ScottSA

Nope, and the gun was black as far as I could tell. I only saw the barrel as it was pointed at my head. So what you're implying is that black guns are dangerous!? How racist! I suppose a yellow or red gun would instill fear in you too, but a white gun is more yer kind huh? When will people learn to accept guns for what they are instead of according to the color of their barrels?

It's high time the Italians suffered a few pogroms.

What I call it is terrorism and while you say it is far from French Quebec, there is no hiding the fact that it has been rapidly increasing during the government conversation on reasonable accommodation. That's as ridiculous as pointing out that there's no hiding the fact that it's been happening during the warming of the weather in spring or the rising of gasoline prices. Totally irrelevant. I don't suppose that the bomb could be Muslim in origin? Naw, that's a religion of peace. Preposterous.

I agree.

Which country in Africa is democratic ? A few, depending upon how one defines "democracy" Which country in Africa is not suppressive ? Depends on the definition of "suppressive". Which country in Africa isn't a regime ? Countries are not regimes. Forms of government are regimes. In the case of autocracies or cult totalitarianism, the term 'regime' can be properly applied, but generally the term 'regime' refers to the philosophy or governance in a country; eg "democracy" or "communism".

Pardon me for pointing it out, but the devil is in the details, and you're just ignoring the details. Your answer to the prospect of an opposition PM and a majority party is "probably won't happen"? That's not good enough when we're talking about scrapping an entire system of democracy and installing another. The idea that consensus works better than oppositional politics may play well in feminist healing circles, but it hasn't proven to be a thrillingly workable solution in governments like the Weimar republic or the EU.

"Global Warming" has been changed to "Climate Change" to better accomodate the colder winters, frostbitten Global Warming activists and expanding polar caps. Get with the program.

It's not at all clear to me what the controversy is about. Harper disallows lobbyists in the war room and this is a bad thing? How, exactly?

Language ought to be taken out of the hands of illiterate comma misplacers.

To a simple mind, that is true. You have a simple mind, ergo what you say is true for you. Now go play in traffic. Myata: the standard is fairly straightforward: intentional attacks on civilians is terrorism. Attacks on military targets is not. If military targets hide among civilians (your mixed bus analogy), they are breaking intl law in doing so, AND they are still legitimate targets. Don't blame me, blame the GC. The GC, in aid of common sense, doesn't outlaw the killing of civilians, it simply outlaws the intent to target only civilians, and demands that the combatants use as much care as is practical to avoid civilian casualties. That doesn't mean that all combatants caught blowing up military targets are simply enemy combatants and deserving of POW status if they get caught, but that's another point altogether.

The US is on every continent in the world, mostly at the invitation of the host country. It's not a big plot by the Bushistas. What IS a big plot, and an active war, is Muslim terrorism. You can deny that to your heart's content, but it is there, and it is being fought by both sides. Denying that the War on Muslim extremism exists is rather like denying that the cold war took place.

Why is there always a tendency to drift toward censorship in forums? First it's the rather subjective topic of 'flaming' (which can be quite entertaining in the hands of a master like Morris), then it moves on to curbing the various heresies of the current intellectual western world like "racism" and "bigotry" and the other ridiculous preoccupations of right-think. Finally the scales tip in favor of one philosophy and the process of incremental censorship ends up producing a choreograph of same-think posts by a certain cadre of posters while everyone else wanders away. I have no particular issues with the truthers. It keeps kids off the street in the same way that it kept Trekkies out of trouble a generation ago. Searching for bogeymen is a fairly harmless pursuit, as harmful occupational choices go with youth these days, and if nothing else their ideation is a demonstration of just about every know fallacy out there http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ . It also serves, ironicallly, to demonstrate the truth of Goebbel's "big lie": if you make the lie big enough and ridiculous enough, people will start to believe it. In any event, I prefer to believe that than to believe that mass hysteria, or worse, insanity, has grabbed western society by the throat. I dunno, I co-admin a forum http://24.69.78.93/forum/index.php with one rule only: there are no rules beyond the obvious no spamming rules. People can flame and use pottymouth to their heart's content, and things seem to work quite well. My co-admin has even gone completely off the wall and become a truther himself, but I just ignore the threads, or if I'm feeling ornery I pop in for a bit of flaming and then pop out. My co-admin was considerate enough to create a forum dedicated to conspiracy theories, so that cuts down on the nonsense a bit, but my experience with conspiracy minded crackpots is that to them everything becomes a conspiracy and reality is absorbed into an alternate reality where nothing is what it seems and the wooscary puppetmasters control our minds. But it seems to me that. as with everything else, the best antidote is simply to ignore an idea or to put it to the test of debate. Censoring an idea obviously leads to it gaining more currency

Right. Joining WW II brought us nothing but trouble too. WW I too for that matter. All those casualties we didn't have to have...my goodness, why don't we just close our eyes and pretend the rest of the world doesn't exist?

