Monthly Archive: November 2005

Being subject to a criminal investigation during an election being fought largely on the question of ethics sounds like something from a sitcom.

It's hard to imagine a worse possible time:

The RCMP have begun a review of reported heavier-than-usual trading in income trusts and dividend-paying stocks ahead of an announcement last week that the federal government was increasing the tax credit on corporate dividends.

NDP finance critic Judy Wasylycia-Leis sent a letter of complaint to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police earlier this week requesting the probe into whether Bay Street insiders received advance knowledge of the announcement, Staff Sgt. Paul Marsh told Bloomberg News.

"The RCMP will review the information provided to determine if there is a basis to proceed with a criminal investigation," Marsh said.

"It would be inappropriate to speculate what action may or may not be taken."

Not just the RCMP, but other stock market regulators as well.

Finance Minister Ralph Goodale denied allegations that information was leaked.

Expect a lot of airplay, as well as some very pointed questions aimed at Paul Martin from the other party leaders during the leadership debates.

You have to wonder if maybe the Prime Minister should have taken the opposition up on its offer to start the election in mid-January.

OK, I'm trying to coin a new term here, and I'm certain it will fall flat.

There was a pretty lousy but thoroughly enjoyable TV series in 1979 called "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century" starring Gil Gerard and Erin Gray. If you are in your late 30s like me, you'll remember it.

In the pilot episode, Buck infiltrates the enemy mothership which is secretly carrying a wing of small attack bombers with which to attack Earth during a peace conference. Buck hides an explosive in each of the bombers' engines. The attack begins, the mother ship starts launching the bombers, the bombers immediately explode after clearing the launch bays.

Buck Rogers, rugged individualist, saves the day.

Why was I recalling this bit of silliness? Because it seems to be happening to Liberal Party mothership right now.

Funny thing is, the person most likely playing the role of Buck Rogers in this little play is not someone you'd expect.

More detailed information seems to leaking out from inside Consulting and Audit Canada. Is the information accurate? Some of it is. For the rest I can't say one way or another.

But it seemed so detailed and so damning that I'll post it -- you decide for yourself.

I was checking Belinda Stronach's new digs on the Web, and it strikes me that she has some interesting new friends to help her out with her campaign.

I guess she needs new ones since many of her former campaign workers are so angry with her that they're working hard to make sure Lois Brown, the new Conservative candidate, wins the riding of Newmarket-Aurora.

I gave the Liberal Party Blog a rough ride for being a bit too much on the cute side.

Some people thought I nailed it; some thought I was missing the point.

Well, at the risk of sounding partisan, here is the Conservative Party Blog, and I think it strikes the right note, at least for me:

Welcome to the Tour Blog at conservative.ca. Over the next several weeks, I will attempt to provide an "inside" look at Stephen Harper's national tour as we cross the country speaking with Canadians about Stephen Harper and the positive Conservative vision for Canada. As a tour staffer, I hope to offer you a perspective from "inside the bus" as the Leader visits all corners of the country. Be sure to check back each day for the latest news from the road!

One staffer's log of the events and experiences of a campaign. No attacks or insults delivered in mocking tones, but insight and perspective written with respect for both the subject and the reader.

Sounds like the two blog capture perfectly the choice being presented to Canadians.

But then maybe I'm missing the point again.

From the Great Pumpkin, a tale of two Peters.

One is the CPC candidate for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell, near Ottawa.

The other is another conservative figure, an economist and writer for the National Post, the Western Standard, and other major publications.

The first owns the domain www.pierrelemieux.ca, while the second owns .org and .com.

With the election underway, maybe the candidate Lemieux could use a bump up so he gets spotted first on searches, so go visit the site or link him up.

Which gives me an idea. I'd like to construct a blogroll of all CPC candidate websites. I've got one already, the address for candidate Lemieux. Help me out by sending me the links to any candidates you know. Identify what province they're running in. Let's see if we can construct the full list within a week.

...when you decriminalize marijuana.

You get The Official Blog of the Liberal Party of Canada:

Wow, look at me! I'm in "cyberspace," where no one can hear you scream. Or maybe they CAN hear you scream but they don't pay attention because they're too busy looking at naked ladies. Either way, stop screaming, would you?

I for one am betting this so-called "Internet" is really going to catch on. It's neato.

That really what's on the blog. No kidding.

Obviously there is a bit of tongue-in-cheek here (the Internet "catching on" is meant to be a joke), but it's also supposed to be a clever way of delivering the Liberal message of how scary Stephen Harper is, in this case, comparing Stephen Harper to the Grinch:

Remember, kids: one is grumpy and has a heart two sizes too small. And the other one's the Grinch.

That's a knee-slapper.

For me, I'll keep to my dry and serious presentation, with a special effort on being news-like. For those who want sophomoric wit and words like "neato" in their political discourse, well, you've got that other blog.

Remember: views expressed on this blog do not necessarily represent the policies or beliefs of Paul Martin. Except when I write about the hypnotic musical stylings of Nana Mouskouri. We're totally in sync on that.

One more thing I don't have in common with Paul Martin. I guess I did learn something from reading it, though it hardly seems to have been worth the effort.

I hope the Conservatives avoid the temptation of going all "cutesy".

[Hat tip to small dead animals]

Based on some nagging doubts and some solid information, I decided to double check into the story about the mysterious phone calls being made in the riding of Conservative MP Gary Lunn.

As you might recall, there was a story posted at Free Dominion, alleging that people in Gary Lunn's riding were getting calls from someone pretending to be representing Gary Lunn, and during the course of the conversation, dropping the bombshell that Gary Lunn does not support Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper.

That was reported on Sunday, two days ago.

Yesterday, I called Gary Lunn's office and spoke to Logan, an executive assistant, who said he had not heard of this, and that it was not likely to be true. We all chalked it up to an internet myth.

