05.19.2010 04:27 PM

109-0: your move, Steve-O

Let’s now see you tell the entire Province of Quebec to “shut the fuck up,” Mr. Tough Guy:

Quebec to Harper: enough with the ambiguity over abortion (Abortion-Flap-Quebec)
Source:
The Canadian Press
May 19, 2010 17:13

MONTREAL –  The Quebec legislature has taken aim at the Harper government over abortion and demanded a clear expression of support for a woman’s right to choose.

With that, a debate that remained largely dormant in national politics for over two decades suddenly threatens to become a federal-provincial issue.

Politicians on both sides of the legislature unanimously adopted, by a margin of 109-0, a pro-choice motion Wednesday.

The motion demands that the federal government continue to respect free access to abortion, end its “ambiguity” on the issue, and stop cutting funding to women’s groups that favour abortion.

But a spokesman for Prime Minister Stephen Harper insisted the government would not be drawn into a debate over abortion.

“The prime minister has consistently said throughout his political career, before we formed the government and even after, that our government will not initiate or support legislation that reopens the debate on abortion,” said Dimitri Soudas.

While the Harper government has repeatedly promised not to introduce abortion legislation, its refusal to fund abortions as part of a G8 maternal-health initiative is among several recent events that reopened a debate that had been largely absent from federal politics since the late 1980s.

Opponents say they fear a repeat of the strategy being used to kill the gun registry, where a backbench MP introduces a bill with widespread support from the government.

20 Comments

  1. billg says:

    I have no idea why Harper is doing what he’s doing, but, he’s about 80 and 3 right now so I’m hoping there’s more then just pandering here. And on another note….hey Quebec…you take 8 billion a year from BC, Alberta and Saskatchewan just to stay afloat….without Canada you’d have been bankrupt 10 years ago…your opinion is starting to matter less and less…maybe a little less fake outrage and a real attempt to get your province out of Greece and Spain style lunacy.

    • allegra fortissima says:

      Greece’s debt: over 300 billion Euro! The country is not only bankrupt, but also corrupt to an extent that Canadians can’t even imagine! Some sort of “banana republic” on the outskirts of Europe, with basically nothing more than a tourism sector and agriculture!

      And you have the nerve to compare Quebec with Greece? Give me a break!

    • Michael Watkins says:

      Looking at Canada as a bunch of localized fiefdoms is not what our greatest leaders have done, instead they’ve chosen to look at the whole and how the whole can prosper. We can all be very grateful for that foresight.

      I’ll have to make an assumption and presume billg is either from the west or just likes parroting old Reeeform ideas spoken and unspoken about the West Wanting In (and Wanting Quebec Out).

      That’s typical Firewall Harper talk and only goes to show why he’s thankfully never going to earn a majority

      I’m a westerner. I’ve never felt more “out” of Canada than I have over the past decade and that has more to do with what “western” political forces (Reeform / Canadian Alliance / and the unholy CA-PCPC merger) have done, both in and out of power.

      PS: Since you’ve raised the spectre of debt, whose the worst debt champion of them all? Why none other than the Harper government, current record holders by any measure.

      Stephen Harper added billions to Canada’s national debt before the 2008 election even as he said “no deficit spending”, “we won’t add to our debt”, and “no recession” during the election. A couple weeks later, without even an apology for misleading Canadians what should be seen as the biggest fraud ever perpetrated, Harper says “we have no choice”.

      Well sir, he did have a choice. He could have been up front with Canadians before and during the election, the election he called which in doing so broke his own promise and law.

      You can thank Harper and little Jimmy Flaherty for socking it to future Canadian taxpayers as they spent us deeper into debt, and lied about it for months, piling on debt at astounding rates, far faster and deeper by all measures than any government had done in the prior decade, even after 9/11. The Harper government now holds the modern day record for fiscal mismanagement. Harper on debt: higher, faster, more painful to fix.

      By a country mile.

  2. allegra fortissima says:

    Vive la province du Quebec!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSiX91zk61g

  3. Rotterdam says:

    Liberal MP’s Paul Szabo, John McKay and Dan McTeague.

    Defenders of human life, people of conscience, ostracized by their own party.

