CIVITATENSIS

I’ll be away for a couple of days. I shall return on Monday.

Obviously the deal between Grits and NDs is not about numbers. Giving up 99 for 19 supporting voices on the budget sounds like something only Joe Clark could do. So what’s the deal?

Martin could be as stupid as the leader of the immediately previous minority government. It’s possible, but not likely. Martin may have come to the realisation that the Bloc and Tories are going to pull the plug, and he gets to show that he is doing something –beside sweating bullets and whining on TV.

If Martin has read the writing on the wall, he may want to give the Tories an excuse to execute the government, and then fight the battle of the election accusing the Tories of being in bed with the separatists. We started to see vestiges of that today. Martin may be encouraged by polls that say that his free-fall has levelled off. The strategy seems to be to put the Tories on the defensive, and subject to attack on the “national unity” issue. Layton is doing the same. Ontarians will buy that one. Yeah…., I know.

Clayton had the most to gain from the beginning. If Martin turned him down, he could say that gave the government a chance. He portrays his party as still having relevance. Look how much press he has suddenly received since the weekend. And, he gets to keep the auto workers on his side –whatever that may mean. But he also surrenders much ground on the corruption scandal by getting too close to Martin, though he could still spin it and say “Canadians don’t want an election just now so we have an obligation to find ways to make Parliament work.”

Clayton does not need help looking weak. So, he loses too, since Hargroove’s bragging today, because it only reenforces the image of a weakling. Except for the part that that is just the way that NDs like their leaders: a balding version of Audrey McDonough, with a moustache

Their greater problem, if the Tories learn to tap into it, will be that the Martin-Layton duo is vulnerable to accusations that they are spending surplus money originally not intended to be spent but to go to the debt, while Ontario is complaining of a $23 billion gap with the feds.

National Unity will definitively be the centre of the Liberals’ campaign. John McCallum already began a pre-emptive attack on this budget/unity front, charging Ontario of placing regional concerns ahead of the country, says Le Devoir, fanning the flames of regionalism.

Guite’s testimony is currently under ban. All that Le Devoir could say today was that his testimony now goes farther than it did before the Commons Committee and his previous appearance before the Gomery Commission.

We shared with him, quite forcefully, I would add, that the labour movement was not anxious to have an election,” Mr. Hargrove said yesterday. “We saw absolutely no reason that we couldn’t make use of the minority situation in Parliament to make some gains on the issues that were important to working people.

As the labour unions start to pick at the carcass of Paul Martin’s Liberals, things could get more dangerous. Everybody is commenting about who will be next in line at the trough: Parrish, Cadman, Kilgour? The more reason to put the Libs finally “out of their misery,” for all our sake.

I heard Paul Martin on CBC saying that he worked out his deal with Jack Layton because it is “good for Canadians.” But it was not that good before last weekend. It was not that good when his budget was presented. How come?

The deferred reductions in corporate taxes will widen the gap in productivity between Canada and the United States. But since some of those tax cuts weren’t planned to take effect until late in the decade, the $4.6-billion of new spending slated for this year and next will have to come, in part, out of budget surpluses,

writes Ibbitson.

The NDP didn’t get taken. We did. When Martin promised Layton to remove from the budget the multi billion tax cuts to small and large business, Layton threw his support behind Martin as agreed.

Now Martin is seeking the support of the Conservatives to produce a legislation outside the budget that will restore the tax cuts that he gave up to Layton. Does it sound like Layton got taken?

Well, not really. Layton still gets his big spending spree, and he does not care where the money comes from. But the money that bought Layton was our money. Does that mean that we all own a piece of him now?

The Liberals are trying to keep the tax cuts to keep their government afloat (as if…), to put the Conservatives in a tough spot, and to be able to say that the “spirit” of their budget is intact but the Conservatives shut it down. But the Conservatives are not going to buy that. Harper has said:

The prime minister has just cut a $4.5 billion deal to buy votes to deal with allegations of vote buying. So to deal with Liberal corruption we get an NDP budget. The way that this parliament is supposed to work, I guess, is what the Liberals don’t steal the NDP gets to spend.

