Kenney Defends The Government Re The Roma

An excerpt from a Jason Kenney interview, where he justifies the Canadian gov's  stance re Hungary's treatment of the Roma:

 I have repeatedly condemned those voices of intolerance and xenophobia and continue to so as I did when I was in Hungary, in part expressing my solidarity with those in the Roma community who face discrimination and who are targeted by this kind of xenophobic rhetoric... That's why I ... went out to a small Roma village and met with people, went to a Roma school ... met with grassroots from community leaders in Miskolz ... I would point out that the designation of a country of origin in our asylum system is not, as you suggest, some kind of a -- it doesn't offer a country bragging rights. 

We continue to say that Hungary and the central European countries must do much more to integrate and protect the Roma and other vulnerable minority communities. That doesn’t change. 

At the end of the day, the designation is not that a country is 100% safe for 100% of its citizens 100% of the time.  

Well, shit, I've condemned all sorts of people in my time.  I've even denounced them.  For example:

(Yeah that's me.  With my hair long Donald Sutherland looks a lot like me)

...but the point being, once I did all this denouncing nothing changed. 

So Kenney did a bunch of denouncing.  What if nothing changes in Hungary?  That country still gets 100% of the benefits of being a "safe country" whether of not they do anything to make their country safer for their Roma (or Jewish for that matter) minority.  Maybe they don't get "bragging rights", but they still get Canadian $ in any Canada/EU Free Trade Deal.

Jason Kenney Is Being Lied To

From Canadian Jewish News:

A recent Canadian billboard campaign in Hungary targeting would-be Roma asylum-seekers to Canada with the message that new immigration laws severely limit their ability to seek refuge from persecution here led [Hungarian film-maker Adam] Csillag to contact The CJN to alert Canada’s Jewish community to the situation in his country.

[...]

“Hungary is lying to Canadian politicians when it says it is democratic,” he said. “Jobbik and its paramilitary [groups] are doing terrible things to Roma. I witnessed serial killings of Roma in 2008. The police are against the Roma.”

In a recent phone interview from his home in Budapest, with his daughter Anna translating, he said public discourse in Hungary has reached the point where “a disturbing amount” of people are unabashed about insulting minorities, particularly Jews and Roma.

He said he’s now advising his daughter and all Jewish youth in Hungary to leave for their own safety and a better future.

Anna, who is half-Jewish on her father’s side, confirmed that for the past few years while attending university, her friends and classmates have never been shy about telling her how much they like her “despite” her heritage.

The Roma, Jason Kenny, And The University of Haifa

The Roma Community Centre of Toronto, Canada has sent a letter--their second, because their first from earlier this month has not been responded to--to the University of Haifa in Northern Israel, asking that the University "reconsider granting an honorary doctorate to [Minister for Citizenship and Immigration] Jason Kenney", due to the fact that he's been trashing Roma refugees from Hungary in the name of "law and order" for the past six months.

There's even a connection to Roma hater Ezra Levant, The Ez being

...a member of the Canadian Friends of Haifa University’s Tribute Committee organizing the Nov. 4 ceremony to award Mr. Kenney the University of Haifa degree.

Whether U-of-Haifa wants to give Kenney a medal is their own business, obviously, but I do think they owe the RCC the courtesy of a response and an explanation.  You can find the email of their Vice President for External Relations and Resource Development through the link, if you want to pitch in.  I would note that almost  all of Canada's Jewish community groups, including the Tory-friendly CIJA, have expressed concern over the government's bill C-31, which would stigmatize Roma refugee claimants.

Update On Roma Vs. Kenney

Members of Toronto’s Roma Community Centre will disassociate itself from a number of other groups protesting a reception for Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney--who will be honoured by the Canadian Friends of Haifa University (CFHU) on Nov. 4 at the Fairmount Royal York hotel-- to symbolically show that  they are not anti-Israel, merely oppose Kenney’s Bill C-31, which they feel unfairly targets the Roma community.

