Seeing Through the New York Times

This is funny.

Via: SMA.

Musing About Alberta Separation

Canada West Foundation CEO Roger Gibbins has a politically adriot musing of how Alberta separation could come about. It’s a “possible world’ scenario of a separation referendum in 2020, after years when the federal government has taxed Alberta energy resources, and has also used environmental taxes/protections as a cash grab for Alberta energy revenue.

In short, separation comes about if the feds create an NEP-style energy management plan, and also take powers for environmental protection away from provincial control, that is, away from the people who live and breathe the air of the environment in question. All done in the name of protecting their eastern interests.

It’s an interesting musing. However, the reason for Gibbins writing deserve some thought. He obviously sees some of the same rumbling among Easterners that we at ThePolitic.com have noted in the past. Usually, we’re more critical of those rumblings than Gibbins usually is. However, here he hits numerous important points and uses them as warnings against what could happen if eastern politicians listen to the voices of expediency, and use federal powers unconstitutionally in such a manner as to make the law of Canada even more than a joke than it already is.

UPDATE: Gibbins might be concerned about proposal like Michael Ignatieff’s which MI presents as NEP-lite. MI wants a carbon tax to help out with environmental protection. When it’s pointed out to him that that’s not all that different than the NEP, MI concedes:

It’s tax-shifting, not tax-increasing,” Ignatieff told The Vancouver Sun.

Ignatieff acknowledged he is taking a risk by proposing higher taxes at the gas pumps given that may Liberal critics in Western Canada see the tactic as similar to the loathed National Energy Program of the early 1980s.

The NEP of the late prime minister Pierre Trudeau was viewed by many critics as a bid by Liberal-dominated Eastern Canada to confiscate wealth from the Conservative-friendly West.

”Risky? That’s what leadership is all about,” he said.

Fear of a national unity divide has inspired Ignatieff to devise a new twist in his plan. While the scheme is intended to be ”revenue neutral,” the tax change initiative would funnel any surplus cash back to the province where the tax was collected.

”The funneling back to the province of origin is extremely important politically because I think it’s fair to say that Liberal energy policy (under Trudeau) created the impression of being anti-Alberta and being, you know, kind of “confiscation by stealth,” he said.

”And we just have to send a very, very clear message politically that that’s not what’s going on hereE This is a national unity issue.”

A Liberal grand-standing his manliness about “taking risks” by playing fast and loose with the constitution. And playing fast and loose with language: “it’s tax shifting, not a tax increase.” Of course, we should just trust him.

AIDS Politics

Most people are weary of having to listen to blowhards like Stephen Lewis and others gathered at the recent AIDS conference. What’s shameful is that most media fell for their rhetoric, providing unbalanced covereage to its politicization.

Fortunately, Canoe.ca has a story on Canadian Health Minister Tony Clement’s response to the wild claims made by said blowhards. Saying he’d had enough, Clement commented on criticisms the government hadn’t made any decisions yet about funding Vancouver’s safe-injection site:

The health minister also expressed frustration about criticism of his government’s refusal to commit to renew support for North America’s only safe-injection site for drug-users in Vancouver.

Clement said the matter was “a red herring” because it was still under review, and there was never any plan to make an announcement on the site.

Most of the activists at the conference also attacked the Catholic Church and the Bush Administration’s preference to promote abstinence as a way of curbing AIDS as fanciful and unrealistic. Michael Coren’s rejoinder to this silliness is to the point:

At its most simple, stop fornicating.

How refreshing. He adds:

When the figures are analyzed objectively, there are three distinct infection levels in Africa. The least hit are African Muslims, who are the most sexually conservative people in the region. The second level is composed of Roman Catholic Africans, who are more faithful to church teachings on abstinence.

The most likely to be infected are non-Catholic Christians and those who follow tribal religions. Which means, if we dare to be blunt, that AIDS prevention is most certainly connected to marital fidelity and lack of pre-marital sex.

So it looks like religious teachings do make a difference, not only teaching chastity and abstinence, but, more importantly, fidelity in marriage. I suppose AIDS activists don’t like to hear such talk (you won’t hear Bill Clinton promoting fidelity in marriage), but there you have it.

Coren also compares the effect of AIDS on Africa to that of other diseases:

While sexual and chemical addiction are powerful habits, both place cause and effect squarely on the individual. Not so Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, most cancer and heart disease, leukemia or malaria.

The latter, by the way, still kills three million people a year in sub-Saharan Africa. Yet none of these or dozens of other illnesses receive anything like the publicity or funding given to AIDS.

