May 31 - Nice, pointed Question Period in Parliament yesterday with especial note to the Spin Team the taxpayers provide for the Martin Libranos, courtesy of this post at Newsbeat1.

(Question: does anyone else have trouble loading the Parliament webpages? I'm not sure how I'd feel if it was just me ...)

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May 31 - This is all speculation just yet and, despite what we may want to believe, it is probably best to wait until the tapes are fully translated and made available to the public,. Nevertheless, this is intriguing: but according to CTV,

CTV News' Ottawa Bureau Chief Robert Fife reports that the Prime Minister knew of the negotiations.

According to Fife, the full four hours of transcripts of Grewal's taped conversations with a top Martin aide and Health Minister Ujjal Dosanjh show:

- Martin was ready to talk to Grewal about defecting like he did with Belinda Stronach
- Grewal was offered a government position two weeks after the vote

The transcripts could be released Tuesday. Conservative House Leader Jay Hill has said the party will be turning the tapes over to the RCMP soon.

The federal ethics commissioner Bernard Shapiro is also expected to announce Tuesday whether he will conduct an investigation into the alleged Liberal deal-making.

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May 31 - After the French voted "Non" on approving the EU constitution, President Chirac was expected to replace Jean-Pierre Raffarin as Prime Minister yet I must admit when I read this, Chirac named De Villepin prime minister to head new French government, I began to laugh.

Good old de Villepin. What an excellent choice. Despite his hauteur, he seems to have a bit of cowboy in him.

In August, 2003, the news broke that De Villepin had been involved in a botched attempt in July to free his former student, beauty queen and Columbian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt who had been kidnapped over a year earlier by FARC guerillistas. It was rumoured that he had offered money and medical treatment - and perhaps weapons - to a rebel leader in exchange for Betancourt's freedom, and that he tried to fly secretly from Brazil into Columbia without advising either the Brazilian or Columbian governments.

The French foreign ministry first denied the story and then apologized to Brazil

Tension between France and Brazil rose on Thursday when Samuel Pinheiro Guimaraes, the Brazilian deputy foreign minister, said M de Villepin had given information which proved false.

One deputy demanded the expulsion of French diplomats, saying they "would do better not to treat us like one of their African colonies".

In a written statement, M de Villepin offered his apology to his Brazilian counterpart, Celso Amorim, who accepted.

According to leaks from disgruntled officials at the Quai d'Orsay, the French foreign ministry, Mr de Villepin authorised the launch of "L'Operation 14 Juillet", to secure her release. His critics claim that he hoped to score a dazzling diplomatic coup by bringing Betancourt home on Bastille Day. Instead, Mr de Villepin is now carrying the can for a hideously bungled affair that not only seriously embarrassed his boss, President Jacques Chirac, but appears to have damaged the prospects of the hostage walking free in the near future.

Back in Paris, Mr de Villepin had told his senior adviser on Latin America, Pierre-Henri Guignard (who doubles as his deputy chief of staff) to set L'Operation 14 Juillet in motion. Guignard quickly assembled an experienced "protection team" from the Direction Générale de la Securité Exterieure (DGSE), the French equivalent of MI6. An 11-man squad of agents, including pilots, a doctor and communications specialists with jungle navigational equipment, set off with him for Manaus on July 8.

The unheralded arrival of the C-130 the following day, ostensibly to refuel en route for French Guyana, mystified the Brazilian authorities. Why would the aircraft make a 620-mile detour when it could more easily have flown directly to its destination?

When airport police requested a routine check of the Hercules, the entire French team produced official passports and claimed diplomatic immunity to prevent any such inspection. Most of them then set off for the palatial Hotel Tropical, bearing large metal cases. By the time Guignard and his three rugged colleagues left on their chartered flight to Sao Paulo de Olivena - directly across the river from the town where Astrid Betancourt was waiting - the Brazilian federal police were hard on their trail.

According to the flight plan that de Abreu [the pilot they hired] filed, the Caraja was to remain at the landing strip until four other passengers arrived the following afternoon, July 10. As soon as they arrived, the French team took a water taxi to the Flamingo hotel. Guignard [a priest who was Astrid's contact] then set off to contact another priest, Father Pedro, who had been enlisted to help on the Brazilian side. For de Abreu, the situation was becoming alarming: during the flight he had been questioned about his night-flying experience and his plane's ability to land on rough terrain.

Unnoticed by his new companions, he returned to the airstrip and flew to a neighbouring town where a police unit was stationed. "I informed them that I suspected a plot to seize my aircraft in mid-flight and divert it to another destination," he told Le Monde. "They advised me that the Frenchmen were already under surveillance and that I should return to Sao Paulo de Olivena and await developments."

Across the river in Colombia, Astrid was now fretting about the lack of progress in her own role in the mission. Despite making every attempt to be "visible" around town should Farc representatives be present, no contact had occurred. On impulse she made the long river trip back to Leticia to await further news. "I sat looking out over the Amazon watching dolphins leap and dreaming that suddenly I would see Ingrid's face on a boat arriving, and that I would almost die from the emotion of the moment," she says.

