Young Liberals take strong stand against Mulcair's pro-Harper, pro-prohibition stance on marijuana

Today Young Liberals across the country are taking part in a campaign taking on NDP leader Tom Mulcair for his pro-Harper position on marijuana prohibition. I'm proud to count myself as part of the Ottawa team, putting up posters, handing out information and buttons, and reaching out to the majority of Canadians who believe that continuing the war on marijuana would be a mistake.

The current state of marijuana laws in Canada are hitting taxpayers hard, and Stephen Harper's tough on wallets crime schemes will only make the situation worse. Hardworking Canadian policemen and policewomen should be working on stopping serious crimes, not be forced to arrest Canadians for possession of small amounts of marijuana for personal use. It is particularly disappointing to see the NDP and Tom Mulcair stand with Stephen Harper on the issue of marijuana, as those punished under the current laws are disproportionately youth, members of racialized communities,and those with limited income.

Liberals are taking a strong stand for common-sense drug crime policies, as legalization will hurt violent gangs by depriving them a significant source of income, and help policemen and policewomen keep more dangerous drugs off the street. I am happy to see the Young Liberals take the lead on this issue and push the senior party in the right direction, making clear, strong arguments for evidence-based policies.

Liberals want to treat Canadians like adults and take on Harper on his costly and ineffective prohibitionist policies. The NDP and Tom Mulcair want to capitulate and let Harper set the terms of discussion on drug laws and crime. A big part of rebuilding the Liberal Party is staking out bold new policies and advancing them to Canadians, and I'm glad I can play a part in that process today.

"The tyrannical instinct to censor"...is fine when Tories do it

Senator Doug Finley (formerly Tory war room chief) delivered a speech in the Senate on Tuesday attacking the Human Rights Act, and said of it that "The tyrannical instinct to censor still exists." Apparently Finley didn't get the memo, the Conservatives are fine with censorship, as long as it suits the political ends.

After all, they have shut up climate change scientists:
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/editorial/story.html?id=d489ec1a-36d4-41fb-b692-6c90faa0dcaa

And now they've gutted vital environmental oversights:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/tories-curtail-key-environment-provisions/article1518844/

Released thousands of censored documents on the Detainee Issue:
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/afghanmission/article/785188--tories-table-thousands-of-documents-on-afghanistan-mission

The Senator also quotes George Orwell, saying that "Freedom is the right to tell people what they do not want to hear", which given Conservative actions, is also ironic.

One only has to look at the treatment the Tories have given to whistle blower Richard Colvin, or former CNSC head Linda Keen to see what this government thinks of those who speak truth to power.

Heck, the Tories will even ignore those who tell them what they don't want to hear when it is your tax dollars paying for it, such as how they have ignored the taxpayer funded crime research.
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Politics/2010/03/14/13226061-cp.html

It's a little rich for the Senator to talk about telling people what they don't want to hear when:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has explicitly and publicly stated that his government does not accept peer-reviewed research on criminal matters.

In a 2008 speech, Harper flatly denounced research-based justice policies, accusing the pedlars of such policies of trying to “pacify Canadians with statistics.”


Yes, how dare such things as "evidence" and "facts" play a role when forming public policy on climate change and the environment. Despite Senator Finley's pleas, his government is doing a fine job of censorship.

National Post calls for the legalization of sex work

http://www.nationalpost.com/opinion/story.html?id=2073540

Many bloggers have written about the need for the Liberals to "get smart" on crime as opposed to the Tories populist but tax dollar wasting and ineffective polices on crime. The decriminalization of sex work (as opposed to legalization, which would treat sex work as a vice to be regulated, and not simply work) would be a good start. As others have said, simply parroting the Tories on crime does no benefit to the Liberals, both practically and politically, as all it results in is bad policies becoming law, and it doesn't help us politically, as the Tories will still drone on on how the Liberals are soft on crime, and voters won't support the Liberals over the Tories for supporting Tory policies.

The Liberals need to develop some policy backbone on social issues, and not be afraid to fight to Tories on the crime issue. The greatest advantage of having Ignatieff as leader is that we have a leader who has a grasp of complex issues, and has an international perspective. The decriminalization of sex work is a policy that would play to these needs and advantages. Ignatieff can rightly say that countries which have decriminalized sex work have seen a drop in violence and crime against sex workers, and by freeing up our hardworking law enforcement officials from simply being a morality squad, they can focus on real crimes and real criminals, similarly to arguments in favour of the decriminalization of marijuana (which is another issue the Liberals need to be more vocal on). Canadians will always associate the Conservatives with being "tough on crime", so we need to sell something different from the Conservatives, get some clear blue water between us on the Conservatives on social policy issues. Calling for the decriminalization of sex work, marijuana, and voting against the proposed random DUI tests would be a good start.

Tories show true colours on Youth

Check out my entry into the YLC positive politics contest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MevlKbbGzdM
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With the NS Tories running third, I can understand why Conservative Premier Rodney MacDonald would want to try and rally the base, but this move reeks of being an electoral "Hail Mary". For the Tories, however, this bound to be intercepted pass shows true Conservative colours on youth: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nsvotes2009/story/2009/05/21/novascotiavotes-curfew-tories.html

PC leader Rodney MacDonald said he can't think of any reason why a child would be out on the street at 1 a.m.

