When Hel Freezes Over

The federal government could hold consultations for up to five years before it finalizes new regulations for limiting greenhouse gas emissions, CBC News has learned.

Which the Tories had better hope happens.

Hel freezing over that is, since it is actually an arctic wasteland in Norse Mythology.

And last time I checked the Arctic was melting faster than the Tory focus groups meeting to discuss Harpers non- existent Green plan.

Tory government pays for focus-group research on environmental policy
Prime Minister Stephen Harper insists he doesn't govern by polls, but a leaked report indicates his government has been paying for research to see what Canadians think about the environment. Conservative plans for a new environmental policy - said to rely heavily on pollution-fighting measures rather than climate change - fall in line with what focus groups told researchers this summer.The report, prepared for senior officials by the Strategic Counsel and obtained by The Canadian Press, is a compilation of the views of 75 Canadians across the country.

Seventy Five Canadians will determine the environmental policy of Canada wonder who they were? Maybe these guys or these guys.

The report added that while people in the focus groups didn't feel a strong sense of urgency about environmental problems, the issue is potentially a powerful tool for the Tories in the next election.

Yep must have been these guys. Because they are right out of touch with the rest of Canadians.


So why worry if the arctic is melting right....

Even if 2006 is not a record-breaker, it will mark the fifth straight year of dramatic Arctic sea-ice declines. If the trend continues - and it's expected to - the summertime Arctic could be completely ice-free well before the end of the century, the Boulder researchers say. The change would open previously inaccessible shipping lanes but would be bad news for wildlife and native peoples who rely on the Arctic ice.

Let it melt. Because then you don't need a Green Plan when you have a plan to build a military industrial complex in the Canadian North......

Arctic meltdown

THE Arctic ice cap is melting at a rate that could allow routine commercial shipping through the far north in a decade and open up new fisheries. But a report for the US Navy seen by New Scientist reveals that naval vessels will be unable to police these areas.

But in 10 years' time, if melting patterns change as predicted, the North-West Passage could be open to ordinary shipping for a month each summer. And the Northern Sea Route across the top of Russia could allow shipping for at least two months a year in as little as five years.

The new routes will slash the distances for voyages between Europe and East Asia by a third, and open up new fisheries. The resulting boom in shipping could lead to conflicts, as nations try to enforce fisheries rules, prevent smuggling and piracy, and protect the Arctic environment from oil spills. To complicate matters, Russia and Canada consider their northern sea routes as national territory, while the US regards them as international waters.

Also See

Arctic

Environment

Rona Ambrose

Green Plan

Kyoto

Oil

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Freedom and Democracy Where?

In his speech today Georgie Porgie Terrorist Fighter promoted the same old worn out pre-emptive strike policy that was put in place five years ago, and ain't working. But it comes wrapped in a new cover.National Strategy for Combating Terrorism

The United States, says President Bush, is committed to advancing freedom and democracy as the alternatives to repression and radicalism. "We will take the side of democratic leaders and reformers across the Middle East," he says. "We will support the voices of tolerance and moderation in the Muslim world."Bush On Freedom Agenda

So what countries in the Middle East are now moderate Muslim democracies thanks to the U.S.

Jordan? Nope. Saudi Arabi? Nope Kuwait? Nope. Dubai? Nope. UAE? Nope. Oman? Nope. Baharain? Nope. All of them are repressive regimes and allies of the Americans.

Iraq and Afghanistan are dysfunctional so to call them democracies is laughable.

Iran had democratic elections, as did Lebanon and Palestine. But they unfortunately keep electing enemies of Israel that other repressive democractic state in the Middle East.

And Egypt well they have democracy if you call it that, like Morrocco they ban opposition parties and newspapers.

Yep the US sure is doing a bang up job bringing liberty, freedom and democracy to the Middle East. Sure is helping all those reformers their Petro allies keep jailing.


