Bud Talkinghorn: Bites

I have been too busy to post Bud's work. As I've told you before, Bud, slave labour isn't what it is cracked up to be. Do 'soon come' and 'manana' ring any bells? Sorry, Bud. NJC



Terri Schiavo's right to die

Terri should be a gallow's sermon for making your wishes known. I can think of no indignity worse than lying comatose for years, too brain dead to even know you are there, and having your wishes for an easeful death ignored. "The pull the plug" crowd, to which I belong, considers the good karma that will accrue in freeing up those wasted hospital beds. And think of the money you will free up to the mentally alive ill. If I am brain dead then they can stack up me like cordwood along with my fellow zapped buddies. To think of my lying there for years, while some kid dies from late treatment is too much to bear. As the country's demographics show us, there are just going to be too many of us old codgers hooked up to machines. The burden on the young to keep the health system from crashing will invite deep cynicism and intergenerational friction. The generation that had it all during their lifetime, will now exact a punishing zombie joke on their children. So slap a bumper sticker on your car that reads: "I don't want to be a vegetable," It might clear up any confusion about what your final wishes were.

© Bud Talkinghorn




Two important legal issues addressed

The first one was a comment from Supreme Court Justice, Ian Binnie. He concurred with National security agencies that the security of the nation supercedes that of the individual. Known al-Queda members who belong to sleeper cells cannot be allowed to carry out their plot. We are stuck with a defective IRB which allowed many of them in, but once we see the vile acts they are plotting in future, they cannot be allowed their freedom to act. At BInnie's meeting was David Harris, the CSIS head. He tried to outline the gravity of a mass casualty attack. The fear, the panic, that would ensue is almost beyond our imaginations. As 9/11 showed us, the ripple effects are huge. The cost of heightened security isn't even commented on anymore. If that clown/killer, Mohammed Atta, were to threaten to slash the throat of the female loans official today he would be instantly detained. The fact, that Atta told her he could kill her and take the wall map he wanted, and the map was an aerial photo of Washington, D.C. should have twigged her to his terrorist intentions. But she didn't even officially report the incident. Anti-terrorism is our new world war struggle. We are fighting a wily enemy who hides in the darkness until attack time arrives. Tough laws are a partial answer on the homefront.

The second legal issue is that of confiscating the property of suspected criminals. Under the Ontario Remedies to Organized Crime Bill, adopted in 2002, goods could be seized only after a criminal conviction. Now a new law, called the Civil Remedies Act, removes the need for a criminal conviction. That means that all the police have to do is 'suspect' that the money is dirty to take it. [Scroll down for a link.] If they can convince a civil judge that it is probably dirty, the state can keep it. The Florida and Louisiana police took this to mean that they could randomly stop traffic and search cars. If they found, on their mainly black detainees, cash as low as $800, they would simply take it. The victims could take their retrieval case to court and sue to get it back. You had to prove that it wasn't illlegally obtained. Just try to prove a negative like that. The draconian U.S. legislation that allowed this highway robbery was modified, only after severe condemnation by the media and the public, however. Giving the police the right to casually stop an innocent citizen and seize his money is a righteous step towards a Gestapo-esque police force. This onus-on-the-indivual to prove his innocence flies in the face of legal tradition. This bill is being watched closely by provinces other than Ontario. Let us hope this thug state idea of justice is repealed.

© Bud Talkinghorn -- The next article is related.



'Dirty money' act challenged in class action; Lawsuit says law violates the Charter -- Lawsuit says law violates the Charter Michael Friscolanti, Mar. 21, 05, National Post

Two Ontario men have launched a $100-million class action against the provincial government, demanding that a controversial anti-crime law be struck down because it violates the Charter.

At the centre of the looming court battle is legislation that gives the province the power to confiscate suspected dirty money from people who have not been convicted of any crime. If a person wants his money back, he must appear in civil court and convince a judge that the cash is not linked to anything illegal.

The legislation is unconstitutional, the lawsuit claims, because it breaks a basic tenet of Canadian criminal justice -- that a person is innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. [. . . . ]

Search: Civil Remedies Act, on a balance of probabilities, Kam-Tim Tong, Robin Chatterjee, typically used to grow pot, Ontario Superior Court, legal director of the Ontario Attorney-General's Civil Remedies unit




CBC finally does the right thing.

The CBC's coverage of the Conservative convention was quite balanced. Mercifully, it was not hosted by Peter Mansbridge. That man is an assassin for the Liberal Party. The Mothercorps saw that the policies were debated and the speakers not over-ridden by supercilious CBC banter. The CBC's main commentor, Martin, asked reasonable questions about the political fallout that the major ones would have. His co-host was a Conservative analyst. Let us hope that CBC continues to eschew their former biases against all things conservative.

© Bud Talkinghorn




Sharing the wampum -- "Mansbridge: One on One"--CBC March 13th

It was amusing to listen to Peter Mansbridge interview Phil Fontaine, the Canadian Aboriginal Grand Chief. Mansbridge let him drone and whine on about how the lack of progress in the native community is all the fault of the government. All Mansbridge did was toss Fontaine puff ball questions. Even the few that might have led to an honest introspection about native responsibility for their problems, were deflected back to the whiteman's guilt. According to Fontaine, the Indians should have been allowed to languish in their far-flung communities, keeping their original culture and languages. Of course, if the government had allowed that, they would be accused (and rightly so) for a de facto apartheid approach--reserves as Bantustans.

To this day, Mr. Fontaine refuses to see that assimilation to the economic realities of the world is the only hope for advancement. He wouldn't even be in his position today, if all he spoke was Northern Cree or some other dialect. The subtext to his message was "give us more money and stop asking for any government oversight of the taxpayers' billions" Mansbridge should have pushed him harder. He could have brought up the fraud that permeates too many reserves. There is something very wrong when over $10-billion a year is ladled their way; yet, the wretched housing, crime and alcoholism is still endemic. (Where do these far-flung natives get the money to become alcoholics, when bootleg liquor is $25 a pint on many reserves?)

However, the CBC is on the teat as well. For their billion in our 'wampum' we get endless reruns--this interview was one--and we are fed liberal angst programs like this one. You have a Mansbridge, who prides himself on being ultra-politically correct, trying to tackle the primary Indian's illogical propositions. He failed through self-censorship. Well, I'm sorry but I am suffering from guilt fatigue. Martin has got me all concerned about what we are doing "to save Africa" from its self-inflicted wounds Then there are the homeless guys and womens' shelters in this country that I genuinely want to support. Until I see a true proposal from the aboriginals -- a proposal which comes to grips with their isolationist economical fantasies and their various debilitating pathologies, my heart is hardened unto granite.

© Bud Talkinghorn




Office romances

It is interesting to see that Mr. Stonecipher, the CEO of Boeing, was fired for having an affair with a company senior executive. Now the age of neo-puritanism is well upon us and he did sign on to the company's strict no fraternization rules. But so did his paramour Ms. Peacock (great name that); therefore, why was she not fired as well? It is not as though she were some Girl Friday who didn't know the rules. The legal battle that will probably ensue from this affair will be quite informative. For decades the best place to really get to know someone well was in the workplace. Most of the married friends I know have met at the workplace and nobody batted an eye. Now that the morality police have cut off that avenue, it is back to the shallows of the bars, or the internet chat lines. What's next on the PC checklist?

© Bud Talkinghorn