It's the kind of tragedy than can strike many families, particularly at this time of the year.
Politicians from all parties and levels of government are paying tribute to Christopher Peloso, the husband of Ontario's former deputy premier George Smitherman, after Peloso was found dead following a long struggle with depression.
A very sad story.
But don't expect Con animals like the disgusting Ezra Levant to show any sympathy.
Because he's having a field day...
Well there is still a day and a half left in 2013, but it looks as if Stephen Harper is going to make after all.
Crawling on all fours. With his reputation in tatters.
This is what Toronto looked like this evening from the Island ferry. The sky clearing, the ice breaking up in the bay. Glowing in the setting sun like a city whose nightmare is over.
Except for the huge chunks of ice threatening to slide off buildings and smash into the streets below, and for all the people still without power from Ontario to New Brunswick.
But even though it's been EIGHT days since the massive ice storm hit, and about a MILLION people in THREE provinces were left in the cold and the darkness, at the height of the holiday period.
All Stephen Harper has had to say about this disaster is still these TWO miserable tweets...
OMG. Praise the Lord and pass the garlic. I see the Dark Parson of the Manning Centre is blaming the media for the Senate scandal.
A great deal of media attention has been paid these past few months to the ethics, or alleged lack thereof, of senators Pamela Wallin and Mike Duffy. Much less attention has been paid to the likelihood that the ethics of both are at least partially rooted in their training and experience as prominent members of the media.
And I see some in the media are firing back, albeit reluctantly.
Though I am not crazy about the media circling the wagons against criticism (we can be remarkably thin-skinned), I believe Mr. Manning deserves a reply, particularly because I have long respected and admired him.
By gently pointing out that one should not judge others, lest your own Cons be judged.
It's almost unbelievable that a Canadian Prime Minister could ignore the suffering of so many.
But six days after a massive ice storm struck, and although tens of thousands of people are still without power from Ontario to New Brunswick.
This is all Stephen Harper has had to say...or TWEET...since the crisis began.
He did so love to play soldier. For years he posed as a Great Warrior Leader.
He ordered our troops into the most dangerous part of Afghanistan without the proper equipment. He spent $20 billion dollars, cost us and the Afghans so many lives. He covered up torture, but still lost the war.
Then when he realized it wasn't winning him votes, he cut and run like he said he never would. He betrayed our wounded soldiers, cheated older veterans out of their pensions.
And now there will be no new armoured cars for the troops.
And no parkas for the cadets.
If you watched our little icebreaker trying to clear a channel to the Toronto Islands today, you might wonder if it's heading in the right direction.
Or whether it might also need to be rescued eh?
But if you want to know in what direction Stephen Harper is heading, all you have to do is take in his latest Christmas message.
I wrote this post a few years ago, after somebody questioned how an atheist like me, could celebrate Christmas. And I've run it every year since then on this day, because with some minor revisions to accommodate the passage of time, it still sums up how I feel about this day.
It's Christmas Day, and once again I have to explain to my friends, that although I'm an atheist, and I believe that our beautiful planet is our heaven and our hell.
And although I hate the shopping and the greed.
And although I know it can be a sad and lonely time for many.
I was raised in the Christian tradition, I believe in the earthly message of Jesus the revolutionary, I share the vision of those fighting for a kinder, gentler world.
And I do love this time of the year.
Well I finally got to screen Stephen Harper's year end interview with Global TV, and it was one of the weirdest interviews I've ever seen.
And one of the most chilling.
For there was Harper sitting in what looked like a set from A Christmas Story.
But sounding like a character out of the Nightmare Before Christmas.
It's taken more than half a century of bigotry and prevarication, but the gay computer genius and war hero Alan Turing has finally been pardoned.
Mathematician Alan Turing, who helped Britain win the Second World War by cracking Nazi Germany's "unbreakable" Enigma code, was granted a rare royal pardon on Tuesday for a criminal conviction for homosexuality that led to his suicide.
Justice Minister Chris Grayling said the pardon from Queen Elizabeth would come into effect immediately and was a fitting tribute to "an exceptional man with a brilliant mind."
And all I can say is it's about time eh?
As Toronto woke up to a scene of devastation with more than a quarter of a million people without power, one man was missing in action.
And you can guess who that was eh?
The Mayor in Name Only.
As city officials, staff and cleanup crews worked to repair the havoc caused by an icy storm, Mayor Rob Ford was unreachable, according to a source.
