Rue

I would advise you if you really want to get the scoop on what is going on in Israel try read Ha'aretz or the Jerusalem Post which you can get on the inter-net in English. All the CBC does is rely on second hand reporting now that it is has cut its news reporting to shreds. All of its stories are recycled wire service stories or abbreviated from American or British news sources and so are not the most accurate and reflect an anti-Israel bias. If I am going to read news stories about Israel, I prefer the Israeli media because they are tough on the government but get their info first hand. That said I think your comments are a tad over the top. The "scandals' in Israel are no different then in any other Western nation. I think when it happens in Israel, some people feel that Israel will fall apart or somehow this makes Israel evil because it is part of the double standard that if Israel does something wrong, somehow that has mroe significance. I believe it could be tied to a genuine desire of some people to see Israel fail and so the need to jump on Israel when they think it shows its warts. In regards to Mr. Olmert, in fact an Israeli investigative reporter Yoav Yitzhak just this Wednesday made the allegation that a business man Avi Naor, paid Olmert's wife, (Aliza) money but she did nothing in return for that money. The scandal seems to flow from Mrs. Olmert's functions and status in Mr. Naor's company. The allegations say she either got paid to do nothing, or was paid too much for too little. In response to these allegations from the reporter, a spokesperson from the Prime Minister's Office responded to the Jerusalem Post newspaper and referred to the allegations as a "disgusting lie" as would be expected. The spokesperson claims Mrs. Olmert in fact worked full time on a project and received a salary in accordance with her work. So the contraversy flows from the payments to Mrs. Olmert and whether she did something for them, The reporter says she was paid in 11 monthly installments during a time period when Mr. Olmert would have been the deputy prime minister, minister of industry and commerce, minister of employment, head of the Israel Lands Authority and/or Minister of Communications. Mr. Olmert prior to becoming Prime Minister had his hands on a lot of things because he was a non flashy, hard working, go to guy, content to be the power behind the power. The stroke of Mr. Sharon, prematurely pushed him to the limelight. The reporter is claiming Naor was financially dependent on government work. But before you immediately assume Mr. Naor is an evil corupt businessman it is more complicated then that. He has been very active in starting and raising funds for charities. He started a charity for victims of car accidents. He also started a project that looks after children suffering from poverty. It seems former PM Sharon (also who had his own problems with shady deals with his son) and Olmert worked with Naor on this children's charity and in particular raising money for it. The charity collapsed when funding the government said it would provide did not go through. It now appears Mrs. Olmert was working on this charity project - so the question is why? Was she simply getting kick-backs, or was she genuinely involved in the charity. It certainly is not good optics to have your wife working and being paid by a charity when the government you are part of us is funding that charity. Kind of stupid and arrogant if you ask me. Mrs. Olmert's former boss in the charity was quoted in the article as describing her function as being asked to study all the childrens' programs in Israel and abroad helping impoverished children to get ideas to use. Y The reporter of course has asked for samples of Mrs. Olmert's work but Mrs. Olmert won't give any. There is also another issue that has come up that Mr. Olmert gave preferential treatment to a colleague of his who gave him an expensive pen as a gift. Now you must understand mud slinging, name calling and accusations of coruption are very common in Israel because the country is tiny and everyone's business is so related to everyone else's. Israel's economic market is very tight knit and by nature heavily inter-connected. What we consider conflict of interests or appearance of conflict of interests in Canadian standards are not necessarily considered as such in Israel. They tend to tolerate a lot more of it simply because the economy is so tight and small and doesn't afford as many opportunities and competition as in Canada. None-the-less, the Israeli press is the toughest in the world and they go after their politicians with little fear. I think what is happening in Mr. Olmert's case is he has many enemies and his enemies and the press are sensing his weakness. He just made a desperate move to bring into his cabinet a right wink Russian Jewish hawk, to keep the Russian Jewish community happy. The Russian Jewish community tends to be very hard line. On the other side of his coalition it now appears Shimon Peres is posed to take over the ceremonial post of President of Israel taking away his major power source of moderation. The Israeli Labour Party seems to have major problems, and Mr. Olmert's party seems to be crumbling meaning aq coalition of right wing parties could very well resurface again to take the next election. Mr. Netanyanhu, the former Likud PM and a good friend of Ronald Reagan and Republicans could make a come-back. As all this dirt is unfolding, which is par for the course in Israel, the real story, is Hamas' struggle with the PLO to see who will run the security forces of Palestine. Israel is preoccupied with this issue because if Hamas is able to wrestle control from the PLO it means in effect Israel is back fighting an open war with Hamas who consider themselves at active war whereas the PLO with the exception of its Al Asqa Martyr Brigade and Al Fatah, do not consider themselves in active war with Israel. The appointment of a right wing hawk to be in charge of strategy as to how to handle Iran is a joke. Its meaningless. Strategy as to anything in regards to state security and external threats is and has always been created and defined by the Israeli military and the politicians merely mouth off and pretend they came up with the ideas but they don't-its the military who advise them.

