April Reign

Speak your mind even if your voice shakes

Archives for November 2008

COAL for Christmas

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Little Stevie has been very naughty. Going around thinking he is special, breaking things he sees no value in — like democracy — and generally not playing well with others.

Traditionally Santa brings such children coal for Christmas. I think this year should be no exception, Harper deserves a coal [ition government] and while that is punishment for him it will be a grand gift for the rest of us.

The last few years have been very depressing watching the opposition waste opportunity after opportunity bowing to the manipulations and machinations of a party for whom ideology trumps all. Duceppe put it best;

What the Conservative government presented today was not an economic statement but an ideological statement. This ideology so blinds the government that it fails to see how urgent it is to act.

Instead of presenting a plan to help the economy recover and breathe some air into it, the Prime Minister has chosen to smother it. . . The Prime Minister has preferred ideology to economics. He has placed partisanship above democracy.

Despite the surpluses accumulated over 10 years, the Conservative government not only refused to present its plan, to provide relief, it consciously chose to stifle the economy to advance its outdated ideology on the reduction of government.

Naturally, we are prepared to cut our salaries and to reduce growth of expenditures by the government bureaucracy. But the purpose of these savings should not be to reduce government in order to avoid a one-time deficit, but to support the economy, to support the people.

The government has decided to take advantage of the crisis to attack the rights of women and workers. The government is proposing to suspend public servants’ right to strike. It has decided to attack women’s rights by submitting their right to pay equity to negotiation. Since when are rights negotiable? It is scandalous. We will never accept such an attack by the government on women’s and workers’ rights. We will never allow it.

Not content with putting ideology before the economy, not content with attacking workers, women, and Quebec, the Prime Minister is adding insult to injury by putting his own extreme partisanship before democracy. When speaking on December 8, 2005 about reforming the financing of political parties, the Prime Minister said:

“These measures are directly inspired by reforms introduced by René Lévesque 30 years ago, reforms of which all Quebeckers can be very proud. Quebec has led the way in electoral reform.”

By announcing his intention to eliminate public funding of political parties, the Prime Minister is betraying the memory of René Lévesque. Public funding was at the heart of René Lévesque’s reform. This desire to slash funding is a direct attack on democracy. Using the economic crisis as an excuse and under the pretense of saving $30 million, the Conservative government has shown the world the extent of its hypocrisy.

Hardly a few weeks ago, the Prime Minister called an election for strictly partisan reasons. He spent $300 million, ten times more than what he is trying to save by eliminating political party funding. What will the Prime Minister announce next in the upcoming budget? Does he plan to shut down Parliament to save $500 million?

The Prime Minister has manufactured a democratic crisis, simply to give himself a partisan advantage, because this government’s goal is to silence all forms of opposition: silence artists, silence women, silence unions and silence the opposition.

The latest rumour is that Harper has taken a step back and will reverse the decision to end the public financing of all parties.

Giorno, Harper’s Chief of Staff, has released a memo with such gems as;

* We’re not even two months removed from the last election, and a group of backroom politicians are going to pick who the Prime Minister is. Canadians didn’t vote for this person. We don’t even know who this person will be.

Oh Noes!!! we don’t know who it will be. How can we start smearing them?

* Not a single voter voted for a Liberal-NDP coalition. Certainly not a single voter voted for the Liberals to form a coalition with the separatists in the Bloc.

Actually the PR vote went more to a coalition than to the CONs

* This is what bothers me the most. The Conservatives won the election. The Opposition keeps saying that the Conservatives have to respect the will of the voters that this is a minority and so on.
* …how about Liberals, NDP and Bloc respecting the will of the voters when they said “YOU LOSE”.

YOU LOSE!? HAW HAW You’re rubber I’m glue… This is the best a government that thinks they were born from gods right nut can do?

* And what’s this going to do to the economy. I’m sorry, I don’t care how desperate the Liberals are — giving socialists (Jack Layton) and separatists (Gilles Duceppe) a veto over every decision in government — that is a recipe for total economic disaster.

SOCIALISTS RUN!!! HIDE!!! LOOK UNDER THE BED. Oh hai Sarah

* But how more phony could these guys be?

