Blue Like You
Conservative musings - formerly Joanne’s Journey
With friends like Elections Canada… With Update
Monday, September 10th, 2007Elections Canada is not backing down:
Marc Mayrand, the chief electoral officer, said the current legislation offers several ways of voting that does not include photo identification. That includes mailing a vote, a method more than 80,000 voters used in 2006, he said.“This special procedure supposes that there is absolutely no visual contact between the voter and Elections Canada staff,” he said.
Nonetheless, he said, voters will be asked to visually identify themselves. However, if they choose not to and can provide other information to verify their identity, they will still be allowed to vote.
“I have not amended the act to say that she must unveil her face,” he said. “It is up to the voter to decide what procedure to use.”
Meanwhile, some Muslims are wondering where this all came from and may even be concerned about a backlash:
Alia Hogben of the Canadian Council of Muslim Women agreed with the Prime Minister’s position, and said too much was being made of the veil issue.“I think he’s right, I think for something like elections … women would be happy to show their faces, I don’t think it would be a problem,” Ms. Hogben said. “I think it’s being made into a problem and it doesn’t need to be.”
“For us the sad thing is it’s always focusing on Muslims and as far as I know it wasn’t a request made by Muslims,” Ms. Hogben added. “It probably came up[from] Elections Canada– with good intentions thinking they would try to accommodate people–but I don’t think it’s necessary.”
Not necessary, and extremely divisive.
I know some folks are immediately going to call me up here on John Tory’s faith-based funding suggestion, and try to draw a comparison.
Well, let me tell you. One is about fairness and the other is about national security.
One is actually been an on-going issue for quite a while for a number of minority religious groups, and the other was just pulled out of a hat by Elections Canada, based on Mayrand’s interpretation of the legislation and thereby blindsided all federal parties and their leaders.
But yes, they may both cause some bigotry and needless tension, and that is what we must guard against.
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Bonus: Red Tory’s ‘Conspiracy Theory’ gets shot down!
Well good on him for admitting his paranoia anyway.
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Update: Please note that the first line of this post differs from the original published this morning.
Update: Please note that the first line of this post differs from the original published this morning.
Lord Kitchener’s Own sets us all straight on this matter:
Parliament wrote an election law with a hole big enough to drive a truck through. It’s not Elections Canada’s responsibility to throw up a roadblock after the fact. In fact, they specifically SHOULD NOT be doing so. Elections Canada FOLLOWS the law, they don’t write it, and it’s the fault of Parliamentarians if they wrote a law that doesn’t actually do what they (they now claim, after the fact) apparently wanted it to.
So, it really is the fault of Parliament. Elections Canada is simply following the letter of the law. Good work, LKO. Thanks for the clarification.
We’re paying taxes for this?
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And still the ‘Conspiracy Theory’ continues…
More at CBC.
Phantom Observer spells it all out here.
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OCCB onboard
Monday, September 10th, 2007This has got to be a huge boost for John Tory on the kickoff day of the election - Fund all faith-based schools, bishops urge (Ottawa Citizen):
“The primacy of parental rights in education is a value which should be realized not only by Catholic parents, but also by others.”
“We have publicly committed ourselves to support the concept of the development of alternative schools for people of other faith communities.”
The statement was hailed as a “clear Catholic endorsement of government support for faith-based schools” by the Public Education Fairness Network, a coalition of faith-based community schools.
“I think this was a situation where the bishops felt compelled to comment on an issue of fairness,” said Bernie Farber, chief executive officer of of the Canadian Jewish Congress and a member of the coalition, which also has members from the Armenian, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh communities…
And it’s not just an issue of fairness - It’s the Christian thing to do.
Good for the OCCB. My faith in Catholicism may yet be restored.
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Update: This could be the reason why some of my Liberal readers are a bit grumpy this morning.
Tuesday Update: Faith-Based Revelation - I was a Second-Class Citizen (Globe):
…Tell me, Mr. McGuinty, how do you create a “knowledge economy” that breeds “creativity” and “excellence” (your words) when you are unwilling to elevate the educational standards of 53,000 Ontario students who are receiving this same second-class education?
And yet, there was Deputy Premier George Smitherman suggesting that, because it would cost an extra $100- million, funding for these students is not warranted. This, from the same minister whose response to the ailments of our health system was to increase its budget by $11-billion since 2003. During Mr. McGuinty’s time in office, public education funding rose from $9.4 billion in 2003 to $12.8 billion in 2007. So don’t tell me the money doesn’t exist…
…When Mr. McGuinty says funding religious private schools is tantamount to “segregation,” I first try to ignore the irony that this word invokes. And then I turn to my Muslim friends who graduated from my Islamic school and who are now in law, medicine, teaching, business and, yes, even our armed forces. I turn to my four brothers: two doctors, one lawyer and a future investment banker.
And then I wonder: Since when did it become too expensive or too dangerous to uphold equality? What happened to the idea of accommodating or celebrating diversity?
Thank you for that, Mr. Omar Soliman. Very well said indeed.
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StatCounter
From April 28/08
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PM with Young Supporter
