Breaking news: Ottawa’s Mayor, Larry O’Brien, has just been found NOT GUILTY of ‘influence peddling’ charges!
Of course, many voices have been screaming that this whole mess has been lawfare. And, many people will now want to know why has the operation of the City of Ottawa been so seriously disrupted on a bunch of trumped up, unsubstantiated rumours.
As news stories on this appear, I’ll add links to this post to them.
What interesting times we live in!
Tonight, Lisa MacLeod – the newly named Finance critic in Tim Hudak’s shadow cabinet – hosted a meet-and-greet with Tim Hudak.
It was very lovely. Truly.
And while I spent most of my time talking with other attendees – especially with fellow immigrants to Canada – about our negative experiences with official Apartheid Multiculturalism policies (the latest honour dishonour killings made people – and not just us, immigrants – very, very angry), I did get to exchange a word or two with a few of the celebs there.
It’s been a very long day – and my stamina is still very low – so this will have to be a very brief post. Yet, these little bits are well worth mentioning!
Mr. Pierre Poilievre was there and we exchanged a few words about the latest lawfare suit launched by one of ‘The Sock Puppets’ against Ezra Levant. (Aside: Wednesday, July 29th 2009, there will be an online fundraiser for Mr.Levant’s defense fund at Mark Steyn’s online store . He is fighting this battle for all of us! Thanks to BCF and 5’ofF for the tip!)
Then, I had a little chat with Lisa MacLeod, my host. She was, well, to put it mildly, not impressed with what I have written about her in the past. I can’t say I’m surprised, or that I blame her! What can I say – she makes very lousy 1st impressions…which I did mention, unless I am much mistaken…
I must say that her reaction surprised me a little. I was expecting her to be most upset by my criticism of her conduct as a politician…which we went into, very briefly. Yes, the tention in the air was, as they say, palpable.
Still, it was my criticism of her parenting that really, really upset her. I must admit, I was not willing to back down – I write what I see, as I see it; no more, no less and I asked her if what I wrote was incorrect. This seemed to upset Ms. MacLeod: the anger seemed to dissipate and be replaced by a different kind of ‘upset’. That is good: it showed me that beneath the ‘thick-skinned politician’ veneer (which I was so turned off by), there may be a truly genuine person who cares about the important things in life!
At this point, Ms. MacLeod excused herself and went to watch her daughter play at the nearby playstructure.
Now, I am thinking that I may have been too quick to judge her: that I fell for the image she tries to project (not one I would advise projecting) and failed to see the person behind it. If she convinces me I was wrong about her, I’ll write about it.
IF she convinces me!
In my last post, I voiced the opinion that the whole non-story of ‘what Prime Minister Steven Harper ‘ought to have done’ when, during a Roman Catholic funeral mass, a priest approached him where he was sitting in the front pew of the church and stuck a Communion Wafer into the surprised Prime Minister’s hand’ might have actually increased the PM’s popularity.
Since that post, several people from outside of Canada (some Roman Catholic themselves) expressed a surprise that this would ever become a news event, much less one which dominated headlines for over a week. Following is my reply (and can be seen in the comments) as to how and why this non-story got the press coverage it did:
The whole ‘broo-ha-ha’ – in my never-humble-opinion – started because the RC church was trying to deflect attention from yet another child molestation scandal within The Church. The news of the scandal broke the same day as the RC clerics started screeching ‘damn the sinner – he offended our religion!!!!’ against the PM. I think they wanted to minimize the news coverage of the pedophilia arrests charges laid against some RC priests just then.
The ‘MSM’ news these days has very clear ‘slots’: this ‘slot’ for ‘human interest’, that one for ‘scandal’, a little bit on ‘business’, and so on. If The Church succeeded in making the ‘PM snubs Roman Catholics’ THE scandal of the day, then there would be minimal coverage of their own scandal. The ‘main slot’ would already be filled… AND – they succeeded!
The news-people do not like this PM – he does not treat them as ‘insiders with special privileges’…. so, they are offended that he thinks they are not better than other people – which they DO think they are!
