I’m not “Harper People”… Do I get an Attack Ad too?

I was going to write about Bob Rae and the Harper Party attack ads but I got side tracked.

There was a bit on the news about Harper’s trip to Asia and how Canada was going to be open for business when it came to Asia.

He was talking oil.

He said it would be clear when the budget came down.

I’m not a gambler but I’d be willing to wager that a certain politician is about to ram his pipeline into B.C.’s interior and say it’s necessary for Canada’s Financial Interests.

Canada is getting a lot smaller, there are only two groups... the Pro Harperistas and everyone else.

If you stand against the Harper Party you get half truths and innuendos up the wazoo. Ask Bob Rae, he’s been marked by the Dark Lord as his inequal and is open to the Harper Propaganda Machine’s hate messaging system.

Using half truths and sound bites the Harperistas are trying to make Bob Rae look like the most incompetent Premier in Ontario’s history. Actually Rae did a pretty savvy job of steering a world class economy through a recession with no help from his Federal counterparts, the Mulroney PCs.

Compare that to Harper’s record on the economy and his dealings with the recession. When Rae got through Ontario was ready for business, Harper still whines and pules about how fragile the economy is even if we have supposedly recovered.

Then there is Thomas Mulcair who was merely a candidate for the leadership of the NDP and we got leaked stories about how he approached Harper to run for the Stephen Harper Party but he wanted to be a front row Cabinet Minister. Harper allegedly turned him down because he was greedy…

Thomas Mulcair was a free agent and a well know Quebec politician and talked with both the Federal Liberals and the NDP. Harper would have given his eye teeth to pull Mulcair into his circle. Imagine having Mulcair as his Quebec Lieutenant rather than having to appoint a Senator who wasn’t even from Quebec at the time to sit in his Caucus as the Quebec representative.

The Harperistas were trying to poison the NDP against Mulcair… didn’t work.

Congratulations Thomas Mulcair on your successful leadership bid for the New Democrats!

I understand Bob Rae sent a nice note of congratulations to Mr. Mulcair, Stephen Harper’s Team sent one too, accusing him of being a tax and spend socialist or something of that sort.

Class act Stephen, the ads start tomorrow right? [Edit apparently they start Monday]

When it comes to aboriginal relations, Harper seems to like the natives, when they wear their fancy Indian clothes and make him an honorary chief or sit with him in the high class box at the Olympics. When they are polite and don’t ask for much.

Contrast that when the Harper Party was shocked and amazed by the squalor that the people of Attawapiskat were living in. When they asked for help (by declaring a state of emergency) the Harper Party berated them for being wasteful, smearing them and accusing them of mismanagement of their Native allowance.

This is the same community whose children went all the way to the United Nations to beg for money to have a proper school in their community.

Not long ago an Inuit boy died while travelling from his grandmother’s house to his home on a snowmobile.

When he was overdue, a search was organized and National Defence was contacted to assist. They declined.

They said the weather was too bad for their helicopters. It was not.

They said they have a “call back” policy where the searchers have to call them again before they can act. The policy does not exist.

Turns out there were no helicopters available, they were down for service, both of them.

Apparently Stephen Harper would rather give tax breaks to big oil than ensure the safety of Canadians by ensuring we have adequate search and rescue available at all times.

In Stephen Harper’s world, a Cabinet Minister can lie to the House of Commons, be found in contempt of the House of Commons, and still get a promotion.

In Stephen Harper’s world, a Cabinet Minister can misappropriate money for pet projects and still get a promotion.

In Stephen Harper’s world, a Cabinet Minister can have an affair with a subordinate and still get a promotion.

In the real world these acts would get you terminated and possibly tossed in jail.

In Stephen Harper’s world, those who do not want a pipeline full of bitumen run through their back yards are not allowed to have experts talk on their behalf. Those experts are banished because they are interfering foreigners attempting to damage Canada’s economy. Take that Sierra Club, you bunch of hooligans.

But the other interfering foreigners, the oil companies, are allowed to argue in favour of running the muck through your back yard.

