Not just a pattern. A strategy.

As Dawg says, a pattern is emerging. It is more than that however.

The discovery that phone calls directing voters to non-existent polling places was targeted to a specific age group, in this case voters over aged 60, reveals a strategy.

Most of those who received an automated phone call telling them their polling station had been changed say they were previously contacted by the Conservative Party and indicated that they would not be supporting their local Tory candidate.

Now federal elections officials say that the fraudulent phone calls targeted older voters.

“Every single person I’ve contacted has been (born) between 1947 and 1949,” said one unidentified Elections Canada employee who was following up on the complaints Friday morning.

That's strategic targeting.

The revelation suggests that whoever was behind the fraudulent robocalls that are now the subject of a massive investigation may have been working off of a more sophisticated list of electors than the barebones voter information provided by Elections Canada.

Enright said that the list of voters that all political parties and local candidates receive during an election period contains only the names and addresses of electors. Combined, parties spend millions of dollars during a campaign to identify likely supporters as well as non-supporters and target them for donations and other forms of support.

It also suggests that the Conservatives have done some deep data-mining beyond what the they told their own ridings in their CIMS presentation. The Conservative CIMS, designed to track voters, uses the federal voters list and many other sources to create an accurate database. In the Power-Point presentation the central campaign made to riding campaigns none of the displays, offered as examples, shows any information which reveals the age or date of birth of the voter. If the CIMS training given to riding campaign workers is accurate, the riding had no access to voters' ages.

That raises three questions:
1. Where did they get the information?
2. What is actually stored on the CIMS database and has the CPoC collected information on Canadians which infringes on privacy rights?
3. Where is it stored and who had/has access? This outfit?

G20.ca belongs to the Canadian government... right?

Wrong!!!

Go on over to Bene Diction Blogs On and get the real story.

Now tell me. How is it that Charles McVety knew to lock down the G20.ca URL when the rest of us didn't get the official word that Harper was planning a gazillion dollar photo-op in Canada before December 2009?

Hmmm???

Graphic courtesy of Alison. (Hope she doesn't mind that I stole it without asking).

More cover-ups for the higher-ups

My guess would be that, as in most government scandals, the big problem here is not going to be the initial misconduct by some underling, but the subsequent bullshittery by the government in trying to hush the whole thing up.

Obviously, at some stage someone in the chain of command figured out a mistake had been made in handing over prisoners to the Afghans, and obviously they reported it to someone higher up who was eventually told it was not a problem, when it very much was a problem. The question is: Who was the amoral idiot who decided it wasn't a problem to hand prisoners over to be tortured, and how high up in the government ranks are they? Given the steps being taken to squelch this investigation, I think we can assume it was someone fairly senior, possibly Cabinet level.

The government is doing its best to delay things until they can appoint a new commissioner to the Military Police Complaints Tribunal when the current chairman, Peter Tinsley, reaches the end of his term in December. And they will probably manage to succeed and appoint some useful idiot to shut down the inquiry once and for all.

Which will probably lead the whistleblowers to take the case to the public in bigger and better ways. Eventually, even if it has to wait for a change of government, the truth will out, but it isn't going to set anybody free in this case, except in the sense that they will be free from being tied down to a government job anymore.

Pop Quiz!

Imagine you work as a subcontractor for a bank. The bank wants photos of a bunch of properties on which it holds mortgages to confirm the properties are being kept up and to check the condition of properties on which the mortgage is in default, so off you go in your car with your trusty camera and start snapping away. One homeowner sees you parked in front of his house taking pictures and gets a bit testy. He marches out to the car and wants to know who you are and what the hell you think you're doing taking pictures of his house. Maybe he even gets a bit irate and slaps his hand down on hood of your car. This is not your first day on the job and probably not your first irate homeowner. What do you do?

1. Laugh at him and drive away.
2. Show him your business card, tell him the bank sent you out to take photos of his house and tell him you'll be happy to wait while he calls your office to confirm your story.
3. Stick your .357 magnum in his face before he scratches the paint on your Ford Escort.

Answer key
1. You are an asshole.
2. You are a professional.
3. You are a Republican


h/t to JJ at Unrepentant Old Hippie
crossposted from the Woodshed

Tories versus Conservatives -- Don't reward the rulebreaker

A clear eyed, simple explanation of how Harper's been breaking the law to get his own way, and bending what he couldn't break. IMHO this is the core of it:

The legality of the Oct. 14 election called by Prime Minister Stephen Harper was referred to the Federal Court but the court ruled it did not have time to intercede before the federal election.

It is, therefore, in the hands of the Canadian voter.

