Monday Post

Quickly now...


You say it like it's a bad thing:

The Harper government is snubbing officials from a select group of pariah states, ordering its diplomatic missions around the world not to invite them to receptions celebrating Canada Day on July 1.

Should there be a reason to legitimise nations whose human rights abuses are well-known and little resolved?


Toronto Mayor Rob Ford publicly acknowledged his substance abuse problem and apologised:

Mayor Rob Ford ended two months of self-imposed exile Monday when he returned to City Hall from a stint in rehab to resume what mayoral duties he still has, apologizing for his past offensive behaviour, pleading for a second chance, and promising an "unwavering" commitment to living clean.

In a nearly 20-minute statement, Ford spoke passionately of his addictions and his belated realization that they were destroying him.

"For a long, long time, I resisted the idea of getting help," Ford said. "I was in complete denial. I had become my own worst enemy."

Ford heaped praise on the rehabilitation facility he entered two months ago for saving his life and forcing him to "confront his personal demons."

He said he knows he will require treatment for the rest of his life but that getting help had changed him forever.

"I can proudly say I have begun the process of taking control of my life," Ford said.

Ford's role as mayor has been largely symbolic since November, when city council stripped him of most of his power following his admissions of alcohol abuse and drug use during "drunken stupors" that came after months of denials — along with offensive and profane comments he was recorded making.

The mayor apologized to those hurt by his words and actions, saying he regretted some of his past choices but said he blamed no one but himself for his misconduct.

Looking back, he said, "I'm ashamed, embarrassed and humiliated."

The mayor also made it clear he would stay on as mayor and fight for re-election in October.

Flooding in Manitoba:

The Manitoba government says it will start operating the Red River Floodway tomorrow to protect homes in Winnipeg from overland flooding that has forced at least 200 people out of their homes in other parts of the province ...

The southwestern corner of Manitoba, near the Saskatchewan border, has been pummelled by rain since Friday with amounts as high as 151 millimetres.

Israel has found the bodies of three teen-agers kidnapped over two weeks ago:

The bodies of three missing Israeli teenagers were found in the occupied West Bank, and Israel vowed to punish Hamas, the Palestinian group it accuses of abducting and killing them.

"They were kidnapped and murdered in cold blood by beasts," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement after the military discovered on Monday the remains of the Jewish seminary students who disappeared on June 12.

"Hamas is responsible and Hamas will pay," he said.

It's time for Israel to make Hamas regret its child-killing hubris.


Much to the dismay of the perpetually foot-stompy, the US Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that private businesses with objections do not have to pay for employees' contraception.


North Korea flexes its totalitarian yet impotent muscles by promising to try two American tourists:

(Sidebar: why tour North Korea?)

North Korea said Monday it is preparing to try two Americans who entered the country as tourists for carrying out what it says were hostile acts against it.

Investigations into Americans Matthew Todd Miller and Jeffrey Edward Fowle concluded that suspicions about their hostile acts have been confirmed by evidence and their testimonies, Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency said in a short report.

KCNA said North Korea is making preparations to bring them before a court. It did not specify what the two did that was considered hostile or illegal, or what kind of punishment they might face. It also did not say when the trial would begin.

Though a small number of U.S. citizens visit North Korea each year as tourists, the State Department strongly advises against it.

Visit the Fur. You know you want to.


And now, the war was over and the spirit was broken...

Sunday Post

Your argument may be invalid but that watermelon is a great way to finish off a barbecue.

ISIS has now declared territory it has seized in Iraq and Syria as a "new caliphate":

An offshoot of al Qaeda which has seized territory in Iraq and Syria has declared itself an Islamic "caliphate" and called on factions worldwide to pledge their allegiance, a statement posted on Islamist websites and Twitter said on Sunday.

The move poses a direct challenge to the central leadership of al Qaeda, which has disowned it, and to conservative Gulf Arab rulers who already view the group as a security threat.

The group, previously known as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and also known as ISIS, has renamed itself "Islamic State" and proclaimed its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as "Caliph" - the head of the state, the statement said.

"He is the imam and khalifah (Caliph) for the Muslims everywhere," the group's spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani said in the statement, which was translated into several languages and read out in an Arabic audio speech.

"Accordingly, the "Iraq and Sham" (Levant) in the name of the Islamic State is henceforth removed from all official deliberations and communications, and the official name is the Islamic State from the date of this declaration," he said.

The Sunni Muslim militant group follows al Qaeda's hard-line ideology but draws its strength from foreign fighters battle-hardened from Iraq.

It seeks to re-create a medieval-style caliphate erasing borders from the Mediterranean to the Gulf. It deems Shi'ite Muslims to be heretics deserving death.

It is time to sit back and watch this unfold. The Islamic world has wanted to make the entire globe a caliphate. Now, it can compete with other states in that region.

Interesting times...

Related: Obama is willing to send $500 million USD to train rebels in Syria but will not even speak about the elimination of historic Christian populations in that region.

Also:

A 17-year-old girl and her husband were killed by her family for marrying without its consent, and another young woman was burned alive by a man for refusing his proposal in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province, police said Sunday.

