Stable
Government

Spiteful Stevie Hard at Work
         - - shoveling the SH*T!

Everytime I have the unpleasant experience of seeing and hearing King Stevie Spiteful or the HarperCon Caucus members occasionally allowed to speak in public, such as Beverly "Odious" Oda, Guy Giorno, the closet racist Jason Kenny, or any of the other pre-programmed PsuedoCons spouting the endlessly repeated call to give the fascist HarperCons their long desired majority in the name of "stable" government, I gag in my throat. But, I must admit I can't help but picture in my pea brain the image of Stephen himself doing most likely a poor job of shoveling horseshit out of a stable somewhere on the outskirts of Calgary, his adopted home away from Taranna.

Most of the HarperCon candidates operate in a "stealth" fashion, avoiding all but the most choreographed public appearances in friendly "pre-screened" situations. Those who are allowed off the reservation to "speak" in public seem to only repeat the same tape loop of repetitive and repeated talking points about stable government, evul coalitions and fiscal management - none of which make any sense upon any kind of sane consideration. Surprisingly Glow Ball's new anchor, Dawna Freisen made great efforts to knock Steve off his pre-recorded comments, to little avail, but I did manage to tear myself away from the hockey game long enough to also notice this slip pointed out by Boris West End Bob, over at the Galloping Beaver in Too Bad It's a Holiday and Hockey Playoff Season.

....or more people might have tuned in to Dawna Friesen's "One on One" interview with stevie this evening.

Basically, she ripped him a new one and he didn't look at all comfortable about it. Note how he says "The platform we're not running on is real" at the 4:15 mark.

Since Kevin Newman left "Global National" I had been withholding judgment on Ms. Friesen's creds, but she outdid her MSM colleagues on this one.

Good job . . . .

That accidental and quite possibly truthful statement (the part I bolded) caught my ear too. I decided it wasn't so much a "mistake" as an attempt to actually be truthful, but confusing and confabulating at the same time. Or just an accidental true statement, a rarity in a campaign of the endlessly repeated Big Lie! Generally all one sees or hears from the Canadian Taliban is pre-recorded and re-played drivel in front of pre-screened and politically correct chosen and orchestrated audience.



Those whose mind turns to cheese trying to keep track of the lies would be well advised to refresh their memories with Scandals, Conservative Party of Canada. 2006-2011 (Always under construction) over at the Exile.

It's always under construction but go there for more info and links to background on the subject headings, headings such as: (just SOME of the topics)


Prorogation
the In and Out Scandal
Milliken Contempt Rulings
Withholding Information from Parliament
Bev Oda
Julie Colliard/Maxim Bernier
Raffer and Helena
Afghan Detainee Documents
Bruce Carson
Muzzling of Environment Canada scientists
End of the Mandatory Long-Form Census
General anti-democratic behaviour
Defunding of organizations for ideological reasons
Dimitri Soudas – The


How anyone who checked out the subjects above and gave it all some thought could believe that somehow a Stable Harper Majority would be a good thing for Canadians and vote thusly is beyond my ken. One third of Canadians or slightly more than twenty percent of eligible voters support the HarperCon agenda, but their coalition is working, or has been for five years now.

We're Still Allowed
to Dream

Preview of 2011 Stanley Cup Final?

Here we are halfway through April and an all Canadian Stanley Cup final is still within the realm of possibility. On Wednesday the Canucks shut out the defending Champs and recent Canuck nemesis the Chicago Blackhawks 2-0. The next night the Habs defeated the higher seeded and long time rival Boston Bruins by the same score. So going into tonights game the score stands at Canada 4 and non Canadian Original Six teams ZERO. What better way to follow a Canadian Men's Hockey Gold than with a Canadian East West Stanley Cup final.

Continuing with a different kind of dream.

The Nightmares of Susan Heyes

Susan Heyes who had her business on Cambie almost completely destroyed by the lying collusion of all levels of government and the builders of the RAV line is going back to court, the big court. After winning an almost pyrrhic victory in BC Supreme Court, a settlement that barely covered some of her losses after paying the ridiculous cost of pursuing justice in British Columbia, Susan was dismayed to have that decision overturned by the Appeal Court and is now faced with having to return the already awarded (and disbursed) settlement. I received, along with many other folks, the following letter this morning.

April 15th, 2011

Susan Heyes files Leave to Appeal to Supreme Court of Canada
as a Self-represented Litigant

Is justice only available to the rich and powerful?

I have just filed for leave to Appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada as a self represented litigant.

Contributions can be made to the Susan Heyes Legal Defence fund : Royal Bank – account # 07200 – 5076666

I have no means to pay further huge legal fees to take this case to the Supreme Court of Canada, but as a citizen and a small business owner, I can’t afford not to. This is an issue of national importance with the potential to impact any small business in Canada.

