In Honour Of Saint Paddy's Day - Danny Boy Video

Incidentally, this is even funnier if you're drunk on green beer. Enjoy, I'll be celebratin' me O'Malley heritage tomorrow dontcha know :-)

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Time For Ontario To End Funding To Faith Based Schools

Stephen Harper and the federal Conservatives are using the economic crisis as cover for such policies as eliminating pay equity and removing government oversight into foreign takeovers of Canadian business. By wrapping these initiatives into the budget, and with the Liberals continuing to roll over and play dead, Harper is back to governing as though he had a majority.

While there's a strong argument to be made that Harper doesn't have a mandate for such initiatives, Dalton McGuinty's Ontario Liberals would have no such concern over eliminating funding for faith based schools. In the December 2007 provincial election the Liberals romped to a successive majority, largely because the Conservative platform included extending school funding beyond the currently funded Roman Catholic board.

Bill Davis was a popular Premier in Ontario from 1971 to 1985, but one of his last legislative acts before retiring was to introduce full funding to Roman Catholic Separate Schools...an act which some believe caused an erosion in the PC's rural Ontario base. Both the Liberals and NDP however supported the motion, afraid of the potential political fallout from Roman Catholic voters...especially with so many baby boomers having children of school age at that time.

The result? If you're Roman Catholic and wish to have your children attend a publicly funded school which reflects your faith, you have that option. However no other faith group has that choice available, its either the public system...or you can pay extra on top of your taxes for a private religious school.

I will give John Tory, soon to be former leader of Ontario's PC party, credit. At least his position on this issue was fair. If you're going to provide public funding to one faith group you must provide it to others. The idea of providing public dollars to only one separate school board simply reeks of hypocrisy.

Premier McGuinty now has a golden opportunity to right this wrong, and to act on the wishes of Ontarians who voted loud and clear just over a year back on this issue. Will there be fallout? Certainly, some will be upset at being forced back into the public system...or at having to pay to have their children taught in a school that reflects their Roman Catholic faith. I suspect though that many will be happy to see a government that acts on integrity over political expediency. Additionally it would come with a cost savings to the province, at a time when the province's treasury is stretched to the limit.

To those who argue about the constitutionality of such a move, in this case the constitution is an anachronism. The British North America Act, upon which Bill Davis' decision was justified, was enacted in an effort to reflect Canada's makeup at the time of Confederation. If the courts were later to declare the elimination of funding as unconstitutional, McGuinty (or any later governing party) would need simply invoke the 'Notwithstanding Clause'.

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Want The Truth On Canada's Economy? Ignore Harper and The Conservatives...

If the Conservatives are looking for a campaign theme song during the next election, I would strongly suggest "Three Blind Mice". Stephen Harper bills himself and his party as Canada's best choice to lead the nation during these troubling economic times...with Jim "Mr. Magoo" Flaherty as Minister of Finance. Yeah right!!! Enron Jim went before a Senate Finance Committee recently and told the assembled that "nobody" saw this recession coming...and he did it with a straight face. It was almost as convincing a performance as when Stephen Harper said a Conservative government would "never, NEVER" tax Income Trusts.

I want to believe Stephen Harper when he says Canada's economy is going to rebound strongly, I really do. I want to believe our PM when he says that our financial sector is better insulated from the credit crunch than our American friends. About the only thing I know with certainty is what an effective spin master Stephen Harper has proven himself to be. Harper could see his government defeated at any time, which means he's already in election mode...telling people what they want to hear, at the expense of the truth.

Back in August, September and October leading economists were forecasting a recession. How did Canada's freshly elected government react? Our finance minister went before parliament in November with an Economic statement that didn't even belong on a cocktail napkin. Now he's telling Canadians that "nobody" saw this coming? And he expects us to believe him???

Stephen Harper is touring the country telling Canadians that the lending practices of our financial institutions will buffer us from the worst of the global crisis. In the meantime the Globe & Mail is reporting on Canada's Dirty Subprime Secret, which talks about "a burgeoning subprime mortgage problem that many, including Prime Minister Stephen Harper, have insisted does not exist in Canada". Federal Conservatives are touting their handling of the economy, at a time when our job loss numbers are proportionally higher this year than what's happened in the United States according to the Canadian Press: U.S. vs Canada: One's Economic Slide is Longer, The Other's Deeper.

About the only thing that is clear is that Canada is badly in need of effective and honest leadership. Sadly the Liberals appear content under Michael Ignatieff to allow Stephen and his gang to drive the Canadian economy off a cliff before acting. The next election could very well see Harper and Ignatieff fighting over control of a car that's had its engine gutted.

Canadians don't need politicians to solve all our problems, we can do a lot of that on our own. What we do need are elected officials who can see the forest for the trees, and who aren't afraid to paint an accurate picture...even if it is ugly. Its hard to make informed decisions based on spin and outright lies.

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Palestinians Following Zionist Playbook...

I've never blogged on the Israeli Palestinian conflict before, its not that I don't follow developments in one of the world's hottest conflict zones, its more a case of seeing neither side as having the moral high ground, far from it. Typically I find most commentators choose one side or the other, pointing to the wrongs of the group they oppose, while ignoring the atrocities of the side they support. About the best Op/Ed piece I've seen was written by the Toronto Sun's Lorrie Goldstein, its entitled: No Reason To Choose Sides

Goldstein touches on what many ignore, the history of the region. There is one thing he avoids however, and that is the tactics employed by Zionist groups in their effort to have the British relinquish control over Palestine so that the modern state of Israel could be created. There's no need to go back thousands of years to the Jewish Diaspora, something that took place intermittently over hundreds of years. Wars and conquests have led to the displacement of many peoples over the course of human history. If every ethnic group on this planet started fighting over ancestral homelands we'd have total global conflict 24/7.

Rather than going back hundreds or even thousands of years, we can look back just a few decades. Specifically to the events which led to Israeli statehood on May 14, 1948.

One Jewish terrorist group was Irgun, credited with carrying out the bombing of the King David Hotel in July of 1946. There was also the Deir Yassin Massacre which resulted in roughly one hundred Arab deaths (some accounts are higher), an atrocity accredited to Lehi and Irgun (also referred to as Etzel).

For those sufficiently motivated to do some research, there's plenty of historical information out there about this time period...after the end of WWII and leading up to May 14, 1948. Sadly what it typically comes down to is a case of justification. Machiavelli would have been right at home in the Middle East, because each side in this conflict believes their end justifies the terrorist means employed. While moderates on both sides decry the violence and bloodshed, hardliners in each camp view the use of terror tactics as justified in achieving what they believe to be the greater good. There are Palestinians who will not rest until Israel is totally defeated and wiped from the map, just as there are Israelis who refuse to recognize the legitimacy of a Palestinian state, those who continue to settle in the occupied territories.

The ultimate irony facing Israel is the use of terrorism by Palestinians in their efforts to establish a homeland. It was actions by Zionist terror groups such as Irgun and Lehi which led to the creation of the modern Jewish state in the first place. I don't see any resolution ever in this dispute. The extreme elements on both sides of the equation believe their actions have sanction from God almighty. Arabs believe they have Allah on their side, and Jews believe the land of Israel to be their God given birthright by virtue of them being a chosen people.

There are times when neither side in a conflict has moral superiority, which brings me to conclude the best reaction is the citing of a familiar bromide. A pox on both their houses.



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