Now there's something you don't see everyday

I hate to link to the Toronto Sun, but here's the cartoon which Warren Kinsella tweets is the best editorial cartoon of the year:

Rider Pride

Roughriders rout Stampeders; heading home to play in Grey Cup

Krusty and his brother will now be appearing on Sun News

Sun News thinks they're going to cash in big by giving the Ford brothers a weekly TV show?
They just destroyed their credibility as a news network.  Here's the twitter reaction:

There is just something fundamentally wrong with rewarding this behaviour with a TV gig. Kory Teneycke lacks a moral compass. #topoli
— Steve V (@FarAndWide) November 15, 2013

Right after "Ow, My Balls!" RT @cityslikr: On CNN Anderson Cooper speechless at news that the Fords are being given a TV talk show. #TOpoli
— billmon (@billmon1) November 15, 2013

RT @glen_mcgregor: A crack-smoking inebriate and national embarrassment? Yeah, let's give him a TV show! http://t.co/dfq2YnaFNL #topoli
— Michael Shapcott (@michaelshapcott) November 14, 2013

Yet another reason not to watch Sun News: Ford demands respect for his privacy - so signs up for TV show #topoli http://t.co/4L8zbBLthH
— Michael Shapcott (@michaelshapcott) November 14, 2013

Wonder how Ezra Levant feels about losing his title as biggest loon on the network. Tough day for him I bet. #topoli
— Steve V (@FarAndWide) November 14, 2013

Beautiful

I saw this on twitter -- a migrating pod of Beluga whales in Nunavut Inlet:

Lest we forget? The Harper Cons have forgotten

Before any other kids sign up for the Canadian forces, I hope they (and their parents) realize that their service is no longer honoured by the Harper Cons.  If they are injured on duty, the Harper Cons will throw them away.
Mike Duffy can get more than $100,000 from the Harper Cons.  Canadian soldiers, not so much.
The Harper Cons will, of course, continue to show up for battle honours ceremonies and ribbon-cuttings at memorials. But when it comes to really supporting the troops -- giving them enough money to live on after their service to Canada has cost them their health and their capacity to work - the Harper Cons are nowhere to be found.
Barbara Kay's National Post column demonstrates that the Harper Cons have already forgotten Canada's soldiers:

Today there are more than 76,000 veterans suffering from lifelong disabilities springing directly from their military service, a casualty rate of more than 10%. ... less than 1% of Canada’s veterans are receiving any economic benefits from VAC. VAC recognizes only 1,428 veterans as eligible for economic support until age 65, a mere 0.2% of Canadian Forces veterans. It is estimated that fewer than half are receiving the seriously-injured allowance to which they are entitled.
Other federal actions also rankle. Reports suggest veterans are being discharged before they reach the 10-year limit at which they are eligible to receive a pension. And a fund to help pay burial costs for veterans only applies to the most hard-up of cases, excluding almost anyone short of abject poverty.

Rick Mercer's rant deserves repeating:


November 11 has become a shameful day.

Proof positive

Well there's one thing that the Rob Ford administration proves beyond a shadow of a doubt: any idiot can run the city of Toronto.

Mayor Rob Ford's own deputy mayor and council speaker publicly urged him to take a leave of absence, protesters outside city hall demanded his resignation, one of his longest-serving aides resigned, and an ex-wrestler showed up to yell things at him.
Ford’s response: a kiss, blown at the journalists to whom he said not a word. . . .
Ford promised Sunday to meet the media “anywhere” other than his home. But he has not yet made himself available to face any of the numerous questions he has not yet answered on the extent of his use of illegal drugs, his associations with criminals, and his secret meetings with an accused drug dealer now charged with extortion for allegedly attempting to obtain the video Ford said in May “doesn’t exist.”

His second press conference yesterday showed that Ford sees himself as the victim in all of this, unfairly persecuted for being a drunken lout who just luuuvvvves his city soooooo much.

The least of these

Why is it so startling to see true Christianity in action?
Pope Francis Kisses Severely Disfigured Man And Prays With Him  Francis saw the man from his car, stopped the motorcade, went and hugged him and prayed with him.


The commenters at Buzzfeed said the man has Neurofibromatosis, tumors of the face, a very disfiguring and painful condition.

