The Immigrants’ Canada

Chateauguay Dept: The riding was left vacant after former public security minister Jacques Dupuis left it this summer after 12 years, according to CTV. "I'm not taking anything for granted," said Fournier, adding that while those issues loom large, it's issues like housing and education his voters tell him they care about and monday is the second day of advanced polling before next Monday's by-election in the Liberal stronghold of St. Laurent, where Justice Minister Jean Marc Fournier is running in hopes of winning it again for the Liberals. Fournier, who served in the Chateauguay riding for 13 years, is the front-runner in the Sept. 13 by-election, but Fournier's campaign coincides with some difficult issues for the Liberals' image, including allegations of corruption, slumping poll numbers and the Bastarache commission. As reported in the news.
@t poll numbers, bastarache

Gun Control Laws Dept: Of course, every immigrant’s motivations are intensely personal. However, extensive research by Susan Hardwick, a professor at the University of Oregon, shows that the over-arching inspiration for moving north of the border is an idealistic one, according to Globe And Mail. In British Columbia, for example, Prof. Hardwick found that most recent arrivals from the U.S. reported their primary reason for leaving was the idea that Canada is a safe refuge for liberal thinkers and idealists and these invisible immigrants – there are one million, more than at any time since the Vietnam War – are a unique group. According to a leading American geographer, they come to Canada not for economic opportunities, but for the country’s set of values. Americans are attracted by their view of Canada’s more liberal culture. That includes support for a universal public health-care system, positive attitudes toward gays and lesbians, gun control laws and multiculturalism. As reported in the news.
@t susan hardwick, liberal thinkers

Sri Lankan Dept: Public Safety Minister Vic Toews is expected to take a list of choices before cabinet next week, according to The Star. The commitment to moving forward comes as the Tories attempt to regain control of the national agenda before heading into what could be a combative fall session and oTTAWA The Conservatives are whittling down their legal options to go after rogue boats filled with migrants trying to get to Canada. The government has been floating the idea of new laws since the August arrival of a boat packed with Sri Lankan migrants. As reported in the news.
@t legal options, national agenda

Canadian Politician Dept: The film, Travelling Light: A Journey with Ujjal Dosanjh, will premiere in New Delhi on Thursday during a visit by Mr. Dosanjh to his native country. Filmmaker Meera Dewan said the 46-minute production was inspired by the Canadian politician’s willingness to stand against extremism in his own community of Sikhs. “What struck me about him when I lived briefly in Vancouver is his courage,” Ms. Dewan said. “His has been the lone voice of sanity, speaking up against Sikh violence still brewing there.”, according to Globe And Mail. Many disagree with Mr. Dosanjh. In 1985, a man smashed his head with an iron bar after he criticized the notion of an independent Sikh homeland. He received death threats earlier this year after giving an interview to The in which he lamented the “politically correct” regime of multiculturalism that allows radicalism to fester in Canada’s immigrant groups and the rejection of violence as a political tool has been a key feature of Mr. Dosanjh’s career, which included stints as premier of British Columbia and federal health minister, and is a central idea in a new documentary about his life. Mr. Dosanjh acknowledges that “there was a time when I was younger that I did believe violence could bring about lasting political change.” In fact, after immigrating to Canada during his student years, he hung around for a time with Marxist-Leninists. But it was their espousal of violence that ultimately led him to take a different path. As reported in the news.
@t ujjal dosanjh, premier of british columbia

Immigration Consultants Dept: In an interview with The , Mr. Kenney said he will also ask Indian officials to consider whether they may need a bill similar to one introduced in Parliament this June – the Cracking Down on Crooked Consultants Act – which would make it a crime for a person who is not a lawyer, notary or member of a recognized association of immigration consultants to accept a fee for providing immigration advice, according to Globe And Mail. “There’s a pretty sophisticated industry that produces these kinds of documents.’’ Immigration Minister Jason Kenney will spend three days this week in India, where he will ask officials to focus more law-enforcement resources and share more information with Canada on “immigration fraudsters’’ who often charge applicants thousands of dollars and use fake documents to bolster their cases. “In Chandigarh, in our consulate there, we have a wall of shame’ with some examples of the thousands of fraudulent documents that are generated by this industry – fake marriage certificates, death certificates, travel itineraries, banking statements, you name it,” Mr. Kenney said. As reported in the news.
@t globe and mail, immigration advice

