Global Warming

I have NEVER in my life seen such a divisive issue as climate change! Perfectly sane and normal people go off on wild tangents, and "make their minds up" with fervor normally reserved for religious experiences. I could make an entire post based on this "yes it is, no it isn't" phenomon.

Here is a lecture by James Balog. He is an artist, not some white lab coat with a political agenda. So, because he is an artist, he has a unique approach to the topic. He doesn't sit in his office, and look at computer models. He goes out to glaciers, and looks at them. And watches them collapse. And photographs them with time lapse photography.

Why not take twenty minutes of your life and examine this one. At the very least, you will see some pretty pictures.... http://www.ted.com/talks/james_balog_time_lapse_proof_of_extreme_ice_loss.html

Of course, not all scientists are dweebs, Rachel Pike is really cute. Her talk is only four minutes....and worth a watch if only to watch her boobs bounce. However, it is worth the talk just so we can see just what goes into the scientific conclusions that so many people so blithly throw out.
http://www.ted.com/talks/rachel_pike_the_science_behind_a_climate_headline.html

With that kind of background and work which goes into it, how can you dismiss it as a political football? The problem is that it is so narrowly focused that you can't really argue for or against it, however I think I will listen more closely to the conclusions of the Rachel Pikes of the world than, oh, I don't know...say, Jesse Ventura?

Jesse Ventura. Right...now THERE's a guy that inspires confidence. Get real! Him and Tom Cruise! Millstones around the neck of the truth, both of them! Lord give me strength!

Anyway, I have no intention of changing YOUR mind. No doubt your mind is made up. As were the commenters on James Balog's talk above...I kept asking myself..."did they even listen to the talk or are they just sounding off with their own ideas like trained seals"? Me, I might well be the only person left on the planet who doesn't give a shit about global warming...I would just like to see less smoke in the air, so I think I come down on the side of the scientists. My real concern is Resource Wars resulting from climate change, such as you are finding in Darfur. And I do have to admit to a desire to be a friend to the Earth.

My hero is Stewart Brand. You might remember him, he invented and published the "Whole Earth Catalogue" back in the '60s. He was the original hippie! He has always stepped to a different drummer. Nobody every said he was stupid, but he sometimes seems to be in the business of pissing off as many people as possible.
I even found a talk by him in the TED site.....again, its only 20 minutes. I think you might find him to be breath of fresh air. Whenever I get depressed, I find something that Stewart wrote somewhere, sometime, and realize that I am not powerless to change anything. Treat yourself to a most refreshing lecture, ignore the Al Gores of the world, and watch a talk by a genuine human being....Stewart Brand. This lecture is the one that got him into so much trouble with the environmental movement....so there is more here than meets the eye.
http://www.ted.com/talks/stewart_brand_proclaims_4_environmental_heresies.html



Let me know your thoughts on this.

Urban Legends

Lately, I have been getting some fascinating forwards in my email box. A quick jump over to "Snopes.com" often helps to get the skinny on these stories. Some are "well, what difference does it make", and others are ridiculous "Oh my god, that means that the leader of the Illluminati is hiding in my underwear drawer", and some are outright lies..."Oliver North's testimony was that he installed an expensive security system on his house because he was scared of Osama Bin Laden".

In this world of instant communication, Churchill's phrase "A lie goes around the world before the truth can get its trousers on" is demonstrated daily. I personally don't like lies....even little white lies, because I figure if whoever sent me a lie about "that" (whatever "that" might be) always must then face the question, "If you lie to me about "that", then what else are you lying to me about?"

One is reminded watching the Montreal Rally and the pictures of St. Catherine Street clearly filled with thousands of demonstrators, and the reporters saying "as many as two hundred people are in the street waving plaquards". I was yelling at the screen "TWO HUNDRED PEOPLE....ARE YOU NUTS." and in fact, some of my "on the fence" Quebecois friends were watching that, and they too were struck with the obvious fact that the news guy was lying, and they too were wondering "if they are lying about numbers of demonstrators, what ELSE are they lying about?" So when you get caught out in a lie, you lose all credibility. Many of my friends made up their mind then and there to vote against the separation because they suddenly didn't trust the people who would suddenly be in charge!

As for "its more fun to just send them out"....well, I would not mind if they were simple "Thank you for being my friend" cards (though I am always struck by the fact that if I was such a great friend, then why don't you take a moment to tell me personally instead of sending a forward out on a distribution list, but still, they are nice to get.) but many of the items I see forwarded to my email box seem to be politically motivated, and some seem to come perilously close to resembling hate mail.
Even then, the distribution of political texts is a fine and noble thing....an exercise in free speech. The article about Oliver North is not particularly political, but rather a little inflammatory, and was a fine example of what I regard as "False History". If anyone feels that there is no harm in "False History", I merely point them to a pre war publication called "The Chonicles of Zion".


Anyway, on that note, I shall leave you with my very best wishes and that I hope that you and your family will prosper in the coming year.

Regards,
Bill Fedun
Ottawa

Save the World....

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Brüno meets Michael Moore in this gut-busting wake-up call that proves a little imagination can go a long way towards vanquishing the Cult of Greed.

Who knew fixing the world could be so much fun?

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Gary McKinnon

Gary is probably NOT a name you have heard unless you are a lover of UFO's or fear that the "man" will get you for exposing your conspiracy theory of the day. And although it is tempting to uncover the "Truth" by going to the source, the US government computer files in, oh, say, the Pentagon, it is not generally considered to be a really good idea. Seems they take the idea of hacking into their computers seriously. Even if the person doing it is a geeky kid from North London.

Imagine that.

Gary has been going through a lot of stress lately. Seems the entire US government is really pissed at him...and have managed to convince the UK government to extradite him back to the US to face trial.

The story is all here ... http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/01/gary-mckinnon-extradition-nightmare

Now why is this worthy of even a moment of my valuable time? Well, where should I start? How much SHOULD we protect people from their stupid actions? Should we forgive people who create breaches of security of military security? How about the stupid Pentagon IT clerks who left their laptops unprotected? You think THEY will get more than a slap on the wrist? (actually I do...one thing I am certain about is that the military will eat their own...grin!)

Balance that against the fact that "Hell yeah, he's guilty as sin", with the question, "Will he get a fair trial?"
I don't think he will get a fair trial...though I am certain he will get a trial of some sort. I suspect that his reasons for entering into areas which are forbidden will not be found as important as the fact that he did it at all. A young joy rider who steals a car for "a little fun" is just as guilty as the hardened criminal who steals it in order to send it to a chop shop.
But one might think that perhaps a little humanity might be in order....perhaps at his hearing they may decide that the offence was perhaps misguided. Not malicious.

Regardless, we should all keep this case on the front burner....if only to keep an eye on the goings on of the "aroused tiger" who is proving to not be constructed of paper after all.

What were they thinking?

Beer-drinking Muslim woman to be caned By Julia Zappei, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Muslim model Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno, 32, will be caned for drinking beer. (THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/Mark Baker) KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - A Muslim woman sentenced to be caned for drinking beer wants to quickly get the punishment over with now that it has been confirmed by an Islamic appeals court judge, her father said Tuesday. If the punishment is carried out, Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno, a 32-year-old mother of two, would become the first Muslim woman to be caned in Malaysia, where about 60 per cent of the 28 million people are Muslims. The case has ignited a debate in this moderate Muslim-majority country whether conservative Islamists, who advocate harsh punishments, are gaining influence over the justice system and whether Islamic laws should intrude into people's private lives. According to local media reports Monday, chief Judge Abdul Hamid Abdul Rahman of Pahang state's Shariah courts decided to uphold the sentence passed by the state high court on Kartika after a one-month review of the case. No date was immediately set for the caning. Kartika's father, Shukarno Abdul Muttlib, 60, told The Associated Press that while the family had yet to be informed of the judge's latest decision, his daughter "accepts the punishment" and would like it to be carried out sooner rather than later. "We obey the law," he said, adding that "it's a challenge ... (but) it's the way of my life." Pahang court and religious department officials declined to talk about the case Tuesday. Others could not immediately be reached. Kartika, a former model and nurse, was sentenced in July to six strokes of the cane and a fine of 5,000 ringgit ($1,400) for drinking beer in December 2007 at a beach resort in violation of Islamic laws. Islam prohibits Muslims from drinking alcohol. Kartika, who pleaded guilty, refused to appeal her sentence and was on the verge of being caned on Aug. 24. But the punishment was halted at the last minute following an uproar in the media and among rights activists. Instead, the government asked the Shariah High Court Appeals Panel in Kuantan, the capital of Pahang, to review the verdict. Judge Abdul Hamid, who headed the panel, ruled that the sentence was correct and should stay. The caning would be done with a thin stick on the back and would be largely symbolic rather than aimed at causing pain, unlike the caning of rapists and drug smugglers with a thick rattan stick on bare buttocks that causes the skin to break and leave scars. Malaysia follows a dual-track justice system. Shariah laws apply to Muslims in all personal matters. Non-Muslims - Chinese, Indians, Sikhs and other minorities - are covered by civil laws, and are free to drink. Only three states in Malaysia - Pahang, Perlis and Kelantan - impose caning for drinking alcohol. In the other 10 states it is punishable by a fine.

Because they hate.

