War is Peace, Security is Freedom

Matt Welch associate editor at Reason magazine has a new quiz online for Republicans, and in Canada; Conservatives, who claim to be Libertarians.

The Pro-war Libertarian Quiz: How far are you willing to go to win the War on Terror? (January 5)

I look forward to hearing how the Blogging Tory's who support the War in Iraq answer this one. Especially those RightWhingNutBars like Cannucklestan who have all the American patriotic militarist links on their sites. Go ahead answer the quiz.

As Matt say's; My belief, crudely summarized, is not only that you do not need to imitate totalitarians to beat them, but that it doesn't actually help. I'd love to know where my pro-war friends draw the line. I'd love to know.

Tags anti-war / war /United States/Politics /blogs/ libertarianan

Well Said

A good critique of partisan political/ Election bloggers for the Liberals and Conservatives can be found here.

Of course Le Revue Gauche never has been a partisan Party based political blog.

We just tell it like it is.

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Canada
Federal Election
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Personals; Multiplepersonality Blogger looking for others

Lonely, frustrated, multiplepersonality blogger Werner Patels has issued a looney, err lonely hearts message to the blogosphere to join Alberta Avenue, his personal blog which he pretends is an online magazine. Call for more authors

In fact this is rather revealing of Herr Patels who has claimed all the while, since he began publishing AA, that it is a conributor run publication. Implying that all the anonymous posts were by a multitude of bloggers. Of course the only contributors are the multiple personalities of Herr Patels.

AlbertaAvenue - The Voice of Alberta is always looking for additional authors. It would be great if we could find additional writers reflecting the viewpoints of the major political parties in Canada (Tory, Liberal, NDP, Green) as well as the US (Republican, Democrat).

Yes poor Herr Patels is getting tired of writing all of these viewpoints, sans the NDP, by himself.

The journal he calls the Voice of Alberta, vote Conservative Federally, Liberal provincially, and Green all the time, is anything but. It shows that truth in advertising does not exist in the blogosphere. If truth in advertising was applied to Herr Patels he would have to say AA was the voice of a lone politically-schizoid idiot in Calgary.

P.S.
No, don't thank me Herr Patels. I know I have promoted your site with this blog comment and hundreds of my readers will be flocking there soon......NOT.


P.P.S.
Herr Patels rather than post legal threats in the comments section of my blog please have your lawyers contact my lawyers; Hungadunga, Hungadunga, Hungadunga, Hungadunga and McCormack.

Now then, in re yours of the fifteenth, yours to hand and made to rep, brackets, that we have gone over the ground carefully and we seem to believe, i.e., to wit, e.g., in lieu, that, uh, despite all our precautionary measures which have been involved, uh, we seem to believe that it is hardly necessary for us to proceed unless we, uh, receive an ipso facto that is not negligible at this moment, quotes, unquotes and quotes. Uh. Hoping this finds you, I beg to remain...as of June 9, cordially yours. Regards.




Jamison: 'In care of Hungadunga, Hungadunga, Hungadunga, and McCormack...'
Spaulding: You've left out a Hungadunga! You've left out the main one, too. Thought you could slip one over on me, didn't you, eh? All right, leave it out and put in a windshield wiper instead. I tell you what you do, Jamison. I tell you what. Make it, uh, make it three windshield wipers and one Hungadunga. They won't all be there when the letter arrives, anyhow.
Jamison: 'Hungadunga, Hungadunga, Hungadunga...and McCormack.'
Spaulding: '...and McCormack.'
Jamison: 'Gentlemen, question mark.'
Spaulding: 'Gentlemen, Question Mark!!' Put it on the penultimate, not on the dipthonic. You want to brush up on your Greek, Jamison. Well, get a Greek and brush up on him!
Jamison: 'In re yours of the fifteenth.'
Spaulding: I see.
Jamison: Now, uh, you said a lot of things here that I didn't think were important, so I just omitted them.
Mrs. Rittenhouse: Well!...(Spaulding swings at his head and misses.) Whoa, Captain! Good gracious! Oh, my!
Spaulding: So...you just omitted them, eh? ...You just omitted the body of the letter, that's all. You've just left out the body of the letter, that's all! Yours not to reason why, Jamison! You've left out the body of the letter!...All right, send it that way and tell them the body'll follow.
Jamison: Do you want the body in brackets?
Spaulding: No, it will never get there in brackets. Put it in a box. Put it in a box and mark it 'fragilly'.
Jamison: Mark it what?
Spaulding: Mark it 'fragilly.' F - R - A - G...Look it up, Jamison. It's in the dictionary. Look under 'fragile'. Look under the table if you don't find it there.
Jamison: 'Quotes, unquotes, and quotes.'
Spaulding: That's three quotes?
Jamison: Yes, sir.
Spaulding: Add another quote and make it a gallon. How much is it a gallon, Jamison?
Jamison: 'Regards.'
Spaulding: 'Regards.' That's a fine letter, Jamison. That's an epic. That's dandy. Now I want you to make two carbon copies of that letter and throw the original away. And when you get through with that, throw the carbon copies away. Just send the stamp, airmail. That's all. You may go, Jamison. I may go too.

