The G20 Consensus: The Advent of Post-Structural Adjustmentism
By Quentin Albatross

The leaders of the twenty most economically powerful nations in the world met in Washington D.C. on Saturday to discuss tentative collaborative action to stem the recessionary pressures of the global credit crisis. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper was pleased with the results, stating that “despite the great diversity of countries in the room for those two days of the summit, there was a practically unanimous agreement on all major topics."

Ever since the beginning of the financial meltdown, there has been increasing pressure on politicians to renounce what is known as the neoclassical economic model. Critics on the left blame neoclassicism for the ballooning economic crisis, as financial deregulation is one of its hallmark features; deregulation has taken a lot of flak as of late. Shockingly, some of the G20 leaders – most notably, French President Nicolas Sarkozy – seemed to concede to this ideological critique, and attempted to begin to form a new economic ethos for the twenty-first century.

Maintaining the tradition of French intellectuals, Sarkozy gave a rather vague lecture to the media after the meeting in an attempt to define the new economic ethos. “Perhaps something has occurred in the history of the concept of neoclassical economics that could be called a ‘recession,’ if this loaded word did not entail a meaning which it is precisely the function of neoclassical – or neoclassicist – thought to reduce or to suspect,” he began distractedly. “But let me use the term ‘recession’ anyway, employing it with caution and as if in quotation marks. In this sense, this recession will have the exterior form of a rupture and a redoubling.”

After speaking for roughly six and a half hours, an English translator took his place at the podium and muttered, “Well, basically, he says that everything is really complicated and we shouldn’t rely on universal models to approach diverse and unique economic problematics.”

The speech was met with the disapproval of a significant portion of those who claim to have actually understood the totality of what Sarkozy said. Those on the left argued that Sarkozy’s renunciation of a “universal centre” provided no basis for any economic action to stop the bleeding caused by the credit crisis. "Even worse," stammered an anonymous neoconservative, "the subjective nature of Sarkozy's model carries the taint of protectionist sentiment!"

The French President was unavailable for comment, but his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy pacified most of the critics by stating that she would confiscate his collection of Derrida essays and make him read some Camus or Sartre.

Breaking Down the Vote
By Quentin Albatross

The 2008 United States Presidential election set new precedents across the board. Americans voted in record numbers; many of them for the first time. President-elect Obama managed to raise more funds than he could spend, and most of it came from contributions under $200. Perhaps just as remarkable was the amount of polling and analysis provided by the media. There were almost as many polls conducted in October 2008 as there were for the entire duration of the 2004 election. And the analysis available to TV viewers on election night was stunning.

For example, CNN systematically broke down voting trends into various demographics. President-elect Obama won over the youth, while McCain won over the elderly; Obama wooed African Americans and Latin Americans, while McCain wooed Caucasians; the list goes on.

There was actually so much data that a lot of it went unreported due to time constraints. Most notably, the pollsters and pundits largely ignored the philosophical identifications of voters. The data is confusing at times and often ambiguous, but it does manage to provide some insight into the mind of the American voter.

Unsurprisingly, voters who identified themselves as existentialists voted unanimously in favour of the Democratic candidate, Barrack Obama. On the other hand, a shocking 70% of those who claimed to be advocates of Jean-Jacques Rousseau opted for the Republican candidate, John McCain. The Rousseau cohort was fairly confident that the McCain-Palin ticket would inevitably bring about a “return to nature” via further economic liberalization, as well as the prospect of war with Russia.

The post-structuralists leaned heavily in favour of Obama, but a significant portion also claimed to have deliberately destroyed their ballots. Meanwhile, Neo-Platonists, Machiavellians, objectivists and nihilists voted overwhelmingly for McCain. The former three groups cited individual liberty as their primary motivator, while the latter group stated that the name McCain “sounded cool.”

The Nietzscheaen vote was split in half, but this is not out of the ordinary given the ambiguous nature of Nietzsche’s work. In fact, this demographic might be statistically unreliable, as a recent survey of self-proclaimed Nietzscheaens found that most of them had only ever read isolated Nietzsche quotations on Wikipedia, which they took entirely out of context.

Curiously, Kantians were moved by Obama’s universal maxim of hope, but were also one of the largest cohorts of Ralph Nader supporters. Pollsters refrained from asking why this was, as Kantians are generally dull and unpleasant.

In the end, it may be the anti-theorists who offer the most insight in this demographic analysis. Perhaps the classification of American voters into demographic cohorts is unimportant, and worse yet, misleading. By reducing Americans to a collection of “isms,” one might neglect the importance of that fact that the nation has democratically elected a President who appears to be, despite the inherent limitations of his many “isms,” a fundamentally good man.