Everyone's favorite human rights activist and Jewish community leader Bernie Farber, who has been helping the RCC prepare their hate-speech complaint against Ezra Levant, will nevertheless be attending the Kenney presentation as a guest:

Farber, who will attend the university’s gala event as a guest, said he has a “deep and abiding respect” for Kenney’s stances on Israel and antisemitism.

“On those issues, we stand shoulder to shoulder, and I consider him a friend. But like all friends, we can have differences of opinion on some issues,” Bill C-31 being one such item, he said.

Farber added that he felt Kenney was being “very hard on the Roma” and that many respected representatives of the Jewish community are in agreement. Earlier this year the Toronto Board of Rabbis and Elie Wiesel, among others, had urged the minister to reconsider the legislation. 

Some of the other groups protesting the event include  Queers Against Israeli Apartheid, Independent Jewish Voices, Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid, International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network and Jews Opposing Zionism.

PS. Its quite possible that Ezra, an official  "friend of Haifa", will be at the same reception.  If it comes to it, my money is on Bernie by TKO.

Remembering All Of The Victims

Yesterday, to mark both  Holocaust Remembrance Day and International Roma Day, Bernie Farber and Gina Csanyi-Robah of  the Toronto Roma Community Center penned this story about the Porajmos (Devouring), the genocide of Europe's Roma population under the Nazis.  It is not an easy thing to read, but remembrance is a duty we owe the past.

Roma Sacrificed To Free Trade

Ex CBCer Karl Nerenberg talks  Bill C-31, and how it will allow countries like Hungary--where a far right drift in national politics threatens the local Roma community*--to be labelled  a safe “Designated Country of Origin” when it comes to evaluating refugees landed in Canada:

The government has already telegraphed that it wants to name all European Union countries as safe. To do otherwise would put a major spanner in the works of the current Canada-Europe Trade Agreement negotiations.

In fact, Kenney said on Friday that when the new measures come into play, Canada will be able to lift the visa requirements on the Czech Republic, a requirement which was imposed to stem the tide of Roma from that country seeking refugee status in Canada.

Lifting that visa will make Europe very happy, and eliminate one serious irritant in the trade agreement talks.

See?  And everyone thought Jason Kenney was just being a jerk.  In reality, its all so Canadians can get access to cheap clothing from the old East Block.  Anyway, the Nerenberg piece is a longish read, but a good one.

* The Jewish community too, although this fact hasn't made  the news reports as often.

Update On Levant's Roma Rant

It has now drawn a complaint to the Law Society of Alberta:

Roma Community Centre (RCC) of Toronto, Ontario, wishes to file a complaint with Alberta Law Society (ALS) against Ezra Levant. According to the ALS Code of Conduct, “Alberta’s lawyers are expected to conduct themselves and their law practices in ways which are highly ethical and above reproach.” We believe that Mr. Levant demonstrated highly unethical attitudes and behaviour in a recent broadcast of “The Source with Ezra Levant” (Sept. 5th, 2012, at 5 p.m. EDT, Sun News Network). We also feel that for a member of the bar to promote hatred against an identifiable ethnic group is conduct unbecoming a lawyer, and wonder if Mr. Levant’s broadcast violates Section 319 of the Canadian Criminal Code, ‘Wilful Promotion of Hatred’.

Here the RCC "wonders" whether Levant's broadcast, which I have written about here, might have violated section 319, so I am not sure what concrete steps, if any, they have taken towards filing a criminal complaint.   The body of the RCC letter does confirm, though, that they have gone to the CRTC and Canadian Broadcast Standards Council.  From the tone of the Sun TV's eventual apology to the ROMA which, I am told, was followed in the same broadcast by second apology for Ezra's on-air cursing, it sounds like any lawyer's fees to defend against all these complaints will be borne by Ezra alone.

Refugee Health Cutbacks: Canadian Jewish Groups Respond (Or Not)

Since the negative consequences of Bill C-31 have become apparent over the last month or so--for example,  many refugee claimants will lose access to life-saving drugs such as insulin, and to preventive care--several Jewish organizations have expressed concerns with the law.  They have been especially troubled by those sections of it relating to the prevention of illegitimate refugee claims.  Designating countries like Hungary as "safe" would  make it near impossible for  claims from Hungarian Roma to succeed, even though the country is far from safe for this particular minority group.  And due to their common experiences of persecution during the 2nd World War, the Jewish and Roma communities have often been thought to share an historical bond.


