Amy Goodman And Canada's Olympic Paranoia

When it comes to independent, agitational journalism, the standard is Amy Goodman and her radio/television institution, Democracy Now! Goodman and her staff often find themselves accosted by officials, foreign and domestic. This happened again on Thursday. But it didn't happen in East Timor or Burma. Goodman was detained by our neighbors to the north.

Canadian border officials held Goodman in Vancouver for 90 minutes when she attempted to enter Vancouver to attend events launching her new book, Breaking the Sound Barrier. But the Canadian Border team didn't care what she was there to do. They wanted to know what she was going to say. They demanded to see her notes. They searched her car and surreptitiously checked her laptop. They returned her passport with papers demanding she leave the country within 48 hours.

What could possibly have led to this level of scrutiny? They cared little that she was there to discuss the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq or the state of health care. The critical concern of the Canadian Border authorities was that Ms. Goodman would be discussing the 2010 Winter Olympic games in Vancouver. This is not a joke.

In an interview with CBC News, Goodman recalled that the border agent "made it clear by saying, 'What about the Olympics?' And I said, 'You mean when President Obama went to Copenhagen to push for the Olympics in Chicago?' He said, 'No. I am talking about the Olympics here in 2010.' I said, 'Oh I hadn't thought of that,' He said, 'You're saying you're not talking about the Olympics?' He was clearly incredulous that I wasn't going to be talking about the Olympics. He didn't believe me."

Ponder for a moment the Canadian state's paranoia wedded with arrogance. They moved quickly from concern that Goodman would be a critic of the games, to aghast that it would not be the centerpiece of her speech.

As Derrick O'Keefe, co-chair of the Canadian Peace Alliance said to me, "It's pretty unlikely that the harassment of a well known and respected journalist like Amy Goodman about whether she might be speaking about the Olympics was the initiative of one over-zealous, bad apple Canadian border guard. This looks like a clear sign of the chill that the IOC and the Games' local corporate boosters want to put out against any potential dissent."

In Vancouver, dissent is now the only obstacle to an Olympic-sized theft. The games stand to cost Vancouver, in the analysis of the Vancouver Sun, "$6 billion and counting so far." Local papers are starting to ask, "Could the Olympics bankrupt the City of Vancouver, or put it in a financial straitjacket for decades to come?"

But it's not just the economic theft.

Harsha Walia, member of No One Is Illegal and the Olympic Resistance Network, said to me, "In the lead-up to the 2010 Vancouver Olympic Games, we have witnessed and been subjected to an increasingly fortified police state, including intimidation and harassment of activists by security and intelligence forces as part of an unparalleled $1 billion security and surveillance network. In contravention of basic rights, police have stated their plans to set up checkpoints, search people without cause, and erect security exclusion zones."

The Canadian government has leveled public housing, stifled civil liberties and harassed local activists. The last thing they want is someone like Amy Goodman telling the world.

"I am deeply concerned that as a journalist I would be flagged and that the concern -- the major concern -- was the content of my speech. " said Goodman.

We need to see what happened to Ms. Goodman as a challenge to expose truth about Vancouver. Amy Goodman is just the tip of the iceberg. Let's make the 2010 Games the Titanic.

 

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Comments

[betty123456]

Is anyone seriously surprised by this? lol. It's common and totally expected!

-----
Olympic News: Your #1 Olympic News Source
http://www.olympic-news.info

[Finnian]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_Goodman

[lwaldmann]

We have to face facts, this is" The Whole World is Watching" scene. Anybody with any gripe wants the whole world to know, so what better place to be seen the at the Olympics. Why do you think so many terrible things have happened at these events. The Whole World is Watching, get it.

Lary Waldman

[Skookum1]

All the more reason for Canadian Border Services to learn better than hassling high-profile journalist-authors....

[Bennjy]

Isn't it pretty common fare for a country to be getting a tad paranoid a couple of months before it hosts the Olympics? Granted, it is the Winter Olympics which carry about 1/10 of the fanfare of the Summer Olympics, but there's still a lot more international attention on Canada than usual. Especially since there has been some complaints about the 2010 Olympics domestically, it's a bit understandable for a country to get a bit China-ish in this situation; it becomes a concern if the paranoia remains after the games.

[PlayTOE]

The ultra left wing in Canada have decided to use Olympic Games and any similar effort as a backdrop to gain unnecessary and silly political points.

