By DemocracyRules
At last, a Prime Minister who will expand our microscopic military. “If you want to be taken seriously in the world, you need the capacity to act - it’s that simple,” said Prime Minister Harper.
American defense contractors, please line up on the right. Y'all come!
Pro Patria
By DemocracyRules
h/t National Post
The U.S. MSM does rotten things like this too.
Here's the scam. Last week the Canadian MSM reported about a new StatsCan study which said Canadians did no better financially between 1980 and 2005. "The poor stay poor and the rich get rich", eagerly proclaimed the CBC newsreader.
The trouble is, the MSM misread the report. It actually said that Canadian real incomes increased substantially in 25 years. Announce a retraction? Not on your life.
This week StatsCan released new data, and their press release made clear that last week's data meant income growth for Canadians from 1980 to 2005. Furthermore, more growth was recorded in 2006, and the poor benefited the most.
Predictably, the 'new' news wasn't reported, because it's good news for the poor -- especially single mothers. Ahh, life with the Communist MSM. Thankfully, we have one center-right newspaper that steers its own course, the National Post.
Without them and the bloggers, we would be lost.
Pro Patria
By DemocracyRules
(Quotation from John F. Kennedy.)
The Canadian blogosphere is under attack from a serious lawsuit.
The Story So Far
Many years, ago, Canada became concerned about certain neo-Nazi groups and Holocaust deniers, who would not shut up. Furthermore, Canada is loaded with minorities, some of whom sometimes feel discriminated against. There is no question that racism, ethnocentrism, and discrimination exists in Canada. The Government set up anti-hate legislation and Human Rights Commissions that were supposed to adjudicate allegations of discrimination. Mainly this was for rental and workplace disputes.
The anti-hate laws and CHRC "seemed like a good idea at the time" (just as Stalinism once did). However, the anti-hate statutes were seldom used, and the CHRC kept a low profile. My favorite case was a group of female secretaries who worked in a women's counseling and referral center mainly run by lesbians. The secretaries brought charges of sexual harassment against their bosses.
One person very active in bringing these cases before the CHRC was Richard Warman. He previously worked for the Canadian Human Rights Commission, and he knew the ropes.
Canada, like the USA, has Islamists who are duking it out with moderate Muslim groups (For example, the Muslim Canadian Congress. The Islamists send them death threats and other charming communications.)
The Islamists, based in various mosques in Canada, have had their own troubles with the CHRC. Muslim women at a mosque in Edmonton brought charges against their Imam for sexual harassment and sex discrimination.
Then the Islamists started to use the CHRC as their own weapon. They charged a newspaper publisher, Ezra Levant with hate for re-publishing the Muhammed cartoons. They charged Mark Steyn, who write a column for MacLean's (the Canadian equivalent of 'Time'), with racism for quoting a Norwegian Islamist who glowed that Muslims were "reproducing like mosquitoes" in Europe.
These kangaroo courts actually took the Islamists seriously and undertook proceedings against these men. Ezra Levant in particular relished the fight. He is a feisty lawyer who dislikes the CHRC and Canadian regulations which stifle free speech.
The CHRC is becoming a laughing stock. Their kangaroo court proceedings are mainly incriminating the CHRC as grand inquisitors and hypocrites who do little or nothing to advance the cause of human rights in Canada.
Now Richard Warman Goes Ballistic!
Today he has filed suit against a whole bunch of bloggers and others who have been reporting this story. He is also suing the National Post newspaper (which has some good columns). The list, thus far: Ezra Levant, FreeDominion.ca, Kate McMillan of SmallDeadAnimals.com, Jonathan Kay of the National Post newspaper and its in-house blog, and Kathy Shaidle of FiveFeetOfFury.com.
If you think American bloggers are poor, well they're rich compared to Canadian bloggers. I'm not sure if a single independent Canadian blogger makes enough $$ to live on. The market is one-tenth the size of the USA.
Richard Warman has previously sued libraries for carrying books he doesn't approve of, and he now wants to ban international websites he doesn't like from being seen by Canadians.
These websites will need financial help to win their case. More details at Kathy Shaidle's blog, FiveFeetOfFury
A letter or email to the Canadian Prime Minister, Stephen Harper could help a lot. Mr. Harper leads the Conservative Party, which has never liked these commissions and their ultra-left goings-on. The Canadian government has tolerated the commissions because of proddings from groups like the Canadian Jewish Congress. However, the CJC is very left-wing, and they obviously cannot see that there is a crazy "sorcerer's apprentice" quality to the Canadian Human Rights Commission shenanigans.
