April Reign

Speak your mind even if your voice shakes

Harper

Khadr Video Shames Canada

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Omar Khadr
Omar Khadr

CBC today carries the story and video the CSIS interview with Omar Khadr. Although the video quality is poor it is obvious that this is an anguished young teen. He tries to tell the integrators of his need for medical care and is met with a smug superior attitude and a complete lack of empathy. He is then told that his breakdown is a “strategy”. I’d like to see the CSIS agent endure half of what this boy did and see what his “strategy” would be.

“We Canadians stand for compassion, we stand for the rule of law. And what you are seeing there is the abuse of the rule of law as Canadian courts have indicated about Canadians and Canada’s involvement in Guantanamo Bay,” lawyer Dennis Edney told CBC News.

Omar Khadr getting battlefield first aid.
Image via Wikipedia

Edney said Canadian officials should have asked Khadr about potential torture, but instead went into the interview without any help for the then teenage boy.

“We don’t do that in Canada and that shouldn’t have happened to this young, most vulnerable boy in Guantanamo,” the lawyer said.

He also said Khadr suffers from several injuries, including the loss of sight in one eye and difficulty with the other, as well as shrapnel and bullet wounds. [ ..CBC ]

Presumably the CSIS agent saw this picture of Khadr as he lay nearly dead on the battlefield. Not an adult soldier but a child brought into war. But Harper doesn’t care for children. He is already trying to put more Canadian youth in prison. Why should he care about one that he can easily get his lunatic fringe to smear? One even went so far on the CBC site as to say that even if Khadr were 6 years old we should kill him. And this person is walking free.

Harper continues to use following LIberal precedent as an excuse for not doing  the Canadian thing, the right thing, the humane thing, the just thing. He refuses to bring Khadr home because he says the Liberals didn’t. Well since when does Harper follow the Liberal play book? In Nuremburg “following orders” was not accepted as an excuse to commit crimes against humanity. How much less successful would following a political foes precedent be?

Khadr is the only western prisoner not claimed by their country. His continued presence there, and this video shames all Canadians.  Harper must either bring Khadr home or step down as Prime Minister. A leader who refuses to protect his own people has committed treason against them.

You can see the tape here — Link opens Video in New Window

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My Canada doesn’t include Republican Politics!

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It is time to take back our country from the religious and idealogical extremists.

Say no to the dissolution of the Wheat Board.

Say no to extremist groups controlling women’s bodies.

Say no to religious control of Canadian arts.

Say no to bribery and vote buying.

Opposition parties must STAND UP! Stand up for Canada, cause Harper won’t. Stand up for women, cause Harper won’t. Stand up use your voice… use your vote …end the Republicanization of Canada!

Image credit:thefilter.ca

Inspiration :mrgreen:

Say Goodbye to Democracy!

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{with apologies to Country Joe and the Fish}

Come on all of you Liberal wo/men
Uncle Harper needs your help again
he’s got himself in a terrible jam
way down yonder in Afghanistan so
put down your prinicpals, buck up and vote
Cause now the Cons get to gloat

And it’s one, two, three, What’s the opposition for?
Don’t ask me I don’t give damn, send more troops to Afghanistan

And it’s five, six, seven, no more parliment debates
ain’t no time to wonder why, whoopee democracy’s gonna die

Come on SoCons, let’s move fast
your big chance has come at last
Illegal abortion and gay sex too
kill SWC no one to stop you
and you know that glory can only be won when we’ve
blown ’em all to kingdom come

And it’s one, two, three, What’s the opposition for?
Don’t ask me I don’t give damn, send more troops to Afghanistan

And it’s five, six, seven, no more parliment debates
ain’t no time to wonder why, whoopee democracy is gonna die

Come on Oil Companies don’t be shy
Liberals are gonna support your guy!
Step right up and pollute the land
No one is gonna slap your hand
Open up the oil sands

And it’s one, two, three, What’s the opposition for?
Don’t ask me I don’t give damn, send more troops to Afghanistan

And it’s five, six, seven, no more parliment debates
ain’t no time to wonder why, whoopee democracy is gonna die

Come on Voters throughout Canada
Send more Liberals to Ottawa
No longer matters how you vote
Now we’re all in the same boat
We’re ruled by one party
Say goodbye to democracy!