The mayor could not be found all Sunday morning by city staff working to organize warming centres and other emergency preparations, the source said.
When I heard the freezing rain tap tapping against my bedroom window the other night I feared the worst.
It brought back memories of The Great Ice Storm of 1998, and I wouldn't want to live through something like that again.
But when morning came I saw I was lucky. The storm had only sideswiped the waterfront. The trees in the neighbourhood were shining with ice, but still standing. And we still had power.
Unlike so many other Canadians.
Oh no. Duck and cover. Two weeks ago I accused the Cons of waging a real War on Christmas, by laying off people and killing jobs at this time of the year.
Now it turns out they're also in the trenches defending themselves from the imaginary War on Christmas.
Last night I ran this latest production from the Con Ministry of Propaganda and Disinformation, to make a point about Stephen Harper's Big Oil agenda.
But tonight I thought I'd take a closer look at that ghastly ad to see what else we might learn.
And I must admit I was shocked eh?
Because that frothy video isn't just bad propaganda, or the political version of one of those phony pipeline ads, or a quasi fascist ode to a megalomaniac.
It's blatantly FRAUDULENT.
Well I see Stephen Harper got an early Christmas present, courtesy of the Big Oil gang at the National Energy Board.
A polarizing debate over the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline heated up Thursday after an independent panel from the National Energy Board recommended the federal government approve the pipeline with conditions.
Because he needed something to cheer him up eh? And now the scam is on, and the fix is in.
It's a personality cult worthy of a place like North Korea. With a monomaniacal Great Leader who seeks total power.
Who would muzzle his opponents, declare the truth to be what he says it is, attempt to brainwash us into submission with OUR money.
And replace the Government of Canada with the Harper government.
They say he is holed up in his bunker at Harrington Lake surrounded only by his closest advisers.
The small band of PMO fanatics who never say no to anything he says, even when he's rolling on the floor biting the carpet.
Or in an alarming state of total DELUSION...
But of course even his faithful fluffers can't conceal the ugly reality. It wasn't a banner year, it was Stephen Harper's anus annus horribilis, and his situation has never been so desperate.
Damn. I'm always making the same mistake. Because I can't help looking for the good in everyone most people, I keep thinking that some Cons are better than others.
So when some of my friends in Ottawa told me that James Moore was slightly more human than most members of the Harperite cult, I believed them.
But was that ever a mistake eh? And were they ever wrong.
Because it turns out Moore is just another miserable Con ideologue, as heartless and cruel as his morally depraved leader. And this is outrageous.
He's gone to ground. He can't be found. He's hiding from the media. Even his Twitter feed has gone silent.
He's trying to make the sordid Senate scandal disappear by disappearing himself.
But even from the safety of his hideout, he's lashing out at those he considers his enemies.
He's a bigot, a bully, a boozer, a beast. He's shaming us in the eyes of the world.
Each time Ford appears in the media, it's another eerie reminder of what we've become: crude, swaggering, bungling, irrational and mendacious. We've reached that staggering moment in a brilliant horror film when our protagonist realises the truth: Rob Ford is the New Canada. He is us.
But I see that Rob Ford has at least one redeeming quality eh?
He's making the Cons fight each other.
It's a small country of just over three million people wedged between Argentina and Brazil.
But little Uruguay has just done what other bigger countries have never dared to do: legalize the production and sale of marijuana.
And for that I see is already attracting the unwanted attention of the Drug Czars at the United Nations.
It couldn't have been a more surrealistic sight. The absurd Con House Leader Peter "Tubby" Van Loan, standing behind an absurd sign, declaring absurdly that the fall session of Parliament was a huge success.
Amid calls for democratic reform from his own caucus, the Conservative government's House Leader is instead celebrating his party's legislative accomplishments - saying Canada's Parliament is working better than ever.
"We’re very, very pleased with the progress that was made in this fall session, as well as a number of the bills that were introduced, bills that made it off to committee, bills we got over to the Senate for their consideration,” he said, calling it “overall, a very, very productive year.”
Even though the Cons only passed THREE bills, the Senate scandal dominated proceedings, and their Great Leader was clubbed like a seal by Tom Mulcair over and over again.
Hallelujah !!! We have our David Daniel. Somebody has finally stood up to the ghastly Con Goliath Rob Ford.
Toronto Star reporter Daniel Dale has served Mayor Rob Ford with a libel notice over comments the mayor made during a televised interview earlier this week.
