Dear Ryan: Stephen Harper's visit to the North. Dear Ryan, Thank you for letting Yukoners know about the pre-budget consultations for the 2013-2014 budget. As far as I could tell, most of your Conservative colleagues didn't offer this information to their constituents. So I know that you were really stepping out for us. I forwarded this information on to everyone I could think of. Democracy Watch and the David Suzuki Foundation were very happy to receive the heads up. The subject of the 16th letter is the Prime Minister's visit to the North. First I want to comment on how regrettable it was that Mr. This also reflects badly on the judgement of local Conservative organizers. I am far more concerned about a previous incident in 2010 when the Prime Minister raced an ATV over the Tuktoyaktuk airport runway. A long-time Yukoner recently told me that previous visits by Prime Ministers were held as public events, open to anyone.
The theme of the Prime Minister's visit was northern development. I am in favour of resource development, Ryan. Scientists protest the 'death of evidence' on Parliament Hill. They filed down busy Wellington Street to Parliament Hill in the noon sunshine. More than a thousand people, many carrying signs and wearing white lab coats, escorted a black coffin and the Grim Reaper to mark the Death of Evidence . This was not your average Ottawa demonstration. Organized by scientists and groups like the Council of Canadians and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the rally was attended by researchers, graduate students, doctors, lawyers and many people who wanted to speak out against the "new Iron Curtain being drawn between science and society.
" The procession made its way under the empty windows of Stephen Harper's Langevin Block office, passed the watchful eyes of a dozen police on bicycles and through a narrow opening in the fence around the Hill. The crowd was greeted by a large contingent of white-coated protesters on the stairs in front of the Parliament buildings. The cuts to research and knowledge by the Harper government is wide and deep. Free speech grounded: RCMP pulls plane down due to banner criticizing Stephen Harper.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) pulled a plane hired by the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) back down to Rockcliffe Airport due to its political message on Saturday, September 1. The PSAC had hired a plane (image attached) to fly over Ottawa and Gatineau with a trailing banner which read, in French, "StephenHarperNousDéteste.ca", (Stephen Harper Hates Us). Over the previous two weeks the plane had been making the rounds over Montréal and other communities in Québec as part of the PSAC's "We Are All Affected" campaign. The plane left Ottawa's Rockcliffe airport on Saturday morning and had been up in the air for less than two hours before the RCMP instructed the pilot to return to the airport for an interrogation.
The RCMP stated that it needed to intervene due to the nature of the political message and because the plane entered restricted airspace around Parliament Hill. Public Values. Ontario closing provincial parks, reducing Ranger program Unoperating parks under-served, day-based jobs inadequate. by Julie Dupuis, Straight Goods News staff Editor's note: This is PublicValues.ca Associate Editor Julie Dupuis's departing editorial.
For her last issue, she shares her views on protecting public services in light of the Ontario government's latest changes to Ontario Parks programs and operations. FRENCH RIVER, ON, October 4, 2012: Hitting home hard to a former Ontario Ranger (Esker Lakes Provincial Park, 1996) and current hiking enthusiast, the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources recently announced that ten provincial parks will revert to non-operating status while it will also be transforming the overnight Ontario Ranger program to a day-based one. ... Posted: October 05, 2012 More > Red Tape Reduction Commission puts Canadians' safety at further risk Posted: October 04, 2012 Ontario Ministry of Labour lays off the same number of inspectors it just hired.
Stephen Harper, Leo Strauss and Reductio ad Hitlerum. What do close advisers to Stephen Harper and George W. Bush have in common? They reflect the disturbing teachings of Leo Strauss, the German-Jewish émigré who spawned the neoconservative movement. " Donald Gutstein (1) Those words are certainly true but I would also ask another question. Gustave points out that individuals in a crowd may range in intellect, but when presented as a mass to a common cause they become homogenized: In the collective mind the intellectual aptitudes of the individuals, and in consequence their individuality, are weakened.
Leo Strauss would develop a philosophical argument which he called Reductio ad Hitlerum which included playing the Hitler card. So when neoconservative philosophy is attributed to Strauss, it's OK. So I'm going to remove the shadow of Hitler and the Holocaust and outline the techniques used by the ultimate propagandist, Joseph Paul Goebbels. This will be the first of a series.Phenomena of a Hypnotic Order Sources: Trouble in Toryland: their Dirty Tricks catalogue. Lawrence Martin is the author of 10 books, including six national bestsellers. His most recent, Harperland, was nominated for the Shaughnessy Cohen award.
His other works include two volumes on Jean Chrétien, two on Canada-U.S. relations and three books on hockey. The Conservatives have been caught up in many shady activities since coming to power. The revelation that they may have been behind a robocall operation to suppress voting for opposition parties would rank, if proven, among the more serious offences. Stephen Harper has denied involvement in the scam in which operatives acted under the guise of Elections Canada officials. Coincidentally, another controversy, the in-and-out affair, involved Elections Canada. Some of Harper’s most senior officials took part in that operation. In giving or not giving the benefit of the doubt on matters like these, the question of the track record figures prominently. There follows a list – is Harperland becoming Nixonland? 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. Harper, Bush Share Roots in Controversial Philosophy.
