Eight years ago when I started attacking Stephen Harper and his ghastly Con regime, it sometimes felt lonely out there.
Almost nobody, and certainly nobody in the MSM, was attacking him like I did. Many of the old poobahs in the blogosphere thought I was over the top. That he was bad but not THAT bad. And that I should grow up.
And of course, my Mum was sure I'd end up in prison eh?
Then a few years ago things started to change. The blogosphere caught fire, Lawrence Martin wrote his book Harperland.
And now Michael Harris' new book Party of One should just about seal the record and finish him off.
By the time author Michael Harris nears the end of his magisterial review of the strife and times of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, it is as if he felt the need of a shower. Almost 500 pages of Party of One: Stephen Harper and Canada’s Radical Makeover have by then been devoted to chronicling the Harper government’s bullying, abuse, duplicity, betrayal, affinity for crooks, public shaming of individuals, diminishment of democratic institutions.
“It was hard every day getting up and working on this particular government,” Harris told the Star in advance of the book’s publication this week. “It made you feel poorly.”
For it sounds like the book, I wish I had written eh?
And to make it even better, it includes quotes from some wonderful Canadians, like the late great Farley Mowatt...
“Stephen Harper is probably the most dangerous human being ever elevated to power in Canada,” Mowat tells the author. “We took Parliament for granted, but, like the environment, it turns out that it is an incredibly delicate and fragile structure. Harper has smothered MPs and is destroying Parliament.”
Or the last great Speaker of the Commons Peter Milliken.
“Parliament can hardly be weakened any more than it already is. Harper can’t go much further without making the institution dysfunctional. He is trying to control every aspect of House business. In fact, it will have to be returned to its former state by someone if we are to have a democracy.”
I love the way it begins with the words of a young Canadian, Brigette DePape, who inspired so many with her lonely protest...
This quote by the distinguished diplomat Paul Heinbecker couldn't be more devastating.
“Canada’s diplomacy is hugely different under Harper,” veteran diplomat Paul Heinbecker, former ambassador to Germany, tells the author. “It is a reversal of our history. “We have become outliers. We are seen as more American than the Americans, more Israeli than Likud. Given what our foreign policy has become, I would not have joined the service today if I were a young man.”
Because you know how I feel about Steve and his friend Benny...
And this one, from the former information commissioner Robert Marleau sums up how I felt about Harper so long ago, and how I still feel about him now.
“Canadians are sleepwalking through dramatic social, economic and political changes surreptitiously being implemented by a government abusing omnibus bills and stifling public and parliamentary debate,” Marleau continued. “Mr. Harper has not played within the rules. Having attained absolute power, he has absolutely abused that power to the maximum.”
And the best part is that unlike so many others in our useless MSM, who have spent most of the last eight years polishing Great Leader's butt with their tongues, you know that Harris will not mince his words.
And when people like Jim Coyle are already calling it the "definitive text" on the Harper years, all I can say is thank you Michael.
For it will do our homegrown dictator enormous damage in the lead-up to the next election. And hopefully it will inspire others in the MSM to follow Harris' example and start criticizing Harper like he deserves.
For it needs to be said. It always needed to be said. He is the worst Prime Minister this country has ever known. A political thug, a foul bully, an outlier, a man as Canadian as a three dollar bill.
And yes, as I've always called him, he is a real MONSTER...
So let's make sure that when Party of One comes out we buy the book and share it widely.
For it is the book we have been waiting to read for so long.
And it will help destroy him...
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37 comments:
Oh no Simon? On one of Harper's x-mas interviews he said, he is a devout Christian and prays for guidance every day. My son splurted his coffee, half way across the room. He said, Harper must have meant, he *preyed* every day.
Harper called Russia and Putin evil Communists and then, sells Canada to Communist China. Harper still sells arms to Russia.
Harper lied regarding, he was requested to take a bigger role, in this war with ISIS. The US said, they did no such thing. Everything that could be bombed, already was. Harper wanted to bomb the rubble into pebbles.
Harper was a miserable failure in Wales. His speech to the UN was to a pretty nearly empty room. Harper is a pariah and no-one wants him. Harper forced his way into this war and he is frantic to redeem himself, to the rest of the world.
However, the world has a very dim view of, Harper selling Canada to Communist China. Harper sees himself as a big shot, in the global governance movement. Harper's speech on global governance for Canada, means exactly that. Harper is a traitor to Canada and doing acts of treason. Harper belongs in prison and the opposition does nothing.
Another book Canadians should take for a spin is 'Harperism: How Stephen Harper and His Think Tank Colleges Have Transformed Canada' by Donald Gutstein. Its pages help explain just how we ended up with Harper and his rogue style of ideological governance.
