Juno News - December 03, 2023National Citizens Inquiry exposes harms of Covid measures
Episode Stats
Summary
In this episode, we discuss the findings of the National Citizens' Inquiry into the deaths of 9/11 victims, and the need for criminal charges against those responsible for the deaths. We also hear from the inquiry s administrator, Ches Crosby, who joins us to talk about his role in leading the inquiry, and why criminal charges should be brought.
Transcript
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The reason I think this is important is that it sets a standard for a discussion that should
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exist in society. And I heard from the lead counsel for the NCI, Sean Buckley, that they
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sent out summons and requests to a number of public officials, I forget how many, but what
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they said is that not a single one answered with a favorable response. Most of them didn't
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respond at all. So no one agreed to testify under oath before this commission who didn't
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want to be there, who wasn't a voluntary figure. And obviously it didn't have subpoenaing power,
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but no public officials were prepared to withstand that. Now you may say, okay, well, why would they?
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It doesn't have any official status. It's a citizen-led inquiry. But I'd say putting the
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voices of citizens front and center is exactly what Canada and much of the world was missing
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over the last three years. And hearing testimony that was very citizen-focused and citizen-oriented
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was precisely what this discussion needed. So yes, the fact that Alberta and Danielle Smith
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had their inquiry is good, but it was not meant to be as broad and holistic as this one. Ches Crosby
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is an institution in Newfoundland politics and was the administrator for the National
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Citizens' Inquiry. And is that, I should say. He joins me now. Ches, good to talk to you.
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Thank you, Andrew. You and I met in an elevator in Calgary just before the dinner that's held
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annually to benefit the Canadian Centre for Constitutional Freedoms. I only had time to introduce
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myself, but not to give you an elevator speech. So maybe I got that chance now.
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Yes, you certainly do. And I know you were at that hearing and the press conference a few
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moments ago. I'm glad you were able to peel away and join us. One of the things that jumped
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out at me in the report, and again, I haven't read through the whole 5,300 pages yet, is a call
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to have criminal and civil penalties for institutions that the commissioners say were culpable in
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perpetrating these things on Canadians. Now, what are we talking about here? I mean, who
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We're talking about people at various levels of responsibility. As a lawyer, it won't surprise
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you that my outlook is the more civil lawsuits, the better. But also, eventually, this country
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is going to have to get to the stage where criminal proceedings are taken. Usually, those proceedings
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begin with people at lower levels of responsibility. And then you have people becoming whistleblowers.
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You have people doing plea bargainings, and they give the receipts, and people higher up the
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chain of command. And generally, you work your way up that way. But we very much do need criminal
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prosecutions. What sorts of crimes am I thinking of here? This is not an exhaustive list, but criminal
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negligence causing death might be one. Hate crimes could be another. And we have a very interesting
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and powerful statute in this country called the War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanities Act. It was
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borrowed from international law. And it's sitting on the books of Parliament since the year 2000. Now,
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one little problem with that is that it requires the permission of the Attorney General of Canada before
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a prosecution can be brought. I don't think you can expect to get that permission as long as the people
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are in office who are in office right now at this moment in Ottawa. That's the Trudeau Liberals.
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But eventually, that permission will be granted should somebody want to seek it. And I happen to know of a
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group of retired detectives who are hard at work on this now. So I take from your answer that you don't
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buy into the idea that this was a political problem that has to be responded to in a political fashion,
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as though basically, this was just bad policy. And the antidote to bad policy is to vote out
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the politicians who imposed it. Well, that's certainly part of the antidote. They got to be voted out.
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The tipping point is being reached, not just in Canada, but elsewhere. And that's, you can visualize
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that sort of like a dump truck load of sand. And at a certain point in the tilt of the dump truck load,
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some of the sand begins to run out. And then there's a cascade of more sand. And then the entire
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load comes out all at once. Well, we're coming up to that point, where things that were unthinkable,
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even months ago, are going to be very thinkable, and in fact, will be done. And I'm talking about,
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you know, I'm talking about holding people criminally accountable, as we were just discussing.
