32 Replies to “Reader Tips”

  1. Wicked Game!!
    the version of this, as filmed on the beach, has always been much sought after… it is now on youtube again, but quite often deleted for some infraction or other.

  4. I remember being ostracized on multiple conservative blogging sites when this issue came up.
    Does anyone in the conservative blogging group still want to pretend that the “just visiting” ads were a good idea?
    ‘Just visiting’ ads had ‘unintended consequences’ for Tories, says Apps
    Television ads against Ignatieff ‘mobilized’ Liberals to fundraise more than the Conservatives in the second quarter.
    http://tinyurl.com/pxnh2w
    Money quote:
    “We didn’t respond because we thought they were doing more to frame Stephen Harper as a mean and nasty prime minister than they were to framing Michael Ignatieff and it’s interesting they didn’t have appreciable impact on the polls.”
    My CPC donations, badly spent.
    Blech.

  6. Vitruvius, I think that your incorrect rendering of the name of tonight’s song was caused by a cross-pollination with a memory of Vicious Games by Yello.

  7. Here’s the original video mentioned by marc in calgary – a remarkable piece of work.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJ7WJZXDMNc
    [Thanks for correcting my misspelling of the title, Marc and
    Exetaz. As to the beach video, I like the studio version better.
    De gustibus non disputandum est! ~ Vitruvius]

  8. Here’s another example of the leftists being hoist by their own petard, one that’s been floating around for a few days:
    The Quebec government has decided to expand the number of surgical procedures that can be contracted out from hospitals to specialized clinics from three to 56; one of them is abortion. However, it also wanted to add new measures to ensure the operations are done safely, including having sterile operating rooms.
    It turns out that building a sterile operating room is too costly for three Montreal abortion clinics, which have said they will stop offering the procedure if the rules remain in place. So now apparently the government has decided to create an exemption for abortion clinics.
    This raises some questions. First, if the issue can be decided and then dropped in the space of a few days, doesn’t it seem like it’s nothing more than make-work for regulators that has nothing to do with genuine patient safety? Second, the title of the Andre Picard column was “we need fewer barriers to abortion, not more”. Since when is ensuring patient safety a “barrier”? Analogously the same could be said of any kind of regulation: we need fewer barriers to freedom, not more. Cooper v. Hobart, a Supreme Court decision of 2001, exposed regulation as worthless because regulators cannot be held legally responsible for shirking or disregarding their duties. So why bother with the cost to taxpayers?
    Finally, here’s a gem from Picard deep in the article: “There is ample evidence that specialization results in better outcomes, from cost-efficiency through to fewer medical errors. But, at the same time, when relatively easy, profitable procedures are contracted out to the private sector, it gives the mistaken impresssion that public institutions are less efficient”.
    Are you sure it’s the specialization that makes better outcomes rather than privatization? Government bureaucrats don’t have to worry about the bottom line much and don’t have the pressure to do more with less that private businessmen do. That’s why public institutions are less efficient. It’s Economics 101.

  9. The National Post reported some typically ignorant comments from Ed Broadbent, unlamented former federal NDP leader:
    “Mr. Broadbent said ‘the disastrous consequences’ of two decades of budget cutting, tax cutting and of slashing social programs in Ottawa … led directly to ‘last fall’s economic crisis'”.
    The problem is that the “two decades of budget cutting” are the direct result of even more decades of Liberal and Conservative governments implementing essentially NDP policies of regulation and intervention that strangle economic production (the NDPers complain loudly about economic “growth”, remember) while throwing tax dollars willy-nilly to almost everyone who wants some, thus encouraging people who would otherwise become productive citizens to go on social assistance or take other handouts instead. After all, our social progams “define Canada”, according to their loopier advocates, so what good would they be if no one is in bad enough shape to collect from them?
    Broadbent’s tirade is typical blame-the-victim garbage. If he wants to see who’s responsible for Canadian economic problems, he should look in the mirror.

  10. There has been a skirmish in Rafah between forces of the Hamas government and militants from Jund Ansar Allah, one of several radical groups seeking to enforce an even stricter version of Islamic law in Gaza than Hamas does. The fighting began when the Hamas faction surrounded a mosque where 100 members of JAA were holed up.
    The shootout resulted in the death of at least 13 people.
    Terrorists turning on each other? Faster, please.

