE TYEE is about..., it was Kudos to YOU for THAT. If ,however, YOU want to play editor, send in a resume' and an application.

After others commented, I simply submitted a different take on it...based on a reasonable devil's advocate type of argument.

Time you found a crowded theatre,and cleared it via voicing the first syllable with some of your rather unique views and misinterpretations. There's your free speech "quality control". I think I'll pass on attending.

Otherwise, the "Free Will" UBER Law allows you to create your own cyber space site, then "let er rip"...and see if you get subpoena'd.

Simple...capisce'???

The stump under worked and over paid.

Stump you can’t complain about not getting your two-bits worth, now don’t forget to declare it (25c) on your 2007 income tax return (next year).
Talk about being over compensated.

"guests" and free speech

This nonsense:

Was what I was reacting to maestro.

If you don't think banning someone in such a high-handed and arbitrary way - just, as it were, 'disappearing' them - is a problem in a country where private corporations can be forced to ensure due process; then I can't help you. You don't know what free speech is.

If you'd been paying attention - and the editors had too - you and they would have seen several examples of real Anti-Semitism posted by a character called kjc here at Tyee.

You can look it up.

Stump:

Stump;

Your point is well taken...we are both (i)the audience and (ii) providers of content to the same audience...a dual role.

However, we are not the Editors...that's the basic point.

I had originally heard about THE TYEE from a colleague who would send me the odd TYEE article from time to time. After awhile I choose to access the TYEE site. It most certainly proved interesting, lively and intriguing,etc. right up there on the " Free Speech " front.

The TYEE format is unlike any other so -called " free speech " media, were we can comment and debate literally instantaneously and without a deadline.

Ever sent a Letter to the Editor???...and what happened to it IF it got published???

Rafe used to talk about his cases where he was a Defendant re: "Free Speech" (which he had talked about when he was still on the radio )...perhaps he should put down his Environmentalist Hat and replace it temporarily with his Lawyers Robes ,....perhaps in a future TYEE topic, ....and discuss the basic issues of what constitutes crossing the legal line...which ultimately decides what IS VERSUS what IS NOT free speech (ie not without cost). Perhaps he could even discuss SLAP lawsuits.

offensive vs constructive

Nightbloom sez:

Lenny Bruce wants a word with you NB and Ginsberg is chomping at the bit too! :-)

let's all lie down and let the maritimes piggy back on our labor

you're right about the newfies, maestro. hard working but a little daft. they overfished and then demanded EI. work six months and kick back the other six. culture of entitlement.

Ted Tweak

Stump - when Lenny Bruce or

Stump - when Lenny Bruce or Ginsberg show up on these threads, then I'll eat my words. The individual in question doesn't quite fit that bill.

not a question of individuals

Nightbloom:

I thought we were discussing the principle rather than the individual.

Offensive references

I guess making ad hominem remarks about the residents of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador doesn't violate the Tyee's guidelines. Neither does insulting the people of Quebec, or folks from Ontario or, God forbid, Toronto, or people of a cooperative and socialist frame of mind...(What is it that Elliot and Ron Erwin always calls us?) - idiots and lefties and several other less polite appellations.

And if you don't see those things as evidence of a double standard go down this site to the Harper/Green makeover article and look for what kjc posted about the evil influence of Jews in the world. He uses code, but it's there and it is far from the only time he/she has posted such hateful stuff.

You guys need to read a little more closely since you're so concerned to defend David Beers' treatment of Coyote. The fact Beers can hide behind a rule that is more notable for being ignored does not in any way counteract the arbitrariness and high-handed way Coyote has been treated in this instance.

Woody

I'm not looking to be paid, just pointing out we are not simply consumers, and banning posters for their vehemence may prove to be a handicap for a site ostensibly devoted to ideals.

The hardest p.o.v.s to defend are those which make us uncomfortable or angry.

Just in !!!

Lenny Bruce and Ginsberg will apparently be the opening act for the Beatles re-union.

Elvis is pissed.

Quote:I thought we were

That doesn't negate the fact that we all 'signed' agreements when we signed up for this. We've all got freedom of speech. Some of us even have blogs of our own. That doesn't mean The Tyee has to subsidize anything and everything people want to disgorge on their website.

G West...are you heading " South " ?

What part don't you get G West???

Perhaps the TYEE staff is between a proverbial rock and a hard place...Coyote's " free speech " rights versus perhaps there was quasi FIRE yelled out in a cyber - space theatre ? Maybe they deemed Coyote to be the softer of the two difficult situations...ie the legal path of least resistance .

I recall "Spanky" got spanked by the TYEE editor months ago...haven't heard from him in months...(unless he has a new moniker).

I think it's been repeated ad - nauseum that we all seem to be against censorship as an ideological principle...however, someone in charge(not us) had to make a judgement call.

If you ever read TYEE's D. Beer's bio re THE TYEE ,...he himself was let go from his position in the hard -print media... which left him a bit confused...but he soldiered on and helped create THE TYEE. I think that's ironic, but not hypocritical,...as Lord knows what type of things crossed his desk when viewing potential hard copy.

We had an Editor in a local community paper who was unceremoniously fired...yet I found his editorials somewhat low key, mainstream and rather generic. The "rumour" was that one of his editorials pissed off the School District trustees at the time , who , the rumour went,went into the paper and apparently bent someones ear. If it's the one editorial I am thinking of got him fired,..in MY own view...repeat, my OWN view...someone has a very VERY thin skin.

The fact that the local school board ( and Local Gov't )are some of THE biggest advertising clients for local community newspapers certainly is an interesting " coincidence ", isn't it ???...and yet these are PUBLIC bodies. All I know is a local elected offical told me personally one-on -one that he had tried to intervene re : at least some fair treatment... how it all ended up I don't know.

Regardless,.....Options to resolve this issue are available, but we need not go there right now.

Defining the line

No argument from me there. But how do I know what I can't say, what will essentially be edited from the record of a dialogue (poly-logue?). I think you have to rely on the law. Editing a story or even a letter (more one-way in nature) is different (in terms of free speech) than removing posts. As a transcript it's compromised. At the very least I think there needs to a "post deleted" marker in the thread to let the reader know what's going on. A conversation mediated in that way is in some ways akin to the Watergate tapes... there's bits of reality missing.

Quote:No argument from me

Common sense, Stump. The individual in question knew precisely what buttons to push. As I said, there was a long-running and well-known track record there.

So did you actually go on radio, or not?

In other news, remember when

In other news, remember when the AIDS lobby, the social welfare sector and apologists for the drug-party industry all closed ranks to denounce “premature” reports in San Francisco of an HIV super-virus, not so long ago…?

Well guess what?

Health officials warn of new HIV threat found in King County
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003552431_hiv02m.html

At least two types of HIV drugs don't work against the strain, and another type has limited effectiveness, officials from Public Health — Seattle & King County said Thursday.

"It's conceivable there can be more infections, and the gay community is at highest risk," said Dr. Bob Wood, the HIV/AIDS program director for Public Health.

All the men were diagnosed with the strain as soon as they tested positive for the virus — unlike other HIV patients who develop drug resistance over time, often from taking medications inconsistently, Wood said. But there is no evidence the strain is rapidly spreading...

Wood said all of the infected men are gay and have had multiple partners, most anonymous. They also used methamphetamine, which tends to increase sexual activity....

Expect this to be mined by the Drugs-&-AIDS industry for yet more grant funding to underwrite their ineffective prevention strategies, their "public awareness" campaigns and their local patronage disbursements in urban jurisdictions.

Hyeena:

Hyeena

I've read both the Canadian Charter and the BC Human Rights code... many times...but sometimes debates like these encourage one to go back and either review or have a closer look.

If you ever get a chance to see that GLOBAL TV show

" STAMP FISHERY: LOSS OF A DREAM ", I truly encourage you or anyone else to. I would guess that it will be re-run in the future.

I was simply channel surfing and stumbled across it...at first I thought it was a CBC or NEWSWORLD show. It was fascinating and well done.

I know on the TYEE some have ragged and slagged the CanWest media empire , but I found the show pulled NO punches as it was not at all complimentary to ANY mainstream political party, Federally or Provincially (and the NDP weren't even hinted at).

The show ,in my view, was very indicting, and in some ways I am somewhat surprised it was even shown. This TYEE "Little Sisters" Charter topic had coincidentally come up the day before.

After viewing it...I was rather disgusted...and not at all towards our East Coast fellow Canadians. In my view the Gov'ts have created another quasi - "2nd Nations" reservation...and perhaps a quasi -precedent...try reading The CHARTERS "Mobility" rights SECTION 6 (4)

In my view...for example.... the Pine Beetle Kill could make a major portion of BC an economically depressed zone where the employment rate is below the Canadian average. Would this not qualify them to be treated on par with the East Coast Canadians. Wood and Fish are renewable resources. See the parallels and the possible Charter application ???

Or would the EI say NO..... you are still a part of BC..... let the Urban BC City Slickers types cover you through their PROVINCIAL programs. However, then a BC Gov't gets pissed and says NO , our interpretation is you FEDS cover BC the same way you cover the East Coast. See you in Court.

Then say the Feds lose a court challenge...but they can't fiscally etc. cover BC to the same level as the East Coast has been historically ....so now they find a new benchmark...the same " EQUAL " treatment via all must accept a lower pro-rata funding. That is then non -discriminatory,...correct? ... but THEN this now pisses - off the entrenched feeling of entitlement that is literally becoming a multi-generational expectation on the East Coast according to the TV show I mentioned.

Very Vicious Circle !

The so - called Canadian Charter seems to have already either created a subtle non -level playing field in 1982...or set up interesting precedents for the future. ( Also: Read the 9 times New Brunswick is specifically mentioned in one section...NO OTHER province...)

PS Apply this same scenario potential to Alberta when the last drop of oil is pumped out. Then what? What if the so-called " Have Not" Provinces start to outnumber the so-called "Have " Provinces ???

Correction

I meant to type 'did HE actually go on radio...'

The Golden Rule.

G west said,

Garf West, do I have to point out the Golden rule and its meaning for you?

THE GOLDEN RULE----HE WHO HAS THE GOLD, MAKES THE RULES.
On this site, BEERS owns the gold!

Well, woody given what's happened lately

It happens to be pretty tarnished gold. If the particulars of this little incident hadn't been posted here and on the Cohen thread there wouldn't have been a single person any the wiser about what went on here yesterday. If you think that's gold, well in my opinion it's iron pyrites, not real gold.

nightbloom

Your question relative to Coyote and his appearance on campus radio - if I hear anything, I'll pet you know.

The Constitution

maestro its unfortunate that Mel Smith is no longer alive, the points that you have brought up he may have provided an answer to. Possibly he may have discussed your topic in his book “My home and native land” which unfortunately I have neither purchased or read, matter of fact, Ill attempt to get one from the library today.

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=mel+smith+my+home+and+native+land&btnG=Google+Search&meta=

Author MEL SMITH

Book title is, OUR HOME AND NATIVE LAND
Not--- My Home and Native Land----

Woody:

Woody:

Yes, I recall Mel Smith when Rafe had him on his radio show...one of those parties that may, I repeat MAY, be a prophet far ahead of his time.

