Trump's Lessons Learned -- October 2016

Update, October 21, 2016: Ackshully, scratch that thought. He has learned zip. And is unlikely to improve upon that scholastic record. . .

This in from our campaign correspondent...

On the Heartburn Campaign Trail...

Day four of former Prime Ministerial Chief of Staff Nigel Wright's testimony at the Senator Mike Duffy Trial:

...and yes, that is Comic Sans in the caption. He deserves it.

The secret Stephen Harper, revealed

'Tis the season for politico Christmas cards... *

* Original image: Emperor Haute Couture from the fertile mind of Kingston artist Margaret Sutherland.

** Shooped accessorization from the fertilized mind of coyote.

Julian Fantino - Minister of Veterans Affronts

Pamela, (stone)Wallen: not the main event

Mr. Speaker: This is kind of sad, actually. Sometime in the distant past, before Pamela Wallen chose to parlay down a (good, ackshully) journalism gig into that of a public entertainer (Who Wants to be a Millionaire, c'mon down...!) and thence to a public shill and hat-passer for the current Capo, ummm, prime minister, she was one of the more trusted figures in the country.

By now, although us coyotes who sit independently haven't been tracking the polls, we imagine that her public credibility is, technically, pretty much shot. So much that we with a taste for the, ummm, visual arts, have finally ourselves descended into the photomanipulative mud pit with Wadena's former fave daughter.

But, Mr. Speaker, I want to be crystal clear on one point. The record will show that I have been absolutelyveryperfectly clear all along: it is only a set of unfortunate anatomical coincidences -- and that famous hair -- that led us to the mashup you see beside you in this post. We tried all weekend -- dog knows we tried -- to make Stephen J. Harper look more Nixonian. Problem was, after hours of twitchy, obsessive and mean-spirited micromanaging on the old computing device, he still only looked like a generic crook. So, really, no net gain.

It may have had something to do with the copious butter left on our paws from all the popcorn we scarfed during last week's guffaw-inducing nightly newscasts. Us coyotes are technoklutzes to start with. Slippery paws and dreadful popcorn hangovers do not improve this lamentable failing. But I think the PM's visual is more a case of, "if you've seen one moral grey-to-black area, you've seen 'em all."

So while the unfortunate Ms. Wallen will likely hang tough in the senate this week, that august, ummm, independent body will likely hoof her, on the strong urging of the main perp.

Because some anonymous kingpin -- let's call this mysterious miscreant, for the sake of convenience and pejorative labelling, "Skeevy Steevy" -- is the one who appointed the Three Senateers in the first place. By all means, give his discarded proxies the attention, and if warranted, the heat they may deserve. Something less like a lynch mob of pitchfork and torch waving PMO sock puppets, and more like due process would be appropriate.

But,Mr. Speaker, the body politic must keep the ol' probative blowtorch squarely upon the ass of that guy trying his best to keep lurking in his own moral shadows -- the calculatedly bland Skeevy Steevy.

Us coyotes think that no matter how many senators, chiefs of staff and and parliamentary secretaries get creamed by the bus, the source of the rot is the guy who appointed them. The guy whose uber-partisan approach led to a whole whack of nudges and winks around public expense account billings in aid of collecting change for his political machine. The guy whose former parliamentary secretary stands accused of trying to buy an election. The guy whose party was found guilty of robocalls and declared it a great victory. The obsessive micromanager who would have us believe that he has completely firewalled himself from a scheme to buy off a senator's silence in the name of "plausible deniability".

Mr. Speaker, here's the skinny on Skeevy Steevy: if you create the culture; if you hire all of the perps you now slag, if you needed to create mechanisms for plausible deniability so that you can tell Parliament and the country's citizens with a nearly straight face that you were in the dark about something that has your greasy proxy pawprints all over it, if you try to blow it all off at a party convention with smirking bluster, you're culpable.

You're Nixon, laffin' boy.

Harper to Con-Vention: "Hey, come into the Kool-Aid Jacuzzi...!"

This weekend, ReformaTory faithful will finally gather in the cold light of post-Hallowe'en Calgary to convene triumphantly eat humble pie and consider their party's dubious future.

They might wonder, with cause, if the floods of biblical proportion (heh) that scrammed the original convention back in May were a dark portent. They might wonder, with cause, whether their god-like leader is actually a tin idol trying to smudge out a long series of sizable fibs with the kind of linguistic technicalities that allow him to think to his own self that he's still telling something resembling the truth. They might wonder, with cause, why, the tighter the PM squeezes down on message control the more crap squirts out between his fingers. They might wonder, with cause, why the hell the wheels are grinding off of their deadly bus. They might wonder, with cause, whether the foundation of their strong stable Conservative majority, ummm, moral certitudes, is become purest runny Jello.

