Another royal tour, another bunch of opinion columns decrying the royals.

Look, I’m Irish and I’m a republican, and I have been since I read Yeats at the age of 13. But, honestly: why do some people get their kilts in such a knot about the Windsors coming to visit?

I mean, it’s not like they’re calling for the mass-murder of gays – like the “religious leaders” the Harper government permitted into Canada this very week. It’s not like they’re neo-Nazis – like haters the Harper government permitted into Canada a few weeks ago.

As guests go, and in comparative terms, they’re quite inoffensive. Sure, they cost taxpayers a lot, and they’re an anachronistic anti-democratic institution. But so’s the Senate – to which Harper appointed some of his defeated cronies just a few weeks ago.

See a trend, here? I say we should keep the Queen as our leader, and ship the Harper cabal over to Britain, to take up residence in the Tower of London.

Who’s with me?

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…specifically, your pocketbook, and how they can get their sweaty mitts on it:

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…unless you’re the Ontario NDP, that is, in which case you’ll use American photographers, American models and American companies for your, um, election platform.

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…so say the people.

Meanwhile, Big Tobacco’s shill, Tim Hudak, voted against the Smoke Free Ontario Act.

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Interesting piece.

Why, you might ask, was he compelled to write now about this issue? Is it in fact even an “issue”?

For him, I can testify, it was. He deeply despised those Conservative “Just Visiting” ads, and my sense was that they wounded him on a personal level.

At the time, I recall thinking that the little political tableau was replete with irony: one leader was a Canadian who had lived in the United States, and desperately wanted to prove he was Canadian.

The other leader was a Canadian who lived here, but who desperately wanted to be an American.

The self-hater won. Happens a lot, in my experience.

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Roxy Roller, Canada’s favourite political dog.

Roxoid, seen above, is always hungry. She’s part lab, so that comes with the territory.

She eats Fromm’s. The place where she has been getting her food, Tails in the Beach, makes us both really, really unhappy for a host of reasons. We wouldn’t recommend it.

So: anyone know where you can get Fromm’s in the East End?  We need an alternative.

Look at Roxy. She’s counting on you to come through with an answer.

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…because it gives me an opportunity to watch this again.

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GUESS WHAT DAY IT IS LOL OMG LMAO

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H/T GritChik.

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“Brian Topp says the NDP won by being “muscular” and standing up to the Tories. In reality, the Dippers lost – big time. Shortly after the May 2 election, the New Dems were in a hurry to convince the rest of us they were moving towards the centre. They talked about ditching socialism, and reaching out to unhappy Liberal voters.

But then along came the postal labour dispute. With their obstructionism in the House of Commons, the NDP lurched left, and gave us every reason to believe they still favour union power over people power. The New Democrats may remain popular in Quebec – but I guarantee their one-sided filibuster tactics did them no favours in the rest of Canada.”

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