Today Is Election Day

Bill C-16

Subject to an earlier dissolution of Parliament, a general election must be held on the third Monday in October in the fourth calendar year following a previous general election, with the first general election to be held on Monday, October 19, 2009.

Well okay it should have been today, except that Harper took us into an election early, violating his own law. Instead in a cynical ploy to grab power the Harpocrites ran an election saying there was no recession, they would not raise taxes nor would they have a budget deficit...my my how things changed after they were elected with another minority government and the economy crashed.

Harper then prorogued the government within two months of that election in order to avoid being ousted by an opposition coalition, while still denying there was a recession.

Today with the threat of another election still in the air one has to ask why the rush last fall if not for the fact that actually the Harpocrites have been ready for an election since they won a minority in 2006. Every day is election day for them. They are not ruling as a government but as a party running a party campaign around the economic issues they denied were a reality last fall.

However if we take the PM at his own word well perhaps we should have had an election today. But that's just a technicality...

Harper says recession is no time for an election -

Harper says recession over only in technical sense

And despite all the political platitudes offered at the time it turns out that Canada's fixed election date did turn out to be an illusion........

Bill C-16 on Fixed Date Elections November 06, 2006 Third Reading in the House of Commons House of Commons, Ottawa Monday, November 6, 2006 Check Against Delivery Introduction Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to begin debate in third reading on Bill C-16 – An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act – which would provide for fixed date elections. First of all, I would like to note that the Bill was carefully reviewed by the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. A range of expert witnesses has appeared before the Committee and much discussion has taken place. The Committee heard from the Chief Electoral Officer, representatives of political parties, academic experts, as well as me. While I have been informed that there were lively debates on key issues, I am pleased to note that Bill C-16 carried in Committee without amendment. Moreover, while there were some minor differences on some of the details of the Bill, I was struck by the fact that all parties represented in the House of Commons support the fundamental rationale of the Bill. I believe that all parties share the view that elections belong, fundamentally, to citizens. They belong, Mr. Speaker, to the people. All parties agreed with the principle that the timing of elections should not be left to the prime minister but should be set in advance so that all Canadians will know when the next election will occur. Mr. Speaker, today I will begin with a description of the current process for calling general elections and I will discuss some of the difficulties associated with it. This will be followed by a discussion of the many advantages associated with fixed date elections. Finally, Mr. Speaker, I will be very pleased to present the specifics of Bill C-16. Current Process Today, it is the prerogative of the Prime Minister, whose government has not lost the confidence of the House of Commons, to determine what he or she regards as a propitious time for an election to renew the government’s mandate. The Prime Minister then requests dissolution of the House from the Governor General and, if the Governor General agrees, he or she proclaims the date of the election. What we have, Mr. Speaker, is a situation where the Prime Minister is able to choose the date of the general election, not based on what is in the best interest of the country, but what is in the interest of his or her party. Bill C-16 will address this problem and will produce a number of other benefits. Advantages of Fixed Date Elections Mr. Speaker, before going into the details of the bill, allow me to discuss the key advantages of fixed date elections. Fixed date elections will provide for greater fairness in election campaigns, greater transparency and predictability, improved governance, higher voter turnout rates, and will help in attracting the best qualified candidates to public life. Fairness First of all, allow me to discuss the issue of fairness. Fixed date elections will help to level the playing field for those seeking election in a general election. With fixed date elections, the timing of general elections will be known to all. Since the date of the next election will be known to all political parties, each party will have an equal opportunity to make preparations for upcoming election campaigns. Instead of the governing party having the advantage of determining when the next election will take place – an advantage they may have over the other parties for several months – all parties will be on an equal footing. And it’s only fair that each party will have equal time to prepare for the next election and know when it will be. Transparency and Predictability Another key advantage of fixed date elections is transparency. Rather than decisions about election dates being made behind closed doors, general election dates will be set in advance as prescribed by this bill. Once this bill is passed, the date of each election will be known by all Canadians. Predictability is also a key advantage of fixed date elections. Canadians and political parties alike will be able to rely on our democratic election system working in an open and predictable fashion for all general elections. Plans can be made on a reliable basis to prepare for, and respond to, fixed date elections. Improved Governance Mr. Speaker, fixed date elections will allow for improved governance. For example, fixed date elections will provide for improved administration of the electoral machinery by Elections Canada. The Chief Electoral Officer, in majority situations, will know with certainty when the next election will occur and will be able to plan accordingly. This will almost certainly involve greater efficiency at Elections Canada and will, therefore, very likely save money for taxpayers. Political parties will also likely save money as they will not have to remain on an ‘election footing’ for extended periods of time. Moreover, fixed date elections will allow for better parliamentary planning. For example, members of parliamentary committees will be able to set out their agendas well in advance, which will make the work of committees, and Parliament as a whole, more efficient. Higher Voter Turnout Rates Yet another reason for adopting fixed date elections is that this measure will likely improve voter turnout because elections will be held in October, except when a government loses the confidence of the House. The weather is generally favourable in most parts of the country. Fewer people are transient. So, for example, most students will not be in transition between home and school at that time and will be able to vote. Moreover, seniors will not be deterred from voting as they might be in colder months. And, of course, citizens will be able to plan in advance to participate in the electoral process, arranging for advanced voting if they plan to be away. An additional benefit is that pre-election campaigns to ‘get out the vote’ will be able to be well