The Election will be over soon

This little girl, I am sure, speaks for most of the American people.

Some others who have spoken out over the centuries about politics and politicians:

We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office. ~Aesop, Greek slave & fable author

Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber. ~Plato, ancient Greek Philosopher

Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river. ~Nikita Khrushchev, Russian Soviet politician

When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President; I'm beginning to believe it. ~Quoted in 'Clarence Darrow for the Defense' by Irving Stone.

Politicians are people who, when they see light at the end of the tunnel, go out and buy some more tunnel. ~John Quinton, American actor/writer

Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich, by promising to protect each from the other. ~Oscar Ameringer, "the Mark Twain of American Socialism."

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. AND The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it. ~P.J. O'Rourke, American comedian and writer.

I offered my opponents a deal: "if they stop telling lies about me, I will stop telling the truth about them". ~Adlai Stevenson, campaign speech, 1952.

A politician is a fellow who will lay down your life for his country. ~ Texas Guinan. 19th century American businessman

I have come to the conclusion that politics is too serious a matter to be left to the politicians. ~Charles de Gaulle, French general & politician

Instead of giving a politician the keys to the city, it might be better to change the locks. ~Doug Larson (English middle-distance runner who won gold medals at the 1924 Olympic Games in Paris , 1902-1981)

The problem with political jokes is they get elected. ~ Variously attributed to Will Rogers and George Bernard Shaw

The Ukrainian Election

Preliminary results would indicate that President Yanukovych's Party of the Regions will form the next government.

The Kyiv Post reported at 5:30 Ukraine time the following results:

These are the preliminary results as of 17.30 p.m.

Preliminary results of the leading parties that pass the 5 percent threshold on the closed party list. Figures taken from the Central Election Commission, after 69.21 percent of protocols were counted.

Party	Percentage of votes	Number of votes
Party of Regions	33.51	4 564 369
Batkivshchyna	22.97	3 129 026
Communist Party	14.51	1 976 813
UDAR	13.13	1 789 236
Svoboda	8.95	1 219 979

Preliminary results of the leading candidates in the single mandate districts. Figures taken from the Central Election Commission. Results are based on 59.22 percent of votes counted.

The First-past-the-post results can be seen here and are being updated as new counts come in.

Exit polls do not agree with the counts above that show the Regionnaires and the Communists with a lower percentage of the vote and the Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) and UDAR with a higher percentage.

The Economist's Eastern Approaches blog believes that Yanukovych will get a simple majority but not a Constitution changing 2/3 majority, which means that Ukraine gets a shot at unseating him in 2015. 

The Party of the Regions and its allies are unlikely to win two thirds of the seats in parliament. It wanted this in order to change the constitution to abolish direct elections to the presidency. This would lower the risk for the unpopular Mr Yanukovych of losing the presidential race in 2015. If direct elections were abolished the president would be elected by parliament.

Head down; Mouth shut

Today was housecleaning day.  Tomorrow is election day.  We are kind of hoping Ukraine cleans house too but of course it isn't going to happen.  Yanukovych's Party of the Regions is going to win and people know it.  Not that they have anyone else to blame.  They voted him in last presidential election and enough of his party last general election to form a government, knowing (or they ought to have known) what was in store for them.

It was bad enough when they had proportional representation. Ninety odd political parties, many of them fictional, produced little clusters of deputies who sold out to the highest bidder.  Party of the Regions won the most seats and so drew the most of the small blocks.  This time, they have gone back to 50-50  proportional and first past the post. First past the post favours the Regionnaires  as there will be dozens of candidates, again many of them fictional, to split the votes of the opposition.

Polls have been banned for the past several weeks.  When 87% of the populace say they hate your guts two days before the election and you end up with 53.7% of the vote, it is a bit embarrassing, so no polls please.

The Orange Revolution in 2004 was the only time in the past several hundred years that Ukrainians "beat city hall".  And it got them the square root of Sweet Fanny Adams.  A president with no balls and a prime minister with big brass ones.  The folks who helped bring them to power wanted their payback and turned out to be just as incompetent and corrupt as the crowd they threw out.  So in a fit of pique, Ukraine voted in the bad guy next go round.

Yulia is in the slammer, sitting this one out, which may not be a bad thing.  She is better looking than Yanukovych, 1000 times more clever, and just as corrupt.  If she and her cronies were in power, how would things be different today for the Ukrainian in the street?  Other than Russian would not be the unofficial official language, maybe not much.  Just a different set of folks would have enriched themselves. My opinion.

