You either pay attention or pay through the nose. I would rather pay attention.
Today, Liberal MP’s, including Citoyen Dion, were all wearing green ribbons on their lapels.
So I thought I should find out what green ribbons stand for. And this is what I found by googling “Green Ribbon Campaign”
1. Open Adoption Records
3. Free The Irish Political Prisoner Campaign
6. Rural Community and Family Support
8. End institutionalized aggression
I wonder which of these the Liberals were showing their support for.
I knew when the PM mixed up the Rubik’s Cubinet on us a few weeks ago that he did it for a solid reason. After two days of watching Question Period, I now know why.
1) I am glad Monte Solberg is in the forefront with HRDC. He is a sharp witted man who can really handle himself in Oral Questions. Diane Finley did fine, but Monte has a magic touch in the verbal sparring department.
But more importantly,
2) The PM put John Baird, the equivalent of debating juggernaut into the environment portfolio. Watch him dismantle the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the member from Ajax-Pickering (while giving a subtle shot at the member from Wascana) in today’s oral question period.
(Click the video below once to start the show)
If you cannot see the video play above, try clicking the following link instead.
The night was February 8th, 1989. David Suzuki’s hair had more black than grey in it. The location was Alumni Hall at the University of Western Ontario. The debate was about race and a University of Western Ontario professor, Philip Rushton was preaching that intelligence was related to your race and penis size.
The controversy was immense. The outrage was real. Me and my fellow students were all up in arms over this outrageous claim made by an unknown professor.
So a debate was scheduled and the famous scientist David Suzuki was to be our saviour. We knew that a lowly professor could not possibly stand up to the onslaught that a worldly man like Suzuki would bring.
But it never happened. If there was someone scoring the debate, Rushton would have kicked Suzuki’s ass. All Suzuki could go on about was how a University of 50 or 60 thousand students couldn’t find anyone to debate this monster. How our world class school had to go outside its’ walls to find someone to denounce this professor. I was never so disappointed in David Suzuki as I was that day. But heck, when a major controversy was happening, Suzuki was there … at least in name.
And now he is at it again. The economy is flush with money and David Suzuki is aiming to make his mark on the subject of climate change and global warming. He is launching what CTV calls an “election-style environment tour“. Note it was not called an “Election-style Attack Tour”.
The first question that crossed my mind was “how much emissions is this tour putting into our atmospphere” as Suzuki is using a bus for the tour. The response is given:
The David Suzuki Foundation says in a news release that the carbon emissions associated with the tour are offset through its investments in sustainable energy projects, such as wind farms, solar installations, or energy efficiency projects.
Buying carbon credits with investments in green programs is good for his foundation but it is not acceptable for our government to invest money in Made in Canada green programs. For Suzuki to be happy, we need to give our tax dollars to Russia and Saudi Arabia via Kyoto.
David Suzuki has now disappointed me twice.
After the backlash in the press yesterday Citoyen Dion is backtracking on his comments about reinstating banned party members.
“Certainly, you cannot exclude forever people who made mistakes,” he was quoted as saying. “And someone who has even, I believe, recognized their error.”
Yesterday, Mr. Dion backtracked, insisting that he would have no involvement in reinstating Mr. Côté and suggesting it probably will not occur.
“I am not seeking to reopen that issue and there’s not an application [from Mr. Côté] as far as I know. There is a procedure we follow,” Mr. Dion said, asserting that party officials would handle any such case. “I’m not recommending anything.”
Dion is quickly building a reputation as the “wrong choice” for Liberal leadership.
Mr. Dion’s aides acknowledged privately that the leader is trying to bring the controversy to a quick end and is unhappy that his misstep could raise the spectre of the sponsorship scandal again — noting that his leadership campaign had stressed that he was a veteran Liberal with untainted integrity.
Aides said his comments were an off-the-cuff answer to an unexpected question.
< sarcasm > That’s what I want in a leader …… good solid off the cuff answers!! < /sarcasm >
Stealing a page from their judicial definition of “life”, the Liberals have redefined the term to mean “some arbitrary time we see as being fit”. Today, Citoyen Dion says he would not be against letting some of those banned for their part in the Sponsorship scandal back into the party.
Specifically speaking about bag man Marc-Yvon Côté, who dispersed over $100,000 in illegal funds to several Liberal Party candidates, Dion says he would consider letting Côté and possibly others back into the party after they were banned for life.
Here we go again. Listen to CFRA newsclip below.
ADDENDUM For a crude English translation of Le Soleil, click here.
… If you tossed it away on being an environmentalista.
For those who don’t know, I went to dozens of Grateful Dead concerts in my youth. I used to have long hair, go unshaven for weeks, I wore tie-dye and Guatamalan pants and cruised around the American north east whenever the Dead were coming around. Heck, I was even at a concert in Rich Stadium in Buffalo the night before my Transform Analysis Final exam.
