The Nightmare of Socialist Medicine: Sex Changes Now! Cancer, Autism, Brain Surgery Later

Ontario’s Minister of Health proudly announces Thursday: Sex Change surgery will once again be covered by the province’s socialist health care monopoly.

Amazing! The province must be swimming in funds! All problems in the health care system must have been solved, if we can now provide the resources for sadly pathetic, psychologically disturbed adults to have their bananas turned to peaches.

Perhaps we should call Sylvia de Vries, who would be dead by now if not for the good fortune of living across the river from Detroit’s Henry Ford Hospital, and tell her the good news. And while we’re at it, call Stephan Marinoiu, nearing bankruptcy to pay for his son’s autism therapy, to let him know. Hey, see if Lindsay McCreith wants in on the celebration:

(An aside: for an idea of the state of conservatism in Ontario today, here’s the Tory PC’s reaction to the story: “The Progressive Conservatives declined to comment on the issue, saying they wanted to wait and hear something more from the government than Smitherman’s musings to reporters.”

In Defense of The Lord’s Prayer

As part of this age of stupidity and denial, a coalition of busybodies, politically-correct liberals, Christianity-bashers, Jew-haters, and radical atheists continues to wage war against what is, to me, the most obvious of all overarching facts of modern Western history: that the sustained periods of freedom, innovation, fairness, justice, and prosperity that have been enjoyed in our gilded age were created and defended by the Judeo-Christian moral code, and by leaders who were strong believers. Today’s battle by these folks: the Jihad being waged by Dalton McGuinty and Ontario’s governing Liberal Party against The Lord’s Prayer. Curmudgeonly liberal-minded Jewish commentator Larry Zolf does a nice job defending the centuries-old daily recital here. The Oakville Beaver did a hilarious re-writing of the prayer back in February, found here.

I fear that the vast majority of those who believe it should be expunged from public life have never stopped to consider exactly what The Lord’s Prayer actually says (a hint: you won’t find a single sectarian word). Here it is:

Our Father, who art in heaven,  Hallowed be thy Name.

(Yes, indeed, it accepts the concept of a singular supernatural God, which horrifies atheist absolutists, but should offend no one else.)

Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.

(A call for man to work towards making life in this world as heavenly as possible - the noble aim of every idealistic public servant, whether religious or not.)

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our trespasses,

As we forgive those who trespass against us.

(Humility, contrition, and forgiveness: what controversial concepts!)

And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.

(A reminder that doing the wrong thing is highly seductive, and that doing the right thing requires strength and guidance.)

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever.

(Another call for humility - a reminder that there is something much bigger and stronger than our own egos, intellects, and material desires - a message any politician needs to hear few minutes.)

Amen.

(That’s a religious word. AHHHH!)

My question to those who wish to make this prayer illegal in the public square: which of the sentiments expressed is offensive to you? If you’re intellectually honest, you’ll say: the acceptance of the concept of God. If you’re a muddy-thinking liberal, you’ll say: “it’s not offensive per se, but, you know, like, separation of church and state, right?” If you’re a knee-jerk secular Jew, you’ll say: it’s a Christian prayer, can’t you see? (no, I can’t…Jesus must be between the lines). If you’re a conventional soulless non-practicing-Christian-Canuck, you’ll say: we don’t need these old concepts and corny sentiments, and go back to getting your news from Jon Stewart and your moral compass from Gray’s Anatomy.

Defining Deviancy Down, Defining Deviancy Up: Classic Charles Krauthammer (1993)

With a 2-month-old baby and a 3-year-old attention-grabber in the house, and a major project on the go at work, my blogging has been very light the past couple of weeks, and threatens to remain so into May. So, my dear visitors, read and discuss this lengthy but worthwhile transcript: “Defining Deviancy Up” (Charles Krauthammer’s address to the American Enterprise Institute, September 13, 1993). Fifteen years ago, the great columnist and commentator paired Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s theory of “Defining Deviancy Down” (the magic political trick of eliminating social problems by re-defining pathologies as normal) with his own corollary, “Defining Deviancy Up” (the elevating of deviant behavior, with the intended or unintended effect of making normal behavior appear deviant). Well worth a read, for a good understanding of how our society has devolved over the past 60+ years.

