Canadian Political Parties (We need your help!)

[Lotuslander]

Ubergod wrote:

Pierre Trudeau enhanced the practice of ruling by Order-in-Council(intended for emergencies only), thus began the government practise of bypassing Parliament.

This is simply not true. Orders-In-Councils are not and never have been intended for emergencies only. Supreme Court Judges are appointed by OICs and we've had a Supremem Court since 1873. OICs are intended for daily government business on matters too small or unimportant to bother Parliament with, everything from appointments to procurements of pencils to regulations to pardons. Infact about the only time OICs are used for emergencies is when a Government has to ask a vice-reagl to allow the Government to run on special warrents, usually for supply purposes.

Whether Trudeau abused this practiced and created an Imperial Premiership is another question. I personally agreee that Trudeau for all the Hoopla is somewhat overrated. Did he by-pass Parliament too frequently and help concentrate Power in the PMO? Most likely yes. Did he over step the law and disregard Canadian constitutional conventions by using OICs? No he was in his authority, what he did whether I or anyone else likes it or not was constitutional.

 

[FiveParadox]

Orders-in-Council

Agreed; Orders-in-Council are a fact of life on Parliament Hill. To bog down the House of Commons with each and every appointment, and each and every matter of Government Business, would only serve to grind the business of the House to a halt.

While I would not argue that the former Prime Minister of Canada, the Right Honourable Pierre Trudeau, did not perhaps make use of this convention more than most other Prime Ministers in modern history, he was within his constitutional bounds in doing so.

 

[McDonald]

Re: RE: Canadian Political Parties (We need your help!)

Actually the onus isn't on us to provide you with why it is cultural suicide...it is on you to explain why it isn't.

What a cop-out!

Notwithstanding the fact that we have yet to establish a definition for "cultural suicide," why should the onus be on me? If someone on this board wants to pretend that it is an undistputable, conclusive fact that multiculturalism is "of course" cultural suicide, and I want to to know why that is, then the person who made the statement has the choice of whether or not he wants to answer me. There is no ettiquette which dictates that I should have to answer my own question. That would ("of course") be asinine.

I said that I would love for someone to explain to me just how multiculturalism is "cultural suicide" and to first explain what "cultural suicide" actually denotes. Now, someone can either answer the question or not answer it... but don't give me a cop-out, for that will only convince me that you cannot explain this beliefs (and that's what it is... belief, not fact) logically.


Now, let me address the "melting pot" theory.

The theory is that people from all over the world come to a country, and meld into the single uberkultur, each adding its own distinct flavour. This is supposedly what we here in the US have, culturally speaking. Most Americans believe this, but it's not like it's undebatable. Even though people tend to come here and assimilate, cultural communities remain. For example: the Irish-American community has been the IRA's "cash-cow" for decades. The majority of the funding for the IRA and its political affiliate Sinn Féin come from an American-based "charity" called NORAID (the Irish Northern Aid Committee) which claims to be a charity for the displaced families of political prisoners and victims in Northern Ireland. What it is, is a wind-tunnel for IRA/Sinn Féin funding. So, a lot of good this "melting pot" did here to combat the sort of thing you're talking about with the Tamils.

The Tamil Tigers would be raising money from sympathetic Tamil-Canadians whether Canada had been a melting pot or not. The children and grandchildren of today's Tamil immigrants will be just as Canadian as Susie MacDougal or Jean-François LaPorte (made-up names). They will speak in perfect English or French (or both), with standard Canadian accents. They will go to Canadian universities and get jobs in the urban centres just like everyone else. There will be a few bad eggs from every cultural background... you make it seem like white Anglo kids never get into gangs, or like the Hell's Angels aren't predominately white.