Pimping the Premier: Presto! Comes to BC to Assist in the Prostitution of the Worst Government in Provincial History–A Political Terrorist in Winter
There is a peculiar dynamic in this country, which too often manifests itself prior to death, and it’s called ‘Sainthood.’
I haven’t the foggiest as to why this is. But it’s very, very strange to me. The people who hurt us, we not only reward lavishly; we commit them to apotheoses, which are as unholy as they are unseemly.
All of my absolutely favorite writing heroes, Hitchens, Thompson, Richler and Fotheringham all noted it, so perhaps this is why I am so jaded and cast as utterly nasty by some of my more tepid colleagues (as the majority are): Much like those in this craft I admire most, I will not, ever, abandon the time-honored tradition of firmly embracing the public’s trust in favor of having to pander to a public figure so that an editor or advertiser will not have cause to wince.
There is the full raising of a fool’s banner to the rafters and then the lesser version.
What’s happened to us, particularly in this province, is that where politicians once feared reporters, the reverse now holds true. In fact, news organizations relish in it. A recent column on our current Premier by my friend Gary Mason is a case in point: Ms. Clark doesn’t hold the same ham-fisted principles as her equally despised predecessor and she’s more democratic to caucus. This is either Gary’s kidnapper writing such perfect, categorical nonsense or an off day for one of Canada’s best columnists.
But this is a mere blip in the general scheme of things.
Of course, a full ‘Sainthood’ must come from a desperate politician looking for any breathing room, no matter how fetid and blustery the air.
Specifically, I am thoroughly appalled with the complete lack of tenacity the mainstream press treated the recent visitation of Presto! ( a moniker borrowed from the great Dr. Foth) to British Columbia.
If we are wont to speak of politicians looking for foul air to breathe, I suppose the most superficial explanation is that Premier Clark’s no longer localized stench is much worse than the man who defined political terrorism in this country.
But is it?
Premier Clark invited Presto! to BC in a vain, brazen attempt to photo op a shot across John Cummins and the BC Conservatives’ bow. But a more detailed review of a most divisive, destructive man is worthy of an exercise, if only to illustrate the parallels between Ms. Clark and Mr. Manning.
The Reform Party, the Manning wet-dream, was one of the single most schismatic efforts in Canadian history. At every turn, there was Mr. Manning, photo op after photo op (where have we seen this before?) ignoring the damage his movement was doing to Canada just to advance his causes–which were largely crypto-religious and not-so-quietly zealous. At every juncture, when a needy constituency in this country became apparent, Mr. Manning said one thing and delivered another (where have we heard this before?).
When Quebec’s bubbling, reckless Pequistes saw the Reform Party as a threat, instead of allaying fears, Presto! stoked them with bubbling, reckless rhetorical drivel of his own. Quebec must take responsibility for itself, yes, and lose the persona of the petulant, but favored, child (clearly, little has changed in this regard), but were there not better ways to assuage those fears than by unbridled brinkmanship? It sealed the Reform Party’s fate as a regional protest party, and not much more pertinent on the national stage than the BQ they so hated. It also guaranteed a decade of Liberal Party tyranny and the raping of the public purse by its operatives.
All so Presto! could commit to an exercise in futility. Everyone wants a Prime Minister. Not everyone wants Christ.
At the 1994 Reform convention, Presto! allowed a resolution forward (he even supported it, as did ALL his disciples) which called for homosexual rights not to be recognized as equal to the rest of us (despicable). An interesting footnote was that two of his Reformers voted against it: One, was Jan Brown and the other you may have heard of: His name is Stephen Harper.
As the winds of an economic maelstrom loomed, at various times during his tenure as Leader of the Opposition, Presto! fiddled and twiddled with competing and incongruent, inprobable solutions to real problems. This was leadership worthy of being hailed by our Premier, at a private party the other day, as “strong and visionary”? How much shame is there in simply admitting that Mr. Manning is a vengeful, miserable, shameless little man, who came here to payback John Cummins for not being a devout follower (read: a fool like the other original Reformers)? But Ms. Clark, unconditionally desperate to reverse a pained course of failure in government that she has personally led, needed to have Mr. Manning appear and once again prove his worthlessness–and hers.
