The Canadian Press has discovered that the Canadian International Development Agency advised the federal government that its maternal health initiative should include abortion (where legal). The Toronto Star thought this article so important, it splashed the wire story at the top of its paper today. No doubt that to a certain type of mind, this seems scandalous, but it really is not. Policy is [...]
Rebecca Walberg writes about the Harper government's maternal health initiative from a Jewish-notion-0f-charity perspective: The medieval philosopher Maimonides developed a ladder of tzedaka that tells us how best to give. The ideal is to give in a manner that is not begrudging, that is respectful of recipients, and that helps them to become self-sufficient... Providing abortions for women in developing countries does [...]
The National Post reported the Prime Minister will vote against Roxanne's Law when it comes before Parliament and will recommend the Conservative caucus do likewise although the vote will not be whipped. A spokesman for the Liberals said that they won't whip the vote either, although not many Liberals are expected to support the private member's bill to outlaw coercing a woman [...]
I don't think that the abortion debate ever went away. The social peace, as Jean Chretien called it, was a combination of media-imposed silence and politically inspired cowardice, but there are hundreds of thousands of Canadians who passionately oppose the status quo and polls show the public is deeply divided. In most years, there are more members of pro-life groups in Canada than there [...]
Norman Spector in a Globe and Mail blog post this morning notes: For that, Quebec MNAs — whose own days these days are filled with allegations of corruption and such — will be able to turn to La Presse.There, a “reliable source” (meaning Dimitri Soudas is my guess) tells reporter Joel-Denis Bellavance: “If a private members bill criminalizing abortion were tabled, it [...]
Norman Spector in the Globe and Mail this morning: Perusing my morning read, I read that Premier Jean Charest has told The Globe and Mail that “abortion is an inalienable right.” That would be the same Jean Charest, by the way, who as an MP voted in favour of the Mulroney government’s abortion law that would have restricted this supposedly inalienable right. [...]
Today Quebec's National Assembly unanimously passed a motion (109-0) that said: “That [Quebec’s] National Assembly reaffirms the right of women to free choice and to free and accessible abortion services, and asks the federal government and the Prime Minister of Canada to put an end to the current ambiguity on this issue, and that the National Assembly reaffirms that the fact of supporting [...]
Dunn Media & Entertainment has four very good videos of the National March for Life in Ottawa last week. We especially encourage educators to look at the fourth video, the one on the youth conference. See also the Campaign Life Coalition video with the reaction from its national president Jim Hughes following the March.
The Globe and Mail reports that Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff continues to follow Frank Graves' culture war advice, telling $500-a-plate Liberal supporters in Toronto: "But let’s be clear: we didn’t end the 25-year consensus on a woman’s right to choose. They did." Except that isn't true. It was Ignatieff that brought up abortion in the context of maternal health. The Harper proposal to combat maternal [...]
Suzanne T. Poppema, chairwoman of Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health, writes in a letter to the editor of the New York Times: "As a physician, I firmly believe that women need access to birth control, education and abortion in order for them and their families to flourish ... It’s clear to me that a 'blue state' model — including abortion — is [...]
A month ago, Harris Decima found that Canadians were evenly split on whether abortion should be part of the government's maternal health initiative (48% opposed to including abortion, 46% in favour) but now 58% say abortion should be included while just 30% think it should not. The Canadian Press report on the Harris Decima poll: A new poll suggests that a majority of Canadians opposes [...]
From Thomas Sowell: Make no mistake about it, letting old people die is a lot cheaper than spending the kind of money required to keep them alive and well. If a government-run medical system is going to save any serious amount of money, it is almost certain to do so by sacrificing the elderly. Real compassion, as Sowell makes abundantly clear in [...]
For years, professional journalists have touted their superiority by noting that they have fact-checkers and editors (which is barely true in many publications today, but that's another issue). This correction in the Toronto Star yesterday, however, shows that even publications that have editors and fact-checkers maybe aren't worth the paper they produce each day: News corrections for May 11 An excerpt from veteran [...]
The National Post has an excellent editorial on the feds nixing funding for the Gay Pride Parade in Toronto. People have asked me why is LifeSiteNews "obsessed" with the possibility of the Toronto Star buying the Post and I only have to point to editorials like this one that provides a rare dissent from the politically correct orthodoxy that finds funding special [...]
Catholic Insight has issued a statement strongly opposing a proposal in Toronto city council to allow stores to open on Christmas and Easter. Bottom line: "The greedy, the godless, and the childless want to steal the last few holidays from the working and middle classes." The course of action suggested by CI: Please lobby your councillor to vote No to holiday store [...]