Juno News - LAWTON： Stop With The Social Issues Litmus Test

00:00:00.000 Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to another True North Report. My name is

00:00:04.360 Andrew Lawton, Fellow with True North, with you for the next little while in

00:00:08.640 what will be our last one of these in the month of August, which has no

00:00:14.920 significance other than the fact that we're all going to be very miserable

00:00:17.880 when September arrives and we realize that the summer has unfortunately wasted

00:00:23.040 away like Justin Trudeau's promise to balance the budget. The two are just as

00:00:28.200 real right now, which is to say non-existent, but there is going to be a

00:00:32.160 lot to talk about in the fall though, so I'm not as much lamenting the loss of

00:00:37.080 summer as usual because it's election season, which is really like a big old

00:00:41.160 summer vacation for any of us freaks that are addicted to politics. So you always

00:00:45.780 have to find the silver lining, as they say. In any case, thank you very much for

00:00:49.700 tuning in. A lot to talk about today, but I want to start off with a bit of a

00:00:54.520 question, and if you're tuning in you can chime in on this in the comments section.

00:00:58.480 We're gonna have lots of discussion going hopefully, and that is what do you

00:01:02.380 think the biggest issue facing Canadians is this election? Now this is one of

00:01:08.680 those things like your teacher might have told you when you're in your in your

00:01:11.800 classroom years ago, there's no right answer, there's no wrong answer, but there

00:01:15.820 are common answers. And I would venture a guess to say that if I were to go and

00:01:20.400 talk to 100 people right now and say what do you care about the most this

00:01:25.200 election, I could probably tell you with a fair bit of accuracy what people are

00:01:31.740 going to say. And I can say this because I did this about a year ago when I was a

00:01:36.240 candidate in a provincial election. Now obviously the issues are slightly

00:01:39.780 different provincially compared to federally, but I think the way that

00:01:43.520 people approach elections is pretty much the same. They care about cost of living,

00:01:49.140 they care about taxes, they care about, I mean accountability and transparency or

00:01:54.900 evergreen topics. The federal elections specifically you might get people

00:01:59.580 citing specific scandals like SNC-Lavalin or the treatment of Jody Wilson-Raybould,

00:02:04.620 but the issues that people care about the most in Canada in politics in

00:02:09.880 elections are the issues that affect people the most. And 95 times out of 100 I'm

00:02:16.620 going to say these are pocketbook issues. And you get people that of course are

00:02:20.700 going to bring their own specific concerns to the table and this is always

00:02:25.360 going to happen. And you know what, one of the great things about living in a

00:02:28.860 democracy is that you can decide whatever issue it is that will become the chief

00:02:33.300 criterion for you to cast your ballot. If you want to cast your ballot on tax

00:02:37.120 policy you can, if you want to cast your ballot on environmental policy you can, and if

00:02:42.120 you want to cast your ballot on horse racing in the West Indies you might be

00:02:46.380 looking for a candidate that shares your position for a while, but you can do

00:02:50.320 that, you can make that case. But the reason I bring this up is to say that most

00:02:55.320 Canadians do not care about social issues. And when I say don't care I mean it 1.00

00:03:01.560 doesn't even come up one way or another. When people do care about it, typically

00:03:06.300 it's because they're socially conservative. It's a lot more common for a

00:03:10.320 social conservative say I you know I care about abortion than it is for someone 0.83

00:03:14.020 who is not pro-life or someone who's pro-choice. But people just don't care

00:03:19.500 about these issues. Which is why it makes it all the more curious that the

00:03:24.000 Liberals insist on talking about pretty much only those issues this week. And

00:03:28.980 there's an understandable reason for that that we'll talk about. But I wanted to

00:03:33.780 preface this discussion by saying think of the issues that you care about, think

00:03:37.780 of how you rank the issues you care about, and for the most part abortion is

00:03:42.720 not going to be the top concern, even less so gay marriage. Gay marriage is not 0.96

00:03:47.280 going to be the top issue for Canadian voters. It's been settled, it was settled

00:03:51.600 15 years ago. Even a conservative, remember this, even a conservative government in

00:03:57.780 2006 had the question about whether it was worth reopening the debate and that

00:04:03.060 party that government under Stephen Harbour opted against it. So there is not an

00:04:07.920 appetite to deal with these things and that's there's a reason for that because

00:04:13.060 by and large it just isn't the top priority. But the Liberals are doing what

