I posted recently about an Ontario conservative scheme to suppress the vote in the upcoming provincial election.
A Party calling themselves None of the Above could be traced back to Mike Harris.
Recently it was also discovered that several Ontario households received letters from the PC Party with incorrect information, that would have sent them to the wrong polling stations.
We also learn of yet another group Decline the Vote, urging young people not to get involved in the election. Again, it is run by conservative strategists. From Reddit:
After seeing so much buzz around this "initiative", I took a look at the website promoting it and soliciting donations. The contact page lists Paul Synnott of Windsor. Turns out he worked for Campaign Research before forming his own company Polisource. Their profile says, "a New Media Solutions company focusing on conservative Canadian Politics at the Municipal, Provincial and Federal levels.
Because of spending limits, they promote the idea that they are not held to any restrictions.
Under the cloud of the Robo Call trials, the conservative movement continues to use suppression techniques to steal elections by keeping those who won't vote for them away.
Since Mike Harris and Stephen Harper went to the Far Right in the U.S. for their political strategies, tricks have replaced sensible debate and fair political strategy, in too many Canadian elections.
Vote suppression tactics now define the GOP, and are quickly coming to define our conservative politicians. They know they can't win us over with their policies so instead they cheat. Very sad.
During the 2010 U.S. mid-term election campaign, a group of "discontents" emerged, calling themselves Latinos for Reform.
President Obama had secured most of the Latino vote in 2008, so the group's message was that Obama had let them down. Given the Republican's anti-immigration policies, LFR knew that voting GOP was not an option, so instead they encouraged Latino voters not to cast a ballot for anyone.
The founder of this group, Robert de Posada, was the Republican National Committee's director of Hispanic affairs and worked for the Bush administration and a group founded by Tea Party leader Dick Armey.
We learn this week that in the run up to the Ontario election, a group of "discontents" has emerged. Calling themselves the None of the Above, encouraging those weary of the top three, to choose them instead, thereby nullifying their ballot.
A longtime supporter of Mike Harris who he knew from his home town, in 1989 Greg worked to change the Party Constitution from a delegated convention to a one person one vote process. This change was key to Mike Harris winning the Leadership in 1990.
So what is really behind this? Did Mike Harris have a little chat with his home town buddy, knowing that Tim Hudak could be in trouble? Is that why Vezina is putting up Green Party signs to help split the vote?
“Now many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome — good government. They want everybody to vote. I don’t want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people, they never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now."
There are three rules in the Neoconservative Handbook on running elections:
1. If you think you can't win - Cheat!
2. If you only have a good chance of winning - Cheat!
Every Ontario Conservative is singing from the same Hymnal. "Close the Ontario College of Trades, close the Ontario College of Trades .... Hallelujah, Hallelujah."
Seemed strange to me because before they starting singing about it, I'd never heard anyone wanting to make this an election issue.
I've been following Canada's Neoconservative movement long enough to know when something is up. And it didn't take long to discover what it was.
The driving force behind this, is a group calling themselves Stop the Trades Tax. Anytime a "grassroots" movement opposes some kind of tax, you can be sure that they are short on grass but long on roots, and those roots usually lead back to a lobbyist and an industry or corporation.
Stop the Trades Tax was the brainchild of Karen Renkema, former Vice-President of Council of Ontario Construction Associations. In 2007, it was announced that Renkema would be leaving that job and going to Queens Park to act as a lobbyist for one of their members.
Renkema is now also the Chair of a group Ontario Skilled Trades Alliance, which some believe is simply a proxy for the construction industry.
[Ontario Skilled Trades Alliance] call for reduced journeyperson to apprentice ratios (where have we heard that before?) and oppose any new compulsory trade certification, saying that those things kill jobs and inhibit economic growth.
Koller disagrees, but you can see where Hudak got his talking points.
We know from Randy Hillier's "leaked email" that the PCs were going after the construction industry for funds, on a promise to allow them to hire non-union workers. And what better way to lure campaign funds, than the commitment to cancel a program that is impeding the industry's ability to increase their profit margin, and eliminate competition from smaller firms.
And Renkema is clear. She will not compromise, and even the hint of a mere review, has her steaming mad. In fact, in most of their press releases, they bash the Ontario Liberals for allowing The Ontario Trades College to exist.
Now you can't google Stop the Trades Tax without generating a myriad of PC MPPs and candidates signing a pledge to get rid of it. (Yes those dreaded pledges)
I wanted to find out what actual trades people thought of this and found on a Carpenter's union website, a list of reasons why the Ontario College of Trades was important:
Consumer Protection: Consumers will have access to a membership registry that will display the member’s standing with the college to inform their decision to hire skilled trades people. Consumers will also be able to voice complaints to the [OCOT]
Self-Governance: Skilled trades practitioners in Ontario deserve the same respect as teachers, doctors and nurses in this province. All of these professions have a regulatory college and trades people deserve the same respect for their industry.
For the first time in North America, apprenticeship ratios will be determined by members of the skilled trades. This ensures that the skilled trades industry is able to respond to market demands while ensuring a safe working environment for apprentices and journeypeople.
Promoting Skilled Trades to Youth: The College has a mandate to promote the skilled trades to youth. Attracting youth is essential to have a thriving skilled trades industry in Ontario.
Cracking Down on the Underground Economy: Enforcement officers from the college will be fining trades people practicing a compulsory trade without the appropriate license. These efforts protect consumers from inferior and unsafe work and protect members of the college from illegal competition.
Worker’s Health and Safety: The College will ensure that all members, apprentices and journeypeople, have the proper training and support to practice their trades
“The College of Trades is good for the trades. The decisions affecting the skilled trades are being made by the trades for the trades, and not by politicians like Tim Hudak,” he said.
“It’s about time the Conservatives quit bashing the college and rather embraced the structure and worked with all the stakeholders to make it a successful body.”
I'm at a bit of an advantage because I know how to speak Neocon.
Cutting red tape - deregulation leaving consumers and citizens vulnerable
Eliminating bureaucracy - Handing decisions over to lobbyists.
Trim the fat - cut public services for we the public
Choice - Privatization
Hudak promised transparency and he's delivered it. We can see right through him.
Men should pledge themselves to nothing; for reflection makes a liar of their resolution. Sophocles
Pledges are nothing new for politicians. Some are broad in scope, like FDR's pledge to a New Deal for Americans, or President Obama's pledge to not raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year.
In 1994, Newt Gingrich's Contract With America, while mostly a treatise on "family values" laced with anti-government claptrap, helped the GOP win the primaries. It was a pledge.
What a lot of Canadians are no doubt unaware of, is that Stephen Harper's Reform Party helped to draft the Contract. It's author, Republican pollster Frank Luntz, had been working with Harper and the gang since 1991, and in fact it was Luntz who told Harper to use hockey terms whenever he could to lure us into a state of complacency.
What really sold Americans on The Contract, was the "folksy" way that it was delivered; and the fact that it was revealed just days before the election, there was little time for anyone to give it a thorough analysis.
During this week's Ontario leadership debate, Conservative Tim Hudak, "pledged" that if he couldn't balance the budget in two years, or create one million jobs in eight years, he would resign.
He delivered this pledge with the same "folksy" sincerity as Newt Gingrich did his, and again near the end of the campaign. Will it be enough to fool voters?
We know that Hudak visited America's Far Right to help draft his platform, at a time when the Tea Party was calling for a renewal of The Contract.
Most of the opposition to Hudak's pledge appears to be in the reality of his being able to honour it. I worry that he will.
Not that it might boost his credibility, but of what it could cost Ontario.
