That funny Skinny Dipper

That funny Skinny Dipper

has a fun post ...

If Political Parties were stores what would they be?

Canadian Tire - Conservatives
Zellers - Liberals
Home Hardware and The Source - NDP
Mountain Equipment Co-op - Green

What's in a name...

What's in a name...

There is a proposal at this weekends NDP convention in Halifax to drop the "New" from the New Democratic Party of Canada moniker. Several generations have grown up with the "New" attached to the Democratic Party in Canada. I think its a good idea to drop the "New" as well. Michael Byers, a professor at UBC and NDP candidate in the 2008 federal election thinks its a good idea as well, you can see his article in the Toronto Star today.

The people most fearing the potential NDP name change are the Liberals. The Liberals biggest threat is the NDP and their worst nightmare is the potential of the NDP with a name change to be seen by many younger Canadians for their polices rather than the dreaded red scare the NDP has been hobbled with at the hands of very effective Liberal campaigners and their supportive media.

Put a name change together and the prospect that the next election will see no party with a majority, the Democratic Party stands to make gains, likely at the expense of the Liberal Party. No wonder Liberals are running scared.

Mr. Ignatieff has returned the party's traditional core support levels – and revived it in Quebec – but the Strategic Counsel poll found they have lost the traditional edge among women, younger voters, and Canadians who live in cities and large towns, crucial to their hopes of victory. The NDP vote has remained firm.“The Liberals have plateaued,” said The Strategic Counsel's Peter Donolo. - The Globe and Mail, August 11, 2009

One of the reasons for this lack of growth has to be leadership on issues. People have a good idea what the Conservatives and the NDP would do. People have also seen what they get with Ignatieff and they haven't warmed up to it. Two big issues Liberals fumbled, E.I. and the Republican attack in the US on Canada's healthcare system.

As tens of thousands of vote rich Ontario workers lost jobs every month, Ignatieff proposed a committee to spend the summer studying the idea of change. What these workers needed was action, not another delay. The Liberals will pay dearly for that miscue.

Next up is the outright attack by the right in the USA of Canada's healthcare system. Now we all know and appreciate that we don't have a perfect system, its still better than the US healthcare system. Canadians are more than a little ticked off to see our country being maligned in this manner. They want Canadian leaders to speak out. Only NDP leader Jack Layton has stood up.

Name change or not, the next election will see the NDP going after both Harper and Ignatieff. This is a taste of what you will see from the NDP provided by National Director Brad Lavigne...

“Mr. Layton has written a book about investing in Canadians and their communities. Mr. Ignatieff has written books defending torture,” said Lavigne.

“Mr. Ignatieff has defended and supported the war in Iraq … If Mr. Ignatieff or Mr. Harper were prime minister in 2004, Canada would still be in Iraq today.”

Lavigne also scoffed at Ignatieff’s proposed changes to reform the Employment Insurance system saying the Liberal leader was “out of the country” when the system Canada has today was crafted.- By PETER ZIMONJIC, National Bureau, Sun Media

The NDP name change throws a big wrinkle in the Liberals election plan. They know its a smart move, its an opportunity to re-brand the NDP and they have little time to counter attack, unless the Liberals decide to find some other "face saving" means of supporting the Harper government until the spring.

What's in a name, ask any Liberal.

update: I found a post by the Northern BC Dipper supporting a name change. He does a good job of it!

Springfield Missouri Anti-gay Ordinance Likely to Fall later this Summer

Springfield Missouri Anti-gay ordinance likely to fall later this summer...

It shall be unlawful for any person in a public place to invite, entice, persuade or to address a person of the same sex for the purpose of inviting, enticing or persuading such person to commit sodomy. Sodomy means any sexual act involving the genitals of one person and the mouth, tongue, hand or anus of another person. - Sec. 78-224

This ordinance was adopted in 1976, likely in the hey day of Anita Bryant's crusade attacking gay rights across the US. Springfield council member Doug Burlison has asked the City Attorney Dan Wichmer to draw up language to remove the ordinance, a move that could eventually be voted on by the council."My primary concern is that it's a bad law. It targets a specific population of our citizenship," Burlison told the News Leader.

City Attorney Wichmer told the News Leader the ordinance is unconstitutional and has not been enforced in years. According to News-Leader archives, police initiated a crackdown in 1999 in Phelps Grove Park and at Lake Springfield, arresting five men.

You can help by sending a short email to Springfield Missouri Council telling them how important it is they remove this discriminatory ordinance. Send your email to the City Clerk and a copy to Councilmember Doug Burlison.

Reminder: Its always a good idea to be assertive and polite in your communications.

------------------------
City Clerk, Brenda Cirtin
Busch Municipal Building
Fourth Floor
840 Boonville Avenue
Springfield, MO 65802
417.864.1650

bcirtin@springfieldmo.gov
------------------------
Councilmember, Doug Burlison
Busch Municipal Building
Fourth Floor
840 Boonville Avenue
Springfield, MO 65802
City Hall: 417.865.7175
Fax: 417.864.1649

dburlison@springfieldmo.gov

Gay and Lesbian Community Center of the Ozarks
518 E. Commercial, Springfield, MO 65803
Phone: 417-869-3978
Fax: 417-831-6063
Web Address: www.glocenter.org
E-mail Address: glocenter@glocenter.org

Gay Day - Let the kid out

Gay Day - Let the kid out!