By any chance you have any videos of Hamas and Al Fatah shooting demonstrators as well?

I appreciate Besty's honesty in her response. Look I do not doubt I have a male bias in my response, but I think its dangerous to equate bafoon behaviour in the house of commons with far more serious issues. All it does is take away from the serious of certain issues and lump them in with trivial issues. In regards to the McKay incident, we know what he said. He said "you have her" in response to Mr. McGuinty commencing the stupidity by making a reference to McKay's dog. It is the utmost in hoppocracy for McGuinty to turn this into what it has become. He is equally as stupid. Technically all McKay said was "you have her" he did not say she was a dog and the inference has come from McGuinty, Layton and anyone else who wants to act all outraged and self-righteous. If he had said you already her, the dog... he would then have to apologize. But at no time did he say she was a dog and the rest is being inferred and in a world of free speech inference and actually saying something is what turns things into trivial pursuit. To try make politics of this comment is patronizing and suggests women are so weak and thin skinned that such a comment turns them into quivering wrecks. Seeing all the Liberal women line up turned them into trivial charactatures of themselves and their gender. To top it off, watching all the male members of parliament such as Saint Jack of Layton trot out their usual self-righteous b.s. is a joke. It fools no one. Give it a rest on the issue. The average Canadian is not that stupid that they can be manipulated and if you want to try make browny points from it youd own play the seriousness of real issues. Now in regards to the world wide trade in women and children as sex slaves or domestic violence or abuse, lets get real and deal with such substantive issues. As for Ms. Stronach and any other women who genuinely would have me believe they are weak and have fallen apart over this and feel traumatized, I have three words for you - get over it.

In answering this, it would be helpful to know if you understand the economic concept of 'public goods'?How would that be helpful??? Would it tell you what web search you must do and what to cut-and-paste for your response? Not if you know what a free market is. Have you ever heard of a security guard?Even high school level economics teaches the free market. Well I am glad you have now reduced policing to security guard work. I am sure police officers across the world appreciate your analogy. The one problem with you now wanting everything privatized is that in your dream world the market place would be determined by honest presumably market fearing humans who simply obey supply and demand and bid. There would be no cost cutting, no coruption, no conflicts of interest, no using of police forces or the justice system to influence people and gain power and the people building the roads, parks, you name it as you say, they would all be honest hard working people and do their best for us all and never cost cut to maximize profit and endanger lives. Yah I love it. Private police forces. Nothing to worry about there. Sorry, your notion that you can privatize police is just not practical and in reality governments tender road work and lots of other public work to the private sector already so in that sense you are being redundant. I know you want a private army, private medical care, private schools, private everything. Good luck.

Sure. Taxation is wrong because it is collected by force. The fact that nobody can freely opt out of taxes and opt out of the supposed "benefits" funded by taxation, makes it theft or burglary. If it was right, it would not have be expropriated with force. If everybody agreed with it, they would give it up willingly. Try this experiment: Send everybody a tax assessment that says: "Your fair share = X. Please remit X out of the goodness of your heart and socialist solidarity to your neighbor IF YOU WANT. If you do not remit X, you will forego all of the glorious benefits of imposed socialism." Any difference between the forced tax collection and the experimental collection proves that taxation does not represent the wishes of the tax-payer. The burden of proof (taxation is not theft) is on the taxman because he has been caught red-handed. What I would like to know is, in your ideal world when someone completely opts out, assuming he will now no longer use roads, share water supplies, schools, electricity anything at all, and will be completely and absolutely self-sufficient and use nothing but his own stuff all the time-how would you manage that in this day and age? I can see if you plan to live on a self-sufficient island and cut yourself off of all services from anyone else, but other then that, I don;t think your point is practical and therefore a realistic one. I think in this day and age the size of the planet and technology forces us whether we like it or not to have to share certain resources and if you think the planet is an unlimited place that can basically provide billions of people doing what-ever they want without sharing good luck.