In fact, the rescue plan was rapidly unravelling. On July 11, after waiting in vain for Ingrid's expected passage into Brazil - the French team believed that if Ingrid was to be freed her captors would deliver her to the Brazilian border town Sao Paulo de Olivena - Guignard and his team flew back to Manaus, leaving a note at the Flamingo hotel asking Astrid to contact them at the Tropical hotel.

When they arrived, federal police detained them for questioning in the presence of the French honorary consul. All four invoked diplomatic immunity, providing only a work address in Paris: Boulevard Mortier, the headquarters of the DGSE. Soon after midday on July 13, the Hercules took off on the return flight to France where a political scandal was developing fast.

Unknown to the French authorities, a photographer for the respected Brazilian newspaper Carta Capital had been tipped off about the story and had taken a picture of the French plane on the runway at Manaus. The Brazilian media, quoting senior officials, then reported that it may have been carrying weapons destined for Farc as the ransom for Betancourt.

Both Mr Chirac and the French prime minister, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, were abroad when the first reports about the rescue mission appeared in the French media. Each immediately issued stringent denials, Mr Chirac insisting that "this kind of operation would not have happened without me being informed, and I was not informed". When he saw the photographs from Manaus airport last weekend, officials confided, he exploded in fury.

As more embarrassing details about L'Operation 14 Juillet began to leak out, the French government abruptly changed tack, flatly denying that any "direct negotiations" had taken place with Farc.

Last week, Farc intensified the debate by announcing that it had never considered liberating Betancourt or any other of its several hundred captives - among them three American CIA men - without direct negotiations with the Colombian authorities about the release of its own members being held by the military.

Raffarin, in a short address after the president accepted his resignation, promised that his successor would work to bring a significant drop in unemployment in the last two years of Chirac's second term - which could be his last.

"I confirm this commitment, even if the drop in the dollar and the rise in oil prices delay it for a few months," he said.

Raffarin defended his three-year record as prime minister, saying he acted to protect the future of the pension system and state health care, among other programs.

"I have always been aware that what is healthy for the nation does not go unblamed by public opinion," said Raffarin. Polls showed that he was one of the most unpopular prime ministers of the French Fifth Republic that was founded in 1958.

By the way, Nicholas Sarkozy will return to his former position as Interior Minister.

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May 31 - Editorial in yesterday's Toronto Sun on MP Gurmant Grewel's allegations that the Liberals tried to induce him to abstain on the budget vote - Liberals protest too much - brings up the impropriety of their leaking to the media that Immigration Minister Joe Volpe had asked the RCMP to investigate allegations of wrongdoing by Grewal:

Grewal has denied this allegation and what's more, it was sleazy of the Liberals to smear him this way. This wasn't a case of revealing that Grewal had been charged with anything, merely that the government had requested the Mounties look into it.

Indeed, this incident has become yet another subject of controversy in this affair, with Grewal denying Liberal claims that he wanted the investigation dropped in return for abstaining on the non-confidence vote.

The tapes reveal Grewal and Murphy discussing Volpe's actions, although the Liberals insist this was only about the possibility of having Volpe say something positive about Grewal, to lessen the sting of the immigration controversy for him.

Even if that's true, if the Grits really believed Grewal had committed immigration improprieties, why did they talk to him at all in the first place? Why didn't they just say "no"?

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May 30 - Are you tired of people saying "they all do it" whenever you talk about corruption in government? Kate has a good reply and exposes the fallacy of that particular argument in They Are Not The Same:

... The argument that "all polititians are the same" is not only a falsehood - it is a falsehood with a hidden intent. Manufactured in an attempt to pull all those in the public service down to a lowest common denominator, it sustains the apologist's rationale to endorse "The Devil You Know". That particular devil just happens to be the soil in which corrupt governments take root.

Buying into the canard is not a product of cynicism, but an admission that one's own moral compass should be sent in for a rebuild. If we truly believes that "all politiicans are the same", then we must also concede that all citizens are "the same", held to no particular standard of honesty or integrity, and that with such low expectations of government, undeserving of better.

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Tomb of the Unknowns
Photo from US Memorial Day images (1993 Smithsonian Institute.)

May 30 - Memorial Day was officially proclaimed in 1868 to honour those who died during the Civil War. After World War I it was changed to honour all Americans who died fighting in any war.

It is a day of sorrow and joy, grief and dedication, humility and pride. It has taken renewed meaning these past four years because we have lost good men and women in action and each loss means an empty chair at the family table.

The Tomb of the Unknowns holds a special poignancy. Their honour guard has patrolled every day, night and day, since 1930 and the nation was reminded of their dedication when, in 2003, they refused the order to evacuate during Hurricane Isabel with the sturdy reply "No way, Sir!".

Today we honour those who gave their lives in defense of our freedom whether their names be known to us or "but to God."

Greyhawk has a series of posts to honour Memorial Day starting here and down. Some of those he honours this day are Maria Ruzicka, Margaret Hassan, Italian Brigadier Giuseppe Coletta, Air Force Technical Sgt. John A. Chapman and Rick Rescorla.

