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We believe in spending your money on departments whose focus is the encouragement of illusion over reality. That is all.
Where to begin with such a malodorous concept? Starting with irony is always good, so… for instance how about the blinding irony of the Conservatives dedication to ‘austerity and smaller government’? How this equates with creating nebulous departments with equally nebulous goals defies rational comprehension.
“It was a Conservative campaign promise meant to promote religious freedom worldwide.
The promise, the Tories said, was to give a Canadian foreign policy focus to oppressed religious minorities in places such as Egypt, Pakistan, China and Iran.”
Well, it sorta sounds good, but how does this mission statement jive with the rest of Canada’s foreign policy?
“Last month, Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird called freedom of religion a linchpin of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedom and Bill of Rights. Prime Minister Stephen Harper has also touted the new office, hoping Canada would step forward as a major champion of international religious rights.
At an hour-long interfaith meeting in Toronto on Wednesday, participants Abdul Hai Patel, of the Canadian Council of Imams, and Rev. Bhante Saranpala, of the West-End Buddhist Cultural Centre, said Baird noted the “office doesn’t have any teeth.”
But Baird spokesperson Joseph Lavoie said the minister was referring to the office’s legislative influence around the world.
“At the end of the day, we can’t force another government to do anything,” Baird said in a later interview.”
Oh, so we are going to set up a government bureaucracy to send guilt-inducing notes to other countries tell them about how to run their countries, fantastic. Of course, the amazing rate of failure will be promptly ignored by the Conservative powers that be because as always, ideological concerns always trump science and empirical evidence.
“the new entity — which will cost $5 million, employ five and, Lavoie said, launch in early 2012 — has rankled a number of Canadian religious organizations, human rights groups and academics, who remain unsure of what it hopes to achieve and whose interests it will serve”
Well, with no tangible goals, its impossible to get a bad evaluation. Win!!
““It could be argued that a secular government is well-positioned to (promote religious freedom abroad) because it doesn’t have a vested interested in any particular community,” said Tamas, who attended the October consultation. Baha’is face persecution in a number of Muslim countries, including Iran.”
Just out of the goodness of our hearts. Wowzers! It certainly couldn’t be a sweetheart nod to the deluded Conservative base here in Canada, nope nope nope no irrelevant agency adding mindless persiflage to our foreign policy. The ORF will make a difference.
“MacDonald points to Harper’s trip to China next month. While Harper has criticized China’s commitment to human rights in the past, the country remains one of Canada’s largest trading partners, with $13.2 billion in exports and $44.5 billion in imports in 2010.
MacDonald said it is “absolutely inconceivable” that the Tories will speak out against China’s well-documented persecution of Christians and the Falun Gong. In October, Baird voiced support for China’s Christians and Falun Gong, as well as its oppressed Tibetans and Uyghurs”.
Err…
Hey, you in the lab coat. Stop your filthy science right now, I have policy to fabricate!
If Steven Harper was a puppy, he would be getting a firm “NO” and a being ignored right now when it comes to his views on science and the dissemination of scientific knowledge through government agencies. We get it Stevie, you hates the empirical reality that science provides because it makes your socially conservative ideology(census anyone, or Prisons perhaps?) look like horseshit.
Our systematic dismembering of Canadian Science has not gone unnoticed. Nature has released a short editorial decrying the ineptitude of the our Conservative government on the handling of science.
“Over the same period, Canada has moved in the opposite direction [from the fundagelically fracked up United States, no less]. Since Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative Party won power in 2006, there has been a gradual tightening of media protocols for federal scientists and other government workers. Researchers who once would have felt comfortable responding freely and promptly to journalists are now required to direct inquiries to a media-relations office, which demands written questions in advance, and might not permit scientists to speak. Canadian journalists have documented several instances in which prominent researchers have been prevented from discussing published, peer-reviewed literature. Policy directives and e-mails obtained from the government through freedom of information reveal a confused and Byzantine approach to the press, prioritizing message control and showing little understanding of the importance of the free flow of scientific knowledge.”
You know there is a problem when we are being compared negatively to the US with regards to the dissemination of scientific information.
The Long Gun Registry, More Prisons, and of course, lets not forget the long form census…
I’m with Rick on this one.
Voter turnout it at an all time low in Canada, let’s not increase that number anymore okay Steve?
The New Corporate Logo for Alberta Power Companies - "Plunder"
And make no mistake it is a generous gift.
“In Alberta, the big standout price increase was for electricity, which cost 63.6 per cent more in January than it did a year ago,” he said.
Go figure. When the people who generate the power also control the supply do you think that they will manipulate the system of their benefit? Of course they will.
“In the wake of revelations that TransAlta Corp. manipulated the power market to increase profits, a report to the Alberta monitor warns there’s a risk that participants may be working together to the same end.
The study prepared by consultancy Charles River Associates for the Alberta Market Surveillance Administrator, the enforcement arm of a system set up when Alberta deregulated its power market in 1995, looks into whether the level of data released makes it possible for participants to work in concert — but not whether they actually have.
It concludes that the Alberta market “may be susceptible to co-ordinated behaviour” because it has high supplier concentration, barriers to entry, repeated and frequent interaction by players and relatively constant levels of demand.
So the situation is ripe for plunder of Alberta’s citizens and plunder is exactly what TransAlta did.
“In a negotiated settlement with the MSA, TransAlta agreed to pay $370,000 and admit it purposely blocked the import of cheaper hydroelectric power from British Columbia over 31 hours in November 2010, creating an artificial shortage of electricity and higher prices.
