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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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.


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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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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

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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.


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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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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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Comrade Kate of SDA

Will wonders never cease, the entire Conservative movement in Canada appears to be moving to the Left. First Comrade Harper keeps talking about 'Canadian workers' and 'working families', which is only a hop skip and a jump to him saying 'working class'.

Then Edmonton Centre candidate Laurie Hawn joins Federal Prison Guard Union members in Solidarity Forever.

Now Kate McMillan from Small Dead Animals in her latest blog on CBC quotes Vladimir Illich Lenin. No really. She quotes Comrade Lenin.

Now of course if I quote Comrade Lenin then I get accused of being a Lefty. But if Kate quotes him well..... ok lets put it in context. She really is NOT supporting a return of Red Toryism in the Conservatives she is attacking her favorite bug a boo, socialised day care. Ok and she is attacking socialized health care.

Lets deal with the former first. In her blog she says;

But that anyone would propose that government "knows best" when it comes to early learning and child care is nothing short of frightening.

"Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted." - Vladimir Lenin

Oh that clever Lenin, he surely is responsible for the Liberals and NDP day care policies. I bet they hired him as a disembodied advisor. But wait this quote sounds familar. Hmmm let us google around for a minute and see what we find.....
Oh dear Lenin was paraphrasing that famous Jesuit quote:

"Give me a child for the first seven years, and you may do what you like with him afterwards."

And since this has been the core philosophy of Catholic Education, I wonder if Kate is as frightened of the Church knowing best. Specially since Canada is a Catholic country. Perhaps not by government edict but certainly by census, if not concensus. Of course she doesn't mind Church indoctrination. Like most Blogging Tory's she is all in favour of private delivery of services by the Church. Moral values and all that. But the government funding secular non profit daycares, oh heaven forbid such interference in our individual and family lives.

Instead she makes a straw man out of Lenin, raises the bugaboo of daycare as a communist plot, not unlike the old red scares around flouride back in the early sixties. Except she says nothing at all about education having always been the delivery of ideology by the Church or State.

The only free school movement that has historically existed is not what Kate has in mind. No siree it has been Anarchist, starting with Francisco Ferrer and the Modern School Movement in Spain in opposition to the Catholic Education system in that country.

Early in the summer of 1908, after his release from jail, he wrote the story of the Modern School. The work was entitled The Origins and Ideals of the Modern School and was translated into English by Joseph McCabe and published by the Knickerbocker Press in 1913.

Following the declaration of martial law in 1909 during the Tragic Week, he was arrested and executed without any proof by firing squad at Montjuich Fortress in Barcelona on October 12.

Shortly after his execution, numerous supporters of Ferrer's ideas in the United States formed what were called Modern Schools, or Ferrer Schools, modeled after la Escuela Moderna. The first and most notable Modern School was formed in New York City in 1911.

Coincidental with the anarchist Modern School Movement was the Summerhill Free School movement in Germany which moved to England and influenced the homeschooling movement of the early sixties.

Summerhill: the early days

Summerhill was founded in 1921 in Hellerau, a suburb of Dresden. It was part of an International school called the Neue Schule. There were wonderful facilities there and a lot of enthusiasm, but over the following months Neill became progressively less happy with the school. He felt it was run by idealists – they disapproved of tobacco, foxtrots and cinemas – while he wanted the children to live their own lives. He said:

I am only just realising the absolute freedom of my scheme of Education. I see that all outside compulsion is wrong, that inner compulsion is the only value. And if Mary or David wants to laze about, lazing about is the one thing necessary for their personalities at the moment. Every moment of a healthy child's life is a working moment. A child has no time to sit down and laze. Lazing is abnormal, it is a recovery, and therefore it is necessary when it exists.

Together with Frau Neustatter (later his first wife), Neill moved his school to Sonntagsberg in Austria. The setting was idyllic – a castle on top of a mountain – but the local people, a Catholic community, were hostile.

By 1923 Neill had moved to the town of Lyme Regis in the south of England, to a house called Summerhill where he began with 5 pupils. The school continued there until 1927, when it moved to the present site at Leiston in the county of Suffolk, taking the name of Summerhill with it.

Yep social engineering is what Kate opposes, of course unless its delivered by the private sector as a commodity. Or perhaps by the church through access to public school funds or through religious based home schooling (an extension of Sunday School).

That is what she wants for day care, education and health care. She calls these commodities, at least she is honest about her capitalist apologetics. She wants all this delivered by the private sector. Or in an unregulated fashion, such as Baba babysitting, which is all the Conservative plan pays for.

Where she is not honest is of course her revisionist history of Canada and our social programs. She rely's upon her reading of American right wing propaganda and applying it uncritically to Canada. Lets look at Medicare for instance.

In her same blog item she says this about Medicare.

With the generation who remember life without socialized medicine slowly passing into history, the nation fully indoctrinated with the belief that the words "commodity" and "right" are interchangable, the Liberals have decided to welcome a future voting demographic to the concept that "babysitting" is a government responsiblity.

Oh what generation is that Kate? You obviously missed my blog about how Socialized Medicine Began in Alberta, even before it began in Saskatchewan.

And it was demanded by the ruling classes, the political powers that be, in the medical establishment as well as the government, and it was introduced by a right wing government; Social Credit. It began in the 1940's.

So there has not been a modern generation without Medicare in Canada except your grandparents, when they were children. After WWII every Canadian that came home from the fight for freedom was prepared to fight for social programs, cause when they left home there had been a depression and no social programs and when they returned they were not prepared to settle for less than the current social programs we enjoy. If they hadn't gotten them there would have been a revolution. Which is why Keynsian economics was used to createthe welfare state.

But Kate the historical revisionist denies all this.

Mind you Medicare as it existed in Alberta and Saskatchewan were different then Medicare is today. And different from the private insurance policies that folks in other provinces lived under. And I don't imagine that generation wants to return to that.

Nope they are seniors now and they ain't much in mood to listen to wet behind the ears whippersnappers like Kate tell them that what they consider a right should now be sold back to them as a commodity. Nope. Thats why they vote. And they vote in large numbers. And they vote to keep pensions, medicare, etc. They are the most vocal defenders of the status quo, cause they and their parents fought for it and built this country around those rights that Kate would sell off.

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Conservatives Turn Left

In a stunning move to the left Edmonton Centre Conservative Candidate Laurie Hawn called a media scrum to exploit, err expose the plight of Federal Jail Guards and their union which have been without a contract for five years. But before Laurie could start singing Solidarity Forever, he was turfed from the jail.

Now these guards of course are under the jurisdiction of the last Liberal left standing in Alberta; Anne McLellan, whom he is running against.

Blogging Tory Civitatensis blogged about this to which I left this reply;

Gee is this the same Conservative party that has Rob Anders as an MP the same Rob Anders who opposes Forced Unionization....and wants Right to Work laws....do I smell opportunism here...yep smells pretty strong too.

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CTV scoops CBC

Yesterday morning as CBC ran Don Newmans Politics show, 10 AM EST and CPAC ran their Talk Radio show CTV NEWSNET scooped them both and ran Jack Laytons Pharmacare announcement from Windsor live. Don only quoted from the press release in his discussion with the Media wonks from the Three Party War Rooms.

And Jacks announcement was original not a retread or 'me too' like the Liberals and Conservatives who announced identical Immigration Head Tax and Health Care plans. Tweedledee and Tweedledum indeed.

Yep I am more and more impressed with CTV on the election than I am CBC, and even more so now that Angry in the Great White North is praising CBC for its coverage of the Harper.

When Blogging Torys like CBC, cause they publish racist Kate of SDA, and say nice things about Harper, are right wing phone pledges for public broadcasting far behind?..."its the end of the world as we know it."


