OMG. I can hardly believe my furry ears. But a strange sound is coming from the Con Castle.
And no, it's not the sound of Great Scandalous Leader standing in front of a mirror, and screaming "I know NOTHING !@#!!!" Over and over again. To see which one looks more credible.
No, it seems that one of his faithful traitorous followers, Michael Chong, is planning a revolt of the Con sheeple !!!!!
It's not a good news hockey story. It's a huge blow to the CBC.
For years, HNIC has been a cash cow that helped float many of CBC’s other news and original programming endeavours, with some estimating it was worth $200 million, and up to half of the TV network’s advertising revenue.
And of course the CBC can't count on any help from Stephen Harper.
The Prime Minister's Office has slammed the door on any bailout for the CBC to make up for lost advertising revenue from hockey broadcasts.
"CBC already receives significant taxpayer funds," PMO spokesman Stephen Lecce wrote in an e-mail.
Because he would like to destroy it eh?
But there could be a big consolation prize. It could be the end of Don Cherry.
If you watch Question Period these days you know that there is a new star in the Con Circus.
The clown Paul Calandra, the Prime Minister's parliamentary secretary, who answers more questions about the Senate scandal than Stephen Harper does.
And turns every serious question into a joke or a smear.
It was cold and dark tonight by the lake where I live. Like it usually is in late November, in Canada.
But at least for the first time there was a sprinkling of snow on the ground to brighten up the gloom.
Which is more than I can say about Harperland, where it just keeps getting darker and more dangerous.
For just look what we learned about that monstrous regime today.
I must admit when I first saw the headline "THE SENATE SCANDAL'S OUT OF LEGS !!!!" I was shocked, and my heart dived into my boots.
I felt like running to a window, opening it wide, and screaming: "Nooooo !!! Nooooo !!! How could this be HAPPENING ??!!#!@!!
How low can we go ?!@#!!!! How dumb are my people !#@!#!!! How short their attention spans !#@!#!!!
But luckily it was too cold to open the window eh? And it was only Margaret Wente.
Well there he was again today answering all questions about the Senate scandal by repeating the same mantra.
Nigel Wright and Mike Duffy are the ones responsible. That's why Duffy is no longer a member of the Conservative caucus, that's why I fired Wright.
But for some reason not explaining why he hasn't fired Irving Gerstein, the Con bagman-in-chief.
They are threatening our democracy. Threatening the planet, threatening our lakes and rivers.
Now they stand accused of the ultimate crime: threatening our food supply.
Canada’s food recall system has not been properly managed by the federal government and “significant improvements” are needed to keep consumers safe, says the federal auditor general.
In his report released Tuesday, Michael Ferguson blasted the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) for shortcomings in its oversight of the food safety system.
It seemed only appropriate that at one point in today's Question Period Stephen Harper looked like he was praying.
But who can blame him eh?
Because the day of reckoning has finally arrived. And as Paul Wells wrote today, you can't polish a turd.
Golly. I can only imagine the state Stephen Harper must have been in last night as he watched the byelection results come in.
Especially the one in Brandon-Souris, the riding that has been in Con hands for half a century.
And although in the end no seats changed hands, I'm sure the Cons were still pumping him full of horse tranquilizer long after it was over.
Because it's not like he had anything to celebrate eh?
Not when he almost lost the eternal Con riding. And not when Justin Trudeau was declared the big winner.
Well he wasn't in the House of Commons today to answer any questions about the Senate scandal.
No doubt recovering from his latest attempt to try to improve his image by posing as a man of the people. Which can't be easy when you're a millionaire.
And you have to go to a football game to try to make yourself look popular.
But of course, it's not hard to understand why Stephen Harper is so afraid of saying anything eh?
Not when he's caught between a rock and a hard place.
Well since nobody believes what Stephen Harper and his Cons have to say about the Senate scandal, because they've lied about everything for eight years.
And nobody believes anything the Con senators have to say because they've been revealed to be nothing but stooges of the PMO.
Today the Harperites tried something different eh? They sent out their chief flak Jason MacDonald to make a new and outrageous claim:
Good to go didn't mean let's make a deal. It meant do what you must to force Mike Duffy to PAY.
Well now we know why Stephen Harper has been looking so pale and so fearful. Or just so pathetic.
Because he just may be about to start paying for that sordid Senate scandal.
The federal Liberals maintain a lead in three of four ridings up for grabs in Monday’s byelections, according to a new poll from Forum Research.
