The Recession and the Frozen Body

As I watched this little tug trying to tow a ferry across the frozen lake, only to give up and turn back, I couldn't help but think of Stephen Harper's useless budget.

And wonder why anyone could think that it's going to pull us out of a recession.Or prepare us for the horror that lies ahead.

Or why anyone is surprised that the Americans are becoming protectionists.

When their economy is imploding, millions are suffering, and entire communities are dying.....like the once great city of Detroit.

Where they dug this poor guy out of the ice the other day...













Finally.

There are at least 19,000 homeless people in Detroit, by some estimates. Put another way, more than 1 in 50 people here are homeless.

The human problem is so bad, and the beds so few, that some shelters in the city provide only a chair. The chair is yours as long as you sit in it. Once you leave, the chair is reassigned.

Thousands of down-on-their-luck adults do nothing more with their day than clutch onto a chair. This passes for normal in some quarters of the city.

It's so bad in Motown that some people are predicting that it could become the first ruin of the American Empire.

Meanwhile across the river in Canada we're preparing to go into a brutal recession with a sham of a stimulus budget, and an Employment Insurance system that covers less than half of unemployed Canadians.

And our idiot leaders are in a state of denial.

Neither the governing Conservatives nor the opposition Liberals seem to understand the seriousness of this crisis. Rhetoric notwithstanding, both parties appear to think they are dealing with a problem that will go away in two years and allow the world to return to business as usual.

What is Stephen Harper doing? What are the Liberals thinking by supporting a budget like that one without demanding major changes? Can't they even IMAGINE how bad it could get?

It's time to stop putting cheap politics before the real lives of suffering Canadians.

Because time is running out. The Big Chill is almost here.

And we're going nowhere...

The Christianists and Pepsi's Gay Ad

In yet another alarming sign that The Abyss cannot be far off, the crazy Christianists in the U.S. have been on a feeding frenzy lately...boycotting food companies that support gay rights.

First it was Campbell's Soup, then it was McDonald's. And now it's Pepsi.

The good news is that Pepsi isn't backing down.

And has just released an ad in Britain.

Which is making the crazy Christianists even crazier....




Hmmm....whatever....I mean excellent ....how ORIGINAL !!!!

I wonder how many Pepsis I can drink a day without having my teeth fall out ? Or how many hamburgers I can eat .... before Sébastien would have to push me around in a wheel barrow?

Oh well.....in other good gay news...the two penguin daddies in China just got married.

Oh boy...or should I say oh birdy?That'll drive the homophobes wild.

But then that's the BEST thing about being gay, and living in a world as bigoted as this one.

You get to shove empty Pepsi bottles up the bigot asses of the crazy Christianists. Or slap them in the face with a stinky sardine.

And every SMALL victory counts....

The Holocaust Denier and the Homophobe

Now that the Nazi Bishop has apologized to the (former Nazi) Pope for making "imprudent" remarks about the Holocaust.

"Amidst this tremendous media storm stirred up by imprudent remarks of mine on Swedish television, I beg of you to accept, only as is properly respectful, my sincere regrets for having caused to yourself and to the Holy Father so much unnecessary distress and problems..."

But not to the Holocaust survivors or the Jewish people.

I can only wonder if the Holy Hitlerite is ever going to offer a non-apology to gay people for his violent homophobia.

In fact the sin is so unnatural that Mother Church ranks it alongside murder, defrauding the worker of his just wage, and oppression of the widow or orphan, as one of the four sins "crying to Heaven for vengeance".

Or a offer a non-apology to women for his depraved views on female equality.

What needs to be proved is that even to a decent university, if such could be found, few or no girls should be sent. This is because of the God-given nature of girls. Which, despite today's massive propaganda to the contrary, is quite different from the God-given nature of boys!

Right.

I didn't think so.

I'm not surprised....














This is the Church that Benny built.

The horror. The horror....

Ignatieff and the Stupidity of it All

As I explained yesterday what bothers me the most about Michael Ignatieff's decision to support Stephen Harper's deeply flawed budget is its sickening moral failure.

His decision to abandon his so-called Liberal principles, and not even call for changes to the budget's most reactionary elements.

Ignatieff understands what's wrong with the budget. Yesterday, he detailed some of its main defects – its failure to address the fact that most jobless people don't qualify for employment insurance, its refusal to deal with child care, the strings attached to its infrastructure spending proposals, its gratuitous attack on the principle of paying men and women equally for work of equal value.

Then, having listed the budget's flaws, he said his party would support it anyway.

So millions of unemployed Canadians could be condemned to lives of poverty and misery.

