Peter F

The National Academy of Sciences disagrees with your position. From Science, Evolution, and Creationism, National Academy of Sciences and Institute of Medicine. © 2008 National Academy of Sciences http://www.nas.edu/evolution/IntelligentDesign.html

So can Shell. To repeat the linked article: "Shell, which recently completed a transformative acquisition of its key LNG rival BG Group, is cutting spending to US$30 billion this year from US$35 billion in 2015, and has scrapped a number of projects over the past year." Is that not reason enough? Shell thinks so.

From the linked article: Why shouldn't its BC LNG export project be put on hold? Hell, Shell doesn't think its worth it - why should other investors inside or outside Canada wring their hands with worry?

But is there an appeal process to appeal the decision to overturn the umpires ruling? At some point, the buck stops.

This is new! Now you are paying attention to a judges reasons instead of passing the reasoning off as specious. Do the reasons matter when it is the judges ideology that is the determing factor?

...and asside from arseholes I've never met anyone who agreed to mandatory minimums!

You're right about the circumstances of the Chattel thing nevertheless I am very glad that decision was made despite my ignorance of what led up to it. I know the SCC never said there can be no restrictions upon abortion. I am very aware that the court foresaw some instances where regulation of abortion could occur. Nevertheless, I am still very glad they made the decision they did. Some future court could very well make decisions that displease me - in fact they have already with the Walmart case. Surely your position isn't that if a court makes a decision I don't like then the Court has no valid role in protecting rights and restricting what government can do? Is that your concern? That the supreme court could make a decision that restricts parliament?

They are not essentially running the country! Lordy, you think parliaments don't matter? Legislation doesn't matter? Budgets don't matter? all because of some unelected judges that make decisions that may or may not please you? The SCC only makes decisions about whats brought to them to make decisions about. They are tasked to make a decision concerning some question or other. They don't wander the halls of parliament shredding whatever legislation takes thier fancy. Even if your dream came true and the SCC judges served for limited terms - Even then! - What supposed acountability would they have? They'd have to justify thier decisions? They do that already. They could be removed at the whims of some PM? How would that be accountable?. Would they be required to serve prison sentences - and some PM's whim - to teach them a lesson?

I will ignore your contention that there are no legal reasons for judges making decisions and its all about thier personal ideology. I consider that all unsubstatiated bullshit - ignoring all the decisions upholding legislation or rejecting legislation where arguments regarding laws and precedent consume whole forests of paper. Let us assume you are correct - and to be honest I to a large extent agree - that ones decisions, be they judges or bloggers or ditch-diggers or politicians, are based upon ideology. How can any of us escape such a thing? Even SCC judges? Or writers of Constitutions? As you said: What is your point?

Sure they can kick out any government they so please. Judges on the SCC can be booted too but the process certainly is not easy and shouldn't be easy. The reason SCC judges are appointed for life is so that they can say the government is wrong without fear of being removed from the bench. Its a good thing and, yes, also a troublesome thing. Thats why PM's pick (within certain parameters) who will fill the openings on the bench. They certainly aren't going to pick folks who are ideologically opposed to the PM's ideology - or maybe they will. Its up to the PM.

I most certainly can honestly say that. Gay Marriage rights prove that. The Morgantaler decision proves it. The Women are not Chattel decision proves it too - even though that came long before any charter of rights - it was a Supreme Court deciding that government legislatures were being unjust.

Response the First: Overly Broad Legislation is not in s.7 of the Charter. "7. Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice." The principles of fundamental justice do not embrace 'overlybroad legislation'. Unless there is a good reason for doing so. Fundamental Justice is not some concept that the Court just 'made up' 10 or 20 years ago. The Principles of Fundamental Justice have been around since King John reluctantly signed the Magna Carta back in 1972 or somthing. It was Fundametal Justice that brought those armed and dangerous Barons to that particular field. Denying the imprisoned water is not in section 7 either - but Fundamental Justice is. So folks don't die of thirst in jails nor are they subjected to overly broad legislation without appeal. The words Fundemental Justice have some meaning don't they? Does the term not encompass many things? And yes, it most certainly is a creation of the courts from previous cases. Judges and union negotiators have one thing in common: they know that words have meaning. Response the Second: Presuming what legislation intends. They didn't presume anything. They went back and read remarks from the Justice Minister to determine what the intent of the legislation in question was. They did presume that the Minister meant what he said. Response the third: Using hypothetical cases for legal argument. Of course they use hypothetical arguments. And they also relate those hypotheticals to cases at hand - as they did in the case linked. Debates in legislatures when crafting laws are chock full of hypotheticals. 'What about situation X? What happens then? Is such a thing what we want with this legislation? ' Its an entirely legitimate process when making decisions. Response the Fourth: "honour of the Crown" Unfortunatly the link you provided leads me to 404. But I do remember readiing a decision regardding the Honour of the Crown. That decision, If I remember right, was about interpretation of treatys in regards to modern times hunting and fishing rights. The SCC court said that the Crown deals in good faith. It means what it says and does not bullshit those who the crown is negotiating with. At least the idea was that that is how Judges interpreting treaties should read things. If the crown signed onto a treaty allowing the natives to hunt for sustenance in perpetuity, then thats what the crown meant. That is the concept behind "honour of the Crown". It may be that the Queens flunkies negotiating contracts have absolutely no intention of following through on this clause or that clause - but the Courts of the land should under no circumstance assume that clauses agreed to by the Crown were just lies and bullshit. That is legal reasoning: There is a point to the Honour of the Crown concept. It holds governments to the terms of contracts they enter into.

