All Hell has broken loose here in Ottawa, and has spread to a lesser degree to other parts of Canada, namely Toronto, Quebec City, and the border between Alberta and Montana.

Truckers, upset with the Vaccine Mandate, have invaded and occupied the downtown core, including Wellington Street, running in front of Parliament Hill. Like a lot of protests, everyone thought they’d drive through Ottawa, stop and give a few speeches, then leave. Not this time. They came in Friday, January 28th, and have been here every since. Today is day 12.

In no time, they set up a small city on the streets downtown, including fuel supplies for their trucks, food brought in (a wooden store erected in Centennial Park), and other logistics, to keep everything going. They even set up a supply depot a few miles away at a baseball stadium parking lot. Crowds of supporters who arrived with them, thinned out for the work week, then came back this past weekend, along with more truckers.

There has been a carnival atmosphere to the whole thing, and admittedly, in one sense, looks like fun (bouncy castle, street hockey, and pig roast included), although masking a darker underside. A good part of the downtown core is populated with residential neighborhoods. As part of their protest, truckers have been blaring their air, and in some cases, train horns, at all hours of the day and night, torturing and traumatizing human and beast alike. I’m lucky, living in South Keys, well away from the disturbance. The city finally got the truckers to not blow their horns between 8pm and 8am, but some are still doing it, regardless.

The Rideau Shopping Centre, never closed before, was shut down almost immediately, in addition to various other businesses, from coffee shops and restaurants to vendors of every kind in the vicinity. This, as on this past Monday after the first weekend, Ontario lifted its latest lockdown on certain businesses, including restaurants, only adding salt to the wounds of small business in the downtown. Unable to work, employees affected, aren’t getting paid, putting their own lives in financial jeopardy.

Locals have been harassed, physically bullied in some cases for wearing face masks, and those working in the few stores open, insulted for the same reason. As always with these things, there’s a certain fringe minority/thug element, with their own agendas. some even calling for the overthrow of the government. Canadian flags have been flown upside down, marked with swastikas, Stars of David, and even burned. The War Memorial was temporarily turned into a small parking lot (until police intervened), Tomb of the Unknown Soldier danced on, and statue of Terry Fox defaced.

As nothing of this size has ever happened before, authorities have been caught off guard, and slow to crack down, but gradually adapting to the situation. Mayor Jim Watson and City Council declared a state of emergency two nights ago. Extra police have been brought in from other forces. The baseball park supply depot was just shut down, tickets issued for everything from not wearing seatbelts, open alcohol, to dangerous storage and handling of fuel. Arrests have been made, and several police investigations are under way.

Authorities have also managed to shut down the truckers’ Go Fund Me page, cutting off a major source of money, which at last count had accumulated over $10 million. Surprising, but not so surprising, some of the money collected, has come from unknown sources outside of Canada.

There are a lot of armchair quarterbacks out there, critical of the Ottawa Police, and the federal government’s handling of the situation. Truth is nothing like this has ever been encountered before, anywhere in Canada. No amount of preparation, at least in the short term, could have prevented what has occurred. Lessons are no doubt being learned, in case there’s a next time.

At the very beginning, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau quickly dismissed the truckers as a fringe group, and not worth meeting or discussing terms, mainly the lifting of the Vaccination Mandate. He was then spirited away with his family to an undisclosed location for security reasons. As luck or bad luck would have it, Trudeau was also diagnosed with COVID, just before leaving Ottawa, and hasn’t been heard from since. Various ministers of his cabinet have been speaking out, calling on the truckers to end the occupation or face serious penalties. Now that he’s beyond the 5-day quarantine period, many feel that as Prime Minister, Trudeau should say something to address the situation.

In a sense, Trudeau isn’t wrong, as this particular group represents roughly only 10% of Canadian truckers. Unvaccinated truckers can’t come back into Canada, at least not without facing tests, quarantine, etc. The crazy part about it is that the US has instituted the same mandate, so that 10% are screwed either way...unless they GET VACCINATED! The other 90% of truckers are fully vaccinated, many looking down their noses at this group, for giving all truckers a bad name.


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02/07/2022

Posted on 02/07/2022
Copyright © 2024 Chris Sorrenti