A Bear's Rant

The Arrogant Hypocrisy Of The Left

2012-03-11T13:12:00.017-04:00

I have always tried to bring a level of objectivity to what I write. I tend to be conservative by nature, although not always by voting practice. If I have an ideology, it is that I am opposed to injustice and hypocrisy (not to mention stupidity) and can be as critical of what I see on the right as what I see on the left. That objectivity is increasingly being threatened by what I see happening on the left lately.

Former President George W. Bush
expressing his feelings about
the Constitution and the law.

I was highly critical of the administration of George W. Bush for establishing Guantanamo and of both former President Bush and his unprincipled pit bull, Dick Cheney, for allowing torture and terror to be a part of their imprisonment and intelligence gathering practices. They were clearly not only contrary to American law and justice but to the very spirit and ideals set forth in the American Constitution. It seemed to me that the administration was attempting to defend the American way of life by becoming the very thing it fought against. It was a violation of what most Americans believe in and for which too many Americans have died to defend.

More troubling, it was a clear message to terrorists that they had succeeded in making their enemy so afraid, they were willing to violate their own beliefs and laws in order to protect themselves,

Detainees at Gitmo, blindfolded and
water boarded.. Started by a right-wing
president, continued by one from the left.
Is this really American?

Not surprisingly, many on both sides of the political spectrum agreed and spoke out against Gitmo and the administration’s practises. Today, however, the voices on the left are quite silent at the egregious threats to democracy by the current left-wing administration.

Consider these policies implemented by under a Democratic presidency.

FAST AND FURIOUS: The ATF was authorized to sell, and did sell, illegal automatic weapons to members of drug cartels abroad. Many of those illegal weapons found their way back into the United States where more than one American Citizen has been murdered as a result. In the current administration's twisted way of thinking in the War On Drugs, they have somehow developed the idea that the best way to fight crime is through criminal acts is supposed to be an anathema to the morality espoused by the left.

REDEFINING DUE PROCESS: The current Administration has now redefined due process to such a narrow, legalistic meaning, they had to come up with a separate name for it; judicial process. According to the those who defend liberty on behalf of Americans, citizens of the U.S. are not entitled to due process, just judicial process. This is the interpretation they now use to justify the killing of American citizens abroad and are using to rationalize the killing of American citizens within the country.

No need to take my word for it, Eric Holder, Attorney General under Barrack Obama is on record with this definition and his FBI Director refused, before a Congressional Committee, to answer whether or not, the administration now condoned the killing of Americans within their own country. Syria's Basshar Al-Assad uses much the same legal argument to justify the killing of Syrian citizens and while the left is highly critical of the Syrian government, it is silent about the dangerous path its own president is taking them down.

SOPA and PIPA, two bills put forward to provide the administration far-reaching powers to control the Internet, again outside the limits of constitutional due process. (For those on the left who were unaware, drafting of the legislation now known as SOPA was initiated in 1997 at the beginning of Bill Clinton's term in office. In typical government fashion, it has taken 14 years for various Congressional Committees to finally get it to a stage where people can actually see it and oppose it.)

PRE-CRIME DETECTION: In what can only be described as science fiction, The Department of Homeland Security is moving forward with pre-crime detection, a means whereby it believes it will be able to predict the likelyhood of someone to commit a terrorist or criminal act. It's almost as if the administration has turned national security over to the same people who develop video games or at the very least, watched Minority Report starring Tom Cruise just once too often.

The left sneers at the right for its tough on crime agendas but the right never came close to dreaming up a way of holding people accountable for crimes the authorities thought they 'might' do. What kind of left-wing mania drives such a level of paranoid tyranny?

THE LACK OF RESPECT FOR THE TERRITORIAL INTEGRITY OF OTHER NATIONS: Under President Obama, The United States violated the sovereignty of Pakistan in order to kill Osama Bin Laden and Yemen to kill Anwar al-Awlaqi, an American citizen. I don’t condone terrorists and support efforts by all democracies in taking strong and aggressive action to capture, try and convict them. Having said that, I fail to see how violating your nation’s laws and ideals to protect those things, including violating the sovereignty of other nations, does anything other than demonstrate the failure of your own system and way of life. When the enemy successfully brings you down to his level, he's already won.There are some who celebrate this international form of vigilante justice but the left, which heavily criticized the Bush Administration for similar attitudes and breaches of law, has been silent on this now that it is their man behind the trigger.

TAXING AMERICAN BORN CITIZENS OF OTHER COUNTRIES: Under the current administration, the IRS has been authorized to now treat anyone who was born in the United States but who is actually the citizen of a foreign country as an American taxpayer. Consider that for a moment. Your parents were visiting or working in the U.S., your mother was pregnant and you were born before your parents returned to their own country. You are now an 'accidental' American citizen and taxpayer even if you never lived in the United States, claimed American citizenship or even dropped in for a visit to Disney World with your kids on a two-week vacation. In fact, you are not only a taxpayer, you now owe back taxes for all the years you have been working and paying taxes in your own country.

Thousands of letters were sent to citizens of other countries, born in the United States, advising them that they were going to be charged with tax evasion, ostensibly making them criminal fugitives, unless they contacted the IRS and made arrangements to settle their outstanding tax debt.

There are countless more examples but these are some of the more egregious and they exemplify a growing trend in government to control the lives of its citizens. There has been an increasing encroachment on civil liberties and the rights of citizens in most democratic countries and I don’t see it as a left or right issue.

Are any of the extreme media
opportunists good for any of us?

What disturbs me is the blind eye that supporters on the left turn to the erosion of rights caused by their own while literally frothing at the mouth to condemn those on the right. To be sure, the right has its share of sins and does its own share of finger-pointing but not with the arrogant and sanctimonious self-righteousness of the left.

Recently, Rush Limbaugh called a university student a slut on air. He was rightly criticized heavily for it by outraged people on all sides of the political divide. Where was the left when Bill Maher referred to Sarah Palin as a "c*nt" or Ms Palin and Michele Bachman as "boobs"? Where was the left's outrage when it was one of their own who behaved so shamefully?

It certainly didn’t come from Gloria Steinham who happily sat on Mr. Maher’s program to chat with the 'wonderfully provocative' darling of the left entertainment world.

It would seem that Bill Maher share
as much in common with George. W. Bush
as he does with Rush Limbaugh.

It didn't come from the left-biased media elite who are always quick to jump on every perceived slight by those on the right, no matter how insignificant.

Where were all those left-leaning celebrities who speak out against even the slightest comment that demeans women they see or hear on the right? Where was Susan Sarandan, Soledad O'Brien or even Hillary Clinton? Apparently the Left believes it is only inappropriate to demean women you like or with whom you tend to agree.

In what can only be described as bemusing, the outrage over Maher's comments came from people like Ann Coulter. Routinely criticized by the left, it was Ms Coulter who is best known for her somewhat rabid, extreme right-wing, shoot-from-the-lip attitude was equally critical of both Mr. Limbaugh and Mr. Maher. The rest of those on the left, apparently were too busy applauding Mr. Maher’s grandstanding donation of $1 million to Barrack Obama’s Super PAC to be concerned with concepts like hypocrisy. For his part, President Obama has yet to decline the contribution despite all of his comments about wanting his daughters to grow up in a society where women are treated with respect and free to hold and voice their opinions without being demeaned. In the president's rarified world, money talks...bullshit walks.

While it is still impossible to actually know what Occupy actually stands for, it is fairly self-evident that it is not right-wing. While the left likes to criticize the Tea Party and not without justification, the simple fact is that the Tea Party has used the system to build its membership. We may not agree with its policies or principles but one thing is clear, it has shown respect for the democratic process and the Constitution of the United States.

Another example of the kind for freedom of expression
condoned and supported by many on the left

Contrast that with Occupy which tramples the rights of others, stands in solidarity with convicted prisoners as San Quentin, rationalized sexual assault and child abuse within its own camps and defaced and vandalized public and private property including churches. Where was the left when Occupy was on its rampage? They were writing checks in support of a protest rabble they claimed was the ideal of democracy. Tired, forgotten left-wing activists from the 60’s were lining up to for photo ops at the tent cities and left-leaning celebrities were all over themselves to demonstrate they were in solidarity.

Are you getting the point?

There is much to criticize on the right and it should be criticized aggressively and usually is. It is the hypocrisy on the left that bothers me. While the right is accused of being ideological, it is the left that clings to its ideology even in the face overwhelming evidence that what it supports is undermining the very things the left claims to hold most dear.

Michael Moore protesting the wealth of others
while enjoy the luxury of his own

While the left criticizes corporate tax breaks and bailouts (which I also criticize), it has a different opinion when it comes to entitlements for its own causes. The left is only too happy to see money pumped into activist groups and increased salaries, benefits and entitlements. It's even willing to see some social programs cut back if it means the 'pet' projects will go forward.

It claims to support the poor but doesn’t do much more than pay lip service to any concept of real support. Even in times of high unemployment and harsh economic realities, the left can always be counted on to support another union demand for higher wages and more benefits regardless of the impact it has on others.

The left criticizes wealth on the right while celebrating and even wallowing in the reflected glory of those who support them like Michael Moore, George Soros and Al Gore. The left has turned environmentalism and social activism into highly profitable ventures and have become highly accomplished at ensuring government funding for their profitable, non-profit organizations and causes.

In a world where there are some hard economic choices that have to be made, the left always finds a way to justify making sure the funds continue to flow to their pet projects and friends even if it means not using money to overcome things like child poverty. They can blame that on the right after the check clears the bank.

And in the end, that is my increasing problem with the left.

The left talks a good game but when they have their hands on the reins of power, they are no better than the right and too often even worse. The hypocrisy is palpable and offensive. Too many groups and organizations on the left that claim to be working for the greater good are lined up like pigs at the trough at every opportunity to get a piece of the cash.

Politically, they are as ideological as anything the criticize on the right.

The left is determined to support Barrack Obama, not because he is the great defender of liberty or even all that effective as president. They support him because to do otherwise might make them seem racist, a charge they often make against those critical of the president. They support him because it's politically correct and the image of voting for a black man is one they like. He's young and seems cool. They support him because he's on the left, with them and when his policies seem a little right-wing, they remain silent because to criticize him would be an admission they were wrong. Image is everything with the left.

They support him in much the same way they supported Occupy, without much thought to the consequences of where he is leading them. It is absurd adherence to ideology and a wilful partisan blindness that not only rivals but that exceeds most on the right.

I believe that if all you can offer up is the same hypocrisy that you are against in others, then you are no better than what you oppose. Your stated values and principles are made meaningless. There is corruption, lack of ethics and sheer stupidity on the right but those are more than just a part of the left’s lexicon as well.

The only real difference between the left and the right today is the left wants it both ways with its sanctimonious, self-righteous hypocrisy. It is impossible to maintain any sense of credibility for what you espouse when you embrace the same language, tactics and assaults on ethical morality as those you criticize.

Unfortunately for the left, principles are only valid if you actually live them and you can't lay claim to living them if you are unprepared to judge yourself by the same standards by which you judge those with whom you disagree. While it likes to lay claim to the moral high ground, the simple fact is that the left has proven itself to be as unprincipled as anything it criticizes on the right.

It's hard to imagine how that is going to make a reality out of the left's promise of a better way of doing things.

LINKS

US Defends Killing American Citizens Abroad

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5joay9Ja42SsH3Ll18mXVpRz3C8xQ?docId=CNG.8feec9dc17b9d8bb080003d2f171a36a.01

Fast and Furious Just May Be President Obama's Watergate

http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2011/09/28/fast-and-furious-just-might-be-president-obamas-watergate/

The Attack On Accidental American Citizens

http://mises.org/daily/5666

Homeland Security Moves Forward With Pre-Crime Detection
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20117058-281/homeland-security-moves-forward-with-pre-crime-detection/

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Reefer Madness?

2012-03-09T14:55:00.005-05:00

A few days ago, I posted a tongue-in cheek satire about how government over-regulates just about everything it touches. The piece was called “The Real Problem With Legalizing Marijuana” and it attracted almost ten times as much readership as anything else I’ve written. I’d like to think it was because people are interested in government but that wouldn’t be true.

It attracted more attention because many people thought it was about marijuana and judging from the response I received, there is apparently a very large constituency that is heavily invested in the issue of marijuana legalization.

After reading it, most people got the satire and had a chuckle but not all. Some were quite concerned that I was making assumptions that I wasn’t qualified to make. That may be true but the great thing about satire is that it doesn’t require qualification, just a sense of humour which also seemed to be lacking in some who read the piece.

More than a few who read the piece were quite perturbed by my reasoning, especially as they took it to be a serious attempt to undermine efforts to legalize the demon weed. I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe they were the victims of smoking a little too much Mother Nature and were perhaps, as a result, the best argument against legalization.

For clarity’s sake, let me state that I really don’t care if they legalize marijuana or not. I am not threatened by the fact that many smoke it and my life won’t be minimized if it disappears tomorrow. Marijuana was far more important to me when I was a teenager and thought it was one more symbol of rebellious freedom against the establishment, my parents and anyone else that made the enemies list.

I don’t feel like that now.

Marijuana has some therapeutic medicinal use and I think that should be explored and opened up. Certainly, weed can’t be any more harmful to those in chronic pain, suffering from MS or other debilitating diseases than the prescription medications they get through their doctors. Most of those drugs are so powerful that in a sixty-second commercial, as much as forty-five seconds can be devoted to the harmful side-effects of those drugs and only fifteen seconds given to promoting its benefits.

From my own personal experience and that of folks I have known over the years, there are two basic side-effects to smoking a few joints now and then.

The first is becoming so mellow that you willingness to do much more than breathe can be quite prevalent in some. This in and of itself isn’t much of a problem, the world could probably do with a little more mellowing but it can become an issue if that term paper has to be in tomorrow or your boss is expecting you to show up on time for the client presentation.

The other issue, and I believe a more serious one, is the craving for things like chocolate chip cookies that often accompanies marijuana use. As I have seen with some of my friends in the past, this can eventually lead to excessive weight gain and there is just nothing cool about being tubby while trying to look ‘with it’ while smoking a joint; especially if your jeans have become two sizes two small as a result. I know…been there….done that.

At the end of the day, marijuana which used to be legal (as did cocaine, actually) is really one of those ridiculous debates that fill too much time and which are clouded by too much prejudice and bias. We have far more legal products that are more harmful to waste so much time debating the evils of weed.

What does concern me though is that I can draw thousands to read a piece on the legalization of marijuana and only hundreds to read a piece on child abuse or the undermining of our democracies. It makes me wonder just where, exactly, our values as a society lay.

Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em by all means but take a moment to think about the real issues in the world. Worrying about legalizing marijuana when almost a million children are missing in North America or The Attorney General of the United States is able to justify the killing of American citizens abroad is nothing less than reefer madness.

Or maybe it’s just one more example of a world going mad. I’ll let you decide.

LINKS
The Real Problem With Legalizing Marijuana
http://bearsrant.blogspot.com/2012/03/real-problem-with-legalizing-marijuana.html

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

CNN's Soledad O'Brien - The Erosion Of Professional Journalism Continues

2012-03-08T18:34:00.012-05:00

Watch this ‘interview’ by CNN’s Soledad O’Brien and then we’ll talk.

This kind of biased, prejudiced and bullying excuse for journalism has more in common with The National Enquirer than it should ever have with a news organization that claims the credentials of CNN.

Ms Obrien was not interested in covering the story, she inserted herself into it as if somehow she is part of the story and her opinion is as important, if not more important, than that of her interview subject.She had so little objectivity she even talked down to and over some members of her celebrity panel of ‘experts'.

Indeed, I found it interesting that only one person on the celebrity panel of talking heads actually got it right. She criticized the media for the uneven job they do as gatekeepers of the information that is fed to the public and suggested that it wasn’t the media’s role. Ms Obrien, clearly didn't agree and was quick to talk over her ‘guest’ because she didn’t like the criticism.

In fact it was self-evident that Ms O'Brien came to the interview prepared to shoot down the claim being made by Joel Pollack and it quickly became even more clear that she wasn't interested in anything Mr. Pollack had to say. Her conduct had more in common with the Rush Limbaugh's of the world than anything even remotely representing professional and objective journalism.

Ms O’Brien exemplifies the worst in modern mainstream media. She was demeaning, rude, lacked objectivity, was poorly informed about Critical Race Theory (the actual topic of the interview) and argumentative. I respect a journalist being aggressive in their search for the truth but I resent this kind of arrogant partisanship posing as journalism.

