In Praise of Bob Rae. A Goodbye to a Good Man

On the day that he announces his political retirement, I come not to bury Bob Rae, but to praise him.

Not only did I vote against Rae twice when he was leader of the Ontario NDP, I actually enjoyed doing it. But I don't vote for someone as much as I vote against everybody else. Indeed, the proudest ballot I ever cast was for a transvestite to be mayor or Toronto, so convinced was I that he/she would be less embarrassing than Mel Lastman.

Having said that, there's much to respect and even admire about Rae.

He's easily one of the smartest people in Canadian elective office in my lifetime. Even those that disagree with him, as I repeatedly did, acknowledge that he's a heavyweight. And that's something that's profoundly lacking in public life today, where stupidity is too often considered a virtue.

Rae also engaged in the single greatest act of political bravery in my lifetime. For all intents and purposes, he pulled the plug on his time at Queens Park because he thought it was necessary.

Shithead conservative bloggers and dishonest Sun Media hacks, like Brian Lilley, enjoy pummelling Rae for Rae Days, all the while heaping praise on Republicans like Scott Walker for doing essentially the same thing.

Rae Days requires absolutely no courage for conservatives, since that's what their base vocally wants, anyway. However, the public sector unions were Rae's political base, and he knew it. And he still immolated himself doing what was right. If that's not bravery, I have no idea what is. Moreover, it speaks to the bald hypocrisy of his critics.

Speaking of hacks like Lilley,  (who, full disclosure, is apparently a friend of my ex-girlfriend) He joyously posted this retarded and fundamentally dishonest chart from Sun News on his Facebook page this evening.

Did Premier Rae spend a literal shit-ton of money in the face of what was then considered a brutal recession? He sure did. And that's the primary reason I voted against his government in 1995.

What is nicely left out is the fact that there was a worldwide recession during Rae's tenure at Queens Park. What those lying fucks at the Sun neglect to point out are the federal and U.S employment and deficit figures at the time.

Why is that? I suspect that it's because the prime minister of Canada during the worst of it was Progressive Conservative Brian Mulroney and the president of the United States was Republican George H.W Bush, who to varying degrees, did pretty much exactly what Rae did as premier of Ontario. All three raised taxes, all three had high unemployment, and all three had massive deficits.

But Rae is studied not only in isolation from the context of the time, the figures also leave out what his conservative peers were doing at the time.

By the way, why does Sun poster boy Stephen Harper get a pass? Unlike Rae, Harper started out with a $13 billion surplus, which he immediately pissed away on electioneering hucksterism. Then, in the guise of his Keynesian "Action Plan," he created tens of billions of dollars in new deficits, which he spends millions more advertising on television, five years after the fact. And none of that happened twenty years ago, when Keynesian economics were the the accepted wisdom, Harper's doing it now.

I point that out not to defend Rae, but to highlight the intellectual dishonesty and gullibility of what passes for the Right these days. Not only can we not win on our merits when we engage in nonsense like this, we don't deserve to.

I made no secret of my opinion that Bob Rae was the Liberal party's last, best chance of surviving, if not actually winning power. He was uniquely qualified to call the Harper government on its own bullshit. Rae was not only smarter than the rest than the rest of the federal leaders, he was more politically experienced and intimately familiar with the pitfalls of having headed a party and a government before.

If Rae compared his record in Toronto to Harper's in Ottawa, I believe it would have been devastating ... for Harper. And I think the Tories knew that, too.

But the Liberals insisted on being the Liberals. They continue to hate one another more than they hate Harper, and they refuse to renounce their addiction to stunt leaders, like Michael Ignatieff and Justin Trudeau. And that's precisely why "Canada's Natural Governing Party" is going to cease to exist by the end of the decade. By forcing Rae out of the permanent leadership race last year, I think they signed their own death warrant.

Although I opposed almost everything that he did in public life, I never doubted Rae's sincerity. I believe him to be someone who actually got into politics to serve what he thought was the greater good, rather than personal enrichment or self-aggrandizement.

Unlike most of the ward-heelers out there, I'm of the opinion that Bob Rae will better off without politics. Sadly, politics will be worse without Bob Rae.

