Friday, January 1, 2010

Prorogation and the Culture of Impunity

Note: The following is a response to Todd, who critiqued my last post from a Marxist perspective.

Todd,

I've been in transit, seeing family members, and now, drinking heavily due to my numerous psychological problems. I have been wrestling with some of your comments on and off over the last few days though.

One of things you took issue with was my saying that our Governor-General, Michelle-Jean, has shit for brains. You then made some comments about seeing her in the same way that some saw Obama as the Messiah, but since I never succumbed to Obama's charms and I never saw the G-G as the person to save us all, I don't know where any of that is coming from. (You yourself described her as an empty-headed liberal, so, again, I don't know where the difficulty lies.)

Constitutionally speaking, the G-G is a political reality. Something that exists. It therefore behoves us to understand its functions and its powers. The G-G represents the powers of the Crown, which continues as head-of-state as governments come and go. It's also a relic of a less democratic era. But what are the details of its function today in the here and now?

I will submit that these powers are generally untested. It is only when a sociopathic wanna-be despot like our own insane, stupid stephen harper decide to push things to their limits that we have to decide. But it seems to me that the G-G was not intended, and is still not intended, to function as the puppet of a prime minister. The G-G is not constitutionally bound to do anything and everything the prime minister says. Is it the case that the G-G constitutes a guaranteed escape-hatch for a prime minister when they get in trouble? That's ludicrous.

The G-G was an idiot when she granted harper his escape from the confidence vote in 2008 and she is an idiot now for having granted him a second prorogation to allow him to escape from yet another catastrophe of his own making in 2009-10. The first prorogation could have been said to have been politically wise in that Western alienation and anti-separatist sentiment had been enflamed by the coalition crisis, but this second prorogation, simply to allow harper to escape responsibility for his war crimes, is completely inexcusable.

On to more substantial issues:
Is what Harper's done illegal? Obviously not.Is it unfair? Naturally, but bourgeois parliaments aren't well noted for meeting standards of fairness. They're loci for struggle, and that can get ugly (even between bourgeois factions). Harper's a right-wing bastard not a fool: he'll play hardball as long as he has to to get as much of his way as he can.

I'm afraid that I can't be so objective about things. I think that you can search my blog and my overall internet presence to see that I have few illusions about Canadian democracy and liberal-democratic capitalist democracy in general. But at the same time, Canada's system remains one of the world's more responsive ones. Human rights are generally well-respected in Canada. Furthermore, this is the system that we've got. This is the system that I, as an individual, have. And I am FUCKING OUTRAGED at what harper is doing to it.

Tell me something: When you see the video of Robert Dziekanski being murdered by those imbecilic cretins from the RCMP, do you launch into some cynical explication of the tenuous respect of bourgeois democracy for the rights of the individual or do you get FUCKING OUTRAGED?

Tell me something else: If, for all your contempt for Canada's bourgeois democracy and bourgeois liberties, would you see no difference between your status today and your status if elections were banned and you were arrested indefinitely and tortured for your Marxist writings tomorrow?

Or is it the case that we have certain constraints on executive power today that are in fact valuable? Isn't it the case that Richard Colvin's attempts to respect the rule of law, and parliament's attempt to hold the government accountable, are important things, and that we shouldn't regard their arrogant, dismissal with cynical detachment?

"Harper has repeatedly used prorogation to hide from the opposition"

Given his governments' status as a minority, what _else_ do you expect from him? See my remark above about fairness in any parliament.

I guess we shouldn't expect any better from the contemptible scum-bag, but that doesn't mean we have to acquiesce to it.

And then we get to some REAL meat:

"Prison? He may never go, but he has committed enough crimes."

I'd enjoy seeing this happen (not that it'd change much else)

Are you kidding? A prime minister brought down and imprisoned for war crimes? I've already written about the impact of such an outcome! Can you imagine what would happen the next time some imperialist US president asked a Canadian prime minister to join in some criminal foreign adventure giving some diplomatic cover to another initiative to stomp some other poor country into the ground?

All that prime minister would have to do would be to point at the example made of the harper government to say honestly; "Being a shameless, grovelling kiss-ass, I'd like to help, but there's a good chance I'll end up being responsible for war crimes and we can't get away with that here in Canada."