I don’t happen to think the President Obama is a racist nor do I think he should be held accountable for what he may or may not have believed when he was in college. We all hold different opinions over the course of our lives and those opinions often change as we gain more life experience.

For that reason, I don’t happen to believe that the video in question is all that revealing or even important in trying to determine President Obama’s suitability for office. He has a record in office, judge him favourably or not based on his record. The constant search for extraneous nonsense from his past is nothing less than a desperate attempt by some to try to discredit him because they are either unwilling or unable to debate him on the issues or his record.

It is equally abhorrent to watch his supporters conduct themselves like cult followers who block any attempt to criticize him, especially in the media. I found Ms O'Brien's obvious bias as disgraceful as anything I've seen on Fox News. I think the president has a sufficient record from his first term in office that is all that is necessary to help people decide whether or not he deserves a second term.

Having said that, I have no issue with people like Mr. Pollack voicing their opinions no matter how much I may disagree with them. That is democracy and that is what we all purport to believe in. There is, however, something distasteful and inappropriate in watching a ‘journalist’ mock, lecture and denigrate the subject of her interview as Ms Obrien did in this video clip. It betrays her bias and a belief by too many in the mainstream media that they know more than anyone else and are not only the gatekeepers of information but the gatekeepers of what we should be allowed to see and believe.

That isn’t the role of the news media and if Ms Obrien is incapable of understanding that, one would have hoped that the executives at CNN would have understood it. I think there is something dangerous about media acting like government when it comes to the dissemination of information.

Freedom of the press is a highly-prized and valued right in most democracies but with great freedom comes great responsibility. Too many in the mainstream media have lost sight of that as they turn their reporting into entertainment or platforms for their own biased beliefs.

Whether it is John King with his ridiculous question to Newt Gingrich during a Republican candidate debate (a question clearly designed to embarrass Mr. Gingrich), the daily rantings of Fox News or Ms O’Brien’s complete lack of professional objectivity during this interview, the state of a journalistic standard that was once the envy of the world is clearly deteriorating. Too many who work in the media today are arrogant, elitist and less interested in presenting the story than they are in presenting their opinions of the story.

It’s small wonder that more and more people are turning their backs on the media celebrities and elite and searching for their information from other sources.

The bottom line is that when the media makes itself part of the story, it is no longer qualified to cover the story. After watching this embarrassing interview, one is forced to wonder if some media personalities will ever be able to get past the arrogance of their own celebrity to understand that.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Wikipedia overview of Critical Race Theory

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_race_theory

Scholarly articles on Critical Race Theory

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?q=critical+race+theory&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=dTVZT4niNMbl0gHRwcHaDw&ved=0CCEQgQMwAA

For Outstanding Achievement In Government Waste & Stupidity - The 2011 Teddy Awards

2012-03-07T15:49:00.007-05:00

Many countries and industries present awards for outstanding achievement by individuals and groups and we are all familiar with awards like The Grammies, The People’s Choice and The Oscars. Awards are not merely presented for achievement in the arts and in entertainment, however. The Nobel Committee presents awards recognizing significant contribution in fields such as medicine and environmental sciences and there are countless academic, scientific and industry-specific awards world-wide.

Perhaps no single group, however, is more overlooked when it comes to awards than government but in Canada, a nation of thoughtful and sensitive people, we have rectified this with the Taxpayers' Federation of Canada's Annual Teddy Awards for outstanding achievement in government waste and stupidity.

The 2011 Awards were presented yesterday on Parliament Hill. Sadly none of the recipients were available to accept their awards in person but we believe they should receive the recognition they deserve. Here are the Teddy Award recipients for last year.

The Federal Teddy Award – Winner: Agriculture Canada

Agriculture Canada won for its program to provide financial subsidies to tobacco farmers to make the transition from growing tobacco to an alternate crop. The program was a bargain at a mere $284 billion but unfortunately, after the investment was completed, there were actually twice as many farmers growing tobacco as there were before the cash subsidies were distributed.

The Life-time Achievement Teddy Award – Winner: Gilles Duceppe

For those unfamiliar with Canadian politics, Mr. Duceppe was the former leader of the Bloc Quebecois, a political party with the decided objective of bringing about the break up of Canada by causing the province of Quebec to secede and become an independent nation (still using Canadian currency and relying on Canada for defense, communications and health care). Mr. Duceppe who did not wish to be a Canadian nonetheless felt obliged to encourage others to benefit from Canada and quickly put his party's executive director on the federal payroll. It is estimated that his career in federal politics has cost the country in excess of $41 million and a grateful nation has awarded him a pension worth in excess of $2 million for his efforts.

The Provincial Teddy Award – Winner: The Alberta Legislature

This award was presented in recognition of Alberta’s standing committee on privileges and elections. Each member of the committee, which is comprised of 25% of the politicians sitting in the legislature, is paid a monthly stipend of $1,000 in recognition of their commitment and dedication to review political privilege. The committee has not met since 2008 which makes it quite the privilege.

And my particular favourite

The Municipal Teddy Award – Winner: The City of Montreal, Quebec

The award was presented in recognition of the city’s dedication to ensuring that sidewalks were plowed even when it hadn’t snowed. This video says it more elegantly than any words of mine ever could. Close runners up might have been the City Of Ottawa for putting GPS tracking devices on Blanding Turtles and a $1.3 million bike lane over six blocks in the downtown core but nothing quite rose to the effort put forward by Montreal. Here's the video of their hard work and dedication.

The Teddy is named for Ted Weatherill, a former federal government bureaucrat who was dismissed in 1999 for inappropriate expenses. Apparently Mr. Weatherill was never able to find a lunch in the city for less than $100 when the government was paying….which apparently was frequently.

Sadly, Mr. Weatherhill is no longer able to spend taxpayer money but fortunately it appears that there are more than a few who were only too willing to step up and carry on the tradition of waste and stupidity.

We salute them all.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Reflections The Day After Super Tuesday

2012-03-07T10:50:00.003-05:00

It could just be me but it seems like we are voting more and accomplishing less with each election held in our various democracies.

Super Tuesday, as it is affectionately known, was held yesterday in the United States and a raft of delegates were awarded to the various Republican Candidates. Despite all the talking head predictions, nothing has been decided and while Mitt Romney remains the front-runner, he hasn’t wrapped the nomination up and the also-rans refuse to bow gracefully out of the race for the good of the party and perhaps the country.

Barbara Bush called this the worst political campaign she’s ever witnessed and I tend to agree with her. Billions are being spent to indulge three old men and a guy in a sweater-vest in their lust for power. None bring much that’s any different from the other three to the table and this orgy of empty rhetoric and ridiculous pandering is far from over. The only real question right now is, how much damage can this primary campaign do to the Republican Party? It’s difficult to believe it could possibly do much more than it already has but after yesterday’s results, it appears there is still more damage to do.

It isn’t any better anywhere else.

In Greece, people riot in the streets to protest austerity measures forced on them by the spendthrift ways of previous governments. In Egypt, people rioted against the provisional government put in place to transition Egypt from Mubarak’s reign to a new democracy even as the elections were about to be held.

In Canada, we’ve had 5 elections since 2000, that’s one election every 2 years in a country where the typical life of a government should be 4-5 years.

None of this includes bi-elections to replace retiring or representatives who have died in office nor does it include all of the municipal, county, regional, provincial/state or other elections held in various countries.

Like Winston Churchill, I believe that democracy is a terrible form of government, it’s just better than all of the alternatives but it seems to me that a simple concept like democracy has been hijacked by politicians and their political parties. Elections and preparing for elections has become a bigger part of their reason to exist, than governing.

In fact, I have come to believe that governing is increasingly in the hands of the bureaucracy with only minor tinkering from whichever politicians have most recently been elected.

Think about it.

Most of the regulations, laws, taxes and other things that get imposed on us are created by bureaucracies. Politicians may pontificate in their legislatures and even pass the legislation created by the bureaucracy but in the end, it’s the bureaucracies that actually put it all together and then implement it. Sometimes, the very legislation Party A introduced but failed to get adopted before their term ended, and which was opposed by Party B, gets implemented by Party B once they’re elected. Why? It’s because the bureaucracy remains constant. Only the politicians and their parties change.

Most politicians don’t have much experience with running a business let alone a government and many of the issues are complex and far-reaching. Politicians have difficulty focusing far enough ahead to plan on where to have lunch. It’s small wonder they tend to let bureaucracies do the heavy lifting.

Of course, that begs the question. Why do we need politicians and their parties when all they do is spend obsene amounts of money trying to get elected, draft legislation that is favourable to themselves, their parties and their ‘friends’ and which generally treat the electorate as no more intelligent than participants on the Jerry Springer Show?

I’ll grant you that there is a slight possibility that this an over-simplification and that political leaders actually do some governing. They embroil us in wars we can’t afford and in which we shouldn’t be involved. They attend international conferences where they agree the situation is grave and then further agree to do nothing except forging agreement on the conference press release. They pass money bills to make sure that the bureaucracy is fed and the social assistance checks go out on time and they dream up legislation that never seems to actually address the real and long-term issues facing our societies (like poverty, infrastructure and crime) but which always give them lots to talk about on Meet The Press, CNN or CTV.

The simple fact is that, we the people, need people to represent us in government. We can’t all drop by our respective legislatures for a discussion of the issues. Occupy has been trying that out without much success. The ‘up twinkles’ approach to democracy isn’t any better than what we already have, it’s just funnier to watch.

What we need is true representative democracy. By that I mean a democracy where the politician represents his or her constituents, not a political party, power base or Super PAC. We need people with integrity, vision and a strong moral sense of public service, people who see serving their neighbours as an honour rather than as a path to power and wealth.

Overthrowing a dictatorship or other tyranny isn’t of much use if it only going to be replaced by democratically elected party hacks who are no better than those who were overthrown.

In the end, I look at what passes for political leadership in my country (Canada) and I am disgusted by what I see. It is nothing but the basest partisanship and a lack of principles. It is political parties that confuse not getting caught as being morality. It is no better anywhere else and I despair for my friends in the United States who have watched billions spent over the past ten months but have precious little from which to choose despite the expenditure.

As long as we continue to believe that it is only the candidate or political leader we don’t like who is the problem, the political parties and their strategists will continue to win the game and our system(s) will never change for the better.

We will continue to watch our democracies be eroded by immorality, greed, influence and sheer stupidity.

It almost makes you long for the good old days of a Julius Caesar.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

The Shameful Disgrace Behind The RoboCall Scandal

2012-03-04T04:43:00.006-05:00

A hypocrite is someone who is defined as pretending to have values, morals or principles that they don’t actually possess or live. A politician is defined as someone engaged in politics and as someone who acts in a manipulative and malicious way usually to gain advancement.

If anything more clearly demonstrates that both of these definitions are alive and well in government, it is surely the RoboCon scandal in Canada. The level of political hypocrisy has become so repugnant it is threatening to deflect attention from the issue itself and redirect it to the disgraceful response by politicians on all sides of the political divide.

Just a week ago, Bob Rae interim leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, apologized for the behavior of one Liberal staff member for VikiLeaks, a dirty little smear campaign by a rogue employee of the Liberal Party. I believe Mr. Rae’s apology was sincere and that he, as leader, knew nothing about the staffer’s activity. He clearly expected the Conservatives to believe that when he apologized. It did not, however, prevent Mr. Rae from attacking the Prime Minister for the very same thing he just denied applied to himself

Liberal Party Interim Leader Bob Rae

“The prime minister has created a Nixonian culture. This stuff doesn't happen unless the boss lets it happen. He has allowed to seep into his party and into his organization a culture of attack and, frankly, a culture of deception and dirty tricks..."

NDP Member Pat Martin has been so careless with his accusations and vitriolic that he is now being sued by RackNine for defamation, a lawsuit that Mr. Martin dismisses as an attempt to shut him up. Exactly! It is more than an attempt; it is a desperate move to put some sense of responsibility back into the issue. Mr. Martin has no evidence whatsoever that RackNine has done anything improper or illegal but it hasn’t prevented him from smearing the company with careless innuendo and defamatory labels like “RackNine rascals” in attempt to further his self-serving attack on the Conservatives.

For their part, the Conservatives, led by Prime Minister Stephen Harper have conducted themselves with no more dignity or integrity. Instead of taking a leadership role in uncovering the truth of what happened and working cooperatively with all parties the paty has done the usual circle the wagons defense and then counterattack strategy. They have hurled outrageously stupid accusations back at the opposition parties that border on lunacy. It almost makes you believe their political strategies are developed by children who have too much sugar in their systems.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper

It is an ongoing disgrace and an overwhelming insult to Canadians and to our democracy.

Our electoral system has long been demeaned by cynical political parties who promise much during campaigns and deliver little but more of the same inefficiency, lack of vision and hypocrisy once elected. Now our electoral system, our very democracy, is being attacked by those who believe our right to vote is merely one more commodity to be manipulated on the way to victory.

What are our politicians doing about it? Nothing!

They pontificate, they yell across the floor at each other in the House of Commons and they strut their arrogant self-righteous rhetoric before the public at every televised opportunity they can arrange but in the end, they are doing nothing of any real value.

The simple truth is that there isn’t one politician sitting in the house who really gives a tinker’s damn about our democracy. RoboCon is a ‘made in Heaven’ opportunity for the opposition parties to advance their political agenda against the government while to the government it is just one more attack to be deflected. Nobody really cares about what RoboCon or the subsequent gamesmanship that is now going on is actually doing to our society, our government or to our democracy. It's all about winning political points.

Far from demonstrating that they are interested in discovering the truth, the actions and words of all politicians are undermining what little confidence Canadians had left in their democratic processes and the integrity of government. If the only response politicians can offer when our right to free and fair elections is under attack is more partisan name-calling and unproven accusations protected by parliamentary privilege, what use are they?

Automated calling systems are used by all political parties. The misuse of it as appears to be the case in the 2011 election has serious repercussions for the integrity of our elections and, therefore, our democracy. Anyone and everyone involved in voter fraud should be charged and punished to the full extent of the law. That is something all political parties should be working cooperatively towards.

Instead, we are given just more of the same self-serving partisanship because our electoral system has been hijacked by those to whom it was entrusted. Political parties, their politicians, staffers and backroom strategists have turned our elections into little more than a game in which they treat voters as little more than the pieces to be manipulated and moved around the board at their discretion. It is this attitude by all politicians and their parties that have led to corruption like AdScam, VikiLeaks and now RoboCon.

I'm tired and more than a little disgusted by the self-righteous rantings of members of Parliament like Pat Martin and the simpering hypocrisy of NDP Interim-leader Nicole Turmel. I'm tired of the folksy, dishonest arrogance of Liberal Interim Libear Leader Bob Rae and I am tired of Prime Minister Stephen Harper putting his viscious partisanship ahead of the welfare of the country.

If nothing else, RoboCon has demonstrated once again how little respect politicians and their parties have for the people they claim to represent and the Parliament in which they sit. It demonstrates once again how little integrity and decency they bring to politics and to the people's government.

Politicians claim to represent us but they don't. They don't share our values. That is the real meaning of RoboCon and it is nothing less than a disgrace.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

CNN And Michael Moore Go At It Over Health Care

2012-03-03T12:18:00.003-05:00

I’m having a bad day.

I just watched an interview with Michael Moore on CNN and find myself almost agreeing with him, if not on all of the facts raised by CNN, certainly on Mr. Moore's response to Wolf Bliitzer's presentation and questions. Finding myself to actuallly be 'sort of', 'almost', 'kind of', 'possibly' in agreement with Michael Moore is threatening to make my head explode. Here's the interview.

I consider Michael Moore to be just one more cynical opportunist making a great living off criticizing things with anything but an objective and balanced view of everything from gun control to health care. He has accused middle-class Americans of being racist while sidling up to the young in attempt to present himself as hip and aware to help promote his movies.

He sided with Occupy in their protests against the so-called 1% and when it was revealed that Mr. Moore is actually a member of the 1%, he quickly altered his stance to try and redefine the 1% as an attitude rather than an economic issue.

Now it’s health care and while I have no doubt that many of his statistics are probably accurate or close to accurate, the simple fact is that they do not prove what he thinks he is trying to prove. First and foremost, despite his oft-repeated statement about 'free' health care in countries like Canada (my country) the fact is that it is not free or even close.

