What on God's Green Earth!!! Is this a Joke???

Imagine my total disbelief when I read this article this evening. As many, many of you know, I am a very strong supporter of Mr. David Orchard. I'm also a very strong supporter of seeing David get to Ottawa as a Liberal MP.

To that end, this blog will become an unofficial campaign blog for Mr. Orchard's nomination campaign...and there better be a campaign dammit. Peter MacKay screwed David Orchard, and I'll be damned if it happens to him in our party.

So, let the games begin shall we.

Here is a letter from a new member of the Liberal Party of Canada. He joined because he believes in Mr. Orchard. Understandable.

Following is a letter sent from a well-known member of the Canoe Lake First Nations (and well-known family in the North), and supporter of David's candidacy in the riding of Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River. He sent this letter which he entitled, "Liberals beware", to the Liberal Party to warn them on hearing that the incomprehensible was about to take place (as you read in this morning's Globe).
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Canoe Lake
December 16, 2007

My name is Joseph D. Iron. I live in Canoe Lake with my wife Dianne and family. When I heard that Gary Merasty was stepping down I was worried. It was a very close election last time. Gary won by only 60 some votes, I think, and we don’t like Harper and the Conservatives.

When I heard Dave Orchard was running I felt good. I said I’d help right away. I joined the Liberal party with my wife and two boys. I paid 40 dollars for a family membership. This is the first time I paid for a membership in a political party. It’s the first time I’ll be voting in a federal election.

Each of my girls also paid for their memberships. This is the first time I ever saw that. It’s the first time they took any interest in politics. They did that because Dave is well known and because we know him in the north.

We had a blockade in 1992 when they were clear-cutting our forest. Two hundred police were coming in that time with guns and dogs and everything. The police put a perimeter, a 50 mile radius all around our camp, so nobody could come in to help us. The elders phoned Dave to ask if he would help us. He came up from his farm in his truck and got through 3 police roadblocks to our camp. They arrested 31 of us, my wife and I included, and put us in a bus, handcuffed behind our backs. We were almost all Aboriginal. Dave stood with us. Two of the women arrested were pregnant. Dave told the police to take the handcuffs off at least the pregnant women. In the end, they moved the handcuffs from behind their backs to the front so it was a little less painful. At the police station in Meadow Lake they took all the Aboriginal people off the bus and left Dave alone and handcuffed inside. Then about 8RCMP took out their sticks and went to the bus for Dave. We all thought he was going to get a bad beating but a head RCMP ran out from the office and the police talked a while. Then they just threw Dave into the cells with the rest of us for the night.

The next day they let us out. They later dropped the charges. Dave and his adopted brother Tyrone Tootoosis contacted David Suzuki and the three of them came up in an airplane to support us. There was lots of media there that time. We have the photo of David Suzuki, myself, Dave Orchard, Tyrone Tootoosis, Irene Durocher and others. Quite a few families in Canoe have that photo.

Our elders say that we were right. The courts have now ordered that there is a duty to consult First Nations. We were protecting our forest, our land, our rights and Mother Earth.

My oldest daughter was 17 then, she remembers Dave coming. My other girls were 6, 7 and 9 and my boys 2 and 3, but everyone still talks about that. One of the pregnant women was Irene Durocher. After her baby was born she and her husband Joe named him Tyrone David because of Dave. He is now 15 and his whole family bought memberships to help Dave. The people here still talk about how the RCMP treated Dave that time.

When we heard about two months ago that Dave was running, our community put on a soup and bannock for him and lots of people bought memberships. They paid from their own pocket. Forty dollars for every family is not easy to find on the reserves. Joe Iron Sr. was there. He is about 93. He bought a membership. Leon Iron is about 80. He was the first one at the hall. He was there before Dave got there. He took out his money and bought the first membership.

Now lots of young people want to buy memberships for Dave. Some cannot afford 10 dollars. They are asking if they can put in one or two dollars, as much as they have, and pay more as they get it.

My wife said to me “what other white person would have went to jail with us?”

I saw one of the chiefs from north of Meadow Lake the other day. He gave me forty dollars. He told me to give it to Dave to pay for a membership for him and his family. He is a long time chief, very well liked. He told me “we’re going to send a white guy to Ottawa this time. He knows our issues, he’s a strong voice and he is a fighter.” Several of his councillors bought memberships too. “We like that white boy,” one told me.

