June 2008 Archives

Today I read about auto-da-fe, literally "act of faith". It was the penultimate step in a trial of the Spanish Inquisition. After conviction, the guilty infidel would declare his faith, as a sort of penance. And then he'd be killed.

Which, other than the gravity of the sentence that followed, is exactly what Lori Andreachuk of the Alberta Human Rights Commission ordered Rev. Stephen Boissoin to do. The Spanish auto-da-fe was an act of Christianity; Andreachuk's order is an anti-Christian auto-da-fe, in which Rev. Boissoin must renounce his faith. That's a 21st century twist.

And then there's the Star Chamber. I was fascinated to learn that, among its other victims, entire juries were tried in the Star Chamber if they didn't render the politically appropriate verdict.

But the most striking analogy was a Star Chamber order of 1632, which is a template for the show trial of Maclean's magazine of 2008.

According to Wikipedia, 1632 is when the Star Chamber:

...banned all "news books" because of complaints from Spanish and Austrian diplomats that coverage of the Thirty Years' War in England was unfair. As a result, newsbooks pertaining to this matter were often printed in Amsterdam and then smuggled into the country, until the ban was lifted six years later.

So foreign trouble-makers who objected to free speech and who insisted on politically correct versions of current events managed to censor the news. Plus ca change.

It's fascinating to me that Canada's human rights commissions defend themselves as progressive and modern and evolved. In fact, they're medieval throw-backs to an age when political and religious terror, censorship, and abuse of process still coloured political life. Those were the dark days; how terrfying that they are being revived now, by those claiming to be angels of light.

I was speaking with a friend in the PMO today about the Canadian Human Rights Commission's decision not to take Maclean's magazine and Mark Steyn to trial under section 13, the thought crimes section of the Canadian Human Rights Act. (A trial would have meant certain conviction; in its 31-year history, not a single target of section 13 has ever been acquitted.)

My friend was delighted, and saw this as good news.

I suppose, in a very specific sense, it is good news.

I asked him if Father Alphonse de Valk, the editor of Catholic Insight -- another magazine that has been hauled before the CHRC -- will be let go, too.

"Who?" asked my friend.

And that's the problem here, isn't it? Maclean's magazine is enormous -- in size, in strength, in profile, in legal resources. And that is precisely why it was let go. It was such a big fish, it would have pulled the Bad Ship CHRC underwater, rather than be reeled in.

Not so with small fish like Fr. de Valk, so small he is being crushed by legal bills, so small my friend had not even heard of his case.

So small that the CHRC knows it can prosecute him with impunity.

So small that he shall not be afforded the politically-motivated "justice" meted out to Maclean's.

That's the problem here. That's why we can't let up. One of the fundamentals of the rule of law is that no-one is above the law, and no-one is below it.

The Canadian Human Rights Act is a bad law -- unconstitutional in its application, when tested against the Supreme Court's 1990 Taylor decision, that barred its application from political matters.

So Fr. de Valk should not be below the law.

But the CHRC thinks the law is good law, and so far, the Conservative government hasn't said otherwise. If that's the case -- and I submit it isn't -- then Maclean's shouldn't be above the law, by virtue of their wealth and power.

Whether the law is unconstitutional or not (I say it is), the case against Fr. de Valk and Catholic Insight is the same as the case against Mark Steyn and Maclean's. That one was set free, while the other is persecuted, merely highlights the political corruption of the system.

Fire. Them. All.

I read my friend Debbie Gyapong's concerns here and here about the Supreme Court's recent ruling that expands the scope of fair comment in defamation law. As I wrote on Friday, the ruling tilts the law further towards free speech, including "outrageous" and "ridiculous" speech. As someone who is sometimes accused of both, I'm naturally pleased!

Debbie focussed on the fact that in the actual case that led to this decision, the plaintiff, Kari Simpson, was a Christian conservative, who had been likened to Nazis by the defendant, Rafe Mair, on his radio show. The judges said that might be extreme, but it's a fair comment. (That is distinct from a statement of fact. If Mair had said that Simpson was a member of the Nazi Party -- a false statement of fact, not a fair comment on a true fact -- then the defence of fair comment wouldn't apply.)

Debbie's worried that this might mark the start of open season on Christians, in terms of defamation. I have a few thoughts in response.

1. When was the last time a Christian sued an anti-Christian for defamation? I think it's exceedingly rare. So I don't think this SCC decision will suddenly stop Christians from suing in defamation law -- they weren't doing so frequently in the first place.

2. Anti-Christian bigotry was going full tilt before this ruling. I don't think this ruling will increase it. Defamation law, until this point, hadn't really been a barrier to Christophobia.

See update below.

Bernie "Burny" Farber, the executive director of the Canadian Jewish Congress, has converted to Islam. I think it's a wonderful symbol of tolerance on the part of the Official Jews of the CJC that they let Burny continue in his post.

Other than a conversion, how else can you explain Burny's behaviour?

I first detected that something was up when Burny came out in solidarity with Mohamed Elmasry, the anti-Semitic president-for-life of the Canadian Islamic Congress, giving an intimate interview to the Toronto Star's resident anti-Israel pundit, Haroon Siddiqui, in which Burny accused anyone who criticized Elmasry's complaint against Maclean's of being an "Islamophobe".

Maybe Burny will get a "media award" from Elmasry, just like Siddiqui received!

But Burny was just getting started.

Just last week he hit the media circuit, hard, to rebut a news story that warned of Hezbollah terrorist attacks against Jewish targets here in Canada.

Burny was quoted in the Globe and Mail, the CBC and Canadian Press stories far and wide saying that specific intelligence information was not real, and not imminent. How does Burny know? Because, he says, "Canadian authorities" have "told me categorically". Yes, I'm sure that Canada's spy agencies regularly give Burny classified briefings all the time. No need to worry -- Burny says all is clear!

Burny's quote in the story -- denying that terrorism is a real threat, downplaying anti-Semitic violence -- is astonishing. It's factually unsupportable -- Muslim terrorists have torched a synagogue in Edmonton, a school library in Montreal, and were caught before implementing even more massive schemes. Tut-tutting the risk of Muslim terror usually falls to Elmasry and his fellow terrorism excusers. But they're not too credible. Why not get a Jew to do the "there's nothing to see here, go back to sleep" propaganda for them?

Particularly astonishing is the contrast between Burny's "don't worry, be happy" approach to threats of real violence, and his hyperventilation at non-violent, if offensive, language on the Internet. There is no racial epithet Burny doesn't want the Canadian government to prosecute (well, in fairness, he hasn't called for the prosecution of his friend Elmasry's epithets). So he's all for the prosecution of mere words. But a terrorist threat? Calm down!

I receive a half-dozen e-mails a day from Jews across Canada -- including senior members of the community, including senior fundraisers -- who are just scratching their heads about the CJC, and Farber in particular. I've heard from Jews in Vancouver, Winnipeg and Toronto about trying to cut off their United Jewish Appeal funds to the CJC. It reminds of the grassroots revolt when the CJC prostituted itself to the government in 1992, and officially endorsed the doomed Charlottetown Accord. This time it's even weirder -- and grassroots Jews, the people Burny claims, without a mandate, to represent, are getting just as fed up.

I wouldn't worry too much about Burny, though. If the CJC actually listens to its "constituents" and gives the boot to Burny and his man-crush on Elmasry, he can always get a job with the Canadian Islamic Congress -- or even Al Jazeera.

UPDATE: I see by the comments that my attempt at satire was too subtle. No, I don't really think Burny has converted to Islam. I just think that he has become a dhimmi -- that he has become subservient to radical Islam. I think it's because his career has been so wedded to human rights commissions and their censorship, and now that radical Islamists are using his favourite vehicles, rather than renounce those HRCs as dangerous, he has done the mental gymnastics required to support their use of the HRCs, too. It's tough to repudiate one's past mistakes; too tough for Burny to do. But there are other voices in Canada's Jewish leadership that see the awful mistake made by the Jews when they endorsed political censorship.

You'd think someone who is an aspiring actress would have a little bit more composure than Pardy exhibited; that perhaps she might have had a bon mot or two of her own in reply to comedian Guy Earle's admittedly foul rant. Instead, she ran straight to the government. How pitiful. How weak. How un-self-confident. Her attempt at looking cool and composed in the above picture must have mustered the totality of her acting ability. I prophesy she will never rise above an un-credited extra.

I'm pleased to see that at least one of Pardy's tribe gets it: on the website from which I took this picture, she is denounced thusly:

...shame on you for implicating all of us in this shameless dance with the insatiable beast of censorship. I still remember a time not that long ago when books deemed to have explicit gay and lesbian content were not allowed into Canada, and now, thanks to the foolish and shortsighted tantrum of one sadly insecure little lesbian hipster, we can all look forward to another walk down that dark path.

thank you for bringing this distinctly fascist distortion of liberal thought into our community.

And here is a more contemporaneous report on the subject, from the gay magazine Xtra West. Note this cowardly comment:

The couple refused to comment for this article, on advice from legal counsel. "I can't even give you my name [to be] printed," said one of the women, who would only confirm her first name as Lorna.

But look at this interesting tid-bit: Zesty's (the nightclub) has been home to a lesbian comedy show for years:

Accounts of the incident have been making the rounds on the internet, with some calling for a boycott of Zesty's, while others say any action should target the comedian, not the venue which has played long-time host to queer artists like the comedy troupe Laff Riot Girls.

"We're collateral damage," says Lee Ann Keple of the lesbian-run comedy troupe that has held its shows at Zesty's for the past seven years. Keple says she has always had a good relationship with Zesty's management, and does not support the call for a boycott.

No matter to Pardy and her angry friends. They're suing not just Earle, but the restaurant, too. Given that Earle lives in Toronto and, as a comedian, is likely penniless, but Zesty's is stuck in Vancouver and is obviously a going concern, who do you think will foot the bill here in the end?

Pardy is a disgrace. But that's not the problem. The problem is that the Gordon Campbell's government has given that disgrace a powerful legal weapon in the form of the BCHRT.

What a disgusting new chapter in the grostesque book of Stalinism being written by Canada's HRCs.

Fire. Them. All.

I came across this discussion of the legal ethics behind the assault on Mark Steyn and Maclean's. It focuses on Khurrum Awan, one of the PR puppets for the Canadian Islamic Congress's president-for-life, Mohamed Elmasry.

I've already asked a few questions about the propriety of Awan, who was not a complainant in the B.C. suit against Steyn and Maclean's, testifying at the hearing in place of Elmasry. I had never heard of someone sending in a surrogate "witness" before. Hell, why not hire a professional actor? And how could Awan be assisting the CIC's legal team, while also being a witness for them?

Not just a witness -- a soon-to-be-employee. Awan's examination in chief was led by Faisal Joseph -- even though Awan has said that he will start working for Joseph when he's done articling at the courts. And then there was the bizarre spectacle of Awan giving hearsay testimony about what one of his fellow student sock-puppets had told him months earlier -- while she was just sitting a few feet away in court, at the table reserved for the CIC's lawyers.

As Woody Allen would say, it was a travesty of a mockery of a sham.

But Australia's skepticlawyer asks another question: what was Awan doing acting for a private client (the CIC) while still working as a clerk for the Ontario Superior Court of Justice? Did the court know that one of their clerks was moonlighting as junior counsel?

That's not the first time Awan has taken liberties with his position. Earlier this year, he sent an angry letter to Jason Kenney, the Conservative cabinet minister who has stood up for free speech, and signed it using his job title. As you can see in Kenney's delicious smack-down, that was highly inappropriate -- and Kenney brought it to the attention of the Chief Justice. I am told that, after Kenney's letter was received by the Chief, all of the law clerks were assembled and read the riot act about abusing their offices.

It doesn't sound like it sunk in to our little sock puppet, does it? 

Here's the CBC's "At Issue" political panel discussing the end of the Parliamentary session. Lots of smart comments throughout, but my favourite (of course) was Rex Murphy's pick for the most under-reported news story of the year: the war against freedom of speech prosecuted by Canada's human rights commissions (scroll forward to 2:30 minutes in). Rex calls the Conservative government's acceptance of the HRCs "very disturbing".

It's true; I still encounter MPs who are oblivious to the situation; and I bet that 90% of severely normal Canadians haven't evern heard of human rights commissions. But six months ago, that number would have been closer to 99%.

With insane decisions like the B.C. prosecution of the "un-funny" comedian, I expect that more and more Canadians will become familiar with these kangaroo courts, and they will continue to be denormalized. Yesterday's decision by the Canadian Human Rights Commission not to prosecute Mark Steyn and Maclean's was not a legal decision, but a P.R. decision by them. Too little, too late -- the denormalization of HRCs is well underway.

Today's decision by the Supreme Court of Canada about defamation law has shifted the balance from plaintiffs to defendants -- in other words, towards greater free speech. The court calls it a modernization, which it is -- phenomena like talk radio shows, partisan TV panels and the Internet were not around when defamation law was developing (it actually goes back 400 years). It also brings us more in synch with the U.S. approach to free speech, and breaks away from the European model of soft censorship.

In other words, it should terrify Canada's human rights commissions. I had no doubt before this decision that Canada's HRCs were conducting themselves in an unconstitutional manner -- exceeding the narrow censorship powers granted to them in the 1990 Taylor decision. Now it's a certainty that section 13 would be batted down by this free speech-loving court.

The facts of this case involved B.C.'s radio legend Rafe Mair, and a conservative activist named Kari Simpson. But the law applies to all cases in Canada going forward, not just theirs.

The decision is written in pretty plain English, unlike some of the 200-pages of opaque gobbledegook the court became known for in the 1990s that were likely the sign of indecision as much as anything. This decision is pretty clear.

Here are some key lines from the ruling:

In my view, with respect, the Court of Appeal unduly favoured protection of Kari Simpson’s reputation in a rancourous public debate in which she had involved herself as a major protagonist... 

In the absence of demonstrated malice on his part (which the trial judge concluded was not a dominant motive), his expression of opinion, however exaggerated, was protected by the law.  We live in a free country where people have as much right to express outrageous and ridiculous opinions as moderate ones.

...Mair has a reputation for provoking controversy.  With controversy has come a measure of commercial success.  His listeners expect to hear extravagant opinions and, according to his counsel, discount them accordingly.

...There is concern that matters of public interest go unreported because publishers fear the ballooning cost and disruption of defending a defamation action.  Investigative reports get “spiked”, the Media Coalition contends, because, while true, they are based on facts that are difficult to establish according to rules of evidence.  When controversies erupt, statements of claim often follow as night follows day, not only in serious claims (as here) but in actions launched simply for the purpose of intimidation.  Of course “chilling” false and defamatory speech is not a bad thing in itself, but chilling debate on matters of legitimate public interest raises issues of inappropriate censorship and self-censorship.  Public controversy can be a rough trade, and the law needs to accommodate its requirements.

...In much modern media, personalities such as Rafe Mair are as much entertainers as journalists.  The media regularly match up assailants who attack each other on a set topic.  The audience understands that the combatants, like lawyers or a devil’s advocate, are arguing a brief.  What is important in such a debate on matters of public interest is that all sides of an issue are forcefully presented, although the limitation that the opinions must be ones that could be “honestly express[ed] . . . on the proved facts” provides some boundary to the extent to which private reputations can be trashed in public discourse.

The decision doesn't end defamation suits, of course. It merely moves the fulcrum a bit, by widening the scope of what constitutes "fair comment". Fair comment must still be rooted in true facts; but if those facts are clear, and the defamer's comments are clearly his own views, the court will give latitude to even "outrageous" and "ridiculous" opinions.

The rule of thumb for writers -- and bloggers -- remains: get your facts straight. But the good news for free speechniks is that, if your facts are accurate, you can be dramatic, critical and even wrong in your opinions. It's good news for bloggers -- and bad news for censors everywhere. 

UPDATE: You can watch the video by clicking here and scrolling down.

UPDATE 2: See below.

Congratulations to CHCH TV out of Hamilton. They had me on a show today, along with a comedian, debating the decision by the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal to put a comedian on trial for unfunny jokes about lesbian hecklers. I say congratulations, because the CHCH editors managed to find someone in Canada who was willing to defend the BCHRT's decision to have the trial. That's impressive.

They found this support in the personage of Susan Cole, the senior entertainment editor of Toronto's NOW Magazine, pictured at left. She's smiling -- I think -- which is odd, because Cole has a very particular definition of what's funny.

She called the remarks by the comedian in question "hate speech" and "discrimination", and said they "weren't funny". That's pretty impressive, given that there hasn't been a trial yet. But I think Cole understands the human rights industry just fine -- everyone's guilty; it's just a matter of who's unlucky enough to be charged.

Until now, HRCs have tried to dress up their political censorship as something else -- not as political hygiene, but as eradicating "hate". That's a neat trick, given that hate, like love, is an innate human emotion, and can't really be eradicated through laws -- though hate can surely be exacerbated by them. But now HRCs -- with Cole's delighted support -- are now taking it upon themselves to determine what is or isn't "funny", even at a comedy night.

Finally, we have some top talent looking into the matter of what is or isn't funny. Forget about Jerry Seinfeld or Jay Leno; we've got the dour sourpusses at the HRCs on the file. Once they come up with the magic recipe, wannabe comedians around the world will simply have to follow the instructions of the HRCs, and -- presto! -- the laughs will follow. At least that's the logic of a government agency that seeks to be the arbiter of what is or isn't funny.

I was asked by the host how this would affect Vancouver; I said I doubt the Just For Laughs Festival would be visiting anytime soon -- talk about a frenzy of hate crimes! And I asked if Eddie Murphy or Chris Rock, both of whom use the word n*gger the same way you and I use the words "and" and "the", would be allowed into town.

Cole had a quick answer: yes they would. Because they're allowed to make Black jokes, even using the word n*gger. But Whites can't. I'd have to read the transcript to be sure, but I think Cole implied that not only would the same joke told by a White comedian be illegal, it wouldn't even be funny. This, from the "senior entertainment editor" of an arts magazine.

That's nuts, of course. But, from a "human rights" "law" point of view, Cole is actually spot on. Under our "human rights" "jurisprudence", Mark Steyn and Maclean's were subjected to a five-day "hate speech" trial for "Islamophobia" in Vancouver for quoting radical Muslims. The radical Muslims who made the offensive remarks weren't charged (though the BCHRT asserts its jurisdiction not only nationally, but internationally); but Steyn and Maclean's were charged for repeating them. That's actually Cole's logic: a lesbian can crack a joke about lesbians. But a straight woman, or a man, can't. Same joke; but only a special victim group is allowed to tell it.

That's perfect politically correct logic for you -- and it's why, for example, Canada's feminists have been largely silent about the Muslim honour killings, polygamy and even female genital mutilation in Canada. Because Cole is merely a white woman; her poker hand is trumped by women of colour; and nothing beats the full house of a foreign-born, visible minority, Muslim. So traditional liberal values like free speech, the equality of men and women, and non-violence towards women, take a back seat to the politically correct value of not insulting "the other".

Cole was genuinely excited about this comedian being charged with "hate speech" for making fun of lesbians -- all the while acknowledging that the same jokes would be fine if the joke-teller was lesbian. What a horrid world Cole wants us to live in.

It got me thinking, though. What kind of jokes could Barack Obama tell? His mom was White; is he Black enough to tell Black jokes? How about someone who is one quarter Black? One eighth? Are they only allowed to tell gentle Black jokes, but the really tough ones are reserved for very black-skinned Blacks?

Could a straight woman pretend to be a lesbian in order to tell jokes about lesbians? How would Susan Cole propose to check her bona fides? And how about bi-sexuals?

Could a transexual -- a man who "became" a woman -- tell jokes about women? Even if he was still six feet tall, and looked pretty masculine?

Can anyone tell a joke that begins "a priest and a rabbi walk into a bar", or would you need two people to tell that one?

Can you convert to Islam, tell some Muslim jokes, and then convert back when the show is done (provided you're not executed for apostasy)?

If a lesbian tells a joke about lesbians, and it's not funny, do you still have to laugh? If you don't, is that discrimination?

There are so many rules about the "new comedy". All of which are lustily supported by a very angry woman named Susan Cole, and soul mates on the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal. I'm sure that the comedians of the world will be hanging on their every word, and following their position papers on what jokes are funny and what jokes aren't.

Aleksander Solzhenitsyn, the Nobel Prize-winning writer, was sentenced by a troika to eight years in a labour camp for writing a joke about Joseph Stalin -- he made fun of Stalin's moustache, calling him "the whiskered one". An estimated 200,000 Russians were sent to the Gulag for making jokes. 

It is a mistake to think that freedom only grows; that once achieved, it always remains. The malign human instinct to control one's neighbours, to silence one's foes, is eternal. There are Stalins in every generation; they must be met with Solzhenitsyns in every generation.

UPDATE 2: Susan Cole said in the clip that George Carlin never said anything hateful. Uh, okay. A commenter provides this clip of him responding to a heckler. I'm not saying it's pretty; I'm just saying Cole is clueless.

Here's a friendly review of the fight for free speech in this week's Eye Weekly, a Toronto magazine with an arts/left-wing flavour. A few excerpts from a great big article:

..Complaints were filed [about the Western Standard's publication of the Danish cartoons] with the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship Commission, to which Levant responded politely — hoping that they could work things out. But the complaint by the Edmonton Muslim Council wasn’t going away, even though the Western Standard did, suspending its print edition — and annual boat cruises — last October, after losing around $4 million in four years of operation.

That opened a window of opportunity for Levant to investigate the investigators: for prosecuting the publishing of images of Muhammad, was the Canadian government facilitating the enforcement of sharia law? How could the 15 bureaucrats handling his file be experts in every field, as their jurisdiction required them to be? And why was he expected to take their opinion seriously?

...The curtain rose in January of this year, when his defiant appearance before a human rights investigator was filmed — and promptly posted online, putting Levant’s daily blog diatribes in context. The debate that sparked the complaint has been eclipsed by a different one, turning Levant into a foe of the Jewish status quo, which has historically availed itself of similar Canadian bureaucratic channels to shut down outlets for anti-Semitism.

Meanwhile, he finds himself being supported by left wingers squinting to see beyond Levant’s well-cultivated partisan persona. “My personal temperament is that of a scrappy guy. I won’t say I don’t enjoy fighting back, but there are real costs involved with me doing this — even if I’ve received support on the legal side, there’s also the matter of stress, and time.

...Censorship of objectionable content seemed to be a recurring theme in Canada when material classified as pornographic would have to be physically imported across the border to be seen, heard or read. First they came for the art movies, then they came for the rap albums, then they came for the lesbian bookstores… and then, over time, dangerous artistic ideas were no longer put on trial.

When it comes to human rights commission tribunals on the editorial content of magazines, however, it seems the wake-up call is coming from inside the house. Like the earlier battles around border bureaucrats, the human rights commission fight, pivotally, is one of justice administered outside the criminal and civil courts. In human rights tribunals, unlike in hate crime or libel proceedings, the accused has no right to be judged by a jury of peers, no right to confront the accuser, no method of recovering legal costs in cases of frivolous prosecution, and none of the traditional defences for speech violations — fair comment and truth, notably — are available to defendants. If a complaint is deemed worthy of investigation, the tribunal becomes simultaneously investigator, prosecutor, judge and jury — a situation, critics point out, hundreds of years of constitutional tradition has removed from Western justice systems.

 Levant feels his case deserves to be taken at least as seriously as the proposed amendment to Bill C-10, which threatens to withdraw tax credits from Canadian filmmakers who cross a moral line, resulting in protests from the arts community. Gradually, he’s gained support from organizations like PEN Canada, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and gay rights group EGALE — strange bedfellows for someone mostly recognized as a ranting neo-con stereotype. Yet he shoots down any suggestion that his world-view might be perceived as quirky.


...Omar Ha-Redeye, a 29-year-old University of Western Ontario student who contributes to the blog Law Is Cool — where human rights commissions aren’t being dismissed out of hand — feels Levant has abused his high-profile platform.

“The only distinguishing feature between this case and the previous ones is that the respondent has taken it upon himself to start a campaign against the human-rights commissions, rather than resolve it quietly and efficiently,” says Ha-Redeye. “Had he taken on the issue prior, there’s a possibility they would have summarily dismissed the complaint as a frivolous retaliation for his activities.

“The problem is that Levant has conflated this issue with other HRC issues, and quite deliberately. These commissions have done enormous good in Canada in the past — their informality, which he criticizes, is intended to provide flexibility.”

At the other end of the spectrum sits Denyse O’Leary...

“The commissioners strike me as middle-class busybodies anxious to meddle in anything they can,” she says. “Failed professionals who will blender into any area, and then assess that. It seems to me that they lack a sense of boundaries, and imagine that they can remake society into whatever they think it should be.

“No society can be free if being upset is seen as a source of harm. Part of being an adult is to deal with what upsets you. I see things that upset me all the time.”

And what Ezra Levant seems most upset with are the people he feels have betrayed him most — the “official Jews” who turned hate monitoring into a career, making celebrities out of people espousing unpopular views in far-flung places, like Hitler-loving First Nations chief David Ahenakew.

Leo Adler, director of national affairs for Friends of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre showed up to heckle Levant, claiming that since the number of anti-Semitic websites based in Canada has gone from one to 8,000 over the course of 13 years, the law is therefore more necessary than ever. The quarter century separating Adler from Levant may well just be a generation gap, however. Does the power to post something online equate to actual power?

“The biggest problem is that people like him want to re-fight World War II,” says Levant. “However, the threat is no longer Hitler’s Holocaust — it’s Ahmadinejad’s.”

Remember, an attempt to make this point by republishing cartoons is what sparked this issue in the first place. The book that Ezra Levant signed a deal last week to write was spawned by his months of research into human rights commissions in Canada, putative experts in everything from public pot smoking, to transsexual labiaplasty, to the editorial content of magazines. Told he could solve his case with a cash settlement, Levant balked, and turned it into an investment in his public profile. But he insists that it’s not all about him. “The story is about human rights used as a sword to hurt people rather than shield them, and how there are massive abuses in this parallel justice system.

“I refuse to be the latest in an assembly line of people ground into powder.” 

See update below.

The Canadian Human Rights Commission, like any petty tyranny, has a strong instinct for survival. As I predicted last week on the Michael Coren Show, that instinct would cause them to drop the complaint against Mark Steyn and Maclean's. And so they did.

With an RCMP investigation, a Privacy Commission investigation and a pending Parliamentary investigation, they're already fighting a multi-front P.R. war, and losing badly. Not a day goes by when the CHRC isn't pummelled in the media. Holding a show trial of Maclean's and Steyn, like the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal did earlier this month, would be writing their own political death sentence.

So they blinked. Against everything in their DNA, they let Maclean's go. That's the first smart thing they've done; because the sooner they can get the public scrutiny to go away, the sooner they can go about prosecuting their less well-heeled targets, people who can't afford Canada's best lawyers and command the attention and affection of the country's literati.

"There's nothing to see here, people! So turn your TV cameras off, and let us continue on our work without your scrutiny! We promise not to target famous Canadians -- at least not for a little while. We'll keep picking on under-lawyered weaklings. We'll continue to build up our jurisprudence, continue our 100% conviction rate, continue building legal precedents. So when we come for Maclean's next time, we won't have to blink."

Here's Maclean's reply, which is far more polite than I would have been:

...Though gratified by the decision, Maclean's continues to assert that no human rights commission, whether at the federal or provincial level, has the mandate or the expertise to monitor, inquire into, or assess the editorial decisions of the nation's media. And we continue to have grave concerns about a system of complaint and adjudication that allows a media outlet to be pursued in multiple jurisdictions on the same complaint, brought by the same complainants, subjecting it to costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars, to say nothing of the inconvenience. We enthusiastically support those parliamentarians who are calling for legislative review of the commissions with regard to speech issues.

The only question remaining is whether Heather MacNaughton, chief kangaroo of the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal, will convict Maclean's. The "jurisprudence" is there; Maclean's surely is "guilty" of "likely" "exposing" someone to "hatred or contempt". Everyone's guilty of that; so the only question is who gets charged.

Will MacNaughton save her skin -- and preserve her tax-funded sinecure, like the CHRC is trying to do? Or will she continue her Stalinist approach to speech? Tough call; her decision in the comedy case shows she's as nutty as a Snickers Bar. But I'm still betting she'll acquit Maclean's. She'll throw that big fish back into the sea, so she can continue to haul in lots of smaller ones with political impunity.

UPDATE: Several readers ask if this means that section 13, the thought crimes section, no longer has a 100% conviction rate. No -- it still does. Because that 100% conviction rate is at the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. The agency that refused to run with the complaint was the Canadian Human Rights Commission. They're the pretend police and prosecutors; the CHRT are the pretend judges. Every single section 13 case the CHRC has brought to the CHRT has resulted in a conviction, and there's no reason to think the Maclean's case would have bucked that trend. The CHRC blinked, and decided not to prosecute. They knew that to do so would have been political suicide. Better to keep going after powerless, and often lawyerless, targets.

Guy Earle, a Toronto comedian, must now stand trial before the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal on the charge of telling unfunny jokes.

That sounds like a joke itself, but it's not.

In May, 2007, Earle was hosting a comedy night at Zesty's restaurant in Vancouver. He says a couple of lesbians came in, got drunk and starting making out right in front of the stage. He said they also heckled him and other comedians.

In other words, like anyone else -- gay, straight or otherwise -- they set themselves up for some wise-cracks. And crack wise Earle did.

But didn't he know he was in the People's Republic of British Columbia?

Lorna Pardy, one of the humourless lesbians, filed a complaint against Earle and Zesty's. In B.C., unlike other human rights commissions, it is possible to make a preliminary application to dismiss a complaint.

That application to dismiss was rejected this week. Here is the ruling, that commits the matter to go to trial.

Take a look at who wrote it: Heather MacNaughton, the same tribunal member who chaired Mark Steyn's show trial earlier this month.

In that trial, too, the funny-ness of jokes became an issue. The Canadian Islamic Congress said that some of Mark Steyn's jokes weren't funny, but they also insisted that the CBC's awful "sitcom", Little Mosque on the Prairies, was indeed funny, and if Steyn didn't think so, he was a racist.

So MacNaughton feels comfortable in her self-appointed role as government joke-tester.

Oh, there's a joke here alright.

