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Man, this sure paints a rosy picture, don't it?
Prime Minister Stephen Harper met today with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul, Afghanistan. The two leaders discussed the challenges Afghanistan faces in achieving its objectives of rebuilding a free, democratic and peaceful country.
President Karzai expressed his gratitude for the support Canada has offered Afghanistan. Prime Minister Harper offered his congratulations on the significant progress already made and reiterated Canada’s unwavering commitment to the people of Afghanistan.
Yeah, about those "people of Afghanistan" and that "commitment":
Afghan Women Still in Chains Under Karzai
Kabul’s central jail holds female prisoners whose only ‘crime’ is their refusal to be second-class citizens
Well, I'm sure that, given Stephen's unwavering commitment to freedom, rights and democracy, he's going to have some harsh words for Karzai on this issue and ... and ... um:
NDP MP Irene Mathyssen points out that while the Cons may not have taken up the reactionary call for a direct frontal attack on Status of Women Canada, they're pushing SWC programs out of business by conveniently ignoring funding applications:
OK, maybe they'll just talk about football.
THIS IS ALMOST TOO EASY, as commenter "neo conservative" whips out his trusty six-shooter and neatly blows off several of his toes:
If you're gonna be a dufus, might as well be a world famous one.
The BBC's Lee Carter in Toronto says Mr Karzai will not be meeting the leader of the New Democratic opposition party, Jack Layton, who has called for Canadian troops to be withdrawn from their combat role in Afghanistan.
Mr Layton said that despite repeated attempts to set up a meeting with the Afghan president, none was scheduled.
Under the circumstances, then, this has to suck:
Afghan Leader To Meet With Layton Today
This is the day N-D-P leader Jack Layton finally gets to meet with the Afghan president.
He'll sit down with Hamid Karzai in Montreal to discuss their opposing views on the Canadian military mission in Afghanistan.
I'm guessing there's a reason "neo conservative" calls his blog the Halls of Macadamia, but to spell it out would be just cruel. So I won't.
Think nuttin' of it.
Gosh, aren't I adorable when I'm right? Back here, I warned you about the possibility of a supposedly non-partisan "support the troops" rally turning ugly (and by "ugly," I mean Conservative.) Lo and behold:
Although billed as a non-partisan rally, Mr. Harper used the occasion to slip in a not-so-subtle jab at NDP Leader Jack Layton, who has called for the withdrawal Canadian troops from the combat portion of the mission.
"Friends, I believe you cannot say you are for our military and then not stand behind them in the great things they do."
I'm guessing that Stephen didn't go on to say that dead troops were, in fact, a good thing. That might have seriously harshed the mellow all around.
Apparently, someone's had quite enough of the lies.
AWWWWWWWW ... Fox News is so cute when they get bitch-slapped around the room and now have to spin like crazy.
AND THE FURIOUS BACKPEDALING BEGINS. Over at Fox, the main page promo for the Clinton interview now reads, "Strong Reaction." Jeezus, that network can be more infantile than the Blogging Tories. If that's even physically possible.
Many years ago, I was reading the transcript of a debate between a biologist and a young-earth creationist (whose names, mercifully, escape me at the moment since neither of them did a particularly stellar job). Not surprisingly, during each man's presentation, their respective supporters in the audience would applaud wildly whenever they thought a point was scored.
During their summations, the creationist pulled a bit of a fast one when he stated (and I'm paraphrasing), "In the end, it's all about wanting the best possible science education for our children. So those people who are here this evening, if you support quality science education, stand up and show it."
Oh, that was clever.
What the creationist did was a well-known and sleazy kind of "bait-and-switch." Naturally, everyone there was prepared to say that they were in favour of good science education (based on how they defined it, of course.) So it wouldn't be at all surprising if the creationists in the audience immediately leapt to their feet and applauded madly.
But what about the supporters of biological evolution? What were they supposed to do? Of course they supported good science education but, if they had stood as well, there's no doubt that that gesture would have been re-interpreted after the fact as overwhelming, bipartisan support for the creationist speaker.
More recently, this bait-and-switch trick in public discourse has been on spectacular display south of the border. See, if you publicly "support the troops," then that support is repackaged as if it were support for the Bush administration. And if you disagree with King George and his minions? Well, then, clearly, you don't support the troops. I'm sure you can see how this works by now. Which brings us to "Wear Red Day," and the latest incarnation of right-wing, bait-and-switch sleaziness.
Canada's wankers would, naturally, have you believe that wearing red is to show support for "the troops." But does anyone actually believe that? Let's consider the evidence, shall we, once again stealing from Mark C. since he's such a delightful source of wanker silliness. As Mark quotes:
Hundreds of military spouses, family members and others are expected to rally on Parliament Hill tomorrow in response to a “Wear Red” campaign launched by family members of soldiers at the CFB Petawawa who last month began a six-month tour of duty in Kandahar, Afghanistan.
Now there's the first hint that something devious is up. See, it's not just a "wear red" thing, is it? No, what's happening is a rally on Parliament Hill, where it's going to be irresistibly tempting to portray that mass of humanity as showing their support for the Harper government and its policies after the fact. I mean, be honest -- if you were in charge, could you resist the potential PR bonanza?
What? Me, a conspiracy theorist? Perhaps. So let's give Mark C. the last word and let him dispel any doubts, shall we?
Actually there are likely to be thousands and most will be "others", i.e. ordinary civilians like my wife and me. National Defence Minister O'Connor, Gen. Hillier and perhaps Prime Minister Harper will speak.
Well, how about that? A patriotic rally on Parliament Hill to ostensibly "support the troops" and, gosh darn it, what a coincidence that some prominent members of the CPoC could "perhaps" show up to speak and get some serious media face time. And how could you blame them? All that patriotic emotion in one place -- what a great photo op, and a chance to spin it later as PM Stephen Harper and his cronies basking in the adulation of the worshipping masses. And not a Liberal or Dipper or Green to be seen up on stage, at least not according to Mark C. Life doesn't get any better than that, does it?
And remember -- you read it here first.
P.S. If Canada's military have an ounce of sense, they'll have a recruiting table there. 'Cuz it's always easy to talk the talk, know what I'm sayin'?
DING DING DING ... We have a winner. Thank you, thank you very much. I'm here until Thursday. Try the veal.
Shorter H. Cameron: "Next thing you know, those broads are going to want to vote. Where does it end?"
YOU KEEP USING THAT WORD "FREEDOM" ... From the comments section over here, we have Canadian right-wing he-man Brent Colbert, getting all freedomy on us:
Show your how much you support our troops by sending in your photos of you wearing red and enjoying the freedoms that they are fighting for.
Although, by "freedom," Brent isn't actually counting the freedom of women in Canada to make equal pay, participate equally in Canada's social, cultural and political life and, you know, not get slapped around by abusive husbands or boyfriends. That kind of thing just doesn't make for good TV and, when it comes to Canada's wankers, it's all about the sound bite, ya know?
Shorter Mark C.: "I'm outraged that some people wouldn't support the troops."
Shorter PM Stephen Harper: "Dead troops. Mmmmmmmmm ..."
There's a fine line between irony and hypocrisy.
It doesn't take much to get unhinged Catholic Kathy Shaidle all cranked up:
UK: 6-year-old burned to death in "honour killing"
"Alisha's brother, 21-year old Abdul Hamid, had been seeing a teenaged girl, Meherun Khanum, since the end of 2005. Meherun was the sister of Hussein Ahmad. When her family found out about the relationship, a threatening phone call was made to Abdul on Thursday, March 9, warning him to stay away from the 15-year old girl.