The ruling of the BC Appeals Court, if not overturned, would mean that any small business in Canada in the path of a mega-project could suffer severe financial hardship or bankruptcy, without any legal obligation to tell the truth or to provide restitution, on the part of those responsible.

In this case of the P3 model for the Canada Line, this project has even been provided with the powers and funding of every level of government, to profit at the expense of the small businesses. This is unjust and unfair.

I began this fight for justice and compensation six years ago. I have mortgaged my home twice to keep my business viable. $300,000 of the $600,000 award plus costs, was paid out in legal fees, leaving me with a fraction of my actual losses to invest back into my business.

The Canada Line consortium, with assets over $13 billion, expects Hazel & Co to repay the entire $600,000 award, including the already paid legal fees. However, the lawyers for Canada Line apparently suggested that they might be prepared to waive some or all of the recovery of all moneys paid to Susan Heyes Inc. if no Leave to Appeal Application to the Supreme Court of Canada was filed.

Faced with another massive legal bill, and considering this financial inducement, the incentive for stopping any further legal action is compelling. But so is my determination for justice to prevail, and for this issue of national importance to be fully heard, and rectified.

I welcome financial assistance to continue this challenge.

If the several years of catastrophic business losses caused by the secretive, non-compliant cut and cover construction of the Canada Line is not considered severe, unreasonable, intolerable - and merits compensation - what process, what length of time and what degree of harm is?

The Supreme Court of Canada will be asked to consider the balance of fairness in the shared burden of costs and the shared benefits, as they relate to all participants in this landmark case, and that leave is being brought forward by Susan Heyes as a self-represented litigant, at great expense.


Susan Heyes
HAZEL&CO
4280 Main Street
Vancouver, BC
V5V 3P9

604 687-0721 w
604 551-8852 c

I can't help but reflect on how much the consortium's attempt (in the part I bolded -kc), undoubtably with the implied if not explicit support of government, to buy Susan off with the offer to not pursue remedy if she were to choose to not appeal to the Supreme Court, reeks of business as usual in the banana republic of BC. Obviously Ms. Heyes is cut from different cloth than say, Basi and Virk. Maybe she isn't on the hook for six million, but the principle is exactly the same and Ms. Heyes' silence cannot be purchased by the more sleazy elements of our society who appear to be running the show at the present time.

Like many of my fellow bloggers, all of whom don't necessarily agree on everything, I urge anyone who can to support Susan Heyes in this David and Goliath style affair. Laila Yuile in her post today says in Susan Heyes files Leave to Appeal to Supreme Court of Canada:

Wonderful and stunning news that I wholeheartedly support!! I would very much like to host a fundraiser for residents of Surrey/WhiteRock/Delta/Langley in the near future to assist Susan’s fight for justice, and will post detail as soon as things are in motion!! Please email me directly if you would like to be involved!

I ask you, who will fight for you if your home, your business, was next?

So far already this morning I have found support from besides Laila, Alex Tsakumis at Rebel without a Clause calls out for support for Susan and her efforts to stand up for some actual justice. I'm confident others on my blogroll will be covering this development and urging support for Susan's cause, as one can plainly see the notice was sent out earlier today.

Judicial Findings are not
.....Creative Writing Projects

The Vancouver Sun writes a headline that makes it seem as if a long serving judge were a cheating college student in Judge's plagiarism voids $5-million trial.

A new trial has been ordered and a $5-million judgment thrown out because B.C. Supreme Court Justice Joel Groves plagiarized most of his ruling.

In a staggering decision Thursday, involving an expensive 30-day trial about a baby boy severely injured during delivery, the B.C. Court of Appeal said the judge had substantially reproduced all of the submissions of a participating party in the lawsuit as his reasons for judgment. It is only the fourth reported case of its kind in Canadian history, the judges said in their ruling.

I fail to see why the issue of "plagiarism" is even relevant. The legal team for the plaintiffs were PAID the big bucks to articulate their arguments in their submissions to the court. If they did such a good job as to articulate the merites of the case CORRECTLY in the eyes of the judge, why should the judge waste more time in an already OVER(EFFING)LOADED (in)justice system trying to paraphrase legal mumbo jumbo he felt explain his findings and decision?

As an author of the "plagiarised" prose commented:

Paul McGivern, a lawyer for the family, said the ruling was hard to swallow given the costs and hardships of fighting another trial.

He had not yet had time to speak with his clients and explain the decision to them.

"We did everything we needed to do and the judge agreed with our submissions," he said. "I always write my submissions in a form that allows the ease of transfer to the judgment for the judge. And here I thought I had been brilliant."

McGivern ventured that the copying was not as rare as the appeal court thought: "This is the second time it's happened to me in my career."

"I had one other judgment where the judge adopted my submissions [like this] but it didn't go to appeal."