The government of Ontario has refused to fund a child's medical treatment:

A three-year-old city girl has run into a government-sized roadblock in her fight against a high-risk form of childhood leukemia.

Diagnosed with the aggressive cancer when she was nine weeks old, Phoebe Rose Doull-Hoffman recently had a relapse for a third time.

Her family and doctors agree her best bet at beating the disease is a Phase 1 clinical trial at a New York Hospital.

It's pricey, in the $250,000 range. They asked OHIP to pay for the treatment and after an 18-day wait, Phoebe's parents, Jenny and Jonathan, got the bad news -- the province won't fund the treatment.

In a letter, the Ontario ministry of health said it had "evaluated this patient's" application but found Phoebe's case "does not satisfy the evidence requirement" for funding of the treatment, saying there wasn't enough proof the treatment would work.

The government said in the letter, provided to QMI Agency by the office of Ottawa-Vanier MPP Madeleine Meilleur, it "does not fund treatment that is considered experimental in Ontario."

What the government of Ontario will fund.

Discuss.


What is wrong with people?

The mother of a toddler who died in an unattended SUV in suburban Atlanta told investigators she did online research on how hot it needs to be for a child to die in an unattended vehicle because she was afraid it might happen, police said.

Nothing about this makes sense.


Interesting:

On the western coast of Hudson Bay in northern Manitoba there's a gravelly cliff, covered in grass and large rocks, with a 360-degree view of the stark and wild area around it.

It doesn't look like much to the untrained eye, but some 400 years before Europeans set foot in North America, the cliff was a thriving hunting camp for the ancestors of today's Inuit.

Today, there are remnants of 22 large tent rings, as well as food caches, burial grounds and kayak rests — all estimated to be about 1,000 years old.

Researchers are heading to the site, just south of the Manitoba-Nunavut border, next weekend to carefully excavate for animal bones and tools in the hope of gaining insight into the lives of the ancient Inuit known as the Thule.

Ladies and gentlemen, take a trip back in time when the railroad did not run.

Friday Post

Time for the week-end...


Someone (read: Putin) can't be happy about this:

Over Russia's objections, Ukraine's new president on Friday signed a free-trade deal binding his country more closely to Western Europe, sealing the very agreement that triggered the bloodshed and political convulsions of the past seven months.

Either the Ukrainians drive the wedge between themselves and Putin's iron grip or it can count itself as another impoverished neo-Russian state. It and Poland should have developed their shale gas that would have released it from energy dependence from Russia and possibly given other European countries a chance to do the same.


Meriam Ibrahim has finally been freed:

Ibrahim grew up Christian, but was charged with apostasy from Islam because her estranged father is Muslim. She was sentenced to 100 lashes and to hang. She was pregnant at the time of her sentencing. She was freed this week after a court canceled her sentence, and then rearrested as she tried to leave Sudan with her family. Her husband, Daniel Wani, is a US citizen.

The penalties for apostasy are part of Islamic sharia law. Her own family members turned her over to the government for prosecution. The US State Department says that it met with Sudanese officials and pressed for Ibrahim’s release, and that she be allowed to leave Sudan “as swiftly as possible.”

Apparently, a chunk of British Columbia belongs to six Indian bands:

The Supreme Court of Canada, in the most important aboriginal rights case in the nation’s history, ruled that the Tsilhqot’in First Nation has title – or owns – 1,750 square kilometres of land in south central B.C.

The landmark ruling will provide a clear and less onerous roadmap for all unresolved land claims in B.C. and throughout Canada involving First Nations seeking to negotiate modern treaties – or to fight for their land rights in court.

“Aboriginal title confers the right to use and control the land and to reap the benefits flowing from it,” Justice Beverley McLachlin ruled in the 8-0 decision. ...

In B.C.’s case, due to a technicality, the provincial forests act will have to be amended in order to maintain that authority.

Future economic activity on title lands, involving anything from mines and logging to pipelines and hydroelectric projects, will require the “consent” of title-holding First Nations.

But the court also said the Crown can justify “infringement” of that title, when consent is absent, under specific circumstances. ...

Legal analysts have said a ruling such as Thursday’s would significantly strengthen the hand of First Nations in B.C. or Alberta who want to file a land claim on territory along the Gateway route, and hope to obtain an injunction preventing construction while that claim is heard.

The judgment, because it was dealing with a semi-nomadic people who only seasonally occupied many parts of the claimed territory, established a less onerous test to establish title.

The 2012 ruling declared that title required proof of intensive, site-specific use that was sufficient, exclusive and had some semblance of continuity from the time British sovereignty was established – in B.C. it was 1846 – to the present day.

But Thursday’s ruling recognized a more flexible test than that spelled out by the three B.C. appellate judges. It also explained in greater detain than in past cases how judges and negotiators should in the future marry the differing perspectives of Aboriginal and common laws.

“Rather, a culturally sensitive approach suggests that regular use of territories for hunting, fishing, trapping and foraging is ‘sufficient’ use to ground Aboriginal title, provided that such use, on the facts of a particular case, evinces an intention on the part of the Aboriginal group to hold or possess the land in a manner comparable to what would be required to establish title at common law.”

