Topic
Nice is so over. Nice is for pussies.
Cartoon by Greg Perry.
Ten Tyee contributors share their ideas of what the election signifies. Please add your voice.
Dear World,
OK, so we know that when you thought of us before, if you thought about us at all that is, you thought: "Aren't they nice, those Canadians, living in that big cold empty country with trees and mountains and moose."
We're writing to let you know, that's so over.
Now we're not nice, we're angry. We're going to protect our interests, and we're just not going to take it anymore.
What "it" is we haven't quite figured out, nor have we got a handle on exactly why we're angry. But boy are we ever. We're so angry we just want to get out there and bomb something.
And before you joke about how decrepit our bombers are (and let's not even talk about submarines), we'd like you to know that we have on order some rather expensive shiny new bombers, and when they get here, eventually, THEN we'll show you all a thing or two about blowing stuff up.
Go fry
The melting Arctic? All ours. So in your face, Denmark! (In your face too, Russia, from time to time, although we don't really mean it, since you are kind of tough).
And the Middle East? Don't even get us started. With their unethical oil they are such bastards, unless of course we're trying to sell them donuts, in which case, we're good buds. It's not like they'd hold that bastards thing against us anyway.
The UN? That place is for pussies. Any group that would vote for Portugal over Canada must be totally irrelevant. Tiny, bankrupt Portugal? They can't even skate. Please, they are so Old Europe.
And Africa? You can go fry. We're going to pop a bunch more anabolics into those tar sands, boys, and strip mine the hell out of Northern Alberta even faster. Let the atmosphere be damned. We're Canadian. We're used to bad weather.
We also just shipped a bunch of bumper stickers to India to stick on their Tatas. They are made out of the asbestos we just took out of the prime minister's residence and say: "Choke On This, Suckers."
The royal we
As for America, our neighbour who used to define us in the "not," we've decided we kind of like that dumbing down thing you're up to, so are importing it. Who needs so-called "facts" when we now have Fox News North?
One thing we're not angry about, though, is the monarchy. You Brits, keep sending them over the pond to visit, at least the cute ones! It keeps the proles distracted.
Our chief diplomat? John Baird. Consistently voted the MP least likely to be diplomatic, we thought he'd be perfect.
So get used to it, world. Mr. Nice Guy got run head first into the boards and there's a new enforcer on the ice. Brain damage is a small price to pay for protecting our interests. Whatever they are.
Sincerely,
The New Canada ![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
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pwlg
1 year ago
add to the list, Canada's mining companies abroad
Now here's an industry that fits in nicely with the New Canada, hell, even the Old Canada.
The Yanks seem to be finished with their punishment of the Banana Republic states now its our turn.
The coup in Honduras, no problem, we have mining interests there.
Poisoning of water sources in Guatemala, no problem, we have mining interests there.
Para-military killings of environmental and social justice advocates concerned about forced displacements and health issues, no problem, we have mining interests there.
Jeffrey J.
1 year ago
Well Said
This was brilliant. And hilarious. But sadly, also true. The world is much more dangerous place with Herr Harper and his thugs roaming the world. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
kasi_visvanath
1 year ago
yes!~ we are so tough!! Heil Harper!!
look out WORLD!~ Herr Harpo is in town, and there ain't room enough for the both of you....better git out of Dodge by lunch time, if you don't want a showdown on the streets with Canada's number one tough guy....our very own Putin clone....
whose eyes belie the creepy smiles as he signs away the life blood of innocents in Libya..., as he pushes the Alberta oil sands bullshit pipeline through BC despite the demands of the people who LIVE there....
and then there's the Minister of National Resources, who i heard today on CBC radio talking about the Oil Pipelines, both across Northern BC and the one into Texas through the US...and going on and on about how our entire economy is so dependent upon sales of this raw product overseas to Asia.
he went further to state that the main opposition appears to be funded by "Billionaire socialists in the US"......
with that one line it was totally clear just how deluded and hallucinating this fellow is....
have you ever met a Billionaire Socialist?? i believe that to put those two words together constitutes an "oxymoron".
the Conservative Party of Canada is the new Fascism "Lite" model.....give your capitalist friends the country's resources now in exchange for a nice cushy job later, when the voters boot you out...and in return the wealthy elites support the Conservatives with lavish donations.
it's a nice cozy relationship between government and business of the "you scratch my back and i'll scratch yours."
David Beers
1 year ago
Hey folks, love your passion for commenting on The Tyee, but...
Can we drop the references to Nazi Germany?
TYRONE
1 year ago
Trash!
READ THE HEADLINE!
snert
1 year ago
Yawn!
Yawn, again.
Leonard
1 year ago
Bad?
OK, nobody is squeaky clean, but that's not us, not me , not Canada, not the Government of Canada, but the Harper Government, hopefully a temporary aberration. We can look forward to their happy retirement soon at their spiritual home, the Bush Compound in Texas.
igbymac
1 year ago
Really Leonard?
You think Harper is just an aberration and not a continuance of the crime wave?
Mulroney - Air India bombing fiasco, cancellation of the National Energy Program, Meech Lake, Canada-USA Free Trade Agreement, privatization of Petro-Canada, Gulf War, Oka, NAFTA
Chretien - HST, budget cuts shifting wealth to the private sector, war in Kosovo, indicted with other NATO leaders for war crimes in Yugoslavia, the invasion of Afghanistan, the sponsorship scandal
Martin - Canadian Steamship Lines reflagging and the conflict of interest issues, Sponsorship scandal, his privatization neo-con work as economic minister under Chretien
Harper ... etc
I admit he is one sick puppy, but if he was such a shock to the electorate, explain his re-election two times running, each time progressively stronger?
