Vic Toews' Embarrassment, Couldn’t Happen To A Nicer Guy!

Canadian Public Safety Minister Vic Toews (pronounced Teivz) the self-described “minister of family values” from Steinbach, Manitoba with his pugnatious sponsorship of Bill C-30 bearing the equally misleading moniker of "Protecting Children from Internet Predators Act," which proposes that the RCMP, CSIS and others appointed by the Minister be given the power to engage in the warrantless online surveillance of Canadians, has surely learned a very important lesson in his twilight years. Don't lead with your chin!

What was the man thinking with his statement in the House of Commons equating non-supporters of this intrusive and unnecessary bill with supporters of child pornographers? If one wanted to isolate oneself and so polarize an issue as to invite personal attacks it's hard to think of a more effective way of accomplishing that and poisoning ones own reputation at the same time. Because as we all now know "minister of family values" Victor Toews is not. 

This has been in the news for some days now so outside of opinion don't expect anything new here, but to recap: 

• Vic Toews very publicly denigrates a majority of law abiding Canadian citizens, for fun apparently.
• In response @VikiLeaks30 starts tweeting unflattering facts about Mr. Toews' personal & parliamentary life.
• #TellVicEverything hashtag invites Canadians to do just that, pandemonium ensues.
• #DontToewsMeBro joins the fray, the possibilities are legion, the inter-tubes are abuzz.
• Tories claim @VikiLeaks30 uses a HoC IP address and tries to attribute it to the NDP.
• A smarmy Vic Toews denies he said what he said, tries to claim victim status. The internet laughs.
• @VikiLeaks30 acct. closed but is replaced with @VikiLeaksMirror, to keep the fun going. 

Now, one has to keep several things in mind when trying to understand what has happened here. One point is that the Liberal party tried repeatedly to introduce an even more draconian bill when they were last in power and repeated the attempt as a private members bill after they lost the election in 2006. Apparently the benefits to the government of having such power to chase down anyone they choose to is recognized across party lines. So you really have to thank Victor for reminding us that politicians are essentially all the same. Very important that!


Another point is the concept of public domain. Vic Toews divorce filings and the information contained therein is public domain. So when @VikiLeaks30 tweets that "the minister of family values" fathered a child on his family babysitter, carried on an affair for seven (7) years with her, divorced his wife of thirty (30) years and cut off child support to his now ex-wife in 2010, this is perfectly within the bounds of public discourse. Supporters of Mr. Toews using a variety of mental gymnastic tricks have tried to portray this reporting as morally or professionally wrong. It is not. It is simply a statement of facts.

The irony here, which is lost on no one, is how Vic Toews in a stunning display of hubris, a) brought about his own personal travails and b) further complicated this secretive and opaque government in it's continuing attempts to curtail the rights of all Canadians across the land. This blogger can assign a feeling of schadenfreude to a) while thankful describes my response to b). Why thankful? Because I cannot possibly think of a more effective way to galvanize the public to the threats to our liberty posed by this Tory government of Steven Harper and his evangelical gang of reform party bigots. 

You don't have to marvel at the antics of Newt Gingrich and that crowd of hypocritical neocon Republican thugs south of the border folks. All you need to do is pay attention to what goes on on a daily basis in our own House of Commons. And don't expect our media to lay it out for you. It takes someone from outside the system who doesn't need to bow and scrape to the powers for access. Thank you VikiLeaks! Whoever you are.


PS: My elderly parents knew nothing about Victor Toews before this. Now they know enough to be disgusted by both him and the government of the day which he represents. Good work Vic! You're a peach.

Pepper

Denial is more than just a river in Egypt

Here is a news item from last week;

Fight over headphones delays flight

MONTREAL -- Two pilots on an Air Canada Jazz flight were forced to break up a fight between two passengers who were brawling over a pair of headphones, police say.

One of the men was kicked off the flight at Trudeau Airport and has been arraigned on several charges.

The altercation delayed the flight to Winnipeg on Tuesday afternoon.

Montreal police spokesman Dany Richer said officers were called to the plane, which was still at the gate.

