Count me in as one of the tens of thousands who does not approve of Stephen Harper proroguing parliament again. I just won't be signing on to Facebook to add to the count, because I have thus far managed to avoid joining that closed community and see no reason to change things.

Note to organizers: spend a little time and effort to build an open community site to champion your cause. Sure, Facebook is instant and easy, but if you want to attract the most people, use FB for promoting your open site, not for hosting it.

Via CBC's Kady O'Malley an EKOS prorogation poll summary:

According to these latest fresh from the field findings from EKOS -- full report available here -- fully 52.3 percent of respondents said that they were "clearly" aware that the prime minister had "decided to prorogue - that is, suspend - Parliament until early March."

An additional 15.2 would describe their level of awareness as "vague," and 32.5 percent who claimed to know nothing at all about it. Well, until they ended up on the phone with the EKOSbot, presumably.

Clear -- as opposed to vague -- awareness was highest amongst self-declared Conservative supporters -- 66.9 percent, compared to 59.5 percent of Liberals, 51 percent of Greens, and 45.3 percent of New Democrats, and just 33.9 percent of Bloc voters. Undecideds, not surprisingly, were more likely than partisans to be previously unaware of the PM's move -- 46.5 percent had no idea, compared to 35.3 percent of those in the clear, or on the clear, or however that should sentence should end.

So, how did they feel about it? Not all that warm and fuzzy, as it turns out. Out of those who told EKOS that they were aware that parliament had been prorogued, 68.7 percent are against it, including 40.5 percent who stand "strongly opposed." Just 31.4 percent said they supported the move, and 10 percent declined to share their feelings.

Via Susan Delacourt at The Star, The Economist slams prorogation:

Never mind what his spin doctors say: Mr Harper's move looks like naked self-interest. His officials faced grilling by parliamentary committees over whether they misled the House of Commons in denying knowledge that detainees handed over to the local authorities by Canadian troops in Afghanistan were being tortured. The government would also have come under fire for its lack of policies to curb Canada's abundant carbon emissions. Prorogation means that such committees-which carry out the essential democratic task of scrutinising government-will have to be formed anew in March. That will also allow Mr Harper to gain immediate control of committees in the appointed Senate, where his Conservatives are poised to become the biggest party.

Mr Harper has form. He prorogued Parliament last winter, too-to dodge a short-lived threat by the three opposition parties to bring his minority government down. Having gone to the polls three times since 2004 Canadians do not want another election. He might say that governing in a minority obliges him to play fast and loose with parliamentary nicety. He has nursed the economy and he has confounded those who feared that he would impose his supporters-loathing of abortion and liking for the death penalty on a generally tolerant country.

A legislature matters more than the luge

Mr Harper is a competent tactician with a ruthless streak. He bars most ministers from talking to the media; he has axed some independent watchdogs; he has binned campaign promises to make government more open and accountable. Now he is subjecting Parliament to prime-ministerial whim. He may be right that most Canadians care more about the luge than the legislature, but that is surely true only while their decent system of government is in good hands. They may soon conclude that it isn't.

To the opposition parties: when you talk about Harper's disdain for democracy please do not forget that he showed Canadians on his very first day in office, way back on February 6, 2006, just how little he cares for the concept.

What happened that day? David Emerson, re-elected after having campaigned as a Liberal cabinet minister, was sworn in as a Conservative cabinet minister. Turns out Emerson was in secret negotiations with Harper and his proxies less than 24 hours after having been re-elected and promising to become Harper's worst nightmare.

The votes of sixty-four thousand Vancouver-Kingsway citizens apparently meant nothing to either Harper or Emerson.

Appointing Michael Fortier to cabinet in that same parliament, even though he was not elected, and even though Harper essentially promise on French language TV during the campaign that he would not do that, was yet another example of the Harper approach to breaking Canada's democratic traditions.

Hey Canada, you can't say you weren't warned.

