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30 June 2007

Bobbies bang up bombers

"I can confirm that we believe the incident at Glasgow airport is linked to the events in London yesterday," Constable Rae said at a news conference. "There are clearly similarities and we can confirm that this is being treated as a terrorist incident."

A British government security official said the methods used in the airport attack and Friday's thwarted plots were similar, with all three vehicles carrying large quantities of flammable materials.

Police later arrested two more suspects in the London and Glasgow plots in Cheshire county in northern England, Scotland Yard said early Sunday.
As crackdown continues... watch for heightened "M.O.L."

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RELATED: Beating bomber bingo
And the decision to raise the threat level to "critical" - which means an attack is imminent - reflected concern that those responsible have the capability and intent to carry out further bombings.

All flights to and from Glasgow Airport were suspended on Saturday.
Call me paranoid, but you might wanna take a pass on the London Gay Pride parade, or any other large public gathering in the UK this weekend.

The smart money's at home watching telly.

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UPDATE: Band on the run

Maybe house arrest wasn't the answer, huh?
A key member of the Crevice gang was Anthony Garcia. During his trial, an Al-Qaeda supergrass revealed that Garcia’s brother, Lamine Adam, had allegedly wanted to bomb a nightclub and was seeking a formula for explosives.

The supergrass’s testimony was not considered strong enough for prosecution. However, Adam, 26, and his younger brother, Ibrahim, 20, were placed on control orders in February 2006 on the grounds that they planned to kill British soldiers serving abroad.

The two brothers and a friend, Cerie Bullivant, 24, who was put on a control order last July, went on the run six weeks ago. Police think they may have slipped abroad, but they cannot rule out that the trio could still pose a threat within the UK.
Find these guys and send them on to Allah.

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In other Aboriginal news...

No good deed... goes unpunished.
-- PINE RIDGE, South Dakota (AP) -- Tribal police Thursday shut down a volunteer blockade aimed at keeping beer out of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, where alcoholism is rampant, and arrested three organizers who refused to leave.
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RELATED: It's like that time travel paradox

Facts don't matter to the lunatic left... you're always gonna end up being a racist, a whatever-o-phobe or a nazi...
Brainwashed by years of Little Big Man propaganda, their eyes blinded by New Age sweetgrass, the average Canadian lefty's tiny conscience -- a wizened chunk of white guilt, junk science and bad history at the best of times -- bursts like the Grinch's heart when you say anything bad about natives.
Even when they can't explain why.

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Whatever you do...

In Dalton McGuinty's politically correct nanny-state... don't actually call a thing by it's proper name...
Native protesters swept in at 9 p.m. Thursday night and protest leader, Mohawk Shawn Brant, said they were armed and willing to use force if police intervened.

"We've made no secret that we have guns within this camp."
While the media continues to soft pedal Shawn Brant's domestic blackmail and terrorism as a "protest" or "an inconvenience..." one politician, and one only, has the integrity to call it like it is...
"You can't have people walking around with balaclavas and carrying guns," Tory said. "We have to restore and maintain respect for the law.

McGuinty has got to use the courts and every other means available to say that we just can't have the law being disrespected."
Or we're no different than the Gaza Strip.

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RELATED: OPP continue to refuse...

To enforce the law of the land... when it involves aboriginals.
CN Rail expressed frustration with police for refusing to stop an illegal blockade in Eastern Ontario that disrupted the key train system that transports $100-million worth of goods along the crucial Montreal-Toronto corridor yesterday.

For the third time in 15 months, a blockade forced CN Rail to leave 25 trains sitting idle, while transport trucks were slowed on the highway and nearly 5,000 Via Rail passengers had to change their long-weekend travel plans.
Will Brant walk away unscathed again?
Presumably the OPP figured it was best to wait for Brant to surrender, which he has done in the past, rather than inflame a potentially volatile situation. But they refused to explain the decision.

"All we can say right now is that we'll execute the warrant when it's appropriate," Const. Angie Atkinson said.

Initially it was thought Brant would surrender once the blockades came down. But Brant had no plans to spend the long weekend in jail. Instead, he said he would enjoy Canada Day with his family and then turn himself in mid-week.
Who's running the OPP anyway... Julian Fantino, or Shawn Brant?

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FROM THE COMMENTS:
Anonymous said...
Did you feel as angry when the farmers blocked the 401 with their tractors?

Grandad said...
I was enraged... Then I ate.

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Iraq : Big on capital punishment...

AND cutting out the middleman...
The Iraqi Aid Association (IAA), a Baghdad-based non-governmental organisation working with displacement, children and youth issues, says dozens of Iraqis have been killed after using the internet to access erotic sites.

Fatah Ahmed, spokesperson for the IAA, said: "We have received information from many sources that militants are operating spies inside internet cafes just to find out who is browsing sites they have deemed offensive to Islam."

Ahmed said most of the killings or abductions happen directly after the victims leave the internet cafes.

Breaking stuff and killing people

Canadian SpecOps gets a new commander.
A formal transfer of command at Ottawa's Cartier Drill Hall placed the 44-year-old Col. Day in charge of the Forces' tactical and anti-terrorism units, which are in the midst of a 10-year expansion that will see their size doubled.

The Special Operations Forces command, or CANSOFCOM, includes the JTF2 commando unit, a special helicopter squadron, a chemical- and nuclear-weapons unit, and a broader Special Operations Regiment now being built up to a battalion size of about 700 soldiers.
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RELATED:
JTF2 - Their business is killing...

And business prospects around the world are looking good.

This just in...
-- GLASGOW, Scotland, June 30 (Reuters) -- A four-wheel-drive vehicle crashed into the main terminal at Glasgow airport on Saturday and exploded in flames, a day after police foiled a possible al Qaeda plot to detonate two car bombs in London.

"It raced across the central reservation and went straight into the building," said taxi driver Ian Crosby outside the terminal.

Crosby said a stocky Asian man had got out of the car and was quickly wrestled to the ground by bystanders.

"It would appear to me to have been a deliberate attack. I think this was a terrorist attack," Crosby said.
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LAST WORD: All doubt gone...
Mr. Leeson said bollards — security posts outside the entrance — stopped the driver from barreling into the bustling terminal at Glasgow's airport.

