Molly

... well... except that the answer to that question would have to be a solid 'Yes', regardless of who's asking it, or in what context.

You might try putting on a wig with waist-length hair, and then add 5 square metres of fabric to the pile, to see if it provides any cranial protection. Probably ask a Sikh man how often his turban falls off, too, and what sort of activity it takes to knock it off his head. I've seen plenty of helmets fly off, but I've never seen a turban suffer any disturbance at all, under any circumstances. It may be anecdotal, but I'd suspect they might achieve CSA approval if tested, and maybe even perform better than some helmets. If they do, or even if they perform better than helmets not designed to cover uncut hair... where's the beef?

Yes. Yes, they do. But don't expect us to simply congratulate him for tossing her out after she became a laughingstock, and acknowledged possible criminal without recalling that he's the fellow who chose her in the first place, and up until scant days ago showed every sign of being completely satisfied with that choice. It's not as though she appeared from nowhere, without history, reputation, or allegiance, unknown to any but God.

Toadbrother, that makes me laugh. As one of her more thoroughly jaundiced, never impressed constituents- one who would have injured myself rather than vote for her in the first place- I ask why? She's as much our 'representative' today as she was a week ago. (Acknowledging that I'm being snarky, I'd say she's exactly as effectual today as she was a week, a month, a year ago, too.) If her continuing her job happens to be inconvenient or embarrassing for Mr. Harper, oh well, eh? There's no particular reason why the Tories should have a special right to have their laundry shoved under the cushions and out of sight. .......... Kimmy -If Guergis knew he was doing that, then she's either a complete moron or a complete doormat, or maybe some of both. A third alternative is 'or completely complicit'. Truth be told, though, the more comes out, the more of a joke it all becomes... Even if every element of inuendo is true, it still comes off like a non-violent remake of 'Fargo'.

Her constituents won't give a tinker's damn what the police find (except for the festival of schadenfreude), and won't be influenced by the mutual party loyalty, either. (She has been an extremely loyal Harperite. Embarrassingly so.) They have the local take- what they choose to believe, as opposed to what has been proven by police. She was elected on the basis of party, much more than personal merit, and has been chalking up a mixed record ever since (regardless of the greater perception of 'rising star'. The local view has been much more cynical and less flattering.), cuminating in this spectacular flameout, and very busy, very uncomplimentary gossip mills. In this riding Mr. Harper is suffering from the association.

I'd be very surprised if anything particularly substantive ever is proven... but absence of hard proof only equals 'not proved guilty'... very different from 'innocent'. I live in her riding. It has been interesting to listen to local gossip and conversation, and the shift in tone over the last few months. I can't imagine her being re-elected, and even find it doubtful that another Conservative will replace her.

http://www.library.utoronto.ca/canpoetry/scott_fr/poem5.htm exerpt: He seemed to be in the centre Because we had no centre, No vision To pierce the smoke-screen of his politics. Truly he will be remembered Wherever men honour ingenuity, Ambiguity, inactivity, and political longevity. Let us raise up a temple To the cult of mediocrity, Do nothing by halves Which can be done by quarters.

Yep. I don't see how anyone could credibly believe that he had any solid sort of influence in the PMO. Some social connections certainly, so government doors might be a bit more open to him than Joe Citizen, but to me at least, he comes off as wa-ay too lightweight for anyone who matters to want to invest in him. The great embarrassment for the Conservatives should truly be that they ever had anything to do with him. (I find it hilarious that he was only asked to remove the CPC logo from his website yesterday. Talk about milking it, and his ex-MP status for all they were worth!) This is a connection of which I was unaware, too: http://www.bloggingcanadians.ca/LiberalBlogs/rahim-jaffers-better-half/

Rhetoric aside, there have been some decent NDP provincial governments. One can afford say a lot of things in opposition that one would never do as government.

Ye-e-es... I don't think that would make Dylan Thomas's toes twinkle.

He might wish that he was the spear side, but he wasn't. Aren't you a cozy literalist, though! No poetry in your soul at all?

Likely because 'meh' is being interpreted as 'approve' instead of 'who cares?'.

On March 9, 2010, crown attorney Balogh told a hearing (in front of a different judge) that she was withdrawing all charges speeding, driving over the legal blood alcohol limit, and cocaine possession against Jaffer because there were issues with the evidence and she saw no reasonable prospect of a conviction. She replaced the charge with one count of careless driving, to which the former MP pleaded guilty. He was fined $500 and also voluntarily made a $500 payment to a cystic fibrosis charity. 'problems with the evidence' = police screwed up.

I'm pleased to see the lie called on the suggestion that there was something wrong with the evidence, and/or the competence of the Caledon OPP. Blaming the sweetheart treatment on the police was shameful.

