Bud Talkinghorn: Reefer Madness 2, Cotler & Privacy, Michaelle Jean, In defense of less is more

Reefer Madness 11

Is it possible that America's new Drug Czar is really Harry Ansinger the second? I wait with anticipation for the sequel of that famous short film pushed by the first Drug Czar himself. You know, the one where the weasel-looking dude axes his better half, because she threw out his stash. And when he is sentenced, he is rolling his eyes crazily as the judge gives him the Ole Sparky. What superb casting! But imagine if they could get Brad Pitt to play the bad guy and Jennifer (Garner, Lopez, Aniston) to play the virtuous wife. Boffo effect, I tell you. The only proviso of the contract being is that none of them has to undergo a drug test. In the director's cut, they could have Marc Emery as Mr. Big, He could be shown as a Goldfinger type, plotting to destroy Halliburton's will to carry on the war in Iraq or some other patriotic theme. Perhaps in one of Charlton Heston's more lucid moments, he could be hear intoning, "If those Canucks just had a sensible gun policy, they could have blown these grow-op b*****ds away." As a counter balance, to woo the more liberal crowd, you could have Michael Moore suggesting that Dubya's real crime was puffing the wacky weed, not snorting cocaine. "What's he really growing down there in his hidden farm in Crawford?", might be a key tag line innuendo.

You simply can't cast the paranoia net too wide when you are fighting drug fiends. Just because we failed to defeat demon rum during Prohibition--and incidentally brought in the Mafia, which has never gone away--doesn't mean we should give up the good fight. I ask for only one no-no. Don't include asking the students, as in the past, to bring in a suspected marijuana plant to the teacher, as they might have been infected by this hideous addiction as well.

© Bud Talkinghorn--The only thing I can say about that Emery boy is that he certainly saved the Coast Guard and the airforce a whole lot of a lot of money trying to stop those ships loaded with ditch weed from Colombia and Mexico.

No comment on the inimitable Bud and the wacky weed. Gimme that old time . . . stuff that pours.




Big Brother wants to read your blogs and e-mails

It is ironic that Justice Minister Irwin Cotler, who was advertised as "a prominent civil rights advocate" by the Liberals, now wnats to trample the most basic of privacy rights. He wants to grant the police and CSIS the sweeping authority to intradict anyone's correspondence in the name of national security. Yet he is the same man who always champions the right of undocumented 'refugees' to enter Canada and who often simply disappear into the cities' ghettoes when their claims are to be judged. Under the Liberals' watch we have even seen 36,000 deportees disappear thusly.

Would such draconian legislation really ferret out the Ressams in our midst? I highly doubt it, as there seems to be a plethora of al-Qaeda agents who happen to be computer experts. Through coded messages and advanced encryption these terrorists would probably foil any attempts to intercept their plans. On the other hand, it would be a fine tool for the Liberals to harass their opponents. Look at how Chretien used the police to falsely accuse Beaudoin in the BDB scandal. Then there was the infamous example of how Nixon used the Internal Revenue in the States to attack his detractors. That action was strictly illegal, but he managed to use it anyway. Giving this viciously corrupt government such a weapon is unthinkable. If they have suspicions of terrorist activity on the internet they can get a judge's permission to tap it. Cotler should turn in his badge for even suggesting such an abomination.

© Bud Talkinghorn




Will the real Michaelle Jean please stand up?

The spin on Ms. Jean is making me dizzy. The separatists feel cheated. After all, didn't she salute their cause in camera? Didn't she and hubby get down with the FLQ brothers? The Liberals are in a huff because she finally did make a weak statement disavowing any allegiance to the separatists, but those d*** "smear campaign" people aren't buying it. As though that isn't enough, the media is now reporting that her ascendence was primarily due to the former Heritage Minister, Helene Scherrer, rooting for her. Ms. Scherrer is now a secretary to Paul Martin--nobody ever loses their pay check because the public voted them out--and she vouched for Jean. According to Scherrer, Jean is the epitome of what Canada needs as a G-G. For one, she went out to Calgary to speak and, by gum, she gave her initial speech entirely in French. So if most of the rednecks couldn't understand it, that's their problem. Besides Trudeau gave them decades to get with the bilingual mandate. On top of that she really likes the fact that Jean is "very, very much a Quebec nationalist", just as Scherrer has always been herself. That Jean is a woman plays well to the feminist voters as well.