“He's trying to get through the main door frame but the bollards have stopped him from going through. If he'd got through, he'd have killed hundreds, obviously,” he said.

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Gonna get all "root causes"...

On yo' ass...

Fallout from Jordan Manners shooting takes down administrators at Toronto's C.W. Jefferys C.I.
The school's principal, Charis Newton-Thompson, and vice-principals Stan Gordon and Silvio Tallevi, were given changed duties earlier this week after Julian Falconer, chairman of an independent safety panel examining the school, reported findings to the director of education for the TDSB.
Because we can't just blame the kid who pulled the trigger.

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29 June 2007

On the road to Shariah

A Manchester magistrate who refused to deal with a defendant because she was wearing a full Muslim face veil could face disciplinary action.

Zoobia Hussain, 32, of Crumpsall, who is charged with criminal damage, plans to write and complain, her lawyer said.

A statement from the Judiciary of England and Wales said: "Mr Murray is concerned about questions of identity when the full veil is worn in court.

Algonquians now claim Parliament Hill

"We're going to bring some people to Parliament Hill, put a camp there and stay there until we get an answer to resolve the problems that we have in our community," Chief Matchewan said.

The fact that thousands of Canadians will descend on the proposed campsite for this weekend's Canada Day festivities will not deter the chief.

"That's our land there; they have to know that. Those thousands of people are going to know that Parliament Hill is on unceded Algonquian title," he said.
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UPDATE:
CTV aboriginal spinfest

Just finished watching the two lead stories on CTV news. Both stories were about the blockade of the railway lines and the 401 at Deseronto.

As expected, absolutely no mention of Shawn Brant's threats of armed insurrection... merely a softball interview, where Brant, just like Arafat and company, got to speak out of the other side of his mouth.

In both stories, aboriginal law-breaking was characterised solely as an "inconvenience."

I think I'll stick with the actual story.

Funny, CTV missed this stuff too...
CN Rail spokesman Mark Hallman would not discuss revenues the company might have lost when it cancelled its freight trains for the day, but said the company operates 25 trains carrying about $100-million worth of commodities between Montreal and Toronto every day.

At a demonstration outside Queen's Park in Toronto, aboriginal protester Doreen Silversmith slammed the federal government's offer of $125-million to end the 15-month standoff with native protesters in Caledonia, Ont.

“The government can goddamn shove it up their asses,” she said to the cheers of about 400 natives and University of Toronto students.

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Double your fun

Looks like somebody was playing for keeps...
The discovery of the second bomb, about 20 hours after the first, suggested a co-ordinated and more sophisticated plot than was initially thought — similar to the July 7, 2005 suicide bombings where four bombs exploded within an hour of one another on London's busy transit system.
Hopefully, because police they have these vehicles and devices intact, there will be enough forensic evidence to nail the perpetrators.

This may be a very long summer in the U.K.

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UPDATE:
Iraqi suspect in double bomb incident...

Was under house arrest.
Police say they are looking for an Iraqi who went on the run from a control order only 11 days before yesterday's failed bombing attempts. The man, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, is part of a six-strong cell linked to al-Qaeda in Iraq.

Instead of charging the men in open court and exposing sensitive intelligence, the government imposed control orders, effectively confining them to their homes for 18 hours a day.

He went missing on 18 June in north-west England, and his whereabouts are unknown. He was the second of his group to abscond from a control order.

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Chugging that Liberal Kool-Aid

Sure... everything's just hunky-dory, until suddenly you're lying in a crumpled heap, staring at raw, bloody stumps... where your legs used to be.
"Sure, it's disturbing, and obviously it reminds everyone of 7/7," said Ian Hiskos, 32, eating at a cafe across the block from the police cordon on Haymarket.

"I try not to think about these things."
Every knowledgeable security expert in the world agrees it's a question of when... not if.

Wake up and smell the species.

Slicing and dicing

It's a beautiful day... to celebrate diversity.
-- CAIRO, Egypt -- The death of a 12-year-old Egyptian girl at the hands of a doctor performing female circumcision in the country's south has sparked a public outcry and prompted health and religious authorities this week to ban the practice.

The case sparked widespread condemnation and was closely followed in Egyptian papers, which also reported that Shaker had passed out sweets to pupils in her class earlier on the day of her death, to celebrate her good grades.

It also evoked memories of a 1995 CNN television documentary depicting a barber circumcising a 10-year-old girl in a Cairo slum.
Sorry... some aspects of our culture are inarguably superior to the third world.

Maybe that's why so many people want to live here.

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RELATED: Do the right thing

Norway steps up...
-- OSLO, June 29 (Reuters) -- Norway took steps on Friday to crack down on circumcision of girls by barring families from travelling abroad if officials suspect they plan to have the procedure done outside the country.

The intervention followed reports in Norwegian media that at least 185 girls from Norway -- daughters of immigrants -- had their genitals cut in just one village in Somalia.

The government said it would refuse passports to families suspected of sending girls abroad to have the procedure carried out. Authorities can also forbid a family from travelling if they suspect the purpose is female circumcision, officials said.

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The majesty of the law

TORONTO AND DESERONTO, ONT. — Ontario Provincial Police, who shut down Canada's busiest highway early Friday morning west of Kingston due to native protesters in the area, have decided to reopen Highway 401.
So what sort of penalty is there for shutting down the busiest transit corridor in the country and threatening an armed battle against the provincial police...
Hours later the OPP issued an arrest warrant for protest leader Shawn Brant on a charge of mischief.
It's like these thugs went out and egged somebody's house.
Mr. Brant told reporters Friday morning that he would be willing to turn himself in later in the day but not before he ”gets to give his kids a hug.”
Good grief.

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LEGAL INTERJECTION: Ah, your honour... a small point

Not to step on anybody's toes here, but...
Section 83.01(1)(b) defines terrorist activity as:

(E) causes serious interference with or serious disruption of an essential service, facility or system, whether public or private, other than as a result of advocacy, protest, dissent or stoppage of work that is not intended to result in the conduct or harm referred to in any of clauses (A) to (C)
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RELATED: It's only a matter of time...

