Federal NDP blocking nominations for political reasons Part 2

Svend Robinson is one of my political role models. He recruited me to the NDP in 1986 and I was active in his riding association. Even after I moved to the Greens, I continued to admire and support Svend because of the way he did politics. He continued to exercise his freedom of speech as a candidate and as an MP; he even sometimes voted against the party; and, of course, he and I were both arrested in the 1993 Clayoquot Sound blockades against a land use decision by a sitting NDP government.

But I have to wonder, is there room for a Svend in today's NDP?

I am not seeking to be elected; otherwise, I would not have chosen to run in St. Paul's, the riding in which I reside if I were. What I hoped to do was to campaign for social democratic values as an NDP candidate, advocating strongly for party policies with which I agree in my own words and contribute to a national campaign that elected more NDP MPs. I am a reasonably effective public speaker and campaigner and hoped to put these talents to use in a way that both benefited the NDP and allowed me to engage in an activity (campaigning) that I genuinely enjoy.

"the NDP shot at native protesters" is incorrect and unbelievably provocative. Why should the party accept someone as a candidate who is willing to make such horrible and inaccurate statements.

For the benefit of people here who have successfully passed grade 10 civics, I'll apologize for a post that will no doubt insult your intelligence. However, since there is at least one person that needs clarification on how Canada's system of governance works, I will happily oblige.

British Columbia does not have a provincial police force. Because of this, the RCMP act, under contract to the government of British Columbia, as the province's provincial police force. That means, when they are enforcing provincial laws, they are acting as the provincial police.

Now, as a provincial police force, they are accountable to the Attorney General of British Columbia. The Attorney General is a New Democrat, chosen, presumably democratically, by their local NDP riding association. That means, when they do something like, say, order 400 cops into a land dispute with heavy weapons and tanks, and fire 77,000 rounds of ammunition , they are doing so, not just on behalf of the citizens of the province, but as a New Democrat. Did New Democrats actually shoot at aboriginals? Of course not. Stalin didn't personally starve any Ukrainians, George Bush didn't personally kill any Iraqis. They made the political decisions that allowed those situations to happen.

Stuart, thanks for your reply - which if I may say was inspiring.

wow, who knew the RCMP had tanks..... :rolleyes:

and again I will note that this thread over here indicates quite clearly that provincial NDP parties, are not that  of the federal NDP, especially when lead by Ujaal.

Unionist,  it was short sighted, overly simplistic and was apparently made from the position of counting on people, such as yourself, not knowing much about what was and is happening in the Clayoquot.

Lots of people used that little action for a point of self promotion.....

The following link details a bit more, but is also not all emcompassing, but one can get a essence of what was transpirong.

http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/dsi/Clayoquot/clayoquot_sound.htm

and more info here [7] a snippet follows;

Ironically, I drove by the local highway on the day when a large group of protesters were arrested.  I didn't see anyone along the highway.  I will guess that the blockade took place on a side road.

Is there room for a Svend in today's NDP?  No.

"Hi, my name is _______. I am not seeking to be elected."  One can lose credibility right away.  Even if there is only a one percent chance at winning, one must always strive for the best.

Kloch, there were so many agendas being played out at that time, I don't think such cut and dried statements are warranted, and you're being insulting when you make them.

I've just had time to read the Wikipedia article linked to in the last thread, and there are so many factual problems I don't know where to start.  There is no citation for the "red nigger" comment in it.  Although there had been a history of difficult relations between ranchers and first nations in the Cariboo and Chilcotin over the years, this particular rancher was a very good friend of the neighbouring aboriginal community (which was part of the Cariboo Tribal Council), to the point where he had a family relationship with them (one of his children was married to a member of the band).  People had used his land with permission for a long time.  The fellow Wolverine who showed up from Alberta had some very bizarre ideas about master races that were anti-semitic, and had drawn in a few of the younger people with some of his crazy ideas, much to the consternation of the elders and band council.  He wasn't from that community, and the Shuswap (Secwepemc) never had a sundance as part of their tradition; that was a plains Cree ceremony, not a Secwepemc one.  They were not interested in any radical blockade or uprising about sovereignty, as they were already engaged in the early stages of treaty negotiations with the province and federal government.

It's clear that various arms of government staked out an interest in ramping up the rhetoric, but if you assume that the RCMP "E" Division always obediently followed the direction of the BC NDP government, you don't know your history there either.  The commanding officer there turned out to have approached Gordon Campbell about running for the BC Liberals, and was a bit of a cowboy who enjoyed the media coverage from BCTV.  Ujjal was very obviously running for premier from the time he joined cabinet, and didn't hesitate to freelance on any issue that served his interests in that regard either.  I don't think the local aboriginal government was very happy about having the RCMP move in to the situation the way they did, but they were hardly the originators nor were they supporters of the activities of Wolverine and his band of followers (at least some of whom were probably born with fetal alcohol syndrome and susceptible to following demagogues).

Long after the TV cameras and urban lefty activists left town, the elders and band council went back to that campsite and burned it down, leaving the very clear message that they had never approved of this particular activity.  Also, I don't know where people get the idea that Phil Fontaine was the national chief of the AFN at the time, because I remember very clearly attending a gathering with the Cariboo Tribal Council afterwards when they invited Ovide Mercredi as National Chief to come and talk about the peaceful Gandhian approach to making change.

Unlike probably most people in this thread and its predecessor, I've been there, and the more I learned the more I realized I didn't know.  It's easy to know the story so simply and so well when you never have to bother with the details.  My memory may be a bit foggy on some of the details here, but the gist of it is right.  Us non-aboriginal folks have a real tendency to romanticize and accept facts being served up by others who may not always know.  We need to be a bit more careful in that regard.

I think people can see now why I object to the very simplistic statement that "the NDP shot at native protesters".

I would like to know what 70,000 rounds of ammunition were fired at.

I'd want to know the source of that number before I even attempted a guess.  Knowing what I know about the BC media then (and probably still, for that matter), I'd take anything they reported from that location with a grain of salt.  On the other hand, the RCMP has never had a great reputation in its dealing with aboriginal people in BC either.

Knowing a thing or two about being a candidate I would never, ever support someone who thought they were doing a big favour for everyone by running and shows such a over-blown sense of themselves and demonstrates no understanding of how a candidate is the least important part of a campaign.  And if you are not in a campaign to win, one has to wonder what other agendas are at play.  Even in the most low hope riding I have seen I have never met a candidate who wasn't doing everything they could to win, not for themselves, but for all the volunteers that were putting their heart, soul and sweat into a campaign.

Just sayin'

If my math is correct, each of the 400 RCMP members fired 6x 30 round magazines of ammunition.

That's a lot of bullets fired at nothing.

Webgear, I wish I remembered more about the details of the case.  You're right it was a massive overreaction.  I'm pretty sure that some native "defenders" showed up with guns, but we all know how the police live for the chance to run one of these operations and "kick some ass", which usually leads to things careening way off the rails.

On the other hand, the NDP has a very very strong record of supporting aboriginal rights and self-government, along with the daily health, education and economic issues.  We elected the first native MLA in the country, appointed the first native cabinet minister, and were the first party to ever run on a platform of settling aboriginal treaties on the basis of aboriginal title.  It is an unbelievable disservice to that record to dismiss it flippantly with a very simplistic statement.

How much is that people dont get how a candidate who said "the NDP shot at native protesters" is an election powder keg ready to blow big time?

And how much is that people simply don't care?

[And for what its worth, unlike the other outraged folks in this discussion, with Stuart I don't get the sense that it is either. I get the feeling you just parked those questions somewhere else.]

[Another note: there is plenty of powder in those few words relayed here. And who knows how much more there may be in the full version.]

And since it has not been said for a while in this extended discussion, its worth noting:

Representing the making of patently inflammatory statements as "disagreeing with party policy/actions" is straight up disengenuous.

[Although some allowance has to made for the effect exposure to routinized inflated rhetoric has on understanding what is inflammatory.]

