Top Of The List!
NEW: Change - we know the problem - what the fuck are we going to DO about it is the question...??
(still) NEW!! Ammo - selection of very good commentary from other writers on important stuff; - FAAAAARRRRR BETTER THAN TV!!!
Canadians for Canada Coalition (CCC) - United Left, if you will - but bottom of the line - Get Rid of Corporate Government in Canada - 2004 Federal Election may be your last chance - act NOW PLEASE!!
The Debt Conspiracy Theory Fact - do you believe people who email you from Africa wanting to give you 10 million bucks? No? Well WHY DO YOU BELIEVE THE NATIONAL DEBT IS LEGITIMATE?!?!? (Sorry - I get excited about this...)
911 - as important as the debt scam - ask yourself why you are so afraid to admit the truth here, even when it's been kicking you in the face almost since it happened? When the world you live in is operating under a lie this big and obvious and monstrous, you have no security whatsoever.
Unbrand Your Life
![[Blue Ribbon Campaign icon]](http://br.eff.org/br.gif)
Pogo knew....
stop this....
and this....
Thomas D'Aquino
Hand of Mordor
in Canada
stop this...
save this...
random quotes
George Orwell 1984
mama mama who dat scary man mama??!!
- comment from a friend - you, Rude, get a bit rude with your friends sometimes - you should watch that - puzzled me for a moment, because I try to treat my few friends with the utmost consideration - perhaps RM? - ahhhhhh - I at times perhaps get carried away in these small observations on the state of things, and say things like "...YOU ....." whatever - which may seem to be directed at "the reader" - it is, really, a case of "if the shoe fits wear it", to coin a phrase, and, for those who are my friends, the shoe does not fit .....
Priority mentions! Lear's Shadow by a Canadian artist named Douglas Ord - very thoughtful and well executed place to visit, expressing many of the same ideas to be found here, but in a somewhat calmer and more visual and reflective way. A little trying for those with low bandwidth (c'est moi! c'est moi!!) - but worth the wait.
The Pispot's been at it again all week - just a matter of picking the most offensive stuff, as various constraints (I still haven't finished the equations which will allow me to extend the actual length of the day somewhat) prevent one from commenting on quite everything one might like to. Talk about conspiracies - I don't ever remember being asked if I wanted 24 hour days or any of that shit man. bobsyeruncle (fuck I wish somebody would tell me what that idiotic phrase is supposed to mean someday)
Our Miss Nicks - (you remember her! - she's the Pispoter who thinks that The Matrix is an allegory SUPPORTING her and her fellow neocons!!! Really!! - in favor of letting "free markets" guide us all to a better future - after we get rid of them damned treehugging socialist bastards who want to take away everyone's freedom, like in the movie!! WOWSER!!!! did you know that you should be identifying with Smith and not Neo, because Lizzie is really Neo!!!!!?!?!?!? you damned commies!!) - anyway, she's at it again - we do feel she has become seriously disconnected from reality after only such a short acquaintance, but fairly impressive - which, one supposes, is not that hard to do in BC - they seem to have been at least a bit disconnected for some time - this is the province, don't forget, that elected Bill Vanderzam a few years ago, and is currently in the process of giving the rich of that province massive tax breaks while committing themselves to several billion bucks to build some places for athletes from around the world to play in a few years - we don't have any particular objections to building places to play sports, but we do feel that there may be a slight problem with priorities here, if we take a look at the same government pleading poverty for its less well-off citizens, and closing schools and hospitals and stuff like that. But that's Canada all over, in the new millennium.
Anyway, in this particular piece we are going to look at, she takes up the cudgel foretold in this very space a few short issues (haha) ago, about how NGOs are a blight on the face of the planet - Soft totalitarianism of the world's NGOs - faithfully following along in the steps of The Master's Voice at the American Enterprise Institute (she claims some recent UN report is her source, but a diligent search turns up nothing at all recent from the UN on NGOs, but the AEI did begin an NGO-watch initiative a couple of weeks ago, as we talked about), the Pispot (I think you could take any of their "columns" and put any of their shills names on them - they read faithfully from the same script - via Ms. Nicks taking their first shot (another prediction - not their last!) at the existence of NGOs in Canada and elsewhere - how dare anyone get together and speak for the "small" people and try to thwart her neocon masters and the Dollar-Market Democracy they stand so firmly for!!!! These people (that'd be yer far-right wacko neoconmen (and girls in this case) who shill for anti-Canadian wannabe-American outfits like the National Pispot and Fraser Institute) constantly complaining about how bad this country is and how great the fascist USA is - and not a friggin one of them ever explaining why they don't just move down there to that elitist heaven they have such high regard for and leave us poor socialists and our medicare system and stuff like that alone. Not a one - it would be nice to see someday. But then, so would April in PEI without 20 feet of snow over my garden - nice but unlikely - I don't know where they ever got the old saying about two things being inevitable - death and taxes - they missed a few - the idiocy of rightwing ideologues and snow in PEI in April come to mind, for some reason. Anyway, we didn't start this to talk about snow in PEI (one would rather not, actually), but to have a little examination of Ms. Nicks' follow-the-leader feelings towards NGOs (and, by extension, the neoconvicts she speaks for all). RM archive copy
Well ok Rude enough of the suspense - what's happenin' man! Let's have a wee look at a couple of the things yer Ms. Nicks is on about, and why anyone not a secret member of the AEI should, as usual, be a bit careful about believing anything they say. Liz says, for instance,
"...So let's be clear. Environmental NGOs and private foreign foundations effectively shut down the forest business in B.C. in the '90s, and are now hell- bent on shuttering what's left of forestry, mining and fisheries...."
