Lois Brown drives a Diesel

I really hate when politicians make inane statements in response to serious questions, case in point Conservative candidate Lois Brown.

Last Friday I had the opportunity to attend a debate at Cardinal Carter Catholic School in Aurora. A student asked all five candidates a question about sustainability and the stupidest answer was most assuredly from Lois Brown who stated, “Every time I write the word conservative I underline Conserve”

What kind of stupid fucking answer is this? Does anybody actually think she does this and even if she does is it relevant to her political beliefs on the environment, sustainability, peak oil etc?

Rather than talk about NAFTA and our obligation to sell oil to the U.S. rather than horde it for Canadians, rather than defend her parties position to cancel rebates for fuel efficient cars, rather than talk about a nation energy strategy, rather than talk about subsidies for big oil while doing nothing substantive for alternatives, she offered up.

“I have a VW Diesel that gets 50 MPG”

At this point I did not know if she was simply running scared on Tory policy or disrespecting the intelligence of these students. Had I not been in a Catholic school surrounded by a couple hundred impressionable teens I would have started jeering or swearing just about then. (Mind you there was one stunning teacher wandering about the auditorium that I would been more than pleased to spend a detention or two with.)

Back to you Lois; owning a Diesel is not proof of ones environmentalism or belief in sustainability, in fact it might just as easily be seen as proof that:

You know the dealer and got a discount
You drive a lot and are just frugal
You like the styling
Your husband bought it and you just drive it
That only VW had the colour you liked.

It could also simply mean that Lois like most Conservative voters make impulsive choices without doing any real research. After all a VW diesel is not a terribly good car diesel or not, they are rated quite poorly in both Lemonade and Consumer’s Guide ratings, and while they use less fuel they still spew out a great deal of particulate matter and are damn expensive to repair. Not only that but when rationing comes diesel will be hit hardest because it’s needed to grow and deliver food as well as heat our homes.

Apparently Lois thinks driving a frugal Diesel is enough good Karma to offset her support of a leader who does not accept Climate Change is real, who believes Kyoto is a socialist scheme to funnel money from rich countries to poor ones, who tries to bullshit a nation that intensity targets will allow us to lower our carbon emission, and whose government overruled a judge’s objection to water permits issued to a Tar Sands project.

I think it’s time Lois Brown gave those students some real answers on her environmental beliefs and commitments and how she can justify those against Conservative policy


(You know maybe an old VW Diesel is a good analogy to the Conservative Party, a poor choice that’s expensive to maintain and generally stinks.)


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Rae scores a point, Harper looks stupid!

I don't know how long Rae has been sitting on this bomb but this is certainly the time to drop it. Apparently our Great leader steals speaches from Australia's Howard when he can't come up with stupid arguments on his own.


Does a leader plagerize? me thinks not!Recommend this Post

NDP campaign a sham in Newmarket Aurora

Newmarket Aurora riding has a full roster of candidates
Green- Glenn Hubbers

Liberal- Tim Jones

Conservative -Lois Brown,

who are all active in this campaign as well as candidates from the Progressive Canadians - Dorian Baxter who has a great deal of presence (and signs that still say Progressive Conservative, ???), and Christian Heritage - Ray Luff

SO WHERE THE HELL ARE THE NDP?

Mike Seaward who also ran for the NDP and came 4th in the last Ontario election was nominated about a week into the campaign, has no web site, no signage, and no apparent presence to date in this election. While they might have a campaign office I can find no address for it and no one I know claims to have seen it in their travels. The only proactive thing I could find for Seaward is a Facebook page.

So my questions are:

Is the NDP running a dummy campaign in Newmarket Aurora on purpose?

Is this a subbtle but unofficial way of throwing leftish support to the Liberals to stop Lois Brown?

Or are they simply in disarray after the 4th place showing in the provincials and their failure to break the 10% mark last Federal election in Newmarket Aurora, leaving the local coffers more depleted than usual?

Have they simply surrendered in a no win riding?

And finally, why should loyal NDP supporters (in this riding specifically) use their votes to support a candidate or organization not making an effort?

I agree with voting your ideals and achieve nothing(I've done it many times), but I balk at giving my vote to someone who is not even trying to earn it.

This is not an attempt at slagging the NDP in general, but simply questioning an unusual anomaly I’ve not seen in nearly 20 years in this riding. The NDP has always campaigned reasonably hard despite the no win secenerio, but this time round the NDP are running what can only be considered a sham campaign.Recommend this Post

Talking Liberals off the ledge!

This election is pissing me off big time. At a time when I should be putting all my efforts into talking up the Green cause I find myself spending just as much time taking to my friends and contacts defending Dion and trying in earnest to keep them from voting Harper.

Some of these people have been staunch Liberals for as long as I’ve know them and yet now due to Dion’s lack of presence and his inability to adequately explain the Carbon Tax, they are honestly considering joining the sweater vest express to oblivion.