prepared, as the organizers will be aware of exactly when the next general election will take place. Candidates Finally, I want to mention an advantage that will have resonance to many of those in this chamber. It is a difficulty with the current system that I have witnessed personally (and something I have mentioned in interviews when Bill C-16 was first introduced). Fixed date elections will help to attract many of the best qualified Canadians into public life because it will be easier to plan their own schedules to enable them to stand for election. For many of our most talented Canadians, unfixed election dates make it difficult to plan to enter public life because they simply don’t know when the next election is going to be held. I think fixed date elections can only help in attracting the most qualified individuals to public life. Details of the Bill Mr. Speaker, I would like to turn to the details of the bill. 1. Responsible Government Legislation providing for fixed date elections must be structured to meet certain constitutional realities of responsible government. They include: • the requirement that the government have the confidence of the House of Commons; • respecting the Governor General’s constitutional power to dissolve Parliament. The bill before us was drafted carefully to ensure that these constitutional requirements continue to be respected. So, the bill does not in any way change the requirement that the government must maintain the confidence of the House. Moreover, all of the conventions regarding loss of confidence remain intact. In particular, the Prime Minister’s prerogative to advise the Governor General on the dissolution of Parliament is retained, to allow him or her to advise dissolution in the event of a loss of confidence. Moreover, the bill states explicitly that the powers of the Governor General remain unchanged, including the power to dissolve Parliament at the Governor General’s discretion. 2. Modeled After Provincial Legislation As set out in the government’s platform, this bill is modeled after existing provincial fixed date elections legislation. The legislation is very similar to the approach used by British Columbia, Ontario and Newfoundland and Labrador. Mr. Speaker, it should be noted that the legislation in all of these provinces is working – and working well. British Columbia recently had its first fixed date election (May 17, 2005) and Ontario and Newfoundland and Labrador will soon have their first fixed date elections (October 4, 2007 and October 9, 2007 respectively). In British Columbia, there was certainly no evidence of what some critics have called a “lame duck government”. 3. Mechanics The government’s bill provides that the date for the next general election is Monday, October 19, 2009. Of course, this will be the date only if the government is able to retain the confidence of the House until that time. So, for example, if the government were to be defeated tomorrow, a general election would be held according to normal practice. However, the subsequent election would be scheduled for the third Monday in October, in the fourth calendar year after that election. And that is the normal model that would be established by this bill. General elections will occur on the third Monday of October in the fourth calendar year following the previous general election. We chose the date very carefully and one of my parliamentary colleagues will provide a full explanation of our choice during the course of this debate. However, in brief, we chose the third Monday in October because it was the date that was likely to maximize voter turnout and to be least likely to conflict with cultural or religious holidays – or with elections in other jurisdictions. 4. Conflicts This raises an additional feature of the bill that I want to bring to your attention – a feature that provides for an alternate election date in the event of a conflict with a date of religious or cultural significance or an election in another jurisdiction. In the current system, the date of the general election is chosen by the government, so it is rare that a polling day is chosen that comes into conflict with a date of cultural or religious significance or with elections in other jurisdictions. However, with the introduction of legislation providing for fixed date elections, there is some possibility that, in the future, the stipulated election date will occasionally be the same as a day of cultural or religious significance or an election in another jurisdiction. The Ontario fixed date elections legislation provides that, if there is a conflict with a day of cultural or religious significance, the Chief Elections Officer may recommend an alternate polling day to the Lieutenant Governor in Council, up to seven days following the day that would otherwise be polling day. Using a variation of the Ontario legislation providing for fixed date elections, our bill empowers the Chief Electoral Officer to recommend an alternate polling day to the Governor in Council should he or she find that the polling day is not suitable for that purpose. The alternate day would be either the Tuesday or the Monday following the Monday that would otherwise be polling day. Allowing alternate polling days to be held on the following Tuesday or Monday is consistent with the current practice of holding elections on a Monday or a Tuesday. Illusory in Nature? Mr. Speaker, some Opposition members had concerns that this bill is illusory in that the Prime Minister can call an election at any point up until the fixed date for the election. However, Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has to retain his prerogative to advise dissolution to allow for situations when the government loses the confidence of the House. This is a fundamental principle of our system of responsible government. Moreover, if the bill were to indicate that the Prime Minister could only advise dissolution in the event of a loss of confidence, it would have to define ‘confidence’ and the dissolution of the House of Commons would be justiciable in the courts – something that we certainly do not want. Conclusion Mr. Speaker, this bill providing for fixed date elections is long overdue in Canada. In June, Ipsos-Reid released the results of a poll which showed that 78% of Canadians support the government’s plans to provide for fixed date elections. You may know that the third week in October is already Citizenship Week in this country where we celebrate what it means to be Canadian citizens. Of course, fundamental to being a Canadian citizen is our civic responsibilities, including our duty to vote. It is fitting, then, that general election dates will be set for the third Monday in October. This legislation will provide greater fairness, increased transparency and predictability, improved policy planning, increased voter turnout, and will help to attract the best qualified Canadians to public life. I hope my colleagues on both sides of the House will join with me in supporting it and I look forward to the Bill’s speedy passage in the Senate. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

tags
Canada, Flaherty, politics, Conservatives,consumer spending, tax-credit, , economy, government, Conservatives, Harper, recession, Conference Board of Canada, consumer confidence, Economy, Finance Minister,

Harpers Putsch

Since winning power in 2006, albeit as a minority government, Stephen Harper has been set on gaining a majority to keep HIM in power as PM. That first summer his reading included a biography of Stalin, the Man of Steel.

