Peace, order and good government, eh?: Just wondering
What would make Stephen Harper think it's a good idea to go to Davos and tell other countries what he intends to do to us before he told us? …
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The Galloping Beaver: Oppression is eternal . . .
Bad Hair Day: Execution of the Czech 'heretic' Jan Hus at the Council of Constance, anonymous woodcut, 1415 ©AKG-imagesTHE NEW HUMANIST is a delightful site, at the other end of the intellectual rainbow from the GOP and its chimps, and well worth a visit anytime. Currently, there's a fascinating article about the Holy Inquisition. Why should you care, in a Stevie world, about stuff that happened 500 years ago? Well, Cullen Murphy believes its echoes are to be heard today:Interrogation. Surveillance. Ethnic profiling. Censorship. The words come from 21st-century headlines, but they have an …
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Sister Sage's Musings: Harper vs. Harper: Elijah tackles Stephen’s Daddy State
Truer words have rarely been spoken. First Nation chief from Manitoba Elijah Harper says what needed to be said, that 'the federal Indian Act treats aboriginals like children and chains them to the government for their entire lives'. Asked about his seminal moment in history, Harper said he opposed the Meech Lake . . . → Read More: Harper vs. Harper: Elijah tackles Stephen’s Daddy State …
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Orwell's Bastard: Once again, time to play … Let’s hear from another Sun reader!
Source here.Strictly speaking, I have doubts about the authenticity, as this guy can actually spell.Related posts:Electro-Motive: Foreign corporation takes Canadian tax dollars, fucks over Canadian workers | #cdnpoliThe Sun's effect on our national conversation is obvious, but what about the Globe?BCL catches @SueAnnLevy rewriting history, smearing brave firefighters#SunMedia and journalistic ethics: another juxtapositionKate's royal ass cheek: #sunmedia triumphs again, @davidakin makes sure we all know about it …
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Northern Reflections: Making It Easy
Susan Riley wrote in the Ottawa Citizen yesterday that federal politics these days is truly baffling:It is hard to decide what is more astonishing: Prime Minister Stephen Harper's inconsistencies and course corrections, or the fact they have done no serious damage to his standing in the polls.For a man who claims to offer no surprises, Stephen Harper has been remarkably inconsistent:He accused critics of wanting to "cut and run" in Afghanistan, but, after nearly a decade of futile struggle, conceded the war was unwinnable and began withdrawing Canadian forces. He was never going to …
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the regina mom: PMO Hates Gays & Greens, Judges & Nurses, AKA “Foreign Radicals”
Wow! This media AlerteInfoAlert from the Prime Minister’s Office is a sight to behold, dear Reader. Do take a moment to thank Kady O’Malley for postponing her book-reading and sleep in order to share it with us. the regina mom is also foregoing some book-reading and sleep to write this. As with her poetry, she’s going to take it line-by-line or at least stanza-by-stanza so it may take awhile to find appropriate links and all. She hopes you’ll follow along, that you’re a brave enough soul to make it to the computer-eye-glazed end.
From: …
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Sister Sage's Musings: “Let Me Be Perfectly Clear…”
Our Canada is gone. Harper made that perfectly clear this morning in Davos, Switzerland. Sweeping changes to Old Age Pensions. Privatisation of science and innovation. Deregulation. MacKay signed off our military sovereignty quietly yesterday, authorising Homeland Security operations on Canadian soil, in the event of an emergency, or a terrorist attack… Canada and . . . → Read More: “Let Me Be Perfectly Clear…” …
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Peace, order and good government, eh?: Friday night unplugged
It's a low key, acoustic set this evening. The opening clip is from Peter Seeger's Rainbow Quest — Brownie McGhee performing solo on Don't Pity Me.
Lyle Lovett takes the lead on My Baby Don't Tolerate with backup by John Hiatt, Guy Clark and Joe Ely. At the break, Hiatt will demonstrate that as a lead guitarist he makes a great songwriter.
