Abandoned Stuff by Saskboy

Are old folks homes a human rights violation? It’s an interesting question. Nichole asks Africans what they think about Witch Camps.

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Hat tip to Michael

My province has been on the hot seat recently in blogs and in politics, as racial and discriminatory issues bubble to the forefront of public consciousness. A Saskatchewan MP once held very ignorant views regarding homosexuals, and was on tape expressing those views. He’s since said he doesn’t feel that way any more. Perhaps he’s lived a little and seen that he was wrong, since that time. People can change, let’s hope he has for the better.

Premier Wall has also had to apologize for immature or inappropriate behaviour on the same recording. He’s not having a good week, after having to distance himself from Small Dead Animals, who is batting 2 for 2 in having premiers say that the often crude, radical conservative blog doesn’t speak for the people of Saskatchewan. Now Kate’s on record as wanting a famine to toughen Canadian socialists up, and for drug users to die faster of disease. I really don’t know what other offensive territory she could tread into next, but I can wait to find out. Maybe I can make some suggestions? I haven’t known her to go after Romainian orphans, or bonspiel volunteers, but there’s still time to branch out and offend everyone!

And an apparent coup took place in First Nations politics, where the disgraced David Ahenakew managed to return to a previous post of power. A new trial being ordered is not the same thing as an acquittal, and we’ve all heard his very offensive thoughts to know he’s guilty of promoting hatred. If he’s not criminally responsible, it’s still shameful for the FSIN to associate with him on purpose at this point. Is he on record currently as being ashamed of his remarks about Jews? Not that I’m aware of. CBC reported he did, but last time I read he did, he recanted.

- UPDATE: Interesting. He declined the offer. That doesn’t let the FSIN off the hook though.

As if that wasn’t enough bad news from First Nations politics this week, there’s criticism that their exemption from tobacco tax is killing non-Natives too. Ignoring the fact that tobacco abuse kills a higher proportion of First Nations people than other Canadians is fine apparently. Any leadership organization stupid enough to reinstate a disgraced person like Ahenakew, isn’t going to have the fortitude to question the health effects of basing their economic culture on gaming and drugs. How frustrating it must be for people trying to work inside the First Nations power structure, to change things for the better? It’s certainly frustrating to watch it from the outside. Perhaps that kind of frustration is too much for some people like Kate, and they deal with it by telling people to die. I must take care not to lose my patience in that way.

Westerners, as a whole, have a harder time understanding the impact pollution has on our environment. This is due to a combination of things (not really our education system in relation to elsewhere). One factor is that a lot of our jobs are based on resource extraction and agriculture. These jobs require heavy equipment with diesel engines, and people don’t want to feel shame about their ‘office’ equipment. They didn’t build the equipment anyway (they just repair it). If it was so bad, no one would build it, right?

Another factor is that unless an entire forest is on fire, we just don’t SEE pollution in the air like more urban-dwelling Canadians do. Calgary and Edmonton get smoggy, at least they have in the Summer when I’ve been through, but it’s not a year round problem. Regina and Saskatoon tend to get foggy at worst. Smog in those two cities is usually attributable to stubble burning, or a forest fire. Our water sources are not so great as it is in Toronto, to raise our humidity to the point where we can’t breath from the mixture of moisture and muck.

And so a combination of economic induced denial sets into people. It especially settles in people who have no grasp on chemistry, history, or physics because they lack the logic defenses their mind needs to shrug off propaganda fed from other people who depend on our broken systems not being changed.

If your skies looked like this, would you have 2nd thoughts to the seriousness of air pollution too? For some people out here, it’s the last straw they need to give up on logic, and to give in to denial and complacency.

- Museum with ship and a “new” elevator, 2 minutes south of Moose Jaw on Highway #2. There’s a NFB film about this ship, and the poor man who built it. He wanted to sail it back home to Europe, but was committed and died. He tried to tow it across the prairie with animal and human power, to sail it up to Hudson’s Bay via our river systems. In a way he’s a metaphor for people of this country who don’t understand or even acknowledge we have an air pollution problem. They build too many of the wrong vehicles, and mis-use them until they go crazy and die, defeated. Hard working, but in a role that can’t last. Instead of finding a new way to live where we are, we’d rather destroy ourselves on the chance that we can get back to how things used to be; Back to better times.

ACR has the headline the mainstream media probably wanted to run with.

The web is buzzing with ordinary folks who think the TSA is full of really SMRT people. These particular ones found that I predicted the new War on Boobs.

- Flemming, SK old grain elevator is getting a facelift on one side

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I’m back in Regina after a very odd day. It’s strange to say goodbye to someone for probably the last time, but that’s what I did. Then arriving back in town just in time for a birthday party, and 3 games of laser tag which have been planned for more than a week. I finished 2nd, 1st and 1st and scored 5th on the daily leader board. A day with lows and highs, and in two capital cities.