Perhaps we should turn Stephen Lewis’s angry rhetoric around and point it at him. If he accuses Harper and Bush for negligence, I guess he can be painted with the same brush by deflecting attention away from the numerous people suffering these other diseases.

Who is “Big Oil”?

We constantly hear from easterners that a Stephen Harper government means Canada is run by the boardrooms of “big oil” in Calgary.

According to The Economist, “Big Oil” really consists of state-owned oil companies, none of which reside in Calgary since Petro-Canada was privatized:

Yet Big Oil is pretty small next to the industry’s true giants: the national oil companies (NOCs) owned or controlled by the governments of oil-rich countries, which manage over 90% of the world’s oil, depending on how you count. Of the 20 biggest oil firms, in terms of reserves of oil and gas, 16 are NOCs. Saudi Aramco, the biggest, has more than ten times the reserves that Exxon does. Those with misgivings about oilâ€???that its price is too high, that reserves are running out, that it damages the environment, that it is more a curse than an asset for countries that produce itâ€???must look to NOCs for reassurance.

It goes without saying that NOCs are inefficient and horribly run. And should be privatized.

H/t: Canadian Taxpayer Federation

Laugh of the Day from the NDP

Courtesy of the Rev. Brenda Curtis, newly elected nominee for the Saskatchewan NDP:

In her acceptance speech [Rev. Brenda] Curtis said some people think the United Church is a front for training New Democrats.”But I assure you that it’s not. However, I have my suspicions that if Jesus had been a party politician, he would have been a card-carrying New Democrat.”

Kate from SMA makes the pertinent observation:

First things first – would Jesus have been a member of the United Church of Canada?

President Jimmy Carter Embarrassing Himself, Again

When President Carter isn’t kicking back and enjoying a casual game of baseball with his despot buddy Castro, he’s busy denouncing Israel and the United States.

SPIEGEL: You also mentioned the hatred for the United States throughout the Arab world which has ensued as a result of the invasion of Iraq. Given this circumstance, does it come as any surprise that Washington’s call for democracy in the Middle East has been discredited?

Carter: No, as a matter of fact, the concerns I exposed have gotten even worse now with the United States supporting and encouraging Israel in its unjustified attack on Lebanon.

SPIEGEL: But wasn’t Israel the first to get attacked?

Carter: I don’t think that Israel has any legal or moral justification for their massive bombing of the entire nation of Lebanon.

It’s no wonder Carter and Pierre Trudeau’s were such good buddies.

“He was the first person I invited to visit me when I was president of the United States,” said Mr. Carter. “He gave me a lot of very sound advice on international affairs because I had never served in Washington before.” (National Post, October 4, 2000)

Alberta Oilsands to go Nuclear?

Alberta Energy is contemplating funding a $3 billion nuclear energy plant to supply electricity and steam for oilsands producers.Â? The Globe and Mail has details here.

Torture Prevented Airliner Terror Plot?

The Guardian mentions reports that the plot to blow up several US bound airplanes from the UK was averted because of information extracted by Pakistani torturers:

Reports from Pakistan suggest that much of the intelligence that led to the raids came from that country and that some of it may have been obtained in ways entirely unacceptable here. In particular Rashid Rauf, a British citizen said to be a prime source of information leading to last week’s arrests, has been held without access to full consular or legal assistance. Disturbing reports in Pakistani papers that he had “broken” under interrogation have been echoed by local human rights bodies. The Guardian has quoted one, Asma Jehangir, of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, who has no doubt about the meaning of broken. “I don’t deduce, I know – torture,” she said. “There is simply no doubt about that, no doubt at all.”

H/t: First Things, with commentary.

10 Non-Religious Arguments Against SSM: Parts 9-10

Anthony Esolen completes his 10 part non-religious argument against same-sex marriage.

Summary of Part 9: SSM does nothing to stop self-destructive behavior.

Summary of Part 10: Harms the emotional growth of children.

See here for previous posts.

Is Castro Dead? Probably, maybe not, who knows?

On this 80th birthday of Fidel Castro, Juventud Rebelde, the Cuban periodical for communist youth, published four new photos of the dictator. In one picture, clearly intended to prove he is alive, he is holding a section of the August 12 issue of Granma.

Sean Glesson does a excellent job of summarizing the evidence. Make sure to scroll down and see the photo with President Carter (embarrassing himself) with Castro at a 2002 baseball game in Cuba.

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