A memorial for New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton continues to get bigger as he lies in state on Parliament Hill in Ottawa August 25, 2011.
506 tweeted photographs … one portrait of Jack Layton
Reasoned, incisive, confident yet not brash, totally conversant on issues, in charge of the room, on the verge of a historic breakthrough in Quebec. Most of the faces in that room, seasoned journalists all, had interviewed, seen or watched him many times before. But for the very first time, the words “prime ministerial” emerged.
Ultimately, Jack would garner that endorsement and go on to make history by becoming the first NDP leader of the official Opposition.
The man who never stopped growing. The man who a country came to know as simply Jack.
Quite an extraordinary story, indeed.
Yes indeed. Jack made every New Democrat feel so proud & honoured to be on the journey with you -- "we won't stop until the job is done"
"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world."
Mayor Ford’s first story has stuttered to a stop, and his new Toronto story is still missing something: the moment of collective revelation, when we learn something new and wonderful about what it means to live here at the crossroads of the world. His current tale about dismantling what isn’t “nailed down” is hardly a story at all, for all we’re waiting to hear about is what we’re going to lose next, and where’s the suspense in that?
It looks like sovereigntist strategists can count on outside help to achieve their purpose.
Alone of all members of Parliament, Quebec’s New Democrats are being asked to account for their past political leanings.
Some self-appointed high priests of federalism have gone as far as suggesting that a public recanting of anything that smacks of a sovereigntist belief is also in order.
Presumably, they rather than the voters who elected those MPs to the House of Commons would be the judges of what amounts to a high enough level of federalist rectitude.
The exercise suggests that the action of offering one’s candidacy for a federalist party — a bid that bucked every pre-campaign polling trend in Quebec last winter — does not speak louder than words.
Many of the Quebecers who supported the Bloc until last May did so out of a sense of rejection of their collective difference that stemmed from the 1990 demise of the Meech Lake Accord.
Now, as then, a Quebec oui to Canada is getting lost in translation.
If they don't fess up perhaps you could water board them because Human Rights Expert Ignatieff - the last failed Liberal Leader - didn't think that was torture. But poor joke aside, for real political context, the Star should send its same McCarthistic questionnaire to the Quebec Liberal and Conservative MPs too (and their failed Quebec candidates)!They were also asked if they had ever held a membership in another political party at the provincial or federal level, how they voted in the Quebec referendums, whether they ever cast a ballot for the Bloc Québécois and whether they considered themselves federalists, sovereigntists or believed another term would best describe their beliefs.
The Star asked them to explain their choices and noted the goal of the questionnaire was to learn more about their perspectives in the hope of sparking a greater discussion on these issues outside Quebec.
One week later, not a single NDP MP from Quebec had agreed to participate.
Robert Asselin, assistant director of the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa, said the silence of individual MPs could hurt their case.
The reaction of the Conservative government, particularly Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, is still reverberating.
Instead of condemning the leak, vowing to probe its origin, or referring the matter to the RCMP, Kenney adroitly kept the suspicions about the two men very much alive, while stressing he could not comment on intelligence information.
A government that hides behind the skirts of “privacy” whenever it suits its purpose was only too content to let this document have its day and help it along with a little oxygen.
Supporters of both men are suggesting the leak was political and, to be sure, a government proud of its “no leaks” discipline has no qualms about leaking when it suits its needs.
To end:
Both have battled Ottawa and essentially won.
Charkaoui is a Montreal school teacher.
Abdelrazik is also living in Montreal, raising his children and apparently unnerved by the reader comments on newspaper websites, which Champ says include threats.
Charkaoui has been the victim of earlier selective leaks — and there is nothing new in this tactic.
More recently and infamously, there were security intelligence leaks meant to smear Maher Arar, the Ottawa man who was suspected of terror links and was ultimately compensated by his own government for his ordeal.
To say that Charkaoui and Abdelrazik have the right to know whether their government is leaking damaging information about them does not make them folk heroes.
But they shouldn’t have to fight shadows.
Absolutely this Conservative Government is disgusting as they represent on behave of Canadians. After what the Liberals did to Arar, one would think that Cons would have learned some lessons in DEMOCRACY & CIVIL RIGHTS.
So Kenney needs to take full responsibility here and do his time in jail - right?
BULL CRAPBut Ms. Turmel was still under fire by the end of last week also for the way in which she and party brass, including Mr. Layton, only reluctantly and after disclosure elsewhere, revealed her full involvement with sovereigntist supporters, the Bloc Québécois and the fringe provincial separatist association.
"Her dishonesty around the disclosure made it all the worse because it cast further aspersions on it," said Mr. Powers. "She was either blindly naive or deliberately dishonest, and I think that's hurt them also, because the other branding thing the NDP have tried to bring forward is that they're more honest and straightforward than other political parties, and that didn't help them here, the way she's managed all of that."
This Australian national pension fund system is largely led by “industry funds,” industry-specific funds originally set up by the union movement and whose trustees consist of 50 per cent union-nominated and 50 per cent employer-nominated members.
These not-for-profit low-fee “industry funds,” responsible only to their members, manage the pension funds of almost half of Australian workers. In 2010 these union-originated industry funds included nine out of the 10 best-performing funds. All pension funds, whether industry funds or retail funds, are intensely regulated.
This system has now been in place for more than 20 years, under governments of both main parties. It is now part of the social and political landscape in Australia and is unchallenged. The only argument is over whether the percentage contributed by employers should be increased.
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