Another day has gone by. I just got off the phone with Logan, and the story has changed somewhat. True to his word, he found his boss and talked to him about it. This is what he understands happened. Someone did make a phone call to a constituent. As far as he knows, there was only one such phone call. That constituent heard something during that conversation that made him or her concerned, and then that person called Gary Lunn, who assured the constituent that all was well, including Gary Lunn's genuine support for Stephen Harper (which Logan pegged at 150%, something that, after a moment, caused us both to laugh because it seemed like such a cliche).

So is there a story here? Apparently there is, but what it is, I'm not certain yet. The truth lies somewhere in between the extremes. Something did happen. But was it a dirty trick, or just a confused political discussion?

I'll keep checking. And if you are an MP, or work for an MP of any party, and you are reading this, you might do well to check if there is a pattern of weird mischievous calls being made in your riding.

Lesbian and gay rights attorney barbara findlay

In British Columbia, a lesbian couple rent a hall from the Catholic group Knights of Columbus to hold their wedding reception. When the Knights realized it was for a lesbian couple, they canceled the booking and refunded the money.

The couple took the Knights to the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal, and won a small judgment. Interestingly, the Tribunal made a comment that suggested that a minor amount of extra effort on the part of the Knights to help the couple out after canceling the booking would have turned the judgment in their favour.

That has the lawyer for the lesbians very upset.

BFI trading (click to enlarge)

The allegations of leaks and insider trading with the collusion of the Finance Minister Ralph Goodale's office continue to swirl.

Check out the chart showing the trading on BFI, the garbage collectors. I find this chart one of the strongest pieces of evidence that something rotten was going on.

On Wednesday, just before 6 p.m. EST, the federal finance department officially announced it would cut the tax on dividends and would leave trusts alone. That's the type of news that is always announced after stock markets close at 4 p.m. EST because it would give a boost to those types of securities.

But trading in many trusts and dividend-paying stocks became much heavier than usual in the hour or two before the market's closed on Wednesday, and share prices rose sharply.

At BFI, the trading picked up as early as 2pm. But look at the price per unit. Essentially flat. These buyers wern't reacting to a shift in the market that had happened. They were preparing for a shift that would happen.

Stock exchange re-opens the next day, and in the wake of the announcement not to tax trusts but to cut taxes on dividends, BFI leaps three dollars. There is a bit of profit taking, but the guys in the know hold on to their units instead of devaluing them by dumping them all at once.

That amounted to what looks like 350,000 shares moving for no apparent reason. Not earth-shattering, but a nice piece of change, especially if you didn't actually have to work at it.

The huge spike in pre-announcement volume, followed by signficantly reduced volume post-announcement, is going to be the kind of flag that regulators are looking for.

I wonder if they would care to know that BFI contributed $2,000 to Paul Martin's leadership campaign in May 2003. Probably just coincidence.

Stephen Harper tonight:

"This is not just the end of a tired, directionless scandal-plagued government, it's the start of a bright new future for this great country," Harper said.

Well, of course, we're all happy that Carolyn Parrish is not running for re-election...

A minor bit of interest, but Pierre Poilievre, MP for Nepean-Carleton, has incorporated the West Quebec Post article about David Smith into his web site as a "clipping" to highlight his work representing his constituents' interests.

Of course, Poilievre is not running against David Smith, who represents the riding of Pontiac, but Laurence Cannon is. And Laurence Cannon, the Conservative Party candidate in Pontiac, is certain to be handing out copies of the article throughout the riding.

Will this make a difference? Well, though many of us outside of Quebec don't recognize the name "Laurence Cannon", inside Quebec, it is very well known. He was a communications minister under Robert Bourassa, and he comes from a family of politicians and business giants.

He is one of the Conservative Party's best bets for a seat in this election, and a leader for further gains in elections to come.

And maybe, just maybe, I helped out a little bit.

Update: Apparently there is something to this after all.

Yesterday I posted about a rumour going around that constituents in Gary Lunn's riding in British Columbia were receiving calls from someone pretending to be speaking on Lunn's behalf. That person would then chat and let drop the little bombshell that Gary Lunn doesn't support Stephen Harper. The rumour then has it that the person called Gary Lunn's home, presumably unintentionally, and that Lunn has since gotten in touch with the press and the RCMP.

I just got off the phone with Gary Lunn's executive assistant in the BC constituency office, and he says the story simply isn't true. I sent him the link to the original post in Free Dominion, and he's double-checking with the boss, but is certain he would have heard something.

And he made it absolutely clear: Gary Lunn fully supports Stephen Harper!

Cute story. But it looks like this was one crime the Liberals did not perpetrate.

We'll just have to settle for all the other ones.

[Looks like small dead animals is also confirming that this story is just a fabrication.]

Unless, of course, you routinely get emails from the CIA or the FBI.

But for the rest of us, there is an email worm circulating that preys on natural human curiousity:

The latest Sober worm, first spotted over the weekend, has generated the vast majority of virus-laden e-mail traffic in the past 24 hours and could cause problems for corporate e-mail gateways, security companies said.

This variant of Sober generates e-mails that purport to be from the CIA or FBI. These messages tell the recipient they have been looking at illegal Web sites and should answer some questions in the e-mail's attachment. If the attachment is opened, the computer is infected, and the virus sends copies of itself to any e-mail addresses found on the hard drive.

So don't worry. Visiting the website of the Conservative Party to study their platform in the hours before an election call might not be something that the Liberal government wants you to do, but it's not illegal.

Anyway, the FBI is not likely to be interested in what you are doing online.

Unless, possibly, your name is Alfonso Gagliano.

[Hat tip to TG]

Of course, the nanny state that is Canada loves this idea:

Transport Canada is road-testing cutting-edge devices that use global positioning satellite technology and a digital speed-limit map to know when a driver is speeding, and to try to make them stop.

When a driver hits a certain percentage above the posted speed limit, the device kicks in and makes it difficult to press the accelerator.

[Dr. Peter Burns, chief of ergonomics and crash avoidance with Transport Canada's road safety directorate,] said proponents of such devices are enthusiastic about the potential to reduce deaths and injuries from car crashes, as well as reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, which are greater at higher speeds.