It would seem to me that the presiding judge, by including as written these passages from submissions, was indicating that in HIS JUDGEMENT the submissions were correct. Again, why waste precious and expensive time in a court system starved for resources trying to rewrite stuff that already cost hundreds of dollars an hour to create, if it is also correct IN THE JUDGEMENT OF THE JUDGE?

Spiteful Stevie's Nightmares for the Weekend!


Helena Guergis (above) and the Afghan Detainee Docs!

Helean "cast aside" Guergis has risen from the mists to haunt Stevie again, at a time when we are almost into shellshock from the daily displays of PsuedoCon sleaziness. If they aren't hiring convicted felons to work in the PMO and later lobby for their friendly former escort/present fiance or trying to claim praise for themselves that was given to the previous government by the Auditor General, perhaps they can't manage to contain the fact that all the lurid accusations against Helena Guergis were unfounded. Then today was originally Gilles Duceppe's deadline for release of the vetted Afghan detainee documents which may or may not be made public before May 2, perhaps to the embarrassment of both the Liberals and the HarpoCons.

How Stephen Harper can even utter the word integrity and not be immediately struck down by lightning is in itself a good argument for atheism or at least agnosticism.

Professional
Prevarication Ltd.

Bev Oda_Tory - One Stop Sleaze Shop!

Evidence, what evidence?

It should be clear by now that there is NEVER enough evidence in the entire Universe EVER convict a BC Liberal of ANYTHING. Remember Jane Thornthwaite, when she got busted at a road block coming up from partying at the Olympics and blew .30 over? Remember what she said?

(Jane Thornthwaite)...admits she was impaired when caught in an RCMP roadblock last night. North Vancouver-Seymour MLA Jane Thornthwaite says she was returning from some events when she was checked by North Van RCMP.

Thornthwaite claims full responsibility for her actions and expects to be charged with impaired driving.

She must have woke up sometime since then and remembered that she was, after all, a BC liaR and thus there was no reason to admit to anything. She went to court today and according to the CBC Drunk-driving charge dropped against B.C. MLA:

B.C. Crown prosecutors have dropped a drunk driving charge against Liberal MLA Jane Thornthwaite, following her arrest at a roadside stop last year during the Olympic Games...../snip

But on Tuesday in court, that charge was dropped by Crown prosecutors who said they had insufficient evidence to proceed with the charge....../snip

Instead Thornthwaite pleaded guilty to a Motor Vehicle Act infraction of driving without due care and attention.

Immediately upon posting the story was followed by:

"This story is closed to commenting."

I guess the CBC was afraid their servers would go down from the heavy traffic like a DOS attack, just from the rest of the poor souls in British Columbia who have had their car towed, stored for months at their expense and had to pay a fine for blowing about HALF of what the Queen of the North Shore blew. Today our friend Laila pointed out that our unelected premier is busy renaming ministries in her spare time, some of which have been renamed two or three times already in the last year. Custom Stationary providers must be big donators to the Liberal Crime Family too!
While you're at Crusty, perhaps you should think of a new and more appropriate name for the Ministry of Justice!

Is it Drugs......or
Stunning Stupidity?

Senator Pam Wallin - or how to succeed with
neither brains nor beauty!

Updated below: 7:00 PM

This morning while listening to one of my favorite CBC shows, The Current (luv ya Anna Maria) and cleaning up the kitchen, I became perplexed and was forced to consider the fact that maybe this morning they had some really extra special drugs floating around the studio.

To begin with the "Voice" that usually has a really sharp and amusing comment to introduce the show, and puts a smile on my face even on a grumpy morning, just made me grumpy when I wasn't already. Perhaps the voice was just trying to be funny, and failed. But he reinforced the absurd meme promoted by Harper and the useless media that somehow having an election now and then is some kind of hardship for Canadians. I mean, would it be better if we had to exercise our democratic aspirations in the manner of Syrians, Egyptians, Libyans and the rest of the folks getting shot at? Two thirds of the Canada electorate, that show up, DO NOT want Stephen Harper to be President (sic) of Canada, no matter how much he thinks he deserves it.

Anyway the voice opened by referring to the debate coming up tomorrow night and said that (approximate quote) "Harper and Ignatieff will go mano-a-mano for six minutes, an hour or two less than Canadians expected when Harper issued his challenge/invite to have a one on one debate with the Liberal leader." But then he went on to say that that was FIVE minutes more debate between these two than Canadians were interested in hearing. As I said, maybe he was just trying, unsuccessfully to make a joke - because I know I would love to see two or three hours of meaningful substantive debate between the two, and Harper-Layton, Layton-Iggy etc. Having four or five people talking over each other in short sound bites for an hour or two is hardly a debate, no matter that Gilles Duceppe as irrelevant to BC as he may be makes more sense than any of them and Lizzie May the Harper helper has important issues to raise.

By the way my colleague, the Powell River Persuader, addresses this foolishness about the horrible cost (the cost of an afternoon of the G20 or 1 1/2 of Harper's new toy jets) in Bill Good, Fat Hog Boy!

