For Canada's Women...

Consider carefully when Harper won't include a full range of women's health options on the world stage ... apparently at the urging of Canada's religious right wing.

Remember that this is the same man under whose governance cutbacks have disproportionately affected women - both socially and economically.

Harper, and the extremists in the ReformaTory base, would happily dial Canada's society back to pre-WW II era social structures - where women were treated essentially as doormats.

The "anti-abortion" movement is is more about regulating women's sexuality than it is anything else. These same people are also actively opposing contraceptives and comprehensive sex education. All of which are part of ensuring that a woman is able to control her fertility.

If Harper is unwilling to present a comprehensive platform on the world stage, can you imagine what he'd do in Canada if he wasn't constrained by the limitations of a minority parliament?

There's The Talking Point, Then There's Reality

Tom Flanagan vomits the following forth:

Canada changed from a constitutional monarchy to a constitutional democracy as the franchise was extended to all adults and political parties became national in scope. That evolution was recognized in 1982 in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Section 1 characterizes Canada as "a free and democratic society," and Section 3 grants the right to vote to "every citizen of Canada."

... In countries where coalition governments are common, parties reveal their alliances so that citizens can know how their votes will affect the composition of the executive after the election. In stark contrast, those who voted for the Liberals, NDP or Bloc in the last election could not possibly have known they were choosing a Liberal-NDP government supported by a secret protocol with the Bloc. ...

Put it all together, and you have a head-spinning violation of democratic norms of open discussion and majority rule. The Governor-General, as the protector of Canada's constitutional democracy, should ensure the voters get a chance to say whether they want the coalition as a government. They haven't yet had that chance.

He starts off with a lie - and it is a whopper. "Canada changed from a constitutional monarchy to a constitutional democracy"

Really, Mr. Flanagan? Are you sure about this? Last I checked the Queen was still our titular head of state. Your argument is specious - it starts from a false premise, and concludes a logical fallacy when held up to reality - as this letter points out so nicely:

Eugene Forsey: "It is the people's representatives in the newly elected House who will decide whether the minority government shall stay in office or be thrown out."

(It's also interesting that Flanagan didn't publicly postulate such an argument in 2004 when the Con$ were plotting coalition with the Bloc and NDP)

Perhaps Mr. Flanagan needs some remedial courses on the structure of Canada's government - he seems to have lost sight of them during his descent into neo-Con/neo-Rethuglican dogma.

[Update 11/01/09]:
With respect to Patrick's off-topic question, Wikipedia has phrased the role of the monarchy in our government quite well:

In theory, supreme legislative power is vested in the Queen-in-Parliament; in practice in modern times, real power is vested in the House of Commons; the Sovereign generally acts on the advice of the Prime Minister and the powers of the House of Lords are limited

In short, the Queen governs on the advice of her ministers. While she rarely exercises the power to intervene in the politics of the country, it is possible to do so:

Typically these powers are:

1. to dismiss a Prime Minister;
2. to refuse to dissolve Parliament;
3. to refuse or delay the Royal Assent to legislation.

[/Update]

[Update 12/01/09]:
Over at Northern BC Dipper's blog, I see someone claiming to be Tom Flanagan has posted a comment that reads:

Hi NBCDipper (whoever you are),

You’re quite right to pick up on that phrase in my most recent Globe column, but I didn’t actually write those words. The Globe’s editor changed them withut consulting me, and thereby altered the meaning. What I wrote was that the apologists for the coalition accuse others of not having paid attention in Political Science 101, which is actually quite different from what was printed. TEF

Okay, but it merely makes Flanagan's article a repetition of the same talking point that the HarperCon$ have been spewing since November last year. It is a talking point that is based on a blatant distortion of the structure and nature of Canada's parliamentary democracy. As far as I am concerned, Flanagan's argument remains specious - especially in light of the fact that the Con$ were negotiating just such a coalition in 2004.
[/Update]

There's Nothing They Won't Buy

... and in the case of the HarperCon$, it's votes.

It's funny how it goes with this lot. One day, they are busy denigrating the Premier of Ontario for complaining about the seat redistribution:

The seat issue had erupted into such an angry war of words between Ottawa and Ontario that then Conservative government house leader Peter Van Loan called McGuinty "the small man of Confederation" for demanding Ontario get 21 additional seats instead of 10.

Now that big daddy didn't manage to secure his vaunted majority in October, he's suddenly willing to hand over the whole lot to Ontario:

A lengthy and often bitter fight between Ontario and the federal government was quietly resolved last week when Prime Minister Stephen Harper agreed to give the province 21 additional seats in the House of Commons, Premier Dalton McGuinty said Wednesday.

