Welcome to "Hey, watch your &%$@^@#$ mouth" Day.

[Post-dated to remain up here all day, Monday, March 31.]

... during which we of the Canadian Progress-o-sphere will act all sissy and be polite and not use bad words that give people a case of the pearl-clutching vapours, in exchange for which we are challenging members of the Canadian Right-o-sphere to not, well, lie pathologically. And stuff like that there.

Normally, I'd suggest that we're all pretty sure how this is going to end, but that would be rude. So I won't.

Good luck. Break a ^&#^*^%(*&^)$ leg.



Urrrghhh ... insulin ... must reach ... insulin ... THUD!

New Music From Karen Kosowski!

This past Saturday I was in Toronto to take in the CD release party for Karen Kosowski. I have played her album "Out Here At Sea" as a constant fixture in my listening queue for well over a year. Her new album, "Meeting the Future At Full Speed" is finally here. Karen has a superb voice and is a songwriter and craftsperson of the first order. If you want to dig a new artist and help promote Canadian talent, take a moment to drop in at Karen's site and sample a few tracks. You can order the CD or download it from iTunes and if you want to see a captivating performance, check out her tour page, she'll be on the west coast in mid-May heading east from there.

Strongly recommended music!

Earth Hour, redux.

I would be remiss if we didn't discuss the environmental benefits of wind farms:


I'm guessing that sound you hear is LuLu chewing through the arm of her office chair.

Today’s Dim-Witted Mesopotamia West.

Shorter Frank: The average little woman doesn’t like fighting, guns, and the military. But that doesn’t stop them from calling 911 if they’re threatened so a big strong man with a gun can come save them. This makes them illogical ... but then, they are women.

And furthermore. My stars ... Frank’s musings are downright filthy.

Let me start by saying I support women's liberation, equal rights for women, pay equity and elimination of the 'glass ceiling.' I've worked for women, I've married women, I enjoy the company of women. OK, ladies, I'm your guy.

At the risk of being accused of lacking in civility, Frank, you wouldn’t be my “guy” if you were the last one on earth.

And further-furthermore. Go check out Red Canuck's post on Frank - big fun. Thanks to Red Tory for the heads-up in the comments.

Accusation!

I have been accused of breaking the day's covenant of civility.

From the comments some creature calling him or herself mike the greek calls us liars and cheats.

mike the greek said...
Sorry... you guys lost. PSA posted the first obscene comment 28 minutes after this post. It's been since removed.

I thought you never lied, CC?

12:50 PM

He compounds his claims by demanding some form of monetary reward...

mike the greek said...
CC,

Nice try... You people couldn't hold on for a full 30 minutes. Check your log...

And personally, you've proven yourself as a liar. Care to send me my reward money? I think it was $750, was it not?

1:32 PM

mike the greek, there is indeed a lie being perpetrated and you are the author of that lie. I have neither made an obscene comment nor have I removed a comment, obscene or otherwise. In point of fact, since I joined this blog I have had occasion to remove exactly one comment that I made from the site and that was an accidental double post. I suggest you either produce evidence to support your claim or you can issue a prompt and complete apology. Nothing else will be satisfactory.

I did not break the challenge, I did not remove a comment and I will not be called a liar by a drive-by miscreant. I shall expect your apology forthwith.

Those Darned Liberals

CTV is covering a new poll that looks very bad for the Liberals.

A new poll paints a devastating picture of a Liberal party completely reduced to a rump in Quebec if an election were held today.

"For the Liberals, they are in a worse position than they were in the middle of the sponsorship scandal," political commentator Jean Lapierre told CTV's Question Period on Sunday.

I certainly hope that nobody within the party is surprised. Although having heard the commentary of such punditorial wizards as Monsieur Cherniak, one can't help but imagine that they will be wide eyed with shock. As a party they have abandoned their role as opposition to the government. They have rolled over and exposed their bellies so often that their dismal performance has driven away any support they might have had. Stephane Dion has failed to provide leadership, he has failed to stem the tide of the weak minority re-shaping the nation to suit it's own agenda.

On a personal note, over the last year or two I have written a number of letters to Members of Parliament, Ministers and Senators. I have received detailed responses from Mr. Layton and the NDP, I have received the brush off and lies from Mr. Prentice and the PMO, I have received no responses whatsoever from my MP (to whom I have written more often than anyone). In fact, the only Liberal Party response to come in so far, is from a Senator. Senator Hervieux-Payette took the time to respond in detail to issues I raised concerning Bill C-10, no such response was forthcoming from the appropriate critics taking up space in the Opposition benches in the House of Commoms. This is not an issue of preception, it is an issue of performance. The Liberal Party has not shown an interest in doing the job of Opoposition, why on Earth would we entrust the greater responsibility of governing to them?

We've all seen the dismal display of the voting records and attendance of the Liberals in their supposed role as Her Majesty's Official Opposition.



Many of us are unlikely to forget Monsieur Dion and the Liberal's response (or lack thereof) to Bill C-484.

At this juncture, the country is best left as it is. The Conservative Party of Canada is in a de facto majority position, as they are operating unopposed. The Liberals are adrift, utterly ineffectual and there are no viable alternatives. Yet whilst the Liberals snipe at one another and there is a sense that the party ranks are jockeying for position, Dion continues to threaten that he might bring down Harper's government. Much as I would love to see the Conservatives faulter, fail and fall out of office, that will not happen. Any election in the near future will return a Conservative majority. If Dion and the Liberals think otherwise, they are simpletons and fools.

The Harper forces would love nothing more than an election. They are doing everything in their power to prompt a return to the polls. They would make the choice of potatoes on the Parliamentary cafeteria menu a confidence issue of they could.

Leadership is not the sole issue facing the Grits. There is a systemic reek of arrogance within the party that is made all the worse by their failure to do their jobs. Among the leaders in waiting, there is no-one that Canadians will rally behind. Ignatieff is neither liked nor trusted, Bob Rae will forever be tainted as the NDP premier who floundered and sank out of sight in Ontario, the man who generated the backlash that brought the much reviled Mike Harris to power. Failing the emergence of Justin Trudeau or a similar new face with sufficient charisma and strength to wash out the old, dirty players, there appears to be little more to hope for than a continued minority.

At this point the Liberals need to purge their ranks. The Conservatives were very, very successful in hanging the stink of Adscam and the sponsorship scandal around the neck of the Liberals. To date, that stink of corruption and entitlement has not been washed away. An imminent return to the polls would perform that purge in a most unpleasant manner. Stephane Dion, should he decide to bring down the Harper government, will go down in history as the man who presided over the decimation of the Liberal Party of Canada.

My solution to the Liberal malaise... have Dion step aside and draft Joe Clark as leader. Failing that or something equally audacious, we're doomed to their fumble fingered parody of the night of long knives. All of their protestations aside, the Liberals are in disarray. They need to clean out their ranks, pull up their socks and provide at least a semblance of vision and leadership.

One lump or two?

It’s the first annual CC-HQ “Be Polite Even if it Kills You Tea Party”. Our first topic for discussion today:

How badly do you think the BTs will lose this challenge and, more importantly, how quickly will they attempt to a) shift the goalposts on CC’s original challenge, b) reach new heights in weaselocity, and c) say they never agreed to anything in the first place?

