Northman's Fury

Embattled Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier has resigned from cabinet over a security breach involving classified documents, Prime Minister Stephen Harper told reporters on Monday.

Not that leaving classified information lying around unsecured isn't a serious issue, but something tells me that wasn't the real reason Mr. Bernier fell on his sword.

He has been in a weakened position in recent weeks since a gaffe in April during a visit to Afghanistan, where he publicly suggested the removal of the governor of Kandahar.

Earlier this month, the federal government was forced to rent a Russian cargo jet to ship helicopters to Burma to deliver aid after Bernier publicly promised the Canadian military's new C-17 transports, none of which were immediately available.

He also has been under fire for his involvement with his former girlfriend, Julie Couillard, who has links to the criminal biker underworld.

Montreal newspaper Le Devoir reported Monday that Couillard, who was once married to a biker, is the head of a high-tech firm that has been involved in airport security.

Speaking to reporters after the announcement, Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe rejected Harper's contention that Bernier's resignation had nothing to do with Couillard's highly anticipated interview on Monday night with private television network TVA.

Duceppe said many questions remain unanswered, including how "people with very strange pasts" can bid on government contracts for airport security.

Safe bet that Bernier's resignation is an attempt to ensure such questions remain unanswered.

I must admit to being rather late to this debate. I followed the postings of others whose opinions I trust on the subject and even a cursory glance at the snippets of the bill and the comments of its supporters made it clear that it was more of a stealth attempt to make abortion more difficult if not outright illegal, and related to that but more important, to restrict a woman’s right to her own body.

After reading this post by 900 ft Jesus, along with the comments, I actually sat down and read through the bill. It left me rather disturbed and I think it’s important to explain why.

Here is the part 900’s post didn’t include:

238.1 (1) Every person who, directly or indirectly, causes the death of a child during birth or at any stage of development before birth while committing or attempting to commit an offence against the mother of the child, who the person knows or ought to know is pregnant,

(a) is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for life and to a minimum punishment of imprisonment for a term of 10 years if the person

(i) means to cause the child’s death, or
(ii) means to cause injury to the child or mother that the person knows is likely to cause the child’s death, and is reckless as to whether death ensues or not;

(b) is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for life if paragraph (a) does not apply but the person shows wanton or reckless disregard for the life or safety of the child; or

And here is the part that 900 quoted:

(2) An offence that would otherwise be an offence under paragraph (1)(a) may be reduced to an offence under paragraph (1)(b) if the person who committed the offence did so in the heat of passion caused by sudden provocation within the meaning of section 232.

Section 232, for thoroughness, reads as follows:

232. (1) Culpable homicide that otherwise would be murder may be reduced to manslaughter if the person who committed it did so in the heat of passion caused by sudden provocation.

What is provocation

(2) A wrongful act or an insult that is of such a nature as to be sufficient to deprive an ordinary person of the power of self-control is provocation for the purposes of this section if the accused acted on it on the sudden and before there was time for his passion to cool.

As explained in most introductory law courses, the provocation in question is usually of the scale of walking in on your significant other shagging somebody else and killing one or the other or both in a fit of rage.

It took me a while to work out why this all bugged me. To begin, paragraph 238.1(1) relates to basically causing a miscarriage, but is only an offense if the person causing said miscarriage is aware, or should be aware, that the woman is pregnant. Causing a miscarriage while being unaware of the pregnant state of the woman you’re beating means you’re free and clear so far as this section is concerned.

The sub-paragraphs speak to the intent of the offender. You’re guilty of an offense under (1)(a) if you have the intent to kill or cause fatal harm to the unborn child. You’re guilty under (1)(b) if, while beating the woman, you’re not being too careful about the child she’s carrying. The difference is significant not only regarding intent, but because later in the bill, another section is amended to make it possible for courts to delay parole for offenses under (1)(a).

You don’t have to go any further than this to see that the focus is on the foetus and not the woman. The severity of the offense in this section is entirely independent of the woman’s fate. Indeed, regardless how badly she’s beaten or otherwise harmed, you are only culpable of the most serious offence if you intended to terminate the pregnancy or were certainly aware that your actions would do so.

The section 900 highlighted merely adds insult to injury. Read in the context of the above, you can attack and beat a woman with the intent to cause the death of the unborn child and still be granted a more lenient sentence and possibility of early parole if you were somehow “provoked” into wanting to terminate the pregnancy through abusive means.

Sickening even to contemplate.

When all else fails, go to the smear:

There's irony in Sen. Romeo Dallaire lecturing the Canadian government (and the U.S.) on its attitude towards Omar Khadr, now approaching his eighth year in custody, most of it at Guantanamo Bay.

As well as accusing the U.S. government of "panicking" and behaving like terrorists by prosecuting Khadr for war crimes, Dallaire says Canada is no better by not insisting Khadr be returned to the country of his birth.

Irony in Dallaire's testimony to a Commons foreign affairs committee on human rights, is that he was an abysmal failure in protecting human rights when he was a general in command of the UN mission in Rwanda in 1994.

Some 800,000 Tutsis were murdered in a genocidal rampage that Dallaire was forewarned about. UN headquarters in New York ignored his warnings (it was his first UN command).

Dallaire also did nothing when 10 Belgian soldiers under his command were massacred. (Dallaire has said it would have risked the lives of more soldiers if he'd committed them to try and save the 10.)

Yup, let's blame Dallaire for what happened in Rwanda. And irony? Yeah, I'm sure it's ironic that a man who bore witness to one of the most brutal episodes of man's inhumanity to man while the rest of the world averted it's eyes and twiddled its thumbs might have any kind of insight on human rights. And Worthington doesn't stop there.

Dallaire has become a poster boy for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This has resulted in modest wealth and status -- promotions and medals before he retired, a UN post as adviser, a Liberal senator, and a sought-after speaker and authority on human rights in Darfur, China and elsewhere.

A "poster boy for PTSD"? Read: he's not all there and can be safely ignored. And we'll further degrade his successes as though they were gifts given out of pity for this "damaged" man.

Of course, Worthington is only following the example of his ideological bosses in Parliament. After all, attacking the messenger and smearing his service is a lot easier than trying to defend Canada's decision to allow the world's first trial of a child soldier for war crimes in the kangaroo court system of Guantanamo.