Canucks wait in fear for this woman to speak

From somewhere north of the World's Longest Undefended Border (TM), Poor Len Canayen reminds us that, for our beloved Montréal Canadiens, the NHL hockey season is nearing an end. Next game is tonight when the Habs visit the Devils of (ugh) New Jersey. Game time is 7:00 EDT, on RDS. 

Three hours earlier, it's federal budget day in Canada. The Hon. Chrystia Freeland, Deputy to Prime Minister Blackie McBlackface, Minister of Finance and Printing More Money, and Diplomat of the Year 2018 (you could look it up), will tell the Canadian sheeple how much more they will have to pay for the socialist utopia in which they live.

No-one is looking forward to Ms Freeland's budget speech. But, Walt reminds our many Canadian readers, things could be worse.

The fragrant and lovely Ms Freeland could become prime minister, if Mr Socks decides not to risk leading his Gliberals into a fourth election, and hands her the poisoned chalice, as Lyin' Brian Mulroney did to Avril Phaedra Douglas "Kim" Campbell in 1993. It could happen! Lifetime pct .982.

While Canuck minister plays SJW, USA and Mexico near NAFTA deal

Canadian investors and businesspeople are chewing their nails, waiting and hoping for their federal government (Just In Trudeau, Prop.) to get serious about reaching a deal with the Paranoid States of America (and maybe Mexico) to renew the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The economies of the Land of the Somewhat Free and the Great No-longer-white North are so intertwined that a reversion to the status quo ante would be disastrous for Canada, less so for the USA. Canucks are worried about the possible failure of negotiations, Americans... not so much.

Chrystia Freeland, Canada's silver-spoon liberal Minister of Global Affairs [sic], announced as negotiations got under way that her Liberal government's priorities would be: aboriginal rights, gender equity and climate change. The American negotiators replied, "Huh? Don't you want to talk business?" Months of dithering have passed with Canada and the USA failing to even get on the same page, while the Mexicans look on in puzzlement.

So tired are the Americans of having to deal with the fragrant Ms Freeland and her SJW agenda that they resorted to holding "lower level" meetings without her. See "Canuck foreign minister Freeland skips 5th round of NAFTA talks", WWW 16/11/17. Mr Socks responded by putting former Conservative Prime Minister Lyin' Brian Mulroney and cabinet minister Rona Ambrose on the negotiating team, but everyone knew that was just for show since Ms Freeland won't talk to anybody who doesn't agree with the liberal orthodoxy. "These people are impossible to deal with! I'm going home!" was how she responded to questions from the Belgian government during negotiations for a Canada-European Union trade deal.

The Americans' next ploy was to let it be known, through "back channels", that they would be happy to sit down with someone more business-minded. That led to a clandestine visit to the White House by Stephen "Call Me Steve" Harper, the Conservative who Junior defeated in October of 2015. See "Mysterious meeting between WH bigshots and former Canadian PM", WWW 28/6/18. Unfortunately, word of the visit leaked out, and the Liberals can't afford politically to follow up on any progress which might have been made.

The state of play at the moment is that, absent the distraction of Ms Freeland and her SJW demands, the USA and Mexico are having productive talks, getting down to where the rubber meets the road. Reports this week suggest they're getting close to a deal, including an agreement on the contentious auto sector. That a deal is imminent was confirmed by none other than POTUS himself, who sent out this tweet on Friday.

Because of tariffs and trade barriers, President Trump said, "Canada must wait." Bad news for the Canucks, but not unexpected.  Two days earlier, Breitbart News reported that former New York Stock Exchange President Tom Farley said expected Trump to reach a trade deal with Mexico before the midterm elections. "Likely not Canada. China will be the bogeyman," he said. "You’ll see China continue to struggle. And then the idea will be can we get a big trade deal prior to [Donald Trump's] next election" in 2020.

Before the NAFTA negotiations got underway, many predicted that President Trump would have the hardest time working with Mexico because of his promise to erect a wall along the border. Instead, American negotiators have discovered they have a lot of common ground with the Mexicans, and talks have gone well. The stumbling block in renegotiating a tripartite NAFTA is... wait for it... Canada!