I agree.  In the last federal election, Green Party leader, Elizabeth May, encouraged local voters to support the best Green or Liberal candidates to defeat the Conservative candidates.  I think this upset some local volunteers and Green candidates who felt that May did not fully support some Green candidates.

Remind, I never agreed with Stuart about what happened at Clayoquot Sound or Gustafsen Lake or anywhere else, because I have no idea and I bow to your knowledge of the history and politics there - although I hadn't heard about Svend being arrested and would be interested to know more about that. I simply wanted to understand why Stuart wanted to be a candidate, when candidates are not allowed to speak their minds, especially not once elected. I thought he gave me a credible answer.

OO, I'm sorry, but your comments are simply deflection.  Ujal was running for Premier.  The "E" Division RCMP wouldn't follow orders and their commander wanted a Liberal Premier. The NDP did nice things to the aboriginals in the past.  Wolverine wasn't a nice guy.  So what?  The particulars in this case are that the government authorities, which the BCNDP was a part of, played a role in a standoff that was condemned for it's heavy handed response by the RCMP.  The facts you stated do not change any of that.  

More to the point, Stuart hasn't said anything that would legitimately disqualify him as a candidate in terms of making racist, sexist, homophobic or other inappropriate comments.  He is being denied the right to run for a political party because he has made critical comments about his party of choice in the past.

And you wonder why people get turned off the political process...

No, I wonder why it's impossible for people to deal with complex issues.

I did find a more balanced view of the situation in an article from the Canadian Encyclopedia.  I'd forgotten about the role played by that inflammatory lawyer Bruce Clark.  Those native protesters who were convicted by the way, were convicted by a jury with a native foreman.

You won't find me defending the behaviour of the RCMP in the matter, at all.  But I maintain that it's an irresponsibly simplistic and inaccurately provocative statement to say that "the NDP shot at native protesters" as a way of summarizing the whole matter.

If you think that the NDP should accept someone as a candidate who shows a propensity for making such statements, you really want us to relive the fiasco of the last campaign all over again.  I for one would not want to see that, and the federal party has my unequivocal support in making such decisions.

There is a comprehensive account of the Gustafsen Lake episode that can be found here:

http://sisis.nativeweb.org/gustlake/chrono.html

Yes there were armoured personal carriers there (so you can stop rolling eyes) and the RCMP got them from the military.

I have no doubt that the RCMP version of events is largely nonsense, and the fact that no government has ever allowed an inquiry into the event, as well as findings in a US Court in 2000 would lead me to further think this.

I also have no doubt that had these actions occurred under a Liberal BC government there would be little debate about them. I have little doubt that no one here would be siding with the attorney general at the time, and I have no doubt that very few of us would take the RCMP's version any more seriously than we did the OPP's version of Ipperwash (and, amazingly, they did hold an inquiry into that incident). I think that there are a large number of New Democrats who might, in an off-the-cuff comment on Facebook say that Mike Harris' government shot at natives and few would disagree.

The fiasco of the last campaign, involved people who were engaged in criminal conduct or anti-semitic behaviour, a far cry from what Stuart said. If the party cannot allow criticism of its past or present, even if slightly inflammatory, then we are hardly a democratic party. The fact that one or two people here think the party decision was fine makes it no more democratic, I was unaware that you represented all of NDP opinion, nor, more importantly, the opinion of the membership of St. Paul's.

Now you need not worry, we will never know.

OO said "Wolverine and his band of followers (at least some of whom were probably born with fetal alcohol syndrome and susceptible to following demagogues)."

I don't think it is particularly useful to say that activists who followed Wolverine did so possibly due to fetal alcohol syndrome...many people of many races have followed demagogues, even if one accepts this term in Wolverine's case, so why the comment in this context? I think there is significantly less evidence to back this up than there is to back up Stuart's comment, and frankly, it is much more provocative!. I think it far more likely that they followed him because they were pissed off about how their people had been treated.

Issues are, indeed, complex. That is why there should be room for more than one opinion on them in the NDP.

Finally there is this little gem from the NDP attorney general at the time:  "There is no point in more meetings (BTW there had been none up to the point when he said this), I will not negotiate with renegades. There is only one issue here: law and order. There will be no deals, no talk about land ownership. It is not about land. They can give themselves up to the police for protection or face the consequences. The police will use whatever force is necessary to dislodge them." Ujjal Dosanjh, the former BC Attorney General.

Well the police did use the necessary force. And it involved shooting at natives.

That chronology was assembled by Bruce Clark the lawyer, and is no more reliable than the RCMP's version of events.

Michael, the court heard and accepted evidence about the fetal alcohol syndrome, which is mentioned in the Canadian Encyclopedia article, so please give that a read.  It is a big problem, and a number of Shuswap chiefs have been begging governments to help them deal with it for decades.  As I mentioned in the earlier thread, I spent some time in and out of the Cariboo in the years directly following those events, and have heard many many different sides of that story, which apparently you have not, and in any event I don't think you would really find Bruce Clark a very reliable person to put your faith in, had you ever had the chance to deal with him.

Whenever the issue of Gustafsen Lake comes up, so does the "smear and disinformation" campaign tactics that are used in an attempt to divert attention from the main issue. Raising Fetal Alcohol Syndrome as somehow responsible or relevent to the standoff at Gustafsen is a particularly repellent and irrelevent distraction which shouldn't be allowed to stand. Bruce Clark was particularly subject to smear because of his unchallenged status as the leading academic authority on the settled and binding constitutional and international law precedents and statutes that renders BC and Canada's actions fraudulent, constitutionally tresonous and genocidal.

Anyone who points out the serious and criminal nature of the ongoing criminal usurpation and genocide in progress with respect to Canada's illegal occupation of Indigenous lands and the theft of resources comes under this kind of sleazy attack which was used also to great effect at the time by the BC NDP Premier, AG and others. It worked so well it got them elected. It is again resurrected here.

"the positions expressed by the sundancers on their nations' sovereignty and aboriginal title and rights are not 'extremist'. They are shared by many Indian poeples across this province. British Columbia is unceded Indian land. Our nations' ownership of our respective territories has never been extinguished. We are not 'squatters' or 'tresspassers' in our homelands...It now appears there is more concern by governments that the so called 'squatters' of Gustafsen Lake will 'undermine' the BC Treaty Commission termination process than about constructive alternatives.'

Union of BC Indian Chiefs Statement on the Standoff at Gustafsen Lake, 1995

"I'm in prison because the NDP wanted to kill natives to get votes. Is this how politicians get elected here - bump off a few more of our people?" Wolverine 1997

"British Columbia NDP Convention February 2000, Policy Resolutions Justice and Legal Affairs L-2000-06 Gustafsen Lake

WHEREAS it is clear that the RCMP engaged in a deliberate program of misinformation with the public regarding the events at Gustafsen Lake ...Whereas it is a matter of video and court record that they bragged about their ability to decieve the public with misinformation and smear tactics..."

Since I note there has been a thread started on Gustafsen I will post some important materials there. As for Clayquot Sound, Svend Robinson's arrest was a complete repudiation of the rights and title of the area's Indigenous. He was even  arrested in a special Tshirt which read 'MY CANADA INCLUDES TREES'.  And he aggressively defended the BC NDP tactics employed at Gustafsen Lake and Mike Harcourt, Ujjal Dosanjh and others. Like shit on a blanket the BC NDP mafiosi all stuck together on Gustafsen.

When it comes to settler states, governments respond to genuine Indigenous resistance much the same and as far as Gustafsen Lake NDP really did mean No Difference Party! People like Stu Parker need to get the stillborn resolution for a Gustafsen Inquiry passed and implemented so that this party can clean itself of some of this filth which obviously still infects it.

What happened at Gustafasen Lake is relevant in its own right. But the central point is what Stuart Parker said on public record,and whether it is legitimate for the NDP to remove him as a candidate because his statements make him a substantial liability during an election campaign.