Furthermore, if Canadians manage to hold a sitting prime minister accountable for war crimes, do you not think that this would have an impact on the frustrated citizenry of the United States? Don't you think it would be internationally significant were we to put almost an entire government behind bars?
but what slamdunk proof do you have that he's committed them [war crimes]?
I've written about this as well. In this post I show how it has been the harper government's strategy to maintain a smokescreen of bad reporting, record-keeping, etc., to erect the argument of "plausible deniability" about their knowledge of what happened to the prisoners we took. I have also pointed out that in the Tokyo War Crimes Trials Japanese officers were hanged despite their claims that they didn't know what was going on within their departments because the Allied justices said that they SHOULD HAVE KNOWN. It was their RESPONSIBILITY to know what was going on. In other words, the harpercons have been too "clever" for their own good. Their disgustingly cynical attempt to show that they had no idea what happened to our prisoners is the case against them.

There is no way out of this for them. If they knew and covered it up, war crimes. If they were so lackadaisical and indifferent about their responsibilities, war crimes. End of story.

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to hoist one of these corporate stooges on their own petard. And we owe it to the rare courage and honour of Richard Colvin, a man who (despite his obvious abilities) was foolish enough to believe in our system and to believe therefore in "the Mission" (tm.) in Afghanistan, but who, when confronted with the truth, believed it was his duty to protect Canada from complicity in war crimes. It would be the height of irresponsibility to throw this chance away!

What's happened to Bush II, Cheney, etc. after they stepped down? And they're even filthier than Harper: Harper just found himself in charge of (part of) an occupation; he never actually started a war (yet).

It is precisely the disgusting impunity that bush II and cheney enjoyed that we have the chance to avoid here in Canada!!! We have sworn testimony of evidence which should warrant war crimes charges. We have documentary evidence of possible war crimes. We had a parliamentary inquiry into the truth of this testimony and this evidence. And harper has nauseatingly prorogued parliament (with the assistance of our shit-for-brains Governor-General) to avoid the consequences of his actions.

We have seen the harpercons ignore the will of the majority of the people's representatives (and despite all your cynicism, that is what they are or what they should be, and it is in that capacity that harper has shown his contempt for them and therefore us) to turn over these documents, citing empty "national security" considerations while at the same time leaking less-redacted versions of those documents to friendly generals and journalist hacks like Christie Belchforth.

"Let's see what action is taken against him internationally for enabling torture."

Again: Bush II and Cheney.

See above. As well, we can point out to Canadians that the International Criminal Court (which, with other legal tools) has made things difficult for people like Kissinger, Pinochet and Rumsfeld, only conducts proceedings when it appears that the justice system of the war criminals' countries are not up to the task. A file has already been started at the ICC on this and it would be a major embarrassment to Canada if the ICC had to do the heavy-lifting because we as a people and as a society were too ignorant, apathetic, cynical or what-not to do it!

"Anger is good right now."

Fine. Let's have a good measure of intelligence with it instead of just operatic howling and Menshevik kvetching about how _unfair_ the PM is being.

I believe that I've provided that intelligence. This is not about harper not playing fair. This is about harper trying to get away with torture. This is about harper's repeated showing of contempt for our very system of government while at the exact same time, asking us to respect his authority and the authority of the law! This anger is at harper's spitting into the faces of the decent, intelligent people in this country while engaging in blatant militarism and illegality and fucking torture.

"We should be angry at being told (metaphorically speaking) fuck you and your democracy by the PM and his gutless ass kissing, self-serving MPs and Senators."

I don't know. I keep missing those remarks about (what spirit) bourgeois democracy (has) being ignored, drowned out as they are by the even more constant and long-lasting (over a century) "Fuck yous!" towards workers, homosexuals, women, internationalists, sovereignists, etc. that I've been hearing and reading about.

Yes, and so, when the chips are down and you've finally got a chance to put one of these fuckers away, what is your response? To blithely say that our whole system is corrupt so what can you do? Piss on that! I'm hearing from "pwogwessives" how my anger is off-putting and now I'm hearing from more radical Marxists how my anger is missplaced. When is the right time to strike? When is the right time to use the tools that the system has made available to strike a blow for justice? If not now, when???

