I've been so busy recently that I somehow forgot that it has now been ten years since one of the worst nights of my life.
The night when Stephen Harper finally won his glorious majority, his "strong, stable, national, majority Conservative government."
And set out to change Canada beyond recognition.
With the most horrifying assault on our precious values this country has ever seen.
The day after that night of horror, Heather Mallick wrote this in the Guardian:
The triumph of Harper's Conservatives is a revolution in Canada. Grumpy old men are happy but modernists, women, young people, immigrants, people fond of evidence-based policy will be much less so. It's the beginning of a kind of war, conducted in a dull, quietly agonizing way.
And that's exactly what happened. It was a war, it was agonizing, and it was horrifying.
And what makes it even more horrifying is that although Justin Trudeau was able to bring down the Con monster, and send him flying into the garbage can of history.
And was also able to restore many of our Canadian values.
I think that Harper did manage to change this country almost beyond recognition.
He made it an uglier, greedier place, much more American than it was before. He attacked the rights of women and LGBT Canadians. He declared war on scientists, and worshipped at the feet of Big Oil.
He pitted Canadians against each other, with his never ending wedge issues. And never stopped trying to jail as many of them as possible.
It was an absolute horror show, Harper and his Con cult corrupted this country in every possible way, and the bestial Trump years only corrupted it further.
Which helps explain, to me at least, why as some Canadians risk their lives on the front lines of the pandemic, others don't give a damn about their lives, or the lives of the elderly and the vulnerable.
Choosing instead to act like selfish beasts, or the worst kind of Americans.
Which makes this song, Land You Love by Hey Rosetta! and Yukon Blonde, written to inspire Canadians for the final battle against the Harper regime in October 2015 so poignant...
What have we lost, poisoned, or crushed? What highest hopes were stolen from us? What holy rolling hills were cut into dust? What voices were stifled, silenced, scared and carried off?
And so inspiring.
Now is the time (oh) When a change has to come (oh) For you to draw a line (oh) And to fight for the land you love
Which is just as well, for in a few months we will have to defend our Canada once more, this time from this brutish Con beast, this Harper stooge, who would take it back from us again.
And we will have to teach him and his ugly Cons a lesson they will never forget.
Omitted from this national day of mourning is the NDP's role in that disaster, which they will never apologize for and haven't given up on trying to repeat. Fortunately, as P.J. Fournier points out in his latest polling analysis, the NDP are pretty much the Nothing but Defunct Party -- particularly in La Belle Province.
Hopefully Trudeau can get the majority back, so that he doesn't have to deal with the kind of obstructionism that's been taking place in this deranged minority parliament. The assault on Guilbeault over the web giants bill being just one example. But the smear campaigns in the committee star chambers are arguably far more egregious. Go look what they're tweeting on the Vance matter. They're depraved.
But they are, of course, following in the footsteps of Le Bon Jackboot, who was Harper's best friend and useful idiot in the CRAP fascists' march toward destruction. It's long overdue that he stops being such a sacred cow and unimpeachable deity in Canadian politics. The man was complicit in plunging the country into despair just to make himself and his cult of personality relevant. He was Bernie before there was Bernie, a self-serving egotist if there ever was one. "Nach Harper, Uns." More power to Trudeau for being the catalyst for their orange wave to get, well, orange crushed.
https://thewalrus.ca/fake-left-go-right/
From where I sit, it looks to me like Harper's gutter-level nastiness rubbed off on the Dippers as much as it has the blue meanies in his "party of one". Their best results have been Con majorities that rendered them useless. But they don't care, as long as they get to spew their hate of Trudeau and own the Libs. They have never climbed down from their outlier high of 2011 and never gotten over their grudge about losing the brass ring in 2015. And probably never will.
I'm getting antsy for an election. It's time to throw the Cons and their enabling sidekicks of the New Deplorable Party in the rubbish bin once and for all.
Hi Jackie....I had written a whole section on the NDP in this post, but after thinking it over I cut it all out, which is something I very rarely do. What I wanted to do was debunk the myth of the Orange Wave. I wanted to explain that the reason Quebecers suddenly went for the NDP had nothing to do with the party’s policies or their affection for Jack Layton. The reason they did was because they realized the Ignatieff Liberals were not going to be able to prevent the hated Harper from snatching a majority. So it was definitely more like a desperate one-night stand rather than a love affair, and as you can see today it’s unlikely to be repeated. And as for the fake scandals, they didn’t work last time and during a pandemic are likely to be even less effective, and probably even counterproductive...
