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An Open Letter to:
Stephane Dion, Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada
Jack Layton, Leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada
Gilles Duceppe, Leader of the Bloc Quebecois
September 5th. 2007
Prime Minister Harper has taken the advice of his neo-con advisers and prorogued the first session of the 39th Parliament and reconvened a new session for October 16th. Prime Minister Harper has opted for a tactical retreat in a desperate attempt to save his government and regain the political initiative. Harper is falling in the polls because he gambled and failed to align Canadian public opinion behind the Bush US-NATO War in Afghanistan. Harper has paid the price for attempting to impose a made in Washington neo-con agenda on Canada and setting his Government against the deeply held beliefs of the Canadian people for peace and economic and social justice, for Canadian independence and sovereignty. There is no basis for the opposition parties to collaborate in a sham effort by Harper to re-invent his government. Harper cannot be reformed, he can only be defeated and that is what the opposition parties must do at the earliest opportunity.
The Canadian people can’t afford another two years of Conservative misrule. To imagine that progress can be made on the demands of the Canadian people for Parliamentary action to end Canada’s combat role in Afghanistan, to challenge the big oil interests and honor our Kyoto commitments, to stop the destruction of Ontario and Quebec manufacturing jobs, to retain the Canadian Wheat Board, to stop the privatization of health care, to address the urgent economic needs of those living in poverty, to accept the just demands of the Aboriginal people, to provide low cost housing for the homeless and rebuild the crumbling infrastructure in our urban and rural communities of the country under a Harper Government is not only illusory it is deceitful.
The neo-con ideology of Prime Minister Harper has poisoned public discourse. Even many Conservatives recoil from his compulsion to micro manage Government. His Ministers are chosen for their willingness to spread neo-con doctrines of fear and intolerance. Harpers foreign policy reeks of imperial ambition. Harper has weakened the federal state and made the country more vulnerable to the foreign takeover of our vital resources and industries. The leaders of the opposition must find the political courage to say what most Canadians have already concluded. The Harper neo-con experiment must end.
Don Currie, Chair,
Canadians for Peace and Socialism |