The Final Nail in the Coffin of Conservative "Accountability"

With a government that has been so patently dishonest and lacking in transparency from the beginning it was only a matter of time before it came to this. Though when was the last time a party's headquarters’ were raided by the RCMP?

But really this is just another in a long list of lies, stonewalling and troubling secrecy on the part of a Government so unwilling to accept any criticism or have any semblance of accountability.....

- The gutting of their own Accountability Act and breaking their promises on Access to Information.
- Continued misleading of Canadians with regard to the Afghan detainee torture scandal and repeated attempts to block any investigation of this file that carry on to this day.
- Shameful and repeated censoring of Access to Information Requests.
- Censoring Government scientists to ensure only the “party line” gets heard.
- Firing independent regulators (like Linda Keen) for doing their jobs.
- Creating a manual manual on how to disrupt committees which they have used to block any investigation of the Cadman affair (where Conservatives stand accused of bribing Chuck Cadman to vote with them) and the “In and Out” Scandal that has been the source of today’s RCMP raid.
- And a long list of other troubling actions.

This from a government that pledged in the last election to be open, transparent and accountable?

So for those who thought the “In and Out” Scandal involving accusations that the Tories broke the law in allowing local candidates to claim $1.2 million in expenses for ads produced by the national campaign (thus going over the legal spending limit) was no big deal think again. You don’t see the RCMP raiding party HQ over a minor issue. But this should not be seen in isolation and with such a long pattern of shameful behavior on the part of this government if they ever tried to run a campaign claiming they were an honest and accountable government Canadians will either just laugh or turn away in disgust.

Canadians will instead be looking in the next election for a leader that embodies honesty and integrity and there is no federal party leader who has exhibited that more in his career than Stephane Dion.

Even Jack Layton has said that Dion is a “committed Canadian and a man of principle and conviction” as have so many others that have worked with Dion over the years. Canadians will see this clearly come election time as well. In contrast to the scandal prone Conservatives who mislead and stonewall at every turn, Dion will provide an honest government that is open and transparent.

Instead of a one-man show Government with the weakest front bench in Canadian history, a Dion led Government will have the strongest front bench in Canadian history.

Instead of demonizing and silencing our scientists and independent regulators, Dion will listen to them.

Instead of a government that governs at home and abroad based on ideology, Canadians will see in a Dion led Government one that governs based on reason and sound policy.

Instead of a government that is now seen as a pariah on human rights and the environment, under Dion, Canada will be a leader on both fronts.

Instead of a government that stands up for Canadians only when it’s convenient, a Dion government will stand up for all Canadians at home and abroad.

Instead of dividing people, Dion will show his capacity to unite them (like he did here).

Instead of always eyeing which policies will win the most voters or only paying attention to those voters that might vote for his party, a Dion government will provide Canadians with the policies needed to move Canada to the head of pack in the 21st century.

Dion will give Canadians the Government we can trust and the Government we need at this time in our history.

I for one look forward to a Prime Minister Dion so we can put this shameful era in Canadian history behind us and have a government we can proud of again not just at home but across the world itself. Today we move one step closer to that.

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Gone Two Days and So Much Changes: On Cadman and Afghanistan

What a week in Canadian in politics! I have to say first of all, I am glad to see so many Liberals who were upset about the budget response back focused on the horrible Tory government we have.

So of course EVERYONE has given their thoughts on the Cadman affair, but this is too big not to pile on with my thoughts, though I also wanted to talk about something I haven't read much about on the Liberal blogs involving Afghanistan.

First of all though the Cadman scandal. For those who don't think this is a big deal, when was the last time that we have been talking about the PMO possibly authorizing breaking the law? If in fact Harper or Doug Finley authorized offering Cadman financial incentives for voting a certain way (whether that be a $1 milllion loan or a $1 million life insurance policy) as I understand it is breaking the law.

So the RCMP must investigate this and while the NDP think this issue doesn't matter, the Liberals have to keep up the heat. I think we need to wait a bit yet to see if we should hold on an election on this issue, but if Harper's stories keep changing this week and they continue

I still think we can win a Spring election, but I think it's not so bad to let this affair play out another month or so so we can have more answers and then voting No Confidence in this terrible government. When we go on our own No Confidence motion in a month or two then we can frame the election how we want. As well, the budget still wouldn't pass (if memory serves me budgets aren't usually up for third reading until April or May and then of course still have to clear the Senate) so for those who believed strongly the Liberals needed to stop it, it would be stopped.

But this is big and it seems so far the only Tory defense is that the Cadman family are all pathological liars! Tell me Tories, what reason do everyone of Cadman's relatives have to lie about this? And what reason do the Conservatives have to lie about it?

You might say the offer of life insurance is implausible, but maybe they just meant "life insurance" (as in Cadman would in some way be compensated for the loss of his parliamentary plan to the equivalent of $1 million) . Again you can't attack this story without calling the Cadman family liars and so far Harper has refused to do so, so maybe he just happens to know they are right. Dance around it all you want but those are the facts of the story so far.

There's enough evidence from Cadman's own words in different interviews and Harper's own words that point to financial offers being made. We don't know for sure yet if the law was broken, but if the RCMP don't investigate that would be wrong.

So then there was another issue this week that I would have liked to have seen much more coverage on it. Scott Tribe talked about it, but I don't remember seeing it on any other Liberal blogs, but I think it's very important nonetheless. So it seems Afghan prisoner transfers have resumed. The issue of prisoners Canadians have handed over being tortured was a huge issue in the past and I am disappointed this issue has been drowned out by the Cadman scandal.

The Liberals have been strong defenders of human rights in the past and were very forceful in keeping on this issue in the past, I just hope they don't let this one slip. There was clear evidence priosoners were tortured in the past. It was bad enough that the Tories even admitted to it and had transfers stopped. So what's changed? Apparently not all that much, so we need to keep their feet to the fire on this.

This is a fundamental human rights issue that the Tories have badly handled and they don't seem to care if Canada is violating international law. They need to be put on the spot over this and the Liberals need to be asking more questions. We also need a clear solution for how to handle this prisoners in the future.

I also agree with Scott that Amnesty and the BC Civil Liberties group should go back to court on this issue. The lawsuit stopped because prisoner transfers stopped, I think the onus is now on the Harper to explain why they have resumed and Liberals ought to do all they can to assure we get answers and that Harper is held to account on his shameful handling of this whole saga.

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Canada Halts Transfers of Afghan Prisoners: Will the Conservatives Finally Admit They Were Wrong and Apologize?

Well, well. It seems after all the bluster that there couldn't be any torture going on, that anyone who said there could be was a Taliban lover, and that Canada could not possibly stop transferring prisoners to Afghan custody (Dion was told he was crazy for even suggesting the Conservatives look into other options), well I guess a certain government wasn't being very honest:

The Harper government quietly stopped transferring prisoners into Afghan custody months ago after compelling evidence of torture was discovered, the government admitted Wednesday on the eve of a federal court hearing.

Surely now the army of Conservative supporters who derided any suggestion of there being torture going on in Afghanistan will line up now to correct themselves and apologize to Stephane Dion and others who have been calling the government on this issue for almost a year now.

Surely Stockwell Day, Stephen Harper and Gordon O'Connor will also line up to admit they were wrong to make misleading claims in the House and to impugn Stephane Dion's character for raising this issue.

Though there remains a real question now, just what is being done with the prisoners if they aren't being handed over to Afghanistan authorities? After so much obfuscation from this government, Canadians deserve answers and an apology for such horrible mismanagment of an issue that has given Canada a black eye on the world stage.

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