Canucks heave Steve, elect the Hair Apparent

It was a dark and stormy night. [This is not the Bulwer-Lytton contest. Start again. Ed.] Seriously, then, I'm using toothpicks to keep my eyes open after a loooong night following the Canadian federal election results on the idiot's lantern. It was a night to remember. [No movie titles, please. Ed.]

No analysis this morning, just the numbers and a couple of comments. Fear and loathing of Stephen Harper, impelled Canadians to show him the exit/sortie. That this would happen was apparent for weeks. The question was who would replace him, with some wondering if the opposition NDP and Liberals would split the anti-Harper vote, allowing the Dear Leader to rise from the coffin he built for himself.

Turns out Canucks are smarter than that.There was an organized push for strategic voting. ABH (Anybody But Harper) voters were asked to mark their ballots for the candidate with the best chance of beating the Tories in their riding, and most decided that would be the Liberal. That caused the NDP vote to collapse, even in long-time strongholds like central Toronto.

The NDP lost big in Québec, where the aberrant "orange crush" of 2011 turned into an "orange crash". Québécois are great bandwagon jumpers too, and, once they saw which was the wind was blowing, turned around to get it at their backs. It must be said too that the niqab issue hurt the NDP in la Belle Province, which, interestingly, seems more committed to Canadian values than TROC.

In the end, Mr. Harpoon's Conservatives didn't do that badly, hanging on to 99 seats in the 338-seat House of Commons. It was the NDP collapse -- they finished with 44 seats compared with over 100 before -- that propelled Justin Trudeau's Liberals into government, with a comfortable majority -- 184 seats.

There is much rejoicing in the urban liberal parts of Canada. In his acceptance speech this morning (Montréal time), Trudeau II spoke of "sunny ways", inclusive politics, celebrating diversity (especially if it wears a Sikh or Muslim head covering), yada yada yada. He channelled Obama 2008, with lots of talk about hope and change, concluding with "For Canadians, better is always possible."

Well... yeah... Canucks are glad to see the back of a prime minister even more despised than Brian Baloney. In the euphoria of the moment, nobody's talking much about what happens next. Expectations of M Trudeau are high, very high, and it will be interesting to see to what extent he can rise to meet them.

Further reading:
"Justin Trudeau's turn to face the weight of expectations" - Neil Macdonald (no relation to Sir John Eh), CBC News
"Stephen Harper's legacy: Good, bad and a dose of ugly" - the estimable Terry Milewski, also on the CBC News site.

If you only had one bullet...

Poor Len Canayen here! Just saw this picture in Canada's Notional Pest, and it makes me wonder...

If you're a Canadian, a lover of your country and its national winter sport, and you only have one bullet... which of these orifices would you shoot first?

Replay from Walt: I'd make the tiny perfect Bettman stand in front of Lyin' Brian and shoot `em both at once!

Secretive, controlling, manipulative, crude, autocratic, vicious, unprincipled, untrustworthy, paranoid

Andrew Coyne is a political analyst, journalist, and member of CBC-TV's At Issue panel. He is no lover of Canadian Gliberals and Kneedippers. His politics are generally MOR, leaning perhaps to the right. One must pay attention, then, when he excoriates the Conservative government of Steve "Stephen" Harper.

This he does in "The economy is in good shape, so why is support for the Conservatives slumping?" in today's National Post. I hope Mr. Coyne and his publisher will not mind if Walt reprints a large chunk of his column -- an excellent explanation of why Harper and his party are even more reviled by Canadians than his role model, the execrable Lyin' Brian Mulroney.

Mr. Malarkey at least had a twinkle in his eye and the charm and blarney of a son of the ould sod. Harper has none of this, only the character of a self-righteous, self-satisfied bully. And that is why, unless there is a major distraction or disruption between now and 2015, the Harper-led "Nasty Party" -- Coyne's phrase -- will lose the election due in that year. (Lifetime pct .986.)

Here is Mr. Coyne's view.

If today both Mr. Harper and the party he leads are actively disliked by more than seven voters in 10, it may be because they have gone out of their way to alienate them in every conceivable way — not by their policies, or even their record, but simply by their style of governing, as over-bearing as it is under-handed, and that on a good day.

When they are not refusing to disclose what they are doing, they are giving out false information; when they allow dissenting opinions to be voiced, they smear them as unpatriotic or worse; when they open their own mouths to speak, it is to read the same moronic talking points over and over, however these may conflict with the facts, common courtesy, or their own most solemn promises.