- Liz seems to be overlooking the activities of the US forestry industry in shutting down the BC forestry industry through their "Free Trade" activities under NAFTA, so oft in the news, with one current case even still outstanding - but that's pretty par for the course - Lies'R'US is, after all, the trademark of the US and its affiliates such as the Pispot - and of course we don't even want to consider the merits of any particular argument, such as the fact that about 90% of Vancouver Island is more like a moonscape than an original old-growth forest these days - just maybe forestry OUGHT to be cut back Liz, in the name of saving the frigging planet!! And the fisheries? Living in so-called Lotusland of Canada out there on Saltspring (what the hell is she doing with all them hippies anyway? a question for another day!) she may well be unaware of what is happening on the east coast, but that doesn't make the disappearance of the cod stock there any less of a disaster than it has been, and I am NOT speaking of the livelihoods of the Newfoundland fishermen or the sad fate of some National Seafoods canning plants - the North Atlantic cod stock was one of the wonders of the world, an icon of the bounty of nature - and in a few short decades "we" (I am, apparently, of the same race, although evidently not with the same brain or something) have brought this incredible thing to the verge of extinction - not a new activity for us, but another shameful tragedy wrought by Homo sapiens - but WHO GIVES A FUCK ABOUT THAT SHIT!!! (some do! - Serendipity file number XYZ - as I write, this piece appears in my mailbox about this very thing! - Silver Donald Cameron, an Atlantic writer, on the good guy side of stuff, talking about the poliical problems that caused the collapse of the fishery)(perhaps I shouldn't put words into Lizzie's mouth - but one can almost hear it) - as any good capitalist knows, ALL that stuff out there has only one purpose, to make money!!! - and as long as there's a fish in the ocean, by god, let the laws of the market and capitalism operate, and may the best fisherman win!! (that is, the guy with the most money to buy the biggest boat and nets, and guns and stuff to protect their turf, etc and etc - "market economy" in action). She may not know of the problems with the east coast fishery, but one would think she could hardly be unaware of the problems with the salmon fishery in BC, also currently facing some very serious threats - but apparently such threats don't concern her, since she is so determined to get rid of anyone who dares to not only speak in favor of environmentalism, but actually organize to try to do something useful. Her words "what's left of...." the fishery etc indicates she may have some awareness that the resources are indeed threatened - but the entire tenor of her tirade against NGOs says quite clearly that, as far as she is concerned, SO FUCKING WHAT???? LET'S GO AND GET WHAT'S LEFT!!! KILL THE TREEHUGGERS AND ANY OTHER SOB WHO TRIES TO STOP US YEAH!!! - actually, dear, you don't have to be so upset - once you finish off the fish, and the forests, which it seems you are probably going to do, as "your" side is clearly winning here, the planet will probably die, at least as we know it, taking the treehuggers along with it - are you aware in any part of your brain that when that happens you will go too, along with your children and the rest of your family and friends? All your bucks, and the bucks of the AEI and Izzy ain't gonna save you for long - at some point you will find you can't eat 'em. Fuck you people make me mad sometimes. Greed and stupidity - I guess they've been inbreeding pretty badly as well - greed and stupidity squared and cubed. fuckfuckfuck
And this one from dear Liz -
"... The UN (mother of all NGOs) report continued that NGOs are encouraging small poor countries not to open their markets to trade, because NGOs are inherently suspicious of business and the market...."
- they always leave out some key words, and lie a lot - it's absolute nonsense (at best - a 'straw dog lie' is a more likely explanation) to say NGOs don't like business - NGOs support business in every country in which they operate - the difference, of course, is the word "big" - NGOs support SMALL LOCAL businesses, under local management and control, with the profits and jobs staying in local communities - which, of course, is complete anathema to BIG business and international control of everything, which most non-corporate sponsored NGOs do indeed oppose, many quite strongly and successfully (undoubtedly this success being the source of the AEI and Liz's ire) - Liz's bosses and gods, of course. There might be some interesting discussions there, about to what extent small can become a bit bigger and still be useful to local communities - but Liz ain't having none of that - no siree, we'll just generalize (i.e. lie) today - NGOs ARE AGAINST ALL business!!! - what fucking idiocy. Actually, it is Liz's bosses who are against business, if you look at it objectively - it's hard to call a huge multinational cartel a "business" - but what these things do is shut down local businesses as much as possible, and establish a monopoly of one type or another - thus denying the local community the many benefits of small, local businesses, everything from decent service to accountability to providing decent-paying jobs - can you find me a Walmart or Nike shop that does those things? And those of you with a Walmart within spitting distance - would you care to take a quick sort of tally of the number of small, local businesses that were destroyed when Walmart opened up - small businesses that also kept a lot more of the profits circulating in the community one way and another - where do you figure Walmart profits are going? And would you care to take a wild guess as to which side of that equation any of your local NGOs might be in support of? We KNOW who Liz would support.
- and on we go (too bad we've already done a "Deconstructing" piece - this one could be taken apart much the same way, possibly even moreso - but a lot of it would get needlessly repetitive, so we'll just take a couple of new points from her rather incoherent ramblings trashing NGOs... necessarily so, of course, since any objective analysis would show the necessary role such groups play in today's world, so cool and rational wouldn't cut it here (rarely does with anything the Pispot writes about, for that matter, for the same reasons....) -
"...Once people know the full effect of NGOs and their private foundation funders, that influence will vanish for a generation...." - one wonders if one isn't detecting just a bit of BAWBL here, or at least wishful thinking (so many Fraser-type or other right-wingish reports are based on this kind of thing - they decide what kind of society they would like, and then commission "academics" and suchlike to provide proof that this is how it is, or should be, and their "wishlist" is often pretty much diametrically opposed to both reality and the wishes of most people - like lower taxes leading to closed hospitals, for instance) - fear-based perhaps - since all over the world, it would appear that NGOs are actually growing in influence - what is losing influence in leaps and bounds are huge corporate-based organisations like the WTO and NAFTA, as people are starting to open their eyes more and more as these corps and their organisations keep bashing them over the head, and realise that these people, in spite of all their fine talk about democracy and prosperity for all, are, in reality, making a small group of people very wealthy, and the great mass of people poorer and less free - and people do not care to be lied to over and over again, and eventually the peasants do revolt, as every elite has found throughout history - and also throughout history, shills of the elite have lied to the bitter end, as Liz is doing here, trying desperately to maintain their position. The increasingly smaller number of people turning out to vote is another aspect of this - as more and more citizens realise that "their" political parties are actually not doing much for them, but regardless of which TT (tweedledum-tweedledee) candidate gets elected, the actions of the government are what the corps want, rather than the people - something else everyone has to wake up about soon if we are to save our country - there is NO FUCKING IMPORTANT DIFFERENCE between the Libs and Conservatives in Canada anymore - hasn't been for quite a long time, at least 20 years - just note the lies they all tell - Mulroney said before his first election (1984) he was DEFINITELY AGAINST FREE TRADE!!!! - it's true - check any newspaper archives you want if you're too young to remember - but then he reversed course and brought it in - and when people had had enough of that shit, Chretien PROMISED to "renegotiate or abrogate" the NAFTA before his 1993 election - and within weeks signed it with no changes. Lies lies lies lies and more fucking lies - and who wins and loses? In every case, the corps win and the people lose. And as I keep fucking saying, they're going to keep lying and fucking everyone until enough people stand up and say STOP!!! - and the growth and strength of NGOs during this time in our history (and of course the consequent fear of them, and thus this move to get rid of them by the neocons) is a direct result of that fact - that the "elected representatives" of the people are NOT representing them anymore, and they see the country going to hell, and things happening they do NOT want, but the government is CAUSING it, not helping them. It's the old "Democracy" shell game - where is democracy? under this shell or that one?!?!? - the hand is faster than the eye!! - you pick the Libs? HAHAHA - you lose!!!! you pick the PCs?!?!? HAHAHA you lose again!!! - NONONONONO - the shell game is the enemy!!! - if you want REAL freedom, REAL democracy - you tell the conman (that'd be your neoconman, yes indeed!) to take a fucking hike!!! - when the agent of the conman (that'd be your TT "candidate") comes knocking at your door - tell him or her you want a legally enforceable contract that they will do what they promise to do, and NOT do anything else of ANY importance without your fucking permission (as in, of course, some kind of countable townhall meeting situation or something, something a little more open at any rate than behind-closed-doors meetings with the corporate lobbyists) - tell them you are FUCKING SICK of their FUCKING LIES!!! - and by FUCK you will not vote for them or anyone else until you are FUCKING SURE that the person who is elected is going to represent the fucking PEOPLE and NOT the fucking corps. Seriously - you get enough "fucks" in there, and they might believe you're serious. Then again you might get locked up.... society depends to a large extent on people accepting many blatant lies and saying or doing nothing about them - people who run around pointing at naked emperors are not usually highly regarded - know that before you start pointing......