See:
Gotcha!
Thanks Herr Werner
A Confused Alberta Liberal

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Canada
Alberta
Conservatives
blogs
Liberal

Labour Abandons the NDP

It's not just Buzz or his economist in residence Jim Stanford that have abandoned the NDP now the House of Labour, the founding members of the New Democratic Party have abandoned endorsement of the party in favour of third party lobbying.

CLC puts issues at forefront:: calls for support of policies, not parties, in federal election [Globe & Mail] 05-Jan-2006

This is not new, they did this during the 2004 election, basing their propaganda campaign around 'issues'. But having seen the negatigve impact Buzz embracing Martin has had we have all been waiting for the CLC to come to the defense of the party they created.

The late launching of their campaign this week and their failure to endorse the NDP and attack strategic voting is shameful. Why have they even bothered. Brother Georgetti and the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) should hang their heads in shame.

Labour Launches Its Own Federal Election Campaign [CLC] 05-Jan-2006

What was needed now was a strong push in the labour movement for the NDP not some weak tea vote on policies campaign that one would expect from a Liberal front group like the Council of Canadians. Now a strong attack from Labour on the Liberals and Conservatives was needed. And it ain't happening. This makes the CLC irrelevant as well as ineffecutal as a political force in this election.

They sound exactly like Buzz and the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE) who support the Liberals. An low and behold behind their 'issues' campaign is the truth. Brother Georgetti has abandoned the NDP for the Liberals.

Labour's minority report on the election [24 Hours Vancouver] 05-Jan-2006

A major Canadian labour leader is crossing his fingers for another minority government in the next election.

"We think minority governments work better than majority governments," said Canadian Labour Congress president Ken Georgetti yesterday. "We've seen the results and we're quite happy with them."

Georgetti said the last minority government was better for labour, passing legislation that protected workers' pay if their employers went bankrupt. There was also more money for training and education.

While Georgetti claims to still support the NDP so does Buzz and they sound like Tweedledee and Tweedledum when it comes to the Liberals.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) an affiliate in the CLC at least has taken the bull by the horns and done the right thing. The best “strategic vote” is for the NDP [CUPE] 05-Jan-2006

What had always made Canada different from the U.S. was our labour movement was the source of Canada's Labour and Socialist parties.Through out the thirties till the red scare of the fifties radical unions, were aligned with the Communist Party and the One Big Union formed by the Socialist Party of Canada. In the fifties the divided labour movement in Canada came together as one federated body the CLC and went on to merge with the CCF to create the NDP.

In the U.S. the AFL/CIO historically followed Samuel Gompers dictum of rewarding your friends and punishing your enemies. And would not be until the 1960's that they aligned with the Democrats. An independent labour party never existed under the auspices of the AFL/CIO though the Socialist Party of the USA was a power house under Eugene Debs at the begining of last century.

Today the CLC has reverted, as has Buzz and the CAW to Gomperism. And its all over jobs in the Southern Ontario Rust belt. Auto and Steel jobs. Screw the rest of Canada, screw the NDP, screw Quebec, its all about Ontario. The CLC should give up any pretence to being a national federation, and change its name to the Ontario Labour Congress. And the CAW should change their name to the Ontario Autoworkers Union.

Hot: Endorsements. NDP candidate Peggy Nash, whose boss, Buzz Hargrove, keeps trying to hug Paul Martin when labour union bosses traditionally hug NDP leaders, is doing just fine without him. Ms. Nash, who is running against Liberal incumbent Sarmite Bulte in the Toronto riding of Parkdale-High Park, recently received an endorsement from Stephen Lewis, the former Ontario NDP leader and former Canadian ambassador to the United Nations, who is now involved in fighting HIV/AIDS in Africa. Meanwhile, CAW chief economist Jim Stanford is endorsing Greig Mordue, the Liberal candidate in Oxford, a Southwestern Ontario riding. Mr. Mordue is the government affairs official for Toyota, which the last time we checked, was a Japanese car manufacturer. Mr. Mordue is running against Conservative incumbent Dave MacKenzie. Of course, Toyota just broke ground on its new plant in Woodstock, which is part of the Oxford riding.

And Toytoa is one of the companies NOT unionized by CAW, along with Honda. So go figure why such a high profile labour fakir like Stanford would support this particular Liberal. A foot in the door for the CAW to unionize the number one car maker in the world as the number one car maker in the U.S., GM sheds jobs as it tanks in the world market. Opportunism as usual in the world of bread and butter business unionism. Once upon a time the CAW and other large industrial unions claimed to be the Left in Canada, and the Left in the union movement.

Today they show themselves for what they are, shameless business unions out for the good of their own members.Willing to sacrifice class struggle for a bowl of pottage.


Tags
Canada
Federal Election
Buzz Hargrove
Politics
CAW
Strategic Voting
NDP
CLC
CUPE
Labour
Liberals

Conservatives Hidden Agenda Exposed

That smiling face of the Harper, looking like a Prime Minister, looking acceptable to Joe and Janey Canuck, sounding well reasonable, is a slick groomed media image. The real Harper and the real right wing Conservatives will re-appear after the election. Unlike last election, no right wing Randy Whites will be allowed to upset the Conservative election apple cart. Nope. A pax silensius has been reached with the party's extreme right wing. They will shut up for now, biding their time till the Conservatives win the election, they hope, and then the cat will be out of the bag.

Elect Conservatives, then talk about issues: social conservatives

A traditional definition of marriage and abortion weren't mentioned, but social conservative groups that consider those to be important issues say they're satisfied with the direction the party is taking in its effort to form the next government. "They have to talk this way to get elected," Link Byfield, chairman of the Citizens Centre for Freedom and Democracy, said. "I think a lot of conservatives honestly agree with that."Hermina Dykxhoorn, president of the Alberta Federation of Women United for Families, says no main stream party is talking about the issues she considers most important, such as abortion and same-sex marriage. But she says she's willing to not talk about those issues during the election if it means electing a Conservative government.

These are the same folks from Alberta that support Firewall Alberta, in the case of Link Byfield and his ilk and a refederation of Canada based on Harpers decentralized Canada from Sea to Sea. See Alberta Seperatism Not Quite Stamped Out

AFWUF ( pronounced Aff woof) opposes unions, opposes equal pay for equal work, and opposes a womans right to choose publicly funded daycare or abortion.See Right to Life = Right To Work

They are aligned with Real Women of Canada and Life Canada, and have been part of the Byfield right wing front groups. See It's A Family Thing

This CBC item had the Blogging Tory's all a flutter crying foul.

But then good old Elsie Wayne, the mouth that roared from New Brunswick, let the cat out of the bag in CTV interview with Mike Duffy. She has teamed up with Pat O'Brian former Liberal and his anti-gay lobby which is quietly lobbying Conservative MP's and mobilizing the right wing vote in Ontario against the Liberals and NDP.

Elsie Wayne, Former Conservative MP

CTV Wed. Jan. 4 2006 9:39 PM ET

Without the party's approval, former Conservative MP Elsie Wayne wants to bring the same-sex marriage debate back to the forefront of the election campaign.

And the same cretinous right wingers populate this front group too, including Real Women Canada, Campaign Life, its the Byfield gang and their pals.

Yep the Tory's have a hidden agenda always have always will, if they allow free votes for Same Sex Marriage they will allow free votes on abortion and the death penalty, regardless of what Harper says now. If they become the government it will be open season on human rights as private members bills originate from the Whipless backbenches of the Torys.

My Columns on Harper


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Canada
Federal Election
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byfield
Conservatives
Stephen Harper
Alberta

A Simple Question Baffles Harper, Again

Ask the Harper a straight question or a simple question, he sputters, stammers, skates around it in his answer. Like Do You Love Canada, or Will you swear on the bible to keep your promises. He sputters, asks for the question to be repeated, hums, haws and then doesn't answer it.

He reminds me of Marvin the manic depressive Robot with a brain the size of a planet from Hitchhikers Guide to the Universe.

The other day in Quebec he was asked if he got his prop money from a local cash machine by a clever and witty Quebecois reporter. Obviously too clever by a mile, Harper asked him to repeat the question then blathered on about a supporter loaned them the money, and he had to return it.....Not sure what that meant.