-One Red Paperclip house in Kipling

- Near Confusion Corner in Winnipeg on the way back from a birthday supper

- Grey Cup 2007 sign won in a bet with Manitoba, on our border

- Good advice about taking the stairs instead of the elevator. I do about 12 flights a day in separate trips.

Without fail, going to Winnipeg in a non-Summer season has brought a snow storm. Even more unfortunate are the circumstances that brought me here, but such is life, and the cycle of it. Still it’s strange to make a surprise mid-week trip to another city, and even worse to feel guilty about enjoying the moments of leisure, when a relative is at death’s door in hospital. It’s more important than attending something like this.

Last night my brother, sister-in-law, and I piled into their white car and drove to Langbank. We stopped in Kipling and I saw the Red-Paperclip house for the first time. They have red paperclip lights up on the power poles on the highway. The farm where we spent the night has seen about a century of Canadian Winters. On the wall of the computer room was a photo of the 1913 harvest.

After a hearty breakfast (and homemade midnight snack of muffin and chicken noodle soup), we were on our way into Manitoba. The snow started at about the border, and increased in intensity until it was a whiteout by Brandon. The radio only had warnings for highway 16 until that point. Fortunately we made it through into clear weather, and it was sunny by Portage la Prairie. I had lunch at a nearly empty A&W, while my siblings stood in line behind about half a dozen Mounties and others at Subway. I finished eating nearly before they got back to the car.

Parking in Winnipeg wasn’t too hard, and we found our way to visit in the hospital. It was apparent that we’d be staying an extra day by that point. And the weather wasn’t going to let us return tonight in peace anyway it turned out. A local weather report indicated traffic accidents and closed roads.

When merging in Saskatoon or elsewhere… Don’t Stop! Zack explains why there are bad drivers in Saskatoon (and most of the province) who couldn’t figure out Circle Drive, so they took out the traffic circle that gave the Drive its name!

Simply put, Saskatchewan doesn’t train its drivers well enough.

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And Quebec doesn’t train its children any more how to operate their bodies’ sexual organs. Learning to operate your body safely is an optional component of the curriculum.

… that I didn’t talk about it right away until some of the chips settled. It really is huge. It’s confirmed by an American blogger as a big deal — that’s how we know for sure ;-).

Chuck Cadman is a being a more effective opposition MP than Stephane Dion. And he’s dead; Cadman, that is.

Some people just seem to be more ethical than others. Chuck Cadman was an ethical man driven by a sense of justice. He told the Conservatives he met with to keep their bribe for his vote.

- Actual [ominous] Conservative ad mailout

Harper, Finley, and Flanagan are not appearing to be quite as ethical. For a party that claimed cleaning up influence peddling in government was a priority, we now are seeing why they realized it was a problem.

Do you think this would be fun to attend at the UofR? I like the ominous title:

PUBLIC LECTURE
Conservatism: The End of an Era
with Dr. Tom Flanagan
March 28, 2008 ~ 2:30 pm

If I asked the question, “Was Chuck Cadman offered anything for his vote against Martin,” would I next be saying, “Don’t taze me bro!”?

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More can be read about this story.
Kady.
The damning tape.
Garth “Scumbag” Turner has details you have to see.

I wonder, since Adscam brought down the Liberals, will Cadscam bring down the Conservatives? If it doesn’t, I think we send a terribly dangerous message to politicians. That message is that they can get away with anything, even offering bribes as unofficial party policy. I would just be sick if nothing is done about this. Hearing the audio tape of Harper’s admission, and the corroboration by the Cadman family, an RCMP investigation is really a formality at this point.

I think they may be my blog’s first experience with February 29th. It’s Sadie Hawkins Day (if it isn’t celebrated in November, as John Murney pointed out to me), where for most of the 20th Century anyway, the stereotypical gender roles of dating are supposedly turned on their heads. I wonder how many marriage proposals there are on this leap year day, coming from the woman to the man? Alas, I am not about to dig into Statistics Canada’s site to see if they know.

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UPDATE:
I heard an interesting story today I thought needed to be shared somewhere on the Internet. I was mentioning the strange story of a child who had gone deaf in one ear, to a co-worker. The boy regained his hearing after a q-tip cotton swab fell out, years after it was mysteriously lodged in the outer ear canal. That prompted my co-worker to recall a story of a man from Southey, SK who as a teen put a sunflower seed up his nose. He was too embarassed to seek medical help in removing it after his attempts failed, so he left it there… for years! As a man, decades later it came out on its own.

Who knows what kind of effects it had on his life. Maybe he snored up a sunny storm every night because of it, or would get birds pecking at his face as he walked down the street? Maybe it grew a sprout? Frankly, I think I’m better off not knowing. And in case you’re wondering, the person who told me this story knows a guy who knew this guy, so it has to be totally accurate. Right?

If he’d just gone to the doctor right away, it wouldn’t have made for such a strange story, and wouldn’t have wound up on the Internet, like it now is. If this was you, please leave a comment ;-)