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Thanks,

Mark McCaw ~ twitter's @bigpicguy

Author of "Insights Inside a Mind" ~ blogging the big picture








Thursday 28 April 2011

Scary stories~Best left to Hollywood.

     With apologies to politicians, partisans, and oodles of professional and amateur journalist/blogger types, I don't buy into the many end of the world scenarios being dangled in front of me pre-election day.

     A number of scenarios are playing out and it will be up to Canadians to decide how they want the country to run over the next months and years. What is clear is a lot of people are coming to the realization it isn't difficult to vote, that voting is important, and they are thoroughly enjoying the idea they actually have some power for a change.

     In the last few days you can expect plenty of drama flying in all directions. I put some thought into it and I've come up with my own scenario, which, is really a concoction of many years of observation, mixed with way too much reading while watching every news program going, following twitter, all jumbled up in my big bag of things I think about and I will guarantee this scenario is valid for at least another 6 hours or so.

     Based on my own knowledge of things political, conservatives took out a very large hammer this morning and firmly smashed the "break glass in case of emergency" thingie. This will result in a flood of John Baird-like hollering about all the world ending events that are about to rain down upon us.

     The conservative strategy will require us to carry steel umbrellas for the next few days as they throw every scare tactic, including the kitchen sink, at us. You won't have to listen hard to hear the world is coming to an end. The banks will fail. Cows will not give milk anymore. Provinces will float out into the ocean. Raging camels will overrun the Arctic. Your children will have to give candy to adults on Halloween. You get the idea. The only thing they can do now is try to: a) scare people into voting FOR them, or, b) scare people into NOT voting. Key message will be anything that remotely sounds frightening.

     This is the payback for their arrogance. Ignoring Canadians, ignoring reporters, ignoring how distasteful Canadians found issues like G8/20 porkbarrelling, the hiring of convicts to top positions, appointing senators charged with fraud, trying to ruin the life of Helena Guergis and not even speaking her name, let alone apologizing for what they'd done when it came to light the astounding charges that were 100% unsubstantiated. I'm not the only one who almost lost my lunch when, in a single day, the party wrote to Elections Canada asking student votes in Guelph be voided, then congratulated Elections Canada publicly when their request was denied. Come on. This doesn't even touch on dozens and dozens of examples of poor judgement, someone (bit players) getting fired every day, the list makes me gag. As it does for many Canadians who are tired of this garbage. All along they have smugly believed we would just ignore all of that, we'd ignore their record, we'd buy into their "violent torpedo of sound bites". It's not too late for these people to save themselves from themselves, however, since every single day has brought us another new, ugly conservative revelation, they've removed the rose coloured glasses a bit late.

     So the question upon us. Harper must go, where should I mark my 'X'?

     I guess since Jack Layton is the flavour of the day, I should start there. While he looked as though he was off to a slow start, Jack is the current Justin Bieber of Canadian Politics. I'm not sorry people are running away from Stephen Harper, I just hope they are sure of themselves where they stop. Now, before I get wildly attacked by NDP supporters, I'm not going to launch into some kind of a vote for Jack is a vote for Karl Marx or something so stupid. That tactic is best left to conservative idealogues.

     I believe in social programs designed to better the society I live in. I am in a position and prepared to pay to provide certain services, even if I don't use, or may never need them. Someone else does. I'm ok with caring about others, even the ones I don't know. One thing I do know, people who vote NDP can count on at least having a leader who will listen and work with others.

     I do still have some serious reservations about the NDP. In my opinion, they are still unable to develop a program to advance their agenda in a way that doesn't rock confidence in the economic fundamentals of the country. No, Canada will not be mysteriously bankrupted overnight due to some mad give-everyone-everything spending spree, rather, when one scrutinizes some of what is being put forth, as popular as it may seem in the heat of the moment, it gives me troubling pause.

     As populist a promise as it is, the credit card relief idea should worry you. Aside from the unwanted side effect of capital fleeing to somewhere profits aren't being cut is part of the equation, leading banks to have less money to lend, but the bigger problem is they will find other fees, rates, etc to recoup those losses. There are ways to get relief for families but regulating it is asking for more trouble than any Canadian really wants.

     Today Jack is talking about regulating gas prices. This will be seen as a direct attack on the oil and gas industry, which is super in the eyes of the average joe but once again very bad policy when you look at the wider ramifications, not the least of which is the cost to the environment of artificially low gas prices which lead to higher consumption.

     Those are two examples of policy that is not mature enough to govern this country. This is almost Anti-Harper to the max, without the criminals of course. Harper has tried to move us to an uncomfortable right-hand corner of the room and my only fear of the NDP is they will just shift me uncomfortably to the left-hand corner of the room.

      I'm going to make no secret about it. I am not happy with any of the existing parties. None of these people show me a vision of Canada other than replacing one colour party with another. In order to maintain a sense of stability, and remove this 5 year stain on our country that has been "The Harper Government", I believe one needs to go to the polls on election day and vote for the Liberal candidate. This rids us of Harper and his stable crew of convict yes men (women to the back of the bus) and does not set the financial community to alarm.

     I don't say the NDP will never be ready to lead, I don't know that. I know they can't at this juncture. Were I to offer advice, it would be to start in the centre and introduce yourself to the world. Don't announce yourself with an earthquake that could take a lengthy period of adjustment that would ultimately hurt the people who trusted you.

     I've found it difficult to write this. I like Jack Layton, I like the many friends I have who are NDP members and supporters. I just have too many red flags to justify taking the chance.

     I won't say the Liberals have always been the best. Perhaps people don't find their message inspiring enough. I tend to believe we've been so poisoned by the centuries long Ignatieff attack we may be trained not to hear his message. Partly his fault for believing we're adults and want to hear someone talk when really we're towel waving morons who want to hear the loudest shouter.

     Nevertheless, I, Mr Bigpicguy, endorse the Liberals in this election and on May 3rd I am rounding up a posse that wants to change the game, not just the players.

     I'll end this diatribe by urging you to elect anyone but Harper. We will still be alive on May 3rd and 10 times more Canadian than we were the day before. It may be the end of the Harperian calendar, it won't be the end of the world. I just choose to choose some stability while my plan to change it all gathers steam!

     PS~if you're reading this is BC please do something to get Elizabeth May elected so we can actually hear what she has to say.

My Election View 2011

     In a few days it will be over and Canadians will have elected the players who will provide the drama we will refer to as the 41st parliament of Canada. Congratulations, Canadians have their day.

     It's an honour really. Many Canadians, mostly the youth of the nation, gave their lives to give you the opportunity to choose who you want to run your country, rather than be told who should run your country. The one day in our country when a homeless person has the same voice as a party leader, a CEO, or  billionaire. Your day of power, so don't forsake it, don't allow friends and family to forsake it. Don't just vote but do all you can to encourage everyone to vote, no matter how they intend to mark their ballot, it's just that important.

     I make no secret I chose to vote for the Liberal candidate in this particular election. I think they have a platform I can live with, one that changes the priorities to more of what I like about Canada. The idea we can help each other. I also know the liberal party not only created the conditions that allowed Canada to ride out the worst of a bad situation, the same minds that made Canada the envy of the world are still Liberals. I've also been impressed to learn of the intelligence, passion and committment of Michael Ignatieff. As a man it would be difficult to equal the amount of dignity he has handled himself with in the face of years of personal attacks, attacks on his family, his wife, his integrity. I've listened to a man who speaks, not from a teleprompter, not from notes, but from a sense of disgust at what Canada has become, and a sense of amazement that Canadians don't seem to realize that very slowly, quietly, the society we have always been so proud of is changing and by the time we open our eyes we will not even recognize ourselves in the mirror.