American Jobs Already Being Destroyed by the “Radical Left”
By Sally Purple

While Barrack Obama won the American election by a hefty margin on Tuesday night, a significant portion of Americans are distraught. Republican supporters worry that the President-elect’s plans will involve significant taxation, and that this will cause American jobs to disappear. But even before President-elect Obama has had the chance to begin this alleged taxation binge, Americans have begun to blame job losses on him.

Political cartoonist Ernesto Savage was laid off from one of the biggest daily newspaper firms just one day after the election. His former employer claimed that it was no longer feasible to employ political cartoonists.

“And it’s true!” Savage exclaims. “Cartoonists make people laugh by exaggerating politician’s features. What am I supposed to draw? Big lips? An afro? My career is ruined because of Obama!”

Republicans have rallied behind Mr. Savage, who has been aptly dubbed “Joe Cartoonist”.

Harper Names New Cabinet
By Sally Purple

Last Thursday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper unveiled the new Canadian Ministry -- there were some major changes. Most notably, Canada's new old cabinet now features a significantly larger number of women, as well as more ministers from Ontario. Most of the prominent MP's from Harper's first Ministry either stayed in place or were shuffled to different jobs. After swearing their oaths and posing for photographs, the Cabinet Ministers were led to a secret underground location and were placed under lock and key. They are not expected to be heard from again, barring the hypothetical scenario in which they would participate in another Ministry unveiling ceremony at some point in the future.

The Canadian Renaissance
By Quentin Albatross

Within the first month of being re-elected, Prime Minister Harper has responded to those who have criticized his cuts to the arts. The leader of Canada's new old government has sent us a selection of his own Haiku poetry to demonstrate that he does truly have a passion for the arts. He was adamant that we publish them post haste, threatening to cut our funding if we failed to oblige. And so without further ado we present the poetry of Canada's new old Prime Minister, Stephen Harper.


I shake my son's hand:
Old enough for life in jail
Is too old for hugs


Liberals passing
Purge the senate and be free
Birth of true freedom


I lowered taxes
Rise Nietzschean Superman
Bask in my haven


Heroic: the sheer
Coldness of my demeanour
Fights global warming


Harper was so pleased with the fruits of his labour that he also requested his Haiku poetry to be posted regularly in his very own sidebar. "Harper's Haiku" can now be found on the left-hand side of the site. You won't want to miss it.

Dion Quixote: A Eulogy
By Ayn Radcliffe

Is it possible to lose faith in democracy based on mere reason alone? More importantly, would such reason be justified? I ask this question in a very limited context – the death of Dion's political career. It was argued that Dion was not a man of conviction. He was portrayed by his critics as an indecisive and panicky man who was not fit to order from Baskin Robbins, let alone run a nation.

And yet here was a candidate who was willing to stand by the carbon tax, an unpopular proposition, throughout the entire election campaign. In doing so, he may have sacrificed any hope of furthering his political career. Perhaps Canada needed “indecisive,” given this example of adherence to what was, as will be demonstrated, a categorical imperative.

Dion was of a rare breed – I believe that he was, in fact, a knight of reason. A knight of reason is one who acts on maxims that he or she would wish to serve as a universal law. But are not all politicians knights of reason if such a person were to be based on this definition? I hold it that they are not. Rather, the likes of Layton and Harper fall into another category, one which stands in opposition to the knight of reason – the fool.

The fool preoccupies himself with accepting populist maxims in order to make personal gains. The knight of reason, on the other hand, faces the paradox of the windmill. That is, in order to create a more sustainable future, one must build windmills. And yet to do so, one must fight the populist giant, which is, in fact, a windmill.

How does one create that which it must destroy? Kantian logic would suggest that the paradox can only be solved by adherence to the categorical imperative – the carbon tax. It taxes pollution in order to allow for the construction of windmills, while it reduces income taxes simultaneously in order to pacify the fool, and thus vanquishes the windmills.

In Stephane Dion Canada had a candidate who was willing to create and destroy windmills in the name of the categorical imperative. He was a knight of reason, and Canadians rejected him in favour of yet another fool. While this may cause one to lose faith in the democratic process, Kantians must stand by it with fervor. After all, democracy is the only political system that one would desire to be universal. Thus, democracy is, like the carbon tax, a categorical imperative. The fact that one categorical imperative has annulled another is the paradox of the windmill that Canadians must examine in the wake of the death of Dion Quixote.

Throughout Dion's brief Liberal Party leadership role Canadians told him that he was delusional – the carbon tax was a bad idea. Perhaps in the next election, with Dion's perilous quest at an end, it will be time to tell him that he was right all along. Next election, I urge all Canadians to take a hard look at the leadership candidates and elect the knight of reason, whoever it may be. I, for one, have had enough of fools.

Greenspan Admits Error
By Sally Purple

Three years after an eighteen year career of advocating the power of the free market and eliminating financial regulations, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan has admitted that his free-market ideology was at least “partially” wrong. This admission was made before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, who grilled him on Thursday in the wake of the global credit crisis.