On that chief’s reserve they remember that Dave came up over 10 years ago to warn them about the plan to bury American nuclear waste in our territory. Dave came and spoke in their band hall that time. That plan was stopped. And they want to take memberships to help him now.

The other day I heard people saying that some big people in the Liberal party are going to try to stop Dave, that they are going to appoint an NDP woman who I never heard of over top of Dave. We were in a restaurant in Meadow Lake. I said Dion is not stupid. One other guy said, Dion appointed his friend in Montreal and he lost. If they do this and they hurt Dave I won’t bother with the Liberals anymore. I will go with the NDP. And my family too. I think the chiefs will have something to say
about this too. And that is without even talking about democracy.

If the NDP woman wants to run she should sell memberships just like everybody else.

The people bought memberships because we believe in Dave. If they block him I think we will organize for a refund of our money.

But right now, this just makes me want to go out and sell memberships for Dave. Lots of people want to buy them now. We sold 11 memberships this afternoon.

Joseph D. Iron
Dianne Iron

Ignatieff to Fight McGuinty?

WOW!!!

It never ceases to amaze me how writers at national newspapers continue to underestimate STEPHANE DION. In this article, Ian Urquhart of The (sun, the moon and the)Star goes above and beyond the realm of fiction.

In real time news today, Dion is set to take on his new job as Prime Minister.

Baird Needs his Head Read?

COMPLIMENTS OF OUR FRIENDS AT THE STAR


Does Baird know what he's saying?

The Toronto Star
Tue 18 Dec 2007
Page: AA08
Section: Opinion
Byline: Mark Abley
Source: Special to The Star

Poor John Baird. I know it's getting close to Christmas, when we should all show charity, but perhaps the federal environment minister needs to spend the festive season in a secure psychiatric institution.

I say this because of the radical disconnect between what Baird appears to see and what the rest of the world sees. That kind of disconnect gives psychiatrists a major part of their income.

The minister spent last week in Bali, at the United Nations conference on climate change. Business leaders, diplomats, environmentalists and politicians all knew where Canada stood. Along with Russia and Japan, we lined up behind the U.S. in opposing binding commitments on greenhouse gas emissions for developed nations.

The Americans at least had the lucidity to grasp their own position. Baird, however, seems to believe in calling a spade an important agricultural breakthrough.

Last Thursday, when he addressed the gathering, he declared that "Canada is committed to developing a new international framework, driven by the science." "Let me be clear," he said. "Canada is determined to honour our commitments."

Poor man. Just like someone watching the traffic inch toward the Gardiner and muttering that the zebras are moving at high speed, he uttered words that are wildly at odds with reality. Under the Conservatives, Canada has no intention of honouring the commitment it made when it ratified the Kyoto Protocol in 2002.

The power and pace of climate change are now beyond debate. For Baird to claim that science was shaping Canada's position is on a moral and intellectual par with Japanese whalers announcing that their work is motivated by compassion for humpbacks.

If science were really driving the framework (Baird's incoherent metaphor, not mine), then the 2007 assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change would have provided a basis for the final accord. That report made the need for prompt action blindingly clear. But in Bali, the European Union's attempt to establish binding targets for emissions was shot down.

And, in fact, the IPCC report may already be outdated. It predicted that Arctic sea ice would probably vanish by the summers of the late 21st century. A newer report, from scientists at the Naval Postgraduate School in the U.S., suggested this may occur as early as 2013.

While Baird was blathering on ("Canada is committed to the United Nations process and these discussions"), his delegation was fighting hard to keep verifiable targets for developed nations out of the Bali agreement. We won the battle, even if we helped ruin our children's lives.

Emilie Moorhouse, of the Sierra Club of Canada, was in Bali last week. Describing this country's stance in her blog, she used the following adjectives: "extreme ... undiplomatic ... absurd ... disruptive ... ridiculous . .. shameful ... embarrassing."

"Canada is committed to action," said Baird. True, if stalling and polluting can be defined as action.

Or perhaps Baird meant that Canada is committed to sabotage. That was the verdict of Hans Verolme, global climate-change director of the World Wide Fund for Nature. "The U.S. government," Verolme stated, "aided by a small group of nations including Canada and Japan, has ... thrown up several roadblocks in the negotiations."

