Stephen Harper: Man of Ideas
Canada’s prime minister is a man of firm views. He never dithers.
Where does he get his ideas? Does he pluck them from the air? Consider ten of his initiatives since he took office:
· Ditching the Kyoto Accord and replacing it with a “made in Canada” environmental approach that does nothing to reduce green house gases.
· Deep-sixing the national child care program, launched late in the life of the Martin government, in favour of a system of “choice” for parents.
· Extending Canada’s Afghanistan mission for two years, increasing military spending, and signaling that Canada will seek to expand its global influence through war-making, not peace-keeping.
· Dumping the historic aboriginal accord achieved in the autumn of 2005, thus denying first-nations billions of dollars in development capital.
· Unveiling “three strikes and you’re out” legislation to tie the hands of judges and to make it easier to lock up offenders throw the key away and make prison expansion a growth industry in Canada.
· Abandoning the gun registry in favour of the idea that guns don’t kill people, people do, and that after they have offended they will be harshly dealt with.
· Cutting the funding for women’s groups to lobby for greater gender equality.
· Dropping the funding of literacy programs from federal spending.
· Considering legislation to allow public servants to refuse to solemnize same-sex marriages, as well as legislation to protect groups who promulgate the view that biblical passages justify the killing of homosexuals.
· Strongly endorsing Israel’s “measured” military assault on Lebanon and branding those who point to atrocities committed in that assault as “anti-Israel”.
It looks like an application for membership in the Republican Party.
· Ditching the Kyoto Accord and replacing it with a “made in Canada” environmental approach that does nothing to reduce green house gases.
· Deep-sixing the national child care program, launched late in the life of the Martin government, in favour of a system of “choice” for parents.
· Extending Canada’s Afghanistan mission for two years, increasing military spending, and signaling that Canada will seek to expand its global influence through war-making, not peace-keeping.
· Dumping the historic aboriginal accord achieved in the autumn of 2005, thus denying first-nations billions of dollars in development capital.
· Unveiling “three strikes and you’re out” legislation to tie the hands of judges and to make it easier to lock up offenders throw the key away and make prison expansion a growth industry in Canada.
· Abandoning the gun registry in favour of the idea that guns don’t kill people, people do, and that after they have offended they will be harshly dealt with.
· Cutting the funding for women’s groups to lobby for greater gender equality.
· Dropping the funding of literacy programs from federal spending.
· Considering legislation to allow public servants to refuse to solemnize same-sex marriages, as well as legislation to protect groups who promulgate the view that biblical passages justify the killing of homosexuals.
· Strongly endorsing Israel’s “measured” military assault on Lebanon and branding those who point to atrocities committed in that assault as “anti-Israel”.
It looks like an application for membership in the Republican Party.
posted by James Laxer @ 2:45 PM
8 comments
8 Comments:
OK, I'll bite. As a "small c" conservative, a few of those are exactly why I voted Conservative last election.
Kyoto - Although they haven't abandoned it completely, there is very little value in it. Less than half of the countries on the planet are involved in it, and paying money just so you can pollute more doesn't solve the problem.
Childcare - Both plans suck, the government shouldn't be involved in childcare to this extent. The Liberals plan was 5 billion to help 7% of the children in daycare. That about 2% of the kids in Canada, dumb. So is the Conservatives plan, but at least more Canadians see something from it.
Afghanistan - It was NEVER a peacekeeping mission, and the fact that some of the rules have changed is no reason to pull up our tents. The soldiers think we should be there, the Afghan citizens think we should be there, and so does their President....
In our Aborigonal Agenda debate on my site, we decided to keep the Kelowna Accord, but have the option to re-enter negotiations after looking through it. That way money still goes where it's needed, but if there is something we don't like, we still have the option to call it back. The Conservatives do seem to be taking care of the water issue though...
Judges currently have too much leeway when it comes to deciding sentencing, and it's not really a "three and you out" deal. After three violent offences, all it does is put the owness on the Criminal to prove he can be rehabilitated. I don't have a problem with it personaly.