"The following day, the arson attack took place, shortly before midnight."
The two accused men deny the charges.
The little girl was trapped in her bedroom and suffered burns over 95% of her body. She died in hospital the next day.
Oooooh oooooh ... can I play, too?
Religiosity Common Among Mothers Who Kill Children
Andrea Yates said Satan told her to drown her five children.
Deanna Laney said the Lord sent her signs to beat her three sons with stones.
And the night before Dena Schlosser became the latest Texas mother to take her child's life, she told her husband she wanted to give her children to God. The suburban Dallas mother was charged with capital murder for severing her 10-month-old baby's arms. Attorneys were expected to discuss her competency in court Tuesday.
Women who kill their children commonly cite God, the devil and other religious influences for their actions. Although the mothers are also often found to be severely mentally ill or psychotic, the recurring theme of religiosity begs the question: Is religion to blame?
Theologians, sociologists and psychiatrists generally say no. They say religiosity is a common theme among psychotics because hallucinations and delusions usually take familiar forms.
Your move, Kathy.
Well ... this is a novel way of looking at it:
Opposition members are demanding that Prime Minister Stephen Harper explain what he meant when he said during a television interview that the lives lost in Afghanistan may have strengthened the Canadian military.
"This is the first time in some time that Canada's moved to the front lines of a peace-and-security operation, and I think it's really sinking into us all how difficult that is and what that really means," Mr. Harper said during an interview with CBC televised Monday night.
"At the same time, I can tell you it's certainly engaged our military. It's, I think, making them a better military, notwithstanding, or maybe in some way because of, the casualties."
In the same way, I suppose, that killing off a few Conservatives might make them a stronger political party.
I'm sure that analogy breaks down somewhere.
The hilarity here is, I'm sure, entirely unintentional:
The Toronto Star, in a truly disturbing display of economic illiteracy, advocates for a major increase in the minimum wage on the grounds that it will help the poorest members of society. By which they mean killing off thousands of jobs.
I expect this sort of flabbergasting economic reasoning from undergraduate political science students who think "economics" is some isolated "thing" you can massage and mould like a lump of clay. I don't expect it from the editorial board of a major Canadian newspaper.
This message dissing poor people brought to you by Aaron Lee Wudrick, undergraduate law student.
UH OH ... Poor Aaron seems to be getting dangerously deep into mindless hero worship here:
Difficult to find time to post lately, school is very busy - but the Prime Minister is in New York to speak to the UN tomorrow, and tonight spoke to the Economic Club of New York, and gave what I considered to be an outstanding speech.
Whatever you may think of his policies, this man looks and sounds like a statesman, and projects Canada as a strong country, with clearly defined principles and objectives.
I'm guessing it's only a matter of time before Aaron descends entirely into Hinderakeritis. I'm guessing it won't be long. I'm guessing we should start a pool.
Over at My Blahg, Robert discusses the notion that even the North American neo-con whackjobs understand that they'd probably come out on the short end of a real "religious war." To which one can properly respond ... well, duh.
I mean, when the "enemy" is quite prepared to sacrifice suicide bombers but the best we can expect out of our Bible-thumping cheerleaders is that they're prepared to put on something red and hang out for the cameras for a while, well, I'll take the foreign extremists and the point spread, know what I'm sayin'? But that's missing the larger picture.
It's not the foreign Islamogothiextremojihadifarians that worry me. It's these lunatics. Make no mistake -- the foreign religious loons concern me. They give me reason to be wary. But the local religious Christopaths? They scare the crap out of me, because they're the Scripture-spouting idiots who do shit like this.
When it comes to the foreign nutjobs, maybe we can protect ourselves against explosives and rocket-propelled grenades and suicide bombers. But the homegrown ones? They have a much more evil agenda -- they want to totally fuck us over from the inside.
These are the clinically-insane devout, who want to expunge actual science from public school classes and replace it with fundamentalist Christian drivel. These are the yahoos who want to curtail womens' rights, and gay rights, and want to change the law so that they have the right to deny service to anyone who doesn't quite measure up to their moral standards.
Swarthy, middle-Eastern extremists with shoe bombs, I can deal with. But that doesn't begin to compare with the fear I feel when I imagine vicious, ignorant dingbats like this possibly running the country.
Suddenly, the Islamojihadifarians don't seem like such a big problem anymore.
P.S. It's not just that the homegrown religious warriors seem bent on trashing Canada from a human rights point of view -- they're also just plain stealing our money.
Consider the recent giveaway of almost half a billion dollars of softwood lumber money to the United States. The Canadian wankersphere would have us all believe that this was a small price to pay to get a "deal." But ask yourself a simple question -- would the CPoC have been as accommodating if it had been President Al Gore in the White House and all that money would have been going into Democratic coffers to be available as a completely unaccountable slush fund for the next U.S. federal election?
Don't make me have to answer that for you, OK?
Since I happen to be in Toronto for the next few days, I'm up for a beer or six at the end of the week. I wonder what that Zorpheous low-life is up to ...
Blogging Tory "Kerplonka" explains what gets his Underoos in a bunch:
I just finished a "revisionist" account of the Marshall Plan. Someone smash my head in with a cinder block so I can stoop to the level of intelligence needed to believe this bullshit.
Yeah, historical revisionism. Dontcha just hate it when that happens?
That's so cute -- Blogging Tory Michael Hussey is playing the game "Six degress of separation."
Aw, come on, Mike -- you can do better than that. Here, I can name that tune in one note:
You'll forgive me for revisiting the topic of a very recent post but, honestly, there are reasons why reading Canada's wankers makes me want to dig out my frontal lobes with an ice pick.
Exhibit A today is one Aaron Unruh from the right-wing blog "The Politic", whose infantile whining is exceeded only by his teeth-gnashing dishonesty. Or maybe stupidity -- I always have trouble telling those two apart.
Let's begin at the beginning of Unruh's screed, shall we?
New Brunswick: The Liberals Steal One
See how that works? The Conservatives win elections, while the Liberals steal them. Only six words in, and Unruh is already knee-deep in assholitude and wading deeper by the sentence.
Congratulations to New Brunswick Liberal leader Shawn Graham who has eked out a miniscule win tonight.
Whoops, let me start over. The Conservatives have electoral victories, while the Liberals "eke out miniscule wins." A miniscule win being, I'm guessing, somehow not as valid as a massive, landslide kind of win, even if it is a majority, which the Conservatives didn't get in the last federal election. Oh, sorry, I probably shouldn't have mentioned that -- I'll bet that's still a sore spot with Aaron, given his childish petulance these days. But I digress. Onwards and upwards.
Even with a recent redistribution that blatantly favoured the Liberals, Graham failed to get more votes than Bernard Lord.
Translation: Whine, whine, whine, bitch, moan, statement of obvious fact that everyone already knows. And the capper:
Luckily, the electoral system came to Graham’s rescue and he won despite that most New Brunswickers voted for his opponent.
Translation: More snot-nosed bitching and moaning, followed by blatantly false claim. What's that, you say? Why, yes, Aaron is simply full of it, since the very article he links to shows the overall election results as Conservatives: 47.65%; Liberals: 47.00%. Which, as I'm sure even Pete Rempel might appreciate, means that most New Brunswickers emphatically did not vote for "[Graham's] opponent." So how could anyone write something so stunningly idiotic? Oh, the fun is just beginning.
Immediately below Aaron's original posting, we have the disclaimer:
Edited to deal with a silly objection.
It was? Where? It's annoying enough that Aaron disses the objection as "silly," even as he admits that he has edited his posting to deal with it. But what's the change?
