The Big Picture

Once more, go read Alison at Creekside: The North American-Made Energy Security Act to admire how she neatly connects all the dots.

So my question is: were the robocalls in support of Con candidates, for the purpose of MASSIVELY infuriating and mis-directing Canadian voters during the federal election funded by Koch Industries?

The calls came from a US location. Elections Canada has no jurisdiction or no mandate to investigate this form of illicit campaign contribution. Though the flurry of calls were fast and furious, and their purpose was to discourage electors from voting for anyone but the Contempt Party, it would be difficult to pin this disruptive tactic on them.

While the calls clearly targeted specific households in certain ridings - which makes one wonder who provided the robocallers with annotated Canadian electoral lists - where to start looking in order to make the connection between Koch Industries money, the undeclared contributions and the Contempt Party war-room?

Endless rancour from Contempt Party

As expected, the howling jackals and hyenas that form the political *base* of the Contempt Party are still feasting on the carcass of the LPC leader.

Not content to express in the most petulant manner their chagrin that the man they've slandered and vilified for years in attack ads wouldn't grovel before their leader, they've continued their vituperative yapping for days after the election has ended.

In that, they are far, far worse than their mentors in the US. Karl Rove may have inspired the Cons' dirty tricks warriors, but at least he knew when to call off the scavengers.

Speaking of the US, it'll be interesting to discover who funded the robo-calls used by the Contempt Party to spread dis-information to electors in key ridings throughout the campaign.

IMHO, the munnee was provided by the Koch brothers who have bankrolled Teabaggin' US politicians like WI governor Scott Walker. Look at Con jobs Kenney, Soudas, Gill. They have the manner and style of Koch$uckers, do they not?

Pedophile priests and hockey coaches

Holding up photographs of girls and boys who were sexually violated by Catholic priests, parish members in the diocese of Philadelphia demonstrated outside the basilica to denounce church officials who engineered a deliberate cover-up and evasion of crimes perpetrated against children.

From here:

[...]the Philadelphia Catholic Archdiocese placed on leave 21 priests accused of sexual abuse of minors [...] The leaves followed a grand jury report last month that lambasted the archdiocese for allowing 37 priests to remain around children despite "substantial evidence of abuse." That report and the investigation that led to it were made possible because the diocese had supplied prosecutors with information following an earlier grand jury report in 2005.

The earlier report concluded that dozens of priests had sexually abused children dating back at least a half-century. But prosecutors were powerless to bring criminal charges because statutes of limitations had expired.

While prosecutors can't bring charges against the 37 priests due to statutes of limitation, prosecutors say the cases "show a pattern of the church looking the other way when it came to investigating these charges," said Tasha Jamerson, spokeswoman for the district attorney's office. [...]Critics [...] said church leadership continued to show a lack of understanding about child sexual abuse in the way it handled the suspensions. The archdiocese drew condemnation for, among other moves, declining to release a list of the priests, choosing instead to inform each parish. Local news outlets gathered and published the names this week.

The grand jury found that an archdiocesan board that reviewed allegations often judged as "incredible" or "unsubstantiated" allegations against priests who had been independently accused or flunked a lie detector test.

"These are simply not the actions of an institution that is serious about ending the sexual abuse of its children. There is no other conclusion," the report said. That the church provided the district attorney's office with information "is some sign of progress," although "much has not changed," the grand jury said.

"It's not unlike a chemical company that has toxic spills in 21 places around Philadelphia," and it won't say where they are, said Barbara Blaine, president of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests. "The priests only get removed when there's public pressure or publicity to make that happen, and we see that across the U.S. as well," she said.

More here.

Corporate types in the business of *creating wealth* for themselves - as recently observed from the actions of the Kochs and their koch-suckers in Wisconsin - will interven in government in order to protect their interests and increase their profits. When there is resistance and even push-back, they will fight tooth and nail to discredit their critics and to crush people who don't fall into line.

Institutions such as the Catholic Church and the NHL follow the same business and risk-management models. (In other news recently yet another adult survivor of adolescent sexual abuse suffered at the hands of Graham James stepped forward to tell his story.)

Pope Maledict, Gary Bettman and the Kochs have a lot in common, it seems.

To paraphrase yet again Mark Steyn: It must be convenient to have canon and business laws that oblige all your pathological greed.

Corporate greed

A joke for my virtual roomie and our dear readers, by way of Bouphonia:

A public union employee, a tea party activist, and a ceo are sitting at a table with a plate in the middle that holds a dozen cookies. The ceo grabs 11 of the cookies, turns to the tea partier and says, "Watch out for that union guy. He wants a piece of your cookie."