Why?

Why is it always a chore to get our government to do the right thing? Why is it that every Tom, Dick and Harry on the street from Toronto to Tuktoyaktuk knows what the right thing is and what should be done but our elected officials don't?

From Letting the Auditor General see MP's expenses to the Afghan Detainee "scandal" how come these people are so damn obtuse?

Are these "issues" some sort of political version of a head-fake? While we are getting the run around on a simple matter of transparency what else is happening?

We need a new way of doing politics in this country, and fast.

Fire. Them. All.

Traditions?

New rules for Native Bands eh?


Seems that the Government wants to drag the Aboriginal leadership kicking and screaming into the 19th century...

How dare they!

Finding levers to move the world

In the sound and fury surrounding the CPC budget, many people are proclaiming the end of the Conservative movement in Canada. Some left wing commentators are expressing glee at the prospect, while ideological Conservatives are expressing disgust. The budget was a political response to the problem of remaining as a minority governing party in power during an economic crisis. While it is not "conservative", it did allow the CPC to retain political power, and provide stability during this difficult period, which is the role of a political party.

The bigger long term question for people espousing "Classical Liberal" values should be "what do we want to do with this power?" Objectivists, Libertarians, Reformers and Conservatives of various stripes have either never answered the question or done a poor job of selling the ideals of limited government, personal responsibility and the rights of freedom of speech, property ownership and Rule of Law. If "we" are really serious about achieving these goals (and most people who believe in the "Classical Liberal" philosophy agree on the ends, if not the means) , then focusing all our attention on the CPC and Ottawa is distracting us from the real problems.

Some of the commentators have noticed that we should be making our voices heard on talk shows and letters to the editor (especially on the on line versions of the newspapers, where you are far more likely to be published and read). Directing your attention to the culture wars, we also need to make our voices heard, both directly by commenting on the fare we are presented on radio, TV and other media, and applying pressure to support positive messages and eliminate negative messages through contacting advertisers and offering praise for sponsoring media that supports freedom of speech, property rights and the Rule of Law, and boycotting advertisers who sponsor media that supports "Progressive" tropes.

As well, "we" need to start focusing our electoral power on the other levels of government. City Councils have become havens for "Progressives", and their antics affecting ownership of property are as great a threat to freedom as the CHRC, indeed greater since property ownership is one of the few practical expressions of our political rights and freedoms. Joining local groups promoting responsible civic government is a good start. Some examples in Ontario include: the Windsor Association of Concerned Taxpayers (WeACT); the Forest City Institute; the Toronto Party and Eye on Ottawa. If you have a group, let us know. If you want to start a group, contact these people and ask for advice.

Provincial governments are next, since they have been given a carte blanche to extract tax monies from us through Federal equalization payments. Seeing your tax dollars go to provide a tax cut to taxpayers in a different province is hardly a recipie for delivering responsible local government or even a strong national federation. Success stories are rare, but the remarkable growth of Saskatchewan after the demise of their long standing NDP government and culture should be a beacon and example to us all. The provinces have a much larger selection of political parties as well; Ontario has a Libertarian, Capitalist and even a Reform party as alternatives to the Progressive Conservatives. Large scale support to those parties will cause the other parties to take notice and react (even if electoral success is denied the smaller parties).

Face it. Ottawa is only one piece of the puzzle, and indeed it isn't even the largest piece. If we want to move the social, cultural and political landscape to support the values of freedom of speech, property rights and the Rule of Law, then we need to become active in many other areas besides Federal politics.

Freedom is a self help project.

UPDATE!!!Don't Even Think About it Mme Governor General.

I've heard it more than a couple of times with regard to this political party tax grab/vote subsidy but anyone want to try and tell me how this money grab is democratic?

I mean if the winning party of an election gets 14 million votes and wins a majority but then proceeds to lie, cheat and steal, elect unpopular people to lead their party, divorce the party from the very people parties are supposed to represent and still get $23,800,000 every year regardless of the poor job they do?

