JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

This was the act of an extremely foolish and impetuous man.

Canadians traditionally are people who try to resolve issues through diplomacy, and you can’t have diplomacy without diplomats, a point I would have thought rather obvious, but apparently not so to all, judging from a sampling of mindless comments.

There is not one good thing that can result from this act for Canada or Canadians, with the sole exception, if you are a Conservative, of the Conservative Party’s campaign coffers owing to special interest donations.

Then there are the hollow cheers from the little mob of unofficial representatives for Israel’s interests (interests as defined by the three madmen currently running the place: Netanyahu, Barak, and Lieberman) who swarm like flies on any story of this nature, trying to bury thoughtful comments and prevent meaningful discussion.

You can tell them, almost to a person, despite the pseudonyms used in almost every case, by their tone: it lacks all logic and is devoid of ethics.

They never argue the genuine merits of one side or the other: they just call names, advocate the destruction of millions of innocent people, and offer limp efforts at frat-boy jokes.

What is Canadian about such behavior? Just as what is Canadian about Baird’s utterly foolish act?

Nothing, unless your idea of being Canadian is to sound and act like America’s Republican buffoons, the pathetic likes of Newt Gingrich or Sarah Palin or Rush Limbaugh or indeed Mitt Romney.

None of whom ever uttered a thoughtful sentence, and all of whom regularly go out of their way to say obtuse and abusive things that create conflict and division.

Divisiveness and conflict – that literally defines Stephen Harper’s legacy to Canadian politics.

The audience you draw does tend to define the nature of your acts, and you’ve only to read a sampling here to understand what Harper and Baird have achieved, and it is not something in the interests of the vast majority of Canadians.

But then Harper is a 39% prime minister, isn’t he?

And our democracy is badly bent when that kind of support allows acts and words that will do damage for years to our long-term interests.

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

I wouldn’t have minded the expense had there been something genuinely to celebrate.

Instead such occasions only remind one of how far CBC has fallen.

And in doing this, current senior management has made a terrible strategic mistake, having partially or fully alienated its traditional listeners and supporters.

No one can doubt that the dark bulk we call prime minister is going after CBC eventually.

Why would the man who does things like end the Wheat Board without farmers’ approval or destroy the gun registry (against general public support) or end public support of election costs hesitate?

The man has a tyrant’s mindset, and he is quietly dedicated to turning Canada into a pathetic imitation of the United States by virtue of a 39.6% mandate – which is to say, by virtue of no mandate at all, but a purely technical victory in our flawed election system.

CBC’s current senior management has managed to destroy a good deal of what was valued by listeners while not really succeeding in gaining a hoped-for huge new audience.

How else could it be, stuffing dull mediocrities like Jian Ghomeshi, Evan Solomon, or George Stroumboulopoulos down our throats? Or playing the low end of popular music in a desperate effort to gain young listeners? Or its repeated wading up to its armpits in favoritism and nepotism, while mouthing stuff about prejudice of various kinds? Nepotism is prejudice of the most blatant kind.

CBC has no hope of being a hugely popular network, unless, that is, it just becomes like other networks, in which case, there is no case for keeping it.

It should be a showcase for Canada’s best in ideas, conversation, music, the arts, and comedy, and that necessarily means an appeal that is quite different than all the commercial networks. Not everyone wants to listen to the best, just like not everyone likes the opera or the ballet, but it should be there for anyone who is interested.

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN BY PRESTON MANNING IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

Political gravity has shifted in the country?

Harper through years of work has increased his support from about 30% to 39.6%.

Almost two-thirds of Canadians still reject this man and his party.

The only real lessons from the election are three.

One, we have a serious democratic deficit in Canada when less than 40% of votes turns into a majority.

Honest and conscientious men concerned with our affairs would work towards correcting the situation, not crow about it.

Two, dirty and unethical tactics do achieve some success in politics. The United States is rife with them. Now Harper has introduced them to Canada, debasing the decency of our politics.

As an interesting sidelight here, we get a hint here of how little a role religion – both Harper and Manning being religious – actually plays in genuine ethics.

Three, leadership matters, and the Liberals did not have any.

They appointed a weak man who missed almost every opportunity to respond forcefully to Harper’s half-truths, evasions, and outright dishonesty.

This weak man also sneered at a coalition which would have long ago stopped Harper, and he was inept enough to end up being accused of plotting to have one. Pathetic.
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“Preston just keeps looking better and younger every time his photo appears…”

Preston had a complete make-over at some point, maybe as part of his initiation as president and CEO of the one-man institute founded by himself.

Hair dyed.

Eyebrows skillfully dyed to match.

Dumped the granny glasses and fit-up with contact lens

New wardrobe.

Possibly a few needle-loads of botox.

