Wil's Rant

Everyday the reports seem to gather speed and seriousness. They are now predicting the end of Polar Bears in the wild in less than twenty years. Perhaps there are people who don't care about the bears, maybe the loss of all the worlds glaciers might get their attention, no.... then maybe the loss of all the land areas associated with the new sea level might be noticeable. Of course, there are people who will still refuse to take some responsibility for the destruction, perhaps the lack of ability to go out in the sun anymore will get their attention. This will be, actually is, the result of ever increasing ozone depletion, new records to be set this year. Alas, I suspect that even this will not persuade those who will continue to refuse to see the truth and start demanding that our governments take action. When faced with such a large portion of a world populace that chooses to believe that the world was created 6000 years or so ago despite the enormous amount of evidence to the contrary, what hope can the more enlightened few have that they are going to be able to change this type of thinking. People have to start recognizing certain things. They might start by understanding that their holy scriptures have been written by humans, whether under the guidance of God or not. Humans make mistakes, sometimes deliberately, and these mistakes make their way into the texts. Is it so hard to imagine that some person in history may have erred in fact or understanding when transcribing the words of God? This question I put to the religious persons out there who refuse to believe some of the evidence of science. I don't have to be a Muslim in order to recognize truths within the Koran. The same can be said of all faiths. Instead of focusing on the differences among our faiths could we not instead focus on the similarities. There are a great many. Enough for us all to come to an understanding of each other and respect the independent views of our neighbors.

The ability to sit down and write things like this is the greatest freedom in the world. A freedom that I wish all nations would allow. The first step on the path to a better world is dialogue. Free intellectual discourse on all subjects is likely the peak of evolutionary progress. The terrorists in Iraq do not represent the Iraqi people. They do not even represent the Sunni, from whom many of which come. Yet they get the loudest voice because of their actions. I can't blame anyone for not wanting to sign up for American style democracy, or Canadian for that matter. The capitalist democracy we enjoy here is highly flawed and unjust to say the least. It is however the best the world has to offer at the time. The simple act of voting, which we here oft take for granted, can have an extraordinary affect on a people who have not has this right for some time. I witnessed this fact over and over when watching the interviews at the polling stations. This definitely has to be a very good result of the American intervention there. Hopefully they have the freedom to create a non-multinational corporation based capitalism unlike that which we have here. I suspect that the American business machine would not like this one bit and will work very hard to make sure that the Iraqi democracy that will evolve out of this mess will be one in which they will be free to wreak their havoc.

Perhaps some good can come out of all the dying going on in Iraq these days. I'm struck by the words of some of the people at the polls during the election. Many have risked death to vote, yet they come. IN a great many, you can see joy on their faces. I strongly disagree with Bush's reasons for going there, but I can't argue that this election had been over due for some time and George seems to be the only one who was going to make it happen, and has. What the terrorists don't seem to realize is the fact that they are playing right into the hands of people like George. The more innocent people all over the world begin to fear that they will end up getting killed by some nut, the more they become willing to accept the rule of people like George and the associated loss of privacy resulting from all the increased surveillance and security. The more people like George get elected, the less rights all of us will enjoy. Most people will gladly accept the government's increased presence in our personal lives if it means our kids won't get killed by an extremist. So in fact the terrorists are driving the trend towards a much more severe police state, globally. Meanwhile China grows stronger and will very likely start to protest the U.S. actions much more strongly, with the support of Russia who also feels very threatened by recent U.S. actions. The problem with George's campaign to free the Iraqi people is the fact that he started the whole thing with a pack of lies. Any relationship born of deceit is better lost than lived, so I say again, Goodbye George. I just hope that the American people will start to say the same thing.