So who makes this equivalent of a backseat driver? A company in Sweden. No surprises there.

Two things come to mind.

Since the system is GPS-based, and requires knowledge of where you are, this is essentially a citizen tracking system. Just one more way for the government to know what you're doing.

The second thing is that this will, of course, generate a whole new black market for devices or modifications to defeat the system. Some will focus on foiling the internal feedback system tied to the accelerator. Others will target the GPS itself, since if the system doesn't know where you are, it won't know that you're speeding.

Then there will be the GPS-jammers. Some will be frauds, doing nothing but filling the pockets of scam artists. Others might work, even partly, and will create havoc wherever they are turned on.

And then the constitutional challenges, perhaps launched by provinces fighting what they see as another federal intrusion on a provincial responsibility.

A Liberal MP wants the government to stand in judgement of how you spend your free time.

You do the "right" thing, and the government will toss back a bit of your tax money.

Apparently, this will help Canadians learn to love their country.

Right...

That's the question being asked by NDP Finance Critic Judy Wasylycia-Leis.

It'll be a question asked by the chairman of the Ontario Securities Commission.

It'll be a question asked by RCMP financial investigators.

And if there's any justice, it'll be asked by Canadians when they are looking at their ballots.

How would they have benefited? By taking advantage of a convenient leak of a crucial tax decision from Finance Minister Ralph Goodale's office last week:

On Friday, CBC News reported that trading in many income trusts and dividend-paying stocks became much heavier than usual late Wednesday – just before the government announced that it would not tax trusts and would cut the tax on stocks that pay dividends.

And several published reports said investors knew early about the plan, which lowers taxes on some stock returns.

Here's one such "published report". And here is an example of the weird trading patterns.

What was that about the Liberal Party being utterly unlike an organized criminal syndicate?

I get on average about 1,800 hits a day. Today I'm at 1,180 with three hours to go until midnight.

Why do I mention this? Because even a slow weekend for me is not generally too shabby. I don't know why. But whatever the reason, I'm grateful I haven't fallen to the depths of this famous person.

At Le Blog de Polyscopique, we have much of the text of the West Quebec Post article on David Smith and the Abotech affair translated into French. If you have contacts in Quebec who are interested but have, of course, only had the reports in Le Droit to read in French (those reports essentially cover the same ground as the Globe and Mail articles), then send them the link so that they can get informed.

Just who is Paul Martin calling?

Update #2: Retract that retraction! Maybe there is something to this after all.

UPDATE #1: Apparently this story is just so much smoke.

There is a story on Free Dominion that a Conservative MP, Gary Lunn representing the BC riding of Saanich--Gulf Islands, has been the target of a dirty trick.

I have not been able to get any confirmation of this, given that it is Sunday, and no one is in either the constituency office or the parliamentary office to answer calls.

As the Official Opposition Critic of Public Works, Lunn has been a busy man, and probably has more than a few enemies in the Liberal Party.

As I write this, there is a story that his constituents in his riding are getting calls from someone claiming to call on Gary Lunn's behalf.

During the course of conversation, the caller reveals that Gary Lunn does not support Stephen Harper.

How is it that we know? Because the caller made the mistake of calling Gary Lunn's home to deliver the message of infighting between Gary Lunn and the leadership of the Conservative Party.

Well, news of infighting inside the Conservative Party on the cusp of an election call is sure to give pause to any potential voter.

It also gave pause to Gary Lunn himself, when he himself received the call!

According to the account, Gary Lunn has reported the call to the RCMP and to the press.

We'll see if any of the major media outlets report on these shenanigans, or if the Mounties dig up anything.

Is the story true? Are the Liberals behind this? Well, I expect that if they are, they've been careful to avoid leaving any traces back to them. But then maybe they wouldn't have expected to have been caught so quickly, so who knows just how careful they were.

If they're behind this, that is. And if the story is true.

I'll try to find out more tomorrow.

A successful industry? (click to enlarge)

The Liberal game plan of showing us the benefits of long-term and uninterrupted Liberal government that are put at risk by "politics" is in full swing.

That's always the way with institutional ruling parties. They need time and minimal distractions. And if the voters cut short their time, or distract them with elections and inquiries and such, then they are hurting themselves.

This isn't an election promise. It's electoral extortion.

In this case, it is a threat that unless the Liberals are elected, and maintain power for the next two decades, Quebec's opportunities to enjoy the maximum benefit from aerospace and defence spending will be threatened by the Conservatives and their ally, the free market.

It's also quintessentially Canadian, at least with this tired and incompetent Liberal Party in power.

What is it? It is the ridiculous manner in which tax policy regarding income trusts and dividents was being announced, changed, and leaked over the last week.

Since then, it has been full-scale panic as Ottawa dealt with all sorts of anger from all sorts of people -- market participants, industry executives, retail investors and pension funds.

And the final straw: "The government then tells a bunch of Bay Street insiders what it is going to do so they can profit. And then it does it. It's insane," added the banker.

Read the whole thing at Autonomous Source.

These are prudent fiscal managers? Unindicted leaders of a criminal cartel, more like.

The Liberals have been trying hard to gain traction with the argument that the Conservatives in their lust for power are forcing Canadians into an election they don't want to have.

But in one of those strange paradoxes in politics, the Liberals are likely to be the victims of the blowback from Canadians who are truly irritated by elections.

Julie Murray of the West Quebec Post has been in regular contact with this blogger over the last week, preparing a story on David Smith and the Abotech affair.

In deference to the people at the Post and their desire not to be scooped, I've kept quiet until today, when the weekly was published and hit the stands.

The questions for David Smith, Liberal MP for Pontiac, are now in print. And not just in print, but in a local paper. The West Quebec Post, with a circulation of about 5000, distributes in David Smith's riding. Don't forget also that Pontiac is just across the river from Ottawa.

