Sssh! Single Issue Voting Not Encouraged By Canadian Catholic Bishops

One of the problems bedevilling many elections is the phenomenon of 'single issue' voters. The issue is usually a very worthy one such as 'healthcare' or 'care for seniors' or 'right to life for the unborn' or 'education' or 'immigration' or 'jobs' or 'the environment' or 'higher/lower taxes' or 'crime and punishment' or 'national security' or (your pet issue here). The trouble is that real life is never about one single issue even if that appears to be front and centre at a point in time for you and me.

It seems to me that voting on the basis of a single issue is very much like choosing a particular expensive gourmet restaurant over other candidate restaurants based purely on the fact that the restaurant of your choice is the only one that offers Pacific Blue Fin Tuna in its third course, and without regard to what is in the other courses at that or any other competing restaurant. Don't you care that your Valentine partner will have ethical issues with Confit Foie Gras? It seems silly, doesn't it? But isn't that what single issue voters do? I've had emails from well-meaning friends urging me to join this or that political party and then vote for this or that person to be leader of that party because he/she is the 'only one' taking a stand on a pet, controversial issue.

Contrary to what many people might presume, the Canadian Catholic bishops are not single issue voters. I know this because I have read their Guide for the 2015 Federal Election. As with previous federal elections the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops has issued an 'Election Guide' for Catholics. I get the impression that it is meant to be kept a secret as I never hear anybody talk about it and no priest of my experience has ever mentioned it, privately or publicly, in my hearing. If it was not for the fact that I have an email subscription for new publications from the bishops' conference I myself would have no idea of its existence.


The email begins: (CCCB – Ottawa)... With the federal election campaign underway, the Commission for Justice and Peace of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops (CCCB) has issued a guide inviting Catholics to vote with discernment. In its "2015 Federal Election Guide", the Commission lists some basic principles from Catholic moral and social teaching to help voters analyze and evaluate public policies and programs.

It then provides this link to their web page titled Guide for the 2015 Federal Election.
http://www.cccb.ca/site/eng/media-room/4243-guide-for-2015-federal-election

How incredibly circumspect, inviting Catholics to vote with discernment, Obviously the bishops do not want to alienate anybody by being forceful in any kind of way about Catholic moral and social teaching! The web page in turn provides three more links which I reproduce below for your convenience and invite my family and friends to read with discernment - and anybody else who cares to. I expect you will find, like me, that none of our political parties measures up. Sometimes the way to find the best is find the least worst.
Link to the Guide of the CCCB (PDF)
Link to the Guide of Development and Peace
Link to the Guide of The Canadian Council of Churches

Hard Labour in a Canadian Prison?

An Internet search on Julie Balotta, according to Google, will produce about 144,000 results in 0.24 seconds. She is famous, having given a breech birth to a baby boy who survived the ordeal.  OK, that happens somewhere every day. What made her famous is that the labour started in what is now an infamous prison. This, too, has been known to happen in prisons for women around the world. What makes the Ottawa-Carlton Detention Centre infamous?

• This woman was in labour for hours without being provided one shred of medical assistance other than a pain killer. If the reports are to be believed, nurses (really?) told her she was having indigestion or "false" labour. (In my opinion these nurses need recertification before being let loose again on an unsuspecting population.)
• She was told that she should not have allowed herself to become pregnant if she cannot handle pain.
• When she made too much noise she was moved from the cell which she shared with two other women and segregated in an isolation cell where she was utterly alone.
• Finally, after a baby's foot emerges, officials call an ambulance. Baby Gionni is delivered by the paramedics right there in the prison cell - all credit to them.
• Eventually mother and child are admitted to hospital - Julie needing blood, Baby Gionni with respiratory problems.

You can get more details here: Ottawa prison investigating allegations that guards ignored womanwho gave birth in jail cell

Human right organizations, bloggers and newspapers are outraged, rightly, that Julie's rights were violated, regardless of why she is in jail, and an investigation is underway according to Ontario's minister for correctional services, herself a former delivery room nurse. (Advocates call for inquiry after woman gives birth in Ottawa jail cell)

Nobody seems upset that Baby Gionni's rights were violated. Oh, yes. Of course. This is Canada. In this country a child in the womb, of any age, is not legally a person and has no rights. I wonder what the legal position is when a foot is sticking out?

Toronto Mayor's Solution to Guns and Gangs - Lower Taxes

You can't make up this stuff. An important plank in Mayor Rob Ford's solution to the city's gun violence is to lower taxes for businesses so companies can create jobs so that gang members can "get a job."

I naively thought that Ford could not surpise me any more. I was wrong. Click the link and read on.

Toronto Mayor RobFord’s blunder in labelling immigrants criminals hurts the city.

The Toronto Star, 22July 2012

Bill C-10 - An Open Letter to Senator Mike Duffy

Senator Michael Duffy

The Senate of Canada

Ottawa, Ontario

K1A 0A4

19 February 2012

Dear Senator Duffy,

Re. Bill C-10 (Omnibus Crime Bill).

I decided to send this letter to you as someone who frequently followed Mike Duffy Live on CTV. From that show I believe you to be a man of integrity who will not blindly follow political ideology.

When deciding whether or not to support Bill C-10, the Omnibus Crime Bill, in the Senate I urge you, please, to acquaint yourself with, and be guided by, facts derived from the experience of other countries, as well as certain states in the U.S., which have already gone through this exercise at great expense and found that it is not a cost effective way to deal with crime.

Canadians need tax dollars to be more wisely and responsibly spent at this time of global economic crisis – particularly when the costs are likely to be extremely high over many years with little or no return on investment.

Your sincerely,

Terry McCann

Canadian Tax Payer

(My address)

The above letter was printed, signed and put in the mail for delivery by Canada Post. If you want to know why I did this please watch the following YouTube video.




To contact the Canadian Senate, go to: http://www.parl.gc.ca/SenatorsMembers/Senate/SenatorsBiography/isenator.asp

Is the long-gun registry a boondoggle?

If it wasn't a boondoggle before it certainly will be now that Stephen Harper and Vic Toews have decided to destroy all records collected over the last 16 years, not merely stop new registrations. Hell, I have difficulty bringing myself to throw away an old cell phone if it's still in working condition. They will happily consign one to two billion dollars of working system to the crematorium and then toast their victory.

It shows the hypocrisy of the initial accusation.

The ultimate irony is that getting rid of something that police forces across the country access thousands of times a day for their and our safety is being trashed by the Minister for Public Safety. Criminals must be laughing their heads off.

The Omnibus Crime Bill - Voices of Sanity

The omnibus crime bill is 103 pages long. It holds nine separate bills, some of which will create major changes to the Canadian justice system. Harper wielded his majority as a bludgeon this week and limited debate to a mere two final days before sending it to the Conservative dominated committees for approval.


Here's what the Canadian Bar Association had to say:

The Canadian Bar Association (CBA) has concerns with several aspects of the government’s proposed omnibus crime bill, including mandatory minimum sentences and overreliance on incarceration, constraints on judges’ discretion to ensure a fair result in each case, and the Bill’s impact on specific, already disadvantaged groups. 

The Bill’s approach is contrary to what is known to lead to a safer society. The CBA is also concerned about how this omnibus process is likely to limit appropriate careful parliamentary study of the Bill’s component parts. The Bill, Safe Streets and Communities Act, was introduced today (Sept 20).

“The impact on northern residents, Aboriginal people and people with mental illness will be especially profound,” says Dan MacRury, of Sydney, Nova Scotia, chair of the CBA’s National Criminal Justice Section. The CBA believes that the Bill will make already serious criminal justice system problems much worse, with huge resource implications.

Here's what Elizabeth May, Green Party leader and MP for Saanich Gulf Islands, had to say (she had the final word) during the prematurely closed debate on the omnibus crime bill:


“Mr. Speaker, the clock is ticking and this debate is closing far too soon for those of us who believe that we are on the verge of a very large, serious mistake that future parliamentarians will have to struggle to correct.
First, let me say to the hon. government benches and the members here where we agree. I would happily vote for the Victims of Terrorism Act. I would vote to change the Criminal Records Act to replace the word “pardon” with “record suspension”. 
However, I will be forced to vote against this legislation if it comes packaged with sections that would cause this country nothing but grief.
I wish to say to all hon. members on the government side whose talking points have repeatedly forced them to say that those who question the flawed premise of mandatory minimum sentences have somehow sided with criminals against victims. Nothing could be further from the truth. Members of my family are involved in law enforcement. People close to me have been murdered.
It is not as though we side with criminals when we recognize a piece of legislation is so egregiously flawed that this place should say "no."  We look at all the evidence from criminologists, not just one or two, but all of them. We look at evidence from our own Department of Justice that studied this matter in 2002. We look at what is happening in the U.S., not only at the fact that its prisons are full of people but its prisons are full of people disproportionately low-income and black.
We also look at what could happen in this country. We have seen the report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples and the report on the Commission on Systemic Racism in the Ontario Criminal Justice System. We know that with this legislation, without a lot of changes in our system, we would disproportionately fill our jails with people who should not be in jail. 
We also know that this legislation would cost us billions, which has not been fully costed.  Yet, at the end of the day, it may actually result in weaker sentences for those who deserve higher sentences because we would ruin the opportunity for judicial discretion.
Thank you Mr. Speaker.”

If you would like to contact your own Member of Parliament, click on the link for a suggested template letter and your MP's address.


Here follows the template content:
Dear Member of Parliament,

As a voter and one of your constituents, I want to clearly express to you my concerns with and opposition to Bill C-10 – the omnibus crime bill.

This legislation is severely flawed. While there are parts of the Bill that are indeed worthwhile, I believe many of the others will only undermine and shame our entire system and ideal of justice in Canada.

I don’t want police to be able to spy on my emails and internet communications without a proper warrant from a court of law.

I do not believe a teenager charged with possessing a few pot plants should be treated more harshly than someone charged with sexually molesting a child.

In Canada we have a correctional system, not a penal system. I do not believe mandatory minimum sentences serve the best interests of justice. This legislation will fill our jails with people who should not be in jail.

I have seen the news reports from the United States. I know this approach to justice has been tried there, and it has failed.

Furthermore, as a taxpayer, I am very concerned with what this legislation is going to cost me. Each new prisoner will cost an additional $108,000 per year of my money. I understand the new prisons that will need to be built to house these extra prisoners will also cost billions more. In this time of deficits, this is not how I want my government to spend my money.

As my representative in Parliament, I am therefore calling on you now to faithfully respect the wishes of your constituents and vote against Bill C-10.

Sincerely,

"Stop Harper." Has Brigette Marcelle DePape drafted the rallying cry of the next election?

C.E.S. (Ned) Franks, professor emeritus in political studies at Queens's University, says that Brigette Marcelle DePape set a bad precedent with her "Stop Harper" silent protest during the Governer General's throne speech last week. In an opinion published in The Star (Page’s protest sets poor precedent) he says that this should not be seen as a legitimate act of civil disobedience because, he says, she was not protesting a specific law or policy. "She was simply objecting to the results of a democratic nationwide election in which she, along with every other citizen 18 years or older, was entitled to vote."

Well, that last statement seems to me to be a leap of logic based on at least two, if not three, questionable premises.

Firstly, I am not alone in questioning how democratic a first-past-the-post election process can be when the winning party and leader is imposed upon the nearly 60% of the voters who voted against that party and leader. Being a professor of political studies, Ned Franks must be even more aware of that than I am, which makes his statement all the more puzzling to me. Certainly Marcelle believes, as do I, that Harper doesn't reflect the majority of Canadians.(Page with 'Stop Harper' sign fired from Senate)

Secondly, rather than protesting the outcome of an election, saying "Stop Harper" might simply be saying "Stop Harper"; simply objecting to what Harper is doing; simply saying, "Harper's agenda is disastrous for this country and for my generation." She certainly concedes that Harper and the Conservatives have a majority parliament for the next four years and seems to be of the opinion that it is time for some kind of moral majority to stand up and protest in some kind of extra parliamentary way, even using civil disobedience.

Thirdly, language is something living and evolving. Maybe there is a narrow definition of "civil disobedience" accepted in the university halls of political science. But there is a wider understanding that is generally accepted in the broader population. That caring about social issues and the environment as principles of conscience can lead someone to civil disobedience does not violate any semantic understanding of the term "civil disobedience" in my mind nor, I suspect, in the minds of ordinary speakers of the English language.

From my personal point of view, this is the first time in my thirteen years in the country that I have seen any kind of passionate, political engagement on the part of university age young people in Canada. I don't think DePape is going to get her "Arab Spring" in the Canada of 2011. I do hope that she and her friends can be somewhat successful in raising the awareness of Canadians to the very serious issues facing our country and the world beyond our own pocket books and wallets.

I think that Brigette Marcelle DePape may well have drafted the rallying cry of the next election. Which will be more important for each of the opposition parties in the next election in four years time: to be the official opposition or to "Stop Harper?" There is a big difference. One is relevant to the important challenges facing our country and the world. The other is about party politics - and quite irrelevant.

The Budget: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

According to an Ipsos poll, half (50%) of Canadians say to opposition parties: pass budget, avoid election.

I must confess that, although I do not like the idea of 6 weeks of politicians plying their platitudes, I cannot support this budget and I am glad the opposition parties are rejecting it. That puts me in the other 50%.


Here’s what I like

• $400 million to extend the ecoENERGY Home Retrofit program for one year.
• $300 million to benefit low-income seniors
• $300 a year in Family Caregiver Tax Credits for family members looking after sick or disabled relatives.
• Forgiving a portion of education loans for doctors and nurses if they work in rural and remote communities.