“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity, myself included, are in a state of shocked disbelief,” he stated. Democratic representatives badgered Greenspan for hours, attempting to distance themselves from any possible involvement in the crisis themselves.

He later made an appearance at the House Committee on Scapegoating and Unwillingness to Prevent Future Catastrophes, where he placed all of the blame on irresponsible bankers. Said bankers are to appear before the committee on Friday where they are expected to blame consistently low interest rates, competition with China, and Margaret Atwood.

"The Carbon Tax Is Dead"
By Quentin Albatross

The pundits agree: Dion's failure in the election symbolizes the Canadian rejection of a carbon tax. No matter that 230 economists and 120 prominent scientists publicly stated that it was a sound idea -- the people were simply not willing to change their lifestyles to create a more sustainable economy.

"Dion just didn't convince me that it was a good idea," stated Caron Thingbit, who voted for the NDP. "Why punish the kitchen table? Consumers aren't degrading the environment to the point of collapse, it's the corporations! We need real regulation! Kitchen table!"

An anonymous Conservative Party voter, on the other hand, argued that "the economy is knowledge-based and no longer requires the environment to function -- thus, the carbon tax has no basis in reality." Upon seeing that our reporter did not immediately agree with him, he spat at her, and then accused her of being a radical CBC employee.

Another interview subject rejected both of these arguments as aspects of "the herd mentality." "Don't you see?" he bellowed loud enough to draw a crowd. "The carbon tax is dead! The carbon tax remains dead! And we have killed it. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was sanest and most sensible of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?" He then ran into a fountain in the park and attempted to "purify himself" before he was wrestled away by Toronto police officers.

This publication holds that while the loud man was at least correct to a certain degree, he will likely be misinterpreted by the majority of people for years to come -- the carbon tax will continue to remain "as dead as a Dion," or so the saying goes.

The Cliché Shift

The Liberals have announced a novel and resourceful plan to fund their spending programs: a Liberal government would tax only those citizens whose dollars are not hard-earned. "I like Mr Dion a lot," said Damian Quince of Kitchener. "I know Harper and them want to protect me from Liberal tax hikes, and I guess I'd care if I worked up a sweat fifty hours a week so I could afford luxury home appliances, but really I'm a lazy git. I'm lucky money comes easy just because I have a suit and I can type stuff. So I really don't begrudge Dion a share of my earnings, if he thinks he needs it to feed the homeless or buy textbooks or something."

For some reason the plan has not gone over well in Alberta's oil industry.

--Richard Clyde

Belated Election Day Report
By Maxwell Frederickson and Angel McCloud

Last Tuesday was the Canadian Federal election, and even though the results have been well-known for some time, there remains to be told another side of the story – the people's story. What the corporate media would like for you to believe is that Stephane Dion’s Liberals lost both because the public lacked faith in Dion’s leadership capabilities, and he failed to properly explain his highly controversial Green Shift. What they failed to tell you was the truth – Dion’s loss was, in fact, the first telltale sign of the coming proletariat revolution.

Politics are being polarized across the globe. In Latin America there is a growing leftist trend, while in almost every wealthy nation in the Global North the neoclassical capitalists are tightening their grip on ideology as a whole. The fascists of the 21st century have no need for explicit coercion, as the bourgeoisie are readily joining with, or giving up their freedom to a small aristocratic elite. The ideological center is being moved to the right by the corporations and their army of mathematicians, and the bourgeoisie are blind to the mechanics of their slavery. The middle class is disappearing, and soon there will only be the workers and the capitalists – class warfare will ensue.

This is notably true in Canada, where the bourgeoisie have sewn the seeds of their own demise by re-electing the neoconservative technocrat Stephen Harper. The true lovers of freedom, Marxists such as us, were dancing in the streets upon Harper’s victory. You would think it would be otherwise, but it was so. The move of the political nexus from center to right will inevitably push the workers to the left as their rights are further and further abused by the rightist elite. The triumph of freedom and the proletariat is inevitable, as it is rooted in history.

Alas, we are not here to preach theory, as history will prove us right in the near future regardless of whether we are believed or not. Rather, we have a report from the front lines that urgently needs to be presented to the people. We hope that in seeing this report, the people might understand the inevitability of the revolution, and they may then choose to fight with the workers, and not the oppressors. On election night, we camouflaged ourselves in the garb of the middle class and casually observed the goings on of a typical voting station in the suburbs of the GTA. Here are our original tape-recorded musings, dutifully typed up for your reading pleasure.


Maxwell: We have just arrived at the voting station. It is ten past five, and there is currently a steady trickle of voters coming and going.

Angel: One woman who just entered is pushing a stroller and holding the hand of her son. She is wearing a stylish blue blouse and a short black skirt, has her hair tied up, and is covered in a fine layer of makeup.

