Reader Tips

Reader Tips 24 Comments

In the interests of maintaining the public’s faith in the fairness and impartiality of our legal system, it is important that justice be not just blind but also sober. In tonight’s amusement we contemplate what a civil trial might sound like if, instead of being held in a proper courtroom and overseen by a bright-eyed, razor-sharp judge, it was held at a corner table in some local tavern twenty-five minutes after last call.
The comments are open for your Reader Tips.

24 Replies to “Reader Tips”

  1. Great post by Daniel Greenfield at Sultan Knish. Excerpt:
    “The best thing we could do for human rights is to toss away the UN and its armies of bureaucrats and useless blue helmeted peacekeepers. Leave them by the side of the road, along with the World Bank and the WTO and all the rest of it, and actually build an alliance of civilizations based on countries that practice democracy and human rights. If you want a loan, don’t cry to us about your poverty or your starving children. Hold free and open elections. Toss away your blasphemy laws and free your political prisoners. That is a lot more likely to bring about human rights, than funding building after building of scuttling bureaucrats moving around pieces of paper and dining out in posh restaurants.
    “But of course we won’t do that, because the real goal is not human rights. It’s the phantasm of world government. The great mirage of a united world and a united humanity. A Fourth Reich that will finally demolish nations and borders, and teach everyone to live just like in a Benetton ad. It’s an ideologically driven goal, and like most such goals, leads to tyranny. The larger the system, the harder it is to maintain the rights of the individual within its spinning cogs and wheels….”
    (…)
    “The left insists that human rights can only come from giving up freedom, and accepting government authority. That is the opposite of the principles on which America was founded. To give it credence, is to drink of the poisoned well of tyranny….”
    The whole thing here.

  2. About the basics of human existence.
    As it sometime happens in the course of human events…..
    You sit on the toilet, toilet cracks (heh), all things being equal, sheet happens, (what can one say).
    The judge, in slow motion, looks like she had more beer than your present correspondent.
    What is interesting that you can say that about an American judge, a Canadian would throw you in a slammer just like that.

  7. Can someone confirm to me if Canada was the first country to develop/adopt and then relinquish nuclear weapons?
    Was that a bad decision?
    Yeah, yeah, we got f*cked with the Avro Arrow.

  8. An example of how the media twist a story to make their point. Jonathan Kay in the NP wrote an article defending universal checking of us and our bags using a story showing because Israeli security checked each bag they were able to thwart a muslim using his pregnant girlfriend to blow up an El Al aircraft.
    http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2010/11/26/jonathan-kay-why-universal-scan-and-frisk-is-the-only-way-to-prevent-mile-high-terrorism/#more-19561
    I wrote to him with this email.
    “Jonathan, I remember this story and you are leaving out the most vital parts. Israeli security spoke to the woman and asked her a few questions as I believe she was flying to Israel first not Jordan. They asked her where she was staying and she replied the Hilton in Tel Aviv yet she had very little money with her and the Hilton was one of the most pricey hotels. She also said her future husband was going to meet her there. Did you pack your own luggage she was asked. Well no, he did it for me. A few further questions and her bag was fully checked and the explosives were found.
    Totally different take on this story as it showed the Israeli security system with well trained officers not wholesale checking of everyone was the critical difference in the detection of this threat.”
    Kay responded to me “Yes — same story. But later in the column, I write about how the Israeli approach involves close questioning, of the type she received, and I did too when I traveled to Israel.”
    I wrote back to him on the latest turn of events.
    “Thanks for getting back to me.
    Now we will have to contend with the Law of Unintended Consequences as the CDC and several doctors are already warning of the passing of germs and a myriad of diseases to passengers through TSA personnel not changing gloves between genital and close body inspections. One female army veteran had her sanitary pad inspected! These idiots are examining colostomy bags, surgical bandages, children’s diapers, what can go wrong. The TSA has admitted the gloves are to protect their employees not the public.
    Wayward husbands coming home from Los Vegas will be blaming the security agents for any STDs they bring home.”

  9. Yeah, yeah, we got f*cked with the Avro Arrow.
    Posted by: PiperPaul at November 27, 2010 1:59 AM”
    if the Arrow was only a so-so plane, why couldn’t we keep one as a momento?
    if it was actually a remarkable performing craft, why was it scrapped?
    to all those in favour of scrapping it, you can’t have it both ways. which is it? run-of-the-mill or leading edge?
    can’t have it both ways.
    leave it up to a small minded Conserrrrrrrrvative to cave in to petty personal grudge.

  11. Dave isn’t Kay married to Conrad Blacks daughter, living in a gated community and I doubt he travels via the cattle car like we peasants?

  12. This is my brother Mohammed….in Oregon
    ————————-
    Mohamed Osman Mohamud, 19, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Somalia and resident of Corvallis, was arrested on accusations of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction (explosives) in connection with a plot to detonate a vehicle bomb at an annual Christmas tree lighting ceremony, the Justice Department announced.
    http://hotair.com/archives/2010/11/27/somali-born-teen-arrested-after-attempting-to-detonate-a-car-bomb-in-oregon/

  13. Helped to do my part on that CBC poll “will you watch Sun News”.
    Please note they will only have this poll up until Dec 13 or close the comments at a sooner date or at their discretion (like if the poll starts going south).
    Best get those votes in now.