Will Canadians buy Martin’s scheme? It’s a rhetorical question.

via Coyne and politics watch

Alfonso Gagliano, the disgraced former Liberal Minister of Public Works, claims that the Quebec separatists were conducting much worse business than his own government’s unethical and illegal plan to subsidise his party’s finances. Gagliano has gone as far as to suggest that “Quebec’s then-separatist provincial government spent five times more” than the Liberals did. It is not clear what he means by spend, but he seems to be saying that the Parti Quebecois defrauded tax payers by amounts five times greater than the Liberals did?

We’re showing to Quebeckers the bad things that happened during this sponsorship program… but there’s no inquiry in the other side.

Right now, we’re just looking on one side and that is helping the separatist movement to gain momentum

If Quebeckers would know what the separatist government in Quebec did in those same years, on the same files, they would be more outrageous.

This statement begs the Watergate questions, what does he know and when did he know it?

By the sounds of it, Gagliano seems to be saying that the Chretien Liberal government set up its scamming programme to counter the separatist one. That would mean that as a Minister of the Crown, he and his boss had knowledge that crimes were being committed by the PQ and failed to report them. That is an abandonment of responsibility as officers of the Crown, and an abdication of their fiduciary duty. Instead, they chose to engage in similar unethical and illegal activity. That makes them silent accomplices. It also begs the question about what Paul Martin knew.

If, on the other hand, the allegations of separatist wrong-doing began after Adscam was up and running, then Chretien, Gagliano, Martin and the rest of the Liberal cabinet could hardly point fingers at the separatists –maybe the most likely scenario. And then we would have to conclude that the Chretien government established the template for the separatists to follow.

In short, if the separatist are reaping a political boost from the sponsorship racket, his party bears the blame on two counts: showing them how to use and improve the federal scheme to defraud tax payers, and for abdicating their duty to prosecute the wrong doing.

Either way, the Liberal government surrendered its responsibility to fight for this country –in that is in fact what they were doing– while remaining within the bounds of the rule of law and in dutiful performance of its responsibility. The RCMP shroud be taking notes.

Lastly, Gagliano’s account is very similar to his boss’, Jean Chretien. There is no contrition or admission or wrong doing. He has in fact said that there was nothing wrong with the defrauding programme. Instead, he is trying to shift the blame on to the Gomery Commission. IT will be responsible for the destruction of the country that Gagliano has forseen. My four year old boy is more responsible than that.

Lorrie Goldstein from the TO Sun speculates into the far future. He wonders about a time when Ontarians might awake from their dream by confronting them with another one. Valiant (and funny) effort.

Surely, the intentions of voters all over the country have moved. That cannot be denied or ignored (not even by Liberals), but it remains still a mystery to me that Liberals still have as much support left.

One does not have to live at the centre to recognise that Ontario has become the final frontier of electoral politics in this country. But the placid natives in that land have become far too conservative, which is why they cannot stop voting Liberal. I am starting to be in favour of revolutions.

Pierre Pettigrew, the Foreign Minister who sought to silence the Catholic Church and who declared that Canada will not follow its own interests, is sure that he won’t win his own riding back. He has been sweating bullets about it for a few weeks. He even whined about his soon-to-come demise to a couple of CPC MPs in Ottawa. There has been talk among Liberals to move ministerial assets to safer ridings for the next election, but then they would be confronted with the stigma of running away from angry voters. Pettigrew is afraid to face the music; he wants to quit, but he does not want to be seen as a quitter.

So, he has been looking for a place to go –to save himself from the humiliation of losing his seat. Enter the messy business of electing a new Secretary General (subscription required) for the Organisation of American States, OAS. For six ballots now, no candidate has secured the majority vote needed, which is 18. At the moment, Mexican Foreign Secretary Luis Ernesto Derbez and Chilean Minister of the Interior Jose Miguel Insulza are the two contenders going into the May 2 seventh ballot vote. Derbez is the candidate of a “realist” block and it would be good for the OAS to get him, but he is opposed by the anti-US coalition headed by Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. The vote is tied at 17.