And to finish up folks, I hear the Federal Cons and the media crying about the cost of an election, $300 million dollars, like I said, there is no better real person stimulus package than holding elections, having worked many elections the people who work them are seniors, students, mothers and fathers and people like me, almost all the money spent on elections goes to regular folks and this story here backs me up and debunks the myth that election spending is money wasted, it`s a great read enjoy

BC Liberals and Conservatives make me sick, out of one side of their mouth they claim spending $900 million on a roof is a stimulus package that creates jobs where as spending money employing little old people during an election is wasting money, Effing hypocrites! And what about Harper spending $30 million dollars in two months advertising how he spent billions of deficit dollars, that my friends is really wasted money, you wanted this election Harper, good luck with all those contempt of Parliament charges, pleasent dreams Bev Oda!

Actually the so-called Broadcaster's commission should maybe form government because in the last couple of weeks they actually made two GOOD decisions. First by barring Lizzie May from the debate, leaving more time for people who will actually elect members and today's decision to move up the French language debate that would have otherwise been entirely ignored if it had run up against the opening game of the Habs-Bruins playoff series. Come to think of it, this is becoming a pattern, calling an election during the playoffs, Capo Campbell held one during the Canucks run last time - anything to suppress the vote - maybe we can get down around Campbell's last popularity ratings for turnout at this rate, single digits.

The first segment was a three person panel discussing the federal election. Pamela "I retired to the Senate" Wallin was the designated talking point recitator for the HarperCons. After the previous spokesman had stated that the diffference between a Iggy and Stevie led government would be minimal, Pamela, either under the influence of the aforementioned drugs, showing absence of intellect or faithfully following Steve's training said she disagreed. She then went on to say that if Michael Ignatieff was to form government we would have, are you ready for this?

(replacement for Harris refugee Flaherty) Minister of Finance, Jack Layton!

(replacement for Airshow McKay) Minister of Defence, Gilles Duceppe!

Gimme a break! Yeah Pammie, maybe you should go back to Moose Jaw where you won't be a hazard to yourself or anyone else. I guess other than the turncoat Emerson, who turned INTO a PsuedoCon, I haven't noticed that many Liberal, NDP or Bloc cabinet ministers in Spiteful Stevie's minority COALITION GOVERNMENT!

The Daily Dose of HarperCon Sleaze(Updated)

Update: While John "Pit Bull" Baird foams at the mouth and quibbles about wording of various drafts of Ms. Fraser's report, that she cannot issue to a non-existent Parliament (good escape Stevie), Sheila Fraser issues a scathing letter that CAN be released. She is irate because the lying Harper crew lied to Parliament and falsely attributed statements to her regarding security measures at the G20. According to the CBC:

Auditor general Sheila Fraser is not pleased the Cons misquoted her about the G8 slush fund the day Parliament dissolved last month.

Their dissenting opinion to the committee report to the House read :

All witnesses brought forwarded testimony demonstrating strong endorsement of the government's unprecedented transparency to summit costs.

The Auditor General, Sheila Fraser commented in this regard the following: "We found that the processes and controls around that were very good, and that the monies were spent as they were intended to be spent."

.....but according to Ms. Fraser the quote had nothing to do with the summits. Instead, the Conservatives falsely recycled an old comment she made on security spending by a previous Liberal government after the 9/11 terrorist attacks a decade ago.

/tip of the touque to Alison at Creekside -- If the Harperites ain't lying they ain't talking and their lips ain't moving!

Original Post:

Spiteful Stevie has made a career out of disrespecting Parliament and Canadians who aren't either Corporate elite or Fundie Xtians who believe man and dinosaurs walked the earth together and Charles Darwin was the Devil's butler. He showed it during his time in opposition and with the NCC by telling Americans how third rate we were at every opportunity. He shows it in government by purposely muzzling his caucus and training them to disrupt committees and other parliatmentary processes. He shows it by after spending years attacking the un-elected Senate, then stacking it more than even Brian Mulroney (with deadwood like Wallin and Duffy) so that anything that offends his ideology will go there to die, even if sixty percent or so of the people's ELECTED representatives have passed it, sometimes even twice!

Then when the tactics above fail he brings out the big guns of either prorogation or calling yet another election. This time I figured he tried to get to call an election on the budget, to avoid the multiple comtempt charges, but this morning yet another thing Steve would prefer to avoid reared its ugly head. According to my NOT favorite paper the National Post:

Tories misled Parliament to get G8 funding: report

The Auditor General says the Conservative government misled Parliament in order to get support for millions in spending on projects for last June’s G8 conference in a Tory-held riding north of Toronto.

According to The Canadian Press, a Jan. 13 draft report from federal watchdog Shelia Fraser on the G8 Legacy Infrastructure Fund found that Industry Minister Tony Clement, along with Huntsville, Ont. mayor Claude Doughty and the management of the upscale Deerhurst Resort ignored the funding conditions set out by the government when they handpicked more than 30 projects that received $50-million in taxpayer funding.

