Willy Loman

Fox News NorthNational Post has a new puff piece framing Harper's traditional conservative support for what I assume are the declining number of Progressive Conservatives that the neocons need to diversify their base. They had to dig pretty deep, coming up with Kim Campbell. I guess quoting Mulroney's praises just won't cut it anymore or more likely were no longer being offered.
Anyway the best Kim could come up with was that "Harpers competent but too controlling". Not quite sure what basis Kim is using for comparison, but Harpers team certainly seems as inexperienced as hers was during her short as Prime Minister. Just as inexperienced, but a lot more arrogant. Kim sugested that "Harper needs to be a little bit franker about what he would do if he got a majority government."
Sure Kim, asking a Neocon to be open and honest about their agenda is the same as asking a leopard to change it's spots, or little Johnny to quit swearing in class or a snake to…

With one church destroyed the Christian rock group Starfield is continuing it's tour across Canada.
You would think that these evangelical, cultists just might take it as a sign of some sort, you know, like from God that he/she or it is not really happy with what they are doing and how they are doing it.

You could be a devout Catholic, Jew, Hindu, Muslin, Buddhist (I like the Buddhists, they're cool) or even the Pope himself, but you ain't going to heaven with these spurious, sycophants. At least not until you convert and are reborn by renouncing your other faiths and accept Jesus as your savour. And these churches are renting out their halls to allow these well organized propagandists access to the children of their congregation. Are they not a competing group for Christ sake (pun intended).
PS: Oh and check out their online store where you can buy a cool shirt that reads "I want to hold the hand that holds the world". I really don't know much about religion, b…

According to this Globe article the US has now set up camp next the Canadian forces. So much for Steve having his own war.

This move in support of Harpers demands at the last NATO meeting is considered as the Americanization of the Afghanistan war.

Maybe that should be the re-Americanization, since they sort of took off a while ago to spread democracy throughout the middle east.
But this new U.S. contribution is accompanied by a push to "Americanize" the 40-nation NATO mission, especially in the British-Canadian Southern Command. General Dan McNeill, the U.S. Army officer who currently commands the 40-nation NATO coalition fighting in Afghanistan, said in an interview that he hopes Canada and other nations will adopt U.S.-style tactics and doctrines, including lengthier deployments for soldiers, harder-line opium-poppy-eradication strategies and the use of military forces in reconstruction and humanitarian work. Canadian and British senior officers, in interviews yesterday, sa…

It is strange though that the CTV headline here emphasizes the spray painting of "Traitor" and not the "FLQ" which you would think would be more to the point. Maybe they are taking their new found affection for the neocons too seriously or they just want to increase their Alberta ratings,

As promised by Baird, when announcing his plans to save the environment, Canadians are going to have to make sacrifices in order to lower our carbon emissions. Harpers government wants to reduce smog-causing additives in paints, stains and varnishes. 

According to CNEWS: Baird is proposing limits on volatile organic compounds, which are found in everything from house paint to nail polish and vehicle coatings. Baird says the compounds are the second largest contributor to smog in Canada, after vehicle emissions.
Apparently they are not quite as concerned about the Tar Oil Sands. At least not in the same way.

PS: In all fairness Baird probably saw the word "Organic"and thought is was a Liberal additive.

Right on queue here's the Fox News CanadaNational Post framing of the neocon spin on the forthcoming Bill C57. The article is about a Roman Catholic doctor: Dr. Levia "who refuses to prescribe birth control pills, though he will talk about natural family planning; and no patient should expect him to give a referral for an abortion because that, he said, would be akin to "co-operating with evil".

When you read down the article you find that Levia is member of the "Canadian Physicians for Life". This organization headed by a Williard Johnston MD defines something called the Hippocratic Tradition (apparently not the Oath that we have heard some much about) as being against abortions and birth control. 
The Post article basically steers it along the Roman Catholic argument, even mentioning the Pope's recent visit and of course no mention of C57. I mean Catholics still represent a large portion of voters in Canada and especially in Quebec, you know the new ba…

Interestingly the winner of last Friday's Neocon Scandal of the Week: Harpers, In and Out Scheme, dominated the media throughout the early part of this week. There were numerous articles and newscasts about how the neocons tried to circumvent the messaging of the raid by holding a private meeting with select representatives from friendly, media, corporations and how candidates were unaware of the tricks used in funding. 
Some conservative candidates in the last election claim that they were dropped by the party because they wouldn't agree to the shady accounting. There were even charts showing how the scheme might have unfairly influenced the actual results of the election.
But hey, they are neocons and as Harper said upon his return from praising Bush in New Orleans, if our interpretation of the rules was wrong, we won't do it next time.
With so much press, I  was concerned that we would have to run with the same story. But leave it to those crazy Neocons, there's alwa…

It's a rough time to be a Polar Bear according to the recent flurry of articles about killing them. From Canada, the Numavut government is proposing to our Feds that the annual hunt on Baffin Island be reduced to 64 bears from a 105 last year. Of course the local Inuit are claiming that their government is wrong on the number of bears available for slaughter. We are talking about a difference of less than 50 bears here.

