The Governing Opposition

There is no remembrance when you can not forget.

2011-11-11T11:11:00.155-05:00

So as I finish the first stage of the new Schwarzlose workout training program, which is basically a hybrid system that simply takes all the best from two No Pain No Gain style old school bodybuilding workout routines being Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone with some of Jason Statham mixed to fill in any gaps. Though obvious this action is just a natural bulk up system, fully built for one to go out into the world feeling good, sleeping eating, drinking and training well at their maximum to gain their maximum physique, but this action can also be a cutting down system too by feeling stronger, sleeping longer, training harder, drinking more and eating less until that maximum physique is attained once again. Just in starting on this program alone, I have gained a little over 3 and three quarters of extra lean mass in a month, which maybe slow but that is new muscle over the old and lowered the total body fat percentage by one full percent according to my pinching calipers.

One point to stress on the bench press and even the squat and deadlift however, my gains have not come from the routine's but rather the rather intense progressive overload method created and reformulated by the strength and conditioning program in the athletic department at the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers, where you are consistently increasing the amount of iron you are lifting incrementally yet consistently and your muscle stimulus potential to build more longer strength, larger size and lean mass.

As I began the post here on Canadian Remembrance Day, did something I have not usually had time for, sat down to watch a couple films being the 46 minute 1998 National Film Board of Canada's John Mccrae's War In Flanders Fields and the 169 minute 1998 Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan where all of us went from Guelph, Ontario to Flanders, Belgium and from Payton, Iowa to Normandy, France in just seconds. With only the idea of not to reason why but to do and die, soldiers gave their lives for country and cause their leadership deemed essential, necessary and right to keeping its Capracornian principles and ideals of society being freedom, liberty and democracy, where God is for us and no one can be against us. This is also the society that openly teaches us to just earn it even though we know we never can, so indeed lest we forget memoriam eorum retinebimus angus Dei omnium Rex ta panta en Christoi synesteken forever, that is remember also the One we do know Who through we all shall indeed earn this once and for all.

Tea Party Occupy Wall Street Protestors waving the Red, Black and Blue

2011-11-07T21:31:00.129-05:00

First came a Tea Party then a need to Occupy, with both a deeper sense of economic doubt and social inequality than had been felt before the grander political change, some believe that both should either benevolently merge or hostily takeover as one protest, running an independent presidential candidate in the upcoming American Presidential election with the message "Forget about change, they want dollars, instead give us liberty not debt!" as the working election slogan on the current state of affairs then see how policies like restoration of Constitution of the United States and the broken democratic process and political system with fair pay and taxation, ending the doubledipped advanced recession, megagreedy big bank bailouts and its supposed creator United States Federal Reserve Bank fly in real time and life.

If one reads between the lines quietly along the Allied Western Front, they can see nothing but negativity coming from the majority of people over their ultimate life purpose in this world, but indeed a time has come for a more positive solution to all the problems entering so rapidly into their lives.

Taking a couple steps back from the protests, the people within and those without need to realize that justice is something we do not find in this world, as it says in the Holy Bible Matthew 5:45 "That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." Like the philosophically virtuous question of ethics in the eyes of Aristotle and Plato, justice is the proper disposition to act what is just in action and to be think what is good in thought, bringing Athens in line with Jerusalem while holding to cautious warnings from both Tertullian and Paul to look to the next world and life. Speaking on the gift of eternal life, Jesus once famously said in the Holy Bible Mark 10:31, "But many that are first shall be last and the last first." and that we can all take to the bank.

Obama not our America changed

2011-11-04T23:33:00.039-04:00

We had hope, change we could and yes we can, believe in.

But we did not realize that it was not a vote for a candidate of change for President, but a candidate that changed as President, as Obama was a flipflop of himself pre and post election. As candidate on the campaign trail, he was an excellent populist speaker on communication and supposedly horrible executive manager, yet as the President in the White House, he has been a perfect executive manager in government, only to lost his touch as that populist speaker. The only conclusion one American can simply come to, is that Obama, not our America, has changed.

It may have begun with us, but as we come to the light at the end of the long tunnel, it has ended with him.

First an Arabian Spring and now an American Fall

2011-10-24T21:33:00.007-04:00

By now everyone knows about the amazing chain of events in the Middle East that started in Tunisia where a grassroots revolution through civil resistance over widespread governmental corruption leading up to the self immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi in the mantra of "Ash Shab Yurid Isqat An Nizam", ousting of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi, continues through Algeria, Lebanon, Mauritania, Sudan, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Morocco, Western Sahara, Palestinian National Authority, Jordan, Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, Kuwait, Syria and has likely now ended in Libya with its raging civil war and the dramatic overthrow of its head of state Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar Al Gaddafi that ensued within, together called the Arabian Spring in the East.

I would now like to argue that turning from the Afroriental expression of independence, freedom and democracy, one not exactly like the prepackaged globalized United States marketed product sold abroad colonialistically through Western styled education, health care and human rights then outsourced back to us through budgetary cost benefit analysis and contracting using the low risk and high reward tradeoff principle, we now look to the Americoccidental spectre of a coming American Fall in the West. Politically, a promise of hope and change has lead to just more of the same, leading jokers on the left to Occupy Wall Street like 1929 and clowns on the right to repeat the Boston Tea Party like 1773 in protest, yet no one wants to face the realities of 2011, where from lobbyists to legislators, a nation continues to be overpromise, underestimate and nondeliverable as "Mission Accomplished" becomes "Assignment Incomplete". Add this to the obvious twinning of both economic and defense aims, ways and means into undesirable strategic ends, whose consequences domestic and foreign bring no one closer to its original stated goals, one can now understand how government, not the citizen, has given up on its supposed commitment towards achieving cultural goals through the traditional democratic processes in America.

The politically elite powered triumvirate which is the military industrial complex, and not the White House or its President, may still call the final shots in a direct line, from Wall Street to the Pentagon to the Beltway, but that same old iron triangle establishment of the status quo is slowly bending to the will of, by and for the people though current results do not show it, with every Tea Partier, Street Occupier or some other kind of unaligned independent protesting citizen joining their brave new civil rebellion and their own mantra of "Do Not Tread On Me" against big imperialistic government, excessive taxation with no special representation, treatment or service for the people yet ballouts its special interests using political collusion, correctness and bias, the gap between those legally represented by vested interests in their society and those without any of all of this grows wider and deeper, until one day the rule of law and the power of interest will no longer be.

Democracy is as democracy always does

2011-10-07T07:31:00.007-04:00

Democracy is as democracy always does, even at just less than 50 percent strength last night in Ontario, historically lower than any provincial vote ever before since Confederation in 1867, which meant the parties that have been delivering status quo to the taxpayers of the province would end up getting the majority of the vote actually made, while those promising citizens hope and change would have to wait until next time to try again.

Also just less than 50 percent was the colouring of the Saugeen riding Tory blue by the voters there, while the province itself remained Grit red with 53 seats, albeit by a supposed major minority of 37 percent, with an opposition of 54 seats made up of 37 Progressive Conservatives at 35 percent and 17 New Democrats at 23 percent, fringe parties took the huge brunt of the blow, where even the Greens free fell five points to 3 and Reform did not even register a point at 0.

In the end, the electors of Bruce Grey Owen Sound, who decided collectively who their representative individually for the next session of legislature would be, felt safe with more of the same in Walker, rather than taking the chance at change with a choice for Jolley and bucking against the status quo, thus enacting a Bill of Rights rather than a Shane of Responsibilities.

Minority and Resilency equal Opportunity for Independence

2011-10-03T17:43:00.087-04:00

As we state in the opening preamble of our own 2011 Ontario provincial election camapaign statement of principles, Bruce Grey Owen Sound is home to independent minded citizens with the resilience, endurance and perseverance to find new opportunity in the face of difficulty, indeed these are difficult and tumultuous days we live in. Unknown are the environs we move towards, in various areas, economically a slowdown is all but guaranteed, how deep no one knows, politically a minority is also in the cards, whose it will be for sure, with Tweedle Red and Tweedle Blue neck and neck tied, is completely uncertain.

With such a history of resilency economically and knowledge of a minority politically, now is the right time for Bruce Grey Owen Sound to declare its political, economic and cultural independence, with a vote for Independent Shane Jolley.

An Ontario Legislature at Queen's Park will have no mandate, rudderless without any clear sense of aim, lacking the people first principles an Independent can give it. The lone common voice of the Bruce Grey Owen Sound people could finally be heard in Toronto independently, finally making a real difference, especially during this era of fiscal and economic insecurity where critical thinking, not party platform parroting, to begin getting out of the hole we have dug ourselves into. An important vote for Independence could give Bruce Grey Owen Sound the kingmaking power and control of the 107 seat Assembly in that minority government, if we decided to properly use the local resiliency we have always had to bend yet not break, to simply be strong and resilient in times of trouble and thus must resurrect the maverick political spirits of United Farmer Labour Agnes Macphail, Liberal Red Grit Eddie Sargent and Progressive Conservative Tory Bill Murdoch by voting Independent again with Shane Jolley for a more responsible citizen, community and country across the Province of Ontario.

Debate neither decided the election nor solved any problems in Ontario

2011-09-28T23:11:00.044-04:00

The head to head rock them sock them that was the Ontario election debate, proudly brought to you by the broadcasting consortium, between all three major party leaders at Queen's Park did not decide the election. Nor did it solve any problems in the province, either in the areas of democratic, fiscal, social, ecological, cultural, economic or constitutional renewals or reforms, at the personal or community levels. It left us all with more essential questions, possibly, than substantial answers on the question of responsibility and who actually wants to lead and take some instead of dishing it out and leaving it on the table just to get cold.

Obviously, we did not expect all of Ontario's problems to be decided in a couple hours, or even major policy decisions to be agreed to in such a format where well rehearsed talking points partisanly were the name of the game, but we did expect an inordinate amount of decorum to properly think, deliberation to properly speak and responsiveness to properly rebut the answers to the question with one's good communication skills.

Respect in these areas left much to be desired, which is why that debate yesterday neither decided the election, nor solved any problems in Ontario therein. On the extreme other hand, at an all candidates' debate in Owen Sound held tonight, seven candidates vying for the seat in the Bruce Grey Owen Sound riding agreed on the need for a brand new local decision making mechanism versus the current centralization mentality of, by and for Toronto as the rural urban divide widens the growing gap on issues like health care, education and energy. This regional idea originally lead before the election campaign even started of course by Independent Shane Jolley, who actually has not only taken the lead on this issue as the founder and coordinator with the Local Motive Project in 2006, but has also taken responsibility to further the role of the riding in a responsible mix between direct and representative democracy for Bruce Grey Owen Sound.

Very Hopeful Thoughts on the upcoming Ontario Provincial Election

2011-09-07T21:13:00.064-04:00

In so far as very hopeful thoughts on the upcoming 2011 Ontario provincial election, I have not really changed my head on this, still believe three various actions will happen from it.

One, the Mcguinty Ontario Liberals will be winning a minority government, something which could have been rectified if Dalton had of stepped down a year and one half at least earlier, whereas now he likely has cost the party another strong majority, the final count will likely be Liberals at 34 percent and 52 seats, Progressive Conservatives at 33 percent and 29 seats, New Democrats at 29 percent and 25 seats, Green at 0 percent and 0 seats, Reform at 0 percent and 0 seats too and Independent at 0 percent and 1 seat. This minority sadly clashes with my second thought, Mcguinty steps down for a leadership race, where former finance minister, party president and current Vaughan Liberal candidate Greg Sorbara would have smoothly taken over within two years, instead we likely will be facing another election in that quick time. Finally my third idea which still has the Liberals, Tories and New Democrats at each other necks as par usual at Queen's Park, but instead of the same old status quo politics of sturm, drang and krieg, an Independent from the North shall come into the Ontario Legislature and bring a brand new politics of peace, recovery and reconciliation down from afar being a district called Bruce Grey Owen Sound into Toronto, which then would launch us forward towards achieving Ontario's true place of greatness in the world, from what it is today to what it can be tomorrow.

I can dream, you can too if you tried, imagine.

Taking Personal and Community Responsibility

2011-09-03T19:31:00.084-04:00

Just taking responsibility, that simple task in politics, let alone life, seems to be one of the most difficult things to do. But that is a task we, Shane, the rest of the campaign team and I have been given to do and break it down into areas of our own lives collectively we need it the most. From the policy research, formation and development side of the campaign, Shane and I believe these Seven Core Values towards Personal and Community Responsibility are key in this upcoming provincial election and its Bruce Grey Owen Sound campaign.

In so far as Democratic Responsibility is concerned, we must renew, reform and protect the democratic mechanisms that give voice to every citizen. We must demand genuine representation, free of party interference, and we must participate to fullest of our ability in the democratic process or risk losing our voice. On Fiscal Responsibility, we must bring respect back to the relationship between government and its taxpayers. We must understand that for every tax should come a service and expect the government to deliver it effectively, efficiently and equally amongst all citizens. On Social Responsibility, we must look to the interests of others as well as ourselves, starting with our closest neighbours. We must work together as a community to ensure the well being of our citizens. On Ecological Responsibility, we must be stewards of our local land and resources for the long term. We must manage our affairs in interest of future generations so that they can have equal or better opportunity than this generation. On Cultural Responsibility, we must return to our roots as a Canadian and Ontarian people, and as a Bruce Grey Owen Sound community. We must respect and recognize everyone's differences, as well as our similarities, in order to become more united as a people and a community. On Economic Responsibility, we must consider the impact of our purchasing decisions on both the quality and quantity of local jobs. We must return to understanding economics as mutual provision, rather than an abstract system that is outside of our control. We must look to our strengths, skills and wisdom as a caring local community to find our way forward in this time of global economic contraction. We must live within our means, personally and collectively. Finally as far as Constitutional Responsibility is concerned, we must demand greater jurisdiction over the policies that affect our unique rural economy, environment and culture. We must reorganize our regional governance to safeguard our local interests. We must not abdicate responsibility to upper levels of government for key policies affecting our future well being, particularly in the areas of planning and taxation.

From our actions come the chances and consequences of risk and reward, those choices bring the personal or collective power of change, whether positive or negative. Success is found in the most positive and rewarding ones being excerised and willed via that power, which is ultimately held deep within all of us, yet rarely ever used in the days of depression, decline and defeat. This is why all votable citizens of Bruce Grey Owen Sound needs to know that though there is always a price to pay and a demand to be decided for taking responsibility, be it time, money or effort, we gain that power of change back to make through ourselves.

An Openly Independent Bruce Grey Owen Sound in a Very Dependent Ontario

2011-08-29T13:23:00.076-04:00

This past weekend, Independent Shane Jolley of the Independence for Bruce Grey Owen Sound Ontario election campaign asked if I was interested in helping him free the electoral district, constituency or riding from the traditional party machinery of well oiled politics here provincially, you bet you I am! Volunteering my time, academically through the sociology department at Redeemer University College and politically for a worthwhile cause, is key to our future as a community and mine as an individual in it here in the Twin Counties. Standing up against the same old status quo is very important and having Shane do that on behalf of us without advance prodding is magnificent, especially in helping to protect and conserve the way of life we all have been so fortunate to have in Grey Bruce Owen Sound, where else would one really want to be?

Though I will be working primarily in the backroom, as the campaign manager in charge of special operations intelligence and command, working on principles, policy and the campaign platform and the support poll maps at the desk, I will be looking forward to meeting all of you throughout the area and in various part of the Saugeen region of Cottage Country we live in.

Thinking back to my time as campaign youth chair and countless other positions on the various election campaigns of Bill Murdoch, looking back at the storied career of Eddie Sargent's storied career at Queen's Park as a child and reading about the days of political yore through the sharp eyes and ears of Agnes Macphail, I recognize the streak of independence we hold close to our collective hearts in Bruce Grey Owen Sound. Some else I note is, we never turn our backs on those we believe need our help or maybe having a tough and rough time about it, indeed times we are most definitely facing yet again, which is why this upcoming vote will be one of the most important in recent years, making the decision made in it just as important. We need to make our voice heard in this province, in this dominion and across the whole wide world itself, our think global yet act local economy, environment and culture demands it more than ever before so think Bruce Grey Owen Sound and vote Independent for Shane Jolley.

From Obama to Layton a Message of Hope

2011-08-22T03:33:00.004-04:00

Both Jack Layton, former Leader of the Opposition with the New Democrats in Canada, and Barrack Obama, current President of the United States with the old Democrats in America, surprising came from similar lifepaths to end up near the very top with a pinnacle of success in their chose field of politics. Involved with their respective law, academia and civic government communities advocating and organizing for the poor, penniless and powerless, eventually becoming the candidates of change via the sharing of similar themes of hopefulness during their speeches in culturally diverse elections yet of which the aftermath culminated in similar results. From the genuine dreams of ideals came the honest truth of reality, neither could fully realize the potential either wished to completely harness, which seemed to me at least to be that lesson the parents always taught us as kids being rights versus responsibility and consequences with confidence.

From that past book of Obama's, Dreams from my Father, among the personal reflections and experiences he wrote of, I took up three quotes being these: "All too rarely do I hear people asking just what it is that we've done to make so many children's hearts so hard, or what collectively we might do to right their moral compass - what values we must live by. Instead I see us doing what we've always done - pretending that these children are somehow not our own", "The study of law can be disappointing at times, a matter of applying narrow rules and arcane procedure to an uncooperative reality, a sort of glorified accounting that serves to regulate the affairs of those who have power - and that all too often seeks to explain, to those who do not, the ultimate wisdom and justness of their condition. But that's not all the law is. The law is also memory, the law also records a long-running conversation, a nation arguing with its conscience" and "What is our community and how might that community be reconciled with our freedom? How far do our obligations reach? How do we transform mere power into justice and mere sentiment into love?" From this current letter of Layton's, Dear Friends, again I took up three quotes being these: "All my life I have worked to make things better. Hope and optimism have defined my political career, and I continue to be hopeful and optimistic about Canada. Young people have been a great source of inspiration for me. I have met and talked with so many of you about your dreams, your frustrations, and your ideas for change. More and more, you are engaging in politics because you want to change things for the better", "As my time in political life draws to a close I want to share with you my belief in your power to change this country and this world. There are great challenges before you, from the overwhelming nature of climate change to the unfairness of an economy that excludes so many from our collective wealth, and the changes necessary to build a more inclusive and generous Canada. I believe in you. Your energy, your vision, your passion for justice are exactly what this country needs today. You need to be at the heart of our economy, our political life, and our plans for the present and the future" and "My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world." of which I can faithfully say we should abide by these yet declare the greatest of these being love.

The Holy Bible's First Corinthians Book Thirteenth Chapter Thirteenth Verse seems to be the original of Obama's and Layton's echo we hear and cry we heed, love is something we lack, as we do too with hope and faith, which may just be the reason we also lack the empathy to be caring and compassionate towards each other as a community and thus lack the morality to be right and free as well as responsible and just as individuals within it. Both of these individuals of certain power and prestige have used their political lot in life to bring us closer to the greater good, the higher form and the supreme just, however neither could quite get us there to dialectically sublate and fulfill our absolute state of superior existence and beyond its obvious limitations, which due to sinfulness of, by and for humanity would seem to be an impossibility here on earth. We may not change the world by ourselves, but we mere created humans know who can help us and will and if we have faith, hold hope and start to show love, perhaps then and only then will we want to be more like Him our Creator.

Political Independence Day in Bruce Grey Owen Sound Ontario Canada

2011-06-03T15:07:00.155-04:00

I remember talking with Shane about this very thing a couple years back, during a politically motivated meetup at Shorty's around mid May 2008 in downtown Owen Sound, I remember Jolley asked everyone to vote on whether they felt he could best represent the riding of Bruce Grey Owen Sound as a Green or an Independent. The vote was split at 3 as it came time for me to have a say, I simply thought one could not conscientiously represent the general interests and principles of a people and its region with its local culture fully when they obviously have to represent the special interests and principles of a leader and their party with its global ideology as well, just by the fact of philosophically reflective practicalities alone. So, the decision Shane has come to with his declaration of independence so early in June I believe comes from that grassroots vote and a tiem of reflection upon whether to represent the general interests of a region and the special interests of a party, where the now former deputy leader of the Green Party of Ontario and one time highest votegetting Green in the nation has decided not for latter but for the former in Bruce Grey Owen Sound.

Speaking about the self serving system that is the party power politics, Jolley hits on exactly why I find politics a pathetic and dangerous place to be pausing at the present, instead to serve the interests of local constituents and help navigate the serious challenges via global economics, rising energy prices and the basic rural inequities Bruce Grey Owen Sound has still yet to solve.

Actually, going one further, Shane makes it clear that not only can the Saugeen region survive these negative circumstances, but thrive in spite of them, making us many positive opportunities for our region to capitalize upon them. However for us to do so, we must recognize that rather than run quickly forward using party power politics and the self serving system that strengthens it, we must shirk off that entitlemental idleness and rights supported barrier of irresponsibility towards achieving instead meaningful change and voluntary civic action of responsibility. In quoting outgoing former Independent and Progressive Conservative Member of Provincial Parliament Bill Murdoch three times with "It seems to me, over the past 100 years or so, we have taken away the individual rights of elected members of government, and in doing so we have taken away the rights of constituents who elected them!", "In my view, a government should be applauded because they are so confident in their leadership, so certain of their direction, that they allow members to think, to react, to represent, and to vote." and "“If you did not get elected to speak your mind, to defend your constituents and to adjust or even change the system, then what did you get elected for?" Jolley sets himself up to walk the walk most talk and talk in replacing the man he was thirteen points behind in the last provincial election, independently and confidently Shane will seek a return to people first political system, where local citizens are engaged, involved and taken seriously at the Ontario Legislature at Queen’s Park in Toronto. Ignoring the citizen electorate, let alone their elected members, governments, cabinets and parties sell their ideology, through a platform of their creation, leaders telling regions how to live, eat, drink, breathe and think via social media tweet addendums from their penthouse top floor corner office with oversized windows overlooking Bay Street downtown Toronto. Not this time, think twice and vote once for Independent.

A Separate Quebec falls on the chopping Bloc

2011-05-09T11:33:00.123-04:00

Wow, how could my prediction on the 2011 federal election in Canada been anymore wrong, I knew the Conservatives would be around 150 seats as the Governing party over the Liberals, who I had neck and neck with the New Democrats both just under 45 for a minority, but I was sure the Bloc Québécois was going to return as the Opposition with 73 seats. Boy, was I wrong and how, because if one just switched dynamics between the BQ and the ND then one could move closer to our actual results. By the end of last Monday, the federal Tories had finally won their majority with 166 seats from its original 143 minority, the New Democrats used Québec to go from 36 to 103 to become the Opposition, the Grits from 77 to 34 losing not only the Opposition title but its leader, just like the Bloquistes who moved from 47 to 4 and even the Greens threw everything including the kitchen sink into Saanich—Gulf Islands to finally elect Elizabeth May also of London North, Central Nova and Cape Breton Highlands—Canso.

Now though I think a story can be told from either the historical motion of no confidence by the House of Commons against the Crown in Council, a first time ever in the Commonweath, where a government and its cabinet had been found in contempt of its parliament to which is must remain accountable. Or how the loss of the House's only Independent being Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier's André Arthur, who came in second with 27.8% of the vote, to the New Democrats would affect federal politics. But I think we should take up a suggestion by the Bloc, indeed we should Parlons Nous Québec or let us talk about Quebec, to just try and figure what is next for La Belle Province.

It was a shallow attempt to get people talking about the province avec le Bloc, its raison d'être being souveraineté association, le chef du Bloc Québécois Gilles Duceppe must have realized protection of jobs and the economy not language and the culture was the mot de jour. Indeed, the cause célèbre that broke the camel's back apparently was the massive rally and grand speech for separation with current Parti Québécois leader Pauline Marois and former PQ premier Jacques Parizeau to solidify the Péquistes at home in Saint Lambert and Longueuil in Montréal during the final week, but the iron fist of sovereignty lost its grip to a more nationalist, socialist and progressive Québécois audience who now wanted more unity and less separation in Canada even amonst the francophone voter. In the end, the more positive message politically by Jack Layton and the New Democrats of hope, change and optimism won over the obviously negative message politically of fear, entrenchment and separatism, which is likely the best part of this story altogether.

From Change and Hope to Rage and Vote

2010-11-01T15:33:00.000-04:00

After writing a weblog article on Monday the 3rd November of 2008, in which I expressed my personal feelings that despite a Barack Obama Democrat victory over John Mccain's Republican campaign, life would go on in America, since Obama would be like a third presidential term of George W. Bush, explaining how tied he was to Iraq, Wall Street and the political Republicrat system, I literally had to shut down that whole political weblog because of the constant violent threats, coercive expressions towards legal action suits and just plain massive barrage of instant messages within. I hope this posting does not lead to a similar event, something I think is less possible as I have slowly been proven right on many counts, despite the internet tar and feathering I originally received cybertronically which I now hope to evoid!

These midterms will most definitely turn towards the Tea Party's favour, which has been coopted by the Republicans into a future majority in the House, an expanded seat gain for its minority in the Senate and likely capture more victories than defeats in the Gubernatorials. I think that three key actors lead to this turn of events, first, the libertarian agenda of the fiscalist Tea Party movement finally pushed over the brim of the cup of joe that is America, where the 2008 federal Wall Street bailout of banks and financial institutions under Bush, the Emergency Economic Stabilization of 2008 and 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment economic stimulus acts got under the skin of the average taxpayer. Second, while believing Washington was taxing and spending too much, investing and saving too little and listening and doing not enough, Taxpartiers moved from disorganized protester discontent to orgranized political action, which is exactly what powered Scott Brown into winning Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy's seat the special 2010 United States Senate election. Finally, despite those who think Sarah Palin would be my third actor, it actually is the American citizen themselves, as the slogan Tax Enough Already, ten point contract that covers reduction in government spending and taxation, the national debt and federal budget deficit and the return to an originalist interpretation of the United States Constitution, respect for the constitutionality of legislation and the adherence to it seem to ring true in most Americans' hearts.

From a Contract with America in 1994 to a Contract from America in 2010, not much has really changed, quite like my past argument over the real difference from Dubya to Obama, Republicrats will stay the same no matter how much the average taxpayer and voter want change, just look at the amount declared as Independents to illustrate the fact of disillusionment in politics today. Moving quickly from the 2008 political issues of social justice and the environment to the 2010 edition being fiscal prudence and the economy, the prospects of being unemployed and without a job made the pragmatic idealist into a principled realist, which is why tomorrow will move America back into hard politics and well away from health care. Tomorrow will be a Republican victory, like yesterday was for the Democrats, but the real question is when does the Citizen of America finally get theirs?

Death and its obvious lifelong inevitability

2010-10-31T23:33:00.010-04:00

So according to the Death Clock dot com, my personal day of death is Thursday, March 31, 2050, something I think can live with. I mean if you think about it for a second that is only about less than 40 years from now, lots of life still left to live, plus add to all of this a fact that I have lived a really good life and and I have tried as a saved sinner to live my life the best I could in the fallen conditions we live in. Thanks to the Holy Bible KJV Matthew 24:42-44 and the Lord Jesus Christ, we can have confidence that as it states, "Watch therefore for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come, but know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched and would not have suffered his house to be broken up, therefore be ye also ready for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh."

How, praytell, do we stay on the straight and narrow in so far as health choices for our mind, body and soul that may not seem quite so healthy?

No other food has taken on the worst rap than red meats, such as beef, for bringing on overweight body fat, heart condition and other cardiovascular diseases, yet the saturated fat in extra lean and grass fed cuts like the sirloin and round give you that added protein and conjugated linoleic acid boost to build and burn not bloat, especially watch out to pick select over prime cuts for a less fatty choice. While using high saturated fat and cholesterol yet low in the bad versions of both found in fast metabolizing foods that are still calorie dense, such as coconut, grapeseed, flaxseed and fish oils and eggs, you can mix it up with preworkout foods and drinks like monounsaturated fat and nutrient dense peanut butter and green tea and postworkout foods and drinks like dietary fibre and nutrient dense green banana and chocolate milk. Add these onto the other regular meats like poultry and fish, fruits like pineapple, peaches and plums and vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, carrot and spinach for all the good carbohydrates you need, then you should be good for a couple extra years I suspect.

Back to Redeemer for one more York

2010-08-21T12:43:00.006-04:00

Things did not work out for me to join York University and their Lions football club, mainly the housing situation being the problem, after being accepted by them for studies the second time in three years. But the ease I had with the academics and athletics did not match the hubalub I dealt with through housing, which became the deciding factor, which means I will finish my fifth and final at Redeemer University College with an honours major history to follow the political science degree to go, even though I will not get to finish my criminal justice minor as the internship hours and placement would not work along with my then overloaded schedule including the capstone historiography. In the meantime while I am down here with family and friends in the south, my hope personally is all the best for the York University Lions in their 2010 OUA and CIS football season with the opening for training camp this weekend I would have loved to be a part of, as they get ready for their first game being an exhibition in Quebec City against the Laval Rouge et Or with two a days until the end of August and look to perhaps join them in their quest for gold in football next year instead.

Is this suspension the final waterloo for Waterloo

2010-06-16T06:06:00.004-04:00

More than a decade ago, the University of Waterloo Warriors, of the Black and Gold, were basking in their 1999 Yates Cup victory over their crosstown rival Wilfrid Laurier University Golden Hawks 32-20, yet now today, a year after tying for sixth with Guelph and out from playoff contention in their conference, the club has been officially suspended from Ontario University Athletics and Canadian Interuniversity Sport play by its own school administration, how did it all come to pass?

Chiefly, a detailed investigation by the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport has revealed nine potential anti doping infractions by Warriors football players from sixty two urine and blood samples taken, possibly the biggest steroid investigation in Canadian university history, all of which stemmed from the arrest of thereafter suspended receiver Nathan Zettler for possession and trafficking of anabolic steroids, as well as facing additional charges for breaking and entering, possession of stolen property and breaching a a probation order which banned him from campus, this began an internal molehunt by the administration that led to where it tis at currently. This investigation led by the administration at Waterloo brought out four players admitted to steroid use, three others testing positive, one more refusing to be tested completely plus another pending further review by officials and police, those amongst them, who have waived their rights to a hearing then acknowledge they have committed a doping infraction, will be granted the ability to play again in two years, a wait of just one more year over their fellow clean teammates, who too have been penalized though none of them are guilty of the crime or have done anything wrong to deserve this punishment. With the chief executive officer of Canadian Interuniversity Sport Marg Mcgregor calling this investigation the most significant doping issue ever in the union's history, believing their "doping control program needs to be strengthened to ensure a level playing field and protect the rights of the vast majority of student athletes who respect the rules and compete are clean", one has to wonder if that is even possible anymore, especially in light of the fact the O.U.A. and C.I.S. do not even actively encourage scholarship recruitment and those who graduate rarely get shots at the professional Canadian Football League ranks, let alone higher, making the reasons for one to risk losing the love of just playing the game even that much more majorly bizarre.

So, is this suspension the final waterloo for Waterloo, or can the billed smartest team in O.U.A. and C.I.S. football do a Belgian comeback that would make even Wellington's domination of Napoleon pale in comparison, I guess we have one whole full year to find out, the question is who still will care about the Warriors and be waiting that long for the return of Black and Gold football and its $1 million plus refurbished Fieldturf on campus for it to actually matter?

Dutch double Danes in World Cup soccer

2010-06-15T09:21:00.001-04:00

The Danes got the double Dutch deluxe yesterday in Johannesburg, in the first World Cup 2010 South Africa soccer match for both clubs, with Denmark starting off the scoring on itself, but eventually the Netherlands got a legitimate goal late in the match to win and now take a Group E pool lead.

The question of whether Simon Poulsen or Daniel Agger scored on their own net in the 46th minute, early in the second half, is all that is left for one to answer, since the end result was a Dutch win over the Danes. The game featured a scoreless first half, that brought on more yawns than horns, after the dynamic Danish duo of Poulsen and Agger headed in the first goal for the Dutch, Dirk Kuyt gave the Orange a late strike over the Red in the 85th minute, rebounding a shot by Eljero Elia that beat the Danish goalkeeper but deflected off the goalpost back to Kuyt. With a Soccer City official crowd of 83,465, one could guess that if the population difference is anything like Canada or the United States, there was likely way more Dutch than Danes in those seats, which gives another reason for the State of Great Despair to get on with their natural population boom soon.

Though I do not watch much soccer, even when it may be the World Cup which apparently the rest of the world seems to watch much of, I do enjoy seeing Danmark and Nederlanden going at it against each other at least somewhere athletically, my hope is that we see at least another match between these clubs, perhaps a playdown atop their pool.

College Football Sanctions for Michigan and Southern California

2010-06-11T11:11:00.000-04:00

Big Ten Football will eventually become Big Thirteen

2010-05-31T13:13:00.005-04:00

Big news in American college football has been the possible expansion of the Big Ten, thus a contraction of another conference in the N.C.A.A., or possibly just a shoreup of the last independents, either way these changes will change the face of college football in the United States for quite sometime, let alone starting the 21st century with one bold step forward into its future.

The news mainly deals with the implosion of the Big East with either Syracuse, Pittsburgh or Rutgers being the twelfth, but supposedly they even have the crown jewel of the Big Twelve, Texas, on line to possibly join up. Well, all I can say is that none of these programs will be making the Big 10 into the Big 12 or 13, as none of them make any sense, on the other hand two or three which do are the Iowa State University Cyclones, University of Nebraska Cornhuskers and or the University of Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Of the very top, Iowa State makes the most sense, mainly because it would join its archrival University of Iowa Hawkeyes, however Nebraska is a next door rival of Iowa, has been a bubbling with discontent for years down in Lincoln and is higher profile than Iowa State, which is more of a weaker sister, then you have Notre Dame, but with the Fighting Irish of South Bend Indiana, you do not pick them, rather they would pick you. Just like Texas, no matter what, changes are going to be made, the Boise State University Broncos will lead the expansion stampede by riding hard over to Mountain West Conference from the Western Athletic Conference to join their new rival Texas Christian University Horned Frogs in the worst kept offseason secret, with a promise of more to come, such as perhaps the University of Montana Grizzlies moving on up a division to replace Boise State in the W.A.C.

If changes do happen in the Big Ten Conference, I can guarantee not only will the Big Twelve Conference deflate, ironically both in the mellee just may end up switching their original conference sizes, but either in kind the Pacific Ten Conference, South Eastern Conference and or Atlantic Coast Conference will inflate, no matter what, once again the Big 10 is showing just how relevant it still is when it somes to a big picture system that is the N.C.A.A., even if the game on the playing field is not matching its behind the scenes muscle off.

Oh sheesh yall twas a dream or whateva

2010-05-24T12:21:00.006-04:00

Wow, that was got to be the weirdest wackedout weekend I have had here at Redeemer ever, especially in light of the fact I was not even supposed to still be here. Yeah, originally invited over at two parties down at Mac on Friday, one held inside the campus in the woods behind the Back Ten fields and one around Westdale near Cootes Drive, then sent another instant message to go over to York, the plan included a party in the Village around the same time as the ones at Mac, where all of us would then leave at midnight by caravan, take in a campfire near an undisclosed swamp between Happy Valley and Bethesda in the King area, then finish the late night by hitting up a beer pong competition of some cigar gentlemen's club pal of a pal's place south of Barrie, like I said wow. Needless to say, for a guy who has been watching between like seven to twelve films a day, all of this would seem like a break, however instead to me right now, it would represent culture shock to its most extreme, which meant I stayed back in the cave, starting the night off rewatching Citizen Kane, so uh yeah?

Also, of late being this weekend, I have been having these absolutely weird, not quite psychedelic, but definitely fantasia like, all now in technicolor dreams, as to why that is weird is usually my dreams, for the good or the bad, are in black and white and now that I think about it even grainy in picture or blurred at the edges, if ever I even get to dream, as I usually do not especially while here at school. So what does it all mean, without the help of a frame by frame picture sequence afterwards that explains what happened the night before in the morning like in the Hangover, I think Freud slipped up when he said dreams, as the interpretative unconscious activities of the mind yet obscurely redacted and repressed by the mind to regain and remain at the previous level of relative sanity for the mind before the event, were communications through a symbolic language that could not be translated into the world of the awake thus also not understood. Instead, I would think our conscience, that judgement or intuition of the intellect that helps us to distinguish what is right from what is wrong, can tell in our sleep or while being awake, using the language which is being symbolically used to offer us more than outside knowledge whatever the inner message, by gaining our attention, we start identifying and becoming interested towards it, perhaps desire and make a decision for it and finally act on it ourselves, a final act from this subliminal communication that uses symbolic language to recreate an innate mandate of meaning, purpose and direction from their basic hardwired knowledge of humanity to be acted out culturally of, by and for the dreamful individual.

So, in the end, I decided to forget about it this Monday morning, watched and critiqued more films for content review and commentary, assessing the different genres and their subgenres by categories such as the narrative elements, setting, theme, mood, format and target audience academically within these particular works of art selected for class, trying hard to answer the whys, whats, hows, whichs of the auteur and their film, whens and wheres, using both theoretical and practical aspects. Took a break after seven films in a row, did some calisthenics, plyometric and resistance training outside as the school gym was closed, bladed about the campus for an hour plus for some cardiovascular from Kitty Murray around the loop and down the straight to Garner, came back to my very hot and dry independent apartment, to sweat out a 92 degree Fahrenheit or 33.3333333 degree Celsius Monday night like it was a Finnish sauna, with the aftermath of Lost, 24 and other finales playing out in front of me on the computer with internet television, just to see what excellence in program content broadcasting I may have missed during the school year. Evidently not much, so after switching from network television webisodes to some online comedy par College Humor, The Station, Equals Three, MattG124 and a bit of Fail Blog then some old Beavis and Butthead via Adult Swim to kill, after which I ditched the laptop programming for some live action outside, being the wonderful fireworks show the whole Meadowlands neighbourhood in Ancaster put on all weekend long, with our very own Redeemerites holding theirs at 390 Springbrook Road, quite the barrage of gunpowder and smoke, the long and short was a most hilarious show and the mishaps and misfires near the end had made it all the better in my own honest opinion, too bad I will miss their Dominion and Independence ones this coming early July down south here, but then perhaps in the end of this spring summer school course I will realize all of this was, oh sheesh y'all t'was a dream or whateva!

Something cold is hot in state of Denmark

2010-05-11T07:37:00.004-04:00

Now as I do not usually comment on hockey, though my two home countries have been in most of the recent world junior, senior and Olympic championship Gold medal finals, I have to state that I am not surprised by the outcome for these European hot up and comers in the world of cold ice to which I still have familial connections there.

Koln, being a western German city near the Netherlands, is home to the 2010 IIHF world senior ice hockey championship, along with Mannheim and Gelsenkirchen, completing the sport's year long circuit, where America won the world junior and Canada won the Olympic championships respectfully. Internationally, Denmark has always been a middle power political player, but now with tournament wins against Finland 4-1 and the United States in overtime 2-1, the Danes may start getting long awaited respect in the wide world web of sports too, especially in a sport where it lost to Canada 47-0 way back in 1949. All that is missing would be a couple wins against Russia, the Czech Republic and of course Sweden, a sweet victory if the 13th ranked Danish club indeed pulled it off, quite like a win over Canada, something that came very close to happening in 2003, when Denmark did defeat America 5-2 and tied Canada at 2, after 54 years of not playing the sport.

Having one whole side of my family being originally Danish itself, myself tempted in the past to play American football and even in the future train for a possibly run bobsled for a Team Denmark if they compete for 2014, I am personally very proud and happy for the state which is anything but rotten with these superior results on the world stage.

Our last Redeemer Political Science Film Night and Debate chaos in motion

2010-04-17T01:23:00.008-04:00

Originally supposed to be over a dozen alumni, current new Young Political Scientists Interested in Learning Onsite Now and old Redeemer University College Political Science Association members and undecided freshmen, the final number was dropped to half and less, as some came in noted the lack of fellow poli scis such as Jan Korevaar, Nathan Martin and Kevin Bratcher and left to find the others, then all those others would come after those previous had left to search, oh the madcap hilarity that ensued, making the night one comedy of errors no Hollywood laugh a minute flick could match before the showing even started.

The film we ended up showing, due to all the cancellations, lateness and overall ineptitude the days between the essays and the exams bring us, was a made for television CBC miniseries H2O from 2004 in the university's recreation centre, which starred and had been written by Paul Gross who plays Canadian Prime Minister Tom Mclaughlin in the movie. Between the hidden agendas, betrayal and murder, comes a mininarrative that an exclusive continentalist power elite run the country by political, economic and military force, a power strengthened only by the assassination of his father and focused only in gaining Canada's most valuable resource being water. After the film, we had a discussion that included a topic by outgoing RUCPSA and YPSILON member David Nusko on the power elite, military industrial complex and its security over liberty iron triangle, as well, two on the political policy process and the effect of union and corporate powers upon it respectively coming from rookies Christian Vandergeest and Katelyn Borgdorff.

Redeemer's Political Science department, which is headed by Dr. David T. Koyzis and also assisted by Prof. Robert Joustra and Dr. Justin Cooper, is going in the right direction based upon film nights and the discussion, discourse, dialogue, debate and deliberation of the issues afterwards, giving academics an alternative from the positivist world politically we see all around us every which way we look from statistics, behavioural polling and other quantitative methodologic data that brings the legislation of the law of the land as it tis and the enforcement of its order over the people as they are to a normative perspective of the foundation and function of laws and values being to what are their purpose, meaning and goals as they could be in their qualitative methodolgical ends as they should be, such as the question what is truth and its evaluation in life, which in the end is the most important question of all.

Tories must coalesce with LibDemos to make a minority government in Britain

2010-04-16T17:43:00.000-04:00

Like in 1974, Britain shall make way this year for a minority government after previous dynasties of majorities in both 2000s Labour and 1990s Tory flavour ruled their respective days, according to its most outstanding debate. But it would seem the Liberals, or should I say the Liberal Democrats of yore, did not politically die out when last in power in 1910, split in 1922 and eventually merged in 1983. Instead, though the Tories lead in the polls, it would seem without the help of the LibDemos, a Conservative majority would be impossible, nor one for Labour unless it made a 1977 type parliamentary deal to work together, especially with a giant European political economic cloud over their collective heads.

As the winner Margaret Thatcher gave way to her former Chancellor of the Exchequer John Major for the loss, so has Tony Blair done the same deed for his in Gordon Brown, allowing for a legacy not so different than Canada's Liberal Jean Chretien and his Finance Minister Paul Martin, but the Brit voter seems to see the LibDemos Nick Clegg as the next Winston, whether Churchill or Smith depending, rather than David Cameron, who seems to have a personality as brittle as breakfast Weetabix!

Three facts will come from this general election, one being that Brown has lost the Labour dynasty of majorities, second being as the socialist LibDemos vote goes up so it will for the nationalist Nick Griffin and the British National Party as Brits protest the lack of choice in parties and change in policies, third being the possible implosion of the Conservative and Unionist Party of the United Kingdom if they can not work a deal out that allows it to rule yet again, one they have not done since World War Two. This could include being the figurehead power, yet allowing the future hung parliament's balance of power to run the policy, being the LibDemos, until a time it can show it can rule with a realistic manifesto towards change for a real choice, where it would then lose confidence in their own coalition government, a first in 70 years, to make the case for a majority. So, the ball is now in the court of both Labour and Tories, how will they lob it back?

House of Commons and Senate needs to show Auditor General some common sense and dollars

2010-04-01T16:20:00.006-04:00

Witness just what is happening as we speak over the pond in the United Kingdom, fiscal accountability has made its return through a parliamentary review of the expenses incurred by Members of Parliaments and Lords in their House of Commons and Lords, originally refusing to release details after it was finished, the English people, subjects or commoners wanted to know where their pound was privately going, so leaks began to show as to how important the audit was and for exactly what they spent on the public dime. Altogether, this now will bring a great tidal wave of change to Great Britain it has not seen in half a century, where the Speaker of the House and other high ranking Members of Parliament are relegated to the sidelines as the whole disaster blows up in front of them, enter its North American colony, the Dominion of Canada, into the international economic fray that has affected Europe from Iceland up in the north all the way down to Greece in the south. Like Old Blighty, a similar controversy is stiring here in the Great White North, where for the past nine months, its saintly Auditor General Sheila Fraser, yes she the author of the sponsorship program report that proved $100 million of its $250 million went to Liberal insiders advertising firms and government entities in forms like untendered job grants, has asked the Conservative government if she can simply audit the $520 million expenses of the Members of Parliament and Senators in our House of Commons and Senate to make sure all is well spent.

The federal Tories however though, along with its governing all party committees, being the House's Board of Internal Economy and the Senate's Internal Economy Committee, do not want her to both conduct this value for money and performance audit on their spending habits, something that allows her office to publicly audit financial statement per annum a private firm, being Klynveld Peat Marwick Goerdeler does currently, with elected officials stating her office has neither the authority nor the jurisdiction, which makes one wonder just who has their hand on the controls ensuring proper management if her Office of the Auditor General of Canada indeed does not. This all seems to not just be short changing the Canadian public fiscally, but perhaps also on the issue of democratic govermental honesty, accountability and transparency socially. When one looks at politics in our culture in the now, one can see how the lack of ethics and moral fibre in the past has shaped the landscape it plays its unprincipled game upon, which sadly is how we base our deformed worldview on how it will play itself upon into the future, where rights and freedoms become greed and malice which breed ignorance and irresponsibility to the rule of law as it tis without its advancement towards productive virtues such as truth, trust and the highest good.

So the democratic process is slowly being nickled and dimed by those lawmakers who swore to uphold its principles and defend it from the very actions they now do, not just here in Canada but elsewhere as previously mentioned, all of which create scandals, fiascos and crises where none truly need be, if only the inside and elite leaders of the day were more open to their people, citizens and finally taxpayer who pay those essential taxes which make up a politician's salary. Principles and values of the day go beyond the economic, politically we must remind ourselves that in life more is valuable that our adoration of the almighty dollar, our almost religious fervor of buying and owning the most lustfully modern and brand newest consumable goods, or attending the weekly mass at the mall, an institutional structure that we lay in debt to as one whole society, being a human is of intrinsic value itself, not an extrinsic number with no purpose or meaning in the life we live. We defeat ourselves when refusing to recognize or realize victory, this is the case in full when looking at the fair, checked and balanced request of Miss Fraser to know where the $440 million spent in the House of Commons and $93 million spent in the Senate is going towards, she has identified the ideal we seek from our higher officials and only now is looking for backing to optimize its vision, mission and performance for the greater efficiency, efficacy and execution which leads to overall excellence, equality and enjoyment in governance by, of and for the citizenry at large, therefore I would ask that all Canadians stand up now, support your Auditor General's independent call for real democratic governmental honesty, accountability and transparency, where the system today exempts it from external oversight audits and Freedom of Information requests, so finally once and for all we can find out exactly where the Loonie buck actually stops.

Skeelering quickly Into the sun

2010-03-15T21:07:00.006-04:00

It might be the ides of March, usually known as time for a loss of power, but the weather being so bright and warm, the general student body of Redeemer has taken to the main street on campus to play sports and I beat all to it with my favourite around this point of the year being skeelering. The sport is basically short speed skating except on rollerblades, a sport that was popularized and is clearly a favourite in the Netherlands, especially the provinces of Groningen, Friesland and Noord Holland, with the stretch from Garner Road to Kitty Murray Lane being a perfect question mark shaped trail for one to ride down and up. Sometimes, it tis best to get outside the campus bubble I have found over the years, when I do, I usually do a high and low speed blade of what I call the Meadowlands Boot, by going north down the lane, turn east on Stonehenge Drive, then go north up Meadowlands Boulevard, sometime make a late night or early morning stop between Olivia Place and Citation Crescent at Meadowlands Community Park for a quick ghetto workout on the jungle gym, prison bars, firemans pole and other makeshift amenities, then keep going north until Golf Links Road, where you go west until you hit Kitty Murray Lane, wind your way south curving like a boot until you get back to ReDee.

Skeelering quickly into the sun, I took advantage of today and will be doing the same tonight for my first midnight blade here at Redeemer since September, getting a small but still noticeable tan above my tanktop and below my spandexshorts, amazing since we are only in middle of March but it feels like the middle of July, unfortunately though however essays and exams month is around the corner, which stops us all from enjoying up the weather and instead sweating out the work.

Other than all of that, I have been taking in as much sunshine as possible, as I remember last summer, where I would guess that our area of Cottage Country got about more or less a month full of the rays and the rest being rain, that really started the old Scandinavian melancholy and Native depression to set in, something that has anyone in both contemplating an overdose of Vitamin D calciferol secosteroids to end it. Complementing the anaerobic exercise workouts during short term yet high intensity weightlifting, skeelering, like most aerobic long term and low intensity activity, can help maintain primary areas of body strengthening, motoneuron development, coordination skills, balance, stamina, agility, power and endurance theough quadriceps, hamstrings, groin, hip and gluteal muscle development and secondary fitness goals, including low impact gliding over high impact grinding, which protects the legs, knees and feet, unlike running or sprinting and raising the resting metabolic rate, which is key to burning off fat and building on muscle for a better, stronger and longer lived life. So go on and get out there, fit in and strap on your blades and join us on the pave in fighting off the fat and adding on the muscle while burning off about 300 calories in 30 minutes down the fast lane.

A week for recovering ones conscience and discovering ones bravery at Redeemer

2010-02-10T21:37:00.004-05:00

One great thing about our Redeemer University College is that it picks up on topics largely ignored by the greater academic community and unfortunately left untouched by them, which is really fine by us, as it gives Redeemer an exclusive sneak peek at the alternative future, one that is particular and part and parcel of the minority point of view in this world, that can be in the eyes of the others.

An example of this would be last Wednesday, when Dr. Bob Goudzwaard came to visit, spoke at chapel, then after the lecture in the auditorium, stuck around to impart more wisdom and knowledge from his time and experience in various roles and callings, such as being deeply involved in international development issues, through consultations with and between the World Council of Churches, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. An elected politician in the Dutch parliament, then with the Anti Revolutionary Party and now Christian Democratic Appeal, as part of the European Christian Political Movement and a professor of economics and social philosophy at Free University of Amsterdam, as well as a regular contributor at Cardus, Goudzwaard's message simply is to seek global justice in many different ways, as pointed out in his book, Hope in Troubled Times: A New Vision for the Global Economy, which had been presented and promoted in the lecture. Though it was mainly economically based, a budding political scientist could salvage the message that a nation state that has financial strength, secure homes and clean air, food and water for our children still will have economic poverty, environmental degradation, energy shortages, global terrorism and local overtaxed land for tis citizens, without Christ as the centre and source of truth, knowledge and hope, we can not work together, continue to live selfishly and watch civilization sink further into the abyss of efficiency until its end. That end comes, via the forced upon demands for economic productivity and financial growth from human beings without their right to sustainability, stability and recreation, which bring with it a truly better standard of living, instead of the current rapid global economic development of world globalization which continues to enslave us one by one until we are one captive society, keeping us further away from a deeper sense of shalom, as Dr. Koyzis and Prof. Joustra have spoken upon in the past. With coauthors Goudzwaard, Mark Vandervennen and David Vanheemst giving us in the book some real world solutions to life threatening problems from the collective global crises, changes and challenges of today, we go to the cross, the circle and the palm tree and must individually look deep inside ourselves examine, review and find the common ground conscience and conviction we share to create genuine partnership now, towards concrete action in the future that includes caring for and sharing with one another, instead of our overdeveloping, overexpending and overconsuming, perhaps we need to stop underestimating God and His strength, power and glory forever and ever.

Yesterday, being Tuesday of this week, Sophie Scholl: The Last Days, a multiple award winning film, was shown by the history department, which must know that sixty seven years ago later this month is the anniversary of their execution, for that event which the movie was based on actually happened as the White Rose Movement and Manifesto of the Students of Munich intelectual resistance group in Nazi Germany, both of which had been motivated by ethical and moral conviction, all mainly being either Lutheran Protestant or Roman Catholic in belief. It tells of a young 21 year old girl arrested early one morning in February 1943 for distributing anti Nazi literature as part of their anonymous leaflet campaign with her brother Hans, which started in June 1942 on their university campus, along with her brother and friends, bravely refusing to give in, no matter the dire consequences, stand up for truth as it was and continuing to strongly resist including others, such as her professor of philosophy and psychology Karl Huber, in on the crime of actively opposing dictator Adolf Hitler's National Socialist Third Reich regime, though most would join her fate. The principles of courage, honour and trust made the six core members arrested by the Gestapo, found guilty and executed by decapitation some of the greatest heroes in German history, with the story being included with text from their sixth leaflet being smuggled by Helmuth Vonmoltke, from Germany through Scandinavia to the Britain, then dropped over Germany by Allied planes in July 1943, giving the White Rose Movement the last word in the end against the Axis. This 2005 German film by director Marc Rothemund and writer Fred Breinersdorfer really gives us hope that if another totalitarian regime with yet one more single answer official state ideology, perhaps we can see another Family Scholl and company stand up against the machine without violence, allowing for alternative ideas to permeate, pass along and flow throughout, giving any uniform nation state or culture a source of pluriformity it needs to defend itself as a properly viable worldview if it actually it. I know that God helped Sophie and the others involved in the White Rose Movement, all young intellectual students who risked all for no earthly reward but freedom, to lead them not into temptation, by giving and maintaining the stength and power needed for such bravery to stand ones ground, thus delivered them from evil of the day, making the wrong right again in the afterlife, to be absolutely completed in the future reformed world to be.

It truly has been one week for recovering ones conscience and discovering ones bravery here at Redeemer, always good to look at where you are, where you have been and where you are going on the roadmap of life, never wanting to forget the knowledge we have gained, as those who do not learn from the mistakes of the past, are fatefully condemned and destined to repeat them in the future.

Meadowlands Mafia started in September but finished on Friday

2009-12-13T09:37:00.000-05:00

The Meadowlands Mafia in Ancaster at Redeemer had started out as an athletic response to the Alpha Mu Omega back in the Fall of 2006, in 2007, we had our first Royal Mafia Liftoffs in weightlifting, finished with Seven on Seven Offseason Scrimmages and sent a representative into RUC's Sausagefest III. The next year of 2008, we all went to York University Lions Football Recruiting Day and Academic Campus Day, then added some gym arena indoor rink football and united fight clubbing, which only had moderate success. This year however, we have added Redeemer University College Pro Weekends for March 12-14 and 19-21, with the Royal Mafia Liftoffs 2009 for weightlifting to follow on April 7.

It has been the slowest year to date, as far as getting a grip of and taking off with it, as one of our members has been suspended three times and was given the year off to think about their past actions.

For his sake, and ours, I hope we can all move past it, as no equipment full tackle scrimmages have been move down the hill towards Scenic Woods over looking Dundas, Westdale and Mcmaster, where some of us played together and won that big game of flag Canadian football at Mac's Alumni Field. Though we started out slow in September, off and on without a new workout program since the days of AMO, we persevered through, now at the point we have regained the Redeemer Rough Royals matra and begin to ready ourselves in defending its glory against the Ancaster Scenic Woodsmen at the Royal Snow Bowl/Super Chili Bowl. After the last 7 weeks of full out practice and daily workouts since the last week of October, I believe this holyday break starting tomorrow night will come at the best time for our boys, so we can start 2010 with a brand new leaf as a brand new cosca on January 6th.

New Philosophy of Whutevs

2009-12-04T11:09:00.002-05:00

Between coffee stops at Horny Tim's down Garner Road West and licking the Maple off the Canadian around White Brick Church, my bio partner in class Jeff Exner had this awesome new epiphany, where he came to the sudden realization of the meaning, the complete comprehension of the essence of a philosophy that was so interesting I just had to share it here.

This new philosophy, from this former admittingly freshmen philosophy major, was the Whutevs School of Thought, which as it has been explained to me is quite simply, when given an extremely difficult task at hand, you shrug your shoulders and simply say whutevs, like perhaps it has been a list of books on Postmodernism in Historiography or a final exam cumulative study list for Bio, just do the shrug and say whutevs.

Kudos to you, Jeff, and this simple new system to let the water upon one's back roll like off a duck's back, this could save many a life out there from burnout or worse, best thing coming out since Kramer from Seinfeld's idea of Serenity Now but Insanity Later, but it really does free you for the moment any stress filled type situation hits you, along with prayer first and foremost, which is good unless you are, like me too, a pressure cooker and need it to function.

Weekend Tackle Football in Scenic Woods Ancaster

2009-11-28T19:49:00.002-05:00

Weekend Tackle Football, sliding in grey oozee like mud, formerly grass lawn transformed into ripped up green turf bits and pieces, Jack Frost lying across the end zone before you slide into the whiteness alongside with him, drier and hotter before the wet and cold get within you. Missing a 4 score by a shoelace tackle on a fallen run here or a wraparound coverage on a failed reception there, gave up secondary again to be on the line for reddog and wildcat blitz formations, picking up a couple sacks, a fumble recovery, but no sacks. But most important, much bonding with fellow ballers and talking in depth about the game, working hard on bettering ourselves each game, all of which happened in Scenic Woods Ancaster just this afternoon.

In Canada on Vanier and Grey Cup Weekend, if you are not playing in either of course, you are then asked to partake in the elements, as listed above plus the rounder pigskin than all cowhide south of the 49th, usually somewhere else.

Now, when you play, or even much more importantly, when you practice, one must always listening to your weaknesses before talking about your strengths. Using such a system in life, as well as in game, leads to more wins, victories and championships individually, and of course in the collective sense as team. I truly believe when the game becomes all about the money, the stats and the fame, all that is not honourable and virtuous in the world but of it, that is when one must hang up the cleats and walk away from the game.

Redeemer Number Two for Highest Tuition Nationally

2009-11-22T11:33:00.002-05:00

With an annual tuition of $11,924, Redeemer University College apparently maded Micro Soft Network's most expensive Canadian universities list as second highest tuition nationally, unfortunately, as of 2009-2010, the annual tuition actually is $12,704. That $12,704 does not include the $4,320 for independent housing, nor the $1,200 in books nor $420 student fee we pay annually, plus an extra $2,160 to keep your apartment in the summer for next year, which if you do that, you may as well take a summer course at $678 a pop while you are there. Without any scholarship, Royals could be paying annually up to $18,644, with that grand total being jacked up to $21,482, if you do the summers at Redeemer too.

Trinity Western University of Langley British Columbia beats our erroneous total with their annual tuition of $17,460, so is the one given for the Spartans in err too, according to the TWU website, the actual annual tuition as of 2009-1010 is $18,450, which does not include the $4,236 for independent housing, nor the $1,000 in books nor $230 student fee they pay annually, which gives them a grand total of $23,916.

We Royals save $5,272 at the high end to the Spartans' own when the chips are down, thus TWU really is not that spartan when it comes to costs, however RUC does live up to its name in being quite royal with its. But remember now, these are the two highest tuitions in Canadian post secondary education today, with places like Mac going at 5,565, York at $5,761 and Windsor at $5,939, which is almost the exact difference between Trinity and Redeemer, yet Manitoba has the lowest in the nation at $3,597 while still playing major CIS sports like football. This all said, during these days of depressed economic times, students like us need to show our support for the academic institutions we believe in, even when it may literally cost the farm, as the almighty dollar means much more today than it has in the past.

York Asks Us Why You

2009-10-17T21:11:00.002-04:00

York University Cheerteam kept screaming in our ears, during the Lions' near win against the Ottawa Gee Gees 54-31, "Hey Why You"?

Kind of reminded me of how Redeemer always has that religious philosophy mantra "What Time Is It"?, I know it is year two of three since my original acceptance letter to York, with time a ticking downward in an ever going and growing spiral. So, it kept going off in my head for this second year of football recruitment days, throughout all the speeches by Football Head Coach Mike Mclean and Athletic Director of Sports and Recreation Jennifer Myers. Even going home to watch replay of tonight's End in North Bend, where Notre Dame barely lost it to UniSoCal 34-27 with shades of the Lions game found within, I could hear that old refrain over and over again.

So this brings us to why, York asks us "Hey Why You"?, to which we reply "Hey Why Not"!

Land of Snow, Cold and Flu

2009-10-15T15:45:00.001-04:00

Before Thanksgiving Holyday, just under half of Redeemer University College was hit by either the common flu or cold symptoms, afterwards it has become over half. My pal Kyle Gowling would say "Dude, it is like dejavu Doomsday, all over again!", but of course he is not here, instead helping build a rivalry between his Emmanuel Bible College in Kitchener and Heritage Bible College in Cambridge just north of us here. But now the snow has hit us, all three of these events seemed to have the RUC student body struggling with tired weariness right now, as Redeemer's Head Chaplain Syd Hielema pointed out earlier in an emailed message for TSF devos.

As this seems to be a trend that started in early October, we have to be thankful nothing worse has actually hit the population on campus, such as the supposed flu of the swine that lives amongst those in both Toronto and Hamilton.

Disease and sickness are serious issues, I have tried my hardest to be a model on campus on them, but we do have to recognize that humans do not have full control over how they fully work. A shot or dose of what ails you here and there will not fully equip oneself to fight off the cold or flu, however doing this, plus maybe a little prayer to He who can just might do the full trick for those in need. The Crown I believe comes out today, perhaps it will better address these issues of importance for those on campus, then again I would not bet my health on it.

Minneapolis is the New City of Champions

2009-10-07T13:37:00.001-04:00

I think for those who enjoy professional football and baseball, you would now have to agree with the statement that, Minneapolis is the new city of champions. The twin cities that are three, including St. Paul's and Bloomington, have a red hot Minnesota Vikings team, who as of Monday with Quarterback Brett Favre, cheezed off his old squad in the Green Bay Packers 30-23 for the Monday Night National Football League victory, just a week after making his 43th career comeback from fourth quarter deficits or ties with just 3 seconds left against San Francisco, and a just as fired up Minnesota Twins club, who as of yesterday without First Baseman Justin Morneau, defeated my favourite Detroit Tigers 6-5 in 12 innings during a special tiebreaking playoff game, who had been 146 days in first place, became the first team in Major League Baseball history to lose a three game lead with four games left to play, at one point had a 7 game lead in the standings, only to completely lose it to Minnesota right up to the final weekend of play. The Hubert Horatio Humprey Metrodome, which is sadly in its last days now as it is the same age as the university I currently attend, has never seen such excitement in all of its years and I for one am happy.

Lots of emotion all around, Minnesota, and specifically Minneapolis, may just be in the line of having not one, but two championship banners flying within its domed stadium, with a pennant for American League Central finishing at 87-76 and National Conference North currently at 4-0 already in sight.

Though I love my Detroit and its Michigan and Green Bay and its Wisconsin, my third love of the Mid West is Minneapolis and its Minnesota, I picked the Vikings with Favre to win the Super Bowl and now so I will pick the Twins without Morneau to win the World Series, though I still wished my Tigers had not have blown it. Now, they must play a favoured Yankees squad in New York tonight, but I still think that their winning streak will continue throughout the league division series and beyond, as Detroit knows, Minnesota has a lot of heart and spirit to get where they are and know better than to lose it all in a four game sweep. As for the Vikings, three more wins, then off to Lambeau Field, to give those Green Bay Packers the business on the first day of November, with a bye week rest right after, the last eight will be interesting, but I have a feeling Favre just needs to play his new found rivals one more time for his emotions to burrst out for another run into divisional, conference and then league championship games for the wins.

Western and Laurier share with Queens

2009-10-03T07:09:00.003-04:00

Since the Mauraders of Mcmaster won four straight, the Yates Cup, the oldest still existing sports trophy in North America that surpasses the professional Canadian Football League Grey Cup and college Little Brown Jug of Michigan and Minnesota fame in longevity, has been kept by just three clubs. A repeat by the Wilfrid Laurier University Golden Hawks from 2004 to 2005, once by the University of Ottawa Gee Gees in 2006 and then another repeat by the University of Western Ontario Mustangs from 2007 to 2008, this little factoid is why I had picked in the preseason Queens University Golden Gaels for the 102nd Yates Cup win this year, bringing the provincial pigskin prize back east, only for it to come back west next year in another repeat. But fact of the matter is, no matter who takes it here in Ontario, no Vanier Cup is coming here for awhile yet, I would however love a fight between the Pacific West's University of Calgary Dinosaurs and the Atlantic East's Saint Mary's University Huskies for the Cup nationally this year, though I know in my heart of hearts it will be Quebec's Laval to lose yet once more.

Not sure between Laurier and Western exactly who Queens would face, I kind of left it up to who would win the first game of the year on the Scores University Rush, which was won by Western 30-7 in London against Laurier. As it stands, past the halfway mark in the season, CIS # 4 Queens is 5-0, while CIS # 2 UWO fell to Mac this weekend 42-35 in London, making them 4-1, CIS # 8 WLU who beat Mac last week 30-14 in Hamilton, fell down to 3-2 with CIS # 10 Guelph, Ottawa and Mac. Mac, along with these other clubs, seems to be part of the middle of the pack group that will make the playoffs, but clubs like the York University Lions at 0-5, Toronto at 1-4 along with Waterloo and Windsor at 2-3 will be on the outside looking in as predicted.

Losing the 40th Argo Cup 45-27 in the Red and Blue Bowl, after coming within a couple of seconds of winning against the Lancers 17-14 as Jason Marshall returned a missed field goal 125 yards for a touchdown with 40 seconds left in the game but no onside kick was tried, thus now the Lions' losing streak continues at 16, picking up from the 2001 to 2008 Varsity Blues of Toronto's 49, although York previously owned it at 47 from 1988 to 1995, with off season woes like a three month faculty strike and one week training camp affecting it. York will need more than 26 year old, 440 pound and 6 foot 8 inch rookie DT Duane Mark who currently wears size 18 shoes, former Australian rugby PK Adam Moretti who can kick 60-yard field goals, projected starting QB Patrick Hooey who backed up 2007 Hec Crighton Trophy Erik Glavic and Ted Abraham on 2007 Saint Mary's Huskies Vanier Cup team and 31 year old Michael Hyatt, formerly of the Concordia Stingers making a possible comeback. No, a hardcore dose of some real hard smash mouth hitting football is what any hard luck squad needs to get back into the game, old school action that no program seems to work into, like the kind of in the gym training Duke uses in the final Rocky Balboa film of the saga, yeah, let us start building some hurting bombs, indeed!

Redeemer Almost Home of the Braves

2009-09-19T21:49:00.002-04:00

When I first got my Redeemer summer newletter to read there would be a baseball tournament, I was a half past ecstatic then, finally be able to smack a nice 9 inch out the park and beyond. Last time I played baseball at the school, in my freshman year there, dudes were catching my monkey pitches and swings off the side of Augustine Hall, a la West Hill from Siberia Parking Lot, without any windows smashed or damaged. For the first time ever, I came into the student roundup on Labour Day happy as ever, ready to sign up for playing a sport at the institution, but wait man, was I truly in for quite the surprise.

Looking over at the guys by the intramural signup table, I noted the words softball and immedately my heart sunk, with no other real choice, I signed up anyhow just to do some batting practice in for the year, adding right under skill level in the game 0.

So, there we all were playing coed intramural softball as the Braves, taking out the Cardinals, Angels and Expos at James Smith Park on Garner and Fiddlers Green from 9 in the morning to 2 in the afternoon, maxing, relaxing and suntaxing into the playoffs. Breaking from our Division 1 play, we got over to Meadowlands Park and rocked the semi final at 4, winning after I stole some bases then almost got caught in a rundown, only to get the ball beaned of the top of my head, which brought in the winning run and me home too. At 6 however, we got smoked in the championship final, though I made three catches at the end to keep it close, all of which made me wish I had never picked up a softball bat in my life and hopefully never again make that same mistake.

Carolina, you did good, lady!

2009-09-15T07:21:00.001-04:00

Early last evening, I got the call from home, Carolina, my pet Heinz Fifty Seven cat, was fading and eventually within an hour, had passed away. This cat was my own personal one, following Christina's Katherine and Hans' Spotty, but was different in that it was neither a full house or barn cat, as she lived her youth as a barn one and her mature life as a house one, yet did many of the same attributes both had performed while alive. But indeed age caught up to her, only a day ago was just walking around, today collapsed down to ground.

My best memories of her were how she knew how sick I was during the near death illness early in the 2000s, she, like the rest of the family, stayed by my bed, knowing how important such a kind act it was, even though I openly asked everyone to go on about their business through my suffering. She would join me and often the rest of the family on walks far back past the creek and into the bush, doing those special acts only a pet can do for you, to remember them as what they are to you. Most importantly though, like the other cats of my siblings, Carolina would come up to you when you were out of sorts and know just how to pick you up when you were down, usually with an oddly human like action that brought on back that joy you may have temporarily lost.

Being away from home with such a call really puts one totally off their game, no matter where they are or what they do, but at least Mother knew the plan, that she was to be now buried where the other two have been put to rest in the front lawn, just like the family cat she truly was. We know she was not human, pets like other animals only have the special qualities we instill within them, but there were always those magical times when they almost seemed to understand what exactly was being said and respond in kind as a member of the family. Indeed, she did good, so truly sorry to hear of her going, but everything in life with a purpose has a place and surely a time, just sadly her's was now.

Why on youtube is his facebook still up and linkedin her twitter all in myspace on you digg?

2009-09-12T12:09:00.004-04:00

Cautiously, I think social networking websites are slowly taking over our human face to face, or maybe that is faith to faith, lives and I am sure I am not the only individual in our greater society that sees this. I noticed at Redeemer, a very small yet smart post secondary university, with academics on par with Mcmaster, Toronto and York for example, people have bubbled themselves within the bubble itself. Nobody takes a personal initiative to socialize collectively unless some autonomous decision is made by the school, a subgroup within the campus or a subgroup without, the shirking of which has made a weaker student body, dare I say proving those coming up are soon going to suffer because of this lack of responsibility on the part of us more senior level students.

Per example of all this, as we signed up or reeed up for ReDee, and throughout the freshmen F.R.O.G. or L.A.U.N.C.H. or whatever they call their rookie orientation week now, the more and more I saw its participants using their cell phones to tweet, facebook, myspace or digg around with others far away inside the cyberspace, instead of right there with others in front of them outside with reallife. One instance had a greenhorn Redeemer gal, with parents beside her, punching in frantically what at that second was going on about her for registration, check in and move in day, while both her father and mother looked over her shoulder to join in and read her thoughts, ideas and overall excitement, is this what is left of the allround sharing and caring family time? Another newcoming bud was already getting palled up, giving people out his network address and trading back with theirs, which ironically here used to be done easily with the bodybook, a paper book that easily held the photos and facts of all students and faculty, if ever one needed to know who anyone was, but just where did that great invention go, shame!

Understandably, online social networking is a part of our society's technological, industrial and scientific progress, modernity and supposedly positive forward push into the idealized future, thus we can not just buck today's bricks of goals that make up tomorrow's wall of morals, ethics and values for its own sake. But rather if we actually want the ancient morals, ethics and values of yesterday, in any way, shape or form, to be like and as they were then, we need to go back to our past, look at the origins without technology as they were, see what their meaning, purpose and nature actually were and are even now with modernity next to it. The prospective time in our succeeding place to be will allow us to see the wisdom of such thought, with the reason of faith or faith within reason abounding our every step forward, as we remember and never forget all those we took behind us to get here.

Euthanasia as societally legal as Abortion

2009-08-04T13:37:00.003-04:00

Life is about Liberty, Independence, Freedom and Equality, all humans essentially are created, born and die with inherent dignity, innate worth and inalienable rights, to ignore this undeniable fact is to ignore life itself. That now said, why debate an issue if it will just be going to ignored along with any good points within, like abortion was. Personally I heard Charlton Heston's Detective Thorn in Soylent Green when he said, "It is people. Soylent Green is made out of people. They are making our food out of people. Next thing they will be breeding us like cattle for food. You have got to tell them. You tell everybody. We have got to stop them somehow!", from overpopulation to underpopulation, we are slowly killing the human within humanity.

It was obvious that euthanasia would be considered eventually as some kind of appropriate care in certain particular circumstances, quite like abortion was to protect what endangers their mental, emotional or physical well being or to provide mercy for those in uncivilized inhumane situations like rape or pain, change the old quote around, you get what is done in private by adults does not concern the Criminal Code of Canada and there is no place for the state in the hospital bedrooms of the nation, so nothing really changes with extra amendments to the Criminal Law Act.

What does change, however, is the idea that all of these anti life amendments help to build up, not break down, culture. If people do not like people, then feel very free to stay as individualized as possible in the greater community of humanity, but I think when one cuts themselves off from life, culture and community as a whole, they only then will find it not worth the living. Negativity, not positivity, breeds this kind of thinking, which leads to actions like this kind of doing, if we do not live our life more positively, are we not less human, denying ourselves of ourselves, denying the liberty, independence, freedom and equality within it, so is that not what L.I.F.E. is all really about in the end?

Canada's Cottage Country needs some global warming after a summer of global cooling

2009-07-29T17:43:00.001-04:00

From the Beaches of Sauble to Wasaga, with Lake Huron and Georgian Bay in between, this summer's version of Canada's Cottage Country has been nothing but rain, freezing with exception to Dominion of Canada Day and American Independence Day week. This, alongside the current economic slowdown, has given the business of recreational activities from down in Grand Bend to up on Muskoka one big cold to sneeze on, but hopefully a rebound towards a more sunnier disposition will be made before Labour Day. Indeed, it truly needs some global warming after a summer of global cooling, perhaps we need to return to my favourite and correct terminology for unseasonal longterm weather being called climate change.

Hallman Chapel of Chesley Lake Camp finds the Ecumenical Middle Ground

2009-07-19T19:37:00.004-04:00

Coming back from the day and night service at Hallman Chapel of Chesley Lake Camp, I find it wonderful to see many different groups of ethnic and religious backgrounds unite together under one banner, which seems not to be something many churches within Western Christian tradtion repeat today. Watching those from the Mennonite, Reformed and Lutheran ecumenical dialogues, cooperation and commonalities amongst these Christian Protestant congregations work, sing and learn as a people in itself truly models love as it should be, being Bible believers, followers and workers in the Word for the good of God even while vacationing. For the past three years, plus many random visits before then, my family has solidly been spending their Sundays during the summer, enjoying the word, song and community it engenders, which is something we should all be thankful for.

If You Can Not Say Anything Nice Or Do Anything Productive

2009-07-11T23:07:00.001-04:00

So, first it was Canadians for Democracy in 2008, which apparently scared the Canadian public away from minority governments and coalitions, then now Republicans for Ignatieff in 2009 to show a tougher and rougher Grit, later perhaps a Democrats for Harper one in 2010 to show a softer Tory in Quebec and Ontario and gain that long sought after majority. Watching all of the drama from a far enough distance from Ottawa, you had to literally shake your head at how honestly horrible the lengths special political interests would go to have their own way, measures never taken openly before in the Great White Northern version of the game. I just have to wonder if those unofficial or official Conservative Party of Canada operatives know how damaging these kind of astroturfed ghosting tactics are to Canadian politics in general and the attitudes of the Canadian electorate.

Brought to you by NearlyFreeSpeech, RespectMyPrivacy and AmericaOnLine, its leader Semper Fi Colonel does indeed get the best of Liberal Party Leader Michael Ignatieff on the hot topics of human rights, preemptive wars, targeted assassination, coercive interrogation, counterterrorism, torture and energy security and independence, while supporting American exceptionalism for those still in love with the Republican Bush Adminitration. Which I suspect the good people formerly of CFD and presently RFI seems to bank on the opposite reaction from the Canadian public at large, being the same kneejerk reaction by Canadians in their support last year for a professionaly solid majority over the amateurish coalition of the backroom dealings, something we can agree sadly they will likely get. Canada is seen as a progressive liberal democracy, yet everyday in most everyway since America's 9-11 with Martin or even NAFTA with Chretien, as Manley slowly replaced the large shadow of Thomas Daquino at the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, it has become more regressively conservative oligarchy, plus as this financial shakeup during the reign of the Consevative Harper Government has proven on both the continentally integrated crossroads of Bay and Wall streets, a rather economic one at that.

Just because you messed up on a lowly academic quote on international exclusivity misattributed to him, through your quick blitzing shock and awe warfare to fear and scare politics transition style of campaigning and obviously continuance of absolute partisanship even outside Parliament, despite the proof of its destructive nature towards cooperation within it, does not mean you can attack your official loyal opposition with everything including the kitchen sink. Going after those you disagree with politically means, first, having the solutions for where to go, if and when the electorate back you. As you know, pointing where not to go is easy, the hard part is winning through working hard for the people now instead of losing through private internal tricks which just creates public external blowback later.

The Road to Wellness Independence as the Pursuit of Physical Happiness

2009-07-06T21:37:00.002-04:00

Having now supplanted my old goals for one whole year, I have moved on to a more difficult program for 2009, with a 10 week big bang beginning from the Fourth of July to Labour Day which shall kick start it off. Using the Three Point Ultimate Strength and Conditioning System by fitness authority Chris Cubitt of Primetime Performance, I will continue the goals from the old program, however will now excelerate the work from it with this new program for better results. The Road to Independence as the Pursuit of Physical Happiness is key within the Primetime Performance Plan, going hard at the start on Independence Day and staying hard onward from Labour Day forward, again the progression and results of which shall be recorded on the Blogger, Facebook and Angelfire sites.

Keady is the King of Communities in Rural Ontario and Canada

2009-06-21T13:01:00.000-04:00

Nothing says loving except a couple slabs of fresh seasoned beef, served up by both Chatsworth Township Mayor Howard Greig and Keady Farmers Livestock Market Manager Garry Kuhl, as what happened down at the Keady Beef Barbeque yesterday. Just enjoyed the atmosphere, music and those around us, got meeting lots of familiar friendly faces, ones our family knew for years and still know well enough to say hello or shake a hand. Though we all had to go before the fiddle music and square dancing kicked off the dusk, I suspect I will likely be hearing about all the goings on well into the summer, hopefully stories from some of those personally involved in them until we meet again next year to renew old acquaintances.

I especially enjoyed seeing a few schoolmates from back in the day, but I missed many who had been there but may have left, however truly found it special to see former nextdoor neighbours Harris and Hazel Kuhl and speak with former athletic coaches Jim and Kaye Holmes, all of whom are hardcore Keady Community Club supporters and members, though I did miss seeing their kin there at the event.

Over the years things may change, but the community that is the hamlet of Keady and its Green Monster Arena have stayed the same, an obvious fact that may of us close to it remain quite proud of. Traditions, heritage and history of those who share in its intangible culture can be found deep in the mind, heart and soul of those who commune inside, live within and share that spirit, people may not patriotically wave its flag, pledge its oath or wear its colours, but instead they simply do good individually for the greater whole collectively. That proud spirit which is alive in hamlets such as Keady in Rural Ontario and Canada today, it is that energy which keeps the Urban Toronto and Ottawa engine that is this province and nation moving forward day in and night out, without such that healthy balance of reformed traditions and progressive change could nor would not be found.

Time is now to end Corporations and Unions in Government

2009-05-27T21:45:00.007-04:00

Now, I have always felt government has no place for either corporations or unions, instead as governments are taxpayer paid institutions, they should be run by the people, for the people and of the people, in other words, bureaucratic not democratic governmental entities that make the unelected decisions for those who had been elected to make them. Yet, we have instances of both with public private partnerships like the crown corporation PPP Canada and its Department of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities and Infrastructure Canada's Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund, Infrastructure Canada Program and Building Canada or through its Public Private Partnerships Fund and its Ontario Ministry of Public Infrastructure Renewal and Infrastructure Ontario's Ontario Superbuild Corporation using the alternative financing and procurement model and public service commissions like the Canadian Union of Public Employees, Public Service Alliance of Canada, National Union of Provincial Government Employees, Ontario Provincial Government Employees Union and its Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System. But today we have even more proof as to why both entities have no place in the people's government.

Watching essential public services the majority of the people need become private has been quite disheartening, when those in the business of privitization could just as well compete with the government status quo system on their own initiative without taking out the public marketplace, especially when government and their ministries outsources to business outside its own jurisdiction. Such actions make their own taxpayers wonder aloud, why their government they pay taxes for should continue to get their patronage when their own governments do not buy from their own companies that pay the taxes they run on, hurting the chances that company owner employer and worker employee will be playing more, or even any, taxes to that government in years future. However wrong that may be, so is watching a Canadian and Ontarian public service unionized worker, paid to work for the same government and its ministries yet now striking, trash literally these privite citizens' efforts to clean up their city, by openly and freely dumping a bag of garbage onto a recently cleaned green field because they felt the child in question was threatening threatening job security for the unionized public servant. Have we all become so obsessed with our individual selves that we forgot about the greater collective good, did we stop caring about the community around us and when did government stop believing in the mantra for the use, benefit and enjoyment of the people. Also, just to point, for those people who use the old left and right political labels will see there in the example above just how the inside politics of the New Democrats economic labour and Green environmental stewardship ideals clash, which is why both entities can not agree political, nor will they ever merge electorally.

Our governmental system needs to be run by government, which in turn needs to be run by the people, if we continue this unelected, unaccountable and undemocratic way of living governmentally, we should expect what all of us get every day in every way. My proposals to solve both problems, in so far as corporations are concerned, shut down all P3 initiatives to be replaced by more stable funding and foundation of current crown corporations that have been deemed essential services by the majority of the population, overseen by a non partisan randomly selected group of eligible citizens and the Management Board of Cabinet or the Department or Ministry of Government Services, in so far as unions are concerned, shut down all PS/GE agreements to be replaced by a government strengthened and merged Civil Service Commission and Public Service Grievance Board to settle grievances, commission and pay through negotiation, mediation and arbitration towards a square fair deal, again overseen by a non partisan randomly selected group of eligible citizens and the Management Board of Cabinet or the Department or Ministry of Government Services. That being said, I think having corporations and unions fighting it out in the private realm and marjet is great, thus we still need them and there is a place for both, just not in our public government of the people.

Paging James Marshall

2009-05-24T13:49:00.002-04:00

A Democratic Liberal may be the brand new occupant of the real Air Force One, but another, the Canadian Grit federal party leader Michael Ignatieff, reminds me of the past occupant in the fake one. With quotes such as "If you mess with me, I will mess with you until I'm done." towards current Tory Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in response to his Conservative "spite and spin" attack television advertisements, or "The prime minister of Canada has only one job, and that is to unite Canadians and never divide them, and that, Mr. Harper does not understand.", Ignatieff almost is a rhetorical spitting image of the fictional President James Marshall, played by actor Harrison Ford in 1997's Air Force One. Will Igor Korshunov in this case be Gilles Duceppe with Iggy telling him to "Get off my plane!", or will upon becoming Prime Minister state in a major international speech, "'The dead remember our indifference. The dead remember our silence.' I came here tonight to be congratulated. But today when I visited the Red Cross camps, overwhelmed by the flood of refugees fleeing from the horror of Kazakhstan, I realized I don't deserve to be congratulated. None of us do. Let's speak the truth. And the truth is, we acted too late. Only when our own national security was threatened did we act. General Ivan Radek's regime murdered over 200,000 men, women and children and we watched it on TV. We let it happen. People were being slaughtered for over a year and we issued economical sanctions and hid behind a rhetoric of diplomacy. How dare we? The dead remember. Real peace is not just the absence of conflict, it's the presence of justice. And tonight, I come to you with a pledge to change America's policy. Never again will I allow our political self-interests to deter us from doing what we know to be morally right. Atrocity and terror are not political weapons and to those who would use them: Your day is over. We will never negotiate. We will no longer tolerate and we will no longer be afraid. It's your turn to be afraid.", I just wonder.

Facebook and Myspace socially networking the World but culturally retarding its Humans

2009-05-23T23:11:00.003-04:00

Being in three people's profile picture has forced me to weigh in on these social network communities, something others at Redeemer have been wrestling on for awhile, as it seems to go against their Protestant puritanist work ethic, Christian creational stewardship responsibilities and inner harmonic sensibilities. Personally, I think anyway that anyone can ever communicate with others, that in of itself truly is a good thing. Though I do agree we need to push for more face to face not interface to inteface, we must recognize that society has pressed inhuman burdens upon all of us that we must therefore we must improvise, adapt then overcome this problem that has become technology over humanity, if we do not then we risk turning the natural human in humanity into an industrial machine as in machinery.

Brett Favre was always going to be a Minnesota Viking

2009-05-05T19:12:00.001-04:00

From his Favre Pack to Brett the Jet, we all knew he was going to be in the Triple H Metrodome wearing the famous purple brainbucket with the warrior horns painted on each side, eventually. Neither Tarvaris Jackson nor Sage Rosenfels were going to get the franchise call in 2009, obviously because Vikings head coach Brad Childress is waiting for a Pack axe grinding Number Four to come out and score once more, therefore one expects Favre to be tossing out to Percy Harvin come September. Unless he rereretires, after his unretirement for personal reasons, the bet on Brett is on that he is Minneapolis and Saint Paul bound.

Make that Canada and Quebec is a Coalition of Conservatives Separatists and Socialists

2009-04-29T23:49:00.003-04:00

So, almost half a year later, after Liberals under Stephane Dion supported a Coalition of Socialists and Separatists, it seems Tory Stephen Harper is dead in Quebec, absolutely occurring after supporting fully Liberal Jean Charest, all this particular strategy has done is create scenerios where, on the very same day, Adquistes joined Pequistes to now try and defeat Charest by forming their own coalition with Pauline Marois being the Premier, forcing Charest to find extra support thus aligns himself closer to a more popular fellow Liberal Michael Ignatieff and that freezes the unpopular Conservative Prime Minister Harper in le belle province after he basically gave the Action Democratique du Quebec his kiss of death in the last election.

The amount of chickens who come home to roost in all of these situations does not even come infinitely close to explain the backroom and grassroots winks, nudges and nods of understanding to say no more we see here.

The openly burning of political bridges, which have been going on between Harper, Charest and Dumont, now adding Marois and Ignatieff into the mix, has been beyond both hilarious and stupendous, way past the colour pale of Canadian federal and provincial party politics, as federal Tories work along with Bloquistes and Socialists in the New Democrats to keep Parliament going while their Quebec clones do likewise with the Parti Quebecois back in le Assemblee Nationale, all in all, this leads to a Harpercritical Entente Cordiale federally and provincially that may remind others perhaps of a Mulroneyish Beau Risque, yet one must wonder just where the honour and dignity is and how one can ever gain it from any of this.

Betting on the Bottom Dollar in Sports

2009-04-25T09:01:00.000-04:00

I remember playing against Adam Cuomo, who is from Hamilton and was the start running back for the Burlington Braves, in the championship final game for the Ontario Football Conference way back when I was playing for the dynasty era Windsor Alpha Kai Omega Fratmen. Memory also holds that he got knocked out quick, when he got rocked into a light standard at Windsor Stadium, immediately sent for to hopsital in a big game where he could have made the difference, as it came down to a Canadian single if I do remember correctly. Being a sparingly used running back on the other side in my rookie season, I looked at Cuomo as the kind of back you wanted to be the league, like our own Craig Carter, to dominate and never stop running.

To read today on ESPN, the Toronto Sun and Hamilton Spectator, that Cuomo, then a little used University of Toledo running back who made the academic honour roll, was part of a Detroit based point shaving gambling scheme over a three year period is sad in two ways, one, Canadians never seem to get their shot in the big show no matter how talented, and two, no player who still feels worthy or a real teammate would ever take part in gambling while playing, as this is just as bad as use of performance enhancing drugs in the eyes of others.

His Detroit gambler is as good as a pimp, using Cuomo as his prostitute, but I still feel in someway, the program in Toledo let down Adam too, somehow the Rockets helped to bring him to such a point in his life, where his loyalty was no longer with the program, but with the gambling pimp. Quite evident was his remaining within the situation after his eligibility was exhausted in 2003, upwards to 2006, which obviously by then had meant much more to him than playing, thus he lost his edge and love for playing the game. Having only recently lost his job in the steel industry in Hamilton, as his cousin tells ESPN, this federal criminal investigation by the FBI will not help things, along with an issue of indictment and extradition proceedings to begin soon this summer, but hopefully a lesson can be gained by not just Cuomo, but also the Rockets program, or any other football and other sports program in other universities or colleges, that being if you are a band of brothers, then make sure your father, the coach, and your uncles, the staff, make it known by speech and action that you are indeed a family.

Participatory Democracy or Electoral Porkbarreling

2009-04-24T21:45:00.005-04:00

The backbench Member of Provincial Parliament from Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound, Bill Murdoch, who I have worked along with in the past, has been allowed back into the caucus of the Ontario Progressive Conservatives, a place he himself has not been a member of since last September, when the provincial Tories booted into him into the Independent seats. Coincidentally, this only happened after former party leader John Tory announced he would become host of a new CFRB call in show every Sunday aptly named the John Tory Show, as Tory removes his economic boosting presence from campaigning provincially to municipally in the City of Toronto coming next year. But Backbencher Blues, a forty minute segment from the Agenda on TVO, gives some indication that Murdoch's fight for particpatory democracy seems to be misconstrude by his former pals Chris Stockwell and Frank Klees as electoral porkbarreling.

Sadly, there seems to be a problem between party loyalty and constituent demands, as Steve Paikin aludes to, but also party machinations upon the representative of the constitutent, where Murdoch was not given the right to vote on an issue that every member should be allowed to do, thus why be there ever, which seems to be his major beef.

Now, there is a prime lesson here to be learnt, but can the mistake be recognized as being made, in this situation, I do not think anyone can actually see it and therefore will not be rectified now for any future gain. Watching both Stockwell and Klees turning on their pal Murdoch on the issue of representative democracy is quite unfortunate, with John Tory not living up to promises he made to members within, not listening to all of them leaves his personal campaign mantra of leadership matters without, all of which really does lead to all leader, Premier or Prime Minister who solidifies power, makes decisions and just simply repeats the same old status quo government like the last one and to be the next one. Unwhipped free votes would be a great idea legislatively, but having leader, whip and members all working together by consensus to make the big decisions in caucus as government, or even opposition, seems to be a futuristic dream of the grassroots that will take some time for us to sort out properly through policy development, so do not hold you breath anytime soon.

E Motional Month

2009-04-19T09:01:00.003-04:00

The sudden engulfment of the three Es, essays, exams and Easter, have combined to make this month quite an emotional one. Jokingly, I have been stating after that of this closing E and E month for the winter session, we get one of R and R, rest and relaxation, but instead reality sinks in, as it will be maybe half a week and then back on the academic trail for spring course load. Giving out a special prop to my iron works partner and cycling trainer, who I said so long farewell auf wiedersehen to last night, CRC Sea to Sea 2008 Tourist Christeena Nienhuis of Sarnia for a hard year on the bike and weights too, for a restful summer on and off the road and then an even harder year this coming September on those absolutely inconsistent stationeries in the corner of the cellblock. Now, in the meantime, I will be hopefully picking up the aforementioned History of Film course here at Redeemer in Ancaster, so feel very free to visit me at Luther Court if you are still around, because right afterwards, it will be back to the real estate grind yet again!

Predestination of Free Will

2009-04-13T13:37:00.004-04:00

After completing a few great Reformed theology courses at Redeemer University College in Ancaster, Ontario, Canada, other than getting the earful from the department about its North American rivalry with both the Knights of Calvin in Grand Rapids, Michigan with its track and field and the Defenders of Dordt in Sioux Center, Iowa with its football and baseball, the big issue was always the five complete points of Calvinism from the Canons of Dort, sometimes referred to by the acronym T.U.L.I.P. It would seem that some Calvinists of the Reformed faith believe the the limited atonement should be an unlimited kind, though unconditional election remains, as none can believe on their own, thus must be elected into faith in Christ. Many it would seem, coming into the 500th anniversary of the birth of the French born but Dutch adopted Reformer Jean Cauvin ou John Calvin soon, see predestination and free will as two separate entities, however, I think it truly is both through the free will of predestination or perhaps the predestination of free will.

I know this seems impossible, but if I can try and explain it, I believe God allows for both within His plan.

God is sovereign over all, including over His created, ordered and predestined world, humanity's creation and the cultural mandate, however with it, He gave His own humanity complete and total freedom of choice to do good and right or wrong and evil. Though He knows the big picture script, metanarrative or worldview by His ultimate determination, our small picture lives are still decided by us, as He knows what hardwiredwise we are going to do by His creation of us, therefore we do not really change things, as they were already going to be changed. In other words, the future will depend on what we do in the present, but the present was determined by what we did in the past, all within the sovereignty of the almighty God. Looking at the early church fathers, as Augustine answered, God, being Omniscient, made the future thus knew in advance the saved and the not, furthered by Luther's Salvation by Faith Alone not Good Works and extended by Calvin's belief that God, not only knew through grace, but decided what choice every person would make in his life, as people had no free choice or will. However, individual free will and choice must be allowed, for all of those, with their hearts known to God, to make their final choice by themselves. So, I hope that solves that mystery, as many have asked me what I thought on the issue, took awhile to get it out there, but just before exam week seems the right time now to speak on the issue.

Midnight Rollerblading Sonata

2009-04-06T21:23:00.004-04:00

As totally weird and beyond real as this is, I rollerblade at night, actually more accurately, usually right at midnight especially. Now, as we are coming up to exams, with good weather to boot, I lace them up and go out with the baroque, classical and romantic sonatas of Johann Sebastian Bach, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Franz Schubert, Johannes Brahms and Joseph Haydn, to name a few, going on up in my head. I started the practice while playing junior football, as I used to night bike at midnight in my youth, but without a bicycle away from home and only rollerblades on the road, I just replaced the mode within the practice and voila.

Shocked however I was to find out, there were actual Midnight Rollerblading Clubs, akin to the popular Fight Clubs, going on around the world, in Paris, Rome, London and even Minneapolis of Minnesota as this snippet proves. Personally, I totally understand the idea, the activity gets the mind racing, as it also soothes the soul, with songs of joy, sadness and other emotions in between filling your inner being, the complete lift and exhilaration one gets from it, you simply do not turn back. True, when a game, match or competition is on, I blade to rap and hard rock in the day, but come night, nothing but that classical sound of piano, violin and organ get me in the mood to go, do and act out into the night.

I waited impatiently for the snow up here in the Great White North to quickly disappear, quicker in the Niagara region thankfully, but when it came time, out I went gliding into my first midnight skate. Coasting from the sidewalk to the laneway from main building to Augustine Hall, I could feel that inner flow from within to sail along with, as I bobbed, weaved and skimmed from southern Garner to western Kitty Murray entrances, the pure feeling and sensation of complete awareness and consciousness brought total excitement. This is what the Creator's creation, order and the mandate is all really about here on earth, our respect, responsiveness and responsibility to it, if that is not how we feel then we must react at the lack of receptiveness we feel without any true reflection on the life we love to live.

Greater Good Government meets the Criminal Code of Canada

2009-04-05T19:39:00.000-04:00

The Sixties Babyboom Generation of Love, Peace and Dope introduced abortion, the method of birth control after the fact, to make free love, or more open sex, freer. Like the music, media and medications around and abound, Babyboomers also never though much of abuses within the restrictive traditional family, where father knew best, or eventually when the work around the clock mother left the unworkable marriage, which gave into divorce and opened up relationships with other men without marriage, common law or even other women homosexually, men too separating to create partnerships outside the old way. All legalized with Canada's Criminal Law Amendment Act in 1968-69 by Liberal Prime Minister Lester Bowles Pearson and his Minister of Justice Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Bill C-150 was the omnibus bill, following those of similar initiative in European nations at the time. Introducing major changes in decriminalization of previous illegal activities like homosexuality, abortion or contraception, regulate lotteries, gun possession, drinking and driving offences, harassing phone calls, misleading advertising and cruelty to animals to the Criminal Code of Canada, as "there is no place for the state in the bedrooms of the nation" since "what is done in private between adults does not concern the Criminal Code of Canada". The Dominion free itself in one sense, however enslaved itself in yet another, but the colony's blunder would not reveal itself until later.

Revisiting and reflecting upon this point in Canadian political scientific history, I am yet again reminded of what my old poli sci prof, Dr. David T. Koyzis, Ph.D., University of Notre Dame, Professor of Political Science at Redeemer University College, once said that, you can only know what kind of a conservative one is by asking them the question "what are you trying to conserve?", similarly, I extended this logic, saying you can only know what kind of a liberal one is by asking them the question, "what are you trying to liberate?", either side knows who they really are. Questions, issues and policies from the Big C Party Member Conservatives and Big L Party Member Liberals may not be the same one supported the small c platform voter conservatives and the small l platform voter liberals, in some cases, a Conservative may vote with a liberal and a Liberal may vote with a conservative, so the difference has truly become miniscule to the point of possibly not mattering anymore. Odd that for many in both movements, the letters L, F and M either stand for life, family and marriage between opposites or liberty, freedom and market between competitors, but neither together, perhaps the old politics of polarization has indeed defeated the new politics of realignment, where a Green or Reform, heck even a New Democrat or Bloc Quebecois, can not make a difference because of their lack of power, from the grassroots to the backroom, or as it now is vice versa!

The 2010s Babybust Generation of L, F and M is deciding which one they are, seeing both set of values as incompatible with each other, just as the generation before did, like the generation before them, but Generations X, Y and Z will have to understand there really is no political left or right here, no polarized debate between the blues and the reds, instead taxpayers, citizens or just regular everyday people will have to decide what is best for them. Can they find the extreme middle ground, away from the same old ideological status quo, pragmatic in debate and deliberation and principled in action and leadership, or is this a dream of the past? Can we expect government to protect its citizens from what endangers their mental, emotional or physical well being, in using reasonable and probable cause to provide both peace and order and what really constitutes the greater good government Ottawa supposedly provides us for the price, monetarily or not, we pay daily for it? When natural population increase by birth was replaced by artificial population increase by immigration, some people saw a cultural rebirth of a New Canada, yet others saw a cultural war within their Old Canada, ironically those of the bicultural Old Canada refused to admit an Older Canada of the third, or shall I say first culture that outdated both, ironically too it was the support base of that bicultural Old Canada people that created the situation we have today. Will Canadians, all of them including Gen Xers, Yers and Zers, finally decide to reject the bicultural Old Canada clique, so we can merge the monocultural Older Canada with this multicultural New Canada and finally move forward past the political divisiveness, dissention and discord, instead towards cultural unity, harmony and completeness!

Spring Fever Not Just Yet

2009-03-30T21:30:00.002-04:00

As we enter Essay and Exam month, or E and E, I look around to see not the North American brand of spring fever, or sets of physical and psychological symptoms, such as an unexpected increase in energy, vitality and particularly sexual appetite, associated with the arrival of spring, in exhibition throughout our cozy campus community. Quite the opposite, I see the more European brand that is a lethargic state of low energy, obvious weariness and overall weakness within the sudent body at Redeemer, so I wonder just where this comes from. Personally, though we are in the Steel Belt or Niagara Region of the Province of Ontario, I think people feel down because the snow is still with us, which has given the greens and flora its natural arrested development, but that is just my own theory, just hoping it and the underlying negative factors within turn around soon.

Independent but not a Republic

2009-03-16T11:11:00.001-04:00

Today in the Hill Times, NDP MP for Winnipeg Centre Pat Martin suggests that the time for Canada to stand up as a nation, on our own two feet and declare ourselves the Republic of Canada is now. Like John Manley, a former Deputy Prime Minister under Jean Chrétien, Liberal MP for Ottawa South and Time Magazine 2001 Canadian Newsmaker of the Year, he too is an outspoken critic of and an advocate of the abolition the monarchy of Canada, as well as friend of republicanism, originally using the marriage of the Prince of Wales to the Duchess of Cornwall as proof of its uselessness. However, I do not see why Canada would have to become a Republic, as being a Dominion keeps with Canadian tradition without remaining within a politically depressive mental state of colonialism and domination by one of the three founding peoples.

Personally, I believe Canada always should have declared its true independence years ago, with the patriation, or bringing home of the constitution, through the Canada Act of 1982 only being a mere permission to go out alone into the night, while still being under curfew of the English British Commonwealth and Crown. Looking beyond the Canadian Two Solitudes and into the Aboriginal Third, it would go along way for both the French Québécois and especially those in our maligned nation of Natives to rid the Dominion of the oppressive symbol of colonialism in this country once and for all!

Why not take a first step towards it by declaring a Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II Act, whereby upon her untimely death, the Dominion would be released from its role as a constitutional monarchy to that of a constitutional dominion, thus the heir apparent to the throne, the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II, Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall Prince Charles shall not then become Canada's king?

Opposition goes from Red Tory to Orange Socialist

2009-03-03T09:49:00.001-05:00

Dalton Mcguinty Liberals will soon go from targeting Howard Hampton and John Tory to Andrea Horvath and Tim Hudak, with both Peter Tabuns and Bob Runciman wondering just what could have been, in terms of where they were on the questions of leadership and ideology respectively. You see now, John Tory will soon fall back to lose an ideologic byelection and Andrea Horvath will soon come from behind to win a leadership convention, they are on completely different paths in as far as the political world at Queen's Park. Red Tories do not do so well in bad economies, especially ones which go from recesssions to advanced in its state to depressions, Orange Socialists, whether CCF or NDP, do, here in Ontario, tradition shows from Agnes Macphail to Ted Jolliffe to Stephen Lewis that bad times give them official opposition or better position, as Bob Rae can attest, to take the corporate elites out for the average joe worker and their union.

When the Ontario Tories began rolling back its Common Sense Revolution before 2003, the Ontario Liberals saw their chance, while the New Democrats could only talk about power for the public. Such talk in those good times was useless, so they lost both power in the political sense, being their official party status. But times soured, with it so did the position of Red Tories and Blue Liberals here in Ontario, which has allowed the Orange Socialist back into the race, with talks of bailouts, stimulus packages and economic governmental programs that basically redistribute taxpayers hard earned money they, being the people, could better spend themselves individually.

Yet people truly love government in hard times, so they especially like the Orange Socialist over Blue Liberals and especially Red Tories, who as they become a third party, will become much a bluer tone of Tory, while the Liberals return closer to its redness with an Orange official opposition. With the end of Tory, along with Howard and the beginning of Horvath, along with Tim, Ontario politics changes yet again, but does it really is the question, as leadership and ideology fold two out and mold another set in. Mcguinty knows that bland works, as Bill Davis his mentor proved so many times before, but this only works if the people are, when they do not and unemployment becomes a problem, then bland is replaced by the bold. Neither Davis nor Mcguinty are bold, the inventive leaders coming will have to be, already the difference between a John Tory, throughout his byelection rhetoric, and Andrea Horvath, throughout her convention rhetoric, is quite obvious, he will keep the same old system through ideology and she wants to change it by turning it on its head through leadership. That alone is why she will find her way into the winners circle, he will find his way into the losers square and neither political twain shall meet, except for perhaps a parade or two on a personal level this coming summer.

Ignatieff Liberals own Harper Tories budget

2009-02-05T21:36:00.002-05:00

The Coalition of the Unwilling may be dead, but the Ignatieff Liberals have already overshadowed the Dion era by forcing the Harper Tories on a budget amendment vote that require regular reports to Parliament on the budget's implementation and costs, set for March, June and December, which basically keeps the leash on the same old new government. Though all MPs voted to allow it by a 214 to 84 margin, the other former coalition partners, the New Democrats and Bloc Québécois voted against it absolutely, which has officially put an end to an interesting political experiment in consensus solution building as a new found decision making process tool by the collective opposition. Those unaccountable billions of dollars being spent by a undisciplined Ottawa will now have a watchdog report tagged onto them, which in the end may not actually change anything, but at least it gives the appearance of it, with a promissory note to the taxpayer of something more lasting and legislatively enforceable in the future.

Harper Federal Tories need to know Quebec is a Coalition of Socialists and Separatists

2009-01-29T21:29:00.002-05:00

Before the Brian Mulroney cum Stephen Harper backing Tory Lian Macdonald of the Montreal Gazette and Policy Options of the Institute for Research on Public Policy spins the recent CROP poll from La Presse into a Charest styled "I support the Conservative ideal wholeheartedly, but do feel nods towards socialism and concessions for separatism are needed to maintain Quebec" argument for La Belle Province, let us be very clear, Conservatism in Canada, or Toryism is both socialist and separatist. If you are currently neither, due to polarization, you are instead a Liberal. Unity has always been the buzzword that allowed Tories like John A. Macdonald, John Diefenbaker and Mulroney to have it both ways, traditionalism and progressivism, but when the means they used came to an eventual and final end for all three, none had a surplus, each had deficits and separatism or some form of nationalism was on the rise in Quebec, all with their help federally.

Likewise as in the present, the Conservatives under Harper have now traded their lead to the Bloc Quebecois, 35 then and now 34, Tories today total 16, only a point away from Jack Layton and his New Democrats at 15. Liberals, the original antiseparatists, are in second with 31, surging on the new power Michael Ignatieff gives, while the Harper Tories lost, amongst francophones of the province, almost half of its support overall. Harper himself has lost the other question of leadership, as to who should be the next Prime Minister, Ignatieff has it with 37, Layton comes in second with 23 and Harper gets a sweet 16, proving at this point in time, Quebecois have taken quite to heart what the Prime Minister said in his early December address to the nation about that coalition driven by separatists and socialists, an actual attack on the culture and values of the majority of Quebecois themselves. After everything Harper gave to it, giving his all, literally turning on his original supporters, three different cirles of them, abortion for the social conservative, trust funds for the fiscal conservative and Quebecois nation resolution plus elected Senate for the democratic reformers, there really is nothing left on his table for his own hardcore supporters, his end is nigh and that light is at the end of his tunnel.

Add to all this as well, economic times Harper promised would not be have indeed become, especially for one with a Master's degree in economics from the University of Calgary, the implications are beyond obvious. By misjudging the economic, social and political situation now, he actually has made it difficult to make any real progressive forward in these same areas later, accordingly the 61 percent of Quebecois who answered they were dissatisfied with the Harper Tory government’s handling of federal affairs were not just members of that vilified coalition he spoke about to our nation, but rather the province at large who had been polled. Which is why the Harper Federal Tories in Ottawa need to know Quebec is a Coalition of Socialists and Separatists and vote accordingly, that said, after seeing the recent federal budget and hearing about intentions by Albertans for Independence, perhaps the same could apply to a good percentage of those sitting on the governing side of the seemingly glass built House with an opposition waiting outside with stones in hand.

The economic engine of Canada now pathetically putters

2009-01-27T23:34:00.002-05:00

Ontario, the provincial leader of the confederal pack, is now officially a have not, joining six others, gaining $347 million, while Newfoundland joins four other have provinces. Now, all provinces except Ontario have one time or another been on equalization transfer payments, Ontario paid in full many a ride for the others, but here comes the change in that, one I would believe no Ontarian wished for nor any Canadian. Therefore I submit, fairness for both Canadians and Ontarians is a return back to building a strong Ontario for an even stronger Canada, we need to make the Province of Ontario work not just economically, but socially, fiscally, environmentally, politically and beyond.

All we have to do, if we become more responsible in all these areas, plus even further into areas we have not touch before, is finally work to make the Dominion of Canada rich again by our presence within it, but it will take really hard work to get there.

Realizing this, Ontarians must start tightening our belts collectively, to make a public example for the rest of Canada to see, our politicians and legislature should cut back on its pay and cost, our government and bureaucracy should lower down its taxes and waste, then we as citizens should ask it to stick to the basics in services for only the essentials and those actions we can not do for ourselves. If we all could just sacrifice our past position of pompositic prestige, then perhaps we could move forward, someone has to take the hit, we should do as we have done, be the example yet again the nation, for its commonwealth and its future. Our aim should be high, be true in our target for a better tomorrow for our youth, look to make sure mistakes now do not repeat for them later, one by one push the have not moniker out so we can replace it with the old have title yet again then know that yes we can do it!

Harper's Economic Stimulus Package will be Mulroney's Goods and Service Tax

2009-01-25T09:39:00.002-05:00

Stephen Harper's Economic Stimulus Package will indeed become just like Brian Mulroney's Goods and Service Tax, as both of these Tory torments will go down in history as being unpopular, quite useless and becoming yet again long term policies for short term policies for both of these Canadian Prime Ministers. Unfortunately for us, once the failed Tory Prime Minister is replaced by the hopeful Liberal Opposition Leader, usually that unpopular measure stays in place, no matter how much they campaign and promise to do the opposite, no different will it be for Michael Ignatieff. Remember Income Tax, during the horrible crisis of the First Great War in 1917, as Great Britain and the United States began putting these brand new schemes into effect governmentally, Canada's move reservedly called it one to be implemented temporarily until the end of that war. Just the same, this economic stimulus like the goods and services tax will be campaigned against, only to be continued in some other government cheese factory in the name of some other reason it must be kept, as even with good times, the vicious cycle of bad times is not far behind they will say. We keep adding more deficit and debt unto the small and weak backs of the children of this nation, continent and world, all without thinking of where all this will lead to for them and their young and perhaps yet to be futures, I would hope we could begin thinking about them before we just worried about ourselves just this once.

Count the Creator's Lucky Stars in Life

2009-01-15T22:30:00.003-05:00

Do you ever notice one never fully counts the Creator's lucky stars above until one just barely misses one of their greatest tragedies in their entire life? This is me, last night I was at the university gym weightroom, I was performing a regular 225 pound Smith machine Lalanne squat that never gives me problems. However, that night was no ordinary night, as this machine is counterbalanced, stablized and needs for reracking being not, I take liberties, such liberties as instead of letting my shoulders take on the load up to its secured hooking point, moving the bar up manually with my own arms to go above instead.

That would be my big time mistake, one I may not have been able to ever repeat again, but am lucky to say I hope never to in my life.

As soon as my arms reached up with the barbell vertically, the weight seemed to pull backwards and down, like the Olympian this summer who ended up popping out his elbow. As the support gave out, so did the arms, which then proceed to immediately go backwards as though each were still forward, a massive stretch I normally can not do as I am not a acrobat who can contort, is hypermobile or have any real flexibility at all, so this was a complete shock to me. As I snapped, crackled and popped my way backwards, within mere seconds, my arms which still held the weight, now backwards, began immediately pulling up, from the level of my buttocks area, back up to over my shoulder and with more snapping, crackling and popping, made it above my head again to complete the original task.

Looking back now, I subconciously think I knew what kind of a sound it would make if I had dropped the weight, plus I always get hounded for being too noisy with them anyhow, so I made the effort without another thought.

After completing this, I took check upon how my body was for only less than a minute, God allowed me no immediate effect, the snaps, crackles and pops seemed to be natural, no bones had been actually broken, there was a balanced stretch across from top back right out to both arms, from the faces of the girls across the room on the arm press machines, I thought I must have destroyed everything. After I finished my workout circuit, however, I did begin to notice changes, such as massive shaking of the arms, when I tried hard to keep them straight ahead, yet they ranged up and down from head to waist, later this night, there was massive aching just as I was getting into the workout, but no really pain though, yet has stopped me from doing the dumbell operations I usually do over my head, as well as limit my bench press as the muscle around the elbow and joint under bicep affecting the biceps brachii, brachialis, pronator teres and brachioradialis, basically anything under the rotator cuff and deltoid of mainly the left, but also the right arm. This has forced me to change my routine, now going mainly advanced on legs, basic arm workout instead, so I can hopefully get back to it by the ides of March, but we shall just have to see as this was only my first day fully with the injury, something I usually am without, having to work through it and just adapt to it as we move forward. Ironically, my Creator has allowed me grace yet again, He could have broke every bone, tore every tendon and mince every muscle, if He wanted to yesterday, but no, He kept my intact for a purpose yet again only known to Him and I thank God for that absolutely.

Bart Andrus for Argos like Mike Mclean for York

2009-01-13T11:03:00.002-05:00

A man who was made in the West, Bart Andrus went from being a starting quarterback for the NCAA Division II University of Montana Grizzlies of Missoula, now a perennial champion, to the 1996 National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics coach of the year by turning around Montana's Rocky Mountain College in Billings, from many winless seasons to a winning 6 and 4 one, now a top ranked offence to be sure. Jumping to the pros, as an offensive assistant with the Tennessee Titans of the NFL during Super Bowl XXXIV, he crossed the ocean, becoming an offensive coordinator and winning his first World Bowl VIII ring against the Scottish Claymores of Glasgow and Edinburgh with the NFL Europa team Rhein Fire based in Düsseldorf, Germany. Finally, he got the head coaching job for the Amsterdam Admirals, eventually winning the World Bowl XIII against threepeating World Bowl winner Berlin Thunder, a year in which he was also named Coach of the Year in the NFLE.

Another man who was made in the West is Mike Mclean, before he became the head coach of the York University Lions, he had helped take the St. Mary's University Huskies of Halifax to the 2007 Vanier Cup, as its defensive coordinator in two years, making it the top ranked defence in the nation. Before that, he led as head coach, the Edmonton Huskies to back to back Canadian Junior Football League championships from 2004 to 2005, after turning it around in five years time from the winless program it was, named Football Alberta's coach of the year in 2004. Behind him is a professional experience in playing seven CFL seasons as a linebacker with the Edmonton Eskimos from 1985 to 1992 and winning the Grey Cup in 1987.

Argonauts of Toronto now looking to make Andrus its coach are taking the same steps the Lions of York took in making Mclean theirs, both are proven winners on the field and behind the bench, equally able to eventually get things back on track where they belong. Though it will take some time, I have a feeling both can make a dynasty out of their time there, time being the keyword, as without it nobody has a shot at making any change, without that chance, how can anyone be given the athletic freedom to make their own gut instinct and choices. Finally, good things for Canadian football both professional and amateur in the Big Smoke, something T dot O can be proud of across the board.

Might makes right and Bauer plays power

2009-01-11T23:09:00.003-05:00

24 Jack Bauer Redeemer University College Canadian Foreign Policy and International Relations Prof. Rob Joustra United States Foreign Relations Dr. David Zietsma

Reformed Elected Senate now Tory Appointed Seats

2008-12-15T15:45:00.004-05:00

Like I have been saying constantly since 2003, democratic first populism took a blow in the House when the Reform and Alliance caucuses merged with the Conservatives, something the post 911 polarization of politics caused I am sure of. I would argue that only the Bloc and Greens still have remnants of it, though I also think that the aforementioned polarization and its recent effects in the coalition merger deal have killed that kind of populism on their side too. Anyhow, with this selection, not election, of his Senate, Stephen Harper should officially shake off any idea that Reform is still on his mind finally in the minds of many Canadians.

That now said, having already brought in the unelected Quebecer Michael Fortier and Albertan Bert Brown, this action is therefore not without precident. With 18 vacancies, in the 105 seat Senate, the provinces involved within this particular sweepstakes are four in Quebec, three each from British Columbia and Nova Scotia, two each from New Brunswick and Ontario and one each from Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan and the Yukon territory. I think some picks that would seem to be quite Tory friendly would be Mario Dumont, Luc Harvey and Ian Macdonald and Michael Fortier again in Quebec, British Columbia's will likely be John Reynolds, David Emerson and either Clarence Louie for his aboriginal or Nancy Greene for his athletic status with the upcoming Winter Olympics in Whistler Vancouver, Nova Scotia's will likely be Rodney Macdonald, John Hamm and Stewart Mcinnes, Bernard Lord and Percy Mockler in New Brunswick and Mike Harris and Preston Manning for Ontario, Newfoundland's will likely be Rick Hillier, Pat Binns for Prince Edward Island, Elwin Hermanson for Saskatchewan and Dennis Fentie for the Yukon, unless he remains Premier.

Due to age and overall life long residence, I could see Harper replacing a pick for Preston Manning, who I believe still lectures at the University of Toronto as a senior visiting scholar, for John Tory. But I think one should look at this from the other side, Tory is really a Tory, Tories have a sense of noblesse oblige and communitarianism, which is what embodies him and the aristocratic Senate to a tee. So in order to get that balanced Red and Blue Toryism which powered Brian Mulroney federally and Mike Harris provincially to two terms consecutively, I think Harper needs to bury his rivalry hatchet with the Joe Clark wing, replace Marjory Lebreton and make his past nemesis Tory his future Leader of the Government in the Senate and end his supposed past belief in Reform once and for all since we all know by now, that while doctors take the Hippocratic oath, politicians take the Hypocrite oath instead.

Could this Liberal Socialist-Separatist Coalition split Canada?

2008-12-03T19:37:00.000-05:00

As I said in Dr. K's class, forget that King-Byng affair of days yore, this Dion-Jean fiasco is going to blow it out of Canadian governmental and constitutional affairs history all time!

Pumped Up to the Next Level

2008-12-01T22:10:00.000-05:00

Jack and Gilles sent Stéphane up the Hill

2008-11-30T15:33:00.003-05:00

Wow, did I ever espeak to soon, Stéphane over Stephen say Jack and Gilles, as Layton of the New Democrats and Duceppe of the Bloc Québécois work together to form a left wing Canadian socialist to separatist coalition of the Opposition to fight the right wing Conservative Tory Government when Parliament is back in session, hoping to replace Harper with Dion. In such troubling economic times, you would think all the leadership in Ottawa would be working hard to create plans to help your average everyday working Canadians, but all parties on the Hill seem bent on giving us one huge constitutional quagmire to go with the severely depressed economy, just in time for Christmas holydays in the Great White North. For those still watching with the six week old election scorecard, MP for Toronto Centre Bob Rae, who has been there and done that, is reportedly good to go with this, especially since his internal polling numbers have not been to good for that recent leadership race, however Grit leadership rival and former roommate Etobicoke—Lakeshore MP Michael Ignatieff is supposedly not, with his single minded quest for the Liberal crown that would be his to capture, so we shall just have to wait to see who comes tumbling down the Hill and who else follows right after.

From Billion Dollar Bush to Trillion Dollar Obama

2008-11-27T17:55:00.002-05:00

Obama plans second $700 million dollar bailout, bailout increased by another $800 million, the current bailout package for Wall Street and beyond $1.5 trillion with talks of including the Big Three's auto sector crisis.

There are three very important quotes to remember from this financial flameup fiasco: "It's not based on any particular data point, we just wanted to choose a really large number." — a Treasury Department spokeswoman, explaining how the $700 billion number was chosen for the initial bailout, quoted on Forbes .com Sept. 23 "Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency." — a Treasury Department legislative act, proposed Emergency Economic Stabilization Act under Secretary Henry Paulson, September 2008. "Cash for trash, there are no atheists in foxholes and there are no libertarians in financial crises." — Paul Krugman, discussing the financial bailout, New York Times Sept. 22. Looking at the United States of America's national debt situation, this Paulson bailout took it from $10.6 trillion to $11.3 trillion, as the annual budget deficit for 2009 fiscal year may actually surpass $1 trillion.

Canada, on the other hand, is being very smart on its fiscal prudence, possibly the advantages of having an academic and economist as both the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition, who hopefully will remain as cooler heads internationally that prevail, one can look forward to an economic statement that lacks any new massive fiscal stimulus packaging for an old long time economic cyclic problem.

From America to Omerica

2008-11-05T17:43:00.000-05:00

Well, from America to Omerica, yes they did make change they could believe in finally after years of the same old status quo system. However, now that all of the United States have entered their new frontier, breaking the biracial culture barrier, many thought impossible, can they get past their recently anti bipartisanship political barrier, which has been replaced by a pro political polarization? With both the House and the Senate, the Democrats have push forward their agenda against a lameduck President George W. Bush, yet I argue, our newly elected President Elect Barack Hussein Obama II may actually just become the third term of Bush Democrats and other independent voters had voted against.

I suggest that a Democrat President Obama will fight against the will of the Democrat majority House and Senate, showing his muscle immediately upon taking office, as well as using his already well build popularity to carry legislation through which may not be too popular with his fellow political Demos. With the domestic economy currently torn in shreds, look for Obama to start turning back on some of his earlier promises about pulling out from the War on Terrorism, in Afghanistan or Iraq, protecting civil liberties that we outrageously violated and flagrantly assaulted by the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act or USA PATRIOT Act of 2001 and continue the Bush administration's policy on free trade protectionism. Finally, if the House and Senate fight these measures, look for Obama to openly threaten any Democrats, running two years from now, who refuse to go along and get along by not endorsing them for reelection with the presidential stamp of approval.

Yes, a barrier has been passed down south, but the more that it changes, basically the more it really is the same thing. Imagine the surprise, by those who voted against Bush and disliked his policies, when they realize they just elected a Red third term to go, all done by the good Blue guys, which seems to have more twists and turns here than an episode of Prison Break, Lost or 24! If Bush had been like Golda Meir and plotted revenge on the international terrorists of 911 just like the Mossad Munich Massacre, I just wonder how much history would have changed for the better, or perhaps how few untendered public military contracts would have been made for outsourced private multinational corporations in the name of economic development, military machinery and political expediency to continue the cultivation of the complex.

Give Laval the Hec Trophy

2008-11-01T20:01:00.002-04:00

Laval Rouge et Or, a club which has won three of the last five Vanier Cups, has yet to have a Hec Crighton Trophy winner. With such absolutely solid quarterbacking, as Mathieu Bertrand and his backup partner William Leclerc and now Benoit Groulx with his backup partner Cesar-Roberto Sanchez-Hernandez during their era, only the voting officials within Canadian Interuniversity Sport Football seem to be the last ones to recognize such greatness in their own sport of Canadian University Football. A nod should have went to Mathieu Bertrand then, so a nod should go to Benoit Groulx now, making either only the second Quebec Student Sport Federation Football player to win since the creation of the Hec. About the game, I think we shall once again see Laval after one year's absence, without Manitoba's experience and maturity, the West shall give le Rouge et Or a bye into the big show, with Saskatchewan or Calgary. While home turf maybe Ontario's, Ottawa, Western or Laurier will be no match for a St. Mary's club determined to right the wrongs of last year, however the Huskies will lose to Laval in Hamilton at Ivor Wynne on the 22nd guaranteed.

Mcdonalds Corporation is Monopolizing Sweepstakes and Mister Moneybags in the Credit Crunch

2008-10-30T18:17:00.060-04:00

Growing up I loved playing the game, the one played on hard cardboard, not a piece of glossy paper or even online, but when the Mcdonalds Corporation brought its 2008 Canadian version Monopoly sweepstakes promotion, with its 2000 controversial fraud scandal behind it, in line with the American edition that continues to be the most popular game in the industry amongst those with lower income, less education and quite obese according to various studies published and readily available to most anyone.

Unlike the actual game and contest, the credit crunch allowed those who could not afford it to buy the most expensive properties, taking a trip across Boardwalk down the Golden Arches Avenue to buy Park Place, only to find themselves seized and forclosed to either the banks or federal government as their interest and value depreciates, not collecting a tax debate or two, not able to pass go or keep going on as they are bankrupt and instead being taken directly to jail or federal penitentiary.

Keeping it real is learning of fast food franchisees unable to secure loans, lines of credit or even personal tradeoffs as restaurant operators, even those running the shop have to pay the bills to keep it running, still at the end of the day, whether their aim is strutting down either Wall or Bay Street, anyone stuck eating tons of high fat and carb and low prot food made fast and eaten faster to win big, as the sun lowers, usually remains walking down the same old Main, King or Queen Street.

Kenyan, Panamanian or American

2008-10-29T19:09:00.004-04:00

Both Obama and Mccain has gone leaps and bounds during this campaign, one trying hard to run from the shadow of the past president to be and the other running from the shadow of the former first lady before that, each looking to have a decent shot at becoming the Forty Fourth President of the United States of America. But problems have bubbled up, Barack may have been born in Hawaii or perhaps Kenya, while John was born in the Panama Canal Zone, neither within the national territory limits itself. This now brings into question the eligibility of both, which gives them some commonality, not unlike how both John F. Kerry and George W. Bush were proud members of Yale's Skull and Bones in 2004.

So, who is a natural born citizen, a citizen at birth, such that one can be a President someday? The 14th Amendment defines citizenship as to be "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." The United States Constitution framework is gap filled by the United States Code law through Title 8 and Section 1401 which states "citizens of the United States at birth being anyone born inside the United States; any Indian or Eskimo born in the United States, provided being a citizen of the U.S. does not impair the person's status as a citizen of the tribe; any one born outside the United States, both of whose parents are citizens of the U.S., as long as one parent has lived in the U.S.; any one born outside the United States, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year and the other parent is a U.S. national; any one born in a U.S. possession, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year; any one found in the U.S. under the age of five, whose parentage cannot be determined, as long as proof of non citizenship is not provided by age twenty one; any one born outside the U.S., if one parent is an alien and as long as the other parent is a citizen of the U.S. who lived in the U.S. for at least five years, with military and diplomatic service included in this time, and one last historical condition is that a person born before May, 24, 1934 of an alien father and a U.S. citizen mother who has lived in the U.S.

Now, with no real possibility of either candidate's citizenship being constitutionally challenged in the courts, both Obama and Mccain can focus with less than one week to go on the race at hand. Barack and John, up to now, do not seem to be offering much change in substance if at all and very little in style, which sadly leads one to think that it will be a campaign that goes racial. As an American dual citizen myself, I think it really is comfortable to know we half and halfs have a chance and choice to change America at the highest level, if we ever think that things are getting out of control down there for our fellow Americans, because America only needs one special interest group in control of it and that is Americans.

York treats special team better than Mac

2008-10-19T22:01:00.001-04:00

Getting accepted this summer by York University towards entering its law school was great, getting an invite to its football recruitment day was even better, yet getting to know the club's attitude on special teams was key for me to develop a throughout opinion about the school. Seeing how important they spoke about the kicking and punting and of course the return game on punts, kick offs and missed field goals, I felt more emphasis was given to it there at York than what Mac had said to me back in 2006 and moreso last year as the change from Greg Marshall to Marcello Campanaro to Stefan Ptaszek have left it near dead, surprising it tis one third of the Canadian game that is one third needs more time and care than a couple minutes after the real practice. Even if York is not where it should be right here right now, it gets that it needs to be, especially on the special teams where a punt return for 50 yards or a kickoff return for 35 yards can start the offense right off on the right foot to create a greater chance at scoring.

The overall theme I got from that 50-13 drubbing by the Laurier Golden Hawks was bend, break and bust, we will once again be back next year, I believe they will get better eventually winning the Red and Blue Bowl first then eventually other games will follow.

I do believe there is a culture for winning at the school deep within its soul, Mike Mclean seems to want to bring that junior football championship attitude he developed out west in Edmonton and the university one out east in Halifax to York and that works, especially when it comes to just plain old winning games any and every given Saturday. Johnny Syme's pal Bart Zemanek played a most valuable game, as its most valuable player he should return as either a graduate assistant or coordinator to bring the field to the clubhouse, I feel he could lead and inspire the boys especially from what Johnny has said about the man. Experience is what is needed, without it games are impossible to win, as it grows it goes and so will York.

Canadian University Football Down South

2008-10-17T10:37:00.002-04:00

Despite a marvellous 5-2 record atop the Canada West Universities Athletic Association division of the Canadian Interuniversity Sport, the Simon Fraser University Clan will likely be playing National Collegiate Athletic Association Division II by the 2010-11 season, going down south after coming up from the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Division II in 1997. While the ability to offer full ride athletic scholarships is key, something one can not do in Canada after several years of denial, its athletic director David Murphy believes it goes back to their traditions. Likely joining former opponents in the Great Northwest Athletic Conference, the Clan may be going back to old traditions, but will lose out on our Canadian identity, especially if others follow suit, which I believe will likely be the case. The CIS should allow for the full ride for athletic scholarship like the NCAA, now that it has brought in athletic eligibility restrictions, you can not expect to act like the Americans in one area, then pretend to still be Canadian in another, either wear the Maple Leaf with pride or make academically based athletics open season for all.

Dalton not Stephen won the election

2008-10-15T11:11:00.002-04:00

Mcguinty, not Harper, won the election last night. A cool and calm voice of reason asked for fairness for Ontarians, as we all know that building a strong Ontario for a strong Canada makes for a strong Confederation, the Government of Ontario's Fairness campaign stated just that. In a time Liberals need a sense of direction, Dalton has found it by attacking Stephen's anybody but Ontario interprovincial spending budget, especially when the federal mandate is weakened yet again by a third straight minority government in four consecutive years, with the results being obvious election night, as the federal Tories put their money down on Québec or nothing, gaining little in seats from their side with a -1 loss and much in alienation from ours with a +11 gain. A year before the big fiscal bust, Harper's Minister of Finance and former Mike Harris Tory Jim Flaherty calls our home "the worst place to invest", I would simply say to him that it also is "the worst place to run and represent", if you are going to make harmful statements like that about your home province. Ontario Liberals are far away from perfect, but they are right about Ontario and the need for interprovincial fairness in the Confederation right here and right now, perhaps the problem is they are too quiet on the issue, leadership is about being loud, the exact time for Ontario to gain that will be here soon.

Thanksgiving and Risktaking

2008-10-13T22:10:00.003-04:00

After one delicious Thanksgiving photo shoot and turkey eat, the evening turned over to risktaking, in both the financial stock markets and political federal elections, with my projection remaining the same, a Stephen Harper Tory minority government with no funny business by the opposition until after the pecuniary storm. This may force the Liberals, New Democrats or Greens into democratic leadership reviews, but I do not think so, or would truly hope not, Stephen got 2004 so why can not Stéphane have 2008, as well Dion seems to need time now to actually fashion a proper agenda for himself, not using a watered down version of the fifth party's with its "Think Green Vote Liberal" mantra. The federal Tories will gain, the Liberals will lose and Jack Layton's New Democrats will take the leftovers with some breaded stuffing on the side. Gilles Duceppe's Bloc Québécois will remain steady and since Elizabeth May's Greens never really had a seat in the House at dissolution, nor shall they have one when it when Parliament reconvenes whenever that is, though I do believe there ideas have made quite the difference in this election, just like the Reformers before them. All in all, this election will likely replicate the markets in one way, in the end this will turn out to be all really be about nothing, in the long term sense of things.

Twilight's Last Gleaming from Depression to Repression

2008-09-21T19:31:00.001-04:00

Remember, one government's budget deficits and debts of today are their people's user fees and taxes of tomorrow, bringing elevation down to depression. Why repeat the same cycle over and over again without any change in the historical status quo thus confirming governmental insanity? Just say no!

Bill is right that John should just stop walking the Park

2008-09-12T09:43:00.002-04:00

Dalton Mcguinty owns John Tory, outright with no real help from any other political entity, so Bill Murdoch, the maverick MPP of Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound, is right when he tells him to just stop walking the Park, get inside or stay outside. Without a real actual seat in the Ontario legislature, Tory had the chance and now Murdoch believes his Progressive Conservative party must cut their losses and elect a real leader, since we all know leadership does matter.

The problem is he is the only member of their 26 member caucus who believes this, especially after the special closed door caucus meeting held in Barrie Bill did not attend to find out who the lucky members was going to be to give up their seat for John, mainly due to his own promise of finding a seat by the end of the year or else, a choice prospect for Dalton as he watches Tory power disintegrate, as Stephen Harper and the feds have no time for their provincial Progressive cousins, giving them no government appointments or any other kind of inside job at Ottawa, where the real power now resides.

Even Bob Runciman, the current House Leader and MPP of Leeds-Grenville, has made it hard to resign for Tory now, as if he did it, people would ask why did he not do it right after John failed to get elected in unsuccessful attempt in Don Valley West, after successfully winning then spurring the good people of Dufferin-Peel-Wellington-Grey, or now just Dufferin-Caledon. Perhaps Mcguinty will feel sorry for Tory, give Vic Dhillon a social justice work government head job in the Park, give him Brampton West to run and then let him be the next Bill Davis, then again probably not.

9-11 7 Years Later

2008-09-11T23:09:00.000-04:00

9-11 7 Years Later

Football remains the underground at Redeemer

2008-09-07T18:06:00.000-04:00

Homecoming Football Game, where is the homecoming football game, man? For those who missed it, welcome to the club, because there was no Homecoming Football Game on Royals Field in Redeemer University College of Ancaster, Ontario, Canada. So, no Mud Bowl today likely can be extrapolate into no Snow Bowl later, or at least that is how I am going to interpret it. Unlike Brigham Young University, University of Notre Dame or even Liberty University to the south, as I have said before, Redeemer is quite confident in being the academic superhouse only, without the extra added expense athletics cost in the long run, except maybe in soccer, volleyball and basketball, which remains a fact as well because no other Private Christian University competes at that level in elite sports like football. Personally, I came for the academics, so athletics never really crossed the mind, though it would have been nice to stayed in game shape with a club and league, no matter how small it would have been right here on campus, instead of the off campus game we play between Caledonia and Hagersville. But that is not the kind of animal RUC is, therefore we must accept it and move forward, run the race to receive and obtain the prize we all strive for in life to His glory.

Change slowly disappears with introduction of strawpeople

2008-09-06T15:29:00.005-04:00

Change is not going to happen, not this time now, as the mindset has changed from a full on progressive reform change in America, to just settling for half measured change that is going to happen and will be moderated from on top by the big man. The United States was created by revolution, countries like Canada were created by resolution, which is why both now look for the opposite in their political heroes and leagues. To now paraphrase, Obama, Biden and the Democrats may give you all you want, but Americans believe they can not deliver, Mccain, Palin and the Republicans on the other hand will say they may be the mavericks, rebels and bipartisans on enough issues to not be another Bush. America has an electoral track record, one that shows it has bought that kind of quasi change agenda, especially just after eight years of shock and awe politics. So, as change slowly disappears with introduction of all these strawpeople, is the name of this new united party Democans or Republicrats?

Are we better off with Harper?

2008-09-03T21:30:00.001-04:00

Here yet again, we are faced with the worst choices in leaders to choose from, as talk of a general federal election looms quite large. The federal Tories will be answering their preemptive strike question for us, because supposedly we are better off with Harper, without the fuss and muss of answering the question ourselves in the booth as to whether Stephen deserves a majority, minority or to lose it all. Like I say, if he calls an election singlehandedly right now, he knows he at least has a minority, but as he would be now breaking his own rules of the agenda, he would be kissing any chance at that coveted majority, if he really wants to be like Brian Mulroney. Conservatives may have a legitimate advantage over the Liberals, New Democrats, Bloc and Greens, but the power gained by being governors has been pissed away through killing promised reform initiatives by its grassroots base, something that was going to obviously happen after the merger, which leaves Reformers supporting Progressives without any of the principles to back that support up. Harper and Mulroney have not yet merged Reformers and Progressives fully into this new Conservative movement, today with a faltering economy and tax and spend policy to boot, that said none of the opposition parties or provincial governments have put a hole through its agenda, therefore it shall be returned with not a majority, but a minority, until the Liberals can landslide their way back into office again.

Coming into Labour Day pains

2008-08-31T17:43:00.000-04:00

Changing back from home and office to school is so honestly annoying, yet though all these Labour Day pains as they are, much learning can be gained in the way one prepares for the overall change made. Anxiety, nervousness, persistent worriful fear never enters into the equation, but then again neither does excitement, so really it just means entering a new environment then maintaining the status quo with a twist of difference from the same old. Hamilton is the place to be for Labour Day there is no doubt, but instead of in a hot sweaty gym for registration sign in day, maybe it would be truly best held in a sunny open stadium?

Greens finally in the House for the wrong reasons

2008-08-30T17:43:00.002-04:00

I understand the Greens need to get in the House, but having a Member of Parliament do so for them by crossing the floor, or rather jumping the bench, from Independent to Green, after Blair Wilson of West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country's year long walk in the wilderness from the Liberal caucus he was originally elected to. In all likelihood, Leader Elizabeth May has pulled trigger on this in order to get a shot at speaking in the debates, which still may not happen if the Canadian media consortium decides he still has yet to sit in the House as a Green or he was never elected in his riding as a Green, then add upon this his tarnished reputation made when he was accused of not properly recording financial expenses during the 2006 federal election anonymously, something which has since been cleared of serious wrongdoing by Elections Canada despite some violations. It has been forgotten that Reform had their first MP elected in a byelection, not selected amongst Independents already in the House, so it shall be interesting to see what kind of a bounce the Greens can get from this development, though it should be noted a Social Credit-Reform-Alliancee turned Conservative John Reynolds got elected there in that riding, so anything is truly possible with such an openminded lot on the election of a Liberal turned Green. However, with less than a 1,000 votes separating both mainstream parties, a bitter fight, like the federal election itself, will likely be the outcome for all involved.

2008-08-23T09:49:00.000-04:00

Vee Pee will be either more of the same or change

2008-08-19T09:31:00.001-04:00

Hello Denver then hello Saint Paul, first the Democrats then the Republicans, next week Jackasses will gather to get Mile High, while Labour Day will give the Elephants Excel Energy for their pump up play. As the Blues and the Reds fight it out in the streets, trying all their best to make peace with the average Joe and Jane on the street, seeing if the media can get them an all time high bounce that excels past that out of nowhere miracle a supposed backwater nobody named Bill Clinton performed so many years ago in 1992. The question however, will not be just how high the big bounce will be coming out of the convention, but rather who is going to be picked as the vice president nominee for both Obama and Mccain, something which is much more critical for the Demos than the Repubs.

Obama is change, so going with another grey haired full white guy will not work, been done from time immemorium, but the obvious is not to obvious anymore. The dream ticket of Obama and Clinton is not going to go, as Hillary wants either 2012 if Barack does bomb, or 2016 if history is kind to him, so instead Democrats need a redeem ticket, one that now will ignore John Edwards. Besides how much changes does Clinton really have in her political genes, so the obvious choice for Obama is narrowed down to just three, Russ Feingold, Dianne Feinstein and Debbie Stabenow.

Feingold, is the leading contender as one of Obama's most strongest supporters, the Wisconsin junior Senator has a long history of bucking the going trend, foe example the only Senator to vote against the USA PATRIOT or Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act, as well the former recipient of the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award is about as bipartisan as they come, working along with John in cosponsorship of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, a major piece of campaign finance reform legislation in this century. However, as he is a man, politics say they need a women to balance this dynamic once in a lifetime ticket for change, but the selection has less to do with the selection of the women, but rather the selection of the region. California must be won and California Senator Feinstein can win it, however, if Michigan is indeed the battleground this year, as I believe it is, then Michigan Senator Stabenow is the one, especially as she comes from the same class year as Clinton.

Mccain is different, his situation does not force him to pick someone specific, as Obama must pick either an actual agent of change or a women from voter rich or key battleground territory, anyone can do for him and likely will. Detroit born Mitt Romney, a former Governor of Massachusetts, whose dad was a Governor of Michigan and 1968 presidential candidate, seems to be the no brainer, especially with again Michigan being the key battleground this year in my own mind. However, as he was also a former candidate for the Republican nomination in the 2008 United States presidential election, there may be some problems with this, so if he is out, these are the next three best bets.

The hometown favourite, like fellow Minnesotans Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale from conventions past, will be Governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, no doubt about it here, especially as Minnesota will be another battleground come November. Another one who is a strong supporter of Mccain could be Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger of California, with the vote rich population to boot, yet neither seem to have the political experience to make such picks reality. So, in the end, one has to go to Joseph Lieberman, the independent Democratic Senator from Connecticut, whose own bipartisanship is only matched by that of a Russ Feingold, which it may very well be. If Barack goes anywhere else but Obama-Feingold or one of the gals, John may very well have it with a future Mccain-Lieberman administration for America, or Romney for his base. So, we now wait, as one of these two will make a mistake, anything less than change for Obama or anything off the status quo for Mccain, then it will be showtime.

Redeemer Rough Royals are Ready to Roll

2008-08-16T15:57:00.007-04:00

Redeemer Rough Royals are ready to roll in our third football season, glad to hear the players of the years from the past Andy Luchies and Matt Neal will be returning, as I just know both Pain Train and Real Deal will be rumbling to bring on the noise in September. Not sure how the outdoor tackle ball on the field is going to go, with no change on the ironman rules or a legitimatization towards a flag game for the college association league, it will be a heck of a battle this year from leafy turf and into the snow for one more Super Bowl Sunday Chili Snow Bowl victory against another regional opponent elsewehere. But I do know with three separate teams for the club to play indoor touch ball in the arena, making it all out war on the floor, a 50 yard gym wall to wall brawl hopefully giving us another great RUC Royal Cup.