I lament this further loss of freedom and loss of common sense. I lament the fact that one thin-skinned radical lesbian activist is perpetuating the new stereotype of gays as intolerant of any criticism or dissent. I'm sure that EGALE would oppose this lawsuit, because they know it just looks bad, bad, bad on their community who themselves use trangressive art, including comedy, to deal with difficult issues. What do you think Rosie O'Donnell would have done -- whine to the government, or heckle back?

But, as I've said before, in this battle, the worse the better. Just days after George Carlin died -- the comedian who broke boundaries about what could or couldn't be said in comedy -- we have this stunning example of censorship. Not just censorship, but a clear swipe as the entire theory of comedy, the anything goes realm where society's foibles are mercilessly poked and prodded -- and where connoisseurs of humour freely attend, knowing they'll likely have an ox or two of their own that's gored. If comedians are no longer allowed to offend -- let alone respond to rude hecklers -- then comedy will cease to exist.

I think Heather MacNaughton has just made herself -- and the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal -- a punchline in a thousand jokes to come.

This goes to the theme I've mentioned before: once you start censoring "offensive" ideas, there's no stopping, and no-one is safe, because the word "offensive" is so vague. Once it was neo-Nazis; then it was conservatives and Christians, now it's comedians who pick on drunk hecklers.

Here's a video clip of Earle talking about the case. Is it rude? Sure it is. Is it funny? Funny is in the ear of the beholder. Is this any of the government of British Columbia's business? Hell no. 

We've talked about Pearl Eliadis before. She's a member of the human rights jet-set -- a former director of the Ontario Human Rights Commission, a woman who has seen the world on our dime, fighting against what she calls hatemongererers. Here's my introduction to Eliadis.

As I mentioned recently, she gave a rant at the luxurious HRC get-away the other weekend at beautiful Niagara-on-the Lake.

A friend has sent me a copy of her PowerPoint presentation, which you can view here.

It's the kind of thing that human rights grantrepreneurs love to do -- give a self-serving PowerPoint presentation to other human rights workers, in a five-star hotel, on the government's tab. I'd like to know how many thousands of dollars Eliadis got paid for that, on top of a lovely weekend by the lake, but I'll likely never find out.

Let me draw your attention to a few things in Eliadis's presentation that offer us a window into the mindset of the HRC industry.

Look at her description of the media response to recent HRCs' attacks on freedom of speech. She calls it "hysteria."

My first thought, of course, was to file a human rights complaint against her. Hysteria is rooted in the Greek word for uterus, and it was considered a women's malady. In other words, Eliadis is engaging in both sexism and able-ism. But I digress. I know what Eliadis means. Media hysteria simply means things she disagrees with. Just like "hate speech", means political ideas she disagrees with, and "discrimination" means Canadians' day to day choices she disagrees with. It's a lot easier to denounce someone as mentally ill (hysteria) or criminal (illegally discriminating) than to argue with them. That's a trick that Bernie "Burny" Farber knows.

But look at what she claims is hysterical: the use of the phrases "thought police", "convictions" and even "prosecutions".

But what else is the order from Alberta's HRC, telling Rev. Stephen Boissoin that he must renounce his religious views, if not the work of thought police?

And what do you call the issuance of such an order, along with thousands of dollars in punitive fines, if not a "conviction"?

And, to take my own case as an example, what is an 850-day, 15-person investigation by the government, if not a "prosecution"?

Is that really evidence of "media hysteria"? Or is Eliadis's name-calling simply her way of avoiding a difficult debate?

On her next page, Eliadis says that this subject has gone from "an interesting debate" to a "storm of controversy". I guess the difference, for her, is that what she called an interesting debate was when no-one was challenging her. Now that her arguments are being demolished by the blogosphere and mainstream media alike, it's mere controversy. Whatever gets you through the night, I guess.

On page 9 of her presentation, Eliadis tries to make the case for strict regulation of speech, claiming that it's "the most powerful human act". I suppose in an intellectual sense it is. But I'd say that murder is a more powerful human act. My point being, speech itself never killed anyone. The Jews of the Holocaust weren't killed by name-calling; the were killed when they were killed by violence. Their "right" not to be hated wasn't a real right. Their right to property, mobility, freedom of association, self-defence and ultimately to life were taken away. Speech couldn't touch them, other than their feelings, until Germany undid the real human rights protecting Jews.

Eliadis calls speech a "powerful weapon". But that is only true metaphorically, just like TV's "Crossfire" is not really a cross-fire, and a media "scrum" is not really a scrum, etc. Eliadis is being deliberately tricky; she is using a metaphor for violence, a metaphor for a true crime, to try to criminalize mere speech. It's a common trick, and you see it often with the mis-use of phrases like "gay bashing", which are used interchangeably to mean mere criticism, and actually physical "bashing". It's a deliberate attempt to blur the lines between words and violence. On page 11, she does this again, claiming that speech "poisoned" the environment. Again, poisoning someone is a real crime, which is why those words are stretched and misused to cover mere rudeness.

On page 13, Eliadis hints at her real agenda: hijacking and commandeering Canada's media, and subjecting them to HRC meddling. She wants "poisonous" -- hell, why not just say "murderous" while you're at it! -- speech in the mainstream media to lose its "immunity" from Eliadis and her group of would-be editors. She loved Rick Salutin's comment that "money controls the media", a Marxist complaint that seems touchingly quaint, in the era of the Internet. Neither Eliadis nor Salutin spring to mind when I think of the word "modern", so they probably don't know much about how the Inter-Webs work, but money is no substitute for good ideas, as the New York Times's shareholders are discovering.

As happens quite often, Eliadis reaches for foreign legal traditions when she wants to supplant our own legal traditions of liberty. Readers will recall that Ian Fine did so in his debate against me on CPAC -- he complained that we're out of synch with the United Nations -- run by such moral exemplars are China and Iran. So, too, Eliadis excuses her soft fascism by appealling to an obsolete, unCanadian foreign treaty, on page 14, claiming that we need to impose "special responsibilities and duties" on our media. Needless to say, those special duties will be in fulfilling Eliadis's world view.

Perhaps the most telling page in Eliadis's PowerPoint is on page 16. She is obviously referring to Mark Steyn, when she talks about Muslim demographics and "controversy entrepreneurs". That's quite a comment coming from a grantrepreneur like herself. Just a reminder: Steyn didn't file the complaints against himself that cause the "controvery"; the Canadian Islamic Congress did, and three human rights commissions humoured them. As a leftist might say, Eliadis is blaming the victim.

(I think the world needs "controversy entrepreneurs". To me, that means someone who helps the public work through controversial issues of the day. That includes scholars, the media, politicians, think tanks -- anyone who deals with spicy matters. The human rights commissions would shut down any meaningful disagreement over controversial matters. If that's the choice, I'm on the side of people who actually plumb disagreements, not paper them over.

But do HRCs actually paper over controversies? These days, HRC positively advertise for controversy -- whether it's Barbara Hall's call to have racial complaints "spike", or Alberta's 60,000 brochures teaching new immigrants how to bitch about life to HRCs. I think the real controversy "entrepreneurs", in the bad sense of the word, were in the hotel with Eliadis.)

But look at what she says then: it's largely irrelevant that Steyn's facts are true. If Steyn uses those true facts to "vilify" someone -- say, radical Muslim terrrorists -- he's still guilty of a human rights crime. Truth is not a defence. Eliadis compares Steyn to Rwandan radio stations exhorting murder. That's an execrable comparison -- Steyn has not been accused of inciting murder; again Eliadis blurs mere speech and violence. But, again, it wasn't a Rwandan radio station that killed people. It was soldiers with machetes.

Let me conclude as Eliadis does, with the quote she wanted to leave her fellow HRC activists with:

"there is no real freedom of speech if the media do not provide an outlet for other viewpoints more nearly equal to the outlet they reserve for their own."

Again, it's a Marxist comment; and it's hopelessly outdated in the era of the Internet. But it shows the lean and hungry eye with which the HRCs look at Canada's media.

I'm glad that every journalist in the country (except Bernie "Burny" Farber's friend, Haroon Siddiqui) gets it: they're coming for Ezra Levant and Mark Steyn today, and for the Globe and Mail and Toronto Star tomorrow.

UPDATE: A commenter or two points out that Eliadis engaged in outright fibbery in one of her PowerPoint slides. She claimed that, as part of the "media hysteria", the Ontario Human Rights Commission's guilty-verdict-without-a-trial was called a "drive-by shooting". Uh, no it wasn't. It was called a "drive-by verdict" (by Mark Steyn himself), which is actually funny, and true.

But that fact isn't quite useful enough for Eliadis, as she tries to portray her critics as violent, is it? So she amends the truth; changes the facts; and then presents it to her echo chamber of fellow human rights jet-setters. What a liar.

Fire. Them. All.

Mohamed Elmasry, the Jew-hating president-for-life of the Canadian Islamic Congress, somehow managed to get an Op-Ed in his hometown paper, the Kitchener-Waterloo Record. I hear it's part of a series devoted to "marginalized voices". I understand that David Duke will have a column next week.

Let's point out the usual lies in Elmasry's column. Here's one:

...four Canadian Muslim law students launched human rights complaints against Maclean's magazine with respect to its October 2006 article, The Future Belongs to Islam, written by Mark Steyn. The Canadian Islamic Congress, of which I am president, acted as a facilitator.

That's a lie, of course. Those students were PR puppets; the actual "style of cause" of the suits was Elmasry vs. Rogers. It's a useful lie, because it allows Elmasry to avoid direct contact with the press, other than through scripted Op-Eds, for fear he'll be asked about his comments approving the murder of Jews.

Here's another lie:

On March 30, 2007, the law students met with Maclean's senior editors and proposed that the magazine publish a balanced response to Steyn's article from a mutually acceptable source.

The response was that Maclean's "would rather go bankrupt."

That, too, is a convenient lie. As I reported from the courtroom of the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal, Khurrum Awan, one of Elmasry's PR puppets, admitted under oath many, many, many, many, many, many times that the CIC never asked Maclean's for an article to be published, written by a "mutually acceptable source". It was to be an author of the CIC's own choosing. Their claim of wanting a "mutually acceptable" writer was a lie, a PR trick, to make them seem slightly less unreasonable.

Either way -- mutually acceptable choice or not -- it was still an outrageous shakedown, a violation of Maclean's property rights and freedom of the press, and quite possibly extortion. The fact that Elmasry still lies about it is not surprising -- a man who justifies of the murder of Jews wouldn't blink at merely lying. What's surprising is that the K-W Record would publish such exposed lies, to their own discredit.

Elmasry's last comment is instructive:

Nevertheless, media attacks against the complainants, the Canadian Islamic Congress and the human rights commissions have continued, non-stop since the case against Maclean's was made public earlier this year.

He's right on that one. The Canadian Islamic Congress has received near-universal condemnation in the media for its shakedown and prosecution of Maclean's. Elmasry would like to ascribe that to "Islamophobia". Uh, no. It's not that he's Muslim that makes us feel "hatred and contempt" for him. It's that he's a fascist, a censor, a bully and a destroyer of our liberties. The fact that he does so in the name of all Canadian Muslims (the actual sign on the court room in the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal hearing read "Mohamed Elmasry on behalf of Muslims in British Columbia") is a pity, though, for, no doubt, many people watching Elmasry's hijacking of our legal system in the name of Islam would indeed feel antipathy towards not just Elmasry, but to Islam and even B.C. Muslims. How unfair to them, when it was a lone bigot from Ontario who instigated that trial, illegitimately using the name of all Muslims.

But I cannot end this post without agreeing with Elmasry on a particular point: he argues that his fascist approach to censoring his opponents was not invented by him. It was built by Canada's Official Jews, especially by his friends at the Canadian Jewish Congress. He writes:

In 1998, someone representing Canadian Jews filed a complaint with the British Columbia Human Rights Commission against North Shore News columnist Doug Collins. The commission ordered Collins to pay $2,000 in damages to the complainant for "injury to his dignity, feelings and self-respect." The commission also ordered the North Shore News to cease publishing statements that expose Jews "to hatred and contempt."

A lawyer with the Canadian Jewish Congress was quoted by the Jewish Independent on Dec. 21, 2001, saying the decision reflects Canadian legal precedents which recognize that certain types of speech are not legally permissible, especially if they are seen to cause public harm.

I regret that Elmasry is correct on that point. Bernie "Burny" Farber has long argued for the right to censor one's political and religious opponents. That he has done so in the name of all Jews is a scandal, and one that all Canadian Jews are paying for with their reputations.

Farber has about as much democratic legitimacy to speak for "the Jews" as Elmasry has to speak for "the Muslims". Both of them share a love for the bullying power of the state; both of them would rather gag their opponents than debate them; both of them are eroding our Canadian values with their own soft fascism; both of them are bringing the public name of their religions into disrepute.

The difference is that Elmasry knows exactly what he's doing: using Burny Farber as a "useful idiot", a PR cover, just like Elmasry used Khurrum Awan as a useful cover. The end game is the gagging of opposition to radical Islam. What luck for Elmasry that he has a damned fool like Burny Farber to take the flak for him.

Rob Wells is an anti-Christian bigot. That's fine -- Canada is a free country, and people are free to be bigots, just as long as they don't get violent about it. Hate isn't against the law. (Well, actually it is, under section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. But no-one has ever been charged under that law for saying anything anti-Christian. It has only been used against Christians. And, while we're on the subject, not a single Muslim has been charged under that law, either.)

Wells has filed a series of complaints with Canada's human rights commissions, trying to bully Christians into silence. He's sued the Christian Heritage Party. He's sued Catholic Insight, a magazine. As usual, Wells doesn't have to pay a penny for this persecution -- the government happily provides the investigators and lawyers to do so. The CHP and Catholic Insight have to pay their own bills, and they won't be compensated even if they win.

All of this is old news, as are the other petty abuses rained down upon those unlucky enough to be trapped in Canada's grotesque HRC system. But what struck me in this interesting story in the Sun, was Wells's hubristic view that he is the arbiter of what is Catholic doctrine or not. Forget that Benedict XVI fellow over in Rome, and forget Catholic Insight's own editor, Alphonse de Valk, a man who also happens to be a priest. Look at this excerpt from the story:

[Wells] argues the material on [Catholic Insight's] website "does not represent Catholic teaching" and wants the human rights commission to proceed with his complaint expeditiously.

"It's hateful, discriminatory and it has to be challenged," argues Wells, who adds the controversy is not about religious freedom.

"I don't care what they say from their pulpit," he says. "But when they put hate messages or messages that are likely to expose minority groups to hatred or contempt, it's against the human rights legislation."

There are more than 1.1 billion Catholics in the world, and there are countless denominations and orders that "represent" a spectrum of interpretations of Catholic teaching. Fr. de Valk represents one way, a way that is surely more in synch with that of the Vatican than Wells's views, which are overtly heretical.

Freedom of religion -- as well as freedom of speech -- means that Fr. de Valk can believe whatever he wants to, even mere Christianity, the bedrock of Western civilization. But Wells would have the government of Canada, through its agency, the Canadian Human Rights Commission, order Fr. de Valk to censor himself, on the basis that his views were not "representative" of true Catholicism, or were otherwise illegal.

It's one thing for Wells to harbour the delusion that he's the pope, and that he knows better what being Catholic means than a Catholic priest. But it's quite another for the Canadian government to humour Wells's conceit, and grind Fr. de Valk through months of procedure and tens of thuosands of legal fees while they consider Wells's absurd anti-Christian gambit.

The second comment by Wells is equally revolting. He says that he doesn't care what Catholics say in church, only what they say in public, such as on the Internet. That's logically inconsistent, of course -- if he's truly worried about "hate", it makes no sense to approve of it in a building but not in a newspaper. That's not important; Wells has the right to be an illogical twit. Again, what's troubling here is that he would have the government of Canada, through the Canadian Human Rights Commission, sweep Christians out of the public square, and into the silence and seclusion of their churches. And anyone who knows the history of ghettoes knows that's probably just the first step.

Again, Wells is allowed to have his bigoted views that Christians can be quietly Christian, but ought not to be able to share their views publicly. That's just "hatred and contempt", and as long as Wells doesn't get violent about it, that ought to be his right. But for him to petition the government to enforce his bigotry -- and for the government to consider it for the better part of a year -- is the scandal.

Every society has its haters, like Wells. But only when those haters have access to the power of the state are the rest of us truly in danger.

That's what's happening now. It doesn't feel like Canada, does it?

Here's a powerful public letter from Bishop Fred Henry of Calgary to Ed "Ed" Stelmach, the Premier of Alberta and overseer of the bigoted human rights order against Rev. Stephen Boissoin -- including a lifetime ban on that pastor from commenting on moral issues, and an order for him to publicly renounce his faith. (If you think the previous sentence is a typo, or fiction, see my blog post here.)

Bishop Henry himself was the subject of a shakedown by the Alberta human rights commission a few years back. He settled that claim by "clarifying" his statement on gay marriage. I think that he regrets that act of compromise, since it obviously emboldened the HRC. If they could roll the Bishop, they could surely roll a poor, low-profile pastor. Bishop Henry is making up for lost time. Some excerpts, with some of my favourite parts in bold:

Dear Premier Stelmach:

I have raised the issue of the Alberta Human Rights Commission several times with you in the past 18 months. On each of those occasions, you said that you understood the issues and shared my concerns. However, the situation is continuing to deteriorate across our country and the various levels of governments are seemingly non-responsive...

Each judgment emanating out of our various human right commissions seems to be more brazen and bizarre than the one that preceded it. However, for inane stupidity and gross miscarriage of justice our own Alberta Human Rights Tribunal deserves to take first prize for its treatment of Stephen Boissoin.

June 2008: The Alberta Human Rights Tribunal fined Stephen Boissoin, $5,000.

Section 30 of the Alberta Human Rights Act states: "Evidence may be given before a human rights panel in any manner that the panel considers appropriate, and the panel is not bound by the rules of law respecting evidence in judicial proceedings."

It would also seem that this panel is also not bound by reasonable argument or the elementary rules of logic but is free to skewer anyone not espousing and proclaiming politically correct views.

Darren Lund, the complainant, said that Boissoin's words in his 2002 letter to the Red Deer Advocate were hateful, and furthermore, an assault on a gay teenager three weeks later could be connected to them. No proof of either was presented.

Lori Andreachuk, the chairperson of the tribunal, agreed that his words were "likely" to expose gays, "a vulnerable" group to hatred due to their sexual orientation. No court in the land would connect the letter and the assault but this silly tribunal did.

Andreachuk acknowledged, "In this case, there is no specific individual who can be compensated as there is no direct victim who has come forward."

However, she also wrote: "Dr. Lund, although not a direct victim, did expend considerable time and energy and suffered ridicule and harassment as a result of his complaint. The panel finds therefore that he is entitled to some compensation." One might ask on what grounds?

She concluded that Boissoin "shall pay to Dr. Lund an award for damages, jointly and severally, in the amount of $5,000." Lund wasn't the victim of any kind of discrimination and yet he is handsomely paid and, subsequently, was feted as Gay Pride Parade marshall in Calgary.

The tribunal effectively stripped Boissoin of his right to freedom of speech. "Mr. Boissoin . . . shall cease publishing in newspapers, by email, on the radio, in public speeches, or on the Internet, in future, disparaging remarks about gays and homosexuals."

What is meant by "disparaging"? This is tantamount to ruling out honest debate and a plurality of views in the public sphere lest someone be offended by a differing viewpoint.

...The tribunal decided to extract a further pound of flesh by way of public humiliation. "Mr. Boissoin and The Concerned Christian Coalition Inc. provide Dr. Lund with a written apology for the article in the Red Deer Advocate which was the subject of this complaint." What happens if Lund is not satisfied with the apology?

Mr. Premier, we have talked enough about the inadequate provisions of and appointment to the Alberta Human Rights Tribunals. It is time to repeal Section 3(1)(b) of the Alberta Human Rights Act and to protect the rights of religious freedom. Every person has the right to make public statements and participate in public debate on religious grounds.

Gentle reader, what do you think? Do you think that Stelmach will continue to ignore and stonewall on this issue? Or do you think that Bishop Henry's letter will elicit a response? And, if so, what response?

The Globe and Mail weighs in with yet another editorial calling for the abolition of section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act -- the "hate speech" section. An excerpt:

...Like its sibling in the B.C. Human Rights Code (at the core of the Maclean's hearing in Vancouver earlier this month), section 13 of the federal statute is aimed at what is "likely to expose" people to hatred or contempt because of ethnicity, religion and other specified factors. Evidence of such a likelihood - in the absence of a solid science of mass psychology on which to base expert testimony - is bound to be dubious, and there are no defences of the kind found in civil lawsuits about damage to reputation, such as fair comment.

Back in 1990, a case from the federal human-rights commission about the hate-message section made its way up to the Supreme Court of Canada. Khurrum Awan, one of the instigators of one of the trio of complaints against Maclean's, has portrayed the court's decision in that case as an active recommendation of section 13, in preference to the hate-speech sections of the Criminal Code. In fact, both the majority and the dissenting minority were troubled that the hate-message section is not limited to cases where there is hateful intent, though the majority was sufficiently comforted that the Human Rights Act's penalties were less drastic than the Criminal Code's.

Whether or not the future belongs to Islam, as Mr. Steyn fears, both the present and future belong in large measure to the Internet. A statutory provision that once restrained racist cranks who were putting telephones to wicked uses now threatens public debate in the press on matters of concern to all Canadians. It may well have been too broad in 1990, as three out of seven Supreme Court judges then thought; it is much too broad in the 21st century.

I like that argument a lot. It's philosophically principled. But it also refers to the pragmatic problem: in the era of the Internet, such vague and far-reaching censorship is bound to fail.

Here is Glenn Reynolds, professor of law and Instapundit:

When the stormtroopers wear clown shoes instead of jackboots, it's easy to forget that they're still stormtroopers.

I like that, too. Because it's right: when Canadians (and Americans) start to ridicule the human rights commissions, we're well on the way to reforming or abolishing them. But, until that change is wrought, they're still brutal censors.

As per Michael Teper's comment, I poked around some of the expense reports on the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal's website.

My favourite -- no surprise -- is that of Athanasios Hadjis, their chief censor.

Allow me to draw your attention to two entries.

The first is a lunch that Hadjis had last fall with Heather MacNaughton of the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal. She was the chair of Mark Steyn's show trial last month in Vancouver. I can only imagine all the tips and tricks Hadjis -- who boasts a 100% conviction rate for "hate speech" -- was sharing with her.

But what's more telling is that Hadjis filled out the forms and submitted his expense request... for $11.

Nothing is too small or petty to bill to taxpayers. I bet that $11 reimbursement cost $100 in bureaucrat manpower to process. But the man is entitled to his entitlements.

If only all of Hadjis's bills were so trivial.

Last year alone, Hadjis dinged taxpayer more than $40,000 to travel around. That's a staggering sum -- about what many Canadians earn in a year's work. But it's also surprising how few trips it took for Hadjis to hit that mark.

I guess that sort of thing happens quickly when you rack up more than $3,200 for 24 hours in Saskatoon.

Gutting Canada's tradition of freedom of speech isn't just an ideological crusade. It's a huge industry, with plenty of perks. I wonder if Hadjis keeps all the frequent flyer points he racks up on our dime.

UPDATE: Some commenters point out that flying first class is sometimes done in business. Sure -- in some businesses it is. Most businesses are small businesses, who fly economy. But that's not the point: the point is to emphasize that there are a lot of collateral reasons why this censorship endures. It's an industry, and for hundreds of Canadians, it's what they do instead of real work. If Hadjis had to run his own law firm, instead of jaunt around the country censoring people, I doubt he'd fly first class on his own dime, or even on the dime of most clients. The CHRC/CHRT/HRC industry is a gravy train.

Joseph Brean's report from the human rights commission conference in luxurious Niagara-on-the-Lake is fascinating for other reasons than his recounting of the Canadian Islamic Congress's defamation of Mark Steyn. Such conferences, invariably paid for by taxpayers, are one of the perks for those working in the $200-million/year human rights industry.

(Take a moment to see how hard Jennifer Lynch, the chief commissioner of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, works. She jets off to Africa, at a cost of $5,800; then Geneva, for a mere $8,300, Australia, for a bargain of $7,500. I can't remember the last time I spent $90 on breakfast, but then again I don't work for the CHRC. Maybe the reason she goes overseas so often is she can't handle the CHRC's "organizational conflicts" -- though a $150 lunch on the subject must have made her feel better. My favourite expense of hers has to be the $1,300 to get from Ottawa to... Toronto. Let me guess: it's a "human right" to have a chauffered limousine.)

Conferences and expensed meals are certainly a perk for Pearl Eliadis, who was a guest speaker at the Niagara conference, and who, like Lynch, has travelled the world on the public dime. Readers of this blog will remember Eliadis for her semi-literate Op-Ed in the Montreal Gazette back in February. In that creative column, she had moved the Danish cartoons to Holland and introduced the English language to the word hatemongererer. But more seriously, she simply decided to do away with the 800-year-old priniciple that a man is innocent until proven guilty. See my take-down of her tripe here.

Well, Eliadis is back -- and she's angry!

According to Brean's report,

...Ms. Eliadis had harsh words for the growing contingent of bloggers who lambaste the commissions, and have been invigorated by the prominence of the Maclean's complaints.

Ms. Eliadis singled out one in particular, blazingcatfur.blogspot.com, as "poisonous" for referring to her panel at the conference as a "Texas cage match."

She said it was evidence of the "appalling tone" that is "illustrative of how badly this debate has gone."

My thoughts about this, in no particular order are:

1. It's a delight to know that the grassroots campaign for freedom of speech, started on the blogosphere, irritates the professional "human rights" industry so much. I take that as incredible encouragement to keep it up.

2. I'm enormously jealous of Blazing Cat Fur. Good heavens, what do I have to do to get notice by Eliadis? I've been charged with the hate crime of publishing cartoons. What has BCF, that whippersnapper, ever done?

3. Look at Eliadis's complaint against BCF, what Eliadis calls "poisonous" and "appalling": BCF called Eliadis's debate with the great Alan Borovoy at "cage match". Besides a troubling glimpse into the fragility of Eliadis's own self-esteem, it's an insight into just what these HRC workers consider to be "hateful". Because, really, what's the big difference between "hate speech" and speech that is "poisonous and appalling"? It's actually quite a revelation: Eliadis's own words show us that she's about political censorship, about squelching criticism, about muzzling her opponents. She's not even pretending that it's about real human rights. She doesn't want her world view to be criticized, and so she wants to criminalize dissident views.

I said it before, back in February when I first heard of Eliadis: we are lucky to have such thick-skulled, thin-skinned, politically tone-deaf opponents. 

But I'm still jealous of Blazing Cat Fur.

The Canadian Islamic Congress is back in the news, comparing Mark Steyn to James Keegstra, a convicted criminal and Nazi sympathizer.

Of course, it wasn't Mohamed Elmasry, the president-for-life of the Canadian Islamic Congress, who uttered that defamation. He doesn't like to talk to journalists -- they're too prone to ask him about his comments on national TV that any adult in Israel deserves to be murdered by terrorists.

It was Wahida Valiante, Elmasry's deputy.

She was speaking at a conference of Canada's human rights commissions, paid for by tax dollars.

Stop right there for a moment: the CIC, which currently has two live cases before Canadian HRCs -- the case that just finished a five-day hearing in British Columbia, and a pending case at the Canadian Human Rights Commission -- was on a panel at a conference organized and paid for by human rights commissions.

The CIC is still suing Maclean's. It is a party before two HRCs. And yet the HRCs invited the CIC as their guest -- surely paying for her expenses, if not an honorarium.

In other words, they invited one side of the lawsuit. They didn't invite Maclean's or Mark Steyn.

It's the moral and legal equivalent of a judge in a criminal trial inviting the police and prosecutors over to his home for dinner while the trial is still going on.

Such an act of bias would immediately lead to a mistrial, and disciplinary action for the judge. But that's real courts, and real trials -- you know, with boring old rules written by dead white men. That law stuff about being "neutral" isn't for kangaroo courts.

According to this report:

...Wahida Valiante, national vice-president of the Canadian Islamic Congress, said the commissions are the only recourse available to minorities treated unfairly in the media.

She repeated the CIC's complaints that membership in press councils is optional, and that criminal hate speech charges require the consent of the federal Attorney-General, which leaves human rights commissions as the only option.

She compared Mark Steyn, the author of the Maclean's article in question, titled The Future Belongs to Islam, to James Keegstra, an Alberta high school teacher who taught and tested his students on how Jews "created the Holocaust to gain sympathy."

"They basically talk about the same theories," she said. "This is not a civil dialogue."

She said that, in Germany, long before the Holocaust, "it was the words that set the stage for what happened later on.... We may end up with the same fate, and that is at the heart of why [the complainants] wanted to take this on."

It is staggering chutzpah for a member of an officially anti-Semitic organization like the Canadian Islamic Congress is, to invoke the memory of the Holocaust. The CIC are avid supporters of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who proudly brags about the next Holocaust, one that he's planning. And the CIC themselves endorse Jew-killing, as Valiante's own boss, Elmsary, told us on TV.

But put aside her Jew-hatred for a moment; and put aside the outrageous bias that the HRCs show by feting her at their conference.

She's comparing Mark Steyn to James Keegstra, a convicted criminal. She says that Steyn's theories are "basically the same" as Keegstra's neo-Nazism. I have no doubt that Valiante received applause from the assembled HRC bureaucrats, especially from the Muslim supremacist who works for Alberta's HRC, Arman Chak, if he was there.

Mark Steyn is a great man, with international success. He is invited to meet with presidents, prime ministers, kings and queens, with leaders of industry and media and charity. He operates at the highest levels. So it might not make sense for a man of his stature to stoop down so low as to file a defamation action against Valiante.

But I'd love to see that little Jew-hater on trial, explaining how Steyn -- a philo-semite and Zionist if ever there was one -- was "basically the same" as an anti-Semite of the rank of James Keegstra.

It would be a waste of Steyn's time and a distraction from his more important work. But I think it would be a useful missile into that anti-Semitic rats nest.

