Let's hope it is different

Let's hope it is different this time, and it will be if enough people learn about what this great video talks about...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBJ1kxnVMw4

I don't think this has

I don't think this has anything to do with Jack Layton, even his election success, but with the periodically occurring periods of awakening in history, now happening all over the world.

There come the times, when people start waking up to the crimes and this might be it, and long overdue.

The interpreters of the Mayan calendar speculated many years ago, that Dec.2012 could either mean the destruction of the Earth, through a polar shift, or the beginning of the Age of Enlightenment.

I hope for the second version and it is about time, because the degree of growing corruption ruling and enslaving humanity has been getting intolerable for many years.

Mr. Harper has the intelligence level of 10 year old 4th graders and anything he says is at that level. No wonder he has many followers, but it won't be enough on the long run, before he disappears into a string of directorships.

Ed Deak.

Murray Dobbin on "How Badly Harper Mis-Read Canadians"

I appreciated the variety of topics Mr. Dobbin engages in, given the article's title. However, and using the latitude Dobbin did, I wish to say the following:
1. I believe few Canadians of any political/apolitical persuasion did not anticipate the untimely death of Jack Layton, nor how we would all feel about his loss. I argue that that is a heart-felt respect that goes across Canada and across all party lines. I do not need to further eulogize him to say why that is so, as his life and career speak for themselves.
2. There is a difference between "Conservative" and "conservative". I would have appreciated Mr. Dobbin making a clearer distinction of these both when he either quoted Harper or, when he attributed to Harper a perceived attitude/opinion.
3. A grave point remains that only 60% of Canadians voted, and the results, whilst surprising in many areas of the country, gave Harper and the Conservative party a majority. I believe that an enormously helpful role the Canadian media can have in the next four years is to impress upon all Canadians the importance of voting or living with the results. I for one am only interested at this point in the opinions of those who took that privilege to the voters booth.

Harper's Misreading

With regards to Harper's ridiculous claim that Canada is now conservative,I would like to point to the scoreboard for the last federal election : Apathy 40%
Nonconservative 36%
Conservative 24%
They actually placed 3rd, with less than 1/4 of the eligible vote and their victory was more about strategy than countrywide acceptance.

Questionable Connections

It's questionable that one can extrapolate from the results of an Ontario election to national politics. Provincial parties and federal parties are different even though names are similar or the same, with the exception of the NDP. Are BC Liberals really Liberals, for instance? Also, is the Occupy movement anything other that an opportunistic bandwagon that those who hopped on it saw passing by and took advantage of? And Jack Layton's passing had real shock value, and discounting that as contributing to the reaction to it would be a big mistake. As for a "misreading," clarification is simple: Count the seats in the Commons.

Describing President Harper et al

We all stumble to find adjectives to describe the greedy, wealthy despots who have subverted democracy around the world for many years while stealing us blind. We, the sheep have allowed the most unimaginable financial and social atrocities to become common. Well here are the terms, long out of mainstream use but very pertinent to what we deal with today.
Plutocrat or Plutocracy: Reference – The Free Dictionary (online)

1. Government by the wealthy.
2. A wealthy class that controls a government.
3. A government or state in which the wealthy rule.

Oligarch or Oligarchy: Reference – Dictionary.com (online)

1. a form of government in which all power is vested in a few persons or in a dominant class or clique; government by the few.
2. a state or organization so ruled.
3. the persons or class so ruling.

Usurer or Usury: Reference – The Free Dictionary

1. The practice of lending money and charging the borrower interest, especially at an exorbitant or illegally high rate.
2. An excessive or illegally high rate of interest charged on borrowed money.
3. Archaic Interest charged or paid on a loan.

No other words can describe the state of Western “Democracy.”

We have the right of free speech, (unless it upsets the above, at which time law enforcement teaches us that is not acceptable.)

We have the right to free and open elections, (easily influenced or purchased by the above.)

We have the right to expect government to protect us against unfair financial charges and practises. That ain’t happening!

We also have the right to be protected against monopolistic and predatory charges for basic needs such as heat, power and telecom. That also is not in the cards.