But it will only work if a LOT of people do this, or something like it. As we well know, it is no problem at all to blow off the 5% or so of us who see through their little games.
In a nutshell of course (oh there goes that punning again!) these people friggin HATE NGOs on principle - NGOs were and are formed to (try to) speak in a collective voice for the people whom their supposed government is NOT speaking for, elections and democratic theory aside, as the governments in reality are speaking for the people who run them from Bay St (in Canada, and whatever similar neocon HQs exist elsewhere) - the same masters as the Pispot and Ms Nicks - they, of course (Bay St, CCCE et al.), are generally supportive of what the government is up to these days, or the general direction it's been heading the last 20-odd years, since they basically dictate that direction (lower taxes anyone?) - they're never happy, of course (and it's part of the shell game to continue to knock government, because as long as there is the chance of democratically electing the government, there is a chance WE will elect people who will represent US and NOT the corps!!!, so they do want to convince US to cut off our only true chance all by ourselves! - gimme those chains bro! - it's like a good cop-bad cop routine - ya gotta remember they're still cops!!) - i.e. as we recently saw, the $$$100 Billion in tax cuts of a few months ago, which appalled most centrist (i.e. pinko-commie-treehugging-crazy-fucking-lefties) sorts of Canadians in the damage it was going to inflict on everything from health care to education in an already gutted system, was only grudgingly received by the neocons who had been demanding such cuts - and within days they were demanding even MORE cuts!! - really, they won't be happy until there is nothing left of government at all except a few police to protect them when their mandarins drive around collecting the rent from the peasants, all of whom are living in the dark of course, market-price electricity being far above the ability of peasants to afford. Three cheers for the New Feudalism!!
But this is what most NGOs, at the end of the day, are trying to stop - the full ascendency of corporate government, and the saving of our country and planet from the environmental and social genocide of the neocon "businesses" whose apparent goal is the complete eradication of life on earth. I know that sounds extreme, but it's pretty much the only conclusion you can come to when you examine what they demand - to take an example from dear Liz, the right to cut all the trees in the BC forests is high on their list, and to catch all the fish in the ocean - and it is the activity of local NGOs trying to stop this devastation that has Ms. Nicks so upset this time. It would be nice if we ever got a chance to talk about this stuff in elections, but the Pispots and Suns see to it that nothing of substance is ever brought up (or rarely, as with the so-called Free Trade election - but they fixed that up ok).
And finally (YES!!!!!) - the Pispot-Enterprise-Nickie outcry against NGOs at this time is simply another perfect example of a BAWBL - NGOs are TRYING to have some say, on behalf of many, many people in the country (Canada and around the world too, of course) who have been quite deliberately excluded from the corridors of power regardless of who they voted for, which have been taken over by - UNELECTED corporate lobbyists - this is the thing that seems to offend the PP et al., or at least their rallying cry, about the NGOs - their "unelected" status - but hey! - I don't, for instance, recall Tom D'Aquino ever being elected to any public office, yet he gets invited to a hell of a lot more dinners at 24 Sussex than, for instance, even high-profile NGOers like David Suzuki or Maude Barlow - and whether Ms. Nickie cares to admit it or not, David and Maude speak for a hell of a lot more Canadians than Tom d'Aquino. We will admit, though, that although his client base is smaller by orders of magnitude, his bank account and the money he represents are larger by the same orders of magnitude - and since we have transformed (without anybody in Ottawa bothering to tell any citizens) into a market democracy (one dollar = one vote), that means Tom and his few bodies but lots of money get listened to, elected or not, while NGOs, lots of bodies but few dollars, get told to take a hike - and lambasted by Ms. Nicks and the Pispot for even daring to ask that their voices be heard. Nor do we recall anyone at the Pispot et al. ever being elected - yet they do nothing, day after day after month after month after year after interminable year except cajole and lie to the Canadian people in a very serious and well-organised effort to sway and shape popular opinion. A far louder voice than any of the NGOs ever have.
Oh well - enough of that.