That's disingenuous. He was entirely embraced as their man... until he didn't win. He wasn't disavowed in any manner at all until he became a walking scandal, was still considered the distaff side of a 'power couple' within the Tory ranks until Helena did it to herself, and he still seems to inspire only uncomfortable silences from the high-moral masters of bombast.

Your grasp of $ can't possibly be that poor. You really are joking, aren't you? I can't believe I'm about to explain this to a supposed adult, but here goes: You and the other guy each owe $100 for the year, but he pays it off at a rate of $10/month (so ends up paying $20 more than he needs to) but you only pay $8/month, and at the end of the year have to pony up $4 more to pay off the hundred dollar debt. In the end, you have both have paid $100. Your year-end $4 was not 'extra' to cover money 'given' to him. The $20 he gets back came from him, not you. Paying your debts late doesn't entitle you to give away other folks' money.

Unbelievable. 1. Income tax refunds are refunds of money you paid, but didn't owe in the first place. They aren't a gift. 2. Charitable donations are deducted from gross income, rather than from tax payable, so when making a charitable donation you actually are giving more of your own money than of everyone else's- unlike political donations.

Irrelevant to the question of abortion. No law can/should require the sharing of ones body with anyone or anything else. In all other circumstances, killing to defend ones own physical integrity is perfectly acceptable, so if denying occupancy of ones uterus results in death of a living human occupier, so be it. Life/not life is not meaningful to ones right to refuse to host it.

Wrong. It is deducted directly from tax payable, not from gross income.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the reimbursement of election expenses. Uncomfortable enough that taxpayers provide parties with the money they spend in the first place, but irrational to give it to them twice, so long as they spend it liberally the first time. When you pile 60% reimbursement of election expenses on top of the 75% tax credit, $25 from a donors pocket can mean up to as $135 from unwilling taxpayers...more than 5:1. (Or, should I say $136.75. Must not forget the per-vote subsidy.) If the $100 is used as a basis for borrrowing to cover election expenses, it can be even more.

"My point is how can you be so sure that it is an officially held policy and not a gaffe by some flunky?" Because they haven't corrected it. Have actively refused to correct it. Have tried every sort of defelection to avoid correcting it, and have had spokesperson after spokesperson appear to talk about how they don't want to talk about it.... but not a single one to correct any misunderstanding.

" If anything, this will win back women which is a demographic the Liberals have to have in order to win." I'll go you one farther: it's not even a case of women being drawn to the Liberal party. Their own conduct wrt this question has been tepid, and for many of them, just shallow gaming. It is much more a case of women being forced away from the Conservatives. Whatever else I (and many like me) might base a vote on, I cannot-- simply CAN NOT give my vote to someone who would restrict that essential right to first dibs on ones own body, if they could get away with it. It's an ascendant question.

"There's a word for prejudging and labeling people as a group by the actions of a few... " Bill, Bill, Bill... 'bible-thumping social conservatives' were your words else I would not have used/repeated that label, and it isn't PREjudging when it is a direct assessment of an action/policy they have taken/espoused- especially when they've been been called on it but continue to hold to it. (It isn't even the first thing they've done that fits that stereotype.)

Now hold on a minute! The flippety hasn't entirely flopped, and it's entirely possible that it won't! Like it or lump it, abortion services are a normal part of maternal health aid, too, right up there with contraception. So... they shuffle Canada's international aid policy to disinclude both of those things, then only backtrack so far as re-including contraception... all the while screaming that they don't want to allow abortion to become an issue. EXCUSE me! They made abortion an issue by changing a 'settled' position! And it won't be fixed, backtracked or completely flippety-flopped until they return to where we started! Bill... I've already waited to see if they fix it, and so far, they haven't. Actions speak. They are, IMO, rightly defined as 'bible-thumping social conservatives' for exactly as long as they continue to act like 'bible-thumping social conservatives'.

It has nothing to do with how many there are, but with the welcome they, and their opinions recieve. This very thread topic, Bill is the perfect example. The whole notion of contraception having no role in a maternal health policy is absurd... simply asinine. Individuals may not be whacked out religious wingnuts or come up with such foolishness on their own, but if they are game to go along with it 'for the good of the party', then they are functioning as WORWingnuts. The difference between a wingnut and a functional wingnut is negligible. That stupidity either has a place, or it does not. Within the Conservative party, it apparently has a welcoming home. Someone pitching that bilge on behalf of the NDP party would be removed posthaste. In the Liberal party, they'd be laughed out of the room. In the Greens... forget it. Nobody who would suggest such a thing would ever have become a greenie in the first place. But the Conservatives? Would even consider it a prospect, depending on how virulently the public responded to it.