Uh huh. Alex, I'll take "Things Harper Will Do For a Majority" for $200, please.

This is nothing more than Harper playing his cards where he thinks he will have the greatest degree of "traction" - and since pouring money into Quebec didn't succeed, he's now spending his attentions on Ontario.

Next up, wait for astonishingly large amounts of money to be poured into Ontario, while Quebec and Alberta get told to bugger off. (Alberta will be ignored because Harper knows full well that he can get a bale of hay elected in this province, so he doesn't have to give a damn)

A Little Refresher ...

[Update 19:30]
It's even worse than I feared according a Dominion Institute commissioned survey:

The institute drew up four basic questions:

* Who is the head of state?
* How can Canada's system of government best be described?
* Do Canadians elect the prime minister directly?
* Can the Governor General nix a prime minister's request for a new election?

The really sad part is how few people actually got the answers right:

About 75 per cent of Canadians believe incorrectly the prime minister or the Governor General is head of state, ...
Given a choice how best to describe the system of government, 25 per cent of those surveyed decided on a "co-operative assembly" while 17 per cent opted for a "representative republic."

Canada is neither. Only 59 per cent picked correctly — constitutional monarchy.

In a similar vein, 51 per cent wrongly agreed that Canadians elect the prime minister directly.

...
A full 90 per cent responded correctly that the Governor General does have the power, which Jean may yet be called on to wield if the opposition coalition does defeat the government with a vote in the Commons.

If a majority had responded anything other than in the affirmative about the Governor General's powers given what's been in the news in the last few weeks, it would have made the results that much more disappointing.

What's even more vile than those results is the way that the HarperCon$ are preying on the ignorance of so many.
[/Update]

Since Canada's government seems intent on lying to the public about the concept of a government formed by a coalition, I thought it worth a few minutes to dismantle the outright lies that are being foisted upon us from the PMO.

One of the talking points that has been thrown out there is that an opposition coalition is somehow analogous to a coup d'état.

This is blatantly false. I'll refer briefly to the Wikipedia article on the subject for a practical working definition:

a coup, is the sudden unconstitutional overthrow of a government by a part — usually small — of the state establishment — usually the military — to replace the branch of the stricken government, either with another civil government or with a military government.

The first point here is that a coup d'état is unconstitutional. So, let us consider the constitutional realities that are at play right now in Canada for a moment.

Wikipedia provides a reasonable (but incomplete) summary of the Governor General's legal powers. If one reviews Section III of the Constitution Act of 1867, it clearly vests the executive power of government in the crown, represented in Canada by the Governor General:

9. The Executive Government and Authority of and over Canada is hereby declared to continue and be vested in the Queen.

10. The Provisions of this Act referring to the Governor General extend and apply to the Governor General for the Time being of Canada, or other the Chief Executive Officer or Administrator for the Time being carrying on the Government of Canada on behalf and in the Name of the Queen, by whatever Title he is designated.

This is the first part of the discussion that is important. The appointment and swearing in of the government in the House of Commons is performed by the Governor General on behalf of the crown. In a situation such as a minority parliament, the Governor General is presented with the potential for several different options - the party with the plurality of seats will likely be asked to form the government first, but as the King-Byng Affair of 1926 demonstrated, the Governor General may ask the leaders of other parties to form the government.

As far as I know, the coalition has taken no steps which undermine or violate the authority of the Governor General in this matter.

Now, let us move along to how the coalition has proceeded. Prior to Prime Minister Harper requesting, and being granted, a prorogation of parliament, there was to be a confidence vote in the House of Commons on Dec 12, 2008 on the motions related to the Fiscal Update that the Harper-led government had tabled in the House of Commons in late November.

In a Westminster parliament, a government that loses the confidence of the House of Commons collapses. The concept of a confidence motion is a recognized and accepted construct through which the sitting government will be tested. Although a government's collapse usually triggers a general election, it is not necessarily the case that happen. If the Governor General can be persuaded that one or more of the opposition parties can form a stable government for some period of time, the Governor General has the right to ask the opposition to form a government without triggering an election.

So, since the coalition was proceeding through a legitimate path to deprive the Harper government of the confidence of the House of Commons, it is hard to claim that a coalition is in any respect a 'coup d'état' in any meaningful way.

