John Kenneth Galbraith, once said of Richard Nixon: "Our nation stands at a fork in the political road. In one direction lies a land of slander and scare; the land of sly innuendo, the poison pen, the anonymous phone call and hustling, pushing, shoving; the land of smash and grab and anything to win. This is Nixonland. America is something different."
Lawrence Martin in his book Harperland, writes: " [A]mong this breed of new conservative was a different temperament. It was an attitude not readily found in the traditional Canadian middle-of-the-road parties, but more common to a strain of American Republicans. It was a current of bitterness, an anger ..."
David Emerson, the Liberal who crossed the floor for a cabinet position in the Harper government, admitted that he "couldn't fathom the intense level of acrimony. He had never seen this kind of thing with the Liberals. But with Harper and his men, it was woven deep." He spoke of them as "viscerally hating their political opposition", saying that "Sometimes it was just startling to me."
Former Liberal MP Keith Martin, who also served in both parties, described the Conservatives as politicians who had been in an environment "that has bred a hatred". (Harperland p.3)
It's as though they can't help themselves.
Historian Richard Perlstein said of Nixon that he was a "serial collector of resentments", and those resentments created the kind of visceral politics that Nixon engaged in. Says Perlstein, "By the end of the 1960s, Nixonland came to emcompass the entire political culture of the U.S. It would define it, in fact, for the next fifty years." (Nixonlandp. 46)
You would think that with Harper winning his majority, he might try to play nice. In fact, didn't many journalists suggest that the only reason Harper was so combative and controlling was because he had a minority?
We learned recently of prank phone calls in Liberal, Irwin Cotler's riding of Mount Royal. The calls originated with a company called Campaign Research, used by many Conservative candidates during the last federal campaign.
Blogger Sixth Estate reminds us that Campaign Research was founded by several Conservative insiders, including Nick Kouvalis, the Rob Ford election aide from Toronto, and Aaron Wudrick, the Conservative campaign manager who was caught a few years ago calling for the creation of Conservative “shell organizations” and “front groups” on university campuses. He worked for Peter Braid.
There is nothing illegal in what they did, just slimy.
We have had five years of this kind of politicking and it's growing weary. Can we expect another five years, or worse, as in the case of Nixon's influence, fifty?
I would much rather try to eat looking at the picture of the men at the top of the page, than try to eat, listening to this story. It comes down to who are the biggest asses.
But Irwin Cotler, is working to find a peaceful solution, and while no one can rule out war, all other measures must be looked at first; starting with trade sanctions.
Unfortunately, with Parliament closed down, the motion he's working on won't see the light of the day until March, unless someone can restore democracy to Canada. But at least Mr. Cotler is doing his job.
Canadian human rights activist and former justice minister and attorney-general Irwin Cotler revealed at a Jerusalem press conference on Wednesday a petition he is spearheading that calls on governments and the UN to take immediate and massive diplomatic and economic action against Iran. Cotler accused the Iranian government of violating international law regarding nuclear weapons development, incitement to genocide, state-sponsored terrorism and human rights.
Other speakers at the press conference included Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz, who spoke from the US, British MP Denis MacShane, who spoke from London, Bassam Eid, executive director of the Palestinian Human Rights Monitoring Group and Prof. Suzanne Stone of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law. All have signed the petition, which includes documents and eyewitness testimony describing Teheran's violations in all four areas, according to Cotler. It also includes a "road map" of sanctions and remedies that the world should apply against the Iranian government to force it to cease its alleged violations of international law ... .
There was a brief but important piece in the National Post today by Keith Landy, on the horrendous ten per centers distributed by Harper and his Reformers, accusing the Liberal Party of anti-Semitism.
To call a Jewish leader anti-Semitic was beyond reprehensible, especially one who has been so active in human rights issues. Were they hoping he wouldn't run again? I'm hoping he does.
Much has been made of late in regards to the Conservative 10-per-center and most specifically the role of the then-Liberal government at Durban 1. According to the handout the Liberals "willingly participated in the overtly anti-Semitic Durban 1." In August of 2001, I was a delegate to Durban 1 as the then-national-president of Canadian Jewish Congress. Allow me to say what occurred there.
We all were excited by the prospect of Durban 1. It was the early part of the new century, 911 was still nothing more than an emergency phone number and we hoped this international anti-racism conference would sow the seeds for a better world to come. How wrong we turned out to be.
As we came closer to the beginning of this gathering it became increasingly clear that the enemies of Israel were determined to hijack it. Israel was to have attended but the more anti-Semitic activities in and around the Durban site were countenanced the more it became clear that Israel simply could not stay. We too began to wonder if Canada should be there at all. In fact we called for Canada to leave.
