Why Chris Alexander Should Resign Immediately

After keeping a low profile for a few days, and no doubt trying to forget the ghastly image of that poor little boy on the beach, he's out there again.

Cheerfully tweeting away...



And giving us a big thumbs up.

But in his private moments Chris Alexander must be haunted by the ghost of Alan Kurdi.

Because it turns out Alexander knew much more about the plight of the Kurdi family, and what led to that tragedy, than he has ever admitted.

And he cannot escape his full measure of responsibility.

It’s quite true that the initial (and immediately rectified) rushes of the story inadvertently conflated an application on behalf of Mohammad Kurdi’s family with a complex set of correspondence to Citizenship and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander on behalf of both families. But what has since emerged from Alexander’s own files is a closer proximity between the dead boy on the beach and the handling by Alexander’s office of the Kurdi families’ predicament than it appeared even at first.  

Yes, Alan and his brother Ghalib and their mother Rehanna drowned when their life raft swamped shortly after setting out from Bodrum, Turkey, for the Greek island of Kos, a mere 12 sea miles away, leaving Abdullah Kurdi the only survivor. But it is more than a stretch to assert that the tragedy had nothing to do with us, as the paper trail in the case clearly shows.

He knew that Alan's aunt was trying to bring his father Abdullah's family, and his uncle Mohammad's family to Canada. He knew that Mohammad's family was desperate.

On April 9, Alexander was made aware that the condition of Mohammad’s family had worsened and grown more urgent. Two of the children were working in a factory but were only occasionally being paid. “The family is now starving,” Alexander was informed in writing, “as they do not have enough to buy food… we beg you to intervene and assist in saving this family.”

He knew that the fate of one family was tied to the other...



Alexander and his officials knew, all along, that the application for Abdullah’s family hinged on the approval of the application for Mohammad’s family. They were also aware that neither family had a chance without ministerial intervention to exempt them from a Catch-22 document requirement that it was impossible for the families to fulfil in Turkey. 

Finally, they knew that Tima Kurdi and her G5 co-sponsors intended to apply for Mohammad Kurdi’s family first, and then Abdullah Kurdi and his family – even if it took years to raise the funds to resettle them here in Canada.

But still he did nothing. And why?

Because he knew that his morally depraved leader Stephen Harper had decreed that refugees should be treated like the ENEMY...



To pleasure his bloodthirsty bigoted base, and other Canadians too scared or too miserly to offer those suffering people a safe haven. 

Just 36 per cent of Canadians think the federal government should allow more refugees from Syria, according to polling by EKOS Research. “There is a very large number of Canadians that are saying we have to be very careful about who we bring into this country,” says Kyle Matthews, senior deputy director of the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies at Concordia University. 

“One of the reasons which no one is really talking about, but it’s playing out in Europe, is that there’s concern about the ability to integrate Muslim refugees.”

Now I don't know if that poll is accurate. I hope it isn't. Because if it is it would shatter a lot of illusions I had about this country, that I want to be seen as brave, noble, and decent.

But what I do know is that if that poll is half right, Stephen Harper and his Australian attack dingo Lynton Crosby will try to use this human tragedy as yet another wedge issue to try to win the election...



As that dingo or flying monkey has always done.

"The hallmarks of the Crosby campaign are negative campaigning, often around race or immigration. It's the type of campaigning that involves really tearing at the fabric of society for shorter term political gains."

And what I also know is that Jason Kenney is playing the same dirty game by inventing absurd excuses to rule out airlifts. 

Airlifting Syrian refugees en masse is not one of the measures Stephen Harper's Conservatives are contemplating as they prepare to announce new measures to expedite the process for resettling refugees to Canada, says Defence Minister Jason Kenney. In an interview airing Saturday on CBC Radio's The House, Kenney ruled out the refugee airlifts proposed by the party's political rivals, saying it would be "imprudent" for Canada to do so.

While at the same time missing no opportunity to pleasure the Con's religious base...

Conservatives will continue to prioritize the resettlement of refugees from ethnic and religious minorities, which Kenney said his government has deemed as "the most vulnerable." "They are not typically in the camps because, by definition, they are minorities and many don't feel safe there," he said.

Like only a Con could...



The one who used to brag all the time about those shiny new C-17s, until the time came to use them.

And yes, Terry Glavin is right:

Anyone who breathes a sigh of relief that Canada turned out not to be so directly implicated in the death of little Alan and his brother and his mother: They’re deluded. Anyone who imagines that Canada is off the hook for the shame, the agony and the hopelessness that Mohammad and his family continue to endure, then there is something dangerously wrong with them.

But it doesn't just apply to Alexander, who if he had a decent bone in his body would resign immediately. 

And who will never escape the ghost of Alan Kurdi and his doomed family...



It applies to all of them. Those who play the dirty game. And those who support them, and by so doing shame this country and its values.

But of course, most of all it applies to Stephen Harper, whose moral depravity has corrupted them so many beyond recognition...



And would turn this big beautiful country into small ugly one full of frightened people.

And all I can say is thank goodness that there are only thirty-seven days before we can finally defeat that beast.

Rescue thousands of desperate refugees, and our precious values.

And make this country, our Canada, noble and decent again...

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