Coaching on how to look at the camera without making people laugh at the results.

I do think he missed the chance to turn up the back collar of his jacket, a la 1959 rockers. That would be in keeping with his newly-learned smile, rather suggestive of an early Elvis snarl.

Bet with his self-appointed institute job he has a shiny car, maybe something sporty like a pink and black convertible.

The guy’s clearly now a regular chick-magnet.

But when he opens his mouth or takes his quill pen from the inkstand, we hear or read the same old crotchety noises.

What was it Obama said during the campaign about putting lipstick on a pig…?

JOHN CHUCKMAN

POSTED RESPONSES TO A COLUMN BY JEFFREY SIMPSON IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAIL

“The NDP platform seldom gets a costed look. It’s a pastiche of guesses and conjectures.”

Please, it is exactly the same for all parties, only in the case of Conservatives, we’re not talking about election platform items, we’re talking about actual policy.

We have no idea, and Parliament has no idea, of the cost of current Conservative policies and proposed legislation. None.

The complete lack of costing of government proposals and policies and campaign policies is one of the greatest flaws in our democracy – a hole big enough to drive a fleet of trucks through.

An ignorant vote is no vote at all.
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“Steal the election?”

Enough, please, of such complete ignorance. Reading this kind of line makes one think we live in Orwell’s 1984.

Coalitions are, and always have been, a completely legitimate part of parliamentary government.

Just because Canada has not used the tool to any extent does not make it an inappropriate one.

Dozens of parliamentary democracies have been governed this way, including at this moment Britain and Israel.

The mindless repetition of Harper’s thoughtless slogans about coalition sadly demonstrates the poor knowledge of a large part of our electorate.

An ignorant democracy really is not much of a democracy, but this kind of sad ignorance is at the very foundation of all Harper’s efforts.

Indeed, Mr. Simpson, I think Harper’s use of this slogan is more dangerous than anything else being said by anyone.

If he fails to get his majority, he is setting up people in the West for deep resentment about the East.

It reminds me quite sadly of Hitler’s “stab in the back” line about why Germany lost World War I.

This kind of intellectual and ethical filth works.

But it works only at the peril of civil society and democratic values.
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Our democracy is in genuine trouble.

Mr. Ignatieff is an appointed leader in the 21st century.

Mr. Harper is a control-freak who feels free to bend every rule and tradition of Parliament to keep his place and promote his agenda.

No one seems to care and no one seems to be able to do anything about a man who stands in contempt of Parliament and a man who has abused democratic values in countless situations in committees and in appointments.

Everyone points to the Bloc in Quebec as being against our values when in fact the Bloc’s existence and our tolerance of it represent the finest part of Canadian civil and ethical values.

Indeed, it is a sad thing to have to say, but Mr. Duceppe, in a number of ways, represents democratic values and statesmanship better than the current leaders of our two major parties.

This whole election is meaningless. Harper plays the tiresome and anti-democratic game of seeking out a limited number of “swing” ridings and in those ridings blasts his horn on narrow wedge issues of little interest to anyone else.

Nowhere, absolutely nowhere, does Mr. Harper offer us a set of cohesive policies around which we can unite as Canadians.

And Ignatieff is not much better, a man of surprisingly mediocre political talents considering his noted background.

And Harper spews the anti-democratic venom of “the stab in the back” if he doesn’t get his way.

Harper represents the most poisonous individual ever to hold high office in Canada and he will leave a legacy of hateful ads, secrecy, no tolerance, poorly-considered comments, pandering to certain groups, and a whole lot more.

Texas-style hateful politics.

JOHN CHUCKMAN

 

POSTED RESPONSE TO A COLUMN IN TORONTO’S GLOBE AND MAILReading of Helena Guergis’s airport melt-down, I may have new sympathy for the unpleasant Rahim Jaffer, her husband.

Maybe there’s actually a good reason Rahim Jaffer (of drunk-driving, cocaine-possession, and getting-off-with-a-slap-on-the-wrist fame) does the desperate things he does?

He appears to be married to a lunatic.

And, yes, indeed, where were the RCMP tasers on this one, as someone above asked?

I guess they save that treatment for poor foreigners who can’t speak English and who are not junior cabinet ministers.

And even then, they need four officers against one person to “deploy” the taser.

The photo with the story only shows two RCMP officers with the ghastly Guergis.

God, the new Conservatives have pathetic ministerial material. Peter “we’ll fight for Israel” Kent, Helena “I’m God” Guergis, Peter “my ex is a dog” MacKay, Lisa “leave my documents behind” Raitt, Maxime “leave my secret papers at my biker gang girlfriend’s” Bernier, and so on.

Our election system is a terrible mess if its result is keeping a bunch of second- and third-raters like this running the country with about a third of the country’s support. We really do need serious election reform.