They might. Some of the more prominent rats in and around the old blue machine are blinking nervously in the harsh glare of unaccustomed daylight. But they have not quite yet broken into full disorderly retreat. I digress. Slightly.

So it seems more likely that most of The Base may grudgingly accept their leaders' slightly sweaty and trembling invitation to ignore that distracting senate scandal (among myriad others...) and take a flying leap long, warm bubbly soak in the party's patented Kool-Aid Jacuzzi. And feel free to drink a little of it. Actually a lot.

It may help those base delegates to ignore the even baser clouds of flying monkeys in short pants PMO kids. who will be frantically trying to winch together both their crumpled leader's mojo and the tattered curtain that they would really, really like to be shrouding the unpleasantness of Duffster*uck.

It might work. . . because, you know, those amoral, lying lefties ain't fit to run the country.

On the other hand, they might just be left with a bad aftertaste, and the nagging suspicion that 'somebody' very senior in the Prime Minister's Office has been peeing copiously into the hot tub, all along. . .

They might.

Duffy vs. Harper: hidden evidence, bare knuckles. . .

Wow. No matter how you look at it, it was a tough week for the old popcorn maker here at Casa Coyote. Prudent semimythical quadrupeds have laid in industrial quantities of kernels and butter for the inevitable long, drawn shakeout.

All I got right now is that it totally depends on which lying sack of, ummm, spin, you care to disbelieve marginally less at a given moment. And whether you can untangle the double negatives in that last sentence. Because it definitely refers to two negatives. . .

Enemies list? Really?

To ancient tricksterish quadrupeds, HarperCo's notional Cone of Silence over the workings of his eponymously branded government looks more and more like the cone of shame. The one worn by bad dogs that thought they were big dogs.

So news that HarperCo's 'new-look' cabinet appointments came complete with PMO-approved (Or, ummm, maybe disapproved... semimythical coyotes are famously unclear on etymological niceties.) enemies lists in the ol' ministerial briefing books are no shock at this stage.

Neither is the predictably hurried "no comment", from the PMO kids, who try to keep their semi-anonymous, fully-rabid partisan sockpuppetry out of the public eye in lieu of, you know, reassuringly bland, focus-grouped media lines like Strong Stable Conservative Majority and The Economy.

Except. This government's reeling ethos lately looks about as stable as that of an untreated paranoid schizophrenic. And that  little cult mag, The Economist, internationally respected and not-so-left-wing, has been serially, seriously critical of HarperCo's alleged economic chops. And a little understanding, nay respect, for those who happen to breathe the air outside one's own ideological iron lung is supposed to typify a working democracy.

Some few pundits are suddenly recalling that Richard Nixon, another famously paranoid conservative who hated daylight on his government and tried to black it out, also had an Enemies List. Hey, it's what pundits are for.  Come to that, Nixon also tried to ignore and/or lose inconvenient evidence that spiked his reassuringly bland media line. Those who follow history can draw every lesson they need to know from a quip that decades first turned cliché, then adage:  "It's not really about the crime, it's about the coverup."

Still holds, I think. But being fans of investigative science (heh...), we coyotes await avidly any new evidence of daylight's effects on sweaty five o'clock shadows.

Twinkies done...

From Hostess, makers of more kinds of faux baked goods than you can shake a spatula at, the gut wrenching news that Wonder Bread is toast, HoHos have lost their punchline, Twinkies no longer light the firmament from a thousand sparkling points of light on the shelves of gas station convenience stores across the continent. And anyone planning to live through the zombie apocalypse had better find another indestructible survival food.

If we had a Twinkie right now, we'd tearily stick a fork in it and call it dinner. Oh, ummm, wait! They're indestructible... Never mind. Those things will outlast civilization as we know it. And, come to that, cockroaches.

Lug nuts and the census

So, even when faced with near-universal opposition, and even when the Chief Statistician quits in protest, the government has no problem trashing the mandatory census long form: "It's intrusive!!!! We're pandering to our loony fringe base, dammit!!!!"

So we coyotes will try to explain the issue in terms that make sense to the would-be defenders of this move, WHO ALWAYS SEEM TO FULL-CAP THEIR (OFTEN FURIOUSLY UNGRAMMATIC AND ANONYMOUS) FORUM COMMENTS: the lug nuts on that cherished Chevrolet half ton you use to earn your living.

