Blue Like You

Saturday’s National Post editorial condemned the Nanny State for increasing interference into traditionally parental jurisdictions - Leave parenting to parents. The unelected, Liberal-dominated Senate wants to ban spanking in Canada, and the motion will now go to the House of Commons for approval.

As Licia Corbella illustrates from personal experience, there are times when a little tap on the hand or rear end is the only method that works:

…We tried reasoning with our little angel. That didn’t work. Then we gave him time outs. Then longer time-outs. We lectured calmly, we screamed loudly, we removed privileges. Nothing worked.

The bites became a reflex. Soon they were leaving significant marks and a very upset victim.

Eventually, we warned the biter that if he bit his (twin) brother again, he would be spanked. We didn’t have to wait long. He bit his brother that same day. I spanked his clothed bottom. And guess what? It worked.

The biting stopped.

Vow broken. Sanity and peace restored. One son protected from bodily harm, another from a very anti-social habit…

Spanking should of course be used as a last resort, or as a way to convey imminent danger when the child is just to young to understand anything else. Here I’m thinking of situations with a hot stove or running out in the street, etc. But spanking should never be done in anger or excess.

What really baffles me though is how the Liberals ignore the imminent reality of a growing fetus, but then suddenly want to take over every aspect of that child’s life as soon as he emerges from his mother’s body.

Why not just grow a population of Test-tube Lemmings and eliminate the middle(wo)man?

Bernier resigns over classified documents left in an non-secure location. David Emerson will take over for the time being. (H/T National Newswatch )

Star - Embattled Bernier resigns .

Stephen Taylor has an update with Bernier’s letter of resignation .

ChuckerCanuk has a great post up and good discussion in comments.

Let’s face it. This did not turn out well. But as Stephen Taylor says, "Today was a bad day for Conservatives, but it represents an opportunity for the government move forward on its agenda without this distraction."

I would also suggest that it’s time for the Prime Minister to consider promoting some of his very hard-working MPs. Steve Janke nominates Jason Kenney for Foreign Affairs.

Couillard interview here .

Sandy weighs in here .

Don Martin is particularly caustic tonight - Maxime Bernier’s grave mistake .

Light blogging today because the weather is just too nice to be indoors. However I can’t pass up a chance to discuss Iggy’s sanctimonious stance regarding Bernier’s ‘mistake’ which he seems unable to forgive.

As Stephen Taylor says, how quickly he forgets - Liberal Boulevard Lined by Glass Houses.

And check out the comments at this CTV site!

Such as :

Jeff S.
"The Prime Minister Stephen Harper chose this guy so it calls into question his judgment in personnel," he said.

Ignatieff spent some 20 years living and teaching in the United States and then conveniently moves to Canada to take a shot at the Liberal leadership. He’s hardly one to talk about someone elses qualifications to serve in the Canadian government.

Gren
Wait…would Ignatief prefer that Canada not provide an air craft at all as one was not available? Or would he prefer that Bernier promise to rent a plane to assist? Canada did what it needed to do under the circumstances. Making noise is all this is about…partisan politics…Igantief, the fact you would pick this as an issue demonstrates you are not ready to govern. If you are going to pick an issue and make it partisan make it news worthy!

Granted the 2 million in aid is a little low…

BobLoblaw
Ignatieff - this is weak. Seriously, the plane was provided as were millions of dollars in relief. Every time you get yourself involved in one of these namecalling partisan affairs, you demean your own status. You and the faltering Liberal Party should be focusing on rebuilding the pathetic grounds the party stands on instead of making weak attempts to unseat the government.

The Liberals seem to be stuck in the 90s with this sort of blame-gaming and in tandem with the ridiculous carbon tax - proves the Liberals have absolutely no idea what the pulse is, never mind potentially getting their finger on it…

david
The only thing liberals and NDP have to contribute to this country is calling for people to be fired. They never have any alternate policies, and constantly create imaginery scandals.
Bernier was given incorrect information on the C17’s, but we wont hear about that.

dazed and confused
OK. I think I must be missing the boat here…
We came through to honour a promise eventhough it cost $1m to rent a plane, we are taking a active role in working with the Afghan government and expect a voice consider our soldiers are getting killed there and offered too low an aid figure to a militaristic government until we knew that the funds would make it to the people in need?
I don’t understand which I guess is why I don’t vote Liberal anymore.