Even the most cement-headed of bloggers generally accept that, if you modify your original posting in any significant way to change its inherent meaning, you have a moral or ethical obligation to point out what that change was. And yet, in Aaron's piece ... nothing. No overstrike. No deletion. No hint to the reader as to what's been quietly altered so he might not look like such a total dick. No hint, that is, until you get to "Balbulican"'s first comment:
“he won despite that most New Brunswickers voted against him.”
Gosh, not unlike that other dude…what was his name…Hacker? Herpes? Whorepurr?
Whoa, hold on there. Balbulican's quote most certainly does not match Aaron's current text, does it? In fact, one can safely say that the quote Balbulican is reproducing is actually, technically correct -- more people did vote against Graham than voted for him. So what? That's the way Canadian elections work. As Balbulican points out, it's exactly what happened with the CPoC in the last election.
And yet, we see that those are not the words in Aaron's piece at the moment. Is this what he quietly changed based on a "silly objection?" And changed, I should point out, to now be totally wrong.
"The Politic"s Aaron Unruh: Because there is clearly a shortage of right-wing stupidity north of 49 and, besides, even Pete Rempel needs someone to feel intellectually superior to.
Over at My Blahg, Robert has a short piece on the latest bit of petulant childishness on the part of the CPoC:
The Geological Survey, along with presumably the rest of the offices in the Canadian government, was sent a memo requiring them to stop saying they worked for the government of Canada, or the Canadian government, or anything sensible like that. Instead, they were to leave no letterhead untouched, changing all references to “The New Government of Canada”.
Yes, it's breathtakingly immature and self-indulgent but let's not get too carried away. Be patient. If the Liberals can eventually get their shit together in time for the next election and hand the CPoC their asses on a plate, then those Liberals can do likewise and issue an official edict, changing all government letterhead to read "Canada's Governing Liberals: The grownups are back in charge."
Or something equally amusing.
Honestly, some days it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps. Driving around Waterloo this morning and caught snippets of an interview on CBC Radio (89.1 FM locally) that started at 9 a.m.(?), involving a female interviewer who redefined the concept of "airhead."
Referring to the recent pissing contest between Catholicism and Islam and Pope Ratzo the First's indelicate bitch-slapping of the latter, the interviewer first altered reality by claiming that His Popeliness had already "apologized" for his remarks. No, sweetie -- he hasn't. Deal with it. A few minutes later, a male guest took fantasy even further by claiming that the Pope had apologized "three times already." Aaaargh. (Sound of forehead banging on keyboard.)
But the best was yet to come, as the conversation turned to what the Pope was "really" trying to say, and that he was just pointing out the dangers of "irrational faith." Excuse me? Irrational faith? As opposed to what? Rational faith? As in, based on reason? I'm sorry -- when did that product suddenly appear on store shelves?
Please, someone tell me there's a transcript of this idiocy somewhere. 'Cuz I just don't get enough indescribable stupidity in my life these days.
It's always fun to see which principle the citizens of Wankerville choose to sell out each morning. Over here, Jean-Francois celebrates:
NB Liberals Win!!
FREED! FREED AT LAST! THANK YOU, THANK YOU!
To which The Politic's Aaron Unruh, apparently misunderstanding the concept of democracy, snipes:
Congratulations. Got fewer votes than the Tories. The Liberals steal another one.
Uh, right. Losing the popular vote while still winning the election. That'll piss off a wanker faster than anything, won't it?
I think we can all agree on the problem here:
Calling for the Pope's execution
That's the ticket for a world-class religion which professes itself to be peaceful: let's kill anyone who insults Islam - or whom muslims percieve as having insulted Islam...
Uh-huh.... real mature and sophisticated: "We don't like what you said, so we'll kill you." Now tell me how we're supposed to take Islam seriously if its public face and voice in the West preaches barbarism?
Exactly. You know what those bloodthirsty, barbaric Muslim whackjobs need? A good role model, that's what:
After the September 11 attack masterminded by a terrorist hoping to spark a religious war, virtually every official and pundit knew better than to take the bait. Except for conservative commentator Ann Coulter, who wrote in a syndicated column on September 12 that in responding to terrorists "we should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity."
Um ... OK, that was a bad example. Let me get back to you about this.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, of the Narcissistic Psychopaths for Lieberman Party, makes an interesting observation on Afghanistan:
“A lot of people want to fight the other war [in Afghanistan], the one we’re not involved in.”
Uh ... come again? The war that you're "not involved in?" Dude, you broke it, you can at least help fix it, know what I'm saying?
Canada's own Crazy-Assed Racist Redneck™ is just so adorable when she takes on logic and bludgeons it bloody with a tire iron:
Having come to agreement that "need" is the threshold for a citizen's right to own a firearm, the discussion is ready to move forward.
Announce to your friend that you are ready to accompany them to their home. You will begin with an inspection of the kitchen, and from there, will work your way through their house, tagging each possession you believe they do not need in "today's world".
Don't forget the garage.
There's no logical reason to limit the inspection to possessions that pose a threat as weapons. With the consequences that await society from global warming, and the alarming increase in energy consumption, those homes with a television in every room, two cars in the garage, and appliances of pure convenience - food processors, cappuccino makers - cappuccino makers! - must come under review.
Kate has a point. I can't count the number of times I've fantasized about launching an attack on a local synagogue, armed only with a seething, anti-Semitic rage and my fully-loaded, semi-automatic Presto Salad Shooter. I now understand why those people look on me and my coffee grinder with such fear -- they know what's coming, and they're powerless to prevent it. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
P.S. Currently, we have an uneasy truce, what with those people and their automatic Matzo ball makers. But I'll be watching them. Those Jews are a sneaky, sneaky people.
I swear, this is what happens when Daddy turns his back for just a minute and The Politic's little Georgie Freeman grabs the keyboard:
Pope Benedict apologised today ...
Um, no ... no, he didn't. If we follow the link, he certainly started out in a promising way:
Pope Benedict XVI said Sunday that he is "deeply sorry" his remarks on Islam and violence offended Muslims ...
But, sadly, an actual apology wasn't forthcoming:
While Benedict expressed regret his speech caused hurt, he did not retract what he said or say he was sorry he uttered what proved to be explosive words.
Yeah, that's kind of the important part right there, isn't it? Being sorry for what you actually said, not for the way people reacted to it. Sort of like this.
I'd comment further on the contention by the leader of the Catholic Church that "violence is not compatible with faith" but I'm too busy clawing my eyes out at the moment.
SHORTER POPE RATZO THE FIRST: "Um ... that wasn't me, that was my evil twin Skippy."
As God is my witness, I would never stoop to such sleazy tactics. I'm sure even a Blogging Tory could understand that.
There was this:
Accused of lacking leadership as Canadian hosts of an international HIV/AIDS conference, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government has cancelled related policy announcements "while the issue is so politicized."
Then there was this:
Prime Minister Stephen Harper says this is not the time to start discussing how the Montreal college shootings might have been prevented.
He says all the facts aren’t in yet from Wednesday’s attack and it’s too early to begin a political discussion.
And, of course, this:
Given the intense controversy surrounding the proposed softwood lumber resolution, PM Stephen Harper promised to delay any implementation, claiming that this just wasn't the right time, as the issue had become too "politicized" and ... and ...
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I couldn't even finish inventing that last sentence with a straight face. Must be getting old.
How can you not do something with a line like this?
