Well, not really killed, but politically speaking, I think we should consider the odious Jason Kenney toast, done in by his own incompetence. After his offensive, pseudo-high minded comments about MPs Borys Wrzesnewskyj and Peggy Nash, he has been caught addressing a group designated as terrorists by Canada, the European Union and the U.S. on Parliament Hill(!). And he invoked the name of Stephen Harper in his welcome to them (! again).
OTTAWA—Conservative MP Jason Kenney, who likened Hezbollah to the Nazi party and condemned fellow MPs for urging dialogue with a terrorist organization, himself spoke to a rally organized by Iranian supporters of a banned terrorist group.A photograph of Kenney, who is Prime Minister Stephen Harper's parliamentary secretary, appears on the website of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, the political wing of the PMOI, or People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran.
The PMOI is one of the names used by the MEK, or Mujahedin-e-Khalq, an armed Iranian rebel group formally designated as a terrorist organization by the governments of Canada, the United States and the European Union. The Canadian government put the group on its official terror list in May 2005.
Kenney is shown addressing an April 6 rally on Parliament Hill, and the group says he welcomed participants "on his own behalf as well as the Prime Minister."
The group touts Kenney's support, saying "dozens of Iranians and supporters of the Iranian Resistance joined in a rally in front of the Canadian Parliament to condemn (the) clerical regime's plan to execute political prisoners in Iran, specially those affiliated to the PMOI."
The group has been lobbying to persuade governments in the United States and United Kingdom to remove it from their terror blacklists, and promotes itself as the democratic secular alternative to the Islamic clerical rulers of Iran.
But Human Rights Watch says the Iranian rebel group is itself responsible for serious human rights abuses. It interviewed former members of MEK who reported "abuses ranging from detention and persecution of ordinary members wishing to leave the organization, to lengthy solitary confinements, severe beatings and torture of dissident members."
The NCRI website says the April rally that Kenney attended was organized by "the Committee in Defence of Human Rights in Iran."
Kenney feigns ignorance of the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran, and pronounces himself "shocked" to find himself associated with the group, whose website proudly bears his photograph as he addresses the rally. He claims he and his staff did "due diligence" in checking out the group before he agreed to speak. That says something not very flattering about his ability, and that of his staff.
Now, Wrzesnewskyj advocated speaking to Hezbollah in the interest of getting a lasting peace in Lebanon. Problematic, certainly, given the west's general moratorium on communicating with groups designated as terrorists, but misguided toward a decent goal. He also said it in the emotional heat of the moment as wandered through the devastated villages of South Lebanon. Nonetheless, he paid the price for his political ineptitude and has been stripped of his portfolio as foreign affairs critic for the Liberal Party.
Kenney, the PM's parliamentary secretary, lauded a terrorist group in the very heart of political power in this country, and did so in the name of the prime minister. As Mike at Rational Reasons points out, he's got to go.
Liberal MP Borys Wrzesnewskyj resigned his post as deputy foriegn affairs critic after he suggested that perhaps Hezbollah should not be on our terrorist list and that maybe it would be a good idea to negotiate with them in order to try to bring about peace in the region. He said all this while in the devastation that was Lebanon. Despite this sentiment being echoed even by Conservatives around the world, he was quickly denounced and attacked, even by memebers of his own party.No one was more agitated and vocal about this than perennial blowhard CPC MP Jason Kenney...
*snip*
[In a photo on the banned group's website] Kenney is not suggesting we talk to this banned terrorist group, he is actually talking to them. He is, in fact, speaking at a rally for them. Unlike Wrzesnewskyj, Kenney is actually a member of the Government and a direct representative of the Prime Minister.
Enough spin and hypocricy. If Wrzesnewskyj had to resign for suggesting it, Kenney must resign for actually doing it.
That sums it up nicely. It remains to be seen whether Kenney will take the honourable route (given his less than honourable history, I have my doubts) or whether Harper will have the gumption to relieve him of his post. Either way, this hypocritical, incompetent windbag needs to go.
(Apologies to South Park for the mangled catchphrase in this post's title.)
Interesting that Kenney would feel he had to disavow any sympathies with the MEK in such a flustered way. The U.S. State Department may have listed them as a terrorist organization (way back in the nineties), but there is lots of noise about CIA and Pentagon interest in them as useful destabilizers in Iran, as a simple google search will tell you. It may be that powerful people will see that Kenney's embarrassment does not last long.
From the Star:
Kenney said Nash's criticisms are "utterly ridiculous."
"Peggy Nash and company were explicitly talking about negotiations with Hezbollah, a banned illegal terrorist organization.
"I, of course, would never advocate the delisting of the MEK or the People's Mojahedin or any other organization deemed by our security and intelligence agencies to be a terrorist entity."
No Jason, you would simply cheer them on on the lawn of Parliament Hill. In the name of the Government of Canada and PM Stephen Harper.
Technically, isn't that breaking the law, giving aid and comfort to a terrorist group?
Just wondering.
In the immortal words of Nelson Munz:
"Ha-Ha!"