Pro Patria
NB: The views expressed by me, DemocracyRules, here and elsewhere, do not necessarily represent those of Gina Cobb or any other entity or person, living or dead. My opinions are entirely my own.
By DemocracyRules
h/t Small Dead Animals, Ezra Levant
This is a quote from Ian Fine, senior general counsel and director-general of dispute resolution at the Canadian Human Rights Commission. He certainly did not use asterisks in his statement, either.
He was making a point about racism by quoting a white supremacist.
This is part of kangaroo court proceedings of the CHRC which have accused Canadians Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant of being racist by making ordinary journalistic quotations relating to Muslim extremism.
Apparently Mr. Fine can quote racist remarks with impunity. However when Mark Steyn directly quoted an Islamist's proud remarks that European Muslims were "reproducing like mosquitoes", Steyn is now on trial for hate speech.
I call on Mr. Fine to adjourn these proceedings immediately and dissolve these disgusting kangaroo courts.
Pro Patria
Canada's nationalized healthcare system faces a shortage of doctors, if long wait lists for patient care are any indication. Once again, the primary source of the problem is governmental meddling:
The term crisis is often over-used. But when five million Canadians do not have a family doctor, one-quarter of Canadians can't get same-day access to a physician, and wait lists are held responsible for $14 billion in lost annual economic activity, it qualifies as a crisis par excellence.
. . . . In 1991 a report by health care academics Greg Stoddart and Morris Barer, commissioned by federal and provincial governments and later serialized in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, examined ways to control the country's rapidly growing health care budget. The report provided 53 recommendations, among them a 10 per cent cut in medical school enrolments and limits on foreign-educated doctors. Provincial governments quickly latched onto the now-ridiculous idea that fewer doctors would mean lower costs, and ignored the rest of the report.
So to solve a non-existent doctor surplus, enrolments were promptly reduced at medical schools across the country. This reduction, plus unforeseen demographic and economic factors, led to the genuine doctor deficit of today. Now, with six years required to produce new doctors, even immediate acceptance of the CMA's proposal will leave many under-serviced Canadians unsatisfied for years. For a quicker response, CMA president Brian Day cogently argues we should accredit some foreign medical schools currently teaching large numbers of Canadian-born students in countries such as Ireland or Australia, in the same manner that certain U.S. schools are accredited.
The bigger lesson here, however, is that any centralized plan for controlling our complex health care system will inevitably flounder on unintended consequences and bureaucratic hubris.
By DemocracyRules
Most people have never experienced -58 F temperatures, but Western Canadians have.
With wind chill, here are some predicted temperatures in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba for Tuesday:
These temperatures include wind chill factors, which makes the bite harder. With just jeans on your legs, it feels like a bunch of people are thrashing your bare legs with icy piano wires. Bundled up properly, things are just fine. I once walked to school when it was -90 F wind chill, and I was confused when the school doors wouldn't open. The school was closed, so I walked home. The skating rinks were closed when it went below -10F, which was always a disappointment for us kids.
"Police in Calgary are trying to determine whether a man found lying in the middle of a street Tuesday morning froze to death as overnight temperatures in the city dipped to -27F." As a general rule, napping in the middle of the road is not a good idea, but when the pavement is that cold, and the wind chill makes things even colder, don't get drunk and don't lie down.
"Schools in parts of Saskatchewan are closed for a second day Tuesday after blizzard-like conditions rolled through the province a day earlier. Whiteouts have also made driving treacherous on some Saskatchewan highways... There was traffic chaos ... as drivers tried to start their vehicles and then spun their tires and fishtailed on snow-covered roads made icy by the deep freeze."
The global warming goons could call it a climate change 'anomaly', if it weren't for irritating statements like this: "With the wind chills and the bitter temperatures, this is the coldest cold snap since last year," said Dan Kulak, who said frigid temperatures could last for several days. Ho hum, another Canadian winter.
Did I mention that many Canadians are global warming sceptics?
By DemocracyRules
How the MSM loves to chase its tail.
The Canadian MSM implies that the Canadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (the equivalent of US State Dept.) is accusing the US of torture.
An unknown person inside the Ministry put together a power point presentation on torture which mislabeled US interrogation techniques. It calls torture such things as forced nudity, blindfolding, forced nudity, hooding, forced nudity, isolation, forced nudity, sleep deprivation, and forced nudity. It also mentions forced nudity. It calls Gitmo a place where torture is likely practiced. (Apparently these 'torturers' need practice).
Does the forced nudity include making inmates take a shower, or what?
Amnesty Internationale obtained the document as part of its lawsuit accusing the Canadian government of doing a bad thing by transferring detainees captured by the Canadian Forces to Afghanistan's custody. So far they seem a little short on proof of wrongdoing regarding that subject, so now this.
"The emergence of the document ... is bound to strain relations with the two countries with which Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper has sought to strengthen ties during his two years in power." The 'Ottawa Citizen' adds hopefully.
For this to be true the Canadian government would actually have to accuse the US of something. As soon as the MSM launched this story, Minister of Foreign Affairs Maxime Bernier immediately disavowed the document. "The training manual is not a policy document and does not reflect the views or policies of this government," said Bernier's spokesman.
Darn it must be hard for the MSM to watch their stories turn to vapor. Oh well, good or bad it will all be fish wrap tomorrow. It's clear it's not just the US State Dept. which is riven with leftists who think that they are a separate government unto themselves. It's common in Western democracies.
By the way did I mention the forced nudity?
By DemocracyRules
h/t Small Dead Animals
Disgusting mistreatment of Ezra Levant, a publisher. The Alberta Human Rights Commission engages in a witch hunt on behalf of some Muslims who don’t like the cartoons.
From the transcript, quoting Alan Borovoy, a human rights lawyer who helped set up these commissions: “hardly the role we had envisioned for human rights commissions. There should be no question of the right to publish the impugned cartoons.”
Meanwhile, a bunch of Muslim goons set up a hate site on FaceBook against Ezra Levant.
Ezra Levant is a piece of shit JEW
Screenshot.
Group members:
Ali Zee - Admin (Calgary)
Usher Ahmed (Calgary)
Super Samer (Calgary)
Issam Zeineddine (Forest Lawn High School)
Khalil Jeha (Calgary)
Hussien Abdulbaki (Calgary)
Abe Rafih (Calgary)
Bassam Youssef (Lebanon)
Issam Khalil (Calgary)
Manal Abdallah (MRC CA Alum '07)
Yet another near disaster in Canada's socialized health care system, as a man desperately searched for a hospital to give him an emergency appendectomy:
. . . the 21-year-old Gatineau [Quebec] student went to bed, thinking he'd feel better by the morning. But when he woke up the next day, the pain was still there, and it was getting worse.
He headed to Gatineau Memorial Hospital, thinking that doctors would soon figure out what was ailing him and take care of it.
He never imagined the ordeal that would follow: The young man was turned away from five hospitals, got lost in an ambulance and, 28 hours after he was diagnosed, he had a burst appendix removed -- in Montreal.
John Stossel takes a look at nationalized health care in Canada. As you may already know, it's not all sweetness and light in Canada. Sometimes the delays are death-defying. Or perhaps death-ensuring.
Even a Canadian Member of Parliament came to the U.S. recently for breast cancer surgery (probably for breast reconstruction, although the details are not yet known). She claimed that her actions in leaving her own country for surgery were not an indictment of Canada's health care system but "said the decision was made because the U.S. hospital was the best place to have it done due to the type of surgery required."
No kidding.
Her actions speak louder than her words.
What will Canadians do if Hillary Clinton gets her way and America's health care system becomes as delay-prone and overburdened as Canada's? Where will Canadians flee for health care then? Cuba? Mexico?
Update: More conformation of ridiculously long surgical wait times:
Joyce Manz's blood boils when she sees government health-care ads depicting shorter waits for surgery in Saskatchewan.
"When the commercials come on TV, anything to do with health care, I could take my chair and throw it at the television," Manz said Monday. "I feel very helpless and now I'm very frightened because I'm on morphine."
Manz was put on a wait list for back surgery in August 2006. When she called the Saskatchewan Surgical Care Network last week she was told her surgery won't happen until February, but she wasn't given a reason for the delay.
"Honestly, I don't know how I'll wait until February," she tearfully told reporters on Monday morning.
It's tragic but simple from an economic standpoint. "Free" goods and services are almost always overused. If ordinary economic factors like price and willingness to pay can't be used to focus medical care on those who need and want it the most at a price they are willing to pay, other factors like discouragingly long wait times will be used as a way of rationing medical care resources. In addition, doctors are less willing and available to provide medical services in a timely way if they are heavily regulated and tightly limited as to the potential profit they will receive.
The problems Canada is experiencing are not a temporary, correctible blip. They are inherent in socialized medicine. They are direct consequences of heavy-handed attempts to overrride the laws of supply and demand.