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Post 9/11 The Real Tragedy

Lung Problems Plague 9/11 Workers
Study: Nearly 70% Of Ground Zero Workers Had Respiratory Issues
Findings highlighted by the study include:

Almost 70 percent of World Trade Center responders had new or worsened lung symptoms after the attacks.

Among responders who had no health symptoms before the attacks, 61 percent developed lung symptoms while working on the toxic pile.

One-third of those tested had abnormal lung function tests.

Thanks to the Bush Regimes EPA refusal to do a hazards assessment, those who went to clean up were not warned of the toxic hazards. And in fact Bush himself was the poster boy for how safe it was, when he stood on the rubble of the WTC without Personal Protective Equipment...Respirator, etc.

Five years later; Chickens, Home, Roost.

9/11: Katrina Started at Ground Zero

Here's how it worked: First, Karl Rove and George Bush saw an opportunity -- mounting the pile of World Trade Center rubble -- for a public-relations coup in devastated Manhattan that could instantly reverse the President's distinctly unpresidential day on 9/11 and his administration's previously weak polling numbers. Second, Washington pushed New York Mayor Rudolf Giuliani and local officials to get with the program and re-open Wall Street (which the 9/11 attacks had shut down) faster than was advisable. Third, city officials were told by administration emissaries that, despite the pall hanging over Ground Zero, all was well with the air and water in lower Manhattan and normal life should resume.

Finally, although nearly the entire city could, for months to come, smell the rancid co-mingling of burning plastics, asbestos, lead, chromium, mercury, vinyl chloride, benzene, and scores of other toxic materials as well as decaying human flesh, Bush's appointees in the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) continually bombarded city officials with reports claiming that the air was certifiably "safe" to breathe. As EPA Administrator Christy Whitman put it, "There's no need for the general public to be concerned." To this day we do not know the extent of contamination or level of exposure to which residents, workers, and students in the area were (and are still being) subjected.

Everyone got on the band wagon: the President mounted the pile of rubble without respiratory protection, signaling to firemen, policemen, and volunteers that he-men shouldn't worry about the towers having become a toxic waste-pile the likes of which the developed world hadn't seen since Chernobyl. Under the goading of EPA officials, even the venerable New York City Department of Health (despite internal dissention) began proclaiming lower Manhattan safe for the return of residents. (At that time, Lower Manhattan's congressional representative Jerrold Nadler was arguing that it was still dangerously toxic.) The Board of Education, feeling the heat from the Giuliani administration -- in turn, reacting to pressure from Washington -- ordered schools just a few blocks from Ground Zero reopened and thousands of students were sent back to the neighborhood.

Also See:

War

Bush

9/11

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Say It Ain't So

Afghanistan is falling back into the hands of the Taleban, a report by an international think-tank has claimed.

The Senlis Council has blamed international forces for failing to achieve stability and security.

The Senlis Council, which provides advice on foreign policy, security and development, claims nothing has been done to address widespread poverty in Afghanistan.

Its report, Afghanistan Five Years Later: The Return of the Taleban, says that the Taleban have a strong psychological and de facto military control over half of the country.

"Nato is caught in a trap in a way. They are faced with a deteriorating situation, they cannot do the core job of helping reconstruction," Emmanuel Reinert, executive director of the Senlis Council, said.

Opium war 'making enemies

British and US efforts to decimate the opium industry in Afghanistan have "hijacked" nation-building attempts in the country, and are driving support for the Taliban, a report said today.

The highly critical study of the five years since the US-led invasion found that Afghans are starving to death despite international donor pledges and that the foreign military presence was "fuelling resentment and fear" among the local population.

The report, by the Senlis Council, an international policy thinktank, said that the US-led international community had "failed to achieve stability and security" in the war-torn country and that attacks were perpetuated on a daily basis.

Of course Opium helps fuel that armed resistance.......as it did with the War against the Soviet Union.....