Maxwell: No doubt a Conservative voter, Angel.

Angel: Most certainly. Her husband, who in all probability beats her, has actually just strutted into the room with an oppressive air. He is now guiding her gently towards the correct voting station, and inevitably to her sad demise.

Maxwell: Yes, capitalism has the female sex in a precarious state indeed. An elderly gentleman has just now left a voting booth and inserted his ballot into a box, and is now ambling towards the exit with a smug grin on his face.

Angel: He must be at least sixty, and is wearing a very comfortable cotton sweater. And he certainly must be comfortable after sixty years of living off of the plight of the workers. The oppression is just dripping from the walls, Maxwell.

Maxwell: And speaking of oppression, one of the apparently “unbiased” Elections Canada employees has just beckoned a confused looking young professional female towards his table.

Angel: Yes, yes I see it all, Maxwell. I can only imagine what horrible, oppressive lies he is telling her right now! Perhaps he is encouraging a vote for lower taxes and deregulation, all of the hallmarks of the Conservative Party. Or, worse yet, perhaps he is suggesting a strategic vote for the Liberals in order to fend off the neo-con reactionaries, and also the ensuing proletarian revolution!

Maxwell: One can only imagine the oppression that poor woman feels as she calmly walks towards the voting booth with her election ballot in hand.

Angel: Mind you, it’s her own fault for propelling the inherently unjust mechanisms of capitalism in the name of accumulating private property!

Maxwell: Yes indeed, Angel. She herself bears all of the marks of a scrutinizing, self-interested member of the bourgeoisie who lacks any empathy whatsoever. It is truly sad.

Angel: But look! A grizzled, middle-aged man has just entered the room in denim jeans, a weathered black t-shirt and a denim vest.

Maxwell: Perhaps a representative of the working class, isolated here in the suburbs amongst the tyranny of the bourgeoisie?

Angel: He could very well be, Maxwell! Oh, wait, what’s this button on his vest? Ah, that’s a shame.

Maxwell: What is it?

Angel: His button says, “Soft on crime doesn’t work.” Sadly, this man has been oppressed to the point of corruption and will be voting for the neo-cons tonight.

Maxwell: What a pity. It seems that some of the proletariat still lack class consciousness, and will remain divided until they see one another as comrades in the historical class conflict designed to render them impotent before the forces of capitalism.

Angel: Uh oh, we’re being pointed at. It seems that one of the agents of oppression has heard our conversation and is gathering a posse of reactionaries to expel us from the building.

Maxwell: Let us leave then, with dignity, before they have a chance to oppress our freedom to be here.


And so we left with looks of consternation, mulling over the state of affairs in this so-called “democracy” of ours. We can only hope that this article, this revelation, will open the eyes of the people, and that the people will not be coerced and silenced by the hypocritical ideological tyrants of the bourgeoisie. For there is only one route to freedom, and the people cannot locate it by listening to the one-sided, shallow-minded corporate media. Rather, they must listen to the voices of freedom -- the voices of the people*.


*People do not include corporations, tyrants, conservatives, pseudo-Marxist intellectuals, imperialists, national socialists, nihilists, fascists, pet owners, racists, religious institutions and their respective clergies and zealots, self-righteous assholes or hypocrites.

Harper Consoles Worried Canadians

At a news conference yesterday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper managed to do what no other leader has done thus far -- he found the upside of the raging credit crisis.

"I think there's probably a lot of great buying opportunities emerging in the stock market as a consequence of all this panic," he stated in his usual heart-on-sleeve manner. When asked to elaborate on how to capitalize on catastrophe this morning, he gushed, "It's simple! You sit on your hands, wait for everyone else to become so poor and desperate that they'll take any offer, and then you buy up all of their assets at Wal-Mart prices!"

After one reporter duly pointed out that no credit will be available for consumers or businesses at that point of a recession -- or depression -- Harper warmly replied, "So? You just use all of that cash that you've got lying around! Don't you see? Down is the new up!" He then skipped merrily away from the podium to exclaim for all to hear, "I can't wait to hit rock bottom!"

In light of this, Harper is no doubt very optimistic about the next set of polls.

Harper Projected in Second Place

While Prime Minister Stephen Harper will certainly be reelected, the largest homogeneous group of potential voters will be choosing apathy on October 14th. Canada does have a record of higher voter turnout than other countries, such as the United States, but the numbers have been dropping with each subsequent election. This one will likely prove to be no different, given that many potential voters claim not to care much for this selection of leaders.

"The problem is that none of these so-called 'leaders' truly represent Canadians! exclaimed a red-faced Edward York, Deputy Chairman of Activists for Institutional Inertia. "The people would be foolish to elect a leader who can't provide them with what they want. So they won't vote!" When asked what, pray tell, the people want, he emphatically sputtered, "They want a decisive leader who will listen to whatever they say, and a platform that will ensure that everything steadily gets better without changing the status quo! And more importantly they can't stand the typical unrealistic goals and broken promises bullshit!"