Another "disconnect" story - as in, I read a headline, and think - "Yeah! I dig that! - but why the fuck is it in the Pispot?!?!?" - but then, after a perusal of the story, things become a bit more clear - as we ("we" being Me and Bobby McGee here) talked about briefly before sometime or other, we ("we" being the "good" guys and the "bad" guys here) often use the same words, but attach different meanings to them - it's all part of the agenda shit we talked about awhile ago - people trying to do dirty deeds like yer local neoconmen cover their real agenda by various means, and this is one of them - you know the story - Orwell knew it well - take words with good meanings, and twist them to your own perverted ends - Bush's "Patriot" Act, for instance, which gutted the US Bill of Rights or whatever they call it down there, and more correctly would have been called something like the (first big) Bush Traitorous Act - I don't know why they couldn't have been a bit more honest - it's apparent that no one in the American tv-loving public would have thought twice about it - one thinks at times that both Madison-Avenue and the White House are so set in their lying ways that they just automatically lie about everything.
Anyway - the headline that got me this time - Why are we still fighting gag laws? - piece by an old-time rightie we've mentioned before called Clare Hoy RM archive copy (interestingly enough, Hoy lauds the Supreme Court for striking this law down - usually any time the Supreme Court does anything at all, the rightees are screaming about how the damned and double-damned "activist" court is interfering with the sacred democratic process yada yada yada yada - I guess if it's doing something they like, they'll sort of forget about that bit for awhile - the word "hypocrisy" is usually emblazoned somewhere on the forehead of every elitist, at least for those with the green glasses to see clearly in this land of Oz - "One law for us and another for you!" being one of the favorite expressions (coded of course!). But that's just an aside - let's get on to the story....)
- basically, Hoy here is taking the federal government to task for trying to limit the amount of money that can be spent on partisan advertising during an election campaign. In itself, Hoy is right enough here (pun alert!!) - the problem is, that as the "right" see and promote it, this is a very one-sided 'right" - another aspect of "market democracy" where those with the bucks are free to speak as much as they want (i.e. the National Pispot, or Izzy's rags) - but what about the majority of non-wealthy people? Do they have any kind of equal "right" in our democracy to be heard beyond the casting of a solitary and functionally irrelevant TT vote every few years? And this is Hoy's and the PP-etc's failing - they don't address how the people without any money to buy several weeks worth of expensive newspaper ads during an election campaign might get THEIR two cents worth into the debate - again, I guess, not a concern of the rightees, whose second motto is "one dollar one vote - THAT'S democracy!" It's a very real concern of both sides actually - the rightees know that even when they are allowed to spend unlimited millions buying candidates, and filling their newspapers with lies and propaganda, they still barely manage to maintain control of the government, and do so only through archaic election laws that allow them to control the major parties, and allow these major parties to achieve "majority" governments with a small fraction of the support of Canadian voters (example - year 2,000 - Chretien's Libs (or would that be more appropriately worded Bay Street's Chretien's Libs) get 40% of the vote - with approx 60% voter turnout - approx 25% support of voting age Canadians - yet a solid majority of seats in the House of "commons". Yea democracy. And let's not start with the many voters who do not show up - it's not because they don't care (most of them anyway) but because they understand the system is so rigged that their votes make little or no difference, so feel it is a waste of time - and one can hardly argue with them).
Imagine, for a moment if you will, and tying in the first small story above, what would happen in an election if Suzuki's environmental organization and Barlow's social organization and other popular and widely supported NGOs were allowed EQUAL advertising space with D'Aquino's business organization in the media of the nation, to lay out their viewpoints for the electorate, not seriously limited by the amount of money they had - and if we had some sort of proportional representation in this country so that people who could truly call themselves representative of the people of Canada got into power in Ottawa!!! IMAGINE!!!! - no - I don't know if I'm about to laugh or cry or fall through the looking glass again! - but THAT is what these people are so terrified of, and that is why they MUST do as much as they can to derail any influence of NGOs, and anything they can to maintain the power of the Dollar Democracy.
And that ain't conspiracy theory. It's fucking fact.
(oh man I get carried away! - but what about some proportionality they say?!?!? - should one lone wacko promoting a government of by and for, shall we say, Martians, be allowed equal space in the papers?!?! - well, ok, let's work out some proportionality ideas - for instance, Tom D represents, as I recall, the CEOs of the 500 wealthiest Canadian corps - definitely a voice of the rich. What if we took the time to get together the 500 poorest organisations in Canada (providing them with funding, of course, just for the sake of fairness - maybe sort of the same amount that Tom's bunch spend on offices and staff and travel and meetings and funding research that is favourable to their ideas and so on?) and gave them equal space to put out their point of view - it's no big deal!! - newsprint is cheap - as part of the election law, mandate that in every election, the Feds will cover the cost of the newsprint (but not commercial ad rates!) - and every group or individual who can show a certain small level of support will get space - perhaps even according to the level of that support, based on issues or something rather than the amount of dollars one has? too carried away, I bet..... but speaking of - a quick comment on Chretien's "new" electoral financing package - pretty suspicious looking - he saw to it that the Libs got a big head start in the financing - kind of like giving last year's Stanley Cup champs the first pick at the draft AND a preferred schedule AND a big cash bonus to pick up free agents - REALLY fair shit man!!! - if he or anyone was serious about making elections more fair, they could do a fuck of a lot better than this cosmetic shit - of course, they (or the corps that run them) have NO fucking interest in making elections more fair at all - quite the reverse, actually, and I think a somewhat longer commentary on this is on the list so we'll just leave 'er for now....)
- and again, to anticipate the protest that "But Rude! - you're doing the same thing they are but from the other side!" - I do beg to differ - what they are after is a process where those with money get to speak and fuck the rest - I am not saying that - what? those who are poor should control things and the rich be excluded? - no - I am simply saying that ALL who wish to participate in whatever national debate should be allowed an opportunity to do so - and that means doing something to allow those without money some sort of opportunity to do so, and not making your "freedom" to speak contingent on how much money you have, which seems to be what "they" are promoting, and which does not accord with the definition of democracy as I understand it.
This is one of those things - under the pretense of supporting free speech, what Hoy actually talks about here is free speech FOR THOSE WHO CAN AFFORD IT!! AND FUCK THE REST OF YOUS!! - he (and the other neoconmen) for some reason manage to leave this last bit out whenever they talk about it. As always, we try to shed some light on this kind of shit here. Dim batteries, but we try, following in the steps of brave Diogenes with his lantern in the dark of the dark night - with but a small thread to the Force. Obi Wan - where the fuck are you when we need you?!?!?!?! (I know what he'd say....)
Democratic disconnect: as talked about before, there seems to be a big disconnect between democratic theory and the reality we are living under, and the Pispot is a great place to wander if you wonder what that feeling is like, or need a fix - this story Tax the rich more? Statistics show they pay their fair share may provide a clue about that - we'll discuss (haha) the story itself in a bit, but at one point the CTF (Canadian Taxpayer's Federation, so-called - they ought, in the interests of accuracy, add a word or three to their moniker - i.e. "Rich" CTF might be more accurate.......) RM archive copy point out that something like 3.5% of Canadian tax-filers earn over $100,000 bucks a year - what they don't point out, but what we all know, is that the MPs we "elect" have deemed themselves worth something like $135,000 at entry level (man wouldn't you just love to be able to set your own salary and never have to ask anyone but your coworkers if they approved, and do it the first day on the job and your "bosses" couldn't fire you for five years???? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!! YEEEEESSSSSSS!!!!!! - and of course, with the media batting for you, in five years they'll have forgotten about that last pay hike that you always do long before an election for this very reason and will elect you again!!!! - seriously though, this has to be part of the payoff system for these semi-humans who must have, at one time, had a real human soul and have decided to sell it for lucre - and you always hear them (MPs and the Big Business people who support them) whinging about the need to pay high salaries to attract "quality" candidates - (about that
And it ain't gonna change until YOU stand the fuck up and say ENOUGH!!!! (and you AIN'T gonna hear anyone on your tv tell you that, my friend!) (sorry there I go again - but my friends ("real" friends!), don't take it personally! - it ain't directed at you! - it's my frustration trying to reach out to those who do NOT hear my voice or the voices of the many, many others like me, who spend their 4 hours a day in front of their tvs maintaining their brains in the state of whitenoise acceptance and apathy that allows the current ongoing coup of our government and country (and world for that matter) to continue, who DO believe that lower taxes are great and THEIR government is a bad institution (it ain't the government, it's the people they've allowed to be placed there) - and so on. Here - lemme buy the next round.....)
- context context context!!! - actually, lower taxes would be fine for thee and me and those we love and our (true) peers, and are eminently possible in a well-governed and wealthy country like we have here, while not only maintaining but vastly IMPROVING our entire social and physical infrastructure!!! - by fairly taxing the people who are accumulating most of the wealth in their greedy little offshore accounts, and by getting rid of the national debt so that 25% of our taxes don't go straight into the accounts of those few individuals or institutions wealthy enough to be lending money to the government - how that's for starters eh? a 25% tax reduction right off the ol' top!!! - funny we don't hear the Frasers or Pispot or CTF talking about that one!! (or our 'representatives"!! - hahahaha - actually most of them probably have no more idea of the National Debt Scam than most other Canadians - but they should - in their positions ignorance is not an acceptable defence) - really - just imagine if our parliament actually spoke for the 95% of non-rich Canadians, and was trying to encourage the 5% of the wealthy to start supporting this country, rather than lying and otherwise coercing the 95% of non-wealthy to make the rich even richer!! What a RADICAL friggin idea!!! - no wonder they're all so terrified of anything approaching "real" democracy, where the people might actually try to do such a thing!