Canada's Wonderland is hosting Gay Day, August 29, 2009. PFLAG Canada presents Gay Day at Canada’s Wonderland.


Don't miss out on live entertainment, all-you-can-eat buffet and regular Park admission savings.

$5 from each ticket purchased supports PFLAG Canada. Discounted tickets available on-line at Canada's Wonderland, PFLAG or at Priape (501 Church Street).

PFLAG Canada is the only national organization that provides individual, family and community-based support to anyone with questions or concerns about sexual orientation and gender identity issues. PFLAG supports, educates and provides resources to anyone with questions or concerns. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

PFLAG Canada is there when it seems no-one else is.

Queerthoughts will be there, hopefully you can make it as well!

Who is behind the Town Hells

Who is behind the Town Hells

Watch this display of organized attacks by the big money people in the town halls held across the USA by Democrats. The Republican Party has labeled these Town Halls as Town Hells...

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

They are Gay, Duh!

They are Gay, Duh!

The American Psychological Association declared Wednesday that mental health professionals should not tell gay clients they can become straight through therapy or other treatments. - NY Times, August 6, 2009

By a vote of 124 to 4 the American Psychological Association agreed that gay patients should not be told they can become straight. Reparative therapy is used primarily by religious conservative therapists and wing nuts like James Dobson. They have destroyed many lives along the way with their zealot like assault on the GLBTTQI communities.

Enough already!

He hopes people don’t Google his name

He hopes people don’t Google his name

“He hopes people don’t Google his name,” said John E. Hartwig, a former deputy inspector general at the Department of Health and Human Services, one of various state and federal agencies that investigated Columbia/HCA when Mr. Scott was its chief executive. (NY Times Article, April 2, 2009)

Rick Scott is the big money man behind Conservatives for Patients Rights (CPR), a lobby group created to stop President Obama's Health Care plan from passing. The organization is run primarily by Scott and have hired the Swift boat company, Creative Response Concepts (The company contributed to John Kerry's loss in 2003 with a smear campaign, now commonly referred to as "Swiftboating", to be its public relations firm.

Scott is no stranger to controversy, In the 1990's he built the largest health care company in the world, owning over 340 hospitals and hundreds of other health care facilities. He was turfed as the CEO by his board of Directors when the FBI launched an investigation into fraud of Medicaid and Medicare which lead to 1.7 billion dollars in fines and reimbursements to several States and the federal government.

Richard J. Kirsch, the national campaign manager for Health Care for America Now told the NY Times in April, ...“We cannot have a better first person to attack health care reform than someone who ran a company that ripped off the government of hundreds of millions of dollars.”

Yet despite this incredible past of heading a hospital conglomerate that defrauded the US and many State Governments of 100's of millions of dollars, the main stream media are slow to pick up on who the people heading these so called "grassroot" organizations like CPR are. They have made their billions using the current system of private health insurance. Scott does not want to see that change anytime soon. He has a vested interest in insuring no public plan is created.

Scott now owns Solantic, a firm that operates urgent care clinics, marketed as a "lite" emergency room for people that do not have health coverage. Some of these are in Wal-Marts in Florida. These center's cherry pick customers by doing the light work, leaving the burdensome work to an already overloaded system.

The American Academy of Pediatrics discourage regular use of urgent care because they say it undermines the concept of having a primary-care doctor who manages long-term health. "There's nothing like having a physician that really knows you," said Dr. Karl Altenberger, a retired Ocala physician and immediate past president of the Florida Medical Association told the Gainsville Sun in Florida.

All of this indicates to me that Rick Scott sees healthcare as a commodity to be bought and sold as the market will let it. A public funded health care option would see fewer people using/needing his urgent care facilities as people will be able to afford good regular health care and will not have to wait until something can not be tolerated any longer before they seek treatment.



Scott is a very rich American. He has a vested interest in a health care system that must meet Wall Street expectaions for profits each quarter.

More on Scott and his and like organization in future posts.

Ottawa Mayor Not Guilty

Ottawa Mayor Not Guilty

Larry O'Brien found not guilty of charges on influence peddling

see Ottawa Citizen... and CBC.ca

It appears that one can never be successfully convicted of these charges in Canada. There needs to be some serious review of the laws in question.

The right wing was very concerned with two candidates from the right entering the race for Mayor thus splitting the vote allowing the middle of the road candidate, long time city counselor Alex Munter to squeak out a win.

I am pretty sure that many folks talked to both Larry O'Brien and Terry Kilrea, about the probable electoral defeat of the Conservative forces if they both ran.

What we will not know for sometime if ever, is what was really offered and by whom to convince Kilrea to drop out of the race. His decision to drop out pretty much ensured O'Brien would become the front runner in the election for mayor.