Hi anon....Thank you for that list of Harper’s crimes against Canada. But since I attacked Harper and his filthy Con regime almost every day for ten years, I think I have most of them memorized. 😉
The anniversary of the little dictator's majority is something I'd rather forget but in hindsight, we must never forget it. Canada's experimentation in autocracy was a corrupted and complete failure but the damage that was done is still being corrected today and the odious remnants of Harperism is rife within this putrid far right gaggle of assholes. Assholes may be a harsh description but one only needs to follow their actions and behaviors to see that that is what they are. Same as their GOP relatives. I swear that being an asshole must be a prerequisite to joining the Cons and GOP these days. What is worth celebrating though is that our democratic institutions stood up to Harper's flagrant abuses of power at every turn and after 4 years of dictatorship, Canadians had had enough and kicked his sorry ass to the curb. The worst PM in Canada's history who despised JT, was beaten by him. Can't get much sweeter than that. JD
Hello Simon, I haven't visited your blog since after the last federal election, and for that, I apologize. Blame it on spending lots (too much?) time reading the Patheos channels of Hemant Mehta, Cassidy McGillicuddy, and others! Is it fitting that I'm saying what I have to say on "The National Day of Reason" (the first Thursday in May)? I really didn't plan it that way. Honest!
Anyway, the one aspect I have been tracking is the absolute attempt of the religious right to take over and destroy the U.S. with their bigotry and hatred. From what I've observed since we suffered under that religious fundaMENTAList Steven Harper, is those same bigots are trying to do the same thing here through twisted religious-based right-wing hate-laced organizations like "Campaign Life Coalition" and "CitizenGo" run by dangerous religious fanatics Jack Fonseca and David Cooke. Harper took his orders from these religious bigots, and thankfully, they also got him kicked out when the voters in Canada finally woke up to the damage Harper and his band of bigots and misogynists were doing to this country.
In the last federal election, I made clear several issues that were very important to me as a voter. I made clear to any candidate running in that last election is that I will not support any party that does not believe in the separation of church and state, and I wanted section 13 of the Human Rights Code reinstated. I also wanted laws created, laws similar to the American laws created under "The Johnson Amendment", that stripped the charitable status of any non-profit organizations who became politically active in elections. My main target with that was religious organizations. People electing dangerous religious bible-thumpers like Sammy Oosterhoff to the Ontario legislature is proof why religious organizations must be banned from becoming politically active. As you can guess, the candidates from the three parties of bigotry, the Conservative Party of Canada, The People's Party of Canada, and The Christian Heritage Party, or as I call them, The Christian Hate Party, all told me to get lost. Well, guess what! Those religious-based hate groups, Campaign Life Coalition and CitizenGo are both strong backers of Mr. Scheer in the last election, and are strongly backing Mr. O'Toole in the next election.
Speaking of Mr. O'Toole, I caught his political campaign ads on TV. Are they even legal? I also visited his website. Oh wow! The way it goes on about O'Toole makes you want to throw up! I fully expected there to be a claim he was born through immaculate conception and a virgin birth! As it was, there was a spot at the end of his website that allowed for comments. I posted one, not that I expected anything to come of it. I made a statement that I choose the candidate that best represents me, and the issues I stand for. I then asked two questions. I could have asked ten! With my first question, I asked where Mr. O'Toole stood on the separation of church and state. My second question was about where Mr. O'Toole stood regarding creating laws like the American Johnson Amendment to govern and prevent non-profits from becoming politically active. I should have brought up the re-instatement of Section 13, but chose to concentrate on the first two. I posed those questions back on March 5th. The fact that they know my phone number and my e-mail address, there has been no response. That tells me that Erin O'Toole is a bible-thumping bigot, and he and the Conservative Party of Canada are not, and never will be fit to govern Canada.
Simon, just stopping by while I nurse off the effects of my second shot. Apparently Katie is going to the Defence committee star chamber tomorrow. Do you think this is a good idea, hoping to close it off, or will it just keep the story going unnecessarily?
