Canadian politics is awesome.

[theweaselking]

Minister of Science And Technology Gary Goodyear, in response to a question about how a creationist can possibly be qualified to hold the position of 'minister of science and technology': "Madam Speaker, what I would recommend to the hon. member is that when he tightens that towel around his neck at nighttime that he not do it for more than 20 seconds. It actually ends up causing cerebral anoxia that leaves permanent brain damage."

On the floor of the House of Commons.

You stay classy, CPC(non-communist)


(Notably, Mr Goodyear did not make any attempt to explain how he, as a creationist who rejects all science as ungodly, can be competent in the role of Minister Of Science And Technology.)

Comments

[snakey.livejournal.com]

Sooooo reassured that these dudes are voting on whether I get human rights today (again).

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

What did we expect from a government with a Minister of Public Safety who reads neither the bills he's presenting in the House nor anything dealing with criminology published later than 1930?

-- Steve'll also point to the continued presence of Bev Oda in cabinet as manifest evidence that the CPC(non-communist) just doesn't have a deep enough "bench" to find qualified candidates for senior positions.

[sparkindarkness.livejournal.com]

There needs to be a competency test before taking a cabinet position.

Having a minister for science who is a creationist is like having a minister for transport who doesn't believe in the internal combustion engine

[theweaselking.livejournal.com]

A creationist in a prominent position is an embarassing scandal for our government. A *non*-creationist is a scandal for yours.

I'm just saying.

[iblis-kukl.livejournal.com]

[torrain.livejournal.com]

Aaaaand that was nearly my morning coffee on the keyboard. XD

[maelorin]

"yes, minister", "yes, prime minister": documentaries?

[cosmiccat.livejournal.com]

He's also a chiropractor. So he's a creationist and a pretend doctor, and they put him in charge of Science and Technology. In fact, the decision was probably based on his fake doctoring skills, despite "chiropractor" being to "doctor" what a pentacle and some incense is to the Large Hadron Collider.

Also (and this is somewhat old) he's apparently decided that the NRC isn't doing enough to help large corporations milk Canadian citizens for sellable ideas, so the NRC is being "refocused" to research commercial products instead of doing, you know, actual research, like it's supposed to:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2012/03/06/technology-goodyear-national-research-council.html

This despite the blazingly obvious fact that researching and developing commercial products is what the entire private sector is for and we fund these public institutions with public money so they can do the risky, low-return research that gives us "useless" things like the cure for cancer.