Reaction to grounding of plane towing anti-Harper banner

The grounding of a plane towing a protest banner over Ottawa on Labour Day got the CBC Community talking. The banner, sponsored by the largest national labour union, read in French, "Stephen Harper hates us."

The RCMP ordered the plane to land because it "appeared to be within restricted airspace," said RCMP spokeswoman Cpl. Lucy Shorey.

But the pilot of the plane hired by the Public Service Alliance of Canada said that he was outside of the no-fly zone extending 0.35 nautical miles around the Peace Tower.

The Prime Minister's Office says the grounding of the place "was an operational decision by the RCMP, not a political one."

Most people in the CBC Community were critical of the decision to ground the plane.

• "It proves the point that we are not as free to express our views as we think we are. Any pilot with such a politically sensitive message would be very careful to make sure their course was within the legal boundaries of routing and flight paths. The RCMP are not above repressing the voice of opposition, the G20 mess confirms this," said gypsysmith.
  
  
• "Push this to the end. Make the police apologize and (best case) admit where the decision came from," said Renoir.

For many of the commenters, the story raised a lot of unanswered questions.

• "Why would the RCMP not have checked with Nav Canada first? A flight plan would have been filed. Confirmation of airspace would have been given. Either the RCMP is incompetent or the public is being fed a 'whopper,'" said sgriffin.
  
  
•  "This is very interesting. How did they contact the pilot when he was flying? Do they have a direct line (bat phone maybe?) or did they have to go through an airport control tower? If they did then they would have known the flight path and where the plane was going to be," said thesnuce.
  
  
• "Would the RCMP have grounded the plane if the sign read, 'We love you Steven Harper?'" asked yellow bird.

Some of the comments pointed out that if the point of the grounding was to suppress the banner's message, it failed quite badly.

• "Good work, RCMP. If you had left the whole matter alone hardly anyone would have noticed. Now you've brought this to the attention of the entire nation and sullied your reputation even further," said Corporal Canuck.
  
  
• "A classic example of the Streisand effect," said jfjfjfjfjf.

A few commenters were critical of the union's action in putting up the banner in the first place, or in its attempts to spin the story.

• "Wonder if PSAC actually contacted their members to find out if they wanted their union dues spent on such blatantly political and expensively trivial exercises such as this. I suspect not," said Malcolm X.
  
  
• "Just like Harper, PSAC decision makers are elected to make decisions - don't like the decisions? Vote better local leaders the results at the next election will be different. I support this decision by PSAC leadership. Harper has demonstrated nothing but contempt for public service," said mystory.
  
  
• "The RCMP acted on their own. Maybe they got it wrong. Of course, the unions and the left love to spin it as another false example of the PM taking away their right to malign him. Harper had nothing to do with it," said LifeIsButADream.

Thanks, as always, for your feedback. Feel free to continue the debate and discussion in the comments section below.