Overkill


Sad and frustrating all at the same time…

Restraint
Restraint
Restraint

The only three Rs I could care about in times like these.

Let me get this straight: the education minister quits as a result of the impasse what with the student strike.

She’s replaced by the old education minister, who is already the head of the treasury board as well as the deputy premier. The crisis has no conclusion in sight.

So why was she allowed to up and quit?

There ought to be penalties against this – how many times have various politicians, cabinet ministers, presidents of public universities or public transit agencies simply walked out on the job (in some cases collecting major severance packages) without facing their critics and any potential lawsuits heading their way?

It’s sad that she felt compelled to leave as a result of the student strike. It infuriates me that Charest would accept that. What kind of message are they sending to the youth of Québec? Is the strike working in that its forcing ministers to quit? Will this not encourage students (and the myriad anti-government organizations going along for the ride) to press on?

And it’s not like it will change anything. Both sides have dug in their heels, without wanting to give an inch. At a certain point standing by your convictions becomes hopelessly futile and anti-productive. Refusing to negotiate with a lunatic despot is one thing. Charest hardly qualifies, he can be negotiated with.

Now I’m less certain though – allowing Beauchamp to resign her post means he has to come back to the table even more stubborn than before. And now the more militant core of the protest movement may feel their tactics are working.

All of this is leaving the general public in a hopeless state – if the government can’t do anything to resolve the crisis, what do the students propose we should do? It’s not like they have any better answer than ‘give in’.

Ideally, education should be 100% state funded, but that won;t happen with the current government and I can guarantee you won’t happen under any péquiste government either. The student movement could be working out a brilliant solution to this mess, but they can’t seem to do more than bully those who disagree with them.

Not to mention pissing off the general public. Last week’s Métro smoke-bombing was idiotic to say the least. Take it as an indicator the general public is losing faith in the student leadership and the movement as a whole – the cops used social media and found a plethora of willing tattle-tales to rat out these presumed free-tuition fighters.

But now they may face a terrorism charge, and five years in one of El Presidente Harper’s ‘supermax prisons for leftist intellectual re-education’. Okay, I’ll admit it – they haven’t yet settled on the new name.

A terrorism charge? For a smoke bomb you can pick up at any military supply store?

They didn’t kill anyone. No one was hurt. The economy didn’t grind to a halt.

All they did was piss Montrealers off and lose credibility.

It almost makes me think they should be let go, but that’s not right either. Five years of community service, helping young immigrant kids learn how to speak French… now there’s an idea I’m certain would make almost everyone happy.

And finally in this cavalcade of excess: Victoriaville, and the SQ’s annual attempt to remind everyone that yes, indeed, they are still the thugs we know and loathe from Oka.

All of this is leading me to an awful conclusion. When it comes time for the next provincial election, my choice will be between a bunch of closet social conservatives who smell to high hell of collusion, nepotism and myopic ‘nation-building’ policies, and Jean Charest’s inept PLQ.

Why do we do this to ourselves? We were once so very great.