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Wednesday, July 16, 2008
A stopped clock tells the right time twice a day
McCain's best buddy Joe Lieberman is right on something for once: the 1st Amendment. Lieberman co-sponsored the Senate version of the Free Speech Protection Act of 2008, which would protect American residents from foreign libel judgments. This will make it harder to engage in "libel tourism," a method favoured by radical Islamists to silence their critics. From the Daily Bayonet:
"United States Senators Arlen Specter and Joe Lieberman wrote an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal yesterday that points out the danger of having foreign jurisdictions attempt to chill or limit free speech in America.
The bi-partisan senators are speaking in support of a new bill that will prevent US Courts from enforcing foreign court rulings in the USA.
Put this strong position together with Ezra Levant's invitation to speak in front of a US Congressional caucus on human rights last week and you can see that politicians from all parties south of our border take protection of individual liberties very seriously.
What a pity then that our Canada's senior politicians seem so intent on avoiding the issue."
I'm not so confident that "politicians from all parties" in the US "take protection of individual liberties very seriously." Among the multitude of abuses against the Bill of Rights, the McCain-Feingold bill has already severely crippled political speech in the United States. For now however, having our Constitution "guarantee the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society," means that free expression is in shoddy shape right now in Canada and we need to be much more vigilant in defending against abuses of our speech rights than those in the US. Nonetheless, it's nice to see that Ezra Levant, still bearing battle scars from his skirmishes with the AHRC, is championing freedom of speech for all.
Posted by Kalim Kassam on July 16, 2008 | Permalink
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The U.S. is more free than Canada in some respects, and less free in others. In some areas, the U.S. is downright draconian, kafkaesque, and fascistic.
I won't revisit the debate on the American "war on drugs" to illustrate this theme. I will, instead, ask readers to familiarize themselves with American family law by visiting the website of Glenn Sacks, or reading the new book by Stephen Baskerville, "Taken Into Custody."
As much as I am a critic of Canadian family law, the American version sounds infinitely worse. I read stories every week about men being jailed for failure to pay child support when they have no genuine reason to be paying in the first place. Two circumstances are particularly common:
(a) Fathers come back from serving 12 or 18 months in Iraq, to find that their wives have long since filed for divorce and child support while they were gone, without giving them any notice of the proceedings. Of course, when they get back they are deemed in arrears for child support -- even though the wife cleaned out the bank accounts and liquidated other assets -- and are arrested forthwith and thrown in jail because they haven't the means to pay the arrears.
(b) A single mother claims on an ex parte application that So-and-so is the father of her child, and she gets an order for child support. The man isn't notified (she says she doesn't know where he has "taken off" to), but is tracked down a couple years later, by which time he is in considerable arrears for child support. He is thrown in jail. He gets a DNA test done, proving he isn't the father, but the Courts ignore this because the statute of limitations has passed wherein he is allowed to contest parentage (!). So he either remains in jail for the rest of his life, or pays child support for the rest of his life for a child that isn't his to a woman he may never have met.
In one case, the mother named 16 different men as the father -- all of whom successfully contested parentage on the basis of DNA tests -- before she finally identified the actual father. Yet she was never charged with paternity fraud, or even mischief.
When Americans feel they need to address an "injustice," there are few nations on the planet that go over the top for punishment like them. The "land of the free"? I wonder. Kafkaesque more like.
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-07-16 10:22:41 PM
Good god, Grant. That's horrible! Why aren't politicians going to bat for the veterans, at least? You'd think that veteran status would be enough to counter the "deadbeat dad" stigma and get some movement from Congresspeople, no?
Posted by: Terrence Watson | 2008-07-16 10:38:55 PM
I have heard of some politicians making some efforts to assist veterans facing divorce or claims of parentage, but the feminist mantra of "deadbeat dadism" drones out everything.
The situation in America is far worse in every way than I could ever describe it here. It really behooves the America-lovers in this crowd to study the family-law situtation there in some depth. Completely, provably innocent men are reduced to the state of indentured servitude all the time -- sometimes based on nothing more than having the same name as someone else!
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-07-16 10:50:57 PM
Grant,
Congratulations, you've given me another injustice to point out. A day later, and I'm still thoroughly disgusted by the cases you raised.
Best,
Terrence
Posted by: Terrence Watson | 2008-07-17 9:00:06 AM
Kalim: I could not agree more with you. Libel tourism is dead wrong and its wrong under then guise of the HRC's and or Canada'a defamation/libal laws.
To use Plaintiff friendly libel laws to intimidate writers and commentators is an abuse of the process of law.
I hope you and Matthew will fight this when you see ANYONE do this evil
Posted by: Merle | 2008-07-17 12:52:47 PM
"The situation in America is far worse in every way than I could ever describe it here."
Hmmm...now why would that be? Possibly because the black illegitimacy rate is breaching 80%?
"Ricky Lackey has six children on the way.
Don't call them sextuplets - they're each with different women.
When Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Melba Marsh asked Lackey during sentencing Friday on a charge of attempted theft how many children he had, the 25-year-old said, "None, but I have six on the way."
A stunned Marsh tried to clarify. "Are you marrying a woman with six children?" she asked.
"No, I be concubining," he said.
Prosecutors said Lackey is the expectant father of six children with six different women. The women all are expected to deliver in August, September and October."
Posted by: DJ | 2008-07-17 2:34:17 PM
1. How does any of this negate the points I made above?
2. Fairness requires that you attribute as much culpability to the mothers as to Mr. Lackey in the above scenario.
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-07-17 5:08:16 PM
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