08.07.2014 08:40 PM

In Friday’s Sun: Conservative war room steps on own bomb

Sometimes political war rooms get way, way too cute. Sometimes, even, they do something that ends up hurting them a lot more than it hurts their opponent. Sometimes, they’re idiots.

Case in point: Justin Trudeau’s 2011 visit to one of the mosques in his riding. The Tory war room saw it, seized on it, attacked it.

Big mistake.

You can almost picture it happening. The neatly-barbered youngsters who comprise the Tory election brain trust are deep within the bowels of some non-descript Ottawa government building, peering at their glowing computer screens. Looking for something, anything, with which to hurt the one adversary they fear the most – Justin Trudeau.

One of the kids is suddenly excited. He has found a clip in which Trudeau says that he has visited every mosque in his Montreal Papineau riding, including the Al-Sunnah Al-Nabawiah mosque. Trudeau was there in March 2011.

The Conservative kids in their dark suits are all ecstatic. After Trudeau visited the mosque – note that word, AFTER – a U.S. intelligence report came out, and said that some men had passed through the mosque a decade earlier. The mosque was a place “known al-Qaeda members were recruited, facilitated or trained,” said the report.

The Tory war room swung into action. They leaked their find to the media, including Sun News. They then instructed Steven Blaney, who is apparently the minister of something called “Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness,” to issue a public statement excoriating Trudeau.

“It is completely unacceptable that Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau would associate with a group that allegedly radicalizes Canadians to join al-Qaeda and engage in acts of unspeakable violent extremism,” said Blaney, who nobody has ever heard of before, and likely never will again.

“Now he is pandering for votes amongst religious extremists in our own communities. It is clear that Justin Trudeau cannot be trusted to keep Canadians safe.”

Get all that? Radicals! Extremists! Unsafe! “Unspeakable violent extremism,” even!

Except…there’s a problem, Conservative war roomers. Three of them, in fact. We’ll lay them out in point form, and use small words, so you’ll perhaps understand.

1. In March 2011, as now, Justin Trudeau was a garden-variety MP. He was not the Minister of “Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness,” or the “Prime Minister,” either.

2. As such, he did not have, and does not have, the power to pick up the phone and call CSIS or the RCMP, and demand that they turn over their Top Secret file on the Al-Sunnah Al-Nabawiah mosque. If they have such a file, they sure as Hell wouldn’t be sharing it with Justin Trudeau, Private Citizen.

3. If, however, such a file existed at CSIS or the RCMP, or anywhere else, only two MPs would have access to it. Their names are “Stephen Harper” and “Steven Blaney.”

See the problem you have created for yourselves and your bosses, Con war roomers? Are you getting the point? If “unspeakable violent extremism” is associated with that mosque, why have Messrs. Harper and Blaney DONE NOTHING ABOUT IT?

One is the Prime Minister of all that is Canada, the other is ostensibly the Minister of “Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness,” whatever that is. They knew what was happening at that mosque, they were in discussion with American intelligence folks about it, and THEY DID NOTHING ABOUT IT.

And, as I told my flummoxed Sun News colleague Brian Lilley on-air, THEY COULD HAVE DONE PLENTY – including taking away its charitable status. (God knows they are doing that with plenty of environmental and church charities the Conservative war room distrusts.)

Anyway, apologies for the all-caps, there, Conservative war room kiddies.

I think you’re all IDIOTS, this week, and I figured that was the only way to penetrate your TINY SKULLS.

56 Comments

  1. Arnold Murphy says:

    First of all that the security concerns being legitimate, they did nothing about them, except tell the people that are the target of surveillance that they are being watched. Second, they themselves are intonating that Trudeau should practice some form of discretion without reason, that would be a form of discrimination. Third, by vocalizing their concerns to the public about a mosque that may have had some problems 20 years ago they are condemning those citizens who regularly attended that mosque peacefully to a dangerous amount of scrutiny and possible targeting. Fourth, they are not responding as you say to the threat if any exists, why? because they cannot prove one exists, so it is more or less hearsay. Fifth, let’s dig up some White Supremacist bones since we are in the Con way back machine, let’s talk about Harper and his affiliation and affinity for White Supremacists since they really are the number one terrorist organization and criminal gang in North America. It’s all really sketchy, Harper and his boys in short pants really have egg on their face on this.

