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That's great, EBD, it's like country & western pulp fiction!

Aye, Vitruvius, the old ways are passing:

"Sheepdogs herding a flock may be a familiar farmyard scene, but it could soon be confined to the past if bosses at Tesco have their way.

"The supermarket chain has told its major supplier of lamb to stop using dogs, which it claims cause stress to the animals.

"It means shepherds at the farm may need to use methods such as beating the ground with sticks and waving their arms to control the flock.

"Outraged staff at Silver Fern Farms in Fairton, New Zealand may now have to get rid of up to 60 dogs to comply with the orders, meaning several of the animals will be destroyed.

"Shepherd Mick Pethram told the Telegraph newspaper: 'New Zealand sheep are used to dogs, they know dogs.

"'There's more stress in a human herding and manhandling them, waving their arms and beating sticks. Dogs are part of a sheep's life. This is absolute baloney.'

"He continued: 'We'll be desperately trying to sell them, but most of us will end up putting down three or four each.

"'These are good dogs. Taking away our dogs is like taking a hammer away from a builder; we can't do our job without them.'"

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1167370/Tesco-tells-farm-stop-using-sheepdogs-stress-flock.html

(h/t ghostofaflea.com)

The key phrase in your referenced Daily Mail link, EBD, was, in my opinion: could soon be. Presumably, given that wording, it could also not so soon be, for example, once the Tesco desk jockeys realize the cost to them. The media are funny like that; I find it useful to be skeptical about what they purport to conclude.

The internet allows us to follow an unprecedented number of stories like that, yet I know of no evidence that the relative number of stories like that is changing. So, is the situation getting worse, or are some people just spending more time listening to the inevitable portion of the broadcast that will always be bad news, because it sells?

Do people just sit around and think up things to be offended about. This was probably prompted by the Baa-Studs video.

Anyway, always liked the Smothers Brothers. nice clip, thanks

iggy is going to have to pull out the mega puffin poo to cover this one. quebec politics. iggy , mulroney , duceppe, all of them , the filth never stops.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/montreal/story/2009/04/08/mtl-taxevasion-montreal-0408.html

the WEST WANTS OUT

FREE THE WEST

It seems our old intruder troll new real etc. is now plying it's trade at CBC as Codbutton....
Check out the comments on the story about the Winnipeg floodway.

BTW - CBC gets it wrong right off the hop ... the floodway is nothing but a ditch that neither opens or closes. Its the Red River that is gated at the south end of Winnipeg to keep high water levels out of the city.

The floodway doesn't even need the gates to be closed to carry water.. ... which is why it was partially full since last summer's rains.

No link since Kate's spamfilter is blocking every post that I include a link with.

Just bein' convivial, Vitruvius. The segue, for starters, was a....segue. I still haven't quite mastered the art.

Regarding the link, it wasn't my intention to make some general, pressing, pervasive and universal case that things are getting worse. Rather, I find it amusing when political correctness grabs the ball and runs out of bounds, and then out of the stadium with it.

Hey, speaking of segues:

"My coworker/pal Jason got engaged last weekend. He planned it out all perfect, seemingly. There was a limo involved and a nice, romantic drive around the beautiful downtown lakes; all he had to do was choose the right moment to actually present the ring and pop the question. The problem was that their conversation in the limo had naturally turned toward the annoyances of the day, which wasn't exactly providing a good segue for the proposal. It got to the point where his bride-to-be started talking about her friends health problems and she said 'So, Suzie finally passed her kidney stone last weekend...'

"That's when Jason saw his opportunity and seized upon it:

"'Speaking of stones...."

http://www.planetdan.net/blog/2006/10/bestworst-segue-ever.htm

Copenhagen: Environmental Munich

Climate: Czech President Vaclav Klaus once called global warming a new religion, a Trojan horse for imposing a global tyranny worse than communism. Details about the Copenhagen Conference prove how right he was.

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=323046044706313

CTV(TASS) turns a Harper statement into a bash.

no concept of how the mulroney pseudolieberal clothing was just a normal quebec/ontario control juncture at the intersection of bay street and sussex drive and caused the formation of the Reform party with actual morals.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090408/schreiber_inquiry_090408/20090408?hub=TopStories

mulroney , like any other PQ politician is cut out of the same POS, the same eastern puffin poo molded into a different form.

quebec is the chicago of canada. corrupt beyond all belief.

FREE THE WEST

Obama to tackle illegal immigrants from........

....Ireland

“It is something that we would like to see resolved, because of the obvious pain and difficulty that it imposes, not just on people in the United States — whether from Derry, Fermanagh, Tyrone, Belfast, Dublin, Mayo or Kerry — but also because family difficulties occur, such as people dying,” the deputy First Minister added.

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/obama-to%20tackle-illegal-immigrants-from%20ireland-14251332.html
------------------------------------------------
U.S. Says It Failed to Stop Rwanda Killings

"Rwanda did not suffer from 'ancient hatreds' between Hutu killers and Tutsi victims," Ambassador Susan Rice said. "It suffered from modern demagogues, from ... those who were willing to kill in the warped name of ethnic difference, from those who saw division and death as a path to power."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123915527594899839.html

Re billypb above, here's Baa-Stud: farmers, sheep, and LED lights. Who can resist?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2FX9rviEhw

Google boss warns newspapers not to pi** readers off
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7988561.stm

I actually agree with everything you say, cal2, except for the very last bit.

Paul Martin was a millionaire lawyer from Quebec with connections to Powercorp, Jean Chretien was a millionaire lawyer from Quebec with connections to powercorp, whereas Brian Mulroney was...a millionaire lawyer from Quebec with connections to Powercorp. A Liberal, in that regard, by modern standards.

No wonder Iggy's getting all huffed on Mulroney's behalf.

Stephen Harper, of course, is the leader of a different party than Mulroney's or Iggy's, so the whole thing has little to do with him.

Looks like the HRC will be at it again:

http://www.calgaryherald.com/Health/Rights+complaint+filed+over+Alberta+gender+surgery/1478279/story.html

Speaking of light emitting diodes...

Paul Martin. do you mean that PureLaine from Windsor Ontario

yes. the millionaire , graduates from university. parachuted into power corp by daddy. and a few years later after serving the hard time in the front office and never in the trenches emerges as the prez of canada steamship lines. probably having not even seen one. and with the money types from montreal and the cooliation of easterners meeting at sussex and bay street and a few overseas registrations and tax dodges becomes a millionaire. that paul martin.

and brian mulroney who presides over one of the first big bankruptcies in canada at another PQ bailout case , Iron Ore . somehow becomes a millionaire.

no , no, release us from the ball and chain of lieberalism and duffism.

FREE THE WEST

I think half of this money could be saved by replacing the newel cap with an exacto blade for those so inclined.

http://www.calgaryherald.com/Health/Rights+complaint+filed+over+Alberta+gender+surgery/1478279/story.html

EBD: Thanks for the great laughs, here is another:

Cows with guns

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FQMbXvn2RNI

Cheers

Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht, Commander in Chief

1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group "True North"

I see your cows, and raise you penguins ;-)

Yeah, Cal: "After years and years, we're almost in...and we have the best PM ever....now let us out!"

At least wait for the Liberals to get in, eh?

Re Martin: my bad. I thought he was from Quebec. It was the shrug, I guess. Only Liberals shrug like this:

http://www.candidate.xpr.ca/media/20080213-Subpage-DionMissing.jpg

Who needs GM or Chrysler when you can have teleportation ?

Who needs GM or Chrysler when you can fly?

"We can fly, you know. We just don't know how to think the right thoughts and levitate ourselves off the ground." - Michael Jackson

"South Park creators given signed photo of Saddam Hussein"
http://tinyurl.com/az5y8v

These where taped a long time ago. The second one has a lot about whats happening in Canada. The West specificaly. Its a scary experiance to see hoe right on they are. This is a Conservative Jew speaking at a Christian Church about Islam & Israel.

#1

http://video.google.com/videoplay? docid=-4497103094767024346&hl=en

#2

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8240382400822440693&hl=en

That's hilarious, Piper Paul. "I have it on pretty good information from the marines on detail in Iraq that they showed Saddam the movie.

"Over and over again -- which is a pretty funny thought..

It IS a funny thought. In a...more domestic context, it's impossible to explain to people who haven't seen Team America what an enduring classic it is. The musical numbers are ab-scrunch funny. There's one in particular: for thousands of years men have made a life-exhausting attempts to delineate, with never-before-seen precision, the exact yet somehow ineffable and endless extent of the singer's love for a particular woman. In the movie, amidst the dramatic threat of global destruction, no less, Trey Parker earnestly adds to this ample pile with --

I miss you more than Michael Bay missed the mark
when he made Pearl Harbour
I miss you more than that movie missed the point
and that's an awful lot girl....

Yes, his love interest is unmistakably approaching a very high bar indeed. At the end of the lushly-stringed song, when he's stating his case more forcefully, and pleadingly croons --

Why does Michael Bay get to keep on making movies?
I guess Pearl Harbour sucks
just a little bit more than I miss you...

-- and it's an end of the earth compliment because it is so universally understood -- by the songwriter -- that the movie Pearl Harbour sucked to a degree that, like his love, is simply beyond any human expression.

Ah hoo ha ha ha ha...

this is what they believe.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/130812

"Wind power is a complete disaster

There is no evidence that industrial wind power is likely to have a significant impact on carbon emissions. The European experience is instructive. Denmark, the world's most wind-intensive nation, with more than 6,000 turbines generating 19% of its electricity, has yet to close a single fossil-fuel plant. It requires 50% more coal-generated electricity to cover wind power's unpredictability, and pollution and carbon dioxide emissions have risen (by 36% in 2006 alone).

Flemming Nissen, the head of development at West Danish generating company ELSAM (one of Denmark's largest energy utilities) tells us that "wind turbines do not reduce carbon dioxide emissions." The German experience is no different. Der Spiegel reports that "Germany's CO2 emissions haven't been reduced by even a single gram," and additional coal-and gas-fired plants have been constructed to ensure reliable delivery.

Indeed, recent academic research shows that wind power may actually increase greenhouse gas emissions in some cases, depending on the carbon-intensity of back-up generation required because of its intermittent character. On the negative side of the environmental ledger are adverse impacts of industrial wind turbines on birdlife and other forms of wildlife, farm animals, wetlands and viewsheds.

Industrial wind power is not a viable economic alternative to other energy conservation options. Again, the Danish experience is instructive. Its electricity generation costs are the highest in Europe (15¢/kwh compared to Ontario's current rate of about 6¢). Niels Gram of the Danish Federation of Industries says, "windmills are a mistake and economically make no sense." Aase Madsen , the Chair of Energy Policy in the Danish Parliament, calls it "a terribly expensive disaster.""
http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=1479461

"Also on Obama's plate: an immigration bill

"While acknowledging that the recession makes the political battle more difficult, President Barack Obama plans to begin addressing America's immigration system this year, including looking for a path for illegal immigrants to become legal, a senior administration official said Wednesday...."

*"Arctic team: 'London, we have a problem'"

**"CAT have been outed".
...-

**"Malcolm (03:58:13)
It would appear that the Catlin Artic Survey have been beset with problems from the outset but have delibrately kept quiet about it till today.

I wonder why that was?

The notion that CAT has actually been collecting any meaningful data has now been knocked on the head.

CAT have been outed, if they are not bringing home the science then you cannot call this a survey. It is a PR exercise in stupidty."
urlm.in/cbng
...-

"Arctic team: 'London, we have a problem'

After enduring ferocious weather, it has emerged that British explorers studying the Arctic are struggling with a series of technical problems."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7991801.stm

"Harper, Igantieff Spar over Mulroney Inquiry"
Toronto Star Apr.09/09

*Mr Ignatieff & the Liberal Party, when this matter first broke, were pratically demanding that i throw Mr. Mulroney in prison without a trial. Thats how extreme their response was.
Now they are out there pretending that somehow they are his best friends and they dont agree with any of this.
Stephen Harper

*comments are closed on this article at the Star, Imagine That!

EBD:

I am still a regular lurker here at SDA, but my posting has been down over the last few months. I hope this is OK to post here in Reader's Tips. Please advise if otherwise.

Recently, I came across the obituary of a former, regular commenter on the Shotgun, Mr. Jack MacLeod, who passed from this life last October. Although the Shotgun has changed with the ownership changes in early 2008, I had thought at least a few other SDA readers might be interested in this news since they are now commenting here.

My condolences, albeit very late, to the MacLeod family.

Obama declines comment on US hostage crisis off Somalia

Obama was asked to comment on the situation several times by reporters at a White House event on refinancing for homeowners. Obama, however, stuck closely to the script and replied that he wanted to remain focused on housing.

http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSWBT01101720090409

"CAW says Ont. Wrong for not backing Pensions"
ctv.ca apr.09/09
View vid
*Ken Lewenza said the Union will hold a "Massive" Protest at Queens Park next week in response to Premier Dalton McGuinty's comments that Ontario's pension-guarantee is Not enough to cover pension's.

*IMO to Lewenza

Why should the Ontario Taxpayers fork over another Billion or so to the Unions when thousands upon thousands of taxpayers from across Ontario & Canada have taken hits to the tune of Hundreds of thousands of Dollars on their Private Pensions. We do not have the Luxuries of earning Massive dollars & We have to take our Modest savings and invest in our Own Private pension funds, Are we protected? No we are Not.
Iam sick & tired of these Unions, Me Me Me Me Time for our Politians to have some Balls & stand up to these Unions & say take a hike All Canadians are Under a Crunch in this stressfull time. I know you wont get that from any NDP/Liberal federal Politician as they are so afraid of Offending the Unions & might not get a vote from them.

Oscar Elías Biscet

They kept me in a punishment cell, naked, with several fractures on one leg.

Mr. Chairman, today I want to speak about torture, about what it means for a human being to be tortured, to be humiliated, or what may be even worse, to watch a friend, a companion, or a relative being tortured.

As many of you know, I spent twenty-two years in prison for political reasons. Perhaps, I am the only delegate in this Commission who has spent such a long time in prison, although there are several persons here who have known in their own flesh the meaning of torture. I do not care about their political ideology, and I offer to you my embrace of solidarity, from tortured to tortured.

I had many friends in prison. One of them, Roberto López Chávez, was just a kid. He went on a hunger strike to protest the abuses. The guards denied him water, Roberto lay on the floor of his punishment cell, agonizing, deliriously asking for water. water? The soldiers came in and asked him: "Do you want water?"? The they took out their members and urinated in his mouth, on his face? He died the following day. We were cellmates; when he died I felt something wither inside me.

I recall when they kept me in a punishment cell, naked, with several fractures on one leg which never received medical care; today, those bones remain jammed up together and displaced. One of the regular drills among the guards was to stand on the steel mesh ceiling and throw at my face buckets full of urine and excrement.

Mr. Chairman, I know the taste of the urine and the excrement of other men? that practice does not leave marks; marks are left by beatings with steel rods and by bayonet thrusts. My head is still covered with scars and you can feel the cracks.

But, what can inflict more damage to human dignity, the urine and excrements thrown all over your face or a bayonet's blow? Which is the appropriate article for the discussion of this subject? Under which technical point does it fall? Under what batch of papers, numbers, lines and bars should we include this trampling of human dignity?

For me, and for innumerable other human beings around the world. The violation of human rights was not a matter of reports, of negotiated resolutions, of elegant and diplomatic rhetoric, for us was a daily suffering.

For me (it meant) eight thousand days of hunger, of systematic beatings, of hard labor, of solitary confinement, of cells with steel-planked windows and doors, of solitude.

http://www.cubaverdad.net/torture_in_cuba.htm

Down with communism.
...-

"Students in Moldova rioting against Communists

I am an American expat living in Moldova. Presidential elections were held last Sunday with the communists claiming victory. This caused riots to break out and about 15000 young people crowded into downtown Chisinau and ultimately ransacked the Parliament building and the Presidential offices. The government blames Romania for attempting to overthrow the Moldovan government and has expelled the Romanian Ambassador, sealed the border to Romania and shut down access to all the most popular social networking sites including facebook."
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2225584/posts

"The following is a link to a youtube video of the situation as it occurred:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sgi38cSwBXA"

Catlin Arctic Survey may be a staged hoax.
The Patron is HRH Prince Charles.

