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This is unbelievable!
The Conservatives plagerized the Auditor General !!!!
This is a criminal act!
Sheila Fraser should sue the government.
I can't believe Canadians will vote for this kind of government that's "beneath contempt."
Auditor-General boxes Harper in
http://www.torontosun.com/news/decision2011/2011/04/11/17953806.html
This is pretty bad - now the Tories are themsleves leaking drafts of the report they were never supposed to have had in the first place - to prove that they weren't criminals - just incompetent and wasteful!!
Don Newman posted an article that touches on this very subject over at ipolitics.ca today. Towards the end he says:
The attack ads will be designed to discourage Liberal and uncommitted voters from going to the polls. In a low-turnout election, right-wingers have found their supporters are less numerous but most motivated. Anything they can do to keep the turnouts low helps their chances.
The attack ads may make ordinary people cringe and turn off of politics, but they don’t deter the people who don’t want to register their guns, don’t think a woman has a right to chose, the people who think we need big new prisons even though the crime rate is going down.
Newman's great. I hope Solomon invites him on P&P soon.
Cons and ex-cons! And weeks to go yet!
The polling in the days just before the vote should be mighty interesting.
I really hope this sticks to them. I'm just not convinced it will. If hardcore/softcore con voters didn't care about contempt of parliament, why would they care about misappropriation of funds?
For softcore Con voters contempt of parliament could be chalked up to political games by the opposition. This latest scandal is of the Con's own doing and it contradicts their claims of being fiscally responsible. Now the hardcore Con voters will continue to support Harper and will argue that a) the report shouldn't have been leaked and b) we all should wait until the final report before judging.
and for anyone who has ever had children or been one c) the Liberals did it too. (Like that's an excuse, but I guarentee it will be used)
Stockwell Day keeps claiming that he doesn't know how the plagerized words appeared!
Absolutely disgusting!
We need to get Canadians to feel very angry and outraged about this, so that they will be motivated to go out and vote against Harper!
Don't know if it's new but saw a good NDP ad talking about cleaning up corruption by the Cons. Well timed for sure.
The Cons are doing a good job with their spin. They leaked a version of the report tonight that doesn't talk about illegality or misleading Parliament, and so obviously Harper tomorrow in the debate will claim that the final report won't be so bad for his government afterall.
There's so much spin going on right now it's hard to keep track of it all, but I'm positive the A-G said about that other leaked version - hey, not so hasty - wait until you read the final report.
Did I not hear rumours a few weeks ago during the committee hearings on the contempt issue that there might be more things revealed during the campaign that would seriously damage the Conservatives and their "Standing Up for Canada"sloganeering???
The Conservatives don't seem to be getting too damaged so far. They still have big leads in the polls.
Unfortunately nothing seems to stick to them.
Outside the Ottawa bubble, is anyone really paying attention?
Got the debates and this juicy little morsel that came up yesterday...
Let it sink in for a few days...Then we'll see....
From what I've read,the Conservatives have topped out at around 40%.Meaning that they only seem to hold their base and not much more.There is still alot of undecided voters in vote rich Ontario,and with this G8/G20 stuff coming out (and the potential fallout from the illegality of it) I suspect some of those voters on the fence will start to look for alternatives...
The Cons really have been busy muddying the water since the AG story broke earlier today. That's something they're very good at and seems to be effective in confusing Canadians to the point where they don't know what to believe. I mean, I expected a swift response but even I was shocked by how fast they leaked the revised report.
Yup. The Conservatives are very, very formidable. I never thought it would be so difficult to bring Harper down when he first came on the scene, but he has turned out to be an incredibly strong foe.
We'd also have to consider the current situation as evidence that when economic uncertainty prevails, significant portions of a well indoctrinated commodity society will permit themselves to be susceptible to an agenda which best exemplifies their most selfish impulses. A lack of basic honesty, criminal behaviour, warfare, etc are merely seen as tools that must be employed to preserve the only existence people are familiar with. It doesn't seem to matter how bad things become, how corrupt and treacherous the system is, so long as the favoured demographic remain convinced that they'll retain their first in line status for the every increasing slim pickings. Systemic problems are never traced back to the source, because they are always depicted by the corporate media as either being someone else's fault, requiring measures up to and including war to address, or the time honoured ‘that's just the way things are' excuse.
It's not actually these Conservatives that are so formidable, it's the consensus presented by the 'converged and consolidated' corporate media that is so difficult to fight.
Layton just sent a letter to the other leaders and to Sheila Fraser asking for a meeting Thursday morning to find a way to release the final draft of the A-G's Report. Being discussed on P&P.
Sheila Fraser's response:
The Office of the A-G has not received the letter, and furthermore, said she will be in Nunavut the rest of the week.
P&P panel is suggesting a teleconference.
So these unelected people who are not members of parliament are going to try and force an officer of parliament to turn over documents and break the law? That's almost as bad as getting the GG to prorogue so you can stay in the PM's office.
Well, it was Layton who wrote the letter. And there have been two leaks of draft copies of the Report already. The argument is that it is the public's right to know. All the party leaders are onside with the idea, and even so is the Speaker of the House.
Yes, Layton who is unelected and not an MP. That's a great argument but it's asking a civil servant whose job it is to make sure politicians don't break the law to break the law.
Despite the best efforts of her (Fraser's) office, the law has been broken already - twice - and only by releasing the final report can Canadians be confident that nothing shady (like a cover-up) is going on.
Three wrongs make a right?
Now you're getting it! Welcome to the world of politics.