February 2007
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February 25th, 2007
Imminent War Alert!!!
Dick Cheney has just concluded a visit to Australia, which has me convinced that the US attack on Iran
is coming soon. I'm certain that the purpose of Cheney's visit was to sign up a willing coalition member for
the coming Iranian excursion. The Brits have made it clear that they won't be helping out in taking on Tehran, but
it is very likely that Australia will. Australian foreign policy seems to have two central tenets...
1) Go along with the Americans on every one of their military adventures. (The Aussies even went to Vietnam)
2) Hope that if Australia ever needs a hand, the Americans will return the favour.
It is a safe bet that Aussie Prime Minister John Howard assured Cheney of Australian support in the coming
Iran debacle. We will likely learn about that in the coming months. That makes an ad-hoc coalition of the US,
Australia, and Israel set to commit yet another neo-conservative blunder of epic proportions. To my friends in
Australia, its time to write letters to your MP's. Peace to everyone. Khoda Hafez.
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February 23rd, 2007
The Shaheen II, or Hatf VI, missile with a range of 2,000 kilometres (1,240 miles) was launched
from an undisclosed location...
"The attack is imminent," Mullah Dadullah said in an interview with Al Jazeera television.
The gathering was snubbed by key arms manufacturing nations - including the US, Russia, Israel and China...
Bone-chilling temperatures and a nasty north wind greeted several thousand athletes and visitors
to the Yukon's capital for the start Friday of the 2007 Canada Winter Games.
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February 20th, 2007
Happy New Year
Gung Hei Fat Choi! The Year of the Pig is upon us, and if you believe the fortune tellers, it will not be a good one.
At the risk of seriously discrediting myself, I will now make ten predictions of my own for the Year of the Pig.
Alex's Pig Year Predictions
1 - The US will launch air-strikes (but not an invasion)
against Iran. 2 - Iraqi insurgents will launch an effective
offensive on Baghdad's Green Zone. 3 - As deficits continue to
rise, The US Dollar will continue its depreciation. 4 - NATO forces
will suffer a dramatic rise in casualties as fighting in
Afghanistan intensifies. 5 - A resurgent Al Qaeda will attempt to
assassinate Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. 6 - More than one
major hurricane will strike the US Gulf Coast. 7 - North Korea will
violate conditions of the Six-Party nuclear deal. 8 - Stephane Dion
will become Prime Minister of Canada. 9 - Al Gore will accept the
Oscar for "An Inconvenient Truth". 10 - The Vancouver Canucks will
win the Stanley Cup.
"Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future." Niels Bohr
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February 14th, 2007
The Trap
Originally posted February 14th, 2006
The following phrases are for the sake of visitors who will find this page through a search engine.
Excuse me if this comes across as overly cynical.
Fuck Valentine's Day. Valentine's Day Sucks. I Hate Valentine's Day. Valentines Tabernacle.
Thanks for letting me get that out of the way. If you have come to this site by "googling" one of those
phrases, I welcome you. As you well know, today is Saint Valentine's Day, one of our culture's many fake
holidays. In addition to being a day for expressing your love, Valentine's Day (and its high expectations)
serves as a poison to many relationships. Today, clueless men everywhere will disappoint their wives and
girlfriends. Women may just want to be reminded that they are loved. Men aren't always good at that.
Today will also be a painful day for lonely singles, overwhelmed by the hype. Many will go out tonight
in a desperate search to find someone, anyone to fill the emptiness. Watch your drinks.
Like Christmas and Easter, Saint Valentine's Day is a watered down version of a Pagan celebration.
February 14th was the day that Romans honoured Juno, the Goddess of women and marriage. Then, in the year
269, a Christian named Valentine was executed for refusing to renounce his faith. On the day of his execution,
(again, February 14th) he left a love letter for the daughter of his jailer. The letter was said to have
been signed, "From your Valentine." How sweet.
Our culture has taken this blend of a Roman holiday and the death of an obscure Christian and turned it into
a capitalist windfall. Men are expected to "be romantic," today. More often than not, this means that men are
expected to open their wallets. Advertising campaigns shout "Don't let her down like you did last year!" To stay
out of that dog-house just Buy! Buy! Buy! Today will be a very good day for flower shops, restaurants, greeting
card companies, jewellers, and chocolate makers. That aside, does Valentine's Day have any real value? What
does it mean for our culture when for many men, today's main goal is not to screw things up?
My girlfriend and I have decided to opt out of Valentine's Day celebrations. What a wonderful woman she is!
We can celebrate our relationship every day, we do not need to resort to the contrived gift-giving exercises
of a fake holiday. (Thank you very much) For the men out there who will be caught in the Valentine's Day trap,
I am sorry. I've been there many times myself. I remember all too well how today can focus your partner on
what a cheapskate you are. I hope that your relationship can survive it. If not, there's always next year.