After all, they have ‘access to power’!!!! At least, they HAD access to power….. until this ‘newcomer’ PM refused to treat them as royalty. Who did he think he was? They were here longer than he – they KNEW ‘the ropes’! And he refused to bow down to them?!?!? Let them ‘take him under their wing’ and ‘show him how to get things done’?!?!? In exchange for ‘inside info’, of course… (and free spots at expensive dinners, and other ‘perks’ they became accustomed to by the previous corrupt government, in exchange for not writing up the worst of the scandals….)
How dare he!!!
As a result, the vast majority (with exceptions, of course) of journalists – especially political ones – feel slighted by him and do their best to snub him back, put him down, make even positive things he does – even the ones they themselves like – surrounded by so many ‘backhanded compliments’ that despite the positive story, they make him look bad. Or, they try to!
The political opposition – well, they would really, really like something to attack him for. But… for all his faults (and he has those, of course), deep down, Steven Harper is a very honest man and he expects honest behaviour from his ministers. So, there is actually very little that he can be attacked for by the opposition politicians!
His opponents have believed that Steven Harper’s support came from the ‘religious right’. So, they thought any story which could be spun that he is ‘not sensitive’ to religion or religious people would erode his main support base.
I think that they miscalculated!
Most religious people – including Roman Catholics – shared YOUR reaction. The attack has backfired on BOTH the RC church AND the PM’s opponents!
Still, this was not really ‘about’ the Communion Host: it was cheap politicking! And that, I suspect, is ‘universal’….
Perhaps this is obvious to everyone, perhaps it has been written about and I have missed it…
Did the ‘Communion scandal‘ actually improved Prime Minister Harper‘s image? Is that, at least partially, why the polls are saying his popularity is up by 7 points (as per Angus Reid poll, reported on CFRA today)?
Let me explain my reasoning…
Steven Harper is a lot of things: an awesome economist (and, in these turbulent times, most of us prefer to have an economist rather than a lawyer or an academic without any experience outside the College campus.). That is a big plus for Mr. Harper.
But, his political opponents have always successfully exploited the fact that, for ever, Steven Harper will be associated (in the minds of most urban Canadians, especially those in Ontario and Quebec) with the ‘Evangelical’ taint his Reform Party past brings. Rightly or wrongly, the Reform Party could not shake the kind of ‘Sarah Palin-type- thingy’ (please excuse the technical jargon…): right on so many things, but, kind of scary when it comes to ‘faith issues’….
In some places, politicians are ‘expected’ to be ‘religious’: it ‘proves’ to the ‘little people’ that they are ‘humble’ and ‘pious’…. This is still true of ‘US conservatives’ – at least, this is more true of them than any other Western ‘group’.
Why these ought to be good qualities in a political leader, I don’t know!
As a matter of fact, I seriously question whether people who are willing to put religious faith above facts and reason – and, especially above the will of voters – ought to be in any positions of power whatsoever. After all, I would like the laws governing my country to be reasonable – not faith based!
Here, it is important to note that this ‘faith’ could be religious or ideological – it does not make an iota of difference in the practical impact of ‘faith-based’ laws on our society!
Though Canadians are very poor in recognizing ‘ideological faith, we are very sensitive to ‘religious faith’. Therefore, any suggestions that a politician might be so religious as to obey the tenets of his religion over the will of his constituents when drafting laws and policies harms that politician. It makes it very unlikely that he/she would get a majority, because the large urban areas will not take what they perceive as that big a risk.
And, more and more Canadians are aware of just how many religious leaders abuse their power. This is not specific to any one faith – one could easily find examples of abuse from just about every religious sect. Rather, more and more people suspect that the fault lies in allowing any man or woman to exercise power over another, using spirituality as the ultimate weapon: obey, submit, behave this way and believe this dogma – or you will suffer eternal torture…
That is why most organized religions in Canada are loosing members: dogmatization of spirituality is becoming more and more unacceptable to urbanized, mainstream Canadians! And that includes Canadians of all political bends…
When the Roman Catholic Church said that priests ought to deny ‘Communion’ to any politician who does not vote to ban abortion, there was a serious backlash against the Roman Catholic Church. This was widely understood to be ‘spiritual blackmail’ of the politician: threatening him/her with eternal damnation of his’her soul UNLESS he/she placed the Papist dogma above the will of their constituents!
