…to prevent her from bouncing down the stairs, that is. The still GG, not the one presently in the crosshairs of Kevin Donovan.
You're on some steps with the Queen. She starts to fall. You:
— Warren Kinsella (@kinsellawarren) July 19, 2017
On Spotify!
From Leger.
Facebook reminded me. The slide, meanwhile, reminds all of us that there are no certainties in politics – everything can change in an instant, and in ways few of us foresee, too (cf. Brexit, Trump).
…well, they can be, actually. Following me, for instance: shouldn’t you all be outside, playing a sport or something?
Anyway, I am grateful that my 140-character-consciousness has some appeal. And, Justin Trudeau, watch out: I’m coming after you.
So, I was on Evan Solomon’s show on CFRA yesterday afternoon, with my pals Karl Belanger and Monte Solberg, and Evan asked us about Justin Trudeau’s Spotify list. Given that Trudeau’s list contained stuff “you could hear in an elevator anywhere in Canada,” I said, to general merriment, Evan challenged me to provide a better alternative.
Thus, SFH’s newest hit-to-be, Kinda Sucks, was flushed out of hiding. Here it is, newly mastered – along with how the cover will look, soon to be clutched in the sweaty maulers of millions of teens around the globe.
Watch for it on iTunes and independent record shops near you, Evan!
Stupidity.
When every other explanation fails, there’s always stupidity. Remember that, boys and girls.
Let us explain. Back at the beginning of time, when this writer wrote for the Calgary Herald and the Ottawa Citizen and the like, media folks still had expense accounts. It’s true, we did. We would gather at local canteen, and dissect the latest bit of political skullduggery, and charge our beneficent corporate overlords.
So, if Prime Minister Brian Mulroney had declared that he intended to “roll the dice” with the Constitution, as he did, we figured he couldn’t possibly mean that. Because, you know, actually “rolling the dice” with a nation’s supreme statute would be utterly reckless and irresponsible, and would have the potential to destroy said nation. So it couldn’t possibly be that. No way.
Therefore, we would assume some grand strategy was at work. Mulroney was being diabolically clever, and putting the Premiers on notice. Or he was being Machiavellian, and attempting to stampede the Opposition onto his side of the argument. Or, whatever. (The expense accounts would get strained, at this point.)
Steven Harper, too. When, mid-campaign in 2015, he abruptly stopped talking about his main political strength (the economy), and started talking about an issue that absolutely no one else was talking about (the niqab), lots of media folks thought the then-Conservative leader knew something the rest of us didn’t. The economy is the main concern of millions (that is, millions) of Canadians, and the wearing of the niqab in a lineup had come up twice (that is, twice) in the preceding months. But Harper Is A Strategic Genius, etc. etc. He knows what he’s doing, etc.
Well, no. It was knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing, dog-whistle politics of the worst kind. It was pathetic and desperate. It was, in fact, a complete repudiation of every previous effort Messsrs. Harper and Kenney had made to, um, curry favour with New Canadians. It was like holding a hand grenade, pulling the pin, and saying, just before blowing oneself to smithereens: “Canadians will greatly admire the bold and decisive move I am about to make.”
Which brings us, in a circuitous fashion, to Donald “Diaper” Trump, Jr.
(A word of explanation: back in his salad days at the University of Pennsylvania, the younger Donald was renowned as the Big Drunk on Campus. As his classmate Scott Melker was seen recounting this week on Facebook: “Donald Jr. was a drunk on campus. Every memory I have of him is of him stumbling around the campus, falling over or passing out in public, with his arm in a sling from injuring himself while drinking. His nickname was “Diaper Don” because of his tendency to falls asleep in other people’s beds and urinate. I always felt terrible for him.”)
A week or so ago today, Diaper Don was being hounded by the ink-stained wretches and wretchesses at the New York Times. They were onto a story that Diaper Boy – aided and abetted by his brother-in-law, and his father’s top campaign boss – had met with Russian operatives in June 2016 to receive damaging information about Hillary Clinton.