Palin Admits to Book Ban Attempt

After weeks of consistent accusations from the media, American Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin has confessed to trying to ban one book during her political career. The book in question, Friedrich Nietzsche's The Gay Science, never did make it to the chopping block; Palin is apparently still disappointed that it did not.

"Trying to classify abnormalities such as homosexuality as a science is amoral and godless!" she shouted at last night's press conference. Upon being told that the title translated to "The Joyful Wisdom", Palin retorted, "There shouldn't be anything doggone joyful about it! It's a sin."

A New Normal

Even as international markets begin to feel the effects of the U.S. lending crisis, a variety of Canadian institutions are being forced to make some changes in order to reassure their customers and patrons. Dr. Percival Snellcroft, a family physician from Newcastle, reports considerable success since switching over to tongue recessors. "Basically they're like tongue depressors, but they're a more natural product and don't induce any urge to cut the morning cereal with sawdust. My patients like that." Similarly, across Ontario and indeed the country, a growing number of elementary schools now break for "correction," prisoners are sent to "adjustment" facilities, and orthodontists just kind of shine a light on their patients' braces and hum mysteriously. Dr. Snellcroft urged practitioners in other countries to follow his example. "Every little bit helps prop up our dying economy and stave off social collapse," he chortled.

--Richard Clyde

[Editor's note] We would like to apologise for a particularly witless mistake in a previous post, now (thankfully) removed, in which we quoted Mr Jacques Derrida. The section in question read: "On the one hand, if modern linguistics remains completely enclosed within a classical conceptuality, if especially it naively uses the word being and all it presupposes, that which, within this linguistics, deconstructs the unity of the word in general can, according to the model of the Heideggerian question, as it functions powerfully from the very opening of Being and Time, be circumscribed as ontic science or regional ontology." As any child can see, it can't do anything of the sort, and the omission of the all-important "no longer" in the second clause renders the entire passage unintelligible gibberish. We apologise for the error.

Debut Edition

On the Fly

Market Fears in Europe

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has implemented measures to battle what has now been officially labeled as a recession in France. Meanwhile, mounting pressures on British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to do likewise have led him to take an unorthodox approach to appease his critics. He has promised to invest millions into a plan to move the landmass of Great Britain closer to its most neighbourly continent. This proposition would transform the tedious two and a half hour ferry from Dover to Calais into a half hour ferry from Dover to New York City.

Harper Caught Again

Alarmingly, the Liberals have unearthed evidence of a third instance of Harper and his writing staff plagiarizing someone else's material. The speech in question is a soliloquy that was delivered by Harper in August 2006, which began, “Now is the winter of our discontent / Made glorious summer by this son of York”. What is more alarming than the fact that Harper is now accused of plagiarizing on three separate accounts is the fact that, until now, no one realized that he lifted this speech directly from the popular Canadian sitcom Corner Gas. While this has hurt Harper's chances in Ontario, it has bolstered his support in Quebec, as his apparent devotion to Corner Gas has made it clear that he does have an appreciation for the fine arts.

Insights Into Tasing Death

A BC man was killed last week after being tasered after falling through a window naked after being stabbed. Soon after the incident was made public, a police watchdog organization complained that the police should have used a less violent restraining tactic on the unarmed robbery suspect so as not to have killed the man. Police fired back, by stating that it may have been the stab wounds or the fall that killed him. This led the media to arrive at the deceased man's wife's original question, why the police tasered her dead naked husband.

Featured Reports

The Third Federal Leaders' Debate
By Funiculus Trent

Ever striving to thrust a well-bristled broom into the less-frequented corridors of Canadian politics, this correspondent was able to secure admission to the little-ballyhooed third federal leaders' debate, which permitted ordinary Canadians to gauge the candidates on a variety of central issues in the arts today. There were no television cameras, of course, CBC citing a lack of funding for the event, but I felt this added a certain thrilling immediacy. Here, close enough to smell it, was history being made.

I squeezed in between Chad Kroeger and a preoccupied-looking stack of Marshall McLuhans. Not a moment too soon, for our candidates were already arrayed around a rich mahogany table. On the left, Mr Harper sipped coffee and tried to ignore Mr Layton's rude napkin sketches; to the right, Mr Dion nursed a pint and played whist with a slightly glazed Mr Figueroa (the Communist leader having been invited for obvious reasons). Mr Duceppe, at the far right, quietly hummed Puccini and looked bored.

The host, in a gratifyingly post-structuralist move, asked not to be named in media accounts; I will refer to him merely as G. Stroumboulopoulos.

