Home at last

16 hours driving, 1500km (last few hundred all dirt), and one sick dog but I'm here.

Ah Labrador City, except for the sign signifying the Newfoundland curling teams gold medal victory as soon as you cross the border from Quebec, and the new fully automated car wash (old car wash was either student/fire hydrant driven or a metal frame with some hoses outside of the mine), nothing much has changed.

Just 6 more days before doing it all again on my way back to Ottawa.

Well I'm off

Driving back to Labrador City for the week.

20 hours there.

5 days of relaxation.

20 hours back.

I'll probably do a little writing while I'm home but you can never tell, once I enter full veg mode I can't make any plans.

Later.

Those damn dirty undercover Wingnuts

They're really blogging up a storm over at Huffpo and giving the real progressives a bad name.

Sheldon, you better break out your Rove detector and start cleaning house.

My Apologies

I guess I owe the progressives a bit of an apology. According to venture capitalist Sheldon Drobny, a leader in the progressive movement in America and co-founder of Air America Radio, all of those anti-Semitic blog entries and comments that are so prevalent on the left side of the blogosphere are not in fact being posted by liberals at all. Even though they may be on liberal web sites, in many cases even written by the site owners, rarely deleted (in cases where site moderators routinely delete opposing viewpoints), and are more often than not agreed with by the majority of commenters, these are not in fact liberal commenters.

His reasoning behind all this is that progressives can "disagree rationally with different points of view" and "most of the racism (he has) experienced has come from the far right, not the left", therefore all of these comments are in fact a part of the vast right-wing conspiracy to discredit liberals. And who does Sheldon suspect, or more to the point accuse, of being behind all of this anti-Semitism on the left, why Karl Rove of course!

I guess he really doesn't read a whole lot of blogs or for that matter ever leave his sheltered liberal circle of friends. Just from his own post you can see just how 'rationally' progressives deal with different points of view. To paraphrase his posting : "If anyone disagrees with me they are obviously racist right wing anti-Semites".

The problem with the blogosphere is that that viewpoint has become more and more prevalent within today's left. There was a time when conservatives and liberals could sit down and discuss policy without a personal insults crossing the table, or if they did they were more in a joking manner, and after all was said and done the two groups could still head out for a civilized meal together. Much has changed since those time as the more moderate liberals are being pushed further and further out of power and instead being replaced by the much more virulent 'progressives'. Just look at how Senator Lieberman is being portray by the Daily Kos and his crew right now. A man with a 90%+ liberal voting record is now termed a DINO simply because he disagrees with the Democratic stand on the war. Where is the room for rational disagreement. For another example of this breakdown all Mr. Drobny would have to do would be listen to his own radio station, if he can find somewhere in the country where it can still be heard (a bit of a low blow I admit).

It's pretty easy to claim that all racism comes from the 'other guys' when you outright deny all the evidence to the contrary and when said evidence is undeniable you simply attribute it to them anyway (just Google registered Democratic and Al Gore campaign contributor Fred Phelps). Perhaps Mr. Drobny would care to explain why most of the anti-Israel/pro-Palestinian/Hamas/Hezbollah rallies, which do not even try to hide their anti-Semitism, are organized by progressive 'peace' groups. The very same 'peace' groups that are regular backdrops for Democrats running for office across the United States.

Does Rove truly have that much power and cunning to manage to get people to live undercover as liberals for decades just so that at the time of his choosing, which I guess is today, they can come out and write nasty hate filled commentaries on the net and then march in protests against an allied state and in support of known terrorist organizations whose stated goals is the annihilation of every Jew in the Middle East? If so, who is Mr. Drobny to think that he has the power to stop him? Or is Drobny himself a Rove plant meant to thrown people off his scent by creating ludicrous arguments?

Let's be clear, there is racism on the right. Few would deny that KKK is a racist organization, but we on the right have managed to keep our nutcases confined to a very small base and do not allow them to get any power. In fact the only known member of the KKK currently serving in the upper echelons of the US legislative branch is Sen. Robert Byrd, a democrat. That used to be true for the left as well, but since losing power in all branches of the United States government they have become desperate and have turned to any source of help. Enter the extreme left to fill the vacuum.

(h/t LGF)

Return to the Heart of Darkness

OK, so a few days ago I linked to a Daily Kos post that was actually defending Israel's right to exist; an aberration to say the least. Well, it looks like saner heads have finally managed to reassert themselves amongst the brain trust of the progressive left and things have returned to normal (with at least one notable exception).