Date: Thursday, June 11, 2009, 12:18 PM

Brigitte Gabriel - Letter to President Obama
> Brigitte Gabriel, is a Lebanese Christian woman thrown out of her home by Palestinians, who has written a book called: Because they Hate. Below, Brigitte, who now lives in America, writes to President Obama, bringing her unique perspective to bear.
> Brigitte Gabriel - Letter to President Obama.
>
> Dear Mr. President,
>
> You face difficult challenges in matters such as achieving peace in the
> Middle East and protecting America from the threat of radical Islam and
> terrorism. These are challenges that have vexed past presidents, going as
> far back as our second president, John Adams. I have no doubt you appreciate both the gravity of these challenges and the enormous obstacles that exist to solving them.
>
> I also have no doubt that you and your staff understood that, no matter what you said in your speech last Thursday in Cairo, there would be those who would take issue with you. That is always the case when attempting to solve problems that are as deep and emotionally-laden as these challenges are.
>
> I am assuming it is your sincere hope that the approach you have chosen to take, as evidenced by what I'm sure was a carefully crafted speech, will
> ultimately prove successful. However, it pains me to say this sir, but,
> while you said in your speech that you are a "student of history," it is
> abundantly clear that, in these matters, you do not know history and thus, as Santayana noted, you are doomed to repeat it. In doing so your efforts, however well-intentioned they may be, will not produce what you profess to hope they will produce.
>
> A wise man once said that if you start with the wrong assumptions, no matter how logical your reasoning is, you will end up with the wrong conclusion. With all due respect Mr. President, you are starting with certain assumptions that are unsupported by history and an objective study of the ideology of political Islam.
>
> You began in your speech by asserting that "tensions" exist between the
> United States and Muslims around the world, which, of course, is correct.
> Unfortunately, you then proceeded, incorrectly, to lay virtually all the blame for these tensions at the feet of America and the West. You blamed
> western colonialism, the Cold War, and even modernity and globalism.
>
> A student of American history, who is not trying to reconstruct it to fit a
> modern politically correct narrative, would state that tensions between
> America and Muslims began with the unprovoked, four-decades long assault by the Muslim Barbary pirates against American shipping in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. I find it telling that you mentioned the Treaty of Tripoli in your speech but ignored the circumstances that led to it. That treaty was but one of numerous attempts by the United States to achieve peace with the jihadists of the Barbary Coast who were attacking our shipping and killing and enslaving our citizens and our soldiers and who by their own admission were doing so to fulfill the call to jihad.
>
> These jihadists were not acting to protest American foreign policy, which was decidedly isolationist, and there was no state of Israel to scapegoat. They were doing what countless Islamic jihadists have done throughout history, acting upon the hundreds of passages in the Qur'an and the Hadith that call upon faithful Muslims to kill, conquer or subjugate the infidel.
>
> A student of world history would know that, for all the acknowledged evils of Western colonialism, these evils pale in comparison to the nearly 14 centuries of Islamic colonialism that began in Arabia under the leadership of Mohammed. The student of history would know that Islamic forces eradicated all Jewish and Christian presence from Arabia after Mohammed's death, and then succeeded in conquering all of North Africa, most of the Middle East, much of Asia Minor, and significant portions of Europe and India, eventually creating an empire larger than Rome's was at its peak.
>
> The number of dead and enslaved during these many centuries of Islamic imperial conquest and colonialism have been estimated to total more than 300 million. What's more, the wealth of many of the conquered nations and cultures was plundered by the Islamic conquerors, and millions of non-Muslims who did survive were forced to pay onerous taxes, such as the "jizya," a humiliation tax to the Islamic caliphs. Indeed, in some areas Christians and Jews were made to wear a receipt for the jizya around their neck as a mark of their dishonor.
>
> These facts have not been invented by Christian or Jewish historical
> revisionists, but were chronicled by Muslim eyewitnesses throughout the past 14 centuries and are available to be researched by any person seeking an objective understanding of how Islam spread throughout the world.
>
> You say in your speech that we must squarely face the tensions that exist between America and the Muslim world. That is a laudable notion with which I agree, but by casting Islam as the historical victim and the West (and by implication, America) as the aggressor, you do not face these tensions squarely, but alleviate the Muslim world from coming to grips with the jihadist ideology embedded in its holy books and acted upon for 1,400 years.
>
> Even worse, you empower and embolden militant Islamists who regard your gestures as signs of weakness and capitulation.
>
> The issue is not that all Muslims are terrorists or radicals or extremists.
> We all know that the majority of Muslims are not. We also know that many peace-loving Muslims are victims of Islamist violence.
>
> The issue is this: what drives hundreds of millions of Muslims worldwide to call for the death of Jews?
>
> What drives millions of Muslims to riot, destroy property, and take innocent lives in reaction to the Danish cartoons?
>
> What drives tens of thousands of Muslims to demand the execution of a > British teacher whose only "crime" was allowing her students to name their teddy bears "Mohammed"?
>
> What drives countless Muslims worldwide to actively participate in, or fund, or provide nurture to terrorist organizations?
>
> What drives Muslims in mosques in America to proclaim and distribute
> materials that call for hatred of and the destruction of infidels?
>
> What drives entire Islamic countries to prohibit the building of a church or synagogue?
>
> To assume, as you apparently do, that what drives these actions is not an > ideology embedded in the holy books of Islam, but rather other "root
> causes," most of which you lay at the feet of America and the West, is at
> best naïve and at worst dangerous.
>
> Lastly, I must address your statement that "Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance." Unfortunately, the examples you gave are the exception rather than the rule.
>
> Historically speaking, I seriously doubt the Egyptian Copts, the Lebanese Maronites, the Christians in Bethlehem, the Assyrians, the Hindus, the Jews, and many others who have been persecuted by Islamic violence and supremacism, would agree with your assertion.
>
> For instance, Christians and Jews became "Dhimmis," a second class group under Islam. Dhimmis were forced to wear distinctive clothing; it was Baghdad's Caliph Al-Mutawakkil, in the ninth century, who designated a yellow badge for Jews under Islam, which Hitler copied and duplicated in Nazi Germany nearly a thousand years later.
>
> I witnessed first-hand the "tolerance" of Islam when Islamists ravaged my country of birth, Lebanon, in the 1970's, leaving widespread death and
> destruction in their wake. I saw how they re-paid the tolerance that
> Lebanese Christians extended toward them. My experience is not an isolated one. When you make an unfounded assertion about the "proud tradition" of tolerance in Islam, you do a great disservice to the hundreds of millions of non-Muslims who have been killed, maimed, enslaved, conquered, subjugated or displaced in the cause of Islamic jihad.
>
> Mr. President, those of us like me who are ringing the alarm in America
> about the threat of radical Islam would like nothing better than to
> peacefully co-exist with the Muslim world.
>
> Most Americans would like nothing better than to peacefully co-exist with the Muslim world. The obstacle to achieving this does not lie with us in America and the West. It lies with the hundreds of millions of Muslims
worldwide, including many of their spiritual leaders, who take seriously the repeated calls to jihad in the Qur'an and the Hadith. Who regard "infidels" as inferior and worthy of conquering, subjugating and forcibly converting. Who support "cultural jihad" as a means to subvert non-Muslim societies from within. Who take seriously the admonitions throughout the Qur'an and the Hadith to convert the world to Islam by force if necessary and bring it under the rule of Allah.
>
> Unless you are willing to courageously and honestly accept this, your
> aspirations for worldwide comity and peace in the Middle East are doomed to fail. >
> Sincerely,
> Brigitte Gabriel

Swiss banks

Yet another example of the US government thinking that somehow, someway, their laws, regulations, wants and needs somehow apply to another country!

Please visit Canoe.ca for the rest of Sarah's excellent report!
http://money.canoe.ca/News/Sectors/BanksFinance/2009/04/30/9308786-ap.html#top

Swiss bank tries to keep secrets
By Sarah Larimer, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
2009-04-30 21:56:00

banking giant UBS AG said turning over to the IRS the names of thousands of wealthy Americans who might be withholding billions in income from U.S. taxes would violate Swiss law and undermine international relations, according to a court brief filed Thursday.

The U.S. Internal Revenue Service has sued UBS to try and force the bank to turn over information about 52,000 account holders the agency says have an estimated US$14.8 billion in assets and are using Swiss bank secrecy to shield the money. UBS asked that a Miami federal judge deny the IRS petition.

"There can be no question that the Swiss interest in enforcement of its financial privacy laws is strong and legitimate," the filing states. "In contrast to some other countries' financial privacy laws, the laws of Switzerland impose criminal, as opposed to merely civil, liability on those responsible for violations."

(my comment on this...)
Her report goes on to document the idiocy of trying to get a Miami judge to sue Swiss banks to get them to divulge the names and amounts of money kept in the Swiss bank accounts. So how did this all happen? Well, when a bunch of banks went on the auction block last year, the Swiss bank UBS AG bought the accounts. Now who owns the accounts, and what is in them is pretty much a Swiss matter! It was ever thus. The Internal Revenue Service figures this was a money hiding scheme by the bankers who were going under, and maybe the UBS bankers themselves who probably met with the account holders and informed them that henceforth your banking information is protected under Swiss law. The IRS figures that since they don't know what or who has the accounts, they are possibly evidence of tax evasion. And they are probably right! But...its a Swiss bank so tough nooggies.

