Lying: The Pillar Of Politics

This timely message is brought to you by the folks at Operation Maple:

Your Morning Smile

Pinocchio, Snow White and Superman are out for a stroll in town one day.
As they walk, they came across a sign:
"Beauty contest for the most beautiful woman in the world."
"I am entering," said Snow White.
After half an hour she comes out and they ask her,
"Well, how did you do?"
" First Place ," said Snow White.
They continue walking and they see a sign:
"Contest for the strongest man in the world."
"I'm entering," says Superman.
After half an hour he returns and they ask him,
"How did you make out?"
" First Place ," answers Superman. "Did you ever doubt?"
They continue walking when they see a sign:
"Contest! Who is the greatest liar in the world?"
Pinocchio says "this is mine."
Half an hour later, he returns with tears in his eyes.
"What happened?" they asked.
"Who the hell is STEPHEN HARPER?" asked Pinocchio.

UPDATED: Carnac The Magnificent Stephen Harper Is Not

Readers of a certain age will remember with fondness the Tonight Show, starring Johnny Carson. A staple in my youth and throughout my adult life, Carson was a peerless entertainer who would often go to considerable lengths for laughs; like all comedic endeavours, some worked better than others.

One of Carson's enduring creations was Carnac The Magnificent, a 'psychic' who would hold up an unopened envelope, discern its contents, and give an answer to the question posed within. Sometimes it worked well, other times it bombed.

It appears that Stephen Harper is our own version of Carnac, discerning answers from some etheric realm that is not accessible to mere mortals, answers that seem at odds with secular polling results and science. One such instance occurred the other day, when Stephen the Magnificent pronounced on Canadians' views on marijuana:

How well do Harper's assertions stand up? CTV News investigated, and came up with these results:

“Most Canadians (when) you actually ask them, do not want the full legalization of marijuana.”

A 2014 survey by Angus Reid Global found that 59 per cent of the 1,510 Canadians surveyed supported legalizing marijuana and 41 per cent were opposed.

“I think the statistics in places like Colorado are very clear on this. When you go down that route, marijuana becomes more readily available to children.”

Marijuana has only been legal in Colorado since Jan. 1, 2014, so extensive research has not been conducted. However, drugs have been decriminalized in the Netherlands since 1976, and past-year cannabis use among young Dutch citizens appears to be declining. Among those aged 15 to 24, past-year use dropped from 14 per cent in 1997 to 11 per cent in 2005, according to a study in the journal Addiction.

“Marijuana use has actually been declining (in Canada).”

A recently-published report by Statistics Canada noted that about 12 per cent of Canadians surveyed in 2012 said they had smoked marijuana in the previous year – the same proportion the agency found when it did the same survey in 2002. However, the results did vary by age. Past-year marijuana use declined over the decade by nearly one-third among those between the ages of 15 and 17, was stable among those aged 18 to 24 and went up among those 25 or older.

While the issue of marijuana legalization may not be uppermost in most people's minds, Harper's stance and his frequently fanciful assertions on the topic do serve to remind us of something none of us should forget as we prepare to cast our ballots. The Harper regime has shown a consistent aversion to empirical data, an aversion that has led to the muzzling of scientists, the end of the mandatory long-form census, egregious contempt for the implications of climate change, and the passing of punitive criminal laws in a time of steadily declining crime, just four consequences among many of a government bent on governing almost exclusively through the narrow lens of ideology.

Unlike the Carnac skits, there is nothing to laugh about in Stephen Harper's pronouncements.

UPDATE: the Toronto-based International Centre for Science in Drug Policy is now weighing in on the prime minister's Pinocchio proclivities. M. J. Milloy, an infectious-disease epidemiologist,

said his group’s research proves that recent use by teens in Colorado has gone down from 22 per cent to 20 per cent in the first year that the U.S. state regulated recreational pot sales. The Conservative Party did not respond to calls for comment on the report.