My view is that unless something is formally entrenched with specific wording...it IS w-o-r-t-h-l-e-s-s...or simply is meant to serve the current future interests of a very few. A pro -rated warranty is of more realisitc value (to the client) than the Charter.

The Charter in my view was meant to give us a false sense of security, or lull us into one. Much of what it INCLUDES are things I think most of us average Canadians either take for granted , or simply follow as part of our daily lives.

However, what the CHARTER EXCLUDES is what should be of more concern to the average Canadian.

The NOTWITHSTANDING CLAUSE in Charter Sections 32 and 33 is somewhat confusing, ambiguous, creates a legal fog...and thus not in our, the Canadian citizens( who the Charter was apparently meant to serve) best interests.

I think there is a Formal LEGAL TERM for something like this NOTWITHSTANDING CLAUSE...."a WEASEL CLAUSE" ...so why would Trudeau-sky include it....why create a CHARTER for the people( = Gov't?)and then at the same time give the same Gov't (=us?)the right to do what the NOTWITHSTANDING CLAUSE allows the Gov't (= us? ...or the elected power hungry representatives ? ) to possibly do to us whatever they may see fit?

If you haven't already read others' post above on this NOTWITHSTANDING CLAUSE topic, I recommend you do. The NOTWITSTANDING CLAUSE apparently gives the Gov't the "right" to over-ride societies(= OUR ) RIGHTS and apparently it also has to be reviewed every 5 years.

I never really trusted Trudeau, and even less the more I read this Charter.

Of course the Public laps it up....( "careful what you ask for you may get it" ....or did we actually give Trudeau a mandate??? )...and watch out for wolves in sheeps clothing who try and deliver.

The need for a charter

The need for a charter of rights and freedoms is more to protect minorities from the depredations of majorities. You and woodrow and Mel Smith (who was a First Nations hater of the first rank) may think that from your point of view everything in this country is just dandy fine. And so you're free to make slimy ad hominem comments about people who don't live in your province, or who don’t live in the West, or who don't happen to share your prejudices. Which is fine because we all share free speech – but don’t expect not to be challenged. But when push comes to shove and some employer decides he'll fire an employee because he's gay or she's pregnant or because he doesn't want to give an employee a particular religious holiday off work then we need a charter and we need fair and equitable access to the courts to ensure that EVERYONE is treated with a modicum of fairness all across this country and where access to that fairness isn’t only by means of a fat and bulging wallet.

I can't force you to empathize with your fellow citizens - that's a matter between you and your own conscience - but I think a decent and civilized country does pay more than lip service to principles of fairness, equity and equal treatment before the law.

If that costs some tax money, so be it. Let’s spend a little less on the crazy adventure in Afghanistan. An adventure which, according to my most recent reading, isn’t even providing much of value to the women and children that seem so central to the justification for continued Canadian troops’ presence in country. I’ll post more of that later when an appropriate thread comes along.

Our Prime Minister hasn't really got a clue of what is necessary to be a decent Canadian citizen and is more concerned with calling down and criticizing things he's never had to experience like Maritime unemployment; first nations rights; the need for a concerted effort to save the environment; gay marriage and decent child care for working women and single mothers.

The Canada of the past you guys remember so fondly was a white bread country of two solitudes, a land of imaginatively blissful stable marriages and families where dad worked and mom stayed home and sewed, a place where the only Chinaman in town ran the New World Café and the only Blacks anyone ever saw were with the Harlem Globetrotters or a barn-storming baseball team, a land where happy Indians stayed on the reserve and sent their kids to religious residential schools, where Preston Manning’s brother was sterilized in an Alberta institution. A lot of that wonderful stuff you’re pining for was rotten them and we live in a different world today. There is no going back; things have changed and the legal framework that organizes our society needed to change too.

God help us that Harper isn't in power too long and can't ruin what had been partially achieved.

Woody:

Woody:

Sorry to bother you again, but I came across this link you might find of interest...by a rather obscure author.

Date: Feb 13/1998

http://sisis.nativeweb.org/clark/feb1398del.html

Ya ever heard of him ???...probably one of those flakes we should brush off...this guy is out to lunch via his doom and gloom prophecy ...YEEESH..what absurd predictions eh?

Alci:

Hmmm

You state:

...." Mel Smith(who was a First Nations hater of the First Rank)"

Do you have anything to verify that?

Gee, I seem to recall when Mel was around, I listened to what he had to say...and Rafe (also a Lawyer by training who I consider a bit left -of- center..BUT not that there is anything major wrong with that ...and who I also recall had no patience for hatemongering racists, so why have one as a guest??? and get his ass in a sling as well???..I rest my case ) and I don't seem to recall anything remotely hateful or racist towards First Nations from Mel Smith.

He seemed to articulate his views from a legal premise...provided objective discussions...and even better in clear laymans terms ....and if he was even remotely racist(i) the Charter and (ii)the BC Human Rights code was in effect at the time was it not?

Did the First Nations ,ironically on this topic , ever try to file a complaint based on what you claim about Mel?

Do you think he was a foolish man that would risk his professional reputation with possible sanctions by the Law Society of BC ? Was he not a Q.C.?

Objective debate and laying out concerns in a "Devil's Advocate" approach is not "HATE" Alci...or the Legal Profession would not exist...nor would many others.

Evidence ...(BTW :not anecdotes) Alci...SVP....

Happy to oblige maestro

Another, rather alarmist, interpretation of Delgamuukw was delivered to the Vancouver Board of Trade by Mel Smith, QC. He characterized the decision of the Supreme Court as creating the most serious state of crisis in the province’s history in regard to provincial sovereignty, as lacking in proper legal foundation, and as ruining the provincial land claims process. Smith’s points included these grim assessments: Crown ownership of the land mass of B.C. has been drastically undermined; the province’s ability to make land resource decisions has been seriously hamstrung; aboriginal groups have been given special status in legal proceedings in regard to rules of evidence and aboriginal perspective; and aboriginal title has been made superior to other forms of land tenure and can only be infringed when rigid test conditions are met and compensation is paid. He also believes that the Supreme Court failed to confirm that lawmaking authority rests solely with Parliament or provincial legislatures.

Mel Smith, who was a Deputy Minister for the Socred government in the 1980s, proposed that the B.C. treaty process should be replaced with a legislated solution, such as was recently done in Australia with regard to its Aborigines. This proposed federal statute would automatically extinguish aboriginal title on all alienated (tenured) Crown land, past, present, and future, and would pay compensation based on statutory criteria. As a result, there would be no limit or hindrance on the province’s authority to continue to infringe on the remaining aboriginal-title lands. He also suggests that compensation should be the sole responsibility of the federal government. While such a radical "final solution" might hold an appeal to certain segments of society, the current political and social climate in Canada would seem to preclude the possibility of its success.

The primary significance of the Delgamuukw decision appears to be in its treatment of the nature and content of aboriginal title, how it is proved, how it can be infringed on, and how it can be extinguished. Translating this decision into practical and specific situations has yet to be accomplished, and there is a wide diversity of opinion in this regard. Even so, there are a number of outcomes that are significant for the environmental community.

Please note the highlighted materials

Source: http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:xHOTYdI3tO8J:www.bcen.bc.ca/bcerart/Vol9/delgamuu.htm+Mel+Smith+and+FIrst+Nations&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=5&gl=ca

Alci:

First...thanks for the info.

(I see no evidence Mel was cited for violations of the (i)Charter nor (ii)BC Human Rights Code.)

However, upon perusing what you provided, I fail to see where Mel Smith is hate - mongering towards First Nations.

This is not an issue of either Compensation or NO compensation re: the treaties issue. We have to start off with "Is there a valid claim for compensation ?If so , What is it based on ? "

If compensation is, in fact , owing to First Nations ,how will it be provided? and in what form?

The first papragraph seems to show Smith's concerns with :

" aboriginal groups have been special status in legal proceedings in regards to rules of evidence and aboriginal perspective ",

" aboriginal title has been made superior to other forms of land tenure and can only be infringed when rigid test conditions are met and compensation paid"

"He also beleives that the Supreme Court failed to confirm that lawmaking authority rests solely with Parliament or provincial legislatures".

To this point, my view is Mel Smith Q.C. who was both a Lawyer and once a Deputy Minister in the BC Gov't is putting some Non -laypersons (ie professional expertise and experience) objective arguments forward.

Mel is speaking for BC...advocating for BC, not Canada , nothing wrong with that... and if I am not mistaken I think a disproportionate number of First Nations groups are within BC as opposed to other provinces.

Mel is not saying NO to compensation ... he is asking HOW and he feels LAND as the commodity for compensation is not a good idea. He cites that a legislated solution on par with what Australia had done...if that worked there why re-invent the wheel here???...as ironically Australia had old British colonial roots-ties as did BC when the first Europeans came to BC 's First Nations areas. Thus,First Nations treatment in all ex- British colonies as a consistent common -law approach perhaps ?

The irony is that in most legal cases, when the courts , or Gov't , has ruled compensation is owing... isn't CASH the compensation commodity. Does ICBC pay you out in Logs...does Worker Safe pay you out in goats...do Lawyers accept jewellry and hockey cards in lieu of $$$ ?

What Smith is saying is that, and speaking FOR BC's interests, and which I further interpret as NOT in a negative vein towards First Nations, BC could be in a major compromising situation if LAND is the compensation commodity.

Given that the Federal Gov't is generally the main "Big Brother" overseer of the First Nations, Smith is saying that the issue should be dealt with at the HIGHEST levels of Gov't(Feds) , which would perhaps force the fairest and most equitable settlements and level playing field which would thus be in all Canadians best interests, and perhaps moreso for the First Nations best interests than otherwise.

Mel Smith is simply seeing that an INequality is starting to evolve...that perhasp discrmination FOR a group as opposed to discrimantion AGAINST a group.

He likley foresees that if the "Gov't powers that be" start a compensation process he is voicing concerns over... the slippery slopes will literally be nonstop. It's NO sweat off the Gov't and the elected officials backs...but the BC citizens interests will be THE ones compromised and may be obligated towards compensation either in perpetuity or in an ever expeditous sense ...not good either way.

It seems that currently the Canadian Politicians Zeitgeist is they are NOW (as opposed to the past)literally and figuratively tripping over themselves for some "feel good legacy" on these First Nations issues..and will literally sign anything that is pushed under their noses...versus treading softly and carefully.

Perhaps Mel Smith was very cognitive of the (Federal)Charter and felt that if the issue was dropped into the lap of the Feds...the issue would be resolved quicker, given the Feds are THE superior legislative body.

It may still be forced via the Charter in the future.

My view is that the Feds are sh!tting bricks... a derelection of duty on their part to not go near this issue, and that they would be obligated to provide compensation which implies tax dollars... not land...and then all fiscal hell would break loose.

I also perceive that the FEDS are aware of the Charter implications if they even go near this issue...the Feds wish to avoid the initiation of possible precedents.

Lets say for arguments sake that BC Land claims totalled $10 BILLION. BC can't afford it...and the FEDS would have a big dent in their budget...so be default the FEDS ignore it...and then it goes back to LAND as the compensation commodity, and the onus is back in the Provincial lap. It's like everything else they have downloaded onto the Provinces.

Ottawa more and more reminds me of McDonald's...franchises out power to the Provinces and we franchisees = all "give" to Ottawa..it takes our franchise fees ie tax $$$'s ..and doesn't give back.
The real McDonald's should be perhaps be P3'd and run the country..at least there is some consistency and predictability in the product throughout the franchise territory.

