Getting religion

[FarmRanger]

How does gay marriage reflect the wishes of Canadians. Polls suggest that if it was put to a national referendum, it would have been voted down. The Liberals are no better at reflecting the wishes of Canadians than the Conservatives. They do have a lot better PR though, thanks to the left wing media coverage we are "enlightened" with in this country.

[silverback]

With all due respect f_s, nobody needs to "wait" for the results of the Gomery inquiry. All the testimony is available to the public. Everyone is free to read it and make up their own judgement rather than waiting to hear how CBC/CTV/Global choose to spin their sound bites.

It reminds me of the immigration probe that just wrapped up. The report actually called for Judy Scrow? to resign, but nobody reported that and like everything else, they just ignored it and went on vacation.

[silverback]

I personally doubt if Martin will call an election when the Gomery inquiry results are made public. Just because he has promised it, doesn't necessarily mean he will honor his promise !!

[farmers_son]

It is true that the testimony before Justice Gomery is available on the Internet at:
http://www.gomery.ca/en/rulingonstanding20040705/

I think we need to keep in mind that this testimony is often contradictory and some of it will be found to be outright lies. Justice Gomery will have the responsibility to determine what is truth and what is fiction. That is why I am withholding my judgment until his report is issued.

I am sure gay marriage would be voted down if it came to a referendum. But how do you uphold the Charter of Rights and Freedoms when the Courts have said that banning gay marriage is against their charter rights and apparently using the not withstanding clause is not an option? I personally like Klein’s suggestion that the provinces should not be in the business of marrying people and leave it to the churches to perform marriages. Government does not belong in the bedrooms of this country.

Emrald1: If you want to take issue with the way Ontario people vote in terms of their provincial leaders you could do so but it may be none of your business as an Albertan. However I am concerned that viewing federal politics in terms of which province voted which way is contrary to nation building. If we are to be a nation of one people united under one federal government then we need to accept the majority decision. When you say things like Ontario will vote for the Liberals it is stereotyping. It is no different than saying the blacks voted the government in or the gays voted the government in or big business or labour voted the government in and so on. The people of this country will vote the government in as long as you believe our voting system is fair and honest. Whether those people live in Ontario or Quebec or Alberta they are Canadians and in a democratic country the majority form the government. A Canadian is a Canadian no matter what province they live in or what other demographic you might want to look at and they are entitled to vote for who they want.

[farmers_son]

I don't know where you got the imprssion that I give a damn how citizens of Ontario vote provincially, its how they vote federally that affects me !!! Until the entire electoral system is changed our votes out west don't really count, so how Ontario votes certainly is my business !
I agree with Ralph on the marriage issue and also agree that the state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation but lately it seems as though folks of a certain pursuasion have felt the need to flaunt their bedroom activites in the face of the nation. Hopefully, now they will all marry and live happliy everafter.,

[FarmRanger]

Public perception may have been that the gay marriage legislation was simply upholding a charter right, but that was not the case. Gay marriage was NOT deemed to be a charter right, and the courts threw it back into the hands of the politicians. So much for the democracy and the wishes of the majority. The simple fact is that most provinces gave all the same rights to gay couples anyway, only the marraige name was exclusively for traditional unions. Which is largely why I think the whole thing was a diversion of public attention from adscam and illegal diversions of taxpayers dollars to Liberal coffers.

You are right that there are conflicting stories in the Gomery inquiry, but since blame can't be assigned to individuals, it really won't accomplish much even if he does sort it out. When Gomery doesn't name names, (which he has not been explicitly given the power to do), the public will be expected to assume that no politicians are to blame, and it will be life as usual. The corruption will continue, with some modifications to procedure which will likely be ignored, like Canadian law was ignored in Chretians government, in which our current Prime Minister was a cabinet minister.

[farmers_son]

Actually how Ontario votes provincially does affect you as the provinces have considerable influence on federal policy through Ministers meetings and so on although they cannot decide who forms the government.

Maybe I am trying to make too fine a point which is viewing Federal politics in terms of Provincial voting patterns is contrary to nation building. Federally the Province of Ontario does not vote in a federal election. Neither does the Province of Alberta. The citizens of Canada do vote however. They reside in federal ridings not one of which is called Ontario or Alberta. The residents of Avalon, Beauséjour, Kings—Hants, Provencher, Blackstrap and Pitt Meadows--Maple Ridge--Mission to name a few decide who will be their Member of Parliament who then represents them in Ottawa.

Viewed this way, every Canadian’s vote counts. Your vote counts whether you vote for the successful candidate/party or not. Making broad statements about how a certain demographic votes only breeds discontent and division. If you insist upon stereotyping, 1.6 million Ontarioans voted Conservative in the last election, more than in the rest of the country combined. I for one think it is unfortunate these statistics are kept. Why not include demographic information on each ballot so we can really understand our country better? Do you think it would be useful to know how women vote versus men? Or by race or by annual income. How about education or language? It is just as counterproductive to view federal voting patterns in provincial terms and it is just as irrelevant.

[FarmRanger]

If current polls are right, Ontario and the maritimes will be almost exclusively Liberal, the west will be almost exclusively Conservative, and Quebec will be almost exclusively Block. You can’t tell me that provincial voting patterns don’t make a difference.

Nation building is done with equitable treatment of all regions with justice being meted out fairly, while trying to uphold decent values we can all agree on. Unfortunately the Liberal governments we’ve been getting do none of the above and its fractionating the country to the point where we are going to have even more divisiveness and unrest because of it. There is no widespread acceptance of separation, and other such ideas in a well governed democracy. Time to cut the Liberals loose, and get some kind of government restructuring in this country before its too late. This fiddling while Rome burns, and pitting one area of the country against another has got to stop. It may get many people to vote Liberal out of fear, but its going to tear the country apart.

[silverback]

F_s, I don't believe our election system is fair at all.

The first past the post system does not accurately reflect the wishes of the public. The best system would be representation by population whereby if 30% voted liberal, 30% voted conservative, and 30% other, that would be how the makeup of parliment would be set at.

And as Ranger said, the gay marriage issue had nothing to do with their legal rights, they already had those in place. The issue is the ability of churches and other organizations to freely express their views without being drug out in front of the human rights commissions for disagreeing with what they want to.

[ivbinconned]

Debateing Farmers-son reminds me of the wise words of my dad.
"do not waste your time having a war of wit's with someone who is unarmed"

farmers-son I do wish your research and opinion went a little deeper than what the CBC regurgatates for you every day. Your obvious grasp of canadian history is very shallow.

I would urge you to read my last two posts of Mark Steyn...I hope you find them enlightening. But please don't then try to convince us that you are smarter than him.