Secretive, controlling, manipulative, crude, autocratic, vicious, unprincipled, untrustworthy, paranoid … Even by the standards of Canadian politics, it’s quite the performance. We’ve had some thuggish or dishonest governments in the past, even some corrupt ones, but never one quite so determined to arouse the public’s hostility, to so little apparent purpose. Their policy legacy may prove short-lived, but it will be hard to erase the stamp of the Nasty Party.

Perhaps, in their self-delusion, the Tories imagine this is all the fault of the Ottawa media, or the unavoidable cost of governing as Conservatives in a Liberal country. I can assure them it is not. The odium in which they are now held is well-earned, and entirely self-inflicted.

How judicial inquiries work

In the UK and Canada, the accepted way to "deal with" a scandal which is having unpleasant political repercussions is to hold a judicial inquiry or a royal commission. Here's how it works. You find an "unbiased" (but compliant) judge -- a retired judge verging on senility perhaps -- and give him terms of reference that effectively take away his fishing pole. That is, you restrict him from poking too deeply into the dirt at the heart of the matter.

A paradigm of futility would be Canada's famous White Oliphant commission, a topic Walt harped on [wrote on, surely. Ed.] back in 2010. The real scandal was the money that former Prime Minister Lyin' Brian Mullarkey received from Airbus Industries for his part in getting Air Canada (then a crown corporation) to buy a substantial number of its A320 aircraft.

However, the commissioner, Mr Justice Oliphant (retd), was told he was to enquire only into whether Baloney had had any business dealings while he was still prime minister with Karlheinz Schreiber, an oleaginous German-Canadian dealer in armored cars, spaghetti machines and what have you. It was Schreiber who gave the Jaw That Walks Like A Man brown envelopes full of 1000-dollar bills, which the Jaw stashed away and, errr, forgot about until the Mounties started investigating, errr, Schreiber.

The other thing you do, to make sure an inquiry or commission does no harm to anyone, is to deny it the power to punish anyone. It can make findings, and even recommendations, but don't let it initiate criminal proceedings or actually punish anyone or order anyone to do anything. Walt finds that this is ridiculous and recommends that future commissions actually be provided with a few teeth.

Fast forward three years and change location to London, where the British government and its broadcasting arm, the British Broadcorping Castration [British Broadcasting Corporation! Ed.] are up to their nether regions in shit over hundreds of sex crimes which (an independent broadcaster has revealed) were committed by the famous comedian and notorious paedophile, Sir Jimmy Savile.

"Sir Jimmy" got his knighthood from Her Britannic Majesty, by the way, and a similar honour from the late Unblessed Pope John Paul II. Embarrassingly for the Queen and the Vatican, the honours cannot somehow be taken back, since the old bugger mercifully died some months before his delicts came to light.

This week, Brits have been shocked [Shocked, I tell you! Ed.] by more claims of sexual abuse, this time by a senior politician of the Thatcher era. On the BBC's Newsnight programme, a young man said he had been abused by an unnamed politician -- not Lord McAlpine -- at the Bryn Estyn children's home in Wales.

The response of the British government to the latest wave of sex abuse allegations has been altogether predictable. On Tuesday, Home Secretary Theresa May announced a new police inquiry is to investigate fresh allegations into the way police handled child abuse accusations in care homes during the 1970s and 80s.

And -- get this! -- there will also be a judicial inquiry into the failings of previous judicial inquiries. Amazing, isn't it?

Further lurid details: Wales child abuse: PM orders sex abuse inquiry probe

Footnote: The legal beagle who drew the terms of reference for the useless Oliphant commission duly received his reward from a grateful Conservative government. He is now the Governor-General of Canada.

Forgotten the Oliphant commission already? See "The Oliphant labours, and brings forth...nothing" and "The Oliphant hath laboured...". [Some lack of originality in the second headline. But that was back in 2010. We're doing better now...aren't we? Ed.]

The great multicult mistake

Here's a brief history of multiculturalism in Canada, according to Salim Mansur, political scientist, columnist for Canada's Sun newspapers, and author of Delectable Lie: A liberal repudiation of multiculturalism, a new book soon to be panned by the lamestream media as "unhelpful" and "downright racist".

