Bin Laden's Driver and the Great War on Terror

I don't know about you but I'm feeling a little safer tonight. One of those nasty terrorists at the Guantanamo Hilton has finally been convicted.

Who says waterboarding doesn't work?

Even if it's only Osama's driver. One of his MANY drivers. And everyone else got away.

Still, I guess when it comes to the Great War on Terror every small victory counts. And besides you can't be TOO careful.

He might have tried to drive his car ...or his camel ..... all the way from Assghanistan to Amerika. And since like most Afghans he can't read a map, he might have attacked Canada by mistake.

Then we'd be scared of EVERYTHING like the Americans are, and wouldn't that be a bummer? Eh?

So what I want to know now is..... when are they going to arrest Osama's cook?

I hear he puts so much Spicy Jihadi sauce into his infidel stew, Bin Laden's farts are practically a biological weapon.

And what about the guy who irons his turban? He must know EVERYTHING.

And while we're at it... what about his vocal coach?

Because this is SCARY....



I don't know what that Numa Numa stuff means.

But it sounds DANGEROUS.

As the Dark Lord Dick Cheney always says.

In the Great War on Terror you can't be too careful.

Or too CRAZY...

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P.S. Now that they've nailed the driver....do you think they'll convict the child soldier ?

Paris Hilton, Obama, and the Cadbury Gorilla

Ever since I saw the McCain ad portraying Obama as a Magic Negro, and Paris Hilton as a slutty white groupie, I couldn't wait to see what Paris had to say.

And she didn't disappoint me...

See more funny videos at Funny or Die

I am soooooo proud of her. That last stint in rehab really worked. I hope she does run for President some day. She's EARNED it.

But what I found even MORE fascinating was a post comparing Obama's appeal to that of a gorilla chocolate ad.

Obama and that Cadbury ad are both successful, at least in part, because people are not quite sure what they mean. So people want to talk about them, and write about them, and debate them at length. And - crucially - email, post and create their own user-generated videos about them. In this way do the chocolate bar and the politician become media phenomena. In the age of the web, a little bit of ambiguity is a very powerful thing.

The Web? Ambiguity? Who knew? Maybe.

One thing is for sure though. When Paris Hilton can deliver a clearer message than either Presidential candidate.

And one candidate calls the other The Chosen One.

Or the Anti-Christ.

And a drum-playing monkey gets involved.

I have no idea where Amerika is going.

But can The Abyss be far off ?

If Stephane Dion is Serious About an Election....

....and wants his Green Shift to be a winning issue rather than a moving target for Stephen Harper and his Republican Cons.

He should take some time out from selling the plan. Badly.

And take a real close look at the way Barack Obama is fighting back against John McCain...



And then read what Kevin Drum has to say here.

More important is the basic message of the ad: McCain is in the pocket of big oil interests, just like the Bush/Cheney gang. As a one-off, this probably doesn't have much impact, but if it's a harbinger of things to come — and I assume it is — it holds huge promise. It's just like McCain's legendary series of flip-flops: on an individual basis they don't matter too much, but when you put them together into a coherent narrative they make a powerful story. After all, pretty much every McCain flip flop has a single source — changing his position to be more acceptable to the anti-tax, big business, Christian conservative base of the Republican Party — but nobody gets that unless you put them all together and then bang them over the head with it.

Exactly. It's the NARRATIVE that counts.

Right now the Cons OWN the narrative, while the wonky professor goes around trying to convince Canadians .... at weiner roasts....that his plan is as brilliant as he is. Which is charming I suppose.

But if I was a Liberal I would strongly suggest that he have a good plan B in his back pocket , work on his narrative as well as his English, and run a Canadian version of that ad.

You know something like this one....

Stephen Harper was a climate change denier when Big Oil was spending millions trying to deny the undeniable.

Stephen Harper killed Kyoto. Shamed Canada in the eyes of the world. Because Big Oil wanted the plan cremated.... even as the planet burned.

Stephen Harper is opposed to a carbon tax because Big Oil doesn't want anyone to take a bite out of their billion dollar profits.They're SCREWING us at the pumps but still they want MORE !!!! And their Stevie is willing to give it to them.

Stephen Harper was, is, and always will be, an oil pimp from Alberta. Who puts the interests of Big Oil BEFORE the interests of Canada.
















OK maybe not those words. But DEFINITELY that music.

C'mon Liberals gimme a little pump rage.

Doncha think it's time to give these foul Cons a taste of their own medicine?

Put together a nasty narrative....

And bang them over the head with it ?

The Westboro Baptist Church Burns

On this holiday Monday I've got some good news and some bad news.

First the bad news.

The gay-hating Westboro Baptist Church caught fire the other day....but DIDN'T burn down.