With a growing majority of Americans opposed to the war in Iraq, even ardent hawks refusing to enlist in droves, and the Pentagon pulling out ever more stops and sinking to new lows in recruitment and retention, a new all-volunteer generation of UUUU's may emerge -- the underachieving, unable, unexceptional, unintelligent, unsound, unhinged, unacceptable, unhealthy, undesirable, unloved, uncivil, and even un-American, all led by the unqualified, doing the unnecessary for the ungrateful.
Oh, man, have I got just the fertile recruiting ground for you. "Platoon, by the left ... no, no, Jesus Christ, the other left, for fuck's sake!"
Warning: Joel Johannesen densitude alert ahead:
Apparently, Joel's just tail-waggingly thrilled about the following nifty development:
U.S. Army meets re-enlistment goal? Tells us something.
Posted by Joel Johannesen
Here’s what else “tells us something”: the fact that you have to stand on your head and search to find this news. Yes that also tells us something. It tells us that the liberal media doesn’t want us to know about this. So I think it’s actually two extremely important facts, neither of which the liberal media wants us to know about.
Joel's got a point. That's not something you'd ever hear from that gosh-darned liberal media ... hello ... what's this?
Thank God for Blogger archives. Otherwise, I'd have to do actual work.
I DON'T GET PAID ENOUGH FOR THIS. It's one thing to disembowel wankers' arguments but, really, I think I have to draw the line at doing their research for them.
At Joel's eye-rollingly gullible piece above, commenter "parem" writes:
Here’s the truth about the composition of the U.S. military, a study that refers to a politician’s proposal to reinstitute the draft based on typical leftist misconceptions. I suggest people who expect to debate leftists to file this:
Who Bears the Burden? Demographic Characteristics of U.S. Military Recruits Before and After 9/11
by Tim Kane, Ph.D.
Center for Data Analysis Report #05-08
http://www.heritage.org/Research/NationalSecurity/cda05-08.cfm
Ah, yes, the right-wing Heritage Foundation -- an unimpeachable source of objective analysis, to be sure.
It took about 15 seconds with Google to learn that Mr. Kane's views on the subject of recruiting data are about as useful as a platoon of Blogging Tories in actual combat. The eighth hit for that Google search:
In short, NPP and the Heritage Foundation agree on the numbers. The crux of the dispute is what the numbers mean. The implication of Dr. Kane' report is that the income range of $25,000 - $54,999 does not constitute low and middle income. However, the federal government uses various definitions of 'low income' when creating eligibility criteria for particular federal programs. The range may include families with income levels up to 200% of the poverty level or $34,058 for a family of four.*
Recruits from zip code areas with median household income levels of $25,000 - $34,999 are over-represented in the armed forces. NPP stands by its conclusion that youth from low and middle income areas are being heavily recruited.
File that, baby.
MUST READ: As commenter Edwin suggests, you really should check out Billmon. And follow the links. Then, unlike the wanks over at PtbC, you will actually know something. Doesn't that make you feel special?
I'm not sure what to make of this but I'm getting an unusually large number of hits these days from Google searches where, even when there are tens of thousands of matches, somehow this humble blog ends in the first one or two dozen hits displayed. See for yourself:
Mind you, this is my personal favourite: don't let the door hit you in the ass. Yeah, I'll take ownership of that one, thanks.
Oopsie:
In his speech at the University of Regensburg, [Pope] Benedict quoted criticism of Islam and the Prophet Mohammad by 14th century Byzantine Emperor Manuel II Palaeologus, who wrote that everything Mohammad brought was evil and inhuman, "such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached".
Benedict repeatedly quoted Manuel’s argument that spreading the faith through violence is unreasonable, adding: "Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul."
I'm not sure what the Pope was thinking when he criticized evangelism via the sword. After all, everyone knows the high-powered rifle is the weapon of choice for religious lunatics everywhere these days.
I mean, Muslims might get a bit temperamental at times but, come on, they're not Luddites.
Pretty much the definition of "words coming back to haunt you":
The gun college killer Kimveer Gill displays proudly on his blog is a restricted firearm under Canadian law but popular with the country's shooting fraternity.
"To be perfectly honest it's a lot of fun to shoot," said Tony Bernardo, executive director of the Canadian Shooting Sports Association, who also owns a Beretta CX4 Storm.
"The little pistol calibre it comes in gives virtually no recoil. It's very accurate. The firearm is just one of those firearms that's just a lot of fun to spend a day at the range with." ...
"It doesn't have a huge muzzle blast," Bernardo said from Oshawa, Ont.
"It doesn't recoil you back into next week. It's just a fun little gun that people go out and shoot tin cans at the range with.
In unrelated news, the Catholic Church gave its highest rating -- 5 stars -- to the Astroglide line of personal lubricants.
"Hey," said the National Post's Father Raymond J. de Souza, "it's water-based and water-soluble, so it cleans up quickly with just a wet paper towel. What's not to like?"
There's speculation, and then there's premature eJankulation. It's not a pretty sight.
ARGH: OK, so I pooched the title. Too late to change it now.
Take a deep breath:
Right from Kimveer Gill's blog. The MSM sure can't make this guy into a right winger. I hope other bloggers pick up who this guy is and make it widely known.............
Dislikes: THE WORLD AND EVERYTHING IN IT But to be more specific: Animal Cruelty Country Music Posers Chavs Jocks Preps Downraters Anything And Everything Hip Hop All Those Who Oppose My Rule Traffic American Government Anyone Who Supports The American Government Politics Comedy Movies Religion All The Governments On Earth God Stress People In General Really Hot and Humid Summer Days Lies Betrayers Deceivers Manipulators Lawyers Anyone Who Has Anything Agains Metal Or Goth Capatalists People Who Think They're Real Smart Asses But Who Are Really Just Mother____rs People Without Manners Downgraders Rude People People In General Anyone Who Has Ever Said Or Done Anything Bad To A Goth Girl (I WILL KILL YOU) Sunlight (Arrgghhh, It Burns) Goody Two Shoes F___ng Religious People Who Think They Know Everything.....And Then They Stick It In Your Face Cuz' They Think They Know Everything (They Don't Understand That They're Just A Bunch Of Little Sheep) Catholics Society Traffic When My PC Crashes Or Freezes...Arrgghhh Mmmmmmmmm, So...What Else??.. Ummmm, Let Me Think.....(This May Take A While)... F__ing' Jocks Cheerleaders Preppies F___ING JOCKS Teachers Who Try To Be Like The Students So They Can Be ^popular^....Instead Of Doing Their Job The Way They Should...And TEACH F__k, Just F___ing Writting This Stuff Is Pissing Me Off People Who Talk With Their Mouths Full Bullys When My Rifle Misfires And I Gotta Stand There For 60 Seconds Waiting For It To Fire, Or Not The Universe Anyone who doesn't like VF Church Going Assholes The World Bible Thumpping Know-It-Alls Damn I Gotta Lot Of Dislikes Child Molesting Priests All Priests Republicans Racists Homophobes Did I Mention That I Hate The World Pitbulls (They're Too Dangerous) Waking Up Life The City It's Just So Damn Crowded Warm Beer The Human Race When A DVD I'm Watching Skips Or Freezes Dogs GOD DAMN MOTHERF___NG JOCKS
This text is quoted from the shooter's blog.The shooter is apparently a leftoid......not a right wing conservative.There has beens stories goin round, sayin this guy's guns were registered.Sure looks like that gun registry sure helped those poor people in Montreal.The gun registry is useless.If it was effective, the woman who was killed would still be alive today.I blame the Liberals and NDP.This guy was one of em.He promoted the gay agenda and he hates christians, just like Layton and Graham.
In other words, LEFTOIDS kill people.....NOT Conservatives.
Get that into your thick skulls Mr.Layton and Mr.Graham and Mr.Duceppe!!!!
