One More Thing...

A Tesco store has asked customers not to shop in their pyjamas or barefoot.

Is this the insidious, creeping hand of Big Brother Corporation?

Notices have been put up in the chain's supermarket in St Mellons in Cardiff saying: "Footwear must be worn at all times and no nightwear is permitted."

A spokesman said Tesco did not have a strict dress code but it does not want people shopping in their nightwear in case it offends other customers.

Elaine Carmody, 24, a full-time mother of two young boys, described the ban as "ridiculous" and "pathetic".

She said she had regularly gone shopping at the store in her pyjamas until about a week ago when she was turned away when she went to buy cigarettes.

What is pathetic is the complete lack of dignity and decorum when going out in public. I mean- how hard is it to put on a proper pair of pants, even jeans, when buying cigarettes in front of your impressionable kids? Lazy in the body and lazy in the mind.

Aahhhh, Canada.....

It is rumoured that Obama's catastrophic "Buy American" policy might not affect Canadians after all.

But it seems those fears have been misplaced. Sources within the Obama administration say that an agreement to fix Buy American is close to being concluded and could be announced within days. The President is said to be resolved that future economic growth can only be achieved by boosting exports and keeping markets open, rather than by raising tariff walls.

Because Mr. Obama cannot rely on Congress to pass legislation exempting Canada from Buy American provisions, the complicated deal will rely on the President using his executive power to treat sectors of the Canadian economy as American, by claiming supply chains are so integrated they cannot be separated.

First of all, I don't believe him. However, let us step into this imagination land of "free trade" for a moment. Mr. Obama, who campaigned on cutting off America's most important trade partner, now realises he needs us. Damn right. Given the dire straits he finds himself in, a strong partnership with the second largest and least mad country in the world might pull his political fat out of the fire and make America's toque a littler stronger. Of course, he will have to stick it to another guy but that has been the president's forte for quite some time.

Do you remember when Scott Brown won the Senate seat in Massachusetts? Sure you do. And who helped make that possible? A Canadian did.

Was a Canadian complicit? Republican Scott Brown's stunning victory last week in heavily Democratic Massachusetts rocked the American political landscape, derailing President Obama's health-care agenda and sending the prospect of reform spiralling into uncertainty. But Scott Brown didn't do it alone -- the person behind Brown's upset win is a Canadian named Rob Willington.

Interesting. Mouse skin cells can be turned into neurons.

Signifying Nothing

The speech last night was just another speech.

Yet he talks and talks and talks. There is no problem for which the solution is not another speech, another interview, another campaign appearance. The sheer omnipresence leads to another problem which undermines his oratorical skills. Someone who talks so much invariably falls back on the subject which he knows best. For Obama that is himself.

What he said.

Mid-week Post

Wow. When you fall, you really fall.

Prorogation of parliament is the ending of a session of Parliament. If MacKenzie King, Trudeau, Mulroney and Chretien can prorogue Parliament, why can't Harper? If people don't like it, demand reform when the next session sits.

While those unsung heroes- Hollywood celebrities- patted themselves on the back- I mean- raised money for Haiti, tens of thousands of people marched in Washington. No biggie, apparently.

In South Korea, skywalkers cross Han solo. I'm not making this up.

And now for something mellow...

Please Say These People Won't Leave Canadian Airspace....

...and embarrass the rest of us.

(courtesy of PTBC)

Here’s a small sampling of some of the hateful comments on one of the most divisive, hateful web sites in all of North America, the state-owned, taxpayer-funded CBC, which represents all of us to the world.

Mostly, the CBC fans reason, if a left-wing candidate didn’t win as in Massachusetts, it’s simply because all Americans are stupid, beyond, in some cases, even being valid as human beings. And (related) possibly worse, they’re also Christians. Most of the comments from these far-left extremists are moronic, and all contain multiple spelling and grammar mistakes. almost as if the folks who wrote them were educated by the CBC and/or state-run public schools. All these comments were approved by the taxpayer-funded CBC moderators.

All of the above-mentioned irony flies quickly over the heads of the CBC and its commenting fans.

yoggii wrote: “I can’t believe the absolute stupidity of the Americans.”

proudcanuckmutt wrote: “...the Republicans are uniformly right wing extremists and Christian fundementalists.”

Never again do I want to hear the term, "Ugly American". From these thoroughly absurd comments here, we have both "sour grapes" and "idiocy so obvious that this person has to be hidden in the basement until the guests leave" covered.

But it doesn't end there.

An article by Michael Coren (emphasis mine):

A recent survey commissioned by the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute and conducted by the Innovative Research Group has revealed that Canadians believe climate change is a greater threat to the country than international terrorism. Which leads us to a quite startling conclusion. Canadians are dumb.

Really- at what other conclusion can we arrive? If the very real threat of wealthy Islamist terrorists is a lesser concern than the alleged melting of icebergs, then they must also have no problem with long and pointless body searches before boarding planes to Cuba, Mexico or some other Third World hot-spot. At least they won't be able to read magazines which might challenge their notions of a greater global danger as nothing is to be on a passenger's lap during the last hour of flight.

Mid-week Post

The people have Massachusetts have sent a message to gaffe-prone Martha Coakley and the morally decrepit Kennedy dynasty by electing Scott Brown to the Senate. The arrogance possessed by both Mrs. Coakley and the Kennedys just galling. This Divine Right of Kings nonsense went out centuries ago. Did they not know that?

For a smackdown, please see here.

A major aftershock has struck the already ruined Haiti.

The ringleader of the notorious Toronto 18 has been sentenced to life in prison, which doesn't mean a heck of a lot in Canada but is an infinite improve over the Air India debacle. Meanwhile, a fellow rat leaves the sinking ship.

What? The NDP were caught cheating? I'm surprised!

(SIDEBAR: not really)

An example of a wonderful human being.

Should bad taste be taxpayer funded? Many would say "no!" in tones so emphatic that snow would melt. It's bad enough that some pro-abortion would-be "intellectual" makes some blather about how she feels abortion is so amazing (don't even attempt to claim impartiality on the issue) but is it publicly-funded? That's all I want to know. If you want an example of paranoia, please this.

A little over a year to the day, Mr. Barack Obama assumed office and then proceeded to ruin the US. How the pundits make excuses for him. "He inherited Bush's mistakes." Oh? Did not Harry Truman inherit the Second World War from FDR? Would someone care to tell this "community organiser" to man up and do right by his country?

(Many thanks, Mr. B)

Apparently, the glaciers in the Himalayas aren't going to melt the way we think they are. That was speculation, not fact, just like much of climate science.

English and German experts believe they may have found the remains of Princess Eadgyth (Edith), a popular noblewoman from the tenth century. Interesting.

And now, your mellow moment.

Mid-week Post

So many things to blog about.

It is believed that 100,000 people were killed in an earthquake that struck Haiti on Tuesday afternoon. If you can help, please do (like this organisation here. Hat-tip to Sgt. Lejaune).

Even more sad news: Miep Gies, who helped Anne Frank and her family hide, as passed away.

The ongoing trial of the "Toronto 18" is not so much an example of hare-brained gangsterhood in so much as it is a study in cold remove and deceit. We are seeing the usual white-washing and duping we generally see from Islamist apologists. If the planned attack- as the accused declare- was merely to make a point, then a blog would have done just as well. I don't believe mass casualties were never the intention.

In some sort of lame attempt at equality, Berkley High School is considering scrapping its labs and five science teachers in order to address a race gap. Oh dear. Instead of assessing the actual factors in students' apparent inabilities in this academic arena, it is better to just can dedicated teachers and squash an entire subject. Lovely. Set the bar for mediocrity and ignorance a little lower.

The shocking death of a mother who apparently pushed her infant son out of harm's way serves as a reminder that anyone can be irresponsible behind the wheel of car.

A Vietnamese immigrant is slated to be Canada's first Asian bishop. Fantastic.

Google threatens to pull out of China. The company threatened to shut down their operations in the communist country when they discovered that cyber-attacks were launched against human rights activists. And I should believe this bold threat why?

A rather heart-wrenching article concerning a North Korean teenager's attempts to assimilate in South Korea. I am disgusted that many South Koreans would consider xenophobia as a perfectly valid response to North Koreans' plight. If compassion and general decency won't come naturally to them, then perhaps they should consider what happens when North Korea's totalitarian state collapses and there is a great influx of North Koreans looking for work in Seoul (if not asking why their cousins to the south aren't helping them resurrect their decrepit country). One would hope the South Koreans who behave atrociously to North Koreans will have developed some manners by then. Feeling raw about the Kim dynasty's militarism is one thing; picking on a teenager is quite another.

Sarah Palin has signed on as a contributor for the Fox News channel. If I were Sarah Palin, I would end my segments by putting my feet up on the news desk, lighting a cigar with a one hundred dollar bill I made from selling my book and then muttering something about how damn good this cigar is. Joking aside, whatever pads her resume. I really believe she is deliberately underestimated as a political force by a media virtually unapologetic of its favouritism to a single group or person.

In closing, mellow out with a crazy cat picture.

Stupid People: the International Edition

K-Pop singer Shin Hae-Chul has entered into the political fray with- I must say- predictably stupid results. I say this because any celebrity who possesses the audacity to claim he or she has a handle on any socio-political issue because of the amount of soy lattes they drink is a fool and is seriously deluding themselves if not the public. We've seen it before.

Back to Mr. Shin:

"I, as one of the Korean people, congratulate the Democratic People's Republic of Korea on its legal launch of a rocket," the singer wrote on his webpage last April.

One could exhaust oneself with various reasons why Mr. Shin's congratulations are incredibly short-sighted but instead let the focus of this pig crap be the response to Mr. Shin's web post.

From the article:

Conservative civic groups charged Shin with openly praising the North Korean regime and thus breaching the National Security Law.

"Shin, being an influential public figure, should be held responsible for confusing people by posting his arbitrary political opinions on cyber space," said a civic group official.

I hold the opinion that Shin Hae-Chul is fortunate to live in South Korea, a sovereign nation with universal suffrage, where he should be free to express his unbelievably ignorant (and arrogant- as if someone asked him to speak for them) views. Let Mr. Shin's words hang him. Let him praise the morally and politically corrupt Kim dynasty on live television while pictures of starving North Korean children are shown in the background. Let him defend this arguably treasonous tripe to relatives of kidnapped and/or murdered Korean and Japanese nationals. After, let the consumers decide if his music is worth buying.

Don't make a Dixie Chicks martyr out of him. For what he said, it's totally not worth it.

Mid-week Mellow

(first of the year)

Alas, the unicorns forgot, as well.

(sniff)

Global Warming Strikes South Korea

Record snowfall hit Seoul and central Korea on Monday, the first work day of New Year, causing traffic congestion and paralyzing parts of the city. It was the highest snowfall since the country's modern meteorological observations started in 1937. The Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) said 25.8 cm of snow was recorded in Seoul as of 2 p.m. Monday. The previous record had been 25.6 cm in January 1969. A weatherman said more snow will fall in Gangwon Province and the northern part of Gyeonggi Province by Tuesday morning as a large mass of snow clouds moves east.

When I was there, the snow wasn't that bad. People in Seoul must be freaking out. They mustn't worry, though. We've gone through the same thing over and over again.

In the New Year

In the new year, the world was assailed by unseasonable warmth and by unseasonable warmth I mean lots of snow and frigid temperatures.

Prior to the new year, the son of a wealthy Nigerian banker tried to take his anger out on 288 people by igniting explosives in his underpants (I daresay he wasn't smart to begin with) but was thwarted. Instead of doing something smart, officials are blaming poverty and creating even longer lines at the airport. The system of idiocy triumphs again.

Embassies are closing down in Yemen because of the Lutherans.

(SIDEBAR: the Lutherans aren't really to blame.)

Yet another attempt on a Danish cartoonist's life is made.

Dogs prove once again that they are awesome.

A great start to a new decade.

2010

To sum up a decade in a few paragraphs is quite the feat (in summation: disasters, catastrophes, new pope, new faces, awards of some kind and snow). I won't bother with New Year's resolutions as we should resolve to make ourselves better all the time. I have no idea what will happen in the next year but can only hope it will turn out for the best.

So- happy new year and decade.

PS- my good friend is a New Year's baby so lots of happiness to you!

The Feast of Stephen

Today is the feast of Saint Stephen, one of the first Christian martyrs, whose death is recorded in the Acts of the Apostles.

It is also Boxing Day, a day when poor boxes were opened and the money inside was offered to the poor.

This article in American Thinker expounds the sadness and bleakness of Christmas and life in general under communism. Read the whole thing.

Yet one of the inescapable paradoxes of Communism is the fact that the godless state, which professes the virtue of materialism, can then so completely fail to provide even the material necessities that most in the West take for granted. Although there were rubber chickens and wooden pop guns in the market, there was a general absence of everything else. By the time Christmas rolled around, there was little variety of food, and milk had disappeared from the stores. Fresh fruit, including oranges and bananas, vanished entirely, as did all fresh vegetables, except for an aging stock of potatoes, carrots, and turnips. Other than some suspiciously outdated and moldy-looking sausages, meat was in short supply. What there was, along with the potatoes, carrots, turnips, and sausages, was the bland production of the state canneries: jams, jellies, canned vegetables and fruits, potted meat and chicken, and an adequate quantity of bread to be washed down with ample supplies of locally produced plum brandy, beer, and wine.

It might seem that the state had at least provided an adequate caloric intake, but every day I saw people of all ages, from young women with infants cradled in one arm to old men in ragged suits, fumbling through garbage bins for bread crusts and bones.

Christmas was also accompanied by the unrelieved cold. The Communist state had guaranteed heating and electricity for all, just as it had guaranteed universal free medical care, but blackouts were frequent and long, and water shortages predictable: two days off, one day on. Every night, the heat was turned off at nine o'clock. I slept in a cold room under a mountain of blankets, sometimes lying awake as my breath rose like smoke in the moonlight. Then I got very sick, but I refused to be taken to the hospital for fear of being made sicker.

Merry Christmas

My favourite bit on the Charlie Brown Christmas special is when Linus tells Charlie Brown what the true meaning of Christmas is.

No matter what, please do have a Merry Christmas and an enjoyable and safe day off.

Mid-week Mellow

(stupid cat)


Just in time for Christmas.

Christmas Week: Holiday Movies

As we all prepare during the final days before Christmas, we might want to kick back and relax with some holiday favourites.

It's a Wonderful Life: watch Jimmy Stewart chew the scenery and Clarence get his wings in this Christmas-time favourite.

A Christmas Carol: this film version of Charles Dickens' Christmas classic makes us love Christmas all over again.

A Christmas Story: why get a pair of socks when you can get an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle?

Die Hard: nothing says the peace and joy of Christmas like blowing up terrorists.

Sympathy for Lady Revenge: a wonderfully crafted Korean film that starts off Christmas-y but gets dark. Really, really dark.

These last two entries aren't movies but are really worth watching.

"Miracle on Evergreen Terrace": Bart tries to cover up his nearly disastrous antics during Christmas. Minus the Cajun sausage.

"A Charlie Brown Christmas": the Browniest of Christmas specials. My favourite bit is when Linus recites from the Gospel according to Saint Luke.

Don't have time to watch these shows? Go here.

Archaeologists have found a dwelling from the time of Jesus. Sweet.

Freaky Friday

Yep.

The Ugly Canadian.

Usually the "Ugly Canadian" is a total dweeb who sews a Canadian flag on his backpack and labours under the misconception that the world loves him and will totally forgive him if he is rude, demanding, ignorant of the local culture and mangles the language. According to Mr. Murray Dobbin, however, the Ugly Canadian is one who doesn't do enough to ward off global warming, supports the military effort in Afghanistan, is appalled by China's many human rights abuses and seeks new economic opportunities . Mr. Dobbin's screed is basically anti-Harper and is so ridiculous that it shouldn't be responded to but I will- a little. Canada is not even remotely polluting when compared to China whose people are nothing more than coolies living in cancer villages. Canadian troops are doing more to stabilise a restive region of the world that countries like the former Soviet Union screwed up in the first place than peaceniks who decry Canada's presence there.

I'll stop here and suggest that Mr. Dobbin compare his lot in Canada to one in North Korea or Cuba. No doubt, his screed would have gone unnoticed by the half-literate populations there as their access to the Internet is strongly controlled or non-existent.



When not eliminating Africans or Asians to save the planet, getting rid of one's household pets become the next best thing in saving the planet from global warming the causes or existence of which no one can really prove absolutely. According to a recent book, Time to Eat the Dog? The Real Guide to Sustainable Living, by Robert and Brenda Vale of New Zealand, household pets have a very sizeable "carbon footprint". Assuming one buys into this footprint (or pawprint, as the case may be) stuff, let's point out that owning a pet can be costly, therefore, many choose not to get one. If some people do, they might go overboard in its care. Even so, given this absurd notion, I'd rather spend an entire afternoon talking with my dog (God rest his fluffy soul) than drown in the "green" cesspools created for everyone by hypocrites and extremists. He was more intelligent, charming and definitely more cuddly.



(how can anyone eat a face like that?)

Cap and trade, essentially, is a sort of barter system wherein a central authority sets a limit (cap) of emissions companies can expel. Companies must purchase "credits" which allow them to expel emissions. If they must emit more, they must buy these credits from companies which expel less. If one wasn't paying attention, it seems like a decent enough idea. In truth, it's as useless- and harmful- as carbon off-sets (paying someone else to make up for your "environmental mistakes" by planting trees and such). An article in the Wall Street Journal maintains that cap and trade serves only to tax, create unemployment and move industries elsewhere:

We should add that all of this is precisely what Kyoto envisioned. The idea is to tax Western industry and then send the proceeds to developing countries as an incentive to join the anticarbon crusade. But unless governments close their borders to foreign investment, business will flow to where the carbon tariff is least punishing. China and India understand this, which is why they won't agree at Copenhagen to anything that reduces this advantage.

It's a waste of time.

And now for happier things....

Ffffffffudge......

In this time of peace and happiness, it is important to share love and by love I mean fudge. Here is a recipe for cream cheese fudge:

5 ounces good-quality milk chocolate, finely chopped
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped
6 ounces cream cheese, softened
Pinch salt
3-1/2 cups sifted or strained confectioners' sugar
1 tsp. vanilla

Line an 8 inch square pan with a doubled length of regular-weight aluminum foil, shiny side up; set aside. In small heatproof bowl, combine chopped chocolates. Set over hot water on low heat (water should not touch bottom of bowl); stir frequently until almost melted. Remove from heat and hot water; carefully dry bowl bottom and sides. Stir chocolate until melted and smooth. Set aside.

In large bowl, beat softened cream cheese and salt with large spoon or sturdy hand-held electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Add sugar, one cup at a time, beating after each addition until smooth and incorporated; scrape bowl bottom and sides and mixer beater(s) with rubber spatula frequently. Add vanilla with last half-cup of sugar.

All at once, add melted chocolates, which should still be warm. Immediately blend in thoroughly. The fudge will stiffen very rapidly, so if you start blending it in with an electric mixer you'll probably need to finish blending it in with a large spoon. Make sure the fudge is an even color; scrape bowl bottom and sides well.

Working quickly, scrape fudge into prepared pan. With back of a large spoon, press fudge into as even a layer as possible (you might have to finish this by using the backs of your fingertips, but do so as briefly as possible. A slight oily layer may form on top, but this will be reabsorbed quickly.)

Chill fudge for at least one hour before cutting. To cut, use a large, sharp, straight-edged knife. Remove uncut fudge, still in foil, from pan; transfer to cutting board. Peel foil back from edges. Cut into small squares. To keep cuts neat, it will be necessary to rinse the knife blade under hot water, then dry it, frequently.

Store in refrigerator, tightly covered, or freeze. Fudge can be eaten refrigerator-cold or brought to room temperature, covered, before serving.

Variation: For fudge that is slightly less sweet and a shade darker in color, use 4 ounces of milk chocolate and 3 ounces of unsweetened chocolate.

Here is a recipe for Glögg (drink responsibly!):

3 sticks	cinnamon
2-3 pieces	dried Seville orange peel
2-3 pieces	dried ginger (not ground)
some 10	cardamom seeds (whole)
some 10	cloves (whole)
1 cup (2.5dl)	water

Also:

sugar

1 bottle of wine (or similar amount of black currant or grape juice for a non-alcoholic alternative)

What to do:

· Heat spices and water to boiling, then turn off heat and let stand overnight

· Sieve/filter out the spices

· Add the wine (or juice)

· Add sugar to taste (that should be a minimum of one deciliter (=2/5 of a cup); we’re talking Swedish cooking here!). You probably have to heat it first so that the sugar dissolves, then see if you want to add some more

· Heat. Note that alcohol evaporates at 72 degrees Celsius (or is it 78?) so you want to be a bit careful!

Serve hot with raisins and blanched almonds (dropped into the cups after serving). Glögg is normally served in tiny cups (the cups from your Turkish/Japanese/etc. souvenir tea set will be perfect), and some tiny spoons are useful for fishing out the raisins and almonds.

Finally....

An Alberta court ruled that failure to adapt to Canadian culture is no excuse for wife-beating.

The Alberta Court of Appeal said in a decision released on Tuesday that Kibrom Gebreweldi Teclesenbet, who had moved from Sudan five days before the assault, cannot claim he had not yet adjusted to Canadian standards. The judges quashed a conditional discharge and replaced it with a 30-day jail sentence. "To suggest it might be acceptable to beat one's wife with a stick elsewhere does not mitigate the seriousness of the offence," they wrote.

Up your nose, cultural relativism!

A Bowl of Stupid With a Side of Crazy

Where do we start?

It's bad enough a conference that could decide the economic fate of participating nations still continues despite record cold temperatures, Al Gore being publicly embarrassed and Climate-gate but to include Hugo Chavez and Robert Mugabe? I thought the point was to legitimise the conference? What does it say when these tyrants are given a free reign?

Climate "activists" deface a Canadian flag because of the oil sands in Alberta. The total area of the oil sands in Alberta stretch 140,000 square kilometres with about 500 square kilometres of land disturbed by oil sands surface mining activity, are estimated to produce173 billion barrels of oil and make up "about five per cent of Canada’s overall greenhouse gas emissions and less than one-tenth of one per cent of the world’s emissions". China, apparently, has soaring greenhouse emissions with "more than 400,000 people die every year as a result of air pollution, an estimated 190 million people drink water so contaminated that it makes them sick and 40 per cent of its land mass is affected by soil erosion. Indeed, the Chinese desert is expanding at a rate of 1900 square miles per year and is already encroaching on Beijing". Yet China hasn't faced the scathing vitriol Canada has. I suppose it's easier to attack a Western country than cut off an arm of the Sinoctopus.



(China in all its smoggy glory)

As for the flag defacers, grow up. You're not going to walk in minus forty degree Celsius temperatures and we all know it. How many resources have you consumed with your ridiculous stunt?

An eight year old boy in Massachusetts was suspended from school and ordered to undergo psychological testing before returning to school after he drew a crucifix.

From the article:

An eight-year-old Massachusetts boy was suspended from school and ordered to undergo a psychological evaluation after drawing a figure of Jesus Christ nailed to the cross.

The second-grader drew the crucifix after his teacher asked children to sketch something they associated with Christmas. But the boy's father said he then got a call from the elementary school informing him that his son had created a violent drawing.

"When she told me he needed to be psychologically evaluated, I thought she was playing," the boy's father told the Taunton Daily Gazette.

The drawing in question shows Jesus on a cross with Xs in place of his eyes to symbolize death.

The man, who asked for his name not to be published to protect the child, said his son gets specialized reading and speech instruction at school, and has never shown any tendency toward violence.

"He's never been suspended. He's eight years old. They overreacted," he said.

The child drew the picture shortly after taking a family trip to see the Christmas display at the National Shrine of Our Lady of La Salette, a Christian retreat site in Attleboro, Mass.

Toni Saunders, a non-profit educational consultant, said the boy's father reached out to her for help after trying to have his son moved to another school because "he's traumatized by everything that has happened.

"I've had kids suspended for idiotic things before, but I've never had to deal with anything like this," Ms. Saunders said.

In my time teaching, I've seen kids draw reindeer instead of cars, put ink their mouths, sing songs, dance when there is no music and behave when presented a cookie or sticker. I've also seen kids with anger issues. I've seen kids blithely rattle off the garbage they watch on TV because their parents are too lazy to monitor their watching habits or even engage them in another activity altogether. Never once would anyone suggest these children needed help. Did it not occur to the teacher to quietly ask the boy why he drew what he did or go out on a limb and make a cognitive connection between Christ on the Cross and the Christ-Child in a manger (not that we're allowed to discuss any of these things)? Did it not occur to the teacher that the over-reaction was more harmful than helpful?

I believe this in my bones: there are people who are so desperate for attention that they would drag people down to get it.

Religious charitable groups could be forced to choose between abandoning their values or going out of business if an Ontario Human Rights Tribunal decision is not overturned, an Ontario Divisional Court was told yesterday.

An Ontario tribunal ruled that Christian Horizons had no right to fire a woman after she entered into a homosexual relationship. I'm sure this woman is proud of herself. While she gets to luxuriate in a bath of her own self-pity, a charity which helps the disabled could shut its doors forever. She knew the rules going in and could make any decision with her life but no matter- it's better to pout, whine and destroy religious charities. Where should the needy go? To the government? Nowhere? Thanks for the selfishness. If spoiled individuals or special-interest groups take away the rights of private groups, how does it benefit anyone?

Don't forget to write to Santa!

Mid-Week Mellow

This is Haeundae Beach in Busan, South Korea. This photo was taken in August during a spell of twenty-plus degree Celsius weather.

If you're in Saskatchewan, you might prefer to be on that beach now.

Might.

More than likely.

Anything's better than forty below.

Just saying.