Extreme weather events have always been with us and they will always be with us in future. We cannot do very much about them...

And for all those hysterical folks who like to shout that the "sky is falling" everytime there is a thunderstorm (we did have those before all this "global warming" hysteria, you know) there is this piece in the Star (of all places!) that does a good job of debunking some of the weather/climate hysteria the media is obsessed with.

It seems that every time there is a storm (or flood, or fire, or whatever) the news people can't wait to start yammering on about the "extreme" weather we are having and how it is getting worse all the time, and scientician X says its all because of scary global warming, and its only gonna get worse, so BE AFRAID!...What they don't ever do is actually go back and, you know, look at the facts...instead of relying some "climatologist" and their computer models (um, models don't actually "prove" anything, especially when modelling something as complex and variable as the earth's climate & weather patterns).

The simple fact is that "extreme" weather has always been wih us, and always will...

"No longer will the key to Ottawa be who do you know. We are going to condemn to history the practice and the politics of cronyism."

That was from a speech given by our Prime Minister in 2004. And how does Paul Martin show us that he has indeed vanquished the scourge of cronyism from the Canadian political scene? Well, with those brave words still ringing in our ears, he promptly appoints to the senate, well, more of his political cronies.

If I look in the dictionary for the word “hypocrite” is it true I will see a picture of Paul Martin? Or would that picture be beside rottenlyingshitswallowingbastard?

I mean, come on. Is appointing to the senate people who worked on your leadership campaign really the way to signal to the Canadian public that you have “condemned to history the practice and politics of cronyism”? Does Paulie not realize that words and actions are, indeed, connected, and that when he makes pious sounding promises like this that his actions when in office should actually reflect these ideals?

Another thing that PM & company have blathered about is reducing the level of cynicism in the Canadian electorate - what with every election producing a lower voter turnout than the last - especially among the younger crowd. Well, do you think that actions like this might have something to do with it?? Can you blame people for being cynical and thinking that politicians are nothing more than bloated windbags whose every breath is used to utter the lies they think the public wants to hear in order to get elected – especially when their actions once in office are so blatantly at odds with those lies?

At this point, if I got a call from Paul Martin telling me that it was all blue skies today, I’d be packing my umbrella.

Goodbye Gaza

The big news over the last couple of weeks has been the Israeli pullout from Gaza. Personally, I can’t see why on earth they would have wanted to be there in the first place – 9000 Jews surrounded by an implacably hostile 1.3 million Palestinians. I’ve heard/read quotes from settlers decrying the pull out, since the land is “theirs” through some ‘biblical’ right – which just goes to show that the Islamoid death cult that has grown up in the Palestinian territories is not alone in rearing religious zealots.

Leaving aside the ongoing debate over whether the Israeli’s were right to be there or not, it will certainly be interesting to see what the Palestinians do now that they have been given control. Will they actually work to build a functional society (which would require them to stop preaching hatred and focusing on jew-bashing and incitement to martyrdom in their schools), or will Gaza essentially become one big terrorist staging area? It would be nice to see the former, but I have the uneasy feeling that the latter is more likely – especially given some of the rhetoric already coming out of Gaza: this is a victory, terrorism works (or words to that effect)…doesn’t sound to me like the words of people intent on getting on with the tough job of (re) building a functional society…

For example, from The Globe today (in a story about Hamas claiming 54% of the terrorist attacks in Gaza:

“Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said the figures “are a document of Hamas' struggle and Hamas' role in liberating this precious part of the homeland.”
“They show that “resistance is the Palestinians' strategy of choice,” Mr. Abu Zuhri said.
“It made this victory possible, and this victory can be repeated,” he said, referring to Israel's Gaza withdrawal.”

The “this victory can be repeated” sounds pretty ominous, doesn’t it? Doesn’t quite like they are looking at this as an opportunity to build – more like, flush with a sense of victory, they are looking to keep blowing stuff up (and people) – and when will that stop?

PM's trip aimed at soothing West

Oh, now there is a laughable headline...followed by a laughable article in the Star that details how PM & the gang are going to tackle the issue of Western alienation by - wait for it - holding some meetings out west. Wow. That'll just about do it, won't it? Those pesky westerners will hardly be able to resist the charms of the Liberals if PM & the gang are so willing to grace them with their august presence, right?