So go read the article, and consider what impact it might be having on voters in Pontiac. It'll also be interesting to see if the story gets picked up by another paper, what with an election call days away driving interest. I am personally gratified that Julie Murray was able to independently verify many of the facts I had uncovered, and that I am credited (see the end of the article) for my work on this. She has added much more material as well, with quotes from her interview with David Smith being especially interesting. Thanks also to editor Fred Ryan. I hope wading through my amateurish attempts at journalism wasn't too much of a burden.

As for the role of bloggers, I hope this small example of the synergies that can exist between the new media and the traditional media inspires Canadians to look at bloggers in a new light. It is the sort of thing the folks at Open Source Media PajamasMedia meant when they talked about a "bridge between old media and new".

Joseph Massino, boss of the Bonanno mob family, not a member of the Liberal Party

Things are getting nasty in the House of Commons, and when emotions are running high, it is easy to misconstrue the words of others.

For instance, the phrase "organized crime" is a loaded one. It doesn't have to mean "The Mob".

No one is saying that.

Really.

Well, just the FBI.

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the official launch of "Rescuing Canada's Right: Blueprint for a Conservative Revolution" at the Albany Club in downtown Toronto. If you have't already ordered a copy for yourself, click on the banner at the top of this blog and order yours now. And since Christmas is coming, a few extra copies for friends and family.

Besides the authors Adam Daifallah and Tasha Kheiriddin (whose parents live a short hop from me, it turns out), I was able to meet such luminaries as Mike Harris, former premier of Ontario, Tony Clement, former Ontario Minister of Health, Gerry Nicholls of the National Citizen's Coalition, and Conrad Black (almost).

Almost because he was surrounded by a scrum of reporters for the duration of his visit. It was actually sort of embarrassing to watch the desperation of these reporters.

A much classier brand of media personality was also present in the persons of Andrew Coyne of the National Post, Michael Taube of the Toronto Sun, and Rondi Adamson, a syndicated columnist.

And then there were a bunch of bloggers located strategically near the food table: Stephen Taylor, Bob Tarantino, and Greg Staples, just to name a few.

Here's hoping for the success of the book, and for more opportunities for conservatives to come together and work for a brighter future for Canada.

The CBC is looking for people who are "freaked out" scared of the Conservatives. Just the Conservatives.

Maybe balanced reporting means finding a man who is freaked out scared, a woman who is freaked out scared, an aboriginal who freaked out scared, a person who is disabled who is freaked out scared, and so on and so forth.

A series of anonymous posts was received at this blog yesterday, apparently from someone who works with or near Frank Brazeau.

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Frank Brazeau, Abotech, Liberal Party, PWGSC, Scott Brison

...when Canada's artistic elite start reaching out for the cash that they couldn't get by selling their works directly to the public.

Ungrateful barbarians that we are.

The stake that is going to be pounded into the heart of this government:

November 22, 2005 — Mr. Harper (Calgary Southwest) — That the House condemns the government for its arrogance in refusing to compromise with the opposition parties over the timing of the next general election and for its “culture of entitlement”, corruption, scandal, and gross abuse of public funds for political purposes and, consequently, the government no longer has the confidence of the House.

Come on, Stephen Harper, tell us what you really think.

The Sheila Anne

I've avoided commenting on this NealeNews headlining story because I felt tempted to turn it into a joke:

How many suspects? Well, what's the population of Canada?
Why $300,000? Well, how much money was stuffed into those suitcases Chretien had in Shawinigan?

Rick Mercer can come up with funnier stuff than that.

But the RCMP took it seriously.

Canadian soldiers firing an Eryx anti-armour missile. What street thug wouldn't want a chance to do that?

More thoughts about male responsibility, and the lack of it, and the government's responsibility to help fix a mess it helped create.

It's an idea that'll never fly, but here goes.

A woman has a child. Tests show the man to be the father. He has two choices:

• provide financial and parental support for his children
• join the army

Technorati Tags: Toronto, welfare, gun violence

Rapper 50 Cent holding a gun; no role models

Gun violence has been a major concern in Toronto this summer. Last week, at a funeral for one slain teen, another teen was shot dead on the steps of the church, not far from where my parents live.

Needless to say, this is overwhelmingly black-on-black violence.

So where will the black community go for help? The government of course.

Technorati Tags: Toronto, welfare, gun violence

Prime Minister Paul Martin

From the Ottawa Citizen:

Prime Minister Paul Martin's minority government introduced $86 million in new spending initiatives yesterday, with several billion dollars more still to come, in advance of what now appears to be the Liberals' certain defeat next week in the House of Commons.

One of the problems in our system is that the man who sets the budget is the man who sets policy is the man who leads the legislative agenda is the man who spends the money.

So as we Canadians are faced with the choice of who to elect to lead this country, to make decisions about Canada's role in international affairs, to set the tone of the administration, we are also faced with the dilemma that the same person is the one who is going to give out goodies.

For many Canadians, that makes it a tough choice (for me too -- diapers are expensive!).

Our prime minister can make financial promises because he controls the budget. In other systems, the head of state (in Canada, the PM is the de facto head of state) can't set budgets. That job lies with a separate, typically legislative, body. Because a legislature is made up of many people, the budget is a group effort, and no one involved has the power to promise much of anything.

An election without promises, at least without unseemly promises of cold hard cash, would be a welcome change.

Have you been having problems with trackbacks on this blog? This post is for you.

A funny story from my past, when I was caught reading porn in the office.

A new Superman movie, Superman Returns, will be in theatres in 2006.

Michelle Malkin points us to the website for the trailer, and as she says, it's pretty cool.

I've always liked Superman for its theological elements. There's a lot of depth there if you care to look.

Technorati Tags: Superman, Superman Return, Christoper Reeve, Jesus

Drudge links to an article in the Wahington Times, warning about the vulnerability of the US to an electromagnetic pulse attack:

A single nuclear weapon carried by a ballistic missile and detonated a few hundred miles over the United States would cause "catastrophe for the nation" by damaging electricity-based networks and infrastructure, including computers and telecommunications, according to "War Footing: 10 Steps America Must Take to Prevail in the War for the Free World."

