tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-91605932024-03-12T19:01:59.525-04:00John the MadG.K. Chesterton once wrote that "if something's worth doing, it's worth doing badly." Thus my blog. I am a proud member of the Red Ensign Brigade. We are commandos of the mind, corrupting liberal youth by buying them Guinness and teaching them ancient ballads of the Dominion, when Canucks were brave and carried their weight in the fight for freedom. A pint of the best and they are ours forever!John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.comBlogger452125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-75004969388457789442009-05-18T19:04:00.002-04:002009-05-18T22:25:44.912-04:00Immaculate Mary v. the presidentI dare any practicing Catholic <a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/damian_thompson/blog/2009/05/17/notre_dame_honours_a_prolife_priest">to watch the arrest</a> of Father Norman Westlin at Notre Dame University and not feel a deep sense of shame for this once great Catholic institution of learning.<br /><br />As Father Westlin is arrested he sings that great Catholic hym <span style="font-style: italic;">Immaculate Mary</span>. As he is handcuffed<br /><br />"Why would you arrest a catholic priest for trying to stop the killing of a baby? Use your mind. You got it all backwards."<br /><br />Indeed father we do.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-28648725466475912192009-01-04T10:24:00.009-05:002009-01-05T00:18:48.574-05:00Gaza<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI_ocUAMAWB88GK4oDQEl9fD8IKeWIOWoKcuiiR9K43cY69kHn0_nW_VFxlA95x0OK0KrcfPE8ZwtmqIFgnRhIGvF1wLFhzw35e_fHhH6FZf4B2HlfKX6UxPIMvxD8DGz7mhXT/s1600-h/Hamas+rocket+heading+for+Israel.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 258px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI_ocUAMAWB88GK4oDQEl9fD8IKeWIOWoKcuiiR9K43cY69kHn0_nW_VFxlA95x0OK0KrcfPE8ZwtmqIFgnRhIGvF1wLFhzw35e_fHhH6FZf4B2HlfKX6UxPIMvxD8DGz7mhXT/s400/Hamas+rocket+heading+for+Israel.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5287669760508644962" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><a href="http://images.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://cache.boston.com/resize/bonzai-fba/AP_Photo/2009/01/03/1230975639_7792/539w.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2009/01/03/israeli_ground_forces_enter_gaza_in_escalation&usg=__Ea7xC3gVqgb-HPI2xS5pqzqH0uw=&h=348&w=539&sz=19&hl=en&start=5&um=1&tbnid=nhSc_PKvHiHvdM:&tbnh=85&tbnw=132&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dphotos%2Bisraeli%2Bforces%2Bin%2Bgaza%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG">(Hamas Rocket Heading for Israel, AP Photo/Bernat Armangue) </a><br /></span><br />I've been reading a fair amount about the Israeli military assault on Gaza this week. Amid Christmas celebrations and family time here in my comfortable Canadian home I watched as the crisis escalated. Among the articles I read, was a piece in today's Sun newspaper chain, by Eric <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Margolis</span>, called <a href="http://www.ottawasun.com/Comment/2009/01/04/7912141-sun.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">A Mess in the Making</span></a>.<br /><p> </p><blockquote style="font-style: italic;"><p>While Israeli F-16 jets dropped tons of bombs on tiny, 360-sq.-km Gaza -- the equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel -- Israel's Defence Minister, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Ehud</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Barak</span>, asserted, "We have totally changed the rules of the game." </p><p> He was right. By blitzing <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Hamas</span>-run Gaza, the world's largest outdoor prison, packed with 1.5 million Palestinian refugees, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Barak</span> presented the incoming U.S. administration with a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">fait</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">accompli</span> and neatly checkmated the newest player in the Mideast Great Game -- that other "Barack," Barack Obama -- before he could even take a seat at the table. </p></blockquote>I wouldn't worry too much about Obama. There is nothing he can't do. But "the world's largest outdoor prison" .... ? Does <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Margolis</span> think <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Gazians</span> live in fields? It must have something to so with closed borders and restricted access to a larger adjacent country. If so, he may he may be on to something. I think someone ought to complain to the United Nations about that big wall the Egyptians erected along their shared border with their fellow Arab brothers and sisters in Gaza.<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Thanks</span> to that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"></span> wall, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Gazians</span>, such as <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=090104200852.o253kg1p&show_article=1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Abu</span> Ali</a>, (h/t to <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/index.php?category=0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Breitbart</span>.com</a> via the <a href="http://drudgereport.com/">Drudge Report</a>) are reduced to digging tunnels to Egypt to carry out their smuggling operations.<br />The Israeli Defence Force, of course, is aware that these tunnels are conduits for weapons along with foodstuffs and other smuggled contraband materiel. Accordingly, their <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">air force</span> is attacking the tunnels as I write. But fear not:<span class="lingo_region"><br /><a style="text-decoration: underline; color: black; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal;" class="lingo_link" href="http://get.lingospot.com/link/?@li2=1405&key=SVKEJENJ&ps_id=EvvQmA99Wm&q=QQ:lqOTqjptCQP7HZ_GAISORJJOAGIOBADVKVV&site_id=breitbart.com&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsearch.breitbart.com%2Fq%3Fs%3DAbu%2520Ali%26sid%3Dbreitbart.com&url_key=_TaCUO0C:P7BGI%5BDK&v=1&%7Eboot=1231124437117" rel="nofollow"></a><blockquote style="font-style: italic;"><a style="text-decoration: underline; color: black; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal;" class="lingo_link" href="http://get.lingospot.com/link/?@li2=1405&key=SVKEJENJ&ps_id=EvvQmA99Wm&q=QQ:lqOTqjptCQP7HZ_GAISORJJOAGIOBADVKVV&site_id=breitbart.com&url=http%3A%2F%2Fsearch.breitbart.com%2Fq%3Fs%3DAbu%2520Ali%26sid%3Dbreitbart.com&url_key=_TaCUO0C:P7BGI%5BDK&v=1&%7Eboot=1231124437117" rel="nofollow"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Abu</span> Ali</a> vows that once the war in Gaza ends he will quickly repair his tunnel under the frontier with Egypt, one of the many underground links used by Palestinian smugglers that have been blasted by Israeli warplanes. <p> "Life cannot go on in Gaza if the tunnels are destroyed -- they're our only opening to the outside world," he said, speaking inside the Palestinian enclave that has been blockaded by the Jewish state for more than two years. </p><p> Hundreds of tunnels have been carved out beneath the Gaza-Egypt frontier, providing a vital conduit to bring basic needs into the territory which has suffered an increasing stranglehold in the past 18 months. </p><p> Foodstuffs, building materials, medicines and electric equipment are all brought from Egypt through the passages -- as well as weapons, notably rockets, and ammunition. </p><p> Such contraband provides smugglers with a profitable business. It is also a source of income for <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Hamas</span>, the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Islamist</span> movement which has been the sole ruler in the Gaza Strip since June 2007. </p><p> The movement levies taxes on the smugglers' income from the tunnels which are linked to the territory's electricity grid with the blessing of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Hamas</span>. </p></blockquote><p></p></span> I'm told those triple P, public-private sector partnerships are the wave of the future in public policy circles and here it is in action in Gaza. Go <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">Abu</span> go. But I digress. let us return to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">Margolis</span>.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;"></span><blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">Israel believes its mighty information machine will allow it to weather the storm of worldwide outrage over its Biblical punishment of Gaza. Who remembers Israel's flattening of parts of the rebellious Palestinian city of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">Jenin</span>, or the U.S. destruction in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">Falluja</span>, Iraq? As Stalin liked to say, "the dogs bark, and the caravan moves on."</span></blockquote>Actually, I remember a wee bit about <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">Jenin</span>. I remember terrible tales told of a Israeli massacre there in April 2002 back in the good old days of the heroic Intifada. It was claimed that over 500 Palestinians were slaughtered in the refugee camp, many crushed by Israeli tanks. <a href="http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/670151/posts">Marie <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">Colvin's</span> April 2002 reportage</a> in the Free Republic was common.<br /><p></p><blockquote style="font-style: italic;"><p>Images of this man-made earthquake zone have flashed around the world as evidence that the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, is responsible for another war crime in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">Jenin</span> on a par with the massacre of Palestinians in the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">Chatila</span> and Sabra refugee camps in Beirut 20 years ago. </p><p>Israel has responded that the devastation was the consequence of a pitched battle against entrenched terrorists. </p><p>What really happened? Tragedy doesn't necessarily breed truth. The propaganda war had begun before the white dust settled over <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">Jenin</span>. </p><p>Rafi <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">Laderman</span>, a personable Israeli reserve major, emerged from the battlefield and made the rounds of the media in his rumpled green uniform. His clear plastic spectacles signalled his real job as a marketing consultant. </p><p><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">Laderman</span> insisted that all the buildings in the refugee camp had been destroyed by explosive booby traps set by the terrorists, or levelled by Israeli bulldozers because they "presented additional engineering difficulties" that could endanger civilians. He himself had stopped the fighting to lead Palestinian civilians to safety. </p><p>All that seemed disingenuous. Equally unlikely were Palestinian claims that the Israelis had killed 500 Palestinians in cold blood, most civilians, and buried them in mass graves under the rubble after running them over with tanks. Israel said about 70 had been killed. </p><p><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">Terje</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">Roed</span>-Larsen, the United Nations envoy to the Middle East, cut through the propaganda by stating the obvious: "No military operation can justify this scale of destruction. Whatever the purpose was, the effect is collective punishment of a whole society." </p><p>He and his family received telephone death threats from Israeli callers for his pains.<br /></p></blockquote><p></p> <p>In May 2002, Richard Starr, managing editor of the Weekly Standard <a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/001/218vnicq.asp">wrote this</a>.<span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Big <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">Jenin</span> Lie</span><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-style: italic;">PRECISELY A MONTH AGO, on April 8, the Palestinian news agency <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_33">Wafa</span> was reporting that Israel had committed the "massacre of the 21st century" in the Palestinian refugee camp in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_34">Jenin</span>. "Medical sources" informed <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_35">Wafa</span> of "hundreds of martyrs." This was a lie, concocted not only for local consumption--to keep the Palestinian people whipped up in a patriotic, Israel-hating frenzy--but mostly for export to the West. </span></p><p style="font-style: italic;">That same day, you could hear breathless reports of the supposed Israeli atrocities in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_36">Jenin</span> being spread by Palestinian sources on NPR, CNN, and elsewhere. Typical was the hysteria of Nasser <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_37">al</span>-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_38">Kidwa</span>, the Palestinian representative to the United Nations, on CNN: "There's almost a massacre now taking place in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_39">Jenin</span>. Helicopter gun ships are throwing missiles at one square kilometer packed with almost 15,000 people in a refugee camp. . . . Just look at the TV and watch, watch what the--what the Israel forces are doing. . . . This is a war crime, clear war crime, witnessed by the whole world, preventing ambulances, preventing people from being buried. I mean this is an all-out assault against the whole population." </p><p style="font-style: italic;">No, this was an all-out assault on the truth. There was a pitched battle in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_40">Jenin</span>. But the "hundreds" of martyrs were a cynical invention. The death toll was 56 Palestinians, the majority of them combatants, and 23 Israeli soldiers.</p></blockquote>What sparked the battle in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_41">Jenin</span> where the Israeli army fought a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_42">vicious</span> house to house battle against a few hundred Palestinian <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_43">guerrillas</span>? A suicide bomber blew up 28 innocent Israeli civilians. The bomber was trained in the Jenin camp.<br /><br />No suicide bombings, no Jenin. No rocket attacks into Israel, no Israeli military incursion into Gaza. Simple really.<br /><br />So why does Hamas continue to provoke war that it knows will result in large Palestinian casualties? That's the essential question for you to contemplate.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Update</span><br /><br />The disinformation campaign to discredit Israel is in full swing for the current military operation. Go to <a href="http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/">Little Green Footballs</a> to learn about a propaganda piece purporting to show a gruesome Israeli attack on civilians. Not so, it seems. It was a 2005 Hamas rally at the Jabalya refugee camp in the north of the Gaza Strip, in which their own damn Qassam rockets exploded, killing 15 people, injuring dozens - including children. <br /><br />I simply do not trust media reports showing civilian casualties. There are civilian casualties, to be sure, but the media is simply not very trustworthy on this matter.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-89951903075547158052008-12-16T19:30:00.006-05:002008-12-16T20:25:41.538-05:00Polar bears and scrambled eggs<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhce_s_9_0bsac3hhPNqVblaBLq2t3EfSbuuhvJjZEFA_UOdrwJFw2VMhwXIWl5-eKUWrXTjsBl-N43NnmnHYL9iM7prBdBb57_TWfcnpG4k6OwE5b78UXBMBr6MaVDg3yC9VWO/s1600-h/polar+bear+at+garbage+dump.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 130px; height: 130px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhce_s_9_0bsac3hhPNqVblaBLq2t3EfSbuuhvJjZEFA_UOdrwJFw2VMhwXIWl5-eKUWrXTjsBl-N43NnmnHYL9iM7prBdBb57_TWfcnpG4k6OwE5b78UXBMBr6MaVDg3yC9VWO/s400/polar+bear+at+garbage+dump.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5280561227168486770" border="0" /></a><span style="font-size:85%;">(Large white pig carnivore looking for pigs at Churchill garbage dump - </span><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 128, 0);">www.worldofstock.com</span></span><span style="font-size:85%;">)</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />From Randy Boswell of <a href="http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national/story.html?id=1079029">CanWest News Service </a>we learn the following horrible news.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"></span><blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">Canada's vulnerable polar bear population could survive the effects of climate change by switching a significant part of their diet from seal meat to scrambled eggs, according to a new U.S. study that suggests snow geese nests along the Hudson Bay shore may become a key feeding site for the iconic Arctic mammal.</span><br /></blockquote>This is outrageous. Will no one move to save the snow geese young? Does no one care?<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">The latest study of the Arctic's "most visible and charismatic predator" highlights the energy-rich attributes of geese embryos but cautions that egg eating benefits for bears "will depend on the increasing temporal overlap with the nesting period and on the foraging behaviours of individuals eating the eggs. It is likely that other food sources will also have to play a role if the polar bears are to persist."</blockquote>Temporal overlap? I think I've heard of that - t'was a central theme of a number of Star Trek episodes, wherein Wesley Wark fell in love with a anarchistic alien lizard ..... or something like that. Just because I'm lighthearted doesn't mean that the polar bears can be. Their traditional way of life rummaging in northern garbage dumps for leftover tuna tins is at stake here. Anyway, I am surviving. Not the least of why is because my nesting period does not overlap my temporal whatever.<br /><br />Focus here folks. The study is clear and authoritative<style>/* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style><span style=";font-family:";font-size:12;" ></span>. It was done by academics.<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">"It is likely that other food sources will also have to play a role if the polar bears are to persist." </blockquote>What other food sources? Once those damn furry ice flow foragers have developed a taste for scrambled eggs, can back bacon be far behind? (Note to American readers - back bacon is what you republican revolutionaries call Canadian bacon.) If so, pigs are now endangered. Now this may serve the theological purposes of certain strict bearded Wahabbist mullahs in caves in Pakistan and Afghanistan, but I like my back bacon. Crisp and tasty.