- fuck there I go crossing the old mirror again - Hi wonderland!!! how y’all doin?? how's me ol bud the White Rabbit - sorry, the Mad Hatter!!!!!!
Ya oughtta have a look.......
- and here's our old trusty friends at the Pispot again, whining and sulking still cause they didn't get a chance to go and play war with their big brothers down south - and they did so want to show what wonderful, loyal sycophants they were, and maybe get an invite to George's ranch. We note, of course, that anytime "we" talk about things in the past, even the recent past, "the war is done and Iraq is liberated - get over it!!" is the cry from the Pispot - but not for their own little peeves - we'll be hearing about this for awhile, to be sure. It's pretty pathetic altogether as well - anyway, in this one Learn from Australia they're making a big issue out of how the Australian government (I was going to say the Australians, but my reading of various internet mail lists indicates that many if not most Australians are not that happy with what the government did by trotting along obediently behind the Americans, tails and tongues a wagging as the Pispot people feel Canada should have been doing (what a sad vision!) - but there, as here, democracy is an idea more noted in the breach than the practice.... but not, of course, noted in the "national media" of that country any more than here, as the existence of a truly functioning, representative media is, again, more noted in the breach than the presence...) eagerly joined up with George and Tony on their latest bombing rampage, and are using this to make the case that Canada, because of its common historical ties, should have joined up too. Now - one might say exactly the opposite, of course - an Australian might be down there somewhere writing that Canada's government had the balls, supported by most of the Canadian people, to tell George and his warmongers in Washington to STICK IT WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE or something polite like that, and why the goshdarn didn't Mr. Howard have the guts to do the same, instead of doing things not appropriate for an Australian male, like asslicking. Yeayea, I know - dream the fuck on Rude.
Anyway - "....The Australians are adjusting their foreign policy to best address the new dangers confronting the Western world..."
- pontificates the PP - well, I guess that's one way of saying certain elements of the Australian government are busy seeing how far they can shove their tongues and/or whole faces up the Pentagon's asshole - sorry for seeming crude (yea right Rude hahaha) but that's what it amounts to - and goddam the PP editorialists want to get in on the feast too. Our poor sad Canada, however, is ".... loudly hawking warm-and-fuzzy 90s- era ideas to deal with terrorism and other new problems...." - they don't specify, but I guess that refers to anything the US doesn't want, like peaceful solutions to world problems. One would hate to be the agent of waking anyone up at the PP, but most of the world is happier with "warm and fuzzy solutions" than bombing the fuck out of everything. They note that -
"...Prime Minister John Howard has earned the gratitude of Washington as a result. Mr. Downer declared the Iraq war showed how "blind faith" in bodies like the United Nations must no longer guide his country's foreign policy. Rather, policy must be anchored by "a determination to advance the national interest in a pragmatic and hard headed way..." - it's difficult to determine if the PP people know what they're talking about, but I think it was perhaps De Touqueville quite some time ago who first observed something like - "No one has ever gone broke over-estimating the intelligence of an American..." or something like that - that would undoubtedly apply to hard-core derivative and despicable sycophants like the PP editorialists since, in the nature of reverse-evolution, the spawn of slime-crawlers is rarely more intelligent than the spawner (that's scientific biology talk) - meaning that they probably don't actually realise what they are suggesting here - that we dispense entirely with any attempt at multilateral institutions (such as the UN) that are designed to promote peace and harmony in the world, and go back to the system of "the big guys do what they want, and the little guys sign on or get whacked". Way to go PP - at least you're proving what we've been saying for some time - the goal of these people is ultimately regression to some sort of New Feudalism in the world. In their typically gutless approach, of course, they daren't stand up and say it out loud. I'm not sure what they're worried about, really - the 5% or so of us in the country who seem to understand what they are up to aren't running anything important these days, so could not either drive them from the country or take them to court for High Treason, which is what they truly deserve (the inevitable hypocrisy and contradictions these people get into is striking - imagine a US paper preaching what they are preaching - make the US government subservient to some other government!! - Man!!! quicker than spit - Special Pass from Reichsmarshall "Rabbit" Ashcroft one-way to Guantanamo Bay!!!). They don't carry on and explain how that would apply to their precious "trade" agreements, but one would think the same rules must apply - but that's what the US is in the process of doing anyway - "...give us free access to your markets and anything else we want or we'll bomb the fuck out of ya!". Tell ya what, Pispot editorialists - I'll take up a collection and buy y'all a ticket to Crawford - if you'll promise to stay.