The Kimveer Gill A&E biography courtesy of Ace of Spades, picked up by Canada's own Free Dominion, and finally reproduced in all its splendour and glory on the blog of one tory_canuckistan, of whom we can read:
I have just finished my grade 12.I am took grade 12 math, then I will be done High school.I am horrible when it comes to mathematics.
I swear, if there was any more stupidity concentrated in a single article, we'd have a warp core breach and Mr. Data would have to separate the saucer section just to save the crew.
(H/T to commenter Radical Centrist.)
This can only be described as a disturbing new development in the "Global War on Terror":
Published reports have identified the trenchcoat-clad man who opened fire in a Montreal college Wednesday as 25-year-old Kimveer Gill, of Montreal...
"His name is Trench. you will come to know him as the Angel of Death," he wrote on his profile on vampirefreaks.com, an online hub of goth culture.
The blog paints a dark portrait of the 25-year-old man.
"He is not a people person. He has met a handfull (sic) of people in his life who are decent." But he writes that he finds the vast majority to be "worthless, no good, kniving, betraying lieing (sic), deceptive."
From which we can all draw the obvious conclusion -- Canada is now the new central front in the struggle against Islamogothivampirojihadireclusofarianism™.
If only he'd been wearing a turban, it would have been perfect.
ABOUT THAT NAME ... Commenter John suggests that the name "Kimveer Gill" is more likely to be Hindu or Sikh than Muslim. Or it might be totally bogus. A Google search on that name turns up, at the moment, exactly one hit, where you can see the name "Kimveer Gill" alongside other names of questionable authenticity such as "johanna jacobs, Roger Brüntezon, Rohan de los Mil Nombres, xx, Fernando Roiz, Rok Satler, Domagoj Gojak, Raphaël Bonte, rolando reider."
One gets the distinct impression that Kimveer Gill isn't quite the name on his birth certificate, but I'm sure that won't stop the conspiracy theorists. Mundane things like facts never have.
... and you even had a pretty good idea which Canadian right-wing cementhead would have the pre-requisite lack of class or decency to suggest it first, didn't you?
The shooting at Dawson College has the nation shocked. But soon after the shock has worn away will be the search for an explanation. One disturbing possibility comes to mind.
Go on, Steve. Say it. You know you want to.
Dawson College is in the Westmount area of Montreal. It is an anglophone school. It also caters to the large Jewish population in the area. The college is less than a kilometer from Shaar Hashomayim, the largest synagogue in Canada.
The college offers a Jewish and Israeli studies program.
And Steve's basis for these sleazy insinuations? You're going to be shocked:
Am I jumping to conclusions? No, because I have not concluded anything.
Of course not. Would it be irresponsible to speculate? Fuck, no. If you're Steve Janke, irresponsible, unfounded speculation is pretty much a way of life. Oh, and there's this delightful closer:
But taking aim into a large crowd with no apparent specific target sounds familiar.
You're right, Steve, it does. Refresh my memory -- how exactly did that turn out?
Suspect in Jewish Federation shootings recently baptized
Man who grew up Muslim drifted from Christianity
Naveed Haq, now widely portrayed as a Muslim American so angry at Israel that he shot up a Jewish charity in Seattle, had recently converted to Christianity.
OK, then. So, according to Steve, there's no real evidence that recent converts to Christianity are on a murderous rampage but you shouldn't just dismiss the possibility.
Steve Janke: Giving Christians a bad rap without even trying.
STOP IT, STEVE! YOU'RE KILLING ME! There's so much more crunchy goodness here, I can't resist. If you read the comments at Steve's piece, you learn that Steve originally had the shootings in Toronto, not Montreal, only to be corrected by a reader. That's our Steve: Mr. Geography.
Yet another reader pops Steve's anti-Semitic, Islamojihadifarian conspiracy theory when he writes:
Sorry Stephen:
But the students themselves have said that this not a predominately jewish school. That one's been axed. If you want to post. Post on Video Game, TV or Movie violence.
But does that put a crimp in Steve's wingnuttery? Hell, no:
As for Fergy's comment, the question is not whether it *is* predominantly Jewish, but whether the gunman thought it was. The location, the tactics, the choice of weapon -- it sets off alarms. I'm betting I'm wrong, but we'll see soon enough.
'Cuz when you have a good conspiracy hard-on going, it's really painful to not stroke it through to its conclusion, know what I mean? But here's the best part of Steve's idiocy:
Dawson College is in the Westmount area of Montreal. It is an anglophone school. It also caters to the large Jewish population in the area. The college is less than a kilometer from Shaar Hashomayim, the largest synagogue in Canada.
Did you catch that? According to Steve (if I'm reading him correctly and I might not be since I'm not all that fluent in "Stupid"), if the shooter really was bent on killing Jews, he first located Canada's largest synagogue, pinpointed it precisely on a map and then went elsewhere. To Steve, this makes perfect sense: synagogue full of potential Jewish victims, so let's go almost a kilometre away before opening fire.
Sure, I'd do that. If I was mentally retarded. Which is why, I'm guessing, that scenario makes so much sense to Steve. It's just so on his wavelength.
Whoa ... what's this? Compassionate conservatism just oozing off the page at Steve's place:
Mother, daughter hanged in Pakistan
From The New-International (Pakistan):
SHEIKHUPURA: A woman and her daughter were hanged allegedly by their relatives in the Janiwala village, Nankana Sahib district, on Wednesday. Arshad Bibi, wife of Ashraf, along with her daughter Muqaddas had separated from her spouse four years ago and allegedly developed illicit relations with some people. Arshaf had frequently asked her to shun the bad practice and return home, but to no avail. On Wednesday, Ashraf along with his brother Ishaq and Riaz convinced Arshad Bibi and Muqaddas and brought them back to his house. When they reached home, Ashraf, Ishaq and Riaz allegedly hanged Arshad Bibi and Muqaddas. The Sadar police have started investigations after shifting the bodies to a hospital for post mortem.
I wonder what the "illicit relations" were. Probably talking to the neighnours [sic].
Just to remind people like Jack Layton what the price to be paid for losing this fight.
And there you go: It's critically important that Canadian troops fight and die in Afghanistan to prevent women from being hanged in Pakistan.
Steve always gets those two places confused.
[Updated with new snark below at no extra charge.]
Whoa, what a relief:
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AFTERSNARK: The most depressing (and predictable) feature of that entire site can be found in the scribblings of commenter "Mister Kim" for that posting, who writes:
Got a comment ?? Then COMMENT !
Do not be afraid to speak up and voice your opinion. The Left is counting on your fear to do so.
Because, as we all know, there's nothing more terrifying than expressing your opinion on a website on which absolutely no dissension to your beliefs will be tolerated.
Profiles in courage, the lot of them.
SMITHERS! RELEASE THE HOUNDS! Until now, I'd resisted the temptation to link to the earlier Joel Johannesen-related idiocy but, sadly, commenter David just had to pick at that scab so, what the hell -- if you have a couple of hours and at least half a bottle of good bourbon, make yourself comfortable and go here, here, here. here, here, here, and, finally (God help us all) here.
This is, without question, the best entertainment you're going to get from someone in my price range. I hope you appreciate it.
Sometimes, Google can be so entertaining.
It's not like I'm terribly interested in what the BTs have to say at the best of times, but this recent development just begs for a wanker perspective:
Months before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forbade military strategists from developing plans for securing a post-war Iraq, the retiring commander of the Army Transportation Corps said Thursday.
In fact, said Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, Rumsfeld said "he would fire the next person" who talked about the need for a post-war plan.
