The MSM in the States is at last starting to stand up to George Bush’s Theo Con Agenda.

Blogger Andrew Sullivan is no longer alone. http://andrewsullivan.com/" title="http://andrewsullivan.com/" target="_blank"http://andrewsullivan.com/  Recently Sullivan reminded his readers just how much the Republican attitude towards the religious right has changed over the years by quoting the following from Barry Goldwater.  

"However, on religious issues there can be little or no compromise. There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this supreme being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God's name on one's behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I'm frankly sick and tired of the political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in 'A,' 'B,' 'C,' and 'D.' Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who thinks it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of 'conservatism.'"

Barry Goldwater, September 16, 1981.

From today’s NY TIMES (April 26th 2005)

“To the dismay of many mainstream religious leaders, the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist, participated in a weekend telecast organized by conservative Christian groups to smear Democrats as enemies of "people of faith." Besides listening to Senator Frist's videotaped speech, viewers heard a speaker call the Supreme Court a despotic oligarchy. Meanwhile, the House majority leader, Tom DeLay, has threatened the judiciary for not following the regressive social agenda he shares with the far-right fundamentalists controlling his party.”

“The Bush administration and Congress have turned over issues bearing on women's reproductive rights to far-right religious groups opposed not just to abortion, but to expanded stem-cell research, effective birth control and AIDS prevention programs. The Food and Drug Administration continues to dawdle over approving over-the-counter access to emergency contraception for fear of inflaming members of the religious right who deem any interference with the implantation of a fertilized egg to be an abortion. This foot-dragging may be good politics from one narrow view, but it harms women and drives up the nation's abortion rate.

The result of this open espousal of one religious view is a censorious climate in which a growing number of pharmacists feel free to claim moral grounds for refusing to dispense emergency contraception and even birth control pills prescribed by a doctor. Public schools shy away from teaching about evolution, and science museums reject scientifically sound documentaries that may offend Christian fundamentalists. Public television stations were afraid to run a children's program in which a cartoon bunny met a lesbian couple.

In a recent Op-Ed article in The Times, John Danforth, the former Republican senator and U.N. ambassador who is also a minister, said his party was becoming a political arm of the religious right. He called it a formula for divisiveness that ultimately threatened the party's future. With the nation lurching toward the government sponsorship of religion, and the Senate nearing a showdown over Mr. Bush's egregious judicial nominees, it is a warning well worth heeding.”

From Chris King of The Washington Post April 23 2005.

“As the promoters of tomorrow's "Justice Sunday" national telecast have demonstrated, there is no depth to which they won't sink in their campaign to seize the country.

The statement by one of the sponsors of tomorrow's event, Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, is an example of the Holy War that is being launched by the right. In one of the most outrageous smears to be uttered by a so-called religious leader, Perkins said that "activist courts, aided by liberal interest groups . . . have been quietly working under the veil of the judiciary, like thieves in the night, to rob us of our Christian heritage and our religious freedoms." That is an unmitigated lie that should not be allowed to stand.

Which judges are out to rob Christians of their heritage? That is religious McCarthyism. Perkins should name them, provide evidence of their attempted theft of "our Christian heritage" or retract that statement with an apology. Don't count on that happening.

Angered by Democratic opposition to some of President Bush's judicial nominees, Perkins's group has also put out a flier charging that "the filibuster . . . is being used against people of faith." To suggest Democrats are out to get "people of faith" is despicable demagoguery that the truly faithful ought to rise up and reject.

But will that occur in American pulpits tomorrow? The Christian right counts on the religiously timid to keep their mouths shut. So why not exploit religion for their own ends? They will if we let them.

And that's just it. Americans of faith -- and those lacking one -- ought to vigorously resist attempts by power-hungry zealots to impose their religious views on the nation. That means standing up to them at every turn.”

Stephen Harper has a “Theo con” “agenda” http://www.tblog.com/templates/index.php?bid=koby&" title="http://www.tblog.com/templates/index.php?bid=koby&" target="_blank"http://www.tblog.com/template...;static=438583 that he wants to see implemented. I think Canadians need to force the other political parties to pursue, and or to continue to pursue a progressive agenda. I suggest that the list remain small and manageable. If the list grows too long, support will splinter. I propose the following rather modest list

    & nbsp;   1) Gay marriage

2) Legalization of marijuana

3) 5 Weeks paid vacation

4) A National Child care program

Now, in order to spread word of the progressive agenda, whether this be its final form or not, I propose that adherents link together under one banner, Progressive Bloggers.    

