46 Replies to “Reader Tips”

  2. Moving the free-speech goalposts away from the Christians and closer to the left:

    Andy Stephenson and Kathryn Sloane will stand trial in what their supporters say will be a landmark case concerning freedom of expression. The pair were arrested in June last year outside Wistons abortion clinic in Brighton, after they refused to take down a 7ft by 5ft illustrated banner.
    They will appear before magistrates in September after the Crown Prosecution Service authorised charges against them. Mr Stephenson, 37, a father of three, has been charged with causing “harassment, alarm or distress” under the Public Order Act 1986…

    Andrea Williams of the Christian Legal Centre makes an awfully good point:

    “Andy and Kathryn were simply displaying true images about the reality of abortion. Such images should not be suppressed from the public consciousness any more than pictures of famine or the reality of war.”

    It does seem highly unlikely that a pro-relief activist would ever be arrested for, say, displaying photos of African children starving and dying in a famine on the grounds that it might cause “alarm or distress.”

  5. Recently my wife and I were in New York. We spent just two days there and I urge anyone who has the chance to visit. It is a remarkable place.
    We went to the 9-11 memorial site. (They discourage the term ground zero) We had to get a pass at a storefront 3 blocks away as the site is not yet finished. We had 45 minutes to spare before our time to enter the site so we walked a few blocks and found St. Pauls church. Trinity church on google maps (????)
    Inside there were 5 tables of different people with some sort of story to tell. I cannot remember the other 4.
    911 USA Hope
    Fabrizio Bivona was a first responder that survived the attacks. He wrote a book about that day called Gone but Not Forgotten
    We did not buy it at the time but ordered it after we got home. I cannot read for more than a few minutes at a time. I thought I was well read and educated on the events of 9-11 but I was not. In this book are stories and images I have never seen or experienced.
    Please check out his site and story.
    Maybe I am biased, having met the man. And after visiting the site it changes how you view the day.
    He wrote the book and for 5 years he only offered it to other first responders around the country. Only after numerous firemen told him he had to let other people read it did he release to the general public,
    A more humble man I have never met.
    I am now in the process of sharing his story to family, friends and co-workers.
    SDA is non of these but from the posts of many here I have read,
    This book would be of interest.
    Thanks for the time, and the bandwidth, for this.
    Jeff

  6. Bluetech “And today we will likely be remembering where we were when…
    In the air, landed in TO, stuck for days. Mad as hell at the savages. Still am.
    We should not allow immigration from mohammedan countries.
    Except their victims, the minorities, the persecuted, the true refugees.

  7. Thanks for sharing that, Jeff. I’m aware that the horrors of that day were far more earth-shattering than we knew, if that’s possible. The images the first-responders have to live with, I’m sure, are seared into their memories, dreams, and waking hours forever.
    God bless them, and rest eternal grant to those who died on that awful day — and every person who is committed to preventing another 9/11 on Western soil. There’s no room for complacency or rose-coloured glasses. We need to remain vigilant.

  9. I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night / He was raiding the public treasureeee…♫

    The Chicago schools had been offering the (Chicago Teachers Union) a 2 percent raise every year for four years. In response, the union had demanded a 30 percent raise over two years followed by a 25 percent raise over two years…

    The average teacher in Chicago makes about $76,000 per year.

  11. @ Jeff and batb. I couple of years ago we were at a local fund raiser dinner and one of the fireman who was caught in the collapse of one of the towers and along with a couple of other people survived the collapse and crawled out at the place where the girders had formed a cross describe what had happened to him and the others.
    You could have heard a pin drop during his talk, and it was heart wrenching. He also had a terminal illness due to the event.
    And, then we have apologists upset about Canada canceling 3000 passports and closing the Iranian embassy.
    We also have the revolting articles by the haters of the west Doug Saunders and the other moron who also teaches journalist students at Ryerson.

  13. Jeff, batb, ken, thanks for your comments.
    I was on my way to Montreal’s Dorval airport to catch a plane to Alaska, where I was to give a conference paper. I had no idea as I drove the hour to the airport of what had happened; it was only when I arrived to (not) catch my flight, that I found out – and still couldn’t understand what was going on as so little was known at the time.
    All flights cancelled, the only planes were American planes landing and disoriented passengers being bused away.
    A wrenching, terrible day. Made malevolent in these years by the contemptible comments of the left and their support for terrorists.