Sarah's report continues....
February's lawsuit followed an agreement in which the Justice Department would defer criminal prosecution of UBS in exchange for the identities of up to 300 U.S. customers and payment by the bank of $780 million. That deal did not cover the list of 52,000 names now sought.
Government officials could not be reached for comment late Thursday.

Cricket.

So why are we over in Afganistan?

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2009/03/02/8597451-ap.html

Because thats where the head of the snake is.

US weakness?

I rather like James Lewis...he seems to call it like he sees it, and too often, he seems to be a voice in the wilderness, so to speak. This exerpt is from the American Thinker blog, and I suggest you visit it to read more of this magnificent orator and journalist. Regardless of the title, it seems to be more about the US weakness in the face of the world's bullies than an article about Israel. Worth the trouble reading.

http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/02/can_israel_make_it_alone.html




Can Israel make it alone?By James Lewis


In 1938 the West abandoned Czechoslovakia and Poland to Nazi aggression, signaling so much weakness that Hitler immediately grasped that he could now send his tanks against France and the rest of Europe. At Yalta, in 1945, the United States and Britain abandoned Eastern Europe and half of Germany to Stalin's armies. China was left to Mao Zedong, who ended up killing an estimated 40 million of his own people in various utopian massacres. In 1975 we left Vietnam and Cambodia to the tender mercies of Pol Pot and Ho Chi Minh, poster kids of the American Left. Several million dead people later, in 1979, Jimmy Carter abandoned Iran to Ayatollah Khomeini and his torturers, one of whom is now President of Iran. Later this year Iran may explode its first bomb. The Obama administration will stand by and smile.
Now the US and our allies cannot control everything in the world, not by any stretch of the imagination. We were able to defeat Soviet imperialism with a true bipartisan consensus, from Truman to Reagan. But that took half a century. It also took tens of millions of clear-thinking Americans, Europeans and Asians, who were willing to recognize evil and stand up to it. Still, our record of standing by besieged allies is decidedly mixed, especially when Democrats take power. Barack Obama is no Harry S Truman.
Israel's planners have to be thinking that with Obama and his crowd in power, the United States may simply pull out the rug from the democratic and modern state of Israel.
Caroline Glick of the Jerusalem Post has listed some of the moves that have already been made by America-hating regimes -- just in the first weeks of the Obama Presidency.
She writes,
Since coming into office, Obama has repeatedly tried to build an alliance with the "newly emboldened" Russian bear. A week after entering office, he announced that he hoped to negotiate a nuclear disarmament agreement with Russia that would reduce the US's nuclear stockpiles by 80 percent. ... Responding to these American signals, the Russians proceeded to humiliate Washington. Last week President Dmitry Medvedev hosted Kyrgyzstan's President ... in Moscow. After their meeting the two announced that ...Kyrgyzstan will close the US Air Force base at Manas which serves American forces in Afghanistan.
Clear enough, right? But not to our media, who just haven't bothered to notice, choosing instead to stage the most butt-kissing display of presidential worship in history.
Last Friday, the Pakistanis tested Obama. The Supreme Court freed Pakistan's Dr. Strangelove -- A.Q. Khan -- from the house arrest he had been under since his nuclear proliferation racket was exposed by the Libyans in 2004. ... Khan's release casts a dark shadow on Obama's plan to dismantle much of America's nuclear arsenal, because with him free, the prospect that Pakistan is back in the proliferation business becomes quite real. ...
Pakistan's open contempt for the US and its weakness in the face of the Taliban's takeover of the country has direct consequences for the US's mission in Afghanistan ..... This week the Taliban bombed a bridge on the Khyber Pass along the Pakistani border with Afghanistan that served as a supply line to US forces in Afghanistan.
You probably didn't hear that on ABC News Tonight.
How about Iran?
Obama came into office waving an enormous olive branch in Teheran's direction... (But) the regime has become more outspoken in its hostility toward the US. ... . It has announced it will only agree to direct talks with Washington if it pulls US forces out of the Middle East, abandons Israel and does nothing to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. ... In all of its actions, Iran has gone out of its way to embarrass Obama and humiliate America. And Obama, for his part, has continued to embrace Teheran as his most sought-after negotiating partner.
Apparently if somebody spits right in your face and you pretend not to notice, it's just as if it never happened. That's not true in Southside Chicago, and it's not true in the Middle East. It only works that way in the liberal imagination.
Just look at the world. Putin is arm-twisting the Ukraine. He has cut off natural gas supplies to Germany and its neighbors in the middle of a bad winter. He is now in control of all the pipelines that supply Germany --- which is constantly sabotaged by its own Greens, who refuse to develop nuclear power plants.
And the US? Obama doesn't want to know. Neither does Hillary, who just flew off to Asia. Nor does Joe Biden, who now competes with Hillary and the National Security Council for control over foreign policy. The President is busy trying to peddle a trillion dollar payoff to Democrat Machines all over the country. Americans seem to be in a daze.
We are being tested by the bullies in the world. We are failing all their tests so far. Bullies keep testing and testing until they meet resistance, and there is no hard muscle in this flabby administration. It goes against their most cherished beliefs.
If you look at the world the way Israel must be doing, the question is, can you survive with a flabby America, or even with an America that turns against you?
The basic answer is "Yes," but at a stiff price. Israel is a fairly advanced nuclear power, and no such power has ever been overthrown by any other. The risk is just too great. Nuke-armed Pakistan is always on the edge of crumbling, and it is now believed that its intelligence service helped Islamic terrorists who gunned down hundreds of civilians in Mumbai a few months ago. India may threaten to retaliate, but it can't do much in the face of Pakistan's missiles armed with weapons of mass destruction. Pakistan is therefore using its nuclear power to create a safe haven for Islamic terror assaults on the Hindu nation next door.
After 9/11 the Pakistan government was sufficiently afraid of George W. Bush to allow American strikes against Al Qaida on its territory. But Pakistan has pulled back since General Musharraf was driven from power -- in good part by American pressure, along with outrageous and ignorant public insults from Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. So Musharraf is gone, and the Pakistan military and terror-support apparatus is now free to keep attacking majority-Hindu India. It may be their way of keeping their own militants under control. Or maybe they just believe in sticking it to the infidels, wherever they may be.
This is not, as the Obama administration would like to believe, just a quarrel about the Kashmir. It's all part of the worldwide jihad -- like communism and Nazism, Islam is inherently imperialistic.
When Iran gets its bomb, the Mullahs will feel free to sponsor terrorism in Saudi Arabia, as Ayatollah Khomeini did, or wherever they can stir up trouble in the Arab world. Iran's proxies have been launching missiles at civilians in Israel for years. They came close to hitting the nuclear power plant at Dimona in this last round, as much of a red line for Israel as anything imaginable. Next time they could easily hit that plant. What would Obama do?
The death of Israel is only a part of what the Mullahs want; they really crave control over Mecca and Medina, the holiest cities in Islam. The Saudis have ruled Arabia for only a hundred years, a fleeting moment in time by the millennial reckoning of fanatics. Why should the Arabian Peninsula be dominated by the despised Sunni Arabs, when seventy million Shiites in Iran are only fifty miles across the Gulf, and will soon be armed with nukes? The Persian Empire never stopped at the Gulf. Why should the new Shiite Caliphate stop there?
That's why the Saudis are looking to make peace between the Arabs and Israel. It is also why they financed Pakistan's nuclear program, and why they will do the same for Egypt when the time comes. They see a deadly threat to their survival, even if the American government doesn't.
So Iran's nuclear weapons will be used to create impregnable havens for terror groups. If Obama allows Iran to dominate the Gulf to "satisfy its ambitions to become a regional power," as the Left likes to say, you can fully expect the Mullahs to take the logical next step.
Nations have no permanent friends, only permanent interests -- like survival. If the United States abandons the Jewish State, Jerusalem will have to seek new alliances. It may feel driven to conduct an open nuclear test if Iran does. That's what happened with India and Pakistan ten years ago. Israel is working with India -- and so far, the US -- on advanced antimissile defenses. India has a natural affinity with the Israelis, as a majority-Hindu state that has been fighting jihadi terror since 1948. Historically, India experienced constant aggression from Muslim powers. China and Russia have a long horror of Islamic invasion. If survival is at stake, expect Israel to make whatever alliances it can.
Other nations that rely on us --Taiwan, Singapore, Poland, the Czech Republic, the Ukraine, Georgia, the Baltic States -- will also see the handwriting on the wall. Not all of them will collapse.
Western Europe may be crumble to domestic Muslims, as the Geert Wilders case suggests. But Russia has a thousand years of fighting Islamic aggression, and has just carried out a vicious war against jihadi rebels in Chechnya. China also fears Muslim invaders and rebels. Even Australia is showing real spirit in the fight against this very ancient fascist ideology.
In a decade or so civilized nations will have adequate anti-missile defenses, and better protection against smuggled dirty bombs. Bio-identification will make it easier to pinpoint dangerous people trying to enter the country. But we may have to pay a big price in individual freedom.
These calculations are surely going through the minds of politicians and strategists around the world. If the Obama administration walks away from democratic allies, we will see a fast reshuffling of the alliances we've seen since World War I.
Obama is the most radical leftist ever to occupy the White House. He will teach us many lessons, but he is not likely to sway American culture for very long -- including our admiration for small and besieged democracies. If anything, he will end up reminding a new generation why the United States fought the Cold War. There will come a time for another Ronald Reagan, a president who combines our deepest values with a coherent national strategy.
But that's over the long term. In the next four to eight years Israel will have to think very hard about how to survive without the United States.

