It's Debate Time !

I was in my first-ever all-candidates' debate on September 24, at Beth Emeth, a synagogue right around the corner from my house. It was nice to have the opportunity to directly debate with the other candidates, and in particular to challenge the Tory candidate about the abysmal record of the government on the environment, the economy and Harper's autocratic style. I'm looking forward to the upcoming debates — one this Sunday evening when I'll be representing the Green Party of Canada in an all-parties' Toronto Jewish Community Political Forum organized by the Canadian Jewish Political Affairs Committee (7:30-9:30 p.m. Sunday October 5 at the Shaarei Shomayim synagogue at Bathurst and Glencairn) and a York Centre all-candidates' debate the next day organised by the Balmoral Homeowners' Association (7:30-9:30 p.m. Monday, October 6 at the Montecassino Hotel at Sheppard Avenue W. and Chesswood).

I also watched the televised leaders' debate in French last night, on Radio Canada. It was such a historic occasion: the first time a Green Party leader has been included in the debates. The forces of democracy in this country have not been suppressed by petty partisan politics, thank God, despite the best efforts of Harper, Layton and Duceppe.

Elizabeth May gave a creditable performance, and she got in the points she was trying to make. She pointed out, for example, that Harper is taking only very small steps in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and that the recent Canadian Medical Association Journal article written by several editors of the journal that blames Harper's government for the listeriosis crisis (see http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/rapidpdf/cmaj.081477v2.pdf) is not a meaningless statement by low-level lackies. Tonight's debate in English will also provide ample opportunity for Elizabeth to shine light on the serious flaws in the Conservative approach, I'm sure.

The tide is turning, as Canadians get glimpses past the too-smooth exterior of Stephen Harper and into the mensonges that underpin many of his statements. For example, he glibly states that a carbon tax will ruin the economy — when an economic analysis his own government commissioned but then buried showed that a carbon tax will not hurt the country (see the September 12, 2008 Green Party of Canada news release about this, at http://www.greenparty.ca/en/releases/12.09.2008).

And earlier this week it was revealed that a speech Stephen Harper delivered in the House of Commons on March 20, 2003 urging the government of the time to send Canadian troops to Iraq was largely cribbed from a speech delivered just two days before that by Australian prime minister John Howard. The man who wrote the speech — who had been a member of Harper's election campaign team this time around — took the fall and he resigned. Which seems to imply that Harper's foreign policy is either directed by speech writer, or by foreign governments. It seems more likely that the latter is the case rather than the former, since it was a very important speech for Harper. Wonderful to think that the man who's become our prime minister, who tries to fool Canadians into thinking he's a moderate, and who wants a majority government is a puppet of John Howard and George W. Bush!