Aug. 27, 2006: #1

Soldier's blog cites breakdowns -- Online criticism of GPS units and vehicles may have violated security , Aug. 26, 06, Siri Agrell, NatPost
www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=
d870e74d-3c25-495b-b6c5-996d1036b2f6

A personal Web log kept by a Canadian soldier serving in Afghanistan raises several concerns about equipment used by the military personnel deployed in the country.

The blog kept by Matt Austin, a 21-year-old engineer private from Kitchener who arrived in Kandahar last week, was ordered taken off-line on Monday by his superiors.

But a "cached" version of the site, called Matt in Afghanistan, is accessible through Google and suggests that map software was accidentally erased from Global Positioning System receivers used by soldiers and that jury-rigged vehicles have been breaking down while troops are on patrol.

Search: GeoTech , maps and route information , removed from a hand-held GPS unit




Being Michael Ignatieff, Michael Valpy, Aug. 26, 06, Globe and Mail
www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/
RTGAM.20060825.wxboat26/BNStory/National/home

[....] Despite what he may say to the contrary, he has made his life into an effective vehicle that travels from Point A to Point B. When he has recognized endings, he has ended things — wham-bam — and gone on to something else, at times reinventing himself dramatically in the process. Not a lot of people do that.

And, yes, it has meant being ruthless — and in the past, others have paid the price.
... he tells me: “The point about ruthlessness that's important is that I am prepared to pay the price of my own life. You can pay your own bill, but inflicting the cost on other people is very hard — and you do get up in the night and think of that.”

I still don't understand his obsession with writing about his family — the books and the articles that have laid out the intimate details of his life and the lives of those close to him. [....]

Lengthy, worth reading. It is the seeming bloodlessness, the ruthlessness, that struck me ... while focused on his own future and smiling congenially. There is something not quite human, at least cold, about his treatment of his brother while at UCC, but read it and decide for yourself.


Mr. Valpy will be our guest tomorrow (Monday) at 1 p.m. EDT to take your questions about Mr. Ignatieff and the race to success Paul Martin.
Join the Conversation at that time or submit a question or comment in advance.
www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/
RTGAM.20060825.wlivelibsiggy0828/BNStory
/specialComment/home




How to succeed in business in Canada ...

Building the world: SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. , Aug. 26, 06, G & M
www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/
RTGAM.20060826.wrcover26/BNStory/Business/home

[....] Luckily for SNC-Lavalin shareholders, Mr. Lamarre has turned Canada's premier engineering firm into such a planetary powerhouse -- with projects in more than 100 countries -- it hardly seems to matter. In Mr. Lamarre's 10 years as CEO, sales have grown fourfold to the more than $4-billion expected in 2006. From oil fields in Saudi Arabia and Siberia to a gas-fired power station in the Algerian desert, from feasibility work on the world's biggest aluminum smelter in Dubai (and undoubtedly more contracts, if the $7-billion project is green-lighted) to Inco Ltd.'s Goro nickel mine in New Caledonia, SNC-Lavalin has racked up an $8.3-billion backlog of contracts that will keep its 12,000 employees at the forefront of a global building boom for years.

In Canada, SNC-Lavalin has hundreds of engineers working in Alberta's oil sands. It is building Vancouver's $2-billion Canada Line rapid transit system and owns a third of the consortium that will own and operate the line for 35 years when it opens for the 2010 Winter Olympics. Mr. Lamarre is also anticipating a big windfall for SNC-Lavalin, a partner in the Candu nuclear reactor team, from Ontario's decision to plow $40-billion into new and existing nuclear power stations. And it's a no-brainer SNC-Lavalin will be first in line if Quebec proceeds to undertake $25-billion of new hydroelectric developments by 2015. [....]

.... Indeed, SNC-Lavalin's relationship with Canada's government is close, since many of its contracts -- both domestic and international -- are funded by public agencies. The firm often counts on Export Development Canada and the Canadian International Development Agency, as well as the World Bank, to underwrite work in developing countries. [....]

Search: really juicy government contracts , Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index , Candu reactors , France's Areva , James Bay power, diamond mine construction , Vancouver Sky Train

It's a no-brainer. Being from Quebec didn't hurt in getting government backing and contracts.



Taxpayers always pay for politicians' great ideas ...

Petrocan debt has taxpayer over a barrel , Neil Reynolds, Aug. 25, 06, B2
www.rbcinvest.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/
PEstory/LAC/20060825/RREYNOLDS25/Columnists/
columnists/columnistsBusiness/2/2/4/

OTTAWA -- How much did Canadians pay for Petro-Canada? David L. Yager, a Calgary oil field service industry executive, asks it in a different way. How much are we now paying? The federal government sold its last Petrocan shares a couple of years ago, and you may have thought that we had finished with this sorry 1970s experiment in state-owned oil companies. Not so.

