DoctrineVille
Mr de Jong was the latest codswallopinarian/high ranking member of the BCLiberal party to emerge from the bunker...
These people are not reasonable.
And it is not just because they have been in too power too long.
The fact is, they have been unreasonable right from the beginning
The following is an illustration of that fact from a piece by Kim Lunman, then writing for the Globe and Mail, back in 2001:
What's left of British Columbia's old NDP government fits into a cramped office on the first floor of the legislature with a view of the building's ventilator.
The door is marked "Opposition MLA Offices." The word "official" has been left out on purpose after much bickering with the new Liberal government.
"The double 'O' scares the heck out of them," says NDP Leader Joy MacPhail, one of only two NDP MLAs re-elected in May.
A few months ago, Ms. MacPhail was the deputy premier, with a spacious office overlooking the capital city's scenic inner harbour.
Today, the 49-year-old Vancouver MLA makes up half the opposition. She and Jenny Kwan, also a former NDP cabinet minister from Vancouver, share tight quarters with a researcher, a receptionist and two aides...
{snip}
...Ms. MacPhail and Ms. Kwan were denied official-opposition status by Speaker Claude Richmond in a ruling last month supported by Premier Gordon Campbell. In his ruling, Mr. Richmond cited an obscure encyclopedia of parliament that states the official opposition must "be prepared to form government."...
****
Truth be told, all of this non-stop codswallopanarianism is starting to remind me of the early days of the Obama administration wherein he tried to work with those very finest of the fine folks on the other side.
But then and there, just like here and now, it very quickly became abundantly clear that you cannot work with people who care more about wielding crony-backed power than improving the common good.
So let's ignore the bleatings of these people, their surrogates, their inspectors and their bought-and-paid-for shillophants.
And lets get on with it.
Because, as the greatest of all the denizens of Left Blogistan, Steve Gilliard, once said about finest of fine people that care only for wielding power and destroying the common good:
" I'm not interested in debating them. I want to stop them."
OK?
(Merv Adey's words work also)
______
And as for all of this speakerized side-dish of hollandaise sauce-obscured codswallop about a 'constitutional crisis'?....Well....Bernard Lord held a one seat majority in New Brunswick for three years between 2003 and 2006 wherein a speaker from his party broke the ties.
Earlier 'This Doomed Day In Clarkland' (TDDIC) posts can be found...Here.
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13 comments:
I refer back to your post re an NL broadcaster's opinion of all things relevant in our local BC world, there's probably no need to remind most that Claude Richmond did and most likely still does have his heavy handed hand on whatever anyone at NL Radio opines in their news or editorials. At least it was ever thus in the 70's and 80's when I was there and have no doubt that situation still exists. Claude and his buddies in the Kamloops Flying Club our at the Airport still run the show politically in that part of the interior. Bud Smith was also highly involved, both as a back room boy but later as an elected MLA, but ran into a bit of a fuss involving a female reporter.
Lulymay--
Glad somebody gets my little burrs tucked under the saddles!
Didn't know, though, that these fine folks are still running the show up there.
.
Ross:
Don't forget, this was Flyin' Phil's territory and his legacy/organization/followers still live on in his memory. We were quite used to the provincial political/Kamloops political/real estate triumvirate operating there. Nothing to see here folks, unless you were on the outside looking in.
Actually NL radio was just sold to an eastern outfit.
https://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/kamloops-nl-broadcasting-sold-nova-scotia-broadcast-corporation/
People in Kamloops with a little intelligence called NL redneck central.
The BC Liberals, after shutting down the Legislature early last sitting and running from questions about issues like very intriguing housing projects related to their major financial backers, now want to devote ten days to debating the speech from the Throne. Where was this BC Liberal zeal for debate in recent sittings when it came to real issues like health ministry firings, housing, or children in government care?
I think the Green and NDP MLAs should make their critique of the Throne speech on point but very short, and see what the BC Liberals do to fill the ten days debating themselves.
Ignore the bleatings?
Done!
As I recall, the two member NDP caucus of the day was denied 'official opposition' status---which permit a larger parliamentary budget and certain procedural privileges---because it was two seats short of the four required to be recognized even as a party, let alone official opposition (I'm not sure if that's by statute or custom); the same situation rendered the single seats of both federal and BC Green (now with three seats) parliamentarians as 'Independents' who happen to be members of their respective Green parties.
