Oh, there is much in the news today to report and comment on, but I'll start with something close to my heart: Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair, whom I regard as an unindicted co-conspirator in the police violence that erupted during peaceful protests at the 2010 G20 Summit in Toronto.
In a previous post, I reported how the Chief was offended by the phrase 'the banality of evil' used by a criminal lawyer in an article on the propensity toward racial profiling of the Toronto Police. Today, a Star reader, Paul de Groot, takes him to task:
Re: Arendt reference is offensive, Letter March 16
Police chief Bill Blair justly faults criminal lawyer Reid Rosonik for his comparison of the disproportionate arrests of blacks in the GTA to the “banality of evil” as demonstrated by the Nazis. He is on shaky ground, however, when he levels the charges of intellectual laziness and unpersuasiveness.
Chief Blair’s stonewalling and intellectual indifference in the face of overwhelming and endless evidence of police wrongdoing during the G20 fiasco, hardly qualify him to make these charges. Given his newfound fondness for intellectual rigour, I assume we can expect him to make a full admission of the egregious police malfeasance during the summit that continues to taint this city’s police force?
Paul de Groot, Toronto
It is so good to hear the voice of the people.
