Oil sands science seeps out
By Alison@Creekside
Remember that two year Environment Committee study on the tarsands that was ultimately shredded because the four parties at the table couldn’t agree on the wording of the witnesses’s testimony? The Lib members of that committee have now released their own report on the testimony and, as Andrew Nikiforuk reports at The Tyee, it [...]
Airshow Mackay and the Red Barons
By Alison@Creekside
Frankly I don’t think we can be expected to write a whole new blogpost every time Flying Ace “Airshow MacKay” and his trusty sidekick Woodstock Kory climb up on top of the Con doghouse to fight off the Red Baron yet again in the Arctic, so this time we’re just going with what David [...]
A G20 public inquiry? Not at this rate.
By Alison@Creekside
A special meeting of the Public Safety and National Security Committee was held Monday, “Requested by Four (4) Members of the Committee to Undertake a Study of the Issues Surrounding Security at the G8 and G20 Summits.”
Will there be a parliamentary study on G20 security issues?
Well, first they had to agree to a motion [...]
Lindsay Blackett strays from the script
By Frank Moher
So, Lindsay Blackett was just performing a public service when, at the Banff World Television Festival, he called Canadian TV “shit”? Apparently so. As the Alberta Minister of Culture and Community Spirit told the Calgary Herald earlier this week, his intention was to create “a national discussion” about Canadian TV’s crapitude. But I [...]
On shutting the fuck up
By Alison@Creekside
If there’s one thing Steve does really well, it’s using hot button issues to sew strife and division among his enemies.
Within a day of Conservative Senator Nancy Ruth’s tactical warning on Monday to NGOs that their insistence on having access to abortion included in Steve’s maternal health initiative for developing countries risked blowing the [...]
Ottawa expands its terror kit
By Alison@Creekside
Your government announced on Friday that it needs more powers to combat terrorism.
Justice Minister Rob Nicholson: “These provisions are necessary to protect our country from the threat of terrorism.”
A redo of the panicky, now-defunct Anti-terrorism Act of 2001, the new Combating Terrorism Act includes preventive arrest and forcing people to testify at secret hearings [...]
Rights and Democracy, and Hypocrisy
By Alison@Creekside
On the same day we are hearing from the three fired members of Rights and Democracy at the Foreign Affairs Committee (see below) comes an op-ed in the National Post by R&D board member Marco Navarro-Genie. And what a gong show stinker it is too.
According to Navarro-Genie, the Foreign Affairs committee is involved in [...]
Big day for the Blue Dog Liberals*
By Alison@Creekside
Quite a day, Blue Dog Liberals.
You voted against stopping a $¼-million government subsidy to an asbestos lobby group.
2) You dogwhistled about abortion, in your maternal health initiative for developing countries “wedge” motion, but were too afraid to actually include the word.
3) You used the “wedge” motion — intended to smoke out the Cons [...]
The Cons find their wedge issue: Israel
By Alison@Creekside
Two days ago Jason Kenney’s communications director Alykhan Velshi tweeted that Con MP Tim Uppal from the inquiry panel at the Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Antisemitism will be looking for unanimous all-party approval when he introduces a motion to condemn the use of the word “apartheid” as applied to Israel in the House [...]
Israel for dummies
By Alison@Creekside
Jason Kenney explains the difference between anti-Semitism and legitimate criticism of Israel at Monday’s session of The Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Antisemitism:
Irwin Cotler: “How does one distinguish between legitimate criticism of Israel and crossing the line?”
Jason Kenney: “Criticism of Israel predicated on a view of Israel as a criminal enterprise, as a state [...]
