Premier: Stephen Harper Responsible for Winter Storm

Executive Council
March 17th, 2008

Government continued to fight for the betterment of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians today by outing the party responsible for the blizzard currently blasting most of the island portion of the province. Through advanced meteorological and divination techniques known only to the province’s most elite soothsayers, Prime Minister Stephen Harper was determined to have caused the storm.

“Our government has determined that Stephen Harper is actively directing the blizzard that is shutting down most of our province currently,” said the Honourable Premier Danny Williams. “We’re not entirely sure how he is able to control the weather, but we are absolutely certain that he is using this storm to send a message that he is intent on continuing his campaign to undermine this province in all its endeavours.”

The storm began for the eastern part of the province on Monday and is expected to last until sometime Tuesday, dumping as much as 60 cm of snow in some areas. “Monday of course is St. Patrick’s Day, which also indicates to us that Prime Minister Harper likely distrusts the Irish. Quite frankly, I can say we are not at all surprised that the Prime Minister holds such a regressive attitude,” the Premier added.

St. Patrick’s Day is viewed by George Street as one of the biggest nights of the year for business outside of George Street Festival and Mardi Gras. According to a preliminary study by Memorial University economist Greg Locke, the storm is likely to mean lost revenue for the city of St. John’s and by proxy the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador of up to “a lot of money, I guess.”

“Rest assured that the Prime Minister will absolutely not have the last laugh in this situation,” Premier Williams said. “While he may currently have in his possession some kind of advanced weather control device, I have ordered a crack team of archaeologists from Memorial University to retrieve the Ark of the Covenant, which as far as I know is proceeding on a go-forward basis.”

“While we’re waiting, however, I have decided to expand the ABC program to ABCD: ‘Anything But Conservative & Druid.’ Ideally, this will allow the people of the province to send a powerful message to Ottawa and put an end to a government of frauds and black wizards.”

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Celebrity Poker: Canadian Politicians Edition

I was actually almost surprised that VOCM placed their coverage of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's cabinet shuffle above their article on Tara Oram getting voted out of Canadian Idol, but then again I'm not sure if it had been the other way around they'd really be getting their priorities wrong; both events are at roughly the same relevancy to our lives in this province.

What did actually manage to surprise me, however, was that some people seem to think that Harper leaving Jim Flaherty in the position of Finance Minister is only now signalling that the Atlantic Accord business means little or nothing to Harper.

We have been following the same story, right?

This isn't like an episode of LOST where we're now suddenly realising that THERE WERE TWO ISLANDS ALL ALONG [warning: the preceding sentence contains a spoiler]; if Harper's unscrupulous nature wasn't immediately apparent on the first day of his mandate in making patronage appointments or goading floor crossing from the Liberals, then one could have assumed that his openly musing about reneging on his promise of excluding resource revenues from the equalization formula was probably a better indication that he didn't care about our feelings too much. But I understand we're still in a The X Files-esque form of foreshadowing, and that could get a little difficult to follow occasionally.

Fortunately for us after the budget was dropped Harper made it fairly clear directly in the aftermath he either didn't care about overtly breaking campaign promises or had somehow managed to rationalise it that he had in fact kept it; honestly I'm not sure which is more likely (take your pick of whichever one helps you sleep better at night). And then top himself, just to show how much he didn't care he openly asked the unsatisfied Premiers to challenge the government in court. I'm pretty sure if you added a laughtrack to CPAC no one would be able to tell that it wasn't a bastardised Canadian version of Yes, Minister.

But yet people/MPs seem to be thinking that the war of equalization between this province and Ottawa has become a non-issue only now in light of Harper's decision to hold Flaherty instead of folding him. I want to say I'm surprised that even callers in VOCM could hold this opinion, but, I'd never be able to live with myself if I uttered untruths on the internet.

I will say, however, that if this is the hand Harper wants to take into the next election, he'd better make sure his poker face and bluffing skills are up to snuff. He doesn't seem to need much practice with the latter, though.

Also: I'm aware that this is probably your source for serious political commentary but just for those of you who treat this as some kind of entertainment (you must be bored because this blog is honestly not that funny), here are some BONUS UNUSED CARD ANALOGIES:

• Harper's reshuffling his hand in preparation for the flop
• Harper must have pocket Aces if he's this brazen over the Atlantic Accord
• Harper's so conservative he treats this country like a game Texas Hold-Em (har har)
• I'm out of good card jokes so you could say I busted (we are now talking about Blackjack fyi)
• Federal Tories looking for electoral support in this province are getting a big "GO FISH" from Danny Williams, which is ironic because we have a moratorium you see

I am so sorry you had to read that.

"Were you sent here by the devil?" "No, good sir, I'm on the level!"

Remember that episode of The Simpsons where Phil Hartman's Lyle Lanley character convinces Springfield to build a faulty monorail as a get-rich-quick scheme? More specifically, remember at the end where he's on the plane that makes a surprise stopover in one of the towns he screwed over with a monorail previously and his plane is stormed by an angry torch-wielding mob?

That is the exact scenario I envisioned when I heard this morning that Prime Minister Stephen Harper would be gracing our fair province to look at the damage caused by the recent post-tropical storm. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that it was with the intention of getting a damage assessment so as to provide federal assistance in the cleanup efforts in the relatively near future, as opposed to showing up just to laugh derisively at our misfortune in person before flying back to Ottawa for a delicious meal of kittens with a side of toddlers.

As I sit here writing this entry at this exact moment, the Prime Minister is touring Conception Bay North/Placentia/Dunville, flanked by his favourite Newfoundlanders Loyola Hearn and Fabian Manning. I can only hope that Harper will realise that those towns only look that way after being hit by a very rough storm and do not actually appear in states of disrepair constantly. And you know, since's he's pretty insistent we can do without the Atlantic Accord, he might honestly believe it.

Danny Williams, on the other hand, wasn't asked to come along, and is predictably throwing a tantrum like a six-year-old who wasn't invited to a birthday party. I'm not sure why he was expecting an invite, though; last time I checked, children who hate each other don't generally hang out together outside of a very poorly thought out playdate. Lay off going around telling everyone Stephen Harper is the devil and pick him up a nice Transformers action figure, Premier, and maybe you'll get to play with the big boys again.

Not that Harper is in the right here, either. I'm sure his mother must have taught him to invite all the children to his parties, even the unpopular ones who do nothing but complain about the flavour of the cake or the weird smells coming out of the McDonald's ball pit.

But, hey, kids will be kids I guess. We should enjoy it while it lasts; they grow up so fast, the little darlings.