If a games involves some inner city Urban Renewal, then the complaint is that it removes public housing or low cost housing .. ignoring the facts that these are mostly in need of replacement *(becoming slums), and are replaced with modern quality affordable housing units.

If an event will cost some money to put on (and every event costs something) then the claim is that this money should go to some social program or other .. ignoring the facts that Canada has good quality well funded social programs, and that large events are mostly self-paying, and often profitable, especially when the additional tax revenue brought in by them is considered.

Such misinformation and protests tend to destroy Canada's bids on things like Olympics and other similar events.

[Skookum1]

"ignoring the facts that Canada has good quality well funded social programs"

ROTFL. British Columbia is notorious for ultra-low welfare rates, difficulty in getting on the system, tens of thousands of people who have been cut off for no really good reason other than they haven't had enough income to start with. The current BC government has been slashing social programs of all kinds; it's in their ideology and their playbook as not being supportive of big business. Talk about misinformation, your post serves just fine as an example of outright lies.

The Olympics are NOT self-paying and have required huge subsidies of all kinds, including an amendment to the City of Vancouver's charter so they could keep financing going for the Athletes' Village (as the hedge fund originally in a "public private partnership" - Fortress Investments - backed out). All kinds of programs and projects around the province were cancelled in order to free up money to subsidize the Olympics with, and cost overruns on projects like the Convention Centre (which will serve as the Olympics media centre) are ANYTHING but "self-paying" or "profitable". "Especially when the additional tax revenue brought in by them" is a typical line of government/free-enterprise apologists, but when it comes down to actual bookkeeping ad cost-benefit analysis, only the governments' claims (and those of right-wing organizations like the Fraser Institute) claim that they make money; everyone else knows this is an outright lie.

[Skookum1]

Huff Post readers and editors should be aware that the British Columbia provincial governments' "Public Affairs Bureau" is a $30 million/year, 223-staffer newsroom/p.r. organization - said to be the largest newsroom in the country - known for regularly spewing out crap like what PlayTOE's post above....in fact, the argument made in that post is pretty much standard fare in government/BC Liberal press releases and campaign claims......

[Skookum1]

Further coverage in Canadian blogdom; Harvey Oberfeld is a retired mainstream media reporter who was come out of retirement in his blog; some commentators in this thread are other notable newspaople from BC:

http://harveyoberfeld.ca/blog/border-services-attack-on-media-freedom-merits-more-than-just-a-story/

[CJWebber]

There are idi0tic border crossing guards in all countries. It isn't indicative of the entire country.

[CBone]

You sure? It always seems to be when it is an American border guard doing it.

[Sievehead]

It's a sad fact that in some fundamental ways present-day Canada can be even more overtly fascistic and eerily totalitarian than even her vastly more powerful and oft certifiably insane neighbor to the South. What people may remember fondly as a kind, progressive and liberal refuge from the standard-issue cruelty and abuses of every-day American life pretty much died, as did so much else worth preserving in human culture, with the Trudeau era. The worldwide rise of the Troglodyte Capitalists in the Eighties and their concerted attack on all reasonably sound economic structures with its concomitant emphasis on narcissistically-oriented philosophies of personal fulfillment at any cost and ruthless disdain for those booted to the gutter by the increasingly monstrous appetites of its inhuman engineers has left no room, finally, for anything more than a cold and heartless corporatism to blanket the country with its steely-black eminence. And as for the matter of socialized health-care, the slow, but steady, disintegration of its required funding and the insidious rise of private insurers and privately-run hospitals all but guarantees its inevitable demise...

[Skookum1]

Authoritarian and autocratic behaviour is nothing new at all in Canada, if you dig around its history; it's a legacy of colonial rule and the famous "tug the forelock" trait of Canadians towards the absolutism inherent in the way our parliamentary democracy is structured. The "Mr Nice Guy" image of the country evolved only in contrast to the more overt US abuses of power; don't forget that it was Trudeau who invoked the War Measures Act, which authorities used to round up all kinds of activists, not just Quebec separatists....though it's true that the Mulroney years marked the onset of overt rightist/police-state actions and the emergence of a lapdog press who will justify nearly anything so long as it keeps them their huge government advertising contracts.....the rigging of the constitutional debate so as to avoid genuine political reform is only another aspect of this.