So folks here are pretty discouraged and resigned, which is too bad.  The Economist reckons that the defeatism may not only let the Regionnaires win the election but get a Constitution changing majority. won't that be fun.  World Affairs has also written off this election to the Regionnaires but speculates about when Yanukovych himself will get the boot from his own party and supporters who may also tire of his incompetence.

In the meantime, Ukrainians will revert to form.  Head down, mouth shut and try not to be noticed while working to survive.  They, as a people, survived the Poles, the Turks, the Austrians, the Tsar, the Communists and the Germans (though a great many of them didn't survive those two inflictions) and now independence and a "market economy".  They will still be here when Yanukovych is gone.

Ukraine Slowly Loses Its Freedom

I said in an earlier post that the Regionnaires would likely win the election 10 days from now and it appears I was right to think so.  The Economist blog Eastern Approaches today posted this article: 

Ukrainian politics - Ten days before polling day

The ruling Party of Regions and its allies look set to win Ukraine’s parliamentary election on October 28th. They may even gain a constitutional majority with control of two-thirds of the parliament. This will likely happen despite the fact that most Ukrainians regularly tell pollsters their country is heading “in the wrong direction” and less than a quarter of them plan to vote for the Party of Regions.

Perhaps the most important reason for this is that Ukraine has reverted to the mixed proportional and first-past-the-post system last used in 2002. Back then, it allowed Leonid Kuchma, an unpopular president, to secure a working majority in parliament thanks to a divided opposition and post-election defections to his camp.

The same conditions are in place now for Viktor Yanukovych, the current president. His candidates can come out on top in first-past-the-post constituencies where three or more opposition politicians are competing. On October 14th the two main anti-Yanukovych forces agreed to withdraw some of their candidates in some districts in order to limit this phenomenon, but they have stopped far short of a genuine alliance. It is testament to the current parliamentary opposition’s ineffectiveness that it allowed this electoral reform to pass last year, giving the ruling party a chance to retain power in an election that could be classed as free and fair (given that an elected parliament had agreed to its rules).

Still, it appears Mr Yanukovych’s team sees no compelling reason to take that chance: there are plenty of ways to skew the vote before international observers, who see this election as a crucial test for Ukrainian democracy, arrive to observe the polling itself. Evidence from various quarters suggests this machinery is in motion across the country.

For more click HERE

This article is not comforting and simply reflects how Ukraine is sinking deeper into the morass.  It is becoming more and more like Putin's Russia.  It was more free under Yushchenko than ever before but that is rapidly giving way to government control and a police state.  Ukrayinskiy Tyzhden, Ukrainian Week has a very depressing article on how the government is clamping down hard on the few remaining independent media outlets, including their own magazine. They concluded the article with this information on a new Law on Slander that will kill investigative journalism.

On September 18th, the Verkhovna Rada passed a bill “On Amending the Criminal Code and the Code of Proceedings of Ukraine to Increase Liability for Attacks on the Dignity and Business Reputation of Individuals”. Officially sponsored by the Party of Regions’ Vitaliy Zhuravsky, the draft law was actually designed at the Presidential Administration as proven by an electronic file posted on the parliament’s website. The list of crimes in the new draft law includes slander, punishable with prison terms of one to two years or two to five years. Slander that accuses someone of a serious crime may carry up to a three-year jail sentence. Top officials are not hiding the purpose of the draft law. In its response to a question by the online publication Economic Truth regarding corrupt property foreclosures based on court decisions, the Ministry of Justice wrote that it was “dishonest activity” similar to that of the publication that “brought forth the legislative initiative to implement liability for slander”. The question about corruption was left unanswered.

  

If passed, the law on slander will destroy the remnants of independent journalism in Ukraine. In lieu of a fair judiciary, any journalist who criticizes an official or publishes an investigation on potential corruption will automatically become an object of criminal persecution with the outcome known in advance. This is essentially an attempt to apply the tools used against jailed opposition members to attack legitimate free media outlets using obsolete soviet provisions of the Criminal Code. Despite promises from government representatives to soften the draft law following sharp reactions by the Western and Ukrainian public and politicians, the law, if passed, will signal the end of free speech and journalism in Ukraine. After that, journalism in the country may degrade completely.The government seems to have taken a step back under pressure from the public. When this publication was being prepared, the Party of Regions’ Vitaliy Zhuravsky stated that he would recall his draft law on slander. However, he also said that he was going to submit a finalized version to the parliament after the election. According to The Ukrainian Week’s source in the Party of Regions, legislative changes on criminal liability for slander will “definitely” be passed after the parliamentary election. 

