Saturday, June 11, 2011

An Important Cause and an Illegitimate Government

I've said before that the environment isn't my main focus. I hate camping. I hate flies and mosquitoes. I like cities, books, bars, ... that sort of thing. Then there's the science. It's all I've got to grasp political-economy, ... were someone to come up with some scholarly paper about soil depletion, global warming, ocean stocks, or whatever, I wouldn't really know how to respond.

At the same time, I realize that without the planet's life-sustaining properties, the human race, with its cities, books, bars, art, etc., would soon dwindle into oblivion.

So, given the fact that 99.9% of the scientists who have the right to an opinion say that global warming is real and that it's caused by human activity, and that if the human activity that causes global warming isn't left unchecked, civilization itself is threatened, I take it seriously.

And given the fact that the deniers of human-caused global warming are generally oil-industry shills and complete shit-heads, I take the crisis more seriously and treat the doubters with the massive contempt that they deserve.

And, therefore, given the news about temperature change and carbon emissions just released, and the increased calls for civil disobedience to try to save humanity (regardless of whether a festering pustule like Ezra Levant thinks it's all a crock) is more than called for.

And, in this context of necessary civil disobedience, we, as Canadians, have an obligation given the fact that our country (besides being complicit in torture in Afghanistan, besides being a terrorist state that tortures its own citizens, besides being a racist, colonialist country that forces its unconquered First Nations to live in squalor and criminalizes them when they enter our cities, besides being a cruel, oppressive, squalid country that destroyed democracy in Haiti and forced the Haitians to live in grinding misery and starvation) is one of the worst offenders in creating this disaster.

Thankfully, the task of civil disobedience in this country is even more justified because the government that is going whole-hog to help destroy civilization is completely illegitimate. Our prime minister is a despot and he won his position as a result of an archaic electoral system, but, more importantly, he was elected by people who were either ignorant of the reality that they were voting for the party of despotism or they simply didn't give a shit.

It's those voters who didn't give a shit that I'm interested in. These people viewed harper's serial assaults on Canadian democracy and Canadian democratic institutions, because, in their warped minds, all of this helped their party maintain power while leaving the opposition to plead impotently by the sidelines yet again. It's the mentality of the bully. When adults get together to work on some project, or, what the hell, play a board game together at a table at the cottage, if one party cheats their way to victory, the other participants will probably complain, but it's not likely that they'll take the offender and smash his head through the window. In a more serious context (like, say, a business arrangement), cheaters are taken to court. If the courts rule in the plaintiff's favour and the cheater ignores it, with impunity, sometimes the plaintiff will complain about the courts and the injustice of it all. But here, we're talking about the people who make the laws, and appoint the judges, and who write the rules.

The whole system is debased because of our toleration of this monster. The longer we endure his revolting, disgusting presence, the more will our political culture slide into total irrelevance and sick comedy, as in the United States of America.

We must unite, and we must plan, and we must organize, environmentalists, unions, intellectuals, teachers, students, voters, citizens, philanthropists, parents, children, workers, the unemployed, judges, lawyers, we must hit them hard, we must hit them everywhere, we must force this government to resign.

And the swine who voted for this piece of shit government, the bullies who were so happily contemptuous of democracy when it is their party which benefits by ripping up the rule book and all standards of decency? They have no right to be listened to. They have renounced their claims to fairness, to due process, to everything.

And, if they, a minority of the population, really want to get physical to try to protect their despotic government, they are more than welcome to try. Because that is what it has come to. That's the significance of harper's tearing-up the rule book. That book of rules existed so that power could be exchanged peacefully and that said power would act within certain constitutional-democratic limits.

It has come to this: We have an illegitimate government which the very existence of continues to debase our claims to be a constitutional democracy. The harpercons have beaten Canadian democracy to the ground (or did we all help them?) and now they're pissing on its unconscious form.

11 comments:

Uncommoner said...

Just a small comment, because you are right in so many ways but one point bothers me...

If Harper's government is illegitimate, so too is every other government Canada elects until there is serious overhaul of our electoral system. It seems to me to be dangerous to attack his legitimacy on those particular grounds.

The fact that his previous government was found in contempt, has been shown to be guilty of endemic corruption and multiple counts of electoral fraud and that he personally was aware that he was employing convicted criminals in the PMO is a much better reason to question his legitimacy.

That said, our electoral system does suck and it needs changing, but it's not going to change under Harper and I have my doubts about it changing under any of the major parties.

I have hope, just not much faith.

thwap said...

Uncommoner,

Just to clarify: My mentioning of our FPTP electoral system was mainly to show that harper's election to a majority government isn't based on anything like majority support.

It's not for that that I think his government is illegitimate. It's all those other things.

Sorry for the confusion.

Uncommoner said...

See, that's what I thought and I just wanted to confirm it, really. This is what happens when I read while half awake.