I never voted for him and I never would, but I wish the man well in private life.

Scott Reid States the Obvious, Is Still Wrong

Here I go again, saying something utterly uncontroversial to anyone that isn't three years old, a partisan fuck, or an abject idiot.

People in politics, as a general rule, don't enter the life to serve you. And they really haven't for about thirty years.

Politics has become a laboratory for mediocrities to see how rich they can make themselves off of the public teat.

There's no greater example of that than the revolving door between politics and lobbying. This is nothing more than a legal version of influence peddling and trading in on public service. I actually have more respect for those that actually have the balls to steal taxpayer money without the pretence of serving anyone other than themselves. Were it up to me, politicians, their appointees, and the senior civil service would be banned from lobbying for life.

Actually, that's not true. The only reason I wouldn't advocate stuffing the lot of them in a bag and drowning them like cats is that it would be impossible to find a big enough bag. So a lobbying ban will have to do.

The more mediocre a staffer you are, the more likely you are to moonlight in opinion journalism, especially in Canada. You almost never see the real kingmakers on TV or writing columns that even third-graders know are horseshit. Instead, you get the worst sycophants imaginable pretending to know "how it really works."

Which brings me to Scott Reid, the former Paul Martin consigliere. In 2005, Reid said the single most balls-out stupid thing I've heard in thirty years of studying politics.

You see, then-Opposition leader Stephen Harper was hoping to steal the Liberal issue of a national daycare credit from out from the Grits. So he offered a $1,200 a year tax credit to families as a way of ward-heeling himself into office.

Now, if you opposed the Tories, there were any number of ways to attack the proposal. For example, you do what I did: call it an unaffordable welfare program for the middle class and an example of hucksterism at its worst. The left is always going to oppose Harper's programs. If you want to beat him, you need to turn fiscal conservatives around from voting for him. I thought everybody knew that.

Apparently, Scotty didn't. That's why he said this ...




The "beer and popcorn" debacle reinforced the long held and richly deserved Liberal reputation for unbridled arrogance. Even when its true, you never tell the public that the government can spend their money better than they can. And, unsurprisingly, Harper made the Liberal Party wear that remark for years.

That's why I'm amazed that anyone listens to anything Reid has to say about politics. On the other hand, a lot of people are very fucking stupid.

On Friday, he published this in the Ottawa Citizen, and it stands as an example of how you can be right, while still being completely ignorant of a history that you yourself lived through. It really is a remarkable read.

Stephen Harper is gradually turning into Jean Chrétien.

From Teflon to tinpot, from insuperable to insurrection, the two leaders appear to be travelling remarkably similar paths in the second half of their time as prime minister.

That's demonstrably not true. Harper was Chretien from as far back as 2005, well before he moved into 24 Sussex drive.

This is because Harper heads a party populated mostly with lunatics and fetus fetishists. Hyper-religious "Big Government Conservatives" are not only fewer in number in Canada than in the United States, they also tend to be more geographically isolated and don't carry as many seats as they do in the U.S Congress. Majority governments do not rely on these people's support.

But they can fuck up the chance of winning one, as we saw in 2004. The Conservatives were enjoying a 10 point lead over the majority Liberals, when their candidates started spouting off about abortion, gay marriage, and other shit that sane people don't give a shit about. The Tory hopes of a majority evaporated and Liberals were only reduced to a minority, instead of being physically destroyed.

When the Martin minority government was defeated in the fall of '05, Harper knew that he had to muzzle those psychopaths, lest he be humiliated again. Not only did he vow not to legislate on those issues, he imposed brutal message discipline on his candidates. Since nothing succeeds like success, it shouldn't surprise anyone that he carried that discipline into government.

Chretien's experience was different. As a minister in the Trudeau government, he was routinely humiliated by the Prime Minister's Office. The Sun King once went so far as to rewrite one Chretien's budgets and release it to the public without consulting him first.

Then there's the nature of the Liberal Party itself, which is based almost entirely on regicide. Since about 1975, every Grit leader has had a powerful leader plotting behind the scenes to relieve him of his job. And Chretien knew that Paul Martin (who Scott Reid worked for, remember?) would do to him exactly what he did to John Turner, as he in fact later did.