The EMP danger was highlighted recently by a special congressional commission that has received little public attention and is considered a unique way for rogue states such as North Korea and Iran, or other enemies such as al Qaeda, to use nuclear weapons in the future.

Well, the devil is in the details. While North Korea or Iran might be able to manage something like that, I'm not so sure about a terrorist group. Frankly, a proper EMP is a hard thing to pull off.

Scott Brison, Public Works Minister

Not knowing Scott Brison personally, I have to wonder if the extreme behaviour he's been exhibiting recently is normal for him, or indicative of a man under a lot of stress.

Then you have to wonder if the same goes for the rest of the Liberal Party caucus.

Technorati Tags: Scott Brison, Liberal Party, Stephen Harper, Gerry Nicholls, Sandra McGrath, NCC, National Citizens' Coalition

Read the story of Shaun Joshua Deacon, and you'll wonder whether we need to subject judges and prosecutors to the wrath of the community every three or four years.

Can you guess what they are?

Another example of why government handouts are stupid. The government should reduce taxes, individual and corporate, across the board.

But they won't. Why? You have a better photo op if you dole the money out in the form of specific loans and grants.

Smiling federal ministers, smiling corporate executives, smiling local mayors, smiling union representatives. Maybe even one of those big novelty cheques for the group to hold up for a group photo to put in the paper.

Of course, if the handout fails in its goals, those same politicians should be front and centre explaining what happened to the money they so wisely spent on our behalf.

That never happens. They're never around for bad news announcements. But that won't stop me from pointing those politicians out.

Technorati Tags: Joe Volpe, David Emerson, Walt Lastewka, Jim Bradley, St. Catharines, General Motors

The 32nd raising of the Red Ensign.

A rant of epic proportions.

Terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi

From the Jerusalem Post:

The Elaph Arab media website reported on Sunday that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of the al-Qaida in Iraq terror group, may have been killed in Iraq on Sunday afternoon when eight terrorists blew themselves up in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.

Is that all we have? Well, apparently, the terrorists did a number on themselves, leaving the classic question of whether al-Zarqawi might be trying to fake his death in order to take the heat off of himself. From Debka:

A sample of his DNA is in American possession for a match-up.

The bodies they are trying to identify are of 7 men and one woman, who blew themselves up Sunday, Nov. 20, after their hideout in northern Iraq was under siege by a large US force, backed by tanks and helicopters. The bodies are burned black and unrecognizable. Four Iraqi security officers were killed and 10 injured in the operation.

DEBKAfile’s military sources add that also Sunday, US and Iraqi forces raided al Qaeda sanctuaries in Baghdad and captured several suspects. They followed an intelligence tip which confirmed DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s disclosure (Issue 227 Oct. 28) of the arrival of Zarqawi and his top team to Baghdad on Oct. 15.

Still, if al-Zarqawi is really wondering why his 70 virgins haven't arrived yet, and why all those little guys with pitchforks are poking at him, then you've got to admit that this could be a big story, and that it couldn't have come at a better time.

Technorati Tags: al-Zarqawi, Iraq, Mosul, al Qaida, al Qaeda

David Marshall, Deputy Minister of Public Works and Government Services Canada

From the National Post:

A major federal department has temporarily banned the hiring of able-bodied white men in an unusual move critics say could spark a backlash against the very disadvantaged groups it is meant to help.

Managers in the Public Works department must hire only visible minorities, women, aboriginals and the disabled, except with written permission from their superiors, David Marshall, the deputy minister, ordered in an e-mail circulated yesterday.

Pierre Teotonio, a department spokesman, said last night the order was prompted in part by a precipitous drop in the number of employees hired from the designated groups this year. The proportion of female, disabled, aboriginal and non-white new hires fell from one in eight this March to only one in 20 by September, he said. The federal benchmark just for the hiring of visible minorities is one in five.

Oddly, David Marshall could kill two birds with one stone -- address the question of the quality of aborignal hires and clear the air about the Abotech affair.

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Frank Brazeau, Abotech, PWGSC, David Marshall

Fr. George Coyne, SJ, Chief Vatican Astronomer

Intelligent Design is the theory that holds that the universe is so complex that it could not have achieved this state of complexity without an intelligence somehow directing it.

It is creationism by another name. But since it tries to infer God by semi-observable means, that is, by passing some kind of judgment on the complexity of the universe, some Christian groups in the United States want it taught as a scientific theory in opposition to classic Darwinism.

Recently the Roman Catholic Church has weighed in, and today we have a report that the Vatican's top scientist, Fr. George Coyne, says that intelligent design is not science, and belongs in a history or culture class, not in a science class.

But then the Pope is on record as criticizing those who say that the universe was created without direction.

The Pope wins, right? Well, no, and that might come as a surprise to many people, Catholics and non-Catholics, who might have a simplistic view of the role of the Pope and the range of his authority.

Technorati Tags: Intelligent Design, George Coyne, Pope Benedict XVI, Christoph Schoenborn, Roman Catholic Church, papal infallibility

This is not a new post, but I thought the closing remarks of this other post deserved a spot of their own, if only to help me organize my thoughts.

Basically, I'm wondering if I've been pursuing the wrong line of inquiry in the Abotech affair, or perhaps more acccurately, one of lesser importance to the real problem behind this scandal.

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Frank Brazeau, Abotech, Liberal Party, RCMP, pensions

It has been suggested by several people via comments and personal emails that I make the Ethics Commissioner aware of the material relating to David Smith collected on this blog.

I've attached an open letter to the commissioner. I'd like some feedback, and if it is positive, I'll send him a copy.

Also be aware that a key post got deleted. It was the the one that revealed a whole twist on the Abotech affair related to the RCMP Pension Fund. I've rewritten it, along with new information. It's called "A twist in the road".