In 1995, Conservative MP Jason Kenney, then head of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation; criss-crossed the country promoting his anti-tax philosophy. As part of his tour, he met up with Mike
Harris who signed a pledge not to raise taxes if elected. Harris also pledged to balance the budget.
To keep the first promise, while lowering taxes for our
wealthiest citizens, Harris implemented and increased user fees, and downloaded many services to municipalities, resulting in property tax increases for most residents.
To keep the second, in a desperate eleventh hour move, he sold a toll highway, giving away a century of needed revenue
In the final week of the campaign, all parties will flood the
airways with ads, further confusing the electorate. Maybe all they will remember is the goofy grin and the "pledge".
Despite the fact that such contracts would not be legally binding in Canada, we might still be on the hoof for the settlement.
In an interview in 2012, Hilary Clinton was asked “Which designers do you prefer?” Her response was brilliant: "Would you ever ask a man that question?”
Says journalist Mary Elizabeth Williams:
That terse exchange over her wardrobe ... exemplifies everything that endears Clinton to her supporters – and everything that exasperates so many of us about the current state of womanhood. You can be the secretary of state, even a former presidential contender, and it still comes down to how you look.
Last night during TVO's coverage of the Ontario Election Debate, panelist Robin Sears criticized the suit that Premier Kathleen Wynne was wearing. With so many important issues facing Ontario today, how is that relevant?
Kathleen Wynne is an accomplished woman. Openly Gay and the first female Premier of Ontario. She is inspiring. Maybe I won't go to her for fashion tips, nor should I.
She went into the debate, with a handicap, having to bear the full brunt of the gas plant scandal. It's worth mentioning that Tim Hudak ran in 2011 on a promise to close the gas plants and when asked about the cost, he said a billion dollars.
And as to repeated accusations of corruption by Andrea Horvath, given that the NDP brand has taken a hit recently with the Nova Scotia scandal and partisan mail outs, she's hardly in a position to label anyone.
These kinds of attacks only turn people away from the polls, further eroding our fragile democracy.
Last night Tim Hudak graced us with his colloquial family stories, but we're not voting for his family. He did offer a bit of comic relief however, when he revealed how he acquired his "math skills".
As I've said before, I am getting tired of junk politics. Had Kathleen Wynne showed up wearing a halter and a mini skirt we might have questioned her sanity, but she wore a suit. It hardly makes her incompetent.
What if We Voted Based on the Size of a Man's Penis?
Just as the interviewer was wrong to ask who designed Hilary's wardrobe, Sears was wrong to critique Wynne's clothing during an important POLITICAL DEBATE.
Many question why more women don't enter the political arena. Do they really need to wonder, when our adversaries capitalize on our vulnerabilities?
During the 1997 federal election campaign, while heading up the National Citizens Coalition, Stephen Harper spent $ 200,000.00 on attack ads that ran on radio stations, coinciding with print ads and massive billboard visuals, in what he dubbed "Operation Pork Chop".
In Edmonton, where Liberal candidates Judy Bethel and Anne McLellan were running for re-election, he ran a newspaper ad featuring two pigs drinking champagne, while frolicking in a trough filled with cash. The pig's heads were replaced by those of the two women, and the caption read "On June 2, Chop the Pork. Re-electing these two MPs will cost you 1.7 million."
The ads worked, and though McLellan did squeak out a victory, Bethel was pummelled and never returned to politics.
Use of unflattering or trivializing animal terms is a common rhetorical ploy, especially when referring to women, and no doubt Harper knew that portraying Bethel and McLellan as pigs, would tap into female insecurities about weight.
Recently, during a question and answer session at the PC convention in London, a delegate told Hudak he calls Horwath the "Great Pumpkin" because her party's colour is orange and he thinks she "put on a little bit of weight."
Hudak did nothing to address this.
According to Michael Wiederman of Columbia University; "In Western culture women's bodies are objectified more so than men's, and other writers have noted the multiple ways that such objectification may negatively impact women's lives."
Not only are women's insecurities about body image exploited, but also their perceived frailties.
When Randy Hillier, the Conservative incumbent for the riding of Lanark - Frontenac - Lennox and Addington, was with the controversial Ontario Landowners Association, he launched a campaign against restrictions on hunting, especially when the animals are trespassing on your property.
So he sent a picture of a bullet ridden deer to Ontario Environment Minister Leona Dombrowsky, stating “The attached pictures are the direct consequence of government injustice, and when individuals no longer fear the tyranny of legislated abuse and intimidation. In keeping with tradition, all nuisance animals are consecutively named, enclosed are pictures of ‘Leona'".
This was clearly an issue for the National Resources Minister, but the Natural Resources Minister was a man. Hillier banked on Dombrowsky's shock and aversion.
What if the NCC or any political opponent, ran an attack ad on a male candidate, with his image holding a bottle of Viagra, and the caption "Does this man suffer from Electoral Dysfunction?"
Or "Not only does he suffer from jock itch, but has too much space in his jock".
I'm not always so indelicate but last night made me angry.
When politics are reduced to this level, it insults us all.
I thought all candidates were dressed appropriately, but I just don't give a damn.
Indiana- Louise Cohoon was at home when her 80-year-old mother called in a panic from Terre Haute: The $97 monthly Medicaid payment she relied on to supplement her $600-a-month income had been cut without warning by a private company that had taken over the state's welfare system. (1)
Hold that thought.
The Globe and Mail has recently revealed that after losing the last election, Tim Hudak visited members of the American far-right to help prepare his current platform.
We already knew that his mathematically challenged Million Jobs plan, was created with the help of Republican Benjamin Zycher, king of offensive Tea Party rants, like:
“Now, let me be blunt: Michelle Obama, the product of lifelong affirmative-action coddling, is an intellectual lightweight who fancies herself a serious thinker. Just read her Princeton senior thesis, an intermittently coherent stream-of-consciousness pile of leftist jargon, campus pseudo-seriousness, and racial-identity babble. Can there be any doubt that the Princeton administrators accepted it only because of her skin color?”(The National Review, August 17, 2009)
or
“And so I have a question for my legal-beagle colleagues: Are whites not entitled to equivalent treatment under the 14th Amendment? If so, does that mean that education about the history of slavery would become illegal, as it would depict whites negatively? Would it be illegal to point out that most modern-day terrorist acts are perpetrated by Muslims? Anything about black crime, illegal immigration by Hispanics, ad infinitum? Can air brushing of photos be far behind?”(National Review, April 24, 2006)
That's why the Tea Party loves him, but why Tim Hudak? Because he is with the American Enterprise Institute, and that's always been enough for Canada's Neoconservatives, but more on that later.
Tim Hudak claims that he wants to model Ontario after Indiana under former governor, Mitch Daniels, the man who supposedly saved his state from rack and ruin.
Before he arrived, Indiana had a deficit and after he left, a surplus. Sounds good, right? That's what was said about Mike Harris, except that he only left us with more debt and a 5.6 billion deficit. The only reason Harris looked good on paper was because of increased U.S. exports as a result of NAFTA and a devalued Canadian dollar.
To help balance the books, Mitch Daniels leased the Indiana toll road through 2081, which meant a short term gain but seventy-five years of lost revenue.
Mike Harris leased Ontario's toll road for 100 years, and it sickens me when I think of the money Ontarians have lost. But like Daniels, Harris needed to balance the books before an upcoming election, and a huge lump sum payment did just that.