On the other hand, if you eliminate the subsidy the party has to remain loyal to its base, it has to generate it's own funds. It has to be able to come up with leaders, platforms and policies that their supporters will support and it has to hopefully do well enough to gather more support the next time. That is democracy.

Democracy is not being forced to treat a vote like a post dated cheque.

The other concept being hoisted upon us is that these parties (all of them) are somehow part and parcel of our democracy and they must survive or our democracy won't function. Absolute bullshit.

There is no party that has to exist. If the party can not survive on it's own then like a business it shouldn't. There is no legal, democratic or constitutional mandate for any of them. They are supposed to be private entities separate from and unconnected to government qua government in any way. Anything less than that is an aberration of democracy the likes of which we see in Banana Republics and communist "Peoples Republics".

I hope that the Conservatives stick to their guns on this one. It's sink or swim time and I'm sick and tired of the political parties using my money to keep themselves afloat.


The word you're looking for is breathless indignation.

But before these leeching slimeball waste of skin political backroom dolts try to rob me of the right to vote for who leads this country they should probably take a breather.

They should take a good hard look at the second chart here.

If you think that western Canada is going to roll over and suck the teat of a socialist Government that they overwhelmingly rejected, that is imposed on them by an unelected Royally appointed babysitter, you're smoking dope.

Look at the numbers from Manitoba west... 71 CPC Members of Parliament, 7 Liberal, and 14 NDP. 71 to 21, you do the math...

Try to pull a fast one Mme Jean and the separatists in Quebec may get their wish courtesy of Liberal NDP and Bloc greed and delivered by the long ignored western provinces.

Yes to Politics

Politics, as defined in organizational theory, is a process to allocate limited resources. This definition goes a long way to explaining the huge levels of effort expended by politicians and their lobby groups supporters to gain and maintain hold of the reigns of power; the rewards are the armed power of the State itself to seize, channel and direct wealth and resources towards you and your supporters.

Unless a true revolution like the technological Singularity comes along and relieves us of the need to find or allocate resources, politics will be a part of our lives for the foreseeable future.

Politicians are keen to keep the game under their control, however. The use of electoral "gag laws" to eliminate outside participation or debate in election campaigns comes to mind, as well as the implicit alliance between the MSM and "progressive" political parties to ignore or downplay certain stories.

Given these constraints, it is difficult to imagine that people like you and I can have any influence on events. I would like to suggest otherwise. The first level of government and the one that has the most impact on your day to day lives is the Municipal government, and groups are springing up to take on local politicians and hold them to account. In Ontario, some of the groups include:

The Toronto Party

Eye on Ottawa 

Forest City Institute

Winsdsor Association of Concerned Taxpayers

While most of these groups are small, the fact that we as a people are now able to harness the power of the Internet to find like minded citizens, do research, and spread our message through both old and new media suggests that the rules of the game are indeed changing, and changing to the advantage of the citizen. The true breakthrough will occur when these groups (ant their counterparts across Canada and around the world) achieve enough critical mass to actively influence the debate on issues. (I happen to know this is true, since the Forest City Institute made a submission to the Finance Committee an the Health Tax; a submission reported in the Globe and Mail,(behind firewall) but not the London Free Press, which is the home newspaper of the FCI.

For you, the reader, look for groups like this in your home town (or found one if none exists). Get involved in the political process, since it is your scarce resources that the political class seeks to allocate. Oh, and please let us know about these groups in your area. Send links through the comments section and share with everyone. A political revolution is possible by harnessing the power of the Internet and joining forces against the political class and their status quo. 

Get involved; say "Yes" to politics.

Anti-politics

Well, I’ve decided to throw my hat into the ring…

I’m entering into politics.

No, I’m not actually going to run for office I’m going to participate in the next best thing as any Canadian can tell you… I’m going to bitch about it from the sidelines.

