Right On! Blog

What’s worse, someone stealing a purse, or someone stealing billions from hundreds of thousands of investors?

Parmalat’s jailed founder, Calisto Tanzi, has admitted to prosecutors that he shifted euro500 million ? roughly $620-million (U.S.) ? from Parmalat’s coffers to loss-making travel businesses controlled by his family.

Are they sure his name isn’t Ponzi?

The SEC, which has alleged Parmalat engaged “in one of the largest and most brazen corporate financial frauds in history,” is seeking civil penalties and repayment of any ill-gotten gains with interest for U.S. investors, who hold some $1.5-billion in its bonds and notes.

Parmalat’s auditor needs to at the very least lose their credentials.  As for me, I’ll be switching milk brands.

There is always a rest of the story, so here it is, telling you what the headlines don’t on yet another Toronto murder.

Toronto homicide detectives may think instead of how crude street justice got Mr. Sweeney in the end: He was, they say, essentially executed at the G-Spot nightclub in the early-morning hours of Dec. 22 .

Trudeau’s Charter continues to release criminals faster than the cops can catch them.  Half of these guys would be alive today if they were in jail.

And the lawyers get richer.

Get ready for another broken promise – the Liberals will no doubt not even try to keep the lid on next year’s 407 toll increase.

During the recent provincial election campaign, Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty, now premier, said he would roll back tolls on the highway.

…this promise is right out of Crouton’s GST book of red lies.

(more…)

Happy new year to all, and here’s looking back at the new, lawless Toronto.

Ellis said he’s disturbed by what appears to be an emerging class of callous, violent criminals in the city. “To me there’s a lack of sense of community value, … a lawless subculture that’s out of control.”

Gangs are the new families of the 2000s – complete with capital punishment without trail for the slightest transgression.  To think you boomers thought the strap was bad.

From the hyprocrisy files comes this bulletin:

Khatami also thanked “anybody who has offered assistance, including the Americans.” But he downplayed talk that Washington’s contribution, among the largest from nearly 30 countries, including Canada, would thaw frosty relations between the two countries.

“Humanitarian issues should not be intertwined with deep and chronic political problems,” Khatami said. “If we see change both in tone and behaviour of the U.S. administration, then a new situation will develop in our relations.”

Sending millions in aid doesn’t constitute a tone?  Glad the Iran government sees taking care of its citizens as separate issue.

This woman sure was on the right plane.

A grandmother who suffered a heart attack on a plane could not have wished for better care…When the stewardess put out the call: “Is there a doctor on the plane”, 15 cardiologists stood up to help 67-year-old Dorothy Fletcher.

See, there is good news in the world.

:neale:

Some real worthwhile reading in Steyn’s mailbox this week.  A great deal of it dealt with Steyn’s assertions that the fertility of the Western World is in dangerous decline, with social engineering like homosexual marriages not helping things at all.

Does that mean the state should force individuals to have children? No. But it does mean it should not assist in facilitating dramatic societal changes, the consequence of which will be fewer children. It should surely be clear by now , for example, that European cradle-to-grave welfare legislation is the world’s longest suicide note.

One letter writer produced a connection between high tax rates and low fertility rates, another had some interesting thoughts on how the more socialist a country, the more uncaring it was.

Big news: a scientist who stands up against the junk science that is Kyoto scored a victory for honesty from the Dutch government.

The news from Denmark vindicates a political scientist, which is always to be welcomed. Lomborg had the temerity to challenge a gaggle of radical environmentalists on their own turf. In his book and in his response to its reception, Lomborg showed beyond question that his critics were mostly ideological fanatics hiding behind their professional credentials as biologists and health scientists.

Strange how this wasn’t in the Red Star, eh?

I always thought MASH ($US orders) “jumped the shark”

when Trapper and Henry left the show.  Good to see Trapper is doing ok today.

The rebellious spirit of “M*A*S*H” Army doctor Trapper John McIntyre never changes on reruns, but the star who played him, Wayne Rogers, long ago traded his fatigues for pinstriped business suits.

:neale:

I’d guess that meeting this animal by accident would qualify as most people’s worst nightmare.

Indonesian villagers claim to have captured a python that is almost 49.21 feet long and weighs nearly 992.07 pounds, a local official said Monday.

:neale:

One of my Xmas gifts was Rush in Rio DVD ($US orders), clearly the pinnacle product of the band Rush’s career.  I wrote a bit of an amazon review below.

Some links to sample:

[url=http://www.rushinrio.com]http://www.rushinrio.com[/url]

[url=http://www.rush.com]http://www.rush.com[/url]

(more…)

You know the laws of the land are clearly not working when the criminals are meting out their own justice.

A Brampton man acquitted of second-degree murder only days ago was shot dead Saturday in what Toronto police are calling an execution.

It may deny the the accused his “Charter rights” but it is pretty efficient, eh?

No big surprise, but Mark is against gay marriage.  He fears that it could just be a passing fad in the homosexual identity crisis, which is not a good reason to alter a thousands of years old tradition.

I’m against gay marriage. I’m against it for what I think is a conservative reason. Marriage has been around for thousands of years. Sodomy, as a sexual act, goes back just as far, but homosexuality, as a recognized condition, dates only from the late 19th century, and gayness, as a 24/7 social identity, is of even more recent vintage. Who’s to say it isn’t a passing phase?

Besides, the social engineers have done a lousy job tinkering with societal structure, and this change will probably turn out badly as well.

I said here that GWB should win this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.  Austin Bay thinks the GIs who won Men of the Year from Time should win the NPP.  Both would be wise choices.

“Person of the Year” should be the first in a crescendo of honors. Frankly, the grand accolade U.S. GIs have earned is the Nobel Peace Prize.

via Instapundit

That giant flushing sound of your hard earned tax dollars is coming from a past party in Ottawa.

It cost the federal government more than $300,000 last May to announce plans for The Canada History Centre, a Chretien legacy project that may fall victim to Paul Martin’s capital spending freeze…and a $6,000 catering bill.

Must’ve been some good food.

:neale: