Shameful anti-Semitic slurs against Rae

CP’s Joan Bryden tells us about the shameful anti-Semitic slurs spoken against Bob Rae’s wife Arlene Perly Rae. Bryden reports that these comments were made by Liberal delegates desperate to smear Rae to prevent him from becoming Liberal leader. CP:

Bob Rae was the target of anti-Semitic attacks during the Liberal leadership contest, motivated at least in part by the fact that his wife is Jewish.

Sources close to Rae say that his wife, Arlene Perly Rae, was approached during last weekend’s convention by a delegate who didn’t realize she was the candidate’s wife. The delegate told her not to vote for Rae “because his wife is Jewish.”

Perly Rae stonily informed the delegate that she was the wife in question. The delegate beat a hasty retreat.

The incident might have been shrugged off if it had been an isolated event. But Rae team insiders contend it was part of a larger pattern of anti-Semitic smears on Rae, who finished third.

Bryden, who provided some of the best behind-the-scenes coverage of the Liberal leadership convention (see this article for just one reason why), also goes on to describe a flyer that was circulated electronically among some delegates slamming Rae and his wife for their defense of Israel.

I received a copy of this shameful flyer:

disgusting-flyer.jpg
Click to enlarge

Sad.

UPDATE: Stephane Dion responds:

For Immediate release
December 8, 2006

Statement from Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion Regarding
the Anti-Semitic Comments Made Against Bob Rae and Arlene Perly Rae

The hateful comments made against Liberal leadership candidate Bob Rae and his wife Arlene Perly Rae at the Liberal leadership convention in Montreal are reprehensible and will not be tolerated within the Liberal Party of Canada.

Canada is a nation founded on diversity and tolerance for people of all faiths and ethnic backgrounds. The Liberal Party of Canada celebrates and promotes this diversity and tolerance.

There is no room for abhorrent comments such as these within our Party. The individuals who made these despicable and prejudiced comments are condemned by myself and Liberals throughout Canada.

Good for Dion.

I’d like to thank Jane Taber!

Not only was Taber was solid on CTV’s MDL as she put the questions to the new Liberal leader Stephane Dion, she used my blog’s research on two separate stories last night. Here’s a transcript:

Jane: Okay. Now on the environmental issue you have said that is one of your three pillars of course. That’s what you campaigned on during the leadership. Yet you have been voted I think seven times in a row the fossil of the year. What do you say to that? Because people have said your environmental plan is not —

Stephane Dion: Seven times in a row?

Jane: Seven times in a year.

Stephane Dion: The Liberal government maybe or over 13 years. Not me. I have been — I have received once this prize.

Jane: We saw the buttons at the campaign.

Stephane Dion: Yes, because of the record of the record other the years. Not because of my own achievement. To the contrary —

Jane: You were part of that government.

Stephane Dion: To the contrary, remember, we brought the world together at the Montreal conference on climate change. You remember that.

Jane: M-hm.

Stephane Dion: We put 182 nations together last December, December, 2005 at the same Palais des Congres where we had the convention last weekend. And at that time, I have been celebrated as a hero, if you allow me to say so, because we saved Kyoto at that time. And I remember that last February for the anniversary of Kyoto, the European caucus of the green party and the Belgium caucus of the green party invited me to celebrate what I have done. And they thought this I was a great minister. One when they discovered I was a Liberal they were a bit disappoint bud they gave me recognition the anyway.

Jane: Why should Canadians trust you? You were part of that government where we did see the greenhouse gas emissions go up.

Stephane Dion: Because I have been a very successful minister of environment. Madam Elizabeth May give me a prize or recognition for what I have done. The —

Jane: She is, of course, the leader of the green party now.

Stephane Dion: yes and also what I have done for nature to protect the — our seabirds. I received a prize for. That I have been a minister of the environment well accepted by the environmental groups and they are not easy. And by the industry when they are ready to work with us, they said that I was really helpful to push environmental technologies in Canada as we should. But since then, the current government is doing nothing. They always blaming us for what we have done. And they are doing nothing. If they are right, they just have to do more than us and I will do much more because this is the issue of the century.

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Makes this whole blogging thing feel worthwhile when I can help shape the debate. (see my fossil of the year post here)

Taber also used my last post on Trudeau running in Outremont on the show.

Thanks Jane!