Update on Chuck Cadman Affair

So, here's a copy of Prime Minister Harpie's statement of claim. It's a long document. I haven't even read it yet. But if you're dogged and determined, go ahead. I got this (with some finagling) from Stephen Taylor's Constipated Blog, which I read now and then to find out what the other ideologues are saying. If you click on the square box in the upper right corner, you'll get a full-sized page.

Read this doc on Scribd: Statement-of-Claim-Stephen-Harper-stephentaylorca

The Chuck Cadman Affair

Um, did I mention that Canajun politics get interesting sometimes? Yes, I think I did in the previous post. Here's another example, this one on the federal level.

Canaduh has a minority parliament at the moment. It's been a long moment. Two years of Constipated minority government. And before that, some months of Gliberal minority government. For those who don't follow this, minority government means that the party with the most seats in the House of Commons does not have a majority of the seats, so that whenever a vote comes along, the governing party must depend on some other party to vote along with it. Usually that's one of the so-called "Third" parties, of which there is more than one. There are two: the Floc Québecois, which has seats only in Québec, and the NDP (aka Nearly Demented Party) which has seats only in its own mind. That leaves Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, the official opposition party, which is the Gliberal Party of Canaduh. And there is also the odd Independent Member of Parliament. And believe me, that is odd, because the party system has a stranglehold on the Parliamentary system in this our Dominion of Canaduh.

Which leads us into the latest scandale to hit the House. By my (admittedly hazy) calculations, we've had nearly three years of minority government around here. And that's the true beginning of this story.

Back when the Gliberals led the minority government, the array of forces was so evenly split that one or two votes could totter the teeter and bring down the government. And it just so happened that there was one Independent MP, name of Chuck Cadman, who represented a riding somewhere out there on the left coast. (There's a whole back story there, too. He'd been formerly a Constipator, but was dastardly done out of his re-nomination for his seat. He ran as an Independent and beat the pants off the Constipated candidate who had usurped his place. So, by conviction, Cadman was a Constipator, but he sure as hell didn't owe them much.

Chuck Cadman was also dying of cancer. And this is where the story gets sticky.

The leader of the Constipated Party of Canada, our most beloved Stephen Harpie, lusted mightily after the job of Prime Minister. He dearly desired to defeat the Gliberal government in a vote of non-confidence and thereby trigger an election which he deemed he could win. (And which he eventually did win, although with only another minority...)

There was just such a non-confidence motion coming up, engineered I forget how, but never mind. And Harpie wanted Cadman's vote badly.

But here's the rub. Cadman, even if he agreed with Harpie, was highly unlikely to help bring down the government. And here's why: as an MP, he was entitled to death benefit insurance to the tune of $400,00 or so. Well, his wife was. But if the House dissolved, technically Cadman was no longer an MP. He was, rather, a candidate. And the question of death benefits was up in the air if he died while running for office. So...better for him and his family if he died while actually in office. Not everybody was aware of this, but a sufficient number of people were in the know including, according to his own account, Stephen Harpie.

Nevertheless, a couple of Constipated officials decided to approach Mr. Cadman anyway. And the allegation is that he was offered a $1M life insurance policy if he would vote against the government, and thereby cause it to fall and precipitate an election. Which the Constipators hoped to win.

Well, when push came to shove and shove came to vote Mr. Cadman voted with the governing party, those slippery Gliberals because, to him, a death benefit in the hand was better than Constipator promises in the bush. And furthermore he said publicly that he had been offered nothing more than an unopposed candidacy in the next election and funds to help him campaign as if he were an official Constipator candidate. In other words, no real financial benefit to sway his vote, which would have been totally illegal.

But now, a new biography of Cadman, Tom Zytaruk's book Like a Rock: The Chuck Cadman Story, has revealed the alleged machinations of the Constipated Party. The book claims that Cadman, on his deathbed, confided to his daughter about the offer made to him.

Who the hell knows whether this story is true? Only the people who may have made such an offer, and Cadman himself, who is dead.

But the Gliberal Party has been having a field day with this. If the offer was made in bald terms (which seems unlikely...how could anybody be that stupid?) it was illegal as hell. Accusations have been flying in the Common Bawdy House of Commoners.

And on the Gliberal website. Have a look at these articles:

Harpie Must Come Clean About Allegations of Constipative Bribery,
Gliberals sayHarpie Knew of Constipative Bribery
Harpie Must Explain Content of Zytaruk Tape

And what has been the result of all this fur flying? Prime Mystery Stephen Harpie, who is nothing if not petty and vindictive, has decided to sue the leader of the Gliberal Party, M. Dion and the Outremonts, and several other members as well, for libel. It's a first for the Canajun political system. (See, in Canajun politics, you can say damn well anything you please in the Common Bawdy House of Commoners if it's not un-parliamentary, and there are no repercussions. But if you repeat statements outside the House, you open yourself to law suits. It's called Parliamentary Privilege or something like that.)

The main defence against charges of libel is truth. If your statements are true and proveable, you can't lose. But in this case, proof may be hard to come by. As for statements on the Gliberal website, maybe they can argue that they were only "reporting" on statements made by members in the Common Bawdy House.

