Wednesday, March 2, 2011

What am I smoking?

In the comments to this post from "The Galloping Beaver" about the Federal Court of Appeals decision against the harpercons on the "In-and-out" scandal, wherein I say that this is just one more nail in harper's political coffin and that he's toast, commentator Dana asks:
Man alive, thwap, haven't you been paying any attention at all for the past six years?

This is maybe the eleventyth time you or someone else has predicted that Harper is toast and every single time his polling numbers either remain the same or they rise.

Whatever you're smoking I want some.
About a week and a half ago there was a very articulate condemnation of Canadians' apathy and ignorance in the face of harper and the whole right-wing assault on everything. Dana might even have written it! I really can't argue that it is highly depressing that in the face of torturing peasants in Afghanistan, in the face of the destruction of Haiti, in the face of decades of rising homelessness, household debt, insecure unemployment, environmental destruction, increasing income inequality, police violence, racism, and now the self-implosion of the world financial system that has costed Canadians hundreds of billions of dollars, stephen harper was able to inch forward in the polls.

It's depressing that the likeliest candidate to replace harper is an out-of-touch, arrogant, elitist prick who buys into the neo-liberal snake-oil as big as harper and Flaherty do.

But I see the role of the blog-o-sphere as presenting views of the world that haven't entered into the mainstream consciousness but with time can affect it (the way DailyKos and MoveOn and CommonDreams, and the great flag-ship Znet did to some effect in the USA). And part of my little job with my dozen or so daily readers is to contribute to the criticism of the harpercons and other neo-con, neo-lib, always-stupids, and to speak positively about our chances.

And I really do believe that harper is easily defeat-able. Go through this blog and you'll see several entries where I express the opinion that harper will be defeated if only somebody stands up to him.

What we need is more left-wingers shooting their mouths off. In the 1960s and 1970s it was left-wingers who shot their mouths off. They criticized imperialist wars, environmental destruction, patriarchy, and racism and for a while the right-wingers were cowed into silence. Then they recovered. An economic crisis ("stagflation") supposedly discredited left-liberalism's Keynesian economics and (try to wrap your heads around this one folks) supposedly vindicated the theories that were discredited by the Great Depression in the 1930s (and which appear now to be set for a second discrediting today).

Then we had Thatcher and Reagan and the whole Archie Bunker counterattack. And look at the sad, sordid results. Epic failure. Epic stupidity. The rise of racism and the election of "Tea-Bag" politicians who call for the elimination of laws against child labour!

The fact that even in the USA, where corporate mainstream news/propaganda, FAUXNews, Rush Limbaugh, etc., ... sixty percent of Americans back the Wisconsin strikers against the corporate stooge Governor Walker. Canada has not been as debased by right-wing shit-headerry as has the USA. The numbers would be even higher here.

What we need (as Montreal Simon is forever saying) is the courage to stand up to bullies.

17 comments:

900ft Jesus said...

"What we need is more left-wingers shooting their mouths off."

exactly. If we give up, shut up, we've already lost.

Canadians seem to love the bandwagon, so left-wingers need to control it with their voices.

thwap said...

Yeah, the longer we allow idiots like harper to use the word "socialists" as if it's a term of derision, the longer Canadians will forget about how it's "socialism" that allows them to access health care without paying.

Kev said...

I'm with ya thwap, I refuse to STFU, as the only weapon that we have at our disposal is our voices.

The louder and more often that we yell from the rooftops the more likely that we will be heard.

Giving up because the fight is a long hard one in no excuse in fact it just serves to motivate me even more

Orwell's Bastard said...

Yes, but my dear fellow, your points, well-founded thought they may be, are inevitably lost in the torrent of sarcasm, foul language, and, well, forgive me, but someone has to say it ... rudeness characterizing virtually all of your posts.

Tut, tut, my good man. Incivility will get you nowhere. More flies with honey than with vinegar, don't you know. Do try to make your arguments more tastefully.

