Or tenants up steve’s butt.
The past five years suggest that Cautious Stephen will keep Wild Steve in check.
Another of these ridiculous speculative pieces on harper, claiming that gee, he’s not that bad, he’s restraining his far right ideological impulses, he’s practically a Liberal now, don’t worry, be happy, he’ll be moderate because he wants to keep his majority next election.
These journalist offer up broad examples to support their arguments: he spends more than the Liberals, Martin’s cuts were deeper, he has promised not to re-open the abortion debate...
I’ve noticed that these fantastical pieces often come up when steve has done something particularly destructive, something that shows how vicious he can be with his hatred of things that most Canadians value.
Last week, harper cuts nearly 800 jobs from Environment Canada, mostly scientists, climatologists, meteorologists. This at a time when climate change has kicked into such high gear that we badly need those types of scientists to help us understand new weather patterns, plan for erratic, destructive weather, and learn how our planet will be changing and what we can do to minimize the negative impacts.
Last week, it was reported that harper has been actively lobbying European countries - with our tax dollars - to soften policies that would curtail his plans to massively increase tar sands development and production.
Steve’s plans to pump money into huge, expensive, unnecessary prison are well known. Since his re-election, Stats Can has been hit yet again doing away with a survey that gives a picture of the status of women in Canada. How can policy be shaped effectively if we don’t have a clear picture of what is needed?
The harper government continues to alienated other countries by hammering home how under his rule, Canada will blindly defend whatever Israel does, even going to the extent of declaring anyone who criticizes Israel’s actions as an anti-semite.
Yet reporters like Ibbitson continue to insist that steve is being cautious, reasonable, moderate.
Practically a Liberal? He may have spent more that most Liberal governments, but what he spends on is the real measure of his politics and ideology. Military, prisons, self-promotion as opposed to social programs that benefit a wider range of Canadians. Martin may have made deep cuts in the public service, but those cuts were not geared at getting rid of programs for ideological or political reasons. It isn’t the number of job cuts that’s telling, but what jobs are cut, what programs are abolished.
Cut the long form, and steve can make up his own statistics to suit him, like going on about crime rates, for example. Cut environmental jobs and programs and there are fewer studies showing how devastating unchecked land development will be, fewer inspectors to monitor the harm caused by existing projects.
Make no mistake. Let me be clear. Obviously. Steve is not holding back, he’s not being moderate, he doesn’t give a shit about what Canadians want or how his bludgeoning of our country and it’s policies will affect us. He has the unshakable belief that he knows better than everyone else and he’s damn well going to do as he pleases. He’s also insulated enough in his own delusions of power and brilliance that he’s blind to any evidence - including the protests of Canadians - that his inflexible beliefs could be wrong.
Harper is an extremely dysfunctional, disturbed creature. He’s too paranoid to take advice, too narcissistic to consider that anyone can enlighten him on anything. He’s also mean, angry, petulant, and vindictive. No room there for caution or moderation.
I wish journalists would do their fucking jobs. Or have at it, be honest, and just join steve’s communications team to remove any illusion of who they really work for.
Update: Impolitical has
more here.
