Canada's Climate Barbie Dumber than Wood

Climate fanatics promoting hysterical predictions of an imminent climate apocalypse remain dumbfounded that there are those like me, who put little stock into their dire predictions of impending gloom and doom.
And so in order to frighten the unbelievers, these climate doomsayers and their political allies ramp up the pressure by making more and more outlandish predictions.

The latest prediction is that the world has but a scant ten or twelve years to turn things around before it is too late and we face an irreversible climate disaster.

This prediction which is meant to frighten disbelievers into action has quite the opposite effect on myself because I know we cannot possibly do what the climate-doomsayers tell us what we must in order to avert disaster.
It is like a hockey coach telling his team which is losing 5-1 with a minute left in the game that they should just push harder in order to win. It isn't going to happen.

I remember that just before the great housing crash of 2006-7 all the experts were pooh-poohing the one investor, Peter Schiff, who predicted with dead accuracy the upcoming financial meltdown. The experts told all who would listen (and we all listened) that the good times would continue to roll along.
Financial experts like Arthur Laffer and Mike Norman went on television citing statistics and fundamentals proving beyond a shadow of a doubt why Schiff was dead wrong. Watch a hilarious video of the idiots and their predictions.
The investment world believed this so-called 'expert consensus ' and subsequently lost gazillions in the crash.
What's the point? Many of these same idiots who were dead wrong then, are back on TV today telling us what to do with our money and predicting how the market will perform tomorrow.
So much for consensus.
As they say..... “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.”

And so it brings us to the granddaddy of climate-hoaxers, Al Gore, who started the panic, telling us like Chicken Little, that the sky is falling.
His predictions, amongst others, that by today we would all be underwater due to the melting of the polar ice caps has proven to be wrong, or worse a hoax.
At least Gore has the humility to shut up today and say no more.

Then there is the famous 'hockey stick' graph in which scientists presented a dramatic increase in the rise of CO2.
Turns out that British climate scientists deliberately fudged the numbers as was discovered when incriminating emails were publicized by way of a whistle-blower.

The so-called 97% scientist consensus around global-warming is widely cited as irrefutable proof that science is overwhelmingly on the side of man-made global warming.
But the statistic is largely based on papers published. Ask yourself what scientist in his or her right mind would dare to publish a paper decrying the myth of man-made global warming. It would be career suicide and by the way, what university or government would dare fund research debunking the popular theory? None.

Canada's Fraser Institute shot down the 97% myth rather handily;

Not only is there no 97 percent consensus among climate scientists, many misunderstand core issues

“Like so much else in the climate change debate, one needs to check the numbers. First of all, on what exactly are 97 per cent of experts supposed to agree? In 2013, U.S. President Barack Obama sent out a tweet claiming 97 per cent of climate experts believe global warming is “real, man-made and dangerous.” As it turns out, the survey he was referring to didn’t ask that question, so he was basically making it up. At a recent debate in New Orleans, I heard climate activist Bill McKibben claim there was a consensus that greenhouse gases are “a grave danger.” But when challenged for the source of his claim, he promptly withdrew it...

...In 2012 the American Meteorological Society (AMS) surveyed its 7,000 members, receiving 1,862 responses. Of those, only 52% said they think global warming over the 20th century has happened and is mostly man-made (the IPCC position). The remaining 48% either think it happened but natural causes explain at least half of it, or it didn’t happen, or they don’t know. Furthermore, 53% agree that there is conflict among AMS members on the question.
So no sign of a 97% consensus. Not only do about half reject the IPCC conclusion, more than half acknowledge that their profession is split on the issue.”

None of this matters, pesky facts don't mean a whit to Climate keeners the world over who believe what they want to believe because climate change isn't science, but rather religion.

Canada's Environment Minister Catherine McKenna has an impressive resume of feel-good jobs, but absolutely zero background in science and less in economics. One would hope that she would bone up on the science of climate change and the effect of a carbon tax before lecturing Canadians on the subject.
Apparently, she hasn't.

“Environment Minister McKenna cited the deaths in promoting a 12¢-a litre carbon tax under the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act. “We are all paying the cost of extreme weather events like floods, like droughts, like forest fires, and 90 people died in Québec this summer because of extreme heat,” McKenna told the Commons on October 26.”

HaHa!! What an idiot. Full of degrees and credentials but no brains.
There are lots of people like her in the Trudeau cabinet.