There's a good chap.

Anonymous said...

Re: And part of my little job with my dozen or so daily readers is to contribute to the criticism of the harpercons and other neo-con, neo-lib, always-stupids, and to speak positively about our chances.

A laudable goal however it seems to me that it's in simple aid of getting rid of the self-serving hypocrite who looks after his partisan buddies with cushy jobs and Senate appointments that you don't like -- and replacing him with the self-serving hypocrite who will look after his partisan buddies with cushy jobs and Senate appointments that you do.

"Positive chances" are one thing, "positive choices" are something entirely different.

For example, if Canada changes the arse warming the PM's chair will MP's sent to parliament by well intentioned (but IMO somewhat idealistic and deluded voters) get the choice of what legislation they do or do not support? Or will they continue be told how, when, or even if, they will vote?

If Canada changes the arse warming the PM's chair will the partisan buddy appointments end? Or will friends, financial supporters, and partisan hacks, of that arse continue to benefit from it?

If Canada changes the arse warming the PM's chair will there be political accountability and transparency? Or will be be business as usual?

And if Canada changes the arse warming the PM's chair will the divisive, hyper-partisan, political rhetoric, name calling, and demonizing end, and a new era of actually finding out what Canadians want instead of telling them what is good for them be ushered in under rainbow filled skies?

Dana said...

You can't possibly believe that keying bytes into the blogosphere equates with physically yelling from the rooftops or using a bullhorn in a crowd in order to have a voice that is heard.

Can you?

Please tell me you understand the distinctions that must be made between the people you share your living quarters, meals and/or beds with and the people you only know as pseuds online?

Did you notice the power of the people who took to the streets in Tunis? Cairo?

They used online tools as organizing tools not as substitutes.

I've been saying this for a good 6 or 7 years now but Bush/Cheney/Harper/Baird etc and their ilk don't give two shits for what people say.

Only about what people do.

And so far no one in Canada is doing squat.

I'm in my mid-sixties. My time for being in the streets, at least at an organizational level, is over. Now I'm just trying to look after critically and chronically ill loved ones and preserve what remains of my own well being.

If you want anyone to believe you really are yelling from rooftops - get on a real rooftop and really yell.

What you're doing right now is sitting behind a keyboard and indulging yourself.

thwap said...

Dana, Kev, OB, stageleft,

I'm right in the middle of something big and then I'll probably go to bed, so I only have time to reply to Dana for now.

Dana, with respect, if you re-read my post you'll see that I specifically explained that I believe my blogging is making only a tiny contribution to Canada's political culture. I also mentioned what I think the US bloggers managed to achieve.

For the record, I have done more than blog. I've attended demonstrations, marches, circulated petitions, distributed pamphlets, voted, volunteered on campaigns, etc., etc.,.

Getting to your first point about how I'm groundlessly optimistic about the possibility of defeating harper, I will re-state that in my mind, the danger is overestimating this fat, stupid tub of shit.

I have always sincerely believed that the minute somebody comes up against him with a sustained attack against his serial stupidity, sleaze, and criminality, he will crumble. It's an indictment of our country that that hasn't happened yet.

wv [haven't signed in yet!] = "balls"

Dana said...

"...the minute somebody comes up against him with a sustained attack against his serial stupidity, sleaze, and criminality, he will crumble. It's an indictment of our country that that hasn't happened yet."

This I agree with 100%.

I'm proud of you for your activities and I too believe that the fat tub of shit can be defeated.

I don't however believe he can or will be defeated by a divided opposition. Neither the LPC nor NDP will defeat the CPC. Together, in whatever way that can happen, they can consign him and his gang of miscreants to the toilet bowl of history.

But, and this is a very big and very real but, that is not going to happen. There is simply to much partisan entrenchment.

Given that, the possibility of defeating Harper is operationally zero.

And that's what makes me angriest.

That there are people, professional politicians and party supporters both, whose loyalty and commitment to their party of choice outweighs their loyalty and commitment to Canada.