Yours? Geez I don’t know I don’t think we’ve seen the worst of them yet

* I mean, I follow the news, virtually every single day you have Harper or Flaherty out there telegraphing exactly what they plan to do with the economy. And not once did you hear the Liberals, NDP or separatists talking about toppling the government in response.
* No — do you know what set this off. When Flaherty said he was going to take taxpayer-funded subsidies away from the opposition. Now there is a reason to try and overturn an election— because the Conservatives the audacity to say “Hey, it’s a recession, maybe you should take your nose out of the trough.”
* And I wish the media would be more clear on this point — the opposition aren’t being singled out by this fact the Conservatives stand to lose the most money of all. The only difference is that Canadians are voluntarily giving money the Conservatives, so they don’t need taxpayer handouts. The only reason the opposition would be hurt more is because nobody wants to donate to them. They should be putting their efforts towards fixing that problem.
* I don’t want another election. But what I want even less is a surprise backroom Prime Minister whom I never even had the opportunity to vote for or against. What an insult to democracy.

Hmm so every other democratic country has the system you guys want to dismantle but anyone who calls you on it is against democracy? So how are things there in the Ministry of Truth?

Sign the Petition. Support a Coalition

Giorno memo from the G&M

International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women

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The anti-rape poster seen in the picture above started a debate not over how to better protect women or make them feel more comfortable reporting rape but whether or not it was an insult to God and too sexy.

“The poster poses the question: ‘Who Pays For Man’s Sins?’ and a caption which reads “Only four per cent of women who suffer sexual violence report their assailants.”

“I’ll do everything in my power to stop this poster going up,” said a city councillor, Maurizio Cadeo.

He and other right-wing councillors said the poster was “blasphemous” and would offend the religious beliefs of many Italians.

“We’re calling for the poster to be withdrawn because an important day like this should not be debased by such a sexual provocation,” said councillor Carlo Fidanza, a member of the right-wing National Alliance party.

Sexual provocation? Seriously?

The good councillor is not alone however,

A new poll has found that nearly half of Northern Ireland’s students believe that a woman is wholly or partially responsible for rape if she flirts.

The Amnesty International commissioned poll, published on 29 September, entitled Violence Against Women: The Perspective of Students in Northern Ireland, explores the “blame culture” found in attitudes towards women and sexual violence.

The research revealed that, of the 715 students surveyed at Ulster University, 46 per cent felt that a woman’s flirting would leave her bearing some of the blame in the case of rape.

30 per cent believed that women were partially or totally responsible for rape if she wears sexy or revealing clothing and one in ten reasoned that violence was acceptable against a girlfriend who nags, flirts with other men, or refuses to have sex.

Attitudes it seems have not changed overly much. Women are asking for it if friendly and sexually autonomous, and frigid bitches if they are not. At fault for abuse if they don’t protect themselves and nags if they defend their rights and beliefs. They are tarring all men as rapists if they cross the road or take other self defense measures and accused of having at least partial fault if they do not and an attack occurs.

Days such as today provide an opportunity to highlight the issues of violence, yet they will do nothing to stop it. Real change needs to come from all of us recognizing each others humanity, dignity and rights.

Prison Changes You!

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Conrad Black in a letter to the Sunday Times rails against private prisons, the war on drugs and high incarceration rate in the U.S.

“U.S. justice has become a command economy based on the avarice of private prison companies, a gigantic prison service industry and politically influential correctional officers’ unions that agitate for an unlimited increase in the number of prosecutions and the length of sentences.”

Fruitless attempts to wipe out the illegal drug trade are to blame for the situation, says Black, taking up a battle cry long espoused by people he’s never traditionally associated with – those on the left of the political spectrum, including groups like the American Civil Liberties Union.

“The entire ‘war on drugs,’ by contrast, is a classic illustration of supply-side economics: a trillion taxpayers’ dollars squandered and (one million) small fry imprisoned at a cost of $50 billion a year; as supply of and demand for illegal drugs have increased, prices have fallen and product quality has improved.”