If you read nothing else, read the posts dedicated to Rick Rescorla here and here. I don't know if heroes are made or born, but Mr. Rescorla was not only a war hero but was also a hero in his civilian life: he got 2,600 employees of Dean Whittier to safety on Sept. 11. He was lost that day because he went back upstairs in an effort to get more people out.

Rolling Thunder has become a uniquely American addition to Memorial Day since it first roared into D.C. in 1988 to honour those killed in Vietnam and MIAs from all conflicts.

(The photo at the link, by the way, is of Air Force Gen. Richard B. Meyers and his wife, Mary Jo, riding to the Pentagon to join the rally. Never do anything by halves!)

God bless the men and women who chose to serve their country. They ask so little, only that we remember and support them, and in return they are willing to give so much.

On this day we should dedicate ourselves to try and be worthy of them.

11:47 Jeff Jacoby writes about Sgt. Rafael Peralta of Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 3d Marines.

The Korean War movie The Bridges at Toko-Ri ends with the question Where do we find such men? After reading Jacoby I suddenly realized that we don't; they find us.

A tribute at Legacy.com: In Remembrance (link via Michelle Malkin, who also has some other wonderful links for Memorial Day here.)

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May 29 - Ben Macintyre writes tongue in cheek for the London Times on the Canadian-American and French-British rivalries in Everybody needs bad neighbours:

In our thoroughly globalised world, the US and Canada, France and Britain, cling anachronistically to their singular, ancient rivalries. Australia and New Zealand look further afield than each other for economic comparisons; Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan do not expend energy anxiously surveying their respective sex lives. But the English Channel and the US border with Canada remain the distorting, two-way mirrors through which these neighbours perceive themselves.

Americans and Canadians will, at the drop of a hat, bring up the War of 1812 and work backward to 1776 to present our list of grievances, but that list seems downright contemporary compared to two countries who can begin theirs in 1066.

Macintyre is looking at a bigger picture set in European terms and his conclusions are interesting but he doesn't address (or perhaps even know about) the impact of Adscam on Canadian thinking and sensibilities.

The family nature of U.S. and Canadian relations is one that we tend to rush past and it has been made easier by the wholesale re-write of history which de-emphasizes British rule and influence up here in order to side-step the end of French rule at the Plains of Abraham (Canada's Culloden, if you will) which brought a reluctant step-brother into the family.

The current scandel proves the point that we can re-write history but we can't undo it. Adscam is directly related to (if only because it formed the pretext for) anglo- and franco-Canadian relations, and many of us are re-examining our former attitudes to the cause of Quebec sovereignty and recognizing that the exposure of how basely that issue was manipulated by the Liberal Party in their pursuit of one-party rule justifies Quebec outrage and, further, may have irreparably damaged prospects for a truly united Canada.

The divide-and-conquer strategy of the Libranos is being exposed, and some are beginning to realize that the implications go far beyond Quebec and permeate the very weave of today's Canada.

Every time Bombardier is granted a contract there are grumblings in Ontario, but which profit most when the contracts are awarded to Quebec: Quebeckers or those who own Bombardier? It's past time to get deeply suspicious of the quasi-Socialist pretentions of the Libranos and look closer at who gains from these contracts. If it is done in the name of national, or family, unity, then why are the kids bickering?

Once the Libranos decided that they were the natural governing party of Canada and set about to do whatever they could to assert their rule they forgot the danger that the kids might get together and compare notes. Some are noticing that one family analogy which may fit is that of a parent who purposefully incites quarrels between the adult children in order keep them bitterly divided and, in the case of a wealthy family with sizeable assets, ensures they will continue to pander to the parent in order to get what they perceive to be their rightful shares.

But Quebec and the West have had enough and, within their own families, are seriously thinking of getting out of the family business and setting up their own. Ontario is the "good eldest child" -- compliant and obediently determined to uphold the patriarch's dominance (although it privately feels that it should get more for its loyalty than the parent is alloting) and is so invested in the family business that it tends to dismiss the mutterings of those who wonder if the price of unity is worth the cost of their dignity.

Like many parents, the Libranos shrug aside the signs of rebellion, thinking that "kids will be kids," and forgetting that the blind love of children for the parent is replaced by a more critical view once the kids grow up. Should the judgement be that the parental unit makes decisions more for its own benefit than that of the family as a whole then the justification for maintaining family unity is lost.

They played a good hand when they projected Paul Martin in the role of the sympathetic "other" parent and, by seeming to overthrew Chretien's iron rule, he gained some traction by apologizing to the kids for taking them and their contributions for granted and promising to address their concerns and to treat them with more respect, fix the democratic deficit, and distribute more of the profits from the family business.

But then the family quarrel was aired in the Commons, and the Libranos retained power by marrying both the NDP and Belinda Stronach and pre-emptively gave a larger share of the profits to the kids. Martin thus, to all appearances, retained control as this placated some of them, but there is a limit to how often that strategy can be successfully employed.

