Conservative Standards

I can't help but notice, lately, just how low conservatives like to set the bar for themselves -- and their peers. In Canada, the Conservative Party is just fine with having its move to strike hate speech laws, applauded by skinheads. The Republican Party -- with some exceptions -- has been perfectly fine with being taken over by incompetent wingnuts who are so livid with a black man being the President of the United States, that they have flat out stated that their first priority is not fix America's sagging economy, but to get rid of him at all costs.

For that matter, they have little apparent problem with hitching their economic hopes to a presidential team that was respectively near-to-dead-last in job creation, and whose only economic idea is to raise taxes on the middle class while cutting upper-class taxes even more. This goes against any kind of financial sense, never mind the overwhelming view of the people the Republicans are trying to convince to vote for them.

For that matter, Republicans -- by and large -- seem to have no problem with being associated with people who wear their utter hatred of blacks, gays, and women on their sleeves... and yet are so stupid and juvenile that they will still insist they aren't bigots. This is despite campaigning on voter suppression that targets blacks, revoking most gay rights, banning women from military service, and forcing impregnated rape victims to carry the offspring of their attackers (and probably give them visitation rights, as is already the case in many states).

This is the company that conservatives today keep -- either by their direct support, or by their compliance. It's true that not all conservatives are like this... but it begs the question of where they were, when the extremists were given the keys to the car. It also begs the question of why so many of them are still counting themselves among the number of these people who are not just offensive and inept, but borderline terrorists. Was there truly nothing you could do to stop it? Is there nothing you can do now?

If I were a member of any political group that engineered or condoned open bigotry, sabotage of the country for no good reason, election tampering, violence against people who simply want to help others, or even assassination of an elected leader... not only would I be putting as much distance as possible between myself and them, but I would be publicly speaking out about it. It's admirable that there are groups calling themselves "Republicans for Obama" -- but if it were me I wouldn't even want to call myself a Republican.
I would be far too ashamed.

Some Republicans Love Dumb Laws

Did you know that in Florida, it's illegal for unmarried couples to live together? I didn't, until just a few minutes ago. Apparently it's punishable by a $500 fine, and up to 60 days in jail.

As you can imagine, a law that outdated, ridiculous and likely unconstitutional isn't enforced anymore. In fact, I just read a posting from someone claiming to be a Florida police officer, who says that his partner was laughed at by their supervisor, for trying to uphold it.

To give the Republicans some credit -- for once -- one of their Florida lawmakers is attempting to repeal it. Not surprisingly, he's running into opposition from Focus On The Family, Governor Rick Scott, and Rep. Dennis Baxley (the latter of whom, are also Republicans).

Rep. Baxley in particular -- former senior member of the Christian Coalition -- is quoted as saying “I’m not ready to give up on monogamy and a cultural statement that marriage still matters”.

This is a statement being made a lot, but I'm saying it anyway... for a party that claims to hate intrusive government and love the Constitution, it seems that many Republicans sure love to invade the private lives of American citizens.

That's to say nothing of how absurd it is to claim that this -- like, say, gay and interracial marriage -- is a threat to marriage as a whole. Most couples that live together, do so as a prelude to getting married (seriously, just how ignorant is the Christian Right?). Even the ones that don't eventually marry, are usually no less monogamous than the ones that do (and frankly, when conservatives speak out about the spousal abuse and infidelity in their traditionally married homes, then they may get on a high horse about the rest of us).

If Republicans really respect American values -- including FREEDOM -- then they need to prove it by either backing off of laws like these, or quitting office. The American way of life, does not allow for the kind of perversion that they wish to impose.

Harper's Intimidation Has Begun

Well I knew years ago, that Harper's supporters were going to get nasty if he ever won a majority. Why wouldn't they? He can do whatever he wants, and all of his history says he's going to do whatever he can to wipe out disagreement, by force. (if you don't think that's so, take a look at how he treated outsiders during the election, or how he treated peaceful protesters at the G20 summit last year)

The morning that I found out that Harper got the majority, I wrote in to every Canadian newspaper that I could, with the following letter (which got printed in at least two papers):

"What is the matter with this country?? I hate to sound like a sore loser, but this honestly makes no sense to me -- how is it that the only Prime Minister to be found in contempt ANYWHERE, who is wasting our money in record levels, who attacks dissent all the time, and acts as if democracy is a dirty rumour, actually got elected to a majority government? It's not like his corruption was hard to spot!"

Well, within hours of its first printing, some yahoo phoned my house. He identified himself as "John Stephens" and then stopped talking (apparently thinking that that name means something to me). He then said I made a lot of wild statements (even though everything in that letter is substantiated), and said I sounded like Jack Layton -- I thanked him for the compliment.