Your excruciatingly polite thoughts in the comments. CC, milk or lemon in your tea? And PSA, be a darling and pass the cookies. Thanks ever so.

Come again, Steve?

Submitted for your ... edification?


Thanks for clearing that up, Stephen. I appreciate it.

DELICATELY-WORDED FOLLOWUP: I left a comment on that post by Bowman, and asked him quite directly what information he took away from Taylor's prose, and how he thinks Taylor answered his question. That was at least an hour ago and, not surprisingly, Bowman is being annoyingly slow at dealing with incoming comments.

Feel the love!

Or not.

Blogging Tories Short Takes, Mar 31, 2008.

Shorter Gerry Nicholls: "I'd like to take a scholarly and critical look at the Canadian military with respect to its historical treatment and denigration at the hands of Canada's liberals. Let's start with Hollywood."

Shorter Kate McMillan: "When it comes to examining the state of the American economy, I trust the nuanced and thoughtful perspective of Ferris Bueller's teacher."

Shorter JR: "I can't believe that survey didn't have a category for people who hate the environment. Why, the nerve!"

Shorter Frank Hilliard: "I've always had a soft spot for ruthless dictatorships that crush every form of public protest and dissent and ... hey! You darned kids get off my lawn!"

Shorter Ezra Levant: "But enough about me. Let's talk about me."

Oh ... so THAT'S how capitalism works.

Five Feet of Got a Quarter?™ Kathy Shaidle goes begging for sponsors, at which point -- in a demonstration of amusing irony -- progressive blogger Dr. Dawg throws a few bucks in the tip jar:


at which point, Kathy Shaidle shows her undying gratitude for someone willing to shell out some cash to alleviate her poverty:


I have to admit, this is a definition of "customer appreciation" with which I am unfamiliar.

DISCLAIMER: No genteel language was harmed in the making of this blog post on this, "Be Polite to People With Whom You Disagree Ideologically" Day.

T-minus 2 hours and 28 minutes ...

... And counting. So to all the mouthbreathing, CPoC, talking-point spewing, Kool Aid© drinking righttards - a very merry fuck you and fuck your mindless, compassion-free politics.

That is all.

"... and when she disses niggers, you just have to laugh."

Against all logic, someone named Paul clearly wants to get into Kathy's Spanx and figures sucking up is the way to do it:

Thanks so much, Paul. You're a sweetie!

Kathy Shaidle is one of my favourite writers. Her blogs are/were daily must-reads. Kathy is bitchy in the most wonderful way. She is sarcastic without being mean, she is vicious with a smile.

So we're wondering ... is making fun of fat kids sarcastic without being mean, or being vicious with a smile? I always get those two confused.

Free-market clusterfuck? No fucking shit.

You're not going to believe the recent revelation. No, really, you just won't:

Free-market thinking takes hit from US economic crisis

No way! Get the fuck outta town. Really?

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A deepening economic crisis has led to unprecedented actions by US policymakers that raise questions about how far government regulation should go in a free-market economy, analysts say.

The Federal Reserve, in addition to dramatically cutting interest rates, has opened up its massive reserves to Wall Street securities firms for the first time since the Great Depression in an effort to stabilize a jittery financial system.

This move, along with a Fed-engineered rescue of troubled investment giant Bear Stearns, raises the prospect of new supervision of Wall Street firms that had previously escaped regulators.

Well, fuck me gently and call me an altar boy ... who could possibly have imagined that fiscal irresponsibility on that scale might call for slightly stricter oversight? Did you see that coming? I didn't see that coming.

Allan Meltzer, a professor of political economy at Carnegie Mellon University, says the Fed agreement to guarantee 29 billion dollars in troubled Bear Stearns assets was a mistake.

"This action transferred potential losses from the market to the taxpayers," he said. "I do not believe the present system can remain if the bankers make the profits and the taxpayers share the losses."

But be careful here, kids; when it comes to pondering the inherent unfairness of big business privatizing the profit but socializing the losses, don't try that sort of logical analysis at home -- remember, Meltzer's a professional.

That’s quite the leap of logic.

Shorter Mike “Beware the Islamification of Feminism” Brock: I think Brenda Martin likes prison because now that Big Daddy and Canada’s New Government™ are finally paying attention to her, she’s being completely ungrateful. She just wants to have her cake and eat it too — and how bad could prison be if they have cake?

And furthermore. If I use Mike’s logic, then I could say that, based on his writing, I think he has no soul. After all, he appears to be just fine with Big Daddy and his merry band of Kompassionate Konservatives leaking a report to the press that refutes many of Martin’s claims because they’re taking some bad publicity on this whole mess (remember kids, accountability for thee but never for me). But that would be a stupid thing for me to say, wouldn't it?

... then there's "Don't Slam Your Head In The Oven Door" Day.

In honour of the various Canadian wingnuts and whackjobs who decided, for one reason or another, to negate any possible benefit of "Earth Hour" by simply being contrarian out of pure, childish spite, we here at CC HQ would like to designate May 1, 8-9 p.m. as "Don't Run Your Genitals Over a Cheese Grater" Hour.

You're responsible for getting your own cheese grater.

Sunday Funnies.

It’s not Monday yet ... so I thought we’d go with some classic yet oh-so-potty-mouthed Eddie Murphy.

Just for PSA …

Because he keeps kicking my ass over my music choices. I also happen to like this song.

Victory is mine! The mind-numbing assholitude of Kate McMillan.

First, let's check in on the non-retarded, to fully understand what happened in Toronto during Earth Hour:

Toronto hits energy target

As city powered down for Earth Hour, electricity demand shrinks about 8.7 per cent compared to a typical late March Saturday night

Now, go back and read, slooooowly, the most important part of the above (important bit emphasized for the hard of thinking):

electricity demand shrinks about 8.7 per cent compared to a typical late March Saturday night

Quite right -- the only way to judge whether Earth Hour had any effect is to compare the electricity consumption during that hour to what it would normally be. It doesn't matter if power consumption actually increased for that hour -- what matters is whether or not it increased as much as it normally would. Are you with me so far? Really, make sure you understand that point, so that we can genuinely appreciate the assholitude that is Kate McMillan:



And what do the non-stunned among you see in the data above? Why, yes ... the actual power consumption is noticeably lower than the projected (or normal) power consumption right around Earth Hour. A victory for folks who give a shit about the environment? Not so fast -- dumbfuck Kate is having none of that (emphasis added):

(Yes, I noticed the "projection". No dice, blackout boosters. The science is settled - any detected upward trend is a win in my column.)

And on that astonishingly misrepresentative basis, Kate declares "SDA Gets Results!".

"Canada's Bestest Blogger" Kate McMillan: Stupid, or dishonest? You make the call.

P.S. Yo, Catprint! How are things on your planet these days? Just curious.

AFTERSNARK: There's something seriously disturbing about this statement from "The Holocaust is a Hoot" Kate:

The science is settled - any detected upward trend is a win in my column.

Ignoring the fact that Kate is entirely out to lunch on the end result, what does it mean to say that "The science is settled?" What "science?" There was no scientific principle at stake here -- simply a bunch of folks who figured to turn off a bunch of lights and save some power. And regardless of whether or not it made a difference, nothing about "science" was ever at risk.

