Northman's Fury

Little question that this will be getting some major play on the left-side of the blogosphere in the next couple of days.

RCMP searched Conservative party headquarters in Ottawa on Tuesday at the request of Elections Canada.

. . .

Elections Canada is probing Conservative party spending for advertisements during the 2006 parliamentary election campaign. Corbett, who enforces the Elections Canada Act, launched an investigation in April 2007 after chief electoral officer Marc Mayrand challenged the spending claims.

The best coverage of this is over at Impolitical's place. I'll point you to this post for a great run-down of the whole situation. I'd say there's some storm clouds brewing on the Conservatives horizon. Who knows? This might even give the Liberals the backbone to start acting like an opposition party.

Cross-posted to In The House and Senate

Update: Via the comments from In The House and Senate, this post from Zorpheous:

Now don't get me wrong, it is a fight that needs to faught and won, even if the people are Kate, Kathy and Ezra, but they are hardly the first. Take my blogging partner Mark, who is being sued for defamation for linking to site that had, supposed libellous material. Mark has blogged about this, I have written about, we have pointed the draconian defamation laws for over two years now.

So I have one simple question,... Where were all you freedom of speech warriors then, eh? Oh right, you only support freedom of speech when it is speech you agree with, but when it is Ezra sueing his former employee's or Harper trying to SLAPP the liberal party or the Green Party Backroom boyz trying to squash free speech you just laughed or applauded the people doing the sueing.

. . .

While Mark and are friends, we are not always in communications with each other. This morning, while I was typing my rant, Mark had already posted something about his situation and need for funds. So now, it is time for Kate, Ezra and Kathy to take up Mark's cause as well as theirs, cause it Mark loses his fight, it will set a precedent that can be used against them. Mark fight is their fight and Mark's fight will be faught and won or lost long before theirs. So time to pony up people, if you truly believe in what you have been screaming about, go to Mark's place at Section 15 and help him out

Let me second those sentiments. The Crookes case is the one to focus on, and I for one, feel far better supporting the defendants in that case than the likes of Kate McMillan.

We now return you to the original posting

Admittedly, when I first heard of the libel suit that Richard Warman had launched against a group of bloggers, I was, shall we say, less than sympathetic to their cause. Free Speech doesn't cover you when you launch libelous attacks. Trying to hide behind it when your defamatory rhetoric comes back to bite you in the ass doesn't carry any water with me.

Some further research into the matter, however, indicates that there may be more at stake here than my first rough glance showed. The trigger was a comment by Stageleft:

Part of the action claims that a link to a defamatory publication is republication of the libel - and that concerns me.

Part of the action claims that allowing what others said to stand is also actionable - and that concerns me.

To my understanding action against The Free Dominion, Levant, and Shaidle, would appear reasonable - they actually said stuff.

McMillan appears wrapped up in this because of things she allowed other people to say - and as a guy that owns a group blog with unmoderated comments that concerns the living f*uck out of me.

Now, there are a couple of points there that I'm going to have to address individually, the first being what kind of liability do blog owners face for links? Something like this is probably an overreaction at this point, but it does indicate the kind of worry some may be facing.

As it happens, this isn't the first time this issue has came up. I posted about a CBC story about just such an issue back in August. (YouTube video is gone, but the CBC story can be found on their site here.) That Wayne Crookes case is about the widest application of such an argument in a libel case I can find. Michael Geist wrote a good summary on how that lawsuit threatens online Free Speech. That case is the precedent-setter in Canada, is ongoing, and anyone inclined to defend Free Speech should consider donating to that legal defense fund.

The second point is trickier. How much responsibility do you have for what others post on your site? I can see a site owner bearing some responsibility for what others are allowed to post on their sites, and to remove posts that libel others. Even there, with larger sites where any registered user can post diaries, that logic breaks down as most of those aren't going to be moderated. Comments are even worse, particularly if you don't want to monitor them all the time. If you can be held accountable for what somebody says in relation to your post, it's a quick way to ensure that most blogs disable comments completely, which takes a great deal of the give-and-take nature of blogs and their commentary out of the equation and diminishes their power. (This doesn't mean that the persons who made those posts and comments shouldn't be held accountable for them. Again, I have no sympathy for people who get nailed for what they themselves have said.)

Of course, just to muddle the issue a little further, this post by Red Tory indicates that Ontario's libel laws may be part of the problem:

The present state of Canada’s libel legislation is another bête noire of mine. Simply put, it’s archaic (quite literally medieval, dating back to the time of Henry VII in fact) and in desperate need of overhaul. Under the current legal regime, one can be sued for anything said about another person that allegedly damages their reputation. If sued, the onus is on you to prove the truth of your statements; the fact that you genuinely believed them to be true is not good enough. Even truth is not an absolute defense — if the court finds you told the truth but your intent was malicious, you might lose anyway. Little wonder that people come from all over the world to file libel suits in Canada, particularly in the province of Ontario.

