copyright MMXII V.1.0.2
by Morley Evans
Dear Angela,
As you surely must know, the British monarch has been a "constitutional" sovereign since the English Civil War when Parliament became supreme. The monarch has some power, it is true, but it is unclear what that power might be. "Tradition," they say? The rascals in Parliament have the power. Parliament is bicameral with the House of Lords filled with Lords who have life peerages and hereditary Lords whose peerage is passed down from father to son. The House of Commons is filled with commoners, that is with people who are not aristocrats. They are morons elected by morons to represent the moronic interests. They usually represent the monied interests. This is similar to the American bicameral Congress and the Presidency. The President has much more power than the Queen who has much more money than the President. The Congress has much more of both money and power than the Parliament. Since WW I, hereditary Lords have been forced to admit tourists who wander through their homes and help pay the bills. The stately homes were once made safe from foreclosure by stolen fortunes and slavery. Those were the good old days. The Newport, R.I., "cottages" were nothing compared to the stately homes in Britain.
In many ways, it is not fair to blame the British monarch for the sins committed by the State that the monarch heads. Americans are trained to dislike George III, but he did many admirable things for which he gets no credit. Queen Victoria had very little to do with the atrocities committed by the British Empire. Victoria organized Irish relief during the potato famine when Britain itself was in a depression. Canadians, meaning the people who took over after 1867, are a despicable group of liars who wrap themselves in the flag and make sanctimonious proclamations to conceal their abominations. Failing to honour promises to the French and the Indians rest at the base of a mountain of crimes committed by Canada's leaders. Yet all believe their lies. They have done everything in the name of The Queen. She had nothing to do with what they have done or what they continue to do. An American President has everything to do with what the United States does, by contrast.
I have been a libertarian since 1979, when I read Restoring the American Dream by Robert Ringer. I owe next to nothing to Ayn Rand. I thought We The Living was very good. I only recently had my eyes opened fully by George W. Bush. "One never knows whom one will have to thank." Queen Elizabeth II may be a nice old lady, but she does bear some responsibility for what is done and has been done in her name and in the name of her ancestors. With the British Empire long gone these past sixty-some years, the British Royals look more-and-more ridiculous. Elizabeth may be Elizabeth, The Last, as she fears. The Queen of the Netherlands rode a bicycle. The King of Sweden lives modestly compared to The Queen.
I, myself, believe God is an anarchist and that that is the story told by The Bible. "I am a jealous god," God tells us in many places. He warns His people not to choose a king instead of Himself. http://morleyevans.blogspot.ca/search?q=saul. Moses rescued His people from the slavery of idolatry in Egypt. His people were not building pyramids for Pharaoh. They were living in Egypt which was Mankind's first state-level civilization. Do slaves building pyramids have gold? Has anyone ever wondered from where came the gold the Hebrews melted down to cast the Golden Calf? Pharaoh was a god. God didn't like that. God has been trying to teach His lesson for a long time (since the Garden of Eden, actually), but Man is a slow learner. (That inclues women.) If God hasn't been able to teach His lesson in thousands of years, Angela, we should not despair if we can't do it either. We are only human. We don't even know for sure what His lesson is! We are not God. Like Moses, we can only do the best we can with what we have. That is what life is about. That is why we are here.
We do know this one thing for certain: Man cannot be trusted with power.
Love you, Angela, keep working! Keep writing! Keep dreaming!
- Morley
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
Monday, June 25, 2012
Our Muslim Brothers
© MMXII V.1.0.0
by Morley Evans
Here is more sensible advice from a sensible man:
by Morley Evans
Here is more sensible advice from a sensible man:
Our Muslim Brothers
by Uri Avnery, June 25, 2012
Everybody knows by now why we are stuck in Palestine.
When God instructed Moses to plead with pharaoh to let his people go, Moses told him that he was unfit for the job because “I am slow of speech and of a slow tongue” (Exodus 4:10).
Actually, in the Hebrew original, Moses told God that he was “heavy of the mouth and heavy of the tongue.” He should have told God that he was also heavy of the ears. So when God told him to take his people to Canada, he took his people to Canaan, spending the prescribed 40 years — just long enough to reach Vancouver — wandering hither and thither in the Sinai desert.
So here we are, in Canaan, surrounded by Muslims.
For decades, my friends and I have warned that if we dither in making peace, the nature of the conflict will change. I myself have written dozens of times that if our conflict is transformed from a national to a religious struggle, everything will change for the worse.