Now here's another twist. Cadman's wife Dona, who originally endorsed the tale of attempted vote-buying, will be a candidate for the Constipated Party in the next election!

Did I mention that Canajun politics can get interesting sometimes?

(PS. Anybody who has read this blog knows that I don't use the real names of individuals or parties when I write about Canajun politics. I make up new names to protect the guilty. In this case, however, I did use the real names of Cadman and his wife, cuz you have to give the story some touchstone with reality if you expect to be able to follow it. Now, if you click on the links, you'll get the real names of the parties involved. I can't be held responsible for others' inability to write proper satirical fiction.)

Update on Caledonia

This past weekend a group of Caledonia residents and others staged a small protest outside the home of Julian Fantino, the chief of the Ontariario Provincial Police. Demanding answers for what they see as police inaction and uneven enforcement of the law.

Sometimes Canajun politics gets interesting.

Mr. Fantino wasn't home. He was in Caledonia.

Coincidence? We think not.

There was some controversy because politicians, including Gory Tory the Leader of the Tories, said it was improper to take your protest to a private home. My take on this is that it's fair game, since it's the residents' private homes and property values which have been devastated by the intransigence of politicians. Good on 'em, I say.

Not that it actually did much good on 'em.

The next day I got to hear both Mr. Fantino and the leader of the protest, Merlyn Kinrade, on a Steeltown radio station. They were interviewed separately. Mr. Fantino started off calmly, but as he warmed up, he warmed up, until by the end of the interview he was positively hot under the collar. (In passing, this is my experience with law enforcement people, or anyone accustomed to authority: they have a wonderful veneer of caring and reasonableness. But the veneer is thin. The merest breath of opposition is likely to arouse the urge to exert power.)

Mr. Kinrade, on the other hand, derided Mr. Fantino's remarks. Fantino had suggested that the protesters and others of their ilk needed to do better research. (My question: Research? What better research than actually living there? Mr. Fantino does not make a habit of living where he works. When he was chief of Hawgtown he lived not in Hawgtown but rather the safe white suburbs north, which is where he still lives.) Mr. Kinrade suggested he would let Fantino use one of his bedrooms for a week.

I'm coming across as critical of Fantino and the police. On balance, yes I am. But I truly understand Mr. Fantino's frustration. He repeated that it's not his job to solve the Caledonia problem. He and his forces are stuck in the middle. Clowns to the left of him, jokers to the right. (I leave you to decide which are which.) He also repeated that he has received no directives of a political nature at all. But I still don't believe him.

And his going to Caledonia when he knew that people were travelling to his home strikes me as typical of an arrogant copper who loves to be a smartass and knows he can get away with it cuz he's got a gun. He claims he's having dialogue with the Caledonians. True. Just not all of them.

Caledonia, Caledonia, What Makes Your Big Head So Hard?

Today is the second anniversary of the Six Nations native occupation of the Douglas Creek Estates in Caledonia, in good old Ontariario.

The second anniversary.

I haven't written about it previously. The world is full of occupations and disputes and land claims. Many of them bigger and more momentous. Israel, Palestine and Gaza. That's one big land claim isn't it?

But Caledonia is closer to home.

On Feb. 28/06, the members of the Six Nations took over a land development site called Douglas Creek Estates, on which building had already taken place, saying it was native land and it belonged to them. They blockaded the road, which was in fact, the main street of Caledonia and took over. The blockade caused major disruptions in the town of Caledonia, gave rise to protests by the local residents, and in some cases incited destruction of property and minor violence. Especially during the first year of the occupation, there was a great deal of tension. This abated somewhat after the blockade was finally removed, but other developments since then have ensured that the crisis is not yet past.

That's a little bit of background. If you want more, Google Douglas Creek Estates - Caledonia ON and you'll find that a little industry has grown up around this occupation.

So now we are into year 3. HWSRN just happened to be in Caledonia today, the actual day of the anniversary. He took some photos (from a distance, without getting out of his vehicle, because it is not a place that is inviting to people taking photos, unless you are big mainstream media, and sometimes not even then.)

The Caledonia occupation brings into stark relief all the problems Canada has had in dealing with aboriginals, land claims, and the reserve system. Overlapping jurisdictions exacerbate the problem. 200 year old treaties raise their hoary heads. Mohawk Warriors slip in and out of the territory relatively unimpeded. It's a mess. And the local residents suffer the consequences but don't have any of the power.

Ultimately, the Six Nations are claiming (based on a treaty of 1784) a huge swath of southern Ontario, six miles on either side of the Grand River, for its whole length, which they say was never legally ceded to the government of Canada. It was taken from them over the years by government fiat or shady dealings, anything but an honest trade.

And here's where the difficulty begins. Jurisdictional troubles. The aboriginal question is a federal responsibility. And successive federal governments, of any party you'd like to name, have managed to drag their feet when it comes to dealing with land claims. They seem to hope it will all just go away if they ignore it or prolong the agony.

It's not going to go away. The First Nations have, if not the highest, one of the highest birth rates in the country. (And there's an interesting anthropological study...)

As a result, the state of land claims by aboriginal groups in Canada is a disaster. There have been some successes, but the looming claims far outnumber those.