And: Steyn has a precedent to follow. Several years ago, Valiante wrote a similarly defamatory remark about Daniel Pipes, the American scholar who studies Islam. She said nearly the same thing about him -- claiming that he supported a Nazi-style genocide against Muslims in America. Needless to say, Pipes said no such thing, and the bigoted CIC, fearing a massive loss in court, agreed to publish an apology on their website, which you can read right here:

In the April 29, 2005 edition of the Friday Bulletin, the Canadian Islamic Congress and Ms. Wahida Valiante published on its website an article entitled Worth Repeating: Media Propaganda: Hitler, Bush and the "Big Lie". The Canadian Islamic Congress and Ms. Valiante apologize without reservation and retract remarks in the column that suggest that Dr. Daniel Pipes is a follower of HItler or that he uses the tactics of Hitler or that he wants to ethnically cleanse America of its Muslim presence.

Clearly, Valiante hasn't learned her lesson. Maybe it's time Steyn had a lawyer teach it to her again.

My visit to Toronto happened to coincide with the Annual General Meeting of PEN Canada last night, so I popped by. I was impressed with the size of the meeting, and I learned that they have more than 1,000 members across the country. A large part of the meeting was listening to reports about journalists and other writers around the world who have been persecuted for speaking out. What impressed me was that PEN Canada, unlike other NGOs, wasn't shy about tackling censorship in countries that are politically fashionable.

We heard a report about freedom of speech in Cuba -- a country whose state fascism is ignored by too many Canadians who would prefer to think of that country as a cheap holiday destination, rather than an island prison. (The Communist law under which many Cuban writers are detained is called "social dangerousness". Sounds like there's some cross-pollination of ideas with Canada's human rights commissions.)

I was deeply impressed with the presentation of Sheng Xue, a Chinese freedom activist, who read a touching poem about Tiananmen Square. But she didn't just talk about that butchery; she gave many examples of current persecution of political dissidents, listing writers serving prison terms of up to 25 years for the crime of speaking out. Too many commentators have turned a blind eye to that tyranny, preferring to be dazzled by China's economic growth, or the looming Olympics.

Xue didn't just talk about persecution back home; she detailed the troubling phenomenon of Chinese agents in Canada issuing threats of violence against activists right here in Canada, like herself, who speak out against China's bullying. That's not just China's shame -- it's to Canada's discredit that we allow foreign agents to bring their own censorship into our country.

I had a chance to say hello to some people there, who were alive to the domestic threats to free speech posed by Canada's human rights commissions. Chris Waddell of the CBC gave a report to the meeting about HRCs, highlighting their arrogant presumption to censor their fellow citizens. He gave an excellent summary of their procedural flaws, too, from their lack of uniformity, lack of procedures, lack of rules of evidence, lack of jurisprudence, lack of expertise, etc.

I had a chance to chat with him, and to shake hands with John Ralston Saul, PEN Canada's honourary patron, who clearly takes a hands-on role with PEN.

I left impressed with the group. They are clearly idealists, and though many of them had strong personal political views, they approached the issue of free speech, both domestically and internationally, in a non-partisan manner. There were no politically correct exemptions for the countries of the world that are the pets of the UN and much of the world's media.

I'm proud to have bought a membership.

Last night, I also managed to squeeze in an appearance on CTV's Mike Duffy Live, to talk about Stephane Dion's new carbon tax proposals.

I'm naturally opposed to new taxes, especially taxes so opportunistically excused as being "for the environment". That won't shock folks who have read my skeptical book, Fight Kyoto. But what was startling was how difficult the Liberal pundit, Joe Jordan, found it to make the pitch for Stephane Dion's tax.

It was fun to see the NDP pundit criticizing the tax -- that's rare. It was exciting to hear from her just how unpopular B.C.'s provincial version of Dion's tax is (60% opposed; 50% strongly opposed).

But what struck me was how poorly the federal Liberals have written their sales pitch. Put aside any of my criticisms, and the NDP's. Focus on Jordan's own "positive" message: when he was going on the offensive, when he was in sales mode, when he was making his best pitch, he was talking about the "pain" he was going to bring Canadians. He was talking about forcing Canadians to modify their "behaviour". And those were the benefits of his new tax!

Can you imagine how that will sell on the doorsteps in an election?

Knock knock.

Hello. Who are you?

I'm Stephane Dion's Liberal candidate in your neighbourhood. I've got a great idea -- a new tax on energy.

But energy prices are already very high! Why would you want to raise them?

Well, because we want you to change your behaviour.

What do you mean?

We want you to change how you live -- drive less, have a colder house in winter, a hotter house in the summer, you know. Stop your bad behaviour.

Who the hell are you to tell me that?

Well, look, Stephane Dion says we have to endure some pain. It's either some pain now, or a lot more pain later.

Get lost, creep!

[Door slams shut]

Who was that, honey?

Well, he said he was a Liberal candidate, but I don't believe it. That was probably some Conservative Party dirty trickster.

I'm not sure how that's going to work out. Vote Liberal: Painful new taxes, to change your behaviour.

Here's the video clip. Tell me the above is not an accurate summary of the Liberal pitch.

I e-mailed and called some friends in the Conservative government today, both senior staff and MPs, to ask them what they thought about the Canadian Human Rights Commission's PR stunt -- their pre-emptive "self-investigation".

As I wrote yesterday, it is a ludicrous conflict of interest for Jennifer Lynch, the CHRC's chief commissioner, to hand-pick a person to review her agency. It is also inappropriate for her to engage someone to review her political mandate -- that's a job for elected politicians, not appointed bureaucrats who work for elected politicians. And, finally, I pointed out that Lynch's proposed review carefully avoids the real problem areas in the CHRC, such as its corruption.

I fired off some brief e-mails to the Hill. "Were you ambushed by Lynch?" I wrote to one, assuming my friend would know what I was talking about.

"No," came the quick BlackBerry reply.

"So you think it's OK for her to pre-empt Parliament's own inquiry?" I wrote back.

"What?" came the response.

Later today I spoke by telephone with some of the same people. They indeed were ambushed by Lynch's ham-fisted PR stunt. But they told me that, in their view, it was nothing but an attempted distraction. They genuinely don't care; they'll ignore it.

That confirms my instincts not to give too much credence to this sham review -- and not to spend too much time debunking it. As I mentioned, I'm going to indeed send over some of my most challenging questions to Richard Moon, the professor who is writing a paper about the future of the CHRC. But that's a win-win situation: if Moon does address the corruption the CHRC, it will be the first time anyone does so. If he doesn't address them -- and I suspect he will simply and honestly say that Lynch's narrow instructions to him forbid him from asking any such questions -- then it will prove the whole exercise to be just that: an academic exercise, not a true attempt to clean up that corrupt organization, and rein in its abuses of our freedoms.

But other than sending over some such questions, I'm really not going to spend a lot of time on it. It's an attempt by Lynch and her beseiged CHRC to create a diversion, to distract or delay their day of judgment.

Parliament's not buying it, and neither will I.

I don't think that the folks in the bunker at the CHRC understand the Conservative government at all, and the Prime Minister in particular. I think that of all the political chess moves they could have made, this stunt was perhaps the most foolish and counter-productive they could have chosen.

Until now, they simply stonewalled, brazening it out, denying any wrongdoing whatsoever, even denying the bald facts as revealed in various hearings, under oath. That's not particularly unusual for decaying bureaucracies.

But Lynch's move was different: it was insubordination. It was meddling with politics -- meddling with MPs' turf. In particular, the thought that a third-tier government appointee like Lynch would presume to review her own political mandate, and presume to commission a report on what her job should be -- instead of doing the job she was given -- is exactly the thing that irritates the PMO.

I am reminded of a story from the first few weeks of Stephen Harper's tenure as Prime Minister. There had been an election in Belarus, and it was rigged. Harper wanted to issue a critical statement, and he ordered that it be done. The bureaucrats from the Department of Foreign Affairs nodded, but sent back a mealy-mouthed press release about "monitoring the situation". Harper was frustrated that he was being ignored, so he asked again for a critical release to be drafted. Again, the crats came back with pablum. Enough was enough: Harper literally hand-wrote a scorching press release, and ordered it sent out. "I am shocked that a dictatorial and abusive regime, such as this one, can continue to exist in today's Europe," he wrote.

You can read amazing story here (quick, free registration required).

What's the point? The point is that Harper probably didn't care a lot about Belarus. He just wanted a critical release to be issued. But the DFAIT bureaucrats wanted to "Yes, Minister" him. All of a sudden, he cared very much about Belarus. Sure, it was about democracy in an Eastern European country. But it was also about democracy in Canada: who was running the government -- him or unelected civil servants? It was their own belligerence that made Harper up the ante.

Lynch's self-appointed "review" is her Belarus press release. It is her telling Harper: I'm more clever than you; I'm going to make things more difficult for you; I'm going to cut you off at the pass; I'm going to publish my own whitewash before you can get your own review going. I'm smarter than you, or at least trickier than you. And I'm going to surprise and ambush you, rather than work for you.

In other words, it's a staring contest.

The CHRC's antics have already bothered Harper quite a bit. They've been a hassle for him -- in the press, in caucus, and with the party's base. But instead of working with Harper -- or just shutting up -- Lynch called in a pre-emptive strike, a PR stunt that caught Harper off guard.

Dear friends, how do you think that will end?

I've known Harper since I was a teenager. I've been his friend and I've sparred with him and then been his friend again. He can be a deal-maker; he can be a compromiser -- just look at him and Jean Charest. But if he senses insubordination or subterfuge, he can be tough as steel, upping the ante again and again to show that he's the boss.

Lynch could have met him and worked with him. Instead, she chose to sandbag him in public. I'm so glad that she did.

Here is my appearance on the Michael Coren Show, broken up into six segments on YouTube. What do you think?

I missed it when it was released, but PEN Canada has issued another statement condemning Canada's human rights commissions, and their abusive "hate speech" provisions. (I'm also quite impressed to see their advocacy for press freedom in China.)

Here is their new statement, released just this week. An excerpt, with my favourite parts in bold:

Recent complaints in Alberta against journalist Ezra Levant and in Ontario and British Columbia against Maclean’s magazine for a piece by writer Mark Steyn raise disturbing questions about the degree to which human rights commissions have taken it upon themselves to become arbiters of what constitutes free speech.

PEN Canada believes this is not the role of human rights commissions and that governments across the country need to make that clear both to their commissions and to Canadians.

…“Whether you agree with Mr. Levant’s decision that the Western Standard should publish the Danish cartoons about the prophet Mohammed or not, no one in a free and democratic country such as Canada can seriously argue the magazine should not have the right to publish them,” said PEN Canada’s national affairs chair Christopher Waddell.

“That is equally true for Maclean’s magazine and the excerpt it published from Mark Steyn’s book that led to the complaint against that publication.”

Neither complaints should ever have been accepted by a human rights commission and such complaints should be immediately dismissed.

To ensure there is no repetition of such attempts to constrain freedom of expression through the guise of human rights legislation, PEN supports calls for removal of subsection 13(1) of the Canadian Human Rights Act which states that it is discriminatory when individuals or groups say or write anything that is “likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt.”

Similar wording in provincial human rights statutes should likewise be removed.

That's a powerful statement, and it's the second one made by PEN. Now all that's needed is for the Conservative government to stop hiding under their beds, and do what everyone in the country from the Toronto Star to the Globe and Mail to the CBC's Neil MacDonald is asking them to do -- take the duct tape away from the human rights commissions, and stop letting them gag free speech.

Yesterday, Jennifer Lynch, the Chief Commissioner of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, announced that she had retained a professor from the University of Windsor, Dr. Richard Moon, to review the CHRC's role in policing "hate speech" on the Internet.

Here is the National Post story (I returned Joe Brean's call late and was quoted only in their Ontario edition, which I can't find online) and here is the Ottawa Citizen story.

There are three problems with this review.

First, it is the CHRC hand-picking its own reviewer. Nice trick, that. "Officer, I know you pulled me over for speeding. Well, good news! I've hired my own traffic safety expert to study my driving, and make recommendations. You can go home now -- I've got it under control."

It's a conflict of interest.

Second, the mandate of the review is inappropriate. Here is the official terms of Moon's review:

Professor Moon will conduct legal and policy research and analysis and make recommendations on the most appropriate mechanisms for addressing hate messages (and more particularly those on the Internet), with specific emphasis on section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act and the role of the Commission.

In conducting his study, Professor Moon will take into consideration:

- existing statutory and regulatory mechanisms - whether they are appropriate and/or whether they require change;

- the mandates of human rights commissions and tribunals, as well as other government institutions presently engaged in addressing hate messages on the Internet;

- whether other governmental or non-governmental organizations might have a role to play and if so, what that role might be;

- Canadian human rights principles, including but not limited to, those contained in the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms;

- mechanisms used in other countries; and,

- Canada's international human rights obligations.

So it is not a review of the CHRC's corrupt conduct -- their hiring of corrupt staff, drummed out of real police forces; their tampering with evidence; their tampering with official transcripts; their lying under oath; corruption and interference with investigations; their rejection of complaints that would embarrass them; their own serial commission of Internet hate speech offences, etc., etc. And it certainly doesn't deal with the current elephant in the room: the RCMP and Privacy Commissioner's investigations of the CHRC for hacking into a private citizen's Internet account.

None of that is covered in Moon's mandate. All of that is being ignored. That's no coincidence.

(No, officer, my own traffic expert will not ask me if I've been drinking. He will do a "big picture" review of the wisdom of traffic laws themselves.)

But look at what Moon will review: existing laws; what other government agencies do; Canada's obligations under treaties, etc.

Good idea -- for Parliament to do. The CHRC has been given a job -- a job they've been doing awfully. But instead of Moon looking at the corrupt manner in which they've been doing that job, he's been given the job of brainstorming what their dream job should be. Thanks, but we've got an elected Parliament to do that.

(Boss, I've been thinking. I know I haven't been doing a good job lately, and the police keep coming around. So I thought I'd do you a favour and review my job description for you. I'm also reviewing your job description, too, boss. When I'm done, I'll let you know what you think.)

The third problem is that Moon's review will happen in a bubble. It is not a judicial inquiry; he cannot compel people, such as Richard Warman, the CHRC's former investigator, current chief complainant, and prolific author of online posts on neo-Nazi websites, to answer questions. He can't subpoena recalcitrant witnesses, like the CHRC's Ian Fine or Dean Steacy, or their documents. He has no powers to actually investigate -- but, as I mentioned above, he hasn't even been authorized to investigate anything, other than what Lynch's dream job would be.

Moon will not travel; he'll work in his office, with a visit or two to CHRC headquarters. He'll have no staff of lawyers or other investigators. But, again, it's not an investigation; it's a brainstorming session by a professor.

Other conservative bloggers have focussed on Moon himself, looking for bias. I don't even think that's the point. I think the point is that Moon is not conducting an inquiry or investigation at all. He's been asked to write a position paper for Parliament. He's been asked to write an abstract essay about regulating the Internet in the 21st century.

I'm sure it will be interesting. But we already have 308 people who are paid to come up with policies -- and they happen to have the democratic legitimacy of being MPs. They're the ones who are charged with those high level reviews; for her to announce this, after learning that the government itself is planning a genuine inquiry not just into high level questions such as censorship, but also operational matters like the corruption I've outlined above, isn't just disingenuous, it is interference.

Canada's Parliament will review the CHRC's bad behaviour. For the CHRC to announce, in a showy manner, that it will review itself -- but to exempt its corruption from that review -- must be seen for what it really is: a PR exercise, undertaken under duress.

I plan to participate in Moon's review. Not to legitimize it -- but rather to prove it is a Potemkin review. I have already written to Moon, who was quite courteous in his reply, and even invited my submissions.

I will make those submissions, and post them on this blog, of course. I will send him questions -- real questions, pressing questions -- about the CHRC's conduct, its operations, its corruption. And he can do one of two things: address those questions, or tell me that he isn't allowed to do so given that he's really been asked to write a political science essay, rather than do a meaty investigation like the RCMP and Privacy Commissioner and Parliament are doing.

I don't plan to pick on the guy, because that's clearly his purpose -- to be window dressing, to be a distraction, even to be a fall guy for Jennifer Lynch. At the end of the day, she's the one who is politically responsible to Parliament for the corrupt and abusive mess over which she presides.

Hiring some professor to write a political position paper is not just irrelevant, it's deeply insulting to Canadians who are demanding an end to her corruption, and it's just as insulting to Parliament, which has already announced its intentions to begin a democratically legitimate, and (hopefully) properly staffed and resourced investigation into all relevant matters, not just the ones Lynch will permit.

I wish the Michael Coren Show was available from their website "on demand", so I could link to it, but I don't think it is. I watched the show tonight, and I thought it went pretty well. I am still chuckling about Michael's decision to repeatedly play the video clip of Mohamed Elmasry, the president-for-life of the Canadian Islamic Congress, saying that any adult Jew in Israel is a fair target for a terrorist. Here's a friendly review of the show by The Girl On The Right, who also reviewed my speech to the Jewish Civil Rights Association.

The ideaCity conference begins tomorrow, and I speak there on Thursday. I have another private speech in Muskoka next week.

I have had a speaking agent handle my invitations for a few years now: Martin Perelmuter of Speakers Spotlight, perhaps the sweetest and most trustworthy man you could ever meet. (I love the fact that he also represents Justin Trudeau and David Suzuki!)

I've always had a slow but steady stream of invitations, but they seem to have spiked up lately. I'm off to Newfoundland shortly, and a couple of events in Ottawa. I attribute that to a growing national interest in the problems with Canada's human rights commissions. Canadians are concerned at the erosion of our civil rights, and they're appalled that that erosion is happening at the hands of rogue agencies who have the gall to call themselves "human rights commissions" even while they infringe on our rights. I'm glad to be a voice for reform, and I hope to continue to do so until we can shut these counterfeit courts down.

I have to admit, talking about this and other political topics with a group of interested people is one of my favourite things to do. Drop Martin a line if you just can't get enough via this blog or my media appearances!  

Out of the 400+ blog posts I've written this year the one that has attracted the most readers has been the one about the Stalinist sentence that the Alberta human rights commission's divorce lawyer/censor-in-chief Lori Andreachuk meted out to the Alberta pastor Stephen Boissoin.

That story created a buzz because Andreachuk's order was so un-Canadian -- a Christian pastor was ordered to recant his views, publicly renounce his faith, and never speak "disparagingly" again, for the rest of his life, about either homosexuality or the particular gay rights activist who hauled him before the HRC.

Another part of the order that Rev. Boissoin must follow is:

Mr. Boissoin [must] provide Dr. Lund with a written apology for the article in the Red Deer Advocate which was the subject of this complaint

and

request [his] written apology for the contravention of the Act be published in the Red Deer Advocate.

Well, yesterday the Red Deer Advocate had something to say about Commissar Andreachuk using them as her personal propaganda organ. It's one of the best Op-Eds I've read on the subject -- a mix of strong analysis and obvious passion. It impressed me, for I always bore a bit of a grudge against the Red Deer Advocate for agreeing to a plea bargain with the Alberta HRC several years ago -- they had been the target of the same complaint as Rev. Boissoin was, and instead of fighting it, Maclean's-style, they succumbed. I suppose I shouldn't blame them too much -- they're a business that has to make money, and fighting against the bullies at the HRC costs a fortune. But yesterday's Op-Ed makes up for whatever moral ground was lost in that first capitulation. Here are some extended excerpts; but the whole thing is great. I've highlighted some especially good parts:

A lot of folks in Alberta and beyond are feeling bruised and abused by the Alberta human rights commission’s conduct in dealing with a letter to the editor that was published on this page six years ago today.

We at the Advocate are among them.

We have had our eyes opened to some state-sanctioned ugliness.

The letter, by a local pastor, expressed love and compassion for some homosexuals, while decrying the activist homosexual agenda of some educators, MPs, judges (and possibly, though not specifically mentioned, Advocate editorialists who have long supported gay rights.)

Stephen Boissoin’s letter promoted a flurry of responses, pro and con, in our pages and two complaints to the Alberta human rights commission against the Advocate.

...a lengthy, dispiriting process that culminated at the end of May with the rights commission ordering Boissoin:

• to pay two people whom the commission acknowledges were not direct victims of his words — $5,000 to Lund for ridicule and harassment and up to $2,000 to a witness;

• to apologize in writing to Lund;

• to ask that the Advocate publish his letter of apology and the commission’s seven-page Decision on Remedy.

Boissoin has no intention of apologizing, as he makes clear in a letter on this page.

The galling presumption of the rights commission to subvert a newspaper’s own judgments over whether, when or where it should publish coerced opinions offers a window into its dangerous thinking.

...The more fundamental and serious defects of the rights commission surround its flawed processes that can lead to repressive and dangerous fallout.

Canada has criminal laws against libel and expressing hatred. Those laws are applied in courts, after police investigations and careful review by skilled prosecutors.

They are argued by lawyers before a judge, in a legal framework with rules of evidence that protect all sides.

The Alberta human rights commission, and others like it across the country, lack these tested and protective structures.

...The effects of how their processes are applied and findings are enforced endanger free speech and liberty.

The rights commission judged that Boissoin’s words “likely” exposed homosexuals to hatred or contempt. That’s a judgment based on scant evidence and a warped reading of Boissoin’s comments. It was arrived at by ignoring some of Boissoin’s phrases and misinterpreting others.

...Now, the rights of Albertans to publicly express views that they honestly believe are being constrained not by criminal law, but by fear of being hauled before a rights commission and the certainty of accumulating massive legal bills to defend themselves.

More egregiously, the rights commission not only wants to censure hateful speech (a laudable goal), but to pre-emptively deny some Albertans the right to express their legitimate views on certain topics.

The commission forbids Boissoin from writing “disparaging remarks” about gays — a phrase that has dubious legal weight — and forbids him, in advance, from writing critically about Lund’s involvement in this case.

This is called prior restraint. It’s an abomination in any free and democratic society.

But it’s what Lund sought and what the misguided rights commission has agreed to order.

I think that's the toughest Op-Ed I've ever read on the subject. Good for the Red Deer Advocate, and for Joe McLaughlin.

I'm also glad that the Advocate allowed Rev. Boissoin to publish a letter to the editor, too. You can read it here in full. Some excerpts, with my bold and underlining. It contains some stunning details I had missed: 

[The Advocate] quotes Lund saying, “I certainly didn’t request an apology, so that was a bit of a surprise.”

“I don’t see the value in an insincere apology.”

Lund’s response fails to surprise me.

What’s interesting is that an apology is precisely what he sought for almost six years.

Lund’s original complaint to the rights commission asked that I pay thousands of dollars in fines to him and to Egale Canada, a pro-gay lobby group, in addition to a written apology.

He further requested that if I failed to provide the apology, an order be put into place that would ban me from having my opinions published in every major newspaper in Alberta.

Egale responded publicly by refusing to accept a fine designated to them.

Egale further stated that though it does not agree with my opinions, more importantly, it did not support Lund’s complaint against me.

After Lund’s original complaint was rejected, he appealed on University of Calgary letterhead.

Unfortunately, his appeal was granted and he amended his request for a remedy.

He asked for $5,000 for himself, $5,000 payable to an arm of the Alberta Teachers’ Association plus, once again, a written apology.

Here is his request for the apology word for word: “Dr. Lund requests the panel provide an order directing Mr. Boissoin to publish a full apology in the Red Deer Advocate within one month of this panel’s decision. Mr. Boissoin is to apologize for submitting the article and for his views on homosexuality.”

Lund did not just request an apology for my letter to the editor but also for my personal, deeply held religious views.

He went on to request that “If Mr. Boissoin fails to comply with the order, that the panel provide an order disallowing the publication of Mr. Boissoin’s views on homosexuality in any of the major print media in Alberta, including the Red Deer Advocate, Red Deer Express, Calgary Herald, Calgary Sun, Edmonton Journal, Edmonton Sun and Lethbridge Herald.”

These excerpts can be verified at http://www.albertahumanrights.ab.ca/LundDarren113007Pa.pdf

Lund is correct when he says that there is no value in an insincere apology.

But instead of acknowledging that for the last six years he has sought an order that I provide one, he acts totally surprised.

I will never offer an apology. I stand behind what I said (my interpretation of it) in my 2002 letter to the editor.

Imagine a world where an officious, meddling busy-body can request a government bureaucrat to order his political or religious opponent to be banned from writing a letter to the editor of any newspaper in the province. But Darren Lund did more than that; he didn't just request that Rev. Boissoin be gagged; read his demand carefully. He requested that all of Alberta's newspapers themselves be ordered not to publish it, even if they received such a letter.

Andreachuk essentially accepted Lund's fascist request -- she didn't tag the newspapers with her order, but went so far as to ban Rev. Boissoin, forever, from uttering his views even in private e-mails. Again, not just from uttering "hateful" or "discriminatory" views, whatever those are, but anything disparaging at all.

It's been six years since Lund filed his abusive complaint against Rev. Boissoin. That's how slow and grinding these commissions are. I should know -- I'm coming up on 900 days in my own case, being prosecuted by the keystone cops at the Alberta HRC.

It's good to see the Red Deer Advocate standing up so vigorously to the HRC, and publishing Rev. Boissoin again. But the fact remains: Andreachuk's order stands. And Premier Ed "Ed" Stelmach is fine with that, as if his freshman cabinet minister in charge of the HRC, Lindsay Blackett.

Why don't you e-mail them each here and here, and let them know if you're on the side of Rev. Boissoin, the Advocate and free speech, or on the side of Andreachuk, Lund, censorship, bullying and the Alberta government?

P.S. If you think that Andreachuk & Co. are showing any restraint in the wake of the massive, international backlash against their fascism, think again. 

Take a moment to read Edward Greenspan's smackdown of the three Osgoode Hall sock puppets, including the serial liar, Khurrum Awan. An excerpt:

I've never before been embarrassed by a fellow Osgoode Hall Law School graduate until now.

My fellow alumni are the three complainants behind the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal complaint against Maclean's magazine for publishing supposedly "Islamophobic" articles, including columns by Mark Steyn. It is embarrassing that these complainants graduated from Osgoode Hall when it is apparent that their education seems to have lacked any lessons in the true meaning of civil liberty.

...

The complainants want to hijack the free press. But there should be no right not to be offended. There should be no right of reply.

There is, however, a right to publish and speak out, and the CIC and the other complainants have taken full advantage of this right.

...

If Maclean's refuses to publish any counterviews or replies, so what? That's why it is called "Maclean's" and not "CIC's." And that is why nobody outside of the CIC can tell it what to publish on its website, either.

The thing is, I understand how the complainants feel. They probably feel the same way I and other Jews feel when we go to the Canadian Islamic Congress website and read "editorials" with headlines such as: "Zionist Israel at 60 -- A History Built on Ethnic Cleansing" and "Israel: An Armed Ghetto by Choice."

Now that it has been a complainant, I wonder how the CIC would like being a respondent in a human rights tribunal?

I somehow doubt Leo Adler would debate his fellow member of the tribe, Edward Greenspan, either. 

Denyse O'Leary was at my speech today, and she recorded it. She's transcribed parts of it on her blog, here.

Other bloggers in attendance today include Kathy, Wendy, Mike and Scaramouche!

Today at my speech at the Jewish Civil Rights Association, I challenged Leo Adler of the Simon Wiesenthal Center to a proper debate. Considering he sat through about an hour of my monologue before being able to put a brief question in a Q and A session, you'd think he'd go for something a little more even-handed. I'd fly back to Toronto anytime to do it -- and I'm sure we'd get a helluva crowd. If 100 tickets to this event were sold on a couple of weeks' notice, I'm sure that a debate between the two of us could, truly, move close to 1,000. I'd be happy to donate the proceeds of such an event to a charity -- I'd pick Ken McVay's Nizkor project, because I care about rebutting Holocaust deniers, and I can't think of a guy who gets better bang for the buck.

Of course Adler won't debate me, though. He's not really into that sort of thing.

So why did he attend what must have been a frustrating, even demoralizing, event today?

Why did he pay money to listen to what must have sounded like fingernails scratching on a chalkboard for an hour?

Why did he suffer the gentle hostility of a room full of free speechers?

Because it's June. 2008, not January, 2008. In January, 2008, the idea of abolition the section 13 thought crimes provision of the Canadian Human Rights Act was unthinkable. Today it's being publicly advocated by federal cabinet ministers, and every media organ in the country from left to right.

Who knows? By the time December rolls around, by which time I expect true changes to be afoot, the bravest of the Official Jews might even deign to debate me. It's not something they're used to, but it's a very Jewish thing to do. They should try it some time.

Let me remark on three amazing media milestones. And let us reflect on how impossible these would have seemed six short months ago.

The first was a lengthy story by the New York Times on Mark Steyn's show trial in Vancouver, and an accompanying podcast of a discussion on the same subject. Some free speech bloggers have lamented that the item was not as full-throated of its denunciation of Canada's thought crime laws as might have been expected from a newspaper that itself enjoys the First Amendment. But that is not the point. The point is that the New York Times, liberal though it is, is still the standard of what is regarded as "all the news that's fit to print", my affections for the New York Post notwithstanding. In other words, when the NYT covers it, it's real news and it's big news, and it's OK for every other journalist to cover it -- in the U.S., let alone in Canada.

The second is Neil MacDonald's impressive online commentary on the CBC's website. This surprised a number of conservative bloggers who are only familiar with McDonald's reports on world affairs -- where he takes a skeptical, if not adversarial, approach to the U.S., the war on terror, and Israel. But I know another side of MacDonald. Back in 1993, when I was just a young pup starting out at the University of Alberta Law School, I ran afoul of the school's internal human rights commission, called the "Committee for Equality and Respect" (I'm not making that up.) I had written an article for the student paper criticizing the faculty's quota system for admissions -- that is, a lower standard for certain special minorities. In other words, if you were the "right" race, you could get in with lower marks.

I was hauled before the assistant dean, and given all sorts of threats -- that I'd be sued in defamation (a premonition of things to come!), and charged under the school's "non-academic misconduct" provisions. Instead of buckling, as I'm sure I was expected to do, I made a bit of a fuss. That fuss took the form of MacDonald, a cameraman, a sound man and a director/producer flying in to Edmonton and camping out in our law school for three days. The resulting mini-documentary kicking the living daylights out of the school's absurd political correctness. I've never seen a more devastating piece, though credit must go to the assistant dean for providing the unbelievable quotes that MacDonald gleefully aired. Needless to say, the U of A backed off -- at least until I graduated. The school's fundraiser told me it had measurable effects on their efforts.

I saw MacDonald a couple of years ago, and we shared a laugh about that doc. He claims it kick-started my political career. I won't disabuse him of that, because I love the idea that the CBC "created" me as a politically incorrect demolisher of human rights commissions small and large!

