and the band played on..

In the House of Commons - October 19, 2007

ORAL QUESTIONS

Privacy

Hon. Garth Turner (Halton, Lib.): Turner.G@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, millions of Canadians may have had their privacy breached and their trust misused by members of this House. This is due to CIMS, a database run by the Conservative Party, which each party MP has installed in his or her office.

Unknown to millions of constituents, personal information is routinely fed into this database, which experts are calling a 'chilling' breach of ethics. Will the Prime Minister do the ethical thing and release the names of Canadians in this database, giving voters the opportunity, if they wish, to opt out?"

Hon. Peter Van Loan (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform, CPC): VanLoan.P@parl.gc.ca

"Again, Mr. Speaker, I appeal to you in that I fail to see what a political party database has to do with government business.

What I can assure the member of is that no department of this government makes use of that database. It is a party database. I do not understand his concern."

Hon. Garth Turner (Halton, Lib.): Turner.G@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, I will answer that. When the Canadian Press asked the Conservatives if citizens could see their file in the party's secret database, the party asked what the specific reason for that would be.

I will answer that. This is their information. It belongs to them. This is their privacy that the government party has no reason to breach. These are their own members of Parliament elected to serve-"

The Deputy Speaker: Blaikie.B@parl.gc.ca

"The hon. government House leader."

Hon. Peter Van Loan (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform, CPC):

"Mr. Speaker, I will say it again: it is a political party database. How political parties run their campaigns in terms of databases has nothing to do with the administration of government and no department uses it. No minister's office uses it that I know of."

Mr. Paul Szabo (Mississauga South, Lib.): Szabo.P@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, the government has not denied that it obtains and exploits personal information for political purposes. The Conservatives have created a national database that records personal information which was confidentially provided to the Government of Canada.

What Canadians want to hear from the government is that the person elected to represent them is not using the confidential personal information to fundraise for political purposes. Will the Prime Minister cease this unethical practice and stop violating the privacy of Canadians?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC): Kenney.J@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, is this not special? The Liberals, who have made an art out of communicating with different communities based on publicly available lists, are now shocked that someone else should do the same thing.

I can see why the member for Thornhill is not asking these questions any more. She very kindly sent out Rosh Hashanah greetings to her constituents: 'SHANA TOVA My best wishes for a year filled with peace, good health and happiness'. That was from the MP from Thornhill.

I also got a notice yesterday that members of the Chinese community in her constituency were receiving Chinese New Year's greetings.

Would those members just please stop the hypocrisy?"

Mr. Paul Szabo (Mississauga South, Lib.):

"Mr. Speaker, invasion of privacy and ethnic or religious profiling is simply unacceptable. If someone contacts an MP with a CPP or passport problem, they do not expect to land up on a political mailing list. For example, we saw this last year when the member for Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke was caught collecting information from passport applications to send out birthday cards.

This type of unethical behaviour is inexcusable and alarms Canadians, who expect their members to represent them, not exploit them. Will the Prime Minister do the honourable thing and stop this unethical practice now?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC):

"Mr. Speaker, only a Liberal could think it is unethical to wish somebody a happy New Year.

Here I have a letter from the co-presidents of the Canadian Jewish Congress, who say:

We commend the Prime Minister for this thoughtful gesture. We are heartened that our elected officials make the effort to extend good wishes to members of other faith communities, communities that make a vibrant contribution to the diverse multicultural fabric of Canada.

That is what the communities are saying, but perhaps that member would like to ask his colleague from Thornhill why she was sending Chinese New Year's greetings to members of the Chinese community in her riding and where she came up with those lists. Probably from the same place we did."

Cdn Parliminet on Rosh Hashana Greetings!

In the House of Commons - October 17, 2007


ORAL QUESTIONS

Holiday Greetings

Mrs. Susan Kadis (Thornhill, Lib.): Kadis.S@parl.gc.ca


"Mr. Speaker, a number of my constituents were recipients of mysterious Rosh Hashanah greetings from the Prime Minister. It was a mystery because they had no idea they were on such a government mailing list. One constituent, Michelle Kofman, was one of those Canadians. She wants to know two things: how does the Prime Minister know her religious affiliation and how did his office get her personal information?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC): Kenney.J@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, all members of this House I suspect, certainly all party leaders, send holiday greetings around the time of Christmas to millions of Canadians on publicly available lists. We make no apology for doing the same thing with Canada's Jewish community to celebrate their important high holidays as well.