Furthermore, any action by aboriginal groups inevitably takes place within some province's territory. So the provincial governments have to become involved. This occurs mainly in the area of policing. And in Ontariario, policing of sites like the Caledonia occupation has become a thorny problem, because a native, Dudley George, was killed by provincial police in 1995 at a similar dispute in Ipperwash Ontariario. The current premier of Ontariario, Malton McGuilty was instrumental in setting up the public inquiry that excoriated the previous government's actions at Ipperwash. So, when it comes to Caledonia, he's walking on eggshells. The result is a lot of football tossing. Back and forth. Back and forth.

Many Canajuns I have talked to just want the governments to do something! On the other hand, their opinions about the Six Nations claims are quite divided. Everybody seems to agree, more or less, on the justice of their claims. The natives have begun to develop the idea that they are stewards of the earth. I think this is possibly just another version of the Noble Savage myth, perpetrated by the "Noble Savages" themselves. But the protesters clearly broke laws and have never been called to account for that. The OPP (Ontariario Provincial Police) has repeatedly failed in its duty to enforce the law, and there is not a citizen in the province who doesn't think the reason for that is political manipulation. Malton McGuilty is guilty. And the continued inaction (or, at the least, failure to make visible progress) is made worse by the fact that the Six Nations groups themselves appear unable to produce a united leadership.

Oh, there's so much more to be said. But I have only one thing more right now. You know, India, Pakistan, most of Africa, parts of Asia...they're all still working through the consequences of colonialism, that virulent strain of thought which presumes that you can take over and actually own somebody else's land, their homeland, their culture. We see it all happening far away.

Caledonia proves that we're still dealing with the colonial past right here.

Fear & Loathing in Montebello

Do you get the feeling that our so-called leaders are afraid of us?

That's the question that occurred to me as I watched TV coverage of the Montebello meeting of the Three Amigos.

The summit and its coverage were barely a blip on our consciousness. A few minutes on the nightly news. Commentary during the day. It's as if we hardly noticed that ordinary citizens voicing legitimate protest were assaulted by police. Here in the Peaceable Kingdom.

More than anything, this is what disturbs me. Leave aside for a moment the merits or flaws of the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP). It's that the people who ostensibly represent us hide behind a wall of police in riot gear, going so far as to invade (I'm tempted to use the term “desecrate”) a nearby cemetery; spray tear gas everywhere; mock the people involved; and pretend that it's just a casual, bureaucratic-type get-together – and we're not outraged by it. It's little more than an item on the national news.

Now, this may be mundane fare in war zones, or riot-prone countries. Not so unusual even in the US, I suppose, which has a history of sending in the National Guard. But here in the Peaceable Kingdom, I'd think such an event would rank fairly high on the outrage scale.

And it leads me to a question we have all had directed at us whenever one of our governments wants to do something that invades our privacy or our civil liberties: Amigos, if you have nothing to hide, what are you so worried about? Really! Why not let everybody see what boring stuff you're doing? Or is it that you spent two days playing on X-Box and don't want anybody to know?

I heard PM Harpie make fun of the protesters and citizens who have been expressing concern for months over this summit by citing the example of one industrialist attendee, a manufacturer of jelly beans. It seems the standards for jelly beans don't quite sync up between Canada and the US. How, he wonders, can discussion of jelly beans possibly be construed as a North American Unity conspiracy? My response to this is: What? You need a battalion of armed guards to discuss jelly beans?

OK, so I've drifted into the pros and cons of the SPP now. In fact, I reserve judgment on this issue. For the moment. I've been reading and hearing about it for months, and in fact intended to write a post about it quite a while ago but never got around to it. It seems obvious to me that the three countries that are party to NAFTA would want to harmonize some aspects of their trade and economic relations. Common standards for jelly beans, that would be a good thing. It's natural that we should agree on certain standards. In my view, though, the agreed-upon standards should be the highest standards, not the lowest. And if any one country cannot meet those standards, well they should not be included. Simple as that.

For example, it's been publicized that the US considers Canada's regulations about pesticide use on fruits and vegetables to be a restraint of trade, because they are more stringent than those in the US. Too bad, I say. The US should be forced to live up to the higher standard. The same goes for any regulation.

These are bureaucratic considerations. When it comes to things about true national interests, like water, oil, security, then I begin to think we are not necessarily obliged to be in lock-step. The SPP raises issues like harmonizing a terrorist no-fly list. We've all heard horror stories about innocent people ending up on such lists. I'm not in favour of bowing to the US on points like this, because I believe the US is still suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and is not really thinking clearly about its security issues. And what they've managed to do so far is make us all a little crazy.

One thing that gives me pause in all this furor about the SPP is the strange bedfellows it has created. Here in Canada, the main opposition has come from the Council of Canadians which, by most standards, would be considered left-wing/progressive. Maude Barlow has been pushing the Canadian nationalist/beware the US message for a long time. Often she's right. But sometimes they're a little shrill and paranoid, I think. More so lately. But on the US side, who do we have? Most definitely right-wing Jerome R. Corsi, author of The Late Great USA, prime architect of the Swift Boat movement to defeat John Kerry in the last presidential election...a man who believes his government is leading the Murricans into a North American Union similar to the EU. This is a man who fits comfortably into the spectrum of opinion ranging towards the Michigan Militia and the anti-United Nations fanatics who think they are about to have their freedoms removed by One World Government.