This peek into the goings on of today's liberal mind brought to you by LGF (simply because I couldn't stomach spending that much time at Kos myself):

• Hasn't America Done Enough for Israel?
• The U.S. is now a legitimate military target
• When is the USA going to invade Israel?
• When is the USA going to invade Israel? Pt. 2
  

... and the always popular title of

• The United States of Israel

And just in case that wasn't enough to show you just how far in the sand their heads are buried, try this gem on for size:

• Worldwide Backlash in pictures.

You have to wonder, if even in their highly filtered photo essay on the 'anti-war' protests they can't even find one person supporting Israel while there seems to be no problem finding pictures idolizing terrorist leaders (correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't this clear violation of Islamic tradition the very reason for worldwide destruction not too long ago) overwhelming support for Hezbollah, Hamas, Lebanon and Palestine, how exactly does this all go to show that LGF and by extension Zombie, are lying when they show these photos of protests in NYC, Chicago, Dearborn (first pic is from NY), San Francisco (video with sound) and L.A.

And not to stop at the American border how about these photos of similar 'anti-war' protests in Montreal, Moscow, Copenhagen, Switzerland, Berlin, London (with some special speakers) and Sydney.

For a group of people who can see Rovian/Neo-Con/Haliburtonian plots to take over the world behind everything from the timing of the street lights in Bangor Maine to the price of cheese in Des Moine, these evolved progressives seem to have a hard time noticing the painfully obvious. If only we had some way of knowing what these extremist truly wanted.

It's amazing what you can do ...

.. with free access to satellite data and a hell of a lot of spare time.

But I'm sure this is just a large Chinese paintball course, and any similarities to any other geographical location is purely coincidental. Right?

The Power of Veto

So it looks like today may be the day when President Bush breaks out that dusty veto stamp and slaps it on the embryonic stem cell spending bill. His first use of the veto since taking office 6 years ago. No matter what his ultimate reasoning, ethical, financial, roll of the die, etc.. I say it's a good call.

In general, the government of a democratic state should not be using tax payer money to fund voluntary activities which a significant percentage of it's people oppose. And in this case that's all they are (or aren't) doing. There is no law on the books limiting private funding of stem cell research, only Federal and as shown in California, every state is free to take it upon themselves to put public monies toward this line of research if their constituent should so choose.

In reality, if embryonic stem cell research truly offered the miracles it proponents put forward at every press conference then the private money should be flowing in from all over. The fact is the science behind this line of research is questionable at best and most of the promises being made are merely fantasies being pushed by special interests. As of today, embryonic stem cells have proven more problematic than beneficial whereas the research into adult stem cells has already been used as the basis for several advances. Is this really where the Federal government should be investing it's limited resources?

While most opponents of Bush are likely to deny it to their last breath, this is a text book example of what the framers of the Constitution meant the United States to be; a system in which the Federal government takes care of the big things that have international significance (such as border security and the military) while the States decide what to do for most other issues. The fact that the Feds like to get their fingers into everything they can find should be no excuse to let them.

Now, if only Bush could manage to find that stamp a little more often.

And now a word from their sponsers

It didn't take too long for Islamic 'rights' group to start condemning PM Stephen Harpers words of support for Israel.

How is it that CAIR has any standing in Western media? Despite their close ties with terrorism (a Googling of their board members, current and former, will come up with more than a few direct ties to outright terrorist organizations worldwide) they are still the go to guys for comments and are consistently presented as the voice of 'moderate' Muslims. They're now calling Harper's comment in support of Israel "incredibly insensitive". To whom exactly? There are two main parties involved in this war, a Ally country and a world recognized terrorist organization and while it is true that the Lebanese themselves have not attacked Israel, they have permitted a group whose stated goal is the destruction of the Jewish state to essentially run the southern region of their country.

In a perfect world the Israeli's could destroy only Hezbollah targets but the truth of the matter is that due to a general weakness on the part of the Lebanese military, there are few resources in the country that cannot be used by Hezbollah to either evacuate key personnel and equipment or bring in reinforcements and supplies. Airports, power stations, fuel dumps, etc.. can all be used by Hezbollah with little or no resistance from the local governments. It's the same reason the terrorist organization has survived for more than 6 years after a UN resolution calling for it's disbanding.

What makes this whole situation all the more terrible is that unlike the West Bank/Gaza situation, the majority of Lebanese do not support Hezbollah. Their political wing holds only a few seats and little political power outside of the south but until the central government can create a force capable of handling Hezbollah themselves, either internally or with outside help, then Israel has little choice but to continue their attacks.

