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Something happens to Mr. Ignatieff each year as summer ends. It is a bravado driven insanity that speaks to the core thinking of the Liberal Party and its misguided sense of entitlement to govern. Go Iggy Go!

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     Elmer Gantry for the new millenium. He desecrated the hallowed Lincoln/MLK land today with the purpose of underpinning the lower classes, the poor and struggling to celebrate the haves. But he has done it in a genius way. He has turned his evil upside down so that it looks smiley face Stepford wive-ish. He has presented his rally as an open book (mostly the bible) for all people to join. The only stipulation it would seem is that you are all very, very religious, preferably Christian. He asked attendees to leave their signs at home (like true Beckbots, most did - great response from NAACP: "Dr. King never had to ask his followers to leave hateful signs and guns at home".)

Beck made pains too to make the rally about the troops, of course. All immaculately planned and organized, Beck's rally positions the tea party and...">                              

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The Royal Canadian Mint will soon be issuing a commemorative $1 coin celebrating the Centennial of the Saskatchewan Roughriders: 1910 - 2010.

This is an exlusive first peek!...">                              

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     Howard Dean. One of the few Democrats with balls, Dean has always said what was on his mind, no matter the political fallout. However, his defense of the anti-Islamists and their crusade against Cordoba House smacks of putting party interests ahead of the larger humanitarian issue.

By siding with the 68 percent of Americans who object to the Cordoba House, on the surface because of its location, Dean is being loyal to his party. He knows that Obama's stance on the centre is out-of-touch with the majority of the country. He knows this is bad for the Democrats in the mid-terms just ten weeks away. Instead, Obama is looking beyond the politics. He is do...">                              

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     Dishonest Health Care Poll Interpretation Month, as the Globe and Mail also serves up a doozy of a spin of the CMA's poll on health care to the effect that respondents think it's just peachy to torch any semblance of a universal system.

So let's set the record straight. Based on the CMA's polling, more Canadians are concerned with declines in coverage and quality than they are with paying taxes to support the health care system Canadians should be able to expect from their government. And the fact that respondents still place those issues first even after years of being brow-beaten with fictional claims about health care being unsustainable should speak volumes about the difference of opinion between Canadians at large and th...">                              

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     Tablet magazine. Luban argues that Islamophobia as it is developing in North American and Europe has strong parallels to traditional anti-Semitism and examines the furor over the "9-11 mosque" as the latest and most fervent example of this. Here's an excerpt:
many of the tropes of classic anti-Semitism have been revived and given new force on the American right. Once again jingoistic politicians and commentators posit a religious conspiracy breeding within Western society, pledging allegiance to an alien power, conspiring with allies at the highest levels of government to overturn the existing order. Because the propagators of these conspiracy theories are not anti-Semitic but militantly pro-Israel, and because their targets are not Jews but Muslims, the ADL and other Jewish groups have had little to say about them. But since the election of President Barack Obama, this Islamophobic discourse...">                              

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     latest reporting on New Brunswick's election this fall includes an interesting parallel between Roger Duguay's message and that of some disaffected federal Cons - as both are rightly pointing out the problems with funnelling public money toward corporate interests. Here's Duguay:
NDP Leader Roger Duguay said his priority would be to stabilize deficits and stop "wasteful government spending," adding that he would eliminate grants and forgivable loans to companies for the next five years.

"Most of the time it's not the best place to put our money," he said.Needless to say, the proposal to shut off the taps to the corporate sector makes for a rather useful explanation as to what the NDP would do differently than its competitors to ensure that New Brunswick's provincial budget is managed responsibly.

And it only helps that Duguay's message is nicely paralleled by someone ...">                              

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     Stieg Larsson's supposedly fictional accounts of corrupt law enforcement in Sweden, prosecution spokesperson Karin Rosanger gives a bizarre interview with Al Jazeera regarding the withdrawal of rape warrants for WikiLeaks Julian Assange. Granted, she cannot divulge some details, but her complete whitewash of the incompetent handling of the case by the Swedish prosecutors is almost humorous.



H/T: Glenn Greenwald">                              

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     The true face of the Atlas Juggers. This guy just happened to be black and had a Muslimish hat on. What's next? Pinning yellow stars on anyone who looks like they're Muslim?