We sold off the assets for less than we paid, then kept all the debt. By Mr. Yager's calculations, a detailed spreadsheet that covers 25 years, we now owe $80-billion for Petrocan -- more than 20 per cent of the national debt. At 5-per-cent interest, we're paying $4-billion a year for an enterprise we don't own. This is slightly less than we pay for national defence; slightly more than we spend for foreign aid. [....]

The Adam Smith Institute: The Free-Market Think Tank



Tom Godfrey: Dying to get into Canada , Aug. 27, 06
www.torontosun.com/News/Canada/
2006/08/27/1779161-sun.html

Some unscrupulous funeral homes in Vancouver -- and possibly Toronto -- have issued phony letters of burial that are used by immigrants abroad to sneak into Canada, an MP says.

The scam surfaced last month after an Indian citizen was arrested by Customs officers at Vancouver airport when he couldn't remember the name of the "sister" whose funeral he was attending, said B.C. Liberal MP Sukh Dhaliwal.

[....B.C. Liberal MP Sukh Dhaliwal] refused to name the B.C. funeral parlour that issued the letter.

Counterfeit news -- Scenes were enacted and re-enacted; dead bodies were carried from point to point and then back again; Hezbollah spokesmen chatted on cellphones until it was time to turn on the tears for cameras , NatPost, Aug. 27, 06
www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/issuesideas
/story.html?id=eb48ad39-2760-4de5-bd19-afd3222aa8d7



Oliver North - Stunningly naive.......... -- or here for the original
newsbeat1.com/2006/08/
oliver-north-stunningly-naive.html



"Egypt State Media: Syria Committed 'Massacres' in Lebanon"
www.newsbeat1.com/www.metimes.com/articles/
normal.php?StoryID=20060823-080349-7931r


What did you do in the war, UNIFIL? -- You broadcast Israeli troop movements., by Lori Lowenthal Marcus, 09/04/2006, Volume 011, Issue 47, the Weekly Standard, via newsbeat1
weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles
/000/000/012/622bqwjn.asp

[....] UNIFIL--the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, a nearly 2,000-man blue-helmet contingent that has been present on the Lebanon-Israel border since 1978--is officially neutral. Yet, throughout the recent war, it posted on its website for all to see precise information about the movements of Israeli Defense Forces soldiers and the nature of their weaponry and materiel, even specifying the placement of IDF safety structures within hours of their construction. New information was sometimes only 30 minutes old when it was posted, and never more than 24 hours old.

Meanwhile, UNIFIL posted not a single item of specific intelligence regarding Hezbollah forces. [....]

Canadian military seeks Muslim recruits, August 25, 2006
canadiancoalition.com/forum/messages/18632.shtml

The Canadian Forces want more Muslims among their ranks.

There are few Muslims in the Canadian military and that is something that Rear Admiral Tyrone Pile, who is in charge of recruiting, wants to change.

[....] "The Canadian Armed Forces do not reflect the cultural diversity in this country and that's a pity," Pile told observers at the mosque. [....]

Bader Siddiqi, president of the Ottawa Muslim Association, supports the military's drive to better understand his culture.

"It is a positive when you send a Canadian Muslim" on a peacekeeping mission, Siddiqi said. "It is good to have people serving in the forces who understand the language and culture. There are fewer mistakes, fewer accidents and fewer deaths."

A must read -- note accommodations made.




Cdn military reduces security checks on recruits
cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2006/08/27/1779690-cp.html

[....] For example, a candidate who would be granted "secret" level clearance once had a background check done that went back 10 years. Checks now only cover the last seven years.

The majority of people in the forces receive "confidential" level clearance, which previously required a check of the last 10 years. The exemption has cut that check by half, down to the last five years. [....]

Search: General Hillier recommends , Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the RCMP



Why Britain Stopped the Terror Plot -- "ability to be nimble, to be fast, to be flexible, to operate based on fast-moving information", Insight Magazine, August 25, 2006

The Homeland Security Department has neither the legal nor technical tools to match the British capture of terrorist operatives before they were about to blow up passenger airliners.

Officials said U.S. law would not have allowed the FBI to conduct the type of surveillance that led Britain to uncover the al Qaeda cell and capture what could be the network’s chief. They said the department also does not have the funding to detect new types of bombs used by al Qaeda. [....] .

A comprehensive overview of the four types of photo fraud committed by Reuters, August, 2006 -- via CNEWS Forum
zombietime.com/reuters_photo_fraud/


WHO ARE THE PALESTINIANS?, By Yashiko Sagamori, November 25, 2002
www.think-israel.org/sagamori.html

Yashiko Sagamori is a New York-based Information Technology consultant. This essay is a response to a letter by a newspaper reader who referred to the so-called "Palestinian people". This version was reprinted from Christian Action for Israel. (http://www.christianactionforisrael.org). The article appeared first in Arutz Sheva and is reprinted with their permission.

