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Monday Dec. 10, 2007 BACK |
NEXT
Mr. Harper,
can you send everybody home?
by
Angelo Persichilli
THE HILL TIMES
Please
Mr. Harper, can you put an end to this session of our dysfunctional
Parliament? I don’t know about you, but I’ve had enough of the mudslinging
in a building that’s supposed to be a house of democracy, and where MPs are
supposed to show some dignity and decorum.
I don’t want to spend a lot of time talking about NDP MP Irene
Mathyssen because I feel embarrassed. She’s wrong even if she’s right.
Even if her colleague Conservative MP James Moore was really looking at
pictures of a “scantily-clad” woman, a sincerely concerned and responsible
person would have privately approached him and taught him a lesson on morality
and respect for women and Parliament. If anything, she would have had the
opportunity to verify the facts and avoid an embarrassment for her and her
party.
Exposing the matter in the House was nothing but an attempt to gain
political points. And, worse than Mathyssen, look at Liberal MP Karen Redman
who jumped into action trying to shamefully score a few shots without even
knowing what happened.
Unfortunately, this was not the only event on the Hill that embarrassed
Canadians last week.
We had to go through two testimonies of Karlheinz Schreiber in the
Commons Ethics Committee that, more than anything, showed how deranged things
are in the House. This situation is a mockery of a system that, until now, has
guaranteed centuries of democracy and, most importantly, dignity for this
country.
MPs have forgotten they are in the Canadian House of Commons. They
think they’re in a “Schreiber Variety Store” where they buy mud and
whatever tool they can find to help throw that mud at their opponents. The
only thing they are not looking for in that store is the truth.
But the Schreiber-Mulroney affair is also instrumental in exposing
other deficiencies in our institutions. For example, we have learned that
there are RCMP officers who don’t know that if you remove a belt from the
pants of a handcuffed man, his pants will fall down. I hope they’re not the
same agents looking after our national security.
This, unfortunately, doesn’t come as a surprise. There are many
events involving our police forces, especially those serving at Canada
Customs, who use unnecessary and ridiculous force only if the papers of those
arriving in Canada are perceived to be false.
Most of the time they are wrong but the handcuffed tourists and
innocent people are damaging our image in the world. We know of complaints in
many foreign embassies in Ottawa and sooner or later our country will be
embarrassed worldwide.
Schreiber might not be the most innocent Canadian citizen, but he
definitely didn’t deserve to be handcuffed like a dangerous criminal. If
anything, he is accused of fraud by the German police but he is a squeaky
clean Canadian citizen, even though our politicians, and media, believe that
there is the possibility of corrupting a former Canadian prime minister. If
the accusation is true, I believe that the corrupted and the corruptor should
end up in jail. But if Schreiber ends up in jail, the opposition parties
won’t gain political points. Schreiber is not the only Canadian citizen or
resident persecuted abroad and not in Canada.
On Nov. 28, the front page of the National
Post had
the headline “Canada: A Mafia haven.” The newspaper reported “last
week’s declaration by Italian police that one of the Mafia’s super clans
is based in Montreal is only the latest reminder of the place Canada has held
in the world of transnational crime; newlyreleased files from the U.S.
government archives also place Montreal at the epicentre of the world’s drug
trade.” They love this country because they know our politicians are not
interested in fighting crime, but looking for mud to throw at each other.
Unfortunately, most of those in the media are the same.
They were mobilized in full force for the first pathetic appearance of
Schreiber in front of the Committee when he did not give any information other
than he was supposed to give $500,000 to Brian Mulroney instead of $300,000.
That was the headline in most of the newspapers the day after.
Last Tuesday, the testimony was also interesting. Schreiber called
Mulroney a liar but said clearly that the former prime minister did not take
money for the Airbus deal.
That news was reported on page 87, but no front-page headline in most
of the papers.
However, after the Liberals leaked a letter from the controversial
businessman to the media basically saying the contrary of what he told the day
before to the committee, the news reappeared on the front page.
So much for consistency and fairness.
I know that a new election would change nothing because the problem is
not a change in government—it’s necessary to change the mentality that is
pulling this country into the mud.
That’s why, considering that Christmas is around the corner, can
Harper refer this matter to the proper authority, close the shop, and send all
the MPs home?
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