The ‘little ‘l’ liberal’ Canadians are loath of any erosion in the ‘secularity’ of our laws: they will never support a politician whom they suspect of having a religious agenda!
Perhaps not surprisingly, there are more and more ‘non-religious’ ‘little ‘c’ conservatives. People who do support many core conservative values, but who are very uncomfortable with the ‘religious’ component of today’s Conservative movement. Very, very, very uncomfortable!
Just remember John Tory!
Steven Harper – with all his good and bad points – had a problem shaking the ‘religious’ image of the old Reform Party. And his political opponents exploited it very, very skilfully.
Now, to this ‘Communion scandal’:
Some Roman Catholic Cleric attacked Steven Harper for his conduct during a Catholic funeral mass which Steven Harper attended. It would appear that the priest walked up to the people sitting in on the benches in the church. Steven Harper offered him a hand for a handshake – that is what politicians do, they shake hands as a symbol of greeting or acceptance or a number of other things.
The priest, instead of shaking the offered hand, stuck a communion wafer in it.
Now, the PM was ‘damned if he did/damned if he did not’ do just about anything.
Had he rejected the wafer and tried to give it back to the priest, he would be committing a grave offense: he would be ‘rejecting Jesus himself’!
Had he tried to minimize damage by pocketing the damned thing and giving it back to the priest later, he would create horrible offense: one does not ‘stick Jesus in a pocket’!
And, had he committed ritual cannibalism and eaten the ‘literal flesh of Christ’ – as Roman Catholics believe they are doing when they consume a Communion Wafer – he would be giving great offense because non-Roman Catholic Christians are not allowed the salvation which eating the flesh of a dead guy is supposed to bring, according to the RC dogma.
The PM took the latest option. And, was immediately attacked for not being a fine young cannibal! A bunch of RC clerics attacked him, for ‘offending their faith’ – while not saying a peep about the latest child sex-abuse scandal in the Roman Catholic Church became public that day!
Steven Harper’s political opponents – seeing an opening to attack – made the most of the story. The one about the PM accepting a communion wafer – not the one about more RC priest pedophiles. They ‘shouted it from the rooftops’! They got it into all kinds of papers, so no Canadian could remain unaware that Steven Harper is insensitive to religion!
Wait a minute!
Steven Harper was trying to shake the ‘he’s too easily influenced by religion’ image – especially among the urban folk. And now, his opponents are announcing to everyone that Steven Harper is not religious enough???
What an effective way to allay those fears of people who liked him, but worried he might be a religious freak! He’s just a normal guy, after all!
No wonder that Steven Harper’s popularity went up!
How many ways are there of saying: NOT GOOD! NOT GOOD! NOT GOOD!
Just Right has the story – with the video:
Sneaking it in under cover of a defense authorization bill with debate scheduled for the wee hours of the morning the Democrats succeeded in passing sweeping new federal hate crimes legislation.
Just as the ‘general awareness’ of this intrusive oppression is rising in Canada, Americans are going to be blindsided by it!
Of course, the majority of Americans will remain oblivious to the danger, thinking their constitution will protect them and their rights… till one of these neo-fascists smiles primly at them, explaining that ‘Freedom of speech is not an American concept’…or some such thing.
They’ll never believe it could happen to them – even though it already has!
Ayayayayay!
Yes, this is more ranting about what is happening in Ottawa… so many eyes will glaze over and click over to another, more ‘global’ post elsewhere…
BUT…
This is more than just ‘local politics’.
If one follows the proverbial ‘money’, it becomes clear that this show trial is less about the figures involved (as fun as it is to pull them apart) and more about – labour unions.
Because it was the labour unions who had declared a war on this rookie Mayor – a successful hi-tech business guy – for winning on a platform to ‘reign in the unions’… And the unions all around the country are watching the legal precedent this sets!
Does this seem far fetched?
Let’s connect the dots….
