The anti-gun propaganda is relentless

Vincent J. Curtis

30 May 22

RE: Handgun use in violent crime growing, StatsCan says. A Canadian Press story by Hina Alam published in the Hamilton Spectator 30 May 22

It isn’t until paragraph 15 of a 21 paragraph story that you get actual figures.  In 2020, there were a grand total of 743 homicide victims in Canada, of which 277 were killed by handgun.  StatsCan relies on police reporting when it says that 8,344 were victims of crimes “involving guns.”  But since police can’t distinguish between pellet guns and the real things, and probably neither can most victims, we don’t really know the number of times real guns were employed.

Nevertheless, the Liberal government wants to seize 250,000 so-called “assault rifles.”  This isn’t in response to Uvalde and Buffalo because this is the same bill that was introduced after 1 May 2020.  An assault rifle is not anything like a handgun, and it appears that “assault rifles” were only used twice in Canadian criminal history for mass shootings, Ecole Polytechnique in 1989, and Nova Scotia in 2020.  In both cases an AR-15 was not used, and the rifle that was used was illegally possessed.  There are approximately 1,000,000 handguns legally owned in Canada, and in response to a rise in handgun crimes, the government is moving to ban “assault rifles” that are used for sporting purposes.  Today, Prime Minister Trudeau announced future ban on handgun sales, importation, and transfers.  The political con should be obvious: the Liberals are not letting a crisis go to waste.

Notable in 2020 was the massacre in Nova Scotia of 22 people, and when you’re dealing with small numbers, one crime can bump the statistics up by lots of percentage points.  What’s being lost is 277 out of a population of 35 million is a miniscule fraction.  277 is the number of people killed in Chicago in a month.  The slaughter of 18 in Uvalde, Texas, is a weekend tally in Chicago.  Every weekend.  Texas has had five mass shooting since 2014.  The point is that Canada is not the United States, and Canada does not need to seize people’s guns and property to take other people’s pain away.  Not in this country.  Pain should not beget pain.  Nor should we let political opportunists get away with saying “give me more power, and I will take your pain away.”

Seizing the guns of the law abiding won’t make this country any safer.  The people saying they can make you feel safer all have armed protection details.

-30-

P.S.  CBC News reported today about feral hogs invading Alberta towns.  Hogs have been a problem in the U.S. for decades, and the solution has been to hunt them at night with AR-15s with night vision equipment.  Why the AR-15?  Low recoil means fast follow-up shots, accuracy out to 300 meters, and a standard magazine capacity of 30 rounds.  Rural, and even urba, Alberta is going to need AR-15s for varmint control.

Gun Control and the Constitution of Canada

Vincent J. Curtis

17 Mar 22

After William the Conqueror occupied England, he required his barons to obtain a license from him before they could crenellate their castles.  Crenellation makes a castle more defensible against a siege, and William wanted to make it difficult for any of his barons to rebel against him.

And rebel they could, since they had arms and followers.  Unlike his son William Rufus, William ruled in a manner that made him at least respected by his barons.

On June 15, 1215, at a place called Runnymede, which is near Windsor Castle, the leading barons of the realm met with King John of England, where John, under pressure of rebellion, signed what came to be called Magna Carta.  This was the deal: either John signed, or the barons would rise in rebellion.  Being barons, they had arms and followers, and would be able easily to overwhelm the unpopular John if it came to rebellion.

On June 7, 1628, the Parliament at Westminster passed the Petition of Right, which demanded of King Charles I that he conform to Bills and agreements he previously made and to forego the assertion of arbitrary powers.  Parliament passed the Habeas Corpus Act to protect themselves from arbitrary arrest and detention by Charles.  Charles didn’t listen to the Grand Remonstrance, and in 1642 an impatient nation rose in civil war and deposed the King, Charles famously losing his head.  In those days, the owning of a sword was nothing remarkable, as it gave the owner a means of defending himself, self-defence being a recognized principle of English law.

