Monday, May 11, 2009

Sometimes an Ideology is, well... just an Ideology

I used to respect this man. Really, I did. I even defended him when the nutty NDP accusation erupted in the House last year.

To me, he was someone I disagreed with, but he always seemed honourable and steered away from the outright untruths that many in his party were willing to push. No more. Now that he is in cabinet, that seems to have changed everything. Sad, no? Telling too.

What I'm referring to is this. Moore said in committee that there would be no cuts to the CBC on April 29th. Friends of Canadian Broadcasting were happy to hear that then. Here's what they say now:

"Friends was relieved to hear Minister Moore's promise to the MPs on April 29. Obviously, we're disappointed that he misled the heritage committee," Morrison said.

Misled is far too polite, but that in the end is what the Conservatives have done on practically every single damn file. I cannot for the life of me understand why (investigative or otherwise) journalists don't point this out...as an ongoing theme I mean.

I saw some of this committee meeting today and if I was a Conservative, I'd be hiding out somewhere. That they are comfortable saying what they do in front of cameras, to the nation, is beyond troubling.

Dean del Mastro, literally shouted down witnesses, demanding to know if they felt only the Conservative government had a vendetta against the CBC. He claimed to be a finance guy, then proceeded to manipulate numbers in a fashion that no one could follow and demanded that no one comment on his math, just answer his partisan question.

Thankfully, Scott Simms came after him and brought the real world back, but shortly thereafter Rod Bruinooge, who is generally pretty mild mannered but passive aggressive, imo, unleashed the same line of questioning.

Kudos to the witnesses, the Canadian Media Guild and the Federation of National Communications specifically, who fought back and gave as good as they got.

It's amazing that the dysfunction of parliamentary committees is to the point it is and somehow, it's not being reported on. This is our system of governance for gawd's sake.. This is where the country's biggest and best ideas are supposed to be debated, analysed and direction is meant to be taken.

It's all become a ridiculous farce with the current government. Everything is a game and paranoia seeps through every discussion. There is no thought to the future of this country. It's all about scoring political points now. No real direction, just ideology that they have been waiting years to get out there, by ANY means.

For the record, there was a similar circus going on at the Justice committee today.

Sometimes things are just as they appear. The ridiculous is trumping reason but that apparently isn't important enough to report on. If the Conservatives can trumpet some victory, it surely is that the media and the country have become inured to their idiocy, ideology.

3 comments:

Cari said...

When I first heard Mr. Moore say that he was a fan of the CBC, felt a little better..Harper must have gotten to him. He may have been speaking for himself at the time, but he was cut short.
My MP has been getting a letter, from me here and there about the CBC. He is on the commitee for Heritage and he writes me back how he likes the CBC etc.
I hope he does, as a lot of Rural voters voted for him.
I agree where is the news?

RuralSandi said...

Interesting - Del Mastro (Peterborough MP) has a small local station that is a CBC station in his riding (CHEX).

Moore certainly is a big disappointment, sort of. He was one of the Con MP's playing pranks at the Liberal convention (when Dion was made leader) - he's very partisan.

Face it - Harper and his gang of partisan puppy dogs just can't be trusted.

I don't know how others are doing - but I received (May 11) my "13th" ten percenter. Not even quite mid-May yet and 13 of them, one being a 14 page booklet.

I wonder what the limit is as this is taxpayer funded.

penlan said...

Let's hope Moore, Harper & the rest of these thugs are gone before they can make further cuts to the CBC.

It's across the board with these jokers to cut funding to everything that is important to Canadians as a whole. If this is "playing to their base" then it's insane. Their base will always be there but they are pushing other voters further away. We are not stupid & this partisan bs has gone too far & gone on for too long.

Harper & the Cons do not know how to govern. As you said it's all pushing ideology, to the detriment of this country. It's all attack & partisan sniping as we suffer economically, environmentally, & now morally & ethically.