H/T to maz2 for spotting this Don Martin item in the National Post.

Via Canadianna, a Toronto Sun item that raised my hackles. Abuse ruins life of girl, 7

– An Oshawa trucker was sentenced to 17 months in jail yesterday for ruining a young girl’s life with “despicable” sexual abuse….

How dare they?
When is society going to stand up and demand an end to this reprehensible behavior?
When are we going to demand that people stop declaring to young victims of sexually based crime that their lives are ruined before they begin?
“So sorry dear – you’re spoiled goods. Going to be a long 80 years….”
A few years ago a friend revealed, almost matter-of-factly, that as a young teenager she had been the victim of a gang rape. She jumped through the counselling hoops of conventional psychological wisdom until the day she realized that she was still wallowing in the event, stretching a brief trauma into an extended one. She decided instead to accept what happened, put it behind her and get on with her life. She never looked back.
While not everyone has that type of strength, her story does tell us something. If we want to help victims of sexual crimes regain normalcy, it’s time that society and the justice system stop sending mixed messages. We claim there is no shame in being a victim of sexually based crime, then try the cases in courts that “protect” identities and ban publication of testimony. We applaud their courage, then use “fate worse than” hyperbole equating rape with murder, as though the truly couragous victim would have choosen death over submission.
We tell small children that the crime is “not their fault” – but that their lives are ruined and childhoods at an end, placing before them the additional hurdle of self-fulfilling prophecy.
Sexual assault is a heinous, traumatic crime that deserves the full force of the law – additionally so, because of the predatory nature of offenders and the threat they pose to others.
It often requires a good deal of medical and emotional support for survivors to recover their health and their lives – but this is also true of drunk driving victims, those who survive beatings or robbery, survivors of spousal abuse – all of whom we expect to pick up the pieces and move on. Elevating the victim of sex crime to special status as the ruined perpetual “survivor” may be as damaging a societal response – perhaps more so – than that of 50 years ago, when they were told to shut up and get on with their lives in silence.

If you’ve never taken a pillion before, and want a few tips;

Arrange a signal that they can give you if they are uncomfortable. Don’t let them sit there scared witless at 70mph afraid to move. Take it steady to start with. Having a pillion on the back effects braking and acceleration. So allow time in judging gaps during overtaking and don’t break suddenly. Stop frequently to check they are ok. Check for pulse.

At least they didn’t remove his manly bits with an icepick.

You know, it seems to me that if you set out to protest the views of a couple dozen left-wing white supremacists, you might choose a means of expression that doesn’t reinforce their position?
Update: ABC news caught in a misleading headline.

Now, this is cat blogging!

Update: Snopes has more.

What must I do to get a link from “Small Dead Animals” to one of my posts?
Answer here!

But are they testing the stuff for lead content?
h/t Lost Budgie.

Darcey Jerrom spotted this amusing item;

Premier Gary Doer’s speech at the Manitoba Metis Federation’s general assembly this morning might be a bit awkward. Doer was supposed to receive the Manitoba Order of the Sash, the federation’s highest honour, at its 37th annual meeting in Brandon.”
The Manitoba Metis Federation rescinded the honour at a meeting this past weekend but were unable to get ahold of Doer to tell him

I’d link to the original post, but there’s so much good stuff at Dust My Broom lately I suggest you just go over and start at the top.

The Indian Posse is not a “youth gang”. It’s full-fledged organized crime that recruits aboriginal youth to exploit a youth justice system that grants virtual immunity from prosecution and incarceration. In turn, the Canadian justice system affords more lenient sentences for aboriginals by dictate of the Supreme Court. It’s no wonder that so many destroy their lives and others in the conviction that crime pays.
19-year-old Elizabeth Halkett was a crown witness in a case involving the murder of her brother. On March of 2004 her body was discovered in her burned out home. She was already dead when the fire was set. Yesterday, charges were finally laid.

Twenty-two-year-old James Slippery, who was already charged with arson in the case, appeared in a Saskatoon court today to face charges of being an accessory after the slaying and committing an offence for a criminal organization. Two other men, Elwood Poorman and Gerald Littlecrow, were also in court to face similar charges.
All have been remanded in custody until their next court appearance October 7th.
Halkett was to testify against a 16-year-old alleged member of the Indian Posse in the stabbing death of her brother, Joel, last year. Police say she was slain before she could testify at a preliminary hearing.

The three were also charged with committing an indictable offense in association with a criminal organization.

Hugh Hewitt is watching the fun;

The Annan gang hopes to kill real reform in a swamp of small stiches and minor adjustments, with the objective being the release of a statement hailing some bogus “comprehensive reform package” of more than 500 specific steps that will be implemented by 40 committees over the next 24 months, at which point a self-congratulatory release will issue noting that of the 512 specific reform proposals set forth in the fall of 2005, Secretary General Annan announced that 493 had been adopted, 8 tabled, and 11 still under review. Blah blah blah.
Ambassador Bolton –and the Bush Adminsitration– wants a few, big, significant bright-line changes (starting with Annan’s resignation, I hope) and if we can’t have a real reform agenda, then we don’t do the deal. No papering over the deep criminality of the organization. No cover-up for the posers.