However, following a conversation with then-deputy foreign minister of Israel Michael Melchior, we decided otherwise. Rabbi Melchior urged us to remain in Durban to combat the anti-Semitism and hatred that was evident even before the conference began. His reasoning was that since the Oslo accords, Israel had left the international stage, leaving it open for the demonizers to take control. Rabbi Melchior believed that the hate-mongers must be confronted.
In no way can it ever be insinuated that the Canadian government of the day willingly engaged in an anti-Semitic conference. On the contrary, the Canadian delegation --along with representatives from my organization and B'nai Brith Canada -- stared anti-Semitism in the face at Durban 1. By doing so I am convinced we played a significant ameliorating role, and raised the alarm to the rest of the world.
Frances Russel wrote a great column in the Winnipeg Free Press about the horrendous anti-Semitic ten per centers sent to Jewish communities by the Reformers.
It was politics at it's worse.
Mentioned in the article was the fact that if we allowed these to be OK, then others could find themselves targeted. But Rob Anders already did that with Muslims in his community. This kind of behaviour is appalling and must be stopped.
Of all the racial/religious/regional wedge issues the Harper Conservatives have exploited in their quest for a majority, the taxpayer-funded pamphlets associating the Liberals with anti-Semitism are the most contemptible. Last week, in a relatively rare occurrence, Commons Speaker Peter Milliken ruled the flyers breached parliamentary privilege, an ancient right protecting members of Parliament from attacks designed to cripple their representative role.
He found that former justice minister Irwin Cotler, an internationally recognized human rights expert, had been dealt a "direct and personal" blow by the flyers mailed into his Mount Royal constituency and four other opposition ridings containing significant numbers of Jewish voters.
"I must agree with several members who suggested that there is no denying the critical role that context played in shaping the cumulative net effect of the words used in this mailing," Milliken said. "The mailing constitutes interference with (Cotler's) ability to perform his parliamentary functions in that its content is damaging to his reputation and his credibility."
Cotler called the Conservatives' accusations "loathsome and dangerous... Some of the responses to the flyers in my riding called upon me to leave Parliament, to in fact even leave the Jewish community, as I had betrayed that community. There could not be a more pernicious and prejudicial fallout from this damaging flyer."
He added he had been accused of being a "self-hating Jew" and continued: "There can perhaps be no greater betrayal for the people of Jewish religion than the portrayal of one of their own as anti-Semitic, and that holds true as well for the member for Winnipeg South Centre."
But the government was not about to apologize. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney called the issue "ridiculous."
"Members opposite are trying to make a capital case out of a conventional political communication, using the same tactics and distribution they use all the time, even on the same set of issues. Basically, incontrovertible facts are presented that are matters of conventional political debate."
How "incontrovertible facts" can be the subject of conventional debate Kenney didn't explain, perhaps because the "incontrovertible facts" in this instance are half-truths.
The perennial target of the most pernicious forms of discrimination and persecution over the millenia, concluding with the Holocaust, Jews are particularly vulnerable to any attempt to single them out.
Yet the Harper Conservatives did just that; hopefully without knowing what they were doing. Winnipeg South Centre Liberal MP Anita Neville gave the issue its true context in her parliamentary remarks:
"In the 61 years since the creation of the state of Israel, 11 people have occupied the office of Prime Minister of Canada and none, until now, has ever sought to turn that broad support for Israel into an issue of partisan politics. However, the current government and the current Prime Minister try to govern on the principle of divide and conquer, divide and rule. In this case, they are doing it by singling out Canadian Jews for a special message and it is a message that, I would submit, is based on deception, innuendo, half-truths and non-truths.
"For the current government, such conduct seems to be instinctive. However, I would submit again that it is not the Canadian way. A government that sees nothing wrong with a ten percenter targeting Canadian Jews now will see nothing wrong with targeting Sikhs or Muslims or Serbs or Bosnians tomorrow.
"The manipulation of religious or ethnic minorities for short-term political gain...is a recipe for long-term disaster. A country like ours becomes ungovernable when a government seeks to mobilize or divide people on the basis of their culture and their religion.
"In this particular case, a ten percenter targeted at Jews or any other minority attempts to turn them into political fodder and the communities in which they live into someone else's battleground.
"As a Canadian Jew, I would say that we are quite capable of managing our own disagreements without the interference of the national government or any political party."
The Harper Conservatives should apologize -- and stop playing politics on the incendiary field of race, religion and identity.
And further proof that Jason Kenney was dropped on his head a few too many times when he was a child; he claimed that the fog was so thick he couldn't hear. Poor Jason.
OTTAWA — The Conservatives may have damaged the reputation of Liberal MP Irwin Cotler by sending taxpayer-funded flyers into his Montreal-area riding which suggested the Opposition party was anti-Semitic, Speaker of the House of Commons Peter Milliken ruled Thursday.
