Bravo, Canadian Arts Community

Way to justify all that public arts funding

When Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced his attention to cut arts funding from Canada's budget during the 2008 election, his Conservative Party took what was actually a well-deserved dip in the polls.

Frequently a target of conservative thinkers, public arts funding provides a vital life line to cultural works that help develop and promote Canadian culture and identity.

But to say that governments of varying levels have a role in financially supporting arts isn't to say that arts and culture should be funded indiscriminately. The funding being indirectly extended to Homegrown, a terrorist-sympathizing play about Toronto 18 terrorist Shareef Abdelhaleem stands as a stark example of something that should not have been funded.

According to Catherine Frid, the producer of the play, Homegrown isn't actually a terrorist-sympathizing work.

“Homegrown does not promote, sanction or excuse terrorism," Frid insists. "It looks at one of the men convicted of terrorism and points out some of the many irregularities in the Canadian criminal justice system that led to his conviction"

"He wasn't planning to blow up Bay and Front Street with a truck bomb," Frid continues. "People don't know the whole story behind Shareef's conviction. I'm not speaking for all the Toronto 18, I'm just focusing on the one person I met and whose case I followed and I'm telling that story."

The problem for Frid is that her assessment doesn't hold up under scrutiny.

When Abdelhaleem was convicted, his defence counsel called no evidence regarding his guilt or innocence, and instead merely tried to argue that he was entrapped. in a subsequent ruling, it was ruled that Abdelhaleem was not entrapped.

The only means by which funding of a particular project can be justified is that it embodies Canadian culture, or promotes Canadian values.

All too often, "Canadian values" are passed off by the far left as a canard. In fact, there are very few values -- conservative or left-wing -- that could be definitively described as Canadian.

But there are some values that definitively are not, and sympathy for terrorism is one of those.

Even as the controversy builds surrounding this play, politicians are already beginning to demonstrate who gets it, and who just doesn't.

In the category of those who don't get it is Toronto City Councillor Adam Vaughn, who insists that government has no place deciding what art is or isn't exhibited.

Which isn't at all what this story is about. Very few people are suggesting that play such as the one Frid is producing shouldn't be exhibited publicly at all. (Some individuals are, and these notions actually are misguided.)

The issue is about what kinds of productions public funds should support.

Toronto City Councillor -- and member of the Toronto Arts Council -- Norm Kelly does get it.

"There is freedom of expression but there is nothing that says there should be freedom of investment," Kelly insists. "Art plays a number of roles in society... but [this play] would be going too far. If the court was correct in its assessment of their intent, I don't see much artistic merit in that portrayal."

Likewise -- as is so often the case -- the Canadian Taxpayers Federation's Kevin Gaudet gets it as well.

“You want to put on a play? Fine. Hang up your shingle and ask people to pay for it," Gaudet said. "If it has to do with sympathetic portraits of terrorists who want to destroy my country, I won’t go."

A great many Canadians won't bother to go see such a play. A steep financial loss incurred by an empty theatre would serve as a stark lesson for individuals such as Frid about how far Canadians are prepared to sympathize with terrorists, home-grown or otherwise.

The Canadian Taxpayers' Federation opposes any and all funding of cultural festivals. In this, they are in error. But in opposing any form of public funding whatsoever for Homegrown, they are right on the money.

Homegrown should not receive a red cent of public funding in support of it. If Catherine Frid cannot provide or secure the money to produce it, it simply doesn't deserve to be made.


Other bloggers writing about this topic:

Blazing Cat Fur - "Your Taxes Really are 'Play Money'"

Alan Adamson - "Arts Subsidies"

Attention Members of Parliament: We Put You Into Those Seats, We Can Take You Out of Them

But Canadians shouldn't have to wait for an election to dump the incumbent

Canadians already getting fed up with the refusal of MPs to open their expense accoutns to the scrutiny of the Auditor General now have something else to fume about.

Not only does the Auditor General not have access to MPs' expense accounts, but records regarding their in-House attendance is apparently secret as well.

Canadian Taxpayers' Federation chief Kevin Gaudet puts it particularly succinctly.

“I don’t see why any of this stuff is secret,” Gaudet mused. “What is it they are hiding here?”

Canadians have the right to know.

Canadians elect Parliamentarians in expectation that they aren't merely electing that individual into a position or an office -- but that they are also, in effect, hiring them for a job. Their constituents have the right to expect that they will do that job.

For some of Canada's MPs -- the Prime Minister, cabinet, and leaders of opposition parties -- periodic absence from the House of Commons is not only acceptable, but to be expected. Often, MPs will be delegated to go abroad as part of a diplomatic or trade mission.