And, if you have any spare cash, please donate to the legal defense funds of Kate MacMillan, Kathy Shaidle, and Ezra Levant - blogging superstars who have been slapped with nuissance law suits by Canada’s one-man Human Rights Complaining industry, Richard Warman.  Free speech must be defended.

Toronto Star’s Allan Woods makes disgraceful attack on Harper at Auschwitz

First, the good: PM Stephen Harper shows once again that he is a class act, a statesman, and a leader beyond what we have come to expect as Canadians. While touring the Auchwitz Nazi Death Camp memorial in Poland yesterday, he remained silent and reverent, and refused to use the visit to the sacred site to make political points. He declined to talk to the tag-along press contingent about it, and left this beautiful, thoughtful message in the guest book at the memorial:

“We are witnesses to the vestiges of unspeakable cruelty, horror and death. Let us never forget these things and work always to prevent their repetition. Lord, bless the souls of those who suffered and perished here and deliver them from evil.”

Now, the bad. Here is a screen shot of The Toronto Star’s disgraceful attempt to use this visit to Auschwitz as an attack on Harper:

1. The Star chooses an angry-looking Harper file photo from Parliament to set the tone for the story, rather than an image from the visit to Auschwitz. The photo used here is completely unrelated to the story, and could only have been chosen for the sole reason of connecting Harper’s supposed “mean” personality to his visit to Auschwitz.
2. The story leads with: – “Prime Minister Stephen Harper uttered not a word of reflection to the Canadian public following his visit to Auschwitz yesterday.” Third sentence: “He didn’t speak after kneeling before a red-and-white wreath at the camp’s Death Wall memorial, where thousands of prisoners were executed, though he did appear to be moved.” Fourth sentence: “He didn’t speak after emerging from the claustrophobic gas chamber and crematorium, the lethal machine of Nazi terror. He left just one reflection of three sentences, written in blue ink in a leather-bound memorial book.” The implication: Harper was indifferent to the horrors of Nazi Germany. The reality: Woods & company are so utterly ideologically against Harper that they’ll use the PM’s completely appropriate and heartwarming response to the depravity of the Nazis, as an opportunity to repeat the long-discredited phony charge that Harper is cold, mean, and harbouring a “hidden agenda”.

Shame on you, Allan Woods and The Toronto Star. You spit on the graves of dead Jews by your obscene actions.

Glass house alert: “Nortel” Garth Turner gloating over Lukiwski’s 17-year-old blast

Many political partisans spent this evening puffing up another Conservative-bashing non-scandal, trying to bring down Saskatchewan MP Tom Lukiwski for a drunken “faggot” blast caught on video tape 17 years ago. Among those attempting to make political hay over these intemperate, and sorely regretted, long-lost words of Lukiwski is none other than Parliament’s fool on the hill, Liberal MP Garth Turner.

Perhaps Mr. Turner forgot that he lives in a glass house. Time to pick up the shards, Gartho. Remember this? From John Lawrence Reynolds’ October 2002 Globe & Mail expose on unlicensed investment gurus:

In a Canoe “Money” chat room back on Sept. 27, 2000, Turner assured participants that the stock market was undergoing a mini-correction, that the Dow would hit 30,000 by 2006, and that “Nortel [then trading at $96.60] is a wonderful company and, given the recent decline, I think it is a strong ‘buy.’” That day, the TSE closed at 10,250.

Barely two months later his enthusiasm refused to wane, despite a TSE index of 8,945 and a price for Nortel stock of $56.35. “Will the Nasdaq again reach 5,000 and the TSE attain 11,000?” Turner asked. “Will it be warmer again in April? How about clipping this column and taping it to the fridge?”

Those who did would have noticed that, as of March 26, 2001, the TSE had slipped to 7,686 and Nortel, at $25.60, had begun its slide to penny-stock status. Turner remained confident: “By the time the flowers bloom in Saskatoon, the back of the bear market will have been broken. We will see sustained gains in Toronto and New York, and those who fled from stocks and equity funds into cash and money-market funds, taking a loss in the process, will be sorry indeed.” The bull was still charging.

Perhaps he should re-mortgage that shattered glass house, to buy more stock:

Turner promulgated his strategy of pulling equity out of one’s home and plunging it into diversified mutual funds in his book The Strategy: A Homeowner’s Guide to Wealth Creation. It includes some quite pointed advice. Turner writes: “If your real estate falls in value, to the point where the home equity loan is greater than the worth of your home, you can always take a walk. Then it’s the bank’s problem.” But it’s not just the bank’s problem, as any real estate lawyer or banker will confirm. In Ontario and most other provinces, a homeowner continues to be liable for mortgage debt.

