JONESIE: One mad man's idea worth support, another to run from | iNFOnews | Thompson-Okanagan's News Source
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JONESIE: One mad man's idea worth support, another to run from

 


OPINION


Welcome to another edition of news soup, let’s get to it:

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Hey did you hear that 2020 was yet another record-breaking year for overdose deaths and calls to paramedics for overdoses, setting us up for another record in 2021?

No, you didn’t.

We’ve been covering the overdose crisis from the beginning but since 2017 we’ve noticed something very disappointing — readers have tuned it out. My theory: It likely feels like tragedy porn because there are few answers and very little that regular folks can do to help. While anyone can catch COVID-19, people presume they’ll be untouched by the overdose crisis.

That’s often the sentiment when we talk to families who have lost someone — they were shocked their loved one was using drugs, and of course devastated they only found out through their death. Two things you need to know: 1. The pandemic has changed the drug supply again. It's often cut with other agents that actually makes it harder to recover from an overdose through Naloxone. 2. The people most at risk are those who use drugs alone and there’s a lot more of them than you might think.

Social distancing and hand washing aren’t going to make this one go away, there’s no vaccine coming to save it. But ignoring it isn’t going to help either.


I giggle every time the RCMP sends a news release advising residents to report fraud. Why would you? We’ve been waiting for years — literally, years — for the RCMP to complete several high profile fraud cases. I know it’s difficult to investigate and prosecute these cases but I’m not sure why the Mounties have such a pitiful record on these files.

My only theory is no wannabe cops show up at Depot with an interest in numbers and reading accounting books. They’re just not compatible.

It’s shameful. Some thug or desperate thief typically find themselves guilty of crimes of stupidity and opportunity. The scammer on the phone or the gambling addict in the accounting department has long ago committed themselves to a crime. The culpability is so much higher.

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I don’t see the world at all the way Art Lucier from Kelowna’s Harvest International Ministries does. He’s the religious activist behind the Canadian Firewall, which seeks to combine Church and State again, in part because Canada’s leaders have "come under the direction of demonic influences.” He wants to end women’s sovereignty over their own bodies. He’s also delusional enough to think Donald Trump is a positive influence and shares his views (good lord). He thinks his dreams are divine manifestations.

He actually holds himself out as a prophet.

I certainly have my biases because I am not, have never, will never be a religious person.

However I still support their legal challenge to public health orders that restrict religious gatherings. If B.C. thinks Costco and certain health clubs can keep their members safe, surely churches can create safe plans for religious gatherings.


I also don’t see the world as David Lindsay does. He’s the tinfoil-hat-wearing leader of Kelowna’s anti-lockdown marches every Saturday.

Much has already been told about this man, about his Freemen-on-the-Land pseudo-legal arguments that make no sense, about his support from white supremacists, etc.

I know him as David Hunter Kevin Lindsay and I’m here to tell you, this man is dangerous.

Lindsay tried to explain his theories to me before in the early 2000s. He’s a good speaker, sounds wise and his theories seem to make enough sense in its circuitous logic to attract similar-minded people suspicious of government.

But mostly I am aware of him because I covered perhaps a dozen people who followed his crackpot advice to not pay income taxes and to fight them in court. Many of them families. He has never succeeded — not once. Every single case ended in complete and utter devastation for his followers as they not only were forced to pay back taxes, but huge fees and penalties.

I watched more than one break down in tears and the stress he brought upon their lives was palpable. 

Listen to him and follow him and his ideas at your own peril. 

— Marshall Jones is the Managing Editor of iNFOnews.ca

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