Archive for: June 2007

Okay, more funny stuff. This has been making its way around the net for some time right now and some other bloggers have mentioned it as well. I can pretty much gaurantee that it’s just another of those internet fabrications but I have to admit that I damn near laughed my arse off the first time I read it.

As the story goes, a lady libertarian from the Centre Of The Universe® wrote a lot of letters to the government, bitching and moaning about the treatment of captive shitbags insurgents being held in Afghan jails. After bitching away in dozens of letters over several months, she finally got something back from DND:

National Defence Headquarters
MGen George R. Pearkes Bldg, 15 NT
101 Colonel By Drive
Ottawa, ON K1A 0K2 Canada

Dear Concerned Citizen,

Thank you for your recent letter expressing your profound concern of treatment of the Taliban and Al Qaeda terrorists captured by Canadian Forces who were subsequently transferred to the Afghanistan Government and are currently being held by Afghan officials in Afghanistan National Correctional System facilities.

Our administration takes these matters seriously and your opinions were heard loud and clear here in Ottawa. You will be pleased to learn, thanks to the concerns of citizens like yourself; we are creating a new department here at the Department of National Defense, to be called “Liberals Accept Responsibility for Killers” program, or L.A.R.K. for short.

In accordance with the guidelines of this new program, we have decided to divert one terrorist and place him in your personal care. Your personal detainee has been selected and is scheduled for transportation under heavily armed guard to your residence in Toronto next Monday. Ali Mohammed Ahmed bin Mahmud (you can just call him Ahmed) is to be caredfor pursuant to the standards you personally demanded in your letter of complaint. It will likely be necessary for you to hire some assistant caretakers. We will conduct weekly inspections to ensure that your standards of care for Ahmed are commensurate with those you so strongly recommend in your letter.

Although Ahmed is a sociopath and extremely violent, we hope that your sensitivity to what you described as his “attitudinal problem” will help him overcome these character flaws. Perhaps you are correct in describing these problems as mere cultural differences. We understand that you plan to offer counseling and home schooling.

Your adopted terrorist is extremely proficient in hand-to-hand combat and can extinguish human life with such simple items as a pencil or nail clippers. We advise that you do not ask him to demonstrate these skills at your next yoga group. He is also expert at making a wide variety of explosive devices from common household products, so you may wish to keep those items locked up, unless (in your opinion) this might offend him.

Ahmed will not wish to interact with you or your daughters (except sexually) since he views females as a subhuman form of property. This is a particularly sensitive subject for him and he has been known to show violent tendencies around women who fail to comply with the new dress code that he will recommend as more appropriate attire. I’m sure you will come to enjoy the anonymity offered by the burka over time. Just remember that it is all part of “respecting his culture and religious beliefs” as described in your letter.

Thanks again for your concern. We truly appreciate it when folks like you keep us informed of the proper way to do our job and care for our fellow man. You take good care of Ahmed and remember, we’ll be watching.

Good luck and God bless you.
Cordially,

Gordon O’Connor
Minister of National Defense

Canada Dominion Day is almost upon us once again, boys and girls and I figured that I’d put up a few funnybone ticklers here that I found while I was clunking around the net today.  It only seems fittin, given the time of year and the fact that I’m not likely to find time to put anything else up for a little while (yeah, I know; the last time I said that, I put up four posts that day…).  So, no more ado (or adon’t), here’s some stuff to read:

Ripped off from the Winterpeg Sun’s Ian Shanley, some ways to tell if you’re a Canuck or just a Yank who took a wrong turn:

• You’re Canadian if bring a portable TV on a camping trip so that you don’t miss the hockey game.
• You’re Canadian if you know that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) don’t always look like that.
• Maybe you can sing O Canada in French and actually know what the words mean.
• Perhaps you have sent angry letters to the CBC demanding the return of the Hinterland Who’s Who spots so you can finally find out what happens to the Arctic ptarmigan in winter.
• I’ll bet most of us have stood in line for hours for Tragically Hip tickets.
• We’re all bilingual to a point, too. I’ll bet you know the French equivalents of “free,” “prize” and “no sugar added,” thanks to your extensive education in bilingual cereal packaging.
• It is quite likely that you know more than three guys named Gordon. You’re thinking about it right now, aren’t you?
• Here’s something every one of us has done in February; we hear it’s going up to -10 C, and we think it’s mild weather! Am I wrong? On the other hand we find -40C a little chilly.
• I’ll wager that at some time, someone has accidentally stepped on your foot, and you’ve turned around and apologized!
• We know that a pike is a type of fish, not part of a highway.
• And don’t even try to tell me that you don’t have Canadian Tire money in your kitchen drawers.
• Remember, as kids, we’d have to design our Halloween costume to fit over a snowsuit? Fast forward to now, and the odds are that you’ve taken your kids trick-or-treating in a blizzard. Know why? You’re Canadian! It’s what we do eh? There’s more.
• We all know that the last letter of the English alphabet is always pronounced “Zed,” not “Zee.”
• And during the winter, which lasts for like eight months, your local newspaper covers the national news on two pages, but requires six pages for hockey. Speaking of which, you sports fans all perk up when you hear the theme song from Hockey Night in Canada.
• You are truly Canadian if you have more kilometres on your snowblower than your car.
• You are truly Canadian if you know which leaves make for good toilet paper.
• And you are definitely Canadian through and through if the trunk of your car doubles as a freezer!

And some more stuff:

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA…
1. 2010 Winter Olympics – champagne tastes on a beer belly budget.
2. Vancouver: 1.5 million people and two bridges.
3. The local Whistler hero is a pot-smoking snowboarder.
4. The local wine doesn’t taste like malt vinegar.
5. Your $400,000 Vancouver home is just 5 hours from downtown.
6. A university with a nude beach.
7. You can throw a rock and hit three Starbucks locations.
8. Great place for avalanche training.
9. There’s always some sort of deforestation protest going on.
10. A drunk driving premier – setting a good example for all British Columbians… a Ralph Klein wannabe.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN ALBERTA…
1. Big Rock between you and B.C.
2. Ottawa who?
3. Tax is 7 percent instead of approximately 200 percent for the rest of the country.
4. The Premier is a fat, alcoholic who is easy to make fun of.
5. Flames vs. Oilers.
6. Stamps vs. Eskies.
7. You can exploit almost any natural resource you can think of.
8. You live in the only province that could actually afford to be it’s own country.
9. The Americans below you are all in anti-government militia groups.
10. You can attempt to murder your rich oil tycoon husband and get away with it.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN SASKATCHEWAN…
1. You never run out of wheat.
2.There are no curves or hills on the highway.
3. Cruise control takes on a whole new meaning.
4. Your province is really easy to draw.
5. You never have to worry about roll-back if you have a standard stick shift.
6. It takes you two weeks to walk to your neighbour’s house.
7. YOUR Roughriders survived.
8. You can watch the dog run away from home for hours.
9. People will assume you live on a farm.
10. Buying a huge John Deere mower makes sense.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN MANITOBA…
1. You wake up one morning to find you suddenly have beachfront property.
2. Amusing town names like “Flin Flon” and “Winnipeg”.
3. All your local bands make it big and move to Toronto.
4. The only province to ever violently rebel against the federal government.
5. Hundreds of huge, horribly frigid lakes.
6. Nothing compares to a wicked Winnipeg winter.
7. You don’t need a car – just take the canoe to work.
8. You can be an Easterner or a Westerner depending on your mood.
9. Because of your licence plate, you are still friendly even when you cut someone off.
10. Pass the time watching trucks and barns float by.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN ONTARIO…
1. You live in the center of the universe.
2. Your $400,000 Toronto home is actually a dump.
3. You and you alone decide who will win the federal election.
4. There’s no such thing as an Ontario Separatist. Separate from what? You are the centre of the universe.
5. Your grandparents sold booze to the States during Prohibition.
6. Lots of tourists come to Toronto because they mistakenly believe it’s a cool city.
7. The only province with hard-core American-style crime.
8. Much Music’s Speaker’s Corner – rant and rave on national TV for a dollar.
9. Baseball fans park on your front lawn and pee on the side of your house.
10. Mike Harris: basically a sober Ralph Klein.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN QUEBEC…
1. Everybody assumes you’re from a different planet.
2. Racism is socially acceptable.
3. The only province to ever kidnap federal politicians.
4. You can take bets with your friends on which English neighbour will move out next.
5. Other provinces basically bribe you to stay in Canada.
6. The FLQ.
7. Your hockey team is made up entirely of French guys who can’t skate.
8. The province with the oldest, nastiest hookers.
9. NON-smokers are the outcasts.
10. You can blame all your problems on the “Anglo bastards”.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN NEW BRUNSWICK…
1. You are sandwiched between French morons and drunken Celtic fiddlers.
2. One way or another, the government gets 98 percent of your income.
3. You’re poor, but not as poor as the Newfies.
4. When listing the provinces, everyone forgets to mention yours.
5. The economy is based on fish, cows, and ferrying Ontario motorists to Boston.
6. No one ever blames anything on New Brunswick.
7. You have French people, but they don’t want to kill you.
8. Everybody has a Grandfather who runs a lighthouse.
9. Just as charming as Maine, but with more unemployed fishermen.
10. You probably live in a small seaside cottage with no television.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN NOVA SCOTIA…
1. The only place in North America to get bombed in the war by a moron who set ammunitions ship on fire. (Halifax Explosion).
2.The province is shaped like the male genetalia.
3. Everyone can play the fiddle. The ones who can’t, think they can.
4. If someone asks if you’re a Newfie, you are allowed to kick their butt.
5. The local hero is an insane, fiddle playing, sexual pervert.
6. The province that produced Rita MacNeil, the world’s largest land mammal.
7 You are the “only” reason Anne Murray makes money.
8. You can pretend you have Scottish heritage as an excuse to get drunk and wear a kilt.
9. The economy is based on lobster and fiddle music.
10. Even though it smells like dead sea animals, Halifax is considered Canada’s most beautiful city.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE ON PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND…
1. Even though more people live on Vancouver Island, you still got the big kick-ass bridge.
2. You can walk across the province in half an hour.
3. You were probably once an extra on “Road to Avonlea”.
4. This is where all those tiny red potatoes come from.
5. The economy is based on fish, potatoes, and CBC TV shows.
6. Tourists arrive, see the “Anne of Green Gables” house, then promptly leave.
7. You can drive across the province in two minutes.
8. It doesn’t matter to you if Quebec separates.
9. You don’t share a border with the Americans, or with anyone for that matter.
10. You can confuse ships by turning your porch lights on and off at night.

TOP 10 REASONS TO LIVE IN NEWFOUNDLAND…
1. The poorest, drunkest province in Confederation.
2. If Quebec separates, you will float off to sea.
3. In the rare case when someone moves to the Rock, you can make them kiss a dead cod.
4. The economy is based on fish, seafood, and fish-related products.
5. If you do something stupid, you have a built-in excuse.
6. You & only you understand the meaning of Great Big Sea’s lyrics.
7. The workday is about two hours long.
8. You are credited with many great inventions, like the solar-powered flashlight and the screen door for submarines.
9. CBC sets time in terms of you being on the half hour.
10. It is socially acceptable to wear your hip waders on your wedding day.

So there you have ’em; enjoy. Me? I’m off to a weekend of beer, bbq, bonfires and buddies. Have a safe one, everybody.

Damn, I’m starting to wonder if somebody spiked the punch at the last judge convention (or whatever the hell it is that those bozos have) or something. 😯 Common sense seems to be on display in a befuddling abundance in our courtrooms lately. First it was Superior Court Justice Eugene Ewaschuk down in TO figuring out that yes, Angel Jones is an irretrievable psychopath and needs to be locked up, permanently. Now we have Superior Court Justice David Little in London deciding to say, “to hell with the YCJA, people need to know who this asshole is…”

The identity of a 20-year-old man who fatally stabbed a London man and later bragged about the killing to an undercover police officer was revealed in court yesterday.

Derek Szanyi was 45 days shy of his 18th birthday when he stabbed Bill Smith, 37, between 13 and 17 times on his front step on Nov. 16, 2004.

A jury convicted Szanyi of second-degree murder on Dec. 12.

In sentencing Szanyi yesterday, Superior Court Justice David Little lifted the publication ban on his name.

The ban had been in place because Szanyi, who was 17 when Smith was stabbed, was tried as a youth.

Well, so much for that sonofabitch being able to hide behind a balls-challenged law. Now if we can just make this the rule, instead of the exception…

We all know by now exactly what a dickless, balls-challenged “justice” system we have in this country.

You’re a law-breaking bag of shit criminal offender? Aw, it’s not your fault; you just need more understanding; mommy and daddy didn’t show you enough attention or expose you to enough diversity when you were a child.