It's not that the "guns don't kill people" thing is true, but the registry really does nothing to stop anyone from shooting anyone.
I think the gender equality thing is being abused myself. For example, a firewoman has to carry less weight to pass her tests than a man does. I don't care who carries my ass out the door during a fire, but they better damn well be able to lift me. (just as an example.)
Dropping Literacy Funding - Agreed 100%, bad idea. Not only does it hurt the country, but it makes a party look bad.
The SSM one - This is a political football and the chances of it ever coming into play are slim. Most gays wouldn't push the subject if a JP asked if someone else could do it. Why would you want to be married by someone who doesn't want to do it....
I'm half and half on the Isreal one. Hezbollah is recognised by the Canadian Government as a terrorist organisation, so support should in fact be given to Isreal on this one. Lebanon did almost nothing to stop the Hez from what they did, and if the Hez were better armed, it would have been an entirely different war with numberous more Isreali casualties..
>>>> Afghanistan - It was NEVER a peacekeeping mission, and the fact that some of the rules have changed is no reason to pull up our tents. <<<<
True. However, there are a ton of other reasons why we should pull out.
>>>> The soldiers think we should be there, <<<<
yeah and. Besides being a loud mouth idiot Hiller is delusional. He believes despite what happened with the Toronto 17 and the emergence of home grown terrorism as the biggest terrorist threat to western democracies that the mission is making Canada more secure and a more likely target.
>>>> the Afghan citizens think we should be there, <<<<
According to what poll.
>>>> "It's not that the "guns don't kill people" thing is true, but the registry really does nothing to stop anyone from shooting anyone."
Of course it does. Take gun related suicides and accidental shooting they have been more than halved since the legislation was introduced. Now to be sure, that is unfair answer. People are using other means of committing suicide. However, as with the previous gun control legislation, there is some evidence now emerging that it is helping to reduce suicide attempts.
DazzlinDino is another good candidate for the membership of Republican Party. Cons and Bush also say that they brought democracy in Afghanistan. If that is democracy then I prefer to live under dictatorship.
Cons have their own mandate. Why they keep blaming Liberals for Afghanistan? People went for the change of government and not to put in bunch of whiners to tell us that it is Liberals’ fault.
Harper is giving Canada bad name by being lapdog to Bush.
I do not believe that Canada should pull out of Afghanistan. I think it's pathetic that, as usual, Canadians didn't listen when they were warned that we would take a high number of casualities as late as December 2005.
My problem with the war in Afghanistan is that the Conservatives have attempted to use this war to their advantage. Rather than promoting the non-fighting aspects of progress in Afghanistan, they have launched a "military is sexy" campaign to lure Canadians into the Canadian forces. The most inclusionary policy I've seen from this government since assuming office is allowing the General to claim that there are not enough muslims in the forces.
To claim that the government shouldn't be involved in childcare is the most ridiculous argument I have ever heard. While it's true that the national childcare strategy could have been better, I would say that the government does have a role to play in the early childhood education arena. Both men and women have careers. The days of the standard employment relationship are nearly over, although I would suggest that whites still have better access to what's left of the SER than the rest of us. Perhaps, I will leave this to the ambitious academics to hash out.
Abandoning Kyoto would have made sense if the Conservatives had a plan. All that outside of office (almost 20 years) and still there's no plan. Now the environment minister is telling us that Canadians care about air quality more than they do about global warming. Air quality is an issue, but I doubt this is true. How strange it will be when the United States wises up to Global Warming (As it is becoming a huge issue there) while in Canada all we will care about is air quality.
Perhaps the issue is that we are planning to wait for the United States to take all the steps on every issue, and then copy their initiatives. The issue I have with that is...why have an environment minister? We could save money by outsourcing our portfolio to the United States and fire all of the Environment Minister's staff, and certainly pay her a lot less. This goes the same with Foreign Policy. There is no point in having our own policy if all we plan to do is back up the United States and all their initiatives. Instead we can have a few ministries.
