normanchateau

It is unfortunate that Harper chose not to attend the return of dead soldiers to Canada...more so even than his attempt to ban the media from attending. Even Harper supporters had no problem with previous Prime Ministers who chose to attend their return as a sign of respect.

Normie, good to see you back. The promise was to eliminate the capital gains tax for cases of charitable donations. Are you that opposed to giving money to charity? Shoopie, I am completely in favour of eliminating the capital gains tax on charitable donations. However, you must have a very short memory, In January, 2006, Harper promised to virtually eliminate the capital gains tax by allowing deferral of tax on reinvested capital. That particular campaign "promise" seems to have been totally forgotten by you. Funny how some Conservatives can forget a broken campaign promise made a mere four months ago by Harper and instead spread misinformation strongly implying that Harper only made reference to charitable donations. Interestingly, Garth Turner actually predicted that Harper would fail to honour this campaign promise: http://www.garth.ca/weblog/2006/04/24/

In your pathetic response, you totally missed the point Shoopie. Of course university professors are expected to publish as part of their job. This is general knowledge. Read my post again. What I was referring to was their writing in their free time. Let me make this clearer for you. A university professor who is an environmental scientist, if he chooses to write a popular nonacademic novel in his free time, is not doing so as part of his job.

Apparently we agree. Harper's continued absence from the return of dead soldiers to Canada can indeed be interpreted by some, especially those who abhor Harper, as "respect for the dead".

Yes, he's good at honouring campaign promises. For example, take his promise not to appoint senators. He not only appointed a Quebec party hack who had run his election campaign for leadership of the Alliance Party, but also put the hack in Cabinet. A party insider from Quebec, unelected, unaccountable to the House of Commons or the voters, controlling public funds from the privacy of the Senate chamber. Not only that, but Fortier's Cabinet portfolio was at the centre of the Gomery inquiry. Quebec snouts are at the trough again but it's now a Conservative trough. No wonder Brian Mulroney worked so hard on Harper's behalf. Mulroney's vindicated.

So if an Ontario university professor, whose salary is funded by the provincial government and whose research grants come from the federal government, writes a book on his own time, he must pretend to be a private citizen and not let anyone know that he's a government employee? Imagine the outcry from Conservatives if a Liberal or NDP government muzzled university professors who promoted Conservative values in their free time.

Shoopie, why do you suppose Harper has recently not attended the return of dead soldiers to Canada?

Those of us with capital gains tax to pay this year will certainly remember the Harper promise of January 6, 2006, when he promised to eliminate the capital gains tax. Instead, it was eliminated only for charitable donations. Maybe one day Harper will realize that false promises aren't the way to gain credibility.

I wonder how Conservatives would feel if a Liberal government silenced or fired a civil servant who had written a novel with an anti-Kyoto bias? Is it remotely possible that they might not be supportive?

In addition to banning the media from attending the return of dead soldiers to Canada, Harper has decided that unlike previous Prime Ministers, he will not attend himself, even in the absence of the media. I suppose Harper's absence can also be viewed as "respect for the dead".

Oh yes, of course those military-hating Canadian leftists did not participate in World War II.

True, Afghanistan still has the legal right to execute Muslims who convert to Christianity...a right they had under the Taliban. But thanks to the US invasion, Iraq now also has an Islamic constitution. No weapons of mass destruction were found but at least an Islamic theocracy has replaced a secular dictatorship. And as Iraqi Shi'ites and Sunnis kill each other, terrorists will no doubt cease to exist.

What rogue nation will launch a nuke at the US if the US withdraws from Afghanistan? Who the hell possibly has technology to hit the USA with a nuke? North Korea So North Korea will nuke the US if the US withdraws from Afghanistan?

What rogue nation will launch a nuke at the US if the US withdraws from Afghanistan?