The last actual count was done in 1997, where the population was set at 2,100. According to our government's revised numbers based on computer models, the current, estimated, number is now around 1,500 or a 30% drop in 10 years. Local hunters claim that these estimates are wrong, One man's brother-in-law has seen six bears in a single day, and that the government is looking for bears in the wrong spots. Besides Polar Bears to the Inuit are like cows are to the people in the south.

But it gets worse for the bears. The US Senate for some reason was supposed to …

So the wrong drug, but the music still messed you up.

Associated Press: U.S. President George Bush sought Thursday to boost the flagging Mideast peace process by voicing fresh optimism about the creation of a Palestinian state.
He remains confident that the definition of a state for the Palestinian people would be reached before he leaves office in January.This is from the fucking idiot who when taking office in 2001, scrapped Clinton's Mid East Peace Plan, claiming that he was not interested in nation building and that the Israelis and the Palestinians should work it out on their own.
Let me help you out here, George. There already is a definition for a state, you idiot.
state |stāt| noun: a nation or territory considered as an organized political community under one government

Next week Bush will be in Africa, working on a new definition for hunger.

SEATTLE — Microsoft Corp. said Thursday its fiscal third-quarter profit fell 11 per cent from a year earlier, when the software maker reported more than $1-billion (U.S.) in deferred revenue tied to delays in the launch of the Windows Vista operating system.
So what's new, they have been disappointing technology users for years.

Mary Dawson our Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner has just joined the ranks of Marc Mayrand our Chief Electoral Officer of Canada and Linda Keen the former head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission in announcing an investigation in the misconduct of another one of Harper's neoconservatives.

From CTV: "The federal ethics watchdog is investigating a sole-source contract Finance Minister Jim Flaherty's office awarded to a well-connected Conservative."

Wow is it only Tuesday? The picking the winner for our "NEOCON Scandal of the Week" segment is going to be really tough this week. Drop by Friday night for the winner.

Just in from the Canadian Press: Harper while defending NAFTA "Canada is the United States' No. 1 supplier of energy. We are a secure and stable supplier," said Harper, standing at a lecturn next to Bush and Calderon. As Bush chuckled into his microphone,..."
Great now Bush knows that we have oil.

I'm sorry, the poor man is probably dead but this MSNBC headline is one of the funniest I have read in a while.

Apparently he was trying "to raise money for a spiritual rest-stop for truckers"

Don’t you miss the indecisive, vacillation of a federal Liberal government. Their ability to take the middle of the road on any issue, do nothing and try to maintain the status quo. Not so much indecisiveness with our New Neocon government, they have a plan.

Where the Liberals would wait for an overwhelming majority of Canadians to demand that they finally take action one way or the other, you know sort of let the people demand change (at least until that sycophant Martin did his stint). However, to our new Neocon government, it is more a matter of implementation. They already know what they want to do.

To the reformers, old conservatives or whoever actually supports these neoconservative ideologies, who claim that this is nothing more than the baseless “secret agenda” scare tactic used in the past, here is an example.

The recent abundance of Pot articles in the news this last month has jogged my still functioning brain cells and reminded me of the evils of these Neocon ideologues. To se…

Hey, we made the list. That is very progressive of them. Welcome.

I feel just like Steve Martin did in the movie "The Jerk". The phone book's here! The phone book's here!

From the Jeff Beck album Truth
Truth (1968) was the first full-length album by Jeff Beck and his backing group. The album featured three original songwriting collaborations between Jeff Beck and Rod Stewart, "Let Me Love You", "Blues Deluxe", and "Rock My Plimsoul". Highlighted by a re-recording of the Yardbirds' "Shapes of Things", Willie Dixon's "I Ain't Superstitious" and the traditional "Greensleeves", it is considered by many to be one of the first heavy metal albums. Both Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones played on "Beck's Bolero", originally recorded in 1966 with Keith Moon on drums and Nicky Hopkins on piano.I owned too many copies of this album (4 albums and 2 CDs). I kept lending it to friends or apparently giving them away. The above listing from Wikipedia calls it the first Heavy Metal album. There was a lot of confusion with genre back then.
I have many memories about Truth (not necessarily t…

