Surely any responsible policy making process requires that all relevant circumstances be considered. If you omit an important factor then you might come to a false assessment, perhaps even dangerously wrong. Yet time and again Steve Harper shows that excluding relevant factors is essential to his policy making. There's a real wanton recklessness to that.
I suppose Steve Harper could be considered 3/8ths of a genuine prime minister for he excludes as much if not more than he considers.
Take our militarized foreign policy. That appears to have been outsourced to Capital Hill and the Pentagon. Peter MacKay seems as happy as a puppy after he's been to Washington to collect his latest marching orders from the U.S. Defense Secretary. Remember last time? He came back delirious, babbling about how Canada needed to establish a powerful and permanent military presence in east Asia. He and Harper have been pushing to buy a light bomber that's totally unsuited to any genuine Canadian needs but is a ticket to the first ranks of America's aerial Foreign Legion. If you don't get that, Google "Operation Chimichanga."
Our economic policy? As a freshly-minted Petro-State a lot of that too has been outsourced. We're driven by the demands of the mainly American petro-producers who run Athabasca and the wishes of our customers, the U.S. and China. They rattle our chain and our ears perk up, pronto. Meanwhile the legacy economy is allowed to get by pretty much on its own.
Domestic policy? Law and order, that's it. Steve's fundamentalist urgings make him a real crime and punishment guy. Well, in truth, crime continues to fall as it has for years which kind of exposes Steve as really mainly a punishment guy. There's more than a little kinkiness in that. I wonder if Steve has a closet full of leathers and cat o'nine tails whips? Punishment and retribution, that's the order of the day. It appeals to Steve's vindictive streak.
And to expedite his fundamentalist-driven policy making, Steve loves to clear the decks of unwanted, extraneous factors like facts and science. Extraneous things, like the census. That's nothing but a huge bag of those dirty facts. And science! Why the federal public service is full of scientists busy doing, well, science things. We can't be having that bunch of loudmouths spouting off information. Nobody needs to hear that, especially our fractional prime minister. Best we simply gag them.
The one thing above all else that Harper exiles from his policy making is the reality of climate change what he, not that many years ago, dismissively denounced as a "Socialist plot." He claims that he's seen the light but actions speak louder than words and Harper's lack of action speaks volumes. As Harper's longtime buddy, Tom Flanagan, acknowledged, Steve's stock in trade is in “appearing to make a difference without actually changing anything.”
So Steve doesn't actually deal with problems but he's a master at planting the illusion in the public's mind that he's making a difference without actually doing anything in reality. And so a great many relevant facts and circumstances never are allowed to intrude on Steve's decision making which then becomes conveniently detached from reality.
When you add up all these deficiencies, it's easy to come out with the 3/8ths of a prime minister result. Steve doesn't want to lead Canada. Steve wants to run Canada's economy and he thinks it's fine to run it free of facts and science and reality. It comes right back to his raging fundamentalist instincts and that's just sad.
Harper was Policy Chief for his, Northern Foundation Party in 1989. That's where Harper's abusive dictatorship comes from. Harper was linked with Christian Fundamentalists, among other dubious links. During Harper's x-mas interview, he declared himself, a devout Christian. He said. He prays everyday for guidance. Perhaps Harper meant, prey's.
ReplyDeleteHarper is the worst, most corrupt P.M. in, the recorded history of this Nation. Canada is in the worst debt, also in Canada's history.
Harper is not about....What is good for the country, provinces nor the Canadian citizens. Harper is all about Harper and, to hell with the people.
Harper is from the, ninth ring of Dante's Inferno.
Great article.. and excellent links. The Flanagan link took me into interesting territory. I tend to think we can fix politics, bad legislation, catch crooks etc.. but we can't necessarily fix environmental issues or help nature recover. Certainly, the broad attacks of Stephen Harper, his elected MP's and Ministers on our environment will lead to a cascade phenomena.. a term often used in medicine and healthcare.
ReplyDeleteI follow a story you're quite familiar with, farmed salmon and their impact on wild salmon fisheries. I often see this story as a very useful microcosm to help see how the entire country is being stage managed and selectively mugged by the Harper Government.
I went this morning to the DFO website. Of course I wonder how Keith Ashfield, Minister of Fisheries and Oceans is still employed. But then I feel the same about all the Harper Ministers including Gail Shea who is filling in for Ashfield while he recovers from a heart attack.
Surely the Minister must be vulnerable if in violation of the current Harper Government policies regarding west coast fisheries. To my surprise I found myself reading a letter from the Minister - Geoff Regan circa 2005 - http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/publications/pdfs/wsp-eng.pdf - and no doubt the policies stated do not reflect the current Harper Government or Mr Ashfield's or Gail Shea's policies.
Wikipedia is surely out of date as well - but identifies Ashfield - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisheries_and_Oceans_Canada -
"To address the need for conservation, the department has an extensive science branch, with research institutes in various locations across the country. Typically the science branch provides evidence for the need of conservation of various species, which are then regulated by the department"
Flanagan confided. “He listens to his Chief of Staff, Nigel Wright, and a small group of men he has come to trust: Baird, Clements and Flaherty"
Not much science in that group and the previous Chief of
Staff Guy Giorno's specialty was election campaigns with a legal background in Accountability and Ethics.. Really ! so that's the brain trust that along with Ashfield whacked all the scientists or muzzled them. Meanwhile, Gerry Ritz is looking after fish farms.
The 3/8's fractional Prime Minister it would seem is 100% responsible for the current status of the west coast fisheries as well as the fish farm industry and the scandal of infected fish being sold in Canada and abroad. Those are his current policies after all. Those are Ministers he appointed and supervises. Those are Canadian citizens, scientists and biologists he fired or muzzled. That's our First Nations and Canadian commercial fishermen he's put on the receiving end of his ignorance, greed and incompetence.
What a horror show .... Harper and his entire cult ....
A "horror show" indeed. I got a drift recently of talk of farming GMO or "frankenfish" in coastal pens. Haven't heard much about it since. In the U.S., where the project began, there were endless assurances that GMO salmon would never be allowed near the sea but would be hatched and raised in pens ashore.
ReplyDeleteFisheries is a shared jurisdiction for inshore waters. But the BC "Liberal" government has been in the fish farmers' pocket since, well forever.