Canadian Parliament Attacked

Great Debates
241

As V (of “V for Vendetta”) said, “You cannot kill an idea. Just a point of view.”

The idea of Canada–a modern, progressive, Rule-of-Law-governed, and economically-sound state–will not die, no matter what. I subscribe to it, as you likely do too. So, it appears, do many of the contributors to this thread.

If the gunman had made it into the Commons chamber and started shooting, would that be the end of Canada? No. As stated, you cannot kill an idea–we would mourn, but we would put new members in that chamber and carry on.

But the point-of-view of the attacker can be killed. We need to let people with such views know that what their so-called idols do is barbaric, is done in the name of power (not religion), and that they will not be honored for joining the fight; but rather, be cannon-fodder on the front lines, so those more ideologically-pure (and most assuredly non-Canadian) will be safe.

Do we need to build “Fort Parliament,” as a previous poster alluded to? No, I don’t think so. One of the great things about our country’s governance is its transparency. The fact that an ordinary guy like me can visit our capital and sit in the public gallery of the Commons and watch our government make decisions is a cornerstone of our democracy. I would not want to find that our government could only operate in camera, sub rosa, and so on; because the public is too dangerous to let into the decision-making chamber. That is truly scary; as, if that comes to pass, we might as well be the USSR, North Korea, Cuba, and other such bastions of personal freedom.

Shamozzle, you have said, repeatedly, that we need to “do something”; now and in the future. What, precisely, do you think we should do?

242

Sorry, that should read:

“That is truly scary; as, if that comes to pass, we might as well be the USSR, North Korea, Cuba, and other such bastions of personal and political freedom.”

Emphasis added to indicate what would have been included, had I not missed the edit window.

243

Does anyone know what the current security measures are on Parliament Hill?

244

Who are all the fellas with guns here?

From that video, I got the impression that the Parliament building was very well protected indeed, with about a dozen armed men streaming through the corridor down towards the shooter. One gets the impression that even if Mr. Vickers hadn’t been around, the shooter would’ve been killed soon enough no matter what.

245

The words “horse”, “door”, “closed” and “bolted” spring to mind. Many of the replies have also been Parliament centric. Terrorist tactics and targets do change.

246

How to piss Anderson Cooper off and get fired for the sake of a selfie and your being a jerk on Twitter.

247

The video I saw showed that by the time the guy arrived at the Parliament buildings in the commandeered car, as short and quick as the ride was, several RCMP cruisers were already right behind him. I’m not sure how many armed officers were actually in pursuit after he got inside, but I would guess that many or most of them were RCMP officers from those cruisers.

An interesting note about the gun, since this discussion has sometimes turned to gun issues. According to the CBC it was an old style Winchester .30-30 Model 94, a gun apparently unchanged since 1894. It holds a max of 8 rounds, more normally 7, operates by lever action, and is a bit of a chore to reload, at least relative to the speed with which events were unfolding.

In the context of gun control, one could note that this lunatic had this gun despite the fact that his various convictions and other factors would have made him ineligible for legal ownership. But there’s another side to it, too. Because semi-automatic weapons, handguns, and the like are so tightly restricted in Canada, this old deer rifle was the only thing he was able to get his hands on – and though he shouldn’t have had it and police are trying to figure out how he got it, its limitations probably saved many lives. If he had been armed like the Sandy Hook shooter, who had several semi-automatic weapons as I recall, including the infamous AR-15 Bushmaster and tons of ammo, it’s really frightening to think how horrific the casualties could have been. As the CBC pointed out, he had the opportunity to shoot lots of people on the way into the Parliament building, but held his fire because he was intending to use the few rounds he had left inside the building.

248

Good for Anderson! And for those who may not know, Sun News is right-wing trash, so no surprise there. Not exactly CBC or Peter Mansbridge.