We believe, unlike the Liberals, in multiculturalism and celebrating all of our cultural communities' holidays and important dates."

Mrs. Susan Kadis (Thornhill, Lib.):

"Mr. Speaker, Ms. Kofman and Canadians deserve a full and complete answer from the government. The Privacy Commissioner has been asked to investigate, one of three investigations involving the Prime Minister and the Conservative government.

Why is the government compiling lists of Canadians according to their religious and ethnic affiliation?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC):


"Mr. Speaker, I promise the member opposite that if she sends me a Christmas card, I am not going to launch an investigation.

The fact of the matter is that Canada is a beautiful mosaic made up of people of different cultural and religious backgrounds. This government believes in sharing greetings with Canadians from all of those backgrounds at important times in different cultural and religious communities. We make no apology for doing so."
In the House of Commons - October 18, 2007





ORAL QUESTIONS



Holiday Greetings

Mrs. Susan Kadis (Thornhill, Lib.): Kadis.S@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, let us not forget there is a third investigation underway. This one involves the Prime Minister's Office and a breach of privacy, an allegation that should send chills down the spines of all Canadians.

My constituents, Mrs. Faulkner and Mrs. Donin, want an explanation. Both of their names mysteriously appeared on the PMO list to receive a Rosh Hashanah greeting, but neither is Jewish. They want to know how they were identified with a religious affiliation they do not hold and why there is such a list.

Calls to the PMO went unanswered, so today I ask the Prime Minister again if he will explain how his office compiled the lists?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC): Kenney.J@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, I am sorry to hear that she did not enter into the happiness of the Rosh Hashanah new year, but I can quote from the executive vice-president of the Canadian Jewish Congress, who said, 'I don't think there is anything nefarious here whatsoever' and that most people in the community would appreciate this.

Frank Dimant of B'nai Brith Canada said, 'I really do think there's a very sinister motivation by individuals who are asking for an examination of where these lists came from or how they were accumulated'. What is her sinister motivation?

Before she answers that, I would like her to tell us whether she has ever sent out Rosh Hashanah cards, or other Liberals have, to members of the Jewish community."

Mrs. Susan Kadis (Thornhill, Lib.):

"Mr. Speaker, Canadians expect their privacy to be protected, not exploited.

The Prime Minister's Office has dodged calls on questions on this issue from my constituents. I have had to write a letter to the Privacy Commissioner at the request of one of my constituents for an answer, but they want to hear from the Prime Minister. How did their names get placed on the list? The PMO could not have received their names from public lists as they are not constituents of the Jewish faith.

How did the PMO access their private information? Will the Prime Minister explain how the list was compiled?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC):

"Mr. Speaker, I understand why the member did not want to answer my question. Perhaps it is because this morning I received an email from a constituent of hers, Mr. Arthur Burke, and I would be happy to table this. It says:

Dear Sir:

I received a Rosh Hashanah card from my MP, [the MP for Thornhill]. I don't know from where she received my address or how she knew my religious affiliation. I would be very appreciative if you might be able to look into this

We know that Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish new year, but it seems for that member it is the high holiday for hypocrisy."


Hon. Garth Turner (Halton, Lib.): Turner.G@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, the Secretary of State for-"

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

The Speaker:

"Order, please. I know members on both sides seem to disagree on this point, but we have to have some order in the House so we can proceed with the discussion.

The hon. member for Halton has the floor now."

Hon. Garth Turner:

"Mr. Speaker, now that the Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity) has admitted that the government used private information to send unsolicited mail to Canadians, will he now apologize and, better still, tell us where that information came from? Are Conservative members of Parliament collecting that from their constituents, yes or no?"

Hon. Jason Kenney (Secretary of State (Multiculturalism and Canadian Identity), CPC):

"Mr. Speaker, that proves once again that those members cannot think on their feet or retool during question period.

