I know our American readers will be waiting for me to say something about the mid-terms, and I will. But the Rouleau Commission hearings continuing in Ottawa this week are important not just to Canadian readers but for all concerned with protecting the freedoms of speech, assembly, and peaceful protest.
This week the Commission is hearing evidence from the Freedom Convoy organizers, the people Canuck Prime Minister Just In Trudeau called "a tiny minority with unacceptable views." Agent 3, who has been watching the live stream, writes:
Have you had a chance to see any of the Rouleau Commission hearings? If you're just seeing clips on the news, you're missing a lot of fun, because the lickspittle media are cherry-picking the clips that make the truckers look bad and make the feds look justified in invoking the Emergencies Act.
But I've been watching them live, streaming online, and it's like a Saturday Night Live sketch.
E.g., the characterization of Diagolon as a dangerous right-wing conspiracy. It was actually a joke started by a couple of guys in Alberta, and the feds took it seriously. The crowd in the hearing hall actually laughed out loud, and Rouleau threatened to clear the room, as he has done several times now. Pretty soon what was supposed to be an open hearing is going to be closed. Already they've decided that the CSIS [the Canuck equivalent of the CIA. Ed.] spies can testify in camera, so we won't be able to see their incompetence.
Ed. has searched the Net and has come up with hours of video. Links will appear below. Here's one clip -- not one seen on the legacy TV network newscasts, featuring Tamara Lich, the little lady from Saskatchewan who was arrested, denied bail twice by Liberal judges and finally released on appeal, and is still under house arrest awaiting trial. I found her testimony very calm and rational, and yet moving.
I should have put "organizers" in quote marks. A thread common to the testimony of Ms Lich, James Bauder, Benjamin Dichter, Tom Marazzo, Chris Barber and the controversial Pat King, is that none of them knew more than two or three of the others and had divers motives for being involved in the Freedom Convoy.
There were a number of different groups and sub-groups, and no unifying command structure. No-one knew for sure what the others were doing or trying to do, the prime example of the disconnect being the so-called "Memorandum of Understanding" authored by James Bauder, which some of the leaders never saw and others regarded as "fake news".
Tamara Lich agreed with previous testimony that there were "power struggles" between groups involved in the Freedom Convoy, and felt like some were just looking for an opportunity for self-promotion, while others were more interested in getting their hands on some of the millions of dollars raised through GoFundMe and other sources. That was a problem for her as she was tasked with handling a lot of the money.
She said there were tensions between herself and Pat King, whom she described as “very controversial.” She confirmed she had a tense conversation with King about his involvement and that she’d both told him he should not come to Ottawa and to “check his ego” after he claimed he’d organized the convoy alone./
Ms Leach characterized the Ottawa protest as a "love fest" and said she had seen no evidence of the harassment and intimidation alleged by local residents, businesses and police. about harassment and intimidation. "I can’t say I ever witnessed any of that."
She described herself as "concerned" about Mr King’s controversial rhetoric. Some months before the Ottawa demonstration, he said in a video circulating on social media that Prime Minister Trudeau might "catch a bullet". He also spoke of a the Great Replacement conspiracy to reduce people of Anglo-Saxon descent to a minority. Said Ms Lich, "I was getting messages and phone calls from a lot of people that were concerned that he was involved."
Another convoy organizer, Benjamin Dichter, a former Conservative candidate who Ms Lich described as "a friend", testified that he was frustrated by the decision-making, or lack thereof. He complained about a deal that some convoy members struck with the City of Ottawa to move vehicles out of residential areas and onto Wellington Street, in front of Parliament Hill.
Mr Dichter said the deal was a bad idea and the people pushing it weren’t aligned with the protesters broader goals. "I think they were focused on ending the protests and getting everybody out of the city as quickly as possible," he said.
Dichter. And he accused Keith Wilson, a lawyer who had represented the convoy, as being "Pat King in a suit."
The commission also heard from James Bauder, a self-described "tirbal person" [like Pauxcahontas? Ed.], who came to Jesus not long ago and felt that God had led him to organize not just this convoy but a "Beat Hug" convoy which had staged a protest in Ottawa some months previous.
Mr Bauder was the publisher of the controversial "Memorandum of Understanding", which he wrote himself in spite of being unfamiliar with legal terminology, Canada's government structures or Constitution. The MoU called for the Senate and the Governor General to work with a "citizens' commission" which would take over from the government.
His proposal would have suspended all Covid-19 mandates and refunded any fines people had paid for breaching the Covid rules. Several other organizers testified that they didn't want anything to do with the memorandum. Mr Bauder said he stood by the document, but ultimately no one was willing to sign on. "It means nothing because nobody signed it. nobody entered into it."
The hearings continue this morning with cross-examination of Tamara Lich. If you want to see the drama [or farce? Ed.] play out, try the National Post website. So far they're the only one of Canuckistan's mainstream media to stream the hearings in real time. But be warned. You may find yourself behind a paywall.
Ed. has found a couple of full-length (hours and hours!) videos of previous sessions, viz.:
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