Which still leaves us with the problem of what to do about situations like Iraq and elsewhere where the people are being enslaved, tortured, or their lives threatened by some extremist group who would have us all living in fear. We know what not to do, see history George W. Bush. The U.N. has shown over and over that it lacks the teeth and uniformity of cause to take fast appropriate action to save lives. This must change. The U.N must recognize certain elemental truths and have an Emergency Response Force that can move in very quickly and decisively in time when they are called upon. U.N. teams have had success in the past. They are much more likely to be accepted by a populace than American troops, especially if they had a large Muslim presence in said force. In situations where the U.N. forces have failed, it has been largely due to the fact that the members could not agree on the terms of their use, and as a result, many have died who might not have had the U.N. been more decisive. Hence the need for an agreement on fundamental truths, and the creation of a force who could respond without the need for lengthy debate in the General Assembly. Perhaps an Agency within the U.N. who could act within a given set of guidelines without direct instruction, and whose actions would be subject to review rather than a force having to wait for instructions on any given matter. Who knows? The one thing we can be sure of, we haven't found the right way yet.

Germany has taken a leading role in trying to get the U.S. to use a technique they haven't really tried in a while, diplomacy, to get Iran to back off on their Nuclear program. The U.S. might start by slowing it's use of military threat over the region. The U.S. continues to escalate it's threatening posture in Iran by flying missions over their air space. The U.S. can not fight the entire world. Russia is now starting to increase it's military presence in Syria in response to the continued American instigations. The entire world is becoming much less stable by the current American mind set. While I realize that it has become very unfashionable to speak out against the U.S. policies and actions, more rational people must continue to do just that. The U.S. might serve to cause of freedom much better by being the worlds true friend rather than to spread freedom through threat and invasion. More and more the term "American Interests" is becoming a prelude to another invasion. Using the excuse of protecting the homeland has been done before when attacking others in the world, in fact two world wars were fought over the phrase. More and more the U.S. is using the terms homeland security, national interests, and national security to justify ever more serious violations of human rights and torture. All of which was done by Germany prior to the last world war. The U.S. is quickly becoming another evil empire while saying that they are just trying to spread freedom. I'll tell you one thing, my idea of freedom is vastly different than the current American version. In America, freedom is only acceptable on their terms, with the U.S. gaining all the advantages in any negotiation. Is it any wonder that so many countries decide that they would rather face hardship than to accept American " help".

How democratic can an election actually be when so many of the citizens will not vote either because they are too afraid or because they refuse to participate so long as the Americans remain in Iraq? A Shiite majority is widely predicted, even though they do not control a majority of the country. Large amounts of people in the Sunni controlled areas are expected to abstain for these reasons. It's still hard to imagine how this can turn out any other way than as a full out civil war. On the up side there are many Shiites and Sunnis working together to try to make the most of this and just perhaps make a start on the long road to true democracy.... Not the republican kind.

I thought this type of thing was not supposed to happen anymore. A man declared dead was found to be breathing once he got to the morgue. Could be a movie in this one.

Multiple reports out on the environment come out now everyday. From estimates as to how much Everest has been shrinking to even more scary predictions on Global Warming. Oh yeah, that's right, I forgot, any suggestion that humans have anything to do with Global Warming and climate change is Un-American. Surely I'm not the only one to see that these Republicans are a damn scary bunch. Hell, judging by their words, they are just about the most Un-American thing to have ever happenned in the U.S.

Looks like those earlier estimates of the age of the shroud were flawed. New testing has shown that the shroud is much older than the past estimates. So the mystery surrounding the shroud continues and past comments about it being a forgery can now be revisited.

Sooner or later, someone's going to have to pay for all these fun and games. Perhaps we might approach that pillar of reason and sanity Ann Coulter. Nice to see that the women aren't being left behind in the race for lunacy that has been taking place in the U.S. for the last five years. Hell, all one needs to do is question the logic of the current plan to get an immediate reaction from types such as she. The reaction will include being called the enemy of the U.S., being unpatriotic, being called a terrorist supporter, etc. So much for democracy, so much for dissent, so much for freedom of speech, so much for the constitution, so much for the Bill of Rights, so much for every premise that the U.S. was founded on. Hell the U.S. of Ann Coulter's dreams, and all those who share her views, looks an awful lot like Nazi Germany. Oh, and Ann, as far as your warning that the U.S. will soon roll over and crush Canada....While that may in fact happen one day, you might want to study the history of the last time the U.S. tried to invade Canada, and also, I'm sure that if the U.S. does in fact come our way one day, Ann Coulter won't be among those who put their lives on the line. Oh no... She will comment on the great struggle from the comfort of the studio. Meanwhile, all those persons whose rights to express their views she is so quick to label will have to go out and do the fighting for her and her loud mouthed friends. And the U.S. debt just keeps going up and up, setting new records every year. Perhaps if they just keep beating the war drums loud enough nobody will notice.

