Whoopsie! B.C. NDP Loses Candidate

Vancouver — Dana Larsen has resigned as the New Democratic candidate in the British Columbia riding of West Vancouver – Sunshine Coast following questions raised about his role in a company that sold coca seedlings.

I have a soft spot for West Coast Hippy types, so this is all you'll get from me.

Because Its The Most Pressing Issue Facing Canadians Today...

The Conservatives have proposed new regulations that would set a minimum package size for cigarillos [miniature cigars] to make them less affordable for children.

Not that I even disagree with this kind of stuff, but its beyond even "small bore" in its scope. I hope they didn't fly anywhere to announce this, because that would be a waste of fuel.

Wells says Harper was in Welland, which I assume is someplace that's not Toronto.

Update: Apparently, this announcement also touched on banning hookah pipe tobacco. Stephen Harper...leading us into the 21st century!

Because When The Ship Is Sinking

You Need A Steady Hand On The Tiller.

I'm pretty sure CITY TV mentioned job cuts, though the Bloomberg Story doesn't.

Tory Support Fluctuates Randomly, New Poll Suggests!

I can't make heads nor tails of the methodology behind The Globe and Mail/CTV Strategic Counsel nightly polls of battleground ridings, but I'm sure they involve Peter Donolo examining the entrails of a chicken and writing headlines based on the condition of its liver.

The guy from Impolitical can explain why this poll is meaningless better than I. Let me just say that of all the meaningless polls released during this election cycle, Strategic Counsel's is by far the most meaningless.

Whatever She Can Do, He Can Do Better

Chicago, IL - Urbanite and Presidential candidate Barack Obama spoke before a group of hunters and outdoorsmen today in Boise, Idaho in an attempt to solidy support from over 225 million Americans that own firearms and of those that hunt.

Obama chose Boise because in the words of his aide, "Mr. Obama wanted to return to the area where he hunted and killed Bigfoot on his last hunting expedition."

I would note that neither Barack nor Sarah Palin were able to subdue Bigfoot with their bare hands. I did that once. But I let him go.

Is There Nothing She Can't Do?

WASILLA, AK - Records and eyewitnesses have come to light that prior to announcing her candidacy for the Vice Presidency; Sarah Palin shot a Bigfoot from a helicopter.

Blogger Fears Getting Kicked Out Of The Sandbox Of Eden

Hogwash. That is my one word response response to the panicked and childish reactions by Stageleft and other bloggers to Joseph Brean's piece on Marc Lemire's constitutional challenge to Section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. The passage that seems to have set everyone off is:

Anyone who runs an online message board, from the lowliest vanity blogger to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, can be charged under federal human rights law if visitors to their site post hateful comments, according to the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

Cue the outrage! Bloggers might actually have to pay attention to their comments section! Well, presumably they are already doing that, aren't they? To make sure any honest to god defamation doesn't occur? No? For them the act of maintaining a blog is, then, the intellectual equivalent of masturbating in public, where one just spews pointlessly and flees?

But lets just see how difficult it would be to spot the kind of material Section 13 is designed to regulate:

...the material for which Mr. Lemire is accused, including 50 to 100 separate messages on his freedomsite.org and another site with which he is associated, is "voluminous," "vile" and "more than offensive."

Boy, that kind of stuff would be sooo difficult to distinguish from the insults and casual racism that can pervade a typical blog's comment section. And, if pointed out to the blog owner, would be sooooo difficult to remove.

I'll tell you what, Stageleft (and Kate, and others) most of the material that appears on your blog is frankly too lame to approach actual hate speech. I, on the other hand, know all eight words for "fuck-head" in !Kung. If I'm not worried about running afoul with the CHRC, why should a bunch of bed-wetters, leaf-eaters, and thumb-suckers be afraid?

...well, I suppose to some extent we all fear taking responsibility, don't we?

