Hi Jordan and Kobie, Thank you for taking the time to read our post. While the language we referred to used both the terms President and Prime Minister, our post is designed to refer to heads of states. Although both the women you mentioned above were elected Prime Ministers, the Presidents in their respective counties were the formal Heads of State. I apologize for the lack of clarity in our argument, but our discussion was meant to focus on women who have held the "Head of State" title. Thank you for reading, The Dominion

David, We are relieved to hear that you made bail. Best, The Dominion

Thank you, Mr. Davies. It is quite an honour to have our blog noticed by an MP. Your insightful counterpoint is appreciated by us, and hopefully by our readers.

Hi Michael, Thanks for reading. Those are great points. If domestic law failed to protect Canadian wizards from Dementors, Canada's international obligations would appear to provide that protection. Looks like we are safe!

Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it!

Hi Renzo, Thank you for reading our post and your comments above. We agree with much of the criticisms of police street checks, and much of the criticism is that they are racially motivated. We hope that procedures will be put in place to ensure that if they continue to be used, the reasons behind so are clear. We also hope that any racial motivation will be eliminated. Thank you for reading! The Dominion

David, Thank you for your continued support to the project. Truth be told, I'm not entirely sure if we are able to see specifics as to where our traffic comes from. The Vice Dean is the all-seeing eye when it comes to our statistics, and generally just lets us know what our hit counts are like. All the Best, The Dominion

Hi Jens, Thank you for your comment! The purpose of adding in the religion of the men from Bountiful was that there have been suggestions they may choose to challenge the current polygamy legislation on the basis of freedom of religion. We completely understand that this is a small, unique group from British Columbia, and by no means imply the Mormon religion on a larger scale practices polygamy. This group may simply make the claim that based on their unique religious beliefs there is a potential Charter challenge. If the Mormon religion as a whole has banned this practice then a court could potentially consider that as a factor when determining if the law does discriminate based on religion. Kind regards, The Dominion

David, you are right that it would be rather odd if he had died before he was born. Once again, thank you for your comment and reading our posts!

http://whatwillwedotoday.com/images/2013/03/HALquotes.006-e1363869879703.jpg

Hi David, Thank you for reading and your comment! Your analysis was very insightful and helpful. We hope you continue reading the rest of the semester! Kind Regards, The Dominion

Thank you very much for catching that mistake, Judge Rounthwaite. That was a poor turn of phrase on our part. Because the Superior Courts are the courts of inherent jurisdiction, any power a lower court has is delegated from that court, but technically not by that court. The legislation governing that delegation is the Provincial Court Act, RSA 2000, c P-31.

Bob, thank you for your comment and reading the post! We agree with your last statement that if the leader does not uphold the values of the people he will not be successful. All we can do at this time is see what ideals he puts forth when actually in office. The Dominion

Thanks for your comment. Trump may very well be a troll, though being a troll and a threat to democracy are not mutually exclusive. The “procedural safeguards” of democracy only function if the American people and the government they elect respect and maintain them. This post is much more focused on the American people's decision to elect this man, not the man himself. You’ll notice that my lone descriptor for Trump was a “demagogue”. As per the OED: “A leader of a popular faction, or of the mob; a political agitator who appeals to the passions and prejudices of the mob in order to obtain power or further his own interests; an unprincipled or factious popular orator”. I am not looking for the word disturber; I have already identified him as such. In my mind, Trump’s victory is a symptom not the cause of profound issues in America. The people who voted for Trump either agreed with his rhetoric of racism, sexism, homophobia, and xenophobia, or they decided that they were willing to overlook it because of their discontent with the political establishment. Either way, I believe we have to take the strength of their sentiments seriously. The reason I think Trump is a threat to democracy is because so many of his supporters are willing to advocate for repealing constitutional rights, including women’s right to vote (#repealthe19th), abortion rights (the Supreme Court held that it falls under the 14th Amendment), or the constitutional jurisdiction of the president to elect Supreme Court justices. The combination of Trump’s horrendous statements and the intensity of the discontent in the American public is simply too strong for me to not take it seriously. The people don't know what Trump was serious about and what he wasn't. We simply don't know how far his supporters may go in advocating for eliminating constitutional rights. Trump doesn’t need to send out a directive to kill all the lawyers; Republicans now control the White House, the Senate, the House of Representatives, and Trump will shape the Supreme Court for decades. Respectfully, characterizing his presidency as a show is dangerous, it implies that we can sit back and watch, rather than hold him accountable for the fear and unrest he’s caused in his own country.

