Saturday, December 27, 2014

He May Have Hidden In A Closet .....



But that likely isn't stopping Stephen Harper from manipulating the narrative surrounding the Parliament Hill tragedy to his own political advantage.

At least, that is the speculation of Stephen Maher.

Crack addict Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, who killed Cpl. Nathan Cirillo and who was then himself killed in a barrage of shots within Parliament, is really not understood any better today than he was when the tragedy occurred on October 22. However, one thing is quite clear:
The shooting heralded the end of Trudeau’s long honeymoon, bringing him down within polling range of Stephen Harper for the first time since he became leader of his party.
But it is not a lack of data that prevents our understanding of those terrible events; two videos exist, one of which would either confirm or refute the narrative about Kevin Vickers, the sergeant-at-arms, who, we are told, finished Zehaf-Bibeau’s rampage by heroically diving, James-Bond-style, to shoot him dead.

The problem, as Maher reports, is that
... we don‘t know where that story comes from. On the day of the shooting — when the world desperately needed a story — anonymous sources told TV journalists that that’s what happened. We later learned that the shooter had been shot several times by a number of people.
The second video is one that Zehaf-Bibeau recorded to explain himself.

Unfortunately, neither video is being released to the public, despite the fact that
a week after the shooting, RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson told reporters that he wanted Canadians to see it [the second video] “as soon as possible.”
In December, he took that back, and said that he might not be able to ever release it because of the “intensity of the investigation,” whatever that means.
Maher sees nothing good in this:
It’s possible that between October and December, Paulson’s political masters let him know that he should not release the video.

It suits the government to behave as if the RCMP is independent, but Paulson appears to be more like a deputy minister than a police chief.

And Harper wants to portray this attack as an example of why we must be led by him, not Trudeau or Tom Mulcair, who are too soft-headed or weak-willed to protect us from terrorists.
But of course, this kind of secrecy and the speculation it engenders is par for a government that has shown consistent, pervasisve and egregious contempt for almost everything that a healthy and thriving democracy demands.

Perhaps the larger question is, do enough Canadians care?

12 comments:

  1. That is precisely the right question, Lorne. If we don't care, we will get more of Harper. Period.

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  2. The Royal Conservative Mounted Police has been in the Tory bag since Zaccardelli scammed Ralph Goodale and the Martin Liberals to give Harper his first win. Then there was the appointment of a veteran Tory insider, Bill "Bubbles" Elliott, to be the first civilian commissioner. The way Paulson stage managed his senior officers to throw a blanket over the Duffy/Wright affair merely confirmed it. I've seen not one sign suggesting today's RCMP is anything but a partisan, political agency of the prime minister.

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    1. Harper has much to answer for, Mound, the subversion of the RCMP just one of his myriad crimes.

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  3. .. I will could send you my informed but completely amateur analysis of the gunman's 'storming' of Parliament. But for now, how odd we know via the 'authorities' he had a knife for beheading, and the Vickers storyline.. but ZERO to prevent us presuming his 7 shot Winchester 94 was empty when killed, and that he had no ammo on his body.. or footage to support reloading.

    Harper himself testifies he must have hidden in the closet after the 10 second 'firefight, which they all heard coming toward them'.. and Tony Clement does the same re bolting out a backdoor to hide upstairs, leaving a quadraplegic MP among others to face the terrifying unknown. The red badge of courage belongs to Cpl Cirillo & his fellow comrade, both unarmed.. those assisting them at the Cenotaph, the unarmed Commons Security guard wounded, the other Commons guards, RCMP, Ottawa police pursuing down the hall and Kevin Vickers..

    The dark chill of Stephen Harper, Ray Novak et al has fallen upon this event and information regarding it. Speaker Scheer no doubt is acting on such direction re his investigation with zero capability.

    At the very top of the disgrace pyramid is who else? Stephen Harper, who hid in a closet.. later to be whisked away as only a featherweight phony could be. Look for this event to be manipulated, distorted and spun.. but bottom line, a Conservative MP, unnamed.. announced that his leader, the PM of Canada hid in a broom closet during crisis.. and nothing will ever be the same in Harperland.

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    1. The term 'chickenhawk' hardly does justice to the dark one, does it, Salamander. Thanks for your comments, including the information about Tony Clement's actions, which I had not heard about; they are strangely reminiscent of this Seinfeld episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u1cbZTwBx4

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  4. Lorne:

    I normally do not use pejorative nicknames for politicians, hells, I don't generally use nicknames at all, but this requires one, and I am torn between Captain Closet or The Closet Commando. I'm leaning towards the former, because it resonates to the image of Captain Canada which Harper loves to portray him as, and as much as I hate to say it, when I say it I hear in the back of my head that old Hanna Barbara cartoon Character "Captain CAVEman!" shout as well, and I hope that also might resonate in the older voting crowd.

    I believe it is important to get this into common use as much as possible as soon as possible to combat the revisionism Harper has been doing on this subject, because this moment in his life showed his true character, as moments of crisis will do in the heat with human beings. Given his bellicosity on the international stage, given his branding himself as a strong domestic leader the fact that his first instinct was the abandon his closet people and hide by his own choice needs not to be forgotten!

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    1. Those are most fitting sobriquets for our imaginary 'commander-in-chief' Scotian. I am taking the liberty of posting your comments as a separate entry so that we can spread the word and elicit the views/suggestions of other readers as well.

      This sounds like it has the makings of a fine political contest.

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  5. Yo everyone who commented here and replies from Lorne I agree. We will never know the truth we are being lied to but the fact that Heroic Battle Fatigue Dressed Photo Op Herr Harper hides in a closet and loves to sit with various kittens on his lap is absurd. He is not a leader but in my humble opinion a loser acting out the 1%er's design for Huxley's novel Brave New World? What have we gotten ourselfs into? Nice mess Eh?...

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    1. You are right that we have gotten ourselves into quite a mess, Mogs, and it is up to us to get ourselves out of it. 2015 will require the electoral participation of all citizens who yearn for a better Canada.

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  6. To further that we are all guilty in a way the juxtaposition between living our lives and keeping tabs on federal and provincial governments let alone civic municipal and county regional districts. Why do people [thank goodness not all] get drunk with power once elected? We need methinks a strong vibrant militia to keep these fools on the hill [parliament hill] in check. What else can I say?

    Cheers,
    Mogs Moglio

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    1. While the task is monumental, Mogs, with so many demands on our lives, the people of Canada are going to have to decide whether having a healthy democracy is worth their collective effort to bring about.

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