The Good Judge on Bail, Insite & Tasers

MAY TIME, BAIL TIME IN B.C.
May 14, 2008
OH to be in British Columbia in cherry-blossom May, a time of longer, warmer days and the joy of nature’s palette of colourful magnolias, rhododendrons and azaleas.
To the Dutch it was Blaumand, (blossoming month), and to the French: Floreal, (time of flowers). The Anglo-Saxons named it “thrimilce,” for it was a month when they could milk their cows three times a day. May was aptly named after Maia, the Roman goddess of growth and increase.
Yet May-time in 2008 is not about dancing around the Maypole with fresh flowers. It is about too many colourless lawyers and ersatz experts flannel-mouthing away in three separate matters of public importance.
· A never-ending horror of bail release followed by murder;
· Insite’s fate;
· a provincial inquiry into the tasering of Robert Dzieskanski.
Bail release and murder
On Sept. 4, 2007, in Oak Bay, a suburb of Victoria, Peter Lee murdered his wife and children and committed suicide.
In the months leading up to the murder, Lee had been released on a no-contact bail which he flagrantly breached when he took his wife for a drive and injured her by crashing into a power pole. That violence brought Lee’s bail into question. In a hearing to determine Lee’s status, crown counsel did not oppose this dangerous man being let loose again despite a police request he be detained to protect his wife.
Lee murdered his family on the day he was required to make his first appearance specified in the renewed bail.
There is an intense need to inform the public why this man was not detained, and what information and policy was relied upon by Crown counsel in deciding not to show cause for detention.
In a formal public inquest now taking place, coroner Jeff Dolan has been stymied by the attorney general’s minions. Although two supervisory Crown lawyers have been put before the coroner to explain policy concerning bail, the ministry has refused to produce the lawyers who actually made the decision not to seek detention.
Coroner Dolan ordered the pertinent counsel to appear and that triggered an adjournment of the inquest to have the issue decided by the Supreme Court of British Columbia on May 26; a date when a similar case of refusal by Crown lawyers to testify is scheduled to be heard.
The attorney general’s justice branch says that Crown lawyers are entitled to immunity from examination of their behind-closed-door machinations. It makes a grandiose claim of privilege analogous to that afforded the judiciary.
The status of a judge is made secure by judicial independence. That means finite tenure, a reasonable remuneration, and absolute privilege in terms of how their decisions are arrived at. It is mischief of the highest order to claim that civil servant prosecutors have a constitutional status approaching that of judges.
The coroner is right. He must compel decision-making Crown lawyers to testify, thereby assuring that nothing will be concealed from the public.
Where is the attorney general in all of this? You guessed it: he’s making speeches of concern. Maybe a thought from the distant past will get Wally Oppal into the world of action. “Woord is but wynd; leff word and tak the dede,” said John Lydgate (1370 – 1451) in his Secrees of old Philisoffres.
Oppal knows, and so do all lawyers in the criminal justice branch, that bail conditions imposed on wife beaters do not eliminate the likelihood of further violence. It is in the public record: release of maniacal men on bail brings with it the metronomic certainty of murder and mayhem.
Insite: propagandized success
We are being buffeted by a storm of propaganda concerning Insite and the impending decision of the federal government on whether Insite will be allowed to continue operating beyond June.
It is mainly driven by so-called health professionals, local politicians and epidemiologists who desperately want to continue their campaign to decriminalize illicit drugs and make addiction into a treatable illness. The cornerstone in this nonsense is the Insite shooting gallery: a scheme of enabling drug use that is falsely touted as the road to abstinence. It is a pernicious scheme that not even the Wizard of Oz would tolerate.
Insite is not a place for desperate addicts to begin withdrawal, it is a shooting gallery first and last. No matter how they record their experiment it remains a falsehood. There is no truth in the notion they spread that enabling the use of drugs in these sterile circumstances is somehow a first step in abstinence.
Provincial inquiry: – death of Dzieskanski – use of Tasers
After Robert Dzieskanski’s death following tasering, the provincial government was quick to appoint former judge Tom Braidwood to conduct an inquiry into police use of Tasers.
Yet the whole process is hamstrung by lack of jurisdiction over four members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who confronted a confused Dzieskanski, and chose to bring him under control by electrically stunning him with a Taser.
Come on Mr. Oppal, think back over the years to your work as a commissioner enquiring into policing in British Columbia, and your report in1994, Closing the Gap. Try and remember your absolute and crisp words stating that our leased force of Mounties, ostensibly our provincial police force, could not be made to comply with any of the provisions in our Police Act.
Be reminded of one of commissioner Braidwood’s first public comments: that his inquiry has no jurisdiction over the Mounties.
At the end of this still-born inquiry, the learned commissioner may see fit to advise you and the premier to re-constitute the British Columbia Provincial Police in order to fulfil British Columbia’s constitutional duty.
Mr. Oppal, it is your constitutional duty to bring order to policing in our province by having all police bound by the provisions of the Police Act.
Act now, or Dzieskanski-like deaths will happen again and again.