A restored Stuart dynasty failed to learn its lesson, and in 1688, with the nation again rising in the Glorious Revolution, James II abdicated, and William of Orange and his wife Mary Stuart assumed jointly the throne of England.  The Bill of Rights was passed into law in 1689, and among its provisions was the condemnation of: “causing several good subjects being Protestants to be disarmed at the same time when papists were both armed and employed contrary to law.”  And “By raising and keeping a standing army within this kingdom in time of peace without consent of Parliament, and quartering soldiers contrary to law.”

Consequently, it was declared and agreed to by the King that: “That the raising or keeping of a standing army within the kingdom in time of peace, unless it be with consent of Parliament, is against law;” and “That the subjects which are Protestants may have arms for their defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.”

Together, these two provisions enable oppressed subjects to rebel against Kingly misrule.  There were, of course, many constraints against such an extreme measure as rebellion, but the principle is clear: that misrule by the King could have consequences.  The King’s defenses against rebellion were, first, the awful gravity of rising against the King, who had a near divine right to rule, and, second, good rule by the King, making rebellion unnecessary.

Such was the law of the land in the thirteen colonies when, because of a quaking rebellion, British soldiers attempted unsuccessfully to confiscate the firearms of the colonists.  That the colonists retained their arms enabled the American Revolution to succeed.  The right to keep and bear arms provided in the 1689 Bill and the attempt by the British to confiscate privately owned firearms as a means of quelling rebellion are what led to the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.  “A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

In the American view, a militia was what won the American Revolution against King George III.  While it may have occurred to some that a government so excellently devised as American one, and led by so great and good a character as General Washington, an armed citizenry was no longer necessary or desirable.  However, there were enough anti-federalists around that the Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment, had to be ratified if the constitution drafted in Philadelphia was going to be enacted.  Even in America, the power of the citizen to rebel against misrule was going to be retained, however remotely.

The Dominion of Canada inherited British law as it stood in 1867, which included Magna Carta, the Petition of Right, Habeas Corpus and the Bill of Rights of 1689.  The Riel Rebellions of 1870 and 1885 were both suppressed by superior military force, but the rebellions were possible because the Metis people of Rupert’s Land had arms.  There was the FLQ crisis in 1970, but various gun control bills didn’t begin passing the Canadian parliament, until 1977.

The Firearms Act of 1995 gave the government the nascent power to confiscate firearms, contrary to the provisions of the Bill of Rights of 1689, though it wasn’t exercised on a large scale until May 1, 2020.  On that date, the government, by order in council, declared approximately 250,000 semi-automatic rifles to be prohibited, and revoked the permits granted to people under the 1995 law to possess them.  This number is at least three times the number of rifles the Canadian military has.  In short, the gun confiscation would deprive the people of Canada of the means of armed rebellion against misrule, contrary to law and custom going back nearly 1000 years and particularly against the intent of the Bill of Rights of 1689.

Lest one tut-tut such a need as never arising in these days of democratic election, present need is not the point.  One only has to look to Australia and New Zealand as democracies that subjected the people to the most extreme and arbitrary misrule and police enforcement under a rubric of combatting a disease – after the firearms of their populations had been confiscated.  In Canada, the Emergencies Act was declared, bank accounts frozen, and donations attempted to be seized by order of the Prime Minister’s Office - to solve a parking problem on Wellington Street in Ottawa.  That protest arose because of the misrule of the Prime Minister, who would not deign to meet with the protesters or even propose to redress their grievances.  (He was democracy itself, he argued.) The protest was simply declared to be an ‘illegal occupation’ by another political leader, and that was that.  It wasn’t an armed insurrection, the protesters were peaceful, unarmed, and they were seeking redress of grievance. Nevertheless, the protest was broken up by armed agents of the state using superior force, and by the attacks on personal finances before guilt was proven in court.

It is said that an armed society is a polite society, but there’s something about an armed citizenry that tends to keep the rulers polite also, or at least restrained.  Why should a popularly elected government ruling well fear armed rebellion?

The law and custom of the English speaking world has been to lay the executive government open to armed rebellion should it misrule.  King William III was particularly clear on this point; he didn’t even require loyalty oaths from those around him.  The government is protected against armed rebellion, first, by the awful prospect of rebellion itself – the overthrowing of the existing order, an act never to be taken lightly - by the maintenance of armed agents in the form of police and a standing army, by other powers such as those over banks, and ultimately by its own good rule.