Oh, I don't know, how about, not committing crimes? The fact that similar curfews have been struck down across the country doesn't seem to matter, as this is just another example of when it comes to crime/justice issues, the Tories will always put effectiveness and legality behind raw partisan appeal.

Crime, and Visions for Canada

http://www.thestar.com/SpecialSections/Crime/article/460704

The country's annual bill for policing, courts and incarceration – an estimated $13 billion excluding provincial costs – is about to jump. And rather than make neighbourhoods safer, the opposite is likely: troubled communities figure to get worse.
Propelling Canadians down this road – one proven to be monstrously expensive and inept at reducing crime in the United States – are seriously flawed perceptions of crime and punishment.

That about sums it up. The Tory vision of Canada: A government which won't lift a finger to tackle the environment or poverty, but will gleefully slash billions from the federal coffers, and burn cash to prove a point to its socially conservative base by importing failed policies. In Harper's Canada, throwing people in jail for a single marijuana plant is a more important priority then moving Canada's economy into the 21st century. In Harper's Canada, government is reduced to a tax collector, rather then the force for social good limited government intervention can be. In Harper's Canada, law and order is reduced to a brute fist, rather then a protector of about common society and individual rights.

When an election comes (likely this fall) Canadians will be presented with a choice, between two Canada's. One Canada is a regressive, deficit ridden, determinedly backwards looking land, while One Canada is a richer, greener, fairer Canada, one of open minds, open hearts, and proudly standing together towards oncoming history, ensuring a future for people and communities across this great country. The people of Mississauga, and of all of Canada, cannot afford to fall behind.

The Tory Mental Crime Wave

I was reading this article: http://www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/462063 about how new crime stats could damage Tory attempts to play the "tough on crime" card. While crime rates are in fact lower across the board, the Conservatives seem to be sticking to their messaging that an obviously shrinking problem is more of an issue then the environment, a slowing economy, or Canada's place in the world. A couple of quotes from the article are particularly worrying:

“(They) try to pacify Canadians with statistics,” he told party supporters in January.
“Your personal experiences and impressions are wrong, they say; crime is really not a problem. These apologists remind me of the scene from the Wizard of Oz when the wizard says, ’Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.”’
That assertion was echoed today by Justice Minister Rob Nicholson.
“We are not governing by statistics. We are governing by what we promised Canadians in the last election and what Canadians have told us,” he said in an interview.

Pacify with statistics? Not governing by statistics?

Good to know that the Canada's government is not bound by inconvenient things like, you know, the truth, in favour of placating the socially conservative "lock em up and throw away the key" base of the party. I'm waiting for the Elections Canada style accusations thats that Stats Can is full of Liberal hacks trying to cook up conspiracies against the government. Furthermore, given the inaction of the Conservatives on the economy, I wonder how far an ignorance of statistical truths and reality based evidence extends in the party. The article also talks about how media and popular public perspection of crime can be far off the mark in terms of actual crime rates and the like, which brings to mind the comments of former Republican Senator and John McCain economic advisor Phil Gramm, on how America is statistically not in a recession, but the public perception is overwhelmingly that they are in one, a situation Gramm called a "mental recession." Some of Gramm's remarks can be seen in this article: http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/jul/09/mccain-adviser-addresses-mental-recession/, and some of them can be very easily applied to the crime situation in Canada.

Mr. Gramm said the constant drubbing of the media on the economy's problems is one reason people have lost confidence. Various surveys show that consumer confidence has fallen precipitously this year to the lowest levels in two to three decades, with most analysts attributing that to record high gasoline prices over $4 a gallon and big drops in the value of homes, which are consumers' biggest assets.
"Misery sells newspapers," Mr. Gramm said. "Thank God the economy is not as bad as you read in the newspaper every day."

Compare that to the Toronto Star article:
The numbers fly in the face of popular media and political messaging, which portrays crime across Canada as rising in both volume and ferocity.

Anyway, from a political perspective, tough on crime messages, particularly when deployed by Conservative parties, tend to be attempt to win/hold on to suburban voters worried about bad things happening in nice little bedroom communities, like say, Mississauga. Really, that is the only region where tough on crime messaging would be effective from a Conservative perspective, rural areas which might favour tougher crime laws are already generally Tory leaning, while urban areas won't vote Tory anyway. Crime also plays into favoured Conservative tactics relating to putting a scare in voters to get them to the ballot box (Tax on Everything, anyone?). In the past, when areas like the suburban GTA West could be counted on to deliver solid support for the Tories, a crime focus could be expected to work, however, times and demographics have changed. I'm going to semi-quote Gerard Kennedy's response to my question re: selling the green shift to small c-conservative suburbs, that the 905 belt has changed dramatically since the days of the Big Blue Machine sweeping the area (example, from 95 to 07, the provincial PC vote in Mississauga South, a former stronghold, fell from 69% and 23,000 votes to 34% and 14,000 votes) thanks to demographic changes coming as a result of younger, more socially liberal minded families moving in from the 416, and increased immigrant populations in the area, which tend to be more Liberal friendly. Conservative messages of fear based on "personal experience and impressions" as are bound to fail opposed to real progressive action based on, you know, facts. One last interesting tidbit from the Toronto Star article:

“For the fourth year in a row, the lowest provincial (crime) rate occurred in Ontario and Quebec,” said the agency.

Interesting that the Ontario crime rate is so low after 4 years of the "small man of Confederation" Dalton Mcguinty in charge, and following the "lock up the homeless" tough on crime PC's.