So it's not as if Kate is wrong with that statement, so much as she's simply spouting meaningless gibberish. No matter how Earth Hour turned out, science was never in any danger one way or the other. And it's that statement from Kate that makes me think she's lost it mentally, and has finally been reduced to writing illogical nonsense that has no semantic value whatever.

I mean, stupid and dishonest is one thing, but there really is a level below that that's even more frightening, and it looks like Kate's finally arrived. And, from here on out, I'm guessing this is not going to be pretty.

GOD ALMIGHTY, WHAT A FUCKING RETARD. Even when some of Kate's commenters try to explain the significance of "projected" vs "actual" power consumption, this is the breathtaking stupidity you get:


And around here, Kate, fucking retarded is fucking retarded. What a complete and utter twatwaffle.

Piety?

No, I don't think so.

Holy fuck, the Denyse O'Leary stupid!

It's not Monday yet, so I'm safe in pointing out how Canadian creationist cementhead Denyse O'Leary is being a total fucking retard yet again, with her latest spate of updates:

Update March 28, 2008 4:45 pm:

I was in a press conference a few minutes ago for the Expelled documentary (about scientists who are persecuted for questioning Darwinism and other materialist evolution theories).

"Persecution" which (we have already established) is utterly fictional. Movin' on, then.

Mathis confirmed that he kicked PZ Myers out of the film to make a point ...

And what "point" was that, Denyse, since by now we've heard at least six different excuses as to why PZ was booted, every one of those excuses contradicting the ones before it. There was no "point," Denyse, it was simply Mathis being an asshole. Next.

(Myers endorses the destruction of the careers of those who question Darwinism, yet he was really upset about getting booted from a film).

The first part of that is a lie and, furthermore, it has no logical connection to the second part. That's just Denyse being a complete retard.

I'm sorry ... I can't go on. The stupid is just overwhelming. I need to go lie down with a cold compress until my IQ recovers.

Just press play.

Come on ... you know you want to (it's completely midget-free, Frank, promise).



And, for your big fat information, THIS is girrrrllllll power. Not to mention one hell of a song, too. Which is something the Spice Girls wouldn’t know shit about.

Going dark now. Happy Earth Hour, kids, see you on the other side.

Oh. My. God.

Five Feet of Crazy™ has found a new way to beg for support ... I mean a new money-making venture to hump and it’s a winner.

Thanks for all the Top Spot luv, guys!
Wow, there's been an amazing response to my new ad format, the Top Spot link display at the right.

And why not? You get a highly visible link from my 3000 uniques/day blog for a whole week, for only $10!

If there's a delay in your order appearing, it won't be a long one. I have to approve the link requests before they appear.

If you get a good response traffic wise from your ad with me, I hope you'll consider making the Top Spot link an ongoing part of your traffic building plan.

And everybody else: please visit our advertisers! Thanks.

Only $10? What a bargain! No, really — as in bargain basement.

That’s just beyond sad. Would someone just give her a hat and a corner so she can finally get down to some serious panhandling? Come on, no more fucking around (it’s not Monday yet, so there), Five Feet. Put your begging where your endlessly blathering mouth is.

"Be Nice to a Dumbfuck" Day: 35 hours and counting.

Just think ... less than a day and a half until you're expected to be polite to total smegheads for a full 24 hours. And I've been asked about the actual rules, so here they are, for what it's worth.

Be civil. For a whole day.

That's it. What else were you expecting? You still have every right to shred someone's argument if they're being a dipshit but, rather than describe them as a "retarded hypocrite," keep it to "hypocrite." There's absolutely nothing wrong with accusing someone of hypocrisy if that's what they're doing. Make the claim, then back it up. Take stupid people out to the woodshed and paddle them soundly. Simply do it lovingly and methodically and politely.

And, if you're not sure, err on the side of caution. It's only 24 hours -- you can behave yourself for that long. And when it's over, we can all traipse over to check out the BTs and see how determinedly they ignored this, and how they continued to lie their faces off. Yes, it'll be great fun.

Next time, I'll bring cake.

Ezra, Ezra, Ezra …

Going after a blind man? Seriously? That’s a bit much, even for a narcissistic, hypocritical, professional victim with delusions of adequacy — like you, for example. One can hardly imagine how you could possibly top this shining example of your complete and utter lack of simple human compassion. Maybe you can write an entire post mocking the mentally disabled? Or the benefits of kicking puppies? Christ, the Right makes me sick.

Now go read the good Dr. Dawg line up Ezra’s ‘nads and soundly kick them about the blogosphere with not a swear word to be found.

Saturday Morning Cartoons.

Such an innnnnnteresting monster, too. My stars. If an innnnnnteresting monster can’t have an innnnnnteresting hairdo then I don’t know what things are coming to.



P.S. More coffee. More, more, more.

Being progressive means actually apologizing when you fuck up.

Now here's some irony. Very recently, progressive American blog ThinkProgress accused Sen. John McCain of lifting parts of a speech from someone else, in effect, committing plagiarism. Turns out they were wrong, for which ... oh, hell, let's just let you see how people with integrity handle it:

CORRECTION: As a blog that strives to maintain credibility and transparency, we would like to explain our mistake. When we were alerted to the tip that Adm. Ziemer gave a similar speech in 1996, we searched LexisNexis and McCain’s campaign site for whether the senator used the disputed phrases before that time. We did not find anything. After we published the post, the McCain campaign contacted us and pointed to a speech given by the senator in 1995, which appears on McCain’s Senate site. As soon as we were alerted to the error, we rushed to publish a correction. Once again, we regret the error, and we apologize for it...

UPDATE It appears that Ziemer's speech may have been plagiarized from McCain. According to the McCain campaign, the senator used these lines before Ziemer -- in 1995. We regret the error.

In short, TP initially suspected plagiarism, tried to refute it, didn't find any disconfirming evidence, went with it, found out they were wrong, and went public with that. Whoops, our bad, won't happen again, case closed, right?

Wrong:

Right wing rejoices over ThinkProgress’ mistake.

The right wing has been jubilantly celebrating the fact that ThinkProgress made an error in claiming John McCain had plagiarized a speech by Adm. Timothy Ziemer. Drudge, Weekly Standard, National Review, and Instapundit have all referenced our mistake. On its “political grapevine” segment this evening, Fox News reported our error as well. Fox host Bret Baier said, “The left-wing blog ThinkProgress has had to eat its words.”

I trust I don't have to explain the overwhelming irony here.

So, Kate ... how's that "handover" going? Uh oh ...

Among a number of other similarly-optimistic bits of utter fluff from last year, here we have Canada's Bestest Blogger™ Kate "Dead Jews are Teh Funny" McMillan being all chirpy and good-natured about the progress over there:

May 22, 2007

"One by one, the 18 provinces of Iraq are being turned over to the Iraqis"

Yes, yes, yes ... as they stand up, we'll stand down ... etc etc etc, yadda yadda yadda. So, Kate, how's that Iraqi independence and self-sufficiency working out these days? Well, shit (emphasis added):

U.S. Airstrikes Aid Iraqi Army in Basra

BAGHDAD — The American military conducted airstrikes Thursday and Friday to back up stalled Iraqi forces in Basra and battle Shiite militias in Baghdad as continued violence and political infighting worsened the prospects for any timely reconciliation among Iraq’s warring factions.

