Oh. My. Furry. Photo-op. It was supposed to be the animal show of animal shows.
The Con Ministry of Propaganda and Disinformation's most spectacular production.
A chance to boost Great Ugly Leader's sagging polls, by making him look as cute and as cuddly as a giant panda.
But somehow, despite the heroic efforts of the marching band, and the FedEx cheerleaders, it just didn't work.
Sometimes these days when I look at the horror that is Harperland, I can't help feeling like that other Simon in Lord of the Flies.
Who realized that The Monster the other boys were hunting with their wooden spears didn't exist.
And that the real monster was THEM.
Dear Chief Spence
I was so happy to hear that you will be ending your long hunger strike.
Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence has decided to end her six-week-long hunger strike after members of the Assembly of First Nations and the Liberal and New Democrat caucuses agreed to back a list of commitments supporting aboriginal issues.
For you have endured enough, your people need you, and you don't need to die for your great struggle to go forward, stronger than ever.
I was glad to see that Idle No More's Day of Action took the movement's message to Canadians.
Loudly but peacefully.
From downtown Toronto to Vancouver Island, protesters ramped up weeks of demonstrations to another level, still peaceful, stopping traffic on busy highways and major rail lines, forcing Canadians to stop and listen.
Once upon a time when I thought about the plight of our First Nations, I used to think that George Bernard Shaw was right:
"The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them but to be indifferent to them. That is the essence of inhumanity."
But now I see that in Canada we've managed to do both. We were indifferent to them for so long, and now that they cannot be ignored, the hate is extraordinary.
One of the many things the Idle No More movement has done is force many Canadians to stare at the face of the real Canada.
And in the process take a good look at themselves.
But what I can't help but wonder is now that they have, do they like what they see?
Because I don't, I'm horrified.
Oh boy. I sure picked the wrong day to be felled by the flu eh? Because I wanted so much to be there.
But even on the small TV in my death bed bedroom, it was an awesome and inspiring spectacle.
As members of the federal government and First Nations community met behind closed doors today, demonstrators marched in communities across Canada in support of the Idle No More movement, echoing calls from a hunger striking Ontario chief for indigenous sovereignty.
There was an incredibly revealing moment today. A moment that summed up the way many in the MSM have been going after Chief Spence and the Idle No More movement.
And like it has been all along, it was both banal and brutal.
Well I think it's safe to say that it was quite a day in my home and native's land eh?
As if the great Ojibwa Mishipeshu of Lake Superior was thrashing its tail around and causing a great confusion.
Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence says she won't be at a meeting Friday between First Nations leaders and Prime Minister Stephen Harper because Gov. Gen. David Johnston isn't attending.
As the great rising continues, I see that a Global TV crew has been kicked out of Attawapiskat.
A Global News crew was escorted off the Attawapiskat reserve in northern Ontario and threatened with arrest after trying to do a story on living conditions in the community.
And while on the one hand I'm sorry about that, because I want as many Canadians as possible to see how many First Nations people live. So they can better understand why they are rising.
On the other hand I can't blame Chief Spence and the people of that poor little community for being angry at the media.
Well it's not in the Book of Chaos, the 200-page handbook the Cons once put out to disrupt the opposition, and shut down committees.
But it clearly comes from the same cesspool of depravity.
From the same Con operatives who brought you Stephen Harper's catalogue of dirty tricks.
From those in the PMO who would produce along with their talking points, a handy guide to follow in case of an emergency. Or the sudden need to smear an opponent.
Well say what you like about Stephen Harper. Call him the Crime Minister or the devil himself.
But nobody can deny that he's consistent eh?
One moment he's waging a war of wills with a starving woman who represents some of the poorest people in Canada.
Or boasting about the eleven thousand government jobs he has killed.
The next moment he's waging war on the unemployed.
Beginning Sunday, people on EI face stricter, more complex rules for keeping their benefits, with the goal of getting unemployed workers back into the workforce sooner.
Even though that could cause mass misery all over the country, especially in Atlantic Canada.