And one thing that I can tell you is that at a Grateful Dead concert there is lots of dancing and lots of drumming. This is not limited to the actual concert mind you, but what takes place the whole day of in the parking lot and for hours after the show. Past live concerts can be heard playing all over and if you walk around enough you find this circle of drummers. Anyone is welcome to sit in with their bongos or whatever they want to beat on. It’s actually quite surreal.
When Jerry Garcia died, I always wondered what would become of the Deadheads. What would this pro peace, anti war, anti capitalistic society do? What would the innovative ones among them do to survive? I am talking about the ones selling home made crafts and tie dyes and veggie burritos.
Now I know where they are all dancing and drumming.
(note: the video below contains some swearing, but is WELL worth the 30 minutes)
I can safely say that after watching this video, I have realized that over half the people show up at these things for the party and not the cause. I am not sure if I find that to be a good thing or a bad thing.
H/T to 905Tory
A commenter at 905Tory pointed out a link to Penn’s radio show where he interviews Patrick Moore. It is also quite enlightening. Patrick Moore WAS the International Director for Greenpeace until 1986 and grew the organization from the original fledgling it was to an entity pulling in $100 Million USD before resigning. Find out why.
Tell me about the rabbits Stephane Dion.
“My first interest was for the society of animals, not of man,” he recalls. “We had a neighbour named Gaston Moisan, a biologist who was a deputy minister of natural resources. He set traps for the rabbits, to band them, and used to take me with him. He was 5-foot-7, but he was a giant for me.”
A charming childhood anecdote — except, according to Mr. Moisan, it never happened. “I don’t know how he could have imagined that,” the retired bureaucrat and university professor says. “I had nothing to do with Stéphane. And I never sensed any interest on his part for my work.”
H/T to Darcey at DustMyBroom.
When the Liberals claim Prime Ministerial adviser positions, like that of Walid Khan, are not getting any value out of the positions, they ought to know.
Liberals may be basing their skepticism about the value of MP Wajid Khan’s report to Stephen Harper on their own experience with special prime ministerial advisers.
Onetime Liberal MP Sarkis Assadourian says he never did a day’s work after being appointed a special adviser to former prime minister Paul Martin.
Shortly before the 2004 election, Assadourian agreed to step aside in his Brampton riding so that a star recruit, Ruby Dhalla, could run for the Liberals in his stead. In return, Martin gave him a job as a special foreign policy adviser.
“They put out a press release and he said to the media and the nation with a straight face I was working with him as (his) adviser on the south Caucasus and Middle East,” Assadourian said in an interview.
“The whole thing was a lie . . . I never a single day worked in his office. I was never paid a single penny.”
Repeat after me. “The whole thing was a lie ….. The whole thing was a lie ….. The whole thing was a lie.”
Wait it get’s better:
“For 15 months I was lied to,” he said.
Asked if he regrets accepting Martin’s job offer and giving up his seat, Assadourian said: “I regret knowing him as a person.”
Paul Martin should hang his head in shame.
H/T to DBT and Jack’s Newswatch.
As Ottawa city council works through ways through the budget for 2007, the issue of spending money on free “crack pipe kits” has come up again. And, as expected, the Ottawa medical officer of health, David Salisbury, is defending the program.
However, the police chief is standing by his statements too.
Police Chief Vince Bevan has said that he opposes the program because it promotes illegal drug use.
“The chief’s position is clear on this,” said spokeswoman Isabelle Lemieux.
Am I wrong in assuming that a program designed to minimize the spread of HIV and Hep C should be left to the provincial government? I always thought health care was provincial jurisdiction.
In fact, last fall during the election run, I called in to a radio show hosting the candidates for Cumberland ward (not my ward) and asked how the candidates would vote if the idea of safe injection clinics was brought up. Rob Jellett, the incumbent, was the only one who stated clearly that this fell under provincial jurisdiction. Since safe injection clinics give free needles and are there to help prevent the spread of diseases, one would conclude the free crack pipe kit program is in the same boat.
I think we need more of city council to read Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species.
ADDENDUM
From CFRA:
Ottawa Police are responding to the scolding they received from the city’s Medical Officer of Health.
A frustrated Dr. David Salisbury says the police service has done everything in its power to interfere with the needle exchange and crack pipe programs by confiscating the kits. However, Ottawa Police Superintendent Gilles Larochelle isn’t offering any apologies.
He says in a criminal investigation, police will seize drug paraphenalia(sic) no matter where it came from. He adds they sometimes take away the pipes for “safety reasons”.
This is priceless. H/T What’s Right is Right
Click the image below ONCE to start the video.
Ok, so maybe it’s my favourite clip from SouthPark.
If you have any trouble viewing the above video, try clicking the link below.