  2. Ron says:

    Deep in the bowels of the The Harperbunker™. They have breathed their own air for so long in there, that the mould has affected their brains.

  3. Trish Angleton says:

    1. If Trudeau was and is only a “garden-variety MP”, what business does he have not only claiming to be the only choice for Prime Minister but some kind of messiah?

    2. No “Top Secret File” was needed. The essential characteristics of the ultra-fundamentalist Wahhabi sect as a breeding ground for terrorists was well known for a full decade after 9/11. This is Wahhabism: practices forbidden by preachers include performing or listening to music, dancing, fortune telling, amulets (e.g. crucifixes), television programs (unless religious), smoking, playing backgammon, chess, or cards, drawing human or animal figures, acting in a play or writing fiction (both are considered forms of lying), dissecting cadavers (even in criminal investigations and for the purposes of medical research). Common practices include female genital mutilation, the full “ninja” veil, corporal punishment for women.

    3. Many people in CSIS, other intelligence agencies, and SIRC could have viewed this secret file or others like it. Prominent Liberals have been SIRC members. They have the highest security clearance. If “unspeakable violent extremism” was taking place, why did they sign off on this course of action unless there was some actual intelligence plan? Sadly, SIRC’s fourth-back chairperson, Arthur Porter, is languishing in a Panamanian prison. One might actually say Canadian intelligence is a bit of leaky ship.

    The fact that your readers dismiss Ayann Hirsi Ali, Human Rights Watch, the American Intelligence Community, et al. as “rambling and incoherent rant,” “Conservative shills,” “blah, blah, blah…….” etc. is proof of total moral bankruptcy. Somewhere in the world, at this moment, there is a woman being beaten with in a inch of her life, a Christian or a pagan or someone not Muslim enough is having their head sawed off, or a young girl is having her clitoris hacked off, all in the name of radical Islam, yet you people laugh and joke and play it so cool, hipsters, detached philosopher kings. Frankly, the shriller your ad hominem attacks, the more you sound like the preachers in this radical sect.

    Bombs went off today but not in the Con. war room:

    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-takes-iraqs-largest-christian-town-of-qaraqosh-9653789.html

    • Bobby says:

      Good post. I don’t think this was a stumble on the part of the Cons. at all. I’m a bit surprised that someone who wants to be PM or his team didn’t do their own homework on this Mosque.

      All this proves of Trudeau is that he’s naive and as vulnerable as the next PM wannabe for some Oppo. spin.

      The Con. boys planted a seed – that’s all it has to do. Detrimental to Harper? Not really. The door’s now open for him to actually DO something about this Mosque with your insistence. This column helps that IMO.

    • Lance says:

      But Trish, if everything you said is true, it still doesn’t answer the question: “if ‘unspeakable violent extremism’ is associated with that mosque, why have Messrs. Harper and Blaney DONE NOTHING ABOUT IT?”

      Most of the time I think that their war-room gets it right. But, they are drinking their own bathwater on that one above. At least have the courage and the spine to admit it.

      • Joe says:

        I don’t believe it is the place of the PM or any other elected official ‘to do anything about it’. It is up to the RCMP – CSIS to keep track of and when appropriate make arrests. However when our political leaders go to such it places implicitly means that Canada approves or at least condones the practices of such a sect. In the Canada I grew up in we don’t beat women, or mutilate their genitals. We don;t force women to live in portable tents. We believe in a pluralists – live and let live society that holds you are free to practice your religion so long as you don’t harm anyone else in said practice. None of these fundamental principles of a civilized society are present in this particular Muslim sect. Our political leaders should have the political sense to steer clear of sects whose belief systems if implemented would destroy the Canada we all love and enjoy.