Liberal candidates lead their opposition by more than 10 points in Toronto Centre, the Montreal riding of Bourassa, and the Manitoba riding of Brandon-Souris, according to the poll.
Well I'm sure you remember the scary story of the Con zombie Vic Toews, and his infamous internet snooping bill.
The one Toews called the Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act (Bill C-30) but was really just a sinister plan to read our e-mails. By among other things forcing internet service providers to hand over information to police without a warrant.
The bill was killed after massive public protests, and Toews retired. But now it's back under a new name, Bill C-13 or The Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act.
And so are the Con zombies.
The other night I told you how the Harper Cons have launched an all out assault on Justin Trudeau, the biggest since their smear campaign against Michael Ignatieff.
By among other things running ridiculous ads in ethnic communities, like the one above, to target Trudeau's views on marijuana.
Stephen Harper’s Conservatives want to talk pot. Specifically, they want to talk about Justin Trudeau’s admission that he smoked marijuana with friends a few years ago, while an MP, and the Liberal Leader’s support for legalization.
And as if that wasn't bad enough, they're also trying to compare marijuana to crack.
I like the look on Stephen Harper's face these days. He's starting to look like a deer caught in the headlights.
For the first time you can see fear in his eyes.
The man who likes to scare and bully others is now scared himself.
I've always thought it ironic that a man called Greg Horton should be the one who might bring down Great Timmy Leader by exposing the corruption of his evil empire.
But it wasn't until today that I realized how much we owe that RCMP investigator.
The Mountie investigating the Senate expense scandal, Cpl. Greg Horton, went before a judge on Wednesday to consent to the public release of the Information to Obtain (IT0) a production order he had sworn five days earlier.
The ITO was provided to the media later that day. Had Horton not consented, it could have been weeks or months before journalists or the public saw the document, if ever.
I told you it would be a hot love story, and you can't get any hotter than this eh?
Stephen Harper thinks Rob Ford has been a bad boy. And he may be rough trade.
But he still loves him. And he doesn't think he should resign.
Well he wasn't in the House of Commons today. He was out in Lac Megantic handing out a $95 million cheque.
But he couldn't run away from the questions about another cheque.
The one he was apparently prepared to write Mike Duffy to paper over a budding scandal with party funds.
The one that can be boiled down to this question: who do you believe Stephen Harper or the police?
It was a scene right out of the last days of the Weimar Republic. A Con regime exposed as rotten to the core.
Its leader proclaiming his innocence, and clinging to ignorance.
He fought back against his accusers like a cornered animal. He tried to smear them by accusing them of criminal acts, even of being communists.
He fudged his answers, and repeated his talking points over and over again.
But he could not deny the allegations contained in this report.
Well after staying away as long as he could, and seeing the stature of his ally Rob Ford diminished, Stephen Harper returned to the Commons today, only to find the Senate scandal waiting for him.
And ending up looking a little diminished himself.
Well at least on Sun TV.
Less than 24 hours after its debut on Monday night, the conservative cable news channel axed Ford Nation, its highly touted TV talk show starring Rob and Doug Ford, despite record ratings for the network.
Well let's put it this way eh? It wasn't pretty. He rocked back and forth in his chair mocking a councillor by pretending to be a drunk driver. He shouted insults at people in the audience.
He stomped around like a bull in a crack house, knocking down a councillor. He compared what was happening to him to Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait.
But at 5:33 pm on the blessed day of November 18th, 2013, Rob Ford was finally neutered.
Well I told you it would be a fascist circus, and that's exactly what it turned out to be. With the bully mayor on a rampage.
Chaos broke out during an extraordinary city council debate on reducing embattled Toronto Mayor Rob Ford to essentially a figurehead.At one point, the mayor bolted across the room and appeared to accidentally knock over Councillor Pam McConnell.
As you can see with your own eyes...
Now its beyond denial, now it's psychosis. Now he's no longer satisfied with being the Crack Mayor of Toronto.
Now he's telling Fox News he wants to be Prime Minister.
He is the only one charged in the Robo Con scandal.
Michael Sona, the former Con staffer who claims he is being set-up to conceal a much larger conspiracy.
A couple of days ago we finally found out the names of six Conservative Party workers, who the PMO has brought forward to claim that Sona told them he did it.
A publication ban has been lifted on the names of six witnesses who allegedly said then Conservative Party staffer Michael Sona bragged to them about arranging a misleading robocall in Canada's 2011 federal election.