I’ll intentionally strip out the details, to reduce the ‘noise’ and make the facts stand out.
The Union of Unions laid the complaint….few months into the 4-year-Mayoral term.
The police (belonging to the Union of Unions) investigated the complaint….for over a year.
The civil servants (belonging to the Union of Unions) decided to lay charges….against the advice of their own prosecuting attorneys, none of which would take the case.
The civil servants (belonging to the Union of Unions) scheduled the trial a year later: for a time when most of the city union contracts are up for renewal…coincidence? Really?
During the Mayor’s leave of absence – for the trial – the city unions (belonging to the Union of Unions) negotiate ‘new contracts’ which are much more generous (money and control) to them than could ever happen if the Mayor were in his chair…..and even gave back concessions the Mayor had won earlier, when he refused to give in to a winter bus-strike.
By now, the Mayor has effectively been crippled by this lawfare for most of his term in office…and the next race has already begun!
Whether the Mayor is found guilty or innocent, it seems to me that the Union of Unions – the Canadian Labour Congress and its constituents and minions – have already won!
The end…
…of a lot of things!
This rant is a follow up to my State is Mother, State is Father… and Why young kids should not be ‘institutionalized’.
Why the rant?
There are many motives for doing this: McGuinty’s announcement said that he would begin implementing this program in areas where school enrolement was falling, and in economically depressed areas.
In other words: Canadians are having fewer children, so the school enrollment is falling. That means fewer jobs for teachers – like the premier’s wife! So, he is doing something about it: if you have fewer children going to school, then to keep the number of teaching jobs up (or even raise it), you must increase the number of hours the kids are kept there!
This is a make-work-for-teachers program! Nothing more!
The kids are just pawns!
What will be the impact on our society? It will make it more and more difficult for parents to look after their children themselves… It will be another nail in the coffin of the ‘nuclear family’!
Please, consider the following:
Our tax system penalizes families which choose to have one parent stay at home to raise their kids. These families are taxed at a much higher rate than those who choose to use daycare (the cost of which is, in many cases, also subsidized from taxpayer dollars).
In order to make ends meet, many young mothers (it is mostly mothers) who choose to stay home to raise their young children will start a small, home-based daycare. They’ll take in two or three other kids, pick them up from the schoolbus and care for them after school in their home. I have seen these home based daycares – several of them.
They are loving homes and, in most cases, the care-giver and the child develop strong bonds. This is good: small, home-based daycares mimic the ‘extended family’ scenario in which children have traditionally grown up and which, in my never-humble-opinion, is the best social setting for the healthy social growth of a young child.
What will happen under the newly proposed McGuinty plan?
McGuinty will have destroyed thousands of small, women-run business!
McGuinty will take away their jobs and give them to the teachers!
Because now, parents will not pay a neighbour or a friend to look after their child: it will be cheaper and more ‘convenient’ to just put them into school for 10.5 hours! And the taxpayers will pay for it all – so, why not?
And the women whose daycare income (now gone) used to allow them to stay at home will have to pay higher taxes, to pay the salaries of teachers (who get paid much, much more per hour than the caregiver was) who stole her job from her!!!
These women will be forced to work outside of home to make ends meet….and their own children will end up in the educational institution as well…because they will no longer be able to afford to look after them themselves.
In one punch, McGuinty has destroyed the ability of many parents to raise their kids themselves by depriving them of income and raising their taxes all at once!
People do not get rich running small, home-based daycares! Their income is pretty low – just enough to let them ‘make ends meet’, so they CAN raise their children themselves, with the love their children deserve!
Taking away from low-income women and giving to the fat-cat unions! That is ‘education – McGuinty style’!
Yes – it’s true!
I JUST MIGHT!!!
OK – I am suspending my rant against institutionalizing young children, in order to comment on something WAY OVER THE TOP!!!
Yesterday, our Conservative Ministers of Justice (!) and Public Safety (Rob Nicholson and Peter Van Loan, respectively) have announced sweeping new legislation which would give police the power to snoop on all internet traffic – and the identity of people on the net – WITHOUT A WARRANT!!!
