Thank you, Lorne Calvert

Thanks for the Family Day holiday -- we really enjoyed it.

Money doesn't care where it comes from

Kthug writes about what is going on with the European economy:

Look, I understand why influential people are reluctant to admit that policy ideas they thought reflected deep wisdom actually amounted to utter, destructive folly. But it’s time to put delusional beliefs about the virtues of austerity in a depressed economy behind us.

They have it backwards, as usual. I'm no economist, but if there is one thing we should have learned in the last 80 years, it is that we can't wait for the economy to improve before we spend money -- rather, our economies improve BECAUSE money is being spent. Like any simplistic idea, of course, this can be carried too far, but basically money doesn't care where it comes from. Whether the money in an economy comes from a government or not, it is the circulation that is important, not the origin.

The stupid, it burns

Who is this incredibly stupid man?

...his understanding of the bill is that police can only request information from the ISPs where they are conducting "a specific criminal investigation."
But Section 17 of the 'Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act' outlines "exceptional circumstances" under which "any police officer" can ask an ISP to turn over personal client information.
"I'd certainly like to see an explanation of that," ...
"This is the first time that I'm hearing this somehow extends ordinary police emergency powers [to telecommunications]. In my opinion, it doesn't. And it shouldn't."

Why, that's the Minister of Public Safety. The person whose staff wrote the bill. The person who brought it to the House of Commons without bothering to read it. The person who thought that anyone who objected to it was a child pornographer.
Welcome to your nightmare, Vic.

And how stupid do they think we are?

I know, I know, but look at this:


At 10 am, the bill to allow warrentless electronic snooping by police is titled "Lawful Access Act"; at 11:17 am, the bill is titled "Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act" (which, by the way, it apparently won't actually do).
H/T to Sarah Schmidt at Canada.Com who also quotes Anne Cavoukian, Ontario Privacy Commissioner:

“They’re calling the bill ‘Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act.’ Give me a break. The warrantless access does not just apply to cases of child pornography or child predators. It can apply to something that’s not even a criminal activity. It’s ridiculous to go to these lengths.

In the iPolitics blog, Michael Harris summarizes the basic problem with this bill, however noble-sounding its name:

The only thing that separates a democratic state from a police state is the notion of accountability. . . Warrants don’t prevent the police from doing their investigations, they protect the integrity of the system. In order to get a warrant, the police have to demonstrate reasonable and probable cause that a crime is being committed by a particular person. Remove that requirement and you end up with a system that could be driven by unprofessional hunches, misplaced zeal, idle curiosity, or malice.

Or doing political favors for the powers-that-be.

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...