Stroumboulopoulos: In these times of economic uncertainty it is by no means short of a good idea to characterise precisely what Canadians mean by the devilish phrase "The Arts." Mr Dion?

Dion: By "The Arts," I believe that the typical Canadian would like to say, "Works Containing Ideas Or Aesthetic Worth Whose Value Does Not Stem Primarily From Their Purely Economic Value."

Stroumboulopoulos: Any problems there, Mr Layton? Mr Harper?

Layton: No, I think we can pretty much agree on that.

Harper: An admirably even-handed definition, Stephane.

Dion: Thank you, Stephen.

Stroumboulopoulos: Calm down, please, gentlemen. Now, each candidate will have 30 seconds to identify what, in his opinion, is the most pressing artistic question facing Canada at present. Let's start with Mr Layton.

Layton: Well, let's be honest with ourselves. It comes down to what Canadians are discussing around the dining room table: What is this government doing to ensure the continued health of artistic education? We have a tremendous network of community organisations, ready to train our youngsters, and a Harper administration that would entertain cutting their funding. It comes from a classist attitude that says the urban poor should content themselves with Ravel while the economic elite learn Beethoven. As prime minister I would set aside one billion dollars so that everyone can learn Beethoven.

Harper: That's simply pie-in-the-sky thinking, frankly. One billion dollars could fund universal Schubert at best, and you have to consider the importance of the visual and dramatic arts as well. There's only so much money to spend, Jack. No, this government sets priorities, and I think the track record shows my commitment to fighting the trend of our nation's galleries to embrace shallow and trendy gimmickry in place of challenging, spiritually enriching paintings. I hope I don't need to remind the audience that in thirteen years of Liberal administration, thirteen years, not a single motion was made toward selling off Voice of Fire, what a disaster that was.

Dion: I was intending to address myself to the Shakespeare Authorship Problem, and the public's right to know having been stifled at every turn by a ham-fisted administration, but...

[My heartfelt apologies, dear reader-- the McLuhans chose this critical juncture to topple headlong into the aisle, distracting me, and even with Mr Kroeger's swift assistance, by the time Mr McLuhans was returned to his seat the debate had become quite heated.]

Harper: As I was trying to say, I think Ms Atwood's endorsement is actually a strike against you, Gilles!

Dion: Now Steve, I know you have a soft spot for Findley, but--

Harper: Tim Findley has nothing to do with it, though now you mention it he has been undervalued. I'm just saying that, I mean, just because he has one heavyweight in his corner, he thinks he's untouchable.

Duceppe: You're just angry because you haven't thought of a decent English-language opera yet.

Harper: And I told you, I will as soon as you give me a French string quartet worth the name!

Stroumboulopoulos: We have to move on. Here's another question from an ordinary undecided voter.

O.U.V.: This question is for Mr Dion. As you know, it's very concerning that Canada hasn't produced an important poet for two generations. It's a matter of some contention I'll admit, but when I'm at Tim Hortons for my Thursday morning coffee and the talk turns to poetry, the consensus is always that nobody since Smith has quite lived up to the modernist promise. What will a Liberal government do to address this issue?

Dion: Well, let me first say that I think it's a very complicated and difficult problem, which we will certainly not be able to solve overnight. Perhaps even the defining challenge of the 21st century. And it demands action by everyone, everybody pitching in and doing his part without necessarily being rewarded by immediate results. We're looking into what we call a Meaning Shift, but there are no easy answers.

Harper: In other words, you have no platform except for what you've plagiaristically cobbled together out of Bloom. And it's all talk-- not he nor any of his school has put out even a sonnet's worth of pragmatic action.

Layton: Speaking of platforms, Steve, is yours hiding in your pocket there behind the opera glasses?

Figueroa: I think Canadians define Art as a mutable repository of the material expressions of class struggle, the locus for manifold instances of oppression ranging from the self-evident to the gnostically obscure, and the means by which ordinary Canadians daily repudiate the extinct notions of beauty and worth.

And it was with that entirely valid and inspiring dictum ringing in my ears, dear reader, that I rushed home to my beloved Epson and tapped out this little precis. I pray that, on the issues that count, it may make your decision just a little bit easier when you step into that booth on the 14th.

The Signs, from Bay Street
By Ayn Radcliffe

Prime Minister Harper and his Minister of Finance, Jim Flaherty, have made it clear that Canada, being quite unlike the United States, will not have to endure the same economic hardships as its southern neighbour. This stance has come under heavy scrutiny from, not only opposition leader Stephane Dion, but numerous economists and journalists as well. As for myself, I take it that we can learn more by reading the signs of Bay Street.