And like Stalin his recent political machinations reminded me of the intriques in the Bolshevik Party as Stalin played off alliances of Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Radek, Bukharin, and other central committee and politburo members, against each other to maintain power.

In porouging parliment he saved his job and his government...for the moment.

And despite his protestations about saving demoracy, his actions are the opposite. Which is typical of the right wing, who use language to mean its opposite. For instance Freedom of Information acts passed by right wing governments are anything but that, they actually limit freedom of informantion and access. Just as the Harperocrites transperancy and accountability act is anything but.

And right wing parties manufacture political crisises in order to create the conditions to either take power or stay in power.

So when Harper talks about democracy he means something other than parlimentary democracy. Rather he looks south and want to create a PMO with the power of the U.S. Presidency.

"The Canadian government has always been chosen by the people," the prime minister declared in his mid-week televised address to the country.
But now, he told viewers, a coalition of opposition parties is trying to oust him through a backroom deal "without your say, without your consent and without your vote."
Just how valid is Harper's claim that changing governments without a new election would be undemocratic?
"It's politics, it's pure rhetoric," said Ned Franks, a retired Queen's University expert on parliamentary affairs. "Everything that's been happening is both legal and constitutional."
Other scholars are virtually unanimous in their agreement. They say Harper's populist theory of democracy is more suited to a U.S.-style presidential system, in which voters cast ballots directly for a national leader, than it is to Canadian parliamentary democracy.
"He's appealing to people who learned their civics from American television," said Henry Jacek, a political scientist at McMaster University.
In Canada, there's no national vote for prime minister. People elect MPs in 308 ridings, and a government holds power only as long as it has the support of a majority of those MPs.
"We have a rule that the licence to govern is having the confidence of the House of Commons," said Peter Russell, a former University of Toronto professor and adviser to past governors general.
"I'm sorry, that's the rule. If they want to change it to having a public opinion poll, we'd have to reform and rewrite our Constitution."

If we are to understand the current political situation and how we got here we have to review Harpers rise to power. Firstly he left the Reform Party as a short lived MP, having been a former assistant to its first MP Deborah Grey. He had an ego that would not let him work with Preston Manning then Reform Party leader who is a prairie populist. Harper however comes from the Calgary School, a modern neo-con politick influenced by Reagan/Gingrich Republicanism, and the authoritarian ideology of Carl Schmitt and Leo Strauss. Several members of the Calgary School being ex-pat Americans.

The new conservative movement sled by Harper shed its populist appeal, and its base, while maintaining the language of reform to appeal to that base. Under the tutelage of Calgary School mandrin Tom Flanagan. the object was not Preston's agenda to reform Canadian politics, but to gain power and destroy their main opponent the Liberal Party. It was to hold power at all costs, first and foremost, democratic reform was abandoned for the politics of right wing political economic social engineering, to transform the state in Canada into a Republican lite government. In order to do this it was required to Unite the Right.

With the failure of the Reform Party and Canadian Alliance to do this, it was clear that a strong man, a man of steel, would be needed to bind the disparte right wing base together into a party capable of winning an election and begin the process of defeating and destroying the Liberal Party, Canada's Natural Governing Party, andultimately what these ex-American politicos hate most the liberal social democratic Canadian State.

This was the same agenda of the Gingrich Republicans and their Contract With America, to defeat forever the Democrats, who had been the Natural Governing Party in the United States.

With Harpers win of the leadership of the newly minted Conservative Party, which intigrated the Canadian Alliance with the old Progressive Conservative Party, purging the progressives and populist Reformers, the Republican Revolution model of politics was adapted to Canada.

The arrogance of the Liberals was finally met with an arrogant Conservative leader set with and agenda to seize power and destroy them once and for all. No other Canadian politician had ever been elected to parliment like Harper. None of the previous Conservative PM's had ever viewed taking power to mean destroying their political opposition.

This should have been clear to the Liberals, but in their arrogance as the Natural Ruling Party they chaose instead to view their defeat in 2006 as the fault of the internal clash between Paul Martin and Jean Chretien. A clash that had led to Martin gaining a minority government bequethed with a Chretien era scandal. Even after Martin's defeat the party failed to realize how serious Harper was about his mission and political agenda to destroy them.

In their arrogance they held a six month leadership race complete with supposed party revitalization discussions. The latter ended up on the cutting room floor. The former was hotly contested, and included a front runner, Michael Ignatieff, brought from Harvard to battle the Calgary School boys. Unfortunately the race which got nasty ended in a lame duck choice; Stephane Dion, whom nobody really wanted, but appeared at th moment to unite the party as the best of a bad lot. Again the failures and foibles of all the leadership candidates were exposed for all Canadians to see, and their words used in the leadership debates would come back to haunt them.

