Cowboy Junkies: Canadian

“Sweet Jane”; ‘The Trinity Sessions’ (1988)

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The First Three News Stories On 07/09/07

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Yesterday’s News Tomorrow: I promised myself I’d start doing these again, then I get really, really ill. We’ll see how far I can get tonight before my inevitable collapse. There are no source links… I’m not well.

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Page Jump:
BBC World; CBC The National; CTV National News

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5.30pm BBC World

1) The Surge Questioned Again: The American general in charge of pacifying insurgents in Iraq, General David Petraeus (insert Goliath joke here) recently told reporters it takes, on average, ten years to get the job done. This, of course, translates into Reporter Speak as “decades” — as in: “American general says fighting the insurgency could take decades.” There was one really interesting military tidbit in this story… it never occurred to me before, or at least I never thought of it in these terms before, but the Americans have had total air supremacy since the beginning of this clusterfuck, but have never controlled the ground. As an amateur historian that’s amazing to me… the only other example I can think of where this has occurred — you know… since planes were invented — was the French and American Adventure in Vietnam. Meanwhile, even the BBC reporter was admitting that “The Surge” is the right strategy and is working. Patraeus isn’t fighting Sunni or Shiite, he’s fighting “al Qaeda”, that’s the important difference. It’s like Gordon Brown not using the “Muslim” word during the Scottish/London thing. Winning hearts and minds isn’t aboot chocolate and soccer balls, it’s aboot convincing the Locals that they share a common enemy with You. And now the local Sunni’s are helping the Americans, which is what they wanted to do five years ago. But all of this is meaningless because it’s two years too late and “The Surge” will never be given the proper time… Iraq’s future is entirely in the hands of Washington Election Politics.

2) Convictions In 2005 Near-Bombings: Four men who set out on July 21, 2005, to destroy another chunk of Britain were convicted of “conspiracy to murder” and sentenced to life in prison today. Judgments against two more men are expected soon. Two weeks after suicide bombers killed fifty-two people in London, six recent immigrants — from “the Horn of Africa”, according to the reporter — picked up their hydrogen peroxide and back-packs and headed out into the London transit system to slaughter some more innocents. None of their explosive devices worked, although each one was detonated. All six of the men claim the devices were not meant to explode, but were meant to be a “hoax” as a protest against the Iraq War… which has to be the most retarded defence in the history of jurisprudence. Between “The Shoe Bomber”, the 2005 July 21 non-attack attack, the breakup of the plane attack last year, and last week’s non-attack attack… well, holy shit. Did you know the only country on “The List” bin Laden put together not to be hit with some kind of attack has been Canada? Did you even know we were on “The List”? At least someone thinks we matter.

3) IAEA Back Into North Korea: In exchange for cash, a couple of planeloads of food and the last three years of “Hustler”, “Barely Legal” and “Cracked Magazine” the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been allowed back into North Korea to examine whatever nuclear plants they’re allowed to look at… does anyone remember where this “North Korea” is?

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10pm CBC: The National

1) 13-Year Old Girl Convicted Of Murder: She’s the youngest person to ever be convicted of first degree murder in Canada. When she was twelve she and her 23-year old boyfriend (allegedly, he hasn’t had a trial yet) slaughtered her family, including her 8-year old brother. Under the Youth Criminal Justice Act her name cannot be released (I could, but don’t want to) and the maximum sentence she can receive for all three counts is ten years, but only six “in custody”. It took the jury in Medicine Hat, Alberta three hours to deliberate. In 2006 she helped (allegedly, he still hasn’t blah blah) a Creepy Older Fuck (COF) to stab her mother and father, then she strangled her little brother and stabbed him a few times. She claims she was “under the influence” of COF, and was a virtual “zombie during” the attacks. The jury didn’t believe her… plus under Canadian law “the accused can be found guilty of a crime if they intentionally aid, abet or counsel another person to commit the crime”. Her official sentencing will be in August, COF hasn’t entered a plea yet and is expected to go on trial later this year.