According to the Washington Post:
“I think that it’s going to turn out to be a bit of smoke and mirrors for Indiana over the longer haul. I feel like he’s been very skilled at selling Hoosiers -- and quite frankly the country -- a bill of goods, and it’s really disappointing,” said Betty Cockrum, the president and chief executive officer of Planned Parenthood of Indiana who clashed with Daniels in 2011 after he signed a law cutting off public funds to the organization because it provides abortions.
Cockrum, who ran the state budget for former Democratic Gov. Frank O’Bannon, said Daniels relied on tricks to make the state’s books look good just like any other governor, but he rarely gets called on it because of his national reputation.
And as it turned out she was right. Daniels lost track of $556 million in tax money, borrowed $2 billion to shore up Indiana's bankrupt unemployment insurance fund and took billions in federal relief money, while denouncing the practice. He also left many of his key projects unfunded.
But the rich got richer and his friends a bit friendlier. Further to the story of the 80-year-old woman who lost her Medicaid:
Cohoon's mother, now suffering from Alzheimer's disease, was one of thousands of Indiana residents who abruptly and erroneously lost their welfare, Medicaid or food stamp benefits after Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels privatized the state's public assistance program — the result of an efficiency plan that went awry from the very beginning, the state now admits.
Though the $1.37-billion project proved disastrous for many of the state's poor, elderly and disabled, it was a financial bonanza for a handful of firms with ties to Daniels and his political allies, which landed state contracts worth millions.(2)
Harris also made a complete mess of things when his government tried to privatize many aspects of our welfare system. It ended up costing taxpayers 4 to 1, what it would have cost had they just left well enough alone.
Hudak wants to privatize Ontario's public service, with the same goal in mind. More money in the pockets of those already having trouble keeping their pants up.
If It's Good Enough For Stephen Harper
In the Globe abd Mail article, they list the people and institutions that Hudak visited during his Tea Party romp, most with affilation to the Harper government.
Grover Norquist - Jason Kenney headed up the Canadian Taxpayers Fedeartion, the Canadian spin-off of Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform.
Cato Institute - Part of the network of think tanks that helped to define the Reform movement and boost the fortunes of Stephen Harper.
Heritage Foundation - Worked with Stephen Harper and the National Citizens Coalition. The late Paul Weyrich, when he headed up the HF, helped Stephen Harper in 2006, by instructing the American Right not to talk to Canadian reporters, for fear they would scare off Canadian voters.
David Frum - Not only a former speechwriter of George W. Bush, but was activly involved with the Unite the Right campaign's hostile takeover of Canada's legitimate Progressive Conservatives. He also introduced Stephen Harper to Rupert Murdoch, enabling him to bring his version of Fox News to Canada. His sister, Linda, is one of Harper's senators.
So as Canadians sleepwalk toward the next federal election, no doubt unaware of just how much the American far-right has taken over our country, Ontarians need to lead way.
Mike Harris allowed them to write his Common Sense Revolution and now Hudak has allowed them to write his Million Jobs Plan. We need to say enough is enough. The Tea Party in the United States is slowly losing momentum. We have to stop ours before it destroys us, in the same way that they have destroyed politics in the United States.
Oh and by the way, Mitch Daniels' job creation plan? Wrought with mathematical errors and mostly just made up stuff.
Sources:
1.Indiana a Changed State After Mitch Daliel's 8 Years, Washington Post, January 2, 2013
2. Indiana's bumpy road to privatization,Los Angeles Times, June 24, 2011
In 1999, Mike Harris ran in Ontario on an anti-union platform, promising to get tough with union bosses.
The backlash was immediate, but Harris wasn't worried. He had a secret weapon. Deceit.
In the run-up to the election he had pulled out all the stops, beginning with advertising at the expense of the Ontario taxpayer.
"... the log for three stations in the 12 months before the campaign, shows the Tories advertised in the months before the campaign at unprecedented levels ... The Tories used government advertising as part of their overall re-election campaign .. Government advertising ran at unprecedented levels during the campaign, bathing voters in feel-good spots and positive imagery. (1)
In fact, under the direction of Guy Giorno, the Harris government spent 42 million tax dollars in self promotion. Later Giorno would do the same for the Harper government, though their abuse of our tax dollars is now well over 100 million.
Tim Hudak is yet to have that kind of access to our money.
Another factor in Mike Harris's victory was in turning on the taps of the wealthy and corporate sectors, by increasing the amount of money he could hit them up for.
Party contribution data demonstrate that the government's near doubling of the legal limit on contributions to political parties in an election year (from $14,000 to $25,000) was prompted by the Tories' dependency on contributions from wealthy individuals and large corporations who give the maximum donation possible. The higher limits on contributions brought the Tories an additional $2.2 million, while the Liberals took in $277,000 and the NDP $103,000 as a direct result of the changes.
To almost all Ontarians, the higher contribution limits are irrelevant because they cannot afford to donate such large sums ... both previous and existing contribution caps are not a restraint on, but rather a licence for, the very wealthy and corporate interests to try to influence government. (1)
Mike Harris himself bragged that he had the support of 100 corporations, pleased with the corporate welfare state that Harris had created.
More than two-thirds of the money the Conservative central campaign raised came from corporations. MacDermid calculates that 16 per cent of all the money raised came from just 19 corporate conglomerates. For example, TrizecHahn and its subsidiary Barrick Gold made 17 contributions worth a total of $121,000, and the Latner conglomerate, which includes companies such as Dynacare, Greenwin Properties and Shiplake Investments, gave over $100,000. Over all of the contribution periods in 1999, TrizecHahn and related companies gave to the Tories $255,000, the Cortellucci (see story of Adams Mine Scandal) and Montemarano companies $254,000 and Latner companies $220,000. (1)
They also shortened the period of time for campaigning which benefited them immensely.
When the government shortened the campaign period from about 40 days to 28, it benefitted fund-raising that depends on large donations from relatively few individuals and corporations. The Tories raised $4.9 million dollars without spending a penny on fund-raising, while it cost the NDP $206,000 to raise just over $400,000. The shorter campaign also brought the unregulated pre-campaign period closer to election day and allowed the Tory campaign to advertise in the pre-campaign period as much as in the campaign period without any concern for spending caps. (1)
Perhaps more importantly was the removal of seats that Harris knew he couldn't win, under the guise of cutting costs.
The government's 21 per cent reduction in the number of MPPs, from 130 to 103, has resulted in few cost savings to the taxpayer because of increased members' spending and a projected salary increase. MacDermid argues that this measure has in fact cost Ontario citizens, reducing their chances of receiving timely services and assistance from their elected representative. (2)
Stephen Harper has gone the other way, gerrymandering with thirty new seats at the expense of the Canadian public.
In their book: The provincial state in Canada, Keith Brownsey and Michael Howlett, also wrote of the Harris government:
"As in 1995, the Tory campaign was a well-executed, generously funded and probably the most undemocratic Electoral campaign that post-war Ontario had witnessed." (3)
Yet even with the overt cheating, the Tories lost 23 seats, and that was because of the unions and other groups, who launched a campaign against Harris's stealing from the poor and middle class, and giving it to the already wealthy.
It was only the reduction of seats that gave Harris another majority.
Tim Hudak is posturing with unions now, but without the benefit of our money, it could cost him.
His over the top Million Jobs promise (there are only 555,000 unemployed)' has been debunked as a work of fiction, supported only by a right- wing Republican strategist.
Hudak is now toning down his dire message of one million unemployed, but showing the tape of his "one million unemployed Ontarians" could be a feather in the cap of the Ontario Liberals.
If we had 1,000,000 unemployed and now only 555,000; that means that they created 445,000 jobs after the economic crisis.
He's clearly not the brightest bulb on the tree.
