Sunshine in Canada (A VERY POLITICAL POST)

WARNING: A VERY "POLITICAL" POST!

It's too soon to rejoice, and the Liberal Party has a history of failure to fulfill election promises. Nonetheless I feel cautiously optimistic. The Harper government's objective was never clearly defined but seems to have been to cut costs by reducing taxes and the size and influence of the national government. The Treasury Board tightly controlled the flow of money so funds allocated remained unspent. Military Service pensions and benefits were not delivered, nor were allocations to First Nations, enabling the government to boast that they had balanced the budget. If funds voted by their own government had been disbursed they would have had a deficit of several billion dollars. They governed with a unique combination of paranoid fear, austerity, and deceit.  They did terrible damage to Canada's international reputation and standing among the enlightened nations. For these reasons and others set out below I believe the Harper government was the worst for 100 years. It's good to be finished with them. 

In February of 2015 I compiled a list of reasons why I would never support the Harper government, and strongly believed that no enlightened intelligent person would. Here are my reasons:

Why I don't support the Harper conservatives (Compiled February 2015)

1. Ideology, not evidence, determines political decisions; strong anti-science bias

The Conservative Party of Canada is one of the most scientifically ignorant, politically inept sets of political leaders on earth. They are worse than ignorant. They are willfully obscurantist, hostile to science, blindly blundering about, rejecting evidence in favour of their narrow ideology. They have abdicated from international discussions of the most urgent policy issue confronting humanity, the critically urgent problem of climate change and what to do about it. 

2. Lack of vision

The Harper Conservatives have an extraordinarily narrow vision of Canada. Indeed they are without vision. Stephen Harper sees Canada as an ‘energy superpower’ but only considers petroleum fuel as the source of this energy. Moreover, the fuel is very ‘dirty’- bitumen or tar that requires costly, energy-intensive refining. Further, while he seeks to maximize consumption and combustion of oil, Harper has no time or patience with conservation of energy. He has even less time for sustainable energy, for solar, tidal and wind power. This directly contradicts traditional conservative philosophy.

3. Profligacy

Among the gifts left to Harper by the previous Liberal government, along with a large fiscal surplus, was a program of subsidies for enhancing energy efficiency by improved home insulation. Among the first act of the Harper Conservatives was to cancel this program.

4. Fiscal irresponsibility

Another immediate act was irresponsible tax cuts that eliminated the healthy surplus inherited from the previous government. These tax cuts were, of course, very popular with the most short-sighted portion of the electorate. These were truly acts of a visionless government, that called to my mind the biblical saying, “Where there is no vision, the people perish.”  

5. Governs on ‘divide and rule’ principle

Nations run best on collaborative teamwork. The concept of collaboration is alien to the Harper government which functions on a ‘divide and rule’ principle, setting one ethnic or interest group against another. There are many examples of this obtuse behavior. One that is more harmful than most is Harper’s refusal to attend meetings of first ministers of the provinces and territories.

6. Partisan policy in Israel-Palestine dispute

For many years before the Harper government came into office, Canada had a high international reputation based on its record of impartiality and altruism, particularly in the Israel-Palestine dispute. The Harper government has destroyed this reputation. It has sided unequivocally with Israel, boasting that it is Israel’s best friend, needlessly making an enemy of Islam.

7. View populace solely as taxpayers

The Harper government sees the people of Canada first and foremost as taxpayers. Newborn babies, indigent single mothers, old people dying of cancer or dementia are not primarily taxpayers, although they have well defined needs for health and social care. Every Harper government action boasts of an accompanying reduced tax burden. You get what you pay for. I don’t mind paying more for better quality, for example of CBC radio and high quality postal services.

8. Hostile to women’s reproductive rights

The Harper government is unfriendly, to say the least, towards women’s reproductive rights. Some years ago they denied charitable status to the International Planned Parenthood Federation, Family Planning Canada, and several similar NGOs. They withheld approval for the so-called ‘abortion pill’ for over 2 years, longer than any other drug ever submitted for approval in Canada, longer than any other nation. 

9. Mean-spirited and vindictive

The Harper government is mean-spirited and vindictive, for instance targeting altruistic non-governmental organizations that promote concern for the environment. These are seen as enemies, presumably because they disapprove of government policies that are very destructive of environments. These have been subjected to costly and needless audits by Canada Revenue Agency.

10. Attacks on Parliamentary Budget Office and Elections Canada

The Harper government’s way of doing politics relies on hatred and contempt for political adversaries. These adversaries include the permanent civil service. Civil servants are regarded and portrayed not merely as enemies of the CPC, but enemies of Canada – a complete distortion of reality. They have adopted the same attitude to impartial agencies such as the Parliamentary Budget Office and Elections Canada.  The aim seems to be to emasculate or neutralize democratic infrastructure that threatens them by telling the unvarnished truth.

11. Hypocrisy and empty gestures

Examples of this include Harper’s very public ‘apology’ for the atrocities committed during the residential schools fiasco. It was an empty gesture because nothing whatever was done to follow up and make amends for the parlous plight of First Nations people: no move to ameliorate the plight of people on reservations where living conditions are deplorable, outright refusal to establish an inquiry into the root causes of conditions that have led to over 1200 missing and murdered women and girls. 

   

12. Use of omnibus bills rather than parliamentary debate

The Harper government repeatedly bypasses democratic debate by using ‘omnibus budget bills’ as a way to change laws without submitting these laws to formal parliamentary debate.

13. Lemming-like rush towards extinction (opposite of sustainability)

The actions of the Harper government take all life in Canada towards extinction. I wouldn't mind in the least if the Harper government became extinct. But it makes me angry to think of them carrying bright children with them to extinction, children who manifestly could run Canada and the world a great deal better than they have.  In the interests of life in Canada and life on earth, we must get rid of this bunch of scientific ignoramuses who have been mismanaging our lovely part of the habitable world for far too long. 

14. Narrow, ideologically based economic policy

Economic policies are very narrow, based on resource extraction rather than sustainable diversification. In early 2015 we see the adverse consequences as oil prices collapse.

Economic policies are ideologically based, as in dismantling of National Wheat Board, which ensured stability of income for farmers. Taxation relies on 'boutique' tax cuts for targeted segments of the population.

15. Mediaeval approach to crime and punishment

Crime must be punished. That's far more important than preventing crime. More and bigger prisons, harsh sentences, are the solution. If they could get away with it, they would restore the death penalty.

16. Miserable mean-spirited management of refugee resettlement (because they are Muslim?)

 Refugees are viewed as potential or even actual terrorists. If possible, keep them all out "None is too many" which was the prewar government policy towards Jews fleeing the Nazi regime in Germany, is the covert policy of the Harper conservatives. 

A few additional reasons to reject Harper and all he stands for: 

Our flag: Not even $50K for 50^th anniversary paid for from Museums’ budget, versus $400K for War of 1812 when Canada didn’t even exist                                                                                              

False and misleading erection of phantom ‘terrorist’ enemies – stoking fires of ‘national paranoia’

Delay, delay, delay help for distressed Muslims (e.g. Syrian refugees, Al Jazeera journalist)

During the election campaign, Harper and his crony Jason Kenney added a further reason. A woman, just one of two women in the past decade, wanted to wear her niqab (face veil) during her citizenship ceremony.  Harper declared that he would prevent this, if necessary by special legislation. If an ordinary Canadian had made such a statement, couched in language that was an implicit incitement to violence, there would be a strong case for prosecution under legislation against racist hate speech. That the prime minister of Canada should say such a thing, not once as a slip of the tongue but repeatedly, in my view disqualifies him from holding any public office.