Contact Judicial Gadfly at wallace-gilby-craig@shaw.ca or by posting your comment on the Writer’s Corner of www.realjustice.ca

Bad Will Headline Hunting

The Nutty Mayor has sunk to a new low - even for him.

As thousands have died and many thousands are dying or dead trapped under fallen buildings in Sichuan province, China, this creep has tried to grab yet another headline by "announcing" that he is looking at building a new city hall because of earthquake concerns.

What a ghoul.

What dreadful bad taste.

Nutty has become infamous for blowing hot air about nothing and pretending that he is making some official "announcement," when he has, in fact, spoken to no one about anything substantive.

But get this and get it clear.

There are no plans afoot anywhere in city hall to build a new city hall. This is simply the mayor trying to grab attention. And it is sick.

To play on the misery and suffering of the people of China and their many friends and relatives here in Metro Vancouver, is detestable.

Why did the Sun even report this obscenity?

Can't anyone just tell this fool to be quiet?

Job App

I will be available in January 2009; I am willing to relocate.

RESUME

GEORGE W. BUSH
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20520

EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE:

Law Enforcement:
I was arrested in Kennebunkport, Maine, in 1976 for driving under the influence of alcohol. I pled guilty, paid a fine, and had my driver's license suspended for 30 days. My Texas driving record has been 'lost' and is not available.

Military:
I joined the Texas Air National Guard and went AWOL. I refused to take a drug test or answer any questions about my drug use. By joining the Texas Air National Guard, I was able to avoid combat duty in Vietnam.

College:
I graduated from Yale University with a low C average. I was a cheerleader.

PAST WORK EXPERIENCE

I ran for U.S. Congress and lost.

I began my career in the oil business in Midland Texas , in 1975. I bought an oil company, but couldn't find any oil in Texas. The company went bankrupt shortly after I sold all my stock.

I bought the Texas Rangers baseball team in a sweetheart deal that took land using taxpayer money.

With the help of my father and our friends in the oil industry (including Enron CEO Ken Lay), I was elected governor of Texas.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS GOVERNOR OF TEXAS

I changed Texas pollution laws to favor power and oil companies, making Texas the most polluted state in the Union. During my tenure, Houston replaced Los Angeles as the most smog-ridden city in America.

I cut taxes and bankrupted the Texas treasury to the tune of billions in borrowed money.

I set the record for the most executions by any governor in American history.

With the help of my brother, the governor of Florida , and my father's appointments to the Supreme Court, I became President of the United States, after losing by over 500,000 votes.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS PRESIDENT

I am the first President in U.S. history to enter office with a criminal record.

I invaded and occupied two countries at a continuing cost of over one billion dollars per week.

