Tag: police state

Canada: Mark Carney Vows Internet Speech Crackdown if Elected, Citing Online “Pollution” of Misogyny, Conspiracies

It was supposed to be a routine campaign pit stop, the kind of low-stakes political affair where candidates smile like used car salesmen and dish out platitudes thicker than Ontario maple syrup. Instead, Mark Carney found himself dodging verbal bricks in a Hamilton hall, facing hecklers who lobbed Jeffrey Epstein references like Molotovs. No rebuttal, no denial. Just a pivot worthy of an Olympic gymnast, straight to the perils of digital discourse.

“There are many serious issues that we’re dealing with,” he said, ignoring the criticism that had just lobbed his way. “One of them is the sea of misogyny, antisemitism, hatred, and conspiracy theories — this sort of pollution online that washes over our virtual borders from the United States.”

Ah yes, the dreaded digital tide. Forget inflation or the fact that owning a home now requires a GoFundMe. According to Carney, the real catastrophe is memes from Buffalo.

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North Carolina Lawmakers Are Considering At Least Nine Bills To Regulate Intoxicating Hemp-Derived Products

North Carolina lawmakers have proposed at least nine bills this year that seek more regulation on the sale and purchase of gummies, drinks and vaping products containing compounds from hemp.

Most of the bills seek to make it illegal for youth to buy snacks, drinks and vape products containing hemp-derived cannabinoids or to keep them off school property. Legislators and sheriffs talked about one of the bills, House Bill 680, The Protect Children from Cannabis Act, at a Wednesday news conference.

The bill would make it illegal for shops to sell consumables containing hemp compounds without a permit, and would make it illegal for people under 21 to buy them. The Alcohol Beverage Control Commission and Alcohol Law Enforcement (ALE) would have investigative and enforcement powers.

“Currently, there’s no age restriction on purchasing these intoxicating cannabinoids, and children do use these and buy these every day,” said Rep. Timothy Reeder (R-Pitt), one of the bill’s primary sponsors.

Onslow County Sheriff Chris Thomas said vape shops have opened near schools in his county to take advantage of the young customer base.

It appears sellers are focusing on young customers, he said, “because the young clientele is a customer for a long time.”

An effort to regulate snacks containing hemp cannabinoids and banning the products from schools faltered last year when the state Senate attached medical marijuana legalization to a House bill. The House and Senate have been at an impasse over medical marijuana for several years.

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Liberal Canadian PM Mark Carney Runs on Banning Free Speech if Elected Canadian Prime Minister

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney promised to crack down on free speech in his latest campaign stop in Hamilton, Canada.

He’s actually running on banning speech in his country in the final weeks of the election. The 2025 Canadian federal election is scheduled for April 28.

Mark Carney is taking over where Marxist Justin Trudeau left off.

Mark Carney: “There are many serious issues that we’re dealing with. One of them is the sea of misogyny, antisemitism, hatred, and conspiracy theories — this sort of pollution online that washes over our virtual borders from the United States… The more serious thing is when it affects how people behave in our society. When Canadians are threatened going to their community centers or their places of worship or their school or, God forbid, when it affects our children. My government, if elected will be taking action.”

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Military Veterans Slam DoD’s Reinstatement Form for Forcing Them to Lie About Separation — Demands They Say It Was “Voluntary” and Made “Freely and Without Coercion”

Conservative military veterans are sounding the alarm over a new Department of Defense reinstatement form that they say whitewashes the truth about their forced separations during the COVID-19 vaccine mandate era.

Veterans who once wore the uniform with honor are now being told that if they want back in, they must lie on paper and pretend they left the military of their own free will.

The Department of Defense has released updated guidance officially inviting back thousands of service members who were involuntarily separated for refusing to comply with the now-defunct COVID-19 vaccine mandate.

The move comes under Executive Order 14184, signed by President Donald Trump on January 27, 2025, and implemented by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

The order compels the Pentagon to offer reinstatement to any military personnel—active or reserve—who were forced out solely for refusing the COVID shot.

The new policy outlines a comprehensive process for both involuntary and voluntary separations.

For those involuntarily discharged, the Military Departments are tasked with identifying and contacting eligible former service members, offering them reinstatement through the Boards for Correction of Military/Naval Records (BCM/NRs).

The process includes medical pre-screening, expedited record reviews, and potential financial benefits like back pay, restored rank, and credit for lost service time, subject to offsets such as wages earned post-separation.

Reinstatement requires a four-year service commitment, with a two-year option for those nearing retirement eligibility.

Service members who voluntarily left or allowed their service to lapse to avoid vaccination can also apply to return.

They must submit a sworn statement attesting to their decision and meet retention standards.