Of course, it's also possible that Baird isn't mentally ill at all. It's possible the minister was lying through his teeth. But that wouldn't be a charitable thing to say at Christmastime, would it?

Montreal journalist and author Mark Abley appears fortnightly.

markabley @ sympatico.ca

The Next Niagara Falls MP

Joyce Morocco takes a moment with Stephane Dion and Rev. Marya Buckingham at a breakfast in Niagara Falls.

Joyce Morocco has been selected as the candidate here in Niagara Falls to take on Conswervative Justice Minister Rob Nicholson in the next federal election. Joyce has been a constant community activist for many charitable organizations and, recently, oversaw the building of the new ambulatory care centre at Greater Niagara General Hospital as chair of the GNGH Foundation.

A past city councillor, Joyce is more than ready, willing and able to take on Mr. Nicholson and return Niagara Falls to its favourite Ottawa colour - RED.

Harper Toast in the New Year

Another short session in the House has come to an end. So too has the second year of this Stale Conservative government's mandate. The New Year will spell the end of Harper and his cronies and their lack of governing ability.

It's quite clear that Stevie Harpo has lost his sense of control over all things political. The Mulroney debacle is making life very different for his right honourable dictatorness. And if any of you think this Schreibergate thing isn't going to affect the Conservative Party and that Canadians are tuning out, you'd be sadly mistaken.

Not to mention the fact that this government has done nothing in two years of their mandate to address global warming. Mr. Baird et.al have embarrassed this country beyond belief this week. When has Canada ever been referred to a "minion of the US" in the past?

The end of the month will also mark the beginning of the Liberal climb in the polls.
You see Mr. Harper has to call a by-election (or two, or three, or four) for Toronto Centre. I can assure you Mr. Rae is quite ready to take his spot in the House.

I can also tell you, my friends that the Liberal Party will make up for all that shitty press they received in the Outremont debacle by soundly crushing the NDP and the CONS in Toronto Centre and Willowdale. Harper's only chance to stay in front in the polls would be to have these by-elections occur as part of a general election. If he can't achieve that, the Liberals ride sweet, huge victories into a general election.

And, of course, the Mulroney fiasco will be perpetuated as the public inquiry will be spelled out in January. The Liberals will be blessed with an election win right in the middle of that inquiry a la the same strategy as the Conswervatives used during the ADSCAM/Gomery farce. All the links will be established by then between the current government and the Mulroney government. McKay, Bernier, Nicholson to name three.

Anywho, we here in the Liberal Party have some good reasons to ring in the new year in a loud and celebratory fashion.

CHEERS!

I Couldn't Agree More

Below is an article that appeared in the Owen Sound
Sun Times.

Tories leading us to climate disaster
Posted 1 day ago

Prime Minister Stephen Harper calls the tune. His ministers dance. His
back-bench MPs? It's hard to imagine them having much say about anything, at
any time.

But perhaps the current Conservative caucus - including Bruce-Grey-Owen
Sound MP Larry Miller - will begin to speak with a louder voice, now that
their jobs are all at risk.

For that is precisely the case. The Harper government's intransigence at the
UN climate-change conference in Bali this week is striking. It puts the
Conservatives on a collision course with Canadian public opinion, on the
most important issue of our time. It hands the opposition parties a lever
that, if handled skillfully, could topple this government.

Here's what's happening in Bali, in a nutshell. European nations are
pressing hard for a commitment to binding, greenhouse-gas emissions cuts of
between 25 and 40 per cent by 2020. Canada, the United States and Japan are
resisting that effort. Canada used to bill itself internationally as an
environmental do-gooder. No longer. Nowadays, we wear the black hats.

Why are we playing this role? Harper's environment minister, John Baird,
says it makes no sense for anyone to cut emissions until the world's biggest
economies - the United States, China, India, to name three - do so as well.
Harper and company want a binding global climate-change deal, they claim,
but one that's fair.

This doesn't hold up, for this reason: The Tory government is doing little
or nothing, within our own borders, to combat climate change. This country
could be leaping ahead, technologically. Instead, we're taking baby steps
for the cameras. A bit of money here, a bit of money there, a photo op, a
speech. But major, concrete action? No.

There is no federal consumer carbon tax to make it more expensive for
urbanites to buy those big, gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles. There is no
ambitious federal plan to induce consumers to hybridize their vehicles.