Absolutely agree with your susinct analysis.

To start with I do not know what planet you come from, but on the planet earth the medical and scientific communities have long since come to the conclusion that one's sexual drive is genetically programmed and homo-sexuality is a natural built in mechanism in all life forms not just humans. You may wish to venture outside yoru comfort zone and read up on scientific studies where the brains of lesbians (don't worry they were dead) were examined and the structure of the brains, the coils were similiar to those of males and NOT females clearly proving that homo-sexuality is defined by chromosones, hormones, and a myriad of chemicals and physical biological mattre predisposed or pre-designed in the dna code. Here is the point. You are absolutely dead wrong when say there is no scientific evidence and all you have to do is read. That said environmental conditioning can shape sexual behaviour but it does not necessarily make it permanent. For example, men in prison will engage in homo-sexuality but it doesn't make them homo-sexuals. They revert back to hetero-sexuality the moment they can get their hands on a woman Likewise men who are molested as children don't magically turn gay. It doesn't work that way. There are again oodles of studies to show that children of gay parents don't turn gay because they have same sex parents. Despire your using coded Christian words of mercy and kindness to describe yourself, for you equate homo-sexuality to alcoholism, violence, and/or crime are expressions of hatred based on your inability come come to terms with homo-sexuality. You will have to look inside yourself to figure that one out. What I can say to you is that vaving sex with someone of the same sex is not self-destructive, its not violent and in fact it is quite healthy if someone is genuinely gay and with another genuinely gay person and the medical community long since declassified being gay as a mental illness or a crime. Sexual acts between consenting adults and that is the key, between consenting adults are not right or wrong-they are a private matter of expression that those two adults and only those two adults can define their meaning and context not you. Sorry but for you to make blanket statements that homo-sexuality is akin to a substance abuse problem or criminal violence is hateful not just ignorant because you are now imposing negative motives to the minds of gay people and that is intellectually dishonest.

Yah the point is the old testament, new testament and Koran were all re-edited and re-written with many passages left on the editing floor and we will never ever know what was actually originally said.

And who says, exactly, that all sexual acts must ultimately culminate in reproduction? Better yet, who are you, or any Christian/Muslim/Whatever actually, to dictate what constitutes as "misconduct"? I engage in a number of sexual activtities (all heterosexual) many of which couldn't possibly result in reproduction. And I certainly don't consider that I am guilty of "misconduct" Lol. Wasn't that what Michael Jackson said in court?

Please on two accounts; 1-Harper is no more courting the Jewish vote then the Liberals have in the past-ethnic pandering is not the exclusive domain of one party 2-to stereotype all women as thinnking the same and actually giving 2 shyts about what McKay said is ridiculous-the Liberals tried to turn it into political points and it has not worked and Jack Layton as usual came across as a patronizing, self-righteous twat. Twat by the way is not meant to be disparaging. I just like the way it sounds to describe the noise that comes from Layton's mouth when he speaks.