I guess that'll do for now.

12 comments:

no_blah_blah_blah said...

I agree that anger is good right now. People should be feeling something other than complacent contentedness. I was pretty damned nervous/sick to my stomach for a day, then uneasy the next day, and now I'm just pissed off.

The Conservatives will do one of two things. They may be hoping for some reflected glory from the Olympics, and they may want to trigger an election by tabling a ridiculous budget (or something like that). Their alternative would be to frequently prorogue Parliament legally (unfortunately). Still, during this time, the investigation into the Afghan detainee issue will continue, one burdened step after another. Furthermore, Harper cannot prorogue the ICC (although the UN Security Council could, sort of).

Either way, they cannot avoid the inevitable. Even if they slow Parliament to a crawl until 2013, an election is legally required: the ultimate check. That is when the general populace will get the government they deserve, in a manner of speaking. As Mentarch noted astutely in the previous thread, the question is whether public outrage can be maintained.

bulldogger said...

There's no justification for torture and the consequent undemocratic proroguing of parliament in a pathetic attempt to sideline justice. It would be an unprecedented victory if Harper, or even a few of his crew, were to be charged with War Crimes, but as much as I'd like to see it happen the chances are slim to none.

I agree with 'no_blah_blah_blah' in that we shouldn't get caught up in pipe dreams, again the likelihood of accountability is slim to none, but public anger and frustrations can be transferred to the next, and that is the question, how ? Each month that passes will result in said anger dissipating at an accelerated rate. I'm not up-to-date on the logistics and planning of the Olympic resistance efforts, but if for example, there were documented cases of police brutality on peaceful protesters, the result could be public outrage reaching Robert Dziekanski levels, especially if Olympic security were to use their "emergency earthquake warning device" ie LRAD.

no_blah_blah_blah said...

Since this wasn't clear in my first post, I should stress that accountability for war crimes needs to be pursued, regardless of the likelihood of successful prosecution. It's obvious that the powerful find ways to protect themselves. In particular, the Security Council has vetoes and the ability to delay ICC prosecution for a year, with the ability to extend the delay annually. The reason why war crimes prosecution must be pursued within Canada is to show that Canadians do take war crimes seriously.

Since sports is being used as a backdrop, I'll note that Wayne Gretzky once said, you miss one hundred percent of the shots that you don't take. The chance of success is low (but non-zero!), but the warning served to future governments will be noted.

As for maintaining public anger, I think that constant reminders through the media asking Canadians why they treasure Canada would be best. The Olympics and sports-related glory is fleeting. Ask Canadian's what they consider is important about Canada. Chances are that a functional democracy is high on their list. A Parliament slowed to a crawl is would be quite dysfunctional.

bulldogger said...

Absolutely, there should be a push for accountability being there's always a chance something could come of it, but taking recent events into consideration -- the outrageously public cover up of Robert Dziekanski's murder -- I can't stress enough how unjust the justice system is.

Todd said...

(Wow. A whole post dedicated to me. That's a nice late Xmas present. Thanks. !{)> )

Thwap said:

"I have been wrestling with some of your comments on and off over the last few days though."

>blush!<

"You then made some comments about seeing her in the same way that some saw Obama as the Messiah, but since I never succumbed to Obama's charms and I never saw the G-G as the person to save us all, I don't know where any of that is coming from."

Well, that wasn't directed at you so much as Jesus. I was getting a little tired of the leader fixation I was reading.

"Is it the case that the G-G constitutes a guaranteed escape-hatch for a prime minister when they get in trouble? That's ludicrous."

True. The King-Byng affair bears this out.

"The G-G was an idiot when she granted harper his escape from the confidence vote in 2008 and she is an idiot now for having granted him a second prorogation"

That's fine and easy to say, but my critique is that you're personalizing her action instead of trying to understand it (which is different from condoning it, mind) in the context of her political and social position, both in the government apparatus and larger society.

"this second prorogation, simply to allow harper to escape responsibility for his war crimes, is completely inexcusable."

Like I said: I'm not excusing it. I don't like what she did in the slightest, but leaving it at that and fulminating just isn't that useful (to anyone beyond your own psyche).