This is nothing new. If the tactics employed by the government on a massive scale succeed to win them a constitutional majority in the new parliament (300 out of 450 seats)—even if supported by no more than 25% of the population—the Yanukovych regime will be able to completely ignore the international community. In doing so, he may point to having “absolute popular support” and a constitutional majority in the parliament as signs thereof. “All questions about Ukraine will be answered after the election,” said Yanukovych at the Yalta European Strategy conference. In this light, this phrase may gain an entirely new meaning.

For the full article, click HERE

To be honest, moving to Russia is appealing.  At least there it is all Russians and one knows how the system works.

Alarm at Greek police 'collusion' with far-right Golden Dawn

Return of the Brownshirts a result of IMF austerity in Greece.

Greece's far-right party, Golden Dawn, won 18 parliamentary seats in the June election with a campaign openly hostile to illegal immigrants and there are now allegations that some Greek police are supporting the party.

"There is already civil war," says Ilias Panagiotaros. If so, the shop he owns is set to do a roaring trade.

It sells camouflage gear, police riot gloves, face masks and T-shirts extolling football hooliganism.

On the walls are posters celebrating the last civil war in Greece, which ended in 1949.

"Greek society is ready - even though no-one likes this - to have a fight: a new type of civil war," he says.

"On the one side there will be nationalists like us, and Greeks who want our country to be as it used to be, and on the other side illegal immigrants, anarchists and all those who have destroyed Athens several times," he adds.

You hear comments like this a lot in Greece now but Ilias Panagiotaros is not some figure on the fringes: he is a member of the Greek parliament, one of 18 MPs elected for the far-right Golden Dawn in June's general election.

To read more click HERE

Its About Development (not NGOs vs Mining companies)

Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) is Canada's Official Development Agency (ODA) through which the Government of Canada channels money for international aid and development.  My own experience with CIDA has been that any programs which are simple and useful they tend to kill and while they claim to be "results driven" their bureaucratic overhead is some four times that of comparable European ODAs.  

CIDA has been very reluctant to work with the private sector other than consulting firms, on the grounds that they would rather forgo development than do something a commercial company might benefit from.  But to give credit, they have co-funded some development projects with Canadian mining companies (see article below). Having said that, CIDA has funded some good on-going development programs through NGOs to alleviate poverty in some of the poorest parts of the world.

This is apparently changing.  Policy now seems to be to fund development projects where the investment pays off not in development necessarily but in increased trade.  They are unfunding KAIROS Canada, long time effective development NGO composed of several Canadian churches.  There is a suggestion that KAIROS may have angered the Harper government by refusing to whitewash Israeli atrocities against Palestinians and not necessarily siding with Canadian mining companies when they may be in the wrong.

CIDA has also greatly reduced funding to Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (CCODP).  You can read more details on Dennis Gruending's Blog HERE. 

Now what CIDA has done is fund to the tune of many millions of dollars Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) projects with three Canadian Mining companies. You can read the backlash on Dnnis Gruending's Blog and many others. I am not in a position to defend the projects or the companies because I know nothing about them, however I do know a little about CSR having worked on a couple of projects with my friend Wayne Dunn.  When done right, CSR projects can bring real benefits to both the communities around the mine and the mining company.

Wayne has written a couple of articles on his experience with CSR.  The first is reprinted below with his permission.  It is also available on the website of Canadian Association of International Development Consultants (CAIDC).  His second article is available on the website of the McGill Reporter HERE.

********************

 

I have been listening to the debate regarding CIDA’s partnership with some Canadian mining companies and felt compelled to put forward some thoughts based on over two decades of experience working at the interface where the interests of communities, global private sector, governments, development agencies, environment, NGOs and others meet.  There have been some spectacular successes and abysmal failures at that interface.  Impoverished people and communities have been uplifted, or they have been pushed further down, environmental miracles and disasters have occurred.  It has been far less about the types of partners involved than it has been about the right partner, plan and approach, based on the specific situation.

The recent discussion over CIDA's collaboration with Canadian mining interests in support of international development has been framed in terms of the interests of Canadian NGOs vs the interests of Canadian mining companies.  The discussion is more properly framed in relation to the interests of the people and communities that should be the beneficiaries of Canada's development assistance.  It’s about the world’s poor and how CIDA can best support education, health and other development issues.

CIDA does not have an easy role.  Its budget comes from Canadian taxpayers and it has a responsibility to ensure that the money it invests in development produces results.  CIDA often works with and through Canadian partners including NGOs, educational institutions, private sector (including mining) and other partners.  There are successful examples for all types of partners, just as there are unsuccessful examples.  No single group holds a monopoly on success, or failure.

