Terrorism as Excuse

In the wake of two separate "terrorist" attacks on my country this past week, it's important I get my thoughts out.
The second "terrorist" attack, on Wednesday, was considerably more gaudy than the first despite identical death tolls; the prior incident has not received quite as much attention. Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent was run over and killed outside a federal building south of Montréal. Another victim has survived this attack; the killer was shot by police four kilometres away from the crime.

The next day, Cpl. Nathan Cirillo, a reservist from Hamilton, Ontario, was shot twice, point-blank, as he stood guard at the War Memorial in Ottawa: he died later in hospital. His assailant walked into the Centre Block of our Parliament buildings and opened fire, spraying as many as thirty bullets, wounding one parliamentary guard who reportedly tried to disarm him. Sargeant-At-Arms Kevin Vickers, whose duties had hitherto had been purely ceremonial, displayed the calm and poise of his prior career with the RCMP as he confronted the killer and shot him dead. No telling how many lives he saved.

Hi, rest of the civilized world. We were off in our own little bubble there, despite having been at war for thirteen years against the same menace the rest of you are fighting. Nobody ever seemed to consider that inflicting violence halfway around the world might ever inspire someone to commit acts of violence here, but hey, it happened. Now here we are, awake.

Or at least that's the narrative our government is seizing upon.

Stephen Harper, who insisted years ago that the Canadian government be renamed in his honour, has made the attempted curtailing of personal liberties a hallmark of his regime. (This, along with running up the largest deficit the country has ever seen and increasing the size of government, give lie to the idea that he represents "Conservative" values; but I digress). Anyone against grossly expanded police powers such as warrantless searches and online surveillance has, in the past, been branded a sympathizer of terrorists and pedophiles. His laws have time and again been rammed through Parliament--he can do that with a majority government--only to run up against the Supreme Court of Canada where they are found unconstitutional.
It's Harper's ultimate goal to gut the Constitution to prevent that outcome. Our Constitution was modernized largely by one Pierre Trudeau, a man Harper considers to be the embodiment of evil and whose son, incidentally, is to be the next Prime Minister of our country if you believe the polls.

I have another narrative. Two people were killed this week in tragic acts committed by insane individuals. In both cases the motivation was radical Islam; this is, contrary to all Harper's bleating, a red herring.  That's what my e-friend Catelli noted in an exceptional blog post the day after the Parliament attack.
If it wasn't radical Islam, it would have been something else. Hatred, once it gets strong enough, doesn't even need a justifying force. It just is, and it seeks violent expression. Islamism just happens to be a convenient vehicle for hatred right now. That's it; that's all.

I put "terrorist" in quotes above because the word is so malleable as to be almost meaningless. The Harper government (I'll oblige the man: it certainly isn't my Canadian government) considers you a terrorist if you oppose its views on environmental issues (such as it can be said to have any). Meanwhile, Justin Borque, who murdered three RCMP officers in Moncton this past June, is not considered a terrorist despite Moncton having been locked down in precisely the same way Ottawa just was (and for much longer, too).  No new laws were rushed into being after Borque went on his rampage; the ones we had were considered more than adequate. Borque may receive the harshest punishment the Canadian justice system can hand out: consecutive life sentence totally 75 years without possibility of parole. (Evidently the life expectancy in Canadian prisons is just 25 years, an oddity that really should be corrected).

"Terrorist" means whatever you want it to mean. In Harper's case it means "yay, we get shiny new powers". I will not suggest for one minute that the Canadian government had any hand in the attacks perpetrated this past week; I will not just suggest but outright assert that behind the scenes our government officials are ecstatic that their vindictive and authoritarian agenda can move forward now.

Don't let it move forward. Stephen Harper himself said that "Canada will not be intimidated" before launching furious legal salvos that reek of intimidation. Let's keep our heads here. It seems apropos to quote Ben Franklin:

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety