Evening Star

There were some given in the NP article I linked to.

Warren Kinsella

You didn't lose anything in translation. Imo, the OP is kind of ridiculous and hard to discuss.

This is pretty good, though, with more detail on who has sought to emulate the Charter and why: http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/04/17/adam-dodek-dont-hate-us-because-our-constitutions-beautiful/

I think that made me like the Charter more.

IIRC, Bill 101 was found to be in violation of the Charter but QC invoked the notwithstanding clause. PET denounced the law, famously.

Tbf, the article doesn't really say that other countries are deliberately referring to the Charter/Canadian constitution as a template as much as that since the early 80s, the sorts of provisions in the charter are becoming more common worldwide. The second option here seems more likely to me: I would be interested, though, in hearing about whether any other countries have deliberately looked to the Charter as a template or inspiration.

India more than Pakistan, surely. Pakistan has a state religion.

OED gives this definition for "decriminalize": so it seems that you're right that there's no hard and fast distinction! Interesting!

Voted to legalize marijuana only. Seems like an understatement to say it's "a bit" easier to get hooked on cocaine or heroin than on alcohol.

This is not what I understand "decriminalization" to mean. I've always understood it this way: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decriminalization i.e. the removal of criminal penalties but something milder than legalization: e.g. you could still get fined but you wouldn't get a criminal record.

Really? On what grounds?

Actually, that would only make sense to me in the US. By the standards of Northern or Western Europe, the CPC do not seem left-wing at all. If anything, I could believe that the NDP platform would be right of centre in many ways by Northern European standards.

OK, I was being a bit of an arse. I'm not especially knowledgeable about UK politics in the Blair era. What are some of Blair's accomplishments that we should strive to emulate? The only things that come to mind for me are ending free tuition and CCTV, neither of which inspire me. I mean, if someone truly believes that abortion is murder, this seems like a reasonable position to me. (Likewise with throwing significant support, i.e. human lives and large sums of money, behind a war one holds to be truly wrong and unjust.) That's a fair distinction but I'm not sure I agree. I think it has just been the case that the NDP had a solid base of support in SK/MB for a number of historical reasons and until recently, had never been able to break through the Liberals' hold on Central Canada. McDonough and Layton were not extremist, uncompromising leaders.

Don't see your point. You say the NDP has never compromised enough to win power and then a couple of posts later you list NDP leaders who did exactly that. And, especially now that Bush himself has admitted the invasion of Iraq was an error, why would anyone look to Blair as a model to follow?

Has anything been innovated in SK recently?? My sense was that the boom is due almost entirely to commodity prices and resource extraction.

I like the use of "coming to light" there, as if it had actually been a secret that the NDP tends to favour spending on social programmes and is not always that gung-ho about military spending; only now are we beginning to truly uncover this hidden agenda.

Reasonable point, actually.

I actually also think it would be a good idea for the Opposition to produce an alternative budget that is more detailed than their 2011 election platform. I mean, whether or not they (we?) like what the Tories have done so far we do have to live with it. If the NDP wins power in 2015, they will have to deal with the effects of CPC government.

I also think that list is pretty weak, even compared to Ignatieff/Rae/Dion/Kennedy.

Polls are listed on the pages he linked, including one that showed Dion's Liberals at 40%. Check the links again.

He was answering my question.

Thanks.

Did the Ignatieff- or Dion-led Liberals ever lead the CPC in a poll? I don't remember.

Anger can express itself in different ways. There are guys who will get into a barroom fistfight. Then there are guys who will be completely calm and polite to your face, if eerily so, while arranging for your brake cables to be cut when you're not looking. It's the difference between a bully and a calculating nerd.