The Politics of Interference: What Really Happened With the Obama Campaign?

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

During the 2008 Democratic leadership race, the Harper government became embroiled in a controversy over a leak from the PMO that temporally derailed Obama's campaign.

In the primaries, Obama and Hillary Clinton were campaigning hard in Ohio and taking turns trashing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), blaming it for heavy job losses in the state. Obama went so far as to warn that NAFTA might have to be renegotiated. When two officials from the Canadian consulate in Chicago met with Austan Goolsbee, an adviser to Obama, they raised the matter. They understood from Goolsbee that Obama's words should be viewed as political posturing more than any clear statement of intent, and they passed on that interpretation in a memo to senior officials in Ottawa.

Three weeks later, Harper's chief of staff, Ian Brodie, revealed while chatting with reporters that the NAFTA-bashing should not be taken too seriously, that it was mainly rhetoric. News of this got out but didn't cause too much of a stir. Then the memo prepared by the Canadian officials was leaked to the Associated Press. The story made headlines across the U.S., embarrassing Obama, who appeared to be saying one thing publicly and another privately. Goolsbee was angry, claiming that the Canadian officials had misrepresented his words and the Canadian embassy in Washington was under the gun. Diplomatic memos were rarely leaked, especially in the middle of a presidential campaign, and since the Harper government was Conservative, many suspected that the leak was politically motivated. (1)

There was an investigation and an apology, but it would turn out to be a bigger story when the Harper government connections to U.S. Republicans was revealed, making it look like a deliberate attempt to discredit Obama. They were looking for ammunition and thanks to Stephen Harper they found it.

In the end, [Kevin] Lynch's report cleared Brodie of having a hand in the leak and failed to find a culprit, saying the net was too wide. Since the investigation had been going on for little more than two months and had not yet served its purpose, critics wondered why it was already being shut down.

The Lynch report was released just before a weekend break, the time when political news attracts the least attention. But at the start of the following week, the Toronto Star's Jim Travers contradicted its findings, quoting a source as saying, "This was a very deliberate piece of business for political purpose. It puts political ideology ahead of what's good for the country."

As part of the investigation, Ian Brodie was questioned in detail about both Sensenbrenners. He said he met Frank two or three times over the years at large gatherings or receptions but never actively contacted him. As for Harper, he said, "I know the father visited the PM once." As chief of staff, Brodie explained, "it was my constant and unrelenting policy always to downplay the various controversies in the Canada-U.S. relationship.' His comments to reporters about the campaign chatter on NAFTA, he noted, were a perfect example of this. And while he acknowledged some personal links between Conservatives and U.S. Republicans, he added, "I think it's fair to say we were all much, much closer to the Australian Liberals."

With Sensenbrenner's denial and no one able to prove involvement of the PMO, the story tapered off .... however, this incident left room, given the way Harper operatives worked, for plenty of suspicion. "I don't know that there was anything particularly conspiratorial about it," said David Emerson of the leak. But like most others, he couldn't be certain. (1)

James and Frank Sensenbrenner

James Travers was the first to expose the connections:

Fingers are pointing at Conservatives close to Stephen Harper for leaking a diplomatic memo that badly embarrassed Barack Obama and put Canada's vital cross-border interests at risk. Multiple sources say the Canadian note questioning the Democrat frontrunner's public promise to reopen NAFTA was leaked from the Prime Minister's Office to a Republican contact before it made American headline news. Contradicting Friday's inconclusive report, they claim the controversial memo was slipped to the son of Wisconsin Republican Congressman James Sensenbrenner.

Frank Sensenbrenner is well connected to Harper's inner circle and, at Ottawa's insistence, was briefly on contract with Canada's Washington embassy to work on congressional relations. Travers reported that the PMO had leaked the memo to a Republican Party contact, Frank Sensenbrenner. Sensenbrenner was the son of Congressman James Sensenbrenner* and was well connected to Ottawa Tories. He even worked for a brief time at Canada's Washington embassy on congressional relations. (2)

And understanding how Stephen Harper operates, it is completely believable that he would work for his Republican counterparts, who were hoping to discredit John McCain's toughest competition.

This news reportedly hurt Obama's chances in two key Democratic Party primaries and generated accusations of political interference by the Harper government in U.S. political affairs. In March, Harper called for an in-house investigation of "allegations of unauthorized disclosures" by Brodie and Wilson.