Anyway, I by no means have the legal expertise or knowledge to determine just who is right and wrong on this, but the SDA part of the case appears to be something all Canadian bloggers should be paying close attention to. A couple of other pretty good discussions on the matter can be found here and here, and I'm certain the story will gets loads of victimization play from the defendants ideological brethren.

Cross-posted to In The House and Senate

It appears as though the Conservatives are taking a bit of flack over their deliberate paralyzing of parliamentary committees.

NDP whip Yvon Godin said Hill called the meeting in a bid to find a way to end the partisan rancour that has ground the work of several Commons committees to a halt.

According to Godin, opposition whips bluntly told Hill that Conservatives are to blame for the problem, filibustering, walking out or otherwise obstructing the will of the opposition members, who hold a combined majority on all committees. They advised Hill that the only solution is for Conservatives to follow the rules and accept the will of the majority.

Godin said Hill then warned that Harper is prepared to ask the Governor General to call an election on the grounds that the minority Parliament has become dysfunctional.

Three committees have descended into anarchy:

-Environment committee, where Tory MPs are filibustering a NDP climate change bill that is supported by the other two opposition parties.

-Justice committee, where Tory chair Art Hanger has repeatedly walked out of meetings rather than deal with an opposition motion that the committee investigate allegations that the Conservatives tried to bribe former independent MP Chuck Cadman to vote against the previous Liberal government in 2005.

-Procedure and House affairs committee, where opposition members voted to turf Tory chair Gary Goodyear after he rejected demands for an investigation into alleged spending irregularities by the Conservatives in the 2006 election. They replaced Goodyear with another Tory MP who didn't want the job.

Did I say deliberate? I did indeed, because for those of us with long memories, (and blog archives), there was this little story that came out last May.

The Harper government is being accused of a machiavellian plot to wreak parliamentary havoc after a secret Tory handbook on obstructing and manipulating Commons committees was leaked to the press.

Opposition parties pounced on news reports Friday about the 200-page handbook as proof that the Conservatives are to blame for the toxic atmosphere that has paralyzed Parliament this week.

. . .

The handbook reportedly advises chairs on how to promote the government's agenda, select witnesses friendly to the Conservative party and coach them to give favourable testimony. It also reportedly instructs them on how to filibuster and otherwise disrupt committee proceedings and, if all else fails, how to shut committees down entirely.

The tactics described in the current story are all Standard Operating Procedure from the Tory manual. At a guess, they’re hoping for the general amnesia of the news media and public in order to get away with it.

It would be nice if the opposition parties were to bring this to everyone’s attention and hammer the Conservatives over it. Unfortunately, the Liberals seem intent on proving they have the spines of jellyfish.

Late Tuesday, the Liberals offered an olive branch to get the House affairs committee, which has not met in more than a month, back to work. They said they're now willing to "temporarily postpone" examination of the Tory election spending issue while the committee moves on to other matters

Forgive my crudity, but they really need to grow a pair.

Sometimes just the headlines can tell a story for you.

Bigger Nahanni park, zinc mine have to coexist: Harper

Former Tory hopeful to head N.W.T. environmental board

Battle looming over mine site near Nahanni park reserve

See? You don’t even have to read the stories to grow suspicious, particularly if you’re familiar with the Conservative’s maneuvering around the Nuclear Safety Commission and the firing of its head. Consider my interest piqued.

The dormant zinc mine that is sitting on the edge of the Nahinni park has been trying to get permits to open up for years, and has been opposed by Parks Canada and environmental groups. They are rightfully concerned that the toxic tailings from the mine will contaminate the Park’s watershed and want the Park’s protection extended to include the mine site.

That said, a bit of digging shows numerous other, likely more significant, reasons for the Conservatives and the mining industry to want to get rid of Gabrielle Mackenzie-Scott as head of the impact board. The two biggest were the turning down of a uranium exploration bid in the Thelon River , Basin, and the recommendation to end free-entry claim-staking. That second decision in particular would have a significant impact on the mining industry and the environment.

Under the free-entry system, any licensed prospector may stake a claim on any Crown land without notifying local people. That claim gives the holder legal rights on that land and binds him to perform a certain amount of work on it.

Aboriginals and environmentalists have long held that the free-entry system allows industry to chip away at environmentally or culturally significant lands before anyone has a chance to discuss where development should be allowed and where it should remain off limits.

"It's a system that doesn't fully acknowledge that there are other rights of equal or perhaps greater importance," said David Livingstone, Indian and Northern Affairs director of renewable resources and environment for the N.W.T., who spoke in favour of such a recommendation at hearings on the project.

It's almost impossible to establish a protected area or create a land claim on land with pre-existing mineral dispositions on it, Livingstone said.

All of this points to the fact that the mining industry has been none too happy with the Board for the last year or two, which puts the Conservatives decision to ignore the board's recommendation to re-appoint their (now former) chairwoman in a rather poor light. Once again, it appears the Conservatives are interfering with the independence of a regulatory body.

I wish I could say I was surprised.