Heart of Canada

Amen(d)

At the age of 12, after I came within a hair's breadth of beating one of my seventh-grade teachers at chess, he told me that someday I would be prime minister of Canada. I'd like that. However, I'd also like this (choose your player):

WM

Quicktime

Real

Amend for Arnold also means amend for people like me!

[Via Tiger]

Would I Make A Good President?

What are the two most important personality traits for a good president? Stubbornness and disagreeableness!

Here, all this time, my rather uncollegial detractors were thinking these were bad qualities in themselves!

Democrat Dollars

For all Kerry's talk about big-business Republicans and worker Democrats, I found it very interesting that the Democrat electoral college votes came largely from "old-money" New England and "new-money" California.

Ok, ok, before all you Democrats jump on my back, I'll agree that PA and IL carry a considerable union punch. It's just pretty hard to ignore that eastern old-money and western new-money influence in the Democrat vote.

A Sad Day

He may have been controversial, but now he's a martyr.

Election Coping and Distraction

If you just can't take it, if the American election has completely gotten to you, and you just cannot wait for the results, try using this little bit of weirdness to distract you.

Must. Have. More. Data.

Only a true political junkie could capture the data fervor that many people get into pre-election. What a small "bit" of compositional brilliance by Paul Wells.

My Old Stomping Grounds

Peter, read my lips: Wilkes-Barre, not "Wilkes-Barry"

Steyn, Columnist Without Fear

So, I'm looking for my daily dose of The Monger, and I find he points me to this no-holds-barred piece by Steyn, who gives Americans his take on the war in Iraq and Canadian healthcare in one breath:

     One thousand Americans are killed in 18 months in
     Iraq, and it's a quagmire. One thousand Quebecers
     are killed by insufficient hand-washing in their filthy,
     decrepit health care system, and kindly progressive      Americans can't wait to bring it south of the border.
     If one has to die for a cause, bringing liberty to the
     Middle East is a nobler venture and a better bet than
     government health care.

He also says something that I've been thinking for a long time:

     As for this Bush-failed-to-get-bin-Laden business,
     2-1/2 years ago I declared that Osama was dead
     and he's never written to complain. There's no more
     evidence for his present existence than there is for
     the Loch Ness monster, which at least does us the
     courtesy of showing up as a indistinct gray blur on a
     photograph every now and again. Osama is lying low
     because he's in no condition to get up.

If Osama isn't dead, well, please stand up, nice and tall, so we can do something about that. I think Steyn's right. Besides, we have ample proof about Osama from this. Really, I saw it today. Team American killed him. No kidding.

Steyn takes no prisoners and neither do Parker and Stone. I hope no giant socialist weasels try to take over.

Gary? (ratatatatatat) Gary?

Postscript: In her razor-sharp way, Kate takes on Ebert regarding Team America. Definitely worth reading.

Presidential Pageant

So we're giving a buddy of ours a lift to work the other day, and the conversation turns to politics. We start discussing the presidential debates, but, really, the conversation's just too deep for 8:30 am -- I think only John Gormley is licensed to think out loud that early in the morning.

Anyway, the conversation had waned and trailed off to silence when suddenly our buddy says, hey wouldn't it be interesting if, instead of a debate, they held a kind of pageant? You know, the candidates would have to parade around in business suits and, like, have to wrestle each other or something.

Heh.

American electioneering goes on so long, it just gets silly!

Postscript: Ooo! Bush and Kerry will be going head-to-head in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, otherwise known as the center of the universe! Think I'm joking? It's one of my favourite places and it's in the Keystone State, but pu-leeze don't say "Wilkes-Barry"! Everyone knows it's pronounced Wilkes-Bear!

*pout*

I miss Boscov's!

The Return of the Crusades

"Senator Kerry, and all pro-choice Catholic politicians, who publicly call themselves Catholic yet who blatantly violate canon law by continuing to profess heresy and receive Holy Communion, must publicly reject their abortion advocacy for the sake of their own souls, and the others they have scandalized," Mr. Balestrieri said in a statement. "They have been excommunicated." [Link, via Pogge]

Confess! Confess, I tell you!

Apparently, however, the re-opening of the Crusades isn't official.