Just for fun

Defining "progress" down

The New York Times describes how things are improving in Iraq since al-Sadr halted his attacks:

Since Mr. Sadr gave his order in mid-September, the numbers of unidentified bodies found on the streets of Baghdad daily have rarely exceeded a half dozen. When his militia was more active, there were often 30 or more unidentified bodies found daily.

When you do the math, it works out to about 360 unidentified murders in the last two months. Great news, eh?

Great line of the day

I found one of the most chilling parts of the Afghanistan prison story today to be the matter-of-fact, bureaucratic tone in the Corrections Canada memo:

On a Health and Safety level we will be walking through blood and fecal matter when either on patrol or in the prison and should not be wearing our personal footwear as it will track into our personal quarters.

In a comment to Pogge's post, Skdadl pinpoints why this was so disturbing:

I think we call this the banality of evil. I have to walk through blood and fecal material, so I need better boots. This is the road to Nuremberg, folks. And this is being done in our name.

United

Young, old, western, eastern, English-speaking, French-speaking, northerner, southerner, right-wing, left-wing -- we are all united in sorrow and shame about the tragic death of Robert Dziekanski.

Great line of the day

Dave at Galloping Beaver has a post up about the Amnesty International report on Afghan prisoners:

... DND and the Canadian Forces have an obligation, no matter where our forces are deployed, to observe Canadian law. We don't get to ignore the mistreatment of prisoners taken by our forces, even if that mistreatment is happening at the hands of others after being turned over.
The responsibility for the detention of prisoners falls to the Aghanistan authorities because we have agreed to that obviously flawed arrangement. As a belligerent involved in a war, we have every right to retain prisoners in Canadian custody.
It's about time prisoners taken by Canadian Forces were placed in Canadian custody until the objectives of the Canadian mission have been fully satisfied. And if the argument is that it is too costly to do so, we shouldn't be involved at all.

Emphasis mine.

So what's stopping you, Brian?

So Brian Mulroney is trumpeting the old "I just want to clear my name" schtick. Globe columnist Lawrence Martin's on-line chat about the Mulroney public inquiry pinpoints the flaws. First:

If Mr. Mulroney is so innocent, as he claims, why hasn't he come forward and explained himself on the question of the $300,000? Why can't he say how he made a bad error of judgment in accepting cash, in dealing with this man, and that he is sorry for it, but he did nothing illegal. Remaining silent leads to suspicion.

and second:

... It's not just a case of accepting Mr. Schreiber's words. They should be greeted with utmost suspicion. But... stories revealing Mr. Mulroney's failure to pay taxes on time on the $300,000 handout cannot be ignored.

Paul Wells reminds us that Mulroney had another option too:

A judicial inquiry is the "only way" to establish his innocence? Gee, I would have thought a 1,000-page book might have been a good place to try.

And Scott thinks the public is growing suspicious of Harper now too:

. . . the mere fact Mulroney’s name is some how connected to Harper, however tenuous that might or might not be, and the fact that Harper had 3 flip-flops in the past week on what type of inquiry to hold - from a cocky dismissal of it with a vague warning about investigating past Liberal regimes last week, to an independent person to see whether we need an inquiry, to now a full blown inquiry - gives the impression to the public something fishy has been going on.
It has led at least 2 pollsters to either conclude that it’s causing Con poll numbers to drop, or that it has potential to do so.

Finally, in the "if we knew then what we know now" department, Wells also observes:

if the Liberals had voted down the throne speech, Stephen Harper would be fleeing scrums today on the campaign trail, ordering candidates not to talk...

Denial is a river in Egypt

Kos asks why do conservatives deny global warming? Yes, I have wondered about this myself:

Climate science isn’t really partisan in any meaningful way, yet as long as the movementarians think that attacking the science will score a vctory against liberalism they will go on attacking just the same. All the petro lobby needed to do was polarize a scientific matter along political lines and the rightwing movement willingly became what amounts to the private army for a cause almost completely tangential to their individual interests. Retired tobacco execs look on with a mix of humor and deep jealousy.

Profound ignorance

If anyone ever wonders why the image of the United States is declining across the world, along with its economy, just ponder the profound ignorance and parochial egotism of this quote from LA Times columnist Jonah Goldberg:

Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business.

What gave him the idea that the United States has the right to act that way?

