The reviews are in

When the Harper Cons have lost Sun Media, you know they're in trouble. And their Senate abuses have lost Sun Media:

November’s vote killing a climate-change bill that had been passed by the House of Commons was the most noticeable foray in the Tories’ guerrilla war.

The Senate’s historic function of giving legislation a thorough once-over and public airing before it becomes law is on hold.
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As a politician who hasn’t been able to break through and gain majority-inducing public support — somewhere north of 40% — Harper has to be careful about taking any path that alienates large numbers of voters.

But election concerns aside, he should not be undermining the purpose of one of the branches of Parliament.

Canadians are partial to consensus. Helping forge consensus is one of the Senate’s strengths, maybe its only one. Turning it into a Conservative bully boy might be legal, but it is wrong.

And even Senator James Cowan is less than pleased that his chamber is overriding the will of elected representatives with nothing but a single snap vote:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, refusing to recognize the limitations inherent in our parliamentary system of government, particularly in a minority Parliament, is turning the chamber of sober second thought into his personal back-stop by using it to defeat measures passed by the elected members of the House of Commons he does not agree with.
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Bill C-311 arrived in the Senate on May 10, 2010, but for more than six months not a single Conservative senator rose to debate it. In response to a request by Liberals to either speak on this important initiative to help deal with climate change, or allow it to go to committee so that Canadians could have a chance to express their views before the Senate made a final decision about its fate, Conservative senators decided to simply kill it outright, and to do so immediately.

History was made that afternoon. Until that vote on Bill C-311, there had been an understanding spanning generations that there exist self-imposed limitations on a powerful appointed chamber in our parliamentary system of democratic government. Those limitations and that understanding have been erased by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who once again has shown little respect for Parliament or for Canadians who wish to be heard on the important issues of the day — in this instance, climate change.