The money was meant to help the region prepare for the summit, enhance local infrastructure, and showcase the natural beauty of the area for foreign dignitaries and media.

The confidential report examining the $1.24-billion G8 conference
in the Ontario resort community and a later G20 meeting in Toronto was to be tabled in Parliament last week, but was shelved due to the election.

As part of her investigation, the auditor general was set to examine “whether the amounts spent were used for the intended purposes — for security, policing, organizing and hosting of the summits.”

Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff accused Conservative leader Stephen Harper of sitting on the report, and called for its immediate release.

Mr. Ignatieff described the G8 summit as a “scandalous waste” through a “chain of bad decisions,” and is expected to address the leaked report Monday afternoon.

“This is an allegation by the auditor general about criminal activity. Let’s make sure the criminals are punished,” she said during a Toronto campaign event. “Let’s get to the bottom of it now — not after May 2.”

Sheila Fraser, one of the few people in Ottawa that I feel actually gets up every morning and says to herself - What can I do for Canadians, today?

the Catch 22
w/ Voting Green

The Fruits of Voting Green

Yesterday I was catching up with some of my more favorite blogs and over at Sister Sage's Musings came across an interesting post, About How Smart Voting “Can Keep Harper Humble". SSM had reposted a piece by John Deverell outlining how by targeting strategic ridings and avoiding splitting the (majority) non-Harper vote, Spiteful Steve could perhaps be denied his wet dream of a mamority dictatorship, which would be even more suffocating than his current fascist minority. This inspired me to get in touch with the organization known as Catch 22 Canada, which was founded during Harper's first cowardly use of prorogation, which sent many disturbed Canadians to their dictionary to learn a new word. I'll let Mr. Deverell introduce the group and its purpose and tactics (bolding mine, as usual).

Stephen Harper, the benign dictator (his phrase), is openly campaigning for a majority – and he might get it. Voter turnout in Canada has been dropping toward U.S. levels. The right is united in a Conservative Party engorged with funds raised by tax credit. The Harper permanent campaign machine is organized and motivated to pursue its large advantages within Canada ’s wonky voting system.
If voter turnout is low, the usual response to a flood of televised attack ads, and if there is no new issue which shakes up people’s voting tendencies, then the May 3 headline is: HARPER WINS MAJORITY. If that happens, it won’t be long until we read: LIBERALS AND NDP SEEK NEW LEADERS.

What can still change this picture is informed tactical voting. A year ago, a small group of people bothered by the Prime Minister’s suspension of Parliament for 22 days set up a volunteer group, Catch 22 Harper Conservatives (http://catch22campaign.ca/). They wanted to short-circuit Harper’s maneuvering toward unchecked majority control of government.

The Catch 22 founders realized that, given the usual vote-splitting among squabbling opposition parties, only a smart, targeted campaign run independently of the parties could deny Stephen Harper his goal. This Catch 22 upstart is starting to inspire discouraged voters in 52 of Canada ’s 308 electoral districts to vote together against Harper and astonish Canada .

The strategy is pretty straightforward, and reminiscent of a plan during the election of 2008 to trade votes between ridings so that voters in say Edmonton, who normally would waste their vote on the almost extinct Liberals, would vote NDP in exchange for an NDP leaning voter giving a vote to the Liberals in a suburban Toronto riding where the Libs had a better chance of knocking off the PsuedoCon put up by the piano mangling robot in a sweater. After all, two thirds or more of Canadians DO NOT want Stephen Harper to represent anything more than some part of Calgary (and not even that, really), yet here we are, five years into a Harper Reign of Terror and a War on Science and Facts being waged in the name of ideology.

Since I am fortunate to live in a island of progressive sanity, where we send representatives of neither of the neo-liberal corporate butt-kissing parties to neither Victoria nor Ottawa, I can't really participate. In my riding the Federal Libs are an endangered species, rarely spotted in the wild and the last election featured a HarperCon candidate that was too busy fighting various criminal charges over smuggling and hit and run charges to even matter. We sent a Campbellite to Victoria in 2001, and after four years of almost daily school closures, hospital closures and reduced ferry service to our communities, that MLA had to go back to his law practice. Even gerrymandering couldn't win the most recent provincial election for his replacement.