The signs tell many different stories. Understanding these stories can be incredibly difficult, however, given the nature of the postmodern era. The shape, colour and texture of a Bay Street sign depend entirely on which intersection you are basing your observation from. At times you may perceive that the sign consists wholly of white lettering on a blue background, surrounded by a perfectly rectangular frame. But then, finding yourself in the context of, say, Yorkville, the sign takes on an entirely different form. The inherent simplicity of the blue and white parallelogram is replaced by an abomination that cannot be described by any self-respecting Kantian. The sign, which was once an end in itself in its rectangular, a priori form, has been corrupted by the forces of postmodern superfluity into an object of dubious value. The street signs of Bay Street have fallen into a dismal state indeed, having been constructed upon hypothetical imperatives.

But looking deeper than the superficial street signs, you see the signs of Toronto's financial core. Within the bowels of the Toronto Stock Exchange, hither, thither and every whither are the last bastions of the Enlightenment: the financial tickers. Glowing nuggets of data waltz across the ticker screens, one after the other, in perfect harmony. One can hear Tchaikovsky or Strauss floating above the mind-numbing crowds of materialists. I shed three or four categorical tears as I strolled through the TSE, proclaiming aloud, “If ever hath there been a kingdom of ends, then this be it!”

The mystifying aesthetics of the ticker are determined by their service to the practical function of sending data to the optical nerve in the most efficient fashion. Hence, we have arrived at a near perfect demonstration of the categorical imperative; it is upon this that I make my economic prognosis.

Given an unproductive second quarter in Ontario, Canada's reliance on trade with the US, and the bursting of the commodity bubble, a deep recession is inescapable for Canadians. It would seem that even the meddlesome street signs of Bay Street unequivocally state to Canadians: No left turns – buses excepted.

In Other News...

As reported by Julian Fox

Stephane Dion Admits Lack of Clairvoyance in Green Shift

Chest-deep in concerns about his ability to lead the country through the “global recession,” Stephane Dion admitted yesterday that if he could have predicted that everyone would stop giving a shit about the environment because a few banks shit the bed he may not have built his campaign around his Green Shift program.

Dion was visibly frustrated – Conservative pundits predicted that he was about to cry – as he stumbled through the following during a campaign stop in British Columbia, “People these days, they don't really believe in anything. The environment seemed like the thing, you know? I couldn't have predicted the market collapse. I'm not psychic. Now nobody gives two shits about the Earth. What am I supposed to do?”

Liberal poll numbers fell sharply after Mr. Dion's comments, largely due to Conservative attack ads aimed at spreading the word that the Liberal leader is in fact incapable of predicting the future. When asked, during a campaign stop in Manitoba, if the Conservative party possessed some magical scrying orb Prime Minister Stephan Harper replied smugly, “Of course we can predict the future. There will be unstable times for a while, and the best course will be sensible monetary policies.” Asked for proof of this fortune-telling ability and clarification of the terms 'unstable times' and 'sensible policies,' Stephan Harper directed interested parties towards his party's economic platform. Unfortunately, said platform has so far only been made available to those who can see into the future.

Elizabeth May Drugs National Leaders

Careful observers of last Thursday's Leaders' Debate no doubt noted the kissing frenzy that erupted between Green Party Leader Elizabeth May and her opponents at the tail-end of the broadcast. Relieved to be leaving one another's company and the smell of cat urine that permeated the debate table, the male leaders, even Prime Minister Stephen Harper, crawled and elbowed their way one by one to plant Miss May on both cheeks.

Seemingly unafraid of parading his European tendencies in the face of blue collar Canadian voters, Stephane Dion walked away from Miss May grinning and tongueing himself like a talking horse. Jack Layton followed stiffly, beginning the exchange with the declaration “Jack Layton's going to kiss you,” and proving himself a man of his word. Gilles Duceppe seemed concilatory as he accepted sloppy-thirds and a compliment on his pretty blue eyes and Stephan Harper brought up the rear and in doing so received the smallest unannounced dose of powdered MDMA.

Later, after reports from all parties of tribal rhythms and purposeful grunts heard through heavy oak doors, it came to light that Miss May's cheeks had been lightly dusted with the popular party drug in an act of guerrilla assault perpetrated by slightly effeminate make-up artist, James Dewford. When reached for comment, Miss May, managed only to repeat “Really? Come on, no way. Really?” several times before shaking her head disbelievingly and walking away.

Unaware they had been drugged, the various leaders' vibrations manifested themselves in wildly dissimilar ways. Concerned Ottawa residents Harold and Maria Schuen were awakened sometime before dawn by the sound of shattering glass and loud music coming from their living-room. Descending the stairs with a baseball bat, Mr. Schuen narrowly avoided caving in the skull of Conservative Leader Stephan Harper, whom he found fingering crude erotic illustrations into his carpet with Nutella. Smiling, his teeth gummed over with hazelnut-spread, Mr. Harper told Mr. Schuen he “finally got it,” and “it makes perfect sense.” What Mr. Harper was referring to remains unclear, but his poll numbers have improved in Quebec, ostensibly as a result of his new found interest in the arts.