"I think that you can search my blog and my overall internet presence to see that I have few illusions about Canadian democracy and liberal-democratic capitalist democracy in general."

>sigh!<

Yes, you're such a scamp.

"Tell me something: When you see the video of Robert Dziekanski being murdered by those imbecilic cretins from the RCMP, do you launch into some cynical explication of the tenuous respect of bourgeois democracy for the rights of the individual or do you get FUCKING OUTRAGED?"

Neither.

My explications aren't cynical (I think; the rubber hasn't exactly hit the road in a meaningful way for me yet), and I learned long ago that outrage is like an orgasm: fun while it lasts but totally personal. (And it can be addictive.)

cont'd below

Todd said...

(cont'd from above)

"If, for all your contempt for Canada's bourgeois democracy and bourgeois liberties,"

Careful with this. There's a fine line between contempt and explication and dislike of the ugly parts of class society.

"would you see no difference between your status today and your status if elections were banned and you were arrested indefinitely and tortured for your Marxist writings tomorrow?"

Of course. I've been around a bit longer than that to be able to recognize just how progressive bourgeois democracy was and has been over what went on before it and how things do progress within it, even now, despite what is considered "normal" (never mind outstanding horrors and venality).

"Are you kidding? A prime minister brought down and imprisoned for war crimes? I've already written about the impact of such an outcome! Can you imagine what would happen the next time some imperialist US president asked a Canadian prime minister to join in some criminal foreign adventure giving some diplomatic cover to another initiative to stomp some other poor country into the ground?"

It's entirely possible he could go along with it, telling everyone, maybe even believing himself, that he'd be able to do something to mitigate the impact. (It's a refrain I've heard from some non-radical US lefties when they talk about the Democratic Party as a vehicle for social change). But you're begging the question of another imperial adventurist invading another country and calling on our PM to help: if the head-of-state for a somewhat important country like Canada were to be sent to prison as a war criminal, you're assuming this would have no effect whatsoever on anyone else. Shouldn't you be trying to argue that it would give pause to _any_ adventurist thoughts in, say, the G7?

If it did give pause to further Canadian aid to imperialists, I'd say that it might make it harder for a Canadian PM to accept publically but still not impossible given enough motivation.

"Furthermore, if Canadians manage to hold a sitting prime minister accountable for war crimes, do you not think that this would have an impact on the frustrated citizenry of the United States?"

See above. Had you argued that bringing to book someone like, say, any US president since, maybe the 40s (yes, there are plenty beforehand, too) would have an effect here in Canada, I'd tend to agree more (although I don't think it would act as a complete deterrent; we'd need revolutionary changes in global society for that to happen).

"I've written about this as well."

When I say "slamdunk" I mean no, nada chance of plausible deniability. Something like a videotape of the cabinet making their secret plans, calling each other by name, etc. Without something like that, calling them war criminals is just name-calling, and it's worth exactly the breath it takes to make the utterance.

Your second point about war trials suffers from the fact that it was the victors who were making the rules at the time. I agree that ignorance is, at very best, a very poor defence (one reason I try to correct error wherever I see it), and, objectively speaking, the defendants were definitely guilty of war crimes as they were COs and members of a party that encouraged such things. However, one can't and certainly shouldn't ignore that it was the victors who made the rules for the trial and needed to have some rolling heads.
(cont'd below)

Todd said...

(cont'd from above)

"In other words, the harpercons have been too "clever" for their own good."

Like I said: this might be their downfall.

"It would be the height of irresponsibility to throw this chance away!"

Right. I'm not arguing otherwise. What I was originally arguing was that your post was long on venom, light on argument.

"We have seen the harpercons ignore the will of the majority of the people's representatives (and despite all your cynicism, that is what they are or what they should be"

You're mistaking caution against wasting one's breath and (general) knowledge of how class society works for breathless and simple "Gosh-People-Sure-Are-Stoopid!!" cynicism.

"we can point out to Canadians that the International Criminal Court (which, with other legal tools) has made things difficult for people like Kissinger, Pinochet and Rumsfeld,"

IIRC, Pinochet only got arrested then let go; Straw ignored the ICJ. While this is something important, note that it didn't do very much to deter others from Pinochet's way of doing things. As for Kissenger and Rumsfeld, how has either the ICC or the ICJ made things beyond annoying for them?

