mcqueen625

CTVWho is Michael Chong and does it matter whether he resigns from the Cabinet? The caucus? Pierre Trudeau used to say that he got involved in politics to make sure Quebec didn't leave Canada and to make sure English Canada didn't kick it out. If you're a federalist, the only sensible position is Harper's. If you're a separatist, then you can side with Kinsella because there'll be almost no one in Quebec except those astute political analysts Serge Joyal and Trudeau Jnr to support you. The flaw in that thinking is that only opens up the country to other groups demanding to be considered as nations. I know, people are saying that this is just symbolic and that's all it means, but they would be wrong. Already we have the Acadian Society demanding that they also are a nation and should be recognized as such. New Brunswick jumped right on Trudeau's bandwagon and declared that NB is "Officially Bilingual," and ever since the Acadian Society has used the courts to push forward with theri own agenda of making New Brunswick into a French speaking province even though after more than 40 years less that 1/4 of the population of New Brunswick speaks French, but still they persisted. Many jobs in NB were and are declared to be requiring fluency in French, or do not apply. This has simply become a make-work project for Acadians, and now that they have those jobs, they are now demanding that they be able to work exclusively in French even though the majority of the people they interact with are unilingual English, and these Acadians were hired because they supposedly speak both languages. Having dealth with many of them, they certainly did not have to have any competency in English in order to get their jobs. Just as soon as Harper made that declaration about the Quebecois being a nation, the Acadian's demanded of an MP at a apublic function that they are should have nationhood declared for them as well. Maybe the rest of us should also join lobby groups and demand nation status as well. After all if Canada is to be fair to one, it has to extend the same honor to the other segments of Canadaian society. This declaration has done nothing to promote harmony, instead it has further divided us along linguistic lines, and is fragmenting the country.

People on Income Assistance should definitely be allowed to vote, but people living in prisons for breaking the laws of this country should definitely not be allowed to vote. When they made the choice to break the law and are convicted and sentenced to prison they should lose their right to cast a ballot. They have shown themselves to be disrespectful of not only other Canadians but also the laws which govern our society, so why should they be allowed to participate by having the right to vote?

How about, "None of the above."

That may be true but there is definite referals stipulating that man should not lie with man nor woman with woman. So I guess homasexuality is definite not something that is condoned in teh Bible, the Koran or any other religious texts. Bottom line here is that the term "Marriage" is for the Christain faith a religious sacrament and the term predates the establishment of Canada as a nation and therefore Canada had no right to change a definition which they had no part in defining in the first place. If they wanted to call it 'Civil Union as did England then I could care less but in my opinion Canada has perverted the meaning of the term marriage by chainging the definition as defined by most religious faiths to include gays and lesbians. As far as I'm concerned they can tell me that they are married, but other than some paper they have they that states that it does not make it all right nor will I accept that it is a marriage.

I read somewhere. I think it was in the Canadian Free Press that having Canadian morals and values actually means having no morals or values at all. It's what feels good at the time. I think therer is a lot of truth in that statement, starting with our Supreme Court and running downhill through the Parlaiment of this country and the Senate.

Agreed, and I have said all along that as long as the lyin Brian Mulroney is hiding in the back room giving the orders the Conservatives will still be just the same old tired Progressive Conservative Party led by Joe Who and then Lyin Brian. Sorry I forgot about that woman who inherited the PC party between Joe Who And Brian. What was her name again?

Right on, and the more we call ourselves a multicultural country the more we become less united. Ask the people of France if multiculturalism is working for the, and they will tell you that is definitly a failed social experiment, especially when the muslims are put into the mix, because they want French culture to change in order to make them fell all warm and cozy, even though it has divided the country along ethnic lines.

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2006/11...474855-sun.html Bob is absolutely correct on this issue. What Iggy and now Steve are doing is just plain dumb. As if big spendng Bob has any credibility especially in Ontario where he almost bankrupt the province. He is the last person we want running this counrty. He can't even make up his own miind whether he os NDP or Liberal, and given different circumstances he would be giving the NDP another try.

I think it is a very good idea because for one thing it will stop any future Liberal government from coming up with another hair-brained sponsorship program to in effect buy votes.

What are you taling about? Islam views all other faiths except Islam as infidals and calls for us to be subserviant to the Islamic faith or be destroyed. Tolerance, their idea of tolerance is "Do it our way, or else."

