Budget renews Liberal feud
TORONTO–Sheesh, thank God people don’t take the media and politicians seriously, otherwise, they would be highly confused, terribly scared and, most of time, upset with us. Take a look at the events of last week: on Monday, and for the last two to three years, the future of the country was at stake because of […]
Manley team to open up campaign offices
OTTAWA–Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister John Manley’s undeclared leadership campaign team is currently in the process of setting up offices in Ottawa, Toronto and Calgary, senior Manley sources told The Hill Times last week. Operating under the umbrella organization of “Friends of John Manley,” the Manley (Ottawa South, Ont.) team is currently setting up […]
Canada’s place in world has been devalued and diminished: Canada-U.S. relationship weakened by waffling
PARLIAMENT HILL–I am pleased to see that the list of terrorist groups has been expanded now to 19 under the Criminal Code and Canada’s Anti-Terrorism Act. [The newly-listed groups are: the Abu Nidal Organization, the Abu Sayyaf Group, and the Sendero Luminoso organization]. I am concerned, however, by the inefficiencies and the fact that many […]
Cruel and unusual punishment… [Smoking rooms]
Cruel and unusual punishment… It may not be politically correct to sympathize with smokers these days. But being locked up in a totally non-smoking building for five hours while under pressure to digest the biggest spending budget in close to 40 years and have stories ready to file the moment the embargo is lifted…well that […]
C-12 gets interesting
The fate of Bill C-12, junior sports minister Paul DeVillers’ fairly innocuous bill to promote physical activity and sport, will be interesting to follow in light of new measures promised in last week’s budget that would force arm’s-length foundations to table their annual reports in Parliament. Last December, the bill was amended in the Senate […]
Coast Guard is neither an enforcement nor security agency: Our role is one of support to the security community: Meisner
The following is an edited transcript of the testimony of Tim Meisner, director of policy and legislation, marine programs, at the Canadian Coast Guard, who appeared before the Senate National Security and Defence Committee on Monday, Feb. 17. Mr. Meisner was called before the committee which is looking into the need for a national security […]
Get rid of the GST
It’s no secret that Finance Minister John Manley may run for the Liberal leadership. It would be a feather in his cap to do something Paul Martin never dared to defy Jean Chretien by repealing the GST. The media spotlight would be his, the Canadian Alliance would be hard-pressed to complain, and what the heck, […]
It’s not only children who say the darndest things…
It’s not only children who say the darndest things… Perhaps there are parts of the budget speech that John Manley would like to do over again, but the statement he surely really wishes he never made was the one given to reporters the day before last Tuesday’s budget, when he visited the Greenboro Daycare Centre […]
Liberal says ‘Sopranos-style’ revenge going on
OTTAWA–A veteran Liberal Party strategist says despite the evidence, it’s not a foregone conclusion the federal Liberals will win a majority government in the next election. Hershell Ezrin, chairman and CEO of GPC International, the largest public affairs company in the world, told The Hill Times last week that the fight over the control of […]
Media and anti-Semitism
In his Feb. 17 column “Media hype anti-Semitism” (The Hill Times), Claire Hoy states that the vast majority of Canadians are as accepting of other cultures and religions as anybody in the world. I agree. However, what kind of standard is that when, for example, many Arab countries today advise their citizens regularly in the […]