"This anger is at harper's spitting into the faces of the decent, intelligent people in this country while engaging in blatant militarism and illegality and fucking torture."

Right. Anger: that's all that post was about and not much else.

"Yes, and so, when the chips are down and you've finally got a chance to put one of these fuckers away, what is your response? To blithely say that our whole system is corrupt so what can you do?"

Well, if I'm going to be blthe about it, I'd more likely say our whole society (not to mention those around the planet) needs to experience systematic, revolutionary change and would you like to help?

Seriously, Thwap, I'm the last person to throw up my hands and shrug (I don't even say "Wait for the Revolution" any more except as a half-joke). It's just I'd rather see people talking about the problem intelligently and with knowledge than simply sputtering and fulminating.

As for putting away someone, if were up to me (or you), sure, no problem. But it's not up to me (or you). It's up to people who are actors in a social schema that allows for this kind of crap (and implicitly condones it), notwithstanding their own personal opinions and character.

"I'm hearing from 'pwogwessives' how my anger is off-putting"

Yes, well, been there. I usually find something interesting from Marx, Lenin, or Trotsky about social peace.

"and now I'm hearing from more radical Marxists how my anger is missplaced."

No, I think your anger is spot on. It's just all I see is anger; I'm asking you: what's next? Any more ideas? If not, fine. We can set these things on the back burner while they simmer more. When new bubbles start appearing, let's examine them again.

"When is the right time to strike? When is the right time to use the tools that the system has made available to strike a blow for justice? If not now, when???"

Any time. But it all depends on what you're going to do and how you're going to do it. Right now, what can "we" (and I'll be _very_ loose here and just talk about anyone who's unhappy with Harper and the Conservatives) do? I suggest that "we" talk and don't shut up about how bad Harper and the Conservatives are, citing facts and quotes, in order to make people so sick of hearing about it, they'll be more likely to hand him an even smaller number of seats than Mulroney got after free trade went through.

thwap said...

Todd,

I didn't think it was necessary for me to state that the Tokyo War Crimes Trial was an example of victors' justice.

But the great thing about it is that it set a precedent.

And the whole thing about legal precedents is that they're supposed to be precedents for future judgments.

The only way that harper can avoid a prison cell is through the blatant disregard for the rule of law.

At the very least, we can at least expose the criminality of the system through going after harper in a clear-cut case of war crimes.

But I don't think that we, the people, are so weak. Nor do I see that Canada or harper are so powerful that they can just sweep us aside if we demand that justice is carried out.

We're going to have to agree to disagree. You believe that I'm mindlessly ranting and I believe you're engaging in self-destructive and self-perpetuating defeatism.

We don't have to find a video-tape of harper ordering torture. We just have to point to the sloppy record-keeping of our prisoner transfer system.

That sloppy record keeping is the crime. Just because harper is not a Japanese officer in the hands of his victors, doesn't mean that the law isn't the law.

I'll admit that I'm passionate about this. (I'm either not as wise as you or not as jaded.) It is my hope that the simplicity of the situation can be communicated, and that revealing passion for Canada's reputation, passion for democracy, passion for the treatment of the people of Afghanistan, can only help in communicating the importance of this crisis.

Todd said...

Haloscan seems to have eaten my earlier comment, and I'm not in the mood to re-write it.

I'll say this:

1) For all that I'd be delighted to see Harper and his ilk carted off to the pogie (on any charge that could be made to stick), I think you're operating on more passion and "grasping-at-straws" hope at the moment than real understanding of what's possible and what's likely.

2) You said:

"But I don't think that we, the people, are so weak. Nor do I see that Canada or harper are so powerful that they can just sweep us aside if we demand that justice is carried out."

and

"You believe that I'm mindlessly ranting"

Which is a gross misrepresentation of what I wrote earlier.

If there's one thing that seriously angers me, it's misrepresentation of what I write.

I don't fucking care if you did it "in a fit of passion". Don't do that to my words again.

I don't trust people who can't consistently represent what I write.

thwap said...

Todd,

"You believe that I'm mindlessly ranting"

Which is a gross misrepresentation of what I wrote earlier.