Before the aboriginals reach critical mass. If you can threaten to shoot cops and get away with it... upping the ante is the next "logical" step.
A car bomb planted in central London would have caused "carnage" if it had exploded, police sources have said.

A controlled explosion was carried out on the car, packed with 60 litres of petrol, gas cylinders and nails, in Haymarket, near Piccadilly Circus.

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It's just like Osama said...

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UPDATE: An experiment for my Stageleft socialist friends...
Try this yourself some time... get a bunch of your buddies AND their deer rifles and TRY blockade a four lane highway for a couple of days.

One caveat though... if you're a middle aged white guy with a regular job and a family... the local SWAT Team is gonna drop you like a crazy girlfriend if you don't immediately disarm and assume the position.
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When there's a strong horse and a weak horse... insurgents park their loyalty with the one who looks like a winner.

And that's what the aboriginal community is doing right here.
-- TORONTO AND DESERONTO, ONT. -- Ontario Provincial Police shut down Canada's busiest highway early Friday morning west of Kingston due to native protesters in the area, who had earlier blockaded a section of secondary highway and a stretch of nearby railway track on the eve of the National Day of Action.

Friday morning, the Ontario Provincial Police closed Highway 401 both ways between Napanee and Belleville and were diverting traffic north onto Hwy 7 due to native protesters "being in the direct area, for safety reasons," said Sergeant Kristine Rae of the Smith Falls detachment.
I'm sure that's not the way Shawn Brant and his merry band of aboriginal thugs are gonna see it.

This is a coup for the terrorists. They just cut Canada's busiest transportation route and if the OPP are working from the same old playbook... we're gonna have to beg to get it back.
Thursday night, Mr. Brant's protesters lit two bonfires in the middle of the highway near Marysville, Ont., and had also parked pickups trucks, a van and school bus there.
Let's not forget Fidel Brant also claims his troops are armed and ready to shoot.

Time to call in "OUR" army.

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RELATED: Where's Waldo?

A statement from Dalton "You can't get there from here" McGuinty...
Friday is about grievances aboriginal communities have with the federal government, not the province, he said.

"I remain hopeful that this national day of action will proceed in a peaceful and respectful way," McGuinty said, adding it will be up to provincial police to deal with any blockades or illegal activity.
Yup... not his problem... no surprise there

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28 June 2007

Armed Terrorists threaten OPP

Try doing this with a bunch of your buddies... and see how long it takes the local SWAT team to knock your dick in the dirt.
-- DESERONTO -- Mohawk protesters, who said they had guns and wouldn't back down, began preparations for blockades of the main CN line and Highway 401 near this eastern Ontario town late Thursday, despite widespread calls that an aboriginal day of action be peaceful.
Once again though, being aboriginal confers extra-legal status on these guys.

To no one's surprise, professional agitator and spokes-native Shawn Brant is front and centre...
Mr. Brant said he intended to lead blockades of one or both of the main traffic and rail corridors between Toronto and Montreal starting at midnight Thursday night, or before.

He wouldn't disclose the actual sites, but confirmed that he and others were prepared to “meet force with force” if police got in their way.

“We've made no secret that we have guns within this camp,” he told The Canadian Press in an interview.
This sociopath has apparently got some sort of Billy Jack looptape constantly running through his fevered brain.
Mr. Brant says the time to educate Canadians through peaceful rallies has passed.
By his own very public admission, Shawn Brant is screaming out that he is "armed and dangerous".

What more do police need to shut this asshole down?

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UPDATE: OPP Commissioner Fantino responds
"We're certainly in a position where we want to demonstrate goodwill," he said. "We certainly do not want to become the cause of conflict.

But having said all of that, we also have to be mindful of other people's rights and entitlements as well."
Boy, was I ever wrong about Fantino.

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UPDATE2: CPR jumps in...

Is this worshipping at the altar of political correctness...
-- OTTAWA -- Trains across the country will grind to a halt today in a show of support for the Assembly of First Nations call for a national day of action.

In a show of solidarity, Canadian Pacific Railways has ordered all of its freight trains to stop for one minute at 2 p.m. ET.
Or simply a shrewd business tactic?

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National Day of Action, my ass...

It's the other 364 days of "business as usual" we really ought to be worried about.
-- NAPANEE -- Provincial police seized a $40,000 load of what they have termed illegal cigarettes just a few kilometres outside the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory earlier this week.

If convicted, the minimum fine the man will face for possessing 23 cases of unstamped tobacco is $37,950, police report.
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*** BREAKING: VIA folds ***
-- TORONTO -- Via Rail is suspending service on Friday on the highly travelled Montreal-Toronto and Ottawa-Toronto corridors in anticipation of an aboriginal day of action.

“While we recognize the impact this may have on individual travel plans, the decision was taken after careful consideration of the uncertainty of the situation and the potential risks involved in attempting to operate under such unpredictable conditions.”
If the McGuinty Liberals and the OPP are gonna run for cover as per usual, there's no percentage in VIA trying to go it alone.

Abandoned by the government... yet again.

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It's safe to say...

Thomas Walkom has never walked down Driftwood Avenue...
"Few things are more crucial to a nation's sovereignty than its control over legalized violence."
Is this guy for real?

Uh, Tom... I'm gonna go out on a limb here... but I'm guessing that it ain't the U.S. Secret Service that's murdering all those black kids in Toronto.

Maybe we could just focus on "illegal" violence for a bit.

If that's ok with you.

Who's sicko now?

What does the President of the Canadian Medical Association have to say...
"This is a country," Dr. Day said by way of explanation, "in which dogs can get a hip replacement in under a week and in which humans can wait two to three years."
I don't know where Michael Moore gets his "once upon a time" information from... I'd love to tell him about the 7 hour wait I had in the local ER with a sick fevered child.
It's not simply that Mr. Moore is wrong.

His grand tour of public health care systems misses the big story: While he prescribes socialism, market-oriented reforms are percolating in cities from Stockholm to Saskatoon.
(via Kathy)

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UPDATE:
And then, once you get in
In Canada, it is estimated that there are up to 12,000 deaths annually due to drug-related adverse events.