And the head of the homophobic cult, Fred "Crazy Daddy" Phelps, thinks he knows who is responsible....



Although at least one neighbour isn't so sure.

Leona McQueen's is 91 years old. Her garage is about 30 feet away from the site of the fire. McQueen says she has been butting heads with church members for decades. She says the fire may have been an elaborate attempt to scare her into selling her house.

Hmmm...

I have my own theory.

I figure after a wild night of all in the family sex, Crazy Daddy probably passed out in a garbage can.... with a crack pipe in his mouth.

The good news?

If we can't get them for hatemongering.

Maybe we can nail them for insurance fraud....

Did Steve Fossett Fake his Own Death?

When Steve Fossett, the great adventurer, disappeared almost a year ago, the news really hit me hard.

I love flying and he was one of my heroes.

I even thought of going down to Nevada, renting a small plane, and joining in the search.

Sébastien brought me gently down to earth. OK not so gently.... more like a crash landing.

But now comes the real shocker.

Did Fossett fake his own death?

Last September, America's great aviation daredevil took off on a routine solo flight, and was never seen again. Now, as allegations of an elaborate double life begin to emerge, investigators are questioning whether he really died – or even crashed – at all.

So now I'm conflicted.

On the one hand I hope they eventually do find the wreckage...so this story can be laid to rest.

But on the other hand I can't help hoping that he survived.

That he's living on a remote tropical island. Resting in a hammock sipping a margarita. Poor but happy. Spinning fantastic tales to disbelieving islanders....about flying around the world without landing. And other crazy stuff.

Still the great adventurer.

Still my flying hero....

The Killing of Tim McLean

It's one of the biggest stories in the world. The most read story in the London Times Online. The most popular news video of the week on YouTube. The tabloids can't get enough of it.....the nightmarish killing of Tim McLean.

I suppose it was inevitable. It's Halloween AND The Night of the Living Dead.... on a bus. But I still find the frenzied ghoulish coverage, and some of the reactions it is conjuring up from bottom of the human gene pool, absolutely nauseating.

The bloodthirsty calls for the killer AND his family to be punished. Even though we live in Canada, the man is obviously mentally ill, and his poor family must be devastated.

And then to make matters even worse, there's the screeching chorus of blowhards accusing the other passengers of being cowards. Like this commenter in the Globe.

I can't say that I agree with the police chief remark about how 'brave' the passengers were. In fact, if you noticed, the police chief had to pause a little before saying the word 'incredible' when he was describing how the rest of the passenger behaved. I think he was trying so hard not to say the word 'cowardice'

Or this collection of ignorant chickenhawk shite

There are lots of ways to take a knife away. How about some MEN stepping up, you know, like more than one? How about throwing a blanket over him? How about a tire iron? Bussess do have them. Canadians=pussies.

Which is ridiculous, further victimizes the passengers, and forces me to say this: I've been taking martial arts since I was knee high to a grasshopper. I've been in more fights with bigot bullies in Canada and Scotland than I can count. I'm pretty confident I could disarm just about ANYBODY coming at me with a knife or a broken bottle or whatever.

But in the dark confined space of a bus, faced with a man in a psychotic frenzy and armed with a big knife, and with the victim obviously mortally wounded, even if I wasn't shocked out of my sleep as they were, I would have done EXACTLY what they did. Trap the man in the bus and hold him there until the police arrived.

And anyone who suggests they would have done anything differently is both a wanker blowhard AND a bloody idiot.

When the news cycle moves on there may be some lessons to be learned. All of them to do with how to better identify and treat mental illness. One can only hope.

But apart from that all I take away from this tragedy is that a decent, gentle, hardworking, Canadian kid died in a horrible act of random violence.

That there was nothing anyone could have done to save him.

And that Tim McLean was loved by many.














"He was a little guy with a heart bigger than you can know. He made friends effortlessly, disliked no one and accepted everyone for who they were..."

And will be sadly missed by them for the rest of their lives.

Just like the passengers on that bus will be traumatized forever.

Everything else is meaningless... just ugly noise.

Rest in peace Tim...

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P.S. Unrepentant Old Hippie, Dr Dawg and the Vanity Press all have excellent posts on this subject.

Blogger Lockout or Sitemeter Problem ?

For a while this afternoon when I tried to access my blog it caused Internet Explorer to crash. Kaboom. Over and over again.

At first I thought it was this problem.

And I was extremely annoyed and of course paranoid. Who was responsible for this outrage I wondered. Some right-wing dummy at Blogger? Or some homophobe spammer in Uzbekistan?

Or could it be the Iranian Mullahs.... the climate change deniers....Dick Cheney and his gangsters....or heaven forbid.... The Vatican?