Suppose your neighbourhood garage guys - call 'em Steve and Tony - say outta the blue that they want to replace all your lug nuts with Dodge lugs, because they think Chevy is arbitrary and intrusive for insisting on Chev lug nuts. Hell (they reason), Dodge lugs look pretty much the same, so no problem, right? Oh, and? Steve and Tony can pump gas, but neither's ever worked as a mechanic.

Would ya buy that, Durango? Nope. Because you, lug nut connoisseur that you are, know that Chev and Dodge lugs have different diameters, thread pitches and chamfers. Assuming they even sorta fit, those babies are gonna strip out, or leave wheel slop. Your wheels will come off, someplace inconvenient and possibly fatal.

There are a bunch of trucky things you could customize that, arguably, wouldn't wreck the ol' Silverado's utility: running boards, exhaust stacks, a big pair of them fine-looking chrome bull balls hanging off the trailer hitch. Dodge lug nuts, not so much.

Now, assume your pickup is a census. (It's a metaphor, Durango. Work with it.) See, reliable census information is Canada's business edge. Lotsa smart people rely on it to make sure the country as a whole can earn its living more efficiently. As every civilized country in the world aspires to.

A mandatory long form is intrusive, but a small price to pay for citizenship in this country you claim to love so much. Much like obeying stop signs at intersections. We work co-operatively toward common goals, unlike, say, those anarchists you hated so much at the G20. To do anything else is to court rump of skunk, and madness.

A voluntary long form is pretty much like Dodge lug nuts on your Chevy - doesn't match. Reading statistical trends properly makes tracking changes accurately over time really important. Even if you label the data you collect by the same name, changing the method you use to collect it means that you can't reasonably compare it with, well, anything that came before. The wheels come off. Just like that Chevy.

Now, I'm only a dumb coyote, so here are my questions: why would you trust an ill-fitting lug nut named Steve to change that? Why does Steve think some lug nuts are more equal than others? And why, if Steve keeps saying his opponents are unpatriotic and unCanadian, is it always him that seems hell-bent on changing this country, lug nut by lug nut, into something unrecognizable...?

Just askin'...

Rahim redux

The quiet sucking sound at ex-MP Rahim Jaffer's parliamentary hearing Wednesday was his former pals vacuuming the last of his political oxygen from the room. The whumpwhump as they tossed him under the crosstown 95 was just punctuation.

It's taken me a couple of days to puzzle out what went down, because us coyotes are just slow that way. Jaffer led with bravado, proclaiming his simon-purity in the matter of peddling influence; moved to bathos when he choked out a little well-timed contrition toward his wife, ex-minister Helena Guergis; then changed it up to bafflegab in cross-examination, to blow smoke over his (many) inconsistencies. He seemed convinced it would work, even after Tory MP Tom Lukiwski passed copious photocopies all 'round to contradict what Jaffer had said.

I finally got the plot when I realized that Jaffer copped his script straight from his parliamentary days. Tories use the bravado/bathos/bafflegab gag in every duel in Question Period. Come out firing, briefly tug the constituents' heartstrings, then bellow any arrant nonsense that unsubtly ignores the actual question. Admit no fault, however self-evident. (Preferably wearing a snarky sneer - for manifold examples, I cite the face beneath John Baird's hair. I digress.)

It seems to work - for governments. That, say, think they have the power to sit on document trails that show who knew what, about Afghan prisoners being tortured. I digress again. Sadly, this time...

Regular schmoes are not so lucky. Jaffer ain't plugged into government anymore, despite his alleged illusions to the contrary. With less hubris he might've noted the prime minister missed no opportunity to label him a private citizen. And he coulda guessed that if Mr Harper could blackball former PM Brian Mulroney - party luminary such as he is - then a problem partyguy from Edmonton-Strathcona would barely rate.

I'd say Harper lives in secret fear of taint. Yeah, he's a coldly calculating stinker who seems indifferent to what others think of him. But any hint of potential irony around a narrowly-defined sort of government corruption gives him the cold willies. He squeaked out a couple of elections by promising to end all that. So if some of his ministers tolerated an alleged illegal lobbyist who used to be one of 'em, without ratting him out in the fashion the PM hisself ordered, it would look, ummm... bad.

The real irony is that it was an impossible promise. The PM has gotta think that even with his stranglehold on his caucus, it's only a matter of time until one of 'em screws up. Coulda happened already. Inevitable human nature will kneecap him right where he staked out his only moral high ground. Sometime, his bus will come. Bummer about that squeaky-clean legacy...

Unsurprising breaking news: Transit strike continues

Transit workers yesterday rejected the city's 'final' offer in a federally-supervised vote requested by the mayor and council.

The 75 per cent margin among those who voted appears to be a convincing rejection of the city's offer, and of Mayor-Larry-driven negotiating tactics that tried to bypass union leadership.