He tried to get me to meet him for coffee, but since I'm not in the habit of meeting total strangers who stalk me in the phone book because they have an issue with me attacking a crooked Prime Minister, I said no. I lost all patience with him though, when he actually tried to excuse Harper's behaviour by claiming that Harper's had a minority since 2000. I screamed at him that not only was JEAN CHRETIEN in power in 2000, but Harper wasn't even in federal politics at the time. Frankly, so much of what this guy was pulling was bad enough, but you've got to have a ton of nerve to stalk and patronize me, when YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THE FACTS.

Over the last few days, some of Harper's meaner YouTube fans have left comments on the "Bored on the Corner" vid where I announced Harper's majority (I flagged the worst of them, but you can try to look for them here). Basically they were calling me a loser and a communist and a hippie and a welfare bum, etc. etc. (pretty weird conclusions to draw from what I actually said in the video, but anyway...) I think my favourite was from the user "welovesarahpalin" who accused me of having bitter hatred for conservatives and Christians, when on other videos he/she (and others) literally called for the severed head of a CBC journalist who got threatened at a Harper rally, for asking a hard question.

(this is also someone who claims that conservatives aren't racists and bigots... I replied with a link to a video of a Harper MP attacking gay people)

Not surprisingly, they then left comments on my YouTube channel -- once again -- ASSUMING that I'm unemployed, that I'm a welfare bum, that I'm lazy, that I'm a communist etc. and that EVERY LIBERAL/NDP SUPPORTER IS LIKE THAT (even though I've met NONE who are like that). I was told that if I fit any of those criteria, I should just die.

It won't fucking happen!

January's Morons of the Month

In my last video, I already went after some of the bigger idiots and monsters we've seen in the first month of 2011 -- like Sarah Palin, The Tea Party, Fox News, and of course Jared Loughner. In this entry, I'm going to go on a bit about the other pissants and buffoons.

The mainstream Republican Party, for using an anti-abortion bill to REDEFINE RAPE. I'm completely serious. Of course, the so-called Pro-Life Robots are all kissing the GOP's boots for this bill, either not knowing or not caring that if you're underage or drugged and get abused, it sucks to be you (according to The Righteous Right _tm).

The Toronto Sun (and various conservative pundits/trolls) for telling Canadians who actually care about freedom, to get over what happened at the Toronto G20 summit. Isn't that a little like telling the survivors of 9/11 or The Holocaust to get over their pain? I don't care if police brutality is worse in other parts of the world, the fact is that 1,000 Canadians were essentially assaulted and kidnapped, for no reason whatsoever -- THAT'S FUCKING ILLEGAL, YOU MORONS. Furthermore, I'd love to know how the Sun reporters who were also wrongly arrested, feel about their co-workers and employers basically throwing them under the bus for doing their jobs.

Emperor Stephen Harper and his supporters, because they attack the Liberals, NDP, and Bloc Quebecois for stoking the flames of an election, AFTER the CRAP Party unleashes its attack ads. And before anyone brings up the Liberal attack ads, I do flag all of them as spam when I see them, but I should also point out that at least the Liberal ads are attacking Harper's POLICIES, whereas the CRAP ads are attacking Michael Ignatieff PERSONALLY (and generally not telling a single bit of truth). The fact that people still expect me to think that a guy who spent MULTIPLE BILLIONS of Canadian tax dollars on projects that do no good whatsoever for Canada, and lets our industries be sold out from under us, is IN ANY WAY GOOD FOR THE ECONOMY, is outrageous. That's like saying that The Flat Earth Society should be in charge of the Smithsonian Institute, or the Aryan Brotherhood in charge of Amnesty International.

That's it for now -- give them hell.

George Galloway in Canada

(This is basically an expanded video version of an earlier blog)

 

RIP Dr. Laura -- Wait, she's still alive? DAMMIT!

So right-wing radio nut/fake psychiatrist Dr. Laura Schlessinger is quitting her controversial show, because she wants to be free to express her First Amendment rights, without retaliation from the people she offends, advertisers, or the FCC. Evidently, this is in response to her latest bigoted tirade, where she repeatedly referred to black people as n***ers and -- SHOCK! -- people were outraged over it.

(jeez what took them so long?)

First of all, I'm glad she's finally gone -- it couldn't happen to anyone more deserving. Well, except maybe for Charles McVety, the Westboro Baptist Church, the National Organization for Marriage, and pretty much everyone who's worked for Fox News. Oh, and Stephen Harper, but that's a different matter.

Second, before any neo-cons out there get up my ass about free speech, I suggest you take a look at broadcasting laws in your country. In Canada, in addition to our hate speech laws, we have the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council. America has the oft-maligned Federal Communications Commission. While both policies -- and their enforcers -- have their occasional problems and brain farts, they are nonetheless the law of the land when it comes to what you can have on public airwaves. Frankly, anyone who's ever been near the broadcasting industry knows that there are certain words you are not allowed to say on the air -- Professor George Carlin did some seminal work on this subject in the 1970s. This is especially wise, when some of those words are used by various bigots and supremacists in their rants to call for the deaths of everyone who isn't a straight white Judeo-Christian (and sometimes it's even more narrow than that).

Third, if Schlessinger really wants to find a place that frees her to spread her bile, she's going to have her work cut out for her. I doubt that any other mainstream outlet will want her, because she's a defamation lawsuit/huge FCC fine waiting to happen, she clearly hates about half of the country, and isn't above using foul language and slurs to say so. The FCC even has some involvement in Internet regulation, which limits her options there as well (plus that's assuming the best case scenario for her, that she's able to set up her own web site and video streaming service -- after all, YouTube, BlipTV and most other video sites forbid her kind of dreck too).

So I guess that limits her to private functions with the KKK, Aryan Brotherhood, and Republican Party. Well, at least that would be honest as well as open.

Miss (Muslim) USA

Miss (Muslim) USA... who the hell cares?

Another year, another Miss USA pageant that causes controversy, over conservative bigotry. If you missed it -- and I certainly would have if not for the Reich Wing -- Rima Fakih, a Labense-American from Michigan, became the first Arab woman to win the pageant. Almost immediately, conservative bloggers were raising their pitchforks. Why? Come on, do you even need to ask?

Despite the fact that this woman was raised in a partially Christian family, and the fact that she won the contest by parading around in a micro-bikini, right-wing blogger Debbie Schlussel insisted that Fakih was a Muslim extremist because -- wait for it -- she has the same last name as someone in Hezbollah.

Seriously? That's what you've got?

Unfortunately, many others have the same point of view, calling the increase of Muslim beauty queens a quiet form of invasion brought about by affirmative action. Um, here's a wacky thought, but maybe these women EARNED their crowns! And how many times does the smart part of the world have to explain, that being brown doesn't make someone a terrorist. It's like we didn't learn anything from the days when black people had to sit in the back of the bus. By the way, I really have to point out that if Rima Fakih did go around the Middle East dressed the way she does, she would be gangraped, mutilated, and stoned to death for being a so-called whore and infidel. Yeah, she really sounds like a member of Al Qaeda, doesn't she?

And one last thing -- you guys tried this exact same bullshit when Barack Obama ran for president. Aside from bunch of ignorant rednecks, no one believed it, and so most of you guys just look like idiots and racists. Find something else to say, or just quit while you're behind. Enough said.

Ezra Levant vs. Free Speech

As anyone following the "Ann Coulter in Canada" farce knows, her primary supporter in the Great White North is a conservative commentator named Ezra Levant. He's mostly known as an exile from the Conservative Party, as well as defending his "right" to reprint the inflammatory cartoons depicting Muhammed the Prophet as a terrorist.

When the provost of the University of Ottawa politely but firmly reminded Ann Coulter, that her usual hate rhetoric is illegal here, Levant was one of those accusing the provost of hate speech himself -- just because Coulter is a conservative -- and has filed a complaint to the Human Rights Commission, despite the fact that the hates its very existence. Sensing hypocrisy yet?

Anyway, a short time ago, an amateur stand-up comic in British Columbia was taken to that province's HRC, for yelling at a lesbian couple that was talking during his act (and if you didn't already guess, it's alleged that he used homophobic slurs). Levant, you guessed it, says that this isn't an issue, and the case has no merit.

So let's recap: it's okay to print sacrilegious and racist cartoons of Muslims (I know he says it's about free speech, but when he prints a cartoon depicting Moses or Jesus in the same light, then I'll buy that claim); it's okay to scream slurs at a lesbian couple in a public place; but God forbid that you remind a hatemonger, that we don't take kindly to her saying things like "we should kill all Muslim leaders and force the people to convert to Christianity", or "Canada's lucky we allow them to exist on our continent".

When this chucklehead comes to the HRC, defending America's answer to Osama bin Laden, I hope they throw him out on his ass.

Maine Homophobes II

Is it just me, or is the so-called "Moral Majority" not even trying to look respectable or rational anymore? Just a couple of days after I posted my rant about Maine voting to revoke same-sex marriage, this prick called JarodysCampaign -- who lost an election for city councillor down there -- said to me that the definition of marriage MUST be "one man and one woman", that the gay camp was the only one that made it a rights issue, that being gay is a choice... you know, the usual horseshit. And if you think I'm going to just let this be, you clearly haven't seen the show.

Let's start with this business about the definition of marriage "clearly" being between one man and one woman... well, according to who? Depending on which religion or denomination or culture you ask, marriage can be defined as all sorts of combinations of human, not all of them simply one man and one woman. In fact, in ancient times same-sex marriage was quite common, not that the Christian Right will ever acknowledge it, because it requires them to read a book not endorsed by The 700 Club. Jarody's argument that he's helped restore the "original" form is also very dubious, when you consider that the original form not only forbade marrying outside of your race or religion, but by and large women had no choice in who they were going to marry -- AND more often than not, it was done as little more than a business deal. Not to mention it was not only common but expected, that the husband would keep a mistress -- NOT THAT KIND OF MISTRESS! Thank you... The point is, marrying out of love is a fairly new phenomenon, despite what the so-called family values clan says. If anyone out there doesn't believe me, I suggest that you go to a very special building in your town: it's called a library.

Oh and I'd be neglegent if I didn't point out there are parts of The Bible -- like Deuteronomy 21 -- that say it's totally fine for a man to force a woman to marry him, as a sort of war trophy. I'd also be sloppy if I didn't point out that it was totally normal for marriages to happen at age 12, in those days. Wow, how loving and godly.

Incidentally, this same man also claimed that by criticizing a clearly discriminatory point of view like his, I'm being a Constitutional Revisionist. Really? Does that mean he also thinks that mixed marriage, decriminalized homosexuality, women's rights, desegregation, and even the separation of church and state should all be revoked? What about the partonizingly named "Defense of Marriage Act", which only exists to discriminate against gays? By the way, I just love how a guy like him shuts down critics by saying that he won't talk to people who are intolerant -- that's like a Neo-Nazi slamming people who have issues with swastikas.

He's also one of those who dismisses gays as a whole, by saying that being gay is a choice. Um yeah, do you ever notice how you almost always hear this bullshit from people who have either never had a non-judgemental talk with a homosexual, or never willingly talked to one at all? Now I know that science isn't entirely sure what does cause homosexuality, but there are a couple of things that are certain. One is that since it's found in animals all the time, that pretty much destroys any argument that it is unnatural. The second is that there is NO evidence whatsoever, that people actually choose to be gay.

Furthermore, at the risk of ripping off David Cross, try actually thinking this attitude through a little. Even in this supposedly enlightened part of the world, if anyone even THINKS you're gay, then no matter how young or old you are, you are going to be harrassed, assaulted, singled-out, discriminated against, raped, or murdered solely because of what gender you're supposedly attracted to. Not only that, but you can't count on The Powers That Be to do anything about it -- they may ignore your troubles, or simply say you got what you deserved. This includes many of the supposedly moral and upstanding people in the church. Wow, that really sounds like a life I'd want to live.

By the way, don't even get me started on the arguments that "You support gay marriage, so you must be gay", or "What did the Christian Right take away?" Seriously, do you idiots not hear yourselves talk? Do you really not understand how stupid you sound?

The cold-bloodedness and hypocrisy of the "traditional values" people never ceases to amaze me. They call themselves devout Christians more often than not, but even I know that Jesus said to let what is the government's, belong to the government. Kind of like He also said to judge not, lest ye be judged, to live a non-capitalist life, and to live as a community -- not that the Moral Majority likes to hear any of those things either. And let's not forget, they called the same-sex laws in Maine undemocratic, even though they were voted in freely by the elected senate. It seems really convenient to me, that of all the things they could get nitpicky about in politics, it's things that give rights to people they despise for no good reason. I bet you they'd never go to this much trouble, if the same senate declared that only conservative Christians be allowed to vote. Enough said.

Sarah Palin's Delusions

So Sarah Palin's memoirs come out this week -- do your own jokes -- and among other things, she slams the media for supposedly being biased.

Are you freaking kidding me? Even if every reporter outside of Fox News is magically liberal-biased, apparently the thought has never crossed her mind that she wouldn't have been so easily painted as a complete twit if she didn't act like one in the first place. Take it from a seasoned video editor -- you can't create something that big, out of thin air.

I'll also never understand why the die-hard conservatives STILL think that Palin would be good for any public office (even though the Republicans mostly have the sense to stay away from her now). I'm sorry, I do try to be fair to "the other side" when I can, but with her it's impossible: never mind her politics, she's so stupid that she actually makes George W. Bush look like a genius. I don't buy the books claims about her being well-read, there is NOTHING going on upstairs, in any picture or footage I've seen of her.

To be fair, maybe that's not all stupidity -- people have been known to go nuts with cabin fever in remote parts of Alaska, so maybe she just snapped and no one did anything about it. Either way, I wouldn't trust her to keep an eye on an empty parking lot, never mind run a large country and its soldiers.

Harper doesn't follow Canadian news?

http://www.thespec.com/News/CanadaWorld/article/658989

Honestly, I'm not in the least bit surprised -- most conservatives these days (Canadian and American alike) prefer to only hear what they want to hear, rather than actually look at the world around them and find the facts.

Re: Obama's School Lecture

I didn't see Barack Obama's lecture to high school students, but according to everyone who did see it, it was basically a talk on the importance of trying hard not only in school, but life. You are in charge of your own destiny, there is no excuse to not try, that sort of thing.

So why are so many Americans so pissed about the very idea of the President talking to their children, that they pressured schools to not participate in the lecture? Why are they so convinced that Obama has a hidden socialist agenda, when there has been little to no evidence of this at all?