Harper entered politics with a mission. He wanted to transform Canada into a loose confederation of autonomous provinces with the federal government limited to foreign affairs, defence and an arbitration role among the provinces.

He felt it could be done without a constitutional change. "Just a willing federal government," he said. He even suggested there should be a firewall around Alberta, his province of choice.

To execute his plans, he needed a majority in Parliament.

Steven Patten, associate professor of political science at the University of Alberta, states in a new book, The Harper Record: "He hasn't wandered far from the ideological beliefs that first motivated him to engage in politics. He surrounds himself with conservatives who share his strong ideological beliefs and when he compromises on policy or the membership of his team, it is typically a strategic move designed to bring him closer to winning a majority government."

By planning this election way back in the early summer, Harper effectively added millions to his war chest (the pre-election call anti-Dion ads) , and got the voters to underwrite more attacks disguised as privileged parliamentary mailings. Then, once he had been stealth-campaigning for a couple of months, he called the election -- as though, having ambled casually halfway down the track, he finally let the guy fire the starter pistol.

Only widespread Canadian distrust (not much allayed by the rather creepy silence of the ATOC [1] candidates) stands in his rulebreaking path.

I don't think there's anything new in the Toronto Star Op-Ed, but it's all compressed and clear and dandy for xeroxing and handing out on street corners.

I wonder -- Canadian law prohibits a criminal from profiting from the proceeds of his crime. Does a nation qualify as "proceeds of crime"? and will this effect only Harper himself, or also the candidates pulling his dogsled?

Noni


[1] All The Other Conservatives

Jason Kenney: Liar or moron?

The Toronto Star does it right and calls bullshit on Conservative Rottweiller Jason Kenney for using a widely discredited piece of propaganda as if it were the gospel truth.

"In a terse exchange, Kenney asked him if this meant he equated Canada's inaction with "Al Qaeda strapping up a 14-year-old girl with Down's syndrome and sending her into a pet market to be remotely detonated." Kenney was referring to an erroneous story about unwitting bombers in Iraq - which military officials later retracted when it was revealed the bombers were adults and did not have Down's syndrome."

Jason Kenney: Mendacious moron, prevaricating prick or just an ignorant, loudmothed jackass who doesn't know what he's talking about? We report, you decide.
What a novel concept - a politician talks out his ass and the media actually points out that he is talking out his ass. I could get used that.

The issue in question that Kenney is trying to distract from is Liberal Senator Romeo Dallaire's comment that Canada's Gnu Gummint should maybe be trying to do something about the plight of Omar Khadr, the 21-year-old who went to Guantanamo Bay intead of high school and college after he was shot and captured in Afghanistan at age 15 by U.S. Special Forces during a raid on Taliban encampment. He is alleged to have thrown a grenade that killed a US soldier, for which the US is charging him with a war crime.

Kady O'Malley was there for the subcommittee hearing in which Dallaire pointed out the obvious, that Khadr's case has become a political hot potato that has more to do with the US government not wanting to admit it is breaking the law than it does with Khadr's alleged war crime.

The National Post quotes the exhange at the parliamentary subcommitte on human rights:

"In panicking, [the United States] is doing exactly what the extremists and terrorists are doing. They don't want to play by the rules," testified Mr. Dallaire.

So naturally Jason "Fathead" Kenney, like many a factually-challenged blogging tory, grabs the wrong end of the false equivency stick and immediately jumps to the defence of the poor, helpless, U.S. military-industrial-national security apparatus and decides to bring Al-Quaida in the whole thing:

"Is it your testimony that al-Qaeda strapping up a 14-year-old girl with Down's syndrome and sending her into a pet market to be remotely detonated is the moral equivalent to Canada's not making extraordinary political efforts for a transfer of Omar Khadr to this country? Is that your position?" Mr. Kenney asked.
"If you want a black and white, absolutely," replied Mr. Dallaire. "You're either with the law or not with the law.
"My position is that the minute you start playing with human rights, with conventions, with civil liberties, in order to say that you're doing it to protect yourself and you are going against the fundamentals of those rights and conventions, you are no better than the guy who doesn't believe in them at all."

Interestingly, the hacks atthe National Post headline their story "Dallaire likens U. S., Canada to al-Qaeda" when it was Kenney that brought up Al-Qaeda, not Dallaire. Like you needed further proof that the National Post is lame.