The Zionist-Arab struggle started as a clash between two great national movements, which were born more or less at the same time as offshoots of the new European nationalism.
Almost all the early Zionists were convinced atheists, inspired (and pushed out) by the European nationalist movements. They used religious symbols quite cynically — to mobilize the Jews and as a propaganda tool for the others.
The Arab resistance to the Zionist settlement was basically secular and nationalist, too. It was a part of the rising wave of nationalism throughout the Arab world. True, the leader of the Palestinian resistance was Hadj Amin al-Husseini, grand mufti of Jerusalem, but he was both a national and a religious leader, using religious motives to reinforce the national ones.
National leaders are supposed to be rational. They make war and they make peace. When it suits them, they compromise. They talk to each other.
Religious conflicts are quite different. When God is inserted into the matter, everything becomes more extreme. God may be compassionate and loving, but his adherents are generally not. God and compromise don’t go well together. Especially not in the holy land of Canaan.
The religionization (if a Hebrew-speaking Israeli be allowed to coin an English word) of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict started on both sides.
Years ago, the historian Karen Armstrong, a former nun, wrote a thought-provoking book (The Battle for God) about religious fundamentalism. She put her finger on an astonishing fact: Christian, Jewish and Islamic fundamentalist movements are very much alike.
Delving into the history of fundamentalist movements in the U.S., Israel, Egypt, and Iran, she discovered that they were born at the same time and underwent the same stages. Since there is very little similarity between the four countries and the four societies, not to mention the three religions, this is a remarkable fact.
The inevitable conclusion is that there is something in the zeitgeist of our time that encourages such ideas, something anchored not in the remote past, which is glorified by the fundamentalists, but in the present.
In Israel, it started on the morrow of the 1967 war, when the army’s chief rabbi, Shlomo Goren, went to the newly “liberated” Western Wall and blew his shofar (religious ram’s horn). Yeshayahu Leibowitz called him “the clown with the shofar,” but throughout the country it evoked a resounding echo.
Before the Six Days, the religious wing of Zionism was the stepchild of the movement. For many of us, religion was a tolerated superstition, looked down upon, used by politicians for reasons of expediency.
The overwhelming victory of the Israeli army in that war looked like divine intervention, and the religious youth sprang into life. It was like the fulfillment of Psalm 118:22: “The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.” The pent-up energies of the religious sector, nursed for years in their separate ultra-nationalist schools, burst out.
The result was the settlers’ movement. They raced to occupy every hilltop in the occupied territories. True, many settlers went there to build their dream villas on stolen Arab land and enjoy the ultimate “quality of life.” But at the core of the enterprise are the fundamentalist fanatics, who are ready to live harsh and dangerous lives, because (as the Crusaders used to shout) “God wills it!”
The whole raison d’être of the settlements is to drive the Arabs out of the country and turn the whole land of Canaan into a Jewish state. In the meantime their shock troops carry out pogroms against their Arab “neighbors” and burn their mosques.
These fundamentalists now have a huge influence on our government’s policy, and their impact is growing. For example: for months now, the country has been ablaze after the Supreme Court decreed that five houses in Bet El settlement must be demolished, because they were built on private Arab land. In a desperate effort to prevent riots, Benjamin Netanyahu has promised to build in their stead 850 (eight hundred and fifty!) new houses in the occupied territories. Such things happen all the time.
But let there be no mistake: after the cleansing of the country of non-Jews, the next step would be to turn Israel into a “halakha state” — a country governed by religious law, with the abolition of all democratically enacted secular laws that do not conform to the word of God and his rabbis.
Substitute the word “shariah” for “halakha” — both mean religious law — and you have the dream of Muslim fundamentalists. Both laws, by the way, are remarkably similar. And both cover all spheres of life, individual and collective.
Since the start of the Arab Spring, the fledgling Arab democracy has brought Muslim fundamentalists to the fore. Actually, that started even before, when Hamas (an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood) won the democratic, internationally monitored elections in Palestine. However, the resulting Palestinian government was destroyed by the Israeli leadership and its subservient U.S. and European subcontractors.
Last week’s apparent victory of the Muslim Brotherhood in the Egyptian presidential elections was a landmark. After similar victories in Tunisia and the events in Libya, Yemen, and Syria, it is clear that Arab citizens everywhere favor the Muslim Brotherhood and similar parties.