I spent the U.S. surplus and effectively bankrupted the U.S. Treasury.

I shattered the record for the largest annual deficit in U.S. history.

I set an economic record for most private bankruptcies filed in any 12-month period.

I set the all time record for most foreclosures in a 12-month period.

I set the all-time record for the biggest drop in the history of the U.S. stock market. In my first year in office, over 2 million Americans lost their jobs and that trend continues.

I'm proud that the members of my cabinet are the richest of any administration in U.S. history. My 'poorest millionaire,' Condoleezza Rice, has a Chevron oil tanker named after her.

I set the record for most campaign fund-raising trips by a U.S. President.

I am the all-time U.S. and world record -holder for receiving the most corporate campaign donations.

My largest lifetime campaign contributor, and one of my best friends, Kenneth Lay, presided over the largest corporate bankruptcy fraud in U.S. history, Enron.

My political party used Enron private jets and corporate attorneys to assure my success with the U.S. Supreme Court during my election decision.

I have protected my friends at Enron and Halliburton against investigation or prosecution. More time and money was spent investigating the Monica Lewinsky affair than has been spent investigating one of the biggest corporate rip-offs in history. I presided over the biggest energy crisis in U.S. history and refused to intervene when corruption involving the oil industry was revealed.

I presided over the highest gasoline prices in history.

I changed U.S. policy to allow convicted criminals to be awarded government contracts.

I appointed more convicted criminals to my administration than any President in U.S. history.

I created the Ministry of Homeland Security, the largest bureaucracy in the history of the United States Government.

I've broken more international treaties than any President in U.S. history.

I am the first President in U.S. history to have the United Nations remove the U.S. from the Human Rights Commission.

I withdrew the U.S. from the World Court of Law.

I refused to allow inspector's access to U.S. 'prisoners of war' detainees and thereby have refused to abide by the Geneva Convention.

I am the first President in history to refuse United Nations election inspectors (during the 2002 US election)

I set the record for fewest numbers of press conferences of any President since the advent of television.

I set the all-time record for most days on vacation in any one-year period. After taking off the entire month of August, I presided over the worst security failure in U.S. history

I garnered the most sympathy ever for the U.S. after the World Trade Center attacks and less than a year later made the U.S. the most hated country in the world, the largest failure of diplomacy in world history.

I have set the all-time record for most people worldwide to simultaneously protest me in public venues (15 million people), shattering the record for protests against any person in the history of mankind

I am the first President in U.S. history to order an unprovoked, preemptive attack and the military occupation of a sovereign nation. I did so against the will of the United Nations, the majority of U.S. Citizens and the world community.

I have cut health care benefits for war veterans and support a cut in duty benefits for active duty troops and their families in wartime.

In my State of the Union Address, I lied about our reasons for attacking Iraq and then blamed the lies on our British friends.

I am the first President in history to have a majority of Europeans (71%) view my presidency as the biggest threat to world peace and security.

I am supporting development of a nuclear 'Tactical Bunker Buster,' a WMD.

I have so far failed to fulfill my pledge to bring Osama Bin Laden to justice.

RECORDS AND REFERENCES

All records of my tenure as governor of Texas are now in my father's library, sealed and unavailable for public view.

All records of SEC investigations into my insider trading and my bankrupt companies are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

All records or minutes from meetings that I, or my Vice-President, attended regarding public energy policy are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public review. I specified that my sealed documents will not be available for 50 years.

---

'Splain Me, Will Ya?

Could you explain something to me, please.

Yesterday - or was it the day before? - I saw six women on CNN.

They were a little make-shift panel of middle-aged, middle-class white and black women who are all voting for Hillary Clinton to be the Democratic nominee.

So far, so good. No problemo. Got it. Good. Fine.

Now, they are asked, "So what if Hillary is finished? What if Obama takes the nomination?"

One of these otherwise seeming reasonable sane persons says, "I'll vote for the Democratic nominee."