The Catch-22 with Catch-22

So since this campaign, which strikes me as a good idea, is not applicable to my area I thought I would check out a riding that Catch-22 considers "in play" and see what they had to say about it. My attention was immediately drawn to the riding of Saanich-Gulf Islands, because I think Gary Lunn is just too brain dead to be in government, much less hold any portfolio and of course this is the riding being challenged by the putative giant killer Elizabeth May in her on going coast to coast odessey seeking out impossible dragons to slay. I must say, though I haven't researched other ridings, that I am disappointed by the strategy, or lack of same I have seen so far in this riding. Of course that is to a great extent the fault of Ms. May, who may have already ceded a seat to Stevie by even choosing this riding to contest, with over 300 from coast to coast to choose from. I couldn't really find any advice that voting for a particular candidate would be the best move, but it did seem to indicate they thought a vote for Ms. May would be the way to go here. I think with this development Mr. Lunn is probably sleeping much better than he would be without Ms. May having entered the race.

First here is a visual breakdown of the results from 2008.


Note the sea of polls that are Liberal red on Saltspring, Galiano and the rest of the Gulf Islands aided and abetted with more as one approaches downtown Victoria. A persusal of the numbers even more clearly shows how in play this riding could be, especially when one takes into consideration the allegations of electoral hanky-panky that Mr. Lunn may have benefitted from.

Saanich-Gulf Islands election tactics under microscope

Some odd -- even worrying -- things happened in the Saanich-Gulf Island's riding successfully held by Conservative cabinet minister Gary Lunn.

By Times Colonist (Victoria) October 30, 2008

Some odd -- even worrying -- things happened in the Saanich-Gulf Island's riding successfully held by Conservative cabinet minister Gary Lunn.

One election dirty trick involved phone fraud and seemed both unethical and illegal. The RCMP response, which suggested election fraud allegations just aren't a priority, was disturbing.

And while there is no evidence of wrongdoing, it appears third-party advertisers played a disproportionate role in the riding.

If nothing else, the events raise questions about the effectiveness of current laws and enforcement efforts...../snip

In spite of these questionable campaign tactics the results were:

LUNN, Gary Vincent Conservative 27,991 43.4%
PENN, Briony Liberal 25,366 39.4%
LEWIS, Andrew Green 6,742 10.5%
WEST, Julian NDP 3,667 5.7%

So it is clear that this is far from an NDP stronghold, with the "socialist" party coming in a distant fourth with half the vote of the third place Greens who only had a quarter of the votes of the top two established parties. Add to that the fact that the Liberals themselves appear to have nominated a candidate with at least as "green" a set of credentials as Ms. May herself, it would appear Ms. May has not only cost herself a chance to sit in Parliament elsewhere than the gallery, but perhaps guaranteed Gary Lunn another term and an even more vested pension plan when he finally loses or retires. Renee Hetherington,Business Woman. Author. Scientist. Community Leader, the Liberal candidate this time has the following C.V.

Renée is Co-Author of Cambridge Press’ “The Climate Connection” with evolutionary biologist Robert G. B. Reid. Renée’s academic credential include a B.A. in Business and Economics from Simon Fraser, M.B.A. from the University of Western Ontario and an Interdisciplinary Ph.D. in Anthropology, Biology, Geography and Geology. Renée was also awarded a National Science and Engineering Research Doctoral Fellowship for her work on the Queen Charlotte Islands/Haida Gwaii.
Renée was a co-owner of a family security business and 450-head cattle ranch in the BC Interior as well as being elected BC’s Cattlemen’s Association Council Director and Executive Director.
Renée and husband Bob live in North Saanich and have two sons who are both in University.

According to the Times-Colonist, Green Party’s May gaining ground on Lunn in Saanich-Gulf Islands, poll suggests.

Of the voters who have decided and say they are definitely voting, 34 per cent said they’ll support Lunn and 32 per cent will back May. Liberal candidate Renee Hetherington and NDP candidate Edith Loring-Kuhanga each received 17 per cent.

So in a riding where the environment IS an issue of importance to voters and every party but the PsuedoCons considers the environment an important issue three parties are splitting 66% of the vote, and if these results occur on May 2, Gary Lunn would return to Ottawa with a mere 34%, representing a minority of the constituents of his riding. Way to go Lizzie!

It isn't difficult to wonder if the Green Party is little more than an astro-turf organization, created and backed behind the scenes by the Campbell Liberals and the HarperCons (ala the Billionaire Koch Brothers whose "small business" funds the "grass roots tea-baggers to our south). After all, outside of "green" dogma, many of their policy positions, when not totally incoherent, range from far from progressive to downright Ayn Randian. As if it wasn't bad enough that the Liberals and NDP (and the Bloc in Quebec) drain votes from each other allowing the Theocrats and Dinosaurs of the so-called Conservative Party to rule for the few, along comes the Green Party just to make sure Spiteful Stevie can continue to play President in spite of the fact that MOST Canadians can barely tolerate the man.

Focusing on ridings that are actually in play, and then voting strategically makes a lot of sense. However, in Saanich-Gulf Islands I see no sign of effective strategy from either Elizabeth May or the Catch 22 organization and I'm pretty sure Stephen Harper is a lot happier about that than I am!@#@$%##$%^^&

 

Wasted
Public Spaces!

