All Arcane on the Western Front

So, I'm sitting at home trying to eat enough to stick to my diet (If you don't eat enough, in proportion to how much you burn, your body will eventually begin telling you to eat lots of food, not good when you work at a convienience store) and I'm doing what most Canadians do at 3 AM on a Saturday night, watching a post mortem of the Campbell campaign in '93...

Okay I'm a giant political geek, but it was still a worth while experience. I saw the infamous think twice ad. The one where Chretien's pacial Paralysis is mocked. And I never saw this ad when I was 10 and the election was in full swing, but what they're trying to do is portray this man as a fool. If you get a chance look at that ad. Then listen to the audio and substitute this picture:
Voice Over: Doesn't John Diefenbaker understand the need for a national oil Pipeline? Think Twice, Vote Liberal.

That picture could have been used. Same way, same emotions, no outcry. The '93 think twice ad gave people the impression that the Tories were saying 'would you elect a disabled guy?' when they were saying 'would you elect an unstable guy?'

So what was the mistake here? Twofold:

1. The Tories didn't clarify the message believably, instead they yanked it confirming the impression of the ad.
2. The staff didn't run the ad by the leader so when it became an issue, she was firing blind.

In other news I've fixed my comments so you don't have to be a blogger to chime in. Hopefully this will unleash a torrent of feedback. Or at least some spam.

I may illiterate, but I am no liar.

When someone gets their facts wrong, don't call them a liar. Confront them with the fact. If they concede the possibility that they may be wrong. That is enough. If they hang up on you, then you can call them an idiotic Claire Hoy wanna be. (Couldn't resist the dig Terry)

I screwed up my facts on the NDP's position on the War Measures Act in 1970. I thought the NDP voted against on 2nd and for on 3rd. I was wrong They voted for on second and 6 of 22 voted for on third. I made the point that it is sad that Bev Desjarlais was punished more for opposing gay marriage than Ian Deans was punished for opposing habeus corpus and the right to a lawyer.

Oh how the democratic have fallen.

So in response this series of Dipper hacks on the eminently crappy red version of Free Dominion: www.rabble.ca/babble
called me and my erronious statement the following after I had "provisionally withdrawn" my claim of Dipper weak willedness on the WMA:
(Remember this is after I had conceeded the point in the space of minutes.)
"There is a technical term in moral theology to describe a statement like that.
It's called a lie."
"Your position is completely laughable - like that of most Liberal apologists."
"It is demeaning to Babble to post lies and non-facts pulled out of one's anus. "

Classy.

"This is likely to be administered for a course of years and then end in despotism ... when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic government, being incapable of any other."

-Benjamin Franklin speaking to the Constitutional convention.

Odd that.

Happy 110th Birthday Chief.

BTW: There have been 12 tory PM's to 9 Liberal PM's, yet the Grits have run the country for the longer period. Odd that.

I love Joe.

Poor, deluded, obviously not wearing a bra, Joe.

This is without a doubt the most pathetic photo I have ever seen of the man, found on Wikipedia:

I feel bad. Like Joe is the Rudy of Canadian Politics. Except if Joe were the Rudy of Canadian politics is would have involved more sleeping in a cot in the janitor's room and less adulation by his team mates. It'd be like if Rudy wandered down from the stands while nobody was looking and got his buddy Marty to take this photo of him with the Grey Cup while everyone was busy celebrating. It's very, very, sad.

Joe had to deal with a lot of Prime Ministerial things while not having the advantage of being able to act very Prime Ministerial. Joe buried Diefenbaker, something that would have made even Trudeau look small. You don't believe me? Look at the NFB film 'Dief' and watch Pierre viewing the casket. You didn't know he had a beard did you? But anyhoo, he looks like a broken man saying goodbye to a freind who has spurned him. That's pathos. That's feelings of inadequacy. That's a man being reminded about the beautiful and civic nature of Canadian Nationalism. That's a man who's going to introduce the NEP and tell Reagan where to stick it in a few months time.

Ah, for the days when our atheletes were more surprised by events than our leaders and when our national press had more context than our sporting press.

I'll have more on The Secret Mulroney Tapes later. But for now, I'm far too drunk.

