Shell shocked by massive defeat in 2003, the Ontario PCs came to believe the media line that everything that even remotely appeared to have a connection to the Mike Harris years had to be purged to save the party.
Thus the election of John Tory as leader, the quintessential red Tory Toronto establishment man, with nary an idea to disturb the status quo or a word to ruffle anyone's feathers.
Randall Denley would like him to offer some. Not too disturbing, mind you. Just something to show that he's doing something other than not being Dalton McGuinty.
But Tory has no ideas of his own. He's never had to. All the positions he has held--principal secretary to Bill Davis, partner at Torys LLP, CFL commissioner, CEO of Rogers Cable--have all offered him the opportunity to show visionary leadership, and he's gotten by with being a bland if reasonably efficient manager of the status quo.
This will show on the campaign trail, to his detriment. People want a steady hand on the wheel. They also want someone who can navigate rough waters. Tory hasn't shown that he can do that. And unless he can, he'll be another nice guy who couldn't quite measure up.
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3 comments:
Wrong.Wrong.Wrong. The thug Harris couldn't be elected dog catcher. Tory has the right idea. Unless you're from the rube planet of Alberta surely you can see a trend?
In Britain the New Conservative Party is more liberal than Labour. In Canada Harper is taking his party in the same direction. Howard in Australia is in trouble. EVERYBODY acknowledges climate change as a problem now. The left is rising the right is going down with Bush.
I love elections where if one party wins I win...and if the other party wins I win too!!!!!
And of course you guys lose-lose....
And Maxime Bernier for federal party leader before Harper drives us into the ground.
Is it bad to discuss these things here?
I think we must, we can only sit idly by so long, he has certainly not proven himself
Bernier is a brilliant choice for our future. We need to do this before Dion gets his majority.
Friday, July 07, 2006
Behind Bars, Before The Bar
Believe it or not, even the Bar has some standards for joining it. Something about not bringing the profession into disrepute.
Stop snickering.
Even the Quebec Bar didn't want this guy, but may be forced to take him:
He left the country after being repeatedly denied enrolment in the Quebec bar admission course because he stabbed his mother to death when he was younger. But Sébastien Brousseau has finally prevailed in his decade-long campaign for the right to become a lawyer.
The Quebec bar says it will not appeal a decision this spring by a panel of judges who ruled that Mr. Brousseau is sufficiently rehabilitated that he can practise law without hurting the reputation of the legal profession.
....
Mr. Brousseau was 21 when he killed his mother, Micheline Sévigny, in their home near Montreal, stabbing her 40 times. According to psychiatric assessments cited in court documents, his parents had separated and he lived with his mother, often feuding with her.
The night of Nov. 16, 1990, according to his account to a psychiatrist, Mr. Brousseau got into an argument with his mother and she swung at him with a baseball bat.
He said he remembered defending himself with a kitchen knife but did not recall how often he stabbed her. He said that she was in agony when he came to his senses, so he slit her throat to end her suffering.
Despite the lurid details of the slaying, the ruling noted that the Crown changed the indictment against him from murder to manslaughter, on the advice of psychiatric experts.
After being paroled in 1992, Mr. Brousseau attended law school. By the time of his fourth attempt to register in the bar exam school in 2001, he had obtained a pardon.
A pardon may wipe away a criminal record and all of the usual consequences of having one, but it cannot undo a man's past.
The absence of a criminal record is neither sufficient nor necessary proof of good character, according to just about any Bar.
Had Brousseau's past offences been fraud or any other breach of trust, the Bar would never have given him a chance. Even if he had only faced civil judgments for same, and never any criminal indictments.
Had his crime been drunk driving, the Bar wouldn't have cared as long as he hadn't killed or maimed anyone.
In any event, his may be a hollow victory yet. The Bar can close ranks against anyone with a firmness and discipline even the Mob would envy. He may have to be admitted to bar school, but no firm is obligated to hire him for articles, without which he cannot be called.
And even if he should find and complete articles, he will still have to demonstrate that he is of good character, to the Bar's satisfaction, again.
And it will find any excuse to keep him out, now.
But even if, despite all this, he is admitted, no firm in Quebec will obligated to hire him, nor the Bar help him hang out his own shingle.
When the Bar wants you out, it will move heaven and earth to keep you out.
Source: Globe and Mail
Posted by Loyalist at 7:10 AM
67 comments:
Anonymous said...
Thanks. I will try to prove you wrong. By the way, I already did my exams and have a job.
Sebastien Brousseau.
7/11/2006 11:57 PM
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