On CTV's Power Play show Wednesday host Tom Clark asked Brian Wilfert, the Vice-Chair of the Special Committee on Afghanistan (paraphrased) "Did Laurie Hawn contact you regarding participating in committee via teleconference, as he claims?" Wilfert's answer was a categorigal "Absolutely not!". You can choose who you believe.

I hope that a majority of Canadians do not care at all if there are partisan implications, for any party, in the Afghanistan detainee affair. We just want to know the truth.

We aren't getting the truth from our government.

Today in a sixteen page brief (PDF) addressed to the Special Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan, Richard Colvin continued to set the record straight. Do read it.

Of the many issues noted, in my mind the most troubling accusation levied is that senior public service staff who both brief and take orders from Ministers and the Privy Council Office (the PM and his anointed) appear to have counselled Colvin and other embassy staff to lie about the situation in Afghanistan.

Think about it - the most senior levels of our government have institutionalized lying.

We aren't talking about some misdemeanor or minor public fraud but an issue of huge public importance, one that can bring down a government or, back then, hobble a new government. We are talking about a war which has cost Canadians dozens of billions of dollars since 2006. The financial and ideological capital tied up in this war are immense, not to mention the human casualties and suffering that are as a direct result of policy decisions made in the comfy confines of Ottawa area office buildings.

Given the obvious attempts by the government to hide the truth, or run from it, nothing less than a full judicial inquiry will do.

Inoffensive mural take-down latest in series of chilling-effects

Recently on CBC Radio One Vancouver City councillor Geoff Meggs went to lengths to poo-poo community concerns about 2010 Olympic games-related bylaw changes being voted in by the Vision Vancouver-dominated council.

Paraphrased, he said "I can't believe how many people I know will come up to me at an event or dinner party and express concern that we are going to march into people's property to remove signs". He went on to add that the bylaw changes council sought were only intended to give the city powers to deal with commercial infringement of the Olympic brand, and that in no way were the changes intended to impinge upon free speech.

Oh, really?

Vancouver orders removal of anti-Olympic mural (Marsha Lederman, The Globe and Mail, Friday December 11 2009)

In fact, when her landlord, Peter Wong, received a notice from the city telling him to remove the graffiti from his building, he had no idea what they were talking about. "I called them and said I cannot find the graffiti. And they said the sign [the mural] is graffiti." This surprised him, because the murals have been up for years and he had never heard from the city about them before.

Indeed such murals are common place at The Crying Room which has been showing work inside and outside since 1999. This piece did not draw the attention of city inspectors in 2006:

A handy guide for art-challenged inspectors.

The five-ring piece in question was taken down mid-November.

Patrick Smith, director of Simon Fraser University's Institute of Governance Studies, said the removal of the sign is symptomatic of the high demands the 'Olympic movement' places on its host cities. He believes Vancouver will be the beginning of a shift away from the modern Olympic era, with communities saying the cost of hosting is too high.

"I think the city has kind of caved in to a whole serious of events here," said Prof. Smith, also a past chair of SFU's department of political science. "It [the Olympic movement] dictates an awful lot to local citizens. It's not as if the event isn't interesting and doesn't grab the attention of people around the world, but [the Olympic movement] goes too far and it asks too much."

The next time we hear Meggs or other councillors dishing out happy talk I hope that we are being informed the city inspector made an honest error, or was overzealous and has been scheduled for both an attitude adjustment and an art appreciation lesson. I'd prefer to hope that the inspector's bad taste has not been officially institutionalized by the city managers just in time for the 2010 games.

Yes, I know I'm probably giving the city too much credit here.

As I write this Chief of Defence Staff General Walter Natynczyk is holding a hastily called press conference to announce that contrary to statements he made just yesterday, indeed there is some evidence that some Canadian detainees transferred to other powers have suffered abuse.

It would appear that the good General is busy building the plausible deniability defence for Gordon O'Connor and Peter MacKay, and Stephen Harper of course.

