Maxime Bernier for PM? You betcha!

C'mon, he's decorative, he's dumb, and besides, since he came out today as a climate change 'skeptic', the Blogging Tories have been falling all over themselves to get their teabagging credentials in order :

"Maxime really is great!!! Keep up the good work Maxime. One day you will be HM PM.

"You had me at Bonjour"

"Finally a Canadian Conservative Speaks Truth"

"Enter Maxime Bernier with a daring volley launched in the heart of climate lunacy."

"Maxime Bernier for Prime Minister! Finally, someone on the government side with the cajones to speak out."

Finally - I think they meant to say - a Sarah Palin with cajones.

Max speaks :

"What is certain is that it would be irresponsible to spend billions of dollars and to impose unnecessarily stringent regulations to solve a problem whose gravity we still are not certain about."

Gravity? Gravity is also a hoax! The earth sucks! Max for PM! You betcha! Also! Too!

CSIS agents secretly interrogated Abdelrazik

in a Sudanese prison in October of 2003 after he was jailed "at the request of mysterious 'Canadian' authorities", newly released government documents show.

A February 2008 Foreign Affairs briefing note to Maxime Bernier confirms :

"We were not informed of his arrest until November 2003, when Sudanese authorities advised us he was detained at the request of the government of Canada (please see attached memo for more detail)."

Unfortunately we don't know which mysterious Canadian authority because that attached eight page memo obtained by NDP MP Paul Dewar has "every single word, including the page numbers, blacked out."

Not us, says CSIS, insisting CSIS "does not, and has not, arranged for the arrest of Canadian citizens overseas."

So how did you know he was there then? Paul Koring at the G&M reasonably asks - especially as Foreign Affairs claims not to have known he'd been arrested until a month later in November.

Later today Dewar will attempt to force a motion asking for Abdelrazik to be brought before the foreign affairs committee. The motion will fail because the Cons have shown they will go to extraordinary lengths to keep him from coming home, presumably at least in part to protect "mysterious Canadian authorities".

5pm Update : In comments, Skdadl and Frank point out that my link to Koring's G&M article is a rewrite from last night's original, which contained these two now missing additional paragraphs :

"Although the most recently obtained documents confirm another glaring discrepancy in the claims made by various government agencies involved with Mr. Abdelrazik, a review of thousands of pages of document in The Globe's possession shows that not everyone in the Foreign Affairs ministry was unaware of Mr. Abdelrazik's imprisonment.

In an Oct., 16, 2003, e-mail marked “secret,” officials of the intelligence unit of Foreign Affairs note that CSIS agents will pass on details of their then just-completed interrogation of Omar Khadr in Guantanamo and planned to “send two officers to Sudan next week to interview Abdelrazik.” "

Skdadl is reminded of Arar. Yes.

In 2002 at Bagram prison, a 15 year old Omar Khadr was shown photographs of Arar.

On January 2009 at a military commission hearing in Guantanamo Bay: "[FBI]special agent Robert Fuller told Khadr's war-crimes hearing that the young Canadian was not immediately able to name Arar, but did say he looked familiar."

He looked familiar. On such evidence hangs the lives of men.

Snap election? Snap book release.

Julie Couillard's editors are probably working overtime right about now.

More at Impolitical.

Cleavage-gate : boobs vs boobs

yeah, you were awesome too baby ... hey, did i leave some shit there last night? ***


BT Stephen Taylor is pleased that this whole sordid business of biker chicks and microphones allegedly planted in the seams of mattresses is now solidly behind us :

"By clearing the deck of the Bernier issue, the Prime Minister’s office will construct a narrative of promptly dealing with issues of substance and holding the line on fabrications from the opposition...
Today was a bad day for Conservatives, but it represents an opportunity for the government to move forward on its agenda without this distraction."

Yeah - "an opportunity", "moving forward", "constructing a narrative", "promptly dealing with issues"!
So what have you got for us?

Ottawonk, from whom I pillaged the above pic and ***, notes that according to this Government House Leader page, next week is "Sound Economic Management Without a Carbon Tax Week", tastefully accompanied over at the ReformaTory homepage with this pic.

Oh. So it's Business as Usual with Funny Hats Week vs boobs then, is it?
I'm sorry, Mr Taylor, but I'm gonna hafta go with Cleavage-gate here. Boob stories always have more legs.

Ottawonk - very wicked funny on this - Go

Cross-posted at Creekside

SPP : What's good for General Motors ...

Condi Rice, Mexican Foreign Secretary Patricia Espinosa and Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier gave a statement Tuesday following their mini-SPP meeting to discuss the upcoming North American Leaders’ Summit in New Orleans, but only Le Maximator managed to say nothing badly in both official languages.

From the US Dept. of State website : Maxime Bernier :

"So we discussed what is important for our countries. And as you know, we want to ensure that North America is a secure and economically dynamic region.
This is important for us, but this is also important for our citizens."

Why, thank you for noticing, Maxi.

Condi did clear up any worries we might have had that the North American Competitiveness Council has the loudest and only non-gov voice at the SPP talks though :

"This SPP ... is work that bridges all of the important issues: security, trade, prosperity. It also has permitted the leaders to engage the public – the private sector and civil society through the North American Competitiveness Council."

Yup - General Motors, Lockheed Martin, Wal-Mart, General Electric, Chevron, Ford, Canfor, Home Depot, Bell, CN, and PowerCorp - they got your back!

