I love my commenters.

Regarding Ezra's latest "Voyage of the Dumbth," anonymous commenter does the math (lightly edited):

It's always fun calculating just how badly Ezra is gouging his sheep for the privilege of basking in his presence.

On the recent Israel/Dubai "fact-finding" mission, a comparison with an identical tour package from Indus Travel suggested he was roughly doubling the cost of a standard tour package, without providing many of the benefits Indus included (e.g., flights).

That research is even easier this time, since Ezra has simply reserved a bunch of cabins on an existing Holland America cruise, the standard seven day "Western Caribbean", March 23. How badly is he screwing his readers this time? Well, let's compare.

If you sign up for a standard Verandah cabin directly with Holland America, the cost is $1,449 Canadian. If you book through Ezra, however, the costs shoots up to $2,118 AMERICAN, or $2,864 Canadian. That's DOUBLE the cost.

Here's the Rebel costing: https://rebelnewscruise.com/pricing.htm

Here's the Holland America costing: https://www.hollandamerica.com/en_US/find-a-cruise/C4W07B/I426.html

You'll note that Ezra's site only shows you the US pricing. I guess that makes it look cheaper. So you pay twice as much - for what, exactly?

Ezra provides a hilarious list of "exclusive Rebel Cruise" benefits, in which he tries to describes exactly the same thing in as many different ways as possible. These elite Rebel Cruisers will enjoy:

• CURATED CONVERSATIONS
• PANEL DISCUSSIONS
• Seminars
• Cocktail parties
• extensive interaction with guest speakers (who at this point are Tamara Lich, Ezra, the horrific Dave Menzies, the barely articulate Alexis Lavoie, and chief oil lobbyist Sheila Gunn Reid
• numerous social events

You have to admire the number of different ways he manages to say "You'll get to hang out with us and listen to our usual talking points for a week."

Arch Patriot Ezra appears to be booking all this through the "Cruise & Travel" authority, an American firm based in Georgia. Maybe a redneck-to-redneck quid pro quo?

Indeed.

AFTERSNARK: Given that the cruise departs from Fort Lauderdale, it seems that pimping out a "star guest" like Tamara Lich could be problematic, given that a) she might be in jail, or b) she might be denied a visa given her felony charges.

Let's watch.

Ah, the burning stupid.

 

Tune in next year when Brandon is shrieking hysterically about how the Canadian healthcare system won't treat his daughter for a totally preventable terminal condition because she refuses to be vaccinated, and it's all Justin Trudeau's fault.

Freedom!

Ah, today's Hot Sauce Expo.

I'm not sure this qualifies as "restraint."

Pretty sure the Chark "Morel & Black Truffle" will be opened this evening.

P.S. On the spur of the moment, I entered the fresh hot pepper eating contest. I made it pretty easily up to the Habanero and Madame Jeanette peppers (both 250K to 500K SHU), but I bailed when the next challenge was a Yellow Ghost (1 MLN SHU). You gotta know when to hold 'em, and know when to fold 'em.

All aboard this year's Voyage of the Dumbed.

Apparently, Ezra needs another tropical vacation, and he'd like you to pay for it:

"Drop those coconuts, David!"

*Bonk*!

"Ow!"

P.S. Perhaps Holland America should know about other cruise lines that have washed their hands of Rebel News' hatemongering, racism and bigotry. And there's always this:

P.P.S. The most sad-making aspect of Rebel's annual fellatiofests is the decline in quality of the "special guests." Where once Ezra could claim at least vaguely-recognized C-listers from the right-wing dumbshit-o-sphere, these days, he seems limited to one deranged dingbat who's only there because she's being paid (Lich), followed by (dear God) Sheila, She-Wolf of the SS, David "The Menses" Menzies and Rebel's utterly unforgettable hack journo on the left of that group portrait, for whom the invariable reaction is, "Who the fuck is that!?!?"

If history is any guide, the cruise costs only triple what you'd pay if you booked it yourself. But you knew that, right?

AFTERSNARK: Would anyone like to do some comparison shopping?

Four hours and counting ...

This is my haul from last year's Hot Sauce Expo:

Will I have learned restraint this year? It's unlikely.

Rebel News: Still lying.

Oh, sigh ... here's Der Rebel, still misrepresenting what went down related to Steven Guilbeault:

Once again (and as I have already explained), the very ruling linked to in that article is a consent decree, meaning that Rebel News agreed to settle, and that Rebel agreed to a settlement of $20,000 -- that amount was not ordered by the court, it was an amount Rebel News agreed to take to fuck off and go away, and which was simply formalized in the consent decree.

Rebel News -- bragging about shit that never happened yet again.

JUXTAPOSE!

Unprincipled, untalented hack Brian Lilley who has, for years, repeated and defended Doug Ford's pathetic blaming of previous Wynne administration, is suddenly outraged -- OUTRAGED, I TELL YOU!!! -- by politicians blaming previous administrations from years past:

Freedom! Oh, wait ...

Getting really tired of people who demand the "freedom" to spew viruses all over the rest of us:

Ezra Levant: Lying again?

I am not a lawyer but perhaps someone can clarify the following oddity. Recently, Rebel News' Ezra Levant was yanking himself raw in public, bragging about how the court "ordered" Steven Guilbeault to pay Der Rebel $20,000:

However, I am reading the actual ruling, which is a consent order:

which, as I understand it, represents simply the government offering to pay $20,000 for Ezra and Der Rebel to fuck off and go away, and Ezra and Der Rebel accepting the offer. So it seems to me that this in no way represents the court "ordering" anything; rather, it is nothing more than the court formalizing a settlement offer which (again, as I understand it) has no legal value whatever as it was settled.