While there is ample room to debate the negative effects of climate change, there is no room to debate whether a warming planet will lead to more deaths.

Last summer Quebec had a heatwave for about two weeks. I wouldn't call it disastrous, it was actually rather nice. This heatwave of about 30 degrees average would be laughed at in Africa, which incidentally has little air-conditioning and suffers precious few deaths due to heat alone.
But the Quebec newspapers started pedalling the nonsense that Quebecers were dropping like flies because of the heat. The stories were so moronic they should have been recognized as fake news

And so our Climate Barbie Environment Minister (yes its a well-deserved pejorative) repeated this nonsense as a dire consequence of climate change.
Someone who purports to lead Canadians in the subject of the environment should do a modicum of fact-checking before speaking. McKenna is so used to espousing bullshit that she sounds like a vapid beauty pageant contestant offering her view on world peace.

Not surprisingly the Quebec government agency that monitors births and deaths recently revealed that there was no increase in deaths in July during the heatwave as compared to years before.

While there may or may not be debate over the effects of global warming, not so over the issue of heat versus cold in relation to premature deaths.

"The study — published in the British journal The Lancet — analyzed data on more than 74 million deaths in 13 countries between 1985 and 2012. Of those, 5.4 million deaths were related to cold, while 311,000 were related to heat."

So worldwide, fifteen times as many humans die from cold temperatures as compared to warm temperatures, yet Climate Barbie tells us the opposite.
It isn't a leap to say that as the Earth warms, deaths from cold will decrease and deaths from heat will increase, but the net effect will be a vast overall decrease in deaths due to hot or cold weather.
Climate Barbie should learn arithmetic as well as basic science before lecturing us.
It is sad that idiots like her actually have a say in something like a carbon tax which cannot possibly have any effect on global warming.
How do I know the carbon tax will fail?
Well first its just a plain bad idea, but more importantly, it will fail because the grossly incompetent government of Canada will administer the plan, a government that cannot even pay its own employees properly and this going on for years.
What large company in Canada could get away with not paying employees for weeks or months because of a computer snafu?

At any rate, Canada contributes about one half of one percent of the world's CO2 output, so even a successful carbon tax program that would cut those emissions by say 10% would have almost zero effect, this while China and third world countries ramp up their CO2 emissions as they modernize.

By the way, a carbon tax is useless as long as other trading partners don't install the same tax. The other alternative is to impose trade sanctions against those foreign producers not subject to a carbon tax. None of that could possibly happen.

All these considerations- taxes, science, economics are beyond the scope of Catherine McKenna's expertise, schooling and experience.
She is the perfect example of the Peter Principle, which tells us that employees rise in the hierarchy through promotion until they reach the levels of their respective incompetence.

I'll not be lectured on climate (or anything else) by McKenna or Justin, who are just politicians expert at trolling for issues they can exploit.

The world is always getting hotter or colder, this with or without mankind's interference.
At any rate, I'll take hotter over colder any day of the week....

Anglophobia Reigns in Opposition to Mega Mall

The Island of Montreal consists of several cities and towns coexisting with the larger and dominating city of Montreal.

In 2002 the PQ government wanted to eliminate these towns because many had anglophone majorities which qualified them for bilingual status, something the separatists abhorred. The PQ government hatched a plan to eliminate these towns by forcing them to merge with Montreal, thus bringing the anglophone component down below the threshold required for bilingual status.

When the Liberal government of Jean Charest came to power it did so on an election plank which would allow the former towns the right to de-merge through referenda held in each former town if they so desired.

Of the 27 merged towns, 15 did de-merge, with the anglophone community voting massively to free themselves from the clutches of majority control of the City of Montreal.
The towns didn't get off scot-free, they were forced to continue to live with the elimination of their police and fire services and instead, over-pay Montreal for inferior service. The towns were also required to continue to contribute taxes to Montreal as a forced tribute.

These bedroom towns with large anglophone components are largely situated at the western end of the island of Montreal and for the most part are out of sight and mind of the francophone majority.

But the towns of Westmount, Mount-Royal, Hampstead and Cote Saint-Luc are smack dab in the middle of the island, occupying prime real-estate. Westmount sitting on the top of the mountain with its multi-million dollar homes and the Town of Mount-Royal with its famous separation wall along L'Acadie Boulevard remain symbols of the hated English domination of the city.
While nobody in the French media will say it out loud, these bastions of English privilege remain galling, vestiges of a colonial past that just won't disappear.

