Stephen Harper the briber...(reloaded)

...when will he be removed from office?

That post on the Cadman bribery was written March 6th, almost 3 months ago.

It's about time the opposition starts beating the drum for removal of this corrupt government. The Bernier scandal is one thing, but the Cadman bribery really shows how corrupt this current government is. And it's coming all the way from the PMO.

A is for Asshole - Meet Conservative MP Asshole Tom Lukiwski (video)

How much I love Conservatives like Tom, making things sooo easy for us. Watch and be appalled:



PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT (more)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We – we would like to ask you a question. You are actually quite – quite – how can I put this delicately –
TOM LUKIWSKI: Old.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: -- fucking old, eh?
TOM LUKIWSKI: Well, as we say in tour, I may be old, but I’m fucking A, eh.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And who is this A person?
TOM LUKIWSKI: Well, let me put it to you this way. There’s A’s and there’s B’s. The A’s are guys like me, the B’s are homosexual faggots with dirt on their fingernails that transmit diseases.

LINKS
- Wikipedia: Tom Lukiwski
- Youtube: Conservative MP Tom Lukiwski's Hate Speech
- National Post: Sask. MP Lukiwski's homophobic comment

The NDP and the Cadman bribe: "Tommy Douglas must be spinning in his grave like a lathe"

Not my words, but those of Don MacNeil:

Tommy Douglas must be spinning in his grave like a lathe.

The former leader of the New Democratic leader, chosen as the Greatest Canadian of all-time, would be shocked to find out what his party under Jack Layton has devolved into.

This week the New Democratic Party of Canada has decided it will not support an Ethics Committee investigation into the Chuck Cadman Affair.

Yes, yes, we know this. Anything else about the NDP?

Pat Martin, an NDP representative on the House of Commons Ethics Committee, says the Cadman affair is not “a good fit for the ethics committee” and that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police should investigate.

Pat Martin and the NDP may be the last people who still have faith in the Mounties. The Liberals have also asked the RCMP to look into the matter as well, but have also proposed it go to the Ethics Committee. The Bloc Québecois support the Liberals but Jack Layton and the Conservatives oppose public committee hearings into allegations of bribery leveled against the prime minister.

I agree, it's weird for the NDP to fully trust the RCMP. By the way, on other corruption files the NDP had no problem handing it over to an ethics commission first. Double standards for sure.

The Cons motives are obvious. The same could be said about the Liberals and Bloc but the puzzling thing to some is why the Dippers aren’t willing to get to go along.

The conventional wisdom has the NDP in league with the Harper Gang in trying to silence the Chuck Cadman Affair, because they are afraid the only beneficiary, politically, of the whole scandal will be the Liberal Party and the New Democrats would rather be complicit in a cover-up than risk being hurt politically.

Indeed, we can't trust the NDP on the Cadman file. Shame on the NDP!

Pretty strong language, I agree, but then again it’s a pretty strong topic. This has the makings of the greatest Canadian political scandal since the Pacific Scandal that brought the end to the first Conservative government of John A. Macdonald.

So the question (again) is why is Jack Layton running interference for Stephen Harper? If the answer turns out to be for purely personal partisan gain than Layton and Martin have hands as dirty as they allege the Harper Gang’s are.

Exactly! Dirty hands are appearing everywhere I look.

Also the NDP are coming off a bribery scandal their own.

Really?

One where they had to apologize in the House of Commons and pay a cash settlement to a Liberal candidate in the last election that they accuse of trying to bribe one of his rivals. The story was a complete fabrication by a NDP candidate and the party paid a heavy price, both financially, and what would be more important to Tommy Douglas, to their reputation as being the conscious of the commons.

It might be something they want to avoid as the Cadman Affair may do collateral damage to Jack Layton’s political objectives.

Read the whole story: It's not too late to build a better world

Bye, Bye, Canada; Stephane Dion doesn't see any problem with SPP's Deep Integration plans

Neo-liberals love SPP. It's secretive, exclusive (for government and big business only) and authoritarian (no citizens' involvement in the decision making; not even allowing a public forum on SPP). What neo-liberal would not fall for it?

Stephane Dion has been awfully silent on the SPP issue. And there's an obvious reason for the apparent indifference: Stephane Dion couldn't care less about deep integration with US and Mexico; SPP fits the Liberal's neo-liberal platform so why complain about it, why not let sleeping dogs lie? I see no evil....

Can we now say the Liberal Party of Canada is neo-liberal? Can we now, after Progressive Conservatives turning Conservatives, call the Liberal Party the Neo-Liberals of Canada?

Just wondering.

- Wikipedia: neo-liberalism
- Council for Canadians: IntegrateThis!

The Energizer Baird; My Blahg

My Blahg by Robert McClelland

Minister Tony Clement or: How Canadians should learn to stop worrying about drug addicts

The good old straw man fallacy is working overtime for Conservatives again. This time it's the method of reasoning against safe-injection sites. Here's how it goes:

1. you think up an issue ("What about safe-injection sites?")
2. you poll for the views of Canadians (many believe these sites reduce harm to the community)
3. you check your own beliefs ("illegal drug use? Bad....")
4. in case 3 opposes 2 (regardless of any facts of course), you - by the strongest means possible - shoot down each and every opposing argument by misrepresenting the opponent's position ("for God's sake, call them myths"), and then refuting the misrepresentation.
5. you spread the word (the "Debunking the Myths" document).

