Anglicans to move against Euthanasia
According to this report in The Age, Bishop Phillip Huggins has proposed a motion to the National Synod of the Anglican Church (currently meeting in Melbourne) to oppose the moves of the Federal Labor Government to move toward allowing Euthanasia laws in the Territories. The motion includes the words: ''Our task is to protect, nurture and sustain life to the best of our ability.''
Bishop Huggins correctly points out the rather underhand way in which the Greens have acted in regard to this matter:
Bishop Huggins said: ''This was not a matter of pre-election debate. Would people have voted the same way if they knew a Labor government with the Greens would, as a near-first action, promote a conscience vote on euthanasia?
''There would be more integrity in foreshadowing this proposal before an election rather than immediately after. It should have been made plain during the election campaign. There should be a broad-based public debate.''
This point was echoed in a short letter to the editor on The Age's opinion page (not currently online), which commented that there were more than twenty Green's policies listed on Andrew Bandt's election pamphlets - not one of them mentioning Euthanasia, and this was their very first move once they got a candidate into the lower house.
Lesson No. 1: If you paint your agenda Green it is easier to hide it in the woods.
posted by Schütz @ 9:36 pm
9 Comments
.JPG)
9 Comments:
I thought euthanasia might be on the Greens' website. I just spent a couple of minutes looking for it, but without success. There are hundreds of their policies there, so it might well be hidden somewhere. Clarity seems not to be one of their policies.
I remember the fanfare when Bob and Julia signed the Greens/Labor agreement and I think Bob said there was "nothing controversial" there. It seems their plans were not so clear, and Bob is confident Labor will agree to anything he asks.
Julia Gillard's downhill slide in recent weeks has been extraordinary. She was an extremely competent and fluent minister, but since the election, she has produced the 2 memorable phrases: "the real Julia" and "I rule nothing in and nothing out". Kevin Rudd was crticised for standing for nothing, but can anyone tell us what Julia stands for?
FWIW, my prediction for this government is:
-it will last the full 3 years
-nothing much will be done
-Julia Gillard will become one of the most unpopular PM's in our history.
Bob Brown for all of his "good" intentions is a deluded old hippy,who trusts in the goodness of Man, ignores the Providence of God ,whilst trying to build a Green paradise on earth. Yep a recipe for disaster i say
That's odd, Paul G, a swift Google search enabled me to find pro-euthanasia policies which were expounded at length on the Greens' website as early as 2008 (and never, to my knowledge, discarded later):
http://greens.org.au/media/2008/09/17/2842
So however much we deplore the Greens, we need to admit that this is no real surprise - the Greens have "form" in this matter.
I must agree with Robert on this one. Most educated voters knew the Greens' stance on social issues to be extremely 'progressive'...
The problem with universal suffrage twinned with compulsory voting is that many of the people who vote are not well informed.
I am not the least bit surprsied the Greens have chosen a couple of hotly debated social issues to kick off the new parliamentary season. Minor parties love the attention they garner during 'conscience debates'. The Greens use this soapboxing tactic for nastiness and evil wheras the Chrsitian Democrats (Nile) have used this kind of tactic oftentimes for the common good. I am hopeful the DLP will push back just as hard against the Greens on these social issues when Senator-elect Madigan arrives on the scene.
One against ten in the Senate, Marcel. He will have to push hard. But then, he's a blacksmith, and those blokes and blokettes have never done a hard days work in their lives, so...
The Greens truly are the culture of death in political form. Robert was right, they haven't hidden their clear intent all along (unlike several groups within the major parties) but it is still a mite decietful to not say a single word about it during a campaign and make it your first-off-the-bat policy in office.
The one policy I could not get out of the Greens, even after 3 months of back and forth calls and emails with policy staffers, is their "Family" policy. It is their policy NOT to have one. (c.f. Yes Prime Minister "no-policy policy"). I narrowed it down by asking which indivdual situations they supported. They enthusiastically supported every perversity I threw at them (admitedly I may be naive in that department) and the only moral choice they absolutely *refuse* point-blank to support was marriage between one man and one woman.
While the Greens have not concealed their agenda, they certainly haven't been honest about their priorities in seeking election. The media, too, needs to take a fair share of the blame for lack of genuine critique of Green policy.
As horrid as it sounds, I hope the Greens DO muscle Julia in the next three years. I hope the people of Australia get to see exactly what they stand for, and where it will take the country.
I find the Greens' policy silly, which is almost as bad as being evil.
Having said that, I think we need to take a leaf from the Holy Father's book and remain calm, and keep proclaiming the alternative. It is not a matter of hating the Greens, but trying to show them there is a better way.
I think this is similar to the case of ethics classes instead of Scripture in NSW public schools. I don't think the best tactic is to unleash legions of lawyers, or to say "keep off our patch". The best thing is to have confidence in the Christian message and proclaim it. It has worked for 2,000 years, so why stop now?
This article blames the Labor Party. I don't think that is entirely fair. All Labor has done is agreed, as per the agreement with both the Greens and the rural Independents, to allow private members legislation to be debated.
Had Abbott got up as PM, he would have had to sign up to exactly the same provision, since the rural Independents demanded it.
And both Gillard and Abbott have indicated that if it came to a vote it would be a conscience vote (as it was every other time this issue has come up, including under the Howard Government last time the issue came up).
What we are seeing is not the consequence of Labor getting up, but of the Greens getting an MP in the Reps. But even if Brandt hadn't won, even if the Independents didn't hold the balance of power we would presumably have seen the legislation in a year's time anyway when they get the numbers in the Senate. Brown after all has form on this issue.
Really we should be blaming the Green front organisation Get Up....
My understanding of the current Australian political landscape is that Labor and Liberal have preferenced the Greens , rather than each other, and this has been a factor enabling the greens to get so much representation.
Furthermore, many voters simply do not understand what the greens stand for other than tree hugging and fluffy bunnies. If they knew the Greens were for voluntary euthanasia, unrestricted access to abortion, cutting funding from private schools etcthey would not have not have voted for them
By the way John Madigan, Victorian Senator elect for the Democratic Labor Party is giving a talk
Pro lifers In Politics We Need More of em. He will be talking about voluntary euthanasia , abortion etc
on Friday 22October
At St Anthonys
Cnr Riversdale Road and Power Street
Hawthorn
starts 7pm.
cost $10 proceeds to Pro Life Victoria
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home