Brussels was a horror, Rob Ford was very sad, Hillary lost Utah and Idaho, Justin Trudeau didn’t get credit for making the biggest contribution to the welfare of First Nations in generations.  Yesterday was therefore an unhappy day. 

Until the end of it, that is. Late – too late – the results started to come in, in an important Calgary provincial by-election. The Calgary-Greenway contest saw the once-mighty PCs returned, but not by much. Wildrose came second, but not by much. And, nipping at all their heels, was the Alberta Liberal Party. 

Whose candidate, Karbani Khalil, beat out the Alberta NDP. You know, the government.

I know I shouldn’t read too much into a by-election result, I know, I know. But the Alberta Grits were the first political party I belonged to, and the one to which I will always be loyal.

The PC win will effectively put the brakes on the unite-the-right efforts currently underway in Alberta. The results also mean the Alberta NDP is a one-term aberration – because it is. And all of that creates opportunity for my party.

I will be in Calgary next month for a series of meetings and seminars with my Alberta Liberal friends. When I have more details, I will share same here for those who wish to attend. In the meantime, forgive me for the lengthy post. 

Yesterday was a crummy day, for lots of reasons. But it ended not badly, if you are an Alberta Liberal like me!

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Just when you thought this piece of garbage couldn’t sink any lower, he does. 

  

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I didn’t ever support the man, of course. I was critical of his politics, too. But, one day – out of the blue – he and his brother Doug were very kind to me at a very bad time. You don’t ever forget stuff like that.

Deepest condolences to the Ford family, something which I’m sure all commenters on this web site share.

BREAKING: Family says former Toronto mayor Rob Ford has died at 46 after fighting cancer.

— The Associated Press (@AP) March 22, 2016

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Allow me the alliteration: it feels like all that there is to smile about, as we start March 22, 2016.

So, I listened to CBC Radio, as I do every morning, and I found myself wondering about the choices they had made.  The mass murder in Brussels – with 30+ dead, and about a 100 gravely hurt) topped the newscast, but today’s federal budget was close behind.  Then there was an analyst predicting that Bombardier would get its $1 billion, even though it is still “outsourcing” Canadian jobs to places like Mexico.  And then, of course, there were stories that bypass all of that: basketball, traffic, the weather.

It’s not like this sort of dilemma doesn’t happen every day, of course.  I will always recall listening to CBC Radio on the morning of 9/11, and how the discussion was with Chuck Strahl, talking about something in Ottawa – just as the world was ending for some 3,000 people in New York City.

Choices are hard, I guess.  So what would you do, if you were today running a news outlet somewhere?  What would you lead with?

• Brussels: On the one hand, the death toll is very high, the attack was apparently meticulously planned, and Belgium is a nation well-known to many Canadians.  On the other hand, it is regrettably something that happens a lot, these days, and it is happening far away.  Oh, and (forgive me for stepping out of my neutral stance, and openly detesting this sort of soulless relativism) you are far more likely to be killed by a runaway train than a terrorist.
• Budget: On the one hand, it is the first budget of the new Liberal government, and it will dramatically change the fiscal approach of the past decade – and it will (reportedly) mean a lot to First Nations and provinces.  On the other, it is just another budget – one that is mostly leaked in advance, and whose measures have little to no effect on the day-to-day lives of ordinary people.
• Bombardier: On the one hand, it is probably much more fiscally revealing than the budget, it will advance federalism in Quebec, and it has ample precedent.  On the other hand, it is an actual scandal – it puts Quebec before the West, it throws good money after bad, and it doesn’t even guarantee that jobs stay here.
• Bypass: Who knows? There is nothing I can do about any of it.  I prefer People magazine and Grey’s Anatomy.  I am an ostrich.
• UPDATE: And now, Rob Ford has passed away.  Incredible.  Good luck getting your budget even noticed, Mr. Morneau.

So, a poll.  Vote now, vote often, etc.  What would you do?

[polldaddy poll=9358118]

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The etymology of the phrase “lipstick on a pig” is politically timely. Bear with me, here.

Pigs, it turns out, have been bandied about in human expression for a long time. There is a plethora of porcine proverbs. In the Bible, there is Matthew 7:6, “pearls before swine.” Making a silk purse from a sow’s ear is another one everyone says, even whilst everyone knows that silk comes from insect larvae, not some unfortunate pig’s auditory system.

