You might want to look into putting together an emergency medical kit...
Between December and February, there were at least 42 instances when Ottawa's paramedic service was at Level 0, which means there weren't any ambulances available.(h/t reader mike)
Scientists get to mess with the most famous pile of rocks on the planet...
-- (LONDON) -- Some of England's most sacred soil was disturbed Monday for the first time in more than four decades as archaeologists worked to solve the enduring riddle of Stonehenge: When and why was the prehistoric monument built?Myself... I've always had a bit of a soft spot for Mighty Carhenge.
The excavation goal is to find remnants of the original bluestones, or related materials, that can be subjected to modern radiocarbon dating techniques...
And they say 'modern art' isn't accessible.For my "Highland Clearances" compensation cheque from the British Royal Family...
As the clock ticks down on Monday's application deadline, many Chinese-Canadians who were forced to pay Canada's controversial head tax in the late 1800s and early 1900s have not applied for a federal redress payment.**********
Since those people could miss out if they don't apply for $20,000 in government compensation, Chinese community advocates are calling for the deadline to be extended by another three months.
Dr. Dawg has seen the movie and didn’t like the tie in between the Koran and the ongoing Islamic terrorism which Wilders’ film underscores.*
Dawg drags out the hoary idea that the Bible has blood curdling passages too, so there. Which explains all the headlines we see about Anglicans beheading the infidels and Biblically inspired Amish hostage takings.
And make a prediction that Stephane Dion will be Prime Minister... right about the time we all get our "flying cars."
Of course, not everybody agrees... but then again, that's why they call him "'Special' K."
(via natnews)
This is almost as hilarious... as his last "Top 10 List."
*
Is good for something after all...
"If the name of the game is patriarchy, if we're in a society that still places great value on women's looks, then one way to make the game work for you is by taking that which patriarchy values - your beauty, your sexual appeal - and making them pay for it."**********
"Champion of 'some' of the people."
-- ST. JOHN'S -- Newfoundland and Labrador's former health minister said Monday his staff made the Premier's office aware of problems with breast-cancer testing months before it became public.*
A spokeswoman for Premier Danny Williams's office said he is off on personal time and not available to comment.
Starts cryin' about those poor fellows down at Guantanamo Bay... maybe you could spare a moment in your thoughts for Matt Maupin...
Sergeant Maupin was a 20-year-old private first class when he was captured on April 9, 2004, after his fuel convoy, part of the 724th Transportation Company, was ambushed west of Baghdad.Yet another telling example, of the capricious, unknowable "Will of Allah."
A week after his capture, the Arab television network Al Jazeera broadcast a videotape showing Sergeant Maupin sitting on the floor surrounded by five masked men holding automatic rifles.
"While a few lights may have been briefly dimmed for an hour or so last night, at the same time maybe this entirely painless and quite easily managed conceptual exercise has inadvertently provided us with another, highly revealing sort of illumination..."
Yeah, Pink... that is "highly revealing" all right."The problems began when, as part of the refurbishment of the town hall -- built in 1546 -- the council decided to heat the building with geothermal power from deep below the earth's surface."*
"In September last year an Austrian company sunk seven geothermal probes 140 meters into the ground."
Just watched five term City Councillor Diane Deans on the CTV affiliate CJOH... explain why the city of Ottawa is in such financial straits.
Apparently, Diane lays this misfortune squarely at the feet of the evil Mike Harris government... very specifically citing the "downloading of social programs" to municipalities in Ontario.
It seems though, that Ms. Deans is having some sort of seniors moment. On her own website from February of this year, she reports as follows...
On January 29, two colleagues and I attended a hearing of the Provincial Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs to tell the Provincial government what the City of Ottawa would like to see in the 2008 Provincial Budget.Now, for anybody who has been living in a cave since 2003... that meeting would be with... not the long-gone Harris government... but the two term McSlippery regime.
We asked that the Ontario government help municipalities become more financially sustainable *** "by uploading the cost of social programs" *** and public health, and to help us fund a youth treatment facility for Eastern Ontario.
"Don't suppose Deans mentioned that McGuinty closed the Rideau Correctional and Drug Treatment Center on the Southern border of Ottawa and Montague Township, eh?"*
That the real reason MP's have to keep on raising their own salaries... is so they can attract a certain calibre of candidate...
"Belinda Stronach, who rejoined the company as executive vice-chairman in May, collected about $4.3 million U.S. for eight months work while keeping a foothold in the House of Commons."I mean... who could take issue with that?
"If we are to castigate someone for drawing on a salary while doing little to earn it... let's start with Paul "guitar hero" Martin, who I understand has the among the lowest attendance records among all MPs."*
Totally off the hook... yet again...
Wendell Damian Cuff, 25, of Toronto, was arrested at his home early Sunday and charged with one count of first-degree murder and five counts of attempted murder.**********
A warrant has been issued for another 25-year-old Toronto man named Owen Anthony Smith, wanted on the same charges as Cuff.
A downtown subway shooting was likely the result of a petty argument between strangers that quickly escalated into a young man shooting a young woman -- who was also armed, police say.**********
As the three men exited at Spadina station, one pulled out a gun and shot one of the women in her thigh. The men then fled.
"Their empty cubicle farm located at street level is always lit up at any hour of the night when I walk by on the sidewalk."**********
"Sadly, Earth Hour was no exception."
"There is no innocent until proven guilty. You are guilty once they decide you are and they will prove it no matter what."**********
“Earth Hour wasn’t ever going to be about the electricity results.”That's very true.
For Mayor David Miller to call for metal detectors at all subway stations...
"The TTC is wound into the very fabric of the city and the life of the city goes on the TTC as well," he said yesterday. "It's important to keep this in perspective. Toronto is a safe city, but there are incidents that occur from time to time.""Incidents?" I guess that's one word.
Last year, a 21-year-old man was stabbed to death at Victoria Park subway station and a fare collector was killed there in 1995. In 2003, a 19-year-old was shot several times while waiting for a bus at the Kennedy subway station.Oh yeah... I guess it doesn't count as TTC-related crime, if you actually walk out the door.
"A gang of 10 teenagers violently robbed scores of subway commuters yesterday afternoon during the peak of commuter rush hour."*
Here in Canada... as our overburdened healthcare system continues to collapse under the crush of increasing demand, we are constantly being told that our emphasis must shift to prevention... rather than treatment... of illness.
It's an idea that is very much in vogue in the larger world as well.
"At least one organization that treats AIDS patients has called for giving up on a vaccine and shifting the money to testing, treatment and prevention."But the New York Times, yet again defying logic, reason and common-sense pronounces...
"That is too defeatist."Now, call me crazy... it just seems to me that AIDS... at least here in North America... is one of the more easily preventable diseases one might encounter.
No boiling today... but we had another pretty good haul of sap late in the afternoon.
Got on the scoreboard, as of last night, with one beautiful bottle of the best maple syrup anybody could hope for.
Some anxious moments near the end, as we were afraid of creating another batch of maple sugar. Today we also picked up a candy thermometer.
We'll see if it gets any easier to work that maple magic tomorrow.
*
Answer the call...
"Send us: Photos and video of your Earth Hour celebrations"We promise not to laugh.
"you can have anything...*
that you desire...
magic... and you know...
you're the one...
who can put out the fire"
Looks like he's managed to piss off all his former supporters... as well as Canadian taxpayers...
"He's a liar," declares Balwant Singh Gill, president of the Guru Nanak Sikh temple in Surrey, near Vancouver. "He said he would obey the laws of Canada and go home. We think it's in his best interest to go home. We even offered him $100,000 for medical treatment in India."Why should anyone care about this case? Apart from the outrageous lies Laibar Singh has told to everyone to remain in Canada... the fact is, the money comes right out of your pocket.
Half that amount was posted as a surety to the Immigration and Refugee Board, in order to buy some more time for Mr. Singh to recover from his illness and arrange his affairs in India. The money, raised by local supporters, has been forfeited, says Mr. Gill, thanks to Mr. Singh's intransigence.
Mr. Singh's care in Canada also has a price, one borne by taxpayers. Earlier this month, the Vancouver Sun reported that his public medical bills have already reached $491,900.Get rid of this guy... NOW.
That's in addition to the $62,947 the Canadian Border Services Agency has spent on its aborted deportation attempts.
To the TTC buzz-phrase... "Red Rocket."
News reports are beginning to come in about a firefight at Toronto's Spadina subway station...
"Heavy gunfire erupted on a subway train just after 8pm on Friday. Early reports suggest two groups may have been involved in a shootout and one woman was apparently hit by a bullet in the leg."**********
"One of the shooters has been described as a black male in his late teens or early 20s. He's 5'8, with a medium build, wearing a black baseball cap with a jean jacket and jeans."
CTV reported that the incident was believed to have started in the north end of the city and that the victim and a second female had been arguing with a male suspect and another male for most of the trip before the gunman open fired on the train full of riders making their way downtown.Now, it's the Globe & Mail that claims CTV is reporting this event... but as of 11:30 pm it wasn't on the CTV news with Lisa LaPhlegm, or on their website.
"There was a dispute between a man and a woman. She slapped him in the face and he took out a gun and shot her in the crotch," a plainclothes police investigator said at the scene.Oh yeah... the Toronto 'Red' Star had a slightly less complete description of the suspects...
Police were looking for a black male with a black jacket and a red patch on the front who ran from the northeast subway exit.
"Police combed the area to try to find three male suspects, all between 18 and 20 years old and wearing dark-coloured clothing. One man had a beard and an athletic build, and another had braided hair."*
Apparently Shawn Brant doesn't give a crap for Mohawk rules and regulations either...
A judge has returned control of a disputed Deseronto-area building and lands to the local Mohawk band council, but a defence lawyer says his clients will appeal the ruling.It does appear though, that not all the Mohawks have rejected the jurisdiction of the wily white man's courts.
In a judgment released Wednesday, Justice Lynn Ratushny of Ontario's Superior Court of Justice ruled the building and lands must be returned to the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte (MBQ) band council.
The case had been brought by MBQ Chief R. Donald Maracle on behalf of band council and all band members against Shawn M. Brant, his father, Ronald L. Brant, Andrew Clifford Miracle and Ohwistha Capital Corp.**********
The lands were occupied and the building built by the Brants, then sold to Miracle - though the judge wrote neither the Brants nor Miracle ever had band council's consent.
Ratushny, in her written ruling, explained that in 1992 the Brants approached the band with an offer to purchase the property in question.*
Though they did not purchase or pay for the lands, they did borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars from Ohwistha - an Aboriginal finance company that administered development loans for native businesses - and from Industry Canada to help them construct buildings there.
None of these funds were repaid.
"Have you made special plans for Earth Hour Saturday?"
**********"I live in a hood that has a high percentage of 'glowtards'."**********
"Julie Langer, of World Wildlife Fund Canada -- the group organizing the event in Canada -- said the goal of Earth Hour is to inspire action and promote change."*
"Langer said most people realize that simply turning off the lights for an hour won't save the planet."
"But the hope is that by doing so, people will become motivated to 'make every hour Earth Hour.'"
I feel your pain...
Is it a deterrent against bad behavior, or a way to keep weapons out of the hands of violent inmates?Now... shut up and eat.
Some prisons are serving inmates Nutraloaf, a blocky mash of ingredients that provides all the nutrients growing convicts need to thrive — and can be eaten without a fork or a knife.
If it pisses off Iran... I'm in.
**********
UPDATE: Somebody's getting a little cranky
Note: Due to high traffic and DDOS attacks the site may be unusually slow. We're working on resolving these issues...thanks for your patience.**********
"Following threats to our staff of a very serious nature, and some ill informed reports from certain corners of the British media that could directly lead to the harm of some of our staff, Liveleak.com has been left with no other choice but to remove Fitna from our servers."Not to worry though... as soon as I heard that these guys had wussed out... I figured somebody would pick up the slack.
"This is a sad day for freedom of speech on the net but we have to place the safety and well being of our staff above all else."
"LiveLeak has removed Dutch politician Geert Wilders controversial movie on the Koran because of death threats."Imam Darcey to the rescue.
"I figured that would happen and that is why I uploaded it onto our own server."
While most of the fuzzy-bunny left seems to be overly obsessed with, say... what's going on with the Antarctic ice-shelf... I've decided to focus on stuff a little closer to home... like what I shovel into my yap, three times a day.
