Shucking Oysters: The Horror of Politics
By Alex Allen
Which is scarier? Halloween or politics? One is a holiday with make-believe frights; the other is a living nightmare with real frights. Some people – like most dogs – have an intense fear of Halloween. Others find politics to be more frightening. I would wager to guess that many of us, at this timely juncture, are finding politicians and their politics a bit scary. In fact, if you’re not suffering from political anxiety you’re not paying attention.
Politicians are similar to fireworks. You’ve got your Bombettes, Noise Makers, Bursting Torpedoes, Sparklers and Flames. Watching politicians and their parties implode is just as much fun as pyrotechnics. And this week we are witness to a brilliant display. Now, we can gloat about our dysfunctional politics up north for a change. BC politics: The soulless NDP, the ugly Conservatives, and the well-meaning Greens.
For added flavour, let’s throw into the bubbling cauldron, a party led by a former Liberal/United MLA and a party led by one very questionable individual. No morals? Nasty? White privileged? Yes, you too, can have your very own political party. It’s alarmingly easy.
Let’s start with BC Conservative leader John Rustad. Arrogant. Rude. With as much charisma as a slice of white bread (down from a toaster a year ago), he seems to have no semblance of empathy or perception. Whoever his handlers are, they have not figured out that this man is beyond grooming (except perhaps a mole excision).
This week, Rustad’s “management” committee urged him to step down: “As evidenced by sagging poll numbers, memberships, fundraising, a shrinking caucus and staff, philosophically inconsistent policy, low morale, and perhaps most importantly, a lack of enthusiasm and tepid endorsement from our membership, your leadership has ceased to serve that purpose.”
Rustad, in his usual myopic way, said that he will not resign, that it was an “internal matter within the party.” Yes, and –? This all comes after yet another BC Conservative caucus member quit. The latest, Penticton-Summerland MLA Amelia Boultbee, stepped down saying: “He has invited me to ‘get the F out’ if I don’t like it and I’ve taken him up on that offer.”
With laser-focused ignorance, Rustad responded, “I can tell you very clearly as the Conservative Party of British Columbia and me as leader, we have one direction and one direction only, which is to bring down this NDP government.” Unbelievably, Rustad said he believed Boultbee had found her role as critic for the Ministry of Children and Family Development stressful and that she had recently broken down in tears in his office. A month ago, Mr. Paranoid ordered his MLAs’ phones searched to determine who was leaking information to the media.
Vancouver-Quilchena MLA Dallas Brodie was kicked out of the caucus in March after making comments mocking residential school survivors. Peace River North MLA Jordan Kealy and Kelowna-Lake Country-Coldstream MLA Tara Armstrong resigned shortly after in solidarity. Elenore Sturko, MLA for Surrey-Cloverdale, now an Independent, was drop-kicked in September “for not being a team player.”
Les Leyne wrote, “It would take a miracle to arrest the momentum. Rustad staying on as leader would create new levels of weirdness in a party that has had more than its share. But the party has set records for strange behaviour every other week for the last year, so nothing can be ruled out.”
One-direction Rustad fired his communications officer, Lindsay Shepherd, at the beginning of October after she posted: “The Orange Shirt and the Orange Flag perpetuate untruths about Canadian history, such as the grandest lie of all that 215 children’s graves were unearthed in Kamloops. It is a disgrace that this fake flag flies in front of the provincial parliament buildings, and it is a disgrace to see the shirt of lies framed prominently and permanently beside the coat of arms so that locals and tourists cannot view our insignia without having their eye drawn and redirected to the Orange shirt.”
And now we have the One BC, started by disgraced MLA Dallas Brodie along with MLAs Armstrong and Kealy who accused Rustad of diluting Conservative values. Since then, the dynamic trio have pushed for such legislation as repealing the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and ending sexual orientation and gender identity policies in schools.
One BC’s Brodie, with bald-headed bravado, just proposed a bill to prevent publicly funded employees from making Indigenous land acknowledgements. “Land acknowledgements are the anthem of a suicidal nation,” she said. “They’re recited in classrooms, boardrooms, and before virtually every public event. They’re repeated ritualistically to instill the belief that our country is illegitimate, that Canada has no right to exist, that our ancestors are evil, and that our history must be abrogated.” Brodie added, the acknowledgements are a “grooming exercise to encourage British Columbians to acquiesce into the surrender of their own land and accept that they do not have power over their own resources in this province.”
The bill was defeated on a vote of 85 to five failing to pass first reading. Sources say it’s unusual for a private members’ bill to fail on first reading, but not surprising, considering this is the second One BC bill to be voted down so far this session. The first was a bill to stop doctors from providing puberty blockers to minors.
If that’s not enough, Brodie is promoting a documentary called “Making a Killing: Reconciliation, Genocide, and the Plunder of Canada” which criticizes “the reconciling industry as a lucrative guilt campaign that has funnelled billions of tax dollars, often under false pretenses.” Former BC Green MLA Adam Olsen, reacted to the ongoing ignorance: “I feel for all our relatives who have to confront these kind of messages and have their entire history questioned in such a mean-spirited way.”
One thing is sure, Brodie and her party will be constantly haunting Rustad on who wears the rightful right-wing crown. The other party, Centre BC, created by former MLA Karin Kirkpatrick, are offering a “more pragmatic, moderate” option to the shape-shifting NDP. Eby, known for his ruthlessness is floundering. He has no climate policy. He’s not interested in conserving old growth forest. He’s fast-forwarding mining applications with no environmental foresight. Even the $12 billion budget is over the top. The NDP have failed in so many areas, from housing affordability to the opioid crisis, one has to question why they even exist.
José Maria de Eça de Queiroz, the Portuguese novelist and diplomat, wrote presciently in the 1880s: “Politicians and diapers have one thing in common. They should both be changed regularly, and for the same reason.”
What’s going on in this world – both locally and beyond – is without question scary. It shows that there is true evil and that there is real horror and most of it’s happening in the murky world of politics. Be very afraid.