Pierre Pettigrew is one of two Canadian names that are being floated as potential deadlock breakers. Pettigrew’s office is saying that Pierre is “flattered” that the OAS has brought his name up; they are not saying that he is an unofficial candidate –but he is. He and his aides are trying to spin it as if the OAS came to look for him as a saviour to rescue them out of the impasse in the voting of the two current candidates.

I don’t expect Pettigrew to make a public move unless he is sure to win. So, right now he must be working the phones. He needs the support of a minimum of six states to get his name on the ballot. Canada presently supports Derbez. If Pettigrew does run and win, the CBC will tell us how proud we should be that international bodies come to Canada looking for leadership. It will be the Louise Arbour thing all over again.

The other Canadian name being mentioned is Marc Lortie. Lortie too is a Chretienite Liberal with significant diplomatic experience and wide contacts in Latin America, but perhaps not enough clout to beat a foreign minister. Especially now that the Chretienites are on the outs. In 1985, Chretien (ooops) Someone convinced him to leave the diplomatic service to go work for him at the PMO, where he stayed until 1989. Lortie went back to Foreign Affairs and became Assistant Deputy Minister, Americas. He is now Canada’s Ambassador to Spain.

Lortie is a charming and smooth man; it is hard to imagine that he and Chretien went to the same school. Probably as a product of the Liberal Party, he is openly anti-American (He should get along well with Spain’s anti-American Prime Minister Zapatero), and I found him to be extremely –though subtly– condescending toward Latin Americans (I’ll have to write about that another time). That makes him the right man for the job.

h/t: Tom Cerber

In a new series comparing Leo Strauss, the Chicago political philosopher, to Sayyid Qutb, the radical jihadist, the CBC has sunk to a whole new low, points out Tom Cerber here and here.

See your tax dollars propagate ignorance.

Chuck Guite will begin to testify this week at the Gomery Inquiry.

Guite…has already said his elected bosses cleared every move he made while running the sponsorship program in the 1990s and had the final say in every spending decision.

He has also said he dealt directly with ex-prime minister Jean Chretien’s chief of staff, Jean Pelletier, when discussing sponsorship matters in 1996.

We should expect more along these lines. It will also be interesting to see if Guite was aware of the kickback ring –the trail of money going to the Liberal Party.

Guite’s testimony will be covered by a publication ban similar to the one that covered Jean Brault’s testimony. Most anticipate another Tsunami on the blogosphere this week. The Captain will probably be ready!

On the argument that Canadians should wait for Gomery to issue his report, the Prime Minister appealed to “due process.” I have noted that this is just a smoke screen that blurs the distinctions between the judicial and the political here, and others have written about the same here, and here.

Conservative Life offers a new angle to Martin’s apparent preoccupation with fairness and due process:

Why did Paul Martin fire Alfonso Gagliano before the Gomery inquiry had even been called?

Paul Martin likes to brag about how he took quick action when revelations of corruption were revealed by the auditor general. He fired Alfonso Gagliano without ANY evidence that he was personally connected to the scandal. There was no trial. There was no inquiry. It was simply because Mr. Gagliano headed the scandal plagued program. There was no need to wait for due process or investigation of any kind.

And, one might add, Martin fired Gagliano from a job that by then was no longer connected to the scandal. Even less connected, say, than if Gagliano had been in Finance and then went to the PMO. It’s a lot easier to plead for due process when Martin’s own job is on the line.

Alfonso Gagliano, one of the Central figures in the sponsorship racket orchestrated by the Liberal government, claims that Paul Martin –the leader of his party– is destroying the country, reports say. Gagliano appeared tonight in an interview for Radio Canada (see here). He is quoted as saying that it is “a question of time” before Canada breaks up from what he foresees will be a rise of separatism in Quebec. Gagliano has affirmed that to his knowledge there was “nothing scandalous in the sponsorship program.”

