Incoming
Sgt. Rae, at your service.
UPDATE: From a friend with deep Grit caucus connections: “Rae to Jerusalem. Smitherman to Ottawa. All’s well that ends well.”
Sgt. Rae, at your service.
UPDATE: From a friend with deep Grit caucus connections: “Rae to Jerusalem. Smitherman to Ottawa. All’s well that ends well.”
Okay, I’m sorry, but I have a total man crush on this guy [full disclosure: whose caucus I’ve given comms advice]. When I read this (highlighted) Tweet last night, I literally burst out laughing. It got a lot of media attention, too.
Peeps, indeed. Hilarious.
That’s a pretty representative sample of opinion on the Liberal blogosphere, these days. Grits seem to be very, very unhappy with the Afghanistan result.
Messr. Rae and Ignatieff’s volte-face – on ending the war, on Canada’s foreign policy, on ratification in Parliament – has clearly left many Liberal partisans enraged. They are certainly filling my inbox with that sort of sentiment. All of the various tribes – Dionistas, Martinites, Chretienites, even Ignatieff and Rae enthusiasts – seem to be seriously pissed off. I certainly am.
Now, most Liberals aren’t as foolish as Yours Truly, of course, and prefer to make their criticisms anonymously (for now). Having experienced how the current OLO deals with disagreement, I can certainly understand that.
For my column in this Sunday’s Sun, then, I want to provide readers with a sense of the mood in the Liberal Party of Canada in the wake of the Rae-Ignatieff reversal. So if you spot a Liberal blogger/Twitterer/whateverer giving voice to that – pro or con – I’d be grateful if you’d point me in their direction, in comments or by email.
I may be wrong about Liberals being mad at Messrs. Ignatieff and Rae, but I don’t think so. Your help would be gratefully received, either way.
UPDATE: That didn’t take long. I’ve already received a snotty email from Jason Cherniak, declaring that I should no longer refer to myself as a Liberal (to wit: “at some point don’t you think you should stop claiming to be a Liberal…?”). Ah, Jason: you just never change, do you? Next up: they’ll start calling Queen’s Park. Just watch.
UPDATED: Get a load of this: Jason, a Liberal official, has sent me an “Informal Libel Notice” (whatever that is) for, apparently, calling his snotty note snotty, and for revealing that he no longer wants me to “claim” that I am a Liberal. I’ve told him to beat it.
It’s also bizarre. There is nothing that Stephen Harper loves more than lobbing policy hand grenades at the Liberal caucus, and watching them dance. On gun control, on abortion, on almost any issue, Grit disunity makes Harper happier than a flea at a dog show.
So why, then, is he now giving the Grits a break?
I hum ‘Stars and Stripes Forever’ whilst Monte looks on, awestruck.
Clippage here, at about the 1:45 mark.
I’ve been asked to go on a CBC panel, tonight, to discuss Tony Blair’s comments to Evan Solomon – to wit, that the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. are really just about a struggle within Islam, modernity vs. fundamentalist extremism, etc.
I’m no expert on that subject, but I do know from my Irish Catholic experience that if these conflicts are really about faith – and not oil, or treasure, or power, or strategic position – then we are well and truly screwed for about, say, 1,000 years. That’s usually how long these deity-driven things take to peter out (thus my preoccupation with the separation of church and state, BTW).
Evan interviewing Blair is here.
What thinkest thou, smart commenters?
A quick recap:
Interesting, yes. That’s accurate.
It would also be accurate to say it’s pathetic, too.
I know they’re channeling Springsteen more than they should, and that they seem to be a bit more calculated than a rock’n’roll band should ever be, but…it’s the song. We’ve been listening to it for months – and tonight on the way back, too – and it seems to be from the heart. It does.
The words, too. They reveal the kind of love of words that you don’t see many bands admit to, these days (or know how to, even if they wanted to). So I put them below the video.
Look what you started.
I seem to be coming out of my skin.
Look what you’ve forgotten here,
The bandages just don’t keep me in.
And when it was over, I woke up alone.
And they cut me to ribbons and taught me to drive,
I got your name tattooed inside of my heart.
I called for my father, but my father had died.
While you told me fortunes, in American slang.
Look at the damage,
the fortunes came for the richer men.
While we’re left with gallows,
waiting for us liars to come down and hang.
And when it was over, I woke up alone.
And here’s where we died that time last year,
And here’s where the angels and devils meet.
And you can dance with the Queen if you need,
And she will always keep your cards
close to her heart.
So close to her heart, before they tear you apart.
Something I have been suggesting to Liberals for a long time. Finally, someone has done it.
It’ll make for some excellent spots, too.
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