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 Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

Unfrozen Caveman Minister of State

by Aaron Wherry on Friday, February 11, 2011 9:25am - 50 Comments

From Julian Fantino’s remarks at a news conference with Justice Minister Rob Nicholson yesterday.

I  don’t know much about politics—I’m learning a lot—but one thing I have learned is that part of Mr. Ignatieff’s agenda is flip-flopping on critical public safety issues.

This rhetorical trick—call it the “naive insight”—was of course pioneered by Cirroc, the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer.

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  • JamesHalifax

    Secondly, one does not rise to the ranks in the police force without extensive knowledge of politics.

    • Jan

      No kidding – just ask Bill Elliot.

  • WDM

    You`re far too humble Mr. Fantino. You also learned to be a partisan hack!

    • Brian

      Bravo. Although close examination will show that he was *born* a partisan hack.

    • hollinm

      Unless of course he chose to run for the Liberal party and then he would the fountain of knowledge about crime and punishment.

      • http://intensedebate.com/people/Ottawa_Centrist Ottawa_Centrist

        No, I doubt the Liberals could have prevented him from speaking.

        • noob_goldberg

          What good is a fountain if it doesn't spout?

          • http://intensedebate.com/people/Ottawa_Centrist Ottawa_Centrist

            Good enough for the House of Commons!

            Which just leads back to your question…

      • WDM

        No. Liberals can be buffoons too. Case in point, Carolyn Bennett and the national anthem.

      • Pat

        The Liberal Party met with him and then decided they did not want him. He would not have had that particular choice on which you base your comment.

        • hollinm

          Unless you are on the inside you have no way of knowing that. Just spin? Maybe. It is quite possible that when the Libs found out Fantino had Conservative views and his position on justice issues was different than their's they may well have turned him down. However, I suspect the opposite is true. The Libs desperately wanted to hang on to that riding. They needed a star candidate and I suspect they would have allowed a camel to run if they thought it could win.

          • Jan

            The Libs almost did hang on to it…

  • Andrew (not PorC)

    Hey, we learned something new: Julian Fantino is disingenuous! Oh wait…

  • danby

    Ahhh…. such a good little soldier, our Julian Fantasia .

  • Mike T.

    Rather than being a "pioneer", wasn't Caveman lawyer a parody of naive insight in earlier lawyer dramas?

    Darn it, where's Weinman when you need him?

    • noob_goldberg

      The wiki article does mention Matlock as an example, but I've always thought that Columbo embodied that principle best.

      • DBM

        I may just be a naive country boy who doesn't understand these high fallutin' television references…but I am pretty sure Columbo's not a lawyer.

        • noob_goldberg

          Indeed, but I think Matlock was an extension of Columbo, the only difference being that Andy Griffith wore a tie and had a pot-belly.

          But I wasn't really paying attention, being so distracted as I was by this fancy "internet" thingy.

  • noob_goldberg

    I'm a huge fan of naive insight, which can be used to great effect, but Julian Fantino is no Columbo.

    There are two parts to naive insight, and although Fantino may have half of the equation, I'm not yet convinced he's mastered "insight".

    • Jan

      His 'HItler Theory' remarks pretty much ended the insight question for me.

  • MostlyCivil

    Well, he was ranking high on the truth-o-meter with the first 5 words "I don’t know much about …" but lost it with the obvious lie.

    Though he is quite likely "learning a lot", like how to stay silent until you're told you can speak. Good boy.

    • Mike T.

      "Sit, Fantino, sit! Godo boy!"

  • tedbetts

    "flip-flopping on critical public safety issues."

    You mean like supporting the gun registry and saying it saves lives one day, and then joining up with a government trying to destroy the registry?

    You mean like supporting gun control and then joining up with a government that doesn't?

    You mean like a PM that lashes out at opponents for not waiving democratic processes to rush approval of certain crime laws, but who then throws out his own crime laws by proroguing, not once, not twice but three times?

    You mean like a government that pretends to believe in law and order but continually breaks the law, ignores subpoenas, disruptst the democratic process and has now even been caught forging documents.

