Monday, May 15, 2006

Another Cute Quip from Karen

Well, my cherished M.P. Karen Redman is at it again. She is trying to make political hay on the heels of federal environmental funding cuts. In Waterloo Region, workers at the Energy Efficiency Program were told Friday to halt home evaluations that helped homeowners identify ways to reduce energy use in their homes.

The Saturday Record ("Ottawa to end energy-use tests in area homes") reports that:

“Cambridge Conservative MP Gary Goodyear supported the cut and argued too much of the cost of the program went to administration and too little to improving energy efficiency.”

However, Ms. Redman was apparently quite "appalled":

She puts blame for the cut squarely at the feet of Conservative philosophy:

"Anyone who was very happy with what Mike Harris did to Ontario will be very pleased with Stephen Harper is doing to Canada," Redman said.

Pul-leeze!!! Is that the best ya got, Karen? The “Scary Stephen” gimmick isn’t working anymore. You’ve got to come up with something more original; more creative!

Well, at least Karen is doing her bit for the environment – by recycling old election scripts.


* * * * * *

Update: Karen was just on the Jeff Allen show on Newtalk 570 (May 16). Now she is pulling out the old "Stephen Harper = George Bush" card.

You wouldn't make a very good poker player, Karen.

More to follow.

61 comments:

Anonymous said...

Too bad that she was not in the least bit appalled with the many acts of malfeasance of her party when they had control of the nation.

Let's see if she is at all appalled at the coming revelations in the A-G Report on the ongoing Gun Registry Fiscal Fiascoe.

My guess? Probably not.

And Lady K, and the rest of her cohorts will undoubtedly find some phe-flippin'-nominal way to spin this into being the fault of Harper/Layton/Harris and my dear old departed Aunt Matilda.

l.h.&k.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

lol! Good one, Tango! Thanks for the chuckle on a dreary Monday morning.

Anonymous said...

The "Harper = Harris" line is something leadership hopeful Gerard Kennedy uses a lot. I wonder if your MP is a supporter because she seems to be echoing his campaign phrase.

Thomas @ thelongwalk.ca

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Thomas, she says she can't endorse anyone because she is the party whip.

molarmauler said...

I loved your last line Joanne.

All right-wingers are either Bush or Harris.
Why can't we be Reagan or Thatcher or Mulroney or Howard? I'd even settle for Schwarzenegger or Ted Nugent.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Thanks, Molar. It's just so easy to have a bit of fun with Karen. ;)

Reagen - Exactly. One of the last Hollywood Republicans.

Anonymous said...

Only stupid people cannot make the connection between the electricity bill and their use of electricity - Liberal voters may need things like this pointed out to them, but please Ms Redman, don't consider all of us to be complete dumb*sses.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Oh, man! Thank you anonymous! Another good laugh. Things are looking up indeed.

Zac said...

"Reagen - Exactly. One of the last Hollywood Republicans."

Hopefully the last.

The last good Republican was Abraham Lincoln.

Anonymous said...

Old Abe sure knew how to take one on the noggin for the team though, didn't he? Something like JFK.

And wasn't Abe the guy who actually brought in the Proclamation of Emancipation, and not some 20th Century Democrat? As Omar was wont to posit.

Omar said...

And wasn't Abe the guy who actually brought in the Proclamation of Emancipation, and not some 20th Century Democrat? As Omar was wont to posit.

Seeing as you are here talking behind my back, I would think Joanne would be kind enough as to permit me to respond....

Lincoln’s preferred plan was to ship the slaves back to Africa because, he said, he would prefer the white race to be superior, and he did not believe that the two races could ever live together.

Nice.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Hello, Om-ar... (spoken in the tone Jerry Seinfeld used when talking about "Newman")

You are welcome to join in again as long as things are kept civil and no personal shots are taken.

molarmauler said...

Omar, times change and I don't think Abe would be making comments like that today. And I don't think that his preference (if you presented it in context- I'm a little wary of taking you at face value) diminishes his acheivement or his legacy.