The Ministry of Propaganda
The Ministry of Canada-US Relations
The Ministry of Trade
The Ministry of Judeo-Values.
Think of all the money we could save. Instead of a Prime MInister we could have a Governor General (like we do now)...but instead of being the Queen's Rep he/she could become the President's REP in Canada.
Does this sound ridiculous? Likely...but when you think about it a bit more, maybe it will make some sense.
I've noticed that the Conservative government has moved from being an opposition party, to being an attack the Liberals government.
Why have a government so inept with no real progressive plan for Canada. Harper makes Mulroney look like Canada's saviour. At least he had a plan on acid rain, and at least he did something to stand up against the apartheid in Africa.
Finally, lets have a word about our justice system. Judges have too much leeway in sentencing? These Thatcher-like policies being implemented by Harper will do nothing do solve crime issues. Do people not commit crimes because they are afraid of the penalties, or are people streamed into criminal activities because they have allowed their life to progress to the point that they have little options.
Has crime increased because there is a further gap between the rich and poor in Canada? Have minorities lost some of the gains made in the 1970s? These are all important things to ponder.
Finally, the burden of proof of danger should remain with the crown. This is their JOB! It's their job to prove that an offender should not be released, that is the whole point of prosecution in the first place. Why ask the defendant to plead his innocence or his cure. Only the prosecution and the state can assess the criminal affectively.
Thank you, that is all.
Harper is truly a man of conviction, he'll stick to his convictions even when they've been proven wrong and refuted by everyone else (to badly paraphrase Stephen Colbert's remarks at the George W. Bush press gallery dinner).
Deep-sixing the national child care program, launched late in the life of the Martin government, in favour of a system of “choice” for parents.
Since we were lobbying the Liberals at the time of the election shows me Harper was listening instead of pulling it out of his hat. No one wants daycare stopped we're asking for an equal shot with childcare.
I am a stay at home mom who childcares her own children. I have childcare costs daily and we live on one income. We have no added benefits like the parents who use daycare do.
Daycare parents get advocated for by people calling themselves child care advocates yet they do not advocate for childcare. If they advocated for childcare they would not be against tax breaks for stay at home parents. In which they are, and many more ways are shown how they are against helping stay at home parents.
Maybe if the Liberals tried listening to stay at home parents, instead of Martin saying "we're not there yet" they might still be in power.
we call equality "fund the child" this way the parents choose their own childcare. Whats the old saying if you can afford it they will build it!
This is why I didn't and will never vote for a conservative in my lifetime.
-The universal child-care program is a taxable program and many families will find that out when it comes to tax season(hmmm, I just doesn't see how it benefits low-income families).
-The war in Afghanistan...was never really our war to begin with, these countries have been in war with one another for thousands of years and this is suppose to be a country for peace, not wage war.
-I think Kyoto is definately importante...Rona and her conservatives don't give a damn, they won't be alive when we've finish destroying our planet and using our planets resources. Its our children and their children etc...are the ones who will have to suffer the consequences(this future picture reminds me of the movie The Chronicles of Riddick).
-Stephen is too overly cozy with Bush and it just makes Canda more prone for terrorists...Fact:Bush and Bush sr. are just bullies and always want go to war(remember the Gulf war in the early 90's)
-Finger pointing, its always the Liberals fault, what about the last tory who sold us out to free trade(Moron-Mulroney),7%gst,conservatives put it there in the 1st place, about time they start fixing their mistake, with this meezlee 1%, I don't feel it made a big change, it just gave companies a chance to hike their regular prices to make up for the 1%.
-Stephen Harper is forever avoiding questions and to me I think is a definate sign of a "Hidden Agenda" as it has always been speculated.
-Lastly I would like to say is the conservatives are making Canada look very bad with the latest meetings around the world...EM:Rona A and FAM:Peter M. (Embarrasing!)
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