Well now we know what the new H1N1 flu virus is probably going resemble. Not the savage mass murderer of 1918. The far more gentle killer of 1957.
The swine flu strain that has sickened people in 30 countries rivals the severity of the 1957 “Asian flu” pandemic that killed 2 million people, scientists said.
But a killer nonetheless.
The virus is more contagious than seasonal flu, the Geneva-based WHO said yesterday. A “moderate” pandemic like the 1957 Asian flu could kill 14.2 million people and shave 2 percent from the global economy in the first year, the World Bank said in October.
Which makes what this Canadian doctor says ring a little hollow. ....The media must be more critical. How many pandemic false alarms do we need (remember "bird flu" -- the last great threat) before reporters start asking tough questions? How many times do the voices of catastrophe need to be wrong before we doubt their message? Because a pandemic on the scale of 1957 in a more crowded world where more than a billion people go hungry, is nothing to sneeze at.
And what if the second wave of the pandemic is more deadly than the first ?And if you don't warn people about what might happen, how can you get them to change their behaviour? Or prepare them for a worst case scenario...as scary as this one. This is the scenario that has some scientists worried. The two viruses meet — possibly in Asia, where bird flu is endemic — and combine into a new bug that is both highly contagious and lethal and can spread around the world.
The good news is that when lethal viruses mutate to become more contagious they lose a lot of their killing power.The bad news is that even if this virus doesn't mutate into something deadly, it could still infect billions people so we can't underestimate what it might do. "This H1N1 hasn't been overblown. It's a puppy, it's an infant, and it's growing.... This virus has got the whole human population in the world to breed in — it's just happened. What we have to do is to watch it, and it may become a wimp and disappear, or it may become nasty." You know... no matter what that doctor says I think I'm going to keep washing my hands a lot. And opening doors with my elbows.
Because better too prepared than not prepared enough eh? And besides ....I did a little research and found out that back in 1957 they were also hoping for the best. Wearing suits and ties to rock concerts. But preparing for the worst.....
Well I guess draining the life blood out of the CBC wasn't a quick enough death for Stephen Harper. Now he wants to cut off its head. Even if it makes Heritage Minister James Moore look like a liar.
Moore said in response to a question from Liberal MP Pablo Rodriguez on April 29 that the government would not be cutting the CBC. But then as I've pointed out before, like all the other Con sheeple, Moore is just his monster's voice. I don't know why any normal person would want to tear down a national institution, instead of building it up and making us proud of it. But I know why Stephen Harper hates it with a passion. Because with all its successes and failures it's a mirror of who we are...and so very CANADIAN. And Harper hates Canada and its values so much he won't be satisfied, as The Amazing GritGirl has pointed out , until the CBC looks and sounds like this...
I on the other hand won't be satisfied until the foul Canada-hating Con channel goes off the air for good. Won't that be the best show EVER? Defeat them, crush them, turn them off....
I have tried to stay away from criticizing Michael Ignatieff, because he is the only political leader who can bring down Stephen Harper, whether we like it or not. I was even prepared to cut him some slack for what he had to say today about the Coalition. If the proposed coalition of opposition parties had come to power last year it would have deeply and enduringly divided Canadians, says Michael Ignatieff.
“I'm in politics to unify people, not to divide them...There was also a question concerning the legitimacy of the coalition that troubled me.”
Even though I don't agree with him. Legitimacy wasn't a problem. The country is as divided back then as it is today. And killing the Coalition that represented the views of most Canadians wasn't a grand unifying act. It was an act of supreme political cowardice. A decision that condemned hundreds of thousands of unemployed Canadians to lives of misery because they don't qualify for E.I. And left the country, at a time of crisis, in the hands of a bunch of Con thugs who don't know what they're doing. And because actions have consequences Omar Khadr is still in Guantanamo, and Abousfian Abdelrazik is still stranded in Khartoum. And so on and so on. But whatever...it's no use crying about what might have been.
But how can Ignatieff and the Liberals justify their support for this wretched bill? Under Canada's proposed new drug laws, an 18-year-old who shares a joint with a 17-year-old friend could end up in jail. The Conservative government proposes to automatically jail dealers and growers at a time when several American states, most recently New York, have retreated from mandatory minimum sentences, saying they are a glaring symbol of the failed U.S. war on drugs.
I realize that Stephen Harper is playing cheap politics, but does that mean the Liberals have to jump into the moral quagmire and roll around with him?
Just because they are too AFRAID to do the right thing?
While the New Democrats and the Bloc Québécois have voiced strong opposition to Bill C-15, the Liberals have indicated they will support it when it comes back to the Commons for third reading.