In Canada free health care is paid for by every Canadian who pays taxes through those taxes. In some provinces, like Ontario, there is an additional health tax added on and when it’s all added up, almost 50% of every tax dollar goes to funding ‘free’ health care.

The result?

Longer wait times in emergency rooms, a shortage of hospital beds, increasing administrative costs, ridiculously long wait times for surgeries, a shortage of facilities like MRI clinics and of family physicians and the delisting (privatizing) of various medical procedures that were once included, like chiropractic and optometry in some jurisdictions.

Even more disturbing, Canada ranks below the United States when it comes to wait times for medical treatment.

I support universal access to health care and I don’t mind seeing it funded by taxes but I resent the way the current mess of the Canadian health care system is constantly held up by the uniformed like Mr. Moore as being something to which other countries, including his, should aspire. Indeed, the debate in Canada about how to improve health care is anything but. The mere suggestion of looking at new and different ways to deliver health care, which might include a blend of private and public delivery, is immediately blocked by the hysterical screams of those who would rather defend an increasingly unaffordable system, with declining efficiency, than do anything to improve it.

But, as Arlo Guthry said after a 20 minute disertation on his experience one Thanksgiving at Alice's Restaurant, this isn't what I came to talk about. I came to talk about the mainstream media and the CNN interview with Michael Moore is just one more example of the problem.

It isn’t CNN per se, it’s the mainstream media in general with their biased and slanted opinion- based approach to journalism that is as demeaning to democracy as the cynical lack of morality demonstrated daily by our politicians and the political parties they represent. The mainstream media are the fourth estate and are protected by the right of freedom of the press. With great freedom comes great responsibility but the mainstream media are failing in meeting that responsibility.

Their coverage of major news events is more about presenting their ‘take’ on the event than actually presenting facts and letting the public decide for themselves what it all means. Indeed, the media now spend more time interviewing each other about the news than they actually do interviewing the newsmakers themselves.

I don’t deny Mr. Moore his right to make his movies even if I don’t agree with the content of them nor do I begrudge him his financial success. I think his movies are one-sided and that Mr. Moore himself needs to become more objective but that is just my opinion.

I am less forgiving with the mainstream media.

When I watch a debate of presidential candidates and one of the key questions asked is about ridiculous things like the allegations of infidelity made by the ex-wife of a candidate, I just shake my head in disbelief. When a national television news network prefers to show talking heads rather than the event, as the CBC did during the ‘televized’ coverage of the last federal budget, I sit in wonderment at how little televised coverage the presentation of the budget actually received.

There is a place in journalism for comment and opinion but here’s a big 10-4 for the mainstream media. Your opinions are not news and are not as important to us as you think they are. We want to know what is going on, not simply what you think about it. Most of us actually have brains and are more than capable of using them. Give us the facts and let us decide for ourselves rather than spoon feeding us your opinions as if every bit of commentary was part of the Sermon on the Mount.

The relationship between the media and politicians is becoming incestuous and that is worrisome. In Britain, the phone hacking scandal by various newspaper tabloids is no less disgraceful than the Robocon scandal in Canada over potential electoral fraud during the last election.

There was a time when the news media was above all of that, a time when the news media could be trusted to uncover the truth and get it into the hands of the people. Now, the mainstream media are a biased, opinionated entertainment medium complete with super-graphics and theme music for every major event from political debates to wars.

And worst of all for me, the behavior of many in the mainstream media have put me on the same side of the fence as Michael Moore and that has seriously ruined my day.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

The Real Problem With Legalizing Marijuana

2012-03-01T00:17:00.009-05:00

There is a growing movement in most democratic countries to legalize, or at the very least, decriminalize marijuana use. While not as divisive an issue as abortion, for example, there remains a fairly significant divide between those for legalization and those opposed.

Those in favour of legalization tend to cite things like the fact that marijuana is a reasonably benign drug, not much different from alcohol or nicotine. Others talk about its medicinal properties in dealing with chronic pain and diseases like glaucoma. Still others dismiss the idea of charging people with a crime for the recreational use of marijuana as just one more absurd and failed part of the war on drugs.

Those opposed to legalizing marijuana talk about it being a ‘gateway’ drug that eventually leads users to harder, more dangerous drugs like crack cocaine. Some talk about safety issues related to things like smoking marijuana while driving while others decry what they see as the road to addiction.

The arguments for and against are many and varied but there is one issue related to legalization that I believe has been overlooked and is more serious than any mentioned above.

Here is what will happen if we rush into legalization of marijuana without serious and informed debate and consideration.

First, the government will create standardized packaging regulations with appropriate labeling in both official languages. Regulations will be drafted to establish size of brand name, product information and where safety labeling must appear

Almost immediately, the government will add an excise tax to every pack, provincial (state) governments will add sales taxes and in Canada, GST (goods and services tax) will be charged to the whole mess. This will increase the cost of marijuana by approximately 300% as it has for cigarettes.

Agriculture Canada will establish standards for how marijuana can cultivated. A marketing board will be established to control pricing both in Canada and its export markets and to establish grade standards. This will result in monopolization of distribution and artificial inflation of pricing as it has done for milk and wheat.

Health Canada will demand health warning labels complete with pictures, similar to those they demand be included on cigarette packages. The only real difference is that the marijuana pictures will be of people freaking out as they search frantically for chocolate chip cookies and potato chips after smoking a joint.

Companies like Sara Lee and Betty Crocker will develop marijuana brownies causing the Agriculture Department to send in food inspectors to ensure that both the production facilities and the product itself meet new standards set by new legislation. Health Canada will require the publishing of nutritional information on the side of packaging and PTA organizations will form committees to develop guidelines to prevent kindergarten children from bringing the wrong brownies to the weekly picnic party during sandbox.

Eventually activists will protest marijuana.

Environmentalists will protest against the use of land for marijuana farms instead of using the land for more wind turbines. University campuses will be aflame with protest that marijuana is not permitted in the classroom and the cost subsidized by government and AdBusters will protest the commercialization of Mother Nature.

A new activist group will emerge. People Against Marijuana (PAM) will form and begin a concerted campaign against the smoking of marijuana. This will not be the same people as those currently opposed to legalizing marijuana. PAM will be formed by former ant-smoking activists running out of smokers to harass. They will apply for, and receive, government grants to fund their new offices and to pay the salaries of an Executive Director and support staff. They will implement fund raising campaigns to support promotional efforts lobbying governments and the public against smoking weed.

Simultaneously a new movement will be formed to legalize Hashish or Hash as it is known. This will initially lead to more confrontation as some will confuse the movement with an attempt to legalize cornbeef hash which they thought was already legal. PETA will protest believing hash (the cornbeef kind) is cruel to animals. Radical Islam will protest calling legalization of hashish an insult to their religion and suicide bombers will attempt to blow up hookah manufacturing plants. There will political division, confrontation and violence in the streets.

PAM will lobby provincial and federal governments for new laws restricting the use of marijuana in various public locations. They’ll start with the workplace and then move to ban smoking marijuana in malls and parks. They will convince the broader public that marijuana users are as evil and stinky as cigarette smokers used to be before they were run out of town. Eventually, PAM will be successful at getting government to ban marijuana from rock concerts.

Marijuana will fall out of favour; more and more people will quit resulting in declining sales which will undermine the marijuana farming industry. Some farmers will go bankrupt or be forced to sell their land to real estate developers and then retire to Florida with the proceeds of the sale.

With fewer farmers growing good weed, the market will become unstable, prices will fluctuate and tax revenues will fall causing the government to raise taxes even higher on a 20 pack of joints.

Eventually, all of the fun of tokin’ with a few friends will be lost as marijuana users stand shivering outside in winter where the smokers used to stand. Rock concerts will become drab dreary affairs and the cost of a pack of average grade joints will be too expensive for the low-level buzz.

And all of this will happen because of the legalization of marijuana So a warning to all the sons and daughters of Mother Nature. Be careful what you wish for, it just might come true. If you like weed, before you rush into causing your government to legalize it, consider what legalization has done for other recreational products like cigarettes.

Come to think of it, legalizing cigarettes did more to reduce smoking than all of the law enforcement efforts combined have achieved in reducing illegal drugs. It certainly was more effective at reducing smoking than the old British custom of cutting off the noses of smokers.

And in the end, maybe that’s all that's needed to reduce drug use. Forget the expensive and ineffective War On Drugs. Legalize drugs and then let the bureaucrats take over. They ought to have drug use down by 70% within a decade.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

The Lynch Mob Mentality

2012-02-27T19:03:00.013-05:00

“C’mon boys. The sum a bitch is guilty. Let’s string ‘im up.”

“But he hasn’t had a trial yet and …”

“We don’t need no trial. We know he done it. No need ta waste money on a trial where some slick willy lawyer will only get ‘im off.

We need to see justice done and string the sum a bitch from a tree.”

Sound familiar? It should, it’s pretty much the kind of discussion that you see across social media just about every day. This powerful and potentially connecting medium that could be used to inform and promote understanding is degenerating into little more than a lynch mob mentality by too many who scream for justice while ignoring the very principles on which justice is founded.

In Canada, the prevailing social media wisdom is that it is impossible that Stephen Harper and the Conservatives aren’t behind the RoboCon scandal. It doesn’t matter that no one knows who is behind it. “We don’t need no trial to know who’s guilty, let’s just string the sum a bitch up and get it over with.”

This mirrors the same online 'wisdom' that assumed it was the NDP who were behind the recent VikiLeaks website. The CPC, the mainstream media and even the Liberal Party joined with the social media lynch mob in blaming the NDP.

Oops. It turns out it wasn't the NDP or even an NDP supporter at all. It was a Liberal Party researcher. We didn't learn that until the Parliamentary investigation was completed but that didn't stop the mob from presenting opinion and suspicion as fact.

You would think, if nothing else, this might slow down the rush to judgement until after the RCMP and Elections Canada have completed their investigation into RoboCon but, of course, it hasn't. The same presentation of suspicion we saw in VikiLeaks is once again presented as evidence and accusations are cobbled together with the few facts that are actually known to draw the mob conclusion as to who is guilty.

It's the same in democracies all over the world. The hysterical rhetoric, the allegations and the accusations go beyond debate and are nothing more than the same mob mentality that fuels riots and lynchings; the lack of tolerance and respect for law that feeds hatred and ugly things like racism and related crimes.

It doesn’t seem to matter to the people in the lynch mob that they don’t really haven’t very much real evidence, all that matters is that they’re filled with self-righteous anger which is all that’s necessary to justify lynching those suspected. They read stuff online, hear more allegations and accusations from the current target’s political opponents or from others who share the same bias and that becomes ‘evidence’. There’s no need to wait for a trial or even for the official investigation(s) to be completed. “We know the sum a bitch is guilty.”

It is not part of what constitutes a true democratic society built on a foundation of justice. In Canada and the United States, all accused are presumed to be innocent until found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. On social media, all it requires to find someone guilty is lynch mob courage where a whole lot of biased opinion, accusations, half truths and a wee bit of what is actually currently known are slung around the saloon in advance of the lynching. The mob worries this stuff over like a dog working a bone. It works itself up until it is positively frothing at the mouth and all reason has fled.

I often wonder how many who are in such a rush to judgment would feel if they were the target of the mob. I wonder how happy they would be to see democratic fundamentals and principles of justice so quickly tossed out the window as they so easily do now when it someone else under attack.

I’ve been accused of defending the CPC. I am but not because I support them and certainly not because I’m not suspicious of the truth behind RoboCon. I defend them, as I would anyone, against uninformed mob-mentality attacks and allegations because that’s all they are, attacks and allegations. I defend them because I believe in the presumption of innocence until all of the facts are known and charges laid. I defend them because I am tired of a lynch mob mentality doing as much damage to my society as corrupt and cynical politicians.

In Canada, like all democracies, we don’t hang people based on suspicion, innuendo and opinion. Only lynch mobs unconstrained by decency or respect for the rule of law do that. I defend the CPC simply because I am tired of seeing my society, my country and my democracy undermined by a shrill, ill-informed and self-indulgent social media lynch mob.

Let the police and Elections Canada do their work. They will uncover the truth of what happened and when they do, they will determine what charges, if any should be laid against those responsible. That is how our system of justice works and it works well when given the opportunity. It protects the innocent while bringing the guilty to justice. If we had left it to the mob, it is the NDP who would have been hung from a tree for something done by a Liberal staffer. There is no justice in that.

I consider this rush to judgement and self-righteous presentation of suspicion as fact to be every bit as corrupting to our society as anything our political parties are doing; and our political parties are corrupting our political system at an alarming rate.

Justice makes every effort to be blind and objective. Lynch mobs don't. They are self-righteous, sanctimonious accusers led by their prejudices, their bias and speculation presented as fact. They are unconcerned with things like presumption of innocence or the rule of law, they let anger and suspicion lead them on. The argument could be made that Lynch mobs are efficient and git 'er done quickly, often before the evidence is in or the trial has begun but in the end, that is every bit as corrupting to a democratic society as anything the mob thinks it's defending the society from.

We got rid of lynch mobs many years ago when the Wild West was tamed and civilized by the rule of law and order, true democracy and allowing the justice system to do its work. Unfortunately, we didn’t eradicate lynch mob mentality.

It’s back, alive and well and spreading like a diseased virus across social media.

LINK
The Seattle Windshield Pitting Epidemic and mass delusion
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/opinion/columnists/more+look+phone+scams+more+find/6217556/story.html

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

The Hypocrisy Continues. Will The Sheep Keep Following?

2012-02-27T16:46:00.001-05:00

Oh my, my….The Speaker of Canada’s House of Commons has announced that his investigation into the VikiLeaks attack web site has been traced back to a Liberal Party staffer. I can already hear the rationalizations forming on the left.

To be fair, Bob Rae, interim leader has accepted the resignation (fired) the staffer involved and has formerly apologized to the House and to the minister the site was set up to attack. For their part, the Conservative government and the minister accepted the apology. How civilized.

Liberal MP Justin Trudeau

The usual sanctimonious and self-righteous hypocrisy that only politicians do so well quickly followed, led by members of Parliament like Justin Trudeau. Mr. Trudeau tweeted that he was ‘appalled that a Liberal could be behind such a dirty trick. You’ll note that he did not tweet that he was appalled that anyone would do this, just appalled to learn it was a Liberal. This would be the same Justin Trudeau who routinely tweeted about VikiLeaks, making sure that people knew the address of the web site. Mr. Trudeau then went on to tweet that personal attacks were unacceptable in politics. This would be the same Justin Trudeau who called a minister, “a piece of shit”, in the House of Commons.

I am struck by a broader hypocrisy though.

The Conservatives are facing their own issue with the RoboCon scandal where someone or many used Rack Nine calling service to send out false automated calls to try and disrupt voter turnout in one or more ridings during the last election.

The Liberals expect the world to believe that VikiLeaks was the work of a single, misguided staffer while at the same time making allegations that RoboCon couldn’t possibly be the work of only one or two people. They allege it must be the work of the Conservative Party. Really?

It is clear that more than a few Liberals, including some MPs used and/or directed people to VikiLeaks but they still insist that it was only the work of one person. For some reason, they are unable to grasp the same possibility in the RoboCon issue.

Interim Liberal Leader Bob Rae

Bob Rae has gone so far as to now announce that as many as 27 Liberal candidates lost in the last election because of voter disruption by automated phone calls. Really? How is it that Bob only figured this out and has only announced it now? Wouldn’t you think that if there had been electoral fraud the Liberals would have been on this right after the election? Apparently not. I’m sure it has less to do with political opportunism and more to do with a thorough and ongoing Liberal investigation that only coincidentally was completed just now as the RoboCon scandal hit the media.

What does all this mean?

For me, it means that our current anger and finger-pointing at Harper is both misguided and foolish. Harper is merely symptomatic of what is really wrong with our political system. It has been hijacked by cynical opportunists and hypocrites. Harper is no worse than the rest and the rest are no better than Harper.

The ongoing anger focused on Harper merely plays into the hands of the other snakes in the grass just waiting to bite you as they and their parties have done so often in the past.

The hypocrisy will never end, the corruption will continue until people stop blaming one party or another and start blaming what politicians and their back room boys and girls have and are continuing to do to our….that’s ‘our’…..political system and government.

The question now is how many of us will continue to act like sheep and blindly follow the partisan hypocrisy that is served up as the best our democracy has to offer?

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Those Who Don't Learn From History......

2012-02-25T05:26:00.017-05:00

“Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.”