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Abotech, Liberal Party, Bernard Shapiro, Ethics Commissioner

Update: This twist might, in fact, be the road we should be following. With the release of the Auditor General's report in November 2006, suddenly the role of Abotech makes a lot more sense. Read this update to understand why.

This post is a recreation of the original Morneau Sobeco post. Somehow that post has been deleted, and while I'm trying to retrieve it, I've decided to re-write it from scratch. I'm using the post I made for small dead animals as the basis for this version.

My chase of what appears to be an aboriginal company shell game has run smack into an iceberg.

David Smith, who sits in Parliament for the riding of Pontiac and claims to be an aboriginal, ran a company called Abotech, a computer consultancy firm, out of his home. Now the company is run by his wife, a nurse. Smith insists he has no idea what is going in Abotech.

For a full list of posts related to this scandal, check out the Abotech archive.

Abotech has been caught up in a KPMG audit at PWGSC. Several contracts between Abotech and the federal government have been terminated. Why? No one is saying. Also, a bureaucrat named Frank Brazeau has been suspended without pay in connection with the audit. Frank Brazeau is also David Smith's cousin. Why was he suspended? No one is saying.

The theory is that Frank Brazeau directed contracts meant to go to an aboriginal businesses to Abotech. Frank Brazeau was the consultant at Consulting and Audit Canada who help implement the Procurement Strategy for Aboriginal Business. Smith took his cut, and passed the work to a non-aboriginal firm.

But then came news about a $30 billion lawsuit going forward against the Liberal government. Unions representing 300,000 public servants are suing to recover pension surplus money that Liberal finance minister Paul Martin took to pay down the government's debt.

What does that have to do with Abotech?

Quite a bit, as it turns out.

Ethics Commissioner Bernard Shapiro

David Smith, the Liberal MP for the riding of Pontiac, is subject to a formal investigation with regards to his company Abotech, and the contracts it had with the federal government, contracts that have since been terminated.

The question that confronts us is how do an ethics investigation and an election interact? As it turns out, the answer is murky, and potentially a controversial subject in if itself.

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Abotech, Liberal Party, Bernard Shapiro, Ethics Commissioner

Crowds shopping in Maine last Christmas; the sign of a truly important religious event

Paul Martin impresses us with his knowledge of the important religious festivals:

Prime Minister Paul Martin warned the three opposition leaders today that they could offend religious and ethnic groups by forcing an election over the holiday season.

Martin told reporters en route to this port city for an Asian Pacific summit that the timetable he set for an election in March or April would allow Christians and Canadians of other religious faiths to celebrate their religious holidays without interruption from politicians knocking on their doors.

Here is the calendar for 2006:

• Ash Wednesday is 01 March
• Palm Sunday is 9 April
• Good Friday is 14 April
• (Western) Easter Sunday is 16 April
• (Orthodox) Easter Sunday is 23 April

Well, as we all know, Christians don't really care all that much about Easter. If they did, they'd make it into a big shopping holiday, with gifts and gaudy decorations and an Easter Tree (or something).

Clearly, Christmas is the more important religious holiday.

Paul Martin claims to have saved us from this.

From a speech Prime Minister Paul Martin gave to the Empire Club and the Toronto Board of Trade in May, 2005, discussing what other G8 countries thought of Canada in 1994:

Their view of Canada was clear: our fiscal recklessness over decades was a giant boulder plummeting down from above. And we were the coyote, holding up a little umbrella and a sign that said: "Yikes!"

Never again can we allow government to live beyond its means like that. The penalty is too great. We must be vigilant and we must be disciplined, for that is the eternal price of fiscal freedom.

My government's plan begins, today and always, with an unflinching commitment to fiscal responsibility.

Paul Martin takes credit for steering Canada away from the fate of Wile E Coyote, to be flattened by the boulder of fiscal recklessness.

I wonder if he has that "Yikes!" sign handy? According to this ex-civil servant, he's going to need it.

Technorati Tags: Paul Martin, Liberal Party, Wile E Coyote, Harry Swain

Known as Pajamas Media during the ramp-up, Open Source Media, or OSM, officially launched yesterday:

Readers unfamiliar with blogs are sometimes puzzled by the concept, thinking that they are mere online "diaries," where egoists and sentimentalists record their thoughts and feelings. But the phenomenon of blogging is much more than that; it’s the modern equivalent of the Gutenberg revolution, a way of putting not just published material in the hands of the public—but publishing itself.

Where journalists once gave us "experts say," blogs give us the experts themselves. And where faceless, "objective" editorial boards once handed down opinions and endorsements, bloggers sound off, the numbers on their public sitemeters lending them unassailable credibility as voices for the rest of us.

OSM’s mission is to expand the influence of weblogs by finding and promoting the best of them, providing bloggers with a forum to meet and share resources, and the chance to join a for-profit network that will give them additional leverage to pursue knowledge wherever they may find it. From academics, professionals and decorated experts, to ordinary citizens sitting around the house opining in their pajamas, our community of bloggers are among the most widely read and influential citizen journalists out there, and our roster will be expanding daily. We also plan to provide a bridge between old media and new, bringing bloggers and mainstream journalists—more and more of whom have started to blog—together in a debate-friendly forum.

In the 1960’s, the medium may have been the message, but in the new century, it’s time for the medium to get out of the way. Call it the blogosphere, call it citizen journalism, or call it (we hope) Open Source Media—but the next phase in the democratization of ideas has begun. Stick around, read some blogs, and come back often. Our door will be open.

Visit the site, check out some of the excellent blogs listed, check out the blog archives and the "blogjams", and watch the media reinvent itself.

Technorati Tags: Open Source Media, OSM

Bob Rae, former NDP premier of Ontario

Bob Rae, former NDP premier of Ontario and more recently the author of a major study on post-secondary education, gave a speech in which he sung the praises of a post-secondary education.

Along the way, he manages to insult and belittle anyone who, by choice or by circumstance, did not get a university degree.

