Well it was, if not nice, then ok while it lasted, but yeah, we are having a sort of “coup” up here in Canada, just weeks after an election in which the Conservatives won a slightly strengthened majority.
See, the way the Parliamentary system “works” is: like Israel and Italy, the opposition parties, when combined, often outnumber the ruling party in terms of seats. So they can band together into coalitions and overthrow the “real” government.
And we all know what bastions of democratic sanity and peace those Italian and Israeli parliaments are!
This suddenly jeopardizes our year long fight to reform the Canadian Human Rights Commissions and repeal Section 13 with its the notorious “hate speech” “likely” clause, a fight that was finally gaining traction and momentum a few days ago…
Ugh.
All this proves what I’ve been saying all along, in essays like “The Donkey in the Bathtub”: we can’t depend upon who is “in charge” in Ottawa to help us fight and win. We must change our culture, not the laws, and simply defy and violate Section 13 into obscurity.
An Ottawa insider who requested anonymity wrote me this morning:
I know you aren’t big on party politics, I don’t blame you. But this coup to replace Harper will matter to your readers in some important ways.
[The opposition] Dion, the Liberals, NDP and Bloc are all against changes to the [Canadian Human Rights Commissions].
Harper may be moving slowly but change will come. Meanwhile, Dion campaigned on making women a protected group for hate crimes and hate speech meaning the only people not covered would be white, Christian males.
Me: how can you tell?! No one can understand a damn thing Dion says.
He also promised to add what would amount to a gender auditor to make sure all government policies would be beneficial to women.
Hey, suddenly Obama seems rational!
Then there are the questions of what policies of the Bloc and NDP the Liberals will agree to in order to ensure support. Both advocate making it easier to get employment insurance and paying more to the unemployed. During tough economic times, how wise is it to give people a greater incentive not to work. Why get off the couch? EI pays more.
And of course, Quebec, as always, will get more from this deal.
But the main thing will be an end to any possibility of reforming the CHRC, in fact they will be strenghtened.
Here’s a comment from another blog that sums up the situtation. Alas, most of the in-jokes will fly over the heads of my American readers, who should consider themselves lucky in that regard:
Let me see if I have this straight:
A cobbled together coalition Liberal/NDP/Bloc/Romulan/Tholian government will have to choose among 2 proven failures (Dion, Rae) and an American Citizen (Ignatieff, who also looks like a Romulan) for who will lead the Liberal Party, unless the lights go dim and they push Dion out the window of the balcony, in which case Colonel Mustard in the study with the candlestick will be accused of the crime.
Failing that, Alfonso Gagliano is always good for a few accusations of misdemeanor pasta eating.
To help seal the deal, the patriach of the Librano crime family, papa Doc Chretien, last seen whizzing around Canada in 1995 at the last minute to save us from the separatists has swooped in to broker a deal with the former union hospital orderly and former Maoist Revolutionary, Gilles Duceppe. (Look it up on Wikipedia, its hysterical).
They will then troop off, arm in arm, to visit former CBC employee and head of Canada’s Military Michaelle Jean to attempt to convince her that despite that silly little matter of the missing billion or so on the gun registry and the 100 or so million toilet flushed with Liberal ad agencies and the $300 Million general election that the Four Weddings and a Funeral Crew (Dion’s funeral, Iggy, Rae, Layton and Duceppes wedding) deserve a polygamous, same sex union that will result in a new orgy (pardon the hideous imagery) of trough licking and ad agency spending and, oh yes, financing of their respective political parties.
That makes sense. I think the coalition should rename itself the UAE – United Arab Emirates — nationalize Alberta’s oilfields, and then score themselves a serious harem to go along with their legion of boot licking sycophants that can follow them around like the sultanates which they so aspire to be.
Canada’s constitutional vetting is fulfilled by an FLQ toasting GG, and the balance of power in the coalition government will be held by a Maoist wannabe separatist.
Only in Canada you say?
Shitty.