In choosing Dion, they thought they would naturally regain power, they were unprepared for the total war that Harper was about to unleash on them.

With a minority government and buckets of money available the Harper government wasted no time in perparing for another election. And it began the day that the Liberals elected Dion as their leader.

Gone now were the catcalls about you had ten yearsto fix things, and accusations about the Quebec Ad Scam and being entitled to their entitlements. No the Liberals played into Harpers

hands, his strong leadership, his furherprinzpal, versus their milqutoast soft leader Dion.

They prepared for a spring election, spending on attack ads against Dion that left the broke Liberal party reeling. When that election did not happen they porogued parliment for the summer to return in the fall, blaming the Liberals for their failure to pass law and order legislation that was their stock in trade appeal to their right wing base.

By the end of 2007 they had wasted the surplus the Liberals had left them with GST cuts, tax cuts for big business and bloated military budgets for their war in Afghanistan. This was always a key element of the neo-con agenda, spend government money so that they had no alternative but to cut politically objectionable services and programs.

"I'm hopeful there will be some ideologically-driven, neo-conservative cuts to government," political scientist Tom Flanagan, a former chief of staff to Harper, said in an interview.
Such cuts, he added, would be consistent with Harper's long-term goal of reducing the size and scope of government.
"I think that's always been sort of the long-term plan, the way that Stephen was going about it of first depriving the government of surpluses through cutting taxes . . . You get rid of the surpluses and then it makes it easier to make some expenditure reductions."
At a minimum, Flanagan said: "I think there's certainly room for some incremental cuts to useless programs."
The government has already used the economic crisis to put off plans for a national portrait gallery, citing the need for fiscal restraint in uncertain times.
From Flanagan's perspective, the government would do well to scupper a host of grants, contracts and business subsidies and to pare a lot of what he considers wasteful spending on cultural and aboriginal programs.

Despite passing legislation for fixed date federal election, with the next one being the fall of 2009, Harper kept up the election style attacks on Dion and the Liberals. It was always about Harper versus the other guy, who was a wimp, not a leader, etc. etc. Canada was kept on election footing, the Conservatives showed off their new war room for the election, and then quietly closed shop six months later.

Durng the Fall of 2007 through the spring of this year the rudderless Liberals prop up the Harper government, unable and unwanting to bring down the government, unprepared to go to the polls, Dion allows his MP's to bow out of critical votes, including confidence votes, with only token opposition to Harper.

Come the summer of 2008 and again government is porugued for the summer to resume in the fall. Everyone is busy watching the U.S. Presidential race, and watching house prices drop as oil prices rise, and the loonie gains on the U.S. dollar. Then everything begins to fall apart. The recession comes, a recession that George Bush spends a year denying, saying the fundamentals of American Capitalism are strong. John McCain his replacement says the same thing on the campaign trail. Heck even our Economist In Chief, our PM Stephen Harper assures Canadians that our economic fundamentals are strong, and a recession and credit melt down won't hurt our financial system and the government surpluses.

But Harper see's the writing on the wall, a recession would bring down his minority government, so being the opportunist he is he gambled on an early election, before the meltdown got to bad. Despite fix election dates he threw that aside like his promise not to tax Income Trusts. Two years of election style campaigning had left the Liberals and Dion weakened, and the polls showed that in the early days of the recession he was risisng in the polls, Canadians were looking for secure leadership in this time of unease and uncertainty.

So he called an election in September for October. The Man of Steelwas now transformed into Uncle Steve, the sweater wearing, father of two, a serious listner at the kitchen tables of immigrant and ethnic Canadians as nmumerous TV ads showed us.

And then the sweater came off. Harper announced political cuts to Arts and Culture programs, and denounced artists and cultural workers as effette elitists (read Liberals) who criticise the government that feeds them. And he introduced tough Law and Order promises to put teenagers in adult prisons. Appealing to his right wing base in Western Canada. But it bombed in Quebec and we were to discover that the Conservatives had contracted out their campaign in Quebec leaving them with no one to effectively counter the BQ attacks on these policies.

All along our esteemed Economist and PM insisted like his counterparts to the south that Canada's economic fundamentals were strong. And then the market crashed. And despite that crash Harper lied to the Canadian people saying that he would not have a deficit and that his government would still have a surplus. He insisted our financial market place could weather the storm, while promising $75 billion to bail out the banks.

An all the while the Liberals floundered about with a lacklustre leader whose complex Green Plan was obtuse except for one fact, it was a tax increase. Harper leaped on this from the earliest days of the Green Shift even before the election to call it a deficit plan and a tax grab. And the Liberals could not convince Canadians otherwise. The Natural Governing Party entered the election as the Natural Bumbling Party.

Jack Layton on the other hand finally abandoned the politcs of being the Opposition and ran for the PM's job. While Elizabeth May and the Green Party finally got into the leaders debates.

Still we all watched the U.S. election campaign between Obama and McCain.

And despite the pre-election polling, the defeat of the Liberals and their leader, Harper won a pyrichic victory, he ended up with more seats, as did Jack Layton and the NDP, but Harper remained with a minority government, in the midst of the biggest crisis capitalism has faced since the Great Depression.