Let’s hope so – a housecleaning of the Euro-Canadian Desmarais cartel could have nearly as much impact on addressing the duplicity, corruption and hypocrisy of Canadian foreign policy as it would that of the United Nations.

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Top 10 murder rates by city (per 100,000 population):
Regina: 5.0;

Billy Jack Bird pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in the vicious beating death of 71- year-old Selina Nellie McIntosh and aggravated assault for the attack that left George Alexander McIntosh, 74, in a coma. He has never regained consciousness.
“It is incomprehensible how such violence could be directed to these kind and gentle people,” Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Ellen Gunn said, in accepting the joint recommendation of life in prison with no chance for parole for 20 years on the second-degree murder conviction. Bird will serve a 10-year concurrent sentence for aggravated assault.
Recounting the facts of the case in court, Crown prosecutor Kim Jones said George had been giving money to people in the couple’s North Central neighbourhood for about two years, “out of kindness or attempts not to be bothered,” and had given Bird $800 a few days before the attack.
On July 1, 2004, Bird went to the couple’s Princess Street house to ask for more money and became enraged when George refused to give it to him. Court heard that Bird “snapped,” ripped the phone out of the wall and hit the elderly man until he was unconscious.
When Selina entered the room, Bird began a vicious beating that continued in almost every room in the house, the court was told. Bird then removed the woman’s pants and underwear and masturbated above her body in what Jones called “an act of utter disrespect.”
Selina was able to put on a pair of sweat pants before she died.
Police later found Bird’s bloody shirt and jewellery he’d stolen from the house inside a nearby dumpster.
He was interviewed by police and ultimately confessed to the crime.
Court heard George and Selina McIntosh had been married 37 years, and had two children and three grandchildren. Both had survived cancer and Selina had Alzheimer’s disease. Their son discovered the couple’s bodies on July 2, 2004, after being unable to reach them by phone all day.
Court heard the house was found ransacked and in complete disarray, with blood throughout the home and the bedroom door ripped off its hinges.
Selina McIntosh was dead at the scene and had facial injuries, a broken nose and cuts around her lips, mouth, cheeks and chin. Her larynx was fractured and many of her ribs were broken, puncturing her lung. She died from severe trauma to her head, chest and extremities.
George McIntosh was taken to hospital in critical condition, having received a broken jaw, facial injuries and a severe head injury that has left him in a persistent vegetative state.
“This home invasion was an act of unspeakable horror,” Jones told court, calling the attack “a brutal and senseless crime.” In a victim impact statement read aloud in court, the couple’s son said few people could understand the experience of finding their parent’s “murdered, lifeless bodies” inside the family home.

A 450 sheep pileup created havok in a Turkish province recently.
450 Sheep Jump to Their Deaths in Turkey (AP)

First one sheep jumped to its death. Then stunned Turkish shepherds, who had left the herd to graze while they had breakfast, watched as nearly 1,500 others followed, each leaping off the same cliff, Turkish media reported. In the end, 450 dead animals lay on top of one another in a billowy white pile, the Aksam newspaper said. Those who jumped later were saved as the pile got higher and the fall more cushioned, Aksam reported.
“There’s nothing we can do. They’re all wasted,” Nevzat Bayhan, a member of one of 26 families whose sheep were grazing together in the herd, was quoted as saying by Aksam.
The estimated loss to families in the town of Gevas, located in Van province in eastern Turkey, tops $100,000, a significant amount of money in a country where average GDP per head is around $2,700.
“Every family had an average of 20 sheep,” Aksam quoted another villager, Abdullah Hazar as saying. “But now only a few families have sheep left. It’s going to be hard for us.”

I found the story just short of post-worthy until I saw Ann Althouse‘s take on the story: “Sheep are such sheep.”
via OTB

Child Molester May Have Struck 36,000 Times

SAN FRANCISCO-June 19, 2005 � Despite being arrested at least nine times for molesting boys, Dean Arthur Schwartzmiller managed to avoid lengthy prison terms, coach youth football, move in with another convicted sex offender – and be named by authorities as one of the most prolific child molesters in history.
Schwartzmiller’s criminal record began 35 years ago, but he never registered as a sex offender and spent just 12 years in prison. In his time on the outside, police suspect he molested children as many as 36,000 times in several states, Mexico and Brazil.

Schwatzmiller is 63. He probably didn’t start molesting children before his early teens. He has spent 12 of his adult years in jail, so first conviction notwithstanding, I’ll guesstimate his molestation “career” at 35 years.
365 days in a year.
“36,000 victims”.
There’s no doubt that Schwatzmiller is one vile little waste of skin, but you have to wonder if any of the people responsible for reporting this figure own calculators.

going….

Thanks to a tip from a commentor; check out these screenshots of an attempt to use the words “human rights,” “democracy,” and “freedom of speech” on a Chinese language MSN Spaces blog.
(Actually, there are generally a lot of good tips in many of my comments sections – more than I can follow up on.)

Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, an abortion-rights advocate, vetoed the measure, saying medical professionals – not legislators – should set standards. “

So sayeth (705) BLUE. Apparently, the Liberals are furious that he opened his mouth to verify some of the most damaging portions of the Grewal tape – and that’s just the latest. He’s about to “to get lost in the shuffle” when new cabinet appointments swing around.
(Via a reader who spotted it at Jack’s Newswatch who’s got his finger on a number of interesting items.)