And it’s one, two, three, What’s the opposition for?
Don’t ask me I don’t give damn, send more troops to Afghanistan

And it’s five, six, seven, no more parliment debates
ain’t no time to wonder why, whoopee democracy is gonna die

“We’ll find a way to not defeat the government”

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Inspiring words from the opposition. I hope that Liberal partisans who moaned and bitched about the NDP propping up the government are suitably embarrassed by this stunning failure to represent the people of Canada.

I don’t have any particular quibble with Dion but if this is how he shows decisiveness and leadership…well let’s just say things don’t bode well.

Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion said on Wednesday that his party won’t defeat the government on the federal budget, but also won’t vote in favour of it.

“We’ll find a way to not defeat the government and to express our disagreement with this budget,” Dion said while leaving a caucus meeting in Ottawa on Wednesday.

He said the Liberals will still have an amendment, but the party has decided not to take the government down in the vote of confidence over the budget.

link

Perhaps Dion emersing himself in CanCon has watched Jim Carey one too many times;

Fletcher Dion: You scratched my car!
Motorpool Guy Harper: Where?
Fletcher Dion: [indicating with his hands] Right there!
Motorpool Guy Harper: OH… That was already there.
Fletcher Dion: You – -LIAR! You know what I am going to do about this?
Motorpool Guy Harper: what?
Fletcher Dion: Nothing! Because if I take it to small claims court, it will just drain 8 hours out of my life and you probably won’t show up and even if I got the judgment you’d just stiff me anyway; so what I am going to do is piss and moan like an impotent jerk, and then bend over and take it up the tailpipe!

Keen on covering their asses

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Linda Keen was fired last night.

The sacking of Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission president Linda Keen will put more pressure on Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, already under fire from opposition legislators and the media for his handling of the affair.

Keen lost her job for refusing to allow a 50-year-old reactor at the Chalk River facility in Ontario to reopen after regular maintenance in November. The reactor makes more than two-thirds of the global supply of medical isotopes.

{LINK}

Carol Goar pulls no punches in her assessment of the situation;

If they held auditions on Parliament Hill for a hot-tempered bully and his thuggish sidekick, Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn would be shoo-ins.

Their month-long attack on Linda Keen, the president of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, has been ugly, unwarranted and unfair.

Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion would be perfect for the role of hypocritical scold. In his rush to demand Lunn’s resignation, he overlooked the fact that his own party had ignored warnings of serious deficiencies at the Chalk River nuclear reactor site for years.

Yet this blundering trio may have done the nation an inadvertent service.

At long last, Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. (AECL), the crown corporation at the centre of the medical isotope scandal, is getting public scrutiny. Finally, the red lights that have been flashing since at least 2000 are attracting some attention.

For more info and background see

Politics n Poetry

POGGE

The Galloping Beaver

Omar Khadr

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Two stories in The Star today about Omar Khadr.

One on a video tape that was released to the press, despite not having been allowed to be aired in court. Oops wonder how that happened?

The lawyer for detained Canadian terror suspect Omar Khadr accused the U.S. government yesterday of abusing the legal process after CBS News broadcast for the first time a controversial video recording which allegedly shows his client manufacturing explosive devices.

“I think it’s outrageous that this tape has been released without the approval of the court,” lawyer Dennis Edney said in Edmonton.

Long seen as a key piece of evidence against Khadr in the eyes of the prosecution, Edney believes the U.S. government leaked the video after stalled proceedings prevented it from being shown in court.

The courtroom airing of the 12-minute tape, which allegedly shows a 15-year-old Khadr planting land mines and assembling bomb timers, was delayed during a hearing Nov. 8. The recording was broadcast Sunday on the CBS newsmagazine show 60 Minutes.

[Read more…] about Omar Khadr