He will likely take the opportunity at the next family gathering (which would be the next election) to praise the children profusely and humbly, and this will work only to the extent that the kids are denied a thorough understanding of the business accounts for the family in part because foundations which receive federal money are not accountable for how they spend that money.

There is another who wishes to be made head of the family, and some of the siblings use their distrust or dislike of Harper as a pretext for their continued support for the Libranos, but I am genuinely perplexed that, by inference, Joe Clark is somehow be seen as more likeable and charismatic than Harper.

[In contrast, President Bush has many qualities I admire but even I wouldn't call him charismatic. My support for him stems from support for his policies, so his personal appeal is not even a factor. The same can be said for Australian PM Howard.]

I also fail to see how anyone can pretend that Paul Martin has personal appeal, and I am stunned that people still worry about the "hidden agenda" of the Conservative Party when, should the allegations at the Gomery Inquiry be proven, it would seem that it is the Libranos who had the hidden agenda and it was to enrich themselves and their friends at public expense rather than anything that resembled governance.

Oddly enough, it may be the experience of living under Liberal despotism that causes fears about the Conservatives; people may believe that the CPC is as capable of forcing unpopular legislation through Parliament as the Liberals.

I hope the Conservatives use the next period to craft and state their policies. Their failure to do so is probably due more to being a new party and needing to have those kind of discussions among their members but Eastern voters are not likely to buy another pig in a poke.

Canadians are facing a dilemma of another sort though when the media projects the value of personal appeal over policies. Is it possible to maintain illusions once the blinkers are off? The polls seem to say yes, and that is the challenge for both the Libranos and the opposition parties - everywhere except Quebec, that is. They, at least, had the grace to feel insulted by the bribery, and rightly wonder how much the rest of the family truly values them when the others don't share in that outrage.

And that's the real pity.

(Links via Neale News.)

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May 29 - Emergency at work - I was called in this evening* and just got home.

Maz2 and Tony kept the ball rolling these last few days (thanks!) and Andrew Coyne has a post has with a great title: It's a vast right-wing punditocracy! (of course it is) The post has some interesting links on the allegations that members of the Conservative Party were offered inducements to abstain or be absent for the Real and Official Non-Confidence Vote last week.

I particularly like the first one from the Vancouver Sun (link no good unless you have a subscription) in which Arthur Schafer, director of the Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics, scores a grand-slam by making what to my mind is the critical point about using patronage appointments as a form of bribery:

"In my view, the latter is every bit as serious as the former. Perhaps more serious, since the harm to Canada may last longer and be more serious than the 'mere' loss of public money."

Mark the calandar on this: we learned that Man of Culture Jacques Corriveau is into making Noble Gestures which is why he put 4 volunteers for the Liberal Party on his payroll even though they did no work for him:

Corriveau said he hired Serge Gosselin at his firm Pluridesign in 1999 and paid him $55,000 -- half of that for Liberal-related work.

Pluridesign's financial statements show Corriveau put three other Liberal staffers on his payroll after the 1997 election, paying them $86,509 from 1998 to 2000.

He said he made the backdoor donations to the Grits at the request of ex-Quebec party head Michel Beliveau, adding he felt obliged to after billing $1 million for printing election signs.

I am so very happy that the medical condition which had prevented him from recollecting certain things has improved and am hopeful he will be able to remember even more things.

*Make that yesterday evening, i.e, Saturday evening.

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May 27 - Darcey has some updates on the Poundmaker protest: a press release from the Poundmaker Working Group and organizing a grocery run.

Ian Lance is making that grocery run Saturday (tomorrow) and is collecting funds through his Pay-Pal account.

Look, we've complained on this site (as well as others) as to how the outrage over corruption in Ottawa has been largely limited to sighs and laments, but members of the Poundmaker Working Group are not content to wring their hands and wish somebody (else) would do something about corruption in their own community -- they have engaged in an act of civil disobedience because, having already reached their tipping point, they have taken the initiative to push their point home.

Ian has issued a compelling call to support this action in Fighting Corruption Our Way. Is their struggle really that separate from what we've been so angry about? I don't think so.

May 29 - 2:36: Lance reports and writes of something fundamental that he found at the protest and in the Poundmaker Working Group. Great post.

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1 Thanks, Debbye! Just one correction - it's actually Lance, who lives much closer than I do to Poundmaker, that is doing the actual grocery run So far, we've collected about $500.00 or so. Which seems like a lot, but groceries for at least 30 people.. that will last for only a couple of days.

Posted by: Ian Scott at May 27, 2005 06:05 PM (KiTgm)

2 I support your adventure and wish you al well but am on Vancouver Island so out of reach. Anyway only one comment here and I know that's not allowed so food for thought... Do you really think Auditor General Fraser is a hero? With cautious respect. Is the Auditor General office and staff functioning properly? How come it took over ten years to get these blatant excesses looked at? And on that huge budget too. I don’t see how the Auditor General could have contained knowledge of this sprawling mess. This is just a measure of Liberal repentance and timely damage control. Lets get something constructive done, we have to demand Whistle Blower Protection law with real TEETH. Not wishy-washy ‘should dos’ as Fraser suggests. Allan Cutler blew the whistle on Guite over ten years ago. That should have saved us millions. Instead, Cutler was sacked. What knuckle dragging stupidity. Martin promised to enact independent Ministry and department Account & Audit. He's an expert on how to stop pilfering. Trouble is he has to be forced to keep any promise he makes. He made that promise during his CBCTV Grovel speech. It will cut off the Liberal’s mad money somewhat, but any sacrifice is ok to hold onto power. Yet, I suggest Martin will hope we apathetics forget the promise he made about account and audit. Let’s get hard law enacted now! Then, no matter who is in power, our National Revenues will remain fairly secure. 73s TonyGuitar at bendgovernment.blogspot.com This whole farce has gone on long enough, don’t you think. When are real Canadians going to organize and do something concrete about this mess?

Posted by: TonyGuitar at May 28, 2005 05:02 PM (rmMzv)

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May 27 - The 60's produced a lot of people who still hold to the values expressed by JFK, Dr. King, Malcolm X and RFK, and George Bush is also a product of the 60's. He expressed those ideals in his Whitehall Speech which spelt out the cause for freedom as our priority in U.S. foreign policy - and wasn't that the primary banner under which we marched in the 60's? I could understand dismissing the speech as mere words but we are actively in the field, fighting and dying to give life to those ideals, and our country was finally putting its money where its mouth was.

One would think that political activists from the 60's would feel some satisfaction that the major impetus for our activism - that the U.S. was supporting vicious dictators as part of the Cold War - had finally been addressed. So why are so many of them on the other side?

Keith Thompson's column in the SF Chronicle was noted by Instapundit (among many others) because he spells out unequivocally how the left abandoned liberalism. I can well imagine how the column was received in San Fransisco, though, and it probably started with the phrase "Yes, but."

Maz2 sent me a link to Thompson's website (Thompson at Large) and I noted in the interview on the main page that he expressed his admiration for Robert F. Kennedy. (Thompson also writes the blog Sane Nation.)

Invoking RFK sure brings back a lot of memories. People who make blanket assumptions about baby boomers do so in a vacuum. Maybe some day I'll write the definitive essay on how my generation was affected by events which culminated in 1968 and were I to really try and write it the thesis would probably be based on this hypothesis:

Baby-boomer Democrats are idealists who were mugged in 1968.

Maybe you had to be there to get that, but I'll just try to condense and say that politically aware people were hit with a bombardment of events in 1968 and those who look back on it as their heyday probably forgot that actually, it was a year of intense pain, struggle and loss (I sort of covered some of the events here in my early and thus raw blogging days.)

One unchallenged assumption we made back then was that those brave and courageous enough to stand up to U.S. foreign policy were liberations fighters. We were wrong. Different people probably have individual moments when that assumption proved disasterous, but for me it was probably the scenes of Vietnamese frantically trying to get out of Vietnam when the U.S. withdrew from Saigon - why were all these people trying to get away? they were free now! - and then the embassy takeover in Tehran forced me to reconsider my automatic support of the anti-Shah forces in Iran (because Khoumeini's supporters were, you know, progressive) and, although it took awhile and required kicking some very bad habits, I gradually figured out that being pro-democracy rarely equated anti-American. This new awareness wasn't based on fear but on guilt: I had blindly supported all things progressive and thus supported groups and causes that were as destructive and murderous as I imagined U.S. foreign policy to be.

A realization like that can really knock the wind out of you. Just think "Pol Pot" and imagine the shock when ugly reality intrudes on your complacent support for progressivism.

There are a lot of people who haven't moved beyond their 60's views, and that's their right, but I do find it disturbing that they so little resemble the people we were back then. We may have been dumb, but we also had a lot of love for and eagerly embraced the world and the future. Our belief system was as far away from cynical sophistication as you can possibly get - in fact, we avoided cynical and sophisticated people because they were, like, plastic, you know? Never trust anyone over 30 because they were all sell-outs who had been co-opted by the establishment and lived in the suburbs with houses made of ticky-tacky.

We despised liberals above all because they were phony, which proves that we were right about some things. We also despised the establishment, and the problem with today's liberals is that when they became the establishment, they became what they once opposed.

Yes, I'm going somewhere. I think that maybe you have to be humble enough to admit that the extravagances of one's youth were what they were, and they require neither stubborn defense nor apology but just a little honesty to ascertain what was good and should be preserved and, maybe, even a chance to feel good because even if there were some mistakes there were also some right calls, like supporting the Czechs, the civil rights movements, an end to apartheid, hating hypocrisy and understanding that freedom was worth fighting for even if we misread what actually were freedom, or liberation, movements.

Thompson obliquely addresses this:

Back to your question: Have I moved right? What today is called liberalism is almost unrecognizable from the liberalism of the late 1960s. This is not to be nostalgic about the past — it's a question of being accurate. In his 1966 Cape Town speech, Bobby Kennedy declared himself unwaveringly opposed to communism because it exalts the state over the individual and over the family. He said the best way to oppose communism is to enlarge individual human freedom.