I suppose, therefore, that I was less surprised that others to see MacDonald's obvious disdain for censorship and political correctness. That doesn't mean I am any less delighted to see it.

Finally, I refer again to today's lead editorial in the Toronto Star, by far Canada's biggest-circulation newspaper. Here it is in full; let me excerpt parts of it, and bold some of the best passages:

...All this gives Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government an incentive to have Parliament take a fresh look at Section 13 of the federal rights act. The section deems it a "discriminatory practice" to communicate "any matter that is likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt" via the Internet. Ottawa and B.C. should repeal such sections and stop trying to regulate the media.

Conservative MP Rick Dykstra has asked the Commons justice and human rights committee to review Section 13. And Liberal MP Keith Martin has introduced a private member's motion to have the Commons call for the section's deletion. However these initiatives play out, they reflect growing unease that an unwarranted chill is being cast on free speech, when sufficient safeguards exist elsewhere. Parliament and the provincial legislatures should take note.

Canada's Criminal Code already provides for a two-year jail term for inciting or promoting hatred against identifiable groups. Libel laws can be invoked. And provincial press councils field complaints.

Does society need to cast more of a chill on press freedom in order to combat discrimination? Polemicists such as Steyn are better countered in the marketplace of ideas. Readers who feel ill-served are free to go elsewhere.

Parliament and the legislatures should rethink laws that have the effect of targeting opinions rather than actions.

As Alan Borovoy of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association has argued on these pages, human rights commissions should concern themselves with discriminatory behaviour, not discriminatory opinion. "Generally, the answer to bad speech is good speech," he wrote. Wise words, from a respected rights advocate.

That's amazing stuff. And remember, the Toronto Star is officially left-wing -- it's built right into the company's charter, in what are called the "Atkinson Principles". But, then again, freedom of speech has always been the chief tool of society's marginalized and downtrodden; it was what granted women suffrage, and brought equality for racial minorities, and then gays.

A large story in the New York Times; a strongly supportive item by the CBC's Neil MacDonald; and a full-blast lead editorial in the Toronto Star, all in the same week.

I'd say we've just about accomplished step one in the two-step plan for reform: Canada's human rights commissions are being denormalized.

Time to ramp up step two: cajoling, poking and prodding our slow-poke politicians to now make the changes that the public demands.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) I'll be on Michael Coren's TV show for the full hour. That's a lot of talk time -- but I'm sure we'll fill it up! There's so much to talk about these days. I'm still staggered by the fact that today's Toronto Star came out against the "hate speech" provisions of the law. In other words, the Red Star is now more liberty-loving than the Conservative government.

If you live in Ontario or Alberta, you can find details about the show's airtime and channel, here (it's at 8 p.m. ET in Ontario).

I think that most conspiracy theories are merely attempts by people to seem more clever than they are -- or certainly more clever than everybody else. They're also a handy way to blame cosmic forces for one's own problems or misfortunes.

Jews have long been at the center of many conspiracy theories.

Including the conspiracy theory that Jews want to censor the speech of their critics.

Unfortunately, on that last one, the Official Jews seem eager to everything possible to make that conspiracy theory seem real.

The Canadian Human Rights Commission's "hate squad" has plenty of Jews, from Harvey Goldberg, to Ian Fine. Irwin Cotler, also Jewish, was a Justice Minister who eagerly prosecuted many hate speech cases. And, of course, many of the section 13 hate speech cases are packed with Jewish interveners -- the Canadian Jewish Congress, B'nai Brith and the Simon Wiesenthal Center. That's a lot of Jews. And even Athanasios Hadjis, the Greek tribunal chair, was in a formal political coalition with the CJC before his appointment.

In other words, as I said at lunch today, Canada's Official Jews seem to be trying their best to prove the conspiracy theory true.

This censorship cabal has certainly persecuted its political enemies, not just in the HRCs, but also under the Criminal Code provisions -- like Jim Keegstra, or David Ahenakew. As I said today, the Jews turned these nobodies into stars.

Men like Ken McVay of Nizkor are perfect antidotes to these conspiracy theories -- in his case, a Gentile volunteer who painstakingly rebuts anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial.

Men like the SWC's Leo Adler feed these conspiracy theories -- in his case, reflexively piling on to any political enemy of the Jews who is caught in some hate speech web.

I'm embarrassed that so many People of the Book are involved in high tech book-burnings. But I'm angry that they're doing so in my name, as a fellow Jew.

It's just a handful of Official Jews; most normal Jews I know are hostile to censorship. But when you call yourself the "Canadian Jewish Congress", you fool a lot of people -- just like something calling itself a "human rights commission" fools a lot of people, too. 

NOTE: I've got to run to a meeting now, but I thought I'd put up a quick post about my speech today. I'll come back to edit and improve this later. But for now, here are my first thoughts:

I enjoyed my speech to the Canadian Jewish Civil Rights Association. So did many of the attendees, including other bloggers, commenters and donors to my legal defence. They obviously were supportive to begin with There were also a few undecideds; at the very least I gave them some new ideas to think about. And then there were a few hard-core censorship types there. Or at least one -- Leo Adler of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

I talked about the few Jewish experiments in censorship, and how each of them ended badly -- Caiaphas the High Priest censoring Jesus; Jewish participation in building Soviet Communism that then devoured them; and then Jewish use of Weimar Germany's censorship laws that were later deployed with gusto by Adolf Hitler.

Other than those examples, I really couldn't think of any Jewish censorship, because Jews, historically, have been victims of censorship, not perpetrators of it -- only natural, given that Jews have been a perpetual minority for two millennia.

I talked about section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act, and how it is impossible to defend against. I talked about its bizarre "pre-crime" nature; about its attempt to regulate emotions like "hatred and contempt". I talked about how the Canadian Human Rights Commission itself propagates hate on the Internet, going online in drag as neo-Nazis, spewing bigoted venom.

It was a good, old-fashioned rant. And then came the questions.

There were some good ones; Michael Teper asked what would happen if human rights complaints were filed against Jewish rabbis who taught a Torah that called for homosexuality to be punished with stoning. It was a good question -- because that's pretty much what got Alberta's Rev. Stephen Boissoin a lifetime speech ban on the subject, courtesy of Alberta's HRC. And then there were some other good points, too.

I had just finished answering a question by referring to a recent meeting of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, and how that group's supporters are not in favour of censorship, when Leo Adler himself, the boss of Canada's SWC, came to the microphone.

Not surprisingly, Adler didn't really have a question. That's fine; but it just wasn't the right forum for a debate. I had just given a 45-minute rip-snortin' assault on human rights commissions, and telling Jews not to use Nazi-like tactics of book-burnings against our enemies, but to take the approach recommended by most of Canada's gay lobby, namely to oppose censorship, even of offensive anti-gay comments. You just can't rebut that in a 30-second comment.

Adler went on for a few minutes, and I interjected a bit here and there. I think that some in the crowd were sympathetic to him, merely because I had used his organization as an example of what not to do for much of my speech. But taking over the Q & A session just wasn't the right forum.

I told him I'd debate him in a proper debate anytime, anywhere -- and I meant it.

Adler disputed that the censorship campaign of the HRCs was a product of what I call "Official Jews". He didn't like it much when I listed all of the Jewish lawyers in the room at the Warman v. Lemire hearing, and pointed out that non-Jewish interveners like the Canadian Constitution Foundation were refused standing (as was the Civil Liberties Association), both of whom happen to be against censorship.

Adler pointed out that the tribunal chair, Athanasios Hadjis is not Jewish. True enough, I pointed out -- but I noted that Hadjis had entered into a "coalition" with the Canadian Jewish Congress in his political life before he became an HRC "judge". That little skirmish really went nowhere.

But then Adler made my point for me, writ large: he noted that when the SWC started fighting against Internet hate, there was just one anti-Semitic website, and that now there are 8,000 of them. I think Adler was trying to prove just how big of a problem that is (though, in a world with a billion web pages, I'm not particularly alarmed). But I pointed out it did the opposite: if, despite destroying our fundamental freedom of speech, and building a jurisprudence of censorship that anti-Semites like Mohamed Elmasry are now using against Jews, Adler and company haven't been able to stop the proliferation of anti-Semitism on the Internet, wasn't that proof of his own failure?

I called Adler and his fellow "Official Jews" the super-agents who turned nobodies like Jim Keegstra and David Ahenakew and Ernst Zundel into international superstars. I pointed out that Weimar Germany's anti-hate laws didn't work either -- other than to give Hitler a head start when he took over. I just thought that summed it up perfectly: a man who claims Internet hate has increased 8,000-fold on his watch, but keep swearing by his high-tech book burning.

Adler sat down after a while, and I told him I'd love to debate him. I didn't have a chance to speak to him directly. But Wendy told me that she overheard Adler talking with a colleague, saying he'd never agree to debate me. "I don't debate liars," was what she reported he said.

I'm not lying, actually. Everything I said in the debate was accurate -- from the Official Jewish involvement in the censorship business, to the CHRC's own role in disseminating hatred online, to the RCMP and Privacy Commissioner's investigations of their hacking, etc., etc. I've probably read 5,000 pages of human rights information in the past six month, from rulings to affidavits to news stories. I think I'm better-briefed than Adler himself, who presumably does other things for the SWC besides work their censorship file.

Like Ian Fine, the hapless senior counsel of the CHRC who debated me a few weeks ago in Edmonton, I think Adler genuinely doesn't know just how rotten the CHRC and the whole "anti-hate" industry has become. Fine was clearly caught off guard in his debate against me, challenging me to "prove" one allegation after another, which I proceeded to do using his own CHRC documents. I think Adler would be even more poorly briefed.

But let's say I was lying. Why wouldn't Adler want to debate me? He obviously is concerned enough about me and my campaign to end his censorship to attend my speech. It must have been painful for him -- paying $20 for the pleasure of listening to me demolish the CHRC. Every time I cracked a joke that got a laugh, every time I made a point that got a collective "ah" or "hmm" must have irked him. But he sat through that punishment for the chance to try to challenge me.

He failed. The forum was wrong. But why wouldn't he like the proper forum? This very day the Toronto Star came out with a lead editorial calling for the abolition of the section 13 hate speech section. Clearly many people across the political spectrum are persuaded by the ideas expressed by me and others. Surely if we're all acting on lies, Adler has a duty to show the world the truth.

But he won't debate a liar.

And that's his problem.

I'm not a liar. But Holocaust deniers are. Many anti-Semites are, especially with their blood libels and other smears against Jews. Being a Jew -- or at least being a Jewish leader like Adler -- means debating liars all the time. It means taking the effort to show people the truth.

But Adler is above that -- whether it's a neo-Nazi, or little old me.

That's his problem. And, unlike the neo-Nazis he's censored in the past, I'm not going to shut up for him.

Ken McVay, the Gentile founder and operator of the wonderful Nizkor website, debates all Holocaust deniers he finds. He seeks them out -- and rebuts them with documents, facts, arguments and just plain hard work. That's less glamourous than getting the government to order your opponents silenced, but it works.

I don't know if Adler thinks he's above debating liars, or if he's too lazy, or if he's just not that good a debater, and he knows it. 

You would think that a religion also known as The People of the Book wouldn't be much into book burning. Oh, I know that in 2008 our human rights commissions, and the Official Jews who support them -- the Canadian Jewish Congress, the B'nai Brith, the Simon Wiesenthal Center -- don't actually burn books. That's too 20th century. Now we order political deviants to to shut down their websites. And if the deviant is a Christian pastor, we order him never to send an e-mail or give a sermon.

I'm giving a talk today to the Canadian Jewish Civil Rights Association on the subject of free speech. I'm glad to learn from the organizer that the event is standing room only. To me that is a sign that grassroots Jews, normal Jews, Jews who aren't Official Jews, are increasingly offended by the pro-censorship line taken by our self-appointed betters. But, as I've said before, pretending that Bernie Farber of the CJC represents Canadian Jews is like pretending that Mohamed Elmasry of the Canadian Islamic Congress represents Canadian Muslims. More and more Jews look upon the likes of profesional race-hustlers like Farber the same way Clarence Thomas looks at Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton: Get a real job and stop embarrassing the rest of us. Or as we Jews would say, Stop being a shanda for the goyim.

Just tonight, a friend gave me a report about a major Simon Wiesenthal fundraiser, held in Toronto a few weeks ago -- their "Spirit of Hope" event, featuring former U.S. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, former U.S. House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt, and CNN's Glenn Beck. Those are pretty big names, and other than Beck (on whose show I've appeared a couple of times) I wouldn't think they'd be following Canada's human rights commissions and their censorship laws.

My correspondent writes:

Glenn Beck said sarcastically "maybe I'll move up here to Canada" and Gingrich retorted "watch out, Glenn, if you do that the human rights commission up here will probably shut down your program and throw you in jail." (Paraphrase).

About half the audience exploded in spontaneous cheering, laughing and applause. No one looked angry or booed - I got the impression that the other half of the audience didn't understand the reference.

That confirms another report of the event, here.

What does it mean? It means that many Jews, even fancy society Jews, understand that freedom of speech is an essential Jewish value, and that censorship is an essentially violent and barbaric substitute. Censorship says: "I can't convince you, or I'm too lazy or worried to try, so I'll silence you by force." How un-Jewish.

As I've written before, disagreement and debate are woven into Judaism itself. The entire Jewish Talmud is an argument between two "houses" of thought. As Israel's first prime minister, David Ben Gurion, said, "the test of democracy is freedom of criticism." I can think of a half-dozen Jewish cliches and jokes that go to the Jewish love for disagreement and noisiness, and even offensiveness. "Two Jews, three opinions". Or, as the rabbi who introduced Mark Steyn at the Vancouver Hillel fundraiser two weeks ago said, "after Mark's speech, we'll have an answer and answer session".

The second thing to learn from that Wiesenthal dinner incident is that very serious people in other countries -- on both the left and the right -- are watching what is going on in Canada, and they are deeply unimpressed.

The third thing -- and this is my point, actually -- is that the Simon Wiesenthal Center, whose high-powered guest speakers trashed Canada's human rights commissions and whose well-heeled dinner guests applauded that trashing, is one of the most vicious interveners in Canadian Human Rights Commission censorship trials.

In other words, the SWC's boss, Leo Adler, is utterly disconnected from his own membership on the essential matter of free speech. Adler raises money from opponents of censorship to spend in the pursuit of censorship.

Surely, of all the Jewish groups intervening for censorship, Adler, with his focus on the Holocaust, should be the most sensitive to book burnings. But he's not. Perhaps it's some weird vengeance, some psychological therapy, some turn-around, where the Jews get to burn the Nazi books now. That's precisely the kind of immoral, unprincipled vengeance that some self-appointed gay activists are now indulging in, too, when they persecute Christians using the HRCs.

From Australia's Herald Sun:

Canada is insane. The human rights industry, still trying to strip Mark Steyn of the right to free speech, includes Canadian Human Rights Commission lawyer Giacomo Vigna, whose feelings are astonishingly tender. Ezra Levant produces the transcript of Vigna’s last case, which was called off for the day after this submission:

MR. VIGNA: Sorry. Mr. Chair, I don’t have the flu but I don’t feel in a serene state of mind to proceed with the file today…

Andrew Bolt's item generated more than 80 comments. I like the suggestion by one Aussie -- Vigna should listen to whale music, to find peace!

Yesterday I mentioned the new propaganda document circulated by the Alberta human rights commission. It's disgusting to begin with, but the fact that it is deliberately targetting new immigrants is downright vile. The Alberta human rights commission -- in other words, the Government of Alberta -- is trying to persuade newcomers to Alberta to support their grievance industry, and become little race hustlers, little Al Sharptons, just like Khurrum Awan of the Canadian Islamic Congress. It makes sense; complaints are down 15% year over year in Alberta; if all of those professional race hustlers in Ed Stelmach's government are going to keep their jobs, they need new complaints, and fast.

I read through the propaganda brochure again, and I thought I'd highlight a few bits.

I thought I'd check in on Lindsay Blackett, the freshman MLA in Alberta who is now the minister of "Culture and Community Spirit". That's the ministry that runs the Alberta human rights commission, which is funny in itself (but no funnier than the fact that the Alberta government actually has a Department of Community Spirit. And if you think that's funny, they just renamed their Department of Government Efficiency, which had over 1,000 bureaucrats. You think I'm making this up; I'm not).

But is it really funny to have a Ministry of Community Spirit? Is it a good idea to have the government giving official direction to what you should celebrate or not, what you should feel or not? Alberta, which has a very strong culture and an enviable sense of community spirit, got along fine without such interference for a century. Were Albertans doing something wrong, that they needed to be re-educated by the government?

Apparently we were. When that ministry starts issuing bigoted, anti-Christian orders like the one in the Rev. Stephen Boissoin case, it's clear that even the most benign-sounding government power can and will be hijacked by radical activists, empire-building bureaucrats, and lazy, politically incoherent politicians.

Which brings me back to Blackett. I had previously expressed my hopes that Blackett, who seems on paper to be severely normal, would bring some common sense to an out-of-control ministry.

So, given the national -- and international -- media storm about his government's order in the Rev. Boissoin case, I thought I'd check to see what Blackett was up to.

His ministry just issued a press release today -- telling Albertans to "celebrate summer solstice with the magic of fire and water". I don't think it's an official order, like their order that Rev. Boissoin renounce his Christianity. I think it's just our friendly government telling us what kind of beliefs are acceptable. We just heard from them about what kind of beliefs aren't. Christianity: bad. Pagan celebrations: good.

Hey, a summer party sounds fun. I'm all for it -- Halloween is fun, too. I'm not against either. It's just creepy and sad to see the total obliviousness over there at our Ministry. 

I know: the order to Rev. Boissoin was issued by the human rights commission itself, not from Blackett. But that commission is Blackett's responsibility. And the Government of Alberta did something in that hearing I've never seen them do before: send in a Justice Department lawyer to intervene, to make sure Rev. Boissoin was indeed convicted. More than any other decision of Alberta's HRC, this one reflects the views of Blackett and the rest of his government.

And those are just the cases that go all the way to a ruling. 90% of Alberta's human rights targets fold without a fight -- they just can't afford the fight, either in terms of time (I'm well over 800 days in their prosecution of me for publishing the Danish cartoons) and money (I'm at the $100,000 mark -- thank you to my online donors for saving me from ruin). That's why Calgary Bishop Fred Henry copped a plea three years ago, when he was targetted by the Alberta government for being a Catholic.

I think they're so tone deaf up in the provincial government, so immune to public accountability, so drunk with power after their last majority election, that they just don't give a damn. In fact, they're doubling down. They're not reining themselves in; they're going on a propaganda mission.

I came across this other press release, too: 60,000 copies of an HRC propaganda brochure are to be given to new immigrants to help teach them to read. They'll learn English by studying Alberta's version of Mao's Little Red Book. No "see Jane run" for them. More like "see the Christian thrown in jail".

You can see that propaganda document here. It's not meant to teach English. It's not meant to educate newcomers about their "rights". It's meant to drum up complaints, to get new business for the HRC, to keep their grievance industry going at full tilt.

I've read every human rights ruling in Alberta over the past five years, and the examples that this propaganda document outlines just don't happen. The majority of HRC rulings are little financial shakedowns, usually construction workers injured on the job who want more than they're entitled to at the worker's compensation board. There hasn't been a single ruling about say, anti-immigrant graffiti on a wall, or a Muslim praying at work -- examples used in this document. Not one case. Which is precisely why the HRC is advertising for that new business. Their last annual report showed that complaints in Alberta declined 15% last year. Albertans had better complain more, of some bureaucrats might have to get productive jobs in the private sector. And to get that new business, the HRC is slurring Alberta, making it seem like a bigoted community, where newcomers aren't welcome.

You want bigotry? That's bigotry. Anti-Alberta bigotry. You wouldn't think it would come from the Alberta government, but it does.

But I can't conclude without pointing out a particular lie in that propaganda document. On page 8, it says that "the Commission does not take your side or the respondent's side". That is a damnable lie.

The Commission does indeed take the complainant's side. For 800 days, it has investigated and prosecuted me on behalf of radical jihadis in Alberta -- the anti-Jewish, anti-Christian imam from Calgary, Syed Soharwardy, and then the Edmonton Council of Muslim Communities. For 800 days, they've had their fatwa prosecuted using tax dollars, while I've had to foot my own bill. No fewer than 15 bureaucrats are working on my case. And if I ever get to have my day in kangaroo court, the commission will prosecute me -- perhaps with their in-house Muslim supremacist lawyer, Arman Chak. Again, I'll have to foot my own legal defence, but the jihadis against me will get a free prosecution, courtesy of the Alberta taxpayer.

It's grotesque that Lindsay Blackett is hijacking ESL classes to foist his "human rights" propaganda on new immigrants. It's despicable that newcomers are being taught to see themselves as victims, as complainers, as ingrates, and taught to view their new home as a hostile, racist place. But it is completely predictable that the corrupt "human rights" industry, and its government enablers, lie about their tactics, and claim to be merely neutral.

They're not neutral. They are destroyers of inter-ethnic harmony, and underminers of the rule of law. They are not protectors of human rights. They are destroyers.

What do you think of what newcomers to Alberta are being taught? Do you think that Alberta's new reputation as an anti-Christian jurisdiction ought to be in this propaganda document? Or do you think it should stick with imaginary bigotry, not the real stuff perpetrated by the government?

Let me know -- and let Blackett and his boss, Ed "Ed" Stelmach know, too. Here and here are their e-mails.

The Huffington Post is the largest, and arguably most influential, left-of-center website in the United States. Here is an Op-Ed, by constitutional scholar Eugene Volokh, that expresses appropriate revulsion at the Alberta human rights commission's anti-Christian order in the Rev. Stephen Boissoin case. Like everyone else, Volokh is disgusted. But his last points are the most important:

Recall that the Supreme Court of Canada originally upheld the Canadian "hate speech" bans precisely because

[T]he phrase 'hatred or contempt', are sufficiently precise and narrow to limit its impact to those expressive activities which are repugnant to Parliament's objective. The phrase 'hatred or contempt' in the context of s. 13(1) refers only to unusually strong and deep‑felt emotions of detestation, calumny and vilification and, as long as human rights tribunals continue to be well aware of the purpose of s. 13(1) and pay heed to the ardent and extreme nature of feeling described in that phrase, there is little danger that subjective opinion as to offensiveness will supplant the proper meaning of the section.

Well, it looks like the Alberta Human Rights Commission is no longer "pay[ing] heed" to the limits imposed by the law. Unfortunate — but not surprising.

The bigots in Canada's human rights industry justify their censorship by referring to that very Supreme Court decision, claiming that it empowers them to ban websites and issue lifetime gag orders -- our 21st century version of a good old-fashioned Nazi book-burning.

As Volokh points out, they're lying -- the SCC did not give them that power. Canada's HRCs are issuing baldly unconstitutional orders. They're bullies. They're counterfeit courts. They are bringing the law into disrepute.

But that suits Alberta's premier, Ed "Ed" Stelmach, just fine. As I mentioned before, he even sent in a special lawyer from the Department of Justice to intervene against Rev. Boissoin.

Why not let the premier know what you think of his unconstitutional, anti-Christian bigotry? E-mail him here.

But be careful -- if you hurt his feelings, he might give you a lifetime gag order, too.

Here's another gay website that condemns the anti-Christian bigotry of the Government in Alberta, as expressed in that province's human rights order against a Christian pastor. I'm going to post the whole thing, with some of my favourite comments in bold:

What my gay brethren are doing in Canada is wrong, wrong wrong. I am compelled to side with the conservative Catholic, David Warren. In free Canada, Warren could have called me sinful; I could have called him an idiot; but neither of us could have silenced the other through prosecution. Stephen Harper’s Canada is no longer a free country. The “conservative” PM has failed to challenge and dismantle the left’s apparatus for thought control. Anyone who publicly deviates from multiculturist values can be legally persecuted at the whim of some twice-baked fruitcake. (Yes, I’m mixing metaphors today.)

Gays are in vengeful mood after centuries of abuse. I understand that. But they are fools to seek remedy in collectivism. Gays are few, and traditional cultures remain hostile. The only safety for deviants is a state that protects the individual. Collectivist gays aren’t the only minority exploiting the multiculturist courts. Islamists are busy establishing enclaves for Sharia. Once these have been secured, Canadian gays will be targeted for murder by Islamic extremists. Who will protect them? The ninnies in the “human rights community?”

Every word of that applies to the Jews, too. Are Jews -- everywhere a minority, everywhere "deviants" -- really going to be safer in a collectivist world, where the government has maximum power, or an individualist world, where every person has constitutional rights to be eccentric, dissident or even "deviant". It's a rhetorical question; Jews (and gays, and Blacks, etc.) know the answer already. There is always a low-level of illegal anti-Jewish, anti-gay, anti-Black violence. It's managed by the criminal law.

But the true butchery in history -- such as the Holocaust, which killed both Jews and gays -- has always been perpetrated by the state.  

Update: I've accepted commenters' suggestions to use © rather than TM. I just had to figure out how to write that symbol!

I think another lawsuit is coming my way.

Today, my lawyer received this letter from a radical Muslim activist in Toronto. It's a Certificate of Registration of Copyright. He claims to have copyrighted the image of Mohammed, PBUH (which stands for "peace be upon him"). In other words, it's now Mohammed, PBUH, ©.

I checked it out on Industry Canada's copyright database and, sure enough, there it is: two weeks ago, Akhtar "Hector" Agha has indeed registered a "Restriction on Depiction of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)". It's right there on the government website.

I'm not sure, but I think "Hector" might be looking for a royalties payment for whenever I do something like post this picture.

Well, it's been about an hour since I committed the hate crime of republishing Rev. Stephen Boissoin's illegal letter to the Red Deer Advocate.

So far nothing has happened to me. Ed Stelmach's local Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice obviously hasn't noticed yet. I haven't seen any stern-looking Young Pioneers patrolling my streets wearing "hate crime" whistles around their necks.  (I should call over to my parents' place to make sure Giacomo Vigna hasn't sent his hired goons over again.)

The 15-man team prosecuting me for publishing the Danish cartoons hasn't noticed, either. Then again, a year into their investigation, they still hadn't actually read the offending article.

But I have noticed a bit of a change. I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror -- I think I've lost ten pounds! There's less grey in my hair -- well, not really, but it looks sexier.

I feel like a dashing rogue, like the Scarlet Pimpernel. Now I know why men ride motorcycles; now I know how it must feel to sport a moustache, to wear a tattoo (and not just the Chinese pictograph for ginger beef, but a tough one, a home-made one, that says "mom").

There's something ineffable about being a free man, about saying what you want, about not being afraid of what someone else thinks.

It feels pretty good.

I'd encourage you to try it.

Go ahead.

Publish Rev. Stephen Boissoin's hate crime. I don't care if you're Christian, or gay, or both. I don't care if you agree with it or not. Just republish it. Do it because you're not supposed to do it. Because Lori Andreachuk and Ed Stelmach and Darren Lund say you can't. Do it because the Red Deer Advocate caved in and copped a plea bargain, instead of fighting like Rev. Boissoin (and Maclean's and Mark Steyn) did.

Do it to show that you have natural rights that predate, and exceed, any "human rights" given or taken away by Alberta's human rights commission.

Do it to show that you're alive. To feel alive. To show that democracy and freedom are still alive.

I have to tell you, I feel great. I'm going to post it again, right now.

Homosexual Agenda Wicked

The following is not intended for those who are suffering from an unwanted sexual identity crisis. For you, I have understanding, care, compassion and tolerance. I sympathize with you and offer you my love and fellowship. I prayerfully beseech you to seek help, and I assure you that your present enslavement to homosexuality can be remedied. Many outspoken, former homosexuals are free today.

Instead, this is aimed precisely at every individual that in any way supports the homosexual machine that has been mercilessly gaining ground in our society since the 1960s. I cannot pity you any longer and remain inactive. You have caused far too much damage.

My banner has now been raised and war has been declared so as to defend the precious sanctity of our innocent children and youth, that you so eagerly toil, day and night, to consume. With me stand the greatest weapons that you have encountered to date - God and the "Moral Majority." Know this, we will defeat you, then heal the damage that you have caused. Modern society has become dispassionate to the cause of righteousness. Many people are so apathetic and desensitized today that they cannot even accurately define the term "morality."

The masses have dug in and continue to excuse their failure to stand against horrendous atrocities such as the aggressive propagation of homo- and bisexuality. Inexcusable justifications such as, "I'm just not sure where the truth lies," or "If they don't affect me then I don't care what they do," abound from the lips of the quantifiable majority.

Face the facts, it is affecting you. Like it or not, every professing heterosexual is have their future aggressively chopped at the roots.

Edmund Burke's observation that, "All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing," has been confirmed time and time again. From kindergarten class on, our children, your grandchildren are being strategically targeted, psychologically abused and brainwashed by homosexual and pro-homosexual educators.

Our children are being victimized by repugnant and premeditated strategies, aimed at desensitizing and eventually recruiting our young into their camps. Think about it, children as young as five and six years of age are being subjected to psychologically and physiologically damaging pro-homosexual literature and guidance in the public school system; all under the fraudulent guise of equal rights.

Your children are being warped into believing that same-sex families are acceptable; that men kissing men is appropriate.

Your teenagers are being instructed on how to perform so-called safe same gender oral and anal sex and at the same time being told that it is normal, natural and even productive. Will your child be the next victim that tests homosexuality positive?

Come on people, wake up! It's time to stand together and take whatever steps are necessary to reverse the wickedness that our lethargy has authorized to spawn. Where homosexuality flourishes, all manner of wickedness abounds.

Regardless of what you hear, the militant homosexual agenda isn't rooted in protecting homosexuals from "gay bashing." The agenda is clearly about homosexual activists that include, teachers, politicians, lawyers, Supreme Court judges, and God forbid, even so-called ministers, who are all determined to gain complete equality in our nation and even worse, our world.

Don't allow yourself to be deceived any longer. These activists are not morally upright citizens, concerned about the best interests of our society. They are perverse, self-centered and morally deprived individuals who are spreading their psychological disease into every area of our lives. Homosexual rights activists and those that defend them, are just as immoral as the pedophiles, drug dealers and pimps that plague our communities.

