Who do they think they are?

Paraphrasing Catherine O'Hara's memorable Beetlejuice line, the Harper Cons are going insane and they are taking us with them.
A question about expanding government surveillance powers, and Vic Toews responds: “He can either stand with us or with the child pornographers.”
A statement from the Parliamentary Budget Office that the Harper Cons are wrong about an OAS/GIS shortfall and Jim Flaherty responds: "Unbelievable, unreliable and incredible."
The Liberals and NDP have to resort to procedural sleight-of-hand just to have a discussion about Official Languages committee business in public -- and that public access will end the very minute a Conservative member is able to speak again. So much for Harper's open and accountable government promise.
And can you imagine what they are saying behind closed doors about the judges who are ruling against their pet ideas on mandatory minimums and prisoner transfers?

Just say no

The Wall Street Journal is just being silly when it continues to whine about the birth control flap:

The White House wants to impose its birth-control ideology on all Americans, including those for whom sponsoring or subsidizing such services violates their moral conscience.

The stupid, it burns!
Anyone who doesn't support birth control doesn't have to use it.
There, problem solved.

Whitney Houston dies

What a shock, she was only 48.



Other great songs.

S**t Saskatchewanians Say

From Thread Saskatoon

Great line of the day

John Cole writing about the stupidity of Catholic bishops in the States flipping out over women's health insurance:

I am so sick and tired of fighting stupid petty battles because of your damned religion. I am sick of getting bogged down in these stupid arguments. I am sick of you using your religion as a way to divide people. I’m sick of you using your religion to get in the way of other people’s lifestyle and healthcare choices. I am sick of you using your religion as an excuse to bomb people. I’m sick of your religion getting in the way of policy making. I’m sick of you using your religion to stifle scientific progress. I really am. Do whatever the hell you want in your home and in your church, but just get out of my face with whatever horseshit you believe, be it anything from judaism to catholicism to mormonism to islam to jehovah’s witnesses to the church of the flying spaghetti monster.
Whatever the voodoo that you do is, keep it your damned self. I am officially sick of your crap.

Does anyone remember when John Kennedy had to promise not to let his religion affect his decisions as president? And much more recently, Jean Chretien and Paul Martin had to remind Canadian bishops that they weren't elected as Catholic leaders.

Torture

In the history of the world there has probably never been a nation that didn't sometimes intentionally torture prisoners and secretly use the information so obtained, however unreliable.
But at least we used to be ashamed of it.
Not any more.

Boo-hoo

My response to Karen Handel's self-serving letter of resignation is

Cry me a freaking river, Karen!

Talking the talk

In one of the least surprising decisions in the history of Canadian jurisprudence, the Sask Party's essential services law from 2007 has finally been struck down by the courts as unconstitutional.

So now, all of a sudden, the Wall government actually wants to talk to unions:

The minister added that he is willing to meet with the province's labour groups to discuss ways to improve the essential services legislation.
"What we'd like do with organized labour is sit down and work with them and see what types of things can be resolved," Morgan said.

They couldn't have cared less about talking to labour before they passed the bill in the first place -- described as "the most sweeping and heavy-handed essential services legislation in Canadian history." Better late than never, I suppose.

The ones I liked the best

Dozing in front of the TV

Only a few thousand Canadians are watching Sun News on any given day -- I never have myself. But I guess back on Oct. 19, that "miniscule" number included Jennifer Ditchburn, and wasn't that just too bad for Sun News:

Ms. Ditchburn, who’s been reporting on the Hill for 15 years, said she saw the original Sun News broadcast of the oath and that it struck her as “interesting.” She decided to make an access to information request about it the same week.”
“I was just sort of fishing to see if there was anything interesting that would come up and something did,” she said.

The whole press gallery will be watching Sun News now, thus doubling their viewership. Win-win!

Deja vu

We know the fight is coming again.
We know they're not going to stop until they get what they want -- and what they want is a new abortion law in Canada.
But what they don't seem to realize is this: we have watched the Democrats in the US go along with the erosion of abortion rights for the last 20 years. We have seen them appease and give an inch and pander and knuckle under and go along with stupid laws like requiring ultrasounds and waiting periods and counselling and notifications. And all this going along to get along hasn't satisfied the pro-lifers one bit -- they have demonized Planned Parenthood and are targeting contraception and Gardisil treatments.
Could this happen in Canada? Maybe. The Harper Cons are doing whatever they can to quietly mollify their own pro-life base. But I do believe that Canadians realize that any law that gets the state involved again with abortion decisions -- even a supposedly-reasonable limited-impact law that just deals with a tiny number of cases like so-called "late-term" or "partial birth" abortions, nothing to see here just move along -- is the thin edge of the wedge. We are not apologetic or shame-faced about believing in a woman's right to choose.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more...

Sweetest video ever

"

A red letter day

Circle February 3 on the calendar.
A Virginia Republican listened to a woman's personal abortion story and actually agreed it was her choice to make, not his.:

“I don’t feel like I have the ability to make a decision as difficult as the one that young woman made,” said Republican Sen. Harry Blevins of Chesapeake, whose abstention resulted in the GOP-backed bill dying on a 7-7 party-line vote.

Font rant

Just for fun, here's Mike Lacher's I’m Comic Sans, Asshole.:

You think I’m a malformed, pathetic excuse for a font. Well think again, nerdhole, because I’m Comic Sans, and I’m the best thing to happen to typography since Johannes fucking Gutenberg.

The centre isn't holding

Rough beasts, start slouching. I'm starting to think a few things are starting to fall apart for the Harper Cons.
After telling middle-aged Walmart cashiers that MPs are going to force them to stand behind their registers until they're 67, they won't cut their own lavish pensions.
After releasing a batch of embarrassing info about CBC salaries, they won't reveal how many of Harper's staff are also being highly paid.
After Harper perished the thought that he would introduce any anti-abortion legislation, he's losing control of the Conservative backbenchers.

And the courts are slapping down their cruel ideology.

Stay tuned.