You certainly have the right to disagree with Prime Minister Trudeau, but this Bill was not shot down by one man or even one party. Conservative MPs almost unanimously voted down the Bill, NDP MPs almost unanimously voted in favour, while 39 Liberal MP's supported the Bill. To effect change, we need to lobby our MPs as well as our Prime Minister. What source shows Prime Minister Trudeau pouring millions of dollars into the seal hunt? Though his government has certainly not changed the seal hunt's status quo, from all the sources we've seen, the amount of government funding has remained relatively unchanged. It's also important to remember that Justin Trudeau is not his father, even if you don't like Pierre Trudeau, our current PM needs to be evaluated on his own merits. Time will tell if his government passes legislation to deal with this issue and the seal hunt. But rather than simply condemn his ability as a Prime Minister based on his action with this one Bill, as Canadians, let's show him and our MPs that we want new legislation passed.

Hi David, thanks for your comment. The reference in the title is from Peter Sankoff's article found in citation 15. Definitely give it a read, he cites examples of updated legislation from other countries like New Zealand.

Dr. Friedland, First, we thank you for your kind words regarding our project. Secondly, when we had first considered writing this post, we had wanted to make sure that we weren't off base here. In doing so, the student who wrote this post consulted with a couple of students within the Faculty of Law who identify as Indigenous to get their thoughts on the policy. Of course, we couldn't publish their opinions as a result of the policy itself, but suffice it to say that we've taken great care to represent their position, as it mirrored our own. We agree that the policy is in place for a very good reason, and we are most certainly in agreement with its aims. Our criticism is for the overly broad application of the policy. While agree with the need to protect Indigenous people from having their history taken from them and possibly distorted, we cannot support the misuse of research policies like this to stifle freedom of the press. Our position is that the REO has erred in blurring the line between research projects and media. Kindest Regards, The Dominion

MG, Are we to understand that your "quite simple" solution is to intentionally violate Section 30.3.2(2)c of the Code of Student Behaviour? It states: "No student shall represent another's substantial editorial or compositional assistance on an assignment as the Student's own work." Your assertion that we "intended to interview Indigenous peoples about certain issues. Then, would have taken your notes home and compiled a blog selectively featuring certain opinions," was appropriately led with "If I understand correctly," because it it quite clear that you don't, and quite frankly, your accusations of our desire to silence certain opinions is nothing short of insulting. Finally, the Research Ethics Office CAN "do something about this". They can choose to slightly narrow the scope of how this policy is applied so that it covers actual research, and doesn't result in silencing a project that is effectively journalism. Respectfully, The Dominion

Dan, Those two references should be ample. O' Canada was just changed to make a line gender neutral, as this issues deemed important enough to expend the political capital required to do so. The government was completely silent on the issue of making it religiously neutral. While you are absolutely correct in mentioning that the Preamble is without force and effect, and the Supreme Court of Canada agrees. Having said that, one must consider the impact that telling the non-religious that the basis of their country's constitution and their rights is something that they fundamentally disagree with. In general, things are getting a lot better for atheists and others who identify as non-religious, but the issue is far from resolved. Thanks for writing, The Dominion

Thanks for the info, David! You must have a lot of insight if you can summarize your 54-page honours thesis into one sentence!

Thank you so much for the correction!

Thank you for your thoughts, Mr. Bliss and Mr. Harfield. As mentioned, and (as we hope) is evident from our post, there is no disrespect aimed at the Justice or the judiciary. Equally, we respect the authority of our Parliament. Nevertheless, as we are junior in our careers and have been taught by academic criminal legal experts, we stand by the analysis of the academics who specialize in the area. Please see the response above your comment from Professor Stephen Penney. Also of use might be this video from Professor Peter Sankoff: http://www.cbc.ca/player/play/766946883918/

Thank you for your assessment! We're very curious to see the next steps.

Thank you for the correction! The error has been fixed.