It was Andrew Scheer's fatal flaw, the one that more than all the others cost him the election.
His religious fanaticism that made it impossible for many women and LGBT Canadians to trust him.
So not surprisingly those who would replace Scheer are desperate not to make the same mistake.
And one leadership candidate, Pierre Poilievre, is even trying to whitewash his past.
In one of my last posts I wrote about Andrew Scheer's bizarre performance after emerging from a bruising seven-hour caucus meeting.
And how he tried to convince us that his Cons were united, and that he was really a winner not a loser.
Which didn't really surprise me. They don't call him a serial liar for nothing eh?
But what did surprise me, was the way the Con media is going after him.
It's now been quite a few years since the hideous Rex Murphy regularly disgraced the CBC's flagship news program The National, with his reactionary views and his Big Oil propaganda.
But Murphy is still around, still pimping for the tar sands, still going after Justin Trudeau as only a rabid Con could.
And since he is no doubt bitterly disappointed by the election result, he's now venting his fury on those who would dare ask Andrew Scheer whether he's a religious bigot.
He is without a doubt the most anti-gay political leader this country has ever known.
A creepy religious fanatic who began his political career by working with an Alliance MP who wanted to re-criminalize homosexuality, and arrest LGBT Canadians.
And has refused to apologize for comparing them to dogs.
So you can imagine my surprise when I saw this.
As you know, I have been trying for months to get the MSM to write about the relationship between Andrew Scheer and the former Alliance MP Larry Spencer, a man so homophobic he wanted to jail gay people.
I wrote one post after the other, I tweeted again and again. But nobody believed me or gave me the time of day.
I was getting ready to head out to Saskatchewan to try to track down Spencer, if he was still alive.
When it finally happened.
Almost every day for more than two years Andrew Scheer has attacked Justin Trudeau in the vilest and most cowardly manner.
But now that the Liberals are exposing the bigotry and religious fanaticism of one Con candidate after the other, he's not happy, as you can see from the look on his face.
And from the way the Con campaign is going up in flames.
I've tried hard to explain why I find Andrew Scheer's religious homophobia so deeply disturbing. I think it's important to do that because it explains so many things about Scheer, including his diseased hatred for Justin Trudeau.
But it's not easy to portray something that ugly.
Scheer knows how to hide his true feelings behind a creepy smile.
So I'm really glad that the Liberals dug up this video of Scheer during the same sex marriage debate.
Believe it or not, Andrew Scheer is now trying to pose as a tough guy, in a desperate attempt to make Justin Trudeau look weak.
Even though Trudeau makes Scheer look like a yappy Con chihuahua.
The one they call Weak Andy, who would embarrass us on the world stage, by talking big, carrying a small stick.
And looking and sounding ridiculous.
Ever since he became the leader of the Cons, Andrew Scheer has been very careful to conceal his extreme religious views.
He won the leadership with the support of social conservatives, but deleted his platform minutes after he was elected.
And although does send out an occasional dog whistle to his rabid religious base, he has been able to conceal his own extremist past.
Like the angry way he reacted when Dr Henry Morgentaler was awarded the Order of Canada.
Or how he began his political career working in the office of one of the ugliest religious bigots this country has ever known...
A Missouri-born Baptist preacher and Canadian Alliance MP named Larry Spencer, who believed that gay people should be arrested and jailed.
In late November 2003, Spencer caused controversy in Canada by Vancouver Sun reporter Peter O'Neil when he said that he would support any initiative to outlaw homosexuality. He stated that in the 1960s, a "well-orchestrated" conspiracy began and led to recent successes in the gay rights movement.
This conspiracy, he further said, included seducing and recruiting young boys in playgrounds and locker rooms, and deliberately infiltrating North America's schools, judiciaries, entertainment industries, and religious communities. According to him, this conspiracy started with a speech given by a U.S. gay rights activist in the 1960s whose name he could not remember.
Spencer was eventually fired as Canadian Alliance Family Issues critic by Stephen Harper.
He left politics and went back to preaching, forgot that apology, and started portraying himself as a victim of religious persecution.
In the manner LGBT people know only too well...
But as for Andrew Scheer, he never apologized for having worked so cheerfully for such a ghastly bigot.
On the contrary, as Neil Macdonald points out, not only is his anti-gay record abominable.
He voted against a law normalizing same-sex marriage, arguing in the Commons that "homosexual unions" are antithetical to raising families.
Not only he did he refuse to extend hate crime protection for transgender Canadians, one of the country's most brutalized minorities.
He even defended another religious bigot who called for outlawing, and presumably jailing LGBT Canadians.
