April Reign

Speak your mind even if your voice shakes

General

The Children’s Health and Nutrition Initiative

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OTTAWA – The Children’s Health and Nutrition Initiative – a proposal to make safe and healthy food available to all of Canada’s children – will help working families address real concerns relating to childhood obesity and malnutrition.

NDP children’s advocate Olivia Chow (Trinity Spadina) says the initiative calls for universal nutritious food programs to make breakfasts, snacks or lunches available to any child in Canada under the age of 18, in venues deemed most appropriate by each local community. This initiative will mean that no Canadian child will go to school hungry.

The initiative was unveiled today in Ottawa by a group of concerned Canadians led by Chow, Dr. Robert Cushman, former Medical Officer of Health for the City of Ottawa, and Ulla Knowles, a parent and Student Nutrition Facilitator at FoodShare Toronto.

Providing children with nutritious food has a long history.

Today most countries provide for at least one good meal per day. There has been some success here with school breakfast programs but they depend heavily on support from corporations who are not likely to be providing fruits and cheese and other foods children may not have access to at home.

[Read more…] about The Children’s Health and Nutrition Initiative

Is Canada a soveriegn country?

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It’s getting hard to tell.

First we turned from peace keepers to war mongers.

Then

An American policy has forced Montreal’s Bell Helicopter to ban 24 employees from working on a U.S. military contract because of their nationalities.

and now


The Royal Bank has refused to open American dollar accounts for people of certain nationalities since April 2006, Radio-Canada reported Monday.

Canadian citizens with dual citizenship in Iran, Iraq, Cuba, Sudan, North Korea or Myanmar are affected.

The bank didn’t agree to an interview with Radio-Canada, but did confirm the report.

The Royal Bank is conforming with U.S. Treasury Department laws.

Conforming with US Treasury laws???

Holy crap did I sleep through the invasion? Are we now the Northern Division of the States?

When is Liberal corruption not Liberal corruption?

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When the Liberal is now a Conservative!

The spin doctors must be making even their own heads turn with this one.

When those reports were filed two weeks ago, they showed that Khan’s car dealership loaned losts of money to his riding association.

There was $88,000 loaned in 2004 and $91,000 in 2005.

While such loans aren’t illegal, they must be paid back. A local Liberal admits they haven’t been repaid yet.

“No, the loans have not been paid back, and the reason is we’re waiting for refunds or reimbursements from Elections Canada,” said Paul Gallardo.

However, critics say those refunds, based on votes in the last elections, won’t be enough to cover Khan’s loans.

The Conservatives are going to have a little sticker shock on this new MP they’ve got,” said NDP MP Paul Dewar.

Do mine eyes deceive me or are the Conservatives actually supporting the Liberals???

Conservatives call the whole matter a partisan smear, pointing out that most Liberal leadership candidates took out loans to finance their campaigns.

Better get Baird on the case right away.

Poverty

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The Star has started a series on poverty.

It is informative and heartrending but will anything change?

Red Jenny had an interesting post yesterday about empathy. Which included this statement

…possessing power itself serves as an impediment to understanding the perspectives of others. Through several studies, the researchers assessed the effect of power on perspective taking, adjusting to another’s perspective, and interpreting the emotions of others.

[Read more…] about Poverty

Defective Politics

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The leadership race doesn’t seem to have had the intended effect of strengthening the Liberal party.

Though I suppose one could legitimately argue it has weeded out those with very right wing ideology.

Harper told a crowd of party faithful that the support of former Mississauga-Streetsville Liberal MP Wajid Khan and now of Mark Persaud, a former chair of the federal Liberal party’s multiculturalism committee, shows people are realizing the “failure of the Liberals to match talk with action” when it comes to new Canadians.

This has nothing to do with New Canadians and everything to do with social conservatism.

The conservatives have found a supportive base for their stance against women’s issues, including reproductive rights, for their stance against social programs and their willingness to allow religion to dictate policy.

This statement is very telling

Khan said his “disillusionment” with the Liberals began in 2005, particularly after Paul Martin’s government signed a budget deal with the “socialist” New Democrats to extend the life of its minority government. Khan said his decision to defect was made easier by Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion who, he said, has no foreign policy, no economic credentials and no commitment to “family values.”

family values

Code for getting back to the good old days when men were men, sheep were nervous and the poor did the right thing and died off or went into the woods where decent people didn’t have to deal with them.

The NDP might want to take note of this part of that quote

after Paul Martin’s government signed a budget deal with the “socialist” New Democrats to extend the life of its minority government.

If he has publicly stated that he is disillusioned with a party for working with the NDP is there much chance that Harper has any intention of entering into or honouring any agreement with a socialist party?

Next we’ll have calls to check for Reds under the beds..but I digress.

We have seen the disasters that have been created by bowing to the religious right in the States.

Abstinence programs that have resulted in higher pregnancy rates, cut backs of services that are pushing poor people into even greater poverty, children threatened with death for questioning whether scripture is belief or fact, threats to women’s autonomy.

Harper doesn’t even believe this crap himself but he’s very much an ends justifies the means kinda guy, as well as a big spoiled baby who wants to get back at every person who ever thwarted him and their family, friends and supporters.

Canadians are not Father knows Best the way much of rural America is. They are much more likely to not only support but live a life where both partners work and where daycare and other supports are needed.

It is more important than ever that we make sure these people get to the polls. The pulpit masters will certainly be doing their bit to get the fundamentalists out there.

Alcohol wasn’t a factor?!

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Argument over godfather of soul, creates grandfathers of stupidity.

ATMORE, Ala. (AP) – A man shot a friend when the two got into an argument over James Brown’s height, police said.

Dan Gulley Jr. was charged with assault in the shooting of David James Brooks Jr., police said. Officers said the men were at a friend’s home on Monday when, according to witnesses, the argument over the height of the late “Godfather of Soul” escalated, with Gulley, 70, shooting Brooks, 62, twice in the abdomen.

Brooks went to his car, got a gun and shot at Gulley but missed, then went to the police station, officers said.

and the kicker?….The Mobile, Ala., Press-Register newspaper said officers did not believe alcohol was a factor in the argument.