Mr. and Mr. Brison

Canada will now have its first Federal Gay Political Marriage. And no it will not be John Baird and Stephen Harper. But it will be a conservative marriage, albeit a progressive one.

Liberal MP Scott Brison is set to become the first federal politician to tie the knot in a same-sex ceremony since MPs made gay marriage the law of the land just over two years ago.

Brison, 40, will marry partner Maxime St. Pierre next Saturday in his Kings-Hants riding, a bucolic corner of Nova Scotia's Annapolis Valley.

Brison, a former Progressive Conservative party and Liberal party leadership hopeful, came out in 2002 and became Canada's first openly gay cabinet minister in 2004. But he's never defined his political persona around the issue and has closely guarded his private life.

I hope he is not Anglican.




H/T to Scott Tribe for this.


SEE:

Brison Kennedy Debate On QP

Brison Knew Better

Gay Liberal Leader

Fete Accompli

The Sexual Revolution Continues

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Not Queer Enough To Be Canadian

The story of Alvaro Orozco, a young Nicaraguan man who has claimed refugee status for being gay is a story of the stupidity of the social conservatives both in his home country and in Canada.

As I posted here in February when this story first surfaced; the Refugee Board in Calgary refused his request saying he didn't look/act gay.

Unlike our PM who occasionally looks like one of the Village People. Or that famous Conservative Cabinet Minister who is still in the closet.

And since Nicaragua is such a progressive country, having recently reelected Daniel Ortega as President, the refugee board figures that he would be safe from harm in that most Catholic of countries. A country that recently totally banned abortion.

Many LGBT Nicaraguans held prominent roles during the Sandinista Revolution, however, LGBT rights were not of any priority to the Sandinista government due to an overwhelming Roman Catholic population and was thought to be a huge political risk sure to be met with hostility from the Roman Catholic church.^[1]

After the United States lifted the economic embargo against Nicaragua many non-governmental organizations (NGOs) promoting LGBT rights began to operate in the country due to the absence of pressure from the United States. As a result, Nicaragua hosted in first public gay pride festival in 1991.^[1] The annual Gay Pride celebration in Managua, held around June 28, in still in motion and is used to commemorate the uprising of the Stonewall riots in New York City.^[2]

After gaining support the LGBT community suffered a huge setback when a bill formerly written to protect women from rape and sexual abuse was changed by the Social Christians.^[1] The change imposed a sentence of up to three years in prison for "anyone who induces, promotes, propagandizes, or practices sex among persons of the same sex in a scandalous manner." Activist did not keep quiet and along with their allies they protested in Nicaragua and at embassies abroad, however, no change occurred and former President Violeta Chamorro signed the bill into a law in July 1992 under Article 205 of the penal code.^[3] In November 1992 a coalition known as the Campaign for Sexuality without Prejudices, comprising, amongst others, lawyers and lesbian and gay activists, presented an appeal to the Supreme Court of Justice, challenging the law as unconstitutional. However, the Supreme Court rejected the appeal in March 1994.^[4]

A country that refuses to recognize a womans right to choose is not about to recognize the right to sexual orientation. And in that macho Catholic country declaring yourself gay is tantamount to a jail sentence. A damn good reason not to deport Alvaro Orozco.

A Nicaraguan national who fears persecution in his homeland because of his sexual orientation was ordered deported yesterday by Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board -- a decision his lawyer said came as a "huge surprise."

Alvaro Orozco, 21, says he was just 12 when he fled Nicaragua -- a country where homosexuality is considered a crime punishable by up to four years in prison -- because his father beat him for being gay.

Yesterday's decision places Orozco's safety at risk, his lawyer, El-Farouk Khaki, told a news conference.

And I like this; the Minister responsible for Orozco's deportation is NOT taking phone calls!!

Thursday August 9, 2007
Urgent Press Conference – Stop the Deportation of Alvaro Orozco

6 months after community action and national media coverage resulted in the deferral of Alvaro Orozco’s deportation order – Alvaro received today, August 9th, 2007, a completely shocking negative response to his Pre-Removal Risk Assessment, which means that his deportation is now imminent. His last resort is for the Minister of Immigration, Diane Finley, to intervene.