Sometimes I think I should change the name of this blog to Houses (making it plural) of Infamy. Though this started as an attempt to generate discussion and find information about the "Raid on the Ledge," over the years that other fancy building on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, both Houses of Congress and even the California State House of Representatives and Senate have come into the discussion here. Heckfire, even the Glendale, Arizona City Council has been the subject of a post here (What's Wrong with Arizona?). Perhaps it would be appropriate to try to come up with a more perjorative term than "infamy" as well, or maybe just add some additional terms and qualifiers. Maybe this would be appropriate.

Houses of Infamy, Shame, Absurdity
Downright Silliness and Criminality!

Here is a picture of the British Columbia Legislature at work, or at least in its normal state - EMPTY!



Rattenbury's Shrine to Otiosity!*

* otiose adj. serving no practical purpose, functionless [L otium leisure]

This august chamber has been actually used for only FOUR days in the past three quarters of a year - and very sparingly in the last two years. Of course, perhaps this is for the best. After all we currently have a premier who would have to sit in the gallery like a tourist since she was chosen by a few thousand members of the Campbell Crime Family and represents no British Columbians except for the Public Affairs Bureau and the Gang that Stole Our Railroad.

Then there are some members who shouldn't be in any building without bars over the windows and razor wire on the perimeter, members like John Les and Kash Heed (and the retiring Capo Gordo) who would be in more maximum security facilities were it not for British Columbia's "Oh So" Special Prosecutor system, designed to free politicians from having to hire their own criminal defence lawyers. Besides even when they do have a day of pomp and ceremony and open a sitting of the Legislature very little happens, no real debate, just a bunch of adolescent name-calling and thumping on desks until the last day or night when the BC liaRs ram through a year's worth of legislation, some of which isn't even eventually struck down by the courts or the cause of legal settlements to be borne by the taxpayers (like the HEU contract tearing up fiasco).

Of course, the BC Ledge is not unique in being an insult to the people who it is supposed to serve. In Ottawa we have the House presided over by Spiteful Stevie, that is at least open for business when he doesn't have to prorogue or force an election in order to avoid having to answer incriminating or embarrassing questions. Then there is the House of Representatives in Washington D.C. Here in a nation involved in at least three wars (counting just those that they admit to), in the midst of an economic disaster and budgetary crisis, at least the elected representatives of they the people show up fairly often to, I guess, justify their six figure salaries and platinum plated benefit package. The photo below was taken in the House of Representatives during debate about the budget that threatened to SHUT DOWN the government, leaving families with daddy overseas engaged in combat having to get in touch with loan sharks to buy groceries and not become homeless, among other minor incoveniences.


American Tax Dollars at Work!

Don't these idjits realize that with a simple deck of cards they could play solitaire without the waste of electricity involved in running all those laptops? Heckfire, they could even play some two or more handed games WITH each other, if they could get along at all.........

Contempt is a
Two-Way Street

As Spiteful Stevie Harper roams Canada in his bubble, limiting questions from the media and demanding proof of PsuedoCon Loyalty to even attend an election rally, everyone, especially the muzzled and thoroughly tamed excuse for a media, seems to forget to even mention that the actual reason we are going to the polls on May 2 is CONTEMPT. The contempt of Stephen Harper for Parliament and the people of Canada, not families, not fiscal management or mismanagement or evil (WARNING: some may find the following word offensive) coalitions.

The last time our hero almost had to face a vote of contempt in the House of Parliament, he prorogued Parliament, for the second time in his assumed presidency. The last time, before Christmas of 2009, on the verge of being found in contempt for refusing to produce documents related to Afghan detainees and the possibility that they were being (knowingly) turned over to torture (a war crime - currently creating problems in the UK, Australia and the US as well as Stevie's Canada). Here we are over a year later, and STILL, the Harper Government (you know the one that used to be the Government of Canada) hasn't produced a SINGLE document.

Of course with the assistance of his handmaidens in the print and broadcast media he has successfully fostered the meme that this is merely partisan opportunistic use of procedural minutae. That is really rich coming from the most controlling P.M. in the history of Canada, if not the commonwealth, whose PMO distributed frickin' manuals to its MP's and staff with instructions about how to disrupt committees and in general cripple Parliament from accomplishing anything that isn't part of his neanderthal agenda.

Well now this unseemly delay just might come back to bite him (and maybe the Liberals as well) in the butt as it is possible that a major document dump of the aforesaid Afghan detainee docs could occur right in the middle of the election. Perhaps our man Steve already has staff researching how to prorogue, declare and emergency or otherwise call a halt to an election that according to our man at 24 Sussex no one (especially him - who had been running attack ads all year) wanted or felt was necessary.

According to the Goober and Maul(the truth):

The first batch of papers related to the handling of Afghan detainees is expected to be released within two weeks – a mid-election document dump that could damage both Liberals and Conservatives, or absolve them of wrongdoing in a matter that once dominated parliamentary debate.