I did not see the interview, but from the reports here and here, the CBC luminaries do not appear to have pressed him on the question of his part in the scandal, and therefore his own responsibility in his foreseen doom of the country.

Gagliano takes it as a foregone conclusion that Premier Jean Charest will loose the next election and the Parti Quebecois will seize power. In short, he is just full of praise for his partisan brothers and sisters in Quebec. Gagliano equates the destruction of the Liberal Party in Quebec, a likely occurrence given his own shenanigans in Public Works, with the destruction of the country. It is precisely this kind of arrogance that seems to have led the Liberals to the corruption that now envelops them.

…at this stage, the separation of Quebec from Canada is not stoppable. It’s a question of time. It’s going to happen.

Gagliano denies that Ad companies were paying Liberal volunteers in Quebec: he said that

it was his understanding that the party paid the volunteers.

Part of the allegations is that Groupaction had Liberal Party election workers on payroll. But allegations have also been made that Groupaction and other ad agencies brought bags of money to Liberal Party organizers to pay “volunteers.” Technically, it may be true that the party paid “volunteers” (an oxymoronic formula, for sure). That still does not answer the question regarding the origin of the monies used to pay Liberal “volunteers.”

Mentioning Earnscliffe by name, Gagliano also raised the question of Paul Martin’s financing of his leadership race, and asked

why the sponsorship inquiry did not investigate how Martin financed his own run for the Liberal leadership.

Could it be because that was not a sponsorship scam? Surely, Don Cordonnola does not actually buy the story that Martin called the Gomery Inquiry out of the kindness of his heart.

Gagliano’s qualification that there was nothing wrong with the sponsorships “to his knowledge,” offers a clear indication of his line of thinking, and, again, the arrogance that Liberals think that they can play fast and loose with the law in order to further their objectives. Not that I buy the “we were saving the country” spiel. But they do, they have come to equate the country with the party. How Stalinist of our friends.

Those of us who are not with the party, essentially, are stateless.

On the basis of the so-called prophecies of Nostradamus, people predicted the end of the world for the year 2000. But the predictions were revised and reoriented by others. The arrival of the anti-Christ would be preceded by a black Pope, they say. As much as I like Cardinal Arenzi, I am pleased that Ratzinger won.

And just when Paul Martin thought things might get better, a new Canadian version of Chicken Little will arrive to the airwaves tomorrow on Radio-Canada’s Le point. Former Minister of Public Works and now disgraced Capo, Alfonso “Cordonnola” Gagliano, will share his vision of Canada’s immanent demise, caused by, I am really not making this up, the Gomery Commission and the probable move of Stephen Harper to Sussex Drive (for those of you who think I am making this up, see here [en francais]).

Lord Thundering Jebus!! This should provide some priceless footage for Conservative advertisements in the up-coming election campaign. How much worse can it get for Paul??

PS: donnola is the Italian for weasel.

Cross posted to ThePolitic

Related:
Martin on Gagliano

The first time I visited the Quebec National Assembly, a keen US tourist asked the young guide from New Brunswick what “Je me souviens” meant. She recited a sweetly diplomatic line: “It means “I remember;” Quebecers remember their history and heritage, and parliamentary democracy is part of their heritage,” she said not giving the smallest hint of having rehearsed the line for days. Not bad, I thought (and certainly ages better than the guide at Queen’s Park who instructed us all that the Mace was a symbol of the power of the people of Ontario!!!). The QNA guide was, of course, right –except that there is much more to it than that.

Watching Gilles Duceppe and his gang, the QNA guide’s explanation helps me to make sense of why the separatists may be among the few talking like real parliamentarians, in the language of the traditions of parliament. Le Devoir quotes Duceppe on Friday regarding Martin’s Liberals: “Il y a bris de confiance. Ce gouvernement n’est plus en mesure de gouverner” [There is a breach of confidence. This government is no longer fit to govern] .

C’est honteux: If only Jack Layton and Paul Martin would remember.