The Tsilhqot’in First Nation is made up of six Indian Act bands. The trial, which began in 2002, lasted 339 days and included a visit by Judge Vickers to the claimed territory.

What the Supreme Court has done has given an oligarchy the power to stymy economic progress in what can be a real-estate nightmare.

Interesting times.....


Find another damn doctor:

A doctor at a walk-in clinic in southwest Calgary is refusing to prescribe birth control due to her personal beliefs.

Chantal Barry of Westglen Medical Centre does not prescribe contraception. A sign at the facility’s front desk reads, “The physician on duty today will not prescribe the birth control pill.”

A receptionist at the clinic confirmed the policy is based on Barry’s personal preferences and said patients looking for birth control are provided a list of other offices in the city that prescribe it. Westglen only has one doctor available to walk-in patients at any given time.

It won't be funny if the Republicans win in November:

President Obama is denouncing House Republican plans to sue him over the use of executive actions, saying they are legal responses to inaction by GOP lawmakers.

This is the same absolutist who had his own Supreme Court rein him in.

Enjoy your downfall, Moron-in-Chief.


Journalists are failed writers whose pathological need to make the world fit their vision matches their realisation that they aren't the scribes they think they are:

Ever notice that when you read an article on something you know a lot about, they’ve got 50% of the facts wrong? Whether it’s a story about your hometown or your favorite band, it’s always shocking how half-assed the journalists are. Apparently, lots of people have noticed this. Last week, we learned of a Gallup poll that said confidence in the media had plummeted to 22%. In 1979 it was 51%. This is because we’ve gone from investigators hitting the pavement to ideologues pounding their keyboards. A reporter used to go where the story led him. Now he starts with the story and crams in facts until it fits.

And now, popsicles that are just cocktails on a stick (don't lick and drive). Enjoy.

Thursday Post

Yes, it is a slow week on Parliament Hill:

Edmonton MP Laurie Hawn says the recent criticism levelled at federal Justice Minister Peter MacKay for e-mails he sent on Mother's Day and Father's Day is "utter nonsense."

This is a non-story, the kind of non-story that will change its tone depending on who tells it. Had some Liberal wag extolled the virtues of its Liberal female MPs who bred and then passed their onelings off to the nearest nanny (instead of doing what millions of Canadian mothers already do and know to be true), then none of this would be an issue. As it was Peter MacKay (or whoever in his office sends the e-mails), it's now evidence of alleged Tory unsophistication.

Remember- this is the party of graft and admiration for the "basic dictatorship" that kills female babies and pawns North Korean women off to the grimiest bidder.


SEE: government, voted for:

The “horror” stories of Hydro One customers over their bills have unleashed an unprecedented number of complaints to his office, Ontario Ombudsman André Marin said Monday.

So far, his office has received more than 7,900 complaints about the provincial utility’s billing practices – and they keep pouring in, he said after releasing his annual report.

One knows Justin Trudeau means to say "carbon tax", not "carbon limits", which neither prevents pollution or preserves the natural environment (if one buys the theory that carbon is a pollutant). Carbon taxes add to the cost of everything. Where one once paid four dollars for those wretched bags of milk, one can expect to pay more. Add that to the cost of everything one buys or uses and watch the standard of living deplete while the costs of living rise.



Life is sucking for Obama right now:

The Supreme Court dropped a huge bomb on the Obama administration, unanimously rebuking the President for arrogating to himself the determination of when Congress is in session for the purpose of making recess appointments.

 **

On Thursday morning the Supreme Court ruled in a unanimous decision that Massachusetts’ thirty-five foot protest buffer zone around abortion clinics violated the First Amendment rights of protestors....

This was one of several unanimous decisions handed down by the high court in the past two days, along with this morning’s decision about recess appointments and yesterday’s decision about warrantless cell phone searches.

And now, Baby Got Books. Enjoy.

A Post... For Now

How was your first day of summer?


Quickly now...


A cease-fire would allow Putin to continue taking all of Ukraine:

Russian President Vladimir Putin expressed support Saturday for Ukraine's unilateral cease-fire in its battle against pro-Russian separatists and appealed to both sides to halt all military operations.

Meanwhile...

The federal government is concerned about the latest claim that Russia is trying to use its energy resources as a tool to pressure its neighbours.

Instead of threatening to cut off oil and gas to its European customers, Russia is allegedly helping non-governmental groups to spread misinformation about hydraulic fracturing - known as fracking - in order to help keep Europe dependent on Russian energy.

The accusation came from the secretary-general of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who said Thursday that Russia was actively working with environmental groups to plot against fracking.

"I have met allies who can report that Russia, as part of their sophisticated information and disinformation operations, engages actively with so-called non-governmental organizations, environmental organizations, working against shale gas obviously to maintain European dependence on imported Russian gas," he said.

Employment Minister Jason Kenney said Friday that whether or not Russia is helping to spread lies about shale gas development, the continent needs more energy options, particularly from Canada.
He said Canada needs to build pipelines that travel east to help reduce Europe's dependence on Russian oil and gas.

"All of this links together," Kenney said.

SCORCH:

Where did they find that haughty reptile representing the IRS? He should play the villain in every movie until the end of time.

If this person had been working for a private company and not the IRS, he would be in irons right now.


Let's cut Pakistan off:

When Paul arrived in Thailand 18 months ago (December 2012), he was very angry and confused.   He was betrayed by people he trusted. His whole family was almost killed and everything he worked for was gone, stolen, lost forever, because his family was Christian and had no legal rights in Pakistan.

Over at the Fur: a Connecticut school blocks even the Vatican's website over fears of "hate speech" (insert own home-schooling comment here), James Delingpole is awfully clever, a graphic of countries that have enacted hate speech laws and much, much more!


And now, "Breaking Bad" a la "Mr. Men". Enjoy.


Stay cool.

Friday Post

Here comes the week-end...


Oh, what a surprise:




So Russia's incursion into Ukraine wasn't humanitarian after all!

This should render any argument against fracking or drilling as invalid given that such arguments are fuelled (no pun intended) not by environmental or consumer concerns but by those who stand to lose the most.

Follow the money, not of the oil or gas companies who don't hide their ambitions but of those who cry the loudest.


Also:

China has sent four oil rigs into the South China Sea in a sign that Beijing is stepping up its exploration for oil and gas in the tense region, less than two months after it positioned a giant drilling platform in waters claimed by Vietnam.

**

Federal Justice Minister Peter MacKay is defending comments he made last week about why so few women are appointed as judges in Canada.

MacKay was responding to Wednesday’s Toronto Star report about an Ontario Bar Association meeting at which he was asked about the lack of women and visible minorities on federally appointed court benches.

MacKay answered the question by saying that women don’t apply to be judges because they fear the job will take them away from their children — and that children need their mothers more than their fathers, the Star report said.

On Thursday, rather than back away from the comments, MacKay stood his ground.

Yes, about that:

The percentage of Ontario lawyers who were Aboriginal was unchanged between 1981 and 2001, but increased from 0.6 to 1.0 percent between 2001 and 2006. In 2006, it is estimated that there were 315 Aboriginal lawyers in Ontario. Aboriginal persons are 1.96 percent of the Ontario population and 0.57 percent of all university graduates with occupations. Relative to the number of Aboriginal university graduates with an occupation, there are about twice the expected number of Aboriginal lawyers. 

 

In 2006, 3,685 or 11.5 percent of all Ontario lawyers were members of a visible minority, up from 9.2 percent in 2001. To compare, members of a visible minority accounted for 23 percent of the total Ontario population in 2006, 22 percent of Ontarians with an occupation, and 30 percent of Ontario university graduates with an occupation.

As one can see, there is a potential tidal wave of affirmative action hires minority and female judges who may rule from the bench interpret the law.


Moving on....


For the refreshing honesty of it, I wish people would just admit that slavery never left us:

A massive overhaul by the Government of Canada to tighten and control access to its embattled Temporary Foreign Worker program is designed to make the program an “option of last resort” for Canadian companies, but immediate response to the sweeping changes claimed it too severely punished those putting it to legitimate use.

Employment Minister Jason Kenney announced on Friday the introduction of several significantly tougher policies surrounding the hiring of foreign workers, and introduced stronger oversight for companies that apply for assistance through the program.

Under the new system the names of companies that hire foreign workers through the program will be made publicly available, and companies that abuse the program will be more harshly punished.

“We are overhauling the program today to ensure we put Canadians first, that the Temporary Foreign Worker program is only used as a last and limited resort, that Canadians always come first, that employers redouble their efforts to hire Canadians for available jobs and to ensure this program works in the best interests of the Canadian economy,” Kenney said at an afternoon press conference.

But immigration advocates and small business groups were quick to express their frustration with the amended plans, claiming the changes were too drastic and swung the pendulum too far in the other direction.

We can always deny Pakistan aid:

A 20-year-old woman has been gang-raped, killed and hanged from a tree in Pakistan in a case with a chilling resemblance to a double rape and murder that caused outrage in neighbouring India last month.

Pakistani police said Muzammil Bibi, 20, was attacked by three men in a field in the impoverished Layyah area of densely populated Punjab province.

"This is the first time in my 22 years of service in the police that I have seen such a case, where a girl was raped in this way and found hanging from a tree," senior officer Sadaqat Ali Chohan told Reuters.

"We have heard of such cases in India but never in Pakistan. The girl's clothes were torn. We took her down and moved her to hospital. Her body had signs of resistance. We have arrested three individuals who have confessed to the crime."

According to police, she resisted the rape and attackers strangled her.

Police said her parents spent all night looking for her and found her body hanging the next morning.

Also, let's stop trading with China:

China again rejected U.N. concerns Thursday about the fate of North Korean defectors in its territory, reasserting its long-criticized policy of sending them back to their totalitarian homeland against their will. 

China has classified tens of thousands of North Koreans hiding in border areas as illegal migrants, not asylum-seekers, and routinely returns them to North Korea if they are caught. Back in their home country, they face harsh penalties including even death.

Most North Korean defectors walk across the border with China before seeking to resettle in South Korea. 

"With regard to the illegal border-crossers from North Korea, we are obliged to deal with the relevant issue in accordance with international laws, internal laws of China as well as humanitarian principles," China's foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters when asked about U.N. concerns about North Korean refugees in China. 

"In China, we have no such thing as political asylum," Hua said.

(Kamsahamnida)



And now, WWI from the air.

Mid-Week Post

Rich, filling and with no after-taste....


The Northern Gateway pipeline has been approved after a four year-long review:

The federal government approved the Northern Gateway project Tuesday, a confirmation that had already riled pipeline foes before the decision was announced.

Natural Resources Minister Greg Rickford's announcement opened Round 2 of what will become a lengthy legal skirmish with some aboriginal bands and environmentalists threatening to disrupt the $7-billion project.

The pipeline had already won the first round: approval in December from the National Energy Board and Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency after 18 months of public hearings.

Regulators imposed 209 conditions on builder Enbridge before shovels break ground on the twin 1,177-km pipeline from Alberta to the BC coastal municipality of Kitimat, where super-tankers are to ship diluted bitumen to Asia.

The pipeline is still subject to two hundred and nine conditions, as well as absurd oppositions that propose no feasible alternatives or economy-boosting solutions.

Canada is a resource-rich country. It is disastrous not to rely on these resources for our own and for others' benefit. Anyone who proposes not to do so is mad.


I'm sure e-mails on government servers get lost all the time:

The agency revealed Friday it had lost two years of potentially incriminating e-mails from Lois Lerner, the former IRS official who has been at the center of the investigation, and on Tuesday, the House Ways and Means Committee found that five more IRS employees had also lost e-mail correspondence.

It's time for some prison sentences.


Two hundred and seventy-five troops against the al Qaeda offshoot, ISIS, just won't cut it:

President Barack Obama told Congress on Monday the United States was deploying up to 275 military personnel to provide support and security for U.S. personnel and the country's embassy in Baghdad after militants seized control of the north of the country.

Much like anything he has done, this proposal is window-dressing from a president who prefers to golf rather than do anything constructive. The situation in Iraq is well out-of-hand. At this point, it is Iran versus a handful of Middle Eastern oil magnates still standing. The entire region is a hot zone.

Time to hit the links.


We don't have to trade with China:

A cheap brand of Chinese-made smartphones carried by major online retailers comes preinstalled with espionage software, a German security firm said Tuesday.

G Data Software said it found malicious code hidden deep in the propriety software of the Star N9500 when it ordered the handset from a website late last month. The find is the latest in a series of incidents where smartphones have appeared preloaded with malicious software.

The Chinese government continues to crackdown on Christians:

Chinese authorities completed their task of removing yet another cross from a church today, nearly a week after a group of Christians tried to stop the government's anti-church campaign.

As The Telegraph’s Tom Phillips reports from Shanghai, on early Tuesday morning a red cross was removed from the top of Guantou church, located in Wenzhou, a city known as "China’s Jerusalem." Last Wednesday, members of the church successfully stopped a demolition crew from removing the cross, but it was removed with a crane in secret this morning, according to Zheng Legou, a local church leader who spoke with Phillips. 

There are more than 67 million Christians in China, according to the Pew Research Center, but a Chinese official for religious affairs said the spread of the religion was “too excessive and too haphazard” in an address to Communist Party members. 

This morning’s action has renewed fears that China is cracking down on mainstream religion as Christianity moves across the country. In April, authorities razed an entire megachurch in Wenzhou, which is known for its large Christian population, and in March 2013, the Zhejiang government launched a three-year “Three Rectifications and One Demolition” campaign to “rectify” and destroy what they considered to be “illegal structures.” The United States' Congressional-Executive Commission on China released a statement on June 6 saying the program “contravenes international norms and Chinese regulations governing religious affairs.”

But... but...

Pope Francis strongly condemned “gender ideology” in a private conversation with Austrian Bishop Andreas Laun earlier this year, the bishop related in a recent essay.

In doing so, the pope follows in the footsteps of his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI. Nearing the end of his pontificate, the pope emeritus spoke twice about gender ideology as “a negative trend for humankind,” and a “profound falsehood,” which “it is the duty of pastors of the Church” to put the faithful “on guard against.”

Bishop Laun, auxiliary bishop of Salzburg, wrote about the words of Pope Francis in March in an essay for the German Catholic news publication Kath.net. Bishop Laun told LifeSiteNews that he met the pope briefly on January 30 as part of the Austrian bishops’ ad limina visit, a meeting with the pope that bishops must do every five years.  Laun added that he was the last of the bishops to speak with the Holy Father. 

“In response to my questioning, Pope Francis said, ‘Gender ideology is demonic!’” Laun wrote in his essay, adding that the pope was not exaggerating in his comment.  “Indeed, gender ideology is the destruction of persons, which is why Pope Francis was justified in calling it demonic,” he said.

It is refreshing to hear the gurgling sounds of American leftists and anti-Catholics (both equally stupid) choking on their own delusions. If anyone was expecting this pope to be to the far left, it is wonderful to disappoint them.



