In this article in the NP, Kevin Libin notes the uncivil and unproductive nature of Question Period, where “the men and women who represent us hoot noisily a their parliamentary rivals, loudly spit impromptu comments like delusional street preachers, and phonily guffaw at corny one-liners.”
It is an embarrassing and childish spectacle, largely because virtually every question is an insult, and not an actual question. This yes-or-no “question” from Liberal MP Pablo Rodriguez is exemplary:

“Will the Prime Minister keep on acting like a tin-pot dictator who ignores democracy?”

Obviously, opposition MPs weren’t looking for answers per se. When Ignatieff opened the fall session with the question “When will the government start listening to the real priorities of Canadians?” and, later, “When will the Prime Minister put an end to the politics of division and fear…” he wasn’t asking for a date and a time, and neither were opposition MPs like the NDP’s Glen Thibeault, who asked “When will the Conservatives stop playing wedge politics…”, or Lib Maria Minna, who demanded to know “When will the Conservatives stop making poor decisions with taxpayers’ money….”, or NDP MP Megan Leslie, who asked “When is the government going to put aside partisan games and shameless vanity…”
NDP leader Jack Layton, too, had a pressing and highly specific question about the government’s time frame:

“When will the Prime Minister realize that he is making bad decisions for ordinary people?”

Um, next Thursday, at 3:36 pm?
The opposition wasn’t just interested in knowing when, they also demanded to know why: “Why does the government choose to listen to the NRA and not to Quebeckers?” “Why is the Prime Minister so indifferent and incompetent…” “Why is the government determined to divide Canadians on this issue…” Ralph Goodale: “Why so out of touch with ordinary Canadians?” Bob Rae: “Why are the Conservatives prejudiced against democracy in Canada?” Liberal MP Geoff Regan: “Why can those characters not behave responsibly?” Ignatieff, again: “Why is the government so insensitive to the needs of these families…”
The prize for the most disingenuously, entirely rhetorical question has to go to Michael Ignatieff, who asked a question that began –

Is it any wonder, with that record…”

Is this the final act before we put the financial crisis behind us?

This is the biggest fraud in the history of the capital markets. And it’s not something that happened last week. It happened when these loans were originated, in some cases years ago. Loans have representations and warranties that have to be met. In the past, you had a certain period of time, 60 to 90 days, where you sort through these loans and, if they’re bad, you kick them back. If the documentation wasn’t correct, you’d kick it back. If you found the incomes of the buyers had been overstated, or the houses had been appraised at twice their worth, you’d kick it back. But that didn’t happen here. And it turned out there were loan files that were missing required documentation. Part of putting the deal together is that the securitization professional, and in this case that’s banks like Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan, has to watch for this stuff. It’s called perfecting the security, and it’s not optional.

You just can’t make it up.

Worthless, non-Ivy-League loser economic analysis here.
I’m going to go drink heavily now.

The Swedish retail giant IKEA announced yesterday it will invest $4.6-million to install 3,790 solar panels on three Toronto area stores, giving IKEA the electric-power-producing capacity of 960,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) per year. According to IKEA, that’s enough electricity to power 100 homes. Amazing development. Even more amazing is the economics of this project. Under the Ontario government’s feed-in-tariff solar power scheme, IKEA will receive 71.3¢ for each kilowatt of power produced, which works out to about $6,800 a year for each of the 100 hypothetical homes. Since the average Toronto home currently pays about $1,200 for the same quantity of electricity, that implies that IKEA is being overpaid by $5,400 per home equivalent.

… but it feels so good.
Update: Ontario Proles Grow Restless over Green

ht: John

More please:

But the real basis for supporting Mr. Chong’s admirable initiative is near-universal agreement that Question Period desperately needs fixing. Question Period — the daily 45-minute forum in which opposition members get to put questions to the government — has become a national disgrace. Decorum is abandoned as MPs shower ritual abuse on one another, posing questions designed solely to embarrass and receiving responses intended to insult or obfuscate. All in an atmosphere so toxic it’s a wonder MPs don’t emerge gagging and coughing every afternoon.

… the usually resultant compound when one combines green with science:

California grossly miscalculated pollution levels in a scientific analysis used to toughen the state’s clean-air standards, and scientists have spent the past several months revising data and planning a significant weakening of the landmark regulation, The Chronicle has found.

On Tuesday Sun TV News withdrew its application for the Category 1 license that would have required satellite and cable companies to carry the channel.
Here’s what one member of the “I get to decide what views are acceptable in this country” crowd had to say:

It is a huge victory for every Canadian who took time to write, email, phone or other wise (sic) protest this grotesque plan to move Canadian political culture to the far right.

That is one powerful TV station.

Perhaps I am spoiled being an American being accustomed to my freedom of speech, but it angers me (whether you agree with Geert Wilders or not) is the fact he’s being persecuted for voicing his opinion.
Last I recall my grandfather fought in the Netherlands to free them from the nazi’s and I if I remember history correctly as well, the Canadians also helped in the liberation of the Netherlands from tyranny (not to mention they keep fielding excellent snipers).
I doubt I would do the same today.
Regardless, today in the blogosphere there is a movement to make posts, articles, etc. about Geert Wilders. The problem is they’re just posts that voice support for him or at least his right to speak his mind. That achieves nothing. I find it much easier to just contact the people prosecuting him and remind them we may not send waves of our boys over next time.