"In the last 48-24 hours, Israel announced that it was considering bombing the Iranian nuclear installations - reported on the back pages. About a day later, Ahmadinejad announced that Israel has no right to exist - reported on the front pages." As usual Higgly you completely distort what was actually said. What Prime Minister Ehud Olmert actually said was and here is the actual quote; " Iran would have 'a price to pay' if it doesn't back down from its nuclear ambitions". It was the wire services who then added their editorial comments on their wire services the wording " hinting broadly that Israel might be forced to take action _ his strongest words yet ... " At no time did Olmert state Israel would bomb Iran. What Higgly has done is to quote an Associated Press wire story out of context which also took a comment Mr. Olmert stated, and added their spin to it not Mr. Olmert's. Shimon Peres immediately clarified Mr. Olmert's statement after it was made and it became apparent Associated Press was running with it and cranking up the heat, and made it clear Israel was not planning to bomb or attack Iran. And once we are on the topic, Iran made comments as to Israel prior to the last comment by Olmert which in turn did trigger off Iran's latest comments. Its an on-going series of tits for tats and the latest came about because Olmert was in Russia. Russia is acting as a middle man between Israel and Iran these days. The rhetoric that cames from the Iranian leader's mouth and what is actually being talked about between Israel and Iran is not making the press nor will it make the press. It doesn't sell. The name calling though does. The press likes to report short sound bites to an audience which now no longer listens more then 10 seconds. The reality is Israel has been talking to Iran through Russia for quite some time. As well if you knew anything about Israeli foreign policy you would know two things. First off, they do not make bellicose statements that they will attack or bomb a country. They have never given their enemies a heads up like that. It would be tactically stupid and only invite retaliation before anything was actually done. Israel is not a country that engages in threats of attack. If they attack they just do it. Please don't mix up some macho posturing with your need to turn it into a bomb threat. It was far from it. Secondly, it is not in Israel's interests to bomb Iran at this point. All that would do is mobilize fundamentalist Muslims. Israel right now is completely preoccupied with a civil war about to explode between the PLO and Hamas the last thing it wants is another front with Iran. It also in case you are interested has been involved in secret talks with Syria because the major preoccupation in the Middle East now is a Shiite Sunni civil war in many nations spilling out from Iraq and a major war between the PLO and Hamas which is technically a Sunni war but could be blown wide open by Shiite fundamentalist militants coming to Hamas' side which Syria, the PLO, Egypt and Jordan do not want. With due respect Higgly your analysis as to Israel's motives again reflects your own preconceived biases.

The Middle East is a red herring issue. Its complete b.s. and all these candidates are full of it on this topic. The real issues are the environment, the economy and acknowledgement of coruption and the wide spread lack of ethics during the Chretien years that the LIberal Party still has not come clean for. Igg is showing he is 100% first and foremost al prostitute on political issues and knows how to pander to his audience. He is doing what Liberals do, pander to audiences. He has pandered to the Quebec vote with his reference to changing the constitution to define Quebec as a society within a society. Its absolute meaningless drivel but Francophone Quebecers have bought into it hook, line and sinker and he's secured the Quebec vote and that will now take him over the top. The fact that he has sucked and blowed on the Middle East seems to have not meant anything to Liberals used to this kind of oral recreation from their leaders. Bob Rae can not be sold in Ontario, or out West. He has shown his past economic record in Ontario is just too big a cross to bare and defend against and no one in Ontario or out West will take him seriously. The fact that Chretien's camp was so desperate to support him speaks loudly for their lack of trust in Dion and their lack of comfort with Igg's superiority complex. Dion is perceived as a Trudeau type Liberal, another "anti-Quebec nationalist" Franco-phone and quite frankly Canada's been there and done that time and time again with the Liberals and no one is in the mood for another Canadian who doesn't speak English very well and is very brittle and arrogant and just can't come down from his ivory tower for average Canadians to indentify. Gerard Kennedy has shown he can not speak French and aside from some feel good buzz phrases isball hot air and no substance and does not have the intellectual capability of understanding the economy and should have stayed in provincial politics. It was between Rae , Ignatieff and Dion, but Iggy pulled out the old suck and blow with Quebec, showed he would go down on and perform oral sex on Quebec and that Quebec as a society was not hard for him to swallow if you excuse the pun. I think unfortunately Igg will now win. I just don't see people rallying around Rae because I think they now realize his NDP record is just too big to ignore. A betting man would have thought Dion would have gone over to Rae or vice versa but it is now clear Dion despises Rae as much as he does Igg and is a wild card and may just release his people to go there merry way if Rae's people don't go to him. I just don't see Rae's people going over to Dion. They are after all Liberals sensing they need an Anglophone to win. So at this point, I think prize clown Igg will win and if I were the Tories I could care less. Whether its Rae, Igg or even Dion, Harper can handle any of them. Dion in my opinion would give Harper the hardest time because of the environment, but would lose because of his poor English, lack of popularity in Quebec and out West and his lack of a common touch. Rae would get blown out of the water over his economic record. Igg will if annointed leader, self-destruct. At this point I see the Liberals in opposition with Rae and Igg and Dion sniping at each other, Igg will quit after 2 years, Rae will take over, lose another election and Harper will be around at least 8 years.