Although American officials have emphasized that the campaign in the southern port city of Basra is directed by Iraqi forces, the Iraqis have failed so far to wrest control of neighborhoods in Basra from Shiite militias and asked the Americans and British to step in. The Iraqi military does not have jet fighters.

So, to sum up, the U.S. forces are only there in an advisory capacity, if by "advisory capacity" you mean supplying advice one air-to-ground missile at a time. Now that's advice.

Well, isn't THAT just a knee to the happy sack?

Oh, this is delightfully delightful. Quickly now ... who do you think we're talking about here?

They are vehemently against abortion, they resist progressive woman's rights. They view homosexuality as a crime against nature and God, some advocate the death penalty as an option for it. Separation of Church and State is despised by these folks; they insist the nation is founded on the principles of their religion, and they work hard to bring that de facto theocracy about. They deplore strong language, gay characters, and sexual content on TV and in the media. And they ignore the Geneva Convention when it suits their ideological purposes, including provisions against torture or due process. They're anti-stem cell research, pro-creationism, and generally distrustful of science. These folks are easily whipped into a state of frenzy with ideological manipulation to the point where they will commit violence, or at least tacitly endorse that violence is acceptable, if it advances their Divine agenda. They then take great pains to justify that violence, including unprovoked attack of civilian areas, under certain conditions, with convoluted theological gymnastics. They are almost to the man pro-death penalty ...

Think you know? Heh ... the envelope, please.

Man, that's gotta be awkward.

P.S. Note that, while that original article is over two years old, it's only gotten truer since then.

They're so adorable when they're acting like petulant fuckwits.

Blogging Tory and The Politic's Matthew wants you to know just what he thinks of this whole "Earth Hour" campaign:

I plan on turning on every appliance and lighting fixture in my place: the first hour will be to rebuke some poor soul who thinks that sitting in the dark singing koombiya will somehow prevent polar bears from sailing on ice floats; the second hour will be for the power I’d normally use during the two hours anyway; the third hour is to use more electricity than would’ve been used if the self-righteous ecowarriors didn’t bemoan their poor Gaia’s condition to the rest of us to begin with.

You know, Matthew, a grown-up would have just said, "Thanks, but no thanks." That's what a grown-up would have done.

I'm just sayin'.

STMBSP. (Stephen Taylor must be so proud.)

AFTERSNARK: Speaking of Blogging Tory petulant fuckwits, ...

DEEP AFTERTHOUGHTS: There's something truly creepy about reading the comments on this topic over at Kate McMillan's Aryan Bar & Grill, where the majority of early commenters were quite unapologetic about how they were going to deliberately waste energy for the simple pleasure of showing those dirty, tree-hugging, Birkenstock-wearing, Prius-driving hippies what they can do with their "Earth Hour."

One has to wonder what kind of mean-spirited, vindictive personality it takes to do something that is, quite simply, an act of vandalism -- the deliberate destruction of someone else's efforts. But it's not just regular vandalism; no, what makes this doubly depressing is that it's pointless and personally costly vandalism.

One might at least understand if Kate's flying monkeys, in the act of undermining the whole concept of Earth Hour, at least got something out of it. But they don't, do they? There's nothing in it for them other than the thrill of wrecking someone else's work. It's the same infantile thrill they get out of freeping someone else's online poll to destroy whatever value it might have had. There doesn't have to be anything in it for them -- the enjoyment in ruining someone else's project is satisfaction enough for them. It's nothing more than walking by someone building a tower of cards and kicking it over because it pleases you. But it doesn't even stop there.

In fact, it's easy to see that that sort of vandalism actually costs. For the sheer sake of undoing whatever benefits might have been gained from Earth Hour, these people literally pulled out their wallets and paid real money to crank up their heaters, and turn on their lights, and light their barbeques, and run their vehicles pointlessly. For what? Because it pleased them. Fuck the environment, they said -- getting even is more important.

Grown-ups who weren't interested in Earth Hour would have simply said, "Sorry, not interested, thanks. But knock yourselves out." But these are not grown-ups we're dealing with here. Instead, they're some creepy form of sub-human whose only source of entertainment comes from the damage they can do to people they don't like, and from the pointless vandalism they can inflict. And the truly scary part of all of this?

These are the people who are currently running the country. Or hadn't you noticed?

No.

We don't want to hear from you yet again. We want you to shut up.

L’État c’est moi.

Big Daddy and Canada’s New Government™ prove, once again, that they really are incapable of playing well with others. If, you know, by others I mean the rest of the fucking universe (it’s not Monday yet!!).

Opposition members are furious that the Tory government has rescinded an invitation for them to take part in the NATO leaders summit, where the future of Canada's Afghan mission will be decided.

The Liberal, New Democratic and Bloc Quebecois defence critics were invited to accompany Defence Minister Peter MacKay to the meeting in Bucharest, Romania, next week.

The Department of Defence sent out the invitations, but then revoked them on Wednesday, saying that NATO had limited the size of the Canadian delegation.

A spokesman for the military alliance has denied a cap on delegates has been set.

Come on. If you’re going to lie about why you’ve pulled the invitations back, at least try put some effort into it. Christ, you’re politicians — lying is like breathing. But don’t worry, boys and girls, everyone’s favourite spokesbitch is on the case.

A spokeswoman for Harper insisted the delegation is a government one and not open to opposition members.

Sandra Buckler said there are some international meetings when opposition critics are "paired" with government minister, but this isn't one of them, even though invitations were issued.

"I absolutely can't explain what happened with that, but I can tell you that this is a government delegation and that on this trip there will be no pairing," she said Thursday.

*Cough Choke Cough* I’m okay, I’m ooooooookay ... just had a little trouble swallowing that last one. Sandra, I don’t want to say you’re lying — even if it’s something I’ve pretty much come to expect any time your lips are moving — but that’s a bit rich. Even for you.

"... and if it weren't for my trick knee ..."

Over at Blogging Tory Neo's place, Neo's remora fish detach themselves from his nether regions just long enough to bang out a blog post or two explaining how Neo roolz!!!

And yes, the statistics do tell a tale. Its even better when you take the proper Military demographic of young adults between 19 and 40 years of age and compare it to the same civilian demographic ( rather than the entire civilian population) Then you see the Military is way below all National averages for everything from road traffic accidents (for hours driven), drug use, smoking, drinking, spousal abuse, family violence, personal debt and several other statistics that the socialistas love to use to beat up on service people. The only thing the military are higher in is post traumatic stress...

And I'm guessing, perhaps sudden death by sniper fire or having various body parts detached and relocated elsewhere by roadside IEDs. But I'm guessing that was just an oversight. At which point, Lee pops by:

Right you are, kit.
Statistically, they are safer in Afghanistan than they are in Canada.
-Lee-

And yet, Lee, they're over there, and you're back here, no doubt pining for the relative safety of Kandahar City but sadly having to risk life and limb on the mean streets of Kapuskasing or something.

Drop me a note offline, Lee ... I'll set you up with the address of the nearest recruiting centre. No, no, don't thank me ... anything to rid Canada of another useless fuckwit, that's what I always say.

