THIS SHOULD BE A FARK CATEGORY ALL ON ITS OWN Not News: Finance Minister Jim Flaherty promises $4 billion in federal cuts, but won’t say from where the money’s coming. (Globe and Mail) News: The tax cuts made by Harper in the minority days have created a structural deficit in the federal government (Globe and Mail). Fark: Harper sticks the government with the estimated $80K cost to take a government jet from Ottawa to Boston to watch Game 4 of the Stanley Cup, then promises to repay $1,500 of the cost from his salary – which is paid from the revenue of Canadian taxpayers. (Toronto Star) As Charlie Sheen would say, WINNING!
THIS SERIES IS OVER Bruins in six. (TSN) And the real reason why the NHL didn’t suspend Alex Burrows? Biting’s not that harmful: hell, what hockey player takes to the ice wearing his dentures, anyway? (The Onion)
HE’S NOT THE FIRST THAT HASN’T PRATICED WHAT HE PREACHES, BUT IT’S STILL ENTERTAINING TO LOOK AT The next time John Gormley rants on CJME/CKOM about the evils of big government, remember there was a time when government was big enough to pay him. (Saskatoon Star-Phoenix)
HIIII-YAH! Fans of Firefly and the Muppet Show (guilty as charged) will really enjoy this mashup (yfrog via Nathan Fillion’s Twitter feed). But there’s one actress who’s not fond of having her character played by Miss Piggy …. (whosay.com)
THE MORE MARGARET THATCHER SUFFERS FROM DEMENTIA, THE SMARTER SHE APPARENTLY GETS Sarah Palin, in a desperate attempt at appearing all presidentially, says she’s going to England to meet Margaret Thatcher, probably confusing her with Posh Spice or Queen Elizabeth. Baroness Thatcher’s response? If you pass by my house, just keep going. (The Guardian). It’s probably a frantic attempt to keep from learning American history from Palin (Salon) … as Stephen Colbert demonstrates to his approving fans. (Gawker)
THIS IS WHY WE FIGHT PARTS ONE AND TWO One of the real reasons why big business in America likes war and the military is that they’re so easy to scam from – as this case between 14 American soldiers at the end of their Afghanistan tour and Delta Airlines illustrates (Gawker). (JUst as I was about to post this, Gawker blogged that Delta has changed its policy.) But why do people continue to protest? Johnann Hari gives some pretty good reasons why: (The Independent)
You might ask – so what? What has been changed? To understand how and why protest like this can work, you need some concrete and proven examples from the past. Let’s start with the most hopeless and wildly idealistic cause – and see how it won. The first ever attempt to hold a Gay Pride rally in Trafalgar Square was in 1965. Two dozen people turned up – and they were mostly beaten by the police and arrested. Gay people were imprisoned for having sex, and even the most compassionate defense of gay people offered in public life was that they should be pitied for being mentally ill.
Imagine if you had stood in Trafalgar Square that day and told those two dozen brave men and women: “Forty-five years from now, they will stop the traffic in Central London for a Gay Pride parade on this very spot, and it will be attended by hundreds of thousands of people. There will be married gay couples, and representatives of every political party, and openly gay soldiers and government ministers and huge numbers of straight supporters – and it will be the homophobes who are regarded as freaks.” It would have seemed like a preposterous statement of science fiction. But it happened. It happened in one lifetime. Why? Not because the people in power spontaneously realized that millennia of persecuting gay people had been wrong, but because determined ordinary citizens banded together and demanded justice.
YOUR MUSICAL MOMENT OF ZEN: If Seanbot 3000 is reading this, don’t click on the link. For everybody else, it’s The Greatest Story Joe Ely Ever Told …