Much pettifogging often attends the defence of misrule, but no amount of law can justify misrule.  A government that takes the means of armed rebellion away from its citizens, for whatever reason, is up to no good – if not for itself, then on behalf of a successor government it cannot control and does not even know.

A thousand years of experience shows that the attempt to mass confiscate arms from the public, for whatever excuse alleged, must be resisted as being the first act of a further program of oppression preparatory to misrule, however innocent the confiscators protest themselves to be.  In 1995, Prime Minister Jean Chretien promised that registration would not lead to confiscation; well, less than thirty years on, that trust and promise was broken, and confiscation has begun.  The innocent rulers of today can make no worthwhile promises concerning the misrule of future governments.

-30-

 

Blind squirrels: Hamilton's housing crisis

Vincent J. Curtis

29 May 22

RE: The real work of city growth is never easy.  Spectator editorial 28 May 22.

Even blind squirrels can find a nut occasionally, and it appears that the nuts writing Spectator editorials might find the squirrel yet.

Having won the battle not to expand the urban boundary, the victors are now confronted with the consequences of their victory.  The actual business of accommodating 236,000 new Hamiltonians within the existing urban footprint is going to inconvenience a lot of the current residents.  And that’s just building the accommodations above ground.  The real problem arises underground.

The existing sanitary sewers and water supply of the lower city and the Mountain are designed to handle the existing number of residents, let’s say 400,000 people.  Put another 236,000 into that same area, and there may not be enough capacity to handle the additional required volumes.  Never mind whether the electrical substations can handle the addition power demands.  Never mind all the additional parking that will have to be handled on existing residential streets.  Disregarding power and parking, the entire city will have to be dug up to install larger pipes.

On the other hand, an entirely new area of development would only require the installation of new trunk lines to service the new area, and more parking is not a problem.  A much cheaper and convenient solution to growth.

What will be needed is an outer ring road connecting up with the QEW at Fruitland Road and the 403 and 6 interchange.

-30-

Where are the architects? Ontario's housing crisis

Vincent J. Curtis

26 May 22

RE: All parties fall short on housing crisis.  Spectator editorial 26 May 22.

The answer to the housing crisis is well known and has been known for decades.  Economist Thomas Sowell has repeatedly pointed out in his books that the answer is to make more land available for development.  When demands outpaces supply, enable more supply.  In this respect, the PC Party isn’t falling short on the housing crisis, it is going to force municipalities to make more land available for development one way or another.

The arguments against making more land available were first trotted out, in Sowell’s memory, in the 1970s, precious farmland, green spaces, blah, blah, blah.  Arrant nonsense. Superficial excuses that fall apart upon the least analysis.

Funny thing is, all those calling for no development already enjoy their own home, their own single family dwelling.  They benefit from skyrocketing housing prices.  They aren’t subject to the ramifications of their anti-grown ideology.

British philosopher Roger Scruton proposed one means of overcoming resistance to building new neighbourhoods is to make them more beautiful.  That would require architects to get off their lazy backsides and get creative.  Unfortunately, Hamilton’s favorite architectural team are committed Marxists and are into Brutal Concrete, so we can’t expect beauty from them at cross-purposes to their politics.

The promise of Hamilton since its inception is a little patch of paradise a family can call its own.  That includes Irish immigrants in 1835 who came with virtually nothing, but could build a home on a 1/5 acre lot on O’Reilly Street.

Marxist ideas would turn Hamilton into a teeming hell-hole if allowed to.  (Marxism is hostile to private property, in case you newbies didn’t know that.)  If Canada is short of land and water, the rest of the world is doomed.

-30-

Whom does Hamilton shaft?

The City’s ethical dilemma

Vincent J. Curtis

21 May 22

RE: Doing the right thing on workplace vaccinations.  Spectator editorial 21 May 22.

The city does indeed have an ethical dilemma concerning the retention or dismissal of 440 city workers who refused vaccination.  That dilemma is: whom does the city screw?

