Finally, an admission that all that multiculturalism provides is the destruction of a national soul.

Its about time that these fundamental truths were recognized. We are not all the same, and we can't all get along.

From the left, a call to end the current Dutch notion of tolerance

by John Vinocur, International Herald Tribune, December 29, 2008.

Two years ago, the Dutch could quietly congratulate themselves on having brought what seemed to be a fair measure of consensus and reason to the meanest intersection in their national political life: the one where integration of Muslim immigrants crossed Dutch identity.

In the run-up to choosing a new government in 2006, just 24 percent of the voters considered the issue important, and only 4 percent regarded it as the election's central theme.

What a turnabout, it seemed - and whatever the reason (spent passions, optimism, resignation?), it was a soothing respite for a country whose history of tolerance was the first in 21st-century Europe to clash with the on-street realities of its growing Muslim population.

Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, the Netherlands had lived through something akin to a populist revolt against accommodating Islamic immigrants led by Pim Fortuyn, who was later murdered; the assassination of the filmmaker Theo Van Gogh, accused of blasphemy by a homegrown Muslim killer; and the bitter departure from the Netherlands of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali woman who became a member of Parliament before being marked for death for her criticism of radical Islam.

Now something fairly remarkable is happening again.

Two weeks ago, the country's biggest left-wing political grouping, the Labor Party, which has responsibility for integration as a member of the coalition government led by the Christian Democrats, issued a position paper calling for the end of the failed model of Dutch "tolerance."

It came at the same time Nicolas Sarkozy was making a case in France for greater opportunities for minorities that also contained an admission that the French notion of equality "doesn't work anymore."

But there was a difference. If judged on the standard scale of caution in dealing with cultural clashes and Muslims' obligations to their new homes in Europe, the language of the Dutch position paper and Lilianne Ploumen, Labor's chairperson, was exceptional.

The paper said: "The mistake we can never repeat is stifling criticism of cultures and religions for reasons of tolerance."

Government and politicians had too long failed to acknowledge the feelings of "loss and estrangement" felt by Dutch society facing parallel communities that disregard its language, laws and customs.

Newcomers, according to Ploumen, must avoid "self-designated victimization."

She asserted, "the grip of the homeland has to disappear" for these immigrants who, news reports indicate, also retain their original nationality at a rate of about 80 percent once becoming Dutch citizens.

Instead of reflexively offering tolerance with the expectation that things would work out in the long run, she said, the government strategy should be "bringing our values into confrontation with people who think otherwise

[...]

... Ploumen says, "Integration calls on the greatest effort from the new Dutch. Let go of where you come from; choose the Netherlands unconditionally." Immigrants must "take responsibility for this country" and cherish and protect its Dutch essence.

Not clear enough? Ploumen insists, "The success of the integration process is hindered by the disproportionate number of non-natives involved in criminality and trouble-making, by men who refuse to shake hands with women, by burqas and separate courses for women on citizenship.

"We have to stop the existence of parallel societies within our society."

And the obligations of the native Dutch? Ploumen's answer is, "People who have their roots here have to offer space to traditions, religions and cultures which are new to Dutch society" - but without fear of expressing criticism. "Hurting feelings is allowed, and criticism of religion, too."

[...]

"The multi-cultis just aren't making the running anymore. It's a brave step towards a new normalcy in this country. "

The former Governor General needs to shut up.

Ed Schreyer, the former Governor General and once NDP leader and premier of Manitoba, needs to keep his political biases in his belly, and as a former GG, needs to understand that it is not his place to comment on affairs of the office he no longer represents. Such is the decorum he should be according his successor. Coloured by his political bias, he should save his comments for his memoirs. Neither the present Governor General, nor the government of the day has requested his public opinion.

"Moi, I be pretty dam good dumb-fuck! You'll see!"

And he was...

Expanded video here.

Dion's coming out speech here.

The prime minister, in spite of being severely ill this week, managed to get his basic message out in a short but inclusive, patriotic speech. M. Dion was to follow up with a statement in response. He couldn't do it, literally, despite feeble attempts with what appeared to be a cell phone camera.

THe choice for the Governor General can not be more clear. M. Dion is not capable of running any government, much less one having to stick handle its way through monumental global financial issues. Canadians made the right choice in the last election; they know it, and the opposition parties and the supporters of the Bloc should too.