The homosexual agenda is not gaining ground because it is morally backed. It is gaining ground simply because you, Mr. and Mrs. Heterosexual, do nothing to stop it. It is only a matter of time before some of these morally bankrupt individuals such as those involved with NAMBLA, the North American Man/Boy Lovers Association, will achieve their goal to have sexual relations with children and assert that it is a matter of free choice and claim that we are intolerant bigots not to accept it.

If you are reading this and think that this is alarmist, then I simply ask you this: how bad do things have to become before you will get involved? It's time to start taking back what the enemy has taken from you. The safety and future of our children is at stake.

Rev. Stephen Boissoin

Here's another story in Xtra, about Rev. Stephen Boissoin. It's four years old, which tells you how slowly these human rights commissions work.

It was written by Stephen Lock, a director of EGALE, the gay rights lobby, and it was in particular response to a group of vigilantes who stormed a fundraising dinner to help pay for Rev. Boissoin's legal bills:

Some eight to 11 people crashed an Apr 17 fundraiser being held by the Concerned Christians Coalition Inc. (CCC) in Calgary’s Coast Plaza Hotel’s ballroom. Before being removed by security staff, and before police arrived, the individuals—some wearing bandanas over their faces and camouflage gear—chanted “Rightwing bigots go away, Gay Militia here to stay” and pounded drumsticks together as some members of the CCC held hands and prayed while others gaped in amazement and fear...

If the “Gay Militia” had remained outside chanting and pounding their drumsticks I would have no problem with that and, in fact, would have supported that as their right to express opposition to the policies and statements of the CCC.

Freedom of speech, freedom of peaceful assembly, and freedom of beliefs are valued rights in Canada.

Gate-crashing a private function, terrorizing people, and disrupting their event are an abuse of those freedoms, and an abuse of another group’s freedoms. It is this tactic that I, and Egale, have criticized.

Make no mistake: I have no sympathy for the views of the CCC or the Rev Boissoin, believing them to be poisonous. I want people like him to go away and allow us all to live in peace and harmony. However, to those involved in this action, and to those who would defend it, one must ask: If the situations were reversed and some masked radical Christian group dressed in army fatigues burst into a private function within our community, would that be okay? Would that be simply a matter of exercising their right to freedom of speech?

This “Gay Militia” action was juvenile and, in a post-9/11 world, potentially dangerous.

Looking at the video it is clear that several CCC members were terrified. All they knew is that a group of shouting, masked individuals in army fatigues had just burst into their function and taken over the podium. The CCC leadership makes a great deal of noise itself about how Christians are under attack by “Christophobes” and how Bill C-250 will criminalize even the mere criticism of the “homosexual lifestyle.” While those claims are in error, imagine the terror of ordinary members sitting at a fundraising dinner experiencing a situation like this.

What a fascinating article. Lock asks us to imagine if the roles were reversed -- if a Christian "militia" had burst into a gay rights meeting. I think the police SWAT team would have responded, really I do. Do the same mental exercise regarding Rev. Boissoin's order: imagine if an anti-gay bureaucrat had ordered a gay activist to apologize to a Catholic priest, and then to write a public renunciation of his gay lifestyle in a newspaper. It's unthinkable.

I'm impressed with EGALE's approach to freedom of speech -- and, in this article, their belief in property rights and the right to be left alone. What a contrast with Richard Warman -- who claims to be an EGALE member -- the human rights complainer-of-fortune whose guiding philosophy is called "maximum disruption" and who counsels and conspires in the kind of petty violence that the "gay militia" did in Calgary. Watch this video clip to see Warman in action.

So Canada's leading gay lobby is against censorship of Christians. Canada's gay newspapers, like Xtra, seem to share that view -- and even republished Rev. Boissoin's article.

Is there any more proof needed to show that Canada's kangaroo courts are nothing but a self-perpetuating grievance machine, stirring up dischord and rewarding complainers-of-fortune? 

I got up early in Calgary to do John Oakley's radio show -- he's been a champion of free speech, and it was nice to be back on the air. 7:40 a.m. in Toronto means I probably got to a lot of morning commuters in the Greater Toronto Area. It wasn't a long segment, but I thought I got the main points out about the Rev. Stephen Boissoin case.

I've been thinking about the insanity of the government ordering a man to apologize for his beliefs, and to publicly denounce himself and renounce his faith. I wonder what I would do if it happened to me. It probably will -- I'm being prosecuted for publishing the Danish cartoons of Mohammed. But publishing those cartoons was part of my political views, and my job as publisher; Rev. Boissoin has been ordered not just to renounce his views or opinions, but indeed his very faith. He is being asked to murder not just his mind, but his heart.

It's un-Canadian, and it's a particular embarrassment to Alberta. Shame on Premier Ed Stelmach, who sent in a government lawyer to intervene against Rev. Boissoin. That sealed Rev. Boissoin's fate -- there was simply no way that a second-rate Progressive Conservative patronage appointee like Lori Andreachuk, the human rights commissar who wrote the Orwellian order, would have bucked not only her own ideological biases, but also a pretty clear instruction from her political patrons to crush that Christian. So she did.

The more I think about it, the angrier I become. What can I do about it? Well, I can continue my general battle against human rights commissions -- and, as I always argue, the first stage of that battle is the public denormalization of them, by merely exposing their fascism. So my Op-Ed in today's National Post makes me feel a little bit better.

But I think I can go a step further: I can personally defy the Alberta HRC, and its commissar Lori Andreachuk, and its puppet master, Ed Stelmach, by republishing Rev. Boissoin's "hate speech" on my website, right here, right now, while sitting in Alberta. It's my way of saying: I'm still free.

It should go without saying that I don't necessarily agree with Rev. Boissoin and, as anyone who reads my work knows, I would not have chosen his particular choice of language. It's fair to say that many people would find his letter to the editor rude, and even offensive. So what -- those aren't crimes, or at least they ought not to be.

By the way, I note that a gay magazine called Xtra has also published Rev. Boissoin's "hate speech" in its entirety. As readers will know, intentions are no defence to the charge of hate speech (neither is "truth" or "fair comment"), so Xtra is just as "guilty" as Rev. Boissoin is. And as I now am, too:

Homosexual Agenda Wicked

The following is not intended for those who are suffering from an unwanted sexual identity crisis. For you, I have understanding, care, compassion and tolerance. I sympathize with you and offer you my love and fellowship. I prayerfully beseech you to seek help, and I assure you that your present enslavement to homosexuality can be remedied. Many outspoken, former homosexuals are free today.

Instead, this is aimed precisely at every individual that in any way supports the homosexual machine that has been mercilessly gaining ground in our society since the 1960s. I cannot pity you any longer and remain inactive. You have caused far too much damage.

My banner has now been raised and war has been declared so as to defend the precious sanctity of our innocent children and youth, that you so eagerly toil, day and night, to consume. With me stand the greatest weapons that you have encountered to date - God and the "Moral Majority." Know this, we will defeat you, then heal the damage that you have caused. Modern society has become dispassionate to the cause of righteousness. Many people are so apathetic and desensitized today that they cannot even accurately define the term "morality."

The masses have dug in and continue to excuse their failure to stand against horrendous atrocities such as the aggressive propagation of homo- and bisexuality. Inexcusable justifications such as, "I'm just not sure where the truth lies," or "If they don't affect me then I don't care what they do," abound from the lips of the quantifiable majority.

Face the facts, it is affecting you. Like it or not, every professing heterosexual is have their future aggressively chopped at the roots.

Edmund Burke's observation that, "All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing," has been confirmed time and time again. From kindergarten class on, our children, your grandchildren are being strategically targeted, psychologically abused and brainwashed by homosexual and pro-homosexual educators.

Our children are being victimized by repugnant and premeditated strategies, aimed at desensitizing and eventually recruiting our young into their camps. Think about it, children as young as five and six years of age are being subjected to psychologically and physiologically damaging pro-homosexual literature and guidance in the public school system; all under the fraudulent guise of equal rights.

Your children are being warped into believing that same-sex families are acceptable; that men kissing men is appropriate.

Your teenagers are being instructed on how to perform so-called safe same gender oral and anal sex and at the same time being told that it is normal, natural and even productive. Will your child be the next victim that tests homosexuality positive?

Come on people, wake up! It's time to stand together and take whatever steps are necessary to reverse the wickedness that our lethargy has authorized to spawn. Where homosexuality flourishes, all manner of wickedness abounds.

Regardless of what you hear, the militant homosexual agenda isn't rooted in protecting homosexuals from "gay bashing." The agenda is clearly about homosexual activists that include, teachers, politicians, lawyers, Supreme Court judges, and God forbid, even so-called ministers, who are all determined to gain complete equality in our nation and even worse, our world.

Don't allow yourself to be deceived any longer. These activists are not morally upright citizens, concerned about the best interests of our society. They are perverse, self-centered and morally deprived individuals who are spreading their psychological disease into every area of our lives. Homosexual rights activists and those that defend them, are just as immoral as the pedophiles, drug dealers and pimps that plague our communities.

The homosexual agenda is not gaining ground because it is morally backed. It is gaining ground simply because you, Mr. and Mrs. Heterosexual, do nothing to stop it. It is only a matter of time before some of these morally bankrupt individuals such as those involved with NAMBLA, the North American Man/Boy Lovers Association, will achieve their goal to have sexual relations with children and assert that it is a matter of free choice and claim that we are intolerant bigots not to accept it.

If you are reading this and think that this is alarmist, then I simply ask you this: how bad do things have to become before you will get involved? It's time to start taking back what the enemy has taken from you. The safety and future of our children is at stake.

Rev. Stephen Boissoin

OK, you "human rights" bullies. Come get me. (But will you please stop harassing my parents?)

Tomorrow's National Post is running my blog entry on Rev. Stephen Boissoin. I cut it down to 700 words, and they've already posted it to their website, here.

I've written 417 blog posts since I've started blogging in January. That post has received more traffic than any other single blog entry I've written. (My YouTube videos, which as of today have received 578,000 views, were spread out amongst several blog entries).

I wonder what the threshhold is on this issue for Premier Ed Stelmach to give a damn? Unlike other HRC decisions, he can't claim it was an "arm's length" ruling by an "indepenent" tribunal. He sent a lawyer, representing the Progressive Conservative Government of Alberta, to intervene in the hearing, against Rev. Boissoin.

I've already done radio talk shows on the subject from Alberta to New Brunswick; tomorrow morning at 7:40 a.m. ET I'm doing John Oakley's popular show on AM 640 in Toronto. (I'm getting up at 5:40 a.m. MT just to do it -- if by chance you're up at that ungodly hour, you can listen live, by clicking here.)

I have the same thought as I did when I watched Mark Steyn's show trial in Vancouver. If Steyn's show trial could be such a circus when Maclean's and Steyn were so well-behaved (they called no witnesses; Steyn didn't even live-blog the thing; their lawyers were prim and proper); and if Rev. Boissoin's order can be an even larger news item, at least by my crude measurements (he didn't testify either; he has no mainstream media support, no money, no connections and no influential friends); imagine what a show trial would look like if the target himself decided to use the forum to promote his views, and misbehave a little?

I don't know when my own show trial will begin. The 15 lazy government bureaucrats working away on my file have had 800 days, and they haven't even scheduled a trial. Then again, a year into their prosecution, their chief interrogator hadn't even read the magazine article she's being paid to investigate. It's about what you'd expect from Ed Stelmach's bloated government.

This issue was first a hot potato for the federal government, because of the corruption and abuses at the Canadian Human Rights Commission -- an RCMP investigation tends to get press attention. Then it became a problem for the B.C. government, because of Mark Steyn's show trial. Rev. Boissoin is now a problem for Ed Stelmach.

It's sort of a political IQ test for Stelmach now: does he pull the plug on the Alberta human rights commission prosecution of me? Or does he convene another circus, on top of the Rev. Boissoin affair? 

I've had a lot of fun with the Canadian Human Rights Commission lawyer Giacomo "Serenity Now" Vigna. He's the buffoon who, in the middle the Warman v. Lemire hearing, suddenly declared that he was not "mentally able to proceed" because he was "not in a serene state of mind." If you want a good laugh, read the transcript, starting at page 4867 here. Let me quote just a few lines from it, and the hilarious response by opposing counsel:

MR. VIGNA: Sorry. Mr. Chair, I don't have the flu but I don't feel in a serene state of mind to proceed with the file today. I don't feel very well. I feel dizzy, I feel anxiety, and I am not in a serene state of mind to proceed with this file today.  

I have a lot of things worrying me right now and I don't want to elaborate, but my colleague said, Mr. Fine, there are some certain incidents that have occurred which I don't feel at liberty to elaborate right now, which have had an impact on my ability to proceed in a professional way on this file, at least for today, because I wouldn't be rendering the Commission a just service by proceeding in this condition.  

I am not dying, Mr. Chair, I don't have the flu, but I am not mentally capable of proceeding under these circumstances.

THE CHAIRPERSON: But the witness is here?

MR. VIGNA: The witness is here. It's not the question of the witness. The witness is here. I thought until this morning that I would proceed, but I really don't feel primarily mentally able to proceed, and physically too.

...MR. CHRISTIE: I have heard two explanations which are as frivolous as any I have ever heard in justifying an adjournment of a whole proceeding… To say I am not feeling well, but sit here and talk about it, is inconsistent. There is no medical certificate, and I heard very faintly Mr. Vigna say I'm not physically sick, I don't have a serene state of mind. Very few of us in the difficulties we face always have a serene state of mind. I don't know what that means.

This is not a case of a nervous breakdown or a mental state justifying a psychiatric examination. I am certain of that. To say I don't feel like doing it today is insulting... 

MR. VIGNA: Mr. Chair, I will provide a medical certificate.

THE CHAIRPERSON: Please sit down, Mr. Vigna.

MR. VIGNA: I feel insulted by that comment.

THE CHAIRPERSON: Please sit down.

God that's good. Well, good if you're looking for entertainment. The proceedings were cancelled, and the CHRC -- that is, you and I as Canadian taxpayers -- were ordered to pay for flight and hotel costs of everyone who had flown in for the hearing when Vigna had his breakdown. The Law Society of Ontario Upper Canada is still investigating his conduct, and so they should. 

Oh, where was I? Right. As regular readers will recall, Vigna has threatened to sue me for, well, writing exactly what I've just written above. You can see his rambling, home-made libel notice here. As I remarked at the time, I'm not sure why Vigna wants to sue me, when he's the one who made a fool of himself. We all make fools of ourselves from time to time. But only Vigna has the masochistic tendency to want to relive that embarrassing moment again in open court.

Well, maybe Vigna has calmed down. His threat to sue me was in April, and it's June now. Maybe he has finally found that serenity he sought.

Nope.

Now my parents tell me that Vigna has been harassing them at their home.

Vigna has been sending a private investigator to my parents' house again and again, demanding to see me. My parents, who are far more polite than I am, keep telling Vigna's hired tough guy that I don't live there anymore. I did when I was a teenager. But that was in 1990.

The last time Vigna's hired muscle came to my parents' house, he refused to leave. My parents said he had a Bluetooth phone device in his ear, and seemed to be taking instructions from someone -- Vigna himself? -- who told him not to go until he had found me. In the end, Vigna's enforcer must have lost his serenity, too, because he threw some papers down at my parents feet, and stormed off.

Classy.

My parents are much better behaved than I am. Had some neckless bouncer come on my property and refused to leave, I would have called the police. Not my sweet parents -- they're old fashioned, and believe in being courteous, even to bullies.

But Vigna the brave harasser of senior citizens should be careful. For while my parents are sweet on the outside, they are just as stubborn as I am, in their own way.

Alberta's human rights commission tried to shake down my father, Vigna-style, 25 years ago. Here's how my dad put it in a recent letter to the Calgary Herald:

Almost three decades ago, the AHRC came down heavily on my group radiology practice, demanding that we place a male X-ray technician at female fertility tests, as we had exercised "gender discrimination" by hiring a female technician.

Thousands of dollars in legal fees, seven months of letters of explanation of medical procedure, of female patient sensitivity, and AHRC visits, were of no avail in convincing the arbiters of hurt. Not only were they ignorant of medical procedures, patient vulnerability and sensitivity, as well as physician liability, they were intruding on physician-patient relationships.

It was only when confronted by the radiologist stating that he was prepared to go to prison to uphold his patients' rights, rather than give in to the kangaroo court, did these commissioners back down.

My dad fought his fight against the thugs of the human rights commissions. Now it's my turn.

And I'm happy to fight them -- in their kangaroo courts, in the court of law, and in the court of public opinion. By the way, we're creaming them.

I just wouldn't have thought that they'd stoop so low as sending a private investigator to harass my parents.

But, really, why should I be surprised? The Canadian Human Rights Commission has no problem with tampering with evidence, tampering with court transcripts, lying under oath, hacking into a private citizen's Internet account and publishing vicious hate messages themselves. They deliberately recruit corrupt employees.

So why should it be surprising that they're picking on my parents?

Giacomo "Serenity Now" Vigna isn't just a clown. He's a bully who sends private investigators to harass his opponents' families. But in his defence, Vigna works for Ian Fine. He's just living down to the CHRC's corrupt corporate culture.

Fire. Them. All.

The Waterloo Record, the hometown newspaper for the Canadian Islamic Congress's Mohamed Elmasry, has come out all guns blazing against Elmasry's abusive human rights complaint against Maclean's and Mark Steyn. Here's an excerpt:

For five depressing days in a nondescript courtroom in Vancouver last week, one of the most important rights in Canada -- the right to free speech -- was repeatedly kicked in the head.

It was a shocking, demeaning and unsettling spectacle that would be more at home in a totalitarian state than a country that claims to be a liberal democracy. But the attack on Maclean's magazine for daring to publish the Oct. 20, 2006 article, The Future Belongs To Islam, was entirely permissible under British Columbia's human rights laws. It is time those regulations, indeed the nation's human rights regulations, are rewritten. Much depends on this...

In one sense, freedom is its own defence and the greatest justification of all for what Maclean's did.

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees that "everyone has . . . freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication.'' The charter does not extend this freedom only to viewpoints that are accurate. And in any case, who are the members of a tribunal panel to determine the truth of a subject as massive as that as the role of militant Islam in the world today? Nor does the charter grant free speech only to those who do not offend, affront or cause anger. If that were the case, the nation's newspapers would be filled with white space and its airwaves silence...

In a free and open society, the kind of society Canada wants and claims to be, citizens have the liberty to discuss important and controversial subjects. In 2008, in the aftermath of attacks launched by Islamic extremists against the United States, Britain and other countries, it is imperative that Canadians learn about and talk about this great global faith and the violent minority who would hijack it. That discussion will be difficult, even rancorous at times.

But if it proceeds, it will lead to greater mutual understanding for all. The B.C. Human Rights Tribunal is impeding this discussion and the operation of a free press. The powers of this and other such tribunals should be curtailed so that the discussion goes on -- and true free speech in Canada survives.

Paul Schneidereit has another column pounding away at the insanity of Canada's human rights commissions, and their arrogant designs to be the government's official arbiters of what can and can't be published. An excerpt:

Observers have noted the B.C. Human Rights Code also provides for mandatory injunctions against repetitions of actions found out of bounds by the tribunal. That presumably means that if the tribunal finds against Maclean’s, the magazine will be prohibited from again publishing articles similar to Steyn’s in future. That’s a hefty – and subjective – censorship blanket the CIC’s call for "fairness" could provoke.

If HRCs think they can order a Christian pastor to publicly renounce his most deeply-held beliefs, what would stop them from ordering Maclean's to print some Islamofascist propaganda, too?

I wish that every journalist in the country could have attended that show trial in Vancouver. They would have been repelled by every sight: the hustlers and hucksters of the Canadian Islamic Congress, looking to hijack a private magazine; three radical activists sitting on the dais, as if they were some real judges; the hourly abuse of natural justice. I left there revolted; had I not had the real-time outlet of live-blogging, I think I would have either shouted out loud or vomited.

Oh well. Schneidereit will have his chance to watch such a kangaroo court first-hand, soon enough. They're coming for him now -- or at least his newspaper, the Halifax Chronicle-Herald, the largest newspaper in the Atlantic, and one of the most respected. But that doesn't matter; all that matters is that some thin-skinned complainer has complained about them. (Surprise! It's a jihadist!) I hate that his paper will now have to spend tens of thousands of dollars fighting this shake-down. But, on the other hand, I'm not sure how many more show trials can happen, with the wall-to-wall coverage that Steyn's received, before severely normal Canadians take to the streets in protest.

On several occasions, I've pointed out that the Alberta government's persecution of a Christian pastor for writing an anti-gay letter to the editor was not supported by EGALE, Canada's leading gay rights lobby. As former executive director, Gilles Marchildon wrote when the case was still winding its way through the HRC. An excerpt:

While it is difficult to support Boissoin’s right to spew his misguided and vitriolic thoughts, support his right, we must.

If Boissoin was no longer able to share his views, then who might be next in also having their freedom of expression limited. Traditionally, the LGBT community’s freedom has been repressed by society and its laws.

Plus, it is far better that Boissoin expose his views than have them pushed underground. Under the glaring light of public scrutiny, his ideas will most likely wither and die.

In fact, his words may serve to increase public education. By more clearly seeing the ugly face of bigotry and prejudice, the need for teaching tolerance in schools becomes obvious.

I'm impressed with that. It's a call to civic responsibility. Marchildon doesn't abide Rev. Boissoin's comments one bit. But instead of asking the nanny state to protect him, instead of outsourcing his civic duties to some HRC, Marchildon wants to engage in a public debate, and use it as a teaching moment. And, as the title of his article, "Freedom for all means freedom for each" shows, Marchildon knows that if an "offensive" Christian activist is censored today, an offensive gay rights activist can be censored tomorrow.

If only the "leaders" of the official Jewish establishment in Canada had such common sense. They would have governments -- by far history's biggest butchers of Jews -- "protect" us from hostile ideas, rather than doing it ourselves.

Here are two more gay activists who have denounced this anti-Christian persecution. Not because they're anti-gay. But because they know, too, that government haven't historically been friends to homosexuals -- but freedom is, and will be much more reliably so in the future.

ADDENDUM: Debbie Gyapong makes some good points here. What is Darren Lund, who loudly proclaims that he's not gay, putting forward such censorious complaints in the name of gays? That's even more absurd than Mohamed Elmasry claiming to speak on behalf of all Muslims when he sues Maclean's. We know Elmasry speaks for at least one Muslim (himself). Does Lund speak for even one gay person?

Just as Elmasry's fascist attack on Maclean's has set back Muslim-Gentile relations, by portraying all Muslims as a bunch of Saudi-style wackos, Lund undermines the credibility of the gay lobby, by painting it as an illiberal bunch of bullies, who can hardly wait to start "punishing" people as an act of vengeance for their own grievances. That's the shame of these human rights commissions: they reward and foster a sense of victimology and grievance.

The influential Family Research Council, an $11-million/year pro-family U.S. political action group, has caught wind of Alberta's censorship of Rev. Stephen Boissoin. Here's their item on the subject. An excerpt:

As if the lifetime speech ban were not tyrannical enough, Andreachuk also ordered Boissoin to compensate Professor Lund, who was not a victim of the so-called "hate crime," $5,000. Under the terms of his sentencing, the Reverend must "cease publishing...remarks about homosexuals" and submit a written apology to Lund for publication in the Red Deer Advocate...

Conservatives across Canada are in an uproar over the ruling and many are demanding that Premier Ed Stelmach follow through with his promise to review the unbridled "censorship powers" of the HRC. If he refuses, Alberta's thought police can indict any pastor or average citizen who holds political or moral views contrary to the powers-that-be. 

I would add that it's not just conservatives who are appalled. I'm pleased to report that prominent gay rights activists are appalled, too. Here's the former executive director of EGALE, Canada's largest gay rights lobby. 

The New York Post, which has a credible claim to being New York's newspaper of record, has a column about Canada's abusive and corrupt human rights commissions, pegged to Mark Steyn's show trial. Here's Rich Lowry's column in full, properly entitled "Gagged in Canada". Some excerpts:

At its best, Western civilization has fostered freedom of speech and of thought. But Canada has a better idea...

The country is dotted with human-rights commissions. At first, they typically heard discrimination suits against businesses. But since that didn't create much work, the commissions branched out into policing "hate" speech. Initially, they targeted neo-Nazis; then religious figures who'd condemned homosexuality; and now Maclean's and Steyn.

The new rallying cry is, "If I hate what you say, I'll accuse you of hate." The Canadian Islamic Council got the Human Rights Tribunal in British Columbia and the national Canadian Human Rights Commission (where proceedings are still pending) to agree to hear its complaint. It had to like its odds.

The national commission has never found anyone innocent in 31 years. It is set up for classic Alice-in-Wonderland "verdict first, trial later" justice: Canada's Human Rights Act defines hate speech as speech "likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt." That language is so capacious and vague that to be accused is tantamount to being found guilty.

Unlike in defamation law, truth is no defense, and there's no obligation to prove harm. One of the principal investigators of the Canadian Human Rights Commission was asked in a hearing what value he puts on freedom of speech in his work, and replied, "Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value." Clearly...

It is the genius of Muslim grievance groups to leverage Western anti-discrimination laws to their advantage. In his Maclean's essay, Steyn noted how in much of the West, "the early 21st century's principal political dynamic" is whether something offends Muslims. Indeed - but in Canada, truth is no defense.

This is an editorial cartoon from Sun Media. This particular one came from the Toronto Sun's website though, if I know the Sun, this cartoon will shared with other newspapers in the chain.

It's funny, and it's got that Sun style. But the reason I like this cartoon so much is that the cartoonist who drew it, and the editor who approved it, both decided that the subject of the abusive and corrupt practices of Canada's human rights commissions are so appalling -- and that enough of the Sun's readers were now at least vaguely familiar with that fact -- that this cartoon was appropriate.

Cartoonists don't draw for themselves; they draw for their readers; they draw with the news in mind. Their job is like an opinion columnist, but they use a picture, instead of 1,000 words.

Six months ago, this cartoon would have been met with a collective "huh?" both by the Sun's editors and readers. Not now. Now it's met with a collective "ha!" Enough people know about the corruption at Canada's HRCs; enough people are outraged; the case has been made; the denormalization of these commissions is well underway.

I think it's a good cartoon. But the fact that it was even published is my favourite part about it.

I think I was unfair to Lori Andreachuk, the thug on the Alberta "human rights" commission who recently ordered a pastor to publicly renounce his religious faith. Yes, Andreachuk is a bully. Yes, she is a destroyer of freedom of speech and freedom of religion, and an underminer of justice. Yes, she is positively un-Canadian in her values. Everything I said about her was true. But I think I left the implication that her fascist decision was hers alone. It wasn't.

It was a direct result of her boss and political patron, Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach. Let me explain.

Like other Canadian human rights commissions, the Alberta HRC usually beavers away on its own, without direct political interference. The permanent bureaucrats are a mix of lazy civil servants and radical activists. And the "judges" who sit on the kangaroo courts are political appointees, like Andreachuk. She was a small-time Progressive Conservative riding association organizer some years ago who got a political plum. She was not talented enough to become a real judge -- the spelling errors in her human rights rulings alone are a riot -- but she was just fine to be appointed to a second-rate kangaroo court.

Andreachuk usually does her own thing. But something unusual happened in the case of Darren Lund v. Stephen Boissoin, the anti-Christian activist versus the Christian pastor: the Alberta government, Ed Stelmach's government, sent a lawyer to the HRC to argue against Rev. Boissoin.

I have read pretty much every ruling issued by the Alberta HRC since the year 2000, and I can't recall seeing another case in which the Government of Alberta intervened. There have been some cases in which the government was the respondent; but never has the government deliberately chosen to join someone else's fight, to try to condemn a man. (If you can spot another such case, let me know in the comments.)

The Government of Alberta sent in their lawyer, David Kamal, to argue their point of view. Lund, the anti-Christian activist, was already in there, making his case; Kamal was sent to bring the Progressive Conservative government's views. To be clear: Kamal wasn't a lawyer at the HRC. He was sent by the Department of Justice; he was sent by the Attorney General; he was sent to express the political views of the Province of Alberta.

You can imagine how excited Andreachuk must have been. She never had such a fancy visitor in her kangaroo court before. The Progressive Conservatives had appointed her to this cushy gig; and now they cared enough about convicting Rev. Boissoin that they sent in a lawyer to gently let her know which way the government wanted this case to go.

Unlike real judges, kangaroo court judges can be re-appointed, or not. It's not a job for life. So when the Progressive Conservative government that appointed her came in and told her their view, you can be damned sure Andreachuk paid very close attention.

She did, of course. She convicted Rev. Boissoin -- and then went on to humiliate him, as I described earlier.

I blame Darren Lund, the for-profit persecutor of Christians. I blame Andreachuk, government censor. But the lion's share of the responsibility for this Christophobia must rest with Premier Ed Stelmach and his Progressive Conservatives.

Dear reader, If you doubt me, if you think that I exaggerate, if you think that I am being immoderate, if you think that I am being unfair, then simply read the following lines from Andreachuk's ruling convicting Rev. Boissoin which you can read in full here.

222. The Attorney General argues that freedom of expression is subject to a limitation. Further, that if people were allowed to simply hide behind the rubric of political and religious opinion, they would defeat the entire purpose of the human rights legislation.

Stop for a moment to take that in. Political and religious opinion is just a cover; just a "rubric" -- and one that stands in the way of "the entire purpose" of human rights legislation. Well, we can't have that. The Progressive Conservative government of Alberta, through their lawyer David Kamal, says we have a choice: political and religious opinion or human rights legislation. Premier Ed Stelmach chooses human rights legislation. 

240. It is the Attorney General’s position that there is no such thing as “discriminatory political and religious expression”, speech is either legitimate or it is discriminatory.

Did you catch that? "Speech is either legitimate or it is discriminatory". But how could religious speech be anything but discriminatory? Discriminatory means to discriminate, to choose between things. We discriminate every day; it is a compliment to be told you have discriminating taste. Discrimination is in fact the basis for religion, because religions are a code of laws that tell us what is proper and what isn't, what is permitted and what isn't, what is a sin and what isn't. There is nothing so discriminatory as the Ten Commandments. Yet the deep theological scholars at the Government of Alberta's Justice Department believe that "speech is either legitimate or it is discriminatory". To them, all discrimination is illegal -- even spiritual or theological discrimination

Such a childish, shallow logic, such an ahistorical, illiterate view, such an anti-intellectual "philosophy" is a perfect fit for Ed Stelmach's Progressive Conservative government. It suits him, and his drifting, policy-free Tammany Hall.