In Praise Of A Harper Majority

Recently, a number of stories and polls have appeared suggesting that Canada's gay community is united against Stephen Harper's Conservative Party and, furthermore, fear the outcome should it achieve majority status after the next election. Many of the Principled Conservatives at Free Dominion concur (and even throw in a little bit of "folk art" to mark their point with a flourish):

They better be scared. If they weren't scared we'd be doing something wrong.

About time reason and sanity return to our society and cultural bearings.

What's wrong with pointing out the obvious? Their lifestyle is unhealthy and unwelcome in many parts and communities of the country.

Oh my! This guy isn't going to be too happy.

RB from the comments:

It's noteworthy that no one on FD, not even their pet "moderate" Vundo Draxon, had a word to say about the violence-advocating cartoon. You'd think they could dredge up SOMEONE to at least PRETEND to be offended while, of course, fully supporting the person's "right" to freely advocate violence against gays.

The Effect Of The Money Is Wearing Off

The Conservatives' substantial lead over the Liberals appears to be narrowing, according to an opinion poll released on Monday ahead of the Oct. 14 federal election.

The next parliament will be a photocopy of the last one, I betcha.

Update: Nik's numbers show the Tories fading as well.

Tory Turmoil In Edmonton! Retiring Tory MP Refuses To Endorse Hand Picked Successor

I've written a number of times about issues the CPoC has been having with its grassroots. In Edmonton, the pattern has once again repeated itself: the party ignores its own riding association to parachute in a candidate from elsewhere, this time Tim Uppal, and once again, riding association board members quit en masse, this time to support Independent candidate James Ford.

Not only that, retiring Tory MP Ken Epp has apparently decided to sit out this intramural feud, and will not endorse either Uppal of Ford

I've fired off emails to some of the Edmonton—Sherwood Park riding association members and hopefully will be able to update this later in the day.

Impress Me, Liberal War Room

Get out a blast on this before the Tories or NDP and make it a good one. Its the most important single event that is likely to occur during the election campaign.

Hint: Don't mention The Green Shift.

NDP Has Union Problems?

From the Now I've Seen Everything department:

Apparently, the federal NDP is about to be hauled before a labour relations board after pulling the plug on one of its Quebec offices, which, according to federal secretary Eric Hebert, didn’t “meet the objectives of the federal office in the present context and … marginalizes the important work of the Section.”
[...]
As a result, three Montreal-based staffers were informed that, as of July 26th, they’d be laid off, although with “all of their rights and entitlements under the collective agreement”, including overtime and vacation pay. After the staffers launched a grievance, the original layoff notice was retracted, and replaced with a second notice: they were still being laid off, but as of August 5th, not July 26th - and that those benefits that were supposed to be honoured, like overtime, could no longer be guaranteed because the federal party had failed to send along the $36,000 that was to cover the Quebec office operating costs for the second quarter.

In brief: the NDP sacked a couple of employees and then tried to stiff them for their payout. Canada's party of the Dippy Hippies has finally grown up!

CPoC Should Make Its Campaign Carbon Neutral

Blogging Tory Erwin Gerrits asks: How does buying [carbon] ‘offsets’ save the environment?

He then cycles through the standard list of denialist talking points: CO2 isn't a pollutant, Kyoto a Socialist plot, carbon offsets don't work, Gaia worshipper Maurice Strong wants to give our money to the Chinese.

And he concludes that, because Global Warming is all baloney, the Conservative Party shouldn't really worry about buying carbon offsets in an effort make their own campaign carbon neutral.

Naturally, asking the wrong question leads you to the wrong conclusion. The question he should be asking is: Will the Conservatives live up to the principles of their own environmental plan?

Because the Tories have insisted that Global Warming is not all baloney. And because buying carbon offsets is central to the Tory's own Turning The Corner initiative. In fact, what they have proposed--their environmental plan--is a standard issue national "cap and trade" system, albeit one with loose time-lines and inadequate (because intensity based) emissions caps. It even allows Canadian companies to participate in the CDM, the international carbon trading system developed under the Kyoto accord. Conceptually, it is not a lot different from the NDP's proposals, and not a whole lot different from Stephane's Dion's Green Shift. For example, even under the Tory cap and trade system, money will flow East from Alberta.

