Stephen Harper has disappeared. He has not been showing up for work in the House of Commons. Perhaps, Michael Harris suggests, he believes he is the member for Las Vegas/Fort Myers. His party doesn't seem to mind. But they still have not come to terms with their defeat. And their cheerleaders, people like the peanut gallery at the National Post, keep shilling for more of the same. But Harris reviews the record:
Under Harper the economist, 400,000 manufacturing jobs were lost. Worse than that, he presided over a one-third drop in Canada’s value-added exports — the better to concentrate on rapid, unsustainable and environmentally harmful resource development.The NDP has reviewed the reasons for their loss -- even though the review was painful. Tom Mulcair has acknowledge the campaign shortcomings and has taken responsibility for them. We'll see if he survives.
While the rest of the industrialized world was investing in alternative energy sources to save the planet, Harper’s master plan was to subsidize pipelines and pollution and damn the torpedoes. That’s why he dropkicked Kyoto into oblivion and replaced it with the environment-killing omnibus bill C-38. And Rona now talks about how much the Cons love nature.
Harper spent tens of millions of taxpayers’ dollars promoting so-called government programs. Much of this material amounted to thinly-disguised promotional bumf for the Conservative Party of Canada.
So great was this prime minister’s disrespect for Parliament that he shuttered the seat of government for an incredible 181 days for purely political reasons. He unleashed the Canada Revenue Agency on NGOs and environmental groups, using audits as a weapon against his perceived political enemies.
Harper’s attack on civil liberties was deep and disturbing. Bill C-51 gave police-state powers to agencies like the RCMP, CSIS and SEC. Some of you may remember that these same agencies were already spying on environmental groups and then meeting every year with representatives of the oil industry to brief them on the alleged threats facing their projects.
Harper the diplomat turned Canada into what former Conservative PM Joe Clark called a “denier and an outlier”. For the first time in fifty years, Canada couldn’t get elected to a seat on the Security Council at the UN, losing the spot to Portugal. He turned the world into a comic book narrative of good and evil, preferring bombing to talking whenever he had the choice.
Perhaps Steve believes that, as long as he hides, he can escape that word that he used to trumpet -- accountability.
14 comments:
Harris lists many of the things those of us that were taking notice already knew. Owen. But it would now seem that we must add coward to his list of traits for it seems that he has not got the guts to show up and do the job he is being paid for and represent his constituents in the HOC. Shame!
People who know Harper have said that he tends to go into a deep funk when things don't go his way, Rural. I suspect he's in one of his very dark moods.
I used to pout if things didn't go my way...when I was five.
Delusional and cowardly are the two adjectives that come to mind on the rare occasions when I think of Stephen Harper, Owen.
The explanation I got, Owen, is that Harper was concerned after watching the scorn heaped on Jim Prentice when, in the wake of the Conservative defeat, he promptly quit. It seems the Prince of Darkness intends to stay on for "a decent interval" before bailing out to some cushy spot in the private (energy) sector.
Similar fact evidence - Jim Prentice?
j a m e s
Prentice hasn't disappeared, James. But the fact that he's taken up residence in Washington instead of in his struggling province says a great deal.
Perhaps he'll wind up in Washington, Mound -- like Jim Prentice.
They fit like gloves on both his hands, Lorne. But, come to think of it, they also fit when he prorogued parliament.
It's a childish reaction, rumley. But I think you can argue that it's entirely characteristic of Mr. Harper.
Just another blowhard who espoused the "Free enterprise is the solution to all" and that "Government is bad" sucking on the teat of the taxpayer as Mr Harper has done for most of his adult life. Except he's not showing up for work while we still pay his wages. I would have been fired for that Owen.
mr perfect
Harper used to fulminate about public servants who didn't work, Perfect. But, apparently, he's not that kind of public servant.
When a man like Harper Owen, whose core identity is defined by the power he holds over others, I wonder what he becomes when that power is taken away.
It appears, Pam, that he becomes an empty suit.
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