Abortion, Prematurity, and Fertility: Barbara Kay on the whitewashing efforts of the “Pro-Choice” crowd

God bless Barbara Kay - a rare species indeed, as a liberal Jew who sees through “pro-choice” propaganda, and is willing to confront the trail of destruction (physical and moral) that state-funded-abortion-on-demand has caused in our society. Join the discussion at The National Post’s Full Comment section, and read some scientific truth on the negative physical effects of vacuum-sucking nascent life out of a woman’s reproductive organs:

Barbara Kay on abortion: The pro-choice movement’s female guinea pigs

 The birth of my fourth granddaughter two weeks ago — healthy, a good weight — was the occasion for joy and relief in equal measure.

My daughter’s pregnancy had first been fraught with ominous signs of imminent miscarriage. Then the worry was a probable extremely pre-term birth (at 24 weeks’ gestation, her high-risk specialist ominously murmured, “Let’s try to get you to 28 weeks … “). Even on bed rest she was offered only 5% odds of going 37 weeks (she made it to 39!).

This was our family’s first experience with an abnormal pregnancy. In the course of the unwanted adventure I acquired an education in the risks associated with prematurity, today a feature of one in eight births.

The most harrowing risk of an extremely pre-term birth (XPB) — under 28 weeks gestation — is cerebral palsy. The risk is about 38 times higher in XPB than in the overall newborn population.

Sometimes XPB is just bad luck. Sometimes it isn’t. According to obstetrician Barbara Luke’s classic Every Pregnant Woman’s Guide to Preventing Premature Birth, “If you have had one or more induced abortions, your risk of prematurity with this pregnancy increases about 30%.” After two, a woman’s chance of an XPB doubles. A woman who has had four or more abortions runs nine times the risk of XPB, an increase of 800%.

Studies of black American women throw the problem into bold relief. Black American women, although only 12% of the American population, undergo 35.2% of all abortions. In 1987 it was reported in The New England Journal of Medicine that black American women with two previous abortions had a 91% higher relative risk of a subsequent pre-term birth.

As far back as 1967, Dr. Malcolm Potts — himself a robust defender of abortion — writing in The Eugenics Review, noted: “There seems little doubt that there is a true relationship between the high incidence of therapeutic abortion and prematurity. The interruption of pregnancy in the young (under 17) is more dangerous than in other cases.”

(Of the approximately 120,000 abortions performed annually in Canada, the repeat rate is more than 29%, and amongst teenagers repeats are four times as high as for older women.)

This concession by Potts, who actually believed in eugenics, well before the organized and militant ideological polarization on abortion we’re so familiar with, gives the lie to pro-choicers insisting such claims are “scare tactics” fabricated by pro-life activists.

But you won’t find a future-pregnancy prematurity risk on pro-choice Web site fact sheets. The National Abortion Federation’s states: “Comprehensive reviews of the data have concluded that a vacuum aspirational procedure in the first trimester poses virtually no risk to future reproductive health.”

Since “suction” is the standard abortion method, I wondered if abortion clinics give actual potential clients a more nuanced picture. So I asked a friend in her 30s to do some sleuthing in person.

“Johanne” visited two abortion clinics in Montreal.

The Morgentaler clinic does not offer consultations prior to abortions. One signs the consent form and proceeds directly to the abortion. A consultation was only reluctantly arranged at Johanne’s insistence.

Johanne asked a number of questions, including: “Is there a risk associated with a second abortion?” Answer: “No, and the proof is that [the woman] is fertile … One, two, three abortions, there are no risks.”

At the Clinique Medicale de l’Alternative, Johanne was received with less suspicion. As at the Morgentaler, there is no consultation prior to the abortion. (I stress this because where prior counselling is offered, as in Sweden, fewer women choose to abort).

Johanne asked a doctor there the same questions, and again, was there a risk to future pregnancies associated with a second abortion? “No, a woman can have one, two, three, four, five abortions with no problem? “

In response to Nazi atrocities in human experimentation, the Nuremberg Code was adopted in 1964. The code insists on animal studies before exposing human beings to any procedure. All surgical procedures in Canada have been tested on animals. Except one. There are no published animal studies on vacuum aspiration abortion.