Also, I think Redman should have a label that states how much greenhouse gas she expels with every cute quip.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Oh, Molar! They just keep coming!! This is turning out to be a great day!

Omar said...

Hello, Om-ar...

Hello Jerry....

;)

Zac said...

Any response from Redman yet Joanne, in regards to our discussion at my place?

If she refuses to help you, I will rip her like I did Wappel. But in fact if she does respond, perhaps a post appologizing on Jojourn? Perhaps with the title "My MP Isn't As Useless As I Orginally Thought"?

Hmmmm...a little bet, perhaps.

Good to have 'ya back Omar.

RGM said...

Lincoln as the last great Republican? What about Eisenhower? How could anyone be against General Dwight D. Eisenhower? Remember him? Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces? Successor of the great Harry S. Truman (the last great Democrat, btw), Eisenhower kicked ass.

Red Tory said...

Why not link to the article? Why not present a fair argument instead of just cherry-picking a statement she made comparing Harper to Harris? The Energuide program was both worthwhile and cost-effective. It doesn’t seem to have been worthy of getting the first chop from Harper’s axe; certainly not if he had the least concern for the environment. He says that this will be replaced by his own solution, part of the “Made in Canada” plan. Well where is this so-called “plan”? Environmental programs are falling by the wayside to pay for his tax cuts and election bribes, but his replacement “plan” has yet to materialize.

Find out more about the Energuide program in KWC here: http://snipurl.com/qi11

Anonymous said...

Omar, times change and I don't think Abe would be making comments like that today.

The above statement is rather moot as it is irrelevant whether Lincoln would have made the comments today. If an elected official today, he likely would not.

Lincoln responds to the Kansas-Nebraska Act at Peoria, Illinois, on October 16, 1854.


What next? Free them(slaves) and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this, and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white peoples will not. Whether this feeling accords with justice and sound judgment is not the sole question, if, indeed, it is any part of it. A universal feeling, whether well- or ill-founded, cannot be safely disregarded. We cannot, then, make them equals. It does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation might be adopted; but for their tardiness in this, I will not undertake to judge our brethren of the South.

Red Tory said...

Eisenhower kicked ass.

On the golf course...

Zac said...

"Eisenhower kicked ass."

He also warned about the military-industrial complex. Too bad Reagen and Bush don't have the same love for the man that you do RGM.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Zac - Still waiting to hear from her office. I'll give it a few days, and then let you know.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

RT - The Record is pretty lame about providing links to non-subscribers. I can't legally reproduce the whole article either. You'll just have to take my word for it.

OMMAG said...

It seems you are suffering the all too common effect of blogging success.

Your resident troll(s) seem to think that they have a forum for personal diatribe and blather without respect to or for the subject of the post.

Anyway..to the point.
Have you ever seen a Liberal take responsibility for anything that was actually their doing? I doubt that Redman has a clue about the program or what its effectiveness is.

Of course LIberals like it becuase it "looks" like it is a usefull program and "Sounds" like a real benefit to society. Reality is that like most government administered programs the majority of the money goes to providing tax payer funded jobs and the rest is open to interpretation.

Also, the mere fact that a "Program" exists is enough for a Liberal.
Who cares if the same thing can and should be done by individual home owners anyway. Because its part of looking after your home and being responsible.
Concepts unkonown to the Liberal.

molarmauler said...

anonymous, I fail to see how the quote you selected, 5 years before the beginning of the Civil War began, makes any point.

He says public sentiment at the time makes it impossible to make blacks equals. He says he can see gradual changes and can't criticize the pace being made by the South.

It took till 1968 to get the Civil Rights Act.
Maybe Lincoln was a realist too.

Red Tory said...

Nice try Joanne, but you could have either: a) quoted more extensively from the article; or b) said you were reprinting the article because it’s behind a subscriber firewall (of course giving due credit to the source). People do it all the time. Truthout for example provides reprints of NYT editorials for “study” purposes.

Anonymous said...