The second point that needs to be considered here is that in a Westminster Parliament, we elect our representatives, and we do not directly elect the Prime Minister, instead the Queen requests the person most likely to command the support of a majority in the House, normally the leader of the largest party in the House of Commons, to form a government. In short, Stephen Harper sits in the PMO at "Her Majesty's Pleasure", and by a series of quirks of convention belonging to a system that has evolved over nearly 1,000 years.


Since the Harper Conservatives were so willing to form a coalition to replace Paul Martin's government in 2004, it is mind boggling that today we find the same group of people complaining that a coalition would somehow be an illegitimate government.

In October of 2008, Stephen Harper asked Canadians to decide on a parliament. We duly elected our representatives with the full expectation that they would find a way to make the resulting House of Commons work. If that takes the form of creating a coalition government, that is an eminently valid expression of democracy in Canada and in fact would represent a government that is doing what most Canadians would want - a degree of cooperation among the leaders in the House of Commons.

I suspect that Harper is in fact fomenting a crisis for one of two reasons - he either wants "another kick at the can" in the electoral forum to secure a majority, or he is trying to create a crisis big enough to justify re-opening the constitution. In the latter case, I fear greatly what he would do, for he has shown himself repeatedly to be autocratic rather than democratic.

More Rovian Crap From The PMO

Taking more plays from Karl "Turdblossom" Rove, the PMO starts on its next campaign of lies, deception and character assassination:

"The basic substance of the debate doesn't change," said Heritage Minister James Moore. "They're still part of a coalition with the Bloc Québécois and the NDP which remains unelected by Canadians."

Moore insisted "we're prepared to listen to them," but, asked if Conservatives could back specific budgetary proposals by the coalition such as eliminating a two-week waiting period for Employment Insurance benefits, he shrugged.

Right...this coming from a party whose leader is saying that he is willing to work with Ignatieff.

Rajotte said the Liberals don't need to wield the option of a coalition to exert leverage on the government. "The leverage (Ignatieff) has, the leverage all parties have, is that we (Conservatives) require at least one other party to support ... the budget at the end of January."

He added: "They've done some harm to the Liberal brand because a lot of Liberals across this country are not comfortable with the idea of forming a coalition with the Bloc Québécois and the NDP."

Bullfeathers. Rajotte is making assertions here ... and coming from a party who was courting the Bloc and NDP in 2004 to form a coalition, that smacks of plain hypocrisy. There's no way that a coalition is "valid an democratic" one day and suddenly becomes "undemocratic" the next - not unless you are being a two-faced liar.

I dare say that a lot of Liberals are more comfortable making alliance with the NDP and Bloc than with the Con$ - for the simple reason that the Con$ have proven time and again that they are all too eager to kick their opponents in the shins and higher at every opportunity.

A leopard does not change its spots, nor a tiger its strips. A snake may shed its skin, but pretty much the same pattern is always underneath - you can guess which one the Con$ really are as they slither their way through this parliamentary disaster they've created.

Dear Mr. Kenney:

Let's chat for a moment about your comments yesterday, shall we?

"It says to me that the people of Canada want democracy respected. They just voted for a Conservative government six or seven weeks ago. They don't appreciate Opposition politicians trying to overturn election results and make a deal with the Separatists six weeks later."

This is a blatant lie on so many levels it's ridiculous.

Six or seven weeks ago, a majority of Canadians did not vote conservative. Let's be absolutely clear about this. The Conservatives got just over 30% of the popular vote - which means that about 22% of the eligible voters actually voted for you and Mr. Harper.

Second, I think you need a little remedial education in the form and structure of Canada's government - apparently you have forgotten some basics that you should have been taught back in grade school.

In Canada, we elect a Parliament - and we give a mandate to that parliament to govern the country. It is by convention that the party with the most seats is asked to form the government. In reality, it is in fact the party (or group of parties) that can control the majority of the seats that forms the government. The Conservatives are quite some distance from forming a majority in this situation.

Second, you don't get to squawk about a coalition being "anti democratic" when your party has gone after the same gambit. You know damn well that it is both legal, and a legitimate expression of democracy in Canada.

Third, it is the Conservative party that is behaving in a manner that is deeply offensive to the democracy in Canada. This is not the first time, but the third time that Mr. Harper has shut down parliament to avoid debate and to avoid being held accountable for his government's actions and policies. Instead of facing his opposition, or trying to work with the opposition, he tries to skewer them at every turn. When challenged in a serious manner, he folds like a cheap tent.

By shutting down parliament to avoid a confidence vote, Mr. Harper has done far worse damage to Canada's democracy than a coalition government would have. Why do I say this? Because in doing so, the Prime Minister of a Minority Government has silenced the voices of our duly elected representatives - including yourself Mr. Kenney. He has stifled debate solely because he cannot defend his actions as anything other than vicious partisan politics, and he is afraid to be accountable for them.

