By echoing Bush and Blair, Harper has signaled his intent to commit Canada to their war against a shadowy network of international terrorists intent of destroying us for no reason other than that we are free. This shadowy conspiracy does not exist. There is no chain of command. There is no headquarters. There is no organization whatsoever. All there is are small groups of extremists who exchange ideas, techniques and rhetoric through websites.
political cycles
Be ready for this sort of open mouthed denial from the left and segments of the paleo-right in Canada. These are folks stuck in the paradigm that war involves standing armies, manouver, chains of command and top down structure. The program has moved on.
Jihadi ideology in combination with the Islamo-fascist world view is more than sufficient to create the conditions of war without any of the traditional apparatus. By echoing Bush and Blair, Harper demonstrates that he gets it.
It is an early test and Harper has passed it with flying colours. And, I suspect, that the prospect of a twenty meter deep crater in downtown Toronto or at the Pickering nuclear station may convince even the most wide eyed Kumbaya singers that this is not about some kids out for a little wilding.
Or not. Political cycles is so desperate to cling to his illusion that there is not monster under the Canadian bed that he is willing to waste pixels analyzing rhetoric rather than face the reality.
Look forward to more of this sort of non-thought.
To get an appreciation of what is really happening go to the CounterTerrorism blog and start reading…
Written by jay on June 4th, 2006 with 3 comments.
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Thanks to some brilliant intelligence and police work downtown Toronto does not have an Oklahoma City x 3 sized hole in its middle. Several hundred, perhaps several thousand, Canadians are not dead.
We have dodged a huge bullet.
The security service has suggested that there are dozens if not hundreds of homegrown terrorists who they are tracking. They have suggested that CSIS simply does not have the resources necessary to track all of these people.
Meanwhile,
Anser Farooq, a lawyer who represents five of the accused, pointed at snipers on the roof of the courthouse and said: “This is ridiculous. They’ve got soldiers here with guns. This is going to completely change the atmosphere.
“I think (the police) cast their net far too wide,” he said, adding his clients are considering suing law enforcement agencies.”
the star
As the accuseds’ lawyer you would expect him to say that.
Less expected was this quote:
Around the same time, Karl Nickner of the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations issued a statement that he is confident “the justice system will accord these individuals transparency, due process and the presumption of innocence.”
“We stand behind our security forces and the Canadian government in their desire to protect Canada,” said the executive director. “As Canadian Muslims, we unequivocally condemn terrorism in all of its forms.”
the star
Now the question becomes how to deal with the rest of the potential terrorists in our midst.
A beginning to that is to recognize that this is not “homegrown” terrorism. Rather it is a Canadian offshot of a worldwide radical Islamist ideology which sees nothing at all wrong with the murder of innocents. Do all Muslims subscribe to that ideology. Of course not. But some do and that is where we must begin.
For the Toronto terrorists to have met, trained, planned and very nearly executed this thwarted attack implies a strength to the jihadi enterprise which will come as something of a surprise to Canadians deep in denial.
As a society it is time to take measured, but effective steps to reduce the threat.
The first of these is to look seriously at our immigrant screening procedures. the head of CSIS indicated taht they were unable to screen more than 10% of the immigrants from place like Pakistan known to harbour jihadis. OK, let’s work with that number. From Monday forrward do not let in anyone from any nation which habours jihadis until they have been throughly screened. If that reduces the number of immigrants from those countries, tough. Immigration to Canada is a priviledge not a right.
The second is to look seriously at the landed immigrants already here. Again, the status of landed immigrants is essentially probationary. While such immigrants are certainly entitled to transparency and due process of law, it behooves the government to fast track the examination of the status of potential terrorists.
And, yes, many innocent people will be called in for questioning, have their phones tapped, their internet usage watched. While I would hope this was done as gently as possible getting results before the amonia nitrate goes off is of greater importance than a touching concern for the civil rights of individuals in Canada on sufferance.
Third, it may be time to say good bye to the Muslim world as a source of immigrants for a few years.
Fourth, it is well past time to investigate the parallel schools and mosque linked organizations which may be sources of incitement in the Islamic community. Particular attention should be paid to the assorted, almost always immigrant, imams who act as leaders in the Canadian Muslim community.
Fifth, we should explicitly make incitement of terror a crime.
Finally, we need to ensure the co-operation of the vast, non-Islamist, non-terrorist Canadian Muslim community in the efforts to identify and target the jihadis. Everything from outreach to snitch lines to cash rewards should be offered for information leading to the arrest of the tiny minority of Muslims whose ideology permits the murder of innocents. The Muslim community knows which of its members are potential jihadis. It is time for them to cleanse their community and to protect themselves and all Canadians with hard, clear, factual information.
We have been very lucky. And our luck can hold if our fellow Canadians who have information are willing to share it.
The apprehension of this potential catastrophe is likely to be Canada’s last warning. This time there is every chance that there will not be a huge backlash against the hundreds of thousands of peaceful people who practice Islam. but that is because the bomb did not go off.
next time, especially if the bomb does go off, a harsh, unfair and possibly brutal backlash is more or less inevidable. Only the Muslim community itself has the means to prevent this. I only hope they rise to the real challenge of being Canadian.
Written by jay on June 4th, 2006 with 11 comments.
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Police have recovered three tonnes of ammonium nitrate fertilizer in the raids. Commissioner McDonell noted that this amount was three times the amount used by Timothy McVeigh to destroy the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995.
globe and mail
Our friends from the Religion of Peace seem to have adopted the motto, “Go Big or Go Home”. Greaat work on the part of CSIS and the RCMP may well have spared Canada our own 9/11.
We can only hope this serves as a reality check for all the delightful people who are convinced that there is no Islamist problem in Canada. There is. We have dodged a bullet. There are more rounds in the chamber.
Written by jay on June 4th, 2006 with 5 comments.
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In the category of “today’s good news,” we can report that Yale’s Senior Appointments Committee voted down the appointment of Juan Cole to the faculty yesterday, and it wasn’t even close. Cole will not be appointed to the Yale faculty.
powerline
Now the Professor can get on with what really matter like suggesting Christopher Hitchens was drunk when he wrote a piece suggesting Cole might be wrong in his Iranian apologetics. Not that this will stop the lefties from treating Cole as an expert on the Middle East when, in fact, his expertise has long given way to his agenda.
Written by jay on June 3rd, 2006 with no comments.
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First go to see the mirror of the amusing Youth for Volpe site. Then, as /. and a host of others point out, go read Stephen Taylor’s blog about the reason why the Canadian registrar, CIRA, pulled the original youthforvolpe.ca site.
Then ask yourself if you are ever going to register a .ca name again.
Outrageous is only the beginning.
Written by jay on June 3rd, 2006 with 1 comment.
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Oh joy! Two boys with a nasty stomach flu. “Mummy, I’ve pooped in my pants.” Up til four with our five year old’s, sometimes successful, runs for the porcelain altar. Ice runs and the sour scent of puke.
The boys will be well soon. And we’ll do laundry. Lots of laundry. And love them all the more.
Written by jay on June 1st, 2006 with no comments.
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