Oral Hygiene Dept: On Sunday, Maryam Amin, the division head of pediatric dentistry, took her mobile clinic to the Millwoods Sri Guru Singh Sabha Society to give free exams to preschool-aged kids of South Asian descent. While the youngsters were in the chair the researcher interviewed parents to better understand how social influences and cultural beliefs affect oral hygiene practices, according to CTV. Following the exam parents were given information on local dentists and health benefits and a University of Alberta professor in the faculty of medicine and dentistry is taking an innovative approach to improve the quality of early childhood health in immigrant communities. The purpose of the project is to improve the quality of oral health for children and to eliminate barriers immigrant families may perceive. As reported in the news.
@t pediatric dentistry, hygiene practices

Irish Immigrants Dept: Marie Connolly was baptized at Notre Dame Cathedral Basilica in Ottawa in 1853, Chicago retiree-turned-historian Rick Barrett has concluded after thee years of research, according to CBC. Her family were Irish immigrants and her father worked as a butcher in what is now called the Byward Market and an amateur historian in Chicago thinks the first U.S. policewoman was born and raised in Ottawa. He found her birth certificate buried among stacks of paper locked in a vault in the church's basement. As reported in the news.
@t rick barrett, amateur historian

Oil Industry Dept: Delorie Walsh one of the first female land agents in the province's oil industry filed a complaint in 1991 claiming she had been treated unfairly by her employer, Mobil Oil Canada, now ExxonMobil, according to CBC. Then, after being fired from the oil company in 1995, Walsh filed another complaint, alleging the company let her go on the unjust grounds of retaliation. Complaints dismissed An Alberta woman has been awarded $650,000 as part of a 19-year human rights battle the longest running complaint in the province's history. Walsh alleged she was paid less than her male counterparts, was passed over for promotions and was harassed by her co-workers. As reported in the news.
@t delorie, exxonmobil

Vancouver Airport Dept: The Tamils were escorted into safe harbour, given food, medical attention, a place to sleep and seemingly prompt processing by Immigration authorities, presumably with an interpreter assisting, according to Calgary Herald. Seems to me that if he had been dealt with as promptly as the Tamils, Dziekanski would be alive and the RCMP might never have been involved and re: "Lack of charges leads to red carpet for refugees," Don Martin, Opinion, Sept. 2. I've always wondered why the Vancouver Airport Authority and Immigration Canada didn't render the same assistance to Robert Dziekanski, a legal visitor, before he blew his cool and was Tasered. As reported in the news.
@t calgary herald, immigration canada

Former Engineering Dept: But the more this good life is repositioned and redefined as material goods, where objects have become more intrinsically human than people themselves, the faster the liberal arts have fallen out of favour – in the academy, the economy and society at large, where a doctor, an X-ray technician and a former engineering student are now charged with wanting to bomb us into oblivion, according to Globe And Mail. As the culture of homegrown terrorism was coming into being, she undertook a study of the Indian province of Gujarat, where religious violence and an ambitious modernization of the educational system starkly exist side by side. “Gujarat is a classic place,” she says, “where schools have cut out all trace of critical thinking and the humanities, and placed a relentless focus on the technical training of people going into engineering and computer science and so on. I do think that is conducive to a culture where you blindly follow authority and respond to peer pressure. Lacking the empathy developed by a more critical kind of education, these tendencies reign unopposed.” We don't do this instinctively – it takes training. Animals might be collective by nature, but they are hierarchical in their attitudes toward self-preservation and exceedingly narrow in their range of sympathetic feelings. Authoritarian cultures and regimes exploit this us-and-them survival impulse to their advantage, but a democracy glories in achieving the best version yet of the good life thanks to what are traditionally called liberal arts – the broad-based critical education that freed people from all-knowing authority and allowed them to see both themselves and others as fully human. Clearly jihadists are the sworn enemies of liberal democracy, but can there be a connection between the disappearance of the liberal arts and the rise of homegrown terrorism? Or put another way, can we deter violence by teaching young people to think more clearly and compassionately than they now do in a technology-obsessed society where democracy is too often defined by its unthinking excesses? Prof. Nussbaum believes so. As reported in the news.
@t sworn enemies, indian province