- Mark Twain

There is an election fraud investigation underway in Canada. Someone, or many someones, used a robo-call company to contact voters in a riding, or maybe multiple ridings, to inform them that their polling station had been moved. The intention, clearly, was to create confusion and through that confusion reduce the number of voters actually showing up to vote. It was hoped this would swing the election in favour of the party (Conservatives) polling in second place in specific ridings.

Canadians are angry and justifiably so. This kind of manipulation is not only dishonest; it undermines the very principles on which a free and open democracy functions. But that anger has turned from indignation to ‘knowing’ accusation.

The simple truth is that we don’t know who is behind this. We have suspicions and opinions but we don’t know….yet, which is the reason why I qualified who might be behind this in my opening paragraph.

Both the RCMP, Canada’s national police force and Elections Canada are investigating and there is little doubt they will uncover who is behind the fraud, if for no other reason than because it was so simplistic and unsophisticated. Even a newspaper was able to track information that led to one of the key ‘persons of interest’ in relatively short order.

This hasn’t stopped many Canadians from already deciding who is guilty and the rush to judgment is one more nail in our democracy’s coffin.

The national media have assumed it is a Conservative conspiracy and the CBC went so far as to publish a list of all Conservative candidates that had used the same company, including the Prime Minister. They didn't bother to include the notation that there was no evidence or complaint of election fraud in any of the ridings represented by those on the list nor did they bother to identify the robo-calling companies used by the other political parties. Why spoil a good insinuation with facts? This is professional journalism after all.

Liberal PM Trudeau

For decades, political parties and their strategists have worked hard to undermine the integrity of our democracy with an overwhelming and cynical lack of integrity, vision or anything even close to approaching good governance.

In the 70s, the Liberals under Pierre Trudeau ran on a promise not to implement wage and price controls. The people voted in favour of that promise and six months after the election, wage and price controls were implemented. So much for the voice of the people.

In the 80s, the Mulroney government while keeping its major promises, climbed into bed with people like Karl Heinz Schreiber. Mr. Schreiber is currently enjoying the hospitality of the German government on charges of tax evasion and bribery. The government’s association with him eventually led to yet another Public Inquiry that eventually even touched former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.

Former PM Mulroney (left) and
Karl-Heinz Scheiber

In the 90s, the Liberals under Jean Chretien campaigned on a promise to repeal the Goods and Services Tax. Once again, the people voted and once again, the promise was broken.

Later it came to light that the Liberal Party had been engaged in illegal acts, using tax payer money, in an attempt to sway votes in Quebec. It was a sleazy business involving Liberal backroom boys carrying around money in brown paper bags which they dispensed in diners. It was correctly labeled ‘small-town cheap’ by Chief Justice Gomery during the subsequent public enquiry. Some Liberals went to prison as a result and none of the tax-payer money has been repaid to the government by the Liberal Party.

Left to right: Joe Volpe who had
a number of dead people listed
as donors to his campaign. Former
PM Paul Martin who slashed
health care transfers while Finance
Minister, Alfonse Galiano who
was accused of misuse of his
office as a cabinet minister and
former PM Jean Chretien who was
prime minister during Adscam.

While decrying the election campaign tactics of their opponents, the Liberals gleefully released an ad depicting the new leader of the Conservatives, Stephen Harper, as someone who would instantly put military troops in our streets upon being elected. I always thought this a strange claim to make considering the Liberals are the only party to have ever proclaimed martial law in this country, stripping away the civil rights of Canadians virtually overnight, arrested hundreds without warrant or charge and put military troops on the streets of major Canadian cities to enforce curfews.

Now we have the Conservative government of Stephen Harper who campaigned on openness and transparency but has delivered anything but. Instead, we have yet more of the same anti-democratic nonsense of previous governments on both sides of the political divide.

This is a government that prorogued Parliament in order to avoid being defeated in a non-confidence vote, routinely attacks its critics with negative ads even when there is no election looming and has a number of ministers of the crown with hoof in mouth disease. It is a political party that had a somewhat flamboyant interpretation of Election Canada's campaign spending laws and a significant disregard for things like protecting consumers. That became self-evident in the case of the Consumer Cell Phone Plan Comparison Calculator project cancelled by then Consumer Minister Tony Clement after Mr. Clement met with the big cell phone service providers and opted to address their concerns for profits rather than protecting Canadian consumers.

This is the same Mr. Clement who donated $50 million infrastructure development in his riding, a little more grand than Jean Chretien's pork barrelling in his riding but only in terms of cash outlay, not attitude.

In the end, it doesn’t matter which party is in power or trying to obtain power. The promises, the tactics and the focus are the same. It has little to do with serving the people or respecting democracy and everything to do with winning power.

NDP candidate Ruth Ellen Brosseau
who managed a Carleton Universyit pub
in Ottawa was recruited by the party
to run ina French-speaking. Quebec riding
She didn't speak French and had never
seen the riding before.
She spent part of the election campaign
on holidays in Las Vegas.

Even the New Democratic Party, much vaunted for being the ‘conscience’ of Canadian politics, flooded the last election with candidates in Quebec many of whom neither lived in nor had even been to the riding they were now running to represent. In other words, the party was less concerned with democratic representation than winning seats. How is that serving the people? The NDP and their supporters, of course, rationalize this in various ways but that simply makes them the same as the other parties and no better than those they oppose.

In Ontario, Canada’s largest province, the government of Dalton McGuinty broke 75 election promises within six months of winning his first election. He won his second mandate by playing on racist fears of what would be taught in religious schools if full-funding was extended to them as it was to the Catholic school system. It was a strategy not only successful, it was bragged about by some of his strategists following the election.

Six months ago, Mr. McGuinty won his third election on a campaign of a stable and growing economy which has now been revealed, thanks to the Drummond Report, to be nothing but one more deliberate and cynical election campaign lie.

The list is endless and no political party has clean hands in what can only be called the erosion of democracy.

Why is any of this important? It is important because we fail to learn from our own history.

I had a conversation with someone recently about this and her position was she only dealt with the present because she couldn’t do anything about the past. I beg to differ. We can learn from our past and stop making the same mistakes although I see little evidence of that happening.

Anti-Haprer poster
An example of the failed belief that it is only the
current government that is ever the problem

Today, in Canada as in other democracies, the belief is that if we only change the current government, everything will be better. We’ve clung to that belief for decades but it hasn’t proven to be true and political parties count on us continuing to cling to that belief.

So cynical has politics become that it isn’t simply dirty tricks at election time that is a disgrace, it’s what happens in Parliament after the election.

The Liberals attack the Conservatives for the F-35 fighter jet contract even though it was the Liberals who initiated the procurement of these jets when they were in power.

The Liberals put Canada into Afghanistan only to demand Canada withdraw once the Conservatives were elected and then demand that we stay once the government announced a ‘pull-out’ date.

The previous Liberal government slashed health care transfers to the provinces, the Conservatives increased transfers so the Liberals now in opposition, criticized the Conservatives for not increasing them enough.

The Conservatives, for their part, go out of their way to offend as many people as possible with a self-righteous hypocrisy that they never seem to learn from no matter how often it blows up in their face. They promised less government but delivered more.They promised fiscal prudence but have spent like Liberals at a vote-buying flea market.

In opposition, the Conservatives under Stephen Harper tried to form a coalition with the other opposition parties to defeat the Liberal minority government and then govern in its stead but was highly critical of the opposition doing the same thing once he was elected to lead a minority government.

At the end of the day the only difference from one to the other is that the Liberals masquerade their arrogance behind a mask of self-righteous social conscience while the Conservatives masquerade theirs behind a mask of self-righteous indignation. The NDP doesn't pretend, it knows it's righteous regardless of how absurd their policies or hypocritical their politics.

It is no different in the United States where the only difference between the Republicans and the Democrats is about where the tax money goes and in Britain between Labour and the Conservatives it is almost impossible to tell what party is actually governing after it is elected. Regardless of the campaign platform, the policies all look the same after the election. Indeed, the Tony Blair Labour government looked suspiciously like a mild conservative government during its term in office.

All of that to say that simply blaming the current government and believing that by replacing it everything will be different is absurd.

When a political system is only about winning power and not about serving your country, it really doesn’t matter who is in power, nothing will change. If all parties bring lies and cynical and hypocritical self-interest to the table, the people lose and democracy is undermined. The only difference between Canada and some third-world countries is that Canadian politicians don't shoot their opponents........yet.

One thing is certain. Continuing to blame only one party or politician simply plays into the hands of the backroom strategists. They count on it and use our anger and frustration against us by feeding us bromides and empty promises during elections in an attempt to win power.

God alone knows why they want power when all they intend to do with it is pretty much what their opponents would have done.

It is this environment that breeds bright young minds who believe that it is acceptable to use automated, fraudulent phone calls to mislead voters during an election because winning is everything……isn’t it?

Certainly, that’s what the politicians believe……and we’ve been supporting and encouraging that belief for decades. As the old adage goes, "Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it"

It appears that in Canada, just as in the United States and virtually every democracy in the world, we haven't learned very much at all.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Who Speaks For These Children?

2012-02-23T21:12:00.016-05:00

Two weeks ago, two little boys were murdered by their father, hacked to death with an axe and then burned in the house he torched to take his own life along with theirs. Now it’s a little girl, who is dead and those responsible appear to be her own family.

Savannah Hardin, just 9 years old died after her step-mother and her grandmother forced her to run outside their home for three hours. It was punishment for lying about eating candy. The little girl became dehydrated and later died of a seizure.

It’s easy to be outraged over something like this when it happens but what disturbs me is how quickly that outrage passes and we go back to our endless debates and arguments about politics and other trivia.

There was intense outrage after the Penn State scandal erupted. Where is it now? Occupy had a litany of sexual abuse of children, who cares? It didn’t stop those with an agenda from supporting Occupy. Every day all over the world, children are abused, turned into child soldiers, indoctrinated, raped, sold, sexually exploited by pedophiles and killed.

Who speaks for these children?

Every single day, children the world over go missing or die needlessly from neglect or violence or both. Who speaks for them?

It isn’t our politicians. Not one of the current candidates for president in the GOP or the President have uttered a peep about protecting children even though 4 children die from abuse every day in the United States.

It’s no different in other countries, including my own, where politicians and their strategists remain focused on playing the game rather than making the safety and well-being of our children a national priority. Even the current government's labeling of its Internet regulation as the Anti-child Pornography Bill was nothing more than cynical and sanctimonious opportunism.

In the meantime, more than 60,000 children are missing in Canada and more than 800,000 in the United States.

It isn't the media who will cover the stories as they appear but will devote little time to pressuring government to actively do anything. Not one media interview, commentary or question during a political debate deals with the issue of child abuse.

It isn’t the greater society on social media, everyone is too busy buying stuff on ebay or promoting their latest book on Kindle. They see the news story, make a quick comment and go back to arguing about whatever it is they’re arguing about.

Who speaks for these children?

How long do we ignore the fact that children go to bed hungry every night in some of the richest countries in the world? We fret abut bullying, form committees and pat ourselves on the back but who speaks for the abused and murdered child?

We’re too busy. We have no time other than in the abstract to deal with children and their security. We pay lip service to it but when was the last time you saw a protest march to protect our children? We’ve had them to get free university tuition. There was such a march in Montreal, Canada today where university students protested what they consider to be the high cost of tuition.

No one has time or even a thought to march in support of protecting children.

The GOP has now had 20 debates and there has never been a word about children other than the candidates using their own children and grandchildren as props in an attempt to portray themselves as great family people.

There is more talk and outrage on social media about birth control and abortion, debate over unborn children, than there is about protecting living children. Have we really become that jaded a society? Do we really care that little?

What kind of a society frets more about online regulation on the Internet than it does about the welfare of its children?

What kind of a society indeed.

A step-mother and a grandmother stand accused of killing a little girl because she lied about eating candy. It is a terrible tragedy and for a moment many will stop and cluck their tongues and express their outrage or sadness before going back to whatever it was they were doing or were upset about online.

No group will come forward to mobilize the society to force government to act. No political party or individual politician will step up and make the welfare of children a priority plank in their election campaign. University students won’t march to protect children and even Occupy, who recently stood in solidarity with prisoners in San Quentin, won’t occupy anything or protest to protect children like Savannah Hardin.

More people will share the latest Lady Gaga or Justin Beiber video today than will give thought to children, our children, at risk. It makes you wonder who speaks for these children doesn't it? It certainly doesn't appear to be too many of us.

LINKS

A Bear's Rant: Suffer the Little Children
http://bearsrant.blogspot.com/2012/02/suffer-little-children-and-they-do-even.html

A Bear's Rant: Our Children Would Be Safer If They Were Baby Seals Or Dophins
http://bearsrant.blogspot.com/2012/01/too-many-children-would-be-safer-if.html#more

Slaughter of the Innocents

http://www.violence.de/prescott/hustler-new/article.html

Innocents Betrayed

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/innocents-betrayed/

How Many Children Die From Abuse and Neglect Annually In The United States?

http://www.childwelfare.gov/pubs/factsheets/fatality.pdf#Page=2&view=Fit

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

My Days On Twitter

2012-02-22T10:10:00.006-05:00

And so it’s just another day on Twitter….

It starts with the usual slew of Direct Messages from people thrilled that I am now following them, so thrilled in fact, that they can't wait for me to also like them on Facebook, buy their new self-published novel or contact them immediately if I have any questions at all about Internet marketing, social media, want lots more followers or am in need of personal development.

Most of the messages start the same way. “Thank you so much for following. Check out my….”. I often wonder at the expertise of these online marketing experts who think that the best way to develop a new client is to whack them over the head with the sales pitch while they’re still shaking your hand during the introduction.

Even more are so excited that I am now following them on Twitter, they can't wait for me to become their friend on Facebook and imagine, we only just met.

Twitter is one of many social media and a social media that has all but removed the ‘social’ part from the medium. People concerned about the fact you might be a bot require you to validate yourself before they are prepared to speak to you. These are people who don’t see the irony in using a bot to weed out potential bots.

Others send you automated DMs to express their deep appreciation for having the opportunity to get to know you. I gather what they really mean is they’re happy to have you increase their list of followers while you get to know their auto-reply bot.

These are people who somehow have come to believe that the best way to ‘sociaize’ is to automate the whole process. I guess they have forgotten how many of us are frustrated by those automated receptionists that ask us to press different menu options when we call some company or our governments.

It’s not all sweetness and light. Some are quite offended if you unfollow them and have software that sends out tweets telling the world that you have removed them from your list of followers, as if the world really cares. Their indignation has always puzzled me because I always thought it was my list and I could put who I wanted on it. Apparently not.

Once we get through the housekeeping, it’s time to go out and and start browsing the current tweets.

The messages are many and varied but can usually be broken down into main categories: politics, selling and spam (which is more extreme selling), virus/hacking attachments, trivial and self-indulgent nonsense, the tragically profane trying to gain attention by shocking a world too jaded to be shocked by much, outrage, oppression-envy, humour and real conversations with people you have had an opportunity to get to know. The last two categories are the only reasons that I stay on Twitter.

Politics dominates Twitter and the great dichotomy is that most of the discourse is on the oppressive nature of government to the point where Twitter seems more like an episode of Angry Birds than social tweets. It is almost laughable how so many can be so hysterical about living under oppression even as they are free to voice that opinion and to openly criticize government. Try that in China or North Korea and see how far it takes you.

The right, when it isn’t busy trashing candidates within it’s own ranks gleefully attacks the left and any cause will do: environmentalism, activism, education, being a Democrat (or a Liberal, if you’re Canadian) while the left pontificates with self-righteous indignation about the perfidity of the right. Occupy has simplified this somewhat. They simply hate everybody.

I’ve seen playground bullying with less verbal violence and more intelligent discourse.

Many younger people step up with painfully ill-informed opinions on everything from Internet regulation to social issues, toss out a quick opinion, set up a hash tag or two (just to see if they can get a trend going) and then move on to whatever next distracts their attention.

Woven through this tapestry of what passes for political debate and discussion are the sales pitches. Buy my book, click this link for a free gift, contact me for the secrets to better online marketing. The list is endless. Almost none of it is targeted, especially from the marketing gurus which begs the question, how much do most of these self-professed experts really know? It’s more like the old direct mail shotgun approach from the ‘70s than anything approaching a real understanding of this powerful still new online environment.

