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Email: "Pro-Life Liberal MP Paul Szabo Defeats Nomination Challenge"

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Szabo led efforts to defeat or at least substantially improve flawed Liberal stem cell bill BY LifeSiteNews.com MISSISSAUGA, Ontario, March 12, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Uncertainty reigned during heavy voting at the packed Oasis Convention Centre in Mississauga Thursday night. Every parking spot for blocks around the Centre was taken as the mass of almost 2000 voters plus numerous organizers flowed in and out of the building.  At stake was the Liberal nomination for the riding of Mississauga South and the future political career of three times elected, pro-life, pro-family MP Paul Szabo. By the end of the evening Szabo defeated the overconfident Charles Sousa and his organizers by what was a reasonably healthy margin, given the circumstances, of 966 to 838. The riding membership had grown from the original approximately 500 to a final 3400 members during the lead up to the nomination. The Sousa campaign appeared to have suffered more than expected no-shows from among its instant membership sign-ups. Szabo, being the incumbent and a long-time Liberal Party activist, was able to rely on a more committed voter base that showed up and cast their ballots. Szabo has recently been one of the most outspoken Liberal MPs on life and family issues and led the challenge within the Liberals to defeat or at least substantially amend the government’s deeply flawed stem Bill C-6, previously numbered C-13. For this, the principled Member of Parliament incurred the wrath of some of the party establishment and was subjected to the unusual challenge to his re-nomination using political neophyte Sousa. Insiders report that Sousa was specifically helped and guided by MP Carolyn Parrish, Paul Martin loyalist and well known for her rabid anti-Americanism and her views on moral issues that are the exact opposite to those of Szabo.  Parrish, who is known to have a considerable animosity towards her caucus colleague, was apparently determined, along with like-minded party hacks, to make sure that Szabo lost the re-nomination which should have been automatic. Alas, that did not happen, much to the shock of Szabo’s opponents Thursday evening. One Liberal Party headquarters’ bureaucrat was overheard blurting out that Szabo’s win was “a disaster for the party”, whatever that could possibly have meant. Traditional Liberal machine ethnic-herding strategy was exploited by the Sousa camp. 600 Portuguese and 800 Muslim instant Liberals were said to have been signed up by Szabo’s opposition. Evidence of this was unmistakable at the meeting as almost all obvious members of the two ethnic groups sported only Sousa badges. LifeSite interviewed several voters at the Convention Centre. The first Muslim gentleman interviewed freely admitted that he new nothing about either candidate or their policies but said he was voting for Sousa because he “is my friend”. He was quite open, though, to learning more about how the Canadian political process works and the importance of asking the candidates about their views on policies. He had no idea that Szabo was much stronger on the moral and family issues than Sousa, who he was told to vote for. This appeared to be the general situation with many of the ethnic Sousa voters. A young Chinese couple with Szabo badges told LifeSite they were supporting Szabo because of his stand on the same-sex marriage issue. Senior citizens were especially noticeable among the Szabo badge wearers. A Portuguese couple supporting Sousa also admitted that they knew nothing about their candidate or his opponent. A group of Muslim gentlemen made a point of emphasizing that they voted for Sousa because it was time for a change in the party to make sure that Canada would not continue to “blindly follow the United States” and they emphasized that the US is “too aggressive”.  They also felt that Sousa could be counted on to make sure there was lots of work for immigrants and that religious profiling would be eliminated.  LifeSite was told by sources that the Sousa camp especially targeted local mosques and the Portuguese community and it was said that “deals were made” to encourage the groups to support their candidate. However, Paul Szabo told LifeSite that he also had support from Muslims and other ethnics and did not feel that opposition recruiting tactics was an issue.  At the end of the evening, in his acceptance speech, Szabo encouraged party members to put the nomination battle behind them and invited them to work together on the upcoming election. http://www.lifesitenews.com/resources/pro-life-liberal-mp-paul-szabo-defeats-nomination-challenge/

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