The Toronto Board of Rabbis has spoken out in an open letter to the PM.  The Montreal Holocaust Centre has also gone public with its objections.  Even noble Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel has  stepped into the fray.  But what of those groups typically seen as speaking for the Canadian Jewish diaspora as a whole?  


Well, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) has issued a statement that comes across as both minimalist and mush-mouthed.  From the Globe article linked above:


Shimon Fogel, the CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, said his organization agrees with many of the changes the Conservative government has made to refugee policy and with the goal of preventing bogus claims. But, with regard to the health benefits, “we have some concerns, and we have registered some of them with the government.”

So, in other words, kiss the Roma good-by.  And CIJA's other objections will apparently be  whispered to the relevant government minister behind closed doors where they can be noted and then safely ignored.

B'nai Brith's position on the legislation, on the other hand, is a complete mystery.  They've said nothing in the newspapers or on their website that I can find, and have not (yet) responded to the email I sent them.  Perhaps, however, this story from June 26th offers a clue.  In it, a human rights lawyer named David Matas is quoted at length, as he is representing a number of church groups who have challenged C-31 in court.  And good on him for that.  But not mentioned anywhere in the piece is the fact that Mr. Matas is senior legal counsel to B'nai Brith Canada.  Now, Mr. Matas has done considerable  good work outside of BB, but it nevertheless seems significant to me that in the case of Bill C-31 he has been forced to act without the imprimatur of the organization he is most closely associated with

So why the silence/near-silence from Canada's two most important Jewish organizations?  Well, one can only speculate, and so I would speculate  that they have already been courted by the Harper government in the form of its unrelenting support for Israel.  Here, as in the case of Bill C-304, the government has asked for their silence as a quid pro quo.  To me that sounds like a crummy deal, but it seems one that they have been willing to make.

Ezra Off Hook For Hate Speech Charge?

Dr Dawg, and Haroon Siddiqui in the piece Dawg references, think that the Ontario Attorney General, John Gerretson, will not file hate speech charges against Ezra Levant for his anti-Roma screed of six months ago.

However, the following except from a missive by Gina Csanyi-Robah of the Toronto Roma Community Centre, re her meeting with police and the AG's people on March 14th, seems to indicate that no final decision has yet been made:

This is dated March 20th, so I would assume it is the latest information available.  Its also easier to read if you click on the image.

I, Ezra

You can read the official document here, but The Sun News Network mole has slipped me a copy of Ezra's first draft.  As you can see, it's been changed quite a bit:

Dear viewers,

As you all must know, I'm  pretty much fucked right now.  I've lost one defamation case, the Warman thing is still coming down the pipe, and there's even some Muslim kid who may be into my pockets to the tune of six figures.  Worst of all, dad's threatening to pull my allowance and, unfortunately, free speech don't feed the bulldog.  Or pay the lawyer's bill.

So here I am.  Watch me grovel.  Because I need this job.  Really...need...this...job.  Its a 24 hour bus ride back to Lethbridge, and dad's basement gets pretty cold in Winter.  Beside's, what's back there for me?  One way streets; shitty coffee from Tim's.  Yokels in flannel talking hockey and "How about dat snow, eh?"  Fuck that bullshit.  I shill for the oil patch.  There's no fucking way I intend to hang out in it.

And what would I do with myself anyway?  Start-up another magazine, start Muslim bashing, publish those damn cartoons yet again?  Its old man, its old.  I gotta stop living in 2008. I need a new schtick. 

And anyway, it used to be when you bad-mouthed Allah all that happened was some nerd from the human rights commission sent you a letter.  Now everything's a 319 offence.  319 this; 319 that.   Some big copper shows up at your door waving a copy of the criminal code.  Jail cells are cold, man.  People puke in them.  You can get scabies.  Not that I've seen the inside of one, yet, but I'm starting to dream about them, and if this mea culpa doesn't fly I may wind up living in one, married to the convict with the most cigarettes.