As was just noted:

Nobody has attempted to argue for or against whether Stuart's statement is sufficiently inflammatory to warrant the action taken. every time it just goes straight to: 

Note that making inflammatory statements that make you a liability isn't on that list of things that can disqualify you.

If Stuart had said "the NDP government played an unconsionable role in the Gustafasen Lake incident" that would not have been a liability.

You cant just pass off "the NDP shot at native protesters" as rhetorical overkill. It doesnt matter that you can explain what is really meant.

For a candidate, it's now too late for that.

OK, I'm not going to post further on this topic, as it's clear people have more invested in believing what they want to, than in listening to a different point of view. Not characteristics I would want to see in candidates running for public office, that's for sure.

KenS, "rhetorical overkill" is subjective.  And besides, if the NDP did play "an unconsionable role in the Gustafasen Lake incident", there must have been a reason for it such as, say, shooting at people.

OO, yes, that must be it. Anyone that disagrees with you must be closed minded and uninterested in other points of view... says the guy defending the people who refuse to allow a riding association to vote on a potential candidate.

Point of clarification: OO is not a guy.

Kloch, I heartily encourage people to disagree with me. It didn't sound like you had read the material I posted in support of the statement I made that you said was speculative.

This is why I was expressing frustration.

Some people here do not agree that the federal party has any right to vet a candidate for any reason, never mind for issues that could cause damage to other candidates or the campaign as a whole. I'm not one of them, and it would appear based on participation in this thread that most people accept that vetting has to happen, and they won't always be able to know all the facts or reasoning behind decisions that are taken ... regardless of whatever they think about Gustafsen Lake.

There is an interesting parallel between the two situations, inasmuch as what the small group of native folks, who built a shed on Lyall James' ranch and called in the armed Shuswap Defenders, did was as respectful of the wishes of the elders and Shuswap communities of the Cariboo, as would be the actions of a candidate who decided to "speak his truth" in a volatile and perovocative way without any regard for the consequences on his fellow candidates. Both have the potential to lead to explosive consequences.

Have any posted in this thread? I haven't met one in any of my discussions this week and would be interested in learning who they are. Otherwise, I am beginning to suspect that they are made of straw.

My incorrect use of gender specific terms not withstanding, OO, you haven't provided anything except deflection and, now it appears straw man arguments.

Your claim that people don't support the vetting of candidates is an outright falsehood.  I, in fact, specifically and unambiguously said the opposite.  The justification given for Stuart's rejection are that he said that NDPers shot at protestors at Gustafsen lake.  That's hyperbolic, but hardly inflammatory and, as a New Democart, I think it should be up to the riding association to decide democratically if that should be grounds for him being rejected.

You in fact don't have a clue why he was rejected.  All there has been is conjecture, nothing more, based on comments that are, understandably, biased.

I have seen no evidence that the riding association objects to the removal.  Unless, or until they do, there is no grounds to believe this was not done for perfectly legitimate reasons, that we know nothing about, and further that is accepted by the people on the ground in the riding. 

It is infammatory to the nth degree, and a piece of fucking ugly bull shit. And frankly  it seems like he is fullfilling his mission without ever really being a NDP nominee/candidate, eh!

I doubt the riding association on the whole was asked what they wanted, though I bet the President was at least consulted.

But in the final analysis, whether or not a candidate is a liability to the whole party is not and cannot be up to them.

This is a matter of opinion. I don't think it should ultimately be left up to the riding association- because they are not accountable for what happens to the central campaign. Likely, we won't agree on that. But that has a bearing on your larger point about whether people support the vetting of candidates. You know that we don't depend on riding associations to do the vetting. We expect them to to do a lot of vetting- but the ultimate work and decsion lies with the central party, whether or not they happen to in practice delegate that. [But not very often delegated further than the regional campaign structure, and only a possibility if it happens to be active at the time.

So in practice the question is about whether or not one supports the ultimate responsibility for the vetting of candidates by the centre.

Criticism of what happened in this case could be either that the centre did not have justification, or that they usurped what is rightly the power of the riding association.

You are arguing the latter, and I think that justifiably does call into question whether you support the vetting of candidates as it is- for better or worse- presently understood that we do it.

Speaking of arguments made of straw persons...

Exception I took above revolves in its fundamentals around differences of interpretation and opinion. We may also have a difference of opinion or interpretation around what is sufficiently inflamatory to justify dumping a candidate. But we don't know whether there is such a difference because so far you are dodging or dismissing the question. [As apparently, Stuart is also implicitly doing.]

Whether or not what the NDP government did at Gustafsen can be legitimately called "the NDP shot at people" is not the "fact question" here.

The fact question is whether in the context of a national campaign and the kind of questions that you expect in such a campaign Stuart's manner of expression is such that it is far too likely that the manner of expression itself will be the issue, not the substance of the facts that motivated what he said.

Which is why I went to the effort to give an alternative wording that we both agree would strongly express Stuart's strong disagreement with what the BC government did, but I suggest is not inflamatory and would not get him removed as candidate.

You didn't argue with that. Just dismissed it with word play.

Inflammatory is in the eye of the beholder, remind.  There are people who, for example, used to think that calling on working people to form unions and strike against their employers was inflammatory hate speech that ought to be curtailed.  I have a fairly liberal view when it comes to free speech, and feel that the only comments that are explicitly racist, sexist, homophobic (i.e., blacks are not as smart as whites, gay marriage is evil) that clearly run counter to the principles the NDP claims to hold, should be grounds for rejecting a candidate prior to a nomination meeting. 

Now, let's play a different little thought experiment.  Let's say that I'm wrong.  Let's say the RCMP never fire 77,000 rounds at the natives, that the RCMP never called out the army for support, that Dosanjh and the BCNDP is just the victim of a vicious smear campaign by natives, human rights groups and US judges.  Suppose that Wolverine is just a lunatic leading a bunch of fetal-alcohol syndrome victims who can't think for themselves.  The practical implication of what you're saying, is that Parker should be rejected because he made a statement that is wrong.  In other words, anyone who criticizes the party, and is judged to be wrong, can never be allowed to run for public office.

Now, I don't know if anyone here actually means to say this, but that is the practical implication of what you are saying.  And if you don't mean to say this, then you ought to rethink your support of the NDP's decision to reject Stuart's candidacy.

Life the Universe, et. al, yes, we do have a clue as to why he was rejected.  We have the statement from Stuart which hasn't been challenged by anyone. 

I like this quote: "Unless, or until they do, there is no grounds to believe this was not done for perfectly legitimate reasons, that we know nothing about, and further that is accepted by the people on the ground in the riding. "

The vanquished are always wrong, I guess.

No kloch, Parker's statement indicated I,  as a NDPer, was shooting at First Nations, which is a lie and inflammatory on several fronts.

Parker does not have any fucking right to state his lies against me and the rest of my family.

as for your "little" thought experiment,  such a scenario has sfa to do with my anger at Parker's fabricated view.

That is full of it.  The riding association, or at least officials within it have not expressed outrage about the decision, so unless they do one has to assume acceptance.  And who exactly is supposed to challenge the assertions.  As soon as any party offical did they would be jumped all over for violating Parker's privacy. 

No one has been vanquished, talk about over the top rhetoric, and Parker is continuing to show he would not make a good candidate in the way he has approached this issue on babble with heated language and an inability to be cool headed under pressure. 

What has happen is that NDP officials have decided that Parker would not make a fitting candidate for the NDP based on some criteria we only have a biased word for.  It is also clear that riding officals who did the original vetting and would have recomended Parker as a nominee candidate, are not, at least to this point, objecting to this decision, which should tell everyone something.  You might have the ego to think you somehow know better than everyone else, without a single fact in front of you, but I think it wise to put faith in the grassroots people in the riding association that would be the most effected by either a potential candidate being pulled or by a campaign that went belly up because of past actions by a candidate should they have won the nomination.

Wrong track. This is not a question of how you and sixteen or however many people think the vetting process of the NDP should be.