After the last election, it was said by more than a few NDP supporters that the Liberals had convinced some voters, by raising fears of a Conservative government, to abandon plans to vote NDP and instead vote Liberal. I am not sure how much basis in fact their claims had, but some of their anger is misdirected.

There is was no chance of a Liberal majority last time. There was however, a prime opportunity for the NDP to form a minority government with the Liberals. In terms of the NDP this is realistically a best case scenario. Sadly, the two parties fell several seats short. That said, NDP supporters should note the following. Voters who cast their votes for the Liberals in ridings where the Conservatives won and only a Conservative and NDP candidate had a chance to win are no more blameworthy than voters who cast their vote for an NDP candidate in a riding, won by the Conservatives, where only a Conservative and Liberal stood a chance of winning.

The situation will be very much the same this time around. There is again no chance of a Liberal majority and although, the chances of a NDP Liberal minority government are reduced, it is not entirely out of the question. The Question for NDP supporters is what needs to be done to make following two a reality.

1) The NDP and Liberals total seats must be greater than 154

2) The Liberals must win more seats than the Conservatives

Listening to Stephen Harper you would think that Canada has never been less relevant to the United States. “We've just become increasingly irrelevant to a country [U.S.] that has a lot of priorities…” (CBC Newsworld, July 11, 2003). In reality the opposite holds true. Our trade with the US is at an all time high. Not only are they are biggest trading partner, but we are their biggest trading partner. All of this is pretty well known. What is less well known is just how much attention some of the Liberal Party’s more progressive policy proposals (i.e., decriminalization of marijuana and gay marriage) and the Liberals choice not to join the “coalition of the willing” have gathered in the US.

Now, admittedly some of the attention has been negative. Conservative pundits have directed a great deal of bile our way, but not anything Canadians have not already heard from would be Prime Minister Harper; in a letter to the National Post, entitled “Separation, Alberta-style: It is time to seek a new relationship with Canada”, Harper went for beyond anything Lucien Bouchard every put to pen and called Canada “resentful”, “smug”, “second tier” and “second rate”. http://www.stephenharpersaid.ca/" title="http://www.stephenharpersaid.ca/" target="_blank"http://www.stephenharpersaid.... However, whereas Harper only went so far as to threaten to set up “firewalls” around Alberta, some pundits have threatened violence. Ann Coutlier has threatened to have us “crushed”, O’ Reilly has threatened us with nuclear winter and the Western Standard’s Goldberg http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/i s_22_54/ai_94960947" title="http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/i s_22_54/ai_94960947" target="_blank"http://www.findarticles.com/p...  has said we should be “bombed” and his colleague Matt Labash http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articl es/000/000/005/349tpijp.asp?pg=2" title="http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articl es/000/000/005/349tpijp.asp?pg=2" target="_blank"http://www.weeklystandard.com... has seconded him. Thankfully all are only arm chair dictators. Still others have echoed Harper in calling us irrelevant and O’Reilly and gang have also used this line when they are not threatening violence. Most recently, Tucker Carlson likened us to Honduras “only colder and less interesting”. http://mediamatters.org/items/200412010011&nb sp" title="http://mediamatters.org/items/200412010011&nb sp" target="_blank"http://mediamatters.org/items...;  All, of course, are involved in sort of performative contradiction. In repeatedly c alling us irrelevant they have helped entrench us as part of the public debate south of the border and so have made us increasing relevant.   

The Democrats badly needed to update their legislative agenda when Clinton came to power. Clinton brought the party up to speed on the economic front, but after the cold war ended the whole locus of politics in the West switched from the economic sphere to the cultural one and Clinton and the Democrats were caught flat footed. In 8 years of Cultural war, Clinton gave his base next to nothing. He let the social cons set the agenda at every turn. Although, the affect of such a stand pat policy may not have been evident over the short term, over the long term the affects were devastating. “liberalism” if it is to mean anything at all to the average American must represent a vision for American society that weaves together a series of legislative proposals. What is more, this vision has to be updated to meet changing realities. Clinton’s whole approach to the cultural wars was defensive and defeatist.

