Salty social conservatives are galvanising in Ontario
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You can have them all together, but the generally accepted conceptual framework is to separate the two (fiscal and social) and that is the context of the thread.
That is because social is often so impractical that fiscal becomes an after thought embarrassment to them.
Absolutely false in Ontario unless things have changed.
At one of the business' I started many years ago these 2 guys showed up and tried to get me to sign to have my taxes directed to the Catholic board..........
The Ontario PC party rejected a candidate for the Progressive Conservative nomination in the riding of Carleton Friday, after he referred to his rival for the nomination as “Muslim trash.”
The party doesn’t disclose the reasons for disqualifying candidates for privacy reasons, said Nick Bergamini, a spokesperson for the PCs. But he confirmed the party did know about the comments.
“The Ontario PC Party is committed to the principles of inclusiveness and tolerance,” he said.
In September, farmer and mechanical engineer Michael Nowak sent a Facebook message to fellow nomination candidate Brandon Purcell, saying he might withdraw from the race so that Purcell could “throw that Muslim trash to the curbside” – a comment that referred to fellow candidate and lawyer Goldie Ghamari.
Party officials received a screen-capture image of Nowak’s comment. On a conference call Thursday, one of Brown’s campaign chairs, Walied Soliman — who is Muslim — asked Nowak about the text. On Friday morning Nowak received an email from Bob Stanley, the party’s executive director, telling him the party had rejected his application.
“Dirty politics,” Nowak said in an interview with iPolitics. “I love it.”
Nowak said he is disappointed because he believes he was going to win the nomination.
“Patrick Brown and his cronies want to keep her around and they’ll go to any lengths to keep her,” he said in a telephone interview on Friday. “I had a special interest group backing me, and they were going to ensure they had their membership show up to ensure that I won the nomination, but it all fell apart this morning.”
Nowak said he is not racist but was upset with Ghamari because she asked him to withdraw and support her.
“And you know what, I said? ‘If I had a mallet I’d thump you on the head right now.’ I said, ‘I’m staying in the race.’ So I think I have a right to say any derogatory comments I want.”
oh yes there's more...
Ontario PCs dump nomination candidate over ‘Muslim trash’ comment
Yet you can't separate the two. As an example, how do you bring costs down if you legalize heroin given all the problems that go with it? Okay, it's an extreme example, but it illustrates the point. If you want to be fiscally conservative, you do need to better regulate harmful behaviour. For example, cigarettes in grocery stores must be hidden, whether behind a drape, a cupboard door, etc. Why is that? Because seeing it could trigger a recovering smoker who's trying to quit. So, you want to bring health care costs down, some degree of social conservatism can do that.
And to me, social conservatism goes well beyond sex policy and includes drug policy too.
Likewise, you can't have no pollution policy and expect to control asthma. Again, you want to keep health care costs down, you might want a carbon tax to encourage people to take responsibility. Some people might call it the nanny state, but the whole point of it is to protect the least advantaged members of society.
Is Greece your model?
Do we even agree on what fiscal conservatism is? To me, a true fiscal conservative does not encourage tax reductions in the face of mounting government debt. He'll propose savings through efficiencies, streamlining, cutting ballast, etc. But not cut taxes until the debt is brought under control. Most conservatives in Canada are far from being fisal conservatives.
Those that love a debt based economy are not capable of appreciating the merrits of fiscal conservatism. Mf, I suggest that you do not spend another minute thinking about it.
Fiscal conservatives care about people. That's why I volunteer alot and donate to charities while somebody like MF (who hates fiscal conservatives) can't be bothered to take five minutes to write a letter to the Alberta government to help save untold lives. People that aren't fiscal conservatives only care about themselves
Fiscal conservatism is just looking at a balance sheet and cutting costs to get votes.
It has been proven to be harmful to society.
It has been proven to be harmful to society.
Nope. It's about caring for people. I care about people. You don't. I'm a fiscal conservative and you hate fiscal conservatives. The evidence is clear.
You've proven already that you don't care about others by the way you conduct yourself on this forum.
Stop being so silly. Is your letter finished yet? The HALO fundraiser is Friday
I'd be interested in seeing the suggestions you gave Notley if you'd be so kind as to post that letter.....
Who, exactly, is Sam Oosterhoff?
Well, outside of his immediate family, friends, church and political supporters, no one can be sure because Oosterhoff — the teenager who has stunned the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario by becoming the nominee for the Niagara West-Glanbrook riding — isn’t talking.
He’s given no interviews to reporters since defeating former St. Catharines MP and current PC party president Rick Dykstra on Saturday night to win the right to represent the party in the Nov. 17 by-election in the riding.
He’s declined to speak to several news outlets, including the Standard. When I reached out to talk him Sunday after his victory I was rebuffed by someone on the phone who said Oosterhoff would not work on Sunday because he believes that is his “day of rest,” — a reference to a belief held by some Christians that Sunday is a holy day during which no work can be done.