Does it admit wrongly forcing the city staff to get injected with a worthless vaccine as a condition of retaining their jobs, or fire the 440 workers who refused to comply and proved to be right after all?  Does the city risk indiscipline the next time?

The editorial invokes the zombie chant “follow the science, follow the science” and adds a dash of “evidence-based” decisions.  This is unfortunate because the evidence is that the vaccines are essentially worthless to those under 65, and science involves, first and last, the empirical evidence - not hopes and expectations based on theory and models.

It is now common knowledge that the vaccines do not prevent infection and do not prevent transmission, does not induce herd immunity, and so there is little point in getting vaxxed as a prophylactic.  Based on Ontario’s own mortality data, a case simply can’t be made to vaccinate anyone prophylactically under the age of 60.  Besides this, there are small but non-zero risks to getting vaccinated, particularly pericarditis in young men, and these are becoming more widely known.

Poor Andrea Horwath is an example of the failure of the vaccine.  She’s vaxxed; she’s boosted, and she makes a show of wearing her little obedience mask in public.  Yet, she came down with COVID during the campaign.

The Spectator’s ethical argument recycles canards, and the question remains: whom dord Hamilton screw?

-30-

Attila taking the reins of conservativism in Canada

Vincent J. Curtis

20 May 22

RE: Another Tory leader bites the dust.  Spectator editorial 20 May 22.  Also editorial cartoon by Graeme MacKay.

The concern about the political fates of Jason Kenney and Erin O’Toole and the wider angst about the fate of conservatism in Canada says more about the eastern snob media than it does about conservativism.

In a democracy, not just latte-sippers and quiche-eaters get to vote.  Huns, far-right extremists, white supremacists, conspiracy theorists, old dinosaurs, and, yes, even cowboys get to vote and have their say.  The central Canadian establishment might prefer a Conservative leader that looks and thinks just like them, but in a country full of those irredeemable deplorables, that doesn’t always happen.

And if central Canadian snobs are horrified at the prospect of a fire-breathing conservative at the head of a Conservative Party, then maybe they should vote Alberta off Confederation Island.

Believe me, around here, there are plenty who would welcome it.  No more transfer payments, and no more carbon taxes for starters!

-30-

Democracy spoke in Alberta: Why Kenney fell.

Vincent J. Curtis

19 May 22

RE: Alberta premier steps down.  Canadian Press item published in the Hamilton Spectator 19 Aug 22.

It might be useful to Ontarians to hear from a transplant why Jason Kenney fell.  It’s actually a heart-warming story of democracy in action.

Kenney became leader of the United Conservative Party because he served in Stephen Harper’s cabinet.  The UCP was created by the union of the old PC party and the Alberta separatist Wild Rose Party.  Kenney was assumed to be smart, reasonable, and politically presentable to the eastern snob media.  His handling of the pandemic was his undoing.

Kenney proved to be a middle-of-the-road squish.  He didn’t represent Alberta values; he often seemed embarrassed by them.  Those values are individualism, conservative, and religious too.  His big mistake was his slavish following of Alberta’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, the ice queen Dr. Deena Henshaw.  Henshaw was utterly conventional: lockdowns, masks, limits on assembly, etc.  Under her leadership Alberta Public Health had a penchant for closing churches, arresting pastors, putting crowd-control fencing around churches to prevent use, arresting small business owners in rural areas who “defied” the precious orders of APH.  They harassed and prosecuted rodeo organizers, an outdoor event if there ever was one.  No public health order was ever debated or voted on.  They were just ordered.  The Charter of Rights? Pshaw!!

Kenney’s smarts proved to be all political, none academic.  He lacked the smarts to question Henshaw, to consult with Ron DeSantis or Dr. Scott Atlas.  He couldn’t bring himself to tell Henshaw: “think of something else.”

In the end, he was too at variance with conservative Alberta.  Democracy spoke, and he fell.

-30-

White Replacement Theory: Look in the mirror

Vincent J. Curtis

19 May 22

RE: Hatred takes center stage yet again.  Spectator editorial 19 May 22

It’s truly amazing the capacity of post-modernist progressives to look in the mirror and not recognize themselves.  So-called “White Replacement Theory” is nothing more than taking progressives at their word.