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So let's talk about the relevance of this report, because obviously, it was quite monumental that you
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had this citizen led initiative with no public funding and no official status, no royal charter,
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that existed, and that carried on and that, you know, took obviously significant effort and financial
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resources to have happen. At the end of it, you have this 5000 page report, but the process was
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boycotted by the people who were in positions to make these decisions that were ultimately rebuked
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and rejected by this report. I think it stands to reason those people will not acknowledge or if they
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do will not heed the recommendations. So at the risk of sounding kind of glib about this, what's the point of
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it all? Well, you know, these, the whole process of accountability always takes time. We've been
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through a species of madness to, there are various terms for it, maybe it's mass hypnosis, maybe it's
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mass formations, mass something, mass fear, the commissioners described it as a terror. In other words,
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the authorities perpetrated a state of fear quite deliberately and knowingly. And you could use the
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term a psychological operation, a psyops on the civilian population of Canada. It takes a while to
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get over that and to begin to see life in a realistic way. And you probably agree with me that topics that
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you couldn't have talked about even six months ago, in social situations now are no longer taboo,
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you can speak about them. This will continue to change and change in a proper and right direction.
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There will be accountability. And without accountability, there can't be reconciliation.
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And God needs, God knows that this country, Canada needs reconciliation.
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Well, that was, I mean, whenever we've talked about this in the indigenous context, we're always told
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that you need truth before you can have reconciliation, hence the name of the Truth
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and Reconciliation Commission. And in this context, you can't have an honest discussion about what
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happened without dealing with the facts. And even still, some of the basic fundamental facts are in
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dispute by some of the so-called experts on whom the government relied, and a lot of the other
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experts that the government rejected. And, you know, I've often had this challenge as a journalist,
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you know, how can I sort of adjudicate between two people wearing lab coats with letters after their
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names? But I think the government was very quick to shut down anyone with a heterodox view. And that's
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part of the reason we got into these problems. And they really just entrenched that the longer this
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went on, rather than having any basic semblance of humility.
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Well, there's a famous doctor, Dr. Peter McCullough, who you're probably familiar with.
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And he writes a sub stack, he calls it courageous discourse. And I like that term, because there are
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two things that all of us need. We need courage. But we also need the ability to engage in discourse,
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and to learn from people with different viewpoints. And so what we've seen lacking in the authorities,
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who have instituted the measures that we're all so familiar with from the last several years, the
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repression, repressive measures, is they wouldn't turn up at the inquiry, although they are invited,
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and explain themselves. What are they afraid of? They obviously, they obviously have something to
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be afraid of. They know they've got things to defend that they can't defend very well.
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And they're not willing to engage in discourse. And as long as people aren't willing to engage in
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discourse, and I'd actually include criminal proceedings as a form of discourse as well,
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then we're going to have problems, and we're not going to have reconciliation.
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We lost your video there for a moment, you're frozen, but we can still hear you. So I'll ask
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you one final question here, Ches. What would you like Canadians to do with this? Because there is,
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I think, a call to action, whenever something like this is published for Canadians to read it
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and understand and review. What would you like, if you can assign the country homework here, and certainly
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this audience, what do you think Canadians should take from this and do with this document?
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Well, thanks, Andrew. I think that people should have a look at it. They should turn it over in
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their minds. There are going to be a spectrum of people, some who accept everything that's being
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said and are totally on the same page with the commissioners. There will be some who are somewhere
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in between, and there are others to be more resistant.
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Oh, I feel now we've lost the audio here. You cut out there, Ches. Oh, you seem to be moving again.
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If you can try speaking, I think we have you back.
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No, unfortunately, it's cutting off now. We're having a connection issue here, but I do appreciate
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that we had most of the interview with functional technology, and we'll have to get you back in a
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bit more detail. Ches Crosby, the administrator for the National Citizens Inquiry. Thanks for listening to
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The Andrew Lawton Show. Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.