While re-accession restores rank and pay, it does not include back pay or other retroactive benefits unless pursued separately through standard BCM/NR processes.

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Congress Takes Another Step Toward Enabling Broad Internet Censorship

The House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday advanced the TAKE IT DOWN Act (S. 146) , a bill that seeks to speed up the removal of certain kinds of troubling online content. While the bill is meant to address a serious problem—the distribution of non-consensual intimate imagery (NCII)—the notice-and-takedown system it creates is an open invitation for powerful people to pressure websites into removing content they dislike. 

As we’ve written before, while protecting victims of these heinous privacy invasions is a legitimate goal, good intentions alone are not enough to make good policy. 

This bill mandates a notice-and-takedown system that threatens free expression, user privacy, and due process, without meaningfully addressing the problem it claims to solve. The “takedown” provision applies to a much broader category of content—potentially any images involving intimate or sexual content at all—than the narrower NCII definitions found elsewhere in the bill. The bill contains no protections against frivolous or bad-faith takedown requests. Lawful content—including satire, journalism, and political speech—could be wrongly censored. 

The legislation’s 48-hour takedown deadline means that online service providers, particularly smaller ones, will have to comply quickly to avoid legal risks. That time crunch will make it impossible for services to verify the content is in fact NCII. Instead, services will rely on automated filters—infamously blunt tools that frequently flag legal content, from fair-use commentary to news reporting.

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Congressman sues gov’t over post-J6 Capitol Police actions

A congressman from Texas is suing the federal government for $2.5 million over the “unlawful harassment” he faced following the Jan. 6, 2021, protests and riots at the Capitol.

Rep Troy Nehls, R-Texas, charges that a Capitol police officer forced his way into Nehls’ congressional office without consent, then photographed materials in the room, including a whiteboard with a discussion of proposed firearms legislation.

Then the authorities followed up with an investigation by other officers.

Significant is the claim that the police violated the Speech and Debate Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which provides vast protections for members of Congress doing their duties.

The first count charges “intrusion on privacy,” for the entry of the officer into the congressman’s private office and taking pictures.

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A secretive billionaire manages a California city like a one-man HOA… dictating how people run their lives

Welcome to Irvine, CA., where the median price of a home is $1.56 million. The winding streets are spotless, there’s no telephone polls visible, and every house has the exact same terracotta roof.

In the meticulously planned city, which continuously tops hottest housing market lists, streets run in perfect circles, everyone’s house must have windows on all four sides, and lawns are spaced accordingly.

Each village inside Irvine gets its own landscape design where only certain types of imported greenery and brightly colored plants are approved.

The mastermind behind the design and upkeep of Irvine is 92-year-old Donald Bren, CEO of Irvine Co., and the wealthiest real estate developer in America, according to Bloomberg. He’s reportedly a peculiar personality, and keeps personal information about himself private. 

Under his leadership, Irvine has become a bubble away from the rest of the world. 

Every corner of the city has surveillance cameras operated by local law enforcement, who also drive Tesla trucks designed for their specific police department. 

In 2024, Irvine made the list of the top five cities to raise a family, according to WalletHub. 

‘The appeal of Irvine is top ranked education, incredible employment centers, renowned health facilities, and an incredible master planned community with loads of open space, family activities and parks,’ local realtor Cathy Haney, a broker from First Team Real Estate, told the Daily Mail.

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BitChute Discontinues Video-Sharing Service for UK Residents Over Online Censorship Laws

BitChute, a platform widely recognized for its commitment to free expression and open discourse, has officially withdrawn its services from the United Kingdom, citing untenable regulatory conditions under the UK’s recently enacted censorship law, the Online Safety Act. The move comes in direct response to regulator Ofcom’s newly enhanced authority, which enables the communications regulator to levy fines as high as 10% of a company’s global revenue if deemed non-compliant with the Act’s sweeping censorship demands.

This shift in regulatory climate marks what some view as a profound erosion of digital freedoms in the UK. BitChute’s decision could serve as the first signal of a broader exodus, with other international platforms potentially following suit to avoid the heavy-handed oversight now codified in British law.

In a detailed public statement posted to its website, BitChute explained the rationale behind the drastic step:

“After careful review and ongoing evaluation of the regulatory landscape in the United Kingdom, we regret to inform you that BitChute will be discontinuing its video-sharing service for UK residents.”

The platform highlighted the unpredictable and burdensome nature of the new legal framework, emphasizing the Act’s expansive mandates on content moderation and the discretionary powers it grants Ofcom to enforce them. BitChute warned that these provisions create an environment of legal ambiguity, placing platforms at the mercy of vague standards and severe penalties.