The Atlantic premiers say the new rules could have a devastating effect on fishery, farming and tourism industries which are all seasonal jobs.
And they're concerned that if people are encouraged to leave home to take other jobs, they won't come back.
For if the NDP asks how low did the Cons go in 2012? The answer is you ain't seen nothing yet.
And I just hope that Canadians understand that it's all ONE struggle.
That everything the Harper regime does is aimed at achieving the same thing. Killing government, scrapping environmental regulations, attacking unions, turning us into a low-wage economy, making Canada safe for Big Oil, and selling us out to foreign interests.
And that if the moment of truth has arrived for Canada's First Nations.
No one in Canada knows better than its aboriginals that a moment of truth has arrived for both them and the land. For good or ill, an explosion of development quivers over the West and the Arctic. Huge fortunes will be made by a few, great change will be ushered in, and the environment will be altered forever. Either the aboriginals make their stand now, or they will be eternally bypassed.
The plain fact of the matter is that aboriginal anger builds slowly underground before the volcano of frustration erupts. These are patient — not docile — people.
It has also arrived for the rest of us. For unless we speak out now as loudly as the Idle No More movement is doing, we too will wake up in a country we don't recognize. A country with poisoned lakes and rivers. A country run by foreigners that looks like a jungle.
Oh sure. I know a lot of Canadians can't relate to the struggle of our First Nations. But they will, they will.
For the revolt against the Con regime has begun. Fate has determined that the Idle No More movement should lead the way.
And until the rest of us hit the streets with our banners and our drums.
Because I'm ready eh?
These are the glorious sounds of the great Canadian resistance...
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If Stephen Harper thought his grudging offer to meet with the AFN Chiefs would defuse the Idle No More movement, he couldn't have been more wrong.
From Sydney to Cornwall to Vancouver.
Because you can't stop a movement whose time has come eh?
Or it seems stop Christie Blatchford from smearing those in the movement as terrorists. Or suggesting they could threaten the future of Canada, by comparing what is going on to Douglas Bland's third-rate apocalyptic novel Uprising.
In all my years of watching Stephen Harper I have rarely seen him looking so frustrated and so humiliated.
But there he was today at a ridiculous photo-op in a Ford factory, looking like was about to implode.
And no wonder.
For some ghastly reason I couldn't help wondering tonight what Stephen Harper is eating while Chief Theresa Spence dies of hunger.
As Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence continues her hunger strike, a critical care doctor is warning that the human body begins to break down after such a long period without food.
Jones said after three weeks with no food, a person is "very vulnerable" to infections in the lungs and stomach, which can turn "rapidly fatal."
Because you know he does LOVE to eat, and he just gave his personal chef a raise.
One can only imagine what Stephen Harper is thinking as he watches Chief Theresa Spence getting weaker and weaker.
Is there even a flicker of sympathy in his cold dead eyes, or is it all false pride or cold calculation?
Is he appealing to the racism of his rabid base?
Golly. It's hard to believe that the horrible year of 2012 in Harperland is finally almost over.
And that I'm still standing.
For if on this day in 2010 I wrote this:
It was the worst of years. The year when the crazed tyrant Stephen Harper ripped a giant hole in the fabric of Canada, chewed on its heart and its liver, and lied through his bloody teeth.
This year was even WORSE.
One day historians, or forensic psychiatrists, will no doubt argue over why Stephen Harper was prepared to let Chief Theresa Spence die.
Was it because that cold, cruel, man couldn't feel the pain of others?
Or was it because he was a coward?
As Chief Theresa Spence enters the 16th day of her hunger strike, with Stephen Harper still refusing to meet her, I see his inaction is causing some old Canadian demons to take flight.
Flying out of their internet caves like bats, and emitting bigot sounds.
When I woke up today and saw that it had snowed, for the first time this winter, I felt like I was back in Canada eh?
Because I can't imagine winter in the Great White North without snow. Just like I can't imagine this country without the Québécois or the First Nations.
So I can't understand why a Canadian Prime Minister would refuse to meet with a chief from one of those nations, even though his pride might kill her.