  18. It’s like the song “The Sunny Side of Life”
    From the blog arewelumberjacks.blogspot.com
    It’s not a big thing, but maybe worth noting: NBC, ABC, CBS, and MSNBC carried live coverage of each night of the DNC. Through the magic of TiVo I was able to click back in time and note that NBC, ABC, CBS, and MSNBC carried no live coverage of the RNC. Not really such a big thing really, because people who watch political conventions were able to find the RNC on other stations. Plus, people who turned on the TV to find their favorite program preempted by the Dem convention didn’t say, “OK, well I’ll just watch this then.” Most people would rather watch Matlock reruns than a political convention.

  21. So here’s the deal. I am travelling to San Francisco to attend a small conference. One of the speakers is George Bush. He has agreed to answer questions at the end of his talk. If you had the chance to ask a question, what would it be?

  22. Brian, my question would be, “Why don’t you get that old John Deere tractor we kept seeing in media shots of your ranch fixed?

  23. I like it. I thought I would ask him if he would make any changes to the process of choosing appointees for the supreme court given Roberts insane decision but I think I like your question better.

  24. EBD, 10:10 p.m. — It does seem highly unlikely that a pro-relief activist would ever be arrested for, say, displaying photos of African children starving and dying in a famine on the grounds that it might cause “alarm or distress.”
    On a tangential point, is it just me, or has Obama, whose obviously “evolved” into a “pro-choice” kind of guy, really done nothing incrementally meaningful for Africa? Can the same not be said about Bill “Knowbody did anything about Rwanda, but I was the only one to apologize” Clinton — I think I’d classify him as a “rare” kind of “pro-choice guy”? I’m guessing that if either of these gentlemen had indeed, you know, “literally” (per Joe Biden) lifted a finger for Africa, that we’d never, ever have heard the end of it, “literally”.
    On the other hand, despite the best efforts of the MSM to keep the story secret, I hear tell that George W. Bush, who’s obviously “pro-life”, has done more for Africa than anyone. I’ve even heard it from a few Hollywood “left-of-Lenin” types.
    Might there be, you know, a correspondence between being pro-life and really caring about Africa’s children? Just askin’.

  25. Mao Stlong* Lepolt.
    Salcasm, Mockely, and Lidicure.
    …-
    “‘Foolish and Backward Nation’: A Self-Effacing Chinese Satire of America”
    “”The U.S. is actually a giant, undeveloped farming village,” begins an anonymous web post that’s actually a subtle critique of China itself.”
    “Sarcasm in China: Check.
    On the eve of U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s diplomatic visit to the Middle Kingdom, a tongue-in-cheek critique of Americans has gone viral on Sina Weibo, China’s Twitter, with over 44,000 retweets and 5,400 comments. This piece, of uncertain author and origin, laughingly criticizes Americans as foolish, primitive, and naive. Lest American readers be offended, it soon becomes apparent that the essay is in fact a sharp, backhanded critique of China.
    Tea Leaf Nation has translated the juiciest parts (which happen to constitute most of the essay). Please enjoy.
    Don’t Go to the U.S., A Foolish and Backward Nation”
    “(1) The U.S. is actually a giant, undeveloped farming village. In middle school, teachers teach students that the more developed industry gets, the greater harm the natural environment suffers. For example, in an industrial city you should find chimneys everywhere, large factories everywhere, dust everywhere.”
    “(17) Looking at the above photo, it’s enough reason for us to look down on the Americans! While hunting Bin Laden, Obama and his subordinates were staring at an on-screen live satellite feed in the White House’s Situation Room. My feelings are:”
    http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/09/foolish-and-backward-nation-a-self-effacing-chinese-satire-of-america/261946/
    *Ex-Liberal leader Rae’s uncle, c/o Red China.

  26. “Ottawa eyeing full-blown free trade agreement with China”
    http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/09/11/ottawa-eyeing-full-blown-free-trade-agreement-with-china/
    …-
    “China’s Revolution Risk”
    “We all know by now about the simmering leadership crisis in China. The Bo Xilai affair has lifted the lid on a hornet’s nest. I had not realised quite how serious the situation has become until listening to China expert Cheng Li here at the Ambrosetti forum of the world policy elites on Lake Como. (My hardship assignment each year.) Nor had anybody else in the room at Villa d’Este. There were audible gasps.
    The rifts within the upper echelons of Chinese Communist Party are worse than they were during the build-up to Tiananmen Square, he said, and risks spiralling into “revolution”. Dr Cheng — a Shanghai native — is research director of the Brookings Institution in Washington and a director of the National Committee on US-China Relations. He argues that China’s economic hard-landing is intertwined with a leadership crisis as the ten-year power approaches this autumn. The two are feeding on each other. “You cannot forecast the Chinese economy unless you have a sophisticated view of the political landscape and the current succession crisis,” he said.
    There has of course been a basic policy error.”
    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/ambroseevans-pritchard/100019918/chinas-revolution-risk/

  27. Brian, I’d ask him if he’s had a change of heart since he stated ” the Muslim faith is based upon peace and love and compassion.”

