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I’m a little surprised that one of this weeks MSM storys - Green Party of Mexico trying to reintroduce the death penalty, hasn’t made much noise in the conservative blogosphere.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7866811.stm

It just seems to me that there is a ton of debatable issues with the story to explore.

“Mexican Leftys want to kill people in the name of peace”
“Why Mexico only looks safe and cultured on the surface”
“Say NO to the death penalty – unless the Green Party decides its ok”

Vitruvius,

Epistemology might well be observed in the genius of the most underrated musician of our time.

Eric Dolphy performs with a Mingus sextet. Check-round the 5:44 mark for his solo. But make sure to hear the entire piece for context.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzqVXvwMHCU

Interesting article by Conrad Black in Saturday's National Post:

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2009/02/07/conrad-black-some-radical-proposals-for-recessionary-times.aspx

It's interesting but last year I was down south and I had some time and so I did the old Route 66 drive from Flagstaff to Kingman (the original highway in this area still remains). What is cool though is that you are close to the main train route from LA (I think LA is one of the largest if not the largest container port in the world). In Canada, we are used to seeing some really long trains burning it across Canada but you tend to see them maybe twice a day. Along Route 66 in Arizona they seemed to be heading east almost every twenty minutes - and I'm talking about 7 locomotives - in fact I counted 9 locos on one train (they stick them on the front, on the back and in the middle). I pulled over to the side to take a break and watch the trains and a while later a trucker in his transport pulled over behind. We started talking and I told how amazed I was to see these huge trains and I says what gives and he goes it's mostly Wal-mart.

Virtuvius, back to yesterday's Late Nite Radio for just a moment. I was intrigued by your "yup that's me: Sam Drucker" comment in reference to Petticoat Junction. What did you mean by that?

1) You really are the one and only great character actor Frank Cady, which means you are now 93 years old?
2) You bear a striking resemblance to the person of Frank Cady as he was 45 years ago?
3) You bear a striking resemblance and your personality is much like that of Sam Drucker?
4) You're Sam Drucker in the way that "I Am Spartacus"?
5) You think you're Sam Drucker because you're an imaginative amystical phenomenologist?
6) Or is there some logical but nondeterministic mechanistic reason I've missed?

Jeff's theory of intelligence is too narrow as is the framework he is proposing. He ignores the the bio-psycho-social-spiritual realities of human experience/thought. He is taking a purely mathematical and analytical view. He also does not explain how we understand that we predict or form patterns, in other words the theory or framework he is presenting contains the same fundamental error evolution does - our ability to reason-meta-cognition which distinguishes us from all other life forms.

[quote]Twenty-five years ago, when Chrysler Corp. received loans and loan guaranties from the U.S. government, Pierre Trudeau’s talented chief of staff, Jim Coutts, suggested that the Canadian government buy Chrysler Corp., which could have been done for a relative pittance. It would have been a wise move. It might be now, if Canada obtained the right to move jobs to this country and radically renegotiate the working conditions and retirement benefits of Chrysler employees. Chrysler is selling 35% of itself to Fiat for nominal consideration, which would establish the price for such an acquisition by Canada. It would be especially timely if Washington is, as is indicated, now going to maintain Detroit on life support to produce fuel-efficient cars no one wishes to buy.[/quote] Conrad Black

Nice to see someone is thinking Canada can compete independently from the US chaos. … The US does not lack investment money, they just won’t put money in a sinkhole, and alternatives in Canada will fare well. What about GM?

The time is ripe for Canadian investment in "existing" technology (trucks) & supply chain contracts. The Major components of a manufactures product have pricing contracts in the long term commitment of ~ 7 years.

The US NEW stuff will be at a price disavantage for some time. Think Proto-type Costs

Conrad has gone off the deep end. Chrysler is cheap because of the liabilities it has - billions and billions worth. Imagine how aggressive the CAW would be negotiating with a cdn crown Corp. And what about the dealerships etc etc.

if this is how he thinks business operates no wonder he drove hollinger into the ground.

Here's a view to the state of AGW denying...check out the comments at the below article. All of the AGW articles at PHYSORG are treated the same way.

http://www.physorg.com/news153044924.html

"The Dissenter Who Changed the War

As the No. 2 Commander in Iraq, Raymond Odierno Challenged the Military Establishment, Pressing for More Troops and a Long-Term Strategy to Guide Them"
urlm.in/bpxd
...-

"The New American Soldier - David Petraeus, savior of the surge, turns to Afghanistan.

The Iraqis call him King David."
urlm.in/bpxe

Check out larry kudlow's column at nro. The markets are up 20 percent from their lows in November. Iwould provide the link but iphone doesn't support cut and paste (yet). (via rcp)

Here is an elegy for the death of Trudeau's socialist centralist collectivity, aka Ottawa.

Who slew/buried the corpus in the PET Cemetery?
Liberal Iggy Ignatieff with the help of Danny Williams.

"Humpty Dumpty's lesson for Ignatieff"

"Ignatieff's decision also weakens the concept of Canadian federalism as we have known it, and brings us closer to the approach followed in the United States, where members of Congress regularly put the interests of their state and constituency ahead of those of the country.

Ignatieff said this is a "one-time pass," but Humpty Dumpty's experience proves that's impossible. The decision made last week might change the Liberal party forever – unless we think it's normal that Liberal MPs can vote against constituents and God, but not against Danny Williams."
http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/583759

knight99...Why would any party in Mexico want the death penalty?I thought the defacto gubberment there(the druglords) where doing a pretty good job on the death part,without any penalties!!!

These words* by the MSM pundit above in the Star article, refer to the US Senate, the 2 Senators from each state.

In Canada, the reform of the Senate is underway.

Senators Duffy from PEI, Manning from Newfoundland-Labrador, and Housakos from Quebec are leading the way.
The provincial Premiers will sink back to their role as provincial administrators.
Elected senators will represent/speak for each province in the Senate thus maintaining the bicameral form of national government.
No longer will the Prime Minister's Office be the sole arbiter/ruler of Canada.

This is found at the end of this article**."

>>> "legislation to reform Parliament's upper chamber when it's introduced by the government, possibly in the coming weeks."

**"Tory Senator hopes to fast track rail link"
urlm.in/bpxh

*"the approach followed in the United States, where members of Congress regularly put the interests of their state and constituency ahead of those of the country."

I was, Rick in BC, referring to this paragraph from Wikipedia: "Drucker was a fairly minor character in Petticoat Junction but much more prominent in Green Acres, where he seemed to be perhaps the only truly sane character (other than perhaps the leading character Oliver Douglas) in the cast; he was provincial but fairly intelligent".

Is anyone else as flummoxed -- or as disillusioned -- as I am about the brou-ha-ha surrounding "Slumdog Millionaire"?

Oscars, BAFTAs, Foreign Press Awards, etc., etc.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/baftas/4546534/Slumdog-Millionaire-favourite-to-win-at-Bafta-awards-2009.html

It's, at best, the-underdog-triumphs-against-all-odds film and at worst, the-underdog-triumphs-against-all-odds film.

My husband and I saw it last week and were underwhelmed. Why is it getting such adulation? Because it's an Indian film and, as such, gets a "multicultural" and "diversity" sticker?

It's hard to envision any North American movie as punchy and raw and predictable as this film with the Cinderella ending being awarded any film award, let alone being in the running for an Oscar or a BAFTA. 'Tells you something about the state of moviedom these days.

I'd rather blog, thanks.

The Pyramid Scheme of Socialism: steel bars, invisible bars, and Death.
...-

"Poor neighbourhoods growing across Toronto

U of T analysis of census data shows middle class shrinking, especially in Scarborough, Etobicoke"*
...-

"In Zimbabwe the coffin is a wardrobe and the hearse is a trolley
Martin Fletcher in Harare

Winfilda Potoroya’s family could not begin to afford two or three hundred dollars for a proper funeral when the 36-year-old mother died of Aids last week.

