dialamah

Right wing Soldiers of Odin arrested in Vancouver for attacking demonstrators at anti-racist rally.

Nope, it's part of the explanation of why I support him.

Climate change is real and is happening right now in your neighborhood. Hardly matters at this point if it's man-made or part of the earth's natural cycle, but it's effects that were anticipated a decade ago are beginning to occur - and faster than expected. What the long term effects really will be isn't certain, but they could be catastrophic. Hopefully, it won't be - perhaps the worst models are not what we'll end up experiencing, and perhaps we'll figure stuff out in time to effectively mitigate the worst effect. Or maybe the aliens will come and save us. Yeah, I know conservatives think taxes are akin to devil's work, but taxes give us things that we complain about when we don't have - safe roads, education, yada yada. Carbon taxes may not be the perfect solution - but they do have the effect of reducing emissions that support the feedback loop that is accelerating the melting of the polar ice and the rising of the sea level. Carbon taxes alone won't save us - but refusing to do anything "because it's not enough" is not the answer either. If I were in a leaking lifeboat and had one bucket to empty it, I wouldn't stop and toss the bucket overboard because the water was coming in faster than I could clear it - I'd keep working that bucket so I could keep afloat long enough for another option to present itself. Wouldn't you? Anyway, it's not that I specifically support carbon taxes; it's that Chong at least has this issue on his radar, which is more than can be said for most Conservative politicians - and I appreciate that. Perhaps in 3 or 4 years other mitigating strategies will be developed and he'll implement those instead of a carbon tax. I support him because he's smart enough to believe scientists and data, instead of quacks and crackpots.

Yeah sure. But there used to be a sense that we were trusted 'friends' and could just drop by, so to speak. I think that's gone now and it is because of Trump's policies. It's nicer to be friends with neighbors, rather than suspicious and wary.

I was responding to your claim that Libs and NDP wouldn't vote for him as an alternative to Libs. You could be right, carbon pricing isn't the answer. But at least climate change is on his radar; is it on the radar of any other candidate? If I'm looking for a government that is going to take climate change seriously, and 8 out of 9 leadership candidates don't even mention it, the one who does is already ahead. (Insert sweeping generalizations about how stupid and greedy "the right" is because they invariably choose economy over environment, while proclaiming "the left" smarter and more moral because they look for solutions that might prevent humans becoming extinct over the next century.)

The article itself gives reasons that directly reflect the harder stance Trump has taken - people being more careful in their paperwork or just choosing not to go to the States. The article does not support the OP implication that Canadians' concerns about crossing the border are unwarranted.

Well that's a shame for people who don't want to re-elect JT, but also want a government who will take climate change seriously. That's not the only reason I like Chong, but it is significant.

I have and would vote Conservative if their election platform appealed to me. Not everyone is blindly partisan you know.

Honestly, I don't think Chong will get in as leader, he's too far behind and doesn't have enough anti-immigrant, anti-tax, pro-business in his platform to appeal to the hard-core Conservatives, but I think knowing that a lot of non-Conservative Canadians seem to support him over all other Conservative candidates is something the Conservatives ought to think about. Of course one of the more hardline Conservative candidates could change his (her) platform significantly after he's elected leader. But then would he (she) be considered trustworthy by the public?

If the survey taken that says Chong and O'Leary are 1 & 2 among all Canadians, that suggests to me that any other candidate would be the loser in 2019. If the survey I linked is accurate, it shows that more than half of Canadians think climate change is important and Chong does address that - does any other Candidate? If not, then right there you've lost a significant portion of the voting public.

Don't get the whole "Well, if we can't fix it right now let's not do anything at all". And at least he's addressing the issue, rather than ignoring it. Not sure what 'boring speaker' has to do with it, or being 'bland' for that matter. Lots of criticism directed toward JT because he's neither boring nor bland. I think nonentity is a bit inaccurate for someone who's managed to be reelected five times. Although possibly no-one has ever run against him in his riding; is that the case?

Yup, me too. Does this mean you trust me?

