Thursday, March 15, 2012

Robocalls after the hype.

It appears today that The Chief Electoral Officer from Elections Canada has made a statement on the issue. Here is the letter from Him: CBC Chief Electoral Officers statement


So it turns out that crack investigative Journalists who broke this "greatest election fraud in history" story; "Robocalls probe centres on disposable 'burner' cellphone linked to black ops in Guelph riding." May have jumped the gun. 


As it turns out, The Elections Canada Chief Electoral Officer said "Immediately following the 2011 general election, the Commissioner of Canada Elections deployed resources to investigate complaints of fraudulent or improper calls. Since then, over 700 Canadians from across the country have informed us of specific circumstances where they believe similar wrongdoing took place".  This is a far cry from the media hyped number of 31000 which was solicited by The Globe and Mail, and Lead now's website.


Apparently even 700 calls is too many for some people like CBC's Kady O'Malley, but at the same time for others it is smack in the middle of the average.
H/T Stephen Taylor














I did a little quick math after this broke this afternoon, where I calculated the difference and the results.
31000 (Lead now is now claiming over 41000) - 700 = 30300 ROBOSPAM.
700 robocalls at lets say .05 cents (double the bulk as I couldn't find an actual cost, except for HERE. Racknine's site did not seem to have the available info HERE.) would run $35.  Not 3500, just THIRTY FIVE DOLLARS.  Even if it was $100 this could EASILY have been a rogue individual, who could have done it for ANY reason! As opposed to claims of the "Anonymous" source by Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher in this article; "Unlikely a Tory staffer could have acted alone in Pierre Poutine scam: source"


That's what broke today.

Democracy; What's good, is also what's bad about it.

What makes democracies so great is the ability of the will of the people to change that which is unjust. By this I mean Protests for the common good (ie: intergration.). What makes democracies bad is the perversion of protests by lobbyists and activists, who are only interested in getting their way (ie: Quebec students protest tuition increase, and Leadnow's attack to overturn a valid election.)

Taking the 2 examples I give;
1. The student's are mad that they will have to pay more for schooling. Understandable, yet at the same time the costs incurred with providing that education must be adequately covered as well. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2012/03/07/student-protest-montreal.html
2. The robocalls scandal has shown a vast separation between even the centralized Tory government and the radical nature of the Left, leading to the media acting as lobbyists/activists on their behalf.  http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/14/unlikely-a-tory-staffer-could-have-acted-alone-in-pierre-poutine-scam-source/

Now I'm not saying there aren't justifiable reasons to remove a Government from power, but to do so when that Government is actually accomplishing positive goals for a Country shows an ideological desire for power, rather than overall social well being and justice. I also agree that there are times, and ideas, where University students have change the course of countries with positive results. But that is less and less the case when you live in a Country like Canada, which has all the benefits it does to offer. Protests and activism have become about getting your way, not making life better for everyone.

The same thing that makes our democracy great, can be perverted to make it all about self.


Wednesday, March 14, 2012

How Robocalls play out in the HOC.

I was thinking about how the robocall affair has been playing out in the house of commons this morning.  I find the narrative goes something like this:

Oppositions; "AHA GOTCHA!!"
Government; "Got us doing what, when, where?"
Oppositions; "You tell us!!"
Government; "Well we know that Frank Valeriote broke Election Canada rules, and how about Adam Carroll, will the Parliamentary hearings ever get to interview him?"
Oppositions; "BUT, BUT YOU ARE EVIL CONSERVATIVES!!!

It appears though that illegal tactics are not limited to the "Evil Conservatives", as has been shown by Vikileaks, and admissions of guilt by Frank Valeriote and Bob Rae themselves about robocalls in Guelph.
Now we find out that there may be illegal activities on the part of the NDP in an ethnic riding in Toronto. The CBC tells how both Conservative and Liberal complaints have been "brushed off" by Elections Canada, who should now find themselves under investigations of impropriety. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2012/03/13/voting-scarborough.html?cmp=rss

Friday, March 09, 2012

What caught my interest:

March 9, 2012.

Here are my 3 top tweets today:

If there is pre-election complaint of voter suppression against the Tories, will EC broaden it's investigation? http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/09/tory-campaign-worker-in-guelph-tweeted-robocall-warning-two-days-before-election/


: DISGUSTING: Child molester fights deportation to Iraq. http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/sunnews/canada/archives/2012/03/20120309-095101.html 


Citizen's arrest is not vigilantism.  Especially if Police refuse to act on your behalf. http://www.torontosun.com/2012/03/08/vigilante-speaks-out-about-confronting-vandals

Thursday, March 08, 2012

What caught my interest March 8, 2012.