“It’s not a sort of a ‘push a button, get the result’ type thing,” Dr. Milloy said. “We’ve had, what, 40 years of doing things Mr. Harper’s way, both under his government and under previous governments, which have enacted a very stringent cannabis prohibition model.

“Where are we after billions of dollars and thousands of arrests? We are at a place where Canadian teens lead the world in marijuana use.”

You can read the report, and the debunking of the kinds of myths Mr. Harper likes to perpetuate, here.

The Art Of Misdirection

Some, I guess, are better at it than others.

And Now, A Word From PropCan

About two weeks ago, the Toronto Star carried a story about the Harper regime's engagement of the services of a publicity agency called News Canada Ltd.. The organization provides copyright-free material to any media outlets that wish to carry it.

The Harper government pays up to $1.5 million annually for its services, but the real story is that there is nothing in any of the video or text materials that reveal they are sponsored content. It is a propagandist's dream.

The Star reports about one of their videos that casts Health Canada and Aboriginal Affairs in a misleadingly positive light:

An undated video about the Nutrition North program available for use on the News Canada website states as fact that it has increased access to fresh foods in remote areas, leading grocery retailers to pass on the subsidy to consumers by reducing prices

A quick Internet search for any real news story about Nutrition North might turn up results about how the auditor general said the aboriginal affairs department does not actually know whether that is true.

You can access the video by clicking on the link below:

Bringing Nutrition To Canada’s North


This leads me once again to reproduce more fine letters from perspicacious Star readers, who have no trouble seeing through yet another Harper-orchestrated deception:

Re: And now the news – brought to you by the Tories, Dec. 20

The use of News Canada Ltd. by the “Harper Government” to “create and distribute government-approved news items” is compelling evidence that the Conservative Party of Canada is acutely aware that something fundamental is missing from their ability to effectively communicate with Canadians. That something is credibility.

Credibility must be earned and it must be maintained through honesty, integrity, competence, sound judgment, empathy, and fairness. The Conservatives have amply demonstrated that these values are sadly missing from their partisan culture.

Our economy is suffering because of a lack of vision and diversification. Our veterans cannot get the help they so desperately need while budgets are cut and $1.1 billion is returned to government coffers. The gap between rich and poor grows ever wider ever more rapidly. Environmental groups and left-leaning think tanks that question government policies are audited. Northern Aboriginals scavenge in the dump for food while the minister reads her newspaper and refuses to answer questions. The list goes on.

There are two ironies in the credibility crisis the “Harper Government” now faces. The first is that the Conservatives have brought this upon themselves. Years of “truthiness,” cheating, bullying, and hypocrisy have eroded their credibility with Canadians to the point that the Conservatives now believe the only viable way they have to get their messages out is through deceit.

And therein lays the second irony. This attempt to deceive Canadians will only serve to further erode what little remains of the “Harper Government’s” credibility.

Lyle J. Goodin, Bowmanville

Harper has stolen another page from Nazi propaganda minister Josef Goebbels’ book. Harper’s advisers then created an enemies of the PM list as did field marshall Hermann Goering with his blacklist to warn Hitler of his enemies. Meanwhile Canadians receive weekly propaganda leaflets from their Tory MPs across the country telling of their accomplishments.

Bill Tuer, Cobourg

To read the rest of the missives, please click here.

We Must Be Luddites

That can be the only possible explanation for the fact that the federal government is breaking its promise to end abuses of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program so that Canadians can have the first opportunity at applying for available jobs.

As reported by the CBC,

The federal government has granted an exemption to Microsoft Canada that will allow the company to bring in an unspecified number of temporary foreign workers to British Columbia as trainees without first looking for Canadians to fill the jobs.

Yep, it is high time we Canadians stopped fearing technology.

The Big Mac VS The Whopper

Clearly, based upon the shameful falsehoods she uttered at yesterday's U.N. climate summit about Canada being a “global clean energy leader” doing “its part” to cut carbon emissions that warm the earth, Environment Minister Leona Aglukkaq's preference is clear.

Some Nightmares Are Real

Sleep tight, Prime Minister Harper.