Tag: News, Politics, Events

Election Watch: Tories

It took some coaxing from certain parties but here is a link to the March 2005 Policy Declaration of the Conservative Party of Canada. I do not seem to be able to actually save the document and even my operatives deep within the Big Blue Blob had difficulty locating the document on the rather badly laid out CPC website so read it while you can.

Update: I have had a quick look through and am not drastically concerned except for all the wingy property rights things not to mention a federalism (aka constitutional) review of the needs of those poor Western Canadians (aka the rich Albertans!). Here is a list of some of the highlights as far as I am concerned:

    Apparently, you will not be encouraged to be an autonomous slacker under Tory rule. Being yourself is not part of well being, just money, money, money and I, me, mine. Nothing to fear as a constitutional amendment will never never never pass. It is nutty dreamerism of those with to pretend that their Audi and cottage on the lake is worth the same protection as the independent media or those personal characteristics which are used by discriminating state agencies against individuals.

  • Tighter breach of public trust provisions are fine and the Tories will be able to consult with their own incarcerated Senator on the idea.
  • Big science projects are the best science projects. I love big science.
  • I am happy living with the health care and pharmacare principles which include universal access and public funding but public and private delivery as well as catastrophic illness drug coverage.
  • The principle of respect for provincial jurisdiction over housing and immigration gets a little confused as deals with municipalities appear to be on the table.
  • I have no idea what it means that Parliment will run foreign affairs matters. Leadership by disfunctional committee in time of crisis. Brilliant.

So all in all the best thing is it is all there for you to see. I will have to see whether the other parties can pull our a broad ranging paper on what they stand for. Operatives behind the blue wall inform me that this document will form the basis for the election platform in the next election. I may think some of it is nuttsy Alberta speak but at least it is speaking. So not more hidden agenda talk from me. It is all there and some of it is scary but no scarier than those guys who date or married your female pals from undergrad who monopolize dinner parties boring everyone with softie rightist monologues on whatever. Do you want to see that guy on TV every night with PM after his name?

47 seconds later…

Paul Martin did very well. But he’ll lose the election.

Harper did not do well. There is nothing stopping Paul Martin from the TV spot and Harper was wrong to imply here was any type of convention relating to the Prime Minister presenting on the TV. Harper wrongly said that Martin asked to be the one to fix the scandal. Martin said the opposite. He said he will call the election for 30 days after the final report. In the election in June or January, we may all learn what duds the Grits are but we will also get another bucketful of twisty Harper. And then likely a minority Tory government.

Mailbox Money

I recalled this morning, reading about the sponsorship inquiry from a certain distance…because I am down here…that twice in my young and fawn-like life I have actually heard about the same sort of thing happening from the horses mouths except it was money arriving from provincial governments – “the program without a name”.    But without the taint of the kickback, I suppose.  Or perhaps there is a difference between a kickback and a long-term relationship.  Dues served and all that.  Intergenerational patronage kind of thing.

Why do I have this suspicion that these guys either just did it so badly or they just got caught?

First Post-Gomery Poll

The Ipsos-Reid firm has released the first polling since it has been revealed that the Federal Liberals are, well, not quite recalling what is “theirs” and and what is “ours” in terms of money. [Maybe they just listened to Raffi’s children’s song “It’s Mine But You Can Have Some” one too many times.] Anyway, the poll results are astonishing…almost explosive:

The survey found that if an election were held tomorrow, 34 per cent of decided voters would vote for the Liberals, down three percentage points since February 2005, when Ipsos-Reid conducted its last poll. Thirty per cent would vote for the Conservative Party and 15 per cent would vote for the NDP. In the June 28, 2004 election, Liberals received about 37 per cent of the popular vote, while Conservatives took about 30 per cent and the NDP about 16 per cent…The greatest shift regionally was seen in Alberta. There, the Conservative Party has seen a 14 percentage point shift in its popularity, to 57 per cent, while the Liberals have seen a 16-point drop, to just 13 per cent.

So the Tories finally hold a difference-settling policy convention while the media is on fire with the fact that the government is playing light with the books…and the Tories pick up exactly – not – one – voter. This is pathetic and they should be as embarrassed as Liberals by these figures. The funniest thing is that it does not matter if Alberta shifts from the Liberals as if every seat is one by 100% conservative vote they will still have only pretty much all the seats.