These include administering the wrong drug, the wrong dosage, drug interactions and reactions.

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There's standing on principle...

And there's stepping on your own johnson.
-- CANBERRA, Australia -- A boxer who cited his Muslim beliefs in refusing a doping test because he didn't want to expose himself to drug testers was given a two-year ban Thursday by the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority.

ASADA said Omar Al-Shaick failed to provide a urine sample during an unannounced, out-of-competition test in Brisbane on June 13, 2006.

McMullen said Al-Shaick, who now works as an apprentice carpenter, was a deeply religious man but was open to discussing how he might deal with anti-doping tests in the future.
That's a pretty flexible religious stand if you ask me.

Is it possible, just possible... he couldn't afford to take the test, at that moment, for some other reason?

Nah.

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RELATED:
Speaking of elasticity of principles

What about St David of the Church of the Environment
Mr. Suzuki was this year caught running his cross-country climate-change tour from a diesel-powered "rock-star" bus, built for 54, for an eight-man entourage.

And the CBC host has two sizeable homes, despite calling it "disgusting" that the average Canadian's home (most have just one) is larger than that of our grandparents.
And let's not forget that famous McGuinty disregard for the, ah... what's that thing called... oh yeah, the truth.
Calculations using the "terrapass" carbon calculator show that during the last three years of his eight-year tenure as president and CEO of the National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy, Mr. McGuinty was responsible, through work affairs alone, for more than double the carbon emissions than the average Canadian emits at home and work combined. (All records before 2000 were, according to the NRTEE, destroyed.)

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You must be dreamin', honey...

"Just go back to sleep."
-- PORT ST. LUCIE -- A woman was arrested Tuesday after her husband woke up in the middle of the night with a terrible headache and later learned he had a bullet lodged in his head.

His wife drove him to the hospital where doctors said a bullet had lodged behind his right ear.
You've gotta wonder what was going through her mind when he got up and started to bitch about his headache.

She probably started looking for some kryptonite.

27 June 2007

Un... Freakin'... Believable

Some days I just think the world is upside down...
"The findings are disturbing and indicate that the Correctional Service has not rigorously fulfilled its mandate to keep all inmates safe and act on recommendations related to inmate deaths," said correctional investigator Howard Sapers.
Call me wacky... but how about, we move the safety of the general law-abiding citizenry to the top of this list? Isn't that really the primary function of a prison... to lock up the dangerous predators?

If Clifford Olsen and Paul Bernardo and the rest of the murderers, rapists and thieves choose to off themselves or guzzle each other up... well, that's just fine by me.

While we're at it, let's take away their computers, televisions and nautilus machines... prison isn't supposed to be entertaining.

It's time get back to bottom-line basics... 'cos coddling these assholes is just a one way street to more heartbreak.

And let's get Howard Sapers a real job.

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UPDATE: Where the CBC's head is at
"Inmate deaths could have been prevented"
Not a peep, mind you... about the 600 odd Canadians who were murdered by these assholes last year.

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RELATED:
It's official... Dalton delivers dick all
The Ontario government is rife with “puffery” as government departments promise the world, then fail to deliver, according to the second annual report of the provincial ombudsman.

Ontario Ombudsman André Marin on Wednesday lamented the “puffery” exposed by his scrutiny of the government, saying the litany of organizations make grandiose promises but don't follow through.

“I was tempted to label this one ‘The Year of Over-promising and Under-delivering',” Mr. Marin said as he released his report.

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Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

I wonder if Liberal Environment Minister Laurel Broten is familiar with those words...
Robbie Robinson, a retired architect whose backyard abuts Broten's Etobicoke home, says in a submission to the OMB that he fears the construction of the garage, which will include an auto lift, will be higher than a neighbouring home and jeopardize a 14-metre tree that sits between those two properties.

Robinson told Sun Media that Broten and her husband routinely have four vehicles parked at their home -- a hybrid SUV, a station wagon, a sports car and an older car

In a letter to the OMB, Robinson says that the proposed garage would have walls that are 14 feet high and a ridge that is 19 feet high, almost twice what the bylaw allows.
Minister Broten is apparently not available for comment, but an underling was quick to attempt to put a warm, fuzzy face on the massive automotive edifice.
Anne O'Hagan, a spokesman for Broten, said the minister was not available for an interview yesterday, but she told Sun Media that the complainant is not privy to the plan.

"It's a one-car garage; it's actually for the (babies') strollers," O'Hagan said.
Geez... it's for the babies.

That's even better than saving the whales.

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UPDATE: Broten claims she's really green...

As she throws her husband under the bus.
Broten said she has a hybrid SUV but her husband has three vehicles -- two sports cars and a Volvo SUV.
Oh yeah... she loves trees too.

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JUST DESSERTS: OMB lays Broten beatdown
Broten and her husband sent a letter to the Ontario Municipal Board on Friday saying they no longer wanted a variance from height restrictions in their west-end neighbourhood.

But the letter was too late to stop a board hearing Tuesday into neighbours' complaints that the tall garage would dwarf their properties and might damage a large tree.

The board ruled in favour of Broten's neighbours and said she could not have the variance to build the two-storey garage.

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G.I. Sirjana

A sign of the times... the Brigade of Gurkhas going co-ed.
-- KATMANDU, Nepal -- More than 1,500 Nepalese women have signed up with private firms to train for a possible career with the British army after it allowed them to join the Brigade of Gurkhas for the first time in nearly two centuries.

Twenty-year-old undergraduate Sirjana Rana said she would barely get $150 a month in Nepal after completing her studies. But if she joined the British army now, her wages could be 10 times higher.

Gurkha soldiers, a tribe from Nepal's Himalayan foothills known for their fierce combat abilities, have been serving in the British army since 1815.

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Rebel without a brain

Canada's own version of Ismail Haniyeh is still making vague threats about disrupting "something or other" this holiday weekend.
-- DESERONTO, ONT. -- Mohawk protester Shawn Brant has emerged as a lonesome voice of hard-line native militancy, plotting major economic disruption as his way of making Canada sit up and listen.