But the Prime Minister refused demands by opposition MPs that he discipline Brodie over the so-called NAFTA-gate scandal. Brodie announced this week that he would be leaving the Prime Minister's office on July 1. The Liberals yesterday said the report won't end the potential damage in Canada's relations with the United States, particularly if Obama or Clinton becomes president. (3)

Gerry Chipeur and Republicans Abroad Canada

But there was even more to this story that was largely ignored, and it centred around a Calgary lawyer, Gerry Chipeur. Chipeur is a long time activist and legal adviser to the Reform movement, in all of it's manifestations. He represented Stockwell Day in a libel suit and when reports were made public during Day's run for prime minister in 2000, that he had connections with known Neo-Nazis, it was Chipeur who came to his defence.

He was also instrumental in trying to broker a deal with Gilles Duceppe to form a coalition with Stockwell Day. Duceppe presented Chipeur's letter of intent during the 2008 coalition debates.

But even more importantly, it was Gerry Chipeur who contacted Paul Weyrich, the godfather of the American religious right, asking him not to allow his people to talk to the Canadian press during the 2006 election. He didn't want Canadians to know how deeply connected Harper was to this movement.

From his twenty-third floor suite in one of Calgary's Husky towers, Gerry Chipeur can see the distant snow-slicked foothills of the Rockies, but his office decor bears witness to an even more extensive reach. On one wall, a framed photo shows him with Republican presidential candidate John McCain, for whom he threw a thousand-dollar-a-head fundraiser, raking in nearly fifty thousand dollars from American expatriates working in Alberta's oil patch. On another wall, a snapshot of Stephen and Laureen Harper is inscribed with "thanks for being on the winning team"—a reference not only to Chipeur's professional services for the Conservative Party, but his pre-emptive strike on the prime minister's behalf. Only days before the 2oo6 election, he had contacted Paul Weyrich, the late chair of Washington's Free Congress Foundation, asking him to warn fellow American conservatives against interviews with Canadian reporters on the lookout for dirt about Harper's U.S. ties.

Chipeur's loyalties, however, are nothing if not complex. The largest expanse of his wall space is reserved for a portrait of Harper's former rival, Stockwell Day, who had hired him years earlier for a damaging defamation suit filed during his days as Alberta treasurer. Nearly a decade later, Day had barely been installed as Harper's first minister of public safety, when he named Chipeur his department's lobbyist in Washington. That perk was not Chipeur's only reward. In 2007, during the Conservatives' controversial revamp of its screening panels for federal judges, Chipeur won a slot on the judicial advisory committee for Alberta, an unpaid appointment that he regards as a sacred calling. "There's absolutely nothing wrong with a Conservative government appointing Conservative judges," he says with undisguised passion. "We need to get some good judges in. We need Christian law schools."

The implications of his thoughts on the subject are best revealed in a column that Paul Weyrich wrote shortly after the pair had an election chat in 2006. At the time, American conservatives were disheartened that Harper had won only a minority government, but after talking to Chipeur, Weyrich reported, he realized that all was not lost. The new prime minister still possessed extraordinary powers to appoint judges at every level of the courts. "If Harper were to alter the composition of the courts," Weyrich pointed out, "the anti-abortion issue again be contemplated."(4)

And it would appear that using those strong connections to the Republican Party, Chipeur went to bat for John McCain.

The Star reported that Sensenbrenner was introduced into Canadian diplomatic circles by Gerry Chipeur, a Calgary lawyer who had served as legal counsel to the Reform and Alliance parties and headed a group called Republicans Abroad Canada. Sensenbrenner, who got part of his early education in Toronto, attended Reform Party conventions and became acquainted with Preston Manning's inner circle. He was not trusted or welcome at the Canadian embassy, but he was backed by Harper's office, and that allowed him to remain for a time in the position. If the leak did come from the PMO, he would be a likely recipient. But Sensenbrenner denied ever seeing the memo and said he was shocked his name could even come up. (1)

He shouldn't have been. Sensenbrenner, standing directly behind George Bush in the above photo, was part of the Religious Right movement, with ties to Paul Weyrich. He was no doubt one of the Republicans disheartened that Harper had only won a minority.