I'm somewhat torn between wondering when the buyer's remorse for Canadians is going to set in or wondering if we're just collectively too worn down and cynical to work up that kind of feeling. I know some of us already feel that way and more of us will wake up as the greater excesses of Harper's Conservatives come to the fore, but will it ever come to the point where a real majority of us are willing to vote him out?

Then again, it could be worse. For all his evils and corruption, Canada still isn't as lost as our neighbours just to the south.

Anonymous said...

I think we would be far more effective to challenge this disgusting government one MP at a time. Many ridings are saddled with Harper's followers who tow the line and they hate being challenged in public and asked any question that requires them to think. It would be great to have an organized nation-wide effort to get out at public events and give these guys (since they're mostly upper class white males) the public ridicule they so richly deserve. My MP, Dan Albas (who replaced the repulsive Stockwell Day) has referred to Brigette DePape's bravery as partison politics. The obvious issue is the economy. The Cons did nothing more than attach their name to the issue, they've done little to protect the precious few well paying jobs left for the average Canadian and have yet to be really challenged on that. Too bad it didn't happen during the campaign because it was easy to show the emperor had no clothes.

BC Waterboy

thwap said...

Uncommoner,

I think you had a right to be confused by my wording. Again, I was talking about the mechanics of how harper now has dictatorial powers despite having only 39% of the vote (and 25% of the electorate) on his side.

It's his own contempt for democracy and his supporters' that delegitimizes his government.

And, I don't think people are going to wake up until we wake them up. We need to raise the consciousnesses of our friends, families, neighbours, and explain to them the significance of what harper has done.

How sick we are as a culture.

thwap said...

BC Waterboy,

Humiliating brain-dead backbenchers will be a mighty tool of resistance.

And a necessary antidote to the sycophantic media's elevating of harper from the muck whilst insulting NDP novices for their youth and missteps.

Film these encounters. Make their lives difficult.

Anonymous said...

thwap,I like your grab-the-pitchforks sentiments, but...

there are folks besides those who
- voted Con
- didn't vote
who don't give much of a shit.

It's going to take a real shock or personal pain to wake up many Cdns who voted non-Con.

Personally, I think we are past the point of it making a difference who we vote for.

In other words - Time For Revolution - and I'm afraid I don't see that on the horizon, and only catch a whiff of it in the blogoshere.

Is it light the barricades and man(person) the torches or...I've almost forgotten !

thwap said...

I intend to initiate some activity in the 3-d world, and build a movement in my neighbourhood.

There really is no other word for harper's style of government other than despotism and I think people have been lulled to sleep by the inability of corporate news anchors to communicate this simple truth.

There are no "complex questions" about our failure in Afghanistan: We're propping-up a government of rapist and thieves who are worse than the Taliban in enough important respects to have produced a permanent insurgency.

There is no "debate" to be had on Haiti. We're brutalizing some of the poorest people in the world and attempting to kill the brightest examples of the democratic spirit in the history of the world.

There is nothing to describe our treatment of the First Nations other than racist colonialism.

Orwell's Bastard said...

Well, thwap, you're onto something here, as usual.

The challenge is going to be in fashioning an effective opposition strategy for the next four years. I won't pretend I have the answer, but you've got me thinking ...

Uncommoner said...

As an aside to the discussion (note to self: add Rope, Torches, Pitchforks to shopping list) I'd like to make an observation -

Part of our problem, a glaring part, is that for a very long time our elites have been able to largely ignore the consequences of their actions.

Brian Mulroney is a perfect example, so is Bruce Carson and I've no doubt there are many others.

You can see the results even more obviously south of the border, but that is the direction it seems to be going: criminals at the highest level slip right out from under even after their crimes are exposed. A smile, a wink and a pause on their way to count their money.

So long as the leaders and representatives we elect and the men and women who support and serve them answer to a different set of rules, there won't be any true democracy in Canada.

thwap said...

Ahem,

Two stupid trolls had their comments deleted.

Nomenfaodfuj, ... try more than empty-headed drive-bys and i'll give you the time of day.

You'll have to do some hard work to get by my intolerance for stupid bullshit.

"Anonymous" ... http://thwapschoolyard.blogspot.com/2009/08/wanted-better-grade-of-troll.html

OB,

The left is disorganized and deluded, no doubt about it. At the moment we wouldn't know an effective strategy if it bit us on the ass.

Uncommoner,

I actually want to use the sad example of US politics as a warning to Canadians. We HAVE to take our democracy seriously or else we'll end up totally brainwashed and totally conned and totally debased.

Actually, we're worse than the USA in some respects. We've allowed our banks and telecom companies to seriously rip us off for two decades now at least.

We HAVE a public health insurance program, but it wouldn't have come about from any of the latest generations.

We're being successively infantilized by garbage culture and sham democracy.

http://thwapschoolyard.blogspot.com/2009/10/consuming-kids-and-neo-liberalisms.html