Any move Friday to block thousands of commuters on Highway 401 or the CN rail line will depend on last-minute circumstances, police presence and safety issues, Mr. Brant said.

"We're going to have that expression of strength and solidarity across this country," he said in an interview at the quarry he occupied on disputed land last March near Deseronto, west of Kingston.

"Then we'll step back and say: 'You absorb this.' Because the next time we come out, it's going to be harder, it's going to be longer and it's going to have an impact on this economy that Canada can't imagine at this point.

"We've had enough."
Well Shawn, apart from the sexual imagery... you took the words right out of my mouth.

My guess is though, that Dalton McGuinty will let this one, whatever it turns out to be, slide too.

Which can only help the Conservative's chances in the coming Ontario elections.

So bring it on, baby.

A little short term pain will be worth the gain.

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UPDATE: Kingston Mohawks want in
We encourage the participation of as many people as possible, in as many ways as possible.

Some people may choose set up lawn chairs and “relax on the tracks,” while others may choose to stand by the side of the road and pass out pamphlets and refreshments to motorists.

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Land of Misfit Toys

Iran, one of the largest oil exporters in the world, has started to ration gasoline in response to a possible blockade of the country in retaliation for it's hardline stance on developing nuclear weapons.

And unlike here in Canada, citizens aren't shy about showing their displeasure.
At least one petrol station has been set on fire in the Iranian capital, Tehran, after the government announced fuel rationing for private motorists.

Iranians were given only two hours' notice of the move that limits private drivers to 100 litres of fuel a month.

Despite its huge energy reserves Iran lacks refining capacity, forcing it to import about 40% of its petrol.
I'm thinking... if you're awash in oil billions and you still can't manage to refine enough gasoline to keep your own citizens on the road... maybe you really shouldn't be foolin' around with nuclear fission.

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China responds...

To recalls of poisonous and counterfeit products, not with shame and apologies... but with a counter-attack.
-- BEIJING, June 27 (Reuters) -- China has seized two fruit shipments from the United States and warned it would apply greater scrutiny to U.S. cargoes, even as it tightens the screws on manufacturers of unsafe food at home.

The country's quarantine bureau said in a statement on its Web site that quality inspectors had detained U.S. shipments of orange pulp, produced by Modern Skill Co. Ltd, and of preserved apricot from Mariani Packing because they contained high levels of bacteria, mildew and sulphur dioxide.

"When dealing with food from America, local quarantine bureaux should tighten their procedures," said the statement seen by Reuters on Wednesday.
What have these people been smoking?

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RELATED: All talk... no rock
Chinese President Hu Jintao has put clean government and a more even distribution of wealth at the top of his political agenda.

Mr Hu said the fight against corruption was a prominent part of his plans, and he added that an anti-poverty target must be met by 2020.

But he added that "our country's political reforms must adhere to a correct political direction... and adhere to the party's leadership".

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26 June 2007

Read 'em and weep...

Isn't it funny, how simply bringing unpleasant facts to light... also calls out the yappy little dogs of the loony left.

I guess I don't understand how the Liberals longtime policy of sweeping this stuff under the politically correct carpet... was ever supposed to help resolve any of these issues.
In the province's 2005 Report on the Health Status of Aboriginal People, Dr. Chandrakant Shah reported that 50 per cent of aboriginal people living off-reserve smoke, with rates as high as 70 per cent in the late 1990s.

Forty-three per cent engage in binge drinking and 28 per cent use illegal drugs. Sixty-three per cent are considered overweight or obese, compared to 39 per cent of Canadians. Cancers in both sexes are on the rise, and in 1999, 10.7 per cent of all HIV/AIDS cases in Canada were aboriginal.
The truth is that nothing will ever turn around, without aboriginals first, admitting there is a problem and second, admitting they bear responsibility for properly raising their own children.

Obviously, this also entails not hiding behind the Aboriginals are Victims industry.
"Governments really can't do anything," he said. "They can't go in and change things. The change has to come from within, a desire to do something for the community, followed by more of a collaborative working arrangement between governments and First Nations communities. We can't just throw money at it."

The suicide rate in aboriginal communities is three to four times greater, as are the rates of most mental illnesses. At least 75 per cent of aboriginal women have experienced family violence, and an estimated 20,697 aboriginals in Ontario are currently suffering from a major mental disorder, most commonly depression, anxiety and substance abuse.

Source: Report on the Health Status of Aboriginal People in Ontario, 2005, by Dr. Chandrakant P. Shah.

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The wheels on the bus...

Could kill you... just something to think about if someone offers you a deal on cheap Chinese-made tires...
Federal officials have told a small New Jersey importer to recall 450,000 radial tires for pickup trucks, sport utility vehicles and vans after the company disclosed that its Chinese manufacturer had stopped including a safety feature that prevented the tires from separating.
Wait, it gets better...
Ms. Hopkins said the agency’s top officials were “outraged” that Foreign Tire Sales’ executives waited more than two years to pass on their suspicions about problems with the tires.

The company first suspected problems in October 2005. Almost a year later, in September 2006, the Chinese manufacturer, Hangzhou Zhongce Rubber, a former state-owned company based in eastern China, acknowledged that a gum strip that prevents the tread from separating was left out of the manufacturing process.

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Circus Jerkus

My wife, who is a much more tolerant person than I could ever hope to be, just said to me "Isn't it ironic that an event that was originally designed to promote acceptance of the gay community, has turned into such a freak show."

As per usual, she nailed it.

Now, unless I'm mistaken, that seems to be the message our own Blogging Tory Diogenes Borealis is sending out as well...
Another Gay Pride weekend has come and gone, and once more I cringe with embarrassment when I see the images of the various pride parades on TV and in print.

In the National Post today, the only coverage of Toronto's event was a photo of a semi-naked man wearing a studded leather jock strap (and not much else) entertaining a crowd with his package.
It must be difficult for any gay person who doesn't aspire to participate in this uber-public celebration of sexual buffoonery... to be tarred yearly with this very sticky brush.

That, unfortunately, is how contemporary media shapes our perceptions.

My problem with the gay community isn't a religious thing. I don't believe people choose to be gay.