A pity the public’s business never rests, something any would-be political should know.
Multiple interview requests from the Standard have been rejected this week, including an interview request placed Thursday afternoon.
Interest in Oosterhoff from reporters across the province is understandable given the stakes of the Nov. 17 by-election to fill the seat left vacant by longtime MPP and former PC leader Tim Hudak.
For the Liberals, represented by Vicky Ringuette in the by-election, winning would give an unpopular party a needed boost. Premier Kathleen Wynne’s approval rating sits at a lowly 14 per cent, driven by discontent over hydro rates. If the Liberals can win a riding that has long flown a blue flag, it would help stem their political bleeding.
Yet the Tories need to hold the riding as urgently as the Liberals need to win it. PC leader Patrick Brown has to show he is not a Tim Hudak or a John Tory and prove he is a leader who can run a credible provincial campaign.
At the tender age of 19, Oosterhoff has no significant job, political or life experience. All things being equal, his candidacy would not be taken seriously. Yet his victory may significantly shift the Liberals chances of winning a Tory stronghold, internal PC politics and perhaps, if the next election is a close one, decide who governs in Queen’s Park.
His nomination has also potentially wedged him into a political corner from which he cannot escape.
Oosterhoff won his party’s nomination in large measure because he mobilized the support of his church community. Party nomination votes can rest a mere few hundred ballots, so having a motivated church community behind him was a significant factor.
But that begs many questions.
Oosterhoff is described as a social conservative, and certainly he uses some of the right buzz words to suit the label, including the claim that he would be “a voice for common-sense, pro-family policies.”
That is a pretty banal political statement in most contexts. Among social conservatives, particularly religious social conservatives, “pro-family policies” doesn’t usually mean baby bonuses or tax breaks. Historically, it’s code for anti-choice, anti-sex education, anti-marriage equality politics.
Of course, I don’t know where Oosterhoff stands on any of these issues, let alone hydro rates, taxes, climate change and other issues that don’t fall under the category of “family values,” because he isn’t talking.
And that’s the problem.
Take the sex-ed issue, by way of a for instance. It became a bit of a storm during the recent Scarborough-Rouge by-election. A letter from Brown circulated saying he would repeal the curriculum. Brown, who marched in the Toronto Pride parade the year, then backed away from that, saying the letter did not reflect his views on sex ed. The entire affair irritated Ontario social conservatives.
Brown says that Oosterhoff is behind the party’s support of sex-ed. But we’ve not actually heard that from Oosterhoff himself. The only statement we have comes from his riding campaign Facebook page, where Oosterhoff wrote that he will “never waver in my support of parents as primary educators, and I will strive to ensure that parental rights are respected in education.”
That is vague enough to avoid being pinned down on the issue, but perhaps just specific enough to play to a socially conservative audience. But we don’t know for sure because, again, Oosterhoff isn’t talking.
Brown is undoubtedly trying to avoid a religious war in Niagara West-Glanbrook, and probably cannot afford to have a candidate attacking the sex-ed curriculum. That would motivate local Liberals and annoy many Tories who will either vote red or not vote at all.
Mind you, a direct statement of support for the curriculum by Oosterhoff could cost him the support that allowed him to win the nomination of his party. If Ringuette is clever at all, she will attack Oosterhoff on this score and force him to state his stance clearly and publicly.
Oosterhoff’s press allergy is odd. Typically, a candidate will happily take questions, repeating party platform ideas and how they apply locally. In my experience a candidate has never avoided the press entirely, particularly not with an important by-election a few weeks away.
Mr. Oosterhoff, my phone line is open.
http://www.stcatharinesstandard.ca/2016/10/28/lafleche-the-oosterhoff-conundrum
I've wrote numerous letters to Notley and to previous premiers and cabinet ministers. Aside from funding HALO, I have requested funding for fire departments to implement Alberta Health Service's medical co-response program. Fire fighting is a municipal responsibility while health is a provincial one. The program is an attempt to download without stepping up with funds. I've asked Alberta Liquor and Gaming to expand their CIP grant program to include emergency funds. Currently an organization can't recoup funds spent on emergency repairs. For example, the golf course can apply for funding to remove trees or the arena board can apply for funding for a new Zamboni however, if a storm hits the golf course or the Zamboni motor blows up, we can't fix it and retroactively use grant money. These are just a few of the issues I've promoted
Flossy wants the government to do everything but is too lazy to spend 5 minutes writing a letter to ask that they provide life saving funds. Then pretends he's more humanitarian because he's progressive.
You presume that a fiscal conservative opposes tax increases if necessary. I'll agree that manyof Canada's so-called 'fiscal conservatives' support cutting taxes at all costs. To me, that's not fiscal conservatism.
That said, we also recognize that the government needs to learn to distinguish between beneficial and harmful spending. We can't deny that much government spending goes to absolute waste.