I suppose you could say these widely-divergent world-views are united by a common element: the feeling that the sovereignty of their respective nations will be fatally undermined.

Or maybe two elements: that our governments are not telling us what they're really doing.

And I think that is dangerous.

Meanwhile, we were treated last week to the spectacle of Sureté du Québec officers dressed up in Halloween costumes and deliberately trying to start trouble where there wasn't any. Cops inciting a riot. All for the sake of discrediting protesters with legitimate concerns.

And the patronizing tone of all the leaders, insulting our intelligence and assaulting our fellow citizens. Mark my words...it's crap like that which foments unrest. And then maybe our leaders really will have something to be afraid of. Democracy.

Breaking News Headlines From Mental Blog

CANADA TURNS 140!

MOHAWK NATION BLOWS OUT CANDLES & MAKES A WISH

CANADIAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION PRESCRIBES VIAGRA...FOR MEDICARE

PRIME MYSTERY STEPHEN HARPIE TURNS GREEN
AT THE SIGHT OF ELIZABETH MAYORMAYNOT

QUEBEC CREATES SEPARATE NATION...IN ALBERTA

NEWFOUNDLAND PLANS TO BUILD BRIDGE TO ITSELF

PROPOSED TOLL HIGHWAY THROUGH NUNAVUT WILL EASE GRIDLOCK IN HAWGTOWN

BC SALMON SWIM DOWNSTREAM TO PROVE THEY CAN GO WITH THE FLOW

NEW UNDERGROUND RAILROAD TO TRANSPORT RUNAWAY SLAVES FROM SOUTHWESTERN ONTARIARIO TO ALABAMA

AIR CANADA SEEKS BANKRUPTCY PROTECTION, CITES NO-FLY LIST FOR STEEP DECLINE IN PASSENGER BOOKINGS

Parti Québécois Loses 2 Leaders in One Week

Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles DeSeat is known as an excellent debater. "Of course, I'm an excellent debater..." he often says. Here, he is shown defeating himself in debate:

GD: Should I run for PQ leader? Yes I think I should. (May 11/07)
GD: Non, I think you should stay in federal politics. Remain leader of the BQ.
GD: I really think my nation needs me. These Québeckers, they are so confused.
GD: You think the Québeckers are confused? Are you not a member of a federal parliament that is paying you to be a separatist?
GD: Sorry, I forgot. OK, I will stay as BQ leader. (May 12/07)
GD: Non, you should become leader of the PQ.
GD: Please, I cannot make up my mind. Do you think maybe I should instead become General Manager of the Canadian National Hockey Team? Dat way I could choose any captain I want.
GD: I think you should abdicate all responsibility and give it to a woman. How about dat Mare-wha? woman?
GD: Mare-who?
GD: Non, Mare-wha?!
GD: OK, OK, I will stay as BQ leader. B comes before P. Besides, a woman should lead the nation out of confederation. Dat way they cannot always blame it on the men.
GD: Oui, and she probably knows how to make up her mind too.

Yoni School (Federal) Election Watch Pt. 3

Why is this woman waving? It seems that Elizabeth MayorMaynot face opposition in her chosen riding at the next federal selection. M. Dion & the Outremonts has agreed not to run a Gliberal candidate against her cuz she's the leader of the Particoloured Parti Vert. And MayorMaynot may not run a candidate against him neither nor. Separately, they would like to work together in the next Parliament, where M. Dion & the Outremonts expects to be Prime Mystery. Apparently they both have this thing about The Environment. I guess they'd like to have one.

However, MayorMaynot has chosen to run in Central Nova, which is in Nova Scotia, and it's a strong Constipated riding, currently held by Peter Decay, (seen here whistling in the dark) who is the Mystery of Foreign Affairs and also Failed Affairs. (See previous post...and photo below) She'll need a lot of votes to catch up to him. She has one thing going for her though. No one's quite sure if Prime Mystery Stephen Harpie and Peter Decay are interested in having An Environment. So, people who breathe and drink water are a little nervous about them. The Army likes 'em though cuz they plan to buy a bunch of tanks. Elizabeth MayorMaynot definitely wants An Environment. People who breathe and drink water like that.

My take on it is this: Peter Decay should lose. He's been working at it ever since he became Foreign Affairs Mystery. It's a mystery how he manages to avoid being mistaken for the doorman at the Notell Motel. He's a lightweight. A cipher. He lacks the gravitas necessary to pull his weight in the international arena. He has mishandled several major issues. (Like the Mystery of the Murder in Mexico.) He wears gumboots. (Don't get me wrong, I love gumboots, but they don't belong in the House of Common Bawdy Houses....I can't believe I just wrote that! That's exactly where gumboots belong, since you have to wade through so much, uh, uno there.)