The fact is Hezbollah, and their enablers within the west, and I include CAIR in this group, view every civilian death as a victory. If it is on the Israeli side of the border than that most likely means one less Jew on the face of the planet, while if it is in Lebanon, or the 'occupied territories' then that is just one more face that they can broadcast through their PR machines to show the destructive nature of the Israelis. As can be seen from the beach incident a few weeks ago, the facts don't really matter and even if they happen to have been killed from 'friendly fire', as long as blame can still be placed on Israel then they were worthy sacrifices. That is why groups like Hamas and Hezbollah operate quite opening in public places. Mosques, hospitals, schools, etc.. are all seen as legitimate locations to set up shop because any retaliation from the Israelis against such sites can so easily be used to play the victim card in the press.

If CAIR and other such groups were really interested in peace, they would be using their power to condemn these islamo-terrorist groups as being counter to the teachings of Mohammed (though that is actually a very debateable point). By routinely focusing on the slightest of insults by non-Muslims (Danish cartoons anyone) while almost totally ignoring their own internal issues (and I don't mean a half hearted condemnation with a large 'but' in the middle of it) they act as a lightening rod for division. It's time for the MSM to start to recognize this and stop paying them any attention I guess I can only dream.

Update:
And just to prove my point: Ynet News (h/t LGF)

ECW goes Hollywood

An interesting concept: The 1 Second Film

Make a pledge, get a producer credit.

Think I may just have to drop a few dollars in their tip jar and get myself some nice oversized gold-framed sunglasses.

Candid Camera

This is the type of political video I like seeing.

It's always great to see some candid a/v of world leaders speaking their minds. At least in Bush's case, what he says privately matches what he says publicly, with some four letter garnish to liven things up.

Another sweltering day in the city

Current temp: 32 degrees
Feels like: 38 degrees

Heard someone say humidex actually topped 40 earlier this afternoon.

For a guy from landlocked Labrador humidity is a real killer. I can handle, and even enjoy 32 but it's that 5-8 degrees of humidity that really stops me dead.

Thank God for central air!

Now if I could only get Foster join my way of thinking. No matter how hot or cold it gets that little pooch just loves being outside.

End of an Era

This probably doesn't mean a whole lot to people outside of the Ottawa area (and to be honest this won't effect most folks inside the National Capital Region) but as of June 30th, 2006 my favorite computer parts store, Deals Direct, has closed it's doors.

I've always used DD as my benchmark for other computer stores. Unless they matched or, on those rare occasions, beat Deals pricing I wouldn't even bother saving them as a bookmark in my browser, let alone dropping buy to browse.

They will be missed.

A funny thing happened ...

... on my travels through the blogosphere this afternoon; through a helpful link courtesy of Protein Wisdom, I found what may in fact be the very first thread at the Daily Kos that I'm actually happy to link to.

Despite the title, "Imagine a world without Israel", once you get past the actual diarist's post the comments are surprisingly very supportive of the Jewish state. This may in fact be a first for a mainstream 'progressive' web site.

The timing was a bit odd though, since I had just come back from the wilderness of Think Progress where, not an uncommon occurrence, a series of 'blame Israel for being attacked' comments were popping up in all kinds of unrelated threads. First in a Tom Delay post and then in one about warrentless wiretapping. Unlike the Kos thread, these comments were not only not shot down but, as of the time of me writing this, picked up and praised by several other commentors (but admittedly ignored by most).

So far, in the Kos thread, only rusrivman's comments seem to be crossing the line into ridiculous. His apparent assertion that Christianity is the root of all the world's problems because of its evangelical teachings is a prime example of a 'declaration of truth despite all facts to the contrary' type of argument.

Ignoring the fact that almost ever country that allows a true freedom of religion is based on Judeo/Christian beliefs, or the fact that there is no Christian teachings that push forward a 'convert or die' philosophy, or even the fact that some of the very examples he puts forward as examples of Christian intolerance of other religions, like the Crusades, were in fact responses to previous attacks by those same religions (the majority of the Middle East used to be Christian territory before they were attacked by the invading Muslim armies), he totally ignores the fact that from it's very conception Islam has been very much a 'our way or the highway' type religion. Just google Mohammad and Medina to see how the great prophet of Islam treated those who would not convert to his religion. At least it's good to see some people in the thread are challenging his thinking.

Could this be a sign of hope that at least some on the left haven't totally abandoned their senses? Only time will tell.

The current state of the DCCC

This is the latest ad from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. I don't know about you, but I don't think the best way to drum up support for your cause from the moderate voters is to use images of flag draped coffins in your campaign ads.

I can clearly visualize the editors in their offices putting this all together:

"Do we have anything military?"

"We have some video of guy in a helicopter. It does have a gun mounted on the front though. Can we use it?"

"It will have to do. I guess we don't have time to digitally change the gun to say, a walkie talkie do we? We don't want to appear too pro military you know."