I was one of the first to facilitate a large, developmental partnership project between CIDA and a Canadian mining company.  Canadian mining company Placer Dome wanted to go far beyond normal practices and assist the families of 2,500 retrenched mineworkers to establish alternative income streams.  The company committed $5,000,000, CIDA contributed $2,000,000, a number of local NGOs and organizations were involved and the direct impact was felt by thousands of families in hundreds of communities across Southern Africa.  The indirect impact changed the social face of the South African mining industry and led directly to the industry’s progressive (and economically self-interested) HIV/AIDS programming and the project was published in the Stanford Social Innovation Review (link) and used as a case study by the Stanford Business School.

After the success of work in South Africa the World Bank asked Placer Dome to help develop a strategic approach to HIV/AIDS programming in Papua New Guinea that would engage all stakeholders.   We put together a plan and CIDA contributed $200,0000, Placer Dome about the same amount and other partners including Australian Aid, World Bank, World Health Organization, PNG AIDS, Chamber of Mines and others contributed cash and resources.  The end result was a Public Private Partnership Strategy and programming for HIV/AIDS in PNG that was enthusiastically endorsed by a broad cross section of the HIV/AIDS constituency.

In Turkey Eldorado Gold was in the process of developing a gold mine and their work with local communities identified agricultural development as a key local priority.  CIDA partnered with Eldorado (CIDA $200,000 cash, Eldorado ~$750,000 cash and in-kind) and strategies and programs were developed that helped to increase income and productivity of the farmers.

In all of these cases a development impact was achieved because CIDA picked the right partner for the situation.  The mining companies, by virtue of their presence in the area and understanding of the situation, were uniquely positioned to produce results in these cases. In other cases it may well be an NGO or others that would be the best partner.  Experiences like these should help to guide the current debate. 

Canada has a global responsibility to support development around the world.  The execution of that responsibility should not be about one Canadian group or another, but rather about the impact on development.  It isn’t a mining company vs NGO issue.  The mining sector has done terrible things to people and communities, in Canada and globally.  But, so have churches, NGOs, governments and others.  All these groups have positive accomplishments too.  CIDA cannot, and should not exclude entire sectors from its partnership programs.  CIDA must find the partners that enable it to be the most efficient at supporting development for the world’s poor.

Wayne Dunn has worked with private sector, governments, NGOs, civil society and others on over 60 social responsibility/development projects in over 30 countries.  He can be reached at +1.250.743.7619 or wayne@waynedunn.com

Winning Elections in the 21st Century

 "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything." -- Josef Stalin

To be a successful politician, the first requirement is an ego the size of the Taj Mahal; the second requirement (and this applies to political parties as well) is an absolutely belief in the rightness of one's ideas and on the ideology underlying them. This applies whether one is driven by greed and lust for power for the sake of power or by altruism and a fervent desire to make a better world.

The first priority is to be elected.  Actually gaining and keeping power is the ONLY priority because without that, nothing else counts.  (That doesn't mean a party not in power has no opportunity to shape legislation - much of Canada's social legislation brought in by the Liberals was at one time or another part of the CCF-NDP platform).

So the combination of gigantic ego, unshakeable rightness and the need to win puts a great deal of temptation in the way to "help" the voters. This is likely as old as voting. Whether it was Tammany Hall in New York, Daley's Chicago, Duplessi's Quebec or Drapeau's Montreal, the great unwashed were not necessarily trusted to make the "right" choice.  Legend has it Joey Smallwood told Lester Pearson as they drove through a cemetery in St Johns Newfoundland to "Keep waving; some of my strongest supporters are here".

I have to admit Harper's alleged robo-calling is petty stuff compared to the list of observed misconduct in the Russian presidential election.  Putin  owns the Election Commission, the Police/Militia and the Courts so he can get away with 19th century fraud methods.

America, on the other hand, is, as always, much more sophisticated.  They have electronic voting machines.  Touch-screen voting has been in since 1996, although it doesn’t work. There are no paper ballots. There is no accounting, no audit, and no recount. Four companies supply them and are essentially in charge of counting the electronic ballots.  There have been some royal screw ups along with a fair bit of questionable results.  There is little or no security against voter fraud built into the machines compared to Vegas slot machines.

Source: http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/rigvote.html

Some of the interesting things I found:

In Florida, where Diebold registered 16,022 negative votes for Gore, newsmen saw votes falling off Gore’s tally.  A Diebold machine registered 16,022 negative votes for Al Gore in Precinct 216 in Florida in the 2000 presidential election.  Here is how it is done:




In the 2004 election one County in Ohio, equipped with Diebold electronic voting machines, reported NEGATIVE 25,000 votes.