<br /><br />And once those beached arctic landfill foragers get a taste of back bacon they will pillage existing stocks of porkers and hunt them to extinction. They are now empirically proven by American Museum of Natural History biologist Robert Rockwell et al, to be insatiable once they fix their minds on what to eat.<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">The authors themselves witnessed a young bear as it consumed eggs from about 200 eider duck nests near Manitoba's La Perouse Bay.</blockquote>The horror! The horror! Al Gore, are you listening? There is celebrity life beyond the narrowing circumfrence of current global cooling. Save Porky and the poor suffering eider ducks from the big bad bears! You'll be a hero - to the bearded mullahs and the little ducks, at least.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-76293217569542692452008-12-08T23:47:00.005-05:002008-12-09T00:13:05.663-05:00Bob Rae figures out democracy<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieVvsxMPKpOq9Co-Rlr2HlfBNaeqxQhB-QpE6y31gNA9RKWA8UkFl-mwqOQQzX19Rxnecr4hL143YDZnlJglGMEhrLLmgwojPm0HcAuao389Qka_d5swT8ihnnYvW8bl9De64o/s1600-h/Ignatieff&Rae3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 250px; height: 279px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieVvsxMPKpOq9Co-Rlr2HlfBNaeqxQhB-QpE6y31gNA9RKWA8UkFl-mwqOQQzX19Rxnecr4hL143YDZnlJglGMEhrLLmgwojPm0HcAuao389Qka_d5swT8ihnnYvW8bl9De64o/s400/Ignatieff&Rae3.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5277648359932514770" border="0" /></a><a href="http://images.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.magazine.utoronto.ca/02autumn/images/Ignatieff%26Rae3.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.magazine.utoronto.ca/02autumn/school.asp&usg=__9TitAJnhfGCHodx9vLP_HfDQO8c=&h=279&w=250&sz=15&hl=en&start=5&um=1&tbnid=CXVl12suPb47MM:&tbnh=114&tbnw=102&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dbob%2Brae%2Bphotos%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN">(<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Ignatieff</span> and Rae)</a><br /><span class="submitted"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Liberal leadership contender Bob Rae is making <a href="http://bobrae.ca/en/blog/dec7">this interesting plea</a> for democracy on his website.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></span><blockquote style="font-style: italic;"><span class="submitted">2/8/2008</span> <div class="content"> <p>All weekend, I'd been hearing rumors about this, but today I was really surprised to read press reports about various <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">MPs</span> moving for an immediate vote to elect our Leader next Wednesday, in the Commons caucus. </p> <p>I thought I'd seen a lot of politics over 30 years of public service, but this one really came from left field.</p> <p><span style="font-weight: bold;">The idea of taking away the vote from tens of thousands of grassroots activists in every part of Canada, and reducing the franchise to just 76 men and women seems so out-of-step with the modern world.</span>[bolding is mine] It makes you shake your head. Here's just a quick, off-the-cuff list of things that struck me as wrong about this idea:</p> <ul><li>The activist base of the party would be unable to vote. As an MP, I'm enormously and profoundly grateful to the volunteers who sustain my political career in my riding. I cannot imagine rewarding their tireless work by removing their say in the leadership.</li><li>Significant portions of the country that didn't elect a Liberal MP would be unable to participate. What about the voice of rural Liberals, of almost all of Western Canada, of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Quebeckers</span> outside Montreal? All of these folks would be silenced.</li><li>What about the Senate? These great Liberals, distinguished Canadians from inside and outside of politics, would have their votes taken away after lifetimes of service.</li><li>What about the Party Constitution? The party is preparing a perfectly viable, constitutionally valid plan for holding a one-member-one-vote ballot electronically in mid-January. That's just a few weeks away, and gives us time to prepare for the Conservative budget. It's timely, legal, workable, low-cost, and constitutional. </li></ul> <p>It's up to us to put a stop to this hasty, ill-considered idea for electing our leader. I am raising my voice publicly for your right to vote. Please help me by raising yours as well.</p></div></blockquote><div class="content"><p></p> </div>Ah yes, Mr. Rae is the champion of the right of people to vote for Liberal party leader. But as for the right of you and me to vote for which political party forms our government, well ..... that's not on. Here's what the <a href="http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/549442">Toronto Star had to say</a> about Bob Rae's involvement in the formation of the coalition.<br /><p style="font-style: italic;"><di3></di3></p><blockquote><p style="font-style: italic;"><di3>T</di3>here is no doubt that Jack Layton is the brain behind the anti-Harper coalition and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Stéphane</span> Dion is the funny salesman who tried to sell it to Canadians. But the person who sold it to the Liberals was Bob Rae.</p><p style="font-style: italic;">When the first rumours about the coalition surfaced last week on Parliament Hill, few people gave them much credence. Many Liberal <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">MPs</span> wouldn't feel comfortable with Dion leading the Christmas Parade in Vaughan, and Michael <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Ignatieff</span> and his supporters were against it.</p><p style="font-style: italic;"> Then former prime minister Jean <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Chrétien</span> got involved and one MP told me that "now it's clear that Bob Rae is behind this." He also said that Rae's move "trapped" <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Ignatieff</span>, who had to support the deal because otherwise "he is going to be seen as the person who kept Harper in government."</p></blockquote>Why confine democracy to Grits, Mr. Rae? If it's good enough for Grits, it's good enough for all Canadians.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-13788131210652503732008-12-03T20:44:00.008-05:002008-12-03T22:46:46.855-05:00A miserable coalition<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEJYienFOK8TzZsIsLUUuwkDatbhb47MV-O2z-y0O6qX_ZO3uhwb1RtDcRNs8eMwi7pJzAKgh1BrESFuYiQoWPnB_olKZ_57NwCuQlrc8cUWNY-KAsw_UDvlfK_TbD9D4Mf6Cl/s1600-h/PoisonedChaliceWeb-4202.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 279px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEJYienFOK8TzZsIsLUUuwkDatbhb47MV-O2z-y0O6qX_ZO3uhwb1RtDcRNs8eMwi7pJzAKgh1BrESFuYiQoWPnB_olKZ_57NwCuQlrc8cUWNY-KAsw_UDvlfK_TbD9D4Mf6Cl/s400/PoisonedChaliceWeb-4202.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5275745238270191266" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">(Poisoned chalice drawing by <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Riddel</span> - of The Guardian)</span><br /><br /><br />Let see now. The Conservatives should be thrown from office because Mr. Harper was mean about withdrawing public funding from political parties.<br /><br />Why was that mean? Many like me think abolishing public funding for parties is a principled stand.<br /><br />Conservatives actually raise enough money through voluntary contributions of individuals to support their party without the need for direct public funding and without corporate or union donations. Why can't the others? I think it was more tactically stupid, than mean, or in the alternative (as the lawyers are wont to opine) perhaps it was mean, but so what - give your head a shake - this is politics not a girl guide quilting bee. But let me grant you the argument for now. Mean I can take. Unprincipled coalitions I cannot.<br /><br />Mean does not justify the response. The Liberal Party has now gone beyond the pale, by entering a formal coalition with Bloc Quebecois. M. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Duceppe's</span> signature is on the coalition document and the Bloc is committed to undertake certain things - They are most certainly a party to this miserable coalition, despite obfuscation to the contrary. It matters not that they won't be given seats at the Cabinet table. The price of their support will be demonstrated, should they succeed in wresting power from the Tories, in skewed policies towards separatist priorities in Quebec. Jacques <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Parizeau</span>, the former Party Quebecois premier and leading separatist ideologue is thrilled with the coalition. <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Wonder</span> why that might be?<br /><br />The Liberals and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">NDP</span> have made common cause with the separatists, which clearly will have a veto over government legislation including any budgets. Former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau must be howling in his grave in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Westmount</span>. His son, a much lesser newly elected member of the House of Commons supports the miserable coalition. When you voted six weeks ago did you contemplate such a scenario?<br /><br />The miserable coalition intends to install an individual as PM who the country clearly rejected in mid-October (some 50 days ago) in a general election. All because Harper was mean? Was that intended by us voters?<br /><br />Mr. Harper I remind you, already retreated on that funding proposal. Accordingly, it can't stand as the current <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">causus</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">belli</span>, though it is clearly the reason for why we are where we are. A woman scorned apparently cannot match the fury of opposition parties denied public funding. The three coalition partners argue that they ought to be allowed to form a government without recourse to an election because the Conservatives have lost the confidence of the House of Commons and among them they control the majority of seats.<br /><br />Constitutionally, this may be legal, but it ignores the political imperative inherent in the recent electoral result. The Prime Minister must indeed have the confidence of the Commons to govern. This is a bedrock parliamentary convention. Mr. Harper has clearly lost the confidence of the Commons. But there is a greater constitutional principle at play here. The legitimacy of parliament derives from the will of the people, not the will of members of parliament. There might be merit to the parliamentary "confidence" convention, were it not for the proximity of the election. Remember that? It was but seven whole weeks ago.<br /><br />In my view, the Prime Minister has the right to ask the Governor General to prorogue parliament until January when the government can present its budget. Should the opposition oppose that budget, the Governor General should dissolve this wretched parliament and call a general election. The people of Canada did not vote for M. Dion to be Prime Minister, on an interim basis. They did not vote for a coalition government of the Liberals, limousine <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">NDP</span> socialists and separatist Bloc, only to be see a new unknown prime ministerial successor, once M. Dion resigns as promised in three months. The electorate did not vote for this miserable ragtag coalition or this ridiculous scenario.<br /><br />Keep in mind that M. Dion specifically rejected a coalition during the recent campaign. According to constitutional convention, the Governor General must decide if the coalition can provide a stable government before opting to allow them to form a government. It cannot. It is inherently unstable and, given the results of the recent election, is profoundly undemocratic. If the coalition wants to govern Canada, let Canadians say if they agree.<br /><br />That's called democracy and we forget it at our peril.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-38757360683042176732008-12-01T19:42:00.014-05:002008-12-03T22:49:39.215-05:00Three amigos thwart the will of the people<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoNmyuTO6tSBp-FuscCFl7a86O7o9VSnQ2fb3t36J3tiWClf2A-cAZrfD2i58psDcezvUyBUJ8nN2R8mskoHpxnnxKP9UTeys0TI62V8fAm7DJCY7qpRml4411Jmol3G0mnMGL/s1600-h/the+three+stooges.bin"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 261px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoNmyuTO6tSBp-FuscCFl7a86O7o9VSnQ2fb3t36J3tiWClf2A-cAZrfD2i58psDcezvUyBUJ8nN2R8mskoHpxnnxKP9UTeys0TI62V8fAm7DJCY7qpRml4411Jmol3G0mnMGL/s400/the+three+stooges.bin" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5274987511768937810" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">NDP</span> leader Jack Layton, Liberal leader <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Stephane</span> Dion and separatist Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Duceppe</span><span style="font-size:78%;"><br />(</span><span style="font-size:78%;"><b>Photograph by : </b>Chris Wattie, Calgary Herald)<br /><br /></span>Here we have it folks. The three political party leaders prepared to thumb their collective noses at the electorate who rejected M. Dion in a resounding way a mere 48 days ago. You will recall that the Liberal Party received the lowest percentage of votes the party has received since Confederation. This low Grit vote was, if noting else, a clear repudiation of M. Dion, the Liberal leader.<br /><br />Now the trio is proposing to have the Governor General of Canada appoint the rejected candidate to the office of Prime Minister. How will this be done? With the support of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">NDP</span> and the separatist Bloc Quebecois. Cabinet seats are to be given to the former and a great political victory and inordinate political influence over government policy to the latter. There's something for everyone but ordinary citizens denied their franchise.<br /><br />If the Liberal Party really believes it ought to form the government let it go to the people. Vote a lack of confidence in the Conservatives and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">let</span> the Prime Minister go to the Governor General to ask her to dissolve parliament and let's have another election. That's the democratic way.<br /><br />Let the people decide if they want already rejected Liberal leader <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Stephane</span> Dion to be their Prime Minister, propped up in a formal coalition by limousine socialist Jack Layton and separatist (and former Maoist revolutionary) Gilles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Duceppe</span> - a man dedicated to the destruction of the Canadian federation. Let the people decide.<br /><br />This <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">despicable</span> political ploy may be constitutionally legal, but it is politically unacceptable in a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">democracy</span>. It is repugnant to those of us who hold democracy dear.<br /><br />Mr. Harper had already hauled down his battle flag, junked the political party financing proposal, withdrew the plan to temporarily strip civil servants of the right to strike and moved up the budget date to January with the promise of additional stimulus measures. As the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">casus</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">belli</span> diminishes, the opposition's lust for power grows.<br /><br />If there is one sentence that can sum up the politically <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">stupefying</span> events of today it is <a href="http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/12/01/kelly-mcparland-liberal-coalition-could-make-canada-a-coony-of-quebec.aspx">this sentence</a> penned by Kelly <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">McParland</span> of the National Post.<br /><blockquote>The Liberals apparently believe Canadians will buy into this: an unstable government beholden to a separatist party for its survival, led by a man who was repudiated by voters less than two months ago, who will be given the reins through a critical period in the national history and then replaced with somebody to be identified later.</blockquote>Just so. Let the people decide.<br /><br />--------------------------------<br /><br />Have a look at the <a href="http://dailybayonet.blogs.com/the_daily_bayonet/2008/12/coalition-of-the-swilling.html?cid=141010660#comments">Daily Bayonet</a> for another fine commentary on this disgusting effort.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-2231672323276652402008-11-18T19:42:00.006-05:002008-11-18T21:51:57.609-05:00Morally grave reasons<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcR8-7MdNi9TV4o3yKY8hElB_UAbnHpsnHOMLxGeup4LTKUBNE4B693Rfs6h4iRRAQF-xG01KjMKeJYr7vj6luaBni4-un4jeR8mXeVCyz4X4JKKQNJZJDgNvezfJiE41e2NMQ/s1600-h/johnbentleymays.htm"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 88px; height: 109px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcR8-7MdNi9TV4o3yKY8hElB_UAbnHpsnHOMLxGeup4LTKUBNE4B693Rfs6h4iRRAQF-xG01KjMKeJYr7vj6luaBni4-un4jeR8mXeVCyz4X4JKKQNJZJDgNvezfJiE41e2NMQ/s400/johnbentleymays.htm" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5270163407369145410" border="0" /></a><br />John Bentley Mays<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />My copy of the The Catholic Register was awaiting me as I arrived home from the office. I read it as I munched my way through my left over supper warmed in the microwave (not at all as bad as it appears). I wish I hadn't (read it, not eaten it). One of the Register's regular <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">contributors</span> is well known journalist, John Bentley Mays. No surprise that Mays is a Catholic.<br /><br />In his article <a href="http://www.catholicregister.org/content/view/2468/42/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Despite his pro-choice stance, Obama is the right man</span></a>: Bentley explains how and why he voted for the man destined to be the 44<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">th</span> president of the American republic immediately to the south of the Great White North.<br /><br />What follows is a numbingly depressing justification for voting for a man who is almost certainly the most pro-abortion candidate to ever run for President of the United States. Bentley Mays recites a number of reasons for his vote:<br /><blockquote>In the end, I decided to vote for pro-choice Obama for what I consider to be “morally grave reasons.” He is the right man to lead America through months, and perhaps years, of hard times, when thousands are losing their jobs and homes and businesses, and are in danger of losing their hope. He is the right man to counteract the poison of cynicism, greed, ignorance and fear that George W. Bush’s presidency has spread throughout American political culture. He is the right man to restore America’s promise and reputation as a force for good in the world. These were serious reasons to vote for Obama in this moment of crisis — one that is moral and spiritual, as well as economic and political — and they were among the reasons I did so.<br /></blockquote>He did so with some moral qualms.<br /><blockquote>But while I was leaning in the Democratic direction, I was fully aware that the Democratic Party backs virtually unlimited access to abortion — a position I do not and cannot share.<br /><br />I knew that, should a Supreme Court vacancy occur when he is in office, Obama would almost certainly appoint a justice who will maintain the court’s historic 1973 decision in the case Roe v. Wade, which struck down the country’s last legal restrictions on abortion. These political realities were, or should have been, quite enough to give Catholics pause before voting for the Democratic ticket. They certainly gave me pause.<br /></blockquote>I <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">suppose</span> that pause may contain Bentley May's salvation. For his sake I hope so, but for the sake of millions of victims of abortion worldwide, including approximately a million babies aborted each year in the United States, I fear not.<br /><br />Perhaps the most <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">disingenuous</span> thing in Bentley May's article is that he attempts to justify what he did by <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">enlisting</span> the support of [most of ] the Catholic Bishops of the U.S. in his cause.<br /><blockquote>In 2007 the U.S. Catholic bishops issued guidelines called <span style="font-style: italic;">Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship: A Call to Political Responsibility From the Catholic Bishops of the United States</span>.</blockquote>And what does Bentley Mays harvest from these guidelines?<br /><blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">Intrinsic evils,” such as abortion and racism, can never be supported, while seeking justice and pursuing peace must always be approved and backed. But the bishops foresee the most common problem for Catholics in the voting booth: There is rarely any candidate whose views either coincide exactly with Catholic teaching or explicitly contradict it in every respect. That would make the decision easy. In the real world, however, “Catholics may feel politically disenfranchised, sensing that no party and too few candidates fully share the church’s comprehensive commitment to the dignity of the human person.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"> In considering how to vote under these circumstances, the bishops conclude, “there may be times when a Catholic who rejects a candidate’s unacceptable position may decide to vote for that candidate for other morally grave reasons. Voting in this way would be permissible only for truly grave moral interests, not to advance narrow interests or partisan preferences or to ignore a fundamental moral evil.”</span></blockquote>But Mays quotes selectively from the <a href="http://www.usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/FCStatement.pdf">bishop's guidelines.</a> Among other things He neglects to mention are the following quotes.<br /><span style="font-style: italic;"></span><blockquote><span style="font-style: italic;">Human life is sacred. The dignity of the person is the moral foundation of any society. Direct attacks on any innocent person are never morally acceptable at any stage or in any condition. In our society human life is especially under attack from abortion. Other direct threats to the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">sanctity</span> of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">human</span> life include euthanasia, human cloning and the destruction of human embryos for research.</span></blockquote>Barack Obama supports unlimited abortion. As a state senator he voted against a bill designed to protect babies that were born alive after botched late term abortions. He supports <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">embryonic</span> stem cell research that results in the destruction of human embryos as a normal part of research modality.<br /><br />The bishop's document references another bishop's document, <span style="font-style: italic;">Living the Gospel of Life promulgated in 1998 in which the U.S. <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Catholic</span> bishops state:<br /></span><blockquote>Abortion and euthanasia have become <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">pre</span>-eminent threats to human life and dignity because they directly attack human life itself, the most fundamental good and condition for all others (no.5). Abortion, the deliberate killing of human life before birth, is never morally acceptable, and must always be <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">opposed</span>. Cloning and destruction of human embryos for research and even for potential cures are <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">always</span> wrong. </blockquote>The position of the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Democratic</span> Party, that won the presidency, and a majority of seats in the House of Representatives and the Senate and therefore an untrammeled ability to enact its <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">political</span> agenda states <a href="http://www.georgiabulletin.org/local/2008/09/25/life/">the following</a>:<br /><blockquote>The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.</blockquote>Bentley Mays is a Catholic. We are told 52% of Catholics in the United States voted as he did, no doubt for similarly "morally grave reasons."<br /><br />Saint Matthew quoted Jesus as saying in the garden of Gethsemane (in Chapter <i>38 </i>of his gospel):<br /><blockquote>My soul is sorrowful even unto death</blockquote>I begin to see why.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-64817647641715367232008-10-20T22:40:00.004-04:002008-10-20T23:45:07.417-04:00Vomitus in Extremis<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0tDoWpBnkvI5JSnSQypDSJNxc3Mek8xouL0X1FcDAlgwX6j17mZZEThrtPfKi4rQtaAUMYP86wACS8GOuda2ppjqg560GbxaQ3eILDe3kdfPKyZeSULnGPbSWIz4zWk9iosKR/s1600-h/Ezra+Levant.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0tDoWpBnkvI5JSnSQypDSJNxc3Mek8xouL0X1FcDAlgwX6j17mZZEThrtPfKi4rQtaAUMYP86wACS8GOuda2ppjqg560GbxaQ3eILDe3kdfPKyZeSULnGPbSWIz4zWk9iosKR/s400/Ezra+Levant.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5259447582499816130" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://ezralevant.com/">Ezra Levant</a> has resumed blogging about his travails with the Canadian Human Rights Commissions. As far as Canada goes, the term "human rights commissions" is a misnomer if there ever was one. These legislated star chambers (and if you don't know what that is, dear reader, your education is very, very sub-standard - try Googling it) are the antithesis of what ought to exist in a democratic and free society. Come to think of it, they are the very antithesis of what exists in a free and ..... hell you get the drift.<br /><br />Alan Paton once wrote a book about South Africa called <span style="font-style: italic;">Cry the Beloved Country</span>. Given what is happening with these commissions, Canada's version would have to be <span style="font-style: italic;">Vomit the Benighted Country.</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Extreme</span> rhetoric you say? Perhaps. But consider the following: from Mr. Levant, referring to the latest "complaint" emanating from the wretched bowels of Rob Wells, who Mr. Levant describes <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">thusly</span>:<br /><blockquote>The complaint,which you can see <a href="http://ezralevant.com/Wells%20v.%20Levant%20redacted.pdf">here</a>, was filed by Rob "Fred Phelps" Wells, an anti-Catholic bigot in Edmonton who has made a habit of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">harassing</span> school children and little old ladies outside St. Joseph's Basilica. The fact that Wells is a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">CHRC</span> complainant (he also filed complaints against Catholic Insight magazine and Rev. Stephen <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Boission</span>) and not a target of a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">CHRC</span> investigation shows the moral inversion at work at the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">CHRC</span>. Then again, the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">CHRC</span> is one of Canada's largest hate groups on the Internet, with its staff posting literally hundreds of anti-Semitic, anti-gay and anti-Black comments with impunity.</blockquote>This in itself ought to be sufficient to shame the Canadian Human Rights Star Chamber, and cause self-respecting Canadians to rise up en <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">masse</span> and demand these commissions be abolished. In fact, it ought to be sufficient cause, in a free and democratic society, to have these diabolical, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">despicable</span>, disgusting <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">HRC</span> dweebs run out of old <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Bytown</span> and the respective <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">provincial</span> capitals, on a rusty rail, .... but I digress.<br /><br />No, dear reader, the depth of moral turbidity has not yet been fully plumbed. <span style="font-weight: bold;">Ezra Levant's statement of defence, the very document he relies upon to defend himself against his odious accuser was censored by a civil servant (I use the term loosely) and only then passed his statement of defence on to the star chamber commissioners.</span><br /><p></p><blockquote><p>If the commissioners find me guilty, they'll prosecute me before the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. In the thirty years they've been prosecuting section 13 "hate speech" cases, they've never lost. Political prosecutors in Iran and China would be impressed.</p> <p>But here's where <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Dagenais</span> becomes a symbol of everything that's wrong with the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">CHRC</span> and its censorship fetish: she blacked out portions of my defence before passing it on to the commissioners. Seriously -- she censored what I wrote in my own defence, before she passed it along to the people who will sit in judgment of me. She's only allowing me to say thing in my defence that she approves in advance. Look at the <a href="http://ezralevant.com/Dagenais%20redaction.pdf">version</a> of my letter she's passing on: several of my arguments are blacked out. You can read the full, uncensored version <a href="http://ezralevant.com/2008/08/levant-to-chrc-you-should-all.html">here</a> (.<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">pdf</span> version <a href="http://ezralevant.com/Reply%20to%20Rob%20Wells.pdf">here</a>).</p></blockquote><p></p>Lord love a duck! Is this what my father wanted to defend when he volunteered to become an air gunner in the Royal Canadian Air Force in WWII? Is this what my grandfathers intended to defend when they volunteered for service in the Canadian Army in WWII? My fraternal grandfather fought at <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Vimy</span> Ridge and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Passchendaele</span> for this? Is this what my maternal uncle, a Loyal Eddy, lost his leg in Holland for? I swore the oath of allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen of Canada and served as her commissioned officer to have this state of affairs? Thank God my father and grandfathers never lived to see this outrage.<br /><br />What the hell? NO BLOODY WAY! NO BLOODY WAY! If we love freedom, we must not tolerate or submit to this as Canadian citizens. No one who loves freedom and democracy can tolerate this. No one. This is wrong. It is immoral. It violates the principles of natural justice. It cannot, and must not, be allowed to stand. <br /><br /><p>In Flanders fields the poppies blow<br /> Between the crosses, row on row,<br /> That mark our place; and in the sky<br /> The larks, still bravely singing, fly<br /> Scarce heard amid the guns below.</p> <p>We are the Dead. Short days ago<br /> We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,<br /> Loved and were loved, and now we lie<br /> In Flanders fields.<br /> <br /> Take up our quarrel with the foe:<br /> To you from failing hands we throw<br /> The torch; be yours to hold it high.<br /> If ye break faith with us who die<br /> We shall not sleep,<br /> though poppies grow<br /> In Flanders fields.</p>Lieutenant-Colonel John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">McCrae</span> (died 1918)<br />Brigade-surgeon, First Brigade<br />Canadian Forces ArtilleryJohn the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-33710431033645448762008-10-11T00:11:00.005-04:002008-10-11T00:33:10.370-04:00A most dishonourable honour<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgILOJxWkNHZUnvWi-z5Rb5_uLiwQL-mt_t1QlaVE_DVStjvBmWlQpaEBKZnZBt-Jo5xk2kRHJTLVgpW-n-0f5tXec9EbSPiCx1EjswGWNGUHbMMtvpQx1AWsWIQIhdydobA_TE/s1600-h/Order+of+Canada.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgILOJxWkNHZUnvWi-z5Rb5_uLiwQL-mt_t1QlaVE_DVStjvBmWlQpaEBKZnZBt-Jo5xk2kRHJTLVgpW-n-0f5tXec9EbSPiCx1EjswGWNGUHbMMtvpQx1AWsWIQIhdydobA_TE/s400/Order+of+Canada.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5255746994616487586" border="0" /></a><br />Henry Morgentaler, Canada's foremost abortionist has now received the Order of Canada from Her Excellency, the Governor General of Canada.<br /><br />I am filled with disgust at those involved in recommending this noxious award and I applaud those who returned their snowflake and the 100 parliamentarians who publicly expressed their profound disagreement over the shameful decision.<br /><br />Approximately 100,00 babies are killed in the womb each year in Canada thanks, in large measure, to Morgentaler and his ilk.<br /><span style="font-size:+1;"><u><br /></u></span><p style="text-align: center;"> <b>THE SECOND COMING</b></p><p style="text-align: center;"> Turning and turning in the widening gyre<br /> The falcon cannot hear the falconer;<br /> Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;<br /> Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,<br /> The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere<br /> The ceremony of innocence is drowned;<br /> The best lack all conviction, while the worst<br /> Are full of passionate intensity. </p><p style="text-align: center;"> Surely some revelation is at hand;<br /> Surely the Second Coming is at hand.<br /> The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out<br /> When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi<br /> Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;<br /> A shape with lion body and the head of a man,<br /> A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,<br /> Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it<br /> Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.<br /> The darkness drops again but now I know<br /> That twenty centuries of stony sleep<br /> Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,<br /> And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,<br /> Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? </p><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size:+1;"><u>William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)</u></span></div>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-77963402488905647042008-10-07T20:20:00.005-04:002008-10-07T20:34:31.166-04:00Bardot bites Palin with canine like fury<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjJCMU_gn2Hg6m5LSDyTtamCGEbl3QRO-7Y_A9cucqqA_NB4uef622obZhqI1Oe9tboMxlf6f7n_2mjZwZcpzoGXwtyHF6gVs43-HjDBuo-hYH1rPFO2XhSLBgzLHdUtYVIbOP/s1600-h/Bardot+images.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjJCMU_gn2Hg6m5LSDyTtamCGEbl3QRO-7Y_A9cucqqA_NB4uef622obZhqI1Oe9tboMxlf6f7n_2mjZwZcpzoGXwtyHF6gVs43-HjDBuo-hYH1rPFO2XhSLBgzLHdUtYVIbOP/s400/Bardot+images.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5254573856852915890" border="0" /></a><br /><span class="lingo_region">It is remarkable how vicious people, particularly female "progressive" types, are towards the vice-presidential candidacy of Sarah <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Palin</span>. The depth of the animus strikes me as something Satanic in its fierce hatred. From <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=081007172729.q0klgd6h&show_article=1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Brietbart</span>.com</a>, via the <a href="http://drudgereport.com/">Drudge Report </a>we read this.<br /><blockquote>French film legend-turned-activist Brigitte <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Bardot</span> took a swipe at Sarah <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Palin</span> on Tuesday, saying the US vice presidential candidate was a disgrace to women. <p> "I hope you lose these elections because that would be a victory for the world," <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Bardot</span> wrote in an open letter to Republican John McCain's running mate in the November vote. </p><p> "By denying the responsibility of man in global warming, by advocating gun rights and making statements that are disconcertingly stupid, you are a disgrace to women and you alone represent a terrible threat, a true environmental catastrophe," wrote <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Bardot</span>. </p><p> The screen icon from the 1960s, who now heads an animal rights foundation, went on to assail <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Palin</span> for supporting Arctic oil exploration that could jeopardize delicate animal habitats and for dismissing measures to protect polar bears. </p><p> "This shows your total lack of responsibility, your inability to protect or simply respect animal life," <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Bardot</span> wrote. </p><p> In a final salvo against <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Palin</span>, the 74-year-old ex-star picked up on <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Palin's</span> depiction of herself as a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">pitbull</span> wearing lipstick and said she "implored" her not to compare herself to dogs. </p><p> "I know them well and I can assure you that no <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">pitbull</span>, no dog, nor any other animal for that matter is as dangerous as you are," <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Bardot</span> wrote.</p></blockquote></span>As I have pointed out previously, polar bears, are not endangered and are actually growing in numbers. Drill baby drill!John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-24958805712897741282008-08-28T08:21:00.004-04:002008-08-28T09:47:33.308-04:00Nancy Pelosi Keeps on Digging<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRW2AiGFcVVBq8PZDOE8zIv3SgyzGuF0pyp4StNLFiC5dToN8QZfdoHbHFeG1qibORVz1-9HVa1B5yDGZMInnwu5nmau6-dbB0OqZJ7HzXw_Ieyv-Wi8wJQGsrD9iXrJT5LRQs/s1600-h/Pelosi.