And just when I didn't know what to get people as Christmas presents. Thank you Simon.
Oh and in harpers' quest to maintain conservative purity, he is now auditing a bunch of birdwatchers in Ontario. Upp, 300 birdwatchers in one little bird watching group are threatened by having their society audited because they wrote a letter to 2 cabinet ministers suggesting things might affect birds and the environment. My god, get those bird watchers under control immediately.
so much for democracy in Canada. What is the difference between harper and Putin? At least Putin is honest about who and what he is. harper, not so much. harper has gone a long way to destroy our Canadian democracy. The young woman with the stop sign in Parliament said it all. Its too bad Canadians didn't listen.
harper doesn't want democracy. he wants a government just like China's. That's why he signed the trade deal with them. he is such a sad sack of shit.
.. for sure we need more accredited factual journos who recognize Harper for what he is..
But for someone like yourself.. who's beed dedicated, concerned and extremalu proactive..
just visit the various blog sites and articles by Emily Dee..
and give yourself a huge pat on the back for being very much like her..
an ordinary yet extraordinary Canadian with courage and a glowing heart..
I fully intend on reading the book when it comes out. I would also recommend Harperism by Donald Gutstein if you haven't already read it. Talks about the role of think tanks in the HarperCON agenda.
Simon did your mother really think Harper might put you in jail? I thought that was so funny. Although I suppose in this country these days anything is possible.
hi anon...if you remember Harper once said that he didn't really care about the judgment of history, only his God's judgement. At the time I thought that should be enough to disqualify him from holding office, but sadly most Canadians didn't care. As for putting him in prison, I admit that would be a bonus. But I'll settle for removing him from office and sending him back to Alberta on a burro backwards....
hi Omar...thanks for that recommendation. I'm embarrassed to admit that I haven't heard of that book, but will definitely look it up. Those right-wing think tanks have been multiplying like mushrooms, and their influence is enormous. So the more we all know about them the better. I'm willing to bet that a lot of the so-called kids in short pants were hatched in those indoctrination centres....
hi e.a.f...yes they would be good Christmas presents. I'm definitely going to ask Santa for one. I'm ashamed to admit that I haven't bought a book for a while but I'm definitely getting that one. I've always enjoyed Michael Harris' writing. And since it is said to be really well researched it should prove very handy indeed.
Ad of course, the timing couldn't be better...
hi salamander...I am very familiar and have always admired Emily Dee's writing. She started about a year after I did, but I have learned a lot from her. Her work is always well researched, and is particularly valuable in shining a light on Harper's early years, which are still extremely murky. I've been really lucky over the years to have benefited from the example of many bloggers over the years. Some sadly have died, but I will always remember them....
hi Chris...thanks for the recommendation. As I told Omar I haven't heard of the book, but it sounds really interesting. And I also intend to buy Harris' book. It also sounds excellent, and since he is even harsher on Harper than I am, I KNOW I'm going to love it. ;)
BTW thanks for retweeting my stuff so much. I'm a bit shy on Twitter so I really appreciate it...
hi anon....well I don't know if she really thinks I could go to prison. But she definitely thinks it's VERY rude to portray the Prime Minister as a monkey or a pig. For which I have to thank my brother, the rat, for sending her the occasional picture. !#@!!!!!! But then she is a serious artist, and while I'm sure she finds my creations truly shocking, she lives in a pastoral setting in the north of Scotland while I'm here. God help me.... ;)
Simon:
Yes, I remember when you first started up, you were one of the few voices that also recognized the threat Harper truly represented. You and I disagreed on the solution back then, but I do remember thinking how nice it was to have a fellow Cassandra out there, I had been taking a LOT of flak from all quarters for daring to suggest that Harper was something truly alien to our political culture. This despite being able to cite in exhaustive detail about his background as a member of the Calgary School, what that meant, who Leo Strauss was, and what the core principles of a Straussians were, and that the main followers of Strauss in the USA were Dick Cheney and his crowd during the GWB years.
I will admit at the time I thought your style was a bit out there, but never your substance, and I have since come to recognize the merits in your manner of presentation. It may not be a manner suited well for someone like me, and it is certainly not one I can do with any competence myself, but then I am of the older side of the blogging crowd and I am not a visual person either (severe ADHD does has its problems, for me this is one of the main ones, text I am great with, imagery and visual thinking, not so much alas, which is also why I tend to be as verbose as I am instead of using imagery or even trying to describe in imagery). I was one of the only voices in the blogosphere in the time of the treachery of the PCPC by MacKay to Harper and the birthed in treachery and deceit CPC that was shouting about just how dangerous Harper truly was to ALL of us, progressives and centrists alike.