Only on the internet!
History as she is writ.

Loads of stuff for computer geeks.
...-

" Jack Green (06:08:02) :

Addendum to my post: For these guys to be gone from their homes this long and if they are staging this then I would bet you could sit in front of their house and see them come and go. An investigative journalist could figure this out in a minute if they were staging this. This would be like the insurance companies following the guy on crutches that was faking an injury for a big monitary claim but was causght playing basketball or something. These guys need to be exposed!

For one reason why they would stage this hoax would be to save money. An expedition like this would cost a bunch. I also question the timing of it especially since Mr Hawdow went this late before. They picked this late date thinking that they would get video of melting ice which is what they want to show to the world. ie: the ice cap is melting. Wrong! It’s (Ice flow) not melting it’s moving with the underlieing current just like it always has and into the North Atlantic.

An earlier comment at 20:48:16 showed the Arctic Bouy Program drift patterns and temperature data. Man it’s cold up their.

http://iabp.apl.washington.edu/maps_daily_map.html

This is kind of fun when you catch an elaborate hoax. I just hope it gets into the media but you probably know the answer to that."
...-

"Catlin Arctic Survey website recycles biotelemetry data?
8 04 2009

UPDATES WE HAVE UPDATES: 8 updates to this story have been posted -"
urlm.in/cbny

Re Further: My post earlier on the Ken Lewenza Protect the Pensions article & vid @
ctv.ca

The comments are up now & they are not in favour of Lewenza

The thick icens.
Polar bears jubilant.
The Ice Worms are nesting*.
...-

"WUWT Ice Survey Shows Thickening Arctic Ice
9 04 2009

Guest post by Steven Goddard

The WUWT Arctic Ice Thickness Survey has been conducted from the comfort of a warm living room over the last half hour, without sponsors, excessive CO2 emissions or hypothermia. The data is collected from the US military web site http://imb.crrel.usace.army.mil. All of the active military buoys show significant thickening ice over the past six months to a year, as seen below."
urlm.in/cbob
...-

*"When the Ice Worms Nest Again

(Conceivably by Robert Service; in any case, an Alaskan
tradition in the 20s and 30s. Recorded by Wilf Carter ---Montana
Slim --- sometime in the 1940s).

There's a husky, dusky maiden in the Arctic
And she waits for me but it is not in vain,
For some day I'll put my mukluks on and ask her
If she'll wed me when the ice worms nest again.

cho: In the land of the pale blue snow,
Where it's ninety-nine below,
And the polar bears are roaming o'er the plain,
In the shadow of the Pole
I will clasp her to my soul,
We'll be happy when the ice worms nest again.

For our wedding feast we'll have seal oil and blubber;
In our kayaks we will roam the bounding main;
All the walruses will look at us and rubber,
We'll be married when the ice worms nest again.

And when the blinkin' icebergs bound around us,
She'll present me with a bouncing baby boy.
All the polar bears will dance a rhumba 'round us
And the walruses will click their teeth with joy."
(H/T traditionalmusic)

Tip for the "Not Waiting for the Asteroid" series:

http://i.gizmodo.com/5205192/ap-threatens-to-sue-ap-affiliate-for-embedding-official-ap-youtube-vids

AP is suing itself!

something useful from global warming.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/04/09/solar.oven.global.warming/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

next a cardboard box fridge for the eskimos

The Conservative Party of Ontario.
Vote Randy Hillier.
...-

"I’ve learned that Hillier will soon be announcing a policy to rename the party.

That’s right. Instead of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, Hillier proposes that we rename it the Conservative Party of Ontario."