To be continued...

Spare me

AN INEQUALITY IS STARTING TO EVOLVE!.
What in the name of all that's holy do you think the aboriginal people of this country have been experiencing for the last 350 years?

The whole point of the exercise is to redress and counteract centuries of colonial rule and outright murder.

You didn't read the highlighted materials very carefully. That's what Mel Smith and Rafe Mair (at the time - I don't know what Rafe believes now) were in favour of. They don't want to address the magnitude of the criminality of the way natives have been treated and they want to hedge their bets – that’s why they’re reluctant to concur with the Supreme Court rulings.

That’s why Campbell called his stupid referendum. The people of BC are way ahead of the damn courts and the politicians on this file maestro.

Time to wake up and admit the reality of the way the vast majority of First Nations - many of them in jails - actually live right now in the 21st century.

We need to pay those bills fairly and honestly and not with the hand-in-the-pocket bs that the Campbell government has in mind.

Alci Alci Alci

First of all, I can appreciate from where you are coming from, nothing wrong with the concern for First Nations or any one else of whatever background etc. I think we are all on that same page and seeking the same basic fairness and equality for all...or more to the point... WHY wouldn't we?.

However, I am not a First Nation Canadian, but I am a First Generation Canadian...born here..my family roots are actually as one of the first WWII DP's in BC...post WWII , arrived in the late 1940's. We had no say in the First Nations issue, arrived dirt poor...hence let's establish that at the interim.

However, the First Nations problem has been passed down and part of Canadian and BC citizenship is " the SINS fathered by past Gov't s are ALWAYS carried through to the subsequent citizen sons and daughters ".

There are various rights and wrongs that occur in society...amongst people of all backgrounds. How is justice ultimately served ?

BTW....YES I DID READ THE HIGHLIGHTED PORTION, (WHY ELSE WOULD IT BE HIGHLIGHTED???).

The HIGHLIGHTED portions discuss ...would pay compensation..." and it doesn't say DO NOT PAY compensation.

Did you read my comments to what you had posted?

Again, my point is to avoid the ideological bleeding heart rhetoric and get down to the pragmatic brass tacks.

If the sins of old colonialism deserve re-dress..."compensation" ...lets perhaps look at a bigger picture. When BC was entering Confederation...we came under the umbrella of CANADA, did we not? ,and lost whatever autonomy we had...correct?

Thus Canada as the NOW superior governing power ,with BC added, and thus Canada would have to assume any/all liabilities that were incurred by its subsidiaries(ie Provinces), correct? Canada also had British roots...did it not... hence the First Nations issue in(i) BC and (ii) the rest of Canada has a common Anglo-Saxon root.

Unforunately,...Provinces becoming engaged in what is and should remain a FEDERAL matter is very dangerous politically and legally.......what happens is inconsistency and precedents become established...then there is often no going back.

This is much like Local Gov'ts creating policies that can stand out " beyond the norm " amongst their peer Local Gov'ts and get them in hot water....( I can explain a specific case to you...and the instant 180 degree turn a Local Gov't had to do .." No questions asked " ...when it was brought to their attention ).

This goes back to my previous post...ANY/ALL all compensation should be the sole responsibility of the FEDS...it is THEIR jurisdiction...and this is simply a buck-passing exercise... do you and I both agree on that at least Alci ?

ALSO: Are you aware the Semiahmoo First Nations are royally pissed off at the Tsawassen First Nations agreement Campbell wants to ratify...there is now an apparent overlap of Semiahmoo and Tsawassen land claims...which doesn't suprise me. My understanding is that the Gov'ts have drawn the boundaries for First Nation claims...perhaps in the hope the settlements will be smoother...I guess not. If other First Nations follow...this will never get settled...back full circle to the FEDS.

There are far more Devils in the details Alci..which we can continue discussing .

Jurisdiction has nothing to do with it

The whole BS point about Federal/Provincial jurisdiction is arguing about the placement of chairs on the Titanic.

We owe these debts to First Nations Canadians as a whole - not just as citizens of BC. The Federal/Provincial thing is just smoke and mirrors. Moreover, what Campbell is doing will, in the end, help his corporate friends a lot more than it will the various tribes he's working desperately to bring to the treaty table right now. This is not a solution, it's a boondoogle.

You're the one who wrote the nonsense about an "inequality starting to evolve". I don't blame you for not understanding the history of this problem if you're a first generation Canadian but for Pete’s sake take the trouble to learn something about it before you sound off.

You might start with Ronald Wright's excellent Stolen Continents: The New World Through Indian Eyes since 1492

When you've taken the trouble to learn something about the issue and when you've investigated the actual plight of the vast majority of native Canadians then we can talk. Until then, I'm sorry, but you're wasting my time with a lot of wheel spinning.

The devils are in Ottawa and Victoria.

Alci:

Well Alci

What are YOUR...I repeat YOUR views on First Nations and how they self -govern on Reservations.....even if we give them all of BC back........do you think THAT is something we should feel all warm and fuzzy about ? Do you watch the TV news?

You are still in the old bleeding -heart ideological camp...

History is one thing...learning from it and applying it to the present and the future is another.

Solutions result when someone takes charge...not pass the buck.

You are not debating my objective points as to " WHY " versus " WHY NOT ". It is clear I am in the pragmatic LongHouse , not the ideological bleeding heart TeePee.

How about you quit playing moot court and you submit some solutions ie

" If I Alci was Premier or Prime Minister,or both.... I would________.

Then we are back on track.
However...If I do a 180 degree turn and agree with you..will that solve anything???...I seriously doubt it.

Your turn.

Nope, sorry, your turn.

I told you, read the book, find out what life is really like for Canada's First Nations people, find out about their health conditions, their unemployment, their history.

Forget about the phony Federal/Provincial debate and educate yourself about the ties to business and industry and the connection to the ALR in Campbell's compromised non-solutions; read about the 'intellectual' underpinnings of Stephen Harper's philosophy relative to First Nations and the alleged 'waves' of immigrants; study the history of colonialism and the effects of cultural selfishness and religious prejudice.

When you've done all that, as I said above, then we can talk. You play games maestro and I'm not interested in them because they and you are a waste of my time.

I've answered your questions and tried to point you in the right direction. The rest is up to you.

I don't want you to 'agree' with me. I want you to learn something for yourself.

I've written more than enough here for today.

Likewise Alci...enough of

Likewise Alci...enough of this for today...

The only hint that we are both on some same remote page is that the Land Claims issue is being morphed with Crown owned ALR as the compensation commodity, a few signatures and Voila'. The only good I see coming out of it is the formal integration into society of one First Nation group, which will likley serve as a model for other such agreements,.. so they DO become equal citizens VERSUS this Made -in -Canada apartheid charade that is the current model.

What makes you think I am not familiar with the issues you point out. I also drive through 6-7 First Nations Reservations several times each year.

Unfortunately your remaining retro views ain't gonna settle a damn thing. How CAN one forget about the Federal /Provincial debate..the solution is in THEIR hands...who elses'???

Nope, don't think we're even marginally on the same page

And I think, since you put it so crudely, you’re the one with the ignorant, uninformed, retro views.

Sorry. Nevertheless, you asked for it.

In the end, like the clear result of Campbell's immoral referendum, I'll trust in the fairness and morality of the people of this country and this province who actually have a much better handle, on balance, with respect to what western culture has done to the First Nations, that people like Stephen Harper and his American advisors.

There is no THEIR. There is, in the end, only us - the people: And if we let our leadership misrepresent us and try to extinguish or buy off the legitimate heritage of a minority like the First Nations - just because they are a minority; or if we defraud them as I fear Gordon Campbell and his corporate cronies are in the process of doing - we will be, as a people, no better than the tyrants and bullies of the colonial past.

ALKY COPS OUT

Alky I can not find anything in regards to what you said about Mel Smith. You know not what you talk about.
When you stated to maestro in the above discussion (you're a first generation Canadian) you forfeited your argument, that was a cop out on your part.

Nope..sorry...

Sorry Alci....

This issue is being cobbled together with some court cases and some decisions...but nothing approaching realisitic solutions.

Neither side has an answer and both sides are waiting for the other to blink. In my view...The First Nations are as nervous as the other side...this issue is as much a Mexican standoff as is legally and politically possible.

Apparently, as it stands now ,it seems that the solution will happpen when the ducks line up so that greater agendas can be fullfilled in the backrooms yet the public propoganda will suggest it was solely to settle a Land Claim.

You truly are an enigma in your repetitive use of " past sins " . If you wish to run around and picking and choosing who are minorities and who aren't ...and repeat the historical injustices against them again and again, I guess that's your right. If you want to contribute a solution, which you have NOT , your role seems to be as some sort of quasi -conscience.

However, after a while a retro -conscience that doesn't evolve into a Pro-Active conscience becomes rather irrelevant and perhaps even hurts those they claim to advocate for...ie " tuned- out".

As to our leadership...I don't envy anyone in Gov't who is involved in this issue... no matter which way they turn, they are walking in a minefield. Any one who truly looks at this issue would realize this.

That's why this issue is ending up much like the dog chasing it's tail. Gov'ts ..again Alci "GOVERNMENTS", who will ultimately negotiate and legislate the solution often are too short -term in a relative sense, little long -term stability, and consequently little continuity. Start over.... NEXT !!!

This does not preclude in -fighting within First Nations....you deftly avoided my Semiahmoo example posted earlier. Again , if land is the commodity...as opposed to cash like most legal cases , this simply encourages internal challenges amongst First Nations...who may take each other to court...even more delays....maybe even make archaeolgy a very lucrative profession..if you catch my drift.

This issue, in my view, on its present course is much like the TITANIC, but it is only the TIP of the iceberg, but we know how that story ended...maybe we can set another course after re- reviewing THAT history.

I guess where you stand Alci...you seem to imply that you'd cut a blank cheque and also perhaps even give 110% of BC back to the First Nations....you give me no other indication.

Woody:

Woody:

I listened to Mel Smith discuss this issue many times ...and for Alci to claim he was a First Nations hater of the First Rank really surprised me. Alci's becoming the one with the credibility problem. He could have said Mel took a position that________ ...then debated Mel's points.

How many times have I laid out my own points and yet Alci does a Trudeau and tries to deflect it if not ignore it completely? Every time I think there is hope for Alci he disappoints me...I guess that IS my fault for not seeing this pattern.

Mel Smith was a lawyer and put forward his views on legal grounds. All lawyers do that...thats' their job.

I guess using " Judge Alci "logic , he must figure we are all First Nations haters if we wish to submit some discussion and debate on what is undeniably a complicated matter and not sign blank cheques. BTW My god-daughter is part Metis' and I have done business with many First Nations individuals.

Why do people think that this issue is so long drawn out?...its because it is very very delicate and legal land mine ridden. It appears that Private Property is NOT on the table... ie Privately - owned land is not going to be use for Land Claim settlements. Why? Well probably so that a Civil War won't ensue?

Then again so - called Private Property OWNERSHIP is not entrenched in the Charter...then we get into the Charter's NOTWITHSTANDING Clause and other possibilities.