Here’s what I don't like

• $400 million to support the nuclear industry but nothing to support alternative energy.
• $1 billion in subsidies to oil and gas companies that already made a profit of over $8 billion in 2010.
• $10 million for the Grey Cup and Calgary Stampede versus $2.5 million for the Great Lakes (which supply drinking water to 8.5 million Canadians) shows pretty clearly how much the current government values clean water.

Here’s what we should all be worried about

The budget doesn’t even mention the $29.3 billion (Parliamentary Budget Office estimate) the Harper government plans to spend on 65 fighter jets.
Also unaccounted for is the estimated $9 billion for building new prisons that the Harper government is committed to--despite the fact that crime rates are falling!
That’s $40 billion of spending (as much as transfers to all the provinces or total support for seniors) that’s missing from this budget. That’s not financially responsible.

Source: Green Party of Canada

Stephen Harper should stay the course.

As leader of the Conservative Party of Canada this is not the time for you to get cold feet. Continue the courage of your convictions, Sir. You surrounded yourself with brave, forward looking, independent, creative, innovative thinkers and politicians. To find such valueable resources for the PMO and your cabinet you had the courage to ignore the staid, old-fashioned, fuddy-duddy advice of CSIS and the RCMP. Don't throw Bruce Carson under the bus now.

Who cares that Bruce Carson received an 18-month jail sentence in 1983 after he pled guilty to forging cheques and stealing $23,900 from a corporation and two other clients that he represented (Allan Woods, Toronto Star.)   Isn't this just the type of creative mindset that we need when approaching the accounting required for reviving an economy?

Think about it. Bruce Carson and I are roughly the same age. If I started courting a beautiful, vivaceous 22-year-old escort my sons and daughters would be around before you could blink and have me bundled off in a straight jacket to a phrenologist and from there to a padded cell. I do not have "edge". Bruce does. He can do something like that and make it look dapper. Sure, tongues will wag, but thousands of men out there are enviously wondering, as I am, "How does he do it? How does he keep it up?" People like Bruce not only bridge the gap between the generations but help those around him to do so as well or, at least, appear to - including Stephen.  This is the "edge" that the Conservative Party needs to widen over its weary, black-suit, same-old, same-old political rivals.

The Conservative Leader has astutely garnered others into The A-Team: Maxime (Playboy) Bernier, Bev (keep 'em guessing) Oda, Helena (Hellhole) Guergis. These are the flashy ones, in the public eye, image is everything. But there are others who deserve our respect. Who's brilliant idea was it to withhold from the Canadian Parliament the cost of building new and bigger prisons to hold all the new prisoners from all the increased crime that is going unreported? That will show Parliament who's boss and at the same time stimulate the economy. Kudos, too, for the man or woman who first came up with the idea of awarding a contract for new F-35 fighter jets with a low-ball cost estimate. This is how you get what you want.

The economy is far too important for us to be distracted by little things like contempt of parliament, peddling influence, lying about departmental recommendations for the long form census, withholding information, falsifying documents and lying about departmental recommendations for Kairos funding, election accounting fraud. On the contrary, we should see these things as signs of strength in adversity. What's a minority government supposed to do when the majority of MPs are against you? Stephen (Win some, lose some) Harper and his A-Team know what's best for us. Don't change now just because you came into power on a "Transparency" ticket. Obviously that was just a brilliant ploy to woo the voters who were sick of The Sponsorship Scandal. After coming into power the Conservatives were able to blow a surplus before the recession even hit. Nobody knows better than they do how to spend money. They surely now know best how to turn a deficit into a surplus so that we can spend even more money.

If Stephen Harper has a problem, if no one else can help, and if he can find them, you know whom he hires. Now is not the time to make risky changes. Stay with the man whose judgement you can trust. Stephen Harper... and the A-Team.

Addressing the root causes of crime in Canada.

In an article titled Tough on poverty, tough on crime, the Conservative senator for Kingston-Frontenac-Leeds, Hugh Segal, provided the following statistics in Toronto's Sunday Star yesterday:

• More than 70 per cent of those who enter prisons have not completed high school.
• Seventy per cent of offenders entering prisons have unstable job histories.
• Four of every five arrive with serious substance-abuse problems.
• A Toronto study of 300 homeless adults found 73 per cent of men had been arrested and 49 per cent of them incarcerated at least once. Twelve per cent of women had served time.

Hmmm. It is clearly obvious to our leaders in government that, to address these root causes, we need to build more and bigger prisons and lengthen prison terms so that these people can finish high school, learn job skills and get help with their substance abuse problems. This should have the added benefit of reducing the homeless population.