Over at Halton MP Garth Turner’s blog, he mentions that a venture he helped start on Parliament Hill called MPtv has video of the Stand with Isreal rally in Toronto on Wednesday.
Stand with Israel was organized by Canadian Jewish groups, one of many held around the world. A Lebanon/Palestine rally was held in Vancouver.
According to comments under Turner’s post, one of the speakers at the Toronto rally was Charles McVety – an independent evangelical bible college president, and head of several lobby groups in Canada.
Garth: this MPtv feature is great, but it leaves out the two best speakers of the night (I was there) – Maj-Gen Lewis McKenzie, who was intensely critical of the UN, and your old buddy Dr. Charles McVety, who brought the house down with his eloquence and passion. I know you can’t stand the guy, but he was brilliant in his defence of Israel and the Jews, who have suffered so much over the years.
Mcvety is known for his affiliation with the religious right in the US, his program The Word on the Canadian version of TBN (The Miracle Network), Canadian Family Action Coalition, Defend Marriage Canada, registering MP domain names, and his media appearances. (Lloyd McKay Ottawa Watch – Jerry Falwell/Charles McVety)
A search of Google News doesn’t bring up much information on the three rallies, there are about 74 links, many of them opinion pieces, but I didn’t find anything more than basic factual coverage.
Who paid for the Toronto rally satellite feed? Who of the 100 groups participating is managing and distributing the 6 million raised in Toronto? Where is it going?
Likewise for the Vancouver/Ottawa Lebanon/Palestine rallies. Was money raised? By whom? Who is it going to?
Toronto rally – The Spirit of Man, Mark Fox, Western Standard ( A Technorati search shows about 20 posts)
Vancouver/Ottawa rallies - Spark of Freedom, Canadian Dimension, a journal of the one man revolution ( A Technorati search shows about 10 posts)
MPtv – July 19th Ottawa rally and July 29th, 2006 Toronto rally videos. (I have no idea how to permalink, uses Windows media)
That’s some decidely strange bedfellows. IIRC, you’ve chronicled the problems that Turner, a moderate Conservative, has had with hard-core theocon evangelicals. Here, they’re on the same page.
This is an issue that unites about the right three-quarters of the political spectrum.
It is, and politics does make strange bedfellows.
While Garth Turner has not neglected the Lebanese in his riding, under what was extrodinary circumstances – he has raised some important policy points Canada’s federal government needs to be looking at.
McVety is in every sense of my understanding right wing – respected religious lobby groups are able to be on the same page on a few issues with him. I suspect most are experienced enough to understand the dynamics of the partnership, so that when time comes for compromise and the pluralism of politics, they’ll have stepped back far enough not to be bitten.
Garth Turner is a communicator, and a saavy one. So is McVety, and I think we’ll be seeing more clashes.