Looking Down The Road
This country is sleepwalking to disintegration.
The only saving grace is that Quebec will separate on Paul Martin’s watch. At this point, I don’t think there’s any way to stop the process – and if it came to fruition under Conservative government the collective amnesia of the Canadian mentality would forever place blame at the feet of Stephen Harper.
Update Harper response: he scored some very strong hits on Stronach. Saw the writing on the wall that her leadership “aspirations” were unlikely to be realized in the Conservative party, would rather see her gone now than in the middle of a campaign. Good tactic.
“sole ambition in the party was the leadership.. ultimately it will be interesting to watch her progress in the Liberal party.”
He found out from Peter MacKay, this morning. “I think Peter is taking this pretty hard.”
“Belinda called me just moments prior to the press conference.”
More Reaction
Mike Brock feels much like I do;
Belinda, you’re worried what might happen with the Bloc picking up more seats in a spring election? You better be double-worried by the f*cking backlash from Quebec voters when — with your help — the Liberals are returned to power.
You are helping the very party which has put us both in a sovereignty crisis, and in what appears to be amounting to a constitutional crisis in our parliamentary system.
I don’t think your “soul searching” wasn’t very deep. No, I recken it was shallow and plain. Much like you. Face it, all the time you spent contemplating away these past few days was figuring out how you could spin this without appearing like a backstabbing, untrustworthy, sell-out.
Stronach Splits
Belinda Stronach has crossed the floor to the Liberals, with a new cabinet post her bonus.
Well, we always knew she was a Liberal – they were just hagging over the price.
I wonder if she realizes how many new Western separatists she just created today with her comments about Conservatives not understanding the “complexity” of the country? That the party must “grow in Quebec” before it’s a national party? I wonder if she understands that her defection speech will be interpreted as another slap by a self-serving and politically ambitious Ontario power broker at western aspirations to finally have an equal voice in Canada?
Probably not. The woman is that stupid.
The Librano Tsunami Fraud
Mark Steyn in the Washington Times;
As the grotesque charade Mr. Voinovich and his Democrat chums have inflicted on us demonstrates, all the so-called “multilateralists” require is that we be polite and deferential to the transnational establishment regardless of how useless it is. What matters in global diplomacy is that you pledge support rather than give any. Thus, John Bolton would have no problem getting nominated as U.N. Ambassador if he were more like Paul Martin.
Who? Well, Paul Martin is prime minister of Canada. And in January, after the tsunami hit, he flew into Sri Lanka to pledge millions and millions and millions in aid. Not like that heartless George W. Bush back at the ranch in Texas. Why, Prime Minister Martin walked along the ravaged coast of Kalumnai and was, reported Canada’s CTV network, “visibly shaken.” President Bush might well have been shaken, but he wasn’t visible, and in the international compassion league that’s what counts.
So Mr. Martin boldly pledged $425 million in Canadian tsunami relief. “Mr. Paul Martin has set a great example for the rest of the world leaders” raved the LankaWeb news service.
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You know how much of that $425 million has been spent so far? Just $50,000 — Canadian. That’s about $40,000 in U.S. dollars. The rest isn’t tied up in Indonesian bureaucracy; it’s back in Ottawa. But, unlike horrible “unilateralist” America, Canada enjoys a reputation as the perfect global citizen, renowned for its commitment to the U.N. and multilateralism.
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And on the beaches of Sri Lanka that and a buck will get you a strawberry daiquiri. Canada’s contribution to tsunami relief is objectively useless and rhetorically fraudulent.
Her Nanny Won’t Let Her
I don’t suppose that when she wrote;
“… when the U.S. corporate media were cheering the attack on Iraq these [conservative/right wing bloggers] weren’t attacking them for their complicity then.” … and … “Why are the U.S. corporate media downplaying Iraq…”
… that she realized her words were an admission that she doesn’t actually read conservative blogs or the “US corporate media” .
But onward newbie blogger! Hard on the heels of the dismissive “corporate media” posts, she recovers from the bout of Zerbisiamnesia to explain why her brand new Toronto Star hosted “blog” doesn’t allow comments;
It’s not like this is some independent blog not worth suing. It’s a billion dollar media corporation that pays huge premiums for libel insurance. And, Canada has very onerous libel laws, much tougher than in the U.S.
Then there are our hate laws. They’re there for a reason.
Talking down to her readers. Nice touch.
But never lose hope. The Star is not closed to the idea of opening up the comments sections … one day.