On his show on Tuesday, Fox News host Tucker Carlson ran clip after clip after clip of Democrat politicians and their media allies talking approvingly of changing the demographics of America in order to create a permanent Democrat majority out of the voting tendencies and gratitude of non-white immigrant groups.  The first clip was from Joe Biden himself.  When you compare what Biden and these others said with the immigration disaster of the last 18 months at the U.S. southern border – which Biden is in charge of – some people might be inclined to take these Democrat politicians at their word.  Then, you can add in the DREAM Act and DACA, and a pattern emerges.

When you add the fentanyl crisis that kills 100,000 young white people a year and that the white population of the U.S. declined in actual numbers between 2010 and 2020, and some are inclined to take that data as additional evidence.  Again, fentanyl is imported through the southern border which Biden is doing nothing about.

The young man who committed the crime was psychotic.  He had given warning about his violent intentions and he was ignored.  His 181 page “manifesto” is incoherent, he rages apparently about being a left-wing revolutionary and a fascist.  But progressives can’t help themselves.  They have to smear their opponents, the “far-right,” (is there such a thing as the “near-right?”)

“White Replacement Theory” is actual progressive policy.

-30-

Shagadelic, baby!

Vincent J. Curtis

18 May 22

RE: Canada should welcome any women fleeing the U.S. Op-ed by Craig Wallace.  The Hamilton Spectator 18 May 22.

Craig Wallace is a certifiable moron.  He wants us to accept women fleeing the U.S. because it would be good for Canada’s demographics.  The young women he speaks of get pregnant right?  And have babies, right?

Pregnant maybe, but you would be wrong.  This tide of nubile women would be fleeing the U.S. because they want to be able to abort their babies!  There goes much of the demographic benefit argument.

The other part of Wallace’s demographic benefit argument is that these young, nubile women will be well educated and will make good workers – for government and large corporations.  They’ll pay taxes that support CPP, Medicare, education, and just plain raise government revenues.  And they’ll just keep working because – no babies!

But what happens when they get old and there are no children to look after them?  Never mind, a problem for another generation.

Meanwhile, there is some benefit to Canada.  Given the influx of young women, and only women, Canada will become a more shagadelic nation essentially cost-free!  What red-blooded Canadian man can be opposed to that?

I realize we’re talking about men and women, and women getting pregnant and not men, and heterosexual sex, and neglect how we mustn’t be transphobic and all, but Wallace started it.  Perhaps, that’s another piece of evidence that he’s a certifiable moron.

-30-

Stop the Main madness!

Comrade Vincent J. Curtis

14 May 22

RE: Get moving on Main St. conversion.  Spectator editorial 14 May 22

RE: Who do we build our streets for? Op-ed by Paul Shaker.

It is sadly characteristic of the Hannon People’s Daily that it recommend the most Marxist, most nihilistic, most economically disruptive plan of action for any problem, especially when the crisis is manufactured.  In this case, the manufactured crisis of pedestrian deaths at Dundurn and Main.  You’d think the pedestrian carnage was as bad as a failed Russian river crossing.

When the Spectator was on Frid St., and a husky printer could shot-put a typewriter into the intersection, nothing was said about converting Main to two-way..  Nothing was said about the dangers of crossing Main and Dundurn when reporters were sneaking across to grab a Timmies.  In short, a statistical cluster is not going to be allowed to go to waste.

It never occurs to the editors that something less disruptive might be entertained, such as restricting pedestrian crossing, or erecting a pedestrian bridge.  No, the most disruptive, most chaos inducing solution is all that’s acceptable.  Never mind that two-way traffic on Main will require left hand turns across two lanes of traffic without the benefit of turning lanes.  Never mind that the hazards of this vastly outweigh the present hazards.  No, the end of economic disruption is best served by panicking city council into turning Main into two-way, against the best advice of traffic engineers of the 1950s who manifestly knew what they were doing.

To answer Paul Shaker: streets are for cars, sidewalks are for pedestrians.  As usual, Shaker asks the wrong question.  We build our streets for ourselves, that’s who.  The proper question is: What do we build our streets for?  And the answer to that is for communication and commerce.