In a perfect world, enough honest Liberal MPs would either cross the floor or sit as independents to give the Conservatives a clear majority. Canada needs and deserves nothing less at this time. The Liberal Party in its current iteration is done in Canada, and the NDP, through the duplicity of its leader, has demonstrated that its not worthy of Canada's highest office. Woe be to the country who hands it most treasured possession, its governance, to this rag-tag bunch of ghoulish self-serving fools.

Breaking - Iggy crashing the party, finally?

Bourque is reporting that Ignatieff is having sober second thoughts about the coalition, mostly in response to pressure from colleagues and backbenchers.

Ignatieff has really has three choices (well, four - he can just go back to the States), he can suck up to the coalition and watch the party evaporate on the horizon, he can push Dion and Rae out of the limelight and go publicly nuclear on the folly of it all, or his best option - take 10-15 good Canadian Liberals with him and cross the floor, giving Harper the necessary muscle to flush these pretenders out of consideration for good.

If Ignatieff stays the course, he'll have nothing left in May. Dion's actions have likely soiled the Liberal linens for good in the party's present incarnation. Canadians of every political stripe from coast to coast are furious at the spectre of having their vote overthrown. Harper needs a majority in order to start the process of eliminating the future possibility of separatist authority over parliament once and for all. Ignatieff needs to figure for himself who's side he's on, Canada's, or the Liberal's. He can't, at present, be on both.

New updates from Bourque: UPDATE 1:Meanwhile, former Lib MP & Deputy PM John Manley is also now distancing himself from Dion's unholy alliance, telling a G&M confcall that his inclusion in Dion's wise men sounding board is news to him. "I havent agreed to do anything", he said ...... UPDATE 2: Insiders are telling Bourque late this evening that "at least 15 opposition members are ready to break ranks and, if necessary, sit as independents. This group includes Dryden, Tonks, Bevilacqua (from Grits) and Angus (NDP)". Bourque is also hearing that "at least three Bloc members are considering same course of action and there maybe at least two Tories thinking of going the other way (as independents) - Michael 'Cheech' Chong and backbencher Lee Richardson." Developing ...

Les Trois Chavez

What they were really saying...

Chavez Layton: "Merci M. Dion, you're a pretty dumb-fuck, but I've managed to get out of you what I've always dreamed, the keys to the washroom at 24 Sussex, and to sleep in a real bed...you don't snore, do you?"

Chavez Dion: "I 'av to congrat vous for making me le Roi. Its not izzy being un pretty dumb-fuck, but moi, I try. You'll see! Moi, I be pretty dam good dumb-fuck! You'll see!"

Chavez Duceppe: "Eh tabernac! My hand is out, fill it! My allegiance is Quebec, seulement, so cross the palm with more cash! Vous harlots will have to pay en avance, extra for the jolie dumb-fuck."

The Tories made them do it

By Andrew Coyne, Maclean's, Nov 30, 2008

"Well that didn’t take long. Barely three days after the Finance minister rose to deliver his annual fall update, it is all in the dumpster: the fiscal plan, the curbs to subsidies to political parties, the suspension of public employees’ right to strike, maybe even the government itself.

And the settled wisdom of every single pundit in the country is that it is all the Conservatives’ fault. After all, they provoked the opposition beyond endurance. They made demands of the opposition that they could not possibly accept. How could Harper have been so reckless? What a toxic gambit! What a colossal miscalculation!

Absolutely no one pins even a sliver of blame on the Liberals, the NDP or the Bloc. Of course not. Faced with the unreasonable and extreme proposal that they raise funds in the same way as the Conservatives have been doing for years — by asking people for their money, rather than taking it from them — they really had no alternative but to seize power. What on earth were they supposed to do? Revamp their moribund fund-raising organizations? Find a message and a leader capable of motivating large numbers of Canadians to click the “donate” button on their websites? Get off their collective duffs? What were the Tories thinking?

No. No, the sensible, restrained, pragmatic thing to do when threatened with the loss of subsidy is to take down the government. The sober, reasonable, moderate thing to do in this time of economic uncertainty is to provoke a constitutional crisis — to cobble together a coalition without a prime minister or a program, propped up by a separatist party, and demand the governor general call upon it to form a new government, replacing the old one we just elected. It’s been six weeks, after all.