And so the announcement by the Town of Mount-Royal that it will be building a massive shopping, entertainment and dining complex on its territory was bound to elicit howls of protest from anti-anglophone forces appalled that such a mega project on the island could fall outside its control and worse, shift the focus of tourists and shoppers away from downtown.

This week the City of Montreal's planning department complained with great fanfare that the project would add 30 minutes to the commute of some travelling along the derelict Metropolitan Boulevard, a monument to Quebec transportation and construction incompetence.

The traffic study offered by the city is so flawed that it begs the questions as to whether it was serious in the first place, or a propaganda tool meant to throw cold water on the project.
The city claims that up to 70,000 cars will travel to and from the mall each day, this with announced parking facilities of just 8,000 places.
Where will these supposed cars park?

The study forecasted up to 140,000 will visit the mall each day, half arriving by bus and metro, the other half by car. This number is wildly optimistic considering that the West Edmonton Mall which is about two and a half times bigger receives between 90,000 and 200,000 visitors per day.
The study does not consider that most mall traffic occurs on the weekend when fewer commuters are travelling to work.
A reasonable assumption is that the mall when completed will attract about 40,000 visitors during the week and about double on the weekend.
Of the 40,000 daily visitors during the week, half will arrive by public transport and the other half by car (according to the study itself) thus leaving 20,000 visitors arriving by car. Calculating one and a half persons per car, it means 13,500 additional car visits per weekday a figure half of what the study indicated.
The study also fails to consider that the mall only opens after the morning rush hour. The hours between 4 o'clock and 7 o'clock (the evening rush hour) are the quietest shopping hours of the day, as any retailer can attest. Evening shopping starts picking up after 7 o'clock.
The rush-hour bogeyman put forth by the study is a crock.

It's not surprising the mall owners disputed the figures vehemently, but it is strange that no media outlet bothered challenging the city's math.

At any rate, the TMR project known as Royalmount is a complete and utter threat to  Montreal's perceived image as a French only city. The mega centre is located in an officially bilingual town, meaning all signage can be posted bilingually.  Bonjour/ Hi will reign supreme and since the mall will become a tourist attraction, it will serve as a not-so-gentle reminder to tourists that Montreal is indeed a bilingual city.
Not a situation that nationalists can abide by.

And so the attacks on the project begin, with all sorts of reasons being put forward to thwart the projected mall.
Luc Ferandez who reigns as mayor over the hipster Plateau-Mont-Royal borough is raging against the project claiming that it will turn Montreal into a shopping mecca like Dubai, an unacceptable situation.

While complaints about the project are couched in false arguments, leave it to the readers of the Journal de Montreal to complain in the comments section about the English nature of the project.

"Oufff...qu'il commence donc par lui donner un nom Français ! Loi 101 où es- tu ?"
"How about starting by giving the project  French name. Where is Bill 101?"

Royalmount? Pourquoi un nom en anglais? Montréal est en train de redevenir cette metropole anglaise du début du 20ieme siècle..
"Royalmount? Why an English name? Montreal is returning to the English city of the early 20th century"

Bien oui, merci à Jean Charest et ses défusions: c'est ça avoir de la vision pour le Québec et sa métropole.
"Yes sir, thanks to Jean Charest and his de-mergers: that is the vision for Quebec and its metropolis." 

Yes, the hidden contempt and jealousy for any Anglo success is palpable.
In a snarky opinion piece in HuffpostQuebec that dripped with venom, a contributor rained down contempt for the project as well as the English communities of Hampstead and Cote Saint-Luc.

Pascal Henrard described leaving the lovely and peaceful environs of his native Plateau Mont-Royal on a bicycle trip to visit the new location of the Royalmount project. He described his bike ride as a Montreal dream until he arrived at the hateful town limits of Hampstead where shiny SUV eyesores littered streets that seemed to lead nowhere and where rude drivers and residents who never seemed to have seen a cyclist before, honked at him incessantly.
Attempting to cross over to the Royalmount property in TMR via Cavendish (I assume from his description of the four-lane street))  he was dismayed to find the way blocked by railway tracks that conveniently, according to him, separated the rich from the poor, notwithstanding that nobody, rich or poor, really lives on the other side of the tracks.
The only thing he missed and failed to assail was the one-word 'STOP' signs in Hampstead that Bill 101ers abhor. I can only assume he missed this insulting travesty because, well, cyclists are blind to stop signs.