After months away from Mapleleafweb, it's reassuring to find Archie Bunker-style intelligence, absurd generalizations and comic relief masquerading as political comment. It almost makes me want to return to this site more frequently. Let's not get hung up on semantics. Typically the leftist latte-drinking jackasses in Canada do not support helping others. They care only about themselves and absolutely refuse to offer assistance to those in need in other parts of the world because that might mean some of our own would have to make the ultimate sacrifice. Thank you for so eloquently reinforcing my point.

After months away from Mapleleafweb, it's reassuring to find Archie Bunker-style intelligence, absurd generalizations and comic relief masquerading as political comment. It almost makes me want to return to this site more frequently. Yes, those leftists do indeed have a history of hating militarism. Leon Trotsky, when he founded the Red Army, was obviously "more realistic" and no doubt a right-winger. And so was Joseph Stalin. And Mao Zedong. And Ho Chi Minh. And when Fidel Castro's forces invaded Angola and other regions of southern Africa, they were probably trying to install "more realistic" right-wing governments in Africa. And Kim Jong-il of North Korea is what? A military-hating leftist or a more realistic right-winger?

I always thought this was just another zany conspiracy theory, but if there are "official" documents, it must be true. Now that we know that official documents exist, The New World Order is finally exposed on mapleleafweb. For more detailed plans for one world government, click on the New World Order or the Bavarian Illuminati at the following site: http://www.carpenoctem.tv/cons/ More useful information can be found in the book by William Bramley, the Gods of Eden. Bramley exposes the group of scheming billionaires who are planning one world government for what they really are: atheistic extraterrestrials.

Then he's not taken the time to examine what being conservative and the words limited government really mean. I am guessing that since bill C-250 predates the extortion of a gay marriage amendment by the courts, that Harper must have been thinking it would lead to it. It's the only thing I can think of that might lend to him making such stupid comments. Although C-250 predates C-38, I'm not sure that Harper opposed C-250 because he thought it would lead to C-38. If that was his motivation, it's not on the public record. Initially his concern was that it could infringe on the religious freedom of churches but the Toews amendment was introduced into C-250 for that very reason. Once the Toews amendment was put in and there was agreement that churches were protected, Harper apparently lost interest in opposing C-250...perhaps because he saw no benefit politically. This lead to an outcry from the Christian Heritage Party which condemned Harper for not showing up for second reading of C-250. Below is the response of Ron Gray, leader of the Christian Heritage Party to Harper's failure to oppose C-250: http://www.chp.ca/arc-CHPSpeaksOut/ReHarpe...ingMarriage.htm After the Christian Heritage Party and quite a few other religious conservative groups condemned Harper for apparently losing interest in C-250, he and almost every member of his party showed up on third reading to vote against C-250. So it remains an open question, in my opinion, as to whether sincere convictions or political pressure from religious conservatives accounted for Harper voting against C-250.

Ya good point... I don't know what the hell I was thinking. Besides, the NDP and Liberals can outvote them on any issue they don't agree with so the Conservatives are relatively harmless, lame-ducks. When the next election comes around, Harper supporters will attempt to remind Canadians that Harper's government was middle of the road. Fortunately, most Canadians aren't fools (64% voted against Harper on January 23rd and that was with Martin leading the Liberals), and are perfectly aware that Harper is more-or-less powerless and can be outvoted anytime by the Liberals and NDP. One way for Harper to get around the Liberals and NDP would be to make deals with the BQ but on what topic? Certainly not missile defense. Certainly not increased military spending. Certainly not crime prevention. Certainly not daycare. Certainly not opposition to same sex marriage. So what's left? He could shovel truckloads of money into Quebec but this won't be a big vote getter as Martin and Mulroney ultimately discovered. Or he could pander to the hearts and minds of Quebec separatists except that 58% of Quebecers voted for federalist parties this week and won't be impressed. Bottom line: The Liberals would be fools to form a coalition government with the NDP at this point. Their best strategy is to fund raise and focus on their leadership campaign while Harper engages in a futile campaign to convince Canadians that he's really middle of the road by accomplishing nothing of substance in Ottawa.

