Well THEY do it....
Supports the spoiled brat syndrome....
Eighteen seats huh.... Harpo should ask what's-his-name from Illinois how much a senate seat goes for these days....
Harper poised to appoint 18 Senators
- Thread starter Ron in Regina
- Start date
Well THEY do it....
Supports the spoiled brat syndrome....
Eighteen seats huh.... Harpo should ask what's-his-name from Illinois how much a senate seat goes for these days....
I don't think Harper needs to. He (and the Conservative Party) seem VERY capable of
raising funds from their supporters in donations of $1000 or less...The Conservative
Party is more than financially flush.
Good Day to you Socrates. If the Conservatives where to win a majority, I think it
would go down something very much like this:
-January 26th (or so) Harper introduces his budget, and it's fantastic...it spills cash
in all of the right directions in such a quantity that nobody can argue about it at all...
-Tacked onto the end of that budget it the "dump the $1.95/Party/Vote" Pork Barrel.
-The Liberals & Bloc & NDP overthrow the Conservative Government over that
budget.
-Harper goes to the GG, explains that the budget had everything in it that everyone
wanted, and he was still voted down, making the budget irrelevant to the Coalition.
-The GG calls another Election.
-Canada can see that the only reason the budget was turned down was to suck $$$
out'a their pockets in Pork Barrel $1.95/Party/Vote funds in tough financial times...
-Harper wins a Majority...the NDP becomes almost non-existent...the Liberals and
the Bloc wonder just what the Heck happened for the next four years...
That's just one senario, but that would assume that Stephen Harper was a fantastic
chess player, able to plan his moves several moves in advance. Oh well....
Haper won't be happy until Canada is the 51st state.
He would rather tank the country, rather than work with the opposition. The guy is off balance, and i'm glad his days as PM are numbered.
Viva La Canada :canada:
He would rather tank the country, rather than work with the opposition. The guy is off balance, and i'm glad his days as PM are numbered.
Viva La Canada :canada:
Last night on the tube I saw these statistics flash across the screen. I'm posting the numbers from memory. They are accurate within 5%, 9 times out of ten.
Average number of days Canadian senators worked last year: 78
Average number of days Canadian MPs worked last year: 158
Average number of days Canadian citizens worked last year: 252
Suddenly I feel very tired. At least my appointed senators are well rested. And my elected MP is not doing too shabby either.
Yep, appointed by a Liberal PM who had the confidence of the House, and in an active Parliament...
Harper knows he's not going to be in power much longer, and wants to ensure that the Con agenda is going strong long after he's gone...
Do you even know why hypocrisy means?
Please show me an instance where the Liberals even claimed that the Senate should be elected?
The only one showing hypocrisy in this instance is Mr. Harper. For the last, what 10 years (?), he has talked about how useless the senate is, and that is should be reformed. For him to now stack the senate is hypocritical, given his own statements.
Personally, I don't care if he appoints senators or not - but his actions speak again to his hypocrisy, that he has shown often. I do not hold him the Liberal statements or action - I hold him to his. Such as:
Promising open and accountable government - then shutting parliament to avoid a confidence vote (hypocrisy)
Speaking against an appointed senate - then appointing senators (hypocrisy)
Vowing to reduce the size of government - then increasing government spending by more than 2x inflation (hypocrisy)
Buying off the separatists in the past 2 budgets - then slamming the opposition for talking to them (hypocrisy)
Slamming Goodale for talking about taxing ITs, then taxing them 6 months later (hypocrisy).
Passing a fixed election date legislation - then calling an election (hypocrisy)
I could go on....
I have no respect for the man, and I expected better from him, and his party.
If you were an honest, open thinker - instead of a blind partisan - you would recognize that this man is a hypocrite and a power hungry sycophant, and realize that he is not the right man for the job.
Okay.....let me get this straight......
The Liberals have been "stacking" the Senate for about 100 years.
Harper wanted the Liberals to appoint elected Senators when they were in power. The Liberals refused, and continued "stacking" the Senate.
Harper, when elected, does not appoint Senators, because he wishes to see elected Senators elevated to the chamber.
This results in a chamber badly tilted towards Liberal partisans, in a political situation that is unstable, at best.
Harper, with no other option rather than be challenged by a Senate "stacked" with Liberals, regretfully takes his only option, to fill the 18 seats available with Conservatives.......and even that does not bring the chamber into balance, it simply gives Conservatives a reasonable representation there......
The Liberals scream "foul".....And that is hypocrisy.....on the Liberal side.
