Good Riddance Not Goodbye

Two more Blogging Tories have left the building. Or at least in this case we hope they have. But like other BT bloggers I have posted about they threaten to return.
Damn shame too because they really are beneath contempt.

Of course I am speaking of Analouge (yes I know I mis-spelled it) whose foul mouthed contempt for all other bloggers is only matched by his anonmyass comments when he trolls.

The other is Peter Rempel whose site you have to see. I think his picture of the new PM says it all. Though don't expect it to be used by the Conservatives as a promo soon. It can be taken two ways. One is the juvenile nyah nyah of Rempelstiltskin or as a warning of what is too come from the Harper regime. Time will tell.

Well lets see who also abandons ship now that Gomery is done, Paul Martin has held his last photo op press conference.

The one Liberal blogger who left the building came right back in, the revolving door barely completed a turn. Warren Kinsella broke his promise to his wife. She ranks behind Jean Chretien in his books. Ouch.


Tags
Canada
blogs
Warren Kinsella
Conservatives
Blogging Tories

Blasphemy is in the Eye of the Beholder

I see a huge hue and cry going on in the MSM over the Danish cartoonist and his representations of Mohammed bin Laden.

Even the Blogging Tories, Post this cartoon and frighten a terrorist and the Progressive Bloggers are commenting about the Muslim outcry and censorship of what they are calling blasphemous representations of their prophet.

Islam bans any representation of G*D or his prophets. Which is why Islam developed a wonderful culture of architecture and abstract geometric art forms.

So with that in mind ANY representation, whether positive or negative of Mohammed, may his name be blessed, and A***h the merciful ,is BLASPHEMY.

It seems that fear of the Muslim masses has caused the usually staid and established European media to cringe at having masses of outraged muslims torch their buildings.




Muslims, that peaceful religion, like to hold mass rallies and do the "villagers meet Frankenstein" thing. Sorta like brownshirts during the 1930's. This is what religious ideology does, it inflames the souls of their followers, who believe that there is no higher power than their G*D.

Christian and Muslim alike suffer this particular evangelism, sometimes called fundamentalism. It means that man made laws, the social contract of society is less important than the BOOK.

Which is why this text is considered Blasphemy in Islam and great literature in the West.

Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam



In this recent case of the controversial cartoon Muslims are being forgiven for their outrage, and outrageous threats, cause they are minority religion.

They are a patriarchical belief system based on the Old Testament, which has been the basis of the modern state since Constantine. They are just a later adaption of Judeo-Christian monotheism.

Jews are a minority religion as well, one that has faced genocidal persecution for centuries by Christians and Christian States. As an outcast minority in 19th and 20th Century Europe, not unlike the Muslims of today but unlike them they faced annihilation at the hands of the Nazi's which reminds us of the damage ideology gone rampant can cause. Today they demand the State defend them against anti-semitism by using anti-hate laws. Something that Muslims should consider if they are so outraged.


Where Islam is the State this is how they treat religious minorities:
Christian faces death for 'blasphemy' Granted unprecedented final hearing before Pakistan Supreme Court


And in newly liberated Afghanistan, home of Americas newest Democracy, liberated by the U.S. army. Where Canadian troops hunt down the Taliban, and look for Osama bin Laden. Afghanistan where the Bush adminstration claimed they were going to free the Women of Afghanistan. Well it's still a muslim country.

AFGHANISTAN: Editor goes on trial for blasphemy

New York, October 11, 2005—The editor of a monthly magazine about women's rights went on trial today in Kabul's provincial court on blasphemy charges for publishing articles purported to offend Islam.

You see Christians sue, or write letters to the editor, or blog their outrage. But that is because they are the established religion of North America, Latin America and Europe. They are the state religion.

IS THERE A WAR AGAINST CHRISTIANITY IN AMERICA?

'Jesus Juice' gets
corked for good
Couple won't market wine with image some call blasphemous

---

Posted: December 22, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com

A wine called "Jesus Juice" that includes a label with the image of a Michael Jackson look-alike in a Christ-like position on a cross will not be marketed, now that the California media power couple behind the effort has decided to abandon the idea.

As WorldNetDaily previously reported, "Jesus Juice" merlot was the pet project of actress Dawn Westlake and veteran CBS Evening News producer Bruce Rheins, who covered the Michael Jackson child molestation case.

Rheins and Westlake registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office the name "Jesus Juice" in January of 2004, only two months after Jackson was arrested and several days after news sources reported that Jackson referred to the wine that he purportedly gave to minors as "Jesus Juice."