-30-

How many people have to die before....

Vincent J. Curtis

13 May 22

RE: Council backs Main’s two-way conversion.  News item by Teviah Moro, the Hamilton Spectator, 12 May 22.

RE: How many more people must die?  Op-ed by Margaret Shkimba, The Hamilton Spectator 10 May 22.

To borrow some rationale from Margaret Shkimba, how many people have to die before Hamilton gets a smarter city council?  How many people have to die before someone realizes that making Main two-way at Wellington isn’t going to solve a problem at Dundurn?

How many people have to die before we realize that making Main two-way isn’t risk-free itself, and will certainly cause traffic congestion?  How many people have to die before people realize that they’re just being buffaloed by another “crisis” not being allowed to go to waste and being panicked into going along?  How many people have to die before we start hearing that climate change is responsible for all those traffic deaths?  How many people have to die before you realize that a wild traffic accident that occurred near Margaret Street wouldn’t have been prevented by making Main two way, and doesn’t reflect a problem at Dundurn?

How many people have to die before you can get a good sandwich in Jackson Square? 

How many people have to die before they realize that the question is simply an inflammatory way of marking the passage of time?

-30-

How many more people must die before Margaret Shkimba shuts the hell up?

Poilievre’s dangerous

Vincent J. Curtis

13 May 22

RE: Poilievre’s inflation disinformation.  Spectator editorial 13 May 22.

Poilievre’s dangerous.  He must be destroyed.  “Too much money chasing too few goods” isn’t inflation in action; it’s “misinformation.”  Say all that robotically.

It’s amazing watching the minds of the Arts Majors who editorialize for the Spectator turn.  It pretends to expertise in economics it doesn’t have (just like in science!).  It uses ‘misinformation’ and ‘disinformation’ interchangeably, as if they meant the same thing, when they don’t.

Poilievre’s expertise in economics is presented as sheer, uninformed arrogance, in another case of the Left accusing its enemies of doing the very thing they are doing.

Then, near the end of the editorial, comes the admission of unpleasant facts.  The Bank was mistaken about inflation.  The Bank did print $300 billion in two years to fund the government’s economy-destroying lockdown madness.

The Bank did not ‘shepherd’ us through the pandemic crisis, as the editorial rhapsodizes.  There didn’t have to be a crisis.  The disastrous lockdowns were completely self-inflected and unnecessary, as Sweden and Florida show.  Those places came through none the worse for wear compared to anywhere else, and they didn’t lockdown.  Voices here (ahem!) said repeatedly since May, 2020, the lockdowns did more harm than good.  But they were dismissed as “misinformation” in concert with the progressive cancel-culture group think that only now is cracking.

If the Bank had sold $300 billion in government bonds on the open market to raise money in 2020-2021, interest rates would have shot sky high, a warning sign of things going wrong.  Instead, the Bank of Canada printed the money, and now we have inflation.  Surprised?

Poilievre wants to fire the governor for incompetence, and that is not misinformation.  The Bank’s charter requires it to strive to achieve full employment and stable prices.  The governor failed, and so he must go.  A price needs to be paid for incompetence.

-30-

Wasting your time: teaching indigenous women to nurse

Vincent J. Curtis

11 May 22

RE: Heading TRC calls to action in nursing.  Op-ed by Sandra Carroll, Executive Director of the McMaster University School of Nursing.

It is obvious from reading her article that Sandra Carroll is an earnest liberal.  She took to heart the calls for reconciliation by the TRC and is working hard and earnestly to heed it.  Tellingly, when she says the “McMaster School of Nursing is committed to the challenge or working alongside it indigenous nurse colleagues,” she uses the word ‘challenge’ and ‘indigenous colleagues’, as if they were something apart.  The school of nursing might achieve better health outcomes among indigenous peoples as a result of the program, but if she thinks either the effort or the results will advance reconciliation she’s desperately wrong.

By the lights of the race theorists, Sandra Carroll is irredeemably white and western.  Her approach to addressing the call of the TRC is characteristically white and western.  The medicine and methodologies she’s going to be instructing indigenous women in are the products of whiteness and western civilization, knowledge, and techniques.  The method of instruction is characteristically white.  In sum, Sandra Carroll is teaching indigenous women how to act white and western.