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/02/can_israel_make_it_alone.html at February 15, 2009 - 03:33:25 PM EST

Change, part two

Well, I see that we are heading down a slippery slope in a handbasket as usual. South of the border, we have a world leader who has just been handed a mandate to spend like a drunken sailor. Never in the history of the world has so much paper been printed to cover a debt which a lot of folks don't believe the government should have assumed in the first place. Not even in the trust fund debacle a few years ago. Mr Obama's supporters blame the previous administration, forgetting that for the last several years, both the upper and lower houses have been dominated by the Democratic Party. So, sorry, it was the Democrats who got ya into this mess, maybe the Democrats can spend y'all out of it!

Actually, it might work....since so much money existed in the form of mortgages on properties worth only half their face value, this money has essentially been taken out of the economy, and the US's trillion dollar input "should" only be shoveling money back into the hole. Normally it would take a war to pull this miracle off! If they can resist the urge to print a couple of extra trillion, you know, just to leave as tips and pocket linings, then there will not be a corrosion in the value of the cash such as exists in say, the Belgian Congo, or in Germany leading into WWII. Quite a balancing act! So it may well be the right answer, at least for the US.

Now up here in Canada, we are facing an economic meltdown of our own. For the first time since the Trudeau years, Canada has had a negative trade balance. 33 years. We are seeing thousands being laid off from GM plants, auto parts plants are closing their doors, fewer housing starts have been the norm in the US, leading to lower demand for lumber, and it doesn't take a crystal ball to spot that much the same thing will be happening here in the next year or so. Nickel, iron, copper and potash prices are falling through the floor, causing those companies to reduce their operations. We can't sell our oil! Ottawa gang bangers are coming back home because there are no longer any rich pickings in the oil patch.

Note that my examples are all of companies which are foreign owned. They employ thousands of workers here in Canada, and the Obama government is on record as saying that they have no interest in propping up any economy but their own. General Motors Canada is not going to get any of that great bail out money, so GM Canada has stated that they will simply close operations in Canada. Unless of course, the federal conservative party of Canada decides to bail out General Motors Canada. Then they would stay here, and as they piously point out, continue to employ UAW assembly line plugs. You want to bet that Wehrhouser lumber, Exxon, Gulf Oil, and Theissen Nickle are not watching this real closely, and if GMC gets a sugar plumb, their execs won't be flying their corporate planes into Ottawa International Airport asking for theirs as well?

Only trouble with that is, as we get back to the original statement, you can print money like it was growing on trees if you have a place where it vanishes just as quick...like say, a war, or a bank bailout. But Canada doesn't really have that...Canadian banks were "fiscally responsible", and therefore any massive bailout we hand out here in Canada will simply corrode the value of our currency. The trade deficit won't last long....as the Canadian dollar crashes in value like a cessna driven by a drunken ten year old, the economy will recover.

The real question is, as the US dollar nose dives as well, which will come out of it intact and level, and which will simply thunder into the turf?

Ahh, we live in interesting times!