Jack Layton sustained several deep lacerations to his hands and genitals after attempting to subdue and mount his own reflection in a glass surface of some kind. What exactly the surface was has yet to be made public, but preliminary reports allege it was the sliding glass door of a Home Depot located somewhere on the outskirts of Ottawa. The quickly circulated rumour that Layton's injuries were sustained in an attempt to nuzzle up to the big box stores seems to have alienated him somewhat from NDP faithful – that or he just came off like a prick in the debate.

Stephane Dion spent the night at home quietly voicing his hatred of that weird little rapist's half-smile Stephan Harper always gives him to his wife over cups of tea. In time he became highly emotional and spent a restless night enduring nervous digestive issues.

After making his only campaign stop outside of Quebec, speaking at the Economic Club of Toronto on the subject of “susstenble devlopment” - a move many attribute to the lasting effects of the drugs in his system – Gilles Duceppe ran off into the night. As of the time of this writing he is still missing and presumed to have the most beautiful blue eyes you've ever seen.

James Dewford, the perpetrator of the crime, was whipped to death on the front lawn of Parliament Hill for making a mockery of the dignity of Canadian politics. It is unclear whether his death was intentional or an unforeseen side-effect of an otherwise harmless public whipping.

Cindy McCain Thankful for Her Retired Captain's Retired Captain

Cindy McCain, second wife of former prisoner of war John McCain, was reportedly overheard praising her husband's unruly genitals in a recent organized press event. “Can you imagine that on top of you?” Interested parties heard Mrs. McCain ask Ms. Rachel Linder's second grade homeroom class at Whispering Valleycrest Public School during a routine photo opportunity Friday. “I'm just glad his dick don't work no more, it'd be like huggin' off a corpse.”

Following these unscripted remarks, Mrs. McCain was engulfed by handlers and whisked from the school grounds and into the trunk of a waiting blue and tan 1987 Ford LTD Crown Victoria. Pressed for comment Whispering Valleycrest's principal, Leslie Spears, described Mrs. McCain's remarks as containing “little educational value as measured against the District of Columbia Schoolboard's current curriculum.”

Largely suppressed in mainstream media outlets the story has received sparse attention. In the small reaction the slip-up has prompted Repulican hardliners seem optimistic about the effect of Mrs. McCain's comments as they are sure to spare voters still left on the fence the off-putting task of picturing Mr. and Mrs. McCain having sex. Sources close to the McCain campaign have indicated that there was some concern potential supporters could be scared off by the thought of regularly seeing the McCains on television should their bid for the White House prove successful – risking accidentally picturing the couples' horribly incongruous bodies nude and pressed against each other with each appearance.

Less optimistic pundits have pointed out that picturing Mr. McCain wet-noodling Mrs. McCain could be even worse, while most have chosen not to comment.

Questioned on the matter during a campaign stop in Rogersville, Tennessee, McCain's rival, Illinois Senator Barack Obama paused thoughtfully, as if dredging his inner-depths, before answering, “I'm glad you asked that question. It seems to me that if Senator McCain cannot even be depended upon to remain accountable for his own genitals, it would be a mistake to assume he can be accountable for his actions as President of the United States.” Mr. Obama later jokingly advised his opponent to “just offer [his] dick a tax cut.” Which killed. It got really big laughs.

Though Mrs. McCain has yet to re-emerge into the public eye, several of the children she potentially scarred have given interviews – seemingly at the behest of parents eager to watch their kids on television. This reporter's discerning judgment was all that was needed to see that most of the kids had been coached, save for 8 year old Robbie Fishmon who said that he “wasn't really paying attention” and that Mrs. Mccain “smelled like plastic flowers.”

Turns Out Obama Too Good To Be True

After months of exhaustive study the Center for Democratic Policy, a well-known Washington think-tank, has proven that Senator Barack Obama is indeed too good to be true and does not actually exist. In a statement released to the press early last week, the Center drew comparisons between Mr. Obama and Santa Claus or God, “Though he does not actually exist, collective belief in his existence allows him to appear to exist.”

The statement went on to conclude that “should the people of the world cease believing in Senator Obama's existence, he would immediately disappear.”

Exactly five days after the statement was published, seemingly when even those most dedicated to ignorance had learned of it, Mr. Obama completely vanished from the face of the Earth.

Leaping at the chance, Cindy McCain called a press conference to point out that Michelle Obama was “now just another black, single mother.” Mrs. Obama's crushing grief seems to have delayed any sort of sassy, black-woman comeback.

And on that note...

We hope that you enjoyed the debut edition of our journal. Stay tuned for next week's edition, in which we shall ask the critical questions of our era, and then answer them with more questions, and then more questions after that, ad infinitum, until we finally get tired and plagiarize Baudelaire, or something. You won't want to miss it.