The fact is, like all members of Parliament, we have a program to provide holiday greetings. Most MPs perhaps over there only do it at Christmastime, but because we believe in multiculturalism we share holiday greetings on important festivities for all communities based on publicly available lists of information.

Those members should be apologizing for saying one thing and doing another."

Hon. Garth Turner (Halton, Lib.):

"Mr. Speaker, we are here to represent people. We are in our ridings to serve people.

Conservative members of Parliament have a party database in their offices in which is entered the private information of individual Canadians. Now he has just admitted that it is used.

Will the Prime Minister apologize for an unethical invasion of Canadians' privacy?"

Hon. Peter Van Loan (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform, CPC): VanLoan.P@parl.gc.ca

"Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Halton has always said that ethics are very important to him.

He talks today about the importance of representing people, including the people of Halton. That is why he said on February 10, 2006, 'I think anyone who crosses the floor should go back to the people for ratification'. That is one of his ethical standards and I know he wants to follow that ethical standard today."

CJLS, extra lives?

Hello family and friends,

Today the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards will be discussing, among other things, the permissibility of choosing which embryos to implant in a woman during intra vitro fertilization based on their genetic make-up. There's a technical name for it that I can't recall right now. The rabbinical school heard a presentation on it this morning and it was quite fascinating. I then received this e-mail to a listserv that I am on. We live a brave new world.

I hope all is well.

Adam


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September 25, 2007

Dear Jewish Friends and Family,

L'shana tova! I hope you all had fulfilling and inspirational high holidays, along with great food. I feel so lucky to have so much to share with Shelly, my children, new grandson, extended family, and friends.

That brings me to the purpose of this e-mail note. As you know, my work primarily involves helping people build their family when they have difficulty in doing so. I have one situation in which I need your help.

I have a Jewish couple who have built their family with fertility treatments involving in vitro fertilization. They were happily successful early on. Now they have a number of cryopreserved (frozen) embryos remaining stored in a laboratory.

This couple is finished building their family. But they want to give life to their other embryos with another family, rather than donating them for research. I handle this type of embryo donation/adoption case, but I don't have a Jewish couple right now, who are working on building their family in this way.

The donor couple would prefer a Jewish family. The "family" could be a single person, a traditional couple, or a gay couple. They could be childless, or already have a child or children and want to build their family more. The embryo transfer procedure could be to the intended mother herself, or to a surrogate (gestational carrier) for the intended parent(s). The family could live in the USA, or Israel, or anywhere for that matter. I would handle the secular law and process and consult their Rabbi on his or her view of the Halacha pertaining to the case.

I didn't know a better way than contacting all of you to sort of put the word out about this opportunity. Thank you and I hope you all have a healthy, happy, and prosperous new year.

With warm regards,

Jimmy

The irony of shmita: making the poorest poorer

by YehuditBrachah · Monday, October 8th, 2007

Exodus 23:10-11: “Six years you shall sow your land and gather in its produce, but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, that the poor of your people may eat; and what they leave, the beasts of the field may eat. In like manner you shall do with your vineyard and your olive grove.”

This year is a shmita year, described above. It only applies in Eretz Yisrael. In modern Israel, the teleology of the shmita year (arguably to benefit the poor) seems to crash up against the halachic practice of the law: some of the country’s poorest are having to pay exorbitant prices for produce. The New York Times today has an article on it. [Note: heter mechira is the ruling that allows eating produce grown and harvested on the shmita year. See Kol Ra’ash Gadol’s recent pieces on the controversy of the rulings.]

The chief rabbinate, which controls the vital kosher certificates for food, declared this year that heter mechira was the rule, but it also said rabbis of local cities and towns could decide for themselves. The announcement resulted in confusion, anger, an unresolved suit before the Supreme Court, a rabbinical revolt and a declaration by the agriculture minister, Shalom Simhon, that he will forbid imports that compete with Israeli produce.

In Jerusalem, Israel’s poorest city, heter mechira is not supposed to be recognized. But while the Supreme Court is deciding on a petition against the chief rabbinate’s ruling, some supermarkets are selling produce under the heter mechira dispensation.