00:04:18.240 is stunningly known as wedge politics which is trying to drive a wedge between

00:04:23.580 Andrew Scheer and the electorate or trying to drive a wedge between Andrew Scheer and

00:04:28.560 perhaps some of Andrew Scheer's own supporters, which is why the Liberals only

00:04:32.940 want to talk about social issues. They own this thing. The Justin Trudeau is the

00:04:37.200 most unabashedly pro-choice Prime Minister Canada's ever had. He's one of the most

00:04:42.840 ostentatiously pro-LGBT. He wants to talk about nothing other than social issues 1.00

00:04:48.960 because if the election is going to be fought on those, he's pretty confident that

00:04:52.500 he's going to win because you know why not. But the reason this is an important

00:04:57.400 topic is because Andrew Scheer has not ever ever brought these issues up. He's

00:05:02.940 responded to questions about them. Obviously he's a social conservative, he's

00:05:07.340 pro-life, he's got a personal personal moral objection to same-sex marriage, but he

00:05:12.600 has never made those the focal point of his campaign, not even in the leadership. Now

00:05:17.740 when he was seeking the leadership, there were a lot of pro-life people that sought

00:05:21.760 him out. He was endorsed by pro-life groups, he had a lot of pro-life support,

00:05:27.200 he didn't hide that part of him, but he has never been the one to bring it up. So it

00:05:31.780 is fascinating that the Liberals insist on pegging him with this hidden agenda on

00:05:36.340 an issue that he doesn't really seem to care about as a politician, even if he does

00:05:42.120 care about it as a personal Catholic and as a personal social conservative.

00:05:47.740 So let's go back to a few days ago, how this all started out. Ralph Goodale, the Liberal

00:05:52.580 Minister, found this 15-year-old clip of Andrew Scheer talking in the House of

00:05:57.100 Commons when the one of the same-sex marriage discussions was going on. It was the

00:06:01.840 bill that ultimately was passed that made same-sex marriage the law nationwide in

00:06:06.820 Canada. And Andrew Scheer, at the time a Conservative member of Parliament, very

00:06:12.340 devout Catholic, he's still both of those things. Andrew Scheer got up and he spoke

00:06:16.920 against it. He spoke, you know, it was a bit of an awkward speech, there's no denying

00:06:21.480 that, but he was talking about how he was against same-sex marriage for the

00:06:25.680 reason that marriage is predominantly for the purpose of procreation. Now, this is

00:06:31.860 not an argument that necessarily holds up if you're talking about the state role of

00:06:36.420 marriage, if you're talking about the spiritual role of marriage, I think it's a

00:06:39.440 very valid point. But he did what pretty much almost half of the members of

00:06:46.000 Parliament did in that vote, which is to vote against it. And by the way, there

00:06:51.920 were a couple of Conservative members of Parliament who voted for gay marriage, and

00:06:56.180 there were 30-some-odd Liberals who voted against it. So this was not a bill that was

00:07:02.480 a landslide victory. This was a bill that was very close and had a number of Liberals, mostly

00:07:08.880 Catholic Liberals, voting against it. And Ralph Goodale himself, despite posting this

00:07:15.880 video of Andrew Scheer, neglected to mention that he voted against gay marriage twice, in

00:07:21.240 99, and I believe the one before that was in 95. Now, the 1995 and 1999 votes on gay 0.76

00:07:28.360 marriage in Canada were votes in which a Liberal-majority government, both times, a

00:07:35.120 Liberal-majority government under Jean Chrétien voted against. This is, I think,

00:07:41.740 something that is very important here. And, you know, Jean Chrétien oftentimes is held up

00:07:48.580 as this sort of dynastic figure in Canadian politics. He had a majority government, he had

00:07:55.900 good caucus control, he had good caucus discipline, and even in spite of that, two times there

00:08:02.900 were votes by the Liberals against legalizing gay marriage. So when Ralph Goodale, who was

00:08:10.440 one of the ones to vote against it, is saying, oh, how dare this man be against gay marriage

00:08:15.380 15 years ago, he neglects to mention that he was just a few years before that. Now, I'm not

00:08:21.460 even talking about whether it's good or bad policy. I mean, I've been clear on this. I'm

00:08:26.740 a Christian, but I do have a firm belief that it's not the role of the state to enforce

00:08:31.720 a religious definition of any policy issue, and marriage is an example of that. So I support

00:08:37.720 where the law is right now, which is that there is a complete legal equality for a gay couple

00:08:42.740 or a straight couple when it comes to marriage. But the reason I'm bringing this up is because

00:08:48.760 there are lots of Canadians who don't believe that, and that's absolutely fine. We have a country

00:08:54.980 right now where if you look at how people are identifying themselves in the census, two-thirds

00:09:02.200 of the country is Christian. Two-thirds of the country is Christian. Now, are they practicing?