It doesn’t matter that a cool, unpronounceable expression in an indigenous language is used to name the program, making it a ‘learning lodge,’ for it’s still teaching indigenous women how to act white and western.

No doubt the program will achieve something positive in terms of health outcomes, but the end of reconciliation will not be achieved.  The question is, will the resentment produced by the program’s success make things worse?

-30-

Setting criminals free: Think of the community

Vincent J. Curtis

10 May 22

RE: Justice failing indigenous peoples.  Spectator editorial 10 May 22.

It wouldn’t be a Spectator editorial if there wasn’t at least one long-discredited progressive axiom regurgitated in it.  Today, we get two!

The first is that “poverty causes crime” and the other is that “19^th century colonialism is responsible for aboriginal law-breaking in the 21^st century.”  I don’t know how many times the canard “poverty causes crime” has been discredited and disproven, but my records show going back to the 1930s.  Similar claims were made about comic books and certain kinds of movies.  The disproofs are everywhere. For example, that if poverty causes crime, why are so few of the poor actual lawbreakers?  Why aren’t they all the poor lawbreakers?

The same reasoning applies to the colonization canard.  Why are so few aboriginals criminal law-breakers if colonization caused aboriginals to commit crime?  Why aren’t they all, or nearly all?

There are many who look to sub-cultures for causes of crime, and others who look to the character of the individual for answers.  But we do not know the causes of crime, save one: the law, for without a law to break there can be no lawbreaking.

What must not be done is to let out the lawbreakers out of some misplaced sympathy for their racial identity.  White people don’t want sex offenders released into their neighbourhoods, and aboriginal communities don’t want unreformed criminals let loose back into theirs.

-30-

A glimpse of the future

Vincent J. Curtis

9 May 22

RE: Westmount students protest alleged homophobia at Mountain school.  News article by Mark Newman Metroland Media.  Published in the Hamilton Spectator 9 May 22.

This story is of interest because it may provide a glimpse of the future.  If so, we can expect whininess of discontented privileged people to continue.  Theatrical exhibitions of outrage will continue.  Misdirection of blame will continue.  Shallowness will continue.  Adolescent adults will continue.

If 200 Westmount students walked out, it was to take advantage and take a day off.  They feel unsafe!  “Openly gay student rally organizer Liana DeSousa” whines about students like her going to the administration and “not feeling safe.”  I would be more convinced, if she weren’t so angry.  Angry people aren’t fearful.

This walkout was sparked allegedly by unkind comments made on-line by members of the football team about some student “in an openly gay relationship.”  Students of marginalized identities have never felt safe!  All in all, the protesters expect the school administration to do their bidding, or they will be the evil ones.

All this is what you’d expect of adolescent behavior.  Of course, teens who draw attention to themselves are going to be mocked by other teens.  Being mocked is one of the hazards of drawing attention to yourself.  Being noticed was the point!  It wasn’t supposed to have drawbacks!

A student who acts weird is going to either be studiously ignored or made fun of.  A teenager who acts gay is asking to be mocked by other teens.  It’s one way a society ensures there are enough reproductive members of the society.  Teens don’t like being lied to any more than anyone else, and being gay at 15 is a  little young.  Being “in an openly gay relationship” is playing at adulthood and farcical to boot; they’ll be living in their respective parents’ basements until they’re 25!

The adolescents of Westmount have learned from the adolescents in the adult world not to attack the football players, but to attack those with power over them.  But who’s going to put up with the privileged whining when they are in charge?  Or do they believe that adolescence lasts forever?

Hating hate

Vincent J. Curtis

6 May 22

RE: A way to end hatred in Hamilton.  Op-ed by Ameil J. Joseph, associate professor at the school of social work, McMaster University

Ameil Joseph hates racism.  He hates it so much that even a symbol of rebellion he doesn’t understand sets him off and is interpreted as an exhibition of racism.  Then, he’s shocked to discover that the more he reacts against racism, the more hatred and racism there seems to arise.  He’s disappointed to discover that when a fight is picked over a contentious issue, there are some people on the morally questionable side that are happy to finish the fight.