We have a special right to timely and effective health care as well as a social safety net for the disabled, displaced and mentally challenged. You know how that has been working out.

Finally, seniors and particularly veterans have the right to a decent shake from our governments, courts and “civil” service. Same old.
A Plutocratic government, ruled by the Oligarchy and aided by the Usurers is unlikely to ever provide, allow or even acknowledge these rights. It’s long past time for a serious alteration in the way we approach the injustice which has become the norm.
Join avaaz.org http://www.avaaz.org/en/the_world_vs_wall_st/?tta
and support the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ crusade.

Mr Dobbin - Again, a little premature excitment

Somehow Mr Dobbin is excited because of the results of the last two provincial elections.
In Ontario, with a very poor candidate, there was a swing of 29 seats in favour of the PCs (9% of the votes)

In Manitoba the vote swing in favour of the PCs was 8%. This is against a NDP government that has reduced the provincial income tax rate for the vast majority of corporations in the province to zero percent. It taxes its rich an extra 2% over BC and its poor by an additional 5%.

Mr Dobbin is looking for any sign that Canada might be turning into a socialist country but these two events are not pointing in his preferred direction.

Harper

Thankfully for all Canadians, Harper is his own worst enemy. He and his gang of 19th century throwback extreme right wing ideologically driven single issue, Islamophobic, expansionist/occupier/racist/ oppressor Israel worshipping, inept "Christian" yahoos are an aberration. I am confident they will be thrown out in the next election for their ineptitude, misreading of this country and failure to comprehend the realities of the the 21st century.

%

Of the 40 Ontario elections since 1867 there were 11 elections where the Conservatives had a seat count in the legislature of less than 37. This hardly shows much improvement for the Conservative wave John Corman has attempted to prove with a relative short period of data.

In the last 4 elections in Ontario (1999-2011) the Conservatives have struggled to reach their lofty peak they reached in 1995 of 82 seats. With 37 seats in 2011 they are far from being considered a significant opposition.

And if one was to use % gains in terms of seats the NDP going from 7 seats in 2003 to 17 seats in 2011 would mean a far more significant gain than the Conservatives. But using % as a way to determine progress can sometimes be quite deceiving.

pwlg

Of course you're correct. There's really not much to conclude from either elections except that the country is not going left as Mr Dobbin dreams.

John Corman

Clearly you are a Bunkerite, and 40 years ago your thinking was a continental comedy. But that conservatism is like a cancer. Once though cured in the 1940s and 50s, it has come back stronger than ever. So it will invariably have to undergo the knife once more.

I agree you may be correct stating the country is 'not going left'.

One, the people have been kettled right politically for three successive decades by state power and influence, and here is where the state stands.

And two, the majority of people, when given an opportunity to craft an informed opinion on matters, show themselves to be more left than anything we have been offered in Canada for the same three decades.

Vision Problems

Even with the addition of eyeglasses, Stevie's vision has not improved. Apart from being so self absorbed, is he even capable of "seeing" what really needs to be done nationally?

removing cons isn't the answer ..

A bit disappointing for an old hand like Murray not to be seeing the bigger picture - he seems a bit obsessed with hatred of Harper's New Republican Party (aside - note to those who keep referring to them as the 'Conservative' party - that party, at one time a reasonably honorable entity, was ended, at least federally, when Mulroney's backers bought it in 84, and officially got the knife when McKay brazenly lied to David Orchard a few years later and absorbed the remnants of it and the Cdn 'Reform' party and morphed them into the new cdn republicans - they couldn't acknowledge that officially at the time of course, but it's a pretty open 'secret' that their allegiance is much, much closer to Washington than anywhere in Canada ...)

Insofar as Cdns *might* be getting a bit wary of the 'cons' these days, it does not signal a return to intelligence and/or 'social democracy', I fear - it's just the predictable, controlled flow from tweedledee-'libs' to tweedledum-'cons' the Bay St masters have been playing for the last 30 years at least - carry on with their agenda via one party until the voters get really pissed, then, using the media as always, herd the voters over to the other main controlled party. Dee-dum-dee-dum, on and on and on we go - and no matter which is 'in power', the tax cuts continue, the destruction of the country continues via reduced social expenditures, the transfer of the wealth of the country from the people to the elite continues, etc etc.