Canada was the first of the Western democracies to turn multiculturalism — an idea Mansur calls "without philosophical substance" — into official policy. In October 1971, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau introduced multiculturalism as an official policy for Canada. PET told Canadians that they wouldn't recognize Canada after he got through with it. He was right.

In 1988, in a blatant attempt to grab a bigger share of "the ethnic vote", Lyin' Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservatives enshrined Trudeau’s policy in a new Multiculturalism Act. The ethnics and vizmins kept voting Liberal anyway.

The lesson is that you can't blame official multiculturalism on either the centre-left Liberals or the centre-right Conservatives. Both parties, just as much as the pinko NDP, are unwavering in their support for the cult of multicult, even today. It was not just Trudeau, but Canada’s political elite, supported by the intellectual and media elites of the country -- the Rosedale liberals -- who adopted as the law of the land a dubious and deeply flawed policy, with virtually no questions asked.


Four decades after multicult became not just trendy but politically correct, some of the Western democracies -- Germany, Britain, France, the Netherlands -- have openly expressed regrets. Their elected leaders have all publicly admitted the failure of official multiculturalism to secure social harmony or advance national interests.

In Delectable Lie: A liberal repudiation of multiculturalism, Mansur (of Arab origin, please note) analyses why the multicult policy was imposed on Canada in an act of bad faith, and is detrimental to the vitality of Canada or any liberal democracy.

The bad faith resided in the ridiculous proposition that all cultures are equal. This is the keystone of multiculturalism as an idea, and, Mansur says, is untenable.
Individuals are born equal, he argues, but cultures — by definition, culture represents the shared values, beliefs and customs of a collective — are not and never have been equal.

It is absurd, he writes, to say that the culture of the Saudi Arabs — or the Taliban, or Muslims from Pakistan, Iran, Somalia etc. — is in any way equal to and deserving of equal respect as the culture of an advanced liberal democracy, such as Canada before it was smitten by the dogma of multiculturalism.

Late in life, we are told, Trudeau expressed his misgivings about multiculturalism. He was asked to comment on how, as a result of his policy, most new immigrants ranked their ethnic-based cultural identity ahead of Canadian identity. He indicated his sadness, admitting this is not what he had wanted. That's as close as PET would ever come to admitting he made a mistake. Unfortunately, the damage had long since been done. Perhaps it can never be undone.

Click here to read some excerpts from this worthwhile new book. The website is that of ACT! for Canada, which is loosely connected with Brigitte Gabriel's ACT! for America, which has over 150,000 members, close to 500 chapters across America and a full time lobbyist on Capitol Hill.

Spector tells Harper how to wiggle out of the Afghanistan trap

Checking out the comments bulletin boards in major Canadian newspapers [An oxymoron? Ed.], I see that opinion is running heavily against "Call me Steve" Harper's solo decision to extend the mission in Afghanistan for another three years. Even the CBC's "Cross-country Checkup" ["Cross Country", surely. Ed.], which is notorious for screening callers to make sure they only parrot the politically correct party line, had more "antis" than "pros" on Sunday.

You would think that, with public opinion running roughly 2 to 1 against staying in the cesspit that is Afghanistan, Mr. Harpoon might be having second thoughts about the wisdom of caving in to the American demands. Trouble is, having flip-flopped so publicly, and having been caught in a monstrous lie, it's not so easy to do it again.

To the rescue comes Norman Spector, Globe and Mail columnist and at one time a top bureaucrat and political advisor to the not-soon-enough-ex Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. In today's column, Spector advises Mr. Baloney's successor to let Parliament vote on the issue, rather than pretend it's an executive decision that he (Harper) can take on his own.

The way Spector sees it, Harper can't lose by letting Parliament decide. If they vote "yes", it relieves him of responsibility for the further loss of life and treasure. If they vote "no", Harper can go to his masters in the White House and the Pentagon and say, "Gee, sorry, but I couldn't get it past those stupid elected representatives."

It's a brilliant strategy, with the bonus of being seen to be clearly democratic. Even Obama has to have the advice and consent of the Senate before waging war. Why should the Prime Minister of Canada be any different?

Oliphant commission docs online

Following up yesterday's post, here's where you can find key documents of the Oliphant commission's report on Canada's sleazy cheesy former Prime Minister.