But then again, they’re “Harper People”.

But the thing these “Harper People” need to keep in mind, you are only “Harper People” as long as you are useful to him.

Ask the grain farmers who are fighting to retain the Canadian Wheat Board.

He got your votes and now he gets his way.

Trudeau called MPs pawns. Harper has made them Marionettes. They can only speak when Harper puts words in their mouths.

You and me? We are only important for one month every four years or so.

The smears and attack ads are just his way of telling you how to vote, so you can be “Harper People” too.

Lord Stephen, Promise Made, Promise Kept

Apparently the Harperistas have a new line.

“Promise made, promise kept.”

I’m sure the PMO thought long and hard to dream this up before sending out to the trolling class of Harperistas. You know the ones, they post an op/ed and get all annoyed when it gets challenged. Calling people names and being rude because it was in the National Post and so it has to be true or Ezra Levant wrote it so it cannot be challenged… note to the Harper Party chattering classless… op/eds are opinions and carry no more weight than a blog by a cranky old cat and Ezra is an overfed sparrow fart that will write anything for anyone who pays enough. Kind of like prostitution isn’t it?

I write for me.

Now the last time I saw this buzz phrase PMPK was in regards to the impending closure of the Canadian Wheat Board. These junior league Harper Party operatives are all aglow with the news that their Lord Stephen has beat up a bunch of farmers and is rewriting the laws to do it. They think this is wonderful.

I would suggest that the Harper Regime is doing the same type of thing that the despots running the Middle East have been doing for the last few decades. Breaking the existing laws and just writing new ones making whatever they want to do legal.

Government control of the media? New law. Easy peasy. Just pull a string and all the Harper Party marionettes raise their hands and say “Aye.”

Somewhere Orwell is laughing at us.

Now the junior leaguers are not so happy about the class action lawsuit over the properties owned by the CWB and lost income and so forth. The evil ring leader is an immoral LIEberal. Could be, but he’s a member of the Canadian Wheat Board and a citizen of Canada and he appears to be within his rights to sue.

When Ritz got his marching orders from the PMO over this I’m sure I’m not the only one who saw the lawsuits coming fast and furious. The irony is that the very same farmers who wanted the CWB killed will be first in line to get their hands on the spoils should the class action suit prevail. Isn’t Ritz a grain farmer? Think he’ll send that cheque back uncashed?

No, the only problem is that if the government loses, it won’t be the Harper Party footing the bill. It will be a cranky old cat and the rest of Canadians paying for Harper’s folly. If there was true justice in this land the lawsuit would have named Harper and Ritz and the Harper Party and every last one of the puppets that supported this bill accountable for every red cent.

But it’s the Government of Canada that’s doing this, and so it’s the Government of Canada that gets named in the lawsuit.

And win or lose, we get to pay for the lawyers.

Let’s face it, Canadians have hired the most incompetent manager on the earth to run our country. When the situation in Attawapiskat arose our fearless leader looked surprised and astounded about this. Basically the response was “We sent the cheque, what did they spend it on?” followed by blaming the Indians for spending it on stuff. A competent manager wouldn’t have to ask.

These same guys are still planning to buy the jets that may never be made, much less fly. Plan B will be to blame the Liberals for buying the planes.

No, when Stephen Harper wanders off into the sunset after his time in office, we will be holding the bag. Billions of dollars of debt, gutted social services screaming to be rebuilt without a penny in the coffers and who knows what else and we will pass it on to our children because we won’t be able to pay for it ourselves.

That is the promise we’ll get to keep.

Support the Canadian Wheat Board

What happened to Minister Ritz?

Last week he was telling farmers that their Canadian Wheat Board plebiscite meant nothing.  Now he is quiet.  Is this part of the strategy?  Did someone higher up yank on his choke chain?

Maybe, just maybe the fools on the Hill have realized they stirred a hornet’s nest.

Maybe.

Maybe they think if they become quiet, the farmers will become quiet.  Please don’t become quiet.  Keep their feet to the fire, let them know they are accountable to the people and the people will push back.