Yep - thats the way to put and end to that growing sense of alienation and disengagement...why bother listening to the ideas coming out of the west, or getting to know how this sector of the Canadian populace thinks? Just cloister yourself in a hotel with the Liberal caucus, pose for a few photo ops at some nice spots, and emerge from the conference room every now and then to throw out an announcement or two - and remember, those Western folk like things big, so make sure every announcemnent has a nice big price tag attached to it - yeah, that'll impress them!

Goodale told CTV's Question Period on Sunday the caucus and cabinet sessions are "a real, tangible demonstration that we are in touch, and we do get it, and we want to be a close ally of Western Canada."

In fact, I would argue the opposite, that holding a couple of meetings in cities west of Ontario does not show that you are "in touch" or that you "get it" - it just shows how out of touch you really are - that you expect people to be so star struck by the fact that the PM & his cronies (er, or the Liberal Cabinet as they like to be called) have bothered to show their faces west of the Ontario Manitoba border, that all the demonizing of the West, all the redneck cracks, all the "intolerant bigot" comments will just be forgotten? You expect people to forget the fact that the West is pretty much ignored 90% of the time (except at election time, when they make a half hearted effort to win a seat or two)? I mean, really - an asteroid could hit Edmonton, and the Liberals might, just might, make a trip out to inspect the damage - but only so long as none of the fallout happened to fall on blessed Quebec - because heaven forfend if any Quebecer was inconvenienced by this disaster! Why, that might aid the separatists! All hands on deck!

And yeah, they may be playing nicey nicey now, but just wait till the election rolls around - then watch how long it will take for their understanding of "Western alienation" to go out the window...and then we'll all start to here the same old themes about the scary "conservatives" (you know, that vast westernrightwingintolerantbigotredneck party)...then we'll see just how much the Liberals "get it"...

The new GG

To be honest, I haven't given the new Governor General nominee much thought, apart from thinking 'oh well, here's another cynical political appointment made by Paul Martin, that has nothing to do with appointing someone genuinely qualified, but someone who has been picked to give the Liberals some kind of politcal advantage, and who can give the Liberals a crutch to stand on in Quebec...'....um, well, I guess maybe I did give it a little thought...

Anyway, Madam Jean appears to have been picked for no other reason than that comes from Quebec and fits into the Liberal's utopian vision of the "new" Canada - look! she speaks 5 languages! She's a Haitan immigrant! She's a CBC broadcaster (virtually unknown outside of Quebec)! She may or may not have had seperatist leanings in the past...oops, better keep a lid on that one, eh?

None of this, of course, makes her remotely qualified to be the Queen's representative in Canada, but I guess that does not matter. Other countries fill the position of head of state with persons of accomplishment, people with a broad awareness of the nations history (and constitution). But Canada? Looks like if you work for the CBC, your all set - Rideau Hall awaits!

As usual Andrew Coyne has the best write up on the issue...

Three Car Bomb Attacks Kill 43 in Baghdad

"Three car bombs exploded near a bus station and hospital in Baghdad Wednesday, killing at least 43 people and wounding 89 in the deadliest attacks in the capital in weeks, police said. Survivors searched charred buses and cars for signs of relatives."

I'm waiting to hear the howls of outrage from the angry young muslim crowd (and their gushing sympathizers - see the post below - on the Left). but, oh, wait - its not Americans or Brits who did the bombing & killings here, so I guess it doesn't angry up the blood in the same way...

Its all our fault (blaming the war in Iraq part II)

That seems to be the message in Naomi Klein’s latest piece over at the Guardian. Its always impressive that someone who has enjoyed the benefits of Western civilization can loathe it so much.

Anyway – Ms. Klein seems to be twisting herself into knots here to show that at the root of all that nasty anti-western terrorism we face is of course, our racism. To prove this point, she pulls together several different strands and attempts to tie them together to show that terrorists in London are blowing stuff up because of our extreme racism. Hmmm…interesting….

And just how does she tie all this up? Well, to start, she takes a reported statement by one of the failed bombers from July 21 – that he and his buddies prepared for their little outing by watching films on the war in Iraq – of women and children being “exterminated” by Americans and British. Of course she takes this at face value. Me, I am a little skeptical of these types of sentiments – as I’ve posted previously, it’s the Islamist nutters (ne ‘insurgents’) who are killing the bulk of women and children right now (you know, the brave souls who drive a car bomb into a crowd of children, who kidnap diplomats and workers, who blow up schools & mosques). So why would these lads feel the need to strike out at commuters in London? I realize that American and British hands are not clean here, that there are of course still civilians being killed, but the daily horrors, the daily bombings, kidnappings, beheadings, etc – these are acts being carried out by co-religionists in the name of their religion…so to me, all this “we are striking out at the west because of the suffering in Iraq” always sounds like nonsense spouted by people who are looking for the easy justification for their own violent actions (and its also the line that the lefties among us are so keen to hear and applaud).