Right now what the process is, is that the centre has the ultimate power and accounability of what candidates are too much of a liability to allow their candidacy to stand.

Further, that one of the grounds that they can be rejected is for making grossly inflamatory statements. Obviously such determination processes can be abused and thats always a tension and potential problem. But at the end of the day it is agreed that one of the grounds a candidate can be rejected is for making comments that are inflamatory enough to significantly sideswipe the campaign.

That is the process.

And you just dodge it by saying that judgements of what is inflamatory are subjective. Of course they are. Does that mean the judegements should never be made?

I don't think Stuart should be blamed for reacting the way he did: either for hanging up on Pratt, or for continuing to protest how he was treated.

Irregardless of who ultimately is "right" [or most right, or whatever it is]... what do you expect when someone who has worked hard at being a candidate is suddenlt told they are being removed. The answer is not generally going to be "Oh gee, I understand. No hard feelings."

[And even less likely for the kind of person willing to be a candidate.]

Someone who is fit to be a candidate doesn't come on babble and attack people for raising legitimate issues like whether they are very committed given they did not attend riding meetings and things like that.  It isn't that he was upset, it is how that upset was handled.  Given the way he handled things it is probably best, including for him personally, that he is not going to be a candidate.  The small comments on babble are nothing compared to what happens in a campaign, even without comments like the ones that seem to have caused his nominee candidate status to be revoked.

KenS, I'll prepare a more thoughtful response through PM when I get home and have a moment.

Otherwise, I guess if the NDP did it, then it must be right.

LTUE:

while I don't disagree with everything you just said, in general we don't agree on that.

I have heard some good things about Stuart.

Maybe, just maybe, when cooler heads prevail, those that support Stuart's candidancy might consider some quiet and private lobbying with party headquarters to see if there is some way that they would consider changing their minds. It is very, very understandable that party headquarters will be very, very careful with the vetting process AFTER WHAT HAPPENED LAST ELECTION. And thank goodness for that.

This deseves as much respect as people wrapping themselves in the flag as a defense.

And thats a general statement. To make matters worse, leveling it at me in particular, looks like an attempt to sabotage your own credibility.

[Hint: read the threads I've lately posted by far the most in- which are nothing new.]

Yet accusing me of leading a "witch hunt" against the Party isn't "over the top" at all.

My comment wasn't directed at you.  In fact, it was directed at everyone except yourself.  On second reading, I apologize for not making that clear.

It's very Karl Rove, really: defend someone's blacklisting by accusing their supporters of McCarthyism. It's audacious.

EDIT: I'm really enjoying the comments of Lou and KenS. I'm not asking people to jump to conclusions. Their efforts at finding a middle ground and injecting reasonable discourse are to be commended.

If this is the way you communicate in public it leaves one to suspect that the concerns raised about you are in fact correct.  Your comments in both of these threads sure sends up red flags all over the place.  You might want to quit such behaviour if the ego you have displayed is capable of it.

Yeah right, Life, just keep bullying and trying to shut people up for bringing up history that you're clearly uncomfortable with.  It's obvious to everyone reading this what kind of a person you are. 

I also find the comments about the actions of the protestors having a relationship with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome very disturbing and odd and this couldn't be truer:

It's disappointing that apart from some thoughtful posts by a few on here that it's the usual partisan circle the wagons reaction but anyone who has read babble for awhile is used to it.  That's what commissars do and the NDP has as many of them as any other Political party.

As I said at the end of the previous thread, I don't see anything inconsistent between the blocking of Stuart's candidacy and the fawning over Obama by the party "modernizers."

The bringing of Obama's people to Halifax is part of a longer-term project on the part of "modernizers" to dilute the NDP's social democratic/working class nature and turning it into a "catch-all" party that will replace the Liberals someday.

So if you agree with a decision based on the comments presented on babble you are bad, evil, a 'commisar and apparently a bully.  But if you disagree with them, based again soley on what is recorded on babble you are the forces of light and goodness and the keeper of the flame of progressivism.

Nice to see such progressive voices trying to shout down anyone who happens to think that the information as presented can reasonably suggest the right decision was made.

And if you think a candidate can not withstand the fairly gentle barbs here on babble, what possible use could they be in a campaign when comments like those apparently made are thrown in their face by a much more hostile media.

You're the one trying to shout people down, that's plain to anyoe who can read. 

So it is shouting down if you happen to disagree and state it strongly, but it isn't if you support melovesproles opinion?  What is it if you belong to the melovesproles right-thinking club- calling people on their comments, or do you have another name?

As someone not a member of a political party and of the right-thinking club I didn't understand the rules thanks for clearing them up.

There are people here who are offering substantive criticisms.  You are not one of them.

On that note, I want to apologize to OO who I think has been for the most part fair and reasonable.

So now you are the arbiter of what is substantive or not?  Any other roles you play here so I can get the program straight.

You know what, I'm sick of playing your games.  You can believe what you want, I don't care.

All I can say is you're far more guilty of backseat moderating and bullying in this thread than I am.

So if someone does back to you what you do to them it is playing games.  The rules are getting clearer and clearer.  I really appreciate that, it makes it easier not to committ a social embarrassment.

And please tell me what is not substantive about suggesting posters on babble don't have the entire picture and can't and that waiting to see if the grassroots people at the riding level object.

"Back to you"?  You're the one who accussed me of starting a "witch hunt" against the Party.

But I guess you may be right.  The intimidation, bullying and McCarthyism started when I started this thread and you were just trying to defend the poor vicitimized Party against my attacks.

Polutanic2 already called you on your crap, and there's no need to repeat it.

Wrong again

I am not, nor have I ever been a member of the NDP.  The only party I have ever been a member of was the Greens.  I am a sometime supporter of the NDP true, but just as likely to not be and to be very critical.

My problem seems to be that I can spot bullshit and sophistry when I see it.

That's sort of what I said in the last thread. It's the fear of what Stuart may say and how he might say it that is probably the critical factor here. 

And as pointed out somewhere, witches were hunted down and murdered. McCarthy destroyed people's careers and executed a couple along the way - wait, pardon my language - McCarthy contributed to the execution of a few people along the way. To suggest that disagreeing with a central party decision is the same thing, is well, absurd. It's like saying that the party's critics are trying to lynch the person who made the decision. It detracts from the real witch hunts and lynchings which were profoundly sexist and racist but I'll retract the sexism comment anyway. 

Putting on my moderator's hat...

This discussion is starting to go downhill.

Nobody's said anything really bad yet, but it's starting to turn into a sandbox with the namecalling.

Can everyone just try to stick to the merits of their respective positions, m'kay? Rather than accusing others of shutting down debate, being a whiner, or a party toady, try to make a case.  

I also find that attacking someone's alleged hidden motives makes it looks like you don't have any logic behind your arguments.

And yes, I'm perfectly aware that I've engaged in all of these tactics at some point or another.

I'd hate to shut down the thread, but if we don't pull up our socks, I will.

Dismissed.

I think the thread title may have been too provocative.  Does it need a name change?

They just want to see another Dosanjh slide into the party undetected so that there can be many more internet discussion threads like this very valuable one on babble.

I was hoping we could move beyond the "Dosanjh was a Liberal plant" theory as well.

Thats me your quoting. And its not sort of like you said here. It's about what Stuart DID already say, NOT what he might say. What he SAID being brought back as fodder during the campaign. [And not locally.]

If I could interject over the heat I hope I can offer some constructive suggestions.  I'd like to make them directly to Stuart and some of his supporters if that is okay.

Stuart this is the second time you have taken action here on babble that seemed designed to embarrass the NDP. (not being fast enough in getting document too you in a by-election if my memory is right) It may have not been your intent, but it might make some a little suspicious of your motives.  You need to think about that and how you might change your approach to deal with people in an organization the same way you might work collegues, who even if you strongly disagree with you have to work with after any dispute.