The rest of us really must have clear recollections of Mulroney.

Election Prediction

I think it is time to start the speculation. We need a May or June election like ze whole in ze head but the powers that barely be are doing their best to stumble towards that sad day for all. So sayeth The Star:

But if a Quebec judge today grants a major delay in the case, Gomery could lift the ban and reveal possible damning allegations against the Liberal party, both federally and in Quebec. Everyone concedes that the testimony will further erode Liberal support in Quebec, where the party holds only 21 seats. The Bloc Québécois, which holds 54 seats, is boasting that it could win as many as 70 seats in the next election because of the sponsorship scandal. But the real issue is in Ontario, and it is quite unclear whether Tory Leader Stephen Harper can turn the Brault testimony into a winner for his party. Thus, the Tories have been reluctant to suggest they might try to defeat the government. Spokespersons for all the parties concede that an election would be unpopular and that citizens could want to punish whichever party is blamed for not making the minority Parliament work. Frank Graves, president of the EKOS Research polling firm, says that’s his sense of the public’s election-appetite right now. Graves did a poll this winter that seemed to indicate the sponsorship controversy was a spent force; that the Liberals’ critics had got all the mileage they could from ethical issues. However, “now I’m not so sure,” Graves conceded yesterday.

So what would happen if there was an election. I think there will be a backlash on the sponsorship scandel as what comes out can never be as damning as the imaginations and rumours and the neophyte bloggy interest for all of those like the extra 3000 times people who showed up here an extra 5,000 times yesterday looking for the Gomery Commission answers – it will all turn into disgust with their realization that the entire medium and half their fears were a hoax. Thusly and therefore, here [Ed.: “too-tot-tooooooooot” go the horns!] is the next house of Commons IF the election is held before Canada Day:

  • Liberal 121 (down 10 in Quebec, up a few elsewhere)
  • Tories 95 (so sad, no one cared for the new puritanist)
  • NDP 31 (Ontario likes its social freedoms)
  • Bloc 61 (and they didn’t even have to get out of bed to get there)

Liberals plus NDP still miss a slim majority. Nothing is changed. Harper resigns after staying in bed for two weeks, the big sook.

Update:As Normie points out, the Toronto Sun reports, surprise surprise, that the PQ did the same thing. Does this change anything if true? Should the Tories show their cards on this too? Oh…I forgot. No one has wanted them in power for almost two decades.

Gomery Schlomery

I was thinking as the torrent of anguish flying around the Canadian bit of the internet began to subside this afternoon about scandels as we have them here. They have tended not to be in the British style about sex or in the US style about power. They tend to be about cash:

  • There were all those allegations about that friend to both the Christian Democratic Union Party of Germany and Brian Mulroney:

    That would be the same Karlheinz Schreiber from whom Mr. Mulroney was later — wrongfully, as it turned out — accused of receiving kickbacks in connection with Air Canada’s $1.8-billion purchase of aircraft from Airbus Industrie. The false accusation prompted Mr. Mulroney’s famous lawsuit against the government of Canada, in settlement of which he was eventually paid $2-million. Much of this was documented in Mr. Kaplan’s 1998 book, Presumed Guilty, a passionate defence of Mr. Mulroney’s reputation…

  • Saskatchewan’s Tories of the early 1990s were not so fortunate as…

    14 Conservative members of the legislature and two caucus workers were convicted of fraud and breach of trust for illegally diverting hundreds of thousands of dollars from government allowances in a phoney expense-claim scam. The party was destroyed by this scandal

    Having worked on a breach of public trust case, I was very grateful to these guys for creating such a solid body of legal precedent to work with.

  • A number of Buchanan’s Conservatives Nova Scotia’s in the 1980s always seemed to be in the courts and/or the locally known “bagman” it seemed before the Westray diaster put all that in perspective if not entirely in the past. [Google, by the way, is a rotten historian as there is little to be found on the topic.]
  • And, as we all know, it was not only Tories as Jeffery Simpson wrote in The Globe and Mail in February 2004 about Trudeau’s Liberals:

    And, of course, there was patronage. When running for the party leadership in 1968, Mr. Trudeau said, “I’m not against helping a friend of the Liberal Party when I get a chance.” Generally, however, he disliked the grubby
    business of patronage. He couldn’t understand why anyone would participate in politics for the hope of reward.