The party got to the point where in 2002 its identity was based solely upon what it is not, viz., the Republican Party. In 2003, Dean pulled party back from the dead by actually addressing the party base and their anger at Bush. He gave them hope, but the party still lacked a legislative agenda. Enter Canada: Chrétien’s announcement that Canada would be legalizing gay marriage and decriminalizing marijuana gave many Democrats a sense of what could eventually be accomplished. Slowly at first and then more quickly later, prominent newspapers and magazines started gushing over what Canada had done.

Working links

the New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/talk...

From the NY Times Magazine: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/06/magazine/0 6QUESTIONS.html?ex=1112072400&" title="http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/06/magazine/0 6QUESTIONS.html?ex=1112072400&" target="_blank"http://www.nytimes.com/2003/0...;en=7aef39efeffd405d& ei=5070&ex=1061697600 &en=5c469e9929ae55fa& amp;ei=5070
the Nation: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030721&" title="http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030721&" target="_blank"http://www.thenation.com/doc....;s=klein

From the Christian Science Monitor:  http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0627/p02s01-woam .html" title="http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0627/p02s01-woam .html" target="_blank"http://www.csmonitor.com/2003...

From the San Jose Mercury News: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v03/n1051/a1 0.html" title="http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v03/n1051/a1 0.html" target="_blank"http://www.mapinc.org/drugnew...

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: http://www.post-gazette.com/columnists/20030730sa m0730p1.asp" title="http://www.post-gazette.com/columnists/20030730sa m0730p1.asp" target="_blank"http://www.post-gazette.com/c...

From CanWest News Service: http://cpod.ubc.ca/analysis/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewItem&a mp" title="http://cpod.ubc.ca/analysis/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewItem&a mp" target="_blank"http://cpod.ubc.ca/analysis/i...;itemID=421

From Macleans: http://www.macleans.ca/switchboard/essay/arti cle.jsp?content=20031013_6700 3_67003" title="http://www.macleans.ca/switchboard/essay/arti cle.jsp?content=20031013_6700 3_67003" target="_blank"http://www.macleans.ca/switch...

Links that no longer work

From the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com...;node=&contentId=A545 02-2003Jun30¬Found=true

From the Seatle Times: http://seattletimes.nwsource....
In the September 27 2003 edition the Economist also pronounced that Canada was cool, but in order to access that article you have to pay for it.
From the NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/1...

From the International Herald Tribune via the NY Times: http://www.iht.com/articles/9...

From the International Herald Tribune via the NY Times : http://www.iht.com/articles/1...

Even as the Dean scream singled the victory of Victorian reason over passion in the Democratic body, the Democratic base never did loose their sense wonder over the Liberals proposals regarding gay marriage and decriminalizing marijuana. As a result, literally hundreds of thousands looked into moving to Canada in the weeks following Bush’s reelection.   http://slate.msn.com/id/2109300" title="http://slate.msn.com/id/2109300" target="_blank"http://slate.msn.com/id/21093... Canada was made out a be a kind of secular promised land.

The Republican response, outlined above, has ranged from trying to turn Canada into another France to outright worry. For every blue stater lauding Canada, O'Reilly and gang have felt an need to turn up the volume.  The Liberals promise to legalize gay marriage in the wake of the June 12 2003 court decision certainty had Justice Scalia’s beside himself with homophobic rage. “This ghastly prospect was evidently on Scalia’s mind as he composed his dissent in Lawrence v. Texas. If sodomy laws are unsustainable, he warned, then so are “laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation”—masturb ation? is that one still on the books?—“adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity.” Doom looms, it would appear. According to Scalia, “The Court has taken sides in the culture war,” and the next step, logically, must be “judicial imposition of homosexual marriage, as has recently occurred in Canada.”

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?030707t a_talk_hertzberg" title="http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?030707t a_talk_hertzberg" target="_blank"http://www.newyorker.com/talk...