On a purely legal point What about various First Nation specific credits that have been specifically directed to and through the Federal Indian Act...are those applied towards the settlements? How would the Charter , since 1982, look at that in the Big Picture ?

I can see the current path as creating an enormous mess...I think Campbell (....and again this should be a Federal matter and shows how truly " NO BALLS " the Feds truly are ) is simply trying buy peace throughout BC in preparation for the global whore house called the 2010 Olympics.

FINALLY : If the Feds don't do what I submit is their job and sole jurisdiction on this front, aren't all other bets off ?

trouble with reading woodrow?

This proposed federal statute would automatically extinguish aboriginal title on all alienated (tenured) Crown land, past, present, and future, and would pay compensation based on statutory criteria. As a result, there would be no limit or hindrance on the province’s authority to continue to infringe on the remaining aboriginal-title lands.

If that doesn't amount to First-Nations bashing then nothing does. Mel Smith didn't want to negotiate. He wanted to extinguish native title entirely - pay out a one time compensatory package (one size fits all) and then do what ever the majority wanted with every other bit of land the natives of this country might have ever laid claim to.

Just another example of a majority deciding how a minority is going to be treated...and denying them access to the courts by legislation.

Thank God for the Charter and that people like Mel Smith didn't win the day.

I didn't bring up maestro's background woody, he did. Go back and read a little more carefully. If he didn't want it on the table, he shouldn't have put it there.

Charter ???....LOL !!!

The Charter is an ambiguous state of legal flux which can be applied by an equally ambiguous state -of -flux- driven Gov't du jour to use as IT sees fit and at IT's discretion.

It serves no real quantifiable purpose and is in no-one's best and better interests, Neither First Nations,...nor 10th Generation Candians..nor future Canadian citizens.

It is simply a piece of legal-political mind -candy, and I doubt the vast majority of Canadians have even read it. In my view, its simply a loaded gun that is available for the discretion of WHOMEVER achieves power.., which de facto implies and concludes it is not in the true Gov'ts (ie = Us) best interests.

BTW what the hell are you talking about re background...on the table...etc. I am not First Nation and am First Generation...so???? If its wasn't for the fact that all citizens will inevitably contribute to pay FN compensation, there is no even remotely defineable indictment on our family...Our family was probably more dirt poor than the First Nations at the time and got absolute ZERO assistance, even had to pay for English lessons so they were then allowed to go to Public school...but of course Alci...knowing you...you'll twist that around...right?

Still find your views rather bizarre. Settlements imply finality...not payments and compensation in perpetuity, regardless of one's background.

Smith is deceased, but I am sure he would have been more than happy to expand his views...but you Alci are just building a rather shallow and subjective hate-on for someone like Smith who is submitting a possible solution and which may have been one that actually lead to a fair and equitable resolution.

For all you know the "one- time payment" you claim Smith suggested may have actually been very generous and hence very acceptable to the First Nations who may have willingly signed on . Maybe the whole thing is actually being UNDERmined by Lawyers fear of a lost cash cow ....or petty Gov't Indian Affairs bureaucrats who fear job losses.

Smith was a Gov't insider...were or are you Alci?

Arar case had all sorts of compensation numbers flying around...I heard he was up to asking $40 Million....maybe he could have gotten it...maybe not..its called compromise , settle and move on.

How many First Nations members have died since Smith made his proposal...and saw nothing...this is otherwise just a perpetual tennis game.

Believe it or not, there are many other issues out there as well, ie child poverty, homelessness..... yet some take disproportional amount of time and then others start to simmer....

Otherwise, given your History lectures and NON solutions....Time to build that Time Machine,... Alci...you are living in the past...so you may as well move there.

sorry maestro - I completely disagree

Your method of discourse: constantly shifting the subject matter and bringing in extraneous nonsense that has nothing whatever to do with what we've been discussing, is just painfully obtuse and a complete waste of my time.

I happen to know several people who worked closely with Mel Smith when he worked for the provincial government and I trust their judgment, and Smith's own compromised words, far more than your fevered imaginings.

Settlements based on treaties can imply finality - but even that is not certain. If you take the time to look at the Tsawwassen Treaty now under consideration by that First Nation, you'll realize that the benefits of the treaty process may well become alienated from the native peoples they are meant to benefit in a perfectly legal way over time.

The Ni’sga treaty was quite another matter.

I'm not interested in giving anyone history lectures. Adults need to learn for themselves. The fact you're unwilling to do so is none of my affair. I'm perfectly sanguine about the prospect of ignoring you completely.

Go for it. Ignorance is frequently its own best reward.

have another drink, Alcy...

Alci,

you sound like a card-carrying Cupe member/UVIC Teacher's Assistant. wake up and smell the coffee. no one cares about your views except you and perhaps the other pony-tailed bolsheviks at the Sub Pub. Get a job.

Ted Tweak

Not that I care what you do or don't think

Self employed professional.

One 4 month stint in a union job as a summer student some years ago. Other than that no connections to any labour group or political party.

Never touch the stuff by the way - it clouds one's thinking.

The fact you don't care about my views is hardly a surprise. I'd be disappointed if you did.

Oh, no ponytail either.

Sorry to disappoint you.

Alci:

Alci:

Smith's views simply provided a platform for an expanded discussion...I am not bowing down to the altar of Mel...which you obviously can't see.

FYI Alci: I have (i) requested and (ii)recieved from the appropriate BC Gov't department as much information on the Tsawassen deal as is probably out there.

NOTHING is life is certain Alci....however its best to attempt something resembling it. Didn't Chretien once make a comment about holding ones nose and VOTE ?

A point is being reached where those the most affected will be the last to gain, if at all...ie this issue moves into a new generation of First Nations members who become detached from the injustices their forefathers suffered....

The First Nations deal ie Tsawassen Treaty is the Gov'ts offer to the Tsawassen Band..correct..and must be ratified by the Band..correct...? (Thought there is apparently a 10 year interim period at the start). It's no different than OUR leaders negotiating on our behalf.

If the Tsawassen Band feels screwed later, whose fault is that?

The First Nations are smart, savvy and likley have Lawyers to advise them. Otherwise....They and their leadership would take credit or blame ...correct ???...but that is legal and simply the way it is...and indications are they will accept it.

Whats more to discuss?...I'm certainly not the one playing games and I am not being obtuse and shifting...it's a huge topic seeking a solution. Maybe this is test case and used as a template for others. Other bands are not obligated to sign exact same one, are they ?

Remember , this all started with your pattern of hair -splitting in this case re:" anecdotes",and Woody bringing the Mel Smith in via the Charter discussion.

Also in your past post you used the word " Chinaman "..naughty naughty...and then some other typical stereotypes....seems to be your modus- operandi..lets use lots of stereotypes in discussions. Yep!!!

ADVICE: Be more polite next time, you were a guest in that discussion between Woody and me....or we'll have to call the cyber- bouncer.

you're advising ME to be polite.

I don't think so maestro. Look back over what you wrote and its tone. And start at the beginning - not halfway through the discourse.

And, if you and woody want to whisper sweet nothings in each other's ears I don't think Tyee is the place to do it.

As for the rest of what you say concerning the Tsawwassen treaty I'm afraid the synchronicity of events that conjoin in this, along with my personal experience of this government, make me far less sanguine about its intentions than you are. I think you'll find, if you scratch a little deeper in all this that there are strong hints of the BC Rail, Delta Port, Tsawwassen terminals matters inherent in the deal and that the alienated ALR lands which are part of the treaty settlement will be fee simple land which may, in the not too distant future, become an asset - not of the First Nations people involved - but of the commercial interests (and close friends of the Premier) who are involved in dealings behind the scenes. That’s the whole connection to the Mel Smith coda that you haven’t seemed to grasp.

The same thing is happening with certain former BC Hydro water rights leases contiguous with native lands in treaty negotiation in several other locations in the province.
I don't trust the self-described CEO of this government and I think the Native people should be very suspicious of him too. This is a one-man corporation, not an exercise in democracy. You may have noticed that one of the 3 people on the recently appointed commission to look into MLA salaries and pensions (which Campbell earlier said - you may remember - no government of his would EVER support) also comes from the same establishment law firm where Geoff Plant was a partner until he became AG and where Bill Berardino practiced too. I may be wrong, but I think it may also be the same firm that represented BC Hydro and/or Alcan in the recent hearings before the BC Utilities Commission.

These people are all way too cozy for anyone with any real experience in the way things have been happening inside government in this province since 2001 to accept without a semi-trailer load of salt.

Touche maestro

Touche maestro, I think I seen old Alky sulking around a corner licking his nuts. Library said to me on Friday, they will have my Mel Smith book this Friday.

Alky you stated you’re a Self employed professional. To which I must say, Prostitutes are self employed professionals too.

I think you'll find - maestro

That my initial remarks were for Ron Erwin and Elliot. Check it out.

Just one more example from our neighbours to the south

From behind subscription at tomorrow's NYTimes:

Destrehan, La.

The term “time warp” could have been coined for this rural town of 11,000 residents that sits beside, and just a little below, the Mississippi River. A remnant of the sugar-plantation era, the region’s racially troubled past is always here, seldom spoken about but inescapable, like the murk in the air of a perpetually stalled weather front.

The Harry Hurst Middle School is on the site of the old Destrehan High School, which was the scene of violent protests during the integration period of the 1970s. Local residents have tried to blot out the murder case that made Destrehan High notorious three decades ago, but there’s a big problem with that collective effort to forget. The black teenager who was railroaded into prison (and almost into the electric chair) for the murder of a white student in 1974 is still in prison all these many years later. He’s middle-aged now, still suffering through a life sentence without any chance for parole in the notorious state penitentiary at Angola.

There is no longer any doubt that the case against the teenager, Gary Tyler, was a travesty. A federal appeals court ruled unequivocally that he did not receive a fair trial. The Louisiana Board of Pardons issued rulings on three occasions that would have allowed Mr. Tyler to be freed.

But this is the South and Mr. Tyler was a black person convicted of killing a white. It didn’t matter that the case was built on bogus evidence and coerced witnesses, or that the trial was, in the words of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, “fundamentally unfair.” Mr. Tyler was never given a new trial and the pardon board recommendations were rejected by two governors.

(Lurking in the background as the case unfolded was David Duke, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan who was very active politically in Louisiana and always ready to inject his poison into the public issues of the day. If you drive around Destrehan and nearby communities today you will still see some of the old blue-and-white campaign signs for Duke.)

Mr. Tyler, a sophomore at Destrehan High, was on a bus filled with black students that was attacked on Oct. 7, 1974, by a white mob enraged over school integration. A shot was fired and a 13-year-old white boy standing outside the bus collapsed, mortally wounded. Mr. Tyler was arrested on a charge of disturbing the peace after he talked back to a sheriff’s deputy.

Although the bus and its passengers were searched and no weapon was found, Mr. Tyler was taken into custody, savagely beaten and accused of committing the murder. A gun was “found” during a subsequent search of the bus and witnesses were rounded up to testify against Mr. Tyler. It turned out that the gun (which has since disappeared) had been stolen from a firing range used by officers of the sheriff’s department. All of the witnesses who fingered Mr. Tyler would eventually recant, saying they had been terrorized into testifying falsely by the authorities.

Mr. Tyler was represented at trial by a white sole practitioner who had never handled a murder case, much less a death penalty case. He kept his meetings with his client to a minimum and would later complain about the money he was paid.

