If A Country Was Predominately Athiest Would They Be Exempt From A Holy Ware?

The global Internet jihad: Web of terror

Margaret Wente

Pandemic Waiting In The Wings........

GLOBAL SWINE FLU DEATHS TOP 700 SWINE FLU INSPECTORS WEARING IMPROPER GEAR CAUGHT VIRUS

Media Pandering To The Lowest Common Denominator

Priorities perverted

Sorrow over Jackson's death epitomizes West's dysfunction

By MICHAEL COREN

Last Tuesday was a day of extraordinary solemnity and emotion. We remembered and recalled passing and loss and in so doing many of us shed a tear and said a prayer. Life never to be replaced, promise never to be fulfilled, greatness and goodness cut down in their prime.

No, no, no. Not the sordid little funeral of a sexually and ethnically confused pop star in California, but the anniversary of the mass slaughter of more than 50 people and the injuring of more than 700 in London in 2005.

We may also last Tuesday have asked ourselves how and why a world so bulging with wealth and privilege could, on that day as on every other day, have allowed 40,000 children to die of starvation in Africa and Asia, while boys and girls in Europe and the United States are bursting out of their clothes and fighting diseases brought on by obesity, greed and grotesque self-indulgent diets.

Now if any of you, any of you at all, think that there is no connection among violence, war, terror and suffering on the one hand and neurotic hero worship, false emotion and vicarious death thrills on the other, you are as closeted as someone hiding away in the inner sanctums of the Neverland Ranch.

There is in this world a finite amount of empathy and concern. Our compassion fatigue is notorious and recent history has demonstrated that the plight of a kitten or death of a vacuous princess means far more than a dead child held to the lips of an emaciated black mother or an innocent man ripped to anonymous bloody flesh on a subway train on his way to work.

The death of the ridiculous Michael Jackson epitomizes the dysfunction. The very same people who choose presidents and prime ministers by their votes cried in public for a person they never knew and then took time off work -- often lying to do so -- for a chance to attend the man's stadium memorial service or watch the interminable coverage on addled 24-hour television.

They could not control their weeping at the death of someone who gave the world moon walking, some catchy songs, an obsession with holding one's genitalia in public and sleeping with little boys in an apparent attempt to recapture his childhood -- while simultaneously, of course, destroying theirs.

Which surely leads us to understand why Muslim fundamentalists assume the western world to be bizarre, pointless and decayed beyond repair and ask why the people of the developing world are not more angry and bitter. The whole Jackson nonsense also should oblige us to realize just how racist is a North America that likes its black entertainers best when they are hardly black at all. Elvis Presley and the Rolling Stones stole black music, Diana Ross bought into white culture and Jackson simply pretended not to be black.

This is the sophisticated, advanced world of the early 21st century. A world people fought and died to save and one we are supposed to proclaim as an example to those who would bring us down.

In England last Tuesday the parents, children and friends of the dead stood at a new memorial and listened as the names of their loves ones were read aloud.

No Michael Jackson songs were sung, but the screams of injustice and perverted priority shook the world.

Recovery Possibly Hampered By Guilt????

Despite acquittal, Jackson never recovered from trial

The Star Makes It Sound Like Somthing You Would Get At The Source

Korea's brazen threat May 27, 2009
Why is North Korea's ailing Kim Jong-il brazenly courting the world's ire by defying the United Nations Security Council, testing a small nuclear bomb and firing off rockets? For a slew of reasons that betray his pariah regime's inherent ...

Steven Edwards: U.S. meets North Korean nukes with empty words

It’s said North Korea is led by an unstable and unpredictable ruler who can’t be trusted. Still, when statements in the name of Kim Jong-il promise new nuclear bomb and missile tests, the Stalinist country appears true to its word.

Having trouble following through on his finger wagging, meanwhile, is U.S. President Barack Obama.

In April, North Korea launched a long-range missile in defiance of international law, and Obama interrupted his speech in Prague on denuclearization to speak of a “need for action” against Kim’s regime.

He promised a response that day from the UN Security Council, and declared his administration’s “determination to prevent the spread of these weapons.”

Alas, the UN Security Council took a week to produce a legally non-binding statement criticizing the launch. It took several weeks more to agree on what turned out to be minor sanctions against three companies said to be money earners for Kim.

North Korea, meanwhile, demanded an apology for the Council’s criticism, or it would conduct a nuclear test, and fire off another ballistic missile.

The UN Security Council met quickly to condemn North Korea’s second nuclear test in less than three years Monday, and Obama said the “international community must take action” – calling the detonation earlier that day “reckless.”

North Korea responded by firing off two short-range missiles. Maybe no long-range ones had been available on the launch pad.
Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the UN, was dispatched to wag the administration’s finger Tuesday, declaring in an NBC interview North Korea would “pay a price” if it does not “reverse” its course.

“We will take steps … to convey the message to North Korea that the path it’s on doesn’t serve its long-term interests, and is not acceptable to the international community,” she said.