Every now and then an ‘egg’ pops up with a really great offer. These eggs usually follow almost no one and have no one following them but they’re happy to provide us with a link to get a great opportunity (for which they get a small commission). Considering how few people on Twitter are unaware of the spam nature of these folks, it’s amazing so many still buy into trying. I treat these tweets like the Whack-A-Mole game at the fair and just whack ‘em with the Spam report menu option. Some days there are so many, I try to see how many I can whack in 60 secs. My current record is 11.

People I don’t know and don’t follow, copy me on tweets they’ve sent to others, on topics in which I am not only uninterested but in which I have little to no knowledge. They become annoyed if I don't reply and even more so when I do.

Some jump into conversations to which they weren't invited to voice their opinion, usually rudely and become even more rude when their particular opinion isn't considered the right opinion. Who needs this?

Some contact me to tell me I’m a idiot which may be a reasonable assessment while others tell me I’m a fascist in direct contradiction to the person before them who called me a socialist pig. Sometimes I get called a Liberal or a Conservative which apparently are two of the worst insults online, depending on which side of the political divide you embrace.

Fortunately, there are tweets by some who devote their time on Twitter to making others laugh or at least smile and I sincerely appreciate their efforts. Sometimes the humour is quite subtle, other times it is very in-your-face almost vulgar but it is almost always quite funny and usually makes me laugh out loud. Once, one of the messages was so funny, I spit my coffee on my keyboard and discovered that the quickest way to undermine technology is to expose it to moisture. I guess, technology is just like people, we all have our vulnerabilities.

But what keeps me coming back are the people I’ve met from all over the world, good people, interesting people and people who are reasonably well-informed about whatever it is they are interested in. I’ve had some great discussions and debates with these people bordering on the inane to the very serious. We haven’t always agreed but it has always been respectful, thought provoking and/or just plain fun.

It is these people who put the meaning in the word ‘social’ in social media.

These are the people who, while they may not share my opinions, share a desire to connect with others to learn, to understand and to satisfy our curiosities. These are also the people who, for the most part, remind me that not everyone in this world has lost their minds.

And here’s the thing I find most interesting.

It is these same people who remind me of what I learned in the real world, a world in which I have lived in many places both within my own country and internationally. People are people the world over. We have far more in common than we have that divides us. Too many forget that in places like Twitter where the primary buzz is usually against something or someone.

I learned some other things from my few short months on Twitter as well.

I’ve learned that there are an incredible number of frightened, insecure and even paranoid folks out there; people who fail to see the irony of living in a society with they are free to express their paranoid fear of their democratic governments.

I’ve learned that there are many people who because they can remain anonymous, lack the values or self-discipline to conduct themselves with respect for others or themselves.

I’ve learned that opinion is more important than fact to many and that there is a growing intolerance that our societies once had started to defeat before the Internet explosion.

I’ve learned that the herd mentality is alive and well with a majority of people only too willing to jump on a bandwagon without much prior thought and I’ve learned that stupidity and hypocrisy continue to thrive and spread faster than any computer virus.

I’ve also learned that there remains a lot of nice people in the world, people with values, morals, character and common sense.

It gives me cautious optimism that just perhaps, when the current madness no longer grips so many, we just may have a shot at making the world the better place most of us seem to want. We’re not going to get there through war, polarized opinion or stupidity but we just might if we remember those who understand that the true power of social media goes beyond merely shouting out opinions, demonizing those with whom we disagree or trying to turn places like Twitter into one large flea market.

We're only going to get there thanks to the people who brought their values to social media rather than checking them at the log-in screen like too many others.

It is also those people who keep me coming back and I thank them for that. It is a pleasure to have met and to know them.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

The Political Indoctrination Of Children

2012-02-21T10:22:00.003-05:00

History is littered with the indoctrination of children by totalitarian regimes. Nazi Germany had the Hitler Youth. The Soviet Union, North Korea, China and others all moved to control their societies by indoctrinating children at an early age. Children as young as kindergarten age were educated in the ideology of the state with heavy emphasis on the state's view of history, it's enemies and physical training. In virtually every case, there is a strong militarism nature to the training which in many cases included weapons and unarmed combat.

The following video shows how the Nazis understood that the foundation of the ongoing success of their regime was dependent on raising a generation to believe what the state required them to believe. The indoctrination was all the more insidious in that it was often intermixed with physical and other fun activities.

We now live in the 21st century, an era when we are more reasoned, more democratic than ever before. Unfortunately, the political indoctrination and militarization of children continues. As the following video shows, there is a direct comparison between what happened in countries like The Third Reich and what is happening today in places like the Middle East, as well as, Africa and some Asian countries.

Unfortunately, this misuse of children is not limited to totalitarian regimes. The indoctrination of children is rising in some democracies where the political leadership sees its country as under constant threat by defined and sometimes undefined or constantly changing enemies of the state.

It starts with the belief that the state should control thinking and that the state is better served when people see things the way the state thinks they should. Sometimes, as in North Korea, the indoctrination is personality-cult oriented, in other places it is based more on hatred of an external enemy.

Sometimes it is started by those who believe so deeply in a cause, like global warming or sex education or a political party, they blend their beliefs into teaching children what to think rather than teaching them how to think.

No democracy is immune to the misguided idea that there is only one way to think and that is as true in North America as it is in the Middle East.

It doesn't matter if you support President Obama or the Republicans, Stephen Harper or the NDP, the political indoctrination of children is not just wrong, it is just one more form of child abuse. Children should be encouraged to explore the world around them, taught to be curious and to learn from that curiosity. From that should come their own, individual formulation of ideas and understanding. No state, no individual should take it upon themselves to try and indoctrinate children to one set of beliefs, especially beliefs founded on hatred or fear.

In the end, the nation is not well-served by raising children who have been robbed of their right to think for themselves. It is no different than raising a generation to believe that blacks are not equal to whites, that only The Third Reich is righteous, that Jews are evil or all followers of Islam are murderous suicide bombers.

The indoctrination of children is the continuation of extremist intolerance and it takes from them the very thing most of us thought we were fighting to protect..... the right to live our individual lives and to think for ourselves.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

SOPA & Bill C-30 - The Bizarre Fear Of Our Own Governments

2012-02-18T10:04:00.012-05:00

There are days when I become so confused by the confused logic employed by so many that I sometimes wish my head actually would explode.

The ongoing hysteria over proposed government legislation on the Internet is one of those illogical knee-jerk reactions that I can’t reconcile with reality. I try, honestly I do, but no matter how hard I try, I just can’t make the facts fit the assertions being made by the righteous defenders of liberty and democracy feverishly screaming across social media networks. I've even been accused of fear mongering for pointing out general issues about cyber crime.

Let’s look at a few facts.

Let’s start with a basic question. Who owns the Internet? While lots of people who use social media like to think they own it, the simple fact is that they don’t. They don’t provide the infrastructure, the software, the protocols or any of the other things required to maintain and operate the Internet. Government doesn’t own the Internet either. In fact, if you look at the Internet as a single, global entity, nobody owns it. The Internet is an interconnected group of small to large networks all over the world.

But if nobody owns it, how does it exist? The basic infrastructure is owned and operated by large corporations like ATT, Sprint, Verizon and others. Protocols and domain name registrations are handled by organizations like IAB and ICANN. Web sites, networks and individual systems belong to whoever produces and operates them.

Social media and other sites routinely track
and collect personal information and user
habits which they then use to make money

Nonetheless, it is clear that most people who use the Internet feel some kind of ownership and look on any attempt to interfere with what they see as their personal freedom as a violation of their rights and what they mistakenly believe is pure democracy at work.

Those of us who use the Internet do so at the pleasure of those who provide the infrastructure and sites and at our own risk. How much risk? More than most who are opposed to any kind of government regulation want to admit to themselves.

According to the Internet Crime Complaint Centre there has seen an 1800% growth in online crime in the past decade and that’s just the crimes that are reported and they know about.

Business and governments tend to under-report the growing level of crime in order to maintain public confidence in the economy but it is growing and faster than in the physical world.

“More criminals that were involved in traditional crimes

are moving towards the Internet. They know that it’s easier,

more profitable and the probability of being caught is lower.”

-East-West Institute report on cyber crime

Among the most often reported crimes were identity theft, FBI scams and non-delivery of merchandise or payment. Panda Labs, a major provider of online security software, reports a significant increase in credit card theft now escalating into the theft of other financial information, passwords, bank credentials, log-ins and fake credit cards.

Of the top 10 countries with the most perpetrators of cyber crime, The United States is first, Britain is number two and Canada is fourth.

The odds of a person being in a plane crash are 1 in 10.7 million, a car accident 1 in 6,000 and victim of a cyber crime 1 in 2.27.

The U.S., Britain and Canada lead the
world in cyber crime

These statistics reveal even more clearly the level of risk. 79% of people who spend 49+ hours a week online will be the victims of a cyber crime at some point but even those who spend far less time are not safe. 64% of people who spend anywhere from 1-24 hrs per week will be victimized by cyber crime

Add to this pedophile rings, racist attack sites, suicide promoters, Craigslist scams, sexual predators, copyright piracy, as well as, all those legitimate sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter who track their users and collect and sell personal data to make a buck and it becomes clear that the Internet, for all of its benefits, has some serious issues.

Malware sites now exist offering cheap software that allows even the most inexperienced would-be scammer, spammer or just out and out twisted mind to invade the systems and computers of others. Similar sites, so called 'bullet-proof' sites, now exist where pedophiles, hackers, and the sellers of stolen and fake credit cards, pedophile rings, terrorist groups and petty thieves can operate with relatively impunity and anonymity.

Online users have 1 in 2.7 odds of
being victims of a cyber crime

Cyber crime is evolving. Where once it was reasonably simplistic it now includes highly sophisticated techniques that include: Hacktivism, Clickjacking, Cross site scripting, Attacks on vulnerable mobile devices and Cloud computing loopholes.

Much of this crime is enabled by groups like Anonymous and other groups and individuals who devote their careers to theft, destruction, promotion of hate, violation of the privacy of others and online bullying along with every day users gleefully engaging in the piracy of movies, music and other copyright material. It's all protected by the anonymity and lack of regulatory law that the Internet affords them. These are also some of the key groups leading the charge against legislation like SOPA and PIPA in the United States and Bill C-30 in Canada. They have an investment in keeping the Internet free of regulatory protection of honest users.

They’ve been quite successful at whipping up paranoia about government intervention in an attempt to protect “their turf”. In this, they’ve been more than ably supported by online companies and sites that make their living off of the very kind of tracking of personal information so many now fear from government.

But, it will not be Anonymous or Facebook or MySpace that the victims of cyber crime will turn to when they get hit, it will be government law enforcement agencies like INTERPOL, The RCMP in Canada and the FBI in The United States. These are the same government agencies they currently protest and try to deny the very tools needed to provide that protection.

In Canada, people are in a tizzy over the provision in Bill C-30 that will require Internet providers to turn over basic IP and contact data without a warrant to law enforcement. They scream that it is an invasion of privacy, an example of Big Brother undermining democracy but this is the same data that is currently already being handed over voluntarily in 95% of all requests by law enforcement.

They are also concerned about interception and monitoring of communications, something already being done but mostly by hackers and cyber criminals like Anonymous who released a Scotland Yard conference call and posted it online.

Does it not trouble you that the people leading the charge against Internet regulation are the same people who use the Internet to disrupt, to track, to spy, to make money, to do all of the things they've told you government wants to do?

It’s the same in the United State and democracies around the world.

What most people fail to realize is that clarifying in law what police can and cannot obtain without a warrant, actually protects us. When there is no law, there is confusion. When there is confusion, the wrong information or too much information may be turned over. With legislation, the boundaries of what law enforcement can demand, is established. We are further protected by our courts who routinely overturn laws that violate our constitutions and Bills/Charters of Rights. Do you currently have that same protection from those who would invade your computer, steal your data, intercept or track your communications?

The current hysteria is both misplaced and poorly informed.

Canadian Pubic Safety Minister, Vic Toews

Yesterday, our local rag ran a front page story about a Twitter account that was used to post personal information about Vic Toews, the Canadian Public Safety Minister.

This is just one more example of the misuse of the Internet and how those who scream the loudest about privacy and their rights are among the first to violate those of others.

But what I found most interesting is that the newspaper was actually able to obtain and track enough information about the Twitter account without any assistance from law enforcement. Using readily available software, the newspaper was ablt to track down the IP address to Canada’s House of Commons. That’s right, the ability to track you is already all over the Internet and being used daily by people and organizations you don’t know and will never meet. I installed anti-tracking software last Sunday. It’s Saturday morning today and that software has already blocked more than 7,000 attempts to track me and to monitor my online behavior……and that software only blocks some of the tracking.

The account, by the way, has been shut down by the user who having violated Mr. Toews right to privacy is now concerned about being exposed and maybe facing severe penalties for misuse of a government IP address, penalties that could include termination of employment.

That\s the other side of the Internet, too many people acting and reacting without consideration of the consequences to themselves or others in the real world.

It’s a sad thing when people become so paranoid about their democratic government they align themselves with the very people and groups who can hurt them. These are the same people and orgnaizations who most benefit from keeping the Internet free of regulation so that they can continue to shear others as though they were little more than sheep. Sheep follow blindly and too many are blindly following the wrong people and that my friends is a more serious threat to our democracies and our way of life than SOPA, PIPA or Bill C-30.

….and that is not only a logic I can’t fathom, it’s just dangerous and willful stupidity.

Sources for the statistics in this post:

The 2011 Norton Cyber Crime Study; Panda Labs Security Cyber Crime Investigation Report; East West Institute; The Ottawa Citizen, a Post Media publication; The Crime Complaint Centre; The FBI Cyber Crime Reports and techmaish.com

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

The Drummond Report - The Liberal Gravy Train Exposed As An Economic Train Wreck

2012-02-15T21:02:00.038-05:00

Don Drummond author of
The Drummond Report

Well isn’t this just peachy!

The Drummond Report has been released by Don Drummond, the former Chief Economist at TD Bank Financial Group who was commissioned by the Ontario Government to study and report on the state of the province's finances with recommendations on how to reduce the deficit.

It ain’t pretty but that doesn’t come as much of a surprise to anyone except all of those people who kept voting for Dalton McGuinty and his Liberals despite his dismal economic performance, his proven track record of breaking election promises or because they belonged to one of the special interests that got bought with taxpayer money so that he could protect his electoral votes.

Just five months ago, Mr. McGuinty won his third term in office by telling the people of Ontario that the other parties were over-reacting and that the province was in sound ecncomic shape. He went so far as to compare Ontario's economic leadership and job creation to California. He would have been better to compare it to Greece, Ireland or Italy.

Front page of today's Globe and Mail
Canada\s National newspaper

Reality bit hard today and the Liberal entitlement gravy train has come to a screeching halt or more accurately, has been exposed for the train wreck it actually is.

People are in paranoid hysteria on the Internet about some regulations being introduced to protect copyright. They scream about the threat to democracy but the Drummond Report underlines the real threat. When political parties are so careless with our tax money and lie to us in order to get elected, that takes away our right to make informed decisions and that is the real threat to democracy.

This report is so damning, the Premier should be horse-whipped in the public square for his duplicity and his incompetence. At the very least he should resign but don't hold your breath. There is a raft of political spin, finger pointing and excuse making coming. Those tend to be the only things at which Mr. McGuinty is really accomplished.

The Report is calling for draconian cuts to the provincial budget but the premier announced even before the report was released that he wouldn’t consider eliminating all-day kindergarten which is costing the province money if can't afford for no discernable benefit. Apparently saving face is more important than saving a province that was the economic engine of Canada before he took office and is now a have-not province actually receiving equalization payments from the federal government for the first time in the province’s history.

Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty

Liberal supporters castigated Mike Harris, the former Conservative Premier who ran on what he called the Common Sense Revolution and who brought Ontario’s finances under control with an overall 3.9% cut in provincial spending. Thanks to an orgy of mismanagement and spending irresponsibility, Dalton McGuinty’s “prudent” approach will require 17% in cuts. Read that as slashes in government spending which means public sector wage freezes and job cuts, closing hospital and increased service and user fees for reduced services.

Greece is starting to look pretty good by comparison.

There is no question that there will be countless media and blog reviews of the specifics of the Drummond Report online and I have provided a link to the full report at the bottom of this post so I won’t go through the details here.

My issue is with integrity in politics and an electorate so blinded by ideology (yes, it isn’t merely the right that has an ideology) that they willfully have allowed an incompetent politician to lead them to near bankruptcy.

During his first two terms, Mr. McGuinty handed out money to special interest like a drunken sailor handing out five dollar bills to waitresses in a strip club (although comparing drunken sailors to Mr. McGuinty does drunken sailors a disservice.)

Just about everyone in the public sector got significant raises during a time of fiscal restraint. Teachers, the provincial police and public servants, as well as, others received increases far in excess of inflation. Mr. McGuinty then announced he was freezing public sector salaries which is nothing more than cynical and dishonest grandstanding. Now many of them are going to lose their jobs. Those raises, which were used by Mr. McGuinty to buy support for his elections will look pretty feeble to those who traded their votes for a raise once the unemployment notices start rolling out and they are going to be rolling out.

Money was squandered, lost or misappropriated in the billions in places like the Ontario Lottery Corporation, eHealth and Ornge (the medical helicopter service). Full-day junior kindergarten was introduced at a cost of $1.5 billion and additional subsidies were handed over to post-secondary education even as the province was sinking further into debt.

Mr. McGuinty introduced his Green Energy act which now sees Ontario paying wind and solar providers seven to eight times what they pay for hydro-electric power at time when the province has a surplus of energy and is selling it to other jurisdictions at a loss. That's right! Under Mr. McGuinty's leadership, Ontario actually produces power which it then pays others to buy.

There was nowhere that Mr. McGuinty didn't seize the opportunity to buy votes with money the province didn't have.

Mr. McGuinty called this prudent leadership and sound fiscal management in the last election but it is clear that the Drummond Report is revealing anything but prudence or even a casual sense of responsibility to sound fiscal management of the province's economy.

The Liberals will blame it on the global economy but that will be just one more face-saving, self-serving untruth. The simple fact is that this is the most incompetent, cynical and dishonest government ever produced in Canada and it is the people who once again will pay for it.

Undeniably, Mr. McGuinty owes the people of the province an apology but they won't get it. A politician without the character to tell the truth during an election certainly doesn't have the character to admit his duplicity and apologize for what it has caused or the devastation and hardship it will bring to those he was elected to serve. For people like Mr. McGuinty, there is no such thing as feeling shame for having failed the people who bought into the lies and gave him their trust.

The only potential positive in this is that perhaps all those people who ranted in fear about the Conservatives while turning a blind eye to Mr. McGuinty’s record, will drop lemming-like party allegiances and vote based on values and common sense next time around. It would be nice but I doubt it will happen. People become so blinded by ideology that they will rave hysterically about the other guy while following an idiot down the road to perdition.

The people get the government they deserve and in Ontario, they’re about to pay very dearly for a government nobody should have even considered but they elected anyway.

Ontario isn't the only victim of cynical and dishonest politics. People are angry all over the world and they're angry precisely because of the kind of thing that is happening to what was once the richest province in the country. It isn't the global economy that is destroying our way of life, it is politicians and their backroom strategists from all parties who put winning power ahead of serving the public.

It is long past time that we stop clustering in self-defeating ideological chattering gangs, screaming about trivia like the threat to democracy of Internet regulation and got our collective act together by demanding integrity, leadership and sound economic management from politicians. A little vision wouldn't hurt either but that may be asking for too much.

It's what Mr. McGuinty promised in three successive elections. It is what the Drummond Report has proven to have been just one more in a series of cynical political lies.

The Full Drummond Report. If you live in Ontario and voted for Dalton McGuinty, read it and weep

http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/reformcommission/

Drummond Report Catalogues McGuinty Mess In Ontario
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/02/16/don-drummond-catalogues-the-mcguinty-mess-in-meticulous-detail/

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The Demonization Ideology Of The Bourgoisie Elite

2012-02-14T20:21:00.017-05:00

Canadian Prime Minister, Stephen Harper
in a pick-up hockey game with fellow fascists

I spent a half an hour this morning in an online discussion about whether or not Stephen Harper, Canada's prime minister, is a fascist. I don’t know why I bother but it’s my own fault.

I know that as soon as I see or hear the words ‘regime’, ‘fascist’, ‘oppression’, ‘dictator’ and other words of their ilk, there really isn’t going to be much point to the discussion. In a country that is as democratic and free as Canada, using words like that betrays how poorly informed the individual and how weak the argument. It’s usually the sign of yet another ideological hissy-fit rather than anything closely resembling objective and informed analysis.

I get so tired of it. It’s almost like we’ve lost the ability to actually think rather than just react.

I don’t know when disagreeing with a government suddenly meant that the government was fascist but that’s the current buzz word. It’s being tossed about in democracies all over the world and against governments on both sides of the political divide. It’s absurd. The person I tried to speak with this morning went so far as to try and compare Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper with Benito Mussolini. It doesn’t get much sillier than that.

Personally I find it offensive. We have this wonderful opportunity to discuss and debate real issues in an attempt to find solutions but it is being squandered by unenlightened, petty-bourgeois, pseudo-intellectual elites intent on proving their prejudice and intolerance are actually righteous indignation.

People are dying in places like Syria to get out from under repressive regimes and gain what is so carelessly taken for granted here by people who throw around extreme language about oppression as they sip their Starbucks mocha lattes.

Canada is a country where people are free to say pretty much what they want, when and where they want, no matter how stupid it is. People have been tortured, died and/or have simply disappeared for saying a lot less in many other countries.

But let’s look at the issue. Is the Harper government fascist? According to Wikipedia, fascism is defined as follows:

“Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek rejuvenation of their nation based on commitment to an organic national community where its individuals are united together as one people in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood through a totalitarian single-party state that seeks the mass mobilization of a nation through discipline, indoctrination, physical education, and eugenics.”

While there is much for which to criticize the current Conservative government, I fail to see much in common with it and this definition. Let’s look at it point by point.

Individuals united in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture and blood. The current government has a number of members from the English, French, Sikh, Chinese and other cultures which tends to contradict this idea. Goodness gracious, it even has gays and women in powerful cabinet positions. To go a step further, it was the Harper government that went so far as to introduce legislation recognizing Quebec as a distinct society within Canada which also contradicts this part of the definition and it was the Conservatives who went out of their way to successfully attract ethnic voters (a constituency that had pretty much been the sole province of the Liberals) in the last election. So let’s move on.

A single-party totalitarian state.

The last time I looked there were five political parties represented in the House of Commons one more than the four from the last parliament. There were even more which fielded candidates in the election. If a single-party state is an objective of fascism, either the Conservatives aren’t really fascists or in the alternative they’re just not very good at it.

Mass mobilization of the nation through discipline, indoctrination, physical education and eugenics.

Martial Law declared in Canada by Liberal
government of Pierre Trudeau 1970

It’s pretty hard to mobilize a country to one ideology when it offers the freedom to all to form their own opinions and to express those opinions freely. There has been no crackdown or censorship of the media or of free-speech.

Some have tried to suggest that the police response to rioters during the G8/G20 protests are an indication of a federal government suppressing the right of dissent but that was the City of Toronto police service over which the Conservative government has no control. Nor does it even come close to the Liberal declaration of martial law in response to the FLQ crisis which put troops in our streets (something the Paul Martin Liberals would later accuse Stephen Harper of wanting to do during the 2005 election campaign). It was state-control unlike anything Canada had ever experienced before (or since). Virtually over night, the rights of Canadian citizens were stripped and hundreds were rounded up, arrested and taken from their homes without warrant and held without habeus corpus, which the Trudeau Liberal government had suspended.

Canadian troops on streets in
Ottawa and Montreal

Even the state-owned national broadcaster trashes the government with impunity and gets paid handsomely ($1 billion/yr) to do so. The recent Occupy nonsense underscores just how far government is willing to allow dissent to go. It cost this country more than $2 million in damages but there wasn’t a peep out of the federal government or any attempt to shut Occupy down by the Conservatives.

I don’t see any sign of eugenics happening any time soon either although the Conservative government did put through a small tax deduction towards certain sports activities for children. I suppose technically that qualifies as mass mobilization of the nation through physical education but to be honest it’s a pretty tepid attempt at state control at best.

The simple fact is that the current hysteria has nothing to do with fascism and everything to do with too many people who confuse their personal dislike for something as rational political analysis. Too many of these people are guided by ill-informed opinion that makes their positions so weak that the only thing left to them is to demonize the opposition.

Personally, I don’t care if we agree or not on an issue and I enjoy a good debate where people trade points of view. It’s a time-honoured method of moving an issue forward but what passes for debate today is specious. It’s degenerated to the same kind of over-the-top and inane name-calling of spoiled school children who don’t like and bully the unpopular kid in the class.

If you removed the words Stephen Harper and/or Conservative and replaced them with the label of a religious or cultural group, some of the commentary would actually be charged as a hate crime and the person responsible would be prosecuted under existing laws passed by the Liberals.

The bourgeoisie don't like to see themselves that way, of course, they're too busy demonizing others but they should remind themselves that the thing we fear in others tends to be the thing we most fear in ourselves.

It’s absurd to suggest that Stephen Harper is a fascist just as it is absurd to label Pierre Trudeau a tyrannical dictator.

Most politicians are opportunists who walk a fine line between what they think the country wants and what they believe is best for the country. Do they usually get it right? Sometimes but not always; opportunism and politics often get in the way for all political parties.

Most politicians and their parties pander to various special interest groups. The Conservatives, Liberal and NDP all have theirs and the Green Party would have more of them if they were larger with a broader appeal or could find more available groups to which to pander.

The simple reality is that all political parties campaign from either the left or the right but govern from the centre. That’s just a hard cold fact and even the Conservatives have been criticized extensively by the media and others for hugging the centre line when they're not being accused of being Nazis.

How North Korea maintains control
of its citizens

Mussolini and Hitler were fascist dictators. Kim Jung Il, Stalin and Sadaam Hussein were tyrants who terrorized and murdered their own people. That’s tyranny. There isn’t a Canadian politician, including Stephen Harper who has even come close or a Canadian citizen living in anything that is even remotely akin to the oppression of countries like Syria, North Korea or China, so let’s tone down the rhetoric and get back to reality.

It’s one thing to disagree with, debate and even criticize certain policies and political philosophy, it’s an entirely different thing to characterize those with whom you disagree as something they aren’t. That’s nothing but cheap hysterical hyperbole at best or extremist propaganda at worst by an intellectually arrogant elite.

Whatever you call it, it is definitely self-indulgent stupidity and this country isn’t well-served by it.

Godwin's Rule Of Nazi Analogies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Why I Now Celebrate Valentine's Day

2012-02-13T22:00:00.009-05:00

It’s Valentine’s Day; a day when most of us will buy flowers and chocolates, small gifts and cards to express our love for someone. Like most special days, it has become very commercial with florists who look at today with the same drooling fondness that retailers look at Black Friday, only without the price discounts.

For me, Valentine’s Day has never held much meaning except for a period when my daughter was very young and I would buy her a large heart-shaped box of chocolates. She actually liked the box more than the chocolates which made it all the more special back then. After she grew older and had young men in her life who bought her flowers and small gifts, a Valentine’s Day gift from dad lost its appeal and the day lost its significance for me, until I met Maggie.

I didn’t choose the name Maggie’s Bear lightly. Almost from the day she met me, Maggie has called me Bear and she is the only one who ever has. She has always been Margaret until she met me and I started calling her Maggie (a name I used to dislike) almost immediately.

Our first date was for breakfast at a very popular and cool diner that I like. We were to meet there at 10:00 on a Sunday morning but Maggie was delayed by the fact that I gave her the wrong address. Fortunately, she persevered and found both the restaurant and me and I knew from her smile when she walked in that I would be with her for the rest of my life.... or die trying.

We have been together ever since.

The simple fact is that I love Maggie. I love her for her compassion, her humour, her humanity and her warmth. She is a very special lady, a strange combination of a highly successful professional and a silly young girl. She is pretty in her own right and not only because I think so. She has a smile that can melt ice and a gentleness in her voice that can bring even a bear to heal.

I love Maggie for those reasons but also because she has strength and I know she will not falter when the storm rages around us.

I love Maggie because she is sexy, feminine, funny, caring and as my mother used to say, cute as a button.

Mostly, I love Maggie because she fits. She isn’t perfect but she fits perfectly in me. I would rather spend the worst day of my life with her than the best day of my life with anyone else.

She is my wife, my friend and my lover.

When we’re young, most of us have an idea in our thoughts about what the person will be like that we will fall in love with and with whom we will spend our life. I wrote once that while I didn’t know her name or what she would look like, I would recognize her by her smile and by the fact that her hand fit perfectly in mine

I was right.

When I finally found her, I recognized her immediately by her smile and discovered after the first hour of the first day, her hand did fit perfectly in mine.

Her name is Maggie and she is the reason why I now celebrate Valentine’s Day. For me, Valentine's Day is a celebration of her.

Gelukkig Valentine de dag, Maggie. Ik hou van jou - Bear

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If Not SOPA, What?

2012-02-13T02:23:00.006-05:00

I just bought a new computer and have been busy going about the business of setting it up. One of the first things I did, as most of us do, was install anti-spyware, anti-malware and anti-tracking software. There is just so much malevolence out there that without this software, your computer is like a bank vault left open all night.

My father used to say that a lock only keeps out an honest man and he was right.

Consider hackers like Anonymous who break into systems and computers to disrupt and steal data. Sometimes that data is highly sensitive, sometimes it’s financial. Sometimes, hackers break-in just to damage your system.

This is equivalent in the real world to breaking into your home or office and either stealing valuables or trashing the place. We absolutely don’t accept that in the physical world. We demand laws and enforcement of those laws to protect our property. We demand that those who are tried and found guilty be punished but online, we either ignore or actually go so far as to defend these actions by others out of some misguided sense of democracy in action.

It doesn’t stop there, of course. Anonymous for all of its recent attempts to present itself as a defender of democratic and individual rights has done more than its fair share of encouraging illegal and hate-filled behaviour while disrupting the lives of people for no other reason than because they can and because they get a twisted kick out of it.

There are thousands of weak-minded thrill seekers all over the world, like Anonymous, sitting in their bedrooms or their basements plotting new viruses to send out into the world to do nothing more than destroy what belongs to others. This is like having a psychopath go on a rampage in your town, vandalizing and burning down buildings and smashing cars. Again, in the real world we protect ourselves as best we can with the rule of law using the police and the courts to bring those responsible to justice. |In the virtual world we merely complain about it and feed more money into the Internet security industry.

The real world is full of Bernie Madoffs, Enrons and far too many small-time fraud artists. We use the law to not only punish these offenders but to try and recover our lost money and investments. The virtual world has no end of scams. Whether it is some inheritance scam from Nigeria, mystery shopper scam, get rich quick scam or any one of a thousand others, there is no end to people online trying to scam others out of their money.

Artists including musicians, painters, photographers, writers and others routinely have their work pirated by millions which means they lose money they earned through their creativity and to which they are rightfully entitled.

And then come the really twisted.

Consider all those sites with discounted pharmaceuticals, drugs that really aren't drugs at all but rather are useless imitations designed to scam people out of their money. It probably seems harmless when you're thinking about vitamins and even Viagra but what about those people with life-threatening illnesses like AIDS and cancer who are looking for discounted medication to try and prolong their lives?

It is illegal in most jurisdictions to council suicide and yet online, people have not only counseled it, they have gone out of their way to encourage the potential suicide while they watch online. A young girl died in Canada because of a male nurse in the State’s ongoing and persistent encouragement that she take her ownn life rather than seek counseling. In Florida, a young man was encouraged to go through with his threat of suicide by hundreds who had logged in to watch his live-stream. Nobody thought to call the police in an attempt to try and save his life. The Internet is now the primary entertainment provider for the truly diseased mind.

Others, thankful for their anonymity don’t go quite that far. Instead they surf the Internet in search of memorial sites for people who committed suicide, were murdered, killed in an accident or who died from a fatal illness. They get their kicks from logging in to these sites and leaving vile, disgusting messages designed to denigrate the deceased and hurt their family.

Social media sites like Twitter are over-run by small-minded people with even smaller vocabularies who take delight in spamming the community with profane verbal graffiti.

Pedophiles have embraced the Internet like an addict embraces their next fix. They have set up networks to share information and child porn which has created greater access and demand which only puts more children at risk, worldwide. Child-sex rings offer ‘tourist’ trips to exotic locations and access to children as young as infants.

Have an addiction? The Internet has folks only too happy to service it. Gambling. Drugs. Porn. Pick your addiction of choice, search Google or drop by a couple of chat rooms and in no time you’ll have more selection than you’ll find at an all you can eat buffet.

