Thursday, March 24, 2011

Unprecedented Contempt

In the dying days of the 40th Parliament of Canada, the Liberals are now rallying around an "unprecedented contempt" motion as one of their main talking points for the upcoming campaign. For starters, the reason this rarely happens is because it can really only happen in a minority Parliament. Only about 1/4 of our elections produce minorities, so this is unprecedented with a historical sample size of about a dozen. Of those other minority governments, when the House lost confidence they voted no confidence at their nearest opportunity. They never used to go to the trouble to hold committees on contempt, loaded with opposition members granted by an opposition House Speaker.

What's unprecedented is how long this minority government of Stephen Harper has lasted, and no previous minority government had to deal with a 24 hour news cycle and the internet. Well Paul Martin did and it destroyed him. What the opposition has done in 2011 is just conjure up a procedural gimmick to parade in the media in an effort to damage the Prime Minister. They have thrown everything but the kitchen sink at the PM since he was elected, and it hasn't even made a dent. Is the contempt idea going to work? I guess we will soon find out.

10 comments:

  1. Dead-on. These clowns actaully fancy themselves some kind of criminal court with them acting as the both judge and prosecution. People are not this dumb.

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  2. The biggest challenge for these clowns is how to explain this "contempt" to an electorate, who for the most part couldn't give a rat's ass, without slandering (no parliamentary priveledge on the hustings)!

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  3. Anyone looking at the "contempt" charge would quickly see that it is not much more that partisan spin. Unfortunately it is an example where the words seem to sound much more serious than the actual charge entails in this case. I think they need to make clear that this is not much more than partisan mud-slinging -- in my view, that is where the contempt arises -- hijacking committees for partisan purposes -- indeed, an abuse of Parliament.

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  4. Now if they want contempt; I've got contempt. I hold them in the deepest contempt possible! They being the opposition clowns that use false accusations to slander a minister of the crown.

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  5. I think all Harper has to do is to make the point that it is contempt for the Canadian people when the coalition parties will not, and specifically Iggy, completely disavow any such future effort.

    The problem is, and I do remember Trudeau and NEP, even if they all disavow they all believe the public is stupid and has a very short attention span. Unfortunately based on PET doing what he campaigned against in the Crosbie budget the media never made a peep. And they still won't peep.

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  6. They can rally around free NHL arenas in every city: it won't change the fact the general election will allow voters to pass judgment on the failed coalition coup by the political parties in the opposition.

    Some in the left still believe Adscam and the coup were okay.

    I wonder if the election will be over for the Liberals after Ontario results come in.

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  7. If the 3 stooges attempt a coup to take over this Govt. and risk a ruination of our economy and country,the street will look like the streets last month in Egypt. CBC can sing coalition praise, but all it does is make the GOVT. stronger.

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  8. The opposition is suffering from John Tory syndrome... remember our former Ontario Conservative leader who, when running against premier Dolton McGuinty in the last provincial election, would NOT let go of his losing platform of funding all faith-based schools no matter how much the polls showed him sinking? It's the same with this federal opposition... determined to pursue this scandal-a-week/contempt/anti-democracy charges against Harpers government even though the polls show them actually LOSING ground with this bogus strategy... but they won't let it go :-)
    John Tory got trounced in Ontario, even against an unpopular McGuinty who walked away with a majority. Same thing is going on here at the federal level. And I'm waiting for the same result - a conservative majority... keep up the good work Iffy & Taliban Jack - don't let go of that bone!!!

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  9. David Akin says:
    "This government will never be found in contempt of Parliament."

    short,
    clock ran out to debate contempt motion,
    Govt has 10 days in which to reschedual it...
    not gonna happen!

    read it here:
    http://davidakin.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2011/3/23/4778357.html

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  10. If the polls were even remotely close, there could be some justification for the opposition forcing an election.

    But they are not, yet the opposition is clamoring for an election. (apparently whether Canadians want an election or not does not factor into the media narrative this time).

    An election they know they will lose and will cost them dearly in terms of their war chests. Yet they still push forward.

    It is a move of pure desperation. The opposition has become accutely aware that there is a correlation between the length of time the Conservatives hold office (Harper really) and their popularity.

    So they must act now. but there is not a chance in hell that any of the opposition parties will win the most seat in the next election.

    So the goal of this desperate move is to hold the Conservatives to another minority and move again to form a coalition.

    And that will be the focus of the media over the next 60 days. Stop a Conservative majority at all costs.

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