That Harper could not be allowed anywhere near the PMO not even in minority without expecting serious and profound corruption of our basic institutions of government, abuse of power scandals unlike anything we had ever seen before, and that such scandals make money scandals pale in comparison. That a corrupt Lib Martin government was still far less corrosive to democracy and democratic values than any Harper government would be. I was roundly mocked for that belief, yet the historical record has clearly shown I was if anything not extreme enough in my fears and concerns.
Indeed, I will always have contempt for Layton because he either was unable to see what Harper was or chose to ignore it for his own partisan ends, and I'm afraid I find the latter the only plausible option because of how open Harper had been about what he was from the late 80s until after the defeat in 2004. Layton was simply too well informed and capable a political operator to not have known what Harper was, and for whatever reason(s) felt it was worth letting him into the PMO to advance what he saw as NDP interests. I begged and pleaded with Dippers to try and stop this, I tried to argue what was in their own interests as progressives, that Harper was not like other Canadian conservatives, he was truly a Destroyer and Salter of Scorched Earth, and that his will was to take everything progressives and even most centrists value most about our federal government, shred it completely and do all he could to make any successor government's power to recreate such as impossible as he could.
I'm sure you remember this about me from when you first showed up Simon, that I always said I was never a partisan of a party or leader but someone that felt Harper needed to be stopped at all costs and that nothing else mattered. That I kept supporting the Libs in this as the tool to do so not because I was one, but because my reading of the actual electorate that votes showed me they were even in disgrace the only real chance to do so, but only if the NDP focused all its attention against Harper and called him out for the extremist that he was, instead of allowing him to redefine himself as a center-right type as he did..
To be concluded...
Conclusion:
Now, I could to an extent forgive them for that behaviour in the first election when they brought Martin down in doing what they did (not agree with it, but understand it), but in the following two elections they spent at least as much resource/focus on denouncing the Libs as they did the Harper CPC, this despite the Harper CPC being the government and the clear greater threat to core NDP beliefs, values, policies, and principles. Well, that is rehashing to an extent old fights and arguments, and you in the end ended up alongside me in recognizing that Harper must be stopped before all else. I am glad to see this book of Harris' coming out, and I look forward to reading it to see just how well he documented the horror that has been the Harper regime.
I just wish more people in the professional national political media had been willing to do their jobs, the information about Harper was there for them to find, if a man in Halifax can do all I did with nothing but his TV and computer and belief in being an informed voter, they had no excuse for not doing it, which is also why I cannot forgive senior political operatives for failing here in the NDP because they should have been able to see this too, but let their ambitions and/or hatred of the Libs interfere with their perceptions, and we all have paid a terrible price for it.
Partisans and activists missing it are one thing, their own narrow mindsets make that understandable, but professional strategists and supposedly professional disinterested journalists whose beat is the political world, no, they I can not and will not forgive. I am not so arrogant as to think I alone saw all this coming and was able to warn of it back when it could make a difference and all these folks weren't.
You are one of the few Dippers I have any respect for these days Simon, because you did see the threat and you did try to get your fellows to see it for just how bad it really was, and that this was not the time for politics as usual. I do not know how many times I said I would have been fine with the power play Layton and the NDP were making against the Libs if it was the PCPC they were up against, but that Harper's CPC was something entirely different and far more dangerous.
You saw just how insidious the powers that Harper served were, and how much they were contemptuous of not just their usual political opponents/rivals but even much/most of their own base. That they served only themselves and their most narrow peak of the pyramid, especially the resource/energy pyramid. You understood that the threat Harper posed was not with a socon hidden agenda, but with the hidden agenda of destroying every progressive/centrist advancement from Pearson/Trudeau onwards, especially the concepts of a Just Society and one of communal cooperation. You at least tried as best you could to sound the alarm bells to your own, and that counts for a lot with me.
I know I am rehashing a fair bit here Simon, but I am one of the few voices that really tried to get across what Harper was, what he represented, and just how serious and dangerous a threat he was from even before he created the CPCP after assassinating the PCPC with the aid of traitor MacKay. I more than most truly was Cassandra, both in terms of foreseeing and in terms of how that foreseeing was treated by those I tried to tell. So it has left me a bit bitter about it all, I'm sorry and sad to say, but at least finally there are others truly seeing what I saw all along including in the national media and are finally doing the serious exposing of it that was needed a decade earlier. Better late than never may usually be true, but in this case, only time will tell, given the damage done by Harper. As my fears about just how bad it would be if he got into power were underestimating the reality so too I fear about my estimation of the damages done.
