Crude Awakening and the Oil Wars

In a world drunk with oil it's sometimes easier to worry about global warming...and do nothing.

Or squawk about the price of our cheap gas.

Than imagine what could happen to us all when the oil starts to runout.

So this frightening new movie should help.

Here's an excerpt...



In a country that loves its cars...and has a big black oil hole in Alberta that can be seen from outer space...there are so many things to think about.

But three things stand out for me.

One...all it took was 250 years of insane greed to consume the most valuable energy resource the world ever had...without giving a second thought about the plight of all the generations that will follow us.

Two...that if you think the oil wars of today are bad enough. You ain't seen nothing yet.

And three...if we want to save the children who will be born tomorrow from growing up in a very scary world...it's going to take more than a change of oil pimp governments.

It's going to take a revolutionary change in the way we live. And the courage to demand revolutionary political change even if it hurts us.

And I just don't see that happening. We love our cars and our way of life too much. Crazy religion tells us that it doesn't matter what happens to our beautiful planet...because heaven is BETTER.

What we don't think about won't hurt us. May the children forgive us. We're just poor oil junkies. Life is too short.

So let's just party on.




What I love about that Daft Punk video...apart from the music... is that it was put together from more than 100 mini-DV tapes shot by their fans.

Isn't it amazing what we can do when people work together to make something happen?

Isn't it scary what could happen if we don't ?

Finland and the School Killer

In a quiet snowy forest a teenager plays with some apples....



And then goes on to kill nine people including himself.

Then because this NEVER happens in Finland everyone wants to know WHY?

Was it because he was bullied?

Or was it the weather?

At this time of year it is sunk in almost permanent half-light and Finnish families count the days to their winter holidays when they can flee to the bright sunlight of south-east Asian resorts.

Clinical depression is high, the suicide rate too. But above all the Nordic winter isolates the young in the small towns: they arrive at school in the dark and leave it in the dark, travelling long distances to their homes. Friendship in the traditional sense is often a summer luxury.

Or the isolation.

And so friendship becomes virtual......in Finland the high-tech world has become a normal, rather than an exceptional, substitute for the world of human contact. A youth isolated at school sinks even deeper into isolation when he has left the school gates: a recipe for trouble....

Or the fact that a 15-year-old can buy a gun so easily. .

As for the killer...
















Here's what he had to say...six months before he opened fire....




Sad. But so familiar. I've heard it all before. In the court of Eric Harris...the Columbine Killer.

Just like he did.

Weird song though.

My conclusion.

Bullying, teenage anger, and guns make a really deadly mix.

And unless more is done to deal with those problems.

The killing will go on and on...

How Brian Mulroney Could Hurt Stephen Harper

OK forget what I said last night about leaving this country. It's not that Canada has magically improved overnight. In fact, now it's cold AND raining. So it's even MORE depressing.

But the reason I'm not going anywhere Is that NOTHING....however bad or boring could ever ...and I mean EVER...make me miss this.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Friday he will appoint an independent third party to review new allegations by German-Canadian businessman Karlheinz Schreiber over his dealings with former prime minister Brian Mulroney

Not because I care what happens to that old relic Mulroney. The only thing I can't forgive him for is his Bojangles act with Ronald Reagan at the Shamrock Summit.

This public display of sucking up to Reagan may have been the single most demeaning moment in the entire political history of Canada's relations with the United States.

But because I think it could really hurt Stephen Harper and his Noose Party.

Not just because of this stunning allegation.

The court papers also drew Harper into the bitter lawsuit for the first time by claiming Mulroney was to meet with the prime minister last summer to discuss the matter, a claim Harper vehemently denied.

Although I do think if Harper denies it...... and he's serious about protecting the office of the Prime Minister as he says he is......he should take a lie detector test.

But also because there are so many Mulroney loyalists in the Noose Party government who worship the bloated relic. And so many old Reformers who hate him. It could get really interesting ......as in really nasty. Or EXCELLENT...if you love the sight of screeching cons tearing themselves apart. Like I do.

But of course the part I like the BEST is the guilt by association angle. I mean if the Cons used Gomery to smear the entire Liberal Party....I say the Liberals should use the Mulroney Inquiry....to paint the Cons from head to toes... with stinky fecal matter. Don't you?

Look I don't know whether Brian Mulroney is guilty of anything. But when you get $300,000 in chunky envelopes of cash...allegedly to set up a pasta business....and somehow shady lobbyist and arms dealer Carl Heinz Schreiber doesn't end up tossing spaghetti ...
















It doesn't look good.

And since in politics perception is EVERYTHING. And the inquiry could be carried live on tv, day after day, week after week, month after month. After a while if you ask Canadians what they think of when you say CONS, I wouldn't be surprised if they think SLEAZY CROOKS.