It’s all becoming quit tiring; first I have to beat them down with the well documented lies, broken promises and illegalities of the Conservative, followed by a flurry of C61 to the head and a kick of C51/52 to the groin. As they struggle to rise up and defend themselves I finish them off with peak oil, global warming, secret agendas and an impending deficit head butt across the bridge of the nose. At this point I have to reassure them that image is not substance, that leadership is making the right decision not making a rash and pig headed decision.

Of course I do mention that there are better choices like the GPC, but I’m honestly willing to settle for Anything But Conservative at this point.

I’m also tired of dealing with the contagion caused by Dion adopting the idea of a Carbon Tax. The Liberals have done such a piss poor job of selling this idea, and the Cons such a good job of demonizing it (despite their own studies that prove otherwise) that I also have to reassure soft Greens it won’t cause the end of the world.

Things are not going as I expected. The debate win was a pleasant surprise but May continues to get less press than Duceppe, even outside Quebec. The press is not holding Harpers feet to the fire as they should, and I’m spending far too much time talking Liberals off the ledge! Who’d have thought?Recommend this Post

Another one bites the dust!

Julian West has dropped out of race for For The Saanich-Gulf Islands, leaving the NDP short one Candidate in B.C.
West use to be one of ours, so it's kinda funny/sad that this story was not important until he became a NDP candidate. Considering the ill considered, hateful rantings of some conservatives it's a pity a little nudity is enough to ruin this mans career.

I hope the NDP can and will direct their energy in Saanich-Gulf Islands to the next best hope of keeping the seat from Harper. I honestly don't know who that would be,(please be Green, please be Green, please be Green)

Ok, I decided not to be totally lazy, the other choices are
Andrew Lewis - GPC
Gary Lunn - CP
Dan Noreau - CHP
Briony Penn -LPC
but who's in best position to kick Lunn in the nuts, I do not know?

P.S. you guys really need to flesh out that Vetting thing, especially in BC.

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Stupid PM Quotes!

I don't think now that the atmosphere should turn to one of complete doom and gloom. My own belief is if we were going to have some kind of big crash or recession, we probably would have had it by now.,

Prime Minister Stephen Harper

Is he out of his fucking mind?, his point exact point is “I don’t THINK”

For the few of you who have dropped in on my Financial Blog, you know I’ve been suggesting these very failures for several years.

Bear Sterns, Lehman Bros, Merrill Lynch were all destined to die in the first wave of destruction not only because of the bad bets they made on housing but because of the virtual death of all the major Merger/Acquisition activity and IPOs which were the cash cows for these organizations. The damage from this wave of failures has not even been calculated yet as it spreads out through heavily leveraged funds and finally into personal pensions. To claim we are ok or insulated from the past problems let alone the future ones is idiocy at best.

In the big scheme of things Lehman’s failure will not bother average people with limited investments, at least not directly. AIG however, a major reinsurer, is also on the ropes and without a Government loan/handout they will take a credit rating reduction that could spark the forced liquidation of several $100 billion in bonds from funds and pensions who by law cannot hold junk paper. This could start a run on bonds as everyone is force to sell on the same trigger and prices will plummet to cents on the dollar. This will wipe out pension funds, municipal savings and the ability to raise capital for years.

AIG and other reinsurers, and bond insurers like MBIA, Ambac make up the second wave that will destroy debt markets. Without insurance all but the most secure companies, towns, cities, will be able to raise money. AIG reinsures many small insurance companies which will be hammered by this years huricanes, loses from mortages, bond loses and reinsurance will kill them surely.

The 3rd wave or maybe wave 2.1 is going to be the collapse of scores if not hundreds of retail banks. Last week's failure was the Silver State Bank of Nevada the 11th retail bank failure this year. This week it was only Lehman Brothers, we must be hitting botton, NOT!!! This will escalate and we will begin to see multiple failures weekly
Mega rich Willbur Ross sees 1000 bank failures

(Funny aside McCain’s son sat on the board of Silver State Bank)

The FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corp) does not have the capital (or staff) to handle the sudden wave of small banks let alone the imminent failure of some huge ones like Washington Mutual
The FDIC had only $57 billion +- before banks started failing and just the impact from these 10 small banks failures plus Indy Mac is quickly burning through this fund. The FDIC cannot increase premiums to the banks because they are broke and unless they want an armed insurrection the U.S. government will have no choice but to backstop the FDIC and monetize more debt, ie hyper inflation.

Anyone who thinks that with Globalization, Canadian ownership in some U.S. banks, the size of Canadian, and the worlds U.S. currency reserves, plus our dependency on the U.S. consumer that this is not going to cause a crisis here too, must be a DOLT!

Stephen, I'm talking to YOU!

Meanwhile Harper’s words of wisdom paraphrased, it can’t happen now because it didn’t happen yet. WTF?

Yup, hide your head in the sand and pretend bad things cannot happen, that's leadership in the 21 century.

We're screwed!Recommend this Post

Harper's own government study supports carbon tax

It's funny what you find when you use the freedom of information act to get a study the Harper government wants hidden. A study that states a Carbon tax would cause a negligible GDP drop in the first years and actually grow GDP after 2012,

But of course today's headlines simply Parrot Harper's lies, maybe parrots not Puffins should be the official bird for this election



Main Stream Media at its BestRecommend this Post