A statistical analysis on several swing states found that in EVERY STATE that has paper audit trails on their EVoting, the exit poll results matched the actual results reported within the margin of error. So, we have MATCHING RESULTS for exit polls vs. voting with audits vs. A 5% unexplained advantage for Bush without audits.  Here is how that is done: 



The head of a company vying to sell voting machines in Ohio for the 2004 election told Republicans in a fund-raising letter that he is "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." 


Beverley Harris, at Black Box Voting, said that she went into the computer, by-passed the password and changed the vote in less than 10 minutes.

In three different electoral counts in three different states, each candidate who won, did so by exactly the same number of votes!

A CEO of one of the four major voting machine corporations, resigned his position to run for public office. He then won the vote, counted by his own machine. He had a $5 million ownership in the company that counted 80 per cent of the votes. 

Spanish-speaking and other minority areas where the machines have been introduced in some instances the voter pushes for one candidate and the machine registers the other, then deletes the actual choice, to prevent discovery in an audit. 

In Georgia, 22,000 machines were modified by the supplier and no one could see what change was inserted. 

New Hampshire used uncertified software on the touch screen voting in the caucus. There were huge discrepancies between machine counting and hand counting.

Rigging an election is merely a "misdemeanour" in some states and of course

there is incredible resistance to any audits by the beneficiaries of the electronic voting.

This one is my favourite: During Arnold Schwarzenegger’s run for the post of California governor, the vote total showed up on the internet five hours before the polls closed and the figure was the same as the final announced vote. I am certain it prompted The Onion announcement that one of the Diebold machines had accidentally released the name of the 2012 presidential winner in the video below.

Where are the Progressive Christians?

Where are the Progressive Christians? | NationofChange

Why the religious right is able to set the agenda. Because moderates do and say nothing.

Voting Day in Russia

The citizens of the Russian Federation went to the polls today to re-elect Putin for a third term (6 years this time) as president.  He needs more than 50% in this round to avoid a second round of voting.  As if that is a problem.  Three of his opponents are professional losers, though Zyuganov of the Communist Party is the favoured protest vote.  No credible liberal candidates were allowed to run and the oligarch running as an independent will be lucky if his own mother votes for him.

After the protests of December and February over the rampant fraud in the Duma elections, Putin spent a BILLION dollars installing CCTV cameras in all the polling stations.  One of his buddies made half a billion on that, I expect, but not much else will come of it.  My guess is only the Election Commission will be allowed to see the films and we all know THEY won't see anything untoward.  Putin will claim then, that he won fair and square.  Yeah, right.

According to BBC, carousel voting (busing people from polling station to polling station), which is pretty easy to detect, is going all out in Moscow, Novosibirsk and Barnaul and likely in other places to, though they didn't mention it. When the BBC report was filed, already some 3000 instances of fraud had been documented by independent observers.

Not surprised about Novosibirsk.  I think that was the city which banned demonstrations by toys.  Seems that no one could get approval for a demonstration so some enterprising soul put protest signs on toys and set them out in the square.  Naughty, naughty.

The opposition is already organized for protests tomorrow, however so is the Kremlin, having imported 6000 extra police from the hinterland.  I imagine that Putin will be no more Mr. Nice Guy now that the election is over and any and all protests will be brutally crushed.  I don't expect any of the militia brought in will "refuse to fire on their own people".  These are the folks that brought you Stalin, after all.

Harper and GOP, you keep interesting company.

Monday Morning Update: Putin wins with 60% of the vote and a 68% turnout.  Exit polls match the actual count.   A major difference this time is that the opposition candidates are not going quietly, according to BBC.

Putin's Russia comes to Canada.

This email from Avaaz.org was in my inbox this morning.  I had heard a little about it.  Being off the beaten track has its disadvantages.  All I can hope is that the RCMP and the Election Commission nail Harper's hide to the wall over this. Harper needed a majority government so he could wreck the country and this is how he got it.

*************

Dear friends across Canada,

Thousands of voters may have been tricked into not voting in the last election, and investigators are currently failing to conduct a national investigation. Click below to tell Elections Canada and the RCMP that Canadians demand a real investigation, including an account of all election day robocalls -- then forward this email and ask friends and family to join the movement to save our democracy from fraud and corruption:

News reports have just revealed that callers supporting Harper likely misled thousands of voters in the last election. But we can undo this fraud, if investigators now work to find the truth of what really happened.

Last election, voters in as many as 45 ridings received misleading and fraudulent phone calls telling us to go to fake polling stations. New media reports show that this orchestrated attack on our democracy might have worked -- flipping seats to benefit the Conservative party and giving them a majority in Parliament. Elections Canada and the RCMP are, thus far, limiting their investigation to one riding and the members of one political party -- if we raise a massive public outcry they will be forced to expand their investigation to third parties and to dig into fraud across the country.

