An appropriate bumper sticker for the Harper government right now? “Ship asbestos—not drugs.” The Conservative defeat of a bill that was intended to make it easier to provide life-saving pharmaceuticals to Africa has made one thing obvious: Conservatives want Africans to die. By squelching Bill C-398, they have just condemned countless African men, women and children to slow, miserable deaths.
The usual big-business-supporting knee-jerk? No. Big Pharma did not oppose the bill. Another agenda entirely was at work.
When we look at the shameful record of the Harper Conservatives since 2006—colour-coding our citizens, marooning dark-skinned Canadians in other countries (but providing jet travel back for white ones), clearing the way to send deadly asbestos to the Third World to kill workers there, and now deliberately refusing medicine to the dying—an ugly pattern emerges. There is no other explanation but the obvious one.
We should not forget or ignore Minister of Immigration Jason Kenney’s publicly-expressed hatred for the Roma people, or his personal admiration for wartime atrocity-mongers.
One might also add to this toxic mix the government’s strident, blaring opposition to a Palestinian state: in an alternate universe, would the Harper government oppose statehood for Israel, telling desperate Jews to work it out with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem? But Palestinians, to quote one late Israeli leader, are no more than “drugged cockroaches in a bottle.” This government evidently concurs.
The motives of Conservatives in the House of Commons have been bubbling to the surface like methane in a swamp for six years, but many have just wished it all away. It is now impossible to make any further excuses: last night, in dramatic fashion, the Harper government finally tore away its own mask.