Category Archives: Canadian Senate

Monday, 22 September, 2014 – CBC News Headlines:

Monday, 22 September, 2014  -( 49˚F / 9˚C –  & raining @ 8:30 am in Ithaca )-

{ We’ve been doing this because we believe the CBC may be more honest and more respectable than Media in the U.S.A., & not a lot of people in the U.S. may know that or have access to anyone who might point them toward the CBC & their web site. }

{ & again, these are not links. If you want to read these stories, listen to sound clips, or see any video -if there is any video- go to CBC dot CA/news.— & You can also find a link to the web cast of the most recent broadcast of “The National” the CBC’s ‘flagship nightly newscast’ under the “Must Watch” heading on their main page. — Thanks. ———djo——— }

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Quote of the day? Song lyrics from the flower child days: “Love is but a song we sing – /Fear- a way we die / You can make the mountains ring / -Hear the angels cry” – by Dino Valenti – It was performed by the old Kingston Trio, by Joni Mitchell, Judy Collins, HP LoveCraft, The Youngbloods, and Jefferson Airplane and then I lost count. It was called “Let’s Get Together” before the Youngbloods released it as “Get Together” And the Dave Clark 5 released a version as “Everybody Get Together”

 

5 political leaders in a row.

Leaders of the five political parties involved in today’s provincial elections in New Brunswick. Left to right: David Coon – Green Party, Dominic Cardy – NDP, David Alward – PC party, Brian Gallant – Liberal, Kris Austin – People’s Alliance party.

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Lead Articles:

-Updated- Suspect in Clinton businessman shooting arrested, charged with 1st-degree murder   {  }

Storm leaves 23,000 cusomers without power across N.S.   {  }

Ebola death toll now at 2,792 in 5 African nations: WHO   {  }

Male teen charged in death of Surrey, B.C., teenager    {  }

Canadian in Syria blocked from bringing husband home to safety   { Another headline to the same article: “Ottawa blocks Canadian from getting Syrian husband out of danger.”  —djo—  }

-Analysis- People are drinking the drugs we take   { * This one’s scary: “What happens when the excreted drugs get into drinking water?”  —djo— }

-New- Downsizing: When hitting the road hurts like hell   { * This is a series about a large reporter trying to lose weight.   —djo— }

 

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“Offbeat”

No new offbeat news?  😦

 

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“Most Viewed”

ISIS audio urges attacks on ‘unbelievers’ in Canada   {  }

High winds in Nova Scotia leave 50,000 in the dark   {  }

Nude celebrity photo leak: More images posted to online forums   { Repeat? or are there more since yesterday? & Why should we care?  —djo— }

Rockefellers to join in divesting $50B of oil fortune to fight global warming   { They’re probably buying up gold and silver in the belief that their manipulations are about to hit the fan and drive down the economies of everyone in the ‘free world’.  —djo— }

Justin Trudeau’s abortion policy keeps people talking   {  }

-17 photo slide show- People’s Climate Marches around the world   { Yesterday I got email and told you about the Conservative sector of the ‘Main Stream Press’ getting snarky and trying to undermine the sincerity of marchers around the world.  —djo— }

 

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Other:

5 Things to watch for in New Brunswick’s provincial election   { 1. Does election coverage interfere with the season premier of ‘The Black List’? 2. Does it interfere with the season premier of ‘Sleepy Hollow’? * My turn to get snarky– —djo—  }

The story behind Justin Trudeau’s abortion strategy   { * How about the story behind headlines that try to make a political strategy look like cold hearted manipulation?  —djo— }

Unpaid academic internships ‘taking advantage’ of students, critics say   { And over the weekend an article in the Huffington Post suggested that banks were changing their strategies to make it harder for middle class people to get mortgages etc, while making it easier for the top small percentage of the richest segment of the population to cash in on everybody else’s difficulties.   —djo— }

No word on when Mayor Rob Ford will exit hospital   {  }

Cost of policing continues to climb despite reduced cri, study finds   { * Well, heck, somebody has to pay for all those shiny new military weapons and vehicles every police force in the world wants to show off –   —djo— }

Government’s plan to revoke passports raises human rights concern   { ‘A new passport order gives Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Chris Alexander the power to deny passports on the grounds of national security, – “revoking and refusing passports to those going abroad to take part in terrorist activities.”- ‘  * The trouble is, there have been too many cases of people who have been thought to be terrorists because they have a Muslim name. The man who used to be Cat Stevens was denied entry into the USA a couple years back because the Muslim name he took with his new religion also belonged to someone they believed was a terrorist. At least one Canadian citizen was taken from a plane in the USA and shipped off to a country where nobody questions their torture methods and tortured for a couple years. I think he sued the Canadian Government for a lot of money when he released. And if I remember right, there were three or four more cases that were almost identical in their legal system. ** So the kids I went to school with, who used to blurt out, ‘In the Future, the US will be more like Russia and Russia will be more like the USA-‘ -whatever their sources were, were right? And Canada is following the USA down the road to totalitarianism?  —djo— }

Pioneer of mixed-race prom seeks funds for Museum of Human Rights visit   { A teenager “from southern Georgia who planned her high school’s first mixed-race prom last year is raising money to visit Winnipeg after being honoured by the newly opened Canadian Museum for Human Rights.” * And what has me worried is: – Aren’t Museums places where you go to look at things that have gone extinct or out of style? Would the Museum of Human Rights be a place where we might go to celebrate the idea that we once had Human Rights?  —djo— }

Student suspended for selling banned Pepsi takes business to sidewalk   { * Well, heck, the kids who have been addicted to intestine-rotting GMO ‘modified corn sweetener’ in popular soft drinks have to get their suicidal fixes somewhere- * Me being snarky again.  —djo— }

NASA’s MAVEN spacecraft reaches orbit around Mars   {  }

-Must Watch- Worldwide climate change rallies   { ‘Climate change’ is probably more accurate than the ‘global warming’ headline I saw somewhere else. —djo— }

& The Editor’s Picks are left over from yesterday.