The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928, is an old established party that has earned much respect with its steadfastness in the face of recurrent persecution, torture, mass arrests, and occasional executions. Its leaders are untainted by the prevalent corruption and admired for their commitment to social work.
The West is haunted by medieval ideas about the horrible Saracens. The Muslim Brotherhood inspires terror. It is conceived as a fearsome, murderous, secret sect, out to destroy Israel and the West. Of course, practically no one has taken the trouble to study the history of this movement in Egypt and elsewhere. Actually, it could not be further removed from this parody.
The Brotherhood has always been a moderate party, though it almost always had a more extreme wing. Whenever possible, it tried to accommodate the successive Egyptian dictators — Abd-al-Nasser, Sadat, and Mubarak — though all of these tried to eradicate it.
The Brotherhood is first and foremost an Arab and Egyptian party, deeply embedded in Egyptian history. Though it would probably deny it, I would say — judging from its history — that it is more Arab and more Egyptian than fundamentalist. It certainly has never been fanatical.
During its 84 years, it has seen many ups and downs. But mostly, its outstanding quality has been pragmatism, coupled with adherence to the principles of its religion. It is this pragmatism that also characterizes its behavior during the last year and a half, which — so it seems — caused quite a number of voters who are not particularly religious to prefer the Brotherhood to the secular candidate who is tainted by his connection with the corrupt and repressive former regime.
This also determines the Brotherhood’s attitude toward Israel. Palestine is constantly on its mind — but that is true of all Egyptians. Their conscience is troubled by the feeling that at Camp David, Anwar Sadat betrayed the Palestinians. Or, worse, that the devious Jew, Menachem Begin, tricked Sadat into signing a document that did not say what Sadat thought it said. It is not the Brothers who caused the Egyptians who greeted us enthusiastically, the first Israelis to visit their country, to turn against us.
Throughout the heated election campaigns — four in a year — the Brotherhood has not demanded the abrogation of the peace agreement with Israel. Its attitude seems to be as pragmatic as ever.
All our neighbors are turning, slowly but surely, Islamic.
That is not the end of the world. But it surely compels us, for the first time, to try to understand Islam and the Muslims.
For centuries, Islam and Judaism had a close and mutually beneficial relationship. The Jewish sages in Muslim Spain, the great Maimonides and many other prominent Jews were close to Islamic culture and wrote some of their works in Arabic. There is certainly nothing in the two religions that precludes cooperation between them. (Which, alas, is not true for Christianity, which could not tolerate the Jews.)
If we want Israel to exist and flourish in a region that will for a long time be governed by democratically elected Islamist parties, we would do well to welcome them now as brothers, congratulate them on their victories and work for peace and conciliation with elected Islamists in Egypt and the other Arab states, including Palestine. We must certainly resist the temptation to push the Americans into supporting another military dictatorship in Egypt, Syria, and elsewhere. Let’s choose the future, not the past.
Unless we prefer to pack up and head for Canada, after all.
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Cholesterol: June, 21, 2012
© MMXII V.1.0.4
by Morley Evans
Today's cholesterol test was disappointing. I was hoping it would be 10 or more. In "scientific" notation that would be >10. (10 mmol/l = 386.6976 mg/dl) Even so, my "cholesterol" was "high". The lab recommended treatment and we know what that means, don't we?
by Morley Evans
Today's cholesterol test was disappointing. I was hoping it would be 10 or more. In "scientific" notation that would be >10. (10 mmol/l = 386.6976 mg/dl) Even so, my "cholesterol" was "high". The lab recommended treatment and we know what that means, don't we?
Other than these cholesterol results, I am "fine" according to my doctor. No one cares about my history. They simply do not care. No one made a comment that my triglycerides (the only important thing they measured) are 0.64 in a reference range of 0.35 to 1.70, slightly lower than mid-range. C-reactive protein was not measured. They probably don't even know what that is. The doctor thought the cholesterol test is the same as the lab would have done ten years ago. No one cares that Statin Drugs took almost twenty years out of my life. No one cares that I survived what Statin Drugs did to me. No one is interested in knowing why I am healthy or that I am healthy, or alive. My "chart" was not sent from Dr. Cenaiko's clinic in Wakaw. The records of the other 30 doctors and therapists I saw will be unavailable. They will be gathering dust, altered or destroyed. They may have been inaccurate when they were made. All that matters to the system is that Statin Drugs continue to be sold, along with other pharmaceutical drugs. It is important that the people in the system get paid. That is what the system is designed to do. The system is not designed to make anyone healthy. In fact, that would be bad for business. Despite pharmaceutical medicine's "scientific" veneer, we are not dealing with science and we are not dealing with people who are interested in healthy people. The "healthcare system" employs people who do not give a damn. People who do give a damn are disgraced, destroyed and ejected. Those who have jobs are not interested in health, not in mine, not your's, not anyone's. They had better just keep quiet and collect their paycheques. Thinking and asking questions is dangerous.
