OfficiallyScrewed.com – Page 57 – You either pay attention or pay through the nose. I would rather pay attention.

30 Minutes Can Save Your Life …

January 22, 2007Mulder

… 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.

How Does "Osama Bin Laden Middle School" Sound?

January 22, 2007Mulder

This one takes the cake.

The Taliban is spending one million dollars to open its own schools in areas under its control in southern Afghanistan.

The group has announced it will provide Islamic education for students in six southern provinces.

The textbooks would be the same ones used during the Taliban rule.

The Taliban destroyed 200 schools and killed 20 teachers last year.

What a record. Destroy 200 and build one. That’s how you win over the citizens.

I was looking over the courses offered…

Sharia 101 – How To Hit A Woman Without Leaving a Visible Bruise (Full Burka and Hajib required)

Torture 010 – Beheading Dhimmis for Dummies

Advanced Electronics 200 – How to build a bomb using horse manure, a digital watch and a gyroscope

Of Mice And (Boys Pretending To Be) Men…

January 21, 2007Mulder

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.

OS Bookshelf – America Alone-The End Of The World As We Know It By Mark Steyn

January 21, 2007Mulder

When I first heard Mark Steyn speak I thought to myself “This man is going to get knocked off by a hit man!” If that wasn’t enough to get me hooked then perhaps it was the ease with which he lays out facts and cuts through the politically correct haze most other writers/speakers are surrounded with.

In America Alone-The End Of The World As We Know It, Steyn lays out the demographic facts that show how America (yes, Alone) is the only nation in the free world producing enough offspring to sustain its’ own existence. Italy and Russia sitting at 1.2 and Spain producing a paltry 1.1 children per two adults and even Canada producing only 1.5. When the requirement for sustained population is 2.1 (when mortality is taken into account) the only nation in the free world producing enough offspring to sustain itself without immigration is the United States.

But Steyn points out that when we look at other parts of the world the story is quite different. Niger – 7.46, Mali – 7.42, Somalia – 6.76, Afghanistan – 6.69, Yemen – 6.58. To quote Mr. Steyn:

Notice what those nations have in common? Starts with an I, and ends with a slam. As in: slam dunk.

But Steyn doesn’t just look at the demographics of declining western culture and skyrocketing Islamism. He addresses the demasculation of society and the culture of bleeding heartism that lead to statements by people like Osama bin Laden that say America is weak. She has no teeth. It isn’t the military he is talking about. It is the soft underbelly in our society that sees fit to give in to every whining small L liberal.

Whatever your political stripes, this book is an eye opener and a must read in my opinion. After you read it, make sure you give the book to a friend and make them read it too.

ADDENDUM: If you don’t have time to read the book, watch Mark Steyn’s speech to the Heritage Foundation by clicking here.

Now on to Paul Wells’ latest Right Side Up – The Fall Of Paul Martin And The Rise Of Stephen Harper’s New Conservatism.

Liberals Know All About Special Advisors (Because They Wrote The Book)

January 21, 2007Mulder

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.

Vegetarian It Is

January 21, 2007Mulder

After reading Greg Weston today, I am wondering if the next proposal from granola crunchers is that we all go vegetarian and stop our efforts to aid in the reproduction of cattle.

Among the many reasons to cut the bull on global warming, it turns out a staggering 24 million tonnes of annual greenhouse gas emissions are coming from the exhaust pipes of Canadian cattle and other farting farm animals.

In the overall ecological scheme of things, that means farmyard flatulence is contributing as much to heating the planet as half of all the regular passenger cars on Canadian roads today.

All I have to say is that if Cows are making up half the GHG’s that regular passenger cars on our roads make, then we really are lucky our current government opted out of Kyoto or we all may be sitting in a cart being pulled by some farm animal.

The worst offenders?