I like to think of it as voluntary community service.

Actual Blues

*Yawn* Clapton? He's got those pale lily white blues again? Sorry but Clapton hasn't had anything that resembled an edge since 1970. Dude's a technician. He reverse engineers the blues and for all of his studied tone and practiced licks, he just never had the fire. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce you to John Lee Hooker and Hound Dog Taylor. No bullshit here.

Once again, Igor ... the antidote.

Just lie quietly and take some Eric Clapton. You'll feel better.



Suck on that, POGGE.

The devil is in the details, isn't it, Kate?

Oooooooh ... smoking gun!

"Saddam Hussein's intelligence agency secretly financed a trip to Iraq for three U.S. lawmakers during the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion, federal prosecutors said Wednesday."

Depressingly, one doesn't even need to find a different link for refutation, as the very article Kate links to supplies the details:

Saddam Hussein's intelligence agency secretly financed a trip to Iraq for three U.S. lawmakers during the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.

Um, yeah, what's the deal with that "secretly" thing? What's up with that? Oh ...

The three anti-war Democrats made the trip in October 2002, while the Bush administration was trying to persuade Congress to authorize military action against Iraq. While traveling, they called for a diplomatic solution.

OK, diplomacy is good. If that had worked, maybe 4,000 members of the U.S. millitary would still be alive. But I digress. Onward.

Prosecutors say that trip was arranged by Muthanna Al-Hanooti, a Michigan charity official, who was charged Wednesday with setting up the junket at the behest of Saddam's regime...

The lawmakers are not named in the indictment but the dates correspond to a trip by Democratic Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington, David Bonior of Michigan and Mike Thompson of California. None was charged and Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said investigators "have no information whatsoever" any of them knew the trip was underwritten by Saddam.

"Obviously, we didn't know it at the time," McDermott spokesman Michael DeCesare said Wednesday. "The trip was to see the plight of the Iraqi children. That's the only reason we went."

And there we have it; apparently, none of the Dems realized who was behind the financing and were unaware of any connection to Hussein. Unlike, say, this guy:

Yes, that was so easy, it was almost unfair. So sue me.

IN HINDSIGHT, I'm not sure why I bothered with this. The nugget above is collected under one of Kate's "Reader Tips" posts. If I had received a similar tip, my only reaction would have been, "Yeah, so ... what's your point?"

I apologize. I will try to be snarkier and more informative in the future.

Thanks, Jonathan ...

... now I know.

P.S. Hey, Jonathan ... did you know? Well, now you do.

trust me?

Quickly, Igor ... the antidote.

Great Caesar's Ghost! After that bit of wretched Creed from my co-blogger PSA, you definitely need something to counteract the disease.



And, yes, I'll be taking PSA swimming with a brick for that. Bastard.

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

You absolutely would not believe this without the screenshot:


Yeah ... that's Blogging Tory "Neo Conservative" -- he of the "Wanda Watkins" pathological obsession -- off-handedly dismissing the significance of the deaths of Canada's military.

I don't have a punchline. Do you have a punchline? Dave? Thoughts?

P.S. If Stephen Taylor knows about this, he must just be crapping himself.

The "Canadian Dumbfuck Wanker Challenge." Part deux.

[Post-dated to hang around, so read it.]

Just in case you weren't sure about this challenge, I am, in fact, deadly serious, and I want you to take it just as seriously. Let me recap, if I might.

Canada's Retard-o-sphere (aka The Blogging Tories) are constantly pissing and moaning about how we leftists ... well, we progressives ... well, OK, me and my two co-bloggers ... are terrible, horrible, no good, very bad people because we use the kind of language normally reserved for late-night porn or private sessions between Father Murphy and little Billy in the confession booth long after the parishioners have fled the building.

Conversely, we on this side of the sanity line constantly accuse the BTs of being pig-ignorant hypocrites or just flat-out lying douchebags. Hence, this challenge, in which I want the members of Canada's progressive blogging commmunity to be calm, cool and collected for a whole 24-hour stretch, while everyone over there in the Wank-o-sphere tries to be honest for the same period.

So, let's hear it. I want to see comments from other progressives signing on, as well as links to this challenge from other blogs, just to prove that, yes, we are capable of spending a whole day simply addressing the issues in a mature and grown-up kind of way. And when that's over, we'll see just how well the other half did.

They can, of course, choose not to play, but if that's the case, they will no longer have any moral authority to bitch about our language, since we'll have earned the right to reply, "Fine. So we're rude, and you're pathological liars. The difference is, we can choose not to be rude when we feel like it."

So let's go. Let's see some comments from people willing to give this a shot, and let's see some links to get the word out. It's for only 24 hours, and I'm pretty sure you can afford to keep your inner asshole in check for that long.

I'm counting on it.

P.S. And try to keep the comments on-topic. I realize you folks love to free associate in that delightful, stream-of-consciousness, Joycean way but, just this once, try to focus. Surprise me.

P.P.S. By the way, holding your tongue for 24 hours doesn't mean simply stepping away from the keyboard. You still have to blog, and you still have to blog well, and you still have to subject stupidity and dumbassitude to mockery and ridicule. And if you want to do it with wicked wit and snark, that's cool, too. You just have to do it in a family-rated way, that's all.

Yes, please.

This so works for me:

Rice considering VP run?

Steve Clemons reports that this morning, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice attended Grover Norquist’s weekly conservative “powerhouse gathering” at Americans for Tax Reform. Although Rice denied running for office was part of her “political future,” one GOP operative was skeptical, noting that the only reason high-ranking officials go to the right-wing meeting is to “secure” their political positions:

Someone like Condi Rice doesn’t go to Grover Norquist’s den to talk about the Annapolis Middle East peace process. She’s going to secure her future in Republican politics and to position herself as a ‘potential’ VP candidate on the McCain ticket.

Oh, dear God, yes, let this come to pass. Because nothing could possibly make a John McCain presidency more appealing to hard-core conservatives than a black, female VP whose stunning incompetence killed 3,000 Americans.

Yeah, that's my fantasy ticket right there.

Crank It Up!!!

And Justice For All... Or Some Anyway

New Canada's New Government under the Steve Harper Party seems to have a little difficulty with that honesty stuff. Why it was only just the other week that they were fretting over how they could arrange to ignore and abandon a certain woman to her fate in a Mexican jail without looking too awful. Repeated and mounting calls for action from concerned Canadians were becoming troublesome. Reality is not allowed to reflect poorly on Maximum Leader (size plump). Something needed to be done and damn it, there just wasn't time to hire Decima to mount an opinion poll. What to do? Easy. Prevaricate.

So the brain trust gathered in the Steve Harper block of the Parliament building to concoct a response. Given the requirements of SPP and the deep integration of the North Americas, it wouldn't do to make the Mexicans upset. So after splashing about in the shallow end of the think tank, Stockwell Day emerged in one of his wet suits to declare that Canada couldn't advocate on behalf of Martin as that would be interfering in the judicial system of another sovereign nation. After all, gosh, that would be just icky. But just to play it safe they sent inept twat Helena Guergis to Mexico for drinks.

And because Stockwell Day is a man of integrity and consistency representing a New Government of North Star Values it should also be noted that he and the Steve Harper Party were also pleased to abandon Ronald Smith to face state sanctioned murder for his crimes in an American prison.