I find myself agreeing with Steve Janke at Angry in the Great White North when he says;

As for peace-loving Muslims who are offended, well, too bad. Being offended is the price of freedom. Be offended, but don't be frightened or terrorized. Get used to being offended. I feel offended at least three times a week by things I read and by the opinions I hear voiced. I write about it, I defend my point of view, I try to show where others are mistaken or duplicitous, but I never ask that people be silenced.


Blasphemy is liberation. It comes in many forms, mainly those challenging accepted ideas. The Devil's Dictionary It allows us to challenge the idiotic belief systems of authority and the establishment, whether the domain of the ivory tower or the church or the state.

Blasphemy? No, it is not blasphemy. If God is as vast as that, he is above blasphemy; if He is as little as that, He is beneath it.
- Mark Twain, a Biography

Now this is a site I like Positive Blasphemy

Also see:

The Need for Arab Anarchism

No Suitcases At Mecca

Antinominalist Anarchism

Gnostic Heresy Cries Vatican

Blasphemy

Gnostic Heresy in Islam

Tags
Censorship
blasphemy
cartoon
Islam
Mohammed
Danish
Europe

George Walker Liar

The pre-media release of the U.S. Presidents State of the Union Speech the other night focused on oil man George Bush announcing that 'America must overcome it's oil addiction', in particular oil from the Middle East.

It was a lie.

It made all the headlines pre and post STOU.Bush Acknowledges U.S. Reliance on Oil

It was a lie.

It made the blogs. It was a major focus of discussion.

It was a lie.

Like his father before him it was George W. Bush's 'read my lips' line of the night.

It was a lie.

Bush aides clarify statements about oil


Mideast Still a Player in Oil Markets

On Wednesday, Hubbard and Bodman acknowledged that Persian Gulf oil may, in fact, not be replaced at all, even if overall oil imports were to drop because of the increased availability of alternative motor fuels.

Bodman said the president's reference to a 75 percent replacement of Persian Gulf oil was "purely an example" of the kinds of reductions in overall imports that might be possible if U.S. demand for oil were reduced.

"It was not meant to suggest anything related to the politics of the situation. ... It was merely meant to give an example," Bodman added.

Hubbard, when pressed further, abandoned the suggestion that Middle East oil would be "replaced" as the president said. Instead, he said the oil savings would be "equivalent" to three-fourths of the projected imports from the Persian Gulf.

Bush running out of energy

Bush's focus on reducing the percentage of oil imported from the Middle East, which currently accounts for only about 17% of all US oil imports, even drew scorn from neo-conservative allies of the president. They have argued that the impact on global prices created by Washington's demand for oil - regardless of its origin - is what empowers and enriches Middle Eastern exporters, such as Saudi Arabia, that in their view contribute directly or indirectly to radical Islamist movements that threaten the US and Israel.

"It doesn't matter if we don't buy oil from the Middle East," Gal Luft, a co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, told the New York Times. If the US doesn't buy oil from the region, "someone else will, supporting the same regimes".

One commentator, the Washington Post's economics columnist, Steven Pearlstein, took a particularly cynical view of Bush's proposals. "Does anyone really believe that a president and vice president who became wealthy from their association with the oil and gas industry, who never failed to tout the industry line and who presided over the biggest transfer of wealth from consumers to industry in the history of mankind - that these same leaders will move us beyond a 'petroleum-based economy' to one based on 'wood chips, stalks or switch grass'?" he wrote, referring to Bush's description of the sources of cellulosic ethanol.

On the eve of Bush's address, the world's largest energy company, ExxonMobil, announced that it had set a record last year for profits among US companies - $36 billion - apparently as a result of skyrocketing oil and gas prices, as well as generous tax breaks and other subsidies promoted by Bush and the Republican-led Congress.

Tags
Bush
SOTU
America
Politics
President Bush
USA
oil
Middle East
State of the Union

Yo Ho Ho

While George Bush told America "not to worry" that the victory in Iraq was all but assured and the War on Terror was progressing he missed this little fact.

That the destabilization of the region has now, for the first time, made Iraq is a hotbed of piracy.

Iraq stood out "as a new world piracy hotspot," with 10 attacks in 2005 after none the year before.

"Opportunists whose main motivation is robbery and financial gain, and who use extreme violence towards crews in most cases perpetrate these attacks," the IMB report said.

