In this week’s Hill Times: anti-Semitism and white supremacy, courtesy of Canada Post

Some say the material is anti-Semitic and racist. So why is Canada Post distributing it?

The publication is called “Your Ward News.” It has been distributed in Toronto for quite some time, and has always been on the fringes, promoting conspiracy theories and oddball political candidates. But, in recent months, the tabloid newspaper has veered sharply Right, and started promoting material that may offend Canadian hate laws.

Among the highlights contained in recent editions of the newspaper:

  • Editorials railing against Jewish postal workers, “ZioMarxists,” “parasites,” and what the paper’s editor calls “the illegitimate Zionist apartheid state of Israel that holocausts Palestinians.”
  • Advertisements promoting something called the “New Constitution Party,” whose membership cards feature Nazi salutes, and references to “88” – neo-Nazi code for “HH,” or “Heil Hitler.”
  • Articles promoting Holocaust deniers Ernst Zundel, David Irving and Fred Leuchter – and denouncing “mainstream media lackeys” and “cattle” who sought to have Zundel charged with publishing Holocaust-denying propaganda.
  • Articles promoting Holocaust denial and written by Gary Schipper, the former voice of the neo-Nazi Heritage Front, who now goes by the false name “Johnny Jensen.”
  • A lengthy anti-Israel polemic describing the need for “Israeli Niggers to go home,” how the Jewish state “murders thousands” every year, that Zionists are “ZioFascists” and racists, that Israel forcibly sterilizes non-white immigrant women and practices Nazi-style eugenics – and repeats the old canard that Jews are not “true Biblical Jews,” a theory favoured by neo-Nazis for decades.
  • Articles promoting “white nationalism,” skinheads, and the defunct neo-Nazi Heritage Front, in which the author – who describes herself as a “white woman” who favours “white pride” – talks openly about how “white people reserve the right to protest the rape and disfiguration of our country” by non-whites, and calls the New Constitution Party a vehicle for opposing “Racial Marxism.”
  • A letters column mocking Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne for her sexual orientation, and attacking “homos” and “queens” – and a related editorial calling Pride “a freak show on parade floats.”
  • An advertisement decrying “lies that the ZioMarxist-controlled mainstream media is feeding you about Adolf Hitler” – and calling for Jews to be “deprogrammed from anti-German propaganda.”

And all of that is contained in just one issue of “Your Ward News.”

The publication is controlled by a man calling himself Dr. James Sears. But Sears is not an accredited doctor.

According to court transcripts and records of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, Sears has a dark past. He drank while on call as an intern, made “inappropriate” use of drugs, and had “inappropriate behaviour towards female staff members.” While admitted to Ottawa’s National Defence Medical Centre, Sears made ”numerous, random and obsessive telephone calls to women during which he would sometimes masturbate.”

In 1991, the College of Physicians and Surgeons finally suspended Sear’s licence after receiving complaints from female patients. The next year, Sears would plead guilty to two counts of sexual assault and he would be stripped of his medical licence for sexual impropriety.

Along with publishing a newspaper that promotes anti-Semitic and racist themes, Sears also has billed himself as “Dimitri the Lover” – and has claimed he could teach men who attend his “Toronto Real Men” workshops that he can teach them to make women “worship” them.

But the question remains: why is Canada Post distributing his newspaper? Bernie Farber, the former CEO of the Canadian Jewish Congress, is among the many folks asking just that.

“The material in ‘Your Ward News’ is reminiscent of the neo-Nazi, anti-Semitic ravings of the now-defunct racist organization Heritage Front,” said Farber. “It’s frankly shocking that a federal government agency like Canada Post deems it appropriate to deliver this racist screed to Toronto households.”

Indeed it is. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers has called the newspaper “hate mail.” But the corporation has merely shrugged, and said: “We do not have the right to refuse a mail item because we or our employees object to its content. The content is the sole responsibility of the publisher, who is clearly identified in the newsletter. Anyone who has concerns about the content should either contact the publisher or simply dispose of it.”

Bullshit. Your Ward News is hate propaganda – and Canada Post will pay a steep price for its indifference.


Palma Violets and SFH anarchy!

It was Anarchy in TO last night at The Garrison: before a sold-out crowd, the Violets and SFH (and Emma, and crew) onstage together for a shambolic, crazed version of ‘Invasion of the Tribbles.’ It was one for the ages. (Bjorn and Steve Deceive, you were missed.)

 Left to right: Chilli, moi, Sam, Niblet, Pete. Pic by Lala.  


Palma Violets and SFH SOLD OUT!

If you were planning on buying your ticket at the door for tonight’s show, sorry to say but it’s SOLD OUT. For those who got a ticket, see you tonight at The Garrison. PATV is on at 10, us at 11, and the Palma Violets at midnight!

  


I think the Thomsons, Westons, Pattisons and Irvings receive quite enough benefits, don’t you?

Maybe it’s because it’s been a while since my book on this income inequality thing. Maybe it’s because the Occupy kids have moved on. Maybe it’s because I’m missing something. 

But saying this: “Benefiting every single family isn’t what’s fair.”

I don’t see what’s wrong with that. 

Sure, Justin Trudeau has made some verbal flubs. Sure, he isn’t as polished as Angry Tom, or whomever. But saying the 99 per cent deserve more benefits from their government than the one per cent? I don’t see that as a mistake. 

I see that as good politics. 


Debate-change, game-changer

Wow.

“The federal Conservative Party says it won’t participate in the traditional leaders’ debates run by a consortium of broadcasters including CBC, CTV and Global and will instead accept up to five independently staged debates in the run-up to the fall federal election.

The decision by the Harper Conservatives appears to deal a serious if not fatal blow to the near-monopoly that broadcasters such as CBC have had in determining how federal political leaders square off before national votes.

Conservative campaign spokesman Kory Teneycke said the Tories have already accepted proposals for two new rival debates – one organized by Maclean’s magazine and its owner Rogers, and the other by French-language broadcaster TVA.

The Conservative decision now puts pressure on other federal political parties to follow suit.

The NDP said they have accepted the TVA and Maclean’s debate invites, as well as one put forward by an initiative on women’s equality called Up for Debate.”

Some of us predicted this a while ago – but now it has actually happened.

What does it mean? It means the Tories – and, I suspect, the Dippers – believe that Justin Trudeau is not going to do very well in those debates.  That he is going to make a mistake. That it is going to be, as one Grit recently said to me, “two men and a baby.” Why else make such a dramatic move, were not that the case? Why else do it, if you didn’t already know the Grit team is nervous?

To those of you doing Trudeau’s debate prep? No pressure, but the future of the Liberal Party of Canada depends on you, pretty much.