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ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Prime Minister Stephen Harper hinted Wednesday that Chinese President Hu Jintao cancelled an upcoming meeting in Vietnam because he intended to question China’s human rights record, specifically the case of Chinese Canadian Huseyin Celil, who is in jail in China. Harper, traveling to the Asia-Pacific Economic Conference, said Canada values its trade and business relationship with China, but “I don’t think Canadians want us to sell out important Canadian values. They don’t want us to sell out to the almighty dollar.” The prime minister added that they are open to meeting with other governments, but only unconditionally....

...Canada is, along with the United States, Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand, part of the Anglosphere. The Anglosphere comprises the best nations, with the best records for goodness of any major powers in recorded history. Though imperfect, we've collectively been on the right side of more issues, created better societies, and liberated more people from tyranny than anyone else ever. (Example: Nearly every former British colony today has a democratic government. No other European power can say that---not even close.) Not to put too fine a point on it---we're just better. Not genetically, for goodness sake---but culturally. Who knows,...

PRIME Minister Stephen Harper warned today that would unilaterally extend the deployment of Canadian troops in Afghanistan by one year if Parliament failed to pass a motion to extend the mission longer. "This government is not in a position to simply walk away or to run away," Mr Harper told the House of Commons. "If we do not get a mandate (from) Parliament to extend for two years and beyond, we will proceed cautiously with a one-year extension." Thereafter, Mr Harper said he would ask voters for a mandate to extend it further. Canadian MPs will vote today in what...

The Harper steamroller CBC's The National By Rex Murphy May 5 2006 I'm not much good with numbers. Accountants with their hawk and scrutinous eyes terrify me. I'd rather chew sand than read a financial document. Even I can see the Conservative budget is all of a piece with the Harper machine's determination to press a hard, clear agenda onto the Canadian electorate. This is not a minority government we're dealing with. It's a steamroller. Actually we could have and did expect the GST cuts and the child allowance allotments, the budget plums. These, after all, are part of the...

OTTAWA -- The ethics commissioner said Prime Minister Stephen Harper broke no rules when he persuaded David Emerson to switch parties and join the cabinet. Bernard Shapiro said he's satisfied that Harper didn't offer Emerson any special inducements to leave the Liberals and join the Tory cabinet. Shapiro said he accepts Emerson's explanation that he thought he could best serve his constituents from the cabinet table, rather than the opposition benches. Three opposition MPs asked Shapiro to investigate whether Harper violated the rules when he invited Emerson, a former Liberal minister, to join his cabinet. Shapiro said that while no...

A federal judge proclaimed last week that in the final years of Canada's Chretien government, untold millions of dollars were channeled from the treasury into the bank accounts of the federal Liberal Party, several Liberal-friendly advertising agencies and a few senior party backroom gentry in Montreal. His report was viewed with alarm by the media, the politicians and the pundits – by everybody, it seemed, except the Canadian people. They knew that already. They had gathered it conclusively from a report of the auditor-general three years ago, and reaffirmed it in the testimony of the sordid parade of Liberal insiders...

Right Hon. Paul Martin (Prime Minister, Lib.) (for the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada) moved that Bill C-38, an act respecting certain aspects of legal capacity for marriage for civil purposes, be read the second time and referred to a committee. He said: Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of Bill C-38, the Civil Marriage Act. I rise in support of a Canada in which liberties are safeguarded, rights are protected and the people of this land are treated as equals under the law. [English] This is an important day. The attention of our nation is...