Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Maybe because they use different strategies now. Not noticeably. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 (edited) Gutter politics, that is what the result of this add has been. If nothing else and for no other reason this kind of thing should be stopped. This may in fact be where the Harper folks want to go with politics. Maybe they want to get down and dirty, who knows. I suppose on the one hand all is fair unless it is false but it gives me no great pleasure to see what direction is being chosen. Your holier than thou attitude would be easier to take were you not an eager supporter of the real gutter politics practiced by the Liberal party over the last thirty years. Edited July 5, 2009 by Argus Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Actually, Duceppe's comments were extremely effective, and caused a lot of people to vote for the BQ. It neither helped or hindered the BQ's polls at the time. While the Tories were calling the BQ soft on crime, the BQ said the Tories wanted 14 year olds in adult prison. Also, while his comments were untrue, any suggestion the BQ is soft on crime in general, including pedophiles, is fundamentally true. I don't see why you seem to believe making that suggestion is somehow unfair or sleazy. It was fundamentally true as well that the Tories wanted 14 year olds in adult prison. Your party has a similar mentality, of course. Perhaps that's why you oppose the tactic of revealing that sort of thing. Your party wants to increase sentencing for everything with no plan for paying for it or giving evidence that it is the most suitable justice solution. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Not noticeably. Compared to the Tories who have taken gutter politics in a new direction. Lower. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Oh please. Your party has been using mainly attack ads for the last thirty years. Who the hell do you think you're fooling? And you don't think there was a backlash? You think that the Tories should go even more negative and it will result in a majority? Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Good. Who gives a crap what BQ supporters want, think, do, or say? They're BQ supporters!They can all go to hell as far as I'm concerned. It is the NQ supporters now that the Tories have been trying to make Conservative supporters. So I imagine it is the Tories who care. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 How about your ongoing sleazy campaign to mention Alberta in negative terms as often as you can, and imply that Harper and his party are merely some kind of evil western import into what you regard as your pristine liberal politics? Perhaps you can point to some example to jog our memories. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 I guess so because god knows the liberal senate will never let any reform go through. And why should it? Have the Tories talked to the provinces about the changes yet? Quote
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 I object to the spin of the words 'soft on crime'. One need not be 'soft on crime' to see mandatory minimum sentences as utter stupidity. One need not be 'soft on crime' to respect the role of judges (and juries) and expect them to have a better take on a given situation than do short-term MPs on a mission of public posturing, who never have and never will hear the particulars of what they are pre-judging. The bills offered are less 'tough on crime' than they are 'don't give me details. Details hurt my head.' Details like cost and outcome and actual justice.... The public demand for stiffer sentences is the result of an all encompassing disapproval of the kinds of sentences and punishments they see being handed out to criminals, particularly violent criminals, every day in their newspapers and on their televisions. There is a fundamental discontinuity between the belief of the general population in terms of justice, and the laiser faire attitude of the much more liberal political/academic elites who are, by and large, in higher income brackets and so more divorced from the reality of living with crime. The more money you have, the nicer the neighbourhood you live in, the less you need to worry about crime. They don't ride buses and subways, and wait around at dark stations and stops, they drive their car or take a cab. There is little crime in their comfortable suburban neighborhood, and they have their burglar alarms for reassurance or their security in the lobby. Their kids don't go to the crummy schools. They make sure they go to the better ones. And so they feel they have the comfort to treat violent crime as an intellectual exercise rather than, as most people do, a reflexive desire to hammer those who engage in it with stiff sentences. I know this myself. I used to live in a lower middle class neighborhood very close to a housing project. There were violent incidents all around me. Within a two block radius circling my apartment, there were several stabbings, shootings, a kidnapping, gang fights, a drug addled mom letting her kid fall out a tenth floor window, a bunch of swarmings, and several sexual assaults. It was typical for the public high school a couple of blocks away to have half a dozen or more cop cars out front responding to this or that gang fight between Lebanese and Somalian gangs. Now I live in a comfortable neighourhood of detached homes on an old street with big old trees, and no crime. No one much worries about crime here, really, compared to my old neighborhood, though we all have burglar alarms, and/or bars on the basement windows for reassurance. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Personally I think it's about time that the Liberals came out with attack ads which accurately describe Harper's history. How many Canadians remember that Harper lead the charge against lesbians marrying before he was elected? How many Canadians remember that even after he was elected Prime Minister, he attempted to take away their right to marry by "revisiting" the issue in Parliament? How many remember that he voted against making it a hate crime to promote or advocate the murder of homosexuals? EVERYONE knows the tories are not a big fan of the expansion of gay rights. You think there's someone been living under a rock somewhere who would be surprised? How many remember that he spent almost no time in the work force except as a professional politician? Yeah, I don't think they really want to go there given Ignatieff and Layton have NEVER held a job other than on a college campus, and that both epitomize the term "ivory tower intellectual" with no real-world experience. The rest of your post is just inane babbling. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
jbg Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 The Tories are free to call an election anytime. And the Liberals decided they didn't like the result of the last one so they attempted a coup undemocratic coalition. Quote Free speech: "You can say what you want, but I don't have to lend you my megaphone." Always remember that when you are in the right you can afford to keep your temper, and when you are in the wrong you cannot afford to lose it. - J.J. Reynolds. Will the steps anyone is proposing to fight "climate change" reduce a single temperature, by a single degree, at a single location? The mantra of "world opinion" or the views of the "international community" betrays flabby and weak reasoning (link).