Even legitimate sites are not above tracking your Internet usage, packaging it up and then selling it to others who then use it to to make a buck or two. Where do you think most of the adware and spybots come from? If you spend any time online and belong to a social media site or two, your privacy is merely an illusion. The anti-tracking software I installed earlier today has already blocked more than 1000 attempts to track my Internet use and access my information. Without any doubt even more trackers got by my software.

It’s like having people you don’t know follow you around all day watching you, jotting down everything you say, you buy and you do and then selling it to other companies. It’s all so convenient. You don’t even have to belong to most sites. Just drop by for a short visit and they will take care of the rest.

Yes, there is software that prevents some of this but there is no software that prevents it all and especially not the sick, twisted and illegal behaviour of too many out there. In the real world, we have laws to protect us and to provide us with recourse when a crime happens. The Internet is simply anarchy and an unlimited playground for the morally bankrupt and dishonest....although some have confused that for democracy.

Recently, the United States government started to work on anti-piracy legislation to try and get some sense of order and protection on the Internet. The response online was the predictable knee-jerk reaction by those who don't think beyond their own self-indulgence.

Cries of outrage over the audacity of the government to even consider interfering with the Internet were over the top. Labels of censorship, oppression and tyranny started popping up all over social media and many of the big Internet players led the charge. Of course, for many of them, it was less about censorship than it was about income. It's an easy mistake to make when your business model is based on there being no laws or regulation.

Sites like Wikipedia and Twitter shut down for a day in protest. Go Daddy which offered tepid support of SOPA was almost put out of business by those outraged that Go Daddy had dared to voice a contrary opinion to the rest of the online community. So much for democracy.

But here’s the thing.

While I think SOPA is a flawed bill and needs serious rethinking, I believe we need some kind of enforceable regulation for the Internet to protect the innocent and the not so innocent from those who seek to rob and harm others.

Why should we have to armour our computers to protect our personal information like the military protects the gold in Fort Knox? Theft is theft whether it happens online or in the physical world. Child abuse in the form of kiddie porn spills over into the real world and viscious, threatening behavior is the same wherever it happens. We’re working overtime in North America to reduce schoolyard bullying even as we defend against regulation on the Internet where far more bullying takes place.

The Internet is a great place full of information, interesting things to do and places to go. It is how many of us now connect with each other and I use the Internet every day. But it is also too much like Dodge City before Wyatt Earp showed up and I believe it needs a little 'Wyatt Earping' to try and put some sense of civilized order to it.

Perhaps I'm an idiot but I fail to see why we should even consider accepting, let alone condone in many cases, online behaviour that we would not for a moment consider acceptable in the real world.

The Internet has opened up an entirely new spectrum of information, entertainment and connection. Thanks to the anonymity and collective mindset it affords, it has also brought freedom to those who have no sense of responsibility, morality or respect for their societies or the rights, feelings or well-being of others. It is an attitude that is spilling over into the real world where an unwarranted sense of entitlement is on the increase.

To those who oppose any kind of online regulation, what do you propose to protect yourself and others? What are your solutions to child porn rings and suicide clubs? What do you propose to protect the privacy of individuals, not from government, but from Internet corporations who look on you and your personal information as nothing more than a commodity to tracked, captured and sold? How do you propose to protect your family, your neighbours and your society from those who lack the morality, the values or the decency to act responsibly and honestly? How do you propose to defend society from those who see the Internet as an opportunity to destroy, to steal and to indulge every whim they may have no matter how perverse?

It seems to me that rather than give in to yet another simple-minded reaction against the idea, we would be better to ask ourselves, "If not SOPA, what?" and then get busy making the 'what' happen.

Here's a free app to block sites from tracking you online. http://www.abine.com/

Links to just a couple of the millions of articles available on this topic. Do your own research and draw your own conclusions

An Overview of SOPA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act

Why you don't get a cut of the billions mad by social media websites when theyt go pubic
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/opinion/your+content/6141515/story.html

Anonymous
http://www.religiousfreedomwatch.org/intolerance-hate/anonymous/

Encouraging suicide
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100526/1822349594.shtml

A quick look at some recent online scams
http://www.hotscams.com/

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

Suffer The Little Children and They Do, Even In Death

2012-02-09T08:33:00.010-05:00

Braedon and Charlie Powell

Charlie Powell was seven years old; his brother Braedon was only five. Their mother went missing and is now presumed dead, killed by their father. The same father who killed them this week in a murder-suicide.

A memorial service will be held for them today.

You would think that a horrific tragedy like this would stop the world’s madness if only for a moment but you would be wrong. The funeral of these two little boys will be the scene of even more insanity in a world where too many people have no respect for anything beyond their extreme and twisted objectives.

Westboro Baptist Church protesters

The Westboro Baptist Church will protest the memorial service of these two little boys to advance their own political agenda. They will protest to “remind Governor Chris Gregoire that these little boys died because of her rebellion” in reference to her support of gay marriage. To ensure that this memorial service will turn into a complete circus of the self-righteous, Occupy Seattle plans to protest Westboro’s protest. They claim they don't want to disrupt the service, merely protect it from the Westboro protest. What unadulterated hypocrisy!

It isn’t just self-indulgent sanctimony that drives them, it is cynical opportunism. Westboro knows the memorial service will draw large media coverage and attention. What better opportunity to garner attention for their pathetic cause? This is the same group of self-righteous hypocrites that protest the funerals of American soldiers who died in combat and Occupy is right there with them. Desperate to try to present themselves as the defenders of righteousness, Occupy Seattle will clamour for the same media attention by once again doing exactly what they are protesting against.

Every day, I read tweets and blog posts and media commentary decrying the state of things today. People are angry that their society is crumbling and quick to blame and accuse. The anger is palpable and the hatred for the opinions of others is like a cancer eating away at what once made this democracy one of the freest in the world.

Chrysler ran a commercial with Clint Eastwood during the Super Bowl in an attempt to encourage Amerians to remember who they are as a people and what it is that made them a great nation. The response was criticism and sneering at both Clint Eastwood and Chrysler. There is no time for thinking now; there is only time for anger, suspicion and cynicism.

Too many throw around words like tyranny and oppression, treason and traitor. It is a country filled with people protesting that they are being treated like slaves and they’re right. But it isn’t politicians or greedy corporations that enslave them. It is hatred and intolerance but not hatred for a common external enemy but for their neighbours and other citizens with whom they don’t agree but who have the same rights and freedoms or should have.

What is happening at a memorial service for two little boys is disgraceful made all the more so because no one will defend the right of the family of these two little boys to hold their memorial in peace. Fanatics and opportunistic activists will demand their right to protest be respected while virtually everyone will ignore the right of the family to grieve in peace.

The world today has no time for decency but it will make time to defend the right of the zealots to use that memorial service for their own, tawdry purposes.

This is not what the founders intended or foresaw when they wrote the Constitution. They envisioned the birth of a great nation of people working together in liberty, tolerance and mutual respect. They would be ashamed to see how so many have cheapened and disgraced the ideals they set forth in the document they wrote.

There is nothing Christian in the actions of Westboro Baptist Church. They, like extremists from all religions, have perverted the teachings and tenets of their faith to match their own prejudiced and twisted beliefs. There is nothing American in the actions of either Westboro or Occupy who pervert the very concepts of democracy and freedom upon which the United States was founded.

Sadly, Westboro and Occupy Seattle are not unique. They are merely representative of what can only be described as a growing and perverted madness; a madness that today will desecrate the memories of two little boys.

Four children die each and every day from abuse in the United States but nobody talks about it much. Everyone is too busy saving whales at Marineland, protesting SOPA and each other while advancing their own agenda of accusation, blame and outright hatred.

There is no time to be concerned that children suffer every day without much notice. and because there isn't, today, the memory of two children will be used by those with no values. They will get away with it because their actions will be ignored by those who believe their own values are beyond reproach.

It is not a day of which anyone should feel proud.

LINKS

The News Tribune: Westboro Church to picket Powell children memorial service

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2012/02/08/2018371/westboro-church-to-picket-powell.html

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When Does Life Begin?

2012-02-08T13:24:00.007-05:00

My daughter is pregnant with her second child, a girl, and we’re all quite thrilled about it. We know it’s a girl because of the ultrasounds she has had each month. She sends us all pictures of the baby growing in her belly but they aren’t all that attractive to be honest and I am reluctant to put them on the fridge beside the pictures of our grandson.

My grandson is also excited about the new baby coming. He talks to it through my daughter’s navel and kisses it by kissing her extended belly. It’s starting to move a bit and while he is convinced it will be a boy, he is excited to feel it move in her.

She is still eligible for a legal abortion and that begs the question. When does life begin?

I have no idea personally. I know what I believe but I am not so arrogant as to believe that my beliefs are the defining facts for determining the legal opinion. I’m not completely sure that anyone can make that determination but surely medical science is closer to having that capability than most of us.

The reason I raise this is that a Member Of Parliament in Canada has asked the same question in a private members bill. He hasn’t proposed that abortions be ruled illegal or banned. He has asked parliament to consider forming a committee to gather experts together to examine the question of when life begins.

Why does he feel this is necessary? Simply because abortion remains a hotly debated issue some thirty years after they were made legal. It is clear that opinion has polarized and is based on beliefs and opinions rather than facts and it is his hope that by have medical science address the issue, it might resolve the debate so that society can move on. Of course, he is already being accused of trying to reopen the abortion debate but then that is always the first response of those afraid to look for the truth wherever it might lead.

Despite the personal attacks, he is on the record as stating that the answer may well be that life begins at birth or at some other point. It is clarity of the issue that is necessary and not just in regards to the abortion issue.

For example, if someone murders a pregnant woman, in some jurisdictions they can be charged with a double homicide; the murder of the woman and of the unborn baby. In other jurisdictions, they can only be charged with the murder of the woman. In those jurisdictions, the unborn child is not considered to be alive.

In some jurisdictions, assault on a pregnant woman resulting in the death of the unborn child can be treated as a homicide while in others, the crime is reduced to assault on the woman only.

It has led to some women being charged with endangering the life of a child because of substance abuse while they were pregnant but how is that possible if life doesn't begin until after birth?

The simple fact is that in our polarized rush to legalize abortion, the more profound issues were trivialized and the law has had a considerable difficulty catching up. Definitions about life are inconsistently applied which has a direct impact on some women who become victims of varied interpretations of what does or doesn't constitute life . The current definition of when life begins used in Canada is almost 400 years old, a carryover from Britain.

There are more contradictions than just these. Abortion is legal up to the end of the second trimester but illegal after. Some are convinced that this is because it is unsafe to do an abortion in the final three months but that’s nonsense. The procedure would be different, more like a caesarian but just as safe as any other surgery and very easily performed. I suspect the truth has more to do with the fact that there is a fair degree of discomfort at intentionally terminating the life of a fully-formed baby and then throwing it in the garbage as now happens with aborted fetuses.

For all of our sophistication, we don’t know when life begins. Some believe it is at conception, others at birth. Some have picked an arbitrary period in between but all are based on convenient opinion or religious belief. None are based on medical science or human ethics.

It’s long past time that we settled that question once and for all so that we can put the hypocrisy of the debate behind us.

Hypocrisy? Absolutely.

A recent study revealed that 85% of Canadian women are opposed to abortions based on gender selection. Why? If it is isn’t alive and a woman has the right to choose whether to carry the child to term or not, why shouldn’t she also have the right to determine what gender of child she wants to have? How do you police that? Do you take someone at their word that the abortion has nothing to do with the fact that the baby is one sex or the other?

We’re uncomfortable with that because it comes a little too close to the appearance of culling the race.

That’s the kind of stupid situation we put ourselves in when we are too frightened to drill down and seriously examine an issue beyond the superficial level upon which the ongoing abortion debate has been held over the past thirty or forty years.

The argument against illegal, backroom abortions is a powerful one. Too many women died and/or were seriously maimed by medical hacks incapable of conducting a safe procedure. None of us want to go back to that. But it is not a strong enough argument to simply demand abortion up to a certain point of pregnancy either.

It does not address the core issue. When does life begin and until we address that issue, none of us will ever really know. We’ll just continue to hold onto our beliefs, beliefs that are more about shoring up our opinion than they are about finding the truth.

For example, what if we learn that life begins at conception? How will we feel about ourselves then? In the alternative, what if we learn that life begins with the first breath after birth, won’t that validate the decisions we’ve made?

It’s unfortunately, the way we address too many of the most serious and fundamental issues facing society today. For all of our yelling and brave talk, we are a society afraid to examine things below the surface because we are afraid of what we might find. We operate on emotion rather than fact. We form opinions and then defend those opinions against any and all examination of facts we fear might undermine them.

In the interest of full disclosure, I will state my personal position on abortion. Because I don't know when life begins, I am opposed to abortion for anything much beyond saving the life of the mother. But, because I don't know when life begins, I don't believe I have the right to make that decision for anyone else. I believe that it is up to each individual to make that decision for themselves. It is why I would like a better understanding of when life begins, it might serve to help all of us when confronted by that decision.

But then, I feel the same way about all of the major issues facing us today from the environment to the economy; from the justice system to….abortion.

In the end, it is polarized opinion, not truth, that is undermining us. In the end, I believe, informed truth just might set free, all of us on both sides of each and every issue.

As a final point, I'm tired of those who scream that abortion is only a women's issue. It is an issue that defines our society, an issue that determines when life becomes life and that is not merely a women's issue, nor is it an issue of convenience. It is a very human issue and we all have a right to participate in the discussion of it.

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I Have Seen The Enemy - The Enemy Is Us

2012-02-02T14:26:00.028-05:00

Have you ever noticed how many people there are that seem to think that whatever it is they believe in or what cause they've embraced it somehow gives them the right to push it into your face?

Of course you have. We all have and most of us get tired of it after awhile.

Activists of all stripes, religious fundamentalists of all religions, political zealots from all political parties, extreme atheists…whoever; they all share that one thing in common. They have a need to elevate the importance of their cause or their opinion by getting in the faces of the rest of us.

We had to suffer through it all last fall with the precious Occupy protests that confused the right to freedom of assembly with vandalism, violent disruption of our communities and generally making a nuisance of themselves as they alternately pouted, pontificated and threatened. We had to suffer through endless accusations of police brutality and the crimes of Wall St. even as they trashed our cities and allowed crimes including sexual assault, child endangerment and even murder to take place in their camps.

Gay activists feel the need to hold gay pride parades to flaunt their sexuality in as outrageous a manner as possible which always confuses me. We have gays in our family and we don’t see them as being any different from the rest of us or having anything in common with the drag queens and showboats who prance half-naked down Main St. in a parade. I thought gays wanted to be accepted as a normal part of society. What in the hell is the purpose behind trying to prove you are different and apart from the society you are trying to encourage to accept you?

I can’t even begin to imagine a heterosexual pride parade. Would we all dress up in shorts, sandals, wear drug-store sunglasses and build floats with lawn furniture and barbeques on them? How trite, trivial and boring the whole thing has become.

Religious fundamentalists are constantly jumping in your face with pamphlets, flyers and offers of salvation or threats of damnation. The Internet is littered with endless tweets of biblical quotes, threats of perdition or why God hates everyone who worships him in a different way in a different religion. Sometimes I think God must wish he had a better fan club.

Some atheists feel the need to prove some misbegotten sense of moral or intellectual superiority by getting in the face of believers with insulting and usually ill-informed and heavily prejudiced accusations about the fallacy of religion, how stupid people of faith are or the crimes of some within religion.

Some religious extremists are only happy if they’re blowing something up or killing someone.

Too many on the right are constantly looking for ways to provoke or rip off those on the left while too many on the left drag their soap boxes around so that they can preach and lecture and condemn at a moment’s notice while they meet together to plan how to spend even more of other people's money.

It makes you wonder sometimes if the only reason we were given our middle fingers was just so we could wave them at someone else.

photo: media. photobucket.com

Politics isn’t a blood sport, it’s an animal show; a carnival of the absurd filled with hypocrites, cynics and fools.

You can always tell when a candidate is starting to fall back in the polls. The attack ads intensify against his or her opponents regardless of the damage it does to the party or to democracy by distorting informed debate. The ads air constantly in an obscene orgy of money spent pushing self-serving hypocrisy in our faces in a desperate attempt to convince of us something, usually something negative about the 'other guy'.