    The Prime Minister is the biggest flip flopping politician we have ever seen in Canada.

    • Blue

      Are you sure he is the biggest flipping flopper ever ted ?
      We have had some big flip-floppers in the past—remember Chretien and the little red book–eliminate the GST and NAFTA and all that.
      And then there was that Martin guy—he was always dithering here and there.
      And even some of the present day Liberals seem to have changed their minds on corporate tax cuts, carbon tax, Afghanistan etc.
      I`ll admit that Harper does the flip-flop sometime but he has some real competition out there for the biggest flipping-flopper of all time.

      • Be_rad

        14 years of government, and they only reneged on two major policy platforms? I'm impressed.

      • tedbetts

        Harper has flip flopped on more issues and broken more promises in 5 years than the last 5 Prime Ministers put together.

        It started from his first day in office with his appointment of an unelected senator and the appointment of a senator to cabinet where he wouldn't have to answer questions in the House. It rolled on through confidence votes on anything instead of just budgets to taxing income trusts, calling snap elections on a whim, to giving more power (not less) to Parliamentary committees and individual MPs. More of the 145 + broken promises here.

        In fact, other than GST, the Conservative platform of 2006 is more a pretty good and comprehensive list of broken promises than it is a set of objectives the Conservatives had.

        • Blue

          Oh ted, I thought you might want to back off a little on your Harper Rant, if I conceded that he certainly does change his mind on some things, however, a reasonable person would know he is following a long line of former and present politicans utilizing what they like to call the " principled pragmatic approach ".

          But you are like a machine with those lists—-pardon me if I did not follow your link to the 145 + list—I am sure you have already covered them in previous posts.

        • Blue

          OK—My curiosity got the better of me and I went to the 145+ link——Are you guys a bunch of idiots?—-Do you really think you can run off a list of siily accusations, most of which were caused by a disruptive opposition, and convince people that Harper is to blame for all that ails you ? The least you could do would be to prioritize your complaints to a few of those broken promises that are most obvious to people. But, like Liberals, you are trying to be all things to all people and you end up looking disjointed and all over the map.

          By the way might I suggest a 146 complaint—-Harper promised to get rid of the vote subsidy and darn it, he didn`t. Maybe if he had you guys woud not have had the funds to comPILE such a steaming bit of silliness.

          • tedbetts

            Truth hurts doesn't it.

            Personally, I agree that the list could use some refining, splitting out the rank hypocrisies, the abandoned principles and the outright flip flops/broken promises.

            But the bottom line is that he has been nothing but a long string of broken promises and flip flops, no matter how much you folks try to pass the buck to others. Harper has broken more promises in 5 years than the last 5 Prime Ministers put together over 26 years.

            As for the subsidy, the Conservatives are the most subsidized federal party by far. But again, to be clear, that falls under the category of "Duplicious, Two Faced, Self-Serving Hypocrisies" and not "Broken Promises".

      • Richard_S_Argent

        I do love how you conservative types are still furious with Chretien for not abolishing a tax that was implemented by the Progressive Conservatives.

        Do you guys really think that if you whine long and loud enough that we'll forget it was Mulroney who gave it to us?

  • Blue

    It is worth a trip back on SNL youtube to check out the look of Hartman`s Caveman, specifically the eyebrows.

    I`m surprised Wherry didn`t connect the eerie resemblance of the Caveman to the subject of Fantino`s comment.

    • noob_goldberg

      Perhaps, had Chretien not restricted corporate political donations, Geico could have sponsored the Liberal campaign.

      "Prime Minister. So easy, a caveman could do it."

  • gottabesaid

    I'm new to crime statistics and law-and-order agendas. Their strange numbers and figures frighten and confuse me and my unfrozen caveman brain. I get scared and begin banging on my computer until my hands are numb and I fall asleep in a heap at my desk. I mean, I'm a caveman! I don't understand your strange ways. But I do know this: the Conservative government has thus far failed to prove that their minimum sentencing requirements are going to have a correspondingly positive impact on incidences of crime.

