Apologia Rex 01/29/2010
 
In the commentary on proroguing by Rex Murphy, the government apologist who's forced to do a lot of apologizing these days, the undertone was one coloured with amnesia. He wants to know what the fuss is about, suggesting that the only reason proroguing is an issue is because haters are using it as a vessel to direct their anger.

Well, sorry Rex, but you're wrong...again.

If it was just about government taking time off to 'recalibrate' (there was a time when I thought I knew what that word meant) then whatever, I could use some extra time to recalibrate myself (with or without lube).

But no. Many of us are so angry, we may forget where this all started, so let me remind you: Richard Colvin. His testimony regarding mistreatment of afghan detainees, and the subsequent parade of diplomats, current and former, who came to his defence after the appalling mistreatment by the Harper government, leaves the distinct impression the government has something to hide.
 
According to Rex “There’s not an adult in the country who doesn’t know why he [Harper} shut the shop down --- for partisan convenience.” It's a clever line – it implicitly acknowledges that mere convenience is not a good reason to shut down parliament, while also suggesting that the outrage is disproportionate - as if shutting down a committee doing investigative work is roughly as important as something something something on a bull (I forget how the line goes). He finds it amusing that there are suddenly so many defenders of the dignity of parliament, where there were none before. So let me edify Rex on how we feel regarding aforementioned dignity: There is none. Okay?

We're not pissed off at the spectacle and Cirque du Blase that is question period, which is what many think is the sum total of what goes on in Ottawa. When you shut down Parliament, you shut down all of it, committee work, investigative work, and input on minor things like disasters in Haiti.

No, Mr. Murphy, we're not mad at politicians taking extra time to work on their tans, because, believe me, the conservatives caucus could definitely use a bit of colour. We're pissed off because killing off a committee that Canadians felt was important is just one more act of dissing the detectives: Police complaints Commissioner, defanged; Military complaints commission, declawed; Nuclear Safety commissioner, fired.

And while we're on the subject, I just love the lame excuse that “Chretien prorogued parliament.” Which leads me to the question, what does that have to do with the price of tea in the Byward Market? The liberals paid the price for his arrogance, and they have a new leader. I'm happy to judge politicians on their own merits and not on their predecessors'. That's an advanced concept for Harper's communication staff, I know, but they'll learn.  

Here's my favourite Scandinavian poet, Piet Hein and his poem called “Hygiene: a short piece with no reference whatever to the two-party system."

To wear a shirt that's relatively clean,
you needn't ever launder off the dirt--
If you possess two shirts to choose between,
and always change into the cleaner shirt.

I'm not saying the red shirt isn't dirtyt. At this point, it's just cleaner.
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Well, it seems as though the abusive relationship between BC artists and the provincial government continues. We're battered, but we're not ready to do anything about it just yet, because, well, maybe Gordon Campbell will still say he loves us. And it might be all we can hope for, because the cuts aren't being funneled into a home for abused artists.

Normally I'd say the details hardly matter. Usually, it's some insulting figure like a 20 per cent cut to grants, or a freeze on any new funds being handed out, and none of it replaces the larger point that some politicians deal with their anger-management issues by beating up on the arts.

But in this case of Gordon Campbell v. BC artists, it is worth mentioning because the BC Liberals' contempt is so deep as to be fascinating from a psychological perspective. Between last year and the end of next year there'll be a NINETY PERCENT REDUCTION in arts funding. One can only wonder if Campbell had a bad experience with a clown as a child - and there's no shame in that - many of us did, or if he was horribly jilted by a novelist as a young man. I mean, maybe we should feel sorry for him. Or not.

But you have to wonder what's behind these decisions. Or maybe the real question is whether to file the whole episode under Contempt, Ignorance or Stupidity. Because the arts is actually the last thing that should go – it's what get's us through hard times; it's what separates humans from vegetation, although I did come to know a very wise hibiscus – but that was a one-off. And when artists start making economic arguments to defend themselves, you know we're in trouble. Sure, the arguments are there to be made, but art is what contributes to our very identity. Without it, we'd be soulless automatons, which I'm sure Gordon Campbell would prefer. I've learned as much about how to live decently from novels, plays and cinema as others have from the Bible, the Koran or the Bhagavad Gita. In fact, if you want to make an argument for the arts, I think we're better off filing it under mental health care. The stronger our sense of self, the better our self-esteem, and this is what the artists in a community are up to. By driving the conversation of who we are, we come to know ourselves better, and we're healthier humans for it.

I don't expect the fans of “Corner Gas” or “Red Green” to know that those shows didn't just spontaneously materialize out of the ether. They're written by people who struggled until they got breaks, became known with the help of organizations that get funding, and eventually make it on the national stage where it looks like they just dropped out of the sky. Well, they didn't. And while I don't expect every Canadian to know the sausage-making process of their favourite form of art, I do think the political leadership should. And the political leaders in BC sure as hell don't.