Thank God, someone who notices this as well. I also notice that Koffi Annan the hypocrit condemns Israel for defending themselves but always comes out on the side of these terrorist groups Hamas, Hezbollah and their supporters in Syria and Iran. Why is it that these cowardly Imam's who are the same people preaching " Death to America" and "Death ot Israel" are not putting themselves in harms way. In fact they are hiding behind the very women and children with the extremists. What a bunch of cowards! If they are so convinced they are right, why aren't they standing at the front of the terrorists and leading leading them instead of hiding? Cowards, cowards, cowards! As for China, the Liberals, NDP and the EU are more interested in exploiting the chinese workers all in the name of trade (money) than they are in human rights for the chinese people. Mexico is the same, these large multinational corporations are exploiting the workers by paying poverty wages and banking huge profits while the workers themselves are barely existing. This is the vision multinational would like to see for all workers the world over, although I often wonder who they think is eventually going to buy the goods they are manufacturing. Even in Canada the wage gap between rich and poor has grown to the point that the middle class has virtually been eliminated altogether. What we now have in Canada is a situation where more and more people who use food banks are actually the working poor, and not the people everyone associates with using food banks, the people on income assistance.

From what I've read "exploitative" relationships with anyone under the age of 18 are illegal. I'm not sure if the term "exploitative" limits the law to the relationships you've listed or if it is one of those terms that give broad discretionary powers to judges. FTA Lawyer can likely provide more insight though. I am not a lawyer but it seems to me that judges work with the laws provided to them. Quite often judges hands are tied by the wording of a law or the sentencing guidelines. This probably deserves another thread, but I'll comment here for now. I think the Judicial Advisory Committees should be as independent from political influence as possible. Adding a police rep to each JAC seems like a reduction in independence and impartiality to me. I realize that this is a bit off-topic but, I believe the judiciary has far too much power in this country, to the point that our previous PM's have publicly stated that their word in the final word in this country. Myself I elect politicians to be accountable, but if they are going to allow appointed, unaccountable judges to write law in this country than that defeats the whole purpose of having elected representatives. Beverley McLaughlin, while lecturing to law students in New Zealand told them that the judiciary should be emboldened to write law, whether the constitution of their country allowed for that or not. That's called activist judges, who take more authority than was intended for them to have. If we are going to allow these judges to write our laws then maybe we should elect our judges and do away with the parliament, senate, and the G.G.

well said... If your teen is having consensual sex with a person much older then they are that is their choice(as long as the person is not in a professional position of trust ie Doctor, teacher ect.). Probably not a good choice, but a choice none the less. If it is non consensual then there it is clearly a criminal issue. The right always bitches about the 'nanny state' when it comes to social services... so why the overreaching into personal lives? Im not advocating for pedophiles here... but exactly what is the problem with having the age of consent at 14? Hell when i was in school kids were sexually active at 10 or 11, many more were by the age of 14, by 16 if you were not sexually(not nessarily having sex... but other things... u can fill that in yourself) active you were definitely in the minority(cripes don't even get me started on the catholic school kids). I just don't see what problem changing the age of consent from 14 to 16 is supposed to solve. When i was in highschool i was 17, dating a 15 year old, for a brief 2 weeks i turned 18 while she was still 15, her birthday was 2 weeks after mine so she turned 16 shortly thereafter. That would have made me a criminal for those 2 weeks... thats a little silly don't you think? Arbitrary numbers applied to complicated issues and situations are not the solution in they actually created a criminal where none existed. To be perfectly honest this seems like another thinly veiled attempt to get the government back into the bedrooms of the nation. Don't get me wrong... sexual assault is sexual assault... raising the age of consent 2 years is really not going to have a real impact. No it doesn't because of the 5 year clause. I don't know of any 14 year old that is mature enough to make a decision that could affect the rest of their lives, since most kids that age think of themselves as invulnerable. Maybe the kids in your day were engaging in sex by 11 or 12, but they certainly weren't when I grew up. In fact very few people where getting any, unless it was in their mind or by themselves. IN this day and age with the prevalence of STD's and let's not forget HIV/AIDS that can kill, people should be especially worried about young kids engaging in sexual activity, and especially with much older adults, because the chances of them being infected are much higher.