IMO, any law that abridges anyone's right to free speech is unconstitutional and wrong. The reality is that we can't stop hate by making it illegal to say it out loud. Unless you change hearts and minds all you're likely to achieve is making those who harbor those beliefs even more angry than they were. Hicksey, I'm sympathetic to your argument. However, your argument refers to all hate crimes legislation, and not just the addition of sexual orientation to pre-existing hate crimes legislation. Harper himself has no problem with hate crimes legislation based on race, religion or ethnic origin. In fact he said so during the C-250 debate. However, he has a problem with the legislation when it's also based on being gay or lesbian. Had Harper simply said I oppose all hate crimes legislation, then it would have been a clear, free speech issue. But by singling out gays and lesbians, he exposes himself to the criticism of being potentially motivated by religious extremism or even hatred of homosexuals.

Thank you for posting this tml12. It provides precisely what everyone should read to understand that C-250 was indeed the legislation which added sexual orientation and therefore by definition, gay bashing, to hate crimes legislation. If you click on the term sexual orientation in the Wikipedia C-250 article, it states clearly that this is the most common legal term used in laws that prohibit discrimination based on homosexuality (or heterosexuality). Despite all the evidence, some Harper supporters are still keen to deny that C-250 added gay bashing to hate crimes legislation. Harper was very fortunate in that neither the Liberals nor the lazy media even raised the issue of Harper voting against C-250 in the campaign leading up to the 2006 election. He won't be so lucky next time no matter how disingenuous he is in the interim.

I don't know the answer to your question but Chretien was Prime Minster at the time and I suspect he required that the Liberal Cabinet voted as he wanted them to. Once Martin became Prime Minister, the Liberal Cabinet voted differently. Perhaps Chretien was homophobic. Martin and the entire Liberal Cabinet did vote for C-250, the bill to make gay bashing a hate crime. Harper and most of his party voted against C-250. Even Chretien supported C-250. You'd have to be remarkably intolerant not to. That's not what C-250 was about and you know it. I stated exactly what C-250 was about on this thread at 8:56 on January 24th. C-250 was the bill to make gay bashing a hate crime. And Harper did vote against adding gay bashing to hate crimes legislation. And he did so even AFTER Vic Toews successfully introduced an amendment into C-250 designed to protect the religious freedom of those who use the Bible to justify their negative views on homosexuality.

I don't know the answer to your question but Chretien was Prime Minster at the time and I suspect he required that the Liberal Cabinet voted as he wanted them to. Once Martin became Prime Minister, the Liberal Cabinet voted differently. Perhaps Chretien was homophobic. Martin and the entire Liberal Cabinet did vote for C-250, the bill to make gay bashing a hate crime. Harper and most of his party voted against C-250. Even Chretien supported C-250. You'd have to be remarkably intolerant not to. That's not what C-250 was about and you know it. I stated exactly what C-250 was about on this thread at 8:56 on January 24th. C-250 was the bill to make gay bashing a hate crime. And Harper did vote against adding gay bashing to hate crimes legislation. And he did so even AFTER Vic Toews successfully introduced an amendment into C-250 designed to protect the religious freedom of those who use the Bible to justify their negative views on homosexuality.

You seem to have conveniently forgotten your original point. Earlier in this thread you argued that Harper should fire Martin-appointee McKenna simply because he represented the old "Liberal Dynasty". Notwithstanding that he's a proud Tory, Segal is also a Martin-appointee. And do you believe that Segal should have run Harper's campaign while receiving a six figure salary from all Canadians instead of being on the CPC payroll? Obviously Harper sees no problem with this but integrity never was one of his strengths.

McKenna, to his credit, resigned once he decided to run for the leadership. Hugh Segal continues to be paid by all Canadians while working for Harper. Clearly Conservatives see no problem in Segal working for the party and being paid by all Canadians rather than by the Conservative Party. :angry: Hugh Segal would, in my opinion, make a good ambassador to the US.