And not to get off on a tangent, but where was all this righteous anger when Sadaam was filling mass graves all over the country like he was planting flower gardens? Why weren’t assholes like the London bombers strapping dynamite to their chests and blowing Saddam and his supporters up to stop the slaughter of the innocents? And for that matter, why aren’t they right now marching into Syria to stop the torture? Why aren’t they righteously demanding that the insurgent stop targeting ordinary Iraqi’s? Right – because its much easier to blame the West (since we are evil and jam packed with infidels to boot!).

Back to Naomi for a moment – she also brings up Sayyid Qutb – an Egyptian writer who is seen as the intellectual (if you can call it that) “architect of radical political Islam”. Apparently the puritanical Qutb had his delicate sensibilities disturbed while studying in the US in 1948. Apparently Quttb was shocked by both the licentious women and America’s fanatical racial discrimination.

To back this claim, she states:

” By coincidence, Qutb arrived in the United States in 1948, the year of the creation of the state of Israel. He witnessed an America blind to the thousands of Palestinians being made permanent refugees by the Zionist project.”

This bit about Palestinians being made ‘permanent refugees’ disturbs me. Is she suggesting that in 1948 people knew that the Palestinians were going to be held up as cynical pawns in the Arab world’s ongoing war against Israel for the next 60 years? Is she suggesting that the Americans somehow knew that the Palestinians were being made into permanent refuges by their own Arab brethren who will not allow them to settle in any other Arab country and become citizens because it plays much better to world sympathies to be able to hold up the poor Palestinian refugees as evidence of the evil of the state of Israel? No, she couldn’t be suggesting that, could she? Nonsense. The only reason the Palestinians are “permanent refugees” is because the Arab world has wanted them that way.

I always find it annoying that the Palestinians are held up to be the people who have suffered the most in human history. Yes, about 7-800,000 were made refugees when the state of Israel was declared. And lets not forget that the bulk of them were encouraged to leave by their Arab neighbours, with the promise that they would return as soon as Israel was wiped off the map by their invading armies. Oops. Little miscalculation there.

Also lets not forget that at the same time 7-800,000 jews were evicted from the neighbouring Arab states. Don’t here too much about those refugees, do you? Oh right, that’s because they settled in Israel and got on with life rather than focusing their energies on creating a death cult built upon a never ending cycle of grievances and paranoid fantasy.

Do you hear much from the millions (that’s millions of actual refugees, not millions of descendents of the original thousands) of German refugees from WWII? Should the millions of Germans evicted from the east stand up now and claim their right of return – should they march back to Konigsburg (now Kaliningrad) and the other former territories of East Prussia? Should they kindly ask Poland to move a few hundred kilometers to the East? No, because rather than spend 60 years wallowing in the past, the people affected have MOVED ON.

A little bit of a tangent there, but that kind of historical blindness always tends to tick me off.
__
Anyway, Klein’s other main point is that we are racist because we have the belief that American and European lives are worth more than the lives of Arabs and Muslims. Well, perhaps that’s because we value life more – if the arabs and muslims who celebrate suicide bombers as heroes and perpetuate a bizarre death cult mentality don’t value their lives, how are we supposed to?

Fixed for a generation?

Saw an article in the Post this morning which captures the state of Canadian health care in a nutshell – confusion reigns! Apparently there was a poll (surprise, surprise, in the land of government by public opinion poll) which showed that there is some level of confusion regarding the perception of the Canadian health care system versus the reality. Apparently, since the politicians keep telling us that we have the bestest health care system ™ in the world, and that the solution to all that ails us is to throw more public money in, we, well, believe them.
The reality is slightly different. Seems that when polled, Canadians consistently rated our healthcare system far above its actual world ranking for a number of measurable outcomes or characteristics. We actually ranked quite poorly in some of these areas, yet the perception reflected in the poll was that we were doing quite well when stacked up against the rest of the developed world.
If anything, this poll (and the reality) shows that what we need in this country is more open and honest debate about health care, and less useless rhetoric. Politicians always reach for the lowest common denominator in any type of health care debate, wrapping themselves in the flag and solemnly vowing to protect us from the scourge of two tier medicine. I, for one, would like to hear less of this and more real discussion – discussion and debate that includes all the options available to alleviate the crisis conditions in the system, not just more stale rhetoric about throwing another $20 or 30 or 40 billion into the hole and calling that a fix. And yes, that open and honest debate has to include exploration of private care and how it can be utilized to relieve pressure on the public system and provide a much needed injection of cash (forgotten, it seems, in all the rhetoric, is the fact that publicly funded private delivery is one of the cornerstones of our system – since every doctor is not a government employee, and who do you think pays to set up their offices & clinics??? Um, that’s right, they do…).
The sooner the politicos realize that all their rhetorical flourishes and windy speechifying about “public” health care do more harm than good, the sooner we can start putting the health care system in Canada back on its feet – and who knows, if we inject some intelligent discussion and debate, and then act rationally on it, reality may just catch up with our perceptions.
Wouldn’t that be something?

Play ball!

Well, since there is not much happening on the Canadian political scene I’ll have to start shifting gears more if I want to actually continue to update this blog…

So – how about those Blue Jays? After last year’s disastrous campaign I had very low expectations for the Jays, especially after Carlos Delgado, their best hitter, took his big bat down to Florida. With no big name (or big bat) to replace him in the middle of the order, it looked like the Jay’s offense would take a big nose-dive, and winning any more than the 67 games they chalked up in 2004 was going to be a challenge.

Needless to say, this scrappy version of the Blue Jays in 2005 has impressed me. They manage to keep bouncing back, and they have shown some real grit when playing the top teams in the league. If they had managed to show that same grit when playing some of the league’s lesser lights (Tampa Bay Devil Rays, anyone?), then they would perhaps be looking down on the rest of the division from a playoff perch even as we speak. But that’s baseball (and sports in general) for ya – if everything happened the way it was “supposed” to happen, there would not be much point in playing the season out would there?

Anyway – if I had to give them a rating, I’d have to give the 2005 Blue Jays a solid B+ to this point in the season. They’ve been competitive in most games, and above all, entertaining. If they had had some reliable starting pitching (apart from Halladay & Chacin)…well, wouldn’t that be nice?

Some of the hi-lights:

Reed Johnson – should get more playing time. Period.

Aaron Hill – the kid came up to fill in for the injured Cory Koskie and proceeded to tear up the league – he has dropped off some recently, but he’s put up better numbers than Mr. Koskie in fewer at bats (especially RBIs)

Russ Adams – has gone on a tear since being slotted into the lead-off spot. Still a little shaky on defence (he’s closing in on 20 errors), but he’s having a solid rookie campaign.

Vernon Wells – back in the dark days of May it looked like Vernon had taken a huge step backwards, but he really turned things around…

Shea Hillenbrand – good pick up by JP. Came out of the gate on fire, and has since come down a little, but he’s been fairly consistent all season – and versatile – playing 1st, 3rd and dh’ing.

The bullpen – can’t say enough about this group – they’ve kept the Jays afloat in many games. Given the Jay’s thin starting pitching, and you can see where this has been no easy task on some nights.

Room for improvement:

Eric Hinske – the former rookie of the year needs to step up his game. Flashes of power seem to be followed by weeks of feeble groundouts and hitting nothing but air. Can’t argue with Gibbon’s decisions to have Hinske riding pine in favour of guys like Hill & Hillenbrand…

Alex Rios – 7 home runs to date is a start…but for a corner outfielder you expect a little more pop (and the ability to drive in a few runs…49 RBI to date just doesn’t cut it)…now, he’s still young, but he is going to have to step it up a bit for the rest of the year (and next)…

Frank Menechino – the super sub – he has come through with some big hits, but for the life of me I can’t figure out how he gets into some games – apart from the fact that he bats right-handed. I can’t help but shake my head when I see his name in the lineup at DH for some games.

Starting pitching – apart from Halladay (when healthy) and Chacin – its been a pretty mixed bag. Some of the kids have come through all right, but they have also put lots of pressure on the bullpen (lucky for them, the guys in the ‘pen have risen to the challenge).

Cory Koskie – the big free agent signing – he’s always been injury prone, and whadayaknow? This season has proven no different. Even before going on the DL he was not exactly tearing up the league, and since he’s been back, he has been unable to get into a groove. Lets hope he can turn things around.

So – with a little under a third of the season remaining the Blue Jays have been a pleasant surprise. Lets hope they can keep it up…

Back to the beginning...

So, they decided to hit the reset button and go back to the very beginning with the latest Batman movie. This is not a bad thing, considering how bad things had gotten with Joel Schumacher's campy, neon lit, nipples on the batsuit and massive cod-pieces version. So going back to the beginning, with a darker vision, was probably the best way to go, to reset things and get back to the Dark Knight type of Batman.