00:09:09.280 I'm not going to make that claim. I know religion's on the decline. Are they devout? Again, we know

00:09:15.660 religion's on the decline. But two-thirds of the country, when asked how they identify, they say

00:09:21.700 they are Christians. And if you look at the denominational breakdown, and I did a short video

00:09:26.520 on this earlier in the week where I really crunched some of the numbers. If you look at the denominational

00:09:30.940 breakdown, the majority of these, about three-quarters, I think, are from denominations that have

00:09:38.040 a moral objection to gay marriage. The Catholic Church, most mainline Protestant denominations,

00:09:46.760 evangelicals. When you look outside of Christianity, you see the Muslims and Jews. Again, on paper, 0.90

00:09:54.240 most of them against gay marriage and are against abortion as well. So a majority of Canadians

00:10:00.220 identifies with a religious denomination that is in line with what Andrew Scheer was saying 15 years

00:10:08.740 ago. Now, this is important, not because I'm making the case that a majority of Canadians are anti-gay

00:10:15.780 marriage or pro-life. I'm not going to make that claim because there are lots of people that are part

00:10:20.600 of the Catholic Church that don't adhere to Catholic Orthodoxy on every issue, or people that are in the

00:10:26.400 Muslim faith that don't adhere to the fundamental teaching of Islam or what the denominations

00:10:32.720 supposedly believe. But you have the majority of the country that identifies with a religion that

00:10:39.320 believes the exact same thing that Andrew Scheer is saying that is apparently so controversial to

00:10:45.060 the liberals. And the reason this is such a dangerous belief is because right now what the liberals

00:10:51.780 have tried to do, and the media is very much included in this, the media has contributed this,

00:10:57.240 is to make it that a belief that is shared by even a quarter, let's lowball to the nth degree,

00:11:04.720 a belief shared by even a quarter of Canadians should not be represented by more than zero percent

00:11:10.800 of politicians. The belief is that Andrew Scheer is unfit to be a political leader because he believes

00:11:17.720 something even if that belief is on side with where most religions are in Canada and where a great

00:11:24.620 many Canadians are, certainly in the millions. And again, this isn't even talking about whether it's

00:11:29.800 right or wrong. I don't want to get into a theological discussion, and I don't even want to get into

00:11:34.700 a theoretical discussion about it. I'm just talking about the numbers, the liberals, and this is when

00:11:40.400 we talk about the elites, what we're talking about here. The liberals want to make it so that they

00:11:46.040 determine the minority liberal position is the only one that can be represented in political

00:11:53.300 institutions, in the House of Commons, in the media narrative, even if it is a minority when you

00:11:59.340 poll Canadians at large. And this idea of the elite versus the ordinary is such a huge dynamic,

00:12:09.000 and the liberals have been doing this since Justin Trudeau was the liberal leader. You may remember

00:12:13.560 he banned anyone who was pro-life from running as a liberal candidate. So it wasn't enough to say,

00:12:19.820 look, we're a pro-choice party, we're a party that supports abortion, rah, rah, rah, women's rights, 1.00

00:12:25.320 we're going to march in the parade. If you didn't believe that 100%, you could not run for the party.

00:12:31.320 You didn't even get to be in politics. Now, there were a few liberals that voted against gay marriage

00:12:36.900 that, you know, just shut their mouth on it and went along with it and said, yes, we're now going to

00:12:41.440 support the liberals. But this was what Justin Trudeau was saying. So I want to talk a little bit

00:12:48.660 more about where Andrew Scheer, I think, has gone wrong here. And I don't blame Andrew Scheer for it

00:12:55.860 because he fell into a trap that pretty much every conservative falls into, which is thinking that

00:13:01.420 there's anything you can say that will satiate the social issues litmus test. There isn't. The liberals

00:13:08.440 are always going to put this litmus test down. They're going to say, oh, well, what does this

00:13:12.040 person think about this? And why is he not marching in the parade? And what would he say

00:13:15.960 if someone introduced this bill? And, you know, what do you think about this? And no one ever punches

00:13:20.740 back. No one ever punches back. You know, and here's a great example. So Justin Trudeau claims to be a

00:13:26.800 Catholic. He claims to be a Catholic. He claims to be a very devout Catholic. And if you read his book,

00:13:32.780 and I don't know, in fairness, I don't even know if Justin Trudeau has read his own book. But

00:13:35.980 if you read his book, he talks about how his faith is deeply important to him.