Gettin on...

As we age, we tend to end up seeing more of the medical establishment. For

example, my regular family doctor referred me to a female urologist. I saw

her yesterday and she is gorgeous. She's beautiful and unbelievably sexy.

She told me that I have to stop masturbating.

When I asked her why, she said, ..........

"Because I'm trying to examine you."

Change!

Mr. Obama has succeeded in being elected in the US, his single greatest rallying cry was "change".

The change you so ferverently hope for will have nothing to do with removing politicians from the trough or bringing about honesty in government and wishing won't make it so. The "change" will involve a depression economy, depression "attitudes", the equivalent of the "new deal", infill of urban areas, kids with families living with their parents, the loss of mobility (due to lack of fuel and the slapping of toll booths on previously "free" highways), the corrosion of housing prices, stock options and the US dollar. The costs of attending university will be out of reach to even more people, and the loss of jobs will produce a {hopefully temporary} welfare state. Y'all will be darned lucky to avoid a police state.

In my wildest dreams I don't forsee a golden age. Gosh knows I would love to be optomistic, but I don't see any new railways being laid down, or the electrification of existing railways. I don't see any widespread regulations being made to require new housing to be superinsulated, or even to be situated on the lot to take advantage of the sun! (Not that there is any new housing going on anyway.) I see big talk about improving the "infrastructure" as if anybody will be able to drive on it, but nothing about improving public transit.

Oh well....we got our own problems in Canada...in fact Canadian politics is getting quite fascinating. Nobody seems concerned that three quarters of the business in Canada are owned by US businesses which are facing receivership. Not the least of which is the foreign owned GM which is asking the Canadian Government for a BIG handout, and not to be outdone, the totally foreign owned forestry industry is demanding the same.

Yet, I am not gloomy, really. There are unprecedented opportunities coming down the road if we only reach out to take advantage of them. The internet is not just about porn nowadays, its about learning and education. Increasingly, the doctorates you get from colleges are becoming irrelevant. The auto companies may be forced to create autos that people can actually buy, and maybe they can re-tool some of their assembly lines to create electric tramways. They don't have to be "steam punk" trams, but that would be nice....grin!

Well, you wanted change. I DO hope you like it. You will never go back to the days of happy motoring and hour long single occupant commutes, jobs that will pay enough to send your kids to university AND pay off the house. It'll be change to a lifestyle our parents would recognize from the dirty thirties when they built houses from rammed earth, churches all had huge soup kitchens attached to them, and families wouldn't see dad for months at a time because he was working at a job in another city.

A message from the Queen

> Subject: Message from your Queen

>>>>> To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign
> Majesty Queen Elizabeth II
>> In light of your failure in recent years to nominate competent
> candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, or
> most recently to regulate your financial markets, we hereby give
> notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.

>> (You should look up 'revocation' in the Oxford English Dictionary.)

>> Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical
> duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas,
> which she does not fancy).

>> Your new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a Governor for
> America without the need for further elections.

>> Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be> circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

>> To aid in the transition to a British Crown dependency, the following
> rules are introduced with immediate effect:

>>>> ----------------------->> 1. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'colour,'
> 'favour,' 'labour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell
> 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix '-ize'
> will be replaced by the suffix '-ise.' Generally, you will be
> expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up> 'vocabulary').

>> ------------------------>> 2. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises
> such as ''like' and 'you know' is an unacceptable and inefficient form
> of communication. There is no such thing as U.S. English. We will let
> Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be> adjusted to take into account the reinstated letter 'u'' and the
> elimination of '-ize.'

>> ------------------->> 3. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

>> ----------------->> 4. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns,
> lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and
> therapists shows that you're not quite ready to be independent. Guns> should only be used for shooting grouse. If you can't sort things out
> without suing someone or speaking to a therapist,then you're not ready
> to shoot grouse..

>> ---------------------->> 5. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything
> more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. Although a permit will be
> required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

>> ---------------------->> 6. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will
> start driving on the left side with immediate effect. At the same
> time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit
> of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you
> understand the British sense of humour.

>> -------------------->> 7. The former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been
> calling gasoline) of roughly $10/US gallon. Get used to it.

>> ------------------->> 8. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French
> fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling
> potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut,
> fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

>> ------------------->> 9. The cold, tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not
> actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be
> referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted
> provenance will be referred to as Lager. South African beer is also
> acceptable, as they are pound for pound the greatest sporting nation
> on earth and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of
> the British Commonwealth - see what it did for them. American brands
> will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be
> sold without risk of further confusion.

>> --------------------->> 10. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as
> good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to
> play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English
> dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to
> having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.

>> --------------------->> 11. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind
> of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough
> will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities
> to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every
> twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of
> nancies).

>> --------------------->> 12. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to
> host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played
> outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware there is a world
> beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn
> cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first to take the
> sting out of their deliveries.

>> -------------------->> 13. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

>> ----------------->> 14. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's
> Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all
> monies due (backdated to 1776).

>> --------------->> 15. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 p.m. with proper cups, with
> saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and
> cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season.

>> ------------------>>>> God Save the Queen!

Jackass parking

Last Sunday, I went to go to work and discovered that some bozo had parked right in front of my driveway. I had to drive onto the church lawn to get out! Well, okay, it was the Manse for the church. But still...should not happen!
Above you can clearly see the sign which says no parking. Universally ignored by the churchgoers.

And to make matters worse, the son of a gun only needed to move his car ten feet forward to unblock my driveway!

Maybe I should soap his windshield.

The alternative I suppose would have been to interrupt mass to get him to move. A last choice indeed!

Vandals hammer Stonehenge.

Suspected souvenir hunters broke into Stonehenge and vandalised the ancient monument, English Heritage has said.
A hammer and screwdriver were used to take a small chip the size of a 10p piece from the side of the Heel Stone.
English Heritage said further damage was prevented by security guards who spotted the two men at the 5,000-year-old site in Wiltshire.
Police believe the vandals could be the same two people caught on CCTV acting suspiciously a few days earlier.

More information here...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/wiltshire/7414491.stm

Canadian

An Australian Definition of a Canadian - Written by an Australian Dentist

(This was sent to me by my cousin, and whether it is written by a Aussie, or anybody else, the sentiment is still the same.)