I'll be hearing from the various partisans yet again for having said that but their ranting about purity or incompatibility or the damn socialists or the Liberals are the same as the Cons doesn't make the reality any less true.

Until there's some kind of united opposition we have Harper.

Full stop.

Orwell's Bastard said...

Not sure whether it's excessive partisanship or partisanship as such that's gotten us into this mess, but I can't really argue with Dana's analysis.

And when it comes to prediction, while I'm tempted momentarily to go for another cheap laugh by protesting that some of my best friends are liberals, I fear that Dana may be right.

Which brings us to the prescriptive. What are we going to do about it?

Dana said...

The answer to your question, Bastard, is nothing that isn't already being done.

Which translates to nothing at all.

The LPC braintrust (oxymoronically speaking) has decided that Ignatieff's ego will suffice in place of actual strategy regardless of the consequences to Canada.

The NDP braintrust (ditto) has decided that their first foray into bare knuckle retail politics is too much fun to give up even if Canada loses.

If I had a Bloc candidate running here I'd be tempted. At least there's a vision of some kind.

This will probably be Harper's greatest legacy. There was a time when the Parliamentary dining room was a place you could find cabinet ministers dining with opposition backbenchers.

No more. By cranking their partisan animosity up they've managed to generate equivalent levels of animosity elsewhere as well.

We all bought into it and now we can't buy ourselves out.

Last one out please turn out the lights.

Anonymous said...

Million People March to Parliament Hill, Pick a Date!
If the government is Theirs and not Ours, then it is the very least we must do. Who would help us organize that? Unions, they know they are next. Galvanize the 60%.

Toedancer

Marky Mark said...

We don't always agree but I like reading your posts-the MSM is superficial and now I'm a distance removed from all the political and philosophical concepts and debates I used to know very well. Your back and forth was MB at Dawg's place was quite instructive-if only our party leader debates had half that substance.

Marky Mark said...

(Forgot to subscribe)

Purple library guy said...

Hmmm . . . The funny thing is, I agree with Thwap, but I also agree with the post he quoted that he was responding to. I don't actually see where the two claims are opposed.

Yes, we should be talking loud and often about the shortcomings of Harper and his Cons in specific, and of the general corporate-dominated ideology dominating this country in general.
But that does not mean that scandal X necessarily has any chance of bringing him down, and I think it's important to confront the problem; those who fail to learn from history are destined to repeat it, and all that. Harper is constantly doing heinous things, those heinous things receive some degree of publicity, and his popularity remains unaffected. Why? Is it the limited nature of the stories, the critics' failure to frame them in a broader destruction of the Conservatives' positive image for themselves, the simple lack of enough audience share? What can be done differently so that this time the fucker'll go down? Now maybe there's nothing to be done. Maybe enough drip-drip will create a general atmosphere such that one of these days, one of his misdeeds or just the combined aura of them all will stick to him. It happened to Bush. But it's still worth thinking about the problem, which is hard to do if we deny it exists.

As to a need for someone to stand up to him . . . it's not really him nobody can stand up to. It's the mainstream media. Really solid criticisms of Harper would be fundamental one, and fundamental criticisms of Harper are criticisms of the system, and criticism of the system does not make the news. All the more reason to build the blogosphere, of course.

thwap said...

Marky Mark,

I don't remember any back and forth at Dawg's.

PLG,

A big part of the problem is the way the mainstream media normalizes the guy. But also the way that the opposition still decides to treat him as a legitimate political actor rather than the piece of contemptible garbage that he is.

trevorus said...

i believe it was impolitical's blog i was reading the other day discussing how harper is rebranding 'canadian gov't' into the 'harper gov't'

there's several things harper's name should be associated with and it's not government.

i think 'harper prison' has a better ring to it.

or 'harper butt plugs'

'harper police state'

'harper, slimy piece of pigshit extraordinaire'

thwap said...

The great leader indeed.