    • Dave

      But what will be their impact un UNREPORTED crime?

      • gottabesaid

        Listen, unreported crime is foreign and bewildering to me. The only thing I know about reporting crime is bellowing and chasing after the thief with a club or large rock until I get my hunk of mammoth meat back. That's all I know. Unreported crime is simply a baffling and terrifying concept which is beyond my ability to comprehend with my caveman brain. However, this I do know: increasing mandatory minimum sentences cannot have an impact on unreported crime, since in order for those sentences to be applied, a successful reporting of the crime, followed by a successful prosecution of the crime, must take place.

  • MostlyCivil

    Don't you need at least an hour to "flip" before you get to "flop"?

  • tedbetts

    I think Fortier was announced even before Emerson.

    (Technically, Emerson was not a Harper flip flop but a Conservative one, since Harper was always careful to not say he opposed floor crossing. I will give him that one.)

  • chet

    Mr. Wherry,

    Thank you for the tacit admission that WHAT Fantino is saying about Iggy's is absolutly true,

    the only quarrel being with HOW Fantino says it.

    • TimesArrow

      Like much else, you have no idea what a tacit admission means do you?

      • chet

        A personal attack?

        Against a conservative commenter who dares to be critical of the uber liberal host?

        Is it 2:00 pm at the hornet's nest?

  • chet

    And while there's a chance Canadians care more about the speaking style of a particular MP, over the fact that Iggy (the man who's applying to be Prime Minister) seems practically incapable of elucidating a firm position on anything of substance, including on grave matters of our public safety,

    it is a very, very small chance indeed.

    • tedbetts

      As opposed to Harper who comes up with firm positions on all matters every day. The problem being that they are completely opposite to the firm position he took the day before.

      As Rick Mercer put it: "Conservative Policies: Always 20 minutes Fresh".
      [youtube pSn32irCQ0I http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSn32irCQ0I youtube]

  • tedbetts

    Fantino does realize he's working for the biggest flip flopping promise breaker of a PM we've ever had, doesn't he?

    Say Anything Steve has broken more promises in 5 years than the last 5 Prime Ministers have in 26 years.

    Or, as Rick Mercer puts it, "Conservative Policies: Always 20 minutes Fresh".
    [youtube pSn32irCQ0I http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSn32irCQ0I youtube]

  • chet

    "Conservatives fail to prove"…that putting more criminals behind bars will result in less crime.

    Apparently the basic logic of a criminal who's behind bars cannot committ more offences while he's there, is not "nuanced" enough for our progressive friends,

    who apparently need some left leaning social sceintific study to validate whatever position they advocate, regardless of the gymnastic logical contortions that result.

    I suspect if a far left liberal professor who's basked in progressivism his entire adult life,

    came up with a study that showed that people don't feel wet when they go in water, it would be considered gospel if it advanced the right agenda.

    Now, where's that study on how we're supposed to be cooking in greehouse gas filled heat by now….er…now…uhm…manifested in continent wide deep freezes.

    • Richard_S_Argent

      Probably some far left liberal professor from Lakehead, right chiff?

    • Matlock

      Why don't you post that Friis-Christensen (1991) article again? That was a real winner.

      • chet

        Strangely silent as to the several other more recent studies that followed, eh? Again, thank you for the tacit admission that the "science" behind AGW is well past the due date, and that recent advances in science come nowhere near close to attibuting climate to man made events.

    • gottabesaid

      Well, chet, they put more people in jail in the U.S., at great cost, and crime didn't go down. I know it's a bit counterintuitive, but until you can lay your hands on somebody who isn't connected to your government who says that they're on the right track, well, you're blowin' smoke, my friend.

      Oh, how's your courageous government doing on the whole 'global warming is a liberal hoax' thing? Still holding that in to hold on to votes?

  • wellwell

    Fantino knows something the Liberals don't – edumacation makes you stupid (or at least nuanced, which is the same thing).

  • TimesArrow

    fantino does humble just about as well as he does aggrieved and slighted – over the top.

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