Aspirational Tyrant: Justin Trudeau Plays an Irresponsibly Dangerous Game Against "Trucker Protest."
Given that the trucker protest has been indisputably peaceful, what exactly about it concerns Trudeau that he felt the need to go this far?
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
Early yesterday, I wrote a Twitter thread talking about why the Regime is so threatened by the Canadian trucker protest. The reason isn’t complicated nor is it a big mystery, though it does require some unpacking which I tried to do here:
To elaborate some more, the way the Regime has responded to the truckers isn’t all that different from how they responded to the parents chewing out the school boards throughout 2021 into 2022. This, more than anything the Left does, threatens those in power because the left-wing protesters have the capacity to disrupt and destroy, but not much else. Truckers and parents, on the other hand, actually run our economy and society. In other words, they actually matter in a substantive way.
Imagine if a company’s most productive workers decided they were going to go on strike until the less productive workers, who got to do whatever they wanted despite their lack of production, were held to the same standard. The company leadership would be in a bind because a) They’ve been exposed as enabling bad behavior and b) The best workers who’ve been carrying the company on their backs have suddenly done the unthinkable – bring everything to a screeching halt.
That’s similar to the situation the Canadian government finds itself in. Now, I believe, at this point, the protesters are starting to do more harm than good. All things in life, if done in excess, reach a point of diminishing returns. Also, the state cannot afford to lose under any circumstances. The reason why, ultimately, most protests and rebellions burn themselves out is because the state doesn’t give in or outright crushes them. The Canadian government seems on the verge of doing the latter, but, even if they didn’t, all they’d have to do is wait them out, not give them what they want, and, eventually, the protesters would have to go back to their regular lives.
Unfortunately, the protesters are also being supported by people, mostly on social media, who are encouraging them to hold the line at all costs and turn this into a zero-sum, life-or-death struggle. I understand why they feel this way - after all, this is arguably the biggest strike they’ve delivered against the state, but, again, the law of diminishing returns is kicking in, because the government isn’t giving in.
The only thing forcing the government’s hand is the fact the protests, despite being peaceful, are having a real affect on daily life and the economy. It kind of makes you wonder who really holds the cards in all this, doesn’t it? This thread briefly explains the predicament the Canadian government finds itself in:
The thread is referring to Prime Minister Trudeau’s invocation of the Emergencies Act, described by the Canadian government as An Act to authorize the taking of special temporary measures to ensure safety and security during national emergencies and to amend other Acts in consequence thereof.
How does the Canadian government define “national emergency?”
National emergency
3 For the purposes of this Act, a national emergency is an urgent and critical situation of a temporary nature that
(a) seriously endangers the lives, health or safety of Canadians and is of such proportions or nature as to exceed the capacity or authority of a province to deal with it, or
(b) seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada
and that cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.
As is plain to see, the Emergencies Act is a deadly-serious policy that affords the government sweeping powers that are all but dictatorial. The Trudeau government’s invocation of the act is unprecedented - it has never been implemented before, even during that most world-changing of crises, the COVID-19 pandemic. The laws implemented during the invocation are utterly draconian and the type of policies you’d expect to see in a true national emergency, such as mass civil unrest (distinct from a mass protest) where the rule of law has broken down or a war:
Direction to render essential goods and services
7 (1) Any person must make available and render the
essential goods and services requested by the Minister of
Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, the Commis-
sioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police or a person
acting on their behalf for the removal, towing and storage
of any vehicle, equipment, structure or other object that is
part of a blockade.1…
Compliance — peace officer
10 (1) In the case of a failure to comply with these Regu-
lations, any peace officer may take the necessary measures
to ensure the compliance with these Regulations and with
any provincial or municipal laws and allow for the pros-
ecution for that failure to comply.
