Though Stephen Harper tries to play the role of the enlightened one, he has always been pretty homophobic. You can hear him addressing this anti-gay crowd, speaking of 'our family values'. When he was with the Northern Foundation a lot of their literature was visceral anti-gay rhetoric.
He also hinted of his views when he was interviewed on Drew Marshall's Christian radio program in 2005. When discussing his father's switch from the United Church to the Presbyterians, he pointedly noted that Marshall’s evangelical audience would get his drift. What he was referring to was the 1988 decision by the United Church General Council to approve the ordination of homosexuals.
In 2007 Conservative candidate Mark Warner was removed by the party after first trying to "block him from participating in a Star forum on poverty earlier in the year, and pointedly removing from his campaign literature a reference to the 2006 International conference on AIDS in Toronto" -- which Mr. Warner decided to attend, but which Mr. Harper had refused to attend.
In 1985 when Stockwell Day was running in the Alberta provincial election, he declared his campaign a "moral crusade," and railed against homosexuality and pornography. Later, when he was the federal Alliance leader, he refused to send condolences to the Palestinian people on the death of President Yassir Arafat because party insider and former George Bush speechwriter, David Frum, claimed that Arafat had died of AIDS.
Homophobia in this party is well documented, but it goes beyond simple discrimination, to deep seated beliefs that homosexuality is a sin. Harper's new Chief of Staff Darrel Reid once compared hate crime laws protecting gays and lesbians to Nazi tyranny.
So is it any surprise that we learn this week that the government has scrapped plans to build an HIV vaccine processing plant in Canada? With Stockwell Day now head of the Treasury, there is a clear message to Canadians. Our constitution has been replaced with the Old Testament, and all of the rules have changed.
This is so incredibly sad I don't even know where to begin. If we don't get these guys out of office soon, our country as we know it will be gone. And with Parliament shut down we can't even fight these decisions. I want my country back and I want an election now!
Winnipeg HIV vaccine plant quietly shelved:
Researchers at Winnipeg's International Centre for Infectious Diseases were confident just a few months ago that they would soon play a key role in the global fight against HIV, and in the development of vaccines to combat other diseases.
Welcome to the world of Stockwell Day and Darrel Reid.
Kind of a cute video of former Canadian Olympian, Mark Tewksbury, an openly gay athlete; discussing the Reformers and Stephen Harper. How did we let this happen?
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