Whooee! I reckon it'd be fun t' see that there loudmouth know-it-all holier-than-thou KenneyBoy squirm fer a spell but I figger Skdaddler's got it right when he sez sum muckity-mucks'll make sure pore little Jason don't get much of a rakin' over the coals. Shee-it! It's the Trawna Star, fer crysakes. The SDA posse types call it the "Red Star". They try t' make sure nobuddy pays much tension t' the Star an' they say it's jest a lieberal mouthpiece.
I see there's lotsa Pergressive Boogers jumpin' on this one so mebbe there's chance the story'll grow legs. I ain't holdin' my breath.
JimBobby
Ah, my hillbilly sage, but it already has grown legs, if rather wobbly ones:
CTV is covering the story here:
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060824/kenney_rally_060824/20060824?hub=TopStories
So far, the only place I can find it in the Globe is in Dan Cook's political blog:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20051109.wdancookblog/BNStory/National/home
Maisonneuve.org offers a brief of the story here:
http://www.maisonneuve.org/index.php?&page_id=12&article_id=2375
Interesting, and it does speak volumes to the competence of Kenney and his staff, which when one considers he is the PM's Parliamentary Secretary is more than a little disturbing all by itself. I mean really, if the PM's PS's office cannot determine who is a terrorist group as designated by the government itself and allows their elected official to speak to such a banned group in support of their agenda (any of their agenda) this demonstrates a level and acceptance of incompetence that should scare anyone that cares about competent government regardless of political persuasion of the government of the day.
I agree, Kenney needs to go over this and the Liberal critic that stepped down underscores the difference in the two parties on which side actually practices accountability and personal responsibility as opposed to which party talks about it all the time and doesn't actually practice it. We know for example that Harper himself has been a party to a cover-up of falsely made criminal allegations in the attempt to bring down a minority government and then done all he could to hide the fact and especially the identity of the person(s) involved in creating the fraudulent evidence provided to all Canadians under the assurance of Harper et al of it's accuracy/completeness/truthfulness. Yet we saw no repercussions for the LOO committing a fraud on the Canadian people, we saw no taking responsibility for this unprecedented dirty tricks operation in our political history, no all we saw was blame the media and the Liberal war room for "smearing" a "good man" who did nothing wrong according to Harper.
So I expect Kenney will not suffer any repercussions whatsoever UNLESS it becomes a significant enough political football that it adversely affects the CPC chances for a majority, in that event I would expect Kenney to be fired so fast it would be weeks before his mind caught up with the reality. This is yet one more example of the hypocrisy of the CPC on fundamental issues of governance such as accountability and taking responsibility for one's errors/mistakes. The degree of incompetence that the CPC is willing to accept from it's staff so long as that staff is willing to follow the CPC agenda is more than a little scary IMHO.
I have to admit, you folks may be right, but coming so closely on the heels of Wrzeznewskyj's resignation, I'd be real suprised if the Liberals and the NDP didn't make a big enough deal out of this that it gets bigger play in the media.
Tim, I would be all in favour of that, just in the interests of fairness in Canada.
My level of cynicism was deeper, though. I suspect that the White House, the CIA, and the Pentagon would all be happy enough to de-list the MEK, which has become a most useful organization to them. Do Harper and Kenney know that? Who can tell.
The trouble is that "fairness in Canada" doesn't really have much to do with the way the world is in fact operating. Yes, we have a little list, an extremely strange little list, a Heinz 57 varieties list, a kitchen-sink list of so-called terrorist organizations that range all the way from genuine terrorist organizations to duly elected governments. And sure: if anyone in the country is getting into trouble by sympathizing with any of the organizations on that list, then everyone else who tries that should get into the same kind of trouble. That is called fairness. That is called the rule of law.
There remains the question of how mindless that list is, however. Earlier this week, Bob Rae and an associate published an affecting op-ed piece in the G&M about the renewed fighting in Sri Lanka. They didn't quite come out and say that there is something wrong with our official demonizing of the "non-state actor" in that confrontation, given that the horrors committed by the state and the non-state actors seem to be equally distributed and equally horrible, but they were certainly taking baby steps towards that position.
I find our reliance on mindless labels and rhetoric immensely frustrating. But yes: if Kenney can convict anyone else on that superficial basis, then let him be hoist by his own petard.
skdadl writes, "I find our reliance on mindless labels and rhetoric immensely frustrating. But yes: if Kenney can convict anyone else on that superficial basis, then let him be hoist by his own petard."
I share you distaste for mindless labels and rhetoric... good for you for calling it out.
To the point at hand, what Kenney's hypocrisy demonstrates is that Steve Harper's government is using foreign policy as a partisan press making tool rather than what the government of Canada should be doing when engaging the world:
A) Speaking up for Canadian interests, and
B) speaking up for the innocent, and
C) speaking up for global interests
The Harper government is using war mongering as photo-op... with all the inherent capriciousness that comes with such an approach to foreign policy.
If Kenney deserves to be hoist, then so does Stockwell Day.