OK, and last but not least, the photo of his shining moment as Mystery of Failed Affairs:


Now, there is one other thing. I think I've posted on this before, but I'm too lazy to look in the archives. The Particoloured Parti Vert has a petition going to have Elizabeth MayorMaynot included in the televised debates. Up to now she's been excluded. Well, OK, she's been excluded because there hasn't been a televised debate since she was elected leader of the party. But you know what I mean. The Particoloured Parti Vert has been excluded. Cuz they ain't got no seats in the House. But they got a pretty good number of votes across the country, and they have a legit message and platform and planks and the whole edifice of an actual party, and they run candidates in all the ridings (except the one where M. Dion & the Outremonts runs, I guess) and the reporters listen to what they say, sort of, and you see their whirling dervish spinning wheel signs everywhere, so why shouldn't they get to participate in the crummy televised debate? If you're interested in signing the petition, go here.

Yoni School (Federal) Election Watch Pt. 2

Melinda Strongarm Packs It In

I ran right
I ran left
Ran up, was run down
I played House for a while
But too many cooks spoiled the broth
Besides, the Cabinet was bare
When all's said and done
My heart belongs to Daddy

Yoni School (Federal) Election Watch

Canadian Political Hinterland Hoo's Hoo
Why is this man smiling?

This is a premier specimen of the Silver-Haired Bobrae, who has just been moved from the endangered species list to the "threatened" list, having won his nomination to run for the Gliberal Party of Canada in Hawgtown Centre at the next federal election. A former Near Democrat premier of Ontariario, he joined the Gliberals last year, primarily to run for the leadership of the party, which he lost, which catapulted him onto the endangered list. He has proved to be sturdy and resourceful, however, and may yet come out of the wilderness where he has spent much of his time playing piano for seniors.

Yoni School (Québec) Election Watch

Oooooh! Québec politics just got interesting again!

This is the breakthrough ADQ leader Mario Dumont has been waiting for. As for the Parti Québécois, it's hard to say whether the poor showing is because separatism is a dead issue or because people were appalled by leader André Boisclair. Meanwhile, Gliberal leader Jean Charade (a constipator masquerading as a gliberal masquerading as a federalist) apparently just barely hung onto his own seat in Sherbrooke.

Finally, this does not bode well for the Federal Constipated Party of Canada and Prime Mystery Stephen Harpie. He was counting on a Gliberal victory in Québec to boost his own fortunes. The ADQ is an unknown quantity for him, and the PQ, well...you can't cozy up to them too much. They're liable to stab you in the back, eventually, and pack up their kits and leave the country, non?

PS. Apparently Québeckers ain't green.

Spooky Ads by Google

OK, Google ads are getting really spooky. Here I am, reading William F. Buckley's reminiscence and offhand obit of Arthur Schlesinger...in National Review fer heaven's sake...and what appears beside it in a Google ad?

This:

Vote Andrew KEYES

Oak Ridges-Markham
Conservative
Time to WIN in Oak Ridges-Markham

Oak Ridges-Markham!? Bill Buckley's never heard of Oak Ridges-Markham. I've barely heard of Oak Ridges-Markham, except that I've fallen off the Oak Ridges moraine and marked time in Markham.

But my point is this: National Review is sooo Murrican. And conservative. But I'm Canajun. And I happen to be ensconced, oh, not too far away from Oak Ridges-Markham. So Larry gets the political ad closest to his oh-so-not-conservative heart. (Andrew Keyes is a member of the Constipated Party...)

Be advised, this post with link included is not an endorsement. And there's not even an election yet! Keyes is only seeking the nomination for the federal riding! He's not even the candidate yet! He's advertising (with Google) for the nomination!

My point: (yes there is a point)(actually two):

1. Google is zeroing in on us, refining its abilities to pinpoint the location of our innermost secrets, plumbing the vast undercurrents of our political desires, our consumerist fetishes and our emotional vulnerabilities.
   
2. Andrew Keyes is definitely overzealous.

Update on Gas Shortage

OK, it appears I was wrong, sort of, about a gas shortage. Some stations have actually closed down cuz they was outta gas. The Minister for Lack of Energy in Ontariario, Duncan Donut, says about 10% are experiencing a squeeze at any given time. His reaction to people driving about looking for a station with gas? So What!

"You have to put things in perspective," he says.

OK. Here's the perspective. Two events, a fire at a refinery and a simultaneous rail strike, have put the entire province into a furor, cost industry a lot of money, made people a little panicky, and incidentally cost the operators of those empty gas stations a good portion of their yearly income...

So what. Eh?

Do you think the Minister for Lack of Energy might deign to come up with a contingency plan for the future? After all, this was not a major catastrophe. Only a couple of events coinciding.

Premier Faulton McGuilty called it "the perfect storm," implying it was a sequence of events that was so unlikely it could never be repeated. Come on! If the province is vulnerable as a result of these two events, how would we survive a more concerted effort to disrupt supply?

Gee! Maybe it's time to introduce new and stiffer anti-terrorist laws, hold gas guzzlers in detention without counsel until they surrender their pipelines, and send them to a Middle East country where they might be tortured if they don't reveal the source of their gas...

Or we could examine the gas distribution system in the province and figure out how to make it more reliable. Which would be a job for Minister Duncan (So What) Donut. God help us.

Security Certificates No Longer Secure

It's a damn good thing I'm not a journalist cuz I probably would have been fired before now. Here I've been on about security certificates in the last couple of weeks, and I didn't even know that there was a case before the Supreme Court. (Or maybe I knew, once, but forgot.) Anyway, I didn't hear about this until the day before the decision came down.