While the province burns under her governments policies, she’s courting a mean-spirited has-been.
More to the point, Presto! claims to be running something called ‘The Manning Center’. It is there you “learn” to become a Conservative. How absurd! What egocentricity!
Presto! is no more a real conservative than I am about to be confused for Tom Cruise.
Being a religious zealot who says one thing and does another; who has since leaving office been daft enough to embrace David Suzuki, isn’t conservative. It’s confused.
Preston Manning is one of the most destructive, isolating and alienating political figures in Canadian history. Yet, to listen to the Premier, he’s the Second Coming–just so she can add a few more points to John Cummins’ growing approval rating.
I won’t bore you with the link, but from the Manning Center’s website; one of the “Values” they aspire to spread to the faithful is this:
“Principled leadership”
Oh, I see. Mr. Manning must be referring to principled leadership like this.
What’s with all the former Reformers coming out in support of federal Liberal Christy Clark??? The same Christy Clark that used her bully pulpit to loudly denounce PM Stephen Harper???
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And attack him, yes, that Christy Clark.
See, to the Hills, Days and Mannings, Harper is a heretic. They all failed where he succeeded because, simply put, he was smart and they weren’t. There is a ton of inside the ballpark nastiness from that crew because Harper has morphed into a true conservative while they were always far right Reformers. Wing nuts, if you will.
And now, they’re showing it all over again.
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Hitchens, Thompson, Richler and Fotheringham? Good God man, you have too expand your horizons; an atheist, a suicide, a man never photographed without a drink and a smoke and his hair fashionably tousled! I might give you some grace on Fotheringham, though he couldn’t hold a candle to Trevor Lautens!
I have no idea what Preston Manning is trying to accomplish with the B.C. Liberals except perhaps prevent a split which would allow the socialists access through the middle. (an honourable cause in itself). Still, he should remain out of this one, he will become tarnished by it, even if Alex thinks having a Christian conscience in political matters is unacceptable. Your fear of Christianity is worse than an Anchorite’s fear of women! You should shape your fear on the attempts by many anti-Christians who are trying to condone Sharia law in our society, up to and including the Druidic Archbishop of Canterbury and various feminist organizations in Canada.
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There is no hope for you if you mean to suggest that Lautens is better than Fotheringham. As well-read as you are, simply put, you’ve allowed your political barometer to completely blacken your ability to discern good writers from great. Lautens is a good writer, but because he’s a right winger, you embarrassingly suggest Dr. Foth is a child of a lesser God. Pity. One’s judgement suffers when you bleed one fabric into another. As to your pal Presto!, he is a fool, plain and simple. Always has been always will be.
Christianity has no business in politics any more than Islam or Judaism does. It’s a moron’s paradise. The public interest is led by principled leadership–and not necessarily by God. Don’t start with the religious crap Larry. You’re in a small minority of people who think politics and religion mix–because not matter how hard your grip your rosary, it’s just not true. Sharia Law is no less a joke than any of the disgusting anti-gay, pro-life garbage that people like Reed Elley have shoveled over the years.
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Total agreement.
Church and State should always be seperate.
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` Oh well! I must be wrong because James I is backing up Alex Tsakumis. Don’t want to hear your secular crap boys, it seems the protestors at the Occupation on Georgia are making plans of occupying the the Cathedral on Dunsmuir . Apparently they find it all part of the society we live in, and associate it with capitalism, democracy and traditional western civilization. Apparently you don’t. Not surprised!
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If you’d bother to read my previous post inclusive of the comments, not the ones that just suit you, you’d see that I’m doing a post calling to arms all those who believe Ina free and just Vancouver to battle these bastards on Sunday morning because their plan to interrupt Catholic mass at Holy Rosary is a disgrace and they should be hammered black and blue. What a joke this city has become.
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I agree it has become a joke, but admit at least that people see the state and the faith of most practitioners as one and the same; the oppressors, or at least the status quo. They have nothing better to offer, but they hate anything that relates to tradition and fail to understand that they are living in the best country in the world. Take these beliefs away, and it will all fall.
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Completely agree.