    He learned — and wound up filling the Senate, agencies, boards and commissions with Liberals, ending his prime ministerial career with the greatest single-day orgy of patronage in Canadian history. His Quebec ministers met Thursday mornings in a dining room adjacent to the parliamentary restaurant to exercise political discretion on behalf of supporters and party friends. Mr. Trudeau’s ministerial fixers in Quebec
    included Jean Marchand, Marc Lalonde, André Ouellet and Francis Fox, now responsible for Quebec in Mr. Martin’s office.

There must be others. Any other bouts of sticky fingers from Canada’s past?

Vatican v. Gomery Handbags

In a remarkable move consciously mirroring this week’s plot of The West Wing, differences are appearing amongst the cardinals heading to Rome:

With Pope John Paul II lying in state, the battle over his legacy is being brought into the open by some cardinals preparing to choose his successor. The comments are preceded by praise for the pontiff who led the Roman Catholic Church for 26 years, but the need for change and renewal is being made clear. It started Sunday when Brazilian Cardinal Claudio Hummes, a contender to become the next pope, criticized what he suggested was a church out of touch with contemporary life. “The church must adapt to the modern world,” Hummes, the Archbishop of San Paolo, said before heading to Rome. “It can’t give ancient answers to new questions.” The next pope, he added, “must respond to progress and maintain a serious dialogue with science.”

I am just surprised that he made no comment on the testimony from the Gomery commission…sorry the explosive testimony. Favorite Gomery memes¹ so far:

  • Canadians are whimps for not breaking a court order – no need to link to that one. Its everywhere;
  • Canada is a dictatorship because of publication bans – yikes! Blog cops!! In my shed!!! They are watching us all!!!!;
  • Use of plummy pip-pip rights of an Englishman talk in a failed effort to talk law;
  • Poor Paul Martin – vote Tory (nice try Ben…vote NDP… or even independent Rhino); and
  • Best of all – AL YOR BLOGS AR US – the stone brained demands of 14 year olds everywhere that you must let them post any loony comment they can think up.

So far – its men in red gowns 1 v. panicy bloggers in Canada 0 as far as confidence in their democractic institutions goes. Sad.

[Ed.: What was that? Who are you? HEEEEeeeeeeeelp me – the blog cops got meeeee….]

¹ Note: Ben and I hate this word yet I use this word.

Political Theatre Of The Mind

[Special Notice from Editor: it ain’t me.]

It has been a rare day of political scaredy-cat-ism thoughout the realm that could be called the poli-blogs of Canada. Within 24 hours of a few posts like mine on Sunday morning there were some amazingly dimwitted calls for the defence of democracy [Ed.: “toot-ta-tooooo!!!” go the horns!!! To the pea and asparagus harvesters, everyone!!!] because a commission judge ordered a publication ban. Throughout every legal system – even in the USA – there are plenty of instances of secrecy: US grand jury, Canadian trial jury, judicial privilege, solicitor-client privilege, settlement privilege, etc., etc. Some see sense – some know fear – some are just a wee bit off near the end. A publication ban to protect the fairness of a future trial is part of the same continuum and has existed for as long as we have been free. Society works because we have courts and courts work because we have lots of secrets – short term, long term, in theory or enforced by jail time. It is the way the world works…except no one told half the bloggers.

I think it has to do more with the change of the clocks for spring. Some people need a nap.

Update: How could I have been so horribly wrong. Here they are taking Jim Elve, ringleader at Blogs Canada away. Oh well.


Make sure the guys know where to
send the cookies…

Secret Testimony

Much fur is flying this morning on the publication on a US blog of what is stated to be one single source’s take on the secret testimony heard last week before the Gomery Commission. I will not [Ed.: …could not, would not in a boat; could not would not with a goat…] link to it but the canny Googler might do well to consider words that rhyme with “Baptains Borters”. Nothing new in this as the Bernardo testimony was posted on the internet on a “Finnish site” around ten years ago.