What do close advisors to Stephen Harper and George W. Bush have in common? They reflect the disturbing teachings of Leo Strauss, the German-Jewish émigré who spawned the neoconservative movement. Strauss, who died in 1973, believed in the inherent inequality of humanity. Most people, he famously taught, are too stupid to make informed decisions about their political affairs.
Elite philosophers must decide on affairs of state for us. In Washington, Straussians exert powerful influence from within the inner circle of the White House. Strauss defined a regime as a set of governing ideas, institutions and traditions. Usually regime change is imposed on a country from outside through violent means, such as invasion. Is regime change possible through the electoral process? The 'noble lie' Strauss believed that allowing citizens to govern themselves will lead, inevitably, to terror and tyranny, as the Weimar Republic succumbed to the Nazis in the 1930s. 'Regime change' in Canada Harper's mentors. Omnibus Crime Bill: Tory Bill Would Make Canada More Dangerous, Victims' Advocate, Judges Say. OTTAWA - A group including a victims' advocate, two retired judges and a former Conservative MP say Canadians will be more fearful and less safe five years from now under criminal justice changes being made by the Harper government.
"I think fear is at the basis of much of the government's work here," said David Daubney, former chair of the House of Commons justice committee under the Mulroney Conservatives in the mid-1980s. "What it's going to do, unfortunately, is make Canadians more fearful and less safe ... and it's all being done in the name of victims," he told a news conference Thursday. Daubney spent the last two decades working for Justice Canada, most recently until his retirement last year as the federal co-ordinator of sentencing reform. Steve Sullivan, the former federal ombudsman for victims of crime, joined Daubney on Parliament Hill in saying victims seldom feel they find justice in the courts, and that won't change with tough new sentences under Bill C-10. "I'm a judge. The Harper Index. Stephen Harper Says Provinces Will Have To Adjust As Election Promises Get Priority.
IQALUIT, Nunavut - Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered a cold reality to provinces on Thursday: his election promises trump any concerns they may have about how federal actions may affect provincial finances. In Iqaluit to announce education funding, the prime minister took the opportunity to shed light on how federal-provincial relations will work now that he has a majority.
Asked about provincial and territorial governments trying to stretch thin resources to house a prison population that will grow as a result of Harper's crime legislation, the prime minister made no apologies. "We received a clear mandate to proceed with strengthening our criminal justice system to make sure those who commit serious crime do appropriate prison time," he said to an audience that included Nunavut's justice minister.
"We understand that obviously some of the administration of that is the responsibility of the provinces and territories, but we're acting on a clear mandate of the people. " 1 of 9. Robocall Scandal: Demand answers. We need answers and real consequences for Robo-Call election fraud Dear Prime Minister Harper, Mr Mulcair, Mr Trudeau, Ms. May and Mr. Plamondon, I am gravely concerned by the illegal and fraudulent phone calls made during the 2011 federal election. The courts have now verified that these calls were election fraud, and this fraud was perpetrated using the Conservative Party of Canada's database, CIMS. The “robocalls” were apparently designed to stop non-Conservative voters from casting ballots in key ridings by falsely telling voters that the location of their polling stations had changed, causing them to go to the wrong location on election day.
(Your name and contact details will be added here.) The MPAA's Secret Lobby Campaign on Bill C-11 and a Canadian SOPA. Over the past few years, the Motion Picture Association - Canada, the Canadian arm of the MPAA, has recorded nearly 100 meetings with government ministers, MPs, and senior officials. While their lobbying effort will not come as a surprise, last October there were several meetings that fell outside the norm. On October 18, 2011, MPA-Canada reports meeting with Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore, Foreign Minister John Baird, and Industry Canada Senior Associate Deputy Minister Simon Kennedy, all on the same day. These meetings occured less than three weeks after the introduction of Bill C-11 and the decision to sign ACTA, and only eight days before SOPA was launched in the U.S.
To get a sense of how rare these meeting were, this is the only registered meeting John Baird has had on intellectual property since Bill C-11 was introduced and ACTA was signed by Canada. Harper Complicit In War Crimes? | Excited Delirium. For the first time in Canadian history, is it conceivable that our Prime Minister is complicit in war crimes? As the allegations get more serious and intense, I pray that dozens more public servants have the bravado to stand tall and tell the world what about we’ve allowed to happen. If they are bullied and maligned like the Cons did to Colvin last week, it will be the thin edge of the wedge in our sense of decency, pride and function of this country. Write your MPs today. Demand an inquiry into this disgusting mess. WASHINGTON–Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office used a “6,000-mile screwdriver” to oversee the denial of reports of Afghan detainee abuse when the scandal first erupted in 2007, according to a former senior NATO public affairs official who was then based in Kabul.
“It was highly unusual. “The lines were, ‘We have no evidence’ of coercive treatment being used against detainees handed over to the Afghans. “The NDS operated under almost impenetrable secrecy.