Friday, July 20, 2007

Lack of Vision TV


There is freedom of the press and freedom and speech and then there's are common sense and common decency.


Vision TV's airing of a Jihadists monologue is beyond the pale. Their license should be yanked, or at the least put into serious jeapardy until they can stop rationalizing the lazy airing of hate.


You can read the entire story here.


But here are some of the (low) highlights:



In the hour-long talk, Israr Ahmad said, "Jihad in the way of Allah, for the cause of Allah, can be pursued either with your financial resources or your bodily strength when you go to fight the enemy in the battlefield."


"So jihad, the highest form, is fighting in the cause of Allah."


Mr. Ahmad runs a seminary and bookstore in Lahore, Pakistan, and his writings foresee the "global domination of Islam," compare Jews to "parasites," describe the Holocaust as "divine punishment" and predict the "total extermination" of Jews.


His followers in Canada include terror suspect Qayyum Abdul Jamal, who was arrested last summer for his alleged role in a plot to detonate truck bombs in downtown Toronto.


According to Mr. Jamal's wife, Mr. Ahmad was her husband's teacher and mentor.


Mr. Ahmad is not just a religious scholar. He heads a self-described "revolutionary" organization called Tanzeem-e Islami, which wants to turn Pakistan into a fundamentalist Islamic state.


In his book Lessons From History, he writes that the revival of Islam will begin in Pakistan, because it is the only country that "has the potential for standing up against the nefarious designs of the global power-brokers and to resist the rising tides of the Jewish/Zionist hegemony."


Islam will come to rule in four stages, he claims: the Ultimate World War in the Middle East, the appearance of the anti-Christ, the extermination of the Jews and the "domination of Islam, over the entire globe."

Another Mistaken Judge


What is "family?"


It has been argued successfully in a number of court rooms over the years that a "family" is not necessarily consanguineous - blood related.


A family might be an assembly of like-minded idealists, people dedicated to some common vision or goal.


Why then do we have this social mantra that above all and at all other costs, "the family must be kept together."


I cannot tell you how many sensible, if heart-broken, children I know have prayed for their fractious, dysfunctional "families" to call it a day. The shrinks go on about the destructive force of divorce. But not often enough do they talk about the positive and healthy values of dissolving toxic and dangerous relationships.


All of which is to say how appalling it is to see yet another wrong-headed judge make another horrifying judgment in a local court.


A man beats up his wife and is given a conditional discharge.


The judge, quoting the accepted - and ignorant and blind - common wisdom, says, "Canadian society has an interest in promoting and keeping the family unit together."


Question for the good judge:


Does Canadian society have an interest in keeping family units together in which the father is an out-of-control brutalizing pig?


Next question:


Does the good judge read the papers? Does she have any idea about the rash of domestic violence against women in local "Indo-Canadian" families?


Has she heard of Paul Cheema?


The judge said that the man to whom she gave a conditional discharge after he attacked his wife has "suffered the embarrassment of having to discuss this matter..." in public.


Poor baby.


Last question (same question I asked last week in a similar circumstance):


How can we remove judges from their duties when they demonstrate with chilling clarity their inability to perform those duties responsibly?

What is Essential?


Choices.


Life - and acting - are always about choices.


So, explain if you can to this bewildered Alex in Wonderland the list of "essential services" the mayor assures us will continue through the stinky strike that looms ahead.


Along with police and fire, water and sewers are enshrined The Carnegie Centre, the Pride Parade and the Fireworks.


Huh?
The Carnegie Centre is a daily gathering place for Honduran Dope Dealers, Hookers and $100,000/year Poverty Pimps.
Less than one tenth of one per cent could care less what happens to the Carnegie Centre.

Sting - My One and Only Love

Now, here's a pretty good singer, his own true self, with the same song...

Bail Boy Black


Connie the Crook is not a flight risk.


O.K.


And cows can fly.

Light Up the Skies - One Bic at a Time


From the category of "Never underestimate the immaturity of the North American person, or the sneakiness of the human being, or the obsession of the addict" comes this classic from a New York Times piece about now allowing lighters on airplanes:


"Security officers have been collecting some 22,000 lighters a day nationwide, slowing down lines at check points. Even so, many smokers had found ways to sneak lighters through checkpoints, often by placing more than one in a carry-on bag."


For the whole bizarre story, try this.