And my favourite:

Bruce
This coming from the guy who mused about Liberals being like Puffins hiding their excrement?

Garth Turner is starting to sound a tad ticked off.

But an MP calling a female reporter a ‘weaselette’ ?

…I watched on television as weaselette Jane Taber told a breathless Mike Duffy all about the actual slides I used in my PowerPoint presentation to national caucus on May 14th, the reaction of female colleagues to my “tasteless” display and the whupping I took from Dion himself…

Bad form, Garth.

To be honest, Jane Taber is not one of my favourite reporters/television hosts, but Garth Turner is a Liberal Member of Parliament, and as such he represents the Liberal party. To call Jane a "weaselette" is quite distasteful. Well, even if he had called Craig Oliver a weasel, I’d be offended. Name-calling should be regulated to kindergarten and the House of Commons. Actually, that might be offensive to five-year-olds, so I take that back.

I think Garth owes Jane an apology. Can you imagine the ruckus that would occur if a Conservative MP had said such a thing? It’s beyond me why most of the MSM still seem to support the Liberals.

Oh well, maybe I’m over-reacting. At least he didn’t call her a political whore .

* * * *

Update : More at Catnip in the Mash . (That is such a cool name!)

And Steve Janke had a post on this a few days ago - Jane Taber’s weasel report on Garth Turner .

I would just like to join Sandy in wishing all the Moms out there a very Happy Mother’s Day.

The only issue I’ve ever had with Mother’s day is that the weather is almost always worse than Father’s day. It hardly seems fair.

On a postive note, being a Mother is certainly one of the most rewarding jobs there is - and also the most demanding. Those feelings of attachment and concern just never leave, no matter how old your baby is. It was only when I became a mother that I began to understand the meaning of the word ’sacrifice’ - and joy.

So thanks to my Mom for all the emotional support and sacrifices throughout my life. I learn every day what it means to be a mother, and all that you went through for me.

And thanks for the gift of unconditional love.

Jonathan Kay has had a controversial series of posts in the National Post’s Full Comment. It starts here, then here and finally culminates in today’s print column generated from this post.

The main issue seems to be this particular statement in the original post:

…In fact, many Canadians still regarded homosexuality as a lifestyle choice rather than what it is — a hard-wired aspect of a person’s identity, little different from their race or sex…

(Well I might might dispute the notion of sex or gender being hard-wired these days. It seems to be more like something you decide when you get up in the morning.)

In any case Mr. Kay, who is openly secular, believes that homosexuality is hard-wired. Indeed, he is convinced of it and chastises the religious right for vocalizing any opposing viewpoint:

…The idea that these specimens “turned gay” voluntarily — or that they could reverse their God-given lust thrusters 180 degrees as a matter of conscious will–is laughable.

I say all this not to make fun of religious types. But speaking selfishly as a secularized conservative, I do find their line of free-will argumentation slightly embarrassing. It furthers the unfortunate stereotype of conservatives as being out-of-touch with anyone outside society’s mainstream (narrowly defined). It also bespeaks a mindset that privileges dogma above empirical observation, an accusation usually reserved for the left…

So what I glean from this is that Jonathan Kay wants everyone on the religious right to shut up, because he feels that they are embarrassing him and undermining the credibility of the right. (And never mind that religious conviction is not just the purview of the right, although some parties choose to punish or expel their dissenters - all in the name of ‘tolerance’.)

Let’s be clear - There is no place in Canada for the incitement of hatred of any kind. However, we must differentiate between being able to vocalize one’s personal religious belief vs. hate mongering against any other group of citizens.

Which leads me to this question: Is there a hierarchy of ‘rights’ in Canada?

If so, I suppose religious rights are at the bottom - probably because they’re not ‘hard-wired’.

Yesterday, reader Greg left the following comment in my post about closing the Lukiwski file:

I agree, let’s move on to talking about the idiot provincial NDP MPP who is introducing a motion to ban advertising of products aimed at children 13 years old and under. After all us parents need to be protected from being nagged by our kids to buy unhealthy products, and goodness knows we are incapable of making decisions on our own without a socialist telling us what we are allowed to buy for our kids.