O.k. so am I to believe the National Science Academies of Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Russia the U.K. and the U.S. are all wrong? That seems like a lot of idiots... Am I also supposed to ignore the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as well? I mean these scientists and people like David Suzuki I am supposed to write off as quacks? Look all I know is there is a hole in the ozone layer bigger then the continent of North America over Ant-Arctica this year and the biggest ever and that there has been a 40% decrease in the ice thickness of the Arctic not to mention it is pretty obvious to all us non scientists that the weather patterns across the Globe have changed dramatically. As an avid amateur bird watcher I can tell you migratory patterns of birds are completely and absolutely f..cked up. But let us be specific. The Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change if I am not mistaken said in their third assessment report that the planet is expected to warm between 1.4 and 5.8 degrees centigrade between 1990 and 2100 and that over the last 100 years the temperature went up .6 degrees centigrade. Correct me if I am wrong but the debate is not on whether the globe is warming but whether we as humans are contributing to that warming and making it warm faster that it would otherwise. Sorry but I just can't stick my head in the sand and not believe industry and co2 emissions and sulphur dioxide and all the other toxic stuff we spew into the air or from burning fossel fuels is not adding to or exasperating the increase in temperature. It just sounds too much like someone telling me there is no link between cancer and smoking. It just doesn't seem to make common sense. All my limited pee brain knows from reading is that it would appear everyone does agree that the defininition of problematioc climate change is said to be an increase in the global average surface temperature of 2°C above the pre-industrial level. That doesn't seem too much to me. Again I admit I am a pee brain not a scientist but I read scientists say there needs to be stabilization of atmospheric GHG concentrations at 400 ppmv of CO2 equivalent to prevent the earth from warming too quickly and to guarantee thi means the world has to find some way to reduce global GHG emissions to somewhere between l30-50% below the 1990 level by 2050. I have also read industrialized countries will have to reduce emisions by 25-30% between 1990 and 2020 and by 85-90% between 1990 and 2050. Seems to me we are not only ignoring the above which is a daunting task, but now we have people saying, don't worry be happy. It just seems to me it is obvious between coal burning, cars, and indutrial pollution we have contributed to warming of the planet far more then would would have ordinarily happened and there is ample proof of that. Yet some of us just want to carry on ignoring all the obvious signs of nature like we do not have to do anything. Seems to me we have to find alternative fuel and energy sources, give tax rebates for emission decreasing products and for me again being a pee-head non scientist, I think lowering co2 emissions is part of the same struggle to find a way to stop polluting the air and the earth and its all inter-related not seperate. But I know. For some of you its no problem if we all just stop farting.

I think comparing Sadaam Hussein to Hitler is just not appropriate. If anything he is a miniture version of Joseph Stalin not Hitler. I think its symplistic to say that every mad-man who is a tyrant is like Hitler, and anyone who claims to be fighting for democracy is like Churchill. To start with Winston Churchill was a far more gifted statesman and intellect then Bush. What is clear about him was that like Bush, he was an alcoholic but unlike Bush he could function drunk and his memory for detail and his ability to understand nuances and flex with developments is far above anything Bush could ever dream of. To be blunt, George Bush is a misfit. His Master;s in Business from Yale was paid for. He spent his entire life before the Presidency in a drunken haze and a life of sheltered privilege. His governorship in Texas was a joke. It is one of those state's where the governor barely does anything, it was a figure head position much like when Pappy bought him a share of the Texas Rangers. Bush did not run a Navy and can not read and write as an insightful journalist like Churchill did. He has no knowledge of history like Churchill did. He does not understand the military as Churchill did. Churchill lived in an era of immediate danger. Bush lives in a guilded cage and danger is filtered from him. Churchill lived in a country where he could see the suffering of his people daily. Bush when confronted with a relatively basic crisis such as New Orleans hid, and when he did surface unlike Churchill, he had no ability to rally the people. So to compare Bush to Churchill is a joke. He is an intellectual pip-squeak and quite stupid. He is what America wants, a dumbed down leader. They do not like people like Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton because it requires they read and listen to what they say. Instead they prefer Reagan or Bush, people who speak at an idiot level with simple words and guffaw at their own stupidity. Bush is surrouned by weak, brittle, one demensional men such as Rumsfeld and Chaney whereas Churchill was surrounded by brilliant often colourful and eccentric characters and unlike Rumsfeld or Chaney well read ones at that. Sadam Hussein was a horrid man, and a miniture version of Stalin. Yes he committed genocide against Kurds, and ran his country like a good facist dictator, but his impact on the globe was far more limited then either Hitler's or Stalin's. If anything he is a modern day Mussolini, a bafoon. Unlike Mussolini who did encourage war crimes in Ethiopia, Hussein's genocide against Kurds and terror against his own people was probably worse. Let us not kid ourselves for one moment. Churchill's battle was a world battle and had he notbeen able to inspire the free world as he did, Hitler would have changed life as we all know it and take it for granted today. If Hussein had stayed in power, nothing would have changed for the free world. Bush did not go in on behalf of the world, he went in as a pathetic trained monkey for oil companies. Bush did not go in with a vision. He did not rally the people of Iraq to liberate themselves as Churchill did in Europe. He has no DeGaulle in Iraq to parachute back into the country to rebuild it like Churchill and Truman did in France. He has no Monroe doctrine to rebuild Iraq. Unlike Churchill, his war is not welcome and is superficial in nature and lacks any moral integrity. Bush is no Churchill. In the records of history he will simply be remembered as a simpleton who destroyed his country's economy with a colonial expedition that ended in failure.