Colpy there is one other way to look at this. Has anyone heard that the Senate was not operating properly because of being 18 members short? Have Canadians suffered because the senate was underpopulated? Since the senate will still be mostly liberals, what the hell good does it do to spend another $2,340,000.00? Hypocracy, your name is Harper.
The Senate costs each Canadian less than 10 cents per year in salary - Where Harper screwed up last session is that he put all his bills before the house as confidence motions - If Harper had put Senate reform through as a regular motion voters could see his proposal and how the opposition dealt with it - The opposition could have offered ammendments and the bill could be debated. Same for Gun Registry etc. When a PM puts a bill before parliament and stakes his government's immediate future on the line the opposition either can kill the government or vote with it - no options. Harper has been playing hardball against the opposition and not standing up for Canada - We the people are just pawns in Harper's plan. Reminds me of the Pinky and the Brain cartoon - One is a genius the other insane - Harper has missed so many opportunities for Canada.
Juan - Thanks for doing the calculations - It is still under a dollar a year - People still get glossed over when a billion dollars is mentioned - That is $30 per Canadian - The US bail-out of the big 3 would cost Americans $30 each per Billion spent. Those exorbitant CEO salaries are pennies per vehicle when you use your math and has nothing to do with the survival of the industry - People are not going to rush out and buy cars if the CEO pulls a Lee Iacoca and works for $1/yr. Chrysler's turnaround was taking a company that was broken and fixing it - This mess is a market that is broken - Fix the market - Get money in peoples pockets and then the industry will turn around - I haven't owned a new vehicle since 1993 - survived quite well - Never owned a foreign built - had very good success and not one to treat my vehicles with care - Buying a vehicle for me is an economic decision - not a status thing . They are a hunk of rubber,glass, steel and plastic and they provide to my needs.
Firstly - I do see it as the Liberals aren't screaming "foul" - they are pointing out that the Conservatives have for years called for an elected senate - and now are doing the exact opposite of what they themselves have been calling for.
Do you even know what hypocrisy is? It's when YOUR actions run counter to YOUR words. It is not:
When YOUR actions run counter MY words
When MY actions run counter to YOUR words.
Holding the Conservatives accountable to their words is not hypocrisy.
If Harper does not want to be a hypocrite he could
1) Call for elections for the empty seats
2) State - I will fill the seats once we can have an election for those seats
3) State = "I would like to fill them, but it will go counter to my priniciples, so I won't"
Instead he is stacking the senate while he has chance - so basically throwing his principles out the window.
You can spin it however you want, but he is sacrificing his principles for political gain.
I do not respect someone who claims principles in one instance, and his own actions undermine those principles in the next.
It is wrong when the Liberals do, it is (at least) equally wrong when Harper does it. More so for Harper - because he runs his entire government on being "better" than the Liberals - and you can't tell me he isn't doing the exact same thing as the Liberals.
Besides - claiming that the senate is "more Liberal" now because the seats haven't been filled is tripe - the Liberals "dominated" the senate before the 18 retirements - even with the appointments, the Liberals will still "dominate" the senate. appointing Senators at this time does NOTHING except expose Harper as the hypocrite he is.
There is an old saying: "Take care of the pennies, and the dollars take care of themselves." That saying is more than appropriate here. Most people were probably not aware that the Senate was short of 18 members. I wonder if we would miss the other 69?
The Liberals have stacked the senate deck chairs for decades. If they aren't interested in an elected senate and are vying to overthrow an elected PM then by all means the PM should fill those vacancies. The political landscape can't always be aligned perfectly for the liberal party. Certainly not when most of the country wants them out and they won't go away.
There is a difference between calling for change and actually doing something about it - PM's of all stripes have made political appointments to the Senate - Paul Martin actually appointed a couple of staunch Conservatives that he admired to the post. Didn't help him in the election did it?
In all fairness, the Liberals wouldn't get in if more people didn't vote for them. Senators are appointed by the party in power and the Liberals have spent more time in power than have the Conservatives. The next election will probably determine which party the people want.
And the (Progressive) Conservatives didn't when Mulroney was in?
As I have said - I've got no problem with appointed senators. Harper can appoint as many (up to 18) or as few (0) as he wants. The appointment of senators is not an issue to me.
Him standing up for the past however many years and decrying what a horrible, underhanded thing appointed "pork-barreling" senators are, and that the only legimate senator is an elected one (yadda, yadda, yadda) - and then appointing senators is what I have trouble with. Perhaps he just keep mouth shut on certain items - instead of pandering to his base. But then again - it seems his base could care less what he stands for - so long as he is anti-Liberal and a Conservative.