For A Tuesday

Whither spring?


A balanced budget just in time for the election:

Finance Minister Joe Oliver guided his maiden budget voyage into port Tuesday with a precious cargo of targeted pre-election measures on board — and just enough leeway to keep the federal books above water.

The razor-thin $1.4-billion surplus projected this year — the first Conservative surplus in eight years and just the third since Prime Minister Stephen Harper took office riding a $13-billion surplus in 2006 — is entirely dependent on a lengthy series of bookkeeping measures, including asset sales, reduced reserve funds and unrealized collective bargaining gains.

"A promise made, a promise kept, Mr. Speaker, this budget is written in black ink," Oliver told the House of Commons in a budget speech remarkable for its sharp partisan rhetoric.

The election subtext was also written all over the 518-page budget document. ...

Starting in 2017, there's money for major public transit systems that eventually will hit $1 billion annually. Those funds are expected to target Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal.

There are significant increases in the military budget, again starting in 2017, and a slew of security-related spending including more than $290 million over five years for the RCMP and Canada's spy services to enforce the government's new anti-terror law.

Seniors will see a package of benefits that include a relaxation of the rules on registered retirement savings redemptions, a near-doubling of the annual Tax Free Savings Account limit to $10,000, and new writeoffs for home retrofits to accommodate disabilities.

The tax rate for small businesses will gradually drop to nine per cent from 11 per cent over the next four years, there's a 10-year accelerated capital cost allowance for manufacturers and new lifetime capital gains exemptions for fishermen and farmers.

Don't accuse the Tories of not pandering to the masses who want their money back in their wallets.

Quite unlike carbon taxes which are just a war on the poor, but I digress.


This must be embarrassing:




And this:

In today's Globe and Mail, Lawrence Martin writes about a conversation he had with "a top strategist" for the Liberal Party:

"In the Greater Toronto Area, where the election may well be decided, a top strategist told me that the biggest drag on their numbers is not their own doing. It’s the Ontario Liberal government’s early age sexual education policy. “I’m not kidding. It’s hurting the brand badly in certain ethnic communities, especially in the west 905.”

See what happens when you garner the multicultural vote without factoring in that immigrants aren't gated white liberals?


In 2008, Obama promised to meet Iran without pre-conditions. Now, he is promising to give Iran fifty billion dollars:

Yet a new wrinkle has surfaced in the controversial nuclear deal being formulated by the US and world powers with Iran, as State Department representatives on Monday would not rule out handing the Islamic regime up to $50 billion in a "signing bonus" for agreeing to a deal.

Reports have indicated that the US would authorize a release of $30-$50 billion in cash to Iran with the signing of a final deal ahead of a June 30 deadline, which comes in addition to over $11 billion in assets that were unfrozen in the interim agreement signed November 2013.

But the purge of Christians is not a new phenomenon. Whether it is Egypt, Iraq and Syria or on boats to Italy, the genocide of Christians is something that the world just doesn't care about.

The most notable symbol of that transformation is the Hagia Sophia.

Once a Christian church, it was sacked by Muslim invaders and turned into a mosque. Under reformer Ataturk, it was a transformed into a museum over 80 years ago.

But this week, the Hagia Sophia was effectively turned back into a mosque with the approval of Turkey's Islamist leader.

As the Gatestone Institute reports:

"Turkey is not converting churches into mosques because there is a need for more mosques... The message conveyed ... is that Turkey is an Islamic state and no other religion is tolerated."

The ethnic cleansing of Christians from "modern" Turkey proves that jihad is hardwired into the Koran. We see that all over the world.

Good luck dealing with the Islamists, post-modern West. I know you'll do fine.

Oh, wait:

Imagine being a member of the Christian minority having fled the massacres of Syria, made it to Sweden, and then seeing your brother’s killer not only being let back into the country, but getting rewarded for services rendered. This has been real in Sweden since 2013.

And there's more:

It's an accusation Muslim leaders flatly deny.

"Islam is a religion of tolerance and peace," Boubacar Seydou, of the Islamic Association of Niger, said. "In Islam, we are not familiar with such acts of violence!"

Seydou is also key leader at Niger's largest mosque. He allowed CBN News to attend and document Friday prayers.In his first television interview since the attacks, Seydou denied that Muslims were involved in the attacks.

"Muslims did not take part in these attacks. Sure, there were many Muslims protesting the cartoons, but no one pushed them to attack churches. I'm sure if we arrested some of those involved in the church burnings you'd discover that in fact Christians were among those taking part in the violence!" Seydou said.

(Paws up)

 
Liberalism is a mental illness that coddles the weak of mind and spirit.

But don't take my word for it:

Last week, feminists at Georgetown melted down over a visit by AEI resident scholar Christina H. Sommers claiming she makes them feel “unsafe” and demanded the talk carry a “trigger warning.”
But don’t think for a second that it’s just Georgetown that’s a problem.

Yesterday Ms. Sommers appeared at the very liberal Oberlin college in Ohio and was met by some of the same nonsense.

Yeah. "Trigger warnings".


And now, it is fairly easy being green:

The Costa Rican Amphibian Research Center recently unveiled a newly discovered and described frog—and he might look a little familiar. Found in the Caribbean slopes of Costa Rica, the little green amphibian bears a striking resemblance to Kermit the Frog.