-- OTTAWA -- The number of organic farms in Canada increased by almost 60 per cent in five years and continues growing, though they still fill only a tiny part of the food supply, Statistics Canada says.So... a 60 percent increase... that's a startling statistic.
Statistics Canada noted that organic products accounted for less than one per cent of the $46.5-billion Canadians spent in grocery stores in 2006.Head on over to Statistics Canada for facts and figures.
In fact, the agency said, the most common certified organic crops are hay and field crops, and most of this production is exported.
“I’m tired of having a bunch of white people running around doing science... when it comes to Antarctica, it isn’t just the landscape that’s white.”Hey, Doc... throw in a couple of deaf lesbians and we're virtually guaranteed to have "peace on earth."
"Tuesday's hearing probably won't change the outcome of the case against Lemire: Like a five-star hotel that guarantees its guests full satisfaction, the HRC provides handpicked complainants with a 100% success rate on hate-speech cases."So lemme see if I get this right... Paul Bernardo and Killer Karla are entitled to more "due process"... than anyone who gets dragged in front of this penny-ante kangaroo court?
"Better than that: The commission actually lets certain complainants waltz into its Ottawa facilities to fiddle with the online evidence-gathering."
In one famous exchange during the Lemire case, Steacy was asked "What value do you give freedom of speech when you investigate?" -- to which he replied "Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value."**********
"Welcome to the wacky world of Canadian "human rights." If it sounds like a fetish club for servants of the Crown, well, that would be a lot cheaper."*
Stephen Harper is a crazy control freak... but Stephane Dion is a benevolent, fatherly disciplinarian...
-- MONTREAL -- Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion moved yesterday to regain control of his Quebec troops, calling on them to show a "steely discipline," although he would not say what he would do if other dissenters pop up.Steffi-licker supreme, Serge Joyal, seemed a little less optimistic about that superlative and extremely loyal Liberal team...
"I have a much better team than Harper. Not only is it better, it's united," Mr. Dion said.
"They don't seem to realize that we are in a war and in that war, you shoot at the outside, not the inside. You won't improve the situation if you kill some of your own soldiers," Mr. Joyal, who is now a Liberal senator, told CTV News.**********
"I am thrilled that Steffi is still around, it's like having a perpetual live Monty Python skit to view daily -- 'E's not dead....e's just restin'."**********
"Keep him around, the comedic factor is incalculable."
"If his white grandmother's alive... I think it's gonna be a tense Thanksgiving this year."*
Be careful what you wish for.
Conditions today were apparently some sort of arboreal "perfect storm"... for the production of maple sap. Came home from a seminar on organic farming to find Mrs. N hip-deep in magic elixir.
There was a mad scramble to find containers to hold the raw sap... we ended up using the flour and sugar canisters off the kitchen counter, to hold all the stuff we couldn't get into the big stock pot and the slow cooker.
Did I already mention the three containers out on the deck?
Everyone has headed off to bed. I'll babysit the big stock pot for a while and we'll finish this lot off tomorrow morning... just in time to empty our six buckets again.
I think we're gonna have to press our big water-cooler jug into service.
All I can say is... this had better be some damn fine syrup.
A.M. Report - okay, still below freezing... not much in the buckets right now
**********
FROM THE COMMENTS:
"Just remember: you are doing it for LOVE...forget the fact that when you add in your costs for the energy to boil the sap, the time spent, etc., you are creating a $200 bottle of syrup!"*
Is also working on a ruling... to repeal the "law of gravity."
-- VANCOUVER -- A B.C. judge has ruled that a full-patch member of the Hells Angels and two associates are not members of a criminal organization in a trial that was a key test of the recent federal anti-gang legislation.**********
-- DALLAS -- The city cannot shut down a Dallas strip club just because a 12-year-old danced nude there.**********
"There's a laundry list of things we can use to deny or revoke a license, but having a 12-year-old dancing in their establishment is not one of the things that automatically enables us to revoke their license," said Lt. Christina Smith, a Dallas police vice unit commander who oversees licensing of such establishments.
"Defence lawyer Greg Lafontaine said that Allen was a young man when he committed the crime and has matured behind bars.*
He argued that Allen’s previous convictions of assault and threatening death, though serious, do not approach the level of violence of the shooting."
Do you have to be... to bring a bat to a gunfight...
When an officer arrived he saw a man wielding a baseball bat. The officer confronted the man. After some interaction the officer fired his pistol. The man sustained a single gunshot wound to his abdomen.*
22-year-old Nirmal Bagri was taken to Brampton Civic Hospital by ambulance where he underwent surgery. Mr. Bagri is recovering in hospital.
It ain't just for crazy jihadis...
On the night the protest began, as the blockades were erected and police readied themselves for a showdown, Kelley was behind the barricades with the Mohawk protesters. She said it took some convincing, but they finally agreed to let her stay with them behind their barricade lines.Remember... this is the same Shawn Brant who warned OPP honcho Julian Fantino... that the aboriginals had firearms at the blockade... and were prepared to use them that night... a fact that is curiously absent from reporter Susanna Kelley's account here.
The documentary also shows that Mohawk leader Shawn Brant had children at the blockades. The inclusion of the youth in the events was meant to show them that they too "may have to someday stand up and fight for what they believe in," Kelley's documentary quotes Brant.
Asked if children in the protest perimeter was proper, in her experience, Kelley said, "As a journalist I'm non-judgmental about these types of things. That's up to the public to decide."Hey, Susanna... let me help you out here... "dropping children into the middle of a potential firefight?"
Hmmm...
"Why was Tuesday's hearing the one day that won't be transcribed and published?"Not worried yet? Maybe you should be.
"Why was a trifling savings of a court stenographer -- who costs, what, a third of what a lawyer bills? -- chosen as the one area of economy to find?"
"Is the Tribunal, with the unlimited resources of the government, out of cash?"
"Do you access the internet on a wireless connection?"I'm not sure how tech-savvy my readership is... but you should be aware that virtually every laptop sold nowadays comes with built-in wireless capability.
"Well, your government "thought protectors" may be borrowing your internet identity to play-act as white supremacists on foreign internet forums - if you're lucky."
"Because if they can play-act as "Jadewarr, jew-hater", they can play-act as "Jadewarr, child pornographer", or "Jadewarr, bridge blower"."
The next time the screechy, hysterical lunatic left attempts to manipulate your emotions...
"An estimated 2,300 Canadians died in 2006 after contracting antibiotic resistant Staph bacteria, costing the national heath-care system between $200 million and $250,000 million that year, new figures suggest."As devastating as they undoubtedly are to friends and family of our military casualties... combat deaths in Afghanistan... have so far averaged out to 10 or 12 soldiers per year.
"I would like to see your humanity adressed(sic) to 35,000 preventable deaths each day, you sanctimonious, bombastic(fool) fuck."*
How... in the name of "goddess mother earth"... did I not think of this?
"TWO things that you can find a lot of in Portland, Ore., are vegans and strip clubs. Johnny Diablo decided to open a business to combine both."*
"At his Casa Diablo Gentlemen’s Club, soy protein replaces beef in the tacos and chimichangas; the dancers wear pleather, not leather."
So if Tibetans are the new Nazis... does that mean the Chinese army is just re-enacting D-Day?
-- OTTAWA -- China's ambassador to Canada held an extraordinary news conference Wednesday where he likened Tibet's traditional governance to Nazi Germany and called the country's exiled spiritual leader a serial liar.That's weird... I guess I missed the part where Monty and Eisenhower totally crushed those pesky French citizens.
"The Dalai Lama has been telling lies to the world for decades," Lu Shumin told a group of invited journalists at the Chinese Embassy.Three cheers for freedom-fighting China.
They're just good ol' boys like you and me.
-- BRAMPTON, ONT. -- Call it the double-double defence: Would dangerous jihadists take a break from their winter training camp to warm up inside a Tim Hortons?Yup... sounds like a pretty typical bunch of hosers - doing what any red-blooded Canadian lads would be doing in their spare time.
"Now we know where the evidence for that spectacular allegation came from – a conversation in a car during a 10-hour drive back to Toronto from the Northern Ontario settlement of Opasatika where the government claims (implausibly to anyone who has ever been to the tiny community) the alleged plotters hoped to establish a jihadist training camp."*
"The suspects seem unsure as to just who the Prime Minister is that they are apparently conspiring to behead. One thinks it's "Paul um what's his name – Paul loser (former prime minister Paul Martin). Another is sure (correctly as it turns out) that Harper is the man."
"Are these the words of an Al Qaeda fanatic? A rabid Protestant? A management consultant?"
"From the evidence, it is hard to tell."
Your lakeshore condos and that bran' spankin' Porsche Turbo... but out here at the Halls, we're brewin' up the world's most expensive breakfast garnish.
At Mrs. Neo's behest, we finally, after six years on the property... went out and bought the gear to gather and produce our own maple syrup.
It's a pretty modest enterprise, consisting of a mere 6 buckets on 3 trees... but it's ours and we're proud of it. The buckets, spiles, lids and filters, to our initial horror, set us back 80 smackers... but we'll be amortising that over the next couple of decades so I guess it's actually no big deal.
It's coming up 24 hours and we have been simmering the first haul, off and on, all day. Apparently you need to boil down 40 gallons of sap to get one gallon of syrup.
It'll be interesting to see how it all turns out.
**********
UPDATE: Day 1
Ok... no syrup today.
I had to go out and Mrs. Neo was holding down the fort. Apparently there is a very fine line between concocting maple syrup and maple sugar. Mrs. N says that's the trouble with real life versus "book larnin'".
On the plus side, maple sugar is pretty tasty too.
We'll try again tomorrow.
*
There's no entrepreneurial spirit on those native reservations?
More than 300 police officers raided Mohawk territories in Quebec, eastern Ontario and New York State Wednesday morning, arresting suspects in a drug smuggling ring, police said.Talk about busy little beavers... it appears there's more of it... than I previously suspected.
The raids were conducted by provincial police, RCMP, Mohawk Peace Keepers, and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
Arrests were made in Montreal, Kahnawake, Kanesatake, and on the Akwesasne territory, which spans the borders between Quebec, Ontario and New York near Cornwall, Ont.**********
A massive police raid at three different Mohawk reserves in Quebec Wednesday morning netted $2.5 million in cash and a large firearms cache, including three grenade launchers.*
If only we had some some sort of legislation "that would ban" carting around a shitload of guns and drugs...
A Montreal man faces more than 60 charges after police in Ajax stopped an SUV loaded with a "substantial" amount of drugs and an arsenal of firearms, including an assortment of nine weapons, thousands of rounds of ammunition and even a grenade.And a cry rose over the tormented multitude... "more laws, more bans..."
The officers also found a kilo of cocaine worth about $100,000, four 500 ml bottles of the date rape drug GHB, $10,000 in cash and several boxes of laboratory equipment.
Hanna Anastas, 34, of Montreal, faces 64 charges, mostly related to firearms and drug trafficking.
"A police officer gets a warrant to seize buddy's hard drive based on a specific charge with a judge's consent. But that warrant has to be fairly specific, I would presume, to the complaint at hand."And circumventing the intent of a search warrant... what's that about?
"The authorities are not supposed to just do fishing expeditions and maybe discover that buddy's also been cheating on his income taxes or selling fake Viagra."
"But then, this police officer just hands the hard drive over to the Human Rights Commission, which has much mushier standards of evidence, so a totally new agency can do a fishing expedition without having to go through the hassle of getting a warrant."I guess "Lucy" Warman would tell you... it's all about "the greater good"... except, of course, he hadn't bothered to show up.
To plow through this morning... and I'm thinkin' I know who most of them are from...
"Obviously Kinsella's borderline slander is prompted by jealousy."**********
"Steyn visits the White House and Buckingham Palace while Warren hunts for Nazis in boy's washrooms."
"I've got a question for Kinsella."**********
"Where was his outrage a few years ago when more than 1,000 Muslim radicals marched through Calgary chanting "death to the Jews" and flying the flag of the terrorist group Hezbollah?"
In India, they have a problem with cobras. Thousands of people dying every year. So, the government put a bounty on cobras. Makes sense, profit motive, etc.*
Well, not so much. Turns out some real smart guys started farms to breed cobras...