-World- 130,000 Syrians flee to Turkey in 4 days to escape ISIS advance   { * Up 30,000 from yesterday? Ever wonder who might want to stay up all night dreaming up new ways to make sure you’re nervously believing the world might explode into terror attacks and war exploding everywhere at once?  —djo— }

-World- Australia seeks broad anti-terror powers after foiled beheading plot   { * When I was a kid in the late sixties, early 70’s we had an exchange student from Australia come talk to us in school and while people in the USA were starting to doubt the war in Vietnam was us trying to make the world safe for everybody else, Australians seemed to be genuinely concerned that the Red Menace -Communists- who had replaced the -Yellow menace- -Japanese soldiers during WWII- might just swoop down and take over and rape all those nice pure white girls. Australia might be a little more susceptible to propaganda scare tactics than areas more removed from international hot spots. ** Um, anybody got any ideas on how we can reverse the barage of fear mongering b.s. scare tactics that are aimed at out hearts and minds? —djo— }

-World- Visiting Afghan soldiers go missing from Cape Cod military base   {  }

-Politics- Korean president to talk trade during Parliament Hill visit   {  }

-Politics- Tories revive union bill that provoked Senate rebellion, move to limit debate   { * Quick, somebody move to limit the Tories grasp on power-   —djo— }

-Health- Why Winnipeg? How a Canadian lab became an Ebola research powerhouse   {  }

-Arts & Entertainment- 2014 CBC Poetry Prize winner announced   {  }

-Arts & Entertainment- Happy Birthday Leonard Cohen: Q opens the vault   {  }

 

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“Local / New Brunswick”

5 cropped photos from a debate.

The five party leaders in today’s election.

5 things to watch for in New Brunswick’s provincial election   { Here’s their list :  1. Alward’s shale gas strategy – * Can conservative party lies that fracking is safe and necessary for the economy blind enough voters to give the unholy [ censored ]’s another win? * 2. Can Brian Gallant hold lead? * Can the Liberals pull in enough votes to win this one – after they pointed out that, all the time the Conservatives were telling everybody that Fracking meant jobs and prosperity, 3,000 actual jobs disappeared and campaign promises met half their goals- 3. Possible NDP breakthrough – Dominic Cardy did well in the debates after having moved his party a little closer to the centre of the political spectrum, recruiting ex-Liberals and ex-PC members to switch to the NDP banner and ‘pitching the party as the one that takes fiscal matters seriously’.  4. Green Party Leader David Coon – There was a tweet yesterday that Jim W sent me – A poster that was seen in University campus windows that said, “99% Less Bullshit”, showed David Coon’s smiling face- and listed web sites, twitter accounts, and facebook pages-  5. New riding map creates tight races – 55 voting districts were reduced to 49 – They don’t mention People’s Alliance candidate Kris Austin under #5 but his photo is there – *** Okay, I’ve probably done enough damage here- let’s move on to another headline.  —djo— }

New Brunswick: A different kind of election night   { ‘Elections New Brunswick is using vote tabulators to quickly count the votes in Monday’s provincial elections.’ & Link >>—-> http://indigostarcrystalradio.wordpress.com/2009/02/21/how-could-anyone-hijack-a-us-presidential-election <—-<< Jim W has a link to a recorded interview from the aftermath of the 2004 US Federal elections where-in a lawyer has explained how the Republicans stole the election to fraudulently put G.W. Bush in the White House for a second term – the second time he did not win an election legally, but found his butt in the seat of power. —djo— }

8 ridings to watch in the New Brunswick election   { ” 1. Fredericton South- “could be the closest race in the province on election night.” Green Party leader David Coon is running against Progressive Conservatives’ Craig Leonard, NDP’s Kelly Lamrock, Liberal Roy Wiggins and Independent candidate Courtney Mills.  “2. Saint John Lancaster” where former Liberal MLS Abel LeBlanc bolted from the Liberal Party in favour of the NDP. “3. Miramichi” Where ridings/districts were rearranged so sitting MLAs are running against each other. And a former PC MLA is also running in this riding as an Independent. “4. Memramcook-Tantramar ” is another riding in which two sitting MLAs are running against each other.  “5. Carleton-Victoria” Where the Liberal candidate was first charged with fraud in connection with a business he was a partner with, and then the charges were dropped. “6. Saint John Harbour” Where Tory Carl Killen won his race in 2010 by either 7 or 8 votes, depending on which paragraph you read here.  “7. Moncton Centre” The change in ridings/districts here has pitted two MLAs against each other who were famous for launching blistering partisan attacks at one another in New Brunswick’s ‘Question Period’ “8.  Fredericton West-Hanwell” where NDP leader Dominic Cardy is trying to win a seat that could be the NDP’s first seat in the legislature since 2005. ”  —djo— }

2 men stabbed at Esgenoôpetitj First Nation   {  }

New Brunswick election 2014: Voters head to the polls today   { Redundancy R Us? —djo— }

 

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“Aboriginal”

