Angry in the Great White North

One of those odd stories that has come up recently is how awful it was that Prime Minister Stephen Harper sent Rosh Hashanah greetings to Jewish people.

I know, it's weird. But thankfully, Liberal MP Marlene Jennings is pushing the issue:

Liberal MP Marlene Jennings is among those requesting an investigation, saying she believes the mailing violates the privacy rights of those who received the greeting.

“It appears the privacy of these individuals has been violated but that is what I want the privacy commissioner to determine, so that if the prime minister is compiling lists of Canadians by their religious or ethnic affiliation, it doesn’t happen again,” said Jennings.

The federal Conservative party boasts one of the most sophisticated electronic databases in Canadian politics, with more than two million names.

The so-called CIMS program, for Constituent Information Management System, was launched in 2004 and stores data gathered through phone calls, door-to-door canvassing and other means.

Conservative party officials have said in the past that they do not buy corporate information on individuals because that’s illegal under the Privacy Act.

So let's here from Canada's leading Jewish organizations on this "violation":

There is nothing "nefarious" about Prime Minister Stephen Harper compiling a mailing list of Jewish Canadians and sending their households holiday greetings, two prominent Jewish lobby groups said Friday.

Their comments come amid news the federal privacy commissioner has begun an inquiry into last month's Rosh Hashanah greetings, following several complaints from private citizens.

Some recipients complained to the media that they could not understand how they had been identified and did not appreciate the gesture. Several also contacted privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart.

An expert in Jewish studies said the notion of lists of Jews being kept by political parties or governments has dark historical echoes for some Holocaust survivors and their descendents.

But both Bernie Farber of the Canadian Jewish Congress and Frank Dimant of B'nai Brith Canada praised what they called government outreach and said there should be no controversy.

"I don't think there's anything nefarious here whatsoever," said Farber, who's received greeting cards from various political parties for the past 20 years.

I think people would be shocked at just how much organizations, political parties, and corporations know about all of us. That can be annoying, even a bit scary, and sometimes the information is wrong in places.

So maybe some people were surprised to get the mailing, maybe even upset, but that is a far cry from concluding that rules were broken:

Harper's office would not say how it compiled the mailing list, although Jewish phone directories for a number of Canadian cities are readily available on the Internet.

So what is this about secret lists illegally compiled? Are these accusations themselves politically motivated instead of legitimate attempts to protect the privacy of people? B'nai Brith is clear -- the Liberal Party is not interested in protecting Jews in Canada or anywhere else:

Dimant turned the tables and said anyone complaining about Harper's Jewish new year greeting has a political agenda.

"I really do think there's a very sinister motivation by individuals who are asking for an examination of where these lists came from or how they were accumulated," Dimant said in an interview.

He welcomed the greeting, calling it a first for a Canadian prime minister, and said he hopes "it's a tradition that prime ministers down the line will carry on."

Harper has won praise from both the Canadian Jewish Congress and B'nai Brith for shifting Canada's foreign policy to a more pro-Israel footing.

Got that? Marlene Jennings is very sinister.

Hey, I didn't say it.