I think we are seeing the same thing here. There is cash in cobras, and folks like Warman and Kinsella breeding the hell out of them.
Another mythical spring offensive.
-- KABUL -- The Taliban has said it will use new techniques and draw on years of fighting experience to increase attacks in Afghanistan this spring.Translation... we're gonna keep on sneaking out in the middle of the night to plant booby-traps beside the highway... and Allah be merciful to all those bureaucrats down at the Ministry of Agriculture... 'cos we're gonna slaughter them... and their wives & children too.
A statement Tuesday attributed to Taliban senior commander Mullah Bradar also warned Afghans working with the government to quit their jobs or risk being targeted.
“It's the same old story, it's the same old nonsense,” Mark Laity, the NATO spokesman in Kabul, said Wednesday. “What are they saying they will do? More destruction, more unhappiness, more misery.So, Mullah Bradar, you give it your best shot... like you... and your late predecessors... threaten to do every year.
A car bomb has exploded near a farmers' market in southern Afghanistan, killing eight people and wounding 17.*
The provincial police chief Mohammad Hussein Andiwal told reporters there were no security forces in the area and that civilians were the target.
Assorted room temperature IQ's - yup... we're good to go...
The jihadist exhortation – a centrepiece of the Crown's case that was recovered as police seized video from one of the suspects' computers – was entered in evidence yesterday.Hmmm... this little escapade sounds so familiar.
“You go back, you're living with society and you have to put on that face, you know, that we're a bunch of peace lovers,” he said.
The transcript indicates there was laughter in the tent.
"I drove to the shops a few hours ago, where I parked under heavy sniper fire. Oh, excuse me; that was a misstatement and a minor blip."So how is it... that this sort of thing gets a pass in the mainstream media?
"What I meant was that it was raining."
"Caught with his pants down."
Finally, we get to the heart of the argument, as far as Lemire's defence: Barbara suggests that Steacy emailed Lemire to trap him into admitting that the initial complaint was made in a "vexatious" manner, and he - sort of admits that was a factor, although not really.Ah yes... the old, "we only screw over some of the citizenry... sometimes" defense.
Ahh, but if he *had* replied to Steacy's email, Barbara points out, the commission would be able to use that to dismiss any future complaint from Lemire.
"That's not the way we work," Steacy insists. "It's on a case by case basis."
Finally, she gets to her question: does Steacy remember that testimony?Go Deaner... you're really smokin' now.
Answer: "Sort of."
Did he sign onto Stormfront again?
Answer: "Probably," although he doesn't remember for sure.
2:18:27 PM**********
So why *was* he on freedominion.ca before there was a complaint?
Answer: Because there was the *potential* for a complaint to come in, he says - prompting muffled gasps from the group beside me, which includes the two founders of Free Dominion.
Now Doug Christie is on his feet, and expressing grave concern over the fact that a CHRC representative was investigating the site before a complaint has been made.
Barbara K wants to know *who* - othe than Gentes - was considering making a complaint, and Steacy refuses to answer.
"UPDATE: Oh, before I forget: this website hereby announces it will pay $0.23* for a clear photo of Warren Kinsella and any Liberal frontbencher together, taken in the last two years."*
"For such a well-connected political insider, they seem to be hard to come by."
It's a sad day for personal freedom... but local Dads are apparently ecstatic...
Researchers at Indiana University's school of medicine plan to use cellphones to track the movements of 160 14- to 16-year-old girls over the course of a year in an effort to better understand the connection between specific locations and bad behaviour.I'm not sure what they mean by "intervention"... maybe something akin to the electric shock collars you can get for training your dog not to stray off the property?
"If we know there's an area of town where an adolescent girl is more likely to engage in some sort of risky behaviour, then we could potentially program those phones to deliver an intervention," Sarah Wiehe said.
The study, which will take place in Indianapolis, is scheduled to wrap up in 2010. It will compare the girls' geographic location with their reported activities, such as smoking and having sex.Now, from what I seem to remember about my youngest sister's 'teenage antics'... somebody at Indiana U had better be working on a 'taser phone'.
"Been a long while since I was a teen, but from what I remember, the more a place was "out of bounds", the more popular it became."*
"Do they really want to draw, literally, a map for them?"
I'm not up on all the latest lingo... but I think this is called "declaring a fathead..."
"P.S.: Good lord -- look at what a commenter dug up. Young Abdullah isn't just importing sharia law to Moncton -- he's importing stilettos and other assorted weapons, too, as fast as he can. This is a picture of one that he bought just two weeks ago on eBay. Here are the details."Don't bother trying to open up the link to the Moncton Mosque... it seems young Abdullah has suddenly turned shy.
"Oh, and here's what the Criminal Code has to say about stilettos that can be opened with the click of a button -- they're illegal (scroll down to the definition of the phrase "prohibited weapon")."
"But I'm sure Abdullah would tell the police -- if their diversity squad permitted them to raise this touchy subject -- that he follows a higher authority than Canadian laws."
**********Hey, Abdullah... your heart may belong to Allah... but your ass belongs to "Google Cache."Wait a minute... Abdullah's webpage has resurfaced... and, lo and behold... he suddenly has a new hobby.
Funny... that's not what the page said... before it disappeared... after Ezra's post.
The mysterious ways of Islam.Public notice of change of registered nameIf this guy is 38 years old now... isn't he some sort of 'Abdullah-come-lately'.
under the Change of Name Act, chapter C-2.001,
Previous Registered Name: Robert William Palmer Delancey
New Registered Name: Abdullah Robert Delancey
Address: 22 Seventh Street
Moncton, N.B. E1E 3G1
Date Granted: November 28, 2006
Yet again...
"Do you actually believe that anybody has the 'personal freedom' to 'take over the state?' This is so embarrassingly stupid, I'm shocked."Don't worry, Jason... Jeffy 'Bugboy' Davidson still loves you.
"The Nazis were criminals, Jason! It's the crime that's the problem, not the personal freedom!"
"The activists, NGO types, censorious government mandarins and law-school profs who champion Section 13.1 declared their fealty to hyper-tolerance as a state creed many years ago, and are impatient for the rest of us to recite the same pledge of allegiance."(via bcf)
"It sickens the censors that anyone, anywhere, no matter how marginalized, entertains private thoughts at variance with their enlightened attitudes."
I got a kick out of his phrase Nazi libertarians.*
I had to get out my political dictionary for that one. I'm still trying to figure out what it's supposed to mean.
This forms a pattern. Cherniak appears to believe that the greatest threat to freedom is... freedom.
It's what you're actually prepared to do... and to most people, the term "high-risk offender" carries with it some built in warnings... such as "danger, avoid contact, monitor closely" and very probably... "don't let this monster loose."
-- KINGSTON, Ont. -- A high-risk sex offender is back behind bars after he allegedly threatened to kill a group of children after being freed from Kingston Penitentiary.So, Dalton... what exactly is this guy doing out on the street?
Bateman has a criminal record that spans more than 30 years. It includes violent sex attacks on children accompanied by torture and humiliation.
In 1991, Bateman received an eight-year sentence for repeated violent assaults on a Belleville, Ont. girl that included an attempt to rape the nine-year-old with a screwdriver.Apparently, in Dalton McGuinty's fuzzy-bunny socialist paradise, there's no such thing as a bad boy.
He hung the boy by his ankles over a stairwell in once instance and rammed his face into a plate of hot pasta in another.
The man arrested in a high-risk takedown Easter Sunday in a taxi was wanted for a murder last month during which a suspect was identified from surveillance images.If only poor Mohmed hadn't been brainwashed by that inanimate chunk of metal.
Toronto Police today said Mohmed Ahmed Nakhuda, 36, of Toronto, was sought for the shooting death of Jonathan Rodrigues.
Homicide Det.-Sgt. Dan Sheppard said the motive is believed known and he and wanted man were "associates" involved in "lifestyles" he declined to describe.
"Here's the biggest thing we 'racists' notice."**********
"Every single immigrant group that ever came to America -- including the Chinese who came as railroad slaves -- has risen out of poverty and want to achieve prosperity and respect."
"The Irish, the Italians, the Polish, the Jews, the Koreans, the Vietnamese."
"Every group but you."
"And you're the only group we fought a war to free..."
UPDATE 3/23. Well, well, well. First things first. Glenn Reynolds did not link to this post, so leave him alone. Second, all you Nazis and white supremacists can go straight to hell; you can't read any better than Glenn Greenwald. Third, Althouse was right (I won't sully her rep by linking her) when she speculated that I'm too old to care what people think of me.*
As for the rest of the pious bloggerites of the left and right who have been so quick to label this a "racist rant," my only retort to you is laughter.
You are determined to build for yourselves a nonsense world made out of delusions that will continually frustrate and defeat you because you are incapable of being honest about matters which are truly complex and in which no one on any of the innumerable "sides" is free of guilt, wrongdoing, and responsibility.
I pity you. Because you're the ones who will have to live with the consequences of your own deep personal dishonesty, your transparent projections, and your fearful sycophancy. Not me. So leave me out of it too, and see if you can have that discussion you think you want among yourselves.
Good luck with that.
The infelicitously named teachers union in the U.K. has come up with a novel way to solve all of Britain's social ills... let's do away with the separation of Church & State -- in its entirety...
-- NUT conference, Manchester -- Head teachers should allow imams, rabbis and priests to offer religious instruction to pupils in all state schools, teachers' leaders have said.Well, that one's gonna be hard to dispute... I mean, look at how well it's been working in the Islamic Middle East.
The National Union of Teachers (NUT) said the move would be a way to reunite divided communities.
It is not clear why those on board the Global Patriot opened fire.And... wait for it...
Al-Qaeda militants have in the past used small motorboats to attack US military and other foreign vessels in waters off the coast of Yemen, our correspondent adds.*
Following the recent example of evil genius bossman OBL... Ayman the Pieman continues to work that madman mojo...
"Israel and additional Western targets must be attacked as revenge for Israel's aggressive policy in the Gaza Strip."I'm not sure what sort of cultural disconnect allows this guy to overlook thousands of randomly launched HAMAS rockets... but ol' Ayman, once again, trips the light craptastic.
Like bin Laden, the al-Qaeda second in command issued a threat against those countries in which cartoons of Muhammad were published, saying that "They cannot insult our prophet and support Israel and then expect to live in peace in the countries."Anybody remember that old episode of the original "Lost in Space" where the cheesy robot is reprogrammed by aliens and runs around yelling, "CRUSH, KILL, DESTROY!!!?"
Why someone like Chief Clarence Louie isn't Minister of Aboriginal Affairs...
The 47-year-old chief of B.C.'s Osoyoos Indian Band believes the way the federal government has treated natives is dead-wrong.Good grief.
"Our people have to get away from that mentality of spending money and start making money," Louie said. "I love creating jobs and I love making money."
"Hard work, not handouts, is the way to solving the criminally high rate of native unemployment, poverty and incarceration," he argues.
Taxpayers of all races (including aboriginals) shell out $10 billion annually to help an estimated 1 million natives.
Roughly half of aboriginal Canadians subsist on an annual income of less than $10,000, according to the most recent data; unemployment among aboriginals is 26%, three times the national rate; Statistics Canada calculates that more than half of native kids are living in poverty; ¾ drop out of school before completing Grade 12; the incarceration rate of aboriginal men is 11 times that of non-native men; of women, it is 250 times the rate for non-native women.**********
"In recent months, especially, I have been impressed by how ordinary citizens have taken it upon themselves to report the story that the media at-large has ignored."*
Mrs. Neo, who has an insatiable appetite for the written word... is currently plowing through the collected works of Canadian journalist Jan Wong... pausing occasionally, to offer up the ripest morsels from the feast...
"Like lots of resident Western journalists, my phone had been tapped, my mail opened. The secret police tailed me, interrogated my sources and sometimes arrested them."And like any good writer... she gets up close and personal.
"In 1989, a few days after the massacre at Tiananmen Square, plainclothes police mistook me for a student and tried to kidnap me. I fought back, screaming–in English. The agents stopped trying to stuff me in the back of the unmarked car."I'm obviously gonna have to read this one myself.
"Still shaking on the sidewalk, I belatedly realized that if only I had gone along with them, I would have had a great story."
"But on this trip I’m nervous, because I’m returning to Beijing for another reason. I am not only planning to chronicle the future of this great city; I also need to come to terms with my own past."Except that she could never really forget.
