Next week Parliament will once more resume, the second time since the October 14th election. The first sitting lasted a matter of days before Harper’s lapdog Flaherty aka the Finance Minister made an economic statement that accomplished nothing else except getting the three opposition parties talking to each other in a serious way.

Oh, it also brought about a very swift transition of power for the Liberals as Dion left and Ignatieff was installed as leader. He will have to be confirmed as leader at their convention in May but at the rate things are moving, that will be a rubber stamp. Flaherty’s statement provoked the three opposition parties to put together an agreement to form a coalition government to propose to the Governor-General after they had brought down the government on a vote of non-confidence.

Harper responded by showing the steely fortitude that he possesses and running to the GG to ask for parliament to be prorogued, which means to suspend this session of parliament. His reason of course was to sort out how to save his sorry butt to do battle another day. It is rather ironic that the threat of a confidence vote sent him scurrying when he’s been having a ball for two years declaring bills to be matters of confidence and then taunting the opposition to vote against them. Read the rest of this entry »