But for others, missing an exceptional number of sitting days should be considered grounds to recall that MP.

Unfortunately, Canada has no law enabling constituents to recall their MPs. Which is rather unfortunate.

Such a recall law would make a handy club to demand that MPs vote in accordance with the interests of their constituents. For example, constituents could demand that an MP vote in favour of a bill allowing for annual audits of MP expense accounts by the Auditor General.

If they decline to do so, or fail to show up in-House on the day of such a vote, an electoral recall could be used to replace that MP with someone prepared to act in the interests of their constituents -- and in the democratic interest.

That includes recalling MPs if Canadians consider a proroguement of Parliament to be excessive -- as many Canadians considered the 2010 proroguement to be.

It seems that many of Canada's Members of Parliament very much have forgotten that Canada's Parliament does not belong to them alone. While Canada's Parliament once effectively belonged to the monarch, it now belongs to the people.

It does not belong, and has never belonged, to the MPs themselves.

It's time to demand an electoral recall law so Canadians will have the tools to remind them of that little detail.

Well, That's Money Well Spent...

Raymond Lavigne draws fat paycheck to stay home

Being suspended from the Canadian Senate has proven to be quite lucrative for formerly Liberal Senator Raymond Lavigne.

Over the last two years Lavigne, who was expelled from the Liberal caucus over accusations of using Senate resources for personal gain and later placed on a pseudo-suspension after being charged by the RCMP, has collected his his total salary of $130,400 a year.

The charges stem from an incident in which Lavigne was accused of using a Senate staffer to cut down trees on his property in Lakefield, Quebec.

Since then Lavigne has been under an informal suspension. He was asked to not report for work in the Senate. His absences have been credited as "public business" (which one presumes involves mowing his own damned lawn), and as such is attendance record in the Senate is actually being treated as perfect.

If the proper penalty for his absence were applied a penalty of $250 per day would have been applied after 21 days of absence. (Interestingly, if non-sitting days were counted, a full year's absence would still leave Lavigne collecting nearly $40,000 per annum.)

"This guy is a disgrace," said Canadian Taxpayers Federation federal director Kevin Gaudet. "[He] is a poster child of the need for elected senators and accountability in politics."

Liberal Senataor Joan Fraser disagrees. "In this country you are presumed innocent until proven otherwise," she explains, objecting that it wouldn't have been fair to deny pay to a Senator not yet convicted of a criminal offence.

What Fraser is seemingly forgetting is that a June 2006 Senate committee determined that Lavigne had, indeed, misused Senate resources, and ordered him to repay $23,666. The committee itself referred the matter to the RCMP for further investigation.

If the Senate was able to determine that evidence was sufficient enough to order Lavigne to repay the funds it doesn't take a significant leap of the imagination to consider that Lavigne should have been suspended outright for his actions and denied his pay.

Raymond Lavigne should have been outright suspended from the Senate when the RCMP pressed crominal charges against him. If the rules regarding the suspension of Senators was prohibitive, as Conservative Senator Consiglio Di Nino suggests, then these rules are simply another example of the reform so desperately needed in the upper chamber.

Gaudet Hacked, Buzz Sawed

In January 2009, the CBC hosted a special edition of the Dragons' Den in which they entertained presentations on how to fix the Canadian Economy. Among the presenters were Kevin Gaudet and Buzz Hargrove.

On the program, the Dragons were given a hypothetical $20 billion that they could spend however they thought could best stimulate the economy.

Gaudet, the national director of the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation, presented first, calling for tax reflief:



Gaudet began by suggesting there's a high level of consensus in favour of tax relief, citing support for the idea from Barack Obama's chief economic adviser, Christina Romer, citing her insistence that every $1 of tax relief stimulates an economy threefold.

More importantly, Gaudet came with specific recommendations on how that tax relief -- a full $20 billion worth -- could be implemented on a permanent, structural basis.

However, Gaudet wanted to direct that tax relief almost exclusively toward Middle Class taxpayers, with a very small portion going to business. Irene Darra's question about whether or not Canadians would spend that money or save it -- or use it to pay down debt -- seems more than a little ridiculous.

Considering that the global economy is currently grappling with an economic crisis built on defaulting debts it seems that tax relief being used to pay down debt would actually be a very positive step.

There's little question that the Canadian economy wouldn't be stimulated by the full hypothetical $20 billion. But a consumer carrying a smaller debt load is a consumer with cause for greater confidence.