Cross posted at ThePolitic

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger was given a job in 1981, and he performed it very well. The shadows that now some want to cast over him have mostly to do with his past job as doctrine enforcer. Many people have not made the distinction betweeen the man and the peformance of a duty.

But there is a reason why those who take the Throne of Peter change names. It would be unwise to judge Pope Benedict XVI as the sum of his acts in the Holy Office for the Propagation of the Faith. That was then, and this is now.

I am not surprised to read that he said at his installation:

My real program of governance is not to do my own will, not to pursue my own ideas, but to listen, together with the whole Church, to the word and the will of the Lord

He has a new job now. All things indicate that he will take this one as serious as he took the previous one. And that can only lead to an excellent pontificate.

Arguing for greater aboriginal rights, Alain Cairns writes about Citizens Plus. If we follow Benoit Corbeil’s allegation this week, we are also making citizens in haste. Corbeil was the Director General of the Liberal Party in Quebec. He declared (en francais) that leading up to the 1995 referendum in Quebec, the Liberal government made “exceptional efforts” to crank out new Canadian citizens hoping to inflate the ethnic vote in Quebec. Suddenly, the Liberals have also succeeded in boosting the fortunes of Jacques Parizeau and one of the most reprehensible statements ever made in Canadian politics.

In addition, he has acknowledged that the Liberals spent enormous sums of money in the Quebec referendum, in violation of Quebec laws. This is one of the few indications that the Liberals were not completely asleep at the wheel in October 1995. But it will be music to the ears of Bloc members.

…should be the title of a new U2 song, but it is not. It is Bono complaining about Paul Martin reneging on promises he made regarding increasing foreign aid.

He also said Martin’s political problems were no excuse for failing to increase foreign aid.

“It’s a time for real leadership. I understand there’s [sic] problems at home. I understand it’s hard to get time to focus on this.”

Having realised his own useful idiocy, Bono is upset. I wonder how long it will take for Michael Ignatieff to come to a similar realisation. Now Bono knows how most Canadians feel, and he didn’t even get his pockets picked.

h/t: Political Staples

The new Ipsos poll has the Conservatives at 40% support in Ontario, and leading in all regions of the RoC, except for Atlantic Canada (uhmmmm!). The Liberals clocked at 36% in Ontario. In Quebec the Block has reached 51% support. The most interesting part of the findings, however, show that among those interviewed on the night of Paul Martin’s emergency TV appearance, there was “a ’spike’ in support for the Conservatives”. It would seem that the TV manipulation has backfired.

As part of the survey, 377 of the 2,000 interviews were conducted on the evening of Mr. Martin’s televised address. The poll found that of those interviewed that night, there was a “spike” in support for the Conservatives.

We’ll have to wait for more polling (or more info) to see where the spike is, and if it is consistent across regions. If it is located solely in Alberta, it may not mean much since the Conservatives are at 57% (versus 26% for the Liberals) there. Since the telecast was aimed at Ontario, primarily, a surge in Conservative support in Ontario could result in being damning for the Liberals. Not just because the Conservatives may pick up crucial support there, but because it would mean that the strategy of an already desperate government to elicit the sympathy of voters has collapsed.

All the Liberals may have left is the scorch earth strategy. It will be ugly, I am sure.

The Saudi religious police, the Committee for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, detained singer Hisham Abdel Rahman when people gathered around him to congratulate him, kiss him and shake his hands at a shopping mall for his victory in the Star Academy, the Arab world’s version of American idol. The congratulatory kisses and hugs were deemed improper behaviour. Saudi clerics have accused the show of being immoral.

Officials said that Rahman had “violated a rule and created chaos.” He was released after questioning.

Hiding From Politics Behind the Law

Prime Minister Paul Martin insists that Justice Gomery must issue his report before calling an election. Grits go on to repeat that all the facts must be in, that all we have is allegations and not facts. All of this betrays a fundamental disregard for the responsibilities of the Gomery Inquiry (which Martin called) and the distinctions with a court of law (which they are padding with wealthy lawyers that fatten the coffers of the Liberal Party), the law (which they have repeatedly broken in order to milk money from the state for their friends and for themselves), and the constitutional traditions of Canada (which Liberals are trampling).