  30. batb, thanks for saying that.
    Obama, on his own, without the urging of the military, would never have taken out Bin Laden. I believe the tales of his dithering and Jarrett’s involvement and Obama’s three-time refusal to authorize the Seals to take the compound.
    Couple that with Obama’s trashing of the Bush Doctrine (of enabling freedom to develop in the ME) – which means that Obama is effectively enabling fundamentalism to, for a while, take hold in the ME.
    This will lead to more vicious and disastrouso civil wars in those countries as the people fight against both the fundamentalists, and against the attempts by Iran to use this phase to take over the region.
    That’s Obama’s foreign policy.

  33. Of Dreams & Socialist Dreams: Poof.
    Prospero*:
    “Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
    As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
    Are melted into air, into thin air:
    And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
    The cloud-capp’d tow’rs, the gorgeous palaces,
    The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
    Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
    And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
    Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
    As dreams are made on; and our little life
    Is rounded with a sleep.”
    *Shakespeare: The Tempest.
    …-
    George Chronopoulos:
    “I feel disappointed. This is not what we dreamed of,” said George Chronopoulos, who retired last month aged 61 after 37 years working for ODDY as a valuer, mainly for cars, at the agency’s Athens warehouse, one of its four main sites.
    “I used to love my job,” said Chronopoulos, who was also a trade union organiser and served for a time on the agency’s management board. “But now I cannot find a reason to stay.”
    “Sports cars rust away in Greece as auction department disbanded”
    “In a sprawling yard in Athens, a yellow Porsche rusts among dusty motorcycles, police cars with bullet holes and wrecked city buses – a telling image of one Greek government agency’s slide into bureaucratic quagmire.”
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/9535538/Sports-cars-rust-away-in-Greece-as-auction-department-disbanded.html

  34. David Stockman (Reagan’s chief budget officer) says it is right about ending the Fed, anchoring currency in gold and letting debt ridden banks fail – the current set GOP candidates failed to address the core problem with America’s economy – credit and currency control
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJ0LLi8rJZw

  35. ET: “[Obmanation’s dithering and no-policies] will lead to more vicious and disastrous civil wars in those countries as the people fight against both the fundamentalists, and against the attempts by Iran to use this phase to take over the region. That’s Obama’s foreign policy.”
    Obama’s got more blood on his hands than he knows — or cares to think about.
    But, hey, it’s all Bush’s fault.
    I wish to Hell Obama would grow up and grow a pair. But I don’t think this is going to happen to the coddled, affirmative-action POTUS.
    God help the free world.

  38. Q*:
    “…could a climate scientist have a Starbucks in the morning, collect tree rings through the day and still be home for dinner?”
    …-
    “Gormless Grad Killed World’s Oldest Tree”
    “On Aug. 6, 1964, Donald Currey was at the timberline of Nevada’s Wheeler Peak looking for bristlecone pines, the oldest trees on earth.
    A graduate student, he was working on a climate timeline, and the trees held valuable data. Using a Swedish borer, Currey took samples from trunks without harming the pines.
    His 114th specimen had a 252-inch circumference and was so tough it broke his regular borer and the backup. The Forest Service gave him permission to get out his chain saw and cut the tree down.
    It turned out to be “Prometheus,” more than 5,000 years old, and known to conservationists as the most ancient living thing on earth. A sapling when the Sumerians created mankind’s first written language, it had now been pointlessly destroyed.”
    http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-17/gormless-grad-killed-world-s-oldest-tree-lewis-lapham.html
    …-
    A*:
    “New isotope based temperature reconstruction using McIntyre’s ‘Starbucks hypothesis’ tree core samples”
    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/11/new-isotope-based-temperature-reconstruction-using-mcintyres-starbucks-hypothesis-tree-core-samples/#more-70829

  39. Mao Stlong* Lepolt Missing Xi, Mr. Hu?
    …-
    “Mr. Hu will be stepping down as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party later this year and as President early next year.”
    http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/mr-harpers-new-diplomacy/article4534148/
    …-
    “Absent Chinese president-in-waiting Xi Jinping has rumour mill churning”
    http://www.jacksnewswatch.com/2012/09/11/absent-chinese-president-in-waiting-xi-jinping-has-rumour-mill-churning/
    *H/T Mo Strong, Rae’s uncle, c/o Red China.