  11. One of the leftist groups protesting Israel lately is called Independent Jewish Voices. According to the National Post, a pamphlet it handed out at the recent United Church conference contained the following about what it dubs the ‘Israel Lobby’: “It will be a crime to doubt the Holocaust. It will become a crime to note the disproportionate representation of Jews in the media, finance and foreign policy … To keep American minds captive, the Lobby is working to ban as anti-Semitic any truth or disagreeable fact that pertains to Israel …”.
    Those who harp on the real or imagined “disproportionate representation” issue are usually motivated by anti-Semitism. Nowhere is it written that Jews are required to support Israel or fellow Jews, but this group’s minds are the truly captive ones since they unthinkingly adhere to the destructive Marxist bite-the-hand-that-feeds anti-capitalist agenda.

  13. Harassed Iggy.
    …-
    “Prankster uses BBC address to harass Ignatieff”
    “Parliamentary press gallery receives anonymous mass mail-out postmarked London and containing 2005 profile of Liberal Leader with egregious portions highlighted”
    urlm.in/cxie
    Harassed Iggy Joker:
    urlm.in/cxif

  14. From 2005: Iggy harassed.
    Iggy: a free speech censor.
    Iggy: “‘a virus in the human rights movement’.”
    …-
    “No more Mr Nice Guy: Laurie Taylor on Michael Ignatieff
    Once a liberal pin-up and intellectual leader of the global human rights movement, Michael Ignatieff has now fallen out with some of his closest friends. Laurie Taylor tracks an acrimonious battle”
    “Yet this success story, of a liberal intellectual coming into his own, is rapidly turning very sour. Instead of being regarded as a champion of human rights, Ignatieff is now being seen, in the words of one senior academic, as ‘a virus in the human rights movement’.”
    “It all began with an article on torture by Conor Gearty, Professor of Human Rights Law at the LSE, in the February 2005 edition of the Index on Censorship. Gearty’s concern was to show the process by which a number of well-meaning liberal intellectuals and human rights lawyers had handed Donald Rumsfeld “the intellectual tools with which to justify his government’s expansionism”. He was particularly exercised by the manner in which such people had created a climate in which even torture could be condoned. One of the well-meaning liberals cited by Gearty in this context was Michael Ignatieff.
    Ignatieff’s response was as violent as it was unexpected. The harm done to his reputation by the article, he insisted, was so great that it could not even be remedied by the chance to rebut. He had no alternative but to resign immediately from the editorial and advisory board of the magazine and request that any syndication of Gearty’s piece be withheld. This was “an issue of principle”.What was the background to this outburst? Why exactly was Ignatieff so offended by an academic article? What does his response say about his present standing within the human rights movement?”
    http://newhumanist.org.uk/1299

  15. mmmmm I love that song. I just melted. Thanks a lot. Ooughh I have to go to work now. OK brain..Image Change..:: ” Think of Barnie Frank singing this song in his pajama’s. Barneeee Frank” -concentrate- There. That image snapped me out of it and I can go to work now. Whew.

  16. Muslims surprised.
    “”It hurt our honour. It hurt a lot,” says Perwer,”.
    The natural end result of PET’s multiculturalism.
    Kudos to police; ready, aye ready.
    …-
    “Kurdish superstar gets rude welcome to Canada
    OPP told film crew were armed terrorists”
    urlm.in/cxip

  17. Michael Yon, The Kopp-Etchells Effect
    What is this halo phenomenon called? None of the American or British helicopter pilots seemed to have a name for the effect. They provide only descriptions and circumscriptions. I asked many people, and finally reached out to Command Sergeant Major Jeff Mellinger (one of my “break glass only if” sources whom I ask when other means have failed). Jeff asked pilots, and came back with an excellent description from one pilot:

    “Basically it is a result of static electricity created by friction as materials of dissimilar material strike against each other. In this case titanium/nickel blades moving through the air and dust. It occurs on the ground as well, but you don’t usually see it as much unless the aircraft is landing or taking off. The most common time is when fuel is being pumped. When large tankers are being fueled they must be grounded to prevent static electricity from discharging and creating explosions.”

    But still no name. How can the helicopter halos, so majestic and indeed dangerous at times, be devoid of a fitting name?

  18. maz2, I love how they manage to fill an article with a few hundred to a 1000 words, but still not to mention any FACTS. Like, what exactly has triggered the gun call. I wonder. Because any one of us can be next. Or can’t we?

  19. nv53, the article in question by Paul Craig Roberts that was on IJV’s table doesn’t engage in Holocaust denial but argues for free speech. The Post parsed the quote and didn’t include Roberts’ statement that the Holocaust was so firmly established in fact that no one needs to worry about what a few kooks have to say.
    Anyway, this is IJV’s response to the Post article:
    This story mentions a document that was on the Independent Jewish Voices table at the United Church of Canada meeting in Kelowna, B.C. It was written by former Reagan administration official and Wall Street Journal editor Paul Craig Roberts. While Mr. Roberts says that the reality of the Nazi genocide is “buttressed by hard facts,” he implies that it is a legitimate form of historical inquiry to question the Holocaust.
    Independent Jewish Voices absolutely reject this idea. Mr. Roberts’ article was not properly screened by us beforehand, does not reflect the views of our organization and should not have been on our table.