There is no project to build large, industrial wind farms on the Great Lakes
(as the British, for example, are doing now off their coasts).

There is no plan to build a fast, modern train for the Montreal-to-Windsor
corridor, a train that could be designed to carry the massive numbers of
transport containers now being hauled by trucks.

There is no great national project to build a series of newer, more
effective nuclear power plants.

In short, there is no leadership in Canada on this file. Therefore, we have
no moral or political authority to preach solutions to anyone, anywhere.
We're among the wealthiest people on earth, in relative terms, and we're not
taking climate change seriously. Why should the Indians and the Chinese do
so, when they're still struggling to pull hundreds of millions of people out
of poverty?

Here's what might achieve results: Canada, the United States, Europe, Japan,
Australia, acting in concert, agree to slash emissions by 40 per cent by
2020. We then exert moral, and economic pressure on the Chinese and the
Indians to do the same. As a sweetener we offer them access to our own
mass-produced, efficient, clean-energy technology - cars, generating
stations, wind turbines. Yes, that might work. But thanks to Stephen Harper
and his government, it looks as though we're not about to find out. So far,
Canada's obstructionist role at Bali has been critical: We've provided
political cover for the United States to continue to resist any global move
forward. The Chinese and the Indians will in turn, use that to justify their
own stands. And around we go. Without strong pressure from government,
industry has little incentive to mass-produce Green power. So we will
continue to stumble toward disaster - not for ourselves, so much as for our
children and grandchildren.

John Baird's performance at Bali has been worse than shameful. Every single
Conservative Member of Parliament should be made to answer for it.

Bloggers are Citizen Reporters

Well, we have certainly come a long way. The Niagara Falls Review writes a front page story today on Citizen Reporters and how the public and media perceive their presence.

I'll Get By With a Little Help From My Friends

Gonna try with a little help from my friends.

With a little help from my friends.

With a little help from my friends.


Thank you to the hundreds of you that have dropped me a line today. It was all of you that have kept this calm and cool for me.

UPDATE: And this friend too.

Remembering the Pearl

FDR's Speech

To the Congress of the United States:


Yesterday, Dec. 7, 1941 - a date which will live in infamy - the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.

The United States was at peace with that nation and, at the solicitation of Japan, was still in conversation with the government and its emperor looking toward the maintenance of peace in the Pacific.

Indeed, one hour after Japanese air squadrons had commenced bombing in Oahu, the Japanese ambassador to the United States and his colleagues delivered to the Secretary of State a formal reply to a recent American message. While this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations, it contained no threat or hint of war or armed attack.

It will be recorded that the distance of Hawaii from Japan makes it obvious that the attack was deliberately planned many days or even weeks ago. During the intervening time, the Japanese government has deliberately sought to deceive the United States by false statements and expressions of hope for continued peace.

The attack yesterday on the Hawaiian islands has caused severe damage to American naval and military forces. Very many American lives have been lost. In addition, American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and Honolulu.

Yesterday, the Japanese government also launched an attack against Malaya.

Last night, Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong.

Last night, Japanese forces attacked Guam.

Last night, Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands.

Last night, the Japanese attacked Wake Island.

This morning, the Japanese attacked Midway Island.

Japan has, therefore, undertaken a surprise offensive extending throughout the Pacific area. The facts of yesterday speak for themselves. The people of the United States have already formed their opinions and well understand the implications to the very life and safety of our nation.

As commander in chief of the Army and Navy, I have directed that all measures be taken for our defense.

Always will we remember the character of the onslaught against us.

No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.

I believe I interpret the will of the Congress and of the people when I assert that we will not only defend ourselves to the uttermost, but will make very certain that this form of treachery shall never endanger us again.

Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory and our interests are in grave danger.

With confidence in our armed forces - with the unbounding determination of our people - we will gain the inevitable triumph - so help us God.

I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, Dec. 7, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese empire.

Peter MacKay, LLPOF

Minister Peter MacKay stood up in the House of Commons yesterday and stated, " I was all but 21 or 22 years old when I took that job in Germany." Then, in a Clintonesque move, declared "I had never met that man in person" (referring to Karlheinz Schreiber).

Above is a picture of Karlheinz with Petey's dad and Brian Mulroney. So how did Petey get that job in Germany?

UPDATE: Peter MacKay, in fact, says he was all but 26 or 27. The actual hansard notes are contained in the comment section below.