Drunk in Ontario

All over the map

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 01:11:00 +0000

I don't understand this man. Last week he was abso-fuckin-lutely nuts. This week he's sane:

Last week I said that an intensely inexperienced 21-year-woman should not have had to give her life in the pointless war in Afghanistan. The responses were fascinating.

Most of the critical ones seemed obsessed with the fact that the poor girl indeed should have been able to die. A rather perverse way to support her and her family.

The vast majority of these were the usual nonsense. "Everyone is equal," "you're a dinosaur," "I hate you." Then all sorts of delightful and failed attempts to spell the word "misogynist."

OK, let's go a step further. Anyone who claims the war in Afghanistan is about gender equality is either supremely naive or extraordinarily dishonest. We said hardly a word about women's rights in that country until the United States was attacked on 9/11. So, apparently, women were treated well before the Twin Towers outrage but badly afterwards.

More than this, while the Soviet Union was a repugnant regime, the Afghan government begged for Russian help when it was attacked by the Taliban and one of the policies Moscow advocated was women's rights.

You figure him out.

Shark-Jumping

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 00:36:00 +0000

I wonder if Henry Winkler knew the contribution he was making to Western Culture when he went and jumped that shark. The phenomenon has bled off of TV, and has become a sort of catch-all for when someone becomes a parody of themselves. Some people get to jump that shark over and over: Pat Robertson is a great example. There are a lot of repeat offenders, to be sure.

Sometimes the shark-jumping happens on the DL, and it kinda slips under the radar for a while. In fact, I think sometimes the shark-jumping relegates people to the shadows for a while. It's like a time out: "You've exceeded your crazy. Go into the corner and wipe the froth off your chin. You can come out when you're ready to apologise."

I think Michael Coren jumped his shark last weekend. It took me five days to notice, though, because his crazy finally bumped him from the pages of my local fishwrap.

Caring for Karine
Sending our daughters to war in Afghanistan is just wrong
By MICHAEL COREN

No need to beat around any proverbial bush, is there? Let's begin at the beginning. It is apparently for our sons to go kill brown people, but sending our daughters is just wrong. Why, you ask? Good question.

So Canada sacrifices another victim on the altar of equality.

Last week a young girl dressed up as a soldier died in the increasingly futile and pointless war in Afghanistan. She was 21 years old, had been in the country for two weeks on her first tour of duty and probably weighed a little over 100 pounds.

Oh. Girls can't fight wars. Right. Hang on, children. It gets better.

Please know that I mean no disrespect to Karine Blais or to her family...

He doesn't mean the disrespect, but there it is, possums. That's some pretty good disconnect.

...and I grieve for her and them. But what on earth was she doing in such a place and in such a job?

How does grieving for her involve insulting her? I missed that stage of the process. Maybe it's a subset of anger: being a misogynistic asshole.

Look at the photograph of this beautiful girl. Look at the innocence, the gentleness, the grace. All of them precious aspects to the human character. So when I say that she was "dressed up as a soldier" I mean it as a compliment. I've known soldiers all of my life and I have an invincible respect for them. I've seen their courage, integrity and sheer decency.

He has respect for all of them, except this one. And it probably would have been okay if she was an ugly girl. But she was beautiful, innocent and gentle. He can apparently even detect grace from the photo, which, while irrelevant, is pretty damned impressive. I don't like this war. That's not a secret. I think the courage of our soldiers is being wasted and misdirected. But I don't think any of them are playing dressup. Killing people is deadly serious. Mr. Coren needs to keep that in mind.

I've also seen their capacity for controlled and righteous violence, which is
absolutely essential for any fighting man. Yes, man. Because there are few if
any women who have the skills required to serve as a front-line combat trooper.

The thing here is that he's not talking about skills. Skills can be learned. I'd wager that anyone (almost) could learn the skills necessary to be a combat trooper. What he claims is that women (or at least most of them, and certainly not this one) don't have the TEMPERAMENT to be a soldier. He means that as a compliment. I suppose maybe it is, if, like me, you think that soldiers are misguided weapons, perpetuating a fundamentally unjust system. If, however, you claim to believe that being a Canadian soldier is just too cool, and you say that girls can't do it, you're a sexist jerk. Besides, what the hell does he mean by righteous violence? I don't think the violence in Afghanistan is particularly righteous. And how is it different from any unrighteous violence our soldiers may be compelled to commit.

Yes, yes, yes, I know it's fundamentally anti-Canadian to say this but I'd prefer to articulate the views of the silent majority than hide behind some modernist fetish that places more importance on the myth of absolute equality than the safety of a girl who should be laughing with college friends rather than fighting theocratic madmen.

It's not anti-Canadian, it's anti-twentieth century. And I would argue that the boys ought to be laughing with college friends as well.

How much more odious can this guy be?

Can we really imagine for a moment that if a group of Taliban tribesmen rushed a trench or an encampment this poor young woman could fight them off, could deal with the thrusts of their long knives and heavy clubs?

Oh. That much. He manages to be sexist AND racist there. Because the Taliban guys don't use guns or explosives (certainly not the kinds of explosives that actually killed Karine). And seriously, what the hell is he on about? If you're being swarmed by a whole bunch of men, I don't know that having testicles is going to be the deciding factor.

Do we seriously think that the men in the unit would not risk their own lives to protect a pretty young girl who was inevitably being beaten to the ground by salivating killers?

That's just stupid. Do you think they wouldn't fight for a mate if it were a man?

The very reason we have various weight categories for all forms of organized fighting is that whatever the training, a pugilist's weight and muscle bulk give an advantage to the heavier combatant.

That's also stupid. I doubt there's a lot of hand-to-hand combat happening in Afghanistan. And if it was, then training will mean a lot more than weight. I'm about 250lbs. I outweigh my brother-in-law by about a hundred pounds. I have no doubts that he could kick my ass.

More than this, even contrived cultural denial should not prevent us from admitting that the death of a daughter or a wife is different from that of a son or a husband. Women nurture, give birth, care in a way that is unique. Quite simply, they are different from men.

I don't even know what the hell he's talking about here. Women are different, sure. But the capacity for motherhood does not make one a bad soldier. This kind of talk went out of fashion while Queen Victoria was still alive.

If captured, of course, such a woman would be repeatedly raped. And tortured. Again, I'm not meant to say this. Not Canadian, not CBC, not Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Not the sort of thing we're supposed to feel, so we pretend that men and women in the army, police and fire service are given the same tests and have to fulfil the same requirements. Yet truth still breaks through.

This is misdirection. For one thing, while it may be true, male soldiers would likely be tortured. And the raping of women is ostensibly one of the things we're there to prevent. If a woman wants to help with that, I see no reason we shouldn't let her. Besides, she was killed, not captured. He also is putting words in the mouths of his opponents. I have no doubt that a female soldier would be raped (hell, US soldiers were raping their male POWs). Saying so is not a PC violation. I'm not sure anybody is denying it. But by claiming that liberals WOULD deny it, he gets to call us stupid.

We rightly condemn Islamic extremists in Afghanistan because they treat women so badly. Then we allow one of our own to give her life so that we can congratulate ourselves on how liberal and egalitarian we are, lie about how gender difference don't matter and then encourage our generals and politicians to obscure the truth on television about soldiers and causes.

WTF? Seriously: What. The. Fuck? Is he saying that because we let women into the military we are as bad as the Taliban? I think he is. Chew on that a minute, possums. Roll that stupid around in your mouth a bit. See how it tastes, and then spit it out. This guy is a joke.

What hypocrites we have become. Poor, poor Karine -- this is not the way it should have been.

You and your country deserved better.

What does that even mean?

Mr. Coren, I'm calling it again. You're a bigoted asshole.

Canada is apparently not a haven for Canadians.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 17:36:00 +0000

Canada's Federal Court has ruled that the Federal Government has an obligation to try to protect its citizens even when they are abroad. It has indicated that the government has an obligation to its citizens that is greater to that of ou allies.

The Tories are going to appeal. Because they're just that classy.

The last time I wrote about Omar Khadr, I was accused of being an uninformed asshole. I'm going to go out on a limb here and do it again. We need to do what we can to protect this kid.

There are lots of reasons. Afghanistan had nothing to do with 9/11. The FBI has still not tied bin Laden to the attacks. NATO invaded Afghanistan when the Taliban refused to turn over bin Laden. They offered to if any evidence could be provided that linked him to the attacks. No evidence as provided bcause as far as we can tell, it doesn't exist. When NATO did invade Afghanistan, this kid was helping to defend it. As a child soldier. He killed someone in battle. He was then captured, and was not declared a POW, but rather a new, made-up category of detainee, and then put into a prison in Cuba that was built there to avoid sticky legal things like the Bill of Rights.