Why is the "healthcare" system our number one expense? It isn't worth a plugged nickel.
My doctor, herself, is a nice person, as are most of the people in pharmaceutical medicine. (But some are not.) Good people work in bad systems, if they want to work. Sadly, most systems are bad. Why is that? People should wonder why that is. Pharmaceutical medicine is a secret society. The secret is who comes first, the people running the "healthcare" system or you? This is wrong. Pharmaceutical medicine is a racket.
Sunday, June 17, 2012
The Good of Statins
© MMXII V.1.0.1
by Morley Evans
Guest Article by James B Yoseph
What we know about the direct effects of taking Statin Drugs is a potential boon to medicine. Statins are implicated in Cancer, ALS, MS, Chronic Fatigue, Obesity, Auto Immune Diseases, Cardio Myopathy, and a host of other diseases including exacerbated Cardio Vascular Disease, the disease Statins are supposed to prevent.
A huge body of irrefutable statistics has surfaced to prove just how deadly and harmful Statins truly are.
If we can encourage medicine to pay attention, we can learn a lot from Statins as to the cause and effect relationship between mycotoxins and disease. Statins are mycotoxins.
This terrible man-made plague has the potential to save lives.
I would like to sit before some senate oversight committee and ask three questions to be answered by a show of hands:
How many of you are taking statins?
How many of you are suffering what you consider to be some of the discouraging ravages of aging?
How many of you trust your doctor implicitly?
If they told the truth, most hands would go up in answer to every question.
In the first human study done in the U.S., a hand-picked group of six people was selected to take statins. They were heterozygotes, or people with the rare genetic proclivity to hypercholesterolemia. Four of the six had the expected precursors of CVD. Two did not. All were given a statin drug. As expected the cholesterol levels came down.
Doctors Brown, Goldstein, Bilheimer and Grundy headed up the program. They blithely walked past the most significant part of the study: Two, fully one third of the people selected, had no sign of CVD — that fact in spite of their rare genetic proclivity. [If they had high cholesterol, they should have had cardiovascular disease i.e.: atherosclerotic plaque]
Men with an agenda have blinders on. They were there to study the effects of statins. It never occurred to them to study the remarkable health of the two. What was different about them? Instead they gave them a health-destroying drug.
If we do not begin studying health we will never be and never become healthy. The study of medicine and drugs is upside down. Please study health.
Comment by Morley Evans
The "agenda" the "researchers" had was money. The people with "hypercholesterolemia" who did not have cardiovascular disease disproved the hypothesis the "researchers" wanted to prove. Rather than discard their hypothesis, they chose to discard the people. This was not a mistake. This was a crime and the researchers were and are criminals, along with the entire Statin Drug industry and pharmaceutical medicine which harbors the Statin Drug industry and has foisted Statin Drugs onto millions. My own health was destroyed by these people. I was heathy before going to my doctor in 1992. They threw away almost twenty years of my life. They have destroyed the lives of millions more. Visit SUE! Statins! Buy the book. Join the list.
by Morley Evans
Guest Article by James B Yoseph
The Good of Statins
What we know about the direct effects of taking Statin Drugs is a potential boon to medicine. Statins are implicated in Cancer, ALS, MS, Chronic Fatigue, Obesity, Auto Immune Diseases, Cardio Myopathy, and a host of other diseases including exacerbated Cardio Vascular Disease, the disease Statins are supposed to prevent.
A huge body of irrefutable statistics has surfaced to prove just how deadly and harmful Statins truly are.
If we can encourage medicine to pay attention, we can learn a lot from Statins as to the cause and effect relationship between mycotoxins and disease. Statins are mycotoxins.
This terrible man-made plague has the potential to save lives.
I would like to sit before some senate oversight committee and ask three questions to be answered by a show of hands:
How many of you are taking statins?