The Liberals promise to decriminalize marijuana together with their backing of safe injection sites poses a major ideological threat the US’s war on drugs. Hence, all the attention Drug Czar Walters has paid us for the last couple of years.

In a private meeting with then mayor Philip Owen and future mayor Larry Campbell, Drug Czar Walters had threatened action if Vancouver went ahead with a plan for safe injection sites. Namely, Canadians could face major border slow downs. Owen described the meeting thus: “It was the most unsatisfactory meeting of my life.” “The pressure was intense. John Walters had about 30 officers with him, special agents. At the door there was a guy with the bulge of a gun under his clothes.”
http://www.thetyee.ca/News/2004/10/26/VanDru gExpWinConverts/" title="http://www.thetyee.ca/News/2004/10/26/VanDru gExpWinConverts/" target="_blank"http://www.thetyee.ca/News/20...

Shortly after Vancouver Mayor Larry Campbell road to power in the biggest landslide in Vancouver municipal history on platform centered on setting up safe injection sites. John Walters then took the matter public, telling a Vancouver board of trade audience, in what amounted to a thinly disguised threat not to take things too far, that we were only making matters worse. Larry Campbell quipped afterwards that the notion that safe injection sites would make things worse was akin to saying “flies cause garbage”.

Walters has since claimed that Canada risks becoming as big a source for marijuana, a drug he calls equally bad as heroin and coke, as Mexico. He says this knowing full well that Mexico supplies an estimated 100 times as much marijuana as Canada does.
http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread14988.shtml" title="http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/thread14988.shtml" target="_blank"http://www.cannabisnews.com/n...

During the late 1970s Harper’s beloved National Citizens Coalition embarked on a campaign designed to stop the “invasion” of Vietnamese boat people. Founder Colin M. Brown led the charge. During the campaign, Brown attempted to explain why letting in Hungarians fleeing communism after the Soviet crackdown was a justified and why letting in Vietnamese boat people fleeing communism was not. “I think the Hungarians have made marvelous citizens,” Brown declared, “but the bloodlines run the same way. We all come from Europe so they fit in. You wouldn’t know if the people next door to you are Hungarian or not. They don’t all go and gather in a ghetto.”

http://www.stephenharpersaid.ca/ncc/intheirownwords_en .html" title="http://www.stephenharpersaid.ca/ncc/intheirownwords_en .html" target="_blank"http://www.stephenharpersaid....

In the 2000 election Alliance candidate Betty Granger also spoke of Hungarian refugees as helping build Canada to were it is today. “Canada was founded, my heavens, on immigration. We've had the Hungarian revolution. We've got to have open-door policy for many, many reasons. Canada's a largely unsettled country, if you will. We're sort of urbanized." And she famously also spoke of an “Asian Invasion” and of the dangers of, presumably, Chinese boat people.

"Have you been to the West Coast? Oh about five years ago I was out there actually on school trustee business and found myself staying with friends that live there. I call it the Asian invasion, but that might not be the best wording, but nevertheless, the Asian students that have come over to Canada pressured the university system. Our own Canadian students actually could not even get into some of our university programs in Vancouver and Victoria. The land prices, apparently they're buying up blocks and blocks -- a well-monied population buying up blocks and blocks of real estate, building ... like there's a whole economy that (U of W political science department chair) Alan (Mills) was referring to that could occur in Manitoba that is occurring there. I wanted to talk to you also about what was happening once Hong Kong shut down with the boat people, the highly questionable people wanting citizenship in our own country. Our own due process had to go into play. We've actually interred some Asian peoples for a year before they were sent back to their homes. I think that problem has been addressed to some degree, but this is problematic not only for immigration, but also for justice issues because there was a realization that what was coming off these boats was not the best clientele you would want to come into this country.”

http://www.chl.ca/CNEWSElection2000News/ 1121_granger-sun.html" title="http://www.chl.ca/CNEWSElection2000News/ 1121_granger-sun.html" target="_blank"http://www.chl.ca/CNEWSElecti...

 

Coincidently or not, Stephen Harper spoke of Asian ghettoes and Asian immigrants not integrating into Canadian society in 2001. “West of Winnipeg the ridings the Liberals hold are dominated by people who are either recent Asian immigrants or recent migrants from Eastern Canada: people who live in ghettoes and who are not integrated into Western Canadian society.”