In the 16th century, a British physician, of all people, decreed that “hog in armour is still but a hog.” (Yes, of course, but why would a hog be wearing armour in the first place? Are pigs useful in battle?) And, a couple hundred years later, a Baptist preacher picked up the theme, and observed that “a hog in a silk waistcoat is still a hog.” (Again, as with the wartime hog, why would anyone want to ruin a perfectly good silk waistcoat by sharing it with a pig?)

In any event, the precise origins of the “lipstick on a pig” aphorism are unclear. Some say it arose first in a January 1980 edition of the much-read Quad-City Herald, in Brewster, Washington (pop., 2,730), where one wag observed therein that “you can clean up a pig, put a ribbon on it’s [sic] tail, spray it with perfume, but it is still a pig.” Indeed, its pigginess is inviolate. No argument here.

Others insist that the actual phrase came shortly after, when The Washington Post famously quoted a San Francisco KNBR-AM radio host who — when commenting on a plan to fix up Candlestick Park for the Giants — decreed: “That would be like putting lipstick on a pig.”

A political cliché was born!

After that, political folks would end up saying it all the time. Barack Obama and John McCain both said it about each other, in 2008 presidential campaign. At least five political books were written with “lipstick on a pig” in the title. And, most ominously, Dick Cheney declared that it was his “favourite line.” (That’s almost as bad as being a Liberal, and enthusiastically welcoming warmonger Henry Kissinger to a state dinner for you, and … oh, never mind.)

So, in typically circuitous and long-winded fashion, 376 words later, we arrive at this moment. I have elected to append the “lipstick on a pig” cliché — which I personally consider vulgar and impolite, but occasionally apt — to Justin Trudeau’s latest Friday afternoon special, the appointment of seven new Senators by a panel of people he appointed. The appointees’ appointees.

It was in all the papers, along with glowing descriptions of the esteemed Canadians who have the thankless task, or the taskless thanks, of napping in the Red Chamber until the ripe old age of 75. There, they will receive the minimum annual salary of $132,300; at least $161,200 to maintain an office; $22,000 a year if they live more than 100 kilometres from Ottawa, as Mike Duffy knows too well; some $11,100 on top of their regular pay, for sitting on a committee; and many thousands more if they are lucky enough to become the Senate Speaker, or a Senate house leader, or what have you.

Nice work if you can get it, etc. Each of those seven Canadians — including the head of Trudeau’s transition team, so we can probably count him as a Liberal — will now doubtlessly shuffle up to a microphone somewhere, and earnestly pledge to serve their fellow Canadians without regard to partisan affiliation, without fear or favour or grubby political considerations, blah blah blah. They will say all the usual stuff, which have heard a million times before. And, in some cases (because, admittedly, there are not a few current Senators who are respectable and decent folks, focused on the public good) they may well end up telling the truth.

But the Senate of Canada is still — after all of Justin Trudeau’s efforts to affix lipstick to it — a pig. It is a disgrace. It is an anti-democratic abomination, and it should be abolished, not maintained. Kill it, now.

All of us have heard the arguments for the Senate. That it is a chamber of sober second thought. That it improves legislation emanating in the House. That its reports and resolutions are unsullied by politics.

But we don’t care. WE DON’T CARE. If the Senate of Canada were stuffed to its ermine walls with cloned replicas of Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi, Plato, Nelson Mandela, Mozart, Kahlil Gibran, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, Socrates, Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks — and, on civic holidays, apparitions of the Buddha, Moses, Mohamed and Christ — it would still be this: a body of unelected persons, however eminent, wielding real power.

It would therefore be illegitimate. It would be illicit. In a supposedly modern democracy, it would be unlawful, even.

Most of us, out here in the real world, don’t have expense allowances and living allowances and “travel points.” We aren’t guaranteed a job until age 75. We therefore don’t give a sweet damn about how impressive are the CVs of those who won the Mother of All Lotteries on Friday. We don’t give a sh*t, actually.

You can put lipstick on a pig, prime minister. But it is still — then, now and forever more — a pig.

Oink.

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…and it also is not a vegetable.