     As for Stephen Harper, what more can I say about this man. I, being engaged, knew enough about this man in 1995 I realized his ideology was very different, that he is a very shrewd and tightly controlled man who has a plan to remake Canada into a very different country. If you look at his pre-government record, what he has done since he came to power (not to mention how he came to power), and the unbelievably questionable people who populate the highest positions within his inner circle I find it very difficult to imagine a sensible person could support this man. One can argue the local candidate is a superhero, but in this conservative party he's lower than a nothing unless Stephen Harper says so. What he says goes. Cross this man and you will feel wrath you never imagined. He doesn't care if he ruins your credibility, your reputation, your family or your life depending on his level of hate at the time. He is unmistakably a man driven by his hate of everyone who would dare to oppose his views. The most vitriolic of his hate is directed toward his opposition. I've dealt with people like Stephen Harper in my professional life. They don't intimidate me. I have no problem staring them down or telling them exactly how much value I place on their opinion. No matter how much they'd love to think they are better than me, sadly for them, they're not. The small-minded, small-hearted of the world instill no fear in my heart. Garbage is garbage no matter what title they hold or how big their bank account is. No human is better than any other and too bad for Stephen Harper, the emporer has no clothes. You might scare others, to me you're a playground bully, a glorified punk. I'd had more than enough of you, Mr. Gotti wannabe, the teflon is gone, and now we know you have a fondness for fraud it's high time we kicked your ass to High River.

     Jack. Love ya. Hope you do very well. Every policy you have will need to be blunted, if you don't realize that you're not yet smart enough to be PM, but congrats, the NDP is getting there. I'm sorry you haven't concentrated your efforts more on what kind of government Harper has given us, especially right now when more people are listening to you. The election really is more important than whether you can relace liberals, it's about ridding ourselves of a very bad government. By the way, the credit card thing is false hope and not well thought out. Reality is, as PM you can still help people without punishing the market which hurts people's retirement savings. It's only a free ride until the scrutiny hits.

     I sincerely hope Elizabeth May gets a seat to add that refreshing voice. Unfortunately the name Green Party associates them with a fringe that got a bad name early in their history elsewhere and you could provide policies that would create utopia in the country and good luck getting a seat. Sorry, I just try to speak the truth. Whether the truth seems right or wrong it's still the truth.

     No matter what the outcome of this election, I made a promise to my 23 year old daughter. That once the election ends I will start working to drag our 19th century system into the future. No matter how many elections we have, no matter who we elect, we have structural problems with the way our democracy works and many changes need to be made so democracy becomes relevant to every citizen. I will be seeking all kinds of Canadians to work with me and will be inviting those who want a vision for their children's future to dialogue with me to create a firm vision of the Canada we want. My promise is for concrete change by 2019.

     In the meantime. My endorsement is, vote for your Liberal candidate for change we can realistically afford. NDP policies are good, but currently unattainable and the credit card thing may be cute but will cause havoc in financial markets where the medicine could end up far worse than the cure.

     As always, try to examine the big picture. Make up your own mind and vote. Please comment on my blog I appreciate all comments for and against.

     If you're interested in engagement you can follow me on twitter @bigpicguy or email me bigpicguy@hotmail.ca thanks for sharing a piece of my mind.

Monday 25 April 2011

Ideology V. Fact

     The worst possible fact is that ideology is a fact. The thought that most of the rules and laws we follow are shaped by idealogues on any side is truly a sad testiment to how incredibly lazy humans are. True, we all have things we believe, and things we believe in (rightly so), it is alarming how often we allow others to define our positions on any given issue. More alarming is the increasing importance of ideology in the shaping of messages we rely on to take a "personal" position.

     We' re pretty much roundly guilty of it, even those of us who try hard not to be will sometimes fall victim to an ideological mindset tainting our views, sometimes in the face of overwhelming facts that prove us wrong. Mostly, this is because it's hard to admit something you passionately believed in is untrue. Divorcing oneself from a position can be just as difficult as divorcing a partner.

     Because we are individuals, we will react differently to the realization we have bought a line of total BS. Most of us will be embarrassed, of course, and perhaps a little hurt and disappointed for allowing ourselves to be duped. It's how one reacts to the realization things are not always what they seem that is interesting. Some will refuse to believe fact, even overwhelming fact, and become the worst kind of idealogue, taking on a rigid position and attacking anyone or anything that is contrary. Coming in a close second are "rebound idealogues", who, once they've discovered truth is something you have to search for, decide it is just easier to choose an ideology, different from the previous one, because that one hasn't let them down yet. Last, and sadly, fewest, are the idealouges who realize that every thought, every position, every idea comes from someone's special interest, and, it is best to at least do some research into things before coming to a definitive position.

     Ideology will always shape thought and society, even among the brightest and most fair of individuals, it is difficult to divide your personal values from what is right for others. There will be times when most of the facts will go against something you so deeply believe in you can, in no way, find justification to change your personal position. This is forgivable, we are all human.

     I do applaud people who will stand on the courage of their convictions, those who are very open about where they stand. Fair warning, when you do speak up, you should always be prepared to back up your position with something more than rhetoric, name calling and the like. One should also be prepared to stand corrected.

     Society is a better place when we use the resources we have to educate ourselves and engage one another in constructive discussions. Don't just tell me I'm wrong, tell me why I am wrong (without stupid insults thanks) and we can engage in discussion. If we are both willing to admit when we're wrong, or at least work of finding common ground, the world will be better for it.

     In search of the bigger picture...

Sunday 24 April 2011

What really happens after the vote

     I'm intensely interested in politics. Not just federal politics, but provincial, municipal and yes, foreign politics. I'm interested in how ideology shapes politics and of the theoretical basis of the many different systems in play and those proposed for the future.

     Political campaigns are the absolute worst place to try to learn anything about politics. They're filled with all the things that cloud reasoned attempts to educate oneself. Rhetoric, partisanship, outside influences with vested interests, media that is no longer purely objective, opinion, innuendo, truth, lies, ugly smear tactics, subliminal attacks, strategy and on and on. It does not resemble real politics as is practised on a day to day basis between election periods. For those who pay little attention to politics, elections provide about a month of total confusion and bombardment that often has them throwing up their hands and foresaking the polls on election day.

     I believe democracy is still the best system we have, although very little attention has been paid to moving democracy from somewhere in the 1800's to what it could be in the 21st century. I'd like to think of this blog is a place to incite thought and encourage lifelong learning. You don't need to go to school to learn, you just need a few tips on research and methods of dealing with conflicting information. Since you're accessing this online, you have internet access and a search engine, a good start.

     There is something of utmost importance when a democratic nation has an election. Your vote is critical. It's not, as some would argue, that if you don't vote you don't have a right to complain. You still pay plenty of taxes, you are still a citizen, of course you have a right to complain. Your vote is of critical importance because it is the only time you hold absolute power. The only time politicians fear anything you have to say. It is the single opportunity for you to show your agreement with what your government is doing, or change direction. I believe every Canadian should value the vote that was paid for with the blood of millions of men and woman who fought and died so tyranny would not impose itself upon future generations.

     So let me try to give a bit of a primer on Canadian style democracy, just to foster a bit of understanding in a confusing flurry of electio-babble.

     On May 2/2011, Canadians will decide the formation of the next House of Commons. We'll go to the polls in our various ridings and at the end of the night, we will know which seats are in the hands of which party. The gritty truth of our system is such that, no matter who your local candidate is, even if they are the most wonderful person on earth, you can't choose them on a local basis if they run for a party that has practises and policies you don't agree with. Individual candidates have no influence on overall party policy going in to an election. Even if they stand for radical change, the nature of our system of governance shuts that down the minute they are sworn in. I will also point out, for the most part, you are also not voting for the leader of any party. All parties are coalitions of diverse interests and party policy is driven by those who can get their particular issues and ideology on the plate. Your best bet to choose your vote during an election campaign is to examine the platform presented, and take time to look into the party policies, all of which should be readily availble to you on the internet. Keep in the top of your mind that platforms are a group of promises and not a binding contract, therefore any or all of said platform may or may not get enacted once a party is elected, due to any number of factors.

