Go On, Make Her Day

You'll understand the relevance of my post's title when you get to the end of the following video, about the efforts of 81-year-old Doreen Routley, a former steadfast Conservative, to convince people not to vote for Stephen Harper in October. I shudder to ponder what expletives Angry White Guy would hurl at her.


And as a supplement, you may wish to check out some Star readers' reactions to the revelations emerging from the Mike Duffy trial, a few of which I reproduce below:

To help Canadians suspend disbelief and to enter his imaginary world, the next three Senate appointments by the Prime Minister will be: the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny and the Boogey Man. Together, they will enhance our benefits and scare those who threaten us.
Chuck Simmons, Pickering

We’ve seen this movie before. A network of senior political operatives scrambles to cover up an unravelling embarrassment in order to insulate their boss whose abuse of power created the problem in the first place.

After Watergate was exposed, Richard Nixon won the largest majority in U.S. history. It was only later that the wheels came off.

We can only hope it doesn’t take as long for us to be rid of our tyrant and his gang of democracy suppressors.

Dermot P. Nolan, Hamilton

The Duffy trial can aptly be renamed “Wruffygate” due to its profound effect on the federal election campaign. The mounting email evidence and testimony leaves us with two clear conclusions.

Either Stephen Harper knew all along about Wright’s activities. Occam’s razor favours this explanation. Almost nothing happens in the Party of One without Harper’s knowledge.
Or his many underlings were too afraid of their dictatorial leader to tell him what Nigel Wright was doing to extricate Mike Duffy from his dilemma. We have seen this before when Saddam’s underlings were too afraid of him to relate how few weapons he actually had. The resulting electronic chatter fooled U.S. intelligence into thinking he had “weapons of mass destruction.”

Either way, the scandal has derailed Harper’s branding. During the Macleans debate, he simply stuck to his party line, largely ignoring the criticisms of the progressive party leaders. Now he has to answer persistent questions about the Duffy trial evidence. Canadian voters are getting a true picture of the inner workings of the ruling Conservatives.

Donald A. Fraser, Waterloo

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.

Sympathy For The Devil?

With tongue firmly ensconced in his cheek, Andrew Coyne writes that we are being too hard on Stephen Harper, a prime minister who has been cruelly betrayed by all those in whom he placed an absolute trust:

You will be familiar with the picture we have created of him: suspicious, paranoid, controlling, a leader who trusts no one, leaves nothing to others, insists on taking a hand in even the smallest matter. Well, you’d be suspicious, paranoid and controlling, too, if everyone around you was lying to you all the time.

Such deception would be enough to break the spirit of even the strongest person:

Consider what we have learned about the Duffy affair. More to the point, consider what he has learned. Wholly without his knowledge, several of his closest advisers, including his chief of staff, his principal secretary, and his legal counsel, together with his Senate house leader, the chairman of the Conservative party fundraising arm and the party lawyer, conspired over a period of several months to pay Duffy for his improperly claimed living expenses, then to pretend to the public that he had repaid them out of his own pocket, then to attempt to block, shut down, or rewrite a confidential audit, then finally to rewrite a Senate committee report so as to absolve Duffy of any fault.

To have the foundations of his world so shaken must have exacted an enourmous toll on Mr. Harper:

Imagine the sense of betrayal he must have felt — the vertigo, the nausea — as it slowly dawned on him that everything he had been led to believe about the whole affair was a lie: that in fact, everyone knew. Everyone, that is, but him. Imagine the humiliation, to have been played for a patsy in this way — him, Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada — and what is more, for the whole world to know it. He is a proud man, but not immune to feelings of self-doubt. Would anyone respect him now? Could he carry on as leader, if he were not master even of his own office?

And yet, while others might have lashed out in fury at the byzantine machinations of subordinates, the true character of the prime minister became apparent as he chose the road less travelled:

And yet, this good man, deceived, humiliated, betrayed on all sides, found it in his heart to forgive them. You or I, had we found ourselves in the same position, might have taken the most foul sort of revenge: fired the lot, paraded them in front of the media, forced them to answer for what they had done. But that is not, we can see now, Harper’s way: this supposedly ruthless autocrat, this cold, vindictive brute of caricature, responded to this monumental breach of trust with comprehensive mercy. No one was fired, though some were allowed to leave. Some are even travelling with him on his campaign. He was even going to forgive Wright, and would have, had it tested better.

"These are the times that try men's souls," wrote Thomas Paine. Out of this current political crisis confronting the prime minister, all Canadians have been presented the opportunity to see the stuff that Stephen Harper's soul is really made of.

A Blast From The Past

Many thanks to John B who, in response to my previous post, wrote the following and provided this video and this link. I daresay you will enjoy this eerily prophetic blast from the past, as the 'over served' and pompous Mike Duffy attempts a stout defense of his Senate expenditures less that one year into his illustrious post-television career.

I realize that the Beaverton piece is fictional, but let's not forget that Duffy was appointed to the Senate in late 2008 just after the election and possibly as a direct reward for his role in Harper's project to destroy Stéphane Dion.