Dallaire amplified his remarks further today (from the Toronto Star story)

"Suffice it to say that I in no way intended to equate Canadian or U.S. authorities with the terrorist organization Al Qaeda," Dallaire wrote today. "But we cannot avoid the point that if we violate international law in our pursuit of the war on terror, we risk reducing ourselves, collectively, to the same level as those we oppose.
"Our acquiescence with his continued incarceration and prosecution puts in question Canada's standing as a nation that respects global human rights and international law."

Absolutely goddamn 100 percent correct.

Pierre Pollivere also shows he's more interested in protecting George W. Bush's reputation than protecting the human rights of a Canadian child


crossposted from the Woodshed  - now with occasional music and video sermons

Honestly. It was an election promise. I meant nothing.

From the Globe and Mail today:

The Harper government broke its election promise yesterday to require ministers to record their contacts with lobbyists, instead ordering lobbyists to file monthly reports on their oral communication with federal officials.

Draft regulations published yesterday to accompany the government's Lobbying Act create a new public registry of contacts between lobbyists and senior government officials.

The registry will go further than the current system, under which lobbyists have to publicly disclose only who is paying them, which federal agencies they are targeting, and on which general files.

But the new registry will not require reports on e-mails or letters between senior government officials and lobbyists. It will keep tabs on only "oral and arranged communication."

From page 8 of the 2006 Conservative election platform document:

A Conservative government will: .... *Require ministers and senior government officials to record their contacts with lobbyists.

All of them.

Presumably there was a lobbyist who managed to lobby enough members of cabinet to go easy on the regulations being designed to curtail the lobbyists.

And the new regulations are only "one way".

The new regulations would not require lobbyists to report oral communications initiated by federal officials dealing with the development of policy, programs or legislation.

Then there's this little nugget.

In the last general election, the Conservative Party vowed to stop the back-and-forth between politics and lobbying, which it said was corrupting government.

That's right. And some of the politicians dealing with some lobbyists hadn't even moved out of 24 Sussex Drive when the "questionable activity" started.

As impolitical suggests, throw another promise on the barbie.

MacKay is doing a dance around the truth (Updated)

Minister of National Defence Peter (Support the troops, but cover my ass first) MacKay seems to have something to hide.

National Defence has postponed a decision on whether to continue with major upgrades to its fleet of Maritime patrol planes until after Parliament rises for the Christmas holidays.

Critics say the deferral is an unabashed attempt to bury what is expected to be a bad news announcement for Defence Minister Peter MacKay.

A substantial portion of the work has been carried out in his home province of Nova Scotia.

Defence sources say the long-anticipated announcement was put off earlier this week until Dec. 18, almost one month past the government's self-imposed deadline and at least four days past Parliament's scheduled Christmas break.

The bad news? All the work that was going to happen in MacKay's riding is about to be flushed away. Why?

Well, according to the report, there are other plans.

The air force had originally intended to keep its 18 CP-140 Auroras in the air until 2025, but a multi-year upgrade contract was put on hold in September and there have been suggestions the military has been shopping for a replacement aircraft.

Huh?! There's nothing on the project list at ADM Mat. This is new. Very new.

Why are they delaying an announcement? Well, there's a very simple answer to that. After spending $900 million to date on the CP-140 Auroras, the opposition would have a field day ripping MacKay to shreds for even thinking of retiring them. Not to mention all the contractors, many in MacKay's riding who have probably financed themselves to the hilt in preparation for phase two and three of the project only to discover that there will be no work at all.

The life extension has cost taxpayers $900 million thus far and is about to complete its second phase.

To date, the Auroras have received an upgraded navigation system, global positioning systems and better radar, among other things.

The next two phases, which are now on hold, would have given the aircraft better data management system, sensors - such as imaging radar - and finally protection against air-to-surface missiles.

Companies, including IMP Aerospace in Halifax, were preparing for the next round when the project was put in limbo.

Defence sources said officials from IMP met with MacKay earlier this month.

The minister offered no hint about what the final decision might be "other than to suggest they might not be happy with the result," said an official who asked not to be named.

So, why the secrecy and why the delay in announcing it?

Industry officials told MacKay it would be cheaper to continue with the upgrade and keep the planes flying until 2025, rather than spend several billion dollars to purchase new ones.

But the air force has countered that the slow pace of the refurbishment means it could have new aircraft by the time the old ones are back in service, said a defence insider.

Bailing out on the rest of contract would result in a "managable" penalty, the source admitted.

The air force is said to be looking at two aircraft, the P-8 Poseidon and the ASTOR.

The U.S. Navy replaced its Auroas with Boeing manufactured P-8s, which are essentially 737s modified for survelliance.

So, just to get this clear, the air force was told to retain the CP-140 Aurora in an upgraded model. But they're already looking at the P-8 Poseidon. Why would they be doing that unless they were told they could make initial inquiries?

