This is an extraordinary graph, one that tells quite a story.

(H/T to Rayman for the link.)

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Quote:

Crown attorney Richard Roy replied “these are serious violations of the act,” and the party’s guilty plea was an admission that its scheme was “illegal.”

In the future, whenever a Con raises the sponsorship mess – in which the Liberal Party was never found to have broken any law, by the by – throw this back in their face.

Your party broke the law, your party received the maximum penalty, your party was found to be corrupt.

Your party.

UPDATE: Regular Conservative commentator Gord Tulk is attempting to minimize these guilty pleas and sentences by suggesting sponsorship was worse. Here’s what I wrote, and still feel, about sponsorship.

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Moral: don’t support conservatives.  They’re dumber than liberals.

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One of the feminist bloggers I link to, GritChik, has objected to the Sunshine girl tradition at the Sun, now in its fortieth year:

“So, a recent “Sunshine Girl” is headed to the pages of Hustler magazine. Must be a proud moment for her. I admit, I clicked the link in the article that took me to her November 4th appearance in the tabloid. And saw her posing in a barely-there bra and transparent panties.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m no prude. And I believe that, at it’s best, nudity is an art form. At it’s worst it’s exploitative, degrading and damaging (to both men and women). We live in a hyper-sexualized society in which 3 year-olds are entering beauty pageants dressed as the Julia Roberts’ hooker character from Pretty Woman, complete with blonde wig and thigh-high leather boots. Girls, barely out of their teens (if we’re lucky), grace us from the cover of main stream men’s magazines with come-hither eyes and the suggestion that she would like you to join her in the bed she’s rolling around in.”

Way, way back at the dawn of time, when I was a journalism student at Carleton, Peter Worthington was invited to speak to us.  When it came time for questions and answers, I challenged him on the whole Page Three Sunshine girl thing, saying it (a) wasn’t necessary, given the abundance of similar stuff elsewhere (said stuff which is even more readily available now); and (b), it probably wasn’t something a lot of journos at the Sun would like to see continue.  Mr. Worthington was good-humoured about it all, and genially defended the feature.

The Sunshine Girl is no longer on page three, but she’s still around.  And the video of Mme. Bourbonnais’ recent visit is a real eye-opener, to say the least.

What do you think, Dear Readers?  Is GritChik right?  Or do you favour seeing more of Mme. Bourbonnais?

(Not that there’s much more to see, as you will see.)

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…I’m told.

“We’re looking for someone with a Liberal pedigree, significant knowledge of the players at Queen’s Park, great writing and strategic skills, and bilingualism wouldn’t hurt.  Toronto location.”

If you know such a person, contact.

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Maj. Alex Ross

From the author:

Warren:

It really bugged me when Harper quoted my uncle at the Vimy memorial on 90th anniversary of Vimy. He took my uncle’s words completely out of context, in order to justify the massive loss of life and glorify war. For me, that was the last straw, and was the genesis for today’s column.

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Understatements R Us.

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So, what the hell is a conservative, anyway?

Good question. Hacks and flaks use the word all the time, these days ­ to describe political parties, to describe politicians, to describe someone’s position on the ideological spectrum. Because conservatives increasingly dominate our politics at all levels — federally, locally, and everywhere in between — the word gets used a lot.

But is it the right word? Are the people being called “conservative” (mainly by journalists, because journalists are in the shorthand business) truly “conservative?” Like I say, it’s a crucial question, because we indisputably live in a conservative era.

In Europe, for the first time in generations, conservative political parties tower over the landscape. David Cameron in Britain, Angela Merkel in Germany, Nicolas Sarkozy in France, Silvio Berlusconi in Italy — along with conservative dominance in Finland, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland and Belgium.

The European Union, its present economic predicament aside, has been a conservative union since 2005. One of the few socialists, Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, quit this week.

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