2) Two Charged In RCMP Killings: Four RCMP officers were killed by a single gunman near Mayerthorpe, Alberta back in 2005. The lunatic, wounded, then turned the gun on himself. Since then there have been a lot of questions aboot how the incident went down… it started with the four officers being assigned to look after a “Quonset hut” overnight on a property owned by an ex-con Nut Sack who hated the police — the RCMP believed the hut was full of drugs and guns and stuff. But the RCMP officers weren’t told that James Roszko was a freaking lunatic, they weren’t told to be “on guard”, they didn’t have the right body armour and basically the RCMP left the kids out there on their own. Meanwhile, Nut Sack — basically a survivalist-type — sneaks back onto his property, grabs some of his military weaponry and starts shooting. The RCMP, from the time of the killing, believed Nut Sack had help so they went “undercover” to find them… this is the result: “Dennis Cheesman, 23, and Shawn William Hennesey, 28, both from nearby Barrhead, Alberta” were arrested and charged with four counts of first-degree murder. From the report the evidence seems… flimsy, and their involvement doesn’t sound too deep.
Aside: The RCMP has been in serious trouble for aboot two years now — scandals including millions of dollars going missing and a young man getting shot in the back of the head while in custody. The RCMP is not a “true police force” like the NYPD, it’s structured like a military organization… it’s something we haven’t gotten around to fixing yet, which is something I think I’m going to write more aboot later.

3) Fuck Off, The North Pole Is Ours: As much as Canadians think we “own” the North, at least three other countries would like to make counter claims. If you look at a map you’ll see all these islands in the North… just to the left of Greenland. That’s Canada. Or is it? Most of those islands are uninhabited and loaded with oil and diamonds, then there’s the actual Arctic Ocean itself, which is another mother-lode of oil, and a soon-to-be shipping route thanks to Al Gore. So Canada believes that the nautical limitations should apply, which means a 200-mile ring around Canadian islands. But America, Russia and Denmark think the waters are open to all and our claims on some of those islands don’t exist. America and Russia like to send giant nuclear powered ships and submarines up there just to piss us off, because right now Canada ain’t got dick that can make the trip… except a couple of old “light” ice breakers. We tried to have a “war games” up there a couple of years ago and the soldiers almost needed rescuing. It’s remote and fucking cold Up There. So today Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced that Canada is building six new, and armed, medium-sized patrol ships capable of carrying a significant number of troops (apparently Norway has similar boats), plus a “deep water port” will be built somewhere Up There within the next few years. Sovereignty, as PM Harper put it, works like this: “we use it or we lose it.” The ships, while improving our capacity in enormous ways, won’t be able to sail Up There during the winter months… which sounds funny, but there are only aboot four ships in The World that can sail Up There in the winter and they’re all nuclear powered behemoths. Plus, as Al Gore taught us, everyday will be a summer day soon.

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11pm CTV National News

1) Suspects Charged In RCMP Killings: More on the two men arrested and charged being accessories in killing four RCMP officers in 2005. According to police “suspects have been targeted since day one”. The cops cited phone records and the fact that Nut Sack had a rifle on his property that was registered to the grandfather of one of the suspects. There was more information from the suspects side than there was in the CBC report… 

2) 13-Year Old Girl Convicted: First of all, Sarah Galashan — the CTV reporter — has a stunning headshot. The point was made in this report that the young girl has no immediate family left (having repeatedly stuck a knife into them), and there was no visible support from extended family inside the court room… basically this little girl was entirely on her own when the jury convicted her of three counts of first degree murder. Sarah (call me) made the point that the young girl has already spent 15 months in jail, so if she is given the full six years in custody it could be reduced… I think it works out to being two months off for every month already served.

3) Minister Tells RCMP To Fuck Off: This, by far, was the most interesting story of the day, and I knew it was coming, I just didn’t think it’d be this soon or done over email… Canada has never been able to define exactly what the RCMP actually ‘are’. Until aboot 1985 the RCMP were Canada’s ATF, FBI, Secret Service, “National Police Force” for Provinces without their own, they were our anti-terrorism “SWAT Team” and they had internal spying authority (with files on 1 in 15 Canadians). Plus they were a tourist attraction. For the British, picture all the “MI-Numbers” rolled into one, add in your local police force and the Beefeaters and you’ve got an idea as to what the RCMP did here. In (aboot) 1985, the domestic spying parts of the RCMP were spun off into the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), later on (aboot 1993) the anti-terror section was melded with the then-recently disbanded Canadian Airborne (Special Forces), which become JTF-2, one of the most elite and secretive military special forces in the world (it’s a criminal offence for you, me and any MP to know where they are). There were other things… so, slowly, the RCMP has been changing into something more manageable. Over the past couple of years the RCMP have been going through a number of scandals, so to get things back on track the Government has fired the Top Cop and last week they replaced him with a bureaucrat, who will be the very first non-RCMP Officer to lead the force. There have already been some mutiny rumblings so Stockwell Day, the Public Safety Minister, sent out a letter reminding the officers that they serve The Government first, not the “Traditions” of the RCMP. Actually, I’m going to make this into a post, so go back to the last item then stop reading otherwise you’ll ruin the surprise.

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If you find a broken link, or the YouTube stuff isn’t loading
properly, let me know and I’ll find an alternative…
I’m Canadian, it’s what we do. Off the ice.

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