Dion having blown it,by leading the Liberals to their worst historic defeat ever, mopped around Stornmount, spending several days before announcing his retirement as leader of the Liberals. Dion was always his own worst advisor. And his shock at losing as well as his hubris and arrogance that he could be defeated so badly, would siber him up.

Despite bailing out the banks Harper insisted that he would not run a deficit, that he could balance the budget, that his government would have a surplus, as the loonie crashed, the Big 3 Automakers called for bailouts, and the market crash created a recession in Canada.

And so we come to the last two weeks as Parliment resumed. Promising a fiscal update to address the economic crisis facing the country and the world Harper produced a political document that was aimed at his long range plan all along, to finally destroy the Liberal Party once and for all. There was no investment strategy, no bail out for the Big Three, no economic plan perser. Hower there was further cuts to government spending, the only thing neo-cons know how to do, wage controls and the end of the right to strike for federal public sector workers, and the end of public financing of political parties. It was this that was the final straw that broke the camels back.

The path to Conservative political dominance is to financially bankrupt your opponents.
So wrote Tom Flanagan, one of the deep thinkers of the conservative movement in Canada and a mentor to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Flanagan's prescient op-ed piece from August appeared to come to fruition in Thursday's fiscal update when Harper's Conservatives moved to end public financing of federal political parties under the guise of austerity. "There will be no free ride for political parties," Flaherty told the House of Commons in his speech on the update. "Even during the best of economic times, parties should count primarily on the financial support of their own members and their own donors."

The irony is that public financing of political parties was a longstanding Reform Party demand, along with fixed election dates and Senate Reform. Even though it was introduced by Jean Chretien in his final days as PM, a legacy project, it passed the house unanimously. The Canadian Alliance, the former Reform Party, supported it becaue they saw it as a way of leveling the playing field, the Liberals had long benefited from Corporate and Union donations. For Harper now to eliminate it, without even having bothering to raise the matter during the election was simply another example that his agenda was to destroy the weakened Liberals. Finally Dion the doormouse woke up to the fact that the Harper agenda was not just power for its own sake, but the destruction of the Liberal Party. Indeed the entire Liberal cacus finally read the writing on the wall, which had been Conservative graffiti for a decade.

And the little professor saw a chance to be PM, in a coalition government playing right into the hands of Harper. The NDP and Bloc had begun coalition discussions and invited the Liberals in, as they fumed over the betrayl and attack by Harper. Their mistake was to allow Dion to remain in charge, thus playing into Harpers hands. Jack Layton had gotten more popular votes than Dion and indeed the NDP won more seats, and came in second in many regions including Alberta. The Liberals were decimated, and the little professor who would be PM was not seen by Canadians as worthy of the job. Even as leader of a coalition.

Harper played on that to his advantage, while lying about the whole way we had gotten into this mess. We had seen what was supposed to be a fiscal update, changed into a attack on other political parties, wage controls on the public sector, and cuts to government spending. No fiscal stimulaus, other than bailing out the banks, was proposed. No fiscal plan was offered, and still Harper and his ministers claimed they would have a surplus and would not go into deficit.

He could not help himself, he was true to his long term goal of destroying the Liberals, and he saw them severly weakened and he took advantage. He did not expect that the opposition would coalesce into a united front coalition that could offer an alternative to his government.

Which they did.

He quickly backtracked, withdrawing the offending proposals to remove public financing and the right to strike, though wage controls were not off the table. However the damage was done.

And he insisted the next election would be fought over public financing which he couched in the old language of the 2006 election, that the opposition wanted their entitlements.

Faced with a united opposition, a coalition prepared to govern in his stead, who had already let the Govenor General know that, he began another election campaign. With coffers full of donations, he launched his so called defense of democracy, note well not defense of Parliment, but of that American abstract notion of democracy, one person one vote.

Not willing to face the wrath of the house he approached the GG to porouge parliment, to live to fight another day. While he accused the opposition of courting a coup with their coalition, he in fact conducted a parlimentary putsch yesterday to stay in power for another seven weeks.And he did so not for the good of Canada, or the Canadian people, nor even for the good of his own party. He has no plan to deal with the recession and its spiral into depression, rather he will use the seven weeks to run yet another election campaign against the Liberals.

The Liberals mistake and the cracks are showing now with dissident MP's denoucning Dion, was to not have demanded Dion step down and appoint an interm leader to be the PM in a coalition government.

That option remains open. Or they could make Jack PM. Not likely.

So let us recap the Harper government is a minority, the majority of Canadians voted for the opposition. They don't want another election, only Harper does because he has the money to run one. He wants an election not to govern but to finally kill the Liberal party, to run a stake thrrough its heart so it will not rise again.

And that is all his political agenda was ever about. So lets not hear anymore about defending democracy, or being best suited to solve the economic crisis, which he denied we were in and still has not offered any solutions for.Or that he is fighting for Canadian unity against nasty seperatists that he was willing to join with to defeat the Liberal minority government of Paul Martin.

Let us understand that Harper and his cronies seek power for its own sake, to mold Canada in their neo-con image. He has pulled off a parlimentary putsch to stay in power. We need a strong coalition to defeat him and replace him in January.