     So we get to the results. We'll end up with 308 MP's of a variety of political parties. That is a certainty. The parties will have standing in the house, based on the number of MP's elected under the party banner. This is also a certainty. To clear the air, a single party must attain 155 seats to gain a majority in the House of Commons. A majority, during this election, has been an issue. People would have you believe it is of utmost importance or society is in trouble, that's just a scare tactic. A majority simply means the ruling party has the ability to enact whatever legislation/agenda it wishes without fear of losing confidence of the house and needing approval from the populace. This often leads to parties enacting unpopular measures that seem to come out of nowhere. Since it never got mentioned in any campaign, you never had a choice to make up your mind on it, you're stuck with it, too bad, so sad. Yes I have a bias against majority government.

     Now we have our 308 members, and we are clear what we get if we hand anyone a majority of seats in the house. It will take a little longer to discuss the possibilities if no party gets a majority, but hopefully, by the end, you'll understand why there is nothing scary about it. Hopefully it will help you vote the way you want without unfounded fears clouding your judgement.

     For the purposes of this lesson, all we need to know is that no single party has been able to attain the 155 seats required. This means the majority of seats in the House of commons belong to parties other than the one who got the most seats. So we have a minority parliament, nothing new.

     At this point, protocol dictates the party with the greatest number of seats is invited to form a government and to attempt to gain the confidence of parliament. The Government will choose a cabinet and prepare a "speech from the throne", essentially a summary of the agenda of the government. Generally, you wouldn't expect the government to fall on a throne speech, although the possibility exists. The first major test of a government would be their budget. This would be the most likley point where a government would be unable to gain the confidence of the house. We'll explore those options shortly.

     Minority governments, to function effectively, must rely on cooperation and compromise. The sole reason we've gone to the polls so often in the last few years is directly related to Stephen Harper's notion he can govern as if he had a majority when the reality was otherwise. When one wishes to lead a minority government, one must come to terms with the "blunting" of their agenda. One must be able to find enough common ground with the majority opposition to continue the business of the goverment in an uniterrupted fashion, even if it means toning down or scrapping those things that can and will not be tolerated by the majority of the house.

     Suffice to say, should Stephen Harper gain a minority government once again in the coming election, unless he changes the attitude he has had and has continued to exhibit throughout the campaign, he will be unable to hold the confidence of the house for any length of time. So what happens at that point?

     This, under the legitimate process set out under the laws and constitution of our country, opens options. It does not mean we have to go back to the polls, that is but one of the options. Should an elected minority government be unable to maintain the confidence of the house, the next step should rightly be, and we should demand it, that the governer general invite the leader of the official opposition to attempt to form a government. Once this invitation is extended, the opposition leader can proceed in one of two ways. He can accept the offer prima facie and attempt to govern without any formal cooperation agreement with the other parties in the house. When this option is selected, it becomes incumbent upon the new Prime Minister to find a way to get enough of the opposition to support any future confidence motions going forward, most notably, they will probably need to make budget concessions in order to secure enough votes to move forward. I must also stress, they need only have support for legislation that are matters of confidence, the majority of which are spending bills. Other legislation can pass or fail on its own merits without the risk of the government falling once a week.

     The second option has been the boogeyman of this election, the coalition. Nothing evil about it, just another form of cooperation, although it formalizes a cooperation agreement in the house. The difference you would see is in the makeup of Cabinet itself. As a trade off for their support, in a coalition, parties will insist on seats at the cabinet table where decisions are made. It kind of like having a team government rather than a single ruling entity.

     The thing about the second option is it really requires hard work and cooperation/concilliation. In order for it to work, as with any other group dynamic, the parties have to concentrate on agreement. In a majority, everything gets rammed through and you have no say whatsoever until the next election, and a lot of bad things can happen in 4 or 5 years.

     I hope this has been somewhat informative to you. Again I encourage you to get out and vote, it's the only voice you have. There is nothing to be scared of, but as always, I encourage you to look deeper as there is always a bigger picture.

Friday 22 April 2011

Stephen Harper asks us to examine his record

     Well, Canada's 41st election is well underway, we've seen the ads, listened to the catch phrases, been inundated with polls, perhaps watched a debate or two, and you may even have tuned in to the CBC's series of Peter Mansbridge interviews one on one with each of the leaders, which inspired this particular blog post.

     In today's interview, Stephen Harper said we need to examine his record. I thought, ok, why not give it a shot. Now, being an ordinary guy, I don't have a team of researchers to do my bidding, so I have to rely on search engines, memory, newspapers, magazines and the sort. By no means is this the definitive chronological be-all end-all examination of the Harper record, just what one man could come up with.

     It's a fairly disjointed look at things, as I didn't attempt to get into details on dates, just some kind of look at what has been done, and I guess what we could expect a lot more of with a Stephen Harper majority government. I'm not going to add editorial comment, actions speak louder than words.

The Harper Record

Told Canadians in 2008 there was no threat of recession

Told Canadians Conservatives would never run a deficit

Racked up the biggest deficit in Canadian History, eclipsing the 38 Billion Mulroney Conservative deficit.

Claimed credit for Canada riding out a global economic mess even though the regulations that allowed for it were enacted by Paul Martin, a Liberal, who left Harper with a 14 billion dollar surplus in 2006

Guaranteed Canadians his government would never tax income trusts, then immediately placed a tax on income trusts.

Trumpets his party's support for our armed forces and veterans, but doesn't back it up with action. Canada's Veteran's Ombudsman went public with the shockingly poor treatment of Canada's veterans at the hand of the very organizations tasked with protecting and caring for them. The Harper Government does not believe in criticism, so they removed him from his post. Now veterans can be stripped of their dignity and no one has to know.

Probably very few people remember the story of Douglas Tipple. The Harper record is filled with plenty of questionable judgements, this is another example and this one cost us millions. I'd try to explain but it's easier to refer you to the link to one of many sordid stories.

We know Stephen Harper thinks the gun registry is some kind of evil Canada can't stand for. Unfortunately for the High Ranking RCMP official Chief Superintendent Marty Cheliak it didn't pay to endorse it. He was removed from his post because he wasn't french enough (or so was the excuse du jour).

Even though we've maintained a high quality census throughout our history, and that the manditory long form census had never resulted in anyone being charged or going to jail, Stephen Harper claimed there was a landslide of opposition to the "intrusive" form and against the advice of the world's top experts mounted an all out effort to rid us of this incredibly important tool. This resulted in the resignation of Munir Sheikh, head of Statistics Canada, widely regarded as among the world's top experts in the gathering and analysis of vital statistics. Maybe today this isn't a big deal to you, but 10 years from now, when a hospital is desperately needed in your riding, it will be built 40 miles away in the riding of a government member because the information that used to dictate how and where services were delivered depended crucially on the information that used to come from the long form census.

The list of firings, appointments not renewed, and positions phased out just goes on and on, with the central theme being, if you say anything critical of the government, you're gone. If you're lucky, you're gone, this government also has a particular penchant for trying to discredit anyone who disagrees. Either they do the worst job in history of hiring/appointing people to run our institutions, or they have a policy of stifiling dissent. Maybe both, but I don't think so.

Well, you say, perhaps it may all be a huge coincidence. At least we all have rights. The Harper government would prefer you keep your rights to yourself. Closure of Canadian Human Rights Commission offices will hurt Canadians. The three offices slated for closure; Vancouver, Toronto and Halifax received 70 per cent of all signed complaints to the CHRC in 2008.