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRW2AiGFcVVBq8PZDOE8zIv3SgyzGuF0pyp4StNLFiC5dToN8QZfdoHbHFeG1qibORVz1-9HVa1B5yDGZMInnwu5nmau6-dbB0OqZJ7HzXw_Ieyv-Wi8wJQGsrD9iXrJT5LRQs/s400/Pelosi.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5239550772542003266" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/aug/08082706.html">Kathleen Gilbert of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Lifesite</span> News </a>reports that Speaker of the US House of Representatives has <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">backpedaled</span> on her statement to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">NBC's</span> Tom <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Brokow</span> (Meet the Press) on when human life begins - thereby defending her pro-abortion views while attempting to maintain the political gloss that she is in union with the Church. The nub of her earlier statement is as follows.<br /><blockquote>"I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time," she said. "<a id="publishButton" class="cssButton" href="javascript:void(0)" onclick="if (this.className.indexOf("ubtn-disabled") == -1) {var e = document['stuffform'].publish;(e.length) ? e[0].click() : e.click(); if (window.event) window.event.cancelBubble = true; return false;}"><div class="cssButtonOuter"><div class="cssButtonMiddle"><div class="cssButtonInner"><br /></div></div></div></a>And what I know is, over the centuries, the doctors of the church have not been able to make that definition. And Senator - St. Augustine said at three months. We don't know."</blockquote>The 10 <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">regular</span> readers of this blog know that John the Mad spent five minutes researching statements from the fathers of the Church correcting her spurious assertion. The results are in a post below.<br /><br />Her statement created a large negative response from Catholic bishops, 18 ardent and practicing Catholic congresspeople, ordinary ardent and practicing Catholics, and ardent and practicing gay, lesbian, and transgendered Catholics ....<br /><br />(oops sorry, I got carried away with post-modern rhetorical <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">bafflespeak</span> here .... please delete the latter three cossetted and protected special interest groups. Certain of their ardent and practicing members may take offence at <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">JtM</span> including them and thereby drag <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">JtM</span> before any of the plethora of human rights commissions operating in Canada outside of the principles of freedom and common law my <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">ancestors</span> fought to protect. Being a family man, I simply don't have a spare $100 grand to spend defending my freedom of speech from ardent and practicing zealots who may wish to complain to the modern Canadian Star Chambers. ...... but back to the brouhaha at hand .....)<br /><br />Ms Gilbert writes:<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>WASHINGTON, D.C., August 27, 2008 (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">LifeSiteNews</span>.com) - A spokeswoman for House Speaker Nancy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Pelosi</span> defended the speaker's position as a "pro-abortion Catholic", not because the Church is unclear on when life begins, as earlier stated, but because Catholics routinely contravene "clear Catholic teaching" against abortion.</p> <p>In a statement praising <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Pelosi's</span> appreciation for "the sanctity of the family," Brenda <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Daly</span>, speaking for <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Pelosi</span>, said, "While Catholic teaching is clear that life begins at conception, many Catholics do not ascribe to that view."</p> <p>In the controversial interview on <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">NBC's</span> Meet The Press that spawned <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Daly's</span> statement, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Pelosi</span> had said, "The Doctors of the Church have not been able to make that definition [of when life begins]," and called it "an issue of controversy" throughout the history of the Church. "St. Augustine said at three months. We don't know," said <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Pelosi</span>.</p> <p style="font-weight: bold;">Brenda <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Daly's</span> statement says that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">Pelosi</span> is not justified in her pro-abortion stance due to vague Church teaching, but on the basis that many other "Catholics" also violate Church teaching.</p></blockquote><p></p> (bolding is mine)<br /><br />Frankly, my advice to Ms <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">Pelosi</span> is to stop digging. After all many Catholics believe that it gets mighty warm down where she seems determined to go.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Late Breaking News! </span><br /><blockquote>John the Mad has learned that Congresswoman <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">Pelosi's</span> office has just released a list of things that she, as an ardent and practicing Catholic believes is okay for other ardent and practicing Catholics to do, even though the Catholic Church has consistently held them to be <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">impermissible</span> for two <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">millennia</span>.<br /><br />Brenda <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">Daly</span>, speaking on behalf of Congressperson <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">Pelosi</span>, says the list was carefully <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">compiled</span> after 24 hours of intensive research by the Speaker of the House using her new and innovative theological test for sin called "What do many other Catholics violate in Church teaching" and the Washington Post newspaper.<br /><br />According to <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">Brenda</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">Daly</span>, Ms <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">Pelosi</span> says she first used this test as a precocious six year old when her mother told her she had to go to bed at 8 p.m. She recalls that her brilliant <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">retort</span> to her mother was a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">vestigial</span> harbinger of her brilliant recent spiritual insight on the matter of abortion. "Why do I have to go to bed now, Mom," she remembers whining. "All my Catholic friends get to go to bed at 8:30."<br /><br />Ms. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">Daly</span> said that the Speaker, as an ardent and practicing Catholic fully intends to use this novel defence of "Other Catholics do it" when standing before the throne of God at her last judgement. The <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_33">brilliance</span> of the Speaker's theological insight speaks for itself, said Ms <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_34">Daly</span>. It's a wonder Saint Thomas Aquinas didn't think of it.<br /><br />The list of newly allowed practices for ardent and practicing Catholics is as follows.<br /><ol><li>abortion</li><li>euthanasia</li><li>same sex marriage</li><li>idolatry</li><li>blasphemy</li><li>taking the Lord's name in vain<br /></li><li>elder and child abuse</li><li>assault</li><li>murder</li><li>coveting thy neighbours goods<br /></li></ol>"Smoking, bottled water, drilling for oil in the arctic, owning a handgun and coveting John Edwards neighbour's wife will remain on the list of prohibited activities for ardent and practicing Catholics," said the Speaker's spin doctor. "Ms <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_35">Pelosi</span> will not vote in favour of and congressional bill that favours these matters. There have to be some standards, after all." <br /></blockquote>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-34155034731140131862008-08-25T21:52:00.007-04:002008-08-28T08:16:50.200-04:00Chicken Neck Wringing by Human Rights Commissars<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5hqflr2VOesxAiiFA6evLapHtVSpdD8BZyiuvQevh78zps1J0x2z9UsTlS17hy1wxdpQG2qxBQAXMj74-17L3T2f9HxQONuCyhqoZ02FGXcEzmD0VgK4bTRNkxNAJgyu2lo5F/s1600-h/stopthehrclarge127dec98uc0.png"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5hqflr2VOesxAiiFA6evLapHtVSpdD8BZyiuvQevh78zps1J0x2z9UsTlS17hy1wxdpQG2qxBQAXMj74-17L3T2f9HxQONuCyhqoZ02FGXcEzmD0VgK4bTRNkxNAJgyu2lo5F/s400/stopthehrclarge127dec98uc0.png" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5238638984684375570" border="0" /></a><br />Ah, dear reader, things get more and more tawdry with every passing week. I am the son and grandson of men who went to war with the Canadian army and air force respectively (WWI and WWII) to fight for our freedoms. In my youth I had the great honour to receive a commission from <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">HMQ</span></span>, who for some odd reason had the notion to "repose especial trust in my loyalty, courage and integrity," which merely goes to prove that there is simply no accounting for the whims of royalty or their Governors General (in my case The Right Honourable Roland <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Michener</span></span>).<br /><br />When made a second lieutenant, back when men were still men and sheep were nervous, I was a rather pathetic and spindly specimen of the profession of arms- so much so - I kid you not - that a doctor of medicine, in good standing with the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons, after appropriate and solemn reflection, recommended I quaff copious quantities of brewed hops and malt every day in order to gain weight. I followed his advice. It took diligence I tell you. But I digress .............<br /><br />The point of this post has to do with the odious institutions in Canada that are doing their level bureaucratic best to strangle freedom of speech in what Mark <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Steyn</span></span> (himself a target of the these modern Star Chambers) calls our "demented Dominion." My forebears would be shocked and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">appalled</span> at our negligence in defending our freedoms against all enemies external and internal.<br /><br />To the point. My Saturday National Post had <a href="http://www.nationalpost.com/todays_paper/story.html?id=743273">this</a> to say about that.<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>A group of U. S. professors launched a campaign this week protesting plans by a prominent political science organization to hold its annual conference in Toronto next year, claiming that Canada's restrictions on certain forms of speech puts controversial academics at risk of being prosecuted.</p><p>Bradley Watson, professor of American and Western political thought at Pennsylvania's St. Vincent College, said he will present a petition calling for the American Political Science Association (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">APSA</span></span>) to re-evaluate its selection of Toronto for its 2009 conference at this year's annual meeting, taking place over the Labour Day weekend in Boston.</p><p>His protest has garnered support from dozens of professors across the United States, including prominent scholars such as Princeton University legal philosopher Robert P. George and Harvard University's Harvey Mansfield.</p><p>"Our belief is that the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">APSA</span></span> should choose its sites carefully, with particular regard for questions of freedom of speech and conscience," Mr. Watson told the National Post by e-mail. "We therefore believe Canada to be a problematic destination."</p><p>Mr. Watson said that professors signing the petition are concerned that recent human rights commission investigations into <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Maclean's</span></span> and Western Standard magazines over articles concerning Islam, and the conviction of pastor Stephen <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Boisson</span></span>, who was ordered by Alberta's human rights tribunal in May to cease publicizing criticisms of homosexuality, suggest that professors risk being chilled from discussing important academic subjects, or ending up in legal trouble. Mr. Watson said he plans to distribute hundreds of buttons to attendees at the Boston conference reading "Toronto 2009, Non!"</p></blockquote><p></p><blockquote></blockquote>Canada's human rights chickens are coming home to roost and like most chicken coops the stench from the coops is ripe. The smell extends south to our southern neighbours who, while having their own challenges in dealing with politically correct claptrap, have a constitution that unambiguously defends the right of free speech. Here we piously affirm we have the right of free speech, but then <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">immediately</span> state that it is subject to certain necessary restrictions (freedom is not unrestricted - subject to such reasonable limitations etc. etc.) , before proceeding to gut the freedom it of any real content. It is what happens when you treat a seminal constitutional document like the Charter of Rights and Freedoms as not a written set of political guarantees, but as a living tree, necessitating regular applications of ideological legal fertilizer.<br /><br />Sir Winston Churchill <a href="http://www.winstonchurchill.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=971">said to the Canadian Parliament</a> in December 1941:<br /><blockquote>When I warned them [the French] that Britain would fight on alone whatever they did, their generals told their prime minister and his divided Cabinet, "In three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken." Some chicken; some neck.</blockquote>What <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Petain's</span> generals of collaborationist France predicted in 1940, and what <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Adoph</span></span> Hitler's evil legions failed to accomplish thanks to men like my father, the odious apparatchiks of Canada's human rights commissions are achieving through stealth and ideological zealousness. Unaccountable human rights commissars are succeeding in wringing the neck of the chicken.<br /><br />American political scientists are right to be afraid of speaking their minds in Canada.<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>Several professors in the working group behind the protest "have written in areas that seem particularly disfavoured by the Canadian legal establishment," Mr. Watson said. "We are uncertain of the extent of the legal jeopardy that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">APSA</span></span> members might place themselves in should they make public arguments in Canada, or post those arguments online, concerning hot-button issues like homosexuality, same-sex marriage, or the nature of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Islamist</span></span> threat to Western civilization."</p><p>The American Political Science Association, whose members include both American and Canadian academics, is the oldest and largest organization of political science professors. Next month's annual meeting, expected to draw roughly 7,000 political scientists, will be its 104<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">th</span></span>. The program includes such discussions as Terrorism and Human Rights; Varying Perspectives on Same-Sex Marriage; and Missing Alliances and (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Un</span></span>)expected Transformations in the Politics of Islam.</p><p></p><p></p></blockquote><p></p>How much longer will Canadians put up with these modern inquisitions?<br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;"></span></span></span></b><b><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;"></span></span></b><p><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">I</span><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">n Flanders fields the poppies blow</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">Between the crosses row on row,</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">That mark our place; and in the sky</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">The larks, still bravely singing, fly</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">Scarce heard amid the guns below.</span></span></span></b> </p><p><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">We are the Dead. Short days ago</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">Loved and were loved, and now we lie</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">In Flanders fields.</span></span></span></b> </p><p><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">Take up our quarrel with the foe:</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">To you from failing hands we throw</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">The torch; be yours to hold it high.</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">If ye break faith with us who die</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">We shall not sleep, though poppies grow</span></span></span></b><br /><b><span style="font-family:Arial Narrow;"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);"><span style="font-size:78%;">In Flanders fields.</span></span></span></b><br /></p><span style="font-size:78%;"><b><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">By: Lieutenant Colonel John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">McCrae</span></span>, MD (1872-1918)</span></b><br /><b><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Canadian Army</span></b></span>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-87299874029837765152008-08-25T20:02:00.008-04:002008-08-25T21:15:39.990-04:00Nancy Pelosi and Camel Farts<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8sgPWWatlHivGh0xgk5gC8zwELstXVt9QdjUhHlZacbZpSTfgHZk3xAVCOBvbfDKaJY1GNDmfAd0vPzfYPQ4Dy6NIyWG4cIeLYZlLVU_pOgvvEdaTO_JKEWHzLikc8Tl7zMkI/s1600-h/B16_Pelosi_kissing_ring.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8sgPWWatlHivGh0xgk5gC8zwELstXVt9QdjUhHlZacbZpSTfgHZk3xAVCOBvbfDKaJY1GNDmfAd0vPzfYPQ4Dy6NIyWG4cIeLYZlLVU_pOgvvEdaTO_JKEWHzLikc8Tl7zMkI/s400/B16_Pelosi_kissing_ring.