Composed in haste

If the anthem were to be composed today, chances are the words would be a bit different. The same now can be said of the Throne Speech -- the difference being that our retrospective view of the anthem has taken decades, while it took less than two days for the government to reconsider its floated proposal to make O Canada more "gender neutral." 

We are hearing that the biggest (and probably most influential) outcry came from Harper's own cabinet. I believe it was CanWest reporter David Akin who told us that federal cabinet ministers howled in protest when they first learned of the plan on Wednesday morning. 

Yes. Wednesday morning. This whole kerfuffle over the anthem, if nothing else, has given us a bit of insight into the "consulting" claims of the government over the past two-plus months of prorogation. Others have made this observation too; I don't claim it to be original, but why the heck did the government need all that time to "recalibrate" its plans --  if writing the Throne Speech amounted to jotting some hare-brained schemes on the back of an envelope and sending them to the committee of speechwriters? 

It also tells us how much the cabinet is in the loop too. Keep that picture in your mind, of Canada's ministers of the Crown, only learning of their government's overall plan a few hours before the rest of the country heard it. Relatedly, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney seems not to have known that he deliberately excluded gay rights from the citizenship guide, leaving us with the suggestion that someone else -- an aide, perhaps -- did it for him. So this is what it's like to be a cabinet minister these days? You're told at the eleventh hour of the government's marching plans and aides make decisions for you? I guess that leaves ministers all kinds of time to roam about the country,  "working their ass off for you people" -- and throwing  tantrums at airports. Nice work if you can get it. 

Comments

[Clayton]

It must be so hard for those (soon to be former) CanWest guys. All those years of providing media cover for Harper and his gang while they were in opposition (who can forget, "to heck with the courts eh" and "the Asian invasion" as well as all those other quips about gays from their "family values" critic - all papered over). Meticulously paving the way for their Conservative champion until he miraculously ascended to the throne and ushered in their golden era.
And now we learn (from a CanWester no less) that the requisite intellectual qualifications for the average minister of the Crown these days are a little more than a pet rock and a little less than a lemming. The Conservatives were handed the legacy of the best run country in all of the G8 and they still manage to screw up so badly. And then still blame the long out of power Liberals (who really are the ones to blame for the fact our banking system didn't collapse) for the troubles they created for themselves.
I mean Harper didn't even try to rescue CanWest from bankruptcy and disbandment. I have no doubt the Asper's were expecting some support, how else could they have kept the banks and creditors at bay for so long? Ofcoarse, Harper did not turn out to be their saviour, there's gratitude for you.

[Darwin O'Connor]

I don't see why it is necessary to continue the fiction that the prorogation was to "recalibrate". I don't think anyone seriously believes that.

[Matt F.]

while we don't need to "continue the fiction" we do need to provide the appropriate response to the Party who foisted the fiction on us.