At least a good portion of them don't when it comes to A.I.D.s. That's what a recent poll suggests anyway. Considering the U.S. Governments record on honesty and ethics, can you really blame them? And, whose to say that A.I.D.s wasn't developed by the U.S. gov't?

I can't stand Microsoft. I can say this as a person who has been chained to it for more than five years now. I won't go into the seemingly infinite reasons why at this point. I don't feel quite the same way about Bill Gates. For one reason, he has given a good portion of his personal wealth to charity. He's doing so again. Another is the fact that employees of Microsoft from the beginning fared very well when it came time to retire. We have to admit that the guy is a super genius. The problem is that with all super genius', they can get a little obsessive when left unchecked. I think he has been misguided on several key business principles and he has been too obsessed with being the big winner to stop, step back, and re-assess, a very necessary process for someone in his position. In any case, he has done a whole lot more for the less fortunate than many other men in comparable positions.

The verbal war between Iran and the U.S. continues to heat up as the threats continue to fly both ways. The real problem with re-electing George Bush is the fact that he now feels he has been given permission by the people of the U.S. to continue with his one country campaign to make the world safe for America, If the disaster that is the situation in Iraq is any indication, things should get even more impossible to fix as he takes his war into yet an ever-expanding never-ending series of escalations. The thing is most Americans don't support this type of foreign policy. The only reason that they allow this type of action is the fact that 9/11 scared the hell out of them. As a result, the voices of the more liberal and intelligent among them has been totally drowned out by the outrage of the nation. So here we sit. The world teetering on the edge of a new religious world war, as the environment threatens to swallow large portions of the planet in the next fifty years. Did I mention the fact that I think this figure much more likely to be twenty at the current rate of progress? Meanwhile the growing number of nations that now feel threatened by the U.S. are now starting to talk and form alliances. China, Iran, and Russia jump immediately to mind. How long can it possibly be until these other nations say enough and start to mobilize in answer to the American's independent war on terror? The U.S. has become very good at turning war into a big business bonanza. This is the main reason that the American's insistence that they are acting in support of freedom such a lark. The American's record on Nation Building is a sad and sorry one indeed. In virtually every case in the past that they have tried to walk into a country and straighten them out, they have left only suffering and disaster in their wake. I don't know if there is any right way to go into a country and impose democracy. But then again, George Bush clearly doesn't either.

Actually, it was no human explanation. They used to say that it had no rational explanation. I guess someone finally decided that just because it wasn't human doesn't mean it's not rational. In either case, that's what the latest panel of experts have concluded about the weeping Madonna. According to the report, this was determined after extensive testing which would have shown any human cause for the blood. The part I find really perplexing is the fact that the blood tested as human male. Now there's a riddle. Female statues bleeding male blood? Perhaps it would have been easier to believe if the blood had tested female. Yeah that's it, I'd really believe it if it had been female blood, yeah, that's the ticket. Strange but true!

Now there was a guy with a lot of class. I'm not talking about anything to do with money. I mean the deep down class that this lad showed all his life. The kind of guy who became the most famous man in America, so to speak, and yet always appeared humble and kept his private life just that, private. The kind of man who came off as highly intelligent, yet made everyone comfortable and was always poking fun at himself. I've missed him since he left the Tonight Show, we'll miss him even more now.