NDP Member of Parliament Olivia Chow (Trinity-Spadina), as well as many other prominent supporters, have already called for the minister of immigration to allow Alvaro to stay in Canada.

Contact the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Diane Finley.
Important note: The Minister of Immigration, Diane Finely, has the final say on deportation matters. She has the authority to give me permission to stay in Canada.
IMPORTANT NOTICE:
Despite the deferral, supporters should keep contacting Minister Diane Finley's office to keep the pressure and attention up. At this point, the CIC/IRB can reopen his case, grant my H&C (Humanitarian and Compassionate grounds stay), or accept my PRRA (preremoval risk assessment) (once we file the latter two). Now it's up to her. PLEASE keep sending in your support. It's only the beginning! I still has a removal date for mid August and no status yet.

NOTE: THE MINSTER'S OFFICES ARE NOT TAKING ANY PHONE CALLS. YOU NEED TO SEND AN EMAIL OR A FAX

Click Here for a Sample Letter to Minister Finley - Word Doc.

Minister Diane Finley
Immigration Office: 613-954-1064

Parliament Hill
Room 707, Confederation Bldg House of Commons
Ottawa, ON
K1A 0A6
Ph:(613) 996-4974
Toll Free:None
Fx:(613) 996-9749
E-mail: Finley.D@parl.gc.ca

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WSJ Fallout

In light of the takeover the WSJ by Rupert Murdoch the ripples are happening even in Canada.

The Bad News:

One of Torstar Corp.'s five controlling families has signalled it will soon begin selling off shares in the tightly held newspaper publishing company in an effort to diversify their investments.

The Thall family, part of the voting trust that steers Canada's largest newspaper by circulation, the Toronto Star, informed the company that it intends to divest "some or all" of its non-voting shares in Torstar Corp.

Of course there is always a silver lining, if Murdoch can't buy the Toronto Star there is always the National Pest.

National Post readers across Atlantic Canada will now have to travel to Halifax if they want to buy an actual print copy of the national newspaper.

Following an annual business review of the paper, Post management decided to limit sales to only one Atlantic Canadian market — the metropolitan area of Halifax — as of the end of July.

This latest move follows another decision, announced in late March, to limit Atlantic Canadian distribution of the Post to provincial capitals only.

At that time, the paper blamed the prohibitive costs of distributing the paper regionally after circulation numbers are factored in. Home delivery to the Atlantic region was also discontinued in 2006.

Similar reasons were cited this time, with the paper also blaming difficulty distributing the Toronto-produced and printed paper in a timely manner.

"As we took a look at our business model, looked at how and where we're distributed across the country — and frankly no newspaper has 100 per cent distribution across the country, it's just too big — we made some hard decisions," said Steven Hastings, National Post vice-president of marketing and reader sales.

The National Pest continues to decline in circulation, and thus withdrawing from being a National Paper to one that is just another Toronto Rag.

Upon its much ballyhooed introduction in October 1998 by media mogul Conrad Black, the National Post offered a bold new, neo-conservative voice in Canada's national newspaper landscape, offering a different take on the news and current affairs as well as a jazzy, colourful look compared to venerable newspaper the Globe and Mail.

However, the Post soon began amassing large debts from the heavy spending incurred during its startup period. Black eventually sold the paper to fellow media scion Izzy Asper and his CanWest Global Communications (in two stages over the course of 2000 and 2001).

In 2001, management of the still-young newspaper imposed severe budget cuts, laid off a significant percentage of its staff and nixed several sections, with a plummet in circulation the ultimate result.

Wow that was some business plan. Typical of the right, overwhelmed by all their pompous social conservative blathergab when it comes to good old fashioned capitalism they are utter failures, bleeding cash and blue bloods.

SEE:

Liberal Or liberal Media

Lord Black No Robin Hood

Conrad Black

Criminal Capitalism


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Stelmach's Robber Barons

Speculators, the lowest and sleaziest form of capitalist, in Alberta's hot housing market, are now the beneficiaries, not of social embarrassment and ridicule as they once were, but of the protection of the State.