In his interview Minister Ritz said that farmers could keep the CWB, but now I find that’s not true.  You might be able to try and gather up the pieces after it gets blown up, but there will be others grabbing for the pieces too, I don’t see a good future for the family farm on the prairie, and this bothers me.

So why does a Cat in Ontario care?  I see this as an injustice against family farms on the prairies.  We all need to stand with you on this.  If the government was truly interested in helping they would be in serious talks about how to address this issue and how it can be resolved.  Not trying to destroy 70 years of cooperation, 70 years of success.

Isn’t that what Canadians do?  We work together for the betterment of the whole.  At least we used to.  And we look out for the other guy.

I include a link.  If you have not already shown your support for the farmers of the Canadian Wheat Board, this link will take you to a petition asking that the farmers be given the choice of what happens to the CWB.  Support the farmers, they support you.

https://www.cwb.ca/db/corp/petition.nsf/onlinepetitionWeb?OpenForm

It is the least that we can do.

My thanks to Shelley Cooper-Stephenson for the link.  I am using it without permission, I hope you don’t mind.

Edit.. I need to add another link.  This will send a message to the Agriculture Minister and your MP letting them know that you support the CWB farmers.

https://www.cwb.ca/db/corp/respectplebisciteemail.nsf/SubEmailWeb?OpenForm

 

 

CWB vs the Harper government, why does democracy scare you Stephen?

What is it about democracy that scares Stephen Harper and his merry band so much? 

Right now, I’m thinking about the west.  As an Ontarian and city folk, I don’t know all the ins and outs of the Canada Wheat Board, but I do hear farmers in the West calling to save this institution.

The Canada Wheat Board (CWB) was instituted some seventy odd years ago to help Canadian farmers compete on the world stage and reduce the risk of a single bad crop or a severe price drop from wiping out our farmers.  It also evened the playing field so that smaller producers could get their crop to market and get a reasonable return for their produce.

The CWB has in excess of 68000 members, many of whom wish to save the CWB, many wish to see it dismantled.  The question is how many is “many”?

These 68000 members have received ballots to vote on whether to save the CWB or not.  That will tell us how many.  The conservative government says they don’t care how many.  Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said that the results of this plebiscite will not affect the decision of the Harper run government to kill the CWB.  He says “many” farmers want it killed to end.

So, in other words, the government’s position is that they don’t give a rat’s patoot what the majority of the farmers want.  Gerry says he “believes” that “many” farmers want this to happen.  Why not wait a bit and you will Know what Most of the farmers want.

I don’t want a vote in this issue nor do I deserve one.  I’m not a grain producer.  As long as the CWB does its job and doesn’t cost the tax payers anything, it’s a CWB membership issue.

From what I do see from here, is that Some farmers want to sell their grain outside of the CWB.  I’m willing to bet these are large producers and Corporate farmers that have the means available to compete, and removal of the CWB would give one less major competitor in the market.  They aren’t afraid of family farms.  The family farms will blow away with the CWB.  It is the same reason that Mom and Pop stores are withering under the influence of the chain stores.  As an added bonus, then the family farms wither and die, the Corporate farms will just suck them up the same way Walmart takes the former customers of the Mom and Pops.

Before the CWB, farmers were at the mercy of the capitalists.  They produced the product, but had to rely on the rail ways and grain handling firms to get their goods to market.  The capitalists made sure they got their money, the farmers got the squeeze.  The CWB evened the playing field by banding the farmers into a unit that could compete with the capitalists.  The bonus being that the CWB being run by farmers was it was only expected to cover its costs and the profits would go back to the farmers.

So why is the government meddling in a working situation?  The “right” people complained.

We know the voice of the majority carries little weight with the government.  Polls tell us what the people think, we favour the gun registry, we don’t want the government snooping in our emails, but the Harper run government has its agenda and the CWB is on it.

A sensible alternative would be to sit down with the two sides on this and reach an agreement.  Surely there has to be a way that farmers could opt out and compete that would satisfy both sides. 

But that would require listening to the people. 

Something that our current government doesn’t seem all too interested in.