Canadians may see their warts, but the big boobs in government still manage to keep them distracted.
irth1st
1 year ago
Canada
Harper.Co vs. Canada stay tuned.
Langley
1 year ago
The last time I felt proud to be a Canadian
When Chretien told the Americans to fight their illegal war on Iraq without our assistance.
Since then I've had nothing to be proud about (other than a few hockey games in 2010)
I was ashamed to see Harper get his majority and now with B.C. in ruins and the rest of the country polarizing into US style political behavior, the Canada I once knew is long dead.
Gryphon Sable
1 year ago
Some people might be offended...
Some people might be offended at the suggestions of fascism on the part of "the Harper Government" but really, have those of you who are offended actually studied the rise of Hitler? Are those lessons lost on you? If you were told about a fanatical leader who rose to power with a minority of the vote to form a majority government, who stacked the upper house and the supreme court with his cronies, who dismissed statistical evidence of decreasing crime and spent money on jails and munitions--wouldn't Hitler spring to mind?
Here we're dealing with a man who believes that everybody is basically bad (except members of his own cult), that his government is essentially there by divine right, some one who fires recognized, world-class scientists and statisticians who say the "wrong" things, some one who doesn't believe in climate change....the list goes on.
And then there's the ruinous plans to buy aircraft wholly unsuitable for Canada's defensive needs: why do we need first-strike attack aircraft? Worse, why do we need a plane that U.S. military analysts have dubbed "a turkey"--a grossly overpriced underachiever?
Adolf Harper claims to have a background in economics: if that is true, it is clear that his ideology trumps the figures every time.
By the way, great piece of writing! It's hard to find humour in the way "the Harper Government" has made Canadians a world-wide laughing stock.
kmdyson
1 year ago
Harper's vision
the man is a hard right ideologue...wonder what part of that people didn't understand last May...now we pay the price for four years...knowing it will take at least as long to fix the mess he leaves...that is if the opposition has the stomach to act on behalf of people rather than corporations...
andrepiver
1 year ago
Not An Easy Fix
Harper has been systematically dismantling the civil service and any remnants of a culture of service and professionalism. This cannot be corrected in a few years with a simple change of leadership. It takes years to build. Any motivated senior civil servant who is not in hock would have left after Harper destroyed the only source of reliable data on the state of the nation: the obligatory, randomized long form census.....as opposed to a voluntary one skewed by a likely over-representation of the idle with time to spare or the disgruntled with a point to make. And the wonderful first past the post system combined with an ignorant electorate re-elected him with a majority while the media failed to explain what "skewed" statistics mean!!!!Not to mention his lying about non-existent complaints about the census or being found in contempt of parliament. Guess what: it is not "Big Brother" but "Big Corporation"and he's here. We are in a Dark Age.
Countrytype
1 year ago
The Nazis were maniacs. They
The Nazis were maniacs. They were real people who used human nature against the people they governed. Their tactics have basically been copied by Fox/Sun TV and the smear politics of the current governing party. If all you do is squirm and refuse to hear the comparison, how will you consider the great ills that should be considered to follow when wild statements and swipes at democracy like we're seeing now are happening? It's actually terrifying if you've studied the past to see (short of the holocaust) all the bad that the current national bosses are suggesting we need...
Countrytype
1 year ago
Just waiting for 'bad behaviour' to pass?
Why should it if you don't stand up to it?
Not my kind of government. They can't even hack dissent among the democratic public, which is nasty, but the best thing we've got.
wiley
1 year ago
another foreign adventure
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2012/01/09/Canadian-warship-bound-for-Mediterranean/UPI-30111326120733/
Hal K from BC
1 year ago
Google Harper Northern
Google Harper Northern Foundation
Dan Grant
1 year ago
Wake up Canada ‼ In October
Wake up Canada ‼
In October of 2006, an American journalist visiting up north noticed something was not right in Canada. He had been making the trip every year, but this time there was a marked difference.
Something he was all too familiar with in the United States. Corporate-paid for, visceral politics.
http://www.rabble.ca/news/american-journalists-view-harper
Dan Grant
1 year ago
Vancouver, B.C.: September
Vancouver, B.C.: September 25, 2008
Janeane Garafolo on Steve Harper - Wake up Canada!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-B4JRlkMDs
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OwlRol
1 year ago
Dan, similar repeat problem
I suspect that you ran into the same problem that I did, trying to post a comment and having it disappear, so re posting it, resulting in duplicates.
Make sure you are on "All", not "Best" and that repeat problem should not happen.
OwlRol
1 year ago
Good one, including the cartoon
Matt, my sentiments exactly.
Igbymac correctly pointed out the immoral but growing links between government and business, much anti-democratic, schemes since Mulroney.
Its just that the Harper government has taken this to a new level so quickly.
Harpo said that he would change Canada so much that Canadians may not recognize it. He's surely been true to his word.
He really doesn't care what the U.N. or more "socialist" nations think, as long as he can bamboozle the Canadian electorate.
The comparisons to the Nazis, especially Goebbels' propaganda, may be somewhat extreme, but offers some valuable lessons.
It was Mussolini who said that Fascism should rightly be called Corporatism because it was a union of government with corporations.
But, even at its worst, our governments haven't stepped over that line of mass violence and murder of its own people, although the G20 protester treatment was starting to aim in that direction.
I really would like to see a law passed with heavy fines to prevent attack ads and commercials, both federal and provincial, at the very least until an election writ is dropped. Could reduce a bit of the misleading and often hateful propaganda.