-Power Generation – 130 MegaTonnes
-Oil and Gas Industry – 133
-Oil and Gas Exports – 46
-Ordinary Passenger Cars – 50
-SUVs and Family Vans – 44
-Transport Trucks – 45
-Domestic Aircraft – 8
-Mining and Manufacturing – 139
   -Chemical Industries – 22
   -Mining – 18
   -Steel Mills – 15
   -Aluminum and Other Smelting – 13
   -Cement – 11
   -Pulp and Paper – 9
Home Heating – 43
Office and Institutional Heating – 38
Waste Disposal – 29
Agriculture – 55
   -Animal Flatulence – 24
   -Manure Management – 9
   -Other – 23

So there you have it. So let’s put a few facts down. As previous Environment Minister Rona Ambrose stated, it is true that we could take every vehicle off the roads and every airplane out of the air and we would only eliminate 147 MegaTonnes, less than 75% of our target.

It is also true that with scrubber technology on incinerators that we should probably get rid of all landfills. The Netherlands has banned them all together and is now strictly using incineration. This alone could cut close to 30 megatonnes. Why are the environmentalistas not jumping on this idea? It would certainly help remove what may become the biggest pile of trash in the free world should the city approve a proposal to triple or quadruple the size of the Carp Rd. landfill in Ottawa. What a way to add another monument to our nation’s capital.

Another way to cut our emissions is to tell Kyoto to eliminate the penalty we receive for being a net exporter of oil. After all, we may be producing it, but we aren’t burning it. Saudi Arabia exports more than four times the oil we do and they are exempt from Kyoto because they are considered a developing nation. Go figure that one out.

The Saudi GDP is about 20th in the world (+/-2) and they have a population about 3/4’s that of Canada. The per capita number may be lower than us, but when the worlds 20th most prosperous nation is considered developing, think about how many nations our payment into Kyoto would be compensating? Sorry, but no thanks. A lot of oil get’s used in plastics and is not simply burned, so I don’t think we should be responsible with what other nations do with that oil.

And regarding going vegetarian, if we move from beef to broccoli, we wouldn’t eliminate the flatulence, we would just displace it.

Smackdown – KerPlonka Lands One On Chin Of Rob Edger (And Paints Another Face On Stephane Dion)

January 20, 2007Mulder

In an assessment of Stephane Dion’s call for aid to help minority’s deal with hate crimes, Jarrett Plonka does a find job dismantling the argument and pointing out numerous flaws with various Liberal’s positions on this matter. But what gave me a smile was his reply to a comment from Stephane Dion’s Blog Campaign Co-Chair, Rob Edger.

Rob Edger: What’s your alternative?

Jarrett: Basically, either treat all these so-called “hate crimes” as leniently as we do with “normal crimes,” or treat all “normal crimes” with the fire and brimstone with which we appear to want to treat “hate crimes”.

Jarrett is wise beyond his years and disarms the question quite handily. He goes on:

I know which one I’d choose in an instant. The decision is harder for the Cotlerites to whom I referred, who have to balance their desire to have that progressive society while reconciling some of the internal contradictions (including a few that I outlined) that notion presents.

I know which one I would choose too Jarrett.

Hounddog Won't Get My Money

January 20, 2007Mulder

When I heard that the movie Hounddog was going to have a scene which 12 year old actress Dakota Fanning acts like she is being raped by her father, I got sick to my stomach.

I know that incest and child abuse are topics on TV and in the movies all the time, but to portray the video of it is crossing a line I don’t think has been crossed before and I for one will not support the movie by watching it, renting it, or giving it the liberty of being played on my TV when it comes out on Pay TV.

The issue of incest/child abuse can be portrayed just fine without filming a rendition of it. I can only think of one reason this scene would be shot and needless to say Roman Polanski comes to mind.

Michael Coren says it best:

Then they’ll sit back and look smug and caring and enlightened when moral and religious types argue that it’s emotionally and sexually unhealthy to use child rape as a form of titillation for witless audiences.

Some have argued that it’s fine because Fanning’s mother was present during the ordeal and approved of her daughter’s work.

Oh, well, that’s OK then. After all, there has never been a neurotic mother of an actor child in Hollywood, living her life vicariously and enjoying the money and glamour of being mum to a star.

It really is extraordinary that the same sort of people who routinely attack traditional parenting and vehemently oppose even mild spanking are so supportive of a mother’s right to allow her 12-year-old child to behave in such a manner.

Frankly, any criticism will only encourage the chattering classes and inflate still further their sense of self-righteous paranoia.

A child here, a moral code there, a broken generation somewhere else. Doesn’t matter, as long as you’re the centre of attention at a fashionable party.

