Harpernian Irony

 

 

Before heading abroad to join extremist groups such as Islamic State, some Canadians have been stopping first in northern Alberta to earn money to finance their terrorist activities, the chief of the Edmonton Police Service says.

 

“You can go up to Fort McMurray ... you’re relatively anonymous, you’re in one of those work camps and you can make a hockey sack of money in a very, very short period of time,” said Rob Knecht.

 

Let's be clear, folks, there are only two things that matter - the economy and security.  We can easily secure the economy by reducing taxation and therefore government services (and making sure people understand this through massively expensive marketing campaigns) on the one hand while focusing all our attention the extraction and export of natural resources, especially oil.  What can go wrong with that?

 

The next issue, those perilious troubles lapping at our shores and scurrilous rabble-rousers and sociology-commiters on our own soil.  They must be stopped by extreme security measures, increased monitoring of private engagement and of course, tougher penalties.  And if we happen to get some information that may prove useful (at least politically) through torture, oh well, eh?  It's like those missing aboriginal women; it's their own fault for getting mixed up in such things as being a native woman or being a man with a name like Maher Arar. 

 

The Harper government has curtailed the free flow of information, the basis of intellectual thought.  They have provoked strong emotions with their rhetoric and actions for political convenience.  They have increased security that by the very nature of the system they're strengthening targets minorities unfairly, resulting in an imbalance in civil liberties.

 

Oh yeah, and the putting of all eggs in the oil basket isn't working out quite the way they'd planned, is it?  So much for being history's actors.

 

This is master strategist Stephen Harper at his best; his approach to government is fostering a disruption of social cohesion that fosters the very kind of internal risks he wants to fight against.  All that may be intentional, depending on how cynical he is.  But to tout oil as the only economic solution that matters when all evidence has pointed to the contrary, and now the reality is proving the point?

 

They say Harper is a man with a sense of humour.  Hopefully, he appreciates the humour in all of this.