249

How much ammunition did he actually have? Not how much did his rifle hold, but how much was in his possession total? I would suspect his relative unwillingness to fire on random targets reflected scarcity of ammunition rather than the gun’s loading process. The 1894 isn’t particularly difficult or slow to load. The rounds slide into the magazine tube through a loading gate on the side of the receiver. The magazine can be “topped up” at any point just by sliding in additional rounds. Lever guns were the “assault rifles” of their day. They still offer a good rate of fire and anybody who takes the time to learn the simple skills involved in loading the piece can keep up nearly continuous fire.

250

For a little context and timeline discssion the transcript from the RCMP’s briefingis excellent

Personally I have no interest in massively re-organizing how we do things based on an outlier. I do fully expect the various police services (RCMP, Ottawa Police and House and Senate security forces) to review their response and potentially consolidate responsibilities on the hill.

However I sure as hell do not want the actions of some loser that hung his hat on the media’s current panic of the week to take this away from me

251

This would stop a crazed gunman from shooting one standing on guard at a national monument? Or running over a couple of soldiers walking down the street?

Not as far as I can see. There is, literally, no way of stopping a crazed killer - one who does not care whether they live or die - from shooting someone in public, or murdering them with their car. Being armed does not confer immunity to being shot or run over by a car.

The risk is, however, very slight (and there are lots of other risks to worry about). The cost-benefit analysis of having soldiers go armed everywhere in public simply isn’t worth it - as there is little on the “benefit” side (being armed won’t stop one from being shot or run over) and much on the “costs” side (Canadians value a society in which our soldiers are a valued part of ‘us’ and not armed against ‘us’).

Basically, as Canadians, we do not wish to be panicked into giving up our freedoms and our vision of our society just to respond to security threats - particularly by taking measures that will not prevent the occurances anyway.

252

[QUOTE=Shamozzle]
Look at the prospect of an armed gunman in the House of Commons chamber as we look at the prospect of using crystal meth: “Not Even Once”.

Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?
[/QUOTE]

I don’t believe in making policy based on “nice rings.” “Nobody should ever die in a boating accident” has a nice ring to it too, but people will die in boating accidents anyway, and there isn’t any practical way to stop it.

What I think people are concerned about here. Shamozzle, is that the reaction of a lot of folks, including you, are “Something bad happened, so erect the gates and lock the doors.” Putting up the gates and locking the doors can allow for a degree of protection - and as it stands Parliament is not an unsecured building - but there’s a point beyond which it’s really quite pointless. As one American observer pointed out then the US was talking about building a fence on the Mexican border, “a ten-foot wall is going to work right up until a Mexican thinks to bring a twelve-foot ladder.” Perhaps more pertinently, we can’t secure everything. An angry gunman denied easy access to Parliament will simply attack elsewhere. You could walk into a shopping mall and kill people. Attack the crowd outside a sporting event. Shit, just go to Taste of the Danforth on Saturday afternoon and start shooting; you literally could not miss if you were shooting with your eyes closed.

The level of physical security in Canada is, in my honest opinion, about exactly where it should be. A higher level of physical security isn’t going to help, because you’ll just have the terrorists going elsewhere or shooting from further away, or just running people over on the road, as in fact happened this week, and how the hell do you stop that?

You stop it though the security of knowledge; intelligence, smart policing, safe policies, far better attention to mental health, and a refusal to act badly in the name of the good. I love America and Americans but with regret I point to them as an example of a country with more physical security and far, far less safety. I’m not saying I have all the answers they need - you can’t just wave away the glut of guns and the undercurrent of fear in their culture - but you can sure as hell refuse to allow that to seep into ours.

I wrote a number of years ago on the SDMB that Americans are a remarkably wonderful people but are also remarkably afraid of each other and the world. That fear leads to locks and guns and guards, but it also increases violence; if you’re afraid of your fellow man you’re way quicker on the trigger. I am not suggesting we be cavalier about safety and security, but a society with many locked doors and armed men is a society of lockpicks and gunfights.

So if we can make Canada safer, how can that be done? Assuming it’s possible, I’d suggest an increased intelligence apparatus, for starters. The Tories are kind of doing this, though a lot of the public-consumption stuff is just dog-and-pony shit (there may be better stuff behind that, for all I know.) Smart application of intelligence - trying to know who the jihadists are - is a far, far better application of resources than hopelessly trying to make everything secure from them.