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5238610795190199458" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><br /></span>(Photo of U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Pelosi</span>, acting the smarmy Catholic hypocrite - from the <a href="http://www.splendoroftruth.com/curtjester/archives/2008/04/">Curt Jester</a> blog )<br /><br /><blockquote>In an appearance on the NBC program Meet the Press (hat tip to <a href="http://www.blogger.com/lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/aug/08082502.html"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Lifesite</span> News)</a> on Sunday, House Speaker Nancy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Pelosi</span>, a self-professed Catholic, denied that the Catholic Church condemns abortion. <p>Referring to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Barack</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Obama's</span> now-notorious answer to Pastor Rick Warren to the question of when life begins, Meet the Press moderator Tom Brokaw asked <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Pelosi</span>, "Senator <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Obama</span> saying the question of when life begins is above his pay grade…If he were to come to you and say, 'Help me out here, Madame Speaker. When does life begin?' what would you tell him?"</p> <p><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Pelosi</span> responded by sidestepping the question, appealing to her Catholic faith as the source of her uncertainty. </p> <p>"I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time," she said. "And what I know is, over the centuries, the doctors of the church have not been able to make that definition. And Senator - St. Augustine said at three months. We don't know."</p> <p><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Pelosi</span> then said that in her view the question of when life begins is a non-issue in the debate on abortion.</p> <p>"The point is, is that it shouldn't have an impact on the woman's right to choose. Roe v. Wade talks about very clear definitions of when the child - first trimester, certain considerations; second trimester; not so third trimester. There's very clear distinctions. This isn't about abortion on demand, it's about a careful, careful consideration of all factors and - to - that a woman has to make with her doctor and her god." </p> <p>Brokaw continued to press <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Pelosi</span> on the question, observing, "The Catholic Church at the moment feels very strongly that it… begins at the point of conception."</p> <p><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Pelosi</span> again side-stepped the question, suggesting that the Church's current position is only a recent position and that "over the history of the church, this is an issue of controversy."</p></blockquote><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Pelosi</span> is either very ignorant of Catholic teaching on this subject, or she is lying through her teeth. You choose. I suspect that in choosing between these two options you no doubt take into account that politicians are as pure as the driven snow in all public utterances. We know that. For sure. No lying, no obfuscation, no prevarication, no comments that appear to emerge as the aroma emerging from the south end of a camel walking north.<br /><br />St. Augustine was speculating on when "<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">ensoulment</span>" took place, not whether abortion was <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">permissable</span>. As explained by <a href="http://brotherandre.stblogs.com/2007/09/22/ensoulment-theories-and-the-abortion-debate/">Brother Andre Marie</a> M.I.C.M:<br /><blockquote><p>“<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Ensoulment</span>” is the word which describes the point at which the body of the <em><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">conceptus</span></em> is said to be informed by a <em>human</em> soul. (The notion of a living being having “no soul” is a philosophical oxymoron, since the soul is the principle of life in a material being.) There are two basic theories of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">ensoulment</span>. The first is called the “immediate animation, immediate <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">ensoulment</span> theory”; the second, the “immediate animation, delayed <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">ensoulment</span> theory” (also called the “serial <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">ensoulment</span> theory”). As the names suggest, the former asserts that, at the very moment of animation (when life begins), the newly conceived human is animated by a rational soul; while the latter holds that the human soul’s informing of the new body is delayed. This latter theory further holds that there is a progression from vegetative to animal to human soul as the principle of animation. Common in the middle ages, the theory was based on Aristotelian biology and is untenable considering all that is presently known from the empirical sciences. Many learned Catholic authors of the ages of Faith held this theory and advanced it in their writings because it was the accepted biology of the day.<span id="more-27"></span></p> <p>The issue comes into the abortion debate largely by way of abortion advocates advancing the notion that, since men like St. Thomas Aquinas did not believe a human soul actually animated the newly-conceived body for a number of weeks, Catholics are hypocritical for opposing abortion on the grounds that it kills an innocent human being. Of course, this is in itself a species of hypocrisy, given that advances in the sciences of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">fetology</span> [sic] and embryology (as well as genetics) have undone the earlier theory. The abortion advocate using this argument generally presents himself as an “open-minded” individual of a broad scientific culture (one who is “reasonable” as opposed to “dogmatic”), but, by advocating the delayed <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">ensoulment</span> theory, he falls into a senseless retrogression to primitive biology.</p> <p>Among those who have recently revisited the delayed <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">ensoulment</span> theory are the liberal Jesuit moralist Joseph <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">Donceel</span> and the feminist ideologue, Rosemary Reuther.</p></blockquote><br /><br />And more recently it appears we can add to the list of delayed <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">ensoulment</span> acolytes Congresswoman Nancy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">Pelosi</span>.<br /><br />Here are some citations from <a href="http://www.catholic.com/library/Abortion.asp">Catholic Answers</a> pertaining to the actual teaching on abortion from today back to the earliest days of the Church:<br /><blockquote>Thus, in 1995 Pope John Paul II declared that the Church’s teaching on abortion "is unchanged and unchangeable. Therefore, by the authority which Christ conferred upon Peter and his successors . . . I declare that direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being. This doctrine is based upon the natural law and upon the written word of God, is transmitted by the Church’s tradition and taught by the ordinary and universal <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">magisterium</span>. No circumstance, no purpose, no law whatsoever can ever make licit an act which is intrinsically illicit, since it is contrary to the law of God which is written in every human heart, knowable by reason itself, and proclaimed by the Church" (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">Evangelium</span> Vitae 62).<br /><br />The early Church Fathers agreed. Fortunately, abortion, like all sins, is forgivable [<span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">forgivable</span>, not <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">permissible</span> - <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">JtM</span>] ; and forgiveness is as close as the nearest confessional.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">Didache</span></span><br /><br />"The second commandment of the teaching: You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not seduce boys. You shall not commit fornication. You shall not steal. You shall not practice magic. You shall not use potions. You shall not procure [an] abortion, nor destroy a newborn child" (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">Didache</span> 2:1–2 [A.D. 70]).<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Letter of Barnabas</span><br /><br />"The way of light, then, is as follows. If anyone desires to travel to the appointed place, he must be zealous in his works. The knowledge, therefore, which is given to us for the purpose of walking in this way, is the following. . . . Thou shalt not slay the child by procuring abortion; nor, again, shalt thou destroy it after it is born" (Letter of Barnabas 19 [A.D. 74]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Apocalypse of Peter</span><br /><br />"And near that place I saw another strait place . . . and there sat women. . . . And over against them many children who were born to them out of due time sat crying. And there came forth from them rays of fire and smote the women in the eyes. And these were the accursed who conceived and caused abortion" (The Apocalypse of Peter 25 [A.D. 137]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_33">Athenagoras</span></span><br /><br />"What man of sound mind, therefore, will affirm, while such is our character, that we are murderers?<br />. . . [W]hen we say that those women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder, and will have to give an account to God for the abortion, on what principle should we commit murder? For it does not belong to the same person to regard the very fetus in the womb as a created being, and therefore an object of God’s care, and when it has passed into life, to kill it; and not to expose an infant, because those who expose them are chargeable with child-murder, and on the other hand, when it has been reared to destroy it" (A Plea for the Christians 35 [A.D. 177]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_34">Tertullian</span></span><br /><br />"In our case, a murder being once for all forbidden, we may not destroy even the fetus in the womb, while as yet the human being derives blood from the other parts of the body for its sustenance. To hinder a birth is merely a speedier man-killing; nor does it matter whether you take away a life that is born, or destroy one that is coming to birth. That is a man which is going to be one; you have the fruit already in its seed" (Apology 9:8 [A.D. 197]).<br /><br />"Among surgeons’ tools there is a certain instrument, which is formed with a nicely-adjusted flexible frame for opening the uterus first of all and keeping it open; it is further furnished with an annular blade, by means of which the limbs [of the child] within the womb are dissected with anxious but unfaltering care; its last appendage being a blunted or covered hook, wherewith the entire fetus is extracted by a violent delivery.<br /><br />"There is also [another instrument in the shape of] a copper needle or spike, by which the actual death is managed in this furtive robbery of life: They give it, from its infanticide function, the name of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_35">embruosphaktes</span>, [meaning] "the slayer of the infant," which of course was alive. . . .<br /><br />"[The doctors who performed abortions] all knew well enough that a living being had been conceived, and [they] pitied this most luckless infant state, which had first to be put to death, to escape being tortured alive" (The Soul 25 [A.D. 210]).<br /><br />"Now we allow that life begins with conception because we contend that the soul also begins from conception; life taking its commencement at the same moment and place that the soul does" (ibid., 27).<br /><br />"The law of Moses, indeed, punishes with due penalties the man who shall cause abortion [Ex. 21:22–24]" (ibid., 37).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_36">Minucius</span> Felix</span><br /><br /><br />"There are some [pagan] women who, by drinking medical preparations, extinguish the source of the future man in their very bowels and thus commit a parricide before they bring forth. And these things assuredly come down from the teaching of your [false] gods. . . . To us [Christians] it is not lawful either to see or hear of homicide" (Octavius 30 [A.D. 226]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_37">Hippolytus</span></span><br /><br />"Women who were reputed to be believers began to take drugs to render themselves sterile, and to bind themselves tightly so as to expel what was being conceived, since they would not, on account of relatives and excess wealth, want to have a child by a slave or by any insignificant person. See, then, into what great impiety that lawless one has proceeded, by teaching adultery and murder at the same time!" (Refutation of All Heresies [A.D. 228]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Council of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_38">Ancyra</span></span><br /><br />"Concerning women who commit fornication, and destroy that which they have conceived, or who are employed in making drugs for abortion, a former decree excluded them until the hour of death, and to this some have assented. Nevertheless, being desirous to use somewhat greater <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_39">lenity</span>, we have ordained that they fulfill ten years [of penance], according to the prescribed degrees" (canon 21 [A.D. 314]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Basil the Great</span><br /><br />"Let her that procures abortion undergo ten years’ penance, whether the embryo were perfectly formed, or not" (First Canonical Letter, canon 2 [A.D. 374]).<br /><br />"He that kills another with a sword, or hurls an axe at his own wife and kills her, is guilty of willful murder; not he who throws a stone at a dog, and unintentionally kills a man, or who corrects one with a rod, or scourge, in order to reform him, or who kills a man in his own defense, when he only designed to hurt him. But the man, or woman, is a murderer that gives a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_40">philtrum</span>, if the man that takes it dies upon it; so are they who take medicines to procure abortion; and so are they who kill on the highway, and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_41">rapparees</span>" (ibid., canon 8).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">John Chrysostom</span><br /><br />"Wherefore I beseech you, flee fornication. . . . Why sow where the ground makes it its care to destroy the fruit?—where there are many efforts at abortion?—where there is murder before the birth? For even the harlot you do not let continue a mere harlot, but make her a murderess also. You see how drunkenness leads to prostitution, prostitution to adultery, adultery to murder; or rather to a something even worse than murder. For I have no name to give it, since it does not take off the thing born, but prevents its being born. Why then do thou abuse the gift of God, and fight with his laws, and follow after what is a curse as if a blessing, and make the chamber of procreation a chamber for murder, and arm the woman that was given for childbearing unto slaughter? For with a view to drawing more money by being agreeable and an object of longing to her lovers, even this she is not backward to do, so heaping upon thy head a great pile of fire. For even if the daring deed be hers, yet the causing of it is thine" (Homilies on Romans 24 [A.D. 391]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Jerome</span><br /><br />"I cannot bring myself to speak of the many virgins who daily fall and are lost to the bosom of the Church, their mother. . . . Some go so far as to take potions, that they may insure barrenness, and thus murder human beings almost before their conception. Some, when they find themselves with child through their sin, use drugs to procure abortion, and when, as often happens, they die with their offspring, they enter the lower world laden with the guilt not only of adultery against Christ but also of suicide and child murder" (Letters 22:13 [A.D. 396]).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Apostolic Constitutions</span><br /><br />"Thou shalt not use magic. Thou shalt not use witchcraft; for he says, ‘You shall not suffer a witch to live’ [Ex. 22:18]. Thou shall not slay thy child by causing abortion, nor kill that which is begotten. . . . [I]f it be slain, [it] shall be avenged, as being unjustly destroyed" (Apostolic Constitutions 7:3 [A.D. 400]).<br /></blockquote>The historical Catholic <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_42">doctrinal</span> record is clear. Abortion has never, ever, been allowed by the Church - even when there were arguments, based on incorrect, primitive human biology, about when the soul enters into the picture.<br /><br />You may well believe <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_43">Pelosi</span> when she says that "As an ardent practising Catholic, this is an issue I have studied for a long time." It took me less than five minutes to <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_44">Google</span> some of the the actual doctrinal positions on "this issue.<br /><br />One more thing. She describes herself as an ardent practicing Catholic. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_45">Yowie</span>! No Catholic I know worth their salt would presume to use the word "ardent" to describe their faith.<br /><br />Sorry folks, the evidence is clear. What we have here is the fragrance of the south end of a VIP Democratic camel walking north.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-47216448455157630342008-08-17T19:15:00.014-04:002008-08-17T23:26:27.187-04:00Wherein Freedoms of Religion & Conscience Are Abolished<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiq1hDMkGStPWONAflerG1i2myWojrY7YBpU_vzmP3Y7CDS9chVVpBDjRdBzB8W710bs58Sfzy-9tdtQ4sjMKiOICeiyTYCUm4U1ijFy8onP-EuYp0aTIlr7gf947PLnDyP8-j/s1600-h/Heronymous+Bosch.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiq1hDMkGStPWONAflerG1i2myWojrY7YBpU_vzmP3Y7CDS9chVVpBDjRdBzB8W710bs58Sfzy-9tdtQ4sjMKiOICeiyTYCUm4U1ijFy8onP-EuYp0aTIlr7gf947PLnDyP8-j/s400/Heronymous+Bosch.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5235683067400210930" border="0" /></a><br /> <span style="font-size:78%;"><a href="http://images.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://farm1.static.flickr.com/223/513242851_bfc811fd40.jpg&imgrefurl=http://wayneyang.wordpress.com/category/books-literature/&h=500&w=409&sz=155&hl=en&start=3&um=1&tbnid=OpLzsgk0C8bK0M:&tbnh=130&tbnw=106&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dmedieval%2Bpaintings%2Bof%2Bhell%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-GB:official%26sa%3DN">Jeroen Bosch</a> (Here: “Hell” from the tryptich “Garden of delights”)</span><br /><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:donotoptimizeforbrowser/> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><style> <!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} a:link, span.MsoHyperlink {color:blue; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed {color:purple; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:35.4pt; mso-footer-margin:35.4pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;">I am now convinced that draconian powers granted to human rights commissions, the disregard of due process allowed the accused and the politically correct mentality of the commission staff constitute a grave threat to the human rights of Canadians.