2 examples (from this post alone)

"It's just I'd rather see people talking about the problem intelligently and with knowledge than simply sputtering and fulminating."

"It's just all I see is anger; I'm asking you: what's next? Any more ideas?"

Right. So, I'm just sputtering and fulminating what appears to be nothing but an expression of content-free anger, but that's a far cry from mindless ranting?

I'm afraid I don't see the distinction.

Yes, you wrote a lot of other valid stuff, but you also wrote that.

More importantly, you're asking just HOW I purpose to get harper behind bars aside from passionately expressing my anger about what's happened.

Perhaps it seems naive, but I happen to think that it's fiendishly clever to find an instance where the elites are so clearly violating the rules that they've set up to run society and to hammer and hammer and hammer away at this inconsistency so that people are forced to accept that there is no other alternative than to validate those rules or accept that the rule of law does not hold.

The majority of Canadians are disenchanted with "the mission."

The majority of Canadians are still opposed to torture.

The majority of Canadians would (i think) agree that a government guilty of war crimes is a serious thing.

I have proposed, on other issues, using other principles, for years and years, to use the system's own professed values and principles against it.

I believe that we live in a compromised democracy, but I also believe that the system has been set up such that it could be a real democracy if the majority could be made to see how it's compromised and how they've been taken for chumps.

Todd said...

I'll concede "mindlessly ranting" isn't a _gross_ misrepresentation of "sputtering and fulminating". The difference is that the former implies stupidity while the other involves inability to come up with something clear; you don't have to be stupid not to be able to do that, and I don't consider you stupid in the least.

"I happen to think that it's fiendishly clever to find an instance where the elites are so clearly violating the rules that they've set up to run society and to hammer and hammer and hammer away at this inconsistency"

What you hammered away about and drew my attention to wasn't the inconsistencies so much as the personal qualities of Jean, which is likely beside the point, and a wild prediction that Harper's going to jail and the conservative movement in Canada is finished, which is so much empty bombast as far as facts are concerned at the moment.

As for the rest, I agree with you, but mistaking the social for the personal and making empty promises and auguries doesn't help (how many times did you read that the past crisis was "The End of Capitalism!"; it's like a broken watch, that refrain).

thwap said...

Well, my insulting the G-G was really just a tossed-off thing. I despise her for her silence on Canada's depredations in Haiti, so this second prorogation is just the icing on the cake.

I know what you mean about people saying that the latest crisis is always the curtain call for the capitalist system. I was guilty of that myself a few times. Which is why my responses to this latest crisis were always hesitant to see more than there was immediately apparent.

But by the end of this political bowel movement called "conservatism" I'm referring to the particularly inane, willfully ignorant, violent and bigoted crapola that really started with Ronald Reagan, reached its pinnacle in bush II and is now carried by the incoherent Sarah Palin (who absolutely WOWS the steadily-decreasing moronic base of the Repugs while inspiring only derision or fear from the vast majority).

The "conservatism" of the harpercons is just the spill-over from this US-American wave which crested and then broke. Say what you want about past Canadian conservatives, from Arthur Meighen to Robert Stanfield to Joe Clark, even Brian Mulroney, none of them presided over such a stew of stupidity and hatred, with such brutal, anti-democratic methods.

And no other politician (save perhaps Paul Martin) ever left themselves open to such criticism (even Andrew Coyne is disgusted with harper's methods) and to such consequences as harper has with his wannabe-be warrior brutality in Afghanistan.

I'll repeat it again: The harpercons laboured mightily to create the illusion of absolute ignorance about conditions in Afghanistan. But Colvin's warnings showed that there was cause for concern, for investigation, if we had a government that cared about the law and human rights. But the harpercons deliberately ignored his warnings. And the fact that ignorance is no defence, but is, in fact, a war crime itself, makes their contempt for Colvin and for parliament an even bigger crime.

We have this chance here in Canada because we are not yet as debased in our political culture as is the USA. To this day there are significant remnants of critical thought (in Quebec, in social democracy, from the unions) that have prevented the all-out idiocy of the USA's one-party pro-wrestling extravaganza.

We got those hearings, until harper (in desperation) resorted to every trick in the book to sabotage things.

But he's overplayed his hand.

I'm tired and I want to type a post for the day.

Good to have you back.