Pope still hasn’t released records of who attended (was forced into) residential schools in Canada, even after we found over a thousand dead kids (probably more dead from disease than from direct abuse, but why was this a surprise/not officially recorded, and why did they put kids in close, unsanitary conditions without enough food?).

Worse, the articles about it mostly describe someone asking for it then talk about how wonderfully gracious the pope was during the meeting and never mention that he didn’t give over the records - leaving the impression that he did.

Honestly they should’ve gotten it from this. If it’s a worse crime to attack a cop than a regular person, because you’re attacking the system, then shouldn’t there be a very high penalty for directly attacking democracy itself?

My thoughts too.

They should get jail time for attacking democracy (it’s proportionate - the laws these people would’ve voted on could include things that impact whether they get unjustly incarcerated) and they should be forced to help the community they harmed, but not in a way that’s risky like this. Make them babysit to give parents time to vote. Or make them work in a food bank or soup kitchen so people have one less thing to stress about. Or, if they’re not unbearable to be around, make them tutor kids.

Best option: hundreds of hours of babysitting kids while the parents are in the next room with responsible people teaching them more about voting and law, and getting them registered. Partner with a local non-profit that gets people voting and that lets them know which laws are most likely to be changed by this election.

Of course removing the need for registration would be best of all, since in most countries you’re registered automatically, but this judge can’t control that. Make these guys volunteer for an organization getting rid of voter registration, doing something they can’t sabotage, like prepping meals or watching kids.

(Edit: I’m in Canada. For the provincial election I don’t think I needed to register at all. They mistakenly didn’t send me a card and I called to ask and they told me where my polling station should be, based on my address. I just showed up and voted. Every person has only 1 voting station they’re allowed to go to, based on their geographical area. At the station, there’s a guy with a list of all the eligible voters in the area. He checked off my name as having voted. Perfectly easy to have mechanisms to prevent someone voting multiple times at different stations or in a different person’s name without adding hurdles like registration. For the federal one a few years ago I remember checking some stuff online. Could’ve been that I needed to register, but I think I was checking where my area’s polling station was. Either way, took 3 seconds. We still have skeevy things - the federal election had a polling station on my university campus, within walking distance for tens of thousands of people who took classes and/or lived nearby. but for provincial, the closest one required a car to get to, or a bus ride on a really bad transit system. ‘5 minutes by car or 50 by bus’ sort of thing.)

I love the punishment fitting the crime, but this needs to be accompanied by real punishment. Subverting democracy. People get incarcerated, get food stamps cut, get pushed further into poverty, etc, based on laws, including unfair ones they would’ve voted against.

In the same way you get a worse sentence for attacking a cop vs a random person, because it’s attacking the system, attacking democracy should have a very high sentence. Higher than attacking a cop, because that’s an individual and these guys are attacking the very foundation of democracy.

They can’t move directly sideways. They need to move at least partly forward to move.

Changing the lights is a great idea, because all the cars that are in the way now have room to move forward so they can pull over.

Think they’re talking about cases where it’s packed. Cars are closer together when they stop than when they’re moving. There might not be room to move over.