In the coming months I’m going to develop my platform, the same way as the other politicians do, through keeping a keen eye on the topics du jour, a savvy read of the countries mass media and of course by watching the opposition, namely him and him. After all who really cares about him and her anyway?

If you’re expecting apologies for historic mistakes, cow towing to dubious theories, vacillation on and befuddlement of the issues look elsewhere.

Welcome to Anti-politics.

Wisdom condensed to one line

Rather than a long meditation, here is a one liner which explains the mindset of our "progressive" friends and their dictatorial role models world-wide:

Free speech? Next thing you know everyone will want free will.

Who pays; who controls?

While some readers might have wondered about my long absence from Uncommon Sense, rest assured that I have been busy at work and on personal matters (like improving my house!). Things should be settled come the fall.

This post is based on the well known but interesting observation that the bulk of tax revenues are paid by a minority of the wealthiest citizens. While the data here is from the United States, similar results should be found in Canadian data.

If 52% of the electorate can effectively control the wealth of the remaining 48%, what possible incentive will they have to elect responsible representatives or support policies that encourage wealth creation, protect private property or even support the Rule of Law (being able to expropriate private property is a favorite practice of socialist city councils, and the Kelo descision has very far reaching implications)?

It was for a very good reason that Aristotle looked down on Democracy as mob rule, and the Founding Fathers of the United States also had the examples of the "Social Wars" that brought down the Res Publica Roma and the excess of the French revolution to guide them. It should be noted that the franchise in the infant United States was only granted to men of property (Timocacy) to prevent mob rule and protect the property rights of citizens.

How to reverse this situation today is not at all clear. People like the idea of getting something for free, without considering where the "free" came from. For those who do, Socialists of all stripes will invoke class warfare, suggesting the wealth is somehow stolen, and really belongs to the correct class, ethnic group, nationality etc.

The only fact in the article that provides a slim ray of hope is the ratio in the United States is still very close to the 50/50 mark, and a little economic tweaking might push the wealth generating fraction back into the majority. Even in the current situation, the greater powers of organization and initiative displayed by the wealth earning fraction of the population might still be enough to retain control of the machinery of government long enough to do the tweaking on their own.

Of course, the solution of last resort might simply be to go on strike, as eaders of "Atlas Shrugged" know...

Fire. Them. All.

Thank you Ezra.

H/T SDA & No Libs

Signs of the Collectivist Apocalypse (SOTCA)

More rights ≠ More liberty

More rights ≠ More Freedom

More rights = A wrong

We are quickly sliding into the realm of a 'rights' tyranny. With every new "right" concocted by our hypersensitive, overly judicious, politically correct, namby-pamby nanny state, someone else looses a right.

Your right to ensure that the people you hire will do what it was that they were hired for in the first place is contravened by someone else's right to disobey and mooch. (H/T to Ezra)

Your right to free speech is contravened by someone else's (Syed Soharwardy) right to not be "offended".

Your right to have an opinion and express it is contravened by someone else's right to not have it published (McLeans Magazine & Mark Stein).

Your right to call someone an ass for being an ass is contravened by his right to not have his feelings hurt. (Kate at SDA vs. Richard Warman)

Your right to property is contravened by someone else's right to lay claim to that property (Caledonia).

Your right to protect the beliefs you hold dear is contravened by someone else's right to do what your belief tells you is sinful and immoral (Priest charged for Preaching that homosexuality is a sin).

So much for the freedom our rights were supposed to provide, but hey, NONE of our rights were ever guaranteed.

From our glorious illiberal ill-conceived and poorly legislated Charter of 'rights and freedoms'

(4) Subsections (2) and (3) do not preclude any law, program or activity that has as its object the amelioration in a province of conditions of individuals in that province who are socially or economically disadvantaged if the rate of employment in that province is below the rate of employment in Canada.