Looks like the Canadian Military is left with the job of dealing with toxic waste it has buried in the past. One area that holds interest to me is Shirley's Bay, a training site near Ottawa. I was one of the military people who trained at Shirley's Bay. While training there one day I grew weak and started to have trouble catching my breath. Within an hour I was at Ottawa's National Defense Medical Center in intensive care. My stay lasted a week due to what they described as a viral lung infection. That didn't exactly explain the large purple welt that had appeared on my stomach. Now I learn that they had buried some toxic stuff there. I don't know exactly what was buried and where. I might find that information helpful in knowing what long term affects might have resulted.

Almost daily, I come across stories such as these and am left completely astounded. We're not talking about something going on in the jungles of Africa, out of sight and mind. We're talking about right hear in North America and as recently as 1994. To think that an organization could operate with the reported policies is quite hard to believe except for the fact that it has been so widely reported. We are talking about a cult, one that until quite recently openly encouraged sex with their children. I can't help but wonder where to authorities were when all this was going on. The results were all too predictable. One of the abused kids grows up, looses it, and takes revenge before killing himself. One might think that these recent developments might be enough to constitute probable cause for the federales to go in and do the in depth investigation that has apparently not been done to date.

In yet another sign of things to come, experts are now warning over the flow rates of Arctic rivers. Suffice it to say that surely people have to stop arguing the fact at some point and start serious measures to remedy the problems. But there are still those who refuse to accept man's role in the process and as such prefer to do nothing.

Well, not really but then again yes. I suppose I could relate our household's sudden onset of severe flu/cold symptoms to the fact that both my wife and kids come into contact with a great many people during the course of their days. It just sounds so much more interesting to say that we have been the victims of a conspiracy to poison us and make it appear as if it were just the cold. In any case, what a nasty one. My wife is one tough cookie and in 13 years I have rarely seen her slowed much by any illness. Not this time! She has been sicker than I've ever seen her. She has essentially been bed ridden for four days now. I can only say, I'm scared! I have now joined the ranks of the afflicted. My fear stems from the fact that if this thing has hit my wife so badly, it will likely kill me. While I have remained in bed for two days now, I can't get any sleep because the coughing won't let me. Suffice it to say that the flus and colds are getting worse, much worse. Despite taking massive doses of medication, nothing is really providing much relief to date. While I recognize the risk of global pandemic, I have no doubt that flus such as these will have much the same affect. There comes a point in time where further close association of great numbers of people becomes undesirable, if only to stop the spread of illness such as this one. I can only guess at the results of this type of illness on someone who is weak or already sick. Help me!!! I'm coughing and I can't get up!

It's all fairly predictable. British soldiers get caught, just like their buddies, the Americans, abusing and torturing prisoners. Soldiers say the same thing, they were following orders, soldier goes to jail for a long time. The quality of any military service is directly proportional to the discipline practiced by their troops. To suggest that any superior does not know what his men are doing is to either say that he is incompetent or lying. This type of thing usually occurs when the troops are encouraged to act in an unethical fashion. I liked the old days better, that is the days when superior officers spent a whole lot less time trying to protest that they didn't know what their men were doing, and a whole lot more time accepting their responsibility for the actions of their men, and making damn sure the same mistakes never get made twice.

The mudslides have come to B.C. What I could never understand is why people build houses right next to or right on top of unstable ridges. Of course one might think that local inspectors would have never allowed construction in such a location in the first place. But then again, I got taken in by something similar myself. In our case it's water. Our house is built about two feet lower than it should have been based on the local water table. In fact six houses in a row are built like that. The best part is that the water has been rising for ten years. Translation, two floods so far. So I guess that makes me just as big an idiot as everyone else. One thing is for certain, I won't make the same mistake twice!