Omar Khadr, even if he did kill a US medic, deserves to be held in a POW camp, and to be treated humanely. Those are the rules, and while the US is fond of making them up as they go along (such as redefining waterboarding as "not torture" when done by the CIA, but a capital offense when performed by another government), if they want to be the World Police, they should at least pretend to play by the rules. At least with citizens of allied nations.

And the defense for not pushing for his repatriation? The Tories are continuing the policies of the previous government.

Know what? That just means that the previous government was wrong. By that rationale, Obama should keep Gitmo open. Hamid Karzai's government OUGHT to institute Sharia Law. Previous French and German governments invaded most of Europe. Maybe they ought to take another run at it. Maybe the US (and Canada, and the UK) ought to have a look at reinstituting slavery.

Basing your own policies on a previous governments is faulty reasoning. If someone else was an asshole, you are not less of an asshole for following through on their plans.

Canada is a haven for terrorists

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 15:26:00 +0000

For years, our leaders have tried to dispel the American myth that the 9/11 attackers got into the United States via Canada. It appears we still have some work to do.
On Monday night, in an interview aired by the CBC, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano was asked why she wants to increase security on the Canadian border to the same level as the Mexican border. She replied: "To the extent that terrorists have come into our country or suspected or known terrorist have entered our country across a border, it has been across the Canadian border."
"Are you talking about the 9/11 perpetrators?" asked interviewer Neil Macdonald.
"Not just those, but others as well," responded Napolitano.
Not just those. So the 9/11 myth persists, eight years and one administration later.
--The Toronto Star

The 9/11 bombers did not enter the US through Canada. That is a fact. But here's the thing.

So what if they did? Is it Canada's job to protect the US? Do we have to screen all our immigrants to find out if they harbour resentment toward the US.? And if they do, doesn't that just mean they'll fit in pretty well around here?

The US has the biggest defense budget on the planet. They have overlapping security agencies with overlapping jurisdictions. They have Border Security, Customs agents and Homeland Security. Not to mention Immigration, US Marshalls, the FBI, and the goddamned Coast Guard.

Even pretending that those 19 assholes entered the US via Canada, how is it OUR fault or OUR problem? Pretending that these guys came through Canada to get to the US to learn how to fly planes, and plot the act, OUR gus did their job. These men didn't commit crimes in Canada. Our citizens are safe.

If the US can't protect it's own citizens, it needs to figure its own shit out. It is not Canada's job to patrol the US border.

Guns and Jennifer Connelly

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 14:39:00 +0000

Those are the things that generate the most traffic around here. I have no illusions about my skills as a writer, thinker or commentator. It's T & A or the possibility of violence that will draw the crowds.

In fact, the post I wrote about a handgun ban a while ago still generates traffic and comments. I'm not sure what to make of that, since I don't think I'm all that far out with my stance. It's based on, as far as I can tell, reason, not emotion. I know there are factors I have not considered, but the purpose of a handgun is not something I approve of. Murder is not a good thing. It's one of the few Abrahamic principles I can get behind.

Guns are for killing things. Handguns are for killing people. They're one of those things, to borrow a phrase from Nicholas Cage in The Rock, that I wish we could uninvent. We can't, so limiting the availability is the best option. There are all kinds of weapons we already limit, and I don't see people clamouring for their right to own mustard or chlorine gas, vehicle mounted machine guns, or high explosives. These things are also designed for killing people, and we have decided as a society that killing people is generally wrong. So we don't let these things out into general circulation.

I'm not the only one to think this way, either. There are people who are pointing out that the wide availability of firearms does NOT make people safer. That dude who went nuts on the Greyhound bus only killed one guy. Possibly because God only told him to kill the one, but probably also because he had a knife, not a gun.

Alternet posted a relevant story today, as well:

The Gun Lobby Asks You to Please Lay Off the Mass Killings While It's
Trying to Influence Legislation

"The NRA is asking gunmen to refrain from mass shootings while key gun
bills are before legislators," says a newscaster in a recent editorial
cartoon.

Say that! On a month that began with the Alabama, Illinois church and
Germany shootings and ended with the Oakland police killings -- a Miami mass
killing, a Turlock, CA church shooting and the Mexico shootings not even making
the public radar -- lawmakers are not thinking of gun owners as an oppressed
minority.

I'm not suggesting for a minute that people not be allowed to defend themselves, though the commenters on the last post are suggesting that I am. However, we have a system in place that's designed to defend us on our behalf. We hire people to carry guns so that the rest of us don't have to. If you think that a widely armed populace is safer, then I think you might be missing a few things.

Some crimes are violent by nature, and a ban won't stop them all. But most crime is not violent. Most is property crime, and that sometimes becomes violent. If we were truly serious about stopping violent crime, we'd address poverty and the horriying wealth imbalance. We'd address the illness inherent in a consumer society, where people are measured not by the quality of their character, but by the quality of their shoes. We'd look at improving education, health care, and addressing mental illness (which is a very small factor in crime, though it makes the best movies). We'd stop making violent people heroes.

In the meantime, a reduction in the number of firearms is a good way (well, certainly better than no way) reduce the number of property crimes that turn violent.

Energy Savings

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 14:49:00 +0000

Yeah, yeah. Never posting, being all lazy and shit. Not apologetic. I owe very little to my "audience", such as it is. I write for me, and lately I've been not writing for anyone. So, while I am ashamed of myself, it has nothign to do with my readers. I just need to write more.

I have, however, to return to a recurring theme around here, found an incredible way to save energy. Not like electricity, mind you, but my own. It's apathy.

Eventually, spending a lot of time in the echo chambers of the internet leads to an inevitable but discouraging conclusion. You're not going to change the world. You talk to other greeny-type people, and they agree (mostly) with you, and you all decide collectively that the world is going to hell in a handbasket, and you'd better start a vegetable garden.

But all that does is ensure you have too many tomatoes in August (or whenever they come; I haven't actually started this vegetable garden yet), and it does very little to prevent the collapse of the resource-based economy.

You can talk to others, too. People who are different, conservatives, for instance. I was talking to one last night. I didn't understand her at all. At all. I can't begin to tell you how fucked up her perspective is. Oddly, she's one of our closest friends.

But eventually you get tied of talking to people who will not be swayed, or who already agree with you. You start to retreat. That's what I'm trying to prevent.

Call me out. Get me writing. I need to save the world. I have a daughter.

The Audience

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:55:00 +0000

I saw Misery at the Grand Theatre a couple weeks ago. I was disappointed. I was disappointed with the audience, for one. They thought the whole thing was funny. I was disappointed with the acting. Annie was nutty, not menacing, and considering the stories we've heard recently about people being held against their will (by their fathers, or by a government), that sort of geist should have been easy to muster. I was disappointed with the sound. There were cues that were spoonfeeding the audience, and I was insulted.

But the one thing that confuses my wife the most is that I was disappointed with the set.

The set was amazing. An entire farmhouse that could pivot to move focus to the kitchen, the bedroom, the living room, or the exterior, plus a second-floor staircase that as best I can recall was never used. The bedroom consisted of a bed and bedside table, a chair, a lamp, and some stained wallpaper. The living room was minimalist, the kitchen was kitschy. The stairs were there. Study and superfluous, but there nonetheless.

In my opinion, the whole thing was superfluous.

Sure, you need the bedroom, and one other room that Paul explores, but that's it. The stairs, the outside, the living room, the upstairs hallway, the bathroom, and the alcove were all unnecessary. The geography of the house is unimportant, and you don't need to build a house for the audience to know that they're supposed to be imagining a house. We've paid our price, and we're willing to work a little for the experience. The kitchen can have a medicine cabinet (and if I recall correctly, the medicine Paul sought was in the pantry in the novel), and it's not unreasonable to assume that the scrapbook might be in there as well (or near enough to make no difference). What is important is that Paul leaves his cell while the warden is out. Who cares where he actually goes? The set was an unnecessary cost. I can think of ways that money might have been better spent.

Last night was a good example. Last night I saw two performances, one a staged reading on an empty set, and another a performance involving a chair. That nearly empty stage was a kitchen floor, inside a wall, a Venetian canal, a bar and a mausoleum in Paris, a New York alley, a midway, a bathroom, a stoner's kitchen, a ticket booth, a barker's podium, a Ferris wheel, the scrambler, the merry-go-round, the caterpillar roller coaster and the fun house.

I don't recall ever thinking to myself, What the hell? The stage is empty!

Jeff Culbert used language and storytelling to evoke the scenes, focusing on character rather than locale. It was a wise choice, because the stories are not about Mehitabel's drowning lover or Archy's cockroach orators. It's about Archy and Mehitabel. Jayson McDonald gave a very physical performance, playing half a dozen characters at home, in line, on rides and on the phone. Powerful, and no doubt exhausting, it rendered the set moot. Again, the characters were more important than locale.