We will get 'democracy' back in this country not when we boot Harper (or if), but when enough people get smart enough to see what's happening, how they're being manipulated and herded by the media, and decide to take it back via some form of independent candidates not taking orders from any party HQ, including the NDP, who might talk a good show, but are showing themselves to be nothing more than capitalist-light parties anywhere they ever get elected. I'm not holding my breath - but we must hope. (which is about all you can take from the 'occupy' stuff, a tiny tiny ray of hope - no more, because demonstrations have more or less zero impact in terms of 'taking back' the country - demonstrations are just a form of petitioning the masters, and the masters don't give a flying f*** what the people like or don't like. As long as we leave the same people in power, then what's the point of telling them you're unhappy about something? If people really want change, then getting MPs into the government which are somehow legally bound to do as their electors tell them to do, and are instantly dismissible when they decide to is the only way to do it. Now that, I would suggest, would start to worry the Bay St masters. Demonstrations just eat up a lot of time and energy whilst accomplishing more or less nothing of use - have we learned nothing at all since Seattle? )
Democratic Revolution - now or never http://www.rudemacedon.ca/vgi/backgrounders/revolution.html

oh my

- if anyone is reading all that in these days of twitter, the last bit should be
"If people really want change, then getting MPs into the government which are somehow legally bound to do as their electors tell them to do, and are instantly dismissible when they decide to betray their electors in favor of someone with good post-politics job offers or something is the only way to do it. Now that, I would suggest, would start to worry the Bay St masters. Demonstrations just eat up a lot of time and energy whilst accomplishing more or less nothing of use - have we learned nothing at all since Seattle? )

(dealing with word count overruns ...)

Dave, I really like your

Dave, I really like your site. How do you like the video on the banking scam that I posted above?

Occupy Bay Street

And this constitutes a misread, how?

You know

I've always been puzzled by the temerity of political parties to hark back to the "days of old" when families ate at home on Sunday, every face was scrubbed clean, an honest day's work produced a good enough living for a modest house and a car and maybe a vacation at the lake one week a year.

The massive expansion of credit has absolutely ruined most ordinary working people by artificially driving up the price of everything - most particularly housing and higher education - to suit the few that can use that credit to take advantage of the opportunities to play Monopoly with society's production.

Yet has Harper done one single thing to acknowledge that perhaps the way we've done things in the last four decades has left ordinary hard-working people worse-off, rather than better-off? To acknowledge that the greed of the gambler with good credit has screwed the virtuous, hard work of the ordinary saver?

My grandmother taught me my first lessons in saving money - she did it the hard way to come to Canada in the first place in 1929. She would absolutely shit a big, wet brick to see the young snot-nosed couple who bought her place after her death - still in their twenties, driving leased cars and pyramiding capital gains from his import-export "business" into enough income to "afford" a home. I heard they lost the house when things turned down in the 1997 Asian crash, but of course, things don't always turn out that way.

When Harper takes some steps to cure Canadians of their addictions to asset bubbles, I'll become a believer. Meanwhile, though he's no vandal in the mould of Ford, he's no better than the Liberals.

The West is moving Left

Two weeks ago on here realisticman and John Corman were claiming the world was moving to the Right.

Two weeks later they're reduced to claiming the world isn't moving to the Left as fast as some claim.

That's quite a turnaround in a short period of time.

North America it would appear has over the last few years seen a rejuvenated Left and growing support at the ballot box.

People seem to have had it with the Right's inability to manage an economy without creating massive debt and poverty as well as their hysterical ideology and are now looking at the Left as the most moderate option available.

Stephen Harper does not care what we think.

I hate the man, but I give him begrudging credit for being a statesman of a sort.

Ruling with a minority by twice suspending parliament and creating omnibus bills that have motherhood issues embedded in minenefields of draconian legislation - that is creative in an evil way.