At minimum, our public officials should review all robocall contracts for election day, and we can make them dig deep in every implicated riding. Click below to demand Elections Canada and the RCMP act now to protect our democracy, then forward to everyone:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/election_fraud//?vl

On election day - May 2, 2011 - Canadians were inundated with dishonest phone calls saying that voting stations had been moved, then directing voters to a wrong location. Some of these callers even posed as Elections Canada officials. We need get to the truth and to do that we need Elections Canada and the RCMP to expand their investigation and ask the courts to reveal all calling companies’ orders for election day calls. These calls were likely so widespread that they could have actually changed the outcome of many close races!

We already know that Guelph was targeted by misleading calls and that this was part of a complex and pre-meditated plan. Some of the calls used a number tied to a disposable “burner” phone paid for in cash and registered to a Mr. Pierre Poutine on Separatist St., Quebec. A conservative staffer working on the campaign in Guelph has already resigned and if Elections Canada and the RCMP expand their investigation we can get to the truth and confirm full responsibility for all the election day fraud, in all 45 implicated ridings and beyond.

Our government was elected under suspect circumstances rife with reports of voter fraud -- but we can get to the truth. Click below to tell Elections Canada and the RCMP to expand their investigation:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/election_fraud//?vl

Millions of Avaaz members rallied together to win anti-corruption laws in Brazil and in India and now Canadian citizens can come together to rescue our democracy. We can’t let governments steal elections and if we take action today we can win back our democracy.

With hope,

Emma, Ari, Ricken, Laryn, Melanie and the rest of the Avaaz team

Sources

'Robocall' probe puts Tory campaign in Guelph under microscope (Montreal Gazette)
http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Robocall+probe+puts+Tory+campaign+Guelph+under+microscope/6218191/story.html

Fraudulent calls a sophisticated attempt to disrupt an election (Globe and Mail)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/election-fraud-probe-zeroes-in-on-tories-in-guelph/article2352420/?utm_medium=Feeds%3A%20RSS%2FAtom&utm_source=Politics&utm_content=2352420

Marketing strategist Stewart Braddick plays role in Conservative party’s electoral success (Toronto Star)
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/politics/article/1137730--marketing-strategist-stewart-braddick-plays-role-in-conservative-party-s-electoral-success

Harassing and misleading phone calls in 2011 federal election reported nationwide, Liberals and NDP say (Toronto Star)
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/politics/article/1137755--harassing-and-misleading-phone-calls-in-2011-federal-election-reported-nationwide-liberals-and-ndp-say

Robocalls scandal spreads across Canada as number of affected ridings hits 34 (National Post)
http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/02/26/robocalls-scandal-spreads-across-canada-as-number-of-affected-ridings-hits-34/

30 complaints about fraudulent poll changes filed to Elections Canada (Global News)
http://www.globalnews.ca/elections+canada+complaints/6442590858/story.html

Elections Canada probed Tories’ Guelph campaign in November (Maclean's)
http://www2.macleans.ca/2012/02/28/elections-canada-probed-tories-guelph-campaign-in-november/

List of ridings hit by election calls complaints (CBC)
http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/02/27/pol-strange-election-calls-list.html

Two Different Bibles?

“Mark you this, Bassanio, the devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.”—from “The Merchant of Venice”

The Religious Right has been claiming the high ground for years to the point of stating that one cannot be Christian unless one holds their conservative values and that liberals seeking social justice are godless. So I was very pleased to run across a website for The Christian Left www.thechristianleft.com which tells me that it is not just the “godless” who are seeking social justice.  Though if it were, it wouldn’t bother me, nor change my politics.  If being a Christians means I have to be anti-sick, anti-poor, anti-oppressed, anti-minorities, anti-women, anti-environment, pro-wealth and pro-war, then I am just as happy to be out of it.

The home page of the Christian Left is quite lengthy but well worth reading*. It begins:

We are The Christian Left. We’re all around you. We’re among the people. Take a look. We’re part of the Body of Christ. We’re Christians. We’re Liberal. We make no apologies. In fact Jesus' ways are “Liberal.” That’s why He was killed. The Pharisees and the Sadducees were the conservatives of their time . . .We’re not ‘Communists’ or ‘Marxists’ either. We reject all such labels. We will not be profiled or pigeonholed and we will not ‘Be Quiet.’ We’re Christians. We’re Liberals. Please get used to it . . . The most common religious viewpoint which might be described as ‘left wing’ is social justice, or care for the poor and the oppressed. Supporters of this might encourage universal health care, welfare provision, subsidized education, foreign aid, and Affirmative Action for improving the conditions of the disadvantaged. Stemming from egalitarian values (and what Jesus Himself said), adherents of the Christian left consider it part of their religious duty to take actions on behalf of the oppressed.