253

The guy has been apologizing unreservedly on twitter all day. If he’s been sacked his career prospects have just taken a terrible nosedive. Yet, all that is deserved because he works for a right wing news organization. Anderson Cooper acted like a drama queen on social media, he showed little class in this matter either. Im getting a bit annoyed at social media bullying and intolerance. Its worse when that bully is in a position of power compared to the person they are bullying.

Lets just wait until Cooper has a faux pas and we see him desperately(and pathetically) try to save his livelihood and career.

In fact let’s hope Anderson Cooper is demanding Carol Costello is fired from CNN today. Won’t happen.

254

I don’t want this to become a distraction from the main thread, but I just want to say a couple of things.

Yes, the guy apologized unreservedly. Read the apology. He’s right about what an asinine thing he did. And I get the sense from the article that he was fired not so much for asking for a selfie, but for making a huge deal about the whole thing on Twitter, trying to embarrass Cooper, and accusing Cooper of flying to Ottawa to “exploit the tragedy” (Cooper, of course, is sent by CNN all over the world wherever there is breaking news). I’ll also say that though I don’t hold CNN in particularly high regard, Anderson Cooper is by far the best of their motley bunch of anchors and reporters and I have a fair amount of respect for him. I don’t see any “bullying” by Cooper in these exchanges, just defending himself against this idiot.

Lastly, my comment about Sun News may have been misconstrued. When I called them “right-wing trash” I didn’t mean to imply that they were trash because they were conservative. They happen to be conservative, but they are trash because they’re trash – low-grade, low-ethics, low-credibility irresponsible tabloid journalism. Apparently their reporters reflect their culture. Judging only from what I read in that article, this guy probably deserved what he got, not “because he works for a right wing news organization”, but because he was an unprofessional disrespectful dumbass.

255

Fair enough, I won’t derail the thread either. I agree with most of what you say; I think all media organizations exploit these situations to a greater or lesser degree. It’s a game/cash cow for many such organizations; and that Cooper is also one of the better journalists out there.

If this guy has pissed off some mid level CNN correspondent instead of Cooper he would likely still have been in a job today. Cooper did say “he couldn’t believe this guy was employed by any news organization”. To me that is very close to calling for someone’s sacking. Such a call carries a lot of weight when you have a vast Twitter following such as Cooper.

This is me probably being an old fart. Its just one of the things I absolutely hate about social media - the intolerance of the Twitter mob. Such a mob is roused far more easily by the Cooper’s of this world than by your average Joe.

256

As if our hearts aren’t broken enough, now there’s this picture:

257

The dog story was just a blatant, transparent attempt at emotional manipulation. Everybody involved in producing it should be ashamed of themselves.

258

One of the best things about twitter is calling people out on their bullshit, I think. That’s not bullying in my mind.

No one is going to protect you from yourself on twitter. Unfortunately the whole world has access to shitting on you for being a jerk. It’s the flip side of you having a platform, even for your nonsense and bad behaviour, with access to the whole world, I think.

If you want to pronounce your idiocy loud and proud for the whole world to see then you should suck it up when it comes back at you.

And he said, “I can’t believe any news org employs you!” In response to the idiots tweet of, “I can’t believe AC wouldn’t take a selfie with me!”. I’m not seeing that as a call to get the guy fired, but a fair retort.

What got this guy fired were his own stupid actions. Period.

259

They’re going to send Cpl. Cirillo’s body along the Highway of Heroes today:

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2014/10/24/22028286.html

For Non-Canadians, the Highway of Heroes is stretch of Hwy. 401 that leads to the Coroner’s Complex.

From Wikipedia:

People line the bridges along the highway to pay respects as the body is being taken to the coroner. It’s very emotional.

260

Agreed. The only thing lacking was a childs cuddly toy lying on the ground beside said dog. It’s all so easily turned into a big game.