"The conflict began when one of the two men sat on the armrest of a seat and broke his neighbour's headphones," said Richer.

A fight broke out and a flight attendant was unable to separate the men.

"Her arm was hurt during the altercation," said Richer.

The pilots were finally able to separate the two passengers.

Jamie Lee Prefontaine, 26, of Winnipeg, was taken into custody and charged after police say he resisted arrest and tried to damage a police cruiser.

Prefontaine was arraigned at the Montreal courthouse Thursday on charges of assault with a weapon, uttering threats and mischief.

Air Canada Jazz spokeswoman Manon Stuart said the flight was delayed two hours.

If you search this article it will show up dozens of times, exactly the same. But I had a relative on that flight and a different story emerges.

Specifically, there were four natives who boarded in Montreal, all drunk. The one that was taken away by the police and subsequently charged was covered in gang tattoos and had been asleep in his seat and not responsive to the attendant who was trying to wake him. At some point the man awoke and using a chain from around his neck attacked the attendant bruising her arm resulting in his being removed from the plane by the police.

Which version is correct and why am I bringing this up?

It has to do with another story from last week concerning Air Canada's decision to put up their flight crews during layovers at the Sandman away from their old haunts at the Radisson in the city centre citing concerns over an increase in local crime which they felt was brought on by an influx of "rural" Mantitobans driven from their homes by flooding.

In this case there were several more articles from different sources each adding to the story. So much information that native Chiefs started calling for a boycott against AC and legal action against anyone and everyone, a predictable response that we won't address here. What was interesting was the way the Mayor and other provincial politicians and downtown business leaders combined forces to lash out at AC's very reasonable response to the situation in the downtown. They did not use facts like those that could very easily be found on CromeStat as was very nicely done by Menno Zacharias.


Instead he Mayors response was to find one or two people to claim, as a matter of opinion and without addressing any facts, that the Winnipeg downtown is super fine and just needs the benefit of the doubt. I kid you not.

Kevin O'Leary, Tone Deaf?

Or just in character.

Witness this example of his tired shtick getting the slap down by Pulitzer prize winning US journo Chris Hedges.

And now compare that embarrassment with an interview by RT. Yes, RT. CBC should hang their heads.

How To Peel A Head Of Garlic

My wife and I use a lot of garlic, so this is very, very useful!

I have been living in a desert.

Rachel Platten – 1,000 Ships

This has been running around in my brain for a while now. 

And The Last Day Of Summer Is Upon MeYouUs

Hmmm, almost time to put (throw) the sandals away and start wearing socks, if I can ever get the soles of my feet clean again. Going to have to be mismatched darkish socks from the church bin most likely. For a while, till the grey scales and carbuncles wear off.


September equinox or Autumnal Equinox will be tomorrow I figure. Marking the end of summer, and what a great summer it was, no bugs! Heh. Mostly no employment either but one should not complain about what everyone else thinks is likely to be a great deal during the summer time. Being un(self)employed. I'll clue y'all into the reality of that little grade school fallacy some other time, but here's a hint. Being unemployed on a beach in Ischia is a whole lot different than being unemployed in Winnipeg. Just so you know. 

But of course this means I'll be blogging again and so sorry about that my fellow droogs. I mean, you knew it was likely to happen right? As long as I didn't OD or get hit by an ice cream truck stumbling off the curb whilst sssquinting into the way harsh early morning light.

Weeeell, looking around I see that the Blogger™ interface has been updated! Guess I shouldn't be surprised. My FB is a mess. Full of "improvements." And something called Google + which I already have set up and linked to my Twitter/Linkedin/FB/Flickr yadayada. Did it on my iPhone4 while taking a crap and waiting for the 5 to appear and give me a hand job.

Meh. I really need to get something different happening. Isn't it time for nuclear war or something. The 2nd coming?

But I've said too much already. First things first, a little housekeeping is in order. I need to clean out those blog links, reset the wallpaper and get a new battery for the MacBook. I'm partitioned and running Win 7 but 8 is coming out already? How the fuck am I supposed to keep up with this shit, I just upgraded the other partition to Lion! 

Sigh. It's going to be a long winter.