<br /><br />Any reasonable person observing the auto da fey proceedings against Maclean''s magazine (referencing Mark Steyn's book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/America-Alone-End-World-Know/dp/0895260786">America Alone</a>) replete with a drive by smear by Ontario's Human Rights Czar Barbara Hall, the undemocratic silencing of Pastor Steve Boisson, the sordid and costly persecution by process of Father Alphonse De Valk at Catholic Insight magazine, must understand something is seriously amiss.<br /><br />Now we have the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons (OCPS), the governing body for medical doctors in the Province of Ontario, considering adoptimg a new policy, based on case law brought to us by our unelected, unaccountable judiciary and the newly expanded mandate of the Ontario Human Rights Commission brought to us by the elected government of the province.<br /><br />According to <a href="http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/aug/08081508.html">Lifesite News</a>:<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 36pt; margin-left: 36pt;"><span style="font-family:Arial;">"Refusal on conscientious or religious grounds to refer a woman for an abortion could be deemed professional misconduct under this new policy," said Dr. Will Johnston, president of Canadian Physicians for Life. Johnston was describing the likely outcome of a draft policy of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario for which the public comment period officially ended today.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;">How very totalitarian. And how consistent with the mentality underlying human rights commissions. Behold our brave new world where the most profound human rights are routinely violated by the very body named to protect them.<br /><br />Here is the proposed OCPS policy (hat tip to <a href="http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008_docs/HumanRightsDRAFT_081.pdf">Lifesite News</a>). An excerpt.<br /><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <u1:worddocument> <u1:view>Normal <u1:zoom>0 <u1:donotoptimizeforbrowser/> </u1:zoom> </u1:view> </u1:worddocument> </xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">ii) Moral or Religious Beliefs</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><br /><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;"><u2:p></u2:p></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">If physicians have moral or religious beliefs which affect or may affect the<u2:p></u2:p> provision of medical services, the College advises physicians to proceed<u2:p></u2:p> cautiously.<u2:p></u2:p></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">Personal beliefs and values and cultural and religious practices are central to the<u2:p></u2:p> lives of physicians and their patients. However, as a physician’s responsibility is<u2:p></u2:p> to place the needs of the patient first, there will be times when it may be<u2:p></u2:p> necessary for physicians to set aside their personal beliefs in order to ensure that<u2:p></u2:p> patients or potential patients are provided with the medical treatment and<u2:p></u2:p></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">services they require.</span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /><!--[endif]--><u2:p></u2:p></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">Physicians should be aware that decisions to restrict medical services offered, to<u2:p></u2:p> accept individuals as patients or to end physician-patient relationships that are<u2:p></u2:p> based on moral or religious belief may contravene the <i>Code, </i>and/or constitute<u2:p></u2:p> professional misconduct.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;">A bit later the draft policy has this to offer.<br /><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <u3:worddocument> <u3:view>Normal <u3:zoom>0 <u3:donotoptimizeforbrowser/> </u3:zoom> </u3:view> </u3:worddocument> </xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">Within the <i>Code, </i>there is no defence for refusing to provide a service on the<u2:p></u2:p> basis of one of the prohibited grounds. This means that a physician who refuses<u2:p></u2:p> to provide a service or refuses to accept a patient on the basis of a prohibited<u2:p></u2:p> ground such as sex or sexual orientation <i>may </i>be acting contrary to the <i>Code</i>,<u2:p></u2:p> even if the refusal is based on the physician’s moral or religious belief.5</span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;">And what is note 5 at the end of this excerpt? It is this.<br /><!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br /><!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <u4:worddocument> <u4:view>Normal <u4:zoom>0 <u4:donotoptimizeforbrowser/> </u4:zoom> </u4:view> </u4:worddocument> </xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">5. This could occur if the physician’s decision to refuse to provide a service, though motivated by<u2:p></u2:p> religious belief, has the effect of denying an individual access to medical services on one of the<u2:p></u2:p> protected grounds. For example, a physician who is opposed to same sex procreation for<u2:p></u2:p> religious reasons and therefore refuses to refer a homosexual couple for fertility treatment may be<u2:p></u2:p></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 36pt 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family:Arial;">in breach of the <i>Code</i>.<u2:p></u2:p></span><span style="font-family:Arial;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--> <!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:Arial;">We are hurtling over the precipice without even realizing it is there. There is none so blind as them that will not see.<o:p></o:p></span></p>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-27704867053515229002008-08-08T21:32:00.006-04:002008-08-08T23:45:47.225-04:00Maurice Strong speaks the party line<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkBByK6hMbC7tmzvRhC_hgrR0dJD2JBx-suxbHm-zbyggPf2eGJyzqXknch2D4cSVH6wjtLtwMLB4oJNoFmglqyCEEcZ2MzM6AxdrtdtRUmQ2VpCa7virhOaMsLC-Ij8NlZux7/s1600-h/maurice_strong_hires.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkBByK6hMbC7tmzvRhC_hgrR0dJD2JBx-suxbHm-zbyggPf2eGJyzqXknch2D4cSVH6wjtLtwMLB4oJNoFmglqyCEEcZ2MzM6AxdrtdtRUmQ2VpCa7virhOaMsLC-Ij8NlZux7/s320/maurice_strong_hires.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5232331458544383602" border="0" /></a>I picked up my copy of MacLean's Magazine at the end of a shortened but very busy week at work. After supper and fortified with a decent Sicilian wine (2004 vintage), I turned to an <a href="http://www.macleans.ca/world/global/article.jsp?content=20080806_32272_32272&page=2">article</a> at random to find myself reading an article written ostensibly by Maurice Strong (see photo), the well known Canadian champagne socialist, multi-millionaire, and now fully revealed, Chinese Communist Party fellow traveller. Oh yes. He is a mentor to former Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin.<br /><br />On reflection however, I came to the conclusion that Comrade Strong's piece was really ghost written by a gaggle of Chinese communist party communications flacks undertaking damage control for the public relations fiasco leading up to the Peking <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Olympics</span>.<br /><br />I accept that my conclusion was driven by drink. I am a Celt after all and a long time civil servant to boot, so I am therefore, familiar with the effects of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">drunkenness</span> and political spin on public policy matters. I accept that Maurice Strong may well have written it. His agitprop is entirely consistent with the plethora of crap written throughout the 20<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">th</span> century by those whom <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Vladimir</span> Lenin called <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot">"useful idiots of the West." </a>His defense of evil is an ignoble, but unfortunately all too common, tradition with those on the left.<br /><br />Here is the great man.<br /><blockquote>To be sure, this process has been a difficult and even painful one for many, but both Chinese and Tibetans continue to learn and to accommodate the changes that will enable Tibet to retain its distinctive cultural and religious heritage while according its people new and growing opportunities for a better life.<br /></blockquote>Note the denial of the extreme efforts of the Communist Party to eradicate Tibetan culture, religion and identity. He even <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">disingenuously</span> suggests that the Dali Lama's <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">differences</span> with the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Chinese</span> Politburo amount to mere quibbles over the degree of autonomy Tibet ought to be allowed to possess by their Chinese colonial masters.<br /><br />Regrettably, most of the article is behind a firewall, but here are a few tidbits upon which you can chew.<br /><blockquote>Societies progress at different speeds, and in different ways, towards incorporation into their <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">political</span> and social <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">stystems</span> of the highest <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">principals</span> to <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">which</span> they aspire.</blockquote>Translation. We ought to judge the Chinese communist dictators on whether they achieve their own internal <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">aspirations</span>, not any universal human rights norms.<br /><br />Or this:<br /><blockquote></blockquote><blockquote>China has made immense progress towards meeting the goals and objectives articulated by its leaders of producing a harmonious society guided by science that will meet the needs and aspirations of all its people and contribute towards a sustainable and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">equitable</span> world society. Indeed it [the Chinese Communist Party] is embarking on a distinctive an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">unprecedented</span> pathway to a new model of development based on utilizing methods of capitalism to achieve the goals of socialism - a socialist market economy.</blockquote><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Distinctive</span> and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">unprecedented</span>? This is, of course, intellectual blather. I'm not saying Strong doesn't believe what he is asserting. I can't judge the his interior thought <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">processes</span>, but I am saying that his reasoning process is utterly bogus crap. The Chinese Communist Party politburo, witnessing the partial-eclipse of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in the 1990's and the dissolution of large segments of the Soviet empire, decided to abandon the completely incoherent theories of orthodox Marxist-Leninist/Maoist economists and adopt a market driven (capitalist) economic model led by an elite socialist governing tyranny, continuing to call itself the Communist <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Party</span> of China.<br /><br />Now where have we seen this scenario before? You soft leftist advocates think hard now. Can you spell NATIONAL SOCIALIST?<br /><br />Think about that.<br /><br />Strong is a strong advocate of the Kyoto accords. In fact, I would say he is a high priest of that religious cult. Here is some of what he has to say on China and global warming.<br /><br /><blockquote>China realizes that it will be one of the most vulnerable victims of climate <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">change and</span> is already taking serious measures domestically to avert these risks.<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19"> But</span> it cannot be expected to <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">transform</span> these into binding <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">commitments that</span> are not matched by firm and enforceable commitments by the countries , notably the Unite States, whose accumulated <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">emmissions</span> of greenhouse gases have caused the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">irreversible</span> damage already <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">inflicted</span> on the world.<br /></blockquote>Where does one begin? I am not a Kyoto cult member, but it is instructive to those who are, to simply note that China is <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">currently</span> increasing its <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">greenhouse</span> gases to such an extent that it is adding the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">equivalent</span> of the entire industrial <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">output</span> of Germany each and every year. It is building hundreds of dirty coal fire electrical generating stations. Typical of Marxist/socialist tyrannies China is a environmental disaster in action.<br /><br />One more quote for the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">Gipper</span>.<br /><br /><blockquote>The needs of the poor and the newly developing countries cannot be subordinated to the wasteful and indulgent appetites of the rich. and their <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">pre</span>-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">emption</span> of a disproportion of the world's resources.</blockquote>So <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">sayeth</span> this very wealthy socialist/industrialist globetrotter.<br /><br />Pardon me while I go look for a barf bag.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-90162430383052052542008-07-07T21:41:00.004-04:002008-11-13T03:01:34.596-05:00Pastor Steve Boissoin Appealing HRC Ruling<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1dvbyHVsgmm9023vNzygZTzUyuzSDWsZA_i_TjIBJe-I4nZmpvZyLAiOqB6G7ApXItBx-HmLK7C12VWCxL0lj0ZKrfb1PcPEUGNfxrRO48ei4c68_xhjiz5B6w7RsfE4gkOlq/s1600-h/Pastor+Steve+Boissoin.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1dvbyHVsgmm9023vNzygZTzUyuzSDWsZA_i_TjIBJe-I4nZmpvZyLAiOqB6G7ApXItBx-HmLK7C12VWCxL0lj0ZKrfb1PcPEUGNfxrRO48ei4c68_xhjiz5B6w7RsfE4gkOlq/s400/Pastor+Steve+Boissoin.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5220456614499368994" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p></p><blockquote><p><a href="http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jul/08070704.html">July 7, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com)</a> - Alberta Pastor Steve Boissoin has filed an appeal to the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal ruling that convicted him of hate speech. The pastor was found guilty last November of having written a letter to the editor in the Red Deer Advocate that was "likely" to expose homosexuals to hatred. </p> <p>The appeal was filed on June 26 with the Queen's Bench of Alberta.</p> <p>A hearing has preliminarily been set for September 9, although that date could change during negotiations between the involved parties.</p> <p>LifeSiteNews spoke with Boissoin's attorney, Gerald Chipeur, who said that he is confident that the court will grant the appeal and overturn the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal's decision. </p> <p>"We are very optimistic, because the Constitution is so clear," said Chipeur. "We were surprised to have lost before the Tribunal, but we believe that the courts will conclude that there has been a violation of the constitutional rights of our client. We feel very confident in our arguments, and we do expect the courts to intervene and reverse the decision."</p> <p>Chipeur said his confidence was based on the fact that, "the courts have always seen themselves as the defenders of the oppressed. The context and the experience of the courts will lead them to accept our arguments."</p></blockquote><div style="text-align: justify;">Good. Now the whole shoddy matter will be dealt with by a real court, with due process, presumption of innocence, real rules of evidence, and 1,000 years or so of jurisprudence since Magna Carta. The santimonious, bureacratic, ideological zealots in the Alberta Human Rights Commission are about to see what happens when the law is properly adjudicated. That is God willing and the creek dont rise. (I would put in the apostraphe, but for reasons unknown when I type an apostrophe this strange looking creature appears. (è)<br /></div>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-38584983416493594772008-07-07T19:32:00.006-04:002008-11-13T03:01:34.780-05:00The Attack on Saint George<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlqkptoiOWUsI7VmU_rybtns_0yqsrJUZ5NN1V03vUGkF62wjV_TbN0K4A1LskgGt1ydZAkg77wg5Kyp7LgTYJ_urloCe_rQPeObG6DLbinYWAKh91lPvQrim42tKC9hyphenhyphenmFBb7/s1600-h/st+george+cross.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlqkptoiOWUsI7VmU_rybtns_0yqsrJUZ5NN1V03vUGkF62wjV_TbN0K4A1LskgGt1ydZAkg77wg5Kyp7LgTYJ_urloCe_rQPeObG6DLbinYWAKh91lPvQrim42tKC9hyphenhyphenmFBb7/s320/st+george+cross.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5220420778188381938" border="0" /></a><br />Behold the ancient cross of Saint George, patron saint of the English, among others. Alas, there is a <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-393651/Will-George-slayed-Englands-patron-saint.html">move afoot </a>among the English clergy to replace Saint George and his cross with that of Saint Alban for fear of offending Muslims.<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>His dragon-slaying heroics have kept his legend alive through the centuries.</p> <p>But the Church of England is considering rejecting England's patron saint St George on the grounds that his image is too warlike and may offend Muslims.</p> <p>Clergy have started a campaign to replace George with St Alban, a Christian martyr in Roman Britain.</p> <p>The scheme, to be considered by the Church's parliament, the General Synod, has met a cautious but sympathetic response from senior bishops.</p> <p>But it clashes with the increasing popularity of the saint and his flag in England. The World Cup brought out millions of St George crosses as the symbol became increasingly mainstream and less frequently dismissed as a badge favoured only by far-Right political activists.</p> <p>If St Alban replaced St George, the red cross on a white background would have to be replaced as England's flag by Alban's symbol, a diagonal yellow cross on a blue background that bears a strong similarity to St Andrew's cross, the flag of Scotland.