Ignoring the laws of supply and demand won't work because those laws are based on human nature. The free market is the most efficient mechanism yet known to humankind for allocating scarce resources efficiently in a way that maximizes the benefit to all concerned. When we override the free market, somebody always loses. Often, everyone loses.
Here's what passes for the conventional wisdom on Iraq: The war was badly planned and therefore is failing miserably. As a result, America's only option is to fold up the entire operation and slink away, leaving the Iraqis to whatever bloodbath awaits them. We've reached the point of no return; the war is irretrievably lost; and no amount of rethinking or redoubling of effort will make any difference.
Meanwhile, Al Qaeda's early losses in the war on terror, including the deaths of major leaders such as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and possibly Osama Bin Ladin himself, are completely irrelevant, since Al Qaeda is "evolving" constantly and is planning mass casualty attacks on the U.S.:
Al Qaeda terrorists are rebuilding their capabilities and continuing to plan mass-casualty attacks inside the United States, according to an intelligence assessment made public yesterday.
"We assess [al Qaeda] has protected or regenerated key elements of its homeland attack capability, including a safe haven in ... Pakistan [tribal areas], operational lieutenants and its top leadership," according to the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), a consensus analysis of 16 U.S. intelligence agencies.
"Although we have discovered only a handful of individuals in the United States with ties to al Qaeda senior leadership since 9/11, we judge that al Qaeda will intensify its efforts to put operatives here," the report stated.
Retired Vice Adm. Michael McConnell, the director of national intelligence whose office produced the NIE, said the United States will face a "persistent and evolving terrorist threat" in the next three years.
The seven-page public summary of the classified report said the United States is in a "heightened threat environment."
"They're working as hard as they can in positioning trained operatives here in the United States," Mr. McConnell said. "They have recruitment programs to bring recruits into [the tribal] region of Pakistan [who] could come to the United States, fit into the population and then use some of the training that they receive in the Pakistani area for explosives and so on."
Is the contrast between the defeatism of the media in viewing America's chances in the Iraq war and the endless optimism for Al Qaeda's chances stark enough for you?
Al Qaeda remains a threat because it is "continuing to plan" further attacks and "will intensify its efforts" and its members are "working as hard as they can."
But when it comes to the Iraq war, working harder, intensifying efforts, rethinking, and continuing to plan are off the table for the United States. The only option we have is to rip our leaders from limb to limb, metaphorically speaking, for having started the war. Since things look bleak now, they're going to stay that way no matter what America does, and its only option is to turn tail and run.
Don't tell me we've tried long enough and hard enough in Iraq and there's no point in continuing any longer. Nonsense. Al Qaeda's attacks on the U.S. predate the Iraq war, but nobody seems to be pulling out a stopwatch and insisting that Al Qaeda's chances of striking a mortal blow at the U.S. or the West are forever lost.
What a fitting metaphor is Harry Reid's surrender slumberthon in the Senate tonight. Harry Reid knows how to lose a war he has already declared lost. The solution is quite simple: Lie down, accept defeat, and make no effort to prevail.
In the real world, the margin between victory and defeat is rarely great, but the outcome matters a great deal. The margin of victory usually turns on one thing: motivation. If we are motivated to win; if we are determined; if we are constantly "rebuilding our capabilities" and "continuing to plan" and "intensifying our efforts and "working as hard as we can," then there are very few forces on earth that can stand in our way.
By the same token, if we are frequently announcing that we've already lost and that our cause is hopeless, and holding slumberthons to protest our own nation's continued effort to prevail, then we certainly can bring about our own defeat.
Update: Today brings a stunningly important speech from Senator John McCain (via Captain's Quarters):
Mr. President, we have nearly finished this little exhibition, which was staged, I assume, for the benefit of a briefly amused press corps and in deference to political activists opposed to the war who have come to expect from Congress such gestures, empty though they may be, as proof that the majority in the Senate has heard their demands for action to end the war in Iraq. The outcome of this debate, the vote we are about to take, has never been in doubt to a single member of this body. And to state the obvious, nothing we have done for the last twenty-four hours will have changed any facts on the ground in Iraq or made the outcome of the war any more or less important to the security of our country. The stakes in this war remain as high today as they were yesterday; the consequences of an American defeat are just as grave; the costs of success just as dear. No battle will have been won or lost, no enemy will have been captured or killed, no ground will have been taken or surrendered, no soldier will have survived or been wounded, died or come home because we spent an entire night delivering our poll-tested message points, spinning our soundbites, arguing with each other, and substituting our amateur theatrics for statesmanship. All we have achieved are remarkably similar newspaper accounts of our inflated sense of the drama of this display and our own temporary physical fatigue. Tomorrow the press will move on to other things and we will be better rested. But nothing else will have changed.