It would also be informative to our current perspective to keep in mind that the infamous CBC interview during which Peter Stoffer attempted to draw attention to the expense claim abuses that Duffy had committed to support his "expanded role in the party, an exercise that, taking a page from the Jason Kenney manual for publicly-funded CRAP Party ethnopandering, the Scotch-soaked Senator dared to describe as an "outreach", took place in November of 2009, at least three years prior to the "revelations" that have led to the tap-dancing we are now observing.

UPDATED: Now Trending

Following yesterday's sterling advertisement for the Harper base, the satirical publication The Beaverton decided to have some fun:

TORONTO - During a campaign stop reporters asking questions about the Duffy scandal were cursed at by a Harper supporter, before he was removed and offered a seat in the Senate.

“I spoke to my current Chief of Staff, Ray Novak, about making this problem go away,” said Prime Minister Stephen Harper, when asked later about the Senate appointment. Harper further elaborated, “Considering after the 2011 election I appointed Mike Duffy to the Senate in exchange for him doing ‘work’ in the press, this just kind of made sense.”

Harper then clarified that he had no knowledge of any conversations with Novak, and “rejected the premise” that he had said the opposite mere minutes previous.

The latest Senator from Etobicoke has refused to offer any identification outside of the prominent “Doug Ford Mayor” campaign button on his jacket. Following his nomination to the senate, he is expected to chair a committee on how “the media are all lying pieces of shit”.

At a later campaign stop, Conservative spokesperson Kory Teneycke apologized to journalists for the outburst, adding “If you think that guy was bad, you should see the supporters that we screen out.”

It would seem prudent for all future innocent bystanders at Harper rallies to wear protective apparel to guard againt the spewing of infected saliva.

As well, perhaps angry white guy can put an end to this abuse by the Senate, as reported by Buzzfeed.

In a March 2013 memo to Stephen Harper, his chief of staff Nigel Wright and other senior staffers raged that Conservative Senators were too independent and had recommended policies that were not pre-approved by the Prime Minister’s Office.

Imagine, the bought-and-paid-for Red Chamber Conservatives thinking they could act independently! A sobering second thought indeed.

UPDATE: Angry white guy now has a name: Earl Cowan. When contacted by the Toronto Star, he had this to say:

“If I wrote anything for the Star,” he added, “the issue would be: is or is not the Toronto media a piece of s---. Excuse me, a lying piece of s---. I’m forgetting my own lines here . . . That’s the issue. That’s the only issue.”

More Fun With 'Deceivin' Stephen'

H/t Theo Moudakis

And this from Star letter-writers:

Re: Duffy scandal dogs Harper, Aug. 17

Liars.

There are many types, just as there are many kinds of lies – white, boastful, malicious, and the Big Lie. This last kind can perhaps be used successfully only by one class of liar – the Big Man or CEO type.

The method is familiar, probably taught at MBA schools. Appear calm and subdued. Begin by saying “Look,” or “Let’s be clear,” or “I’ve said this before.” Slump your shoulders as a visible sigh of exasperation. Use a somewhat rote, very slightly sing-song style of delivery, like one who is patiently taking up valuable time to re-explain something that the listener, disappointingly, lacked the perception to grasp the first time.

Then unleash the Big Lie. The black economy is actually white. Saving the climate is good, but taking any suggested step to that end is bad. Canadians are in imminent danger of terrorism, and bombing Syria will prevent lone-wolf attacks here.

Past tanker, railway and pipeline disasters have taught us so much that future incidents are impossible. Breaches of election spending rules and Parliamentary conduct are normal, nothing new, conform to past practice, nothing to see here, folks. The Senate scandal was rare, contained, and completely divorced from the practices of the party and PMO. If one didn’t use certain quoted exact words, therefore nothing of the kind was said.

The punctiliously polite Tom Mulcair, Justin Trudeau and Elizabeth May seem to think that on the debating podium they are still hamstrung by the Parliamentary rule against flagging an untruth. Well, Stephen Harper himself has killed the current Parliament, so those rules don’t apply, and good heavens, surely somebody has to bell the cat.

If they absolutely can’t bring themselves to use the word, how about witty references to lengthening noses, or: “Mr. Moderator, do we need to call 911? There seems to be a smouldering odour in here of pants on fire.”

Or how about simply looking at the camera and asking Canadians directly: “On the economy, who are you going to believe – this guy or your own eyes?”

J.A. McFarlane, Toronto

For years we’ve known that Lyin’ Brian Mulroney earned his sobriquet; now we know that Deceivin’ Stephen Harper has earned his monicker, too.

Bernie Smith, Parksville, B.C.

If Nigel Wright believed that his $90,000 payment to Mike Duffy was a good deed, then why would he not have told the Prime Minister? Is there anyone in Canada who still believes that he didn’t?

Paul Axelrod, Toronto

UPDATED: A Member Of The Rabid Harper Base Foams At The Mouth

The following occurred this morning, at a Harper rally in Etobicoke:


You can read about it here.

A persistent Terry Milewski was met by the same crowd lustily urging that the government "shut down the CBC."



Two more reasons not to live in one of Toronto's suburbs.

UPDATE: The fallout begins: