unrepentant old hippie: OOF! *thud*
November 30, 2009 by jj
Now here’s a headline with the impact of a hail of bullets to the face:
No, really:
But I think we should be taking the possibility of a Dick Cheney bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012 more seriously, for a run would be good for the Republicans and good for the country. (The sound you [...]
unrepentant old hippie: More dumb on Twitter
November 30, 2009 by jj
I didn’t think it was possible, but I just found a twitterstream with even more stupid per square inch than #tcot:
#climategate
Don’t click unless you’re wearing a stupidproof vest!
unrepentant old hippie: Fundraiser to send Frank Chauvin the postage to return his Order of Canada
November 30, 2009 by jj
Further to my post about melodramatic anti-choicer Frank Chauvin, whose court challenge disputing the Morgentaler Order of Canada was kicked to the curb on Friday:
After months of being included in the long(er than eight) list of OC medal returnees, Chauvin says he’ll finally return the medal:
“I kept the medal until this hearing was over and [...]
Creekside: I reckon we’ve had just about enough of this bullshit
November 29, 2009 by Alison
“There were allegations of Canadian troops involved in torture. We’ve been very clear that’s not the case.”
No one. No. One. But. Steve.
“I was very proud to have served in Afghanistan alongside the courageous and professional men and women of the Canadian Forces, including Canada’s military police. The focus of our attention, in my view, should not be on those who obeyed their chain of command, which soldiers are obliged to do. Instead, any responsibility for Canada’s practices toward detainees lies, in my view, with the senior military officers, senior civilian officials, and the lawyers who developed the legal framework, designed the policies and practices, and then ordered that they be implemented.”
In condemning with the same brush highly professional Canadian soldiers, and to complain that they were complicit in breaches of the law of armed conflict and knowingly buried his reports, it is Mr. Colvin who has some explaining left to do.
“… in a time when some in the political arena do not hesitate before throwing the most serious of allegations at our men and women in uniform, based on the most flimsy of evidence, remember that Canadians from coast to coast to coast are proud of you and stand behind you, and I am proud of you, and I stand beside you.”
Steve bravely champions the troops by hiding behind them and pointing a finger at them.
Impolitical handily deconstructs Harper’s nonsense
while Contrarian takes down Blatchford.
And yes, why was Christie Blatchford leaked information deemed too sensitive for the Parliamentary Committee on the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan?
.
unrepentant old hippie: Twitter’s liberal bias
November 29, 2009 by jj
Wow, this is old but I missed it and is it ever exciting!
I keed. Not exciting, but pretty freaking funny.
In the great “Facts Optional” tradition of Conservapedia and the Conservative Bible Project, stand back: there’s a Conservative Christian alternative to Twitter!
A few weeks ago, a Christian Twitter user (Christweep?) was hit with a one-week suspension [...]
unrepentant old hippie: Just in time for the festive season
November 29, 2009 by jj
Back in my misspent youth, Molson “Brador”, a beer that was only sold in Quebec, was considered the Ultimate Beer. With 6% alcohol by volume compared to the 5% of our average domestic beers, a halfsack of Brador was an efficient investment of beer capital. Never mind Budweiser with its wimpy 3.2% ABV — among [...]
Politics'n'Poetry: U.S. firm sheds liability for Canadian nuclear peril
November 29, 2009 by politicsnpoetry
Gee, thanks, Steve. Our country is so safe with you at the helm. NOT!!!
From The G&M:
U.S. firm sheds liability for Canadian nuclear peril
Nuclear plant supplier GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy shielding finances from the risks of an accident at a Canadian nuclear station
Martin Mittelstaedt
From Saturday’s Globe and Mail Published on Saturday, Nov. 28, 2009 12:37AM EST
One [...]
unrepentant old hippie: Wingnuts and Science: a bad mix
November 28, 2009 by jj
I think I better start following the climate change debate if this is any example of the hilarity coming out of it.
The climate-flavoured asshattery continued apace this week, rising to a screeching crescendo on Thursday when the Drudge Report mistakenly linked to a post at Scienceblogs’ Deltoid with the headline “New Zealand Climate Science Coalition [...]
unrepentant old hippie: Test
November 28, 2009 by jj
T52VV5RFYUKX
Nothing, just Technorati bullshit
unrepentant old hippie: Morgentaler Order of Canada court challenge FAIL
November 27, 2009 by jj
Oh guess what guess what guess what no you’ll never!… Dr. Morgentaler gets to keep his Order of Canada. What a surprise! (/end sarc)
Most of you will recall how fetus fetishists attempted to get a “blizzard” of returned Order of Canada medals in protest against Dr. Morgentaler finally getting this well-deserved and long-overdue honour. [...]
Creekside: Amy Goodman stopped at Canadian border
November 27, 2009 by Alison
Creekside: How’s that CBC poll on Colvin’s credibility doing?
November 27, 2009 by Alison
unrepentant old hippie: Pick me up off the floor
November 26, 2009 by jj
I’m shocked, SHOCKED, I tells ya:
Roman Catholic Church leaders in Dublin spent decades sheltering child-abusing priests from the law and most fellow clerics turned a blind eye, an investigation ordered by Ireland’s government concluded Thursday.
