According to this article in Healthzone, “A question about pregnant women and the H1N1 vaccine provoked a bizarre bout of heckling and laughter on the Tory benches in the Commons on Tuesday.”
Showing their class once again and reaffirming their disdain for Canadians in general and women in particular, the “Harper Government” shouted down Liberal MP Carolyn Bennett when she tried to ask a question related to the kind of vaccinations pregnant women should be getting.
“I "just was astounded," she told reporters after question period. "I don't know why these people think it's funny or whether it's just offensive or what it is. ... They were just heckling and laughing."”
Another disgusting display by the Reform-a-Tories.
Did John Baird really compare the Harpercrites to “any other Liberal government” as reported in The Hill Times today?
"More infrastructure spending will have been completed this year than in any year in our history. It is moving 10 times faster than under any other Liberal government," Transport Minister John Baird (Ottawa West-Nepean, Ont.) said last week in Question Period, who is overseeing the rollout for much of the money promised in the budget, as a large part of it is going to "shovel ready" infrastructure projects.
If the quote is accurate, it would certainly confirm what many neo-Cons have long suspected about the Harper government.
UPDATE JUNE 2, 2009
I contacted the Hill Times for confirmation of the quote but received no reply, so I went looking in Hansard. On Monday May 25, Hansard records the following reply to a question from John McCallum about the delays in getting infrastructure funds out the door. “More infrastructure spending will have been completed this year than in any year in our history. It is moving 10 times faster than under any other Liberal government.” So it looks like John “Freudian Slip” Baird was reported correctly.
As I blogged yesterday, the Conservative Party’s riding nomination process seems to have something of a democratic deficit, to the advantage of sitting MPs. Well it gets even stranger.
Under the headline “Tories c all nomination rules democratic” The Calgary Herald reports today that Conservative party president Don Plett finds it “very, very strange that somebody would even suggest that this is not democratic.”
His comment follows an explanation that ballots were mailed out to 94,000 party members, and that ballots not returned were counted as no votes.
In what kind of a democracy does a non-vote get counted? Is this what the Harper Conservatives are planning to do to save their skin in the next federal election? If you don’t show up on polling day your vote will automatically be tallied as a vote for the Con candidate?
This just has to be the quote of the day, offered in a comment to this articlein the Globe and Mail about the Conservative Party’s latest affront to democracy whereby sitting MP’s are shielded from nomination challenges unless a minimum of 2/3 of the members of a riding association call for a nomination race in their riding.
According to the article, Tories claim the change is “necessary to ease stress on their MPs and allow them to stay focused on the onerous demands of a minority government.” Yes, that would be the onerous demands of jeering and clapping in the House like a bunch of trained seals (By the way, where is the seal hunt when we could really use it?), memorizing and parroting back PMO-provided talking points, and staying well out of sight (and sound) unless trotted out by his Harpiness to answer legitimate but potentially embarrassing questions directed at any sitting Cabinet Minister. I can see why they need all their energy for that.
Of course the big winner in all of this is Rob Anders of Calgary-West. When Don Martin, writing in his home town paper, The Calgary Herald, says this about Anders, “Raise his name with Conservative MPs and they wrinkle their noses like they've just taken a big whiff of the stuff spring uncovers in an off-leash dog park.” you’d think the Cons would be desperate to dump him. But no, this ruling assures him of yet another run at representing the fine folks of Calgary-West who clearly would elect a stump if they painted it blue and stuck a Suncor sign on it.
However there is a small glimmer of light in all of this as apparently the change has pissed off at least one well known grassroots nutbar. Chuck McVety is not happy, claiming “The democratic deficit in this country is already large enough. We don't need the governing party to be sinking deeper into ... a culture of entitlement.” Uh, yeah.
It’s true. And to prove it, I got this handy-dandy 14-page guide to tax savings in the mail today, complements of Cheryl Gallant, one of the more useless Con backbenchers on the Hill.
Basically it’s more Conservative Party propaganda touting their “Tax Cuts for Everyone” and “Tax Cuts for Hard Working People”. Every page assures us that “Families save with Conservatives” and lists as tax cuts such items as: medical expenses, child care expenses, GST tax credit, capital cost allowance for farmers, education tax credit, and other tax policies that were in place years before the Cons took power. Well it’s not the first, and won’t be the last, time they take credit for the work of others.
Calls in to Gallant’s constituency office asking if this was funded by the Party or by the Government have not been returned.
While Flim-Flam Flaherty insists the CN Tower is not for sale, or maybe is for sale, I have to ask the question: Why do we taxpayers own it in the first place?
But since we do own it, I have a modest proposal for Harper and Co. Why not hang all the portraits originally destined for the National Portrait Gallery on the Tower to be viewed while going up and down in the glass elevators? That way you solve the National Portrait Gallery problem, give Toronto some federal goodies, and turn the CN Tower into something more useful than an aging phallic symbol.