RCMP investigate claim officer made derogatory Facebook post   {  }

Assembly of First Nations says its proposals on missing women ‘tossed aside’ by Ottawa   {  }

NDP forces Commons debate on murdered, missing indigenous women   {  }

Only 3 First Nations candidates running in New Brunswick election   {  }

’60s Scoop adoptees find ‘some kind of belonging’ at national gathering   {  }

-Sadly it looks like every article on this page is a repeat-

 

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{ 11:14 am – Checking for typos and colorizing the headlines.    11:45 am— Almost ready to hit the ‘Publish’ button ———djo——— }

Sunday, 14 September, 2014 – CBC News Headlines:

Sunday, 14 September, 2014  -( 56˚F / 13˚C –  & ‘mostly cloudy’ in Ithaca @ 12:30 pm in Ithaca )-

{ We’ve been doing this because we believe the CBC may be more honest and more respectable than Media in the U.S.A., & not a lot of people in the U.S. may know that or have access to anyone who might point them toward the CBC & their web site. }

{ & again, these are not links. If you want to read these stories, listen to sound clips, or see any video -if there is any video- go to CBC dot CA/news. —Thanks. ———djo——— }

* I spent an hour this morning trying to fix one small error in yesterday’s heading –  and had three blogs suffer fatal confusion and crash — I have no idea what that was all about.  —djo— *

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Ad for facebook messenger.

* “Stay in touch with your friends @ the NSA” ?* “Messenger appears to have more spyware type code in it than I’ve seen in products intended specifically for enterprise surveillance,” says iOS forensics and security researcher Jonathan Zdziarski.

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Lead Articles:

Tweet

One tweet from somebody not very happy with Stephen Harper.

-Analysis- Expenses audit won’t end questions about Senate’s role: Chris Hall   { -Um, The Auditor General is conducting an audit of Senate expenses- worrying some senators who fear their legitimate expenses may be criticized and questioned. *** >>—-> Opinion >>—-> The Harper government has been trying to bring down the Senate, with its checks and balances that get in the way of what many see as Harper’s attempts to turn Canada into his own private slave state. A tweet this morning (above) is one of many that voice their unhappiness with Harper’s attempts to ‘turn Canada into a colony of China’. It was three of Harper’s Senate appointees who were singled out and kicked out of the Senate in the recent scandals, leading some to wonder if Harper was crafty enough to appoint those three and maybe others in an attempt to sabotage the Senate. This Prime Minister has also gone up against the Supreme Court, and anybody else who would not buckle under to his total control. —djo— }

Halifax fire under control but some still out of homes   {  }

Britain to ‘hunt down’ ISIS after beheading of Briton   {  }

North Korea sentences American to 6 years hard labour   {  }

4th doctor infected with Ebola dies in Sierra Leone   {  }

Ontario town told to lock doors due to police probe   {  }

‘They are not Muslims; they are monsters,’ U.K. PM says of ISIS after hostage beheading   {  }

Quebec sovereigntists look to Scotland fo independence hope   { The vote in Scotland with take place this coming Thursday, September 18th, 2014. —djo— }

 

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“Offbeat”

Miss America hopefuls take part in the ‘Show Us Your Shoes’ parade   { & my first impression? the beauty pageant has hit a new low.   —djo— }

&& Everything else under this topic is still there since yesterday.

 

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“Most Viewed”

Central Huron residents told to lock doors for police probe   { I had a nightmare while I was growing up that the Army and National Guard locked down this whole area for some made up reason and went around shooting my friends with impunity- I thought I had awakened in a world occupied by Nazi storm troopers in American Uniforms. So that’s ‘where I’m coming from’ when I say it makes me nervous to hear that any police force wants to lock down whole towns after one person shows up shot to death.  —djo— }

Professional cheerleading ‘should be abolished’   { This opinion comes from former professional basketball player, Mariah Burton Nelson, “Cheerleading implies that women’s proper role is to support men, smile at men and fulfill the sexual fantasies of males,” declared Nelson, who played for Stanford University and in the first women’s pro-basketball league in the U.S. *Um, is this another case of somebody who wants to ‘throw the baby out with the bathwater’? Weren’t the original cheerleaders mostly men? I remember most cheerleaders in high school being ‘popularity addicts’ that I wasn’t particularly impressed by, -but I’ve developed an extreme allergic reaction to anyone who tries to tell me what everybody else should do or how they should think. }

B.C. teachers’ strike: Talks under way at Richmond hotel.   { I wonder if we’ll ever get anything like the truth behind this. Nobody has been able to answer my questions- I saw photos of teachers carrying signs that said they were locked out- but couldn’t find anything to either support or refute that. I should probably spend a little bit of time to dig deeper, but I can’t fly to British Columbia to seek out an talk to anybody out there- and I don’t have a whole day to sit and dig through ‘virtual reams’ of lies, half truths and corporate propaganda to find out what is really happening out there. —djo— }

David Haines beheading: British PM vows to ‘hunt down those responsible’    { Tell him to search his own closet first? }

Controversial natural gas rule changes came after B.C., oil lobby met   { “In January of this year, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers made a presentation to high-ranking officials in British Columbia’s Environment Ministry, outlining changes they wanted to environmental review rules for natural gas projects. – Those changes became law on April 14, but they didn’t stay that way for long.