Mr. Dale published a statement on the Star’s website Thursday saying he served the notice against both the mayor and Vision TV – which aired the broadcast – as the first step of a defamation lawsuit.
He’s asking the mayor to retract the “false insinuation that I am a pedophile,” his statement read.
And now the monstrous bully is going to have to explain himself. Or GROVEL.
Well I see the Cons have finally found a good way to use our Parliament eh?
It may be a lousy House of Democracy, but it does make a great Christmas ornament.
And it does send out a powerful message to its rabid base: there will be no War on Christmas here.
OK. Let me be clear, as we say in Harperland. I ALWAYS thought it was a bad idea to make John Baird Foreign Minister.
I couldn't help but feel that he lacked the necessary diplomatic skills. I never believed him when he declared that the Cons were human rights champions.
Not after the way the Cons are muzzling them in Canada. And not after he declared that human rights were good, as long as they were good for business.
And sure enough I was right eh?
It's my nightmare vision of a Con jungle. A country full of seniors living in poverty and misery.
A country where the old and the poor have no present, and the young have no future.
A nightmare that became even more real today, when the Cons killed an NDP proposal to expand the Canada Pension Plan.
Even though a recent study showed that Canada is the only OECD country where seniors are getting getting poorer, and the government is doing less and less to help them.
And the only good thing I can see, is that some seniors are finally starting to fight back.
He has shamed us all in the eyes of the world, with his moral corruption, his bloated vulgarity, his bestial behaviour.
He stinks of Con Canada, it oozes out of every sweaty pore.
He simply can't help himself. Just when you think he can't sink any lower, he does.
It's a chilling story, a dark tale of spooks and Cons, with a little bit of Big Brother, and more than a hint of treason.
And I hesitate to write about it eh? Lest my phone start clicking and hissing like Stephen Harper himself.
But all patriotic Canadians should now ask themselves this question: is Great Spooky Leader working for us or the Americans?
Well I see Stephen Harper's trip to the Mandela funeral started off on a high note, with a macabre political version of the Mile High Club.
With Harper obviously glad to leave the sordid Senate scandal behind him, and consorting with three former Prime Ministers.
Even tweeting this photo of him and his old arch enemy Jean Chretien...
But I did notice that Great Ugly Leader was the only one drinking, and no wonder eh?
Well as you know I'm not a big fan of Leona Aglukkaq.
I had high hopes that as an Inuk she might do a better job as Environment Minister that she did as Health Minister.
But she has disappointed me from the moment she got her new job,
And this doesn't help...
It's hard to decide which Con clown is more pathetic. The one on his way to the funeral of Nelson Mandela.
The man he once called a terrorist who should be kept in prison, or hanged.
Or the one waddling down the street at a Santa Claus parade throwing candy canes to children.
As their parents tried to shield some of them from his ghastly sight.
But what is only too obvious is the damage both are doing to Canada's reputation.
In my sadness over the death of Nelson Mandela, and because I'm so tired, I forgot that Friday was the anniversary of a monumental Canadian tragedy.
That on a snowy day in Montreal twenty four years ago, an angry man with a gun stormed through an engineering school and killed fourteen young women.
Fourteen young women who were killed in Canada’s worst mass shooting were remembered on Friday amid repeated calls for more to be done to eradicate violence against women.
When I heard the news that Nelson Mandela had died at first I was sad, like billions of people all over the world.
For he was my greatest living hero, and somehow I had hoped that he would live forever.
“Our nation has lost its greatest son. Our people have lost a father,” South African President Jacob Zuma said in a sombre speech to the nation just before midnight, broadcast on all major television channels.
“He is now resting. He is now at peace. ... Although we knew this day would come, nothing will diminish our sense of a profound and enduring loss.”
Well yesterday he was looking for any camera he could find to try to keep his face in the news.
But tonight he was hanging on for dear life and dodging the media, after police documents finally revealed the true heart of the Rob Ford scandal. Not just a mayor out of control.
But one at the mercy of CRIMINALS.
As I watched Stephen Harper being grilled by Tom Mulcair today I couldn't help being struck by how beaten he looked.
How the fight seems to have gone out of him. At one point after slumping into his seat, he even let Paul Calandra the Con buffoon answer a question from Mulcair, something he never does.
Only to be forced back to his feet by Mulcair with this question:
And you can see what I mean eh? He's there but he isn't.
And it all made me ask myself the same question John Ivison asks today: Is Stephen Harper getting ready to RESIGN?
Well it's not exactly the French Revolution eh? But this being Canada it's probably the closest we can get to one.