Which brings us to the case of Stephen Boissoin

Stephen Boissoin is an Albert youth minister who got into trouble with the province's human rights commission in 2002, after writing a letter to the Red Deer Advocate denouncing "the homosexual machine."

He was going to represent himself at court until the American Alliance Defense Fund got wind of it. "We can't take the chance you might lose because what's going on in Canada will affect us in the U.S." Chipeur had been trying to get the ADF to take more of an interest in Canada, so Boissoin made the perfect conduit.

Chipeur is a partner in the Calgary offices of Miller Thomson, where his client list reads like a who's who of the Christian right: he submitted a brief to the Supreme Court opposing same-sex marriage on behalf of Senator Anne Cools, and when Calgary's outspoken Catholic bishop Fred Henry found himself under investigation by Revenue Canada, it was Chipeur who rallied to his defence. He had already carved out a reputation in constitutional law when Dallas Miller, the first Canadian to sign up for ADF'S litigation academy, invited him to Phoenix for one of its conferences. The trip turned into a networking bonanza: through ADF, he dined with James Dobson in his Colorado boardroom, and hobnobbed with Antonin Scalia, a personal hero who is one of the most conservative voices on the U.S. Supreme Court. Despite that rapport, Chipeur failed to rouse any ADF interest in his Canadian caseload—a source of frustration. "They didn't think there was a role for them north of the border," he says. "Then suddenly, after a decade of them largely ignoring Canada, they called me out of the blue."

That request to take on Boissoin's case brought Chipeur a chance to make constitutional history, but it also raised an awkward reality: a legal battle that could determine the parameters of free speech in this country was being financed and overseen by a consortium of ministries in the U.S. religious right, including Focus on the Family. (4)

Still think Canada is a sovereign nation? It's not only the aggressive trade deals that threaten our country. We are now being run by the Republican Party and the American Religious Right. After all we are talking about the Canadian courts here.

Footnotes:

*Pierre Poilivre went to Sensenbrenner to help draft the Accountability Act. Sensenbrenner has been labelled one of the most corrupt politicians in Washington.

Sources:

1. Harperland: The Politics of Control, By Lawrence Martin, Viking Press, 2010, ISBN: 978-0-670-06517-2, Pg. 140-142

2. Signs point to PMO in NAFTA leak: Controversial memo slipped to Republican, several sources say, By James Travers, Toronto Star, May 27, 2008

3. PM's aide fuelled uproar: Report exonerates Brodie over memo leak but confirms chat likely led to NAFTA furor, By Les Whittington Richard Brennan, Toronto Star Ottawa Bureau, May 24, 2008

4. The Armageddon Factor: The Rise of Christian Nationalism in Canada, By: Marci McDonald, Random House Canada, 2010, ISBN: 978-0-307-35646-8 3, Pg. 292-295

Why Do the Poor Have a Deep Emotional Attachment to a Party That Serves the Interests of the Rich?

A CULTURE OF DEFIANCE: History of the Reform-Conservative Party of Canada

In January of this year, the BBC published an interesting article: Why do people vote against their own interests? It was a light bulb moment, and defines to a tee the basis of neoconservativism, as represented by the Republicans in the U.S. and the Reform-Conservatives in Canada.

They are both clearly parties representing the interests of their country's wealthiest citizens, yet most of their "base" support comes from the fringes and those who stand to lose the most if neoconservatism wins.

Last year, in a series of "town-hall meetings" across the country, Americans got the chance to debate President Obama's proposed healthcare reforms. What happened was an explosion of rage and barely suppressed violence ... But it is striking that the people who most dislike the whole idea of healthcare reform - the ones who think it is socialist, godless, a step on the road to a police state - are often the ones it seems designed to help.

Why is that? Political scientist Dr David Runciman is quoted as saying:

If people vote against their own interests, it is not because they do not understand what is in their interest or have not yet had it properly explained to them. They do it because they resent having their interests decided for them by politicians who think they know best.

The Reform Party built an entire movement based on that theory. "So you don't trust politicians. Neither do we" they cried.

And across the border, when Republican Newt Gingrich watched those TV spots and read those ads he was inspired.