With unions and other advocacy groups promoting a Stop Hudack campaign, he may have picked on the wrong people.
But then if he does win, not to worry. He'll pick on us all.
Sources:
1. . York U. Political Scientist Reveals Secret to Conservatives' Electoral Success, York University Press, September 5, 2000
2. How Charles McVety moves money, By Bene Diction Blogs On, April 24, 2008
3. The Provincial State: Politics in Canada's Provinces and Territories, by Keith Brownsey and Michael Howlett, UTP Higher Education, 2001, ISBN-13: 978-155111368, p. 193
DeMott laments the loss of intelligent debate in the political arena, being replaced, in part, with "touchy, feely personal testimonials" and "feel your pain" forced empathy.
In the current Ontario election campaign we've heard party leaders tell us that they worked their way through school, were a grandchild of immigrants and like to run.
Who cares? How is that relevant? Any identification we may have with them should end there. Our concern before we give them control of our money and in some respects, our lives; should not be about inconsequential shared life experiences; but the bigger picture of how they are going to create a better place for everyone.
During the 2008 federal leadership debate, when the topic was unemployment, Stephen Harper claimed that he understood the difficulties facing those out of work, having once been unemployed himself for eleven months.
However, when the media questioned him about it later, turns out that he wasn't really unemployed at all, but sat home for eleven months planning for an upcoming election, while his wife earned money printing material for his Reform Party. Hardly the same thing.
Later, when interviewed about the hardships facing Canadians as a result of the economic crisis, after suggesting that they could grab up bargains in the stock market, he said that his own mother was worried about her stock portfolio.
He was trying to suggest that he felt our pain, but couldn't pull it off. Not that it mattered. We shouldn't elect our representatives to feel our pain, but to alleviate it.
The growing reliance on soundbites and expectations of "just like us", are overshadowing the important issues, by "minimizing large complex problems" (DeMott), and redefining the traditional values of a just society.
Justin Trudeau and the Abortion Debate
I've been doing a lot of eye rolling over this media pet peeve of the week, but when someone I respect and admire weighs in, I pay attention.
Susan Delacourt entered the fray recently, and while I agree in part, I think she has missd the point.
Delacourt states that in 2005, when Stephen Harper was leader of the Opposition, he held a meeting with Hill journalists where he stated that his party
"... would not be having any policy at all on matters such as same-sex marriage and abortion. Members would be totally free to hold their views, but the Conservative party would have no stated position on these matters."
Delacourt was not surprised by this, believing that Harper was a Libertarian. Rather amusing given that he had campaigned against Same-sex marriage, and did not allow his MPs to hold an opinion contrary to any that he deemed the party should hold.
Take the case of former Harper MP Larry Spencer, who in 2003, made some pretty disparaging remarks about homosexuals.
According to Spencer, Harper called him into his office and ripped into him: "You knew we wanted to run on the preservation of the traditional definition of marriage in the next election. Now we can't do that." Spencer went on to say that 'Is it any wonder that the Alliance Party was often being charged with having a secret agenda? When the truth cannot be disseminated, even to caucus members, just what should one believe?'(1)
Spencer's was not an isolated incident, as Stephen Harper has taken complete control of his caucus. Not even his cabinet ministers are allowed to speak to the press until they get their talking points from the PMO.
Calling Stephen Harper a Libertarian is like calling calling George Bush a humanitarian.
Perhaps Trudeau could have rephrased his message, but when the issue is simply messaging, then the problem lies not with the politicians, but with us.
If We Hope to Stop the Rise of Neoconservatism We Need To Think Big
There is little argument that one of the biggest problems we are facing today is income inequality. The rich continue to get richer while the rest of us are expected to keep them in the lifestyle they've grown accustomed to.
Lowering corporate tax is a form of corporate welfare, that rewards the top for refusing to work for the money we give them. Any downturn, no matter how slight, and the workers are the first to go. Profit trumps all.
Richard Henry Tawney (1880-1962), economist and historian said: "A society which reverences the attainment of riches as the supreme felicity will naturally be disposed to regard the poor as damned in the next world, if only to justify itself for making their life a hell in this."
In their book Tax is Not a Four Letter Word, the Himelfarbs write: "American ambivalence turned to anger in the aftermath of the financial meltdown and the massive government bailouts."
And yet the Bush Tax Cuts were still implemented while government services were cut by a trillion dollars. And where were the cuts directed? At the poor, who were blamed for the economic situation, focusing attention away from the Wall Street gamblers and corporate freeloaders.
Tawney believed that the only way to implement real change, was not to focus on single inhumane acts, but the entire notion of social injustice. That's why the Civil Rights movement was so successful.
Justin Trudeau has to do the same. He wants to change the way that the Liberals do politics, focusing on Canadians and not the Party's woes.
The NDP are shifting to the right, to take up what they see as a vacant middle. Unfortunately, Canada's Conservatives have taken us so far to the right that the middle is now just to the left of Genghis Khan.
Progressives have lost their voice and the Liberals have an opportunity to be that voice. But no JUNK!
I want intelligent answers to addressing climate change, poverty, income inequality, racial discrimination and women's reproductive rights, to name a few.
So for the record Justin: your wife is lovely, your children are beautiful and you like to box. Good for you.
But what I want to know is how you're going to do things differently and steer Canada back to the way we were before the Neocon menace. And if that means laying down the law with your party, so be it.
Source:
1. SACRIFICED? TRUTH OR POLITICS, By Larry Spencer, Kayteebella Productions, 2004, ISBN 13-9780978057404
The old adage that nothing is certain but death and taxes, was first used by author Daniel Defoe, but in a different context.
In his The Political History of the Devil (1726), Defoe dismisses the popular notion that the Devil has a cloven foot, or any other characteristic bestowed on him by humans.
He suggests that the Devil himself must laugh at "... the frightful shapes and figures we dress him up in ... especially to see how willingly we are first to paint him as black, and make him as ugly as we can, and then start at the spectrum of our own making."
By believing in this spectrum so infallibly, they refused to see the Devil working in anyone not fitting the description. Thus, the cloven foot et al, became as certain as death and taxes.
This week I attended a Canadian Club luncheon, where Kevin Page, former Canadian Parliamentary Budget Officer, was speaking. I have a lot more to say about his address later, and thank my friend Norma for inviting me to be her guest.
I had an opportunity to speak with Mr. Page personally and asked him how we get governments to take raising taxes seriously, when tax is now a four letter word. He said that it was funny I asked, because in fact, there was a book published recently, Tax Is Not a Four-Letter Word, that addresses that very topic.
In the introduction, editors Alex and Jordan Himelfarb, ask how paying taxes went from ".. being an irritant to a four-letter-word, not to be uttered in public or spoken of favourably in politics".
The problem of course is in the counter revolution of Neoconservatism and Libertarianism, with their message of personal freedom and reduction of "government control". Government is bad, so why should we be giving them our money?
And because of the enormous benefits to corporations, and the wealthiest citizens due to this new philosophy; they had a lot of money to sell their platform to those who would be hurt the most by its implementation.
Taxes became dark and ugly with cloven feet, and that notion has become so embedded in our thinking that we now gravitate to those promising to free us from them, without seeing how devilish the whole thing is.
The idea that reducing corporate taxes as a way to create jobs is nonsense. Research has shown that corporations are hoarding their money and headlines of "record profits" have become the norm. Jobs are still being outsourced overseas, and as we have seen recently, corporations are depending more and more on Temporary Foreign Workers.