I think you can tell from some of the comments from very even handed babblers, like OO, remind, Ken S and others that your comments were at least troubling, and not because they are critical, but because they go way beyond what would normally just be considered criticism to something much more.  I think you need to think about that too.  There is a difference between criticsm and attack and in this case it can be reasonably considered to have been an attack, even if you did not mean it, or still don't agree.  Good people can see it that way and you and others need to accept that - as do those troubled by them have to give you the benefit of the doubt that you erred and were not being malicious.

I have been through the old and the new vetting process.  The new one is certainly quite stringent.  I think we can have a rational discussion on whether the pendulm has swung too far, but I don't think it fair to say that those doing the vetting are not doing it for the best interest of everyone involved, including the candidates involved.  I also have been involved in talking to prospective candidates a fair amount.  The advice I tried to give you above is the same I give everyone.  It takes a healthy ego to take the beating a campaign can dole out, but at the same time, you as a candidate are the least important member of a campaign team, and you need to remember that and act towards the volunteers on your team that way.

If you still want to win a nomination I think there is a way forward.  Firstly you should understand that your comments are seen not as critical, but attacking and offensive by some.  If you want to be a candidate, or involved in the NDP you should publically apologize for going too far in trying to make your point and mean it.  That doesn't mean you can't be critical of NDP actions in the past, certainly I have done that and survived the vetting process.  Think of it this way.  How would your teammates feel on a sports team if you were all peaches and light in the dressing room, but trash talking the other players or the team in general in the media.  You would not be very welcomed in the locker room would you?

If you still want to be a candidate I would address the concerns proactively (as much as I hate that term) and also listen to the concerns people are raising, even the ones that piss you off.  See it as a learning opportunity for handling difficult issues during a campaign and find ways to address the concerns that would both smooth ruffled feathers now, but also undermine any attempt to use your comments agaisnt you or the party later.  Because believe me they will, don't kid yourself about that.

These words were meant with the best intent, and sorry if they sound a little 'lecturey', but I think there is a chance to rescue this (if that is the right word) by talking it through calmly and with understanding with local and national people, assuming you are still interested in being a candidate.

I wish you all the best whatever you decide.

LP, thank you.  I have been trying to be constructive, but as you can tell, I knew enough about Gustafsen Lake to have my antennae raised by Mr. Parker's original statement, and it's something I care about.

Since some folks have evidently not read the article in the Canadian Encyclopedia, I'm going to quote from some key parts:

I tihnk there is a lot of wisdom to what Don Campbell said.  As I recall, Bruce Clark was eventually dismissed as their lawyer, but he may have continued to represent some of them.  You'll note I've never said the RCMP didn't go totally over the top, and Ujjal was undoubtedly being a cowboy.

But this is completely different than Ipperwash or Oka for that matter.  It was a couple of folks deciding, without any support from the duly chosen local aboriginal government or that community, to squat on the private property of their neighbours and build a standing structure where he'd previously given them consent to practice a yearly ceremony, that was never a traditional local ceremony.  They were not acting on behalf of the folks whose traditional territory it was, and who were already engaged in attempting to settle a land claims treaty with the federal and provincial government.  They brought guns onto the site.  I don't doubt that some ranch hands said some intemperate and provocative things either; there is a long ugly history in that area.  The RCMP escalated it into something well beyond what was required, however.

But the chiefs and elders of the local communities did not support the original actions, it was not part of their land claims which were already being addressed, and the native folks involved were at least partly responsible for the escalation themselves.  So, it was completely unlike Ipperwash and Oka.

Also, Kloch, you were right: I did misread something you said when I was looking on a smaller screen.  Sorry about that.

Oh-oh, missed this one before.  I guess all online commenters are guys until proven otherwise, eh ! ;-)  Thanks for being my gender-defender, Unionist.  :-)

HA!

I've made that mistake more than a few time's myself.

You mean the internet isn't just sweaty old guys in their parents basement.  Damn I am going to have to find a new peer group.

Well, the restrictuon, unique to the NDP, that one cannot be a member of any provincial party but the NDP and be allowed to be a member of the federal NDP, and vice versae, tends to indicate the contrary.

It is always nice when the tone takes a turn for the better.

I must say, however, OO that I continue to disagree with your look at Gustafsen. The encyclopaedia is fine for what it is worth, but a new thread on Babble, with far more comprehensive links and evidence on this issue can be found at : http://www.rabble.ca/babble/western-provinces/gustafsen-lake-miracle and these very detailed and researched accounts give a very different portrayal entirely akin to Ipperwash and Oka (where activists were also called extremists, etc...)

I also think that you proved my point re: FSA. If one person was acquitted due to it, presumably the other followers of Wolverine would have been as well...which they were not, so to claim that others suffered from it has no basis in fact.

However, it is good, sometimes to agree to disagree...and I continue to think Stuart should have been allowed to as well!

But where we diverge is not whether Stuart is allowed to disagree with policy or actions of the NDP.

The Canadian Encyclopedia is wrong and it is depressing to see how much nonsense has now gone into the public record. For a start - the Union of BC Indians Chiefs, the senior Indian political organization in BC passed a resolution in full support of the Gustafsen Lake Defenders in Sept 1995. Most of the media were subject to the well controlled "smear and disinformation" campaign orchestrated by the Provincial NDP government and DIA Band and Tribal Council Collaborators in the region which operated in a manner similar to the Karzai puppets in negotiating extinguisment and termination agreements under BC's 'Trick or Treaty' Commission, which Harcourt was pushing at the time and later joined as a Treaty Commissioner. Harcourt said the people at Gustafsen were part of "A new world order cult". Ovide Mercredi said : "no university students were there, no college students, no leaders. There was no one who had a job or a future...They were a group of people frustrated to the point where they had no loyalty to anyone, no loyalties even to their own people." The RCMP called them "terrorists and fanatics who simply want to make war for some reason."

However, just so everyone's clear. Here's what it was about from their own documents delivered to all concerned parties, and here's what the NDP government and their remote controlled RCMP, Tribal Council Collaborators, DND APC's, 77,000 rounds of internationally proscribed hollow-point dum dum ammunition, and a crooked BC bench and bar were trying to silence:

'The Sundancers at Gustafsen Lake have one demand.

That their petition dated January 3, 1995 be addressed publicly by an independent and impartial Third Party Tribunal:

(a) is the popular assumption that the Canadian Courts and police have jurisdiction legal?

(b) or is that assumption criminally treasonable, fraudulent and compicitous in the genocide of the Aboriginal peoples as alleged in the petition?

I Ovide Mercredi, both as a lawyer and as an aboriginal person support the request. The jurisdictional question must be addressed and resolved according to the rule of law.' (Mercredi refused to sign)

Media Should Apologize for Gullibility on Gustafsen Lake

http://sisis.nativeweb.org/gustlake/sep26cli.html

Disinformation and Smear: The Use of State Propaganda and Military Force to Suppress Aboriginal Title at the 1995 Gustafsen Lake Standoff

http://www.uleth.ca/dspace/bitstream/10133/189/3/MQ83763.pdf [79]

Smear and Disinformation Campaign

http://sisis.nativeweb.org/court/dec2096.html [80]

As there is now a Gustafsen thread any further discussion of this sub-category of the Stu Parker issue will go on there. It is depressing to see the same old discredited lies of yesteryear endlessly recycled usually emating from the same old interests. If anyone is genuinely interested search out the materials and make up your own minds. I can tell you that it's about powerful criminals covering up their powerful crimes.

Michael, the discussion about Gustafsen Lake is probably focussed on two different aspects: one about the response of the RCMP which no-one's in much disagreement over, and the other about the issues and struggle.  All I can say is the position and activities of those few native folks were not supported by the elders or councils or the vast majority of people in those communities.  I met a lot of very wise and patient people, who've endured a lot (the Williams Lake residential school, just for one, if you remember that trial) but still advocated peaceful means of struggle.

You are assuming a lot, based perhaps on wanting to embrace a more radical form of struggle, but the people you would lionize like Wolverine were preaching a master-race anti-semitic ideology (not dissimilar to Ahenakew), and lawyers like Bruce Clark have made a career out of exploiting situations like this.  I highly doubt that these are the kinds of folks whose actions you'd want to stake your progressive ideals on defending.

