Harper Is No Statesman

Don Martin in the National Post sums up the latest Harper shoot from the lip international blunder. It seems every time Harper gets on a plane he suffers from Air Rage. He did it this summer over the war in Lebanon and now he does it to China. Truly he is no Statesman. And he doesn't appear to want to be.

After the Chinese leadership asked Harper for a meeting to ease rising tensions between the two countries, the Prime Minister insisted human rights would be on the formal agenda and no mere superpower could decree otherwise.No one in the PMO can explain why Harper waited for the Chinese to extend the invite, what made Harper think he could dictate the agenda and why this rookie Prime Minister failed to grasp the protocol for dealing delicately with concerns that rankle notoriously prickly Chinese leaders.

Business leaders don't like what they're hearing because warm government relations are essential to smooth Chinese trade relations. Experts say it was a mistake because Harper denied the Chinese a face-saving escape. Even friendly government forces in Alberta think Harper's heavy-handed tactics are off base.

Some observers see Calgary MP Jason Kenney, the Prime Minister's sidekick and notorious mainland nose-thumber, as the China clipper.

He defiantly met the Dalai Lama, a Tibetan holy man viewed as a separatist agitator by the Chinese, and was the cheerleader for giving him an honorary Canadian citizenship.

But it's more than just Kenney freelancing on the file. Stockwell Day wrote a paper in favour of recognizing Taiwan while he was Conservative foreign affairs critic. Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay, after attacking China for industrial espionage, turned his political back on meeting the Chinese ambassador for too long. And if that wasn't enough evidence of chilling China relations, a Chinese human rights discussion process and a strategic partnership group set up by the Liberals are being mothballed.

Besides, if Harper insists on riding the high white horse to defend human rights, he'd better watch where he gallops. Violations are not exclusively a made-in-China concept.

Russia has been caught allegedly spying in Canada and been red-flagged by Amnesty International for deteriorating human rights protection. Funny how Harper went to Moscow in July and neglected to raise either concern with President Vladmir Putin.

And what about Dubya? The United States has been fingered for holding "thousands" of prisoners without charge or trial in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba. Will Harper scold George Bush? Doubt it.

See:

Harper

Lebanon

China

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Harpercrsy

Canadian reporters covering PM Harpers trip to Viet Nam for the APEC conference have been banned from asking him questions. No scrums are allowed with the PM. Instead PMO issues press statements. While the PM lectures Viet Nam on democracy, human rights and the need for a free press. Heh, heh. What a kidder this guy is.


Harper kicks off APEC activities by meeting Vietnamese prime minister

Canadian officials later told reporters that during the private portion of the meeting, Harper tied in human rights concerns with Vietnam's expanding trade file. He told Nguyen that economic openness went hand in hand with social and political freedoms. Harper also raised several individual cases of political dissidents imprisoned by the Vietnamese government, including one man who landed behind bars after providing testimony to the U.S. Congress on human rights in his country. Vietnam has been criticized by observers for religious persecution, particularly of Buddhists and Christians, and also for cracking down on journalists and publishers critical of the communist regime.

Of course Canada needs to lecture the rest of the world on Human Rights our record is so pure. Let's see our secret police arrest and keep folks in secret detention and deport folks to be tortured abroad. They raid journalists offices and throw them in jail. The PMO refuses to meet with press critical of the government. The government wants to remove human rights legislation passed by the previous government. And we have a one party state in Alberta.Yep a clear case of kettle calling the pot black.

See:

Harper

Arar


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Politics Is Pragmatic

The Financial Times discovers that even left wing regimes can be pragmatic. They seem surprised at the success of globalized capitalism which they have touted for so long.

Morales opts for a pragmatic Bolivia

The patients start to queue at Chacaltaya hospital at 3.30am. By the time the doctors arrive, at 8am, the line stretches all the way round Plaza German Busch. This grubby square is in Alto Lima, the poorest area of El Alto, a city of 850,000 that sits above La Paz, Bolivia.

Chacaltaya is the first medical facility in South America’s poorest country to treat patients for free. Its staff are part of a contingent of 1,200 doctors from Cuba who have treated more than 2.2m Bolivians so far this year, or 25 per cent of the population.

The hospital, which is widely believed to be funded by Venezuela, highlights the relationship that Evo Morales, Bolivia’s president, has built with allies in Caracas and Havana.

Yet in recent months La Paz appears to have been seeking greater independence from Venezuela and this radical Latin American axis.