Oh yes...if by any chance this inquiry is conducted in secret...then you NAIL Harper for covering up. And ask Canadians can you trust this man with ANYTHING ? And what about that hidden agenda?

You know if you love Canada you've got to hate Stephen Harper.

If you hate Stephen Harper you've got to LOVE Brian Mulroney.

Muahahahaha!!!

Canada and the Shadow of the Noose

I love this country. And the place where I live...even at this gloomy time of the year. But for the first time in my life I'm thinking of leaving it.

For the first time ever I'm ashamed to be a Canadian.

Ashamed to belong to a country that would allow a kangaroo court to try a young Canadian for a crime he committed as a child.















After doing nothing to get him out of that evil place...or stop him from being tortured.

Ashamed to belong to a country that doesn't stand up for its citizens abroad...even if they're about to be legally murdered. By people who don't think waterboarding is a crime.

A country that turns its back on its proud tradition of being AGAINST the death penalty. And refuses to support a moratorium.

Aimed at ending horrors like this one.
















Two gay teenagers lynched for loving each other.

What kind of evil monsters would want to bring this horror back to Canada? As will SURELY happen if these neocon thugs and their Noose Party ever get a majority.

But then what kind of a country are we living in right now where the gap between the rich and the poor is growing. Tens of thousands of children go to bed hungry in one of the richest places on earth.

Gender equality is going from bad to worse.

The opposition is too busy fighting itself to fight the Cons. We all helped murder Kyoto because we're too fat and greedy to change.

And all Canadians seem to care about is streaming like lemmings across the border to shop until they drop. While OUR border businesses slowly shrivel up and die...
















I still love Canada. And I know it's the season to be depressed.

But am I really leaving this country?

Or is it leaving me?

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

P.S. I went to see the movie Control...about Ian Curtis and Joy Division. And it was AWESOME !!!

Although a little gloomy.

Nobody understands Ian so in the end he hangs himself.



Alienation and the shadow of the noose.

In Canada these days they seem to follow me around...

Kings, Popes, and Fishnet Stockings

When I first saw this picture I thought one of the tabloids had managed to get a shot of Prince William primping for another wild Windsor Boy party.

While Prince Harry was out in the woods with his friends, snorting vodka, shagging birds. Or shooting them.

You know...just two MORE reasons to abolish the monarchy.

So imagine how disappointed I was to find out it was just another collection of fake celebrities.

Among the realistic-looking fakes are: Brad Pitt shaving Angelina Jolie's legs; a jailed Paris Hilton paying another inmate to scrub her toilet bowl; Mick Jagger getting his lips injected with collagen; a masked Michael Jackson putting lipstick on a crying baby; Catherine Zeta-Jones helping Michael Douglas fit into a corset; Jennifer Lopez struggling to pull a pair of jeans over her ample caboose; Queen Elizabeth II, panties down, sitting on the john; Richard Gere and the Dalai Lama being served by a topless waitress and President Bush and Tony Blair relaxing in white bathrobes as Blair strums a guitar....

And how SHOCKED I was to discover that this picture wasn't part of the collection.













It was REAL.

Who could have guessed it? A old Pope having such a jolly good time with an old King from a corrupt kingdom. Where you can be arrested....or worse....for wearing a crucifix.

Just like good Catholics are being arrested in the United States for wearing fishnet stockings.

What a travesty.

I mean apart from their vast wealth and their fancy robes, what could those two old fogeys have in common?

Except theocracy, the cult of power, corruption, brutal homophobia, generalized misogyny, and the ignorance of the ages.

Oh. Right.

Remind me to file that one somewhere between the Queen sitting on the toilet..

And Michael Jackson putting lipstick on a baby...

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

P.S. Do you think the next collection will have a fake picture of Stephen Harper blowing George Bush while wearing a hangman's hood?

Or would that also be too real?

And TOO disgusting...

Afghanistan: The Monsters and the Barbarians

Just in case we need to be reminded what monsters the Taliban are.

Just in case we need to be reminded how barbarous and corrupt our Afghan allies are.

Once the shooting began, it took more than five minutes to kill the last of the 15 condemned men.

However, when the final coup de grace had been applied and the night was silent again, it was clear that one man was missing. Timur Shah, perhaps Afghanistan’s most infamous criminal, sentenced to die for kidnap, rape and murder, had escaped in the mêlée that was the country’s first official execution for three years

The condemned prisoners were killed in a chaotic, group turkey shoot. And Timur Shah had escaped with the complicity of corrupt guards.

The bodies were collected. With multiple close-range gunshot wounds, many had their faces blown off and were unidentifiable. Foreign diplomats suggested later that some of the bodies had also been bayoneted

Just in case the military and the Cons need to be reminded that in Canada human rights count.

The Federal Court has cleared the way for two human rights groups to challenge Canada's policy of handing Afghan detainees into local custody where they might be tortured.