Indeed, Canadians became exporters of neo-con innovation in the 1990s. 'I would say Margaret Thatcher and Mr. [Preston] Manning are the two non-Americans we learned most from'', said U.S. Republican House Speaker, Newt Gingrich in 1995.'I know him [Preston Manning] because I watched all of his commercials. We developed our platform from watching his campaign.' (1)

And using the techniques and talking points honed by Manning and the Reformers (Stephen Harper was chief policy advisor at the time), Gingrich's team created their "Contract with America".

It is thus not difficult to understand why the Republicans, in the run-up to the mid-term elections of last November [1994], made such a point of dissociating themselves from Washington and identifying instead with popular sentiment on such issues. The dividends of defining Washington as the source of false values are seen in the results of the elections, which gave the Republicans control of both the House and the Senate. (2)

It's ironic that so many people accuse Stephen Harper of being a Republican (including myself), but the Democrats in the U.S. should be calling the Republicans 'Reformers', and accusing them of copying Stephen Harper.

Proud to be a Racist and a Redneck

Vancouver - On his small square patch of Canada, surrounded by a nine-foot fence of English laurel, Reform Man is railing against the Frenchmen who run the bloody government, and dropping remarks about Chinese drivers.

"I admire a lot of those other cultures, but in their own country," said Sid Blanchett, a diesel engine mechanic. Mr Blanchett lives in north Vancouver, a hotly contested riding in the 2 June election. There are two signs outside his fence: one for the Reform Party, and another that says "No More Prime Ministers from Quebec". He's proud to be a racist and a redneck, he said, if that means defending his own culture, religion, and traditions.

Covering Reform can be like waking up in a Monty Python sketch, as one Vancouver journalist said this week. Old-fashioned caricatures pop up and say the most extraordinary things. Members belt out Oh Canada at party meetings, and while they drop clangers about blacks, gays, or Sikhs, the race they really detest is the French. (3)

Preston Manning and the Reform Party played on those prejudices:

Having a clear critical dynamic, focused on the corrupt Ottawa establishment, was of the first importance to Reform's recent success. In this, as in so many other ways, this party has a similar focus to the United States Republican Party in its present mood ... Part of its appeal is to anti-Quebecois sentiment "let Quebec either secede", Reform says in effect, "or, preferably, stay in Canada but without any of the special privileges it seeks." Outside Quebec this message is extremely popular. It might be noted that Reform did not bother to run candidates in Quebec.

Preston Manning is a smart guy and I have no doubt that he is not racist. But in the same way that his father's Social Credit party fed off anti-Semitism, Preston knew how to feed off people's insecurities. And when his MPs were quoted making racist remarks, he'd simply say that the Reform Party does not condone Racism, but rarely did anything else.

This explains his handling of the Jan Brown/Jim Silye incident.

The cases of Jan Brown and Jim Silye were typical. Among the most progressive and cosmopolitan of the Reform MPs, they also became known for their ability to shine in Question Period. Both were urban moderates and excellent communicators who developed positive relationships with the media and, in the case of Brown, a degree of national name recognition. Both were often unhappy with the "racist redneck" element in their caucus, and endured much criticism from other caucus members for their continuing attempts to broaden the base of Reform policies.

[Then] when [Reform MP] Art Hanger announced he was going on a "fact-finding mission" to Singapore to explore the use of caning and other forms of corporal punishment in the penal system, most Canadians were astonished and amused. Brown and Silye were humiliated, and said so publicly. "I don't want to be campaigning for caning and whipping," said Silye, a millionaire Calgary businessman and former Stampeders star. Brown, another Calgary MP and a corporate consultant with two degrees, agreed with Silye and suggested Reform would lose mainstream voters if it did not shake its extremist image. For their comments the two were raked over the coals at a lengthy caucus meeting in which one MP after another took the floor to lambaste the two, accusing them of betrayal ... (4)

And:

Barely two months later, during debate on the government's proposed amendment to the Canadian Human Rights Act protecting homosexuals from discrimination*, the Reform caucus erupted again. When B.C. MP Bob Ringma** told reporters he would move gay or visible-minority employees to the back of the shop if they were costing him business, colleagues such as Dave Chatters, Leon Benoit and Myron Thompson agreed. In fact, Thompson went further, saying "If they were costing me business, I would remove them." Asked for her comments, Jan Brown replied, "I'm so saddened by this..." (4)

In response, Manning did reprimand Ringma, but also suspended Jan Brown. Instead she quit.