Unfortunately for the old guard, the onrush of events these past few years has produced a lot of people, and especially young folks, who stop, reflect and wonder if they took the red pill or the blue pill. Once you have arrived to a frame of mind to pose the question you already know the answer, so do you do?

One answer lies in a new political undercurrent these days composed of people calling themselves South Park Conservatives and Thompson supplies one definition:

... South Park Conservatives, which describes young Americans who believe in a kick-ass foreign policy, and who mock the compulsory compassion of the P.C. culture. Interestingly, they don't necessarily sign on to every line in the GOP platform.

That's a decent plan for Americans, but what about Canadians? and, more of concern these days, what about the Conservative Party of Canada? I dislike the saying that a conservative is a liberal who got mugged because it is not only dismissive but also implies that conservatives are shallow: someone who will dump their moral principles wholesale after a traumatic event couldn't have held those values very dear. But liberals have become like a friend who keeps suggesting we go out for a latte even though she knows I take my coffee black - she employs the popular word but doesn't really think about what it means.

Thomspon again:

The left/right divide is not what it used to be — that's my point. At the end of the day, I care less about the map than the territory, less about labels than issues.

The Meatriarchy (who is back from vacation) has an apropos post about a pending CBC interview with Trey Parker and Matt Stone and his own thoughts on the misuse of the term conservative.

The CBC Meets South Park may sound like a Monty Python skit, but that's been done. It was an internet thread titled Monty Python Meets the Borg, and the South Park-esque offering was Oh my God, they've assimilated Kenny. The bastards!

I sincerely doubt the CBC can assimilate South Park or even grasp what the movement is all about, but I do hope Canada is ready for the kind of alternative conservatism the South Park types offer: smaller government, de-centralization, truer respect for the individual and above all, replacing mindless prattle in correct-speak PC. It would also be nice to embrace the very liberal notion that we shouldn't be afraid to abandon programs that don't work - despite our investment of both years and money - and try some new solutions that actually might work.

There's a lot of unmarked territory out there, and the Conservatives should be the ones surveying and staking some out.

The innate inertia of Liberals is probably why I kind of share the South Park view of politics:

I hate conservatives, but I f***ing hate liberals.

May 29 - 02:42 - Many posts (like this one) reveal their intent after they have been written. It seems I still don't get why more of my former associates don't support Operation Iraqi Freedom.

I was shocked (in the true sense of the word) when Gulf War I didn't finish the job and get rid of Saddam. I felt a bit guilty so kept abreast of events (and massacres) in Iraq over the years and was on board for regime change long before 2000 elections.

I make no pretense at consistency! I fully recognize that the optimism of the 60's was counterweighed by our real fear of seeing the planet consumed in a nuclear holocaust and maybe our optimism was a defiant response to that fear.

But I never meant the post to be nuanced, and apologize for any pain inadvertant nuance may have caused readers.

I lean towards a libertarianism-with-a-safety-net preference and believe in the tenet That which is not expressly forbidden is thereby allowed (which has gotten me into some interesting exchanges during my years in Canada) and it's a hard-wired thing much like inherent rights and distrusting government.

But my invitation for Canadians to dispense with the old labels and scout the territory was genuine. Labels are human inventions and thus liable to change.

Today's musing were brought to you by the cliche Fortune favours the bold.

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May 26 - Sorry for the light posting - I hit a state where I was too tired to sleep and too tired to post. Really miserable day but I still have to get to work tonight (boo hoo.)

This CBC story about Canada's designation of Iran's People's Mojahedin as a terrorist group needs a little more scrutiny, but I'm inclined to view just about everthing this government says about Iran with suspicion.

The filibuster: one of the curiosities of the American political system, right up there with compromise. Get it together, Congress. We grow weary of your games.

A truly Iraq mission, with, by, and for Iraqis. Every day brings new challenges and the Iraqi people are meeting them.

More tomorrow unless the sky falls and the power is knocked out.

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May 25 - Michael Yon, who's photo "Little Girl" spread across the internet and became part of the American historical record, writes about how information is dissiminated among journalists in Iraq And now, for the rest of the story.....

Interesting read, and very discomforting. If the U.S. military is reporters' main source they ought to admit it instead of trashing the military. Maybe they feel guilty because they aren't doing their jobs properly? (I don't exactly blame them - I'd fear for my safety too were I there - but they should be more honest about how they collect the news.)

(Link via Newsbeat 1

May 29 - I hope I didn't give the impression that I was criticizing Mr. Yon. He is doing what a true reporter does - getting the facts himself in the first-person-singular manner we once assumed all reporters did.

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May 25 - PMO staffer says sponsorship firm paid him $25,000 for Liberal work:

An aide in Prime Minister Paul Martin's office told the sponsorship inquiry Wednesday he was paid $28,000 under the table to work for the Liberals in the late 1990s.