The question, of course, is 'does it work?' And I would have to say....sort of. Batman Begins was really a mixxed bag for me. This re-telling of the origin of Batman provides a decent examination of the psychology behind a man dressing up as a bat and chasing criminals around Gotham, and also does a credible job showing how developed his incredible skills - training with the ninjas on some remote far-Eastern mountain top. I'd always kind of wondered where Batman became such a skilled warrior - what with his ability to take on numerous well-armed adversaries without taking so much as a scratch - and this film does a good job of showing exactly how this came to be.

Its when Batman comes back to Gotham and starts excercising these incredible skills where the film falls down. Its all well and good to see the tortured soul of Bruce Wayne, but its also nice (especially in a comic book movie) to see some decent action. Too bad the action scenes in this film are about the worst you can imagine. Director Christopher Nolan has chosen to have all of them done in close-ups that make it impossible to tell what is actually happening - something that I personally find to be kind of annoying. Not that I want to see blood and gore, or expect Batman to suddenly become Neo and start kicking Agent Smith ass all over the screen, but in any film I, as the viewer, do appreciate being able to actually see what is happening. Isn't this what going to the movies is about? And when you have to wade through so much dark, brooding Bruce Wayne bullshit only to have the Batman kicking ass scenes reduced to a jerky camera and some sound effects...well, thats less than satisfying, isn't it?

So - overall, we have a dark film that gets the viewer into the psychology behind Bruce Wayne's donning of the cape and cowl, but which fails to deliver with the action that a comic book movie needs -and lets not forget that despite all the darkness and psychology this is still a 'comic book' movie. A little humour to lighten the tone a tad might also be in order. All that being said, I did think the movie was ok - not that I would rush out to see it again or anything, but it shows some promise, and was an intersesting take on a familiar story.

Overall - I'd give this a 6.5/10....there is plenty of room for improvement in the inevitable sequel...

The war in Iraq made me do it!

So, the easy way out now seems to be to blame everything on the “war in Iraq”. Plant a bomb on the London Subway? Why, you did it to protest the war in Iraq! Never meant to actually “kill” anyone, just to scare people, and you know, planting bombs is an accepted form of protest nowadays, don’t ya know. Um, and packing these ‘non-lethal’ bombs with nails and nuts & bolts, well, that certainly enhances the non-lethal protest, doesn’t it?

Frankly, I am getting a little tired of hearing this. The “war in Iraq” is being used by the Left as some kind of justification for Muslim anger (especially amongst those poor disaffected Muslim youth in the West), and the crutch everyone reaches for when discussing the “root causes” of terrorism. Frankly I am not buying this. Its very easy to say that you are motivated by the “war in Iraq”, but what does that really mean? Does it mean that you are angered by the ongoing slaughter of innocent Iraqis? Well, in that case, why direct your protest bombing at commuters in London?

Lets look at the actual facts – yes, Iraqi’s are being bombed and killed daily – by the brave Islamic insurgents who are bent on…well, what do they want? To kill Americans, to be sure. To blow things up, certainly, since this is the only talent they seem to display. But to build anything apart from bombs? Doesn’t look like it. So – Islamic militants are slaughtering Iraqis daily (driving cars packed with explosives into crowds of children, hiding in Mosques & schools, blowing up police and army recruits, killing workers, diplomats – well, killing all the people who are eager to get on with life and rebuild Iraqi society) - and the reaction of ‘angry’ muslim youth in the West?– plant bombs on the London subway. To me this does not compute.

Why aren’t these angry young men out protesting the indiscriminate slaughter of Iraqi civilians by “insurgents”? Why aren’t they demanding that the insurgents get out of the country so that the re-building process can truly get under way (I am sure that if you asked ordinary Iraqis they would prefer to have the insurgents stop blowing them up and to leave their air conditioning alone)? Where was all this righteous anger when Sadaam was feeding thousands of Iraqis into mass graves? Oh, but I guess mass slaughter by fellow Muslims is ok – because rather than condemn them, its much easier just to blame the good ol’ US of A.

As I stated in a previous post – its too late to put the genie back in the bottle – the Americans (& Brits) invaded – and as stupid as that decision was, no amount of anti-war protest is going to suddenly un-make it. And I truly believe that the collective buy-in to this whole “its because of the war in Iraq” excuse making is just the latest dodge for people who are keen to blame the US for, well, just about everything.