The settlement, which takes away excess profits of $245,000 and includes a $125,000 fine, will be the subject of an Alberta Utilities Commission public hearing in January.”
This is why we need regulation and strong government oversight because this is just one reported incident that happened to be egregious enough to be caught. Companies do not work for the pubic or the public good, they work to accrue the largest benefit of their shareholders and as noted above if swindling the people of alberta is good for the bottom line, so be it. Yet the lovely PC government goads us with whip and and the bludgeon to buy into this corrupt system.
“Alberta’s regulated rate option — the rate consumers pay if they haven’t signed contracts with electricity retailers — was designed by the provincial government to encourage retail consumers to purchase contracts, which would theoretically attract more competition.
In July 2010, the governing Conservatives ended long-term hedging of electricity prices and collapsed the protective umbrella that had previously shielded residential, farm and small commercial consumers from wild price spikes.”
This simple is collusion with the power companies by the PC party. This is not in the best interests of people of Alberta. Far from it. But let me assure you gentle readers, the brain-dead zombie sheeple of Alberta will continue to vote PC in the next election. Why? Your guess is as good as mine.
Seven-year-old Ferlin Iahtal lies in his home-made bunk bed in his home in Attawapiskat on Dec. 17. Twenty-one people live in the house that has plastic on the ceilings to stop water leaks.
Canada’s active neglect of the First Nations continues. Under the heavy mantle of the oppressive Harper regime minority groups and those concerned with justice should be prepared to take a pass until the current regime of plutocratic conservative troglodytes have been put out to pasture. Harper intends to meet with First Nations leaders again, to discuss land use, resource revenue and living conditions for Canada’s first peoples.
“More than 400 aboriginal chiefs will meet Stephen Harper, the Canadian prime minister, and government ministers at a summit known as the Crown-First Nations Gathering in Ottawa. It is the first official meeting of its kind since he took office in 2006. The aim is to improve the relationship between the Canadian government and what is known as Canada’s First Nations communities. That relationship stalled six years ago when the current Conservative government abandoned a five-year, $5bn plan known as the Kelowna Accord.”
Stalled is quite the understatement as First Nations concerns were unceremoniously kicked to the curb by the Conservative government.
“Resolving outstanding land claims is among the top priorities. Aboriginal leaders feel the current process of settling the claims unjustly favours the federal government.
Also high on the list of priorities is economic development. First Nation leaders want to secure a fair share of revenues from the exploitation of natural resources on aboriginal lands. And on health and education, most First Nation leaders will be pressing for a commitment to levels of funding and services comparable with those for non-aboriginal communities.”
Nothing unreasonable here, just people wanting to take part in the prosperous 1st world nation Canada is. A world that has, for the most part, been denied to First Nations people.
Meanwhile, the Canadian government is increasingly coming into conflict with the needs of First Nations communities as it promotes the extraction of oil and other natural resources. A diamond mine projected to become one of the richest in the world is just upstream from the poverty-stricken town of Attawapiskat on James Bay. The mine is on traditional lands, but the royalties flow to the province.
A puppy sits on the porch of a home in Attawapiskat. Inside, the home has no plumbing or sanitation facilities.
That town also made headlines recently over living conditions when it was found that people were living in tents, shacks and trailers in temperatures of minus 20 degrees Celsius. Charles Angus, a member of parliament representing James Bay, describes the conditions within several of the First Nation communities as an “international disgrace for our nation”. He[Charles Angus] tells Inside Story: “The Attawapiskat crisis certainly shook Canada. In a way it has been our Katrina moment because Canadians were shocked that people were living in such dire conditions but then also shocked that the government had no plan, no seeming interest to respond.”
Racism is alive and well in Canada as we continue to neglect our First Nations and keep them impoverished and on the margins of society.
“Canada not only created these reserves, they displaced First Nation’s laws with provincial child welfare, education and health laws that should apply to all Canadians. The result is most horribly experienced by children. One-in-six First Nations communities don’t even have the basics like water; some of them are using buckets for sewers. The list goes on and it is unacceptable in a wealthy country like ours, and completely preventable.”
-Cindy Blackstock from the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada
We still have far to go on improving our own imperialist record, mending decades of neglect is going to be a huge project, one that is unlikely to be undertaken by the current Conservative Government of Canada.
Homemade Canadian Fail Incoming.
Some people who express racist sentiments just don’t know any better, their peer groups are racist and the sentiments are a shared group meme that is still wrong but at least understandable. The educated though, should just fucking know better. This half-wit brings the supernovae like stupidity with her critique of Handel’s Messiah. As this article was posted on Pharyngula, I’m going to screen shot her lovely quotes; I have a feeling this post may be disappearing fairly soon.
Racism and stupidity, now all in one place!
Wow.
“I don’t think this is simply a cultural phenomenon (as in misunderstanding the Messiah’s content, message, meaning, etc…). I think it is a physio/cerebral problem. I’ve seen it happen in art and design, and even in science – a friend of mine was a Korean PhD student.”
Oh, you’ve got a Korean friend, it must be totally true. Did you share the first little fun fact with your friend that you find them cerebrally challenged as well? Did you put it into small words so they could understand your sane rational discourse?
“So this is what multiculturalism is bringing us. I think it is a mixture of aggressive Asians pushing their way in everywhere, and a liberal white public that wants these multi-culti influences to dominate in its cities and institutions.”
Damn those aggressive Asians for being so darn talented and ruining Western Classical Music Forever!1!!.
No, Camera Lucida it is you who need to go away and stop ruining the world the rest of us.
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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