In BC's case, the colonial legacy in official behaviour and also in legal structures and the province's political culture, is very very strong, rooted in the one-man rule of Governor Douglas and in the cabal that emerged after his retirement between the press, courts and police. British Columbia has a reputation of being the Banana Republic of the North....only a sham of democracy, definitely not the real thing despite a lot of hoo-hah about how great our constitution is (generally made by the people who have made the most money from abusing it....).

[Skookum1]

further to previous, The native perspective on colonialism in BC is even sharper; here's a story by a young Skwxwu7mesh (Squamish) activist about his harrassment by the Integrated Security Unit:
http://www.liberatedyet.com/index.php/politics/2010-olympics/2010-vancouver-olympics-integrated-security-unit-pays-me-a-visit

[thrdr]

Some paranoiac would-be totalitarians are not very smart. If Amy Goodman had never thought about scrutinizing the 2010 Olympics before this . . . she'll be scrutinizing them now. And a lot of other people will be too.

[Skookum1]

Stephen Colbert has been criticizing the Games too, though so far only to do with access for his precioius speed-skating team to practice times.....I can hardly wait for the Canadian Border Services and/or other parts of the Integrated Security to harrass him when he shows up to do his show from Vancouver during the Games. They may even have the balls to refuse him entry; if not, how they'll behave once he's "on the ground" and able to do some local dirt-digging is going to be an interesting affair......

[omalley313]

I thought the same exact thing - maybe it's time to look into the Olympics !!

[Skookum1]

Well, as of tonight's show (Dec 5) he announced he'll be going to the Olympics. And the City of Richmond, where the speedskating oval is that he raised such a successful stink about, has invited him to be the official Olympic Oval Ombudsman. But he says he wants to go as a member of the US Olympic Team (IMO will probably get honorary membership to resolve that) but that would be a conflict of interest re the ombudsman position ("arbiter of fairness" is the job, sort of, and impartiality is required...).

So with a hall pass from a Canadian government, he's not likely to get any hassle at the border or at the airport, and the border posts are probably all faced with "beware of celebrities" directive now. A pity, really, that we didn't get a Colbert-cam having an encounter with Canadian border officials....he'll get the red-carpet treatment; one thing BC governing types hate is bad p.r., whether it was the speed skating rinktimes or the hassling of Amy Goodman; well, they're fine with bad p.r. WITHIN the country, it's when the rest of the world notices that they start to care.....

[Skookum1]

In the midst of my various other posts I'd meant to comment that one of the triggers for "secondary" at the border is certain numbers/combinations of people. A couple, a single individual, a family, no problem; three people with maybe different skin colours or different nationalities, and you're probably in for an interview, or at least a long hard look. Even pairings of an American citizen and a Canadian citizen can trigger some guideline they have as to who to inspect/interview (unless they're related, and even then it's not a given).

Gone are the days when people in Vancouver's eastern suburbs, which abut the border, would pop across the line for some gas, milk or fashion-outlet designer duds; it used to be more casual than buying a ferry ticket to get to Vancouver Island. Some time ago, even before 9-11, the Vancouver/Whatcom County border crossings (five in all, from Point Roberts to Sumas) developed a reputation as "the Berlin Wall of the Northwest". This had to do with everything to cross-border employment and vacation properties to illegal immigration to drugs and weapons and more. And, back then, it was usually "welcome home" from Canadian border agents when you got back from the US; at some point it started being "twenty questions". Not just Americans get harrassed; ordinary Canadians regularly do (i.e. by Canadian authorities).

[GayIthacan]

So they leveled public housing, weeded out the homeless, confiscated privately owned land, raised taxes, and put their city into massive debt?

And this differs from how every other city has handled the Olympics.......how?

[CBone]

Does it matter? It still happened, and it is still wrong.

[Oakville]

It rolls both ways, folks. Check out his pedigree.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Discove­ry_of_Amer­ica_%28Farley_Mowat%29

[liddlethought]

Send your Olympic video clips captured on cell phones and other video devices to [e-mail] to participate in my large-scale public projection in Vancouver to be held during the Olympics. For further project details, see www.liddlethought.blogspot.com. Thanks, and pass along.

[tkondaks]

Canada is not as free a country as it wants the rest of the world to believe. And what Amy experienced is just the tip of the iceberg, one that Canada doesn't want discussed because it will upset Quebec separatists and they will threaten to separate and split Canada in two.

