Oh No! A Political Post!?
Recently one of my most extremely talented and intelligent writer-friends, along with her also super talented writer-man, were on tour in Ottawa, reading and promoting a new book called Rogue Stimulus: The Stephen Harper Holiday Anthology for a Prorogued Parliament. (Fantastic btw). They read at Parliament Hill, followed by another more intimate reading at Gallery 101. I was super excited to be a part of this. However, when my friend bashfully asked if I would come, as she didn’t know where I stood on the whole proroguement issue, I guess I got my back up. (eeek) So here was my response:
I’m livid our government isn’t technically working. It’s quite contradictory to bring in accountability acts and then not stand accountable to do your fucking job. Yes, Harper needs to be out. But I don’t really see any worthy adversary? (Not in comparison, but in totality). To be honest, I just feel disappointed in the entire thing.
Here’s where people misconstrue my opinion and think I’m some sort of hard-core Harper or Conservative supporter. I simply hate that we pick an action by the specific governing body - in this case proroguement – and then just attack ‘them’ – aka: the Harper Government. We need to fight the ENTIRE INSTITUTION. Every party. We all know the Liberals have prorogued parliament on many occasions before this… so if/when the Liberals get in, what’s not to say they’ll prorogue again as well? The battle should be for federal/law change, making it illegal to prorogue parliament, not just another party-change.
I just don’t see a real CHOICE. As Canadians, we just flip flop between the ‘blue’ & ‘red’ when one or the other fucks up – as they inevitably will. So we’ll have yet another expensive election to change parties, think we’ve done something great (yay us), but just get the same leader under a different name/party.
A politician by any other name will still prick you. (hmm, my attempt at a Shakespeare metaphor.. not bad?)
I should also put out a disclaimer that these are common conversations between her and I – she’s an incredibly insightful person that has constantly opened up my mind to many political issues (for one, the support of the Arts. Major.) I hope I have done the same for her.
Obviously I get a little impassioned about the whole thing as you can see. And I think we all should be. I also get distinctively disturbed by how quick people’s memories are. I remember when Harper was elected; all of a sudden people accused this party of committing us to war, and avoiding the Afghan detainee issue; when this was in fact the action of the Liberal Government. (one of many articles, if interested: http://news.ca.msn.com/top-stories/cbc-article.aspx?cp-documentid=23616157 ) Needless to say, the current party, whoever, must always be responsible to take on the messes that any previous one left behind, and unfortunately, this didn’t happen. So what’s worse? The original mess-makers, the lack-of response from the current party, or US – the people that stand idly by not demanding a change to government as a whole. I’ll say the latter.
But until then, I do strongly support those making ANY effort. The Rouge Stimulus is actually a brilliant book of poetry, not only because of the sheer talent – but because it is a strong gut-reaction. One that so many of us Canadians choose to passively ignore.