‘An outcry from First Nations organizations forced an about-face from Environment Minister Mary Polak, who rescinded the revisions two days after they were passed by order-in-council. – Internal government documents obtained by The Canadian Press show 25 to 45 new natural gas plants will be needed to meet the government’s hopes for liquefied natural gas and that the industry wanted regulatory changes expedited so they could make investment decisions. – The Environment Ministry says Polak met with “various industry and environmental organizations” to discuss the regulation change, but the documents don’t make a single mention of any meetings other than with the petroleum producers’ association. – The regulatory review carried out on the instructions of Premier Christy Clark continues, but the ministry says no further changes will go ahead without public review and input.  —djo— }

Hiker falls to his death climbing glacier near Squamish   {  }

ISIS war chest grows by an estimated $3M every day   { And government propagandists try harder every day to spread fear and hatred in order to prepare you for a time when they will send your friends off to die in some stupid dispute they started a long time ago and nobody can remember what the actual root cause was. }

&& There are repeats of yesterday’s Oscar Pistorius Photo slide show and the -Blog- Feature:  “Facebook Messenger found to be tracking ‘a lot more data than you think“.

 

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Other:

Abortion rights trump MP’s freedom to vote their conscience, Trudeau says   { Stephen Harper has been described to me as ‘a rabid micro-manager’. I heard somebody say, ‘Does that give Justin Trudeau the right to become a dictator on the other side of the fence?’  And then I remember Ralph Nader calling members of both the two biggest US Political parties “Republicrats” and I wonder about trends toward the same thing in Canada. —djo— }

-New- Panthers deactivate Greg Hardy as he appeals domestic violence conviction   { This would be the football panthers, right? }

Hurricane Odile to hit Mexico’s Baja with heavy rains, winds   { Well- isn’t that what hurricanes do? I’m trying to remember when we first started hearing about hurricanes and the Pacific Coast.  —djo— }

U.S. citizen sentenced to 6 years of hard labour for ‘hostile acts; against North Korea   { -um, a couple years ago, if something similar to this issue popped up, would we be hearing that U.S. citizens were being accused of spying, or something like that? I’m confused.  —djo— }

-Updated- Shelling in eastern Ukraine challenges ceasefire deal   { And something I heard on Coast to Coast am last week led me to believe that psychics and others who believe they have prophetic abilities believe that sections in the official Christian Bible were heavily edited a long long time ago, but documentation still exists that says ‘Legitimate Prophets’ foresaw Russian troops attacking Scandinavia and then Canada and the U.S. in grabs for natural resources. The person who delivered this news or opinion says that Judaic and Christians were involved in cover-up re-writes in order to strengthen their own power within their religions. This guy went as far as to say that the Prophet we know as Jesus was actually Immanuel, who said that a religion based on his teachings would be perverted by power crazy religious clerics and that the same thing would happen about five hundred years later when another True Prophet would be born in what we call the Near East- and evil manipulating men would pervert that True Prophet’s teachings. Immanuel went on to point out that the Israelites had stolen their land from inhabitants who were there before the Israelites left Egyptian slavery, and that if the two groups did not resolve their conflicts and differences, they would destroy each other. — This was way before there was a Russia or a United States of America — Karmic events were set to be triggered that could see the descendents of the Arabs who would follow the ‘True Prophet Mohamed’ conquer all of Europe, including England, and rule that area for 800 years. ***We may still be able to ameliorate this possibility, if we go back to the original teachings of Immanuel and scrap the revisionist nonsense that was written into the current version of the ‘Christian Bible’ – probably including anything that was added by the non-apostle Paul. *** It gets complicated.*** We’re stumbling around in the darkness of lies that have been hammered into our ‘consciousness’ for two thousand years, or longer. Pray for clarity here, pray the truth gets through to us. Pray for guidance and be ready to change everything you were ever taught to believe. Doesn’t sound easy does it? Want to wake up in chains or worse? Think about this — I do not have a hot line to the Source of all Truth — so you’re going to have to figure things out for yourself, and let me know what you come up with, okay?  —djo— }

‘I can’t wait for the Ford era to end’: Olivia Chow goes after Doug Ford   {  }

-Must Watch- Hot air balloon fest   { In Midland, Michigan }

-Must Watch- Baby coyote sleeps in fireplace   { Why wasn’t this in the Offbeat section? }

-Must Watch- Landing a spacecraft on a comet   { 5 possible landing sites on a comet where an attempt at a landing may take place in November —djo— }

&& ‘Editor’s Picks’ are leftovers from yesterday

-World- :

Typhoon Kalmaegi slams northeastern Philippines   {  }

Hall of fame golfer avoids serious injury in chain saw accident   {  }

-Politics- NDP to propose $15 federal minimum wage   { I believe the US Green Party and others were saying around fifteen years ago that $15.00 an hour would be the minimum ‘Living Wage’ needed to get by back then.  —djo— }

-Technology & Science- Formula E is in infancy but will drive innovation, 1st electric racing series suggests   {  }

-Arts & Entertainment- Ethel Bruneau. Montreal’s Queen of Tap, on why dancing ‘is a religion’   {  }

-Arts & Entertainment- Shakespeare’s complete works to be translated for Chinese readers   {  }

 

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“Local / New Brunswick”

N.B. Law Society members vote against accrediting Trinity Western   { -You may remember from previous articles that Trinity Western subscribes to Fundamentalist Christian Doctrine and forces its students to do the same.  —djo— }

RCMP looking for witnesses in fatal Royal Road crash   {  }

Terry Fox Run struggling with participation on P.E.I.   {  }

-New Brunswick Votes 2014-

-Repeat- Michael Camp: Liberals, PC stick to script in ‘strange election’   {  }

-Repeat- Liberal candidate Andrew Harvey’s fraud charges dropped   { One other article somewhere warned about interpreting this as anything but a case of ‘they don’t have enough evidence’ to press forward. *** & I’m getting sick of all this name calling and dirty tricks stuff. Last week there was a bit of an article suggesting that lots of political signs were being vandalized, with one party being singled out as the biggest victim in one area, another somewhere else. Are adults acting like out of control children? —djo— }

-Repeat- Brian Gallant’s energy stance hypocritical, David Alward says  { & This is probably a case of a piece of coal calling a grey cloud ‘black’. }

 

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{ 3:20 pm = Ack- I need to take a break and then check for typos etc.  —Initial Pulbishing @ 4:15 pm Eastern Time — Pre – tagging and not yet categorized — There may be a few typos left, but my sweetie is having an automobile problem & I gotta go help her out  ———djo——— }

Tuesday, 09 September, 2014 – CBC News Headlines

{ Copied & Pasted from Radio Free Earth News  ———jda—— }

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Tuesday, 09 September, 2014  -( 58˚F / 14˚C & Mostly Clear in Ithaca @ 8:45 am )-  —Today is National Teddybear Day in the U.S.A. & Intergalactic/Inter-dimensional/International ‘wish Jim Wellington a Happy Birthday on Leo Tolstoy’s birthday’ day on planet Earth & ‘beyhond’.— 😉

{ I’ve been doing this because I believe that the CBC may be more honest and more respectable than Media here in the U.S.A., AND not a lot of people in the U.S. may know that or have access to anyone who might point them toward the CBC & their web site. }

{ & again, these are not links. If you want to read these stories, listen to sound clips, or see any video -if there is any video- go to CBC dot CA/news. —Thanks. ———djo——— }

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Apple Logo and somebody intent on a smart phone.

It’s a big day for Apple Computer- They have staged a large unveiling event.

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Spiritual quote of the day, “In an interview, Mahavishnu John McLaughlin said that his Guru had completely changed a lot of his thinking when, after John said, “I can’t work with that guy-” the Guru said, -‘Yes you can, the difficulties you have in working with this person are a chance for you to grow and learn to overcome your self imposed limitations’ – & I mean to tell ya, that bit of inspiration blew a hole in my ability to believe that people who oppose us are tools of some hypothetical devil- That was an eye opener- or maybe a soul- or spirit-opener?” ———Jim Wellington  { I have that on tape- Happy Birthday, Jim —djo— }

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Lead Articles:

-Updated- Malaysia Airlines MH17 likely downed by ‘high energy objects’   { The flashy top-of-the-page ever-changing headline thing credits that discovery to the Dutch.  —djo— }

Russian fighter jets circle Canadian ship in Black Sea  {  }

Pieces of Franklin expedition ship believed found   {  }

Jury selection to continue Tuesday for Luka Magnotta trial   {  }

Why the next royal baby could sway Scotland’s referendum   {  }

‘I can’t just let Damian die in vain’: Mother launches de-radicalization effort   {  }

 

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“Offbeat”

Trailer Park Boys celebrate 8th season’s launch with cheeseburgers, jalapeno chips   {  }

Canadian astronaut leads undersea ‘spacewalks’ on NASA mission   {  }

Antonio Brown kicks punter & other must-see NFL plays   {  }

Automaker sees automated freeway travel within 2 years   {  & I think I remember old shows about future technology telling us we should be flying in hover cars and riding on automated highways by the year 2000.  —djo— }

 

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“Most Viewed”

Russian military planes buzzed HMCS Toronto in Black Sea    {  }

Ottawa company fined for saying it ‘only hires white men’   {  }

Rick Cross, missing Kananaskis hunter, killed in bear attack   { He apparently wandered between a mother bear and her cub  —djo—  }

2 women in their 90s marry in Ottawa 7 decades after meeting   { * Yes, they married each other. & With this article are links to “Same-sex marriage rights by U.S. state” – “Where in the world is homosexuality a crime?” & “Where in the world is same-sex marriage legal?” —djo— }

Apple iWatch and iPhone? New devices unveiled today   {  }

Steven Ruttan, veteran with PTSD, feels compensation falls short    {  }

-Blog- Chat Live with Adrienne Arsenault about homegrown extremism Tuesday at 5:30 pm ET   {  }

 

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Other:

Russia denies buzzing the Canadian ship in the Black Sea   {  * Maybe it was evil aliens or even more evil – U.S. Black Ops guys – using holograms to try to start a war? *  —djo— }

-Special Report- Canadian veteran with PTSD feels $60K compensation ‘a slap in the face’   {  }

-Updated- Shark filmed near Australian beach within hours of fatal attack   { A shark killed somebody at a popular Australian surfing beach. —djo— }

John Baird, Rob Nicholson to discuss 30-day mission in Iraq   {  }

Ray Rice cut by Ravens, banned by NFL after new assault video surfaces   {  }

UN’s chief meteorologist warns of alarming C02 spike   {  }

MacKay to testify as Senate begins prostitution bill hearings { * Yes, Peter MacKay, the ‘Minister of Justice’ is probably guilty of prostituting himself for the Conservative Agenda in Canada 😉 *  —djo  }

NDP plots strategy as Tom Mulcair plans to get out of the House   { The New Democratic Party of Canada is releasing their platform a year ahead of next year’s election -next year’s, if the sitting government isn’t driven out of town on a rail before that- Tom Mulcair is the leader of the NDP.   —djo— }