A rebuttal:

If you are so sure that "Palestine, the country, goes back through most of recorded history", I expect you to be able to answer a few basic questions about that country of "Palestine":

1. When was it founded and by whom?

2. What were its borders? [....]

A must read.



Bribe money in Tamil terror case originated from Montreal, FBI allege , Adrian Humphreys, CanWest News Service, National Post with file from Kelly Patrick, August 25, 2006
www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/
story.html?id=f14acf77-3dbf-4aca-bf58-
8f1e7c77a8f2&k=52933

TORONTO - Money to bribe a U.S. official - traced during an international anti-terrorism probe aimed at the Tamil Tigers - came from Montreal, the FBI said Thursday.

And two of the men arrested in the bribery case are former Montreal residents, adding more Canadian connections to a widening probe that has seen six other men from Canada arrested on charges of aiding a foreign terrorist organization, including money laundering, smuggling equipment and people, and trying to purchase anti-aircraft missiles, machine-guns and other military equipment.

Tens of thousands of dollars from Montreal were earmarked as a bribe for a U.S. federal agent who was posing as a corrupt immigration officer, pretending to allow Tamils to illegally enter the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation alleged in a sworn criminal complaint filed in a New York court. [....]

CBC News: Liberal website gaffe reveals donations, home numbers
www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/
2006/08/23/liberal-donations.html

The Liberal Propaganda Organ has taken it down, it seems. Check.



Writing partisanship into the news , Guy Giorno, National Post, Published: Wednesday, August 23, 2006
www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/issuesideas
/story.html?id=b180ee17-be82-4e14-b5c1-a672b2d0a1be&p=2

Guy Giorno is a partner at the law firm of Fasken Martineau, and served as chief of staff to former Ontario premier Mike Harris

In another place on the Web, Mr. Hubert wrote that "History will remember Hezbollah as an organization that stood up to the most vile 'nation' in human history."

On his own site, Mr. Hubert declared that the "Israeli Terror State continues to hate peace." He proudly posted a third-party claim that "Hezbollah is not a terrorist organization, Israel is" -- calling it "a great article."

Mr. Hubert subsequently apologized for his comments, explaining that he was "impulsively angry" when he wrote them. [....]

More interesting is the media reaction. On Tuesday, I could not find any newspaper coverage of Mr. Hubert's comment, the reaction of the Canada-Israel Committee or the failure of the Liberal leadership to rebuke a party official for his disgraceful diatribe. [....]

Bedsores cost billions, defy easy treatment , Aug. 22, 06, CBC




Abu Reuters-OBL's media adviser
newsbusters.org/node/7152



Jughead university -- "Now Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, Ont., has joined in the attacks" , NatPost
www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/editorialsletters/
story.html?id=85f2115b-a368-4518-893c-ad396b45060d

It is a tired conceit of the political left that conservatives, simply because they hold different views from their own, are inherently stupid. Consequently, whenever a Republican occupies the world's most powerful political office -- the U.S. presidency -- the incumbent is generally portrayed as sort of an idiot-in-chief. It was the case both for great Republican presidents like Ronald Reagan and Dwight D. Eisenhower, and lesser ones [....]

Despicable. Education seems to have become Bush-bashing and indoctrination by the left in Canada. How low does it go below university? Remember the left's activities pre-election in some high schools?



Canadian politicians join Jimmy Carter in siding with terrorists , By Judi McLeod, August 22, 2006
www.canadafreepress.com/2006/cover082206.htm

Jimmy Carter, the peanut farmer who became president, has a new peanut gallery in the land of the Maple Leaf.

While Carter was criticizing the United States and Israel in an interview with the German news publication, Der Spiegel, three Canadian politicians were lobbying to have the Lebanon-based Hezbollah taken off Canada’s terrorist list. [....]

From a friend: Diversion

This equation should be taught in all math classes!
From a strictly mathematical viewpoint it goes like this:
What Makes 100%? What does it mean to give MORE than 100%? Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than 100%? We have all been to those meetings where someone wants you to give over 100%. How about achieving 103%? What makes up 100% in life?
Here's a little mathematical formula that might help you answer these questions:
If:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
is represented as:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.
Then:
H-A-R-D-W-O-R-K
8+1+18+4+23+15+18+11 = 98%
and
K-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E
11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%
But,
A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E
1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5 = 100%
And,
B-U-L-L-*-*-*-T
2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103%
AND, look how far a** kissing will take you.
A-*-*-K-I-S-S-I-N-G
1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7 = 118%
So, one can conclude with mathematical certainty that while Hard Work and Knowledge will get you close, and Attitude will get you there, it's the Bull***t and A** Kissing that will put you over the top.