The Anth Zone

I met another hero of mine last night, The Right Honourable Jean Chrétien was in town signing people’s copies of his book, Jean Chrétien: My Years As Prime Minister. I got my book signed. He’s so awesome. He’s so Chrétien.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said he’ll appoint an independent third party to investigate into the latest allegations brought forward against ex-Prime Minister Brian Mulroney by German-Canadian businessman Karlheinz Schreiber. Schreiber is allegedly involved in the 1999 CDU contributions scandal that damaged Chancellor Helmut Kohl’s political legacy and reputation. Schreiber could be deported to Germany for fraud and theft charges brought forward against him. Karlheinz had recently been getting a lot of notoriety after he failed to sue the ex-Prime Minister for extortion for future business dealings.

Karlheinz was the focus of the Airbus scandal that involved the ex-Prime Minister. He stated that the Prime Minister obtained compensation from the Department of Justice after the charges were made public in 1995 for his business dealings when he was Prime Minister. He settled and received $2.1 million and an apology.

Harper has been named in the affidavit. It stated that he [Harper] allegedly invited the ex-Prime Minister to the Prime Minister’s Office (or 24 Sussex Drive) to meet and discuss Schreiber’s allegations against Mulroney. Steve has denied that no meeting was planned nor scheduled. The affidavit gave the possibility that ex-Prime Minister could have given the current sitting Prime Minister documentation for safekeeping to safeguard the reputation and the political legacy he has left.

The dollar is dropping, the stocks are dwindling. I told you so. The Loonie couldn’t hold a historical record at $1.10 USD for a day and has dropped just below a $1.06. Experts told us the same thing on CBC.

I don’t see the dollar going to rebound anytime soon and build the economy. I can’t wait until the Conservatives regret cutting the GST another percent. A rising dollar isn’t good for the Canadian economy in the long term. It’s hurting foreign investment in our country from the United States and Asia, which have contributed a lot to economic growth here in Canada.

Again. I told you so.

Warren Kinsella is my hero. He also has an awesome new website.

Warren, good job so far. Keep it going!

www.warrenkinsella.com

The Conservative government has gone on a crusade to lower the GST. The Prime Minister has promised Canadians the most competitive taxes on the planet. The economy has become stronger due to the economic backslashes that our friends are suffering in the United States. President Bush has offered no real economic leadership throughout his seven years in office.

He hasn’t even brought forth strongly innovative policies brought forward to the American people. His only objective was to bring the country down after invading a country that had nothing to due with his crusade on terrorism. The Canadian dollar has only become stronger because the Greenback is dwindling.

Ex-Prime Minister Brian Mulroney crippled the national economy and gave its devastating blow. The Free Trade Agreement with the United States and Mexico didn’t generate national wealth; in fact it created additional problematic issues that the Conservative Party was unable to resolve. The only smart thing he did was introduce the Government Sales Tax that the Conservatives continue to place blame on the Liberals for its introduction.

The economy will not suffer immediately from Harper’s cut taxes. The government is losing revenue to pay for programs like healthcare, giving border security agents handguns, and buying large carrier transport aircraft to transport our men and women in our armed forces overseas. Harper is becoming tax cut happy. Just picture him with a price gun, cutting prices in half at Wal Mart.

I am very saddened to learn that the Saskatchewan Liberal Party isn’t represented in the province’s legislative assembly. The Saskatchewan Party has won a majority government forcing the New Democrats packing to move to the opposition benches. Hopefully, Brad Wall is a moderate compared to the rest of his party’s supporters.

I’m also upset that a good man will not be representing the good people of Saskatchewan in it’s legislative assembly.

I want to offer my condolences to the families, students and teachers affected by the school shooting at Jokela High School in Tuusula, Finland (southern Finland). The gunman is believed to be an eighteen year old student and delivered a disturbing message on the video sharing network website YouTube. The Finnish Media reported the video message by the gunman entitled the Jokela High School Massacre; it has been removed from YouTube.

The gunman took eight lives with a .22-calibre gun; nine have been reported to have minor injuries. His unwilling victims were seven students, two female, five male and the eighth victim was the high school’s principal.

If you want to read more about this disturbing event, Gunman dies after killing 8 others in Finnish school.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered an election-style speech to Vancouver business leaders promising British Columbia additional representation in the House of Commons. Stephen Harper defined British Columbia “a relatively middle-sized province,” he went onto say that there isn’t any justification for under-representing British Columbians in Ottawa.

So the Prime Minister wants to give British Columbia additional seats. It’s a good idea on the Prime Minister’s part however; I feel there are other places throughout the country that are misrepresented. Hopefully he goes by it professionally and seeks Elections Canada’s advisement to establish an independent commission. This process is supposed to happen every ten years. It has only been a few since they added more seats federally.