We here at RM (and we do know there are quite a few others) think there are better ways to proceed into the future than as some sort of chained ball-less crawling whipped dog yanked along whichever way on the American chain. Too bad a few media owners didn't feel the same way, so the people of this country had some kind of leadership. Imagine if all of the media in the PP's dream country of some 250 years ago had all been saying "Do what the Brits want! They're big and strong and have the big navy!! We dare not oppose them!! So licklicklick anything that makes them happy!" - well, I daresay the brave Americans of the day (not perfect, but certainly a better bunch than they have now, in terms of both intelligence (no tv would have a lot to do with that) and bravery) would quickly have strung them up by some tender parts and looked for people with visible round things between their legs to lead them. All the PP seems to feel appropriate between the legs of the Canadian beaver is its tail.
shit there's that mirror again - in your fucking dreams Rude!!
- or this one! - Small amount of pot in home OK - MARIJUANA: Judge rules state constitution allows possession if there's no intent to sell - as the Americans (and the Pispot) get all in a lather about the BIG move by Ottawa to "legalise" small amounts of pot, we find this story, indicating that in at least some states small amounts of pot are already legal!!! - but hypocrisy is no surprise to these people. But what they are talking about is crazy, as always - the "new" laws are probably worse than the old ones - the penalties for "trafficking" are doubled, basically - and who is going to be stupid enough anyway to try heading across the border of the craziest, most drug-hating (hypocritically so, got to repeat, the CIA connections to drug-running are undeniable - check it out! - it's about nothing more than -) fascist state in the world with any friggin pot at all (a certain relative of mine shall go unmentioned at this point - suffice it to say that there was a scary as fuck moment in the past when we faced life in the American gulag when a certain person got a little crazy with a tiny amount of that pot stuff (as readers will know, the recreational chemical of choice in this household is ingested through the stomach and not the lungs) - but for some reason the fates were smiling that day and we carried on with our journey, after the certain person in question retrieved the tiny foil-wrapped packet from the parking lot of the Nazi customs people - I did nearly shit myself I will admit) - anyway, where the fuck was I this time - right - American hypocrisy - as promoted by the Pispot - drug laws - fuck why bother!!!!????
New stuff in the Change section -
The mathematics of responsibility by a writer named Ran Prieur - "....We are denying our own power to choose to understand and forgive them, which doesn't help them much but helps us tremendously; and we are denying our power, even our obligation, to transform our society into one that doesn't produce such evil people. How can we do that? I have only a vague idea, but that's the road that's before us, and as Martin Luther King said, in the best ever definition of responsibility, we must go down that road, even if we go alone." - good writer, lot of interesting articles on his site. Many of us, all around the world, working towards the critical mass that will make the change happen. RM archive copy
- and - The New World Order and What To Do About It by Richard K. Moore - Richard has been mentioned elsewhere here, an excellent writer with good ideas. Worth a bunch of time at his site. RM archive copy
- and - The trend toward totalitarianism by a guy named Richard Sellers - "...Conditioning begins early for us Americans, and continues for the duration.... Men with guns and clubs are just waiting for us to make that first wrong move .... Totalitarianism? By the time we reach adulthood we are already well on our way there..." - not a long piece, but from the heart, and well done. RM archive copy
- and just one more, out of dozens - The unofficial history of America RM archive copy - on how corporations have taken over the country - "...The unofficial history of America, which continues to be written, is not a story of rugged individualism and heroic personal sacrifice in the pursuit of a dream. It is a story of democracy derailed, of a revolutionary spirit suppressed, and of a once-proud people reduced to servitude...." - the site has a lot of other good reading as well.
That's enough for this time - hope you're all having a good summer, Canada, China, Belgium, Sweden, Taiwan, wherever!!! (yeayea, even the US of A - you guys especially actually - you got bigger problems than the rest of us put together! - but I know there's a lot of good guys down there fighting on the "Light" side too.....)
Write if ya want.
What direct action did you take today to do something to get rid of corporate government in Canada on this Canada Day Weekend? Do you feel that it was enough, given the situation? Will you feel content telling that to your grandchildren, should they survive, and the country, and the planet?
So much left to say, so little time to say it in - probably only a year or so to the next federal election - do you want to try to save Canada in that frantic four weeks when big Paul drops the writ and EVERY friggin advantage is his - or would you like to start now, when we have some sort of outside chance? Canada for Canadians Coalition - get involved.