What makes the last statement by Coren so valid to me is that Deborah Kampmeier, the director of Hounddog has credits in two movies to date and both are themed around some sexual act.

Her first film, Virgin, is about girl who finds herself pregnant without remembering having had sex so she concludes that she is carrying the child of god.

I guess Kampmeier has discovered that sex sells in our society. Either that or she had a really screwed up childhood that we are will hear about when she writes her memoirs in a decade or two.

Supreme Court Gets This One Right

January 19, 2007Mulder

This post will probably be misinterpreted, but I am glad that the Little Sister’s bookstore lost it’s fight to have the legal battle paid for by tax payers. This case has absolutely nothing to do with gay and lesbian literature. But to me, the SCC got it right because they are not creating a separate path for charter challenges.

Little Sister’s wanted to take Canada Customs to court for detaining many of its imported gay and lesbian material at the border, including books, videos, and magazines. They said the agency has been engaged in censorship, with no one overseeing their decisions on what constitutes obscenity.

But the cost of such a battle would have been around $2 million. The store said they had already spent more than $500,000 on the case and wanted Ottawa to pick up the tab for them to move ahead with their Charter challenge.

“But the court ruled the case didn’t meet the threshold of exceptional case,” CTV’s Rosemary Thompson reported from the halls of the Supreme Court.

“The courts are saying they don’t want to create a parallel system of legal aid. They’re saying that only in the most exceptional circumstance where a case has broad implications can you argue that you need the government to front your costs.”

Well thank goodness for small miracles. And my reason for saying that is that I am getting tired of every moonbat and his/her brother trying to beat us over the head with our own constitution.

Examples you say?

Well we have the Canadian Federation of Students trying to get students who take student loans declared a protected social category so they could declare bankruptcy shortly after getting out of school and not have to pay back student loans. Yes, I am for good low cost education, but I am not for creation of a system that lets students get out of debt free. It took me 10 years to pay back my student loans but I did it. I didn’t pay back a whole lot the first few years because I didn’t make a lot of money, but as I got decent raises from working hard, I managed to increase my payments. Knowing I had that debt drove me to work harder too. (Thankfully the CFS is sitting with a loss in the Provincial court on this matter. I do not know if they plan to appeal to the SCC yet.)

Or we can take a look at a challenge made by the homeless over a decade ago which states:

“A person’s constitutional right to shelter takes precedence over any property rights of the owner of an unused apartment building.”

Yeah, that sounds fair. I have a building I am trying to rent but until I do, the homeless are allowed to squat in it. I can just imagine what showing the building would be like to prospective buyers/renters.

Then we have a BC union challenging the right of a city to use contract labour which they consider breaking of a contract with the employees union. Hey, if contract labour can do the job cheaper, then tough noogies on the union.

But how often do you hear about cases that are not about students, homeless, unions, etc.? How often does a charter challenge actually affect us all? It is this question that we should ask ourselves. And when we feel like we want to find good charter challenges to get behind, we will start looking more and more at agencies like the right leaning Canadian Constitution Foundation which is funding an Alberta charter challenge that is similar to the Chaoulli case in Quebec.

From the Frasier Institute:

Bill Murray, a chartered accountant in Calgary, has launched a charter lawsuit against Alberta’s health-care laws, which are almost identical to the Quebec law struck down by the Supreme Court of Canada in Chaoulli. Mr. Murray was prevented by his government from both accessing specialist recommended surgery on his hip and from spending his own money on comprehensive health insurance. The Chaoulli case could set an important precedent in the debate over access to health care in Canada – should Canadians be able to buy medical insurance for their children or themselves as they can for their pets? What is the fallout from private citizens challenging their right to private medical insurance in the courts?

If you want to support challenges that are good for everyone and not just the special interest groups, the Canadian Constitution Foundation can use your help. Go check them out. I truly believe that if a charter challenge is strong enough and if enough people back it, they will find the money somehow. That’s why I am glad we are not going to pay for the Little Sister’s in their challenge. And it also explains why I am going to be supporting the CCF moving forward.

p.s. Ezra Levant sits on their board.

H/T to my friend Sandy for info on the CCF.