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musings of mark since 2001

While our government attempts to have the population become afraid of “terrorists” and continues to fan the flames of the Israeli-Arab conflicts, at least normal Canadians remain civil to each other and the rest of the world. Perhaps as a result of how we collectively value others, the lure of money generated by spam is outweighed by our respect to ourselves and each other as once again Canada doesn’t even make the list of the world’s top 12 spam generating countries. More likely it’s because we prosecute the jerks that do it, which is what Australia did as well to make it to the very bottom of the list.

One of the countries in the word, (that’s Canada through implicit acceptance of USA policies), that allowed people to be locked up simply because of the colour of their skin, what they do for a living, or what their last name is after 9-11, has changed it’s mind and is now allowing political asylum to same. We’re told this is the “last one” that had been “undeniably deprived of his liberty,” and “held in custody under harsh conditions which can be said to be oppressive.”

At least Canada isn’t one of the three countries overtly supporting the genocide happening in the Mid-East, even as some more Canadian peacekeepers soldiers get themselves ambushed while working for the USA trying to kill off the Pashtun Taliban tribe of Afghanistan, (yet to be accomplished by anyone, ever). The North American MM keeps placating the masses talking hollowly about what it will take to end the violence, but neither side sees the other as human beings and the evangelicals are practically gleeful on their Rapture Ready forums that everything is going according to plan.

How long it will be before our own govt. overtly silences it’s critics is yet to be seen; since Harper was elected they have opted for simply not answering reporters questions or giving interviews, no news is good news?

Enough for that rant, meanwhile on Bowen Island without much danger of a nuke landing here yet, summer is in full swing with the second BBQ of the season this weekend on “The Pier” as the owners of this marina like to call it. The week started sans the nice warm weather, being cloudy every day until the afternoon, but the last two days are nothing but blue sky morning to night with pleasant ocean breezes keeping the temperature moderate.

Notwithstanding the lack of female companionship, life is still pretty easy out here on a little island in the Pacific and it’s a long way from the conflicts on the other side of the world. The knowledge of what other people’s lives are like makes for a surreal evening with the sounds of a BBQ and the band playing music coming through the window…

Joseph Cirincione, a Senior Associate and Director of the Non-Proliferation Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has summarized nicely how the Mid-East got to the point it is now from 1992, seeing everything as pretty much on schedule.

The problems with Diebold voting machines don’t seem to be going away, let’s hope the need to get rid of the human oversight we have now doesn’t become a priority and the infernal machines end up here too.

Information Clearing House, the place on the internet to get the stories that are hidden behind the pay-per-view wall re-produces Robert Fisk’s weekend in Lebanon and it doesn’t look good for the future. The web site is also the place to sometimes catch a compendium of news from both sides, government sanctioned and independent reports when Link TV isn’t working.

No longer a country of Peace, we’re all terrorists now as Harper condones the latest Israeli genocide, even today the MSM repeating the propaganda that Iran, the Lebanese and Syrians are responsible for the killing of innocent civilians, Canadians included, no matter whom squeezes the trigger. Our Prime Minister certainly isn’t speaking for me, calling this a justified response to what appears to be a combat soldier taken as a prisoner when he strayed too far from his own territory. Forget about all the kidnapping of genuine civilians by the IDF in the past, and unless you happen to read the Israeli newspapers, Canadians are not told about the planning and approval made weeks in advance of storming the democratically elected Parliament of another country and kidnapping it’s members.

We are also asked to forget that Israel buzzed the Syrian President’s home just a couple weeks ago, just after Israel killed a family on a beach in Gaza and their first reaction was to deny it. Then they tried to pin it on Hamas. After the shrapnel evidence revealed that they were indeed behind it, they reluctantly admitted guilt. This is just one incident in a litany of human rights abuses this year alone, of genocidal acts perpetrated by Israel with the full support of the USA, and in turn our own complicity to the machinations of war and deaths of innocent people.

Tonight our own government is still repeating the falsehood that Israel didn’t start this latest escalation, placing the blame solely on Hizbullah and insisting that a soldier was kidnapped as if he was a civilian and not a POW, while ignoring the hundreds of innocent Palestinians that are not soldiers already languishing in Israeli jails for years, for the crime of being born in the wrong country.

It does give the mainstream media something to use to drown out the protests against the stolen election in Mexico though, nary a word on TV about the million people hitting the streets - one of the largest protests by citizens of any one country seen in a long time. Proletariats as a whole are probably not surprised that the protesters raging against the machine are not given much attention by the media of the “champions of democracy”.

Looks like the neocons are going to get their never ending war, denying even a UN sanctioned call to a ceasefire to the killing of innocent people and instead trying to focus on business as usual instead. It’s not like any of the gazillions of UN Resolutions passed so far have done any good anyways…

Wonder how many people are glued to the new 24 hour sitcom re-runs these days and avoiding any news altogether? The mainstream media is literally bombarding, (no pun intended), those that will listen propaganda about the dangers of terrorism being right on our doorsteps.