I only have the ruling to go by -- that's where I've found these simple-minded, anti-religious quotes. But I'm sure that Stelmach's lawyer submitted a full brief -- probably as asinine as the federal Justice Department's 50-page attack on free speech. If I get my hands on the government's full filings, I'll let you know.

Why do I mention this? Because Alberta claims to be the freest province in Canada. But it can no longer make that claim, not when Christian pastors are ordered to commit a Maoist self-renunciation. Oh -- and then there's the small matter of my own prosecution for publishing the Danish cartoons. Alberta is the only jurisdiction in the free world to prosecute someone for publishing those cartoons. How proud Imam Ed's mom would be if she could see him now, to know that her son is carrying out an Islamic fatwa.

Seventy years ago, Alberta was slapped down by the Supreme Court of Canada for censoring newspapers. That totalitarian streak, which we thought was gone, is back in spades with Ed Stelmach. Who knew that it would also come with a dollop of anti-Christian persecution?

Stelmach was asked about HRCs during the last election. Here is the audio of his utterly incoherent answer. There's almost no point in asking such a man for his views on the case of Rev. Boissoin. But he is the premier of the province, and his government did appoint Andreachuk, and they did send in Kamal to press for his conviction, and this abomination of a law was, in fact, their first piece of legislation when they took over from the Social Credit government 37 years ago.

So write Stelmach a note. Here's his e-mail address. Ask him how he feels about his new title: Ed Stelmach, anti-Christian bigot.

Pierre Poilievre is the Conservative Member of Parliament from Nepean-Carleton, and the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board.

On June 1st, a constituent wrote an e-mail to him (I've bolded some of my favourite parts):

...it has become clear to me over the last six months that the Human Rights Commissions (including the Canadian one) have been hijacked by "Activists" and those who seek to impose their view of what is proper speech on all Canadians. To do this they are utilizing s. 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act (and its provincial counterparts) to prevent discussion of topics which they regard as controversial and offensive. This must be stopped. Freedom of speech is not just one of the rights listed in the Charter, it is the fundamental right which makes all the others possible.

It has become clear from the case of Warman v. Lemire, currently before the Canadian Commission, that Commission employees are themselves posting "hate messages" online and they have hijacked a private internet account to cover their tracks. The current case against McLean's magazine is an example of the gross misuse of s. 13 to stifle political/social debate and opinion...

To which Poilievre replied:

I share your frustration with the way in which politically correct know-it-alls have decided what the rest of us can and cannot think. There is a private members bill before the House to put an end to this out-of-control insanity.

I plan to vote for it, [redacted]. If there is anything else I can do, let me know...

P.S. I will choose free speech over political correctness every time.

I think that's just a great phrase: "politically correct know-it-alls". Why not take a moment to write a note of encouragement to Poilievre, here. And if you haven't sent a letter to your own MP asking for his or her views on the subject, it only takes a moment. You can find your MP's e-mail address here.

Tomorrow's Washington Times continues their series on Canada's abusive and corrupt human rights commissions. This time, it's to report on the Conservative government's tentative first steps to review the CHRC's operations and its prosecution of "hate speech". An excerpt:

The filing is a change of heart for Mr. Nicholson and the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. In May, Mr. Nicholson's office filed a 50-page legal submission in support of the commission's attempt to stop a defendant from cross-examining the commission's investigators on their tactics. The submission also praised the work of Canada's human rights commissions and tribunals.

News of the submission led to Mr. Nicholson and Mr. Harper drawing heavy criticism, and many conservative and civil-liberties groups had threatened to boycott the Conservative Party's fundraising efforts despite the possibility of a summer election.

Unless I've missed it, I haven't seen the Conservative motion reported anywhere in Canada, other than in the St. Catharines newspaper, hometown to the MP, Rick Dykstra, who moved the motion.

The motion has not yet been adopted by the Justice Committee, since that committee hasn't had a vote in weeks. But I do think it's newsworthy, as the Times does, that Nicholson has abandoned his earlier posture of stonewalling, and is now calling for a review. I hope other Canadian newspapers pick up on the story.

I already blogged about my conversation with Rob Breakenridge about Mark Steyn's trial, the Stephen Boissoin ruling, and other abusive and corrupt activities by Canada's human rights commissions.

My previous post had a link to a 20-MB MP3 file. A regular reader has made it into an easy-to-load YouTube play-list. Click here.

Like many of you, my Internet home page is the newsy Daily Times of Pakistan.

Here is their report that six high-ranking Pakistani officials will fly to Brussels today to "ask" the European Union to restrict freedom of speech:

Pakistan will ask the European Union countries to amend laws regarding freedom of expression in order to prevent offensive incidents such as the printing of blasphemous caricatures of Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him) and the production of an anti-Islam film by a Dutch legislator, sources in the Interior Ministry told Daily Times on Saturday.

My favourite part of the story is the last two sentences. They fit together perfectly, almost like a Shakespearian rhyming couplet:

...the delegation would also tell the EU that if such acts against Islam are not controlled, more attacks on the EU diplomatic missions abroad could not be ruled out.

Sources said that the delegation would also hold discussions on inter-religious harmony during its meetings with the EU leaders.

Got that? If Western governments don't censor their press, they should expect more terrorist attacks. And, with that threat as their opening offer, they're now willing to begin "discussions on inter-religious harmony".

But just as long as everyone knows what will happen if the West decides to be disharmonious.

I note in passing that the Pakistani delegation isn't coming to Canada. Why bother? Our human rights commissions are already doing what Pakistan wants, prosecuting Islamic fatwas using the resources of the state. 

Here is a copy of a form letter currently being sent by the Conservative Party of Canada to party members concerned about the abusive and corrupt Canadian Human Rights Commission.

It's a more succinct version of the infuriatingly condescending talking points that were drafted by the Justice Minister four months ago. Those talking points were worse than dead silence on the matter, because they implied that the recipient of such second-rate bumf would be gullible enough to be mollified by them. Even silence would have been less disrespectful than that attempt at "spin".

Well, after being savaged by hundreds (thousands?) of party members, and the subject of a half-dozen discussions in caucus, last month Rob Nicholson finally amended his form letter reply, promising a Parliamentary review of the matter. It's not much, and it hasn't even begun, but it is, at least, a concession that there are problems.

It's probably time for the Conservative Party to stop using Nicholson's old talking points. I'm not sure that his new stance is going to convince members to re-start their donations again, but it will surely be less off-putting than his original, "full stonewall" PFO letter.

...and my other considered thoughts on Canada's human rights commissions.

My friend Rob Breakenridge invited me on his popular radio show yesterday for an interview. We started off talking about Mark Steyn's trial in Vancouver, and moved on to the Alberta case of Stephen Boissoin.

It's a 20-minute segment (large file) but I think you'll get a kick out of it.

See update, below.

What could Mark Steyn's punishment look like, if he's convicted by the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal?

It could look like this order, issued just last week by Alberta's human rights commission, against a Christian pastor named Rev. Stephen Boission. (The substantive ruling against Rev. Boissoin can be found here. See paragraph 357 where the right not to be offended "trumps the freedom of speech afforded in the Charter." And see a thoughtful response by the former executive director of the gay rights lobby, EGALE, here.)

Last November, she convicted Boissoin. Last week she ordered her "remedy".

It is the most revolting order I have ever seen in Canada. Ever.

I'll excerpt a few lines from her ruling:

In this case, there is no specific individual who can be compensated as there is no direct victim who has come forward...

That's insane already. No-one was hurt. The complainant was an officious intermeddler, a busybody, the town scold, an anti-Christian activist named Darren Lund who had an axe to grind, and Andreachuk gave it to him.

Dr. Lund, although not a direct victim, did expend considerable time and energy and suffered ridicule and harassment as a result of his complaint. The Panel finds therefore that he is entitled to some compensation.

So a busybody with no standing spends time filing complaints -- and gets a tax-free reward for doing so. Oh -- and for his "suffering". Not suffering at the hands of Rev. Boission, but "as a result of his complaint". People in the community ridiculed Lund for filing the complaint -- as they should. And so Andreachuk will get the pastor to pay for that. Why the hell not? Who's going to stop her? Her political patron, Ed Stelmach?

Mr. Boissoin and [his organization] The Concerned Christian Coalition Inc. shall cease publishing in newspapers, by email, on the radio, in public speeches, or on the Internet, in future, disparaging remarks about gays and homosexuals.

There's a lot there, starting with a small but telling point. Darren Lund is a not a medical doctor. He's a professor. But Andreachuk refers to him as Dr. Lund. Stephen Boissoin is a pastor. But Andreachuk calls him "Mr. Boissoin". No "Rev. Boissoin" for her.

But look at the staggering order there. Boissoin can never -- ever -- communicate anything "disparaging" about gays. It's a lifetime ban -- and it applies to every conceivable medium, including his private e-mails.

But nothing "disparaging"? That means nothing critical.

She didn't order him not to communicate anything "illegal" or even anything "hateful". She ordered him to say nothing disparaging. Ever. For the rest of his life.

A divorce lawyer from Lethbridge with a second-rate patronage job just ordered a Canadian pastor to stop communicating to anyone, ever, about gays. Not to stop "hate speech" -- whatever that malleable legal definition is. She just told him to shut up, period.

And then she orders that Rev. Boissoin and his group are:

...prohibited from making disparaging remarks in the future about Dr. Lund or Dr. Lund's witnesses relating to their involvement in this complaint..

Again, not banned from "hate speech", whatever that is today; but banned from disparaging remarks about Lund, an anti-Christian activist, who now is "protected" not just from Rev. Boissoin's alleged anti-gay remarks, but from his political criticism of his own tormentor. Apparently, being a busy-body human rights complainant-of-fortune is a new "protected ground" of hate speech. Become one, and no-one can ever say anything "disparaging" about you again. Ever. Not even in an e-mail.

But Chief Kangaroo Andreachuk is just getting warmed up.

Mr. Boissoin and The Concerned Christian Coalition Inc. provide Dr. Lund with a written apology for the article in the Red Deer Advocate which was the subject of this complaint.

So Ed Stelmach's "conservative" government now believes that if it can't convince a Christian pastor that he's wrong, it will just order him to condemn himself? Other than tribunals in Stalin's Soviet Union and Mao's China, where is this Orwellian "order" considered to be justice?

This is like a Third World jail-house confession -- where accused criminals are forced to sign false statements of guilt. But the thing about jail-house confessions is that they at least pretend to be real. The forcible nature of them is kept secret. Not here: Andreachuk just comes out and says it: you're going to say you're sorry, even if you aren't.

That's a bizarre "remedy". It's meaningless, other than as a thought crime. We don't even "order" murderers to apologize to their victims' families. Because we know that a forced apology is meaningless. But not if your point is to degrade Christian pastors. 

Oh, and by the way, Rev. Boissoin and his organization are ordered to:

request their written apology for the contravention of the Act be published in the Red Deer Advocate.

That's the local newspaper. So Rev. Boissoin doesn't just have to issue a false apology. He has to publicly humiliate himself, by publicly declaring his contrition -- contrition he does not feel -- and his abandonment of his deeply-held religious beliefs. A second-rate government bureaucrat has ordered a Canadian pastor to publicly renounce his religious beliefs.

Does that happen anywhere outside of Communist China, or theocratic Saudi Arabia?

OK. Now the cash. Rev. Boissoin and his group:

shall pay to Dr. Lund an award for damages, jointly and severally, in the amount of $5,000.00.

Andreachuk already said Lund suffered no damages. But so what. When you're forcing a man to publicly renounce his conscience, why not stick him with the bill? In Communist China, the family of prisoners who are executed are sent the bill for the bullet that killed them. So while Rev. Boissoin's money is being divvied up, why not make him pay for the hearing, too? A witness against Rev. Boissoin, Janelle Dodd, will get her expenses paid,

up to the maximum amount of $2,000.

So, let's re-cap.

A Christian pastor has been given a lifetime ban against uttering anything "disparaging" about gays. Not against anything "hateful", let alone something legally defined as "hate speech". Just anything negative.

So a pastor cannot give a sermon.

But he must give a false sermon; he is positively ordered to renounce his deeply held religious beliefs, and apologize to his tormentor for having those views.

And then that pastor is ordered to declare to his entire city that he has renounced his religious views, even though he has not.

That's Alberta's human rights commission. That's the group where 15 bureaucrats are busily beavering away against me, because I published some Danish cartoons two years ago.

That's the same "law" under which Maclean's and Mark Steyn are charged.

Fire. Them. All.

UPDATE: I have written a new post in which I examine the unusually vindictive role played by the Government of Alberta, which sent in a lawyer to intervene in this case -- against Rev. Boissoin. You can read that new post here, which includes the e-mail address of the politician responsible for this travesty.

I just got an e-mail from Meryle Kates, who is organizing my June 16th speech to the Canadian Jewish Civil Rights Association. The event was announced less than a week ago, but already 70 of the 90 tickets are sold.

Meryle writes:

The lawyers generally don't reserve until a few days before, so we do expect this will be SRO!

That's how important this issue is to Canadians. It's not just the preserve of the blogosphere anymore; it goes to the very essence of our free society. I'll suggest to Meryle that we should book a bigger room -- I'm sure we could hit 250 tickets sold. If they invite Mark Steyn next, I bet he'd move 1,000.

In case we don't move to a bigger venue, you'd better e-mail Meryle to book your tickets right now.

UPDATE: Meryle e-mailed me to say they're going to stay put at their prestigious Ontario Bar Association venue on 20 Toronto Street. So get your tickets now -- I bet they'll be all gone by Monday!

P.S. You don't have to be Jewish, or a lawyer, to attend this event. 

1. Keep up to date on the final day of the Maclean's/Mark Steyn hearing at the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal by visiting Andrew Coyne's blog.

2. Here's a radio interview I did yesterday on John Gormley's top-rated talk show (from my cell phone, as I was rushing noisily between meetings -- sorry!)

3. Here's a very important editorial in Calgary's newspaper of record, the Calgary Herald. It holds Premier Ed Stelmach to his campaign promise to review Alberta's Human Rights Commission. You really ought to take a few minutes to read the whole thing, but let me excerpt a few lines. The reference to Boissoin is to a Christian pastor ordered by the Alberta HRC to stop talking about homosexuality, and to apologize -- against his conscience -- to a gay rights activist:

Finally, Boissoin is to provide Lund with a written apology for the sincerely held opinion he published in the Advocate.

As apologies that do not spring from changed minds mean nothing, this must be seen for what it is: the kind of recantation squeezed by an inquisition from some unfortunate, a denial of conscience for the sole purpose of grinding the dissenter's face into the dust, the better that he may eat his words.

In its present form, Alberta's Human Rights, Citizenship and Multiculturalism Act is profoundly anti-liberty, leaving Albertans the right to say only what does not offend their neighbours on any of 13 different grounds.

It has been used to guillotine legitimate discourse on matters of immediate public importance, and removes from men and women that most basic of all human attributes -- the right to their own opinion.

Premier Stelmach, do something for liberty, now. Repeal Section 3(1)(b) from Alberta's human rights act.

And then the Herald's editorial did something unusual: they put out a call to action to their readers, telling them to get behind the campaign for liberty, and to write to the premier. That's pretty rare, and it shows the impressive depth of commitment the Herald has for freedom. Here's the end of their editorial:

To stand up for our hard-won freedoms and western way of life, write to:

Office of the Premier

Room 307, Legislature

Building

10800 97th Ave.

Edmonton, Alberta

T5K 2B6

(No stamp is necessary.)

Or phone: 1-780-427-2251

Fax: 1-780-632-6888

To call toll free call: 310-0000

E-mail: premier@gov.ab.ca

I wonder if Stelmach will indeed do a review of the HRC, like the federal Conservatives are now promising to do. Frankly, I doubt it -- the Alberta Tories are a pretty sluggish bunch; they just went through an election, and are feeling particularly impervious to public opinion. How impervious? They just granted themselves an enormous pay raise, making themselves the highest-paid provincial legislators in the country. And they haven't been ideologically conservative since Ralph Klein's first term.

So what does that mean? I think I know, because I've seen in happen with my own eyes in Vancouver.

I predict that the Government of Alberta will continue to ignore this issue. They'll say it's only animated by a few hot-headed conservative bloggers, and some obsessed editorial writers in a few newspapers. So they'll keep hitting the snooze button on their alarm.

And then my trial will come, as Mark Steyn's did. And then the thousands of Albertans who have been briefing themselves on this subject, and getting angrier and angrier, will have the same spectacle as Vancouver is now having. And the national media will come to town -- well briefed, well prepared, especially after Mark Steyn's show trial in Vancouver.

And then the Alberta Tories -- rudderless, boring -- will have an enormous issue thrust upon them, an issue they could have neutralized in advance.

The Vancouver show trial of Maclean's and Mark Steyn was spectacular, but only because of the buffoonery of the kangaroo "judges" and the stupidity and outright lies of the Canadian Islamic Congress. The respondent, Maclean's, was quite well behaved. They didn't put forward provocative testimony; their lawyers were very sober and buttoned-down; they tried to make it as proper a procedure as they could. Mark Steyn didn't testify, or even "live-blog" the event. The circus aspects of the hearing were all from the CIC and the tribunal itself.

And it was still an amazing show, that grabbed national attention, and even foreign interest.

Dear reader, imagine what an Alberta show trial, over the Danish cartoons, would look like if the respondent chose to misbehave a little bit.

Oh, nothing illegal. Maybe even nothing that could count as "conduct unbecoming". But what if the respondent in that Alberta show trial decided to put on a bit of a show himself? No-one from Maclean's testified. Reader, do you really think I would decline to speak on my own behalf? Do you think I'm genetically capable of remaining silent in the face of such unmitigated crap?

Do you think that I would go quietly? Do you think I would bite my tongue? Do you think that I would be modest, and moderate, and cooperative? Do you really think that I would allow, without acid comments of my own, the kind of corruption we witnessed in Vancouver?

I did not request a show trial. I did not convene the circus. But if Alberta is going to have one, well then, by God, I'll take the role of P.T. Barnum. We already know who the kangaroos are. And the plaintiff is a bit of a clown.

Memo to Premier Stelmach: You've got a few months to spay your own kangaroos and shut down the circus. Stop counting your money from your pay raise, and get to it.

Memo to the national new media: Stelmach will do nothing, and so the show will go on. Bring your cameras. If it's to be a show trial, I promise you a helluva show.

UPDATE: A commenter has a premonition:

I just finished a vigorous panel at the Magazines Canada conference in Toronto. It was chaired by author Noah Richler, and besides me, there was Shelly Ambrose, publisher of The Walrus, Derek Webster, founder and editor of Maisonneuve magazine, and the Literary Review of Canada's editor, Bronwyn Drainie. In other words, other than my somewhat inexplicable presence, it was the height of magazine literati. The panel drew a full room at the conference.

Half way through the proceedings, Noah asked me to talk about various "chills" on speech -- namely defamation and human rights commissions.

I said that I don't think that libel chill is a particular trouble to Canadian journalism, since truth is a defence, and fair comment covers much of the rest. It's good for journalists to have a distant worry about defamation in the back of their minds when attacking someone's reputation -- and accurate reporting is the only defence necessary.

How different that is from Canada's absurd "hate speech" laws, for which truth and fair comment are no defence, damages need not be proved, etc.

I talked a bit about the section 13 hate speech law, reading out its key sentence. And Noah took a poll of the room: did they support the law, or want to see it abolished? 100% were on the side of freedom. I was impressed -- these were, in the main, fancy downtown Toronto culturati. They get it.

On the way to catch a cab back to the airport, who did I bump into but Lewis Lapham, a guest speaker at the same conference. Lapham, of course, was the longtime editor of the exquisitely liberal Harpers magazine. We said hello to each other. I mentioned to him that I was being hauled before the Alberta Human Rights Commission because the Western Standard published the Danish cartoons two years ago. He stopped me, telling me he knew all about it, and he reminded me, in fact, that he had written sympathetically about our very case in 2006!

I was already in a great mood after Noah's panel; but to leave Toronto with the imprimatur of Lewis Lapham, dean of liberal literati, solidified my growing confidence that freedom of speech, opposition to jihadist fatwas and the abolition of Canada's illiberal "human rights" commissions is no longer the preserve of "conservatives", or any other fraction of the intellectual world. It is a cause that every genuine intellectual, anywhere on the spectrum of ideas, can naturally understand.

We're winning.

Look at the first sentence in this political column by John Ivison:

Conservative MPs report that high on the list of issues that concern their constituents is the threat to freedom of speech posed by the interpretation of the hate messages provision in the Canada Human Rights Act by the country's human rights commissions.

He's talking about you -- the e-mailing army of freedom!

But Ivison also warns that it's far too early to declare victory:

But sources within the government suggest Mr. Nicholson may not have undergone quite the Damascene conversion on the issue that Mr. Martin supposes. One Conservative suggested the Justice Minister is in thrall to his departmental bureaucrats, who do not support overturning Section 13. According to this version of events, Mr. Nicholson has eased pressure within caucus by authorizing a review of the act but has managed to delay action by referring it to a dysfunctional committee that hasn't met in months and isn't likely to convene again until well into the fall.

I received a phone call from an MP's office last weekend, telling me that his office received 60 letters about human rights commissions in a single day after I put his e-mail address on this site. An MP's office that received 60 letters a month on a particular issue would likely be that office's hottest topic. So keep at it!

You can find your MP's e-mail address here. Go to it!

Richard Evans has taken the 80-minute Canadian Association of Journalists debate about section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act, and pulled out his favourite eight minutes, basically eight minutes of me getting mad at Ian Fine, the tallowy senior counsel at the Canadian Human Rights Commission. You can read my thoughts immediately after the debate, here.

I was probably too hot for the cool medium of television, and I think I was too detailed for a general debate, but I felt it important to call Fine on his fibs. What do you think?

P.S. I just saw this new offering of spoken-word poetry from Old Jed, too. He's good -- I'd listen to him read this in a coffee shop, while wearing a black turtleneck.

I've been in transit; Vancouver until this morning, Calgary now, and I'm about to board the overnight flight to Toronto for twelve short hours, to participate in Noah Richler's panel at a magazine conference. I'm flattered to have been invited on such a smart panel, which includes Bronwyn Drainie, in whose magazine I published this foreign policy essay last year.

I gleaned a little bit of info on the road about the kangaroo court in Vancouver -- I regret I couldn't stay to keep blogging; over the last 36 hours I've had 45,000 unique visitors, with close to 100,000 visits. That is very rewarding feedback!

On Andrew's blog, I read about Faiza Hirji, the expert whose studies include Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Much was made about her exciting trip to a conference in Melbourne, where she apparently was allowed to speak for seven minutes.

I spoke today with a senior official at the Department of Canadian Heritage -- the people who sponsored her vacation down under. I was told that, when the minister's office read Ms. Hirji's bubblegum wrapper c.v., they immediately put the kibosh on her trip. The minister's office was advised by the bureaucrats (hello, Yes Minister!) that the invitation to Ms. Hirji had already been issued and, notwithstanding the government's objection to funding her quackery, the invitation could not be rescinded. The senior official was rather incensed that Ms. Hirji was passing herself off as having the imprimatur of the government.

I also learn of the insanity of the complainants: that neither Naiyer Habib or his Ontarian boss, Mohammed Elmasry, will take the stand as witnesses. No more evidence was needed to convict this tribunal of being a farce and waste of taxpayers money, but this is just the latest and most arrogant example.

Yesterday in Vancouver, during one of the tribunal's many "health breaks", Habib approached me, and introduced himself to me. I refused to shake his hand; a crowd soon gathered.

He told me he thought there could be a reconciliation between Jews and Muslims -- at least I think that's what he meant. I'm not sure why Habib thought I was the ambassador of the entire Jewish people, but such modesty doesn't burden him, a member of the confidently named "Canadian Islamic Congress". I told him he was a bigot, and followed a bigoted, Jew-hating boss in Elmasry; he didn't try hard to deny it; the crowd grew.

And then I told him what I really thought.

I'm glad he filed this complaint against Rogers.

Not because I dislike Rogers -- far from it. I'm deeply impressed with them, and grateful to them, for fighting this like hell.

And I'm sorry for the trouble and money it has cost them.

But I'm glad that Canada's Jew-hating Muslim fanatics are led by such awful strategists as Elmasry and Habib, people who thought they could strangle hundreds of years of freedom with a single kangaroo court shakedown. I pointed to the dozens of people around, including every senior media organization in the country, and told Habib that none of them would be there, covering his jihad against free speech, exposing his fascist agenda, were it not for his staggeringly stupid decision to take on Maclean's.

I told him he would be famous, almost as famous as his boss Elmasry.

I meant it. For had Elmasry and Habib and their apprentice, the serial liar Khurrum Awan, not made their move so clumsily, so brutally, so poorly, so half-wittedly, they might have continued on with their soft jihad against Canadian values without arousing suspicion, let alone a defence.

I regret that Elmasry and Habib and Awan have exposed moderate Canadian Muslims to hatred and contempt, for their un-Canadian antics. But I am deeply grateful to those anti-Semitic CIC bastards for waking up the nation to the threat of radical Islam, and calling upon a somnolent press corps to rediscover and rededicate themselves to our ancient value of free speech.

I'm afraid I have to go to Calgary now so I won't be at the hearing tomorrow. I'll have some final thoughts, but for the minute-by-minute updates, please visit my friend Andrew Coyne's outstanding blog.

The lawyers are discussing timing of the rest of the hearing; though it's been painfully slow to date, I think that Maclean's will not call any witnesses or evidence. FJ will bring a few more witnesses; I predict they'll backfire -- either in a hail of contradictions, like Khurrum Awan the Serial Liar, or in honesty, like my new IM chat buddy, Andrew Rippin.

I think the case will finish up on Friday.

I've enjoyed live-blogging -- I've had 18,000 unique visitors making more than 40, 000 visits today as at 5 p.m. PT, which is a pleasant reward of its own. But, even though Maclean's clearly won the day, I can't imagine that magazine is happy about spending what I estimate has been $150,000 so far defending this joke of a case in a joke of a tribunal.

I've had a few laughs today, but they're not happy laughs; they're laughs of scorn; laughs instead of tears. Because this isn't a theatre show; it's a tribunal with the force of law behind it, and the power to censor political speech -- a power it has brutally used before.

If I was Andrew Rippin on Lavalife, I'd lose the photo, and rely on my wits. A photo of such boldness, of such confidence, of such imperviousness to the vagaries of feminine opinion, might scare off those who would be won over by his words.

Rippin's testimony was pointless in this hearing. It was legally irrelevant. But Faisal Joseph argued that it went to show inaccuracies of Mark Steyn's article.

It didn't do that. In fact, it proved that indeed there are radical Islamic sects that require total political submission to Islam.

Julian Porter declared his questions done. A second later, he remembered one more and proceeded to ask it. Faisal Joseph objected noisily. A-ha! A little victory! Porter didn't even care enough to push the point -- his work was done.

Now FJ is re-examining Rippin -- asking him to pin down the number of Wahhabis out there. Rippin says he can't, so he doesn't. FJ is trying to limit the damage. Too late for that.

FJ is asking about Osama bin Laden's religious training; Rippin says he doesn't know -- he's a Koranic expert, not a political expert.

Rippin's done. It's 5 o'clock, and I'd say the Rippin exercise was a win for Maclean's -- as if anything in this Alice in Wonderland hearing turned on things like facts or logic.

Julian Porter is now reading out Rippin's work discussing how the fatwa against Salman Rushdie -- a death sentence against him for offending Islam, and indeed his apostasy -- is very much alive in certain Islamic sects. Rippin can do nothing other than to be impressed that someone was paid $800/hour to read his academic work.

Porter refers to Rippin's writings about the "authoritarian aspects" of the Saudi Salafi movement; Rippin wrote that such tendencies are "an unfortunate reality". That could come from America Alone, couldn't it?

Says Porter: "you're a wonderful witness, because you're intellectually honest." True that.

Andrew Rippin would make an interesting professor. He's honest; he doesn't dance around questions, at least any more than any other academic would do simply by nature.

Julian Porter doesn't have a tough job; Rippin has left enough of a paper trail in which he discusses radical Islam, that it's not hard to find Rippin saying, in writing, what Porter wants to hear from him: That there are indeed radical sects of Islam out there, political sects, that demand that their adherents colour their every action with their religious ideology.

Did Faisal Joseph even Google this guy? Other than a shared interest in expressive facial har, was there any other criterion for his retainer?

Julian Porter refers to Rippin's article, "What has Osama bin Laden done to Islam?" He refers to Rippin's study of Wahhabi, Saudi Islam, and its dangers and deviations from moderate Islam. I paraphrase, because it's 30 degrees Celsius in here, and I wasn't quite ready for a slow-motion Koranic exegesis -- nor did the B.C. Human Rights Code contemplate it.

JP: "I'm trying to establish through your writings that there is a sect of very strong belief that disagrees with your interpretation of the flexibility and interpretation of the Koran."

Andrew Rippin: Yes.

JP goes to hand that article to Rippin himself.

Faisal Joseph stand up, in what can only be called a Khurrumian whine, raising his voice quite beautifully, objecting to JP doing so.

JP: "It's his work. Do you want to be out of here today?"

FJ: Stands down once he gets his copy. Somebody's getting a little testy.

JP: "You deal with a theme called 'ten things which nullify one's Islam'. What's this about?"

AR: It's a 17th century wahhabi document. "A [20th century] Saudi jurist wrote a kind of revision to this "ten things which make you not a Muslim"... and that was the point of this particular study. And my point is to say that Osama bin Laden are a part of legitimate Islam...

JP: "As I understand it, the wahhabi... and their strict thought carries great weight amongst parts of Saudi Arabia."

AR: "I'm tempted to say that's beyond my expertise..."

Ezra Levant, to himself: "But you are a master expert about all things Steynian and Macleansy?"

JP: Reading more from AR's article, about the extraordinary strictness of Islam.

AR: "It is."

JP: "And that is a powerful trend in this entire community"

AR: "Yes."

JP: "Is [wahhabism] a view that there should not be any separation of church and state or mosque and state?"