He also defended Alberta Bishop Fred Henry, who told parishioners in a 2005 letter that gay sex is "an evil act, whether it is performed in public or private" adding that:
"Since homosexuality, adultery, prostitution and pornography undermine the foundations of the family, the basis of society, then the state must use its coercive power to proscribe or curtail them in the interests of the common good."
Henry faced complaints to the province's human rights commission. That angered Scheer, who maintained Henry was merely instructing the faithful.
"To think that a Catholic bishop must answer to a civil authority over matters of faith is abominable. It is abhorrent to me, to other Catholics and to every member of every faith community," he said.
A person who has met Scheer many times, tells me that his hatred for gays is palpable, and horrifying to behold.
And for those who think that there is nothing Scheer can do to hurt gay Canadians, they obviously haven't been watching what has been happening in Trump's America.
Social conservatives in the United States have used all sorts of creative schemes to impose their views on populations in states where they hold sway. You often don't need legislation to get your way.
A little de-funding here, a little creative regulatory tweaking there, and you can accomplish what you want without big, loud, bothersome House of Commons debates.
So here's my question:
When Scheer tells his religious base that they should not be afraid, because he will protect them.
What I want to know is who will protect women, gay people, Muslims and others from his Christianist fanatics?
And when will Canadians finally realize who Scheer really is?
And what he might do to this country and its values, if he ever becomes Prime Minister.
Know the enemy.
Vote Canadian...
It's like a nightmare come true. And after only three months in power.
It's Saturday night. Parts of Ottawa are looking like a disaster zone after a tornado hit the region. Thousands are in the dark.
But please don't bother Doug Ford.
He's busy.
If Andrew Scheer had a fantasy university it would almost certainly be a nightmare version of Trinity Western University.
For it has a so-called covenant that blatantly discriminates against LGBT students.
And he is a religious fanatic and ghastly homophobe who chooses to treat gay Canadians as if they didn't exist.
As did his Great Fallen Leader Stephen Harper who used to recruit many of his parliamentary interns from that hideous university.
As you may know, the religious fanatic, and homophobic pervert Roy Moore rode a horse to the polls on the day of his Waterloo.
And the horse was not amused.
And who can blame the poor Sassy?
For anyone who rides like that deserves to be thrown to the ground, or arrested by the SPCA.
But while Moore did end up badly, and looking like a horse's ass.
He's a dirty old man, a grubby sexual predator, a racist, a white supremacist, and an anti-gay bigot.
He steals from the poor to give to the rich. He's trying to leave more than 20 million Americans without any health coverage, and leading his country to war.
The only time he goes down on his knees is on a golf course...
But don't tell that to the Holy Bigots.
Well I can't say I'm surprised that Jason Kenney has turned down an invitation to attend Calgary's Pride parade.
Even though the invitation came from an Albertan with way more fans than he does.
Not when Kenney has been an anti-gay bigot for as long as I remember.
Ever since his grotesque campaign to attack Justin Trudeau by trash talking Canada blew up in his face, Andrew Scheer has been desperately trying to repair his image.
Gone with the wind, or dropped like a hot potato, is all that treasonous talk that could have stirred up the maniac Donald Trump, and cost Canada thousands and thousands of NAFTA jobs.
Now Scheer is using his family as props to try to make himself look like a nice guy.
You know, Mr Normal or Mr Boring.
The kind of nice guy Canadians could trust to invite into their kitchens, unlike the Con monster Stephen Harper.
But if they did, they would be making a terrible mistake.
The Toronto Pride parade is always an amazing spectacle of joy and defiance, and yesterday's was no exception.
And although the controversial Black Lives Matter-Toronto group did its best to grab the headlines.
The star of the show was once again Justin Trudeau.
As you know, I've been trying to warn people that Andrew Scheer is not the nice guy he pretends to be.
Warn them that his perma smile conceals the frightening depth of his religious fanaticism, as well as a truly ugly mean streak.
And that far from being a howdy doody farm boy, Scheer is a ruthless Con operative,
and as great a threat to this country as was Stephen Harper.
It's Christmas Day in Canada, and now that the shopping frenzy is over, and with snow on the ground in the place where I live, the country has never seemed so peaceful and so beautiful.
But this year even those colourful lights can't blot out the darkness threatening to envelop us.
The darkness of those who would appeal to the worst angels of our nature.
And of course the darkness of Trump.
Well he may look like the man from Glad. But Mike Pence, Donald Trump's choice for vice president, is actually the man from God.
He defines himself as “a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican, in that order.”
And he's really bad news for women and gay people.
I've written quite a few posts recently about Jason Kenney, and his plan to unite the right in Alberta.
By destroying the Progressive Conservative party he wants to lead.
And since that's crazy enough, or Kenney enough, and I think that the MSM has given that ghastly Con far too much free publicity.
I wasn't planning to write another post, until I saw this.