"Randy Hillier knows how to handle a wedge"
http://www.stephentaylor.ca/2009/04/randy-hillier-knows-how-to-handle-a-wedge/

E-mail Randy Hillier:
randy@randyhillier.com

Liberal Iggy:
I am not now; nor, have I ever been a member of the Tamil Tiger Party.
Liberally Yours,

STOPIGGY.
...-

"Police Watch and Wait During Downtown Protest"

"The protesters sport Canadian and Tamil Tiger flags.
Canada considers the Tamil Tigers a terrorist organization."
http://www.cfra.com/

I'm responding with a seal doing Mikey Jackson.
http://rightwingvideo.com/?p=1274

'Bama bloggers asking 'Where's the Beef'. No advertising from the people they are "working" for.
http://theplumline.whorunsgov.com/blogosphere/big-liberal-bloggers-tee-off-on-progressive-groups-for-not-sharing-ad-wealth/

Just so readers are able to recall the man now dead as a result of actions of four RCMP officers at the Vancouver airport, here is a backgrounder on Robert Dziekanski.

Some may characterize the event at the airport as a vicious assault by poorly trained members of an armed militia.

I only think of the officers' statements under oath - which to me was not the same as viewable evidence and other witness testimony. And I think of the use of the bureaucratic apparatus to suggest the man was a 'drunk' and/or a 'criminal' posthumously.

Hopefully this will permit us all to see more into the life of Robert Dziekanski.

Inquiry reveals more of Dziekanski's life in Poland

Updated Sun. Apr. 5 2009 3:45 PM ET

The Canadian Press

VANCOUVER -- If most Canadians remember Robert Dziekanski as the panicked, out-of-control figure who died in RCMP hands at Vancouver's airport, Wojciech Dibon might tell them about the Dziekanski who acted as a father to him, taking him camping and teaching him about geography.

But Dibon wasn't able to tell the inquiry into Dziekanski's death about the man he knew.

Dibon, the son of a woman Dziekanski was living with, was 17 when he died and he remains so distraught over the man's death that he was unable to testify at the inquiry sorting out what happened at the airport early on Oct. 14, 2007.

"He and Mr. Dziekanski were very close," says Walter Kosteckyj, the lawyer for Dziekanski's mother.

"This young man didn't have a father figure, Mr. Dziekanski took him camping, taught him the skills of manhood, spent time with him."

Dibon was one of the last people Dziekanski saw before he made his fateful trip to Canada, coming along for the two-hour ride to the airport on Oct. 13, 2007.

Upon arriving in Vancouver more than 20 hours later, Dziekanski spent hours lost in the airport, unable to connect with his mother who was frantically searching for him in another area of the facility.

RCMP were called after Dziekanski, sweating and exhausted, started throwing furniture in the international terminal. Within seconds of arriving, the four officers stunned the man several times with a Taser, and Dziekanski died on the airport floor in the minutes that followed.

The amateur video of Dziekanski's chilling screams and his encounter with police will be the epitaph left for most Canadians, but his friends and neighbours recall a different man, kind and friendly but also with his own share of flaws, eager to start a new life.

Dibon was hospitalized shortly after Dziekanski's death.

"He's had a hard time dealing with that," says Kosteckyj.

Dibon's absence, along with the inquiry testimony last week of others who knew Dziekanski in Gliwice, Poland, adds depth to the man Dziekanski's supporters have angrily accused government and police lawyers of trying to vilify.

He loved geography and read many books about the country that was to be his new home, the inquiry heard.

He played chess and gardened.

He may have had some trouble with the law as a teenager. He smoked and drank.

He was terrified of flying.

"Like a normal person," says Iwona Kosowska, offering a simple explanation when asked to describe her former neighbour.

"He was a very, very good man."

Dziekanski was born in the town of Pieszyce in southern Poland and later moved with his mother to Gliwice, a small industrial city not far from the borders with Slokavia and Czech Republic.

He lived in the same apartment with his mother, Zofia Cisowski, for much of his life, until she moved in 1999 to Kamloops, B.C., where she found work as a janitor.

After Cisowski left, Dziekanski lived with Dibon's mother, Elzbieta, although it's still not clear whether they were romantically involved, and if so for how long.

While he was trained to typeset in a print shop, by the time he left for Canada he was mostly doing odd jobs, heavy labour or handy work. Without a full-time job or much money, his mother would send home cash from B.C.

He planned to learn English when he arrived and find a job, possibly working with his mother.

And he also wanted to travel across Canada to see a place he had only read about in the many books and atlases he had collected about the country.