So the fact that women are guinea pigs is something else you won’t see on the pro-abortion fact sheets or on consent forms. What other abortion risks are women not being warned about? Too many to mention in one column, that’s for sure.

bkay@videotron.ca

And don’t forget about the psychological damage wrought by the abortion generation.

AWOL Paul Martin justifies the unjustifiable: Analysis by Steve Janke

The Prime Minister Canada has so quickly forgotten, has not been forgotten by NDP leader Jack Layton. Layton has called for Martin’s resignation from Parliament because - get this - Martin has not registered a single vote in this entire Parliamentary session! Spending a little too much time with his friends from China, perhaps? 

Steve Janke has more at his always-revealing (but sometimes overly earnest) blog on Canadian politics, Angry in the Great White North.

Canada’s Human Rights Commissioners: Kangaroo Clique of Web Surfing Snakes

Great columnists and bloggers analyze the results of Tuesday’s rare open hearing of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, in the case of professional complainer Richard Warman vs. small-time racist Marc Lemire:

Mark Steyn notes the absolute contempt for justice of plaintiff Richard Warman, who did not even show up to the hearing!

Jonathan Kay states what he thinks is the deadly blow this hearing revealed: that Commission member Dean Steacy tried to protect his anonymity as he posted entrapment messages on neo-nazi web sites by surreptitiously logging on to the internet via the unsecured wireless router of the resident of a nearby apartment dweller.

Ezra Levant, a lawyer himself, exposes the utter lack of fair legal process in the commissions, starting with the fact that the “judge” isn’t a judge at all.

Finally, Steyn pens this epic column for Maclean’s, based on his day in the dreary hearing room with bored Toronto lawyers, neo-nazi pals, obfuscating witnesses, fake judges, lonely bloggers, and the odd mainstream journalist. On the topic of the slug-like commissioners:

I can’t claim to be privy to the thoughts of the HRC inner circle, but I would imagine if they could turn back the clock they’d gladly drop the Western Standard and Maclean’s prosecutions, and go back to their nice little earner of sticking it to neo-Nazis, homophobic Christians, and other underfunded losers in basements whom they could chastise with impunity, far from the prying eyes of press and public.

On the arbitrariness of the commissioners:

The “Canadian” Human Rights Commission does not treat all Canadians equally. The lead investigator testifying on Tuesday, Dean Steacy, is blind, but the justice his commission administers certainly isn’t: if you’re one of their allies, they’ll start lurking on websites before you’ve made a formal complaint. But, if you’re not simpatico, they’ll reject your complaint on the grounds that it was on double-sided paper. Which was what happened to Mr. Lemire, when he tried to file his own Section 13 complaint against the police. Apparently, Mr. Lemire’s complaint was double-sided — which came as news to Mr. Lemire, since he faxed it in. But by the time it uncoiled itself at the other end it had become the first double-sided fax on the planet. “I don’t know what happened to the fax,” said Mr. Steacy non-committally. Hey, it’s a federal bureaucracy: things happen. Evidently one reason why Richard Warman has been the complainant on every Section 13 case since 2002 is that he’s the only one who remembers the critical single-sided rule.

On the habit of commissioners pretending to be neo-nazis, in order to entrap their targets:

There must be a few genuine white supremacists whooping it up over at “Stormfront,” but they seem to be thin on the ground. Mr. Steacy, the CHRC’s lead investigator, is a member of Stormfront; Richard Warman, celebrated Canadian “human rights” crusader and plaintiff on every CHRC case since 2002, is a member of Stormfront; and Sgt. Stephen Camp is a member of Stormfront. What proportion of Canada’s “white supremacists” are, in fact, government employees? On a quiet day, chances must be pretty good that you’ll log on and find the joint deserted except for “jadewarr” (Mr. Steacy) trying to entrap “estate” (Sgt. Camp) while “estate” (Sgt. Camp) is simultaneously trying to entrap “axetogrind” (Mr. Warman). “There really should be a register of pseudonyms,” urged lawyer Doug Christie, “so that investigators don’t wind up investigating each other.”

Thanks to this rare glimpse inside the sausage factory, Liberal MP Keith Martin’s goal of eliminating the dreaded Section 13.1 is gaining serious momentum.