So they improvised:" urlm.in/bpxo
...-

"Costs high behind bars
Prison system's $2.2B budget includes $501Gs for utensils in Ontario, $294Gs for Prairie toiletries. Canada's prison service is spending millions of taxpayer dollars on everything from dentures to prosthetic limbs" (nnw)

*http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/584204

Spengler in the Asia Times, always worth the read, rebuking Obama with "Who are the 'extraordinary' Muslims?":

"My job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives," United States President Barack Obama told an Arabic television channel on January 26. Really? What are their names? Word has come to the West of no extraordinary Muslim thinker since the 12th century. There is one first-rank Arab writer working today who tries to explain why there are no extraordinary Muslims - but on that more below.

Continue....

Nice presentation, Vitruvius. I agree on the importance of the 'capacity for prediction' as the basis for our human intelligence. Certainly, the bio-social-psychological attributes don't enter into this framework.

However, I think that he is referring to only ONE predictive capacity. There are at least two - and the one that Jeff doesn't refer to is the important one.

There's a very nice conference, held every two years by the University of Liege, Belgium. It's called CASYS, or, Computing Anticipatory Systems, organized by CHAOS, or the Centre for Hyperincursion and Anticipation in Ordered Systems.
The people who go are in physics, chemistry, computers, math, biochemistry, bioengineering, economics..not many, unfortunately, as Jeff notes, in biology.

At any rate, following Daniel Dubois, who set it all up, the thinking is that there are two major aspects of our human capacity for prediction. Strong and Weak Anticipation. Anticipation enables the individual to predict the future and therefore, control his interactions with that future.

What Jeff was talking about with his comments on memory is 'weak anticipation' which is based on a memory or a developed model of actual experiences. But there's a more important predictive capacity, Strong Anticipation.

This is based on the brain's capacity to 'imagine' rather than relying on actual experience. The capacity to imagine means that you can, in a way, test possible scenarios without actually putting yourself in harm's way. This capacity operates in an algorithmic fashion, gathering information from many sources. It comes up with a few hypothetical patterns of future scenarios..and you can move, actually, into any one of them.

This capacity to imagine, without having experienced the situation, is the most important property of our human capacity of reasoning. BUT, it is always tempered by the hard pragmatics of Weak Anticipation, which is based on actual experience of reality.

Jeff didn't move into this realm - and that's what this conference in Liege focuses on. The next one is this year, 2009.

Spengler in the Asia Times, always worth the read, rebuking Obama with "Who are the 'extraordinary' Muslims?":

"My job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives," United States President Barack Obama told an Arabic television channel on January 26. Really? What are their names? Word has come to the West of no extraordinary Muslim thinker since the 12th century. There is one first-rank Arab writer working today who tries to explain why there are no extraordinary Muslims - but on that more below.

Continue....

Maurice F. Strong pops out of the woodwork to support China.
"Encourage China to invest in the Big Three, to ensure their survival through the use of Chinese components "
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/02/05/maurice-strong-let-china-buy-detroit.aspx

Know what I think about Obama?

He's got a mental disorder!

I say why I think so...

http://thecanadiansentinel.blogspot.com/2009/02/obama-has-mental-disorder.html

I bet the Leftists get mad at me for saying so, even though they themselves think it's fine to call Republican presidents the worst things in the world...

Political correctness is finite. It had a beginning*; it will have an end.
...-

"PC Terror: On Golliwogs, One-Eyed Scottish Idiots and Sending Poo Through the Post

In England, one of those weeks has just ended that define an entire period. This is no consolation for those who have suffered, and who may yet suffer worse. But I have no doubt that it is worth describing what has happened and trying to explain what it means.

Let me begin with the facts.