From The Canadian Press:
The proposed legislation would:
-enable police to access information on an Internet subscriber, such as name, street address and email address, without having to get a search warrant.
-force Internet service providers to freeze data on their hard drives to prevent subscribers under investigation from deleting potentially important evidence.
-require telecommunications companies to invest in technology that allows for the interception of Internet communications.
-allow police to remotely activate tracking devices already embedded in cellphones and certain cars, to help with investigations.
-allow police to obtain data about where Internet communications are coming from and going to.
-make it a crime to arrange with a second person over the Internet the sexual exploitation of a child.
Did you notice that???
They ‘tack on’ the last one – protecting children from sexual exploitation – on to a whole set of really, really oppressive things. This way, if anyone speaks up against it – they can SMEAR him/her by saying he/she does not want to ‘protect our children’!
I don’t even know where to begin my rant!!!
Do I start with the oppressive police-powers, or do I start with how the issue was intentionally manipulated, using our children’s well-being as a guise to strip us of our rights!!!
OK, I am a ‘little’ angry.
And I think I am right to be angry! And every Canadian ought to be bloody angry about this, too!!!
The Harper government has repeatedly failed to reign in the Stalinist HRCs – which have now been shown to be staffed with political activists, religious extremists and corrupt ex-police officers, and which are trampling on REAL human rights in this country!
It is frightening that the federal Conservative Finance Minister’s wife, Christine Elliot, is running for the leadership of the Ontario Provincial Conservative Party leadership: this kind of ‘political dynasties’ are bad for everyone….and I cannot believe that Conservatives (I am a ‘little ‘c’ conservative – so it is not my place to do so), in Ontario AND federally, have not caused major fuss about this. But, her stand on the HRCs is truly frightening: it is not’ politically expedient’ to reign them in – and the people be damned…this is about ME getting elected!!!
Now, it appears that her shalowness and political opportunism are a reflection of her husband’s federal Conservative policy… and THAT explains why the HRCs are allowed to rattle their sabres and continue to persecute anyone who dares to speak up against them!!!
SHAME, SHAME, SHAME, SHAME!!!
But, even worse, now federal CONSERVATIVES(!) are planning to pass LAWS which would make it easier for the HRCs to abuse people who have committed thought crime – and will give such corrupting power to the police forces, too!
I don’t even know what is happening any more…
How could they?!?!?
Has Ezra’s lesson not sunk in?!?!?
How DARE they?!?!?
This is one lesson that if we wait until after we have learned what it means, it will be too late to ‘undo’ it!!!
What the (insert expletive of your choice) is going on?!?!?
Will I be forced to vote Liberal?
Damn them all!
Friday, 19th of June, 2009 – at 8 pm Eastern Daylight Savings Time (i.e. GMT-4), my friend, Juggernaut, will be hosting a live BlogTV session: learning about and discussing the differences between Canadian and American (as in, USAmerican) systems on such various issues as healthcare, education and other ‘public’ policies.
Juggernaut will be hosting: everyone can join, either by signing up or by participating as a guest.
The link: http://www.blogtv.com/People/TheJuggernauts
I’ll be there – if you would like to add to the discussion, please, join us!
My dog loves the sofa. He also loves blankets.
He absolutely relishes sleeping on the sofa – and this is one dog that has elevated ‘sleeping’ into an art form. Really – I have known many dogs, and owned a few, but I have never met a dog who relishes sleep like this crazy canine does!
Also, he does not like strangers to sit on his the sofa. He’ll watch to see if the person gets up for some reason – even for a moment, sneak in behind them, steal the spot and immediately start pretending that he’s asleep, has been asleep in that spot for a very long time, and why is everyone getting all worked up about this?
He also loves to steal blankets: and has been known to quietly grab a corner and, slowly but steadily, sneak off with the blanket of an unwary person lying down on the sofa, watching TV late at night.
When my son and I came home Monday, he greeted us with great enthusiasm. He slithered off the sofa, stretched slowly and thoroughly, and wandered over to the front hallway to greet us. Honestly – this passes as ‘enthusiastic’ from him: sometimes, he just lifts his head off the sofa’s arm-rest and wags his tail a tiny bit to show he’s noticed you came in.