And honestly, that's why we watch plays, movies and television, isn't it? Why we read books and magazines and poetry? To hear great stories about people. Stories that happen in places, for sure, but usually stories about people (or roaches and cats). Not all the time, to be sure. Sometimes they are stories about places, too, but there are characters in those stories, too (think Hell House, Sin City, or Cabaret for examples), because stories about places aren't enough for people.

The Grand Theatre hosts some amazing, inspiring and enviable performances. But as long as they keep mollycoddling their audiences, I'm going to continue to feel a little insulted, and prefer alternative theatre, like the stuff we have here.

Come see archy and mehitabel and Fall Fair. You have to work a little harder, but you won't be disappointed.

Public relations

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 00:11:00 +0000

It will come as no surprise to most people on the planet, let alone those who still read this blog despite my puling broken by silence, that the Catholic Church is having some PR problems.

This is a good example:

Just a week after Pope Benedict made the decision to bring holocaust-denier Bishop Richard Williamson and his ultra-conservative bishop friends back into the fold, Pope Benedict elevated Father Gerhard Maria Wagner to auxiliary bishop in the diocese of Linz, Austria. Now, if you thought Williamson’s assertions on the Holocaust sounded crazy, just wait until you hear what Wagner has to say on everything from Hurricane Katrina to Harry Potter.

Pope Benedict is kicking ass and taking names in the classless Olympics, and I find it an interesting strategy. To be fair, lenient religions tend to experience a decline in membership, particularly in times of crisis (I don't have time to find a source), and so maybe he's hoping to arrest the inexorable slide into irrelevancy that faces the Whore of Babylon (as Rick Warren would call her) by toughening up. Or maybe he's just playing the German Hardass typecast. I don't know. I do not profess to understand the man. I do not desire to.

However, I have some advice. When it comes to saying crazy shit with no basis in reality, it occasionally takes a little soft sell to get the buyers in. Some guy was actually god and so he came back from the dead? Hard to swallow, really, and I guarantee that part of the church's attrition can be attributed to the fact that is says some crazy shit. Transubstantion is the most public example, and relatively recent, too, in that it's a doctrine that is less than half as old as the church itself. Saying new crazy shit all the time, that takes panache. It takes style. It takes finesse.

I would argue that it takes Tom Cruise.

Tom believes some crazy shit. It's not much crazier than other religious shit, but it's still pretty damn crazy. And every time I turn around, another celebrity seems to have converted to Scientology. The common thread? Tom Cruise. This guy must be really fucking persuasive. He could sell anything. He could sell freezers to the Inuit. He could sell slavery to Africans. He could sell crazy religious teachings to crazy religious people. Apparently his charm is boundless.

What we need is to hook the pope up with Tom Cruise. Apparently Catholics have some sort of resistance to the craziness of Scientology (though Katie is in peril), and so the pope would be okay. However, the pope desperately needs to sell his crazy shit better, and I can think of no one who can sell crazy shit like Tom.

God made men...

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 13:32:00 +0000

...but Samuel Colt made them equal.

Toronto's mayor has asked London, Ontario's fourth or fifth largest city, for support in asking the provincial government for a province-wide handgun ban.

This may surprise you, considering my political affiliation, but I'm not really a fan of rules. I recognize that they are necessary, but I also recognize that many well-meaning rules are often misguided. Ontario's pitbull ban is a good example. It's a blunt instrument designed to punish irresponsible dog owners, but instead punishes the dogs.

And I know that Greens seem like well-meaning-do-gooder social engineers, but we're not about banning things, we're about internalizing costs.

Having said that, I dig on handgun bans.

I know that a ban won't significantly reduce the incidence of violent crime. And I know that people who are willing to break the law in order to kill, rob or terrorize aren't likely to be swayed by the prospect of another charge of possession of a banned weapon. And I know that there are lots of law-abiding handgun owners that will be adversly affected by this law, and they won't have done anything wrong.

But still, a handgun ban strikes me as a good idea.

I'm not saying ban all guns. And I'm not saying that just because guns kill people we should ban anything that kills people. That's absurd. But here's the thing.

Handguns are specifically designed to kill people.

Long guns are for hunting. Knives are for cutting. Baseball bats are for baseball. Cars are for transportation. Pills are for medicine. And they all kill people. But none of them exist specifically for the expressed purpose of killing people. And that's why a ban is a good idea.

Think about it. We have controls on things that are designed to kill people, and we only let certain people have them. Tanks, armoured personnel carriers, grenades, bioweapons, and the like. How are they different from handguns, besides the scope of murder available?

You may have to defend yourself against a bad guy with a gun someday. However, that bad guy is more likely to have a handgun if they're not banned. And it's not your job to kill the bad guys. That's the job for the cops. As for killing people in other countries? That's the job of the military. If you want to be allowed to kill people, become a cop or a soldier.

The fact is that a handgun ban will reduce the number of guns on the street. And it will be easier to identify the people who are bad. You'll be able to tell, 'cause they'll be the ones with the guns. If the only people in the province who are allowed to have handguns are the cops, we'll all be a lot safer. And if someone does use a gun in the commission of a crime, I find it reassuring that they'll have an extra five or six years in the cooler to think about whether or not they should have grabbed a machete, instead.

Yes, people are violent, and they will kill people. But they will at least have to use a little ingenuity and use a tool that isn't designed specifically to make the job of killing someone easier.

You can't write irony like this.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 15:27:00 +0000

I am trying to come up with an apt metaphor for the Catholic Church right now. Granted, they recently decided to get rid of Limbo within their doctrine, but as someone asked me, how can they do that? Did God do it or what? WTF? However, more recently, they've reinstated the practice of indulgences. This is one of the things that Martin Luther was pissed about. You'd think they might have picked up that this is a bit of a sticking point.

And more recently, they've rehabilitated some people who thought it was becoming too easy to be a Catholic, and they took their toys and went home. It wasn't the 95 theses, but it was still some guys starting a breakaway sect. Pope Benedict clearly felt they had learned their lesson, I guess, and let them come home. However, he clearly didn't vet these guys well enough, and has been bitten in the ass.

One of these guys is a Holocaust denier. He's entitled to believe this, I guess. He obviously already believes some pretty crazy things. What I dig about it most is this.

The German government is pointing out this guy is a crazy nutbar anti-semite.

The pope may have jumped the shark.

Pace yourself

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 01:44:00 +0000

I've written before about the need to stay angry in order to stay motivated. I gave a PTGHWAC to Greta Christina (who I recently saw quoted in the local fishwrap) for her take on anger and how it's been the most influential force in social change in history. By and large, I think she's right. Being compassionate and empathetic is all well and good, but being pissed off got Rosa Parks arrested, it started the Stonewall Riots, and I daresay it got the suffragettes picketing the White House.

The problem is that anger is corrosive. It eats you, and it cand cripple you. This happens to me periodically. I'm an angry bastard. I'm pissed off at most voters in Canada and in the US, and completely gobsmacked by nearly half of American voters (who bothered to vote), and by a little over a third of own (well, really, about 18% of Candian voters, since about half of us are pleasantly uniformed and apathetic; must be nice.) who continued to endorse clearly bankrupt ideology. Want proof? Harper claims to be a conservative, but spends more than Liberals. WTF? Nobody has told me what conservatism means anymore, except the predilection to hate brown people, commies and fags.

So I've been pissed at most voters on the continent. That's a lot of anger, and it burns me out. I cease to be motivated to do anything, because not only can I not save the world, I can't even save myself. I'm just too fucking angry, and there's nothing I can do about it.

Let it go, just relax, blah, blah, blah. I know, I know. But the problem is that when I see a problem, I like to fix it. My inability to fix it makes me madder. I wish I could stop paying attention and let it go, but wilful ignorance is the one thing I find utterly incomprehensible, baffling and infuriating.

I should write more. To do that I need to calm down. I should participate more. To do that I need to calm down. I should love, laugh and sing more. To do that, I really need to calm down.

I will start bloggin regularly again. I hope this will start my renaissance. If not, I'll still continue to riff on the news. I can't let it go, even though it's probably killing me. I'm going to stay angry.

If you're paying attention, you either go mad or get mad.

Miracles

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 23:21:00 +0000

I love miracles. They happen all the time. They're awesome. When a plane crashes safely in a frozen river, it's a miracle. However, to paraphrase a line from Saved!, seems to me that the miracle they could have used was not having the fucking birds fly into the engine.