Your statements, Mr. Kenney, merely demonstrate that you are a toadie to Mr. Harper's will and whim. (Not that you've ever even attempted be anything other than a partisan politician - heaven forbid that you might actually have to deal with a constituent who isn't of like mind to yourself)

Harper Makes History!

Albeit, by putting a black mark beside his name for being the first Prime Minister in Canadian history to suspend parliament solely for the purpose of avoiding a confidence vote.

I do not envy the Governor General this decision - in granting Harper's request,she placed herself firmly in a partisan position backing a Prime Minister who, it seems, has lost the confidence of the house. But, had she flat out denied the request, the HarperCon$ would have been screaming about her in the same manner, complaining that she had tacitly supported a "separatist coalition" through her actions.

Harper is now damaged goods as a Prime Minister. Not only has Harper abused our parliamentary processes by running like a coward from a confidence motion, but his actions themselves are fundamentally contrary to the notion of an elected, parliamentary democracy. Not only has Harper dodged a confidence vote next week, but in doing so he has silenced the voices of all of our elected representatives in government and he has demolished any possible credibility he would have to claim that his government is in any respect accountable to the people.

If the Liberals are smart, they will move quickly to replace Dion before Parliament reconvenes. This is no time to sit back and allow another drawn out leadership campaign - pick a new leader, swear them in and gird for battle. A Harper-led government should not be allowed to stand any longer than absolutely necessary.

[Update]
As this blogger points out, in Harper's own words, he has lost his moral authority to govern:

“When a government starts trying to cancel dissent or avoid dissent is when it’s rapidly losing its moral authority to govern.”- Stephen Harper, 2005

[/Update]

Mr. Harper - Why Should We Trust You?

Harper Addresses Canada

How magnanimous of Mr. Harper. He actually chose to address Canada - and unfortunately he simply proved once again that he is far more interested in playing partisan politics games rather than actually governing the country.

Does he talk about his party's plan for Canada? No.

"The opposition is attempting to impose this deal without your say, without your consent, and without your vote," Harper said.

"This is no time for backroom deals with the separatists. It is a time for Canada's government to focus on the economy and specifically measures for the upcoming budget."

Instead, he spends most of his time blathering on about his imagined evils of coalition, and quietly avoids actually talking about how his party is going to govern Canada through the current economic turmoil.

In fact, worse, Harper has further isolated himself and his party in a minority parliament. He might have been able to turn to the BQ for support - if he could convince Duceppe that what he was proposing was in fact in Quebec's best interests. After this week's demonizing, I very much doubt that Harper will get the time of day from Duceppe - or even agreement that it's raining during a downpour.

At a time like this, a coalition with the separatists cannot help Canada. And the Opposition does not have the democratic right to impose a coalition with the separatists they promised voters would never happen.

Right. Sure, Steve. What you forget, Mr. Harper, is that you don't exactly have an overwhelming mandate to govern yourself. In fact, you have a minority of the seats in the house - which means that if the opposition can form a coalition in Parliament that in fact they can govern - quite legally, and quite democratically. You see, Canadians told all of the parties that none of them were acceptable - including the Con$.

The irony is that it wasn't that long ago that Harper's own party was trying to secure a coalition of its own.

I must give Dion's speech some credit - it's possibly the best one he's ever given.

In times like this our compassion as a country is tested. We believe it is imperative that the government offers Canadians who have already lost their job, whether in the factories of South Western Ontario or the forests of Eastern Quebec and British Columbia, the support they need to live in dignity and develop new skills.

That is precisely what we intend to provide.

... and then there is this:

Earlier today I wrote Her Excellency the Governor General. I respectfully asked her to refuse any request by the Prime Minister to suspend Parliament until he has demonstrated to her that he still commands the confidence of the House.

If Mr. Harper wants to suspend Parliament he must first face a vote of confidence.

In our Canada, the government is accountable for its decisions and actions in Parliament.

In our Canada, the government derives its legitimacy from an elected Parliament.

Harper has shown Canadians that he is no longer to be trusted to run Canada - he is far too interested in his own political vendettas, and far too disinterested in the job of actually governing to be an effective Prime Minister.

A Quick, Concise Review of Parliamentary Civics

Here

Read It.

Then go introduce the next twit spouting Con$ervative talking points about coalitions to reality.