Campaign promises become extreme and pander to various special interests and any concept of responsible governance is thrown out the window while real vision for the future is trivialized into bumper sticker slogans. Like everyone else in the great circus of hyperbole, winning has become everything. Truth, and respect for others have all become irrelevant.

It's enough to make your head explode!

I’m tired of the hypocrisy behind it and the insecurity that drives it. I’m tired of the lack of respect for the rights of others, our institutions, our laws, our communities, the lack of civility and common courtesy that fuels it. I’m tired of selfishness and a lack of values masquerading as righteousness and I’m tired of the self-indulgence of too many who feel they and their cause, their belief or their opinion are more important than those of anyone else.

They aren't. It is self-importance inflated to self-delusion. It's a delusion that somehow empowers too many to believe they have been blessed with a moral superiority that gives them the right to attack others for their opinions and beliefs.

There is a considerable amount of talk about democracy and protecting the rights of citizens from government but it is the citizens themselves who undermine the very principles of respect, consideration for the opinions and rights of others, consensus building, the rule of law and decision by majority agreement on which democracy is based.

I’m tired of the ongoing tyranny of minority groups and causes.

Are these really the values we want to teach
our children?

Today it is no longer enough to simply hold and voice your opinion. Today, it has become the norm to try and destroy the opinions of others. To personalize every issue and demonize those who disagree with you.

Today it is no longer enough to earn the respect of others for your race, your religion, your cause, your sexual orientation or your political beliefs. Today it is the norm to flaunt them in rude, insulting and often vicious ways as if they are somehow superior to everything and everyone else. How arrogant and insecure can people get?

The stupidity of it all is that twenty years from now, nobody will care or remember most of the chanting, the arguing, the slogans, the hate messages, violence or the senseless rhetoric being thrown around today which pretty much defines their value.

Ask yourself this question.

How do you want to be treated by others? It seems to me that whatever the answer is to that question is a pretty good benchmark about how to treat them. It also seems to me that behaving like those you don’t like pretty much makes you the same as them. What does that mean about how you really see yourself?

It would be one thing if this behavior was relegated only to the lunatic fringe but it isn’t. There are a lot of nice people in this world but unfortunately, too many can too easily forget that as they pursue some belief, some issue or some cause.

We’re all in this life together but we’re only going to start realizing and benefiting from the strength of that when we stop behaving like self-righteous fools and start remembering that there are very few of us who have a monopoly on truth or righteousness.

Each of us has a limited amount of time on this planet and it’s time to ask ourselves how we each want to be remembered after we’re gone.

Do we want to be remembered by those who knew us as someone who contributed to life, was respected and who made life a little better or would we prefer to be dismissed as just another crackpot who was a pain in the butt and who will be quickly and thankfully forgotten?

We each get to make that choice but quite honestly, I can’t think of anything sadder than leaving this life and having nobody care because we left nothing of value behind us and contributed nothing but anger when we had the opportunity to contribute so much more.

There is an old adage that says the thing we fear in others is the thing we most fear in ourselves. Many of us would do well to remember that in future.

The content of this article is the sole property of Maggie's Bear but a link to it may be shared by those who think it may be of interest to others

A Better Alternative To The Politics Of Today

2012-01-31T22:01:00.010-05:00

After watching a half dozen elections over the past year in Canada and voting in a couple, as well as, the ongoing GOP primary I’m all but electioned out. It isn’t that I’m tired of elections or voting, I’m tired of hearing the same old stuff over and over again. We need a political party with vision, a political party unafraid to face the challenges of our times with bold ideas and innovative thinking.

There was such a party in Canada once. It stood tall and campaigned on the issues that mattered. It fought for those issues from the 1960s through to the 1990s and then finally dissolved in frustration and disappointment as the bigger and better financed parties overwhelmed it with election ad spending.

It was called The Rhinoceros Party of Canada and I intend to encourage the resurrection of the principles and values for which it stood and the issues for which it fought so hard.

The Rhinoceros Party platform was solid. It was made of wood and was about 2’ high.

Beyond that it put forward the issues that matter and I want people to remember those issues in this election year and demand that candidates for all parties give them proper consideration. Below are the issues raised by the Rhinos with some slight amendments due to the fact that it is now 15 years later and some issues have evolved. The amendments are in italics so that the original Rhinoceros Party is credited for the ideas it developed.

The Canadian Navy demonstrating how it will tow
Antarctica to the North Pole

1. Canada will tow the Antarctic to the North Pole giving the country a monopoly on cold in the event of another Cold War.

2. The Law of Gravity is to be repealed immediately upon election of the Rhinoceros Party to government.

3. Abolish the environment because it's too hard to keep clean and it takes up so much space

4. Canada will declare war on the United States, surrender immediately and apply for foreign aid from the U.S. as part of a national infrastructure rebuilding program.

5. The National Debt will be put on Visa, MasterCard and American Express cards and only the minimum monthly payments will be made in perpetuity.

6. The Trans-Canada Highway will be made a one-way road ending in the Pacific Ocean in Vancouver. Only really stupid people will be allowed to drive it and there will be no exit ramps before Vancouver.

Based on this photo it would appear that more than
a few of the 1000 Islands are missing

7. An inventory will be taken of the Thousand Islands to make sure that the Americans haven't stolen any.

8. More accessibility to higher education will be achieved by building taller schools. University tuition will be free. Parking and lockers will cost $10,000 per year.

9. Illiteracy will be made an official language as it appears the country is half way there now it might as well be officially recognized.

10. The country will aggressively pursue sustainable energy programs, particularly from wind. All Canadians will be issued with beanies that have small propellers on top to harness the wind’s energy and a new hot air trapping system will be developed and hooked up to Parliament. Cattle farts will be captured and converted to a usable fuel to replace unethical oil. (we’ll see how long the environmentalists like having their cars smell like bullshit)

11. Canada will annex the Turks & Caicos Islands and offer discounts on Speedo thongs for men. (Don’t visualize please, just move along). The Department of Tourism will then promote Canada internationally as a tropical destination in order to boost tourism revenues.

Driving lanes will be abolished.

12. Drivers, especially in winter, will be permitted to decide for themselves which side of the road they wish to use.

13. All species will be declared endangered except those that are really, really good to eat.

14. We will end crime by legalizing it.

15. The National Anthem will be renamed “Oh Canada, eh?”

16. The Order of Canada medal will be replaced by The Suggestion of Canada medal to make it more polite and less demanding.

17. We will tear down the Rocky Mountains so that Albertans can see the Pacific sunset

18. We will solve the low Old Age Security issue by giving all retired Canadians the same pensions as retiring senators.

Silly? Perhaps but compare these policy promises to some of the foolishness offered by today's politicians. How about the Gingrich plan to put a colony on the moon and when it reaches 13,000 people have the moon declared a state. Or the recent promise of the Liberal Party of Canada to develop a national dementia strategy. We face serious economic and social issues in our democracies today but some of things coming out of the mouths of politicians make the Rhinoceros Party look absolutely prophetic and there is little doubt that it would be considered mainstream these days.

While the Rhinoceros Party is long gone, their ideals live on. It is my hope that each person who reads this will rise up and demand our politicians stop pandering to special interest, garner some common sense and trade their arrogance for a little self-respect and respect for the electorate.

As for the rest of us? Forget occupying parks with tent cities and tweeting one liners. Put pressure on candidates from whatever political party you support to stop their foolishness and start focusing on the issues that really matter. …whether they are those originally espoused by the Rhinoceros Party or not.

Enough is enough!

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More Inconvenient Truth For The Global Warming Crowd

2012-01-30T19:08:00.004-05:00

photo: Science & Public Policy.org

Maybe Al Gore got it right when he named his alarmist video about impending climate catastrophe "An Inconvenient Truth". It appears there are an increasing number of inconvenient truths coming out about global warming but it appears they are more inconvenient for the movement than the planet.

A few days ago, I posted an article by Rogue Operator which took the issue of global warming head on. I won’t repeat his findings here (a link to it is below) but hard on the heels of that article comes new data from the Met Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit. Based on readings from more than 30,000 measuring stations, the data confirms that the rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997. In fact, it appears we are headed for a serious period of global cooling.

Oops!

Environmentalists have been talking about global warming since the turn of the new century. They have fretted and jetted all over the world in a desperate attempt to make the blind see and the deaf hear. They have protested, conferenced, accused, warned, worried and demanded great change and expenditure to head off global catastrophe as the direct result of man-made global warming and it now appears, they were three years too late. The earth isn’t warming at all, it’s cooling down and the causes have nothing to do with humanity.

Solar flares: photo: Suntrek.org

It is primarily solar dependent and that really shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.

The earth has been around for a very long time and has gone through significant periods of climate fluctuation.

Humanity has been around for a mere 100,000 years or so and has been industrialized for only the past two centuries. It would seem to suggest, just on that simple basis, that perhaps climate change is naturally occurring and is going to happen regardless of what we do.

Think about it. There was a mini-ice-age in the 1600’s followed by a period of global warming. In fact, the middle ages of the last eon saw both global cooling and global warming. Not only was it not man-made, humanity survived it quite well.

The hysteria around this issue has become absurd in recent years especially considering that the science continues to contradict itself as it unfolds. Climatologists are not in universal agreement on whether there is global warming, global cooling or what the causes of climate change are. When you know that little about something, you lose the right to lecture anyone else about it or to set or influence public policy.

Of course, funding and research grants are at stake so the rhetoric will continue because in the end, climate change was never about….well….climate change, it became an industry. It’s big business now that supports scientists, researchers, activists, NGO’s, lobby groups and politicians and political parties. A lot of jobs and grant money hinges on keeping the world focused on the fear of impending climactic disaster. (Not to mention those really neat conferences held in places like Denmark and South Africa).

In reality, this issue like so many others is more about money and control than anything else. Consider the latest nonsense coming out of the movement.

Cliff Mass, Weather Blog: TV Weathercasters

Climate change activists are concerned that there aren’t enough media meteorologists who support their cause and are now trying to petition the media to hire more meteorologists who believe in climate change.

It appears that the majority of media meteorologists do not believe in climate change and that has the environmental movement in a tizzy. It, of course, has not occurred to the climate change crowd that perhaps because they work with it every day, the majority of meteorologists don’t believe in climate change because they don't see any significant long-term change in weather trends. Nor has it occurred to the movement that perhaps the failure lies within their own ranks because they have been unsuccessful at getting their message out in a consistent and responsible way. There aren't too many people outside of the movement who take the Fossil Awards nonsense very seriously.

Perhaps, though the simple truth is that those who actually think for themselves instead of merely reacting to the latest “bumper sticker” cause are increasingly dismissing the entire climate change debate as predicated on conflicted science at best or junk science at worst and those who are screaming for sacrifice as misinformed activism, fanatics and the lunatic fringe.

And with good reason.

Since 1990, scientists predicted an ice age, then global warming, then climate change and now once again global cooling. Methinks the global warming crowd have cried wolf a little too often. When they finally get it right, if they ever do, perhaps then we can talk and reconsider ridiculous programs like the Kyoto Accord. Until then, I suggest we focus on more serious issues like unemployment, poverty, ending violence and war, crumbling economies and affordable healthcare.

Unlike climate change, those are real issues and we’ve wasted enough time on, and been distracted from, them by the global warming nonsense long enough.

LINKS

New data shows no global warming in 15 years

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2093264/Forget-global-warming--Cycle-25-need-worry-NASA-scientists-right-Thames-freezing-again.html

Environmental activists go after climate change deniers in the television weather business

http://dailycaller.com/2012/01/30/global-warming-activists-seek-to-purge-deniers-among-local-weathermen/

Science and Public Policy Orgnaization - 35 Inconvenient Truths, How Al Gore Got It Wrong

http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/goreerrors.html

Rogue Operator on the myths of Global Warming

http://bearsrant.blogspot.com/2012/01/guest-contributor-rogue-operator-rips.html

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When Governments Ignore The Law - There Is No Law

2012-01-29T18:02:00.006-05:00

After being away for a few days with only limited Internet access, I logged into Twitter this afternoon and quickly found myself unintentionally caught up in a discussion about Omar Khadr. For those unfamiliar with the Khadr case, Mr. Khadr was the Canadian teenager who killed an American medic with a grenade in Afghanistan following a firefight in 2002.

Omar Khadr

I am not going to defend Mr. Khadr’s actions or try to make sense out of the senselessness that is war. People die in wars and in most cases, for no good purpose. The fact that we still use violence as a means to resolve disputes is a testament to how little we have progressed as a civilized species.

My three opponents in the discussion clearly think Mr. Khadr deserves whatever he gets and I understand their anger with his actions and have no real issue with his sentence. He pled guilty and accepted a sentence that tacked an additional eight years on to the seven he had already served. My issue is with government and the rule of law.

Mr. Khadr was arrested in 2002 at the age of fifteen and was held in Guantanamo for 7 years without due process. In other words, he was held illegally. He wasn’t even formally charged with a crime until 2006 after the United States Government passed The Military Commissions Act of 2006, a law which was retroactive or in other words, a law that made previous behavior suddenly illegal by a new set of definitions.

Think about that for a moment. Think about the power that accrues to a government that can change the law to make something done a year earlier not only illegal for the future but also illegal for the past. Think about a the power of a government that can ignore it's own constitution and legal system to force it's will.

It means that you could have been a law-abiding citizen and suddenly find yourself under arrest because your government passed a law that was retroactive. Consider how close to Orwell's 1984 that really is and what it means for the rule of law and respect for both democracy and the constitutions and charters of rights upon which most democracies are built.

A number of organizations from the United Nations to various legal associations all pointed out the danger to democracy that this situation held but to no avail and Mr. Khadr remained in prison. In 2009, he pled guilty in a plea bargain that was as much about putting an end to his Kafka-like circumstance as it was to an admission of guilt.

He is under both American and Canadian law, entitled to serve his sentence in Canada after the first full year is served in the United States. The United States, for its part, had already announced it would not stand in the way of Mr. Khadr being repatriated to Canada. It is the Canadian government that has ignored its own laws and Charter of Rights.

Despite appeals from UNICEF, The Canadian Bar Association and Amnesty International, among others, The Canadian Government has steadfastly refused to repatriate Mr. Khadr to Canada as is his right as a Canadian citizen. He remains the only foreign national not repatriated by their government in the history of Guantanamo which isn’t much of an endorsement for this current government’s sense of justice which I find particularly hypocritical considering this current government's emphasis on law and order.

It gets worse.

In 2009, the Federal Court ordered the government to repatriate Mr. Khadr after determining that his rights as guaranteed under the Charter had been violated. The government filed an appeal with the Federal Court of Appeal only to lose again. They then took the case to the Supreme Court of Canada which also ruled that Mr. Khadr’s rights were being violated by the government but the government has continued to ignore all court rulings and this country’s constitution and charter.

This is not about Mr. Khadr nor is it about having him released from prison. It is about a government that has taken it upon itself to ignore the law and the courts because it doesn’t agree with their rulings but the law isn’t here for their convenience. It is here to protect citizens from exactly this kind of unilateral and capricious action by a government. Governments come and go. It is the law that is the constant and that protects us from the actions of others, including governments.

When a government can decide which laws it wishes to uphold and for whom, there is no law and we are no longer a democratic country protected by our laws. We are no better than the very societies too many Canadians have died fighting to protect us from.

It is becoming all too prevalent as more and more often, democratic governments ignore or refuse to enforce the laws they are sworn to uphold. In Ontario, the Premier and the Chief of the Provincial Police refused to enforce a court order to remove native protesters. In cities across North America, mayors refused to take action against Occupy protesters who vandalized their cities resulting in millions of dollars in damage.

Governments play footloose and fancy free with access to information laws and manipulate election spending laws to help themselves get re-elected.

If our governments aren't prepared to uphold our laws and the rule of law for the worst of us, it won’t be long before the law will not protect the best of us from those same governments.

Mr. Khadr has pled guilty and is serving his sentence. He is not the issue. It is the actions of government who have treated our laws with so little respect that threaten each and every one of us. While it is Mr. Khadr today, it could just as easily be you or I tomorrow. It could be your home or mine that the Premier of Ontario allows to be overrun by native protesters as he did to home owners in Caledonia. It could be your store or business that is vandalized, your car or mine that is burned by rioters that city governments were too timid to confront.

When government refuses to obey or to enforce its own laws, there is nothing left but tyranny and it is only a matter of time before that tyranny touches someone who is innocent....and that could be any one of us or any member of our family.

If that happens, there will be no one to ensure that the law protects you and I......or them.

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