Gaetano Manganiello, who is on a paid leave of absence from his job as a media officer in the PMO, said he worked off the books as a party logistics specialist in 1998 and 1999. He said the then-boss of the party's Quebec wing, Benoit Corbeil, approached him at the Montreal headquarters and said the party was in dire financial straights.

Corbeil said the party could no longer afford his salary but explained the Pluri Design graphic firm, owned by Jean Chretien's friend Jacques Corriveau, could step in to pay him, Manganiello testified.

"I was informed by Mr. Corbeil that Pluri Design would pay my salary but I would continue working at the Liberal party," Manganiello told the inquiry, saying he was on the firm's payroll for nine months.

"He (Corbeil) didn't tell me why, but in all fairness, I didn't ask why either."

(Via Neale News.)

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May 25 - Master Meriadoc could lecture us well on the virtues of being unnoticed ... at least for a short period of time.

Was Canada Just Too Good to Be True?.

Actually, it's a pretty good article but either he doesn't know about or chooses to ignore some troubling questions about the procrastination of the Liberal Party in allowing the non-confidence vote or the thoughts in the minds of some Westeners and Quebeckers.

Or maybe he just hadn't read the opening paragraphs of this.

Or, more significantly, this Lorrie Goldstein column that takes a pretty close look at the Grewal-Murphy tape and Insta!Stronach Cabinet post.

May 29 - Today's editorial in the Toronto Sun, Can't we take a little criticism? says that Canadians should be thanking Krauss; it seems that Clifford Krauss has been slammed for his article in the NY Times for puncturing some of Canada's illusions about itself.

We hope Clifford Krauss is reading this, because after the week he's had, he deserves a thank-you.

The New York Times' Canadian correspondent filed a stinging dispatch from Toronto last week that predictably riled many Canucks -- because, we submit, it was true.

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1 An excellent article, especially this quote; "Of course, quite a few nations have an embellished sense of righteousness, not least among them, many would say, Canada's southern neighbor."

Posted by: Flanstein at May 25, 2005 04:17 PM (XYwW8)

2 For an alternative view, there's the latest eruption from Mt. Simpson. Seems there's this rogue opposition MP running around trapping innocent chiefs of staff into exquisitely prudent abstractions. For four hours. Or, equally plausible to an outsider, that he was indeed sniffing around, visiting cabinet ministers, opening up lines of communication for a switch, hoping to secure something then or later for himself and/or his wife. http://www.andrewcoyne.com *********************************************** His latest column is up; link provided; an excellent political essay. Compare it to Mr. Simpson (G&M spavined-hackneyed nag; his best cliche is "thin gruel". He has not written an original thought since his last thank-you card to Santy Claus 68 years ago). Support Andre Coyne vs. the Liberals who want us to forget the tapes of four hours long. Bloggers, please keep it up top. AC Coyne is a worthy. Bravo.

Posted by: maz2 at May 25, 2005 06:37 PM (2+PY/)

3 Flanstein, Krauss was writing in American, not Canadian, and there is a difference. There is no U.S. parallel to the gossipy nature of the Canadian media about American national issues because we such to be inpolite and properly falls under the "none of our business" category. Ask yourself: how often do mainstream U.S. publications criticize or air the dirty laundry of other countries? Krauss's article contains absolutely no international affairs content; that's a clue. I too noticed that Krauss inserted some "even-handed treatment" in his article but again, you'd have to read it in American to pick up on what was not said and thus implicitly communicated. As I said: better when Canada was unnoticed (but that too should be read in American.) Maz2, fear not! Read the Goldstein article and go "hmmm."

Posted by: Debbye at May 25, 2005 08:51 PM (ynrmu)

4 Hmmm. BTW, if you were wondering why Murphy isn't going after CTV or the Globe and Mail, the following may be of interest: Step 1: Google: "ivan fecan" ctv globe Step 2: Google: "ivan fecan" "paul martin" Step 3: Pour very large darnk. Just a thought

Posted by: Tony at May 25, 2005 09:51 PM (tjFjH)

5 I caught this one two - Back last November after the election the NYT was praising Canada. Now this. The stabbing buggers!

Posted by: Darcey at May 26, 2005 12:52 AM (lcgli)

6 "There is no U.S. parallel to the gossipy nature of the Canadian media about American national issues because we such to be inpolite and properly falls under the "none of our business" category." Ahem, most American media don't comment on foreign affairs because they don't believe that anything that happens outside their country is important (unless America is involved in which case it becomes VERY important)- not because they are polite.

Posted by: Flanstein at May 26, 2005 08:16 AM (XYwW8)

7 Once again more ammunition that "ought" to be used by the RCMP in investigating the levels of corruption and to what levels the Liberals will go to hold onto their power. The question that remains to be answered is, will the RCMP actually investigate? Who has the authority to order/ask the RCMP to investigate these charges? Will that person/persons please step forward and demand an investigation? I really don't care what the outcome of the investigation is (VBEG), lets get the thing started!