Commentary: Pakistan fuels Taliban's resurgency

Some of the opium bounty greases the relays for Taliban to operate in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas, which Pakistan also denies despite having lost at least 700 soldiers fighting Taliban and their al-Qaida allies in these same areas.
Since the liberation of Afghanistan in November 2001, the area under opium cultivation has grown by almost 60 percent to 400,000 acres. And this despite draconian eradication campaigns by Britain and the United States. Now well over half the country's GDP is derived from narcotics trafficking. Warlords and drug lords -- frequently one and the same -- are represented surreptitiously in President Hamid Karzai's central government, which also includes a minister for "counternarcotics."
Taliban's resurgency in southern Afghanistan has impacted five provinces where crop substitution was abandoned to the exigencies of counter-guerrilla operations. Taliban also encourages poppy farming for levied protection.

And why is that....perhaps because the Taliban and bin Laden Inc. are hiding in the terrorist state next door...

General Pervez Musharraf, the Pakistani president, will also visit Kabul on Wednesday for anti-terrorism talks with Karzai. Fighters cross between Afghanistan and Pakistan through their porous 2,450-km-long border. The two neighbours routinely accuse each other of not doing enough to stamp out attacks along the frontier where Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda and Taliban fugitives are believed to be hiding.

And of course he will bring good news with him.....that the Pakistani government has negotiated a truce with the Taliban..in the Northwest....allowing the Taliban to reinforce their troops in the Southeast of Afghanistan......yep NATO is screwed......

The Pakistani government and pro-Taliban fighters have agreed a deal aimed at ending five years of conflict in Waziristan on the Afghanistan border.
Hundreds of Pakistani troops and pro-Taliban fighters have been killed in the government's attempt to assert its authority in Waziristan as part of the US-led "war on terror". Under the agreement, the pro-Taliban forces have agreed to stop attacks both in Pakistan and in Afghanistan.

Pakistan Backs Taliban, al-Qaeda in Afghanistan: ANP

He said with agreement the Taliban operative in tribal areas were given free hand to carry out disruptive acts in Afghanistan. After the agreement, the Taliban would boldly launch insurgencies in Afghanistan. He said: "Pakhtun of Pakistan will never accept such series of current violence should be on in Afghanistan."

Also See:

Pakistan

Afghanistan

War

Opium





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A Murder of Crows in Canada's Murder Capital

One crow for sorrow,
Two crows for joy,
Three crows for a girl,
Four for a boy,
Five crows for silver,
Six crows for gold,
Seven crows for a secret never to be told.

When you have more than one crow, as in a flock of crows they it is called a " murder of crows."

Crows and ravens have often been popular symbols of evil and death. They play the part nicely and are quite appropriatly dressed. They are of course scavengers and so tend to hang around dead creatures (a gathering of crows, by the way, is called a murder). Their racous caws are considered omens of death in folklore. If crows gather or caw in the vicinity of a house it is expected someone will die there soon

This summer has been a real crow one. Crows everywhere. Can't remember the last time we had this many crows around. Now crows of course are carrion birds who hang around the dead.

Crows, and especially ravens, often feature in legends or mythology as portents or harbingers of doom or death, because of their dark plumage, unnerving calls, and tendency to eat carrion. They are commonly thought to circle above scenes of death such as battles.

So perhaps it is appropriate that this summer was one that had a murder of crows abounding in Murder City.

Edmonton leads nation in homicides

Coincidence? I think not.

Edmonton had 44 homicides, 10 more than in 2004. This resulted in Edmonton having the highest homicide rate among all CMAs, at 4.3 per 100,000 population. Edmonton's rate was its highest since 1981, when CMA statistics were first collected.

The crows hang around where the dead are. And this years homicide rate in Edmonton remains high.

By this time last year, there were 22 homicide cases in the city of Edmonton, including the slayings of pregnant mother Liana White, 29; convenience store clerk Dilbag Singh Sandhu, 29; infant Alexis Grant; and cab driver Hassan Mohammed Yussuf, 41. This year, there have been only 14 cases, five of which have been solved. Eight homicide victims were shot to death, four stabbed, one beaten and the cause of one victim's death has not yet been released. Edmonton area homicide capital

And we are experiencing a serial murderer killing the cities inner city prostitutes Along with vehicular homicide that makes Edmonton sound just like LA.
Teen charged with second-degree murder after road-rage incident


Of course Crows and Ravens are the colour of death and Anarchy.
And they are anarchistic in their practices of mutual aid.