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Larry,
Did you even bother to read my rather short post.
Can a Catholic (myself) not be enlightened enough to see that Church has no place in Gov’t.?
Grow up
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Grow up? shut up! I’m not saying the Church has a place in government, only that it was Christianity that made us what we are, they cannot and should not be totally separated. Alex, if you wrote about it I didn’t see it, and looking through previous post, I still can’t find it, even with “Holy Rosary” in the find box! I did email you about it when I first heard of it. Did you write it since then? By the way, the head of our state is the Queen who is the Defender of the Faith, now the Anglican Church.
Separate that Jimmy!
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Then please explain the following that you said:
“Oh well! I must be wrong because James I is backing up Alex Tsakumis. Don’t want to hear your secular crap boys”
How the hell is my view that Church and State should be separate deem me secular in any way?
And to bring the Queen into this is utterly ridiculous. As far as I am concerned, she is head of state in title only, nothing else.
So Larry, stay on point now. I was reacting to you calling me out in the first place.
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No, he doesn’t. He went batshit on me for not having any interest in his religious beliefs.
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Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not? Should we pay them, or should we not?” But, knowing their hypocrisy, he said to them, “Why put me to the test? Bring me a denarius and let me look at it.” And they brought one. And he said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said to him, “Caesar’s.” 17Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” And they marveled at him. (Mark 12:13-17)
I am pretty sure this constitutes a reasonable argument for separation of Church and State.
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It sure does, my brother.
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Freedom of conscience and religion means to me that any religious group doesn’t have the right to impose its values on the rest of society, but should be protected as far as it doesn’t break the law or violates the rights of those who don’t necessarily share its members’ beliefs and/or practice its rituals.
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Complete agreement.
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…a man never photographed without a drink and a smoke and his hair fashionably tousled!
You say it like it’s a bad thing.
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I know, I was going to tell Larry the same thing but I’m quite reformed. Haven’t had a cigar in months. In fact, I took a dozen with me when I went with the family to Naramata for a month. I came back with all of them and they’re still sitting in my humidor.
As for drink…. LOL!
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It’s not that he was a big drinker or smoker or a slob, it was just his idea of how a good writer should look like. It was all B.S., he didn’t need the “image”.
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You can be very offensive, you know that? What insight do you have in what Mordecai thought about what a writer should look like. Pure writer’s all have that disheveled look because our creativity in the way we turn a phrase or look at a story is different from the usual columnist that simply seeks to bang out 700 wds that some dipshit editor will take, correct the typos and pretend to understand.–not that most care to.
You haven’t the first clue as to what he thought about when pouring a drink or lighting a cigar. nor do you have an insight at all in what he thought about when he put on a shirt, rumpled or not, or the same tweed jacket he bought in Paris twenty years earlier (it was his favourite).
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I take a bath and shower daily and brush my hair (what’s left of it) and my teeth, always put on clean gaunches, socks and shirt, etc., no longer smell like an ashtray because I’ve since quit, don’t smell like a brewery any longer because I (for all intents and purposes) quit drinking, and you say that I’m offensive! I’m sick and tired of the pained and troubled and bored expressions of our various artistes; there is never an excuse for looking a slob. Notice you never do! (and I’m not being complimentary to suck up)
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Larry, I have my own personal style as they do. Let it go. Move on to a story or angle worthy of your intelligence.
You don’t like what Mordecai dressed like but his philosophy on many issues mirrors yours. Like it or not.
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I wonder how well this would go over if they decided to occupy a Gurdwara or a Mosque?
And why don’t they?
And why the hell would they want to disrupt an institution, that has for decades, helped the poor and down and out.
Idiots. Period.
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I’d love it if try true it at the Ross Street temple.
They’d get in…but never get out.
And that wouldn’t break my heart one bit.
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Alex,
You may have a leg up on most posters here re: the politics of the 90′s. All most of us had was the MSM … and we thought they were full of shit even then. (only geeks were on the internet then … and only in the later part of the 90′s).
Presto! didn’t start the separatist movement in Quebec … and the corpse of Layton hasn’t stopped it … Alberta money seems to ease it.