In December 2005, Day (along with a handful of other MPs) attended a conference organized by PMOI/MEK supporters and had this to say:
"Calling on the Canadian government to take a tougher policy on Iran, Stockwell Day, another Conservative member of the Canadian Parliament from British Columbia, expressed his confidence on people to bring about democratic changes to Iran."
Kenney's appearance at the rally may have been inadvertent; Day's statement at an organized conference that involved a satellite hookup to group leader Maryam Rajavi couldn't have been.
Here's the link.
The conference was also attended by some of those pushing, as skdadl says, to use the PMOI/MEK for 'regime change.' One of Day's tablemates was the then-chair of a think tank called the Iran Policy Committee, whose aim is to bring about regime change by supporting the Iranian Opposition (the MEK is one of their favorites): Professor Raymond Tanter. The think tank has strong ties to the US military, foreign policy, political and academic establishments.
Here's part of their mission statement:
For too long, Washington has been divided between those who favor engagement with and those who support military strikes against the Iranian regime. President George W. Bush advocates working with the Iranian people as opposed to the regime in Tehran but has not explicitly called for regime change. By calling for change in Tehran based on Iranians instead of Americans, IPC stresses the potential for a third alternative: Keep open diplomatic and military options, while providing a central role for the Iranian opposition to facilitate regime change.
Their 105-page defence of the MEK is a remarkable piece of work: ask yourself whether any comparable amount of academic effort would go into exonerating other listed groups. I'd bet they'd be few and far between, if any existed at all.
Like skdadl says, somebody really wants this group's status changed.
When you cut through the euphemisms about 'facilitating regime change,' the think tank's program is identical to that of Maryam Rajavi's 'third way' to deal with Iran (i.e. not war or 'appeasement,' as they call it).
I share skdadl's skepticism about the point of these lists, though I can't help but impishly pose the question of whether, in harboring supporters of a group identified as 'terrorist,' we haven't crossed the line into 'rogue statehood' ourselves.
Note: edited to repair link - pogge
From the Dept. of Politics Makes For Strange Bedfellows
Emphasis added.
Don't expect any embarassment on the part of the Tories or the amen corner on the nets. Instead, you can expect lots of talk about the group being freedom fighters, working to bring democracy to Iran. It reminds me of the wonderful days of the 1980's when the Contras roamed the the Nicaraguan countryside (funded by illegal arm sales to Iran, by Ollie North and company). Ah, those were the days. You have to remember that people like Kenney have no capacity for shame.
I just want to thank pogge and posters for this valuable information.
Great links, Stephen and pogge.
That convention last December in Toronto: Stephen, that statement is so strangely written that I couldn't tell for sure that all those named were actually there -- the NCRI certainly wants to imply that, and in any event Day made some sort of supportive statement to them.
Look at who else was either there or, ah, communicating with that convention. I count one Liberal, two Tories, one independent (Kilgour), and Tarek Fatah, which saddens me but then Tarek has been saddening me for a while.
Do these people not watch 60 Minutes? CBS ran a fascinating profile of the MEK three or four years ago -- I found it hard not to think "cult" as I watched that report. They are an extremely strange organization, their leaders given not only to violence but to delusions of grandeur. Gosh: what would attract Jason Kenney and Stockwell Day, not to mention the Bush administration, to such a group?
That's a wonderful source, pogge, much better than the Cangov has managed to provide for us. God forbid that our public servants should ever let the public in on the hard information they have about these groups.
Ya know, pogge and skdadl, you guys have taken this comment thread off into fascinating new territory not addressed at all in my post.
It really deserves much larger treatment, like say a post of its own (hint, hint).
Me? Tim: I just work here. ;-)
Seriously, I thought it was interesting that there was absolutely no word of Kenney's or Day's wee pickles in this a.m.'s Globe and Mail, even though both the Star and CTV have covered the story.
Even curiouser: Google News shows the beginning of a story about Kenney's misstep on CBC, but when you try to follow the link, from Google or from the CBC site, the page does not exist.
I'm wrong: it's back.
skdadl,
The reason I feel confident they were all there, despite some oddities in the wording of the report, is that lawyer Warren Creates, whose conference speech is still on David Kilgour's website, had this to say as he was wrapping up:
Politicians can, should and (the best like those 4 members of our Canadian Parliament here with us today) advocate for human rights. Politicians can acknowledge human rights, but they can’t take rights away.
My emphasis.
Creates is the lawyer representing the PMOI members in Iraq at 'Camp Ashraf.'
What would attract them to such a group? Are they hoping to gain votes, or to fundraise or to gain some other kind of benefit? Would there be a record if such a group donated to someone's campaign, say? Would anyone notice if any of their donors are on the terrorist list?
What would attract them to such a group?
The group's goal is regime change in Iran. That's a popular number in certain circles these days.
What attracted the neo-cons to Ahmed Chalabi? What attracted them to Saudi and Yemeni zealots in Afghanistan in the 1980s?
If there is a wrong side, then as the night follows the day, the neo-cons will pick it.