Thank God that Canada has such statesmen in this time of peril, willing to put partisanship aside in pursuit of high office. What a contrast to those hyper-partisan, power-mad Conservatives, with their insane demands that the parties make do on the millions in tax credits and reimbursements they receive outside the subsidy.

But what am I saying? Notwithstanding the hundreds of column-inches attacking the Tories for their intolerable affront to opposition sensibilities, it is important to remember that the opposition’s sudden lurch for power had nothing to do with the impending loss of public funds. No, the reason they are absolutely forced to defeat the government this time, having declined to do so over Afghanistan, or global warming, or budgets 2006, 2007 ot 2008, is on account of the fall update. Nothing bespeaks the fierce urgency of now so much as an annual statistical review.

Again, the commentariat is as of one maddened mind. How could the government be so blind? Can it not see that unemployment has soared to 6.2%? Why, that’s four-tenths of a percentage point above its recent, thirty-year low. And what about Canadians’ fears of losing their home, what with the proportion of mortgages more than 90 days in arrears standing at an all-time record 0.2%? Okay, it’s an all-time record low, but still. When will it realize there’s a Depression on? Or coming? Or quite possible, certainly, in other countries.

While this laissez-faire, do-nothing government contents itself with spending more than any government in the history of Canada — 25% more, after inflation and population growth, than at the start of the decade — and pumping tens of billions of dollars into the banking system, what Canadians demand is “stimulus.” And stimulus, we all know, in a sophisticated, 21st century economy, can be delivered in only one way: by hiring large numbers of unionized men to dig holes in the ground (see “infrastructure.”) Loosening monetary policy doesn’t count. Tax cuts don’t count. It only counts as “stimulus” if the government spends it.

Or rather, it only counts as stimulus if a Liberal government spends it. The Tories have already promised to deliver billions more in “stimulus” in the next budget. But that’s, like, 58 days from now. We can’t possibly wait until then. We cannot wait to see how the economic situation evolves, or what effect the extraordinary series of measures countries around the world have taken to date will have. We cannot wait to see what the Americans will do. By then the polls might have shifted. By then the crisis might have passed. The government must fall now — so that it can fall again in a month’s time.

Because, as absolutely everyone agrees, the Conservatives made them do it. Not that that had anything to do with it.

CODA: To be clear, the opposition is entirely within its rights to defeat the government, and to request the Governor General to call upon them to form a government. And it is entirely within her prerogative to accept their request, rather than to defer to the Prime Minister’s apparent preference for dissolution.

On the other hand, it is also within her prerogative to refuse their request. They have to show, at a minimum, that they can command the confidence of the House, that is to say that the coalition is stable and secure — which at this point is anything but certain. For goodness sake, the Liberals can’t even agree who should lead them, let alone whether and on what terms they can get along with the other parties."

I'm of the opinion that Andrew is right on the money with this. Harper was entirely correct to blow this subsidy out of the water; it never should have existed in the first place. Political parties which can not find sufficient public support for their policies have no business being supported on the public dole. If their political positions resonate with a sufficient number of Canadians, they will find support. If not, then so be it - that is what is democratic, not simply feather-bedding an endless string of fringe groups.

I believe, however, he is being unnecessarily ham-handed with the civil service. Many of the civil service are still reeling from the drubbing they took during the years of Finance Minister Paul Martin. Income levels for many professional and semi-professional positions severely lag their counterparts in other governments or the private sector. This has become particularly acute in the major metropolitan areas where income levels of civil servants have not had economic increases consistent with the rise in cost of living in these areas.

The net result is that the quality of service is declining because civil service positions are becoming secondary income positions for families, rather than primary careers. Simply put, qualified, skilled people can no longer afford to work for the government offering high quality public service because they cannot maintain a home and feed their families in these high cost areas at their present pay scales. The unions have been ineffective at addressing this, partly because its not in the union's best interest to pump for more wages, but rather more (lower paying) jobs. Union dues are the same regardless of the pay scale. More workers, more dues. From a union perspective, numbers count for more than quality of work.

A coalition of the left will be a disaster for Canada's economic well-being. Harper has set Canada on the right path, and Canada needs the CPC for now. The upcoming Obamanation will quite probably be a financial catastrophe for the US, given that democratic policies lie at the root of the existing crisis. Canada cannot benefit from piling on.