Insane Injustice

Driving, according to the Bush Administration, is the newest war crime. Yes, war crime.

Obviously, things have been quite farcical in the Land of Bush and Dick (Cheney) for years now, but it would seem that, as of the past week, they've actually reached a whole new level of lunacy.

At a monkey trial down there in Guantanamo Bay, at the infamous Land Of Freedom Gulag, some guy named Salim Hamdan was just found guilty of war crimes for driving Osama bin Laden around from 1997 to 2001. I'm not making this up.

This whole situation with Omar Khadr is so repulsive, shameful and depressing. Thinking about how this poor kid from Toronto has been treated makes me, as a Canadian, feel so embarrassed and sad. All his rights have been violated, he's been abused, tortured, held for six years (so far), long periods of which have been in solitary confinement, he faces a sham trial that would make the Soviets proud, and he was just 15 years old when captured, yet Canada has done absolutely nothing to help him. In fact, as we now indisputably know, the Canadian government has been an active participant in this whole tragedy. And so I ask: What sort of nation have we become anyway?

"He's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy"
     -  Brian's Mom to the masses in "Monty Python's Life of Brian"

Like all petty dictators and megalomaniacs throughout history, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe seems to see himself as the saviour of his country, but, far from being Zimbabwe's Messiah, the man has now clearly become the destroyer of this once proud and prosperous nation. Self-delusion and pompous self-importance simply don't get much better than with this buffoon.

Canada's Shame: Generations of Children Kidnapped and Brutalized In The Name of "Civilization" and "Christianity"

Yesterday was truly a great day for Canada. After years and years of waffling and procrastination, the federal government finally did what everyone knew had to be done: The Prime Minister, on the floor of the House of Commons, apologized to the Native People of Canada for the horrific and racist residential school system that this country ran for more than a century, a system that destroyed tens of thousands of lives. It's the single most shameful chapter in this country's recent history and an official apology simply had to be made. So, it's certainly not very often that you'll find me heaping praise on Stephen Harper, but today he most definitely deserves it.

You've all heard of The Axis Of Evil, of course, but what about The Axis of Medieval? Because, man, has it ever been a great week for them! In fact, it's been an amazing week for all admirers of the Dark Ages and all fans of Medieval systems, techniques and mindsets. First there was the report out of Saudi Arabia the other day about the Saudi Arabian "witch" being sentenced to death for, uh, "casting spells" on some guy, then there was this buffoon in the White House threatening to veto a Senate bill outlawing torture, and, finally, there was the start of the show trials for some of the most prominent tortured inmates at the Guantanamo Bay gulag. Truly a great week for Medieval lovers everywhere.

or Iran vs Saudi Arabia in "The Ascendancy of Asininity"

Ok, so two weeks ago you heard about the delightful tale of the 19-year-old woman in Saudi Arabia who, for the crime of being gang-raped, was sentenced to be tortured and permanently disfigured - to call flogging by its real name - followed by 6 months in prison. Well, today we're reminded that, when it comes to full-on barbaric, feudal, Dark Age Mentalities, the Saudis are relatively timid and moderate compared to their brothers in asininity in the Iranian judiciary. I can almost hear the Iranian taunts now: "Hey, Saudis, you call that a sentence? How about death to an 18-year-old for the crime of being raped by her brothers and forced into sex slavery by her parents? Bet you can't beat that, you pansies!"

What a lovely country that Saudi Arabia is. Check out this BBC article about a 19-year-old woman who is not only going to prison for being gang-raped, but is also facing 200 lashes.

Yes, 6 months in prison and a good whipping till all the skin has been ripped off her back, all for the crime of being gang-raped.

Anyone who watched the news here in Canada tonight now knows just how the RCMP works. I'm not simply talking about the video that was released today showing exactly what happened to Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski last month at Vancouver International Airport - how four cops killed him without provocation - no, I'm also talking about the web of lies and deceit that goes into the standard RCMP cover-up.

The American gulag in Guantanamo Bay has one - just one - remaining Western captive still being held by the U.S. government. His name is Omar Khadr. And he's Canadian. Every other Western government did all it could and eventually won the release of every single one of its citizens held in that Kafkaesque joke of a camp. But not our government. No, the Canadian government has abandoned this guy. And the worst thing is he was already abandoned back when he was just a 15 year old kid. That's how old he was when the American's locked him up and started their mental and physical torture regiment on him. Torturing kids? Yup, that's how fucked up the American government has become. Abandoning Canadian kids in foreign gulags? You bet, that's exactly how fucked up the Canadian government has become.

In case you may have missed it, Canada, as the policy now stands, would turn back at the border Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Rosa Parks, everyone ever jailed in the gulags of Stalin or Kim Jong Mentally-il, and anyone else who has ever stood up to unjust laws and regimes. It seems we just don't want their kind around here. Way to go Canada, way to make me proud to be Canadian.