The fact that Michaelle Jean is a nobody to most of English Canada is of no importance. If they were part of the 6% who watch CBC they would be better informed. Well, I have watched Jean in action and find it hard to be overly impressed with someone who spends a couple of minutes introducing (never analyzing) the subjects of Roughcuts and The Passionate Eye--documentaries relentlessly left-wing.

Anyway, we are told that her real import is with Radio Canada, the CBC's Quebec wing. That fills me with more trepidation than admiration. Radio Canada has been a fortress of separatist foment for decades, even though it has existed purely through Canadian tax money. A small accomodation we are expected to make so Quebecers will feel wanted. One further consideration about Jean is her dual Canadian-French citizenship. This is also problematic. Outside of Quebec there is no country that has meddled in the separatist issue as much as France. It goes beyond Charles DeGualle's "Viva le Quebec libre" speech in Montreal. There is evidence that the French Secret Service in the past (and present?) was/is? actively engaged in encouraging Quebec separtation.

David Frum in The National Post (Friday, Aug. 19) did a beautiful job of showing the blatant hypocrisy of the Liberals and the NDP when it comes to "the hideous threat posed by the separatists". Martin chastised Harper for trying to call a early election, which would only "suit the separatist cause", while Layton mouthed the same platitudes for supporting a corrupt Liberal administration. Perhaps the best though, was Belinda Stronach claiming that her opportunism was motivated by the need to keep Canada united.. However, when it comes to nominating a possible separatist supporter to the Governor-General post that is all forgotten.

The republicans amongst us should rejoice because this appointment will only drive another nail in the coffin of the monarchist connection to Britain. From a CBC left-wing elitist like Adrienne Clarkson, to a separatist-leaning Jean, the route to irrelevance is fully established. So maybe we should raise a glass to this absurd appointment.

© Bud Talkinghorn



If we allow Sharia law to be introduced into Canada, then it is only fair to allow the Catholics to reinvigourate the Inquistion and to applaud the Protestants' for bringing back the Salem witch trials.

© Bud Talkinghorn



In defense of less is more

In our multi-tasking, hyper-consumerist society we have lost the ability to quietly reflect on the reason for living. While America is the paramount example of a go, go, go society, there is no question that Canada is catching up. It is not just the neo-cons that believe in the deadly sin of sloth, it is their lefty brethren as well. One has only to see how Sunday as the day of rest has been transferred into a frenzy of mall hopping. Thousands must work that day so that millions can spend the day bustling through the malls' almost identical shops. And these malls might have a ratio of leisure spots to shops of 1:20. Clothing of the body certainly out-distances the clothing of the mind. Now if I saw ecstasy radiating from the faces of these shoppers, I might be converted to materialism; however, more often I see a sullenness reflecting a dissatisfaction with their purchases. And as the malls grow ever more gargantuan, there is a sheer exhaustion from the lengthy trudge necessary to nail that 20% discounted $145 pair of Tommy Hilfiger jeans.

Mind you, if many of these people stayed home, they would be watching television programs that are so fragmented by twenty commercials per hour that they resemble kaleidoscopic entities. We wonder why so many kids have ADHD, yet forget the thousands of shifting images they are exposed to in a night of television consumption--interspersed with their hyper-active nintendo games. Forget ritalin; some of these kids are so juiced they need a healthy dose of thorazine tranquilizer / sedation.

Rolling along with this avarice for ever more goods are a host of looming disasters. The depleted savings accounts of North Americans have put us at the mercy of foreign lenders, including some quite unsavoury ones like the Chinese communists. The three car families and their McMansions contribute to gridlock and urban sprawl. Who is going to buy a tiny Smart Car, when being hit by a leviathan-sized SUV or pick-up truck would turn your car into a metal coffin? However these are minor problems compared to the restless acquistion of the (often useless) things which require vast air pollution and the stripping of the land of its natural resources. Ironically, as we reluctantly embrace the Kyoto Accord in the West, our plethora of cultural trade items have become a siren song for the developing nations. The rapid increase in vehicle ownership in China has turned their cities into smog hells--and that increase is going to gallop along at a swift pace for the near future.

There is no need for us to lead a monastic existence; however, we must temper our rapaciousness. How many pairs of shoes do we really need? Maybe what we need is an ethos that encourages keeping down with the Joneses. Perhaps we should invest in more open sports areas instead of food courts for our increasingly lard-a**ed kiddies.

© Bud Talkinghorn

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