| Subject: Re: On International Law... |
Author:
Mike Redmond
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Date Posted: 19:09:36 03/20/03 Thu
Author Host/IP: NoHost/209.17.158.14
In reply to:
Garnet Shoup
's message, "Re: On International Law..." on 18:38:30 03/20/03 Thu
We do seem to have a range of opinions in the party, but surely that is a reasonable thing to expect in the course of a leadership race. One of the issues we will face after choosing a new leader is how do we adopt party policy on issues like this, and how do we integrate the right, and necessity of the Leader and caucus developing policy, with the stated aims of our party to have input from the membership?
Clearly it is difficult to structure any type of "grass-roots" policy development process that will act quickly, or for that matter, coherently enough to deal with issues like the Irag war. In matters such as this, the most the party can probably do is set out the basic principles on which we believe a Progressive Conservative foreign policy should be based, and leave the details of the immediate application of those principles to our Leader and caucus.
While we are electing a leader of a team, therefore, it is still important to know how any of our prospective leaders would develop policy in these areas, what are the underlying assumptions of their approach, and what principles guide them? Our Prime Minister's comments notwithstanding, this is the time that our prospective leadership hopefuls should debate the rights and wrongs of our position.
I think the war is a mistake, as do many others, but that does not mean that the position of any of our leadership candidates should be based on what the general public thinks, or what is tactically popular in political terms.
I would far rather vote for someone who held a principled and credible position, and could articulate and defend that position, particularly on matters as fundamental as war and peace, than someone who simply put forth a position because it seemed popular.
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