>> ^Shepppard:

1:12
Just left of center screen.
There's a cop that trips, loses the shield, and falls on their face.
That was totally fucking awesome.
But no, there really was next to no violence in this video. I don't know the whole story.. I don't know if these really were just non-violent protesters, or the ones who are going around burning police cars and wrecking buildings.
We've dropped the ball on this. By no means should we have bid on hosting G20 this year, especially after we just shelled out a lot of money for the Olympics.
Harper should've realized that people would be pissed about our tax money going to both things as it is, not to mention like $57,000 on an indoor lake 100 meters from a REAL lake. And now that this is happening, we don't even have the military here clearing the streets of the violent protesters, just rent-a-cops doing their best, and whatever police force the city can afford to send out.
While I disagree with disbanding a non-violent protest in this manner, at least nobody (except the cop who fell on their face) got hurt.


Canada shelled out 10 Million Dollars in Damages to Maher Arar, justly, I think they didn't have a reason to bid on jack shit for some time.

10 Million Dollars to right a wrong. G20 and jackboots are small fries compared to the shit the Allies get up to these days.

At least Ontario had the balls to pay out. The US didn't do jack shit, except deny the case its day in court.

Alas, my rant is beside the point of this video.

More to the point, though, do you think the Military should be clearing the street of protesters, violent or not? I don't know if Canada has a Posse Comitatus law but it is not the Military's Job to disperse angry citizens. The Military's job is to kill, which is exactly why the Posse Comitatus act exists. It puts soldiers in a very bad place, when they have to act on their own soil. I could argue the same point about Police Actions in sovereign nations, but I'd be arguing against years of Policy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act#Recent_legislative_events

Laws like good and evil are human constructs.

http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202462704567&High_Court_Refuses_to_Hear_Rendition_Case

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/11/03/arar

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2009/02/28/al_haramain

Take a good look around people. Your rights don't mean jack shit especially since the civil case against the United States government for the extraordinary rendition of one, Maher Arar. Glenn Greenwald did a piece on it. Something about the Judicial branch said they couldn't review anything the Executive Branch did because of National Security. Well fuck me if Checks and Balances went out the window.

the story of Maher arar is an immense tragedy.
thanks for posting this.
its good to see mr arar in good shape,and to hear,in his words, how this debacle unfolded.
anybody think secret renditions and torture are a good idea?
watch this to see what can happen to any of us.
what happened to mr arar is shameful...just shameful

Condoned torture of prisoners:
The evidence below shows that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Gonzales are guilty of violating "Federal Torture Act" Title 18 United States Code, Section 113C, the UN Torture Convention and the Geneva Convention by ordering and condoning the use of torture. Many prisoners have died as a result.

1. 1/25/02 - White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales wrote a memo advising the President of "the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act," a federal statute, for torturing prisoners. He advised Bush to invent a legal technicality --declaring detainees in the "war on terror" to be outside the Geneva Conventions --which, he said, "substantially reduces" the chance of prosecution. Gonzales was later promoted to US Attorney General. [Nation]
2. 2/7/02 - Bush took Gonzales' advice and signed an order declaring that members of Al Qaeda and the Taliban are not covered by the Geneva Convention. The memo requires that "detainees be treated humanely and, to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity, in a manner consistent with the principles of Geneva." While seeming to call for humane treatment, it is carefully worded to allow for violations of the Geneva Convention when necessary.
3. Bush moves prisoners to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and holds them for years without charges, trials, or access to lawyers. This is ruled illegal by a Federal Judge on Jan 31, 2005.
4. Bush sets up secret prisons run by the CIA in foreign countries to escape US laws against torture. Rice claims European countries supported this plan. [WashingtonPost] [CNN] [FindLaw]
5. 9/26/02 - Canadian Maher Arar was arrested at JFK airport and sent to secret prison in Syria for torture under "extraordinary rendition" program. He was released a year later without charges. He sued the US government but the suit was dismissed by a federal judge David Trager on 2/17/06 citing the need for secrecy. He wrote, "One need not have much imagination to contemplate the negative effect on our relations with Canada if discovery were to proceed in this case and were it to turn out that certain high Canadian officials had, despite public denials, acquiesced in Arar's removal to Syria." Thus the reason for the secrecy is not for national security but simply to avoid embarassing guilty parties in government. This sets a dangerous precedent that may allow Bush to kidnap and torture anyone he pleases. On 1/26/07 the Canadian government apologized and awarded Arar compensation. [Wikipedia]
6. Dec '02 - Alberto J. Mora, the general counsel of the United States Navy, tried to halt what he saw as a disastrous and unlawful policy of authorizing cruelty toward terror suspects. His 2004 memo details his unsuccessful struggle with the White House to stop the torture. [NewYorker]
7. 12/31/03 - German national Khaled al-Masri says he was abducted by the CIA arrested in Macedonia and flown to Afghanistan. He was then tortured for five months and released. CIA has admitted making a mistake in this case.
8. April 2004, photos of prisoners being tortured at Abu Ghraib prison make headlines around the world. Low ranking soldiers are convicted of torture charges, falling on their swords for the White House. [Wikipedia] [NewYorker]
9. 5/24/04 - Seymour Hersh releases article detailing how Rumsfeld's program encouraged torture. "President Bush was informed of the existence of the program, the former intelligence official said." [NewYorker]
10. October 2005, Senator McCain adds an amendment to a defense bill that would outlaw torture by the United States. Bush and Cheney fight this tooth and nail to block this amendment but eventually give in after the McCain amendment is weakened by the Graham-Levin amendment. When Bush signs the bill he adds a signing statement that basically says he can ignore the prohibition against torture under his powers as "unitary executive" and "Commander in Chief ".
11. 6/29/06 - Supreme Court rules in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld that the Geneva Convention applies to prisoners at Guantanamo.

peretz pt 2:

I believe that there is a far more common and realistic hypothetical out there in the wacky lawless (or "shock the conscience" standard) world of the Rumsfeld Archipelago. There is the recent case of Maher Arar.

This man was innocent. The Canadian intelligence was wrong and unreliable. He was tortured for little reason by a nation that supposedly embraced the Enlightenment long ago and supposedly hated Stalinism. And judging from what my colleagues have told me, there are many more people like him (cabdrivers, uneducated waterboys, people that rubbed Pakistanis the wrong way) than plotters like the evil bin Laden in the secret prisons and Guantanamo.

Of course, the other issue that attaches to your question is whether Congress really wants to make the United States the first civilized nation in modern times to specifically provide unbridled executive/monarchical discretion for what would properly and universally be seen as a transparent breach of the minimum, baseline standards for civilized treatment of prisoners established by Common Article 3. I hate the idea of removing the checks or oversight on any of the branches of the US Government, especially this venal and corrupt Executive Branch.