Leader’s debate
Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe brought up abortion and capital punishment -- somehow in the context of young offenders.
Canadian election, day 18
Sadly but unsurprisingly there is nothing much to report from the daily campaign. That's probably because the leaders are focusing on tonight's leaders' debate. What are the odds that moral issues are raised tonight 1) by the moderator or 2) the Liberal or NDP leader as an attack on Stephen Harper's hidden agenda? By our (far from scientific) estimates, the latter is three times more [...]
Environmentalism as a religion
Here's a paper (pdf) on environmentalism as, if not a religion, a substitute for religion. We've written about this before -- here and here. As I noted last year, "similarities between old-time fundamentalist religion and new-age (even pantheistic) environmentalism is stunning."
Lightening Up
Ecologists keep warning us about greenhouse gases and the changes in climate they allegedly cause. There is much to fear, they say, from global warming. Well, I’ve just learned that one of the chief greenhouse gases is nitrous oxide. Nitrous oxide is laughing gas. What is there to fear from global laughing? Instead of climate change, ecologists should focus on [...]
Safeguards cannot protect vulnerable from euthanasia
An expert witness for the Quebec National Assembly’s Special Commission on the Issue of Dying with Dignity testified on Feb. 17 that legalizing euthanasia and assisted suicide will lead to widespread abuse and the killing of the vulnerable. Dr. François Primeau, a professor of psychiatry at Laval University and Chief of Geranto-Psychiatry at the Hôtel-Dieu de Lévis Hospital, used the Netherlands as [...]
Canadian election, day 17
The Montreal Gazette reports that Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe reiterates his support for separation of church and state. Asked about the case of Saguenay Mayor Jean Tremblay who has continued opening council meetings with a prayer despite a Quebec Human Rights Tribunal ruling against him, Duceppe said religion is a private matter, although he maintained Tremblay also had a right to pursue [...]
Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms
John Carpay has started the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms. The JCCF was founded last year "for the purpose of advancing and promoting the core principles of freedom and equality through education and litigation." Here is the website. Here is our Q&A with Carpay. One of JCCF's board members, Daniel Santoro, is slated to argue the case of R. v. Gibbons before [...]
Three B.C. pro-life MPs retire
In one weekend in mid-March, three veteran pro-life federal politicians announced the would not run for re-election, two of them cabinet ministers. On March 12 and 13, Stockwell Day, Chuck Strahl, and John Cummins all announced that they would not run for re-election whenever it is held. Day, president of the Treasury Board of Canada and Minister for the Asia-Pacific Gateway, announced [...]
Canadian election, day 14
Earlier this week, the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada released its Election Kit. In it they offer information to churches about what they can and cannot do during an election -- there is a lot they can legally do which fulfills their Christian obligation to inform their flocks about the responsibility of casting an informed and conscientious ballot. In short, churches must not [...]
Washington shutdown: abortion line in the sand
Are Democrats threatening to close down the federal government because the Republicans won't fund the abortion industry? The New York Times suggests they might be: Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, offered a lengthier, scathing criticism of Mr. Boehner and House Republicans, accusing them of wanting to shut down the federal government by insisting on cutting funds for women’s heath services. [...]
Being dad – more than just showing up
Editor’s Note: There are book titles and quotes in this column that use language that some reader’s might find offensive. Despite my wife’s best efforts, I never had much time for the popular parenting textbooks that ended up on our bookshelves – the “What To Expect When You’re...” series and their like, all written in useful gulps of text, with diagrams and [...]
Walter Szetala, RIP
On Jan. 31, Walter Szetela, who edited the Campaign Life Coalition British Columbia newsletter for two decades, passed away at Vancouver General Hospital. Born in Chicopee, Mass., in 1928, he earned a Master’s degree in Mathematics at the University of Michigan and a doctoral degree from the University of Georgia after serving in the U.S. army. In 1970 he moved [...]
The scandal of moral compromise
In recent weeks, a number of scandals have beset Stephen Harper’s minority government. Rumors and reports of misdemeanors and misdeeds – and the election speculations which they spur – are an irresistible combination for the Canadian political press, and journalists have eagerly documented each new discovery in painstaking detail. But, as the media runs in the direction of the latest and loudest [...]
Back Friday
Our Canadian election campaign watch is off today and tomorrow, as well as other bloggy musings, unless something big happens. Meetings, meetings, and more meetings are to blame.
Get Sun News Network
Kathy Shaidle points to Ezra Levant who said: If we were the CBC or CTV, you wouldn’t have to ask for the channel. It would be forced on you. In fact, under Canadian broadcasting law, every cable provider must carry CBC and CTV, and every single cable subscriber (that would be you) is forced to pay for it, whether you watch it [...]