Are you saying 'defund the police rhetoric' is now being pushed in Edmonton?

If so, that makes me very sad. I agree with budget shifts to more community policing and shifting dollars to mental health experts or more training for cops to deal issues without a 'shoot first' attitude. But any 'defund the police rhetoric' in Alberta is exactly the type of talk the right can use to rouse to action the more deplorable part of the right, who can then be mobilized and kept more active by making them focus on other culture war issues and 'putting down' the leftist threat.

I know a significant group of leftists want exactly that. More 'bad people' to out and fight and to point their finger at, at how horrible they are. They get a win when the far right actually then does the most horrible things. But those same leftists pay no attention to the growing pool of left leaning victims that were left in the wake of them getting their win. I mean, they have lots of sympathy for that group of victims and will be the first on forums like this to say 'oh look how horrible...' but what they won't do is 'not participate in creating those victims'.

Edmonton has always been good at avoiding those flash point issues so I would be sad if the far left there is now forcing things down those avenues.

It started right after the George Floyd murder. Of course our leftist mayor had to be woke and slashed Edmonton's police budget just as did the new mayor a ex Liberal MP

BLM Edmonton called for getting rid of the police helicopter, drug units and other nonsense and than Mayor Iverson took the charge of defund the police

Edmonton Downtown and transit are just not safe

why defund the police would only be a matter of the left ?
all i hear from the right is, lower taxes, smaller government, etc.....
where the money comes from u think to pay for all of this ?

Well that is terrible sad for Edmonton and Alberta as a whole.

my good friend and his husband, who was leaned on a lot by the Edmonton community to help navigate these issues in a way that kept them off the radar of the more right leaning deplorables in AB, has moved to Toronto recently. I really fear that uke type people will step in to that void unhappy with the prior relative peace and growing positive situations for the significant and growing LBTGQ+ community in Edmonton.

They will need to wake up and out all those deplorables, and activate them to say and do the worst things they are wiling to do so they point at them, say how bad they are, and then commiserate with the growing group of victims. All the while denying the role they play and just trying to get everyone to focus on how bad the deplorables are.

it would be such a huge set back for Edmonton and AB, if the deplorables are prodded into action over culture war issues. I am legit saddened and worried about that and suspect we will see things change for the worse.

It has been a while, so I will likely butcher this, but I recall Noam Chomsky talk about the value of provocative slogans and their power to grab attention and shift conversations. I believe he was talking about some phrase to do with American imperialism, but I believe the sentiment works for "defund the police" and in a different way "black lives matter" before it. The idea was for phrases like this any reasonable person* are going to think "well, what on earth do you mean by that!". And it deserves a full conversation, because the phrase is a hook, a spark, a germ. Behind the phrase are conversations about, in this case, are a large range of critiques about the current policing model and a range of policy options to move away from that like unbundling various police services. Even among the left there isn't uniformity about exactly how all of that shakes out, but having a unifying rallying call about the necessity of action and change, a phrase with urgency, a phrase that demands attention, a phrase that reflects palpable anger, can nevertheless play a meaningful role.

And thus so I say: defund the police in Canada.

* but American democracy no longer is - if it ever was - a place where reasonable people discourse about the issues of the day.

Chomsky's point on slogans that I have read was the opposite, that you can (if you want to) create slogans that almost nobody are opposed to, to hide your underlying motive. His case was "Support our troops", which was used to defend a specific war, not support troops. I guess a good example from recent political history would be "All lives matter", which was actually about why people should not care about black lives.

He might very well have made other comments on slogans that I don't know about.

I do not think "Defund the police" is an example of the above. It is not something everyone would agree to. For that matter, it does not even accurately describe any jointly proposed policy or accurately summarize the opinions of those who use it. It was an angry name that gained popularity, and politicians who fail to side-step it tend to spend a lot of time explaining why "defund" somehow does not mean "defund".

In my book, it is a strong contender for worst named political movement in recent political history. Its saving grace is that it probably not "named" as much as it is just venting some rage. Poor names aside, there is a certain level of honesty in that.

Well it turns out the liberals will announce today they are going to ban assault rifles .


Defund the Police may be the worst though the Dems "Ultra Maga" may be close

Well we all know the rights answer cut taxes create a strong economy Trickle Down effect

While Liberals and NDP Just keep spending as will pay for it later

Sadly neither really work

Obviously, it's an evil tragedy and nobody wants anything like this to ever happen. But your a scumbag for trying to capitalize on it by suggesting conservatives are ok with tragedy's like this happening.


It's already extremely difficult to get restricted firearms here. How about we solve problems like gang violence and gun smuggling rather than using low-level thinking talking points like "banning assault rifles" to score political points.

uke would support Defund the Police as it is the most polarizing and will create the most amount of "bad People'.

People may scoff at me saying that but it is accurate. Nothing would rile up and consolidate the 'against' people than a slogan like that. You move them from sleepy apathetic voters, looking to just make money and live their lives, to ones who are now fully engaged, reactive, decrying you, and someone you can point at as 'Bad People' and fight with.

Goal accomplished. And it is the singular goal. Todays activist left feels they have no value if they do not have bad people to point at and fight against and they absolutely want to rile up, polarize and point at as many as they can. They feel more PURE if they stand in opposition (virtue signal) to 90% of the populace so the more bad people they help push that way, the better they see it as being.

I actually believe Uke that on the day he brought his kid to Kindergarten that the tragedy in Texas ways at the back of his mind.

Though here in Canada Uke really does not have to worry about that. Any parents child is more likely to die falling off their bike, car accident, drowning or a multitude of other things. Canada has strong gun legislation. If any party is making it less safe for Canadians it is the liberal party but reducing sentences for gun crimes.