"For this, I want moral support. I need my family to reassure me that I’m not a horrible human being. Or that, if I am, they love me anyway. Thirty-three years ago, in one thoughtless, misguided moment, I destroyed someone’s life."
"This is what I did: in 1973, I ratted out a stranger at Beijing University who wanted to get to America. At the time I did not give it much thought. I certainly did not understand the enormity of what I had done. I recorded the incident in my diary, and forgot about it."
If we can't find any dastardly 'Joos'... we'll just kill each other...
Clashes have broken out between Palestinian factions in a refugee camp in southern Lebanon. The fighting was between members of the Fatah faction and an Islamist group called Jund al-Sham.Who exactly, are these homicidal freaks?
It took place in the densely populated Ain al-Hilwe refugee camp, which is located on the outskirts of the southern city of Sidon. Fighters launched rockets and exchanged gunfire in the middle of the camp, causing dozens of civilians to flee.
Lebanese and Palestinian officials said one Fatah member was killed and four others wounded, the Associated Press news agency reported.**********
Iraqi officials say insurgents attacks in Baghdad and northern Iraq have killed at least 40 people.Oh, man... when it rains, it pours.
In the Iraqi capital Sunday, gunmen in several cars opened fire on pedestrians in a religiously mixed southern district, killing seven people. A suicide car bomber also killed at least six people in a Shi'ite neighborhood (Shula) of Baghdad.
In a previous life, I used to feed and water these stately behemoths... and it's interesting to see how all the predictions of their imminent demise... were dead wrong...
The mainframe is the classic survivor technology, and it owes its longevity to sound business decisions. I.B.M. overhauled the insides of the mainframe, using low-cost microprocessors as the computing engine.Everybody talks about LANS and server farms like they are the be-all and end-all technology... but in truth... sometimes you just need that big, honkin box.
The company invested and updated the mainframe software, so that banks, corporations and government agencies could still rely on the mainframe as the rock-solid reliable and secure computer for vital transactions and data, while allowing it to take on new chores like running Web-based programs.Chug on, my old friend.
"And that's the point. I despise them both. But I don't think either group should be arrested for having foul ideas."Go Ezra.
"According to the press reports that I've seen, there was some chanting and sign-waving and even a few leaflets being handed out, but no violence, and no incitement of violence."
"In other words, it was calmer than a typical Friday afternoon at Syed Soharwardy's mosque."
"How dare he tell me, and the millions of other children and grandchildren, what their forbears sacrifice was about?"*
"How dare he presume to set himself up as the arbiter of what such a momentous and complex event as the War was about?"
"It's an insult and a slight on every single veteran and every single member of their families."
All lined up in the heavens...
A typical bigshot with a rising star would have walked away long before now...(via sda)
Upon hearing news that the CHRC wanted to pull him in for a chat, he could simply have said, "Talk to my lawyer," or better yet, "Blow me," and that would have been that.
He didn't.
A website that a Dutch right-wing politician was planning to use to release a film expected to be fiercely critical of Islam has been suspended.*
The US hosting service, Network Solutions, said it was investigating complaints that it may have breached guidelines on hate language.
It said the site was suspended until it was established whether the content of the site violated Network Solutions' terms of acceptable use.
For this girl's friends and family... which apparently... the Red Star is only too happy to try turn into a case of police malfeasance...
"It's been almost two weeks since an 18-year-old Brampton student disappeared in Ottawa, and her family is complaining the police are taking the weekend off."Is the Star actually trying to suggest policing is a Monday to Friday, 9 to 5 job?
A police airplane has already done an aerial search of the campus and surrounding areas.In its relentless pursuit of "establishment conspiracy", the Star just happens to ignore a few inconvenient facts.
On Wednesday, family members searched the perimeter of the campus, which included help from a search-and-rescue dog and handler.
Nadia's mother says they fear something horrible has happened, but they won't give up. "It's tough not knowing," Chevalier added. She said that Nadia seemed to be depressed lately and had an argument with a friend (apparently her boyfriend) Sunday, the same day she went missing.Now... heaven forbid anything has happened to this young girl... but her well-being... as sure as the sun rises in the east... doesn't hang on any sort of neglect by the local police force.
Nadia's grandmother in Brampton, Menna Chevalier, said she "was in terrible shape and couldn't sleep." Nadia returned to Brampton last week for spring break but "wasn't well," according to her grandmother.
Ottawa Police Sgt. Uday Jaswal, a qualified master searcher who has experience looking for missing persons, said they have used a marine unit to comb the banks of the Rideau River after receiving new information.*
“We are currently interviewing friends and family and are looking at information from other sources, including video cameras,” Jaswal said, adding that police are still holding out hope they’ll “make contact with her soon.”
Police believe no foul play was involved in her sudden disappearance.
Rollin' Rollin' Rollin'...
Though the streams are swollen...
Keep them doggies rollin'...
Rawhide!
*
We do so... feel your pain... but trust me, it could be much, much worse.
*
The news that France is to send an extra 1,000 troops to fight the Taleban will be a timely boost for the overburdened members of Nato who have borne the brunt of its attacks.**********
France has professional, highly capable troops with combat experience gained in many parts of the globe, notably Africa.
"Maintaining the competences necessary to dissuasion at the highest level is a fundamental objective for our security," he said, adding: "All those who threaten to attack our vital interests would expose themselves to a severe riposte by..."*
"Where we have this thing called 'human nature'..."(via ffof)
You want equality, then take it, on all levels.
That means when Obama uses the phrase “typical white person”, he deserves to have his figurative ass kicked just like Whitey’s figurative ass would be kicked for saying “typical black person”. It means Reverend Wright is an asshole of a racist just like David Duke.
Play fair or don’t play at all.
How serious this situation was -- it wouldn't just be George Smitherman wearing those adult diapers.
So be forewarned... if you're planning on having a heart-attack in the Greater Toronto Area... please be sure to book your ambulance ahead of time...
The frantic calls from Toronto EMS to city hospitals warn again and again there are no ambulances to respond to 911 calls.This really isn't news; it's been like this for years. I have a friend who's a Toronto paramedic and he could scare the snot out of anybody who has a friend, or family member, with a serious health condition.
In text messages obtained by the Sun, EMS duty officers plead with hospitals to free up paramedics who are sitting with patients waiting to be admitted.
On March 10, an unnamed EMS duty officer warned hospitals that available ambulance levels were gravely low.If only Dalton hadn't been pissin' away all those taxpayer nickels and dimes.
"We have three available ambulances in Toronto, we are unable to respond to 911 calls, please offload some crews ASAP," one message sent just after 10 p.m. reads.
Less than 15 minutes later, the situation gets worse.
"Update, we have no available units in our system," the next message reads. "We are looking after 40 patients in (emergency department) hallways, please free up some of our resources as public safety is at risk."
On March 1, several Echo calls -- which could be for a child not breathing, for example -- only hit the standard 66% of the time.*
On March 4, Echo calls received in the afternoon were only responded to in less than nine minutes 33% of the time.
Totally off the hook... yet again.
-- TORONTO -- Akinyosoye-Paul followed them outside and continued to threaten them, warning, "You're all going to die."Another less than triumphant moment for the Liberals "Farmer Bob Rifle Registry."
And then he tried to make good on that promise, following them to the North Kipling Community Centre, pulling out a gun and shooting Michael Waterman and his companion.
When police questioned both victims, they were unable to tell them why they'd been shot. It turns out the gunman had made a near fatal error in his blind rage, and shot two innocent people.
Neither was involved with gangs and neither knew his cousin or the suspect.
A man in his 20s parked at an east-end mall with his 9-year-old daughter was shot through the chest last night, police say. The man was taken to Sunnybrook hospital in serious condition and his daughter was taken to a nearby police station to be questioned.**********
Although the strip mall at Lawrence Ave. and Markham Rd. was busy when the shooting took place at 7 p.m., police have no witnesses.
"We had a whole lot of people here, but no one is willing to say anything ... That is typical for Scarborough," said police Const Ryan Shaw.
Four men escaped serious injury after they were shot through the window of a west-end doughnut shop early Saturday morning.Safe city... my ass.
Three of the men were sitting inside Country Style Donuts around 1:15 a.m. at 606 Dixon Rd., near Kipling Ave. when they were shot at close range through the window of the business, Toronto police Acting Staff Sgt. Cheryl Sanson said.
Police said several people were seen fleeing from the scene of the shooting at the Country Style Donuts shop on 1735 Kipling Avenue.*
"The suspect description is male, black, five foot five to five foot eight, blue bandanna, black jacket, dark pants and dark baseball cap," said Beadman. "Toronto Police are requesting assistance from the public in relation to any possible witnesses who may have been present in the area."
Saudi Arabia is to retrain its 40,000 prayer leaders - also known as imams - in an effort to counter militant Islam.However, it may not be as easy as running a few "remedial sessions" down at the local mosque...
Details of the plan were revealed in the influential Saudi newspaper Al-Sharq al-Awsat.
But critics are sceptical about whether such initiatives would work as long as the powerful, and ultraconservative, religious establishment in Saudi Arabia continues to exert enormous influence over society.Hmmm... this could be a long night.
Only last week, a prominent cleric called for the beheading of two liberal writers who had questioned the orthodox view that Muslims can not change their religion.
Let's put aside, for a moment, the thorny matter of whether our elected officials should be negotiating with people... who continue to crap all over the law of the land.
I just wanna know, how many MRI machines could you buy with 50 million dollars?
The two-year-old land dispute in Caledonia has so far cost Ontarians $50 million. And that cost will continue to rise until a settlement is reached.And guess what? Just like those pesky human rights commissions... you, the taxpayer... have to foot the bill for the instigators.
A report suggests most of that money - $35 million - has come from the price of putting police officers at the scene 24/7 to provide security.
Ontario taxpayers are also footing the bill for the Six Nations negotiating team, pegged at $500,000. Aboriginal Affairs Minister Michael Bryant assures the cost of negotiation still runs below what litigation would.Thank you... oh wonderful McGuinty.
"The cost of policing is the cost of keeping the peace."
-- TORONTO -- Assembly of First Nations Chief Phil Fontaine says he's optimistic Ontario will be able to resolve a dispute between an exploration company and a remote Northern Ontario First Nation whose leaders were recently jailed.*
Mr. Fontaine says he was “encouraged” by a recent talk with Aboriginal Affairs Minister Michael Bryant in which they discussed resource revenue sharing and developing a framework for consultation.
Blogging the process of dying is becoming a small yet poignant fixture on the Internet landscape.*
For some, dying is a time to reach out to the world, instead of retreating from it.
Of Eastern Europe is left holding the last lit stick of dynamite...
In a joint statement issued simultaneously in their three capitals, the governments of Hungary, Bulgaria and Croatia made clear they saw no other option than to recognize Kosovo as an independent state.Now the fun really begins.
"Simian Drakich hoots... 'Nice to see Canada now in step with the Nazis, Islamists and Imperialistic thugs.'"Yup... who among us evil Canadians... wouldn't want to throw in... with the gentle, intellectual Serbs?
Lemme see if I can dumb this down enough... for even the biggest under-achievers in the class.
Mexico is a corrupt, sweaty-balled, third world banana republic... and you shouldn't expect to encounter any semblance of Canadian democracy, or, more importantly... Canadian jurisprudence... if you're foolish enough to cross their borders.
-- EDMONTON -- Mexico has flatly rejected a request from Canada to release Brenda Martin, the Canadian woman imprisoned without trial for more than two years.The fact is, they don't really care about what you want, or what you think... and they especially don't respond to stupid bluster...
"I told him that if I get sentenced to 15 years and I have to serve half my time in prison in Canada I will stay here and kill myself, that's it, I am not going back to Canada to go to prison," Martin said.Now... if I was in a Mexican prison... I'm pretty sure I'd be willing to confess to killing JFK... shit... maybe all the Kennedys... to get my sorry ass back to Canada.
-- OTTAWA -- A Canadian woman imprisoned in a Mexican jail says a visit by a pair of Conservative MPs was nothing more than a "dog-and-pony show."Good luck to her.
And apparently, the majority of Canadians.And we want to be a part of this... because..?