Where the government needs to compromise most is in the area of employment insurance. All employees pay into this fund. But only 42 per cent of the jobless qualify for benefits. In bad times, this discrepancy promises disaster.

When he could have forced a compromise out of Harper's desperate Cons.

Had Ignatieff's Liberals cared enough, they almost certainly could have forced the government to back down here. But clearly they did not.

That's bad and unforgivable enough. But what also offends me is the stupidity of it all.

Last December, the proposed coalition promised to pump much-needed money into infrastructure projects, such as housing, roads and public transit. It also vowed to improve social benefits and provide help to troubled industries.

The program was so good that Harper stole many of the ideas and put them into Tuesday's budget.

By forming a coalition, Ignatieff would signal he is ready to govern.

By refusing, he ends up being outmanoeuvred politically by Harper, who in a year or two will claim credit for what will then be an improving Canadian economy.

So let's sum up this brilliant strategy that cost the Coalition its life.

If the budget is a total failure, and millions of Canadians are condemned to poverty and suffering, they will then turn to Ignatieff and his ConLibs to save them. Because he allowed this tainted budget to pass.

Hello? What? Really?

And if the budget somehow magically works, Stephen Harper gets all the credit, and gets to rule forever.

Wow that's BRILLIANT. Eh?

The Coalition really was the best and most Canadian solution to the enormous and frightening economic crisis our country faces.

I hate attacking Liberals...so many of them are my friends. Everybody knows that I believe in uniting the left into a common front so we can drive the foul Cons from power FOREVER.

I also suspect that Ignatieff will live to regret his moment of moral cowardice.... his moment of idiocy. And it will be his worst punishment.

But right now all I know is that he murdered my beautiful Coalition for NOTHING.

And I will never forgive him...

The Christianists and the Condoms

Gawd. I see the rabid rubber bubbahs at LifeShite are alarmingly aroused by all those condoms in Obama's stimulus package.

Although I for one can't understand what the fuss is all about. Isn't a stimulus package supposed to be...um....STIMULATING?

And if the package doesn't work, and millions of Americans have to live in cardboard boxes, can't they at least have a little cheap FUN ? You know.... without producing even more babies they can't afford to feed.....or getting AIDS and stuff like that.

*Sigh* But that's the story of my relationship with the inhuman freakazoids from LifeShite. They annoy me.

And I annoy them back....



And since their rubber fetish annoys me as much as their homophobia .....because in Africa and other poor places stricken by AIDS it leads to GENOCIDE.

And since that squeaky little ad probably wasn't long enough to seriously bother those Christianist woofers.

I thought that today I'd whip out my ....um....heavy artillery.

And send them this Ode to the Condom.....all the way from Bollywood.



Wow. Wasn't that awesome?

Who knew you could dance to a condom ad?

If that one doesn't bag those rubber bubbahs. Or drive them SANE.

Nothing ever will...

Ignatieff and the Coalition that Won't Die

Well I can't say I'm surprised. Just disgusted.

Michael Ignatieff had a chance to do the right thing, and stand up for the rights of poor Canadians, women, and children.

But instead he sold us all out. He'll blow Stephen Harper and "swallow hard" for the price of a meaningless amendment

Ignatieff is attempting to legislate something that's already there anyway by constitutional convention. All he's adding is a timetable, which, frankly, doesn't amount to much.

He didn't even have the guts or the decency to ask for changes to Employment Insurance, so many more Canadians could be eligible for benefits, instead of being driven into poverty and misery. Now there are two Conservative Parties in Canada: Harper's LibCons, and Ignatieff's ConLibs.

And for what? Does he really believe he can win an election against Harper all by himself? When the reason he's doing relatively well in the polls is mostly due to his popularity in Quebec.

But only because Quebecers saw him as a better Coalition leader than Stephane Dion. Now that he's stabbed the Coalition in the back, they'll call him a QUISLING and abandon him in droves.

And does he realize that by killing the Coalition that could have made him Prime Minister, he has only encouraged Stephen Harper to go gunning for an EARLY election? The one he craves to try to bankrupt the opposition parties. The one the Liberals can't afford.

Because now if he's defeated, Stephen Harper can tell the Governor General the Coalition is dead, and she'll have no choice but to grant him an election. Brilliant eh?

The Coalition for Change offered us all kinds of new possibilities. A chance to topple Stephen Harper's foul neocons before he damages our country even more and shames us further in the eyes of the world. A chance to unite the progressive left, and reclaim the Canada we've lost.

But instead Ignatieff opted to collaborate with Harper, by putting his Party before his country, and stabbing the dream in the back. So now it's No We Can't.