Posted by: crabby mr bill at May 26, 2005 11:42 AM (rp6r3)

8 "Who has the authority to order/ask the RCMP to investigate these charges?" Don;t forget "Who has the ability to order the RCMP to forget the afore-mentioned investigation or cover up the results?

Posted by: Jay at May 26, 2005 01:06 PM (PuNh2)

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May 25 - I've had some things on my mind today, like the dissolution of Confederation and moronic pilots, so I needed a really good laugh.

Ask, and it shall be given: Parrish ponders return to Liberal party:

Independent MP Carolyn Parrish says Prime Minister Paul Martin has left the door open for her to return to the Liberal fold.

The Toronto Star reports that the suggestion came from the prime minister himself last Thursday, after she voted in favour of passing the government's budget in a crucial confidence vote.

"He gave me a big hug and a kiss," Parrish told the Star.

She says a colleague asked if it wasn't time for Parrish to return to caucus, and Martin said: "Whenever, you're ready," according to Parrish.

(Via Neale News.)

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May 25 - US military had OK to shoot errant plane.

Yes Rummy! I had no doubt.

Pilot Hayden "Jim" Sheaffer told NBC on Tuesday he thought he was going to be "shot out of the sky."

Solution: Fly a banner from the Washington Monument. It will say:

IF YOU CAN READ THIS, YOU HAVE 0 SECONDS TO TURN AROUND OR YOU WILL BE SHOT DOWN.

I have not posted about this before because I have been in a hot rage: the passengers on Flight 93 gave their lives to protect D.C.

That is OUR capitol and it damned well will be defended.

You know what I'm saying.

May 27 - Rummy says he didn't. Rats.

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May 24 - 11:29: The spirit of Tom Paine is alive and well in Canada. Walsingham has written forcefully and eloquently that The Tipping Point has been reached in Canada and concluded that the only option remaining is to dissolve this confederation.

Will a “spirit of ‘05” now arise here? I believe it is already stirring. The Liberals, with much of Ontario in dumb connivance, have sown the seeds. They do not understand what they have set irretrievably in motion. It is far beyond their sphere of recognition to see that far from saving Canada, they have destroyed it. A Canada worth preserving might just have been revived had this government fallen. But the very factors and forces that prevented that fall have now pointed the future in a very different direction. And I say: so be it. The chasm has been crossed. The tipping point has been reached.

"The Tipping Point" may well take its rightful place beside the pamphlet "Common Sense" and ought to be spread from browser to browser by all who believe in liberty.

(Via Keith, who adds some thoughts in his post.)

May 25 - 7:55 - Despite the bravado in my posted words above, I still feel as though I am in mourning. I felt this way once before: on Sept. 11 (it's an American-sourced feeling.) The logic of Walsingham's post is inescapable, though, and I am somewhat comforted by these words from Occam's Carbuncle if only because he too sees the abyss:

There comes a time, however, when you realize that the apparent complexities of life, while important to our understanding of events, are not what should ultimately speak to us, are not matters upon which to base our fundamental ideas about right and wrong, about what is good or ill for ourselves and our society. The simplest of notions, ones like liberty, democracy, pride, dignity, loyalty, are the ones that must shape our actions. It is precisely these simple ideas that increasingly become meaningless as this party and that interest work to obscure them to their own profit. Are we utterly lost, as Walsingham suggests? Is this the time when Canada, like a reluctant phoenix, immolates itself, and we are left to await whatever incarnation may rise from the ashes? I can't bring myself to say yes. I've urged others to say no. I want to say no. I can't say that either. If you think this is all rather silly and overwrought, then I am sorry for you. Things matter, or they do not.

Oh Canada, how much I grieve for thee.

I'm bumping this post up. Walsingham must be read (and Maz2's comment.) I'm even adding a quote of my own:

These are the times that try men's souls. (It's a quote and I refuse to de-gender it.)

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May 24 - The Kroll Report (from the Adscam auditors) can be viewed here.

May 25 - 06:50 - There's a discussion about the future of the Maritime provinces should confederation collapse in the comments well worth reading. Feel free to join in.

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May 24 - Angry in the Great White North has a breakdown of some of the numbers that came out of today's session of the Gomery Inquiry and has a Sample of how the government manages our money:

Out of a total of $46.32 million:
$460,000, or 1%, went to sponsorship
$8.34 million, or 18%, went to actual work done
$26 million, or 56%, went to "unrelated or unknown parties"
$11.52 million, or 25%, was unspent or the invoices were not found

"Not found." Went to "unrelated or unknown parties."

I have no words.

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May 24 - From Darcey of Dust My Broom with an update on the the protest by the Poundmaker Working Group who are remaining in the offices of Chief Ted Antoine and the Council until new elections are called. Also he's got more background here and a request for support here which asks for letters of support, supplies and phone cards.

If you're not aware of what has been happening, you can read all Darcey's posts on the Poundmaker protest by going here and scrolling down.

Maybe you think it's none of our business? Publius puts it well: "Functioning along roughly the same mental lines that allowed generations of wife beaters to remain protected under the guise "family unity," so the new imperialists have been allowed to get away with their crimes." (Read the post.)

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