How many of you are suffering what you consider to be some of the discouraging ravages of aging?
How many of you trust your doctor implicitly?
If they told the truth, most hands would go up in answer to every question.
In the first human study done in the U.S., a hand-picked group of six people was selected to take statins. They were heterozygotes, or people with the rare genetic proclivity to hypercholesterolemia. Four of the six had the expected precursors of CVD. Two did not. All were given a statin drug. As expected the cholesterol levels came down.
Doctors Brown, Goldstein, Bilheimer and Grundy headed up the program. They blithely walked past the most significant part of the study: Two, fully one third of the people selected, had no sign of CVD — that fact in spite of their rare genetic proclivity. [If they had high cholesterol, they should have had cardiovascular disease i.e.: atherosclerotic plaque]
Men with an agenda have blinders on. They were there to study the effects of statins. It never occurred to them to study the remarkable health of the two. What was different about them? Instead they gave them a health-destroying drug.
If we do not begin studying health we will never be and never become healthy. The study of medicine and drugs is upside down. Please study health.
Comment by Morley Evans
The "agenda" the "researchers" had was money. The people with "hypercholesterolemia" who did not have cardiovascular disease disproved the hypothesis the "researchers" wanted to prove. Rather than discard their hypothesis, they chose to discard the people. This was not a mistake. This was a crime and the researchers were and are criminals, along with the entire Statin Drug industry and pharmaceutical medicine which harbors the Statin Drug industry and has foisted Statin Drugs onto millions. My own health was destroyed by these people. I was heathy before going to my doctor in 1992. They threw away almost twenty years of my life. They have destroyed the lives of millions more. Visit SUE! Statins! Buy the book. Join the list.
Friday, June 15, 2012
Harper Conquers Canada
© MMXII V.1.0.3
by Morley Evans
This story is not well known. It has been buried with the "sponsorship scandal" that brought Harper to power in 2006. The Canadian news hounds are dead to the world — sleeping quietly, drugged and happy. Any Canadian news hounds who are awake are lazy and stupid — those who aren't are unemployed! A Canadian news hound couldn't smell a rotting plate of corruption if it were shoved under his nose. Duh! This story was published in the Huffington Post, an American publication. Canadians have always been happy to believe the lies they have always been told: Canada is such a nice place; Canadians are so good and kind. Not true. Canada has always been corrupt, but Harper and his Tories are something new and malevolent. They are controlled by the same people who own everyone in Washington. Skillful, experienced vote rigging is at work here. Harper is slime. Her Majesty's Official Opposition is scum. The Senate? Why not convene a "Royal Commission" or have an RCMP investigation? z z z z z z z . . . . . . . . .
Why don't we have the CBC (Canadian Brainwashing Corporation) produce an in-depth documentary about Mounties shining shiny brown boots, polishing shiny brass buttons and brushing scarlet serge and Stetsons? All decked out in their finery, Mounties could practice marching. Mounties are prepared to teach the world about good policing! "We have the Musical Ride!" "We Canadians are good."
Here's what the Bishop thinks:
http://thebishopsviews.wordpress.com/2012/05/18/how-do-you-spell-the-word-tyranny-i-spell-it-harper-42/
The widening "robocall scandal" is deeply disturbing -- as is its media coverage.
The language we use to describe a situation, the words that journalists use in their coverage of an issue, literally frame the issue and how we think about it.
This isn't a story about "dirty tricks," it's about election fraud. This isn't "stupid," it's illegal. This isn't "folly," it was a deliberate, systematic, strategic, targeted campaign to steal the election. This isn't "voter suppression," it's stealing democracy.
We should not treat this as some petty misdemeanor. This is a grave threat to our very basic freedom. This is a threat to our democracy. This is corruption.
You would expect this in some tin-pot dictatorship--not in Canada. [Guess you don't know Canada, Mr. Harris.]
The stakes are much, much higher than most people or commentators realize. Harper won his "majority" with 6,848 votes. That's the difference between a Conservative candidate getting elected and the second place candidate in the 14 closest races that the Conservatives "won."
For instance, in Nipissing-Timiskaming the Conservatives "won" the riding with a mere 18 votes. In Etobicoke Centre it was just 26 votes. Out of the 14.7 million votes cast across Canada that is an infInitesimally small margin for a majority -- it's 0.048 per cent.