Well much to my surprise, today’s Record has a scathing editorial against this bill - Let them Advertise Cake:

…Unfortunately, the clumsy bit of nanny-state legislation he’s pushing doesn’t discriminate between good and bad, salubrious and debilitating. It would simply prohibit all commercial television ads for food or drink directed at children under age 13.

But the unintended consequence of Marchese’s proposal would be that ads for healthy food would be banned along with those selling products that could cause health problems. That seems needless, foolish and counterproductive. And it’s only one of many reasons to hope his legislation dies a quick, unlamented death…

Nanny-state legislation?

Wow. Maybe there’s still some hope for the Record’s editorial board.

My son talked me into /begged/cajoled until I agreed to watch a DVD he had rented - I Am Legend.

Not sorry I saw it. Also not sorry I followed his advice about watching it during daylight!

Spoiler alert! There is an alternate ending. Please tell me which you prefer and why?

And what were they thinking?

Liberal MP Andrew Telegdi has succeeded in embarrassing himself, as well as every constituent who voted for him:

If it is possible to lower the standard of political debate in Canada below its already abysmal level, Andrew Telegdi has done the job. In a truly bizarre outburst this week, the Kitchener-Waterloo MP compared the recommendations of an expert panel working for the federal government to the mentality that imposed the notorious Chinese Head Tax and the equally obnoxious Chinese Exclusion Act in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The sin of the panel to bring such abuse hurtling down on their heads? They want to cut the number of times the Maple Leaf flag is lowered on the Peace Tower in Ottawa. For pity’s sake, Mr. Telegdi. Show some proportion. Show some sense. You’re turning an anthill into one of the Rockies…

That editorial is in his hometown newspaper, The (Liberal) Record. Hopefully the riding will wake up and see that Andrew Telegdi has passed his best-before date in politics.

Yesterday’s Post editorial exposed more of Telegdi’s ridiculous rhetoric to the whole nation:

…Today the House of Commons is scheduled to vote on a nonbinding motion by MP Andrew Telegdi, who wishes — against the advice of the protocol panel — to restore the policy of lowering the flag for every dead soldier who returns from Afghanistan. Mr. Telegdi’s motion defines what is meant when someone is accused of “wrapping himself in the flag.” He suggests that the Conservatives are trying to “sweep” Afghanistan combat deaths “under the rug,” as if nobody would take notice of them if they couldn’t check the Peace Tower for the latest vexillological casualty report every morning.

Perhaps it is fair to say such a swinish thing about one’s electoral opponents, or at least inevitable that such things will be said. But does Mr. Telegdi mean to smear the members of the panel with the brush of his conspiracy theory? They were brought in as legitimate experts to research the issue in good faith; it would be a shame if Parliament subjected them to that kind of abuse.

The world’s Top Intelligent Community should think twice before re-electing this man.

Whatever you might think about Helene Guergis’ efficacy on the Brenda Martin file, Post columnist Don Martin has lobbed some pretty cheaps shots in today’s column:

For very different behaviour, consider the video taken by Global News four weeks ago, which can be viewed on the National Post Web site.

The 1992 Miss Huronia is caught giving a scripted Ottawa welcome to a handful of women parliamentarians from Afghanistan. Suddenly Ms. Guergis breaks into tears.

“I promised I wouldn’t do this,” she sobs. “I love you guys. You’re the highlight of my career…. This is just the beginning of a long-lasting friendship for all of us and I can’t wait to see you all again.”

It might be heartfelt emotion, except that this is the same Ms. Guergis who seems curiously unmoved by the plight of Mexico-imprisoned Brenda Martin, a suicidal Canadian yet to be tried after two years in a cramped jail.

How is that relevant? The two events aren’t even related.

And is Don Martin trying to say that he should be the judge of how she feels about things and how she expresses her emotion? How does he even know what she is thinking and how she really feels?

This kind of sexist attitude is very typical of certain controlling, misogynistic men that seek to undermine a woman’s self-esteem in marriages where the woman becomes a slave.

And Martin’s public excoriation of Guergis’ perceived emotional reaction enables certain types of abusive relationships to seem socially acceptable.

Don Martin owes Ms. Guergis and all woman an apology for trying to tell them what is acceptable in terms of how they feel and how they display honest emotion.

Or is it only men who are allowed to have this freedom?