For instance, segregation according to who your parents are and what their classification is, is the law of the land in Canada. This "right" to do something your next door neighbour isn't allowed to do is then handed down from one generation to the next, like a peerage title.

Read it and weep:

http://www.whycanadamustend.com/Chapter%202.htm

and

http://www.whycanadamustend.com/Chapter%205.htm


.

[CJWebber]

I like your Separtist articles, lol. Of course they want to see Canada end, they are secessionists.

[Octoberluna]

that'll never happen. A small group (tho vocal) has never gotten over the fact they lost the country a couple hundred years ago. Vive le Quebec libre but keep my country in one full multi-lingual colourful piece sil' vous plait!

[SPQR1775]

The Olympics has become a for cash event and no longer represent the spirit of humanism. I won't be watching it, I am in IRAQ making the case for a better humanity, PHILOSOPHY FOREVER-FIND THE STARGATE!

[thrdr]

"The Olympics has become a for cash event and no longer represent the spirit of humanism." True enough.

(And I won't be watching them either.)

[Furby2]

Much ado about nothing yet again. As a Canadian, I have only three questions. Who the Sam Hill is Amy Goodman? Why should I care? How many Americans including journalists were let into the country unfettered during that same day? I suppose the only way for this person to grab a little attention is through some sort of notoriety, but painting Canada as a poliitcally oppressive state is going to be a hard sell. Good luck to her, her agent and her lawyers nonetheless :)

[SlurmsMcKenzie]

Isn't canada to blame for palin ? Ya betcha.

[Furby2]

Palin is Canada's fault. We should have been keeping a closer eye on her since we can see her front porch from here :)

[redredwein]

Furby 2, from what you wrote I wonder if you could name a single person in the news biz who merits the title "journalist." Amy Goodman hosts one of the best daily news shows in the world, called Democracy Now!, which you can watch online at democracynow.org if you don't have satellite via Dish or Direct TV. She's also on all Pacifica radio stations broadcast from US cities like Boston, NY, LA, San Francisco and Seattle and some NPR stations. The point is that she hardly needs "to grab a little attention.. through some sort of notoriety."

And the article in no way aims toward "painting Canada as a poliitcally oppressive state......." It is no more nor less repressive than many other so-called democracies, which is to say it is all too often repressive. And it's the jobs of the Amy Goodman's of the world (and the John Pilger's and Greg Palast's and Dahr Jamail's and Jeremy Scahill's - look them up, PLEASE!) to stand up to that repression by exposing it. And for reporting that repression, journalists also occasionally get killed, like what happened last week in the Phillipines, where amongst a group seeking more political diversity, a dozen of them were slaughtered. So piss off until you know what you're talking about, Furball.

[Furby2]

How civilized of you. Let's not debate the point, let's just start calling each other names then, is that how you roll? I'm not saying she isn't a good journalist, I wouldn't know her from a hole in the ground and I will look her up. All I'm saying is she's whining awfully loud for a 90 minute delay at the border that's all. And you're getting your knickers in a knot over all sorts of unrelated matters. You're bringing in the damned cavalry over this. Listen to yourself. I've been detained a darned sight longer than that at borders. And I've had to unpack a lot more than my notes.

[Furby2]

PS - The only talking heads I have heard of in your country who bring to mind solid journalism are Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart, but that's only because they are on mass media so we hear about them in Canada. They make their point through humour and it's quite effective but I wouldn't call it journalism because it's definitely one-sided reporting. I haven't yet come across a U.S. journalist who presents both sides of a story but perhaps you can recommend one.

[thrdr]

If you've never heard of Amy Goodman then you just aren't qualified to peep here--or anywhere else about the subject of journalism. And the rest of your comments bear this out--Stephen Colbert and John Stewart aren't journalists but satirists--ever heard of Bill Moyers? He's only been around for a few decades.

[CBone]

Your ignorance is stunning. Amy Goodman is one of the best and most respected of our journalists. A bit touchy, aren't you about your precious and delicate national image! You must not be a Native or a Quebecois!

[Bennjy]

Are you familiar with Canadian journalists? Journalists tend to cover things that mainly deal with their country, or is mainly broadcast to their country. Its entirely understandable for someone from another country not to know who journalist X from country Y is, even if that journalist is Amy Goodman from the United States.