Posted on by Flick

Conservatives mix up their con-job on new internet snooping bill

Fast-moving news today about the new internet surveillance law, bill C-30.

Vic Toews, Canadian Public Safety Minister, has pulled the GW Bush card in the war against privacy: “You either stand with us, or you stand with the child pornographers.”

He denies saying this, but here’s the video:

In response, the anonymous Twitter user Vikileaks30 has launched a campaign of revealing private details of Toews’ own divorce case.

I won’t repeat any of those tweets here, since I can’t vouch for their truth.

Today, House of Commons staff handed out the “wrong” version of the new law allowing warrantless surveillance of internet traffic.  The error revealed the guts of Conservative communications strategy: accuse defenders of privacy of supporting child predators.

“The short title is listed as “Lawful Access Act.” An hour later, House of Commons staff withdraw it and replace it with the identical bill, save a new short title. It’s now the “Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act.””

It’s a strategy that backfired on then-opposition-leader, now Prime Minister, Harper when he accused PM Paul Martin of defending child molesters in the 2004 election.  Now that Harper has a majority government, it might be more useful for battering down the scattered opposition.

Open Media.ca has a petition against the new law, bill C-30. The law grants unprecedented powers to police, and forces ISP’s to pay for surveillance technology.

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