<br /></p></blockquote><p></p>Go to the link to read the rest. As a Celt of Irish/Scottish descent my default tendency is to take the micky out of the Sassenach, but even my rather fevered imagination, twisted though it may be, is insufficent to conjure up such insanities, and that is saying something. Total madness is not, it would appear, the sole perogative of this poor writer.<br /><br />Hat tip to <a href="http://www.fivefeetoffury.com/">Kathy Shaidle</a> and <a href="http://rachellucas.com/index.php/2008/07/07/anyone-who-disagrees-is-racist-themselves/">Rachel Lucas. </a>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-47621709629628342372008-07-06T21:39:00.004-04:002008-11-13T03:01:35.117-05:00Morgentaler<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimauYpI5-M-lD2K_Xl33EPl-95mUaf8ClUSLRY5o4rXceVjUgG8-fkNIrpspxTDziyOSQNDGuZrtjBTP4tPfYf0pxirNLLJXCT8UfSRlSjgV76IoLgfldK1pyxOzywNrqOp_kC/s1600-h/david+warren+photo.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimauYpI5-M-lD2K_Xl33EPl-95mUaf8ClUSLRY5o4rXceVjUgG8-fkNIrpspxTDziyOSQNDGuZrtjBTP4tPfYf0pxirNLLJXCT8UfSRlSjgV76IoLgfldK1pyxOzywNrqOp_kC/s400/david+warren+photo.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5220081202654123682" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://davidwarrenonline.com/">David Warren</a> is always excellent. This is great.<br /><blockquote>Like many, many, many Canadians, I took the appointment of Henry Morgentaler to membership in the Order of Canada -- proclaimed on “Canada Day” -- as a stick in the eye for everything we believe in. As a gratuitous insult to the memory of three million aborted babies.<br /><br />It was intended as that. The perpetrators of this hateful deed -- presenting an abortionist as a model for “humanism” and as a champion of women -- knew perfectly well what they were doing. As I had learned even before the event, protocol had been breached in making the appointment. There was no consensus on the appointment committee; the chair, Chief Justice McLachlin, had failed to recuse herself. It was done deceitfully, after the Governor-General’s office had assured outraged callers last February that Morgentaler would not be on the list this year. And last weekend, as the rumour spread, a fresh round of outraged callers were being mocked -- given the phone number of Campaign Life Coalition by the Rideau Hall switchboard.<br /><br />The announcement was then delayed -- another irregularity -- until after the Parliament Hill celebrations, to prevent a large pro-life demonstration from coalescing there. And, instead of denouncing the appointment, our cynical prime minister had “talking points” distributed to his caucus before the fact.<br /><br />A very dark thing was done, as such things are always done -- in a very dark way.<br /></blockquote><a href="http://davidwarrenonline.com/">Read the rest.</a>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-67685272272131988782008-07-05T19:01:00.002-04:002008-11-13T03:01:35.321-05:00General Rick Hillier<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfEuJjkCdwMTvsTdjcS-ZVGfem2YnHvy_NXOLU3GrSeC7CzOwnFBsClLBODFli2yGWvfmUTuyv4MHdQXuWPSpYFTUtYQLSj-UhfNT1IqeX0tt6bGPQ4WIIv8UExnYS0jjjNznU/s1600-h/photo20-20rick20hillier201.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfEuJjkCdwMTvsTdjcS-ZVGfem2YnHvy_NXOLU3GrSeC7CzOwnFBsClLBODFli2yGWvfmUTuyv4MHdQXuWPSpYFTUtYQLSj-UhfNT1IqeX0tt6bGPQ4WIIv8UExnYS0jjjNznU/s400/photo20-20rick20hillier201.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5219670800864587890" border="0" /></a><br /><p></p><blockquote><p>"We're not the public service of Canada, we're not just another department. We are the Canadian Forces, and our job is to be able to kill people."</p><p>General Rick hillier C.M.M., M.S.C., CD<br /></p><p><span style="font-weight: bold;">------------------------------------</span><br /></p><p>Gen. Rick Hillier has officially retired as the leader of Canada's military, handing over the reins to Gen. Walter Natynczyk in a ceremony Wednesday in Ottawa.</p> <p>Soldiers marched and Snowbird planes flew overhead moments before Hillier passed a ceremonial flag to Gov. Gen. Michaëlle Jean, who handed it over to Natynczyk.</p> <p>"It has been my privilege to have served you as your chief of defence staff, and to have had the opportunity to represent you across our country and around the world," Hillier said, addressing the soldiers participating in the ceremony directly.</p> <p>"I leave as chief of defence staff awed by you, awed by all our troops, who in my view are absolute national treasures, Canada's sons and daughters, and heroes to all."</p><p>-----------------------------</p><p>Bravo Zulu General Hillier. I salute you, sir!.<br /></p><p>John the Mad CD Major (Ret'd)<br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p></blockquote><p></p>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-32647589795930522592008-07-05T00:47:00.008-04:002008-11-13T03:01:35.456-05:00Another appointment to the Order of Canada<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA9QSkUrOC3Oyx2liXLkQcsJHsoHBTFTQ9l_pH7Rgr5FLMDwkRmypK5WxQ7dI7IPHaBCOq349ZcFOXaZGZ_1g15RfiAF2nE7lESEFyrWqAa6uSCj7Gq1xD4vWvuJDaahijPICL/s1600-h/fourhorsemenzk1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA9QSkUrOC3Oyx2liXLkQcsJHsoHBTFTQ9l_pH7Rgr5FLMDwkRmypK5WxQ7dI7IPHaBCOq349ZcFOXaZGZ_1g15RfiAF2nE7lESEFyrWqAa6uSCj7Gq1xD4vWvuJDaahijPICL/s400/fourhorsemenzk1.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5219396686175782514" border="0" /></a><b><a href="http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=80945" target="_top"><wbr></a></b> <b><a href="http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=80945" target="_top"><wbr></a></b> <span style="font-size:78%;"><b><a href="http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=80945" target="_top">www.conceptart.org/<wbr>forums/<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">showthread</span></span>.<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">php</span></span>?t=80945</a></b></span><br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Rideau</span></span> Hall announced today that Her Excellency the Governor General is following up her exciting appointment of Doctor Henry <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Morgentaler</span></span> to the Order of Canada, by appointing at the same time, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Morgentaler's</span></span> old friend and colleague, best known to the general public as the Second Horseman of the Apocalypse (see depiction above -third from the right) .<br /><br />"This newest appointment is consistent with the transgressive and progressive style for which Her Excellency and her Advisory Committee is striving," said a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Rideau</span></span> Hall staff toady who asked to remain nameless.<br /><br />John the Mad, can report that at <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">considerable</span> expense of buying rounds of expensive single malt, he has ferreted out the "behind the scenes" deliberations of the Order of Canada Advisory Committee.<br /><br />"The Second Horseman, will be inducted into the highest level of the Order, that of Companion," <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">hiccuped</span> the nameless toady, who added that, "Her Excellency's Advisory Committee, Chaired by the Chief Justice of Canada, certainly engaged in vigorous debate and a thorough review of the equine candidate's qualifications before reaching a consensus on this recommendation."<br /><br />"Why we had to send His Excellency Jean-Daniel <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Lafond</span></span> to the Prime Minister's residence at 22 Sussex Drive to obtain a copy of the Bible, after a frantic search of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Rideau</span></span> Hall proved fruitless. It seems that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Rideau</span> Hall library possesses several copies of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Das</span></span> Capital and a dog eared copy of the annotated history of the French communist party in his library, but no Bible."<br /><br />It is rumoured that most members of the Committee were at first opposed to this appointment because it is supposed to go to someone who has demonstrated, "... a lifetime of outstanding achievement and merit of the highest degree, especially in service to Canada or to humanity at large."<br /><br />Judy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Laroque</span></span>, Deputy Minister of Canadian Heritage, led the initial objection by reading out the following passage of scripture from the Book of Revelations.<br /><blockquote>And there went out another horse [the second] that was red: and to him that sat thereon, it was given that he should take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another, and a great sword was given to him.</blockquote>Ms <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Laroque</span></span> was of the view that the Second Horseman, whatever his merits, appeared to be rather more focused on some sort of Divine effort at ending human existence on planet Earth, rather than providing a service to Canada or humanity at large. She stated that, in her view, ending peace and killing one another was definitely not consistent with the primary Canadian values of peacekeeping and supporting equal pay for work of equal value.<br /><br />The President of the Royal Society of Canada, Doctor <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Yvan</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Guindon</span> CM. nodded his head in agreement and added that another meritorious factor is that, "the second apocalyptic horse is red and that is one of Canada's official colours!" Thomas <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Traves</span> Ph.D., Chair of the Board of Directors of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada was very enthusiastic about this point, slurred my anonymous bean spiller. <style>/* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Se</style><br /><br />The Clerk of the Privy Council, Kevin Lynch, then sagely rebutted these arguments by pointing out that Canadian values may have been operative under the Liberals but that the current Conservative government appeared more fond of Albertan values of making war and killing one another. Values change he said and the Advisory Committee must change with the government, .... er times. Everyone seemed to think that notion was hilarious.<br /><br />Once they stopped guffawing, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, the Right Honourable Beverley McLaughlin PC, rose to her feet - her Crimson robes casting a scarlet and fetching reflected glow to her judicious complexion.<br /><br />"Ladies and gentlemen of this August advisory committee," she astutely opined. "You miss the point. Because you are not Supreme Court Justices, I can hardly fault you for your errors in judgment, but errors they are. Why are we spending time perusing this old book for celestial precedence anyway? "Values and governments do indeed change, but we are the vanguard of the new Canada. On the Court we <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16"><span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Supreme</span></span> Ones deliberate matters afresh and so must you. In the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Morgentaler</span> decision we took our inspiration from the living tree of the Charter, not some retro prophesy enshrined in moldy Holy Writ. Get with the spirit of the age people. What is our end game here?"<br /><br />According to my inebriated toady, a member of the Committee (just who, my informant could not remember) then spoke up and spluttered, "Crikey, I tell you that we have just buggered up the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">Morgentaler</span></span> appointment and now have millions of Canadians <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">PO'd</span></span> at us. The Governor General and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">newspaper</span> editors are being deluged with emails and phone calls from outraged churchgoing anti-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">choicers</span>. Catholic bishops and Evangelical pastors are denouncing us from the pulpits. Fortunately the United Church has taken time out of its theological struggle against bottled water to support us, but that accounts for only 300 churchgoers in the country. We gotta do something. I warned you this would happen."<br /><br />Justice McLaughlin smiled serenely and replied, "Of course we have to do something and we are. We are going to recommend to the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">GG</span></span> that she appoint this Second Horseman fellow as a Companion of the Order of Canada. All those upset priest ridden, anti-choice, protesters are going to be blind sided by our being sensitivity to their deepest concerns. We will deliver, for Her Excellency's consideration, one nihilist abortionist and one venerated New Testament figure. We get <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">spokewymen</span> from the Canadian Abortion Rights Action Council to protest the Second Horseman appointment as an unwarranted intrusion of religion into a secular honours system. The media will applaud our balanced approach and the public feeding frenzy will abate.<br /><br />"But the Second Horseman's entire purpose is to bring death and destruction to the planet," muttered the anonymous Committee member.<br /><br />"Indeed," opined the Chief Justice, "but this is also true of Henry <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">Morgentaler</span></span>. We must be entirely consistent in our principles must we not?"<br /><br />And now you know the rest of the story.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-83895180349042354472008-07-02T11:19:00.011-04:002008-11-13T03:01:35.615-05:00Doctor Death Gets the Snowflake<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFXuDW5OgSAZiFDqHcdol6FmSMFgCBCzfCgt4noHjBV3nRz6DtX9sUCdFESxo01PC2JD6HiqXvLbOT84FgDVbP36e_lMSl7bdbVWiHpb1bha-PY44tInkjYwyAPjVk22310Swf/s1600-h/Order+of+Canada+member.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFXuDW5OgSAZiFDqHcdol6FmSMFgCBCzfCgt4noHjBV3nRz6DtX9sUCdFESxo01PC2JD6HiqXvLbOT84FgDVbP36e_lMSl7bdbVWiHpb1bha-PY44tInkjYwyAPjVk22310Swf/s400/Order+of+Canada+member.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5218497379443958370" border="0" /></a><br /><br />The insignia depicted above is that awarded to inductee members of the Order of Canada. The constitution of the Order limits the number of recipients of this gong to 136 Canadians per year out of a population of some 33 million souls. It is intended to be a great honour bestowed on those Canadians who have demonstrated, "a lifetime of distinguished service in or to a particular community, group or field of activity."<br /><br />Sometime in the very near future a man named Henry <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Morgentaler</span> will be inducted as a member of this order. It was so announced on the 141st anniversary of this nation's founding. Morgentaler's presence among the members of the Order will debase, as it already has the Hippocratic oath of the medical profession, all who wear the insignia of the Order of Canada and deeply wound the system of honours maintained by Canadians to honour achievement by its citizens.<br /><br />As a nation we are about to grant our highest honour to a man responsible (as a good friend of mine says) for the deaths of more Canadians than the German army in two world wars. His lifetime achievement is to have snuffed out the lives of children growing in their mother's wombs - children entirely innocent and helpless before this champion of what Pope John Paul the Great correctly called the culture of death.<br /><br />I loathe the very sight and name of Henry <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Morgentaler</span>, for though his followers and fellow travellers are legion, it was he who led the way for the general acceptance of the idea that it is acceptable for physicians and mothers to kill babies in the womb. The Canadian judiciary, members of parliament, the respective provincial legislatures and the medical profession have all have played their perfidious parts, but <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Morgentaler</span> is the central actor and symbol of the unrelenting struggle to unleash the beast. And unleash it he has.<br /><br />A generation of innocent Canadians <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">have</span> been subjected to murder most foul and the leading high priest of the Canadian coven for the fetal holocaust is now to be feted and lauded at Government House by Her Excellency, the Right Honourable <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Michaëlle</span> Jean, Governor-General of Canada. She accepted the advice of the advisory committee established for the purpose of nominating new members to the Order. It is a distinguished panel led by the Right Honourable Beverley McLaughlin, PC, Chief Justice of Canada. I'd be embarrassed by the title Right Honourable if I were them.<br /><br />In a macabre way, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Morgentaler's</span> appointment to the Order of Canada is entirely fitting. The debasement of the Order merely reflects the corruption of our country's noble ideals by the poltroons we allow to lead us.<br /><br />Alas, I fear it will get worse before it gets better.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-48997767501350730662008-06-18T23:04:00.005-04:002008-11-13T03:01:35.747-05:00School acts on psychic's accusation of abuse<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibLC-yA8sMoK3aTF686VOk67-w6YT9VWXx5W5z0n5pfHIxKFjyEUqgmQIdS_Bl32x-lCw0ZpVxjhJOewIwPo6BDmJBDBq2GHZe1wLeaS27uEHtYbjX6QeuddNbagZuCCVet_qm/s1600-h/wizard.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibLC-yA8sMoK3aTF686VOk67-w6YT9VWXx5W5z0n5pfHIxKFjyEUqgmQIdS_Bl32x-lCw0ZpVxjhJOewIwPo6BDmJBDBq2GHZe1wLeaS27uEHtYbjX6QeuddNbagZuCCVet_qm/s400/wizard.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5213433327492481442" border="0" /></a><br /><br />From the alternative universe of the (Ontario) <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Simcoe</span> County District School Board the <a href="http://www.torontosun.com/News/Canada/2008/06/18/5910691-sun.html">Toronto Sun</a> brings you this tale out of Edgar Allen Poe.<br /><blockquote>On May 30, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Leduc</span> picked Victoria up from school, where she's enrolled in an Autism Spectrum Disorder (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">ASD</span>) class with several boys around the same age. When <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Leduc</span> returned home, there was an urgent call asking her to return to the Livingstone Street East school.<br /><br />Frightened, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Leduc</span> rushed back to the school. She and Victoria entered a room where they were met by the principal, the vice-principal and the teacher.<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Leduc</span> said they advised her that Victoria's educational assistant (EA) had visited a psychic, who said a youngster whose name started with "V" was being sexually abused by a man between 23 and 26 years old. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Leduc</span> was also handed a list of recent behaviours exhibited by her daughter.<br /><br />School principal Brian Tremain -- who referred phone calls seeking comment to the board -- advised <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Leduc</span> that the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">CAS</span> had been contacted.<br /><br />"That's when I got sick to my stomach," she said. "I was shocked the whole meeting."<br /></blockquote>You think I made this stuff up don't you. You think that in a rationale world, school officials wouldn't accept a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">phychic's</span> musings that a child named "V" was being sexually abused by an unnamed man aged somewhere between 23 and 26 years old. You would be wrong.<br /><p></p><blockquote><p>Dr. Lindy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Zaretsky</span>, a school board superintendent whose portfolio includes special education, said the school was just following protocol, adding the board is bound by the same legislation (Child and Family Services Act) as the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">CAS</span> when it comes to suspected neglect or sexual abuse. </p><p>"It is clear in all cases that this (information) must be reported," <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Zaretsky</span> said. </p></blockquote><p></p>What is clear is that some school board employees ought to be given the old pink slip. Get thee hence. You aren't fit to teach a tadpole how to swim.<br /><br />Did you know that Doctor Lindy <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Zaretsky</span> cross dresses as a 25 year old man on weekends and spends her time in playgrounds with autistic children named V? How do I know? A homeless two-headed dwarf, high on LSD, on a street in Toronto told me that he consulted an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Ouija</span> board on the matter. There you are. Who you gonna believe? An <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Ouija</span> board or a school board? In <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Simcoe</span> County is there a difference?<br /><br />Now that you know of this new information, it is your duty to call the Children's Aid Society! It's required by law. So says Dr. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Zaretsky</span>, whose PhD is, no doubt, in a hard science such as necromancy.John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-2794230181902686872008-06-07T22:38:00.002-04:002008-06-07T22:52:24.527-04:00Disgust does not begin to describe itEzra Levant informs us that the Canadian Human Rights Commission has altered the official transcript of the Lemire hearing. There is an RCMP investigation underway into possible wrongdoing of HRC staff in this matter and the commission is playing silly bugger with the transcripts!<br /><br />This is beyond belief. It illustrates as nothing else does, that these commissions constitute a threat to our freedoms as citizens of this democracy. I am utterly appalled.<br /><br />John the MadJohn the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-63788521876945158692008-06-03T23:40:00.004-04:002008-11-13T03:01:35.942-05:00Star Chamber procedings - Day two<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHLZKKdn635o6hxh3Lyesk9o29JqGnIOvkNNjUNaSE69ReQ3Z_ch6KdyQo81AYdCA1ZkA9E4B-wbox_38QDanP5hqmi27oJIKp7SUPKQ0Ku5nfq2vt4y1WdeFgXbEwEiFEdndh/s1600-h/Andrew+Coyne.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHLZKKdn635o6hxh3Lyesk9o29JqGnIOvkNNjUNaSE69ReQ3Z_ch6KdyQo81AYdCA1ZkA9E4B-wbox_38QDanP5hqmi27oJIKp7SUPKQ0Ku5nfq2vt4y1WdeFgXbEwEiFEdndh/s320/Andrew+Coyne.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5207867290371575378" border="0" /></a><br />Andrew <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Coyne</span> has been brilliantly <a href="http://blog.macleans.ca/2008/06/03/liveblogging-the-bc-hrt-day-two-a-day-that-will-live-in-entropy/">live blogging </a>the abuse of human rights being foisted on the public by the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal in its consideration of a complaint brought by a Muslim radical against Canada's largest news magazine <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">MacLean's</span>. <br /><br />I know, on the face of it, that the notion of a human right tribunal committing human rights abuses sounds fantastic and Orwellian, but if you know anything about these tribunals you will understand what I mean. If you don't, go look at <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Coyne's</span> blogging. Just a few minutes doing that and you will find yourself weeping in frustration or gagging in horror ...... that is, if you have a conscience or a brain.<br /><br />We must rekindle the spirit of <a href="http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0004947">William Lyon MacKenzie</a> 1791-1861, journalist, member of the legislature, first mayor of Toronto, and leader of the rebellion of 1837 that opposed the Family Compact. <br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><blockquote><br /><br /><br /></blockquote></span>John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9160593.post-29939788101739555692008-06-02T16:21:00.005-04:002008-11-13T03:01:36.107-05:00Shame on us all<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixlRbdOadGpEFHT4yCvIjwpyGaIHJIDza6I_OKLltY2vRhnAk8A-sGdC5waAYdw-C8NWaUUdS5tVfJEivUfiP9627atBlf4Y2ffdc6_D1PcwdDOW1RFQDYBZf1fu1ykPstGy1I/s1600-h/America+Alone.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixlRbdOadGpEFHT4yCvIjwpyGaIHJIDza6I_OKLltY2vRhnAk8A-sGdC5waAYdw-C8NWaUUdS5tVfJEivUfiP9627atBlf4Y2ffdc6_D1PcwdDOW1RFQDYBZf1fu1ykPstGy1I/s320/America+Alone.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5207397751661874754" border="0" /></a>Today, the British Columbia Human Rights Commission(<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">BCHRC</span>)began hearing a complaint by a Muslim extremist against <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Maclean's</span>, Canada's largest news magazine. The hearing, if ultimately supported by a court of final jurisdiction, may well determine the fate of freedom of the press and its Siamese twin freedom of speech, in this demented Dominion. The complaint is against <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Maclean</span>"s for having the temerity to publish an excerpt from Mark <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Steyn's</span> bestselling book, <span style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://www.steynstore.com/index.html">America Alone</a>.</span><br /><br />That such a hearing is taking place at all is an utter disgrace in a constitutional democracy. The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">BCHRC</span> commission uses processes that thwart centuries of established jurisprudence from <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Magna</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Carta</span> onwards that is intended to protect citizens against the capricious and arbitrary exercise of untrammeled government power. Lest you think I exaggerate, let me pass on one of the guiding principles inherent in the operation of Canadian human rights Star Chambers.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Truth is not a defence</span> before a Canadian human rights tribunal, including this provincial rights <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">grotesquerie</span> in B.C. If you love freedom, this singular truth should be sufficient for you to conclude that cherished ancient rights are under attack in Lotus Land O'er the Rockies. But if you, like me, reside in more elegant and sophisticated Upper Canada, do not gloat. No.No.No.<br /><br />When the Ontario Human Rights commission heard the same complaint from the self-same complainant, Mr. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Elmasry</span>, the head of the Ontario Commission launched a scurrilous diatribe denouncing <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Maclean's</span> and Mr. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Steyn</span>, even<span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span>after admitting that the local Star Chamber lacked jurisdiction under Ontario statutes to even hear the case.<span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span><br /><br />Why would a sworn servant of the Canadian Crown abuse her position of public trust in such a way, you ask? Because she can, that's why. <a href="http://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/resources/news/macleans">Here</a> is what the Commission has to say about the case.<br /><strong style="font-style: italic;"></strong><blockquote><strong style="font-style: italic;">For immediate publication</strong><span style="font-style: italic;"> </span><br /> <div style="font-style: italic;">April 9, 2008</div> <br /> <strong style="font-style: italic;">Toronto</strong><span style="font-style: italic;"> - </span><p style="font-style: italic;">The Ontario Human Rights Commission has decided not to proceed with complaints filed against <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Maclean</span>’s magazine related to its publication of an article “The future belongs to Islam.” The complainants alleged that the content of the article and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Maclean</span>’s refusal to provide space for a rebuttal violated their human rights. The decision means that the complaints will not be referred to a hearing before the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario.</p> <p style="font-style: italic;">Denying a service because of race or creed can form the basis for a human rights complaint. However, the Ontario <em>Human Rights Code</em> does not give the Commission the jurisdiction to deal with the content of magazine articles through its complaint process. </p><p style="font-style: italic;">Even though the Commission is not proceeding with these complaints, it still has a broader role in addressing the tension and conflict that such writings cause in the community and the impact that they have on the groups that are being singled out.</p> <p style="font-style: italic;">While freedom of expression must be recognized as a cornerstone of a functioning democracy, the Commission strongly condemns the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Islamophobic</span> portrayal of Muslims, Arabs, South Asians and indeed any <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">racialized</span> community in the media, such as the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Maclean</span>’s article and others like them, as being inconsistent with the values enshrined in our human rights codes. Media has a responsibility to engage in fair and unbiased journalism.</p> <p style="font-style: italic;">“Clearly more debate on this issue is required in Canada,” commented Chief Commissioner Barbara Hall. “That’s why we issued a statement today.”</p></blockquote><p style="font-style: italic;"></p>So Commissioner Hall condemned <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Maclean's</span> (and by extension, Mark <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Steyn</span>) without any hearing on the grounds that the accused acted contrary to values expressed in "our human rights code." Some values! If, as Ms Hall asserts, the media has a responsibility to engage in fair and unbiased journalism (what obligation? - not a legal one), what can be written about a commissioner and commission established to protect human rights, who does such a thing. Those "enshrined values" apparently do not include giving <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Maclean's</span>, or <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">Steyn</span>, a chance to defend themselves before the commission. No jurisdiction. No hearing. Just a verdict.<br /><br />It seems the Ontario Human Rights Code has not enshrined principles of due process, prudence, fairness, or common decency. <br /><br />But for those demented fellow <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">Canucks</span> who rise in applause over such abuse of power and lament the jurisdictional limitation of Ms Hall and her ilk, fear not. Your time is coming soon - as soon as the end of the month.<br /><h2></h2><blockquote><h2>The New Mandate of the Ontario Human Rights Commission</h2> <p>When the <i>Human Rights Code Amendment Act, 2006</i> comes into effect on June 30, 2008, there will be a number of significant changes in the mandate of the Ontario Human Rights Commission [OHRC].</p> <p>Under the new Act, the role of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">OHRC</span> Commisson in preventing discrimination and promoting and advancing human rights in Ontario will be strengthened. The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">OHRC</span> will expand its work in promoting a culture of human rights in the province. We will have the power to conduct public inquiries, initiate our own applications (formerly called ‘complaints’), or intervene in proceedings at the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">HRTO</span>). We will be able to engage in proactive measures such as public education, policy development, research and analysis.</p> <p>The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">OHRC</span> has also been given broad inquiry powers. The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">HRTO</span> may refer matters in the public interest to the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">OHRC</span> and may ask the Commission to conduct an inquiry. We will have the power to monitor the state of human rights and report directly to the people of Ontario. The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">OHRC</span> may also apply to the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">HRTO</span> to state a case to the Divisional Court where it feels the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">HRTO</span> decision is not consistent with <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">OHRC</span> policies.</p> <p>We will, however, no longer process human rights complaints under the Ontario <i>Human Rights Code</i>. Dealing with such complaints will be the job of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">HRTO</span>. A new body, the Human Rights Legal Support Centre, will offer independent human rights-related legal and support services to individuals, ranging from advice and support to legal representation.</p> <p>We will continue to be guided by the <i>Human Rights Code</i> in all our work. The overall spirit of the new law is that the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">OHRC</span> is one part of a system for human rights alongside the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_33">HRTO</span> and Human Rights Legal Support Centre.</p> <p>In some ways, the new law enhances the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_34">OHRC</span>’s independence. We will file our annual report directly to the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, instead of through the Attorney General, as we currently do. We will have the power to monitor and report on anything related to the state of human rights in the Province of Ontario.</p> <p>Our powers to review legislation and policies, for example will be very broad. The new law refers to our ability to consider whether legislation is inconsistent with the <b>intent</b> of the <i>Code</i>. We will have a role in dealing with “tension and conflict” and bringing people and communities together to help resolve differences. Our current role as a developer of public policy on human rights is made explicit in the new legislation, as is the way those policies can be used in issues that are before the Tribunal.</p></blockquote>Yes dear reader, the Ontario Commission's mandate is about to get broader. It says it is getting a role in setting public policy on human rights - a role in dealing with "tension and conflict." What gives me great confidence in what is about to happen is best summed up the following testimony by a Canadian human rights commissar respecting that old British concept of freedom of speech. Let us hear now, <a href="http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NjY1YWJhNDc5ZTkyYzE4NTE3NTYyM2Q1ZTBkZjIxYzQ=">via Mark <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_35">Steyn</span></a> in the National <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_36">Review's</span> online The Corner, from Mr. Dean <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_37">Steacy</span>, the principle "anti hate" investigator for the Canadian Human Rights Commission. He summed up under oath, in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_38">Warman</span> vs <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_39">Lemire</span> (page 4793 of the transcript), the approach we are about to see in Ontario.<br /><blockquote><blockquote><p>MS <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_40">KULASZKA</span>: Mr. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_41">Steacy</span>, you were talking before about context and how important it is when you do your investigation. What value do you give freedom of speech when you investigate one of these complaints?<br /><br />MR. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_42">STEACY</span>: <strong>Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value.</strong><br /><br />MS <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_43">KULASZKA</span>: Okay. That was a clear answer.<br /><br />MR. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_44">STEACY</span>: It's not my job to give value to an American concept.</p></blockquote></blockquote>Think about that. Think hard. Then recall the final stanza of that famous World War I poem by Canadian Army Lieutenant-Colonel John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_45">McRae</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">In <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_46">Flander</span> Fields</span>.<br /><p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style=";font-family:";" ></span></b></p><blockquote><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><b><span style=";font-family:";" >Take up our quarrel with the foe:</span></b><br /><b><span style=";font-family:";" >To you from failing hands we throw</span></b><br /><b><span style=";font-family:";" >The torch; be yours to hold it high.</span></b><br /><b><span style=";font-family:";" >If ye break faith with us who die</span></b><br /><b><span style=";font-family:";" >We shall not sleep, though poppies grow</span></b><br /><b><span style=";font-family:";" >In Flanders fields.</span></b></span> </p> </blockquote>Wherever he may be, old King John must be smirking. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_47">Magna</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_48">Carta</span> indeed!John the Madhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17899858119936750764noreply@blogger.com0