Our editorial board here at JAWL has decided that we are starting to sound a little bit too liberal with so many rants about the Steve and his party. So we have instituted this new feature in an effort to sound less partisan. Introducing The Neocon Scandal of the week.
Although there were a few good offerings from Steve this week the inaugural winner is the neocon reaction to the raid on the Conservative headquarters by the RCMP.
A closer look at the 'in and out' scheme
The Conservatives are under investigation for an "in and out" scheme, under which the party allegedly funnelled money through the local election campaigns of individual Tory candidates so they could spend more on their national campaign.
In the 2005-06 election campaign, the Conservatives' national headquarters transferred money to 67 local candidates - who immediately transferred it back as "payment" for campaign advertising. Of course the neocons claim that this was all legal and that the var…

Thirty five years of sunshine. 

Today, Bush acting upon his new found knowledge that the world is round, has decided to fight global warming. Here's the Associated Press, press release by way of the CBC.
Bush sees U.S. greenhouse emissions leveling off by 2025

U.S. President George W. Bush stepped into the White House Rose Garden Wednesday to announce a new target in the fight against global warming. He wants U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases to stop increasing by 2025 and says his administration has taken a rational and balanced approach to the threat of climate change.

Bush, who leaves office next January, again dismissed what he called "the flawed approach of the Kyoto Protocol." The 1997 deal, which the United States did not ratify, calls on industrial countries to cut their emissions to an average five per cent below 1990 levels by 2012.

It would have limited U.S. economic growth and shifted American jobs to other countries while letting new industrial powers such as China and India increase rather t…

More War News from the Globe:

Apparently Maxime Bernier, Steve's point man on Foreign Affairs got carried away with our country's new role of running a war (I mean we are very new at it).
Bernier urges Karzai to replace Kandahar Governor

Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier dropped a bombshell Monday when he effectively called for the ouster of Asadullah Khalid, the controversial governor of Kandahar province. "There's the question to maybe have a new governor," Mr. Bernier said when asked what Karzai could do about the perception of political corruption in Kandahar province, where Canadian forces are based. "I think (Karzai) can work with us to be sure the (new) governor will be more powerful ... (and) will do what he has to do to help us."Kind of pissed off the Afghans. I mean if one of the objectives is that Afghanistan is going to become a democracy, that should include self rule. Or if Karzai really wants to get rid of one of his corrupt drug lords…

We do not get a lot of visitors around JAWL (as lamented on earlier posts). However when we get such esteemed guests as the United States Department of State, we tend to get excited. 
Apparently someone in the State Department googled Nikolai Pedersen today. As you might recall Nikolai is the 85 year old Canadian farmer whose farm sits on the Canada/US border and whose lane way runs on the US side. See the recent article from the CBC here. 
Right after 911 the US border patrol started harassing Canadians living in cross border towns and in Nicolai's case actually cut off Canada Post from delivering his mail. See the problem is that there is road without a border crossing that runs from Canada through the US to Nicolai's farm house back in Canada. The border patrol stopped Canada Post from using this road and said they would have to go through the border crossing a considerable number of miles away. And of course have the Canada Post truck searched.
The CBC ran a Fifth Estate piec…

War News from the Globe & Mail
Our top political war manager, Trade Minister David Emerson, has determined that "Ottawa will start releasing progress reports every three months on the mission, a move that should begin before the Commons rises in early to mid-June."Well that sort of makes sense as Emerson is an ex-CEO of one of the largest lumber companies in North America and everyone knows progress and success should be measured quarterly. But the war is being managed by the Trade Ministry. We are new at this
One goal of these reports will be to shift the focus away from casualties – the only broadly watched benchmark currently tracked by news media – and toward other measures.Well that would explain the not lowering the flag thing and we better get those people off the 401 over passes every time a dead soldier comes home too. What kind of way is that to support a war.
Mr. Emerson said new benchmarks aren't ready yet but acknowledged reducing Canada's proportionate…

In fact do more than that wipe him from our collective memories. He was unceremoniously driven from office and should be left in solitude, to deal with his impending end of life anxieties. Just as Benedict Arnold quietly lived out his life in England, Mulroney should be allowed to live out his time, anonymously in his chosen homeland.

I remember Canada before Mulroney and I remember why he was driven out office. It wasn't just the rumors of corruption running rampant throughout his government that forced him out. It wasn't just the formation of the Bloc and its revitalized separatist movement that forced him out. It wasn't just his arrogance of demanding 100% approval from all provincial legislatures for the Meech Lake Accord. And it wasn't even the GST (It had to be created as a convenient replacement for the Manufacturers Tax that was impeding Free Trade).