The outcome was predictable. Mr. Tyler was convicted and sentenced to die in the electric chair by an all-white jury. At 17, he was the youngest prisoner on death row in the country. He almost certainly would have been executed if the U.S. Supreme Court had not ruled the Louisiana death penalty unconstitutional.

The Fifth Circuit ruling in 1981 said that an improper charge to the jury had denied Mr. Tyler the presumption of innocence at his trial. “It is folly,” the court said, “to argue that the erroneous charge did not affect the central determination of guilt or innocence.”

What was folly was any expectation that Mr. Tyler would be treated fairly at any point. Despite the appeals court ruling, he was denied a new trial on a technicality.

Now consider this, because it will tell you all you need to know about racial justice in the South. A 19-year-old black man named Richard Dunn was shotgunned to death as he was heading home from a benefit dance in support of Mr. Tyler at Southern University in New Orleans in 1976. A white man, Anthony Mart, was arrested and convicted of shooting Mr. Dunn from a passing car.

Gary Tyler’s current attorney, Mary Howell, ruefully explained what happened to Mr. Mart for the cold-blooded killing of a black stranger: He was sent to prison for life but was pardoned and freed after serving about 10 years.

Nice place, the United States!

Sorry to have to say this,

Sorry to have to say this, Alcibiades, but a very large part of the effectiveness of the Ron Erwin school of thought (yeah, I know that's an oxymoron) is the seeming inability of Lefties to closely exanmine any issue which appeals to their notions of moral superiority. This leaves them wide open to criticism in which only they cannot find any validity.

The portrayal as a racist of Mel Smith, whose book I bought and read, is deliberate. Doing so is required if one is to retain his/her Politically Correct credentials. This type of reaction guarantees Smith's perspective receives no public acceptance or discussion, since few wish to be identified with racism.

The virtual suppression of contrary information by this means has ensured that only information which supports the "facts" you folks portray regarding our treatment of Canadian aboriginals gains currency. This method is evidenced by your summary dismissal of Maestro's posts:

There is lots of information which runs fully contrary to modern interpretations of past and present FN history, some of which even finds its way to the CBC, but which is quickly buried by the plethora of feel-good propaganda. The Residential School issue is such a one.

And so we find the same thing arises re any discussion of Israeli motivations which are not supportive of them, as being overtly or covertly anti-semitic. And this in turn leads us right back to those freedoms which, theoretically at least, are supposed to be guaranteed in the Charter, but as we find out, are guaranteed only to those with deep pockets.

"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance", and I would suggest to both you and the Ron Erwin crowd, Alcibiades, that you can't have it both ways.

Alci:

Is this issue not simply based on so called Treaties (agreements) as opposed to a war involving a conquered peoples.. " ie winner take all " .....which was the historical norm via War elsewhere in the world ?

It seemed that the "powers -that- be" of the day simply didn't want to engage in a War of " Our Guns versus your Bow and Arrow/Spear ".

I read a while back an article that stated that the original plan in Canada was for First Nations to be deemed as having the same status as new immigrants via the politics and bureaucracy and their mechanisms at the time. It appeared this would be a smoother and more efficient way to integrate the First Nations into society ie equal citizens . In other words, Reservations were apparently not part of the original plan .

Unfortunately it appears ,for various reasons, this integration model had either been bypassed or ignored and a segregation one resulted instead. I think it's been a bloody mess ever since.

If it was a MESS to start , all they can do is try to make it AS LESS MESSY as possible at the finish. As I alluded too...the irony is that the First Nation members who suffered most in the past , and should benefit first, are gone or will be gone soon, ...but at the other end of the compensation dynamic/equation,..those of us who had no say in the injustices will also ultimately pay for the " Sins of our Forefathers" in the foreseeable future.

Regardless...Our leadership has failed us ALL (ie First Nation and Non First Nations citizens) .... and likely will continue to fail us ALL.

Me3

Touche'...well said !!!,...and effectively you took the words right out of my mouth. I was thinking much the same and waiting for the proper time to perhaps post something similar.

My God,..if we went back in history to even begin to attempt to " right " every " wrong " ( I am tempted to put in something re: the "Left" at this juncture point LOL ) I think society would stagnate, regress and in fact more wars would result. History shows us Wars etc. are the potholes in the road to Peace and a civilized society. This, of course does not at all endorse what has happened in history, especially the bad portions of history.

History is simply full of issues and conflicts.., rightly or wrongly...." to the Victor goes the spoils" and also the "right" to "write" history.

Look at Ed/Fiat Lux's journey...Ed has always moved forward...he's not going backwards and seeking compensation for being shafted and settling old scores . Now he writes ABOUT it.....not necessarily " rights "(ie tries to correct) it.

As you state, via the Truth VS. the Propoganda, things are so complicated we , the General Public rarely ever sees the scratches on the surface. Often the powers that be simply morph the issue/matter along another path and are supported by the useful -idiots and bleeding hearts and all...which dilutes and deflects the issue, and makes it worse or delays justice.

To be continued....

Feel good propaganda

Me3
What you say here would be a fair critique if it were true.

However, I don't think it is. I'm more than willing to engage anyone in reasoned debate about this or any other issue, but, unless both parties to the debate have actually read and understood the material which describes and characterizes the sides in this debate there can be no starting point in such a discourse.

In so far as Ron Erwin is concerned, I'll simply suggest you've characterized his input accurately and move on to other commentators.

Maestro started his contribution to our discussion with this statement - "an inequality is starting to evolve."

An Inequality is STARTING to evolve!

We know what that means don't we? And it's at the centre of Mel Smith's thesis too - those damn natives may me getting a leg up here and they've gotta be stopped.

That's the revisionism here. Just as the attitude that native cultures in the Americas were nothing more than the latest wave of a succession of 'immigrants' who were pushed aside by more 'immigrants' from Western Europe.

Well, I don't think so. And I don't think it's up to me to be gentle with that kind of revisionism. Any more than I think it’s fair ball to pretend that Mel Smith cared a fig about the plight of the native peoples of this province. He was part, for a good period of time, of a regime (under the Socreds) that stalled the negotiations with the Ni’sga for, wait for it, 100 years. Spare me.

I have read much of this stuff, the forensic anthropology and the cultural arguments and I don't think they hold water. But, even if they do, culturally and anthropologically, that is a question of First Nations history and it's our 'history' as a decent and humane place that I'm concerned about. If our standard of living has to take a significant hit to enable the native peoples of this country to attain a level of economic well being that is comparable with our own - so be it.

But, in truth, what bothers me most about current tendencies in this province is the distinct feeling that the province is dealing from the bottom of the deck in the current set of treaty negotiations. This is a regime that lied baldly about its intentions relative to BC Rail; a regime that studiously avoided answering any legitimate questions in the legislature about what political advisers were doing selling influence. These people cannot be trusted and if my goading a few readers here into opening their eyes and learning more about the real state of native affairs in this country is what it takes then so be it.

I'd rather they did a little research on their own so that we could discuss chapter and verse of course, but for me, what I'm doing is the price of freedom and my own peace of mind.

Having a third world country within our midst is long past funny. The last time Ron Erwin said anything about native affairs in this province he ended his little speech with the wish that he could get a status card. Give me a break!

Alci:

Re Your conspiracy theories of Campbell et al...suffice it to say there exist a " 6 DEGREES OF SEPARATION (or Less )THEORY ", I am sure an undeniably intelligent person like you has heard about it.

My God, man.... how naive do you think the rest of us are...?

Like a Sci-Fi movie...quasi- tentacles and connections spread E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E, both the Good and the Bad.

You are telling me that any/all politicians of ALL stripes didn't "network" build up a network of associations and support??? LOL !!!! That is LIFE !!!!

I personally know an elected official, and I asked them why they bother with a party affiliation. They said it allows them to focus on the elections, so they themselves don't waste time fundraising, which they would have to do as an independent candidate if they didn't have some sort of umbrella group to take care of that.

I wouldn't be surprised if there are connections with Ex politicians ie Geoff Plant as you posted above. So? Welcome to the real world...coincidence or otherwise.

Perhaps the same Law Firm has the best legal minds for the given case,..but they are still also legal professionals who work within the Law . Are we into the "Guilt by Association"..."Tar all by the same brush..." Law firms tend to have M-A-N-Y associates do they not?

Simply a Red Herring...matches the bleeding Heart.

You seem to continually miss the point....and my points of reference. My pragmatism is not anywhere near connecting with you karma's dogma...or dogma's karma. I will maintain my points of reference, yours I find are becoming more like stereotypes and old ideology etc. and trying to change the past by trying to go back to it. Good Luck!!!

I think you are simply treading water and basing your stand on " They got F*CKED !!! ".

EXCUSE ME Alci,....but you, as a student or professor of History,.... Please show me ANY group in the world that hasn't got screwed ? History and civilization is simply an ever evolving state of flux continuum. Compare a World map 10 years ago vs now.

Are you telling me that all BC First Nations co-existed peacefully and never were at war amongst themselves?
Re Tsawassen band, a fellow I know (who tld me as a child he and friends found native remains in the Tsawassen cliff-sides ) said the reason the Tsawassen band is so small is that the Musqueam and U.S. tribes often invaded them...given their locale . (This is also a hint as to formal boundaries to Land Claims ie where are they REALLY!)

Regardless: Why is it Alci, the LEFT -OF -CENTER has been the worst failure for the First Nations ...whether it be the Federal LIEberals or the Provincial NDP when IN POWER as Go'vt? If they were consistent with their "in- Opposition" concerns...they HAD the chance ...why didn't they ???

Maybe there-in lies your answer to the eternal question.

Alci:

Re Your conspiracy theories of Campbell et al...suffice it to say there exist a " 6 DEGREES OF SEPARATION (or Less )THEORY ", I am sure an undeniably intelligent person like you has heard about it.

My God, man.... how naive do you think the rest of us are...?

Like a Sci-Fi movie...quasi- tentacles and connections spread E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E, both the Good and the Bad.

You are telling me that any/all politicians of ALL stripes didn't "network" build up a network of associations and support??? LOL !!!! That is LIFE !!!!

I personally know an elected official, and I asked them why they bother with a party affiliation. They said it allows them to focus on the elections, so they themselves don't waste time fundraising, which they would have to do as an independent candidate if they didn't have some sort of umbrella group to take care of that.

I wouldn't be surprised if there are connections with Ex politicians ie Geoff Plant as you posted above. So? Welcome to the real world...coincidence or otherwise.

Perhaps the same Law Firm has the best legal minds for the given case,..but they are still also legal professionals who work within the Law . Are we into the "Guilt by Association"..."Tar all by the same brush..." Law firms tend to have M-A-N-Y associates do they not?

Simply a Red Herring...matches the bleeding Heart.

You seem to continually miss the point....and my points of reference. My pragmatism is not anywhere near connecting with you karma's dogma...or dogma's karma. I will maintain my points of reference, yours I find are becoming more like stereotypes and old ideology etc. and trying to change the past by trying to go back to it. Good Luck!!!

I think you are simply treading water and basing your stand on " They got F*CKED !!! ".

EXCUSE ME Alci,....but you, as a student or professor of History,.... Please show me ANY group in the world that hasn't got screwed ? History and civilization is simply an ever evolving state of flux continuum. Compare a World map 10 years ago vs now.

