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A Decision That Smells Like Rotten Fish

Is this where we?re headed? Where President Obama will take us if he can?

The ?this? to which I refer is a recent decision by the Supreme Court of Canada holding that ?[g]iving exclusive commercial fishing licences to aboriginal groups? does not discriminate against non-aboriginal fishermen.

Why not? Well, because it?s ?affirmative action.?

In its decision, the court acknowledged the program ?has a detrimental effect on non-aboriginal commercial fishers? and ?that the disadvantage is related to racial differences,? but found the program falls under the section of the charter [the the Charter of Rights and Freedoms] that protects affirmative action programs from constitutional challenges....

The charter section in question ? section 15(2) ? gives governments the right to implement a program that ?has as its object the amelioration of conditions of disadvantaged individuals or groups?

Our Constitution, to the dismay of liberals and Democrats, is much more old-fashioned, speaking as it does not of ?amelioration? but of the quaint concept of ?equal protection,? a concept that its adherents (now pretty much limited to rubes, small towners, most Republicans, many Democrats who are not elected office holders or party officials, and most people not employed by a university or in positions of responsibility in large corporations or the media) revere because it derives from the even more fundamental core value that every individual American has a right to be treated by the state ?without regard? to race, creed, color, or national origin.

But not to worry. The libs/Dems don?t need a Canadian-style Constitution. All they need is a president who will appoint judges who will ?construe? the Constitution we have to reach a Canadian result.

ADDENDUM

A good example of a Supreme Court Justice who has no trouble reading our Constitution as though it were written in Canadian can be found here.

Full post as published by Discriminations on June 28, 2008 (boomark / email).