Yesterday I promised you excerpts from Allan Fotheringham's brilliant Maclean's Magazine article, June 15, 1998, titled "Government by muzzle on the Hill".
Again, as I did yesterday, wherever the Kick Zundel Reflex shows up, I will say "Bless you!" in pious hopes of diminishing it.
Here's Foth, as he is affectionately known to readers - friend and foe:
"Even more tiresome is the relentless march of the Politically Correct Army, all in lockstep, knee-jerked, always searching with keen eye for what would appear to be cleansed, laundered with Rinso, in the public mind.
"The entire Parliament of Canada - that would be the Pizza Parliament of five parties - with valorous bravery voted unanimously to bar Ernst Zundel from speaking on Parliament Hill. This is the nutter . . ."
BLESS YOU!
". . . the nutter, of course, who denies the Holocaust and wastes all our tax dollars by going through the courts when we try to shut him up."
Small but important correction, Mr. Journalist Fotheringham. Mr. Zundel pays his own way. The Holocaust Promoters waste your money.
Fotheringham: "So he calls a Press conference on Parliament Hill. So the pumped-up little pipsqueak called Don Boudria, immediately introduces a motion . . . Every proud member of Parliament, aware that their integrity, courage and intelligence was on the line, immediately fell into line like the barking seals they are. And said yessir, yessir, three bags full'." (...)
"All the pomposity raised by the mountebanks and hypocrites who flesh out the Commons benches was in full flower. Secretary of State for Multiculturalism Hedy Fry - herself an immigrant from Trinidad - cried out: "This is probably the clearest example of a united front against a hatemonger!"
BLESS YOU LIKEWISE, MISS HEDY FRY!
Fotheringham, still swinging:
"Hedy Fry might sit down and have a quiet conversation with herself. The fact that the Parliament of Canada, which has other things to contend with - including loading up its pensions - would take the time to discuss one nutbar. . . "
BLESS YOU AGAIN, MR. FOTHERINGHAM!
". . . tells you a lot about Ottawa. And the screwball Zündel?"
BLESS YOU THRICE! BLESS YOU!
"Of course, (Zundel) just took one step away from Parliament Hill and held his press conference and got six times the coverage he might have got in the first place, where no one takes him seriously, anyway."
Like Dan Quaile said when - was it Bush? - kicked him in the stomach: "That was uncalled for . . ." BUT BLESS YOU! BLESS YOU NONETHELESS!
Fotheringham:
"It's called free speech, which must be protected somewhere in the Charter of Rights - given to us by Pierre Trudeau, who believed in it so much he said "Fuddle-duddle" to a member opposite in the Commons, though his actual words were somewhat shorter."
Ingrid: We Germans have a word called "Schadenfreude" - meaning roughly "Hey, I told you so . . .!" Remember way back when - when someone called Ernst Zundel ran for Prime Minister of Canada against Trudeau? Mr. Zundel, chances are, would not have uttered "fuddle duddle", had he been voted in. He would have kept Canada clean of many things that are now befouling its landscape - including gutter language. But to get back to your astringent article (a lot of it skipped here ) where finally you speak with much respect of one John Grace, former editor of the Ottawa Journal, and whom you quote as having said: " . . . a culture of secrecy still flourishes" and ". . . the essential ethos of high swivel servants was deny, deny, deny. . . " you write - and quite courageously:
"He quotes, in his report, the mantra of an old ward heeler in New York's Tamanny Hall days: 'Never write it if you can speak; never speak it if you can nod; never nod if you can wink.'
"Which brought us, of course, to the now-inscribed-in-the-language Monty Python line, nudge-nudge, wink-wink. Everyone knows what it means, especially the hordes of ex-cabinet ministers . . . immediately appearing on Parliament Hill as pinstriped lobbyists pawing the lapels of this government that is so brave as to banish Ernst Zundel from the Parliamentary lawn.
"Political correctness will be the death of all of us. (...)
"Better to spend our time, as John Grace suggests, on more serious threats to our freedoms. He didn't mention it, but I will. In Sweden, there is a rule. Everything government does must be open - except that which has to be deemed secret. In Canada, everything remains secret - except that which is deemed open.
"These guys are despicable."
Bless you, Mr. Fotheringham, for putting the snake on the table.
Now can we count on you to do just as you say - if and when the Government of Canada, via its CSIS/SIRC apparatchniks, decides to blame Ernst Zundel for yet another ever more imaginary "hateful" deed?
Let's say, the troubles in Manchuria? The realignment of the North and South Pole? Invasion of the Martians? Causing B'nai Brith's insomnia? Destabilizing Canada?
So he can be deported?
I have one final thought for Mr. Foth: Could you have written all, and more, of the above - without nudge-nudge-wink-wink about Ernst Zundel's character?
It wasn't necessary. It added nothing to this otherwise fine article - except more canned, rehashed, recycled prejudice against a human being called Ernst Zundel, entitled to his dignity for what are his beliefs.
Like everybody else.
Ingrid
Thought for the Day:
My definition of the Kick Zundel Reflex, that odd linguistic reflex rampant across Canada if not yet the rest of the world, afflicting the finest of writers:
"The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits of the masses."
(First uttered by Eduard Bernays, nephew of Sigmund Freud.)