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Irans Nuclear Program Is A CIA Oops

Read it and weep. The US intelligence community bungles again. This is another case of SPY VS. SPY. Bad enough that Iran got its nuclear material and bomb making information from America's new found friend Pakistan. Now it turns out the CIA in a dirty tricks operation screwed up and actually gave them bomb blueprints.

US blunder aided Iran's atomic aims, book claims

Julian Borger in Washington
Thursday January 5, 2006
The Guardian

The CIA may have helped Iran to design a nuclear bomb through a botched attempt to channel flawed blueprints to Tehran's weapon designers, according to a new book on the US "war on terror".

In an excerpt from State of War, printed today in G2, the author and New York Times intelligence correspondent, James Risen, writes that the abortive operation misfired when a Russian defector on the CIA payroll, chosen to deliver the deliberately flawed nuclear warhead blueprints to Iranian officials in February 2000, tipped them off about the defects.

The operation, codenamed Merlin and approved by the Clinton administration, was intended to send Iranian scientists down a technological dead end, according to this account. They would spend years building a warhead which would fail to detonate. Instead, Risen writes, the operation may have helped Iran to "accelerate its weapons development" by extracting important information from the blueprints and ignoring the flaws.

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CIA
nuclear
Pallistan
Iran
USA

Coal Mine Disaster No Accident

(CNN) -- As family members waited for word on the fate of the 13 West Virginia miners trapped in the Sago Mine, they looked up to God and north to Pennsylvania's Quecreek Mine. Both gave them hope.

"Whatever did God do for us?"

Anger over false news of US miners' survival It was a mistake, families told, after hailing news of miners' survival

A Disaster in the Making

There are no such things as accidents in coal mining. Never have been never will be. Accidents, acts of god, do not occur in coal mines. What happens is that the company fails to provide for the safety of its workers, by cutting corners. Lack of safety precautions or inspections, lack of follow up, poor mining practices, these are the causes of miners deaths.

This is what happened in Canada's worst coal mine explosions such as Hillcrest in Alberta, Springhill in Nova Scotia and the recent disaster at Westray in Nova Scotia.

As we move towards increasing reliance on coal due to energy shortages, and the need for coal for power plants such as those in Ontario will mean the opening of more mines reviving old mines, and in some cases strip mining. Underground mining of coal is by far the most dangerous. It is why we associate the canary with coal mining because of the methane gases given off by coal.

Increased production of coal will mean more speed ups in the mines, ignoring safety regulations and inspections, more fast buck risks taken by the investors for quick profits and thus higher risks for the workers who mine King Coal.

This is what occured this week in West Virginia. Sago mine was plagued with problems that inspectors found and the company failed to resolve. Which of these was the cause of this weeks explosion and disaster will be discovered soon enough but the companies record of violations and roof falls, only show that this was no'accident' but a disaster that was waiting to happen sooner or later.

The International Coal Group was formed in 2004, when business entrepreneur Wilbur Ross Jr. led a group that bought many of the assets of Horizon Natural Resources in a bankruptcy auction.

Last year, ICG bought Anker, which previously owned Sago. The company has mining operations in West Virginia, Kentucky and Maryland and owned or controlled approximately 707 million tons of coal as of Jan. 1, 2005.

The Sago Mine was cited 208 times over alleged safety violations in 2005, up from just 68 citations the year before, The Associated Press reported. Federal regulators' allegations against the Sago Mine included failure to dilute coal dust, which can lead to explosions, and failure to properly operate and maintain machinery, according to the AP report.

Sago Has A History of Safety Violations

In 2005, the government proposed fines for Anker, the company that operates the Sago Mine, that total almost $25,000 for violations; the company has paid a little more than $14,000 (so far).

Only a few weeks ago, the feds cited the company for a number of violations, but inspectors did not propose any fines. According to the MSHA chart, the most recent Sago Mine violations have not yet been assessed. (Click on the "Standard" column to see the specific violation for each item listed.)