Why? Not because they think it is sound policy; they acknowledge in private that it is not. Rather, the Liberals do not want to give the Conservatives an opening to accuse them of being "soft" on crime. This is craven politics at its worst.
Exactly.
I know politics is politics eh? But cowardice has consequences.
What kind of country makes its unemployed suffer, and would fill its jails with kids? And when is enough ENOUGH ?
Of all the stories I read this week I think I liked this one the best. How the homeless man became a hero, instead of just a guy who lives under a bridge. And how the kid he saved went looking for him...... but couldn't find him. And how it all ended happily today. With some words of advice from one survivor to another. "Stay in school. Don't become homeless," Hall told the teen, who has attended several schools and lived with several different relatives and a foster family.
Nice. Which reminds me the week is over at last. And it's time for some Kylie Minogue.
Why Kylie? Because some people are luckier than others.
Heh heh heh..... Sorry Scott. Have a great weekend everyone. !!!
Or the beginning of the end? Maybe. If Rupert Murdoch gets his way.
Rupert Murdoch expects to start charging for access to News Corporation's newspaper websites within a year as he strives to fix a "malfunctioning" business model. "The current days of the internet will soon be over." But only if his competitors do the same, and form some kind of news cartel. Web users are naturally sceptical.
"As long as there is internet, there will be free content. And as long as there is free content, sites trying to grow on a paid-content business model are not going to survive. It is as simple as that,"
"Newspaper industry should just die and journalism should be democratized. We have blogs, forums, news aggregators... why should I pay for content that someone else can write just as well if not better than the biased reporter/editors at some giant media conglomerate?"
But others not so much.
"I would gladly pay for the service that reporters provide to me! I know it costs money to investigate and report the news and I don't want the news to be controlled by advertisers."
"Pay for news? We have to, unless we want to get our news from a bunch of people who think because they have a blog they are a journalist."
And what's the alternative? "We have to look to a future of smaller journalistic staff and greater user participation..."
And is that what we want? More information than ever before, and fewer journalists to make sense of it? Is that really all she wrote?
Maybe it’s because I’m staying at the Sunset Tower on Sunset Boulevard, but I keep thinking of newspapers as Norma Desmond.
Papers are still big. It’s the screens that got small.
As a disgusted Desmond asks from behind dark glasses: “And who have they got now? Some nobodies — a lot of pale little frogs croaking pish-posh.”
Oh boy. I'm not sure about the future of online news...and the internet as we know it. But one way or the other we are going to pay for it....
I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised by Stephen Harper's decision to appeal the Federal Court ruling that Omar Khadr should be brought home. But it still disgusts me. Because the shame goes on and on. You know when I learned that Canada was the FIRST country to sign the U.N. Protocol on Child Soldiers....the one that says they should be rehabilitated not punished.... I was extremely proud to be a Canadian. Because that's the kind of country I believe in. So when I heard about the Khadr story I couldn't understand why he was being held at Guantanamo, because regardless of what he had done nobody could deny that he WAS a child soldier.
But then when I looked into the case I discovered something that makes the case even more horrible. Omar Khadr almost certainly did NOT kill that American soldier.
And not only that.... some evidence suggests that the soldier who died may have been killed by an American grenade thrown by one of his OWN soldiers. Instead of a Russian grenade used by the Taliban. In other words a death by so-called friendly fire.
Which suggests a possible COVER-UP... and that the only crime that occurred was what they did to Omar. But of course, as I said before, it doesn't really matter. Because even if he had killed that Special Forces soldier, he was a child soldier. Who should have been rehabilitated .....not imprisoned and tortured in terrible places like Guantanamo or Bagram.
But he was. And two Canadian governments didn't lift a finger to help him. Even though according to his lawyers AND his guards Omar remains a decent gentle young man, who dreams of being an artist in Canada...even though he is half blind. A guy who has rejected the extremism of his family, and managed to avoid the clutches of the religious fanatics that surround him. A guy who amazingly enough apparently still loves Canada, even though it abandoned him. My only consolation is that the Federal Court decision is in my opinion rock solid...as well as a harsh indictment of the moral failure of two Canadian governments to do the right and decent thing. And I'm hoping the Appeal Court ruling upholding that decision will be even more BRUTAL. So everybody in this country can understand what CANADIAN values really mean...for those who have forgotten.
So that Stephen Harper is condemned as a mean, miserable, cruel bastard.
I've seen a lot of things on TV, but I don't think I've ever seen a TV anchor threaten to punch a guest. Mckelway: I'm about ready to do a lot more than point my finger at you Rogers: what would that be? Mckelway: I, er, I will take you outside and give you a punch across the face because that is not what I said and that is not what I mean. And then to make matters worse the next day asks for a close-up....so he can announce he has no intention of apologizing. Only to end up get slapped down by his co-anchor...