Are you telling me that all BC First Nations co-existed peacefully and never were at war amongst themselves?
Re Tsawassen band, a fellow I know (who tld me as a child he and friends found native remains in the Tsawassen cliff-sides ) said the reason the Tsawassen band is so small is that the Musqueam and U.S. tribes often invaded them...given their locale . (This is also a hint as to formal boundaries to Land Claims ie where are they REALLY!)

Regardless: Why is it Alci, the LEFT -OF -CENTER has been the worst failure for the First Nations ...whether it be the Federal LIEberals or the Provincial NDP when IN POWER as Go'vt? If they were consistent with their "in- Opposition" concerns...they HAD the chance ...why didn't they ???

Maybe there-in lies your answer to the eternal question.

Sorry....

Sorry for the double posting of my comment ....

The posting function took a while...looked like it froze...and I hadn't experienced it before.

You're still not dealing with reality

I think you're trying but you just don't have the facts. Everything isn't reducible to a meaningless blather of right and left.

That post was nothing but a string of meaningless platitudes. Go do the research - read up on the history and the issues - explore Mel Smith and the Socred Government's role in stonewalling the Ni'sga for a century. Look at the record of the genocide practiced against native people in THEIR home since 1492.

Consider the source of the revisionist ethnography, which dismisses the native peoples of this continent - who were much more numerous than the residents of Western Europe at the time of Ferdinand and Isabella - as nothing more than a wave of itinerant immigrants to be pushed aside or exterminated.

Understand the social conditions and the lasting influence of cultural genocide and residential schools and then come back and we'll talk. I'm tired of responding to disconnected words that wouldn't get an F if I were marking them.

I'm sorry maestro, I'm sick and tired, and it’s a waste of time. You can't even handle the Caps lock key.

Alci:Don't go away Mad...(as a hatter???)

Alci:

Why don't you go checks some stats as to the First Nations and Aboriginal groups in Canada as a percentage of the OVERALL Canadian population? ...if you haven't already.

Many of the stats available are quite vague...and include those with backgrounds ie First Nations Ancestry...which likely refers to part First Nations, but not 100% First Nations blood.

What are THOSE implications especially for Status and Non - Status types???

Your past comments are a combination of amusing and predictable, which fortunately TRUMP the scary ...

Alci quote:

"If our own standard of living has to take a significant hit to enable the native peoples of this country to attain a level of economic well being that is comparable to our own -so be it. "

Well Alci... at least we now KNOW where you stand...after all this. "Significant hit " eh ???

This sort of Alci Logic (???) should imply that perhaps, in the spirit of equality... all the rest of us Non First Nations should ALSO perhaps obtain/gain the same existing benefits the First Nations currently enjoy. I can think of quite a few...and perhaps even some FN Bands I'd like to join.

There also seems to be this delusion by some that the FN's have gotten absolutely NOTHING ...any evidence of that?

Typical ideology and dogmatism which would put any fairness and any possible settlement even further back .
You first Alci...you sign over all that is Alci's .

PS : Oh well a least I can give you credit for having the cajones to say what I suspected all along re your " if I, Alci, was Premier or Prime Minister..."

Back at you maestro

Which aboriginal demographic were you lusting after, maestro?

Let me make a few suggestions:
...one-third of all Aboriginal children under the age of 15 in Census families lived in a lone-parent family, twice the rate within the general population. The rate was even higher in urban areas. About 46% of Aboriginal children under 15 in Census families who lived in a census metropolitan area were in a lone-parent family;

...Life expectancy for registered Indians at birth is increasing and will continue to increase. Between 1975 and 2015, the life expectancy of registered Indians at birth is expected to increase by approximately 14 years for both sexes. Life expectancy for Registered Indians at birth has been steadily increasing since 1975 when it was 59 years for men and 66 years for women, to 67 and 74 respectively in 1990. By 2015, life expectancy is projected to increase to 73 years for men and to 80 years for women. However, a gap of approximately 6.4 years remains between the Registered Indian and Canadian populations in 1995. The mortality rate among Registered Indians decreased from 5.9 to 5.3 per thousand between 1985 and 1994. Between 1988 and 1996, injury and poisoning were the leading causes of death among Registered Indians. The category includes motor vehicle accidents, suicide and drowning.

...Suicide is approximately three times more common among Aboriginal people than non Aboriginal people. It is also five to six times more prevalent among Aboriginal youth than non Aboriginal youth. In First Nations communities, suicide is more prevalent among the young and usually results from feelings of hopelessness and despair

...Aboriginal people come into conflict with the law disproportionately to their representation in the general population. While representing 2.7 per cent of Canada's population, self-identified Aboriginal people represent approximately 17 per cent of all admissions to federal institutions.
Adult Aboriginal people are incarcerated more than six times the national rate. In Saskatchewan, the adult Aboriginal incarceration rate is over 1,600 per 100,000, compared to 48 per 100,000 for adult non-Aboriginals. The number of Aboriginal offenders is expected to rise dramatically over the next decade due to the high rate of the Aboriginal youth population. Furthermore, according to data from the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics Homicide Survey, approximately fifteen per cent of all homicides victims in a given year were Aboriginal.

Still envious?

I haven't even started, by the way - those are just few statistics selected more or less at random from the Demographic Overview Of Aboriginal Peoples in Canada
And Aboriginal Offenders in Federal Corrections - 1999 - Aboriginal Issues Branch CSC

Historical Revisionism.

The difficulty with arguing with people like yourself, Alcibiades, is that you always dismiss anything that that doesn't support your bleeding as "racist" in intent.

You accuse me of historical revisionism, but as I recall, the current rewriting. revising, and reinterpretation of historical accounts, as is commonly done by aboriginal advocates, is justified by noting that since "history is written by the victors" all recieved records of those times are deliberately untrue and racist. This is supposedly buttressed by wrongly insisting that our culture was racist to the core.

This in turn is supposedly "proven" through the use of a type of cultural relativism in which all the favourable reinterpretations are directed towards aboriginals and all the unfavourable ones towards "Europeans".
This insult upon reason is further compounded by ascribing to pre-contact aboriginals modern values re various human freedoms about which they had no knowledge, and then "blaming" our forefathers for not employing modern knowledge about which they had no knowledge either.

The simple facts are, Alcibiades, that NO culture - past or present - has tried as hard to smooth the way into integration as has ours, and certainly NO culture has spent such enormous sums of money as have we in doing so.

Beyond question the largest part of the difficulties contemporary Canadian aboriginals face today is NOT any lack of money to correct the ills you write of (and which are very real), but rather the difficulty they face in adjusting their cultural traditions to ours. Two obvious ones out of the many are the use of Capital, and the use of Democracy.

Discussion of root problems such as these is crippled by the the insistence of people such as yourself that the sole blame for FN problems rests with the "Dominent Socirty".

Well, first of all

Me3
If you took my somewhat dismissive attitude toward maestro (or, heaven forbid, Ron Erwin) as being the only way I'm prepared to argue this case then you didn't read my post to you very carefully.

Now, I'm perfectly prepared to debate the historical record with you and I have no doubt that in the end I won't have much difficulty prevailing since the evidence of deliberate genocide relative to the native peoples of the new world is so clear as to make Hitler's actions relative to the Jews look like child's play.

However, since you start out from the point of view that the solution to the native problem here in Canada is, how did you put it? "...the difficulty they face in adjusting their cultural traditions to ours" - it seems to me that your charge of cultural relativism in these matters is more than a little self-serving and not far from being more typical of your own attitude than mine. I talked

As for that other statement of yours - that "NO culture - past or present - has tried as hard to smooth the way into integration as has ours, and certainly NO culture has spent such enormous sums of money as have we in doing so."

If that's the case, and I sincerely doubt that it is relative to the size of the economy Canada currently generates on the bones of the people whose land we've taken, the money has - in the main - been wasted.

I'd suggest we like to believe that Pollyannaish tripe about ourselves – we see it all the time in the media ...but my native friends would, I have no hesitation, say it's just another example of trying to make ourselves 'feel' better about the creepy sensation we’d otherwise have to acknowledge about hoe uncomfortable we frequently are in our own skins.

errata

second word of last line is 'how' not hoe as it currently appears. My apologies.

alcibiades

If that is supposed to be a refutation of what I wrote, then I have to echo Maestro's complaint that trying to illuminate a subject through a discussion with you is an effort in futility. Thus, I'll note only one of the several absurdities in the above post, namely that we were bent upon "Genocide"

There IS one case of genocide we know of in CANADA, and that concerned the Beothuks. This was not a policy which was officially endorsed, but rather one the settlers of Newfoundland themselves pursued. I defy you to show any evidence that either the British or the French authorities attempted or even entertained any intent of doing so.

What the Spanish or the Yanks did was completely different from out treatment of aboriginals, and it is assinine to lay blame for their actions upon our forebears.

There was a reason US Indians called the Canadian border the "Medicine Line"

Alci:

If you wish to stretch the bow and bring into the discussion anecdotal examples at the periphery of the radar screen...I guess that's your right and perhaps there is "some truth" in what you say.

If a First Nations band or the Gov't , or both wish to have the Band exist in very isolated areas , the problems they suffer are not much different than others in the same isolated areas ie Alcoholism , drug abuse etc.

However, the eternal question is : IS it in the FN groups OVERALL best interests to maintain the old traditions, and even more to the point, is it simply them as pawns for the Band's (i) internal and (ii) external vested interests ?

Our family rented accomodations to a First Nation party and child,( of the Sto' Lo Band if I recall), a single mother at the time, and she was working on her Masters degree. A smart savvy great all- around person, and I don't think she is the exception. She confided in us a rather abusive home life as a child... but she was a pleasure and an inspiration . I also grew up with children of part First Nations , who lived a middle class life no different than the rest of us.

The negative cycle is broken with the first step forward, not backward and re-living the past..... it applies to each and every one of us...we are all equal in that sense as well as many others.

As I keep saying ad - nauseum..... it is the leadership/s that often fails them , both THEIRS and OURS...and in a relative sense our own Gov'ts effectively keep most of us Canadians on a quasi - Reservation, if one really stops to think about it.

Its effectively a big chess game with pawns, on BOTH sides.

Me3

Unfortunately, Me3, you appear to want to respond to something I did not say. Like maestro, you need to read much more carefully.

The phrase I used was "the evidence of deliberate genocide relative to the native peoples of the new world". I was not addressing the record of 'Canada' which is, in its own right, bad enough, but the whole post-Columbian record in North America, including, of course, the Beothuks.

As for my use of the world ‘deliberate’, the test for genocide, recently affirmed in international legal circles, has to do with ‘results’ far more than intention.
Genocide and marginalization, however, occurs in all kinds of ways that are neither direct or overt, and I'll put Canada's soiled reputation relative to First Nations in the dock anytime.

As I said, you are as subject to the Pollyannaish 'image' we've constructed for ourselves as most average Canadians seem to be. Of course, that's not surprising given the absolute irresponsibility of both our media and our public education relative to this subject.

I can give you, by the way, plenty of examples – both pre, and post, Confederation.

Cultural traditions

Alci:

Well, perhaps in this dialogue you may have actually provided some valuable food for thought in your discussion of Me3's points.