Mr. Justice Oliphant's statement -- Summary of his findings
The commission's final report -- The whole nausea-inducing thing - good reading for insomniacs
The commission's website -- Everybody's got a website these days!

Transcript of the hearings -- This cost you millions of dollars. If you didn't see it in TV, the least you can do is read it! Don't miss the part where the Right Honourable Mr. Mullarkey says he never did anything wrong in his life. Many other "Honourables" also exposed as venal or merely stupid. Shoals of sharks [lawyers, surely. ed.] make well-paid appearances.

"Mulroney pressured to pay back $2-million defamation settlement" -- From today's Globe and Mail. Note that the Glob still hasn't enabled its comments section for this story.

Will the sleaziest, smarmiest, scummiest prime minister since Sir John Eh give back the money? Walt's assessment of the chances of that happening: slim and none.

The Oliphant hath laboured...

...and hath brought forth a mouse!

In "The Oliphant in the room", one of my very first posts, I suggested (in what I hoped would be satire) that the report of the Oliphant commission into the dealings between former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and a German businessman and convict, Karlheinz Schreiber, would amount to nothing.

Yesterday, only five months after it was due, Mr. Justice Oliphant's report was finally released. And it amounted to nothing. Here's what we learned.

Mr. Schreiber counted Mr. Mullarkey among his friends, and had unprecedented access to him and his office, even while he was prime minister. Shortly after that Mr. Mulroney took a bunch of cash ($225,000 or $300,000, depending on which crook you believe) from the self-confessed bribemeister, stashed it in safety deposit boxes in the USA and Canada, and still can’t come up with a believable explanation for so doing.

Where did the money come from? Judge Oliphant found it was likely a commission paid by Airbus Industries to Mr. Schreiber for the sale of several Airbuses to Air Canada. But, he says, "there is no evidence" that Lyin' Brian knew that.

Judge Oliphant said that he found Mr. Mulroney's explanation for why he took the money "troubling at best, and, at worst, not worthy of any credence." He characterized the former PM's actions as "inappropriate" -- a conclusion which has been submitted to the Guinness Book of Records in the category "Understatement of the Decade".

Which is the lesser of the two weasels?

But let us not judge the judge. His hands were tied. The commission's terms of reference, as dictated by Mr. Mullarkey's good friend and mentor, "Call Me Steve" Harpoon, precluded Judge Oliphant from asking questions about the Airbus affair.

Worse, he was bound not to assess civil or criminal liability. All he could do was give Mulroney a stern lecture saying how disappointed we all are that he (Mulroney) did not live up to the code of ethical conduct that he (Mulroney) himself (Mulroney) legislated while he (Mulroney) was PM.

Mr. Mullarkey, through a spokesperson, said that he was gratified that Judge Oliphant found there had been no wrongdoing while he (Mulroney) was prime minister. That there was plenty of wrongdoing starting about 48 hours after Mulroney resigned, but while he was still a Member of Parliament, was not explained or apologized for.

The Oliphant Commission cost Canadian taxpayers a sum not unadjacent to $16 million ... including legal fees paid to Mr. Mulroney's lawyers. It's a mystery how the ex-PM qualified for legal aid, since he received over $2 million from the former government as settlement of a libel action over allegations that he (Mulroney) did pretty much what Judge Oliphant has now found he did.

In his statement yesterday, poor Mr. M. did not volunteer to give back the $2 million. When asked in the House of Commons if the government would try to recover the money, Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said the government would study the report.

The Oliphant labours, and brings forth...nothing

In July -- how quickly we forget -- we were enjoying the spectacle of a former prime minister of Canada, one Martin Lian Baloney, appearing before a commission of enquiry to explain why he pocketed $225,000 in case (or $300,000 if you accept the word of the donor) for doing, by Baloney's account, virtually nothing.

The Commissioner in charge of the proceedings was Jeffrey Oliphant, Associate Chief Justice of the Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench. Mr. Justice Oliphant was appointed to his position by ex-Prime Minister Mulroney's government, so of course he could be relied on to make a clear and objective judgment of the facts before him. He said he would do this in December.

December has come and gone -- how quickly we forget -- and there is no sign of any report from His Lordship. Rumour in Ottawa has it that there was not enough meat in the evidence to produce even a thin gruel.