        • Kaspar Juul says:

          Okay professor Joe. Now we know what the Tory elitists thing.

          Enjoy the wilderness. Being out of touch and elitist worked so well for Professor Ignatieff. I only see great success for you.

          At least you haven’t changed with the unquantifiable malarkey

        • smelter rat says:

          Yes Joe, be afraid, be very afraid. Apparently Jason Kenney’s riding is a hotbed of Islamcism. Who knew?

        • TrueNorthist says:

          “In the Canada I grew up in…”

          You know, it makes me feel a little sick inside that I ever belonged to the same party as you.

        • Bruce Dickson says:

          “I don’t believe it is the place of the PM or any other elected official ‘to do anything about it’.” So voters are well-advised to ignore Harper and his party when they’re fixing to get elected based, in no small part, on what they will do about such security threats once in office. Good advice. Pass it on, please.

          “However when our political leaders go to such it places implicitly means that Canada approves or at least condones the practices of such a sect”. Wahhabism is considered an Islamic sect, one under which some of the abuses at which you rightly recoil are reputedly tolerated. One doesn’t need a CSIS or RCMP file to be aware that Saudi Arabia is an important home to wahhabism; yet, just in January of this year, one prominent Conservative Party of Canada leader you might have heard of paid it a hugely supportive, highly publicized official visit. So, you might want to educate Harper and his PMO on how they got that all wrong, as well.

          “Our political leaders should have the political sense to steer clear of sects whose belief systems if implemented would destroy the Canada we all love and enjoy”. Presumably within that group you would include white supremacists, eugenicists, ecology-and-public-health-care-destroying market fundamentalists/privateers, inequality-promoting politicos, sovereignty-dissolving free trade militants – the list is large and growing, daily. Great! Since you already have reason, above, to be sharing your wisdom with the aforementioned in Ottawa, you can add those sentiments to the mix. Hey, better late than never.

    • doconnor says:

      “If “unspeakable violent extremism” was taking place, why did they sign off on this course of action unless there was some actual intelligence plan?”

      High level Liberal staff don’t sign off on every place an MP visits. They would visit 3 or 4 different places every day when in the constituency.

    • Niall says:

      Decent post Trish,

      I especially liked the “bit of leaky ship” quote, and also the ‘Angleton’ surname. 😉
      Keep up the perceptive observations.

      YT

      Niall from Winnipeg

    • david ray says:

      Well written Trish proving once again that if enough monkeys are allowed to sit at typewriters one will eventually write Shakespeare or in your case Shitspeare.

    • Kaspar Juul says:

      “The fact that your readers dismiss Ayann Hirsi Ali, Human Rights Watch, the American Intelligence Community, et al. as “rambling and incoherent rant,” “Conservative shills,” “blah, blah, blah…….” etc. is proof of total moral bankruptcy.”

      Hardly, more that being shilled with crazy ass rants is getting you disregarded.

      And Niall Ferguson is still a wanker

  4. T.W. says:

    Of all the Conbots in Harper’s cabinet Steven Blaney seems the most willing to say whatever is put in front of him.
    No matter how awkward or ridiculous he looks or sounds with CPC taking points, he’ll do it, just like a obedient soldier would.
    By the way, the sentence should be amended to “The Conservative kids in their DADS dark suits are all ecstatic.” IMHO.

  5. que sera sera says:

    As my dear, departed, late granny would have said: “The Conservatives shot themselves with a ball of their own shite.”

    And I must say, they wear it well. 🙂

    Especially Blaney, Fantino and Kenney. Turd is definitely their colour.

  6. TrueNorthist says:

    I find myself asking, why now? The CPC clearly felt they needed to use this now, even though an election is a year or so away. Or is it? Can you say snap election? I bet you can.