For me it was just the Free Trade Agreement itself and the fact that he sold our country to the US corporations. 
I…

Neocon Marketing 101: Hide the intent of your policies by claiming they do the opposite and give them names, slogans if you like so you can win popular support. They call it framing and it is expertly explained by the The Harper Index A great site to keep track of the Neocon con and should be a prerequisite for every Canadian that is concerned about the corporate, right wing, takeover of our country that is now being implemented by Harper and his rebranded Reform Party.

As Canadians we are all aware of the numerous examples from the US. Ignoring the marketing of lies that went into Iraq, it was the social and environmental policies where the Neocons really got creative. In education "No child left behind" left more children behind, in environment, they assigned a former oil Industry lobbyist as head of the environmental protection agency who opened the national parks to the lumber industry, increased the burning of fossil fuels (coal which apparently will be clean someday), d…

According to a report published by the CBC, Blog reading become a habit, study says. Apparently, the regular reading of blogs has become an "internet ritual".The study found that:
The usefulness of the blog is less important
Routine act of checking is more important
Date & frequency of posts doesn't matter
Missed posts are not missed opportunities
Reading blogs a form of "chilling out" or "wasting time"
Readers feel pressured to produce worthwhile comments
Date & frequency of posts doesn't matter
Well according to our site monitor, there are no internet rituals happening around here

After a long tough week: Donovan's Universal Soldier.

Peace

According to this Associated Press article, a Florida jury has awarded $253M to the children of a Cuban man arrested and jailed in Cuba in 1959. He died in captivity in 1977.

The lawsuit alleged that the Cuban government "intentionally, unlawfully, and with complete disregard for human life, tortured and killed him by hanging." The plaintiffs were ceremoniously awarded, 50% more than the $187M they asked for.

And the reason as explained by one juror "Basically, all of us decided that we all wanted to send a message to the world that countries don't mess around with U.S. citizens,"

Meanwhile on Cuba, the US government is abducting, people from other countries and torturing them.

Give me a fucking break.

Lather by Jefferson Airplane from The Smothers Brothers show.

That was a great show. Dam that burning bush.

PS: I think the new Acid Test tile is better.

That's right it is not NATO's war anymore, it is ours. We have ownership.

Steve stepped forward and set down the conditions that had to be met to be successful in Afghanistan (see 1,000 below). Yup, Steve went to Romania and laid claim to the war in Afghanistan. And according to old Lloyd at CTV, the US as our ally is now going to step up and send a 1,000 additional troops. Oh and France is sending a battalion, roughly 700 more troops to help Canada out. They are going to east though, not the south where the Taliban currently is, but hey they are French (sorry France just practicing my US style war rhetoric).

Steve even got to talk to the world press on a podium with Karzi right beside him and explain what is needed and Karzi acknowledged Canada's role. I'm so proud, we finally have our own war.

Way to go Steve! This one's for you.

The Peace Sign turns 50 today.

From the Washington Post today. "Unveiled at a British ban-the-bomb rally on April 4, 1958, the peace symbol's peak of potency was in the 1960s, when it was the emblem of the anti-Vietnam War movement and all things groovily counterculture.
Said its late creator, British graphic designer Gerald Holtom: "I drew myself . . . a man in despair . . . put a circle around it to represent the world."
The symbol has marched in service of many causes over the years: civil rights, women's rights, environmentalism, gay rights, anti-apartheid, the nuclear-freeze movement and the latter-day antiwar crowd."
And I have always looked really cool wearing it.

Happy Birthday and Peace 

Reading all the hype about Harper's visit to Romania for the NATO meetings, you would think the balance of the free world was depending upon Canada getting a 1,000 troops.
Will Canada get them, won't we get them.  Harper and Bernier are optimistic one day, but so much the next day and often of opposing opinion.
There were stories from Canadian Press, Reuters, Globe, CTV, CBC and of course a plethora of positive positioning from the Canwest media.

Here's a few examples prior to, during and following the meeting: PM appears to dampen NATO meeting expectations from Canadian Press on Saturday Bernier optimistic NATO will provide more troops from CTV on Monday
PM confident of securing key demands at NATO summit from the Globe today Tories downplay hopes for troop pledges at NATO summit from CBC today France may send 'few hundred' troops to Afghanistan from Reuters today

The Post had this article about Nato agreeing with Canada and taking the Canadian lead, published under differ…