The contradiction is obvious, it seems, to everyone but the faithful. There are miracles all the time, but they're rather shitty miracles. Here are some examples:

A boy is not hit by a stray bullet because a watermelon stopped it. The bible his brother was holding, however, failed to stop same, and his brother was shot. Nevertheless, a miracle.

A plane crashes and no one dies, because of some kickass flying by the pilot. It was not the pilot who saved them, it was god. Were I the pilot, I'd be pissed.

Jesus appears in a wet screen door, a pita, a tortilla, a chip, or whatever.

So what happened to burning bushes, fingers of fire, pillars of salt, crowds being struck blind, the death of the first born, various & sundry plagues, parting of seas, staves to snakes, surviving a furnace (and what the hell is with this god and fire?), and walking on water? If god still performs miracles, seems to me he's just phoning it in these days.

God gets credit for all kinds of shit, but it seems to me that people always have to do the heavy lifting.

It's not the band that I hate...

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:39:00 +0000

It's a line from an old Sloan song: "It's not the band that I hate, it's their fans..."

This is how I feel about the CPC. It's not the party, it's the conbots. The CPC does what the CPC does, which is anything it thinks it can get away with. I expect most governing parties are the same to some degree. But these guys are good. They can get away with almost anything.

Transparency? I didn't mean US. Jeez!

Accountability? That's for pussies.

Fiscal responsibility? WTF? In this economy? Madness!

Senate reform? Well, I meant more conservatives...

Fixed election dates? Obviously, that only applies to majority governments, not ones that are able to pass legislation with near impunity. Don't be silly.

But the burr in my saddle, the onion in my oinment, the black fly in my chardonnay is the goddamn conbots. The ones that thing the CPC is cool, no matter what it does, how it disagrees with their promises, plans or stated intent, and no matter how detached from reality it might be.

See? They cut the GST, not like those tax & spend Liberals with their balanced budgets and social programs. Those guys were crazy. But cutting the GST is good for the economy. It increases spending...

Recession? What recession? That's crazy talk. The fundamentals of the Canadian economy are sound.

Budget deficits are cool, because we need to keep the economy moving.

The government should stay out of business. That's why deregulation is a good idea.

Well of course business can't be trusted to eep their noses clean. That's why there's going to be an inquiry. Someday. Maybe.

Coalition with the separatists? Treason. In 2003? That was COMPLETELY different. The Liberals were in charge then, and Adscam!

This is called cognitive dissonance. It's not quite a mental illness, but it's close. It's separating your ideology from reality, and it's most evident when dealing with religion. I'd argue that the two are pretty closely related.

Charlie and Lucy

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 00:52:00 +0000

It's been a month. I know. Sue me. It's amazing what an ridiculous personal schedule, a debilitating illness and existential angst can do to a person's get up and go. I spent most of the last four weeks coping. So you can, too.

I saw something funny on the news the other day. I mean besides the no-good-guys carnage in the middle east, the idea that we are prosecuting a Canadian soldier for killing an unarmed Afghan civilian when hundreds of thousands of unarmed civilians have died because we invaded, and the continuing faux-sheepishness of Dubya. This was also aside from the continuing media presence of Palin and her "you guys screwed me" tour, and Coren's constant bitching about the liberal media. On the media. On four different media.

It was this:

Harper pushes for co-operation on upcoming budget

And why not? He's such a nice guy.

THE CANADIAN PRESS
MONTREAL – Prime Minister Stephen Harper offered his political rivals an olive branch today as he dialed down last month's heated parliamentary rhetoric and promised a conciliatory approach to a coming federal budget aimed at helping the ailing economy.

The friendly, co-operative tone came as a new poll suggested a resurgent Liberal party under new leader Michael Ignatieff, who was himself pledging to hold the governing Conservatives to account with a pre-budget wish list of his own.

"Now is the time for everybody...to try and reach consensus if that's possible, but especially to try and work together – federally, provincially, internationally, across party lines – to deal with the problems that everybody knows are urgent and large," Harper said.

I laughed out loud, because I thought I heard heard that before.

Harper's promises to be nice and play well with others remind me of Lucy's football stunt with Charlie Brown. Everyone knows she's gonna yank that ball away, and everyone knows that Harper's gonna pull some asshole stunt at the first opportunity, because that's just the way he is.

January 27. Mark my words. Watch the hilarity ensue.

Banana Republic

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 16:29:00 +0000

Sometimes I drink too much and it interferes with my recall. There have been a few blackouts, and my recollection of situations is sometimes suspect. And at Christmastime, there's more spirit than sense, so things may be worse than usual. It could be that this is just my pink elephant. Instead of bugs, my hallucinations take the form of government coups.

So call me crazy. But didn't Jean prorogue parliament for seven weeks? Didn't she just send everyone home? Parliament is not sitting, isn't that so? Wasn't that a problem because it meant that there could be no action on the economy?

I was a bit surprised to find that we were gonna bailout the auto sector, anyway. 'Cause, you know, fuck it. Who needs a sitting government anyway?

I met a lovely woman last night from Iran. I was faced with trying to explain the actions of a government that I do not support, taking actions that I do not understand, manipulating a system that is supposed to prevent this sort of thing.

Let us set aside the bailout. It may or may not be a good idea. My thoughts on the situation are no secret and conflicted and complicated. That's not the issue. Really.

What really chaps my ass is this: Harper was afraid of the Opposition and was about to be fired. He called a time out. No parliament. No government. No legislation. That was the deal. So if the CPC can pass legislation and give some money to the automakers without a sitting government, this is bad fucking news.

This is disturbing and the precedent is dangerous. Apparently, we need not bother with the distractions like elections or constitutional law. We can just get on with the business of government.

Sexual politics.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 15:30:00 +0000

The Minsters of Finance and Heritage, pictured with the leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition.

I was going to hit at Harper for his latest switcheroo on the appointment of 18 neocon sympathizers to the Senate, but to be honest, it doesn't have much impact unless it's accompanied by a list of his crimes and misdemeanors, and I really don't have the energy right now to fisk a man's entire political life. And to be honest, it's just a dick move that's sure to be added to the greatest hits compilation of a man who has built his career on dick moves. He was probably a dick when he was studying economics, he was almost certainly a dick when he worked at the National Citizem's Coaltition (a misnomer true to the whole "conservative" ethos), and he has been a dick as head of the weirdest and youngest political party in Canada. Oddly enough, Harper, according to Wikipedia, left the Progressive Conservatives because of the economic policies of Mulroney, which resulted in Candada's kickass debt and integration with the US. He has apparently had an epiphany.

I want to explore the phenomenon that gets a dick like this elected.

First, I apparently need to debunk some illusions about Canadians. We're supposed to be neat, polite, helpful and cooperative. We are big into the UN, proud of peacekeeping, and don't litter. We are respectful of nature, not necessarily because we love it, but because we know it can fucking kill you. We're supposed to walk a fine line between our twin parentages of England and France, constantly in the shadow of our big brother to the south, and we have neatly obliterated our history of genocide. We are, in short, like the quiet guy on your street that turns out to be a serial killer.

Because apparently we have either one of two things: a dom streak or a sub streak. This is the only way I can make any sense of it. I have to put it into a kinky sexual context.

The submissive fits our outward personality quite neatly. We are all the things listed above, plus obedient. We do what we're told, and are grateful for the opportunity. It also explains our support for the UN (an unsuitable top, to be sure), and our toadying (particularly recently) to the US. Dubya is one hell of a top. He even likes torture.

The upshot Canada being a bottom is that we like to be told what to do, punished when we step out of line, and keep asking for more. Harper is a pretty good top. He's pushy and belligerent, he's antagonistic and mean, and he's "tough on crime" (I get a little thrill just typing those words). He likes soldiers and body armour. He likes "cutting". He's stoic and capricious.

I have just figured out what Steve can do when he leaves politics. You thought he looked stupid in that cowboy hat? Wait'll you see him in leathers.

When Canadians vote for the CPC, they are finding their own dom among them. They seek to be punished for a hundred years of Liberal rule or something. They are signing up to get their spankings, and they are loving it. You can tell because they voted for him again. The problem is this. The safe word "non-confidence", doesn't work. When we say "non-confidence", he's supposed to put down the paddle and undo the handcuffs. He's supposed to remove the ball gag and get us a glass of water.

He's not supposed to walk out the door and leave us tied up for six weeks.

Our bottomness has bitten us, and we are powerless to do anything about it.

I think, though, that here is where this explanation falls short. It's the powerlessness of being a bottom that appeals. It is relinquishing control, and being subject to the whims of a much stronger person. It also tends to appeal to people who have a great deal of control over things: they like to relinquish the decision making, and being subject to the whims of others is arousing. Historically, Canadians have been a lot of things, but "in control" is not one of them. Sure, we managed to kick the shit out of the locals when we arrived, but not only did we have biological warfare, alcohol and gunpowder on our side, we weren't even Canadians yet. We were still British and French, and those two societies have not been known for going around being nice to other people. Ask the Indians and Algerians if you have any questions.