AR: "...it certainly wants to get at those people who argue that Islam is purely apart... so that Islam must have some bearing on how people act. That to me doesn't say that therefore needs a cetain type of government... so to take that into the simple church and state relationship doesn't quite catch."

JP: You write that it requires "... a deep involvement of state powers in controlling the behaviour of community members. Yes?"

AR: "Yes."

I'm going to stop transcribing this verbatim, because I'm not doing very well at keeping up.

But the take-away is this: Andrew Rippin has written a scholarly article in which he acknowledges that all Islam is not happy-go-lucky Islam; that some strict sects of Islam are out there -- and moreso, that such strict sects require Muslims to have "radical" Islam colour their entire lives.

Rippin won't deny it. First, he's too honest. Second, Porter is holding a copy of his essay in his hands, so there'd be no point.

FJ: How did Muslims in Mohammed's time treat the Jews?

Rippin: "we get a number of incidents, some of them suggesting war between Mohammed and the Jews certainly in Medina; these are quite famous events in the Muslim stories of Mohammed... "ometimes Jews weren't allowed to build or rebuild synagogues"

Again, I'm not sure how that hurts Steyn, helps the CIC, or is relevant to this case. Has FJ even read the Koran himself?

Faisal Joseph is asking Andrew Rippin questions about Islam. Roo Tonie isn't paying attention. I don't blame her; it's irrelevant.

FJ asked Rippin about the term "Mohammedan". Rippin explained that the phrase emerged from a Christian view -- just as Christianty was named at its central figure, Christ, Christians chose to call Mohammed's faith as Mohammedanism. It wasn't a disparaging phrase; it was mimicking how Christians describe themselves.

Rippin, in fact, pointed out that some Muslim groups call themselves Mohammedia.

I'm starting to wonder: did FJ and the sock puppets take Rippin through their questions before today? Or was his appearance as slap-dash as the rest of their case, some of which was hatched just yesterday?

Because if I were trying to paint the word "Mohammedan" as an insult, I'm not sure if I'd be pleased if my expert -- who surely is an expert on Islam as a religion -- would tell me it's not inherently offensive, and in fact is an appellation chosen by some Muslims themselves.

Overruled Julian Porter's objection. Faisal Joseph can now ask a Koranic scholar about his opinions about modern journalism -- outside of his expertise.

It's a setback, if you think that the Roos are the place where this will be decided. In fact, when the Roos convict Maclean's, this and all of the other rejected Maclean's objections will be grounds for appeal.

An interesting note, though: Just before the Roos took their little hiatus, Faisal Joseph asked why Porter is objecting to such commentary by Rippin, but he didn't object when Awan the Liar did.

To which Porter replied that Awan was the complainant, and FJ would have been objecting ad nauseam had Porter tried to cork his client/witness/colleague/future employee.

FJ said "he's not the complainant". The first time that's been acknowledged in this hearing, or in the media.

Roo MacNaughton said that was a "distinction without a difference".

What a joke this tribunal is -- the Roos know Awan isn't a complainant, but they let him testify as if he was, to let the anti-Semitic bigot, Mohammed Elmasry, off the hook for doing so. A surrogate witness. What a legal novelty. What a legal joke.

Courtesy of a commenter. An excerpt:

The question is still, How does Islam become involved in this? Why does Islam have anything to do with this? Or fundamentally, Why is it Islam which groups have used as a vehicle for urging reform or revolution? Mohammed Arkoun, a prominent Muslim writer and intellectual, has argued that the word and abstract concept Islam itself has been appropriated by those who are fighting political battles in a context in which no other ideology is present that will allow for the mobilization of the masses. And certainly the concept of Islam itself is flexible enough to accommodate such use, as is most every other religion also able to absorb such modes of thought. The notions of martyrdom, of the utopian future, of the stark line between good and evil are all such as to support a vision of the world which is focussed upon transformation of society through political action. But what Arkoun notes is that it is the loss of the legitimacy and viability of nationalism, socialism, communism, democracy and so forth as supports for political action that has created a situation in which Islam has had to be used in this way. It is the lack of viable alternatives within the Muslim world itself that has created this rise of what is referred to as "political Islam".

            The question of what does Islam have to do with this is, in the end, meaningless, just as is portraying the conflict as the "crusade" against terrorism or a jihad of Muslims against the West. Abstractions of Islam into the arena of ideological debate are attempts to pose simple answers to complex questions which emerge out of the boundless narratives of human history. As history teaches us, the ingenuity of the human mind to find justifications for its actions on the basis of abstract ideals which it considers authoritative is endless. Muslims are no different than anyone else in that regard. But of course, a movement which has become called political Islam does exist and it involves people who use Islam as an instrument towards certain political ends. Some of those groups are pushed towards more radical means of achieving their ends. This is result of factors within the affected countries in which the balance within the struggle to use the emblem of Islam has tilted towards governments, at least temporarily. That use can be quite limited as in Egypt or all encompassing as in the case of Afghanistan. But in doing so, there is created the space for ever more revolutionary uses of the notion of political Islam, in the absence of any other ideology and in the successful taming of public sentiment by governments in their own use of the Islam as a symbol of identity. In sum, Political Islam is obviously a volatile force, the result of internal community dynamics upon the stage of global politics.

Rippin: the article depicts Muslims as "the other"

Rippin points out what the sock puppets have never done: that, in one part, Steyn was using Col. Khaddafi's words, and he leaves Khaddafi's words out there for the reader to contemplate.

Rippin is less partisan and more honest that Awan.

He has not, in fact, pointed out a single factual error as yet; he disagrees with Steyn's interpretations. But no factual errors as yet.

Again, that's irrelevant. Because none of this is relevant to the law.

Julian Porter has objected to Faisal Joseph's question about the "meaning" of the article; about what "readers would think". Rippin is not an expert in that; he's an expert in the Koran. He's not an expert about Maclean's, or Steyn, or what journalism means, or what readers mean. And, in the context of a lawsuit about words, only the judges -- or the 'roos, here -- can determine that meaning, because that determination is the point of the law. Is it hate speech or not? 

Steyn: Islam has global ambitions

Rippin: "Islam is being seen as this entity which drives all aspects of Muslim life... that this is the primal instinct... this kind of identity of Islam with global ambition... is based on a false understanding of the Muslim doctrine"

"if one looks at analysis of what is popularly called Islamophobia... Islam is presented as an unchanging, single entity, which is characterized as that "other", characterized as barbarism, sexism, etc."

It's an interesting point of view. But it's a point of view. And it's a pretty political point of view, not so much a theological point of view.

But, again -- it's all irrelevant under the law. The law isn't about journalism, or academia. It's about censorship.

Faisal Joseph: Have you read the article?

Andrew Rippin: Yes.

FJ: What's your view of it's depiction of Muslims?

Julian Porter: Objection -- "might I ask the witness to be excused?"

JP: "He can express opinions about what is inaccurate in the piece... But what he says about what the article means is truly your [the BCHRT] job... He can say what is wrong. What he as an expert interprets what this article means, that's not his expertise. He's an expert on the Koran and the interpretation of it. For him to say he took from this Canadian magazine this meaning here and there, I say with respect, is not what he's an expert for... leeway doesn't apply to an expert to say "this is what an article means". It's up to you [the panel] to determine that. You can't be helped by his.. [expertise] in the Koran."

FJ: "this is what I plan on being limited to... factual inaccuracies with respect to Muslims and Islam in the article... he'll be giving evidence that Mark Steyn's article is based on a misperception of Islam... factually, historically and Koranically incorrect"

Ezra Levant: Uh, truth is not a defence under the BCHRT. And lies are not a grounds for conviction. They're irrelevant.

JP: "it's a basic, cardinal rule that an expert may only testify as to what his expertise in... you [the panel] do not need help in what this article means and says, and by inference what the ordinary reader will take from it."

Roo MacNaughton: "we will have no difficulty with allowing the evidence.. on the basis of [FJ's] description of the evidence"

So back comes Rippin

That's the kind of thing you might see on Lavalife and say "whoa".

This is the CIC's next witness, Andrew Rippin. He's been hanging out outside the courtroom all day. I honestly thought he was one of the few slightly-dazed criminal accuseds who wander around the court house -- one of whom asked me, today, for some legal advice (I didn't have any for him).

Now I learn that man is a Christian expert in Islam. Interesting.

I reget my prejudice and stereotyping. He's a little bit of a raggamuffin, but I'm sure that doesn't take away the validity of his expertise.

Hey, Moses had a beard, too, and he was the Giver of Laws.

I'll listen without pre-judging.

We're on a short break now, and I've just reviewed that Mike Duffy Live interview with Khurrum Awan. I see now why Julian Porter cross-examined Awan on it, because it was probably the most lie-packed utterance Awan ever made.

Not only his lies, as outlined earlier, about his shakedown terms to Maclean's. But about what Awan says Maclean's actually published.

Just like the Danish imams packed in a few home-made, extra-offensive cartoons into the 12 that actually appeared in a Danish newspaper, all the better to rev up the riots, so too has Khurruw Awan added a few falsehoods, spicy, inflammatory falsehoods, to what Maclean's actually published, because without it he would seem even more fascistic in his shakedown of Maclean's.

That's why Porter talked about this interview.

Porter: You hadn't heard of the Library of Alexandria until you read it in Amiel's column. Had you heard of Muslim comedian Omar Brooks before Mark Steyn mentioned him in Maclean's?"

Awan: 1,000 words to say "no"

Porter: "are you taking a review of a CBC sitcom comedy should be judged if it's politically correct?

Awan: "can you please split that question up?"

Porter: "those are my questions"

Porter: Is it acceptable that people can question multiculturalism?

Awan: "not in a manner that casts aspersions... on all Muslims, including, without distinction... what does multiculturalism mean in the context of a Muslim takeover."

I'm not saying that makes sense. I'm just saying that's his answer.

Porter: Asked Awan about Amiel's column; asked him about her report that fourteen textbooks were pulped because they weren't multiculti; asked about the three academics Amiel cited in support of her opinions. Asked if he knew anything about those academics.

Awan: Acknowledged he knew nothing about the facts therein.

Porter: are you denigrating Amiel's right to have an opinion?

Awan "not really; it may have reflected my opinion; I'mnot able to tell you what my opinion was, unless you direct me to the context in which I tendered the opinion whatever it was"

Huh?

Porter: "I was really quite struck when you said "I don't even know if the library was burnt down" So you're making a remark about it, but you don't know?"

Awan: "That particular statement is occuring in the context of a particular article... in what seems to be a military conquest, by a military ruler, in which she is discussing our educational system.. I just do not see how a Muslim ruler burning down a library seems to be perhaps what Ms. Amiel is saying is if we have multicult taught to our kids, and respect for Muslims... it will somehow result in having libraries burnt down..."

Did you get that?

It's tough.

It's a big, incoherent mish-mash of half thoughts and half sentences.

But the nugget was this: Awan "testified" that Amiel's criticism of the burning of the Great Library of Alexandria meant that she believed Canadian Muslims would do the same if we treated them with respect.

Now Julian Porter is asking Khurrum Awan about this appearance on Mike Duffy Live. (At least I think so; I'm not going to play the clip in court to confirm it.)

(Awan is wearing precisely the same suit, shirt and tie today as he did back then. Maybe it's his lucky outfit, I don't know.)

Porter's questions were about whether Ken Whyte was "rude" to Awan. Awan couldn't testify that he was, though he said Maclean's rejection of their shakedown offer was rude. Yes, wasn't it.

Without viewing the clip, I can't put this together.

Julian Porter is asking Awan if he remembers whether or not he demanded money from Maclean's.

Porter is now reading out a written demand by the sock puppets for "substantial" monies.

Awan is denying the documentary record.

Awan says that $10,000 was the number they had in mind -- though he acknowledges he hadn't particularize that sum before.

What a gorgeous new lie young Khurrum Awan has offered. He claims that his letter to the editor to the National Post (in response to my own article!) might have been edited by Jonathan Kay, to insert the lie that Porter has caught him in.

Awan is hoping that the Kangaroos will believe that Jonathan Kay added the words "mutually acceptable" to his letter to the editor.

Yeah, that's the ticket, Khurrum. You weren't lying in a dozen identical letters and Op-Eds. Jonathan Kay (I hear he's a zhoo!) and a dozen other editor across the country made identical edits to Awan's letter.

They should be the one answering to big, bad Julian Porter! He's mean!

Now Awan is listing authors he'd find acceptable for the rebuttal article they were demanding -- including Haroon Siddiqui, of the Toronto Star. Why the hell not? Just because they're competitors, no reason why you shouldn't try to force Siddiqui onto Maclean's.

But Porter points out that Awan did not mention Siddiqui's name, or any other.

Porter: why didn't you put those ideas to Whyte?

Awan: "Well we couldn't."  Uh, okay. So you had time to demand cash, and a cover story, but you "couldn't" have spoken the truth back then?

I don't even understand the excuse. But it's not meant to be understandable; it's not meant to clarify; it's meant to muddy, to confuse.

Let me sum up for you, dear reader, who are not here to watch a junion would-be lawyer try to explain to a court why he is a serial, malicious, money-grubbing liar.

Khurrum Awan went in demanding cash and editorial control. Then he realized that doesn't look good in a liberal democracy like Canada. So he edited the truth. He amended what he said. He lied.

And lied and lied and lied.

And kept lying.

He smeared Ken Whyte. He smeared Maclean's. He smeared Rogers. And that damn fool thought he'd get away with it. He was so brazen that he thought he'd even call himself as a witness.

Julian Porter has earned his fee today.

Now Julian Porter is asking Khurrum Awan about his press conference at the InterContinental Hotel in Toronto, featuring Faisal Joseph. Porter pointed out that Awan and Joseph didn't make the "mutually acceptable" offer there, either.

Awan gave his incoherent explanation, with an extra dollop of Fargo: he was worried that Maclean's would distort an offer of a mutually acceptable article, so they didn't make it.

Porter: "if you distort it's okay; if he does, it's bad"

Porter then read out Awan's article in the Globe and Mail, where Awan not only said the proposed article would be from a mutually acceptable writer, but that writer could be from inside or outside the Muslim community -- but, in fact, Awan had demanded that the author of that cover-story rebuttal be from the Muslim community, and of the CIC's own choosing.

Another lie.

Awan is drowning in his own quicksand.

Keep talking, little grasshopper. Keep talking.

Awan wrote a letter to a Rogers executive Brian Segal. It was part of his Sharptonian adventure in shaking down Rogers.

Bad idea. It didn't work. I met Segal yesterday. He comes across as a gentleman businessman, but I get the feeling he's good with a bowie knife.

Segal didn't pay a dime.

But that's not why Awan's letter was so stupid.

It was stupid because now we have a written track record of Awan's shakedown. It's being read back to him in court. He's being asked where the phrase "mutually agreeable" exists. It doesn't.

Now Awan is trying to explain away that lie. Uh, it isn't working. I'd go with the crying strategy.

Did I just hear a flicker in Awan's voice? Is he really going to cry?

He should, if only as a legal strategy. He has already emasculated himself with a two-hour psychotherapy session; why not go the whole mile. I'm sure it would work with the Troika.

Porter is putting Awan's own words to him; Awan is pulling a Richard Warman: he "can't remember". I suppose it's better than lying under oath, but not much.

Now Porter is showing Awan various letters that Awan sent to Maclean's. The fool was stupid enough to put his shakedown demands in writing.

And Porter is showing that Awan demanded that Maclean's submit to the CIC's choice. No "mutually acceptable" anything. That qualifier was added later by Awan the Liar, to appear more reasonable to the Gentile press.

It reminds me of Yasser Arafat, who would preach peace when speaking in English to Western journalists, and preach terrorism to his own constituency when speaking in Arabic.

That's Awan: reasonable to the media; a junior Al Sharpton when dealing with Ken Whyte.

No wonder Awan had trouble finding employment following his clerkship.

Julian Porter himself was at the meeting where Khurrum Awan and his junior Al Sharptons tried to shake down Ken Whyte and Maclean's for cash and a cover story.

Porter asked Awan point blank if the CIC's proposed "counter-article" was to be "mutually acceptable" to Whyte or of the CIC's own choosing.

After obfuscating for a few rounds, Awan acknowledged that he never in fact offered a "mutually acceptable" article -- that was simply an after-the-fact lie, a little bit of taqqiya that Awan et al. has told the press.

Awan admitted that he made no such offer of a mutually acceptable author. It was to be the CIC's own choice. 

One of Canada's best lawyers, Julian Porter, vs. one of Canada's most confused young articling students, Khurrum Awan. There's going to be some cringing.

...just advised that the court's audio recording system has problems.

And yesterday, the court couldn't handle the crowd attending -- dozens were turned away, including reporters.

The court doesn't have its documents, (they're "five minutes away", says Joseph).

As David Frum notes, the bunglers who can't even run a proper show trial would run Maclean's magazine for them.

That's Faisal Joseph, explaining that the full Western Standard post isn't here at the court.

So we've had a ruling by the BCHRT about the admissability of a post they haven't read -- let alone required disclosure of. And we're a day and a half into a hearing.

Those crazy 'roos!

Because it's now 1:40 p.m. PT. Of course, the Troika likes their 90-minute lunches so much, sometimes they go for two full hours. I ascribe it to the thrall my blog post has put them in. But the gallery is in their seats.

In the meantime, I'll post a letter I received from Kathy Shaidle, my co-defendant in one of my many HRC-related legal fights:

Soft bigotry of low expectations.

You're there and I'm not but:

I think that's what's motivating the HRC panel bending over backward to accommodate the poor underprivileged "Mohammedans" in their midst and  letting them get away with their every whim.

(All those in this particular case the "low expectations" have turned out to be quite justified!)

PS: I am totally writing and saying "Mohammedans" from now on... heh.

It's a good question. Would the BCHRT accept such shoddy lawyering from a WASP complainant's counsel? Would they be so indulgent? I don't know.

But I do know one thing. In a free society, when you seek to censor your critics rather than debate them, when you whine to a kangaroo court about the use of the word "Mohammedan", you can pretty much be guaranteed you're going to hear it a helluva lot more.

That's what Khurrum Awan and Faisal Joseph don't seem to understand: the hatred and contempt directed towards them is not because of Mark Steyn's article in Maclean's. It's because of their own graceless manner in responding to that article. They can expect to be mocked for a long, long time.

That's what Faisal Joseph just said! I'm so proud to be condemned by a bigot like that!

Dammit I'm a lucky man. You're known for your friends -- and you're also known for your enemies. I'm pleased to have the second-rate anti-Semites of the CIC condemning the Western Standard's website -- a website with several excellent pro-freedom Muslim bloggers, by the way, including the great Kalim Kassam, and the Iranian refugee, "Winston".

Just to reiterate, the blog posts that McConchie is objecting to -- none of which are located in B.C.; all of which are on the Internet, which is out of bounds for th BCHRT -- were printed off by Faisal Joseph's crack team yesterday, and given to him just then. They've had seven months to prepare for this case. They did so yesterday morning. They're phoning it in.

But that's the big question here, isn't it: is the BCHRT going to go with McConchie's law, or Joseph's politics?

My blog post in question has 128 public comments written in response to it.

McConchie said he didn't read them. He said they might be brilliant legal dissertations; they might be the ravings of an idiot. He didn't know -- he didn't care. He said the whole thing was irrelevant to a B.C. case. Not just because it couldn't fathomably be linked to the Steyn/Maclean's article in question, but also because it was published on a website based in Calgary, Alberta, not B.C.

Now he's asking about another, Texas-based Catholic website. He's referring to commenters "rascal 1", Melanie01, etc. He indicates that he was given this particular blog print out just yesterday. He's wondering why a Texas blog, with comments by an anonymous California commenter, are irrelevant to the complaint at hand.

He points out that all of this is on the Internet -- outside the tribunal's jurisdiction.

But again, Mr. Boring, Mr. Law-Talking-Guy, Mr. All-Those-Dusty-Old-Rule-Books doesn't get it.

He's making legal arguments, to a panel of political radicals, untrained as judges, un-expert at anything other than grievance-mongering.

He has made an objection to Khurrum Awan entering my blog entry as an exhibit! He's claiming it's "immaterial" to this issues!

Roger! Don't deny me an opportunity to get a second human rights complaint! You're stepping on my publicity!

The B.C. Human Rights Tribunal! Those arbiters of right and wrong; the deciders of all that is good and bad; those deep legal scholars; those profound thinkers; those marsupial magistrates that would cause the most ardent Ozzie to smile with pride at their national critter -- they are considering a blog post I wrote last year!

Finally! The big time!

I feel such a sense of pride that the Western Standard website is being discussed by such a high panel! And, though the post was indeed made to the site after I sold it to Matthew Johnston, the blog post in question is indeed one written by me, on December 2, 2007!

Here's the post! I'm not just live-blogging Steyn's case. I'm liveblogging my own case at the same time! Top that!

And here it is in full!

Sunday, December 02, 2007

Elmasry vs. Steyn

As Adam mentioned below, Mark Steyn and Maclean's have been taken to at least a couple of human rights commissions by the Canadian Islamic Congress.

I'm familiar with the CIC and their propaganda campaigns. (Funny enough, the news story on Maclean's website is itself CIC baloney -- they are in no way Canada's "largest" Muslim organization, despite their pretenses. Wikipedia has a quick bio of Mohamed Elmasry, their president-for-life.)

Here's a column I wrote about them after an encounter I had with Elmasry at a journalism conference last year. We were on a panel together, and he railed on about how the "zhoos" controlled the media. He received more than a polite response from the crowd of reporters, and a vigorous defence from a particular CBC radio producer in the crowd. Substitute a Louisiana accent for his Egyptian accent, and Elmasry's speech could have been given by David Duke. How he continues to get kid-glove treatment -- even on the Maclean's website! -- is amazing. Surely his public support for killing Israelis warrants some mention whenever he's quoted in the press.

After the National Post ran my column, the CIC served us with notice under the defamation laws. Of course, they had no case -- we had the defences of truth, fair comment, etc. -- so the CIC had to settle for a letter to the editor almost a year later.

But the CIC learned their lesson: there's no point suing in defamation law, where the CIC would have to pay for their own lawyers, and our lawyers if we won, and where silly things like the rule of law apply. Better to go to the human rights commissions where the taxpayer pays for the prosecution, traditional rules of evidence and procedure don't apply, and free speech is not protected. It still has all of the down-sides for the defendant -- the hassle, the cost, and a lower bar for a "conviction" -- but none of the cost for the complainants.

Speaking of which, the Western Standard's own human rights hearing is finally coming up, nearly two years after we published the Danish cartoons and were first hit with the complaints. We don't have an exact date yet, but the formal "investigation" meeting will be in January. Though we ceased publishing the magazine, we are still a corporate entity, and it's important to me that we see this human rights challenge through.

For your info, here's the hand-scratched complaint against us, and here's our reply. The whole thing feels like justice on the streets of Sudan or Saudi Arabia, more than Canada. I'm sure liberals who fight for the separation of church and state will be speaking out about this human rights complaint any moment now, as vociferously as if the Bishop of Toronto had taken a gay rights magazine to court.

I hope Maclean's fights their complaint hard -- if I know Ken Whyte and Mark Steyn, I'm sure they will. I just hope that the choice is theirs.

I wonder how long before the rest of the surrenderist press corps, the types who applauded Elmasry at that journalism conference, realize that this is their fight, too.

Posted by Ezra Levant on December 2, 2007 | Permalink

The Brussels Journal is the second blog. A Catholic blog was the third.

I don't know the Brussels Journal blog well; I think it's in, uh, Brussels. But why should that get in the way of a Toronto boy bringing a complaint in a B.C. tribunal?

Faisal Joseph is bringing in the blogs!

The Western Standard was mentioned! I was so excited I missed the names of the others. (I regret that, the blog post he's sure to mention was written after I ceased to be its publisher. Oh well.)

"Why are teachers trashing Western values?" is the title of it. And it references America Alone.

This is what Awan is talking about now.

Amiel's article wasn't the subject of the complaint, nor was the book America Alone itself.

But why should such legal arcana stop this tribunal? If it can hear some Toronto law clerk give his personal reflections in some weird, government-sponsored act of psychotherapy, why not let the man go on a long, stream of consciousness ramble?

Now he's kvetching that Amiel mentioned that Muslims sacked the Great Library of Alexandria, Egypt.

None of which is legally relevant. But, just for the sake of political argument -- as this is a political trial -- what exactly is Awan saying? That Muslims burning a library engenders hatred for Muslims? Or is it hateful that Amiel writes about that historical fact?

In all of his media appearances, I've never seen Khurrum Awan tell a joke, let alone laugh. But he is now giving the tribunal his -- what? evidence? -- about what jokes are funny or not.

He's going through one of Steyn's previous columns, and disagreeing with Steyn's analysis of comedy in the Islamic world.

All I can think of is: why are we all listening to this marble-mouthed, un-expert, Ontarian law student who is not even a party to the complaint?

The answer, of course, is that the Troika isn't really listening. Not one of the three of them is even looking at Awan.

Awan has just given us his own ruling: it is no longer "appropriate" to use the word "Mohammedan". Ever.

So Steyn is a lawbreaker!

Now Khurrum Awan is now criticizing Mark Steyn's criticism of Little Mosque on the Prairie.

Awan's literary skills are questionable to begin with; he speaks with an accent that sounds like it's from the movie Fargo. His writing is, well, iffy. He's not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

But he's giving his "evidence" about how Steyn's taste in comedy is... what? Illegal? That's all we're here to do.

And this is the jumped-up little twerp who whines when people call him a fascist.

Faisal Joseph is entering evidence about the CBC sit-com, Little Mosque on the Prairie.

That's what we're doing here, in B.C., at taxpayers' expense -- and with three Maclean's lawyers, and four Maclean's executives. We're in a government hearing about whether or not Mark Steyn is allowed to give a critical review to a second-rate TV show.

A Rogers exec came up to me during the break, and predicted that the Troika would admit some documents, and not admit others -- basically split the objections down the middle, instead of making a decision.

He was right.

He's got this tribunal sized up: they have no bloody clue. They're winging it.

I was chatting with Andrew Coyne, and heard, in the back of my mind, "Order in the Court!" and my lawyer's instincts kicked in, and I stood up, before realizing that I was paying respect to the marsupial magistrates!

I quickly sat down! I'll call it a mid-morning stretch.

It's clear that the complainants have given little or no thought to the B.C. jurisdiction. They're shoe-horning their boilerplate whine into this province's tribunal, because it had easy access, and they were shopping around, as legal tourists, for the easiest place to lay their bullying claim.

Joseph is saying that European "evidence" is relevant in B.C. because "Islamophobia" is a universal phenomenon.

Well, maybe. But you'd think that, with the better part of a year to prepare, that such a universal phenomenon could have been detected in this province.

I've rarely seen such sloppy lawyering.

But I don't think it matters.

While McConchie delicately gives his lecture about the law, Joseph gives a political whinge. Which approach do you think will win over Troika Tonie, the rewarder of bus drivers who have a "human rights" to 118 sick days?

McConchie: "it's a preposterous approach" to disclosure. Documents given to him last night; documents sprung on him this very morning; documents vaguely alluded to; other documents (including quotes from politicians) not provided at all.

No wonder Khurrum Awan has complained that he was unable to find a job when he's done his clerkship.

Roger McConchie is giving a law school lecture. A real panel of judges would be offended -- they know about laws, lawyering and judging. But not this panel. They haven't the first bloody clue. They don't know about evidence. They don't really care. For a day, they've been hearing from a lay witness with no expertise or standing. And they've let it run.

McConchie is telling them how real courts deal with expert evidence. They don't just let some law student submit a "textbook" on "Islamophobia" and say, "read this" it means "we win". They bring a real expert, who will discuss its credibility, authority, etc.

Here's my best effort at a direct quote from McConchie, after telling the tribunal how real courts work: that's "how at least in my experience and my understanding of the law... I accept this tribunal is not bound by the same rules as a regular court, but there are boundaries, there's a minimal requirement to prove the authority of the document that's submitted to the tribunal that is represented to be some sort of academic study, and that would ordinarily be done through an expert witness, and not a lay witness who happens to have seen it."

That's how a polite man tells a tribunal they don't know what the hell they're doing.

Needless to say, not one of the Troika is paying much attention to him, and panellist Tonie Beharrell has her eyes closed for much of it.

While I'm half-listening to Roger McConchie demolish yet another "Islamophobia" study, this one because it's a British study, not Canadian, I thought I'd review this fascinating Wikipedia entry about Matthew Hopkins, Britain's self-described "Witch Finder Generall".

Take a read.

Faisal Joseph wants to enter into evidence a study about Islamophobia.

A study about Islamophobia in the fifteen European Union countries.

And you thought that complainants from Ontario were a bit of a stretch in a B.C. Tribunal!

I just received this e-mail from a reader about Lerners, Faisal Joseph's firm, soon to be Khurrum Awan's:

The founding partners of Lerner’s (Sam & Mayer) are probably spinning in their graves,  seeing their company’s name attached to  Faisal Joseph and Kurrum Awan.   They were proud alumni and strong supporters of my Jewish fraternity at the University of Western Ontario & U of T.   Lerner’s is also the biggest lawfirm in SouthWestern Ontario.   Wonder how the other partners, including the children of Sam and Meyer feel about their firm being linked to the fearsome twosome? 

Watching Faisal Joseph at work is a wonder. His failure to let Maclean's know about his list of witnesses, despite undertaking to do so; his use of his future employee as a witness; his failure to disclose relevant documents to Maclean's, and to attempt to ambush them. All are a wonder to behold.

Joseph repeatedly says that he was once a crown prosecutor. I understand that he was never a staff prosecutor, but was a per diem private lawyer who picked up occasional prosecuting gigs for extra dough.

I wonder if, when he prosecuted accused criminals, if he was a spotty in his disclosure of the crown's documents to the accused. If not, then he's showing what a kangaroo court is about -- sloppy, unfair procedure. If so, then I'm sure many of his cases were overturned on appeal.

Khurrum Awan is going to fit right in.

The Troika has rejected the admissability of the Op-Ed, because it doesn't have the poll's statistics in it. Lucky for Maclean's, the "expert" "Op-Ed" that appeared weeks before their article didn't have those details. Otherwise the Troika would have admitted it.

As what? Expert evidence? Surely not. Cross-examinable? Of course not. Relevant to a publication weeks later? Of course not.

Maclean's objection was sustained, but for the stupidest reason.

