Lies the Harper Haters Tell, Part 6

Continuing the Nexus series fact checking the claims made on the Shit Harper Did website, we once again delve into Aboriginal issues.

In one particular claim, the site seems to infer that Harper is insensitive to the issue of missing and murdered aboriginal women:

The clear intent is to suggest that if Harper isn't funding Sisters in Spirit, he isn't concerned at all about missing or murdered Aboriginal Women.

Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, in 2010 the Harper government devoted $10 million to address the issue of murdered and missing Aboriginal women. The funds were to be spent on the establishment of a missing persons' branch of the RCMP, as well as investments into fighting domestic violence in aboriginal communities.

As it pertains to Sisters in Spirit, it's actually a rather simple idea: criminal investigations are best pursued by the people with the authority to conduct such investigations. In Canada, police lead criminal investigations, not well-meaning but ill-equipped and ill-trained groups. End of story.

Lies the Harper Haters Tell, Part 5

In previous episodes of the Nexus fact check into the Shit Harper Did website, we uncovered dishonest claims about science funding, the G20 summit, and torture in Afghanistan. We've also explored some poorly-supported appeals to religious bigotry.

But in order to conduct the most recent ShitHarperDid fact check, we have to first set the table. To do that, we pay a visit to our old friend Audrey of Enormous Thriving Plants.

Joining a few other far-left bloggers in creeping the facebook page of Conservative Candidate Wally Daudrich, Audrey notes that he identifies Red Dawn as one of his favourite movies, the Tea Party as one of his interests, and Fox News as his favourite media outlet.

Yet there's greater hilarity afoot than simply the creeping of Daudrich's Facebook page. It has to do with a ShitHarperDid claim about water on aboriginal reserves:

Frankly, even one aboriginal community in Canada without safe drinking water is one too many. But the purpose of this claim is clearly to suggest that Harper has done nothing to fix this problem. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In fact, the government of Canada spent $735.6 million between 2008-10 dealing with this very problem. The results speak for themselves. While there were 49 First Nations communities under water advisories in March 2010 -- still 49 too many -- this number is down from 193 in 2006.

That's a 75% reduction in Aboriginal communities with high-risk drinking water systems since 2006. Which kind of makes one wonder about what the Liberal Party was doing during their 13 years in power.

Or what Niki Ashton, the NDP MP for Churchill has been doing. From Daudrich's Facebook page:

While the Harper government was budgeting funds to tackle the water problems in Garden Hill, Manitoba and elsewhere, NDP MPs like Niki Ahston were voting against the funding bills.

Facts like this don't even seem to phase the people behind the ShitHarperDid website. They promote the Liberal Party -- who allowed water safety in First Nations communities to deteriorate -- and the NDP -- whose MPs have voted against funding projects to fix the problem -- as better options than the Conservatives, who have made tremendous progress in fixing the problem.

It's just another lie the Harper haters tell.

Lies the Harper Haters Tell, Part 4

Today on the Nexus series fact-checking the Shit Harper Did website, we examine the site's descent from specious half-truths and outright lies into sheer religious bigotry:

Of course, all of this is based on the work of Douglas Todd.

As if to provoke some very severe doubts about the nature of Todd's work, it seems that his claims about the Alliance Church's beliefs regarding an apocalypse are corroborated only by works by himself. That's suspicious, particularly when Todd tips his hand when he attempts to also link Harper's religious beliefs to Sarah Palin.

It would be bad enough if it weren't just blatant dog-whistle politics. It's also poorly supported.

Todd offers examples of work by Vision TV's Randall Mark and Fraser Valley University professor Ron Dart. Mark's and Dart's works on this subject are not peer-reviewed, and themselves cite no sources.

In other words: they don't pass scholarly muster.

Not that anyone should expect such scholarly matters to be of any concern to the people behind ShitHarperDid. After all, the website is all about dog-whistle politics -- about making statements that would rightly be rejected by most people as utter rubbish, yet serves to get the far-left base all fired up for the election.

As it turns out, however, the joke may actually be on the creators of Shit Harper Did: the far-left base is already fired up to vote. It's moderate voters they desperately need, and moderate voters are likely to be repulsed by the kinds of lies being told at the Shit Harper Did website.

