Segacs’s World I Know

Religious Jews will be allowed to build succahs, according to the Supreme Court of Canada, who ruled against their condo association that was trying to limit them from doing so:

In a 5-4 decision, the justices said the state can’t regulate personal religious beliefs.

“A claimant need not show some sort of objective religious obligation, requirement or precept to invoke freedom of religion,” Justice Franck Iacobucci wrote for the majority.

“It is the religious or spiritual essence of an action, not any mandatory or perceived-as-mandatory nature of its observance, that attracts protection.

“The state is in no position to be, nor should it become, the arbiter of religious dogma.”

B’nai Brith, which intervened in this case, had the following reaction:

Allan Adel, National Chair of B’nai Brith’s League for Human Rights, reacting to the news, stated: “We are satisfied with the decision of the Supreme Court, which has applied a broad interpretation to the Charter guarantee of freedom of religion and believe it to be in the best interests of all Canadians. The Succah ruling is an important, groundbreaking case that champions the cause of religious freedom in Canada and will have important ramifications well beyond the immediate facts of the case.”

Personally, I agree. While not religious, I tend to think that anyone should have the right and freedom to practice a religious belief that doesn’t harm or infringe upon the rights of someone else. The condo association had no real reason to ban the succahs, and people want to build them on their own private property. There are a lot of fine lines and open questions when it comes to religious freedoms, but this ruling makes sense.

And speaking of important court rulings today, our supreme court at home has been tackling an important issue: music downloads.

Today, the Canadian Supreme Court ruled that ISP’s don’t have to pay royalties to musicians to compensate them for the lost revenue from people downloading their music for free:

The court ruled that companies that provide access to the worldwide web are “intermediaries” who are not subject to copyright law.

[ . . . ]

“This decision is a victory for Canadians who have come to rely on the Internet as an increasingly important part of their daily lives,” said Jay Kerr-Wilson, the society’s vice-president for legal affairs.

This one, I agree with. Should we fine Canada Post for the costs of mail fraud? Should Bell Canada have to pay for people using the telephone to run scams? All the Supreme Court did today was reaffirm the principle that a technology is neutral, and that it is the responsibility of the people using it to obey the law, not of the ISPs to pay for those who don’t.

In a landmark ruling with countless political implications, the Israeli Supreme Court has ruled that a 30 km stretch of the security fence must be re-routed in order to avoid negatively affecting the quality of life of the Palestinian people living nearby.

This ruling has sent shockwaves through the Israeli, Palestinian, and international communities. The Palestinians are trumpeting it as a triumph, but they might not have been reading carefully enough:

Dahla argued that the decision to build the fence in the territories was a political rather than a security decision, and international law prohibits the military commander from making political decisions.

The justices rejected this argument.

“We examined the petitioners’ arguments and have come to the conclusion, based upon the facts before us, that the fence is motivated by security concerns,” Barak wrote.

The ruling instead spoke of the need to weigh the legitimate security concerns of Israelis against the harm that the fence’s route would cause to the daily lives of the Palestinians.

Something tells me that the Palestinian Authority doesn’t spend too much of its time weighing its policy of terrorism against the harm caused to the daily lives of Israelis.

Israeli songstress Naomi Shemer passed away at age 74 last Saturday. And Israeli folk singer Arik Lavie succumbed to illness yesterday at age 77.

Both made contributions to the cultural tapestry of Israel, particularly in the 1960s. Their voices will be missed.

David Janes has a roundup of the (mostly-disappointed) reactions of right-leaning bloggers, who chose to believe the polls and Harper’s optimism before last night. Debbye says we got the “devil we know”, and Colby Cosh says he made himself “look like an ass” while Damian Penny “feels like a rube”.

Don’t beat yourselves up too much, guys. The pollsters had it way wrong. There’s going to be a lot of questions being asked at Ipsos-Reid this morning.

Big journalism reacts as well. The Gazette thinks that the Liberals won because “fear overcame disgust”. The Globe and Mail says that Martin’s victory was only provisional, and that he should resist NDP pressures to swing too far to the left fiscally. The CBC speculates on what’s next for Martin, and questions his role as a leader. And of course, the separatist paper Le Devoir lauds the Bloc’s “remarkable victory” and says Quebecers gave the Liberals a “kick in the ass”.