Similarities in the personal styles of the two leaders have long been noted — and many of the qualities they share are admirable. They are both good at winning elections. They each lack any shred of indecision. And they both hold their ground stoutly. Perhaps most important of all, they understand who they are, what they stand for, and the importance of communicating consistency.

Each of those points are demonstrably false.

Both Chretien and Harper won their elections as a result of hopelessly divided governments. The Progressive Conservative coalition built by Brian Mulroney was destroyed by 1993, and Harper beat (albeit, only barely) a Liberal Party in a state of open civil war. Neither was a fantastic political accomplishment.

Furthermore, neither stands for anything at all. Chretien ran on the tired platform of "free shit for everyone," opposing the GST and NAFTA, only to head the most fiscally conservative, globalist government in Canadian history. Chretien successfully carried out Mulroney's legacy.

Harper, on the other hand, ran as a manager and a fiscal conservative. Once in office, however, he blew up the deficit faster and bigger than anyone since Trudeau himself, mostly on ward-heeling nonsense that the Liberals invented.

Neither communicated consistency, and only a moron would suggest they did. Both transparently lied to the public and dared them to vote for someone else, knowing that realistic alternatives didn't exist.

Increasingly, it is not just character but circumstance that begs the comparison of Harper with Chrétien.

The most top-of-mind parallel is caucus unrest. Brent Rathgeber, until his recent resignation, was as unknown to Canadians as the whereabouts of Mike Duffy’s dignity. Suddenly, we are to believe his departure heralds the evaporation of Harper’s control over his own backbench. That would be a gross overstatement.

But it is plain that a number of government MPs are no longer content to suffer in silence. Their personal ambitions are stagnating. Their ideological itch is going unscratched.

And they’re sick of taking orders from the hired help while getting the high hand from the prime minister.

Christ, Reid can't really believe that nonsense, can he? The facts are very different, and they go to the fundamental differences between the Liberal and Conservative parties.

The Tories are generally more disciplined when it comes to caucus and messaging generally. They are also much better team players until things become intolerable, as they did in the latter Mulroney years.

The Conservatives also never have a very deep bench. There's rarely a clear successor to power that everyone knows can win an election, which is why they've never enjoyed party dynasties, like the Liberals used to.

The Grits, on the other hand, tend to have very deep benches of talent. The problem is that they all think that they should be prime minister right away. Since Lester Pearson died, they've devoted themselves to stabbing one another in the back more than they have to actually governing. Whenever the the Tories have shown even a modicum of discipline, they've kicked the shit out of the Grits.

And if Reid is right, there's a Paul Martin in the Tory benches ready to take over when Harper is done in by his own hubris. If there is, I don't see one. Harper's most likely successor is Jason Kenney, and I can't think of anyone who wouldn't be able to beat the snot out of that greasy prick.

I will say one thing about Scott Reid's column. It has the worst people in the world publicly furious, and demonstrates as clearly as anything can that the Liberal civil war is far from over. Those crazed bastards are going to continue to going into elections devoting more time and energy hobbling each other than they do the Conservatives. And they're going to keep doing it until they cease to exist at all.

If there's anything at all the Conservative government can take comfort in during these dark days, it's that.

Things Fall Apart: Rob Ford's Continuing Crack-Up

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Plowing Through More Republican Horseshit, IRS and NSA Edition

Most of you remember my old blog, dont'cha? I spent shitloads of time there from 2005-2008 bitching endlessly about the power of the US federal government and the potential abuse thereof.

And you know what I got for my fucking trouble? A endless amount of nonsense about the Unitary Executive Theory and the righteousness of George W. Bush. Most of those people would describe themselves as Tea Partiers today, and not readily admitting to knowing who Bush even was, let alone ever having supported him so throatily.

Then there's the Citizens United decision, which I've always had a mighty bug up my ass about.

I'm on the record as having said that political activity should get no preferential treatment under the tax code, from deducting lobbying costs right on down to deducting political contributions from your taxes. Shit, I don't even support the charitable deductions for charities that actually accomplish something other than shitty commercials.