If any Non- First Nations groups decide to forensically determine their ethnic backgrounds...should we make Canada a truly Multi Cultural Canada made up of numerous Reservations? We'll have the Irish Reservation, the Scottish Reservation...the East Indian Reservation...English Reservation...Italian Reservation....etc. etc.

Old family photos from Europe show my ancestors living in a small farming town, one show an old Ford Model T being pushed out of the mud. Apparently we lived their 100's of years. I didn't see any indications of power and running water.

However, do you seriously think I or anyone in my family wants to go back to the old ways prior to the 20th century?

My children have a variety of friends of various backgrounds . Many of them are East Indian,and even one generation removed they have quickly adapted to Western culture...ie no turbans, but mostly western clothes etc. body jewelry etc.

As I noted earlier, every year I drive through First Nations reservations... have been since the 1970's...one can see year after year they are moving F-O-R-W-A-R-D , and not backward , into longhouses and teepees.

The more I see,and in my view, I think the younger generations of First Nations are tired of their style of governance...BOTH internally and via the FEDS,...and want to become part of the 21st Century...no different than my ancestors, and also many others and their ancestors.

It's often embarrassing to watch this charade- like game being played ....and ESPECIALLY B-O-T-H sides being played.

Again....Move Forward !

Missing IN action vs. "Missing INaction"

What seems to be missed here is:

---- WHAT was THE Offense/s....

------WHAT is the reasonable compensation...

------and WHO Pays?

Example: Germany lost the war, and paid reparations did it not ? That was based on many things, was it not ?

In a legal sense...the Statute of Limitations would be invoked if this was a Non First Nations case...correct?

However, if Treaties were signed ie the paperwork exists...why is this such a complicated matter?

In addition, if not mistaken....the Courts have allowed such things as Oral history, as many First Nations didn't have legal documents as part of their culture.

In fact,the only thing I personally recall re a physical historical FN border was a relative (when they lived in central BC) mentioning apparently some ancient marking by one FN band on a rock in central BC area ( Skeena? )which basically told all other First nations to KEEP OUT.

What is a Land Claim is settled with FN Band "X" , then years later excavations reveal FN Band "Y" was there much earlier ?

Borders are fluid, boundaries are fluid, people are transient yet we stumble along like blind drunks in attempting to settle something that inherently is UN -quantifiable and UN settle-able.

It is clear Govt's are fearful of the majority of Canadians who are not FN....the potential tax consequences of CASH AS THE COMMODITY FOR COMPENSATION are huge...and will likley result in mass public revolt. LAND is , apparently, THE Commodity for compensation.

However, some exceptions expose this , ie the BC legislative buildings built on FN Land...$30 million in CASH $$$ compensation from the Gov't???

We seem to be using White Man's laws, yet an inconsistent application of the very same White Man's laws. No wonder its a mess, especially when politics and politicians, bureaucrats and lawyers et al get involved.

Sorry maestro

You're still having trouble with the Caps key. I'm a busy man. Do a little more research and then we'll talk. You and Me3 are still stuck on concepts like the 'dominant' culture and 'white man's laws'.

It indicates an attitude of mind.

Free, self confident and unembarrassed people don't talk that way about their neighbours. And they don't try to whitewash the past either.

Before we can move forward it's necessary to understand where we are and how we got here. This requires a degree of honesty and clear-headedness that you don't seem to have achieved. When you stop dealing slogans and extraneous syntax from that endless deck of cards you're so proud of then we can have a real discussion.

Still no better than an F.

Sorry.

alcibiades

It's a total wasre of time Maestro. Too much mythology has been promoted and accepted as "fact". Too many otherwise well-meaning people have bought into the guilt trip Alci so glibly parrots, such as how we now owe Canadian FNs for what the Spanish did to the Aztecs. Says Alcibiades :

Some people could profit from a course in Logic.

Where did I mention either Aztecs or Spaniards to you?

As a matter of fact, you're the one who brought up the Spaniards Me3. I made some casual remarks to realisticman about potatoes, lima beans and tomatoes.

I don't think I'm parroting anyone. And since you appear to be more interested in insults than actually defending your point of view I won’t even bother with a snide response to whatever it is you call logic.

I can't help it if you think that Canadian history began on July 1 1867. It started long before that, but, even if I restricted my remarks about native/white relationships to the post-Confederation era you wouldn't have a leg to stand on, in my view. We are not the wonderful generous kind people you seem to think we are. Despite spending all those millions you seem to think qualify us as the righteous of the earth.

Continue believing that our relationships with First Nations are so much better than those of our American cousins; forget that we sprang from the same roots and inherited two centuries of exploitation before 1776 if you like. Ignore the fact that the British, and the French before them, were perfectly capable of making promises and then ignoring them for generations before and after the American Revolution. Pretend that there are no jurisdictional and governance power sharing relationships in New Mexico today that are the envy of native peoples in this country. Imagine that Aboriginals in this country are not so heavily represented in all our prisons. It's all so very logical.

And it's perfectly fine with me. And that business about the protection of the 'medicine line' and the redcoats; well you might want to consider spending a little time looking into the last years of Sitting Bull's miserable life - after the Battle of the Little Bighorn - and after the Redcoats starved him into returning to the welcome embrace of the blue coats on the other side of that famous medicine line. Or you might want to check the actual documents of the 1891 census in the District of Assiniboia if you want to learn about the ‘status’ of the native peoples in the prairies at that time.

Not so much to be proud of...and not very logical either, considering we're supposed to be such nice people.

As far as continuing this any longer, I'm not interested. You and maestro are apparently more into personal attacks than actual discussion anyway.

alcibiades

You simply don't know your history, Alci. The British were the first of the colonisers to treaty with Native peoples, and for the most part, the only ones. In fact, it was the stated intent of British monarchs, such as by George the First (?) and Queen Victoria upon which is laid the basis of contemporary aboriginal challenges in our Courts.

When the now USA was under the thumb of the British, they made fair treaties with FNs, giving them large tracts of land. Because the British insisted the treaties be lived up to, this hugely irritated the US colonists, and it is a little known fact that it was one of the main issues which prompted their War of Independance.

Immediately upon winning this war, the Americans began the "Indian Wars" designed to drive FNs off their lands and on to small reservations, in order to make way for Westward expansionism.

It's over 40 years now, Alci, that I first read John Colliers Indians of The Americas, the first book to illustrate to the public the shameful treatment meted out to US FNs, which included genocide.

Since then I've been intensely interested in the history of those times, and you can be quite certain that I've been very interested in how Canada has treated the original inhabitants of our land. There is very little I haven't read - pro and con - re those and subsequent times, including the ethical issues arising from them.

You and your guilt-tripping friends have the ear of the public for now - and hence the favour of the politicians - but you can rest assured the cracks in your BS arguments are beginning to show.

40 years is a long time

Moreover, history, not to mention historiography itself, has come a long way since then. I'm sorry, but if Collier is your sole source of information I'm afraid you need to update your reading quite a bit.

Sitting Bull relied upon the promises and undertakings of the great white mother when he and his braves fled across the medicine line...but the great white mother was no where to be found when he and his braves, starving and ill, crawled back across that same border into the waiting arms of the US Army.

And you might want to try and actually 'discuss' something without calling your interlocutor names. If you're actually interested in learning something a little more current and a lot less propagandistic I could have offered some suggested reading.

If I wrote anything about how wonderfully the US has treated its native peoples in a it must have been in invisible script.

It's easy to feel good about yourself when you don't even take the trouble to try to understand what I'm actually saying.

As for political purposes, I'm afraid that's an agenda of yours and not mine.

I mistook you for a thoughtful, educated, reasonably intelligent person.

I won't make the same mistake again.

I think my friend Bill Wilson may well have been right all along.

By the way, John Colliers’ book doesn’t even make the bibliography of the first three texts I just pulled down from my library shelves.

errata

This:

should have read:
"If I wrote anything about how wonderfully the US has treated its native peoples it must have been in invisible script."

One small point of clarification:

I made one reference to current United States practices in one State in terms of jurisdictional sharing with native governance. How that might imply I am an apologist for the appalling, historical record of the USA relative to its native citizens is a question I'd suggest you have to answer.

Alci:

Whatever, Alci...whatever...

Actually..... a Newspaper YESTERDAY had an article by a politician about Land Claims and has most certainly filled in the blanks of what is going on re: a specific case.

It is both fascinating forensic account of what is going on in the backrooms...yet I am also not surprised. Suffice it to say...it is very cobbled together with nothing that assures me it is a valid case nor above board. It is, in my view, simply expeditious and quickie law at any and all costs...bad !

Also, Alci, my reference was neutral re White Mans' laws, but regardless, what OTHER laws will settle Land Claims?

What is actually THE First Nations concept of Land, Land stewardship and Land ownership, if any, and for each individial FN Band ?

We settle any/all issues according to the "here and now" ...I don't see the FN dragging this issue into the "Aboriginal based law courts" ...instead I see the FN Bands using Lawyers and following a process the rest of us would generally access in similar situations ie "the Law -of -the- Land" .

In my opinion, and based on my own due diligence on it, this FN settlement issue and the current manner in which it is being dealt with is a mess in the making, regardless of the overall issue.

Better maestro - keep at it

Just a little more due diligence and reading and maybe you'll start to understand. Even the language we use has a tendency to marginalize. Real negotiations between two nations are something very different from what's been going on in the current round of BC treaty tables.

And I fear the results could be far more accurately described by another label too. Something our Yankee cousins are true experts at; a time-honoured but seldom honourable practice called horse trading. Frequently, when the trading is over, the 'winning' party finds out the horse is lame.

I have a strong suspicion that, despite the good will of the many dedicated and real 'professionals' who are involved in this process, that ceo fellow behind the big cabinet table has a number of business cards under the sweatband of his fedora...You might want to look at the after-tax ‘cost’ of the purchase of BCRail by a bunch of that same ceo’s good friends.

I'd like to revisit these 'settlements' - if they go ahead - some 5 - 10 years down the road and see how much actual progress has been made. And how much ALR land has been alienated from agriculture and into commercial and industrial use.

And of course, I should have added the following:

Only when I see that the social, cultural, psychic and health outcomes of the people who thought they owned this land start to approach those of the people who pretend they own it will I start to cheer. So far, no cause for celebration.

I do appreciate the fact that you've taken your finger off the Caps key though.

negotiation

Can we start with a cool look at what, exactly, is being negotiated with First Nations on Vancouver Island and in British Columbia.

THEY are not negotiating with us for the right to hold onto some few small pieces of our land. WE are negotiating with THEM for the right to say we own this place.

My first nations cousins at no time agreed to give up their homeland. What they agreed to do was let a pack of seemingly homeless people they considered to be refugees take up residence on their traditional territory.

I am not First Nations. My dad was born here not long after his mom got off the boat from Scotland. My mom was three when her parents brought her here from England. I have ties by marriage, by adoption, by extended family, and through my grandchildren who are registered status first nations.

My grandparents did not come to this country as starry-eyed adventurers or heroic explorers, they came as economic refugees in search of work and a better life than they could have expected to have in "the old country". They got jobs in the coal mines around Nanaimo, bought a bit of land from the government, built homes, raised families.

The land the government sold to them did not in fact belong to the government, it was never ceded by the First Nations people, and the government really should be taken to court for selling something that did not belong to them.