So you will not find anything substantive around here as far as evidence goes, but, for the national edjification, how’s about a superficial review of what a publication ban is. The right to receive testamony but create a publication ban around that testimony is a procedure which must be done under power granted to the Commission. The specific powers of the Gomery Commission come from an Order in Council issued by Paul Martin, Prime Minister. It creates a commission pursuant to Part I of the Inquiries Act and, pursuant to section 56 of the Judges Act, the Honourable John Howard Gomery be authorized to act as a Commissioner on the inquiry. Further,

the Commissioner be authorized to adopt any procedures and methods that he may consider expedient for the proper conduct of the inquiry, and to sit at any times and in any places in Canada that he may decide.

Each of these sources in law may include the power to order a publication ban. It is not specifically stated in Order creating the Commissions but the power to create its own rules is and, at Rules 17 and 18 of the Rules of Procedure of the Commission it states:

17. However, applications may be made by a party asking that the Commissioner issue an order that any portion of the proceedings be in camera, or issue an order prohibiting the disclosure, publication or communication of any testimony, document or evidence. Such applications shall be made in writing, supported by affidavit(s), at the earliest opportunity. The evidence and submissions on such applications may be presented in private or in public, or a combination of both, at the discretion of the Commissioner, according to these Rules, which are applicable to in camera matters with appropriate modifications.

18. The Commissioner may, at its discretion, issue an order that any portion of the proceedings be in camera, or issue an order prohibiting the disclosure, publication or communication of any testimony, document or evidence.

It is clear from that wording that ordinarily any “communications” of any “testimony” would be prohibited. That would tell me that speaking about the testimony would expected to be prohibited. Certainly this would cover off the “blogging is not publication” argument evoked by citizen journalists everywhere who wish to be treated as senior cub reporters on any other day. Once a publication ban is ordered, specific obligations are generally imposed on the media present under sections 50 and 51:

50. Whenever the Commission decides pursuant to Rules 17 and 18 to proceed in camera, or issue a publication, disclosure or communication ban, the designated media representative must, to the satisfaction of the Commission, take all necessary measures to ensure that all tape recording or sound recording machines have been turned off.

51. No other forms or means of recording, re-broadcasting or photographing beyond those permitted by these Rules will be allowed in the hearing rooms.

Note that the writing down of notes by pen and paper is not mentioned.

The specific Order requiring the publication ban is also available in the information superhighway. It provides further detail as to the expectations of Judge Gomery in this matter:

The expression “publication ban” as it is used in this decision, should be taken to have the meaning those words have been given in subsection 486(4.9) of the Criminal Code, which states that “no person shall publish in any way (…) any evidence taken, information given or submissions made at a hearing”, in this case, a hearing of the Commission. In my interpretation of this disposition, “broadcast” includes a posting on the Internet.

The word “broadcast” means “broadcast to the public”, so that a publication ban would not prohibit a television broadcaster such as CPAC from continuing to capture the television images and sound of the Commission’s proceedings, and from transmitting them to the media room and other in-house outlets, as it does at present. Rule 50 of the Commission’s Rules of Procedure and Practice should not be construed so as to prevent this practice.

So, even though he effectively removes the word “communication” from the ban he specifically included a posting on the internet of “any evidence taken, information given or submissions made at a hearing” under the prohibition. This certainly could be taken to not include speculative discussion, however, unwise or useless such a practice would appear to be…except that it is 98.742% of everything political blogs actually post. It does not include reading and even pasting into a privately retained file the received information for future purposes once the ban is lifted. That might be taken to be actually implied as the recording and in-house sharing for future broadcast is expressly allowed. The interesting question is what in law is “posting”. It would certainly include a posting such as this were it to include “any evidence taken, information given or submissions made at a hearing”. Is an email that gets passed amongst a circle of friends “publication to the public”? Does it also include second-hand speculation? Is it commenting on another post which includes either evidence or second-hand speculation? It is linking to a site which posts evidence? Is it giving a rhyme of the name of the site where a post may be found? Questions, questions, questions…

It is interesting to note one reason that a publication ban might be reasonable. Under Rule 26 of the Commissions’s Rules of Procedure:

The Commission is entitled to receive evidence which might otherwise be inadmissible in a court of law. Evidence will be admissible based on its probative value in relation to the Commission’s mandate.

Given all the skullduggery of politics, could you imagine that any of the witnesses would have after all this time any clear recollection or even understanding of the truth of what that did? We are into the realm of the political and an election and a political purpose can hang on a useful placement of misinformation.