Is Harper Fixing the Bank of Canada Appointment Process?

Reports out of the American news source Bloomberg.com today says Mr. Harper is stacking the panel to review the new Bank of Canada head. Interesting this story is coming out of the States and not Canadian media. I am no conspiracy theorists but it makes you wonder.

Even more interesting is the tactics used by the Prime Minister - stack the committee to get the nominee you want because you can’t hand pick you favourite directly. The Bloomberg story says:

“Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who can't choose a new central bank chief himself, has done the next-best thing: stacked the panel that nominates David Dodge's successor. Since taking office in 2006, Harper's government has replaced eight of 12 Bank of Canada board directors, instead of reappointing them when their three-year terms expired.”

Remember the high minded Harper rhetoric about the Accountability Act? Democracy Watch notes 15 of the 30 measures in the Act have not yet been approved by Cabinet. The Bill failed to include another 22 promised provisions too.

The most notable key provision of the Accountability Act still awaiting Cabinet approval are the measures that establish the Public Appointments Commission to help ensure Cabinet appointments are made based on merit. No wonder that Public Appointments Commission has not been approved. If it were law - as it should be - Mr. Harper would not be able to manipulate the Bank of Canada appointment process like he is. Remember – he plans to do the same kind of power tripping trickery with the judicial appoint process too.

Harper’s political campaign for the 2006 election provided a policy pronouncement a day. Once elected, he culled that do a policy agenda of only five issues – the Federal Accountability Act being one of them. Harper obviously started off governing slowly and has tapered down. Now he is manipulating our democracy to further control and centralize power in himself.

Supreme Court to Hear Aboriginal Claim of How Feds Dealt With Band Monies From Oil and Gas Revenues

The Supreme Court of Canada has allowed an Appeal on the Crown’s handling of oil and gas royalties paid to the Feds on behalf of the Pigeon Lake Reserve pursuant to Treaty 6. The issue is around common law trust obligation of the Crown for the control and management of the Band’s funds from oil and gas under Reserve lands.

This is going to be a case worth following!

Here is the Note from Eugene Meehan of the law firm of Lang Michener on the case:

The Applicants commenced an action against the Crown respecting its management of royalties and interest on those royalties from an oil and gas field underlying the Pigeon Lake Reserve. The Applicants submitted that the Crown breached trust obligations relating to the control and management of their monies. The action against the Crown was dismissed on the basis that the Crown met all of its obligations as trustee of the Applicants’ royalties. A majority of the Fed. C.A. dismissed the appeals. Issues here include: did the Treaty give rise to common law trust obligations; did the provisions of ss. 61 to 68 of the Indian Act and Orders-in-Council under s. 61(2) infringe or are inconsistent with the constitutionalized treaty rights of the Indian parties to Treaty No. 6; does s. 15 of the Charter protect only “personal rights” as distinct from collective or communal rights of First Nation members; what is the duty of the Crown to consult with First Nations.Chief Victor Buffalo, et al. v. Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada et al.(Fed. C.A., December 20, 2006) (31869) "with costs".

Harper's Ad-scam Money Went to Promote Conservative Candidates in Quebec

The Harper Con Adscam gets curiouser and curiouser. The Conservative Party of Canada launched a lawsuit against the campaign watchdog Elections Canada. This was over the party’s spending in the 2006 campaign to try and squeeze more taxpayer money out of the system to pay for their advertising costs.

Newspaper reports today say the Cons have dropped almost all of the original 34 applicants from the action leaving only two people to take the fight forward. Looks like the CPC Politburo are having some trouble keeping the party faithful faithful. Apparently some former candidates and their official agents are publicly disavowing the advertising scheme.

Other former candidate’s official agents who were named as applicants in the law suit did not even know their names were being used and were never asked for permission to use their names. Others claimed the central party funds were just deposited into local candidate campaign accounts and pulled out again the same day. You gotta wonder how that happens without permission.

One former candidate is quoted as saying $26,000.00 was put in and out of his campaign account and used for advertising “…that was not specifically related to his own campaign.” Opps!

Here is the big kicker. Guess where the additional advertising money was spent! It apparently all went to buying advertising in Quebec. It was targeted to bolster the Harper’s promise of “freer federalism” and in specific support of close races in 10 Quebec ridings the Cons eventually won.

Does this smell like the Conservative version of an Adscam to you too? Party money that is subsidized by the taxpayer used to curry favour with Quebec to save the country? It is not a perfect fit because there is no fraud involved but there is a fit nevertheless.

Check out Impolitical for another take on this issue.

UNLV Studying the Social Capital Influence of Blogs

I recently received an unsolicited comment on the Blog from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas departments of Management Information Systems and Sociology inviting me to participate in a survey investigating the effects of Blogs on “Social Capital.”

I check them out and took the survey and have received a preliminary report on the findings of an early study the UNLV did. I have undertaken to keep the results confidential so far because the results will be published in an academic journal first. I can tell you, based on early reports; the influence in both instances is significant. I can tell you they are a fascinating insight into who blogs and relates to blogs and how they use them.

I am very interested in the influence blogs have both on the institutions who “run” our society from government to the voluntary sector. I am equally interested in the influence they have on individuals. My suspicion that the Internet and Blogs are two inter-related elements in a new revolutionary form of communications is beginning to be proven correct.

I will keep you advised of the developments on this work of UNLV.

Calgary MLA Richard Magnus Announces Retirement From Politics

Richard Magnus (Calgary North Hill) announced today that he is the next PC departee from de PC party. So another veteran that has decided to move on and out of politics. We can expect many more similar announcements like this over the next few weeks I imagine.

Renewal and revitalization of Alberta politics requires it. The Progressive Conservative Party definitely needs to address the issue of political renewal. The party undertook a half-hearted attempt after the less than stellar 2004 election. But that was under old leadership. Now we have new leadership and that brings new opportunity.