Thank goodness we can trust them economically, right? Independent Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page had his budget slashed after revealing the true costs of the Afghan war and disputing the government's economic and fiscal projections. In September 2010 he announced he will not seek reappointment in 2013. An experiment in “transparency and accountability” that was doomed from the beginning. PBO Page most recently alerted Canadians the costs of F35 fighter jets as stated aren't even close to being right.

If you try to protect Canadians, and it ends up an embarrassment for the Harper government, you get what whistle-blower biologist/public employee, Luc Pomerleau got. Fired for leaking a government memo proposing to allow the meat industry to handle its own inspections. The head of the Food Inspection Agency, Carole Swan, fired Mr. Pomerleau, ignoring the fact that the proposed plan potentially threatened public safety. Shortly after food safety was hammered home when several Canadians died of listeriosis from tainted meat from a Canadian plant.

I couldn't possibly list all of the similar stories, all of which happened since Stephen Harper came to power. I'd invite you to use your search engine and spend some time looking into the myriad of incidents where someone has been critical and has been fired, muzzled, or worse.

I'm pretty sure if you read blogs you know a lot of the Harper record yourself.

When his government was about to fall on a confidence motion he convinced the Governer General to prorogue parliament, shutting down the house for nefarious purposes and killing all legislation in progress.

Harper's record shows he runs away at the slightest sign of trouble. When it became apparent the Afghan Detainee documents were going to be made public, they obviously were important enough for this man to, once again, avoid the scrutiny of the Canadian public by ordering up an unprecedented second proroguation of parliment.

Stephen Harper promised to reform the senate and put an end to partisan porkbarrelling in the upper chamber and at first opportuity he stacked it with ridiculous party fundraisers and hacks. He then used these appointed hacks to set a precident in Canadian history. Killing a bill passed in the elected house of commons.

When examining the record you have to ask exactly how it is Mr. Harper delivered on his solemn promise to clean up government. Did he do it by employing a 5 time convicted felon to work as his top advisor? Did he do it by make absolutely ridiculous allegations to RCMP about a cabinet minister in his own government, allowing her to be decimated until the truth came out it was all a lie and then refused to say her name let alone apoligize? Did he do it by employing, then appointing to the senate, men facing charges of fraud for a con game that resulted in over a million of your tax dollars being stolen in a scheme that, in day to day life, would be the same as you putting an empty envelope in the ATM and withdrawing a large sum of cash. The list just goes on and on and shockingly on.

I could add more, aside from the scandal-a-day we get now, but I'm sure you can find plenty, even if you just read the links in the blog you get the idea.

Whenever confronted, it is always a lie, someone else's fault, they refuse to talk about it, hide behind procedure, or turn it back to the same messages intended to somehow scare someone or everyone. One thing I will make very clear on the Harper record. The government did not fall because the majority of parliament rejected the conservative budget. The budget brought forward was never voted on. The reason we are having an election on May 2nd is due to a finding by speaker Peter Milliken that, for the first time in history, the Government of Canada was found to be in contempt of parliament, the most serious charge a government can face domestically. In light of the speaker's ruling, Opposition Leader Michael Ignatieff brought forward a motion of non-confidence in the Conservative Government of Stephen Harper, which was voted on by all members of the house, resulting in a loss for Mr. Harper and the opportunity to judge.

     As Mr. Harper said. Judge them on their record. While by no means is this all of their record, look into it and ask yourself if these people are the ones you want to run your affairs and over the course of a mandate, potentially spend a quarter trillion of your tax dollars.

     It's your choice. Get informed and get to the polls. Know the big picture.

Sunday 17 April 2011

F35's. It's about more than money

     The greatest gift I have ever received came from my parents. It wasn't the latest toy or the hippest clothing, but far more valuable than anything material. They gave me character and taught me to never accept anything at face value. To always educate myself and try to keep an open mind, to have the courage of my convictions yet retain enough modesty to admit when I am wrong and sincerely apologize when it is warranted.

     As a result of this, I can sometimes be blunt and unforgiving when I believe someone is not presenting the truth, especially when it involves spending money out of my pocket.

     I have nothing to hide. Other than being an ordinary Canadian citizen, like most who will read this, the only stake I have in government is the fact they spend plenty of my money. A lot of it is spent on good things that I want or need, or other Canadians want or need. Fine. A lot of it is also spent for a variety of reasons that are for the sole benefit of those who seek political or monetary or personal gain. Not fine.

     I cast my first ballot at the age of 18. I have voted in every election at every level of government for 32 years and I've never missed a single election. I am interested in politics because, other than me, they are the only people directly spending money out of my pocket so I think it's damn important. My opinion. I tell you this because I want you to know the bigger picture, there is always a bigger picture.

     Over my lifetime, at the level of politics where parties are involved, I have voted for Progressive Conservatives (not these Conservatives, no mistake I believe they are different), Liberals, and NDP. I do not belong to, nor ever have I belonged to any political party. For personal reasons I have decided it is in my best interests, and the best interests of my country, to vote for the local candidate that represents the Liberal Party of Canada. That is my personal choice and now that I've made that choice I won't pretend it isn't my choice. I don't demand you agree with me, in fact, I'd love to engage you if you disagree.

     Like it or not, Military spending is an issue in this election. Politicians and media have declared it so, and it is so. They would enjoy it if you would narrow your focus to a single issue. The purchase of a replacement for our aging (and therefore costly) jet fighters. I will admit, jet fighters are kind of sexy-cool, in a technologically-geeky-ominously-scary way.

     In my case, the bigger picture gets in the way. Right off the top I will tell you my military policy ideas are more conservative than my vote. To move forward we sometimes have to compromise. Let's dispense with the F35 kerfuffle and talk about more substantive things.

     I don't want people to take what I say as absolute truth. I want people to think about what I say, do their own research, and form their own opinion. If you agree I'm ok, if not, that's fine too.

     If you're the least bit internet savvy and even occasionally pay attention to the news, you probably know the various arguments. Our Air force, for many reasons (not the least of which is our international/NATO committments) needs to replace the current fleet of fighter jets. This is true, and valid if we expect to be influential among influential nations whether we personally like it or not. We would be led to believe the entire issue comes down to the cost of these vehicles, which, while controversial, comes down to an argument between astronimcal costs and absolutely astronomical costs. Perfect, a lose-lose situation. When it comes to money, whether it's 60 billion or 100 billion or more we can't comprehend it easily.

     Great if it were only about the money. I will clearly state, cost aside I do not feel it is in the best interests of the taxpayers to purchase a box of paperclips without competition among manufacturers/suppliers to ensure good quality at the best price. Just like most of us do at the grocery store. So purchasing billions of dollars worth of fighter jets and absorbing the future associated costs should certainly be subject to rigourous competition.

     The same people who argue for this purchase wouldn't hesitate to insuate you are some kind of communist if you wanted to take 60 billion dollars and make college and university educations a goal for every Canadian. Go figure.

     Even if you ignore all of the above. If you use your search engine to find some of the published industry articles (i.e. Aviation Week, etc) and maybe visit some of the forums you will hear a lot. From a lot of people who make a living in the industry. None of it, outside of official propaganda from the proponents of the F35 could be described as particularly reassuring. From uncontrolled spending to questionable accounting for costs past, present and future this thing doesn't get out of the front office, let alone off the ground. When it does get off the ground (which isn't nearly as often as you might believe if all you know is what you've seen on tv) it has experienced more than its fair share of serious design problems. A growing chorus of voices is raising alarming concerns about the entire F35 program without a word about cost. I leave you to do your own research and decide for yourself.

