Saturday 21 May 2011

The Big Picture

Once more, go read Alison at Creekside: The North American-Made Energy Security Act to admire how she neatly connects all the dots.

So my question is: were the robocalls in support of Con candidates, for the purpose of MASSIVELY infuriating and mis-directing Canadian voters during the federal election funded by Koch Industries?

The calls came from a US location. Elections Canada has no jurisdiction or no mandate to investigate this form of illicit campaign contribution. Though the flurry of calls were fast and furious, and their purpose was to discourage electors from voting for anyone but the Contempt Party, it would be difficult to pin this disruptive tactic on them.

While the calls clearly targeted specific households in certain ridings - which makes one wonder who provided the robocallers with annotated Canadian electoral lists - where to start looking in order to make the connection between Koch Industries money, the undeclared contributions and the Contempt Party war-room?

11 comments:

West End Bob said...

were the robocalls in support of Con candidates . . . during the federal election funded by Koch Industries?

While listening to a CBC Radio report on the election "irregularities" I had the same thought, deBeauxOs.

If I were a wagering person, it would probably be a safe bet that the answer is "Yes" . . . .

Anonymous said...

Ditto me. The answer is yes.

Beijing York said...

I wouldn't doubt it.

Koch Brothers front group

Beijing York said...

Link fail:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Americans_for_Prosperity

Anonymous said...

Did the calls *definitely* come from a US location? The articles I read on the CBC said CBC (or someone else that wasn't either the RCMP or the telephone company) traced the phone numbers to the states, or to Montreal, or wherever. That means they were going off of the caller-id, which can be faked. VOIP providers, for one example, do this on purpose all the time.

If a call isn't traced (and the phone companies only provide the results of the traces to the RCMP, who may or may not even want them) then you can't be sure where the call came from.

Of course, republican-style dirty tricks plus being out of the country to make it hard/impossible to prosecute equals american robo-callers makes a lot of sense, even without hard evidence.

West End Bob said...

Thanks for the Source Watch link, BY - Good stuff . . . .

deBeauxOs said...

Since Cdn journalists don't appear to have the curiosity, the courage or the resources to investigate who funded the Contempt Party's robocalls, can we convince Amy Goodman at Democracy Now to find out if Koch Industries did?

Sixth Estate said...

I distinctly remember it being reported that some calls came from Montreal, and others from the States. Elections Canada might not have the authority to check out the calls coming from the States.

That would make it foreign interference in the election, though. Presumably someone has the authority to investigate that. Of course, it might require the approval of our government and the agreement of the FBI. So you know how that investigation's going to turn out.

Orwell's Bastard said...

There ain't gonna be no stinkin' investigation!

deBeauxOs said...

Good point. Right now, it would take a well-funded Democracy Now-styled project to pick up the Cons' Dirty Tricks Rock and see what scurries out from underneath. Wonder if George Soros has any loose change in those deep pockets of his?

BTW, Orwell's Bastard, you're one hell of a shameless, self-promoting hussy, arent't you?

;^)

Orwell's Bastard said...

I learned from the best, darling. Not as if Comrade Fyrnova plugged my link to her post about the asshole cop or anything.

Speaking of which, who's chopped liver now?

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