So expect anglophobic opposition to the project to ramp up, with all sorts of excuses offered as to why the project should be stymied.
Expect pressure to be exerted on the Provincial government which is the only government that can effectively slow or stymie the project. Towns and cities are 100% under its purview, but given the advanced stage of the project, with hundreds of millions committed and with demolition already underway, there is little to be done without incurring a huge legal liability.

So to my fulminating anglophobe foils all I can say is that you seemed to be checkmated by events or perhaps in language you can better understand, the Royalmount project just may be a fait accompli.

Quebec Sovereignty Movement Dying Off Quickly

 The recent deaths of two old-guard separatist heavyweights, Bernard Landry and Richard LeHir may just represent a tipping point in the death spiral of the sovereignty movement in Quebec.

It is said to be uncouth to speak ill of the dead so I won't comment further on the passing of the separatist stalwarts other to say that I did not care for either of the men, both enemies of anglophones and ethnics.
But the two deaths underline the fact that no new generation of significant leaders is emerging because anyone who advocates passionately for Quebec sovereignty is shot down rather cruelly by a movement that no longer believes in itself.

Poor Martine Ouellet was drummed out of the Bloc Quebecois for being too much of a sovereigntist, advocating for militancy in pushing the independence theme. Now Martine was a wacky political figure, but her commitment to sovereignty was admirable and it seems that she was one of the few in the BQ caucus willing to fight to the bitter end for a principle, even if it meant going down with the ship.
Her treacherous BQ comrades in Ottawa have long given up the notion of militating for independence, preferring to advocate for Quebec within Canada instead, thus betraying their raison d'etre.
I guess life is too comfortable and with lucrative pensions growing fatter by the day, who can blame them for taking the cowardly way out.

All this puzzles me because support for sovereignty remains significant in Quebec. In the last provincial election, a combined thirty-three percent of the electorate voted for the Parti Quebecois and Quebec Solidaire. It's true that each of these votes wasn't necessarily a vote for sovereignty, but it certainly gives an indication that even in these dark days of the sovereignty movement, support remains significant.

The PQ has seen a string of less than stellar leaders, ever since the disaster that was the PQ government led by Pauline Marois, a failed tenure in power that had voters abandoning the party in droves.
But the PQ re-build in opposition never happened with the bizarre Pierre-Karl Péladeau doing perhaps the most damage to the brand. Many PQ supporters (social progressives) held their nose in supporting PKP because his star power promised a winning future. But the unstable Péladeau abandoned his leadership rather abruptly, either because of his nasty marriage breakup or because he was plainly unsuited to the task. Péladeau has a history as a rich spoiled brat, an absolute ruler over at Quebecor and someone who obviously could not abide by cooperating with the hoi-polloi of the PQ party.

The earnest yet underwhelming Jean-François Lisée was left to pick up the pieces and like Humpty-Dumpty, all the king's horse and all the king's men couldn't put the PQ back together again.

And so sovereigntist forces face a daunting and frustrating road ahead with most pur et durs having thrown in the towel of political activism long ago.
In fact, those who militate ferociously for Quebec separation are seen, even by those sympathetic, as throwbacks, as if they were members of the flat Earth society.

Perhaps the losing has gone on too long for the faithful and while Quebecers may support the notion of sovereignty, they no longer have the strength to fight for it, considering the battle a lost cause.

Over on Vigile.quebec, the last sovereigntist bastion of opinion, the website mourned the loss of their chief editorialist, ex-politician Richard Le Hir, whose denunciations of all things Canadian were a comforting staple for its constituency of silver-haired over-the-hill militants. His loss will be impactful.
Surprisingly or perhaps not surprisingly, under the section that discussed the PQs past and future was a list of aggregated stories which underlined the utter demoralization and despair of the movement.

Writer after writer bemoaned the fact that the PQ was coming to the end of the road with graphic descriptions of its demise.
The indefatigable sovereigntist Louise Beaudoin described the PQ electoral debacle as a 'slaughter."

For the moment, there is no next-gen sovereigntist leadership and any movement cannot survive without leaders.