Personally, I would love an electronic free-for-all. It would save me a lot of cutting and pasting. (Please, a favour? No fancy typefaces!) But, as it says at the bottom of this page, the Star has the copyright. I am but a wage slave and therefore must put up with those trucks above my head. That doesn’t mean the Star isn’t fair game. Look here and here.
In fact, you can bet that the suits are watching this blog very nervously because they know that, to maintain even a shred of cybercred, it has to be free-ranging. That they went with the intemperate me as their beta blogger — others will follow — suggests that they are either out of their minds or taking this enterprise very seriously.
“Either, or.” In the two dimensional Land Of Zerbisias, possibilities only come in twos!
Here’s another, Antonia – instead of hiding in the skirts of your corporate nanny, consider blogging like a grownup.
Get your own.
Liberals Are Nice
Monte is up to no good, again;
The most important convention is that the Liberals are Canada’s natural governing party.
No that is not written down! It is a convention that every little Canadian boy or girl learns at their mother’s knee. It is in the very air we breathe. It is written on every human heart. It is as natural as gravity.
It is natural because Canadians are naturally nice. Americans are not nice. Not a single one of them. But we’re nice, all of us, except Conservatives.
Even the Liberals who now stand accused of theft and conspiracy and threatening the lives of other Liberals are nice. We know they are nice because they believe in big increases in government spending. Spending is synonomous with caring. The more you spend, the more you care. That means all Liberals, even the corrupt and deadly ones, are nice!
Conservatives are all mean because they believe that spending shouldn’t grow faster than increases in government revenues. They even believe that there should be limits on the size and scope of government. How mean is that?
Sometimes Conservatives feel anger about Liberal corruption. But anger, strictly speaking, is not nice. So Conservatives cannot be allowed to govern.
Yes Conservatives may have families and principles and good ideas, but if they can’t spend and smile what good are they?
It’s time to end the uncertainty. Let’s do what comes naturally. Let’s reaffirm those corrupt, nice Liberals and spend our way to happiness.
You know, all this talk of Liberals and niceness takes me back….
Signs! Placards! Tractors!
Bruce Gottfred has a few photos from today’s Take Back The Hill demonstration in Ottawa.
Vote Liberal Or The Black Market Dies!
A reader sent this to me, noting the sanitization of language. Though, “sanitization” doesn’t really do this Toronto Star item justice – a dripping propoganda piece by “immigration and diversity(?)” ‘reporter’ Nicholas Keung. The ‘scare’ words are worth a drinking game of their own – why, there’s even a dead baby!
Hope fades…
Plan by the Liberal government to legalize up to 200,000 workers could die
200,000 workers could die…
A plan to legalize thousands of undocumented workers in Canada’s underground economy would be in jeopardy if the Liberal minority government falls as a result of a non- confidence vote on Thursday, says Immigration Minister Joe Volpe. The Toronto MP has already signed off on a final draft of the long-anticipated “regularization” plan, which is now “in the queue” for the cabinet’s feedback and approval – provided there isn’t an election call.
The issue leaves in limbo many of the 100,000 to 200,000 undocumented workers living under the radar in Canada, as well as employers facing shortages of the skills some of them bring.
Initiating the “skill watch” … at this point in the article, Canada has a shortage of skilled labour….
“We’re bringing things closer to a point where some decisions could be made.” Juan Sierra, a construction-union outreach worker, said he has fielded calls from hundreds of undocumented construction workers since Conservative leader Stephen Harper vowed publicly to bring down the Liberal government in mid-April.
Hundreds. Panic in the streets.
They’re worried the plan to legalize their status in Canada will go down, too. “They are really freaked out by the prospect,” said Sierra, of the Labourers’ International Union of North America. “Their hopes were so high because Volpe has promised that this is a priority for the government. If nothing happens, their hopes would be destroyed totally.”
(Harper = “Go down. Worried. Freaked out. Destroyed”. Volpe = “Hope”)
Vilma Filici, president of the Canadian Hispanic Congress […] fears a Conservative government could dump the plan as, he says, the Tories tend to view undocumented workers more as security risks than as potentially valuable contributors to Canadian society.
(Fear Conservatives. Note that the security risk is a “Tory view”, compared to the “non-partisan” description of illegal immigrant as “valuable contributor”.)
Daniel Castro, his wife and their two teenage sons from Argentina are among those living in limbo. The family arrived here in early 2001 and had their refugee claim rejected last May. Together they earn $6,000 a month, which they take in cash. Savings are stashed under a mattress because they’re afraid to keep a bank account. They don’t get to know neighbours because they move every few months to keep ahead of immigration authorities.