Perhaps most concerning to many observers is the following:
Duty to cease dealings
2 (1) Any entity set out in section 3 must, upon the com-
ing into force of this Order, cease
(a) dealing in any property, wherever situated, that is
owned, held or controlled, directly or indirectly, by a
designated person or by a person acting on behalf of or
at the direction of that designated person;
(b) facilitating any transaction related to a dealing
referred to in paragraph (a);
(c) making available any property, including funds or
virtual currency, to or for the benefit of a designated
person or to a person acting on behalf of or at the direc-
tion of a designated person; or
(d) providing any financial or related services to or for
the benefit of any designated person or acquire any
such services from or for the benefit of any such person
or entity.
This means that the government can now unilaterally freeze the financial assets of any protester or anyone donating to the protesters without warrant. Furthermore, the Emergency Act laws implemented for this crisis require financial institutions to proactively determine whether any of their account-holders are protest participants or engaging in providing financial aid. If so, the institutions are required to report this information immediately to the authorities.
Again, this is the sort of thing you’d expect to see in the wake of a 9/11-caliber catastrophe and, even then, such actions would be considered highly controversial. Given that the trucker protest has been indisputably peaceful, what exactly about it concerns Trudeau that he felt the need to go this far?
It’s an objective fact what Trudeau has done marks a major escalation of this crisis. The idea that a peaceful protest, even if disruptive to commerce and day-to-day living, “seriously endangers the lives, health or safety of Canadians,” “seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity,” or “cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law” is thoroughly unconvincing. Would Trudeau have said the same about a Black Lives Matter (BLM) protest of a similar size and scale? He already compared the trucker protest unfavorably with BLM protests earlier in the crisis and, during the mass rioting in 2020 following the death of George Floyd in police custody, effectively ruled out military intervention in restoring order. There is currently no indication Trudeau plans on involving the military in the current crisis, but the point is that Trudeau has wasted little time taking matters to the next level, setting the stage for a mobilization of tremendous resources against the protesters.
By climbing so high up the escalation ladder so suddenly, Trudeau is making it impossible for the protesters themselves to de-escalate the crisis, which is precisely how not to peacefully handle an impasse. It has, in fact, turned the stand-off into a zero-sum, life-and-death struggle for the protesters, not to mention there’s a personal dynamic to all this: the two sides have disliked each other from the start. Now they probably hate each other, again making it impossible for any de-escalation or reconciliation to occur.
To the protesters, Trudeau is a petty left-wing tyrant, a wannabe totalitarian who abuses notions of “safety” as a means of relentlessly pursuing an utopian agenda and sees Communist China as a country deserving of admiration:
To Trudeau, truckers are a bunch of deplorables who aren’t university-educated enough to know what’s good for them. As if though the stakes weren’t high enough, Trudeau’s apparently fragile ego has entered the mix. If the state cannot afford to lose this confrontation because its legitimacy is on the line, Trudeau cannot afford to lose because his political career and his sense of self-righteousness is at risk. But, one wrong move could result in the situation spiraling out of control.
Now, the reality is the nightmare scenario rarely occurs. I think, eventually, the protesters will decide they’ve sent a message (and have they!) and will walk away before things get really ugly. However, the Trudeau government isn’t making it easy. Emergency powers unseen in decades are suddenly at his disposal and they’ve even engaged in some legally questionable activity as part of this attempt to break the back of the protest.
There’s clearly no easy way out of this. Trudeau and the Canadian government have raised the stakes immeasurably and this is tantamount to a declaration of war. But going to war against your own countrymen, especially those who matter most to its survival and love their country to death, tends to invite something resembling a Thermidorian Reaction. History surely won’t judge Trudeau as a “cool” prime minister, but as something worse: a tyrant.
Max Remington writes about armed conflict and prepping. Follow him on Twitter at @AgentMax90.
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Basically, this means that private citizens and entities requested to render assistance, resources, or services to aid authorities in ending the protest is legally required to do so, though they’ll be compensated for their otherwise involuntary servitude.