normanchateau

Thanks for the link. It confirms that the Greens favour outright legalization with taxation and regulation. This will be a hard sell with most of Canada favouring decriminalization. Harper continues to marginalize the Conservatives with his so-con policy of permanent criminal records and even jail sentences for possession of a few grams.

I'm rather sympathetic to the sentiments expressed above. A case can be made for the importance of education and knowledge-based information on decision-making and attitude formation. The following paper was presented at the 2006 Annual Meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association: http://www.cpsa-acsp.ca/papers-2006/Bittner.pdf Here's a nonrandom sample of the research findings in this study: Informed women are more likely to support same sex marriage than are uninformed women. Informed atheists are more likely to support same sex marriage than are uninformed atheists. Uninformed women were more likely to vote Conservative than informed women. Informed women were more likely to support easier access to abortion than uninformed women. Uninformed atheists are no more or less likely to support the Conservative Party than are individuals affiliated with a religion. Informed atheists are 24% less likely to support the Conservative Party than are uninformed atheists. Information may make individuals from rural areas more socially progressive. So perhaps there is merit to the suggestion implied by Argus that electoral decisions be made by those who are "...better educated, more knowledgeable...". Alas I suspect that this suggestion would meet with some resistance from CPC electoral strategists.

If so, we also need a more moderate conservative party, preferably one which is fiscally but not socially conservative. Only Harper's party favours permanent criminal records for possession of a few grams of marijuana. And if you really do view the Greens as more moderate, how do you feel about their platform to outright legalize marijuana and tax it like alcohol? Even the NDP platform hasn't progressed beyond decriminalization though some individual NDP members favour legalization.

More sad news for Canada this week as the military misadventure to prop up the corrupt Islamic Republic of Afghanistan continues: "CanWest News Service Published: Tuesday, November 28, 2006 KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Two Canadian soldiers were killed Monday after a suicide bomber drove his vehicle into a military convoy. The two soldiers were in a convoy attacked less than one kilometre outside Kandahar, ending a six-week lull in Canadian fatalities. As the convoy approached a roundabout, a man reportedly pulled up alongside a Canadian Bison, an eight-wheeled armored vehicle, and detonated a massive explosion. One of the soldiers was identified by CBC as Sgt. Maj. Bob Girouard, 46, a father of three from Bathurst, N.B. The other was identifed by the Niagara Falls Review as Chief Warrant Officer Albert Storm, 36, originally from Fort Erie, Ont., and a father of two." Source: http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national...9d6&k=57602

And as you probably know, some of those drug traffickers are members of the corrupt Karzai government. According to one estimate, Afghan government official are involved in at least 70% of the traffic: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10663339/

Do you have a link indicating that it has passed final reading?

Tories were expecting to make gains at least percentage-wise. Some thought they could win in Ontario. They didn't even come second in Ontario.

This man was never excuted, in fact where is he now norm. I've never said he was executed. What I said is that he was sentenced to death. In response to intense international pressure, including pressure from Bush and Harper, the Karzai government exiled him to Italy in order to avoid the execution that the mullahs were demanding. A country which sentences a man to death then exiles him from his own country for converting to Christianity is not the kind of "democracy" I support. And judging by the fact that a majority of Canadians do not support this miltary misadventure, apparently I'm not alone.

I've never ever said that "there is never a good reason to go to war" nor have I ever said that Canada should "never help another nation again". It's the Afghanistan mission I oppose. I'm proud of what Canadian forces accomplished in World War I and II. But in those wars, we weren't fighting to prop up a corrupt Islamic theocracy.

Age of consent around the world Tonga 12 Guyana, Spain 13 Albania, Austria, Canada, China, Croatia, Estonia, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Peru, Puerto Rico, Romania, Slovenia 14 Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Guinea, Monaco, Poland, Slovakia, Sweden, Thailand 15 Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Barbados, Belgium, Belize, Hong Kong, Dominica, El Salvador, Finland, Guam, Israel, Jamaica, Kenya, Latvia, Namibia, Nepal, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, Tonga, Uzbekistan, United Kingdom 16 Cyprus, Ireland 17 Tunisia 20 Australia 16-17 United States 14-18 http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/crime/ag...onsent-faq.html

The point of this cancer research development is that it may lead to more effective treatments. Researchers are not suggesting that cancer is a myth nor are they suggesting that cancer will go away without effective treatment.

No such qualifier was used in the following poll which found only 8% of Canadians favouring criminal charges fpr possession. Harper is among those who favour criminal charges. http://www.sesresearch.com/news/press_rele...2025%202004.pdf In this poll 53% of Canadians favoured outright legalization which is an even greater step away from Harper's extreme so-con position than the Liberal decriminalization bill.

Citation for that one? http://www.queensu.ca/cora/polls/2003/Febr...inalization.pdf http://www.sesresearch.com/library/polls/POLNAT-W03-T113.pdf

Probably the average voter does not. But the average voter probably does not need to be reminded how so-cons, given the opportunity, would be peeping through keyholes into people's bedrooms to regulate sex. State regulation of sex is common in Islamic countries but not too popular in Canada. This is only in your own mind. You see social conservatives around every corner it seems. There needs to be laws that have teeth to protect the young from sexual predators while allowing them the freedom to grow through that period of time without being made to feel chaep or freakish. Of course the parents will be able to teachtheir children and that would never be an issue and you know that. Exactly, Watching. I do not think the government should go out of its way to restrain homosexuality, but it should not go ouit of its way to promote it either. How about restraining homosexuals from their right to marry or their ability to be covered by hate crimes legislation when someone advocates or promotes killing them? Harper voted against both.