A lot less about Robo-calls, but let's start off with the latest about Elections Canada.

Elections Canada has a fair amount to answer to, especially after reading the ATIP that was presented to start the Robo-smear. The latest buzz is how non registered voters were allowed to vote without giving an address. With the amount of Elections Canada mistakes coming to light it begs two questions; 1. If they can't manage the Electoral powers they have now, why would they even want more? 2. Why isn't there an investigation into Elections Canada in regards to all the screw ups?
http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/03/08/voting-irregularities-marred-toronto-area-vote-in-federal-election-report/

Next we head to Quebec, where University students took to the streets to protest an increase in their tuition (which currently stands alone as the lowest in Canada.)  However the demonstration turned towards violence when police were targeted with snowballs, and respond with force to break up the crowd. I feel that once any object is thrown at law enforcement, they must take every step possible to disperse the crowd prior to further escalation.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/story/2012/03/08/montreal-student-protest-eye.html
More pictures and info here;
http://blogs.canoe.ca/lilleyspad/general/photos-montreal-students-clash-with-riot-police-in-tuition-protest/

On to the separatist that will live off Canada for the rest of his life, National "Teddy" winner Gilles Duceppe! I can't even comment much here, because instead of being charged with his treason, he gets a fat Canada pension.
http://www.torontosun.com/2012/03/07/duceppe-wins-national-waste-award

Finally I move to something that bothers me more deeply than anything else. In BC a member of our armed forces was attacked, his neck was slashed, waiting for a bus.  This bothers me for a couple of reasons; 1. Our armed forces are generally peacekeepers, and the ideological mentality that would make someone perpetrate violence against any of our defenders of freedom show a sickness of the  anti military viewpoint. 2. That this offender will be afforded the freedoms the victim has chosen to defend.
http://www2.canada.com/nanaimodailynews/news/story.html?id=12818bf7-d022-4e14-aed9-cdde1d578a0f

Wednesday, March 07, 2012

So many good blogs.

There are so many good blogs out there that give balance to the current, predominantly liberally, biased media.  I just thought I would mention a few here, that stand up for truth in news rather than the one sided, half information you are probably getting now.

The first alternative isn't even a blog, but an (admittedly) right wing news station. When you watch Sun News, at least you know what to expect, unlike the Main Stream Media that actually thinks it has no bias.
http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/home.html

Here are just a few blogs that I regularly follow to balance my "news" diet;
Brian Lilley (Sun News): http://blogs.canoe.ca/lilleyspad/
Moose and Squirrel: http://mooseandsquirrel.ca/
Small dead animals: http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/
Crux of the matter: http://crux-of-the-matter.com/
CAW workers voice of reason: http://paulsrants-paulsstuff.blogspot.com/

There is a whole list of Conservative bloggers that can be found at;



What caught my interest, March 7, 2012.

Law and health care always attract interest from me, and today I came across a couple of each.

Health;
The tragic story of a woman discharge at 11p.m. from a hospital in Manitoba, who died as she reached her front door; http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/calls-for-inquest-into-post-er-death-141718033.html

Saskatchewan is looking for immigrants with skills, yet Doctors are unable to find any jobs? And yes we absolutely have a shortage of them: http://www.globalregina.com/doctors+having+trouble+immigrating+to+saskatchewan/6442595683/story.html

Law;
Police defend issuance of cell phone ticket to an elderly man who claims he doesn't own one.  I am absolutely behind the law, but if the officer thought he saw something that wasn't, it will give weight to the "the officer was mistaken" defense: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/police-defend-issuing-of-ticket-141718633.html

Protection of property. When you put up with crap from punks, you should NOT be the one charged! http://www.winnipegsun.com/2012/03/06/senior-in-court-for-bringing-vandal-to-rcmp

Weather:
Saskatoon got hit by a blizzard in the past day or two, hopefully as the old adage goes "In like a lion, out like a lamb."; http://www.leaderpost.com/sports/Photos+Winter+blast+hits+Saskatoon/6258212/story.html

And so far today, I have yet to see one Robo-story.

Tuesday, March 06, 2012

Behind the Robocall movement.


I think the most disturbing aspects of this article at Canoe News are 1. “organized by some of last fall's Occupy Ottawa ringleaders” and 2. “Neither Elections Canada nor the RCMP could say whether they'd received any of the online petitions.”