My grand daughters maternal family goes back at least twelve thousand years on the west coast of this Island. In spite of Residential school, in spite of beatings, in spite of rape, sexual abuse, disease, dysfunction, alcohol, drugs and death they still know the boundaries of their families' traditional territory and they still know the original place names of the prominent features of their traditional territory. They have not sold one pebble of it to the government or anybody else, they have not ceded one scrap of it to the Crown, the Queen, the Federals or the Provincials. It is still their traditional family territory and they make sure their kids know about it, it's history, and why it is important to them.

About a year and a half ago I saw a very small notice in the Campbell River paper saying the Regional district would be giving third reading to a request for a wind farm to be put ... on my grandkids traditional territory. I phoned my daughter in law, she phoned her band office, they phoned the members of the band council, the Regional district was notified and the request to lease the land for a wind farm was denied. It wasn't denied on a whim. It was denied because of solid provable legal reasons. It doesn't belong to the Regional District, it belongs to my grand girls family.

Period. Just flat out frakkin' period!

Nobody had bothered to notify anyone in the tribe, the band, the band council or the Vancouver Island council of tribal chiefs.

It was just assumed that of course the regional district could give permission to a corporation to use land which belonged to other people.

Because we have become used to looking at the entire land claims and land use question from the wrong point of view.

We have been carefully taught and conditioned to believe that we are the landowners and the First Nations are a ragtag band of pain in the ass upstart welfare bums who want something for nothing and spend their lives with their hands outstretched for charity.

Every tree that was cut, milled, sold in this province was theirs and they got not one cent of royalty. Huge fortunes were made, most of them by foreigners and the First Nations got frak all. Every fish caught was their fish, people grew rich selling fish but the First Nations got nothing. Enormous profit was dug and heaved out of the land which was theirs and they got not one red cent. They were jammed onto what was then considered to be useless land and guess what, it's just about the only land on the coast which hasn't been ravaged by industry and so now we want those last few acres, too. Nancy Greene Raines, our Olympic Miss Wonderful skipped and danced through a maze of regulations which were supposed to deal ONLY with mining claims and wound up building a top flight ski resort on land which should still belong to the First Nations people, land which was out and out swiped from them.

The federal law said a kid had to be seven years old before it was sent to Residential School. I know a guy who was scooped when he was two. He didn't see his family again until he was an adult. Need I add he's a mess?

Don't give me the Horatio Alger poor boy makes good story about parents who came here as DP's after the war and now look how well you've all done. I call bullshit. They came with educations, they came with the right colour skin which allowed them to buy land First Nations weren't allowed to buy, they got to hold down jobs which wouldn't have hired a "siwash", they became citizens and could vote, which was denied native people. You got to live with your parents, you weren't taken at gunpoint, held hostage, beaten, raped, terrorized and driven to the very brink of mental instability so that when you were old enough you were educated and could get a job and..they couldn't.

I have a gorgeous grand daughter who will be six years old on Valentines Day. She loves kindergarten, she loves subtraction and is doing grade two subtraction. She speaks only English. Her grandparents did not teach their language to their kids so they cant' teach it to my grandgirls. Why? Because if a kid in residential school spoke their own language they were beaten and if that didn't teach them not to speak their language the religious fanatics who ran the schools would shove a safety pin through the kids tongue.

Make you feel proud of how we treated those kids? How about making them kneel on marbles while reciting the rosary? How much of that shite can a little person take before she snaps forever?

Your immigrant grandparents, like mine, came here to escape persecution. And did not realize how the original people were being persecuted.

And still are.

And if you continue in your woeful ignorance to deny full justice to my grandgirls then I feel very sorry for you and you should be ashamed of your sorry self.

Until land claims are properly and ethically negotiated we are all just a pack of squatters in someone else's home.

Alci's epiphany

Well Alci;

I am glad you came to the realization that whatever happen on the FN settlement front...that there will be all sorts of alliances with (drum roll)....Private sector interests.

No differnt than say if I found the mother lode on my property....gee, I highly doubt I would be remotely able to create a $500 Million capital investment out of the blue...I would by necessity seek partnerships and alliances.

It is quite clear the settlement commodity is not only LAND, it is cheap land .....and also inherently the cheapest land ....which is ALR Land.

The magic wand of Gov't created the ALR... another one can UNcreate/UNfreeze it...wow!

Now, do the FN's wish to farm this land...that is their right , correct...??? and is not the land in the "ALR state" as close to the original (ie UNDEVELOPED )land the FN claim as there own as -is -possible ?.

I haven't seen any due -diligence indications the FN's are even remotely interested in this Agri-option..as most deal are structured for some Insta -ALR exclusion and RE-development.

If it is excluded...to maximize the NON ALR potential ASAP.... will require partners willing to co-invest...Gov't seems to not want to be a willing partner, other than Land and ALR removal ...that thus leaves the Private Sector.

Very simple...correct?

( I guess you STIL haven't found that court case eh...Alci...????)

Finally....Thank God for the FN's that the NDP didn't get the FN's co-partnered into the Fast Ferries venture...eh?

Ms Cameron:

If you have had a chance to calm down..we can engage in a rationale discussion without any remote inferences of anti -FN, racism etc.

BTW...by the time my family DP's came here the so-called FN land had already had Crown Grants (I have a copy of the basic land subdivisions AND the names attached)which had been bought and sold over 100 years before our family even set foot here ,and I can assure you most of the Crown Grant names over 150 years ago are 99.9 % Anglo - Saxon Names.

(Unless you are simply Alci's ranting relative)..... Where do you even know about my families background?...most of then never got past elementary school and were in the fields working.

You may be well versed on what is a local FN claim...but they are all based on a case by case basis.

My God...things like FN own the fish...what...are you even remotely familiar with say salmon migration...we could get into a multi-cultural trans-national claim.

Other than that its emotional rants by some parties such as yourself that simply create another "Two solitudes" in BC and the rest of the country.

You have a borderline bigoted view and where you extrapolate your inferences and insinuations of what I am saying and where I am coming from on what is a very delicate matter , and why is beyond me.

Blame the Queen , blame British Imperialism, blame the WASP society et al, but don't you DARE blame me...nor my family.

Please feel free if you have such a remorseful conscience to hand over all you own you also feel is owed to FN groups ...its the least you could do, and pave the way by example, correct ?

I wish your lovely grandchild well, and my best wishes for her future. However, I hope you don't somehow influence and rub off on her the same poison and vehemence you direct at me. I too, have two lovely nieces with First Nations blood,one of whom is my god-daughter.

I've read and heard quite a few rants in my life, but you Ms. Cameron , are worthy of some place in the Top "negative" 10.

Ann Cameron, Thank you

That post is the most heartfelt and cogent summary of what's wrong with most people's analysis of Native/White affairs in this province and country that I've read for a good long time.

No rant there Ann. Just a lot of honesty and no b s.

Maestro's not used to fresh air...but he knows his family couldn't be responsible for anything bad.

You think you get a pass because you're not from a WASP family? ‘Find someone else to take responsibility – I’m a good guy! Spare me.’

What a fine sense of entitlement. You're the internet equivalent of a telemarketer, no matter how I try I can't get you to stop making the same call. No one's buying.

You're as much a part of the responsibility for this outrage as any other Canadian maestro, it isn't a question of blame - it's a matter of taking responsibility and being accountable.

In addition, not being afraid of the truth.

Thanks again Ann.

Best thing on the Tyee for months.

G West

Nice one G West

No sense listening/reading /responding to yer ever increasing nonsense = none - sense.

May as well blame us all for Pickton, Afghanistan, et al

You are losing it...and your insinuation is as slimy a cheap shot as Ms. Cameron's at least Alci has a modicum of more class . I say that For The Record, not that it means much otherwise.

What are YOU doing G West,
I repeat G West what are YOU doing...

....the noose simply needs to be slackened a bit,in the mass societal indictment , the more the merrier. Probably thou feel thine heart is all healed up with hollow words and typical intellectualizing of issues which thou somehow perceives as Pro- activeness and works towards a solution...

"W" is right...and we'll leave it at that.

G West , Ms. Cameron and

G West , Ms. Cameron and Alci..

FOR THE RECORD....Using your brand of logic, we should include you ALL on the list for the Post Nuremburg trials on Holocaust, USSR and Red China execution of millions of dissidents...ethnic cleansing the world over....you get the drift....

Wasting time

Forget it, Maestro. These people do not rely on logic, so all you can do is scratch their guilt itch, so they can feel good in bleeding some more.

Me3. maestro

Both Alcibiades and Ann Cameron have posted actual information and reasoned argument.

All you two guys do is bark. You're the ones who've lost it. Guilt does make some people crazy I guess.

I don't have time for people who can't read and won't think and who believe that every question is all about them.

We are talking about North America and Native people and Colonialism and unfulfilled promises and non-agreements: Is that too difficult for you to understand.

No one is going to take away your land before you can get it out of the ALR and make a fortune maestro. Relax.

And Me3, Canadians are still pretty nice people, on balance. They'll be a lot more comfortable in their skins when they deal with the native peoples of the north end of this continent fairly and equitably, so you can take it easy too.

Me3

Me3

I know...

If it wasn't so pathetic, it would be amusing.

A long as someone rants illogically through a bleeding cardiac muscle...they are allowed to drink the " G West, Annie get her shotgun, and Alci " Kool aid bathwater. No thanks...

Somewhat confused if they are simply sh!te disturbers that also attend cock fights ... or the embodied stereotype we were all warned about.

G West...Annie et al....sounds like a bunch of guilty WASP's, as per usual, feels the sins of THEIR forefathers should be put on everyones else's societal VISA , M/C .

Hypocritical Moochers...

So you don't consider yourself a 'complete' Canadian?

Come on maestro, are you really that full of insecurity and prejudice and hate - all the WASPS fault eh? You couldn't hold up a logical argument if you had the Coles notes to study for a month before the exam.

Nice stuff. I couldn't have asked for a more thorough indictment of your own case.

Instead of actually talking about what might be done to address the wrongs all the immigrants to this land have inflicted on its rightful owners (remember you're the one who always thinks 'property rights' are such a great idea) both directly and indirectly, you decide that calling people names and laying on a pile of rude comments is a better course of action.

How old are you? There's nothing hypocritical about what Anne Cameron wrote, she was very clear and she entitled her piece negotiation. On the other hand, maybe you didn't you notice that?

Seems to me you and Me3 (now that's an ironic handle) are the moochers here.

Thank you. And did you notice I did that with no nasty words, no rudeness and no name calling. You really do have a lot to learn.

MY. my, my!

Didn't this one bring out all the bigots! The only saving grace was Ann Camereon, Alci and Ed.

Wow...disapointing, but truthful.

Did it ever bring out the bigots...man.

anne, thank you for this heartfelt post. I agree with every word, and have always felt the pains of these brave people. It explains so well the reasons for their suffering, and seems to clearly lay out what it takes for them to heal. Keep the Truth out there anne, as I hope many more people will too pick up the sword in opposition to this obvious injustice still going on against a peaceful people.

Excellent comments G. Remember this:

Old Colonialism: Kick 'em to the ground
New Colonialism: Why the hell won't they just get up?

So much talk about our rights, and so little consideration for the rights of these people…

Peace,

Bear

Thanks Bear, Thanks Anne

Peace!