Reports of the early Harper government's control over information are the stuff of legend. I simply do not believe that the PMO, and the generals, are as clueless as they make themselves out to be on this issue.

Both groups - the political and top military brass - have a huge vested interest, especially circa 2006, in keeping from the public any negative reports that would sour public opinion against the mission.

Sure, deaths of our troops are negative in the extreme, but these alone are not enough to turn public opinion against the government's direction. The public is sophisticated enough to understand that, whether they have enough information to determine for themselves if they agree with the mission or not.

But the public would not countenance in any way shape or form our political and military leaders prosecuting a war where basic Canadian values are being cast aside, and that is in fact what appears to have been done.

Not by the rank and file, but by the political and military leadership of this country.

It is a cover-up and nothing less than a criminal inquiry will suffice to get to the bottom of what has transpired.

You may call it realpolitik, or call it being adult and picking battles you can win, but I find it difficult to be politically adult if it means turning a blind eye to painful human realities.

What good are all these wonderful Liberal values, NDP values if you can't stand up when it really counts? Words are just words. It's action that counts. Heidi Rathjen, Ecole polytechnique student

Layton and Ignatieff's mealy mouthed justifications for allowing an un-whipped vote on the long gun registry mean squat to the families of murdered mothers and daughters, sons and fathers.

When Liberals were climbing in the polls, on April 2 2009 an energized Ignatieff declared "We won't let him!" put an end to the long-gun registry. 8 months and sagging polls have drained Ignatieff's bravado. Last spring Layton would only say it wasn't his party's practice to whip private members bills.

Without a doubt the fallen and the survivors of Marc Lepine's attack 20 years ago are far braver than the MP's you'll find voting Yea on Bill C-391 or their leaders.

The latest statistics available from the Firearms Centre indicate there are more than six and a half million non-restricted firearms (rifles and shotguns) listed in the registry. Why scrap this hard-earned data collection when you've already gone through the effort? The sunk costs may have been expensive, but maintaining all the activities of the firearms centre is a mere seventy some odd million a year - it's peanuts.

Polytechnique shooting survivor backs gun control (CBC, Friday December 4, 2009)

Rathjen said she has spoken to some of the families of the Polytechnique victims and said they are "devastated, terrified that this is going to go through."

She had scathing words for Ignatieff and NDP Leader Jack Layton, saying they demonstrated a "complete lack of leadership on this issue, allowing a free vote on what they absolutely knew was a disguised government bill."

Lessons of the Montreal Massacre (The Star, Saturday December 5 2009)

Columbine. Dawson College. Virginia Tech. There've been so many school massacres since Dec. 6, 1989, we've grown disturbingly used to them. The Montreal Massacre was different. Lepine had a specific target: women.

Most women who are murdered are killed by their husbands, lovers or exes. Many are killed in rages - there is a fight; the man finds his hunting gun.

Greenpeace has put some bitingly smart advertising up in the Copenhagen airport.

[Canada] is now to climate what Japan is to whaling George Monbiot

The series (hat tip: Twitter retweet from LibArtsAndMinds) features apologetic world leaders 11 years from now. Recognize this fellow?

Click on image to see other country leaders in 2020...

In other pre-Copenhagen news this week, noted climate change activist George Monbiot in a widely read article in The Guardian labelled Canada an embarrassment. While I am deeply proud of our country, I am not blind to its failures and thus I must agree with Mr. Monbiot.

Jim Prentice, the third Conservative government environment minister in as many years, today put forward a weak retort in that same paper.

Greenpeace Canada is calling on Canadians to sign it's Kyoto-Plus petition, and is of course in high gear in the days leading up to Copenhagen. May the force be with you.