But that aside: the Tories believe in it. Therefore they have given the stamp of approval to a means of reducing the carbon footprint of their campaign to zero but are not using it. Why not? Are they suddenly running out of money? If so, why not take all the money they've saved from shutting down their $1,000,000 website and its pooping puffins and redirect some of that cash saving the planet from their own hot air?

A Minority Is Still A Minority, A Majority Still A Majority

There is already speculation as to whether it will be possible to hold the Conservatives to a minority on Oct. 14, or whether they might win a majority. This discussion is largely irrelevant because there's little difference. Canadians must understand that to elect a Conservative minority is, in effect, to elect a Conservative majority.

This bit of mythology has had too wide a circulation for too long a time. In fact, though, the Tories minority status has imposed significant constraints on their ability to pass legislation over the past several years. Here's just a quick list of really awful Tory bills that, for various reasons, died:

Legislation to kill the CWB (I forget the formal title)
Bill C-484 (Abortion Legislation)
C-10 (Film Censorship Legislation)
C-61 (Copyright Legislation)
Senate Reform (can't remember the name of that one either)
C-6 (Veiled Voter Legislation)

Now, the particular histories behind these bills are different in each case, but for the most part (and in a number of instances I am not probably not recalling at the moment), they were basically killed "by the process" after passing their first or second reading in the House. And the reason that they died in this way, and other ways equally inauspicious, is because, in a minority government, the government does not control the committees designed to examine and amend proposed legislation. The backroom maneuvers that killed them never achieved the same public profile as, for example, the Liberal abstentions in the House that sent them to committee in the first place, but nevertheless they worked.

Give Stephen Harper a Majority, and all of that changes. His party runs the committees. His party rams through what it wants to ram through. The quality of legislation that comes out of the HOC depends entirely on his whims.

The Bunny Is Stephen Harper

...and the Heron, obviously, me.

The first week of campaigning comes to a close and I am feeling pretty empowered. K. Grandian from Tyee magazine interviewed me yesterday on the subject of Politics 2.0, and that should be appearing not too long from now.

Meanwhile, I haven't managed to force the resignation of a Tory Cabinet Minister yet, but it is a long campaign and I shall redouble my efforts.

(This is probably it for today. Later on, I am off to drink beer and plot rebellion with the ProgBloggers)

H/T Naish.

The Doctors Of Ontario Should Blow It Out Their Ass

The Ontario Medical Association wants the provincial licensing body to kill a proposal that would force physicians to put aside their religious beliefs when making decisions in their medical practice.
[...]
Among other things, the draft policy from the College said doctors will have to set aside personal beliefs "to ensure that patients or potential patients are provided with the medical services they require."
[...]
For example, doctors not only can refuse to prescribe birth control pills, but they also do not have to make a referral to someone who would or even discuss it as a viable option. The same thing might go for referring a patient for an abortion or helping a same-sex couple get fertility treatment.

Read that twice and think about it. In a tax-payer funded system, The OMA wants its Members to be able to refuse services to taxpayers because whatever fictitious deity they feel the need to grovel in front of tells them that some of those tax-payers are going to a fictitious underworld when they die to burn in a lake of flame for all eternity.

The new College of Physicians document doesn't say doctors have to perform abortions, mind you, it says it is their duty to tell women where they can get an abortion rather than drop to their knees and fire off a prayer to the swami on the mountain, or wave a bunch of fucking beads.

File Under: You're Not Helping

Mohamed Elmasry endorses the NDP.

Mo's got clout. It was his endorsement that put Robert Mugabe over the top.

Sarah Palin: From Here You Can Actually See Them Being Commies

From her ABC Interview:

Pressed about what insights into recent Russian actions she gained by living in Alaska, Palin told Gibson, "They're our next-door neighbors and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska."