-- BEIJING -- China has ignored calls for dialogue, accusing the Dalai Lama's supporters of organizing violence in Tibet in hopes of sabotaging this summer's Beijing Olympics and promoting Tibetan independence.Boycott the Olympics... that'll get their attention.
“The streets are now filled with police officers. Our hotel is booked out with tourists, but no one feels safe enough to set foot outside,” said the woman, who refused to give her name or that of her hotel for fear of retaliation by authorities.
A police officer in the nearby town of Maqu refused to answer questions about the situation.
“We cannot tell you that information,” he said before banging the phone down.
What you're saying... in essence... is that you're gonna try to emulate that evil Stephen Harper?
Mayor David Miller says he'll move to increase the power of his office and his handpicked executive committee within the next few months.Funny how that works.
Miller said he also wants his executive committee to operate more like a provincial or federal cabinet -- one that can meet in private to discuss issues and political strategies before votes are taken.
"What cheers me, though, is the thought that spring isn’t a human season, not like the seasons we create for ourselves. It comes without caring what you make of it."*
"It may find you unprepared, ill at ease, in a state of erosion. It makes no difference."
"It will stir your blood anyway, once the freezing rain goes away at last."
What part of Stephen Harper's scary, hidden agenda... does this little policy gem fall under?
-- CALGARY -- Thousands of immigrants who tested positive for HIV before entering Canada have been allowed into the country, Sun Media has learned.The Liberal party of Canada always seems to be arguing that... if there is ever a majority Conservative government, there will be a draconian policy of... for example... "more machine guns, fewer lesbians".
Of 2,567 immigration hopefuls who tested positive for the disease that leads to AIDS from January 2002 -- when Ottawa first began screening -- to December 2006, only 126 were refused, said Lorraine Lavallee, spokesman for Citizenship and Immigration Canada.
"He is an agitator, and now thanks to the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal, god forbid, he's a freedom fighter..."I've gotta say... when the fuzzy-bunny CBC starts mocking your leftist HRC ass... you are truly in deep muck.
"Yes, indeed, people are very angry at the Commission and its sock puppet investigators."**********
"So what?"
"The rest of us - police officers, childcare workers, criminal accused, lawyers, average guy witnesses - have to appear in open Court except in the most extraordinary circumstances."
"I was just forwarded a copy of a Commission decision that has overruled the Human Rights Tribunal's invocation of Section 37 of the Human Right's Act."*
"Section 37, as you may or may not know, is a clause of the HRA that allows tribunal proceedings to be held in secret, if the tribunal determines there is any threat to safety of witnesses."
“You went overboard in your unbelief and freed yourselves of the etiquettes of dispute and fighting and went to the extent of publishing these insulting drawings.”*
“This is the greatest misfortune and the most dangerous and the judgment for it will be stronger.”
Women in Iraq continue to shatter... along with the bodies of innocent men, women and children... that infamous "glass ceiling"...
A woman suicide bomber has killed six people at a bus station in Balad Ruz in Diyala province, Iraqi police say. One of the dead was a policeman, a local officer said, and 12 more people were wounded including three policemen.You
If the attacker's identity is confirmed, it would be the eighth female perpetrator of a suicide bombing this year.
As expected, Pakistan's parliament has selected its first female speaker.*
"Dr. Fehmida Mirza has received 249 votes," incumbent Chaudhry Amir Hussain, a supporter of President Pervez Musharraf, announced the vote total in the 342-seat National Assembly.
Parliament members then pounded their open hands on their desks for 30 seconds to applaud Fehmida Mirza of the Pakistan Peoples Party.
The 51-year-old medical doctor and mother of four children is a third-generation Pakistani politician. Her father twice served in the cabinet; her husband was a member of parliament; and her father-in-law was a Supreme Court justice.
Apparently... just like their big brothers in Ottawa... the McGuinty Liberals believe... "there is no problem so big... it cannot be run away from."
-- BRANTFORD -- Tension is mounting over unresolved Six Nations land claims, as native activists continued Tuesday to keep construction workers off the site of a hotel being built in Brantford.So where is Dalton, or more importantly Aboriginal Affairs Minister Michael Bryant?
A site supervisor and one worker arrived in the early morning rain Tuesday at the site of the $10.5-million Hampton Inn Hotel and an adjoining plaza in the early stages of construction at Oak Park and Fen Ridge roads, just south of Highway 403.
They found a group of native activists led by Floyd and Ruby Montour blocking the entrance with vehicles and flags, just as they have for the past few days.
The issue also found its way into the Ontario legislature, where Haldimand-Norfolk MPP Toby Barrett attempted to corner Aboriginal Affairs Minister Michael Bryant over native protests in Brantford blocking development.Call this one... "No answer... no funeral."
"Minister, your government tells developers not to pay the fees and then tells them they're on their own," Barrett said in the legislature. "When will you actually take action to stop this extortion?"
Bryant did not answer the question.
"Toby regularly sends me his updates and news releases. Well this one was quite interesting. In the last "10" months the Ontario Legislature has only sat for "8" days!"*
What would a Chief Justice say?
-- WASHINGTON -- In an unusually long oral argument session, several of the nine justices seemed to hint at their differing positions on the meaning of the Second Amendment to the Constitution, which enshrines the right to bear arms.It's a decision that is bound to resonate, one way or another, throughout the entire United States.
“What is reasonable about a total ban on possession?”
At stake are the gun laws in Washington, the country's most restrictive.Land of the brave -- home of the
Dick Anthony Heller, 65, an armed security guard, sued the district after it rejected his application to keep a handgun at his home for protection in the same Capitol Hill neighbourhood as the court.
For more than 30 years, handguns have been banned in Washington while rifles and shotguns must be locked up and disabled if kept in the home.
That hasn't stopped the densely populated federal district from having one of the country's worst rates of violent crime – often committed with outlawed guns – although rates have dropped sharply in recent years.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, whose vote may well be crucial to the outcome of the case, District of Columbia v. Heller, No. 07-290, disagreed.I'm guessin' Wendy Cukier just went home sick... with nervous diarrhea.
The purpose of the first clause, with its militia reference, was simply to “reaffirm the right to have a militia,” he said, while the second made clear that individuals had the right to own guns.
And Justice Antonin Scalia told Mr. Dellinger that “the two clauses go together beautifully” if the Second Amendment was understood as an effort to guarantee that militias would not be “destroyed by tyrants.”
The proper reading, Justice Scalia said, is, “Since we need a militia, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
You have to fill in the missing pieces...
A man was stabbed three times apparently after saying hello to a fellow passenger on a TTC bus yesterday.Okay, a fairly typical Toronto tale so far, but unlike a lot of crime reports... we get an amazingly detailed description of the perpetrator... to a point.
Police describe the suspect as 18-20 years old, 6-foot-2, with a slim build and short, dark, braided hair.Hang on a second... if the purpose of providing a description of the assailant is to help the public provide information on this guy's identity to the police... aren't they leaving something out?
He was wearing silver loop earrings with diamonds, a black tuque and coat that said "State Property" on the left side, police said. He was also carrying a black mesh bag on his back.
Shsssssssh... we're playin' by "Toronto Rules."(via bcf)
A Toronto man faces 34 charges including attempted murder after a shot was fired at 51 Division officers.**********
Jahnoie Tinglin, 21, of Toronto is charged with two counts of attempted murder while using a firearm, carrying a concealed weapon, two counts of discharging a firearm to prevent arrest...
"I'm surprised this incident hasn't received more media attention."*
"Chinese officials seizing and detaining dissidents is big news when it happens in Tibet, but not in Calgary?"
"Now we're really screwed"... said my great-grandfather.**********
"If only there were some old book around that mentioned weather related events, you know, floods and things. Then people might realize that the weather isn't some kind of brand new phenomena."**********
"Too bad Noah didn't make a YouTube video while building his Ark..."
-- Vancouver -- The first person in Canada to be arrested for raising funds for terrorism appeared in a Vancouver courtroom Tuesday.BIG TROUBLE.
After a brief review of the circumstances surrounding the allegation, the 44-year old Canadian, Prapaharan Thambithurai, was released on $25,000 bail and allowed to return to the Toronto area, where he lives with his wife and three children.Oh Canada.
Myself... I blame Giovanni Caboto...
"So who to blame? I blame urban planners and politicians. We concentrate our poor people in places like Lawrence Heights, far from the bureaucrats who designed it."Hey, Bobo... you didn't get the good news?
Toronto police have identified a man fatally shot inside an east-end apartment as 35-year-old Sasha Haroutiun.But wait... there's more
Officers were called to 326 Carlaw Ave., just south of Dundas Street, at about 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday.
Police said a distraught man called 911 just before 2 p.m. to attend 545 The West Mall, a 15-storey building near Rathburn Road and Highway 427 in Etobicoke.**********
The caller said a woman had been murdered and decapitated in one of the penthouse suites.
You get the kind of life... you deserve.(via cbl)
If Egypt... supposedly one of the most forward looking of the middle-eastern countries... is in this kind of desperate shape?
What does that tell you about the rest of countries in this region?
Egypt's president has ordered the army to increase the production and distribution of bread, in an attempt to cope with serious shortages.Perhaps a few of their Muslim brothers, in places like Libya and Iran, should consider diverting some of those oil billions from armaments & promoting jihad... to feeding some of their starving Egyptian brothers.
Rising prices and alleged corruption have sparked recent clashes at bakeries in poorer neighbourhoods, leading to several deaths.
Many of Egypt's 70m population, about half of whom live below the poverty line, survive on subsidised bread.
"I have many coptic Christian friends that tell me stories that will make me pi$$ my pants. People there have dreams about eating meat, they even have songs about it, lol "Anna aiz lahma, anna aiz lahma, etc."**********
The political crisis in Turkey continues to deepen, following a move by the country's top prosecutor to try to disband the ruling Justice and Development Party on charges of undermining the secular state.*
The prime minister and president, both members of the Islamic-rooted party, are also facing a political ban of five years.
Talk about screamin' into the wind... even the other victims here... the dead guy's alleged friends... are refusing to talk to police.
" -- TORONTO -- Before somebody else grieve like us, or cry like us, speak out, tell the system, show who you are, like no matter what, like let them bring to justice, let them pay the price."Hey, that's what I've been saying... and it's way past time for "the community" to step up and prove it.
"Because it is not fair, 18 years, every day dead for no reason. Now you scared to walk on the streets."
"This is Canada. This is Toronto, not Afghanistan."
"I've read too many HRC rulings and other transcripts, and let's just say the kids who got the A's and B's in law school don't go work for human rights commissions."*
In a dirty, smelly motel room... with that gap-toothed, crack smokin' hooker you vaguely remember talkin' to on the way home from the beer parlour... there was a brief moment where you actually didn't believe it was happening.
That's what I remember about the election that brought the NDP to power in Ontario...
With his two Toronto seats secured, a jubilant Dion last night praised Bob Rae as "an architect of the Canada of tomorrow -- a strong voice for Liberal values in Canada and the world."Negativity, huh... I guess he's forgetting how warmly Ontarians... even our unionised brethren... rushed to embrace "Rae Days."
An equally effusive Rae praised Dion and said Toronto voters had "rejected the politics of fear and negativity embraced by some of our opponents."
With Rae's victory, Dion's "dream team" appears to be falling into place. But Rae's powerful presence in Parliament could also prove a bit of a nightmare for his leader.This is gonna be good.
Loathed by the political Left as a turncoat who damaged the New Democrat brand through such policies as unpaid mandatory days off for the civil service while he was Ontario premier, Rae is equally disliked by the Right for his deficit-swelling ways from 1990-95.
Liberals win by-electionsFunny... Quadra was a squeaker and Dion's hand-picked candidate got smoked... but you have to get most of the way through the article to get to...
"The two Toronto ridings were considered sure-fire wins for Dion and his Liberals."Yeah... same old, same old.
Of Lawrence Heights shooter...
Toronto police on Monday released disturbing footage of the deadly shooting that claimed the life of an 18-year-old man and wounded five others Friday.*
The surveillance video captured two men walking up to an area at a North York housing complex where Abdikarim Abdikarim and five friends were socializing.
"The gunman was never seen speaking with his associate or any of his intended victims," said Sgt. Brian Borg. "He simply walked up within 10 feet of the group, got their attention and without warning, opened fire while walking backwards."
"His actions are very discriminate and it is obvious that he intended to inflict maximum damage."