(2) Subsection (1) does not preclude any law, program or activity that has as its object the amelioration of conditions of disadvantaged individuals or groups including those that are disadvantaged because of race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability.

25. The guarantee in this Charter of certain rights and freedoms shall not be construed so as to abrogate or derogate from any aboriginal, treaty or other rights or freedoms that pertain to the aboriginal peoples of Canada including

a) any rights or freedoms that have been recognized by the Royal Proclamation of October 7, 1763; and
b) any rights or freedoms that now exist by way of land claims agreements or may be so acquired.

26. The guarantee in this Charter of certain rights and freedoms shall not be construed as denying the existence of any other rights or freedoms that exist in Canada.

Breaking the power of the Progressives

The thing that I can't understand is that in the polls both Conservatives and Liebrils are very close to being tied. What could it possibly take for these people to see that party for what it is?

This interesting question was posed on Army.ca, but I'm sure many people on both sides of the fence are asking that very question, and wondering how to change these numbers for their own benefit.

The past strength of the Liberal Party resides in the fact that many powerful groups benefit from the growth and implementation of "Progressive" ideology (i.e. government and quasi government unions, bureaucracies, government companies like the CBC and farmers and businesspeople who have discovered how to milk the system). These interest groups will go to very great lengths to maintain their hold on power. The Liberal Party and their beneficiaries have also discovered how to manipulate the population, using the promise of social programs to bribe the voters, inversion of language to disguise concepts (think about what "progressive taxation" really means, for example), and the use of ad hominem arguments and contrived scandals to suppress or eliminate debate on various topics. Controlling institutions like schools, the media and the courts also ensures things go the way "they" want. Progressives attempt to control the input, the dialogs and the output, just like every other totalitarian ideology throughout history.

For Canadians, the fight against the HRC's may represent the first crack in the Progressive's armour. HRC's operate as "Star Chambers" to enforce the memes of Political correctness, and as currently constituted operate beyond the law. Once this battle is joined fully, it may occur to many people that there are lots of other bureaucracies and government agencies which also infringe upon our rights and freedoms, and action must be taken against them as well. Political parties which have strong ties to these institutions also need to be taken down.

I know this is a battle which will be fought against with all the weapons in the Progressive armoury, and all the more difficult since most of these people and institutions have access to the resources of the State itself. There is a sea change coming as more and more people have finally realized that what is going on outside their houses and inside their lives no longer matches with the picture Progressives (of any political party) try to paint. The rise of the CPC and corresponding small Classical Liberal parties at the provincial level (Wildrose Alliance, Saskatchewan Party, Reform Ontario) suggests to me that enough people are becoming engaged and there is now a real chance this battle can be won in the end.

The Liberal Party is currently riven by internal divisions and lack of resources, but rest assured the Progressives will continue to prop it up so long as it holds the promise of power and riches. Once it is clear the Liberal Party no longer can carry on as a brokerage party and offer the spoils of the State to its supporters, they will desert it for the NDP, Bloc and Green parties to whatever extent they offer rewards to their supporters.

We'll either die free or we die trying.

Little Kremlin on the Prairie

"The product of ones effort belongs to the person who made that effort in the first place and it is their undeniable right to do with it as they wish"

h/t - Making Sense with Nicholls

What Do You Know, They Do Get It

They just don't like it...

Tax cuts by Conservatives leave government hamstrung: Critics

For me this is an "Oh Yeah Baby!" moment. Hamsring and handcuff the government? By all means, and don't forget to hobble and shackle it while you're there.

I don't want government to come running with bags of money (our money) every time a business gets a fiscal bloody nose, and there are damn few (if any) economic situations either global or national that will not, or can not correct themselves in a free market. Don't believe me, take his word for it.

"Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney signaled that he sees a glimmer of hope that financial markets are righting themselves, and cautioned authorities against overreacting with new rules that might ultimately hurt the economy."

Seems like Ms Rand is two for two...

