Softwood Lumber dispute? Get Real!

Was just on a nice fellow's blog site and he, a Conservative apologist, brought up the whole softwood lumber dispute... I believe that the whole softwood lumber dispute is all smoke and mirrors....a wild card designed to deflect attention away from issues of mutual national security and bad foreign economic relations. I know this is not a popular view here in Canada, but if you think about it, there are points of interest.
Point one...most of the major softwood producers in Canada are US firms like Wayrhouser and MacMillin Blodell (now wholey US owned). So the duties hurt US firms! How weird is that?
Point two...this problem has gone on for longer than the working life of any lumberjack in the forest today. They seem to be employed even with all the duties being levied. There is a lot of Canadian lumber going to rebuild New Orleans! So there is NO widespread unemployment as a result of US-Canadian fiscal policies. (Well, there is BSC, but thats another subject which does not really stand up under scrutiny...lets stick to one thing at a time here...)
Third interesting point....China is purchasing lumber companies and oil companies as fast as they can get their hands on them. (google search...I did!). The Conservative government is on record as stating that "Canadians should not just be hewers of wood and drawers of water"! Yet they have allowed industries which "value add" to our natural resources to collapse and languish. Steel mills close. Wire plants close. Beef cutting plants close. Sawmills close.

At the same time, crack and methamphetamines are flooding our cities, DNA samples from rapes are languishing in freezers awaiting funding to process, AFIS and CODIS are only gradually coming on line, illegal immigration is bringing thousands of children and girls into North America every year to face conditions of slavery, and people are having to advertise on the internet to get a kidney in order to beat the two year waiting list!

I think the new Conservative Government needs to have somebody give it some direction! Or at least give it some priorities!

Arar case dismissed by US judge

WASHINGTON (CP) - A U.S. federal judge has dismissed Maher Arar's lawsuit against American officials claiming he was deported to Syria as a terrorism suspect to be tortured.

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/WarOnTerrorism/2006/02/16/1446987-cp.html

I am just sick about this. As I see it, it is a clear indidication of power politics played out with people as pawns....admittedly something which has been done for centuries. Supposedly we were above that though.

Methinks she doth protest too much...

"Methinks she doth protest too much"....W. Shakespeare
NOTHING hurts more than to be ridiculed over something you would prefer to hide...be it sexual performance, a toupee over a bald spot, or exposing the lie that your religion is a peaceful one.
Imagine how furious you would be at an ex-girlfriend who was hanging with a bunch of your mutual friends and made comments about how poor your sexual performance was that night! (it was the booze dammit!) And then published cartoons about it. (ouch!) Or imagine somebody grabbing your toupee and waving it above the crowd as a big joke on you!
(Oh don't blow smoke and tell us alcohol didn't cause you to pass out one night before you could get it on!!!! Its happened to all of us! The point is about what comes afterwards...)
The idea of Islam as a peaceful religion is pretty much blown out of the water....it was founded on powerful schisms, and military might. (A visit to Malta would illustrate this perfectly....143 miles of fortifications to stop a peaceful people?) But, like Goerings "Big Lie", it doesn't stand up to the daylight of modern journalism and global communication. So, like me getting pissed off at a kiss and tell girlfriend, Muslim leaders get pissed off at "kiss and Tell" cartoonists.
And please stop the bombings...we are running out of virgins!!!!