Home Depot says Canadians could be affected by security breach    {  }

-Must Watch- Dogs party in pool for charity   {  }

-Must Watch- Dutch flower parade    {  }

-World- Syria failed ‘on every front’ by international community   {  }

-World- Fire collapses part of famous U.S. roller coaster   {  }

-Business- Scottish independence spectre hammers pound, British stocks   {  }

-Technology & Science- Jack the Ripper named as Aaron Kosminski, Polish immigrant: book   { This report claims that Aaron Kosminski’s DNA was found on the bloodstained shawl of Catherine Eddowes, one of the Ripper’s victims. * What if there were more than one Ripper? There are reports that the ‘Son of Sam’ killings were done by a series of young men being initiated into a cult. What if this cult was entrenched in the culture for centuries? —djo— }

-Arts & Entertainment- Jon Stewart premieres first film, Rosewater, at TIFF 2014   {  }

-Arts & Entertainment-  Tiff 2014: Michael Moore for mayor of Toronto?   { I’d vote for him – not that my endorsement wouldn’t be the kiss of death to anyone’s political career —djo— }

-Health- Dartmouth General patients get special gowns to stay warm   { * How about that? A hospital that actually cares about its patients? Oh, wait a minute, that’s in Canada. Canadians are nicer, aren’t they? & More fun- How many U.S. cities have a mayor who would make Michael Moore look like a nice, safe, conservative alternative? -Okay, so most Canadians are really nice, and friendly, and warm, and sexy, and———  —djo— }  {*** Sounds like Doug fell in love with a Canadian, ya think? —————Jim W }

-Community- CBC News readers skeptical of CRTC’s ‘pick and play’ play   {  }

-Hockey- Penguins’ Sidney Crosby happy with healed wrist  { Yes, CBC News has a whole separate area just for Hockey news, even in the summer, which has been described as ‘Two weeks of bad hockey’ by Canadians. 😉  —djo— }

 

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“Local / New Brunswick”

First Nations forestry plan appeal decision reserved  { “Justice Margaret Larlee promises ruling within 10 days on temporary injunction sought by chiefs” * This is the crawl that I believe Jim complained he couldn’t find clarification for- A judge in New Brunswick’s highest court has reserved decision on an appeal by First Nations Leaders, who want to put a temporary stop to the Alward government’s forestry plan. -I put this article at the top of the heap, Jim’s comments are a couple articles down- —djo— }

Decision on Rod Gillis’s appeal of obstruction conviction due today   { Rod Gillis, described as a ‘prominent Saint John criminal defence lawyer’ was sentenced to 22 months in jail in 2013 after being found guilty of attempting to stop a witness from testifying against one of his clients. The appeal centers around the trial judge’s interpretation of a note Gillis wrote to a client’s former employer. —djo— }

Shale gas debate overshadows focus on alternative energy   {  }

-Repeat- Shale gas development divides voters, CBC poll finds { This was here yesterday. —djo— }

Green Party unveils plan to create new Forestry Act { *** Last night there were several items crawling beneath the CBC News Channel’s programmes, One plan, credited to First Nations, is something I hoped would be clarified here- Another one sounded like the sitting government dismissed some kind of criticism and plans to go ahead with their agenda to allow more ‘Crown’ forest land to be ‘harvested’ by oil company & conglomerate JDI -Irving- who are spending tons of advertising dollars to try to look like they care about the environment etc.—————Jim W }

-New- High-tech golf cart maps Moncton sidewalks    {  }

David Clayton-Thomas happy to be headlining Harvest   { Fredericton’s Harvest Jazz and Blues festival is on now – and David Clayton-Thomas, whose voice you may know from his days with Blood, Sweat and Tears- will be headlining Thursday Evening – Dangit, and I’m stuck in Ithaca- 😦 —djo— }

“New Brunswick Votes 2014

Campaign focus turns to leaders’ debates   { CBC will air and live-stream debates tonight for 90 minutes beginning at 6:30 pm Atlantic Time / 5:30 pm Eastern – & after the debates are finished, you can get the debates ‘on demand’ at cbc.ca/nb <—-<< Link  —djo— }

Anti-Fracking protesters with signs in English and French outside a courthouse in Moncton.

“The possibility of New Brunswick developing a shale gas industry has been extremely controversial. Jim Emberger says the province’s pursuit for a shale gas industry will “have severe, undeniable and observable consequences.” (Adrienne Arsenault/CBC) “

Shale gas pursuit will have ‘severe, undeniable’ consequences   { * Well, ‘duh!’-  I’ve been trying to tell you that all along.* “Opponents to the shale gas industry have packed into meetings and held protests across the province in recent years” & “When we are confronted by new evidence that contradicts what we believed was true, we experience what psychologists call “cognitive dissonance.”  – Because holding two opposing thoughts in our head at the same time is uncomfortable and confusing, we try to resolve the conflict. – We may verify that the new evidence has merit and then change our old ideas and behaviours accordingly. This is essentially how science works. – But because we really don’t like the inconvenience or discomfort that can come with changing long-held beliefs and habits, we can instead resolve the conflict by seeking excuses to downplay the importance of the new evidence and rationalize away any need to change our ways. – We can see both methods at work in how we dealt with the emerging truth about the dangers of tobacco. We eventually changed our habits, but it took decades for us to face the truth. – In the end, the “inconvenient truth” always wins, but our desire to ignore it often costs us time and, as in the tobacco example, many lives. – We are now confronted with an issue that won’t allow us the luxury of decades to change our behaviour. Our pursuit of shale gas and continued use of fossil fuels have severe, undeniable and observable consequences. – We can stay on this course only by ignoring the evidence in three areas: public health, climate change and economics.” & There’s more at >>—-> Link: Opinion Page linked to this issue  —djo— } {*** & The people who crack the hardest are those who believe they are the most stable – & Those who believe they are fighting for a future prosperity they have been lied to and convinced that Fracking is the way to go are among those who believe they’re the stable ones and we’re wacko nut jobs protesting because we’re horny and looking for other wacko nut jobs to procreate with. Link: >>—-> “Half-Past Human dot com“, with their eerie track record of predicting major catastrophes through very scientific means- is with us on this. Fracking will destroy safe drinking water and totally ruin the economy. & Remember? A First Nations wise person told me that the inter-dimensional beings- some of us call them faeries, leprechauns and ‘elementals’- will fight with us against the frackers. Mother Earth does not want to be fracked. Prayers always help, —————Jim W *** }

