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The Liberals in Canada have a history of being soft on terrorism.

During the 1960's and 1970's, they remote-controlled through the RCMP the FLQ "terrorist" group (which was heavily infiltrated by the RCMP) to put bombs here and there, and, most importantly, to kidnap a Québec minister (Pierre Laporte) days before he was to be indicted of influence peddling for the mob, thus sparing the newly-elected liberal government much embarrassment.

In addition, this proved a golden opportunity to declare martial law and suspend basic civil liberties, during which 400 political opponents of canada prime minister Trudeau were rounded-up and jailed without trial.

How about their mission, vision, and values?

The Mounties?

Nope. Our peacekeeping force is the Canadian Forces. The Mounties (RCMP) are our national police force, provincial police force, and municipal police forces all rolled into one package. Of course, big cities have their own police forces, and a few provinces do too, but the theory remains.

You can forward email scams to them at the West African Fraud Letter address. The RCMP webmaster said "This is now a general account for all scam letters."

Right now, no, it would not worry me. Let's pull out all the stops and get the bastards. In a time of disaster some rules get bent, and this is one of those times. I Canada we have something called the "War Measures Act" which essentially suspends all civil rights if put into effect, and it was once in the 60's in response to internal terrorism.

The War Measures Act was used in October 1970 in reponse to the FLQ kidnapping of a Quebec politian and a british diplomat. I was a young child living in Ottawa at the time and it was truly frightening. To this day is it debatable wether this was on over-reaction on Prime Minister Trudeau's part. It is a concession to terrorism to subject your citizens to this treatment. And you are correct, the precident that would be set is terrifying.

http://www.rcmp.ca/html/graphics/charge.jpg

sulli

Didn't a bunch of Canadian Indians (Iraquois? Mohawk?) stage a revolt with semi-automatic weapons a few years ago?

That was the Oka crisis in the early 1990's. The Quebec government allowed a golf course to be built on some land near Oka, Que. A group of Mohawk claimed the land was sacred ground (may have been a burial ground, it was a long time ago). Mohawk Warriors showed up in support, set up

BZAPP!!! Wrong answer.
The city of OKA allowed the construction of the golf course over the ancient burial ground; a blockade ensued for a few weeks, when the Sûreté du Québec (police) was called to dismantle it. In the ensuing mêlée, an officer was killed.

(By the way, Oka is the algonquin name; mohawks call it Kahnesatake. Once mohawks settled there, they gradually drove out the algonquins and hurons who lived there elsewhere).

The land in dispute around Oka is not, and never has been an indian reserve, as it is commonly assumed, and this explains the involvement of the Sûreté du Québec rather than the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (federal) normally used in case of indian revolts (such as the Kahnawake revolt in 1956 against the construction of the Saint-Lawrence Seaway - Oddly enough, the picture on the website is taken at Kahnawake; the bridge is the Mercier bridge, which was blockaded in 1990). As a matter of fact, the federal government department of indian affairs has been purposely been dragging it's feet in this matter, the more so because it helps tarnishing the image of Québec towards the world.

In Canada, indian affairs are a federal jurisdiction, so to better control them and use it against the french who want more control over their lifes. But in the OKA case, the land where mohawks have been living never had the status of reserve. In fact, that land was donated by a french religious (whose name escapes me) order to american mohawks that were fleeing the genocide perpetrated against the mohawk nation in upstate new-york, in the early 1800's, even though the mohawks/iroquois were the ennemies of the french (well, that was when they were useful to the english at war against the french - but when they were no longer useful, after the american Revolution, they were simply exterminated and driven out).

Other mohawks settled in Kahnawake , immediately south of Montréal (the site is worth visiting, being written in mohawk - see below).

barricades, and held a standoff. A second standoff took place on the Mercier Bridge. I believe those standoffs ended peacefully. Another standoff took place at the Ipperwash military base in Ontario; a group of natives claimed the land had been unlawfully taken from them. One native was shot and killed; there have been calls for an inquest into who gave the shooting order.