Presto! offered John Cummins a little acknowledgement – “he knows fisheries” … well, kind of a backhanded compliment.
What does Presto! and CC “know”?
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Not much, apparently.
But while Presto! didnt start the movement to have Quebec bolt, he fanned the flames.
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He didn’t fan them fast enough for me!
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He was also pretty ineffective at flame fanning.
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When you think about these new best friends of Christy, don’t forget about Harper spanking Day for the Canadian Alliance leadership in ’02 and had expressed major concerns about Day’s religious extremism during the 2000 leadership race backing Tom Long.
Harper also had left Reform because of how Manning was running the party and publicly condemned Manning’s personal expense account being run through the party coffers.
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Great points.
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I’m very disappointed that Preston Manning has thrown his support behind Christy Clark. The good news is it probably won’t help her. It’s probably good that he’s not throwing his support behind John Cummins.
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I agree. In fact, it will help Cummins.
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Well this just shows how shallow some can be… Presto! sure was made to be Mr. Christy Clark, Mark II.
I am kept up at nights wondering if and when will caucus finally make sure Christy Clark isn’t Premier to rename Christmas Christymas this year, let me put it that way!
Finally, to truly get into the spirit of the comment threads, “Presto! is no more a real conservative than I am about to be confused for Tom Cruise.” Well at least you had better sex than Tom Cruise did w/ Nicole Kidman, LOL! It took Nicole a new husband to get preggers!!
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Um, okay….awkward pause…
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Sadly, I kind of enjoy reading Josef`s comments.
Great article.
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Have to admit…me too!
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Sorry I had to try to be funny like the others.
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Hey, it was funny, it was funny….
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Thanks. Happy to bring joy to your heart and Chuckstraight’s.
It helps me NOT weep when I read what you write and the fact I must have backed the wrong horse last winter… but then again I wanted to “Rocket for Polak” and that was a model rocket (I have one for real) which had a wet rocket module… then I wanted Alise Mills and she yanked away the DC lines to the rocket motor as I was pushing the button & safety pin down on the box… the rest is history & infamy.
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You know, Josef…maybe I misjudged you after all. You’re a nice kid who wants good government and I appreciate that. And I notice you’re no longer ‘Christy Clark Fan’ which is the right thing to do. As for being let down by Christy, look, you’re not alone. I’ve had over a hundred emails or phone calls from people who will NEVER touch the BC Libs as long as she and her crew are there–and they all voted foe her. Some were even inside campaigners.
As for Alise, she is a good pundit but not a great one. She has good political skills but not great ones. She’s never going to be premier and your supporting that notion only makes you look like you believe in the Tooth Fairy (and I mean that with respect).
And with respect to my old friend Mary Polak, I’ll say only this: You couldn’t find a better friend or a kinder woman. Intelligent too. But why this didn’t translate when she became a Minister–particularly at MCFD is completely beyond me.
An your pal Holman is a good a man as you could ever meet–except he’s got loyalty issues when his pettiness gets in the way.
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Thanks Alex. I am pro-good government. I am against cronyism or socialism or psycho-conism of the Cummins-Bachmann variety. Christy did a lotta good in the past, but I have faint hope she can explain away the PINs, fix CLBC and get through to Christmas. Still support the BCLibs, too many good folks still with em.
I believe in Alise – and especially her moxie the past year plus against the BCNDP, but she has family issues (ill parent which I understand from personal experience is tiring + special needs kid). Probably won’t happen. Can handle Premier Kevin Falcon.
A November to Remember awaits!
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Well you never can tell. I would have guessed (based on my following your blog since April 2011) that being a supporter of Cummins might have made you a follower of Reform back in the 80-90s but I see now that you and I share a common opinion of Presto. (although you are a little kinder to him than me).I also find it amazing that Manning Day Hill and Strahl all have endorsed our brain-dead barbie doll and in so doing dumped on and rejected Cummins.
Remember that 655,000 British Columbians voted Reform in the 1997 election and I guess those voters are who the pols are courting.
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I think that was a protest vote more than being attracted to anything ‘Reform’,
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Hill’s current customer, Spectra, would most likely be the cause of his fawning over the Clucker. The things we do for the corporation. Maybe the others still think Hill is the whip.