I don't know, but frankly I'm getting incredibly sick and tired of it by now. While I have little patience for the narrow-minded to begin with, for Obama haters to constantly resort to lies and fear-mongering is BEYOND stupid. If you want to criticize someone -- and be taken seriously by anyone with an I.Q. of above 15 -- it's not hard to try using facts and an even temper. Why won't American conservatives even try that, it seems?

Further, I have to ask, would these same people be getting their knickers in a knot if it were the dim-witted fanatic Sarah Palin giving this lecture? (man I can't picture much worse role models for young women than her) Would they be so upset, if it were the same words, out of... oh I don't know... Bill Clinton?

I thought America was "the land of the free", so why are so many of the people living there acting like it's their personal gulag?

Health Reform "Coverage"

Obamacare

Health Care and Shona Holmes

Much fuss has been made lately, about Barack Obama's plan to give Americans universal health care. Conservatives -- being the greedy little shits that they are -- are so adamant about stopping this, that they're resorting to an interesting propaganda move to discredit it. They enlisted Canadian citizen Shona Holmes, who claims to have had a brain tumor that was nearly fatal. She further claims that because of a six month wait for treatment, she had no choice but to mortgage her house, borrow money, and otherwise scrape together $100,000 to get treated in the U.S. According to her and those who want for-profit health care, this is a sign that our health care system is a disaster waiting to happen. Guys... go fuck yourselves.

Now that may seem harsh, but there's a reason I'm saying it. For one thing, the so-called tumour was in fact a Cleft Cyst on her pituitary gland, which is not life-threatening at all. Furthermore, there are countless Canadians who genuinely do have cancer, and yet manage to get quick treatment without much of a problem. I don't deny that wait times and coverage blind spots are a problem in our health care system, but as far as anyone can tell the issues described by Holmes simply don't exist. Try being disabled, a senior citizen, or having a rare but deadly illness in Ontario and THEN you can complain about OHIP's shortcomings.

If I may inject a personal story, I can tell you first hand that our hospitals are actually pretty well on the ball. Over a year ago I fell head-first into a sidewalk -- a very similar injury to the one that would later kill Natasha Richardson, so needless to say there was a lot of reason to be concerned. Within two hours of my fall, I was in an emergency room, examined by the doctors, given a clean bill of health, and discharged. The point is, if a need presents itself, our system will bend over backwards to meet it -- all without charging huge fees, I might add.

At the risk of sounding a bit like Michael Moore, it's no secret that the current system in America is the bigger disaster -- millions of Americans can't get health insurance, and the ones that do, often get their claims rejected because some bean counters think that things like heart surgery and tumour removal aren't critical procedures. Private insurance companies are after one thing alone: making a profit, and they don't care if people die to give them that. Frankly, it's my belief that the people who support private health care, just want to legally kill the lower-middle class.

If you still want proof that this whole story from Shona Holmes is a crock, think about this. Even though she hates Canadian medicare, even though she took it upon herself to raise the money to get treated abroad, she's still suing the Ontario government for her health expenses. Yeah, she really sounds like a noble person, doesn't she. Enough said.

Right Wing, Wrong Way

Change is slow. On top of that, the only people who completely embrace it are the ones who didn't like the status quo in the first place. I ought to keep that in mind, when I hear the latest right-wing garbage that attacks Barack Obama, liberals, gay rights, alleged terrorists, or any other conservative targets, but I'm only human. On top of that, I'm someone who was brought up to believe that people should be judged by their actions, rather than what colour their skin is, what church they go to, or who they're in love with. Plus, I place a very high value on not being called a traitor just because I don't like a particular leader. So change may be hard, but it is often necessary, especially when the status quo has failed as spectacularly as it has in the last few years.

Barack Obama recently marked the first 100 days of his presidency, and according to polls, most Americans are very happy with the job he's done so far. On top of that, America is gradually rebuilding its reputation as a diplomatic and innovative leader on the world stage, making amends with countries that previously wanted nothing to do with the U.S. But, if you lurk on political internet forums and blogs for about ten minutes, you'll find no shortage of people who are still utterly convinced that Obama is a Muslim terrorist, the Anti-Christ, a communist, or not even an American citizen. Honestly, this is so stupid and needless that the only good thing about it is its unpopularity.

Leaving aside that his birth in Hawaii is well documented -- at least to anyone actually interested in FACTS -- let's think about this for a minute: Obama was in the running for President for years, so doesn't it make sense that if there was any serious question about where he was born, it would have been caught long before he took office? As for the Muslim theory... leaving aside that Obama's Christian faith is also well documented, the Constitution does not disqualify non-Christians from becoming President. So in case it's not obvious, anyone using a mixed background to criticize Obama is just a bullshitting racist. Period. The Anti-Christ thing is just as stupid, especially since every world leader in recent memory has been compared to Satan at some time or another, and to my knowledge its accuracy rate has been exactly ZERO.