Even though some think that the PM’s position on Gomery cannot be refuted, and since the Liberals seem to be a little confused, I’ve prepared the little graphic below to point out their fallacies, and to illustrate the distinction between the legal and the political.

There is a difference between the legal and the political. The legal is a strict framework of law; the political is the realm of public opinion and of common sense, of moral habits and traditions. Transgression of the law requires legal punishment; transgression of political habits or norms brings social and political punishment -but not necessarily legal.

There is also a distinction between judiciary elements, such as commissions of inquiry and a court of law. Courts assign culpability, and sentence (punish) legal transgressions. Precisely because blame and punishments are assigned, the burden of proof in a court of law is heavy (and that is as it should be). For serious crimes, accusations must be proven beyond reasonable doubt (”a proof is a proof, and when you have a good proof it’s because it’s proven”). Commissions are meant to explore questions of public interest and gather information. They have the power to subpoena witnesses, and issue information bans but they do not assign blame or mete out punishments. All Justice Gomery will do is issue recommendations (Should we have the crooks receive the recommendations and trust them to mend their ways?).

Returning to the political, there is sufficient corroborated testimony or documentary evidence at the Gomery Inquiry so far for people to form an opinion and make a judgement about the Liberal government. Paul Martin cannot deny with the honesty for which he is celebrated, that

• * monies left the Ministry of Public Works in industrial quantities
• * it was paid to a select number of Liberal-friendly ad agencies in Quebec
• * people were sometimes paid for no work performed
• * bills were over-inflated at the behest of federal bureaucrats
• * some of that money was channelled to the Liberal Party of Canada
• * some companies were paying Liberal campaign workers
• * “donations” were made by company employees that were reimbursed by the ad companies
• * a Liberal Party hack recommended that Chuck Guite be put in charge of the racket at Public Works

And it can only get worse, not better. It is about to get worse, if it turns out to be true that some judges have essentially bought a place on the Bench by making large donations to the Liberal Party of Canada (See also here, and here) .

Politics is not law. In politics, even though there is need for evidence, there is no necessity for the burden of proof that courts require. What is needed is enough common sense information for individuals to make a choice. So, in order to make their minds up, Canadians need not wait for the Gomery Inquiry to make recommendations.

Grits are playing on Canadians’ good sense of due process; they are muddling the waters and mixing things that need not be mixed. They are purposely confusing processes and their different standards, passing law as politics. They are hiding from politics behind the law. Canadians will not sentence Liberals at the polls; they will pass a political judgement. That is all that is required. Otherwise, if we were strictly to wait for all due legal process to end, we would have to wait for all the criminal charges to be brought up, and for the ensuing trials to be done. Considering that the Mounties will be involved (Can you say Airbus? Air India?) that could take years and years. But that is where Paul Martin’s logic leads. Booting the Liberals out is not a legal question; it is a political question.

Since there can be no fast rules about these events given that the written constitution does not contemplate governments reaching these depths of corruption, we need to consult our constitutional traditions. In our parliamentary tradition, the government is responsible. One of the central responsibilities of government is to ensure that citizens have respect for the law and faith in the processes. That is why, according to constitutional traditions, when public officials are marred in scandal, they are expected to resign. The mere appearance of impropriety has been traditionally enough for men of honour to offer their resignations. Frankly, we are waaaaaaaay past the appearance of impropriety: Liberals have violated electoral law, to name just the most obvious one, time and time again. In this, Paul Martin and the Liberals have also failed.

The tradition does not say that only those who are convicted should resign, as Paul Martin seems to imply. One is a legal test, and the other is a political test. Since the Martin Liberals have failed the political test, the right thing to do will be to go to the polls -not a year from now, but now. Those who violate the law cannot be expected to uphold it. This is the most common sensical aspect on which politics rest.

