Idiocracy Watch

For those of you not familiar with the case of Abousfian Abdelrazik, here is an excellent primer by the Globe and Mail. It is long, but is well worth the five or ten minutes it will take you to read up on the issue.

There are far too many poignant quotes contained in that article to reproduce them all here, so I would like to focus on the issue of Mr. Abdelrazik’s citizenship, and the rights he is entitled to as a Canadian citizen.

Unfortunately, Mr. Abdelrazik’s case fits quite nicely with the Harper government’s stance on living and working abroad, an issue we have dealt with here at Idiocracy Watch. It seems that the Harper government has chosen to classify Mr. Abdelrazik as a kind of second class citizen, one that does not have the same rights as First Class Canadian Citizens, i.e. those who were born in Canada, raised in Canada, and are “more familiar seeming” than Mr. Abdelrazik.

The Harper government has insisted on classifying Mr. Abdelrazik this way despite the clear legal right Mr. Abdelrazik has to return to Canada, and the obvious resources that have been offered to facilitate that return (read the article). Indeed, according to the Canadian Government:

“As a Canadian citizen, Mr. Abdelrazik is entitled to a one-time Canadian travel document that would allow him to travel to Canada”

(Idiocracy Watch’s emphasis)

All Canadians ought to know about this case and ought to be concerned about the differential treatment that some of us are subject to on the whims of governments.

To be fair, this is not particularly a Conservative issue, Mr. Abdelrazik has suffered much the same fate under both Liberal and Conservative parties. However, Mr. Harper is the current man-about-town, and so he bears direct responsibility for Mr. Abdelrazik’s treatment. It is Mr. Harper who currently has the power to bring him home. And it is under Mr. Harper’s watch that Mr. Abdelrazik has been cleared, time and time again by multiple agencies, of any suspected links to Al-Qaeda.

This issue deserves public attention to ensure that the Canadian government–those regular folks among us who are elected BY US to serve US–treat US ALL equally as full Canadian citizens.

For those of you who can’t get enough of the ongoing saga of Stephen Harper’s ridiculous attack ads, which we have been covering extensively both in print and comic form, here’s Michael Ignatieff’s latest response. It seems to take a page right out of the Idiocracy Watch play book! You be the judge.

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In an attempt to counter the Conservative attack ads the following “mock” attack ad was posted on YouTube:

Interestingly enough, the ad is an attack on POLICY and POLITICAL decisions that Harper and the Conservatives pursued during their tenure.

Contrast the policy and political attacks with the PERSONAL attacks that at root of so much of Conservative strategy:

The Conservative ads focus on Ignatieff’s use of ads which, and here’s the irony, are themselves personal attacks on the Conservative Party’s political track record of recent times. Those ads speculate (without offering any argument) on Ignatieff’s political motivations (again, ironic considering the nature of Harper’s widespread and developing public image (and here)), and they (again, ironically) question Ignatieff’s respect for Canadian political institutions, and (again, so very ironically) accuse Ignatieff of not having a plan for the country’s economy. Now, this last point is particularly ripe for humour considering the current budget was almost entirely crafted by the opposition parties, in an almost-coalition led by the Liberals!

According to Harper’s own economic forecast, this first half of the year was going to be a time of economic surplus and excellent buying opportunities for the markets! (For those conservatives who read these pages, this is a statement about Conservative policy, NOT a personal attack.)

Conservatives attack Liberal ads on the (false) premise that they are attack ads. Why? Here are some likely possibilities:

1) to divert attention from the fact that it is ONLY Conservatives who are leveling attack ads;

2) to legitimize the use of such ads in the political arena by pretending it’s legitimate political discourse;

3) to divert attention away from Conservative policy which has come under question recently;

4) to divert attention away from the rising popularity of Ignatieff and stagnant popularity of Harper (see this recent posting).

Now, anyone who has ever done a card trick knows that diversion is the currency of magicians, who are themselves self-proclaimed liars. That it seems so important to the current Conservative incarnation, well, as far as their policies go, are they magical beans or smoke and mirrors. You be the judge.

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Well our last comic has hit the blogosphere with a vengance. Egyptian blogs, the left-leaning liberal ones from what I can tell, are spreading the strip faster than the actual H1N1 A virus.

Thanks for the interest!

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