Meanwhile, in Parliament...

   
 



... from your elected job
at the House of Commons
in session.


Don't you care at all?

 

"... not more than one further sitting day shall be allotted!"

.. that's how often the Conservatives shut down debates since the 2011 election. That's 25 times a year, on average.

In the last 8 months,  Conservative House Leader Peter Van Loan has already cut off debates 14 times.

Compare that to the three decades BS (that's Before Steve), when fewer than 4 debates were shut down a year, on average.

Conservatives don't play well with others, do they?

Find more baffling and fascinating Conservative misdemeanors at Press Progress.

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Meet Your Conservatives: How Much Tough Is Too Much?

Meet Your Conservatives: Cabinet Monster Vic Toews, "Civil Rights for Gays & Lesbians? No Way!"

Minister of Public Safety Vic Toews (thankfully, gone) 

Who could forget Vic Toews?

He once described gay marriage ceremonies as satanic “black masses”.
Seriously? And it gets better... he insisted that including gays and lesbians under Canadian civil rights statutes would "bring the jackboot of fascism [down] on the necks of our people.”

Mr. Righteous – who worried that gay marriage could lead to polygamy
– got his underage babysitter pregnant. Not surprisingly, his wife of 25 years divorced him.

An Ottawa Who's Who

If you want to know who's on the "inside" track of the CPC,
here's a simple technique I like to call "Check the Neck!"

If they don't have one, you can bet they're "party players"
and may well have the ear of His Leaderliness.






Jason "Mmmmmm... pork buns" Kenney

Christian Paradis - former Minister for Asbestos








John "buy Barrick" Baird









Dean "Hey, where's my soap?" del Mastro










James "kiss my ass, soldier boy" Fantino









Larry "stay the hell where you came from" Miller

 

and of course, The D.u.f.f.











Still not sure? May we present...

Meet Your Conservatives: John Williamson

John Williamson represents the electoral district
of New Brunswick Southwest. Like his leader, he
has degrees in economics. Before becoming an MP,
he worked in the Prime Minister`s Office and as the
head of of a right-wing non-profit organization called
the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

In 2006, while he was the head of the CTF, Williamson
reached out to First Nations with an article titled "Canada's
Teepee Republic," in which he equated the lack of accountability
of First Nations leadership with "banana republics".

Later that same year, the CTF criticized the government's 1998
"statement of reconciliation and apology" to First Nations people
"who experienced sexual and/or physical abuse", saying:

"Were Indian residential schools perfect. Of course not.
But what was the alternative? Should the federal government
not have provided education for aboriginal children?"


He was also not a fan of the Conservatives Temporary Foreign
Worker Program:

"I’m going to put this in terms of colours but it’s not meant to
be about race, it makes no sense to pay ‘whities’ to stay home
while we bring in brown people to work in these jobs."


But perhaps his shining moment (to date) was when he rose
in the House of Commons in 2013 following the Conservative
government`s termination of the long-gun registry in 2013.

To celebrate the momentous occasion, Mr. Williamson
chose to paraphrase civil rights leader Martin Luther King.

"Free at last, free at last," said Mr. Williamson,
"Law-abiding Canadians are finally free at last."

The Reverend King died from a bullet fired in 1968
by an assassin using a long gun.

Meet Your Conservatives: Joe Oliver - Min. of Natural Resources

On May 18, 2011, Joe Oliver was sworn
in as the Minister of Natural Resources
and soon earned a reputation as a classic
Conservative pit bull in his defence of the tar/oil sands at home and abroad.

Like other Harperian ministers, he was not about to let
the facts come between him and his proselytizing.

He brought the party line to audiences of US and Canadian
energy industry executives, informing them that Canada was
“emerging as a 21st century energy superpower.”

Minister Oliver quoted statistics alleging that there is a
downward long-term trend for greenhouse gas emissions
per barrel in the Canadian oil sands, and that Canada is
taking significant steps to reduce its overall emissions.






Inevitably, there were other audiences who were
less inclined to take these pitches at face value and
whose questions would reflect those doubts.


If anyone else dared to suggest the Minister was incorrect
or that perhaps there might be other factors to be considered
they would, in the Conservative tradition, be attacked.


In January 2012, he wrote a letter to the Globe and Mail
about some of his enemies...


"Unfortunately, there are environmental and other radical
groups that would seek to block this opportunity to diversify
our trade. Their goal is to stop any major project no matter
what the cost to Canadian families in lost jobs and economic growth.

No forestry. No mining. No oil. No gas. No more hydro-electric dams.

These groups threaten to hijack our regulatory system to achieve
their radical ideological agenda. They seek to exploit any loophole
they can find, stacking public hearings with bodies to ensure that
delays kill good projects. They use funding from foreign special
interest groups to undermine Canada’s national economic interest."


Read the whole letter at the Globe and Mail.



On March 19, 2014, Oliver was appointed to replace Jim Flaherty
as Minister of Finance.

Meet Your Conservatives: MP Larry Miller

If you're like many Canadians, you probably don't know
or even particularly care who Larry Miller is, but be advised
that up on The Hill, he's a pretty big guy.

“We call him the Keeper of the Flame — the voice
of principle and straightforward talk in caucus,”
said James Rajotte, the Edmonton MP.

“It’s no exaggeration to say he is the most loved
and appreciated person in caucus,”
said Dean Del Mastro, (former) Conservative MP for Peterborough.

These are just a taste of the testimonials in a story that ran
in that notorious lefty lame-stream rag The National Post,
entitled "The voice in Harper’s ear".








If you have heard of Larry Miller, it's probably because of what
he said about Muslim women and anyone else emigrating to Canada
on a local radio show during the Great Kanadian Niqab Kafuffle.

Larry told Muslim women to "stay the hell where you came from"
if they insist on wearing a niqab.

"I think most Canadians feel the same.
That's maybe saying it a little harshly, but it's the way I feel,"
Miller told local radio station CFOS.

"I'm so sick and tired of people wanting to come here
because they know it's a good country and then
they want to change things before they even really officially
become a Canadian, so I have no sympathy for her."

Speaking on a local radio station in his riding of Bruce-Grey-Owen
Sound about the niqab controversy (the Conservative government is challenging
a Federal Court ruling that struck down the ban on face-covering niqabs
during the citizenship oath), Larry Miller acknowledged
"it may sound 'harsh,' but so be it".








Zunera Ishaq, the woman at the centre of the niqab case,
has been a permanent resident of Canada since 2008.

Who scares you the most?

Harper is scary, but Jason is worse...

For those pondering the tea leaves of federal politics,
the omens seemed clear.While Kenney kept his distance
from Harper’s scandal-tarnished brand, his riding
association books revealed a staggering $315,000 war chest,
far more than he needed to recapture his own safe seat,
yet ample enough to share with MPs whose
gratitude might come in handy during a race for the top job.

Certainly, no other candidate boasted comparable credentials
or such populist appeal.As the architect of a seven-year strategy
to woo ethnic voters away from the complacent Liberals, Kenney
was hailed as the rainmaker behind Harper’s long-coveted majority,
but he had also built up a database of immigrant loyalists
that his rivals could only envy.

After tagging along on one of his fifteen-hour days, watching him
shuttle among a dozen national and religious festivals, munching
his way to his nickname, Curry in a Hurry,the Toronto Star succumbed
to breathless hyperbole, comparing his wattage to Justin Bieber’s.
As recently as last January, Ottawa’s influential Hill Times profiled
him not as a minister but a “contender.”


read the whole scary saga of Mr. Kenney by Marci McDonald at THE WALRUS



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