Wasn't Abe a 'Whig' who joined the Republicans because he wasn't able to get elected without their support?

Joanne (True Blue) said...

RT - So you are in effect calling me a liar. Thanks. Another feather in my cap of cheap shots.

I have just fired off a letter to the Record's legal department and will advise as soon as a reply is received. Previously they told me I wasn't allowed to even reprint a whole letter to the editor unless it was my own.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

PGP - Exactly. Reminds me of so many other Liberal boondoggles - gun registry; "national" daycare...

Way too much money invested in administration.

Anonymous said...

If you get the chance to re-watch QP on CPAC tonight, watch for the Liberal that cites the WWF as outraged for that energy plan cancellation.

The plan was a Liberal project with a sunset clause , all person that applied seemed to have been dealt with and the plan honoured its original basis for creation.

Red Tory said...

joanne -- no I wasn’t calling you a liar, so cool your jets. Just suggesting that you were being highly selective in the particular remarks you chose to highlight without giving your readers benefit of access to the source material, that's all. Have fun wrangling with the legal dept. of The Record. I'm sure they will tell you, in effect, to buzz off.

But seeing as you are a subscriber, here's a suggestion... why not copy the article and e-mail it to me. I don't think there's any harm in that.

Sara said...

If you like Paul Martin stealing billions from tax payers to line the pockets of his friends then vote Liberal .... come on now it can go both ways she is just mad cause her funding was cut...

Anonymous said...

Nope! Don't let the paranoia get toooo much of a-holt on ya. But: was NOT talking behind anyone's back. Open air -- open forum. Otherwise I'd have sent it across on a ScottBerry-BrisonBerry. Encrypted.

But whatever works for you to get back onto the bus again, I s'pose.

Yer Southern Democrats just tried to put on a civil war for show. And as an attempted land grab of the north.

The steam engine and the cotton ginny had contributed tremendously to rendering slaves, of any colour or continent of origin, to be economically impractical.

L.H.&K.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

RT - I'm o.k.

Just crashing after a sugar high from eating the rest of my Mothers' Day dessert at noon. Boston cream pie - layers of cake, vanilla pudding, whipped cream, yummy chocolate fudge, chocolate icing and giant glazed strawberries.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Sara - Yeah, so far I haven't seen too many residents up in arms about this. I'm sure we'll see a few letters in the paper though - probably from the employees.

Sara said...

why are we debating any americans, this is Canada people come on. Get it right we can debate politics with what happens on our door step not in the next Country.
The Liberals did give money to anything that sounded good but did not look into it. They went by the word of the lobbyists and did not put their own people on it. If they had they would not have done most of what they did. Ego's got the better of them in the end. They were in power too long and took it for granted.

Zac said...

"They were in power too long and took it for granted."

Lack of credible opposition turned us against each other. Now that the Tories are back on track, we have an enemy again and are focusing like a laser beam.

Anonymous said...

For those who are interested in the environmental debate, go to the following sites to get a different perspective from the one offered by Red Tory, who said:
"He [Mr. Harper] says that this will be replaced by his own solution, part of the “Made in Canada” plan. Well where is this so-called “plan”? Environmental programs are falling by the wayside to pay for his tax cuts and election bribes, but his replacement “plan” has yet to materialize."

http://www.envirotruth.org/about.cfm
The co-founder of Greenpeace, Dr. Patrick Moore, is involved with EnviroTruth.org. Its "mission statement" is the following: "Envirotruth is dedicated to injecting badly needed truth into the debate about our environment. For too long, some environmental groups have seized the world stage and the public's attention by distorting facts, bending the truth and even committing acts of terrorism against innocent citizens."

At http://www.envirotruth.org/myths.cfm can be found a series of "myths" that EnviroTruth.org debunks.

Finally, an interesting video excerpt (5:30 min.) from ABC's John Stossel - OK, not an environmental authority - but interesting nevertheless, can be found here:
http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?category=StosselMyths&=subcategory
Open the segment entitled "Protecting Wildlife vs. People? Bad science protected a fish at the expense of farmers."