Mr Morales, flush with energy revenues and a sense of importance from his position in the region, has shown signs of moving closer to more moderate regimes in the region, such as Brazil and Argentina, and of reaching out to long-time foes including Chile and the US.

One of the reasons for the shift is that the strength of the Bolivian economy gives Mr Morales much greater room for manoeuvre than his predecessors enjoyed.

Revenues from higher gas prices and gas tax increases imposed last year mean that the government is no longer strapped for cash. Debt payments have been reduced as the result of a debt forgiveness deal agreed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

The fiscal deficit, which peaked at 8.8 per cent of gross domestic product in 2002, fell to 1.6 per cent of GDP last year and this year is on course to run a fiscal surplus for the first time in three decades.

Vietnam rolls out red carpet for Bush
Still, Hanoi is keen to strengthen further its relationship with Washington, which is better than ever before. Although two-way trade is now at $9bn (€7bn, £4.8bn) – making the US Vietnam’s largest trading partner – “the potential re­mains huge between the two countries,” Nguyen Tang Dung, the Vietnamese premier, said. “It is the consistent policy of the government of Vietnam to move forward, and push relations with the Americans.”

Vietnam’s economic progress
Unlike their more ambivalent predecessors, Hanoi’s new generation of less-ideological, more market-savvy Communist rulers certainly sees foreign investors as important assets in the drive to transform the country into a regional powerhouse, and to generate job opportunities for the approximately 1m young people entering the labour force every year.


See:

State Capitalism

Globalization


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Tory Bashing

Today it appears I am in a Tory bashing mood.

Gong Show Redux

Canada accuses Chinese envoy of spying on the homophobic fascist cult the Falun Gong. After having been embarassed by the Chinese government who snubbed a meeting with Harper, now the Harpocrites do a bit of tit for tat. Someone in Foreign Affairs that is a Sinologist should be advising this New Canadian Government that in one fell swoop they are undoing over thirty years of effective foreign relations with China. For the shear arrogance of ideology.

After becoming prime minister in 1968, Mr. Trudeau launched a review of Canadian foreign policy which placed a greater priority on Canada’s relations with the countries of the Asia-Pacific region. This led to the establishment of diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China in 1970. In 1973, Pierre Trudeau became the first Canadian Prime Minister to visit China.

globeandmail.com: Thursday, October 11, 1973

Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's visit to China got off to an unusually brisk start yesterday,

Astounded onlookers watch Canada's prime minister ascend the steps of China's Great Hall of Leaders on Nov. 28, 1983. The visit had been kept under wraps. Even the Peking papers haven't written much about Pierre Elliott Trudeau's meeting with Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang. The two world power figures discuss nuclear disarmament over ornamental pots of Chinese tea. This is not Prime Minister Trudeau's first visit to China.


See:

LOL

Conservative Cold Warriors

China

Spies



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Social Capital

Que. to fund companies with 'social conscience' As I have said here before funding for worker owned cooperatives and for alternatives to corporate capitalism needs to be developed across Canada. Using union pension funds and Labour Investment Funds for social investment rather than as they are currently being used as funding for P3's.

See:

Labour Investment Funds

Worker Cooperatives




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Unnesasary Cuts

GST cut taking bite out of government bottom line but it did not take a big bite.

However, the budget surplus for the first six months of the current fiscal year was still more than $5 billion more than during the first half of last year, a year when the government eventually chalked up a hefty, and politically embarrassing, $13.2-billion surplus.

So why the cuts to programs like Status of Women, Court Challenge etc. Which resulted in hardships for social avocacy agencies while making little in savings, which the Tories claimed as their excuse for cutting the programs.

Liberal finance critic John McCallum pointed out that spending on all federal departments and agencies, not including Defence, has risen 8.6% in the first six months of the fiscal year."It strikes me that's a big spending increase for a government that's cutting programs for the vulnerable and at the same time arguing it's a tough, low-spending government," McCallum said.

Of course it was ideologically driven. Instead of funding womens advocacy for feminism this is what the Tories fund; Down the way in the Beauce region of the province, Industry Minister Maxime Bernier doled out a government grant of $23,820 "to promote female entrepreneurship" (think about that one),

And while doling out money to Quebec to buy votes the Tories are still using the working class to build up the surplus to pay for their war efforts. Liberal, Tory same old Story.

Tories walk Grit path

Harper government treats EI as a cash cow

The Employment Insurance Commission this week announced a small cut to EI premiums effective Jan. 1, 2007.