According to this item in The Star, "Canadians guzzled $18 billion worth of booze last year (2007) ... an increase of 4.9 per cent over the previous year."
The Citizen reports that "Moderate drinking shrinks the brain" leading to an increased "risk of dementia and problems with thinking, learning and memory."
And now, Canadians return the Harper Cons to power with a stronger minority.
Harper: “This is not a time for wild experiments...” McKay: “This is not a time to experiment with wild schemes...” Flaherty: “... no responsible economic manager would suggest experimenting with risky new tax schemes...”.
Well, no shit Sherlock! Do these people actually think that, on Day 1 of an ABC government, the new ruling class will enact legislation that will toss Canada’s economy on its ear? In the middle of an international fiscal crisis? Of course they don’t. But they want us, the great unwashed, to believe that is exactly what will happen, and with disastrous results. You can almost sense that’s what they’d really like to see happen, just so they can say, “Told ya so!”.
Any prudent government will do whatever is needed, implement whatever short-term fiscal programs, bolster whatever institutions need to be bolstered, to get us all through this train wreck as unscathed as possible. I don’t care if their colour is red, blue, green or orange, none of the major Canadian parties would knowingly take any precipitous action that would intentionally hurt Canada or Canadians.
The policy positions that the opposition parties are floating are just that – broadly-defined positions. They will be studied, concepts and approaches refined, feasibility will be determined, implementation strategies will be developed, and then, and only then will they be implemented in the context of the international and Canadian fiscal environment of the time – months from now.
So while we may agree that this is not a good time for “wild experiments”, 6 months or a year from now may be exactly the right time for a well thought out and prudent implementation of an alternative fiscal framework for Canada, one which has been proven to work in other jurisdictions with very positive results.
Of course the Harper Cons don’t see it that way. They want us to believe that no one but them has any economic ideas worth considering, or the wherewithal to be responsible managers of the Canadian economy for future generations. (This from an economist who's only economic credentials are academic and a re-branded lawyer.) So instead they dabble with $100 here and $150 there, they obfuscate, they fear-monger, and they insult the intelligence of every one of us who doesn’t drink their particular brand of kool-aid.
The markets continue to melt down. My retirement savings are dwindling by 5-10% A DAY! And like the majority of Canadians, I have no indexed pension to buffer the hit.
Meanwhile, Stephen Harper and Jim Flaherty can think of nothing better to say than, "We knew about this last fall and took the appropriate steps. Aren't we just super smart?" and "The fundamentals are sound. Our banks are sound." and my favourite, "It's all the United States fault. They were stupid and there's nothing we can do (shrug)."
Okay, if everything is so rosy in Canada, why the hell aren't Canadian banks the biggest buying opportunity out there today? If they are in such GREAT SHAPE, and the Canadian economy is SO STRONG, why isn't the smart money just flooding ashore by the boatload? Our economy should be BOOMING. Our bank stocks should be SOARING. But we all know that isn't happening. In fact our markets are getting hit even harder, percentage wise, than the US markets.
Nope, Harper and Flaherty have not a clue between them. They're like a couple of deer caught in the proverbial headlights, saying whatever they think we'll believe while claiming a prescient anticipation of events that somehow eluded the rest of the financial world.
Not surprisingly, we're not getting the straight goods.
- John Baird who meddled in Ottawa's municipal elections.
- John Baird who is, embarrasingly, Canada's pit bull face to the world on climate change.
- John Baird who, until recently, was one of those elites who attended rich galas "subsidized by taxpayers", often arm in arm with Mrs. Steven Harper. (What is that all about, anyway?)
- John Baird who never found a contrary opinion he couldn't deride, belittle, or simply outshout.
- John Baird who feels that telling the truth comes a far distant second to scoring political points.
- John Baird who is nothing more than an immature, angry, political hack.
And to Jim Flaherty et al, I apologize. This photo was misrepresented in my last post. It wasn't really you after all. It was those "54% of decided voters" in Ottawa West-Nepean.
The financial markets are in meltdown. Canadian investors are losing their shirts. Canadian seniors unlucky enough to not have fat civil service or parliamentary pensions are seeing their nesteggs nuked. Again! It's a very, very scary time for many, many Canadians.
So how do the Harpercons respond?
Well, while Flaherty and his advisors are busy coming up with ideas to help Canada and Canadians weather the storm,
little Stevie Harper is singing his new economic theme song.
Wow, that didn't take long. The election hasn't even been held yet and already Justice Minister Rob Nicholson is threatening "confidence motion". According to this story, Nicholson said "We will be taking a zero-tolerance approach. Our crime measures will be confidence measures, we are determined that our law and order agenda will be passed."
That's right. Lock 'em up and throw away the keys. And if you don't agree, we'll keep spending your money, $300,000,000 at a time, until you see things our way.
In other words, the beatings will continue until morale improves.