Good luck.
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February 5th, 2007
...the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a report backed by 2,000 climate scientists
from 113 countries...
Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world's
largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report...
The Tipping Point
Today is one of those rare occasions when I have good news to report. Within the last couple of weeks, there
has been a tremendous awakening in North America. It seems that people now appreciate the disastrous
consequences of doing nothing to combat Climate Change. People everywhere are talking about the issue.
The media is now reporting on Climate Change every day. Suddenly, even dinosaurs like Stephen Harper
and George Bush have acknowledged the elephant in the room. Climate Change is real. The fact that it has been
caused by humans is no longer in doubt; The only scientists who dispute this are on the payroll of Exxon-Mobil.
Most Canadians have experienced Climate Change first hand. Public consciousness about the issue has now reached
critical mass. (Perhaps the green Christmas in Ontario and Quebec was the tipping point) Now there is lots of talk,
and it looks as if there will soon be action. A massive effort from all of us to reduce greenhouse gasses will
not prevent climate change from occurring, but it could greatly reduce the severity of the change. The effects
of Climate Change can be reduced to manageable levels if we act now. There is cause for hope.
It may not yet be too late.
Song About Climate Change - MP3 File - 4M
Originally Posted July 24th, 2005
Have you noticed the heat this year? Of course you have. Its the last week of July and its already looking like
2005 will be the hottest year on record. Of course new records are always being set, especially in the last decade
or so. The hottest year ever recorded was 1998, followed closely by 2002 and 2003, which are in a dead heat in the
race for second spot, pun intended. In fact, ALL of the five hottest years ever recorded have taken place since 1997.
ALL of the ten hottest years ever recorded have taken place since 1990. Do you notice a trend?
I've become aware of two "feedback loops" that I think I ought to describe to you.
Feedback Loop One - The colour white reflects more heat than the other colours; blue, grey, brown or green for
example. The fact that ice once covered the Arctic helped to keep things cold. Heat from sunlight would be reflected
away from the land, back into the atmosphere. Things are changing though. With the global rise in temperatures, more
ice is melting. Melted ice leaves coloured earth behind, be it blue water, grey stone, brown dirt, or green lichen.
This exposed earth reflects much less sunlight and therefore holds much more heat than ice would. As a result, the
surface temperature rises and melts more ice, which exposes more earth and holds even more heat.
Rinse and repeat.
Feedback Loop Two - Much of the vast tundra of Canada and Siberia is perma-frost. This means that the ground stays
frozen throughout the year, no matter what the season. Locked within the ice of the perma-frost are vast stores of
gasses, carbon dioxide and methane in particular. As the global temperature rises, more perma-frost melts, releasing
these gasses back into the atmosphere. These gasses rise to the ozone layer where they help to increase the
"greenhouse effect," causing the temperature to rise even further. These higher temperatures cause even more of the
perma-frost to melt, releasing even more greenhouse gasses, causing the temperature to rise even further.
Rinse and repeat.
Is anyone still insisting that global warming is not occurring? Let me rephrase that. Is anyone who is not getting paid
by big oil still insisting that global warming is not occurring? Can we not see it and feel it first-hand? Considering
the feedback loops I have just described, we've started a process that we can't stop. What do we have to look forward
to? Once the Arctic and Antarctic ice melts, the ocean levels have nowhere to go but up. Once the fresh water from
this ice decreases the relative salt content of the oceans, prevailing currents are bound to change. This is bound
to have an effect on weather patterns, making them much more unpredictable, and potentially much more violent. Ask
anyone who lives in Florida about the 2004 hurricane season.
So what do we do? Denying the problem will not help us. We must accept the reality that the world is changing.
We must do what advanced species always do. Its time to adapt to the new reality. Things are getting much worse, and
although there is nothing we can do to stop the process, we can take steps to lessen the impact. Embracing the Kyoto
Protocol is a great first step. Kyoto was never meant to solve the problem, but to somewhat lessen it. It is also
recognized that Kyoto is only a first step towards long term efforts to reducing our polluting ways and building a
cleaner, more sustainable system of energy use. I urge those of you in nations that have not signed on to the Kyoto
Protocol (cough) to contact your elected officials to suggest that it would be a good idea. Some ancient wisdom from
my part of the world says "We don't own this planet, we borrow it from our grandchildren." They are going to be
pretty pissed off at us if we don't change course, and right now. Its going to be bad enough as things are, do we really
have to make it worse? I hope it won't take an oil crash to get us to do the right thing.
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February 1st, 2007
Which of these people will soon be murdered by the United States government?
The US has issued the latest in a series of warnings to Iran...
...the packages in question were "magnetic lights that pose no danger".
$39.5 billion!
"Kyoto is essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations..."
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