UPDATE: Notorious Muslim hater and racist Pam Geller is denying she had anything to do with the pogromists near attack on the black man at today's near riot near ground zero. Yeah, right.">                              

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     This is a must read. It is the absolute reality of an opportunistic, self-interested bunch of idiots and how they have undermined Petraeus' war strategy of winning Muslim hearts and minds. And who's at the heart of the hate and treason, if you will? Rupert Murdoch and Fox News.
So virulent is the Islamophobic hysteria of the neocon and Fox News right — abetted by the useful idiocy of the Anti-Defamation League, Harry Reid and other cowed Democrats — that it has also rendered Gen. David Petraeus’s last-ditch counterinsurgency strategy for fighting the war inoperative. How do you win Muslim hearts and minds in Kandahar when you are calling Muslims every filthy name in the book in New York?[...]Their sudden concern for ground zero is suspect to those of us who actually live in New York. All but 12 Republicans in ...">                              

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     opinion and prediction as a party directly affected by policy choices:
Critics say the government's sudden decision to mitigate some of the damage from the census furor may have been just a first step in an attempt to reverse the opinion poll trends. However, they also say reinstatement of questions about use of the English and French languages at home into the mandatory short form of the census, and the accompanying announcement it plans legislation to eliminate jail as a potential penalty for failure to fill out the questionnaire, will not solve the Prime Minister's problem on that issue.

"This debate is not going to go ...">                              

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     nadir with a column about the way Islam has dealt with America and visa versa. His point is that for Islam to respected, it has to succumb to the prejudices of the most hateful of Americans and adapt. He points as proof how other religions have curbed their practices - for example, the Mormons with polygamy - and Is...">                              

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     Amusing story inspired by Atlas Shrugs:
When little Aiden toddled up our daughter Johanna and asked to play with her Elmo ball, he was, admittedly, very sweet and polite. I think his exact words were, "Have a ball, peas [sic]?" And I'm sure you were very proud of him for using his manners.To be sure, I was equally proud when Johanna yelled, "No! Looter!" right in his looter face, and then only marginally less proud when she sort of shoved him.The thing is, in this family we take the philosophies of Ayn Rand seriously. We conspicuously reward ourselves for our own hard work, we never give to charity, and we only pay our taxes very, very begrudgingly.  ">                              

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     Facebook page still lists his "running for" as "Stay Tuned!" at the moment.

Needless to say, Moose Jaw North will be one of the top targets for the Saskatchewan NDP in the 2011 election after it fell to the Sask Party by only 33 votes in 2007. And Vieser's strong launch today (including some well-timed pre-announcement publicity) bodes well for his chances as he seeks both the NDP's nomination and the seat in the general election to follow.

(Edit: fixed typos.)">                              

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     Counterproductive.
Remember the Bigger Asshole Rule: To win the hearts and minds of the American public, your first job is to make your opponents look like bigger assholes than you are. Thus, trying to match your opponents in asshole-ness is counterproductive.">                              

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     end of construction of mosques in the USA. I say OK as long as new churches and synagogues are also banned. Freedom from religion for all!">                              

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     rightly criticizes a prime example of how "business-friendly" policy tends to result in a deliberate attempt to limit workers' rights, as the McGuinty Libs are planning to require workers to approach their employers with labour standards violations before reporting anything to the provincial Ministry of Labour:
Fifteen months ago, the McGuinty government beefed up provincial employment standards, guaranteeing temp workers the right to holiday, severance and termination pay. The government also pledged to spend $10 million hiring new enforcement officers to protect precarious workers.

Now the temporary workers feel as if their victory is being snatched away, as the government proposes to “modernize” the Employment Standards Act. Under new rules, workers would be required to confront their boss about unpaid wages, overtime or other breaches of the law before f...">                              

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     Toronto, Montreal, Hamilton and Winnipeg, that's only a small fraction of the rallies organized across the country - and a turnout below expectations can only create excuses for the media to further ignore any future action in support of Canadians' civil liberties.

Which is to say, what thwap said:
I had HOPED to see...">                              

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     Alf Apps's statement that the Libs' goal should be simply to win power as the default alternative to the Harper Cons, Paul Wells makes some great points about the Libs' longstanding pattern of losing support during election campaigns. But it's worth putting that trend in the context of the much-debated question of who, if anybody, constitutes Canada's "natural governing party".

As noted by Wells, during their last stay in power the Libs enjoyed a consistent lead between elections, with their baseline share of popular support standing somewhere around 50% until at least the 2004 election. And it's not hard to see how the Libs' strategy at that point could plausibly be based on the assumption that they could relatively easily assemble a majority government out of...">                              

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     colored people' (emphasis mine):
Also Wednesday, he took his “non-racist” commentary to the next level, penning his version of an “open letter” to Abe Lincoln … from the “colored people…” in which he accuses black people, or sorry “coloreds,” of not wanting to work, of “striving for welfare,” and wanting to buy “flat screen TVs” with white people’s stolen money. Seriously. It’s an apparent attempt at satire, I suppose, but which aligns perfectly with the views of the tea party movement, which is by and large a mash-up of Libertarians who want to get rid of Social Security, disappointed Palin cultists and old geezer racists who believe Obama only got himself elected so he ...">                              

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