Hawaii this time! At least it wasn't done on purpose like many other great eco-mistakes. In this instance it's Puerto Rican frogs that are wreaking havoc. This is another example how a change in economics to a focus on smaller macro-economies would greatly reduce the risk of this kind of thing. By producing most of our requirements locally, we omit the need for long-range transport and save the massive environmental cost that this kind of transport entails. Sooner or later as the cost of the damage to the Earth becomes more difficult to ignore and starts to become incorporated into the price of goods, buying locally will become much more attractive. People who ship things around the world will have a very difficult time competing with local producers. Will their still be global trade? Absolutely, it's an economy of scale thing. Some items and services are just a lot cheaper to produce on a massive scale. Hydro, Mining, Telecommunications,you get the idea. That also generates some answers about the Canadian Beef thing, we stouldn't be trying so hard to sell it internationally anyway. We're practically selling it as a raw resource as it is. We would be much better to focus on building the rendering plants hear. This would be much more preferable to selling the beef to someone else, having them process it, and then buying it back at an increased price.

We have been aware for some time that the oceans and the seas are in big trouble. This is the first I've read about the seas around Britain are in trouble as well. We have all the knowledge we need to stop the damage and possibly even reverse a fair bit of it. What we are lacking is the will to make these changes. What amazes me is that there are those who think that we can survive with our oceans barren. We can not. Should the oceans become barren, all else on Earth will be too, including us!

Christians and Muslims came to blows at a recent funeral in New Jersey. The problem is this incident is not isolated.
More and more people seem to be coming to the conclusion that Muslims and other faiths can't live together in peace. When I question this view the answers always seem to be the same. People in Canada are saying that it is the fault of the Muslim community. They say that the Muslims have the view that any other faith than their own are infidels that if they can't be converted, must be killed. I have very strong hopes that the people who think that all Muslims believe this are wrong. I hold out hope that there are more reasonable Muslims who do not feel this way and who only desire to live in peace with the rest of us and respect each person's right to practice their faith in a manner which they choose. Last summer I had the chance to work on several houses where the tenants were Muslim. In the majority of cases we were treated with the utmost respect and courtesy. This included being treated to coffee, deserts, and conversation. I would have to say that these folks ended up being among the most pleasant people we have ever worked for. The topic of religion never came up. My point being that it is possible to live, work, and play in peace with persons of all other faiths. The moderates among us must speak up loudly if we are to stem the tide which very much seems to be taking us down the road to another great religious war.

Once again Canadian Justice is showing its mettle. The nut in question is seeking a conditional discharge for his crime. The fact that this is even a possibility in cases such as these speaks plenty all by itself.

They think the person who did it may have been seeking revenge. Revenge for the person he killed several years earlier in a drunk driving incident. Now here's the thing, he killed the guy four years earlier. He was killed at his home. That means he hit and killed someone, went through all the legal proceedings, served whatever sentence he received, and managed to be back home within four years where he was killed. Suffice to say, the sentence couldn't have been very harsh. Now consider how the family of the dead cyclist must feel every day that they think about this guy walking around, enjoying his life, when the innocent victim lies dead. Now is it really hard to wonder what could drive a person to take this kind of action when the legal system obviously will not take an appropriate response. This goes the same for all those cases where a criminal commits a brutal murder and is able to plea themselves down to manslaughter and get a five year sentence. This means that they will likely only serve three. This my friends is not justice. The laws have to change in order to give the rights back to the victims again. While I believe that people should be protected from unjust prosecution, criminals must be made to serve sentences more in tune with their crimes. For society to function properly, citizens must be secure in the concept of their personal safety. They must feel as if justice is being done. Some of the largest American cities with the highest crime levels have managed to make huge gains in reducing youth violent crime. This same type of crime has been on a massive increase within Canadian cities. Perhaps it's time to call people like Rudolph Guliani and find out what they did and implement some of those same steps here.

The economics have always been there to show that if only a part of the money spent on military around the world were used instead to feed the starving, hunger could be eliminated on this planet. The U.N. is now calling on the developed nations to live up to a past agreement to double aid to the less fortunate nations. According to the agreement, developmental aid is supposed to be doubled over the next ten years.

