The Bully Pulpit

You know, my immediate greivance with the paralyzing imbroglio slowly consuming the House of Commons has less to do with the tactics being employed by the Conservative government, than with the philosophy of governance the Harperites reveal by doing so. It's reasonably safe to say that most peoples' idea of government is of an institution that, well, governs - sets public policy, uses its authority to supervise a state, yadda yadda yadda. It's the Opposition that's supposed, by definition, to do the opposing.

So what kind of responsible government cancels committees because things aren't going their way, lies blatantly about events that happened, literally, last week, obstructs inquiries into its own alleged malfeisance, and lets the friggin' Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons physically harass an opponent? This is not, as the Globe's byline writers suggest, a war of procedure - it's a kamikaze assault by the governing party on the basic processes of the House that it was elected to protect. It's obscene, it's disgusting, and it's entirely consonant with Stark Contrast's theory about Stephen Harper: that he wants Canadians to expect politics to be as nasty as possible - because he's the reigning king of revile.
________________________________________________________

UPDATE - Hmmmm...I'll tell you what kind of government engineers the above-mentioned dirty tricks - the same kind of government that has 200 pages of material about said kamikaze assault, and an itchy printer finger.

Let's be charitable - maybe it was the clipper again? Someone call the RCMP!