Now I can attribute the second aspect to the fact that it is an ongoing investigation and protocol more than likely dictates this, even though I don't see a conflict with admitting where you are getting you information (especially if the information could be deemed inflammatory, incomplete, or even incorrect. Ie: from a site like Leadnow.ca which has been actively soliciting complaints.)

I attribute the first to the nature of the robocall scandal itself. The disenfranchised Left which seems unable to concede that the Conservatives have a Majority Government. Of course they are being spurred on by the fact that the Tories are trying to achieve their goals in the House of Commons, and have cut debate at times (to prevent the never ending repetition of the Opposition.)

I was once again surprised at a Globe and Mail piece that points out the ridiculousness of the Faux robo-call scandal. Margaret Went's editors must be seething to run “Robo-calls? Get a grip. We'reCanadian”. 


Brian Lilley gives us the lowdown on the background of some of the members of Lead Now in his Blog. And at Sun News Network in this Video.

Monday, March 05, 2012

The Globe and Mail concedes:


Something I usually don't do is post many articles from the far left media The Globe and Mail, however 3 of today's articles seem to be almost a precursor to retracting their past rhetoric on Robocalls.

In the first article: "The case against a Conservative conspiracy", aside from the possibility of a training school staffer accidentally misspeaking with a hypothetical “You didn’t hear this from me, but here’s one thing you could do…” However they concede (unlike the Liberal party has been able to do, even after Vikileaks), “But a vast Conservative conspiracy to steal the general election? No.” Which is a far cry from how they have been misrepresenting the situation thus far, highlighted by their article soliciting complaints.

In the second article: “If robo-calls were meant to keep voters away, they failed miserably”, they go so far as to concede “It seems very unlikely that these alleged tactics greatly influenced the results of the 2011 election.”

In the third article: “Tory support steady despite robo-call,e-snooping uproars: poll”, they have assessed the damage that these scandals have had on voter support, which has been none. Nick Nano's correctly assesses that “I think for many average Canadians who are very cynical, they find it hard to believe that politics of any colour is ethical,”. Although I myself would go a step further, and I would say that the Conservative base remains unchanged because they generally agree with rule of law, which is innocent until PROVEN guilty. Which is something the rhetoric against the Tories as a whole has failed to do. I am concerned at the increase of support for the Liberals though, especially after Vikileaks was shown to be of their party's invention. (Whether the Leader knew or not, you have to wonder if Adam Carroll was the scapegoat for an MP.)



Sunday, March 04, 2012

Smoking gun vs Ballistic report.

Yesterday sometime I came across a blog (wish I could credit where I found it) from an NDP supporter that put out an argument against an NDP, Liberal, and Green party Coalition. In the Blog calles "Straight Goods" they point out a number of things quite correctly, which I have been finding bloggers (even on both sides obviously) have seen but have neen severely lacking in the Main Stream Media.

Case in point, when have you heard the media say that the Opposition parties are trying to invalidate the 2011 election results so there may be need of ANOTHER election?  Not that it isn't out there, Pat Martin from the NDP said as much in his frist speech (found at the bottom of this lawsuit filed by RackNine) "hundreds ofthousands of phony phone calls by the Racknine rascals it makes you wonder about the legitimacy of the Conservatives 39% Majority Mandate". The endgame seems pretty clear.

But I digress; my point was not about lack of media integrity/awareness, but how the mentality of the Left and Right differ.  I read in the past few days: "The left is very vocal and run on emotions. The right are silent and run on rules and facts. The left likes disarray and dysfunction, the right likes peace and order." (Found here.) The truth in this is quite apparent to me, as I have chance to interact with young people whos views are predominantly Left. The instant "Harper should be in jail" posts I see confirm a sharp lack of logic, and/or respect for the rule of law, which I myself hold quite dear.

Look at this like it were a CSI case: Where the Opposition (Lib, NDP) have a smoking gun sitting on Conservative's lap, as Bob Rae likes to say, the Government (Tories) are waiting for the ballistics report so they can catch a criminal and actually convict him.  However  waiting for the results of an investigation doesn't actually do the 2 things this "scandal" is intended: 1. It is intended to tarnish the reputation of the Conservatives through rhetoric and hyperbole that is so easily ingested by the "anything but Conservative" Harper Haters lefties. 2. It is to try to invalidate the 2011 election and send us to the ballot boxes again.