Since the ultra-Orthodox make up at least 30 percent of the city’s population, shops in areas like Geula and Mea Shearim are paying prices two or three times higher than normal for cucumbers and tomatoes grown only by non-Jews in the West Bank. The community is already among the poorest in Jerusalem, but the rulings of their rabbis matter far more to them than money.

Aaron Feuerstein

What is business' responsibility to workers?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YcWLXBXaD8

ps. what's with the background music?

To Talk, or Not To Talk

October 3, 2007 Edition > Section: Opinion > Printer-Friendly Version
To Talk, or Not To Talk
BY DAVID ELLENSON
http://www.nysun.com/article/63835
While the appearances President Ahmadinejad made at both Columbia University and the United Nations dominated press reports last week, there was another meeting at a chapel across from the General Assembly that the Iranian president held last week — one that got reported in a way that needs correction in the dialog in this city.
Organized by Mennonite and Quaker religious leaders in response to a request made by the Iranian delegation to the United Nations, this meeting of 140 religious leaders with Mr. Ahmadinejad was described by the New York Times as "a friendly, even warm exchange with Christian leaders from the United States and Canada convinced that dialogue is the only way to prevent war."
The Times further reported that the Mennonite and Quaker organizers of the meeting were sorry that they were unable to find a Jewish representative to attend this "interfaith dialogue" because "those invited declined because they could not win support from Jewish organizations."
In an age where many routinely conjure up conspiratorial images of "The Israel Lobby," I find this description of Jewish non-attendance on the basis of a failure to "win support from Jewish organizations" incomplete and simplistic at best and disturbing and sinister at worst. The reasons for such Jewish refusal were not the result of some imagined institutional discipline, and I feel obliged as one who was approached and declined to attend this meeting to offer an explanation as to why I, and no doubt others, instinctively rejected an invitation to " interfaith dialogue" with Mr. Ahmadinejad.
A negative response to interfaith dialogue runs counter to my nature and beliefs. As a liberal rabbi schooled on the works of the famed Jewish philosopher of dialogue Martin Buber, I believe that the fundamental nature of reality is social. We need relationship. Indeed, people are made fully "human" because we are capable of entering into dialogic relationship with other persons. As Buber wrote, "All real living is meeting."
Buber believed that there was a value in persons talking to one another in and of itself apart from any "result" achieved. To refuse to dialogue with and encounter another as a member of a people or a religion generally permits a caricature of the other to emerge unobstructed or softened by the reality of personal address and encounter. For all these reasons, my natural proclivity is always to engage in inter-religious exchange. A negative response to interfaith dialogue runs counter to my nature and beliefs, both secular and religious.
Yet Buber has also taught me that — for all his openness — preconditions must always be placed on such dialogical exchange. Buber wrote that in genuine dialogue each partner must begin by fully affirming the personhood of the other. If such affirmation of and respect for the other is not forthcoming, then propaganda, not dialogue, emerges. As Buber himself phrases it, "The manipulator of ‘propaganda' is possessed by the lust to make use of men."
Mr. Ahmadinejad was not interested in real conversation, nor was he interested into entering into authentic relationship with those religious leaders who met with him.
Instead, he was concerned that news of this meeting, which the invitation had stated would be "absolutely private," be made public. In this way, Mr. Ahmadinejad exploited these persons of faith for his own political ends.
His obscene denial of the Holocaust and his exploitation of the anti-Zionist Jews known as Neturei Karta at his Holocaust Denial Conference in Teheran last year, his sworn aim to destroy the State of Israel, and the specter of his nuclear ambitions all cut at the heart of my own historical memory and experience as a Jew as well as the Jewish ethical imperative to value and affirm life.
This "interfaith conversation" had nothing to do with encounter. It had everything to do with manipulation. The words of Martin Buber, and the distinction he draws between "propaganda" and "dialogue" — and not any institutional pressures — explain why I refused to encounter Mr. Ahmadinejad in what was billed as a "face to face interfaith conversation," but was in reality only a smokescreen for exploitation.
Rabbi Ellenson is president of Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.