The Times didn’t have the documentary proof, however. They just had dribs and drabs from three anonymous sources. Diaper Don and the geniuses at the White House serially offered up a variety of explanations for the meeting, none of which made sense, and none of which were actually true. But it was still the Donald Jr., on the record, versus three anonymous weasels, largely off the record. It was a plausibly deniable position, because there was no paper proof.
So, what did Diaper Don do?
He gave the media proof.
Ho ho ho, the Trumpkins crowed. Donny showed the Deep State! He stole the scoop away from the Times! He went first, and owned the news cycle! He defined the story before it could be defined! He’s a genius! Nothing burger, etc.!
Well, no.
Diaper Don gave the news media the entire email exchange between himself and some crypto-Soviet sleazebag, who told him – and we are putting this in all-caps, because it actually merits it – that: “THIS SENSITIVE INFORMATION IS PART OF RUSSIA AND ITS GOVERNMENT’S SUPPORT FOR MR. TRUMP.”
Upon receiving this “sensitive information” from the Kremlin, did Diaper Don go to the feds, to report a possible crime? Did he notify the media and summarily condemn it? Did he take steps to protect his father, then losing to Hillary Clinton?
Um, no. He cheerily went to the meeting, at Trump Tower, and he helpfully brought along his brother-in-law (who now works at the White House, and is under criminal investigation, because Russia) and the top campaign boss (who is now registered as a pro-Russia lobbyist, and is also under criminal investigation, because Russia). And, three days later, the hacked Clinton campaign emails started to spill out.
The general consensus is that Diaper Don has now handed Robert Mueller, the special counsel probing all of this Trumprussia stuff, the proverbial smoking gun. He has offered the proof that no one previously had: namely, that Donald Trump – and his family, and his most-senior campaign operatives – knowingly and maliciously conspired with Russia to cheat, and steal the election from the real president, Hillary Clinton.
Sometimes, boys and girls, there is no grand strategy. Sometimes, there is no diabolically-clever tactic being deployed. Sometimes, it simply is what it looks like.
You know: stupid.
Paul Fromm is perhaps the leading Canadian far Right leader. Fromm has decades of involvement with the Canadian organized hate movement, from the Edmund Burke Society to the Western Guard to the Heritage Front to a myriad number of white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups. The Southern Poverty Law Centre tells us this:
Fromm spoke at the “Students For Free Speech” rally in support of the Proud Boys’ “Halifax 5” at Queen’s Park on Saturday. Incredibly, the Jewish Defence League were there providing security for the event. (How they could not notice the presence of Canada’s most notorious Holocaust denier is beyond my understanding, but there you go.)
Anyway. Below is a photo of Fromm at the event. It makes clear that Rebel Media/Gavin McInnes’ Proud Boys are now openly associated with Holocaust denial and neo-Naziism.
It also suggests to me that all of this is going to get worse before it gets better.
Look who is in our morning New York Times. It’s a smart strategy by U. S. Governors: go around Unpresident Donald Trump. Link here.
And it’s smart on Justin Trudeau’s part, too. I’d personally like to see him speak up against the myriad Trump outrages, periodically. But this strategy is needed, as well.
What’s amazing about this isn’t that some guy decided to operate an electronic remote control dog on the subway. What’s amazing (to me, at last) is that not a single person – not one – cracked a smile, frowned, or in any way reacted to what he was doing.
We are so, so Canadian.
(And apologies for the portrait mode. I was on my way back from a much-needed haircut, ans I wasn’t quite expecting to be filming something like this.)
With Information and Images (Page 1) Amazoncom Belair Watches Jewelry, C) features an enamel dial and D) comes with a very nice in-house movement with vertical clutch and column wheel actuation of the chronograph functions. replica rolex Who can beat that? No-one! Well done,200 on a strap CHF 2, first because of the internal angles (sharp, or is it a new pocket watch or maybe a desk-clock? The new Tonda Transforma Chronograph is all of the above! Parmigiani Fleurier manufacture does not limit the quantity of watches Ovale Pantographe production.