"In my view, the end result was a negative effect that spilled over to (Cotler) in a very direct and personal way," said Milliken in his ruling. "Therefore, I must conclude that the member for Mount Royal, on the face of it, has presented a convincing argument that the mailing constitutes interference with his ability to perform his parliamentary functions in that its content is damaging to his reputation and credibility."
Milliken said that any reasonable person who had read the Conservative pamphlet would be confused about Cotler's actual views, opening the door for federal politicians to investigate the matter in a parliamentary committee.
Cotler criticized the pamphlet for targeting regions across the country with significant Jewish populations. He also complained that it suggested that the Liberals had willingly participated in an anti-Semitic conference and were supporting funding for terrorist groups.
"To identify any political party, let alone a Jewish MP, with willingly participating in such an anti-Semitic event is a most loathsome and dangerous accusation that one could make against that party and that member," Cotler said.
"These accusations have already had damaging and prejudicial effects on my reputation and standing in my constituency . . . These were attacks on me as a person, as an MP and as a member of the Jewish community, and on the party to which I am a member."
But Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney said the Conservatives had presented incontrovertible facts in its leaflets to send a message to voters just like any other federal party.
"Sometimes the fog of hypocrisy is so thick in here that people cannot even hear," said Kenney.
"I am simply saying that this is really quite ridiculous. Members opposite are trying to make a capital case out of a conventional political communication, using the same tactics and distribution that they use all the time, even on the same set of issues. Basically, incontrovertible facts are presented that are matters of conventional political debate."
But judging by the comments after on-line newpaper articles on the subject, something like this could make it rear it's ugly head. The Globe and Mail had to dispense with comments because they were becoming so visceral.
Jewish leaders ask Harper to trash Tory flyer Canadian community members disturbed by mailing they say paints the Liberals as anti-Semitic Michael Valpy Globe and Mail November 23, 2009
Leading members of the Jewish community – many identified as Liberals – have sent a letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper asking him to withdraw a taxpayer-funded Conservative flyer that they say portrays the Liberal Party as anti-Semitic.
The letter is signed by academics, lawyers, politicians, a member of the wealthy and influential Bronfman family and at least one high-ranking former civil servant – Robert Rabinovitch, president of the CBC from 1999 to 2007. About two-thirds are Jews.
“We find it highly disturbing that any party or parliamentarian would attempt to use Israel as a wedge to divide the Jewish community and, indeed, Canadians, for partisan gain,” the letter says.
“Support for Israel should not be portrayed as exclusive to one party. The Liberal Party has a history of support for Israel, working co-operatively and effectively with the Canadian-Jewish community and speaking and acting against terrorism.”
While I continue to believe that criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitic, the notion by the Reformers that Irwin Cotler is not supportive of Israel is insane. His daughter is in the Israeli army.
I find it inexcusable that Stephen Harper would condone this nonsense. A Prime Minister is supposed to hold this country together, not try to divide it in such a horrible manner. I am so ashamed.
Nor does it mean hurling drive-by accusations of anti-Semitism, as one senior Conservative spokesperson did Wednesday on national television. It’s beyond the pale to falsely charge political opponents of anti-Semitism as a tactic for vote-getting. The Liberal targeted by that attack, former Mississauga-Erindale MP and current Liberal candidate Omar Alghabra, has dedicated himself to fighting all forms of racism, including anti-Semitism. His commitment to the cause of peace in the Middle East is deep and ongoing.
Standing shoulder to shoulder with Israel certainly doesn’t mean resorting to lies to smear your political opponents. Irwin Cotler put it best when he stood up on a point of privilege in the House of Commons to denounce the flyers being sent to voters his riding.
What standing shoulder to shoulder with Israel does mean is changing Canadian law to ensure Hezbollah and Hamas were designated as terrorist organizations, as the Liberal government did in 2002.
What it does mean is condemning anti-Semitism vociferously as the former Liberal government did at the Durban I conference, and staying on at the conference to witness the atrocious statements made there at the request of the Israeli government.
What it means is standing by Israel, as the Liberal Party has, since 1948. “My party will never claim to be the only genuine defenders of Israel in Canadians politics,” Michael Ignatieff said in a speech to the Canadian Jewish Congress, "Because I don’t want my party to be alone in the defence of Israel. I want all parties to be genuine defenders of Israel."
Mr. Cotler's Point of Privilege
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege in respect of a flyer subvented by Parliament and the Canadian public, targeting ridings with identifiable Jewish communities and comparing the positions of the Conservatives and the Liberals in respect of what they call matters of value to the Jewish community. Let me relate each of the three matters of value that they speak of: fighting anti-Semitism, fighting terrorism, and supporting Israel.
