Sami beat me to the punch, but it’s worth publicly repeating. Garth Turner, MP for the Halton Constituency in Milton, Ontario, was booted out of the Conservative Party yesterday. For blogging. An elected member of parliament was Dooced.
Here’s the comment I posted on Sami’s blog, but I want to repeat it here as well (in case someone like the MP for my riding happens to see it):
It’s strange. This is our Government, and they boot someone out for documenting meetings and voicing honest opinions. Isn’t that what we do every day? Isn’t that what we should expect, even demand, from our representatives? The MPs represent US, not Harper. They have (IMO) an obligation to be honest (and open, and public) participants, not party mouthpieces.
Turner was booted out because he was openly communicating with his constituents, even when he disagreed with the Prime Minister (who happens to be the leader of the party to which Turner was a member).
We need more people like Garth Turner, who put the people ahead of power. Who believe it’s more important to be open and honest than to tow the party line. Politicians aren’t on The Hill for their own purposes. Nor are they there to serve their Party. They are there to represent us, the citizens of this kick-ass country. One way to do that effectively is to communicate. Blog the hell out of meetings. Politics is a conversation, and all of that Cluetrain stuff.
Now, if he’d have been blogging in-camera sessions, that might be a different thing. If he’d posted Top Secret Plans For Canada’s Troops in Afghanistan or something, I could see sanctions. But from what I’ve seen, he’s simply been posting his thoughts and critiques of his own government’s actions and policies. Which is his right to do, but apparently not as a member of the Conservative Party.
Sami beat me to the punch, but it’s worth publicly repeating. Garth Turner, MP for the Halton Constituency in Milton, Ontario, was booted out of the Conservative Party yesterday. For blogging. An elected member of parliament was Dooced.
Here’s the comment I posted on Sami’s blog, but I want to repeat it here as well (in case someone like the MP for my riding happens to see it):
It’s strange. This is our Government, and they boot someone out for documenting meetings and voicing honest opinions. Isn’t that what we do every day? Isn’t that what we should expect, even demand, from our representatives? The MPs represent US, not Harper. They have (IMO) an obligation to be honest (and open, and public) participants, not party mouthpieces.
Turner was booted out because he was openly communicating with his constituents, even when he disagreed with the Prime Minister (who happens to be the leader of the party to which Turner was a member).
We need more people like Garth Turner, who put the people ahead of power. Who believe it’s more important to be open and honest than to tow the party line. Politicians aren’t on The Hill for their own purposes. Nor are they there to serve their Party. They are there to represent us, the citizens of this kick-ass country. One way to do that effectively is to communicate. Blog the hell out of meetings. Politics is a conversation, and all of that Cluetrain stuff.
Now, if he’d have been blogging in-camera sessions, that might be a different thing. If he’d posted Top Secret Plans For Canada’s Troops in Afghanistan or something, I could see sanctions. But from what I’ve seen, he’s simply been posting his thoughts and critiques of his own government’s actions and policies. Which is his right to do, but apparently not as a member of the Conservative Party.
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Garth Turner for PM ?????? You have got to be kidding. Turner is nothing more that a big mouth hypocrite. He is full of himself and has no end of garbage coming out of his mouth. Turner is a poor example of an MP and despite what he says, he is a blabber mouth and a moron. The Cons did the right by getting rid of Turner as he was a liability to the party.
I live in Milton, close to Turners office. We can’t stand him around here. He will have his ass put in a sling when the next election comes.
OK. Turner _may_ be an ass. I don’t know him. What I was trying to get at is that we need people who are openly sharing information while in office, as opposed to those who treat policy and procedures as National Secrets. I’ll have to take your word that Turner isn’t actually PM-worthy, but I’d still love to see a PM that blogged or at least had meaningful discussions with citizens.
Garth Turner should be our next Prime Minister, as he knows what is going on, and he has the guts to stand up and talk about it. Unfortunately, he is in the wrong Party, be it Conservative, Liberal, NDP, the Greens, the Rhinos, etc. You get the picture. There is only one Canadian political party that is telling Canadians what is really going on, and that is the Canadian Action Party, organized by Paul Hellyer, and currently lead by Connie Fogal, but she is stepping down as Leader in August, 2008, and if I could convince Garth to read their website at http://www.canadianactionparty.com, he would see that his ideas are their policies. I am a member of the Canadian Action Party, looking for a leader to lead our country away from the North American Union that will happen in the next two years, and Canadians stand to lose their assets, their sovereignty, and their Freedoms, when we are controlled by the American Government. You think I am kidding, visit my website at http://www.CAPtaincanadacrusades.ca and act accordingly in your own lives.
CAPtain Canada