Am I understanding all this correctly?

P.S. If I am understanding this correctly, then there is more misrepresentation in that idiotic Rebel article. While Ezra claims that it was the court that "ordered" the $20,000 in legal fees, it seems like Ezra is getting that fraction of what he claims is his own legal fees because he agreed to that amount. Isn't that what that consent order means?

If so, then what happened would appear to be that Ezra voluntarily settled for a pittance compared to his own legal fees, and is now playing the martyr, clearly for the purposes of fundraising.

Colour me shocked.

AND ONE MORE THING ... Here's Ezra, insisting that that settlement represents a clear and unequivocal "precedent" that is a boon for journalists nationwide:

Even the National Post points out that that claim is total bullshit:

Are we done here? Yeah, I think we're done here.

Where I will be this Saturday.

You should go.

What's on your mind?

Time for me to take a break, so y'all can vent as you please.

Might I ask a really stupid question?

Is he allowed to mute Rebel News? Even if a government account is obligated to be readable by anyone who wants to read it, is there anything that requires such an account to have to deal with the profound ignorance and arrogant mockery of a sleazy grifter like Ezra Levant?

P.S. I will have more to say on this, but I think we can all agree -- Steven Guilbeault behaved very, very stupidly and brought this humiliation on himself.

Really? That's your rebuttal?

 

"Yes, Your Honour, my client sexually molested five children but, to be fair, let's consider all of the children he didn't molest."

HONESTLY, I have a hard time believing that any moderately sentient judge would take the above argument seriously. Sure, the Convoy tormented the citizens of Ottawa for three weeks, but hey, businesses that sold "Fuck Trudeau" banners and Nazi flags and air horns made out like bandits. So, it's all good, right?

Sadly, from what I've seen, this particular judge is, in fact, that dense.

Money well spent, I'm sure.

Even as Rebel News' Ezra Levant is crowing over his crushing victory over one Steven Guilbeault, one needs to scroll down to appreciate the depressing vacuity of that victory:

Sadly, then, that victory is not really going to make up for the suspected half mil that Ezra and Der Rebel had to fork out for their recent and massive legal ass-kicking.

Are donors getting charitable tax receipts for this?

P.S. Are any of Rebel News' regular supporters getting at all tired of how so much of their money is going to legal fees rather than, you know, covering the news? Especially when Ezra reluctantly admits that he just blew $90K to get $20K in return, and wants his long-suffering marks^H^H^H^H^H donors to cover the shortfall?

I need a word beyond "gullible."

BY THE WAY, there's more than a little irony in Ezra's bleating here, pretending to care about the Canadian taxpayer:

when Rebel's own accounting and fundraising arm, The Democracy Fund, has already handed out millions of dollars in charitable tax receipts, all of which has to be covered by (you guessed it) the Canadian taxpayer.

If the hypocrisy was any thicker, you could use it to beat some sense into David Menzies.

Freedom! Liberte! Stunning illiteracy!

 

Chronicles of Twatrick: Movin' on up to the east side?

As I mentioned in previous posts, if undischarged bankrupt and fugitive from financial accountability Patrick Ross is going to dodge and weave and evade process servers and sheriffs, I will do what it takes to track him down, and part of that involves my new network of confidential informants (CIs) in the Lloydminster area, who have agreed to keep a watch on Casa Ross and let me know of anything newsworthy, part of that newsworthiness being this curious pic from just yesterday, showing the front end of a big rig in the driveway, making one wonder if someone is either moving in or moving out:

I suspect ongoing surveillance (which, despite Patrick's pathetic bleatings, is perfectly legal if done from a public roadway) will reveal the truth.

CORRECTION: I misidentified that thing on the right; upon closer inspection, it's the front of a trailer, which means that someone is either moving in or moving out in a big way. In any event, ongoing surveillance will resolve this one way or the other.

The Democracy Fund 2022 filing is here!

So, who wants to start poking around?

1) Uh ... why is it that expenses are so much higher than revenue?

2) Holy fuck, but some people are getting filthy rich off of this "charity":

I AM HAVING TROUBLE INTERPRETING THE ABOVE, so anyone who understands this is welcome to weigh in. Revenue for year ending 2022 is listed as $2.4M, while expenses are listed as the much higher $4,1M, almost all of that going to "charitable programs." But how does one categorize the "Compensation" amounts, total of around $3.1M?

Is that part of the $4.1M above? That doesn't seem right as that $4.1M is described as "charitable programs." So how does the total for "Compensation" fit into all this? It sure looks like, over the calendar 2022, TDF paid more in executive compensation and lawyers' fees than they brought in in total revenue.

Can someone make sense of this for me?

JUXTAPOSE!

Man who has never had children or been a teacher of any kind will now lecture you on proper child-rearing and principles of education:

Ezra Levant: Bullshit artist.

Once again, here's Ezra Levant, lying outrageously about the highway arrest of renowned homophobe and bigot Pastor Art Pawlowski:

Luckily, I once explained why this narrative was a total pile of horseshit.

You're welcome.

AFTERSNARK: For more evidence of the lying griftiness and con artistry of Ezra Levant and "Pastor Art" Pawlowski, check out the ridiculous dishonesty of the time Pastor Art was arrested at the airport.

Epic irony fail.

 ... says the man who torched his employment, finances, career choices, dignity, self-respect and credit rating because he wanted to be a partisan shit flinger on Twitter.

You can't make this stuff up.