Check It Out: False alarms cause harm

By Joan Janzen

Recently the newly installed security system at the Martensville Veterinary Hospital kept sounding a false alarm. The culprit was their feisty resident cat, who had been triggering the alarm, causing the Martensville RCMP to show up every time this occurred.

There’s been a few false alarms in Canada recently. We all remember Prime Minister Trudeau making this announcement in February, “These illegal blockades are being heavily supported by individuals in the United States and from elsewhere around the world. We see that roughly half of the funding that is flowing to the barricaders here is coming from the United States.”

CBC Radio, who claim to be “Canada’s most trusted audio newscast”, reported that GoFundMe ended a fundraiser for the protesters over questionable donations to the group. Two CBC News website stories claimed hundreds of donations appeared to be from abroad, and at least one-third of the donations were made by donors with fictitious names.

CBC TV had reported on Jan. 28 that “there is concern that Russian actors could be continuing to fuel things, as this protest grows, or perhaps even instigating it from the outside”.

However, on March 3, a representative from GoFundMe said, “We commenced a review of where donations were coming from. Our records show that 88% of donated funds originated in Canada, and 86% of donors were from Canada.” Their records found no donations by terrorist groups or criminals.

GiveSendGo also verified these were false allegations. GiveSendGo is the second online fundraising platform the convoy turned to after GoFundMe froze convoy donations.

Nevertheless the false alarm had sounded loudly throughout the world, and Prime Minister Trudeau publicly announced his strategy to put out the fire. “Invoking the Emergencies Act has been necessary ... it prevented foreign money to continue to fund illegal blockades,” the PM said.

Trudeau followed up by freezing the accounts of numerous Canadians by evoking the Proceeds of Crime and Terrorist Financing Act, claiming the funds should be considered as terrorism funding as a large portion came from abroad. Precautions were also taken to ensure the safety of CBC journalists. An online Ottawa news source (Blacklock’s Reporter) noted it was company policy that no CBC news person could go near the protests without being accompanied by their hired security guard.

Not many people were aware that CBC TV corrected their Jan. 28 story, adding a clarification note on Feb. 3, or that the website stories had been retracted. And it’s not known how many people read the Toronto Sun article informing the public of CBC Radio’s error in reporting.

But the entire world has heard about Prime Minister Trudeau invoking the Emergency Act and freezing accounts. Those who had their accounts frozen are acutely aware of the harm it caused. What Canadians and the world have not heard is Justin Trudeau admitting his accusations were false.

The entire world heard Canada’s false alarm blaring, but the world is not hearing about our nation’s debt alarm. Our federal debt has reached $1 trillion and is going up by $4500 every single second. At the same time our payroll taxes are going up yet again, and the government is proposing an annual guaranteed income that would cost taxpayers $90 billion dollars every single year.

Now that’s an alarm that needs to be taken seriously! Unfortunately, we’re not hearing much about it, and the Prime Minister is not responding to this legitimate alarm.