Party of One (Hardcover – Oct 21 2014)
by Michael Harris
http://www.amazon.ca/Party-One-Michael-Harris/dp/0670067016/
In Party of One, investigative journalist Michael Harris closely examines the majority government of a prime minister essentially unchecked by the opposition and empowered by the general election victory of May 2011. Harris looks at Harper’s policies, instincts, and the often breathtaking gap between his stated political principles and his practices.
[snip]
To access Harris' articles....if you don't have a subscription to www.ipolitics.ca
click on this link first:
http://www.nationalnewswatch.com/author/mharris/
I wonder what Harper's score would be:
Quiz: Are You A Narcissist?
http://time.com/3136687/narcissist-quiz/
I'm waiting for Harper's memoirs! haha Thanks for the info on Gutstein's book.......will check it out for sure. I have been following Michael Harris for quite sometime and I hope a second printing has been ordered as I'm sure the first will be a sell-out! I would love to meet your mother.
.. the Gutstein book is a must read.. unbelievable
Thank you, fellow Scotian.......I'm predicting that a few of the present Federal conservative members of parliament here in Nova Scotia will be losing their seats en masse.........soon!
I was wondering the same thing!
hi Scotian...you were indeed prescient, I can testify to that. You did see the danger sooner than most Canadians. As to why so many failed to see what might happen, especially in the MSM, that will have to await the passage of time, and the analysis of historians. My guess is that like a body that can't recognize a new virus, far too many Canadians didn't recognize the true nature of the Harper Cons.
Or where their morally depraved leader would take us. I'm willing to forgive that because it actually says something good about our country. But after eight years there can be no excuses. If people don't realize the threat now, they are either fooling themselves, or absolute idiots....
hi Kathleen....well it took Harper forever to write his boring book on hockey, so it will take a really long sentence if he is ever to finish his Prison Memoirs. And yes I think Harris' book will be a big seller. As for my Mum, I have to say that although I have given her many reasons to disown me, she has always supported me a hundred percent...
What's MSM?
Simon:
Everyone remembers the Cadman affair and cite it as the first real evidence of just how power corrupt Harper really was, and the first real warning sign, but I have always thought it was the Grewal recordings fraud that was the true first real evidence in terms of actions, and not just words, of just how far outside our laws Harper would go to gain let alone hold power. When a LOO takes recordings made by one of his MPs, has kept these recordings solely in CPC hands, claimed to have spent three weeks authenticating the recordings for completeness, accuracy, and identity, releases it claiming it confirmed what he had said in the House for three weeks of Ministers of the Crown bribing a sitting MP with a Senate seat in exchange for a vote, only to have it completely unravel almost immediately because it was obvious there was editing in that so called complete and uncut recording and over the next three weeks have it dribble out that the opposite was true, that the CPC MP tried to get a bribe of a Senate seat and the Ministers flatly rejected such, and then claimed it was all a conspiracy of the liberal media and Liberal war room, he has shown his true nature IMHO.
I made a HUGE stink about it and was roundly mocked because of it, but as I pointed out then, if a LOO is willing to at the absolute minimum use obviously edited recordings to falsely smear Ministers of the Crown with serious criminal allegations (and these were) for partisan purposes, and then once the fraud is revealed pretend it was all the other sides fault you have something very dangerous indeed. However, if that same LOO did that AND was responsible for the editing to make those false allegations appear true, swore to all Canadians that this was the honest truth, and then once exposed pretended it was all the media and Libs fault, then you had a leader whose contempt for the law and all civilized conduct meant nothing in the way of his lust for power, and if he would go that far while LOO, what such a man with the powers of a the PMO could and clearly would do was not to be allowed under any circumstances.
So of course I was again mocked by almost everyone for not letting this go, I referenced it many times in the early years of the Harper government precisely because it showed just how far Harper would go, and just how little our Parliamentary traditions, customs, and laws, both Parliamentary and election meant to him in his lust for power, and that he had already proven he would go farther than anyone else in our history. So by the time of the Cadman affair and the unprecedented contempt of Parliament action occurred in my view there was already enough for anyone not a partisan of Harper's to see exactly how far outside normal/traditional Canadian politics of any political persuasion Harper had shown himself to be.
to be concluded...