So ... things not going all that well in Iraq? Maybe it's because there was no post-war plan. Could that be it?
In any event, the lines are open. I'm willing to listen to any wanker who wants to step up and suggest that deliberately avoiding even the smallest semblance of post-war planning represents some bizarre stroke of military genius on Rumsfeld's part.
Come on, folks. Take a shot at it. I'm all ears.
"What monstrosities would walk the streets were some people's faces as unfinished as their minds."
- Eric Hoffer
P.S. For those of you who aspire to something more intellectually challenging than Kate McMillan and her fan club of drooling Morlock groupies, we give you Keith Olbermann. So now, when someone talks about the ongoing "clash of civilizations," you know exactly what they mean.
Oh, my. One does gets comments:
... If you and the extremely tiny, tiny minoirity of remaining murderously hostile atheists have a problem with the 90%+ of your fellow countrymen who aren't atheist dogs then get the *fuck* out and start a little hate colony on Hans Island or something.
Now, it's bad enough to be a batshit psychotic lunatic. But when you're a batshit psychotic lunatic and wrong, well, that's just adding insult to injury. Let's go to the videotape, shall we?
The [Canadian] census also reflected that the percentage claiming no religious affiliation is 16 percent of the total population, an increase from 12 percent in the last census.
Oh, dear. It seems we godless swine are a growing demographic, doesn't it? But the bad news doesn't stop there for batshit psychotic lunatic.
According to this 2005 poll, the number of non-believers in Canada ranges somewhere between 19% and 30%, that uncertainty being based on the fact that many non-believers still insist on incorrectly describing themselves as "agnostics" rather than the more correct "atheist."
So it would appear that batshit psychotic lunatic doesn't have much of a case for referring to atheism in Canada as being an "extremely tiny, tiny minority." Oh, and his attitude sucks, too. But pointing that out is, I think, being unnecessarily cruel. So I won't.
Shorter Pope Ratzo the First: "Enlightenment? What enlightenment?"
BONUS SNARK: It would be funny if it weren't so creepily appropriate.
Lambert's all over this yet again. Go read.
Sometimes, it's a tough call as to whether Damian Penny is being deliberately obtuse, or whether he's really as unspeakably dense as his writing would suggest:
HOLLYWOOD IRONY
While the left throws a massive hissy fit over inaccuracies in The Path to 9/11, the hot ticket at the Toronto International Film Festival is a fake documentary ["Death of a President"] in which President Bush is murdered:
Um ... I'm sorry, I don't quite see the irony there. See, "Death of a President" is quite openly a work of fiction, while "The Path to 9/11" represented itself as a fact-based documentary. See how that works, Damian? It means that your comparison isn't worth, well, shit. But Damian's on a roll, so let's move aside and let the madness continue:
If an American cable network (I think we can safely assume no broadcast network will touch Death of a President) or film distributor picks up the movie, don't expect the Kossacks and HuffPosters to launch any boycott campaigns against it.
Uh ... but why would they boycott? Pay attention, Damian -- fiction versus documentary. How is it possible that you can't appreciate the difference? Oh, wait:
Mind you, the two aren't exactly the same: The Path to 9/11 is a docudrama that takes dramatic licence to show the Clinton Administration's (and Bush Administration's) missed opportunities to take down Osama bin Laden, while Death of a President portrays the murder of a sitting President, and the framing of an innocent Arab for his murder (of course!) to criticize post-9/11 American "paranoia." Big difference.
Ah. So Damian does understand the massive distinction -- he's just being a total dick by ignoring it. In Damian's world, I'm guessing that passes for clever. But, hang on:
(The anti-Path crowd is also trying to draw a distinction between a docudrama shown on network television - the public airwaves - and in movie theatres.
Whoops, scratch that -- now we're back to not understanding the difference again. It must be tough being Damian Penny -- you're never quite sure which demented personality is going to bubble up and take command of the keyboard, so you have to be ready for anything.
CC HQ: Your one-stop shop for rapid-response snark. 30 minutes or it's free.
DOUBLE PLUS GOOD AND JUST PLAIN SNARKERRIFIC: Damian writes, "While the left throws a massive hissy fit over inaccuracies in The Path to 9/11 ...". Apparently, it's not just "the left" that is some kind of pissed.
Some advice to Damian's buddies: Do not ask him for legal advice. Seriously. Or medical advice. He's probably pretty bad at that, too.
(DISCLAIMER: There's some debate as to whether that threat of legal action is genuine, but you have to think AA at least has grounds for thinking about it.)
I'm guessing overly long lines at the Porta-Johns wasn't a big issue:
Today’s turnout for the 9/11 memorial-support the troops rally in Calgary was a bit of a disappointment but on the other hand it was a nice day to come into the city and run into a few a good friends. Richard wrote:
On the other hand, it was a bonus that 10 people had the stones to show up and be counted.
10 people. Geez, I have more folks who've signed my petition, which involves clubbing various members of the Blogging Tories. It's a trend, I tell you. Where's a good pollster when you need one?
Well, this is amusing:
Can someone please explain to me why the Ottawa Citizen continues to provide print space to Janice Kennedy's hateful opinions?
I dunno. Balance?
First, there's Steve working himself into high dudgeon over some allegedly ugly racial insinuations:
OK, I don't think that's what was meant:
... Manitoba Premier Gary Doer got delegates fired up with his warning that in the last 12 months, Canada has moved backwards on the "3 Ks — kids, Kelowna and Kyoto."
Let's hear the assembled throng start chanting "Kay-Kay-Kay! Kay-Kay-Kay! Kay-Kay-Kay!"
Sheesh, imagine if a Conservative had said something like that. Where's Hedy Fry when you need her?
Wow. That's pretty appalling stuff. Until you realize that the three 'K's that Doer was referring to were issues he clearly supported, and was accusing the Conservative government of abandoning, which kind of blows a hole in Steve's analogy but since you weren't really expecting anything resembling coherent logic from him in the first place, well, no harm, no foul, know what I mean?
And then there's Steve, suddenly discovering a sense of literary responsibility and integrity:
An Australian high school teacher who wrote a textbook teaching that the US and Israel are behind state terrorism, and that the Australian government is reaping the benefits from global terrorism, is shocked at the furious reaction. I'm shocked that he's shocked.
Um, yeah -- the hideous injustice of factually questionable or ideologically-biased propaganda being foisted on the public. Man, that just has to suck, right, Steve?
If I have to explain that last part, you just have not been paying attention lately.
Not surprisingly, Kate is positively a-twitter with delight over the piece of cinematic crap that is "Path to 9/11" (emphasis added):
I'm going to sit down in a few minutes to watch this, but those in time zones further east are already blogging their take;
If they'd kept their mouths shut, this would be about the terrorists, which would be bad enough. Now it's about the terrorists and the Democrats.
[...]
Clinton looks very bad. So does Sandy Berger.
And then there's the opinion of someone who isn't as dumb as a sack of hammers:
Disney/ABC defames Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger
Disney/ABC just broadcast a scene that never happened. Clinton National Security Adviser Sandy Berger refuses to give the order to capture or kill bin Laden, even though our guys had him in their sites. Only problem, it never happened. This scene was the biggest problem in the entire show, Disney/ABC has known about this problem since early last week. But they chose to leave the scene in, simply cutting the part where Sandy Berger hangs up the phone. Gee, big change.
Disney/ABC just lied to the American people about Sandy Berger being responsible for Osama bin Laden being alive today. And there was no indication in the broadcast, by Disney/ABC or the local affiliate, that the scene was fictitious.