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Option? I think what the BQ pointed out was that the Tories seemed headed to legislation that would raise 14 year old violent crime to adult court automatically. No, they tried to suggest that 14 year olds, little, innocent, sad eyed rapist-murderers, would be forced into adult prisons to be raped by brutal thugs. In reality, that is, to be truthful, the law said nothing of the sort, and there was no automatic sentence. No do I think it likely there would be an automatic sentence for juveniles. The Tories generally distrust judges or juries to these things on ther own. No it's Liberal party hacks who make up the judges, and Liberal party hacks who wrote the laws and who are interpreting the laws they don't trust. Actually, I support giving judges discretion on all sentencing within the law. Minimum and maximum punishments are already set through legislation and precedent. Oh so then you support the tory bill to give judges the option of increasing the sentence of violent young offenders? Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 The picture is gutter politics. No way of getting around that. The picture is reality, and since your party has as its spinmeister, a guy called called Doctor Dirt, the master of gutter politics, Warren Kinsella, and since you were a long time admirer of Jean Chretien, as down and dirty a politician as this country ever produced, you really have no complaint. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 And you don't think there was a backlash? You think that the Tories should go even more negative and it will result in a majority? What I think is that your hypocrisy isn't fooling anyone. Your party mastered the attack ad a generation ago and have been in love with it ever since. And we will see plenty of them from you next election. So quit whining when someone else does it. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Compared to the Tories who have taken gutter politics in a new direction. Lower. That's only your bizarre interpretation. I don't consider pointing out how soft on crime you guys are to be gutter politics. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Give me a break. I was mocking your statement with the same over the top remarks are you were making. My statement is not over the top. My statement is accurate. You are soft on crime and always have been. The entire judicial/parole system we have today is a result of liberal hugathug mentality. What, you think mandatory supervision was a conservative idea? You think weak parole laws were conservative ideas? You think it was conservatives who decided rapists and child molesters could serve their terms at home? You think it was conservative judges who came up with the 2 for 1 and 3 for one sentencing provision for criminals held in custody prior to trial? Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 It neither helped or hindered the BQ's polls at the time. While the Tories were calling the BQ soft on crime, the BQ said the Tories wanted 14 year olds in adult prison. There were two apparent main factors in the BQ turnaround, neither of them honest. One was their lamenting the minor changes in a couple of secondary arts programs, and blowing that up into a huge "Evil anglos attack Quebec's culture!" thing, and the other was this, blown up as "evil anglos don't understand the enlightened Quebecois approach to crime!" The herd in Quebec rallied to this racial politics thing, and helped swell the BQ numbers. It was fundamentally true as well that the Tories wanted 14 year olds in adult prison. I know that any time someone of your ilk uses terms like "fundamentally true" it's going to be fundamentally dishonest. The tories never ever even suggested or hinted at the idea of 14 year olds in adult prison. They would serve their terms until they became adults themselves, then be transferred over. The bill was quite explicit. Your party wants to increase sentencing for everything with no plan for paying for it or giving evidence that it is the most suitable justice solution. The conservatives seem to want to increase sentences to the extent those sentences are more in line with the beliefs of most Canadians in terms of fundamental justice. The Liberals, BQ and NDP, of course, don't have any interest in concepts like that. Quote "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Molly Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 (edited) The conservatives seem to want to increase sentences to the extent those sentences are more in line with the beliefs of most Canadians in terms of fundamental justice. One extremely high profile case of the application of a mandatory minimum was Robert Latimer. In spite of horror from the jury, and an attempt by the judge to apply a more realistic sentence, the mandatory minimum was upheld by the Supreme Court, because, in spite of flying in the face of ' the beliefs of most Candians regarding fundamental justice', it was _the law_. Mandatory minimums are thoughtless, knee-jerk, anonymous vengeance- an expression of the worst that humanity has to offer. They express a shockingly cavalier attitude to justice. They do not uphold it. Edited July 5, 2009 by Molly Quote "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" — L. Frank Baum "For Conservatives, ministerial responsibility seems to be a temporary and constantly shifting phenomenon," -- Goodale