The U.S. went into Vietnam in an era where they truly felt they were engaged in a war against communism v.s. democracy. The problem is they tried to use their under-classes to fight the war. They lost because it became a class war where the privileged stayed at home enjoying their inequality while the poor lost their lives not to mention also where blacks soon realized they had no beef with Viet Cong but had much in common with them as to how they were treated by white Americans. The U.S. lost the war because it had no vision and no moral ground from which to culminate its attempt to spread its alleged cultural and moral superiority. The Vietnam War was one of genuine cultural imperialism not oil. Ironically years after its ending, Coca Cola and Nike marched in turning Vietnam into another source of cheap labour and capitalism did win out. In Iraq, like in Vietnam, the Americans claim they were coming in to a savage country to help the heathens find democracy. Unlike Vietnam, Iraq has oil. Iraq is all about oil. The pretense of bringing democracy to heathen and/or fighting terrorism or making the world safer fools no one, not even Republicans. We all know it was and is always about oil and trying to protect oil pipelines. We all know brave American soldiers die because the oil conglamorates try to use them as security guards for the pipelines and has made them sitting ducks to be picked off one by one by terrorist attacks. Like Vietnam the U.S. has made the mistake of thinking it could use its conventional army as a political police force and political occupation force and like Vietnam, today's Iraqi terrorists merely up-date the Viet Cong tactics which are of course Mao Tse Tung's gift to the earth from his little Red Book. So like Vietnam, the conventional army is now caught in a civilian war of attrition it can't win. Like the Viet Cong they blend into the back-ground but unlike the Viet Cong some are mercanaries while others are religious fundamentalists but like the Viet Cong, they despise everything America stands for. The similiarity is that the U.S. went into a country it does not belong, tried to impose a government, and tried to act as if it was superior to the natives and could colonize them. It is simply an updated version of the Christian crusades, or the British in so many countries, or any colonial regime you care to mention. The Americans went in to get and protect oil and instead they have gotten caught in quick-sand and any idiot could have seen this would happen but America is all about ego and believing they are superior to non Christian savages. Nothing changes, Like any colonial power, the natives grow more and more restless, destroying the country, and they will end up with their illusion of freedom once they rid themselves of the Americans, until yet another corupt totalitarian regime takes over and no doubt engages in deals with the oil monkey men. Today's enemy is tomorrow's ally and so on. The only question remains how much will these "savages" want in bribes once the Americans have to pull out and like the Vietnamese communists who had no problem getting into bed with Coca Cola and Nike so will these alleged Muslim puritans get into bed with Exxon, Shell, etc., when the time comes. The more it changes, the less things change.

You did already. Try over 3,500 years of it in Europe against Jews manifested in thousands of massacres, pograms and culminating in the holocaust. You did it in North and South America and in Africa and Asia when you supposedly went to save the savages and then killed them all and seized their land or turned them into slaves. My but your memory is short.

Let me spell it out Figleaf. You made the odious comment you did because it was someone who felt Mr. Ignatieff's views as to Israel committing a war crime made it impossible for her to stay in the Liberal party. You deliberately chose that, because it was someone supporting Israel and then you being your usual passive aggressive know it all self, made the inference this person is not loyal to Canada not just the Liberal party. I read your veiled, coded remarks loud and clear. Back peddle all you want but you are simply a coward to me in how you select your snide remarks for anyone who you feel is sympathetic to the State of Israel.