Just in case Peter MacKay needed to be reminded how badly the war is going.

Just in case we all need to be reminded what a tragic FARCE it has become....

Col. Stephane Lafaut, commander of the Operational Liaison Mentoring Team, was briefing reporters just seconds before the rockets exploded.

He said the attack was a signal of desperation from insurgents, but that it was worrisome because "it means the enemy still has some freedom of movement."

Duh.

I know how we got into this mess.

But when and how the fuck do we get out?

Afghanistan and our Chickenhawk Media

I see that ace crime specialist Christie Blatchford has a book out about the war in Afghanistan.

Now I must admit I'm a HUGE fan of her tabloid prose about criminals and their victims...especially since I found out she grew up in Rouyn-Noranda. The poor thing.

But unless somebody GIVES me a copy of her new book...and I'm stuck in a snow drift or an airport or a village like Ottawa ....for more than 72 hours. And I am so bored I have to remember to keep breathing, I won't be reading it anytime soon..

Not just because Don Cherry LOVES it..

"This book will open your eyes to this brutal war and it is worthy of our brave young men and women. It is a tough book written by a tough broad who tells it like it is. I could not put the book down.”

Barf.

Or because Rosie Dimanno wrote this cunnilingual review.

Christie adores her men in uniform, that's always been apparent. But what's not to love about these guys? ...They're thoughtful, kind and funny.They also cherish one another, in a way likely incomprehensible to civilians.

Canadians should be proud – I believe they are – of all these fine soldiers, who want to be recognized not for what's been lost in Afghanistan, the fallen, but for what's been disinterred: a fighting army with traditions and values and valour.

Vomit.

But because like that jingo shite.....and most of the stuff written about that doomed mission by our mediocre chickenhawk media..... I'm sure it's nothing more than cheap PROPAGANDA.

Which really pisses me off. How come I have to read the British media when I want to find out what is really happening in Afghanistan? And what the war there is really like.














From the morale of the troops...

As one soldier said when I arrived at Camp Bastion, the huge and still growing British military base in the Afghan desert: "This isn't our fight; it was just Blair sucking up to Bush."

I asked a number of soldiers whether Afghanistan was a fight worth dying for and they all - with the exception of one major - answered "no".

To the state of the Afghan army.

As British troops took the opportunity to take off their heavy body armour and gulp down a bottle of much-needed water, the Afghans passed round a cannabis joint.

When the Taliban firing resumed, one Afghan soldier had been rendered so oblivious to the danger that he walked straight into the line of fire and was lucky, almost beyond belief, only to have the magazine shot straight out of his rifle.

To the plight of Afghan civilians.

Pilots in attack helicopters and fighter jets do try to check whether there are civilians at the selected target but, with terrified families sensibly taking cover and staying out of sight, it's often impossible to tell.

So terrible accidents do happen. Only a few days before I arrived, 27 members of one family had been killed by an American bomb.

Kaboom. A bomb just like this one...



Somebody should remind that idiot that the Taliban are homophobes too...

You know..... I also happen to be very fond of some of our boys in uniform. Really. And one of the first things I do every morning is check the news to make sure none of the ones in Afghanistan have been hurt...or worse.

And I'm not against the NATO mission itself...just the way it is being handled...and politicized by those two yankee doodles Harper and Hillier.

But if Canadians are going to be able to make an informed decision about the war and how much longer our troops should stay there.

They need REAL reporting.

Not cheap propaganda...

Mark Warner and Stephen Harper's Hidden Agenda

I was checking out this video of an interview with Mark Warner, the candidate for Toronto Centre who was dumped by the Cons.

When these words jumped out at me:

"On my bio it references the fact that I had attended the International AIDS Conference in August of last year.

My riding has as you know a large population of lesbian and gay people...and also people across the board who are interested in that issue. And I felt it was important to signal to them that this is an issue I've done a lot of work on, and I think it's important.

For some reason when my bio went up to Ottawa it (the AIDS reference) was excluded when it came back down.

I had heard at various times THAT THEY HAD OBJECTED TO IT. PEOPLE HAD OBJECTED TO IT BEING IN MY LITERATURE.

I never paid much attention to that frankly because it didn't make much sense to me..."

Good for Mark. But of course it makes a LOT of sense.

Think about it. Who WOULD object to a reference about attending an AIDS conference? What crazy sickos would turn their backs on the suffering of millions of people? Who WOULD be pleased by the firing of Mark Warner?

Except the religious wingnuts of the ReformCon base....like these homophobic nutbars.

The ones Harper and his thugs in the PMO have been secretly courting recently...to prepare them for a possible election. By appointing Jake Epp, a Christian College president and notorious homophobe, to the rigged Afghanistan panel. Or using the Dalai Lama to send out a message about religious freedom in China. Or hinting they may bring the death penalty back. And of course, by firing Mark Warner.