The actual good news in her interview is that since joining the McCain ticket Ms. Palin has recanted her AGW Skeptic ways:

FORT WAINWRIGHT, Alaska (AP) — Vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin's assertion that she believes humans play a role in climate change — made in her first major interview since joining the Republican ticket — is at odds with her previous statements.

...which means that she has been told by the campaign to recant, which means 1) the sheen on her will come off a little bit for U.S. SoCons who put a lot of stock in a denialist stance on this issue, and 2) John McCain is signalling to the mainstream that he takes AGW seriously enough that he wants his VP candidate to stay on the same page as he is (rather than freelance to attract Conservatives).

A welcome development, since most recent polls have turned in McCain's favour.

Meanwhile, one Vancouver blogger is heading South to Canvas for Obama in the American West.


Good luck, dude, you'll need it.

In Case You Missed It

Amidst the large scale meltdowns in the Tory campaign yesterday came a few smaller ones. For example, after some good investigative reporting on the part of Kady O'Malley, it was discovered that footage on the notaleader website did not appear with permission of the rights holders. From TVO's The Agenda blog

Some of the clips might look familiar. They have been taken from an Agenda interview with Stephane Dion, snapped off the context and put them to work. And that is where an ad like this can cause trouble. Now the Conservatives are going to have to deal with the embarrassment of being told to take the clips down (sort of like when Heart told Sarah Palin to stop playing Barracuda at her rallies).

Meanwhile, there are rumours that NotaLeader might be disappearing soon (see video through link). Thus far its still there, although some of the functionality of the site has been disabled. If the "excuse generator" goes down for good, I am claiming credit.

(PS. someone tells me my post on gaming the excuse generator was mentioned on CBC last night. Does anyone else remember that, and can they point me towards an online recording of the show?)

Among The Boyz In The Bunker

Yesterday, defending himself against accusations by Stephen Harper that the Green Shift would imperil national unity, Stephane Dion got off one of the best lines to date in the campaign:

While [Stephen Harper] was busy talking about building firewalls in the West, I was fighting to keep my country together.... I do not need any lessons from Stephen Harper on fighting for the national unity of my country.

And, just coincidentally, yesterday details came to light re some of the staff operating the Tory war room:

...former lobbyist Yaroslav Baran, former Western Report publisher Ezra Levant, PMO polling wizard Patrick Muttart, MP Jason Kenney and campaign manager Doug Finley, who needs no introduction.

So the rumours are true: Ezra Levant is officially on staff at Tory HQ. As Kinsella pointed out yesterday, the idea that Harper should be accusing others of being a threat to the unity of the nation while hauling around a guy that's against bilingualism and pro-Quebec separatism is especially rich. But lets examine a few more of Ezra's eccentric views.

1) He's anti-Charter of Rights.

It was Ezra who made the “It’s the stupid Charter” buttons that were distributed at the last Conservative Convention. Harper’s people were apoplectic when they started showing up on the floor. At first they thought it was a dirty Liberal trick designed to embarrass them until they saw the “Western Standard” logo at the bottom.

2) He's anti-human rights legislation. This has most recently been manifested in his jihad against section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act, wherein he has relied on Canadian and American Neo-Nazi Sources to support many of his allegations. For example, the "hacked wifi conspiracy theory", which Ezra embraced with a vengeance, and which has now been thoroughly discredited, depends in some of the details of its elaboration on information supplied by Don Black, who runs the White Supremacist website Stormfront, and who learned his computer skills in U.S. federal prison while serving time for his attempt, with a number of Toronto-based Neo-Nazis, at overthrowing the government of Dominica.

But there's more! Ezra hasn't stopped with section 13. From the foamy outrage expressed on his website, you can't help but conclude that he just doesn't like Human Rights Legislation, period. For example, in this post he ridicules a blind man's attempt, through the BCHRT, to keep his guide dog.

So, someone should ask Mr. Harper: which of the Ezra's views do you concur with? And if the answer is "none", what are you doing employing this blast from the Reform Party past in your campaign?