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MY province, my country my elections

 For a very long time, my philosophy was right of center; I  believe that the government should only be active in segments of the economy where the market cannot operate efficiently.  I believe that the government should stay out of the bedroom and that women should be able to make decisions with regard to their bodies themselves.  Again, nothing is black and white here, there are complex issues, but these are fundamental issues.  And I believe that governments have an obligation to protect their citizens

In addition, and possibly even more important is believe that individual privacy is fundamental.  Facebook, Google, Instagram and any free application sell your data, no free lunch.  I never got the 23andme test, first because I am not interested, but no one has ever said what is done with this metadata!  Your genetic data is sold, because the cost of the test is higher than what the consumer pays.  Money has to come from somewhere.

Notionally, I am a conservative, although I don't recognize myself in Canada's Conservative Party (or Quebec's version either).  The best was the liberal party.  Middle of the road and least objectionable of the lot.  Although I have been in Quebec for 20 years now I don't feel that I am part of the furniture, I don't feel I belong.  I intensely dislike the policies that the CAQ has implemented, it is doing everything to make Quebecers poorer.  By making our population mono-lingual.

The most recent "crime", but not the only one where this was an issue is the ability of the "Quebec language police" to walk into any business, without any proof or any court sanction and seize their computers and investigate.  They can do what they want with the data.  They could give it to the tax authority (as they have in the past under the Charboneau Commission).

In short, the CAQ doesn't care about individual privacy and the rule of law.  The Quebec Government is one of the first in the OECD to say you have no personal privacy. 

That is aborant because it means that the government can be capricious -- and it often is.  Yet no one political party in Quebec raised this issue, they don't care and that is a tragedy.  Eventually, we will pay the price of such Cavaliere attitude to privacy.



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