Whipped: An Arthur Beauchamp Novel(59)
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Calgary Sun, Friday, September 13
Fear has gripped Calgary following the attempted abduction of an eight-year-old girl from a quiet north-end street.
The girl, whose name and address have not been released, was walking home after school on Thursday, when a man stopped his car and offered to drive her home. According to police, when she backed away he reached out the car’s passenger door but was only able to grab her backpack as she ran into a neighbour’s yard.
He abandoned the backpack and drove away.
He is described as of middle age, of medium height and build, either balding or with short hair, and wearing glasses. A neighbour who answered her door to the girl did not see him or his car, the make or colour of which the frightened girl could not remember.
Over the last three months, there have been three reports of children being approached by a suspected pedophile of similar description. Police have increased patrols near primary schools, aided by Street Watch, a volunteer parent organization that escorts children to their schools and watches over playgrounds.
Environment Minister Emil Farquist, who represents Calgary North-Centre, where the attempted abduction took place, told reporters he will seek unanimous consent in Parliament, when it resumes next week, for the passage of an amendment to the Police Powers Bill allowing warrantless searches of suspected pedophiles.
In a press conference at his constituency office, he said combatting crime will be “a number one priority of this government” in the expected fall campaign, “especially crimes against our most vulnerable and cherished citizens, our children.”
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Island Tides, Tuesday, September 17
The Personal Transformation Mission, a New Age commune that has set down roots on Garibaldi Island, plans to sponsor a rally on behalf of local MP and Green Party leader Margaret Blake.
Jason Silverson, leader of the group popularly known as the Transformers, says the commune’s several dozen adherents have expressed unanimous support for Blake’s platform for a healthy, sustainable environment.
Though as a U.S. citizen he isn’t qualified to vote, he said, “We are all in the same race — to save the planet from environmental catastrophe — an issue that transcends all borders.”
The rally will be timed for early in the campaign, expected this fall.
Silverson’s announcement was received with surprise by local Greens. Rev. Al Noggins, Blake’s campaign manager on Garibaldi Island, declined to comment.
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Global News, Tuesday, September 24
BULLETIN
With unexpected suddenness, Canadian Prime Minister Winthrop Fowler dismissed Parliament today, immediately after the reading of the Throne Speech. A federal election is set for Wednesday, October 30.
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Huffington Post Canada, Wednesday, September 25
My Two Cents’ Worth, by Eugene Popoff
I call foul, Fowler. What a sham. But it was to be expected from the dirty tricksters that guide the fortunes of the Tory party.
I was in the Press Gallery and saw it all. No sooner had Governor General Bouvier finished his throne speech — a gift bag stuffed full of election candy — than PM Fowler dissolved Parliament, forcing what headlines are calling a snap election. A misnomer, given the government was about to fall on its kiester anyway.
The intended result was that Opposition parties were denied what has always been regarded as a solemn right to reply to the throne speech. Silence the Opposition! Another in an escalating series of assaults on what we once proudly called a democracy.
High-fives from smug-faced Tory backbenchers greeted Win Fowler’s announcement, while Opposition MPs stormed out and railed into the microphones of the assembled news media.
I have rarely seen Charlie Moss in such fine form, almost spitting mad as he heaped venom on the tricksters while aides passed out copies of his Throne Speech Reply. Clearly Moss, who has led the NDP from third-party status to Official Opposition, expects to topple the Fowler regime and return Canada to the international prestige it once enjoyed.
Marcus Yates, the Liberals’ hunky new leader, offered a cooler approach, with some levity directed at Fowler’s rush to get out of the Chamber. “I guess he really had to go,” he told a scrum of laughing (mostly female) reporters. Expect the Tories to launch a smear campaign against the thirty-nine-year-old former social worker, as they dig through their trove of old news photos showing him toking at pro-marijuana rallies.
It’s tragic that a fair clump of Canadians have bought into the image of themselves that the Conservatives are selling: tough, no nonsense, get things done. Things like an enhanced police state and the destruction of the environment.
Latest polls have the Tories at their traditional 33 percent. Enough to form a government if the Opposition splits its vote. The NDP is at 31 percent, the Liberals at 20 — a number likely to deflate as diehard Grits flock to the NDP as the devil they know. The Bloc has 8 percent, all in Quebec, and the Green Party, astonishingly, is holding at 6 percent.
My guess is that will evaporate too. In which case I expect Margaret Blake to lose her already tenuous hold on the GP leadership. Anyway, she has other things on her mind these days.
This election will be about democracy, Moss said. But a failure by Liberals and Greens to rally around the NDP could mean they’ll end up getting the government they deserve. Four more years of autocracy.
Eugene Popoff is research director for the Canadian Labour Congress.