You probably missed it in the local news, but there was a report that someone in Pakistan had advertised in a newspaper an offer of a reward to anyone who killed a Canadian - any Canadian. An Australian dentist wrote the following editorial to help define what a Canadian is, so they would know one when they found one. A Canadian can be English, or French, or Italian, Irish, German, Spanish, Polish, Russian or Greek. A Canadian can be Mexican, African, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Australian, Iranian, Asian, Arab, Pakistani or Afghan. A Canadian may also be a Cree, Metis, Mohawk, Blackfoot, Sioux, or one of the many other tribes known as native Canadians. A Canadian's religious beliefs range from Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu or none. In fact, there are more Muslims in Canada than in Afghanistan. The key difference is that in Canada they are free to worship as each of them chooses. Whether they have a religion or no religion, each Canadian ultimately answers only to God, not to the government, or to armed thugs claiming to speak for the government and for God. A Canadian lives in one of the most prosperous lands in the history of the world. The root of that prosperity can be found in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms which recognize the right of each person to the pursuit of happiness. A Canadian is generous and Canadians have helped out just about every other nation in the world in their time of need, never asking a thing in return. Canadians welcome the best of everything, the best products, the best books, the best music, the best food, the best services and the best minds. But they also welcome the least - the oppressed, the outcast and the rejected. These are the people who built Canada. You can try to kill a Canadian if you must as other blood-thirsty tyrants in the world have tried but in doing so you could just be killing a relative or a neighbor. This is because Canadians are not a particular people from a particular place. They are the embodiment of the human spirit of freedom. Everyone who holds to that spirit, everywhere, can be a Canadian. Please keep this going! Pass this around the World. Then pass it around again. It says it all, for all of us

'Keep your stick on the ice'

Museum Pieces

Here are a couple of spaulders which are way too pretty for words. Relevant details...the roped edges, the extant picadills, the mirror polish, (thats pretty rare!) and the high integral fence.

This was a Belgian armour as well...but this one was much more industrial, more "General Issue". It has a very complex rope at the neck line though! Don't think I have ever seen a roped edge that was so complicated, yet it does not match the shoulder armour. I really like the gorget...it gimbals like a gyroscope, and is made from interlocking cones. The one in back is he same. The rest of the armour is so plain that possibly it belongs to a different suit, or (more likely) it would be covered by a cape, so it didn't matter that it was really plain.

Above is the gorget which we saw in profile in the next pic up. With its mitten gauntlet. The makers marks were right out there for the world to see! Well, until he puts on his breastplate, at which time, it will be covered.

This is what it looks like when it is all put together. The large single piece breastplate, the fancy faulds, the elbows that protect the inside of the elbow, and the fancy rolled top to the breastplate which sits on top of the gorget.
Its funny, most people will be looking at this juice can of a cod piece, but the armourer here is in love with the gauntlets!

Ezra Levant

Have you had a chance to follow Ezra Levant's arguments in front of the Human Rights Commission? For some reason, they allowed him to record the whole procedure, and this has supplied Mr. Levant with fodder for a pro-free speech rant which lasts, (get this! ) 90 minutes. He has posted about 20 minutes of his speech on his blog.....http://ezralevant.com/

I doubt that in the future the HRC will allow anyone to record their "interrogations". When that happens, we will have a star chamber in truth!

I don't like Ezra Levant....I think he is a conniving, manipulative man who just happens to publish a newspaper, and like all reporters who fancy themselves a member of a "profession", he is quick to use methods which some would regard as foul. On the other hand,I don't have to LIKE him to SUPPORT him! I think much of what he does is simply done to sell newspapers...something he has in common with a lot of other newspapers!

I deplore what you say, but I will fight to the death to defend your right to say it.

I humbly request any who read this blog to visit http://ezralevant.com/ and give him your suport. Or lambast him...grin!

Conservatives, get a grip!

Here is a list of some of the things I would like to see the Tories them get done. Let me know if there are any problems with it, and if there is anything I left off! I know there are several things I didn't even cover, but this is a start!

This post was originally a comment on the self styled "Conservative Blog of Canada". Its not worth the read, normally, but it had a list of things the guy would like to see. Like "a job for everybody" and "Jean Cretien should be in jail". Yeah, pretty lame. I think I can do better.
Actually, this is a repeat of a blog entry I made about a year ago. And you know, I don't think there has been much change, or progress on these issues.


1) Give farmers an even playing field.

2) Increase the number and training of food testing inspectors, and create a Canadian FDA.

3) Demand that contractors have a federal license and that they post a bond to ensure responsibility.

4) Create a regulatory board which works WITH the unions to ensure that homeowners don't have to call in Mike Holms to fix their deck. (They do that now with electrical and gas...) It should be the same for anything which requires a permit to build. Which is of course, anything.

5) Change the building code to require better insulation, site orientation, ventilation and fire resistance. (U of Manitoba standards, the R2000 house at a minimum!)

6) Build a better and more complete Codis, Afis, and firearms data base with serious safeguards against unauthorized hacking. If you can't use the firearms registry to prevent crimes, than scrap it. (Well, they DID that...the discovery that the firearms registry cost more than the police budget of Montreal, Toronto and Vancover combined seems to have sunk home. This is a very contentious issue, read the above statement again carefully...IF you CAN'T use it to PREVENT crimes, then scrap it. If you just want it for SOLVING crimes, then put the money into Codis and Afis data bases and a decent reward for information system....basically more police officers, and less computer crap. I have an awesome story around here somewhere about an abducted child found after fifteen years due to a random fingerprint check...how many more good news stories would there be if we had a better AFIS system. Then there is the chronically underfunded Criminal Profile Data Base....
Then we would need to deal with some human rights issues regarding all those fingerprints....it can be resolved, again, without spending a billion dollars on a failed data base.

(Personally I would like to see the banning and destruction of all short arms, yes including including patrol police. Then arm the patrolmen with seriously good shotguns, not cheap modified hunting guns. Then anybody with a pistol is "automatically" charged with carrying a prohibited weapon. Contentious idea, I know but stats don't lie, other countries have done this surprising thing with excellent results. Again, I didn't say disarm our police, rather I am saying, arm them with better stuff than pistols. And even WITH the uproar about tasers, tasers are STILL better than shooting a raving crackhead dead in the street! But I don't expect this idea to fly very far! Grin! In my previous blog entry, a reader asked me if I was on crack to think of such an idea...in reality, it would solve a lot of problems (10% of police injured with firearms are injured with their own guns, 30% of school shootings are done with daddys guns...you don't think that is significant? And I have the studies to back up a really whacko idea like this!)

