October 16, 2001

1:04 PM

Canada gets it own Star Chamber.New "anti-terrorism" bill allows police to arrest and hold "suspects" for 72 hours without a charge, allows the government agency that monitors foreign communications to spy on Canadians, and creates "investigative hearings" in which you can be compelled to testify before a judge.
posted by tranquileye (8 comments total)

And perhaps these are all good things. After all, I don't have anything to hide. Do you?
posted by tranquileye at 1:06 PM on October 16, 2001

Not until they decide to make it illegal.
posted by harmful at 1:41 PM on October 16, 2001

No, I have nothing to hide, but that's absolutely no reason to endorse such a thing. If this is passed in anything resembling its current form, we can expect years of court challenges.
posted by transient at 1:46 PM on October 16, 2001

It's not like we haven't seen this before. Our government is not afraid to invoke martial law, as we all know from experience. (For those that don't, check out this link for info on the FLQ crisis in the 70's.
posted by Starchile at 2:06 PM on October 16, 2001

Don't you have to have a military before you can have martial law? ::duckflee!::
posted by aaron at 2:22 PM on October 16, 2001

Compulsory testimony? Not a great way to get to the truth of a matter. Assuming that truthful rather than easy to digest testimony is an objective...
posted by holycola at 2:34 PM on October 16, 2001

And perhaps these are all good things.

Yea. I've always hated my rights.
posted by fuq at 3:10 PM on October 16, 2001

Them's... uhh... peacekeeping words, aaron!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 9:29 PM on October 16, 2001