Well Figleaf if you feel your strong sympathy of Palestinian terrorists and anything anti-Israel clouds your judgement that much, then by all means, stop supporting the NDP. Are you drunk again? Sounds like the pot calling the kettle black, there, Rue. Could you blow any harder? I didn't initiate the comment you did Figleaf. I am only calling you on it because you seem to be full of these self righteous judgements as to others motives and beliefs as if you have a monopoly on truth. Your comments were subjective, and deliberately odious. I do not find them amusing. People have the right to their beliefs and if you want to smear them because they don't conform to yours, I will blast you for being a hippocrate. It aint blowing its throwing the excrement back where its thrown from and that is what it is. People have the democratic right to not agree with politicians. It doesn't make them disloyal to Canada because they have specific views that you don't agree with.

Pouring more troops in is a fool's game and of course is not the solution nor do you parachute in troops. You are missing the point. First of all the Canadian army was neglected for years and does not have the manpower or logistics ability. More to the point, no Canadian troops however well trained would be able to deal with the mountain range you are talking about and necessarily could not mount an effective campaign against people who know these mountain ranges like the back of their hand. Fighting taliban in the mountains is a fool's game and suicide. Parachute regiments are not what you need. Parachute regiments are antiquated. That is what was used in world war two or Korea. Parachute regiments are used in conventional wars. The future is in small elite commando units of no more then 20 or so commandoes. It is also not physically possible to seal the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan and there is a reason no army in the world has ever been able to win a war in Afghanistan. Ignoring this is insane.

Well Figleaf if you feel your strong sympathy of Palestinian terrorists and anything anti-Israel clouds your judgement that much, then by all means, stop supporting the NDP. Your self-righteousness and puffed sense of self-importance and need to wag your finger at others never ceases to amaze me. Problem is every time you wag it, it seems to get stuck up your ass with blatant hippocracy for the very thing you think you are citicizing but merely exposing in your own arguement. Um uh try figure that out.

And where is the story that says these people were asked to leave the strip mall because of their skin color. What if the owners wanted stores selling Korean goods only? I believe you have stated it quite nicely. This was never about skin colour. If the store owner was selling things that catered to Koreans no one would give a hoot what colour his skin was. This is business and anticipating trends and who the market or audience is and catering to them is what it is all about. In Spadina in Toronto the area used to be Jewish. Then it became Chinese. Then Vietnamese came and so on. Does this mean its racist because populations come and go and neighbourhoods change and business people want to cater to the prevalent majority at any given time? Of course not. Businesses change as populations change. I think it comes through loud in clear that someone is trying to hide behind a b.s. arguement about racism to try codify or disguise or hide his own resentment to immigrants in general and Koreans more specifically. What you gonna do next... burn some crosses outside this mall to protect the white race? Give it a rest. If you think this is the pretense you need tomake it respectable spread resentment towards Koreans or immigrants get real. Whether you hide behind a pointed hood or codified references to immigrants its transparent as hell. Y'all be sure to write back now next time some other coloured gets you hot under the collar. Yeehaw.

This passage is a classic example of a concept called "demonization" ..a process where we make it easier to stop listening to our opponents by engaging in words that depict them as violent and less then human. Both sides do it in response to the other. For me as a lawyer and a mediator all I will say is this-these same Warriors being depicted as lawless violent less then human beings are in fact humans and they are a direct reflection and consequence of the words and actions we choose to direct their way. It is as simple as this-spit and you will be spat upon, respect and you will be respected back. This only begins as it ends - when we put down the words as weapons and talk about what we can do not what we shouldn't do.

