Play With Fire, Get Burned

By now, we are all aware of the leaking of the Auditor General's report on G8/G20 spending. We of course have the blowhards on both sides crying foul.

The lefties are convinced this report is a damning picture of what the Harper government is about and just another scandal proving so. Not that they ever needed proof of this; they've swallowed every faux scandal that has been thrown out since Harper took power, practically all of which proved to be false.

The righties are saying this report is completely worthless. As a draft report, it is not the final findings of the Auditor General and thus cannot be taken at face value. Mind you, even the Auditor General Sheila Fraser herself has cautioned the public against accepting this report and should wait until the real report is presented in Parliament.

Now, this whole brouhaha doesn't change my opinion of who to vote for. The timing and means of this release (along with the AG's warnings) tells me this is at best dirty politics by the Opposition and at worst outrightly criminal. That kind of move just affirms my opinion of Ignatieff as nothing more than an opportunist and Layton as the pompous hypocrite he is. After all, while the Contempt of Parliament finding by the Opposition causing this election is questionable, the releasing of an AG report outside of Parliament is by legislation a reason for a charge of Contempt.

But the truth of the matter is actually much more simple: if you play with fire, you're going to get burned.

Many Canadians -- including a slew of bloggers in the Blogging Tories blogroll -- were unimpressed at the scope of spending for the G8/G20 summit. The largesse was unfathomable and quite simply reckless. If you don't think so, just look at how many Blogging Tories are screaming from their roofs over Michael Ignatieff and Jack Layton's spending promises.

As any true fiscal conservative knows, the bigger the government initiative, the greater chance for waste and/or error. And also the bigger the chance for pork-belly spending. Whether or not this erroneously leaked report -- I won't call it the AG's report since it was not released by and is not being endorsed by her -- turns out to be a true representation of her findings, the simple fact is that this is simply a matter of the chickens coming home to roost.

Maybe Harper should use this as a lesson and take a long look in the mirror asking himself what he really believes in regarding government spending.

But I -- and I'm sure many people who warned about the G8/G20 spending -- also can't help but say... I told you so.

Backwards Logic = Backwards Morality

Honestly, how messed up does your morality have to be to think that taking less away from somebody equates to a handout?

Or how insane does somebody have to be to think that lowering corporate taxes is actually taking money away from somebody else?

Perhaps that explains our "progressive" justice system...

Victim: That man has taken money out of my pocket time and again!

Thief: Your honour, the last time I took money from his pocket I took less than before.

"Progressive" Judge: Then obviously you were handing money out. Case dismissed!

Destroying the Illusion of Wealth Redistribution

Saw this video through the NewsBusters.org Facebook page. Absolutely brilliant outline of why wealth redistribution does not work.

19 point lead today... gone tomorrow

A lot of folks on the Blogging Tories are of course ecstatic about the prospect that the Conservatives are polling 43%, a whopping 19 points ahead of the Liberals. This puts the Conservatives into majority territory.

But let's not forget what happens every single time we see one of these polls.

Next week another poll will come out dropping the Conservatives down to 37 to 38% and the media will say the Conservatives must have lost the faith of the Canadian public. I'm sure Frank Graves over at Ekos is doing his own completely unbiased polling which will place the Liberals much higher and the Conservatives much lower.

After all, he has to give Jane Taber something to drool over when she interviews him next.

So, let's not get too hasty here. The election hasn't been called yet and there's a lot of ink to be spilled / pixels to be cycled before a vote even takes place. I certainly won't hide my preference of a Conservative majority government. And I think most Canadians are going to consider voting for the Conservatives if only to end the bothersome trips to the polling booth that the Opposition never seems to tire of.

Pat Martin: The MP Who'd Ignore You

It was really interesting to watch the videos that Hunter at Climbing Out of the Dark assembled showing the disgraceful antics of the Opposition members last week during the witch hunt... er... Commons Committee pretending to investigate whether Bev Oda attempted to mislead Parliament. Discussions of Bev Oda's actions has become completely nauseating; during the committee NDP MP Pat Martin stated several times that how she operates is a "terrible way to conduct business."

Unfortunately for him, in accusing her he displayed how he chooses to deal with requests he doesn't like: he ignores them.

If you go to Hunter's video titled NDP MP Pat Martin Jumps The Shark and skip over to 7:25 you'll hear him describe what he would rather she have done stating, "Why didn't you just not sign it... you could have avoided all this controversy by letting it die... letting it gather dust... never deal with the damn thing."

Well, isn't that an interesting insight into the mind of Pat Martin?

I wonder what his constituents would say if they were to find out that when Pat Martin doesn't want to deal with requests of his office -- what for actual ministers is official government business -- he feels it acceptable to just ignore them?

His ridiculous and despicable antics aside, if you compare the methodology that Bev Oda employed in this situation -- a methodology that the Tories have shown to be standard practice -- to Pat Martin's preference of just ignoring requests made of the government, clearly Pat Martin is the one displaying a complete lack of professionalism.

He sure raised a stink in the committee about MP's not having the option of being silent or as he put it pleading the fifth (note to Mr. Martin: Canada doesn't have a fifth amendment). And yet he feels it acceptable for MP's to ignore requests?

If this is how the NDP would run government, thank God they never will.

Iffy doesn't get it either

So, Michael Ignatieff has jumped into the fray over Justin Trudeau's gap in judgement having complained over honour killings and other cultural violence against women being called 'barbaric'. And what does Iffy say?

"There's no such thing as an honour killing..."

Really Iffy? No such thing?

I wonder what the Liberals would say if somebody came saying something like... oh, I don't know... there's no such thing as a hate crime?

I imagine if the Conservative Party were to say something like this, they would be crucified by the media for ignoring violence against women. I don't anticipate the Liberals facing as much scrutiny over diminishing the reality of cultural violence against women.

Justin Trudeau says he was employing "responsible neutrality" in his comments. Sorry, Justin, but I have a hard time being neutral in the face of women being killed by their fathers or brothers over not being subservient to their wishes... or women facing genital mutilation... or women being forced into marriage.

And not making it perfectly clear to new Canadians how completely unacceptable such behaviour is is not responsible in any way.

Libya, with all your wisdom... teach us how to treat human beings

To them, Rwanda and Darfur was just a dream.

They condemn Israel for targeting vile murderers who lob rockets indiscriminately into schoolyards.

They expect countries like Iran to cease nuclear programs and send their demands on notes dotted with hearts.

But Libya? Here's a country that blows up civilian gathering places in Germany. They conspire to blow up civilian aircraft over Scotland. They shoot their own citizens when the citizens demand freedom.

And yet the United Nations was just a hop, skip and a jump (translation: two weeks) away from praising Libya and sending accolades for "the country’s commitment to upholding human rights on the ground.”

Is it just me or does it make more sense to believe the world is flat than believe the UN is anything but a complete and utter joke that has become completely irrelevant to modern times?

Their stances in the face of genocide, ethnic cleansing, human rights violations, fraud to direct environmental policy, nuclear proliferation... is there nothing this organization can't get wrong?

When a machine has broken down so drastically, when a building is rotting to the foundation, when a bridge from where we are to where we want to be is buckling and rattling at every rivet, it's time to face the truth: it makes more sense to tear down and rebuild than to continue throwing up patchwork repairs, adding weight to a structure that has no more stability than a house of cards.