  20. Juxtapose This – US vs. Canada justice
    —————————————
    Houston – A Houston-area mother convicted of mutilating her infant by cutting off his genitals two years ago was sentenced to 99 years in prison.
    http://www.ottawasun.com/news/world/2009/08/18/10498161.html
    Ottawa – A woman who suffocated her newborn baby with a plastic grocery bag and threw his body in the garbage was sentenced to 18 months’ house arrest Wednesday.
    http://www.ottawasun.com/news/ottawa/2009/08/12/10441821.html

  21. Goreacle Report.
    “Hot spell likely not the last of summer-like weather: expert”
    urlm.in/cxji
    It’s the “expert” again with him’s computer models. Good ole Dave from the sinecure known as EnviroCan.
    But, Dave is a most unsurly civil servant.

  22. What a difference a letter makes.
    http://www.calgarysun.com/news/canada/2009/08/18/10499571.html
    The release repeatedly spelled the capital of Nunavut as Iqualuit — rather than Iqaluit.
    The extra “u” makes a world of difference in the Inuktitut language.
    Iqaluit, properly spelled, means “many fish.”
    Spelled with an extra “u,” the Nunavut language commissioner’s office says the word translates as a derogatory reference to “people with unwiped bums.”

  26. “Brewer failed to mention the man she described was black.”
    A black man with a gun?
    The nightmare of the left-liberals and its MSM; a black man with a gun.
    Scroll down to #4 comment: a black man with a gun.
    Also here: urlm.in/cxjz
    …-
    “MSNBC: No Mention of Black Gun-Owner Among ‘Racist’ Protesters
    On Tuesday, MSNBC’s Contessa Brewer fretted over health care reform protesters legally carrying guns: “A man at a pro-health care reform rally…wore a semiautomatic assault rifle on his shoulder and a pistol on his hip….there are questions about whether this has racial overtones….white people showing up with guns.” Brewer failed to mention the man she described was black.
    Not only did Brewer, Ratigan, and Toure fail to point out the fact that the gun-toting protester that sparked the discussion was black, but the video footage shown of that protester was so edited, that it was impossible to see that he was black.”
    http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2318850/posts

  27. Islam/Muslim denial by the MSM.
    …-
    “Groping [Muslim] Cabbie Gets House Arrest
    The sentence is two months house arrest for a taxi driver who sexually assaulted a woman.
    Thirty-six-year-old Hassan Jabar Majli drove a drunk teacher from the Byward Market to her apartment building in June of ’07.
    He then hugged and kissed the woman against her will after walking her to the lobby.
    Majli will serve a year of probation after his house arrest.”

  29. An island of sanity from the MSM.
    …-
    “Political correctness sinks Canada’s hockey shirt
    The brand-spanking-new Team Canada hockey jersey is the latest reason why we need to give up the Canada cliche.
    It’s time we stopped portraying Canada with such a heavy emphasis on our Native roots.
    Our home and Native land has been shaped by the aboriginals who were here on this land first, but they no longer define the country.
    It’s hard to argue the influence of the Native people on the west coast, and especially in Vancouver.
    A trip to Stanley Park drives it home.
    But when we think of Vancouver and, by extension, look forward to the Winter Olympics, do you really think Inukshuk?” (More)
    http://recorder.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1705130

  30. “About 600 jobs lost as Haworth moves Calgary plant to US
    Globe and Mail – Lauren Krugel – ‎1 hour ago‎
    About 600 workers in Calgary are losing their jobs as a US-based office furniture maker moves its manufacturing operations to Michigan”
    …-
    O’s protectionism is real; more to come.
    Flashback:
    “Obama declares love for Canada, banishes Bush era | Green Business …
    19 Feb 2009 … OTTAWA (Reuters) – Declaring I love this country and waving to ecstatic Canadian crowds, US President Barack Obama helped reignite on …
    uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE51I7GY20090219”

  32. DLM @ 12:10 p.m.:
    I caught the IJV response that you note, which appeared in a letter to the National Post today.
    I agree that free speech includes the right to hold and communicate false positions on historical events such as the Holocaust. I just wanted to note the extreme left viewpoint of the group, what with its near-paranoia about the “Israel Lobby”, the oddity of “disproportionate representation” criticism coming from Jews themselves, and its hypocrisy in accusing others of having “captive minds”, a clear pot-calling-kettle-black situation.

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