Ah, Buzz…

you’re a fuckface.

War Room Amateur Hour

Anyone who followed the CPC with any regularity at all during last year’s election campaign should find this news utterly unsurprising: the CPC’s war room is woefully terrible.

Paul Wells has this:

“Jason Kenney held a news conference in which he complained — incorrectly — that Martin speechwriter Scott Feschuk had insulted ethnic minorities. Feschuk had written a humorous note on the Liberal party website referring to ’socially awkward Omni subscribers.’

“Kenney thought Feschuk was talking about viewers of Omni TV, a multicultural channel based in Toronto. In fact, he was actually referring to now-defunct Omni magazine, a science and technology publication long cherished by nerds.”

So, I mean, that’s bad, right? Like, stupidly, and inexcusably bad? It gets worse. Hours after Paul Wells has made fun of this and it had broken in the media, the CPC sends out a press release from the War Room re-iterating Kenney’s stupid claim and asking if the Liberals are going to stand beside it.

There’s only one explanation: CPC staffers have money riding on the outcome and they’re trying to throw the election.

Harper on SSM

Stephen Harper was on Mike Duffy Live over on CTV tonight. Of course, the topic was Harper’s statements about same-sex marriage.

What’s the plan? A Conservative government will introduce a motion asking whether the House is interested in changing the definition of marriage. If the motion is defeated, there will be no further action. The law will not be retroactive.

What about the notwithstanding clause? Mike Duffy said something like, “Well, you’ll have to use the notwithstanding clause because of the Supreme Court ruling on the issue.”

Warning… Rambling Aside: Fuck. I don’t care what you think about same-sex marriage. Can we at least, for the sake of having a real debate about the need to use s. 33 to halt same-sex marriage, get on the same fucking page? Mike Duffy and all these ham-fisted CP reporters can read, but apparently they choose not to: GO READ THE STUPID REFERENCE. The reference does NOT rule that the traditional definition of marriage is unconstitutional. And so when lazy fucks like our buddy O’Hanlon (who is, incidentally, the freaking Ottawa News Editor) say things like, “But [Harper] didn’t explain how he would ban same-sex unions, given that the Supreme Court has indicated the traditional definition of marriage is unconstitutional,” they are being disingenuous or retarded or both. The Supreme Court held that:

1. The definition of marriage can only be legislated by Parliament.
2. Same-sex marriage is consistent with the Charter.
3. The freedom of religion guarantee in the Charter is (probably) broad enough to protect religious officials from being compelled by the State to perform same-sex marriages with which they disagree.
4. As for question 4, regarding the constitutionality of the traditional definition of marriage: and I quote, “it would be unwise and inappropriate to answer the question.”

Yes, cases in some provinces have ruled that the traditional definition of marriage is unconstitutional. Yes, if Harper re-legislates the traditional definition of marriage, he will have some kind of trouble with these prior provincial rulings. But let us stop implying that the constitutionality of the traditional definition of marriage has been resolved by the Supreme Court of Canada or that the ability to stop same-sex marriage in provinces whose provincial courts haven’t yet weighed in on the issue isn’t available to Mr. Harper without invoking s. 33.

We are all educated adults. We can, at the very least, frame the scope of the issue before us properly, no?

- Rant Off -

Harper brushed him off and, correctly, stated that Duffy is full of shit about what the SCC said. Duffy quickly changed topics.
Why introduce it today? Harper said, “I was asked; and it’s no surprise. This has been our policy for some time.”

Duffy wrapped up by promising to stop beating a dead horse trying to discover the strategic value of the decision to talk about same-sex marriage on the first day of the campaign.

And that’s it.

Update later: By the way, can anyone tell me WHY he came out with this right away instead of ignoring the question (if it was a question that was actually put to him?)  Where’s the upside?

I see that the front page of the Liberal website is already all over his ass on this.  Not particularly surprising either.

I guess it is a 56 day campaign.  That Charter graphic might get a little old by day 30?  Maybe?

Anyways, I think the Liberals come out on top in Day 1.

Official Liberal Party Blog.

Well, Scott Feschuk is an idiot.

Blogs and political parties aren’t meant for one another.  One is supposed to be unscripted and off the cuff.  Politicians and political parties are not (hence why Scott Feschuk is an idiot).

But, on the flipside, when a political party blog TRIES to have the best of both worlds (a blog, which is trendy, but which is also scripted and plays by the rules), you get shit like the CPC’s C-Dog blog.

BQ Campaign Song

The BQ has their campaign song out. I’ll be damned if i know what they’re saying (that’s six years of grade-school French gone to waste), but it’s catchy! Do those separatists know how to party or what?! [h/t Daifallah]

Cherniak

Jason Cherniak, who’s often full of crap, has a good point today. That hidden agenda is so well hidden that a lot of people – ourselves included – are beginning to wonder if it was just a myth.

An election completely devoid of substance… This one’s gonna be some fun to watch (Following American politics closely, we have come to know and love truly negative campaigning.  It is a vice, but one we are unwilling to ever give up.  For Christmas, all I want is the most negative campaign that Canada has ever seen.).

Federal Election Calendar

As part of our ongoing efforts to provide you, our reader(s?), with retardedly comprehensive federal election coverage, we’ve got a federal election calendar for you.

I’ll level with you: I don’t actually know how well this is going to go. But, we have nothing to lose, so onward and upward, I say. The plan is for this to be regularly and fanatically updated with tour schedules, appearances, and other notable events. Because it is hosted, you, our faithful readers, simply have to subscribe to this calendar, and it will update automatically.
How does this work? Well, if you have a mac, it’s quite simple. Click here to subscribe with iCal.

If you are a Windows user, like me, you have a trickier time. I highly recommend downloading Mozilla Sunbird. Once you have that installed, go File –> Subscribe to remote calendar… –> Remote and Next –> Leave “WebDAV” checked and paste this – webcal://publish.uwo.ca/~jlamber6/federalelection.ics – into the location. You should be subscribed.