Tag Archives: Canada

News

Jennifer Lynch flies to Ireland to ask lawyers to help her to crush free speech

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Story from the Vancouver Sun. (H/T Big Blue Wave)

Jennifer Lynch is the Chief Censor at the Canadian Human Rights Commission. She flew off to Dublin, Ireland on the Canadian taxpayer’s dime to tell the lawyers of the left-wing Canadian Bar Association that she needed their help. I guess that suppressing the free speech of ordinary Canadians is hard work, and people are so mean to her – always complaining about her travel expenses and the six figure legal fees they have to pay when they are put on trial for hurting the feelings of thin-skinned Canadian leftists.

Excerpt:

Jennifer Lynch, head of the Canadian Human Rights Commission since 2007, told the Canadian Bar Association’s annual meeting that opponents of rights bodies have successfully created a “chill” that makes it difficult for anyone to defend those bodies without also becoming a target…

She urged them to write “letters to correct misinformation,” encourage other experts to participate in the debate and promote public education of the role of rights commissions and tribunals in the justice system.

How Human Rights Commissions hurt religious liberty

Learn more about the Canadian free speech crisis

Link round-up

Blazing Cat Fur has a round-up of links here:

Ezra Levant: They’re laughing at you in Dublin Jennifer
Mark Steyn: Jennifer Lynch- please send reinforcements
Freedom Through Truth: Fire When Ready
Deborah Gyapong: Jennifer Lynch’s Dublin whine tour
Moose & Squirrel: Lynching the help of lawyers
Ferreras J Dissenting: Jennifer Lynch isn’t just a Cry Baby
Jay Currie: Jennifer Lynch is Pathetic
Scaramouche – Lynch Looks to Lawyers
Denyse O’Leary: Give the CHRCs something worthwhile to do
Five Feet of Fury: Make the life of Canada’s Censor in Chief miserable
Dr. Roy: Lynch calls for lawyers to defend thought police
Scary Fundamentalist: Late to the Party

Here is a breakdown of some of the costs of her globe-hopping from Miss Nixon. (H/T Blazing Cat Fur)

News

Canadians moving to allow more private options for health care

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Story from the Associate Press. (H/T Newsbusters)

Excerpt:

The incoming president of the Canadian Medical Association says this country’s health-care system is sick and doctors need to develop a plan to cure it.

Dr. Anne Doig says patients are getting less than optimal care and she adds that physicians from across the country – who will gather in Saskatoon on Sunday for their annual meeting – recognize that changes must be made.

“We all agree that the system is imploding, we all agree that things are more precarious than perhaps Canadians realize,” Doing said in an interview with The Canadian Press. […]

[Dr. Robert Ouellet, the current president of the CMA] has been saying since his return that “a health-care revolution has passed us by,” that it’s possible to make wait lists disappear while maintaining universal coverage and “that competition should be welcomed, not feared.”

In other words, Ouellet believes there could be a role for private health-care delivery within the public system.

And here is the most important part:

“(Canadians) have to understand that the system that we have right now – if it keeps on going without change – is not sustainable,” said Doig.

“They have to look at the evidence that’s being presented and will be presented at (the meeting) and realize what Canada’s doctors are trying to tell you, that you can get better care than what you’re getting and we all have to participate in the discussion around how do we do that and of course how do we pay for it.”

My most recent post on the problems of health care in Canada is here.

Further study

Learn more about health care with my previous posts on health care:

If the Canadians are running away from single-payer, why are we running towards it?

News

How is government-run health care working out in Canada?

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Political Map of Canada
Political Map of Canada

This Vancouver Sun story was linked at Unambigously Ambidextrous and the Heritage Foundation. (H/T DJ)

Excerpt:

Dr. Brian Brodie, president of the BC Medical Association, called the proposed surgical cuts “a nightmare.”

“Why would you begin your cost-cutting measures on medically necessary surgery? I just can’t think of a worse place,” Brodie said.

According to the leaked document, Vancouver Coastal — which oversees the budget for Vancouver General and St. Paul’s hospitals, among other health-care facilities — is looking to close nearly a quarter of its operating rooms starting in September and to cut 6,250 surgeries, including 24 per cent of cases scheduled from September to March and 10 per cent of all medically necessary elective procedures this fiscal year.

Now consider this story about elderly patients and euthaaisia, from the Washington Examiner. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

“I recommend that you seriously consider a “do not resuscitate” order, said the seemingly nice man in the white coat. “He has diminishing quality of life. And, if he has an infection or illness, we can provide comfort care for him.”

[…]An emergency room doctor made similar comments. She suggested that I did not need to feed him now that he was unable to feed himself–in essence suggesting euthanasia for a man who simply had an infection treatable with antibiotics.

[…]Despite the persistent infection, Dad was discharged because his temperature fell one-tenth of one point below the Medicare guideline for hospitalization. I begged the doctor to let him stay, citing his Blue Cross Blue Shield coverage. The doctor insisted that Medicare ruled and that my father was safer outside of the hospital where he would be less likely to contract a secondary infection.

I did what most people do; I trusted the authoritative person in the white coat. It was a fatal mistake. The lingering infection led to complications that killed him a few weeks later.

Rationing of care to the elderly is already taking place in government-run programs like Medicare. I don’t think we should expand government control any further.

This is the problem with making health care “free”. Everybody wants to use it. So demand is HIGH. But the government doesn’t have unlimited money, so supply is LOW. That’s why there is a SHORTAGE. And that’s why waiting lists, rationing, euthanasia and service cuts are needed.