Disclaimer: I like Jim Prentice and find him to be one of the truly honourable people in politics. In this case I do not at all agree with what he is saying, but as a person of principle he is at least asserting his position and plans in a bluntly unequivocal manner. That said, if it were in my power to do so I would see his government defeated for the position they are taking on climate change. The Conservative Party, as well as the co-founding Canadian Alliance Party (and it's forerunner the Reform Party) have either been denying climate change is an issue, or attempting to block any action on the issue, since, well, forever. Unfortunately, the Liberal record on the matter is equally abysmal. Those I'm sad to say are the unvarnished non-partisan facts.

By now it is old news that Stephen Harper will indeed go to the Copenhagen climate change summit, but only because U.S. president Barak Obama is attending.

What is not widely known is how desperately Stephen Harper had sought an excuse not to attend. Caught on film here's Stephen spending time in places he'd rather be than Copenhagen.

Stephen Harper would rather be in an Afghan prison than in Copenhagen. Click on image for full-size rendition.

The Liberals are running a mini-contest - submit your entries soon! See the Stephen Harper Anywhere But Copenhagen Photo Challenge page for more information.

The government today released another 130 pages of redacted Richard Colvin documents . Many are redacted so heavily as to be worthless, but even still, these documents paint a clear picture which is in agreement with the testimony of Richard Colvin and contradicts the talking-points the Harper government has been using to attack and discredit Colvin.

I have never before in my 15-year career been told that, internally, we must lie to each other. Richard Colvin

Even a quick scan of the eight megabytes of scanned images (PDF) illustrates ample justification for calling a full public inquiry. Here is a quick extraction from the material:

• Concerns over detainee treatment were reported on by Colvin right from the start of his posting, not only after the Globe and Mail broke the story in spring 2007. Colvin himself alerted Kabul HQ (April 14 2007) that reporter Graeme Smith of the Globe and Mail had been conducting extensive research in preparation for a soon to be released article on torture and Canadian involvement which was "too close for comfort". Still, Colvin's attempts at moving the issue forward appeared to be stonewalled by either DFAIT, the military, or politicians back home or all of the above. For example on May 26, 2006 in memo KANDH0029:

  "[redacted] has been trying for some time to get these concerns taken seriously. [redacted] "very much taken aback by the reaction -- the very strong reaction -- of the Canadian military"

• Colvin's reporting shows a pattern of constant attention to the issue. (Page 10) Sept 19 2006: KBGR0118:

  Afghanistan [redacted] detainee concerns - [redacted] today raised with us an ongoing concern about detainees [redacted]

• Other organizations had reported significant concerns. (Page 13) September 28, 2006 KBGR01

  [redacted] what can only be described as strong criticisms of the Cdn approach on detainee issues. There [redacted] are [redacted.............]

• Concerns about the overall treatment of detainees, including those transferred to Afghan custody by Canadian forces, contradicting comments made by defence minister Peter MacKay, diplomat David Mulroney and three generals who testified before committee (p. 22, p. 24 on page 129)

• More than one year after the Harper government had taken power, detainees still were not being monitored appropriately per agreements with the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission -- agreements that were made not with the former Martin government but with the Harper government in February 2007 (page 56); a key section of this document which apparently discusses Government of Canada awareness of abuse reports from the AIHRC is fully [redacted]. Why is this [redacted]?

• Despite a failure of the arrangements established by the Harper government, prisoner transfers from Canadian to Afghan hands continued (spring 2007). The Harper government via then defence minister Gordon O'Conner and also Prime Minister Harper even trumpeted the agreement as being both "recent" and "sufficient". (pages 56, 57)

• Colvin writes on April 24 2007 that a hastily developed "diplomatic contingency plan", developed ostensibly to address media pressure in Canada, ws "insufficient to address the urgent detainee crisis". (page 62) His recommendations include establishing a Government of Canada capacity to monitor detainees, and a suggestion that the military adjust their operations to reduce the number of detainees being captured and handed over in the first place. Clearly no one is recommending that suspects of a high degree of confidence be set free, so this indicates a somewhat wanton approach to taking prisoners.