Wow. What a great video moment. I think I'll file it under Bad Television and Closet Queens. Because methinks that meatpuppet doth protest too much. Does he really think people should be ashamed to be gay? Or does it explain why he spends soooooo much time. Playing the banjo with the boys...
Seriously though....first there's homophobia "Mckelway's use of threatened violence is another indication of how far the LGBT community has yet to go to be safe in America. Had this been any other minority in America, Mckelway would never have felt that threatened violence was acceptable. Then there's self loathing. Normally I'd feel sorry for people who hate themselves. Because they only have one life just like everybody else. And I wouldn't out anyone...even though their actions suggest there is something wrong with being gay. But when self loathing makes some closeted gay politicians our WORST enemies. And makes the fight against homophobia even more difficult. They really have to be STOPPED....
As we all know skanky wingnut racists like Kathy Shittle, Mark Steyn and so many others have made a career out of warning us about The Mooslim Menace. How they are breeding like rabbits in Europe. How the poor white Europeans don't stand a chance against this seething mass of disloyal subjects. Well the first part turned out to be completely WRONG. And now the final blow.
The report by Gallup and the Coexist Foundation says 77% of British Muslims identified with the UK, compared with 50% of the general public.
"European Muslims want to be part of the wider community and contribute even more to society..." Which makes me wonder what will the skanks come up with next to try to scare their cowardly redneck supporters. An invasion of Mooslim faggots from outer space? Or an invasion of Mexican Colombian chihuahas?
Sometimes when you've been fighting for gay rights for a long time, you can't see the forest for the small victories. Or the big ones like this one. In the state where George Bush has his summer monkey house. In the state with the motto: Live Free or Die. And because you can't see the forest...and you can't see it moving like the one in Macbeth...sometimes you can let impatience blind you. Like I did yesterday when I dumped on this gentle idea. By suggesting that it wouldn't change anything, and that any straight people thinking of participating should write their blood types on their arms. Which was very grinchy, and very Simon. Ugh. I did it because I thought the time and effort could be better spent fighting things like bullying in our schools. But I forgot that we can still hold hands AND get the message out. Like Chase did today on Oprah. A 13-year-old Alberta boy was called a "hero" on The Oprah Winfrey Show on Wednesday for speaking out about his torment at the hands of bullies.
And that every gesture than can help make a kinder gentler world can only be good for children like him.
Then there was the message from my oldest and best friend Donald...who just happens to be straight. But is like a brother to me.
Simon if you can't find a straight guy to hold your hand I volunteer. I know my blood type. You sod. XXX Donny Which made me smile and reminded me that there are probably many straights who would like to show their support for love and gay people, and holding hands is a fun way to do it. And made me feel even WORSE. Like hanging my head in shame or impaling myself on my highland sword. Or this one. Because nine out ten sausages can't be wrong....and I deserve it. Until I remembered those trees in the forest, how lucky I am to have a friend like Donald, and the support of so many other straight people. And I decided that maybe I'd better use the Zorro fork instead to pitch a couple of lobsters on the barbie. And party like CRAZY.... Well done Maine. Live Free or Die New Hampshire. Donny you're ON. The struggle continues....
-----------------------------------------
UPDATE: So now it's a parade....Donald and me, his wife Alison and her friend Peggy, two little children, and no doubt Kerouac and his good friend Roger the cocker spaniel. Who thought of this BRILLIANT idea? AAAAAARGH...
Well nothing but good news to report today about the story nobody wants to talk about....the bug in the barnyard. Like the news that the Mexicans have been able to hang on to their sense of humour. To alleviate the boredom of a five-day lockdown in the capital, Mexicans have been gathering in apartments, or joking online. "There's a new tool in Facebook called, 'Who would I cough on if I had influenza?' and you can choose up to five characters," Mr. Talamantes said. "People are playing with that and choosing politicians." Gawd. Now I'm jealous. Or the story about how the British are being encouraged to have flu friends.
Facebook friends, Twitter followers, AND flu friends? Isn't that AWESOME? Lucky them. But the best news of the day was that I finally was able to convince my stubborn fool beloved friend Angus ...who believes the pandemic threat is a just a plot to make us forget the recession and panic us into fascism...about the real dangers of mutation.
By pointing out that the mild virus that's visiting us in Canada, could be a more lethal variety in the fall, after it visits the Southern Hemisphere.
Where surveillance is weak, seasonal H1N1 flu strains are almost all resistant to Tamiflu...so if they swap spit with this new bug anything could happen.
And by showing him this video...
After which all he could say was "gross" and "SCARY."
Excellent dude. What would we do without YouTube eh? Now forget about that fascist plot. Wash your hands. And let's go play Swinefighter....