The first law of medicine is “first, do no harm.”  Dr. Joseph can accept this advice by first, sparing us the moral lectures.  He doesn’t have a monopoly on truth and virtue.  Hanging a flag on your private property to express discontent with misgovernment is not an act of aggression.  The aggression arises when other people mau-mau the property owner into compliance with the political orthodoxy the flag protested.  When it’s none of their business.  When you go out of your way to get offended.  A friendly, neighborly wave couldn’t be attempted.

Hatred is part of human nature, and Dr. Joseph’s zeal to end hatred in Hamilton is fueled by hatred.  The best we can do with hatred is to minimize it.

The best way Dr. Joseph and his friends can minimize hatred in Hamilton is to first, mind their own business, and second, STFU!

-30-

Spec turns into Kamala Harris

Vincent J. Curtis

5 May 22

RE: An appalling attack on the rights of women.  Spectator editorial 5 May 22.

Last month, the Spectator couldn’t tell you what a woman was.  They weren’t biologists.  Persons, birthing persons, or people got pregnant, not women.  Menstruating persons.  Men could get pregnant too!  It’s transphobic to believe otherwise!  Now it’s the editors make the transphobic admission that only women can get pregnant.

Last month, it was get the shot or you’re scum.  You have a responsibility to others! You got fired and deserved to be because you wouldn’t put the vaccine in your arm.  This month, it’s “our bodies, ourselves” and bodily autonomy, and “women have a right to their own bodies” etc. 

The about-face on these issues in the wake of the draft decision on Roe v. Wade simply highlights the nihilism in the progressive way of reasoning.  Say anything to win today.  Never mind what was said yesterday; that’s why we have the memory hole.  Burn it down if you can’t control it.

Roe conferred a “constitutional right” to abortion.  Everyone admits Roe was badly reasoned and the U.S. constitution says nothing about abortion.  It was invented out of whole cloth by progressives back in the day.  The prospective decision would end the constitutional nonsense, and return control and regulation of abortion to the States where it constitutionally belongs.  Abortion advocates will have to grub for votes like everybody else in a democracy.  What are they afraid of except that their cause isn’t as popular as they say it is?

-30-

The Roe leak: The Cause before the Republic

Vincent J. Curtis

4 May 22

RE: The leak of the draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade

The difference between a constitutional monarchy and a republic is that a republic has nothing to hold itself together except respect for its institutions.  Fraudulent elections undermine respect for the republic.  A court system that decides cases on the basis of politics or craven fear undermines respect for the republic’s institutions.  That’s why Benjamin Franklin said that the new constitution would give America a republic, “if you can keep it.”

The advent of progressivism made the cause more important than the institutions that stood in the way of achieving the objective.  If you could bring Utopia here on earth, ask yourself, what lie would you not tell, what crime would you not commit to bring that Utopia about?  The end justifies the means, even if those means undermined respect for the republic’s institutions.

Progressives of the day of Woodrow Wilson and Margaret Sanger were racists and eugenicists.  Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, promoted abortion in the black ghettos to prevent American society from being contaminated with an inferior race.  Wilson thought the U.S. constitution was obsolete because it too much got in his way.

Roe was a triumph for progressivism, more so given the shabbiness of its rationale. No matter, the sacrament of abortion was sanctified by the courts as a constitutional right.  The fight to preserve Roe poisoned American politics for fifty years, and the fraudulent constitutional right it established may now end.  The release of the draft opinion was a transparent attempt to incite threats of violence against the Justices who will end it. 

Abortion won’t end, just the “constitutional right” to it.  Abortion would be subject to law-making and regulations of the States as it was before Roe, and abortion advocates will actually have to grub for votes to enact their preferences into law.

The leaking of the document committed the following crimes: obstruction of justice, embezzlement of government records, and fraud on the United States.  Given the importance of Roe, it is essential to the respect of the U.S. Supreme Court that the perp be caught and punished appropriately.  A no vote should switch to aye in protest of the crime.

-30-