He gets ten out of ten for Machiavellian deviousness and for using John Baird as his Angry Dog, but he is a guttersnipe at best, reversing decades of hard work that established Canada as a leader in global politics.

We now have THE WORST of all possible records on the environment, an accompishment few would want to emulate. Mere words cannot express my disgust at this blunt instrument.

He epitomises the lowest common denominator in politics, and it would be fitting if he were hung, drawn and quartered as in days of yore. Merely seeing him come to a sticky end would not suffice; his is the kind of story you want to take an active part in ending, preferably with a wooden stake.

@Cynic

- thanks for letting me know you liked the essay - one wonders sometimes if anyone ever reads, but one must keep trying. As for the banking vid, I have been trying to sort this stuff out for quite a few years, and have some points of both agreement and disagreement with what they say here, which is basically a libertarian perspective - I have some crossover with the libertarians, but some serious disagreements also. As far as money goes, obviously letting private banks create our money with no useful regulations to how much they can create is an insane idea, at least for us, certainly great for them - but the answer is not some kind of 'gold standard' as is the libertarian stance - various arguments have been advanced, but to me the basic problem is that if we cannot control the people creating fiat money, then we're going to have no more luck controlling them when they dick around with the price of gold, etc, and thus all time spent arguing this is one of the many deadend streets our masters have people running down. The problem is not 'fiat money', or that 'it is created out of thin air' - the problem is who controls the fiat money, and for what purpose. If we had a (**true**) democratic government, overseen and under the control of an engaged, aware citizenry, fiat money would be fine - we would run the money system with the purpose of maintaining a stable economy for all of us, rather than (as the banks do) manipulating the economy (booms, busts, inflation, currency and other speculation, etc etc) for their own advantage - what is great for banks is really bad for the rest of us. I get into more detail in another essay - What Happened? http://www.rudemacedon.ca/what-happened.html . Or there's a couple of good Cdn vids also, i.e. Money as Debt (vII) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCu3fpg83TY .

I think that video confirms

I think that video confirms what you say, I don't see any libertarian view or any mention of going to a gold standard. All money reformers agree with you, fiat money is fine per se, it's who gets the privilege, us or the elite. And believe me, I've seen all the videos. Money as Debt was made by a friend of mine.

sorry

- too used to seeing vids complaining about the fed and then going into a demand for a return to the gold standard which, as you gathered, I think is wrong headed. The suggestion at the end to 'buy gold and silver coins', combined with not paying enough attention during a quick listen, led me astray. You are right, the message seems to primarily be as I believe - to take the money creating function away from private banks, and give it back to **democratic** governments. Good luck to us all - it will, if we ever get enough people understanding this to start fighting, a vicious contest - the masters of the world are not going to go peacefully into that good night (that seems to be what most people they are putting the chains on seem ready to do, unfortunately - it is our job to keep trying to wake them up.) Pass on my greetings to Paul G - he's on my list of people to contact when I get finished with a 'plan' I am working on ....

Ontario results ?

So, we keep on hearing this "fewer than 40% of the voters voted for Harper" and "voter suppression this and that". Well, let's just say for a second the 'under 40%' is relevant and there actually was voter suppression, the Ontario results are the epitome of that then.

- 48% of Ontario voters turned out, so, is McGunity the biggest voter oppressor of all?

- the Liberals, at 37.6% of the vote beat the conservatives by 2.2%, yet they have 43% more seats.

- considering a 48% voter turnout, only 18% of voters cast a ballot for McGuunty. Based on the article's logic, this is worse than Harper's support.

- the Liberals are one seat shy of a majority, with 62.4% of voters casting a ballot for another party. Hardly an endorsement of the McGuinty government.

M

the day the unions died

And takes democracy and puts bully into place as the right to a join a labor union is useless if government is going to get caught up in the financial statements of big business and order them back to work.