Cross-posted at Creekside

Channeling JFK with "little cakes for you"

"John F. Kennedy said to the Americans: 'Don't ask what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country,"' Bernier said.
"Now, today, I'm asking Canadians, 'Don't ask the Afghan government what it can do for us in Canada, but what we Canadians can do for the Afghan people."'

~ Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier addressing Canadian troops on Sunday at one of thirteen photo-ops in Afghanistan.

WTF is he on about now?
Canadians don't need to ask the Afghan government what it is doing for us in Canada.
We already know what the Afghan government is doing for us in Canada.
Without Afghan PM Karzai's little reciprocal staged photo ops, there'd be no opportunity at all for Steve to play Crusader Bunnypants Jr "on the world stage", as he likes to call it.

Bernier was upbeat : "The territory is more secure now today, here in Kandahar than it was a year ago."
The UN was not : "The security situation in Afghanistan is assessed by most analysts as having deteriorated at a constant rate through 2007," stated their August report, adding that their own assessment of a 25% increase in violent attacks is likely to be a conservative one.

The egregious new International Development Minister Bev Oda was also along for the ride, "handing out sweets to soldiers and posing beside military vehicles."
G&M : "Yesterday's tour by the Conservative cabinet ministers included at least 13 photo opportunities. During a trip to a forward base, Ms. Oda stood in front of a concrete building scarred by shrapnel from Taliban mortars and offered a box of chocolate treats to the soldiers.
"Thank you for your work," she said, "and little cakes for you."

Yeah, it's little cakes all round. I think I'm gonna be sick.

Picture Update : Thanks, Zorph! Brilliant!

Cross-posted at Creekside

The O'Connor death watch has begun

Via Jeff, this report from the Globe and Mail details Gordon O'Connor's defiant response to questions as to whether he is resigning his post as Minister of National Defence.

A defiant Gordon O'Connor said yesterday he has no intention of quitting as Defence Minister, and warned his critics not to assume he is about to turfed from the portfolio in a widely expected cabinet shuffle.

"I can assure you of one thing: I'm not retiring and I'm not resigning," Mr. O'Connor told reporters at a military conference in Kingston. "And if you want to run a pool, go ahead. You're going to lose."

I'll take July 20th.

The minister told the conference he expects to deliver the government's long-awaited policy paper, which will include elements of the government's current policy in support of the Afghanistan mission, by the end of the summer.

"Long awaited". As in, way overdue. What's the rush, Gordo? You've only been promising it since the summer of 2006.

The G&M, undeterred by O'Connor's statement, went on to speculate on the possible choices to fill the MND role when O'Connor is turfed this summer. Oh... how do we know that? Well this is pretty telling:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper refused to respond last week when he was asked about a potential realignment of the cabinet and whether it would involve Mr. O'Connor. But neither did Mr. Harper jump to express continued confidence in his Defence Minister, who has been criticized for his handling of several files, including the treatment of detainees and the payment of funeral costs for soldiers killed in the line of duty.

And why don't we pour a little gasoline on that fire.

Mr. O'Connor came to the defence of the Afghan mission in his speech yesterday to the conference on "stability operations," insisting the Afghan army was making such great strides that he could foresee the day when it could take over much of the combat mission now being handled by Canada's 2,500 troops based in Kandahar.

Yet at the same time, Mr. O'Connor was blunt in his assessment of the long-term prospects for Afghanistan, using the kind of unsubtle language that has got him into political hot water before. "Afghanistan has always been a land of instability," he said in response to a conference questioner, adding later, that "I think the area is always going to be unstable."

He said the security situation along the border with Pakistan remains difficult to police, in part because there are millions of ethnic Pashtuns in both countries. "There is a steady stream of insurgents coming across the border," he said.

Later, he tried to temper those comments when asked about them by reporters. "What I'm saying is that Afghanistan is in an unstable region and there will always be challenges to Afghanistan. Our job and NATO's job is to try and create a state that is stable enough to handle its own affairs so it can govern efficiently."

Yeah?

That's not the same mission we were all told about. We were told that the mission was to transform Afghanistan, and now O'Connor is telling us that isn't possible. We've been saying that all along.

Gordon. Pack your kit. Steve is going to fire you.

Two senior cabinet members, Industry Minister Maxime Bernier and Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day, have been touted as the most likely successors to Mr. O'Connor at Defence.

And why Maxime "deregulate everything" Bernier?

Mr. Bernier's name has been cited by Conservatives who believe a Quebec minister would make the best spokesman for the mission when the Quebec-based Royal 22nd Regiment deploys to Kandahar.

Wow. What a reason! OK, so why does Stockwell Day get consideration?

Mr. Day, meanwhile, is seen by many Tories as a surprise success because he has avoided major public pitfalls in a portfolio plagued with tricky issues and bad news, including a spate of RCMP controversies.

That's because Day is off in la-la-land pursuing his superstitious beliefs, making things up about people and failing to provide accurate answers on anything and everything. He has only avoided the public pitfalls because he runs and hides when things get tough and the news media has been giving him a free ride. If his feet had been held to the fire when he screwed up, or if others within his portfolio screwed up, he'd be in the same boat as O'Connor right now.

It doesn't really matter. They're all a bunch of boobs. O'Connor is a liability in his present seat, so it doesn't really matter who they put in the seat.

In any case, watch the calendar and watch O'Connor. And watch the defence policy paper take even longer.