    • Reality.Bites says:

      If only they WERE ostracized. Those three have been spreading their anti-woman and anti-gay hate for far too long. They have no place with decent people.

  4. wilson says:

    A majority in Parliament voted to not include funding abortions in 3rd world countries. The LPC took it to the peoples representatives, and they voted ‘no’.

    Is Quebec pushing for a vote in Parliament to ‘end its ?ambiguity? on the issue’?
    Their motion was very ambiguous about ending the ambiguity.

  5. Alex K. says:

    The McGuinty Liberals MUST introduce a similar motion in the Ontario legislature! Put Harper and Hudak on the spot.

  6. Raymond says:

    When did Harper tell anyone to STFU?

    Does Iggy drink & drive because one of his MP’s does?

  7. Sandra says:

    You have a right to confidentiality from your lawyer, clergy and “doctor”. No one has a right to interfere with a woman’s decision and what transpires between her and her doctor.

    I can’t understand anyone judging when there are such cruelties going on in places like Africa against women.

    Shallow and narrow minded and cold.

    • Troy says:

      Would you argue that the right to confidentiality is meant to protect someone who arbitrarily
      chooses to end the life of an innocent human being? Does no one have the right to interfere
      with a woman’s decision to kill her 6 month old child simply because of a right to confidentiality?
      How very shallow, narrow minded and cold.

  8. Elizabeth says:

    Thank God for Quebec. First of all, there wouldn’t be a Canada without them- we’d be Americans. And they usually know what’s going on in Ottawa before the rest of us do, and they trust them less then we do.

    Quebec is Canada’s ‘canary in the coal mine’.

    I’m glad Harper is being forced out of cover on this. Of course he’s anti-abortion. Of course he doesn’t want to ‘open the debate’. Instead of opening the debate, which he’s going to lose, he is going to sneak in destructive changes through the back door – destructive to women’s rights.

    I see there’s a very quiet article in the G&M on a Budget Bill – which critics say could take power away from Parliament. Harper is always furtive if he knows he won’t get his own way — does things like a sneak and a liar – he’s never up front and open about anything.

  9. Steve T says:

    And yet from an EKOS poll this morning, the Tories have nearly a 10-point lead over the Liberals. Furthermore, the poll notes that the widening of the Tory lead is due almost entirely to a drop in Liberal support.

    Clearly, the abortion issue has no traction with Canadian voters, and/or Canadians aren’t particularly worried about the foreign aid decision. They are smart enough to differentiate between Canada’s choices on foreign policy, and matters of domestic policy.

  10. JH says:

    Again Warren I expected better. You know it wasn’t the prime minister who told anybody to shut the F–k up, it was a lady senator and the opposition latched onto an unfortunate comment – took it out of context for their own ends. Today’s poll shows the Cons up by 10 polls. As someone who has voted by times for various political parties I wonder do you as a Liberal adviser think things like your topic title above and your party’s actions in this regard and similar scandals, are going to win over independant or undecided voters? I realize I probably won’t get an anwer but feel it is a legitimate question to ask of you and your party at this time

  11. JH says:

    meant up by 10 points

  12. Paul R. Martin says:

    Sorry Warren, but you Liberals are the only Party talking about abortion. Jaffer and the Detainees did not work either. The non partisan “Ekos Poll” has the Conservatives leadin the Liberals in both Ontario and the Atlantic Provinces.

    Aslong as they stay negative, the Liberals will not gain any traction in the polls.

  13. Philippe says:

    I want an election over this. In fact, I just want an election- I’m sick and tired of these dinosaurs running our country. Closet Republican Harper is going to find out that this isn’t the US- the hard way.

    I’m also relieved to see the Libs reconsidering their support the DUMB, poorly thought out & massively expensive (fiscal conservatives you say?) anti-crime legislation being put forth by the Neo-Cons. As a wise man down south recently stated in regards to the Health Care debate, “good policy is good politics”.

    While I’m getting things off my chest, if I another 1-page self promotional flyer (with a total of about 10 words) promoting this government’s “accomplishments”, I’m going to organise a public flyer-burnin bonfire tea-party style. Assez c’est assez.

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