"No you're not"

[Takes Deep Slurp from drink]

[Uneasy stare]

"I don't want no union..." [And passes out]

Today on Seanquixote: Another self serving introduction.

More thoughts on the Secret Mulroney tapes:

1) It was no secret that Mulroney loved patronage, but what gets overlooked even more than that is that he loved quotas more. He wanted his cronies and carpet baggers to look like Canada. Having been in the NDP (involuntary shudder at PTSD), I can tell you that they elect their representatives in much the same manner. You get to the point at the bottom of the quota barrel where the last spot has to be filled by a lesbian left-handed west coast immigrant bagpipe technician of mixed Polish and Ugandan descent. Which is fine I have nothing against LHWCIBToMPAUD's, I'm sure that they display equal competence to WASP's (Neither of which I am BTW) But all I'm saying is that the pickin's get pretty slim and that brilliant bio-chemist who fits your quota might not be well suited for the freshwater fish salting board.

2) Failings of FTA: Yes we all know that trade has increased. The question isn't whether trade has increased. That's the point of a trade agreement. The question is whether we have been made better off as a result. The TD study notes that personal incomes have risen less than 4% between 1989 and 2004. Free Trade has made us more trade dependent. It has not made us wealthier.

3) Peter Newman did not stab Brian Mulroney in the back. Brian had 12 years to get these papers to him and then decided that he was going to write his own memoirs. I have no doubt that he gave his good friend every opportunity to live up to the terms of his agreement.

4) Brian didn't realise that even though he wouldn't change the rules of the game, the Americans would. The president has friends, the American government has interests.

5) Chapter 11?! Where American companies can sue the Canadian government for numerous irritants including delivering the mail?! What were you thinking?!

That's about it for now.

The Secret Tisdall Tapes:

I have been warned. From now on I only post in dark green or black. Or if I'm really mad I can highlight one word. In red. But, only one. They're serious. Really. Okay on with the show.

Bought and read the Secret Mulroney Tapes today. Oddly enough I now have more respect for Brian Mulroney. The GST was put in a rational light for me, and I get the point about having Quebec sign the constitution. I still have great reservations about Meech, Charlottetown, and FTA/NAFTA. But, I do understand where he was coming from and how many times he told his good buddies, to whom he was supposedly so subservient, to pound salt, in the nicest possible way of course. But there still remain some glaring mistakes that defined his government, and more that I hadn't thought of entirely. I shall go on to define the major themes of the book in Point/Counterpoint fashion.

Point: Brian Mulroney was a cynical, vengeful man, look at what he did to Julian Porter, denying him the chief justice of Ontario, because his wife published the Claire Hoy book, "Friends in High Places"

Counterpoint: Sean, you ignorant slut, Brian dished dirt on his friends and enemies because that's what he needed to do for Newman to be able to write a truly honest portrail of the man warts and all. It became obvious during the book that he was much like the PM in H2O telling the nation what he felt it had to hear as evidenced by this line:

I put the country up to a mirror and I said, "Here's what you look like and here's what we have to look like in ten or fifteen or twenty years." They couldn't swallow it; they couldn't take it. Now does that mean I was wrong? We'll have to see. I don't think so. That's what a leader has to do.

Point: Speaking of the mirror, a fundamental part of Mulroney's image was Canada as a nation enriched by getting in on the global economy early in the game and protecting its identity through wealth.