Anonymous said...

Sorry, forgot to include these other interesting bits of info:

At http://www.envirotruth.org/sacbeeApril2001.cfm

Sierra Club or Club Sierra? A look at environmental organizations

Anybody besides me remember the urea formaldehyde fiasco? All home owners were urged to use it because of the energy crunch & then they had to have it removed because it posed a health hazard.

http://www.epa.gov/iaq/formalde.html
"During the 1970s, many homeowners had urea-formaldehyde foam insulation (UFFI) installed in the wall cavities of their homes as an energy conservation measure. However, many of these homes were found to have relatively high indoor concentrations of formaldehyde soon after the UFFI installation."

P.S. Conversations between most Canadians inevitably begin with the weather. Most complain about the cold. If global warming is indeed a reality, most of us should be delighted, n'est-ce pas?

Red Tory said...

Well, now that we have the article in hand, let’s take a wider perspective on Redman’s comments about the axing of the Energuide program, shall we. From The Record:

"I think it is just appalling that they would cancel an established program like this that was really working," said Kitchener Liberal MP Karen Redman.

"The audit part of the program is what the Conservative government seems to have trouble with, but that's what gave homeowners confidence to invest in home energy-saving measures, whether it was a more efficient washer or dryer or water heaters. They would invest because they thought they had excellent advice and the money would be well spent and effective," Redman said.

"What baffles me is that it seems they haven't looked at the program to see how well it worked," she said. "I thought it was what the new government wanted. It's a made-in-Canada program, it's accountable and it has proven results."

As you can plainly see, whether you agree or not, Redman’s criticism went far beyond the trite comparison of Harper to Harris.

I’m sorry Joanne, but I don’t think you made a fair representation here at all. Isn’t there obligation for bloggers to present more than just blatantly partisan spin?

Red Tory said...

Gabby -- Envirotruth is a project of the National Center for Public Policy Research, which is underwritten by Exxon Mobil. Nice try.

Zac said...

Dr Patrick Moore was also shown the door at Greenpeace. It's not as if he left because he didn't agree with them.

His company contracts out to large corporations to give them the appearence of environmental protection, similar to an ad agency.

Anonymous said...

In other discussion threads, it's the mention of Hitler or Nazi that is used to discredit one's opponent. When it's the environment under discussion, be sure to mention Big Oil.

Zac & Red Tory: are you riding your tandem bikes - or are you complaining about the rising price of gas?

Zac said...

Just saying Envirotruth is not a credible source for information about the environment.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

RT - I never said that was all she said. I would happily have quoted the whole story or left a link.

I simply said I'm sick and tired of people saying Harper=Harris.

I'm especially tired of my M.P. saying it. I have no way to check and see if what she says is true or not. I would have to look at those statistics and facts that the EEP provided and something tells me they would have a bit of a bias. Somewhat like Jenny Robinson of the YWCA.


"Isn’t there obligation for bloggers to present more than just blatantly partisan spin?" So your blog is the epitome of non-partisanship? Give me a break.

Tarkwell Robotico said...

"Isn’t there obligation for bloggers to present more than just blatantly partisan spin?"

talk about self-importance. a blog is like a free email account only your emails are public. no one pays to read this stuff. no one thinks of it as gospel.

if you think, by running a blog, you've suddenly taken on some civic responsibilities - well, I says: get over yourself.

Zac said...

Agreed.

A majority of the policical blogs out there are partisan because, hey, we're partisan.

I'm willing to call it like it is, criticize my own, and present my point of view, but most of my stuff refelects Liberal values, because I support Liberal values. Just like Chucker and Joanne with the Tories.

We all just have blogs because we're loud mouth jerks with too much time on our hands, who happen to care deeply about the direction our country is going.

Could be worse though, we could all have Star Wars blogs or something. At least we're a bit productive.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Yay, Chucker! I can always count on you to tell it like it is!

Zac said...

* that should say I HAVE liberal values

Sara said...