What I object to is the politicising of the whole thing, the political correctness and the insistence that I must accept whatever propaganda the community chooses to spray around.

I don't wanna hear about any of my neighbours' sex lives.

And I sure don't wanna hear about theirs.

Check out Diogenes... he's worth a read.

**********

RELATED:
With Red Rosie on your side...

Who needs enemies?


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Where profit stomps on history

Heritage... the homegrown variety anyway... is a dirty word in David Miller's Toronto...
A group of CPR pensioners protested yesterday plans to allow furniture giant Leon’s to move into the historic CPR roundhouse instead of establishing a large railway museum.

The city’s Culture Division hired a developer to look for tenants for the building, which is on the city’s waterfront by the CN Tower, and Leon’s has signed on the dotted line to move in by the fall of 2008.
How much unaudited money d'ya figure Toronto City Council has showered on Caribana over the years? And why is this railway museum initiative deemed unworthy?

Our railroads may just be the single most important logistical factor in turning Canada into the amazing country that it is today.

But don't tell that to David Miller.

He has other plans for Toronto.

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UPDATE:
Hurray... more taxes
Plans to clobber home buyers in Toronto with a hefty land-transfer tax won approval from Mayor David Miller and members of his hand-picked executive committee yesterday.

In voting unanimously, Miller and 10 committee members also targeted Toronto motorists with a $60 vehicle registration fee.

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25 June 2007

Creationism my ass...

Ya just gotta love science...
-- WASHINGTON -- Researchers studying Neanderthal DNA say it should be possible to construct a complete genome of the ancient hominid despite the degradation of DNA over time.

Debate has raged for years about whether there is any relationship between Neanderthals and modern humans. Some researchers believe that Neanderthals were simply replaced by early modern humans, while others argue the two groups may have interbred.

Sequencing the genome of Neanderthals, who lived in Europe until about 30,000 years ago, could shed some light on that question.
Now I've probably pissed off my more religious BT brethren here... and that got me thinking.

You piss off a devout Muslim and he wants to kill your lousy infidel ass... you piss off a North American Evangelical Christian... he just wants to pray for your soul.

Just a thought.

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Stand by for cars that top out...

At five miles per hour, whiskey bottles with lockable caps and tobacco that needs special matches to catch fire...

Is there any end to ass-backwards solutions that allow people to not take responsibility for their lives, their children and their future?
Aboriginals in Labrador are hoping a new fuel that doesn't intoxicate gas sniffers could help solve a persistent problem among young people in their communities.

In 2002, the entire community of Davis Inlet was relocated after footage of gas-sniffing children, screaming they wanted to die, was broadcast worldwide.

Just three years later, and after $160-million in moving costs, the chief of the new community Natuashish was forced to admit that the problem was again out of control.
It ain't the gasoline that's the problem here, you dopey assholes... it's inadequate or totally absent parenting.

Why are you having children if you refuse to take care of them?

God help us if this entire community isn't using plastic cutlery.

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RELATED: Numbers don't lie
One in 10 aboriginal children now lands in foster care, compared to one in 200 for non-aboriginal children, the AFN said. There are currently three times as many children in foster care as there were in residential schools.

While some figures show First Nations youngsters account for as much as 40 per cent of the children in Canada's foster care system, the number of Mohawk children in care here is proportionate to communities off the reserve.
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UPDATE: Jeff "Ladybug" Davidson has linked to this post...

So he could call me naughty names.

I think he's still pissed about this and this and this.

Hey Jeffy... I have to ask, yet again... if that's the way you really feel... why would you waste your time constantly coming back here, instead of the healing circle over at rabble.ca?

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Gallbladders, penises tied up...

With string... these are a few of my favourite things...
"I noticed this thing, and so I pulled it out and these five fingers come out, this arm comes up, and then you see the jaw bone and teeth, and nose and eyes," said Ed Filman.

"What it turned out to be was a skinned monkey, and from my understanding, they were going to eat it."

I want my Manimal

Well, hang on to your chromosomes baby... looks like we're in for a wild ride...
So far, our mixtures are modest. To make humanized animals really creepy, you'd have to do several things.

You'd increase the ratio of human to animal DNA.

You'd transplant human cells that spread throughout the body.

You'd do it early in embryonic development, so the human cells would shape the animals' architecture, not just blend in.

You'd grow the embryos to maturity.

And you'd start messing with the brain.

We're doing all of those things.
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RELATED: From related previous comments...

This DNA shit makes people crazy.
I'm with you future-boy... I can't wait for an ape-human hybrid that can wash cars, fetch beers and run a lawn tractor.

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Youth crime wave...

In Hastings County, Ontario...
Police were called to the area of Humewood and Crestview just after midnight Friday, where youths were egging houses in the area.

Officers found four youths, who were forced to apologize to the home owners. They were then cautioned with regards to mischief and returned to their parents.
No murders... no stabbings.

Hmm... what could be so different about Toronto?

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UPDATE:
Speaking of David Miller's subsidised social paradise...

In the same time period...
An innocent bystander was shot in the leg by a stray bullet when gunfire broke out Sunday evening in the Jane-Finch neighbourhood, in the first of three shootings reported in Toronto that evening.

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Great news for junkies...

And the implacably promiscuous.
-- TORONTO -- Ontario has become the first jurisdiction in North America to offer HIV tests that provide results in just 60 seconds and will double the number of sites across the province where anonymous tests are available, Health Minister George Smitherman announced yesterday.
Not so great... for the rest of us.

Like the old saying goes, "The squeaky hedonist gets the lubrication."

24 June 2007

The Bombay Trots

When people tell you not to drink the water while traveling in foreign countries, trust me... they're not kidding.
-- NEW DELHI, June 25 (Reuters) -- Within sight of Delhi's gleaming new metro train, Nawal Kishore slips the body of a baby into the waters of the Yamuna, one of the world's filthiest rivers.

It's just another day at work for the 40-year-old man, who has been disposing of the bodies of three or four children, rich and poor, in the polluted waters of the Yamuna or in the equally dirty river bank every day for the last decade.