"We will not actively pursue bringing back to Canada murderers who have been tried in a democratic country that supports the rule of law," Day told the House of Commons on Thursday.

Given the Steve Harper Party's fealty to their masters in Washington, it wouldn't occur to them to note that our neighbours to the south no longer support the rule of law. They have abandoned Habeas Corpus, one of the fundamental underpinnings of the tradition of Common Law, dating back to the Magna Carta. They have adopted torture in defiance of the Geneva Conventions as a sanctioned investigative technique in the illegal, black site prisons to which they illegally render prisoners and abductees. They are in the grips of an unprecedented usurpation of their very Constitution by a rampant and tyrannical executive branch. Indeed, the Steve Harper Party wouldn't be questioning their masters, architects of this Neocon Utopia.

Yes friends, Stockwell Day is a man of honour, consistency and pure truth, so help me Jesus and the ride 'em cowboy dinosaurs. Why, you'll never catch Stockwell Day straying from the script, er, truth.

Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day personally asked senior Saudi officials on Wednesday to overturn a death sentence against a Montreal man.

A department news release said Day met in Riyadh with Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, Saudi deputy minister of the interior, and Prince Muqrin bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, head of the country's General Intelligence Presidency.

Well perhaps that interfering thing is okay once in a while. And let's not forget that while George W. Bush likes to kiss Saudi royalty on the mouth and go strolling hand in hand through the gardens, them stinking Ayrabs is one of the biggest competitors we have for the mighty petro-dollar. So interfering in their justice system is just a dandy plan. Oh look... shiny!

It seems to be a big week for Canadians getting out of foreign jails, whatever has Mr. Day been up to? A Montreal businessman, Saul Itzhayek, has been released from an Indian prison after ten months of incarceration for a visa violation in what appears to have been a case of entrapment by Indian authorities. Has Mr. Day been secretly roaming the globe interfering in judicial systems on the behalf of Canadians? Maybe not so much, after all.

Itzhayek's supporters, who include former Liberal justice minister Irwin Cotler, managed to give his case high-profile attention.

Oh. Can't be letting Liberals look good. That won't do, Stockwell honey, you just stay busy keeping us safe from non-Jesus films with your pal Charles McVety. This calls for some serious meddling.

Claims that Indian police tricked him into crossing the border from Nepal and then demanded a bribe moved Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier to raise the issue with their Indian counterparts.

Blessed ponies and rainbows, fat Steve himself was riding to the rescue with his sidekick Max. Step aside Stockwell, stand back people who actually give a shit, there's a Montreal vote or two to be won!

Despite Ottawa's high-level intervention, the Itzhayek family expressed frustration over government efforts to free him.

A Canadian consular official came to yesterday's hearing but Sylvia Itzhayek said none attended her brother's trial last October.

"They never wanted to be present before. They should have been present at the trial. I truly believe we may not have come to this point if they were at the trial."

Evil Liberals thwarted, fat Steve comes through with almost too little, almost too late. Fear not Canadians your fate is in the hands of the Steve Harper Party and they aren't sure they care. The lesson, get a prominent Liberal to advocate for you and they'll spring into action to make themselves look good. Unless you're imprisoned in North America, then business considerations out weigh your rights and the Canadian tradition of advocacy for justice for Canadians abroad.

Because you just need more dumbassitude in your life.

No idea if I've already linked to this but, if you've been following the PZ Myers/Expelled clusterfuck, you should simply try to quantify the amount of hideous dishonesty and/or pure retarditude in that article and its comments section.

Read it until you're done, or you're bleeding from the eyes. Whichever comes first.

BONUS DUMBFUCKITUDE, DENYSE O'LEARY FLAVOUR: As a recent update, here's Denyse being a total retard yet again:

Update March 26 2:04 pm: I have just been informed that further Expelled screenings have been cancelled for security reasons.

That excuse is total crap. There is no "security" issue that prompted the film's creators to cancel further screenings. I'm guessing Denyse has been fed yet another load of pre-digested, creationist pablum as to the fact that they had to deal with gate-crashers or uninvited guests or something to that effect.

And yet, it was Denyse herself who, at that same article linked to above, printed director Mark Mathis' rationale for turning away PZ Myers:

"You should know that I invited Michael shermer to a screening at NRB in Nashville. He came and is writing a review for scientific American. I banned pz because I want him to pay to see it. Nothing more."

Got that? Mathis' reasoning had nothing whatsoever to do with "security," and everything to do with being a childish fuckwit. And Denyse knows this -- she reproduced it on her own blog. And yet, she's now loyally promoting another in a long line of lies that contradict all the lies that she's happily reproduced earlier.

What a complete prat.

STUPID OR DISHONEST -- YOU MAKE THE CALL: Just for the fun of it, we have Denyse at that same link:

(While we are here, the Discovery Institute does NOT think that intelligent design should be taught in schools, only that arguments against Darwin's theory should be permitted.)

And then there's reality:

On October 21, the American Enterprise Institute sponsored a forum titled “Science Wars” that focused on the intelligent design/evolution controversy. Among the participants in the forum were the Chief Counsel of the Thomas More Law Center, Richard Thompson, and Mark Ryland, Director of the Discovery Institute’s Washington office.

During the course of the discussion, Ryland claimed that the Discovery Institute had “never set out to have school boards” teach intelligent design. He was swiftly corrected by Thompson, who held up a copy of the Discovery Institute’s “Intelligent Design in Public School Science Curriculum: A Guidebook” by Steven Meyer and David DeWolf Intelligent Design in Public School Science Curricula: A Legal Guidebook.

Seriously ... appallingly stupid or wretchedly dishonest? And do we even care anymore?

Catch the Olympic spirit!

Or, then again, maybe not. Sure, guys, let's give the Olympics to a repressive regime that's world famous for its violations of basic human rights. What could possibly go wrong?

Geez, Denyse, but you're a snivelly little turd, aren't you?

Lord, please stop the pathetic whining:

PZ Myers is really a nice guy?
O'Leary

Someone whose comment I rejected wrote to tell me that PZ Myers is really a nice guy in person. I don’t care, okay. I am entitled to take him at his word as provided in his posts …

Nope, not quite. Here, let me tweak that a bit ...

Someone whose opinion I don't give a shit about e-mailed to tell me that Denyse O'Leary is really quite well-read and intelligent. I don't care, okay. I am entitled to take her at her word as provided in her posts, that she's really a pig-ignorant, lying hack and scientific illiterate.

There you go. Much better.

Nothing personal, but fuck you.

I was going to post a recently-received link here but, given what's been going down the last couple of days, I thought PZ might need it more, so I sent it to him, and he ran with it.

(Wag of the tail to e-mailer E in MD for the link.)

Patrick Ross: Because patience is a virtue.

Once upon a time (not that long ago) and in response to this blog post of mine, University of Alberta student and Edmonton resident Patrick Ross (Hint, hint ... over here, Google!) figured he'd be devilishly witty and clever by posting another example of bogus equivalence:

The absolute atrociousness of white supremacists aside, you really just don't think these things through, do you?

Au contraire, Patrick Ross ... I believe it's safe to say that I think so far ahead that you have no idea what kind of train is about to run you over. So let me explain.

