Ottawa does about face on same-sex marriage for non-Canadians. The Harper government has served notice that thousands of same-sex couples who flocked to Canada from abroad since 2004 to get married are not legally wed. The reversal of federal policy is revealed in a document filed in a Toronto test case launched recently by a lesbian couple seeking a divorce.... The government’s hard line has cast sudden doubt on the rights and legal status of couples who wed in Canada after a series of court decisions opened the floodgates to same-sex marriage. The mechanics of determining issues such as tax status, employment benefits and immigration have been thrown into legal limbo. [The lesbian couple's] divorce application will be considered next month by an Ontario Superior Court judge. They are asking the judge to either craft an exemption allowing them to divorce or to strike down any legislative provision that has the effect of preventing them from doing so. [more inside]
posted by maudlin
on Jan 12, 2012 -
116 comments
Shit Harper Did Does exactly what it says on the can. Example: "Canadian PM Stephen Harper weakened regulations so that more pesticide residue could be left on your fruits and vegetables." "Harper decorated the government lobby in parliament with photos of just himself, instead of the traditional portraits of former Prime Ministers." And much more.
posted by Fizz
on Apr 13, 2011 -
96 comments
Yesterday (April 15), Representatives Doyle (D-PA), Waxman (D-CA), Wasserman-Schultz (D-FL), Harper (R-MS), Boucher (D-VA) and Rohrabacher (R-CA) introduced the Federal Research Public Access Act (HR 5037), a bill that would ensure free, timely, online access to the published results of research funded by eleven U.S. federal agencies. -
Alliance for Taxpayer Access. [more inside]
posted by infinite intimation
on Apr 20, 2010 -
26 comments
Je ne comprends pas anglais, Former Canadian PM Jean Chrétien forgets his second language as he and former NDP leader Ed Broadbent use their elder statesmen status to discuss bringing down the
six week old Conservative government in Canada after the promised
economic stimulus turned into
cutting travel expenses, cancelling pay equity and the right to strike for federal workers, and changing the
party funding law in favour of the ruling Conservatives under
PM Stephen Harper. The opposition still vow to topple the government even though the funding change appears to have been
dropped. But the largest opposition party is effectively
leaderless and they need the Bloc Quebecois support. Could the next Prime Minister of Canada be
Gilles Duceppe?
posted by saucysault
on Nov 28, 2008 -
295 comments
Maybe America needs Barack more than Barack needs America... It's got to be tough being Barack Obama these days. Just managing to hang onto a slim lead in the polls against a truly horrifying Republican ticket - after eight years in which a Republican administration has all but destroyed the nation. Having to explain to people over and over again that no, he's really not a Muslim, and people still don't believe him. Sarah Palin. Maybe America isn't worth Barack's trouble. Maybe there's other fish in the sea, America. Maybe you ought to think about that a little and stop being this way. Canada has an election coming up too, and given
what they've got to work with, more and more Canadians are starting to
take a hard look south of the border.
posted by Naberius
on Sep 23, 2008 -
78 comments
The Ninth Circuit (
maligned by
many as a
hotbed of extreme
liberal judicial activism,
but defended by
others PDF) issued its opinion in the case
of
Harper v. Poway Unified School District last week. Judge Stephen Reinhardt - who, to some people,
embodies
the
alleged evils of the Ninth Circuit - issued the
majority opinion, and Judge Alex Kozinski filed a
strong dissent. The majority opinion held that a high school
principal who ordered a student to remove his T-shirt that said "Homosexuality is Shameful" did
not violate the student's First Amendment rights, reasoning that "limitations on speech" are
permissible in cases where speech is "derogatory and injurious remarks directed at students'
minority status such as race religion and sexual orientation," and the limitation is "narrow, and
applied with sensitivity and for reasons that are consistent with the fundamental First Amendment
mandate." [more inside]
posted by Pontius Pilate
on Apr 26, 2006 -
152 comments
The Latest Addition to the iPod Family: the
iPod Harper's Special Edition. "Each unit comes preloaded with high-resolution photos of every writer whose work has appeared in the magazine during (Harper's editor Lewis H. Lapham's) long tenure..."
Is it me, or is this just super lame?
posted by JPowers
on Jul 11, 2005 -
40 comments
