Political penetration

pol-it-i-cal pen-e-tra-tion: A successful insertion by a social conservative within the Conservative Party of Canada.

Thats not my description, its Globe and Mail columnist Gloria Galloway's from May 27th, 2005. You can find a copy of the globe article here at ValleySceptic blog

This was discussed by bloggers quite abit in May this year.

Gallowy begins her column... "Christian activists have secured Conservative nominations in clusters of ridings from Vancouver to Halifax -- a political penetration that has occurred even as the party tries to distance itself from hard-line social conservatism."

Lifesite News, a Conservative Christian news service reported on her column this way ...

"Naming the new candidates from several ridings across Canada – including Andrew House in Halifax, Rakesh Khosla in Halifax West, Paul Francis in Sackville-Eastern Shore, Darrel Reid in Richmond, B.C., Cindy Silver in North Vancouver, and Dr. Rondo Thomas in Ajax – Galloway described their successes as a “political penetration” by socially conservative Christians."

Someone not in on the happy side of the penetration and thus with a bit of a sour taste left over had this to say after losing to a social conservative supported by Tristan Emmanuel, one of Canada's leading Evangelical political activists, "The difficulty, from a party perspective, is that it begins to hijack the other agendas that parties have,"Ross Haynes speaking to the Globe and Mail after losing the Conservative nomination in Halifax to one of three "Christian, pro-family people". Haynes added, "Candidates who are running on single issues such as opposition to same-sex marriage "probably can't get elected because they certainly don't represent any mainstream population view."

Darrel Reid is past president of Focus on the Family, Cindy Silver was the executive director of the Christian Legal Fellowship and Dr. Rondo Thomas works for the Canada Christian College which is run by none other than Dr. Charles McVety also a Director of Defend Marriage Coalition.

Tristan Emmanuel who operates a centre called, "Equipping Christians for the Public Square Centre" refused to tell the Globe and Mail how successful his group was in securing nominations. He stated, "(He) is reluctant to say how many adherents have obtained Conservative nominations because he is afraid the news media will portray the campaign as the infiltration of the party by "right-wing fanatics."

But "it's happening everywhere, especially in urban ridings and in Ontario... Even in Toronto we have incredible people from the immigrant community who are stepping up to the plate who are just awesome candidates and sincere Christians."

None of this is new news. We all are aware of the effort by social conservatives to win nominations in the Conservative party. We can add Ron Cannon, the Conservative candidate in Kelowna Lake-Country to the list as well.

Can anyone add to the list? Is there a list anywhere else? I would like to add that I see nothing wrong with social conservatives running for political office. My one worry is that they manage to operate within the secular context of decision making. What it usually does tell me is that they will vote against same-sex marriage, abortion and if they follow the American example, they will also be into cutting welfare, supporting private schools over public and watch out for more private health care.

That scares me...


See article by Derek Richards at Words without Walls and CBC's Canada’s Evangelical movement: political awakening

Canada, Human Rights, Christian Right, Conservative Party of Canada, Stephen Harper