First Amendment Under Attack

[dps]

that's a weird loop hole. "As a civil servant you can still run for public office... you just can't come to work or get paid"

It is almost impossible to fire a civil servant so job tenure is important.  Being able to take a leave of absence to run for political office is therefore a significant advantage.  

oh right, forgot about tenure. Could someone, in theory, who worked for 5 years take leave get appointed for say 25 years and then come back at 30 years tenure? or is there a cut off point?

Well for starters you certainly wouldn't come back at 30 years tenure.

Yeah, I would assume that even if you were allowed to come back with your previous tender intact, you certainly wouldn't be allowed to continue to accrue service time during your leave.  OTOH, again, it's Canadian law, so I don't know for sure.

[Neil]

How the hell this is the case of the First Amendment at all???

So you're fine with the government firing employees for writing op-eds in the newspaper that degree with government policy?

I'm pretty sure that if I wrote a letter to a newspaper criticizing government policy I would be canned PDQ.

We're not talking about what would happen, we're talking about what should happen. Do you think that that is an appropriate response? I certainly do not.

As a public servant it is not appropriate for you to be expressing public political opinions.  Public servants are supposed to be apolitical, and able to work with governments of any political ideology.

I don't see how one can square the alleged neutrality of the civil service with their war on the current government.

[DontSayBanana]

I don't see how one can square the alleged neutrality of the civil service with their war on the current government.

I don't see how one can stay so stubborn on the subject when he's not even talking about the same country's civil service.  I'll bow to Beeb's superior knowledge of civil service... in Canada.  This ruckus involves the US civil service, which is a totally different beast.