Which is what I would expect from six Democrats.

But, no.

Hark. Five of these lunatics say, "I'll vote for McCain."

???????????????????????????????????????????????

Gleek! Tilt!

Huh?

I'm completely lost, horn-swoggled, tied up in knots.

You see, sputter, mumble, gag...

I'm of the persuasion that can't understand for one nano-second that a person disguised as a sentient human being voted for Nixon or Bush.

So, when five nice ladies who are sworn Democratic card-carrying members, say that if there is no Hillary, they will be voting for this pathetic old Republican geek, I, uh, well, hm....

HELP!

Robert Werner's 76 year old Mother Gets it - Why Can't the Government?

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

My Mom's Letter to Tony Clement, Federal Minister of Health

The Honourable Tony Clement
Minister of Health
Minister's Office - Health Canada
Brooke Claxton Building, Tunney's Pasture
Postal Locator: 0906C
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
K1A 0K9

Dear Sir,

I am a retired nurse and a senior citizen. I’m also a volunteer visitor counselor at Tourism Vancouver, giving out information to tourists visiting our city. You may be surprised to learn that a growing number of these visitors are well informed about Vancouver being the Drug Capital of Canada. When they want to visit Chinatown we have to advise them about the safest routes to walk there. We also warn them not to give money to panhandlers and to be aware of their surroundings at all times. If traveling by car, we urge them to leave nothing visible inside their vehicles. This is the sad reality of life in Vancouver in 2008.

I live in the South Granville neighbourhood. It’s supposedly one of the better ones in the city and yet I have countless panhandlers asking me for spare change daily. I now carry a pocket alarm which I will set off if I’m ever threatened. This is the sad reality of life in Vancouver in 2008.

The law-abiding citizens in our cities have to now be concerned with which restaurants they can eat at safely, which nightclubs they can go to safely, and which streets they can walk down when the sun goes dim. This is the sad reality of life in Vancouver in 2008.

The common thread running through most of these problems is severe drug abuse. I therefore plead with you to close the free needle terror that is Insite. It is not helping drug users get better but is only prolonging their misery. I fully realize that there are a lot of political forces that claim that Insite is helping to “reduce harm” but it is a huge fallacy. Those proponents like Larry Campbell and Philip Owen should be ashamed of themselves.

Please convert this facility into a Recovery Detox Centre for the endless number of drug addicts in Vancouver. And then set up more in all of our municipalities. I do know there are treatment centres in Prince George and Bowen Island. We need many more!

One Note Gord

I very much like Jim Sinclair's op-ed piece in the Sun today.

Sinclair is the President of the BC Federation of Labour and a good friend.

He chronicled the sins and omissions of Gordon Campbell.

Cost of living, wages, child care, homeless, forestry, Bill 42...it's all there.

And I agree with Sinclair's take whole-heartedly.

One day in our lifetimes, we may actually see a government in BC that is not so ideologically polarized. One day there might be an administration that favours business and social good at the same time.

Imagine that.

As the song goes, "Well, I can dream, can't I?"

Hand Outs

Like most of you, I don't usually give money to those who ask for it on the street.

Yesterday, was one of those rare days when I changed my little "policy."

There is a guy in our neighbourhood who is ugly and scary looking. He exudes "darkness." He wears black and he has a heavy dark barely shaved beard and a crooked toothed smile.

He is clearly suffering from some mental disorder.

But, if you've been around this neck of the woods long enough, you will know that this man is harmless. In fact, he is hard working when given the opportunity.

Many merchants on 10th Avenue routinely pay him to clean the street and sidewalks in front of their shops.

I have no idea where or how he lives.

Yesterday he asked me for some change. I didn't have my little change purse with me, so I declined. He said he was hungry and he needed some food. I walked away - about five or ten paces. I stopped and turned around and he turned around at the same time.

I went back and put a five dollar bill in his hand.