A thing of beauty

Watch this expert driver back a 50' trailer into a space that I might have trouble backing into with my car:

Here's your laugh for today

A question for Toronto

I have a question for the 380,000 people in Toronto who thought two years ago that Rob Ford would be a good mayor.  What possessed you to think that he was ever going to be anything but a loud-mouthed schnook?
What's that you say?  You thought he would rise to the occasion?  Based on what evidence?
Now Toronto is saying mea culpa mea culpa mea culpa mea culpa, along with "I told you so"
But its too late -- Ford won't resign, he doesn't have the capacity to do the right thing.
He'll just stay on and on, ineffective, bumbling around, drunk, coked-up, a national and international embarrassment.
Toronto Star columnist Royson James writes:

Rob Ford is our creation — all of us.
That includes media who coddled him and refused to follow his discreditable conduct with any vigour; and media who scoffed at Star reporters who reported what they had seen. As the Star reporter Robyn Doolittle said, “Journalism was on trial.”
What she didn’t say, but no doubt believes, is journalism was on trial and too many journalists testified in favour of the bad guys and against the public interest.
Too many city councillors looked the other way when it was clear the mayor had some kind of substance abuse problem.
Too many council colleagues joined forces with the mayor when they knew the proper thing to do was to shun him and insist he get help before sitting in his camp. They did so because of the intoxicating effects of power. They wanted to be players.
Too many citizens, hoping to save a few tax dollars, were willing to forgive the mayor of any and all indiscretions. They didn’t want to hear about the train wreck of his personal life. They were willing to sell out the city for a few dollars of perceived city hall “gravy.”
Through it all, Mayor Ford exercised poor judgment, showed no familiarity with the truth, blustered and prevaricated and did everything to disguise his true nature.
And we let him get away with it, despite evidence to the contrary.

Ain't we havin' some fun now

Two cheques: Duffy says Conservative lawyer covered his $13,500 legal expenses:

Duffy tabled a document with the Senate that shows Arthur Hamilton, the Conservative party lawyer, signed off on a payment of $13,560 to Duffy's legal representative last April 3.. . . "That's right. One cheque from Nigel Wright? No, ladies and gentlemen, there were two cheques — at least two cheques."
An audible gasp went up from the gathered senators.

But wait, there's more:

He had said he suspected that the money to cover the cheque had come from the Conservative party—”the base’s money … to make this all go away.” He had said that Mr. Wright had objected to some action of Marjory LeBreton, government leader in the Senate at the time.
“But there is more,” he said.
He said his discussion with the Prime Minister and Mr. Wright on February 13 was not a casual encounter, but an arranged meeting. He repeated that Mr. Harper had told him the Senate’s rules were “inexplicable to our base.”
“Wait,” Mr. Duffy said. “There is even more.”
He recalled how he had said he took out a loan from the Royal Bank of Canada to cover the repayment of his expenses.
“That line about RBC was part of a script written for me and emailed to me by the PMO,” he declared.

That was perhaps the most astonishing speech ever given in the senate. An incredible performance & allegations by #mikeduffy #cdnpoli
— Steve Paikin (@spaikin) October 28, 2013

Integrity is more than fear of looking bad

Finding myself agreeing with Andrew Coyne is an odd position to be in, and makes me doubt myself.
But anyway, I do find this part of his column interesting:

At the heart of it remains Wright’s mysterious decision to cut Duffy a cheque from his personal account: still unexplained, still inexplicable, and not only because of its apparent illegality.... Why risk so much for so seemingly little?... Somehow a number of people around the prime minister absorbed the idea that it was okay to break the law to make an embarrassing political problem go away. That’s deeply troubling, whatever he told them, or they him. 