Canada has been historically support staff. We've not been CEOs, we've been Board Members. We've not been quarterbacks, we're defensive linemen. We're not Superman, we're the Wonder Twins. In essence, our entire history has been as a bottom, and when you're a bottom in real life, you like to get on top, which brings us to the alternate theory.

Harper is our projection as a dom. We didn't elect him to dominate us, but to BE us, as we be a top for a while. Harper has his whip, and he doesn't colour our bums, but the bums of... who, exactly?

To answer that, we need to have a look at conservative mythology. The problem with this is that you have to at least buy into conservative mythology to accept the following premises, but if you accept the traditional "left/right" dichotomy, you are halfway to accepting these myths.

Communists are bad.
Gays are bad.
Liberals are bad.
Human rights stifle free speech.
Frenchies are bad.
Europeans are bad.
America is good. All the time. No matter who they kill.
Greed is good.
Social programs are bad.
Politicians are bad.
Government is not the solution, but the problem.
Except when it comes to punishing small criminals. Then it rocks.
Progressives are anarchists.
Tradition is good.
Human rights are for sissies.
"Human rights" is just a way to make white people, particularly men, feel inadequate.
The environment is bad (or simply a way to make money).
God (particularly our god) is good.
Athiests are actually in denial, or actively on the side of the devil.

I've heard variations of all the above, and while the last two are more prevalent in the US, I've been accused of the same thing. Here in Canada. Right. Where the Constitution recognizes that "Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law". People I had assumed were in the centre all have their pet prejudices. My uncle is a huge corporatist, and a big fan of NAFTA. My friend the history teacher digs the tough on crime schtick. A student was shocked--shocked!--when I suggested that she could pluralize the word "god".

You need not buy into all or even any of these memes. There are others about artists, Natives, Blacks, immigrants, Catholics, politicians, lawyers, social workers, activists, students, youth in general, Cubans, unions, and a bunch that I've missed. All you need to do is recognize that some part of the Canadian population has been in charge for far too long, and it's their turn to be on the bottom. Harper manages to spank someone almost daily.

Sometimes it's just a generalized spanking, like when he closes Parliament Hill in a pique, or whips us with his "transparency and accountability", and then tries to fire the guy who suggests that maybe Harper should be more transparent and/or accountable. He spanked us with an election last August. Sometimes he spanks specific groups of people. He managed to spank environmentalists from Bali without even going himself. He spanked minorities and poor people when he cut funding to legal aide. He spanked the Liberals like when he hit us with his "senate reform" which means filling it with neocons instead of Liberals, independents or Dippers. He spanked tradtional conservatives by spending his surplus. He spanked women when he tried to end their recourse to the CHRC for pay inequity. And he spanked the politicians when he tried to cut their funding.

He even managed to spank Natives while it looked like he was caressing them. By apologising for genocide, he took some of the teeth out of the criticism. "That'll teach them Indians to go around looking all decimated and shit." And he's somehow managing to spank Afghanistan with democracy.

The rest of us don't even have a safe word. We can't make him stop.

He's one hell of a top, and Canadians like to see someone with a spiked collar in charge. Steve weilds it masterfully, either hitting us seperately, dividing us and making some other part of society the bottom for a change, or he spanks us all, and the doms thrill in a little S&M way. It's all very perverse, while somehow refraining from perversion.

It is this division and the persistence of these myths about liberals of all kinds, "libruls", that allows a bully like Steve to stay on top. People still use the word "pinko", and people who are concerned about the environment are moonbats. The decay of the family is blamed on the gays and women are viewed with suspicion. I doubt anyone would say it out loud, but I'm sure that there are some who think things started to go wrong when we took the chains off the Negros, and if not then, certainly when we let them marry whites. The affluence and emptiness of the system is not the problem. It's those assholes who want us to treat people like equals.

Steve's success relies on two things, and both of these rely on myth. First, he needs to victimize each and every Canadian, pointing out that they are the bottoms, and it's time the got on top. He doesn't need to do it himself; he's got people who will. Lorrie Goldstein is a good example. The entire editorial board of the National Post. CTV and its affiliates. John Baird. My nemesis, Michael Coren. My uncle. Ordinary Canadians have been getting screwed, goes the narrative (see list above), and it's time they did some screwing. He then needs to villify other Canadians (see list above). These people are responsible for your misfortune. You lost your job 'cause of unions. Your marriage is failing because gays have infected it. Ecoterrorists threaten your petro dollars. They hate our freedoms.

The third thing he needs that he can't control is our willingness to seek easy answers. He can take this for granted. Every time I'm called a fag, godless, a secularist or a "librul", I win a phyrric victory. I have won the battle, but I know I will lose the war. The world is not divided into good and bad, left and right, black and white, or bottom and top. It's complicated, and the right thing to do isn't always the right thing to do. Ambiguity is hard, and bottoming is easy. Topping is easy, too. It's vanilla that's hard.

I have no prescription. No suggestions.

No safe word.

Nice guys finish last.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 14:41:00 +0000

I've said it before, but it bears repeating, since I'm dedicating so much thought to this thing. I am not a Liberal Party supporter. I am accustomed to having them on Canada's political landscape, and they have governed the nation for most of its history, so I am a little saddened to watch their race to the wilderness, but I personally have nothing invested in them. In fact, federally, I think I voted Liberal once, and it was one of those votes against the Tories.

But Stephane Dion is a guy I found interesting. He was chosen to lead the Liberals, it seems, in spite of all the things that made him a good leader. He is intelligent, thoughtful, passionate, compassionate, partriotic, forward-thinking, a constitutional scholar, and environmentally conscious, as well as being, as far as I can tell, a genuinely nice guy.

He was clearly unfit to lead a Western Democracy.

That says more about our moral bankrupcy than it does about Dion.

However, the departure of Dion is a good thing for Greens. Politically, if not socially. Dion's carbon tax was weak, and it made too many exceptions, but it was the first time the carbon tax was foisted upon the consciousness of the average Canadian. I mixed blessing, to be sure. All of a sudden, people who resist action on carbon economies had a dirty word to fight with. The CPC cemented their support in the prairies by pointing out that the Libs hated them, and wanted to destroy their livelihood. On the other side, anyone who wanted environmental action and was sceptical of the chances of the Greens or the NDP could vote red and say they were helping.

The exit of Dion and his green policies do two things. It makes the Greens the only option for those truly concerned with sustainability. That was always the case, but the perception now meshes with reality. It's good for the Green Party. Though our numbers went up, I am sure that we lost protential votes to the Libs. It's bad for Canada. We are already way behind on out Kyoto commitments, and a Liberal Leader who does not have environmental action as a priority is unlikely to force (yes, force) the CPC to do anything at all. They were deniers until recently, and they still get a lot of support from Alberta.

The departure of Dion signals something much greater than the dismissal of environmental concerns from the Canadian zeitgeist. It reveals a deeper flaw in our system, not just the political system, but society as a whole. Apparently, though the rest of the world has tried on the neocon style of government and found it ill-fitting and prone to wear, Canadians are hell bent on having our turn in the fitting room. We are out of sync with the rest of the world.

Our reputation is about to take a big hit. My wife thinks I was joking the other night, but emigration is more and more appealing.

Independent study project.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 02:29:00 +0000

I am disappointed with the Liberal Party of Canada.

What bugs me most, I think, is that the lessons they need to learn are so readily available. Pop culture has more instruction on how to deal with bullies than any one person could possibly need, yet the Libs need it and are not getting it. So I have a homework assignment for every Liberal and liberal in this country.

At some point over the next few weeks or so, you are to rent the 1987 high school comedy Three O'Clock High. Take notes. Be prepared. Your final exam is on January 27. If' you're really strapped for time trying to figure out how to circumvent the democratic process and your own constitution, then you can find the plot summary on wikipedia and catch the final battle here. I'd embed it, but if you really care, you'll follow the clickthroughs. I can't spoonfeed you everything, you know. If you're interested in watching the whole thing, I think it's been partitioned and posted in its entirety on YouTube. It starts here.

The parallels are not absolute. For instance, Buddy Revell is alone, and while Big Steve doesn't seem to have any friends, he has lots of toadies. And I'll admit that the fundamental lesson in pop culture is flawed, in that the little guy rarely wins, even if he does have brass knuckles. But watch that fight and learn the following lessons:

Jerry is not alone.