SEE:

In Quebec Everyone is a Nationalist
Jack Layton PM

Harpocrites Declare Class War

Wage Controls

Harpers Bonapartism

The Conservative Dictatorship

Our Great Leader

Harper the Autocrat

Harpers Fascism

Democracy Is Messy

Stephen Harper; Canada's Jekyll and Hyde

The Stalin Circle in Alberta

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NDP the New Reform Party

Reasearch just published on the results of the October Federal election shows that the new party rising in the West to challenge the Ottawa power base is the NDP. Even in Alberta, where the NDP won a seat they came in second place across the province over all. After all the original reform party of the west was the CCF; the NDP's predecesor. With a seat in Quebec and Alberta the NDP is now a national party unlike the Liberals.

Liberals ran third behind the NDP in every last western province. While New Democrats came second in 46 western ridings, Liberals came second in only 24 ridings. And, again in 24 western seats, Liberals placed fourth behind the Greens and Independents. Of 42 seats up for grabs in Alberta and Saskatchewan, Liberals won just a single seat -- belonging to veteran Grit Ralph Goodale.

SEE:
Liberals Gain Third Party Status
Populism and Producerism


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Linda Duncan, RahimJaffer, Harper, Conservatives, Cabinet, Government, politics, Edmonton, Alberta, NDP, Liberals, Redmonton, politics, , federal election, Edmonton Strathcona Jack Layton,

Arts Vote Cost Jaffer His Job

Alberta and Quebec have long been allies in their opposition to the powers of Ottawa. This past election that commonality was shown in the reaction to Harpers Arts and Culture cuts. While pundits focused on Quebec's reaction they overlooked its impact in Alberta. In particular in Festival City; Redmonton.

The defeat of Edmonton Strathcona MP Rahim Jaffer was a direct result of Harpers attack on Arts and Cultural workers. After all Redmonton has a booming arts and culture community, we have the Winspear and the Citadel, the Jubilee, we have arts groups and theatre groups, a major Symphony, Jazz City, the Fringe Festival, an International Childrens Arts Festival, a Buskers Ball, the Edmonton Folk Festival and an International Street Preformers festival, etc, etc.

Edmonton Strathcona itself is one of the cities Arts hub. Known to all as Old Strathcona with its infamous Whyte Avenue at its core, it is the centre of the Theatre community hosting the second largest Fringe Festival in the world. Not only do Edmontonians produce and preform the plays, they are mass of volunteers needed to run the Fringe and the mass of visitors to the Fringe.

Did Harper miss this fact? You bet. When the uproar over his political purging of arts funding mobilized the Arts and Cultural community, it was a nation wide response. Of course the greatest coverage was its impact in Quebec where polls showed Harper's policy led to loss of support for the Conservatives.

But overlooked was its impact here in Redmonton. Harper backpedaled and announced that he had increased Heritage Canada funding, but that of course is tied to politically correct Conservative values, then he annouced increased funding for arts and culture for wait for it....children to take piano and dance lessons. He overlooked the fact that dance classes were already eligable for his childrens athletics tax credit that the government introduced last election. And how does funding piano lessons equate with funding for Symphony orcehstra's, Opera, etc. It doesn't. And so it cost Rahim his job.

Arts voters in Edmonton Strathcona voted strategically. And not only NDP and Liberals but Conservatives as well. When it comes to Edmonton Strathcona which is the Reddest part of Redmonton, we have elected NDP MLA's here. When the provincial Tories run candidates here they have been Red Tories,

Rahim was in a tough fight and he knew it. From the start he did something he has not done in previous elections, put up lawn signs. There were Jaffer signs on my street and my moms street where they had never been before. But like the Liberal signs many were on rental or commercial properties, put their in many cases not by the renters but the landlord.

Linda Duncan ran an excellent campaign, and it was based on building a base through three elections. The NDP made a break through federally in the riding when they ran Malcolm Azania, and broke through the usual two way race between Conservatives and Liberals which had left the party trailing a distant third over the years.

The Azania campaign team stayed on and recruited Linda to run last election. She further consolidated the NDP's second place standing loosing to Jaffer by only 5000 votes, votes that had gone to the non-existant Liberal candidate. In that election it was the Liberals who were the vote spliters.

But this election it was clearly a two way race, and despite his sign campaign Jaffers laziness and arrogance cost him. He did not address the Arts cuts, nor did he distance himself from the Harper arts attacks when Harper insulted all cultural workers and masses of volunteers who support them by calling them elitists. In fact he insulted some of the leading citizens of this city who are proud of the efforts they have put into fund raising for Arts and Culture, including wealth bourgoise like the Winspears who donated to have the Winspear Centre for the Arts built. Opps.

Jafers arrogance was on public display election night when at ten o'clock he got up to announce his imminent victory, which the media mistakenly announced not noticing that their were still 14 polls not counted, polls which included mine which are all strong NDP polls.

He was pulled down from the podium by an aide who told him it wasn't in the bag yet.

When he lost he was at a loss for words for several days, again Jaffer's arrogance was publicly displayed with his refusal to concide the election. He only announced his final defeat the same day he eloped with fellow MP Helen Guergis.

