An anti-G20 protester flashes a peace sign near the temporary detention centre in Toronto on June 27, 2010.
Many, many props to my colleague Adam Radwanski for calling out Tim Hudak on his law-and-order screed in the Toronto Sun. Radwanski hits a walk off home run when he writes:
"It would be perfectly reasonable to argue that police should be given some benefit of the doubt on their controversial behaviour over the course of the G20 weekend, and to express sympathy for the very difficult position they were put in. But Hudak went a step further, effectively arguing that if you defend your civil liberties - or even talk about them - you're no better than the idiots who were smashing up storefront." And that Hudak's posturing in this regard "doesn't reflect the kind of seriousness or sense of responsibility that you'd like to see in a potential premier."
Taking seriously the concerns of citizens who saw the police effectively curb, if not suspend, civil liberties during the G20 is not to side against the cops and with over-privileged affluent white kids with white teeth aka thugs and hooligans, as Christie Blatchford suggested in this newspaper yesterday.
The police board inquiry is, one hopes, the thin edge of the wedge. As Toronto councilor Adam Vaughan correctly pointed out, given that policing at the G20 was a multijurisdictional affair, a provincial inquiry is likely the only way to hold all the various levels of government to account.
Last night I spoke to Liam McHugh Russell, the former federal NDP candidate in Etobicoke Lakeshore. He sent me the following video: it's worth a look if you're at all concerned that the police may have overstepped their bounds.