Having seen the system Black has suddenly developed a desire to reform it.

[..]penal reform is a cause he hopes to champion when he’s released from prison.

“I wish to advise Lord Hurd that when I return to the UK, I would like to take up more energetically than I did initially his request for assistance in his custodial system reform activities,” Black wrote, referring to Douglas Hurd, a patron of Britain’s Tory Reform Group.

Perhaps next he could do an enforced stint on welfare, work for a living at minimum wage, need a daycare space……..

Source

You like me! You really like me!

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April Reign has been nominated over at the CBA’s in the Best Non-Partisan Blog and Best progressive Blog categories. Thank you for the nominations!

Unfortunately for the mods at the CBA’s they must sort between traditional blogs like mine and such feminist stalwarts as BBW. 😆

Good luck with that mods and good luck to everyone nominated. Especially the progressives 😉

December 6th Remembrance Site

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I have created a site in memory of the Ecole Polytechnique Massacre. If you have any links you feel should be included, or would like to send content, or know of any memorial observances happening in your area. Please send it in using the contact form on the site.

We Remember

Forced Pregnancy or Forced Abortion is There a Difference?

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Anti-choice groups are taking the recent story of officials trying to force a woman in China to have an abortion, to reiterate their hatred of UNFPA whom they claim is implicit in this action.
UNFPA’s mission statement reads;

UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, is an international development agency that promotes the right of every woman, man and child to enjoy a life of health and equal opportunity. UNFPA supports countries in using population data for policies and programmes to reduce poverty and to ensure that every pregnancy is wanted, every birth is safe, every young person is free of HIV/AIDS, and every girl and woman is treated with dignity and respect.

UNFPA because everyone counts.

It is hard to see how anyone could take issue with that, but then we know that choice of any kind is anathema to the forced pregnancy types. Because they are willing to force people to adhere to their rules and beliefs they cannot fathom that those of us who believe in choice believe in actual choice Meaning that we do not support forcing issue into or out of a woman’s womb. UNFPA in fact supports the choice to be mother through their campaign to make motherhood safer;

Every minute, a woman in the developing world dies from treatable complications of pregnancy or childbirth. Every minute, a family is devastated. The lives of surviving children are put at risk. Communities suffer. And for every woman who dies, as many as 20 others are seriously harmed by fistula or other injuries of childbearing.

UNFPA’s strategy for preventing maternal mortality includes:

* Family planning to reduce unintended pregnancies
* Skilled care at all births
* Timely emergency obstetric care for all women who develop complications.

UNFPA also advocates at many levels for the right of mothers to give birth safely. It spearheads the global Campaign to End Fistula, a collaborative initiative to prevent this devastating injury of childbirth and to restore the health and dignity of those who have been living with its consequences. And it is working to address the shortage of skilled midwives in much of the developing world.

However, based on the most recent statistics, maternal deaths are declining far too slowly to meet the MDG and ICPD target for a 75 per cent reduction by 2015.

UNFPA also helps in providing contraceptives and of course preventing pregnancy is the best way to prevent abortion.

Yet the shrieking continues unabated

LifeNews.com

Egged on by Planned Parenthood and NARAL, Obama has promised to restore funding to the UNFPA, the UN agency that has worked hand-in-hand with Chinese family planning officials.

Not only do Obama and his pro-abortion friends ignore the plight of women like Tursun, they’re willing to send our money to the UN group that gives the people who imprisoned her in a hospital for a forced-late term abortion a pat on the back.

“Obama to fund forced abortions” screams another.

Strangely we are to believe that their desire to force pregnancy is somehow less coercive or less a denial of human rights than forced abortion.

For a more realistic assessment we turn to RH Reality Check

UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, does not support coercion or abortion. It follows the mandate of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) which clearly states that reproductive health-care programmes should provide the widest range of services without any form of coercion. All couples and individuals have the basic right to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children and to have the information, education and means to do so. In addition, the global community has decides that abortion should never be promoted as a method of family planning.

[emphasis mine]

Congratulations to Arzigul Tursun on her continuing pregnancy. May all women around the world have the opportunity to control their reproductive choices.