  40. Pat Martin NDP has a website set up for collecting donations for his slander suit from Rack nie.
    The NDP and Pat Martin are gonna pay huge for this. here is the lawsuit filed by rack nine
    http://www.scribd.com/doc/83565803/Requete-de-Matthew-Meier-et-RackNine-contre-Pat-Martin-et-le-NPD
    From the globe, poor Pat, he needs your money please donate
    http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/ndp-mp-seeks-publics-help-for-legal-bills-in-robo-calls-case/article4535075/

  41. “Facing a CRTC licence renewal in November 2012, is it possible that CBC didn’t want to reveal major audience losses, which would call into question its current strategy and future plans? ”
    http://mediatrends-research.blogspot.ca/2012/09/cbc-is-so-transparent.html?spref=tw
    “Data for CBC News Network come from exactly the same source as audience data for CBC’s main TV/radio service, so clearly the data are available but CBC has chosen not to report them to the government. Here is what the Corp included in the recent report:”

  42. September 11 isn’t a completely dark day.
    Today marks the 39th anniversary of the liberation of Chile from communism. On September 11, 1973, the Chilean army revolted against would-be communist dictator Salvador Allende. Allende committed suicide with a gun given him by Fidel Castro to escpae being brought to justice by patriots led by General Augusto Pinochet.
    General Pinochet and his fellow patriots followed up on their overthrow of Allende by ridding Chile of its communist menace, with Chilean traitors and leftists who didn’t manage to flee justice being sent to join their leader in their thousands. (Many Chilean leftists fled to Montreal, given refuge by the Queen on the predictably poor advice of another friend of Castro’s, her Prime Minster in Canada Pierre Trudeau.)
    The old general only ended his campaign and yielded power to younger, democratically elected men after he was sure the war against communism was won—though not after seeing to it that Chile enjoyed one of the most free and prosperoud economies in Latin America.
    The tolerant left never forgave Pinochet for thwarting Allende’s plans, and persecuted the old man to his dying day wiith frivolous lawsuits. They were out in force today in Chile’s cities, of course, letting the world know that Pinochet was doing God’s work that day.
    From AP (via the Montreal Gazette):
    Street protests began early Tuesday with bonfires and violent clashes with police. One station was attacked in suburban Santiago and hooded activists occupied a major avenue, resulting in 10 arrests.
    A memorial ceremony for Allende Sunday also ended in violence after human rights activists spoke of the unresolved legacies of a military regime that killed more than 3,000 people.
    Interior Minister Rodrigo Hinzpeter called for calm, saying “the people suffering from this violence have nothing to do with what happened on Sept. 11, 1973.”
    Not as such, but don’t doubt that many of those decent, law-abiding Chileans thank God all the same for General Augusto Pinochet.
    If good Christians can’t spend next Christmas in liberated Bucharest, may they spend next September 11 not at Ground Zero in New York but in Santiago, the capital of free, prosperous Chile.
    http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Chileans+march+their+anniversary+Pinochet+coup+Allende+suicide/7225308/story.html
    Related: I move that SDA help a Canadian Allende fan fix his headline. Suggestions, ladies and gentlemen?
    http://o.canada.com/2012/09/11/remembering-911/

  43. I’m trying to figure out whether Slater’s post is crude satire of the sort of crap that used to be turned out by propagandists of Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union and yes, Pinochet’s Chile. If not, if he really believes that Pinochet was anything but a murderous fanatic, he probably subscribes to the old aphorism, “ya can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs”.
    The history of Latin America is a sad litany of men on horseback – some on the left (Castro, Peron, Chavez) but mostly on the right, who terrorized, brutalized and murdered their own people – always for the “greater good”.
    If Slater is serious, I wonder if he has ever set foot in Latin America or ever lived in constant fear of a monster and his henchmen.

  44. maz2 @ 6:07 a.m.:
    Was that Chinese satire written on May 35th?
    That’s probably when Xi Jinping will show up again.

  45. As for Chile, Pinochet’s regime certainly had blood on its hands, but there’s the obvious possibility that Allende would have turned out to be worse had he remained in power for another decade or two, given the mass murders that almost invariably were committed in communist regimes.

  46. nv53
    That’s true, but there was no sign of it during Allende’s lifetime. Immediately prior to the army takeover, protesting housewives banging pots and pans and shouting anti-Allende slogans were unmolested. Can you imagine what would have happened if they tried to hold similar demonstrations during the Pinochet regime? In an eyeblink, they would have been in one of Pinochet’s prisons, strapped down and with electrodes in their vaginas.

Proudly powered by WordPress & Skyrocket Themes

MENU

Navigation