As if to emphasize that the Obama administration means it this time, she made the point in interviews she granted to a host of other U.S. television networks, including CNN and CBS.

UN Security Council “technical experts” were Tuesday huddled in closed-door consultations in a bid to write a draft resolution that will contain the promised “price.”

Rice insisted that the new Council resolution and any additional sanctions were “not the sum total of the response available” to the United States and its allies.

“We’ll be looking at what other steps we can take, along with partners in the region, to increase the pressure on North Korea and to make it plain that these actions will not be tolerated,” she said.

North Korea said in a statement carried by its official news agency KCNA that it was clear Washington’s “hostile policy” towards Pyongyang had not changed.

Seismologists said the new nuclear test had the power of a 4.5 magnitude earthquake, and was far more powerful than the country’s first nuclear detonation in October 2006.

Russia said the explosion was of a size comparable to the U.S. bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.
Following the 2006 test, the Security Council adopted Resolution 1718, which forbids the reclusive regime from conducting any future nuclear or missile launches.

Obama’s rhetoric may have been enough to neutralize one political opponent after another as he advanced to the White House. But on the international stage, something stronger is needed. And it is unlikely to be found at the UN.

Who Are We Going To Call On To Fight The "Enemy?" The UN, EU.....

U.S. mulls over its superpower status By LISA VAN DUSEN, WASHINGTON BUREAU There's a question at the heart of the gap between the two models of American power put forward last week by Barack Obama and Dick Cheney: If America is still a superpower, what kind of superpower does it want to be?

North Korea says it has conducted nuclear test North Korea claims it has successfully conducted a second nuclear weapons test, defying international warnings and drastically escalating tensions with the country. more...

Foreign Policy: The real reason Iran wants nukes May 20, 2009 · In their talks today, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Barack Obama will no doubt have discussed the uncomfortable subject of Iran. Israel views that country's nuclear program as an existential threat; rumors abound that military action might be on the table. The United States firmly opposes Iran's nuclear ambitions, but after decades of estrangement, the United States and Iran look closer to sitting together at the negotiating table than at any point since 1979.

If the United States wants negotiations to work, there is one key prerequisite: Each side must understand the expectations of the other. What the United States wants from Iran is clear: a halt to its nuclear program. But what is on Tehran's mind? Perceived as a major menace in Washington and Tel Aviv, Tehran sees itself under attack. To understand Iran's expectations, just turn the Western perspective around 180 degrees. More

....and the list goes on and on.

On Whose Watch Did This Happen

Pierre Lemieux: Arresting 185,925 Canadians?
Posted: April 03, 2009, 11:00 AM by Marni SoupcoffWhose atch
A major component of the rule of law is that laws apply equally to everybody and are equally enforced. With such laws, it was thought, we are protected against discriminatory laws that would criminalize large numbers of people, even if they are minorities. The ideal of the rule of law was to protect us from the state. But what happens when the state hijacks the law for its own purposes and when hundreds of thousands of peaceful individuals are criminalized by a stroke of the Governor-General’s pen?
Click here to read more...

Time To Dump EU Members

As I asked before; which of the EU members can stand up and recite their miltary victories?

Is MacKay in the running for NATO's top job?

Is MacKay in the running for NATO's top job?

Anyone Have An Answer

Who's right? Who's wrong?
Posted 1/19/2009 10:00:00 AM

As the casualty count climbs in Gaza it seems trite and inappropriate to say that the first casualty in war is truth. But trying to distinguish reality from spin and facts from propaganda shows the axiom to be a self-evident truth. Disseminating information in relation to the situation in the Middle East is akin to herding cats. Good luck trying to get a handle on it. Or maybe that’s the point. If the hearts and minds of those who are ambivalent or confused can be swayed by op-ed pieces in the mainstream media or through heated debates in the blogosphere, the hope is the howls of indignation will be parlayed into political action and ultimately influence the outcome. Disinformation then also becomes an effective tool of diplomacy. In this sense we’re all on the front lines taking in-coming.

- I'm John Oakley

You Decide!

York University's moment of truth: A real university, or a degree-granting hangout for radical Jew-baiters?

Friday, Feb. 27, 2009 Next week is Judy Rebick's favorite time of year, Israel Apartheid Week. And all eyes will be on Toronto's York University, a...

Say what you want - just don't expect taxpayers to pay41
The Canadian Arab Federation called Jason Kenney a 'whore.' Mr. Kenney bit back ......

Daniel Pearl's Father on anti-semitism on campus....
Judea Pearl is the father of the murdered journalist, Daniel Pearl.

Punish All For The Actions Of Few

Isn't that the way of the left......

Proposed young driver law already sees backlash

Urban Revolution In Leslieville????

Leslieville splinters in class struggle

New posters declare war on gentrification

By JENNY YUEN, SUN MEDIA

An anonymous poster campaign is waging a war against young urban professionals in an east-end neighbourhood.

The black posters proclaim: "No yuppies in Leslieville." They have appeared on Green P pay boxes, hydro poles and on the temporary walkway beside the EAST Lofts development on Queen St. E., near the Don Valley Parkway.