Moral betrayal at Monarch

Shock that low-income housing is sold after being built on subsidy

The Stelmach government needs to close a loophole in its tenancy law that let owners of Red Deer's Monarch Place bypass a mandatory one-year's notice before turning the affordable-housing project into condos, said Red Deer-North's Conservative MLA.

Tenants in Monarch Place believed they'd have 12 months before their homes became condos. But they instantly became condos in July; once the units are sold, tenants have 90 days to clear out.

How, many want to know, can this happen?

"You can convert a rental premise to a condominium without any notice to the tenants, as long as you're not asking the tenant to leave in order to accomplish the condominium conversion," says Eoin Kenny, a spokesman for Service Alberta.

"In this case, they weren't asking the tenant to leave. They were merely selling the suite."

The numbered company that bought Monarch Place -- a subsidiary of Everest Developments Ltd. in Edmonton -- never told residents its plans for the complex. Registered documents show surveyors began devising the condo plan for the firm on March 11, four months before it took possession.

Residents thought they'd get one year's notice before a condo conversion, a requirement the Stelmach government recently imposed. But 1327545 Alberta Ltd. legally avoided giving any notice, through a provision that lets it convert and sell units as long as it doesn't clear out the tenants.

Many residents say they don't know who their landlords are. Haut said he has never spoken with the buyers.

Richard Cotter, the Everest subsidiary's lawyer, said his client was unaware Monarch was an affordable-housing complex until after it made its purchase deposit and condo plans.

In July, the company took possession and sold all units to condo investors. Rent increases and for-sale signs soon arrived.

Of course there is federal and provincial funding for affordable housing, but no controls to stop it from being condo-ized.

Since the Canada-Alberta Affordable Housing Program Agreement 
was signed,more than $98 million has been allocated towards the creation
of 3,683affordable housing units throughout the province. Federal and
provincial contributions to affordable housing projects are enhanced by
contributions from other partners including municipalities, local community
housing authorities, non-profit organizations and private sector companies.

Without regulations to control condo speculators, and rent controls in place there is no such thing as affordable housing for anyone in Alberta.

Bridge to Community: The Affordable Housing Crisis in Alberta, a documentary by Brent Spiess, takes an in-depth look at the housing issues in Calgary and how the boom is leaving some people behind. But while Calgary is the film’s focal point, Spiess hopes that Albertans in general can benefit from the film and connect with the issues presented.

“We think the issues here are pretty much the same as they are in Edmonton or Grande Prairie or Red Deer or Fort McMurray,” Spiess said.

In May 2006, the average price of a resale home in Calgary was $358 214, up 43.6 per cent in one year. Similarly, Edmonton experienced a 22.9 percent increase that same year, as average sale prices hit $242 936. The market has had a tremendous effect on renters, and it was in this context that Spiess began the year-long process of making his documentary.

Like his predecessor, King Ralph, Eddie is kicking the poor and disabled when they are down.

While the citizens suffer at their hands the Stelmach regime dodders on protecting special interests like housing flippers and other real estate speculators.

leading Keynes to make his famous observation (in his General Theory):

Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. And his reference point was the 1920s, when speculation, frenzied though it already was (especially in the USA) was, by comparison with its post-World War II evolution, embryonic.

What's more important than housing for Tories? Why golf courses. That is after all where the business of government gets done.

Alberta's Progressive Conservative government allocated more than $7 million in grants to golf clubs over three years, and almost all the money went to courses in Tory ridings.

More than half of the money was allocated in 2003, the year before the last provincial election, according to public government documents.

See:

Pay 'Em What They Want

And New York Has Rent Controls

Stelmach Blames Eastern Bums

He Can't Manage

Drumheller Bell Weather

Stelmach Tanks

Alberta Deja Vu

Padrone Me Is This Alberta

Income Trusts

Housing


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Tin Man

Gee who do you think might have been responsible for this?

In the grip of speculators, tin hits 18-year high

And has lots of cold hard cash to invest?

China

China is also one of the major tin-producing countries; the main producing area is the Gejiu complex in Yunnan which has accounted for a large proportion of the total output in China for many years.

Total mined production of tin in 1990 (as ores and concentrates) was 211,000 tonnes, with the major producing nations being Brazil, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Bolivia and Thailand.

Thus an alliance that once was part of the non-aligned anti-Imperialist bloc now becomes aligned with the new Imperialist player on the block, who can throw some coin their way in the global marketplace.


SEE:

Turning Lead into Gold

China Burps Greenspan Farts Dow Hiccups

China: The Triumph of State Capitalism

China No Longer Red Nor In The Red

US vs China for Global Hegemony

Afghanistan or Africa

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Universal Health Care and Charter Schools

The right wing loved Wisconsin when it adopted their Charter School program, despite it's failure, to create a market place in public education or improve test scores.

Now that Wisconsin wants to try socialized medicine ala Canada, well the wailing, wrenching and rendering of political breasts on the right begins.

Let Wisconsin Experiment with Socialized Medicine

John Stossel says " go for it, Wisconsin ". His theory is that perhaps their experience will finally demonstrate for all that the "socialist approach" isn't the way to go. Of course, as you might imagine, "free" health care isn't free: The plan would cost an estimated $15.2 billion, or $3 billion more than the state currently collects in all income, sales and corporate income taxes.

Hopefully the empirical research that results from Wisconsin's experiment with Medicare, will be better than has been done with "For Profit Education" and Charter Schools.



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Blog Spam

Considering how many problems I have had with Blogspot why does this not surprise me. Google Can't Figure Out That Its Own Blog Isn't Spam


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Conservative Cherniak

If anyone was in doubt that Jason Cherniak is a conservative, as in a classic parliamentary Tory, this should be the final nail in that coffin.

As if we needed any more evidence.




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Pakistan 1933

Shades of 1933.

The government of embattled Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf said Thursday it may impose a state of emergency because of ``external and internal threats'' and deteriorating law and order in the volatile northwest near the Afghan border.

Except that Pakistan, born out of an anti-imperialist struggle the Muslim League which founded Pakistan was aided by the Nazi's, as was the right wing Hindu Nationalist movement.

Muslims had been aroused into solidarity with their Palestinian co-religionists, who were increasingly in open conflict with the Jewish settlers, and supported Hitler's anti-Jewish line. There was also the Khaksar Muslim militia, founded on the model of the Nazi Sturmabteilung (SA, "storming department") by Allama Inayatullah Mashreqi, who had returned from Germany full of enthusiasm for the national resurgence he had witnessed there.

The Muslim League, while in alliance with the British, also had a soft corner for Hitler: "When Nehru returned after a brief visit to Europe in 1938, he was struck by the similarity between the propaganda methods of the Muslim League in India and the Nazis in Germany: 'The League leaders had begun to echo the Fascist tirade against democracy... Nazis were wedded to a negative policy. So also was
the League. The League was anti-Hindu, anti-Congress, anti-national... The Nazis raised the cry of hatred against the Jews, the League [had] raised [its] cry against the Hindus.'" (B.R. Nanda: Gandhi and His Critics, OUP, Delhi 1993 (1985), p.88)

Allama Iqbal in contrast provided a much more workable situation. The Iqbalian concepts of "Mard-e-Momin" and "Shaheen" (even though Iqbal’s Mard-e-Momin and Shaheen could be civilians) were used- much in the same way Nazis used Nietzche’s "Superman"- to invent the "Super-Fauji" who could dodge bullets and travel at the speed of light ... all the while managing a pathetic little country like ours.

If Pakistan’s 60 years are mapped in terms of Allama Iqbal promotion, the graph would be highest under Ayub, Zia and Musharraf. The Ulema - including people like Dr. Israr- the same sort Iqbal had warned against- have also had good reason to own Iqbal. Much of Iqbal’s poetry is recited by the Ulema because it speaks of Islamic glory etc.

Today it is a nuclear state that exports terror.

Wait a minute didn't George II say something about that. As have the Democrats.

Oh yeah that might be why this happened.

Pakistan Leader Snubs Afghan Meeting

SEE:

The Economist Agrees With Me

Afghanistan A Failed State

Pakistan Speaks For the Taliban

Liberation Theology

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Not Surprised

Why am I not surprised.

The chairman of the company that co-owns the Utah coal mine where six workers are trapped has campaigned to improve mine safety - but his companies have incurred millions of dollars in fines over the last 18 months.

Must be a compliance problem.

SEE:

Bump

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