Hands Off Our Internet!

Dear Fellow Canadians:

We live a good life in the "True North strong and free."​

We are accepted as friends around the world. Even Americans travel with a Maple Leaf patch sewn onto their backpacks because that symbol is the universal shorthand for: "I come in peace -- and most likely to party."​

Recently, a darkness has fallen upon our great land.

The CRTC's vision for the Internet in Canada

The Internet today

The CRTC's Internet

So, you wanna be a rock 'n' star? Read this library book

It's 1979 and Ripley Plumedust is a rock star.

He lives with his Nana and plays the piano late into the night, disturbing her sleep.

Ripley's mother died earlier in the week, but he didn't tell Nana. He had his mother cremated and then poured her ashes into his piano.

It has never sounded better.

"Ripleeeeeey," Nana wheezes from the backroom, where he keeps her. "It's three a.m.. I really need to sleep."

"You can sleep when you're dead," Ripley mutters to himself and continues writing a song about the Son of Sam.

Canadian Catholic Bishops Lecture World on "misuse of sex" with utter lack of irony

The nefarious coven of gargoyles known as the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops emerged from its anonymous cave in Tora Bora, Canada this week to release another archaic warning to the world.

The bishops sought in this latest communique to lecture the world about the "misuse of sex".

Grandstanding pianos

A grand piano in decidedly bad repair has been spotted on a sandbar off Key Biscayne in Florida.

Department of Homeland Security officials haven't yet ascertained the piano's nationality, its mode of transportation, political affiliations or its intentions.

Telecom Decision CRTC 2011-44

To the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission:

For a body that "does not regulate the rates, quality of service or business practices for Internet service providers" the CRTC has done a pretty fair job of sticking its nose in where it doesn't belong.

I'm referring to the Telecom Decision 2011-44 "Usage-based billing for Gateway Access Services and third-party Internet access services".

Canadian Judges Without Borders

Nearly 100 percent of the people who go on trial in Russia are convicted. Russians don't hope for fair trials -- only for light sentences.

This is why you should support Canadian Judges Without Borders.

For 40 years, Canadian judges have been releasing offenders they know have committed crimes or sentencing those who've been found guilty to sentences so light and unencumbering that it's virtually Christmas morning every day court is in session.

Now it's time to spread that emotional largesse to criminals around the world.

Canadian Judges Without Borders goes into countries, such as Russia, the Sudan, Egypt and Singapore and work with local judges on learning to love offenders.

"A change is gonna come" sings Sam Cooke -- Uh, no it's not

A friend often talks about politics and the need for political change.

Somewhere, in a parallel universe, what he says makes perfect sense.

In this reality, however, I always confess that his statement baffles me because it does not account for one vital, crucial, undeniable fact:

People are fucking stupid.

Who says Stephen Harper hates the arts?

Headline: CRTC proposes easing ban on broadcasting false or misleading news

Which is excellent news for the Canadian creative community.

This shift would open the door for fiction writers of all stripes to be employed en masse at the nation's news outlets.

Now that facts no longer matter and truth has finally been deemed irrelevant, novelists, short story writers, playwrights and poets will soon head news desks across Canada.

You know church music sucks . . .

Not even Bono can do a gawddamned thing with it:

Canadian Broadcast Standards Council is the most responsive bureaucracy on the planet

It was the complaint everyone at the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council had been waiting for:

The word "faggot" had been detected -- after 25 years in circulation -- in the Dire Straits song, "Money for Nothing."

Although the idea of "money for nothing" was agreeable to the bureaucrat mindset at the CBSC, no one could abide the word "faggot" in a song on Canadian airwaves.

What next? Fornication in the streets? Beheadings in the public park? Due dates on library books being disregarded?

Canadian news could use a little less truth

Conservative Party TV ad

My name's Dan. I'm busy, so I don't have time for my news to bog me down with facts.

The CRTC is proposing to ease the ban on broadcasting false or misleading news.

It just makes sense.

Look, I've got shopping to do, asses to kiss at work, office underlings to torture and humiliate -- I can't clutter my mind with confusing facts and figures.

Oh, you'll hear the moaners saying, "But we need to rely on our news outlets for reliable information so we can make informed decisions -- !"

Jared Loughner and his John Doe #2

Jared Loughner is the 22 year old Arizona man who's been identified as the gunman who shot Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D.-Ariz.) in Tucson earlier this month.

The media reports I'm reading about him are interesting.

His picture-perfect insane mugshot aside, there has been mention in media reports that he was seen just before the shooting in the company of a middle-aged man. These reports have become much less frequent since first being mentioned, though there's been no word on whether law enforcement has investigated this aspect of the Tuscon shooting and resolved the identity of this middle-aged man or if he knew Jared Loughner.