“The BitChute platform has always operated on principles of freedom of speech, expression and association…However, the evolving regulatory pressures—including strict enforcement mechanisms and potential liabilities—have created an operational landscape in which continuing to serve the UK market exposes our company to unacceptable legal and compliance risks.”

The company has implemented immediate restrictions: UK residents can still upload content to the platform, but none of their videos will be accessible to other UK-based users. Their content will remain viewable to users in other countries, who can interact with it as usual.

“The significant change will be that this UK user-posted content will not be viewable by any other UK user, but will be visible to other users outside of the UK.”

This effectively means that while UK-based creators are not entirely barred from participation, their voices are now digitally cordoned off from fellow citizens, a result of legal constraints rather than technical ones.

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Florida’s New Social Media Bill Says the Quiet Part Out Loud and Demands an Encryption Backdoor

At least Florida’s SB 868/HB 743, “Social Media Use By Minors” bill isn’t beating around the bush when it states that it would require “social media platforms to provide a mechanism to decrypt end-to-end encryption when law enforcement obtains a subpoena.” Usually these sorts of sweeping mandates are hidden behind smoke and mirrors, but this time it’s out in the open: Florida wants a backdoor into any end-to-end encrypted social media platforms that allow accounts for minors. This would likely lead to companies not offering end-to-end encryption to minors at all, making them less safe online.

Encryption is the best tool we have to protect our communication online. It’s just as important for young people as it is for everyone else, and the idea that Florida can “protect” minors by making them less safe is dangerous and dumb.

The bill is not only privacy-invasive, it’s also asking for the impossible. As breaches like Salt Typhoon demonstrate, you cannot provide a backdoor for just the “good guys,” and you certainly cannot do so for just a subset of users under a specific age. After all, minors are likely speaking to their parents and other family members and friends, and they deserve the same sorts of privacy for those conversations as anyone else. Whether social media companies provide “a mechanism to decrypt end-to-end encryption” or choose not to provide end-to-end encryption to minors at all, there’s no way that doesn’t harm the privacy of everyone.

If this all sounds familiar, that’s because we saw a similar attempt from an Attorney General in Nevada last year. Then, like now, the reasoning is that law enforcement needs access to these messages during criminal investigations. But this doesn’t hold true in practice.

In our amicus brief in Nevada, we point out that there are solid arguments that “content oblivious” investigation methods—like user reporting— are “considered more useful than monitoring the contents of users’ communications when it comes to detecting nearly every kind of online abuse.” That remains just as true in Florida today.

Law enforcement can and does already conduct plenty of investigations involving encrypted messages, and even with end-to-end encryption, law enforcement can potentially access the contents of most messages on the sender or receiver’s devices, particularly when they have access to the physical device. The bill also includes measures prohibiting minors from accessing any sort of ephemeral messaging features, like view once options or disappearing messages. But even with those features, users can still report messages or save them. Targeting specific features does nothing to protect the security of minors, but it would potentially harm the privacy of everyone.

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Kansas Governor Says It’s Time For Lawmakers To ‘Finally Legalize Medical Marijuana’

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly (D) says it’s time for lawmakers in the state to finally legalize medical marijuana.

The governor called for the reform on Wednesday, as she allowed a separate right-to-try bill to become law without her signature. That measure is intended to give people with debilitating or life-threatening conditions broader access to experimental medications.

“This bill gives Kansans with debilitating disease the option to make choices about their medical care,” Kelly said in a statement about the bill, SB 250. “Now I think it’s time for the Legislature to finally legalize medical Marijuana, giving the Kansans suffering from chronic pain or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and children suffering with Dravet’s Syndrome (epilepsy) the choice of the treatment they and their doctors determine best suits their needs.”

Notably, lawmakers earlier this year considered but ultimately rejected an amendment that would have added cannabis to the right-to-try bill. The lawmaker behind that effort, Sen. Cindy Holscher (D), said her intention was not to create a public medical marijuana system, however.

Sen. Mike Thompson (R) disparaged the idea at the time. “The term medical cannabis is nothing but a marketing ploy,” he said.

Polling from late last year shows that nearly three quarters (73 percent) of Kansans support legalizing medical marijuana. About six in 10 (61 percent) respondents also said they supported legalizing cannabis for broader adult use.

Legislators have nevertheless repeatedly shot down reform efforts.

The House of Representatives passed a medical cannabis bill in 2021, for example, but it stalled out in the Senate. And after numerous hearings on the issue, the Senate Federal and State Affairs Committee voted last March to table a limited medical marijuana pilot program bill.

A later effort to revive the medical cannabis bill on the Senate floor ultimately fell short.

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