You’re a law-abiding citizen who works, pays your taxes and plays by the rules? Or a victim of one of the aforementioned scumbags? Screw you, you insensitive bastard; you just don’t understand how hard life is on them; and you probably vote Tory, too, so everybody knows that you’re the one we should really be worried about.

Asshat judges like Ray Wyant say that it’s the media’s fault that we’re losing faith in the justice system in this country. Bullshit. All the media does (yes, in this case, even the rabidly left-slanting MSM) is tell us what happened in a given case, but Wyant wants to say it’s their fault for reporting on the bugger-ups instead of the courts’ fault for buggering up in the first place. And it is usually the judge’s fault. Sometimes though, the law itself is too lenient, like today’s Freeps showed (with some trimming by me for clarity; the full article is here):

The Camaro was whizzing along Highway 401 when it spun three times and stopped, facing the wrong way.

Driving was Robert Neil Robinson, 39, a five-time convicted impaired driver revving up for his sixth rap.

The alcoholic had driven 10 to 15 metres the wrong way on the 401 to the Highbury Avenue off-ramp in London. OPP stopped him on the ramp.

Smelling of booze, with slurred speech, Robinson had a vodka-spiked bottle of Gatorade at his feet when he was arrested at 10 a.m. on March 11, 2006.

Tests showed readings of 140 and 150 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood, far above the legal limit of 80.

At trial, Robinson pleaded not guilty before Pockele, arguing his car had swerved not because he was impaired but because it had the wrong tires and handling problems.

The vodka had been put in the Gatorade the night before when Robinson had been drinking and walking his dog, he testified.

Robinson had forgotten the alcohol was in the drink and took a swig behind the wheel minutes before his car spun out of control, he testified.

Yesterday, Robinson called his latest brush with the law “pretty devastating.

“I’m just trying to get over this and get on with my life,” he said.

Robinson has twice gone through residential rehabilitation treatment and is receiving counselling and support.

Pockele reviewed Robinson’s criminal record that dated back to April 1987 for driving while disqualified.

Impaired convictions followed — in 1987, 1990, 1996, 1997 and 1998.

His longest jail sentence was seven months for impaired driving and driving while disqualified in 1998, when he was also suspended from driving for three and a half years.

So there you have it. This SIX TIME loser gets hammered, hops behind the wheel, blames everything from his tires to his dog for what he did, and then say, “get on with my life,” like he’s the Goddamned victim here or something.

So, what did this asshole get, after all that? Six months. And thanks to that lovely “statutory release provisions” bullshit that the system’s been infected with, he won’t even do that. And while everybody knows that I have no problems at all with taking some blockhead of a judge to task, this time it wasn’t entirely his fault:

Yesterday, in a London court, the mechanical engineer was jailed for six months — the most allowed under a so-called summary conviction, in which cases go directly to trial before a judge alone.

He noted the Crown, which sought a five-month sentence, often decides to try such cases by summary conviction, so as not to run the risk of having the case tried before a jury.

Sounds like it’s time for a change in the law.

This is what I love about cartoonists. They can, if they’re good at what they do, take some of the most complex issues that you can think of and reduce them to the bare bones of what they really are; all in just a couple of panels. I have to admit that I sometimes catch myself wishing that I could do nifty stuff like that myself, but the fact of the matter is that I have all the artistic talent of a lobotomized warthog, so it’s not likely to happen. Guys like Mike Lester, on the other hand…

(you can find more of Mike’s stuff in the Rome News-Tribune, from Rome, GA)

Well, it’s about God damned time.  That’s all I can say.  Latest word has it that HMCS Corner Brook — one of the four Victoria-class submarines we bought from the Brits in ’98 — is going to be on its way to the waters off Baffin Island this summer to participate in Operation Nanook.

Finally, we can start exerting our sovereignty over our own damned waters ourselves, instead of having a bunch of damned Yank subs puttering around up there…

“Sending a sub up to northern waters has significant ramifications for our ability to know what’s going on,” said Rob Huebert of the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary.

Basing and operating a sub in North Atlantic and Arctic waters keeps Canada privy to high-level NATO information-sharing between other nations who operate submarines, he said.

“The moment you start operating in those waters, what kicks in under NATO is you have to share that information with each other, so they don’t go bumping into each other in the night.”