Gary McHale is suing me.

McHale, who you can read about here and here and here, is suing me because I wrote a Sun Media column describing him as “an Ontario anti-Native, anti-police activist who has spent time in jail for his misadventures.”  He is also suing because I asked him why he did not bar racist Paul Fromm and the neo-Nazi Northern Alliance from attending his rallies.

I am vigorously defending the action, which will culminate in a trial in Hamilton sometime in the next few months.  I will be posting details about the trial, so that those of you who wish to attend can do so.  I fully expect the far right to be in attendance, too, as they have done so in various other such lawsuits against me in the past.

I am also seeking contributions for costs of defending McHale’s lawsuit.  If you want to contribute, please click on the “donate” button to the left, under the blogroll.  It’s going to be expensive, because we plan to fight McHale every step of the way.  If you want to donate directly to my legal team, Ruby Shiller Chan Hasan, you can do so by contacting them here.

My web site’s readers are (I think) the smartest folks on the Internet.  They have helped expose all kinds of things in the past.  I’m asking  for their help with some additional research once again, about these points:

• that McHale is anti-Native
• that McHale is anti-police
• that McHale has spent time in jail
• that Paul Fromm showed up to express support
• that the Northern Alliance showed up to show support

You can send whatever you find to me here, or in comments, below.

If you can help, in any way, I will be eternally grateful.  I intend to fight McHale for as long as it takes (in the Ian V. Macdonald case, the litigation went on for sixteen years, and all the way up to the Supreme Court of Canada).  Every bit helps, as they say.

Thanks, guys.

UPDATE: McHale has tried to post a comment on this web site, saying that he “loved this post.”  Glad to hear it.  So, to the many folks who have already made generous donations – and/or who have sent along kind words – let’s keep at it!

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NEW YORK — Does this happen in Canada?

Darin K. Williamson, who has been asking me a lot of questions on the train between Newark and New York, tells me not to worry.

“I’m on the job,” he says, lifting his plainclothes shirt a little to show me his detective’s badge, attached to his belt. Beside the belt is a gun.

Williamson had been asking me about the 40-odd Grade 7 and 8 kids I was helping to chaperone on a school trip. So I started asking him about the shutdown of the U.S. government by Tea Party lunatics.

Williamson is unimpressed. “All these millions of people going without pay this morning, because the Republicans hate one man,” he says, holding up a single finger. “Millions hurt, because they hate him.”

Williamson is right, of course. And, on the early morning flight that was ferrying the kids, their teachers and me to the United States, we therefore did not know what would await us when we arrived at Newark’s airport.

Tea Party fanatics wanted to kill the Affordable Care Act, taking effect that day. President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party objected, noting the act, called Obamacare, had been a central issue in the 2012 race.

The people had chosen to decisively re-elect the president, but the Republicans didn’t care.

And so, on Tuesday morning, nearly a million federal employees were “furloughed” — in effect, told to stay home because Congress had not approved the funds to pay them.

The airport had two or three border services agents on duty, however, and the kids got through.

But Darin K. Williamson sat on the New York-bound train, shaking his head. “Does this happen in Canada?” he asked again, sounding amazed.

No, he is told. Canadians may sometimes object to the leaders we get. But we generally do not experience very many bloodless coup attempts, in which the lives and livelihoods of millions are held for ideological ransom.

“You’re lucky,” he says.

For us, the government shutdown would be an inconvenience — the kids wouldn’t get to tour the Statue of Liberty because it (and other) federal sites had been shut down. But it was nothing compared to the misery and pain that an extremist GOP rump was inflicting on untold millions of seniors, veterans and average Americans.

If the shutdown lasted very long, some economists warned, the cost to the still-struggling U.S. economy would be as high as $55-billion.

Now, before we Canadians get too cocky about all of this, let me offer another encounter with an average American citizen, by way of comparison.

On the next day, we took the kids to the Museum of Jewish Heritage.

Much of the museum (necessarily) chronicled the rise of National Socialism, and the implications of that for Jews and others.

As the kids watched a video about the tragic wartime journey of the S.S. St. Louis, our tour guide — a nice older lady known to us only as Jill — sidled up to me. “What are you looking for?” she asked me. I had been carefully examining displays about the early days of Naziism in Germany and the countries Germany came to occupy. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I said. Try me, she said.

So I related the disturbing tale of how Canada’s second-largest province planned to pass a law outlawing the display of crosses, Stars of David, turbans and veils by public servants.

I wanted to see what historical precedents existed for such bigotry, I said. Jill was genuinely shocked.

“Is this actually happening in Canada?” she asked. “Canada?”

Yes, Jill was told. Canada. We may not have government shutdowns, but sometimes we experience things that are measurably worse.

“Don’t ever get too cocky,” I tell some of my charges later on. “They’ve got lots of problems. But so do we.”

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…and she doesn’t look a day over 47! Happy Festival of Lala!

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Heading back to TeeDot soon. Got the T-shirt, though.

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Two things about this.

One, I didn’t hear from the author of the piece. I’ve been in New York, but I always check my email and whatnot. So I don’t understand how I couldn’t be reached.

Two, there’s a very good reason why Mr. Reid will never comment publicly on Yours Truly. See number four.

Anyway, I stand by my criticism. The Count was disloyal to those who were loyal to him. In my books, that’s as bad as it gets.

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Psychic sign at corner of Soho’s Broadway and Prince, locked. If you’re a good psychic, can’t you foresee when your sign will be swiped?

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But I mean that in the nicest possible way.

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Walking through SoHo. We are Group Six. Or, I call us, Group Six Six Six. Fits.

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If you are a regular user of hard drugs, I can’t imagine what could be more convenient than having your personal driver moonlighting as a drug dealer!

How convenient!

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