Conclusion:
I'll grant being a process geek gave me a bit of an edge is seeing the implications early on, but I am far from the only process geek out there, especially in the leadership of the national parties and the national political media, which is why I have such a hard time forgiving so many for their silence and complicity in his rise to dominance to be where he is today. I was never all that concerned about which party won or lost overall, so long as the process was respected I could live with the results, because respecting the process is respecting the rule of law, which I thought was a core belief of this nation and its citizenry. Of course I chose a side/party/candidate in each election, but it was always decided on the relevant issues of that election and where everyone at both the leader and candidate level stood. It was not until the rise of Harper and especially the treachery of the PCPC by MacKay and the birthed in deceit, treachery, and betrayal CPC that I became so single focused against Harper, and I guess I feel that if I was able to put aside my usual political practices to fight such a threat to us all I have little to no patience for those who were better placed to do so who failed utterly to do so.
I am hopeful that this election will see his demise and the reduction of his party to third party status, hopefully that will allow the old Red Tory/Real Canadian Conservatives to take control of that party and sweep out this Straussian horror that has dominated the party since inception. However, until I see this party gone from government I take nothing for granted, including the ability of our voters to even now understand just what kind lets be clear at this point demonstrated fascist we have as our PM, and the government that supports him in his actions.
Kathleen F:
I sure hope so, I have never seen as much anger in traditionally conservative elements of our society towards the Harper Government as I've been seeing over the past few years, including some that are now supportive of Trudeau who once swore that the name Trudeau and treachery were hand in hand. When you see those kinds of shifts in older voters, well, that says a lot.
Yes Gutstein's book is a must read. In it he does go into how if P.M. "lets go to war and kill them" harper had gone to the P.C. convention, which elected Mulroney as leader, with his platform, he would have been tossed out on his ass. Now look at us. harper actually makes Mulroney look good and I read Stevie Cameron's, "on the take, the Mulroney years".
Main Stream Media
Don't know about the title of Harper's memoir, but an excellent title for a journalist to use for a Harper biography would be:
Stephen Harper: An Inconvenient Democracy
I just bought this book. I can't wait to read it.
The unfortunate part of your Hate Harper™ crusade is that neither of the two Quebec-centric opposition leaders will win the confidence of Canadian voters, which means Harper will again win in 10/15, or sooner. The Lefty vote will again be split and the Conservatives will win up the middle.... believe it.
Cons and Dippers will tear down Trudeau because both hate the Liberals ... and besides, if the NDP aspires to govern, it must first kill the Liberal Beast. Jack Layton knew this and that's why he defeated the Martin minority government and crowned Stephen Harper as PM of all of Canada. Jack knew he had to lead the NDP through the Liberals before he could challenge the United Right.
The Libs and Dips cannot be merged into a United Left because the Liberals are thoroughly corrupted and not worthy to govern again. Justin is sucking up to the muslim vote big time and won't even call the two "terrorists"; he just whitewashes them as "murderers" who have no connection to Islam! Justin is a devious puppet and controlled by dark forces in corporate Quebec... even worse than Harper's Alberta cabal.
While you attack Harper, the real enemy is Trudeau the Quebec French supremacist who would be even worse than Harper .... believe that too ....!!!!
Current polls reveal that Trudeau's rock star celebrity is recovering all the soft lefty liberals who were attracted to Layton over the years... and now they are flocking back to heartthrob Justin and boosting Liberals in the polls. NDP must soon begin vicious attack ads to destroy the Liberal honeymoon with Canadians before it's too late.
A PM Trudeau would be much worse than PM Harper because Justin is controlled by Quebec and Maritime interests... as represented by Scotian... so obvious.
Donald Gutstein's new book, Harperism, is a serious study of Canada's descent into neo-liberalism and consequent abandon of democracy, democratic ideals and debate, democratic institutions, and decency. Please place it on your bookshelf next to Michael Harris' Party of One.
Started reading Gutstein's book TODAY!
"And yes, as I've always called him, he is a real MONSTER"... apparently even his wife can't stand him and looks elsewhere at times! Is he still not wearing his wedding ring?
The paperback edition of "Party of One" will be released in September 2015 just before the election.Rather strange it has taken so long.
Now we are likely to send soldiers into the Ukraine but they won't be in combat Kenny says.Where have we heard that before???????????????????????????
The problem I see is…. that the only people reading these books, are the ones who already know what Harper is like. The loyal, brainwashed people who vote for him never read anything that puts him in a bad light. So they will continue to vote for their hero.
Harper has got to be gone-why is he still allowed to continue his destruction of our people and our country . innocent people young and old are silenced every day yet he is allowed to continue. Harper is not Canada -Canada is not Harper- he should be exiled to the states the country he admires so much-I'm sure they will be able to stop him.
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