Finally, in 2002 Harper went to bat for Betty Granger. According to Harper, people’s anger at Granger was misplaced. It was Granger who was the victim; She was a victim of a “slur” campaign that he likened to a “kind of low-level form of McCarthyism.”

“Betty Granger is a riding president, a member in good standing. She’s somebody that other members I’ve talked to think very highly of, and quite frankly, she was the victim of an unfair slur story in the last election campaign." (Calgary Herald, January 15, 2002)

 

“Betty Granger is party president in the Winnipeg area and o¬ne of a large number of party presidents that are supporting this campaign. So, I think this kind of thing is just kind of a low-level form of McCarthyism.” (CTV ”Question Period”, February 10, 2002)

 

For what it is worth, I think the Conservatives have abandoned their southern, err Western, plan and moved on. Minority groups are all brothers in arms now; in any furture cultural war the colonial troops will be vital in "protecting" marriage and other threats to the "traditional values".

Seriously, I am not tarring Harper with comments made by some ex minster's assistants, I am questioning his publically stated views. If he does not want to clear the air and explain himself, these statments will continue to dog him and well they should.

If anyone thinks these statments are defensible, then please defend them. I do not think they are. I think it is pretty clear that Ganger was pandering to something pretty nasty.

Harper went to bat for someone who claimed that

A) "asian students" are stealing university spots from our "Canadian students". I am surprised she did not drop all pretense altogether and speak directly to people's fears of UBC becomming "University of a Billion Chinks"

B) "They" are driving up housing prices by buying up all the land.

C) "there was a realization that what was coming off these boats was not the best clientele you would want to come into this country" Boat loads of criminals are comming over. China has emptied is jails, a la Cuba, and they are headed for the Western shores of Canada.

On March 19^th the Globe and Mail (subscription wall) ran an article from the Canadian press entitled “Conservatives shed Reform baggage in move to centre”.   The focal point of the article was Elsie Wayne’s failure to have the party stand against abortion, but the article did mention others.   “Also removed from party’s platform were planks calling for the creation of a citizens assembly to adopt proportional representation, holding elections on fixed dates, referendums for constitutional amendments and general referendums for issues of national importance.” 

The question arises, though, by failing to endorse Elsie Wayne’s motion did the party moved to the center?  Of course not.  The party’s position on abortion going in was exactly what it was going out.  Confused.   Harper has said the Conservative Party will not table legislation on abortion, but that he would allow private members bills and he would not instruct his caucus how to vote.  However, he has also said that it is a provincial matter, presumably making any such potential vote unconstitutional. 

That said, confused policy is often good politics.  By talking out of both sides of his mouth, Harper has managed keep his critics at by and “theo cons”, such as Mary Ellen Douglas, Ontario President of Campaign Life Coalition, happy.   “I am happy to see that the Conservatives recognize that abortion funding is a provincial issue. We have been telling our provincial politicians that for years, but they keep insisting that the issue is federal.”  From watching what has transpired in the States, Marry Ellen knows that the best way of taking away abortion rights is to have the Provinces do it in a piecemeal fashion.  

As for “proportional representation, holding elections on fixed dates, referendums for constitutional amendments and general referendums for issues of national importance”, to call the abandonment of these platforms as constituting a move to the center is just plain weird.  Proportional representation once made political strategic sense for the party.  It does so no longer and is now PR strongest backers are the NDP.   As they extend the election cycle, fixed elections are not really practical for any party, let alone one with less money than the Liberals.   Besides, it is hard to say that such a policy is necessarily left or right.  As for amendments and general referendums for issues of national importance, Harper is not about to scuttle any chance to join up with Americans on some foreign adventure by letting the Canadian people decide important issue, such as whether or not to join the US in going to war. 

“This party will not take its position based on public opinion polls. We will not take a stand based on focus groups. We will not take a stand based on phone-in shows or householder surveys or any other vagaries of pubic opinion... "   

“We also need to rediscover Burkean conservatism because the emerging debates on foreign affairs should be fought on moral grounds. Current challenges in dealing with terrorism and its sponsors, as well as the emerging debate on the goals of the U.S. as the sole superpower, will be well served by conservative insights on preserving historic values and moral insights on right and wrong. As we have seen in recent months, these are debates where modern liberals (with the exception of Tony Blair) have no answers: they are trapped in their framework of moral neutrality, moral relativism and moral equivalence.” 