Most Hindus cremate their dead, but crematoria across India usually turn away the corpses of babies and children under three, citing a tradition which says they should either be buried or submerged in "holy" rivers.
Maybe somebody should tell Al Gore... there's more than one problem facing humanity in this big, bad world.

Anglicans... two thumbs up

**********
UPDATE: The story has been changed

Same G & M link, without any explanation, now goes to this Michael Valpy article that says the vote went the other way...
A razor-thin majority of Canada's Anglican bishops on Sunday overrode the wishes of their laity and clergy and vetoed a resolution that would have allowed for blessings in church settings of committed homosexual unions.

It needed a triple majority of bishops, clergy and laity to pass. The laity voted 79 to 59 in favour and clergy voted 63 to 53, but bishops voted 21 to 19 against.
**********
-- WINNIPEG -- Canadian Anglicans have taken the first step towards blessing gay and lesbian unions.

Delegates meeting in Winnipeg for the General Synod have agreed that the blessing of same sex unions does not conflict with the core doctrine of the Anglican Church of Canada.

Widely approved by clergy and laity, the vote was tight among the Anglican bishops, narrowly passing by two votes.
Lutherans... two thumbs down.
Canada's Evangelical Lutheran church, which is also meeting in Winnipeg this weekend, rejected same sex blessings in a vote held Saturday.
And the beat goes on.

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LAST WORD: Let's ask the Anglicans
Canadian Anglicans, meeting at their General Synod governing convention, voted by the slimmest of margins to defeat a proposal that would have permitted church blessing rites for gay couples.

However, on the same day, the synod – also by a narrow margin – agreed that such blessings are “not in conflict with the core doctrine” of the church. Much of the sixth day of the synod was taken up with debate on the two questions, with dozens of people approaching microphones in the plenary hall to voice emotional opinions.

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Scotland's Sporran Registry

Not even the wild-ass Scots can escape the wrath of political correctness...
Kilt wearers could face prosecution if they do not have a licence for their sporran under new legislation which has been introduced in Scotland.

The laws are designed to protect endangered species like badgers and otters, whose fur used to be favoured by sporran makers.
Can draconian no-underwear penalties be far behind?

**********

RELATED:
What the hell is a sporran?

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Another angle

"Advertising works on me," he continued. "I overeat. I love to drink. I have very base, petty, vengeful thoughts. I’m not just saying, ‘Here’s what’s wrong with the world.’"

"I’m saying, Here’s what’s wrong with me."

Necktie party for Chemical Ali

Jack Layton's probably frothing at the mouth, but let's face it... if you weren't going to give this guy the big jump... then who would actually swing?
-- BAGHDAD -- Two decades after Iraq's military laid waste to Kurdish villages, the Iraqi High Tribunal on Sunday sentenced Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as “Chemical Ali,” and two others to death for their roles in the bloody campaign against the restive ethnic minority.
He's certainly received more due process than anyone would have while Saddam was in power.

Real "justice" would have been handing him over to the Kurds.

Hey Ali... say hi to yer cuz for us, okay?

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A little bit of toilet training...

And she'll be off to university...
A two-year-old girl from Hampshire has become the youngest ever female member of British Mensa.

Georgia Brown, from Aldershot, Hampshire, astounded experts by scoring 152 in an IQ test - putting her in the top 2% of the population for her age.

Psychologist Joan Freeman, who tested Georgia, said she thought the toddler could have scored even higher but needed a nap after 45 minutes of work.

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23 June 2007

Go big... or go home

Nobody can say the Tyendinaga Mohawks aren't dreamin' in colour...
It starts at the northern border of Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory and spans northward to the upper one-third of the township, covering 33,280 acres or 52 square miles.

This tract of land, Bardy believes, was alienated in 1820 when the government built a road to Toronto through the area.

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Gangbangers are so cool

But where are my people... where do the, uh... Honky Bonkers or the Anglo-Saxon Assassins hang out?
-- Toronto -- A 13-year-old boy was rushed to Hospital for Sick Children after he was stabbed in the neck in a gang attack outside the Christie TTC station last night.

Toronto Det. Reg Wright of 14 Division said the boy was among four who were stabbed in an attack launched by the Latin Kings gang, based in the Eglinton Ave.-Weston Rd. area.

The Latin Kings, a Latino street gang, frequent Christie Pits but are based in the old City of York, Wright said.
Relax, I found it... there is a gang that will take white guys.

**********

UPDATE: Latin Kings can take pride...

In a job well done.
"It's not good, he's a quadriplegic and it's permanent, that's what I'm advised," Toronto Police Det. Reg Wright of 14 Division said yesterday, adding the teen was hanging out with some older friends and was "in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Hey homie, let's go stomp some kittens, huh?

**********

LAST WORD:
Brits are seeing it too
A 16-year-old boy has been stabbed to death in a fight between two gangs in south-east London.

The boy was found by officers at about 2326 BST on Saturday suffering from serious injuries in a street in Southend Road, Beckenham.

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This idiotic fascination with celebrity...

It's a shame that Belinda Stronach has breast cancer... it's not something I would wish upon my worst enemy... but I know 324,486 people, in this particular instance, who aren't going to be all that impressed.

Let's see what Statistics Canada has to say...
There were 324,486 cancer deaths over the five-year period. Of this total, 171,655 were males and 152,831 were females. Female deaths from cancer increased at a slightly faster rate, 8.5%, than did male deaths, which rose 5.4%.

In 2004, 66,947 people died from cancer, up 6.8% from 2000.
My guess is the statistics for 2007 are gonna come in somewhere near 70,000 people... not one of them any less special than Belinda.

Now maybe... just maybe... if the Fiberals had taken the 2 billion dollars, that's 2,000 bags of 1 million dollars apiece... and used it to fund cancer research... instead of the asinine Farmer Bob Rifle Registry... Belinda and some of the non-glitterati citizens in Canada would have been way better off in the here and now.

Do you know personally somebody who died of cancer?

Of course you do.

Do you know somebody who was murdered with a deer rifle?

Where should this money have been spent?

**********

RELATED: I've said it before.

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Read it here...