The Corvids - crows, ravens, jays, magpies and jackdaws, are the Einsteins of the bird family; no other birds even come close to matching their intelligence. Crows live in close knit family groups. They communicate -- some 23 distinct patterns of caws have been interpreted -- and they cooperate with each other.

Not only amongst themselves but in relation to carnivores. It has been reported that ravens will circle prey for wolves in the North. Working as air reconnisance, and eating the left overs of the wolves kill.

Ravens should not be confused with Crows. They are smarter, larger and have apparently told one journalist; 'Nevermore'





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NATO Lies

So who is telling the truth here....hmmmm, certainly not NATO.

A deadly two days

NATO officials insisted the continuing operation has been a success, saying an estimating 200 Taliban rebels had been killed and 80 captured. The Afghan Defence Ministry earlier put the number of rebel deaths at 89, adding there also had been some civilian casualties.

The Taliban dismissed the NATO claims as wildly exaggerated.

"They are saying that they have killed 200 Taliban, but they did not kill even 10 Taliban," said Mullah Dadullah, the Taliban military commander for south and southeastern Afghanistan.

"They are just destroying civilian homes and agricultural land. They are using the media to do propaganda against the Taliban," Dadullah said.

Also See:

Friendly Fire

Afghanistan

War





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Canadian Death Toll In Afghanistan

For those who are keeping track, and who isn't, espcially those of you with office pools here is a break down of who has killed our troops in Afghanistan.

Total killed: 33

Killed by Taliban or Insurgents: 10

Suicide Bomber: 5

Accidents: 13
(including land mine explosions often misidentified as 'roadside bombings' in the press)

Killed by Friendly Fire/American Air Force: 5


It's a tie between suicide bombers and Americans bombing us.

And we have had more accidental deaths then deaths at the hands of the Taliban.

Accidents and Friendly Fire have killed more Canadian troops than the Taliban and suicide bombers. And half those accidents were from landmines.

Afghanistan is one of the heaviest mined countries in the world. In spite of eight years of intensive mine clearance, in 1999 only 146 square kilometers of mined area have been cleared. An area of 713 square kilometers remains to be cleared. Landmines kill or maim an estimated ten to twelve people each day in Afghanistan. It is believed that almost 50 percent of landmine victims die due to lack of medical facilities.

This is a really succesful mission so far. For instance this weekends big push against the Taliban resulted in five more Canadian soldiers deaths. Three by the Taliban, one by American friendly fire, one in a plane crash (accident).

The monument to Canadian soldiers who've died on duty in Afghanistan since 2002, situated outside of the Canadian headquarters at Kandahar airfield
Photograph by : CP PHOTO/Murray Brewster

Also See:

Friendly Fire

Afghanistan

War





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Deja Vu

US error kills Canadian, stalls attack on Taliban
PANJWAI DISTRICT, AFGHANISTAN -- Canadian soldiers were minutes away from launching an attack against the Taliban when a US warplane mistakenly fired on them yesterday, killing one soldier, injuring more than 30 others and forcing a pause in the Canadian ...

Gee when have we heard this before oh yeah at the begining of the war in Afghanistan.

Invasion of Afghanistan (2002): 4 (13%) *note* fatalities were Canadian Soldiers, not American. Caused when a US fighter pilot dropped a 500 lb (228 kg) bomb while Canadian soldiers were performing a live fire exercise on April 17, 2002 [1]

Of course it is difficult to tell our troops apart from the Taliban.

So for short sighted US Air Force Pilots here is a clip and paste for their dashboard.

Taliban














Canadians















Also See:

Friendly Fire

Afghanistan

War





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