00:13:40.980 Why is no one in the media asking Justin Trudeau, hey, how do you go to a church that says abortion

00:13:46.600 is a grave sin? Why is no one asking that? And, you know, it's funny, Michael Corrin wrote this

00:13:54.140 laughable piece. I thought it was comedy. It's not comedy. He means this seriously. He wrote a piece

00:13:58.920 in McLean's where he says, this is the question to ask Andrew Scheer about abortion. And he says,

00:14:04.520 his religion says abortion is homicide and a grave sin. Can we believe Scheer when he says that given

00:14:10.700 the power to stop it, he simply won't do so? Well, Justin Trudeau says he's a Catholic. So why

00:14:17.920 should that same question not be put towards Justin Trudeau? You identify with a religion. Now,

00:14:23.720 in fact, no one buys Justin Trudeau as religious. That's the answer to the question. But I'm just

00:14:29.280 following this through to its natural end. If we insist on putting a social issues litmus test

00:14:35.040 based on our politicians religious identity, why are we not putting it on Justin Trudeau? Why are we

00:14:41.680 not putting it on Jagmeet Singh, for example? He's a Sikh. The Sikh faith has a very traditional view

00:14:48.220 of marriage and abortion as well. Why does Jagmeet Singh not have to answer questions about what his faith

00:14:55.300 position is on social issues? And the reason is that this is just used against conservatives. This

00:15:02.920 is the greatest tool to use against conservatives to try to drive a wedge between them and the voters.

00:15:09.560 Now, I do think that it backfires in a lot of ways, just as I think that the summer jobs program

00:15:14.140 fiasco backfired on the liberals because they realized that a lot of people are kind of okay with

00:15:20.140 a church group having a day camp or a church group having some summer internship program. And I think

00:15:26.600 that it backfired and we saw a lot of people that weren't really political get up in arms about it.

00:15:33.220 But there is still this idea that the liberals are trying to drive, which is that if Andrew Scheer

00:15:39.800 has ever opened a Bible in his life, he's unfit to be a political leader. And this is not just

00:15:46.520 offensive to Catholics, it's not just offensive to Christians, it should be offensive to anyone of 1.00

00:15:51.500 faith in Canada, because the liberals are saying that people who have a religious belief are unfit

00:15:57.540 for public life, and by extension, are unfit to even open their mouths in public. This is the sense

00:16:03.360 that the liberals are trying to drive about this. And if you look at some of the headlines, I'll read

00:16:08.080 one from Huffington Post, I think it was this morning, Andrew Scheer tries to clarify Tory's stance

00:16:14.100 on abortion, but creates more confusion. And I, this was by Althea Raj, who, by the way,

00:16:20.300 she's going to be one of the moderators of the leadership debates. I like Althea, I get along

00:16:24.920 with her. I think this was certainly a confusing piece, because she says that Andrew Scheer's Tory

00:16:33.100 stance on abortion creates more confusion. You read the article and the position is quite clear. He says,

00:16:38.140 look, I'm never going to interfere with a private member's ability to vote on matters of conscience,

00:16:44.660 but the Conservative Party is not going to talk about gay marriage, is not going to talk about

00:16:49.060 abortion. This is an identical position to the one that Stephen Harper had, where the party itself

00:16:55.000 had a 50-foot pole approach to social issues, but the small number of people in the party that were

00:17:01.080 going to be vocal on social issues were allowed to. And we saw a couple of pro-life bills that were

00:17:06.180 introduced from Stephen Woodworth, who wanted to at least have a discussion about it, and the Unborn

00:17:12.300 Victims of Crime Act, which, because of the pro-choice lobby, ended up getting sabotaged, even though it was

00:17:18.480 a very important bill that would have done a lot of good and had nothing to do with abortion. It was a

00:17:23.960 pro-life bill in the sense that it was actually about respect for human life. But all of this is to say