In Iraq, American soldiers, Marines, sailors and airmen are still fighting bravely and tenaciously in battles that are as dangerous, difficult and consequential as the great battles of our armed forces’ storied past. Our enemies will still be intent on defeating us, and using our defeat to encourage their followers in the jihad they wage against us, a war which will become a greater threat to us should we quit the central battlefield in defeat. The Middle East will still be a tinderbox, which our defeat could ignite in a regional war that will imperil our vital interests at risk there and draw us into a longer and far more costly war. The prospect of genocide in Iraq, in which we will be morally complicit, is still as real a consequence of our withdrawal today as it was yesterday.
During our extended debate over the last few days, I have heard senators repeat certain arguments over and over again. My friends on the other side of this argument accuse those of us who oppose this amendment with advocating “staying the course,” which is intended to suggest that we are intent on continuing the mistakes that have put the outcome of the war in doubt. Yet we all know that with the arrival of General Petraeus we have changed course. We are now fighting a counterinsurgency strategy, which some of us have argued we should have been following from the beginning, and which makes the most effective use of our strength and does not strengthen the tactics of our enemy. This new battle plan is succeeding where our previous tactics have failed, although the outcome remains far from certain. The tactics proposed in the amendment offered by my friends, Senators Levin and Reed – a smaller force, confined to bases distant from the battlefield, from where they will launch occasional search and destroy missions and train the Iraqi military – are precisely the tactics employed for most of this war and which have, by anyone’s account, failed miserably. Now, that, Mr. President, is staying the course, and it is a course that inevitably leads to our defeat and the catastrophic consequences for Iraq, the region and the security of the United States our defeat would entail.
Yes, we have heard quite a lot about the folly of “staying the course,” though the real outcome should this amendment prevail and be signed into law, would be to deny our generals and the Americans they have the honor to command the ability to try, in this late hour, to address the calamity these tried and failed tactics produced, and salvage from the wreckage of our previous failures a measure of stability for Iraq and the Middle East, and a more secure future for the American people.
I have also listened to my colleagues on the other side repeatedly remind us that the American people have spoken in the last election. They have demanded we withdraw from Iraq, and it is our responsibility to do, as quickly as possible, what they have bid us to do. But is that our primary responsibility? Really, Mr. President, is that how we construe our role: to follow without question popular opinion even if we believe it to be in error, and likely to endanger the security of the country we have sworn to defend? Surely, we must be responsive to the people who have elected us to office, and who, if it is their wish, will remove us when they become unsatisfied with our failure to heed their demands. I understand that, of course. And I understand why so many Americans have become sick and tired of this war, given the many, many mistakes made by civilian and military leaders in its prosecution. I, too, have been made sick at heart by these mistakes and the terrible price we have paid for them. But I cannot react to these mistakes by embracing a course of action that I know will be an even greater mistake, a mistake of colossal historical proportions, which will -- and I am as sure of this as I am of anything – seriously endanger the people I represent and the country I have served all my adult life. I have many responsibilities to the people of Arizona, and to all Americans. I take them all seriously, Mr. President, or try to. But I have one responsibility that outweighs all the others – and that is to do everything in my power, to use whatever meager talents I posses, and every resource God has granted me to protect the security of this great and good nation from all enemies foreign and domestic. And that I intend to do, Mr. President, even if I must stand athwart popular opinion. I will explain my reasons to the American people. I will attempt to convince as many of my countrymen as I can that we must show even greater patience, though our patience is nearly exhausted, and that as long as there is a prospect for not losing this war, then we must not choose to lose it. That is how I construe my responsibility to my constituency and my country. That is how I construed it yesterday. It is how I construe it today. And it is how I will construe it tomorrow. I do not know how I could choose any other course.
I cannot be certain that I possess the skills to be persuasive. I cannot be certain that even if I could convince Americans to give General Petraeus the time he needs to determine whether we can prevail, that we will prevail in Iraq. All I am certain of is that our defeat there would be catastrophic, not just for Iraq, but for us, and that I cannot be complicit in it, but must do whatever I can, whether I am effective or not, to help us try to avert it. That, Mr. President, is all I can possibly offer my country at this time. It is not much compared to the sacrifices made by Americans who have volunteered to shoulder a rifle and fight this war for us. I know that, and am humbled by it, as we all are. But though my duty is neither dangerous nor onerous, it compels me nonetheless to say to my colleagues and to all Americans who disagree with me: that as long as we have a chance to succeed we must try to succeed.