I'm working away on something else right now, or I'd involve myself in another thread.  Perhaps when I need a break, I'll pop in and have a look though.  Thanks for the link.

As to the nomination aspect, I don't want to be involved in giving a platform to people who are prone to make provocative hyperbolic statements, and go postal on the party at the drop of a hat.  It's destructive, and undermines the work and financial contributions of everyone else, and has no place in electoral politics.

I, respectfully, disagree.

His nomination was blocked, by the party's own admission, for this very reason. Given that we can dispute the nature of what happened in 1995, given that the RCMP track record on native relations at the time (and still) was terrible, and given that the NDP AG at the time, as I have quoted, plainly and frankly stated that the use of naked force was going to occur, along with so many other factors, saying, in the context of Facebook, that the NDP shot at natives is a disagreement, plain and simple.

Agree with him or not, many people get very angry at injustice, and they are exactly the people that do belong in the NDP. I would rather a candidate error on the side of being upset over the treatment of natives, workers, women, gays, lesbians and all those so frequently labeled extremists when they stand up to governments of all different stripes than have a party of Yes Men & Women who fall into lockstep with fashionable leadership opinion. If he made any error, Stuart made the right kind of error, and that also matters.

I am NOT, actually a supporter of Stuart's candidacy (nor am I opposed). Not living in St. Paul's, I had not given it a lot of thought, to be frank. But this reason for disqualification is absurd and reeks of a party far too desperate to control "message" as opposed to allowing the creation of a meaningful one.

I am sure (and actually would hope) that many of us, upset at the injustices that surround us, have made harsh or over-the-top comments on social-networking sites on any number of issues. If I wanted to I could probably do a Larry Flint and screen the past or present comments of party MPs or MPPs for moments of weakness or nastiness, and I am certain that I would find them. (In fact, I can think of a couple right now).

But this is distasteful and reeks of the East Germany of The Lives of Others, seeking out hints of unorthodoxy or moments when one's guard is down..

I would warn those who rush to defend this. Little is actually anonymous, and if you want to apply this kind of standard, it will be applied to you as well, should you, one day, make the leap to running.

That, for most babblers, bloggers or facebookers would likely not be a totally comfortable experience.

OK, just had a look.  It's fluff, particularly the stuff about Bruce Clark.  I guess no-one cares about what the native folks who actually lived there think.

Actually, the internet working in real time, I was disagreeing with the post before your's OO!!

"the Union of BC Indians Chiefs, the senior Indian political organization in BC"

It's not. It represents a minority of first nation communities in BC. The First Nations Congress (it may have changed its name since I lived there) represents 70% of the communities, while UBCIC represents about 30%.

It should tell you something that Ovide Mercredi refused to sign the Sundancers' declaration.

However, I am not assuming anything.

I never said I was supporter of Wolverine, and anyone who knows me knows that I am not unusually radical. (One of the advantages of using your real name, is that people can check out the things I have said or written for themselves). In fact, I am strongly opposed to almost all forms of political and revolutionary violence, and have written on this matter publically in several published forums.

I came to the defense of those, if you look at the earlier part of thread, who were saying exactly that the RCMP had overreacted and that they did so in the context of orders from an NDP AG whose rhetoric was extreme and helped to lead to the events as they then occured. I feel that had he acted differently, things could have unfolded differently. I was saying that given this context, Stuart's comments were more understandable. And, at the time, others were being less charitable.

At the time some posters were being attacked for getting their facts, on things like the RCMP overreaction, the NDP AG's involvement, the use of armoured cars, the over-the-top use of force by the RCMP, wrong, which they had not.

History and issues are, of course, complex. But the first versions of Gustafsen Lake being presented in this thread by those who opposed Stuart were a whitewash, and that is all that I wanted to speak to.

As to Wolverine, history, including the history of the treatment of his people by government and police, will judge him far better than I can, but I am certain that his methods, in-and-of themselves, never lead to an immediately positive outcome.

He may not have even expected one.

again you recycle the old lies the NDP/RCMP/Media was pushing way back in 1995, as part of their smear and disinformation campaign. The purpose was the same then as now - distract from the central issue which is the illegal usurpation of jurisidction to steal resources, colonize and  commit genocide in the process. That this should be done by a party which self identifies itself on the 'left' should be of great concern. As for "provocative hyperbolic statements" don't you think "master race anti-semitic ideology" might qualify? You only demonstrate just how ethically and morally bankrupt your No difference Party remains by your smearing of people you clearly  know nothing of but the bad press.

OO, if you do disagree with the views of those in the native community who disagree with you, that thread is clearly the place to take it up.

I do think, however, I have made my case, for what little it may be worth, that Stuart's comments, given the actions of the NDP AG and the RCMP at the time, and given the context he made them in, were, in my opinion, hardly a reasonable reason to disqualify him.

We can all disagree, but preventing people from running for a nomination on these grounds will come back to bite many activists right in the ass... not just Stuart, and you likely find only a few friends here it seems.

You're lumping the NDP, RCMP and Media together, and I disagree with that.

You're also saying I knew nothing of those people, but I've already written that I do.

I think we're done here.

They WERE together. Quite clearly. And the Band Council compradors as well.

I certainly am.

I'm disturbed that people are conflating two distinct positions:

(a) Wolverine and the Sundancers were right (a position I have never held) and

(b) It was wrong to stage a provincial media event based on unnecessarily escalating the conflict and shooting at Wolverine and the Sundancers in order to make the NDP look "tough" (a position I held and hold)

The logic that is being employed by _some_ NDP apologists in this thread is straight from Harper's playbook. Tories labeled Layton "Taliban Jack" for saying the Afghan War was wrong and falsely implied that he backed the Taliban. Just as it is perfectly possible to oppose both the Afghan War and the Taliban, it is equally possible to oppose both Wolverine and Dosanjh's cyncical miltitarization of a conflict that led directly to the shooting of a female protester.

I'm totally willing to engage with people who want to argue that it was reasonable to veto my candidacy. But I'm disturbed by the fact that I keep hearing Rovian arguments that somehow anyone who questions a military incursion is necessarily on the side of the terrorists.

Wow...the comments came so fast and furious, I even missed a couple.

Apologies all...my first recent comment was directed at the short post of Ken S.

My second was to OO's first response, which was respectful on her part and I attempted to respectfully disagree with it.

My third was to OO's second response. which it now seems was not aimed at me, at least I think.

As for OO's final response I am not sure who it was aimed at, but OO I do, in fact respect much of what you have said, and if it angered you that is unfortunate, but I don't think anything I said was extreme or an attack on you personally, I never felt that you were lying when you said you knew the community in question and I never said I did and I am not into conspiracies at all! (I don't actually know you personally nor do I know who you are, but I am sure you are sincere in your opinions, they simply differ from mine on this specific issue).

Well, others can sort it out...

Ok, back to the fun.  

I too remember this, but I recall quite clearly how hard line Dosanjh quickly became over the Gustafson lake seige, and how it came out later that the RCMP had lied their collective butts off about it.  All those rounds fired and turned out almost all came from their own side.  So the NDP wasn't directly involved in it, but please don't tell us Ujjal's own confrontational position wasn't backed up by the party, before, during and afterwords.

I also think that blocking a candidates nomination for some comment made on facebook indicates the democratic deficit in the party now.  Implying Stuart Parker, who I've followed for some time as a constructive and progressive activist, is a kneejerk radical, attention seeker or loose cannon is itself inflamatory.

"You are assuming a lot, based perhaps on wanting to embrace a more radical form of struggle, but the people you would lionize like Wolverine were preaching a master-race anti-semitic ideology (not dissimilar to Ahenakew), and lawyers like Bruce Clark have made a career out of exploiting situations like this.  I highly doubt that these are the kinds of folks whose actions you'd want to stake your progressive ideals on defending.

......