00:17:30.600 that Andrew Scheer made, I think, a big mistake today, where he had a press conference, and the

00:17:37.620 sole purpose was basically to let the media beat him up about his social issues, positions. That was

00:17:42.900 it. Because there have been a few days where everyone online has been saying, oh, Andrew Scheer is going

00:17:47.560 to, you know, reach into your uterus and put a big Conservative stamp on it, and say this is now the

00:17:52.640 property of the Conservative Party of Canada. I exaggerate, but not really. That's pretty close to the tone

00:17:58.820 of media coverage. So after a few days of being on the defensive, Andrew Scheer says, okay, we're

00:18:05.960 going to have a press conference, and we're going to once and for all put this to bed, and say this

00:18:09.740 is my position. But there is no earthly reason to suspect this will put the issue to bed, when this

00:18:17.260 is a position he's already told people probably a dozen times. What he said today is no different

00:18:23.360 than what he's been saying since he became the leader, which is that the party is not going to

00:18:28.200 introduce this legislation, but we're going to have conscience rights for individual members.

00:18:32.760 But that's not enough. That's not enough for the critics. That's not enough for the media. That's not

00:18:38.200 enough for the Liberals. And I'm sorry, but if Andrew Scheer were to come out today, and he were to have

00:18:44.020 had this press conference and say, you know, everyone, I'm a devout Catholic. I think abortion's a sin. 1.00

00:18:49.340 And if I'm Prime Minister, I'm going to ban it and send women who have abortions to the stockades 1.00

00:18:55.460 for public humiliation and then criminal charges. The criticism he gets would be identical to what

00:19:02.920 it is saying he won't touch it. And this is the thing, a little bit of an exaggeration, sure,

00:19:08.720 but not much, because the people are going to hate him no matter what. The people that are demanding he

00:19:15.120 refute all of these, you know, statements he may have made 15 years ago, they're not buying into it.

00:19:21.820 When he says we're not going to touch it, they're not satisfied, because they're convinced that his

00:19:26.200 position actually is the one that I just articulated, that he's going to lock women up who 0.97

00:19:30.680 have abortions, and he's going to go back to Leviticus and replace the criminal code with it. 0.78

00:19:36.340 So this isn't to say that he should do that. But conservatives need to be less afraid of what

00:19:42.580 people are going to think about their positions, because the criticism is going to be there no matter

00:19:48.500 what. So we should be a lot less focused on that and more focused on this is what we stand for,

00:19:54.380 this is who we are. Now, to be clear, I don't think the Conservative Party of Canada is a pro-life

00:19:59.660 party. I think it's a party that has some pro-life people in it. I think it's a party that also has

00:20:05.140 pro-choice people in it. The Liberals used to be that way. They used to be a party that was

00:20:10.640 predominantly pro-choice, but had pro-life people in it. Now it's a pro-choice party.

00:20:15.180 But there's nothing wrong with saying, you know what, there are millions of Canadians who are

00:20:20.060 pro-choice, and there are millions of Canadians who are pro-life. And as a political party,

00:20:24.960 we're going to make sure that we're there to represent all of them. What is wrong with saying

00:20:30.220 that as a party? And to be honest, I think you'd go a lot further by saying that, because at least it

00:20:36.800 would be authentic. It's very inauthentic now when you get Conservatives who are coasting to victory

00:20:43.820 in leadership races and nomination races because of pro-life support. Groups like Right Now and the

00:20:50.260 Campaign Life Coalition, which can mobilize volunteers, votes, and money for pro-life candidates.

00:20:56.160 Andrew Scheer, by the way, was the beneficiary of this. The only reason Andrew Scheer is the leader

00:21:00.700 of the Conservatives right now is because of pro-life support. Remember, Brad Trost's support went to

00:21:08.480 Andrew Scheer almost exclusively in like the, you know, whenever Brad Trost was eliminated. So that

00:21:14.400 would be, he was fourth place. So whatever round of balloting that was, I think the ninth round of

00:21:18.720 counting or something. Doug Ford in Ontario. Only the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of

00:21:24.540 Ontario right now because of the social conservative support that came from Tanya Granik-Allen. When she 0.97

00:21:30.540 was eliminated, almost all of that support went to Doug Ford. So Andrew Scheer is not the conservative

00:21:38.280 leader without pro-life support. Everyone knows it. Pro-life people know it and pro-choice people know

00:21:43.440 it. So when he says, oh, I'm not talking about these, no, people don't buy it. People don't buy it because

00:21:49.520 everyone assumes there had to have been some wink wink at some point with a pro-life group. And we know

00:21:56.400 this for a fact. Andrew Scheer was interviewed by RightNow, a great organization that does a lot of

00:22:01.500 good work. And they ended up endorsing him. They gave him, I think it was an A plus or it might have

00:22:06.860 been an A ranking. And the reason is because he said, look, you know, my personal beliefs, I'm Catholic.