Gaudet was followed by former Canadian Autoworkers Union President Buzz Hargrove, who called on the Dragons to "forget about" the CTF and forget about tax relief:



Compared to Gaudet, who arrived with a well-prepared presentation, Hargrove's presentation was poorly concieved. His delivery was worse.

Hargrove pushed hard for an exclusive push toward not only a stimulus package, but for a stimulus program that would focus largely on the auto and forestry industry.

Hargrove peddled a victim mentality, arguing that the allegedly-otherwise mighty North American automakers have been victimized by bad government policy (although he failed to elaborate on which policies were allegedly harming the auto industry), a discouraging credit market and by what he deemed unfair trade practices.

He called for stimulus of the credit market and protectionist measures -- particularly against Asian carmakers. Hargrove somehow overlooks the fact that Toyota in particular is one of the few automakers actually opening new plants in Canada as opposed to closing them.

Hargrove's suggestion that leasing may be a better model for carmakers is an intriguing idea. But Hargrove's suggestion that credit should be loosened up so consumers can take on more debt at a time of economic uncertainty is ill-conceived.

For one thing, the low consumer condfidence argument has to be considered to apply. One would be foolish to think that consumers who are leery about spending money would be interested in taking on additional debt load in order to do so.

Neither Gaudet nor Hargrove got a particularly gentle ride from the Dragons. There's good reason for this.

Gaudet and Hargrove both represent the extreme ends of the ideological spectrum that together navigated the global economy into the crisis that it's currently in.

Gaudet's focus on tax relief and allowing market forces to run their course unimpeded has already shown its toxic effects. After all, the kind of unscrupulous greed that helped precipitate this crisis should properly be considered to be a market force, likewise with the notions of anyone who thinks they should be able to earn money without producing anything of value.

Hargrove's argument that the hypothetical $20 billion should be spent heavily on the auto industry is not only clearly self-interested -- even if he isn't the president of CAW anymore, he clearly has an intrest in seeing the organization succeed -- but it also overlooks the highly questionable record of Keynesian economics over the past forty years.

In hindsight, one certainly couldn't envy Gaudet or Hargrove. The Dragons' Den seems like an extremely intense environment. Any environment that can seemingly stagger a consumate tax fighter like Kevin Gaudet cannot be taken lightly.

The propositions of both men merely reflect the alternating extremes of economic policy followed over the past thirty years. The Dragons were right to adopt the propositions of neither man, and were probably right to decline to give a red cent to the big three automakers.


Other bloggers writing about this topic:

Rick Spence - "Dragons Second-Guess Stephen Harper"

Stephen Harper's New Worst Nightmare

Canadian Taxpayers' Federation appoints new, familiar, director

Ever since Michael Ignatieff's abrupt ascension to the leadership of the Liberal party, many have been predicting that he's Prime Minister Stephen Harper's worst nightmare.

But one can rest well assured that Harper's nightmares are a good deal worse than Ignatieff.

Considering the deficit that his government has just budged for the coming year -- one that may increase as the government reportedly considers richening the stimulus pot -- Stephen Harper's worst nightmare is trouble in the fiscal conservative base of his party.

With the appointment of Kevin Gaudet as the new federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation, Harper's nightmares may be set to become as dark as they've been at any point of his political career.

Kevin Gaudet is best known for the "Fibber" campaign that lambasted Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty for various broken tax-related promises.

One can only wonder what Gaudet has in store for Stephen Harper. Readers of the Western Standard have already gotten a taste.

"With Mr. Harper in power, many Canadians thought they had a federal government interested in keeping its promises to control spending, balance the budget and reverse decades of overspending," Gaudet wrote in an op/ed. "They were wrong."

"In a hysterical over-reaction to calls for ‘stimulus,’ after eleven straight years of surpluses and debt reduction, the latest federal budget takes a giant leap back into deficit," Gaudet continues. "‘Stimulus’ is merely a new code word for deficit. It is used by those organizations, businesses and special interest groups with vested interests in convincing government to ratchet up spending. They succeeded."

Gaudet should be a fairly familiar face to Harper. Gaudet was the director of Opposition Research -- which Liberal strategist Warren Kinsella long ago dubbed "oppo" -- for former Reform party leader Preston Manning.

Even the National Citizens' Coalition, a group Stephen Harper used to be the director of, has pulled no punches.

“The big spending of this Conservative government will take generations to pay off,” said NCC President Peter Coleman. "The federal government has a poor track record when it comes to creating meaningful and long-lasting jobs."

Stephen Harper is likely having very dark nightmares, but Michael Ignatieff very likely couldn't be any further away from them.