Up to now, leaders of the sovereigntist movement had expectations that their travails would or could lead to an independent Quebec. It is what drove them.
Today those hopes are irrealistic and any aspiring leader has to understand that his or her work will lead nowhere.
It isn't a situation which can attract anyone of substance, so clearly, the writing is on the wall, a message written by sovereigntists themselves.

CAQ Driving Montreal to Become the 11th Province

The 'boiling frog fable' describes a frog being slowly boiled alive. The premise being that if a frog is suddenly thrust into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in cold water which is then brought to a boil gradually, it will not perceive the danger and will be slowly cooked to death. The story is often used as a metaphor for the inability or unwillingness of people to react to or be aware of sinister threats that arise gradually rather than suddenly. Wikipedia

For years Quebec separatist journalists have been bemoaning the fact that immigration has upset the linguistic and demographic balance of Montreal with old-stock francophones seeing their demographic weight reduced year after year to the effect that Quebec is being cleaved linguistically and culturally into two distinct camps...Montreal versus the ROQ (Rest of Quebec.)

Those prescient predictions have largely fallen on deaf ears as the Quebec Liberals while in power have ignored the shift because it served its electoral purpose as the immigrants voted massively for their party, In the recent provincial election, the Liberals retained 19 out of 25 seats on the island, proof that despite the CAQ blowout in the rest of the province, Montreal marches to a different tune.

The new Premier, true to his roots and his old-stock francophone base in the ROQ, felt emboldened to launch the first volley in the war on Montreal by attacking religious garb, something that already brought down the PQ in the past, in its own futile and disastrous attempt to put minorities in their place.

With an impressive election victory in hand and no political obligation to Montreal, the new Premier, feeling his oats, is foolishly choosing to go after Montreal ethnics, rewarding his base with an attack on 'les autres.' It certainly played well in the boonies, not so much in Montreal.
For Legault, there seems to be no political downside to the attack.
He could not be more wrong.

For those who want to see Montreal become the 11th province, things couldn't be working out better, where the accrued polarization of Montreal and the ROQ is the prelude to the separation of Montreal from Quebec.
For those who pooh-pooh the very idea that Montreal could ever separate from Quebec, let me remind them that monumental political change sometimes happens rather abruptly, like the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union or the fall of the Berlin Wall leading to the reunification of Germany.
Where the symptoms of disaffection brew for decades, the final act may seem surprising, when it is anything but.

No one can dispute that Montreal and Quebec are headed on separate political courses and the election of the CAQ, wholly siding with one side will serve only to exacerbate the cleavage between the two as demographic forces in Montreal play out where the weight of old-school francophones is diminishing each year.

The quick rejection in Montreal of Legault's new policy on religious garb wasn't unexpected and the demonstrations that greeted the announcement may have been satisfying for Legault and his supporters because he and the CAQ believe that it is a fight in which they will prevail, a huge political win for his base which has hankered to put Montreal, its Anglos and ethnics in their place for some time.

But the victory over religious garb may actually be Pyrrhic in nature and like British Townshend Acts which imposed taxes on staples like tea in the American colonies, it may well serve only to inflame independence aspirations in Montreal.
The harsher the treatment of Montreal ethnics and Anglos, (something that the CAQ base relishes) the further along Montreal veers towards independence.

 Even Montreal's current leftist mayor, Valerie Plante, herself no fan of federalism, feels impelled to walk a fine line, defending and opposing the CAQ plan at the same time.

"I'm in favour of neutrality of the State, but this bill is ill-conceived. The government must go back to the drawing board"

Mayor Plante seems also to be advancing the idea of Montreal as a nation-state, having taken the remarkable decision to remove the Quebec flag from municipal buildings.

But should Montreal elect a truly federalist mayor next election, it will set the scene for some mighty fireworks between Montreal and the Quebec government, with Legault's freedom to attack Montreal seriously challenged.
A Montreal mayor demanding special status will send shock waves through the political establishment in Quebec and like Canada in its dealings with an ornery Quebec, decisions will have to be made to either placate Montreal's demands for special treatment or run the risk of sovereignty.
It is a delicious prospect that I cannot wait for and certainly a case of just desserts.

The CAQ seems to have a free hand in dealing with Montreal now, but Legault would be smart to be prudent.
Montreal remains the economic engine and the heart of Quebec, with the wherewithal to become the 11th province should it choose so.
Pushed too hard, Montreal with its clearly defined borders can easily fend for itself as a province, something that would be massively supported in the rest of Canada.

