Politicians and humour-challenged Macleans staff writers.

Shall I compare thee to an *old whore*?

Or more approriately, to each other?

Scott Feschuk produced a stupid, cheap, sexist & puerile piece for Macleans that compared escort and hooker. It's been removed now, and according to a tweet I read, he has apologized. So, if readers had not expressed their disgust, he wouldn't have known it was offensive and dirt-dumb?

I wonder ... if DAMMIT JANET! did a similar piece comparing politicians and Macleans staff writer, would the subjects would find it amusing?

For example the former might be considered prickless farts and the latter heartless pricks. Yeah, that exact kind of *humour*.

A deliberate political tactic to restrict abortion?

Is this merely a public pissing contest between two big swinging dicks, Dr Yves Lamontagne, president of the Québec College of Physicians, and Dr Yves Bolduc, Québec Health Minister?

When DJ! first blogged about this 'imbroglio' (Minister Bolduc's word) it appeared it was an oversight or perhaps the insidious work of a zygote zealot at the ministry. But now some claim that the situation was deliberately engineered.

From here:

The threat of closing is not coming from anti-choice protesters who have targeted the clinic for 30 years, but from a new provincial health department law that will govern how special medical clinics provide services.

"It's terribly sad. We still have to fight," physician Francine Léger, the clinic's interim director, said Monday.

Bill 34, which was adopted by the national assembly in the spring, says that abortion clinics must adhere to the same guidelines as specialized medical clinics which provide such procedures as cataract and knee surgeries. That means they have to set up separate sterile operating rooms as opposed to simply sterilizing surgical equipment.

Dr Léger, who also practises at the teaching hospital connected to the Université de Montréal, observes that institutions are not required to conform to the new regulations. In fact, the staff of women's clinics who provide abortion, called IVG (interruption volontaire de grossesse) in Québec, were only informed in mid-June by the Ministry that their medical services were included in the provisions of the law and that they would have to enforce the regulations or close.

According to Dr Gaétan Barrette there is documentation - letters from his organization to the Ministry - that proves that Bolduc knew well in advance that Bill 34 would affect independent abortion clinics. He maintains that this political tactic is an under-handed way to restrict the provision of IVGs to hospitals (overwhelmed by demands for other outpatient medical services) and thus limit access.

Duffy channels Agnew?

Very strange things happen to people's brains when they get religion or political appointments. Fully exploiting the fact that as a senator speaking within the Red Chamber he cannot be sued for slander or libel, Mike Duffy made a rude speech, later retracting a metaphor under pressure from Harper.

Duffy's speech referred to the "nattering nabobs of negativism on the East Coast" who loudly protested equalization adjustments in the Harper government's recent budget that could cost Newfoundland and Labrador and P.E.I. equalization money.

Right at the moment, Mike Duffy's former colleagues think that it's funny, given that his current target happens to be Atlantic politicians.

Will they still find it amusing when he goes full Spiro Agnew and starts calling them "an effete corps of impudent snobs", the "hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history" and the "commie-pinko-liberal press"?

Update: Both pogge and Dave at TGB reflect upon Duffy, albeit from different perspectives. Yet both conclusions seem unanimous in observing that Duffy's appointment is the equivalent of Harper lobbing a MASSIVE stink bomb into the Senate.

Girls and Women, Girls and Women, Girls and Women

We at Birth Pangs are heartily sick of this bullshit meme.

From the recent throne speech:

Our mission in Afghanistan is a noble and necessary endeavour.

It is making a difference in the lives of men who were victims of Taliban oppression, for children forced to live in ignorance, and for women who had no human rights.

From Peter MacKay:

We are supporting women who, under the Taliban regime, were forbidden to go to school, to work or to vote. . . . We are building a future for children, so that they can all be educated, have access to medical care, and have the freedom to grow up in a climate of security and hope rather than in fear.

And from Bev Oda:

"After years of conflict and insecurity, Afghanistan’s education system is one of the weakest in the world. This has deeply affected the country’s ability to rebuild and sustain itself,” said Minister Oda. “But progress is being made, and Canada continues to reinforce its role as a leader for education in Afghanistan, particularly for women and girls."

Well, thank Gord for the Canadians.

Um, well, maybe not. Today, UNICEF released a report on Afghanistan's children.