Not exactly! The problem with the U.N. is that there are so many different opinions that it's hard to get anything done. The problem is significant even at the Security Council level. The U.N. must start to find more common ground when it comes to issues of a populace being effectively held captive. Once achieving that commonality of purpose, the military wing of the U.N. must grow some teeth. The people of the U.S. have the right intentions, I'm talking about the people here not the administration. It is in the application of those intentions that creates the problems. The situation in Iran has existed for quite a few years now. There are many signs that the policies are changing slowly but surely through the efforts of several prominent Iranians. I think the Iranian people should be given every opportunity to resolve the problems that exist in Iran on their own. This will produce a much stronger and stable government in the long run. Any military action by the U.S. at this point would prove anything but productive. If, in some deep part of our minds, we can find justification for the Iraq campaign, we must at least recognize that Iran is not being held captive by some dictator. It is much more difficult to justify an attack there. It's time that the U.N. started doing the job for which it was created and act in a timely enough manner to make any difference.

Now here's one I hope is totally wrong. A journalist is reporting that the Americans already have special forces guys in Iran, just in case so to speak. I should think one chaotic mess at a time would be enough. I have no idea what the solution to the Iraq problem is, but I sure as hell know that any solution for Iran must come from the International community as a whole and not the U.S. by itself. The result of yet another unilateral attack by the U.S. will be even more chaos and very possibly a world war. It's time for the U.S. to show a little restraint and stop acting as bullies. American administrations used to understand the concepts of negotiation and diplomacy. Under George all that seems to have been forgotten.

I just wanted to take the opportunity to recognize the never ending and tireless efforts of what are probably the two organizations that I have the most respect for, Greenpeace and Amnesty International. Their efforts can only be described as heroic in the face of disinterest and often physical danger. Fact is, these guys and gals, have much more courage than I have or ever had, and I've had military training. It takes great bravery to take up a fight, it takes even more to take up that fight and not respond to violence with violence. I don't suggest that anyone not defend themselves when faced with physical harm, but I absolutely recognize that those individuals who are able to do just that have achieved a higher evolutionary level than I have been able to reach. I have hopes that one day violence will be such a rare occurrence that many more of us will be able to join those select few who have evolved to this more enlightened state. I have added links to my side bar for both in case anyone is interested. They have a lot of tips as to how you and I can be of help or simply start living in a more ethical fashion. Check em out.

They just keep dying. Now in North Carolina. More Pilot whales have beached themselves and have died. We can almost consider events like this as a good measure of our affect on the environment. Suffice to say, we're failing. So long as animals in the wild continue to act outside of their normal patterns, we can assume that for whatever reason, we are not living harmoniously with our environment. Only when things like this stop happening can we say that we are succeeding .

Well, at least he's honest. I would much prefer to hear the truth then the non-stop bull we're used to hearing about this subject. Fact is, the U.S. has long practiced the fine art of torture, they just haven't admitted it. Most times, it is done in far away places where journalists are not permitted to tread. In any case, this is one subject that is not so easy to nail down. The moral side of me says that torture should not be allowed under any circumstances. Surely there must be a better way of gaining crucial information from captured enemies, terrorists and criminals. The other side of me can easily picture situations that would justify it's use. I can imagine child murderers or kidnappers who will not disclose the location of the child and where any delay in extracting said information would result in the death of the child. Perhaps this is an occasion for it's use. What about the case of nuclear terrorism. Suppose we have information ( concrete information, not the George Bush variety) that tells us there is going to be an attack and we know who is going to do it. Would this be an excuse for the use of torture? I have high hopes that within the near future we will have the ability to gain this type of information without the use of physical torture, perhaps mental coercion or through the use of truth drugs this could be achieved. In any case, the use or not of torture should be debated in the public forum in a rational manner without the high degree of lies that currently surround the subject.

The Earth appears to be warming many time s faster than all the predictions have so far estimated. Reports for this winter have put winter temperatures between 5 and 10 degrees Celsius above average. If this trend continues at it's current rate, the destruction is going to come very much faster than even I have predicted. The weather patterns this winter should make it clear enough, but just in case it isn't, one only has to wait a couple more to see the real fun begin. And I do mean a few years, not the fifty to seventy that we have been reading about. Let's try within ten years at the current rate of change. And that's ten years for the damage to be extreme. The lead up to that should prove a whole lot of fun for a great many people.