Most of Iraq's attacks were on vessels anchored near the Basrah oil terminal and Umm Qasr off the country's southeastern coast, it said.

tags
Iraq
Bush
pirates
piracy

Gay Liberal Leader

I think Paul Martin pulled the ultimate Jean Chretien, exploding issue thingee when he announced on election night he was stepping down as Leader of the Liberals and the official opposition.

Like the Chretien Adscam which dominated his short lived reign as PM, now Paul has made the Liberal party news again. It's overshadowing the Harper victory with masses of media speculation on who will be running for the Liberal leadership. Clever.

The one successful tactic that worked for the Liberals in the whole election comes the night they lose.

Lots of speculation has dominated the political blogs, left, liberal and right. And frankly I could really care less.

But Adam Rawdwaski makes an interesting point in his National Pest column;

Last week, I got into an online debate with a fellow blogger about why urbanites are so obsessed with the Conservatives' position on gay marriage.

There's another reason for Harper to hurry up with this. To this point, the Liberals haven't been able to fully exploit gay marriage as a wedge issue because Paul Martin was himself unwilling to make a proper case for it. The next Liberal leader probably won't be so squeamish. If the Conservatives wait even until later in this parliament to hold the vote, they'll be handing him a ready-made cause to wrap himself around.

Which is why it is likely this guy will run for the Liberal leadership.



Brison getting calls to lead - Calgary Sun - 30 Jan 2006
Scott Brison mulls Liberal leadership run - Toronto Star - 29 Jan 2006
Brison says he's getting calls about running for Liberal ... - Canada.com - 29 Jan 2006

Tags
Canada
Liberals
Liberal Leadership
politics
Scott Brison

Seperated at Birth

In his State of the Union Address the other night U.S. President George Bush called for a ban on human cloning.Could this be the reason why?





"Tonight I ask you to pass legislation to prohibit the most egregious abuses of medical research, human cloning in all its forms, creating or implanting embryos for experiments, creating human-animal hybrids, and buying, selling or patenting human embryos," Bush said to a joint session of Congress (Bush speech text, 1/31). After the U.N. General Assembly 59th Session in March 2005 approved a nonbinding statement urging governments to ban all forms of human cloning, including cloning for embryonic stem cell research, Bush said, "I look forward to working with members of Congress to enact legislation to ban all human cloning in the United States" (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 3/9/05). Congress is considering at least six bills relating to embryonic stem cell research and human cloning (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 7/25/05).

President panders to anti-manimal lobby! Dr Moreau flees country in rage!

Tags

Bush
SOTU
cloning

Majority of Americans Defend Privacy

If you are innocent you have nothing to hide, so why worry about wire tapping.

Can we translate this stupid arguement into German so it can be put into context, complete with sound track of jack boots marching off to the Nuremburg rally.


Wenn Sie unschuldig sind, haben Sie nichts sich zu verstecken, so warum Sorge über Leitung das Klopfen.

There thats more like it.

However often it has been repeated at least Americans are not sucked in by it.

They oppose the illegal (and dare I say IMPEACH - able offense, a real impeachable offense, not like lying to the American public about a girl and a cigar, ) wiretapping of the Bush Administration.

NBC Wall St. Journal poll finds 53% oppose the warrantless wiretapping.

Tags

Bush
wiretapping
impeach
America

Workers Control Versus Trade Unions

Workers control of production is directly opposite of trades unionism. Trades or craft unionism attempts to secure work by limiting access to their trade or craft. Hence on a large industrial site you can not have multitasking or flexible work conditions as it would be a violation of a trades area of work.

Toyotaism created the modern form of multitasking which challenges even non-trades/craft industrial unions which still modeled themselves on the specialist does one job notion.

Toyotaism and self management models of team work orginated in the workers councils movements that arose during the Russian revolution and in Italy and Germany and later appeared in spontaneous workers revolts around the world through out the twentieth century.

Peter Drucker was one of those who recuperated this radical socialist idea for use as a modern management method. But the contradiction still occurs. When workers seize control of production, as I said here, they produce for the good of society not just shareholders. They also challenge the trades union model of production, by adapting flexible, work choices, rotational skills, and multitasking because it makes sense and it makes work easier.

This is what Zanon workers (made famous by the NFB film the Take) reported at a special meeting on Workers Control at the World Social Forum last week;

Under workers’ control, the workers’ assembly is now the maximum authority in the factory, and the workers themselves elect the ones who coordinate the work, decide upon all the in-goings and out-goings, makes decisions on employment, and so on. They also have a certain rotation in the factory so that everyone learns new abilities and knows how all the machines work, how the process of production functions, etc. Thus the productivity of the plant is being raised.