His friends support him and put themselves at personal risk on his behalf. This might have been a useful lesson for you to learn several years ago, before feeding Paul Martin and Stephane Dion to the media, the public and the CPC after mortally wounding them. His girlfriend takes a hit, Jerry's friend jumps on Buddy, the authorities come to offer support, and Jerry's little sister and the principal offer advice and encouragement.

Buddy is alone.

As I said before, Big Steve does not appear to have many friends, but he does have toadies. The thing with toadies that they are not particularly loyal, and not very inclined to take a hit for the big guy. For further confirmation, check the fight scene in A Christmas Story. When the Opposition Parties told Steve to go to hell late last month, you may not have noticed that suddenly Steve looked very lonely. I saw dozens of Conservatives condemning your actions as undemocratic, craven and opportunistic, but I hear no one from the government benches say how awesome this economic statement was, and that you guys were idiots for not going for it.

The crowd was supportive.

Canadians don't want Steve in charge. Sure, around a third of us do, but most of us don't. Look at that crowd: they're on cars, hanging out of windows and standing on the roof. Everyone is cheering, none of them for Buddy. And the whole school is there: the sportos, the motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, waistoids, dweebies, dickheads, cheek by jowl, screeching for blood. There's the implication that any blood will do, but I'm not sure that's necessarily so. Everyone likes to see the bully get it.

However, remember that this is not fiction, and it takes more than simply being the good guy to win.

Stephane Dion is a good guy. A smart guy. Compassionate and passionate. He his not very articulate, but neither was Chretien. He has vision and a conscience. You guys let him burn. And as soon as Buddy was finished with him, you stood over him and started trying to figure out who was going to start managing the store.

They guy you picked, without consulting the members of the Liberal party, which strikes me as a terribly undemocratic thing to when you're actually being accused of being undemocratic, has some flaws. For one thing, he's even more "intellectual" than the guy you just roasted. He's also made a few errors in judgment. Errors which are eerily like those of the current beleaguered Prime Minister. Errors which will allow them to say, "See? He's just as bad as us. But even more smug and all "intellectual"."

That'll work.

Look at what you're doing. Chretien ruled the party like a despot, I know, and he very effectively hamstrung any pretenders to the throne. The man who succeeded him was capable, but uninspiring. You let him hang. When it came time to replace him, you chose a man who was idealistic and good natured. You let him hang. You have now appointed a man who is smart (usually), has been living in the US for a long time and comes off as smug. You have appointed a slightly more evil-seeming version of Stephen Harper. When he is trounced in the coming election, you'll let him hang, too.

I realize that messiahs are a little thin on the ground these days, but you're going to have to come up with something. You also really ought to elect them next time. You know, just to keep up appearances.

The left is not unified. If you'll recall, the Reform Borg assimilated the Tories a few years back, and we could use the Liberals to block for the rest of us. I was hoping, in fact, that this coalition would open the door to a rule change that would let some of the other guys in. Crowning Iggy has likely spiked the coalition and electoral reform.

Thanks a lot, guys.

Tell me about yourself.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:02:00 +0000

I've spent the last several posts questioning the beliefs of conservatives, and debunking the myths they hold regarding progressives. I've been forced to make some assumptions about their beliefs, however. I simply don't understand them; I cannot get inside the conservative mind. And so I am forced to speculate about what they think.

I've berated them for their renditions of liberals, trying to stick to the representations they present, rather than imagining what they think. I'm not 100% sure that I've been successful, and so I'm going to ask.

I'm pretty sure that some self-professed conservatives will read this either on Blogger or on Facebook. And so I pose a question:

What do you actually believe?

I need to know. Not because I want to belittle the right, but because I want to understand them. I've asked a friend, but so far he seems reluctant to answer.

Help me out, here.

Another salvo in Canada's culture war.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 16:20:00 +0000

Michael Coren is my Grendel. My Green Knight. My Magneto.

Actually, he's none of those things, because while those villains were respected, conflicted and complex, Coren either has become a caricature to me, or he really is that simple, deluded and desperate.

It's probably more accurate to say that he's my Bizarro.

I'm sure that he's a smart man in his own way, but clearly his cognition is impaired. By what, I have no idea. Maybe it's a brain injury. Speaking as a blad man, I can say that Coren's head is kinda shaped funny. I doubt that's it. I figure it's partial paralysis. It's no secret, and not insulting, to note that faith must disengage reason. The Holy Trinity is confusing and contradictory, for instance, so believing it requires that parts of the brain be shut down.

Transubstantiation is another good example. It's bread. To believe that it literally becomes the flesh of Christ is to suspend reason, if only temporarily.

And I've dealt harshly with conservatism before, noting that the persistence of the ideology has less to do with its validity than its simplicity. So there's reason to believe that it's not necessarily faith that impedes Coren's logic circuits, but conservatism. I must note, however, that none of this prevents him from being more widely read, more widely respected and wealthier than I.

He's a week behind in his analysis, which is likely due to the vagaries of his Sun Media deadlines, and as such, he has little to add the the discussion, except the usual batch of insults at pointy-headed liberals. Coren is nothing if not consistent. He can take anything, literally anything, and make it the latest skirmish in the culture war that most of us aren't interested in fighting.

Last week, a report by an academic regarding the Human Rights Tribunal was actually about those poor Christians who are so put upon by Canadian society that they worship in secret, shamefully behind closed doors, constantly afraid that the ever-so-stylish Gay Brownshirts (with their dashing ascots, matching belts and shoes, and neatly pressed trousers) will bust in, and start dragging them off to face the injustice of the Human Rights Commission, convicted of thoughtcrime. Catholics, their churches razed and their masses conducted in hushed tones with guards posted at the doors, fight bravely for their freedom of religion in a society so lost and godforsaken that only 80% of the population identifies themselves as religious, some of whom aren't even Christians, and they labour under the yoke of the agnostic minority.

Coren is, however, up to speed on Canada's political crisis, and, quelle surprise, he parrots the same objections that the CPC has been spouting for ten days. Not content to be able to add nothing new to the discussion, Coren reaches back for some good old-fashioned liberal bashing, and reiterates his basic tired thesis. I say this knowing full well that I repeatedly take his columns apart, and thus am moderately guilty of the same sin. My irony detector is working perfectly well, thank you.

However, Michael needs a spanking. So let's get started.

Stealing power no way to go

There's no need to wait as the title is the best place to begin. The coalition is not "stealing" power. That implies that Steve owns it. He does not. Thank you. Next?

In 20 years of writing columns and hosting radio and television shows in this country I have never known such anger and received as many e-mails, phone calls and letters as over the attempt by the defeated political parties to usurp the democratic process, overthrow the elected prime minister and replace him with arguably the most unpopular and least impressive Canadian political leader since the Second World War.

Ignore for a second Coren's repeated accusations about the "liberal bias" of the media, which he discredits with the first 15 words. This statement might be technically true. I have no idea how much mail he gets. Nor do I care. But there are several assumptions contained here that nonetheless get me reaching for the Tums, muttering, "Jesus, not again."

First, the democratic process has not been usurped. Our system of elections is odd, unfair, quirky and unreliable, but it's the best we've got, and it allows for this sort of thing. As I've said before, I'm not a fan of the policies of any of the coalition parties on the whole, but everything they've done is legal and above-board. Second, the Prime Minister is not elected, and saying it over and over does not make it so. Third, the list of unimpressive Canadian political leaders from the last 60 years is a long one, and I doubt that Dion even cracks the top ten. Off the top of my head:

Ernie Eves
Kim Campbell
Preston Manning
Stockwell Day III
Joe Clark
Peter MacKay
Stephen Harper

And that's only the conservatives (in various incarnations, and only in my lifetime). The Liberals, the NDP, and the Bloc have more than their share of duds.

But here's what really galls me about that paragraph. It is the appeal to populism. What Coren is saying is that he got a lot of mail about the situation, and according to his unscientific sample, Canadians hate the coalition. The problem I have is not the number of Canadians who might agree with Coren, but the fact that he uses those numbers against the rest of us. The majority mattered seven weeks ago (when it elected too few Conservatives to hold onto power). It does not, unfortunately, matter now.

People who have never voted Conservative in their lives are promising to support the Tories and diehard Liberals are abandoning their party because they see all this as a battle between the interests of the country and the ambitions of politicians. There is tangible resentment out there and it proves once again how the elitists of the left simply do not understand the greatness and resolve of the Canadian people.

Those first two statements may be true. Again, I have no way of knowing. The problem I have is that, again, the appeal to the numbers. The fact that there are lots of people who hate the coalition is irrelevant. Again, law and precedent are on their side. The second statement is not only nonsense, in that it makes no fucking sense, but it doesn't have anything to do with anything. It's just Coren's overall thesis: liberals are poopie heads. It's also a red herring. He implies that liberals aren't like "ordinary Canadians". It's a weak xenophobic argument, but it keeps getting traction. It further underlines the fundamental weakness of conservatism.