(Interesting, that phrase "came down" as in "coming from on high" as in "someone above us" as in "Supreme" as in "highest court in the land" and the decision tumbles down to us lower humans willy nilly...which is another interesting expression originally rendered, I think, as "will he, nill he"....but enough digression...)

This was no minor decision. It made the top of NY Times headlines. In large measure, the court agrees with what I think...(and a good thing too! otherwise, the court woulda been wrong...) Quoting from the Times (cuz I forgot to bookmark a Canajun page):

“The overarching principle of fundamental justice that applies here is this: before the state can detain people for significant periods of time, it must accord them a fair judicial process,” Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote in the ruling.

Well, duh! You wouldn't think it would take the Supreme Court to figure that out.

I must remind people, however, as I had to be reminded, that these cases centre around non-citizens who were actually ordered deported. So, for Canajuns, the question is: how did these people get into the country in the first place, and why were they not simply deported when the appeals process was done? It seems to me that any country has the right to decide who gets to stay and who doesn't, and they don't even really have to give a reason. "Entry Refused" stamped on the passport. Done.

There should not be any circumstance, really, like the one these men have been in...confinement, secret hearings, secret evidence, no right to defend oneself. I'm still baffled as to why they were/are being held. The whole matter should have been expedited.

But then, I'm not CSIS. I'm not the RCMP. I'm not the Minister. I'm not the Supreme Court.

At least now the guvment has some direction and a clear statement that the way it's been going about things is not kosher. (Again, I say, we should not need the Supreme Court to tell us this.)

According to the Times, this is quite a departure from the Murrican headspace:

The decision reflected striking differences from the current legal climate in the United States. In the Military Commissions Act of 2006, Congress stripped the federal courts of authority to hear challenges, through petitions for writs of habeas corpus, to the open-ended confinement of foreign terrorism suspects at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

A federal appeals court in Washington upheld the constitutionality of that law this week, dismissing 13 cases brought on behalf of 63 Guantánamo detainees.

And a good thing we're not following that lead, sez this Canajun. I would think the poor Murrican eagle, symbol of liberty, is suffering a severe case of whiplash from the way its civil rights neck has been twisted in the last five years. Leave it to Canajun beavers to gnaw away at the worry lines on the eagle's brow.

Not everyone agrees with me, tho. I read comments on the Hawgtown Grope & Flail report about the court's decision. A lot of people cursing Pierre Elliott Trudeau for saddling us with the Charter of Rights. (No mention that the first Charter was actually introduced by Diefenbaker...) A lot of people hysterically predicting terrorist doom. As far as I'm concerned, a lot of people being downright ignorant and abusive on both sides. Which is why I don't spend a lot of time reading the comments on public sites like that. (Unlike here, of course, where the discourse is highly civilised and unfailingly thoughtful.)

So, there we go again, wandering off from the Murrican way. In some ways, tho, we're not straying too far. Parliament has a year to get its act together, ie. its new Security Certificate Act. Security Certificates will not disappear. But at least these issues will be dealt with in a more open, fairer, and much more timely fashion.

Update on Anti-Terrorist Laws

The acrimoniousness of the debate about these laws (including an attempted low blow on a Gliberal MP by Prime Minister Stephen Harpie in the House of Common Bawdy Houses) is a clear demonstration of the essential dichotomy our (western) society has experienced since 9/11. The pendulum has two ends: preservation of civil liberties; and maintenance of security.

Proponents of extending the laws say these extraordinary powers are necessary -- just in case we need them.

Opponents point to the fact that we have never yet used them, that good ordinary police work is sufficient, and therefore they are not necessary.

I say nothing at all justifies the abrogation of fundamental civil liberties such as the right to a fair trial, the right to representation, the right to face one's accuser, the right to know the evidence against one, the freedom from torture.

To contemplate the possibility that such fundamental rights can be by-passed even temporarily (and what is temporary? Five years, as is the case with some of those held under security certificates?) is to admit that Canada is no longer a democratic state.

Of what use is security if our civil liberties are not secure?

Has the pendulum swung too far? I think it has. What do you think?

As for the political elements of this. The Gliberals are taking a bit of a beating about this, because they're opposing the extension of the laws...laws which they themselves introduced. If I remember correctly, they opposed the sunset clause at the time. Now they're trying to take advantage of it. I'm inclined to let the Gliberals get away with this (cuz I oppose the laws). The so-called sunset clause was included for a reason. These are extreme measures and should not be allowed to stand unexamined. Now it's time to examine them, and thoughtful, conscientious MPs are allowed to change their minds about whether they are necessary.

Yoni School Election Watch Pt. 8

Let's Get the Green Party in the Televised Debates!
(And while we're at it...let's have real debates.)

Here's a link to a petition to get the Green Party in the televised debates. There are no debates yet. There's no election...yet! But my Spidey sense tells me that Stephen Harpie & the Constipators are angling to engineer an election...ie. make it appear that it's someone else's fault. After all, we are seeing negative campaign-style ads already...sans campaign.

