Canadians like to believe that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is a permanent fixture of our democracy — solid, reliable and immune to the political winds.

But constitutional rights are not self-executing, nor are they immune to erosion. They survive only when they are actively defended.

What is now unfolding in the United States under aggressive immigration enforcement by the Trump administration should serve as a clear and urgent warning to Canada about the dangers of arbitrary arrest, detention and harassment by law enforcement.

The recent actions of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Minneapolis are deeply troubling. Two residents, Brandon Sigüenza and Patty O’Keefe, say they were detained for several hours without charge after monitoring immigration officers during the Trump administration’s latest crackdown.

IT is the summer of 2036. The world hurtled past the 1.5 C target for climate heating by 2028 as greenhouse gas emissions, especially in North America, soared under the Trump doctrine of drill baby drill.

Winnipeg now swelters in temperatures that hit 40 C between May and October.

The Squires government was forced to order the closure of Manitoba’s numerous data centres built during the Kinew era. Their water and power demands, especially in summer, are no longer sustainable. Being largely automated with few permanent jobs, they never delivered their promised economic bonanza. Three natural gas generating stations built at a cost of $10 billion, ostensibly to meet peak load demands in winter, were used 24-7 to service these energy vampires. That power is now needed elsewhere.

Summer is now the season of peak demand on the electricity grid, to meet cooling needs and EV charging during the summer driving season. Winters warmed dramatically as climatologists predicted, with temperatures rising at more than double the global rate. Days below -30 C are increasingly rare, allowing wind farms supplementing hydro to meet winter demands easily.

ANY day now, the United States will “come to the rescue” of the protesters in the streets of Iran’s cities and American bombers will unleash “hell” on the minions of the theocratic regime — or not, as the case may be.

It’s nearly three weeks since the demonstrations started (Dec. 29) and U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats are getting old. His latest exhortation to the protesters, whose will to continue seems to be fraying a bit, told them once again that “Help is on the way!” but there is no useful way that he can keep his promise. Bombs alone won’t work.

Trump’s bombers cannot eliminate the elite Revolutionary Guard troops and Basij militiamen who are killing the protesters without flattening the cities they all live in together. His high-tech missiles can pick off the regime’s political leadership in their homes, but others will simply replace them.

A full-scale invasion might do the trick, but Trump couldn’t put boots on the ground even if he wanted to. Given his understandable reluctance to incur serious American military casualties, bombs are the only form of violence he can use against the regime of the ayatollahs. So where are they?