Don't get me wrong - I have a little list of things that bug me about Stephen Harper, many quite serious. I've written/ beaked off about SPP/NAU in other threads. He was lucky enough to benefit from protest votes (Liberal sponsorship scandal), but if you look at things on balance -
- Fixed election dates, campaigned on this, did not occur, abandoned in an attempt to opportunize on public polls in CPC favour (?)
- Original 'sin'/ Dec-03 (Alliance/PCP party merger: Harper + MacKay = Orchard betrayal; no legal consequences)
- Closing access to information vs transparency
- Imperial leadership
- Inept Cabinet Ministers loosing it/files (Raitt-"sexy cancer," Ritz-food inspection-deaths, Bernier-blaming girlfriend-NATO)
- Losing Quebec in a fireball - igniting issues like separatism to fire loyalties
- Lack of respect for Office (e.g. Louise Arbour at UN, Linda Keen re nuke safety)
- Soliciting David Emerson in Vancouver Kingsway, Chuck Cadman (despite Harper's outraged, contrary stance as Opposition leader re a member crossing the floor, i.e. flexible goose/gander standard)
- Income Trusts
- proposed cut of public funding for federal political parties (Jim Flaherty, Min. of Finance) at a time when financing of CPC is strong dec-09
- almost selling publicly-funded RadarSat-2 satellite tech to US private interests (arms manufacturer); now taking credit for keeping it in Canada, even though it was the excellent work of NDP Industry Critic, Peggy Nash, and grassroots opposition
http://activistmagazine.com/index.ph...824&Itemid=143
[Jul4-09] At one point, MDA and Radarsat 2 were up for sale to a U. S. aerospace firm, but the Harper government nixed that deal, noting it was not in the best interests of Canada.
http://www.calgaryherald.com/Technol...679/story.html
- abandoning lucrative, global isotope business, defeatist! public asset giveaways!!! - CAE issues
- Kelowna Accord, abandoned
- Duplicate speech (plagarism of John Howard) re let's-go-to-war-in-Iraq, supporting GW Bush's 'Coalition of the Willing' 2003, as Opposition leader - Canada didn't under PM Chretien, but is in Afghanistan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L8YwJC_nBgw
- MP newletters & ads - there are many people in ridings who don't care for the CPC or perpetual campaigning
- CPC website that looks like a Harper family Facebook page for family values, like who doesn't have family values
and so on