I really hope she doesn't take it upon herself to fall on the sword for this smear campaign like Gerry did. Trudeau has really gone to the mat to defend her, and the Cons were utterly vile in yesterday's QP, making ugly insinuations all the while smearing Trudeau as a "fake feminist."
I hope this doesn't backfire. Cons were the ones who failed those women but they want to hang it all on her. And no matter what she says, the media will twist it or intentionally omit anything that might vindicate the government. They've already tried and convicted the Liberals in the court of public opinion, while letting O'Toole get off with nary a slap on the wrist.
Pontius Pilate press, the whole lot of them. I hate their guts.
Hi JD....I would love to be able to banish Harper from my mind, for I feel that he stole almost ten years of my life, and enough is enough. But as you say his influence on the Cons remains as strong as ever. He built a cult and his divisive ways survive and are still poisoning this country. My fear is that many Canadians have forgotten how close to fascism we came, and as they say, those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it...
Hi Cynical Guy...Nice to hear from you again, and I’m glad to know that you are continuing the good fight. The religious right has never been more powerful and more of a threat to our democracy. Andrew Scheer helped recruit many new religious fanatics, and O’Toole who owes them his victory has made it clear he will not take them on. He had to expel Derek Sloan, but only because he had gone so far over the line that he had no choice. And about two weeks ago when one of his SoCons ,Tamara Jansen , called LGBT people “unclean” In a committee meeting, he didn’t even reprimand her, he joined her in celebrating some religious holiday. And needless to say our useless media has done nothing to hold the Cons accountable. Also many Canadians don’t know that O’Toole has always been a SoCon himself. He may not be as extreme, or as open as the others, but given a chance he could do this country great harm. So we are in for quite a fight again....
Hi Jackie....I think it’s probably a good idea for Telford to appear at that Con Star Chamber. Whenever she has appeared in public she makes the Cons look like slobbering Neanderthals, and I’m pretty confident she can do that again. Also The Cons have been trying to smear Trudeau as a fake feminist, and they won’t be able to smear Telford in the same manner. And if they try they will end up looking like the foul bullies they are, and do themselves serious political damage. The Vance story could also backfire on the Cons because both Harper and O’Toole had such a big role in his point meant, even though he was under investigation. So I think their desperation could could cost them....
Saw one of the Tory ads on my Youtube Feed. Funny how they slam Trudeau for not closing the borders and letting the COVID variants in, but not mention how all the Tory premiers dropped the ball on dealing with CoVID turning Alberta to Ontario into a CoVID red zone.
I can only laugh at these ads, considering how Andy Scheer and the rest of the Tory party treated COVID as a joke and whose behavior would have turned Canada's numbers per capita into the US under Trump.
Trudeau and his government have made some mistakes, but I would rather see them running things while Dougie and the rest of the Resistance is Futile proved they just aren't ready.
Omitted from this national day of mourning is the NDP's role in that disaster, which they will never apologize for and haven't given up on trying to repeat. Fortunately, as P.J. Fournier points out in his latest polling analysis, the NDP are pretty much the Nothing but Defunct Party -- particularly in La Belle Province.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/338canada-what-is-left-of-the-orange-wave-in-quebec-not-much/
Hopefully Trudeau can get the majority back, so that he doesn't have to deal with the kind of obstructionism that's been taking place in this deranged minority parliament. The assault on Guilbeault over the web giants bill being just one example. But the smear campaigns in the committee star chambers are arguably far more egregious. Go look what they're tweeting on the Vance matter. They're depraved.
But they are, of course, following in the footsteps of Le Bon Jackboot, who was Harper's best friend and useful idiot in the CRAP fascists' march toward destruction. It's long overdue that he stops being such a sacred cow and unimpeachable deity in Canadian politics. The man was complicit in plunging the country into despair just to make himself and his cult of personality relevant. He was Bernie before there was Bernie, a self-serving egotist if there ever was one. "Nach Harper, Uns." More power to Trudeau for being the catalyst for their orange wave to get, well, orange crushed.
https://thewalrus.ca/fake-left-go-right/
From where I sit, it looks to me like Harper's gutter-level nastiness rubbed off on the Dippers as much as it has the blue meanies in his "party of one". Their best results have been Con majorities that rendered them useless. But they don't care, as long as they get to spew their hate of Trudeau and own the Libs. They have never climbed down from their outlier high of 2011 and never gotten over their grudge about losing the brass ring in 2015. And probably never will.