"The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, and to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law."

Hurry!

For all of you who want to strike a blow for freedom, read this post from Free Dominion and write the CHRC at the address given. Remember to maintain a polite and professional attitude. CC your letter to your local media outlets (print and electronic) as well as your local Member of Parliament, and blogburst this everywhere you can.

The more people who respond and the greater the exposure given to this issue, the better our chances of ending this assault against our freedoms and liberties! Die free or die trying.

http://www.freedominion.com.pa/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=96805

CHRC taking submissions on issue of closed hearing! WRITE!

The CHRC has said that they will take submissions from the public on the issue of the closed Warman v Lemire tribunal hearing, but the submissions must be made by March 17th.

Please write a polite and professional letter to Ms Jessie Cyr outlining why you believe the hearing should be public.

If you can't write a polite letter, PLEASE DON'T WRITE. You will only hurt our case.

Here is my submission:

Quote:

March 12, 2008 Canadian Human Rights Tribunal 160 Elgin Street 11th Floor Ottawa, ON K1A 1J4 Tel: (613) 995-1707 Email: gcyr@chrt-tcdp.gc.ca Attn: Ghislaine (Jessie) Cyr - Registry Officer Re: Warman v Lemire (T1073/5405) Dear Ms Cyr I am writing to request that the Warman v Lemire tribunal hearing that is scheduled for March 25, 2008 be open to the public. It has come to our attention that evidence will be given that suggests that CHRC investigator Dean Steacy created an anonymous account on a website we owned shortly before a CHRC complaint was filed against us. In addition, the Warman v Lemire case has become widely known on the Canadian internet, and many website owners feel that the outcome of this case will have far-reaching implications in regard to their free speech, and that of their members. We feel that the presence of media and public observers would serve to increase security at the hearing. Since members of the internet community wish to see this matter dealt with in a speedy and professional manner, it is our desire to help maintain a safe and peaceful environment so that the Tribunal feels safe keeping the hearing open and public, so many sets of eyes will be on the lookout for disruptors. Thank you very much in advance for considering this request. Sincerely, Connie and Mark Fournier

Give 'em Hell Ezra

To quote...

"You're in trouble now lucy"

Shirlene You Jest...

"But what is more marvelous still is the bovine indifference of the hearing officer."
c/o Lee Duigon @ MitchNews.com

And with reporting like that it is little wonder that Ezra Levant's verbal bolt gun has claimed its first victim...

Leave Nothing For The Enemy

The post may be UK centric but the sentiment is universal. The question is how long until the tipping point is reached and like brave Denmark we all just say no?

"If the price of getting the extra two million votes needed to win an election is to lose a few thousand “scorched earthers” on the right..."

Taxes...

in 15 minutes.

I spend longer than that bitching about them... daily.

Another doomed attempt at Democratic Reform.

Ontario, TAG! Your it.

Right off the bat I can see two problems.

QUOTE: "This isn't about what party you support, it's not about left versus right, cities versus rural areas, or Leaf fans versus Senators fans --

Waitaminute... If this isn't about hockey, how do they expect to get Ontarians to take their heads out of their asses and pay attention?

Then there's this...

Murray said his group can't afford a flashy television ad campaign...

Doomed! Doomed I tell ya!

There is no project however noble, necessary or urgent that will ever come to fruition without the help of television advertising. I'm sorry, but it's true. We as a society knowingly or not, tend to discount any cause that doesn't make it to the telly. If there isn't some notable celebrity or glitzy commercial on at prime-time trumpeting your cause, then it just doesn't exist.

Don't believe me? Think back, think way back to the days before the internet, before Youtube. There were environmental advocates then, way back in 1970's but they were a fringe. Very few people paid attention, and I would argue that few would be paying attention to Gore and Suzuki today if they were only handing out brochures. Because brochures, as everyone knows comes from the original Latin phrase for "please throw away".