  7. Domenico says:

    It is truly misplaced that the Cons continue to look for wedge issues and attack ad fodder rather than run on their economic, environmental, foreign policy, science, and social record. On second thought….

  8. Ronald O'Dowd says:

    Warren,

    Please follow directions — rinse, and repeat. When they lost Finley and Flaherty…enough said.

  9. Dave T says:

    If the Harper Partygovernment wants to play the “guilt by association game, then they’re guilty of eco-terrorism due to their obvious friendship with Murray Edwards – owner of such notable enterprises as Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. and Imperial Metals.

  10. Philippe says:

    Lol.. well freikan said Warren.

    The thing that makes me the angriest about baseless bullshit smears like this is that instead of debating substantive issues in an intelligent way, we’re in a world of make-believe. WTF do they intellectual midgets have against debating real issues and attacking actual policy stances? THAT is fair game. God knows we have a lot of real problems to solve in this country & talking about these Con-induced side-show fabrications takes away from REAL debates we could & should be having.

    I have no doubt these guys will wake up after the next election wondering why they got ripped a new one.

  11. Carol Mandolini says:

    Devil’s Advocate

    Senior Liberal MP Hedy Fry tweets: “The Conservatives are focused on character assassination” and links to: “Tories haven’t grasped the cost of wedge politics” (Montreal Gazette). Mind, this coming from the operative who stoked the fires of racial tension by shrieking that crosses were burning on lawns in Prince George, British Columbia “as we speak”. No evidence was given and when asked to justify her charge she stated that the mayor of Prince George had informed her. Problem was, there were no burning crosses – ever. No matter, the damage was done. The good people of Prince George still labour under the smear that every other household is KKK or neo-Nazi. (This is Vladimir Putin’s tactic in Ukraine -“combating the glorification of Nazism,” Prensa Latina.)

    Point is, the conservative movement in Canada learned, and learned the hard way, about demonization from the Liberal Party of Canada and its operatives. Whispering campaigns. Misinformation. Disinformation. Men disparaged as “rapists” and “pigs” at Liberal lady’s nights. White people labeled as “colonialists” wallowing in “white privilege” and “racism.” Western Canadians, especially Albertans, became “barbarians” and “hillbillies” out there, outside Hadrian’s Wall, beyond the pale. Heterosexuals demonized as inherently “homophobic,” “heterosexist,” and boring “vanillas”. After 9/11, “Islamophobia” was added to the label list. Any critique of Islam was forbidden on pain of hate crimes tribunals and social ostracizing. Now, native-born Canadians are derided as “nativists,” “bigots,” for daring to question the rational of “open borders” even for those that don’t even bother to conceal their utter contempt for “infidels” and “gweilo” (recall Olivia Chow’s ideological start point: “I’m not male. Not white. Want to start there?”)

    Indeed, the Liberal Party and all “progressive” democratic socialist parties have tried for fifty years to crucify Canada with wedge issues. Quebecois and Western alienation are the bitter fruits of this. The appalling conditions in First Nations is a direct result. The fact that emirs and cultural mandarins rule over self-ghettoizing ethnic blocs with total impunity to lord it over the women, children, and slaves is. Broken marriages and families are another bitter fruit. And the rational behind this divide and rule strategy? Justin Trudeau’s belief in authoritarian regimes like China’s “basic dictatorship.” The Russian comrades, Vladimir Putin, and best friend Communist dictator Fidel Castro’s schemes. “Open borders” and Islamist proxies. (Recall Maurice Vellacott, MP, disclosed the Canadian Pension Plan had invested in Talisman Energy, a key player in Sudan: “Now most Canadians have blood on their hands thanks to the Finance Minister (Paul Martin).”)

    The Canadian People are waking up to realize they have a full-blown insurgency on their hands. Intuitively, they realize it is now or never. They must break the Trudeauite cabal and their cadres or face total marginalization, the Gulag – or worse.