I see the Conservative party shooting themselves in the foot as they seem headed towards choosing a party leader that will most likely lose them the election in 2019. I may not want to vote for JT and the Liberals in 2019, but if my other option is someone like O'Leary or even Bernier, what choice will I have? Climate change is a real thing and each year this becomes more obvious (except for the hard-core deniers), but few of the Conservative candidates are addressing it. Bernier says nothing about the issues climate change will bring and his website features an oil-worker. O'Leary doesn't even seem to have a platform - just regurgitated media bites attacking JT. Combine that with his debate no-shows and I'm left wondering if this is just a a lark to him. Chong, who is ranked 2nd among all Canadians for Conservative leader but 7th among Conservatives, points out that the Conservative party has lost 2/3 of it's membership since 2004; from 285,000 down to 100,000. Clearly this is not a party who resonate with all Canadians, and that matters at election time. Chong is the only candidate I've seen who actually considers climate change an issue - whether one agrees with his carbon pricing plan or not, at least he's not either ignoring the issue or claiming it doesn't exist. This is an important issue for Canadians (http://www.nanosresearch.com/tickers/PDF/POLNAT-S15-T661.pdf), even if the Conservative party doesn't think so. I really do hope the Conservative elects a leader that will be palatable to the more centrist Canadians and thus give us a viable choice in the next election. I'm not the only Canadian who feels this way, either.

And if you want to be fair you should also object to the various motions against anti-Semitic acts, rather than just focusing on a motion that condemns anti-Islamic actions.

There have been several motions condemning anti-Semitism, including a special Protocol on behalf of Jews, defining anti-Semitism. Its called the Ottawa Protocol; look it up. Since Christians, Buddhists and other religions are not subject to attacks in the way that Jes and Muslims are, I think its perfectly appropriate that these two religions are given that special consideration.

Whilst researching the claim that schools were setting up dedicated Muslim prayer rooms, I ran across a story that I found troubling. It involves a school using it's cafeteria for Friday prayers. This bothers me because the cafeteria is for all students and would normally be used. Worse, however, is that the females were required to pray behind the males. I do not think a school should allow such overt and blatant sexism on its property even in the name of religious accommodation. This story is from 2012 so don't know if its still happening. But I think that if we as a society are willing to accommodate some private religious practice in our schools, then we should also be allowed to require that blatant sexism not be a part of that practice. If that is part of their religious ceremony, then Friday prayers should not be part of our accommodation. I think allowing it in school gives tacit consent to sexism. http://torontolife.com/city/allah-in-the-cafeteria/

Seems to me its the other way around.

Whatever, Islamaphobe.

Since what they are "demanding" is an accommodation that is guaranteed to them under Ontario's Human Rights Act, I fail to see the problem. Particularly since that space is available to all students, regardless of their faith. Perhaps the HRA needs to be changed so that religious accommodation isn't permitted. At that point accusations of special treatment for providing prayer spaces for students would be legit. But since your Islamic faith seeks to marginalize and even kill those who disagree with your version of Islam, I can understand why you'd object to schools having shared prayer spaces for Muslim and kafir.

There is a difference between holding prayer sessions at school in which all students are expected to take part on a daily basis, and allowing students spaces where they can pray privately without expecting or insisting that all students take part. Other faiths are allowed the same accommodation if they ask for it; that they have not asked for it, or don't take advantage of the opportunity does not mean Muslims are getting special treatment.

I spent about 30 minutes looking for a situation in which a school had a Muslim-dedicated prayer room, and could not find one. So where does this statement come from? The closest example I could find was this article from the Toronto Sun, with a story about the Ottawa-Carleton School District offering spaces that are open to all students - although the spaces aren't always available or even the same week-to-week. Here's an article which explains the difference between accommodating religion, and proselytizing in the classroom.

I think protests are definitely organized, that's usually how these things work. I don't think they're hired; I think they do it for nothing, cause they believe. Just the same as some on the right spread fear/hate - it's because they really do believe immigrants are bad for the country, brown people are generally stupider than whites and feminism has destroyed society. Violence is wrong, regardless of who's doing it. I have no problem condemning those who started and took part in a riot -- if that's really what happened. The OP provided no link, so hard to say what the truth is, either of the article or the incident.

No doubt you are correct. Righties are rather more cowardly, preferring to appease bullies for fear of offending them and scared witless of people who don't look or act like them. Good thing lefties are around to push for things like equal rights for all people; righties would have kept us back in the 50s. Aren't sweeping generalizations fun?

The US has admitted they were responsible for these deaths ... Good on them for taking responsibility. Now if only we in the West cared as much about 200 dead Muslims as we do about 4 dead Westerners, eh?

Haha, good point - politicians have to be extreme by definition regardless of ideology, eh?