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Surprisingly not many people really understand the work of the Canadian Industry Minister, Jim Prentice, and his recent attempt to violate Canadian citizens in the worst possible way–by taking our rights as consumers.

I have recently drafted an open letter I will be forwarding to Bill Estabrooks, the MP for my provincial riding. I will be posting this letter on my website likely towards the weekend when I have sufficient time to review and mail a copy to my MP.

In the mean time, if you have not brought yourself up to date on the issues presented in Bill C-61, Michael Geist has created an excellent resource for us non political types which breaks down the important details here: http://www.faircopyrightforcanada.ca/

As the next parliamentary hearing will occur on or around September 15th, you can be sure I will bring more details, and probably start a permanent page for any related correspondance.

UPDATE 2008-09-06: I have created a page with the letter I have sent to several members of both my MLA and MP. Please find this in the menu, along the left hand side of this page, entitled “Bill C-61: Open Letter”

There seem to be a lot of public interest recently in the use of Taser’s, this comes after the media reported a few cases of possible taser abuse by the police force, and an even more recent lawuite by Taser International to have the cause of death in some Taser related incidences changed to their favour.

Well I certainly agree that it is wrong to lie and change the cause of death from Taser to ‘Excited Delerium’ (which isn’t a medically sound cause of death), I certainly do not agree with banning Tasers from the police force.

There is an apparent issue with some authority figures abusing people, be it some form of prejudice or their desire for power this is not limited to Tasers. For instance a case brought forward in Nova Scotia over the past couple of years where two officers assaulted a man in a convenience store who was being beligerent, but clearly not assualting or otherwise resisting the officers.

Notice that when this happened we did not question weather the police force should be allowed to have hands, nor any time you hear a police officer has shot someone when they should not have we never question the use of arms, so why would throw away our moral standard to integrity in our police officers and try to solve our problems by banning one of the most usefull, and least deadly tools on the force?

Some people have attempted to state that the only purpose of a Taser is to cause pain, once again this is not a fact. The way the human nervous system works, is that once a nerve ‘fires’ there is a preset period of time until it is capable of sending another signal to the brain. This is why people will rub a sore area of their body, the sensation caused by rubbing blocks more painful signal from getting to the brain, and the Taser works by forcing the nervous system to constantly keep firing so that the target is incapable of movement. Yes a Taser can be painful, but not nearly as painful as mace, or a bullet.

Taser provide authorities with a means of disabling people who are potentially going to cause harm to others, and they do so with a very minor chance of permanent injury or death; You cannot say that about a gun. And very simply put, if you do not want to be hit with one, don’t break the law; I promise this works almost all the time.

Oh squiggly line in my eye fluid.
I see you lurking there on the periphery of my vision.
But when I try to look at you, you scurry away.
Are you shy, squiggly line?
Why only when I ignore you, do you return to the center of my eye?
Oh, squiggly line,
it’s alright, you are forgiven.