So, the Green Party wants in. And they should be in. They received a respectable number of votes in the last federal election, albeit spread across the country without being able to capture a seat. They claim they will receive more than 1 million in the next election. They run candidates in every riding, which is more than you can say for the Floc Québecois. In this period of heightened environmental awareness, they have a message that deserves to be heard.

The petition is directed towards CEOs & presidents of the major TV networks who, I would think, are only part of the debate equation. The other political parties most likely would want to exclude the Greens. Maybe there should be another petition. Or maybe you should all write or email or phone your local MP and the leaders of all the other parties and tell 'em what you think.

As for me, I don't know whether I agree with everything the Green Party espouses. In fact, I'm sure I don't. I don't completely agree with anybody. (I hate it when I hear people on call-in radio say, "I absolutely agree with you..." and then blithely demonstrate that they're not quite sure they agree, or they agree about something else entirely, or they misunderstood the question, or they really wanted to demonstrate how closed-minded they are...) Anyway, I don't agree with anybody. I should be called Larry NO!

However. I absolutely agree that the Green Party should be included in the national televised debates that will surely be held when the next election is called. Let Liz May Have Her Say!

Meanwhile, for those interested, here's the link to the Green Party of Canada website.

Anti-Terrorist Laws

The Hawgtown Mop & Pail* is reporting that our "new" Constipated government wants to extend two controversial anti-terrorist measures that were passed by the former Gliberal government after 9/11.

One, called preventative arrest, lets police detain terrorism suspects without warrants. The second, called investigative hearings, allows police to force individuals who may know about a terrorist plot to share their information in a closed-door court.

The way I sees it, Western governments went thru an orgy of paranoiac legislation in the aftermath of 9/11 -- predictable, I suppose, but regrettable. (Regrettable is not nearly a strong enough word, but I can't think of another at the moment.) The US had Patriots One & Two. Britain beefed up its Beefeaters. And Canada too, fearing the possibility of fences on the border and recriminations about our leaky security measures, (see my previous post on CSIS) decided to get tough on terra.

But all for naught, really. It's been shown repeatedly that extraordinary security, detention and arrest measures are not what gets the job done. In fact, the two measures under consideration have never been used. What is effective is standard, meticulous, determined police work. All the recent arrests, in Toronto, London, the US have come about in this way. Thus, the extraordinary measures are exposed as gratuitous, fear-driven assaults on civil liberties. Besides, it isn't as if we don't already have draconian techniques, such as security certificates, under which citizens can be deprived of all their civil rights without even knowing why.

Unfortunately, Mr. Blockwell Bray, our National Minister of Insecurity and Goofy Photo-Ops,** has resorted to outright fear-mongering:

“People were arrested who allegedly were planning to blow up this building, to behead the Prime Minister and to destroy people in the Toronto area.”

Mr. [Br]ay, who is responsible for Canada's national-security agencies and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, cited the example even though police arrested the 18 Toronto men last June without using those sections of the anti-terrorism laws.

Opposition parties (even the Gliberals who introduced the measures) are opposing their extension. Which proves that the insistence on a review process when they were first passed was actually a good idea. Measures like these are more likely to produce another Maher Arar than a bona fide bomb-toting terrorist.

***

*Footnote: I am forever indebted to Richard J. Needham, the former columnist who, in fact, coined the name Mop & Pail and indirectly gave me permission through books such as Needham's Inferno to comment satirically on the foibles of Canajun society and to mess around with the names of people and institutions. He helped to set me on the path of teenage speling rebeling and probably is partly responsible for my current incarceration in the Yoni School for Wayward Poets.

**Footnote 2:

Retiring Ken Driedup's Jersey!

Last night the Montreal Canadiens raised Ken Driedup's number 29 jersey to the rafters of the Forum (or whatever it's called now...) Good for him, I say!

Of course, we all know, especially if we read this blog now and then, that he recently ran for the leadership of the Gliberal Party of Canada.

All I can say is, as a politician he makes a helluva goalie.

A Maher Canadian Event

Talk radio! Yechh! Sometimes I think the dregs of the earth call into talk radio shows. Unfortunately, I've done it once or twice myself. Of course, I think the hosts should thank God they get the occasional intelligent commentator like me. But mostly, it's feeble-minded chatter, faulty logic, unfocused meandering, inability to stand up to an argument, ubridled envy and uncontrolled rage. And that's just the hosts! The callers are several rungs below that.

What brings this rant on? Maher Arar, that's what.

I begged the powers that be at the Yoni School to bring me a radio so that I might follow the proceedings in Ottawa as Prime Minister Harpie extended his heartfelt apology to Mr. Arar and his family for the unspeakable ordeal they've suffered. And they did! Wonders never cease. A radio appeared and I avidly flipped the dial for outside news.

Actually, the apology itself was a rather banal event, and afterwards Mr. Harpie took all manner of questions, some of them even related to the Arar affair. I'm not going to get into the details of that. What do I look like? A reporter? A journaliste? No! Suffice it to say that Mr. Arar will be paid $10.5M (Cdn) for his troubles, plus legal expenses. Go here for a factual report. Go there for another one. In fact, the most powerful moment of the day was the statement made by Arar's lawyer. Quite impassioned, it was.

