Sad, But Not So Surprising

As I have written before, the evasion of responsibility on the part of the Ford government and its chief medical flunky, Dr. Kieran Moore, is deeply disappointing but not really unexpected. Ideology and political culture almost guarantee that his official stance (get your shots and masks in crowds) will be largely ignored.

However, now Dr. Moore has taken it to a whole new level. Despite his advice to mask up in situations that warrant it, he did this:

Charlie Pinkerton

@CharliePinkerto

On Monday, Ontario’s CMOH Dr. Kieran Moore “strongly recommended” Ontarians wear masks indoors. Last night, 3 days later, he was partying maskless at Toronto Life’s celebration for its 50 most influential Torontonians of 2022, videos show.

UPDATED: The Great Pivot, A.K.A., Refashioning His Image

By now you have probably heard about Pierre Poilievre's outrage over an apparent threat against his wife, Anaida.

The threat, made by Jeremy MacKenzie, is, of course, reprehensible and unacceptable. However, the outrage Poilievre expresses is tinged with a heavy measure of hypocrisy. 

Here is a shot of PP with MacKenzie:

Poilievre had previously sidestepped calls to denounce MacKenzie, including from leadership rival Jean Charest, after the men were photographed together at an event during the Conservative leadership race this summer.

Nick Seebruch wrote on Sept.2,  

Jeremy MacKenzie, the de facto leader of the Diagolon cult... has gone on social media calling for the execution of Canadian Armed Forces personnel. He has encouraged his followers to harass health care professionals, and is facing assault and weapons charges in Sask., and weapons charges in N.S. in an unrelated case as well.

After the photo of MacKenzie shaking hands with Poilievre began circulating on social media, he refused to denounce MacKenzie or Diagolon by name instead stating: “As I always have, I denounce racism and anyone who spreads it,” then deflecting by pointing to what he called “. . .Justin Trudeau’s many racist outbursts . . .”

Then there is the unpleasant participation of PP's wife, Anaida, in inciting hatred, associating Trudeau with pedophiles and terrorist, as I wrote about in a previous post:

That the rage-farmer's wife is all in with Pierre's pursuit of power at any price is evident in a recent Tweet she sent, recommending Canadians visit an extremely right-wing site trafficking in sensational headlines, love of 'freedom' and hatred for Trudeau.'

I could go on and include references to Poilievre's own indifference when members of the media, especially females, have been subjected to terrible abuse and threats, as well as his self-serving response in reaction to Chrystia Freeland's verbal assault when she visited Alberta, but I think you get the picture.

The hands of both PP and his wife are unclean, precisely what happens when flinging mud at others. The fact that Poilievre now posts supreme outrage at the inevitable result of stirring up the baser instincts of people is unseemly and hollow. 

One suspects he is making the "Great Pivot" to appear now as a regular public official, only concerned about his family. 

And who, if they don't know any better, could argue with that?

UPDATE: Our national satirical treasure, The Beaverton, has some acerbic fun with PP. Here is their headline:

Pierre Poilievre asks extremist group to go back to threatening other peoples’ families

Rage Farming And Hypocrisy Come So Easily To Him

While political hypocrisy is hardly rare, in my view Pierre Poilievre 'elevates' it to an entirely new level - new at least in Canadian politics. And while his blind followers will no doubt fail to see this, rational, reflective citizens will.

By now, most people will have heard about or seen the video in which deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland is viciously verbally assaulted by Alberta miscreant Elliott McDavid. If you haven't, I placed it on a previous post. While one cannot draw a direct link between McDavid's disgraceful behaviour and Poilievre, it is clear that the kind of reckless, divisive rhetoric favoured by the soon-to-be-crowned new leader of the CPC emboldens such heinous harassment.

A story in The Tyee  quotes McDavid as saying he is proud of what he did:

“Why did I do that? Because I want the rest of the country to wake up and realize that she is a traitor to the country. She is selling out the country,” Elliot McDavid said in a phone interview Saturday.

 University of Alberta political scientist Jared Wesley told the Tyee

 he expects aggressive attacks on politicians to increase in Canada as right-wing politicians continue to engage in “rage farming” by advancing false and misleading conspiracy narratives.

But, of course, the most dangerous rage farmer, Mr. Poilievre, refuses to take any responsibility for the current rancourous landscape that he so willfully cultivates and exploits. Indeed, until he was confronted by a reporter about the Freeland incident, he offered no denunciation of it. His 'repudiation' of it, as you can see in the following video, was completely self-serving:

He refers in the above to the online abuse his wife, Anaida, has experienced, so perhaps she deserves some scrutiny. Clearly a fellow traveller and soulmate, she reminds me a bit of Lady Macbeth, Macbeth's perfect partner-in-crime:

""But screw your courage to the sticking-place and we'll not fail!"