Holy incomprehensibly-strange-double-standard, SAman! Many things are incomprehensible to you, as evidenced by every word you've written for the last month, but I'm surprised that this is. You should think a bit before you type.

Not if nutcases keep flogging it whilst strenuously ignoring reality.

Suspected, so that could lead to people who may not be terrorists being sent to Gitmo with no legal rights. They are only presumed to be terrorists, and there have been cases when people who were not involved with terrorism got sent to Gitmo. At the very least America should be allowing these guys to have legal counsel, and should be treating them humanely. They have a pretty funny way of showing it. I'm not feeding the troll this time.

My dear chap, in case you haven't figured it out yet, 'running to mommy' as you call it, or reporting a post, as I call it is: 1) The required substitute for responding in kind on this forum. When you insult another poster, my first inclination is to belittle you and call you names that would so shrivel you that you'd fall in obsessive slave-love with me. But thankfully, the forum rules demand that I not indulge that impulse. Instead, I sublimate it by reporting you. 2) A coup counted Score on you by me !huzzah!, each time your arguments fail you so badly. Now, as for the rest of your post, should I take that as pleading for mercy? Here's a hint for your future endeavors in the world of adulthood: Try to avoid loudly declaring victory in a debate. This is especially true after having been soundly mocked in a most comprehensive and humiliating manner. It almost never looks good to the others you might want to hide behind in the future. Don't spend time attempting to keep others from falling in slave love with you. The danger is probably not as clear and present as you think. Worry instead about curbing your tattling to attacks that are actually directed against you, instead of leaping uninvited into conversations between other people with a perky "reported!", followed by the declaration that other people made you do it. Even if it were true, it just makes you look even more spineless.

If we all admit that Beelzebub emerged from the earth, hooked up with the Cathars, the Knights templar and any number of nasty plotters, will you stop monopolizing every single thread with this infantile horsecrap?

Right. It's a new way of packing that the the Hill has discovered: paste everything to the outside of the moving boxes, leaving plenty of room inside for documents to breathe, and minimising the thickness of cardboard necessary for box construction. A little dicey in windstorms sometimes, but much more efficient because...well...just because. It's the result of a $1.5 million NDP study on how to save forests by cutting back on cardboard and save the environment by cutting back on the number of horse hooves attached to flatulent horse bottoms and consequent green house gas emmissions.

Ah, the old appeal to group strength. Yes, that's my problem ... Won't stand up for myself. A real shrinking violet, that's me. If I were referring to you, and under no circumstances might I may not be, I would point out that there is a difference between standing up for oneself and running to mommy. In the context of a BB, standing up for oneself means absorbing a bit of punishment because...well, just because that's the nature of a BB, and indeed of life. Besides, a little well written flaming can be funny, and really, who cares, right? Conversely, running to mommy and pretending to do so because everyone wants you to is lame in the extreme and indicative of utter pathetic weakness of personality. I use the term "you" generically of course, because this observation certainly might not be personally directed at "you" in a more direct sense. That would be mean and I'm sure mommy would be alerted post haste.

Bingo. The penny has dropped. Could it be that Steyn is suggesting that immigration be limited? If you had actually read the book before barging into the discussion, you'd know that's precisely what he is trying to do.

No. You should understand the difference between defending someones right to free speech and defending what they are saying. I am a huge advocate of free speech...indeed I am filing a court challenge on a file next week to defend a client's Charter right to freedom of expression. I read the "petition" as a plea to defend what Rosie is saying, not to defend the right to free speech. Otherwise, why would the author of the petition list all of the content that purports to be proof of the fact that WTC 7 was intentionally brought down? I will not lend my support to such a petition. See, the problem with your logic is that Rosie has already spoken...sure, there may be backlash and consequences for her but that is different from violating her right to speak. No matter which way you slice it, saying things that are controversial will bring you hardship to some extent. Having freedom to say those controversial things is a double-edged sword. If Rosie is truly fighting the good fight here, things will go her way...just ask the Dixie Chicks. Regardless of the side anyone takes here, you have failed to convince me that the right to free speech is at risk here. FTA Well put. No one is denying her right to squack stupidity. If she wants to sink her career because of public or job-related backlash, I'm all for it. If she were being prosecuted by the forces of law and order, that would be a different thing, but all this petition is trying to do is shout down the so-called "talking heads" who are, after all, merely exercizing their own freedom of speech in calling for her head. If she is fired for squacking stupidity, that has nothing to do with her freedom to squack, it has to do with the fact that her bosses don't want to be associated with her stupid squacking.

Not quite following... If french did it during their revolutionary war x hundred years ago, how does it give it any legitimacy now? There is a difference between attacking military forces and attacking civilians. It's the true legal difference between "insurgents" and "terrorists".

Forgive me if I don't bother asking what the point of this question is. Are you alright or are you running a fever?

What a dream job I must have...being paid to call polly's theories stupid. I just wish the cheque would get here...