Walt has already seen an early draft of the report; see "The Oliphant in the Room". Since that version will likely never see the light of day, Walt can now reveal the true winners of the epic battle -- the judge, the lawyers, and of course Mr. Baloney, who had a chance to present his self-serving version of the events for two days...all expenses paid by the Canadian taxpayer.

Stop the unfair tax grab! Sign the petition against the HST!

The following comes from a source who must remain anonymous...

A Boomer Wealth Coach Analysis for Ontario Seniors

Was the Liberal Budget presented to Ontario on 26 March 2009, a tax grant or a tax grab? Depending on whose politics or what lobbyists, the answer will be GRANT! Or GRAB! ..... Or somewhere in between.

Our staff did something different. We read the Budget document, called the Ministry Office for details, and added up the numbers. Then, we looked at the results as to how these proposals would affect the retired, or soon to be retired. It tired us out! Our Report follows. We would encourage you to forward this Report to friends and family. There is a very real need to plan for retirement comfort -- even more so, with the proposals recently introduced.

THE TAX GRAB -- 8% more for NOTHING more

Seniors living in retirement enjoy a lifestyle different than the one they lived while working. In retirement, to be active often means paying a fee, a membership, an admission, a subscription or for costs for travel, etc. We have calculated that the impact of this Liberal Budget will be more costly for Ontario seniors than anyone has reported.

Consider a retired couple, receiving total retirement income of $41,400 after tax per year*, healthy enough to enjoy some comfort in retirement. Many of those items used on a daily basis will now be subject to an 8% cost increase, because of the new harmonized sales tax introduced by the Liberal provincial government in this Budget.

Look at just a few of those items that will cost more, without getting more.
Cable TV: if $60 monthly, yearly increase is $57.60 more.
Golf Fees: if $1,500 yearly X 2, yearly increase is $240.00 more
Gym Membership: if $35 month X 2, yearly increase is $67.20 more.
Hydro: if $85 monthly, yearly increase is $81.60 more.
Haircuts: if $450 X 2 annually, yearly increase is $72.00 more.
Heating Fuel: if $800 annually, yearly increase is $64.00 more.
Internet: If $65 monthly, yearly increase is $62.40 more.
Income Tax Prep. If cost is $150 X 2, yearly increase is $24.00 more.
Legal Fees: for wills, P.Of A., advice, etc. If $400, add 8%, $32.00 more.
London Knights tickets: 4 games X 2, yearly incr. Is $11.52 more (note Senior Season Ticket $484 X 2, yearly increase is $77.4 4 more)
Magazine Subscription: $25 annually X 4, increase is $8.00 more
Movie Tickets: one per month X 2, yearly increase is $16.32 more
Newspapers Subscription: $20 monthly, yrly incr. Is $18.91 more
RRIF/RRSP**: $400,000 family savings, yrly incr. $1,040.00 more. **This is a NEW HIDDEN TAX OF $52 per $20,000 on deposit, ANNUALLY
Telephone: if $48 monthly, yearly increase is $46.08 more
Tim Hortons Coffee: 3 per week X 2, yrly increase is $41.18.
Toronto Theatre: 2 X $150 ticket, yrly increase $24.00
Vacation Travel: $450 airline ticket X 2, yrly increase $76.00 more
Veterinarian: Beagle is Family! Add $32.00 more.
Vitamins: $60 monthly X 2, yrly increase $115.20 more

Are you ready for the TAX KICK coming?
For just these listed items***NEW TAXES OVER $2,100.00 MORE EVERY YEAR ..!!
THIS TAX IS COMING IN 2010

Go to this website to sign a petition against the new HST (harmonized sales tax).
www.unfairtaxgrab.com

Note from Walt: When you go to the website, you'll find it's sponsored by the NDP. God forbid that we should ever again have an NDP government in Ontario -- remember Rae! -- but you'll find that they are the only party fighting against the HST. Why don't the provincial Tories oppose it? Where's their great white hope, Tim Hudak, in this debate? Nowhere!

