Canada's Debate

For those who missed it, the Toronto Star is reporting that Peter McKay has been suggested as a new head for NATO.
This isn’t the worst idea I’ve ever heard (no, that would be any idea involving a combination of Bev Oda and integrity), but it does set a new bar for the continuing disintegration of [...]

Please note that this is not a planned series of posts. The more I observe and evaluate the Middle-East peace process, the more I realize that there are a whole host of easily definable factors which prevent any sort of lasting peace from taking hold. As I see them, I will write about them.
Gizmodo [...]

By now everyone and their mother has heard that Sid Ryan has convinced the University-working members to lead a general boycott of Israel. I’ve recently tried to avoid commenting on Israel because I always end up offending someone that I care about, but in this case there seems to be a clear delineation between [...]

You throw a war, and a “popular resistance” shows up instead?
Recently I’ve seen a spate of news editorials, letters and blogs calling on Israel to show restraint when engaging in operations in Gaza. Good, fine. I agree that Israel’s policies in Gaza (and the West Bank) are terrible. They are largely designed to delay and [...]

I’ve got a quick and easy solution for solving the Israel/Palestine debate. Lets take everyone who has publicly declared one “side” of the issue as at fault, and kick them out of their homes. Every single one… We can then shoe-horn them into Israel/Palestine, and give everyone currently occupying that contentious strip of land their [...]

Before anyone takes my post as a criticism of non-western governance/politics, let me just clarify a few things. Blogging at 7:20 in the morning is still a new thing for me, so I may occasionally get sidetracked.
My primary goal was not to criticize the Pakistani (or other non-western) iteration of Democracy; rather it was to [...]

Can someone please explain to me how President Musharaf’s recent coup against a government led by President Musharaf is subverting democracy? I’ve seen that phrase all over the web and I don’t get it… Pakistan hasn’t had a democracy to subvert since 1999, when Musharaf launched a coup against Bhuto… you know, the woman who [...]

The Taliban has decided to release two sick Korean hostages, and while I am happy for those two people and their families, the news filled me with a sense of dread as opposed to relief, and it should for everyone else. Tony Carson suggests that these people are suffering from some sort of dementia, but [...]

The debate over the environment (Global Warming, smog, preservation and conservation, etc.) is a large and complicated one, with a new banner issue almost yearly. Trying to condense the “struggle” that is modern environmentalism into easy-to-digest information is tricky… Then again, this story does it perfectly. In fact, it summarizes the state of environmentalism so [...]

Afghanistan and Iraq have been in the news a great deal recently (and not without good reason), both in Canada and the U.S., but in every nation where troops are involved in either morass. The word quagmire gets tossed about quite a bit, and in this instance with good cause, and everyone is wringing their [...]

I was reading this op-ed piece this morning and several thoughts occurred. First, for a former diplomat Mr. Sterling displays a startling naivety (more on that later.) What really caught my eye though was this idea that repudiating democracy is hyprocrisy and unbecoming of “free” states.
Ironically, the same President Bush who says he wants to [...]

You know, the more I work (more on that when I have good news to share) the more I find myself feeling stagnant during my free time. For some reason playing the same old computer games and watching the same old tv shows doesn’t satisfy (even if they are among the best) as much as [...]

Apologies for not posting yesterday. Dreamhost has apparently dropped the ball, and I’ve been having server problems all weekend long.
With the “please God don’t vote for the Liberals” budget set to drop, I find myself curiously disinterested. Rather, I find myself turning towards this story, appearing today in the New York Times:
Cloistered by two decades [...]

The relationship between democracy and freedom is a very deep one, but the two are not the same. Never have been, and never will be. It is entirely possible to have democracy without freedom… so, the question remains, is it possible to have freedom without democracy, or more pointedly, is it possible to have democracy [...]

Seeing as I have only one X chromosome, I don’t have any great insight or wisdom to share on what life is like for women. However, understanding women and understanding the circumstances that women face are entirely different; and that is the reason why we should all take some time to consider International Womens’ Day.
I [...]