Though Uke likes to think the problems in the USA are problems here. I am sure he jumped on the BLM bandwagon as well as defund the police. Canada has great training for its police officers and a very diverse force. When we see the odd incident were an officer crosses the line its kneeing a suspect when they are down and been in chase.

I never said conservatives want or are ok with tragedies like this. I said they support making assault rifles legal in Canada again.

As for "capitalizing", we all make political choices and the choice to NOT do something is as much a choice as a choice to do something. The choice to insist on not doing anything and not "politicizing" the moment every day the blood of children slaughter en masse is a choice. Just like the choice to advocate for sensible gun legislation.

BREAKING: Guys, lozen is going to be thrilled. He was just telling us how the Liberals needs to crack down on handguns. Well look at that, the new legislation is a big crackdown on handguns: https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/nati...bill-1.5923922

Of course lozen will shift the goal posts immediately.

I somewhat suspect that the so called father of modern linguistics had multiple points about slogans But yes those types of saccharine trojan horse phrases that superficially nobody objects to but are weaponized for other purposes is at the opposite end of the spectrum from provocative in-your-face slogans whose literally meaning most would reject but nevertheless as a perhaps surprising amount of depth and nuance beyond the slogan if one is willing to engage in the conversation the slogan sparks.

This is how I take it. It is saying that now is beyond the time for action, that the time for polite and nuanced policy statements that everyone ignores is not now. It is the rhetorical burning down of the barn doors.

I support this legislation though I will wait and see what the enhanced sentences are and how much is spent and were at the border. Its clear Justin wanted to capitalize quickly on the tragedy in the USA so will see if and when they implement anything.
Reminder its been 7 years on sexual assault issue in the military .......

Again I will say Canada does not have a problem with legal guns but I also do not see the need to own a pistol .

Also a good article on the Gun legislation

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/world...ef8f77a43cd6c5

From the Article

lozen, do you support Harper era mandatory minimum sentencing across the board?

While it opens one up for a specific type of attack line "lolol they are reducing sentencing for guns while banning the sale of guns how hypocritical!", I think of them as pretty separate. It is correct to move away from the mandatory minimum era for a whole host of reasons. And it is good to clamp down on guns.

I am not sure how it applies to other crimes though I find Harper's minimums actually very light.

I have a strong conservative stance on violent crime.

I am fine with the 3 year minimum for a gun crime for a first offense but a second offense make it 10. I also think dealing drugs we are way to light on but would legalize most consumption of illegal drugs and invest more in treatment.

Though I agreed with Trump that we should label the cartels as terrorists

As for capital crimes I am all for Capital punishment but not by lethal injection instead a firing squad or the guillotine quick and painless

Well you will be ecstatic that the BC NDP just decriminalized small-scale possession of illicit drugs. Yet another issue on the LONG list of issues where your stated position is very left and the party you vote for opposes it:https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/opi...nada-1.6471878

One of the reasons to get rid of mandatory minimum for drug crimes is that if there is a scenario where someone does deal drugs, but there a lot of mitigating circumstances that come out in the trial, then a one-size-fits-all punishment doesn't necessarily get automatically applied in a way that really wrecks their life and puts them into the prison-drug cycle with a high probability.

And I agree with it but would punish those that distribute with heavier sentences and not the guy selling the odd bag to feed his habit

Have you forgotten that I voted for Notley the last two elections provincially and voted Trudeau once?

Uke you keep questioning why I would vote PC over Liberal well this week alone summarizes the fact you really can not trust a word out of this PM's mouth

Lets start with Guns. The average CDN does not realize how hard it is to get a gun in Canada and a majority of gun crime is gang related and illegal weapons

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canad...3e53533c10e306

• JUstin Trudeau announces the ban of assualt rifles even though the we do not have an issue with legal assault rifles
• Justin Trudeau reduces the mandatory minimums for crimes with handguns which already were rather light
• An election is called and the assault rifle ban is dead
• Tragedy occurs in Texas Justin sees a PR moment and quickly announces a new measures on Handguns. No Timeline and very few questions asked

You think he would bring the bill back to ban assault rifles but he already got all the political PR from it.

Lets move onto BC decriminalizing small amounts of drugs which also occurred this week. First Off I like the idea if it is partnered with a plan for treatment and reducing the consumption of these drugs. I do believe Portugal has implemented such a system and the key is they provide users with safer alternatives for their habits. Flat out decriminalizing drugs only addresses jailing addicts.
What is baffling it has the support of the federal government and Justin Trudeau who told voters just 7 months ago no way would he approve this

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/briti...tion-1.5709124

Now onto the third story of the week Sexual misconduct in the military a problem that was inherited from the previous government over 7 years ago that they pledged to fix. They had an impartial judges report on what to do and looked like a simple fix. Instead the government did nothing but protect a defense minister that was part of the problem and called for a new report 6 years in. I have not seen the full version of the new report but most of it looks similar to the old report.


How can anyone vote for a leader of this caliber that either gets nothing done or lies about what he will do

this is EXACTLY why mandatory minimums are terrible. It leaves no discretion for a judge to consider mitigating circumstances that treat two different people with different stories differently. It forces those minimums I’m everyone and now that “odd bag to feed his habit” guy gets the same punishment.

Of Course the week is not done

Trudeau has adopted 72 secret cabinet orders. Justin was very critical of Harper in doing this but Harper used only 25 I do believe

Damn he should have used one for the WE folks

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/trudeau-go...080000151.html

What ever happened to Monteroy and his I think you hate JT?

Absolutely you were implying conservatives are ok with this kind of tragedy since they don't want "assault rifles" banned.

To insist on not doing anything about what? What do Trudeau's actions this week have to do with anything other than political clout with idiots that don't know any better?