And when I say by the strongest means, I mean the strongest means.

Ottawa debunks safe-injection site myths
Federal health minister's top adviser targets Vancouver's Insite facility
Peter O'Neil, CanWest News Service
Published: Monday, May 28, 2007

OTTAWA -- The top policy adviser to Health Minister Tony Clement ordered federal officials to debunk five "myths"about Vancouver's Safe Injection Site, just before Clement announced his refusal last year to extend the site's permit. [...]

The Debunking the Myths document was delivered to Jo Kennelly, Clement's senior policy adviser, only days after other Health Canada internal briefing notes and media analysis described the facility's progress and public support in positive terms.

The [Debunking the Myths] document [...] declared there were five widely held but false public views: that safe injection sites are "commonly used" in other countries; they operate "all across Canada;" they are legal; they present "a complete solution" to drug-use harms; and that the safe-injection site "has the complete support of the community."

It doesn't matter what YOU think, what matters is what the New Government TELLS YOU to think. Are you still with me?

Each of the so-called myths -- there is no indication which individuals or groups were espousing these views -- are then all shot down.

There you have it. Of course it's a lot easier to shoot down non-existing myths (myths you never had in the first place) than deal with the real facts. But who cares about facts on criticism of harm reduction when the fabrication of non-existing myths can lead to such wonderful straw men?

Read the whole story

- Harm reduction and illicit drugs Australia
- Wikipedia: Harm Reduction
- Wikipedia: Criticism of harm reduction
- Wikipedia: Safe Injection Sites
- Wikipedia: Media Manipulation
- Victoria Times Colonist: Ottawa debunks safe-injection site myths
- Wikipedia: Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
- Wikipedia: Straw man Fallacy
- Wiktionary: Myth

Opinion Poll Caught "Lying"

I normally have little time for "the latest poll" but this one is simply too funny to pass:

OTTAWA — As Parliament broke for a week Friday amid speculation it will soon be shut down until fall, a new poll shows that none of the federal parties has made substantial progress with voters since the election 16 months ago.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s minority Conservatives regained a tenuous lead of 36 per cent, a five-point increase over last week, but just kept pace with their 2006 election result, the Ipsos Reid poll found.

Since when is a poll immune to all the political turmoil at the Hill? If we take this poll seriously then we have to conclude that this week was a good week for the Conservatives, right?

Canada's political parties should finally get over their polling fetishes and start basing their policies on content, not on marketing strategies. The numbers do sometimes lie, fortunately I would like to add.

- whole story: Support for federal parties stalled, poll finds
- opinion poll

OIL INDUSTRY did nothing for over a decade; so why reward THEM with INTENSITY TARGETS?

Since Canada's neo-cons love to come up with analogies, here's mine for intensity targets:

You own an old chevy, and you drive daily from Victoria (BC) to Sidney (BC) and back, which is about 60 kilometers. Now, you're asked to limit your reductions, but, you actually have ideas to travel around the world.

The Conservatives make both possible!

Just buy a small Toyota that will reduce at least 6% per kilometre and you can drive as far as you like, pollute as much as you like.

Yes, that's what intensity targets are about; make small improvements to your dirty industry, then you can pollute as much as you like. Who cares if the overall pollution rises?

Oil industry is like a dirty old Chevy
No wonder Canada's dirtiest industry, the oil industry, likes the new plan. They're the old chevy that should have been replaced over a decade ago, but now they can get away with polluting even more!

It's of course a lot easier for the Canada's neo-cons to blame Liberals for inaction (not enforcing emission regulations) than punishing the REAL source of pollution due to inaction; Canada's dirtiest industry, the oil industry.

footnote: It's interesting to see that both parties (Libs and Cons) are so much alike, even on environment; neither one is serious about Kyoto once in power.

Another handout for Big Oil

Interesting post by Robert McClelland:

Hey, the poor oil companies can barely manage to get by on their tens of billions of dollars in profit every year so why shouldn’t the taxpayer fork over a billion dollars to help them out.

Alberta wants Ottawa to help build a $1.5-billion pipeline that would put carbon dioxide emissions from the northern oilsands industry to work in oil wells hundreds of kilometres away.

Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Guy Boutilier is pushing Premier Ed Stelmach’s plan to capture C02 and send it through a $1.5-billion, 400-kilometre pipeline that would allow it to be used to help get more oil out of low-producing wells.

Boutilier wants Ottawa to pony up with $500 million for the pipeline, which would start in his riding in northeastern Alberta. Another $500 million each would come from the province and industry, he said.

You really have to admire the Conservatives on this one for showing their compassionate side by extending a helping hand to the downtrodden billionaires in this country. For that and your rejection of liberal NIMBYism–as demonstrated by your willingness to allow this project to begin in your own backyard–I salute you, Mr. Boutilier.