Jewish "Intactivists" In U.S. Stop Circumcising

Jewish "Intactivists" In U.S. Stop Circumcising


By REUTERS
Published: October 3, 2007
Filed at 10:57 a.m. ET

NEW YORK (Reuters) - In most respects, Michelle Chernikoff Anderson is a rabbi's dream congregant. She sings in the choir and takes classes at her synagogue.
But, like an increasing number of Jews in the United States, she has decided not to circumcise her son, rejecting the traditional notion that it is a Biblically prescribed sign of the Jewish relationship with God.
"I see circumcision as a blood ritual that I can let go of," said Anderson, who lives in Southern California.
Her position is in harmony with a wider decline in circumcision in the United States.
About 85 percent of all American boy babies were circumcised at its peak in 1965, according to a National Opinion Research Center survey.
By 2004, it had fallen to about 57 percent, reflecting the increased birth rate among Hispanics, who are less likely to circumcise their sons, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows.
"Circumcision's out of the closet. It's not a taboo subject anymore. People are talking about it. Parents are talking about it," said Dr. Mark Reiss, a synagogue-goer in the San Francisco area and executive vice president of Doctors Opposing Circumcision.
Among those talking about it is a gaggle of young, male, Jewish commentators. This year alone, in books, online and in magazines, authors Neal Pollack, Sam Apple, Jonathan Safran Foer and Shalom Auslander have all fretted about doing to their sons what was done to them. The title of Auslander's memoir, scheduled for publication in October, is "Foreskin's Lament."
Circumcision is even before the courts. In November, the Oregon Supreme Court will rule on whether a convert to Judaism can force his 12-year-old son to undergo the procedure.
"INTACTIVIST"
Reiss, who calls himself an "intactivist," maintains a roster of 50 officiants who conduct nonsurgical alternatives to the bris, traditionally performed on the eighth day after a boy's birth. He says he fields as many as five queries weekly from conflicted parents.
At the Jewish Circumcision Resource Center in Boston, director Ron Goldman maintains a list of 400 names of Jews who refuse to circumcise their sons.
Reiss and Goldman question circumcision's purported health benefits, such as lower rates of penile cancer and the recent reports that it can halve men's risk of HIV infection.
"Circumcision has always been the panacea for the disease of the decade," Reiss said, noting that non-Jews first adopted it to reduce masturbation, thought to cause syphilis.
Also, they think any benefits are outweighed by the risks, which include shock from blood loss, antibiotic-resistant infections and even death.
Such incidents are extremely rare, said Dr. Jack Swanson of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Between two and six infant boys experience complications per thousand circumcisions, but those are usually minor bleeding or treatable infections.
Under a trained professional, the risk to the child is "infinitesimal," said Conservative Rabbi Joel Roth.
"Jews have given their lives for circumcision more than for any other (religious obligation) and that's why it has become so defining an act of membership," said Roth.
"SQUEAMISH"
Islam has no comparable movement against circumcision, said Batool Al-Toma of the New Muslims Project. Most converts undergo the procedure, although Islam waives the requirement, said University of Colorado religion professor Frederick Denny.
Michael Young, a convert to Islam, had his infant son circumcised but did not undergo the procedure himself. "I'm very squeamish and hate the thought of it," he said.
Judaism is divided on the matter of converts. Reform Judaism does not require it, Orthodox and Conservative movements do.
Circumcision's detractors also claim the procedure reduces sexual sensation and endurance.
"I haven't attempted foreskin restoration surgery, but I've thought about it," said Matthew Taylor, an active Bay Area Jew who resents his own circumcision and who preaches on the evils of the practice to Jewish friends .
But author Julius Lester, who became a Reform convert to Judaism in 1982 and underwent circumcision to feel Jewish, said the procedure also boosted his sex life.
"Circumcised there are far more subtle sensations, and staying power is much, much longer," he said. "From a sexual point of view, I wish I'd gotten circumcised many years earlier."
Anderson is torn between a desire to protect her son's privacy and what she thinks may be a religious duty to discuss her decision not to circumcise.
"Hey, it's my son's penis, it's not mine to discuss in the same way it's not mine to cut. But at the same time, I feel like maybe I have an obligation to share."
The writer, Helen Chernikoff, is not related to Michelle Chernikoff Anderson.