• The very next day Colvin writes:

  "detainee methodologies in the field are too expansive, resulting in the detention of a significant number of Afghans who are not/ not insurgents or combatants."

• An observation that feedback from the field was not welcomed by HQ in Ottawa

• Many memos regarding detainees circa April 25 2007 and onward are redacted almost completely, yet the subject matter is of direct concern to the special committee inquiring into this matter.

• On or before April 30 2007 Canada's Ambassador to Afghanistan a the time, Afir Lalani, had personally censored the distribution list of a memo regarding detainee monitoring and, it appears, had played a role in censoring other parts of the document. This seems to indicate that political orders from on high have declared Colvin a dangerous liability. (page 76)

• On May 7 2007 Colvin warns HQ/Ottawa that Globe and Mail reporter Graeme Smith will be publishing a follow up piece "within a few months" and that Smith's reportage was likely to raise serious public-policy questions.

• June 6 2007 embassy staff visit a detention facility in Kabul, intent on interviewing detainees which had been captured by Canadian forces in the Kandahar area. Reports of torture and abuse allegations are included in the memo (page 95)

• June 9 2007, a two and a half page memo on detainees, drafted by Colvin, is completely redacted.

• August 27, a Regional Command South brainstorming session is attended by a variety of nation's forces. Apparently many good ideas are discussed, but they are mostly redacted, and the conclusion in the memo is "we all recognize the problems but how are they to be solved?" Here Canada has been at war, but we don't call it war, for many years and still no reliable approach to detainees (not to mention ultimate justice for same) is in place. Clearly it isn't a priority for anyone who is in power.

• October 24 2007 Colvin writes what many might consider as a "career limiting memo", a conclusion of his time in Afghanistan. In his opinion Canada has not "come to grips" with the detainee problem and recommends that we stop handing detainees over to Kandahar-area Afghan forces. Period.

• In that same farewell memo, perhaps the most startling observation made is the Canadian embassy had made it perfectly clear that all personnel were to lie about the situation in Afghanistan, not just to media but maintain such lies even within their own ranks. This is a clear indication of intent - nothing less than full blown institutional cover-up. Within this memorandum written by Richard Colvin entitled: End-of-posting observations, dated 24 October 2007 and addressed to David Mulroney:

  Management of Afghanistan by DFAIT

  The next day, the point was unambiguously made to the whole embassy that henceforth the official embassy view is that things are getting better. This is completely contradicted by the available data, as well as by the careful assessments [redacted]. I have never before in my 15-year career been told that, internally, we must lie to each other. (page 125) Richard Colvin

It is long past time for an inquiry setting into this matter where perjury is punishable by jail time.

Attached: 130 pages of Colvin and related reports (PDF)

The Globe and Mail this morning continues to direct a bright light into the murkier recesses of our country's handling of Afghanistan detainee torture and abuse allegations.

Facts relentlessly rising to the surface of this fetid scandal serve only to buttress an inescapable conclusion: Canadians have been lied to directly and through omission by the Harper government.

Backing up allegations former diplomat Richard Colvin has levied against the government, the Globe and Mail today released a redacted document (attached) said to have been censored by Harper political appointee Arif Lalani, the former Canadian ambassador to Afghanistan.

In the International Committee of the Red Cross's experience, 'a lot of abuse happens in the first days.'

Our own records substantiate ICRC's comments about continued delays in notification. For the four-month period of December 1, 2006, to March 30, 2007, the gap from detention by Canadian Forces to ICRC being informed was as long as 34 days. Text from censored component of report by Richard Colvin

Mr. Lalani, a political appointee of the Harper government, followed Christopher Alexander [1] who was appointed as ambassador in 2003. Alexander is a policy hawk who intends to run as a Conservative candidate in the federal riding of Ajax-Pickering.

There is so much smoke circling this scandal that a roaring fire can't be far below the surface. To get to the unvarnished truth of the matter what is needed is an inquiry venue that ensures perjury is rewarded with jail time.