"We all just have blogs because we're loud mouth jerks with too much time on our hands, who happen to care deeply about the direction our country is going."


Zak the government should pay you to lobby the blogesphere lol I love your quotes lol

Joanne (True Blue) said...

I like Zac's comments too. The fact is that without blogs we'd probably drive everyone we know crazy. At least we have an outlet to vent.

Zac said...

Oh yeah. My roommates are science and engineering majors. Whenever I start going on about, "I can't believe what Harper did now" I see thier eyes roll back and a "here we go again" look come over thier faces.

Blogs are usefull for getting your partisan rage out.

Anonymous said...

Does that mean you need some engineer jokes, Zac? I have a friend who is an engineer so I've got a few engineer jokes; some are actually funny!

An optimist sees the glass as half-full. A pessimist sees the glass as half-empty. An engineer sees the glass as having excess capacity.

Blog on, Joanne!

Joanne (True Blue) said...

lol!! Good one, Mac! I've got to send that one to my daughter. She's an electrical engineer.

Zac said...

Hey Mac, send over some jokes...I always love to rip on the roommates.

Red Tory said...

talk about self-importance. a blog is like a free email account only your emails are public. no one pays to read this stuff. no one thinks of it as gospel.

Call it “self importance” if you like, but I think that a writer has an obligation to respect the intelligence of his/her readers. Call me old fashioned. Yes, blogs are free and no one thinks of what is written as gospel (at least I’d hope not), but like an editorial (also frequently obtained for free online these days) while the opinion may be skewed, there should be certain standards of fairness and balance in how the writer’s point is made.

if you think, by running a blog, you've suddenly taken on some civic responsibilities - well, I says: get over yourself.

I certainly have no pretensions to “civic responsibility” and am just another partisan loudmouth with a computer, so there’s no need to get over myself. I simply thought that Joanne presented Redman’s remarks in such a way as to provide a completely distorted impression of what she said by boiling it down to a comparison between Harper and Harris.

Sara said...

What I hate is when people don't just give their opinion they force it down your throat. You know like cults, its great to believe in something but you don't have to commit suicide to prove it.

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Rt - "I simply thought that Joanne presented Redman’s remarks in such a way as to provide a completely distorted impression of what she said by boiling it down to a comparison between Harper and Harris."

The point of my commentary was that I think the Harris and Bush references are getting a bit tedious. But maybe that's all she's got.

Anonymous said...

Theory is when you know everything and nothing is working. Organization is when nothing is working and everyone knows why. Practise is when everything is working and no one knows why.

You might be an engineer if . . .

-you have no life and can prove it mathematically

-you know vector calculus but you can't remember how to do long division

-you chuckle whenever anyone says 'centrifugal force'

-you've actually used and understood every single function on your graphing calculator

-it is sunny and 70 degrees outside, and you are working on a computer but you don't mind

-you frequently whistle the theme song to 'MacGyver' and smile

-you know how to integrate a chicken and can take the derivative of water

-you can think in math, complete with diagrams and graphs

-you've calculated how the World Series actually diverges

-you hesitate to look at something unless you have time to break down its wave function

-you have a pet named after a scientist

-you know a joke about a mathematician

-the Humane Society threatened to have you arrested if you actually performed the Schroedinger's Cat Experiment

-you can translate English into Binary and back again without significant data loss

-you can't remember what's behind the door in the science building which says 'Exit'

-you have to bring a jacket with you, in the middle of summer, because there's a wind-chill factor in the lab

-you describe caffeine as a food group

-you avoid working out because you don't want to contribute to the eventual heat-death of the universe.

-you consider any non-science courses as 'bird' courses

-when your professor asks you where your homework is, you claim to have accidentally determined its momentum so precisely, that according to Heisenberg it could be anywhere in the universe... and he accepts that

-you'll assume that a 'horse' is a 'sphere' in order to make the math easier

Joanne (True Blue) said...

Mac - Hilarious! I'm passing those on too! Thanks.

Zac said...

Nice Mac! I love it.