First of all I believe, but correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't law now allow adults to develop relationships with anyone over the age of 14 years, and the exception only kicks in if that adult happens to be in a position of trust, IE: preacher, councellor, teacher, police officer, probation officer, etc. It does not presently prohibit the ordinary adult from presuing such a relationship with anyone over the age of consent, which presently happens to be 14. I'm all for raising the age of consent to at least 16, the exemption of the 5 year clause. This will legally put a stop to any adult from manipulating or otherwise coericing a child into such a relationship. It won't prevent it from happening, but it will allow those caught to be prosecuted, unless one of our moronic, appointed, unaccountable judges rules off the wall as they do more often than not in this country. I see that the Justices of teh Supreme Court do not want the police to have any say in appointments to the bench. I wonder why, are they afraid rthey may be held accountable for some of their asinine rulings, that they actually be answerable to someone other than themselves in their ivory castles?

A cross is not "our tradition" though blueblood, it's a Christian symbol. The term "our" may be true for you, but it's not true for many others. Canadian schools should not promote any religion over another. You obviously cannot read, because as someone on this thread has already stated that the poem was written to ensure that people never forgot about the sacrifices these brave men and women made so that we would have the rights we now have. It was explained that the crosses simply represent the men and women who died, and not a specific religion. I'm sure that there are non-Christian buried in Flanders Fields under those crosses, but it does not bemean or reflect on their religious beliefs. It is simply a reminder to all of us that these people died in order to preserve our freedoms, adn I'm sure if they could observe what is happening in Canada today with regards to political correctness, tehy would be shaking their heads and wondering why they even bothered to risk their lives for an ungrateful bunch of politically correct a--holes.

Funny you should suggest that because Elton John in an news article is lobbying that ALL organized religion be banned, because most religions speak out against his personal agenda which is homosexuality. At least he's not specifically picking on Christians, because it is not just the Christain religion that speaks out agianst this lifestyle. Is this also where you are coming from? God forbid someone have opinions that conflict with those of the minority. So let's just ban everything so that all humans have no individualism, isn't that what China and other totalitarian states advocate? While we're at it we may as well nationalize all businesses and take away the money our elitists have in this country, and instead let the state provide us with everything from food to clothing, medical care, housing, etc, etc., isn't that how it was supposed to work in places like China, Cuba, North Korea, and other communist countries. Too bad they forgot their ideals, because while their leaders import expensive food and other luxuries for the consumption of themselves and those that surround them., their people starve. I don't beleive that is the kind of world most of us want. What we want is a society that is tolerant enough to allow everyone to have and express their opinions freely, without fear of being labelled a bigot or some other derogatory handle. Insn't that what our brave soldiers died for in order to preserve our freedoms. Now we have special interest groups attempting to take away those freedoms.

As far as I'm concerned and many other Canadians, the Charter as you call it is nothing but a flawed document that the people of Canada had no say in putting together nor voting on it. It has given a bunch of liberal minded lawyers who have been appointed to the bench far too much power in the area of writing law. Even Beverley McLaughlin was quoted as telling law students in New Zealand that the judiciary should feel emboldened to write law, even if their country's constitution does not allow for it, and that is exactly what they have been doing right here in Canada. Waht right does she have to go to another country and instruct budding lawyers to start off their careers by telling them that is is okay to skirt the constitution of their country? From what I have seen from this Chretien appointee it is not encouraging for ordinary Canadians. The Charter as you call it is in fact flawed because it conveys more rights to the criminals than it ever does to their victims, and that is just wrong. I realize that lawyers seem to feel that they are somehow superior and more equal than the rest of society, but being able to pass the bar does not make someone smart nor ethical. Part of the probelm here in Canada is that we have far too many lawyers running for public office, and ultimately deciding such things as the number of doctors and nurses our healthcare system needs. I would suggest that maybe it is time we put a limit on the number of lawyers and accountants, and MBA's our universities are producing. One thing I have come to expect from lawyers is that they make life much more complicated than it needs to be.

I would say many people feel this way. However, 'banning religion' will never work. Just as 'banning homosexuality' wouldn't work. I'd rather see an all out debate about 'Which is the one true god?" (Or scripture...and the evidence for or against the existence of god, and 'truthfulness' of all religious texts, to be put to a worldwide trial) And many people also feel religion is very benefical and gives them the strength to be forgiving. As a christian, I feel the gay lifestyle is wrong. However, I am not a 'hateful' lemming nor do I hate gays, which is the pet stereotype usually trotted out on this topic. For Elton to lash out at religions, it only shows his prejudices. To me it also reveals the true agenda of the gay/lesbian proponents. If you cannot force your beliefs on the majority through flawed legislation and a liberal minded judiciary, why not ban the biggest opponents of the homosexual lifestyle, organized religions.

November 11 is already a provincial holiday in Manitoba. Only from Manitoba west and the Territories for some reason. Wrong, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia also celebrate Rememberance Day as a Public Holiday. I believe it is only Quebec and Ontario that does not honour our veterans with a public holiday.