When we have Rick Santorum making statements like Obama’s agenda is some phony theology not based on the bible or others suggesting “liberalism is a hatred of God”, Mike Lux at Crooks and Liars wonders “What Bible is Santorum Reading?” 

[T]he Bible I read…is overwhelmingly supportive of helping the poor, showing mercy to the weak, refraining from judging, treating others as you would treat yourself, calling on the wealthy to give their money to the poor, and all kinds of other liberal, lefty, progressive values.

Several paragraphs such as this one bring out the clear message of social justice:

The anti-immigrant conservative has to ignore Leviticus, which says: "Don't mistreat any foreigners who live in your land. Instead treat them as well as you treat citizens and love them as much as you love yourself." The pro-death penalty conservative has to ignore Jesus who told the Pharisees that he who is without sin should cast the first stone. The anti-labor conservatives have to not worry about Jesus' brother James (the undisputed first leader of the early Christian church according to most historians) saying "Now an answer for the rich. Start crying, weep for the miseries coming to you ... Laborers plowed your field and you cheated them: listen to the wages you kept back, they are calling out: realize the cries of the workers have reached the ears of the Lord."

He continues:

Now, look: people have every right to believe whatever they want to believe about God, Heaven and Hell, sin and salvation, the soul, and all sorts of theology. . . And if you want to believe in a God who doesn't care about the poor, loves the wealthy more than anyone else, and wants you to be selfish, feel free. But when you claim to fervently believe in the holy words of the Judeo-Christian Bible, and your political philosophy is violently opposed to most of what is actually in that Bible, I have to call you out on that. . .

I will go so far as to say that the modern conservative faith is the direct opposite of what the Judeo-Christian Bible teaches: modern conservatives argue that everyone should take what they want and devil take the hindmost, that we are all on our own, and that if you are rich it means that a Darwinian selection process allowed you to succeed, and that you owe nothing to anyone else. Modern conservatives are far more faithful to Ayn Rand, who openly rejected Christianity because of its values of helping the poor and caring for others. Give her credit for one thing: at least she was honest.

Now someone will say “Well, you are just ‘Cherry-picking’.  The whole Bible is inspired by God and you just can’t pick and chose.  ‘[E]ther it’s all God’s truth in all its parts, or none of it is’”.  My answer to that is to refer you to my previous post “Why can’t I own a Canadian?” 

Every religious denomination, every preacher, every bible teacher cherry-picks in the sense that some verses are emphasized and others are ignored.  That is why there are so many different versions of Christianity. During the civil war in USA, Northern Christians used their bibles to prove slavery was wrong while Southern Christians used their bibles to prove slavery was right.  (Hence Southern Baptists – and thanks, Snowbrush).  Martin Luther cherry-picked Ephesians 2:8-10 and justification by faith became the founding scripture of Protestantism.

Contrary to what the fundamentalists would have you believe, the Bible did not “fall from the sky on the 4^th of July” fully formed in its King James version.  The notion that “the Bible (KJV) is without error in all its teachings, including creation, history, its own origins, and salvation” is wishful thinking.  It is Holy Scripture; it is not a history text, biology text, chemistry text nor physics text. As Galileo famously argued, scripture teaches us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go.

The books of the Bible were written over the centuries by men for men (and not always by the men whose names appear on the various books.  The bible was translated by men for men, interpreted by men for men; labouriously copied over and over again by men for men, with errors, additions and subtractions deliberate or otherwise until the printing press made such work redundant.  Books were added and subtracted until the present day canon was arrived at.  Roman Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox each have very different canons.  Catholic Bibles have 73 books, 46 in the Old Testament, and 27 in the New Testament. Protestant Bibles have 66 books with only 39 in the Old Testament. Orthodox Bibles have 76 books with 49 in the Old Testament.

See Here for a brief outline of the Church Councils convened over several centuries to agree on biblical canon. Politics, power and money have been part of religion since humans first bowed down to a rock.

So everyone reads the same bible, more or less, cherry-picks the verses to support their ideology and accuses the other of being godless.  More on this subject another time.  I have been all week getting this far but have found some excellent writings (see below) on the subject of reading the bible which I hope you will read.  I hope to come back to it at a later date.

Charles Scriven, Ph.D., chair of the Seventh Day Adventist Forum board (publisher of Spectrum), president of Kettering College of Medical Arts wrote a series of three articles in 2010 in the Spectrum Magazine blog around “Why Can’t I own a Canadian?” examining how people read the bible.  They are Grace, the Holy Spirit, and the Threat of Fundamentalism; Part I and Part II and Biblical Realism as an Alternative to Fundamentalism, Here.  

