Right On! Blog

The PM’s only anti-Mulroney promise he followed through on seems to have returned to haunt him

One of Jean Chr?tien’s first acts as Prime Minister was to axe a contract for what he called “Cadillac” helicopters for the military ? a decision that keeps coming back to haunt him.

Chr?tien and his Liberals spent the 1993 election campaign complaining about wasteful Tory spending. And one of their favourite targets was a $4.8 billion contract signed by Brian Mulroney’s government to buy 50 EH-101 helicopters from an Anglo-Italian consortium.

Our few contributions to the war effort are crashing down – for no other reason than to screw Mulroney’s wise decision to upgrade.

While Chretien keeps blabbing about the UN resolution 24912, and his military keeps shrinking and crashing, old proud soldiers of Canada spin in their graves.

There is something wrong with my latest MT install.  Comments are working, although your browser will say it cannot display the page.

I am trying to figure out the problem, while also testing pmachine.

David Frum’s Diary on Bush’s excellent pre-war speech.

The speech President Bush gave last night at the American Enterprise Institute was not only one of the most important of the war – it ranks among the most important state papers of the past three decades.

If Bush himself isn’t the most brightest Presidents in a long time, then his cabinet and handlers certainly are.

It’s been a few months since a Chretinite has uttered the words most Liberals feel.

“Damn Americans. I hate those bastards,” Mississauga Centre MP Carolyn Parrish said as she walked away from a caucus meeting.

Good luck on the softwood lumber negotiations, idiot Liberals.  Americans are very loyal to those that help them. 

This foolish quote coming from a woman who’s riding is essentially an American branch plant suburb.

Every now and then Castro opens his eyes and sees a big bad capitalist world.  Why, he didn’t even recognize China when he visited yesterday.

“I can’t really be sure just now what kind of China I am visiting, because the first time I visited, your country appeared one way and now when I visit it appears another way,” Castro said in a meeting with the head of China’s legislature, Li Peng.

Can you imagine if he gave up his Marxist doctrine and oppressive regime long ago?  What kind of tourist powerhouse Cuba would have been.  What a tragedy for the people of Cuba – living in the third world because of one dictator.  Hmmm..sounds like Saddam’s country.

There’s always a dark side to everything that we thought was good:Google as Big Brother

Google deserves your nomination for Big Brother of the Year

Occam’s Toothbrush has a great link to Dennis Prager’s article: The Future is Muslim, European or American.

The world’s future is being decided at this time.

Such moments are extremely rare in history. And when they have occurred, they have between two, not three, competing ideologies.

But there are now three ideologies competing to shape the future of mankind. They are militant Islam, Western European secularism and socialism, and American Judeo-Christianity and capitalism. The first is being spread both peacefully and violently, the second is being spread peacefully, and the third is not being spread.

To fight the enemy, you need to know them.  Tea with Terrorists is a book that describes the teaching of Islam and why many “fundamentalists” have taken its teachings to the extreme. 

Reviewer: CL Power from Charlottesville, VA United States

The authors of this book have the guts to speak the truth about Islam. They skipped being politcally correct and went straight to the root of today’s terrorism. It’s obvious that the authors did their homework before writing this book. I find it funny that some of the other reviewers have resorted to name calling and character bashing rather that offering a shred of honest contradiction. Christians who read this book will have their faith refreshed, non-believers will start thinking about salvation, and the politicians will be angry that the authors have written the truth and offered them a solution. You will be horrified by the insanity revealed in this story, and hopefully you will be calmed as well by the solution to the problem.

I am sick and tired of David Collenette’s latest high speed train plan..

The idea sounds sexy, except when you start adding up the cost.  The purpose of tax money being spent by government is to benefit the highest number of taxpayers. 

Who uses the train along the Windsor/Quebec corridor?  Rail passengers – and there are not enough of them to justify the monumental expense—which we know will not be $3B.  Try $5B, or even $6B.

Let’s check just a few benefits of road building vs. train building, since the $6B would benefit far more people if were put into roads.

Who would benefit from a $6B road?  Everyone across Canada.  Truckers, busses, RVs, cars, SUVs, ambulances, police cars, fire trucks, to name a few vehicles.  We could twin the Trans Canada, and have enough money left over to knock a few cents off the gas tax too.

If there is a problem with the $6B road, a detour can be set up, and the road will still be useable.  If there is a problem with any of the high speed track or its train, the majority of the route is unuseable.

The road can be used 24/7.  The train and its track will be used 2% of the time, if that. 

I could go on, but clearly one can see that this pet project is simply a terrible waste of money that is rooted in one person’s obsession with trains.  The project has no basis in public need, which is why government should stay out of the megaproject business.

What happens if the $6B road is blocked? 

The train project, proposed by VIA Rail Canada, is expected to cost more than $3 billion.

Proposals for high-speed trains in the corridor have been studied by governments for almost 30 years but the enormous costs have sunk past proposals.

An interesting opinion piece on the recent repealing of all death row inmates in Illinois.

Is the death penalty, by its very nature, “arbitrary and capricious” as the governor of Illinois and the Reverend Jesse Jackson have suddenly erupted into insisting?

No. And they should be made to prove that it is.

Protesting For Useful Idiots

An interesting book that is a must read for our anti-war country.

Retired Maj.-Gen. Lewis MacKenzie says that the peace marchers are helping the war effort.

“The peace marches have probably made the likelihood of war greater,” retired Maj.-Gen. Lewis MacKenzie, former commander of UN operations in Bosnia, said yesterday. “Saddam Hussein has seen this and probably said, ‘Why should I give in? I have half the world on my side.’ “

Hmmm.  Keep marching, guys!

USS Clueless has piece on The guiding philosphy behind the EU.  In case you were curious about some of their many motives for being against the war…

The answer is that the purpose of the European Union is to roll back the post-war experiment in western Europe with capitalist representative democracy, and to restore Europe to its rightful place at the center of the world’s stage by displacing the US as the predominant power in the world.

Winds of Change has more discussion on this topic.  Very interesting.

Right Wing News has a great entry about a speech President Reagan gave in 1964. 

Admittedly there is a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson in history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face–that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight and surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand–the ultimatum. And what then?

Evil never changes – and rising against it in 2003 is more important than ever.

American RealPolitik found a great cartoon on Iraq.  Canada and the world can ignore it at its peril.