In fact, as the crowning glory to display his contempt, Gordon Campbell appoints Kevin Kreuger as minister of Tourism, Culture and the Arts, who, before entering politics, was a manager of road safety for ICBC. So, as an artist, I guess it's fair to say to Kevin Kreuger: You complete me.

Although, his understanding of Arts and Culture seems to be on par with FEMA director Michael Brown's understanding of how to deal with a flood in New Orleans. When Kreuger was asked a serious question about the initial round of 40 per cent cuts to the arts back in February, his response was to quote Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount, saying “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” I mean, what the hell? He might as well have said “The Beaver's Tail Slaps at Midnight.” I don't know what that means. Actually, I'm kidding – I do know what that means, and I'll set aside for the moment how deeply disturbing it is that he's quoting scripture at us like he's Billy Graham with a canoe.

This little gem comes after Jesus runs through the greatest hits of the Sermon on the mount. He starts with the blessed are the meeks, goes into the Lord's Prayer and later starts hinting about the Kingdom of Heaven. But then he says “take no thought for the morrow. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” And you know what? The “morrow” he's talking about isn't to-morrow, it's the biblical 'Morrow” as in the afterlife. He's saying, don't worry about what happens after you die - our present conflict with evil in this world should be enough for us to contend with right now. And you know what? He's right! I'm dealing with the ignorant wickedness of a government willing to choke off the life of it's storytellers. So, yeah, I got you covered, dude, I'm not worried about the afterlife right now.

Or maybe the statement was just meant to be so much hocus-pocus to distract us from what the government's right hand is doing. But no amount of prestidigitation will keep us from this fact: The Liberals actions are a classic case of self-loathing.

Bottom line? You don't commit culture-cide and then call yourself a patron of the arts. Now that's just sick.

To see the Lalo and Patrick Show version, click on the next tab over.

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Would someone please explain to me what is so wrong with the notion of adults cooperating in a coalition government? Because it's pretty clear from the numbers that if Canada gets back on the election merry-go-round, we're going to end up in the same place yet again - a bunch of pissy leaders and the rest of us with vertigo, ready to barf up our cotton candy.

The insane faux-horror that ensued after the last suggestion of cooperation in parliament is enough to make us believe the denizens of a certain Street should be renditioned to Syria for cooperationist propoganda. You know - that dangerous movement that started in 1969 by Gordon, Susan, Bob, and Mr. Hooper - more commonly known as the Sesame Street 4? For god's sake, man, they were teaching children to cooperate! How dare they!

That great definition of insanity is on everybody's lips these days: Doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. The results will definitely be the same: There will be a minority parliament. But the outcome could be different, because three of these things belong together and one of these things just isn't the same. And if you guessed that three of these things are left-of-centre politics, then I think you're ready to play this game.

Because as much as Stephen Harper wants you to believe that a Canadian Axis of Evil wants to hijack parliament, I don't think it's unreasonable to see it as adults cooperating in order to represent sixty percent of the country. Any agreement with the block would go something like this: where common interests overlap, we'll work together to advance those interests. Quebec separation is not a common interest, and therefore is off the table. But of course, the religious faction of Harperville thinks gay marriage is a slippery slope to inter-species marriage, so why wouldn't they equate working with the block on EI reform, or our role in Afghanistan, as the first step toward mandatory poutine on Sundays?

I mean, it just doesn't make any fucking sense.

Of course, the Liberals and NDP are not making it any easier on themselves to work together without looking ridiculous, with constant accusations of who propped up who, and the Conservatives are happy to enlist the support of the separatists themselves in a case of selective amnesia worthy of a book by Oliver Sachs:  The Politician who Mistook the Separatists for a Hat. They all end up looking like hypocrites, and things will be really awkward when they decide to officially bless the union.

In fact, the time really has come for the Liberals and NDP to actually run on a platform of willingness to cooperate. Let everyone know what's on the table so there's no surprises. Stephen Harper is convinced that the country would not stand for a coalition government, and that the threat of one would deliver him a majority. I say we call his bluff. I mean, it's definitely time to try something different, that's for damn sure. There's no question that there is an alternative to the merry-go-round. Maybe those Sesame Street communists might have been on to something. Adults cooperating may be the only way off.
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Okay. Umm, you know, this is kind of awkward and I don't really know how to tell you this, so I'm just going to come right out and say it...

We're not really in Afghanistan to save the women.

There. I said it. Sorry.

Cause, you know, if we were there to save the women, we could have made that effort a looong time ago. We're acting all affronted now, and we're helping the US occupy the country, because, you know, we're helping the women. But you know what the Americans did the last time there was a government in Afghanistan that aggressively promoted gender equality? They helped bomb the shit out of them. They sided against it because they were a communist party, and we can't have that, I mean, women's rights are one thing, but we can't have no goddamn commies administer them. So it's nice to know that we can comfort ourselves with the warm and fuzzies of Women's Rights – which I'm for, so I look forward to our next campaign, which I'm sure will involve marching into Riyadh to liberate the women there.

Our military goes wherever it's political masters tell it to go. The troops are stuck with the mission, so it behooves their mental health to convince themselves they're saving women and children. If they let reality sink in that they're making matters worse, well, that just leads to post-traumatic stress and other varieties of mental breakdown– so, yeah, “helping women and children”, right. Lets go with that.

But on the Afghanistan question, 4 out of 5 Afghan women agree: a good start might include not installing women-hating warlords into government. We're all proud of ourselves for running the Taliban outta Dodge, but then they were replaced by drug-lords, criminals, and misogynists.

Is it any wonder that the one-man puppet show, Hamid Karzai, felt pressure to pass pro-rape laws to appease his rivals?

I know, I know – under the Taliban, women, especially in the rural areas, were confined to their homes, couldn't work or go to school, had no rights and were forced into marriages, often as children. And Today? Well, let's see... women are confined to their homes, can't work or go to school, have no rights and are forced into marriages, often as children. Oh, and one other thing: they're dodging bombs and bullets with varying degrees of success. Sooo, sorry 'bout that, Aghan women. My bad.

But if there's one thing Western governments like, it's progress on paper. “After all”, you might say, "they have their own ministry." Sure, and the starving children of the world had their own song, so, you know...good for them. But yes, it's true, there is a piece of paper, maybe even a plaque on a door somewhere that has “Ministry of Women's Affairs” written on it, but last I heard that closet was being used to store the parliamentary hookah and unread copies of “the kite runner”.

The reality is that in the current Afghan government you can't swing a cat without hitting a woman-hating warlord. This is the group that appointed a fundamentalist judiciary that sends women to prison for adultery, which they commit during the act of getting raped. In the recent elections Karzai and his two warlord running mates ran on the slogan: Misogyny! It's not just for the Taliban anymore!

So, these paper-gains are for the benefit of people who believe in the Wizard of Oz. You know, giving the scarecrow a Ph.d and saying he had a brain was meant as a joke making fun of pieces of paper – Guess what? The scarecrow's still an idiot. I'm sorry, he was.

The only thing our military presence is doing now is pissing people off, doing our part in making sure a steady stream of angry young men find a way to scratch the itch of hatred. When civilians get killed in Afghanistan, the families' response is revenge and joining the Taliban help them get it.

Afghan women know there's work to be done, and people like Malalai Joya, who was kicked out of parliament and had five attempts on her life for criticizing the warlords and their corruption, are prepared to do it. Our help is welcome. But they need the negotiating team, not our bullets.

And, no, we're not actually helping the women. Sorry.

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Ya know what? I'm going to forgo visiting the Mayo Clinic for a benign cyst and complain about my compassionate and gentle doctor who I chose myself, and see whenever my bouts of hypochondria are looking for company. I'm going to do this, because, while I don't have to pay for health care, and I don't have to worry about an exorbitant co-payment that would prevent me from finding out that my “it's probably just a bad cold” is actually the swine flu, I do have to pay for my own vacations – and I think I'd like to visit Washington...for free...and if that means hangin' with a bunch of sour Republicans in thrall with my tales of health-care woe, even though I don't have any, then, whatever, I'll make some shit up.

That time when I was unemployed, depressed and broke...and I visited my doctor who spent half an hour with me discussing mental health issues and general advice on wellness? Never happened! And my buddy who ruptured his Achilles on a Monday and was having surgery on Wednesday – and by the way, a torn achilles is only life threatening if you're a Greek God – but still, no six months wait for this guy! But don't worry, I won't be telling my Republican hosts that story.

Now, this doesn't mean there aren't problems with the Canadian system, and while it's not as enthralling as Michael Moore thinks it is – I mean, I don't get blown by a candy-striper when I go get my tonsils removed – it's certainly not a soviet era system replete with rusty speculums and recycled cotton swabs. And so, while not perfect, our response isn't to replace the system – it's to improve it, and there are government committees that are always looking at ways to at making it better.

So I find it fascinating that American critics will root out any flaw and use it as excuse enough to keep the status quo, which, remember, means tens of millions of Americans have no insurance coverage, and millions more have the privilege of being ruined financially in life and death decisions. It's also exceedingly disingenuous to frame the discussion completely around an either/or scenario. If the American system is one extreme and the Canadian system is at the other, then the US has the opportunity to find the best of both systems and creating something uniquely American. I mean, the Canadian system isn't something you order and it comes in a crate that you pry open with a hammer an sickle.

But, again, I won't be sharing that story until after I've been flown to Washington and take a meeting with Republicans, preferably at Ruths Chris Steak House and after a visit to whatever musical is on at the Kennedy Center. Now there's some shit I can't afford.

If Shona Holmes does not speak for you, then join the facebook group "Shona Holmes does not speak for me" at:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=121164321440&ref=share

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Just when you think the cold black heart of the Conservative government couldn't get any colder, or blacker, they once again show their infinite capacity for contempt of reason.

Safety Minister Peter Van Loan wants to save us from Mikhail Lennikov, a man who has lived an exemplary life with his family in Canada. He worked for the KGB as a student, and he gave details about it to CSIS when he came here. It's been no secret, which, I guess, doesn't make him a very good secret agent...

But now that he's been here for 12 years, his 17-year old son having grown up here, they want to deport him. They originally wanted to deport the whole family, but Immigration Minister Jason Kenney and Van Loan must have accidentally knocked their heads together, because in the ensuing delirium, they actually managed to do one right thing and let his wife and son stay.

Maybe there's no legal statute of limitations on how long you can leave a family's fate hanging, but there's certainly a moral one, and that's what his community supporters, his minister, as well as a growing list of MPs from every other corner of the house are acting on, a nuance that I'm sure the Conservatives have no capacity to understand.

But hey, if their eminences, Kenney and Van Loan have something on this guy, then please, do tell. People on the social right complain about the Nanny state when it comes to Canada's social programs, but for people who are affronted by this perceived adult-child relationship, is there anything more condescending than a government saying it doesn't need to justify it's actions? Millions of intelligent Canadians disagree. Who can blame Mr. Lennikov for seeking sanctuary in his church basement?

I mean, you'd think the Conservatives would be smart enough, if only for public relations reasons, to tell us what they have on this guy. If there's evidence that he was an evil doer, an evil maker, or an evil whatever-intransitive-verb you want to hang on this guy, then look, I volunteer -- I'll drag him out of the church myself.

Instead, these government ministers just cement their image as evil automatons themselves. Had Mr. Lennikov been a desk clerk for the SS, I'm sure Kenney and Van Loan would be giving us their rendition of Springtime for Hitler (Oh, right -  don't say 'rendition').

Hey look, Mr. Ministers, I know that the rejection of reason was the “new black” after 9-11, but at some point, being reasonable men has to come back into fashion. If you can be reasonable and compassionate at the same time, well, all the better. God knows your images sure could use a polish.

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In the run-up to the election of Barack Obama, polls showed that Canadians were falling over themselves in adoration as much as anybody. If Canadians could vote, polls showed we would have done so in the near-70 percent range.

So in one of the great disconnects in Canadian history, I can't figure out why we keep going back to the Stephen Harper well. We've all acknowledged that President Obama is more than just a pretty face. In this era of complex hardships, his Harvard law degree gives him street cred the way a bullet wound would give Snoop Dog his. Obama's moral leadership on the issues of torture and the illegality of Guantanamo has resonated with people all over the world, but Harper still clings to his faith in Gitmo the way a child hopes against hope that the Easter bunny more closely resembles chocolate than rabbit fricassee.

Now, nobody is saying that the inmates in Cuba are the ideal bachelor pool for your daughters’ prom dates, but we must not forget, for those of us who were ever aware of this at all, that the Americans went in to Afghanistan and practiced the military version of Japanese drag-net fishing: Go fish for tuna, and scoop up everything else as well, including dolphins. The dolphins don’t get tossed back. It’s statistically highly unlikely that there aren’t a good number of innocent people in Guantanamo. I’m not incapable of the extra-judicial thought that members of Al-Qaeda should be fried, in the most uncomfortable manner possible. But the equal and opposite thought is the revolutionary position that the innocent should be set free. It shouldn’t take a magnanimous rocket scientist to figure this out.

But Stephen Harper continues to be enamoured and all-faithful to the Gitmo process, Canadian citizens be damned. God forbid Stephen Harper should show a modicum of human decency and at least try Omar Khadr at home.

And with no one else to compete against, Harper can only one-up himself in the category of abject disrespect for the law, and he makes a sport of defying those far more learned than him.

Abousian Abdelrazik, a Canadian citizen, is being refused re-entry to Canada because the Harper minion parade tow the line that he’s on a terror watch list, even though the RCMP, CSIS and the government of Sudan have said he’s not a threat, and UN officials have said it’s okay for Canada to bring its citizens home. It’s like déjà vu all over again.  At one point in the hearing to bring Mr. Abdelrazik back, the judge exclaimed “It’s like Kafka, isn’t it?” to the Government lawyers.

All Canadians should be deeply disturbed by this, including that fine category of Canadian who believes we shouldn’t go easy on “those people.” Look again, Bubbles, as far as Harper is concerned, you’re “those people”, too. 

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