As to the nomination aspect, I don't want to be involved in giving a platform to people who are prone to make provocative hyperbolic statements, and go postal on the party at the drop of a hat.  It's destructive, and undermines the work and financial contributions of everyone else, and has no place in electoral politics."

And using terms like 'McCarthyism' for being silenced by others is hardly unusual, especially in personal conversations, but most just assume that the audience can make out the differences in extent.  To imply otherwise is also hyperbolic.  And to make vetting decisions over this just shows the usual lack of commonsense in the NDP now.  It just draws more attention to what should be just a small indescrection at worse.

Sorry, I'm actually not angry (or I wasn't until someone called the women chiefs I knew a little and respected a lot "compradors").

Stuart, you're not helping your case with me at all by calling people apologists, Rovean, and Harper stooges.  I agree with some of your conclusions, but not that the NDP "staged a media event" designed to escalate violence against natives in order to look tough.  Real life is always more complicated, but doesn't have the same rhetorical flourish.  The RCMP and the Attorney-General had different agendae and different interests in that episode, some of which coincided and some of which didn't.

I'm not even sure what purpose you think it served to raise this issue 15 years later.  Neverthess, what's done is done, and I think everyone's way forward is probably pretty clear by now.

I can't tell you how disappointed I am in this response. 

Stuart with the greatest respect if you want to be a candidate, for any party or any position you need to reflect on whether the approach you are takening is one that brings people together, which is ultimately the most important role a candidate plays.

from NDPP "compradors"

What an unbelievably offensive term to use. Do you even know what it means? And to think you had the gall to lecture someone like OO

Thanks for riding to my rescue, there, BA.

Anyone who had the most basic background and history on first nation-colonist relations in the Cariboo would know how unbelievably offensive that statement was when applied to the people NDPP did.  These were the same woman who showed amazing courage in bringing the bishop who ran the cruel St. Joseph's residential school in Williams Lake to trial, and who have led their communities in a peaceful effort to have their land claims negotiated and improve their relations with their non-aboriginal neighbours; this in spite of all the bad blood and history in that area (you should read about the way the court system functioned there in the 1950s).

For those who don't know what the word comprador means, the definition is "a native of a colonised country who acts as the agent of the coloniser".  I can't think of a case where it would apply less, nor be so insultingly thrown around.

"Bringing people together" goes both ways.  Blocking someones nomination because of personal criticism over the Clark-Miller administration isn't a good way to go about it either.  Especially when so many newly minted NDP "moderates" openly dump on the same regime, but blame it all on "the old way of doing things" instead or the usual bogeymen on the left.

Don't let it get to you Stuart, you have more potential supporters in the party than you see here.

Gustafsen Lake took place during the Harcourt administration.

So what, is that kind of nitpicking supposed to mean something, does it wipe out everything else thats been said?  

I'm sorry OO, I know these situations are never clear cut in action, and I respect most of your opinions, but I see too much of this kind of thing in the party now.  If you want support from the activist left you had all better start taking them more seriously, or expect more of this kind of blow back.  As I have already commented, these kind of suppressing actions only lead to more exposure than what likely would have happened otherwise. 

And here's a pretty good article on it questioning the state's use of force at Gustafson lake.  Found it right next door on babble:

http://people.uleth.ca/~hall/evidence.htm

If people either in or out of the NDP are serious about serious things - then they need to grasp some fundamental facts about the modus operandi of a settler state and a corrosive, continuing colonialism. Gustafsen Lake demonstrated just how befouled and filthy this settler state, even an NDP Provincial one, really was. And is. And yes, compradors are a feature that exists from the AFN 'Grand Chief' to the various collaborating Tribal councils administering the oppression of the colonizer or acting as brokers to Treaty Commission extinguishment and termination sellouts,  to the NDP doing the same for powerful interests up above itself,  which, unfortunately, we the deluded, desparing or desparate often mistake for  'representatives'. Frequently they are not. Frequently they 'represent' precisely the opposite of our best and authentic interests.

Gustafsen Lake should be studied in deep detail because it will reveal important truths about how we  are here in Canada and how things really work.  I ask no one to take anything on trust from me, the NDP or anyone else. But really search out and examine as much as you can so that the reality of what actually happens can begin to correct the spin and 'official messaging' of most of what we are told about  such things.  When the PTB tell you somone is a "fanatic" or a "squatter" or a "terrorist".  Be careful.

The NDP is a corrupt and befouled thing at present. If people wish it to be otherwise, to clean up and rise up,  they will have to change much. Good that people like Stuart Parker are willing to roll up their sleeves to help cleanse the Augean stables of the body politic, and let fresh air, light and health in -  more power to them. I wish him and others like him the best because things are in a highly advanced, deteriorating way. Canada as settler state and colonizer has succeeded in ways that  Israel can only dream of- it is no wonder that there is such official support of Apartheid Israel and malevolence for the freedom fighters. Or for the traditional sovereigntists or warrior societies or grassroots people and their resistance movements here. This needs to be faced, understood and changed. Begin to decolonize now.

People need to think clearly about what to do and just steering the same captive political train down the same tracks on behalf of the same awful owners doesn't change things much.

Do not dismiss where the comment was made. If its inflamatory, and its recorded, it is liable to be brought up.

I and others have not characterised Stuart that way. Our concern with at least one statement he made. Some have also characterised Stuart in the way you describe. In any polarized discussion strong language and positions will be taken. Don't use that to dismiss the whole argument being made.

First of all, for the purposes of determing whether it was legitimate to remove you as candidate what really happed as Gustafsen is a diversion. [With the understanding that there is a relationship between disagreements over what really happened and whether one sees your statement as inflamatory. But there is no necessary connection. I agree with you about the BC NDPs responsibility, I still think your statement was clearly inflamatory and sufficient grounds to remove you.]

More central: yes, "it is equally possible to oppose both Wolverine and Dosanjh's cyncical miltitarization of a conflict" and for you to have expressed an opinion of the BCNDPs responsibility, and to remain a candidate [also to there fore reasonably expect to never hear from the media, since unlike Afghanistan and Taliban Jack, this is really old.]

But you did not do that, you said "the NDP shot at people."

Thats the issue.

Your supporters, and apparently yourself, give yourself a pass: essentially saying that [1] in the context of what happened that isn't inflammatory. And/or that [2] its only legitimate around the list of what 'we' see as inflamatory (racist, sexist, etc). And/or [3] that the riding should be the ones to decide if Stuart Parker is too much of a liability to the national campaign because of the words he chose (which you all insist on characterising as if no one said anything is because 'Stuart expressed disagreement with something the NDP did').

Viz [1]- you all tout court refuse outright the legitimacy of the national campaign protecting itself.

Viz [2]- the party as a whole has decided- not just the powers that be- that we want people removed who are a liability to the campaign. Trying to limit what that can be done over to your list is an arrogation. If you don't like what it is, bring that to Council or Convention, but I take offense to your arrogation that your list is the only legitimate one.

Viz [3]- it does not make sense, nor is it democratic, to let riding associations decide who is an unacceptable risk to the national campaign. They aren't accountable to me.

For our purposes here whether something is inflammatory is not some kind of general criteria.

The relevant test is whether the words are significantly likely to be picked up by the media because they smell a story, and then if they can be dealt with when coughed back to Jack Layton during a campaign.

There is no way Jack Layton could explain or make go away "the NDP shot at people."

Bookish Agrarian, your "disappointment" over my response to a post other than yours seems a little odd. I'm sorry I didn't get to responding to your post yesterday. I hope to today. It is a lengthy post deserving of consideration.

KenS, for me the high point in Jack Layton's leadership was in the 2004 campaign when he talked about how Paul Martin had blood on his hands from the homeless people who died from all the cuts to housing and welfare when he was finance minister. This was a powerful statement that energized our party's base because finally the NDP was getting back to talking about things that mattered, to making elections about holding governments to account for who lived and who died. Paul Martin did have blood on his hands for this but such a link between political responsibility and endangering human life was far less direct and more tenuous in the case of Paul Martin than it was in the case of Ujjal Dosanjh when someone actually got shot because of the hard line he took. Fortunately she lived.