 

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{ 11:11 am & my back hurts- time to check for typos and get out the crayons –   11:45 am Finished, ready to click the “Publish” Button  ———djo——— }

Canadian Senate Scandals, Another Malaysian Jet Down, and Troubles in the Middle East

Monday, 21 July, 2014.

Looks like another crazy week in the ‘Real World’.

—Dishonoured (& unseated) ex-Canadian Senator Mike Duffy had 31 criminal charges read to him related to his alleged misuse of taxpayers’ dollars.

—Somebody apparently shot down a Malaysian passenger jet over Ukraine.

— Israel launched a ‘ground offensive’ into Palastinian Gaza, because they were  tired of dodging rockets launched from what may have been cynically chosen spots in Gaza, showed the world drone video of what they said were Hamas insurgents entering tunnels to sneak into Israel, intending to emerge and create havoc, kill innocent people and sneak back underground before they got caught.

I think John Oliver showed archive footage of Anderson Cooper giving basically the same report from Israel 4 times in the past 8 years. I like John Oliver, he makes me laugh and then feel guilty for laughing, but he hits newsworthy nails on their newsworthy heads when he says stuff something like, “CNN could save a lot of money if they told Anderson Cooper to just stay home and played the old footage as if it was new.” (Not quite a word for word quote, but it is true to his intent, I think…)

I’m still not sure why all the news broadcasts on all the networks I’m able to get went so crazy about covering the search for the first Malaysian Jet that resonated so deeply with news addicts’ consciousness, every night for much longer than would have seemed reasonable to me a couple years ago. And now that everybody is in shock again about what may have been a mistakenly shot down passenger jet over a war zone (in an area where I’m wondering why would they fly that close to danger in the first place?) We’re hearing that Russian Backed militias in Ukraine are grabbing evidence that might tell investigators what really happened and the Russians are hearing that Ukrainians caused this to happen. ((((( If what we ‘ve been told that Vladimir Putin say is true, I get the impression that what he is actually saying is along the lines of, “If those stupid Ukrainians would just pull down their pants and bend over for us we wouldn’t have to be training insurgents and sending goons and high-tech weaponry { and maybe skilled technicians to use that stuff } into their country, kill Ukrainian citizens and blame it on their government…” )))))

More and more every day, I get the feeling that we can’t trust the news we’re getting. “Bubble headed bleached blonds” smiling as they read scripts that sound to me like 85% propaganda, 10% B.S. and less than 5% actual ‘news’ grates on my nerves.

My best guess, if we can believe anything we’ve heard and seen on teevee and on the web, coming to us through ‘main stream media’ is Russian-sympathizing rebels in Ukraine thought they saw a blip on radar that looked like a military target and had well trained technicians shoot a couple high tech missiles at it, hit it and bring it down and then went, “Oops- Not a good military target…”

And the timing- having a major propaganda opportunity “Ooops” happen while Israel would be really happy if the world press was focused elsewhere ( “Anywhere but Gaza… please”) – that could seem more than a little bit suspicious. Ya think? )

But then again, somebody suggested that the real down and dirty manipulators on this planet have been successfully driving wedges between peoples, stirring up hornets’ nests and keeping everybody off centre and easily pushed in fear and anger, and if Israel has always been one of their targets, they (if ‘they’ actually exist) certainly have done their jobs well.

(((( And, on the subject of hornets’ nests, the mayor of a Quebec town or city south of Montreal stepped on a hornets’ nest and died from the shock of being stung numerous times, that made today’s news up here. ))))

& Back to John Oliver, his comment on the downing of the Malaysian Jet was something like “You get this list of surcharges whenever you fly, $35.00 for this and $39.00 for that- Why not offer another option, “$35.00 per person to stay the [ eff ] out of air space near a war zone.”?

