Pride Donation Rocks Canada's Feds

Canada's parliament is up in arms because of a CN $400K donation to Pride Toronto made from a fund designed to boost tourism. Members of the Saskatchewan Conservative Party (again!) are driving a call to discipline the MP who posed with drag queens in a check presentation ceremony.

Toronto's Pride Week may have seen its last cheque from Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government after this year's $400,000 contribution provoked a backlash from within the ranks of MPs and Conservative supporters. And Tourism Minister Diane Ablonczy appears to have been disciplined for the controversy, losing her power to announce handouts from the $190 million Marquee Tourism Events Program, which gave money to the event. Brad Trost, a Saskatchewan Conservative MP, spoke out this week against federal support for Pride Week, arguing that the caucus and Harper's office were caught off guard by Ablonczy's announcement of support for the event. "The pro-life and the pro-family community should know and understand that the tourism funding money that went to the gay pride parade in Toronto was not government policy, was not supported by – I think it's safe to say by a large majority – of the MPs," Trost said in an interview with LifeSiteNews.com, a website founded by the Campaign Life organization.

Canada's wingnuts are clearly taking their cues from their anti-gay counterparts to the south. On the upside, the Canadian federal government gave CN $400K to support gay Pride. Can you imagine that happening in the U.S.?