Among the December 2005 inspector findings were fire-extinguisher violations and violations for surface (above-ground) travelways such as railways. There were three violations issued just since Dec. 18, 2005 regarding a "roof control plan."

The mine was also cited less than a month ago for allowing coal dust to accumulate. Last month, the mine was cited (not fined) for not having proper atmospheric monitoring systems.

In November, inspectors did propose fines for inadequate mine ventilation and inadequate roof bolts.

MSHA has been updating information on the West Virginia mine on its Web site.

---

History of Accidents

Many of the accidents include unintentional roof falls. The Charleston Gazette explored the roof-fall angle under the notion that the series of recent minor roof falls may have been an indication that the mine needed to fix roofing problems. The paper said: Three of the roof falls occurred after International Coal Group finalized its purchase of the Anker operation in mid-November.

Mining Accident Raises Broader Safety Questions

The mining disaster at West Virginia's Sago Mine has raised new questions about safety in an industry that has long been among the most dangerous in America.

Tougher government regulation and technology improvements have helped reduce mining accidents over the past two decades. But at a time of increased mining demand and a shortage of skilled workers, safety problems have continued to dog the industry, contributing to more than 300 fatalities since the year 2000.

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labour
mining
USA
coal
disasters
UMWA

Dead Men Tell No Tales

Nor do dead women. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists , 47 journalists were murdered doing their jobs last year. At least half in Iraq. Which may be the reason the Pentagon saw fit to publish their own good news stories and plant them in the Iraqi press. Just covering for all those journalists murdered by friendly fire.....

Iraq still remains the most dangerous place for journalists: 22 journalists lost their lives there in 2005. A total of 60 journalists have been killed on duty in Iraq from the beginning of the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 through the end of 2005. That number surpasses the 58 journalists killed in the Algerian conflict from 1993 to 1996.

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Iraq
USA
jounralists
War
Pentagon

Harper Runs from the Centre Rules from the Right

I just can't get over how many times the Harper announces he is for 'working families' in Canada, messaging usually associated with the Left and the NDP in particular. He has talked about workers and workng families through out this campaign. And as I wrote here before, he wants to be the friend of blue collar Canadians.

But has the leopard really changed his spots? Well no. He doesn't eliminate the GST he reforms it, chips away at it a percentage here and there. Does he eliminate the Liberal immigration Head Tax? Nope he chips away at it, leaving it reduced to $100. He does things half way. He doesn't support more day care spaces, he gives working Canadians a tax credit instead.

But is this a new Harper, as flawed as his positions are, really appealing to the needs of working class Canadians? Not really says an excellent column in todays Winnipeg Free Press. Which because it is a subscriber only page I am reprinting here in case it no longer sits in the Google cache after today. And besides he says exactly what I have been saying all along.

Canadians terrified of Harper's real plans

Wed Jan 4 2006

FRANCES RUSSELL

WITH the wind at their backs from NDP leader Jack Layton's calls for a change in government and a cheerleading national media, Stephen Harper's Conservatives are cruising at 54 per cent in the polls, just as Brian Mulroney was in April 1984.

Well, no.

After almost two years of all-scandal, all-the-time, the Free Press headline Monday summed it up best: "It's Tories by a nose in new poll." All other surveys still show the Liberals tied or with a slim lead.

How can this be? How can the Liberals even be close after the gaffes, the insensitivity, the dithering, the lack of focus, the culture of entitlement, the arrogance and yes, the scandals? Not to mention the 22 months of the most relentlessly negative campaign in Canadian history, staged by Harper's Conservatives.

Part of it may be public turnoff from the daily battering of words like "corrupt," "corruption," "organized crime," "criminal conspiracy" and worse, spilling daily from the Conservatives, amplified by most of the media. Like battery acid, it's corroded the civility of our political culture and is driving voters away from the ballot box in droves.
But mostly it's because, furious as all Canadians are at Liberal sins, they remain terrified of Stephen Harper and the direction he would take the country.

Like the Bush Republicans, the Harper Conservatives set groups in society against each other. Like Bush Republicans, they govern for the secure and affluent, for the "have mores," as President George W. Bush once memorably described them. And like Margaret Thatcher, they don't believe in society, only in individuals.

Their idea of public policy, as a prominent New Democrat once put it, is to give everybody a bucket of gravel and tell them to go out and build a highway.

It sounds so democratic to give individuals money to "choose." But Conservative promises of taxable allowances and credits, for day care, for public transit passes, for private but not public pensions and for children's amateur sports, don't create public services available to all. They just help individuals with above average incomes. Taxable allowances and credits do nothing for people who don't pay taxes and little for people who earn a modest living.

The single mother working at Wal-Mart on minimum wage can't benefit from a taxable allowance for child care. She needs a subsidized child- care space, a space that won't be available. A tax credit for a bus or subway pass isn't any use to her either if she can't afford all that money at once or if there is no public transit to use. As for the tax credit for sports equipment, she needs it for food and rent.

Harper's $400 million for individual transit tax credits would be better used assisting municipalities to improve their public transit systems. His $1,200 per child taxable allowance is of no use if there is no quality child care to be bought at any price. And his $250 million for new child care spaces is conditional on those spaces being provided by business through tax credits, hardly comparable to the Liberals' universal national childcare program, modelled after universal public education.

The senior relying on the Canada Pension, Old Age Security and the Guaranteed Income Supplement is by definition worse off than the senior with a private pension. But the worse-off senior gets nothing from the Harper Conservative plan for tax credits for private pensions only.

Harper says his plan to station the military in big cities is to deal with natural disasters. But it has sinister connotations of a U.S.-style security state and is far more likely to be about social control.

As the gun violence currently plaguing Toronto illustrates, there is blowback from government policies designed to punish certain groups in society simply because they are disadvantaged. Toronto today is reaping the whirlwind that the former Conservative government of Mike Harris sowed when it slashed welfare rates by 22 per cent and terminated social housing. And Torontonians should take note that several former Harris cabinet ministers are running on the Harper ticket.
In addition to squandering billions on tax allowances and credits to well-off Canadians, Harper intends to cut the GST by two percentage points, transfer a substantial number of tax points to the provinces as he takes Ottawa out of national programs and further slashes personal and corporate incomes taxes.

Vancouver entrepreneur Jayson Kaplan recently returned to Canada from the U.S. In a letter posted on the Politics Canada website, Kaplan is urging his fellow Canadians to see the close similarities between Harper and Bush. He says Harper is using Bush's 2000 election strategy, allaying voter fears by promising to be a "compassionate" conservative, not to intrude the state into matters like abortion and only to spend "projected surpluses." Once in office, Bush did the exact opposite.

"Voting for Stephen Harper is like voting for George Bush," Kaplan writes. "The two are just too similar in their campaigns and their beliefs for it to be a coincidence."

FrancesRussell@mts.net

My Columns on Harper

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Canada
Federal Election
Politics
Conservatives
Stephen Harper

The First Attack Ads

In all the discussion about who will launch the first attack ads in this campaign everyone forgets it was the NDP who did so with their "The Gift" Give the Liberals The Boot ad. The y did it back before Christmas. And it was done right, with humour. Laughter is the most effective weapon because it ridicules rather than scares.

NDP `taking it up a notch' on airwaves

The NDP's first two English-language ads have only been gently negative, presenting lighthearted criticism of the governing party. The New Democrats' pre-Christmas ad, for example, reminded viewers that all the Liberals had given Canadians this holiday season was a lump of coal, but they'd given their Liberal friends big gifts. Then, it encouraged voters to turn around and give the Liberals "the boot" this holiday season. Although critical of the Liberals, its witty approach softened any blows.