Luckily I wasn't the only paranoid one.

And since I DIDN'T get an e-mail from Blogger, I started to wonder what code in my template could be causing this crash? So I did a little googling, and soon discovered another possible culprit.

And sure enough when I deleted the Sitemeter code .... *poof* .... the problem vanished.

Look I don't know if we're dealing with one big problem or two separate problems happening at the same time. Or who is really to blame. A bad bot or a human.

Or even whether my fix will work for you. So please don't sue me if it doesn't. I'll just plead ignorant. Duh? Jeepers Judge I'm so stoopid and dem internets is SOOOOOOO confusing.

But it worked for me....so right now I feel like a GENIUS.

Hello Blogger I missed you.

Bye Bye Sitemeter....

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P.S. In case you're wondering how I'm going to count my readers....don't worry.

With the number of readers I got.

I can use my FINGERS...

The Amazing Story of Christian the Lion

OK I know that gazillions of people have watched this YouTube about Christian the lion.

But somehow I must have missed it.

Now that I have screened it... all I can say is this:

If you haven't seen it, get your hankies ready....



What a lovely story. I don't know what it means.

But I'm guessing.

Lions should be born and live free.

And love is FOREVER....

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P.S. If you want to know more about Christian's story you can read it here.

A Death on the Waterfront

It was a beautiful day on the waterfront.

After days of rain and thunderstorms the sun was out.

And so was the kayak navy.











After the wettest and most miserable summer anyone around here can remember.

The patios were finally open.

















It should have been a day to celebrate.

Except that just a few hours before the Marine Unit had been busy.

Fishing a body out of the water.















Those who live along the waterfront had been asked to keep an eye out for him after his car was found abandoned a few blocks away.

So when I heard he was dead I felt really sad. The old man loved his neighbourhood so much he seems to have gone overboard. And I guess he felt his life was ruined.

If I'd had a chance to meet him, I would have told him I've felt that way before. I've ruined my life at least three or four times. Already. But unless you kill or hurt someone it's never as bad as it seems.

And I also would have told him that I'm sure that his family and friends loved him just as much as they ever did.

But I didn't get that chance and neither did anybody else.

Too bad.

In the evening Sébastien and I went sailing off Ontario Place.












It was a beautiful sunset.

I wish the old man could have seen it.

Sébastien suddenly hugged me. I don't know why.

I almost fell overboard.

Sadness passes.

Life goes on...

John McCain Plays the Race Card

I see that John McCain's campaign is accusing Barack Obama of using the race card.

“Barack Obama has played the race card, and he played it from the bottom of the deck,” Mr. McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis, charged in a statement with which Mr. McCain later said he agreed. “It’s divisive, negative, shameful and wrong.”

Which is not only absurd, but also has to be the most cynical and hypocritical thing I've seen in a long time.

Since, like I said last night, if anyone is dealing from the bottom of the deck....THEY are...


Because this ad is nothing less than racism hiding in plain view.

Of all the famous celebrities they could have compared Obama to, why not Tom Cruise? Or Arnold Schwarzenegger, or Donald Trump, or Oprah Winfrey? Why Britney Spears and Paris Hilton? Why two white blond bimbos?

Only one reason. It's a somewhat tamer version of the white bimbo ad used so successfully against Harold Ford in Tennessee. In juxtaposing Barack Obama with Britney Spears and Paris Hilton, the McCain campaign is simply trying to plant the old racist seed of black man hitting on young white woman. Not directly, but subliminally and disgracefully.

I agree. And so does this monkey.

Hint: play the ad without sound. Remember the pictures tell the story. Check out the close-ups. It's not rocket science people....or a dark conspiracy theory. It's just TELEVISION.

Race in America is a REAL factor not an imaginary one. Especially in a close race. How do you think they are going to bring back the ghost of Jeremiah Wright?

It's nighttime in Amerika and the Lizard Monster is back.

To be fair, I don't rule out the possibility that Poppy is so out of it that he actually thinks it is just about celebrity. Like subliminal has something to do with a submarine. Duh?

But his new campaign team knows EXACTLY what they're doing. They've seen the polls.Their Republican supporters have been laying the groundwork.













Just like they laid the groundwork for the next act today by accusing Obama of playing the race card, so anything he says to fight back will play into their hands. By making it look like he's just playing politics.

And reinforcing both their charge AND the hidden message.

Lordy. Somebody help us.

The Lizard Monster is loose in Amerika.

And anything could happen...

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P.S. As if Obama didn't have enough problems. As if this wasn't Ludacris enough.

"The first black president is destined and it's meant to be," go the lyrics, calling on voters to "paint the White House black.

With idiot friends like that....

Who needs racists?