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Here are just a few images taken from recent issues of this homophobic, racist, misogynistic, Holocaust-denying hate sheet, now being distributed to half of Toronto by Judy Foote’s Canada Post. If you want to get involved in our effort to stop it – and to shame Canada Post and Foote and Toronto police into finally taking action – please let me know.

And apologies in advance for what you will see here.

Images from Your Ward News: racism, Holocaust denial, tributes to National Socialism, homophobia, promotions of rape, columns by former Heritage Front members.  It goes on and on.

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SFH despise him too!

So sing along. It might make you feel better. It did us. 

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From my column in next week’s Hill Times, Troy Media, etc. You asked what I think, here’s what I think.

“…But the Senate of Canada is still – after all of Justin Trudeau’s efforts to affix lipstick to it – a pig. It is a disgrace. It is an anti-democratic abomination, and it should be abolished, not maintained. Kill it, now.

All of us have heard the arguments for the Senate. That it is a chamber of sober second thought. That it improves legislation emanating in the House. That its reports and resolutions are unsullied by politics.

But we don’t care. WE DON’T CARE. If the Senate of Canada were stuffed to its ermine walls with cloned replicas of Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi, Plato, Nelson Mandela, Mozart, Kahlil Gibran, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, Socrates, Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks – and, on civic holidays, apparitions of the Buddha, Moses, Mohamed and Christ – it would still be this: a body of unelected persons, however eminent, wielding real power.

It would therefore be illegitimate. It would be illicit. In a supposedly modern democracy, it would be unlawful, even.

Most of us, out here in the real world, don’t have expense allowances and living allowances and “travel points.” We aren’t guaranteed a job until age 75. We therefore don’t give a sweet damn about how impressive are the CVs of those who won the Mother of All Lotteries on Friday.

We don’t give a shit, actually.”

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Laura Miller is back.

Back in her job, that is, as executive director of the BC Liberals. It was just announced in Victoria, I believe. And – she’s a great friend, and I’m biased, true – that’s a good and right decision.

Ten reasons why:

1. Innocent until proven guilty: It gets forgotten, too often – and particularly when political people are the target – but she is guilty of nothing. Nothing has been proven.
2. The charges are bogus, reason (a): The much-discussed emails aren’t gone. They’re still on the government servers in Guelph. Nothing was erased.
3. The charges are bogus, reason (b): You don’t buy brand new computers for new staffers. You clean off the previous employee’s emailed spaghetti recipes and kitten photos, and you have the new person use that computer. That’s not a crime. That’s what everyone does, the OPP included.
4. The charges are bogus, reason (c): The OPP is out of control – see how they were an actual sponsor of the PC’s Ottawa conference, a couple weeks ago? – and they were out for vengeance. Laura caught them perjuring themselves, she complained, and now they’re going after her for it. They’re rogue.
5. Hysteria and histrionics lead always to bad law. Remember how those dozens of Senators were all corrupt? Remember how they were all going to jail? How Trudeau expelled them from his caucus? It was front page news everywhere. Well, guess what, folks – yesterday we found out that the RCMP aren’t going to investigate any of those Senators. Not one. A quiet admission that the whole thing had been, well, overblown. That is yet another reason why we need to be wary about political witchhunts, always.
6. I know Laura. I have known her for many years. She is one of the most honest and decent people I’ve ever met, inside or outside politics. She didn’t do anything wrong. She simply did her job, in fact.
7. “Misuse of a computer system to cause mischief”? Seriously? That’s one of the big charges she’s facing? It isn’t even in the Criminal Code, as far as I can see. How could she have caused “mischief” when (a) she explicitly had the authority to do what she did and (b) nothing harmful was done – to the computers themselves, or the information that was on them?
8. Try this simple test. Drop your iPhone in the toilet. Or run over your Blackberry with your car. Now, go find a computer. Log on to Hotmail or Gmail or whatever. All your emails are still there, aren’t they? Yep. The “deleted” Queen’s Park emails are still there, too.
9. Should she have left her post in the first place? She left to organize her defence, she’s done that, and now she’s back.  As she should be.
10. Did I mention innocent until proven guilty, beyond a reasonable doubt? Well, I mention it again. It’s the law, after all.

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