Today after announcing the return of the lash, full term imprisonment and throwing away the key for gun crimes....ok sorry, the lash comment was by some Tory nutbar on the Rutherford show.......

A reporter asked him if he would still register handguns since Harper declared he was going to eliminate the gun registry....And Harper replied he was going to have longer sentences for gun crimes. A simple yes or no just does not come easily off his lips.

And then there was this item from the Globe and Mail.

Stephen Harper meets Daniel Cook

Daniel Cook is eight years old and a television star with his own show, This is Daniel Cook, broadcast on Treehouse TV and the Disney Channel in the United States. On his show, he takes on an adult job or task and interprets it through his young eyes.

He's an inquisitive little guy. Well, creative minds at CTV Newsnet thought Daniel might be able to help them with the election campaign, and so they hired him to be a regular correspondent on Newsnet's Countdown with Mike Duffy.

Yesterday, the red-headed newsman was on the tour with Stephen Harper (Daniel brought his Dad, Murray, along as his chaperone). And Daniel landed his first exclusive with the Tory Leader, conducted on the Harper campaign bus. The diminutive journalist was able to stump Mr. Harper when he asked him who he would vote for if he weren't running.

Mr. Harper told him he'd rather "jump off a tall building."

Huh? See what I mean he just can't answer a simple question.

"Oh dear I have a brain the size of a planet and I am so depressed......"
Marvin the Robot.


My Columns:

Harper

Tory Watch

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Federal Election
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Stephen Harper

Anonalogue is a Racist Dweeb

Showing once again that a little bit of education is a dangerous thing for a regressive mind. Anonmyass blogger Anonologue denounces the Liberals post secondary education plan using the Bell Curve as his defense of a Malthusian survival of the fittest.

Liberals Want To Waste Billions On Shitty Students

Hey f**kchop: ever hear of The Bell Curve?

The Bell Curve for those of you who don't remember is a discredited racist attempt to justify why White Folks like Mr. Anonologue are smarter than Black Folks. It tried to cover up its racist ideology by claiming of course that Asians are smarter than White Folks cause they score higher on math and science exams.

As noted biologist Stephen Jay Gould wrote in his review of the Bell Curve:

Herrnstein and Murray's second claim, the lightning rod for most commentary extends the argument for innate cognitive stratification to a claim that racial differences in IQ are mostly determined by genetic causes—small difference for Asian superiority over Caucasian, but large for Caucasians over people of African descent. This argument is as old as the study of race, and is most surely fallacious. The last generation's discussion centered on Arthur Jensen's 1980 book Bias in Mental Testing (far more elaborate and varied than anything presented in The Bell Curve, and therefore still a better source for grasping the argument and its problems), and on the cranky advocacy of William Shockley, a Nobel Prize–winning physicist. The central fallacy in using the substantial heritability of within–group IQ (among whites, for example) as an explanation of average differences between groups (whites versus blacks, for example) is now well known and acknowledged by all, including Herrnstein and Murray, but deserves a restatement by example. Take a trait that is far more heritable than anyone has ever claimed IQ to be but is politically uncontroversial—body height. Suppose that I measured the heights of adult males in a poor Indian village beset with nutritional deprivation, and suppose the average height of adult males is five feet six inches. Heritability within the village is high, which is to say that tall fathers (they may average five feet eight inches) tend to have tall sons, while short fathers (five feet four inches on average) tend to have short sons. But this high heritability within the village does not mean that better nutrition might not raise average height to five feet ten inches in a few generations. Similarly, the well–documented fifteen–point average difference in IQ between blacks and whites in America, with substantial heritability of IQ in family lines within each group, permits no automatic conclusion that truly equal opportunity might not raise the black average enough to equal or surpass the white mean.

Disturbing as I find the anachronism of The Bell Curve, I am even more distressed by its pervasive disingenuousness. The authors omit facts, misuse statistical methods, and seem unwilling to admit the consequence of their own words.

The virulent foul mouthings of this racist dweeb only prove that he is a sore loser, having obviously left school so long ago that he will not be able to benefit from the Liberal post secondary education plan. Jealousy is an ugly thing, so is racism. Bell Curve indeed. This guy is the ding dong.

Like many Blogging Tory's he thinks he lives in the United States. "Precisely when did it become a bad idea in Canada for prospective college/university student to compete for scarce resources by writing entrance exams and SATs?"

Ummm Mr. Racist Dweeb we don't write SAT's in Canada.