First, it was reported on the 3rd February 2009 that Carol Thatcher, daughter of Margaret Thatcher, had been dismissed from her job as a BBC presenter for having called a black tennis player a golliwog. She did not say this on air, but during a private conversation. Even so, the BBC defended its decision on the grounds that any language of a "racist nature" was "wholly unacceptable".

Second, demands are rising at the moment for Jeremy Clarkson, another presenter at the BBC, to be dismissed for having called the Prime Minister a "one-eyed Scottish idiot who keeps telling us everything's fine". Various Scotch politicians and spokesmen for the blind let up an immediate chorus of horror that has resulted in a conditional apology from Mr Clarkson, but may not save his career.

Third, it was reported on the 2nd February 2009 that the comedian and Labour Party supporter Jo Brand was being investigated by the police for allegedly inciting criminal acts against her political opponents. While presenting a BBC television programme on the 16th January 2009, she rejoiced that the membership list of the British National Party had been stolen and published on the Internet. Her exact words were: "Hurrah! Now we know who to send the poo to". The natural meaning of her words was that it would be a fine idea to look up members of this party and send excrement to them through the post. The British National Party put in an immediate complaint, using the hate speech laws made during the past generation. According to a BBC spokesman, "We do not comment on police matters. However, we believe the audience would have understood the satirical nature of the remarks". It is relevant to note that Mrs Brand was present when Carol Thatcher made her "golliwog" remarks, and may have had a hand in denouncing her.

Fourth, In The Times on the 6th February, someone called Matthew Syed wrote how personally oppressed he felt by words like "golliwog", and how good it was that "society" was taking a stand against them. Two pages later, someone called Frank Skinner defended the employers in the north of England who prefer to employ foreigners on the grounds that foreigners are "better looking" and "less trouble". The possibility that he has broken one of our hate speech laws will probably never be considered.

This is a gathering of facts that occurred or were made public during one week. But if we relax the time limit, similar facts pour in beyond counting."
http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/3789
...-

*So what is political correctness, how did it start and how did it become so successful?

Political correctness is first and foremost an attack on free speech, clear thinking and discussion. Political correctness is perpetrated by the left in politics as a cover for their flawed ideology - a sort of cultural Marxism. By cloaking their strange ideas under the cover of not wishing to offend anyone (which naturally appeals to peoples' better nature), they try to bypass debate and give a 'received wisdom' which must not be questioned. And anyone who disagrees with this 'received wisdom' must therefore be a really nasty person and deserves to be ostracised by their peers. This peer pressure is instrumental in enforcing and expanding political correctness.

For example, if you question whether unfettered immigration into this country is necessarily a good thing or perhaps whether immigrants should be health checked, then you must be a nasty bigoted 'Little Englander'. Come on everyone - shout him down with cries of 'racist'. Of course, only the hard of thinking could be drawn into this charade - anyone with an ounce of common sense can see right through it.

So how did it all start? Political Correctness started in a think tank (called The Frankfurt School) in Germany in 1923."

"Political correctness has replaced British Politics!"
http://www.politicallyincorrect.me.uk/

Can't disagree more, batb.

Slumdogs is a brilliant movie told from a point of view we don't get to see, with very good acting from real street kids.

It's my best movie of the year, by far.

"Worthwhile Canadian Initiative"

NEWSWEEK

The legendary editor of The New Republic, Michael Kinsley, once held a "Boring Headline Contest" and decided that the winner was "Worthwhile Canadian Initiative." Twenty-two years later, the magazine was rescued from its economic troubles by a Canadian media company, which should have taught us Americans to be a bit more humble. Now there is even more striking evidence of Canada's virtues. Guess which country, alone in the industrialized world, has not faced a single bank failure, calls for bailouts or government intervention in the financial or mortgage sectors. Yup, it's Canada. In 2008, the World Economic Forum ranked Canada's banking system the healthiest in the world. America's ranked 40th, Britain's 44th.