So, today’s was an enthusiastic greeting! Then, after he followed me to the kitchen and stopped in front of the fridge, hoping that his beautiful brown eyes would hypnotize me to give him a pepperette, when – suddenly and visibly – a though struck him.
Quite suddenly, he abandoned begging communicating and, with unusual swiftness, he ran to the living room. OK, we knew when we adopted him that he was ‘special’ and, though incredibly good natured, he was no border collie in the brain department – so I thought nothing of it.
Later, when I came into the living room, I noticed that he was not lying down on the sofa, but on a chair. And he was not really lying down in his usual way… instead, he was more ‘splayed’: all four paws spread as far apart as possible, his centre of gravity as low as he could get it. His head was not resting, but just slightly elevated in a high-strung sort of way. And his eyes…
His eyes were priceless! They were ‘big’ – his ‘vigilant look’ (well, as vigilant as he gets) – with lots of ‘white’ showing. And they were flashing, side to side – in a particularly self-pleased way!
Had his behaviour not been so ‘obvious’, I would not have looked around too closely to see what he was doing. But, his very demeanour gave away that he was ‘being tricky’: that he had ‘done’ something naughty and thought he was getting away with it!
It turns out that my son – in a fit of insomnia – brought his blanket down, watched some TV, then forgot his blanket on the chair. The dog knows ‘bed blankets’ are off limits to him: but this blanket was not on a bed, was it? So he lay down on it, spread his body as wide as possible to hide the fact that he was indeed occuppying a ‘bed blenket’ which was currently ‘not a bed blanket’… The dog was very, very pleased with himself!
So, what does this story have to do with my post today?
Yes, it was a bit of a long segway, and this story took me a few days to write up, but…
Monday, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty made an announcement. Some person whose makes his living ‘educating children’ released a report today, saying that ‘children need more educating’!
Why, that is almost as convincing as a ‘Cure-all’ salesman saying this potion in this here bottle will ‘cure all’!!! Better buy a few!!!
And, Mr. McGuinty, he is so concerned about the welfare of children, he’ll have to do what is best for all of the children! (Will somebody please shut up the parents of those pesky Autistic kids? They’re not even photogenic: no photo-ops from that lot!)
As I was saying: Mr. McGuinty, he is so caring, he only wants what is best for the children! And since that report by a guy who gets rich by sticking EVERY child into a ‘one-size-fits-all’ ‘institutions of teaching’, that is exactly what this kind and caring man announced he would do!!!
Aside: make no mistake! Our public schools are ‘institutions of teaching’, NOT ‘institutions of learning’!!! They are centered around the needs and desires of teachers, whose powerful union regularly holds the whole population hostage by refusing to ‘teach’ unless it is ‘on their terms’ – ONLY! Therefore, schedules, methodology, material and just about every aspect of ‘teaching’ you can name is tailored to suit the comfort of teachers. Students, who have no union to represent them, are just pawns to be cycled through the system – a pesky annoyance to be minimized and with which the teachers have to put up with as a minor part of this ‘education system’…
So, what is it that this caring, loving man (who is reportedly married to a teachers’ union activist) proposing to do???
He wants to institutionalize our children for 10.5 hours a day, 5-days per week, 50 weeks per year, from toddlerhood on!!!
Of course, the words he used to make his announcement were not as direct as my statement of it is – but the meaning is identical. His version is all about ‘what is best for the children’! And he has that ‘study’ (by a guy who, among others, will have an increased revenue stream if McGuinty institutes) this to back him up!
Here is the video – I invite you to watch the body language:
Did you notice it?
The way he shifts his eyes, the way he enunciates certain words, the way he uses his whole body to help him spit out some ‘concepts’?
It’s that SAME body language my not-so-bright (but way more lovable than McGuinty) dog used when he was trying to ‘pull one over’!
This sent me ‘looking for’ what it is that is ‘the loophole’ here: what is this man ‘pulling over’ on us?
I’ll rant more on this tomorrow….
Xanthippa's Chamberpot 