Instead of Yes We Can...
















But he will not succeed. You can't kill something as strong and as beautiful as that. Sooner or later the progressive left will realize that we're living in different times, and that as long as we don't unite the Cons will rule FOREVER.

Sooner or later the Liberals will understand what they have done. Weaklings. Cowards. Quislings.

Sooner or later the Coalition will be back. Which is why I won't be removing the Coalition emblem from my sidebar.

Ever.

Because to me it will always stand for hope.

Ignatieff and his ConLibs may have betrayed it.

But the dream will never die...

Why the Coalition Should Topple the Cons

I guess this photo-op sums up how I feel about today's Budget. It was supposed to be an informal snapshot of the Harper Team working on the nation's business. Only a CBC reporter on their news channel came up with a detailed map showing where everyone should sit or stand.

So it was hardly surprising that the budget itself was nothing but a giant PR exercise.

It spews money in every direction to try to buy votes. It depends too much on shared funding from cash-strapped municipalities, its tax cuts are peanuts that will cost us dearly later on. It does almost nothing to encourage a greener economy. And it continues this foul Con government's war on Canadian women, with nothing for childcare spaces, and an assault on pay equity.
















But its most catastrophic omission is that it it fails to adequately reform the Employment Insurance system and prepare it to cope with the enormous tide of human misery that could be coming its way. Because as I pointed out yesterday EI in Canada these days is completely inadequate.

Cuts in the early 1990s mean barely half of the country's unemployed today – and fewer than a quarter in Toronto – are eligible for benefits. Those lucky enough to qualify often get far less than poverty-level incomes. And for almost everyone scrambling to find work as the economy crumbles, benefits run out too soon.

And if more people don't become eligible, and benefits are increased, millions of Canadians could be forced into lives of grinding poverty, welfare rolls could swell, and our whole safety net could collapse.

Whatever Michael Ignatieff decides to include in his amendment tomorrow it must include a demand to reform the EI system. And if the Cons don't agree, then the opposition should topple them, and the Coalition should form a new and more Canadian government.

Because abandoning millions of Canada's most vulnerable citizens to the horror of what could be a brutal soul destroying economic apocalypse is simply unthinkable...if we are to continue to call ourselves Canadians.















The Coalition for Change has done some amazing things already in its short life.

It has changed the political dynamic in this country. It stopped Stephen Harper's attempt to destroy our political system. It made him grovel and beg for his job.....and violate everything he ever believed in.

It has made his fanatical neocon ideologues look like IDIOTS, forced them to pretend to be ConLiberals, and come up with money for such things as social housing...which they NEVER would have done otherwise.

Now it must do even more. At a time of national emergency, when so many Canadians face unimaginable misery, Canada must be Canada.....not a neocon jungle.

If the Cons don't do the right and decent thing. Defeat them. Crush them.

Finish them off....

Stephen Harper and the Blogging Woollies

Click pic to enlarge

When I saw this disturbing picture I couldn't make up my mind whether it was Stephen Harper clinging to power by pretending to be a bunny.... or a Liberal.

Or whether it was just the Blogging Tories faithfully humping Great Desperate Leader's leg, no matter what he says or does. And I just HAD to find out.

So I put on my tinfoil tuque and headed over to the BT site. Only to find them grazing peacefully in their pen.




















Baaing about how the Obamamessiah is baaaad, and killing children in Gaza is good. And how global warming is a myth. In short: the usual shite.

But not even a little Bo Peep about how Great Con Leader had just betrayed EVERYTHING they've been bleating about all their lives.You know like big government, deficit spending, arts funding, and helping poor people.

Except from this little lamb. Soon to be known as Unambiguously Confused.

Or just a traitor... judging by this exchange in the comments:

------Well buh byeeee
and be sure to take yourself off this blogroll

------I remain on this blogroll at the pleasure of Stephen Taylor, the administrator. When he asks me to leave, I’ll do so.

But what WAS the Dark Shepherd of the Blogging Woollies up to anyway? On the day his Lord and Master was delivering the most apocalyptic Throne Speech ever written on the back of a matchbox.

Once again I just HAD to find out.

Wow. Can you believe that? Obsessing about Krista Erickson. Again. Will he EVER get over her? And on the day his beloved Leader is trying his best to sound like a LIBERAL. Shame on him.

Look I knew the right-wing was dying. That it had been overtaken by events and discredited beyond repair. And that the Great Recession would do to the Cons what the Great Asteroid did to the dinosaurs.

But who knew they would go out not with a bang but a baaaa?