     As always, I'd like to leave you with something larger to think about. The bigger picture. Should we be pouring billions of dollars in any military purchase without first defining what role Canadians want their country to play? Do we want to be peace-keepers or enforcers of our idea of what is right? In peacetime do we want to maintain a robust military with a reach into the far corners of the world or do we settle for a core of regular forces with a focus on the security of our nation as defined by our borders?

     There is always a bigger picture...

Why "Omnibus" is ominous. A horror story.

     Democracy is an intricate thing, let alone the varying systems of democratic government. Historically, in Canada, our democracy has relied on passing legislation on a bill by bill basis. This is in contrast to the US system where much of the legislation is put through using what are referred to as "omnibus" bills. I understand why many Canadians don't see why this kind of legislation should be worrisome, we haven't often seen it used here.

     Like any human endeavour, omnibus legislation has an intended purpose which is good, yet examining how it has been used exposes its flaws, and there are many. Omnibus bills are to legislation what an ultralight plane is to an Airbus A-380. Rather than pass a single peice of legislation, omnibus bills are used, in theory, to group similar types of legislation into a larger bill in order to speed the passage of "needed" laws. This is good, right? Not exactly, and here are some reasons why.

     Omnibus legislation allows less opportunity to examine the relative merits of each peice of legislation. It opens the door to the passage of some very bad legislation by bundling it along with some very good or popular legislation, much as your TV provider will let you have the popular channel you want, but only in a package with 7 others you don't. You don't get to pick and choose, it an all or nothing deal, the bad with the good like it or not. The process, in my opinion, it not a good democratic process. It can stifle very real concerns and put in place legislation that if otherwise introduced would not stand up to scrutiny. By bundling your bad and/or unpopular legislation in an omnibus bill with other, more important, popular or vital legislation, the proponent of the omnibus bill use it to destroy proper validation of legislation by turning any attempt to question bad or dangerous legislation into an attack on the parts of the bill people really want to see introduced. Now you have the Catch 22. You don't get the lollipop if you don't take the needle. The bonus is, you can bundle in some very bad stuff that would never pass on its own merits and make the voice of reason become the enemy of the public if they do block it since they can't block the bad without blocking the good.

     One must make their own judgement. I think omnibus bills are bad just for the reasons above, and that is merely the edge of a very slippery slope. That is how it begins. If you look to the south, the Americans have evolved the omnibus bill into an absolute art form. It went from merely being a convenient vehicle for passing some bad or unpopular bills to yet another way to fill the never-ending pork barrel. I'm not saying the Canadian style omnibus bill will evolve to this level because our system doesn't lend itself to this type of excess, but the possibility it can be exploited in this fashion exists, and in my experience, when the possiblility exists for politicians to reward key supporters, they will find a way to use it.

     The US version has evolved into something similar to the fictional example I am about to give, keeping in mind US style government does not function the same way as a Westminister style parliament, nevertheless, this can still apply in Canada.

     We understand political parties have agendas. It's generally understood we have to compromise our vote since it is rare we could ever agree with every policy any party has, so we choose our party by aligning ourselves with the one with the most policies we agree with and suck up the other stuff we don't. That applies to every democratic country.

     Keep in mind this is a purely fictional account, although it very clearly resembles the reality of why omnibus can be ominous.

     The ruling party has been having some trouble with its base. In order to garner enough support to continue to hold on to the reins of power, they need to appeal to that base. In order to do so they'll have to put in place some rather distasteful legislation. Knowing it would be impossible to get these measures through under any serious scrutiny, they'll bundle these bad or unpopular bills with legislation that will actually do something good for citizens. The better the carrot, the bigger the stick, so very unpalatable legislation can be enacted by making it part of a larger package which includes something that can appeal on an emotional level, the deeper the emotion, the more you're likely to ignore something you otherwise would never support. This is what they count on with omnibus bills. That isn't enough. Agendas are fine, but even the most fierce idealogue wants to ensure their continued personal success. In politics, continued success is paid for in cold, hard cash. Mom and pop may vote you in, but mom and pop will never know who you are if you don't have the kind of money required to finance your campaign. That kind of money comes in the form of donations. Not the hundred dollars mom and pop send you because you're a nice person who works hard for them, but the big corporate donations on a regular basis the will allow you to outspend your opponents.

     No one could accuse most politicians of not being opportunistic. So rather than merely use omnibus bills to enact some bad or unpopular legislation, they up the ante. Influential politicians will withhold their support for the omnibus bill, unless perhaps, 50 Million dollars can be added for corn farmers. Since this would be helpful to the ruling party and garner the support of all the politicians who depend on corn farmers for support, they write it in as an add on. Done. Not. Problem is, the sawmills have been hard done by and without 30 Million dollars they may have to lay off workers which could translate into a negative voting pattern, another add on. Then there's 42 Million for irrigation concerns, 18 million for some sort of unexplainable research and before you know it, the bill that is going to guarantee that grandma is not going to starve to death on a pension that makes food a luxury (which everyone wants for grandma), is yours if you ignore the fact that abortion will then be illegal and gay people will be jailed, and that the incidential cost of getting politicians to support what you support is an additional 300 Million or so in tax dollars directed to their biggest supporters. This is how it has evolved in our southerly neighbour, and before you begin to think it couldn't happen this way here what with our party system and whipped votes where everyone toes the party line, one only need gaze at Quebec, or Alberta, to see how you can easily replace influential politicans with an agenda, to influential regions or groups or provinces with an agenda.

     It's enough to make you dizzy. And broke. And future generations in trouble. That's why omnibus should be ominus.

Saturday 16 April 2011

Let's talk about SPIN baby!

     I've had occasion to take a few highway drives over the last couple of days, it's great to get away and gives you time to think. I've been thinking, in particular, about spin. Not mere specific instances of spin, mind you, but spin as an art, nay, a science, and the various arms of its everyday existence in our lives.

     Let me say, I'm no stranger to the topic. While I left my media career behind for a more stable life after becoming a single father, I never lost the lessons learned in 16 years immersed daily in the stimulating world of advertising, promotions, and public relations. In the time since, I've continued to freelance, everything from newspaper and magazine articles to consulting on strategy, although my schedule while raising a child and transitioning to caring for a elderly, then terminally ill parent hasn't allowed me time to write as much as I would have liked. It has never stopped me from learning and thinking critically.

     Humans like simplicity. This is a fact. The more we are required to think about something the less we like it. Advertisers/Promotors/Spin Doctors understand this basic concept. You'll have difficulty remembering the content of an entire article/book/show, however in the space of 30 seconds, with one good line repeated frequently enough, I can have you as a loyal customer for years to come. In sixty seconds I may be able to remove a substantial portion of your lifetime income and you will never know it wasn't your own idea. That's why corporations will reserve multimillion dollar budgets to gamble on 60 seconds of your time during a broadcast. It's all about advancing your agenda, and we are all "useful fools".

     Advertising is not my sole bone of contention. The idea that the media will present opinion polls as proof of anything, frankly, annoys the hell out of me. At least advertisements are most often, clearly advertisements, opinion polls are presented in the media as fact. They tell people "This is your opinion", not straight up, mind you, but subliminally. By presenting the conclusions of the poll with a couple of minor details (i.e. +/- and sample size) without any discussion of the deeper methodology, leads most to trust this information is reliable, that, "the facts have been checked" as it were. It couldn't be further from the truth, but for you to get the truth they'd need to bore you with the details and you'd probably tune out. Bad for them, probably good for you.