American conservatives are discovering that by confronting the left directly, in open intellectual warfare, they can win. The day of the appeasing, cowed, double-talking conservative “may” be coming to an end, at least in America:

Let this episode be instructive to all who witness it. The noise and bluster we see from these pre-fab sign-holding, flag-waving malcontents is the beginning and end of their argument. As soon as any intrepid citizen-journalist engages these pre-programmed agitators with a question or two, they reveal emptiness and contradictions as quickly as Sky did.
I’ll give this polite yet confused Obama supporter credit where credit is due: At least he didn’t call me a homosexual like his peers in Chicago did.

This moment is shaping up to become a part of modern folklore.
The toll for the reputations of all involved in SplatterGate continues, and this downfall is so worth documenting.

Nova records the damage.

Oh My:

Loveland police say a woman with a crowbar attacked a controversial piece of art and ripped it to shreds.
The incident was reported at about 4 p.m. at the Loveland Museum Gallery.
Witnesses said that the woman entered the gallery with a crowbar hidden in her coat. They said the woman broke Plexiglas protecting the art display and then she tore up the print.

But then, there’s the rest of the story.
via

Susan Jacoby tells a personal anecdote that nicely encapsulates the progressive West’s moral drift:

An 80-year-old friend of mine — a woman of forceful intellect who used to teach Renaissance history — now lives in a Florida retirement community where many of the part-time staff are teenaged children of recent Afghan immigrants. When my friend saw one of her favorite young Afghan-American women — a high school senior — weeping in the dining room, she asked what was wrong. “Oh, madam professor,” the girl replied, “my father has arranged for me to meet my future husband. He is 40 years old, and the wedding will take place in six months. I wanted so much to go to college, and this will not be permitted.”

When Jacoby’s friend reassured the distressed woman that no woman in America has to marry someone just because her parents tell her to, another resident chastised her for her lack of cultural sensitivity, telling her, “We have no right to interfere with her culture, her religion, her family.”
Ayaan Hirsi Ali:

Here is something I have learned the hard way, but which a lot of well-meaning people in the West have a hard time accepting: All human beings are equal, but all cultures and religions are not. A culture that celebrates femininity and considers women to be the masters of their own lives is better than a culture that mutilates girls’ genitals and confines them behind walls and veils or flogs and stones them for falling in love….The culture of the Western Enlightenment is better.

When the CBC, or CTV, or any network – whether it’s CNN, MSNBC, ABC, or any other – is the subject of either a newspaper news story or opinion column, the headline will inevitably describe the network by it’s name, not by a euphemistic slur; you’ll never see the headline “The LPC Promotional Network Thwarts Access to Information Requests,” for example, in a story about the CBC. Yet for some reason newspaper headlines commonly refer to Sun TV News as “Fox News North.” Try it: if you Google “Fox News North,” you’ll get more than twice as many results as by Googling the actual name, “Sun TV News.”
The phrase “Fox News North” is typically put in quote marks, of course, to indicate that the headline writer is using a euphemism, a slur, or, in most instances, both. Scott Feschuk’s piece at Macleans.ca, for example, is titled “The secret script for ‘Fox News North‘”; another Macleans article has the headline “Can ‘Fox News North‘ win its next battle?” The Canadian Press published a report titled “‘Fox News North‘ set to launch in Toronto.” The The Financial Post published “‘Fox News of the North‘ to launch in Canada”.
On and on it goes. Reuters: “‘Fox News North‘ channel set to launch in Canada.” The Globe and Mail: “Margaret Atwood takes on ‘Fox News North.'” Toronto Life: “Fox News North accepts defeat.”
Sometimes the intended slur is used absent the quotes, which, in proper grammatical usage, indicates that it’s the actual name of the proposed network. Heather Mallick’s article in The Star was titled “Fox News North is a rancid idea”; in the National Post, Tasha Kheiriddin’s piece – and she’s a supporter of Sun TV News’ application – was titled “Fox News North a welcome addition to Canadian media jungle”; Norman Spector’s story in The Globe And Mail was headlined “The real deal behind Fox News North.”
When a headline uses the correct name, Sun TV News, the phrase “Fox News North” inevitably finds its way into the text. This G&M column by John Doyle, titled “I Guess Sun TV News only works if shoved down our throats,” goes on to say “The really interesting thing all this shows about the proposed Fox News North is that…” This news story in The Star, headlined “Former Harper spokesman leaves Sun TV News”, then refers to “Quebecor’s bid to launch a new cable news network that critics have dubbed ‘Fox News North.'”
“Critics have dubbed…”
That’s the whole point, isn’t it? It’s a slur, intended as a scare-tactic, used by critics who want to stop the channel from being approved by the CRTC. So why do so many “news” organizations – particularly those who support the application – use the term in their headlines? Why aren’t dismissive slurs used in the headlines of stories about other networks?
Free advice to outlets who support the application to the CRTC: Stop using the detractors’ sneering description of the proposed network in your headlines. Use its real, actual name instead – Sun TV News.
What a concept.

EUR:

There is a battle being fought on the net over the publication of the Muslim parody of the 10:10 “no pressure” film. They really don’t like that one and as fast as new copies appear, they are moving in to get them taken down, with the last one attributed to the great Franny herself. I guess we must be keeping her quite busy.

… sure it’s a repeat, but I like the tune!

Update to a previous post … more questions:

And there you have it: W&R’s algo impact visualized based on a heuristical algo. In other words, according to the SEC, it is that barely visible blue wiggle that was responsible for a $1 trillion loss in market cap.
As we said, the SEC has not heard the last of this by a long shot.

IMHO:
1. Either we believe the SEC, in which case there is little reason for confidence.
2. Or, we consider contrary view points … in which case there is little reason for confidence.
Any wonder why investors are sitting on their wallets.