Dublin Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, who handed over more than 60,000 previously secret church files to the three-year investigation, said he felt [...]
unrepentant old hippie: An idea whose time has come
November 26, 2009 by jj
Dammit Janet has come up with the “Maurice Vellacott Award” — an honour recognizing leadership in what DJ calls “gynophobia” (which I think is probably the irrational fear of women managing their own reproductive systems). It kind of reminds me of Andrew Sullivan’s awards that are named after Michelle Malkin et al.
When you think about [...]
unrepentant old hippie: Yo, free speech warriors…
November 26, 2009 by jj
…especially you socially conservative so-called “free” so-called “speechers”…Hello? Hello?? (*tap-tap* Is this thing on?)
unrepentant old hippie: It buuurrrrrrns
November 26, 2009 by jj
More teabaggy Goin’ Roguey- booky-waity-lineuppy wingnutty goodness…
Creekside: Dragging the goalposts right off the field
November 26, 2009 by Alison
“Defence Minister Peter MacKay says he never saw a former diplomat’s reports containing allegations of torture of detainees transferred by Canadians to Afghan prisons. MacKay, who was foreign minister at the time, insisted Thursday that he knew nothing of the documents.
“I have not seen those reports in either my capacity as minister of National Defence or previously as minister of Foreign Affairs.”
“I received briefings from the deputy minister and there were attachments to which Mr. Colvin was a contributor but I have not received direct reports from Mr. Colvin,” MacKay said.”
3. Of the XXX detainees we interviewed XXX said XXX had been whipped with cables, shocked with electricity and/or otherwise “hurt” while in NDS custody in Kandahar. This period of alleged abuse lasted from between XXX and XXX days, and was carried out in XXX and XXX.
XXX detainees still had XXX on XXX body; XXX seemed traumatized. This alleged abuse would have occurred before the new arrangement between the governments of Canada and Afghanistan was signed.
“Three generals declared Wednesday that there was no mention of the word “torture” in reports from a senior diplomat who asserts that he repeatedly warned the government against surrendering Afghan detainees to local authorities because they would almost certainly be abused.
One of the recipients of the widely distributed reports, which Colvin says were copied to 76 government and military personnel in Ottawa and Afghanistan, was retired Lt.-Gen. Michel Gauthier, who was then the head of oversees deployment. Gauthier told the Commons committee that none of Colvin’s 2006 reports, including his May document, mentioned anything about torture.
Retired Gen. Rick Hillier, Canada’s top soldier during Colvin’s posting in Afghanistan in 2006-07 : “There was simply nothing there.”
So there you have it – because Richard Colvin neglected to include the word “torture” in his accounts of detainees allegedly being “whipped with cables and shocked with electricity”, there was no torture and the generals apparently feel justified in having failed to read his reports in the first place.
.
The federal government is blocking whistleblowing diplomat Richard Colvin from giving documents to a special House of Commons committee investigating Afghan torture.
Justice Department lawyers have told Colvin – through the Foreign Affairs Department – that they do not accept the view that testimony before Parliament is exempt from national security provisions of the Canada Evidence Act. Violating Section 38 of the Canada Evidence Act can be punishable by five years in prison.
Defence Minister Peter MacKay said the government intends to comply with the order to produce documents, but tempered expectations by saying the records will pass through several filters before they get to MPs.
“Anything we’re legally required to hand over, we’ll hand over,” he said Wednesday.
“We have to, of course, respect the Canada Evidence Act, The National Defence Act and rules pertaining to disclosure. And of course anything having to do with national security will have to be vetted.”Those are the same arguments the government made to the Military Police Complaints Commission, whose public hearings into the same issue were derailed by legal wrangling. The government took a year to censor and hand over records to the watchdog agency and at one point stopped releasing documents entirely.
MacKay did not explain how the Justice Department could ignore Parliament’s authority when it comes to providing evidence.
unrepentant old hippie: Angus Reid: Canadians more pro-choice
November 26, 2009 by jj
A new Angus Reid poll on what Canadians believe about a number of social and ethical issues has bad news for fetus fetishists — 66% of Canadians are pro-choice, up from 61% just two years ago:
With so many moral issues at a crossroads, Angus Reid Strategies undertook a national survey last month asking Canadians to [...]
unrepentant old hippie: Who could have seen this coming?
November 25, 2009 by jj
Let the squeals of misplaced outrage begin:
Oh, boo hoo hoo! All this self-pitying outrage from the Queen of the Rabid, Rancid, Maggot-Infested, Shit-stained Smear herself.
There was no “smear” in this case. The possibility that some brain-damaged right-wing fruitbag might have killed Sparkman in a frenzy of anti-government fury wasn’t dreamed up by “The Left” the [...]
unrepentant old hippie: Marg Delahunty goes rogue
November 25, 2009 by jj
From This Hour has 22 Minutes, Marg catches up with SaWah… sort of…
(Video replaced — this one should work for everyone.)
