Mid-Week Post

In the middle of things....


A terrible thing happened near Orlando, Florida:

The body of a 2-year-old Nebraska boy who was snatched off a Walt Disney World beach by an alligator and dragged underwater was recovered Wednesday, ending a ghastly search at one of the world's most popular tourist destinations.

That poor child.




EgyptAir wreckage has been found:

Wreckage of the EgyptAir flight that went missing over the Mediterranean last month has been found, Egyptian investigators say.
A statement said "several main locations of the wreckage" had been identified.

There were 66 people on board the Airbus A320 when it crashed on May 19 while flying from Paris to Cairo.

It vanished from Greek and Egyptian radar screens, apparently without having sent a distress call.

PM Trulander and other associated yes-men voted against calling ISIS' atrocities genocide:

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the majority of Liberal MPs have voted against a Conservative motion declaring that the violence perpetrated by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) constitutes genocide.

It is no surprise that Liberals would never support any motion that was not their own (indeed, they have been erasing any trace of Harper since they were voted in) and PM Trulander's sympathies towards Islamists has been well-documented. This vote, however nauseating, is not out-of-character.


Also not out-of-character, this:

Not only has that change not happened, but the Trudeau government has instead picked up where the Harper government left off and asked the court to rule on an earlier appeal to have the case dismissed, based on arguments that the government does not have a sacred obligation to veterans. Veterans Affairs Minister Kent Hehr deflected criticism of the move Monday, telling the Globe and Mail that, “this is part of an ongoing lawsuit, which began many years before we came into office,” though he did add that he is still “committed to all items in his mandate letter, including pensions for life.” Nevertheless, the Justice Department has offered no indication that it plans to drop the appeal, nor has the Ministry of Veterans Affairs offered any sort of timeline for if and when it aims to reinstate lifelong pensions.

And who voted in these pieces of sh--?

The 2015 federal election saw a huge increase in turnout among young Canadians — particularly young Canadian women — according to data released by Elections Canada.

While there was an increase among all age groups, the biggest occurred among eligible voters aged 18 to 24, the elections agency said. Turnout among this group increased 18.3 points, to 57.1 per cent compared to 38.8 per cent in 2011.

Elections Canada said Wednesday this is the biggest increase in turnout among this age group since it began making demographic turnout estimates in 2004.

I suspect that had these voters taken a competency test, they would have failed it.

Can one assume they support the denial of genocide in the Middle East?



Iran is terribly cross with Canada:

An Ontario court decision that holds Iran financially accountable to victims of the terrorist groups it sponsors is threatening to complicate Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s attempts to mend diplomatic ties with the Islamic republic.

Through its state-controlled media, Iran reacted angrily over the weekend to the judge’s ruling and seemed to make the resumption of diplomatic relations conditional on overturning it, something Ottawa is unlikely to consider.

“The move by the Canadian government contradicts claims about the normalization of relations between the two countries and compensation for the extremist policies of the country’s former government,” the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman said.

Hossein Jaberi Ansari called the decision by Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice a “political ruling” and “a new step in the direction of the hostile policies of the former extremist government of Canada, which was felled by popular vote,” Press TV reported.

“Any normalization in the two countries’ diplomatic ties requires a radical revision of the extremist and wrong politics of the former Canadian government, such as the violation of Iran’s judicial immunity,” the Mehr News Agency quoted Ansari as saying.

The berating came after Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion confirmed Friday talks “at the official level” had begun with Iran on restoring diplomatic relations, four years after they were severed by then-prime minister Stephen Harper.

The Conservatives cited concerns over security of the Canadian embassy in Tehran as well as a long list of grievances, such as Iran’s military support for the Syrian dictatorship and its nuclear program. Almost three-quarters of Canadians supported the move.

At the same time, Ottawa listed Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism. The listing lifted Iran’s state immunity, opening it to civil suits brought by victims of Iranian-backed terrorist groups, particularly Hamas and Hezbollah, which get money, training and weapons from Iran.

 Dion will cower and that will make things better.




In 1973, the conscription into the American armed forces was abolished. In 2016, a government with an agenda promises to undo all of that:

In the latest and perhaps decisive battle over the role of women in the military, Congress is embroiled in an increasingly intense debate over whether they should have to register for the draft when they turn 18.

 
Oh, look - something that makes sense:

So what to say this time? We can’t speak about the Paris attacks of “last year” without distinguishing between the attack in January and the one in November. The travelogue of terror is such that we rarely even notice attacks in Israel anymore. Three days before the murder of 49 people in Orlando, four were killed in a terror attack at the Sarona Market in Tel Aviv. Per capita, that’s a greater loss of life in Israel than in America last week. There is so little left to say. ...

What matters is that in this war with violent jihadism civilians are targeted for death and societies for terror. These civilians were at a gay nightclub, so the gay community feels the loss in a particular way that invites our solidarity, but when jihadis kill fellow Muslims as well as Christians, Jews, concert-goers, shoppers and cartoonists, it is of limited usefulness to the war to inquire as to why this particular nightclub was the target. It is necessary to comfort America in her grief, and the gay community in particular, but the over-analysis of supposed ancillary causes is not necessary when the primary cause is told to us by the killer himself.

It's too bad that nobody freaking gets it.



And now, back in black:

Looking like a delicious bowling ball, a rare black watermelon was put up for auction in Asahikawa, Japan Tuesday, with the winning bid coming in at approximately ¥500,000 (about $4700).