And Tasha Kheiriddin also connects some of the dots:

And when the issue of integrity is at stake, they won’t hesitate to sacrifice one of their own. ... Maxime Bernier resigned from cabinet in disgrace in 2008 after leaving NATO documents at the home of his ex-girlfriend, who had been linked to organized-crime figures. ...Helena Guergis was turfed in 2010 on unspecified allegations regarding her conduct, fueled by news reports that her husband, former MP Rahim Jaffer, had consorted with con men and “busty hookers.” Former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney was hauled before a commission of inquiry in 2008 over his relationship with fraudster Karl-Heinz Schreiber.
Why did the Conservative government pick on these cases, while others [Bev Oda, Tony Clement] resulted in no penalties? Because while those matters involved errors in judgment, the Bernier/Guergis/Mulroney matters touched on seedy elements that some, at the time, alleged might involve criminal activity.
The Conservative base does not approve of seedy. No matter the guilt or innocence of those accused, the mere association with persons of ill repute is enough to tarnish their reputation.
. . . A threat to the party’s reputation in this area had to be neutralized — in this case (the story goes) by allegedly ordering Mr. Duffy to pay back money that the Senator originally was told he didn’t owe.

If the Harper Cons are actually so focused on how things look that they will do anything to avoid an appearance of dishonesty, then they are doomed.
Honesty is not based on a fear that someone is looking. Integrity is not something that can be achieved by purchase or persuasion. The Harper Cons cannot build an honourable government on a foundation of sand.

Harper told Duffy to do the right thing

In spite of all the tut-tutting in the press about how Harper is now directly involved in the Duffy scandal, what we've seen so far isn't going to stick.
Today's story is about Duffy telling the Senate that Harper ordered him to pay back the money.
Well, basically, what's wrong with that?
Duffy SHOULD have paid back the money willingly.
I don't care why Duffy ever thought it was perfectly OK for him to claim expenses for living in his own home -- anybody with a working brain should have known that wasn't acceptable.
To hear him tell it, Duffy thought it was honourable to resist what Harper wanted him to do.

I said I didn’t believe I’d broken the rules and that to repay would be an admission of guilt. Canadians know me as an honest guy. To pay back money I didn’t owe would destroy my reputation.

Yes, Duffy actually said that.  In February. To continue:

The PMO piled on the pressure. Some honourable senators called me in P.E.I. One senator in particular left several particularly nasty and menacing messages: Do what the prime minister wants. Do it for the PM and for the good of the party. I continued to resist. Finally, the message from the PMO became: Do what we want or else.
And what was the “else”? He said the Conservative majority on the steering committee of the Board of Internal Economy, Sen. Tkachuk and Sen. Stewart Olsen, would issue a press release declaring me unqualified to sit in the Senate. However, if you do what we want, the prime minister will publicly confirm that you’re entitled to sit as a senator from P.E.I. and you won’t lose your seat. Tkachuk and Stewart Olsen are ready to make that press release now. I said: They don’t have the power to do that. He said: Agree to what we want right now or else.
I made one last effort. I said: I don’t believe I owe anything, and besides which, I don’t have $90,000. Don’t worry, Nigel said, I’ll write the cheque. Let the lawyers handle the details; you just follow the plan and we’ll keep Carolyn Stewart Olsen and David Tkachuk at bay.

So Duffy was muscled and maneuvered into paying back the money.
If Harper had told Duffy just to keep the money and let the PMO cover it up, then that would have been malfeasance on Harper's part.
Instead, Harper told Duffy to pay it back. I can't see that Canadians will think there is a scandal in Harper doing that.

UPDATE:  Some good comments that questioned my dismissive tone -- while I still believe if the story stops here there will not be long-term repercussions on Harper, I also agree that there seems to have been a massive cover-up in the Prime Minister's Office about this (no emails, continued attempts to hide things, etc) which leads to the conclusion there is more going on here than just Harper telling Duffy to pay back the money.

Is anybody actually in favour of fracking?

So the meme was building yesterday was about what a huge mistake it was for the #elsipogtog protesters to have seized media cars and equipment and thus turned the media against them.
But what will keep everyone on the same side here  is this -- Aboriginal or white, urban or rural, media or protester, absolutely NOBODY wants fracking except the companies and governments that think they can make money doing it.
As the sign says, no fracking way.