This should be mandatory reading material:

2. WE ARE A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS
 
No, we’re not. We’re a nation of citizens. This country was built on legal immigration, and the ones who made it through learned the language and assimilated. Many didn’t get in. Today’s scenario is 15 million illegals ridiculing those of us who played by the rules. My green card took 15 years to get and I brought a ton of jobs with me. The Statue of Liberty doesn’t say “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, and all their relatives.” 
Oh, and don’t give me that old “They’re doing jobs Americans won’t do” line. They’re doing jobs Americans won’t do—for that price. In Canada, there are no Mexicans and the landscaping still gets done. We use teenagers....

6. WOMEN MAKE LESS THAN MEN
Obama Tweeted this old wives’ tale recently. Does anyone in the White House have a fucking computer? Women choose to make less than men because they’d rather be at their daughter’s piano recital than stay at the office all night working on a proposal. When they don’t have kids, they actually make more than men. If women were cheaper labor, we’d hire them as often as we hire illegal aliens.
On The Independents recently, Jill Filipovic told me that resumes with female names do worse than the same ones with male names. I’m willing to accept that, but it’s not prejudice. It’s postjudice. Employers have noticed their male employees are more likely to stay at the office all night working, even when their daughter does have a piano recital.

7. PRO-LIFERS ARE SEXIST
Most women are pro-life. To ignore their rights while touting abortion is sexist. Also, gender-based abortion is becoming more popular. We’ve seen how that goes for women in China. It ain’t pretty. So stop using abortion rights as some kind of proof there’s a war on women when the opposite is true. ...

10. CHRISTIANS ARE ANTI-SCIENCE
Maybe one in ten Americans believes the earth is only a few thousand years old, and most of those people are old ladies and dirt-poor farmers. They’re not shutting down schools and canceling Cosmos. The other 90% of us are totally okay with the big bang theory. Even the pope supports it. We understand there’s evolution and an incredible universe. We just think God is the one who set the whole thing up. 
Also, if you love science so much, stop refusing vaccinations for your kid. You’re literally making us sick....

 

Read the whole thing. Myths that are trotted out are begging to be dispelled.

And now, as majestic as they may seem, leave the bears alone:

Monday Post

So begins the work-week...


Premier Kathleen Wynne to re-introduce the May 1st budget when the legislature returns on July 2nd:

Speaking to reporters at Queen’s Park, Wynne said she is “very excited” to implement the budget. She also stuck to her promise of eliminating the $12.5-billion deficit by 2017-18.

The Liberal budget, presented on May 1, includes a 10-year, $2.5-billion jobs plan, $15 billion for transit projects in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton areas and $14 billion for infrastructure projects.

Remember- the province of Detroit Ontario's debt is over $271 billion. The manufacturing sector is depleting. Ontario also has some of the highest energy costs in the country. Its "sunshine list" has expanded by eleven percent. There is no money to pay for these projects, pay down the debt and not freeze the wages of public servants.

Ontario Liberal voters, this is your government.

In 2008, Obama declared he would meet with Iran without pre-conditions. During student protests in 2009, Obama offered neither material or moral support. His top adviser, Valerie Jarrett, held secret talks with representatives of Ayatollah Khamenei. Sanctions lifted against Iran neither stopped enrichment of nuclear material nor did hinder the state's ability to do business abroad or finance its programs. Now Iran has stepped in and offered its dubious support for its former enemy, Iraq:

 

The Obama administration is willing to talk with Iran over deteriorating security conditions in Iraq and is not ruling out potential U.S.-Iranian military cooperation in stemming the advance of Sunni extremists, Secretary of State John Kerry said Monday.

Now, I think it's not a matter of Obama's idiocy, weakness or indifference. There is no way one cannot see this as an attempt to empower Iran and destabilise the region or at least remove any vestige of American influence and authority on the global stage. One can conclude that was Obama's endgame. It seems clear given his weak posturing and overtures to dictators and his platitudes to the ignorant electorate. Obama withdrew from Iraq. He even gave a time-table. He has never responded to any crisis or threat in the region the way previous leaders had and has no intention of doing so. Iraqi soldiers simply walk away leaving behind American material for ISIS. Yet another humanitarian crisis erupts in the Middle East. Yet, with a crippled American economy, he still insists on the use of foreign (ie- Venezuelan or Saudi) oil, further empowering dictatorial regimes.

Impeach him. Now.

It's time for Ukraine to frack its own gas:

Further aggravating already tense relations between Russia and Ukraine, the Russian energy giant Gazprom cut off natural gas supplies to its neighbor on Monday, warning that the reduction could diminish the amount of gas flowing to Europe.

 

And now, Pixel Trek will take you where no pixel has gone before.

Happy Father's Day

To the man who could not ignore:

Can we have ice cream, Dad?
Can we have ice cream, Dad?
Can we have ice cream, Dad?

This day is for you.

Surely not!

Ontario Is Taking Crazy Pills

Good Lord:

The ballots have been cast and counted: Ontario has a new Liberal majority government.

There is nothing a Liberal voter will care about at all.


Meanwhile, Tim Hudak (the one who ran a principled campaign) has stepped down.


Rest assured Kathleen Wynne will come after those she hates the most: the people of Ontario.

Energy costs are going to go up, the bureaucracy will be bloated to Baron Harkonnen proportions and no manufacturing jobs (or any private sector jobs, really) will be created.