To put in perspective the distinction between the legal and the political, consider the limited analogy of an airline pilot. A pilot is hired for his qualifications and must have a flying license. There are tests that he must pass to be allowed to fly. There is no way that a pilot would be allowed to fly for ten months after having lost his flying license for negligence and incompetence; for failing a test. Paul Martin's Liberals have flunked several tests and lost their flying license. But all Martin wants is to surrender his driver’s license for the speeding tickets that he has received, and wants to continue flying. One activity has nothing to do with the other.

Martin has not only failed the political test, he has failed the ethical and the constitutional tests. Under the traditions of Canada, a government so wrapped up in scandal should have already resigned. But Martin is not going to resign. In spite of appearances, there is no honour there. So, Canadians must kick him out and say no to one more year of corrupted officials in government.

The Gomery Inquiry can continue. There is no reason to stop it. The federal government and the Liberal Party are represented in the Inquiry. If there are allegations and contradictions, it is up to these to point them out. But we already know enough to make informed decisions.

It is said that people have the government they deserve, but even in their cold apathy, Canadians do not deserve this bad. No one opposes due process, but Liberals must not be allowed to hide behind the same laws that they have been corrupting for years.

Of interest:

“We don’t need a Gomery Inquiry to know how to vote
Conduct and Responsibility, Martin and Gomery
Adscam in 100 words or less

Martin's public address to Canadians coincided with the very day that his long-time mentor Maurice Strong was tied to the $65-billion UN oil-for-food scandal.

Was Martin using the Adscam scandal as a distraction in a Maurice Strong Cordex oil-for-food scandal that would inevitably lead back to him?

Is there no money scheme to which these guys are not tied? Whatever happened to the greedy 1980s? These gentlemen make Gordon Gekko seem like a boy scout. Feel free to replace the word “greed” with the word “power,” notoriously missing from Gekko’s speech.

The point, ladies and gentleman, is that greed — for lack of a better word — is good.

Greed is right.

Greed works.

Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.

Close relationships in Maurice Strong’s circles (Strong is involved in the food for oil scam, and is environmental advisor to Paul Martin) include past finance minister Michael Wilson, who has sat on various boards of major insurance companies in North America. I wonder how the Liberal Party of Canada is insured these days, and if they perhaps have overpaid their premiums?

by CANCC

After the putrid Liberals are done (and to help them leave), there will be need for good people to restore the image and substance of political life in Canada.

Alluding to the PM’s flight from Parliament for three days in a row, Coyne looks at Martin’s video broadcast for Ontarians.

You only had to consider the format of the occasion. It hardly bespeaks a commitment to transparency to make your statement, not in Parliament, not at a news conference, but on videotape, recorded in some airless bunker sealed off from inconvenient questions, then couriered to the networks. That is the technique of fugitives.

UPDATE: I had no idea that someone in Ottawa yesterday had already used the phrase in the title of this posting, nor did I know that many had began to tear their garments, as usual, because of it. So, I came to this on my very own, for one; and second, I am not going to apologise for having, or recognising, a sense of humour when I see it. I don’t buy the “you have offended me” cheap charcuterie from the modern day Pharisees. There are millions of us who are offended that Liberals have played fast and loose with our money and our country; and they’re still doing it by commandeering the waves for a “crisis.” How lame is that?

Do you remember people whining when George W. Bush did not mention Canada in one of his speeches? People “felt” ignored, that Canada should have been “recognised.” Well, we should be proud now that the esteemed Spanish blogger Barcepundit does keep us in mind. You can see why. Perhaps some cash-starved Liberal profiteers have been selling their scamming template to their Eurosocialist cousins.

A CANADIAN-STYLE corruption scandal in Seville, a city in Southern Spain:

Five people, among them a former town councillor, have been accused of faking local authority papers and fraudulently charging for work.

The state prosecutor has indicted the five for criminal offences and they have been summonsed to appear for trial in Seville.

