Michael Ignatieff called him "Nixonion". The label fits. We have not ever seen a government so publicly "fudging" and/or breaking rules, election regulations, and just general ways of doing things.
The tape recordings Harper speaks of are particularly troubling. Remember, this is the same Harper government which publicly admitted to having tape recordings of NDP meetings.
Remember the Gurmant Grewal tapes? Was that also driven by Harper?
How about the Zitaruk tape (Chuck Cadman case), and the Conservatives' repeated attempts to show something that wasn't there? Of course Harper was smack in the middle of that little controversy and potentially illegal act as well.
Why is it, that it seems the guilt in these matters goes all the way up to Harper's top advisers, his PMO, and his cabinet, yet the obvious link to Harper isn't "mediaed up"?
Now, in Parliament, Harper (perhaps blowing a gasket - as he is known to do behind closed doors often) is admitting that he spends his days listening to tape recordings of Michael Ignatieff. How very mature. How fitting a Prime Minister who pretends to care about Canadians, and our economy.
Richard Nixon's ghost lives in Harper? Seems likely at this point.
This "Prime Minister" seems to be around recordings all the time. Nasty tape recordings meant to entrap, to distort the truth, to fabricate "truthiness". He is feared by everyone in his party. He lets Cabinet Ministers, senior aides, and PMO staff routinely take the "fall" for his misdeeds and failures. His "government" revolves around him. A misguided "cult of personality". He is mean-minded, vindictive, and angry. His ONLY REASON FOR EXISTING seems to be to play partisan games.
Forced into a situation where he's ruined the economy with his "0 down, 40 year" mortgages, his ridiculous tax cuts, and his lack of stimulus cash (rolling out), he won't budge to help Canadians. Ordinary Canadians who NEED stimulus money to create jobs for them; to bring EI support; to foster growth and research into new alternative energies, etc. What's Harper's answer? Tax cuts for the rich. Irresponsible tax cuts which will save a few pennies on new purchases, while the economist recommended income tax cuts are laid by the wayside, while destroying Canada's coffers.
Instead of growing and fostering new tech and new alternative fuels, Harper's response is to sell Canada's nuclear agency. No wonder he's let it rot under his watch. The Harper strategy has always been to DESTROY GOVERNMENT FROM WITHIN. Anything he doesn't like about government will go. AECL will be sold, but first the Harper Conservatives let it fall apart. Let it become a public joke. That, he knew, would create enough public confusion and doubt that many Canadians would end up supporting the sale.
The same process is going on in Agriculture, where some of Canada's proudest institutions (like the Wheat Board) are being systematically dismantled by Harper and his friends - while their business is slowly falling into the hands of the corporate giants (like Cargill, UGG, etc.).
In Immigration and Multiculturalism, the department is being turned upside down. Funding has been cut to key areas, and people in countries like India and other South Asian, African, and South American nations are finding it harder to apply for immigration or speak to an official. The Conservatives have closed down one consulate in India (in Chandigarh), which was a source of Punjabi immigration to Canada (we all know that Punjabis are Kenney's and Harper's sworn enemies - Kenney even called Sikhs "hot-headed").
In Natural Resources, Harper's answer to forestry was to give the US billions in a failed "settlement" of a dispute which has once again reared it's head.
Foreign Affairs has seen the appointment of one joke after another to the Minister's role. Canada has become a laughing stock in foreign circles under Harper, after being one the most respected and favored nations under Chretien and Martin. Canada - under Harper - quickly jumped on the global "pariah" bandwagon with G. W. Bush. Canada under Harper become the biggest defender of Bushes' anti-Environment, anti-Peace, anti-Europe stand.
It was Harper's PMO which attempted to scuttle the Presidency of Barack Obama, then acted like nothing had happened.
Indian and Northern Affairs has ceased to exist as a department. Mr. Harper went back on the Canadian Government's word with the First Nations, by cancelling the Kelowna Accord. Harper's bogus line about "standing up for Canada's North" meant nothing, as existing programs have been cut, jobs disappeared, and we have yet to see anything but Harper bluster and hot air regarding any Northern development (beyond Northern Alberta oil).
National Defence was supposed to be the "golden child" of all departments under a Conservative regime. Instead, Harper has degenerated the Armed Forces into a body without a cause, by providing no clear direction on progress in Afghanistan. A former lobbyist Minister succeeded in buying newer equipment for the troops, but we can clearly see that the contract went to "old friends" of the Conservatives. The final "sacrelig" committed by Harper on the Defence file was publicly (to the world) saying Afghanistan was an "unwinnable" war. This single statement was the most demoralizing thing ANY Prime Minister could ever do to the troops. So much for "supporting our troops".
The Environment hasn't been spared. Harper is a climate change denier through and through. He is owned by Alberta Big Oil and Media interests, and his mere lip-service to Canada's energy and environmental future has been abyssmal. He regressed on any action the Liberal governments before him may have taken. He canceled Liberal programs, simply to rename some of them under new Conservative names, while cutting several permanently.
Finance. Harper have given us Jim "I don't know anything about the file" Flaherty, the biggest failure in the Finance file in Canadian history. To destroy the finances of the country he played the typical Reaganomics tune: tax cuts for the rich; and watched the economy go into free-fall during a recession for which we had an existing $13-$15 Billion contingency fund (thank you Mr. Goodale). The Conservative "way" has NEVER worked in Canada for budgeting - at least not over the past 100 years or so.
While he's worked hard to destroy Canada's government and institutions from the inside, the most frightening things about Stephen "the Under-achiever" Harper are his personal views and his angry conservative personality. He believes in the most petty version of politics. He has shown that scrupples mean nothing. He has spat on the memories of great PMs of the past, such as MacDonald, Laurier, MacKenzie King, St. Laurent, Pearson, Trudeau. He has become a single-minded "me-me-me machine" on a tear at tax-payer's expense. He has used tax payer funds to advertise for his own political purposes, and used the most "loose" interpretations of Canada's election laws (still up for review in court - likely illegal). He has secured more power in the PMO than any 5 PMs before him combined. He uses well-stocked party coffers - bouyed by the religious and looney right - to run slick PR campaigns to deceive voters who wouldn't know better.
Harper's people have said "he's changed", but Harper (even just after taking office in 06) has publicly claimed, "(Just before he was sworn in, back in January 2006, he told an interviewer), "I don't think my fundamental beliefs have changed in a decade." Still "Firewall Harper", the PM who thinks Canada is a Northern European Welfare state, who thinks Atlantic Canada has a culture of defeatism, who thinks immigrants in the West live in "ghettoes", and who thinks Alberta should have a firewall built around it. Remember - Harper's people went to Ottawa to change things for ALBERTA - and not for Canada. They have always referred to Canada as some land "foreign" to Alberta.
Stephen Harper IS the lowest common denominator in Canada. He is an embarrassment on the world stage, and the time has come to turf this pitiful PM before he does any more serious damage to this great land. He is more dangerous to Canada than Richard Nixon ever was to the USA.
VICTORY FUND