The situation they faced was that none of the three main trade union confederations in Argentina gave them any kind of support. But a key to the situation, as they explained, was the unity of the workers, not just in their own factory, but as a class. Therefore, they had gone to the other nearby factories to appeal for help and support and received a massive response.

Workers Self Management is also community self management, it means that the factory becomes a community insitution, with support from other workers and members of the communtiy where the workers live and work.

While these workers called for the nationalization of their plant, it is because we as a community have no other way of owning it under the current conditions of capitalism.

Something that even the free market libertarians understand is the limitation of capitalism as it exists today.

Tags
anarchism
socialism
unions
labour
Zanon
World Social Forum
workers councils
Libertarian
syndicalism

International Solidarity

Iran and Iraq are in the news, what is not in the news is the treatment that workers and their unions face under these regimes. A tip o the blog to Leftnews for this.

Iranian workers are in trouble

The state owned bus company and the Iranian government have colluded to raid the homes of Union executives and supporters, throwing their wives and children in jail. This is absolutely disgusting. Canadians have to support these workers in any way we can.

Trade Unionist murdered in Iraq

Alaa Issa Khalaf, a member of the Executive Board of the Baghdad branch of the mechanics union, and a prominent member of the recently created General Federation of Iraqi Workers, GFIW, has been killed. He was shot dead at around 7.30 am on January 25 by several unidentified men as he left for work from his home in Baghdad. In a letter to the authorities of the country, the ICFTU firmly condemned what it considers to be a targeted attack on a trade union activist.


Tags
labour
unions
strikes
murder
Iran
Iraq

The Gloves Are Off

Wow what a short honeymoon. Harper is still only a designated hitter, err PM, has no cabinet yet isn't sworn in and already King Ralph of Alberta has come out swinging. It gives new meaning to the Battle of Alberta. Calgary Premier against Calgary PM.

EDMONTON - The Alberta government is considering legislation that would no longer recognize the supremacy of the Canada Health Act, would allow doctors to practice medicine concurrently in the private and public systems and could open the door to for-profit hospitals operated by foreign corporations, the Edmonton Journal has learned.

The new Alberta Health Care Assurance Act, which Premier Ralph Klein insists will be tabled in the legislature this spring, replaces three existing laws, including the once-controversial Health Care Protection Act, known widely as Bill 11.

Some members of the government are worried Mr. Klein is deliberately testing the limits of the federal government, and that he will cause a rift between Alberta and the newly elected Conservative government.

In a worst-case scenario, Ottawa could cut some of the $2-billion in health transfers it sends to Alberta for public health services.

Blogging Tory Dissonance and Disrespect chortles with glee (what did you expect with a blog title like that) that Harper is between a rock and a hard place. He is hopeful of course that Harper will allow Klein to dismantle medicare in Alberta, which he and other rightwingers call a public monopoly.

I would rather have a public system (it's far from a monopoly there are hospitals, and health clinics as well as specialist services covered by medicare) than a private one any day.

The creation of the private utility monopolies/oligopolies with electrical deregulation in Alberta has meant increasing costs to consumers.Something we will look forward to if Klein gets his way with privatizing health care.

Specialists will move out of public hospitals to create competing services in the private sector. Which will not reduce wait times. Wait times main barrier to specialized care: study

A clear example is the abundance of private laser surgery eye clinics in Alberta. Ironically laser eye surgery was first developed in the Soviet Union, to reduce cataract operation wait times.

On the other hand the rational Blogging Tory Political Staples is worried about the Klein challenge to Harper and well he should be, it will be the first real crisis the new PM faces.

Klein likes to talk about how much money Alberta spends on healthcare, which is just behind Newfoundland in per person spending. But our healthcare still costs less than the privatized system south of the border costs each person! And as the Conference Board report on health care issued today says;

the findings demonstrate that "money is not the panacea in providing better health care. Spending larger sums of money does not necessarily translate into high performance. It is how the money is spent rather than how much, that appears to make the difference."

Also see:

Showdown at the OK Corral

Klein My Way Healthcare Reform

Klein Dares Harper

Beware the Boogey Man

Two Tier Alberta

Alberta Cowboys Hijack Health Care

Whose The Real Rodeo Clown

Tags
Canada
Alberta
Politics
Ralph Klein
Harper
Health Care
medicare
Privatization
Conservatives