Every 50 feet or so along a stretch of Terry Fox Drive in Kanata this afternoon there was a Re-elect Gordon O'Connor sign posted beside the roadway. In among the sea of blue signs were the torn out signs of the NDP and Liberal candidates (There may have been some Greens in there too, but I was trying to pay attention to traffic at the time.) Not a single sign for the other parties was left standing that I could see.
Unfortunately this was a day I left my camera at home, but that image I think says more about one element of Stephen Harper's base than anything I could say in this blog.
So can we now assume that on Monday Michael Fortier's resignation will be on Harper's desk?
Update: September 7. According to this story, Fortier has done the right thing and resigned to run in the upcoming election. I have to admit I am surprised.
I have no intention of getting into the Ethics Committee hearings on the Cons in-and-out scheme, but I just had to comment on Kady O'Mally's live blogging report where she refers to "Poilievreian wisdom". Aside being an obvious oxymoron, that expression made me think of what could be the shortest book ever printed: "Poilievreian Wisdom - The Collected Original Thoughts of Pierre Poilievre, Conservative MP".
In today’s National Post, Don Martin says, “An official high in a Cabinet minister's office has an interesting label for his employer: The Unhappy Government.”
He then goes on to describe the malaise surrounding the Harperites and the general dysfunction of Parliament which has resulted from Stephen Harper’s unconstrained quest for power.
Ending with “...the only people with a legitimate right to be unhappy are the voters”, this article describes, in a nutshell, why the average Canadian holds Parliament and politicians in such disdain. All thanks to Stephen Harper's "new way of doing business". Way to go Stevie!
So here we go again, except it’s now surveys and polling. If I understand this latest elections financing scheme by the CPC, it looks like this: 1. Riding X sends party headquarters $20,000, which is then recorded on their local riding books as an expense for surveys and polling. 2. Riding X then reports that $20,000 “expense” to Elections Canada, for which it then gets a $12,000 rebate from the taxpayer (60% rebate if they got 10% of the vote). 3. Party headquarters then sends the riding’s $20,000 back to them. 4. Net gain to party: $12,000. 5. Net loss to taxpayers: $12,000.
Multiply that by the 50 or so ridings that supposedly participated and we’re in the area of a half-million bucks that, if the allegations are correct, have been taken out of taxpayer’s pockets for the enrichment of the Conservative Party of Canada. And that’s without considering any taxpayer rebate that might have been paid to the national party for the same surveys and polling expenses.
While I personally will miss seeing Pierre Poilievre stumble and bumble his way around this particular minefield, Elections Canada needs to pull out all the stops to get to the bottom of all these election funding allegations as quickly as possible and either deal with it themselves or pass the file on to law enforcement and the courts for legal action. As long as the CPC remains under investigation, they will use whatever political spin and posturing they can to bring Elections Canada’s own judgement and impartiality into question. That cannot continue for long before the credibility of the very organization that is responsible for a fair and transparent elections process in this country becomes irreparably damaged itself.
I recently had a discussion with an acquaintance of the True Blue variety (and I’m not referring to a Maple Leafs fan) and the subject of the ever-increasing litany of Conservative misdeeds, missteps, alleged illegalities, and outright lies came up. (Okay. I admit it. I, kind of gloatingly, happened to toss the old in-and-out scheme into what had previously been quite a nice conversation. Hoowee!) The immediate response, right from the Cons own playbook, was, “Yeah, but the Liberals were worse.”
Okay. I’ll admit it. By some (but not all) measuring sticks, the Liberals were worse. But using that tired old attack approach misses the key point in all of this, which is the Harper Cons got elected in large part because of their promise to be more open and accountable. They set themselves up as Mr. Clean on steroids. Their new government was going to be better and cleaner and everything they did would not only be legal but pass the smell test. No exceptions.
They set the bar and now, 2 years or so later we have (partial list only):
- Watered-down Accountability Act. - Lies on income trusts. - The head of Public Works and Government Services – arguably one of the most influential cabinet posts – still held by an unelected Senator. - Intentional sabotage of the House Committee process. - NAFTA-gate, which has been quietly swept under the Conservative rug (must be getting crowded under there by now). - The Cadman affair. Ditto. - Sacking heads of independent bodies for independent thought. - Jim Flaherty’s contracting practices. - And now, the in-and-out scandal.
Sorry guys. You put yourselves up on that pedestal and swathed yourselves in white linen. If your nice white sheet is now mud-spattered, you need look no further than the gutter in which you choose to play. That’s not the fault of the Liberals or the NDP or the Bloc or the Greens or space aliens.
Remember, the first step towards a cure is to recognise that you've got a problem.
Now that’s a quote you’re not likely to see showing up on the Conservative Party web site any time soon.
Jim Meek, in the Chronicle Herald, describes the latest underhanded move by the Cons to siphon money into one of Jim (Flim-flam) Flaherty’s favourite projects. The fact that his wife and his executive assistant are both on the board is a mere coincidence.
As Meek says, “The audacity at work here is nothing short of astounding.”
Under the headline 