Click on Related Links: See the video
My beads are way holier... than yours.
-- BAGHDAD -- A female homicide bomber blew herself up Monday amid a group of Shiite worshippers near a mosque in Karbala, Iraq, killing at least 39 people and wounding 54, officials said.**********
The worshippers were gathered about a kilometer, or half a mile, from the Imam Hussein shrine, one of the holiest sites for Shiites.
...who never pulls the "poor me" stunt.*
Actually memorializes latest Canadian casualty... forgets to crap all over Afghan mission...
In a statement issued by the military, Boyes' family said they are "devastated" by the news.He will be remembered.
"Jason loved his job, he loved the military and his fellow soldiers loved him back. His world was his daughter, Mackenzie, his wife, Alison, his dogs and his family," the statement said.
"This was his third tour in Afghanistan. We have always, and still do, support this mission."
Lt.-Col. Dave Corbould, commander of Boyes' battle group, said the soldier was "a committed warrior."
Boyes was "a leader through and through," he said. "He was someone we can all emulate. He represented the warrior spirit 100 per cent."
Regimental Sgt.-Maj. Brian Semenko also described Boyes as a committed soldier. He said he had talked a lot about the mission with Boyes over the past few years.
"He was really dedicated to the idea of serving overseas," Semenko said. "He felt the best way to serve was to do it overseas. His idea was not to give candy to children, but to kill insurgents."
That Ontario Liberals are indeed living in an alternate universe...
"The government will have a very, very ambitious agenda to continue to make sure that Ontario's economy is productive," said Deputy Premier George (Diaperhead) Smitherman.Uh, Georgie... you're basing that optimistic statement on what exactly?
The legislature has sat only two weeks in the past nine months. That brief session came last December after members took time out for the October election.Good grief.
"Gee, the summer break must be just around the corner."**********
Mr. McGuinty was armed with a tray of sliced oranges and accompanied by two cabinet ministers bearing crackers and cheese as he met with students at Cliffside Public School in east Toronto to announce the first steps towards his promised second-term priority of addressing poverty.Yeah Dalton, that's exactly what we need... more snacks.
What would happen if you and your friends invaded a mosque during a religious service...
Palm Sunday service at St. Michael's Cathedral had a surprise ending when a demonstrator stood in front of the Sacred Heart Altar and attempted to read out a statement to the congregation.It's the sort of nonsense only aboriginals can get away with... in Dalton McGuinty's Ontario.
Friends and Relatives of the Disappeared (FRD) continued their occupation and interruption of religious services for the second straight weekend with the principal Toronto churches of the Anglican and Catholic religions targeted this week.Ya gotta love how the reporter characterises this... as "an interruption..." like someone clearing their throat and making a public service announcement.
Always nice to see our CBC "taxpayer dollars" in action.
-- OTTAWA -- Executives at Canada's public broadcaster have run up huge bills staying at luxury palace-like hotels in Europe where rooms go for a staggering $800-plus a night.And what these guys lack in thriftiness... they make up for in consistency.
Documents obtained through Access to Information show former president and CEO of the taxpayer-funded CBC, Robert Rabinovitch, enjoyed a five-day stay at the posh Ciragan Palace Kempinski Hotel in Turkey.
The stay in September 2006 cost $4,377 to enjoy the hospitality of one of the world's most luxurious resort accommodations.
Documents also show that Nancy Lee, former head of CBC Sports, and her deputy David Masse, spent $8,590 over five days staying at the sister hotel to the Ciragan, the Kempinski Hotel Adlon in Berlin.Hey, CTV... talk about a missed opportunity... "calling W5".
This just in... details not yet available...
The soldier, whose name has not been released, died after triggering an explosion around the village of Zangabad, a dangerous area littered with mines and improvised explosive devices.**********
He is the 81st Canadian soldier to die in Afghanistan.
He was identified Monday as Sergeant Jason Boyes, 32, of Lynn Lake, Man. He was a member of the 2nd Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry based in Shilo, Man.He will be remembered.
About 500 mainly Ukrainian U.N. police were involved in the dawn raid, backed by hundreds of French troops.*
Thousands of stone-hurling Serbs were seen near the courthouse clashing with riot police backed up by NATO soldiers, who used tear gas and stun grenades to disperse the crowd.
I think I've found the Mother Ship.
An Iranian official leading the latest investigation into the 2003 death of Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi is accusing Ottawa of illegal and biased behaviour in the case.WAIT FOR IT...
Javad Larijani, secretary of Iran's Human Rights Commission, told CBC News that the probe of the Montreal-based freelance journalist's death while in Iranian custody is expected to wrap up in two to three months.Crap... these things are obviously capable of reproduction.
But truth itself.
-- BEIJING -- China's communist government is apparently blocking YouTube over videos covering the recent protests in Tibet.*
YouTube is generally easily available in China, which has about 210 million Internet users.
But access has been blocked after videos on the site showed foreign news reports about protests that erupted Friday in capital of Tibet.
"...in the neighbourhood, a beautiful day for a neighbour, would you be mine... could you be mine?"
A man wanted in a spate of increasingly violent bank robberies was arrested yesterday in a dramatic takedown outside a west-end Bank of Montreal just moments after an armed hold-up.And right downtown...
Charged with 27 robbery-related charges is Lui Gino Maccarone, of no fixed address.
A 26-year-old man was swarmed by 20 attackers who beat and stabbed him in the club district yesterday morning, Toronto Police say.And how about another murder just to ice the homicidal cake?
The victim was "repeatedly punched, kicked and stabbed" outside the Fluid nightclub around 2:30 a.m. as clubgoers spilled into the streets, police said.
A father of two is dead after an early morning shooting yesterday. Winston Watson, a 47-year-old general labourer, was killed after shots were fired around 3 a.m. Saturday.And that's not even counting the six-pack of shootees from Lawrence Park.
Police marked off the scene near Finch Ave. and Hwy. 427 yesterday with pylons outlining the area by a fence where bullet casings were found.
"Anti-brutality march turns violent in Montreal"*
-- LONDON -- Four British Broadcasting Corp. journalists were among seven men arrested in Ireland in an investigation into paramilitary activity, the BBC said Sunday.Yeah... let's just stick with name, rank and managing editor.
A BBC spokeswoman said that means they had approval for what they were doing. She refused to say anything else about the arrests.
I don't think so...
"That may be the only letter in history signed by both Gary Bauer and Gloria Steinem, by executives of the National Organization for Women and the National Association of Evangelicals."**********
But you -- sure as shit -- can't hide.
-- WANA, Pakistan -- A U.S. warplane fired missiles on Sunday at a house in a Pakistani region known as a haven for al Qaeda and Taliban fighters, killing at least 9 militants and wounding nine, an intelligence official said.We have the technology.
Four missiles were fired at the house in Shahnawaz Kheil Dhoog, a village near the town of Wana in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border, just after 3 p.m., the intelligence official said.Sleep tight, Osama... it's only a matter of time.
"Except the boundary walls, the house has been destroyed," said a senior district government official who declined to be identified. "The place has been used for some time as a militant hideout," he said.
Three foreigners, an Arab and two Turkmen, were among those killed, according to the intelligence official. Villagers put the death toll at 18.
Doing all those google searches on my blog -- on 'Farhan Chak' -- maybe Ezra has stumbled upon the answer...
"Arman Chak isn't famous, but his brother Farhan Chak is. Farhan briefly ran for office as a candidate for the Liberal Party of Canada."I'd actually forgotten about this guy... but it turns out his brother Arman works... wait for it... for the Edmonton Human Rights Commission. In his spare time, Arman also apparently runs interference for his outspoken brothers.
"But then it was revealed that he had padded his resume -- oh, and that he was also a raging Jew-hater, a nutty conspiracy theorist and had once shot up an Edmonton nightclub."
"I'd like to think I'd stand by my brothers, too, even if one of them shot up a nightclub and uttered horribly bigoted things again and again and again."Steve Janke has more.
"But the Internet has a funny way of remembering things. Here is the archived page of Farhan Chak's letter. Frankly, compared to his other rants, it's fairly mild -- but I still wouldn't want to run into him at a nightclub if he was drunk."
It's time to slam on the brakes... and turn this bus around.
-- OTTAWA -- A downtown Tim Hortons has been finding so many dirty needles in its washroom garbages that the owner purchased bio-medical disposable bins for addicts to toss them in.**********
The yellow and red bins sit on the floor next to the toilets in the washrooms of the Tim Hortons at the corner of Bank and Cooper streets.
"When my friends ask me why I spend $3 on a cup of coffee at Starbucks that I can get for $1 at Tim's, I tell them it's because I don't want to have to run the gauntlet of forgotten men outside the door."**********
"I can hold my own door open, thanks, and no, you're not getting my leftover coin."
When somebody's curious 4 year-old spikes himself... and contracts Hep-C, or God forbid, AIDS... do they sue Tim Hortons... or the McGuinty government -- you know -- the people who actually fund free needles for scummy hypes?Just askin'.
"...home invasions and beatings will have to happen before the Sun realizes that it bet on the wrong horse".**********
"The crowd whoops and amens as Wright builds to his climax: 'And. And. And! GAWD! Has GOT! To be SICK! OF THIS SHIT!'"Party on dude.
"Obama goes to church for twenty years and never listens to his Pastor - is he trying to pick up the Homer Simpson vote?"*
Are totally off the chain...
China is accusing rioters in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa of killing at least 10 people in violent protests Friday. The demonstrations against Chinese rule in Tibet were the worst there in nearly two decades.Why can't the Tibetans be more like the pacifistic, benevolent Chinese government?
-- BEIJING -- China ordered tourists out of Tibet's capital Saturday while troops on foot and in armoured vehicles patrolled the streets and confined government workers to their offices, a day after riots that a Tibetan exile group said left at least 30 protesters dead.**********
China is gambling that its crackdown will not bring an international outcry over human rights violations that could lead to boycotts of the Olympics.
It isn't even three strikes and you're out...
All seven adults charged in the Boxing Day gunplay that left 15-year-old Jane Creba dead were committed to trial yesterday.THREE GUN BANS!?!?
But only one man is charged with murder.
Valentine, 26, sat stone-faced in the Scarborough courtroom as he was committed to trial, while Tyshaun Barnett and Louis Woodcock, both 21, had their second-degree murder charges knocked down to manslaughter.
The case also raised concerns over the bail system and court orders.
Smith was on two unrelated bail releases for charges of domestic assault and possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking, while Valentine was under three gun bans following previous convictions at the time of the shooting, court documents showed.
This is about saving the children...
Ms. Hitson’s newborn daughter had traces of cocaine and marijuana in its system, and the young woman, baby-faced herself, had fallen afoul of a tough new state law intended to protect children from drugs, and a local prosecutor bent on pursuing it.**********
She made arrangements for the baby’s care, and headed off to a year behind bars.
The Vancouver Island Health Authority (VIHA) just revealed that it has agreed to shell out $2 million for a building to house a new needle "exchange".*
VIHA is doing this, in part, to solve a problem resulting from the existing Victoria needle exchange’s eviction due to the filthy, noisy and criminal behaviour of its 1500 "clients".
Who actually has a dog in the fight?
-- BRANTFORD -- "On another note, while the natives are protesting this summer, perhaps I could express my own protest with a back hoe on the grounds of Queens Park."*
"I wonder if the police would stand by and keep the peace in the same fashion they have done in Caledonia and Brantford."
Mike Quattrociocchi
Brantford
So, tell me again, how Macleans magazine is sayin' the "Centre of the Universe"... is such a safe place to live.
-- TORONTO -- Six people were shot on a Toronto street last night in the Lawrence Heights neighbourhood, police said.**********
Police said six people were taken to hospital; one victim was in critical condition after being shot in the head and also multiple times in the torso.
One of six young men shot in a playground at a Lawrence Heights townhouse complex last night died after taking a bullet to the head.The victim has been identified as Abdikarim Ahmed Abdikarim, 18, of Toronto.
The five others wounded in the shootout are believed to be in their 20s and were taken to local hospitals. Three of the victims remained in hospital on Saturday afternoon with non-life-threatening injuries, police said.**********
A police source told CTV News the surviving victims have not been co-operative with detectives.
Well Toronto if it's not an issue then I guess your Mayor and Dalton have no business calling for a ban on guns now do they?**********
Its a problem or its not, you can't have it both ways.