But the boot is gone and gloves are off as the NDP prepare to launch two new attack ads. 19 Days and counting.

the New Democrats are set to release a pair of new ads, one that hammers the Liberals' record and another that pushes the NDP agenda as the only possible option for voters come Jan 23.

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Canada
Federal Election
media
NDP
Politics
Liberals

Gotcha!

Poor deluded Herr Patels he likes to call people names but can't take it when he is outed for his blogosphere political identity psychosis. But hey I got him to write about me again. Thanks Werner. He has however learned not to link to my website when he attacks me, as he did, again today in his blog item Clarifications

As Mark Twain once said; "Only kings, presidents, editors, and people with tapeworms have the right to use the editorial "we."

It appears that the singular author of Alberta Avenue has this problem and I don't think its' because he has tapworms. To be an editor means you actually have someone, other than yourself, to edit. So I will leave it to you dear reader, does this not sound like a case of multipleblog personality psychosis;

Eugene Plawiuk has attacked this online magazine and one of its authors claiming that AlbertaAvenue - The Voice of Alberta does not know where it stands.

This blog claiming to be an online magazine has only ONE author, poor deluded Werner.

He knows full well the Le Revue Gauche is a journal of Libertarian Communism, which is a school of poltical and philosophical anarchism, but he prefers in his haste to comment to shorten it to communist. Either that or he is red-baiting. Could it be? Say it ain't so, in this day and age!

This seems terribly disingenuous for a 'professional' translator of languages. He cannot even translate or even transliterate the term Libertarian Communist correctly. I will not be hiring him to do translations of any Marx or Hegel or heck even Gustav Landauer for me anytime soon. And perhaps this is why as a professional translator he has so much time on his hands.

His current attack on me of course clarifies nothing, it merely repeated his rambling illogic of why he supports the parties he does which I pointed out in my orginal article makes him a certified political opportunist at best or a certiriable nutbar at worst.

So I suggest that since he is planning to run for the Provincial Liberals he should resign immediately rather than wait, since all his blogging will come back to haunt him. Just like it did Klander and Stamp.

No, No, Werner don't thank me I just don't think you are ready to run for any party until you get over your political psychosis. And your overt fixation on gay politicians like Svend Robinson. Which you say is the reason you can't support the NDP......

In addition, we cannot condone their decision to put up an ex-con and jewel thief as a candidate, which goes against their repeated claims of fighting against thieves in government.

And he uses that royal 'We' thingee again just like Her Majesty.

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Canada
NDP
Alberta
Conservatives
blogs
Liberal

Tory TV Ad Unrealistic

At least one Blogging Tory has raised concerns that the Conservatives new set of attack ads on TV, may have been a boo boo considering the positive message ads the Liberals launched this week.

There are two Tory ads, one with a grim faced Paul Martin with messaging rolling over it.
The other TV ad is average Canadians in various public locales with a TV going on in the background announcing Liberal scandals. The first scene shows a TV announcement then zooms in on two guys in a Tim Hortons, ok maybe not a Timmys but a coffee shop, and low and behold in front of them is the Globe and Mail, with a headline on another Liberal scandal.

This is completely unrealistic no one in a Canadian coffee shop, or even a Timmies reads the Globe and Mail, they read the Sun. The Sun. It can be found in every major city in Canada including Toronto. The only people who read the Globe and Mail drink lattes at Starbucks, and even then they may be found reading the oversized edition of the Sun; the National Pest. Both papers are available at Starbucks.

Clearly this ad was made in Toronto by latte drinking liberals, out of touch with mainstream Canadian culture. Shame on the Tory's. They could have least brought in their resident expert, on all things Timmy, Monte Solberg to advise them. He would have immediately pointed out this flaw in their props.



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Canada
Federal Election
Politics
media
Conservatives
Stephen Harper