Are you really naive enough to think that the U.S. lumber lobby wouldn't appeal this decision? Had the Harper Conservatives not settled this contentious issue it would be festering for years to come. If the Liberal's had gotten back into power we would still be putting up with morons insulting our largest trading partner, and we have already witnessed how effective that tactic was on many issues in getting them resolved. The reality is that the vast majority of Canadian's do not hate the U.S, just because they are the U.S. That priviledge is reserved for the members of both the Liberal and the NDP Parties.

Actually there is. Many employers are now randomly testing for drug use, and quite often it is those who have ingested Marijuana who are being busted. On the other hand those who are doing Cocaine are probably slipping through the cracks because it does not stay in the body very long. Urine testing on job sites is becoming quite common, especially in dangerous work environments such as oil refineries and nuclear plants. Hell, even truck drivers are randomly tested for drugs and are immediately taken off the road, why not ordinary drivers. I would bet that many accidents are cause by the ingestion of drugs as there are alcohol impaired drivers. anyone who is impared in any way should not be behind the wheel of a motor vehicle, and the police need to have the power to demand testing for drug impairment, just as they now have for alcohol impairment. Bottom line, if people want to get high on either alcohol or another drug of choice, they should not be operating a motor vehicle, and if they are they should not pass go, but go directly to jail. Far too many people are dying on our highways, and we have silly-assed lawyers more worried about the rights of the impaired individuals insteaad of the people they just killed in the other car.

Grandfathering any trust leaves the door open for more trusts in the future, and that will result as Flarety says in putting the full tax burden on ordinary Canadians. Individuals in this country already pay the lion's share of taxes in this country and trusts will ensure that individuals would eventually end up paying the whole thing, while corporate bums walk away to bank their money off-shore where the tax-man can't get his hands on their money. The Irving's from New Brunswick are a private empire and before K.C.'s death he gave up Canadian citizenship and moved to Bermuda so that the tax-man could not get their fair share of the money, yet this corporate bum still holds out their hands for lucrative government money.

I agree. It didn't stop the Conservatives from calling the Liberals anti-business when they considered rules on trusts. Now they fear the same backlash but it will come from their business supporters. The stock market is going to drop like a stone tomorrow. The big difference is that the Liberal just talked about it, and the Conservatives actually acted on it. Big deal that they said they wouldn't do it, this shows that they put the interests of ordinary Canadian's above those of their corporate friends. All the Liberal evcer did was talk about doing something positive but all they ever accomplished was to rip us off through things like the gun registry, the sponsorship program and the list could likely go on forever. If the Conservative had allowed it to continue the whole tax burden would have eventually fallen on the working people of this country, and I don't mean the corporate CEO and other executives, since the top 10% of earners pay little or no taxes in Canada.

And according to the news reports that I heard and read, Peter McKay never uttered the word dog, that was uttered by her fellow Liberlas, referring to animals. If he made a gesture towards where she sat that's also immaterial since the Bimbo was not in her seat.

Income splitting does not harm the spinster sisters in your example, it just doesn't benefit them. You discrimination argument could be applied to our current tax system as well. Doesn't it discriminate against single income families? We pay too much tax, period. Income splitting would benefit a large portion of the country without burdening singles. Obviously single people will not benefit but they will not be hurt either. I don't see income splitting as the final solution but as a stepping stone to it. First step is to allow seniors to split all pension income. Second step is to allow income splitting for all families. The third step is to implement the graduated flat tax system. Doesn't "graduated flat tax" sound like an oxymoron? Anyway, I think it's a great fit for Canada as it is a compromise between a pure flat tax system and our current progressive tax system. Sorry to bring up Garth in another thread but income splitting is a huge issue for his constituents and one he promised he would push. Now that he is no longer a Conservative he was finally able to ask a question about it in the House. I find it funny that Garth has more power to push the views of his constituents as an independent than as part of the government. As a part of the Conservative party questions and private members bills of non-cabinet MPs have to be approved by ministers...very few are approved. I would say it is the other way around. With the present tax system claiming married allows the government to determine eligibility for the GST credit based on total household income, while those living in unreported common-law relationships, both are treated as single people and most often qualify for the quarterly credit. As soo as they report to government that they are in a common-law relationship they are immediately treated as a married couple and both lose the quarterly credit, based on combined household income. The couple does not spend any less but now they no longer qualify for the credit. Doesn't make any sense to me, and sounds like discrimination of married couples.