Let me begin with the first. I will cite directly from the flyer, which I will table accordingly as well. The type of language used in this flyer must be borne in mind. The flyer states that the Liberals: Willingly participated in the overtly anti-Semitic Durban I. For shame. This is a false, misleading, prejudicial and pernicious slander, which itself constitutes a prima facie breach of privilege, associating the Liberal Party with support for anti-Semitism and, I might add, associating me as a member of the Liberal Party and each of us as members of the Liberal Party with supporting anti-Semitism.
This flyer is also false, misleading and prejudicial to me personally and my reputation and standing as an MP, constituting yet another prima facie breach of privilege, and I am referring here to the statements with regard to privilege.
I participated in Durban I as a member of the Canadian delegation. I went to Durban I, as did Canada, with other states in the international community, because we hoped and believed at the time that this was going to be the first world conference against racism in the 21st century, as I wrote at the time. However, a world conference against racism turned into a conference of racism and anti-Semitism against Israel and the Jewish community. I spoke then, during the conference. I have spoken and written since. At the risk of sounding self-serving, though I think this is a matter of empirical fact, I believe I have spoken out on Durban I perhaps as much as, if not more than, any member of any other parliament in the world.
Yet this flyer purports to identify me and the members of my party as associating with and willingly participating in an anti-Semitic Durban conference. Not only did the Canadian delegation and I myself speak unequivocally in condemnation of Durban I, but, and this is an important fact as well, the Government of Israel, at the time, publicly commended Canada for its participation and the nature of its participation in the Durban I conference. The Government of Israel publicly commended Canada for Canada's condemnation of anti-Semitism at Durban I.
Does that mean that the Government of Israel, by supporting the Government of Canada, was also identifying with anti-Semitism? What kind of absurdity is that coming out of the members of the Conservative government? This is as absurd as it is false.
Let me go to the second scurrilous allegation. The flyer claims, on matters of fighting terrorism, that the Liberal Party: opposed defunding Hamas and asked that Hezbollah be delisted as a terrorist organization. Let the facts speak for themselves. It was a Liberal government, in 2002, which listed Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist organizations under Canadian law. I have no problem in commending the Conservatives for doing that which we or any other party would do, whether it be in support of Israel or to condemn anti-Semitism.
What I condemn them for is massive political identity theft on the matters of Hamas and Hezbollah. The Conservatives, in this flyer, take credit for listing Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. If they want to take credit for regarding Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist organizations, I have no problem with that. I have a problem with the member saying that we in the Liberal Party supported Hamas and Hezbollah. For shame.
The hon. member is trapped by the facts and he cannot escape the facts. When they take credit for being the first in the world to stop funding for Hamas, it was illegal under Canadian law from 2002 onwards to provide any support for Hamas. How can they take credit that after 2006, they then de-funded Hamas? My god, there has to be some respect for truth and some respect for honesty.
Finally— Hon. Peter Kent: You are splitting hairs. Hon. Irwin Cotler: I do not split hairs with the truth.
The third allegation, lest they say I would overlook the third allegation, is as I quote, that Michael Ignatieff “accused Israel of committing war crimes”. As Voltaire put it, if one takes something out of context, one can hang anybody. Mr. Ignatieff apologized and said the following, and I quote—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
The Speaker: Order, order.
The hon. member knows he cannot use another member's name. He will have to stick with titles.
Hon. Irwin Cotler: The member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore said in 2006, at the same time the Conservatives misleadingly excerpted text from his statement, that: “Between a terrorist militia and a democratic state, Canada must always side with Israel”.” I want to conclude with his remarks, as they bear exactly on the issue before the House. I quote: ...it is beyond reckless for political leaders to try to score points by branding one another as 'anti-Israel'—to try to win votes by claiming a monopoly on supporting Israel.
My Party will never claim to be the only genuine defenders of Israel in Canadian politics—because I don’t want my Party to be alone in the defence of Israel. I want all parties to be genuine defenders of Israel. In closing, I want to cite from House of Commons Procedure and Practice in reference to an action you took, Mr. Speaker:
In April 2005, Speaker Milliken ruled that the reputation of [the member for Windsor West] may have been unjustly damaged by Monte Solberg (Medicine Hat) who had distributed in the Windsor West riding a bulk mailing containing inaccurate and misleading information about Mr. Masse’s House and committee activities. There have been bulk mailings not only in my riding but also in ridings across this country with identifiable Jewish communities. Those bulk mailings not only contained false and misleading information, but they also contained information that was slanderous, damaging, and prejudicial to the Liberal Party and to the performance of each of our individual and collective duties. That is a prima facie breach of privilege and I would call on the Conservatives to cease and desist from these pernicious mailings and to publicly apologize for this false and misleading action.