Watch Geert Wilders’ FITNA Here - Because Freedom, Goodness, and Western Civilization Matters

Whether they like it or not, the Dutch are on the front lines of the war being waged by Islam against the non-Muslim world. One Dutch politician, Geert Wilders, has chosen to simply show us what most of us have seen before, but many of us choose to minimize, ignore, excuse, or ally with - the supremacist and deadly ideology of radical Islam that comes straight from the holy book of the Muslims, the Koran (Quran). Watch his 15-minute film here, and be educated when the media (and seething Islamic masses) tell you that Wilders released an “Islamophobic hate film” intended to offend.

Who offends? Who slaps us in the face every day? Who pledges to slaughter Jews and Christians every day? Who blows up its own kinsmen in suicide bombings every day? Who treats women as separate and unequal? Who loves death more than we love life?

 

(Note: Liveleak, which deserves great credit for being the first to unequivocally agree to allow FITNA to appear on their servers, has now removed the film, due to specific death threats against its employees. View their statement here.)

In HRCs vs. Neo-Nazis, some Jews choose Neo-Nazis

**UPDATE: Maclean’s Kady O’Malley is liveblogging from today’s Human Rights Commission hearing! Part I (Morning) here; Part II (afternoon) here; Part III (late afternoon) here.** 

Perhaps the most regular plaintiffs at Canada’s Human Rights Commissions over the past 30 years have been Jewish community organizations (B’nai Brith, Canadian Jewish Congress, etc.), in the goal of persecuting Neo-Nazi-style Jew-haters into silence. As a Jew, I respect the good, peace-loving work these organizations perform. However, many Jews, like Ezra Levant, Jonathan Kay, Barbara Kay, and a host of other members of the primarily secular-Jewish constituency of these groups, have come out squarely against these groups’ efforts to continue using the notorious “Star Chamber” HRCs, now that they are being abused to the point of absurdity. For a primer on why Jews like me are cheering for antisemite Marc Lemire in today’s Super Bowl of all HRC hearings, read Jon Kay’s brilliant column first published online last night, then in today’s print edition of the National Post, “How to turn a neo-Nazi into a free-speech martyr”- as blogging friend Blazingcatfur recommended last night, well worth a full read, including the comments section following the article. A taste:

Marc Lemire is a former leader of Canada’s neo-Nazi Heritage Front. He helped distribute flyers informing Canadians that “Immigration can kill you.” On the Internet, he acts as webmaster for a variety of anti-Semitic organizations.

In short, he is a bigot — a poster-boy for all those who claim that racism is still alive and well in modern Canada.

But when Lemire faces offagainst representatives of the Canadian Human Rights Commission (HRC) on Tueday, I will be rooting for him — and so will thousands of other Canadians who are otherwise contemptuous of Lemire’s way of thinking. It may seem impossible that decent, ordinary people could be convinced to take the side of an alleged neo-Nazi. Yet, somehow, Canada’s “human rights” establishment has managed the task.

There is only one way to get people to support a despised outcast such as Lemire — and that is to turn him into a martyr for a larger principle — in this case, the principle that Canadians should be able to express themselves without subjecting their opinions to the judgment of heresy-sniffing bureaucrats. At Tuesday’s hearing, Lemire will be interrogating two HRC employees who are investigating whether he violated Section 13.1of the Human Rights Act, which prohibits Canadians from electronically communicating “any matter that is likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt by reason of the fact that that person or those persons are identifiable on the basis of [their group identity].” As Canadian Civil Liberties Association general-counsel Alan Borovoy told National Postreporter Joseph Brean, Section 13.1 could theoretically be used to censor a book detailing widespread German complicity in the Holocaust, since such a book would be “likely to expose” Germans to hatred.

Pitch-perfect, from a writer I lambasted in a published letter to the editor about two years ago for being a narcissistic twit, and who I blogged about last year as being a shame to his mother’s fine name. For whatever reason, the editor of the Post’s comments section has grown significantly in intellect - and blogosphere respect - in recent months.

Look for regular updates today from Deborah Gyapong and Ezra Levant, both of whom will attempt live-blogging from the tribunal. Look for hilarious mockery at some point today from Mark Steyn. And links to all the best stuff should appear, as always, at Small Dead Animals.