  12. TrueNorthist says:

    There is no conservative movement in Canada. Let me repeat that, there is NO Conservative movement in Canada. Just a bunch of wackos like you working in the CPC war-room. Must be the close proximity of so much crazy that makes you think there is some kind of rising tide of bat-shit that will signal the coming of the lord!

    And what is this, your 3rd name in 24 hours? Jeepers.

  13. And our honourable prime minister’s best fishin buddy is a known drug abuser and admitted drunk driver. The liberals don’t need an attack ad. All they gotta do is get people to watch the Ford BBQ video on youtube.

    • Jill Reed says:

      The Andy Warhol Diaries record: “And Consuelo Crespi whose daughter Pilar is married to a Columbian, Echavarria, was also at Diana’s. Tom knew all about Columbia, so I just don’t know about him. He said Pilar’s husband was the biggest smuggler in Columbia, but what does that mean he smuggles? For sure, cocaine. Or money? Echavarria owns an airline there, a small one. We were talking about plane crashes and Tom was telling about his – the one that wrecked his hand that he wears the glove on, and Consuelo said, “If you crashed in an airplane, you were probably in Columbia right?” And he was. Tom doesn’t seem to take coke too much but I think he was missing Margaret (Trudeau) so he was snorting some. He’s so free with it, it’s not like a dealer, he gives it away like it’s candy. ”

      Almost there… the data points are lining up. Columbia. FARC. Hugo Chavez’s funeral…

      • Kaspar Juul says:

        Funny the original quote doesn’t say Trudeau

        Funny, don’t use a google book excerpt and embellish it.

        Seriously Tulk/Observant none of your data points are lining up. You’re crazy

      • TrueNorthist says:

        http://warrenkinsella.com/2012/07/the-toronto-mayors-far-right-friend/

        Maybe they were friends after all? Now that the truth about fatso has been proven it isn’t such a stretch to imagine them swapping spit. But back to our verbose friend above for a minute: You know where else one can find these kinds of weird diatribes? Stormfront or other white supremacist and ultra-right “Christian” websites. Folks who currently “love” Israel simply because they imagine it will help bring on the rapture. Used to be these nuts would litter street corners with their nutty tracts and wail about the coming of the lord. You can see that in his comments about “data points lining up” etc. It’s the end-times dontcha know. He’s just one step away from meeting his maker. If only he could have access to a Buk launcher, then things would move along smartly.

  14. The Golem says:

    There’s terrific irony in the Harper Government creating the Office Of Religious Freedom ostensibly to protect people like Justin Trudeau from attacks such as those coming from The Harper Government about his mosque visits.

  15. debs says:

    so if this thread is correct( by comments and participants)
    we have 1 or 2 diehard neocon/wackocon trolls, using 5 o 6 troll accounts. Harper should be proud of his minions. I admire the folks who can read those long lists of crazy, I start and then I realize I cant keep up with the incomprehensible nonsense being spewed. If you cannot form your ideological response in less then a paragraph, you need to blog it. too bad Warren couldnt devise a block option for us regular readers so we could cancel out the longwinded trolls.
    ___________________________________________________________________
    and this JT topic is just painful. so justin trudeau is bad leader material for meeting with constituents of different cultures, some who may have broken laws. But Harper and his minions are brilliant political strategists for mouting off at UN meetings and making themselves look like idjiots around the world. Harper sucks up to dictators in china and elsewhere, who have many human rights violations under their belts, but thats different when he does it. He can hang with Israel no matter how many children they murder.
    and locally he is besties with Rob Ford>
    I love how the conservatives at sun news live in doublestandville:P

  16. debs says:

    meant to write doublestandardville, sorry about my spelling errors and questionable grammar!

  17. Scotian says:

    “They then instructed Steven Blaney, who is apparently the minister of something called “Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness,” to issue a public statement excoriating Trudeau.