That’s some kind of limbo. Any readers here from Canada Revenue Agency who can fill us in on what a family of four has to earn to take home $72,000 a year?
When eldest son Walter was robbed of his pay at gunpoint near Jane St. and Lawrence Ave. W. last summer, the 18-year-old didn’t dare go to the police. “Our life is between work and home, but we are grateful when we see everyone home in one piece at the end of the day,” Daniel Castro said. “We pray the family will still be together the next day.” Their lives are typical among those in the underground economy, who do jobs Canadians often consider undesirable, particularly in construction, the hotel and hospitality industries, domestic help and general labour. They don’t qualify for social assistance or employment insurance, and if they get sick they pay for care out of pocket.
Gone are those paragraphs of the past when illegals were sought after “skilled workers” .
They literally live their lives out of a suitcase …
Q: How many undocumented workers does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Don’t be stupid. They’re too tiny to lift a lightbulb.
Authorities sometimes sweep down on construction sites, where undocumented workers help fill a shortage of skilled workers.
Skilled, unskilled, skillled… my head is spinning….
A string of broken promises by Volpe’s predecessors, who never seemed to stick around long enough to deal with the issue…
“We just want to live a normal life, but it appears that Canada thinks that it is easier to keep people like us illegally here in the country than to deal with the issue head-on,” said Luis Vargas, 43, who came from Mendoza, Argentina, in 1988. “Every time you have a new minister, they always say they will help. But all they want is some cheap labour for the economy. They want to give us no benefit.”
But wait! It gets better – this skilled unskilled undocumented worker who lives in a suitcase, keeps thousands under his mattress and fears for his life, owns a construction company;
In fact, Vargas, a failed refugee claimant, has been a successful construction subcontractor in Canada since his arrival and hired three others: one undocumented and two with refugee claims still active. His company makes about $150,000 a year. …
What is the number for Revenue Canada, anyway? Ready now… here it comes ….
All 29-year-old Martin wants is a better future for his 2-month-old daughter. Her birth followed a miscarriage that, in addition to the emotional toll, brought a hospital bill of $4,500.
A dead baby and no medicare! Holy crap! Does it get any better than this for a Star “reporter”?
Martin, another Argentine afraid to be identified, said undocumented migrants are not “jumping the queue” in the usual sense, since most would never qualify under the immigration points system, geared as it is toward immigrants with higher skills or money to invest.
All of you teeming, law-abiding, queue respecting masses, yearning to be taxed…
You’re going about things all the wrong way. Why are you patiently awaiting your legal fate under Canadian immigration policy, when you could just flush your passport down the airplane toilet and begin a new life in Canada as an skilled unskilled Liberal voter?
Offer ends soon.
Buying Farm Votes With Their Own Money
The Canadian Wheat Board has announced initial payments for board grains “have been increased”. As curious as the unexpected windfall is the payment date.
The CWB today announced that 2004-05 initial payments for wheat, durum and designated barley will increase effective May 18, 2005.
The increase in initial payments for wheat and feed wheat will be $15.00 per tonne. In the case of durum, the increase will be $30.00 per tonne, except for No. 5 Canada Western Amber Durum, which will see an increase of $10.00 per tonne. For designated barley, the increase will be $13.00 per tonne on two-row and $15.00 on six-row.
(What else is going on May 18th… somebody help me out here…)
Previous dates:
2004 – May 13 (just prior to June 2004 election)
2003 – May 19
2002 – Mar 21
2001 – June 25
2000 – Feb 17
1999 – Feb 25
1998 – April 23
As cynical election ploys go, this one is especially egrarious – to help the Liberals gain a few farm votes the “arms length” Wheat Board is throwing the grain producers’ own money at them – pre-payment for grains they are legislatively mandated to sell to the CWB. The overpayment will be dealt with later in the year, when final payments are “adjusted” to claw the pre-election bonus back.
hat tip – John Gormley LIve, 650 CKOM Saskatoon
Bigger Than Rathergate
Head over to Instapundit this morning for a taste of how the storm is gathering over the Newsweek Koran fiasco. (The link is to the main page – just keep scrolling.)
Newsweek Lied. People Died.
Glenn Reynolds on the now retracted Newsweek story about desecration of the Koran at Guantanamo Bay;
Two points: (1) If they had wrongly reported the race of a criminal and produced a lynching, they’d feel much worse — which is why they generally don’t report such things, a degree of sensitivity they don’t extend to reporting on, you know, minor topics like wars; and (2) If a blogger had made a similar mistake, with similar consequences, we’d be hearing about Big Media’s superior fact-checking and layers of editors.
People died, and U.S. military and diplomatic efforts were damaged, because — let’s be clear here — Newsweek was too anxious to get out a story that would make the Bush Administration and the military look bad.
Indeed.
Boots On The Desk
The Liberals claim to be putting ($8 – $9 – $10?) billion into security. Really? Where are the new cops?
The Hand That Feeds
Habamus Rodentum updates information on the hand that feeds the RCMP headquarters in Montreal and the federal tax centre in Shawinigan. Here’s a teaser – Liberal bagman Joe Morselli’s Buffet Trio, plus secret bank accounts and shredded invoices at the RCMP.
Here’s a bit of historical perspective (September 2000) to bring readers up to speed;
Organized crime mobs are targeting Parliament and other Canadian institutions in an attempt to spread corruption and political instability, says the new head of the RCMP.
During a remarkably candid news conference, Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli said yesterday that criminal groups are focusing on Parliament, the courts and other institutions with the aim of “destabilizing” the political system.
“For the first time in this country, we are seeing signs of criminal organizations that are so sophisticated that they actually are focusing on destabilizing certain aspects of our society,” said Commissioner Zaccardelli. The commissioner is a 30-year veteran of the RCMP who was previously the force’s deputy commissioner in charge of the fight against organized crime.
“That’s a real threat to us. There are criminal organizations that target this destabilization of our parliamentary system.”
[…]
Commissioner Zaccardelli’s startling comments were reminiscent of controversial statements made by former RCMP commissioner Norman Inkster in the 1980s.
Mr. Inkster told a Commons committee more than two dozen MPs were under criminal investigation. He refused to name the MPs, and only a handful were charged in subsequent years. It was later learned some of the investigations were routine inquiries following complaints.
A very long time ago, two people close to me confessed they were involved in lower rungs of organized crime. I had met each independantly and completely by chance while in college – and they were in different organizations. This was when I first learned that there were organized crime figures elected to parliament.
Take Back The Hill Demonstration
I’m a bit far away to attend, but here’s the info for those who aren’t;
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Take Back The Hill Bring something blue (or dye your finger blue), and get out there to give them the message that WE WANT TO VOTE! |
Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road?
“I don’t care why. Yer gittin’ a ticket anyway.”
Dead Parliament Walking
Blogsurfing
I’m busy with yard work today, without much time for blogging, so I”ll direct you to a few lesser known sites worth a look, and deserving of more traffic. Some old, some new, some popular in the US but lesser referenced in Canada. Feel free to add your own via trackback, or in the comments.
Jacks Newswatch is on top of the best stuff out this morning. (Stephen Harper is David Duke? Can it get any crazier?)
How many blog sites feature great writing in both official languages? The only thing I don’t like about Polyscopique is that he doesn’t post often enough.
Lorne Gunter isn’t lesser known, but he’s new to blogging.
Today, Laurent has a plug for Right Ho! – writing by another conservative journalist who chooses anonymity.
Speaking of well known people, new to blogging – if you’re a politician (or a strategist) interested in how to incorporate blogging into your party’s communication strategy, make Bush-Cheney campaign webmaster Patrick Ruffini part of your regular reading. Go back through the archives, too.
I’ll probably do another Carnival of the Newbies in a couple of weeks, so if you’ve sent me a link to your site looking for a plug, be patient. And keep writing.
It Must Be The Hat
The Conservatives want the Liberals to move up Thursday’s budget vote to Monday so that Alberta MP Darrel Stinson can vote before his scheduled operation.
| Stinson is MP for Okanagan Shuswap, in British Columbia. But you know, put a cowboy hat on, and us westerners all look alike. |  |
(I spotted this catch on another blog last evening, but damned if I can remember where)
War! For Kilgour!
Defence Minister Bill Graham was wrong!
“We cannot invade Sudan. It requires United Nations action … it requires political as well as military and aid matters” – May 6, 2005
Canada can invade the Sudan after all!
Canada said on Friday it would go ahead with plans to send military advisors to Sudan’s troubled Darfur region despite Khartoum’s insistence that it did not want the troops to enter the country.
Martin spokeswoman Melanie Gruer said Canada needed the approval of the African Union for the troops’ deployment rather than that of Sudan.
‘It’s up to the African Union to get Sudan’s approval’
Oh. So it’s up to the African Union to do our invading. Well, that’s more like it…
“There is no change to the plan. We will send what we said we were going to send,” she said.
Yeah – or we’re going to get those other guys to make you let us.
In The Medicinal Herb Section
That would be right next to the munchies.