  15. OMG.
    Re the debate last night between Tony Blair and Christopher Hitchens: be it resolved that “Religion is a force for good in the world,” the National Post put a ditz on the beat, a Tamsin McMahon, who obviously knew nothing about the “religion” part of the debate.
    http://life.nationalpost.com/2010/11/26/sparks-fly-as-blair-hitchens-talk-religion/#ixzz16Ug88cG8
    Hitchens: ” … that there is the sense that there is something beyond the material, or if not beyond it, not entirely consistent with it, is, I think, a very important matter of what you could call the numinist [emphasis mine], or the transcendent or at its best, I suppose, the ecstatic. I wouldn’t trust anyone in this hall who didn’t know what I was talking about.”
    Too bad Mr. Hitchens — and the readers of the National Post — couldn’t trust that a reporter on this beat might know what she’s talking about. Obviously, Ms. McMahon doesn’t know the very commonly used theological term “numinous”
    and didn’t even attempt to check it out. Numinous means “spiritual, indicating the presence of a divinity, awe-inspiring, uplifting” (The Canadian Oxford Dictionary).
    To add insult to injury, I can’t for the life of me figure out why The Munk Centre chose Tony Blair, of all people, to debate this topic with Mr. Hitchens, who is by far the best debater — even though I disagree with his POV. Tony Blair could have, and should have, used much more powerful arguments than he did (watching the debate livestream, I kept shouting at the TV points he could be making) and, early on, he definitely should have put a moratorium on the “I” and “me” statements.
    No wonder Mr. Hitchens “won” the debate. There was no contest, as far as I can see — and that was right from the start. Christopher Hitchens argued circles around Tony Blair.

  16. Re Arrow and Canadian Nuclear weapons. I will put this together because they are related subjects.
    The Arrow could have been a somewhat great aircraft. However, at the time it was flown, it still did not have the engine it was supposed to have because it was still in development. It still did not have any weapons system because they were still in development. The Arrow , without engines and weapons was sucking up three quarters of the defence budget.
    I think the Arrow would have roughly been the equivalent of the Delta Dagger. Remember those, they haven’t flown in 25 years. At the same time the F4 Phantom was coming into service. Phantoms are still being flown in various places around the world. The difference is the Phantom can do pretty much anything you would want a combat aircraft to do and the Dagger or Arrow,would only be useful as a high altitude interceptor. As to why they cut them up for scrap I can’t say. We should have bought Phantoms back then. Instead we bought a high altitude interceptor in the form of the Starfighter, and promptly flew half of them into hillsides in Germany trying to use them as strike aircraft.
    The Bomark missile was acquired as a sort of replacement for the Arrow, to fulfill the requirement to shoot down high altitude bombers. The Bomark missile was supposed to be equipped with nuclear warheads, but we never got the warheads. That might have been because the US wasn’t prepared to give them to us, or we weren’t prepared to have them. I think it was the latter. So, we scrapped the Arrow and replaced them with unarmed missiles. Such were the great days of Canadian Cold War defence policy.
    The air force might have wanted Arrows, but to quote and old friend of mine who was an artillery officer. “If we let the users decide on equipment we would still be arguing about black saddles versus brown.”
    All the above is from memory, so if someone wants to argue facts I am happy to here from you.

  17. AGW Report: Arrows down Red-Green.
    Weaver down: Arrows from Conservative government down the AGW fraud.
    More, please. And faster.
    …-
    “Produced by Andrew Weaver at the University of Victoria, considered by many to be Canada’s most accomplished climate scientist,”.
    “Lawrence Solomon: Massive Canadian carbon sink disappears”
    “The Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, a recipient since 2000 of $110-million in federal taxpayer funding, is shutting its doors after failing to convince federal and provincial governments to keep it afloat. The foundation describes itself as “Canada’s premier funder of university-based weather and climate research.”
    In 2010, this foundation, one of Canada’s biggest sinks for carbon-related research dollars, funded, among other works, “Wind Energy in Canada: the Basics, the Resource, the Opportunity” a video for high school and university students whose goal “is to expand knowledge about wind energy and to encourage its acceptance and increased use.”
    The foundation’s coup for the year, however, may have been “Integrated Climate Change Learning Resource for Grade 6.” Produced by Andrew Weaver at the University of Victoria, considered by many to be Canada’s most accomplished climate scientist, this work addressed what it saw as a pressing elementary school need – introducing children to the climate change imperative: “While global warming is the most significant environmental issue of our time, it receives little attention in the Canadian school system,” the foundation explained.
    All told, the foundation supported over 200 major scientific initiatives through research grants totalling more than $117-million at 37 Canadian universities.
    It will be sorely missed by its many grant recipients.”
    http://opinion.financialpost.com/2010/11/25/lawrence-solomon-massive-canadian-carbon-sink-disappears/