His hobbies included playing chess and bridge with friends and working at a nearby garden plot given to him by a family member.

"I would play quite often chess with him and just before he left he gave me a gift of portable chess board," said Ryszard Krasinski, Dziekanski's friend of eight years.

"He had a huge collection of atlases and other geographical material and he had very deep knowledge of geography."

When he left for Canada, Dziekanski, who only spoke Polish, had barely been outside the country and never overseas.

His long trip to Vancouver was his first time flying, and the thought of being on a plane terrified him.

When a friend arrived to drive him to the airport, Dziekanski was in a panic, clutching a radiator, vomiting and refusing to leave.

The scene brings to mind the video of Dziekanski's final moments the next day in Vancouver, the would-be immigrant pacing around the international terminal, throwing furniture and rambling in Polish about smashing the area around him but also asking for help.

Dziekanski's neighbours insisted he didn't anger easily and was never aggressive -- a description echoed by border agents and airline staff who said he was calm and co-operative when they dealt with him.

RCMP lawyers at the inquiry have made much of Dziekanski's apparent legal troubles stretching back to an incident more than two decades earlier.

Dziekanski may have spent time in a reformatory school following a robbery when he was 17, but details have been foggy because it didn't result in a criminal record.

Police and prosecutors in Canada have also suggested Dziekanski was an alcoholic, but his neighbours say he was only a social drinker and had rarely, if ever, seen him drunk.

Whatever his problems, they weren't too much for Canadian immigration officials, who approved him to enter the country.

"He was talking about it quite often -- he told me he was going to Canada, where there is milk and honey," says neighbour and family friend Magda Czelwinska.

"He was very happy because he loved his mother very much and he couldn't wait to meet her."

"Arctic warming" is a hoax. The "temperature" of the earth has been cooling since 1998.
NASA is a lying propaganda tool of the AGW-Goreacle elite.
...-

"Pollution controls caused Arctic ice melt: NASA

People have blamed the retreat of ice in the Arctic on carbon-dioxide driven global warming. However, new research at NASA suggests that environmental intervention in the 1970s could bear most of the blame. The elimination of aerosol particle emissions have removed a cooling element for the northern hemisphere, which has reduced a natural balance in the climate on the effect of human activities:

New research from NASA suggests that the Arctic warming trend seen in recent decades has indeed resulted from human activities: but not, as is widely assumed at present, those leading to carbon dioxide emissions. Rather, Arctic warming has been caused in large part by laws introduced to improve air quality and fight acid rain.

Dr Drew Shindell of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies has led a new study which indicates that much of the general upward trend in temperatures since the 1970s - particularly in the Arctic - may have resulted from changes in levels of solid “aerosol” particles in the atmosphere, rather than elevated CO2. Arctic temperatures are of particular concern to those worried about the effects of global warming, as a melting of the ice cap could lead to disastrous rises in sea level - of a sort which might burst the Thames Barrier and flood London, for instance.

Shindell’s research indicates that, ironically, much of the rise in polar temperature seen over the last few decades may have resulted from US and European restrictions on sulphur emissions. According to NASA:

Sulfates, which come primarily from the burning of coal and oil, scatter incoming solar radiation and have a net cooling effect on climate. Over the past three decades, the United States and European countries have passed a series of laws that have reduced sulfate emissions by 50 percent."
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2225775/posts

Lost in the mist: "economists" with the "unexpected" "surveyed".
...-

"Canada Posts Unexpected Trade Surplus in February"

"Economists surveyed by Bloomberg forecast a deficit of C$1.2 billion in February from an initially reported gap of C$993 million in January."
urlm.in/cboq

Isn't today the remembrance of Vimy Ridge? Have we heard anything about this from our MSM?

Or are they too focused on bashing Harper.

hardboiled: Sad, sad story about Robert Dziekanski -- I ache every time his name appears in the news. But is not just the RCMP who are blameworthy here. I also blame all those indifferent people at the airport and in customs who could not be bothered to investigate this issue despite his mother's frantic pleas. This is really a black mark on Canadian society. I have heard nothing about airport protocol being changed or customs procedures being refined to better accomodate newcomers who are unable to speak English or French.