As Alex Himelfarb states in his book promotion for the Star, we need to ask what we will have to give up to pay for those tax cuts. They'll tell you that they'll only get rid of the gravy, but all that gravy was sopped up long ago, in the name of austerity.
But What of that Cloven Hoof?
The upcoming provincial election in Ontario, is a good place to start questioning the logic of further tax cuts.
Tim Hudak is promising an additional 30% reduction in corporate taxes. (10% for us but only if he balances the budget).
We need to ask him what we will have to give up, setting aside the ridiculous notion of firing 100,000 public servants, wiping out the, albeit fictitious, jobs created through his cuts.
When he was with the Mike Harris government, their 30% tax cut had to be borrowed, increasing our debt by 40%. Cost of borrowing for taxpayers was 800,000,000 a year.
Yet 57% of those tax cuts went to the top 10%' income earners, while only the top 25% saw any gain at all. The average household actually lost ground because of increased user fees and the downloading of services to municipalities, which increased our property taxes.
Harris came to power at the end of a damaging recession. We were already rebounding by 1995. But during the eight year PC reign, from 1995-2003, wages stagnated, especially for lower income. According to the Caledon Institute of Social Policy, the minimum wage in Ontario was the highest in Canada in 1995. By 2003 we had dropped to 5th place.
Instead of the minimum wage going up, the number of those earning minimum wage skyrocketed, as privatization swelled the ranks of the working poor. And while Harris refused to raise the minimum wage, the buying power of the $7.89 per hour, was reduced to $6.85 by 2003, due to inflation.
So what did that 30% gift to the wealthy cost us?
Remember when a political platform includes cuts to Public Service - WE ARE THE PUBLIC!
The Ontario Liberals plan to raise taxes for those earning $150,000 a year. A small step in the right direction. However, we need to make this an election priority for all parties challenging the Neocon Revolution.
NDP leader Andrea Horvath, after quoting George Bush's "job creators", is suggesting that taxpayers need to be respected. Part of showing us respect is treating us like adults.
We're not stupid. We know the deficit has to be dealt with and as with any budget, that means increasing our revenue. That's the conversation that has to take place. Lowering the HST at this point will be just as damaging as lowering the GST was.
We have to decide what kind of province, and indeed country, we want to live in. One where the rich keep getting richer or one where we all reap the rewards from our vast natural resources.
We don't need lower taxes, we need fairer ones, so that everyone can prosper.
Defoe wanted his readers to remove the imagery of the cloven hoof or they might not recognize the Devil when he appeared. We need to remove the image of the Devil in taxes, or we might not recognize their good.
"Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society" Oliver Wendall Holmes
Part of the Ontario Liberal campaign Forward Together was a promised cut to tuition fees for post-secondary education. I'm sure many students thought they'd heard that before, but last week, McGuinty kept his campaign promise and announced that tuition fees would be slashed by 30% for any student whose parents make less than $160,000 per year.
Students were overjoyed with the announcement. In Kingston, a group from Queens were dancing in the street, literally.
Not only was this the right thing to do, but it was a brilliant political strategy in the run up to the Speech From the Throne. How can the Opposition take the government down by fighting against lowering tuition rates?
Dancing in the streets would become marching in the streets.
That man is always a day late and a dollar short. He visited our city recently and spoke at one our most prosperous businesses, on how Ontario was bleeding jobs. The staff looked at him like he was from outer space.
"I am here to save your earth by inventing the wheel."
Kingston has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, and we have been served by both a Liberal MP and MPP for decades. Either avoid this area or use a different strategy. The provincial Conservative candidate came third here in the last election.
Bob Hepburn believes that the Ontario neocons may start looking to Jim Flaherty to save them. Ironic since Flaherty ran for the leadership twice and lost, because he was considered to be too right-wing, running on privatizing our public education and throwing our homeless in jail. He was also a member of Canadians for George Bush. Enough said.
I like the idea of the NDP holding the balance of power. The Liberals will have to remain progressive, since Hudak has clearly opted out of providing any kind of realistic alternative.
The Occupation of Wall Street protests are growing, and appear to have staying power. Without the corporate funding of the Tea Party, they started with just a small group and an idea.
Taxpayers were forced to bail out Wall Street, and yet Wall Street now sits on a mountain of cash, refusing to bail them out.
What are these so-called "job creators" doing with all that money? They certainly aren't creating jobs.
So this small group took to the streets to deliver their simple message and it's beginning to resonate.
Republican presidential hopeful, Herman Cain, suggests that they are playing the victim card. They are jealous of the wealthy, otherwise known as Republicans and their posse; and if they're out of work it's their own fault.
Can you imagine someone wanting to be president of the United States, openly declaring that he has no interest in representing the working class, who are now the "hardly working" class?
He's now tied for the lead.
Canada's occupation of Bay Street protests will start this week and let's hope they are a success.
The fools gold of neoconservatism has been exposed as worthless. Giving more money to the rich, only helps the rich, who in turn help the conservatives stay in power.
In Ontario, Tim Hudak's campaign was reliably disappointing. "Low taxes", tough on imaginary crime and going after welfare cheats. If he'd thrown in "long-haired hippies", it could have just as easily been Ronald Reagan's 1967 campaign in his first run for Governor of California.
In fact, it probably was. For almost half a century, neocons have stuck to the same script.
In Kingston, our local conservative candidate Rodger James, had more signs than any of his opponents. Not many on lawns, but busy roadways were plastered with them, lined up like blue and white dominoes.
I see those signs as a metaphor for today's conservatism.
Gluttony and excess, with nothing behind them but a big stick.
On Tuesday night of this week, I took part in a town hall meeting, via the telephone, with John Gerretson, a cabinet minister in the McGuinty government.
Gerretson happens to be my MPP in Kingston, though his "wired" gathering was not for a Kingston audience, but was province wide. He was acting in his capacity as a senior provincial Liberal.
I had anticipated that the questions would relate to the economy, or healthcare, and of course the dreaded HST. In fact one caller spoke of the HST on Hydro bills, prompting Gerretson to point out that the HST was a federal tax and that rebates compensated most Ontarians for any extra tax burden.
However, many of the questions were about the state of our society. One woman was concerned with the plight of the homeless. She was obviously not homeless herself. There were questions about what could be done about the increase in the use of food banks. About unemployment that was hurting families and why so many seniors were forced to live in poverty.
What was wrong with these people?
Why weren't they whining about high taxes, the debt or the deficit? Aren't they supposed to be our top priorities?
I generally tune out politicians, though I'm sure Gerretson's answers were just what the callers wanted to hear.
But I learned something about the Canadian people. We still care about the disadvantaged in our society, and more importantly, expect our government to do something for them.
And I learned that maybe we are smart enough to realize that if we lower taxes .... again .... our government would not have the means required to do what we expect them to do.
And maybe we now also realize that "lower taxes" is New Right speak for lowering the taxes on the wealthy, while offsetting them with reductions in services for everyone else.
The tired logic of lowering taxes, creating jobs, has been debunked.
I watch Bill Maher religiously, craving for a Canadian program promoting progressive ideas, and this week as a guest he had the lead singer from a group called Rage Against the Machine, Tom Morello.
I have to admit that I'd never heard of them, but I gathered that they may be a bit radical. However, Mr. Morello was intelligent and articulate, and absolutely captivating.
A champion of social causes, he told the story of a group of workers, who made guitars for companies like Gibson and Fender. The work had been outsourced to Seoul, Korea, where working conditions and wages were so deplorable, they would have been shut down in the U.S.
So the workers tried to unionize, and instead of hearing them out, the American based industry simply moved the factory to China, leaving many families destitute.