After the Prime Minister's press conference, (and actually for a while before) I got to listen to call-in radio shows. And the big topic of conversation was this Maher event. Then there was Mr. Arar's press conference. Then there was more blather on the call-in shows. Now, I'm not big on outrage. Annoyance, yes. Righteous indignation, most certainly. But today, I am positively outraged. I never thought I would use this word seriously, because I find it comes to the lips of Canadians too easily, but I am appalled, utterly appalled, at the attitude that some of the callers took in regard to the settlement with Maher Arar. In the space of a few minutes, Maher Arar was transformed from a cause célèbre and Canada's most famous (recent) wrongfully accused into a greedy, suspect, overpaid, self-serving possible terrorist (torture victim...)

One man called in to 570News this morning and suggested that he would like the opportunity to be tortured if he was going to get $10M. ! I repeat: ! And the afternoon host, Gary Doyle, repeatedly mentioned that this apology from the government was politically beneficial for the Constipated Party and Canada's "New" Government. Then! Later on I heard callers to the afternoon drive show on CFRB. One man, a Canadian serviceman no less, insisted that Arar would not have been put on a watch list for no good reason. Indeed, that there was much more to this than we have been told (because the Murricans still don't trust Mr. Arar....! I repeat: !) and that some day we would all discover (presumably when Mr. Arar succeeds in blowing up the Parliament buildings) that we have been duped.

Right. The RCMP admitted there was no good reason. Mr. Justice O'Connor stated unequivocally that there was no good reason. The government has just declared publicly there was no good reason, and apologized for it. But the supposedly reasonable, fair-minded, intelligent citizens of Canada can't believe there was no good reason for it. After all, he's a Muslim ain't he?

Talk radio typically overflows with vitriol, but really, this is too much. Bewildered and bedeviled, I ask myself, "What is with these people?" I put it down to several causes:
1. Envy. Pure envy. "How come I don't get ten million bucks?" these niggardly souls complain.
2. Laziness. Intellectual and emotional. Many of the callers didn't even possess the basic facts about Mr. Arar's case. Too lazy to find out. Too lazy to imagine what his life must have been like then, and now.
3. Faulty logic. Some people wanted to know why this one man should get so much money when there were so many other worthy causes crying for government aid. As if it were a zero-sum game. As if one worthy cause negates another.
4. Stupidity. Sad, but true. Some people are unrelievedly stupid.

Wake up, people! Maher Arar is, and was, INNOCENT! It's not a case of not guilty, or let go on a technicality. He was INNOCENT! From the very beginning. As determined by a two and a half year national commission headed up by a well-respected judge. His rights as a Canadian citizen were abused and his personal safety jeopardized by the calculated actions of a few individuals in authority. People who should have known better but were too absorbed in their own little high-security top-secret worlds to pay attention to something as abstract as inalienable rights. Canadians should not be quibbling over a few million dollars (out of a surplus of billions). On the contrary, Canadians should be expressing massive concern that our collective values of freedom, justice and respect could have been so easily subverted.

In effect, Maher Arar was abducted by the United States, aided and abetted by the Canadian government, his own government. And subjected to torture. For anyone to suggest that the amount is too much, let them think of what it might be like to be tortured for a year. Not just physically. Mentally and emotionally too. Now, I don't like to admit this, but I've been known to cook bacon now and then without a shirt on. You all know what happens when you cook bacon. Sputtering fat, that's what! And it hurts like hell to get just one little drop of hot bacon fat on my oh-so-sensitive belly. I have difficulty imagining what it must be like to be tortured every day, not knowing when the fat will hit the fan, not knowing whether you might live or die, not knowing if anyone at all cares...Anyone who thinks they might like to trade places with Mr. Arar, for any amount of money...well, they're clearly more than one brick short of a full load.

Far be it from me to praise Stephen Harpie, but he and his government did exactly the right thing. Whether it's politically expedient or not makes no difference. And it's not necessarily the easiest thing to do either, apologizing for someone else's behaviour when you had no control over it and it happened several years ago. Think how you would feel if you had to do that.

To tell the truth, I'm practically struck dumb by the idiocy of some of those people. It almost calls for yet another apology to Mr. Arar. If people want to be outraged, they should direct their attention to the people in authority, members of the RCMP and their overseers, who committed this most grievous error and in the end made it necessary for the government to apologize and spend 12 million dollars worth of taxpayer money to try and make it right.

Inky Dinky Parlay Voo?

Something that struck me about the run-up to the Gliberal convention, and during it was how often the subject of the candidates' command of their "second" language came up. Dion & the Outremonts was criticized for his poor English. Kennedy for his French. Blah blah. (A good phrase, passable in either language.)

Of course, it's clearly an asset for the leader of a national party to be fluent in both official languages. It's the reason why Diefenbaker is not still Prime Minister. But in fact, every candidate did well in both languages as far as I could tell. M. Outremont's English is really very good. M. Kennedy's French sounded quite good to me. Better than Iggy's. He might not be able to keep up with the French lads in a pub. But then, who can except French lads in a pub? Brasserie. Pardon me. Moi. Pardonnez.

I learned a new word today. Punditocracy. And what I say is, all these supercilious members of the punditocracy should be thinking to themselves before they open their mouths, "Gee, I wish I could speak French as well as Dion & the Outremonts speaks English!"