I am privileged, as we all are, to be subject to the judgment of the American people and history. But, my friends, they are not always the same judgment. The verdict of the people will arrive long before history’s. I am unlikely to ever know how history has judged us in this hour. The public’s judgment of me I will know soon enough. I will accept it, as I must. But whether it is favorable or unforgiving, I will stand where I stand, and take comfort from my confidence that I took my responsibilities to my country seriously, and despite the mistakes I have made as a public servant and the flaws I have as an advocate, I tried as best I could to help the country we all love remain as safe as she could be in an hour of serious peril.
How bizarre.
Louisiana Democrat William Jefferson, who stashed $90,000 in cash in his freezer and who is facing a federal corruption probe, will get a seat on the Homeland Security Committee.
Do the leaders of the Democractic party in Congress have no shame?
Never mind.
Their actions speak much louder than words.
WASHINGTON — Money talks, but can it also follow your movements? In a U.S. government warning high on the creepiness scale, the Defense Department cautioned its American contractors over what it described as a new espionage threat: Canadian coins with tiny radio frequency transmitters hidden inside. The government said the mysterious coins were found planted on U.S. contractors with classified security clearances on at least three separate occasions between October 2005 and January 2006 as the contractors traveled through Canada. Intelligence and technology experts said such transmitters, if they exist, could be used to surreptitiously track the movements of people carrying the spy coins. Bizarre. Read the article linked above for more forms of espionage that have been uncovered.
As if there isn't enough to worry about, add to the list "spy" coins:
By the end of this year, being a terrorist will no longer be an impediment to boarding a plane in Canada. As long as a member of a terrorist group has no prior record of being a threat to aviation safety, it's a green light all the way for boarding a plane.
We wouldn't want to interfere with terrorist travel plans, you see.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
Or so Canada's national anthem says.
And apparently that's all we do -- we "stand" there. We stand there and wave goodbye to known terrorists as they take to the skies in 345,000-pound jets filled with innocent men, women and children and 20,000 gallons plus of jet fuel.
O Canada. Please reconsider.
In the wake of the Canadian terrorist bombing plot, the Toronto Star (via Captain's Quarters) reports that some Canadian imams are taking responsibility for having failed to properly teach and lead Islamic youth:
Imams across the GTA urged families and communities to take more responsibility for shaping the minds of young Muslims, following the arrest of 17 young men and boys on terrorism-related charges last Friday.
In Mississauga, North York and Scarborough, they spoke to thousands gathered for Friday afternoon prayers, some addressing concerns about backlash, others urging the community to have faith in the Canadian justice system to provide a fair trial.
"There is nothing wrong in saying we failed our youth," said Imam Munir El-Kassen at the Toronto and Region Islamic Congregation in North York. "We did not fail them intentionally, but our community was in a formative stage and our youth searching to fill the vacuum within received wrong advice and training.
"We should be more careful in controlling the youth in the public domain — not everybody should be allowed to talk or lead the youth. They are the most vulnerable."
It's a start.
However, in all the talk of Canadian "youth," let's keep in mind that not all of the suspects are children. In fact, the artist's sketch running with the Toronto Star article depicts four grown men, the oldest of whom is 43 years old (the youngest of the four is 19).
Appearing in Brampton court June 3, from left, suspects Ahmad Mustafa Ghany, 21, Quyym Abdul Jamal, 43, Amin Mohammed Durrani, 19, Jahmaal James, 23. All 17 suspects are to appear today in the same court to begin bail hearings. Sources say others are under investigation and more arrests are expected.
__________________________
Youthful foolishness is often a factor in serious crime, including terrorism, but it is not an excuse. It takes more than just foolishness to plan and commit heinous crimes. It also takes a lack of a functioning moral compass. That is something no society can long tolerate.
In addition to everything else, one of the 17 suspects accused of scheming to blow up Canadian targets in a terrorist plot also allegedly wanted to behead the prime minister of Canada, according to reports today.
"But why?" you ask.
Foolish question.
Islamic terrorists don't need a reason.
But if you must have a reason, here it is:
Because Canada is a decent, civilized, successful, non-Muslim Western democracy.
And for Islamic terrorists, THAT is reason enough.
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