Bloc Québecois Leader Gilles Duceppe insists the documents must be made public by April 15 and says his MPs will withdraw from the closed-door Commons committee that has been vetting them if his demands are not met..../snip

Federal politicians are not certain, however, of a mechanism that could be used to make the documents public when Parliament is not sitting and all of the parties are engaged in election campaigns. Some have suggested the material would be given to party leaders for release. Others say the panel could make the documents public.

The three-party committee was struck last May after months of testy debate in the Commons that ended only when the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper was threatened with being declared in contempt of Parliament.

The New Democrats did not agree to take part in the committee which was struck as a compromise last May after Peter Milliken ruled that MPs had an unfettered right to see all government documents, regardless of potential security implications.

It isn't clear as intimated above whether the committee even exists now with Parliament dissolved or if anything can be released, or if so how it would be accomplished with Parliament dissolved (another reason Stevie wanted to dissolve Parliament perhaps?) but the Toronto Star also has some views on this issue.

Tortured Pretzel Logic!

Since Stevie avoided being found in contempt over a year ago by proroguing the House and then not really releasing anything for over a year, and avoided it again by calling an election now, with yet another contempt charge (the famous Oda "not") in the hopper my readers may wonder why I'm on this today, after-all Stevie's contempt for Parliament and Canadians and Canada is pretty much normal everyday stuff. However the news this morning made me double-check my calendar to make sure it wasn't still April Fool's Day. Stevie Spiteful has once again gone to court, in the midst of the campaign, to attempt in yet another, extremely convoluted reasoning(?) based, attempt to hide information from members of Parliament and Canadians. Now our excuse for a P.M. is concerned for the frickin' PRIVACY of torture victims. I heard this on the CBC before daylight this morning - but the following is from the CTV website (bolding mine):

Date: Sunday Apr. 3, 2011 8:53 PM ET

OTTAWA — The Conservative government quietly went to Federal Court last week hoping to impose limits on what a military watchdog can say in its final report into torture allegations involving Afghan prisoners.

The Military Police Complaints Commission is currently reviewing evidence and writing its report after hearings into allegations that army cops turned a blind eye to suspected abuse in Afghan jails.

Federal lawyers successfully argued in 2009 that the commission's investigation of complaints should be limited to what military police knew -- or should have known -- about possible torture of prisoners by Afghan jailers.

The Harper government went even further last week in two days of hearings and challenged the definition of what military cops could have known.

Justice Department lawyers also accused the commission of stepping "out of its narrow jurisdiction" and investigating Ottawa's policy of handing over prisoners to Afghan authorities -- something it was strictly forbidden from doing.

The government wants to exclude the testimony of diplomats and civilians who did not work for the Defence Department. It lawyers also want any documents belonging to those officials, including reports that warned of torture or documented the abuse, excluded from the commissions findings.

"They're asking the Federal Court to put a muzzle on the commission," said Paul Champ, the lawyer for both human rights groups....../snip

Court records show federal lawyers built their case to strike civilian testimony around the argument diplomats violated the privacy of potential torture victims by passing along the information.

"So that means the information couldn't be shared with military police who might investigate their torture," Champ said. "So how could they have investigated if they were prohibited from knowing anything? It's absurd."

New Democrat foreign affairs critic Paul Dewar said the Defence Department has for years claimed that it was relying on diplomats to warn them about possible torture cases.

""What is the point of these reports in foreign affairs if they were not passed on to the Defence Department?," Dewar said Sunday.

He said it speaks to the reason opposition parties defeated the government in a contempt of Parliament motion on March 25.

"Conservatives can't run from accountability by going to court," he said.

"The buck stops with the ministers."....../snip

The government's refusal to hand over documents to both the commission and a House of Commons committee sparked a crisis in December 2009 where the Liberals brought in a contempt motion that threatened to topple the Conservatives. The prime minister avoided it by shutting down Parliament during the Christmas Holidays that year.

The government eventually agreed to let an independent experts and a committee of MPs -- excluding the NDP -- to review what documents could be released. A year after the agreement, the committee has yet to release a single scrap of paper, although Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe has given them until April 15.

Now I know whose privacy (or a more appropriate word would be SECRECY) Stephen Harper is worried about and it isn't that of any unfortunate victims of torture. I'm certain that is at the top of any torture victim's concerns. I can hardly believe that anyone, even Stephen Harper and his gang of goons could torture the very idea of logic to that extent and even then find EVEN lawyers who could go along with such nonsense.

Best case scenario, the docs get dumped and prove that both P.M. Martin and P.M. Harper implicitly or even complicitly looked the other way from Canadian involvement, while not direct, in war crimes. Then I can only hope that Canadians actually care, and haven't been thoroughly schooled in the politics of hate and division quite yet and we wake up on May 3 to a majority New Democrat government in Ottawa.