We are not fools. We know that Stephen Harper acted rashly and probably should have waited before trying to abolish public funding for political parties.

Gee, Mike. As my grandmother used to say in less enlightened times, that's mighty white of you. This is something that conservatives all across the country are doing. By admitting that big Steve made an error, they are trying to claim the moral high ground. It goes like this: Obviously, this was a mistake, but-- And it doesn't matter what follows the but, because the idea is to make them look chastened and contrite, so that coalition supporters will look like power-hungry assholes. It also assumes that party funding should be cut, which is problematic for reasons I'll get into elsewhere, and it assumes that it is that particular dick move that fired up the other guys: not the right to strike thing, not the equal pay thing, and not the fundamental idiocy of cutting government spending during a recession.

Most Canadians, however, do not support the separatist party receiving 80% of its finances from taxpayers and they also know that the Liberals traditionally were the party of big business and are in financial trouble for the first time because they do not enjoy mass support and are on the verge of bankruptcy.

Whether or not the Bloc gets that much of its money from the feds is misdirection. It's a statement designed to get the reader seeing red so they can't see the weakness of Coren's position. It's also a made up statistic. Coren has no way of knowing whether or not it's true. The fact that it might be is irrelevant. Remember my post on bullshit? The veracity of the claim does not determine whether or not it's a lie. This is a lie, even if it's true. And the second half of that sentence is incoherent in addition to being irrelevant. Furthermore, it's another cheap shot designed to associate "big business" and "Liberal" in the reader's mind. This is useful because corporations are evil, stupid welfare moms these days, and tying Stephane Dion to the CEO of GM is helpful in villifying him.

This, by the way, is one of the reasons why they charged $90,000 to any person who wanted to be a candidate for party leadership, thus disqualifying most potential contenders. They are selecting a new leader, of course, because they agree that Stephane Dion is not fit to be Liberal chief. Not fit to lead the party but, according to these same Liberals, fit enough to lead the country -- at a time of severe financial crisis.

Right, Mike. We get it. They're broke. The minimum amount required to run for leadership is a necessary evil, I'd wager. Yes, it's essentially undemocratic (requiring any deposit at all to run is undemocratic, but welcome to modern democracy), but those leadership races are expensive, and most of the contenders from the last time still owe money. This is a way to make sure they've got the scratch. Coren also implies here that he gives a shit. He doesn't. The Liberals could nominate Jesus Christ, and Coren would probably convert to Judaism, so that he could still hate the Grits. The party leader/PM thing is a cheap shot at Dion. The Liberals were essentially told that Dion is not fit to lead the country, and since they want their leader to be the PM, they are choosing a new leader.

None of this has anything to do with an economic stimulus package but everything to do with desperate politicians who, though told repeatedly by the electorate they are not required in government, see an opportunity to steal power and run the country.

He's quite right that it has nothing to do with an economic stimulus package, because THERE IS NO FUCKING ECONOMIC STIMULUS PACKAGE. If I may be so bold, allow me to suggest that that's part of the beef with Big Steve. Coren also lies about Canadian government in this paragraph. They are in government. You can tell, because they (until Big Steve locked the doors), showed up every day to yell at him. In fact, they make up better than half of the government, which is how they are able to tell him take his economic statement and his resume and look for another position. He also once again calls this stealing, which implies ownership.

I've said it before, but it bears repeating. Coren is a liar.

The Liberals were told twice in a row that they had lost and the NDP have been told at every stage in its history that Canadians do not want them as federal governors.

This is all framing. Yes, the Liberals did lose votes in the last election. They lost seats. Interestingly, the CPC also lost votes in the last election. Coren would call this irrelevant. It's also another misdirection. Their standing in the last election gave them enough power to kick Big Steve to the curb. Canadians gave the the opposition parties enough power to rule if they banded together. There's simply no way around that.

But none of this seems to matter when dog politicians sniff the bones of governance.

Besides being a shitty thing to say, it's also hypocritical. No one has thirsted after more power in Canadian history than Big Steve. He has sealed the PMO, brooks no opposition, and has his caucus afraid to say or do anything without his okay.

So ambitious are they that they shake hands with the devil and form a coalition with people who are the prostitutes of Canadian politics, who detest the notion of Quebec existing within Canada and will sell their votes and seats to anyone who has the cash or the influence.

The Bloc's stance on separation is quite icky, but it is less evil than stripping women of their right to seek equal pay for equal work. Calling them "prostitutes" is nonsense. Legislation passes or fails because of their votes. They are in the government whether you like it or not. Furthermore, the CPC in its various incarnations has proposed to ally with the Bloc twice. Presumably, they were less devilish then.

The separatists despise Dion, the NDP detest the Liberals and everybody knows that Bob Rae and Michael Ignatieff are waiting and watching for the chance to thrust their knives.

They apparently despise Dion less than they despise Big Steve. The internal power struggle of the Libs is another misdirection. It just means that once they decide on a new leader, that guy will be PM. Sound undemocratic? So's letting some pushy dickhead who seems to be mistrusted by most Canadians be the PM. Again, it's the system we've got, and while I'd really like to see a new one, we got what we've got. And those knives in Dion's back can be recycled when the government falls in January.

The Governor General is not to blame, but a former CBC journalist and Liberal appointee married to a hard line Quebec separatist might not be the best person to guarantee the dignity and integrity of our constitutional future.

Quite right, though not for the reasons Coren would think. He wants Big Steve to be in charge, so the GG is a horrible remnant of an archaic tradition. The problem is that she has set a precedent that is dangerous. Coren would, of course, disagree. Now that she's prorogued, I'd wager that Coren thinks the GG is a noble link to our past, and a gentle reminder of Mother England.

As for another election, the wasting of $300 million while people lose their jobs and homes is an open, bleeding wound.
Is this what Canada has come to? Tiresome mediocrities oiling their way through Parliament in the pathetic hope that they will sit in an addled and discredited cabinet.

So what's your answer, Mike? An election might be the only way out of this mess. You're right that it's too soon. But calling the money spent wasted is dangerous. Democracy is worth whatever it costs. Mike would suggest that democracy in Afghanistan is worth the lives of 100 Canadians. Democracy here comes cheap at $300 million. I don't even know where to begin with the second paragraph. It's just name calling.

In the name of all that is good and Canadian, pray on your knees that all this is put right.

The last sentence is pure nonsense, containing nothing, except a call to inaction. Pray? What will that do? To be honest, I want god to stay out of it. The divisions are deep enough without religion.

I don't know how this guy keeps getting published.

Working on your follow through.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 20:42:00 +0000

Allow me to make a detour in order to make a larger point.

Much of the loud horrible screeching coming from the CPC and the conservatives these days comes in the form of misinformation, empty rhetoric or lies. A perfect example is the parallels that have been implied between our electoral system and that of the US. The right is claiming that Canada elected a Prime Minister, and taking away his keys to Sussex is somehow undemocratic, illegal or just plain mean.

Now, I'll reiterate that I voted for no one in the House. I supported none of the parties that currently make up the our Parliament. I did not give a mandate to anybody who currently has been sent back home for Christmas. Having said that, I support the coalition, and not just because it is the lesser of two evils. The idea of cooperation is compelling to me; I just like to see people who disagree get along.

But to return to the CPC. This coalition has been called a coup. We have been told that they have no right to seek power without an election. We've been told that we elected Harper as PM. They keep repeating "undemocratic" as if a) it makes any difference, or b) it were true. They have benefitted from the alchemical nature of first-past-the-post parliamentary voting laws, and now those same laws are biting them on the ass. Now they're undemocratic. I've mentioned this all before, provided links that elaborate, and have supplied adequate snark, I think, to effectively negate these arguments.

Doesn't matter, as we've seen. The memes persist. The ideas are deeply entrenched, and much of it can be laid at the feet of the US.

That is not to say the US is to blame. They elect their state officials in a way that is vaguely similar to ours, but much longer, noisier and more expensive. The differences that matter, however, are more subtle. The average American voter casts a ballot for president. Canadians do not cast a ballot for PM, except in a few ridings. And even then, the ballot is not to elect them PM, but to give them a seat in the House, where the job of PM is decided. With me so far?

So the claim that Canadians elected Stephen Harper PM is wrong in several ways. First, he didn't run for PM, no matter what you think. He ran to be the MP, and then was given the job of PM because his friends had the most seats. However, and this is important, they did not have MOST OF the seats. So Canadians didn't elect Harper even based on the fact that they elected a lot of his friends. They didn't elect enough of them to make his job unassailable. And furthermore, the alchemy of the electoral process gave the CPC 46% of the seats (not enough, I remind you) because they got 37% of the vote. That means that the other three parties combined received 54% of the seats from 56% of the vote (the Greens got 7%).

