Father McShaggy Brings A Gun to a Knife Fight

Blog roll member/denizen/person/whatever Father McShaggy does a wonderful evisceration Michael Coren's latest pile 'o crap in the Freeps.

Says Shaggy:

Michael Coren is my Grendel. My Green Knight. My Magneto.

Actually, he's none of those things, because while those villains were respected, conflicted and complex, Coren either has become a caricature to me, or he really is that simple, deluded and desperate.

It's probably more accurate to say that he's my Bizarro.

And it only gets better from there.

I still find it a wonder that the Free Press chooses to print both Salim Mansur and Michael Coren on the same day. And they never print the retractions needed for the ungodly number of outright lies they tell.

Sonny was right, it is the "The Worse Daily Newspaper in all of Canada".

What I Watch When I Should Be Working

Surfing + Dead Kennedys = Double plus good.

Meditations on Art

As I was up with a crying baby at 5 am, I had some time to watch my collection of Superman cartoons as made by the Fleischer brothers. And since I couldn't hear a damn thing (crying baby), I actually paid attention.




From the opening scene with the shadow of the robot passing over the city, to the secret lair of the villain, it all seemed so familiar.

Now I remember:



Skip ahead 48 seconds and revel in the originality.

Next you'll be trying to tell me that Lucas copied, shot for shot, the final race sequence from John Frankenheimer's Grand Prix (skip ahead to 45:30) for the Pod racing scene in Phantom Menace. He took the plot as well, with the "hero" having a bad start and having to pass the entire field to win the day. But complaining about Lucas and his various appropriations of other people's work is a bit like trying to beat back the tide with a stick.

The Violent Femmes Make Everything Better

Thank God the Liberal Flirtation with Democracy is Over

Now that Bob Rae has been thrown under the bus to make way for Ignatief's coronation we can get back to re-establishing that dominant Liberal majority rule that has guided Canada through so many exciting times. Let's face it, Dion was an accident of democracy that arose from the Liberals moving away from letting the back room boys choose their leader. Thanks to Harper's interesting political judgement in a time of economic crisis, the Liberal machine was able to boot Dion early and avoid one of those unfortunate leadership conventions that have caused them so much trouble. It would have been fun to Bob Rae do his "obama" thing after he argued that while Iggy was the preferred guy of the "super delegates", he figured he could win the grassroots vote. Who can forget Hillary Clinton's view that super delegates know who can win an election but the grass roots don't vote when it counts.

So, just to help everyone connect the dots and see what is coming next, I am going to totally make some stuff up and forecast the political events of the coming year:
My prediction:

• Harper’s government fails when they have to poke their heads up to see if they see their shadows.
• Ignatief rejects the coalition idea with Happy Jack and the Mutineers leading to a late February, early March election date.
• Liberals return to power by sweeping Atlantic Canada and Ontario but face a Conservative sweep between Field BC and Virden Manitoba as well as 50 BQ seats in Quebec.
• Then in the new majority government, the first item of business will be to cut the $30 million in subsidies to the parties but in return, lifting the Chretien imposed fundraising limits on corporations to “help” parties be self sufficient.
• With that, we will see a return to the traditional liberal dominance of Canadian politics.

Footnote to these events: Harper will follow the lead of RB Bennett, Alberta's longest serving Prime Minister (1930-35) and Kim Campbell, Canada's shortest serving Prime Minister (a couple of weeks in 1992) who eclipsed John Turner's record for shortest sitting BC Prime Minister, and take some funky overseas patronage appointment where he will wear military looking regalia while alternating between talking like a pirate and talking like a lead character in Gilbert and Sullivan show.