How did this all happen, anyway?  You're riding high!  Dozens of people are watching your show every night!  And then WHAMMO!!!  You say the wrong thing and the police are at your door and the CRTC wants to confiscate your pay-check.  Its like ole Tom getting greased by those Indians.  Now I'm getting Flanaganed by another bunch of damn swarthies.  Maybe these people are smarter than I thought.

So, Roma, I am really, really, really fucking sorry.  Really.  I'm not shitting you because my lawyer advised me.  See this picture?  That's my kid.  They'll be needing braces pretty soon.  Set me free, Roma!  Huh? How about it?

Ezra In The (Jewish) News

I would just note that this piece in the Canadian Jewish News almost entirely ignores the ongoing hate-speech investigation of Ezra Levant, preferring instead to focus on an address he gave to the Canadian Hadassah-WIZO’s Hatikvah chapter, which is a Jewish women's group.  Ezra's spiel, not surprisingly, was yet another tired rehash of his time with the Western Standard, his publication of the Danish cartoons, and yada yada yada.  The closest CJN staff writer Frances Kraf gets to reporting on the only new news about Levant is:

More recently, Levant’s Sept. 5 on-air rant on Sun News against Canada’s Roma community prompted the Toronto Roma Community Centre to launch a hate speech complaint with Toronto police that is currently under investigation.

Since the paragraphs before and after this contain nothing but Levant blithering on about Freedom and etc., I can only assume he refused to speak of his latest difficulties.  But you know, journalists aren't supposed to let that kind of thing go.  What ever happened to asking the hard questions and demanding straight answers?

Ezra Levant...My Part In His Downfall

Well,it finally happened:

On Thursday October 11, 2012, Toronto's Roma Community Centre officially reported a hate crime to the Toronto Police Services and an investigation is now underway.

This was in response to overtly racist, prejudicial, and demeaning statements made by Sun News Network commentator, Ezra Levant, which were broadcast live on television throughout Canada.

And indeed the Toronto police have confirmed that an investigation is underway.  The way these things work is they will interview everyone involved, including Ezra, and then decide whether or not to approach the attorney general.  So Ezra will get a chance to do his whole "outraged" act, as with the gal from the Alberta Human Rights Commission back in 2008:



God, those were the days.

And I'll tell you a true story. Back in 2008 I was an up-and-coming blogger, and Ezra in the process of crashing and burning The Western Standard.  He had bragged on his own blog that there would be some awesome video footage coming next morning, and to stay tuned for the exclusive.  But me, realizing the time difference between here and Alta., got up early and pinched the footage off his youtube channel before he could post it, then shopped the link to NN and other news outlets.  The rest, as they say, is history...the Neo-Nazis, the lawsuits, the repeal of S13.

Remember, old Ez didn't have much clout at the time; if he had pushed the story it probably would have gone nowhere.  So in a way he owes me for relaunching his career.  He couldn't have moved out of his dad's basement, come to Toronto and made himself a Fox News North Super Star, without my help.

Mind you, he also wouldn't have been able to launch his Anti-Roma rant and get himself investigated. Now the guy might wind up doing slammer time, married to the inmate with the most cigarettes. Funny how things go.  Its almost like Life is a Wheel, that goes up before it goes down...

Tuesday Tidbits

As the Margaret Wente plagiarism story finally hits the mainstream, she discovers a lone defender...yeah,  Ezra Levant, and for him it really all comes down to The Muslims.   Ah well, as Ms. Wente herself once wrote: "It was the best of times; it was the worst of times." (PS.  I stole that joke off an anonymous blogger.)

Speaking of Ezra, Bernie Farber Nate Leipciger and Avrum Rosensweig take him to task here over his anti-Roma rantings.  Worth pointing out that here as with the early days of Wente-gate, Canada's little tribe of media folk said nothing.  Presumably, a CRTC complaint will make them sit up and take note.  Although, from Bernie and company's column it sounds like Roma community leaders have not yet decided whether or not to file a police complaint.

Meanwhile, in non-Ezra-Levant-related news, I think we have the quote of the millennium:

“When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go, exactly,” Mitt [Romney] told the LA Times in an interview. “You can’t find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem.”

If this doesn't disqualify the guy for president, I don't know what will.  I wouldn't trust him with the window seat on a Cessna, let alone The Button.

Sun TV Issues Grovelling Apology To Roma--Ezra Levant Hates On

I am told that Sun TV ran a scrolled apology to the Canadian Roma community last evening during Ezra's show, although I am not seeing it in the vids posted to the network's website.Ezra, it should be noted, has not issued his own apology, which means that a criminal hate speech complaint may still be launched against him.

Ezra Levant In More Hate Speech Trouble

Gina Csanyi-Robah of the Roma Community Center writes:

As a result of Levant's hate speech targeting our community, the RCC has been in contact with the Canadian Race Relations Foundation and is currently writing formal complaints to the Canadian Broadcasting Standards Council, the Canadian Media Association, the Canadian Ethnic media Association, and the Ontario Human Rights Commission.

There are examples through the link.  One of the nastier bits is:

Being a Gypsy isn't like being Black, or being Gay, or being a woman or even Romanian, where many Gypsies come from. Just like being from Sicily doesn't make you part of the Mafia. Being a Gypsy is a positive choice, like being a Blood or a Crip, like joining the Cosa Nostra. For centuries, these roving highway gangs have mocked the law and robbed their way across Europe. Now, because of our broken refugee system, they're here in Canada in the thousands. And they've brought the Gypsy Crime Wave with them. Yeah, no thanks, I'm not interested in calling them 'Roma' or 'Travelers' or having a Human Rights Commission investigate where we as a society have done them wrong, maybe dispatching social workers (laughs) the social workers will just have their wallets stolen. I want to dispatch cops and send the bad Gypsies to Hungary on the next plane. Just warn the flight attendants (chuckles) not to wear any jewelry on the flight!"

The OHRC doesn't adjudicate hate speech, only racist signs and symbols and the like, so I doubt that approach will go anywhere.  But Ezra's is a sickening enough diatribe that it wouldn't surprise me if he didn't run afoul of CBSC regulations...again.

Ezra Levant, The Alberta NDP, And Journosplaining

I guess I should say something about this.  Alberta's NDP government decided they weren't willing to put up with any more disruptions out of kooks from The Rebel (the online HQ of Ezra Levant's personal death cult), and kicked them out of one of their press conferences.  They're rationale was that Ezra was, in his own words, "not a journalist".  Of course, when the real journos heard about this, they collectively shat, and rushed to our lads defense. Not like rational men.  Like Pavlov the dog drooling at his master's bell.  Like chimps chasing a stray banana.

And their arguments were quite silly. There's apparently no way to tell who is a journalist and who isn't; also, its important to allow even bad journalism.  Imagine if someone had applied this line of thinking to cars.  How can we really know which cars are safe?  But we must allow even shitty cars!

But of course nobody making these arguments believes them for one second.  What real media outlet would be willing to hire Ezra Levant after all those lost libel cases?  Let alone the nine-tooth yobos that make up the "contributors" to his cult newsletter.

Theoretically, though, a news outlet is supposed to accept as a journalist anyone who shows up on the front step with a pencil and a notepad.

The fact is, we regulate pork, we regulate cheese, we regulate guns, we can certainly regulate words; we can eliminate whatever kind of talk we think demeans the public discourse in the same way we've eliminated spitting on the floor.  When journos tell you you shouldn't regulate them discount what they say and get to the root, in the same way you would if you were listening to a herring fisherman bitching about new regs on the herring fishery.  "As the herring fishery goes, so goes the nation!  If you destroy the herring fishery, then you will be the ones who suffer!!!"  And etc.

And the thing with the MSM and Ezra, they're not defending him because its a free speech thing. They defend him because accept him as being one of the family, the slow cousin in the basement that they can feel superior too and occasionally decide he's really got a dabble of wisdom in him in his own thuggish way, even if they've seen him eating live baby squirrels or running naked through the woods at night.

Or maybe its like they've been stuck with him so long they've all got a version of Stockholm's Syndrome.

