Not withstanding

I am freakin proud to be Canadian!! seriously. the freakin proudness comes from our most excellent political system. though Canada and the U.S. are both liberal democracies, Canada's political roots differ insanely from the U.S.'s. The U.S. constitution is directly based off of the works of a man named John Locke. this semester I had the opportunity to read his 2nd treatise of government which the American founding fathers used to write the constitution and I can say with assurity that John Locke is one evil dude. from his stance that religion is essential for morals but we should get rid of anything spiritual in it, to his belief in the complete seperation of church and state (something that I wholeheartedly disagree with but it would take too long to explain why), to his dishonesty in writing. there's plenty of other things i don't like about him, but his dishonesty in writing becomes most apparent when he quotes, as he says, "the judicious Hooker". to the casual observer Locke's quotatoins of Hooker appear to support his theories and it appears as though Locke completely supports Hooker's theories as well. when you look up the quotation in the original source, however, it becomes apparent that Hooker is completely contrasted to Locke and had he been alive when Locke published his 2nd treatise of government, Hooker would have vehemently disagreed with Locke on most issues. Hooker as it turns out is actually one of the main influences in the original Canadian constitution. The Canadian constitution, instead of being centered around "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" was centered around peace, order, and good government (noblesse oblige). so Hooker is pretty sweet and you should check him out, but hey I wanted to say some stuff about our awesomely groovy not withstanding clause. There is no other nation with an equivelent loophole in their constitution and I'm glad we do have it. the notwithstanding clause basically allows the Prime minister or a provincial leader to overrule any part of the charter of rights and freedoms that deals with "freedoms of religion, speech, the press, free assembly and association [and] guarantees of equality"(source) and suspend it for a period of 5 years (there is guaranteed to be an election before it comes up for review). Although most democracies include plenty of checks and balances, none of them have anything this all-encompassing. This means that when our courts (which hold way to much powerand that's something I don't like about Canada) screw up and make a really stupid law it can be revoked. exept in the instance of the Quebec language law debates, the not withstanding clause has not been used very much at all. However, numerous governments have threatened to use it and situations usually end up with the courts reconsidering a law and deciding to support the government. to those of you who think having a not withstanding clause is undemocratic or contrary to our rights, consider that Canada, unlike the U.S., was not formed on a basis of "unalienable rights", but it was instead formed on the premises of good government and fortunately sometimes this means going against what the many want (for five years anyways).
pipe smoking professor