Monday, January 3, 2011

Amir Khadir Has Jumped the Shark!

"It's a moment. A defining moment when you know that your favourite television program has reached its peak. That instant that you know from now on...it's all downhill. Some call it the climax. We call it 'Jumping the Shark." -Jon Hein

Click to watch the Fonz "Jump the Shark"
Ever since the 'Fonz' jumped over a shark on water skis, in a television episode of 'Happy Days', the term has come to describe a moment when something or someone that was once great has reached a point where it stops getting better and starts getting worse.

And so Quebec's most popular politician, Amir Khadir, has found his very own shark in the the name of a shoe store called 'Le Marcheur.' Read Story

A week after a survey declared him the most popular politician in Quebec, his boycott actions on one cold December afternoon has set all of that good will asunder.

He should have known better than to participate in a boycott of a honest, hard-working Quebecois, but obviously, he couldn't resist.

You see, protest is in Amir's blood.
Ever since he was a boy, his communist/activist father dragged him from one demonstration to another. While most families went to Church  or to visit grandma on Sunday, Amir was off to protest. Flogging Israel, America, Canada, capitalists and the bourgeoisies was a family tradition. Old habits are hard to change and so it seems that while you can take the boy out of the communist party, apparently you can't take the communist party out of the boy.
....TO THE BARRICADES!

When the negative reaction to his boycott support became overwhelming, Khadir was confident that he could charm his way out of the situation, after all, he's a master bullshitter.

Had he sized up the situation accurately, he would have realized that a quick apology for his actions was the politic thing to do. It probably would have been forgiven.

Instead, he tried to weasel his way out by the tried and true political strategy of lying and spinnng.

When he told reporters that what happened was just a simple misunderstanding and that he never  called for a boycott of the store, just the the Israeli products, he was contradicted rather publicly by the store owner who said in no uncertain terms that Khadir had been encouraging shoppers not to go into the store.

Frustrated that he was losing the argument, he then foolishly asserted his right as a private citizen to demonstrate as he sees fit.
That is when, as we say in politics, 'he lost the room.'

And that bell, cannot be unrung.

No amount of spinning, would help Khadir change the public perception that he was terrorizing an innocent 'Quebecois.' Had the merchant involved, been an Anglo or Ethnic, perhaps the story would never have achieved the media attention it did, but the David and Goliath tussle pushed a decidedly hot button and the story resonated throughout the province.

Not even his friends in the 'Clique du Plateau,' could save Khadir from the thrashing he took in the media. While most on the left, sensing the  mood of the public, wisely kept quiet, a notable exception was Radio Canada's Michel Labrecque whose interview of Khadir was more like a socialist conclave. During the interview Labreque offered this gentle rebuttal to Khadir's boycott "It's not the principle, but the method" arrgggh.......
When Khadir compared the shoe salesman to a merchant of land mines, the host remained respectfully silent.   
VIVE LA CLIQUE DU PLATEAU!     Listen to the interview

It was quite a different story when Khadir tried to defend himself in front of conservatives like Mario Dumont. His charm was lost on the hard-nosed conservative, who wouldn't allow Khadir to skate.
Khadir begged the audience to believe him that it was all a misunderstanding and it would be all put right after Khadir talked to the merchant, to convince him of the error of his ways.
Dumont was having none of it and attacked Khadir viciously by asking about his and his father's communist connection, to which Khadir, off guard,  answered rather clumsily, telling the whopper that his father, only joined the communist party because of pressure from the right.

The bashing continued when Khadir tried to defend himself on Benoît Dutrizac's radio show.
If you understand French, listen to the interview and hear Dutrizac, like Dumont, sneer  at Khadir, condescendingly, advising him to lay off a simple merchant and then asking why he can't criticize any  country, other than Israel. 
Khadir repeated the lie that he never meant to chase customers from the shoe store, a fact repudiated by those on the scene. He then repeated his shop-worn mantra that the boycott was justified because Desmond Tutu and Jimmy Carter are supporters. LISTEN HERE

What is most interesting is the tone of the interviews.
Both Dumont and Dutrizac made no bones about their distaste of Khadir. They sneered and mocked him rather rudely.
This is a game-changer. Journalists on the right sense a vulnerability that wasn't there before and are determined to press ahead with the attacks.

Up until now, Khadir was the Teflon man. As long as he attacked the old guard of Quebec politics and the rich, his radical socialist agenda was ignored.

No more.

Khadir himself has done what Eric Duhaime and Jeff Fillion could not, that is, to get the public to confront his deep communist radicalism and his hidden socialist agenda.

As Khadir tries to put this episode behind him, his communist friends will make sure that it remains squarely in the public limelight.