00:22:12.560 The Conservative Party won't introduce as a party legislation on this, but we'll let individual

00:22:17.940 members do it. And I do defend Andrew Scheer that that position has not changed. That position has not

00:22:25.440 changed since he was running in the leadership. It hasn't changed since he was a member of the

00:22:29.700 Conservative caucus. And it hasn't changed now that he's the leader. What has changed is that there is

00:22:36.360 a lot more fear now. The closer the election gets, the greater the sensitivities are about these social

00:22:42.160 issues. But the Conservatives know, because it happens all the time, that the Liberals are going to

00:22:48.400 drive at these issues. They're going to impose this social litmus test. And what ends up happening is

00:22:55.440 what ends up happening without fail is the Conservatives are so desperate to tell people

00:23:01.220 that I'm not a social Conservative, that they alienate the supporters of theirs who are. And they

00:23:07.320 don't win the support of the people that think it's off putting for there to be a social Conservative

00:23:11.820 in a position of leadership. So you end up only losing support. And I think that clinging to your

00:23:17.180 conscience is going to go a long way. Now, again, Andrew Scheer is not a theocrat. He's legitimately not a

00:23:24.060 person that wants to get in because he wants to legislate on social issues. But saying unabashedly,

00:23:29.740 look, everyone knows my stance on it. I'm a Catholic. And I go to church. And I believe what

00:23:33.600 my church says. And everyone knows where I am on this personally. And yes, my party is not there.

00:23:39.000 But individual members who want to be can be. But instead, it seems like he's apologizing and

00:23:45.520 backtracking and is unsure of his footing because he knows the attacks are coming.

00:23:49.820 And I want to make it clear, I'm not actually attacking Andrew Scheer right here. I'm not

00:23:56.360 because I think that he's going down this road that all Conservatives do. And I get it. I get why

00:24:03.380 you don't want the media to be attacking you as though you are the theocrat, as though you are,

00:24:07.620 you know, like the Canadian equivalent of like the Comanus with the Ayatollah's blue book,

00:24:13.100 or was it green? It was green book or blue book. I think it was actually published with both.

00:24:16.500 But nevertheless, this is where Andrew Scheer is right now. So I mean, Corey writes,

00:24:23.500 why wouldn't he seek all the votes he can get? This is the whole point, though, you can't be

00:24:28.440 everything to everyone. When you try to win everyone's support, you end up losing a lot of

00:24:33.680 support. Because there are going to be people whose deal breaker is someone else's vote winning.

00:24:40.420 I mean, that's the thing. So there are lots of people that will say, yes, I'll vote for you if

00:24:44.060 you're pro-life. And you say, oh, well, I'm pro-life. And then there are going to be people that say,

00:24:47.540 I'm not going to vote for you because you're pro-life. There's no middle ground between these

00:24:51.720 people. You have to pick one. And that's it. And when in doubt, you should always be yourself.

00:24:58.680 Dave writes, all he had to say was that it was a different time and half the Liberals voted against

00:25:03.700 it. He looks weak, letting them be bullies. Well, I don't like the it was a different time answer

00:25:09.700 if his position hasn't changed. And by the way, I'm convinced that Andrew Scheer does believe

00:25:14.780 the same thing that he believed then. And there was a great interview he did on, I think it was

00:25:21.380 with Rosie Barton. It was on power and politics. He had either just become the conservative leader

00:25:26.800 or he was a leadership candidate. So I can't remember the timing. But she asks about this,

00:25:33.560 you know, do you personally believe in same thing? And this is 2017. This is not 15 years ago.

00:25:38.280 She says, you know, yes, you're not going to touch it. We agree. We accept. But do you personally

00:25:42.660 believe in same sex marriage? And he kind of whispers and looks down and says, I do not.