"Probably not, and we only have out lunch breaks to get this thing put together. "

"Ok, use it as is then. Next, on the list .... black family?"

"Well we do have this picture that I copied from a Dell ad last week. "

"Perfect, perfect."

"Hispanic?"

"Check!"

"Something environmental?"

"I'm pretty sure there was a wind farm pic on the cover of that Cape Cod proposal in Senator Kennedy's trash basket."

"Ok, just photoshop out the water and add some grass and it'll work. "

"Dammit, we don't have any Asians!"

"I think we have some stalk of a kid on a swing who I'm pretty sure is Chinese or something."

"Perfect, queue it up. "

(Brief break as assistant scans through tape library)

"Got it!"

"Ok, so that's Asians?"

"Check and double check!"

Check out RedState and Blackfive for more.

In all seriousness, if anyone see even a hint of a proposal for this "new direction" the Dems want to take America, please drop me a line, I'm just not seeing it.

Hezbollah Attacks Israeli Patrol

So far reports are that 2 Israeli soldiers have been confirmed kidnapped and in response, IDF forces have entered southern Lebanon. No word on the conditions of the other soldiers involved in the patrol.

I almost feel sorry for Lebanon, as the Hezbollah forces residing there are mostly backed by the Syrian and Iranian regimes and not so much the Lebanese government. After finally winning independence from Damascus, after so long living under their thumb, it would be sad to see any actions taken by Israel hurt what is essentially a fledgling state.

I just hope that the IDF can walk the fine line and manage to rescue their missing troops while at the same time minimizing damage to Lebanon in general. If they can clearly identify any Hezbollah targets I'm all for them blasting those off the face of the earth, I just think that they need to very careful with both their rhetoric and actions not to make this an all out Israel/Lebanon thing.

Blogs of War seems to have the best roundup thus far. Pajamas Media, Michelle Malkin, Protein Wisdom, Powerline and Captain's Quarters have more.

Unhinged to the Extreme

I had a whole post written about the whole Dr. Frisch/Goldstein thing over at Protein Wisdom but a blogger spellchecking fiasco made it all go away and I'm not in the mood to try and re-write the whole thing.

Needless to say it was very detailed about the difference between the Conservative and Progressive mindsets, showing the right side and left side responses from across the, blogosphere with special mention of the infuriating use of moral relavitism by today's far left while pointing out the few examples of those on the left who seem to understand that you cannot defend the indefensible (you'll have to read to comment thread linked above to find those yourself now), but it's all gone so this is what you're left with.

I'll just say that I'm glad Dr. Frisch is no longer teaching any psychology courses. It's hard to imagine someone who could be so vitriolic towards a political opponents 2 year of child not carrying some of that into the classroom.

Mini-Update: this is one of the best comments over at Talk Left.

Anti-semitism and today's left

It's very scary how many people on today's far left like to blame all the world's problems on The US and Israel. Here are just two posts from the last week on what would normally be considered 'mainstream left' sites. Just notice how little opposition there is to the blatant anti-Semitic diatribes being presented as fact.

Huffpo: Al Jazeera Airs Message From London Bomber

Indybay: More Photos from Monday's Protest

In addition, while I haven't seen this at Huffpo (although the demands are there), Indybay as well as many other 'progressive' sites (DU, Kos, etc..) often delete comments that don't tow the party line thereby reinforcing the echo chamber affect (and I don't mean troll posts whose sole purpose is to insult other posters). I've already had at least one post removed without any notification or explaination from the Indy thread.

Worst 2nd grade science experiment EVER!!

I have to thank Spooked911 over at the Democratic Underground for bringing a little humor to my afternoon and of course, LGF for the original link.

You just gotta love the "at least he deserves praise just for trying" mentality of many of his defenders over there. This isn't a 2 year old being potty trained people, it's a grown man who claims to have a scientific background (though admittedly not in engineering).

Update:
This is just too much. It appears this was 'Spooked' second attempt at creating a clear demonstration at the improbability of the WTC being taken down by the fire. Here's the original
(h/t Right Wing News).

He also has this detailed explanation debunking the crash of flight 93.

Surely this has to be enough to get him at least an honorary doctorate of Engineering at Berkeley.

I wonder why the Bush apologists over at Popular Mechanics left out 'Spooked' from their expert panel reviewing the various crash sites. Obviously they cherry picked their 300 experts and organizations so as to only include those that were part of the governments cover-up.

Good News/Bad News for Sens fans

It's been one of those weeks for hockey fans in the region.