The government refused to negotiate and decided to call out the trigger-happy, racist RCMP on an absurdly large scale and then make inflamatory statements in the media to dramatize its "hard line." Viewpoints Research, the NDP's polling firm at the time, then conducted daily polling of voters to see how they liked the toughness the government was displaying -- the siege's escalation produced an upward trend in the polls which was monitored daily by Viewpoints and touched-off not only more escalation and hard-line statements but also election preparations for the party which planned to go to the polls in the fall of 1995 until NCHS caught up with them. Let me be clear: shooting at these extremists was a cold calculation by a party that had been seeking to publicly dramatize its move to the right since the 1993 "welfare cheats and deadbeats" speech that touched off a shameful period in its history.

The idea that Jack Layton must never be questioned about this dark time in the party's past and that the only solution to this stain on the NDP record is to permanently silence anyone who mentions the party's decision to shoot at native protesters is not just untenable from both a PR and party-building perspective; it insures that we will be the kind of party that will make this mistake again. And that is a far greater danger because if we don't remember how we arrogantly endangered human life the last time we had power, we will do it again the next time we have power. A party that cannot face up to its past and seeks to purge from its front lines those who attempt to make it do so is a party doomed to repeat that past.

I supported Jack Layton's leadership campaign because he constituted a break from the NDP's embrace of neoliberalism and poor-bashing populism in BC and Saskatchewan in the 1990s. When he ran for the leadership he reached out to the activist base which was full of deeply disillusioned people like me. How have we gone from a repudiation of the kind of governing represented in Ujjal Dosanjh to a repudiation, instead, of those who remind us of that time?

SP has demonstrated an infatuation with polls, but no ability to analyze them.  This can come from a romantic's view of a people anxiously waiting to be proselytized that comes out of inadequate contact with real folks in the mainstream - before or during elections.

And with that Stuart I'm finished discussing this with you. For the umpteenth time it is not that you mentioned what happened, it is that you said "the NDP shot at people". Presumably you see this as either no difference or hair splitting. Its not.

And by the way, it is not only lefties who say things that because of public relations dynamics, once said, it is impossible to successfully explain 'the full context' or 'what you really meant'. It happens to conservatives and liberals too. It is more likely to happen to lefties, but the dynamic is no different.

So the requirement is that if you don't want to get sidetracked you pay attention to how you say things. And in the case of an NDP campaign, its not just yourself that you can fatally sidetrack.

It is hair-splitting. I'm sorry you can't see that. The party made the decision to shoot at these people consciously, cynically and directly.

Some examples would be great George!

Much of what is written below was originally for private consumption, so I'll try to address specific people where possible.

For Kens and OO, yes, I understand that there is a candidate vetting process, nor do I disagree that there should be one. However, the application of the highly subjective "inflammatory" comment rule in this case tells me a lot about the mentality of the people who are running the party.

I feel that statements that are racist, homophobic, misogynistic and certain types of criminal convictions, should be cause for rejection. As for the inflammatory statements comment, well, yes, I think we agree that this is subjective and that it is a judgement call. I don't think that this particular judgement call was the correct one, as I don't think what he said was that inflammatory. Furthermore, given the standing that native affairs has in Canadian society, I highly doubt that the majority of Canadians would care about what an NDP candidate said about a standoff with aboriginals 15 years ago (not that I think this is a state of affairs to be admired).

The fact is that the reason for his rejection is the criticism of an action taken by a former NDP Minister who is now a Liberal, in an incident that is fairly remote from most Canadian's minds. This suggests to me that his rejection is simply because he said something critical about the NDP. Unless evidence is produced to the contrary, then I must assume that this is the correct conclusion.

Now, it is all well and good to say that the vetting process must be respected. However, the manner in what it was applied is what is troubling. The treatment of aboriginals in this country is a national disgrace and something that we should be ashamed of, as Canadians. 1995 was a particularly bad year, as it saw paramilitary style operations by both the BC NDP government, and the Ontario PC government. One government on the "left", another on the "right". From an aboriginal perspective, same difference. In the case of the BC incident, thousands of rounds of ammunition fired, international condemnation, and the only incident of a Canadian native being granted political asylum in the US. These are not incidents to be proud of. This is the context in which Stuart said that the NDP shot at native protesters. I don't see his comments as offensive. I see his comments as those of an individual demanding that their political party live up to the principles that it was founded upon. Was he engaging in exaggeration and hyperbole? Yes, of course he was. If the NDP communications staff isn't capable of managing a person like this, then they are not competent enough to run this country. Sorry if that is harsh, but that is my opinion, for whatever it is worth.

Finally, I will conclude with this line of thought: perhaps Canadians would respect us more as a political movement, if we didn't act as if we were afraid of our own principles. People elect their leaders in part, based on our resolve, and whether or not we will defend their interests. If we run away every time some one challenges us on something difficult (Gustafsen Lake, the Middle East, even the use of the word socialism), exactly what conclusions will they draw about us? Of course, if the goal of the NDP is to supplant the Liberals as the official opposition, well then, avoiding controversy and staying on simplistic messaging is probably the smart move.
Of course, if your goal is to be the Liberal party, there is a much easier way to accomplish this: simply join them, and put us out of our misery...

While I'm hunting for the example - from somewhere a week or more back - you could challenge my take on  you as having "a romantic's view of a people anxiously waiting to be proselytized," a condition seen in all of your postings.

Indeed. If Babble is not a place where people can be critical of the NDP, where can one be so? If this is not an online social environment where one can express disapproval of an NDP idea or decision, where would you recommend?

This I find highly ironic. We are a party forged by the trade union movement. So let's extend your metaphor: to whom am I complaining? My coworkers. About whom am I complaining? Management. I think your workplace analogy has real merit because it helps to further dramatize what I see as a culture of corporate or brand loyalty supplanting a culture of solidarity.

I have cast no aspersions on the intent of the staff involved. I assume what they are doing is carrying-out a policy made at the highest levels of the party. And I am sure that the only motivation anyone here has is a desire to benefit the NDP. All this thread is is an argument about what is best for the New Democratic Party.

Unfortunately, that course of action is unavailable to me. Because I wouldn't mean it.

I have issued public apologies before, both heartfelt and otherwise. In order to issue a public apology, I have to make sure that what I am doing does not just benefit me but benefit the people I am seeking to serve. I think that the very last thing the NDP needs right now is validation for invasive practices that function to chill debate within the party. Even if I myself were sorry, I do not think that the party should have any encouragement in its new direction when it comes to intra-party communication.

What other players? What I said was that the NDP did something bad in the past. I have named only one individual who did this bad thing. And he is now wearing someone else's jersey. So this analogy, unlike the workplace analogy, does not hold together as well. I have never said a bad word about a single candidate nominated by or seeking a nomination for this party. Nor have I said a bad word about any party staff -- all I did was name the person who phoned me on the party's behalf when people asked for details of the call. But I have never said a bad word about James Pratt, Pete Treadwell or anyone else in national office.

Hey that's okay. I appreciate your candour and desire to help me. I see it as absolutely sincere.

I appreciate that. I think you can see that I have decided not to take your advice. Being an NDP candidate is just not sufficiently important to me personally to apologize for something I really don't see as wrong. Ultimately, my concern for the NDP is greater than my desire to represent it; I don't want to make it any easier for the party to head in the direction it appears to be heading at the moment. But I am sure that if I wanted to be a candidate, your advice would be the way to go. And so I really appreciate your post.

Thanks and good luck in your campaign.

It's so not my view that I am seeking an example of a post you could possibly be referring to. That is so not how I think about the electorate that I am just dumbfounded.

The last time I posted about polling on this site, it was dredging up approval rating stats from the Trudeau and Chretien eras to compare to current approval rating polls.

And again (#3)...anything forthcoming on romantic imagery and proselytizing?

Long.