We might wonder at the logic behind this, but it goes back to the party's basic philosophy of "us against them". The Jan Browns did not fit into this, but the Rob Ringmas did. They were the people who kept the party faithfuls motivated to call themselves The Reform Man and display a sign on their lawn touting the party line "No More Prime Ministers from Quebec".

This Brings us Back To Why the Most Disadvantaged Oppose Those Wanting to Raise Them Up

Thomas Frank, the author of the best-selling book What's The Matter with Kansas ... believes that the voters' preference for emotional engagement over reasonable argument has allowed the Republican Party to blind them to their own real interests.

The Republicans have learnt how to stoke up resentment against the patronising liberal elite, all those do-gooders who assume they know what poor people ought to be thinking. Right-wing politics has become a vehicle for channelling this popular anger against intellectual snobs. [my emphasis] The result is that many of America's poorest citizens have a deep emotional attachment to a party that serves the interests of its richest.

Watch the following video and listen to how many times the Fox News personality uses terms like "elites in the media and academia", "academic circles" in a piece suggesting that Obama is a socialist.

And in condescending language, make any notions of offering a hand up, as a socialist plot. "These people believe that folks are poor because other people are rich." "Wealth redistribution" "drawing emotion from guilt, jealousy and envy" (all sins). So if God and the Republicans want to ignore the poor, it's only for their own good.

This guy even goes so far as to say that history has buried more bodies from the envy of socialism than the greed of capitalism, which of course is completely false, but they are playing to their "base". The people who should be demanding better from their government as equal citizens, instead are being led to believe that they should not be demanding anything at all.

"Glen Beck and the American people". They are on an even plane. Forget that Glen Beck works for a multi-national corporation, and earns 50 million dollars a year. He is still one of them. And those socialist academics, who are advocating for the lowest levels of society, are "elites". They don't belong to the club. It's "Glen Beck and the American people". Wink, wink.

At the Reform Party's opening assembly, many people left, especially seniors; when they realized what their policies, wrapped in a veil of ambiguity, really meant. An end to subsidies for farmers. An end to public health care. An end to unemployment insurance, Canada Pension and Old Age Security. (5) Those who stayed never really thought it through.

It was "us against them". They spoke their language. And if they felt any tinge of doubt, the Rob Ringmas would come out to remind them.

And while the Reformers preached that everyone was responsible for their own destinies, it enabled them to promote policies that hindered those destinies. The end to things like public health care and public education.

At the 1991 Reform Party Assembly, a guest speaker was William Gairdner, author of the book The Trouble with Canada, which journalist Murray Dobbin stated ".. helped lay the groundwork for Reform Party policy." (6) Reform Party policy which was then being drafted by Stephen Harper.

The Reformers gathered in Saskatoon saved perhaps the loudest cheers, whistles, and applause for Gairdner's last shot: 'And my favourite proposal, by the way, is returning choice to education by privatizing every school in the country'.(6)

Of course making all schools private, would ensure that the disadvantaged remained disadvantaged, and the country's wealthy would remain at the top, while "the poorest citizens continued to serve the interests of its richest."

Gotta' love neoconservatism, which has been dubbed "the revolt of the rich", who use the poor and disadvantaged as their foot soldiers. Brilliant. Wrong. But still brilliant.

Sources:

1. Slumming it at the Rodeo: The Cultural Roots of Canada's Right-Wing Revolution, Gordon Laird, 1998, Douglas & McIntyre, ISBN: 1-55054 627-9, Pref. xiv-xv

2. Policy from the People: Recent Developments in the USA and Canada, By Philip Ayres, Proceedings of the Fifth Conference of The Samuel Griffith Society, April 2, 1995

3. Racists, rednecks and the reform of Canada: With a poll imminent, reactionaries are out in force, By Tim Cornwell, May 26, 1997

4. Hard Right Turn: The New Face of Neo-Conservatism in Canada, By Brooke Jeffrey, Harper-Collins, 1999, ISBN: 0-00 255762-2, Pg. 318-319

5. Preston Manning and the Reform Party, By Murray Dobbin Goodread Biographies/Formac Publishing 1992 ISBN: 0-88780-161-7

6. Dobbin, 1992, Pg. 165-166