The delicious irony of this is that he appears to be off to Ottawa to live with Helen as her live in Assistant and Helen will have lots of time to spend with Rahim since it is speculated that she is destined for the back bench in the upcoming cabinet shuffle.

Yes Linda Duncan and her team ran a great campaign. But in the end we have to thank Stephen Harper for attacking the Arts and Culture community, it pushed her over the top. And put a bright orange spot in the middle of Blue Alberta.

And this is no minor break through. It shows that the Harpocrites policy of taking Alberta for granted cost them big time in Edmonton Strathcona. Next election that vulnerability could lead to more defeats for the Harpocrites.



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Forget Ike It's PetroCan's Fault

P.O. about the 13 cent rise in gasoline prices at the pump last Friday. Don't blame hurricane Ike, rather it was exasperated by the shut down of Petrocan here in Edmonton. The plant has been offline since July!

September 15, 2008

Petro-Canada Refinery Shutdown Causes Shortage Petro-Canada, Canada's second- largest refiner, said filling stations in Alberta and British Columbia may run out of fuel after the unexpected shutdown of a unit at its Edmonton, Alberta, refinery. The company is investigating the reason for the closing of the catalytic cracking unit, a gasoline-producing piece of equipment, according to a Bloomberg report. Petro-Canada spokesperson Jon Hamilton said the reduction in gasoline could last several weeks as the company fixes the unit. "It could be short term, it could be a little longer," Hamilton said. "We're looking at, I'd say, weeks not days, right now." Gasoline shortages may occur in parts of British Columbia's so-called interior region and Alberta, Petro-Canada said in a statement. The Calgary-based company said it's trying to boost supplies in Canada's western provinces partly by buying fuel from rivals. Deliveries to some customers and filling stations have been curbed, Hamilton said without providing details. "The deliveries that we're sending out are reduced from what they would normally get,'' he said. "That might mean a smaller load or that might mean less frequent loads." The company intends to import more supplies to its port terminal in Vancouver and truck the fuel to customers, Hamilton said. Petro-Canada also is altering its distribution network across the country to boost supply in western Canada. The equipment failure is unrelated to a C$2.2 billion ($2.07 billion) modification project nearing completion at the plant. Parts of the refinery were scheduled to be shuttered for about two months starting this month so that the plant can run on crude extracted from Alberta's oil sands. Output at the refinery was cut last month because of a water-boiler equipment problem. The plant is capable of processing 135,000 barrels a day. Imperial Oil Ltd. of Calgary is Canada's largest refiner and marketer.

Since Petrocan, Shell and Imperial Oil are the area's main refiners losing Petrocan put pressure on their retail outlets. Of course this should have been predicated. Add to that the shut down of East Coast gasoline due to Ike and you have the perfect storm.

In March, a shut down at Imperial's 187,000-barrel-a-day Strathcona refinery near Edmonton caused gasoline shortages at Esso stations throughout Alberta, Saskatchewan, B.C. and Manitoba.

Around the same time, Shell Canada Ltd. said its Scotford refinery and upgrader near Fort Saskatchewan, Alta., were operating at reduced rates because of unplanned maintenance.

Last year, Ontarians experienced gasoline shortages for several weeks after a fire at Imperial's Nanticoke refinery.

Canada's refining infrastructure is aging, but companies are not keen on investing in new facilities, said Roger McKnight, an energy analyst with Oshawa, Ont.-based consulting firm En-Pro.

Not only would it would take up to 10 years and billions of dollars to build a new refinery, but they would tilt the market against the companies' favour.

"Their refining margins would drop because of excess supply. So there's no incentive at all for them to do that," McKnight said.

Another factor discouraging the industry from spending money on new refineries is uncertainty about government regulations.

"If I was an oil company, I would like to know in 10 years, when I'm going to have this refinery built, what the eventual specs are going to be and what the emission standards are going to be," McKnight said.

As for the solution it is as clear as the nose on Uncle Ed's face, we need more refinery capacity in Alberta and Canada. Of course given the anti regulatory anti-public ownership attitude of Big Oil and its government in Alberta that ain't gonna happen any time soon.


And so we have gasoline shortages on refinery row.

Back in August, it was Petro-Canada. Now, it’s Shell that has run out of gasoline at some of its Alberta stations.

In Medicine Hat, the Shell stations on Dunmore Road and Eighth St. NW have been out of gas since Friday, while the Shell on South Railway had gas as of Monday but wasn’t sure how long its supplies would last. Shell stations on Redcliff Drive SW and Trans-Canada Way were reporting they still have gas.

Jana Masters, spokesperson for Shell Canada, said there are also a couple of stations in Calgary and Edmonton that are running on empty.

“But these are very small numbers compared to our total operations across the province,” she said.

While the Petro-Canada gas shortage in August had to do with a problem at that company’s refinery, Masters said that is not the case at Shell.

“It’s just a temporary challenge keeping up to customer demand,” Masters said.

It is the lack of tertiary refining that causes gasoline shortages in Canada and subsequently price increases. And wqe won't get more refineries built until there is a national initiative to make it so including a Green Plan.

Call it a Green National Energy Program. If you want to end price gouging lets have a made in Canada Energy Plan that includes increased bitumin processing and tertiary refining capacity.