Technorati Tags: Bob Rae

Conservative leader Stephen Harper

On your mark...

Technorati Tags: Paul Martin, Stephen Harper, Liberal Party, Conservative Party, Canada

At 9pm Eastern, I'll be on The World Tonight with Rob Breakenridge of CHQR Radio in Calgary.

Wish me luck. This will be my first live interview.

Update: Oh crap. I was awful! I need more practise at talking off the top of my head. But some of the feedback seems good, so I guess it's not as bad as I thought.

David Smith is now subject to a formal investigation by the Ethics Commissioner.

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Frank Brazeau, Abotech, Liberal Party, Bernard Shapiro, Ethics Commissioner

From small dead animals:

Mr. Jeremy Harrison (Desnethe--Missinippi--Churchill River, CPC): Mr. Speaker, yesterday we learned that over $600,000 was looted from the St. Phillip's school account of the Keeseekoose First Nation while a former Liberal candidate was in charge. We have the records for the school's bank account, which document a long list of charges made directly from this account to places like Zellers, Bata Shoes, Athletes World, Mark's Work Wearhouse and the Regina casino.

Why is it that Liberal candidates can get away with taking money from schoolchildren to spend it at the casino?

Why should he get away with it? We all know that the casinos are run by the government, and that the profits and winnings go into education. So in a way Mr. Quewezance, the fellow in question who the Liberals recruited to run in 2004 even though complaints were made as far back as 2002, was really moving the money back into education.

The shoe thing? Eh, that's harder to explain.

So what's going to be done?

Hon. Andy Scott (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, audits are conducted routinely. If those audits find things that should go to the RCMP or other agencies, that is exactly what happens.

So we're going to wait for a routine audit. Makes sense, when you think about it. When theft of taxpayers' money by the Liberal Party and its agents becomes a routine occurence, depending on a routine audit to catch them makes a certain sense.

Technorati Tags: Liberal Party, RCMP

Ralph Goodale, Liberal Minister of Finance

Yesterday I posted about the frustration many people have about how the Liberals seem to have trouble with numbers.

Ralph Goodale, our Finance Minister, pleads poverty until election time, then suddenly reveals "unexpected" tax revenues that increase the surplus by a factor 16!

With all this new found money, promises are made to the electorate, contigent, of course, on the Liberals being re-elected.

At this point, I don't even trust that the surplus is really there. Which would make the first weeks of a Conservative government a major disappointment to many when the cupboards are revealed to be bare.

Real or not, the surplus shenanigans are shocking and must stop. I suggested that the Conservatives make it a promise to create a version of the GAO in the United States. The GAO reports to Congress and provides an independent view of the government's financial health.

As it turns out, Stephen Harper has already been made that promise, and it fits the bill exactly.

Technorati Tags: Liberal Party, Ralph Goodale, Conservative Party, GAO, Stephen Harper, Federal Accountability Act

There has been an administrative screw-up on my part, and the content of this post has since been move to "A twist in the road".

Ralph Goodale, Liberal Minister of Finance

Somehow a surplus of $500 million has become a surplus of $8.2 billion! Just in time for an election, of course, and now Canadians will see all sorts of new spending.

But only if they re-elect the Liberals, of course.

Funny how that always seems to happen around election time. Well, it's long past time for that to stop.

Technorati Tags: Liberal Party, Canada, Ralph Goodale, Conservative Party, GAO

Well, the overlapping problem cropped up again. So I took a different approach to reduce the length of the home page. I changed the <MTEntries> tag in the main index HTML file to read <MTEntries lastn="10">. That resticts the home page to the last 10 entries.

Seemed to clear up the problem nicely.

Next step: switch to daily archives from weekly, to avoid the problem on weekly pages.

Scratch that. Keep the weekly archives, but avoid the "too long problem" be re-writing the template. Now for every day of the week, list each entry, the title of which is a link to the individual archive. Print the number of comments and trackbacks to give a sense of the amount of activity for that posting. Finally print the excerpt to give a taste of what the entry is about. I think it works.

I thought I'd share what I learned from my break from blogging to deal with technical hiccups with the blog.

The major problem was a text overlay problem. Helpful readers sent screen shots, and finally I was able to glean what was going on from one shot in particular, where I was able to see which posts were overlaying each other.

The blog was too long, or more specifically, the main page of the blog was too long. For some people using Internet Explorer, the tail end of the main page was wrapping around and overlaying the topmost entries.

I have no idea why this was happening, but the fix is easy -- I need to be more careful about using extended bodies to reduce the length of posts. A couple of weeks ago I got lazy about it, and the problem started cropping up.

I've since gone back and used extended bodies to reduce the length of the home page (known as the "main index" page to a blogger), and I've been told the overlay problem has gone away. I plan to step back through the blog and continue to shrink log posts and add Technorati tags as an ongoing effort.

So for bloggers who write essays instead of blurbs, keep it in mind. Hopefully I've just saved you two days worth of work.

Technorati Tags: blogging

Paul Martin shows himself to be as two-faced as any person whose moral compass is pointed neither at right or wrong, but only at power. At least with right or wrong, you have to be reasonably consistent.

But when you are driving after power, you take turns and twists guaranteed to drive any observer to distraction.

Technorati Tags: Paul Martin, Liberal Party, Canada, Gomery

As an election looms, it's time to watch how the media spins the news.

In this case, the Liberals are depicted as "teetering in Quebec".

The opposition parties are telling Prime Minister Paul Martin to call an election in the first week of January, or face an immediate vote of non-confidence.

Is this a proposal or an ultimatum? It makes a difference.

Apparently there are still some people out there who are having trouble seeing this blog, with text overlaid on other text.

If you are experiencing problems, leave a comment here, preferably with an email. What I need to know what operating system you are using, what browser with version, and what resolution. Better yet, send me a screen capture too, directly to my email.

Also, if you can remember, when did the problem start, if you can recall.