By the way, as long as the right wing is going out of its way to attack Obama as a so-called radical, I'd like to know what they think of the following people: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, and John F. Kennedy. Not to mention recent conservative radicals like George W. Bush and Sarah Palin, or the all-time conservative poster boy, Jesus -- though I mean the one actually written about in The Bible, not the one invented by the witch-burners and homophobes.

As for the communist thing, that only seems to be there at all because he's a socially progressive politician who wants to reign in extreme capitalism and not threaten to bomb every country in the world with brown people in it. Now look, I've gone on enough for one season about how America supposedly places a high value on social liberties, and anyone who can be bothered to read a non-American news source would see that Bush's Dr. Strangelove antics had made the U.S. into a sick joke on the world stage. As for trying to control capitalism... when the Great Depression hit, another sitting President did the same thing, to get the economy afloat again. His name Franklin Roosevelt, and it was called the New Deal -- guess what? It worked. The whole reason why the economy imploded in the last few years is because several other governments since then have decided to undo everything that FDR put in place. So going after Obama for trying to put it back, is kind of like someone getting a triple heart bypass, and then ordering the doctor to take it all out because he can't eat pork rinds anymore.

In other words, if the extreme right wants to shoot itself in the foot, it can be my guest. But it shouldn't take the rest of the world with it.

Another post-9/11 relic still lurking, is the controversy over Canadian terrorism suspect Omar Khadr. Last week, a Federal Court ordered Prime Minister Stephen Harper to bring Khadr back to Canada for a proper trial, on the grounds that he is not only being railroaded, but he is legally a child soldier and thus we are obligated by law to show some leniency towards him. Being the neo-con fearmongerer that he is, Harper is refusing to do this -- yet another sign that he doesn't give a horse's ass about Canadian law -- claiming, among other things, that Khadr was never a child soldier. Excuse me, Harpo, but the guy was 15 when he was captured -- how in the hell is he NOT a child soldier? And who the hell are you to disobey an order from a federal court, anyway? To those of us who've been keeping score, he thinks he can ignore the Canadian public, Parliament, our Constitution, the Governor General, the actual economy, and finally our Judicial system, whenever he doesn't hear them say, "Yes, Emperor Harper". When is this asshole going to get overthrown?

Finally, there's the kerfuffle caused by American Homeland Security, thanks to Secretary Janet Napolitano. She recently said in an interview on the CBC, that several 9/11 hijackers came to the U.S. from Canada. This has been a long-standing position of the right-wing, thanks to a former CIA director who refused to say what proof he had of that claim, and you know something? It's completely untrue. Sure enough, Napolitano took it back a few days later -- claiming that she misunderstood the question, of course -- but the damage had been done. So not only is the perception of Canada as a terrorism haven in the air again, but it's being supported by none other than former Presidential candidate John McCain.

Now, even if it were true, that the hijackers crossed over from Canada, it does beg the following question: either way, the last stop for the terrorists was the American mainland. The onus of stopping troublemakers at the border, lies with the country about to receive them -- so why did American security and immigration not stop these men from entering THEIR country?

What I'm about to close with, I basically said when I crowned Sarah Palin the Douchebag of 2008, but I'm going to re-use it, because apparently it's not sinking in. Look, you right-wing "freedom lovers" (please note my sarcasm), maybe you haven't noticed, but a lot of people don't like you right now. In fact, a lot of people think that conservatives are completely clueless and psychotic. With statements like what's been coming out of your camp lately, you're not exactly proving them wrong. So if you ever want to legimately get power again, the best thing you could do is dig your heads out of your asses, take a look at life outside of your caves, and get a grip on the real world. To be honest, you're looking more and more like Joe McCarthy all the time, and the only thing he's remembered for is being a paranoid idiot who ruined a lot of innocent lives and nearly tore a country apart. Enough said.

Gay Marriage in Iowa and Vermont

Gay marriage is once again in the news, with Iowa and Vermont being the most recent states to legalize it. To be honest I'm a little sick of defending it by now, but it is worth mentioning that a conservative Christian group in the U.S. is taking some pretty heavy measures to attack it.

A few days ago, a group called the "National Organization for Marriage" put an ad on TV and YouTube, claiming to be supportive of gays and lesbians, yet threatening that homosexuals have a vague plan to force heterosexuals to change their lives. Fortunately, good sense is prevailing, and not only is no one agreeing with it, but most think that it's completely ridiculous.

Frankly, pretty much all of the anti-gay marriage arguments are so stupid that it's a wonder that anyone has ever taken them seriously. The National Organization alone is claiming that in Vermont the legislature has taken away religious liberties. First of all, no proposal to legalize same-sex marriage has ever forced a church to conduct one of these ceremonies -- it simply means that the state government has to recognize it, whether the couples chooses to marry through a judge or a clergyman who actually reads those parts of scripture that demand compassion. Second of all, I can't help but notice that this group is unable to be pleased by attempts to satisfy its own criticisms -- the anti-marriage crowd has always said that the courts shouldn't create the law -- even though, strictly speaking, they are just troubleshooting existing laws, which is exactly what they're supposed to do on behalf of the people. Yet, when Vermont legalizes gay marriage with a free vote in the State Senate, the religious right are still up in arms. Finally, the stories concocted by this group are very one-sided and dishonest: for instance, the people who claim they were persecuted over their beliefs, were actually nurses or city groups refusing to serve gays and lesbians -- which is in itself against the law.