On a kind of round table discussion of current hot news topics today on the CBC one participant answered a question about the controversy in the Ukraine with, “— I am glad that our Prime Minister —” Another participant in this discussion immediately tore a strip off this with “We don’t need any cheap shots like that clouding this issue, this is a serious subject and-” And the first speaker in this paragraph responded with, “I was just trying to say that we need leadership-” —And the sirens went off in my head, screaming, “If a politician opens his or her mouth and you hear words like “jobs”, “leadership”, “taxpayers dollars” or any one of a dozen party line catch phrases- you might as well plug your ears, because you aren’t going to hear anything like the truth-”

Senator Duffy:

The (Conservative) Prime Minister of Canada has gone on the record as saying he would like to get rid of the Canadian Senate. He appointed Mr Duffy, who was originally from Prince Edward Island, but hadn’t had a real primary residence there in years, as the Senator from P.E.I. I think the other two Senators who were humiliated in public and thrown to the wolves were also appointed by the current Prime Minister. When the fit hit the shan, Duffy was accused of falsifying his residence and accepting a travel allowance that he never used because his primary residence was in Ottawa, he didn’t have to fly home on weekends. When the RCMP came out with formal charges against Mr Duffy last week (Friday?) He was accused of accepting a bribe (the $90,000.00 ((Canadian $’s)) check written by the Prime Minister’s right hand guy) But the guy who wrote the check was not accused of bribing a Senator. (He was allowed to resign over the incident.) Some of the 31 charges in the list sound a lot like bargaining chips to be used in a legal chess match, something like, “If you plead guilty to the lesser charges and keep this out of the courts (( and don’t spoil the Prime Minister’s bid for re-election coming up soon )) we’ll spank you on the wrist and say, ‘Shame on you for defrauding the taxpayers out of their hard earned tax money…’ and you can sneak off to some resort and enjoy your life. If you drag this through the courts we’ll do everything we can to make you look like an evil child eating monster who needs to be drawn and quartered on prime time television…”

My gut feeling is, Mr Duffy did nothing that a whole lot of other politicians haven’t done up here for years. He even claims to have checked with party officials to be sure he was not committing anything unethical. If you remember the speech he gave on the Senate Floor, he told us he’d asked for advice and was assured that he was doing the right things in the right way and there should be no problems here.

Mr Duffy had been a reporter for the CBC for many years and had covered political things and political scandals before the current Prime Minister appointed him to the Senate. While he was in the Senate, he was useful to the Prime Minister et al as a fund raiser, a real money maker for the Conservative Party.

We may never know what went on behind closed doors and all that, and why the Prime Minister and his staff went after Mr Duffy and two other Senators and saw that they were summarily shown the door from the privileged areas of the Canadian Senate and told never to come back.

But I know what I saw on the fringes of “The Greater Ottawa Area”. I was employed by a news gathering organization there, outside of Ottawa, in an area that was a little too rural for Rogers Cable Executives to support with their presence. I worked for the company that Rogers sold their rights to in that area. I didn’t do much news gathering, but my friends and co-workers did. I was more or less a back up reporter whose main job was to program the local access channel and record and play back Town Council Meetings and make sure the station was on the air if any one of our numerous black outs happened. (I’d have to run or drive in and restart a couple computers, make sure the clocks were all in sync, make sure the radio station that played along with the bulletin board was on the correct station and tuned in as well as it could be.) I was asked to put together one 30 minute video per month for about a year and then asked to drop that and concentrate on keeping the web site up to date, take new still photographs to cycle through with the bulletin board and make sure everything ran smoothly. Once every blue moon I would be asked to get a couple minutes of interview with somebody or get a bit of video if a major fire broke out or something. I was part time and frankly, I hardly had enough time to do the “Master Control”  taping, editing and rebroadcasting the council meetings with introductions and PSAs and sometimes Army News and Local News Programming that was done in the two other stations in our area, and keeping the web stuff current and covering the few special events we had to cover every year (like the Santa Claus Parade, Youth Athletic Awards, Volunteer Appreciation Dinners, and things like that.)

Okay, now for you in the “Lower 48”:  MPs are more or less the Canadian equivalent of Members elected to the House of Representatives in the USA. The area I lived and worked in had an MP who was often described as a loose cannon. A minor loose cannon, nowhere near the caliber of the current Toronto Mayor, but still apt to blurt out truths that made the Prime Minister uncomfortable.

A local lawyer who may have had “Conservative Party” brightly printed on his underwear, described our MP as “An [ effing ] idiot, but definitely ‘Our’ effing idiot.” One close friend of mine said, “The people around here would elect a dead goat if it ran under the Conservative Party of Canada banner.”

But when elections were coming around. The Prime Minister had a hand picked ‘handler’ traveling around with the MP, keeping that MP from televised debates in front of an audience that just might have an interesting question that the MP might blurt out the ‘wrong’ answer to. Local Mayors would get a phone call saying, “The MP will be at your facility in an hour, these are the reporters we will allow to be there, we will be there for twenty minutes, have a good photo op and then be gone. No questions from the Press-”

How do you spell “Micro-Manager”? { “S-t-e-p-h-e-n H-a-r-p-e-r” }

Last week’s tweets and comments from News Professionals included a lot of things along the lines of reminders that the person who wrote the infamous cheque (en USA = ‘check’ ) had said something like “I have to clear this with the top people first” and then something else like, “I got the okay to go ahead from the top-” before he wrote that cheque/check.

We probably would not be dealing with this as a news story if a CBC reporter hadn’t gotten wind of this and broke the story on National Television. It would have happily been swept under a rug somewhere.

We also heard, last week, that Mr Duffy is indicating that he will stick to his guns, and if he gives blockbuster testimony under oath, it’s my gut feeling that there will not be many Conservative MPs coming to Ottawa after next year’s election.

I’m not alone. A lot of respected news people up here and several of my respectable friends, have said that this looks like a no win situation for the Conservatives in the next election.

One of the things the Conservative Party of Canada does best up here is IMPLODE. After a couple Conservative Administrations in recent memory of people over 30, only one or two Conservative MPs politically survived election day.

So who might actually emerge victorious from all this?

John Oliver has my vote.

——— Aerendel ——