Do you want to know why? Because the HST is not just the will or fault of the provincial Liberals. It is just as much the wish and fault of the federal Conservatives, the government of "Call Me Steve" Harper. So much does Harpoon want McGuinty to wear this one, that he (or his finance minister, Jim Flattery) has sweetened the deal with a "grant" of $4 billion to ease the pain...and help Dwight Dunkin Donuts balance the books a tad sooner

Make no mistake, fellow citizens! HST really stands for Harper Sales Tax! It was Mulroney that brought us the GST, and now his successor aims yet another kick at our pocketbooks...and sucks McGuinty into joining in kicking us while we're down.

The biggest whitewash

Readers following the Airbus Commission (surely "Oliphant Commission"? ed.) will be aware that on Sunday Karl-Heinz Schreiber, the man who gave former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney $300,000 in cash (which somehow shrank to $225,000 according to Mulroney) was extradited to Germany to face criminal charges there. Justice Minister Rob Nicholson gave the order with indecent haste, only a couple of days after Mr. Justice Oliphant said he had conluded his deliberations, but much in advance of the judge's report, which might be released later this year.

Here is an astute commentary from Douglas Bell's blog in the Globe and Mail, 3/8/09

As I type this, minds more august than my own are no doubt weighing in on the Schreiber expulsion. That said, can you imagine a key witness in a high-powered U.S. Senate committee inquiry into government corruption being extradited Honduran-style, in the dead of night over a holiday weekend, before the committee had reported its findings?

That Justice Oliphant didn’t have the suck to keep one of his key witnesses in the country lends credence to a curt missive I received early this morning from a player in the inquiry: "One of Canada’s great white-washes."

Walt is prepared to bet a cookie that the "player" mentioned by Mr. Bell is none other than Norman Spector, former fart-catcher for Mr. Malarkey, who was quite adamant in his testimony before Mr. Justice Oliphant that the relationship between Mr. Schreiber and Mr. Baloney didn't pass the smell test.

Check out Mr. Spector's own column, "Spector Vision", in which he reveals some of the things that m'lud didn't allow us to hear. Then read "The Oliphant in the Room", posted here 7/7/09.

The Oliphant in the Room

Agent 03 has been able to obtain a copy of the report of the Hon. J.J. Elephant relating to the business and financial dealings between Karlheinz Fiftyseven and the Right Honourable Brian Mullarkey, P.C. (Progressive Conservative):

Whereas Her Excellency the Governor General, on the recommendation of the Prime Minister who desperately desires to distance himself from any association with his Right Honourable P.C. predecessor, has directed the Commission to conduct an inquiry into certain allegations respecting business and financial dealings between Karlheinz Fiftyseven and the Right Honourable Brian Mullarkey, P.C., the Commission now begs to report:

1. It has assessed carefully all the relevant evidence and information relating to the above matters, excluding only that which would be embarrassing to Air Canada, the Conservative Party, the Right Honourable Mr. Mullarkey, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Farce or any other parties which might be shown to be corrupt or incompetent or both.

2. It has questioned (in private, if necessary) all those involved, excluding of course the Honourable Frank Magazine and Roger Doucet (no relation), who had unfortunately passed away in the twenty-odd years between the events and the time of this enquiry.

3. It believes without reservation the sworn testimony of the Right Honourable Mr. Mullarkey (whose regard for the truth has been well known for lo these many years), especially the part where he swears that he never in his life did anything wrong.

4. It concludes that, while certain mistakes and errors in judgment may have been made, no one was really to blame for anything, in any real way.

5. Further, the commission concludes that there is no compelling reason (other than the moral imperative) why Mr. Mullarkey ought to return to the taxpayers of Canada any of the millions of dollars he received in settlement of a previous court action, or to return to Mr. Fiftyseven any of the hundreds of thousands of dollars he received for services in promoting the sale of arms to hostile foreign governments;

6. Nor should Mr. Mullarkey's counsel, nor any of m'learned friends whose bank accounts have been fattened at public expense return any of the exorbitant fees they have received for sitting quietly and laughing politely at Mr. Mullarkey's little jokes.

7. The Commission recommends that the beatification of the Right Honourable Mr. Mullarkey proceed as quickly as possible, and expresses the hope that the Government of Canada will shortly allocate stimulus funds for the construction in his honour of a church at Meech Lake.

8. Er...that's all. (Steve, is this enough?)

Signed,
"J.J. Elephant"

Note: The Commission would like to express its thanks to Air Canada for courteously transporting him (first class) to Ottawa and back on board its lovely Airbus, at no cost except possibly to the public.