And the anti-media meme is gone now:

Beautiful apology given to myself and @DavidBellCTV by community members. Deeply touched, beyond words.
— Laura Brown (@01LBrown) October 20, 2013

"Everyone here does something to stop fracking" People cheer, stand and clap. @Global_NB #elsipogtog pic.twitter.com/kYbLtjNgsp
— Laura Brown (@01LBrown) October 20, 2013

As it happened on Thursday morning

A Twitter pic of the #Elsipogtog protest:


And here are photos by Media Coop reporter Miles Howe:







Howe, who was arrested at the protest, writes an astounding account of what happened Thursday morning in New Brunswick:

...In the far field, creeping towards the Warrior encampment - which was comprised of one trailer and about ten tents - were at least 35 more police officers. Many of these wore tactical blue and had pistols drawn. At least three officers were wearing full camouflage and had sniper rifles pointed at the amassing group. The Warriors, for their part, numbered about 15.
Through a police loudspeaker towards the highway 11 off-ramp, an officer began reading the injunction against the blocking of SWN's seismic equipment. This was all before dawn.
Still in the pre-dawn dark, about seven molotov cocktails flew out of the woods opposite the police line stationed in the ditch. I cannot verify who threw these cocktails. They were – if it matters - lobbed ineffectively at the line of police and merely splashed small lines of fire across the road. A lawn chair caught fire from one cocktail. Two camouflaged officers then pumped three rounds of rubber bullet shotgun blasts into the woods.
...About ten minutes later, with tensions now becoming highly escalated between the encroaching line of police in the field adjacent to the encampment and the Warriors now on a public dirt road, two officers approached Seven Bernard, chief of the Warrior Society. They attempted to serve Bernard with SWN's contentious injunction. Dozens of guns from all angles were pointed at all of us.
...I could hear the RCMP surrounding us speaking about someone having a gun. I did not see any Warrior carrying a firearm. I can say with certainty, however, that no live round was ever fired by the Warrior side. If, as the RCMP are now claiming, a single shot was discharged, it was not from this altercation.
...Mi'kmaq Warrior Suzanne Patles, in a last-ditch attempt to defuse a situation now spiralling into a screaming match with police guns pointing in every direction, ran into the middle of the field screaming: “We were given this tobacco last night!”
Now crying, in her hand she held a plug of tobacco, provided to her by RCMP negotiators wrapped in red cloth as a traditional token of peace the night before.
Skirmishes then broke out in every direction. From the highway side, District War Chief Jason Augustine was being chased by numerous police. In front of me, everywhere really, Warriors were being taken down by numerous RCMP officers in various clothes. Rubber bullet shots were fired by the RCMP, and both Jim Pictou and Aaron Francis both claim that they were hit – in the back and leg respectively.
I continued to try photographing what had quickly become a chaotic scene until one officer in camouflage and assault rifle pointed at me, saying: “He's with them. Take him out!”
I was taken to the ground and arrested.
...I say in no uncertain terms that it is miraculous that no one was seriously injured yesterday, indeed killed. The RCMP arrived with pistols drawn, dogs snapping, assault rifles trained on various targets, and busloads of RCMP waiting from across the province and beyond.

As an Ottawa Citizen op-ed points out:

The Mi’kmaq people of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, including the Elsipogtog First Nation, have never signed a treaty relinquishing authority to the land on which the Route 134 blockade stands today, or that on which SWN Resources is conducting exploratory testing. . . .  SWN Resources’ exploration permits aren’t legitimate. Nor was the court injunction criminalizing the blockade, and the police action was ridiculously illegitimate, not to mention unjust, unreasonable in its heavy-handedness, and terribly bad public relations for the RCMP.

Aboriginal people in Canada will remember this week after Thanksgiving, 2013.
First they hear a Throne Speech that insults them -- read what Doug Cuthand at the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix writes:

To say the speech from the throne was shallow and unfocused would be generous. From a First Nations' point of view, it was an insult.
Very little of substance was directed toward First Nations. There were several oblique stabs at aboriginal issues, but the speech opened with the same old self-congratulatory settler racism that, for many, represents Canada's foundation.

Then 200 RCMP stage this needlessly provocative attempt to disperse a group of anti-fracking protesters in middle-of-nowhereville, New Brunswick.
And today, as support for the Mi’kmaq rises across the nation, we're seeing the usual inflammatory and ridiculous stories about how the protestors were supposedly "armed to the teeth"  -- yeah, with three rifles and three hunting knives -- and the Harper PMO is rapidly deploying their cheerleaders in the media to promote the same message used against Theresa Spence's hunger strike last winter -- that they're all just a bunch of lazy undeserving welfare bums who waste millions of dollars of Canada's money.