Mr Dobbin at his best

According to Mr Dobbin referring to Stephan Harper:
"...his voter suppression strategy worked, and a huge number of non-Conservatives stayed home. They were the very people who cared enough about democracy and the country that they found the vicious politics of the PM too much to bear."
==========================================
I prefer to have the brightest running our country. If Mr Harper is smart enough to convince all those lefties, the only ones amongst us, according to Mr Dobbin, with a true love of Canada and democracies to stay home on election day then I am in awe of our Prime Minister. (perhaps there's a contradiction in there somewhere)

This has to be the most comical column Mr Dobbin has ever written but I still love to read his work.
Where else would you find someone inventing the phrase "voter suppression strategy"?

I have to agree with you John, in part at least

Harper did read the Canadian electorate well; torn between hockey and apathy, they stayed home and watched neither.

Unlike you though, I don't admire him for being right, in any sense of the word. I am just sharpening my wooden stake and biding my time.

We are all our own worst enemies and like everyone else, Harper will crumble under his own weight. Perhaps John Baird will digest himself in his own vitriolic bile.

I hope Harper is smart enough that he won't need to do a shady deal with a German airplane broker that involves wads of cash in a brown paper bag. It would be funny if he wound up in one of his own brand new jails, but it would be a stain on Canada's fine reputation abroad, wouldn't it? Ironically, it would complete all Harper's hard work at destroying it.

Voter suppression and non-voting collide

Voter suppression through voter oppression is hardly news, John Corman.

And if those who suffer at the hand of government most remove themselves from the spectacle of casting a vote, it seems to the mind of the state that this is a good thing. And, in the short, it may be.

But in the long, when the inevitable frustration of disenfranchisement bubble to the top, and the disenfranchised join together with the principled non-voter (read Thoreau), an uprising is in the making.

If anything can be said, perhaps it is that there are no free rides. Harper, perched upon his magic carpet, can see the horizon if he looks. I doubt he has character for such vision, all the same.

What can you do?

I heard a rumor from a scared but reliable source that somewhere in Alberta a guy has been working on a compound that actually stops a cow from coming home to be milked! When all the cows are coming home, those zapped with this atomized compound just sit there, completely zonked. Apparently, Harper heard all about it and had loads of it made, then got the American air force to spray it on election day over known leftie habitats and swing ridings. This guy must be really stupid if he though we wouldn't find out.

Now they're putting it in the water!

What you have to do to get rid of it is boil your water for 20 minutes; keep all windows open and only do your laundry in a fast running river.

We'll show 'em!

Snicker...

"I prefer to have the brightest running our country."

I very much doubt that. The brightest guy to run this country in the past 50 years was Trudeau - no contest - and I'm pretty sure some of our contributors would have given anything to punish his intellect with a "cranial application of dimension lumber p.r.n. 'til the attitude changes."

fish-counter

"It would be funny if he wound up in one of his own brand new jails..."

White collar crime has been exempted from jail sentences by underfunding of the courts, investigative branch, and justice system.

Under NAFTA, we now export our criminals to the US for their trails and jail sentences - Conrad Black is a particularly instructive case. But only if they don't vote the right way.

Why we are seeing protests

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/why-isnt-wall-street-in-jail-20110216

The North American political-economic system is horribly corrupt.

There's no consequences if you're rich.

Time to Stand Up.

There are no consequences, for too many.

We absolutely must address this. We demand more police, more prosecutors, more judges and many more prisons.

r'man

More police to arrerst the poor, more prosecutors to prosecute the poor, more judges to pass sentence on the poor and more prisons to house the poor.

As the article in Rolling Stone says, there's no will to go after the rich.

Frank

If the prisons are full and the judges are not sending people that have been convicted there, we need more prison space. Not rocket science. If you want consequences then you must have prison space. It's not like you to just give up Frank. Let's hear it from you for more prisons. You did bring this one up.

realisticman

Judges aren't sending rich people to jail because there's no will to arrest them, prosecute them and put them before a judge.

There is plenty of prison space for the rich but their political friends, literally, don't want to see them before a court.

The problem is not lack of prisons or police, there's plenty already. The problem is lack of political will.