Prove me wrong, Liberal voters. Prove me wrong.

Mid-Week Post

On the other side of Narnia…

Trinity Western University’s plans to open its own law school, which would require students sign a pledge not to engage in activities deemed contrary to Judeo-Christian beliefs, have been delayed because of a motion rejecting the institution:

Lawyers in British Columbia have rejected a Christian university's plans to open a law school — a result that, while not binding, represents a strong rebuke of the school's policies forbidding sex outside heterosexual marriage.

The vote is the latest setback for Trinity Western University, a school with about 4,000 students in B.C.'s Fraser Valley, and is sure to amplify an ongoing debate over the rights of a private institution to impose its religious views about homosexuality on students.

The university, which plans to open a law school in the fall of 2016, requires students to sign a so-called community covenant. The document includes a passage that forbids sex outside of marriage, defined as between a man and a woman, and students can be disciplined for violating it.

(Sidebar: the pledge also cautions against alcohol and tobacco abuse.)

The Federation of Law Societies of Canada and the Law Society of B.C.'s benchers have already voted to accept graduates of Trinity Western, which has also been accredited by the province's Advanced Education Ministry.

But more than a thousand B.C. lawyers signed a petition asking that the issue be put to the B.C. society's general membership, which happened at various locations throughout the province on Tuesday.

Lawyers voted 3,210 to 968 in favour of a motion calling on the society's benchers to reject the school.

The vote doesn't have any immediate effect, but the results will likely put considerable pressure on the law society's benchers to reconsider their earlier decision.

If the benchers don't substantially implement the results of the vote within a year, lawyers can submit another petition that could trigger a binding referendum.

University president Bob Kuhn described the results as "highly disturbing" and said the vote was driven by emotion rather than the law.

"It's effectively a rejection of freedom of religion in the context of equality rights," Kuhn said in an interview shortly after the results were announced.

"I think the decision is one of the majority and it's failing to protect the minority. ... It was simply: same-sex relationships trump religious freedom every time."

Trinity Western has also faced resistance elsewhere.

The Law Society of Upper Canada's board of directors voted not to accredit graduates from the school, while the council of Nova Scotia's law society voted not to accredit graduates unless the school either exempts law students from its covenant or removes the offending passage from the document.

The school has launched legal challenges of the decisions in Ontario and Nova Scotia.

If the B.C. law society's benchers implement Tuesday's vote, a similar challenge is almost certain to be filed in the province, though Kuhn said it was too early to speculate about whether that would happen. In addition, Toronto lawyer Clayton Ruby has filed a lawsuit in B.C. objecting to the provincial government's decision to accredit the school.

The issue could very well end up at the Supreme Court of Canada, which has previously ruled in the school's favour on the very same issue.

I find it discriminatory to take student fees and then declare that the student body of X university is “pro-choice” or that Israel should be boycotted and Israeli professors should be banned. I find extremely disturbing that a body can ban a competent lawyer from practising simply because of the university they chose to attend. As there are several schools of law one can attend in Canada and codes of student conduct are no indicator of one’s fitness as a lawyer, the purpose of banning a law school (yes, banning) because of a pledge that some reduce to discrimination against homosexuals (wait- are gay relationships about love or sex?) is not just discriminatory but self-defeating. The academic and professional fate of any one student should not be in the hands of a cultural oligarchy. The expense of competent professionals will prove to be too high sooner rather than later.

A poll finds Canadians wary of trade with China:

China is seen more as a trade threat than an opportunity, according to Canadian respondents of an online survey conducted on behalf of the Asia Pacific Foundation.

The annual survey, in its tenth year, was conducted by the Angus Reid polling firm, between Feb. 25 and March 7, 2014, and received responses from 3,487 Canadian adults.

The participant responses suggest that uncertainty about closer trade ties extends to all of Asia. …

The poll also suggests a disconnect between the trade relationships respondents believe are important, and the actual economic impact of Canada's trade relationships.

About a quarter of respondents view Australia as "very important" to Canada's prosperity, while half that amount felt the same way about South Korea.

Australia is not even among Canada's top 10 trading partners, while South Korea ranks seventh.

China is Canada's second largest trading partner, behind the United States.

"We may have a situation here where Canadian attitudes and perceptions are not in sync with the economic realities," said Yuen Pau Woo, president of the Asia Pacific Foundation.

This year, the survey delved into the reasons behind the shrinking support for trade with China and Asia overall.

The concerns range from a loss of Canadian jobs, to human rights, to national security.

"In short, I would say we fear or we are hesitant or reticent about things we don't know and don't understand," Woo said.

But Woo said Canada needs China and more trade with Asia overall for its own economic security in the future.

(Sidebar: what about female infanticide don’t people understand?)

If Canadians see China as a threat to trade, then why do it? The saturation of cheaply-produced Chinese products has been made possible by craven governments on both sides of the Pacific as well as indifferent consumers.

That and the fact that the tiger is truly a paper one. Mr. Woo’s statement that Canada needs China isn’t wholly accurate. It’s quite the other way around.

No, Ted! We could have made beautiful music together!