With less than half a month away from gametime, the Royals only became Rough when the Redeemer athletic department announced it would not call for the return of flag football as an official college sport this spring, with some players in their last year, there was no other choice but to remain independent and play the rough and tough no equipment game. I figure this independent unsanctioned club will have to eventually go legitimate and join both the OCAA and CCAA, that means going from no holds barred tackle and into an official flag rules game, which many of the original diehards rightfully would never go for.

I truly would, however, like to protest the lack of need by the institution to celebrate both Labour Day and Spring Break. These are two important times of the year for myself, where I have been able to happily party hardy in the past, yet have not been able for the last two and coming three years. My only actual real criticism, constructive or other, of the academic system there, which does not actually really have anything to do with academics, but rather the quality of extracurricular activity up on the Mount ReDee.

Ivy Big Ten League for Ontario University Football

2008-08-15T16:04:00.002-04:00

Many of the commentors on the Canadian university football game have recently been wondering if the Ivy League of Canada, the Ontario University Athletics Football Conference, should be split into two. Nothing really brand new here, since discussions in this area have been on going for years, as every single institution in the conference, let alone the league itself, want the edge. But now the call for change has gotten much louder, in particular, from those in the Atlantic East and Pacific West outside of Ontario.

This leaves conventional wisdom to decide how such an interesting arrangement work out, some think it should be decided by population, others believe it should go by ability. If one did align the schools by population, Ontario would have a Big Ivy Five consisting of University of Toronto Varsity Blues at 63,000 students, York University Lions at 39,100, University of Ottawa Gee Gees at 30,882, University of Western Ontario Mustangs at 25,000 and University of Waterloo Warriors at 22,368, while the Small Oak Five would be Mcmaster University Marauders at 19,113, University of Guelph Gryphons at 17,332, Queens University Golden Gaels at 13,500, University of Windsor Lancers at 12,291 and Wilfrid Laurier University Golden Hawks at 11,869. However, if one instead went by ability instead, then in the past twelve years since 1995, Ontario's Big Ivy Five would have UWO Mustangs at 106 powerpoints, UO Gee Gees at 102, WLU Golden Hawks at 96, MU Marauders at 89 and UW Warriors at 72, while their Small Oak Five would be QU Golden Gaels at 71, UG Gryphons at 60, YU Lions at 53, UW Lancers at 45 and UT Varsity Blues at 21.

So, obviously there is no agreement in both these areas, if one were to combine them, results show two obviously different tiers. The Ivy Schools would then be Western, Ottawa, Mcmaster, Waterloo and York, the Oak Schools would start with Toronto, Queens, Guelph, Laurier and Windsor, ticking off archrivals within the Varsity Blue and Lion camps as well as Golden Hawk and Warriors booster. To find an absolute agreement from all these variables may just be too hard, therefore perhaps the best thing is to let them fight it out there on turf, rather than on the notebook.

Good on Redeemer with Homecoming Football Game

2008-08-13T11:55:00.002-04:00

Redeemer University College is going to start the 2008-2009 year with a Homecoming Football Game, it seems Kyle Schroeder is teaming up with the Redeemer University College Royals Football Club to bring ReDee back to the pigskin on Sunday, September 7, 2008 from 1:30 to 4:00 PM, something I suspect the underground Alpha Mu Omega fraternity will have something to do within the game or without in the pregame or postgame festivities.

The important thing here is that Redeemer is slowly cracking its delicate shell in becoming on that can party, have fun, yet remain a work first academically elite institution, proving that yes it really is possible to have it both ways, something most Canadian universities, colleges and post secondary institutions refuse to do or even believe can be.

Hats of to all those behind this great push to bring the game into the next level to what I always have called the Little Notre Dame of the North, I know when talking about the school to all those involved with the football program down at Mac, that at least it was respected for its academics, but perhaps we can move it ever so closely towards athletics even with one pep rallied homecoming football game as is planned.

Harper will not go to fall election unless forced before fixed date

2008-08-12T17:43:00.002-04:00

With the Canada Elections Act came a one paragraph amendment to Canadian Tory Prime Minister Stephen Harper's planned Monday October 19, 2009 election date, giving the Governor General the final say as to when it happens, in other words, the Act is worth no more than the paper it is written upon, the Conservatives know this fully, ending any retention one has to dissolve parliament is exactly the point to making a fixed election, something that obviously has not happened in this case here.

With no such binding law, which could have been real representative reform in this nation, in effect because of constitutional issues, the whole raison d'être resigns itself, something both Harper and the ruling Tories know. Therefore, one suspects they are waiting for the Stéphane Dion Liberals, Gilles Duceppe Bloc and Jack Layton New Democrats to implode the legislation for him, especially as the backroom play that the inside work is not getting done because of an unruly opposition against the working plans of the government. Quite similar as one pretending to be prevented from governing in the House, when in fact they are disemminating secret handbooks to the media on how to disrupt parliamentary committees and create Parliament into a chaotic House of horrors like never seen before, all in a bid to end this minority government for a chance at a majority one instead.

Bush had Karl Rove, Harper has Doug Finley, so instead of full time governing, administrations have now become full time campaigns, ones that have created the slumping economies we North Americans have slowly become quite bogged down with, Harper et al may not want to repeat Monday, January 23, 2006 again, but if the governing Tories keep playing backroom games, it may just very well become like Monday, October 25, 1993 instead.

Cattlemen of Grey Bruce once again on a roll with Thanksgiving Classic in Owen Sound

2008-08-11T11:45:00.003-04:00

I like what I am seeing from these Grey Bruce Owen Sound Cattlemen, when all of us got together 5 years ago, we never would have figured it would take on a life of its own, as the sport of football in this area was very close to dead as a doornail.

The football movement peaked in March 2005, on Friday the 3rd at 7 PM, we all met at Montana's Bar and Grill where the chair Dave Carriere, a former national senior football champion with the Sudbury Hardrocks and Spartans, held an open meeting that was attended by a dozen or so local football players. But after meeting, things started to fizzle out, with the cancelled showcase 2006 Bluewater Snow Bowl Jamboree tourney being the last event tried in the area. A new set of young turks led by a Cowboy Roy Mccoy have taken over the association we started, with the Wildcats moniker officially changing to Cattlemen, a nickname I originally thought should have stuck, hoping they can follow the former Grey Cup Champion Sarnia Imperials, as the next expansion club into the Canadian Major Football League and Northern Football Conference. All of which brings us to the Grey Bruce Canadian Turkey Bowl Thanksgiving Classic, to be held this October 13th at 9 PM between Team Owen Sound of OSCVI, WHSS and SMHS alumni and Team Grey Bruce of SDSS, GHSS and JDSS alumni, not knowing the event was part of the Cattlemen, or was the pickup 7 on 7 game I played in last year up at the Vic to a 1-0 draw for TOS over TGB, but not totally shocked or surprised either way that it was part of their package.

I am happy though now to see football is once again important, even if at its most unofficial, grassroots or pickup level, just glad to see the sport back in play and open to helping it grow from small beginnings into something bigger someday in the future.

Flyergate by Tories starts a Committee to RE Elect the Primeminister

2008-08-10T20:18:00.007-04:00

When does an innocent ten percent flyer become a guilty piece of government propaganda literature, one could ask, I would answer when that guilty literature and innocent flyer are both sent one the poor taxpayers dollar through a rich politicians agenda.

Right from the very top, I want to say we have seen this kind of franking by all parties across the spectrum, every kind of government is guilty of it, so there is no innocence within politics today. That now said, carpetbombing the whole ridings with six flyers straight is enough to campaign for, campaign towards an end of taxpayer paid franking, which originally was a privilege given to our Parliament by the national postal service. But with privilege comes responsibility, one the current Tory government has lost by insourcing their constitutents fake votes and real inquires to a Conservative Research Group of Government Caucus Services, which must be the Tory backroom for this Conservative government, making one wonder just what the responses and replies from constituents of Grey-Bruce-Owen Sound just really go towards anyhow, which I believe we can likely extrapolate times 308 as it must be happening in every riding across the Dominion!

In this blitz, the environment, carbon tax, military spending, drug crimes, tax freedom day and Senate reform even the parliamentary stylings of the Liberal Opposition Leader all have become literal topics du jour by the federal Tories, as the flyers actually seemed to come in from Ottawa day after day, as though it were already an election with each of these being the party's advertising. Privacy is also quite the concern, as we come from a riding of demogrphic extremes, with elderly seniors and young students who may not know just who is asking or who is getting their mock vote for one of the four parties federal on the back of these frankers, now knowing just who they are going to be or intending to be voting for in the next election. Electioneering seems to be the primary cause, with Harper and the federal Tories campaigning towards a fixed election date they know will happen, though our current one week barrage was done by mistake, the Member of Parliament Larry Miller says they were meant to be released quarterly throughout the year like the update booklet, making the distribution glitch more about the exact time and less about the actual waste created by it.

I personally have been against franking since I knew of the procedure, however I understand it to be a way of life and death in politics, yet this recent development of preelection shock and awe franking irks not just myself, but I am sure others as well, that an inside team we shall just call the Conservative Tory Committee to Reelect the Prime Minister hijacks the method all 127 sitting MPs of the governing party use to speak to their constituents, instead use it to float trial balloons for what sells and what does not, as well as what the voting preference is for each, all in order to get reelected and pay for the new house, car and family they want so bad off your hard earned tax dollar, no way in heck if I have to work just as hard for those myself. Though no actual breach of regulations, we can all now agree this goes beyond the basic decorum of ethics, equity and essential human dignity, not just the politics of certain party successes, failures and the politics in between at Ottawa, but right through the very soul of the average taxpayer and into the flesh and blood person who is behind that paper and metal money. Perhaps, going back to Miller, Harper and the federal Tories flyer on Tax Freedom Day, we could reach it quicker if franking could now come out of the politicians pocket instead of that of the taxpeyers, would they all be in favour of such a free vote on that idea?

So there is no real need for a ten percent flyer slash government propaganda literature in this ditigal ecologically friendly age we live in, all politicans of all stripes should make good use of their computers, internet access and other taxpayer paid technological goodies they have been give, making such pamphlets obsolete and parliamentary update quarterlies about non partisan riding events in the constituency and parliamentary news we need to know.

Beijing will need an Olympic effort to change self as the World will watch on

2008-08-08T16:44:00.003-04:00

Beijing

Will Triple Eights in the East lead to Muslim terrorist attack from the West?

2008-08-05T15:33:00.001-04:00

From the Xinjiang Uyghur region of China, home of the northern route of the Silk Road there in Urumqi, comes a threat one must have known was surpressed by the Chinese military and police for a long period of time, one that, perhaps once isolated, may soon become global in nature. This terrorist threat presents itself recently in an allout attack which killed 16 policemen and injured 16 more, from witin this Muslim populated land, just days before the Beijing Summer Olympics. It also makes those of us who remember the importance of numbers in these attacks, like 9-11-01 New York and Washington attack, 7-7-05 London attack or the purported 6-6-06 Toronto and Ottawa plot, will these Games become the 8-8-08. Remember as well, Emperor Shenzong, nicknamed the Divine Ancestor for his creation of the modern welfare state, who as the sixth emperor of Song Dynasty, invited Uzbekistani Muslims from Bukhara led by Prince Amir Sayyid to help create a buffer zone between his and the Liao empires, by settling between the Sung capital of Kaifeng and Yenching, what is now modern day Beijing.

Later becoming part of a rapidly expanding governing strategy for the land, Mongols forcibly recruited and relocated hundreds of thousands of Western and Central Asian Muslims immigrants to help them administer their new found empire, academically, socially and economically becoming more superior than natives of the land they had took over, using their strong skill set in engineering and architecture to begin and finish the construction of their Yuan Dynasty capital, Khanbaliq, or present day Beijing, as led by Hui architect Yehdardin and the Han architectural learnings. Eventually, the Qing Dynasty kept the mantra of the Manchu in play, that being divide and conquer, keeping Muslims, Hans, Tsang or Tibetans and Meng or Mongolians fighting one another and remaining in conflict, which eventually led to neverending revolts in Shensi, Gansu and of course Xinjiang only almost a century ago, which continued to be surpressed through acts of genocide or a washing off of the Muslim peoples by the Manchu government. By the beginning of the First Great War, this oppression, then forced unification, led to all three Xibei San Ma Muslim warlords taking over the Chinese provinces of Ningxia, Gansu and Qinghai during the Nationalist Warlord Era for the glory of Muhammad and in the name of Allah, fighting both the Communists and the Japanese.

To ignore the Hui people of the Northwest would be a huge mistake for the Communists of the Northeast, though capitalism since 1978 has softened the Cultural Revolutionary chokehold upon them, traditions have been maintained as recently proved with the attack days ago, the current revival to reorganized their past associations for Islamic culture, to recoordinate interethnic activities among Muslims and need of an upsurge in religious expression has been sadly also encoded with a push within by terriorist organizations to gain support from those without. As freedoms have been hard to come by for them, now would be the right time in their mind to make them pay for the perceived hardships since their internal defeat, if an Islamic nation is to be independently founded in China, Muslims just may use that attack to be its starting point towards its own freedom as their own people, especially as their seems to be no other way out in the Great Big Red. As with Munich, we saw how those Black September gunmen used Olympic athletes to make a point, Beijing could just as easily become a Red August, expanding from not just athletes, but spectators too, held globally hostage for all the world to see.

American Global War on Internal Terrorism of 2001 finally ends on Amerithrax

2008-08-01T11:49:00.009-04:00

The 2001 American Global War on Internal Terrorism seems to have come to an end on the September 18 Amerithrax case, as the Federal Bureau of Investigation's new top suspect, Fort Detrick government biodefense scientist Bruce Ivins of Frederick, Maryland apparently committed suicide by overdosing upon learning of his impending prosecution, knowing very well such a dastardly act of internal bioterrorism would lead to a patriotic conviction for high treason with a change of punishment by death penalty.

Just one week after 9-11, letters containing first coarse brown granular then highly refined weaponized dry powder material infected with anthrax spores were mailed to the offices of news media and politicians, including then Senate Majority Leader and South Dakota Senator Tom Daschle, instead killing 5 people and infecting 17 others, all through life threatening anthrax infection, both the less serious cutaneous anthrax and the more dangerous inhalation variety, yet both came from the same bacterial strain known as the Ames strain, originally researched and developed by the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases biofacility at the fort. The first wave of letters came from Trenton, New Jersey and were sent to the media, then a second wave from the same Trenton postmark on October 8, to the Capitol Hill officies of two politicians who both were against the Patriot Act on principles of civil liberties.

It may have reminded many of the Unabomber mail bombing attacks, masterminded by mathematics professor, academic social critic and now federally incarcerated convict Theodore Kaczynski from between 1978 to 1995 from up in Lincoln, Montana, but once the special and secret ingredient of partiotism is added in these days, all bets are off table, especially when one realizes how big it would be for the current adminitration to have Amerithrax solved and wrapped up, giving this case its high priority and uniqueness that rids the so called war of at least one front here at home.

Is that the Toronto Make We Laughs, Maple Leafs or Maple Leaves?

2008-07-31T15:49:00.001-04:00

Hockey is far away from being a favourite sport of mine, but I must wade in when a professional franchise in that game that can not get the plural form of Maple Leaf singular right should be questioned in ever getting its boat righted, Toronto is that sinking Titanic, one some could argue has been sunk circa 1967, the last year they had been to and won their esteemed Cup.

Only today did Scotty Bowman finally pull his trigger, joining family on the Chicago Blackhawks as their senior advisor, this after spending the past several years working as a special consultant for the rival Detroit Red Wings, as well as being turned down by the Maple Leafs and their owners Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, who instead have now decided to hire Ron Wilson as their new head coach.

No wonder a couple of its die hard fans have been sulking about the office, chatting around the watercooler about why the American Olympic Silver Medalist is the boss now behind the bench, rather than a Canadian Stanley Cup Winner, fact remains Toronto knows it can just be the status quo in their sport, as their paying demographic here in the Great White North is willing to keep shelling out for its past tradition, not any kind of future glory, making everyone still being pulled along real parts of the Make We Laughs.

Grey Bruce gets their Cattlemen ready for Prime Time Performance in Owen Sound

2008-07-30T19:21:00.003-04:00

With only three days to go before it starts, Prime Time Performance of Owen Sound seems to have the foothold on as it enters August, separating the champs from the chumps, the contenders from the pretenders, the best from the rest as its Coach Chris Cubitt makes some magic happen up at the Victoria Park Fairgrounds three nights a week four weeks straight.

It would seem the Grey Bruce Owen Sound Cattlemen, an expansion franchise program I originally was in on helping grow in 2003, is getting on board as its partner in bringing a brand new tradition of excellence to our community up here. And just like the Olympics, Prime Time Performance will use this 30 day high performance speed camp to introduce and help in developing an unmatched powerful explosiveness, acceleration and change of direction through different training modules such as functional strength, pro agility and multidirectional and linear speed and acceleration through mobility, movement and posture, with such a supercharged program towards increased peak power output coming home, the best results for local football or rugby, baseball or softball and track athletes is just around the corner. Being one who profitted from the knowledge and expertise of Triple Cee in other areas of sport, I can personally say he is without a doubt worth the upgrade, as he takes it back down to its most basic and grassroots level of training one can get.

Coming from such hardcore training, one can easily make either the comeback or get into the next level of sport for complete success within it, something which makes the difference in a region such as this being competitive in a sport like football at the provincial or national level, as I would still believe the Grey Bruce Cattlemen wish to be in the not so distant future, hopefully the same thing which can help get them right there in time for the next round of expansion in coming years.

More things change the more they stay the same in the Northern Football Conference

2008-07-29T21:37:00.001-04:00

I played for the Sault Ste. Marie Storm, now the Steelers, as a wideout, kick, punt and missed field goal returnman during the 2000 and 2001 seasons, in both the provincial Northern Football Conference of Ontario and Canadian Senior, today Major now, Football League as it has become since, a quality league that had younger but fast Canadian university football and older but experienced Canadian professional football players all playing together in the summer, from late May to late August. Way back then, the Storm and now Steelers were just starting to grow into the likely dynasty program it currently is up north there in the Soo, we had a hot little hand at 5-3 throughout our playoffs, just before getting stomped on in the 2000 NFC championship final game 38-3 down at Ivor Wynne Stadium against the 7-1 Burlington Oakville Longhorns. So a plan was hatched that we young turks of the Sault would roll straight through into the playoffs with reckless abandon without cause to fear anyone, right past everyone and this same time next year win that championship outright from the Longhorns, boy did we have another thing coming.

After starting off the 2001 playoffs on the right foot, by smoking the 3-5 Spartans of Sudbury 41-0 in the quarterfinals, we expected to hear that 8-0 Oakville would be ejected from the playoffs, thus giving us the automatic semifinal win and thus a free ride into the NFC championship final game against the winner of the 6-2 North Bay Bulldogs at 7-1 Mississauga Wolverines semi. The Longhorns, you will see, had played all but their last regular season game with an ineligible and thus illegal American named Robb Hatchett-Foxx, a former CJFL, OFC and NFC player who according to the league, used his deliberate malicious behavior to knowingly deceived his club into those 7 games. That now said, he simply was banned for 5 years, club fined $500 without having to be forced to forfeit those ill won games that kept them in the playoffs, which allowed Oakville to spank us again on their home turf 31-0.

Advance forward seven years later, while just two years ago, the 2-6 Mega City Maddogs were penalized two games for using an ineligible player named Dave Brown on the eligibility issue of not reporting his playing status, but the Maddogs remained in the playoffs as the 3-5 Quinte Panthers did not meet financial obligations, I still decided to stay out from the game due to illness, but also this back of the head feeling that games were decided in boardrooms and not on the field where they belonged. Now, both the 6-0-0-1 Sault Steelers and 1-6 North Bay Bulldogs are involved within a fiasco that a player of theirs named Todd Seely was ineligible as he played a year with the Bulldogs, then played in the Alberta Football League for 6 years before rejoining the NFC with the Soo, then a decision as well that 2-4 Toronto Raiders were late with their players fees and had become ineligible for the playoffs with North Bay replacing them instead, both fiascos may I add could result in a playoff boycott this year then split up of the provincial conference next into a North and South for a real football civil war. For the love of the game of football, I hope cooler heads prevail to make the NFC and the CMFL itself quickly into a better on field product tomorrow, rather than slowly into a worse than bush league quagmire it has sadly become today.