And precisely when students had to compete for scarce resources was in the early 1980's as provincial governments reduced funding to Universities and Colleges and increased tuition fees and foreign student fees.

As funding decreased University Departments increased enterance grade requirements to limit access to public education, to restrict access and to keep their guild like monopolies over their professions like Medicine, Law, teaching etc.

Green Opportunism

The Green party in it's opportunism to get as much taxpayer funding as it can has parachuted candidates into Newfoundland Labrador. Despite the fact that they held a quicky delegates meeting in the first weeks of the election to push an anti-sealing motion through to put into their platform which lost them support of their members in Newfoundland.

Forced to run a full slate to get their share of public funds, they have no hope of making even a reasonable dent on the Rock but they will run front men and women to get their bucks out of us. Principled Party -Not.

By taking an anti sealing position, they are off the map in a riding like Avalon
which is wide open with the resignation of Jim Elford. But that's not their concern anyways. The Green Party Inc.theme song is Frank Zappa's We're only in it for the money.

The Green party has managed to field a full slate of candidates in Newfoundland and Labrador, but has had draw on out-of-province members to do it. Shannon Hillier, who is carrying the Green banner in Avalon riding, admits the party's stand against the seal hunt is an obstacle – at least in Newfoundland and Labrador. "Basically, it's an Ottawa decision," she said. Lori-Ann Martino, who ran for the Greens in 2004, said she could not endorse the party's stand on sealing."I think any Newfoundlander would look straight at [that] and be able to see that this party does not represent them," Martino said. "That's when I realized that this was strategic, and I was just a tool in a bigger political machine that was mostly aimed at Upper Canadians." every vote for the party brings $1.79 in federal funding that can be used to promote the Greens' environmental agenda.


Tags
Canada
Federal Election
Politics
Green Party

The Stamp Story Won't Go Away

Larry Johnsonrude at the Edmonton Journal blogs about Gordon Stamps fall from grace due to blogging. Larry sez:

As part of their election strategy, politicians and their handlers started the campaign viewing blogs as a magic bullet for getting their unfiltered message directly to voters. Instead, they have become a source of embarrassment.
Obviously, blogs are being read. Problem is, they aren’t necessarily being read by the voters for whom they are intended. Rather, they are being closely scrutinized by the writers’ political enemies looking for dirt And they're not finding any shortage. That’s the trouble with something as democratic as the Internet. It doesn’t impose the discipline needed for fighting an election. There is a maxim in journalism that we writers need editors to protect us from ourselves. The same can be said about political operatives.


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Canada
Federal Election
Conservative
Edmonton East
Peter Goldring
blogs
Gordon Stamp
Seperatism
Alberta
Edmonton Journal
Larry Johnsrude

How about a Memorial for Workers

The Alberta government is going to build a memorial for fallen Police Officers. But they don't build a memorial for the workers killed or injured on the job who built this province.

Heck they can't even get it together to fix Highway 63 which has killed more Fort McMurray workers than any accidents in the Tar Sands plants. If they did it would keep more workers alive and then we wouldn't need a memorial, or little roadside crosses to indicate the governments abdication of responsibility. Every one of these deaths are Ralph Kleins fault.

Klein closer to twinning highway to Fort McMurray

At one time the government said Highway 63 would likely be twinned in the next 20 years. But last July, Oberg said he would like to see a plan in place to widen the highway within seven years.

On Tuesday, the medical examiner in Fort McMurray renewed his call for twinning the highway following the crash that killed the oilsands workers from Calgary.

"This is just another preventable accident, and more preventable deaths -- the fifth in the last month on this highway,'' said Dr. John O'Connor.

"The numbers are getting bigger, the population is getting bigger, the road is getting busier and yet (the politicians) do nothing.''

In the last five years, 22 people have died and more than 250 have been injured on the northern roadway.

Earlier this year, the province announced $530 million worth of improvements to highways leading into Fort McMurray, including Highway 63.

But that doesn't involve twinning the section of highway where Tuesday's fatal crash occurred.

Johnson said it's just a matter of time before the highway is fully twinned.

O'Connor said the medical community has repeatedly asked the province to do something.

"We have unanimously voiced our opinion in the strongest possible terms,'' he said. ``We are frustrated and angry at the lack of action and commitment to twinning the highway.

"We are beyond waiting. We are going to do whatever it takes to get some action.''

Since 2000, the number of cars travelling to Fort McMurray has increased by roughly one-third as oilsands projects have expanded

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labour
Fort McMurray
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