I can't really afford to give people five dollar bills, at least not regularly.

But this guy is a part of our neighbourhood. It just felt like a reasonable thing to do.

I'm not telling you what a swell fellow I am. Far from it.

I am saying that sometimes the little rules and policies we adopt for ourselves need some elbow room.

Making a Killing from the Food Crisis

Please watch this Real News video report.

It's an important antidote to the usual flimsy coverage and it's criminal in the deepest meaning of the word.

Thanks

Mexico, Myanmar, China, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Lebanon...

Our piddling troubles here in The Wet Edge seem ... piddling in comparison.

Let's take a day off and thank our stars for what we have at this moment.

Irving Berlin

What follows below is a CBS tribute to Irving Berlin aired in 1988 on the occasion of Berlin's 100th birthday. Today would be his 120th.

Michael Feinstein sings 3 songs and tells the stories of Berlin's genius and contributions.

Only 120 today...

rare for us Rap thanks to John Beatty

The Nub of McCain - Mr. Honorable

This may be all you need to know about John McCain.

The man he hired to run the Republican Convention has resigned.

Why?

Well, it turns out that Mr. Goodyear (you can't make up stuff this ironic) is a PR flak who was hired and payed by the military junta in Myanmar to burnish their image abroad.

This is not a pleasant mother's day group. This is one of the most repressive and violent administrations on earth today. Witness their gracious response to world aid for the cyclone victims.

Read the whole lovely story here.

Two for The Sun

Daphne Bramham and Miro Cernetig have written excellent pieces in this morning's paper.

Bramham spells out the new and growing tactic amongst the politicos and mandarins of launching expensive lawsuits against their critics.

Nanaimo, Kent, Harrison, and Langford are four of the municipalities mentioned.

In each case, a citizen asks legitimate questions of the powers-that-be. In case, the powers sue.

They are emboldened to do so by a 2004 provincial law that allows for something called a SLAPP - a Strategic Lawsuit against Public Participation.

But wait.

Isn't public participation a virtue in a healthy democracy?

Oh, I forgot, in BC and Canerda, "healthy democracy" is becoming as oxymoronic as Catholic University, happy marriage, military intelligence and liquor control board.

Cernetig rightly points out that the millions of dollars and years of abject failure in the DTES call for a new approach, perhaps one overseer or czar for all things DTES.

Exceellent piece and good idea.

But who?

Michael Clague is mentioned. Bad idea. Clague was the director of the Carnegie Centre for years, which means he made a healthy living in the midst of the madness.

No, we need someone completely outside the sphere.

Michael Geller whom is running for city council would do a great job.

Or someone from another side of the continent, who owes no favours.

Whoever it is, sooner is better than later.

Genius - From another Era

Victor Catches a Whiff of Americana

The CEO of Pepsi is a woman named Indra Nooyi. She was raised in India, has powered Pepsi past Coke in stock markets, is praised and envied by CEOs for her corporate brilliance and touted for a Cabinet seat in Washington. Oh, she's also an active, devoted mother.

I don't know what Mr. Nooyi does but I know this. If he came to Pepsi shareholders meeting and announced that he planned to be Pepsi's next president because he had slept with Mrs. Nooyi, fathered her kids and therefore was qualified to do her job, he'd be laughed out of the room.

Melinda Gates is Bill's wife. They've been married since 1994 and have three kids. Melinda runs the Gates Foundation which is on target to amass $100 billion. It was her idea. But if Microsoft were to announce she was going to be the next CEO because she was married to Bill and they had kids and they talked a lot and you know blah,blah.blah.....Well the stocks would tumble and the business writers would slap their thighs in laughing hysteria.

So why does Hillary have a large following among women? Her only unchallenged credential is being married to Bill. She flunked law school bar tests, never practiced law until her husband gave her a job when he was governor of Arkansas, meddled in health care with disastrous results(not her job) when she was First Lady. Her resume is so thin she has to tell whoppers like being under sniper fire in Bosnia and brokering peace talks in Northern Ireland. She then explains these preposterous lies as "mis-remembering"

So. A liar with memory problems is the best candidate female America can offer? Please.