Quebec nationalists who believe that this should never be allowed to happen under any circumstances and that Montreal belongs to Quebec, need to understand that those who live by the sword can also die by the sword.
With the demographic shift marching onward,  a 50% +1 vote by those living on the island on Montreal to leave Quebec and become Canada's eleventh province can be a reality within a decade.
The new province would enjoy instant Canadian and international recognition.

So if Legault, the CAQ and its base plan to pound Montreal into becoming another Quebec City forcing the anglos and ethics to adopt the French language exclusively, abandoning their religion and singing 'Alouette' while changing their diet to steamed hot dogs, poutine and maple syrup, they are bound for miserable shock.

Montreal is not Quebec city and never will be. It is and will continue to evolve as cosmopolitan, urbane and diverse city, worthy of international stature.
Those in the CAQ and their old-stock francophone supporters in the boonies that think that they can force Montreal into becoming the backwater that the ROQ is, are doomed to failure.

So let François Legault, the eager-beaver Premier,  have his fun as he takes power believing he can reshape Montreal.
It won't take long before he realizes the limitations of his power and if he dares to play rough, it is he who will be burned.

Like George III and his Parliament found out, passing oppressive and unpopular legislation from afar, forces the imposed upon to decide whether to obey or revolt.

Montreal is too strong to acquiesce to redneck laws that are out of touch with its reality and so sooner or later, Legault may find himself facing a Montreal version of the  Boston Tea Party.

Quebec's Religious Debate Will Get Nasty

The debate over religious symbols and garb in the public space has polarized Quebecers as few issues have, sovereignty aside. People have strong opinions one way or the other and largely view the other side as extreme, dogmatic and out of touch.
It is a debate fraught with danger, with the distinct possibility that things will get awfully nasty.
As for me, I can honestly see the point of view of each camp and so I am the proverbial fence-sitter, watching the events unfold, feeling like a fan watching a hockey game between two teams that I have no interest in.

I am reminded of the scene in the movie Fiddler on the Roof, where the protagonist Tevye, is called upon to referee a difference of opinion.

I'll do something here that I haven't done in the over 1300 blog posts, that is, defend the points of view of both sides with a view to opening the debate up a little, so those stridently for or against might have a glimpse into the other sides perspective without demonization or rancour.

Let's start with something that we all should believe in, that is that religious freedom is a tenant of a free and democratic society. We are free to worship or not worship as we see fit.

But that being said, religious freedom is not absolute and where religious beliefs run counter to the law of the land, it is the civic law that prevails, something that some religiously observant people disagree with.
Religious laws and customs that provide for female circumcision, forced marriages, underage marriages, polygamy, some animal and all human sacrifices or restrictive education are not allowed. Parents cannot refuse a blood transfusion or a necessary medical procedure for their children on religious grounds, while ironically, they can refuse it for themselves. There is a fine line of reasonableness that our society walks in order to satisfy our right to religious freedom and yet insure our basic human right to health, happiness and well-being.

Restricting religious garb in public certainly runs counter to Canada's Charter of Rights but the new Premier has already stated that he's prepared to use the infamous  'Notwithstanding Clause' to sidestep those charter protections.
This represents an affront to many, who believe that opting out of the Charter is a legalized cheat.
However, it's important to note that Quebec never signed on to the Charter, which was rammed down its throat by the rest of the country.
So among Quebec francophones, both federalist or sovereigntist, using the Notwithstanding Clause is considered not only morally justified, but rather as some sweet revenge.

One of the main reasons the Parti Quebecois' Charter of Secularism failed, was because it painted too broad a stroke, banning all manner of religious garb for public and para-public employees.
The edict would apply to nurses, doctors, teachers, clerks and support staff in hospitals, government-run senior citizen residences and in fact anybody who directly or indirectly received a paycheque that ultimately came from government.
It was too ambitious a project for a minority government, which also rejected a CAQ compromise, a promise for legislative support in return for limiting such a ban to those public employees in positions of power, like police and judges.

And so now that the CAQ is in power it should be no surprise that it wants to enact a law similar to what they proposed, that is, that restrictions on religious garb be placed on those public employees in positions of power.

Why?

