Protest the Prorogation Today

Today, Canada-wide protests against the prorogation are happening. If Harper's decision to shut down parliament has made you angry, you can vent some of that frustration starting at 1pm on Scarth Street Mall.

Hmm. Fancy That.

There's no equivalent federal tax credit for parents with kids in arts programming like there is for parents of sportier tykes, says the L-P. That was one of Stephen Harper's promises when the arts bit him in the ass before the last election. According to the government, it's busy prioritizing the economy, blah blah blah. I can think of one, oh, $86 billion industry that would know how to put money to work to stimulate the economy, but whatever.

I'm actually shocked that anyone cares about such piddling amounts as any of the vote-buying-tax-credit schemes on offer from the feds (in lieu of real programming, childcare, etc. ad nauseum) but who am I to say?

Proroguies Again?

I've been back for 37 minutes and already in a state of impotent rage about the possibility of Harper proroguing another parliament. (CBC)

WTF? If Michaelle Jean says yes again, won't that set kind of a bad precedence (as if the last year's prorogation wasn't bad enough, AND on top of many many many other bad bad bad precedences?)

I think I'll look at this picture of Gilles Duceppe instead.

Sigh.

Je m'en souviens trop...

20 years later and I still feel like crying.

"Au-dela du 6 decembre" is a firsthand doc of the experience, filmed in 1991.

Other coverage:

CTV Montreal has a few good pieces on the anniversary, including a typical "Marc Lepine was crazy (but you can't blame him, can you?)" comment, as enraging now as it was then. I remember many men saying this at the time, or variants of it, in the days after the killings. Many men didn't. 20 years later and that divide is exactly where it was then.

JohnInMtl It's time to put this thing to rest. It's unfortunate that 14 women had to lose their lives to a crazed killer. The gun registry has never deterred a killer and the gun registry will only determine after the fact if the killers had a gun. Harper was fully justified in redirecting $5 million from the administrative budget of Status of Women Canada, closing branch offices and ending funding for women's research and advocacy groups. Do such entities exist for men's rights? Advocacy groups do nothing except to espouse entitlement views. The research group are there to produce unfounded study after study and very often conflicting studies to support the advocacy groups! We already have gender equality legislation and even more in the works!

The Sunday Edition had a great anniversary show in its second hour today. The audio for the show is posted on Monday.

The Globe and Mail on the Conservatives scrapping the gun registry. There are a few doozies there in the comments too, from men and women. Yikes.

Oh, and JohnInMtl?

Fuck off.

I got Nothin'. Nothin.'

Harper praises press freedom in a speech, then refuses to speak to reporters. (CTV)

Meet Stephen Harper's New Brain

Nigel Hannaford, former Calgary Herald columnist and editorial board member has just been appointed as Stephen Harper's new speechwriter. He sure don't like them faggots. Ooooo, goody. (Xtra.ca)

Lies My Prime Minister Told me

Harper didn't say he wanted Senate reform (Warren Kinsella), he said he wanted a Reform Senate. (CBC).

F**k Off. I'm Full.

Further to Rosie's post below (beat me to it, the bastard) I must add: It was only a tiny little thin one. Wafer thin! (Monty Python, NSFW)

Harper pisses off the Catholic vote

Being an occasional participant in United Church of Canada activities (hauling my five-year-old to Sunday School), I'm not totally up on my Catholic Church dogma. But as a BCer in Toronto points out, Stephen Harper committed sacrilege during the recent funeral for former Governor General Romeo Leblanc. When handed the communion wafer by the priest, he put it in his pocket. (A BCer in Toronto) Which, in Catholic liturgy, is somewhere between a severe no-no and a desecration of the body of Christ. (Harper's people said he consumed it later: videos posted on the net [A BCer in Toronto] are supposed to be 'inconclusive,' but to me it looks as though he didn't consume the wafer).

As I understand it (and Catholics or those who know and mock the Catholic religion, please help me on this), when the presiding priest blesses the communion wafer, it becomes 'the body of Christ.' So, doing anything else but consuming it is sacrilege -- it's as if you're insulting the works, efforts, and words of Jesus Christ, who said at the Last Supper, 'This is my body, it is given for you, do this in remembrance of me." (1 Corinthians, Chapter 11, verses 23-26 via Wikipedia).

Being a member of an evangelical Protestant denomination, Harper could have -- or at least had his protocol people advise him to -- decline the communion wafer. Or he should have consumed it right away, and if anybody questioned him on it, said something to the effect of, 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do.'

The fact that he screwed up -- he looks like he's trying to shake the priest's hand when he goes up for communion -- and that he won't admit it (TorStar) -- going as so far (in my mind) as to 'bear false witness' (Thanks again A BCer in Toronto) says a lot about his character. I said I didn't do it, therefore I didn't do it. All evidence to the contrary doesn't apply.

See, that's the problem. Like most social conservatives, Harper doesn't believe in God: he believes he IS God. Big difference.

Harper's War on Science

Scientists -- credible scientists, that is -- are appalled to have discovered that Harper's been stacking the boards of various scientific bodies with climate change deniers. Most recently, he installed Mark Mullins, Executive Director of the right-wing Fraser Institute, to the board of Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), while he appointed John Weissenberger to the board of Canadian Foundation for Innovation, a funder of large research projects. Read a more detailed account at DeSmog Blog. Or an equally detailed but more diplomatic one at the Globe and Mail.

Add to this the fact that Harper is actively defunding curiousity-driven scientific research, is out there provoking and angering the scientific community, and has installed a science and technology minister who is not only a chiropractor (SkepticWiki on chiropractic) but also very likely an evolution denier (or at the very least an evolution not-understanderer), and what you get is a medieval, science-hating government of ignorance. Bring on the Dark Ages. No wonder the credible scientists are packing up and leaving our fair Dominion.

Flush twice, Stephen ...

Your followers back in Ottawa need the Kool-Aid. (The Guardian)