Yep. "Islamicism." It's the top threat facing Canada.
Quick. What was the biggest terrorist outrage that killed the most Canadians in the history of our country?
Hint:
A total of 329 people were killed, including 280 Canadians, 27 British citizens and 22 Indians.[1] The incident was the largest mass murder in modern Canadian history.I'm referring, of course, to the bombing of Air India Flight 182 by Sikh militants in 1985.
Curious, isn't it, that after Air India Flight 182, the Canadian government wasn't enabling draconian legislation, attacking cherished citizen and general human rights, in a misguided attempt to "keep us safe" from further terrorist attacks, but they were after 24 Canadians were killed along with the 3,000 or so other victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Of course, almost all the victims of the Air India bombing were of South Asian descent. So, you know, as long as "real" white-skinned Canadians stayed away from flights to India, they'd probably be safe. A similar sort of logic would argue that as long as Canadians stayed away from the USA they'd be safe too.
NOT SO!!! Don't forget the "Toronto 18." The deadly terrorist outfit (some of whom were teenage boys who had no idea what was even supposed to be going on) organized by an RCMP informant to blow-up a building in Toronto and attack Parliament Hill with swords. Or something like that.
When you hear harper say something as stupid as "the major threat is still Islamicism" you have to wonder if he's really, really, REALLY stupid, or if he's so contemptuous of both his supporters and his detractors (now that he has a majority) that he's not even trying anymore.
Personally, I think that harper believes in the "Islamicist threat" about as much as he believes in Jesus Christ. Which is to say, "Well, sorta, but not really."
It's the same sort of vague, but quite smelly garbage-thinking that sits within the brains of most right-wing morons. Cretins, one and all. The same stupidity that leads them to concoct and believe in such nonsense is the same stupidity that prevents them from noticing that when they speak it out loud or write it down somewhere, other people are looking at them like they puked.
4 comments:
Conservatism goes over best in an atmosphere of fear that chokes off rational reflection. Harper needs a bogey that is relatively unknown so that he can lie about it. Not a lot of Canadians have Muslim friends, so Islam can be the bogey.
A hundred years ago, he'd have been pumping the Yellow Peril for all he was worth.
I love the quotes of Mencken and find it laughable that Steve has never read him. If he had, he would understand that we are not all stupid.
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
H. L. Mencken
Sunsin and Mark,
Exactly. The trick is to invent a threat and keep shouting "Boo!"
In all seriousness, the bombing of Air India should not have sent the entire population clamouring for the destruction of their legal and civil rights. 9-11 2001 killed even less of us, but so many people are shit-in-their-pants scared.
It's ridiculous.
Joe McCarthy understood how it worked. Keep people scared and they will offer no opposition.
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