Right now all the Opposition has is allegations, speculations and assumption. Even if the truth is able to come out, after how difficult the left has made the investigation with the solicitation of "complaints", at best there will be an individual, maybe even a small renegade group at fault. At worst they will find out that it was actually the Opposition themselves that is at fault. Bottom line is that the "evil" Stephen Harper was more than likely unaware of any of it, nor were any of the Tory MPs.

I believe we should get to the bottom of this, find the truth, and punish the resposible. However if we had Bob Rae and Pat Martin's way, all the Conservatives would be in jails (which they are supposedly against) and we would be going back to the polls for another election.

Friday, March 02, 2012

H/T Stephen Taylor for coming up with what may be the source of the 31000 complaints to Elections Canada.














Here is a copy of the complete text that would be sent to (as of Mar 2, 2012):
Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada
William H. Corbett, Commissioner of Elections Canada
Bob Paulson, Commissioner of the RCMP
Nycole Turmel, Leader, New Democratic Party
Bob Rae, Leader, Liberal Party
Louis Plamondon, Parliamentary Leader, Bloc Québécois
Elizabeth May, Leader, Green Party

" Dear Prime Minister Harper, Mr Corbett, Mr Paulson, Ms Turmel, Mr Rae, Ms. May and Mr. Plamondon,

I am gravely concerned by the Elections Canada report that has just traced illegal phone calls made during the 2011 federal election to a company that worked for the Conservative Party across the country.

The “robocalls” were apparently designed to stop non-Conservative voters from casting ballots in key ridings by falsely telling voters that the location of their polling stations had changed, causing them to go to the wrong location on election day.

This news casts doubt on the legitimacy of our Government. We need answers now, and real consequences for illegal behaviour that may have determined the outcome of our election.

I demand a full and independent public inquiry, backed by Elections Canada and the RCMP, to expose the facts about the robocall scandal and ensure that the penalty for this election fraud matches the consequences of the crime - including new elections.

We cannot allow individuals to be scapegoated for actions that benefit institutions. We need to lay the foundation for new laws to restore the integrity of Canadian elections."

Found at Lead Now.

Once again I'll say it looks like this is a ploy by the disgruntled opposition parties to try and gain a "Mulligan" (do over) because they just can't stand the thought of a Conservative Government.

Robocalls part ?

As the robocalls "scandal" continues, I decided to add my 2 "non-cents" to the mix. Now although I did receive robocalls during the 2011 Federal election, I have no recollection of what was said, as I'm sure most of the 31000 new complaints don't.  But I sent an obviously phoney complaint to the "paper" soliciting them, in attempt to show them the ridiculous effort they are attempting.






















I also noticed the way this "paper" is leading people to submit these complaints quickly, or the nasty Conservatives will "get away with it".
With such an obvious Left bias, I have a hard time calling this anything close to "news".  The Globe and Mail called me soliciting a subscription just a few days ago, and ovbiously my response was "Not friggin likely!"

Touching on some fudged numbers.

I'm going to start by addressing the first issue, which is the right to vote. If you don't exercise that right, then by default you have decided to accept the will of those who do vote, and therefore you are no longer counted in the final decision. I happened to be directed to the Marxist Leninist Party, which was complaining how the Conservatives didn't get a majority of votes.
Some of their numbers went like this;

Voter turn-out of 14,720,580 out of 23,971,740 registered electors or 61.4%

Harper's Conservatives received 5,832,401 votes, representing 24.3% of the eligible voters

Voters who cast their ballots for candidates other than those of the Conservative Party totaled 8,888,179, representing 60.4%
(emphasis mine)

The 2011 election was riddled with cries of how this from basically all opposition parties, who seem to have forgotten what kind of democracy we live in. This is easily explained away: It's called the “First past the post” system. This means that with more than 2 parties running (and sometimes there can be a number of fringe parties that run in Canada), the winner of the most votes OUT OF ALL OF THEM is considered the winner.

If we WERE to have a 2 party system, as it stands right now there would be no Liberal Party, Bloc or Green party in the House of Commons. And in this scenario the total number of voters that voted “anything but Conservative” would actually have a majority Government in Canada. These facts are sadly negligent in arguments from other parties who would rather not see the Conservative's take their rightful place as a Majority Government in the House of Commons.

On to the fraud perpetrated by these particular numbers.
  1. If you notice they are counting all voters in the equation, in effort to dilute the percentage of the number of votes received by the Conservative Party.
  2. They also inflate the number of those who voted against the Conservative's by clumping votes for ALL the rest of the parties together as if they were a single unit.
It's time for the losing parties to accept the democracy we live in has chosen a Conservative Majority, much like in the past they have chosen other parties in the exact same way.