What was the exact nature ofthe illegality? Liberal supporters in tightly fought ridings received pre-recorded messages on Election Day claiming to be from Elections Canada telling them that the location of their polling station had been changed. The Liberals claim it was a factor in losing 27 seats. The NDP is claiming it happened to them too. The Conservatives didn't need to misdirect very many voters in very many ridings with tight races to steal the 2011 election.
What is the impact of this illegal action? With a "majority" Harper has eliminated the gun registry. He has appointed 48 Conservative so far in the 105 seat Senate, and four of the nine Supreme Court of Canada justices. This issue is not just about some inconvenient phone calls, it's about subverting our democracy, it's about altering the outcome of the election. And it's about Harper remaking Canada in his own image.
This is the heart of the real story: It's about the Conservative's usurping the power of government.
There are a few important points to make about this scandal:
The Conservatives have proven they will happily break the law to win power.
The Conservatives pleaded guilty to breaking campaign spending laws in 2006 in the election that brought Harper to power. The Conservative party violated election spending limits, exceeding the amount the party was allowed to spend by $1.3 million -- through an "in-and-out" scheme.
In the end the Conservatives pled guilty and got a $52,000 fine.
There was no appropriate consequence for the Conservatives breaking Canada's election law The fine is a joke. The Conservatives spent $1.3 million more than allowed to by law, "won" the election, and paid a penalty of $52,000. The reward: gaining access to the levers of power and deciding how to spend the Government of Canada's $270.5 billion budget.
The case took five years to be resolved. By this time the Conservatives had been in power for five years and had appointed 48 Conservatives to the Senate.
The Conservatives strategy is clear: break the law, deny any wrong doing, frustrate and stall any investigation -- whether by Elections Canada or House of Commons committee -- and when the final decision is about to be rendered, plea bargain and pay a fine.
But here's the realpolitik of it: It's five years after the fact, the media isn't paying attention. It's been covered already. Meanwhile the Conservatives have been enjoying power for five years. The consequences are, well, inconsequential.
The electoral fraud efforts were part of a systemic Conservative strategy.
The Conservatives are trying to claim that a single individual, Michael Sona, was responsible. Sona has worked for Conservative candidates, for a Conservative MP, and for a Minister in the Harper Government. He is not some uniformed, neophyte newbie. He is, however, the sacrifice the Conservatives are more than willing to offer to try and put this illegal action to bed. So Sona was fired last week from his position in Conservative MP Eve Adam's office.
Harper's style is one of systematic command and control. No messaging, no strategy, is executed without the 'Prime Minister's Office (PMO) vetting and approving it. This has become crystal clear during Harper's tenure. Lawrence Martin's book Harperland documents this in detail.
Young Sona, having worked for so many different Harper Conservatives would have had this drilled into him. The fact that it has taken Elections Canada and the RCMP almost a year -- with their powers to investigate -- to uncover this scheme shows to what great length the Conservatives went to to hide this.
The consequences for this electoral fraud should match the crime: Criminal charges should be laid and by-elections called for every riding where electoral fraud occurred. Any person or firm involved should be barred from working in any election campaign ever again. [People should go to jail.]
by Morley Evans
This story is not well known. It has been buried with the "sponsorship scandal" that brought Harper to power in 2006. The Canadian news hounds are dead to the world — sleeping quietly, drugged and happy. Any Canadian news hounds who are awake are lazy and stupid — those who aren't are unemployed! A Canadian news hound couldn't smell a rotting plate of corruption if it were shoved under his nose. Duh! This story was published in the Huffington Post, an American publication. Canadians have always been happy to believe the lies they have always been told: Canada is such a nice place; Canadians are so good and kind. Not true. Canada has always been corrupt, but Harper and his Tories are something new and malevolent. They are controlled by the same people who own everyone in Washington. Skillful, experienced vote rigging is at work here. Harper is slime. Her Majesty's Official Opposition is scum. The Senate? Why not convene a "Royal Commission" or have an RCMP investigation? z z z z z z z . . . . . . . . .
Why don't we have the CBC (Canadian Brainwashing Corporation) produce an in-depth documentary about Mounties shining shiny brown boots, polishing shiny brass buttons and brushing scarlet serge and Stetsons? All decked out in their finery, Mounties could practice marching. Mounties are prepared to teach the world about good policing! "We have the Musical Ride!" "We Canadians are good."