Canada's approach to rehabilitation needs rehabilitating

A heartwarming story of rehabilitation out of Harrow, Ontario yesterday:

Rapist Robert Joseph VanBraeckel reconnected with a former victim:

VanBraeckel was released from prison May 28 and settled in Listowel. He returned to his hometown of Harrow to attend a court date in regard to the custody of his two children. On June 5 he saw his sexual assault victim outside a restaurant on Main Street smoking a cigarette. He stared at her and then crossed the road and came within a few feet of her. She was frozen in place, terrified, said Gary Nikota, assistant Crown attorney. VanBraeckel grabbed his crotch and smiled at the woman.

For this demonstration of how well rehabilitated he was, Mr. VanBraeckel was sentenced to a further 18 months in prison.

"Why is the possibility of ending up in American custody a cognizable ground for resisting extradition?"

Is Salon.com serious, asking this question: "Why is the possibility of ending up in American custody a cognizable ground for resisting extradition?"

I've got an answer: Because the rule of law does not exist in America.

Let's play word association:

Guantanamo Bay

Extraordinary rendition

PATRIOT Act I

Waterboarding

PATRIOT Act II

Bradley Manning

Sneak & peak searches

The Department of Homeland Security

Blackwater

"If you're not doing anything wrong, you don't have anything to worry about"

If Julian Assange ends up in the hands of the United States, he'll be disappeared, locked away, forgotten, held incommunicado where the "pull-the-wings-off-flies" intelligence operatives will take turns giving him Drano enemas and using a staple gun on his head.

I have more faith in the kangaroo court in the Peter Lorre film M than I do in the egregious "fair and balanced" American justice system.

How much power does an idiot wield on an airplane?

From Fox News (the first name in news that can't be trusted): "But [Arianna Huffington]'s travels soon hit turbulence when another passenger on board the United Express shuttle complained that she was still using her BlackBerry, and the flight crew alerted police on the ground, Jen Friedberg, spokeswoman for the Port Authority Police, told FoxNews.com."

I've been on planes and I've seen the gadget fools who just cannot put down their cell phones.

Are passenger lives really at risk when someone uses a cell phone on a plane at times when the flight crew has requested them to be shut off?

Calling all Coincidence Theorists!

It's been a very interesting year, so far, in American politics.

Maybe we'll soon see some life insurance reform in the near future.

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords: "Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was shot in the head this afternoon at an Arizona Grocery store. She is in "very critical" condition, but is expected to survive."

So, the Political Murder Establishment has finally found a use for Sarah Palin

It's worth noting at the outset:

When the left wing spoke about the crimes of George W. Bush, it spoke in terms of impeachment, charges for war crimes, subpoenas, indictments and special prosecutors.

When the right wing spoke about its unhappiness with President Obama, it spoke in terms of violence; 2nd Ammenment "solutions" and so forth.

* * *

An attempt was made today on the life of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D.-Ariz.) in Tucson. She was apparently shot in the head, has undergone and survived surgery and is currently in critical condition.

Obama's plan to scoop the Tea Party

Inside the Hotdog Factory can exclusively report that President Platitude has a strategy for scooping the Tea Party and appearing more American than anyone else in government.

It's been revealed by a reliable source at the White House that during his 2011 State of the Union Address, President Platitude will wear George Washington's dentures.

The dentures of the first president have already been extracted from the Smithsonian Institute and modified by a team of constitutional dentists to fit the current president's mouth.

The president has been practicing with a number of voice and elocution coaches to speak around the cumbersome 247 year old dentures.

Judge Jestus and the Lawn Dart of the Soul

The nightmare replayed itself every few months: Judge Jestus, aged fifteen, seated in the head master's office at Upper Canada College.

"Your breach of protocol is devastating to the moral fabric that binds this venerable institution!" the headmaster harangued. "You were in direct violation of one of our most fundamental rules --"

The headmaster broke off, breathless with outrage.

It's official: Dick Cheney has no pulse

From Newser.com: "Dick Cheney no longer has a pulse. But he is still alive, [no] thanks to the mechanical heart pump he received in July. . . . It helps to push blood through his arteries continuously, rather than on a beat (hence the lack of a pulse)".

The heart pump is said to be a good complement to the garbage bag filled with hob-goblins, which has served as Cheney's "soul" during his time on earth.

As for his brain?

"I can't comment on that," says Mrs. Cheney. "But I can tell you that his trigger finger is as steady as the day I married monst-- man."

Texting Dun Rite!

With a ski hat filled with false modesty, multi-retired and unretired Vikings quarterback, Brett Favre, announced yet another retirement.

"This time is just makes sense," Favre said. "Until I decide it doesn't."

This retirement, however, may just "take" because Brett Favre has plans to join forces with former Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick in creating a new wireless phone texting network called Texting Dun Rite.

It was fitting that the announcement took place in Detroit after the Lions achieved a surprise victory over the Vikings. In fact, at last word, the Lions were still trying to believe they'd won.