What's been seen so far is only the tip of the iceberg. Ther are more.

Lies the Harper Haters Tell, Part 3

As the Shit Harper Did website continues to spew innuendo, half-truth and outright lies at the Canadian people, the Nexus is continuing its fact-checking mission into the claims made on the site.

The site previously lied in suggesting Harper was involved in police abuses during the 2010 G20 Summit, and ignoring net funding increases to science in Canada.

Today, we explore a far more insidious lie from the website:

The site reiterates claims that Harper and the Conservative Party were complicit in the torture of detainees in Afghanistan, and repreats the sensational claims of former Diplomat Richard Colvin.

Unsurprisingly, the site omits a few facts. Such as the fact that it was a Liberal government, under the leadership of Paul Martin, that actually signed a Prisoner Transfer Agreement that provided insufficient oversight of the treatment of prisoners after they were transferred from Canadian to Afghan custody.

Moreover, they had even been warned about the prevalence of torture in Afghan prisons by former diplomat Eileen Olexiuk. They ignored her.

This is very different from how Prime Minister Stephen Harper handled reports of torture. When revelations that Afghan prisoners transferred by Canadian soldiers were being tortured reached Harper, his government immediately re-negotiated the PTA.

But don't expect to hear that from the people behind Shit Harper Did. They're too busy lying to the Canadian public.

Lies the Harper Haters Tell, Part 2

Yesterday, the Nexus' fact-checking series into the ShitHarperDid website explored the site's false claims about the Harper government's record on science.

Today, we examine a claim made about the G20 Summit in Toronto:

The clear intention is to blame Harper for the undeniable abuses perpetrated by police at the G20 Summit.

Yet as it turns out, it wasn't Prime Minister Harper who gave police the powers they abused at the G20 Summit. Rather, it was the Liberal provincial government of Dalton McGuinty.

The McGuinty government not only changed the Public Works Protection Act to arrest anyone in the vicinity of the G20 Security Zone, but they did it without even debating the matter in Queen's Park. In fact, they went to spectacular lengths to keep the changes secret.

The changes fortunately had a sunset clause built in -- they expired on June 28, 2010. The punchline is that they didn't publish the change in the Ontario Gazette until July 3, 2010.

Unbelievable.

It's actually rather remarkable: ShitHarperDid is campaigning against Stephen Harper on the basis of shit McGuinty did, all while promoting the Ontario Liberals' federal counterpart -- for whom McGuinty's brother David is a candidate -- as a "better option".

Just think about that.

Lies the Harper Haters Tell, Part 1

Considering the raw hatred frequently being expressed for Stephen Harper over social networking sites like Twitter this election season, it shouldn't be shocking to see a website like ShitHarperDid.ca attract such a quick following.

What is remarkable is the steady stream of half-truths, innuendo, and outright lies that the website offers up.

Frankly, the ShitHarperDid website has proven to be so dishonest that one could fact-check its claims for days. Here at the Nexus, we'll be doing precisely that.

We start off with a familiar fib:

The CBC story in question about the "evolution scandal" (it wasn't a scandal) does a splendid job of telling about half of the story.

The other half of the story is that Goodyear later affirmed his belief in evolution, explaining that evolution is on ongoing process. Thinking themselves clever, the far-left responded by trying to excise the function of adaptation from the theory of natural selection.

In other words, they actually attempted to butcher scientific theory in order to pose as the defenders of it. Amazing.

As for the cuts the website complains of, the Harper government did, indeed, cut $148 million in 2009... from three specific agencies. While increasing bulk spending on science (including establishing 40 new Canada Research Chairs, and investing extensively in scientific infrastructure) by $3.5 billion.

In other words, Canadian science gave up $148 million in funding to receive $3.5 billion in new funding. But who's counting? Not the people behind ShitHarperDid.

As for the Environment Canada scientists, no organization in the world allows its employees to speak as if acting as official spokespersons without first obtaining the proper authorization. Moreover, plenty of climate alarmists have tried to muzzle any scientists who don't agree with them, but again: who's counting? Really?