I cannot think of a greater libel than to tell millions of people worldwide that you are responsible for Osama bin Laden not being stopped before September 11. Disney/ABC just put the blood of 3,000 Americans on Sandy Berger's hands.
May he sue them for millions.
Canada's Kate McMillan: When genuine journalism is occasionally tempting, but being a lying sack of shit is so much more satisfying.
BONUS TRACK: As I pointed out just a few days ago, defaming Berger seems to be all the rage these days in the Canadian wanker chamber. Not that you can blame them. I mean, it's easier than, you know, actually knowing stuff.
Jesus Christ, I'm not sure how many more of these sorties I can make into enemy territory, as here we have wankerus magnificus Joel Johannesen, getting all man-crushy and misty-eyed over right-wing filmmaker and legend in his own mind Jason Apuzzo.
One of the founders of that festival (and author of the email from this morning, below), is Jason Apuzzo. He has appeared in our Columnist Section when he wrote an excellent editorial entitled: Where Conservative Film is Now. I’ve also mentioned his name and quoted him several times.
So who the fuck is Jason Apuzzo? You're going to be happy you asked. No, no, don't thank me. Always happy to provide the public service of humiliating Joel Johannesen in new and exciting ways.
It's what I live for.
AFTERSNARK: Linking to one of TBogg's many beatdowns of Apuzzo would, I think, be unnecessary so I'm not going to do it. 'Cuz that would just be cruel.
You're welcome.
I have to believe something here was lost in translation:
Pope Benedict said Saturday that low birth rates in Canada are the result of the "pervasive effects of secularism" and asked the country's bishops to counter the trend by preaching "with passion" the truth of Christ.
Because, as we all know, there's no one better to give you advice on dealing with a low birth rate than someone who's taken a lifelong vow of celibacy.
Or maybe it's the gays' fault. That must be it.
Because you can never have enough blogs that bring you the hard-hitting news from the right courtesy of Matt Drudge, NewsMax, Open Bathrobe Media and Canada's own Crazy-Assed Racist Redneck.
MediaRight.ca: Living proof that that annoying paste-eating fixation of yours doesn't need to keep you from being a productive member of the wankersphere.
All right, so that "valuable prizes" thing is total hogwash but, as a member of Canada's progressive (read: non-brain-damaged) community, you -- yes, you -- have the ability to make a difference.
As you can see here, the Canada-wide petition to defund the Status of Women Canada is in full swing, having garnered an overwhelming (at last count) 556 590 617 signatures which, by my calculations, would represent every member of the Blogging Tories coalition plus, for each one of them, the one parent who still loves them.
In response, I present The Petition To Get Canadian Wankers to Shut the Hell Up About the Status of Women Canada.
Act now! Sign the petition! As members of the reality-based community, it's your moral and ethical obligation to take the time. And show your support for Canada's women! And send me money in unmarked, brown paper bags!!
Small bills only, if you don't mind.
In a major step up the food chain, local blogger James Bow makes a splash in today's Record, promising that, regardless of how famous he becomes, he'll never forget the little people that helped him along the way. You know, what's-her-name, and that guy. No, no -- that other guy.
Touching. Seriously:
Five years after 9/11, human remains are still being found at the WTC site. It is a horrible thing to contemplate and clearly illustrates just how utterly evil and devastating this attack was.
Here are some figures:
* Of the 2,749 people who were killed that day, the remains of 1,150 haven't been found. Not a shard, a fleck or a fragment.
Although, it could have been a bit more touching:
Excluding the 19 hijackers, a confirmed 2,973 people died and another 24 remain listed as missing as a result of these attacks.
Canada's wankers: When you're pressed for time and all those big numbers start to look the same after a while, but it's the thought that counts, right?
And over at Steve Janke's Sports Bar and Mud Wrestling Palace, we have excitable commenter "Pissedoff" giving us a finger-wagging lecture on the proper etiquette of civil discourse:
So American Bullshit Company folds for rapist Bill and his helpers. Whats new? Reminds me of blob Kennedy the Dem murderer...
Hey Asshole Lore_weaver, what about that bullshit from your dumbfucker M Moore F9/11, all f**ing lies. Just like this crap Aholes like you spout about it wasn't the Heyrabs just Bush and his cronies. And you talk about Orwellian rewriting history. If you cant stand the heat shut your fucking mouth ...
By the way you motherfucker, Canadian bullshit Comany did a piece about Harper and his indifference by editing a so called news report from Lawanda it got caught out as for what was JUNK. Typical left wing moonbat reporting.
And remember: "No one hates like the Left." It's the phrase that pays.
Over at MyDD, Matt Stoller has some interesting thoughts on how the unfolding disaster that is "Path to 9/11" threatens to fuck Disney in some interesting and unexpected ways. And, frankly, if there's any company that deserves to be taken out to the woodshed, it's Disney.
And the 101st Chairborne continues to make the ultimate sacrifice:
TrustOnlyMulder over at Officially Screwed has begun what I feel is a fitting tribute to our soldiers doing the dirty work overseas.
Tomorrow, Friday September 8th, I will be wearing red for the first time in support of our troops. I hope you, too, decide to wear red to show you care about them.
Great idea, bud. Cheers!
Stay safe and godspeed folks. We are behind you ...
Yes ... several thousand miles behind, at last count. And making sure that gap doesn't get any smaller, if history is any judge.
Back in 2003, you figured you had a consensus for the worst movie ever made:
"DC 9/11: Time of Crisis" has come under fire because its writer and producer is Lionel Chetwynd, a friend and supporter of President Bush and one of Hollywood's few outwardly politically conservative filmmakers. That alone, however, should not be the lightning rod of criticism for this film...
No, the real reason "DC 9/11" should be taken to task is that the movie is terrible. It's uncommonly bad, a film so stiff and unwilling to breathe that when it overreaches for drama -- as it does every couple of minutes -- it nearly snaps in half. There's no blood in this lifeless dud, and the ridiculous re-creation of Bush as, well, as Rudy Giuliani, is so oafishly stylized that the president himself should dismiss the film as a ploy by the Democrats to make him look stupid.
But then along comes this gobbler:
I once sat in a car forever waiting for my mom to come out of a grocery store. I thought that was the definition of "interminable." I had no idea "The Path to 9/11" was in my future.
This is what happens during 4 1/2 lonnnng hours of "Path." Terrorists talk about killing Americans for Allah. FBI and other security officials try to track them but fail. 9/11 happens.
You don't say.
This is the most anticlimactic, tension-free movie in the history of terrorist TV.
Yes, it's the new worst movie ever made. Well, that or "Showgirls." It's a tough call.
A principled stand against sleazy, right-wing historical revisionism? Or a quick cash grab? Grapple, grapple ...
ABC is rolling up everything to do with the 9/11 movie, including the advertising on my feed. Too bad -- they were offering good money.
As Roger Waters once sang, "Every man has his price, Bob. And yours was pretty low."
First, there's the overwhelming cognitive dissonance. See, when the CBC broadcasts something uncomplimentary about Li'l Stevie, the Canadian wankersphere goes batshit crazy with outrage 'cuz, well, it's that fucking liberal media, you know?
And when Reuters publishes photoshopped images of the recent skirmish in the Middle East, well, that's just because they're dishonest hacks. That fucking liberal media, you know?
But when ABC/Disney is getting ready to air an admittedly and openly dishonest "mockumentary" about 9/11, and the Left complains, well, that's just because they're sore losers. See how that works?
Oh, and the lies? Well, there's little Mikey rewriting history in an entertaining way:
This probably explains why Sandy Berger stole classified documents from the US National archives. Trying to cover his sorry butt.