The news report is a little problematic. The US Navy never had Auroras. They were the same airframe, but the US Navy variant was the P-3 Orion. The Canadian Aurora had a much more advanced electronics and avionics suite than the Orion of the day. If there was a fault it was that Canada had too few of them built. But it's strange that suddenly the US P-8 Poseidon has shown up as a possible contender for an air mission which is already filled.

Well, not so strange when you look at who's running the show and the fact that Canada has virtually integrated it coastal maritime patrol activities with the Americans under the NORAD umbrella. (Not NORTHCOM. NORAD. If the distinction is somehow lost in the fog of changing hats, don't let that disturb you. You're not alone.)

In any case, this gets very curious and despite what MacKay and his spokespeople are saying, he's playing politics and trying to drown this announcement in Christmas egg nog.

Let's thicken things up a little: Boris pointed this out from the Canadian Naval Review. (Scroll down to The Aurora Incremental Modernization Project (AIMP): The Future of the CP-140s). That post provides some interesting information, including the facts that Canada declined participation in the USN P-8 Poseidon project because of the Aurora upgrade. Further, the air force assertion that they would have a new aircraft in service before the Auroras are completed upgrading is probably closer to fantasy than fact. Boeing isn't even starting production until 2013, so how the Canadian air force (and DND) can presume to be close enough to the head of the line to put a fleet of new multi-mission patrol aircraft in service by 2016 is a stretch of quantum proportions.

However, on 1 Oct, the Ottawa citizen reported that DND was considering replacing the Aurora in the 2016 timeframe with either a derivative of the Bombardier Global Express (modelled on the UK Astor program) or the Multi Mission Aircraft project being developed by Boeing for the USN (the P8 Poseidon, based on a Boeing 737). Additionally, within DND, a third alternative has been mooted - replace/augment the unmodified Auroras with Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs), perhaps in combination with the Global Express.

While the P8 satisfies the MMA requirement, the Global Express solution falls well short of the mark.

[...]

... it is highly unlikely that DND will be able to actually acquire a suitable replacement for the CP-140 by 2016 resulting in an extended capability gap.

[...]

Even if it were decided to procure the P8, the aircraft is still under development with a planned production decision in 2013. Given that virtually every similar development program has taken much longer than planned it would be highly optimistic to expect that Boeing could actually deliver to Canada useful numbers of aircraft by 2016. (As a current example, the Maritime Helicopter Project (MHP) is widely believed to be two years behind schedule) In any event, we would be in the queue behind the USN who plans to order in excess of 100 aircraft and Australia who have already committed to the P8.

Any announcement by MacKay should be interesting to say the least. The thing to watch for is if the completion of the Aurora modernization program is halted, incurring a financial penalty (which will no doubt be ignored in any announcement), and then followed by an overly optimistic statement that a new aircraft will be in service by 2016.

This is going to be messy and has the potential for being the source of outright lies from MacKay.

Flaherty is the front man for a Conservative election push

Exactly. What's the hurry? Flaherty's latest stunt is to give three hours notice to the House of Commons with the intention to change the 30 October Parliamentary Schedule to allow him to present a budget economic update... in the House of Commons.

Flaherty had wanted to present the economic statement in the House of Commons. But changing the House schedule on one day's notice requires the unanimous consent of all parties, and the NDP has refused, calling the late-notice announcement a political stunt.

That's exactly what it is. So how did the little weasel respond?

"If I can't do it in the House of Commons because of the NDP, then I'll do it somewhere else," Flaherty told reporters.

Really? How about providing that update where it's normally done - in front of the Commons Finance Committee? It's not a budget; it's an update.

CBC-TV's senior parliamentary editor, Don Newman, noted that the last time an economic update was delivered in the House of Commons — rather than before the House of Commons finance committee — was Oct. 18, 2000. That economic statement included large tax cuts.

Days later, the governing Liberals called a general election.

This is more than a little curious. In fact, I agree with Steve: This looks like a maneuver to force an election.

It's OUR war and we're not letting anyone else look at it.

At least that's the way the Conservatives see things. Red Tory picks up on Don Martin's column describing the attempts by the Harper government to prevent anyone but their people from visiting Canadian operations in Afghanistan.

Mr. [Denis] Coderre [Liberal defence critic and member of the Privy Council] has tried for two months to secure government permission to make a fact-finding trip to Afghanistan ahead of Parliament's return in two weeks. Liberal leader Stephane Dion has his application in the system for a visit in November.