So they pooled their resources, sending three delegates, the 6,000 miles to the United States, hoping someone would take up their cause. As a result, Morello's group offered to perform a benefit concert, with all proceeds going to the struggling Korean workers.
However, the day before the concert was to take place, the earthquake hit Haiti. What happened next is nothing short of a miracle.
All of the affected Korean workers asked Morello to instead give the proceeds to the Haitian Disaster Relief Fund.
If people with nothing can be so generous, what is wrong with us? Why has lowering our taxes taken precedence over doing what is right?
The "Tax Man" theme is played out across the United States, mostly by Republicans against their Democrat opponents. It's getting old.
Supreme Court Justice, Oliver Wendall Holmes, once said that "Taxes are what we pay for civilized society".
What is a civilized society worth to you?
Are we being impoverished by taxes, or is cutting taxes impoverishing our society?
I find that those who scream the loudest about taxes, are also those who scream the loudest about potholes, or rant, "where are the police when we need them?", or complain about standing in line at government service offices.
How do you think those things are paid for?
So if the "Tax Man" cometh, I'm lighting the lamp and putting on a pot of coffee. We need to talk. I don't want him to lower my taxes, only to make better use of them.
And if that makes me a "leftie, tree-hugging liberal", I'll wear the title with pride.
Tim Hudak is on the campaign trail accusing the McGuinty government of "cronyism". I thought this was a dangerous path for Hudak to take, given the fact that his former boss and current mentor, Mike Harris, had made cronyism an art form.
A friend shared a 2004 article with me, one of many from the day, giving us some idea of how this was done. The piece did not come from the CBC or the Toronto Star, but the National Post. Hardly a "leftie rag".
Hudak recently warned the opposition to keep his wife out of any of their attacks. For those who don't know, his wife Deb Hutton was Mike Harris's gatekeeper, who took her job so seriously that she earned the nickname, 'Jabba the Hutt'.
Hudak's protection of his family might seem more sincere, if he wasn't dragging them around for the cameras, painting himself as a "family man" simply because he has one.
Back to the National Post article. We can't leave his wife out of it, because she was the centre point of the exposé .
New documents show Hydro One paid more than $400,000 to the consultancy run by former Conservative campaign co-chair Jaime Watt, as the list of Ontario Tories who received lucrative contracts from the utility continues to expand .... Documents obtained by CanWest News Service through freedom of information legislation show Navigator's bills, worth a total of $400,374 between October, 2001, and October, 2003, were for services that included company surveys, strategic counsel and communications planning.
In August, 2002, the utility paid $64,200 for an annual subscription to Current Opinion, Navigator's syndicated study of public opinion on electricity issues. Almost all of Navgator's bills were directed to the attention of Deb Hutton, a senior advisor to both Mr. Eves and his predecessor, Mike Harris. For most of the period in question, Ms. Hutton was Hydro One's vice-president of corporate relations.
The Navigator deals bring the latest total for contracts awarded to senior Tories by the power distribution company to $6-million.
The cronies involved, included Jaime Watt, former Conservative campaign co-chair. Watt is still running Navigator. You might remember the name from an investigation conducted over the relationship between the firm and the Harper government.
Another was Leslie Noble, former college pal of Tony Panayi Clement. Noble was a top lobbyist who helped to run Mike Harris's campaigns, resulting in an undefined position of power within his government. It is said that she often taunted elected MPPs, knowing how impotent they were.
One pipeline Noble has to influence government decision-makers is the unelected cadre of political aides in the offices of the Premier and his top ministers. These aides, many of whom report to Noble during the election campaign, wield tremendous power in government, a reality acknowledged by some Tory MPPs.
Tory backbencher Bill Murdoch says they openly flaunt their power. ``They say, `Hey Murdoch, we didn't even have to go through an election and we're running the place.' '' Queen's Park Speaker Chris Stockwell, a Tory MPP, calls them a "cabal'' and says they make decisions without input from elected politicians. (1)
And she wielded her power unabashed.
When Mike Harris was elected Premier, Leslie Noble became the hottest power broker in Ontario. The 37-year-old is one of Harris' closest advisers and runs the leading lobbying firm dealing with the Ontario government. No other lobbyist has Noble's access to Harris. And no other top political adviser to Harris is a lobbyist. Noble helped write the Common Sense Revolution, ran Harris' successful 1995 election campaign and will run the Tories' next campaign, expected later this year. Noble has no official job with government but regularly briefs Harris, his cabinet ministers and Tory MPPs on what needs to be done politically to stay in power. In corporate circles, Noble is the lobbyist Ontario business executives hire when they want the Harris government's ear. (1)
Her involvement with the Common Sense Revolution, leads us to another name mentioned in the 2004 National Post offering. Said April Lindgren:
Also a beneficiary was Tom Long, a senior Conservative strategist. The headhunting firm at which he is a senior official at one point was paid $88,000 to recruit Ms. Hutton - who was working in the premier's office with Mr. Harris - for her job as vice-president.
Long was another Clement pal, and the man who met with American publisher Steve Forbes and Republican strategist Mike Murphy, to draft the CSR, borrowed from then New Jersey governor Christine Todd Whitman.
Hudak has to be careful about generalizations like "cronyism", when attacking his Liberal opponent. His party's history is one he'd be wise to keep buried. If there are two words that can still put many Ontarians into the fetal position, they are "Mike" and "Harris".
NDP leader Andrea Horwath, is running a nice clean campaign, sticking to the issues. The Liberals are hoping that their record will keep them in power. The Conservatives need to stick to issues that define who they hope to be, not remind us of who they were.
Sources:
1. Queen of the Park: She's the Premier's adviser and Ontario's leading lobbyist. Should taxpayers be concerned? By Kevin Donovan and Moira Welsh, 1999
If there are three words that will warm the blood of the New Right and their corporate pals, they are "cutting red tape".
The picture to the left was published on June 3, 2003, with the caption:
Determined to cut red tape and reduce the regulatory burden are (l-r), Office of Thrift Supervision Director James Gilleran, Jim McLaughlin of the American Bankers Association, Harry Doherty of America's Community Bankers, FDIC Vice Chairman John Reich and Ken Guenther of the Independent Community Bankers of America"
This was during the Bush administration when they allowed the banking industry to write their own regulations, and as a result, that industry deregulated themselves into a global economic meltdown.
The notion of "cutting red tape", is a wonderful populist sentiment, attacking the bureaucracy that can slow down the processing of licenses, etc.
But to the new religion of "Market Fundamentalism", a coin termed by George Soros, "cutting red tape" has an entirely different meaning. Industry lobbies hard to take the scissors to the tape, but they're not concerned with licenses or any of the other menial government functions that can become a minor annoyance.
Removing red tape actually means removing the public from public policy.
Fundamentalists believe that if the marketeers can regulate themselves, the profit margin will guide them to eternal salvation. In other words, if they sell a tainted product and it kills people, they could lose sales, so it's in their best interest not to sell products that kill people, unless they're making bullets or bombs.
The theology worked well when Stephen Harper allowed meat processors to inspect themselves, resulting in the listeriosis outbreak that killed 23 Canadians.
A leaked cabinet document outlined a plan to save money at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) by shifting federal meat inspectors into an oversight role and leaving companies to implement their own methods of making sure that their products aren't lethal.
That's cutting red tape.
And cutting red tape also resulted in the 2000 Walkerton Tragedy in Ontario, when cattle manure leaked into the town's drinking water, killing seven people and making half of the town's population violently ill. Their grief turned to anger when they learned that Premier Mike Harris's Red Tape Commission had deliberately dismantled vital parts of the public health infrastructure in the name of cutting red tape. They knowingly ignored repeated warnings from their own experts who stated that cutbacks in environmental and health protection could have a disastrous impact on public health.
