As
a rule, Politics and Religion are two things that we don’t talk about in polite
company. Both excite passions and can easily get out of hand if we don’t
respect our fellow debaters.
Generally
I don’t talk politics (or religion) in person.
I don’t need the headaches, I don’t need the hassle.
There
was a time that I would discuss politics on occasion. I recall a time when I sat with a friend and
we were on opposite sides of an issue.
We discussed the merits of our sides, pointed out the defects in the
other’s argument and when we were done, neither of us had won. We both learned a little bit though and saw
that our stance on either side was not perfect.
In
the end the issue was decided at the polls, Mulroney won a majority and the GST
was born. One thing I took away from
that discussion was that the GST was not set high enough. Had it been higher, Personal Income Tax could
have been lowered and even eliminated for entry level incomes.
But
that was then.
Today,
I don’t even bother. The respect is all
but gone.
That
was most evident this week when Paul Calandra made a mockery of Question Period. QP has a long history of non-answers and some
politicians have made a pretty good living out of dancing around questions or
deflecting them into the corner leaving the Opposition little room to mount an
attack.
The
media is now reporting that both the non-answer and the apology were handed to
Calandra prior to both events happening by the PMO. In my opinion, if the staffers in the PMO
want certain answers provided in the House, they should run for a seat and give
those answers themselves.
Let’s
put it this way, had Calandra said something along the lines of “I acknowledge
the question of the Honourable Member” and then segued to something along the
lines of “it mirrors the acts of terrorism that the people of Israel recently faced”
and finally going to wondering “why the Members of the Opposition were not as
concerned about the attacks on Israel as they are about the threat of ISIS” or
something along those lines we probably wouldn’t have said much. It still answers not a single thing and even
finds a way to poke at Mulcair but still within the limits of debate in
QP. Most of us would have been annoyed
at the non answer, but it tries to contain the question and deflect it.
I
don’t have the silver tongue required to pull this type of thing off, but I
hope you get the idea. It’s why some MPs
are remembered as legends for their gift of non-answers and others are going to
be remembered as “Jackasses” (Helloooo Skippy!)
It
doesn’t stop there, some like to blame the Internet, but the problem is the
people.
How
many times have you seen (or heard) people saying “don’t read the comments” on
stories that involve politics? It
certainly doesn’t take long for the thoughtful answers (and there are some) to
be pushed down the page by trolls of all different flags slagging each other
and the politics they represent with strawmen, ad hominems and all the other
tools designed to take the argument away from the issue at hand and direct it
into whatever the devil it becomes.
I’ve
been guilty of some of these offences, and I try hard to not stoop to using
them and I’ll tell you it’s an uphill climb.
Another that I try to avoid is the name calling. It’s the same rule that you followed when you
were a kid. When you resort to name
calling, you’ve pretty much lost the argument and that goes for calling the
politicians and the parties by derogatory names. It cuts both ways folks, you might have
noticed that I rarely use “Conservative” but instead use “the Harper Party”. This is out of deference to my friends (yes I
have some) who are conservatives (yes to that too) but find themselves without
a party. The Blue Flag has gone way over
to the right and now they’re standing in the void between that one and the Red
and Orange ones to the other side.
Of
course all this goes in the dumpster if you want to troll and I’m in a mood to
engage or if you want to use half truths to support your argument. A Yiddish proverb runs “A half truth is still a whole lie.” Don’t use them OK?
Look,
if you want to talk politics and debate policy, be my guest, I might even
partake, but furl you flag when you come in the door. When we argue over what the best thing to do
should be, the only flag we should really be worried about is the one with the
two red stripes and a big red maple leaf in the middle.
Now
if we could only get the folks in Ottawa to buy into this.
Cheers!
BC