Canada has done more than survive this financial crisis. The country is positively thriving in it. Canadian banks are well capitalized and poised to take advantage of opportunities that American and European banks cannot seize. The Toronto Dominion Bank, for example, was the 15th-largest bank in North America one year ago. Now it is the fifth-largest. It hasn't grown in size; the others have all shrunk.

So what accounts for the genius of the Canadians? Common sense. Over the past 15 years, as the United States and Europe loosened regulations on their financial industries, the Canadians refused to follow suit, seeing the old rules as useful shock absorbers. Canadian banks are typically leveraged at 18 to 1—compared with U.S. banks at 26 to 1 and European banks at a frightening 61 to 1. Partly this reflects Canada's more risk-averse business culture, but it is also a product of old-fashioned rules on banking. (continues)

Well, I wonder if Vlad Layton and his Bolsheviks who, not so long ago, were on the verge of overthrowing the government, based on lies about the economy, are paying attention?

AssPress hasn't yet used: O's quagmire.

But, look at this word: "escalate". Haven't seen/heard that in MSM since Democrats Kennedy-Johnson did "escalate" the Vietnam plan.

Who are among the "fierce" "Anti-war lawmakers"?

The usual suspects: "Rep. Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts liberal who at one point wanted to cut off money for the Iraq war.

Added Wisconsin Democrat Sen. Russ Feingold, another fierce war opponent: "The idea of putting the troops in without having more clarity at least gives me pause.""

Then there is this claptrap from the left:

" Obama's biggest supporters in Congress say they believe the new president won't go too far. But they're also counting on the popular president to win over a war-weary public.

"I have to believe he will come well prepared and present a case to us that will justify what he is attempting to do," said Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md."
...-

"Anti-war lawmakers worry over plan for Afghanistan
Associated Press ^ | Feb. 8, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) - After campaigning on the promise to end one war, President Barack Obama is preparing to escalate another."
urlm.in/bpyf

Warren gets noticed in the HofC for his usual antics,which if done by anyone else would have had him howling for blood..................http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1GbdMQzrp4.

"My husband and I saw it last week and were underwhelmed. Why is it getting such adulation? Because it's an Indian film and, as such, gets a "multicultural" and "diversity" sticker?"-batb. Oh my,you probably think that cbc's in-house ethnic comedian 'Raj Pinder'isn't all that talented or funny,and I will agree with you again.

Vitruvius,

Despite my thinking Jeffs framework was to narrow, I really enjoyed the video and learned from his perspectives.

"Gore Tells Kids To Ignore Their Parents

Glenn Beck interviews 12 year old who recorded Al Gore telling teens and pre-teens to ignore their parents."
http://www.thehopeforamerica.com/play.php?id=311

I'm glad you liked Jeff's talk, ET and No-One. Of course, there's only so much one can say in twenty minutes, and these talks are real-world too, so of course every presenter is going to be doing a little bit of selling of whatever they are working on at the time; anyway, no single presentation ever shows us more that a little teeny window into the overall situation. Still, it's the putting together of the pieces of the view, in terms of my own model of reality, from the various windows looked through, over time, that I find interesting.

CBCkhadr All Khadr all the Time

search on CBC

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Searched for 'omar khadr' Results 1 - 10 of about 8890.

wouldnt 8890 stories on omar khadr seem excessive to anyone including CBC

Could not agree more,batb.Slumdogs is a piece of shiite.Now what would have happened,if say,some Canuck,produced the same thing,only using natives??? No answer required,we all ready know what would be happening.And Yukon. You really have to get away from that radar screen,and save what few braincells you have left(Oh!) Did I say "left" out loud?

I'm just now listening to Garth Turner being interviewed on the Shawn Leslie show on CKNW in Vancouver. I just wanted to say that he sounded pretty reasonable and was not at all the nasty jerk that he was while he was still in politics. He discussed the effects of the federal budget in reasoned tones, and I did not detect the usual vitriol even when he mentioned Harper's name. Anyway, I thought it was pretty remarkable.

An American perspective of things Canada did right.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/183670?from=rss