Who needs another blog?
I do.

For you who remember me from my high-flying days on radio; from the years on Open Line, first as "Speak Your Mind" starting in 1960 on CHUM Radio in Toronto; for those who found me in the years that followed, on TV, on stage, and in a weekly opinion column in the Sunday Star; for those (younger ones) who joined me in the 90's on CFRB and then Talk 640 - welcome.

I have been silent since 1997 - except for a few cranky letters to the editor and a couple of newspaper columns, and a weekly rant on "Straight Goods."

Why have I re-surfaced?

There is so much to say and , for me, so little time to say it.

This space will be "stuff" and "nonsense." The "stuff" should be substantial. The "nonsense"
will be my own take on some of the world's great nonsense: from the war in Iraq to the decay of the English language.

I did finally decide that the world needed one more blog, because something has to be done to stop the rush toward majority government with Stephen Harper.

This is the man who last year disdained the world AIDS conference but grabbed headlines by recruiting Bill Gates to front a fund for AIDS rsearch into finding a vaccine. This "Stephen-come-lately" will actually make us believe he cares about AIDS, especially if it means votes.

He is "come-lately" to the environment. The greening of Stephen Harper is absurd and political. It was only last year that it did not even appear on his radar. Even with his new incentive, he had ignored the proposed legislation that would make Canada a signatory to Kyoto.

He is the man who wants open government, but rules his caucus with an iron fist - turfing one pretty good MP who had the temerity to disagree.

He is the dictator who fired the pilot of his taxpapyer paid jet for not doing as he (Harper) thought he should, in defiance of flying regulations.

His duplicity was shown when, after promising not to change the tax status of Income Trusts - prompting many hesitant investors, especially seniors, to put their money in those instruments.
He supported his Finance Minister's flagrant promise-breaking and declared that Income Trusts had four years to get it together becasue they were going to be a thing of the past.
(I know that mnany Canadians side with him on this, believing improperly, that those Trusts somehow bled our treasury dry.) It proves definitively that Mr. Harper is one hell of a salesman.

He has even conviced many of us that he does not dance to George Bush's tune.

We have already seen the signs, with his child care legislation, which does nothing to improve child care facilities but hands out a paltry amopunt of money to parents. It is a Bush echo: people know better than government what to do with their money.

I vote, not for less government, but for government to assume the responsibility for making this a better country.

He leads in the polls, at least partly because Stephan Dion has stumbled out of the starting blocks.

I would enjoy hearing from others who believe, as I do, that Harper will do to Canada what Harris did to Ontario.