Because it isn't gonna make it onto Canadian television news.
-- KABUL, Afghanistan -- Dozens of militants were killed in southern and eastern Afghanistan overnight in clashes with U.S.-led foreign troops and Afghan forces, officials said on Saturday.
Little pouty-faced Bob Fife only does the leftbot two-step.

**********

UPDATE: The Captain has more
So far, the operation has resulted in 55 dead terrorists and 23 captured, while the citizens of Baqubah have increased their assistance to the Coalition. They want AQI out of Diyala, thanks to the brutality of the foreign fighters. The Iraqis have no more use for al-Qaeda than anyone else but terrorists and their sympathizers do.
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LAST WORD:
Those noble, warlike jihadis...

Just turned tail and ran. I guess not everybody's ready to give it up for "the big guy" just yet.
Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the second-ranking American commander in Iraq, told reporters that leaders of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia had been alerted to the Baquba offensive by widespread public discussion of the American plan to clear the city before the attack began.

He portrayed the Qaeda leaders’ escape as cowardice, saying that “when the fight comes, they leave,” abandoning “midlevel” Qaeda leaders and fighters to face the might of American troops — just, he said, as they did in Falluja.

Driving Miss Crazy

If you think this isn't happening in Canada, you must be crazy.
Tens of thousands of people are paying fraudsters to sit their driving test for them, the BBC has learned.

The Driving Standards Agency (DSA) says imposters charge up to £500 and can have taken more than 200 tests each.

There are already cases reaching the courts.

On Monday, two men from Oldham, Greater Manchester, were convicted of obtaining driving licences by deception.

Shazad Akhtar, 34, was sentenced to 200 hours community service and ordered to pay £500 costs after pleading guilty to 22 counts of obtaining and attempting to obtain driving licences by deception.

The DSA, which gathers evidence before handing it on to police, has run 1,200 investigations into the activity so far.

Funny, CTV completely missed this

They went instead, with the video closeups of soldiers grieving family members slumped over their loved one's caskets.

So what actually happened today?
NATO's International Security Assistance Force said about 60 insurgents attempted to attack Afghan and ISAF forces Friday in the Bermel district of Paktika province, near the Pakistan border.

The insurgents fired on aircraft, and NATO and U.S.-led coalition forces returned fire, killing about 60 fighters, an ISAF statement said.
On CTV, it's all Canadians dying and families mourning, all the time... the implication being that we are being beaten senseless by the noble warlike Taliban.

That's sure not how the military sees the situation.
Suicide attacks in the eastern part of Afghanistan where the U.S. military operates increased some 230 per cent in the first half of 2007 compared with the same period in 2006, U.S. spokesman Major Chris Belcher said.

Col. Schweitzer said the increase shows the Taliban is less able to launch large-scale attacks.

“That to me is not the barometer that it's getting bad,” he said of the rise. “What would be the barometer to me that it's getting bad is if they do large scale attacks everywhere and they're being effective.”
But don't try tell that to CTV.

They got their closeups of grieving mothers... again.

One last note... resident spin doctor/reporter Bob Fife, commenting on Prime Minister Harper's statement that no extension of the mission would be granted without the support of Parliament... was portrayed as some scheming Machiavellian ploy by Harper.

Even when you give the leftbots what they want, they try to twist it into something horrible.

It's what they do.

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LAST WORD: An eloquent requiem
The Afghan story isn't exclusively and proprietarily about Canadian soldiers who have died.

It's about why the troops are there, what they're hoping to accomplish, their efforts to secure a benighted country and extend the rule of law, the urgency of denying Al Qaeda the strategic foothold they once enjoyed.

It's about promises made at the very top of international leadership, by the United Nations and NATO, by custodians of redevelopment who said to Afghanistan: We won't abandon you again.
(via BCF)

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22 June 2007

Pakistani clerics rush to...

Bestow new honours... on Osama bin Laden...
A group of Pakistani religious leaders led by a pro-Taliban figure has said it will bestow a title on Osama bin Laden in response to Britain's decision to grant a knighthood to Salman Rushdie.
Hey guys... if there's some sort of problem here... how exactly does holding an impromptu "Academy Awards of Jihad" set things right? This silly piece of tit-for-tat theatre has all the social dynamics of a nursery school recess, without, I might add, any of the mostly good intentions.
Allama Tahir Ashrafi, head of the Pakistan Ulema Council, said on Thursday that the group would give bin Laden the title Saifullah.

The name means "Sword of God" and would be given to the al-Qaeda leader for "serving Muslims by waging jihad against infidels".
So this is essentially an award for "Best Mass Murderer", right?

The Religion of Peace... wind 'em up and watch 'em go.

**********

UPDATE:
Islamo-Brits pile on...

Amid renewed calls for Rushdie assassination.
British Muslims on Friday joined in protests against Britain's decision to honour Salman Rushdie with a knighthood, while a hardline Islamic cleric in Iran declared that the 1989 religious edict calling for the author to be killed remained in place.

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The difference here is...

In Canada... the Tigers get to party with their favourite Liberal Members of Parliament...
Media reports in Sri Lanka say that two men arrested in London under Britain's anti-terror laws have suspected connections to the rebel Tamil Tigers.
What's that... surely these arrests are anomalous events?

Well, not really.
In April, police in Paris arrested more than 16 men for alleged involvement with the Tigers.

Similar arrests were made in the United States last year, when at least five Tamil Tiger sympathisers were arrested and charged in New York with conspiring to buy surface-to-air missiles.
Only in Canada, you say?

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And that, my friends...

Is the most important consideration here...
"Obviously it sends a very positive message about diversity," Simon Fraser University criminologist Neil Boyd said of the police board's decision.
Well, maybe the chief can jazz up all their technology... cos' it doesn't sound like he's much of a street cop.
Much of the officer's career has been spent on the technical side of policing. Among other achievements, he created the VPD's first website in 1997, and oversaw the force's transition to a new radio system in 1998.
Of course, maybe I shouldn't be so critical... apparently he's the most qualified and sought after leader in Canadian law enforcement.
"The police board has gone through an exhaustive process, we've searched the whole country for the best person for the job," Mr. Sullivan said.
I wonder how Toronto missed hiring him.

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