I could be wrong but, as I recall, official party status in Ottawa requires at least 12 seats. It's true in some sense that the official opposition should be prepared to assume the role of government at a moment's notice in the event the government loses MPs to some calamity. Remember, long before fixed-election dates, Jean Chretien observed the hapless Stockwell Day, leader of the Reform-a-CRAP-Alliance whose buffoonery and ineptitude forced nine of his own caucus to walk and form their own party; it was called the Independent Conservative Party. Chretien was criticized for calling a "snap election" after only three years into his mandate---which outraged conservatives so much they embarked on a crusade to implement fixed dates they said would end politicians "playing politics" in the very place where politicians are supposed to play politics (right where we can see them). But, in fact, Chretien was able to convince the Governor to prorogue and call an election, probably because the official opposition was so obviously unprepared to assume government should it ever have to. So seething with trumped up hatred for Chretien's supposed outrage were right-wingers that they couldn't acknowledge the favour they'd received by precipitating Day's eventual ouster. Unfortunately we now have fixed-election dates in many Canadian parliaments and, if I was boss, I'd rescind this impediment to proper functioning of the Westminster system in the way it was designed.
Joy MacPhail argued that, opposition being a requirement of the Westminster system, the two seat NDP should be recognized as such and funded adequately for the task. Gordo preferred no opposition, and we now know why: what he was up to was unethical and eventually became illegal in the execution (never mind, for the moment, the litany of other breaches of public trust that have become both the BC Liberals' addiction and legacy).
As I recall, when Frank McKenna's New Brunswick Liberals swept all other parties away at election, he appointed one of his own caucus to meet the requirement of opposition.
The BC Liberals are playing a dangerous game by claiming they don't have to to appoint a Speaker for partisan reason (the blatancy is mind-blowing), that is, by trying to undermine or disable the people's parliament for their own advantage. Can't wait to see if they dare go through with it. I know if I was Governor and suspected as much, I'd expel the Member responsible---and that would be Christy Clark, the nominal leader of the BC Liberal caucus. But naturally they must risk all because all is at risk if they lose executive control and their reputations and electability suffer exactly what the resulting revelations of perfidy would recommend.
As for Mike de Gong, I have only this to say: he's full of shit---that's obvious every time he opens his mouth.
WHO SANG THAT SONG THE BITCH IS BACK?BUT NOT FOR LONG!
they want to what???? they want to debate???? what are they smoking? or snorting? This is the gang who couldn't call the Leg. together in any year more than a few months and then played around like idiots refusing to answer questions. They now want to "debate"? omg, I think its time to drive down the highway of live and see this show. they want to debate their budget. I'll tell you what I'd like to do with their budget, crumple it up and let the Minister of Health go into a hospital bathroom and clean it because its too dirty for patients to use. That is what I'd like to do with the budget. its paper to be used to clean up feces. Now that we've embraced Green we ought not to waste the paper.
Its just bloody insulting. Was about to ask how stupid do they think we are, but I knew the answer. there are a lot of uneducated voters out there. They voted for the queen/party of scams. Want to tell us again how big that "deficit" at the B.C. Hydro Pension fund is?
Might want to join that person who'd like to sing THE BITCH IS BACK on the front lawn of the Leg. perhaps we can raise a guitar player to accompany us.
What ever happened to the statements Christy Clark made on election night when she realized that her party's majority went the way of the LNG windfall she promised in the 2013 election? She stated that she and the party got the message that the electorate had spoken and expected cooperation and she was willing to comply.
Maybe the MSM could ask the BC Liberal Party what their definition of cooperation is in their world.
May the Greendp be a era of restoration to supernatural BC.Free from poli donation influence and obfuscation.
Anon (above): wow! that'd be truly wonderful!
It certainly behooves the GDP to cooperate with each other. They could easily spend the next four years doing things popular with most voters---as any government should. That's a big talking point for pro-reppers: they always pontificate about parliamentarians being 'forced to cooperate' as a result of hung results pro-rep would most often produce. But I bet they'll slightly adjust their rhetoric as a result of this precedent-setting situation by claiming this nearest of split decisions would be, under pro-rep, the exception, not the rule---that this seemingly interminable procedural, game-playing lull is just a freak. I expect they'll also play down the fact that negotiations between the two partners were carried out in camera, with no reference to voters at all.
In no way contending that, I do recall several hung results in federal and provincial parliaments (for example, I watched from my living-room couch in Quebec City Joe Clark's government fall---my spouse of the time was dutifully disinterested in les affaires anglais). But I suppose I could counter pro-reppers' sacred hung cow by noting that single-member-plurality also can, and not infrequently does, produce both hung and majority parliaments, too, rather than only hung ones like pro-rep. I might also note that pro-reppers' oft lauded force-of-cooperation supposedly prevalent in hung situations certainly didn't happen with either of Harper's minorities which displayed the worst erosion of parliamentary decorum in living memory. Nya-nya ; )
Song before the election - it aint my fault AFTER election - barbie girl.?
Unicorn frappachinos for everyone
Debate. Really. You can't be serious... Make the decision, throw them out of the legislature, call the corruption inquiry, prosecute and start seizing documents and paperwork. Don't give them anymore "shredding time" than they have already had. Preserve the evidence as much as possible.
Time folks is in short supply...
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