00:25:48.900 And I think it was so quiet. I'm not even sure that Rosie Barton heard it. And if you look in the

00:25:54.720 clip, it even says, like, you know, turn your volume way up. But he is a man of integrity. And I know

00:26:00.440 that there are going to be a lot of PPC supporters that don't like that. But I believe that he genuinely

00:26:06.060 has his values, has his beliefs, has his morals, and sticks to them. Whether I agree with everything

00:26:11.500 he says and does politically is a different story. But I believe that he is a man of integrity.

00:26:16.860 And what I genuinely want people to say is, I don't need to agree with his beliefs,

00:26:24.280 his religious beliefs, his social issues beliefs, to say, maybe I would vote for him. And this is not

00:26:30.040 an endorsement of him. It should be like that with any politics, with any politician. But again,

00:26:35.280 why is the media not asking Justin Trudeau what his Catholicism means for his belief? Why are they

00:26:40.820 not asking Jagmeet Singh? I mean, this is a big one, because Jagmeet Singh is untested. He's a new

00:26:46.040 leader. Because no one wants to seem anti-Sikh. No one wants to seem racist. You better believe that if

00:26:52.920 there were a party leader right now who were a Muslim, no one in the media would dare ask about 1.00

00:26:59.120 their beliefs on issues for which the Muslim faith has a position that runs counter to Canada's liberal

00:27:05.020 sensibilities. It just would not happen. So the way around this is either A, to enforce this equally,

00:27:11.880 to enforce this evenly, or to say, hey, maybe we can back off the social litmus test, accept that there

00:27:18.120 are Canadians of all stripes, of all denominations, and of no faith at all, that have different beliefs

00:27:23.980 on these religious and social questions. And we can't accept that 100% of our politicians will be

00:27:31.260 in alignment with one third of the electorate just because the liberals say so. And that's what

00:27:37.320 they're doing here. They are, this is the very definition of elite. This is the very definition of

00:27:42.680 elite. They are trying to put their beliefs above yours, regardless of what yours are, to say,

00:27:47.780 we know better than you, we're smarter than you, and we are more morally pure than you.

00:27:53.200 And they're going to continue to berate and insult people of faith because it's what they do. 1.00

00:27:58.440 We saw when Julie Payette was on the job for not less than a year, and she's saying, you know,

00:28:03.440 mocking anyone that says they have a religious belief about the origins of the world. It's an 0.76

00:28:09.640 afterthought. I mean, they don't, it's not even a conscious decision. It's just second nature to a lot of

00:28:15.240 these people in these elite positions. And that's what's lending itself to this litmus test that I've

00:28:20.280 been talking about. So the way to fight back against it is to not shuffle your feet, look down and avoid

00:28:26.680 talking about it, but to say, look, this is who I am. This is what I am. And I have, I didn't support

00:28:32.980 Michael Chong in his leadership, but I had a lot of support for Michael Chong when he said, look, I am

00:28:38.180 pro-choice, absolutely, but 100%, anyone in my party, if I'm the leader, can advance an issue of

00:28:45.620 conscience if that's what they believe. And, you know, it was a lot more truthful when he said it,

00:28:52.640 I think, because he's not a pro-life person. Whereas he was a pro-choice person that said, yes, I realize

00:28:59.480 that the conservative movement has pro-life people. Whereas what we're used to getting in politics in

00:29:04.120 Canada are pro-life politicians that are so terrified of being branded the way that they

00:29:09.540 want to be branded when they're running in a nomination battle or in a leadership race.

00:29:14.140 And that's where we are now. So you're never going to win the support of people by abandoning

00:29:18.320 who you are, but you are going to lose the support of the people that have been backing you along the

00:29:22.660 way. One note I will say on the note of principles, we are going to be as true north this election season

00:29:29.520 covering a lot of the issues the mainstream media is not. As you've seen in this little episode of

00:29:34.800 the show here, covering the issues in a perspective the mainstream media is not. We're also doing it

00:29:40.580 without the mainstream media budget. So if you can chip in and support the work that we're doing,

00:29:45.120 please do. There's a link in the description box there to support our election coverage fund.

00:29:50.400 Because we are a charity, all donations get you a nice little tax receipt. So if you don't do it out

00:29:55.800 of principle, do it out of money. But I do appreciate in advance any support you're able to offer.

00:30:00.720 We'll talk to you next week. Thank you everyone for True North. Thank you. God bless and good day.

Juno News - August 29, 2019

LAWTON： Stop With The Social Issues Litmus Test

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