Of course SC judgements can be questioned - which is why they publish the reasons for thier judgments and the dissents to those reasons. Of course the powers of the day brought in the Notwithstanding clause as a compromise to get others who did not want the SCC over-ride legislatures. Who is arguing different? The arguments I have been hearing is that the SCC is meaningless piffle that has no authority to rule on anything - especially in regards to 'Rights' and interpretations of the Charter. Nevermind that that same Charter as approved by multiple legislatures specifically designates the SCC as being the body that is actually assigned the specific duty of interpreting the Charter. All that means nothing. The SCC is criticized for making decisions based upon thier own supposed liberal morals and ethics. These critics claim that the courts decisions are based upon nothing but. I suspect these critics have never a single one of the hundreds of decisions made available by the court. Or, more likely and far more understandable, the critics get lost in the words that are beyond thier comprehension; roll thier eyes; yawn and put the decisions aside with the firm conviction that these lawyers dont make any sense and are therefore just piling words on a page to baffle the peons with bullshit. What about the judges who dissent? They write up thier reasons - based upon law - for thier dissent. Are they just talking out of their arses too? Anyways I'm ranting. I have to ask should there be any legal forum for a citizen to appeal at all? Is there such a thing as an unjust law? Are we, should we, be at the mercy of legislatures in all things?

http://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/15860/index.do That SCC decision is the most recent released . Are you seriously saying that no legal reasoning was involved in the decision? That they just made it all up without reference to legisltation and Law?

What do you know about the joys of orphan-hood and foster parents? Has the woman killed anyone since she got out? Raped anyone? Done anything criminal at all? Anything? Then leave her and her kids alone.

Allright. Precedented then.

As compared to the case at hand: from the judgement: QUOTE PEERING THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS [1029] The email traffic that has been produced at this trial causes me to pause and ask myself, “Did I actually have the opportunity to see the inner workings of the PMO?” [1030] Was Nigel Wright actually ordering senior members of the Senate around as if they were mere pawns on a chessboard? [1031] Were those same senior members of the Senate meekly acquiescing to Mr. Wright’s orders? [1032] Were those same senior members of the Senate robotically marching forth to recite their provided scripted lines? [1033] Did Nigel Wright really direct a Senator to approach a senior member of an accounting firm that was conducting an independent audit of the Senate with the intention to either get a peek at the report or part of the report prior to its release to the appropriate Senate authorities or to influence that report in anyway? [1034] Does the reading of these emails give the impression that Senator Duffy was going to do as he was told or face the consequences? [1035] The answers to the aforementioned questions are: YES; YES; YES; YES; YES; and YES!!!!! [1036] The political, covert, relentless, unfolding of events is mindboggling and shocking. [1037] The precision and planning of the exercise would make any military commander proud. [1038] However, in the context of a democratic society, the plotting as revealed in the emails can only be described as unacceptable. Putting aside the legalities with respect to some of the maneuvers undertaken and the intensity of the operations, a simple question comes to mind. Why is the PMO engaged in all of this activity when they believed that Senator Duffy’s living expense claims might very well have been appropriate? ENDQUOTE and later, in regards to charge 31 "Breach of Trust by a Public Officer" QUOTE [1239] Mr. Neubauer stated that Senator Duffy’s actions were driven by deceit, manipulations and carried out in a clandestine manner representing a serious and marked standard expected of a person in Senator Duffy’s position of trust. I find that if one were to substitute the PMO, Nigel Wright and others for Senator Duffy in the aforementioned sentence that you would have a more accurate statement. ENDQUOTE https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2809019-April-21-Duffy-ruling.html But you are right, The judgement does not condemn PM Harper. Only his office and all the flunkies busting thier butts to make the scandal go away in order to please PM Harper. He, after all, is an innocent babe wandering the dark forest of politics!

Excellent. So it wasn't decided on whims and some wierd liberal need to ignore legislation.

And they continue to do so.

Argus: Just like you think everyone knows that the word 'everyone' doesn't include homosexuals too. The term written into the contstitution is 'Cruel and unusual' punishment. They could very well have written something specifically forbidding whippings and torture for minor crimes just to make sure that everyone knew that Argus knows exactly what they meant. But they didn't. They used the words Cruel and unusual and did not further define that term. I think they left it at that because they were quite willing to let educated people who know the law actually decide what that term means in relation to the cases brought before them. And too effing bad and so sad for those who did not agree.

They didn't rewrite anything - they rejected it for the reasons they gave. They saw the legislation as possibly resulting in Cruel and unusual punishment. Something the Constitution Act does not allow. They didn't rewrite the legislation at all and I cannot for the life of me understand why you keep insisting they rewrite legislation. Parliament can write up any laws they like. Hell they can even write a law that requires Judges to ignore the law if they so desire The court will reject such things of course. What they will NOT do is rewrite the legislation so that the courts can now apply it. So stop pretending that they do. The court rejected the minimum sentence crap and reverted to what the law was prior.

So you want the SCC to instruct the Legislative folks in how to make legislation ?

...and, as the SCC decision pointed out, shipped of to residential schools whenever the Government flunkies waved the Indian Act and claimed authority over metis. Chickens often come home to roost and often ones ass gets bitten. The past cannot be ignored for your convenience.

Whats idiotic about that? The SCC ruling - as kindly linked by Waldo above - says that if you fit the criteria you get the benefits. Is that not sensible? Is that not rational? see Para 48 of the decision. I suspect your hypothetical claim would fail at the first criteria "self-identification as Metis" and most certainly fail the second also "an ancestral connection to a historical Metis community". But maybe not - I'm no lawyer - nor do I have anything beyond you're declaration that to consider yourself a metis is ridiculous. You're entitled to your entitlements! Go get em.

Goodness! was not your opening bit all about defining and explaining God? Is not defining and expaining God the whole point of your meditations?