Who knew that watching the Con sheep squirming on the shish kebab of history could be so DELICIOUS?

Anyone like mint sauce with their mutton? Mmmm.... I do.

Muahahahaha...

Harper and the Hill the Cons will Die On

As I watched the teeny weeny Throne Speech today I couldn't help but be struck by how beaten Stephen Harper looked.The Governor General may have been sitting in the big chair. But Harper looked like he was sitting on another kind of throne.... shitting himself.

And who can blame him? Once not so long ago he was telling us the fundamentals were sound. Now they're collapsing. Once Great Economist ,Strong ,Clueless Leader told us the outlook was bright. Now it's sepulchral.

The Conservative government set a grim tone for the resumption of Parliament on Monday with a throne speech that used the word "crisis" four times in the first six paragraphs.

There were references to unprecedented uncertainty, worldwide recession, world wars and an allusion to the Great Depression of the 1930s.

But what must cause him even more pain than looking like a third rate fortune teller ....or an ignorant jackass...or looking as if he's straining to expel a turd the size of Jimbo Flaherty..... is having to look like a LIBERAL. Because he's so desperate to keep his job he'll do or say ANYTHING.









But of course there's only so far a fanatical ideologue like Stephen Harper can go, and this is the hill he will die on.

"We are not interested in making it lucrative to pay people not to work, it's not what this government is about, that's not what the taxpayers expect us to spend money on...not making Employment insurance more generous"

Stephen Harper December 19, 2008

With so many Canadians afraid of losing their jobs, and the present EI system so inadequate.

Cuts in the early 1990s mean barely half of the country's unemployed today – and fewer than a quarter in Toronto – are eligible for benefits. Those lucky enough to qualify often get far less than poverty-level incomes. And for almost everyone scrambling to find work as the economy crumbles, benefits run out too soon.

If Stephen Harper doesn't do enough to improve this wretched system that condemns so many Canadians to lives of degrading poverty, the Coalition for Change will have a perfect excuse to defeat the budget and take power. Why go to the wall over tax cuts, as bad as they are, when we can use the power of fear itself ? The fear so many Canadians have that they could be next.

Because Harper can't describe what we're facing as an economic apocalypse, and then do nothing to help its victims. Can he? Unless he's a crazy neocon who would put his jungle ideology before the lives of suffering Canadians. But he's a Liberal isn't he? Muahahahaha.

Wow isn't the Coalition awesome? First it turned Great Crazy Leader into a pathetic, grovelling, pretend Liberal. Now it can bring him down for not being a good enough one. Talk about poetic justice.

Golly. If I wasn't such a hopeless pessimist I might believe we've got the foul Cons exactly where we want them.

Defeat them. Crush them. Finish them off....

Robbie Burns and My Real Scotland

Today was the 250th birthday of Robbie Burns Scotland's most famous poet. And all over the world Scots were carving the haggis....and getting drunk.

"The 250th anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns has been celebrated on a global scale and as it should be - with dancing, singing, laughter and of course the odd dram.

Now I don't drink. And I wouldn't touch that awful offal..... with a ten-foot caber.

The offal in question is what was bobbing in the cauldron. It's organ meat – lamb kidneys, liver, hearts and lungs. Once they were darkly red, glistening specimens of varying texture: firm hearts; resilient, elastic kidneys; puffy, yielding lungs; glutinous liver. Soon, they would be simmered down and ground up

Mmmm....yummy......* Vomit *

On the other hand I was born on the banks of the Moray, in a village in the shadow of the highlands.

And I'm proud of my Scottish heritage. And the Scottish in everyone

Anyone who has ever appreciated how often the best-laid plans really do have a tendency to "gang aft agley," sung Auld Lang Syne on New Year's Eve, contrived to give their love "a red, red rose," or heard a coach utter the words "do or die," has been touched by the most Scottish of writers, Robbie Burns.

And Robbie Burns moves me like few other poets do...or ever could. Not because of the folkloric Scotland he has come to symbolize, the boozy good times, or the hideous haggis and the fake tartans. The real Scotland is a VERY different place.

But because although his life was hard, he was so full of passion for life, and spoke up for the humanity and rights of the humble and the poor. And for the equality of all human beings.

As he does in this poem that moves me the most.











Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord,
Wha struts, an' stares, an' a' that;
Tho' hundreds worship at his word,
He's but a cuif for a' that:
For a' that, an' a' that,
His ribband, star, an' a' that:
The man o' independent mind
He looks an' laughs at a' that.

His passion for the real Scotland....and a better world.... makes me want to fight bullies and tyrants everywhere. And dream that one day Scotland will be a REAL nation again. Where goodness will rule and everything will be possible.