Bush is now reported to be regretting his pledge to keep the troops in Iraq until the job is done , so to speak. I have long wondered how exactly he was going to get out of the complete mess he has made there and now we may be getting hints at how this is to be accomplished. It's hard to imagine the Americans just walking away after completely destroying a nation, but then again, there are plenty of past examples of American history to act as a guide to doing just that.

Even as the U.S. complains about human rights abuses globally, it is becoming known more and more as a trend setter in the very art of human rights abuses. The other nations of the world are now using the American's own record of abuses as justification for the crimes they are committing. Looks like the hypocrisy in the American's own foreign policy positions are clear to everyone but the Americans.

It never ceases to amaze me just how brutal humans can be. Judging from the latest news, we as a species have made very little in the way of real progress. In one report, two would be parents decide to adopt. They end up with a troubled little boy who apparently was not getting along with the father. The end result is that the parents have just been convicted of killing the youngster by salt poisoning and a blow to the head. In another case, in Mexico, several men have been charged with raping and killing multiple women. Enough women to give one the impression that this was a favorite sport among this group. What is even more disturbing is the fact that there are reportedly hundreds more women missing who may very well have fallen victim to the same treatment. When one considers the human record in regards to it's treatment of each other, one can only conclude that we are much lower on the evolutionary scale then the animals which for the most part only kill out of necessity. We, on the other hand, seem much more brutal than all other species combined. I might think that this is a recent development, but that is clearly not the case. We seem to be living up to a long tradition of monstrous acts committed upon each other. I read today that there is actually a video game which allows the player to chop up hookers in L.A. Why anyone would enjoy this particular aspect of the game is beyond me. Is this not the equivalent of giving implied consent to the vary same acts done in reality? Are we all really so depraved that we now accept this kind of imagery as a regular part of life? There is really no doubt that humans are one sick species. It is becoming clear that we are losing even the pretense that we are an advanced species in any way. From the pastime of killing unwanted female children, to killing wives who don't come with the proper dowry, to cutting off parts of the female anatomy that some find objectionable, to the current upcoming trend of picking senior citizens to beat and rob because they are easier targets, to.... well you get the idea. I could come to the conclusion that these are the acts of mentally sick individuals or persons driven practically insane by dire need, but this does not appear to be the case. Many of these crimes are committed in the developed world by people who should know much better or at least show a little compassion for there fellow humans. Again, this does not appear to be the case. The U.S. is leading the charge in being global bullies. Should it come as any surprise that our youth are following in that example and creating a society that bears a strong resemblance to The Lord of the Flies. Police and the courts can only do so much. Anarchy seems to draw closer every day and the situation shows every sign of becoming much worse as our treatment of the environment begins to take more and more of a toll. The only hope I can find is in the actions of all the people who are working very hard to try and change these very realities. People such as Margaret Hassan, former director of C.A.R.E. in Baghdad. Oh, that's right, they killed her too!

There appears to be a rising problem in American schools over the teaching of evolution. The bible thumpers are protesting the teaching of evolution as opposed to creationism. The problem with teaching creationism as a viable theory is the fact that there is very little evidence to suggest that the theory is correct. Evolution on the other hand is backed by a great deal of evidence. I can understand why people who believe that the Earth was created about 6000 years ago might be upset by the fact that schools stress evolution, can you really blame them. Schools should, and for the most part do, teach subjects based on the best evidence and theories that are available at the time. Does this mean that they should exclude creationism, absolutely not. While schools should stress evolution as the most fact based theory available, I don't see any problem with them going over creationism as well. After all, it is another theory. However, it is not the only alternate theory. If creationism is to be included in the teachings, shouldn't all the theories be introduced and then let the students come to their own conclusions. The most common argument for creationism seems to be the fact that they say the universe is far too complicated and delicate for it to have evolved naturally. This is frankly bull. It's really just a numbers game and through the use of statistics and physics we can easily see how evolution may have in fact been the true sculptor of our world. Does this mean that evolution is the absolute truth? No! It simply means that it is the best theory we have to date based on the evidence. As in all knowledge, it may very well be that in the future we will gain more knowledge and look back on the theory of evolution as simplistic and flawed. Only time will tell. In the mean time shouldn't we teach our kids all the theories? The path to enlightenment is not travailed by steadfastly sticking to outdated and unsupported theories, but instead by the rational examination of all possibilities and continuing to search for the answers to the questions that these theories do not address.