Unfortunately for Khadir, PAJU is likely to continue their boycott of 'Le Marcheur,' despite the ongoing fiasco. Those involved are lifelong masochists who embrace failure. Being a communist today, appeals only to those who adore punishment.

And so, for opponents of Khadir, the boycott is the gift that keeps giving.

How will all this affect Khadir politically?

There's little chance that his re-election is in jeopardy.
The socialist, granolas, separatists and eco-warriors of the Clique du Plateau will re-elect him, no matter what.

But the party is over for Khadir and Quebec solidaire in the rest of Quebec. They have been exposed for what they are....finally.

They both have jumped the shark


5 comments:

  1. Mississauga Guy said...

    Outside of Quebec, this Khadir shmuck is a non-starter, about as interesting as watching paint dry on a signpost, a flake, a big nothing!

    He's just another anti-Zionist Arab and heaven knows our country, continent and world has an overabundance of those. Amir Khadir is just another cockroach in the colony only this one proved what a cockroach he is by his words and actions. Why doesn't our government send him back to Iran, where he came from? He is of zero use to Quebec, Canada as a whole and the whole western world. If the potties of the Plateau want him, they could have him or go to Iran with him!

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  2. Mississauga Guy to Editor...

    Re "The Fonz" and Happy Days:

    Actually, Happy Days didn't lose its lustre after the shark jump. Fonzie also jumped over 14 barrels with his motor cycle and other exaggerated feats that made him the cool guy all the other guys envied. There's one of those in every crowd.

    Today's Fonzie is Charlie Harper on 2½ Men. He makes a fortune of money effortlessly writing a jingle a month, lives in a fabulous beach house gets the girls with the ease of the Fonz. All the while, his brother plays the ultimate shlamazel. One line from the show stated by fall guy brother Allen was when Charlie gets laid, he gets screwed.

    Happy Days started to go downhill when the protagonist of the show, Richie Cunningham, played by Ron Howard, left the show, along with sidekick, Ralph Malph, played by Don Most. The Richie-Fonzie relationship, their contrasting personalities, and their adventures were the lead relationship that made the show succeed and Richie's relationship with his two longtime pals, Ralph and Potsie, were the secondary relationship.

    Fonzie became the protagonist when Richie left and it was a 180 degree changeover. Fonzie became very straight, a teacher, a steady girlfriend and adopting a child. The morphing of the Fonz and the strength of his character enabled the show to go on an extra 3 years, but in declining fashion. Introducing new characters kept the show somewhat fresh, but the staleness of the story lines superceded the fresh injection of characters (Melvin Belvin for Ralph Malph?)

    Anyway, since the topic of that Khadir clown is a big zero, may as well talk about the subtopic, Happy Days. The last happy days of Montreal were probably in that era. I remember English being tolerated the 2-3 times a year my mother took me downtown. Sadly those happy days are long gone and only a memory here in Mississauga--not that there's anything wrong with Mississauga. It's only too bad those who criticize it have probably never been here.

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  3. Mississauga Guy to Editor...

    Now that the day is practically over, please don't write about that Khadir nobody again. He is neither worth the time nor the effort. He's a blatant bigot, he's boring, and his ideology is a century out of reality. Fidel Castro is the last emperor of the communist ideal and with his impending death the ideology will be put to bed for all time. I don't imagine his brother has the mind to keep Fidel's dream alive and even if so, it's like the demise of communism in Moscow--Brezhnev died in Nov 82, Andropov 14 months later in Jan 84 and Chernyenko sometime in 1985, just more than a year after Andropov.

    There was nobody after Franco in Spain, Tito in Yugoslavia and communism was simply defeated in Poland and Czechoslovakia. Why don't the Khadirs take their political ideals back to Iran and take on the big Ayatollah? Why not? Simple: The Ayatollah would arrest them and have them stoned for political subversion. It's probably for this exact reason they left Iran in the first place, and I can only question if they left Iran because they were about to be locked up. It's only too bad democracy has the downside of tolerating these obsolete clowns.

    Editor, don't give these a.h.es anymore of an audience. They're just not worth it!

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  4. Mississauga Guy if you are going to be a racist bigot ,get your race right .Khadr is Iranian hence he is Farsi not Arab.
    PS Why do Zionist apologists always use cockroach to insult others,does it have something to do with their own cowardice. If Israel means so much to you,fly there and join the IDF. Other wise you are a cowardly blowhard.

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  5. Here's a link to David Ouellete's site citing various articles/thoughts on Comrade Khadir. Of particular scornful merit is Khadir's response to JF Lisée on Hezbollah/Hamas's right to exist.
    http://davidouellette.wordpress.com/tag/amir-khadir/

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