It is interesting to note that while in Québec, the weeks-long blockade had almost totally cut the road to some important suburbs of Montréal and thus inconvenienced untold thousands of commuters (to the point that an emergency commuter train service had to be implemented), not a single mohawk has been killed by police nor army, whilst a little band of indians in Ontario blocking a little backroad saw one of theirs shot dead by police after only a few days of obstruction. This clearly shows the inherent racism of the english and the high tolerance of the french. In fact, in Québec, 20% of the carceral population is indian, whilst in the rest of Canada, it is 80%.

As for Quebec, even the Quebecois have become sick of the separation mess. The government there has been trying to incite separtist feeling time and time again, but I don't think they're

There is no rush, it is inevitable; history clearly shows that a people's desire for sovereignty (it is not separation nor separatism, we've always been a separate nation) cannot be suppressed indefinitely.

going to pull it off anytime soon. Still, the Parti Quebecois (the ruling party) is pretty paranoid about English - ask a Canadian about the "tongue troopers" and Bill 101 sometime.

The purpose of bill 101 is to protect the existence of the french language in Québec against the onslaught of neighbouring english. The most visible effects have been the prohibition of english commercial signs, and the impossibility for immigrants to go to english schools.

The main idea there is to drive home the point that one cannot expect to live in Québec without knowing french.

Even though more than 80% of the population of Québec is french, immigrants have systematically assimilated themselves into the english community, since the immigration is a federal jurisdiction (the federal govenrment still does not inform immigrants that Québec is primarly french, and encourages them to speak english), and for the last quarter millenium (th e french first came to settle in 1604, thus beating the Mayf lower), the english have been labouring hard to make the french disappear from Canada (in 1760, at the time of the conquest, the french were 90% of the population; in 1867, at the time of the confederation, the french were 50% of the population; nowadays, the french are only 24% of the population). Ethnic cleansing in Canada has been quite successful: large segments of french population outside of Québec have been almost totally eliminated. In the 1880's, a whole french province, Manitoba, was forcibly repressed and turned into an english province. Ontario outlawed the teaching of french language in schools back in 1912. And, as recently as 1977, airlines pilots were susceptible to jail terms if they spoke french during the performance of their duties.

The expression "tongue troopers" is a bogeyman of the english media. The office de la langue française do not hire inspectors to report violations, but rather relies on the public to file complaints, which are then investigated by inspectors.

Another less known (and much less publicized, it would definitely shatter the negative image of Québec the federal government has consistently been trying to portray) effect of bill 101 is the protection it extends to native languages. This is why the Kahnawake website is in mohawk language: Québec has the highest proportion of native speaking their native language (over 80%) whereas in Canada, only the older generations speak the native languages, as the young have been mercilessly taught in schools that viciously suppressed any use of the native language.

Bill 101 is a very mild instrument whose purpose is to undo centuries of extremely harsh treatment.

There's some East-West tension; Alberta, Saskatchewan and parts of Manitoba and B.C. tend to be more conservative than the rest of the country. Nothing vicious; the last really ugly conflict was during the last Quebec referendum (of course).

Of course. This is the typical cluelessness that can be expected out of the english in Canada towards the french. And they wonder why the french want to go out...

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Here's my mirror

Anywho, apperently, in Canada, portscans and the type are not illegal. It isn't even illegal to *attempt* to break in... you haven't broken the law until you actually access the machine. The RCMP officer type I spoke with (who was quite accustomed to Linux - I was impressed) likened it to Girl Guides knocking on your door, which isn't illegal (I argued that if they started checking every door and window for days straight, it would be different, but that's another story entirely).

My point? Oh yes... in Canada, unlike other countries, it isn't illegal to portscan or pingflood. So, i guess, that would make the automatic response legal in Canadian airspace too. Just for anyone who is interested. I guess the attitude is that it is *impossible* for the law to go after every single attempt, and that being portscanned/pingflooded/etc. is just a risk you take going on the Internet, and it is up to the end user to set up the approperiate defenses (which was, incidently, what the ISP that hosts both me and my *active* attacker told me.)

I hope somebody gets something out of that. ;^)
-legolas

i've looked at love from both sides now. from win and lose, and still somehow...