It has to be done very discreetly because Harper needs to pretend he is a social moderate. And as Eugene points out the Blogging Tory echo chamber IS strangely quiet.

But the religious wingnuts get those kind of coded messages loud and clear. Help get us a majority and religion will be back with a VENGEANCE. On the Glorious Day of our Lord when Stephen Harper's hidden agenda is finally revealed.

Along with his dirty little secret....That he's one of THEM.

In the next federal election Canadians will have to choose between a country that tries to bring together the world to fight a deadly killer...with the courage and the kind of human values that make us who we are.

Or a country run by heartless neocons where courage means killing, compassion is a dirty word, and bigotry is a Christian value.

One year later we still face the same choice....and the same danger.

Unless Canadians understand who Stephen Harper really is...and how far he is prepared to go to rape Canada and its values....ANYTHING could happen. Mark Warner found that out the hard way.

Let's hope Canada doesn't ....

Afghanistan: The Beauty and the Horror

When I read that they had restored the Babur Garden in Kabul I was strangely moved.

Does beauty matter in a country torn by war? That question confronted conservationists when they started rebuilding the renowned Babur Garden in Afghanistan's scruffy capital city.

The result is a small miracle: a corner of loveliness in the heart of Kabul. Now open after more than $5-million (U.S.) of work, the garden – at 11 hectares, the size of 20 football fields – draws hundreds of visitors on Fridays, when Afghans begin the Islamic weekend. Families picnic under beech trees. Children chase each other on the lawns. Old men stroll up stone steps past cascades of water.

Isn't that great?

Although I couldn't help but think it's like something out of a Garcia Marquez novel.

An oasis of fountains and flowers surrounded by a creeping, menacing jungle.

Rather like Kabul itself these days.

Still it is a worthy project. The garden is beautiful. And so is the bullet riddled tomb of the amazing man who built it.













Warrior, empire builder, poet, gardener and ......um......admirer of teenage boys.

From time to time Baburi used to come to my presence but out of modesty and bashfulness, I could never look straight at him; how then could I make conversation and recital? In my joy and agitation I could not thank him (for coming); how was it possible for me to reproach him with going away?

To look straight at him or put words together was impossible.... In that frothing up of desire and passion, and under that stress of youthful folly, I used to wander, barehead, bare-foot, through street and lane, orchard and vineyard...

How romantic. Babur and Baburi. Wouldn't it be nice to think of all those homeless teenage boys in Afghanistan singing and dancing for him in that garden?

Instead of signing up to become remote-controlled suicide bombers.

“Even before you blow yourself up, virgins come to the site of the explosion and wait to take you to Paradise,” he says, parroting the propaganda he learnt from his Taleban indoctrinators.

Farman could not read the Koran and when I asked him he had no idea where Iraq was, or Palestine, though he did tell me that President Musharraf of Pakistan was “a Jew”.

This deadly, vengeful child is every Western intelligence chief’s ultimate nightmare. A programmed human bomb that cannot be reasoned with. And against whom there is little real defence.

And no quick, simple, or military solution either.

Afghanistan...the beauty and the horror.

Which reminds me....you know how Stephen Chickenhawk Harper says the Afghan National Army will be ready to take over in 2011....but General Blow Hard Hillier says it will take longer?

After watching this video of ANA recruits getting some jumping jacks training...




I'm with Blow Hard...

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

P.S. Why does Stephen Harper ALWAYS lie to us?

Sexy E-Mail, Fake Coke Machines, and the Naked Twink

I have to admit I'm a technology freak. I have practically every neat gadget ever invented . Except an iPhone, a 60-inch HD TV to watch Stephen Harper and other filthy porn on. And a robot big enough to walk my dog...and serve me breakfast in bed.

So when I heard about this new 3D program that can turn a boring e-mail into a sexy desert island ... or a mighty Boeing 747....I was naturally intrigued...


Hmmm. Tempting but nah. I mean I LOVE the idea of seeing my spam eaten by sharks. But...um...where are all the gay guys?

I suppose I could always choose the jumbo jet version.

But really. I think I need that kind of technology like I need this nifty fake coke machine... to hide from a criminal...










Of course it could only work in Japan. Where the crime rate is really low.

If you tried that here you'd get a screwdriver or a knife in your groin...when the dum criminal tried to rob da machine.

No. If I want a cheap thrill I'm going for these super headphones...AND the dancing twink...



Now we're talking. Look Ma no wires!! Um.....no ANYTHING.

But of course....they only show ads like that one.

And of course this one...



In Europe.

Isn't THAT depressing?

The other day somebody described Canadian culture as being on the cutting edge of blandness.

Imagine what it would be like if Stephen Harper wins a majority?

Thank fucking god I've got a real desert island, a home in Europe..... AND a French boyfriend.

So even if the worst happens....life should be WONDERFUL.

Have a great weekend everyone!