Thursday, May 25, 2006

Hush Money

According to the Hamilton Spectator, the Ontario government is "preparing an assistance program for Caledonia businesses hit hard by the standoff with native protesters, including a blockade of roads and a blackout caused this week by a fire set in a transformer."

So now our spineless Dalton is emerging from his foxhole to buy silence from the outraged community. He reminds me of that wimpy president in "24". A group of Canadian citizens broke the law, but we, the taxpayers of Ontario, will have to foot the bill for the protesters' actions. There are two sets of law in Canada, and this particular minority clearly has more rights than the rest of us.

What I want to know is, where is that money coming from? The health budget? Infrastructure? The emergency slush fund?

Whether or not the land claims are legitimate is beside the point. As Sun columnist Christina Blizzard pointed out, "If a group of thugs at Jane and Finch, or in Rosedale, barricaded a public road, threw objects at passersby and set fires, they'd be cooling their heels in jail by now."

Mike Strobel points to the Maori tribunal as an example of a possible solution to avoid this type of anarchy in the first place.

But if the rule of law can so easily be ignored in Ontario, and the provincial government forces the taxpayers to pay restitution to the injured party, how is that in any way moral, democratic and just plain common sense?

I cannot wait until the next election.

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

My last entry before my vacation Joanne! I agree that there seems to be two sets of rules. One group should not have more rights than another, regardless of what the issue is. There are ways to go about getting "justice" for your cause without breaking the law and hurting innocent people. I fear that all this has done is made more division between the natives and the residents of the town of Caledonia. I think the government is plain and simply afaid of the natives. The rule should be for ALL- You break the law, you pay the price.

Anonymous said...

i meant afraid! didn't check it before I posted!

Joanne (True Blue) said...

lol! That's o.k. about the spelling, Kelly. You can be excused due to excitement. Safe trip and have a great time!

OMMAG said...

Indeed two sets of rules....and the provocateurs of the Native Groups understand how to exploit the situation.

Thanks to SPINELESS politicians like McSquinty this will go on and on.

Anonymous said...

the so called "natives" have won as usual; they will get their government bribes and even if every court decision says they are in the wrong, who in their right mind would ever buy one of those houses?

Joe Calgary said...

Don't forget, in the end the natives tried the Fed route. They always try the Fed route first. Their not stupid, and they know the Feds can trump any provincial laws.

Blame the right party here... Indian Affairs. They do nothing to deal with this land claim shit, and it's getting worse and worse and worse. It's the ineptitude of the Federal Government that has allowed the Caladonia situation to fester.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Joe C. - The Spectator artice says:

He (Harper) said the initial parcel of land involved in the dispute was not part of federal land claim negotiations.

"Obviously we've got negotiators in there now. It really is a provincial land use matter and a provincial law enforcement issue," Harper said.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

PGP - "and the provocateurs of the Native Groups understand how to exploit the situation."

Yup. Just like the 'young offenders'.

"McSquinty"! lol! Thanks. I'll add that to my list. Let's see now;
McSquinty, McWimpy, McLimpy...

Anonymous said...

Yes, the government is afraid of the natives, but they're even more afraid of being labelled "bigot" or "rascist" if the status quo is fiddled with one iota. We have a knife to our throats in this country if we dare try to change the aboriginal industry. And it most definitely should be changed. What have decades of cradle to grave handouts to natives created? Poverty, dependency and desperation. It ain't working, but no one dares fix it.

I grew up near an Indian reserve. I saw this first hand. Caledonia is only one example of this. I would say that there is a simmering resentment anywhere you have a reserve with various other non-native communities near it. You cannot have one set of laws for a certain race of people and another set for everyone else. It creates chaos.

Anonymous said...

And another thing. What were those early Canadian cowboys thinking when they signed all these treaties back in the day? Must have been a little too much whiskey up on Brokeback Mountain...

BTW, my fave is Dalton McWimpy. Good one!

OMMAG said...

Can't take credit for that moniker....I read it in a number of blogs and just picked it up.

I like the reference as it invokes a mental picture of Mr. McGoo blindly stumbling around and creating chaos for everyone around.

Zac said...

"Blame the right party here... Indian Affairs."

True JC, the key here was provincial restraint and federal activism.

Section 91 of the BNA Act, 1867:

...it is hereby declared that (notwithstanding anything in this Act) the exclusive Legislative Authority of the Parliament of Canada extends to all Matters coming within the Classes of Subjects next hereinafter enumerated; that is to say:

(24) Indians, and the lands reserved for the Indians.

This situation blurred the lines in some respects. On the one hand, this was a land claims issue and thus the responsibility of the federal government; on the other this was a public safety issue and thus the responsibility of the provincial government.

Because the system regarding land claims and the resulting public protests is not clear perhaps a parliamentary or senate committee should examine where both levels of government rest in cases like these.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

PGP - McSquinty makes me think of the "see no evil" monkey.

lol! Good one, Soccermom! I guess beads and booze looked like a fair trade back then.

Zac - Good suggestion. Tell Riley to add it to his list of policy initiatives.

Anonymous said...

Don't tell me....another Health care premium to pay for it.

Anonymous said...

At least nobody got shot. If you want to "blame" this provincial government for this outcome, you will have to blame the last one for Ipperwash.

Where does the money come from? The government prints the stuff, remember? Not too difficult to do that. Really difficult to un-shoot somebody.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

"Where does the money come from? The government prints the stuff, remember? "

L.S. - That was an attempt at humour, right?

Anonymous said...

The point is that money can be replaced, human life can't.The reason McWimpy, or whatever everone's calling him, has shown restraint is because Harris gave the province an example of how not to handle situations like these.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Yes, that's true, anon, but I think the whole Dudley George tragedy has paralyzed the premier from taking any kind of decisive action.

Anonymous said...

So McWimpy is paying for the damages they caused.

It ought to be paid out of Indian Affairs' budget, or maybe the money going to "solve" the residential school inmates' problems.

Maybe then that band of terrorists will understand something about consequences of their actions.

Anonymous said...

I think this one has already come up with something useful for the future. Seems to me the progress went into high gear as soon as the "non-native" people blockaded the blockade.

You could almost hear the "no fair" whining, while everyone else just chuckled. Even better, the power outage was probably supposed to add pressure on the "non-natives". It did add pressure, but it did so by causing more "non-natives" to attend their blockade, since there was nothing to do at home with no power.