It's been amusing (but only on occasion) to watch "Nexus of Assholery" blogger Patrick Ross fume and sputter and rant inanely, mostly just making shit up and lying outrageously, when he isn't mangling the English language. But let me explain how Patrick has, at this point, so thoroughly fucked himself in a very long-term, career-wise kind of way. And without any help from me whatsoever.

See, as I understand it, Patrick is currently an undergraduate at the University of Alberta, where he is apparently taking (God help us all) sociology. And, as best I can tell, Patrick is having a ball these days. Hey, I remember my undergrad days -- ah, yes, good times, good times. And Patrick is obviously having fun, too, as my co-blogger PSA documented back here, where we learn that the 26-year-old Patrick is still heavily into debating who would win in a smackdown -- King Kong or Godzilla. Or something like that.

But mostly, Patrick has fun with his blog "Nexus of Assholery," at which he seems to want to give the impression of just what kind of kick-ass, fuck-you, he-man, unapologetic asshole he is. I mean, it's been that way from the very beginning, when Patrick introduced himself to the world:


Yes, that's some seriously deep thinking there, isn't it? And, sadly, not much has changed over the years, as Patrick has managed to make a total ass of himself on a number of occasions like, oh, this one. Yes, that was one for the books, wasn't it? And it was just one of many. But here's the thing that I've been leading up to.

See, I'm sure Patrick gets a real kick out of playing the tough shit, fuck you kind of guy so he can impress the 17-year-old undergrads over there at the U of A, but Patrick clearly hasn't thought all that far ahead. Because, against all odds, I'm guessing Patrick is going to graduate some day. And he's going to go looking for a job. And he'll apply to a company or three, and he'll send in a resume, of course, but ...

Yeah, you know where I'm going with this, don't you?

... but these days, HR personnel don't just take your word for anything anymore. It's not like the old days where they might call your references or ask around. No, these days, HR folks have a whole new weapon in their arsenal, don't they?

And it's called "Google."

And when those HR people get Patsy's resume, and decide to figure out what they can learn online about him, well, that's when the hilarity starts. Yeah ... only partway down the page ... Patrick and his "Nexus of Assholery." I'm pretty sure that's not going to score any major points in the HR office, is it? But I'm guessing it won't end there.

Having stumbled on that little nugget, I can see little Suzie HR's antenna stalks perking up as she starts to narrow her search. Oh, my. And at this point, little Suzie HR is off and running. A MySpace page? Oh, frabjous day, calloo, callay! What have we here? Heh heh ...


And, God help us, it just gets better, doesn't it?


And at this point, I can imagine Suzie HR, leaning out of her office and hollering down the hall, "Hey, you have got to take at look at this retard that just applied for a job here! OHMIGOD!! And he's got a mullet!!" Oh, yes, there will be all kinds of amusement, won't there? But I'm guessing Patrick has never thought this far ahead since, when I mentioned only a couple days ago how I was working up to giving him a savage smackdown, this is what he thought I had in mind:


Patrick, Patrick, Patrick ... you really are precious when you're being that retarded. Why on earth would I stoop to something that underhanded, sleazy and (most important) time-consuming? I have no need to lower myself to that level, for the simple reason that I'm so much smarter than you, there is simply no need.

In fact, Patrick, I don't really need to try to fuck you over for the simple reason that you've managed to do that all by yourself. While you've been getting off being a hypocritical, dishonest douchebag, you've also been leaving this indelible Google trail all over the Interwebz that not even a blind orang-utan could miss anymore. And trust me, HR people are way smarter than blind orang-utans.

And, finally, Patrick, I'm guessing that your first reaction is, no problem ... upon graduation, you'll just erase that blog and myspace page and everything will be cool, right?

Heh heh.

First, Patrick, HR people aren't that stupid -- they understand Google caching. But, more importantly, while you can erase your stuff, you can't touch the permanent record you've built up here. At my blog. And I guarantee that Google will find you here, especially if I regularly post "Patrick Ross" updates. I might even put together a Patsy Ross retrospective one of these days. You know -- a collection of your greatest (retarded) hits, as it were. With lots of Patsy-flavoured keywords to get Google's attention.

Which finally brings me to my wrap-up, where I explain that I have no intention of deleting any of Patsy's comments any more. The longer the Google trail, the better. But if something Patsy says here really irks you and you feel the need to respond, do me a favour and make sure you quote him in sufficient context. Because, since Patsy would still have the ability to delete his own comments, I still want a trail of what he wrote, so your quoting him in sufficient detail would be nice, thank you very much.

In closing, Patsy, there's only one of us here who didn't think this through very well. And, trust me, it wasn't me. Enjoy.

P.S. If Patrick doesn't think being a thoroughly public asshole can come back and bite you in the butt, he might want to chat with Kathy Shaidle, who's publicly whining about being unemployed these days, mostly I'm guessing because no one wants to hang out with such a vile, reprehensible bigot.

But I'm just guessing.

P.P.S. By the way, Patsy, I hope you appreciate the most beautiful part of this spanking, and that's that it doesn't involve anything that you haven't put in the public domain.

Track you down by your IP address? Send people to harass you? What on earth for, given that it's so much more satisfying to just hang you by your own words. Ironic, eh? Have fun trying to clean up your Intertoobs droppings, Patsy. It's not as easy as you think.

Isn't this interesting?

I realize that I’m just a potty-mouthed, conspiracy-theorist, left wing moonbat, but something about this just sets off my Big Daddy control freak spidey senses (emphasis all mine).

The RCMP is standing by its decision to pull crucial details from reports on Taser use, saying the police force is handcuffed by federal information law.

Sgt. Sylvie Tremblay says the Mounties released "all the information that could be provided" under the Access to Information Act.

A joint investigation by The Canadian Press and CBC found the Mounties are now refusing to disclose key information that must be recorded each time officers draw their electronic weapons. As a result, Canadians know much less about who is being hit with the 50,000-volt guns - whether they were armed, why they were fired on, and whether they were injured.

I wonder why I feel that way. It couldn’t have anything to do with the fact that the RCMP Commissioner, and career bureaucrat, William Elliott is rather cozy with Big Daddy? Nah, couldn’t be. But wait — it gets better.

Liberal and Bloc Quebecois MPs on a Commons committee studying Tasers have accused the RCMP of being too secretive. The Mounties say they correctly withheld information on the forms under provisions of the information law related to personal privacy and police investigations.

Information stripped from the forms includes details of several Taser cases the Mounties previously made public under the access law. Tremblay did not immediately address the question of whether the RCMP violated the information law in the past by revealing too much about Taser incidents.

A Canadian Press analysis last November of 563 cases between 2002 and 2005 found three in four suspects Tasered by the RCMP were unarmed. Several of those reports suggested a pattern of stun-gun use as a convenient means of keeping drunk or rowdy people in line, rather than to defuse major clashes.

It’s Big Daddy’s new motto ... transparency from thee but never from me.

"Expelled": The only thing you need to know.

Oh, Christ:

Before the film

Mathis came out before the film and told everyone that the showing was being projected from a laptop, and that on previous screenings this had caused the film to appear dark.

Must I go on? Seriously, do you need that kind of abuse?

Dear SUZANNE:

If you can tear yourself away from all that weepy fetus worship, here's a kid who could have used some protection from your Scriptural fellow travellers.

On the other hand, she was already born so who gives a shit? Isn't that the way it works?

And if you don't like Stephen Harper's principles, well, he's got others.

There was the original, principled stand (all emphasis added):

Ottawa has sent a diplomatic protest note [regarding current prisoner Brenda Martin] to Mexico. Norlock said Harper was considering the best way to help Martin, but worried about meddling in Mexico's justice system.

Well, that didn't last long:

An Indian appeal court upheld Mr. Itzhayek's conviction [for a visa violation] on Tuesday, but reduced his sentence to the time he had already served.

Claims that Indian police tricked him into crossing over from Nepal and then demanded a bribe moved Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier to raise the issue with their Indian counterparts.

But I'm guessing they'd rather not use the word "meddling." It's such an ugly word, don't you think?

Today’s Mesopotamia West Stupid.

Shorter Frank: Trudeau’s Official Languages Act of 1969 is to blame for everything that’s wrong with Canada today from Mounties wearing turbans to sex slaves and child brides and polygamy and teh Moooozlimzzzz!!1!11!!!11!!!!

No, I’m not kidding.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Dear Bible-whomping, "pro-life" pharmacists: Fuck you. No, seriously, fuck you.

JUST TO BE CLEAR, while I like the general decision here, I'm still miffed that these pious yobs still have the legal right to direct customers elsewhere, including (if memory serves) to other pharmacies. That doesn't really help someone who's in a rush, is on their lunch hour, has a bunch of errands to do, and is then told, "I'm sorry, but you'll need to fill this at the other pharmacy across town because my God doesn't care for slutty whores like you."

Keep it simple: Do your job, or get out. I like that plan.

Expelled: The adventure continues.

Read all about it here, since you sure as hell will never get the truth here.

AFTERSNARK: I realize this question is hideously rhetorical, but does anyone think that ignorant creationist windbag Denyse O'Leary is going to mention any of the above? The creators of that wretched Expelled movie are drowning in an ocean of transparently obvious lies, and Denyse sails blissfully on, happily ignoring whatever doesn't fit in with her caramel-coloured, tangerine tree view of the universe.

When it comes to picking on the intellectually unarmed, Denyse O'Leary can only aspire to be low-hanging fruit some day.

LuLu calls bullshit, and the "ick" factor.

Back here, she-of-the-boots LuLu wrote of sanctimonious scold Suzie All-Caps and her gratingly pious and hypocritical friends:

And SUZANNE and her merry band of fetus-fetishists? I guess they’re too busy trying to save the fetuses which are sooooooo much more important than actual live children.

Not to toot mine own horn, but I thought I explained the psychological driving force behind utter frauds like Suzie here:

Yes, for the "pro-life" crowd, fetuses are kind of like new cars -- delightfully adorable as long as they're still in the showroom with the price tag hanging off of them but, once you drive them off the lot, well, the novelty of newness wears off and the requirement for regular maintenance kicks in and then it's just not that much fun anymore, is it?

Pre-born and safely out of sight? Whoo hoo! Post-born and suddenly needing actual care and attention? Oh, man, now you're just harshing someone's mellow. And we can't have that.

Yes, it really is that simple -- fetuses are cool because they're safely out of sight and you can talk about them in the abstract and you can worship them incessantly without getting your hands dirty and, quite simply, there's no "ick" factor.

And it's why fetus fetishists like SUZANNE can speak tearfully about the unborn, while still not giving even the tiniest shit about growing child poverty; because if you got concerned about child poverty, then you might have to actually, you know, see what it's about ... and look at pictures of it ... and maybe even (God forbid) meet some poor children, and that would be just, you know, icky.

It's the same kind of psychological damage that drove fakers like SUZANNE to protest day after day outside of Terri Schiavo's room, wailing about the sanctity of human life in front of the ever-so-convenient TV cameras, after which they quietly packed up and went home, not giving a fuck about the other 30,000+ people in the U.S. who were in a similar medical condition to Schiavo because those poor fuckers weren't surrounded by reporters 24/7 so what's the appeal in that?

It's the crippling mental deficiency that spurs hacks like SUZANNE to bleat tearfully about non-children, while blissfully ignoring real tragedies like, oh, this and being delightfully unconcerned about living children like this.

Understand something -- phonies like SUZANNE don't actually care about the unborn. Never have, never will. What they care about is whatever cause will allow them the occasional appearance in print or on TV where they can fake as much sincerity as they want, while still allowing them to dress fashionably and attend the more stylish cocktail parties and mingle with other equally phony hypocrites.

And, most importantly, what they care about is a cause that allows them to not have to actually touch anything with their hands, which is why they will never, ever, ever be equally concerned about child poverty, or the homeless, or the chronically ill, or AIDS hospice patients or anything of the sort. Because those things are icky. And worthless, hypocritical, pious frauds like SUZANNE don't do icky.

Because icky just doesn't go with a good Cabernet, know what I'm saying?

Dear Kate:

Oh, look:

Slab of Antarctic ice shelf collapses amid warming

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Satellite images show that a large hunk of Antarctica's Wilkins Ice Shelf has started to collapse in a fast-warming region of the continent, scientists said on Tuesday.

The area of collapse measured about 160 square miles of the Wilkins Ice Shelf, according to satellite imagery from the University of Colorado's National Snow and Ice Data Center.

In the spirit of fairness, Kate has a picture of a thermometer.

You were saying, Catprint?

I call bullshit.

When I called for this blog burst, I had no idea how much I would struggle with it. I start out relatively calm and then I can feel myself getting angrier and angrier as I dwell on the catastrophic hypocrisy that is the so-called “Pro-Life” movement. So once again, I’m left with only questions.

Why is it that SUZANNE and the fetus-fetishists only show concern for unborn children? Why do they never whine and cry and protest for children already born? Where is their concern for children living in poverty? Or for child trafficking? Or for disease, disability, lack of access to clean water, adequate health care, safety from abuse? Does any of this make an impression?

And this isn’t a problem confined only to the third world — it’s happening right here in Canada. If you visit Campaign 2000’s web site, you’ll find the following troubling statistics:

Campaign 2000 has released the 2007 Report Card on Child and Family Poverty, revealing that 18 years after the 1989 all-party resolution of the House of Commons, the child poverty rate is exactly the same. Despite a growing economy, a soaring dollar and low unemployment, Statistics Canada data show:
• 788,000 children – 11.7% - live in poverty
• A job alone is not enough. 41% of low-income children live in families where at least one parent works full-time all year, and the family still lives in poverty.
• The risk of living in poverty is not the same for all children. Poverty hits children in racialized, First Nations and recent immigrant communities much more often.

And SUZANNE and her merry band of fetus-fetishists? I guess they’re too busy trying to save the fetuses which are sooooooo much more important than actual live children.

So I call bullshit, even though it won’t make any difference. These people, these supposed compassionate conservatives, wouldn’t know compassion if it jumped up and bit them on their smug, judgmental, pathologically dishonest asses. And they never will.

Surprise, surprise. And here's Susie All-Caps now, proving my point oh-so perfectly. Does anyone else find it just the tiniest bit Freudian how she keeps referring to a fetus in the masculine?