Which is why I made this little video of a journey from Glasgow, across Scotland to the village by the North Sea where I was born...


Here's a ginger ale toast to Robbie Burns.
Down with the awful offal.

Long live the Scottish nation...

Gaza and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

This week is the 66th anniversary of the first uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto. The moment when the doomed Jews of that enclave of misery decided enough was enough, and rose up against their Nazi oppressors.

So how tragic that on this anniversary Israel should find itself having to defend itself from charges that its soldiers committed war crimes against another group of people with nowhere to run.

And that some should compare its brutal assault on Gaza to the Nazi assault on the Warsaw Ghetto.

"To lock people into a war zone is something that evokes the worst kind of international memories of the Warsaw Ghetto, and sieges that occur unintentionally during a period of wartime," Falk, who is Jewish, said, referring to the starvation and murder of Warsaw's Jews by Nazi Germany in World War Two.

Now I don't believe that Gaza is the Warsaw Ghetto ....or that the Israelis are Nazis. But after reading this story.

Israel's blockade has left Gaza's 1.5 million residents relying on the tunnels as their economic lifeline. Everything from medicine, cement, chocolate bars and lion cubs for the zoo have entered Gaza through hundreds of deep, sandy holes.

"If Israel keeps the borders sealed off, we'll keep digging and only Allah can stop us. Let the Israelis drop their bombs. Without the tunnels we can't survive anyway....And if a bomb catches me underground, well, they won't have to dig my grave."

I do see some similarities.

And some lessons for Israel: You can't strangle a poor, desperate, hungry people or bomb them or burn them.

And not expect them to fight back.

Just like you can't expect to occupy and oppress a people for more than forty years and not become callous, and brutish, and indifferent to the suffering of others. Because if the Israelis aren't Nazis, the Palestinians aren't either.

For the sake of humanity, for the sake of Palestinian and Israeli children, for the sake of the sacred memory of the heroic fighters of the Warsaw Ghetto.

Stop these bloody war crimes.

Enough is enough...


















Recommend this post at Progressive Bloggers

Me and the Pope's YouTube Channel

Well I suppose it was inevitable. If Stephen Harper, Vladimir Putin, and the fat lady who fell off the exercise bicycle can have a YouTube channel....so can Pope Benny.

And I for one am delighted. Now I can monitor his periodic outbursts of self loathing homophobia without having to watch the news. Or call some old queen at the Vatican.

Although I must say I'm VERY impressed by his decision to join Google....and support their inspiring campaign for gay marriage.

Who knew eh? Good for him. I guess it's NEVER too late to change your mind....or come out of the closet.

But you know after checking out El Popo's site I'm afraid it needs a little work.

Because sadly he'll never attract any young viewers with that kind of boring shite.

So how about spicing it up a bit....with say a video of Madonna singing Like a Virgin .....dressed in nun's drag? Or the miraculous...and delicious...story of Jesus in a burrito?

Or maybe a scary clip of Benny playing the Grand Inquisitor he once was.

You know.. covering up those nasty scandals and ....um.....excommunicating.... sinners.




















The horrible kids of today just LOVE that gory stuff.

Or even better...how about humanizing the Pope a bit?

So the young ones he says he wants to reach can relate to him....and know EXACTLY where he's coming from.

By taking us back to the halcyon days of his own youth...



Yup. That would work. The uniform is different. But the message is more or less the same. Tomorrow belongs to us...unless you're a feminist, or an atheist, or gay.

Hmmmm....the best thing about this channel? It has COMMENTS.

Hi Benny it's Simon. I know you haven't heard from me before. And I sure hope you don't have a jealous boyfriend.

Because three Ave Marias for YouTube. From now on you ridiculous old homophobe.

You're going to hear from me a LOT....

------------------------------------------------

And you thought I was kidding.

Old habits die hard....

Why The Coalition Must Bring Down Harper

Is it my imagination or is Stephen Harper looking a little desperate these days? Like a pale little Con piggy on his way to the slaughterhouse of history. Oinking for his life.

But who can blame him eh?

First he torched our rainy day funds trying to buy himself a majority.Then he said the economy was sound and that he'd NEVER run a deficit. Then he predicted a healthy surplus. Then he recommended that Canadians buy stock...just before the markets tanked.

Then he tabled an economic update that was nothing more than a vicious attack on women, public service workers, and the other political parties. Then when confronted with the Coalition challenge he ran like a coward to the Governor General and whipped up hatred against Quebec to try to save his sorry ass.