But free market dogma has no room for such considerations, so instead they cut inspection staff, shut down testing labs, and eliminated reporting and enforcement procedures.
As an MPP Tim Hudak claims to have been a strong supporter of Harris's Red Tape Commission, but I notice perusing Hansard, that he failed to show up on the day that a group of high school students from Walkerton visited the Ontario Legislature, telling their story of what cutting red tape meant to them.
Hudak must have taken a prayer day.
"Bless me Ronald Reagan for I have sinned. I almost let my emotions get in the way of carrying out your mission. But the holy mother, Margaret Thatcher, appeared to me in a vision. I am now cleansed, and will never again believe that public interest should get in the way of corporate profit."
In the UK, there is concern over a review conducted by their market fundamentalist government, that is “ part of a package of changes to Britain’s health and safety system to support the government’s growth agenda and cut red tape.” They see it as a workplace death wish.
On the campaign trail, Hudak is also blessing us with the red tape creed, even promising to reduce his cabinet by 20%. Concentrating power, giving us even less of a voice.
We need to change the dialogue. This is not about cutting red tape, but cutting us out, in favour of those we need protection from. Hudak refuses to say where he will make his cuts, but it could very well be in employment standards, including minimum wage. Or workplace safety, product inspection. The list is endless.
Yet he claims that by cutting red tape it will create jobs, and not just for morticians.
Food tasters for the rich. Overseers for slave camps, also known as your place of employment. Whip makers. Enormous opportunities.
We elect people to represent our interests, not work against them. We need to keep our red tape, before it turns into yellow tape, and we all become victims of corporate greed and government crime.
On February 15, 1983, the New York Times ran a headline: Reagan Misstatements Getting Less Attention.
Ronald Reagan was not only the first American President to bring the Religious Right into his administration, but he also launched an era of stupid in politics.
The man dubbed "The Great Communicator" could barely string two coherent sentences together, and after spending three years trying to make some sense of his ramblings, the media had clearly given up.
I have to laugh at how the Right have now canonized him, but during his tenure he was never that popular. I think his highest polling was right after he was shot.
Unfortunately "idiots" is now a term often used to describe the Republicans, as they've capitalized on incomprehension, and it hasn't hurt them one bit.
Their esoteric boys club has learned that there is a fortune to be made in the mining of ignorance.
Glenn Beck is not a moron, he just played one on TV.
When Stephen Harper's Reform Party had its first real political success in 1993, we were shell shocked with their constant firing of racial slurs and half witticisms. The Toronto Sun called them "a bunch of dung kicking rednecks". Now the Sun is among their strongest supporters, pitching the dung they once hoped to duck.
And they have cleverly made the reaction to stupidity, the story, instead of the actual stupidity.
Sun TV often runs a banner reading "We're on your side". Those "leftist elitist pinkos" don't understand you, but we do. Then they run to their own elitist friends and say "watch the puppets dance". Both groups come away with a feeling of superiority.
Neoconservatism 101.
Which brings us to Toronto mayor Rob Ford. When he first appeared on the scene he created quite a sensation. Acting as though he would be more comfortable in Animal House than City Hall, he became the favourite of Canadian conservatives. The more we "lefties" sounded the alarm, the more popular he was.
From Jim Flaherty to Tim Hudak, they couldn't wait to have their photo taken with this new iconic symbol of absurdity. Stephen Harper touted him around the campaign trail, and the two are now BFFs.
However, they may have a problem.
It would appear that Torontonians have awakened to the fact that there is a reason why you don't elect someone like Rob Ford to run the largest city in Canada. His foolishness was not an act. He's really a fool.
His political honeymoon long over, Toronto Mayor Rob Ford has lost the public’s confidence. And now, he’s about to lose council’s as well. The Ford revolution may be aborted before it takes root.
Torontonians are not impressed with Ford’s confrontational style, his lone-wolf approach to leadership and his threats to gut city services after guaranteeing during the election that he’d cut the “gravy” and not cut a single service.
His poll numbers are slipping fast, and in the middle of a provincial election, where Toronto is key, will this hurt Tim Hudak? Memories of Mike Harris's slash and burn policies, and broken promises, are already proving to be a hindrance.
And Hudak has been playing the stupid card with his "chain gang" musings and attacks on "foreigners".
If you've been following the Republican debates, you would have to think that they have finally hit bottom. Cheers when contender Rick Perry stated with pride, the number of people he sent to death, and refrains of "let him die", when a scenario was presented to Ron Paul of a young man in a coma with no health insurance.
Has Canada's new conservative movement finally hit bottom with Ford?
I'd like to think so, but I'm not so sure. There is now an arrogance in the ignorance that is driving this movement. They could never handle bliss. They're just too damned angry. An anger fuelled by the New Right.
"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." Saul Bellow (Canadian-born writer and winner of both the Pulitzer and Nobel prizes)
In it he questions the logistics of the Ontario Conservative's Changebook Platform. I perused that and it reminded me of another questionable platform. That of Mike Harris's Common Sense Revolution.
For Ontarians with short memories or those not biting their nails to the quick and developing a nervous tremor at the mention of Mike Harris, maybe it's time for a little history lesson.
I don't need to tell you the damage that Harris did to this province, so will instead lay the foundation for the 1995 manifesto, that made no more sense, than the 2011 redux.
So grab a coffee and pull up a chair.
The 'Long' and the Short of it
One of the engineers of Ontario's so-called Common Sense Revolution, was Tom Long, former president of the Ontario Conservative party. Long had worked on the campaign of Ronald Reagan and returned to his home and native land, to practice his recently acquired neoconservative skills.
His first big campaign was that of Kim Campbell. If you're asking yourself Kim who (?), she took over the party leadership of the federal PCs, after Brian Mulroney stepped down, and led them to their disastrous showing in 1993, when they were reduced to two seats and lost official party status. (Soon to be gobbled up by the Reform-Alliance)
With the help of several Tory staffers, including John Baird, who was then working for the Campbell government, Long created several personal attacks on Jean Chrétien, including one making fun of his face (the result of Bell's Palsy), that turned the nation off.
Undaunted, Long then turned his attention to Ontario, while Baird went to work as a lobbyist.
Meanwhile Back in New Jersey
Then governor of New Jersey, Jim Florio, was reeling from a report, revealing that his state contained five of the ten poorest cities in the United States, while also the home to some of the country's wealthiest citizens.
Access to education was considered to be one of the stumbling blocks for the poor, prompting a Supreme Court judgement, demanding that Florio raise billions in revenue to turn this around.
So he raised the income tax rate on the wealthiest and all hell broke loose.
His future Republican opponent, Christine Todd Whitman, helped to create Republicans for Responsible Government, organizing mass protests against this "Tax and Spend" Democrat. One of their slogans. How original.
Whitman, a former classmate of neocon guru, Steve Forbes (he handpicked her to run as Governor), then challenged Florio, running on a platform of "Common Sense".
Meanwhile Back in Ontario
Whitman's platform was drafted by Republican strategist, Mike Murphy, a friend of Tom Long's. With wounds licked clean from the Campbell trouncing, he visited Murphy to discuss a new strategy for the next provincial election.
Soon after, the National Citizens Coalition, created Ontarians for Responsible Government, a carbon copy of Whitman's 'advocacy for the rich' group. While Campbell's defeat was devastating for Long, the NCC were actually rejoicing. They had spent $50,000 on the successful campaign of a newly minted Reform Party MP, who they knew would work for corporate interests.