That the rage-farmer's wife is all in with Pierre's pursuit of power at any price is evident in a recent Tweet she sent, recommending Canadians visit an extremely right-wing site trafficking in sensational headlines, love of 'freedom' and hatred for Trudeau.'

Oh… 7 times Trudeau met with pedophiles, terrorists and extremists | True North

tnc.news

7 times Trudeau met with pedophiles, terrorists and extremists

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has a long record of hob-knobbing with individuals who have been convicted or accused of committing heinous crimes such as possessing child pornography or even attempted...

This kind of scurrilous recommendation by the wife of a possible future prime minister is unprecedented in Canadian politics, as far as I know. That she panders like Pierre to an angry and reactive rabble does not bode well for a return to a more civilized discourse, but perhaps helps explain some of the putative reactions she has stoked.

It is said that behind every successful man stands a woman. In this situation, it might be more accurate to say that behind every unscrupulous politician stands an equally unscrupulous wife.

They make quite the power couple, eh?

A Timely Reminder

 With the travel circuit as busy as it is, now is a good time to remind each other that our political 'leaders' have advised all Canadians to avoid unnecessary travel:

UPDATED: They Just Can't Help Themselves

Every time they speak, they show their absolute contempt for 'the people'. Who am I referring to? The British Conservation government. As a companion to yesterday's post about the hapless Dominic Cummings, please enjoy, or bear witness to, the witless Cabinet Minister Michael Gove's 'defense' of Cummings:



UPDATE: Is it just my imagination, or is Boris looking a bit more harried these days? But maybe showing such open contempt for public accountability will do that to a person.

The Village Idiot

I suspect few regard British Prime Minister Boris Johnson as anything other than a village idiot. If you have been following the scandal surrounding his Chief Adviser, Dominic Cummings, you will also see that like attracts like.

Boris has been twisting himself out of shape defending the hypocritical Cummings; after the grilling he has been facing from fearless British journalists, he may well need the services of a good chiropractor, when such is once again permitted (or not, given that the rules don't seem to apply to the likes of him and Cummings):

Back To Business As Usual?

After all of the feel-good rhetoric of the Climate Summit of the Americas, held last week in Toronto, it would appear that we are back to business as usual, at least in Canada.

The Globe and Mail reports the following:

Canada’s premiers are poised to sign an agreement to fast-track new oil sands pipelines while watering down commitments to fight climate change.

The Canadian Energy Strategy will be finalized and unveiled at a premiers’ conference in St. John’s beginning Wednesday.

While it appears that the political will to facilitate the flow of tarsands oil is strong, a commitment to mitigating climate change is not:

Two sections of the plan commit the provinces and territories to help get more pipelines built, in part by cutting down on red tape to speed up regulatory decisions.

But the strategy contains little firm commitment on battling global warming. Its strongest environmental section – a pledge for all provinces and territories to adopt absolute targets for cutting greenhouse gases – is marked as a point of contention that might be scrapped.

There is vague environmental rhetoric peppered throughout the draft strategy, but no binding promises on exactly what the provinces and territories will do to fight climate change – only a general pledge to “transition to a lower carbon economy.” One section, for instance, lists a series of possible climate-change policies, including carbon capture and carbon pricing, but does not appear to require that provinces and territories do any of them.

The obvious contradiction between expanding pipelines and lowering greenhouse gas emissions is one of those pesky details that our provincial political leaders seem happy to ignore:

There is also no explanation on how oil-sands production can expand – a likely scenario if more pipelines are built – while the country still reduces greenhouse gas emissions.

Well, of course this is an obvious explanation, isn't there: egregious contempt for the suffering more and more people will experience as the world continues to warm, and lavish cossetting of those who stand to profit the most from the continued burning of fossil fuels, a truth that no political rhetoric, no matter how skillfully spun, will be able to conceal for very long.

WildRose Revisited

The other day I wrote a post about the Wildrose Party's retraction of its definitive equal rights clause that covered almost every conceivable individual. Although leader Danielle Smith had enthused the day before about its inclusiveness, when party delegates voted it down, she quickly changed her tune, saying that the more generic substitute was better.

In this morning's Globe, Gary Mason offers his own view on what many see as a regressive step for Wildrose, and what he calls yet another 'bozo eruption.":

The change was important for a political institution that is still viewed suspiciously in some quarters. It is widely accepted that it lost the past provincial election when an old blog post written by one of its candidates was unearthed in the dying days of the campaign. In it, Allan Hunsperger condemned gays and lesbians to an “eternal lake of fire.” Ms. Smith lamented the “bozo eruption,” and pledged that the party would do a better job in future of weeding out those with bigoted and narrow-minded attitudes.