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 (edited) There were two apparent main factors in the BQ turnaround, neither of them honest. One was their lamenting the minor changes in a couple of secondary arts programs, and blowing that up into a huge "Evil anglos attack Quebec's culture!" thing, and the other was this, blown up as "evil anglos don't understand the enlightened Quebecois approach to crime!" The herd in Quebec rallied to this racial politics thing, and helped swell the BQ numbers. They didn't swell. The polls say they stayed the same. I know that any time someone of your ilk uses terms like "fundamentally true" it's going to be fundamentally dishonest. The tories never ever even suggested or hinted at the idea of 14 year olds in adult prison. They would serve their terms until they became adults themselves, then be transferred over. The bill was quite explicit. Yes, I have seen the fact check. As many observers said, both Duceppe and Harper were right and they were wrong. Duceppe was wrong that 14 year olds would be in general adult population. However, he was correct that they would be vulnerable if they were transferred at 18. Even Corrections Canada admits that. So, Harper was right that 14 years would not serve in adult prison but was wrong that when they were transferred, they would not be subject to what Duceppe says they would be. I know it doesn't matter to the right wing who believe they have it coming in adult prison. As Corrections Officials have pointed out, their preference is to house younger offenders elsewhere. The conservatives seem to want to increase sentences to the extent those sentences are more in line with the beliefs of most Canadians in terms of fundamental justice. The Liberals, BQ and NDP, of course, don't have any interest in concepts like that. The Tories want to increase sentences with no regards to the cost or whether better alternatives exist. Edited July 5, 2009 by jdobbin Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 My statement is not over the top. My statement is accurate. You are soft on crime and always have been. The entire judicial/parole system we have today is a result of liberal hugathug mentality. What, you think mandatory supervision was a conservative idea? You think weak parole laws were conservative ideas? You think it was conservatives who decided rapists and child molesters could serve their terms at home? You think it was conservative judges who came up with the 2 for 1 and 3 for one sentencing provision for criminals held in custody prior to trial? The Tories always play the tough on crime angle even when crime is going down nationally. They have no regards to the cost. Mo regards for whether there are alternatives. They want to criminalize behaviour on a wider scale and don't trust judges, juries or the police in many cases. They use anecdotal evidence to support their case and use fear as a means of driving the debate. And then they accuse their opposition of being in league with child molesters. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 That's only your bizarre interpretation. I don't consider pointing out how soft on crime you guys are to be gutter politics. If only it was my interpretation, you'd be fine. It appears that the reaction in Quebec is disgust. However, I know that the gutter reaction to that is likely anti-Quebec venom. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 (edited) What I think is that your hypocrisy isn't fooling anyone. Your party mastered the attack ad a generation ago and have been in love with it ever since. And we will see plenty of them from you next election. So quit whining when someone else does it. I think the hypocrisy comes from the Tories who talk about the poisoned atmosphere of Ottawa when it is the Tories that throw gas on things by running negative ads in a neverending election campaign. I think the whining on the part of the extreme right wing is rich on that account. Edited July 5, 2009 by jdobbin Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 No, they tried to suggest that 14 year olds, little, innocent, sad eyed rapist-murderers, would be forced into adult prisons to be raped by brutal thugs. In reality, that is, to be truthful, the law said nothing of the sort, and there was no automatic sentence. No do I think it likely there would be an automatic sentence for juveniles. As I said, it is accurate that adult prison is where they would be headed No it's Liberal party hacks who make up the judges, and Liberal party hacks who wrote the laws and who are interpreting the laws they don't trust. Don't think so. I think it is any judge, any jury that they don't like. Oh so then you support the tory bill to give judges the option of increasing the sentence of violent young offenders? I do. I just don't think they should be going to adult prisons as part of their sentence. Quote
jdobbin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 The picture is reality, and since your party has as its spinmeister, a guy called called Doctor Dirt, the master of gutter politics, Warren Kinsella, and since you were a long time admirer of Jean Chretien, as down and dirty a politician as this country ever produced, you really have no complaint. Still gutter, I'm afraid, despite your bloviating. Quote
Jerry J. Fortin Posted July 5, 2009 Report Posted July 5, 2009 Gutter politics, nothing more and nothing less. Politicians are usually in charge of spinning an issue this way or that to suit their needs, nothing new there. Yet the optics of this little stunt will not bode well for Harper at all. I guess the next poll will tell, but I don't think it will swing the way Steve wants it to. Quote
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