Guest Colonel Douglas Macgregor

NOTE: I am prepping for a trip to Ottawa, the timing of which has been off and on for the past 48 hours. Last night I learned that even though the actual sentencing of Tamara and Chris is slated for August — the Crown is now asking for seven and eight years respectively. A custodial, in-prison incarceration. The crown also wants to impound Big Red, Barber’s truck.

So, our documentary team is heading to Ottawa on Tuesday for the proceedings, in which the Crown will make its case. I will drop a Monday Meltdown but Wednesday is up in the air.

EPISODE GUIDE:

00:00 Monologue/reporting: real estate madness and a possible Liberal bail out for “developers”

27:15 Guest: Colonel Douglas Macgregor on Ukraine and Israel/Gaza

1:01:3 Closing: Louis Theroux settler video and Piers Morgan

I was shocked yesterday to learn about the Crown’s plans for Tamara and Chris. Their prosecution has always felt over the top and not driven by a quest for justice. Rather, it seems the point is sending a message to the masses that pushback against government policy is not acceptable. It is no longer hyperbole to suggest the optics of this are very Tiananmen Square.

A lawyer who knows the case says the proposed sentences eclipse anything in our jurisprudence for this kind of charge. It is also the longest mischief trial in our country’s history and as you know by now, just the effort of traveling back and forth from out west to Ottawa and constantly raising funds is an extra lawyer of punishment.

Wednesday, the hearing laying out the reasons for the Crown’s zeal begins. The idea of either one of these two, gentle, kind and decent Canadians being incarcerated is horrific. I am proud they have chosen us to tell their story and our team feels the weight of history on us to get it right.

On Israel/Gaza, I expect the usual trolling over both the guest and the videos in this podcast but I am way beyond caring. I feel we will all be judged when the bombing stops and objective Western observers can get into Gaza and document the horrors. I’ve learned Gaza has the highest number of child amputees of any place in the world, including countries like Cambodia still infested with buried landmines. Medics had to invent a new tag for for Palestinian children orphaned by the violence and brought in for emergency care. WCNSF. BBC story here.

Medics working in the Gaza Strip are using a specific phrase to describe a particular kind of war victim.

"There's an acronym that's unique to the Gaza Strip, it's WCNSF - wounded child, no surviving family - and it's not used infrequently," Dr Tanya Haj-Hassan who works with Doctors Without Borders told BBC News.

Anyone still chirping that I have not been even-handed should go back and read what I have been writing since October 13th, when I first published on this subject .

It would seem the latest, trademarked Current Thing for the informationally hypnotized is either blind support for Hamas no matter how grim the images coming out of Israel or clapping while Israel embarks on a mission that could wipe Gaza off the map, sending yet another generation of Palestinians into refugee camps. There, I’ve said it. Now both sides can hate me.

Let me state my views up front so there is no confusion: the Hamas attacks on Israeli civilians are a grotesque and era-ending monstrosity that needs a response. That response must be thoughtful, proportional and avoid punishing Palestinian civilians but I fear that train has left the station. When you can find them, the images already coming from Gaza are awful.

Now coming up on two years, my caution about Israel’s plans for eliminating Palestinians in Gaza completely is firming up. I believe the evidence suggests this was always Netanyahu’s plan. Journalist Seymour Hersh thinks he let it happen to save himself from judicial scrutiny over corruption cases that are before the courts.

Coming up on Thursday is the verdict in the Hockey Canada sex assault trial. The Toronto Star has done some unexpectedly excellent reporting from the courtroom.

The first two lines of the Crown’s opening statement in April at the high-profile Hockey Canada sexual assault trial clearly articulated what would become the dominant issue in a trial that captivated the country’s attention.

“This is a case about consent,” Crown attorney Heather Donkers said. “And, equally as important, this is a case about what is not consent.”

It’s an issue that will be finely parsed by Superior Court Justice Maria Carroccia when she delivers her verdicts Thursday in the case of five professional hockey players accused of sexually assaulting a young woman in a London, Ont. hotel room in 2018. Whether the judge finds the woman consented is yet to be decided; both sides have argued over what happened that night, and what it means with respect to Canadian law.

You should speak to your male children about this case. My personal view is that the Crown brought the charges because Hockey Canada paid off the woman and generated a lot of publicity. The players involved behaved atrociously but seemed to believe she was a willing participant — which she said she was — until she said she wasn’t, later. Acting like sex-crazed fools as the boys did, isn’t illegal. And the trial itself, based on the evidence so far — feels like punishment enough. Also, women do have agency. There is no evidence she was retrained or prevented from leaving that hotel room. My instincts tell me that the availability of pornography to this generation of young people played a role.

Stay critical.

#truthovertribe