i'm baaaack

Ok, let's get this ball rolling with a couple of links. First, I discovered Heather Mallick is now writing for cbc (don't be too amazed with my sleuthing abilities...if one obsessively googles her name for months on end, one is bound to get a hit). I'm glad I can get a dose of her every two weeks--I knew she wouldn't be silenced for long.

My second gift to bestow upon you is this documentary called "loose change". I have always been down with the conspiracy theories, and this one is QUITE intriguing. Make sure you have some time to spare as it is full-length.

What else has gotten me all hot and bothered over the last few weeks? Well how about stephen harper and his plans for the justice system. Privatization of prisons so we can have more of them? Increasing the number of crimes that have minimum sentences? (I can see it now--stephen and his cronies will shoo in legislative reform and then cry foul about the activist supreme court when the minimum sentences don't hold up at the SCC). And what about the quiet axe he took to the Kyoto program? I mean, I know we're going to extinct ourselves soon anyways, but I would like to try to delay it for as long as possible. In case you didn't notice, I used "extinct" as a verb. Fun.

Finally, what on earth country are we living in that when 4 soldiers are killed in a warzone our government refuses to lower flags to half-mast? In the u.s. the media is not allowed to publish photos of flag-laden coffins returning from iraq--how fucked up is that? Apparently the liberals under chretien and martin "broke with tradition" by lowering flags for soldiers while the liberals were in power and the new government is just returning to "tradition" by leaving our flag cracking smartly at the top of the pole. Tradition? At what point is an old tradition replaced with a new one? I hate that word anyway. When I was a kid "tradition" meant christmas and birthdays and video/pizza night and brothers day and sisters day (ok, the last 2 were unique to my corny family, but they were indeed traditions for a few years at least). Now "tradition" means discrimination against gay people who want to make a lifelong commitment to eachother, or old white, fat, shriveled men passing their power and money down to their sons. Anytime I hear that word "tradition" I know something will follow that will make me really angry. I say lower the god damn flags when Canadian soldiers are killed in war....if it gets too bloody we'll just leave them halfway raised or start buying flagpoles that are only half as high. At least that would be honest.