  19. Gustave Le Bon* said it first:
    “*The Psychology of Socialism 1899 … “Socialism is in fact nothing but the religion of the Stomach.”
    Brendan Smith, that’s “Brendan “let them eat cheese” Smith”, agrees:
    “As Ireland’s punch-drunk government this month started to reel under the severity of the budget cuts it needs to bail out its bust banking system, it sought to raise national spirits – announcing cheese giveaways, from surplus European Union stocks.
    Irish citizens may already have harboured few doubts about the political bankruptcy of the long-ruling Fianna Fáil party, but any that lingered were blown away in gales of popular scorn as the agriculture minister was rebranded as Brendan “let them eat cheese” Smith.”
    “Writing on the wall”
    http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/fa24c430-f998-11df-9e29-00144feab49a.html
    *Gustave Le Bon:
    “GUSTAVE LE BON and the Crowd ***
    The Psychology of Socialism 1899 … ” Socialism is in fact nothing but the religion of the Stomach.”
    http://www.fulltable.com/crowd/07.htm

  20. AGW Report: F2Kyoto.
    “Northeastern England got their earliest substantial snowfall in 17 years.”
    …-
    “Snow Falls in Northern England, More on the Way”
    “People walk through a snowfall, in Stanley, England, Saturday, Nov. 27, 2010.
    Britain has shivered in sub-zero temperatures since Thursday as snow fell unseasonably early, with more wintry weather on the way. Up to 10cm (4 inches) of snow settled in northern Scotland and north-east England overnight, the earliest major snowfall in 17 years. (AP Photo/Scott Heppell)”
    http://www.accuweather.com/blogs/news/story/42203/snow-falls-in-northern-england.asp

  21. Al the fish in MB at 1:37 AM: “SUN TV gets its license-go help this poll out on the topic”
    I voted a couple of days ago, but I went to the site just to see how it was going. The Yeses are ahead (Yay!!). The funniest thing is they’ve only posted seven comments and have already shut down commenting. You can’t even get in to see the existing seven comments. This is such fun to watch.

  22. Leave it for an Artillery officer to comment on air force equipment. As far as the Arrow goes, it was a work in progress. Not many (if any) aircraft go from prototype to production with no improvements and changes. The P51 Mustang was a dog until someone put in Rolls-Royce Merlin engines in them. The rest is now history. The fact that the Arrow did so well with substitute engines only re-enforces the fact that it was a diamond in the rough that never got a chance to truly shine.

  23. Iggy & O’s Harvard “blockbuster scandal”.
    Now we know why Iggy jumped off the O’Harvard rotten tub. Iggy smelled the roses and jumped into the fire ……..
    >>> The intellectual fraud, “The whole mess — ongoing for three years”.
    Here is a teaser for Iggy: “But what if the same train is approaching, and you are standing on a bridge over the tracks with a fat man.”?
    O’Iggy replies: “Just Visiting”.
    More below: it’s an Iggy Egghead’s tour-de-farce.
    …-
    “The meaning of wrong”
    “A recent blockbuster scandal at Harvard University, in which a top researcher in animal cognition was found to have committed scientific misconduct, did far-reaching damage in Massachusetts and beyond.
    It sullied the reputation of Marc Hauser, once a rock star scientist, now on leave with his courses cancelled, research retracted, and his bustling laboratory on America’s most elite campus all but shuttered.
    The whole mess — ongoing for three years but publicly revealed by the Boston Globe in August and now under investigation by the National Science Foundation — even seemed to cast a shadow of doubt on the entire field of evolutionary psychology, a newish discipline that seeks to explain human behaviour though the history of our genes, and occasionally succeeds.
    One of the scandal’s lesser-known casualties, though, is a ground-breaking online experiment that marks a key moment in a major historical trend — the slow reconciliation of psychology and philosophy.”
    http://www.nationalpost.com/news/meaning+wrong/3892955/story.html
    http://www.bluelikeyou.com/2010/11/27/for-the-holier-than-thou-conservative-purists/#comment-56249

  24. Regarding Avro Arrow (I still have my ORIGINAL 1950s plastic beatup model) as I recall the Bomarc had a range of 400 mi max so to equip them with nukes was silly. The nuke thingy was all for talk and show.
    Arrows had a longer range and were more versatile than that.
    Newer engines were getting ready and armament could be adapted so there is more to the story than we know and it comes down to guessing.
    Dief was ridiculed in the east and probably realized he would not long be PM.
    As PM he became fully aware of the horrendous financial hosing the western grain farmers took under the British Wheat Agreement of the mean Liberals.
    What better way to get even with the Minister of Everything CD Howe, than cut the Arrow and cut up all the existing aircraft?
    The cutting up is the key. Mean, really mean.
    But mean-minded vindictive politics has never been in short supply in this country.
    I think it was the dumbest thing Dief ever did.
    NASA sure was happy though.

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