{"id":476,"date":"2006-09-08T03:26:22","date_gmt":"2006-09-08T03:26:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=476"},"modified":"2018-08-20T19:10:08","modified_gmt":"2018-08-20T23:10:08","slug":"friday-september-8-2006-harper%e2%80%99s-betrayal-of-canadian-families","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=476","title":{"rendered":"Friday, September 8, 2006 \u2014 Harper\u2019s Betrayal of Canadian Families"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Pope has just denounced Cana\u00adda for its pop\u00adu\u00adlar and polit\u00adi\u00adcal sup\u00adport for gay mar\u00adriage. Cana\u00adda has, through\u00adout its his\u00adto\u00adry, been a coun\u00adtry with a Catholic major\u00adi\u00adty, at least in the\u00ado\u00adry. But, in fact, the prac\u00adtice of \u201cpri\u00advate reli\u00adgion\u201d \u2014 the search for some per\u00adson\u00adal phi\u00adlos\u00ado\u00adphy inde\u00adpen\u00addent of any orga\u00adnized sect or author\u00adi\u00adty \u2014 is what actu\u00adal\u00adly pre\u00addom\u00adi\u00adnates in Cana\u00adda, as well as an ingrained belief that church\u00ades should stay out of pol\u00adi\u00adtics. This has long been a sig\u00adnif\u00adi\u00adcant cul\u00adtur\u00adal dif\u00adfer\u00adence between Cana\u00adda and the Unit\u00aded States. Most Cana\u00addi\u00adans would not like\u00adly know the reli\u00adgious affil\u00adi\u00ada\u00adtion of any of their politi\u00adcians, and would not think it of any inter\u00adest. Canada\u2019s for\u00admer Prime Min\u00adis\u00adter, Paul Mar\u00adtin, who is a prac\u00adtic\u00ading Catholic, remarked today that the Pope\u2019s opin\u00adion did not in the least affect him. \u201cIt\u2019s the job of the courts to apply the Char\u00adter of Rights, and it was my job as Prime Min\u00adis\u00adter to see that those rights were respected.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Our cur\u00adrent Prime Min\u00adis\u00adter, Stephen Harp\u00ader, long ago announced that he will, some\u00adtime in the future, chal\u00adlenge the Supreme Court\u2019s rul\u00ading on gay mar\u00adriage. How\u00adev\u00ader, this appears to have been mere noise to please a small seg\u00adment of his con\u00adstituen\u00adcy. He can\u00adnot get much sup\u00adport on the issue, even with\u00adin the ranks of his own par\u00adty, and he knows that such a chal\u00adlenge would not get any\u00adwhere with\u00adin the frame\u00adwork of the Cana\u00addi\u00adan con\u00adsti\u00adtu\u00adtion. Con\u00adse\u00adquent\u00adly, the rul\u00ading par\u00adty has been very vague about how or when it will act on this. My bet is that they will backpedal on this.<\/span><\/p>\n

Regard\u00ading Harper\u2019s pol\u00adi\u00adcy in Lebanon, his\u00adto\u00adri\u00adan (and old friend) Steve Muhlberg\u00ader writes me: \u201cWhen enu\u00admer\u00adat\u00ading the sins of Stephen Harp\u00ader nev\u00ader for\u00adget his sup\u00adport for a for\u00adeign gov\u00adern\u00adment bomb\u00ading and killing Cana\u00addi\u00adan cit\u00adi\u00adzens in an illegal,aggressive cam\u00adpaign.<\/em>\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

I agree whole\u00adheart\u00aded\u00adly. I was appalled that the media in this coun\u00adtry did not seem to think it was very impor\u00adtant that Cana\u00addi\u00adan cit\u00adi\u00adzens were killed by the Israeli mil\u00adi\u00adtary. Four chil\u00addren, ages one, four, six and eight, were among those killed. After some pub\u00adlic pres\u00adsure from ordi\u00adnary Cana\u00addi\u00adan cit\u00adi\u00adzens, Israel did issue an apol\u00ado\u00adgy. But it cer\u00adtain\u00adly was not the result of Stephen Harp\u00ader speak\u00ading up for his nation. On the con\u00adtrary, Harp\u00ader has made it plain that, as far as he is con\u00adcerned, any for\u00adeign pow\u00ader is wel\u00adcome to kill as many Cana\u00addi\u00adan chil\u00addren as it wants, as long as the pro\u00adce\u00addure is approved by the White House.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Pope has just denounced Cana\u00adda for its pop\u00adu\u00adlar and polit\u00adi\u00adcal sup\u00adport for gay mar\u00adriage. Cana\u00adda has, through\u00adout its his\u00adto\u00adry, been a coun\u00adtry with a Catholic major\u00adi\u00adty, at least in the\u00ado\u00adry. But, in fact, the prac\u00adtice of \u201cpri\u00advate reli\u00adgion\u201d \u2014 the search for \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-blog","category-au-blog-2006"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=476"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9404,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476\/revisions\/9404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}