I'm getting antsy for an election. It's time to throw the Cons and their enabling sidekicks of the New Deplorable Party in the rubbish bin once and for all.
Take a look through this list of Harper abuses: https://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2015/08/10/Harper-Abuses-of-Power-Final/
ReplyDeleteIt's like Harper's Cons were a test lab for Trump's GQP - it's amazing how many anti-democratic measures were tried here first!
Hi Jackie....I had written a whole section on the NDP in this post, but after thinking it over I cut it all out, which is something I very rarely do. What I wanted to do was debunk the myth of the Orange Wave. I wanted to explain that the reason Quebecers suddenly went for the NDP had nothing to do with the party’s policies or their affection for Jack Layton. The reason they did was because they realized the Ignatieff Liberals were not going to be able to prevent the hated Harper from snatching a majority. So it was definitely more like a desperate one-night stand rather than a love affair, and as you can see today it’s unlikely to be repeated. And as for the fake scandals, they didn’t work last time and during a pandemic are likely to be even less effective, and probably even counterproductive...
ReplyDeleteHi anon....Thank you for that list of Harper’s crimes against Canada. But since I attacked Harper and his filthy Con regime almost every day for ten years, I think I have most of them memorized. 😉
ReplyDeleteOMG, our own 21st century Benedict Arnold.
ReplyDeletehttps://thinkingaboot.blogspot.com/2014/01/battlefield-shapers.html
The anniversary of the little dictator's majority is something I'd rather forget but in hindsight, we must never forget it. Canada's experimentation in autocracy was a corrupted and complete failure but the damage that was done is still being corrected today and the odious remnants of Harperism is rife within this putrid far right gaggle of assholes. Assholes may be a harsh description but one only needs to follow their actions and behaviors to see that that is what they are. Same as their GOP relatives. I swear that being an asshole must be a prerequisite to joining the Cons and GOP these days.
ReplyDeleteWhat is worth celebrating though is that our democratic institutions stood up to Harper's flagrant abuses of power at every turn and after 4 years of dictatorship, Canadians had had enough and kicked his sorry ass to the curb. The worst PM in Canada's history who despised JT, was beaten by him. Can't get much sweeter than that.
JD
Hello Simon, I haven't visited your blog since after the last federal election, and for that, I apologize. Blame it on spending lots (too much?) time reading the Patheos channels of Hemant Mehta, Cassidy McGillicuddy, and others! Is it fitting that I'm saying what I have to say on "The National Day of Reason" (the first Thursday in May)? I really didn't plan it that way. Honest!
ReplyDeleteAnyway, the one aspect I have been tracking is the absolute attempt of the religious right to take over and destroy the U.S. with their bigotry and hatred. From what I've observed since we suffered under that religious fundaMENTAList Steven Harper, is those same bigots are trying to do the same thing here through twisted religious-based right-wing hate-laced organizations like "Campaign Life Coalition" and "CitizenGo" run by dangerous religious fanatics Jack Fonseca and David Cooke. Harper took his orders from these religious bigots, and thankfully, they also got him kicked out when the voters in Canada finally woke up to the damage Harper and his band of bigots and misogynists were doing to this country.
In the last federal election, I made clear several issues that were very important to me as a voter. I made clear to any candidate running in that last election is that I will not support any party that does not believe in the separation of church and state, and I wanted section 13 of the Human Rights Code reinstated. I also wanted laws created, laws similar to the American laws created under "The Johnson Amendment", that stripped the charitable status of any non-profit organizations who became politically active in elections. My main target with that was religious organizations. People electing dangerous religious bible-thumpers like Sammy Oosterhoff to the Ontario legislature is proof why religious organizations must be banned from becoming politically active. As you can guess, the candidates from the three parties of bigotry, the Conservative Party of Canada, The People's Party of Canada, and The Christian Heritage Party, or as I call them, The Christian Hate Party, all told me to get lost. Well, guess what! Those religious-based hate groups, Campaign Life Coalition and CitizenGo are both strong backers of Mr. Scheer in the last election, and are strongly backing Mr. O'Toole in the next election.