If you're interested in knowing why, I'll tell you.

The more deductions you allow in the tax code, the higher the rates have to be to generate the revenue the government needs to operate. And if you want a government with the capability of both providing accessable health care to everyone and being prepared to bomb everyone from Jakarta to Winnipeg, we're talking about a fair bit of revenue.

Advocates of a flat tax have never been able to answer that basic fact. The more you deduct for yourself, the more everyone pays in higher rates. And this is what made the Ryan-Romney tax proposals last year such a bad fucking joke to anyone with a basic grasp of arithmetic.

My personal hero, Velociman, has one of the most misguided things I've ever seen up here.

A Redress of Grievances
That was, and is, the crime of the Tea Party groups. They are loose, and unaffiliated. When anyone attempts to wrest control of the Tea Parties at any level above the community they are whipsawed, and lashed.
That was the fearful thing. That is what keeps Obama awake at night. The First Amendment guarantees freedom of assembly and the right to redress grievances not as a sop of government, but as a natural right of man. From God, if you will. The Tea Parties were actually fomenting during the Bush bailout leading up to the 2008 election. They have never been specifically anti-Obama. Merely anti-spending. And yet they have been targeted and reviled as mutants, and racists.

There are any number of factual errors in those paragraphs, not least of which is that the Tea Party isn't almost wholly constituted by mutants.

Firstly, nothing calling itself the "Party Party" existed before Rick Santelli's retarded rant of February 2009, and that addressed relief to underwater homeowners under the thumb of the cocksucker banks, who themselves were just bailed out. And that Santelli said this from the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade went almost completed unnoticed by everyone that isn't me.

Second, it's almost impossible to know if Tea Party groups are "loose, and unaffiliated" in light of Citizens United, which restricted disclosure of their donor base.

Thirdly, this isn't about a redress of grievances or even the First Amendment.

Let me repeat that. This isn't about a redress of grievances or even the First Amendment. The Obama administration never shut down the right of Tea Party groups to speak and, if they tried, they did a godawful job of it, since I couldn't escape those mutants last year.

It's actually about administrative tax law.

The Tea Parties weren't asserting a right, they were seeking a favour from the government in the form of non-profit tax status. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm not aware of the right to tax-exempt status for anyone but Indians in the Constitution. Anyone who suggests otherwise is either ignorant of lying.

My ultimate problem with these shithead Republicans is that they want other taxpayers to subsidize the cost of their bitching about how taxes are so high. Their right to free speech isn't inhibited as much their ability to get other people to pay for it is, so fuck them.

Now, do I think that that the administration specifically targeted conservative groups through the IRS? Sure I do.

Is that "Watergate," like so many idiots suggest it is? No, it is not.

President Nixon specifically targeted individuals for IRS harassment,  just as Johnson and Kennedy did before him. The difference is that they weren't organized groups seeking deductions in a post-Citizens United world, which begs such scrutiny. Nixon went after individual members of groups, journalists and sundry political enemies, which is a clear abuse of power and something no one has accused Obama of.

Then there's the recent NSA scandal, to which I ask ...... What did you think was going to happen? 

Most of you will remember that I went apeshit when I first heard about the Bush NSA program that was implemented in secret, without congressional authorization, after 9/11. I went on about it for years, actually.

But the people who were fine with it then - and in some cases demanded the prosecution of journalists that reported on it - are out of their tiny pinheads about it now. Of course, these are almost universally the same twats that want a secret war in Syria, so go figure.

However there are a couple of important distinctions.

First, Obama sought a FISA warrant for the records, which Bush never did, and Republicans insisted that he didn't have to under Unitary Executive Theory, the Authorization to Use Military Force Resolution of 2001 and the "Because ....Lincoln!" argument that they deploy whenever it fucking suits them.

Second, the GOP voted to change the law to to allow for exactly what Obama is doing today. Something I would advocate impeaching Obama for, Republicans legitimized way back when.

And that goes back to the tax case. Do you want to pay higher tax rates just because shiityy people with dishonest thinking don't wantto pay any at all?