     One only need to look at the rudimentary knowledge we have of such polls to understand why they are so misleading when presented as fact. Initially, although we will readily dismiss it (especially if the results are in our favour), a red flag should go up looking at the sample size. The idea that 800 people represent the diverse range of opinion amongst 33+ million people is a mathematical formulation that would boggle your mind. During the current elections, most have come to learn the numbers come, not only from this small percentage of population, but complicating it are factors that include, but are not limited to, only getting the opinion of those who have a land line telephone, and of those, only the opinion of those willing to answer that line. The segment of the population being asked is skewed by many factors over and above these, but where is the point you become concerned?

     To try to simplify things, unless you have a solid working knowledge of advanced statistical analysis and a clear disclosure of all of the factors used to determine the final numbers, the information from this method of reporting trends in opinion is a sham. The idea it is influential is practically horrifying.

     Think of all the things you don't know. You have no idea how many questions were asked. What questions were asked. What order the questions were asked. What order the options were given in if the question was more than yes or no. What media was used to obtain the answers, were the questions written or spoken (inflection and tone can change your answer). Those are just the tip of the iceberg. Calculations that go into "crunching" the raw data obtained require sophisticated knowledge of formulae in order to come to a final number. Unless you are aware of the criteria used by a particular polling agency to come to that final number, you cannot, in any sense, report it as fact. Most people don't even understand some of the basic calculations, let alone the more complex ones. The concept of "weighting" of answers is enough to tire the average human and that is one single factor. To attempt the simplification of the concept of weighting, let's say the population under age 25 is 50% and over 25 is 50%. If the respondents to your poll are 75% over 25 and 25% under 25 that is not a representation of the actual population so a formula must be applied where the opinion is "weighted" to come to a figure, using the raw data you have, that would seem to accurately reflect the true distribution of the population. To do so, the 25% of under 25 respondents must be counted as double and the 75% of over 25 respondents must be reduced by one third. That is just one of the myriad of calculations that go into presenting you with a "final" number.

     Sir Winston Churchill said it better than anyone: "Polls are for dogs".

     My goal is always to provoke critical thought. It doesn't hurt to learn and we have so many tools to do so. I hope I've opened your eyes a bit to peek into the inner workings of the spin cycle. Subjective things, such as opinion polls, remain subjective, even when they are presented as though they are facts. Our love of simplicity often shields us from the bigger picture. There is always a bigger picture.

Friday 8 April 2011

Everything I don't want in a Prime Minister (long)

     I have never hidden my disdain for Stephen Harper and what I believe he stands for. As a serious political junkie I pay a great deal of attention to politics, policies and the people involved. I am unashamedly opinionated which is my right in a democratic nation. You have the right to disagree and I respect that, but only if you can argue your point logically. When people resort to rhetorical statements and name calling I tune them out but I am always willing to engage anyone in meaningful debate.

What best demonstrates why I am convinced Stephen Harper is completely the wrong man to lead Canada (or any other nation for that matter) is revealed in a speech he gave to a US audience, prior to his hijack of Canada's conservative movement, while he was still president of the right-wing "National Citizens Coalition" (you will note he apparently had no problem leading a coalition at that time). While this may be a lengthy rant, I intend it as a critique of the musings of the man who wants majority rule in my country, therefore it is only fair that nothing be taken out of context so the full unadulterated text of his speech is posted in italics with my own assessment after each paragraph. The text of the part of the speech I discuss in this blog is taken from a reprint which you can read in its entirety by clicking here. (Please note, the part of the speech I feel worst about is not discussed in this blog as I would prefer you read the speech in its entirety and come to your own conclusions, I just want to raise awareness)

***the speech Harper gave to a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the right-wing U.S. Council for National Policy, in which he spoke frankly about the aspirations and criticisms he holds for Canada

*Harper*
Ladies and gentlemen, let me begin by giving you a big welcome to Canada. Let's start up with a compliment. You're here from the second greatest nation on earth. But seriously, your country, and particularly your conservative movement, is a light and an inspiration to people in this country and across the world.

Considering the ugliness of US style conservative politics I wouldn't be caught dead calling something like that a light or inspiration unless your ultimate goal is to be lower than a snakebelly. It does, I will note, illustrate where the underpinnings of today's conservative strategy come from.

*Harper*
Now, having given you a compliment, let me also give you an insult. I was asked to speak about Canadian politics. It may not be true, but it's legendary that if you're like all Americans, you know almost nothing except for your own country. Which makes you probably knowledgeable about one more country than most Canadians.

I could leave you to make up your own mind about this one, however, it seems glaringly clear to me that while he claims he is insulting Americans, he quickly turns it to utter contempt for the intelligence of Canadians. Contempt seems to be a central theme with this man, after all, we are still in the intro to his speech here.

*Harper*
But in any case, my speech will make that assumption. I'll talk fairly basic stuff. If it seems pedestrian to some of you who do know a lot about Canada, I apologize.
I'm going to look at three things. First of all, just some basic facts about Canada that are relevant to my talk, facts about the country and its political system, its civics. Second, I want to take a look at the party system that's developed in Canada from a conventional left/right, or liberal/conservative perspective. The third thing I'm going to do is look at the political system again, because it can't be looked at in this country simply from the conventional perspective.

Just setup for a clear view of how much this man, who wants a majority government, hates Canadian things and holds the people of this nation in contempt. A level of contempt I still find shocking every single time I realize this man actually portrayed this view to an audience of foreign nationals.

*Harper*
First, facts about Canada. Canada is a Northern European welfare state in the worst sense of the term, and very proud of it. Canadians make no connection between the fact that they are a Northern European welfare state and the fact that we have very low economic growth, a standard of living substantially lower than yours, a massive brain drain of young professionals to your country, and double the unemployment rate of the United States.

Apparently we are nothing more than the worst of socialists and puzzling to Mr. Harper, we are proud we have compassion for our fellow citizens. For a man who has been bragging about the fantastic performance of our economy against all others, and taking the credit for policies put in place by Paul Martin, he sure seems to indicate only the US knows what they are doing. The first paragraph is just the first of many insults and apologies, he seems genuinely embarrassed we could never measure up to the greatness of our neighbour to the south.

*Harper*
In terms of the unemployed, of which we have over a million-and-a-half, don't feel particularly bad for many of these people. They don't feel bad about it themselves, as long as they're receiving generous social assistance and unemployment insurance.
That is beginning to change. There have been some significant changes in our fiscal policies and our social welfare policies in the last three or four years. But nevertheless, they're still very generous compared to your country.

This is certainly a sign of the compassion this man has. In his eyes we are lazy bums who can't wait to get rich living off the extrordinarily generous unemployment and welfare benefits. Here I have been donating food and money to local food banks and I was never told they aren't needed. To think I believed there was actual poverty in this country.

*Harper*
Let me just make a comment on language, which is so important in this country. I want to disabuse you of mis-impressions you may have. If you've read any of the official propagandas, you've come over the border and entered a bilingual country. In this particular city, Montreal, you may well get that impression. But this city is extremely atypical of this country.
While it is a French-speaking city -- largely -- it has an enormous English-speaking minority and a large number of what are called ethnics: they who are largely immigrant communities, but who politically and culturally tend to identify with the English community.
This is unusual, because the rest of the province of Quebec is, by and large, almost entirely French-speaking. The English minority present here in Montreal is quite exceptional.
Furthermore, the fact that this province is largely French-speaking, except for Montreal, is quite exceptional with regard to the rest of the country. Outside of Quebec, the total population of francophones, depending on how you measure it, is only three to five per cent of the population. The rest of Canada is English speaking.
Even more important, the French-speaking people outside of Quebec live almost exclusively in the adjacent areas, in northern New Brunswick and in Eastern Ontario.
The rest of Canada is almost entirely English speaking. Where I come from, Western Canada, the population of francophones ranges around one to two per cent in some cases. So it's basically an English-speaking country, just as English-speaking as, I would guess, the northern part of the United States.
But the important point is that Canada is not a bilingual country. It is a country with two languages. And there is a big difference.