It's Win-Win

Vancouver dermatologist Neil Kitson has a suggestion for Afghanistan -- send in the Canadian Wheat Board, armed:

So Afghan [poppy] farmers . . . have a cash crop, but they're dependent on distributors and middlemen who make a fortune and might not pay a decent price. The whole thing needs to be taken out of the hands of these cartels, warlords, drug barons, and what have you, then nationalized and professionalized. That's where the Wheat Board comes in . .

Works for me. Now that the Saskatchewan's Gnu Gov is no longer willing to finance the legal battle against barley marketing privatization, the Board needs a new source of funds, too. So it's win-win for both the Board and the Afghan poppy farmers.

Its still fish and it still stinks

As Rosanne Rosannadanna said:

It's still fish and it still stinks.

Digby describes an interview today where a torture apologist AKA military lawyer did the old bob and weave and parse.
Try as he might, he can't change the reality that a civilized nation does not permit the torture of its prisoners. No matter what they might have done.

Great photo of the day

which I found in this good hockey post at First Draft which also has a great photo of a goalie doing a backflip to prevent a goal, though I liked the cat picture better myself.

Remembrance Day

In honour of Remembrance Day, here are a couple of great scenes from The Longest Day:



The fellow cursing the pigeons with "Damned traitors!" was Canadian journalist Charles Lynch, according to Cornelius Ryan's book. But I think Lynch was actually with the Canadians at Juno, rather than with the English at Sword.

And if you have ever wondered about why we have two minutes of silence, listen to Nova Scotia songwriter Terry Kelly:

The Movie Rule

Via Pandagon, I found The Rule for deciding whether a movie is worth watching or not:

1. There must be two or more women in it
2. Who talk to each other
3. About something other than a man

Works for me.

What Digby says

Digby talks about unions and why they are important:

A couple of years ago you may all remember that the Southern California grocery workers went on strike ... Yesterday, I was at one of those stores and overheard a very heartening conversation between a couple of customers and a couple of grocery workers. The customers were members of the striking WGA and they were talking with the grocery guys about the strike. They were very animated, talking tactics and telling of their experiences as Union Men. It brought home to me again why unions are important.
You hear a lot of nasty snark in this town about how these WGA strikers are all millionaires playing at being hardhats, and it totally misses the point. The union movement is about solidarity, which is a fundamental progressive value. I have no idea if those fellows in the store were highly paid TV writers or hopeful freelance screenwriters or what, but it wasn't relevant to the conversation. Those four guys had interests in common in their relationship to the owners of their industries. Unions are one of the vehicles that can make our capitalist society work to the benefit of all and not just the few.

In my own working years, I've been on both sides, in unions and in management. And both sides are better off when there is a union to bargain collectively.

Premier Archie

The Saskatchewan Party will be Saskatchewan's new government.
And Brad Wall will be Saskatchewan's new premier. Wall seems like a nice guy, I know, but I have to admit that he reminds me of Archie.
I don't understand this new craze for fixed election dates. Wall has already announced that the next election will be Nov. 7, 2011 -- and so I also don't understand why he thinks he should bother passing a law about it, he's the government so he can set the date whenever he wants to.
But turning immediately to those more serious issues which couldn't be discussed during the campaign, the press is wondering whether Premier Wall will continue fighting for the federal equalization formula that the Harper Conservatives are refusing Saskatchewan.
I think Wall is already preparing the ground for tossing in the towel, if my mixed metaphors make sense -- already, Wall is framing the argument that a few dollars more in annual federal transfer payments will somehow make up for the billion dollars that Saskatchewan will lose over the next several years if the equalization formula continues to include resource revenues:

Wall said the Saskatchewan Party still wants the same equalization deal as other provinces when it comes to resources. . . . He said there are other tactics to pursue, including pushing for increased federal funding in areas such as infrastructure, post-secondary education and First Nations . . ."There are really some opportunities to build a more constructive relationship."
Calvert, beginning his transformation into leader of the Opposition, told reporters he was concerned about Wall's comments.
"Political allegiances should not lead to a sell-out of Saskatchewan's interests, or people," said Calvert, who said legal opinions prepared by the Justice Department on the equalization challenge will stand up to any scrutiny . . .
The top-ranking of Saskatchewan's 12 Tory MPs, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz, said he was looking forward to working with the new provincial government and had some favourable words for Wall's approach.
"My grandmother, who was a very wise lady, always said you catch a lot more flies with honey than you do with vinegar, so I'll leave it at that," he said in a phone interview.

MY grandmother used to say, if you've got the money, honey, I've got the time.