His name: Stephen Joseph Harper.
So while OFRG poured $560,000 into attack ads on NDP Premier Bob Rae, the "Whiz Kids" (including Tony Clement and Guy Giorno), also known as the "cut and paste" crew, copied Whitman's platform, which was highlighted by a promised 30% reduction in income tax rates.
In November, 1993, Tom Long, the former president of the Ontario Tories and manager of the last federal PC's campaign, went down to New Jersey to find out if the first shots in America's Republican revolution could echo up here ... After organizing Kim Campbell's disastrous campaign, Long needed a good idea to redeem his name as political king-maker. What Long found in New Jersey wasn't a good idea; but he did find the raison d'etre for Canadian neoconservatism in the 1990s.
That November, against the conventional wisdom of American pundits and pollsters, Republican gubernatorial candidate Christine Todd Whitman narrowly defeated Democratic Governor Jim Florio
Few knew that Long and Murphy's friendship would produce Ontario's "made in New Jersey" nightmare. (1)
Monkey See, Monkey Do
Los Angeles Times staff writer, Craig Turner, also wrote of the Ontario/Republican connection, instead comparing Harris to Newt Gingrich.
There is more at work here than the tendency of some Canadians to seek a dark cloud behind every silver lining. The debate reflects the ongoing controversy over Ontario Premier Mike Harris' political and economic agenda, which reminds many of the approach of the U.S. Republicans, especially House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
Harris was elected last June on promises to eliminate the province's burgeoning budget deficit and cut income tax rates by 30%. His enthusiastic budget-slashing--particularly when targeted on the poor, as in a 21.6% reduction in welfare grants--quickly earned him the nickname "Newt of the North," a sobriquet seized on by both admirers and detractors.
Harris' knife has cut a wide swath, leading to $5.88 billion in spending reductions over the next three years. As a result, tuition has risen 15% to 20% at most universities. Dozens of public hospitals are expected to close or consolidate. The cost of prescription medicine in the government-funded health care system is increasing for the elderly. Fares on the Toronto transit system are among the highest on the continent. More than 10,000 of the province's 81,000 government jobs are marked for elimination. (2)
However, this "Newt of the North" was more of a "Whitman of the North", as he not only copied her platform, but also her actions. Let's compare.
Back to Ziedenberg:
Whitman has spent the last three years cutting and fudging the state budget of $16 billion (US) to find the $1.2 billion needed to deliver her tax cut. She saved $26 million by robbing 30,000 senior citizens of their subsidized drug benefit plan. Twelve hundred of the state's 60,000 public sector workers were given their pink slips: Of the first 744 people to lose their jobs, 75 per cent of them were women, and 44 per cent were minorities. State aid to most school boards has been frozen. Trenton's Education Law Centre, a New Jersey public interest legal research group, is pressing the state courts to force Whitman to increase aid to poor schools by $400 million to fulfil commitments made by Gov. Florio. But under her tight-fisted, tax-cut induced budget priorities, no one knows where this money could come from. As well, tuition at New Jersey's public universities will rise by between 10 to 30 per cent. (1)
On May 31, 1995; Mike Harris told the Toronto Star "If I don't live up to anything that I have promised to do and committed to do, I will resign." After promising not to reduce money for healthcare or reduce welfare benefits (page 7 of the Common Sense Revolution), he failed to keep his promise to step down.
Tim Hudak is now telling the Star pretty much the same thing, but how can we believe him? He's learned from the master.
Canada's Neoconservatives like to think they're so clever, with their "new" ideas. But there is nothing clever, nothing revolutionary, and nothing "new". Every word and action comes from their American counterparts, who with the help of the corporate funded Tea Party and demonic Religious Right, have destroyed politics in the United States.
Ah you loved me as a loser, but now you're worried that I just might win
You know the way to stop me, but you don't have the discipline
How many nights I prayed for this, to let my work begin (Leonard Cohen: First we Take Manhattan, Then We'll Take Berlin)
First I took New Jersey. But not On-tar-i-o (Tim Hudak's Swan Song)
To fellow Leonard Cohen fans, enjoy the video. It will help take your mind off the rash you're developing, symptom of the Fear of Harris Lapdog Syndrome. You won't get the song out of your head, but at least the itching will subside.
The latest Tim Hudak ad focuses on his grandfather, a Czech immigrant who "believed in the value of hard work". There is even a close up shot of his immigration papers dated 1898.
All I can say is that it was a good thing that Tim Hudak wasn't around then, or this man would never have stood a chance, given his attitude toward what he is now calling "foreign workers".
Or imagine if Jason Kenney had been in charge of immigration, instead of Clifford Sifton, who was then Minister of the Interior under Wilfred Laurier.
The Laurier government adopted an open door immigration policy, not only to settle some regions, but to provide labour for railways and mines, and Sifton tackled the task with a vengeance.
Working with companies, aggressive schemes were created to lure "foreign workers" including those of Czech descent. The schemes usually involved partial payment for transport overseas and an offer of cheap land. It's highly unlikely Mr. Podatransk got off the ship and said "what now?"
Jobs were usually waiting for them and all efforts made to help them settle in.
I find it amusing when the new conservatives (neocons) claim to have made it with no help from the government, forgetting about things like public education and universal healthcare. And while they brag about their heritage and hard working ancestors, they forget that most early immigrants to Canada, arrived under some kind of scheme.
Dalton McGuinty's "scheme" is not designed to lure immigrants, but is still being painted as an attempt to pander to "foreign workers", while many Ontarians are still unemployed. Non-immigrant Ontarians. However, the program is only for highly skilled workers, who are currently unemployed, underemployed or precariously employed.
We get to benefit from their skills, instead of riding in their cabs.
And it is only a tax credit.
Personally, I think that all corporate tax cuts should be tied directly to employment. We keep hearing that giving more money to big business creates jobs, but that has not been the case. President Obama allowed the Bush tax cuts to go through on that promise, but months later, after tallying the jobs created by giving more money to the rich, it came up flat. In fact NO JOBS WERE CREATED at all.
The NDP are wisely keeping out of the debate, but Conservatives are whistling a xenophobic tune, beginning with a tweeted campaign slogan: "Hire a foreigner instead of your neighbour" Another on Youtube includes: "Too bad it’s not for you… 10,000 only for FOREIGN workers. Ontario workers need not apply. You just get the bill."
Randall Denley, running in Ottawa West reminded us that "People who come from other countries, I guess I call them foreigners." And Peterborough's Alan Wilson wailed that "Some people could lose their jobs and be replaced ... That's something that we really will be opposing. We'll be focusing on our own people here getting jobs."
I'm glad they cleared that up though, because I now know that "foreigners" can't be my "neighbours", can't live in Ontario, and are not "people here."
I hope they publish a handbook, because I'm confused. Maybe a little drawing of what an Ontarian is supposed to look like, so I can compare it to images of my neighbours.
And if they aren't the right colour should I start a campaign demanding that they move? Maybe burn a cross?
During the peak of the recession when people were losing their jobs at an alarming rate, Jason Kenney allowed an enormous increase in migrant workers. Where was Hudak's outrage then?
2008, 2009 and 2010 peaked for "temporary foreign workers". But then Kenney's colleague, Gerald Keddy, suggested that this was necessary because unemployed Canadians were "no good bastards".
You can see why we need a handbook.
But to sum it up.
Immigrants are "foreigners" here to steal jobs from "no good bastards", who may be your neighbours, because those "foreigners" can't be, since they don't really live "here".