*Note: You may want to read the comments at the bottom as well before you make up your mind about The Christian Left.  They seem to be banning any commenters from their FB page that raise any issues they do not agree with and do not differentiate between trolling and honest dialogue.  They have no problem with comments on their website though.

Why Can't I Own a Canadian?

Snopes says this been making the rounds of many years but considering the lunacy being promulgated during the current GOP campaign of presidential hopefuls, in particular by Santorum, it seems fitting to run it by again.

In her (1990?) radio show, Dr Laura Schlesinger said that, as an observant Orthodox Jew, homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22, and cannot be condoned under any circumstance. The following response is an open letter to Dr. Laura, penned by a US resident, which was posted on the Internet. It's funny, as well as informative:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Dr. Laura:

Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination .... End of debate.

I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some other elements of God's Laws and how to follow them.

1. Leviticus 25:44 states that I may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?

2. I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?

3. I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of Menstrual uncleanliness - Lev15: 19-24. The problem is how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.

4. When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?

5. I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself, or should I ask the police to do it?

6. A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination, Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this? Are there 'degrees' of abomination?

7. Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle-room here?

8. Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?

9. I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

10. My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev.19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair, like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

I know you have studied these things extensively and thus enjoy considerable expertise in such matters, so I'm confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.

Your adoring fan,

Jim

Two Presidential Elections - Political Not Funny Jokes

America has a presidential election in November which is not news.  However, Obama has lost a lot of progressive voters because he has broken most of the promises he made and has pretty much sold out to the moneyed crowd.  The only reason he might win again is that the Republican party so far has failed to put forward a credible candidate.

These two op-ed pieces put the choices in perspective:
Bill Boyarsky's What’s Really at Stake in 2012  in TruthDig lays out the GOP position - they do not care which GOP candidate is elected as long as he/she is not so brain-dead they cannot hold a pen to sign bills a Republican controlled  HoR and Senate will put forward and the bills they intend to put forward will take America back to the 19th century.  Read the comments under it to get the reaction of disillusioned progressive liberal voters to Obama's presidency.

Obama, the Human Rights Hypocrite by Paul Craig Roberts in Counterpunch describes what has happened during the Obama presidency, essentially a continuation of W's policies.

As a foreigner, I am hoping for Ron Paul as he has promised to put a "Closed" sign on the American Empire, take all the troops etc home, close all the military bases and stop interfering in the affairs of other countries.  Of course, we all hoped Obama would do something along those lines too.

Russia has a presidential election on March 4th with 5 candidates running, which is not news either. While Putin is expected to win, for the first time there is opposition in the streets and even with a 10% or more padding margin, it will be by a reduced majority.  That is news.

Of the (Kremlin approved) opponents, Zyuganov, leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation will be the strongest contender, mainly as people vote in protest. Zyuganov and Zhirinovsky leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (and a "clown") get a few seconds coverage on the nightly news compared to Putin's several minutes but of Mironov (A Just Russia) and Prokhorov (Norilsk Nickel and Russia's 3rd richest man) we hear nothing. 

Prokhorov was the only independent to make the cut.  The Election Commission goes through the deliberately obtuse required documentation with a fine tooth comb and if the candidate does not meet Kremlin approval, then one undotted i is all it takes.

Putin is credited with bringing "stability" to Russia after the chaotic decade under Yeltsin (See Casino Moscow by Matthew Brzezinski for the 90's in the FSU).  The truth is that much of the spoils had already been divided up by 2000 so of course the shooting died down... a little.  If you read Anna Politkovskaya's "Putin's Russia" which cover's his first four years as president, it is obvious that stability meant that the criminals were in control of the business, the old Soviet Nomenclatura were safely ensconced in the bureaucracy and the FSB kept it all under control so everyone at the top got their share of the loot and anyone who complained was looked after, so to speak.  

It was reported just recently on Ukrainian news that Putin is worth almost 140 billion.  Even if it is rubles, $4.5 billion is not bad for a small time mid-level spy to accumulate.  I also read a while back of a $1 billion house (???) being built near Sochi someplace by Putin's friends for him.  Just to show their appreciation for the stability of course.

 Zyuganov is calling for a reStalinization of Russia, however if you look at recent news items from BBC in the lead up to the election, it would seem it is already happening.

Rosenberg's Russia: On the election trail

Russia: Protests and opposition to Vladimir Putin

Vote rigging fears ahead of Russian poll

Anger over corruption in Russian city of Novosibirsk