7) Bring in federal initiatives to get cookie cutter (read economy of scale cheaper) environmentally sound small scale ethanol plants spaced all around the country. Owned and operated by municipalities who will get the profits that they can use for local initiatives. Use the same model as water purification plants.
I think it is too draconian to pass laws demanding oil companies MUST install 70% ethanol pumps, the way Brazil did, however if they drop the federal tax on such fuel, market demand will do the rest.

8) Re-vitalize the railroads. Increase ridership. Use a fraction of the money we spend on building roads to create more light rail. Better advertising, better marketing. Less corporate welfare, smarter rides (say, smaller trains similar to subway trains running more often between cities? Just an idea. How about high speed trains across the prairies? I know...we would all like to see moving sidewalks between Toronto and Montreal, but I am trying to keep these suggestions in the real world. (If you can call the Concervative caucus the "real world"....ha ha!) But there is no reason why you could not have a roll on-roll off train which would ferry you in your car from Toronto to Vancover departing every hour on the hour. Or your company's tractor trailer! Oh heck, how about roll on roll off from Orleans to centre of Ottawa? The subsidy to provide such a service would be a lot less than creating an extra lane on the queensway! Note the savings potential on greenhouse gas, improved traffic on existing roads, gasoline savings, and wear and tear on automobiles. And if that doesn't work, then make all other downtown roads into toll roads. Hey, they did it in Trondheim and London!

9) Reduce the tax burden on small business, and make grants and subsidies available for small business to start up, and more importantly, suceed against the drag of paperwork, taxes, and municipal bureaucracy.

10) Demand to all provinces that they issue driver's licences that have a box to be checked if the owner does NOT want his organs to be used in a transplant in the event of a death. In this day and age of the internet, I would love to see a web site where a doctor could key in your driver's license number, and read the living will you left on file back when you got your licence. This would probably be a provincial thing but it could be driven by federal funding. I mean, really, a searchable web page? How expensive is that?

11) Increased border patroling, particularly on the East Coast to stop drug smuggling. There is so much of it going on, and so much getting through, that it is a national disgrace. The North has the "Canadian Rangers". A good initiative, but hardly professionals. There are barely enough of them to be listening posts. We need bases up there. Now! There are 6 bases in Ottawa (why? anybody going to attack Ottawa?) , and none on Baffin Island. Well, its cold up there, so why put a base up there? Well, as global warming takes its course, the North will become a more viable route for people, drugs, and foreign nationals looking to stake claims in the arctic. Right now, we have a dispute with Denmark over territory they claim which belongs to us. France is claiming the bulk of the offshore oil fields on the strength of two little islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The US is claiming that they can hammer through our sea ice with great "Manhattan" ice breakers carrying oil.
Its time we started caring about our territory, or we will simply lose it. Is there any way to prevent China from buying up ALL of our iron, lumber, sulphur, nickel and hardwood?

12) Speaking of national disgrace....is there some way to get rid of that seal hunt? It takes in, what, the same as a medium sized MacDonalds'restaurant every year? Can we not find some gainful employment for seal hunters besides risking their lives on the ice for f-all? I know...none of anybody's business but our own, but still, it makes us look bad We sped hundreds of times moree than what the seal fishery is worth to "improve our image abroad". How about doing it for real instead of doing it with hype?


13) A national federally funded mental health facility to
a) take the pressure off the provinces, and
b) to come up with ways to treat mental illnesses effectively. A centralized data base where medical records can be kept (again, with serious controls against unauthorized access or tampering) to deal with footloose street people. Associated with that would be doubling the number of mental health case workers on the "front lines". Don't think we need it? Drop into your local court house Monday morning around 7AM, and tell me again we don't need more case workers. We really need laws to demand that people who are precribed psychoactive drugs MUST take them under supervision, and we need to provide the supervision, no matter what the cost. In other words, you go off your meds, you go back to jail. (We could call it the Brian Smith law, or maybe the female astronaut law!) There MUST be some way to ensure a pschychotic will take his meds, even if he decides to move to Calgary or Vancover. An RFID comes to mind, but I know that conjures up images of 1984,.

14) Federal laws against phishing and identity theft. You know, there are none right now! And it is getting to be a problem. There is a good reason why Montreal is the world centre for telemarketing fraud.

15) Federal monitoring and licencing of pharmaceudical products and drug marketing agencies to ensure that inferior product is not shipped to other countries. Not that there is any, but THEY say there is. ("They" being protectionist regimes who are scared of the low prices of our quality meds!).

16)Increase the number of inspectors at container ports to watch for contraband. If Canada customs has to go through my socks when I come back from Columbia, then they should go through a container I have delivered to my house! Yet the VAST majority never get xrayed, or inspected. But Mr. Jones comes across with an extra bottle of whisky...OMG!

17) Require all auto manufacturers to add armour plates to the inside of doors of cars to prevent theft. Also, required anti theft devices to be built into all vehicles. There are too many to list here, but I rather like LoJack. Too many vehicles are stolen, broken up, or shipped off shore to ignore, yet as long as the insurance agencies are allowed to increase their premiums to cover their losses, then why should they care. And how about that five mile an hour bumber which used to be on every car during the 90's? Did they HAVE to cave into the auto body repair lobby? Have you seen what a 5mph bump into the back of a minivan costs to repair, and how much your insurance will rise as a result? Its disgusting!

18) Insurance reform....see above....but apply it to everything from auto body repair to roofers. Doctors have to get malpractice insurance, and contractors are merely "encouraged" to take out insurance against shoddy workmanship.

There. This is a start. Conservatives are in power right now. Want to bet how many of these initiatives will be even started a year from now?

Pallywood

This is Pally-wood. To my eye, much of what we see on the news is clearly staged. Protest signe in Bali that are all written in English, for instance. But then, most protests ARE staged, that is their nature. But what about those remarkable middle of the battle scenes like those intrepid news reporters are getting from, say, Palestine?

I welcome your opinions on this video.