Update: Thanks to everyone who responded. Based on what I've seen, the problem lies entirely with users of Internet Explorer (and Windows 98, I think). No other browsers reported issues. Further research has revealed that IE is not capable of rendering XHTML properly, and probably never will. So much for all that work making my tags XHTML compliant. So I switched from XHTML 1.0 to HTML 4.0 and re-did all the tags. I'm not sure that this will address the float problem, but it gives me a more solid baseline from which to go forward.

For what it's worth., I did not choose to write in XHTML. The template for the blog came that way. It seems that a lot of people put XHTML headers in their pages, without considering that IE does not understand XHTML very well, or worse, without actually writing XHTML 1.x pages, but plain old HTML 4.0 pages! Something for you to consider if you are a blogger.

Regular blogging will commence momentarily.

Technorati Tags: blogging

Democratic Party Chair Howard Dean

Republican Party Chair Ken Mehlman

From Drudge:

The DRUDGE REPORT has learned from exclusive sources that Democrat Party Chair Howard Dean turned down Republican Party Chair Ken Mehlman's last minute offer to appear together on NBC's MEET THE PRESS this morning.

Moments before taping was to begin with host Tim Russert, Mehlman asked Dean outside the NBC studio's green room: "There's still time for us to go on together Governor." Dean declined with a shrug of his shoulders and an uncomfortable cackle and then proceeded to walk away into the green room.

DRUDGE has learned MEET THE PRESS producers have been working to get a head to head Dean/Mehlman appearance on the program since Dean was named chair back in February. Dean and his handlers have repeatedly turned down the request. The former Vermont governor only agreed to do this week's program if they appeared in back-to-back interviews.

Clearly, it looks like either Howard Dean, or his handlers, or both, are afraid of having Dean in an uncontrolled situation, especially one in which emotions might run high. Dean has a reputation of crazed outbursts.

At some point, however, the reticence is going to become an issue of its own. If Howard Dean becomes a liability (or to be accurate, more of a liability), we might see a fight within the Democratic Party to oust him. With mid-term elections less than a year away, time is short if the Democratic Party leadership wants to avoid having to deal with the Dean Factor while trying to oust the Republican majority in Congress.

The irony for Howard Dean is that to eliminate this one issue, his apparent fear of Ken Mehlman, he'll have to make that appearance. But knowing Howard dean, he's just as likely to say or do something that will seal his fate.

Technorati Tags: Howard Dean, Ken Mehlman, Democratic Party, Republican Party

Recall that Frank Brazeau, the bureaucrat at Public Works and Government Services Canada, suspended over the Abotech affair, has had his entry in the Government Electronic Directory expunged.

The Abotech affair involves questionable contracts handed to a company once run by David Smith, Liberal MP representing the riding of Pontiac. David Smith's wife now runs the company, which is run out of the family home. Frank Brazeau is David Smith's cousin. Something was discovered, but not revealed yet, during an audit that caused Frank Brazeau to be suspended without pay and Abotech to lose contracts.

Curiously, at the same time that Frank Brazeau's name disappeared from the directory, a co-worker and presumably his supervisor, Marc Carriere, assistant director in the same office, also disappeared from the listing. I speculated whether the two were linked.

On a hunch, I called who I assumed was Carriere's boss, Bill McCann, Director General at Consulting and Audit Canada. McCann remains in the directory, but the outgoing message on his voice mail states that he would be out of the office from October 20 to November 4, returning November 7.

The outgoing message was recorded by a woman, clearly not McCann.

It is now November 13, six days past his return date.

If he has a secretary recording his outgoing voicemail messages, then I would assume she would record a new outgoing message on his return as part of her regular duties.

Why has a new outgoing message not been recorded? Did something happen while he was away that made adjusting the outgoing message a moot point? I'll follow up on Monday to see if McCann is actually in the office.

Technorati Tags: David Smith, Frank Brazeau, Abotech, Liberal Party, Bill McCann, Marc Carriere, PWGSC

One of the things I've wanted to do for some time is to use pictures a bit more liberally. Just a photo of a major player in a story, or some other image that seems appropriate. Add some colour. Give the blog a more professional magazine-look.

Well, I learned that no little improvement is simple.

I added code to create a small floating paragraph enclosing the image and caption (or multiple images and captions). The intent was that the paragraph would float to the left, and the text would flow down and around the image block. Worked brilliantly in Firefox. Sucked big time in Internet Explorer.

In Firefox, the paragraph would float to the left, but in IE, it floated to the left and up. That meant the image would underlay the title and other header information for each entry.

After some research, I stumbled onto the solution. Include "position:relative" in the tag stream for the enclosing paragraph. This makes no sense, but the entry I read about fixing up IE floats is that a number of apparently unrelated problems are solved in this way.

I have learned that IE is rife with problems in the way it renders HTML. In fact, many developers curse Firefox for doing it correctly, since it means that hacks that they routinely put into web pages to work around well known IE shortcomings sometimes have bad side effects in Firefox (because Firefox is doing it right).

Thanks to all the readers who have been bringing problems to my attention, and supplying me with screenshots so that I knew where to go to look. I now check my page with both Firefox and IE, and I hope I'll catch errors before you do.

Technorati Tags: blogging

A car burns in Paris, November 8

From the Ottawa Citizen:

Some 3,000 police fanned out around Paris on Saturday to counter feared weekend attacks on high-profile targets such as the Eiffel Tower as the number of vehicles torched overnight rose slightly elsewhere in France, officials said.

In neighbouring Belgium, 15 vehicles were burned overnight, including a bus torched near the eastern city of Liege, officials said Saturday. But the government there played down fears of the kind of unrest that has hit France.

Just 15 cars -- a blip or a spark?

One question is whether these were rioters from France who moved across the border in Belgium in order to cause trouble, or if these are home-grown troublemakers. The answer will have implications across Europe with regards to the question of the trouble spreading, especially when you recall that though Liege is in the French-speaking Walloon Region of Belgium, the city is clear across the country, near Germany border, far from the French border.

Imported from France? Seal