Do We Really Want a Harper Government?Friends,
With Harper and the Conservatives currently ahead in the polls, it is essential that Canadians be informed about who they are voting for. The Conservatives recent attempts to tone down their far right-wing policies are falling apart, though, with the recent announcement that they plan to raise personal income taxes for the lowest income earners, while cutting taxes for the highest-incomer earners.
It is our job to make Canadians all across this country aware of what the Conservatives and Stephen Harper stand for, and that is why I am asking you to distribute this e-mail far and wide across this great country.
STEPHEN HARPER ON:
HEALTHCARE
"It's past time the feds scrapped the Canada Health Act."
- Stephen Harper, then Vice-President of the National Citizens Coalition, 1997.
"We also support the exploration of alternative ways to deliver health care. Moving toward alternatives, including those provided by the private sector, is a natural development of our health care system."
- Stephen Harper, Toronto Star, October 2002.
POVERTY
"In terms of the unemployed, of which we have over a million-and-a-half, don't feel particularly bad for many of these people. They don't feel bad about it themselves, as long as they're receiving generous social assistance and unemployment insurance."
- Conservative leader Stephen Harper, then vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition, in a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the Council for National Policy, a right-wing American think tank.
ON POLITICS
"[Y]our country [the USA], and particularly your conservative movement, is a light and an inspiration to people in this country and across the world."
- Conservative leader Stephen Harper, then vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition, in a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the Council for National Policy, a right-wing American think tank.
ON EQUAL RIGHTS
"It will come as no surprise to anybody to know that I support the traditional definition of marriage as a union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others, as expressed in our traditional common law."
- Stephen Harper, Hansard, Address in the House of Commons on Bill C-38, February 16, 2005.
"Rob is a true reformer and a true conservative. He has been a faithful supporter of mine and I am grateful for his work."
- Stephen Harper endorsing Calgary West Conservative MP Rob Anders, who in 2001 called Nelson Mandela "a Communist and terrorist."
ON THE U.S. OCCUPATION OF IRAQ
"It is inherently dangerous to allow a country such as Iraq to retain weapons of mass destruction, particularly in light of its past aggressive behaviour. If the world community fails to disarm Iraq, we fear that other rogue states will be encouraged to believe that they too can have these most deadly of weapons to systematically defy international resolutions and that the world will do nothing to stop them."
- Stephen Harper supporting the American invasion of Iraq, House of Commons, March 20, 2003.
"Mr. Speaker, the issue of war requires moral leadership. We believe the government should stand by our troops, our friends and our allies and do everything necessary to support them right through to victory."
- Stephen Harper, supporting the American invasion of Iraq, House of Commons, April 1, 2003.
ON ABORTION
"I have always said that controversial issues of a moral or religious nature, such as abortion, should be settled by free votes of MPs, not by party policy."
- Stephen Harper.
"While [Stephen] Harper has not promised to raise pro-life or pro-family legislation he has promised to allow such legislation to be introduced by others and to permit free votes..."
- Anti-abortion Web site LifeSite.net, March 22, 2004.
ON CANADIANS
"A culture of defeat..."
- Stephen Harper, describing the Atlantic provinces, May 2001.
"You have to remember that west of Winnipeg the ridings the Liberals hold are dominated by people who are either recent Asian immigrants or recent migrants from Eastern Canada; people who live in ghettos and are not integrated into Western Canadian society."
- Conservative leader Stephen Harper, in Report Newsmagazine, 2001.
ON THE ENVIRONMENT
"Kyoto is never going to be passed and I think we'd be better to spend our time on realistic pollution control measures"
-Stephen Harper, June 2004
"Stephen Harper not only opposes Kyoto, but he refutes the science. He's back in the dinosaur era. Harper is just totally out of it.."
- David Suzuki on Canadian Alliance leader Stephen Harper, 2003.
ON ECONOMICS
"Withdraw from the Canada Pension Plan... Collect our own revenue from personal income tax... Resume provincial responsibility for health-care policy. If Ottawa objects to provincial policy, fight in the courts... [E]ach province should raise its own revenue for health... It is imperative to take the initiative, to build firewalls around Alberta... "
- Stephen Harper in an "Open letter to Ralph Klein," January 24th 2001.
"We must aim to make [Canada] a lower tax jurisdiction than the United States."
- Stephen Harper, Vancouver Province, April 6th 2004.
"Canada is a Northern European welfare state in the worst sense of the term, and very proud of it. Canadians make no connection between the fact that they are a Northern European welfare state and the fact that we have very low economic growth, a standard of living substantially lower than yours, a massive brain drain of young professionals to your country, and double the unemployment rate of the United States."
- Conservative leader Stephen Harper, then vice-president of the National Citizens Coalition, in a June 1997 Montreal meeting of the Council for National Policy, a right-wing American think tank.
ON REFUGEES
"Well, I've always believed that we have to be a lot tougher with undocumented refugee claimants. Whether the best thing is to send them right out of the country or simply detain them until we get full information, we can look at either but, no this is a problem that does need to be fixed. Particularly post 9/11, we can't take these kinds of security risks."
- Stephen Harper, CHML Radio AM 900 Hamilton, June 3, 2004.
STOP STEPHEN HARPER & THE CONSERVATIVES!
VOTE JANUARY 23, 2006. |