The policy alteration was designed to do just that:

Last year’s recommended alteration to its human rights policy was designed, in part, to show Albertans that Wildrose is as inclusive as any party in Canada. It was hoped the change would dispel any notion it is not ready to govern an increasingly multiethnic and socially liberal society.

The failure of the party is egregious in this regard, and is reflected in its recent loss in the four by-elections last month, which saw all taken by the newly-revived Conservatives under Jim Prentice.

Suddenly, Wildrose looks lost and uncertain. At the convention Ms. Smith blamed the media for many of the party’s woes, accusing news organizations of perverting or ignoring positive stories to instead perpetuate the image of a negative and angry political brand. This takes gall, considering that for much of Ms. Redford’s two-year tenure, the media focused almost entirely on the former premier’s near-constant travails. Wildrose was served up daily opportunities to take vicious, but legitimate, swipes at its main rivals.

Surely, part of the blame must be put on Danielle Smith, who after those losses urged a leadership review that was rejected by the party.

Gary Mason ends his piece with this ominous observation:

The decision to reject overwhelmingly a human rights policy change that would have made the party look decidedly more modern and inviting does nothing to help its cause. At one time, Wildrose seemed close to governing Alberta. Now it could not seem further away from power.

The lesson for the Alberta electorate, I suppose, is clear. No one should be surprised that when these 'bozos' remove their 'public face,' the same faces peer back at them in the mirror.

No Shame, No Shame At All

There is no situation, however tragic, that Harper and his regime won't exploit for political advantage. I guess that comes as no surprise to anyone:



Be sure to check out the Conservative Party website for more evidence, as well as Alison's caricature at Creekside.

When Israel Says It Isn't Out To Punish Innocent Palestinians, It's Lying - And We Don't Care

Actions speak so much louder than words, especially when it comes to Israel attacking Palestinians.

The current invasion of Gaza demonstrates that Israel’s claims to be targeting Hamas but not the Gaza Palestinian population is an outright lie. That much is blatant from the weapons used.

What weapons? Try water. When you’re targeting the civilian population of an already water-stressed locale the simplest way to turn the screws is to attack their water and sewage infrastructure. Once you deprive them of fresh water and compound that with a collapse of their sewage system, nature will take care of the rest. Every bloodthirsty bastard who laid siege to a medieval castle or town knew that.

Gaza is a lot like one of those medieval towns. Its land borders are sealed by Israel and Egypt. At sea, the Israeli navy maintains an effective blockade. With the exception of a few tunnels, if you’re in Gaza you’re not going anywhere. You might as well be trapped behind stone walls and a portcullis.

But what about the water? Years ago Israel constructed what are known as "trap wells" along the border with Gaza. These wells intercepted the natural flow of groundwater that Gazans relied upon. Worse yet, without that fresh water flow, sea water entered the Gazans groundwater supply leaving it heavily contaminated. As more sea water continues to enter the Gazan water resource it’s only a matter of time.

In the preliminary air strikes that preceded Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza, Israeli air force jets bombed Gaza’s water and sewage plants. That has rendered about 90% of Gaza’s already dwindling water supply unfit for human consumption.

Israel understands the power of the water weapon and its punitive effect on civilian populations. During its ill-fated invasion of southern Lebanon to attack Hezbollah, Israeli jets took out the water and sewage pumping plants of Beiruit, far removed from Hezbollah territory. That wasn’t targeted at Hezbollah. It was targeted at the Lebanese civilian population in a city largely opposed to Hezbollah. Israel likewise attacked and destroyed three Lebanese hospitals and on its way out of the country instituted a 72-hour cluster bomb barrage of the south ensuring a massive supply of bomblets for cattle and farmers and kids to stumble across for years to come.

If there was ever any doubt that Trudeau the Lesser is all Margaret and no Pierre, the proof came through in the Liberals’ stomach-churning praise of Israel for its “commitment to peace.” I really don’t know how you Liberals live with yourselves and that party or the pandering opportunist who trades on what once was a great name.

In a place like Gaza, taking down the water and sewage plants is a form of biological warfare. It’s just a matter of time until cholera sets in. Yeah, Justin, that’s some commitment to peace all right.

MoS, the Disaffected Lib

Ten Chemical Weapons Attacks Washington Doesn’t Want You to Talk About

In Oceania and throughout the West, there are things citizens are not supposed to remember. After all, if we don't remember them, did they really happen?

Click here for a refresher course in the use of chemical weapons from some players we should be well-familiar with.

It's All One Big Coincidence

Glad that Ontario Premiere Kathleen Wynne has put to rest that ugly speculation that the province's change in attitude toward a subway for Scarborough has nothing to do with the upcoming provincial byelections.