One resident said he heard that the youths were "playing with their guns" when the gunfire broke out just before 10 p.m. in the Dufferin St. and Lawrence Ave. W. area, south of Yorkdale Shopping Centre.See, Hassan... that's just not true.
Another said the incident may have been triggered when one gun "accidentally fired", prompting others in the group to return gunfire.
Hassan Ainanshe was at work when he heard shooting had broken out next to his home, and rushed back to check on his teenage sons.
"Before it was The Jungle, but we cleaned it up," said Ainanshe, who moved here from Somalia five years ago.
"It's safe now – nothing like this has happened before."
To a gunfight...
For those that don't know him, Major General Peter Cosgrove is an "Australian treasure!"*
General Cosgrove was interviewed on the radio recently.
Regardless of how you feel about gun laws you gotta love this! It is a portion of an ABC interview between a female broadcaster and General Cosgrove who was about to sponsor a Boy Scout Troop visiting his military headquarters.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: So, General Cosgrove, what things are you going to teach these young boys when they visit your base?
GENERAL COSGROVE: We're going to teach them climbing, canoeing, archery and shooting.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: Shooting! That's a bit irresponsible, isn't it?
GENERAL COSGROVE: I don't see why, they'll be properly supervised on the rifle range.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: Don't you admit that this is a terribly dangerous activity to be teaching children?
GENERAL COSGROVE: I don't see how. We will be teaching them proper rifle discipline before they even touch a firearm.
FEMALE INTERVIEWER: But you're equipping them to become violent killers.
GENERAL COSGROVE: Well, Ma'am, you're equipped to be a prostitute, but you're not one, are you?
The radio went silent and the interview ended.
Wearing diapers is exactly this guy's speed...
"If a hospital alters its administration and some people are exited from that environment, is that a cut?"Yeah, Georgie... that makes sense.
"No, I don't think so."
On fairies stealing babies and replacing them with changelings...
I mean, lemme see if I understand... what Don Peat of the Toronto Sun is saying here...
"A shotgun-shell firing revolver called The Judge "COULD BE" the next big, bad thing in Toronto's gangland arsenal."Good lord, that sounds horrific... should we all be heading to our basement bomb shelters?
"Canadian cops say they know about the gun but "THEY HAVEN'T SEEN IT" on the streets yet."Damn... I bet Wendy Cukier was getting all hot and bothered.
"The Judge has been on the market in the US for about 4 years now. One of the American cops they quote in the article comments that they have NEVER seen reports of The Judge being used by gangsters."*
"They like their gold plated Desert Eagles, and a revolver just ain't cool enough for a Crip, Blood or other such scumbag."
"...but darling they'll come a time...
i'll taste all that love..."
"that you've been hiding."
-- WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon says authorities have captured a high-level al-Qaeda figure who helped Osama bin Laden escape from Afghanistan in 2001.*
Officials declined to say when or where Mohammad Rahim was captured — announcing only that he was handed over by the CIA to the Pentagon earlier this week and is being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
So he can find the "really corrupt" politicians... Asif Ali Zardari trots out the O.J. defense...
Zardari, however, is also viewed as a troubling figure by many Pakistanis.**********
During the Benazir Bhutto era, he earned the nickname of "Mr. Ten Percent" for allegedly taking kickbacks during an administration in the 1990's that nearly bankrupted the country.
-- JOHANNESBURG -- One of the most venerated people in South Africa launched a blistering attack on the country's current leaders yesterday, calling them corrupt, arrogant and deeply estranged from those they govern.*
And he said all this with the only two people who rival him in public esteem at his side.
I suspect that if Dean Potter and Stephane Dion were ever to meet and shake hands... the resulting explosion would doom all mankind...
As Potter stepped onto the 180-foot rope — a strand of iridescent blue against desiccated canyon shades of brick and tan and coppery green — he was believed to be the first person to combine the adventure sports of highlining and BASE-jumping.*
Don't put away your dancin' shoes just yet.
-- OTTAWA -- A government budget motion that would spike an opposition education savings plan passed its first hurdle yesterday, as MPs voted 124-87 in favour.*
The Bloc Quebecois and New Democrats opposed the government Ways and Means motion, but it passed because only a handful of Liberals rose to vote against the motion.
Is a bar to high political office?
-- TEHRAN -- President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad flew in from an Islamic summit in Senegal to cast his vote.Yeah, Mahmoud... that's all my friends can talk about... "Why can't we be more like Iran?"
He said the world had chosen Iran as its "role model and saviour".
The BBC's Tehran correspondent Jon Leyne says a lack of choice, due to widespread disqualifications of reformist candidates, could discourage people from voting.**********
"The reformists seem to have given up the fight after many of their candidates were disqualified on the grounds of alleged lack of loyalty to Islamic values."
-- BAGHDAD -- The body of a Chaldean Catholic archbishop who was kidnapped in the northern city of Mosul last month as he drove home after afternoon Mass was discovered Thursday buried in a southeastern area of the city.*
"About Bob Rae's judgment?"*
"Would Rae say that it's dishonest for a campaign worker to submit an invoice for campaign services to someone other than the campaign with a false description of services provided?"
What's up with this?
-- VANCOUVER -- "Silas was a quiet young man, not withdrawn, but he was quiet. He was someone who is a deep thinker, very respectful."**********
"Any parents would be proud to have him as their son."
Corporal Dale Carr said the men — one of them is 38 — are not being named. They were arrested following a massive manhunt, but have been released without charges.**********
In the final leg of the 10-month preliminary hearing, Justice Tim Lipson knocked the second-degree murder charges faced by Louis Ralph Woodcock and Tyshaun Barnett, both 21, down to manslaughter.*
The man shot dead by a Toronto police officer last Saturday has been identified. David Fetterly, 42, was struck by a single bullet in the chest at a Roncesvalles pharmacy around 3:50 a.m.That event, unfortunately, turned out to be a postscript to another Fetterly family tragedy.
"That name was never supposed to be released. We don't want to talk. This has been very hard. It's been a very difficult year," said a family member reached at his Toronto home.*
On July 3, Fetterly's 16-year-old niece Chantele was stabbed in the heart outside her Hamilton home. She died in her mother's arms.
"She was not tied. She was just physically stuck by her body,” Whipple said.*
“It is hard to imagine. ... I still have a hard time imagining it myself.”
Do you have to shoot in the head... before your "good background" is no longer considered a mitigating legal... or moral factor..?
Outside court afterwards, defense lawyer Howard Goldkind said he was disappointed in the decision, saying Zekarias comes from a "good background" and has an "excellent family support."**********
"One can only wonder what he'd be doing if he'd come from a 'bad background'".*
"Heav'n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd... nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd."
-- BEIJING (Reuters) -- A Chinese bride burned her new husband to death after he got into bed after a drunken argument without washing his feet, state media reported on Wednesday.**********
Cooper told police she had become fed up with Watson telling her what to do during their two-year relationship. On the night of the killing, she tried to play a Springsteen CD and he took if off the stereo, triggering a bitter argument.Sleep tight Eliot Spitzer.
"I mean, who the hell doesn't like Bruce Springsteen, for God's sake?" Cooper told police in a record of interview presented to the court. "I just picked up a knife and I went 'boom.'"
I have to wonder how the local Imam explains away... the evidently continually capricious and unknowable... "Will of Allah".
Afghan and coalition officials say a suicide car bomber has attacked a convoy of U.S. troops in Kabul, killing six civilians and wounding at least 35 people.I don't care how religious you are... only a stone sociopath could blithely accept that a deity-sanctioned divine mission... would consume so many friends, neighbours and family members.
Officials say four U.S. soldiers traveling in the convoy escaped Thursday's attack with minor injuries.
In the background... is Red Tory weeping tears of joy...
-- MONTREAL -- A judge has quashed the decree that allows Canadian foreign affairs ministers to refuse a passport on national-security grounds. A summary court release states that the decision by Mr. Justice Simon Noël of the Federal Court involved a passport application by a Montreal man, Fateh Kamel.So... who exactly is Fateh Kamel?
He has been described by authorities as a terror suspect involved in the same ring as Ahmed Ressam, the so-called Millennium Bomber. The Algerian-born Mr. Kamel served four years in France after being convicted of supplying bogus passports to Islamic militants.Once again... our wonderful Charter of Trudeaupia pulls some terrorist's chestnuts outta the fire.
“Kamel was a key member of the Mujahedeen Islamic terror network,” the Canadian Security Intelligence Service says in court documents.
Mr. Kamel, who has Canadian citizenship, has moved back to Montreal where he is married. He turned to the Federal Court for a judicial review after his passport application was turned down.
Saying that the rejection contravened the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Judge Noël has given Ottawa six months to redraft the law.I'll bet he does.
Mr. Kamel denies the allegations against him.
"time to end dual citizenship and set a 4 year deadline to make up your mind"*
"are you a Canadian or not?"
Come for the culture... stay for the gunplay...
A young man “accidentally” cut someone off while driving through Scarborough and it nearly cost him his life when the other driver opened fire on him.I'm gonna go out on a limb here... and guess this guy wasn't a farmer, hunter or target shooter... or anybody likely to comply with a gun registry, for that matter.
Toronto Police say the victim, who is in his 20s and did not want to be identified, was driving along Hwy. 401 near Markham Rd. around 11:30 a.m Wednesday when he inadvertently offended a man in another vehicle.
And instead of being flipped off, as most drivers in such cases might expect, he found himself staring down the barrel of a gun and dodging bullets.
Police describe the shooter as black, 20 to 25 years old, with a medium complexion, round face and stocky build. He is believed to have short, black, wavy hair, and a chinstrap beard.**********
A few hours later, a second shooting in the city’s northwest sent one man to hospital with gunshot wounds to the thigh and buttocks.**********
In that incident, the victim was in the parking lot of a plaza near Weston Rd. and Hwy. 401 when several shots were fired into his SUV just after 3 p.m. The suspect sped off in a white car, said Sgt. Dave Ecklund.
"The gunplay IS the culture."*
Are you really sure this is such a... (cough-cough)...
good idea?
To date there has been no explanation of how those on the bridge missed a routine course correction and failed to notice the mountainous island looming directly ahead in the 14 minutes before the ferry's hull was torn open on the island's rocky shore.**********
"The task force was not tasked to assign blame."*
Riyadh Edition.And make sure you catch the thoughtful commentary after the article...
"If they respect women as they say, let them remove those women in glass windows, like a monkey who is only wanting monkey business."**********
Jamal Al Nakhlani, London - Yemeni
Deceived so many.*
"Saying that Hillary has Executive Branch experience... is like saying... Yoko Ono was a Beatle."*
Gotta tell'ya Stef... ah'm jes' not feelin' the luv.
"...this lying, and cryin's upsettin'...*
and getting no where...
it don't stack up, so slack up and pack up...
i just don't care..."
"don't let the screen door hit you...
on your way out..."
"...and if you can't be...Even if they don't want to.
with the one you love, honey...
love the one you're with"
Launches "Operation Kick Myself in the Face."
Puerile, profane CC is directing his little band of coprophiliacs to search this blog for all references to "Wanda Watkins."
Hey... if he wants to shine even more light on the vilest thing he's ever written... I'm good with that.
Now... put on some rubber gloves... because, in fairness, I feel obligated to return the favour.
Ok... now we're even.
**********
RELATED: No man is an island
Never let it be said that Canadian Cynic has no friends... there are all kinds of progressive people who are proud to break bread with him...
And by the way, Scott... you seem to have lost your picture of CC... as well as the references on your blog to CC and Shoshana at that lefty luncheon.
Don't sweat it... I have copies.
**********
LAST WORD: I should explain...
It's not really CC's fault... he's just being a good mommy.
Apparently noted CC-lickers Ti-guy and Red Tory ran home... and "told on me".
Technorati Tags: Lane Watkins, Wanda Watkins, Canadian Cynic
And everybody carried knives... just in case they had to stab someone?
Yeah... me neither.
On Friday, Weston Collegiate went into lockdown after two teens were slashed in a knife fight during a noon-hour fracas that apparently surprised few who are familiar with the reputation of the Jane-Lawrence high school.Apparently, they've got similar issues in the U.K.
It was just another day, so to speak.
