Harper Describes Himself

One of the more ludicrous things the Harper Government has been pursuing is creating a "monument to the victims of communism".  A more cold-war propaganda-esque move is almost unimaginable.  

But, in Harper's speech at a fundraiser yesterday, he opened his mouth and promptly engaged in self-description.

In language reminiscent of the height of the Cold War, Harper lambasted communism and oppressive or even murderous ideologies. 

"Evil comes in many forms and seems to reinvent itself time and again," he said. 

"But whatever it calls itself — Nazism, Marxist-Leninism, today, terrorism — they all have one thing in common: the destruction, the end of human liberty."

Wow.  Coming from a man whose government has done more to create a nouveau fascism in Canada than any could imagine, this is straight up irony.

He's talking about human liberty.  This coming from a government which has imposed hefty mandatory minimum sentences wherever it can, from a government that has turned CSEC into an agency which is spying on its own citizens, and in general has been trying to turn the RCMP into its own little version of East Germany's Stasi.

Going after "communism" as some kind of evil threat is such a straw-man argument it's straight up there with some of Nazi Germany's propaganda campaigns.  Create a false threat and then go after it at every opportunity.

If communism is such a dire threat, then why has Harper been engaged in the highly secretive TPP negotiations, which mysteriously involve China?  Or perhaps he'd like to explain why he has permitted CNOOC to buy up major Canadian oil and gas assets?  After all, wouldn't China be the most despicable evil on the planet?

This is a man who has tried repeatedly to violate the terms of this country's constitution.  He has tried to appoint judges to the supreme court using partisan criteria, he is passing laws which are designed to increase the scope of government surveillance and laws which attack the fundamental principles of fair democracy.

For Harper to attack a straw man like "communism" when he himself is acting in a manner consistent with the worst dictators that he would criticize.