Let the disaster begin
Well it has finally happened, the lunatics have taken over the asylum
Fear and Loathing in Canada (both the excellent blog and the sentiment) outlines Harper's Agenda as the new Prime Minister is sworn in (and around here, sworn at)

This round up of the new cabinet gives more than the benifit of the doubt to some of Harper's choices.

Let's take a less rose-coloured look at few over the next few days, starting with Peter MacKay, the new Foreign Affairs Minister and former almost Mr. Belinda Stronach (and possibly the new almost Mr. Sophie Demaris?). He also led the Progressive Conservative Party for about 15 minutes before someone noticed the party had died and was starting to smell worse than usual. Apparently MacKay is regularly voted the sexist male MP by Commons staff - clearly an important qualification since romancing rich and powerful women seems to be what he is chiefly known for. As foreign affairs minister, it couldn't hurt if MacKay had a fling with a President Condeleezza Rice or a President Hillary Clinton - though I'd prefer if the breakup didn't include sending the 82nd Airborne to get back the jilted president's toothbrush, favorite t-shirt and White House coffee mug.

Hopefully MacKay will stick to his knitting and do his sucking up in Washington through his yet-to-be-named ambassador. Who will it be? After all Canada's ambassador to Washington will be a vital playing in the Harper effort to get back on side with Dubya's neocons without looking like they've actually donned kneepads.
Names being mentioned include Brian Mulroney, Mike Harris and Preston Manning. Surely there will be Senate seats at least for purveyor of "Common Sense" and old time Injun Fighter Mike "better dead than red" Harris, Brian "the Chin that walks like a man" Mulroney and Parson Manning. I think MacKay should at least consider Joe Clark. Just imagine the stammering, the polite "excuse me, uhh wait just a second now, aww c'mon guys" kind of Jimmy-Stewart-in-the-first-half of "The Man Who Shot Liberty Vallance" kind of standing up for Canada we'd get then!
Our new foreign policy: Whatever Dubya says it is. Move over Tony Blair.


Other, far superior examinations of the start of the slide downhill can be found at Galloping Beaver, who puts the hurt on turncoat David Emerson, who is no Belinda Stronach. Canadian Cynic also smells a rat concerning the man who begged NDP voters to vote Liberal to stop the Conservatives and then two weeks later joined the Tory Cabinet. Doubtless Emerson's new collegues will be as harsh on him as they were on Stronach, who served a year with the Tories and had public conflicts with the leadership before she jumped ship. I'm no fan, but lets just see if new immigration minister Monte Solburg calls Emerson "a dipstick"

Later this week we will look at:

• Justice Minister Vic Toews, who want Parliament to tell the Supreme Court to go pound sand and outlaw gay marriage. He pleaded guilty to breaking campaign laws in 1999 too.
• Public Security Minister Stockwell "Doris" Day who is bound to come up with his own patriot act by the end of the year, probably by taking the one in effect in der Fatherland, I mean "the Homeland" to the south and swapping proper nouns around.
• Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, late of Mike Harris nonsense revolution