It makes me wonder what impression the audience left with. That French is unimportant to anyone outside the province of Quebec? I would like Mr. Harper to defend the comments to Franco-Canadians outside the borders of Quebec but that wouldn't happen as apparently they are so unimportant they don't count. I'm close to positive he couldn't defend it inside Quebec. I guess he thinks his beloved Americans are stupid as well since he felt it imperative to explain to the denizens of the "great melting pot" what "ethnics" are. I wonder how that differs from those "very ethnics" his government has been wooing. In any event he continues on his theme of proving Canada and Canadians are more than worthy of any scorn that could be heaped upon us. ~ Then he continues...

*Harper*
As you may know, historically and especially presently, there's been a lot of political tension between these two major language groups, and between Quebec and the rest of Canada.
Let me take a moment for a humorous story. Now, I tell this with some trepidation, knowing that this is a largely Christian organization.
The National Citizens Coalition, by the way, is not. We're on the sort of libertarian side of the conservative spectrum. So I tell this joke with a little bit of trepidation. But nevertheless, this joke works with Canadian audiences of any kind, anywhere in Canada, both official languages, any kind of audience.
It's about a constitutional lawyer who dies and goes to heaven. There, he meets God and gets his questions answered about life. One of his questions is, "God, will this problem between Quebec and the rest of Canada ever be resolved?'' And God thinks very deeply about this, as God is wont to do. God replies, "Yes, but not in my lifetime.''
I'm glad to see you weren't offended by that. I've had the odd religious person who's been offended. I always tell them, "Don't be offended. The joke can't be taken seriously theologically. It is, after all, about a lawyer who goes to heaven.''
In any case. My apologies to Eugene Meyer of the Federalist Society.

Now a man who aspires to lead a majority governement in Canada should also aspire to bring Quebec closer rather than just write the whole thing off. He feigns disgust at everything Gilles Duceppe stands for, yet in these words he shows he could care less about a massive part of our population, those who call French their mother tongue. I'm not French, although I do live in Canada's only "official"  bilingual province, and I would think if francophones in this province were to read this they would go through the roof. He apologizes for the possibility of offending a "largely Christian audience" but has no problem offending a massive segment of the Canadian population and many non-francos like myself.

*Harper*
Second, the civics, Canada's civics.
On the surface, you can make a comparison between our political system and yours. We have an executive, we have two legislative houses, and we have a Supreme Court.
However, our executive is the Queen, who doesn't live here. Her representative is the Governor General, who is an appointed buddy of the Prime Minister.
Of our two legislative houses, the Senate, our upper house, is appointed, also by the Prime Minister, where he puts buddies, fundraisers and the like. So the Senate also is not very important in our political system.
And we have a Supreme Court, like yours, which, since we put a charter of rights in our constitution in 1982, is becoming increasingly arbitrary and important. It is also appointed by the Prime Minister. Unlike your Supreme Court, we have no ratification process.
So if you sort of remove three of the four elements, what you see is a system of checks and balances which quickly becomes a system that's described as unpaid checks and political imbalances.
What we have is the House of Commons. The House of Commons, the bastion of the Prime Minister's power, the body that selects the Prime Minister, is an elected body. I really emphasize this to you as an American group: It's not like your House of Representatives. Don't make that comparison.
What the House of Commons is really like is the United States electoral college. Imagine if the electoral college which selects your president once every four years were to continue sitting in Washington for the next four years. And imagine its having the same vote on every issue. That is how our political system operates.

To summarize, at least in my mind, Stephen Harper seems to be trying to point out the political system that had served us well for over a century is nothing but a dismal failure that is also a huge sham because the main point of governing in this country is to give all of your buddies and fundraisers jobs. He certainly stayed true to his word on that one anyway. Amazing how you can be so critical of something until the moment you have the power to change it, whereupon you use all of the tactics you derided to your utmost advantage. By this point if the word "hypocrite" hasn't creeped into your mind you will probably vote for this man.

*More setup from Harper*
In our election last Monday, the Liberal party won a majority of seats. The four opposition parties divided up the rest, with some very, very rough parity.
But the important thing to know is that this is how it will be until the Prime Minister calls the next election. The same majority vote on every issue. So if you ask me, "What's the vote going to be on gun control?'' or on the budget, we know already.
If any member of these political parties votes differently from his party on a particular issue, well, that will be national headline news. It's really hard to believe. If any one member votes differently, it will be national headline news. I voted differently at least once from my party, and it was national headline news. It's a very different system.
Our party system consists today of five parties. There was a remark made yesterday at your youth conference about the fact that parties come and go in Canada every year. This is rather deceptive. I've written considerably on this subject.
We had a two-party system from the founding of our country, in 1867. That two-party system began to break up in the period from 1911 to 1935. Ever since then, five political elements have come and gone. We've always had at least three parties. But even when parties come back, they're not really new. They're just an older party re-appearing under a different name and different circumstances.
Let me take a conventional look at these five parties. I'll describe them in terms that fit your own party system, the left/right kind of terms.

More or less setup for some more good ol' fashion down-home vitriol, I'm sure the audience at this point was feeling quite at home, their perverse view of all the wrongs of socialist Canada being confirmed by a man who wants you to give him absolute power. The next section will be of particular interest to NDP supporters.

*Harper*
Let's take the New Democratic Party, the NDP, which won 21 seats. The NDP could be described as basically a party of liberal Democrats, but it's actually worse than that, I have to say. And forgive me jesting again, but the NDP is kind of proof that the Devil lives and interferes in the affairs of men.
This party believes not just in large government and in massive redistributive programs, it's explicitly socialist. On social value issues, it believes the opposite on just about everything that anybody in this room believes. I think that's a pretty safe bet on all social-value kinds of questions.
Some people point out that there is a small element of clergy in the NDP. Yes, this is true. But these are clergy who, while very committed to the church, believe that it made a historic error in adopting Christian theology.
The NDP is also explicitly a branch of the Canadian Labour Congress, which is by far our largest labour group, and explicitly radical.
There are some moderate and conservative labour organizations. They don't belong to that particular organization.

One doesn't need to make much comment on this. He thinks you are evil communists however he would welcome your vote today. He actually seems to hate the NDP worse than liberals, however I'm sure both liberals and Catholics will be greatly interested to read his view of the liberal party and its supporters as follows.

*Harper*
The second party, the Liberal party, is by far the largest party. It won the election. It's also the only party that's competitive in all parts of the country. The Liberal party is our dominant party today, and has been for 100 years. It's governed almost all of the last hundred years, probably about 75 per cent of the time.
It's not what you would call conservative Democrat; I think that's a disappearing kind of breed. But it's certainly moderate Democrat, a type of Clinton-pragmatic Democrat. It's moved in the last few years very much to the right on fiscal and economic concerns, but still believes in government intrusion in the economy where possible, and does, in its majority, believe in fairly liberal social values.
In the last Parliament, it enacted comprehensive gun control, well beyond, I think, anything you have. Now we'll have a national firearms registration system, including all shotguns and rifles. Many other kinds of weapons have been banned. It believes in gay rights, although it's fairly cautious. It's put sexual orientation in the Human Rights Act and will let the courts do the rest.
There is an important caveat to its liberal social values. For historic reasons that I won't get into, the Liberal party gets the votes of most Catholics in the country, including many practising Catholics. It does have a significant Catholic, social-conservative element which occasionally disagrees with these kinds of policy directions. Although I caution you that even this Catholic social conservative element in the Liberal party is often quite liberal on economic issues.