Michael Chong has presented his Reform Act that would shake up our Parliament to its very foundations.
Conservative MP Michael Chong today tabled the proposed reform act, a private member's bill intended to restore a system of checks and balances that would shift some power away from party leaders towards members of Parliament and their party caucuses.
And trim the power of would be dictators like Stephen Harper.
Golly. Because I've been so busy trying to stay on top of the Senate scandal, I haven't been able to write anything about the continuing adventures of Rob Ford.
But they are continuing. And it's still a horror show.
Even though the Fordzilla can't seem to understand that he's only the mayor in name only.
Well he wasn't in the House of Commons today to answer questions about the latest twist in his sordid Senate scandal.
No doubt recovering from his long musical set at a Jewish community fundraiser the night before. Or too busy promoting his boring hockey book in downtown Toronto this morning.
So he didn't have to try to explain why his PMO lawyer's e-mails mysteriously disappeared.
Well I see that Brian Pallister, the leader of the Manitoba Conservatives, wants everybody to know that he didn't mean to offend any unbelievers by calling them "infidel atheists."
Conservative Leader Brian Pallister says he didn’t mean to offend anyone last week when he wished everyone, including "infidel atheists," the best of the holiday season -- and he believes the comment has been "torqued" by his political opponents.
In this bizarre Christmas message...
But he says an infidel is an infidel. He blames his opponents for the controversy. And he's not really sorry.
Golly. It's a miracle I tell you. Remember how the Cons told us that Benjamin Perrin's e-mails had been deleted when he left the PMO?
So we couldn't determine what that PMO lawyer told Stephen Harper about the Duffy deal.
Well it turns out that was just another oops, or another Big Lie.
He invited world leaders to his G20 summit, and then allowed the Americans to spy on them. He had his CSEC agents spy on the Brazilians.
He has just unveiled a Trojan horse cyber-bullying bill that would allow police easy access to our so-called metadata, the records that internet service providers and phone companies keep on our every call and email.
And now I see Stephen Harper is taking his Big Brother tendencies to a whole new level, with a plan to monitor our social media.
OMG. I can hardly believe my furry ears. But a strange sound is coming from the Con Castle.
And no, it's not the sound of Great Scandalous Leader standing in front of a mirror, and screaming "I know NOTHING !@#!!!" Over and over again. To see which one looks more credible.
No, it seems that one of his faithful traitorous followers, Michael Chong, is planning a revolt of the Con sheeple !!!!!
It's not a good news hockey story. It's a huge blow to the CBC.
For years, HNIC has been a cash cow that helped float many of CBC’s other news and original programming endeavours, with some estimating it was worth $200 million, and up to half of the TV network’s advertising revenue.
And of course the CBC can't count on any help from Stephen Harper.
The Prime Minister's Office has slammed the door on any bailout for the CBC to make up for lost advertising revenue from hockey broadcasts.
"CBC already receives significant taxpayer funds," PMO spokesman Stephen Lecce wrote in an e-mail.
Because he would like to destroy it eh?
But there could be a big consolation prize. It could be the end of Don Cherry.
If you watch Question Period these days you know that there is a new star in the Con Circus.
The clown Paul Calandra, the Prime Minister's parliamentary secretary, who answers more questions about the Senate scandal than Stephen Harper does.
And turns every serious question into a joke or a smear.
It was cold and dark tonight by the lake where I live. Like it usually is in late November, in Canada.
But at least for the first time there was a sprinkling of snow on the ground to brighten up the gloom.
Which is more than I can say about Harperland, where it just keeps getting darker and more dangerous.
For just look what we learned about that monstrous regime today.
I must admit when I first saw the headline "THE SENATE SCANDAL'S OUT OF LEGS !!!!" I was shocked, and my heart dived into my boots.
I felt like running to a window, opening it wide, and screaming: "Nooooo !!! Nooooo !!! How could this be HAPPENING ??!!#!@!!
How low can we go ?!@#!!!! How dumb are my people !#@!#!!! How short their attention spans !#@!#!!!
But luckily it was too cold to open the window eh? And it was only Margaret Wente.
Well there he was again today answering all questions about the Senate scandal by repeating the same mantra.
Nigel Wright and Mike Duffy are the ones responsible. That's why Duffy is no longer a member of the Conservative caucus, that's why I fired Wright.
But for some reason not explaining why he hasn't fired Irving Gerstein, the Con bagman-in-chief.