Now five days before a budget Great Incompetent Leader is playing political games again.

Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff accused Prime Minister Stephen Harper of playing political games on Friday, calling the leaking of information from next week's federal budget a deliberate attempt "to get the bad news out of the way."

"I asked Mr. Harper not to play games like that. I told him, 'Put the facts and figures on the table. Don’t let them slip out at his convenience.' But the guy just can't help himself. He thinks it is all some kind of political game."

Which leads me to the obvious question: Why would ANYONE trust Stephen Harper again?

When everyone knows that he will just use a big deficit as an excuse to destroy the power of government... which is all this last of the Bush Cons ever wanted to do.

I know some Liberals believe that now is not the time to bring down the government. That they should make Harper wear the recession, and diminish him even more before making their move.

But I think that would be a fatal mistake. It would destroy Ignatieff's support in Quebec, demoralize and split the centre-left, leave Iggy looking like a Con stooge, and leave the country in the icy grip of a bully ideologue who could say something like this during a time of recession:

"We are not interested in making it lucrative to pay people not to work, it's not what this government is about, that's not what the taxpayers expect us to spend money on...not making Employment insurance more generous"




















Stephen Harper is the most evil and dangerous leader in Canadian history. To believe that he can be trusted or that he can really change would be the greatest act of idiocy or insanity this country has ever seen.

The Coalition is the best and most Canadian of instruments ever designed to rid us of this alien Bush Con government, and provide the kind of stability we need to fight the economic crisis.The best way to bury the separatist threat in Quebec by showing Quebecers that Canada works, when we all work TOGETHER.

The best way to show the world that we are Canadians not COWARDS, and we are determined to get our country back.

And the absolute best thing is that we don't need an election to do it. All we need to do is tell the Governor General that Harper has lost the confidence of the House. Period.

No matter what Harper and his foul Cons say or do next week.... defeat them.

Crush them.

Finish them off....

The Day YouTube Muted my Video

Last summer Sébastien and I made a little video of the gay pride parade and posted it to YouTube. Because the camera sound wasn't very good we edited the pictures to the sounds of We Are Family by Sister Sledge.

It's not Oscar material I admit, but I liked it. So imagine my shock today when I got an e-mail from YouTube informing me that along with millions of others I was a victim of this dispute.

And that our video had been muted.



Hmmm....I don't know. It's not quite the same. Now it reminds me of one of my Dad's 8mm silent movies. All it needs is me stumbling past the camera in my diapers babbling something like gah gah poo poo ca ca.

Which is how I feel about this dispute.

I appreciate that YouTube didn't take down the video. And that they offered me a list of licensed music to replace the audio track...with a click of a button. But after listening to artists like 3 Leg Torso, Ad Libitum, and Mattfatt I don't think I could ever forgive them.

And as for Warner Brothers and the other music companies maybe they should just get with it.

Perhaps, then, the solution is not to throw a cloak of silence over YouTube, but rather to try and persuade content owners that in the brave new world of web 2.0, content needs to be freed from the shackles of convention legal thinking, and allowed to evolve at the hands of the users and fans who really matter.

Duh. You don't say. Really eh?

When will they ever learn? Use it don't lose it.

Gah gah poo poo ca ca...

The Day Chimp Bush Got Humped

Golly....decisions....decisions.

I can't make up my mind which George Bush blow-up doll I like best.

The one that got pelted with shoes in Washington yesterday.



Or the one that got HUMPED...



Ooooh. I think I like that one.

Imagine what we're going to do to this statue.

When it comes down next week...















Everyone is invited to the coalition gang bang.

As long as I get to go FIRST.

Humpity... humpity ....humpity.

Who knew that bringing down the Cons could be so.....um.....EXCITING?

Harper and the Return of The Coalition

As I watched Obama's inauguration today I couldn't help but feel a bit envious. The Americans are so happy and full of hope. They have a new and cool President. While we are wallowing in the pit of despair because we got Stephen Harper.

The foul neocon bully nerd who doesn't know what he's doing, and has all the class of a guy who walks around in his underwear.

And then I saw this new poll and my spirits soared.

Polls conducted late last year showed a high level of opposition, especially outside Quebec, to a proposed Liberal-NDP coalition in the event the minority Harper government is defeated in the House. The new poll suggests Canadians' feelings have evolved, with 50 per cent of respondents favouring a coalition government, while 43 per cent are happier with the current Conservative government.

Imagine that eh? They buried it, nobody bothered to sell it. But the Coalition for Change came back anyway. Stronger than ever.

