Yeah, Kenney's lawsuit is mostly political grandstanding, but I welcome the use of the Act being challenged in court. All this makes our democracy stronger.

How does it "make our democracy stronger"?

A law was on the books for decades but hadn't been used. It has now been used (in a rather restrained way, considering what it could be used for). This use is now being challenged in court, which will likely clarify what restrictions the use of that law actually has. Eg, did it respect the charter appropriately? Was it appropriately justified?

Why does that make democracy stronger? It's just an elaboration of a particular interpretation of the rules by jurists that are probably already not uncomfortable with the state.

The outcome of those deliberations will be to some extent obscure and subject to yet further interpretation and arguments.

That doesn't in, and of itself, make democracy stronger.

I would argue that the use of this Act has already weakened democracy in Canada because it shows that the only response the political systems has to a very minor disruption is to use acts that everyone understood to be for much more extreme situations.

This has already deepened many people's cynicism about the idea of this form of government.

> I would argue that the use of this Act has already weakened democracy in Canada because it shows that the only response the political systems has to a very minor disruption is to use acts that everyone understood to be for much more extreme situations.

Certainly the act was used in response to weaknesses in the system - eg the Ottawa Police Service were unwilling to fine/ticket/otherwise deal with the illegal activity for weeks; crowdfunding sites weren't subject to FINTRAC; etc. Ideally this will lead to proper legislation regarding these weaknesses, removing the necessity of using the Emergencies Act to deal with a similar situation again.

Checks and balances, and legal certainty in either direction.

Legal certainty? It was supposed to be the answer to the problems for the War Measures Act; the Constitution of Transitional Measures Act; the Emergency Powers Act; the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act and some others I have forgotten.

I would argue that laws only mean what they are interpreted to mean by a particular governmental body at a particular time.

And you can in addition have a coherent, clear and easily interpretable body of laws and measures which result in a society which lacks many of the features of what people like to imagine is a "democracy".

There's still a level of certainty that comes from "this law survived legal review by the courts" that I find some value in.

Fair enough. It's better than nothing, but probably not good enough. We'll be seeing more of this sort of problem as living standards decline under climate destruction and the buffers separating us from more direct conflict of interest thin out.