Friday, March 2, 2012

Now This Is Getting Really Frightening

Despite the steadfast denials of Harper and his functionaries, along with the stalwart efforts of Dean Del Maestro at diverting public attention away from voter suppression crimes, Elections Canada reports that it has received over 31,000 complaints from Canadians reporting attempts to subvert their vote.

Even the true believers who discount any possibility that their party and dear leader could have been behind these crimes must be disturbed by the government's cavalier and combative reactions to the accusations, reactions which do nothing to acknowledge the sacredness of our democracy and everything to further alienate the citizens of this country.

UPDATE: Thanks to The Galloping Beaver for this important information.

Nature to Harper Government: Let My People Go

One of the world’s leading scientific journals has criticized the federal government for policies that limit its scientists from speaking publicly about their research.

The journal, Nature, says in an editorial in this week’s issue that it is time for the Canadian government to set its scientists free.


Despite this plea to Harper to stop muzzling our scientists, I suspect it will take an extraordinary act of divine intervention before any changes are made by a government obsessed with controlling the flow of information.

Tory Strategy: I'll Huff and I'll Puff

... until I get my way. Judging by this story of Conservative misbehaviour in Etobicoke Centre on election day, it's not hard to figure out someone's favorite bedtime story.

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Lament For Ontario's Capital

Oh, how the mighty have fallen ...

UPDATE: Urban studies theorist Richard Florida offers his views.

The Bizarro World of the Harper Conservatives

When I was a lad (a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away), I was a devotee of Superman comics. There was something about the son of Kryton's thirst for truth and justice that appealed to my boyish sensibilities.

One of the components of the Superman universe was the existence of a bizarro world, a world in which everything and everyone was the opposite of life on earth. For example, they said goodbye when they arrived home, and hello when they left. For them, good was bad and bad was good .... well, you get the picture.

I couldn't help but think of that world today as I read the latest ploy by the Harper government, led by the parliamentary secretary to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Dean Del Maestro, to divert attention from the crimes of his party by insisting that Adam Carroll, the man the Liberals say is behind the Vikileaks 30 Twitter account, testify before the Commons ethics committee next week.

His reason? He doesn't believe that the Liberal confession constitutes the full story. This, of course, while he and his gang of Parliamentary thugs insist that Conservative hands are as clean as the driven snow regarding the robocon voter suppression crimes.

God these guys make me sick.

The Nation's Editorial Boards: Harper Voter Suppression Stonewalling Bad For Democracy

At least that seems to be the consensus at the following newspapers:

The National Post

The Vancouver Sun

The Hamilton Spectator

The Toronto Star

The Calgary Herald

The Lethbridge Herald

The Ottawa Citizen

The St. John's Telegram

And the list goes on, with one predictable exception, of course: The Toronto Sun

So far, Canada's self-proclaimed newspaper of record, as far as I can determine, has not deigned to offer its editorial insights on the crimes.

Today's Star Editorial Cartoon


Works on more than one level, doesn't it?