And then there's that pesky reality.
Blogging Tory Mike McGuire: When you just can't get enough sleazy, partisan hackery in your life, and Steve Janke's busy at the moment.
You can almost smell the bravado oozing off the page:
A few months ago, the families of Canadian soldiers based in Petawawa started wearing red on Fridays as a show of support for our troops overseas.
Tomorrow, Friday September 8th, I will be wearing red for the first time in support of our troops.
Here's a better idea -- why don't you try wearing khaki? Think about it -- it'll come to you.
Has a Blogging Tory said anything particularly dense lately? I mean, besides Steve Janke?
An anonymous commenter from the previous post draws our attention to an exciting new development in right-wing propaganda:
Pro-Israel lobby targets BBC online poll
BBC History Magazine was forced to remove an online poll after it was targeted by a project aimed at influencing internet opinion in Israel's favour.
The Give Israel Your United Support (GIYUS) website hosts a downloadable desktop tool called Megaphone. The program alerts users to opinion polls and "talkback" features on news sites so they can respond with pro-Israel views. In turn, users can alert GIYUS operators to any opinion polls they think should be targeted.
So is this a big deal? Well, I would think it's, at the very least, a little deal.
Recall if you will the teeth-grinding outrage from the Right over the photoshopped images from Lebanon, allegedly showing more damage than there really was in some situations. The reason for the outrage was fairly clear -- that sort of dishonest manipulation is used for precisely one reason: to unfairly sway public opinion in a way that doesn't mirror actual reality. Which, if you think about it, is precisely the intent when you "freep" an online poll, isn't it? The entire rationale for something like that is to misrepresent the legitimate state of things. Isn't that special?
So is this poll manipulation comparably repugnant to digital dishonesty? Probably not. After all, we all understand that online polls are worth pretty much the pixels they're displayed with. However, given the howling anger from the wankersphere over the earlier photoshopped images, one would think that this kind of manipulation should make those same folks feel at least a little uncomfortable for exactly the same reason.
Sure, that'll happen. Right after my hot tub date with Jessica Alba, that'll happen.
Taking compartmentalization to a whole 'nother dimension, we have Ruth:
My husband sent me this article from YNet News this afternoon.
Passengers on an Air Canada Jazz flight from Montreal to New York claim that a fellow passenger, an ultra-Orthodox man, was removed from the plane after he began praying, Canadian news site CBC reported...
Following up with the CBC, I found this article on the subject.
No freedom of religion for you, not if you live in Canada. That goes double if you're Jewish.
"He was clearly a Hasidic Jew," said Yves Faguy, a passenger seated nearby. "He had some sort of cover over his head. He was reading from a book.
"He wasn't exactly praying out loud but he was lurching back and forth," Faguy added.
The action didn't seem to bother anyone, Faguy said, but a flight attendant approached the man and told him his praying was making other passengers nervous.
"The attendant actually recognized out loud that he wasn't a Muslim and that she was sorry for the situation but they had to ask him to leave," Faguy said.
Wow.
They kicked him off the plane for praying, claiming that it was making other passengers nervous. I'd love to know which passengers he was making nervous, especially since the article also says that he wasn't bothering anyone. Both can't be true folks! What kills me most is the description: "some sort of cover... a book... lurching..." You moron! That's a prayer shawl, likely a Torah and the lurching is how Orthodox Jewish people pray. Comparing him to a muslim??? Could you be any more ignorant? One wonders how that conversation even went.
"Sir, we know you aren't a Muslim, but would you mind not praying? The captain's an atheist and he's afraid God will hear you."
Yay Canada.
True north strong and...
free?
I love the B'Nai Brith's offer of sensitivity training. I say a good old fashioned size twelve to the rear ought to do it.
And it's a damned good thing that that situation was totally, totally different from this one. Otherwise, Ruth might have had to get upset twice, in a fair and balanced way. And, as we all know, we can't have that.
Oh, this just can't be good. I'm pretty sure that, if I was a 3-time member of the U.S. Senate in the fight of my life for re-election, the last thing I'd want is a bunch of blogger newbies manning the barricades, posting pseudo-illiterate rah-rah pieces in between Friday cat blogging and their random ten iPod selections, and having put no more effort into creating that blog than randomly selecting one of the templates from the Blogger catalogue.
Um ... hang on ... scratch that last cheap snark. It was clearly uncalled for.
Getting ready for the long trip home. Time enough on the leg to Denver for an in-flight movie, I figure. I'm hoping for "Snakes on a Plane." Or maybe "Flightplan."
Not to be outdone by Canada's other anti-feminist, Bible-whomping, Blogging Tory female whackjobs, we have the clinically-unhinged relapsed Catholic Kathy Shaidle, suggesting that "We need Status of Women Canada like a fish needs a bicycle."
Which, given Shaidle's religious inclination, inspires the following contest for readers of this blog, which challenges them to similarly complete the sentence, "A progressive and enlightened society needs the Catholic Church like ...."
Be creative. Be imaginative. Hell, be downright sacriligeous. Entries will be graded utterly arbitrarily by our crack (mostly sober) staff here at CC HQ, and the grand prize winner will receive a first run edition of Kate McMillan's recent work on multiculturalism, "Canada's aboriginals: Who the fuck let them in?"
Don't delay. Enter now. Contest closes whenever the hell I feel like it. Offer void where prohibited and prohibited where void.
Weather's here. Wish you were fine. Today off to SF, and tomorrow spend all day on airplanes. Anything exciting happen while I was gone? Sorry? You elected who as Prime Minister? Fucking hell.
How dare our critics smear us with our own words? Fucking liberals.
Is it irresponsible to speculate? Not if you can get your readers to do it for you:
An interesting comment about the initial investigation into the murder of Yasmin Ashareh -- but for now, just a rumour, without even an email address for me to use to contact the person. So I'm not given this any credence, though I'm not saying it's not accurate either. Just...interesting. Maybe a reader with more knowledge of the situation can provide some insight.
By God, that sounds vaguely familiar. Oh, right:
"WANTED: HERBERT SPENCER EXPERT [Jonah Goldberg]
I'm working on a chapter of the book which requires me to read a lot about and by Herbert Spencer. There's simply no way I can read all of it, nor do I really need to. But if there are any real experts on Spencer out there -- regardless of ideological affiliation -- I'd love to ask you a few questions in case I'm missing something.
Posted at 12:40 PM"
Jonah's working title is "Great Thinkers I Have Skimmed, or Dragging My Lazy Ass to the Computer One Mo' Time"
Steve Janke: Taking Jonah Goldberg hero worship to new and really, really disturbing extremes.
Why, yes, I have an opinion on them. I'm so glad you asked.
I'm sure the "rat" association was entirely coincidental.
On the one hand, "It's essential that we fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here! Because if we cut and run, they're going to follow us home!"
On the other hand, "Ohmigod, they're here and they're killing us in broad daylight in our streets!!"
Now, am I the only one who sees the awkward logical inconsistency here?
Whooooooeeee! Looks like another Blogging Tory is all ready to lay down a little "I told you so":
The left's bubble bursts....
Or more aptly blown out of the sky by the US BMD system. I was under the distinct impression that it didn't now nor ever would work???
And once again, we demonstrate our unspeakable laziness and let TBogg do all the heavy lifting. It's like he has this affinity for the Blogging Tories 'cuz maybe they're just as adorable as his basset hounds and almost as smart.
Notice I said "almost."
Paging the Blogging Tories. Blogging Tories, pick up the white scandal phone, please.
Oh, man -- what must it feel like to wake up and learn you've been bitch-slapped by a couple of the best?