Indeed. It was the Quebec Bloc sweep that cost the Liberals their majority government.

There’s a lot of speculation going on about what comes next. Will Martin manage to form a stable minority governing coalition? Or will the whole house of cards collapse in a few months? We’ll have to see.

As of 8:00am, the final results stood as follows:

135	99	19	54	0	1

Overnight, a couple of extra seats were lost from the NDP and the Libs and gained by the Tories. This puts the combined Liberals and NDP at 154 seats – or one shy of the 155 needed to form a majority.

Sweet relief!

While on most issues this will make no difference – an extra vote is generally easy enough to find – it does mean that in theory, the Conservatives and the Bloc (and one independent) can all combine to vote down a Liberal-NDP initiative.

Some of the margins were razor-thin; it will be interesting to see whether recounts affect any results.

According to a CBC poll, us Canadians don’t know much about our government.

Some interesting results of this poll: While only 84% of us could name our Prime Minister, 97% correctly named the President of the United States. And 17% of Quebecers thought that Gilles Duceppe was the leader of the opposition.

Yes, these are the people who decided tonight’s election. Sometimes I read these results and get very scared.

One last thought on the election before I go to sleep: It’s still close. Many ridings were won with squeakers, and others are still undecided. With recounts, the results may still change enough to make a difference.

At the moment, the NDP and Liberals are combining for 157 seats. Remember that 155 is needed for a majority. That’s a close enough number that any recounts, slim losses, or bolting of MPs may put the notion of a Liberal-NDP coalition in danger. Or at least one can only hope…

If Layton gets his way, his popular vote will translate into a lot more seats next time around. But I can’t imagine any of the other parties approving proportional representation. It’s not in their best interests.

And of course, if Duceppe has his way, then Quebec won’t be in Canada in time for the next federal election. And to think that in 8 ridings, the Conservatives stole enough Liberal votes to elect Bloc MPs. *Sigh*.

Update: The combined Liberal-NDP total is now down to 155 predicted seats. However it ends up, it’s going to be close.

The votes have been counted, the results are in, and the analysis begins. Before the morning papers start screaming out their opinions, here are a few thoughts to leave the evening:

Liberals: The nominal winner, Paul Martin, managed to hang onto a plurality, pulling ahead of expectations in the final days of the campaign and making a stronger showing than many people thought. He’ll keep his job. But he also lost his majority, several cabinet ministers, and a whole lot of seats. He also lost his ability to move his party rightward and bring in fiscal reforms, now that he will have to deal with the NDP. He probably has mixed feelings tonight.

Conservatives: Harper’s campaign was the biggest disappointment of the night for his supporters, and his opponents are breathing a sigh of relief. Despite peaking numbers and some crazy-talk about a Tory majority, Harper will be relegated to official opposition status yet again. Despite picking up a few seats, he’s the big loser of this election, no question.

Bloc Quebecois: Duceppe’s virtual sweep of Quebec was a big victory for Duceppe, as he brought his party to levels not seen since the Bouchard days. Predictably, he’s now claiming that this was a vote for sovereignty, and it looks like we might be facing the prospect of another referendum here in Quebec. On the other hand, Duceppe has to be at least a little disappointed that his party will not be holding the balance of power in Parliament.

NDP: Layton and his ragtag bunch of lefties are the night’s big winners. Despite getting the least number of seats of the big 4 parties, and only 15% of the popular vote, it is the NDP that will be setting the agenda in Parliament with this minority government. They will hold the balance of power, and Paul Martin will be forced to make all kinds of concessions to them in order to govern. Layton’s camp is ecstatic tonight.

Overall: In a way, this was the worst possible result. The Liberals had an opportunity to win a majority and move the party closer to the center. Instead, they will be forced to deal with the NDP. In a way, I would have almost preferred a Conservative minority, because at least then the government would’ve been powerless to do anything, propped up by the Liberals only long enough for them to regain their popularity, and then soundly defeated in an election that would restore a Liberal majority. Now, instead of more centrist ideas getting respect, we will be hearing about all of the NDP’s nutty policies getting attention. Tomorrow’s Canada is worse off than yesterday’s, and that says a lot.

So I will head off to sleep, feeling a mixture of relief and disappointment. And then I will remind myself that none of this really matters all that much anyway.