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Hill was never whip–only in name. Harper threw him a bone just to keep him quiet.
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So why are you erasing my posts Alex? Do you find them offensive, or too rational, or out of line?
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What the hell are you talking about? I give you priority because they’re so well written and have never deleted any of your comments.
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Larry, you lost me at “Don’t want to hear your secular crap boys”
The minute you attack someone who has beliefs that differ from you in this way, IMHO, you lose some credibility.
I, for one, would not say to you : “Don’t want to hear your religious crap, Larry”, because it is disrespectful to your beliefs.
Lastly, AGT has never censored my posts. As long as you follow the board rules, he encourages, from what I can see, robust discussion.
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That would be correct.
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People worship Jehovah and Christ Jesus.
People do not worship politicians?
Politicians are hated or liked?
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Separate Church and State
Separate Gov and Corp
And don’t vote the same for 30 years because you like the color or you feel a false sense of loyalty to a brand.
I’m quickly loosing faith in the generation above me.
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I’ve lost all faith in the generation above.
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I have nothing but respect for the generation above, they are the “greatest generation”. I have a picture on my wall of an uncle I never met, he went down on the HMCS Esquimalt, it was the last Canadian ship to be torpedoed in WW II. In fact the end of the war had already been signed, but the German submarine off the Halifax approaches was unaware of it.
My generation and those following couldn’t hold a candle to that generation, these people were from a time of tranquility and faith and confidence in their actions, something I don’t think we will ever experience again. The world was a better world than what we have now. I believe that and nothing today could match it!
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No argument from me.
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I’m losing faith in the same generation because of what’s going on with abortion issues in states like Kansas and Mississippi.
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I have to admit, that I voted for all iterations of Reform/Canadian Alliance ever since I could vote. The main reason was that in the Interior, they were the only viable right-of-centre option to Jean Chretien’s Liberals. As well, I was attracted to their “West wants in” policies.
However, there were many times between elections that I wanted to vote for the PC’s, when Reformers were acting like a clown show and Manning did little to keep a lid on it, or when Day proved to be a poor leader. However, then Joe Clark would open his mouth and send me back to Reform!
All I can say is that I am glad that the Tories and Reform merged with a pragmatic conservative as leader.
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Me too. If you look at Harper’s record, he rejected the hard right at every opportunity.
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Just go over to “Free Dominion”. They absolutely despise PM Harper there, calling him “socialist” and “liberal-lite”. Pretty much started the day after he won his first minority and he didn’t outlaw abortion and same-sex marriage.
My friends consider me to the right of Attila the Hun, but after hanging out at that place, I discovered that I was much more moderate than I thought!
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I’ve been there. I hate to say it, but most of the dwellers there are nuts. Full-on, raving loons.
Real conservatives don’t act like that. There is a compassion to conservatism that is also evident in many I have met who are moderate socialists. You see, politics is about people–and not the other way around.
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Oh well some of us gotta work weekends and holidays and 12 hr. shifts.
I suppose the rest of you live in mommy’s basement?
……. and this just in from the N.P. – Our good friend Conrad Black has this to say about Republican candidate and notorious flip-flopper, Mitt Romney … ” …. chiefly known for a health plan in Massachusetts that didn’t work and for favouring abortion, until he opposed it.” So, apparently I am not the isolated dreamer you would have others believe. You don’t change something so fundamental unless there are a lot of people willing to withhold their vote on your beliefs. Oh, and Ann Coulter, in her latest book, graciously accepts Christopher Hitchen’s pro-life sentiments, if not any of his other grotesque propositions, and of course one of this blog-master’s favourite actors, bon vivant, playboy and all-around master of sarcasm and smugness, Jack Nicholson, has forever been, not merely pro-live but, anti abortion. (though you wouldn’t be able to tell from the glitz press or the paparazzi) This is not to say these want to recriminalize it, but as Leo Abse (the U.K. lawyer who was most responsible for its de-criminalization there) notes: What is no longer criminal, is not, therefore a virtue!