Well, let us consider the secularist's point of view, which is that those who wear religious garb in public, likely hold the view that God's law supersedes the law of the land, something that someone who doesn't believe in God would have a hard time accepting. It actually isn't the garb that is in conflict, but the point of view that the garb or symbols represent.

When I went to cegep, the very first year that Vanier college came into existence, we attended classes in what was clearly a Church beforehand and where crucifixes dotted the campus with the school and the government holding that these were historic and cultural symbols. Fair enough.

I had a teacher who was a nun (that probably couldn't be permitted today,) who gave a course in children's literature. She was a kind, affable, well-read and informed person who just happened to wear a full nun's cassock while teaching class. 

It did not bother or offend me, but I am forever reminded of an incident in a class where a female student was called upon to give an interpretation of a fairy tale and where her slant was that the story was an allegory for sexual power with a reference to an erect penis.

It was here that I said to myself...Whoa! This should get interesting, and it did.

The teacher had great difficulty discussing the subject and was clearly uncomfortable. She steered the discussion away from sex, but most in the class (I assume) felt as I did, that her deep religious beliefs affected her teaching, and not in a good way.

It wasn't that big a deal, but something that I remember.

And so with a judge who wears a hijab, turban or a kippa, it is fair to question whether their deep religious beliefs, beliefs that may hold that God's law trumps our civil law, will adversely affect their decision. It's a fair concern.

People who wear religious garb publicly remind us of their deep devotion to God and the accompanying baggage. While it is a personal statement made for personal reasons, there is a message that is impossible to ignore.

In some respects, it is similar to someone who wears a "Black Lives Matter" or a "Greenpeace" t-shirt. You know where these people are coming from and that is fine.

But it isn't fine for a judge to wear these articles of clothing in a court, (that is why they wear a black frock.) They may hold whatever personal beliefs they choose, but should not display them openly, lest they give the impression that their judgments will be based on these core beliefs, rather than the civil law.

The same can be said of a teacher or policeman whom all have the right to believe what they will, but should not wear those beliefs on their sleeves, lest they give the wrong impression.

And so one can understand the point of view that those public employees in a position of power (including teachers in public schools) be reasonably restricted from wearing religious paraphernalia.

But the idea that employees at the license bureau or the SAQ, or those mopping the floor in a hospital or treating patients as a technician, nurse or doctor should be restricted from wearing religious symbols is pretty much indefensible. One would have to believe that a nurse in a hijab, a doctor in a kippah or a technician in a turban could possibly have their religious beliefs impede or give the impression that the religious views could impede them from providing equal service to all.

As for the secularists who want to ban religious symbols in public buildings, especially in the National Assembly where a crucifix that sits over the speaker's chair is causing a big stink, they should remember that while the crucifix may have a Catholic heritage, there are plenty of other symbols that would have to be treated the same.

The British coat of arms that sits higher than the crucifix is topped by an Anglican crown and the inscription "Dieu et mon Droit" (God and my Right). The royal sceptre, or the "Mace" the symbol of the Queen's assent to Parliament is also crowned with an Anglican cross.
Does all this also have to go, or can we agree that these symbols have become historical vestiges that no longer have a religious connotation?
The same goes for our Quebec flag which clearly displays a Christian cross.
Should we be obliged to change the name of streets and towns that have a Christian appellation? Should the crucifix on top of Mount-Royal be removed?
Most Quebecers of francophone heritage have little affinity for the Church, with less than 5% attending church services regularly and few marrying in church or marrying at all. Baptism rates are falling precipitously and it is fair to say that the Catholic Church is pretty much done in Quebec or will be within another generation.
Why then the attachment to symbols of the past that underscored Quebec's strong bond between church and state?

Likely the answer lies not in the affinity to the Catholic Church but rather in the outrage many Quebeckers feel in being told to erase their history.

But a caveat ....

A couple of years ago I wrote a blog post about an incident I witnessed in a Canadian Tire.
A young Muslim female cashier was accosted by an old francophone bag who castigated the girl for wearing a hijab, a symbol, according to her of the young girl's enslavement.

The girl was driven to tears and I could not resist intervening, unloading on the racist bitch in the most unpleasant and cruel intervention I could muster.

This resulted in the manager intervening, removing the bleary-eyed cashier and leaving myself and the insulter to fend for ourselves.
It wasn't pleasant for any of us.

This is what we are to expect, vigilantes empowered by public policy unloading on innocent citizens based on their religious convictions.

Are you ready for that?