In this society the poor go to prison and the rich pay a small fine. The rich don't even have to admit guilt let alone be punished for their crimes. Which is proof our society is corrupt.

Frank

Why did Conrad Black, Bernard Ebbers, Bernie Madoff, Dennis Kozlowski, etc. go to prison?

The John Howard Society says:

"Prison and jail overcrowding has continued to haunt Canadian and United States corrections facilities as the pressures of an increasing inmate population, coupled with the demand for lower corrections costs, have resulted in a growing shortage of living space for inmates. Not only are institutions operating at maximum capacity, but some exceed capacity. Increasingly, inmates are forced into double-bunking in single cells or living in open dormitories. The Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) National Inmate Survey (1995), found that 26.4% of inmates stated that they were currently sharing a cell with another inmate. "

What do you think Frank. Baloney? Plenty of prison space. Stuff 'em in there somewhere? I'm saddened that you couldn't care about these people.

r'man

"Why did Conrad Black, Bernard Ebbers, Bernie Madoff, Dennis Kozlowski etc"

Etc? By all means go on. You've lsited 4 people out of a prison population of over 2 million.

That's less than 0.000002%

I guess instead of calling themselves the 99% the protesters should be calling themselves the 99.999998%?

The facts are clear, the authorities responsible for policing the stock exchanges and other haunts of the rich don't prosecute people they've worked for and with in the past and may want to work for or with again in the future.

Let's see if I've got this right.

Stephan Harper has created policies which results in "voter suppression" which encourages people not to vote. No one has described exactly how this works but we just have to accept that it's successful.

But, not just any people succumb. The only ones effected by this conspiracy are the left wing people who, as Mr Dobbin describes, are the only ones who "love Canada and democracies".

I'm obviously out numbered so I'll begrudgingly accept what's being presented but, have to add, that we must have one hell of a brilliant Prime Minister to pull off this trick. Especially given, as one poster stated, these lefties being tricked are the "most intelligent" among us.

And GWest, I'm not going to read a book on this "voter suppression strategy". I'm very content that our Prime Minister has been able to find a way to get some of you to hide under your beds on election day. I don't need to know the details.

How perplexing for the mind of conservatism

Prison and jail overcrowding has continued to haunt Canadian and United States corrections facilities as the pressures of an increasing inmate population, coupled with the demand for lower corrections costs, have resulted in a growing shortage of living space for inmates.

Gee, this is a real brain-teaser. I wonder why prisons are so full?

First consideration, the population. Prisons are very disproportionately littered with visible minorities and the poor, and with folks convicted for marijuana offenses. It must be genetic. /sarcasm.

Need space? Incarcerate only those who deserve incarceration, those who are a real threat to the people in society and not just to our 'national interests'.

Costs too high? Stop wasting money on the above mentioned categories of inmates. Unfortunately, cutting military and para-military expenses like jails are not the strategic cuts austerity demands. Under our fascist state of conservatism, the political will demands the privatization of prisons. We all know (because the government told us so) that privatization is always more efficient that state run matters. Just look at the USA.

Clearly privatization of the huge prison industry works. That is why the USA has the largest incarcerated population on the planet. And most fortunately, to the powers that be, there are back-room deals going on daily between government and business to keep each other flush with funds.

Too bad our national disgrace Stephen Harper is incapable of doing anything but what he has been told by his High Priests of Free Markets. Private prisons will be on our sovereign land before too much longer. The question no longer is 'if' but 'when'.

Misread? Really?

A new poll just showed that the Harper Conservatives (perceived) focus on the economy and jobs has them up ten points in the latest poll. That could also be a function of the poor state of the Liberal Party of Canada and the fact that some of the sympathetic support for Jack Layton has subsided.

Harper is a very patient fox. So far, he's convinced a majority of Canadians in the hen house that he's not really a typical fox. I'm waiting for the mask to come off. I don't trust Harper. As much as I like Murray Dobbin's work, I think this opinion is premature. The rejection of Harper will come, but it may take time. He is a clever tactician and has learned patience when dealing with he Canadian electorate.