And although a very well written, concise and thoughtful and heartfelt commentary was entered here, on this blog, about the great love of a mother who would cancel radiation of cancerous cells until after the birth of her child, at the cost of her life – only received two, count them – (2) replies from his vast readership, I applaud it. It seems almost as though the others suspected it to be a trap baited with poison!
In like manner, there are those who saw Preston Manning as a great western Canadian patriot who was willing to stand athwart the Trudeaupian, liberal arrogance of years past, and like William F. Buckley, holler “STOP”. The reason we are where we are today is, in good part. because of the aspirations and hard work of this man. (As Stephen Harper so willingly acknowledged after his first majority) Those who wish to disagree with me, ( and they do, incessantly) feel free to do so, I have big shoulders! (metaphorically speaking) We are out here folks – and we are legion!
Those of you who agree with Mr. Tsakumis, all the time, are rewarded with florid praise; those of us who don’t are accosted by big Greek put-downs like “hypocrite”, never with invocations to Theotokos or Kyrie eleison! And, of course we must never breath the name of a former (now passed) journalist/columnist with the North Shore News, who, when a young man of sheer courage and tenacity, survived several POW camps after bravely fighting the Hitlerian Hun.
But, we live in a brave new world don’t we? And in closing, I would just like you to be aware that Canada is more and more in the news for our daring-do. This from WFB’s National Review of Oct. 17/11.
“A woman in Canada will serve no jail time for strangling her newborn son (with her thong underwear; my addition) and leaving his body in a neighbour’s yard. The court’s rationale for giving a mere suspended sentence for infanticide – which, even in a nation with not restrictions on abortion, is still a crime – was a simple extension of its justification for abortion, which is that Canadians “generally understand, accept and sympathize with the onerous demands pregnancy and childbirth exact from mothers, especially mothers without support.” In the words of one of the judges, “Naturally, Canadians are grieved by an infant’s death, especially at the hands of the infant’s mother, but Canadians also grieve for the mother.”
Someone should grieve for Canada.
Dominus flevit!
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Essay warning….
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Larry, Larry, Larry – how can you respect a politico who bears an uncanny likeness, and has a voice like Pee Wee Herman?
C’mon!
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I guess I’m one of those old fashioned types who don’t judge people on their physical attributes alone. I know, I know, physicality is so popular these days being as our shallowness only allows us to judge people like they do in the media, you know, how big their boobs are as opposed to what big boobs they are. Someone want to tell me how Pierre Elliot Trudeau ever got elected? Got big boobs Island Girl? Send me your vitals, I’ll judge you on that, okay sweetie?
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Ah, Larry…asking a fellow dweller here to divulge the wealth of her assets crosses several lines for me–even in jest.
C’mon. You’re better than this. Island Girl, I apologize on Larry’s behalf.
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Right, but on the other hand, it’s okay to ridicule my political choice by comparing him to the pervert that plays PeeWee Herman. Island Girl, don’t accept any apologies that don’t come directly from my keyboard.
Oh, and I wouldn’t waste too much time waiting around here. You pays your penny, you takes your choice!
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If you’d like to be charged a monthly fee for coming here, that can be arranged.
In fact, it’s been recommended by many people I’m working with as we’re going interactive soon, with daily video blogs etc.
Be careful what you wish for….
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Ichabod Crane alias……. Presto Manning
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Yup. I’d buy that.
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Beau Brummell, definitely not Henri. tabernac, ostie, calix! I don’t know French so it is not really sacrilegious!
Oh, and the day I start paying to comment, is the day Hell freezes over! Though I would accept a small pension, a pittance for my opinion, frustration oughta be worth somethin”.
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I didn’t say I’m going to start charging. I won’t. I’m simply relaying the thoughts of a very respected mainstream journo who comes here daily and thinks it’s a pretty good place to be.
Mind, if I thought I trust you to fire off one of the brilliant pieces I know you can pull off, I’d give you the first ever ‘Rebel’ guest shot. But I’m likely to get the usual indignation about how my imperfect life is in need of redemption. Of course, just riding you a little bit.
I’d love to give you a pension, Sir Lawrence. You and so many others here have earned it.
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Well thanks Alex, but I am of course kidding, this is how Europe is getting in trouble.
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