Today we found out that at the time some of those witnesses claim that Sona was bragging about his exploits, he was apparently sunning himself on a beach in the Caribbean.
OK here's the bad news. Rob Ford made the opening of Saturday Night Live.
And the good news?
He's actually worse than that.
The Americans only used "aboot" once eh?
Ford is NOT invited to today's Santa Claus parade. So the kiddies are safe.
And sooner rather than later, like his good friend Steve Harper, he'll be out on his ass.
Well there he was the other day, trying to run away from the Senate scandal, while claiming scandalously that his trade deal with the Europeans was bigger than Brian Mulroney's free trade deal.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper touted the benefits of the Canada-EU free trade agreement to a business crowd in Montreal that included the architect of the Canada-U.S. free trade deal negotiated 25 years earlier.
Even though we don't know what's in his new trade deal. Even though the Europeans are secretly bragging that they took Canada to the cleaners. And even though the Euro zone's economy is heading in the same direction as the Titanic.
His monstrous presence still threatens Toronto. But he is less of a threat than he was yesterday. The good guys are finally winning. The Fordzilla is finally being neutered.
Toronto city council has voted to both remove Mayor Rob Ford's authority during emergency situations and, under a separate motion, has stripped his power to hire and fire the deputy mayor and appoint members of his executive committee.
They are the first of three motions aimed at leaving Ford as mayor in name only.
He will continue his last 11 months as mayor with severely limited powers.
Gosh. I've never started a post with the same picture I used to end the last one eh?
But you really can't repeat this enough times: You can't put lipstick on a Con hog.
Mayor Rob Ford threatened to sue former staffers Thursday, but it was his reference to allegations of oral sex with a former staff member that sent shockwaves through the city.
At last he stands revealed, the Bubbah Lord of the Ford Nation, in all his grubby glory.
The political thug, the violent rages, the dangerous drunk, the crude sexual remarks, the hookers, the racism.
Oh boy. I have to admit that when you're a blogger and a progressive in Harperland, some days are better than others.
And at first glance today really sucked eh?
For starters as I walked home this evening I was finally forced to admit what I have being denying for so long:
Winter is almost upon us...
Well in case you thought that the Con regime was nickel and diming veterans, and killing good jobs all over the country, because they absolutely HAVE to slay the deficit.
Or as Jimbo Flaherty warned us we could find ourselves in a big black hole, the economy is fragile, the global risk is huge etc etc.
Well forget about that eh? That was last year's last month's last week's story.
Now little Jimbo claims we're heading for an enormous surplus !!!!
There couldn't be a more powerful protest. Or a greater slap in the face.
For years he posed as a patriot, for years he strutted around boasting he was the best friend the Canadian military ever had. For years he could count on the support of most veterans.
But not anymore.
As I've mentioned before, I may be naive ,but I can't help feeling that Michelle Rempel is a cut above most Cons.
I don't blame her for causing a ruckus on Twitter the other day, by taking a shot at this fluffy event.
And I don't approve of the way some on our side went after her.
Because she deserves better than that.
But let's be clear, as her Great Leader likes to say, if Rempel wants to champion women's rights she's in the wrong party.
Imagine you're in the back of an ambulance in Toronto. You're desperately trying to keep a person alive until you can get him or her to a hospital.
The lights are flashing, the siren is screaming, but you're not going anywhere because the streets are clogged with traffic.
And then the patient dies, ten minutes from salvation. How would you feel, or what would you say?
How about damn you Rob Ford ? You BASTARD.
For this is also his criminal legacy....
Uh oh. Call out the Fire Brigade or the Big Lie Brigade. There's more smoke pouring out of the PMO.
Remember when Mike Duffy accused the Harper gang of cooking up what he called a "monstrous fraud?"
Duffy also alleged that the prime minister’s office gave him a script to lie about where the money came from, claiming that he had taken out a loan.
“The PMO told me to say my wife and I took out a loan at the Royal Bank,” Duffy said.
“That line was written by the PMO to deceive Canadians as to the real source of the $90,000.”
And how Harper claimed that "deception" was the reason he threw him out of the Con caucus?
Well now that we've established that eh? Just how will Great Ugly Leader ever explain this one?
Well I'm sorry to report that Rob Ford is still clinging to power, and that the big question seems to be will he go to rehab before he drops dead?
Mayor Rob Ford appeared to brush aside his brother’s request to take a break from city hall duties Friday night, telling reporters: “I love my brother, dearly.”