She should be viewed with hostility by all women who have built their own careers. The message of her candidacy is that if women want to make it, the first step is to marry right. How empowering.

Yet, polls show a huge following among females. I don't get it.

Yes, I understand the sentiment among women that says its a woman's turn to be President. I don't agree with it, but I understand it. I don't think "getting one's turn"is a qualification, other than for children, waiting for a swing in a playground. America has never had an Italian president. Should Italians get a turn. Poles? Amputees?

As for the notion that being married to somebody means you can do their job, the concept is too ludicrous for comment. I've known a number of talented women with great careers. I've had relationships with some of them and we talked about our work. That doesn't mean for a second, that they could do my job. Nor could I have done theirs.

There is some good news in all of this. The black candidate is being castigated for being an elitist. Wow. A black elitist. Finally! I'm old enough to remember that blacks couldn't stay in certain Canadian hotels and now they're elitists.

Thanks for that Hillary.

Good Night and Good Luck

Gas Prices Send Surge of Riders to Mass Transit
By CLIFFORD KRAUSS
Cities with long-established public transit systems and areas with a strong driving culture are both reporting increases in ridership of buses and trains.

So reads a NY Times headline today.

Of course, that couldn't happen in Meekrow Vancouver because we have Transclunk, one of the last efficient systems in the known universe.

America at the Crossroads

Barak Obama is poised to win the Democratic nomination.

All things are possible in primaries and elections, so this is not a given, but it is looking pretty solid.

I like and admire Hillary Clinton.

But I am saddened by the stench of flop sweat in her recent racial comments on voting patterns.

Let's say Obama wins.

America, rocked by the Iraq War, Afghanistan, recession, bad schools, lack of universal health coverage for its citizens and the worst reputation it has ever held in the rest of the world, is at yet another historic moment.

Obama is not the second coming of the messiah, but he is different and refreshing and youthful and full of hope and vigor.

How dreadful would it be for American voters to turn their faces away from the future and vote for McCain?

McCain is the poster boy for The Past. He is old and tired and closed in a pen of stale and failing ideas.

Obama may have much to learn as a leader, but he is the best hope for healthy new beginnings.

I hope he wins.

Tales of Nitties & Titties

First the Nitties:

Vancouver City Councillor, B.C. Lee, will not run again. Boo effing Hoo.

Lee was a total disgrace from the word Go. He did nothing, zilch, zero on his three years on council.

The Nutty Mayor praised Lee's contributions. 'Nuff said.

Arthur Griffiths, a man who never met a deal he couldn't screw up, will run for the BC Liberals. Oh, the excitement.

Griffiths, like Paris Hilton only without the attributes, is famous for being famous. He is the son of a wealthy successful man, who has not mirrored his father's considerable accomplishments.

But Gord likes to be near wealth and power, so Griffiths should suit his limited tastes just fine.

Now, the Titties:

Canwest assigned no less than FIVE journalists and devoted one entire page to politicians and their personal love lives and sex romps. Page A4 no less.

People fall in and out of love. People have sex. Get over it.

Will I soon find The Sun at my Safeway checkout next to The Enquirer, The Star, Oprah, People and all those other illuminating journals?

Children & Families Ministry Hits New Low

I have been writing a great deal of late on the dissater area known as the BC Ministry of Children & Family's. I have also been calling for the resignation of the dead-at-the-wheel Minister, Tom Christensen.

But today's story by Ethan Baron in The Province really tops it all.

The Headline reads thus: "Five girls in care have been selling sex on Craigslist, police say."

The story can be read here.

The last line reads thus:

"The children's ministry and Craigslist did not provide interviews requested by The Province."

Email your Premier.