And about this journosplaining nonsense.  Please, journalists, when arguing this issue don't whip out the few lines your remember from On Liberty, or Mencken, or that book by John Milton with the name that sounds like a piece of gym equipment, as though folks on the other side of the issue didn't read them in college 30 years ago and weren't impressed.  D'you know that Mill's arguments for absolute Freedom of Speech rely on the purest form of truth relativism?  We can't deny Ezra's droolers whatever because, who knows, we can't know they're wrong about the ROMA being sub-human.

Or do you (journalists) spout these lines like you're dropping little semantics turds that sound nice but which  you don't know the meaning of.  In either case, it is insulting.  Stop it.

The Things CIJA Must Do

CIJA is the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, an advocacy group for the Canada's Jewish community.  Arguably, there are things they have to do.  Arguably, they have to go shmoozing at wing-dings  thrown by the government of the day.

Arguably, they do NOT have to swap drinks with the likes of Ezra Levant, whose media career has been a series of brushes with the hate crimes unit, and the CBSC, the CBSC, and the CBSC again, for spreading hate the Roma, Indians, and others too numerous to count.

Show a little class, CIJA.

The State Of Stand With Ezra

The site Ezra is using to raise money for his latest defamation suit has been hacked.  Don't know what issue B3Yaz has with him, but there's some nice gypsy-like music playing on the site now, so maybe it's in solidarity with The Roma (who Ezra slimed).

Update: In the comments, Dawg says the music is Turkish.

Bernie Farber Has Advice

Now that Jason Kenney has left his position as Minister for Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, Bernie makes some suggestions to his successor, Chris Alexander:

Refugees - Remove Hungary and Mexico from the Designated Safe Country list. This can be done immediately and without legislative reform. These designations impact vulnerable communities - ethnic minorities, the LGBTQ community and women facing gender violence. The Minister can also propose an amendment to the law to provide for an expert human rights panel to assess whether a country might be safe, rather than allow designation by statistics. And he can seek to amend the law to provide an automatic periodic review after designation and add appeal rights to persons from designated countries.

I haven't written much about Mexico in this regard.  In the case of Hungary, however, it is quite clear that the country is no longer safe for either its Roma or Jewish minorities.  What is particularly galling is the possibility that these groups are being sacrificed in the name of a Canada-EU Free Trade agreement.

Bernie also suggests:

Health Care - Change the Order in Council to restore the same health care system that has worked well since 1957. No legislative amendment is required, it can be done immediately. Institute a means test as suggested by Canadian Doctors for Refugee Care.

The kind of changes that Bernie wants rolled back were made to the Interim Federal Health Program, I believe.  These recently resulted in a mid-East refugee, who had left home because he had been persecuted for his Christian beliefs, being denied chemotherapy in this country.  As Brad Wall said at the time:

“It’s unbelievable that some of the decisions that have been taken federally are having this impact on people who are clearly the most vulnerable, refugees who are obviously fleeing something quite terrible — that’s why they’re refugees..."

“On the face of it, you just consider the case of this particular gentleman or others who, for example, as it was pointed out … might need prenatal care, this is just common sense. You just do this.

“This is the kind of country we are. You cover it.”

In this case, Saskatchewan eventually picked up the cost of treatment.  So, to prevent the poor fellow from dying, the province paid for a bad federal policy.

And Bernie's last recommendation:

Immigration - Scrap the proposed regulatory amendment to lowering the age of dependency to 18 from 22. This will affect every family applying for permanent residence in Canada. No family believes a 19 year old should be excluded from a family application and left behind.

I am not terribly familiar with these particular changes, I will leave this bit unglossed.

Bernie's  piece, incidentally, is entitled Restoring Canada’s Dignity and Respect, and the entirety of it  lies behind the Globe pay-wall.  Good luck digging it out.

New Jewish Group Fills Gap Left By The CJC

...whose members include  Stephen Lewis, Michele Landsberg and Bernie Farber, and whose mandate includes more than just Israel 24/7 (includes, for example,Hungarian, Slovak and Czech nationals of Roma heritage).  Good luck to them.  Hope to hear lots from them in the future.