Hell, take 'em where you can get 'em, I guess.

The three marsupial magistrates have retreated to their chambers to consider the admissability of an Op-Ed, published before the Maclean's article was.

They have done this a half-dozen times so far during the hearing.

What are they considering? Are they even consulting any precedents? What's going on back there?

They asked for no arguments or cases from counsel. I don't think they even know about such things.

I think they just want to have a good cry about all this, in private, before putting on a brave face, and issuing their "ruling".

It reminds me of the conference call that the Canadian Human Rights Commission set up with the National Post a while back, to "spin" the Post about their coverage. Joseph Brean, the Post's reporter, asked them a tough question. They didn't know the answer. So they whispered amongst themselves -- with Brean right there on the phone! -- before replying.

These are the moral, intelletual and legal giants who are hearing this case.

Before getting to the blogs, Faisal Joseph wants to adduce a poll.

But he hasn't done the legwork -- nor have his three sock puppets, including his assistant/witness Khurrum Awan -- to actually get the poll.

They did some Internet surfing, and found an Op-Ed that referred to the poll.

And they wanted to adduce that.

Oh -- but it gets better. The Op-Ed in question was written before the Mark Steyn/Maclean's article.

How I wish this were in a real court, not a court marsupial, just to watch Joseph get smacked down.

Of course, the troika just stares dumbly.

They agree to allow the document to be entered.

FIre. Them. All.

Surprise! The blogs will be adduced as evidence. By Khurrum Awan.

Awan is not a British Columbian. He is not a party to this complaint. He has no ties to B.C. -- I doubt he's even been to the province before.

He is not a lawyer -- just an articling student.

But he is more politically palatable than his boss, the anti-Semitic, terrorist-supporting bigot Mohammed Elmasry.

So he is being used as a proxy witness. Nice trick, that.

Oh -- and, as I mentioned yesterday, Awan is going to work as an associate for none other than Lerner's, Faisal Joseph's firm.

Faisal Joseph tells us what he wants to talk about today.

Not Mark Steyn.

Not Maclean's.

Not anything in their complaint, as filed.

He wants to talk about the blogosphere's response to their human rights complaint. He wants to ask the tribunal to make the criticism stop.

He wants to be politically immune for his censorsious, fascistic, legally abusive ploy.

Roger McConchie objects.

Any bets on what the troika will rule?

Whenever the troika comes into the courtroom, the armed, bulletproof-vested officer cries "order in the court". Most people in the room reflexively stand up.

But the officer knows enough not to say "all rise"; for these are not judges. He just calls for order.

Most people stand up.

I don't.

I've been asked why the Canadian Islamic Congress has Faisal Joseph, a private CIC lawyer, representing them, rather than government lawyers and bureaucrats, such as the 15 Alberta government hacks prosecuting me over there.

The answer is that, in most (I think all) of the other 13 human rights commissions in Canada, the government has two halves to human rights commissions: the keystone cops side of the HRCs, and then the kangaroo courts on the other. In B.C., there is only the kangaroo courts side of the deal.

The keystone cops are the investigators (like Shirlene McGovern, my interrogatrix in Calgary) and prosecutors (like Giacomo "Serenity Now!" Vigna of the Canadian HRC); the kangaroo kourts are the tribunals, which hear the cases brought by the keystone cops.

Usually, the cops/prosecutors side is called the "commission", and the court side is called the "tribunal". The nomenclature is slightly different in every province; in Alberta, for example, both halves are called the "commission".

In B.C., there is no commission that drums up business, or that investigates complaints -- everything goes straight to the tribunal. To compensate, the tribunal does dismiss more cases, and occasionally even orders costs against complainants. And, there are no government lawyers prosecuting the cases.

Is that better than the other 13 HRCs? I'm not sure. On the one hand, there isn't a full-time team of hustlers, like the fifteen chasing after me, who are trying to stir up grievances and pick fights amongst the citizenry -- no Barbara Halls.

On the other hand, anyone can get straight to a hearing.

That's precisely why the Canadian Islamic Congress, with no roots in B.C., with a complainant from Ontario (Mohammed Elmasry) a lawyer from Ontario (Faisal Joseph) a chief witness from Ontario (Khurrum Awan) and a magazine based in Toronto (Maclean's) is being put on trial in Vancouver.

The CIC was forum shopping.

They went to the easiest HRC in Canada to get to a hearing. And the three panellists were just stupid enough to let them do it. 

There are three of them -- which is highly unusual. I'll get to that in another post. But let's look at those three: Heather MacNaughton, Tonie Beharrell and Kurt Neuenfeldt.

I've written about the plumb stupidity of Tonie Beharrell before. I didn't mention her name -- I just discussed her insane ruling. She was the human rights tribunal member who punished a bus company for trying to reform bus drivers who had absentee rates of up to 118 days a year. You read that right: bus drivers who skipped work 118 days a year, and still got paid, had a "human right" not to be corrected by the bus company. Not just that, but the bus company was ordered to pay them four-figure sums for their "pain and suffering" of being told to get back to work.

You can read that abomination of a ruling here. And here was my blog on the subject.

The good news is that Beharrell, the woman who knew nothing about running a bus company, is now one of the three panellists who know nothing about publishing -- or constitutional freedoms, more importantly -- who is now presiding over Maclean's.

That's the first panellist. Then there's Kurt Neuenfeldt. Here's a ruling Neuenfeldt made a few years ago. It's a case of a tenant complaining about a landlord. The landlord, conveniently, was never served with papers advising him of the hearing. If you think that the mere technicality of not letting the defendant know he was going to be on trial would stop a human rights tribunal chieftain like Neuenfeldt, you don't know human rights commissions.

Here are the "facts" that Neuenfeldt heard from the complainant, Ellen Raweater -- otherwise known as half the story. Raweater, a single mom with three kids, rented a basement suite from the respondent, Steve MacDonald. One day MacDonald complained to Raweater that her 16-year-old son had been causing a disturbance, and he was getting complaints from the neighbours about him.

That's it.

Raweater, naturally, charged MacDonald with anti-Aboriginal bigotry. Her proof: when Raweater caused a fuss, MacDonald asked her if she was going to complain to "Indian Affairs" about it. He didn't kick her out. But he "discriminated".

Years passed. The teenager continued to cause problems. MacDonald had the impertinence to ask about the missing dad, and dared suggest the kid would be "more controllable" if he saw his dad.

Bigot!

There are more petty complaints -- and we never hear the other side of the story. Some of them go to the hygiene of the apartment. Whether or not those allegations are true, they're not human rights complaints based on racism.

Raweater demanded $30,000 for her pains. Neuenfeldt gave her $1,774 and an "order" to MacDonald to stop being a racist.

Gee. If Neuenfeldt called MacDonald a racist, what words will be left to describe the dreaded Mark Steyn?

But neither Neuenfeldt nor Beharrell come close to the queen bee of human rights nannies, Heather MacNaughton. MacNaughton is a social engineer of the first order. Look at this staggering monster of a ruling, in which MacNaughton single-handedly arrogates unto herself the power of the Minister of Education and Finance Minister of British Columbia.

The case was about learning disabled students, and funding for special programs for them. There are a dozen different points of view on the subject; and that is just one of the many subjects that must be dealt with by the Minister of Education; and his needs and priorities are just one of the many demands on the treasury of B.C. that must be juggled by the Treasurer, and ultimately, by the Premier. It's called politics; and if the government doesn't get the balance right, it can be pressured by the opposition (and the media; and other activists); and ultimately be replaced in an election.

But that's too slow and messy. Why not take it to the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal, and get Heather MacNaughton -- not elected to anything, of course; not an expert in education; or budgeting; not having run any business of any size, let alone Canada's third-largest province -- and have her seize control of every damn school in the province.

MacNaughton's stunning ruling issued orders to the entire ministry of education; she took a single complaint, and used it as a pretext for commandeering the whole province. See page 300 of her monstrosity (my bolding; SLD stands for severe learning disabled):

[1024] In addition, pursuant to s. 37(2)(c), I order the Ministry, within one year of this decision, to:

i) make available funding for SLD students at actual incidence levels;

ii) establish mechanisms for determining that the support and accommodation services provided to SLD students in the Province are appropriate and meet the stated goals of the School Act and the Special Needs Student Order;

iii) ensure that all districts have in place early intervention programs so that SLD students can be identified early and appropriate intensive remediation services provided; and

iv) ensure that all school districts have in place a range of services to meet the needs of SLD students.

[1025] Finally, pursuant to s. 37(2)(c), I order the District, within one year of this decision, to:

i) establish mechanisms for determining that its delivery of services to SLD students are appropriate and meet the stated goals of the School Act, the Special Needs Student Order, and the 1995 Manual;

ii) ensure that it has in place an early intervention program so that SLD students can be identified early and appropriate intensive remediation services provided; and

iii) ensure that it has in place a range of services to meet the needs of its SLD students.

[1026] The Tribunal will remain seized of this matter to ensure that its remedial orders are appropriately implemented.

I have no expertise on how to handle severe learning disabled students; and how to weigh their needs against every other competing need in education. Neither does MacNaughton. I have no democratic legitimacy; neither does MacNaughton. I have no accountability to the voters, I have no responsibility to make a budget work; neither does MacNaughton. I would have the humility to say "I have no clue"; and then to say "it's not my job". MacNaughton, instead, said, "I am the boss of this until I tell you otherwise."

Would a woman who commandeers a province's school system and budget, and imposes her own particular priorities, really hesitate to do something as modest as commandeer a magazine's pages and tell them what to print?

Each of these three panellists is an expert in precisely nothing -- nothing except grievances and how little grifters use the now-meaningless phrase "human rights" to liberate a few thousand here, a few thousand there from unsuspecting marks -- or in MacNaughton's school decision, a few million here, a few million there. Their naivete, lack of expertise and lack of legitimate authority is inversely proportional to their zealous arrogance that only they and their supreme moral righteousness can save B.C.

Those are the three moral eunuchs who now stand in judgment of Mark Steyn and Maclean's.

UPDATE: Here's the CBC.ca news story, and a direct link to Terry's story on the National.

Terry Milewski was at the hearing today. His coverage of the opening day was on CBC's The National tonight, with a little sound-bite from me. You should be able to see it here, shortly. It's on at about 20 minutes into the broadcast.

I hope Milewski attends every day, though I'm not sure what the appetite of the CBC's head honchos is for this story.

Then again, now that their old boss of news has decamped for Al Jazeera, perhaps the CBC's Islamist tilt is abating.

Speaking of TV shows, the CPAC debate I participated in last weekend is now posted to their website. You can watch the whole thing here.

I wasn't quite sure how I did at that event; it's tough to tell, when you're right in it. Here's my commentary from that same day. Watching the debate again, I'm glad I came across as angry, but not as angry as I felt, going up against Fine's bald-faced lies.

If you only have a few minutes (as opposed to an hour and a half), fast forward to exactly one hour into the clip. That's where the CHRC's senior lawyer says "there can't be enough laws" governing speech. Bloody terrifying -- enough to make Keith Martin put out this press release.

If you've got a few extra minutes, my opening rant starts just before the ten minute mark. Commenters on Small Dead Animals seem to like that one. I also had a weird back-and-forth with Ian Fine shortly thereafter. And there's a few more rants scattered throughout.

Julian Porter continues to make objections to Faisal Joseph's ambush submissions of blogs and Internet comments, such as Five Feet of Fury and TVO online comments.

Porter did not receive any copies of same in advance. Again, in a real court, that would be laughed out of the court house. But this isn't a real court.

Porter made objections. He said those blogs and comments, made in mid-2008, in specific response to the CIC's own embarrassing antics, had nothing to do with a specific article published in Maclean's in late 2006. He objected to the lack of jurisdiction of the BCHRT, which doesn't cover the Internet.

But that's all legal mumbo-jumbo. The tribunal panellists didn't understand a word of it. Or, if they did, they didn't give a damn.

Because that would mean they couldn't hear more grievances, more bitching, more whining, more "my feelings were hurt!" testimony.

So all political conduct, a political discourse, is now within the tribunal's reach.

It's not just Maclean's magazine now. It's Five Feet of Fury. It's TVO.

And why the hell not?

He wants the show entered as evidence. He alleges that the "donnybrook", the insulting behaviour, was Mark Steyn's, for trying to get a debate going.

That's absurd. More than that, it's legally irrelevant, in a case about Maclean's. But when you're a fascist censor, and a thin-skinned one at that, you can't really stop, can you? Especially when people start to pile on, as TVO, Five Feet of Fury, etc., do?

Awan is now complaining about comments made on TVO's website, after their debate with Mark Steyn.

Awan is trying to hang those comments around the neck of Maclean's. Which is legally ridiculous.

But it shows the thinking on the part of Awan, Elmasry, et al.

They don't want a debate. They don't want a back-and-forth. They want to censor anyone who dares to disagree with them. And, even those true liberals, like Steve Paikin, who make enormous airtime available to them, will be swiped at, and attacked, if they dare to deviate from the Islamofascist line.

That's the line from Kathy's blog that Khurrum Awan is trying to hang around the neck of Maclean's.

As Julian Porter is pointing out, that's got nothing to do with the Maclean's magazine excerpt.

That's the legal thing to say.

What I would say is: that was Kathy's response to seeing three young thugs trying to censor a magazine. It wasn't a response to the magazine itself.

Awan should get used to it: if he's going to act like a fascist, he's going to be called one.

Porter objected. Of course, he was overruled.

This isn't a lawsuit.

If it were, it would have been thrown out. Which is, in fact, exactly why Human Rights Commissions are the weapon of choice in the soft jihad.

A real lawsuit would fail; there is no cause of action called "you hurt my self esteem"or "I want to write a long letter in your magazine". There's defamation, but that comes with defences like truth, fair comment, etc.

This started out as a political science class, a lecture in Marxist thinking about the media, racial identity politics, etc.

But now it's just a journey through Khurrum Awan's own weird psyche.

In other words, it's exactly what this kangaroo panel will respond to. Foolish Maclean's -- hiring Julian Porter, Roger McConchie, etc.! They should have brought in some zen-talking yoga instructor.

These Tribunal panellists know nothing about the law; they know nothing about media, or publishing. Yet they presume to judge Maclean's on both. No; they are, in their DNA, grievance hustlers. Awan's Oprah Winfrey-style testament is a perfect fit of psychobabble for them.

Khurrum Awan is now complaining about Kathy Shaidle's blog, Five Feet of Fury!

Khurrum Awan is a bit of a blogger himself. Or a commenter, at least. Here's what he wrote on Garth Turner's website, a little while back:

Hello Mr Turner,
i noted on your weblog from July that you told the Arab community to go to
hell because of their criticism of you (& the Conservative party) for
behaving like an outpost of the Israeli Likud Party in Canada…seems what
goes around comes around…cuz you have been told to go to hell by the
Conservative Party!! LOL! Hope that was fun
Khurrum Awan

By Khurrum on 10.21.06 12:21 pm

He's a budding Mohammed Elmasry!

Now we're in full psychotherapy mode. Awan is telling the kangaroo court -- apropos of nothing -- about the negative public reaction that he and his fellow mini-fascists received after filing their complaint against Maclean's.

It's got nothing to do with what Maclean's published. It's got nothing to do with Mark Steyn's book.

That public backlash is a natural -- and healthy! and encouraging! -- public reaction to a bunch of little censors trying to import Saudi values into Canada.

Julian Porter is making that exact point now, as an objection. He's reading from one of Elmasry's documents claiming that the public reaction was evidence of Islamophobia.

Uh, nope. It's evidence of a healthy public skepticism of censors, bullies and nuisance litigators.

Khurrum Awan is a junior Al Sharpton -- the U.S. race hustler and shakedown artist. Except that Al Sharpton actually gets paid -- Awan got the door slammed in his face, when he tried to liberate thousands of dollars from Maclean's, and tell them what their next cover story would be.

But if Awan lack's Sharpton's powers of communication, and certainly his powers of persuasion, he has a tool that Sharpton would die for: human rights commissions, where Awan's own impotent threats can be given the power of the state.

Sharpton would make a killing up here.

Awan is now describing his lawfare strategy: filing as many redundant complaints against Maclean's as possible -- in Ontario, in B.C., and nationally.

It's the soft jihad -- and it uses our own legal system against us. Though no legal system I've heard of allows triple jeopardy, where plaintiffs can continue to shop around the same complaints until they win.

Julian Porter made an objection to Awan's reference to the Ontario HRC's slander of Maclean's, without a hearing, even as they dismissed the case.

Porter said this about the OHRC: it was an "abuse of public power -- without having heard any argument, they made a statement that it was Islamophobic. That does cause one to wonder."

Joseph asked if that was an objection.

Porter: "Yes, it is, because you're piggy-backing on it. It's not proper that you do so."

Joseph: It's a public statement. It has not binding authority in this tribunal..." Porter was merely giving "a speech about why he's weeping about what the OHRC says."

So was Porter's objection upheld? Or was it overruled? Can Awan give "evidence" of the OHRC's drive-by smear? 

Uh, objection ignored.

The three-person panel just sat there.

But of course they did. All this "law-talking stuff", by top-flight lawyers like Julian Porter is not their bag. They have no training as judges; they're third-raters, radical activists, given a power they never could have dreamed of. And now Julian Porter is asking them to deal with a matter of triple jeopardy, jursidiction, the appropriateness of jurisdiction, etc., etc.? Are you kidding? These three kangaroo judges couldn't spell half the words Porter used, let alone offer a "ruling".

What a joke.

On the wall outside the courtroom is a sign indicating the name of the case being heard inside. It doesn't say Mohammed Elmasry vs. Maclean's. It doesn't even say Khurrum Awan, standing in for Elmasry, vs. Maclean's.

It says Elmasry, on behalf of Muslims in British Columbia, vs. Maclean's.

Oh, really?

That's about as credible as Bernie Farber, Elmasry's Jewish analog, claiming to speak for all Jews.

I met a young Muslim philosophy student -- who took me out to lunch for sushi! -- who pointed said that he disagrees with censorship, and that Elmasry certainly does not speak for him.

Any real lawyer listening to Awan's testimony wouldn't get it. What is a non-party to the lawsuit -- who is also part of the "legal team" prosecuting it -- doing offering testimony? Or hearsay testimony?

Awan just testified about what another one of the sock puppets -- Muneeza is her name, I think -- had said to Ken Whyte. She is sitting a few feet away here, too -- not as a complainant, not as an expert, not as a witness.

So we've got Awan giving hearsay evidence of what Muneeza said to Ken Whyte -- all of which happened in Toronto.

A real court would laugh this out -- with costs payable to Maclean's.

But, other than the building we're in, and the laughably inappropriate crest and motto on the wall, this ain't a real court, and we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto. Karachi maybe.

This is interesting. Khurrum Awan admits that they demanded to have a submission "of equal length and prominence".

So... that would basically mean the cover story. Again, something they've denied in their media spin to date.

I'm impressed that Awan is telling the truth now -- confirming what Ken Whyte has claimed all along. If it were Mohammed Elmasry on the stand, we'd probably be getting more taqqiya.

Now Khurrum Awan -- Faisal Joseph's future employee; non-expert; non-resident of B.C.; non-complainant -- is giving his testimony of his shake-down meeting with Ken Whyte at Maclean's offices in Toronto.

Awan acknowledges what he has previously denied: that money was part of their demands. Oh, not for his pockets -- but for a race relations organization. The Canadian Islamic Congress, perhaps?

There is a custom amongst lawyers to refer to each other in court as "my friend", or even "my learned friend". I like it, even moreso when it is obviously not true. It's like calling an MP an Honourable Member.

Throughout the morning, Faisal Joseph referred to his "friends", the lawyers of Maclean's.

I suppose that phrase was stuck in his mind, because, as per my previous post, when Joseph made reference to how the Jews have used the hate speech laws to silence their foes, he said, "our friends in the Jewish community".

Good one. I wonder just who Mohammed Elmasry's "friends in the Jewish community" are?

Mohammed Elmasry, the nominal complainant in the Maclean's case, and president-for-life of the anti-Semitic Canadian Islamic Congress blames the Jews for many of hte world's ills.

But every once in a while, even a stopped clock is right.

As Faisal Joseph, and his soon-to-be employee, and current "witness", Khurrum Awan, says, the Jews have used these same human rights laws to bash their political opponents, so why shouldn't Muslims use them, too?

It is flawless logic. Of course, "Jews" didn't set up such censorship. Canada's Official Jews did, people who are Jews for a living -- and I'm not talking about rabbis. I'm talking about my own faith's race-hustlers, people like Bernie Farber of the CJC.

For decades, Farber, and more recently his allies at B'nai Brith and the Simon Wiesenthal Center, have attacked the Canadian values of free speech and political diversity. They've focused on their own nemeses -- usually neo-Nazis. But after dozens of legal "victories", the "law" is now fixed.

And along come Elmasry, Joseph, Awan with a "thank you very much, we'll take it from here boys".

That's the thing about censorship -- what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Just as Weimar Germany's censorship laws were used by Adolf Hitler, so too are Bernie Farber's laws being used against Zionists -- better Zionists than Farber -- like Mark Steyn.

Today's hearing is about a vicious bigot named Mohammed Elmasry using the government to attack his political critics. Brought to you by the taxpayers of B.C., and the legal spadework of Canada's Official Jews.

Oy vay.

I touched on this point in the Globe and Mail in January.

Now Khurrum Awan -- Toronto resident; non-party; non-expert; who will soon take up employment with Faisal Joseph's own firm -- is talking about a conversation he had with some other Toronto lawyer about the Maclean's article.

Forget the hearsay evidence that flows like a river through this kangaroo court -- Awan is telling us about some other lawyer's "shock" at the Maclean's article. Forget the jurisdictional issues -- what is a Toronto grievor doing here, other than forum-shopping, because the Ontario HRC couldn't hear his case, despite their lust to do so; forget his first-year-political science earnest Chomksy-isms.

Forget all the law (the Tribunal certainly has.)

This isn't about law.

This is about Khurrum Awan wanting a great, big psychotherapist's couch to bitch on. A big, tax-funded therapist's couch, where we all have to listen to him bitch about an article he didn't like -- and where the eager "healers" of the BCHRT have the power to fine Maclean's, and order them to make recompense.

I think that many men would be embarrassed to utter in public such a weak-kneed whine. But not Elmasry's young pupil.

Khurrum Awan is on the stand right now. As Andrew Coyne pointed out, that was the subject of objection on the part of Maclean's lawyers. According to B.C. jurisprudence, an Ontario resident, who is in Ontario when he is "offended" by something, has no standing in the B.C.'s Human Rights Tribunal.

The tribunal panellists -- surprise! -- overruled that objection, and agreed to let Awan testify.

So far, that testimony has been -- well, exactly what you'd expect from a junior grievance-monger in training. He's just been reading through Steyn's excerpt, and disagreeing with it. It's even weaker than his appearance on TVO; a stream of illogical connections; tangents; paranoia; and plain old whining.

In other words, it is the meat of Faisal's argument. This isn't a legal case. This is a political case. Maclean's and Steyn have committed political offences. And thus they must pay a political price.

But all of this makes me ask -- as I have asked others here this morning -- where is the complainant himself? Where is Mohammed Elmasry?

As he has done so far, he has been in hiding, letting his second-rate spin doctors carry the PR bag for him. I can understand that -- it's a little tough to hold yourself out as someone whose tender human rights sensibilities have been offended, when you're on record cheering for terrorist attacks on Jews. Thus Awan and the other sock puppets.

I understand that as a PR strategy. But Elmasry and Joseph have made history here today: they've invented the legal sock-puppet; they've managed to twist the rubber arm of the Tribunal to allow Awan to testify, essentially on Elmasry's behalf.

Elmasry, of course, isn't a British Columbian, either, and thus lacks any standing in law. But at least he is the nominal complainant. Awan doesn't even have that fig leaf -- he's nothing but a PR front.

If the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal will allow Awan to "testify" against Maclean's, why not just allow some talented PR flack from Edelman or some other firm to do the same? Why not hire a professional actor -- someone with a better grasp of English, a better grasp of logic, a better grasp of the law -- to take the stand?

It's a counterfeit court. And Awan is a counterfeit complainant. Now he's a counterfeit witness, too.

There have been two different conversations in court this morning. Faisal Joseph, the lawyer for Mohammed Elmasry, opened with a second-rate Marxist soliloquy about the media -- and how Muslims have not been able to compete with the "powerful media" in Canada. That's a rhetorical improvement on what Elmasry himself told the Canadian Association of Journalists two years ago, when he talked about Canada's media run by the "zhoos".

The rest of it is grievance-mongering, race-hustling and general whining about the editorial unfairness of Maclean's.

Right now, I'm listening to Khurrum Awan -- a privileged law graduate, working for the Ontario Courts as an articling student (before he goes on to work for Joseph's firm) -- whining about his marginalization. Only in a human rights tribunal would a professional complainer, who has had Op-Ed appear in every major daily newspaper in Canada, say he's been marginalized.

That's one conversation -- and that's the Canadian Islamic Congress's legal strategy. They're trying to make a general political complaint.

The other conversation is the one put forward by Macleans's lawyers. It's also known as "legal arguments". It doesn't get into political discussions, or editorial explanations. For the B.C. Human Rights Code does not weigh political or editorial considerations; it is neither necessary to prove political incorrectness or editorial "irresponsibility" to convict Maclean's; and it is not a defence for Maclean's to prove that it was politically correct or editorially responsible. It's just not legally relevant. Maclean's is focusing on boring old laws, written by dead white men, talking about things like precedent, freedom of speech, etc., etc.

In a real court, Joseph and his bigoted client would be laughed out of court, and have to pay Maclean's costs.

But this isn't a real court. This is a kangaroo court, with three leftist activists as panellists.

This is the same B.C. Human Rights Tribunal that has come up with such gems as a ruling that McDonald's can't force its staff to wash their hands, because it's discrimination; or that bus drivers have the right to take 118 sick days a year. They're nuts.

Normally, the respondents' lawyers -- the eminent Julian Porter, and the sharp-as-a-knife Roger McConchie -- would slice Joseph's amateur-hour efforts to ribbons. But: isn't it Joseph who is speaking the language of the tribunal panellists?

I've spent the morning in a fetid room at Vancouver's court house, at the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal hearing. It's a counterfeit hearing in so many ways -- starting with the fact that the building we are in was built for a real court of law, but this kangaroo tribunal is anything but a real court.

Let's start with the three-member panel, chaired by Heather MacNaughton. As Jay Currie points out, MacNaughton is a not a judge -- far from it. Like the other two panellists, she is a radical activist, a social engineer of the first order, which is precisely why she was appointed to the Tribunal. She sits under a Herald with the motto, "Dieu et mon droit". It's the motto of British monarchs; it means God and My Right. It's fitting for a court house in a province called British Columbia, with a capital called Victoria. How disgusting that it presides over a rogue panel, prosecuting an Islamic fatwa in the Queen's name. Disgusting.

Trevor Jones wanted to buy a townhouse on Vancouver Vancouver Island. But they had a restriction against pets exceeding 15 kg. That ruled out Jones's Labrador retriever, Chloe.

Jones claimed that he was going blind, and that the condo board was discriminating against him. He took the condo board to the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal. They agreed with him.

Trouble is, Chloe isn't a seeing eye dog.

So what, said the BCHRT. Ka-ching -- $12,000 for Jones's hurt feelings.

Mark Steyn is a goner.

h/t

UPDATE: Meryle's e-mail is fixed.

I've got a couple of speeches about freedom of speech and the threat of human rights commissions coming up that are open to the public.

On June 16, I'm speaking to the Canadian Jewish Civil Rights Association, at the Ontario Bar Association office on 20 Toronto Street. Tickets are impossibly inexpensive at $20 and include lunch. E-mail Meryle if you'd like to buy a ticket. The National Post's Marni Soupcoff will be the emcee.

On June 19th, I'm speaking at Moses Znaimer's ideaCity conference. Tickets to the three-day conference are a little pricier.

My speech at the Fraser Institute in Vancouver last Tuesday was well-received; I think they're going to upload a podcast of the talk. I'll link to it when they do. Here's a news report of that event.

The Institute has asked me to do a larger event in Calgary later this year. I'll link to their sign-up page on their website when it's up.

I'm looking forward to all of these events very much. But the Jewish Civil Rights Association will be particularly interesting from the point of view of Jews and censorship. For decades, the Canadian Jewish Congress, and to a lesser extent the B'nai Brith, have claimed that Canadian Jews are Woody Allen caricatures, so wobbly in our self-esteem, so downtrodden in society, that we would perish without laws that censor words our tender ears can't bear hearing. The CJC, B'nai Brith and the Simon Wiesenthal Center actually swore an affidavit claiming that Jews rely on the government's censorship for our "psychological security".

Other than the race-hustlers and grievance mongers who make their living off of "fighting hate", I actually haven't encountered a single Jew in Canada who believes that tripe. But that shouldn't be surprising. When Bernie Farber and the rest of the lobbyists at the CJC say they represent Canadian Jews, it's sort of like when Jesse Jackson says he represents American Blacks. Uh, whatever you say, boss.

Jews that I know love freedom of speech -- more than most cultures, we seem to be drawn to expressive pursuits. Censorship is anathema to how Jews life their lives, and even to theological Judaism itself.

I attended Mark Steyn's speech at a Jewish fundraiser in Vancouver last Monday, for Hillel. (That's the Jewish youth group that Bernie Farber's friend, Richard Warman of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, disparaged on a neo-Nazi website.) Steyn was very tough on the CJC and their quest to eradicate, in his words, "the last three Nazis in Saskatchewan" while ignoring the real threat to Canadian Jews posed by radical Islam. In a room jammed full of Vancouver's Jewish leadership, I didn't detect a twitter of disagreement when he made his points very firmly; nor were any questions on that matter raised in the Q & A session that followed his talk.

I'm told by my host that there were indeed senior West Coast CJC members present. It's possible that they were just being polite to their guest speaker -- but I don't know many Jews who self-censor like that.

I think that Steyn encountered what I expect to encounter at my upcoming speech to the Jewish civil rights club: that "severely normal" Canadian Jews find human rights commissions' censorship adventures offensive, and they find the CHRC's own online anti-Semitism abominable. And unless, like Farber and company, they're actually getting a paycheque for holding censorious views, they're in synch with the freedom-loving Canadian mainstream on this. I'll be sure to let you know how it goes.