"It's like watching a slow train crash," she said in one newspaper interview. "You know it's going to happen and you can't prevent it unless you take these decisions.One last question about this article.
"There are a minority of (young) people out there whose behaviour is out of control. It doesn't mean we are a broken society," she said.
"But this minority is something we can't shy away from."
Every time I hear about this kind of Fiberal grandstanding, I think of the Far Side cartoon where the dog is leaning out the car window... gleefully telling his canine buddies that he's going to the vet... to get tutored...
“It runs the risk of putting the balanced budget of our government into a Liberal deficit,” Mr. Flaherty said. “We are not going to run a deficit, so we are going to kill the bill.”Let's see how flexible those Liberals really are.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper's gambit puts dozens of Liberal MPs in the uncomfortable position of potentially reversing their support for a colleague in order to stick with Leader Stéphane Dion's decision last month to back the government's budget and avoid an election.
“We dithered, and so all the safe places were taken and we were left with Kandahar.”*
To argue with "the implacable will" of an all-knowing deity?
-- LAHORE -- At least 24 people have been killed and 100 injured in two suspected suicide car bombings in the city of Lahore in eastern Pakistan.They do say he works in wondrous ways...
The police said the first explosion hit the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) at 0925 (0425 GMT) in Lahore. It demolished part of the building, where about 250 people work, just as employees were beginning their day.
The second, near-simultaneous blast hit an office in a residential district of Lahore several miles away, killing three people, including two children.I don't quite get the infanticide thing... but I guess that's the way "holy jihad" works.
Iraqi police say at least 16 bus passengers were killed by a roadside bomb Tuesday in southern Iraq.*
A police spokesman says the bus was traveling from the port city of Basra to Nasariyah. At least 22 people were wounded in the blast.
It's not easy being devoutly religious -- so many targets -- so little time.
-- BAGHDAD -- A suicide bomber killed five U.S. soldiers as they chatted with shop owners while on a foot patrol in central Baghdad on Monday.And who says there are no equal opportunities for women in Muslim societies?
While the face-to-face contact from foot patrols builds goodwill, it also gives suicide bombers, who often slip past security vehicle checkpoints by walking, better access to striking soldiers.
Earlier in the day, a female suicide bomber killed a U.S.-backed Sunni leader who had formed a group to fight against al-Qaida insurgents in central Iraq.And why stop at killing small children... let's get rid of all the pesky intellectuals while we're at it...
Once inside al-Karkhi's home, she blew herself up, killing the sheik and three others - including his five-year-old niece and his 24-year-old cousin, said Mahmoud and provincial police.
In southern Iraq, police found the bullet-riddled body of Basra's only neurologist a day after he was kidnapped by unidentified gunmen."It's a wonderful day in the neighbourhood..."
"Total time from playing Guitar Hero to getting airborne and delivering justice was an astounding twelve minutes."(via sda)
I swear... the ninth time's the charm...
A 39-year-old Toronto man, deported eight times before last month's arrest, faces dozens of charges in connection with the fraud ring that spans from the Greater Toronto Area to Nigeria, police said today.Not sure what the deal is with our border guards... but I'm thinkin' we could maybe get a heads-up next time from NORAD.
Edmund Ezemo is charged with 25 fraud-related offences and one count of illegal entry into Canada.
As "Slick Willie" (yeah, pun intended) syndrome...
"The Times reported that a person with knowledge of the governor's role believes the governor is identified as a client in court papers."*
"Where there's smoke... there's Liberals".
-- OTTAWA -- The RCMP was preparing to charge at least one federal official for leaking Liberal government plans for income trusts in 2005 but was foiled when the official secrets law was gutted by an unrelated court ruling, documents and sources say.So what are we talkin' about here?
This new information appears to undermine the former Liberal government's assurances that there was no advance leak of their market-moving decision to forgo a tax on trusts in late November of 2005.
Transcripts of RCMP interviews with Mr. Goodale and his staff show that, among other things, the Mounties scrutinized consultations between his office and private-sector investment players in the days and hours leading up to the trust announcement.Yup, I'm shocked... truly.
The RCMP communication lines were released under the Access to Information Act to researcher Ken Rubin.
Technorati Tags: Liberal Party, Income Trust Scandal, RCMP
Could try "CHANGING DIAPERS" for a day...
Wasn't there just a big kerfuffle... over seniors in longterm care being abused by nursing home personnel?
So what's this all about, anyway... payback?
Canadians working in long-term care facilities face an "extraordinary” amount of physical violence, unwanted sexual attention and racism – far more than colleagues working in other countries with publicly funded health care systems, a new study says.C'mon guys... make up your minds.
"I will expect to be able to have a "rebuttal" column in every issue of the Canadian Islamic Congress's weekly e-mail newsletter -- not to mention a "Jew's Views" column in the half-dozen Arabic language newspapers in Canada, many of which are virulently anti-Semitic."*
"I'll even demand my "equal time" when the Liberal Party publishes its newsletters -- after all, as a conservative, I'm sure I'll feel offended by what they have to say."
Just think of them as the homicidal toddlers of the Middle East...
The Israeli government has ordered its military to reduce its operations in the Gaza Strip, Israeli officials say.Hopefully, at some point... they'll figure it out.
The lull follows a violent period in which at least 120 Palestinians were killed in Israeli military operations.
Rocket fire into Israel from Gaza dropped from dozens every day a week ago to a few over the weekend.
"I did not have sex with that woman."
"The first threshold question about a vice-president is, are you prepared to be president?" Mr. Kerry said yesterday. "So on the one end, they are saying he's not prepared to be president."Hey, Hillary... maybe you should check with Obama himself... before you start yappin' about him carryin' your bags.
"On the other hand, they're saying maybe he ought to be vice-president."
Because it is run like a business...
Fixing a child’s cleft lip or palate is a relatively cheap procedure with outsize payoffs: cleft children in many countries are ostracized and have a hard time going to school, getting jobs and marrying, and the surgery reverses those disadvantages.And talk about making a "real difference".
Indeed, when pitching a reluctant government, Mullaney refers to cleft children as “nonperforming assets” who can soon be returned to the economic mainstream.
He fights bad incentives with better ones: when Smile Train learned that midwives in Chennai, India, were being paid off to smother baby girls born with cleft deformities, Mullaney started offering midwives as much as $10 for each girl they instead took to a hospital for surgery.*
-- CALGARY -- A Calgary Muslim leader is thankful members of the Calgary Police Service are pursuing anonymous Internet users who posted what he called "chilling threats" on an Alberta-based website.Funny... he didn't send out a press release about his own little "threatening" issue...
On Saturday, Mr. Soharwardy issued a press release thanking Calgary police after he said they have identified that two of the anonymous postings were from Ontario and one was from the United States.
A duty inspector with the Calgary police yesterday said he couldn't confirm information on the case and didn't have details about what might happen next.
Also reported in January, three Muslim women from his mosque have filed a human-rights complaint against Mr. Soharwardy with allegations of sexism and violence.**********
He denied the allegations and said sectarian divisions and a power struggle in the mosque were to blame.
"Now, we have to take everything Soharwardy says with a brick of salt."
"I can spot at least one fabrication in this very brief story -- contrary to his claim, Soharwardy did not file a human rights complaint in December against the Western Standard website (which I sold last fall to a new owner)."
"That's just a bit of taqiyya on Soharwardy's part, as per usual."
To send the Beria best...
"I'm disgusted but not surprised by the tribunal's decision to be secretive."*
"And I won't hold out hope that Canada's large media companies, who normally rush to court in unison to overturn other publication bans, will do so here."
"The problem with these human rights commissions isn't just that they dare to tell Canadians what they can or can't say and think. It's that their processes and procedures -- no matter what they're investigating -- are abusive, one-sided and un-Canadian."
Apparently, Holy Jihad is off to a less than auspicious start... in China...
Chinese forces have for years been battling a low-intensity separatist movement among Xinjiang's Uighurs, a Turkic Muslim people culturally and ethnically distinct from China's Han majority.*
Wang said the group had been trained by and was following the orders of a Uighur separatist group based in Pakistan and Afghanistan called the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, or ETIM.
"These guys are fantasizing if they think they can disrupt the Olympics," said Wang, known for his hardline stance on crushing dissent.
Anybody out there having a little trouble with Microsoft Vista? Turns out... you're not alone.
Mike is clearly not a naïf. He’s Mike Nash, a Microsoft vice president who oversees Windows product management.And how do we know this?
And Jon, who is dismayed to learn that the drivers he needs don’t exist? That’s Jon A. Shirley, a Microsoft board member and former president and chief operating officer.
And Steven, who reports that missing drivers are anything but exceptional, is in a good position to know: he’s Steven Sinofsky, the company’s senior vice president responsible for Windows.
Their remarks come from a stream of internal communications at Microsoft in February 2007, after Vista had been released as a supposedly finished product and customers were paying full retail price.Oops.
Let's talk about F.A.I.R...
In their attempt to show that Joanna Gualtieri was not the victim of harassment and reprisals when she made claims of misspending and waste in the 1990s at the Department of Foreign Affairs, federal government lawyers have already required her to answer 10,579 questions in court.(via justfrank)
What's the next big brain wave... hooker coupons for rapists?
The distribution of safer crack use kits to addicts does not promote drug use, the head of the city's needle exchange program said yesterday.I dunno... let's ask somebody who has to deal with these folks on a daily basis...
Shaun Hopkins, manager of The Works, which is run by Toronto Public Health, said an estimated 12,000 kits, containing glass stems, brass screens and rubber mouthpieces, are distributed every month at a cost of about $1.50 each.
Crack cocaine remains the No.1 drug problem on Toronto streets and police say they're in favour of anything that cuts into the drug's use.**********
They just don't believe handing out crack user kits does that.
Education Minister Kathleen Wynne laid out plans yesterday to allocate $43 million for additional social workers and psychologists for schools across the province to help tackle school violence before it happens.Uh, Kathleen... does that include the kids who aren't swinging pipes?
"Every person must feel they are respected and included in our education system," she said.
Bill 212, the Education Amendment Act, (Progressive Discipline and School Safety Act), 2007 was passed in June 2007. Its provisions take effect on February 1, 2008.Now, I'm gonna assume here, that "students with disabilities" refers to kids with... as they say... "intellectual and emotional deficits"... and not intractably violent wheelchair-bound kids with spina bifida.
The Liberal government’s Bill 212 was in response to a complaint launched by the Ontario Human Rights Commission regarding the extent to which racialized students and students with disabilities were unfairly treated through the zero tolerance approach to student discipline.
In Toronto, they call this... the morning rush hour.
-- BELLEVILLE ONT. -- The idea is simple - a group of interested people will gather dressed up as the living dead and make their way from one location to another.Yup... that's exactly what I was thinking... "different with an "r".
Boutilier said some people may not understand the appeal of the event but added not everyone wants to go to festivities such as the Waterfront Festival.
"A zombie walk may appeal to a different group."
At least he didn't get tasered...
A burglar rummaging through a west end pharmacy was shot dead today after he fought with the police officer who stumbled across the break-in.In another account of the shooting... the "Red Star" stops just shy of using the words "Police Death Squad."
The shooting happened just before 4 am at Solarski's Pharmacy on Garden and Roncesvalles Aves.
Elmo Harris from Niagara, Canada writes: "More murder and mayhem by our police. Police weapons need to be substantially reduced in power to about 32 calibre. There have been far too many deaths caused by the police lately.See, Elmo... I was thinkin' the headline should have actually been... "Violent junkie burglar killed... neighbours breathe sigh of relief."
Even more disturbing are the curious circumstances surrounding those deaths. This cop is by himself, he hears an alarm going and a window broken and he doesn't radio it in? Come on!"
Of stuff I totally did not know...
For all its awesomeness, Pennsylvania’s only contribution to the presidency was James Buchanan. He was in office at the onset of the Civil War and is celebrated mainly for holding down the bottom of the Worst Presidents lists.*
Historians often describe him as “our only bachelor president,” although Buchanan did live for many years with William King of Alabama, who later became our only bachelor vice president.
We do not hear much speculation about whether Buchanan was our first gay president because, frankly, most gay Americans would prefer to start with somebody who didn’t preside over the secession of the South.
The good news is that this really has nothing to do with the Democratic primary.
But I do think a little bit of history can liven up a dreary morning.