Counterpoint: Sean, you ignorant slut, that's a good point. If you're a Canadian nationalist and you take power what would you do with the economy to ensure more Canadian control over our economic destiny? Well first you'd like to ensure as many economic condidtions as you can. Hence FTA. Mulroney though he could guarantee the Canadian economy secure access into the American economy in exchange for giving away something that Canadians didn't much want in the first place: Their excess energy production. Or course as Hnatyshn put it, "Free trade in energy with the Americans is like wife swapping with a bachelor." So now you've opened up the economy. In an open economy there's not much reason to prime the pump as Mitterand found out. Most of your capital can leave the country when it's spent on subsidy, so as Coyne reccomended you start moving your fiscal balance more and more into the black.He didn't do a good job of this, but Crow ends up taking up most of the slack with higer interest rates and a recession gobbles up his tax base and balloons his UI payments. Paul Martin however brings down the nuclear budget that had to follow Free Trade, otherwise why bother? The main advantage of free trade is that you can start underspending the other guy and free ride off of his deficits. That's why Canada's rolling in it now. The Americans are gutting themselves and Canada with it's higher interest rates and strong surplus is lapping it up. So now American capital is crowding your style, you say you want more Canadian ownership? Great encourage savings. You have part one down by choppng spending. Now you need a tax on consumption so that households don't pick up the slack. Hence the GST. A sales tax doesn't tax savings. More Canadian savings, more Canadian investment, more Canadian capital. But while Mulroney was in office the Debt/GDP ratio balooned, so these policies were effectively masked by the fact that the man who could roll the dice with the country didn't have the balls to take a big wet bite out of the budget's ass when he had the chance. Don't de-index the pensions, freeze them for 2 years and then start indexing them again (8% cut) raise taxes your first year. GST immediately and make it 10% Cut interest rates by a point the moment any sector wobbles and apply the savings against the debt. Cut every budget by 10% to start and then begin to follow inflation instead of outstripping growth. Bring in the hard budget quick and the public will have caught its breath by '88. You're out of a recession, don't wander into a boom that will precipitate another recession.

Point: Mulroney needed to be more bashful about his patronage sprees.

Counterpoint: No. Mulroney needed to acknowledge and accept patronage. He needed to be more balanced about it for sure, but patronage is important. It mobilizes people into the political process. It allows you to get bright people who are willing to work with you into positions in which they can aid your government. Some of the best advisors a government has aren't retained as advisors. They are senators, citizenship judges, governors of crown corporations. They know enough about their job to be trustees and they provide a link between government and civil service that otherwise wouldn't be there. Without patronage, only the wealthy can afford politics.

Point: He never really respected his peers did he?

Counterpoint: Ignorant slut, blah, blah, He loved his peers. But yeah, he thought they were idiots.

P: He was a bullshitter.
C: Who believed his own bullshit. That makes him an honourable man, even if wrong.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's episode when you'll hear Sean say:

"Will that be for de pickup or de delivery, Mr. Danza?"

Wow.

I have Comments! And Spam! Glorious Spam!

Truly I have made it!

I just got through Eddie Goodman's book, "Life of the party," the man is an example of partisanship.

I have little else to declare other than every president from Johnson onwards just cost America 10,000 lives and 300 billion dollars.

So now I leave you with my assessment of the Canadian Media adapted from Yes Minister.


The Ottowa Citizen is read by people who think they run the country;
The Toronto Star is read by people who think they ought to run the country;
The Globe and Mail is read by people who actually do run the country;
The Edmonton Journal is read by the wives of the people who run the country;
The Financial Post is read by people who own the country;
The National Post is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country;
The Star-Pheonix is read by people who think it is.
Finally, Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits.

I put my money where my goddamn mouth is.

The Tories have a 500 club again and I am its charter member. Go. Join. We'll drink much scotch together.

Well what do I say?

The world's most powerful nation can spent a quarter trillion a year ensuring their well to do citizens are able to keep their wealth, but can't spend 1% of that amount to secure the City of New Orleans from the most likely natural catastrophe (Category 5 storm surge + collapse of levee around lake Pontchartrain)

For a government that supposedly worships wealth they sure have a stupid way of showing it.

Dennis Hastert doesn't want to re-build.

This is the arsenal of democracy and they have crumbled in the face of a flood. How have we become so blind to that which is obvious?

Those that know America best had this to say:

"When shall we expect the approach of danger? Shall some transatlantic giant step the earth and crush us at a blow? Never. All the armies of Europe and Asia could not by force take a drink from the Ohio River or make a track on the Blue Ridge in the trial of a thousand years. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men we will live forever, or die by suicide."

This is what fear of the other brings. A nation soo afriad of box cutters and shoe bombers that they will spend a hundred billion dollars a year making enemies and won't spend two and a half billion one time protecting themselves from themselves.

There's not one terrorist or army who could inflict upon a nation that which the nation can inflict upon itself.

Lincoln's bones will lay bleaching in the sun and the stagnant waters of the Mississippi Delta and they'll build a million cookie cutter condos far far away from this place.

America has stepped into the abyss. They are willing to forget themselves.

I weep for us all.

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand second gut laugh.



Enjoy Alberta Dick.