First the news that Wade Redden has agreed to a two year contract so we can be assured of keeping at least one all-star defenseman in our line-up. But for me the bad news was much worse, Big Z, Zdeno Chara, had signed with Boston for a 5 year stint.

Don't get me wrong, I like Redden and I'm glad the Sens managed to keep him in Ottawa, but Chara always manages to put that little extra in the game when he's on the ice and since his first season here has been one of my favourite players on the team. Unlike the player responsible for getting him here in the first place, who I did happen to meet once, he will be missed.

My deepest regret, hockey wise anyways, is not meeting him when I had the chance a couple years ago. In my defence I didn't choose not to meet him, just I turned one way down a hallway and he was down the other.

It was during a Senators/Rangers game here in Ottawa a couple years back when and friend of mine, Wanda, and I got to hang around with Shaun Van Allen's wife Colleen and later Shaun himself. Wanda's brother happens to be close friends with Shaun and Colleen so when he and his wife were in town visiting we got the spend the whole night in a box with the players familles (me and her brother being the only guys present) and down in the players room in the basement. After the game we went down to wait for Shaun and met a bunch of Sens and Rangers on there way out of the dressing rooms.

The chance to meet Big Z came when we were heading out to get something to eat and simply because we had the misfortune of being parked in the front lot, and not the back one Wanda and I headed back upstairs while Shaun and company headed through the basement to the back lot. We found out at the restaurant that on their way back to the cars they had stopped by the dressing room to meet some of the guys who hadn't come out earlier.

Word to the wise: be very careful about splitting a restaurant bill evenly, when one of the parties involved just happens to be a professional hockey player who just minutes before played a full game, including one minor fight. Not necessarily something that comes up all that often but when it does, there could be significant money involved.

On a side note: Even after losing a tough game Todd White had the very same ear to ear grin he has on pretty much every picture I've ever seen of him. Even though he is 5'10", he looks as much like a little kid in person as he does on TV.

Some secrets are better kept quite

Via Newsbusters by way of Expose the Left

See more Gaggles here.

Except for ...

... ending Slavery, Fascism, Nazism and Communism war has never solved anything!

I just love that line.

I'll never understand the whole "war is always bad" argument from so many on the far left when even in the last century there are more examples than can be counted where war was the only way to bring peace. I'm not saying that war is something we should be looking for but does no one on the left remember Germany? How about Japan? And while they all love to throw up Vietnam as an example of a bad war do any of them remember the genocide that occurred after the US left that region due to political pressures back home.

Which leads to another line I love: "Those who forget the lessons of history are doomed to repeat them"

They don't even seem to realize that the America that exists today was itself created through a war with enormous support from an outside country; France. A point that should be harder to ignore this week than at any other time of the year.

I think to far too many people the images of cruise missiles being launched from a destroyer had become the image of what they thought war should be; very clean and with very little risk to the soldiers involved. I'm sorry, but war is not clean and to actually promote change in a region you have to get your hands dirty.

In less than 3 years the US, with their allies, have managed to turn around two countries run by abusive authoritarian regimes, who routinely killed their own people with little or no reason. In Afghanistan being homosexual was a death sentence as was being an educated woman and in Iraq, being a 'Rapist' didn't necessarily mean you were a criminal, it was just as likely to be your official government job title.

If they ever bothered to think about it, maybe if they put the pressure on the non-involved countries to get into Iraq and help, instead of act as a roadblock, then things would go much smoother.

But for too many of those opposition countries the problem lies in the fact that they cannot change their stance and still save face. Even with all the proof that the leading voices from the other side, Russia, France and Germany to name just a few, were receiving billions in illegal funds as well as exclusive oil contracts for supporting Saddam, the far left still hold them up as shining beacons of truth in their never ending war to fight American imperialism. It never occurs to them that the very thing they accuse the Bush Admin of doing (starting a war for oil, with little real evidence to back them up I might add) has already been proven to be the main motivating factor in these countries opposition.

Hiding behind the cross

Q: When is it OK to verbally 'bitch slap' a minister?

A: When he's pushing a 100% political agenda under the guise of following Christ's teachings.

Thankfully Rich was in the studio and managed to destroy Rev. Monty Smith (First United Methodist Church) arguments without even breaking a sweat.

A quick question for the Reverend, does Gods love not extend to the 12 year old being raped by Saddam's soldiers? Isn't turning a blind eye to daily atrocities like those violate Jesus' teachings more so than using force to stop them. There are several wars discussed in the Bible Reverend, and as often as not, they were sanctioned by God so you can feel free to be a peace activist all you want but don't try to use the Bible as a shield to deflect criticisms of your stance.

(h/t Expose the Left)

Happy Canada Day!!