Free Speech For Some (read 'for Culture of Death')

It must be really aggravating to some that they have as yet not found a way to apply the 'gag' law to bloggers...

Calgary Herald(my new favourite):

"...The Friends, a group of mostly retired geologists who reject the conventional wisdom that mankind is exclusively responsible for global warming, aired radio ads criticizing the Kyoto Protocol in the weeks preceding the 2006 election. They paid for them through a University of Calgary research account over which Cooper had signing authority, but were not registered with Elections Canada as a third-party advertiser.

In other words, they were charged with violating Canada's gag law, a pernicious piece of Chretien-era legislation designed to limit interest groups from advocating their cause during an election. Politics at election time, it seems, is much too important to let amateurs dabble. Heaven forbid that religious groups should make a point about the morality of legislation, trade unions raise worker issues -- free trade, perhaps? -- or that anybody challenge the global warming consensus.

The law deserves to go, but sadly it is still on the books.

This is surprising. Prime Minister Stephen Harper was himself a victim of it during his time as president of the National Citizens Coalition. In those days, he was highly vocal on the subject, and conservatives had great expectations this heavy-handed restriction to free speech would be among the first pieces of legislative nonsense on his hit list.

We will assume he was waiting for a majority, as none of the opposition parties are anxious to extend citizen participation and therefore support the law. We will also assume that if he gets it, he will scrap the law. It would be good to hear him say so, though.."

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Yep, there are a few things I'd like to hear Harper 'say something' about too. We're giving him the benefit of the doubt, since we know where the 'other guys' stand.

It's a BIG DOUBT. UPDATE

And why isn't he addressing the one-sidedness of Elections Canada in how they prosecute this law?