Be careful of Pequistes bearing gifts!
Jean-Francois Lisée and Language Minister Diane de Courcy are imploring Anglos to chill out. They write, in an open letter in the Gazette, that it was never their intention to reduce our rights. They say they will table a new and improved bill 14, with necessary changes made because they listened to us.
Franchement.
Bill 14 Lite would be nothing more than a lame attempt at political maneuvering designed to win CAQ and public support for the bill.
The only way we can all play together, Mr Lisée, is to dump it entirely. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
Columnist's attitude is a joke
Is Sugar Sammy the funniest guy in Quebec?
Sugar Sammy Is a Montreal Anglo who has totally immersed himself in the French-speaking cultural milieu. So much so that Sammy was recognized as the best comedian in the province.
But not everybody thinks he’s so funny.
There's a bit of a backlash happening because here in Quebec Anglos sometimes are best seen but not heard.
Mathieu Bock-Coté, an Anglo baiter and ethnic nationalist of the first order, writes in the Journal de Montreal that Sammy’s humour insults Quebecers and Anglos must have psychological problems.
If this is the future of Quebec, he writes, there is no future.
Well Monsieur Bock-Coté, if that's not your future, you can leave anytime.
Or at least learn to take a joke.
Unreasonable attitude to reasonable accommodation
This brings us to the parking crisis in Cote-des-Neiges.
It’s been the borough’s practice for decades not to impose certain street parking restrictions on Jewish holidays but PQ minister Bernard Drainville was almost breathless this week when he heard about it.
“If you start having parking regulations for a certain religious community and a different parking regulation for another religious community how can we live together in the same society if we have different parking regulations for different religions?,” asked Drainville.
This is an unwarranted attack on Montreal’s Jewish population by someone who should really know better.
But this is about politics, and appealing to a certain voter base in Quebec who like their daily bread French and white.
This is a minor parking issue that bothers no one.
The subtext here is that the observant Jews are the authors of their own misfortune and should take the blame for such an egregious insult toward the majority.
Sad and scary.
Coderre's PR disaster
If you just dropped in from another planet, you might think Denis Coderre was a crime boss instead of someone seeking to be chief magistrate of Montreal.
You have to wonder who handled the disaster of his campaign launch with social housing boneheads and activists in masks and scarfs surrounding him.
Coderre is now the favourite to win but there's a long road ahead before the cold winds of November sweep across our city.
Coderre will have to earn the confidence of Montrealers whose confidence has been shaken to the bone.
The first day though, was one to forget.