Hours earlier, the mayor’s brother, Councillor Doug Ford, who hadn’t spoken publicly in two days, urged the mayor seek “a little bit of counselling” and go away for a couple of weeks.
Instead of when will he resign before he kills Toronto?
Or who were those sinister characters with the suitcases full of money?
Well by now just about every Canadian has probably seen the horrifying video of Rob Ford stomping around like a bull in a dining room.
Rob Ford, the mayor of Canada’s largest city, has been caught on video in an impaired rant saying he is going to kill someone and “rip his f---ing throat out.”
Ford slurs his words as he staggers around an unknown dining room, apparently high, ranting gibberish and gesticulating wildly.
And since my friend Aidan the shepherd, in the barren highlands of Scotland, has also seen it, I figure the whole world has too eh?
OMG. The horror, the horror. It was supposed to be Stephen Harper's Day of Jubilee. The day he showed off the severed heads of the three Senators to his demoralized caucus. Or tossed them in the general direction of the opposition.
And solemnly declared that the sordid Senate scandal, or The Great Distraction, was over.
But instead the scandal took another macabre twist, when one of the heads started talking....to the RCMP!!!!
It couldn't have been a more disgusting sight, or a more depressing day for Canadian democracy.
Three Canadian Senators sacrificed, along with due process, on the altar of political expediency.
The Senate flexed its muscle Tuesday and in an unprecedented move tossed three of its members — Senators Mike Duffy, Pamela Wallin and Patrick Brazeau — out of the chamber, cutting their salaries and use of office resources.
While the morally depraved leader who appointed them, and ordered their summary executions, denied that the RCMP was investigating his own office.
OMG. What a nightmare. Rob Ford is still the Mayor of Toronto, still clinging to power.
Nobody can get rid of him, he won't resign, he won't go to rehab.
And now the Fordzilla is out of CONTROL !!!!!.
Well I see the Con Convention is over, and so are Stephen Harper's plans to reboot or revive his tired corrupt Con regime.
He did everything to please his rabid base. He promised them they could grope the rights of women, and preach that gay people should be murdered without being accused of discrimination. He turned the party into a CULT.
But even that depraved and scary cockroach gathering couldn't make that sordid old Senate scandal go away eh?
It just made it WORSE.
I have never had any doubts about the real nature of Stephen Harper's Con regime.
Not with a leader so crazed and evil, and followers so fanatical.
But it's still good to see people like Andrew Coyne describe their bizarre convention as a creepy thing.
They may appear like an odd couple. The monstrous Machiavellian and the monstrous buffoon. But they both spent the weekend doing the same thing.
Stephen Harper trying to reframe the Senate scandal by blaming it on the Senators he appointed and the Senate he corrupted.
Rob Ford trying to refocus the crack video scandal on his battle with the bottle.
“I’m not a crack addict. I’m not an addict of any type of drug, even alcohol,” he said. “I’m not an alcoholic. But do I like to have a couple drinks? Absolutely, I do.”
Because that could happen to anyone eh?
And both men clearly thinking they can fool Canadians into believing ANYTHING.
Uh oh. It looks like the Con convention has ended on a nightmare note for Stephen Harper.
I warned him not inflame his Con base, and above all not to WATER them
But he didn't listen. He whipped them into a foaming frenzy with his ghastly keynote speech.
And now the wingnuts are running WILD !!!!
Well his convention speech was a total bust, a parody of a parody of an empty cliché as Andrew Coyne called it.
Or a deranged quasi-fascist rant that only his rabid base could love, as I did.
But that didn't stop Great Desperate Leader from slipping into a black shirt shortly afterwards, and serenading the faithful at the Cowboy Cabaret.
It was without a doubt one of the worst and most disgusting political speeches I have ever heard. One so foul it left me feeling sick to my stomach. And more fearful than ever about the future of our country.
A speech that could have been delivered at a teabagger convention in Alabama, or at the point when Stephen Harper attacked the courts, a beer garden in Nuremberg.
But was delivered to a wildly cheering mob, the pathetic descendants of the once proud Conservative Party, in a Cow Palace in Calgary.
OMG. When I saw those Con zombies going past my place last night, for a moment I thought they were after me eh?
But it turned out it was only the Ford Nation on their way to the Con convention, and they were after Steve.
But he wasn't too happy to see them eh?
Because now he has to meet his slobbering base in Calgary with TWO big monkeys on his back: Mike Duffy AND Rob Ford.