You'll save a whole seven cents per $100 of insurable earnings come the new year. That means someone earning $30,000 a year will save about $1.75 a month.

If you're an employer, the premiums you pay for your workers will fall 10 cents per $100 of insurable earnings.

Wow.

What the EIC doesn't tell you, however, is that despite the small premium cut the massive EI surplus -- pegged at $48 billion last year -- is projected to grow by another $1.5 billion this year, even though the federal government claims EI is now operated on a break-even basis.

According to Human Resources Development Canada's own 2005-2006 estimates, the EI surplus is expected to grow to $49.5 billion in 2006.

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Canadian Values

Remember this from the last election.













Now compare that with this statement.

"Canadian values -- our belief in democracy, freedom, human rights," Harper said. "They don't want us to sell that out to the almighty dollar,"

I guess Canadian values are different from Conservative values.



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Pro Monopoly Tories

Blogging Tory and conservative L' enfant terrible Adam Daifallah prasies the Harper Governments direct interferance in the CRTC. The CRTC is supposed to be arms length from the government, in the past the Conservatives as the opposition howled whenever this came up in Parliament denouncing the actions of the Liberals when they challenged CRTC rulings. However without any debate in parilament, during a week when parilament was in recess the Conservatives do this;Conservatives overrule CRTC on regulation of internet phones

And their reason? Well having destroyed the Income Trusts for Telus and BCE, this is a token kickback to them. But for us as consumers it is an attack on choice, and furthers the monopolistic power of these two giant Telcos. And a conservative like Daiflallah supports such anti-market interferance. Astounding.

The federal government is ordering the CRTC to change its ruling on the regulation of some telephone services offered through broadband internet connections.

The move by the federal government to overrule a decision by the CRTC is a seldom-taken step.

The directive is seen as favourable to the large telephone companies, such as Bell Canada and Telus, even though it fell short of the full deregulation of internet phone pricing that the established phone companies had sought.

The CRTC's initial decision on VoIP in May 2005 ruled against the big telephone companies, saying they could not use their pricing power to undercut smaller businesses and newcomers to the telephone market, such as cable companies.

The agency said it would regulate internet-based phone service the same as any other local phone service, meaning large telephone companies such as Bell and Telus can't offer internet-based phone services below cost.

New companies entering the VoIP market, however, can set prices as low as they want, said the CRTC.

I also have a problem with the so called cable company competitiors Rogers and Shaw which are regional monopolies.

Shaw cable in Alberta is a virtual monopoly for cable services. And true to it's monopolistic practices complained to the CRTC that Vonage was undercutting it's VOIP service. So it arbitrarily uped the cost of purchasing vonage services through its cable network. A network it leases from Telus. A network paid for by the Taxpayers of Alberta. The Tories arbitrary overruling of the CRTC does nothing to address Vonages concerns.

Who controls how you use your Internet access? Vonage Canada challenges Shaw "VoIP tax"

service company Vonage Canada warns that cable and phone
companies could restrict "network neutrality" by limiting Canadians'
freedom of choice on the Internet; requests CRTC investigate
"anti-competitive" action by Shaw

Community Security: the Provident blog: Rogers Home Phone vs. Shaw ...

At best, I would consider the Rogers site misleading... taking a page from Shaw's Digital Phone marketing department, they have decided that rather than explain exactly how their service works, it is just simpler to offer a false statement that is easier for most people to understand.

So, whether using Shaw or Rogers, our position is unchanged: we do not recommend relying on any type of VoIP service (whether Shaw, Rogers, Vonage or anything else other than Telus) without having a secondary, back-up communications method such as cellular back-up or MESH radio.

Daifallah also calls for the elimination of the CRTC, which of course conservatives do.

Forgetting that the airwaves are 'public space', regulated for and by the public for public use.

My complaint about the CRTC is that it does not serve the public interest but the corporate interests. But that is a blog article for another time.

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Science Versus Politics

When the United States banned Cattle from Canada because of the BSE crisis the Canadian government and the then opposition Conservtives all decried the American actions as being political and not based on science.

Today the same Conservatives are the New Canadian Government and oppose the ban on deep sea trawlers.

Spot the contradiction.

There may be as few as 200 bottom-trawlers worldwide

Marine Scientists: Case for Bottom Trawler Ban 'Overwhelming'; Immediate Fisheries Freeze Needed

Marine scientists say the case for a moratorium on the use of heavy trawling gear in deep waters is now overwhelming and should be put in place immediately.





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