By any objective measure, the coalition is a better reflection of the will of the people.

But, heavily influenced by the US system (the only explanation that makes any sense besides blind partisanship in the face of conflicting evidence), conservatives across the country are freaking out, using pretty inflammatory language and accusing the coalition of treason.

Now, considering just how influential the US system is in shaping the ideology and the interpretation of the law for our own conservatives, I have three questions:

First, were you a supporter of the McCain-Palin ticket?

And second, if so, how is it okay that one half of that team was literally getting into bed with a separatist, but not okay that our liberal parties are figuratively doing so?

And finally, though clearly precedent and history are not your strong suits, why is it wrong to ally with the Bloc now, but it wasn't in 2000 or 2004?

Take your time. This one's tricky.

Cheap shots

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:19:00 +0000

I've got nothing cogent to add. Nothing that'll influence the arguments either way. So I'm going to be childish, instead:

I don't usually like math

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 04:30:00 +0000

Yeah, I know what I said. I won't change anyone's mind with my fact-checkery and coherent-argumentism. But I just can't leave it alone.

A friend of mine is pissed because Stephen Harper was elected Prime Minister of Canada, and the Opposition is subverting the will of the people. Allow me to provide the facts.

Harper was elected, as I've said before, MP for Calgary Southwest. In fact, Canadians in five ridings (actually, in any riding where the leader of one of 22 parties was running, but for the sake of my sanity, we will limit to the ridings where the five major leaders were running) had a chance to elect a potential Prime Minister. That's 5 of 308 (16%). In one of those five ridings, the leader lost.

Let's look at some numbers.

Harper received 38 548 votes on election night. That's 73% of the vote in his riding. Pretty damn impressive. It's nearly 0.003% of the total vote in Canada. Clearly Harper has a mandate.

Okay, that's not fair. Let's look at something else. The other four leaders ran in four other ridings.

Dion received 25 095 votes, or 62% of the vote in his riding.
Layton got 45% of the vote in his riding: 20 323.
Gilles Duceppe snuck a majority in, too, with 47 975 votes, or 50%.
Elizabeth May lost to Peter MacKay, getting 32% of the vote (MacKay got 46%).

Of the votes cast in the ridings party leaders sought, Harper got nearly 17% of the vote. Clearly a mandate.

Wait. Still not fair. What about the votes actually cast for the party leaders? Harper did very well. Not quite 32%.

Here it is. Harper was not elected Prime Minister. He did very well in his riding. In fact, he did better than any other leader in their respective ridings. I wouldn't be surprised to find that he did better than almost any other candidate in the country.

I voted for none of these party leaders. Only 52 996 Canadians were given the opportunity to vote for our esteemed Prime Minister (0.004%). Only 227 107 Canadians were allowed to vote for a potential Prime Minister (0.016%). We didn't elect this jerk.

The Green Party of Canada received 940 747 votes and elected no one to the House. In Alberta, the CPC received 820 855 votes and sent 27 members to Ottawa. It sucks pretty seriously, but those are the idiosyncrasies of parliamentary democracy. Every time I mention it, it's pointed out that this is the system we have, and those are the breaks.

When the Opposition loses confidence in the Prime Minister, they can form a government and seek to govern. This is the system we have, kittens, and those are the breaks.

I don't like this system. It distorts the results of the vote and disenfranchises vast numbers of voters. The CPC seems like a bunch of whiners now that the rules are working against them and they've cut and run.

A house divided, northern edition.

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 19:07:00 +0000

I am certain that there's nothing I can say that will change anyone's mind about anything. Certainly not about Canada's Parliamentary cockfight. You can find a constitutional expert (or someone who claims to be) to support your opinion, no matter what it is. And even if you recognize that the coalition is perfectly legal, you may not recognize its legitimacy. There are a buch of reasons for this, but the two I've seen the most are that the coalition is a bunch of sore losers, trying to steal power without earning it, or that they are traitors for entering into an agreement with the Bloc.

You may support the coalition for reasons that have nothing to do with the constitution or the whimsy of parliamentary democracy. My gut reaction was to support the coalition simply because Harper's an asshole. Since then, after a great deal of consideration, I've found other reasons to support them. Listing them here adds nothing to the discussion. You can find them all over the place.

What I do know is this. Six weeks will not help. It will help the CPC get a budget together, but it seems unlikely to me that the budget will pass. It will give the CPC caucus a chance to choose a new leader, but they are unlikely to do that. Harper only owns short leashes. It might give the coalition time to fall apart, but that seems unlikely to me as well. They planned to hang together for 18 months. Six weeks isn't that long.

It gives both sides time to launch the campaign for the hearts and minds of Canadians. The CPC has a lot more money, so they'll be running TV ads using words like traitor, power grab, and democracy. They might say coup. They'll probably rerun some stuff saying how goofy Dion is. They will issue talking points to the bloggers. The MSM editorial pages will be full of invective against those nasty socialists and separatists. It'll be ugly.

The coalition has a lot less money. What have they got? The majority, tradition and law. Any ads they can muster will contain words like democracy, Bush, confidence and economy.

Ads on neither side will contain any substantive evidence for their position. And rightly so. It won't make a damn bit of difference. The trenches are deep and the positions are entrenched.

What bothers me most is division that this is exacerbating. In the US, things have gotten ugly in the afteremath of a contentious and tight presidential election. Old rivalries and prejudices have taken off their hoods. New prejudices have come to the fore, highlighting the culture war. The religious right scrambles desperately to prove Obama's illegitimacy as president, while gloating and screeching in fear about gay marriage (I don't know how they do it.)

Up here, the debate feeds on Canada's own boogeymen. First is the GOP-like behaviour of the CPC. The CPC aren't your father's Tories. They're neocons. Then there's the separatists. We thought that spectre was safely exorcised, and the Bloc now supports a different government (the govenment has included the Bloc for years, but now they might be allied with someone). There's also the vaguely socialist-like stance of the NDP. Accurate or not, the image is there, and we're being blugeoned with it. And finally, there's the meme which has been swiped from Rove's playbook. We're being told that Dion isn't a "leader". Whatever that means.

The divisions are real, though essentially superficial. These issues should be taking a backseat to other, more pressing issues, like the environment, poverty, and our fatally flawed economy. But this is what's shaping debate.

This will get worse before it gets better. I can promise you that. And the Canada that emerges will likely be very different from this one. I can't say whether it'll be better or worse. The CPC might make overtures to the others and patch things up. The coalition may or may not survive. The GG may just prorogue the government again next year because the CPC will fall. We may have another election as the Libs choose a new leader (and probably the CPC, if the government falls).

This is ugly. I know my wine and turkey-fuelled discussions will be interesting over Christmas.

Fickle

noreply@blogger.com (Father Shaggy) — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 03:26:00 +0000

Nearly three months ago, Stephen Harper broke his own election law and asked the Governor General to dissolve Parliament. The voters were furious. So mad, in fact, that they gave Steve a strengthened minority.

During the election, the CPC constantly took the low road, running on Dion's funny accent and his idealism, releasing their platform in the final week of the campaign. The voters were disgusted with this tactic. So disgusted, in fact, that Dion's Liberals got the lowest voter support in history.

As the election results were released, the voting public was indignant that we spent a few hundred million dollars and came up with essentially the same result. So indignant, in fact, that they are now convinced that Harper has an overwhelming mandate.

The CPC said there was no recession. Then they said there probably would be one, but they had a plan, but they didn't say what the plan was. They assured us that they were the "steady hand" we needed during times of crisis, and the Liberals would be a disaster. When their "economic statement" included nothing but pissant ideological spending cuts, the public was annoyed. They were so annoyed, in fact, that when the other parties objected, the public insulted them, and suggested they were afraid of losing their meal ticket.

Canadians have not been represented by a government that reflected the majority of the vote since 1984 (PCs with 50.3%). Given the opportunity to once again be represented by MPs whose parties combine to give them 53% of the vote, Canadians are appalled.

The new Parliament convened and quickly degenerated into bickering, partisanship and name calling. The voters were appalled. So appalled, in fact, that when three of the four parties agreed to work together and form a coalition, the public screamed "Coup!", "Treason", and "Power grab!"

People of all political stripes who have lamented Stephen Harper, his ideology, his contempt for other parties, his disregard of his own legislation, his frightening support for Dubya, his disdain for the arts, and his lack of compassion for Canada's most vulnerable citizens, are horrified that political opportunists might "seize power" from him.

I honestly don't get you people.