The signs claims "Yuppies and their stores pray on neighbourhoods. They push up rents (while) pushing the neighbourhood out. Don't look to others to solve this problem, we have to solve it ourselves."

The poster suggests people can help "save the neighbourhood" by not shopping at high-end stores in the area and organizing tenant unions to fight rent increases.

The last two suggestions on the poster take on an unlawful ring: "Smash their windows" and "write graffiti." The posters have the same graphic layout as others which declare: "No Big Box in Leslieville." Commonly posted in shop windows, they are the creation of the Toronto East Community Coalition.

ONGOING TENSION

"I don't know who is behind (the anonymous posters) but it's somebody who completely doesn't understand the issue," said TECC co-chair Kelly Carmichael yesterday.

Area Councillor Paula Fletcher said that there is an ongoing tension because more specialty and high-end stores are moving in and "some of the (marginalized) residents who have been living there for a long time feel there's not a lot of room for them and that they're being forced out," Fletcher said.

Residents have been tenaciously fighting the development of a Wal-Mart on Eastern Ave. for over a year, arguing that it will only bring minimum wage jobs and more car-gernerated pollution into the area.

Property damage is no way to fight gentrification, a local pub owner said. "We're not in Beirut, this is not the right thing to do," Michael Summerfield, 39, of Prohibition Gastro Pub Oyster Bar said.

Easy To Understand Confusion

'You're half lesbian?

Eamonn Holmes makes embarrassing TV gaffe as Salma Hayek explains her LEBANESE background

By Daily Mail Reporter

Eamonn Holmes was left red-faced today after wrongly announcing Hollywood actress Salma Hayek was a lesbian on live television.

The 48-year-old presenter made the embarrassing gaffe while interviewing the Ugly Betty star on This Morning, which he hosts once a week with his partner Ruth Langsford.

The Belfast native was obviously struggling to understand Hayek's Mexican accent and thought she had 'come out' when he misheard her describing her Lebanese background.

Simple Solution To Solving Poverty

Give the poor more money! Simple. It does become a little more complex when the question of where the money will come from arises. The social in-activists will of course want the government to increase taxes and reduce "subsidies" to businesses which will, of course, drive businesses to other areas and this will increase the number of "poor" people. Then, of course, we can raise personal and property taxes which will drive those on fixed incomes on to the poverty rolls. How about government at all levels holding the line on hiring and freezing union salary demands? How about getting rid of our cradle to grave mentality?

'Time to be bold' in poverty fight TheStar.com - Opinion - 'Time to be bold' in poverty fight

August 20, 2008

A welcome new report from Ontario's food banks exhorts the government to stay the course and not back off its stated goal to reduce poverty because of the growing threat of a recession.

Despite the economic challenges facing the province – and perhaps because of them – "we believe that now is the time to be bold," the report argues. "In difficult times we need leaders, not managers. We must make transformative choices that will build a better Ontario."

It looks to former prime minister Lester Pearson for inspiration. Against a backdrop of political and economic turbulence in the 1960s, the federal Liberal leader introduced universal health care, a national pension plan, a student loan program and a national labour code.

These are empowering words for Deb Matthews, Ontario's children's minister, and her cabinet committee on poverty reduction, who have until the end of the year to draft their poverty strategy.

The food banks' report devises a sweeping plan that would cut poverty in half by 2020, pulling more than half a million Ontarians out of poverty. There is no doubt that targets and timetables are important to ensure the province can be held to its promises, focusing the minds of politicians and energizing the bureaucracy.

The report draws heavily on anti-poverty initiatives around the world to show what works, helping Ontario draft an anti-poverty program of best practices. The proposals would cost the province $750 million next year, rising to $2 billion a year by 2015. But these costs need to be cast as an investment, a "commitment of a generation," the 63-page report argues.

Among its more than two dozen new recommendations, it calls for Ontario to provide-start-up money to set up community development credit unions that would help low-income people open bank accounts to get a head start. The credit unions would combat the temptations of payday loans that charge high interest and trap people in a continuous cycle of debt.

With rising rents pushing poverty up, the report calls for building 100,000 new units of affordable housing by 2020 and providing 50,000 new shelter allowances. It would also give energy subsidies of up to $200 to low-income families.

And it urges the government to follow Quebec's lead and enshrine its promised poverty reduction plan in legislation so future governments would be bound to keep it on the political agenda.

As this report shows, there is no shortage of innovative and workable ideas for Matthews and her committee as they sift through more than 600 submissions and begin the difficult task of devising a poverty reduction plan. The food banks have made an important contribution to the debate – and signalled that they will be watching closely to ensure she does not back away from the challenge.

This Might Be A Solution To Panhandling/Homelessness

Invariably those cities chosen to host various games have found ways of displacing the beggars and homeless in order to improve their image.........

If You Can't Field A Full Roster Does The Other Team Win By Default

OTTAWA, WE HAVE ANOTHER PROBLEM

Sudden candidate resignation in PEI raises questions about Green Shift