Civis4Reform ZOOM meeting 28.02.2024

Last night, I attended thisweekly meeting from 7:30 to 10 PM. Over 40 concerned Canadians participated, hailing from Nova Scotia to Vancouver Island. They have all identified a common problem.

A national coup d’etat has taken place.

When “build back better” was the phrase promoted by virtually all national leaders a few years ago, it sounded positive and had many citizens nodding their heads in affirmation. No one truly undertood the implications. Now we do.

Across Canada, hundreds of groups of “awake and concerned” citizens are assembling in private meetings. Civis4Reform (C4R) is one of them. Wednesday’s Zoom meeting participants voice their worries and recount the harms they have suffered under this so-called “better” regime that we have all experienced as an oppressive expansion of government authority and control.

The expressions of frustration are unanimous among the hundreds of C4R members. No one has conceived of an effective way to defend and protect our citizens from what many people believe to be a form on communism that has bled into Western democracies and their major institutions.

Charles Tichner, the principal author of the freshly published “STATEMENT Of PRINCIPLES - The Rights of Persons & The Duties of Government”, made a statement at 10 PM that was the highlight of the night for me. Charles is a former senior federal civil servant who worked during the years when leaders like Marc Lalonde, Bev Oda and Jean Chretien were well known. Mr. Tichner is also a student of history as it pertains to constitutional and common law. He can speak authoritatively on periods dating back to England circa 1200 AD.

I will paraphrase what Charles said to ground my perspective on “freedom groups” and the challenges all Canadians face to restore the constitutional rights of persons and our expected duties of government:

“While laws and regulations have been written and ratified to protect our rights and freedoms, those who are responsible to enforce them (every employee in the civil service) will regularly override or ignore them whenever it is in the interests of the state”.

In other words, laws are expected to be followed by us faithfully or we will will suffer consequences at the hands of the “responsible authorites”, but those same laws are discretionary for the civil service.

My takeaway.

When any Canadian citizen like me tries to lobby an elected representative to act to defend our “rights of persons”, it's questionable how effective this effort will be if he or she has little-to-no influence or power to stop civil service officials from doing exactly as they please, with impunity.

When thousands (millions?) of Canadians gather in “freedom group” meetings hoping to bring a “unified voice of concern” to influence desired changes through our elected representatives, how will this effort make any difference in reaching the government officials and their staff who make and enforce so many of the government decisions?

These questions lead me back to where I started.

Since 1979, I have watched out governments grow steadily in size, cost and scope of authority. As each year passed, my concerns grew but I always felt helpless to stop it. The erosion of my rights, freedoms and earned assets (taxation and public debt obligations as a citizen) gnaws at me.

In 2007, I discovered the Ontario Libertarian Party and, with it, a community of like-minded citizens. Now, in 2024, with ten provincial and federal elections behind me, the “build back better” crowd continues their campaign to transform the world according to the plans that have become increasely transparent.

I know intuitively that we have far too much government, but how do we reverse this? The coup d’etat seems complete and impossible to erase from history.

I am at a loss as to what to do about this.

And I am not alone.

After listening to a three hour interview of Tucker Carlson by Lex Fridman, my pessimism has deepened. I have great respect for Tucker and his assessment of world affairs, especially his understand of America. If you have patience for a long interview, it's worth your time.