So some of the bad things about liberals appear to be they think the right to own an arsenal of AK-47's is an idea best left south of the border, it seems clear to me the idea of gay rights is also a sore spot, even more so because it is an issue protected by the courts. This is important because, should you need to re-read one of the paragraphs above, Mr. Harper does not respect the makeup of the supreme court which could lead one to think he does not truly believe the highest arbitors of justice in the land are impartial in their rulings. I wonder if he got his views on Catholics from the results of the long form census he abolished. I fail to understand how religious affiliation should come into play, although history would suggest Mr. Harper seriously courts the vote of the religious right, much as republicans do in the US. A left leaning Christian would be of no value to him so under the bus go the Catholics of the country. The man loves to hate, if you aren't 100% in line with his view, you are wrong. The journey from this speech to a Prime Minister who for 5 years has proven he just cannot cooperate with anyone is complete. Opposition parties, civil servants, staffers, the media, citizens, and yes, even the world community which, of late, has taken a dimmer view of Canada, they are all wrong, only Stephen Harper knows what we want, what we need, and most of all, what we should be allowed to know.

It brings me no joy to show Progressive Conservatives he hates you also. You give the man the limited power he has and he thinks you're a bunch of pinko weaklings. If you are responsible for giving him a majority government you are going to find out you're just garbage like the rest of us. None of us understand what a horrible society we have when all we have to do is look south, to the kind of utopian society Stephen Harper wants for you. Stephen Harper is very much a Bush Republican. Maybe his own words will open your eyes. Maybe not. You should know his thoughts on progressive conservatives, so here, in his own words, is his assessment of the ideals you've held dear your entire life.

*Harper*
Then there is the Progressive Conservative party, the PC party, which won only 20 seats. Now, the term Progressive Conservative will immediately raise suspicions in all of your minds. It should. It's obviously kind of an oxymoron. But actually, its origin is not progressive in the modern sense. The origin of the term "progressive'' in the name stems from the Progressive Movement in the 1920s, which was similar to that in your own country.
But the Progressive Conservative is very definitely liberal Republican. These are people who are moderately conservative on economic matters, and in the past have been moderately liberal, even sometimes quite liberal on social policy matters.
In fact, before the Reform Party really became a force in the late '80s, early '90s, the leadership of the Conservative party was running the largest deficits in Canadian history. They were in favour of gay rights officially, officially for abortion on demand. Officially -- what else can I say about them? Officially for the entrenchment of our universal, collectivized, health-care system and multicultural policies in the constitution of the country.
At the leadership level anyway, this was a pretty liberal group. This explains one of the reasons why the Reform party has become such a power.
The Reform party is much closer to what you would call conservative Republican, which I'll get to in a minute.

You can clearly see all of the horrible traits you progressive conservatives have. Spending more money than anyone but Stephen Harper, you also think gays are people, you are mostly against the idea of botched illegal abortions putting the lives of the women you know in danger, and worst of all you believe in medicare. Yes, medicare, greatest of all evils, responsible for insurance companies only making billions in profits when they could be raking in trillions and denying your claim if you get more than a routine illness. His admiration for a system that turns away a significant portion of the population for the crime of being poor, in my opinion, does not seem to align itself with the ideas of the people of a country that considers medicare its most sacred trust.

Next, he goes easy on the bloc, mainly by dismissing them. The people of Quebec should be interested to know if they can't learn to vote properly, they just don't count.

*Harper*
The Bloc Quebecois, which I won't spend much time on, is a strictly Quebec party, strictly among the French-speaking people of Quebec. It is an ethnic separatist party that seeks to make Quebec an independent, sovereign nation.
By and large, the Bloc Quebecois is centre-left in its approach. However, it is primarily an ethnic coalition. It's always had diverse elements. It does have an element that is more on the right of the political spectrum, but that's definitely a minority element.

I hadn't realized until now the liberal use of the word coalition by Stephen Harper over the years. He's like a kid who learned a word people are somewhat mystified at and he likes to use it as often as possible so as to appear impressively intelligent.

Next he espouses his opinion on the Reform Party. I wonder how many of their followers still vote for the conservative party thinking it represents what they stand for. Sorry reformers, you may get some lovin' here, moreso than the others, but you lily-livered wimps didn't have the guts to go far enough. You may call yourselves Christians but you failed to spread the message it is your values and yours only everyone should adhere to. For the record I defer to Stephen Harper for his own words.

*Harper*
Let me say a little bit about the Reform party because I want you to be very clear on what the Reform party is and is not.
The Reform party, although described by many of its members, and most of the media, as conservative, and conservative in the American sense, actually describes itself as populist. And that's the term its leader, Preston Manning, uses.
This term is not without significance. The Reform party does stand for direct democracy, which of course many American conservatives do, but also it sees itself as coming from a long tradition of populist parties of Western Canada, not all of which have been conservative.
It also is populist in the very real sense, if I can make American analogies to it -- populist in the sense that the term is sometimes used with Ross Perot.
The Reform party is very much a leader-driven party. It's much more a real party than Mr. Perot's party -- by the way, it existed before Mr. Perot's party. But it's very much leader-driven, very much organized as a personal political vehicle. Although it has much more of a real organization than Mr. Perot does.
But the Reform party only exists federally. It doesn't exist at the provincial level here in Canada. It really exists only because Mr. Manning is pursuing the position of prime minister. It doesn't have a broader political mandate than that yet. Most of its members feel it should, and, in their minds, actually it does.
It also has some Buchananist tendencies. I know there are probably many admirers of Mr. Buchanan here, but I mean that in the sense that there are some anti-market elements in the Reform Party. So far, they haven't been that important, because Mr. Manning is, himself, a fairly orthodox economic conservative.
The predecessor of the Reform party, the Social Credit party, was very much like this. Believing in funny money and control of banking, and a whole bunch of fairly non-conservative economic things.
So there are some non-conservative tendencies in the Reform party, but, that said, the party is clearly the most economically conservative party in the country. It's the closest thing we have to a neo-conservative party in that sense.
It's also the most conservative socially, but it's not a theo-con party, to use the term. The Reform party does favour the use of referendums and free votes in Parliament on moral issues and social issues.
The party is led by Preston Manning, who is a committed, evangelical Christian. And the party in recent years has made some reference to family values and to family priorities. It has some policies that are definitely social-conservative, but it's not explicitly so.
Many members are not, the party officially is not, and, frankly, the party has had a great deal of trouble when it's tried to tackle those issues.
Last year, when we had the Liberal government putting the protection of sexual orientation in our Human Rights Act, the Reform Party was opposed to that, but made a terrible mess of the debate. In fact, discredited itself on that issue, not just with the conventional liberal media, but even with many social conservatives by the manner in which it mishandled that.
So the social conservative element exists. Mr. Manning is a Christian, as are most of the party's senior people. But it's not officially part of the party. The party hasn't quite come to terms with how that fits into it.
That's the conventional analysis of the party system.

I'm unsure what others may read into Mr. Harper's "conventional analysis", I can only tell you what I got out of it and leave you to make your own conclusions. What I got from all of the above is the impression the real Stephen Harper, if given the all consuming power a majority government would proffer, would institute policies somewhere to the far right of the tea party. He doesn't care what your previous version of Canada was, he doesn't like it and has every intention of moulding this country in the image of the deterioriating society we see to the south of us.

Since it wasn't my intention to write a book, I won't continue with more of what he said, although I will say in my opinion it gets worse, much worse and I will provide the link once again so you can read the text of the entire speech for yourself. Then ask yourself if you believe this is the man who should run our country.

Your vote is up to you. Please use it.

For the complete speech, including the last half which completely turned me against this man and his narrow ideals, please visit this link.

Many thanks to thetyee.ca for reprinting this eye opening speech. A must read for any Canadians who haven't been insulted yet.
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