Speaking of Mr. O'Toole, I caught his political campaign ads on TV. Are they even legal? I also visited his website. Oh wow! The way it goes on about O'Toole makes you want to throw up! I fully expected there to be a claim he was born through immaculate conception and a virgin birth! As it was, there was a spot at the end of his website that allowed for comments. I posted one, not that I expected anything to come of it. I made a statement that I choose the candidate that best represents me, and the issues I stand for. I then asked two questions. I could have asked ten! With my first question, I asked where Mr. O'Toole stood on the separation of church and state. My second question was about where Mr. O'Toole stood regarding creating laws like the American Johnson Amendment to govern and prevent non-profits from becoming politically active. I should have brought up the re-instatement of Section 13, but chose to concentrate on the first two. I posed those questions back on March 5th. The fact that they know my phone number and my e-mail address, there has been no response. That tells me that Erin O'Toole is a bible-thumping bigot, and he and the Conservative Party of Canada are not, and never will be fit to govern Canada.
Simon, just stopping by while I nurse off the effects of my second shot. Apparently Katie is going to the Defence committee star chamber tomorrow. Do you think this is a good idea, hoping to close it off, or will it just keep the story going unnecessarily?
ReplyDeleteI really hope she doesn't take it upon herself to fall on the sword for this smear campaign like Gerry did. Trudeau has really gone to the mat to defend her, and the Cons were utterly vile in yesterday's QP, making ugly insinuations all the while smearing Trudeau as a "fake feminist."
I hope this doesn't backfire. Cons were the ones who failed those women but they want to hang it all on her. And no matter what she says, the media will twist it or intentionally omit anything that might vindicate the government. They've already tried and convicted the Liberals in the court of public opinion, while letting O'Toole get off with nary a slap on the wrist.
Pontius Pilate press, the whole lot of them. I hate their guts.
Hi JD....I would love to be able to banish Harper from my mind, for I feel that he stole almost ten years of my life, and enough is enough. But as you say his influence on the Cons remains as strong as ever. He built a cult and his divisive ways survive and are still poisoning this country. My fear is that many Canadians have forgotten how close to fascism we came, and as they say, those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it...
ReplyDeleteHi Cynical Guy...Nice to hear from you again, and I’m glad to know that you are continuing the good fight. The religious right has never been more powerful and more of a threat to our democracy. Andrew Scheer helped recruit many new religious fanatics, and O’Toole who owes them his victory has made it clear he will not take them on. He had to expel Derek Sloan, but only because he had gone so far over the line that he had no choice. And about two weeks ago when one of his SoCons ,Tamara Jansen , called LGBT people “unclean” In a committee meeting, he didn’t even reprimand her, he joined her in celebrating some religious holiday. And needless to say our useless media has done nothing to hold the Cons accountable. Also many Canadians don’t know that O’Toole has always been a SoCon himself. He may not be as extreme, or as open as the others, but given a chance he could do this country great harm. So we are in for quite a fight again....
ReplyDeleteHi Jackie....I think it’s probably a good idea for Telford to appear at that Con Star Chamber. Whenever she has appeared in public she makes the Cons look like slobbering Neanderthals, and I’m pretty confident she can do that again. Also The Cons have been trying to smear Trudeau as a fake feminist, and they won’t be able to smear Telford in the same manner. And if they try they will end up looking like the foul bullies they are, and do themselves serious political damage. The Vance story could also backfire on the Cons because both Harper and O’Toole had such a big role in his point meant, even though he was under investigation. So I think their desperation could could cost them....
ReplyDeleteSaw one of the Tory ads on my Youtube Feed. Funny how they slam Trudeau for not closing the borders and letting the COVID variants in, but not mention how all the Tory premiers dropped the ball on dealing with CoVID turning Alberta to Ontario into a CoVID red zone.
ReplyDeleteI can only laugh at these ads, considering how Andy Scheer and the rest of the Tory party treated COVID as a joke and whose behavior would have turned Canada's numbers per capita into the US under Trump.
Trudeau and his government have made some mistakes, but I would rather see them running things while Dougie and the rest of the Resistance is Futile proved they just aren't ready.