So much for the move to the middle narrative, but where does Harper want to take the country on social issues?   Harper wants to “revise” the current agenda and take Canada to the right, a la, George Bush.  In this respect the ending of his speech to the convention faithful was very apropos.  “Thank you.  God Bless Canada.”  For those a little slow, substitute the word “Canada” and put in “America”.  http://www.conservative.ca/documents/20050318-Con ventionAddress-Harper.pdf" title="http://www.conservative.ca/documents/20050318-Con ventionAddress-Harper.pdf" target="_blank"http://www.conservative.ca/do... 

“REVISING THE AGENDA

This is not as difficult as it sounds. It does not require a radical redefinition of conservatism, but rather a shifting of the balance between the economic and social conservative sides that have always been there.

In particular, Canadian conservatives need to rediscover the virtues of Burkean conservatism as a key component of that balance. Rediscovering this agenda, to paraphrase Ted Byfield, means not just worrying about what the state costs, but also worrying about what the state values.

For example, we need to rediscover Burkean or social conservatism because a growing body of evidence points to the damage the welfare state is having on our most important institutions, particularly the family. Conservatives have to give much higher place to confronting threats posed by modern liberals to this building block of our society.

Take, for example, the debate over the rights of parents to discipline their children - the so-called spanking debate. Of course, there are legitimate limits to the use of force by parents - limits outlined in the Criminal Code. Yet the most recent Liberal Throne Speech, as part of its "children's agenda," hinted at more government interference in the family. We saw the capacity for this abuse of power in the events that took place in Aylmer, Ont. Children there were seized for no reason other than the state disagreed with the religious views of their parents. No conservative can support this kind of intrusion, and conservatives have an obligation to speak forcefully against such acts.

This same argument applies equally to a range of issues involving the family (all omitted from the Throne Speech), such as banning child pornography, raising the age of sexual consent, providing choice in education and strengthening the institution of marriage. All of these items are key to a conservative agenda.”  

 

Where to begin?  Well, let us start off with Harper’s views of the Aylmer case, views which he has never repudiated. 

The judge ruled in the Aylmer case that spanking the kids with a metal “spanking stick” went well beyond the use of “reasonable force” and that Children’s Aid Society had every right to intervene; the parents claims to the contrary were “sheer nonsense”.  "No community, or society, could reasonably agree with the concept that a parent who sexually abuses or physically mistreats a child should be entitled to give his/her consent to the interviewing, or examination of the child by a member of a Children's Aid Society." 

The Conservative party has vowed to stop such activist judges and Children’s Aid Societies from “interfering” again.  http://www.conservative.ca/documents/20050319-POL ICY" title="http://www.conservative.ca/documents/20050319-POL ICY" target="_blank"http://www.conservative.ca/do...%20DECLARATION.pdf  Policy Declaration: “The Conservative party believes in the right and duty of parents to raise their own children responsibly according to their own beliefs.  We belief that no person, government or agency has the right to interfere in that process accept though due process of law” 

The promise to ban child pornography should raise a few eyebrows.   First, call me stupid, but is child pornography not already banned?  Oh yes, I remember now.  Harper, err some Conservative staffer, decided to test drive this line during the last election campaign.  "Today, [Paul] Martin says he's against child pornography. But his voting record proves otherwise."   "The NDP Caucus Supports Child Pornography?"  When asked whether he thought the line was in bad taste he said this.  “What's in bad taste is the Liberal party's record on child pornography". 

