Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is so fed up with the Freedom Convoy protests in his country that he’s resorted to the favorite tool of tyrants everywhere: emergency powers. “These blockades are illegal,” he declared, “and if you are still participating, the time to go home is now.” The government has described the protests as an “insurrection.” Where have we heard that before…?

While Trudeau ruled out military action, his plans involve towing away trucks, suspending insurance coverage on those rigs, and freezing both personal and corporate bank accounts. (Fundraising has already been problematic thanks to Big Tech.) He gave no time frame, but he promised his actions “will be time-limited, geographically targeted, as well as reasonable and proportionate to the threats they are meant to address.”

Just to be clear, by “threats” Trudeau means “demands for freedom.” He issued an ultimatum, saying, “We cannot and will not allow illegal and dangerous activities to continue.” The only real violence around the convoy was the antifa goon who ran his SUV into a crowd.

The truckers and others are peacefully, noisily, and disruptively protesting Canada’s draconian COVID measures, including vaccination mandates. For this unforgivable sin, Trudeau’s dictatorial message is, Take this shot, shut up, and go home or we’ll take everything else you hold dear.

In other words, to punish people for protesting emergency powers, Trudeau will grab more emergency powers.

As is the case in America, the Canadian media is fully in the tank for the country’s left-wing party. Regarding the convoy, this means calling into question the values protesters are defending so as to make Trudeau’s response seem reasonable.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation says that “freedom” is nothing more than a “useful rallying cry” for the truckers, and has in fact “become common among far-right groups.” Likewise, a Globe and Mail columnist claims the word “freedom” has been “weaponized” and “co-opted” by nefarious characters in “the alt-right, both here and in the U.S.” Their American counterparts at CNN are also mystified by this strange obsession with “freedom,” declaring that the truckers “want their freedom back, whatever that means.”

That’s funny. We’re old enough to remember when freedom was the unifying rallying cry of Western Civilization.

Meanwhile, maybe the protests are working. Alberta, Ontario, Saskatchewan, and other provinces are relaxing COVID rules, though Ontario Premier Doug Ford denied protesters the pleasure of thinking it was their victory. “This plan was in place long before the protests,” Ford insisted, and he’s continuing with that plan “despite” the protests.

As the pandemic quickly approaches the two-year mark and the coronavirus becomes endemic, it’s well past time for politicians to let go of emergency powers instead of seizing more.