So, to anyone paying attention, it's pretty clear that they don't really care about religious freedom, they care about gays not having the same rights as straight people. It's rather like Bush's Defense of Marriage Act -- it doesn't forbid partners from cheating on each other, or getting married just to get rich and famous, so it's not really a Defense of Marriage -- it's an Attack on Gays.

Which leads me to one last point: at the risk of making a strawman argument, it's hardly a secret that -- being socially conservative -- the same sort of people condemning gay marriage have never taken the whole "equal rights" thing very seriously. After all, fifty years ago they used God to keep blacks and whites from being in mixed company, or treated as equals. A hundred years ago, they made sure that women were treated like property rather than people. Two hundred years ago, they encouraged the slave trade. Four hundred years ago, they made sure that so-called witches were murdered by church-run governments. Five hundred years ago, they supported wiping out most of the Indians in this part of the world, and so on. So, for these racist, sexist, homophobic scumbags to cry about the so-called persecution of Christianity in North America, is not only bogus, but it pisses on the graves of literally millions of innocent people. By the way, the irony does not escape me that the directors of the National Organization for Marriage include women and black men; am I the only one who has asked these clowns why gays and lesbians don't deserve their rights too?

If there's anything else that can possibly make the downfall of the so-called Christian Right more entertaining, it's that every so often we hear about one of these conservative ministers getting caught doing something that's not only highly embarassing, but a crime. Embezzlement, drug abuse, prostitution, sexual abuse, you name it they've done it. This leads me to my biggest beef with these goons: leaving aside that in North America, the government is supposed to be secular and respecting everyone's rights, as opposed to just conservative Christians... before you even dare to declare yourself the world's moral police, you had better make damn sure that your own slate is clean. It's pretty dumb when a law-abiding atheist is being talked down to by a "Christian" who not only stirs up anger and hate every chance he can get, but thinks nothing of Jesus' own statement "That which you do unto the least of my brothers, you do unto me." Enough said.

The Liberals may be our best hope.

As everyone in Canada knows by now, we vote on Tuesday. Now, ordinarily I'm not arrogant enough to "tell" people how they ought to vote, at least in any specific terms. I'm also the last person who would agree with any kind of strategic voting; ideally I shouldn't have to do that. The problem is that these are far from ideal times. There is simply too much at stake in this election for people to be silent. So for that reason, I'm reluctantly supporting the Liberal party, and I strongly ask that you all do the same. It's not because I'm a particularly big fan of them, but because they have the best chance of stopping Stephen Harper and the Conservatives.

Despite what the Conservative candidates want us to believe, this election has not already been decided, and the non-Tory candidates are certainly not irrelevant. I find it odd that their slogan is to Stand Up for Canada, because all of the things that myself and most people love about this country are the ones that Stephen Harper has wanted to take apart from day one.

I'm standing up for our ability to sustain ourselves, and have our own voice in the world, rather than just doing every little thing that the White House does. I'm standing up for the right of all of us to have good health care, rather than having to choose between having a place to live and getting a heart transplant. I'm standing up the right of our youngsters to have a good start in life, and our older population to retire with peace and dignity. I'm standing up for the right of women to have equal pay to men, and the ability to control their own destiny and bodies. I'm standing up for the right of gays and lesbians to be with the people they love, to the full extent that straight people are automatically entitled to. Most importantly, I'm standing up for our right to speak out without being persecuted, and to disagree with the government without being vilified and attacked. I'm standing up for Canadians of all faiths to be served by the government, not just whichever xenophobic, homophobic, and self-righteous fanatics are on the Prime Minister's speed dial this month. I say we should stand up for our right to be free, to live our lives well, and maybe even to exist at all.

Heck, if you really need proof that Harper and the Tories don't care about the public, consider this: he never released a platform of his own ideas, until earlier this week, a week before the vote, and after the debates and advance polls were done. In other words, he tried for as long as possible to make sure that he could pull a fast one on all of us, and not have to answer for it. And believe me, if you even dare to question the Conservative party, you will be laughed and yelled at by the people representing our so-called down to earth, rightful governing party.

I want to be able to vote for the party that I really support, but the unfortunate thing about the party system in this country is that everything left of the Tories is fragmented four ways. That's the very reason why Harper is in the lead, despite two-thirds of this country not supporting him at all. Since the other parties aren't willing to work together, then we have no choice but to vote for whichever party is immediately behind the Conservatives in the polls. For better or worse, that's the Liberals.