A recent poll suggested most Ottawa residents sided with council, calling the offer "fair" and saying transit employees should accept it and get the hell back to work.

But we coyotes can't help wondering if this had something to do with the City's carpet bombing propaganda blitz, featuring multiple full-page Petfinder ads per day. All of which pretty much called the offer "fair" and said transit employees should accept it and get the hell back to work. The union hasn't exactly been fattening local media ad coffers to win hearts and minds, so the poll results are make sense with that in mind. And frankly, most Ottawhatamies are pretty tired of adapting to no buses, as magnificent as they are at it, whether they're union-friendly or not.

Now, neither side is exactly covered in glory here. I have heard from possibly reliable sources* that senior drivers game that contentious scheduling roster system to work less and earn more. But the city negotiated that system to address serious Transpo dysfunction and morale problems a decade back, and drivers took long-term pay cuts in exchange for it. I wonder why city ads don't address this sore point, and harp instead on wage offers that on the surface indeed look "fair"? Those disingenuous full-pagers and negotiating (negatiating?) tactics make bulls in china shops look positively sprightly and graceful by comparison. Landed giant squids flopping airlessly, I can see.

Last night, in an attempt to substitute his personal reality for the one he habitually rejects, the mayor slipped 300 union members who didn't vote, into the percentage of those that actually voted to reject the offer, to style his smackdown as closer to 64 per cent. Ummm.... by that pretzel logic, the vast majority of citizens that didn't vote for him in the last municipal election deserve a different mayor, don'cha think...?

I still blame Larry. But I always do.

* Someone who knows someone. You know how it goes.

To readers appalled by Coyote's cavalier attitude

Hey! I didn't actually say I was appalled myself, did I...? And the cookies over here are terrific!

10 Things I Hate About You *

* And yes, that means you, Sparks Street Mall

1. No trees.

2. One word: Yesterday's.

3. Wanna drive your big honkin' poison-spewing SUV down Sparks? Then park it there for hours? No problem.

4. Wanna ride your relatively unobtrusive eco-friendly bicycle down Sparks? Pay a hefty fine.

5. Constant tearing down, reinvention and overhaul -- seemingly on a whim.

6. Tacky souvenir joints.

7. Army of smokers blocking every second doorway.

8. Remote regions of Antarctica have more exciting nightlife.

9. Sadly, most distinctive Canadian feature is Tim Hortons.

10. All street, no sparks.

Buckyblog #3: self explanatory

Oh, and that Schreiber/ Mulroney thing...?

...Kinda like watching eels Mazola-wrestling. Don'cha think?

Publog Research: Preston Hardware

Fieldwork by the Research Director and Coyote, Easter Weekend 2007:

Pluses (Features to emulate)

• FREE! ESPRESSO! SHOTS!

Minuses (Features to Avoid)

• FREE! ESPRESSO! SHOTS! TO! COYOTES!

Summary: I realize we normally don't PuBlog non-food establishments, but the Research Director asked if I wanted to ride shotgun in the Bookmobile with him on a consumer survey. And he offered to roll down the window so that I could hang my tongue in the breeze. Really, he had me at "ride". As usual, I digress.

A serious round of research found us at Ottawa's shrine to hardcore hardware cognoscenti, viewing an automated espresso apparatus selling for many thousands of bonez. At the tap of a touchscreen, this gizmo automatically grinds fresh coffee onboard, tamps it into the filter and pumps espresso at a precise temperature and pressure into two demitasses, all untouched by human hands. (Huh. I can do that last part for a lot cheaper. Uh, I digress again.)

The knowledgeable salesperson explained these complexities, then showed it off and gave us FREE! ESPRESSO! SHOTS! -- This was coffee of a velvety blackness to make roadside Elvis painting hawkers weep, with perfect crema and a mellow richness that seems to be taken for granted at every little store along Preston Street, even as certain international chains that shall remain nameless sometimes struggle for the same effect. Gotta love Little Italy...

Ummmm. But. Somebody shoulda warned the sales guy. And the Research Director. I can't think who would be responsible for that.... The RD placed my FREE! ESPRESSO! SHOT! on the floor so I could slurp it. I slurped. I ran in circles. I peed on the Research Director's immaculately polished footwear. (Missed the pant leg, though. I'm proud of that.) Close readers of my solo project may recall that someone inadvertantly let me snarf down too much chocolate about a year ago. And that I reacted predictably badly. People, again: you should never feed a dog chocolate. Even a two-thousand-year-old, semimythical one. Apparently, we must add espresso to this list, too.

Moral: Free espression carries with it great responsibility...