    It is completely unacceptable that Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau would associate with a group that allegedly radicalizes Canadians to join al-Qaeda and engage in acts of unspeakable violent extremism,” said Blaney, who nobody has ever heard of before, and likely never will again.” Warren Kinsella

    It is worth noting this is actually the second time in recent memory we Canadians have heard of/from this Minister, the last time being when he managed to get the Canadian Press Baloney meter to give the first rating I’ve ever seen of full of baloney to a statement he made about how gun ownership is a right in Canada. Imagine the scope of incompetence involved in any Minister being that disconnected from reality, but a Minister officially in charge of Public Safety not knowing this is only a hair less incompetent that the Minister of Justice not knowing this. A fresh reminder of his sparkling intellect in action:

    “”To possess a firearm is a right, and it’s a right that comes with responsibilities.” — Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney at a news conference in Powassan, Ont., while announcing planned changes to Canada’s gun laws, July 23, 2014. Source at: http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/is-gun-ownership-a-legal-right-in-canada-1.2723893

    It takes a special kind of complete disconnect from reality to manage what this Minister did with the Gun Ownership Right stupidity, but it is possible he managed to surpass himself with this more recent business with Trudeau and the Mosque, although we all know this originated, as everything does in the Harper Government(tm) from the PMO and Blaney is just the shill being used. Sad thing when Ministers of the Crown are reduced to being nothing but puppet mouthpiece shills ALL of the time by a PM, whatever the political flavour of said PM. That is not traditionally how we worked in this country, not until the Harper Government(tm) came to power, especially majority power.

    As to Warren’s piece overall, can’t disagree with any of it. The Liberals clearly went with the most obvious counter-punch in response about how if this Mosque is so dangerous why is nothing done about it by the Harper government (and if there are covert ops underway coming out publicly linking this Mosque this way to extremism and Trudeau will only undercut the ability to complete whatever agenda said covert op would have, so even without knowing if one is ongoing we can castigate because of that). For them that shows incompetence if we believe their public statements about the risks of this Mosque where it comes to Trudeaus actions, or we see their incompetence in managing covert operations by using this active terrorist Mosque for a partisan attack on a domestic political foe thereby letting those dangerous folks know they are indeed under close scrutiny. Either way it demonstrates serious incompetence on national security matters, not exactly a recommendation for being entrusted with power yet again.

    For me one of the most hopeful signs that this long national tragedy called the Harper Government(tm) may finally be coming to an end is with just how incompetent it has been showing itself in an area that once a core element of its power and strength, their ability to find weaknesses in their political fores and destroy them with them, as the prior Lib leaders Harper faced in his quest to gain and hold the PMO have found out over the past decade now, along with so many others both within and without the partisan political arena. When a government repeatedly demonstrates that they have lost the ability not just to sell but even basically execute competently something it was long known for as a core strength, well that is a sign of a government not much longer for this world.

    All that being said, until I see the political corpse of this government with a stake through the heart, the head removed, and the body placed on a pyre and then light it myself I will not assume it is dead yet, this Harper Government(tm) has shown itself to be too dangerous to treat any other way. The dishonour it has brought upon this nation, the citizens, and indeed the very history of real Canadian Conservativism (let alone the other Canadian values we have traditionally treasured for so long, like human rights, tolerance of diversity, and this little niggling thing called the rule of law) will be not years but decades trying to recover/make up for, and we will never be able to regain all of what we have lost under the Harper Government(tm).

    So take this increasingly desperate flailing attack pattern on Trudeau as a hopeful sign all ye that wish to see Harper driven from power whatever your political flavour, because only the most truly dedicated hardcore ideologically blinkered partisan of Harper himself could find merit is this action in either concept and execution, the rest of us see this for what it is. Note I am not excluding real Canadian Conservatives rooted in true Canadian Conservative values from this, because there is one thing (of oh so many ugly truths with him) Harper has proven time and time again, his Conservativism has no roots/connection to Canadian Conservativism beyond claiming the same name, and thankfully it seems many Canadian Conservative voters/citizens out there have finally been able to see that or themselves in the actions of this majority Harper Government(tm).

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