"The establishment came down with a constitutional package which they put to a national referendum. The package included distinct society status for Quebec and some other changes, including some that would just horrify you, putting universal Medicare in our constitution, and feminist rights, and a whole bunch of other things." - Conservative leader Stephen Harper, then vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition, in a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the Council for National Policy, a right-wing American think tank. Odd that he had a problem with Quebec as a distinct society but not as a nation.

Even in this modern irreligious age, it matters in the same sense that Bill Clinton was the first black president. Harper's a WASP even if he doesn't go to church.My point in the OP was that if Harper can't be a successful PM, then I'm inclined to believe that Canada is so intolerant that it is ungovernable. Canada intolerant?? Many Canadians view Harper's problem as being an intolerant so-con and most Canadians don't want a an intolerant so-con as Prime Minister. Just like many Canadians don't want an intolerant so-lib for prime minister It depends on the issue. For example, on marijuana decriminalization, most Canadsians reject Harper's intolerant so-con position.

Ignatieff or Harper?

According to the latest November Mustel Group poll, the Conservatives are now at 33% in BC, the Liberals at 30%, the NDP at 27% and the Greens at 9%. In other words, 66% of the BC populatiuon are now to the left of the Conservatives. Other than Quebec, is there any province in Canada in which the Conservatives are less popular than they are in BC? In the January election, the Conservatives were at 37% and the Liberals at 28% in BC. BC was the only province in which the Conservatives lost seats in both of the last two federal elections and they are now poised to lose even more seats, especially if Bob Rae succeeds in getting some NDP voters to shift to the Liberals. Bob Rae is in first place in Liberal delegate support in BC, Ignatieff in fourth place with Kennedy and Dion in between. The November Mustel Poll also reveals that only 37% of BC residents support the Conservative position on Afghanistan...less than the national average, and only 33% of BC residents support the Conservative position on environmental issues.

I'm no supporter of Michael Ignatieff but if I were, I'd certainly be grateful now to Stephen Harper and the Conservatives for sharing Ignatieff's "vision".

Sure he's a conservative...just not a fiscal conservative.

69%? No doubt a poll conducted by the "Pot Rules" activist group at parties and on the beach. Actually it was SES Research in February, 2003 which came up with the 69% figure. Here's the link: http://www.sesresearch.com/library/polls/POLNAT-W03-T113.pdf Currently the Liberals and BQ favour decriminalization. The Green Party favours outright legalization. And the NDP seems to waver between decriminalization and legalization. But Harper has chosen to please his so-con constituency. This certainly won't win him seats in the cities where the percentage favouring decriminalization is higher than the 69% nation-wide figure.

I realized you were referring to Graham. My point is that Harper helped the entire Liberal leadership convention by defusing the nationhood topic from the convention. So Harper helped the Liberals. And he helped the BQ and PQ who now support the motion as well. But I agree that the next election will tell us whether Harper also benefitted. Personally i see minimum benefit for Harper.

"Canada's military misadventure in Afghanistan at U.S. President George W. Bush's request is ensuring a drug disaster. The results will be more deaths of Canadian soldiers bravely fighting for our country as they unknowingly enable growth of the most evil trade in the world, drug dealing that also kills countless victims right here at home. Sound far-fetched? Not at all. On Sept. 2 the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime issued a startling report that received little media attention. Afghanistan now grows not only 92 per cent of the entire world supply of opium, used to make heroin, but there is now 30 per cent more opium available than total global consumption! So much for defending democracy and promoting development in Afghanistan for five years. The oversupply can only lead to one chilling result - cheaper heroin on streets of Vancouver and the world, and a relentless push by drug dealers to find more customers. The Taliban government of Afghanistan banned production of opium and by 2001 the UN reported that opium poppies had been overwhelmingly replaced by wheat and other crops. But since the Afghanistan invasion opium production has skyrocketed, with Taliban fighters now promoting poppy farming while western armies can neither provide alternatives for poor farmers nor control the countryside. Opium grown in Afghanistan jumped an astonishing 60 per cent last year. Only six of the countries 34 provinces are opium free and in the southern province of Helmand production has jumped by 162 per cent. "The news is very bad. On the opium front today in some of the provinces of Afghanistan, we face a state of emergency," Antonio Maria Costa, chief of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, said. "The southern part of Afghanistan was displaying the ominous hallmarks of incipient collapse, with large-scale drug cultivation and trafficking, insurgency and terrorism, crime and corruption." Source: http://vancouver.24hrs.ca/Columnists/NewsV...828963-sun.html

Even in this modern irreligious age, it matters in the same sense that Bill Clinton was the first black president. Harper's a WASP even if he doesn't go to church.My point in the OP was that if Harper can't be a successful PM, then I'm inclined to believe that Canada is so intolerant that it is ungovernable. Canada intolerant?? Many Canadians view Harper's problem as being an intolerant so-con and most Canadians don't want a an intolerant so-con as Prime Minister.

It's just so easy to write people off with labels. As Stephen Harper did when he wrote off those voters whose sexual orientation he disapproved of when he voted to deny them rights that other Canadians enjoy. The thing is there are some who wear their sexual orientation on their sleeve and there is just no pleasing them, and I think Harper realizes this. That's my point. Harper has written off many people as special interest groups. There's no pleasing them except for so-cons and militarists. For example, even though 69% of the Canadian population and most political parties favour decriminalization of marijuana rather than permanent criminal records and jail time, Harper has chosen to please the so-cons.