In the last election, Stephen Harper said that when he was through with Canada, we wouldn't recognize it. I agree with him. The Canada that I grew up knowing, the one that I suspect the majority of our soldiers are trying to protect, and that most immigrants want to live in, is one of peace, leadership, and acceptance. That is a Canada that has been vanishing at a frightening rate, in the last two years. It's getting to the point where, as a secular, pro-gay rights, pro-choice, anti-establishment activist, am almost afraid to live here now. So I have to really make an effort to remember that dictatorships in the past have always fallen, even if it's taken decades. I just hope that along the way, not too many people like me are put in prison. Simply put, I want my home back. Enough said.

Young People Fucking (review)

Those of you who've been following my rants against Charles McVety and Bill C-10 would probably have heard of a movie with the unfortunate title Young People Fucking. More than any other film in recent history, this one movie has been trumped up by conservatives as a reason for tax money to be pulled from certain films made in this country -- even if they feel the government should be able to do that totally in secret. So you know I just had to make it my life's mission to see this so-called travesty for itself... if only I could find it.

My quest to watch and review this movie could probably make a decent comedy film of its own; it only played in one theatre in all of Hamilton, which stopped showing it the week I decided to go see it, the only rental store in my area doesn't carry it -- which is a little funny, considering that it does carry a movie called Wicked Sins, but anyway... -- and when I finally found it on YouTube it was taken down just as I got halfway through the movie. So unfortunately, this is really an incomplete video, and I'm going to have to base my opinions on what I did see, plus do what McVety has always refused to do: research other articles.

The premise is very simple: we follow four couples and one threesome one night, as they all knock boots. Along the way, they discover that sex is much more complicated than meets the eye, partly because no matter how casual or raunchy it may be, it's impossible to separate it from love. So right out of the gate we have some irony; religious conservatives are slagging a movie that actually promotes a message of love and connection, which you'd think they'd be happy to see.

The most common form of slander -- I mean, criticism -- by Mr. McVety about this movie is that it's supposedly pornographic. Admittedly the scenes are very suggestive, and once in a while there is a shot of coupling that leaves very little to the imagination... but that's quite rare. In the forty minutes or so that I caught, I saw maybe a half dozen or so breast shots, and one bare butt, all filmed pretty discreetly. Also, the sex scenes in question showed little more than continuous hip-grinding, rather than any explicit shots of penetration. According to every single review I have read -- both professional and amateur -- this is the extent of the sex in this movie. I kid you not.

It reminds me a little of the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre; it has a reputation for being shockingly graphic bloodbath, but when you look at it it isn't very gory at all. Hell, I'm not even sure there's that much blood in it!

Let's break this down: if Young People Fucking is to be called porn for showing the odd boob and butt, then so are MASH, Titanic, Shakespeare in Love, most horror movies, Animal House, Not Another Teen Movie, The Last Picture Show, Braveheart, at least four Highlander movies, much of Monty Python's handiwork, and this is just off the top of my head.

We could then go the route of the MPAA and go after hip thrusts; after all, they have a policy of banning movies if they have more than a certain number of humps at a time -- which I find a little strange, considering that some of the more degrading sex acts I can think of don't involve any hip thrusting. If people bumping pelvises makes this movie porn, then you can also say the same of The Shawshank Redemption, Scary Movie, Hellraiser, the original Halloween, American History X, at least three Highlander movies, The Last Picture Show... you get the idea. The point is, it's a really flimsy place to label anything as porn.

I don't dispute that there are movies out there that are so explicit in their sex scenes as to be interchangeable with hardcore porn -- the American-made Shortbus being a perfect example -- but as far as protecting the morals of the public, there would appear to be far better places to start than Young People Fucking. For example, Taking Lives was filmed in Canada, and features a sex scene that has very prolonged shots of Angelina Jolie getting her clothes ripped off and her pounded against her entire hotel room, showing the full monty along the way. But, since it was produced by an American company, it would have been exempt from the rules of Bill C-10. For that matter, what about the Saw movies, which are notorious for extreme levels of gore and relentless torture scenes? They're shot in Canada, but no, they're made by Americans too. If you really want to take the hypocrisy to its logical conclusion, one has to wonder what Charles McVety would have said, if The Passion of the Christ were financed with our tax dollars... I'm going to go out on a limb here, and say that he'd call that exactly the kind of morally enriched entertainment we should be showing to all cross-bearing Canadian families.

The scary part of all of this is that this little scheme from the so-called Moral Majority almost worked -- it took a huge outcry to get the Senate to investigate Bill C-10, and even then the government wanted no part of it. In fact they, like McVety, have refused to see this movie. Do these sort of clandestine, fundamentalist oppressors really sound like the sort of people we should have running Canada? When a theocracy rears its head halfway around the world, the first reaction is to bomb the hell out of it, yet when the same type of thing happens at home, it seems we welcome it with open arms. And people wonder why I'm not patriotic. Enough said.