And finally, Darrell Scott with Kenny Malone on percussion will explain that there's No Use Living for Today. The canned intro stops at around 0:30. Have a good weekend. …
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unrepentant old hippie: Mr.Blue reacts
to 4 days of Obama .gif at top of her pet human’s blog: …
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Creekside: Yo! ‘Freedom 75′ Harper supporters!
Corporate Tax Freedom Day now arrives on Feb 1 next week as corporate income tax has been slashed to 8% of all government revenue at a cost of $13 billion a year.Notice that invisible hand of the marketplace giving the PotashCorp green piggie a surreptitious extra little push in the vid?That's because Saskatchewan PotashCorp was the “leading cash hoarder” between 2000 and 2010, porking away over $5 billion for a rainy day that only ever rains on you. PotashCorp CEO Bill Doyle of Chicago pulled down $11.6 million in benefits in 2010. While his base salary was …
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The Galloping Beaver: Just wondering…
Does it always take a lethal mill fire before the minister will leap into action to help displaced mill-workers? I only ask because between 2000 and 2010 the Canadian forest industry lost 144 900 direct jobs, hitting fully two-thirds of the forest-dependent communities in the country. I wonder where the leaping ministers were then? …
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The Galloping Beaver: Putting the boots to granny (updated)
If the priorities of the Harper government aren't fairly clear by now you, you've been living under rock. Everything is driven by the ideology espoused in this Harper speech. Now, Harper is going to start executing the agenda everyone on the right said he didn't have. You know - the hidden one.One would like to think that Harper's blustering at the World Economic Forum in Davos Switzerland was simply his continuing attempt to pat himself on the back for no other reason than his very existence. It was these lines which have everyones' ears pricked up:As I said earlier, one of the backdrops for …
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Daisy's Dead Air: Friday noise
Eons ago, I used to write record reviews for FOCUS ROCK ENTERTAINMENT (screen capture of old publication here! Only image I could find online!). They paid me in t-shirts, movie and concert tickets, tote bags and other crap nobody else wanted, and records. RECORDS. Lots and lots of vinyl, some of which I still own because I can't bear to part with it.
One of the records I reviewed was VOLUNTEER JAM, which contained this major kick-ass song from the Charlie Daniels Band, jamming beautifully with members of the Allman Brothers Band and the Marshall Tucker Band. (The song ultimately …
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Anti-Choice is Anti-Awesome: Why Poll Data Doesn’t Matter
So, I guess there's been an Angus Reid poll that found that 51% of Canadians favour some restrictions on abortion - and 60% favour restricting sex-selective abortion. I have some thoughts.First of all, who are these people who don't think there should be any restrictions, but then do think that, oh yeah, if it's for sex selection then we should really clamp down. What? I have so many questions for them. Like: how do we determine someone's reason for aborting? How hard do you think it would be to get around such a restriction? What do you think it says about our society that sex selective …
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Northern Reflections: Full Of Himself
On the same day that the Globe and Mail reported on Stephen Harper's "grand plan to reshape Canada," and on Tony Clement's announcement that the "budget axe could cut deeper, sooner," Jeffrey Simpson wrote that, "In the first five years of the Harper government, the number of information officers in the federal government grew by 16 per cent, to 4,459 from 3,855."The growth in the number of information officers is curious. For the Harper government has been all about releasing less information, not more of it. The truth is that the Conservatives are obsessed with information -- or more …
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Politics'n'Poetry: I’m singing in hell
I’m singing in hell This is a place where my City Councillor invokes UN property rights instead of human rights for the 130 people evicted from a rundown apartment block destined for demolition, where the Mayor, hell-bent on the erection of Pat’s Palace and a domed stadium over social housing, believes he’s a big man, [...] …
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the regina mom: Catching Up on Pipeline News and Actions
the regina mom has many links open in her browser window right now so this post could get long. Each relates to the Northern Gateway pipeline. The story, obviously, has legs and is running hard. There’s this bit about the HarperCons determining that there are two types in Canada, those who are allies and those who are threats. CBC covers the story, as well, going more in depth about the HarperCon strategy to make the tarsands look good to Europeans:
The strategy plan contains a chart where it lists its targets, influencers, allies and adversaries. First Nations are characterized …
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