Yet another blogger has been fired for their comments about their work. What sets this one apart is the fact that the blogger in question actually said very little about work on their blog and didn't identify the location of their workplace, but he did identify the company. In this case the author is claiming freedom of speech. He is also stating that he did not berate the company in any major way. Once again I have to state that as an employee of any company, you are required to tow their line, so to speak, when it comes to any interaction where you are identifying yourself as one of their employees. As soon as we make this connection, we totally put ourselves in the hands of the executives of said firm, and in the hands of any judgment they may make about the comments we have made. The more prudent approach, particularity when it comes to publishing, is to work under a pseudonym and to never identify yourself as an employee of the company. I have a feeling this is not going to be the last we hear of this type of thing as blogging becomes more and more common.

So Canada's contribution to the great tsunami effort has finally arrived in Sri Lanka. It is however unfortunate that this contribution has arrived just a wee bit late if you ask me. Bill Graham and company were thinking the matter over during the time that this team may have been most use. Now that they have arrived there seems to be some question as to just what they are actually going to do there. On CTV news there was some talk of road and bridge building. Isn't that the job of combat engineers and the like, not the job of a disaster team. Oh yeah that's right, Canada no longer believes in the concept of a military that is actually good for anything other than light police work. Oh, sorry, it's only the politicians that want to totally castrate our once proud military services. These Canadian politicians are really starting to piss me off. It's getting harder and harder for me to bitch about those crazies down south when frankly, they are the only ones who would save our asses if the fighting ever broke out in Canada or the U.S. In other words, Canada has to start pulling it's military weight if we are to keep the respect of the rest of the world. Then I can get back to the much more pleasant pastime of bitching about the Americans.

News in about a new solar film discovery from U. of Toronto. The new substance has the potential to make solar energy many times more efficient. This would bring the cost per Kilowatt Hour of solar energy way down. Solar energy would also become much more competative with other forms of energy including wind power.

Europe is the latest victim of killer weather as yet another deadly storm hits. Is anybody else getting the feeling that things are going to get much worse before they get better.

The mainstream is acting all surprised at the new reports that may be the doctors down in Guantanamo may not be our first choice for family physician. Hasn't this been totally obvious all along? The U.S. has hardly welcomed U.N inspectors there and has long held the position that the area is a special zone outside of regular U.S. laws. So long as places like this exist, or the School of the Americas, still in operation last I heard but under a different name, there really is no such thing as true civil rights in America. We can't chastise anyone else over their record on civil rights so long as we are party to acts which equal if not surpass the acts which we are criticizing. That's one little thing the C.I.A. and the American government need to learn.

They got through! Despite all my firewalls and security a hacker(s) managed to get through and make my last five days a living hell. The good side is that I had all my crucial files backed up. The bad thing is that with my bloody Microsoft box I effectively had to restore everything to factory condition before reloading all my software. I'm not done yet. Now this may very well be the work of some staunch defender of democracy who takes offence to some of my comments about American politics or it may be just some kid having some fun. Fact is that they tried it again last night. Fortunately I was in the middle of the re-install process and as such was able to stop it before to much damage was done. In any case I can't really understand why anyone would want to do this anyway. In the case of the democracy champion, isn't this kind of thing exactly what democracy and freedom of speech means? If it is some kid, wouldn't you get the same kick out of just getting around the security without destroying everything in the process? Anyway, I'm Back!!!!!