But Mr. Coderre was stonewalled and his calls to the Defence Minister unreturned until he was finally told to buy his own ticket and catch a commercial flight.

Why not, he decided. Mr. Coderre's solo adventure started on Thursday, although he called from London to say he'd been officially warned the military base is off limits and that he will be denied protection by the troops.

Officially warned by whom?

Mr. Coderre says he will piggyback on charitable and humanitarian groups to ensure he sees the wilds of Kandahar up close. If it's done safely, he may well leave with a greater appreciation of the situation than any cocooned minister or parliamentary secretary. Being confined to the airfield gives you no more insight into southern Afghanistan reality than studying the situation from Bay Street.

But it will be very dangerous outside the base and the optics of Mr. Coderre getting hurt or worse for the want of a military babysitter would make the partisan protectionism of the Conservatives appear unforgivably petty.

Lest we forget, Canada's enemy in Afghanistan are extremists trying to stifle free speech and deny women basic human rights -- not Liberals trying to have an informed debate.

Well, there are a couple of things that need to be mentioned here.

First, because Kandahar is a "hot" theatre, people not directly involved in the mission do require clearance to be there. Where does that clearance come from? The Canadian Forces - not the government. If the Minister of National Defence stuck his nose in this he has just made the good offices of the uniformed command of the Canadian Armed Forces little more than his political hacks.

Once there, however, the decision to provide security and protection rests with the commander on the ground in Afghanistan. If orders have been transmitted to him such that he is not to offer security to Coderre, that order is interfering with the authority of the expeditionary force commander. It is also unlawful.

So, who issued it?

Secondly, there is every good reason to limit the visits of so-called VIPs in theatre. I can speak from personal experience that they are an incredible pain-in-the-ass and suck up resources better used elsewhere. But if Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier is going to be there anyway, it would have been more efficient to have Coderre visit at the same time. Since there has to be a "personal protection team" effort made anyway, it is easier to get it all over at once. If Coderre gets caught out in the open without a PPT another problem develops and will require contingency action by Canadian Forces.

Red Tory pulled out a nugget which tells more about how the Conservatives operate.

Sure it's an organizational headache. But officers tell me cabinet ministers are the mother of all migraines. In the case of former defence minister Gordon O'Connor, officers confide his final visit ended with his flacks ripping into military brass for failing to set up suitable camera backgrounds for media scrums.

Yes, well. It brings to mind an incident during another event late in the last century. Having been saddled with a cabinet minister in the middle of something relatively hot, one of the "aides" suggested a photo of the minister and members of my team. It went this way:

- Get rid of the friggin' camera. This is an operational area.

- Just one, maybe two pictures.

- Sure. When all this shit is over and my men and I get home, give me a call.

No photos were taken but the minister did get back at me for my lack of cooperation. Medal presentations were held in the minister's riding and we were required to attend, photo ops and all.

If the Conservatives are so hot on getting Canadians to "support the mission" they had better start learning that we need to know what's going on from someone other than them. If they're not letting other party MPs take a look for themselves, it means the Conservatives are trying to hide something or they're lying about any supposed progress they say is being made.

Judge tells Harper where he can put his barley

Via Le Revue Gauche a Federal Court judge has ruled that Conservative government actions to change the operation of the Canadian Wheat Board are not being conducted in a lawful manner.

A judge has struck down the federal government's move to strip the Canadian Wheat Board of its monopoly on western barley sales.

In a ruling issued Tuesday, Federal Court Judge Dolores Hansen said the government overstepped its authority in trying to end the monopoly through a simple cabinet order.

The decision is a victory for supporters of the wheat board, who argue that having all barley sales handled through the board gives farmers better prices.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative government announced earlier this year it would end the board's monopoly on barley as of Aug. 1, and give farmers the option of selling independently.

The government changed the board's barley-handling through regulations approved by the Conservative cabinet.

Critics successfully argued the change can only be made by passing a law in Parliament — something that could be blocked by the opposition.

In short, this is telling Harper and Chuck Strahl that when they govern by fiat they are breaking the law.

In 1998 the control of the Canadian Wheat Board was handed to farmers in the form of a 15 member board. The federal government has no authority to override the board by way of cabinet order because the Canadian Wheat Board, while established under federal legislation, is not a government department and not a Crown Corporation.

If Harper and Strahl want to change how the Canadian Wheat Board operates they have to get legislation through parliament to change this act.

That isn't going to happen.

------------

Sidebar: Apparently, if you're attempting to read this post from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, you can't do it from your government desktop computer. It seems certain "liberal" blogs are now blocked on some government computers.

We'll be talking about that later.

Oh. Yes. We. Will.