Blogging MP Turner: disqualified
p2pnet.net News:- In an email to p2pnet, ex-Conservative MP Garth Turner hinted at interesting things to come.
Turner was unceremoniously tossed out out of the Tory party for, among other things, speaking his mind. Online. That and saying his constitutents’ interests come before the party’s.
“Now, as an Independent MP, I`ll be able to explore how a politician can actually concentrate on representing Canadians, instead of promoting a party platform to them,” he told us. “It might just be a refreshing change.”
Refreshing indeed and yesterday, at a press conference, Turner, “waved three letters he received from the Conservative brass that say he will not be permitted to run as a Conservative candidate in the next election,” says The Globe & Mail.
“This raises more questions about the role of the average Canadian in the political process and their ability to choose their own representatives – and about the government’s commitment, of course, to openness, transparency and accountability,” the story has him saying, adding, in what has to be the understatement of the 21st centruy, that it’s a problem endemic to all political parties.
The party brass refused to say why he was dumped, “or provide evidence to support it, or come clean on why they`d decided in secret I will be disqualified as the nominated candidate and in fact banned from running for the Tories again,” blogs Turner.
“Apparently not content to kill me once (kicked of caucus last month), they killed me again last Friday (no longer a candidate, and never to be one).”
He goes on:
So my press conference this afternoon was an act of defiance, and I hoped the media people would understand that it was not just all about me. And I think they did. I know, for a fact, the PMO got it.
That became obvious on CTV three hours after my event, when a Harper spokesperson, during a panel discussion on me, took untruthfulness to a giddy new height. Turner had to be turfed from caucus, he said, since he sat there and punched what people were saying into his Blackberry and sent it to his blog.
Holy crap! At least tell a credible lie, bud. The evil whip`s people confiscate Berries at the caucus room door, and the RCMP say they have a block on transmissions from that room. Besides, that guy had never been in caucus.
But I digress. Attacks like that by yet another overpaid, over-juiced, unaccountable, backroom spin doctor show in spades exactly what`s wrong with this political system. MPs attacked by staffers. No free votes in the House. No policy debates in caucus. The leader threatening his followers. A ban on talking to the media. Neutered committees. Broken promises. Big machine.
So, I`m done with that. Quit the party today. I`ll make the most of my Indie status and work to be the best MP I can. I will also be tireless in my attempts to get this damn political system fixed. I`ve vowed to look into legal action again the secret skulkers, to bring in a private member`s bill giving Independents the same rights as other MPs (like being able to issue tax receipts for donations) and to travel around and talk to anybody who wants to lend support to this cause.
Then I finally came home, and dropped into The Dickens pub in Milton, where I climbed to the second floor and found the inaugural meeting of the Independent Electoral District Association of Halton a dozen smiling defectors from the local Conservative board. And I got hugged.
Also See:
email to p2pnet – Garth Turner: no apologies, November 13, 2006
The Globe & Mail – Ex-Tory embraces newfound ‘influence’, November 15, 2006
blogs – Quiting Time, November 15, 2006
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