Here's what the Bishop thinks:
http://thebishopsviews.wordpress.com/2012/05/18/how-do-you-spell-the-word-tyranny-i-spell-it-harper-42/
- Login with Facebook to see what your friends are reading
- i
React
Read more
The widening "robocall scandal" is deeply disturbing -- as is its media coverage.
The language we use to describe a situation, the words that journalists use in their coverage of an issue, literally frame the issue and how we think about it.
This isn't a story about "dirty tricks," it's about election fraud. This isn't "stupid," it's illegal. This isn't "folly," it was a deliberate, systematic, strategic, targeted campaign to steal the election. This isn't "voter suppression," it's stealing democracy.
We should not treat this as some petty misdemeanor. This is a grave threat to our very basic freedom. This is a threat to our democracy. This is corruption.
You would expect this in some tin-pot dictatorship--not in Canada. [Guess you don't know Canada, Mr. Harris.]
The stakes are much, much higher than most people or commentators realize. Harper won his "majority" with 6,848 votes. That's the difference between a Conservative candidate getting elected and the second place candidate in the 14 closest races that the Conservatives "won."
For instance, in Nipissing-Timiskaming the Conservatives "won" the riding with a mere 18 votes. In Etobicoke Centre it was just 26 votes. Out of the 14.7 million votes cast across Canada that is an infInitesimally small margin for a majority -- it's 0.048 per cent.
What was the exact nature ofthe illegality? Liberal supporters in tightly fought ridings received pre-recorded messages on Election Day claiming to be from Elections Canada telling them that the location of their polling station had been changed. The Liberals claim it was a factor in losing 27 seats. The NDP is claiming it happened to them too. The Conservatives didn't need to misdirect very many voters in very many ridings with tight races to steal the 2011 election.
What is the impact of this illegal action? With a "majority" Harper has eliminated the gun registry. He has appointed 48 Conservative so far in the 105 seat Senate, and four of the nine Supreme Court of Canada justices. This issue is not just about some inconvenient phone calls, it's about subverting our democracy, it's about altering the outcome of the election. And it's about Harper remaking Canada in his own image.
This is the heart of the real story: It's about the Conservative's usurping the power of government.
There are a few important points to make about this scandal:
The Conservatives have proven they will happily break the law to win power.
The Conservatives pleaded guilty to breaking campaign spending laws in 2006 in the election that brought Harper to power. The Conservative party violated election spending limits, exceeding the amount the party was allowed to spend by $1.3 million -- through an "in-and-out" scheme.
In the end the Conservatives pled guilty and got a $52,000 fine.
There was no appropriate consequence for the Conservatives breaking Canada's election law The fine is a joke. The Conservatives spent $1.3 million more than allowed to by law, "won" the election, and paid a penalty of $52,000. The reward: gaining access to the levers of power and deciding how to spend the Government of Canada's $270.5 billion budget.
The case took five years to be resolved. By this time the Conservatives had been in power for five years and had appointed 48 Conservatives to the Senate.
The Conservatives strategy is clear: break the law, deny any wrong doing, frustrate and stall any investigation -- whether by Elections Canada or House of Commons committee -- and when the final decision is about to be rendered, plea bargain and pay a fine.
But here's the realpolitik of it: It's five years after the fact, the media isn't paying attention. It's been covered already. Meanwhile the Conservatives have been enjoying power for five years. The consequences are, well, inconsequential.
The electoral fraud efforts were part of a systemic Conservative strategy.
The Conservatives are trying to claim that a single individual, Michael Sona, was responsible. Sona has worked for Conservative candidates, for a Conservative MP, and for a Minister in the Harper Government. He is not some uniformed, neophyte newbie. He is, however, the sacrifice the Conservatives are more than willing to offer to try and put this illegal action to bed. So Sona was fired last week from his position in Conservative MP Eve Adam's office.
Harper's style is one of systematic command and control. No messaging, no strategy, is executed without the 'Prime Minister's Office (PMO) vetting and approving it. This has become crystal clear during Harper's tenure. Lawrence Martin's book Harperland documents this in detail.
Young Sona, having worked for so many different Harper Conservatives would have had this drilled into him. The fact that it has taken Elections Canada and the RCMP almost a year -- with their powers to investigate -- to uncover this scheme shows to what great length the Conservatives went to to hide this.
The consequences for this electoral fraud should match the crime: Criminal charges should be laid and by-elections called for every riding where electoral fraud occurred. Any person or firm involved should be barred from working in any election campaign ever again. [People should go to jail.]
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