The case relates alleged political corruption at the heart of the Seville City Council, in Andalusia, southern Spain.

The former town councillor accused in the case is Jose Antonio Garcia from the Socialist party.

Two businessmen are José Pardo and Jesà ºs Barrera, who were said to have charged the council thousands of euros for non-existent work.

The Liberal mantra has been that the Liberal adventures in Quebec now documented by the Gomery Commission are all “allegations, not proven fact.” And Scott Brison does not say anyhting but. Here he is a week ago.

There have been allegations of unacceptable, in fact, disgusting activities.

But these are allegations, not facts.

And, quoted in the G&M on April 8:

But Public Works Minister Scott Brison insisted the testimony constituted “allegations, not facts,”

In response to a question by Michael Guimond of the BQ on the floor of the House last March:

Mr. Speaker, these are allegations, not facts.

In response to a question from Stephen Harper on the floor of the House on April 6:

Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois very much would like to have an election based on allegations.

And in relation to Jean Brault’s testimony earlier this month, Brison said:

“Repeating (allegations) over and over and over again does not transform them into facts.”

Here is a CBC news clip (in Real Player) in which Paul Martin says that all the barrage of malfeasance and fraud that has come out in Gomery is “contradictory,” which is news to me.

At the very end of the report, Julie Van Dusen, formerly of the PCO, closes the clip by reminding viewers that the testimony that the Gomery Commission has produced “in the past few weeks are have been mostly allegations, not proven facts.”

I am shocked! Now, before anyone jumps to conclusions, I am not suggesting that the Minister of Public Works is cross-dressing. I just I had no idea that Brison was a ventriloquist.

There is an excellent place if you are looking to get a handle on the Liberal money laundering scam, currently under the scrutiny of the Gomery Commission. See the Citizen’s Centre sponsored site anticorruption.ca It features background on the activities, players and much more.

Hold on to your hat when you watch the intro.

In an effort to counter a proposed condemnation of Cuba for violation of human rights at the United Nations, James Brown, a former Black Panther, attacked the United States and defended Cuba :

Cuba is an oasis and beacon for human rights in the Americas and in every corner of the world! As a friend of Cuba, we unconditionally and uncompromisingly denounce and demand an end to all forms of U.S. aggression against Cuba! We further denounce the United States government as the greatest violator of human rights, from slavery and the slave trade to neo-globalism and slave-like conditions and practices, the world has ever seen!

The wonderful thing about Brown’s life is that he lives in the United States. If he were in Cuba, and said as much about Cuba, he would not walk away unscathed.

Some may remember Brown for trying to introduce a class action suit seeking compensation for slavery. He tried to sue everybody and their grandparents. Among the 71 people and companies named were:

the king of Spain, the queen of England, the [Catholic] pontiff, President Bush and Jaques Chirac; the governors of Illinois, Virginia, Louisiana and Texas; nine ports; several major sugar, gun, tobacco and railroad companies; many, many banks and even Bacardi Rum.

He particularly had a fixation on Pope John Paul II. In what could have been a passage taken from The DaVinci Code, Brown said:

The Pope must come and say the truth. … He must come and tell us why … certain Catholic forces disobeyed Catholic laws, enslaved us and became unjustly enriched up on us. He must open the Vatican library and disclose the files

Suddenly the praising of Castro does not sound so strange, now, does it?

Update: I searched to see if Brown has made any endorsements of the Paul Martin Liberals, but did not find any.

h/t: Babalu

Please file this one under the stupidest thing ever written about Terry Fox in any year, in any month. Drum roll, please. I give you John Akpata from OttawaXpress:

If Terry Fox would have had access to organic cannabis for medicinal purposes, he may have finished his quest.

I am sure that Terry’s family lament that he did not become a pot head. Geeezzz!

Don’t bother leaving comments on that blog, btw. It’s for “members only” and if you register, a “board” –the same board that lets this garbage go on-line, will review (and likely veto) your post. They can sniff and edit political leanings that don’t tilt their way, but they have no nose for idiocy. Long live free speech.