Of course others have solutions too, like importing more dirty gas from the U.S. but that is all refined in Hurricane Alley, and we know what that means. 13 cent price increases in one day.

Petro-Canada said it’s pulling out all the stops to make sure supplies of gasoline keep flowing.

Company officials said on Petro-Canada’s website that it was able to use trucks to ship approximately 200,000 litres of gasoline per day from its Vancouver storage facility last week, but that volume has now more than quadrupled.

That’s been partially accomplished by hiring truckers from Ontario to move more product, Stevens said.

The company is also trying to find rail cars that could be pressed into service to deliver gasoline to destinations in B.C. and Alberta.

The company also is trying to boost its gasoline supplies by looking to its other Canadian refineries and to the United States and overseas, Stevens said.

An industry group that represents independent gasoline retailers is calling for a harmonization of gasoline standards between Canada and the U.S., which would allow for more importation of American products during shortages.

Canadian gasoline has hard caps on sulphur and benzene levels in gasoline, which prevents the importation of the product from the U.S. to ease any shortages, said Dave Collins, a director with the Canadian Independent Petroleum Marketers Association.

"It’s great if you’re a refinery because it blocks competition and helps you keep our prices up," he said in an interview from Halifax.

"But it’s not good for consumers and, at times like this, it’s not good for our operations either because we can’t get any gas," he said.

The federal government’s failure to ease importation restrictions means such shortages will likely happen again, Collins said.

Of course the solution is not unrestricted trade with the U.S. for dirty gas, rather the solution was in hand until the Liberals under Paul Martin sold off the last of Canadians taxpayers shareholdings in Petrocan.There is a solution to price gouging, that is worker and community control of the refineries.


SEE:

It's Time to Take Back Our Oil and Gas

NDP And Workers Control

Nationalize the Oil Industry

The Myth of the NEP

Aren't you sorry you sold your shares

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Albertans Want Oil Sands Moratorium

It's not just folks out east who want a moratorium on oil sands development, Albertans do to. Jack was right.

While 56 per cent of respondents are worried about the impact of oilsands development on the environment, more than seven in 10 said they're worried about the health impacts.

A slim majority of Albertans (51 per cent) don't want the federal government to intervene to protect the environment affected by the oilsands, fitting with many Albertans' long-standing dislike of having outsiders interfere with what is seen as a domestic affair. But 42 per cent want Ottawa to become involved.

A sizable majority of Albertans (63 per cent) do not agree the Alberta government is adequately protecting the air, land and water affected by oilsands developments. Only 29 per cent of Albertans say they think the government is doing a good enough job.

One in five say the provincial government is doing enough to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while nearly six in 10 say they are not. Twenty per cent of respondents say they don't know. The federal government receives a similarly poor review.

Seven in 10 young people between the ages of 18 and 34 say the province and Ottawa are not doing enough.

The poll found 88 per cent of respondents think the oilsands are important to Alberta's economic development.

And we are still waiting to get our fair share of royalties to pay for all the environmental and health impacts of the tarsands.



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Rahim Worried

Sign, sign, everywhere a sign
Blockin' out the scenery, breakin' my mind
Do this, don't do that, can't you read the sign?

Signs Lyrics by Five Man Electrical Band

Week one of the hottest election contest in Edmonton. I am speaking of course of my riding Edmonton Strathcona where Linda Duncan of the NDP is running again against the incumbent Rahim (dolittle) Jaffer.

And is Rahim worried? You bet. In the past Rahim has waited to put up signs in front of houses, relying instead on his landlord business pals to put up big signs on their buildings.
But last week, he was out with lawn signs, as was Linda.

If the battle of the signs is any indication, this will be a close race.
Though as an old pal of mine once said; boulevards don't vote, belittling the impact of lawn signs in public space rather than in front of houses. A message that seems lost on the Liberal candidate Claudette Roy who has few lawn signs up in front of homes relying instead on littering the 99th St. hill with her signs.



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Elizabeth May Progressive au contraire

Contrary to the current political myth that Elizabeth May and her Green Party will take votes from the left, ie. the NDP in reality they are a right wing party, and will take votes from the Tories.

Tom Flanagan: Yes, the Greens are mainly a threat to the other parties of the left, especially the NDP. The Conservatives lost some supporters to the Greens at the time of the merger (2003), but that's ancient history now. Elizabeth May doesn't threaten Stephen Harper; she threatens Jack Layton and his attempt in this election to displace the Liberals as the Official Opposition.

May herself may want to focus on the environment, but her passion for putting her foot in her mouth will be challenged when she gets into the debates.

Like this little jewel which exposes her for being the good Catholic she really wants to be.....,

"I'm against abortion. I don't think a woman has a frivolous right to choose".

She has denied that she said 'frivolous' just like she has denied she has called Canadians 'stupid'.

The Youtube controversy was created by Blogging Tory founder Stephen Taylor, showing that the Conservatives are worried about the impact of May on their voters.

But backpeadling when your words are in print or on YouTube, further shows her lack of political maturity.

Now that she is in the leaders debate I frankily look forward to May sticking her foot in it again. And au contraire her impact will be greater on the Liberals and Conservatives more than it will hurt Jack Layton and the NDP.


See:

Green Party

Elizabeth May

Peter MacKay


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