Bob Rae clearly has two strikes against him. One he ran a disasterous regime in Ontario proving he was incompetent. Two, he is an NDP'er who recently switched. He can not win an election. His record in Ontario will cause the Liberals to be unable to win the majority of seats in Ontario. He just has too much baggage and it shows how desperate the Liberals are if this is who they are going to turn to. So who does that leave. Ignatieff has shown everyone that he is a complete and utter idiot. He is thin skinned and unable to think on his feet. He comes from a controlled aniseptic environment where he was used to speaking without being confronted or questioned and did not have to think about what he was saying. His arrogance and belief that he is smarter then everyone has shown he is simply a light-weight full of hot air and full of academia but contains absolutely no common sense, basic communication and social skills or vision. I mean lety us get real he gives a speech about "dreamers'? What a pathetic superficial cardboard mannequin. So that leaves us with who? Dion is a brittle bureaucrat who can't speak English and is too quick to apologize for Chretien. He will never sell in Quebec or out West. Ken Dryden? No one listens to him. Gerard Kennedy? Talk about puff pastry or junk food. Talk about a light-weight who tries to get by with a deep voice and trying to pose like a Sears model. He is a joke. The entire list of candidates are a joke. Years of having Chretien put a strangle-hold on the party choked off any fresh blood and it will take a lot more infusion then this bunch to resurrect this party. At this point I believe the Liberals will make the mistake of turning to Rae sensing Ignatieff is a mistake and the other candidates just are not capable of leading. Rae will squeek in and Ignatieff will act like a spoiled brat and quit after one election. Rae will sit in opposition content with that job for 6 years and then eventually some new blood will come in. Rae will never be elected Prime Minister of Canada and I doubt he wants that. He has always preferred being in the Opposition and no one was more suprised then him when he got elected Premier. People like Bob Rae are great at opposing. Harper basically will easily win the next election with a majority. The LIberals will be reduced to a rump party like the NDP and Block.

After watching the debates yesterday I am now thoroughly convinced that; 1-Bob Rae is a burned out socialist has been 2-Iggy is an arrogant, stupid, moron 3-Stephane Dion can not speak English 4-Mr. Kennedy is no John F. Kennedy as much he tries 5-Ken Dryden needs to go on a diet 6-Scott Biron should move to the Keys or Provincetown and stop trying to act like a straight man 7-Joe Volpe belongs on the Sopranos or singing in a lounge in Atlantic City 8-at this point the Liberal Party is a joke from top to bottom. As a life time Liberal who gave up on the Liberals after the Chretien years of coruption I would vote for Harper any day even though I can't stand his finance minister or Treasury Board minister. I think Mr.l Flaherty is a facist pig but Harper has far more integrity and intelligence then any of these idiots. As for Ignatieff this man expects to lead the Liberal Party and he walks right into zingers from Rae like some sort of stunned twit? Bad enough he inserts his foot up his rectum continuously but then he thinks he can dance while doing it.

Well to start with your construct that you can simpluy lump people into religious and non religious categories probably reflects your intellectual neurotic tendency to need to define things in black and white. "Religious" people, is an interesting label. I take it you mean someone who follows an organized religious ideology. If that is what you mean please be careful in your simplistic differentiations. Many non-religious people are spiritual and many religious people are not spiritual. I would prefer to put it in less black and white terms and say this. People who follow organized religions do so because they seek comfort and certainty in what would otherwise be a world that seems threatening and without meaning. They turn to religion as a consequence of neurotic anxiety and needing meaning and structure in chaos. Organized religion provides comfort from conformity. For me, I do not like religion or to be specific organized religion because I find it sets out to control the individual and impose rules as to how to think and behave and conceptualize that which we do not really know. I believe all our organized religions, are necessarily political, necessarily create intolerance in the name of righteousness, and are imperfect and defective precisely because they are creations of humans, the only life form on the planet that kills for the sake of killing. I think many people like me are not "religious" because in fact we are spiritual and feel there is something beyond it all, and we find religion negates or bastardizes or rapes or molests or contaminates this feeling of innocence and awe with dogma. Thanks but I have never liked joining organizations to define who I am. Thanks but my thought processes and belief systems don't fit into black and white dogma, bibles, korans, holy books. I think like many, I share Marx's beliefs and I do not mean Karl Marx, but Groucho Marx who said, any club that would take me as a member ain't worth joining. That said I am a Habs fan and so M. Dancer speaks eloquently for me as well. Now we ex-Montrealer hab fans know Montreal is our Mecca because its the only place that knows how to make smoked meat, bagels, and steamies and toast hot dog buns properly. The Forum was a religious shrine. Its a shame they had to move. Interesting, in the most intense periods of the French v.s. English debate in Montreal, regardless of whether you were French or English, this evaporated once you walked inside the Forum and sat down. For the three periods of the game, everyone was plugged into the same values and beliefs. Sitting at a game in the Forum was magical and some would say a mystical or religious experience. There are some games in that Forum where truly we all shared for a brief moment a common belief...something no organized religion has been able to do for me.