The Emergency Measures Act Was Invoked On Faked Media Hoax

In the lazy summers of our youth, news went on holidays, too. That’s why the Wayne Gretzky trade to L.A. in August off 1988 was so remarkable. People had to scramble home from cottages and cruises to chase the story. But those day are gone. The 24/7/365 news cycle is a fire hose drowning you with one blockbuster after another.

The past month has seen the Biden coup, the Market crash, the Trump assassination attempt, the race riots in Britain, the Iran/Israel standoff and the aggressive Hamas demonstrations in North America. In this deluge there is little appetite for media to go back and review their handiwork. To see how their stories held up. History is now one news cycle long. Too bad, because some stories need revisiting.

For example, this past week a jury in Lethbridge found two men not guilty of conspiring to murder Mounties in the 2022 Coutts Border Crossing crisis. Albertans Anthony Olienick and Chris Carbert had been in jail since being charged that winter. They were found guilty on lesser charges of having guns and other weapons— which the RCMP had displayed for reporters at the time. But we now know the murder charges were a government concoction.

The media hype around the story of right-wing guys with guns was integral to the Trudeau Government’s scare campaign over the Freedom Convoy. Having botched the vaccine rollout and the three-week occupation of Wellington Street the Liberals were cornered. But layered in with concocted media stories of massive right-wing American financial support, Convoy arsonists, Nazi flags and CBC suggestions of Russian involvement, the Coutts’ manufactured murder charges helped give the PM a get-out-of-jail-free card to invoke the draconian Emergency Measures Act. 

The media’s insurrection potage of Nazi flags and honking trucks was— and still is— swallowed whole by most Canadians. Not everyone saw it that way, however. Here’s Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s recent take on how basic human rights were trampled in what he calls a “Woodstock” event: “The truckers were doing something we take for granted. They were assembling to petition their government about something that was  important. The financial impact of the mandates on their businesses.” He praised the largely peaceful behaviour of the truckers who were accused of a coup— despite the absence of guns or a Jan.6 riot at the gates of Parliament.

RFK Jr. pointed out that Canada, the “premier template of government in the world beside (America)” used facial recognition and other tactics to freeze the financial records of the truckers without charges or convictions. They shut down the Truckers’ GoFundMe account by using fake stories of American interference. “If a government is able to starve you, evict you from your home if you speak out against it… then we are on the road to totalitarianism,” concludes Kennedy. 

While gullible Canadians still take a knee before high-handed media creations, Americans have a populist tradition of pushing back. In the wake of the 2022 midterms that saw Donald Trump’s GOP fail to win gains— and talk that he was finished—comedian Dave Chappelle tried to explain Trump’s staying power with those not in the elite.

Chappelle pointed out that real estate mogul/ TV host  was the first rich white person to confess to the commoners: “We are doing all the things you think we are doing… He’s what I call an honest liar…” Chappelle said. “That first debate, I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen a white male billionaire screaming at the top of his lungs, ‘This whole system is rigged.’ … (asked for proof) he said, ‘I know the system is rigged, because I use it.’”  

When accused during the 2016 debate by Hillary Clinton of not paying taxes, Trump shot back: “That makes me smart... if you want me to pay my taxes then change the tax code…But I know you won’t, because your friends and donors enjoy the same tax breaks that I do.” And with that, said Chappelle, a star was born. 

What was interesting about all this cynicism is that it's still news to the #SNL audience fed cartoons about Trump and his base. Six years later, the Rob Reiner crowd is still huffing and puffing about Russia. The Anti Trump Republicans can’t fathom that the base created Trump, not vice versa.

Leading disaffected conservative author George Will to observe of the RINOs under Donald Trump, "A large number of its elected officials are terrified of their voters ... And if you’re afraid of your voters, you don’t really respect your voters. And if you don’t respect them, you don’t really like them.” Now, the Liz Cheneys and Mitt Romneys are a hunted class thanks to Trump’s base.

Trump the opportunist was the first person in on the game who was honest about The Fix. (Bernie Sanders was always an outsider). Poor middle-class people respected that cynicism. He gave them rough honesty. They gave him loyalty to pursue their agenda. As Chappelle has noted, for all their failings the Trump base sees the world as it is. The progressive left sees a world as they wish it to be. Eventually they are going to collide.”

That collision is already unfolding in the streets of England and Ireland. It’s being tested in the American election where DEI dandy Kamala Harris is being re-branded as the new Obama. Who knows? Maybe someday Canadians might even push back against the Trudeau class. Is the nation ready for that?

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster  A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, he’s a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. His new book Deal With It: The Trades That Stunned The NHL And Changed hockey is now available on Amazon. Inexact Science: The Six Most Compelling Draft Years In NHL History, his previous book with his son Evan, was voted the seventh-best professional hockey book of all time by bookauthority.org . His 2004 book Money Players was voted sixth best on the same list, and is available via brucedowbigginbooks.ca.