Nominations For Prime Minister

With Alberta's newspapers - and population, it seems - having forgotten the basics of how our elected government is supposed to work, I'd like to nominate two candidates to replace Mr. Harper and his band of bullies in Ottawa:

Parrots Buddy and Chipper join Calgary Zoo

Two parrots can make just as much pointless noise and mess as a 140-odd Conservative politicians - only the parrots will at least be entertaining to watch...and occasionally the parrots will learn something new.

Anybody think the Calgary Zoo will agree to a straight swap?

The Arrogance of this PM

Regular readers of this blog already know that I am no fan of Stephen Harper. However, his antics in the last week have taken my opinion of the man to new lows.

Consider his marching orders to the troops:

Mr. Giorno's e-mail stated that MPs must show that the current dispute with opposition parties is merely about the Liberals, NDP and Bloc trying to protect their share of the $27-million in public subsidies and steal power that they failed to win legitimately in the last federal election.

The Tories plan to scrutinize the public reaction to their message over the weekend. If they don't feel they've persuaded Canadians that a change would be disastrous, sources said, they may consider describing in more detail what kind of spending they would be prepared to offer and under what conditions they would pump stimulus into the economy.

Uh huh. Since that little piece of odiousness is off the table (or it was as of yesterday - perhaps the HarperCon$ have put it back on - hard to know), one has to imagine that there's just a little more to the picture than that. Of course, what this really reflects is the HarperCon$ playing more from the Karl Rove book of political dirty tricks than from any coherent sense of doing the right thing for Canada as a nation.

Harper is playing politics while our economy sinks, a Canadian Nero so self absorbed that the only thing that matters to him is his ego.

Harper Needs A Lesson On Canadian Civics

Since I'm hearing this bit of drivel fall from our Prime Minister's lips:

The opposition is entitled to defeat the government as it sees fit, Harper said Friday, but Dion himself does not have the right to take power without an election.

Perhaps it is time to remind Mr. Harper that in fact the Governor General has the right to consider the Leader of the Opposition forming a coalition government if the minority government falls. Such governments have been exceedingly rare in Canada, but that doesn't mean they cannot occur.

Second, to claim that it is 'undemocratic' is completely ridiculous. The last election for the Parliament was only a few short months ago. Canadians sent politicians a message that none of the parties deserves to govern in a majority setting. Therefore, we clearly asked the politicians to find a way to make a minority situation work. Since the leadership of the 'first party' has made it clear that he is unwilling to compromise with other parties, then the other parties have the opportunity to form a coalition - if, of course, they can persuade her Excellency, The Governor General, that such a coalition would have the confidence of the house.

It is, in fact, Mr. Harper who has shown himself to be anything but an advocate for democracy in the last couple of years.

In terms of the political crisis that Harper has just spawned, Jeffrey Simpson has an excellent assessment of the situation, and Harper's behaviour.

Rick Bell over at the Calgary Sun has the grand prize winner for headline: The PM plays politics when the economy is tanking and people are afraid. So how do you spell 'disgraceful?' S-T-E-P-H-E-N-H-A-R-P-E-R.

Undemocratic, You Say?

So, the opposition parties are talking about forming a coalition if they topple the HarperCon$ next week.

Sez the PMO:

The opposition is entitled to defeat the government as it sees fit, Harper said Friday, but Dion himself does not have the right to take power without an election.

"They want to put in place a government led by one party which received its lowest popular vote since Confederation," he said.

Well, the other side of that one is that we are now being governed by a party that didn't exactly overwhelm voters last election either. In fact, a Liberal-NDP-Bloc coalition would actually represent a plurality of voters in Canada.

Of course, as has been typical of the HarperCon$, instead of actually governing, everything is a game to play for them. In the case of the the "FU" that Flaherty delivered yesterday, the lovely little red herring of party funding is in there. The amount of money involved is relatively small, so it's fiscally irrelevant to the government's books.

If the Con$ got it through, they just weakened their opponents by taking money away from them; if the opposition toppled the government, the Con$ would have had a lovely meme to wave in front of the voters.

I see that in today's news, Harper has dropped that little clause from the FU motion that will be before the house on Monday. Whether that is enough to persuade one of the opposition parties to go along with the Con$ is yet to be seen. I think what is most unfortunate is that Harper and his band of goons still have not understood that a truly successful minority government works by collaborating with the opposition.

If the Con$ do fall on Monday, and a coalition is formed, I imagine that we will be seeing an election before 2009 is out. I will be very surprised indeed if the coalition lasts much past the Liberal leadership selection.

[Update]
I see Harper's now trying for stalling tactics to buy himself time.
[/Update]