Canadian-born U.S. Senator Ted Cruz has made good on a promise to renounce his birth country’s citizenship, amid speculation he could make a run at the White House in 2016.

Sad Cat is inconsolable.

Tom Steyer produces another fabrication reason why he opposes the beneficial Keystone Pipeline:

Hedge fund billionaire Tom Steyer, a climate change activist and staunch opponent of the prospective 1,179-mile pipeline from Alberta, Canada, to Cushing, Okla., has hired retired Navy SEAL chief David “Dave” Cooper to assess how vulnerable the Keystone XL might be to deliberate sabotage.

Did Mr. Steyer pour money into determining how railways or oilfields could be prone to terrorist attacks?

This looks like grasping at straws. I would expect someone of his wealth to panic more convincingly.

But of course:

The Obama administration only finalized the exchange of the last remaining U.S. prisoner of war in Afghanistan for five Taliban detainees at Guantanamo a day before the June 1 swap, a top Democratic lawmaker said Tuesday. He said American officials didn't learn the pickup location for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl until an hour ahead of time.

Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2-ranked Democrat, presented the timeline as an explanation for why President Barack Obama didn't inform Congress 30 days before the deal. Republicans and some Democrats have sharply criticized the president for failing to notify them and claim he broke the law. Obama says he acted legally. 

"They knew a day ahead of time the transfer was going to take place," Durbin told reporters in the Capitol, where military officials briefed the Senate Armed Services Committee behind closed doors. "They knew an hour ahead of time where it was going to take place."

But wait! There’s more!

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel – not President Obama – executed the administration’s final call to proceed with the prisoner exchange of five ranking Taliban detainees for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, administration officials told Congress today in a classified briefing today.

The Teflon Don-in-Chief doesn’t just hand things off just like stand-down orders don't disappear in a puff of smoke or that things are fine in Iraq.

It’s time to impeach the b@$#@^%.

I’d be upset, too, if I couldn’t buy that solid-gold jet I’d always wanted:

“We came out of the White House not only dead broke, but in debt,” Clinton said. “We had no money when we got there, and we struggled to, you know, piece together the resources for mortgages, for houses, for Chelsea’s education. You know, it was not easy.”

Any effort to humanise Hillary Clinton is going to be a failed one. This woman has nothing on Lady MacBeth.

An American high school student is banned from the prom because he left pro-democracy messages while on a trip to China:

(Sidebar: China? Really? Weren’t there any democracies to go to?)

Newton North High School senior Henry DeGroot was visiting a school outside Beijing on a semester abroad this year when he decided to have some fun and also make a point by writing prodemocracy messages in the notebook of a Chinese student.

“Democracy is for cool kids,” he recalls writing. “Don’t believe the lies your school and government tell you,” said another message, and “It’s right to rebel.” 

But when Chinese school officials found out, he had to serve five hours of detention. And when he returned home, it got worse: Newton school officials barred DeGroot from his prom.

Newton school officials say he violated semester abroad rules, embarrassed the principal of the Chinese school that was hosting Newton students, and showed so much disrespect for the Chinese that the longstanding relationship with the school may be harmed.

DeGroot sees it differently.

He says his rights were abridged by the Newton school system. The school system, he says, taught him the importance of civil disobedience and speaking his mind, but then punished him when he practiced what he learned.

Instead of the prom, DeGroot said he and his date, dressed in formal attire, went to Five Guys, the local burger restaurant. “I’m missing a lifetime of memories,’’ he said. 

(Another sidebar: a much better use of time.)

As someone who didn’t go to the prom, I can’t say young Master DeGroot is missing much... or anything. Why not stay home and get drunk? And, really, is some trumped-up dance the pinnacle of your life? If that is how one sees it, that’s so pathetic that it needs to be fed Xanax and booze. Life is much bigger than a dance. It is a passage and a myriad of experiences and people that shape you and form your memories. No bundle of streamers and crappy pop music can do that. (Shut up. It’s true.)

That being said, banning someone from a school dance because he left pro-democracy messages in a craphole communist dictatorship (hi- Tiananmen Square) is appalling and baffling. It should be rewarded, not punished.

Home-schooling and charter schools look better by the minute.

Wait- is Angelina Jolie Chinese?

Disney’s most popular villainess may have made herself a new enemy. While in China, on a promotional tour for Maleficent, Angelina Jolie sparked an international kerfuffle by referring to China and Taiwan as if they were separate countries. The controversial statement came up when Jolie was asked to name her favorite Chinese director; she identified Life of Pidirector Ang Lee, who is Taiwanese-American.

“I am not sure if you consider Ang Lee Chinese, he’s Taiwanese, but he does many Chinese-language films with many Chinese artists and actors,” Jolie answered. “And I think his works and the actors in his films are the ones I am most familiar with and very fond of.”

Chinese social media has since reportedly blown up, with comments  calling Jolie “traitorous” and a “deranged Taiwan independence supporter.” Some threatened to boycott her for, in the words of one user, “disrespecting Chinese sovereignty.” Meanwhile, Taiwanese internet users are said to be praising the actress, with one calling her a “brave and brilliant woman.”

Taiwan: these colours don't run.

And now,  two-ingredient popsicle recipes. Enjoy.