I am supporting the Saskatchewan Liberal Party in tomorrow’s election which I am going to be watching the coverage closely on CTV Saskatchewan (got satellite a few months back). My family living Hodgeville (a small farming community located in the Wood River electoral district) has told me over the phone that the Saskatchewan Liberal Party’s candidate Michael Klein has won their votes. The future MLA for Wood River happens to be the father of a good friend and fellow blogger of mine, Saskboy.

The Conservatives have failed to manage their overbearing and solid lead in the polls. They have dropped in the polls for numerous reasons. They were unable to use their time most effectively in the post-throne speech boost because they failed to articulate new and innovative ideas to Canadians.

They have loss Canadians’ trust in their government after last week’s announcement after scrapping the government policy to seek clemency for Canadians overseas who have committed crimes punishable under the death penalty.

The Conservatives have launched a series of negative television ads attacking the Liberals that have found to be unfavourable to Canadians. Canadians recognize that the Conservatives want to Americanize the Canadian political system, like they want to do with our government.

I am pleased to see that the Green Party has a solid ten percent of national support. I do hope it continues and hopefully we’ll see a few Green seats in the next Parliament.

Conservatives – 33%
Liberals – 29%
New Democrats – 17%
Green – 10%
Bloc Quebecois – 9%

Polling information and data was conducted by Harris/Decima and obtained by Angus-Reid.

There is no doubt that the New Democrats and the Conservatives are in league together. There have been moments in Canadian political history where they’ve supported each other’s democracy to perverse the Canadian democratic tradition that has been celebrated for over a century.

Conservative and NDP sources have told CTV that the Harper government will back a NDP motion slated to call for a national referendum to abolish the unelected Senate that’ll be introduced to the House of Commons next Tuesday.

The NDP-CONs will be able to pass Jack Layton’s motion in the House. I have a good feeling that the vote will be defeated in the Liberal dominated Senate. I find it awkward that the Conservatives proclaim themselves to be the defender of traditions that Canadians hold when in fact it’s just a white lie to earn their vote during their electoral mode.

I have a good feeling that the Liberal dominated Senate will make the right decision in defeating this motion.

I apologize for my disappearing act for October, I’ll be returning to blogging sometime this weekend. I would like to apologize to my ‘readers’ for suffering from Anth withdrawal.

It’s been a popular trend of the blogosphere to lead an assault on President George W. Bush’s lack of intelligence since his accession into the United States’ highest office. Today’s episodes were hysterical nonetheless an embarrassment to the United States’ general populous. Let’s point out the comedy of errors George W. Bush performed at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Sydney, Australia today:

• President Bush thanked Australian Prime Minister for hosting the OPEC summit.
• The Comedian in Chief tried to ease himself out of embarrassing moment for America by correcting himself and then going onto say he hopes that Australia will invite him to the OPEC Summit.
• Then he thanked the Austrians for their tremendous support in Iraq nor were they present at the APEC summit since they aren’t an Asia-Pacific nation.

I am pretty sure most of my readers can pinpoint the errors that the ‘Comedian-in-Chief’ made in his speech. To make it lengthy, I’m going to explain to the not-so-brilliant Conservative or Republican supporter who clearly doesn’t grasp the reality that their renowned and ‘respected’ icon is a complete moron:

1. President Bush meant to say APEC.
2. Australia nor the United States of America are apart of Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) therefore Australia cannot extend an invitation to the United States to attend their next get-together BBQ in Tehran.
3. The Austrians haven’t deployed any of their troops to Iraq nor have they expressed doing so. They see the illegality behind the war occurring there and mostly places blame on the United States for Iraqi shortcomings. The ‘Comedian-in-Chief’ of course meant the Australians who have active 638 troops currently deployed in the war torn state. They initially sent in 2,000 troops to assist in the invasion.

Clearly the dim wad has done it again.

The United States Congress has recently passed legislation 227 – 183 to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The Bush Administration’s White House surprisingly has a massive power-hold over Congress regardless of the new Democratic thin majority over its voting power.

I’m disappointed that Congress has given America’s worst President since who the hell knows how long, more power to look over people’s shoulders. The passed amendment allows the Bush Administration to expand the government’s transparent abilities to eavesdrop on ‘foreign suspects of terrorism’ whose communication ‘passes’ through the United States’ jurisdiction.

I do want to commend Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi for trying to push the vote back for voidance; unfortunately her tireless efforts went unheard. The United States seriously needs to clean up it’s act and take a step back from being the globe’s police force and worry about domestic policies that can make America a better place. A paradise that America’s founding father’s dreamt of.

It’s a rare appearance to discuss any level of sports here on The Anth Zone. I thought it’d be a nice thought to congratulate San Francisco Giant’s Left Fielder Barry Bond’s for reaching a career milestone in Major League Baseball with tying Hank Aaron’s 755 career home runs. At, The Anth Zone we will not discriminate against Mr. Bond’s for his illicit drug use. We congratulate you Barry.