And what that means is that in less than two weeks Harper's Bush Cons could be toppled. And the coalition leaders can go to the Governor General and say that they are ready to form a new government.

And the only reason they have to offer to Canadians is that like them they just can't trust Great Naked Leader to do the right thing at a time of economic crisis.

Of the 1,000 respondents, 55 per cent disapproved of Mr. Harper's handling of his responsibilities, while 35 per cent offered their approval.

Which means that like the Americans we too have hope now. Hope that we can get rid of this foul sleazy regime that has raped our Canadian values, dragged our politics into the gutter, hurt women, children, poor people, torched the planet, and shamed our country in the eyes of the world.

And that we too can soon sing this freedom song, like the Great Pete Seeger and The Boss did the other day.



C'mon everyone we can do it. Let's stop worrying and wanking, show some passion for our country, and act ruthlessly to crush the Cons.

So we can sing it out loud. This land is my land, this land is OUR land.

The dirty Cons are rotting in the stinking garbage can of history.

And Canada is Canada again....

Gaza and the Madman Theory

As the Palestinians weep in the ruins of Gaza.

“I couldn't save anything,” said the elderly teacher, with tears in his eyes. “We have nothing left — no money, no food. We have nowhere else to go.”

“In my worst dreams I didn't think it would be this bad,” she sobbed. “This was the house of my children. All the pictures of my children, my diaries, my wedding ring are gone. The Israelis have wiped out my future and my past.”

The Israelis explain the madman theory.

The Israeli theory of what it tried to do here is summed up in a Hebrew phrase heard across Israel and throughout the military in the past weeks: “baal habayit hishtageya,” or “the boss has lost it.” It evokes the image of a madman who cannot be controlled.

“This phrase means that if our civilians are attacked by you, we are not going to respond in proportion but will use all means we have to cause you such damage that you will think twice in the future,” said Giora Eiland, a former national security adviser.

And all I can say is I'm just glad the killing has stopped. I hope the world can help the poor people of Gaza rebuild their shattered lives. I hope the Israelis can learn the difference between being strong and being brutal.




















And of course, madness, madness.

The poor little children.

What a cruel world...

The Cruel Death of a Gay Teenager

This is the kind of story that makes me doubt my faith in humanity.

A gay student jumped to his death after being jeered at by members of the public, an inquest has heard.

Shaun Dykes, 17, died instantly after throwing himself off the top of Westfield Shopping Centre car park in Derby on September 27th last year.

"He bent down to reach down to my hand when there was a shout of, "You're wasting taxpayers' money. He stood up, said, "It's gone too far" and started counting down. Then he said, "No", closed his eyes and threw himself off."

I don't understand why the human scum that taunted Shaun to his death weren't arrested. How they could shout "how high can you bounce? " And then take pictures of his dead body. I don't know what drove that tormented teenager to such an awful end.

What I do know is that about one out of three teenagers who commit suicide are gay. Which when you take into consideration the estimated number of gay people, means they are about 300 times more likely to kill themselves than straight youth.

And what makes it even more shocking is that the hatred that drives kids to commit suicide comes not just from the churchy bigots, or from the schoolyard bullies. But in almost one out of two cases from their own parents. Who don't accept their gay children or throw them out of their homes. Like Shaun who was living with his grandmother.

So what a coincidence that a new made for television movie is out about another gay teenager who jumped to his death. And a mother who rejected her gay son because of her religious convictions only to have an epiphany.



I won't be watching this movie. I just couldn't. It would make me too sad and too angry. I know the subject too well.

And besides I hate the title. Why would anyone pray for Bobby when it was dirty religion that killed him?

What I will do is keep on fighting the bigots and the bullies and the foul forces of religion that fertilize and water the bloody ground of homophobia.

Fight them as hard as I can and as long as it takes, and never ever ever give up.

What else can you do eh?

That's my prayer for Bobby.

That's my prayer for Shaun...

Gaza and the Day of Reckoning

So Israel has declared a unilateral ceasefire in Gaza.

But what does it really mean and how long will it really last?

Hamas has repeated its conditions for a ceasefire. It wants a withdrawal of Israeli forces within a week, and the opening of Gaza's crossings to the outside world.

Israel says Hamas has to take it or leave it. The question now is whether Hamas decides to lick its wounds and regroup - or whether it gambles on dragging Israel into a war of attrition.

After inflicting so much pain and death, Israel still says that Gaza's civilians are not its enemy. That is something that Gazans - and millions of others in this part of the world - do not believe.

And who can blame them?

The two brothers, aged five and seven, were killed at a school sheltering up to 1,800 local residents in Biet Lahiya, in northern Gaza. The mother of the children lost both her legs in the incident and another 13 people were injured.