Since the election debacle, Harper has toned things down the Rhetoric a bit.   Policy Declaration “The conservative government will eliminate all defenses that are currently used to justify the possession of child pornography.”  Sorry Harper there is only one.  The “public good” defense, or if you prefer the Lolita Loophole prevents the state from seizing copies of, well, Lolita.  This was the Globe and Mail’s take on the issue during the election. (subscriber wall)   

“What nonsense.  Canada has a tough a child porn law, brought in by the Liberals, among other things, provides for sentences of up 10 years in jail for putting child porn on the internet. …   The exception Mr. Harper refers to is the “public good defense, which would exempt writers, artists, researchers and legal authorities from prosecution in such circumstances.  Without it, the police could potentially break down your door for owning a copy of Nabokov’s Lolita.  Is that the kind of Canada that Mr. Harper wants?  To include such a sensible and necessary clause in a bill does not make the Liberals soft on Porn.”      & nbsp;

Needless to say, if that is the way the Globe and Mail feels about Harper’s policy agenda, maybe they should again focus on it instead of helping to conceal it by printing articles that such that the Conservatives have moved to the center in terms of policy.  

Raising the age of consent:  Policy Declaration: “The conservative party would rename the Age of Consent to the Age of Protection and raise it from 14 to 16.”  Age of protection huh; that is an interesting name change. 

Gay Marriage:  Harper has “always said that controversial issues of a moral or religious nature, such as abortion, should be settled by free votes of MPs, not by party policy."  This is true with regards to Gay marriage.  Conservative MPs have the right to vote as they see fit.   However, what “controversial issues of a moral or religious nature” get adopted as party policy and what do not is a matter of political expediency.  Opposing gay marriage is politically expedient right now.  Opposing abortion is not.  

“we must realize that real gains are inevitably incremental. This, in my experience, is harder for social conservatives than for economic conservatives. The explicitly moral orientation of social conservatives makes it difficult for many to accept the incremental approach. Yet, in democratic politics, any other approach will certainly fail. We should never accept the standard of just being "better than the Liberals" - people who advocate that standard seldom achieve it - but conservatives should be satisfied if the agenda is moving in the right direction, even if slowly.”

 

Policy Declaration: “A Conservative government would support legislation defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman.” 

The reason why gay marriage is harms the traditional family is simple.  It challenges what social conservatives hold near and dear, viz. “respect for customs and traditions (religious traditions above all)”.  If the state allows gay marriage, people might get the crazy idea that there is nothing wrong with be homosexual. 

Alas, education is a provincial responsibility.  Only with regard to first Nations people can the government seek to undermine, that “harmful” welfare state institution known as, public education.  “The Conservative Party proposes where available and agreed upon by all parties including provincial authorities to offer choice in schooling for first nations.”  

During Harper’s time as VP of the National Citizens Coalition, then president David Somerville summed up the organizations philosophy thus:  “The fact of the matter is, we have stood since 1967 for more freedom through less government and we have promoted that philosophy in a number of different ways, through (public advocacy of) privatization, tax cuts, spending cuts and opposing gag laws. We’ve been consistent for almost 30 years.” 

In 2003 paper Harper took Somerville’s reasoning a step further. 

“In this environment, serious conservative parties simply cannot shy away from values questions. On a wide range of public-policy questions, including foreign affairs and defence, criminal justice and corrections, family and child care, and healthcare and social services, social values are increasingly the really big issues.

Take taxation, for example. There are real limits to tax-cutting if conservatives cannot dispute anything about how or why a government actually does what it does. If conservatives accept all legislated social liberalism with balanced budgets and corporate grants - as do some in the business community - then there really are no differences between a conservative and a Paul Martin.”  http://www.ccicinc.org/politicalaffairs/0601 03.html" title="http://www.ccicinc.org/politicalaffairs/0601 03.html" target="_blank"http://www.ccicinc.org/politi... 

 

In other words, whereas, many people look at the States and see an unbridgeable divide between small government libertarians and the religious right, who favor government interference, Harper sees no such incompatibility.  Yes, “conservatism has been in trouble in recent years”.  However according to Harper, “It is critical we realize that this breakdown is not a fundamental incompatibility between ‘neo-cons’ and ‘theo-cons,’   For Harper, the spread of social conservatism undermines the legitimacy of public programs and government bodies making it politically possible for these bodies to be reduced or better yet done away with.  For this reason being a true red meat libertarian, “to paraphrase Ted Byfield, means not just worrying about what the state costs, but also worrying about what the state values.”

Using wing nut conservatism as a weapon, just how far does Harper want to go? 

2004 "We must aim to make [Canada] a lower tax jurisdiction than the United States."