More than 1,200 killed...one third of them children. More than 5,300 wounded, burned, or mutilated. Tens of thousands forced to flee their homes. Massive destruction everywhere in one of the poorest places on earth.

And for what ? So Israel's reputation can be blackened in the eyes of the world? And the hard men from Hamas can claim victory by just surviving the onslaught? And all over the world young Muslims can shout "we are all Hamas." And strap on suicide belts.

This war was never anything more than madness. And the day of reckoning will be brutal. Because believe me when the world finally sees what Ehud Olmert and his brutish bullies have done to Gaza it will be horrified. And then revolted.

Just like I was appalled when I saw what they did to Rafah.

But at least tonight the bombs have stopped falling, and the children of Gaza, who make up more than half the population, can sleep safe and sound.

And for me that's all that counts. Because what has been done to them in the last three weeks has been an absolute crime against humanity.

And it must never happen again...

















Recommend this post at Progressive Bloggers.

The Christianists and the Krispy Kreme Conspiracy

As you probably know I believe that religion is a mild mental disorder. Except when it comes from groups like the Christianist homophobes and fetus worshippers at Lifeshite.

Where it's nothing less than screeching fullblown insanity.

The next time you stare down a conveyor belt of slow-moving, hot, sugary glazed donuts at your local Krispy Kreme you just might be supporting President-elect Barack Obama's radical support for abortion on demand

Just an unfortunate choice of words? For the sake of our Wednesday morning doughnut runs, we hope so. The unfortunate reality of a post Roe v. Wade America is that "choice" is synonymous with abortion access and celebration of 'freedom of choice' is a tacit endorsement of abortion rights on demand.

Celebrating his inauguration with "Freedom of Choice" doughnuts – only two days before the anniversary of the Supreme Court decision to decriminalize abortion – is not only extremely tacky, it's disrespectful and insensitive and makes a mockery of a national tragedy.

Golly. Let me get this straight. Krispy Kreme offers a free donut of choice...like a chocolate or honey one....and these kooky wookies think it's a secret message promoting abortion on demand?

CHEE---SUS. Hit me with a Boston cream pie. What I want to know is does the secret service know about this? And did someone warn Obama's friend.....the fat bigot Rick Warren?

Because I hear he LOVES them...













Seriously though.... when will these crazy Christianists ever learn that women's bodies belong to women?

Not to them.

And that the only Jesus I want is this one....



Or at least my dog does.

So he can play with it like his bunny. While I run down to the store and get me a ton of Krispy Creme donuts.

I'm not a big donut eater eh? But now that I know the "secret message."

I'm sure I'm going to LOVE them....

Gaza and Israel's Shiny New Weapons

The good news is that there might be a ceasefire in Gaza by this time tomorrow. The bad news is that in the meantime the slaughter of the innocent continues.

Israeli television broadcast desperate cries for help from a Palestinian doctor on Friday after his children were killed in an Israeli attack in the Gaza Strip...

"My girls were sitting at home planning their futures, talking, then suddenly they are being shelled.I want to know why they were killed, who gave the order?"

"All that was ever fired out of our house was love, hugs and acts of peace, nothing else, ever."

He helped deliver Israeli babies, but still they killed his children. Like they've killed so many others.
















And then there are the more than 4,500 wounded...many of whom have been horribly injured by Israel's high tech arsenal of new and terrible weapons.

He says the advantage of DIME is that "it strikes a very small area, 10 to 20 meters, and the fire it ignites burns out very quickly; if it hits us now, we will die, but no one around us will be hurt. The problem is that when you are killed - you are ripped to shreds and there is nothing left." Indeed, the injuries DIME causes are in general more severe than those caused by a "regular" bomb.

A paramedic at the Al-Awda Hospital in the Jabalya refugee camp has told the Palestinian Center for Human Rights that about 90 percent of the wounded he has rescued during the past few weeks were brought in with at least one limb missing.

Nothing better than testing shiny new weapons on a helpless population trapped in a cage like laboratory animals. I bet the Pentagon can't wait to see the results.

And can you imagine what life will be like in one of the poorest little places on earth, with not enough shelter, not enough food or water, not enough medical equipment, and so many traumatized people with no arms or legs .....dragging themselves over the ruins.

Believe me, I have no axe to grind in this conflict. I love the Israeli and Palestinian people like I love all the other people of the world.

But what the Israeli hawks have done in Gaza is a war crime pure and simple.

First must come the ceasefire.

Then must come the RECKONING...
















Recommend this post at ProgressiveBloggers