Ranting and Roaring

The F1 race last Sunday was probably one of the most exciting I’ve ever seen, featuring a last-quarter of the race duel between Ferrari’s Schumacher and Renault’s Alonso. Sauber’s Jacques Villeneuve finished in the points in 6th, which is great news for him and for the team. But …

[Sauber] Teammate Felipe Massa, however, moved to temper Jacques’ celebration by claiming that – had he, like JV, started further up the grid – Sauber would be cheering more than a sixth place.

“If you compare our pace,” said the young Brazilian, “I (would have) done a really good result.”

What a ignorant twat. It’s nice to see Villeneuve’s learned a little humility over the years but the master sportsman is Schumacher, who’s post race analysis tends to follow the template: we won the race because of the hard work of the team; or conversely, I lost the race because of my mistakes. And that’s why he has a team of 800+ workers who’ll kill themselves to get Ferrari back in first place.

Sesame Street’s Cookie Monster is being transformed into a monster who occasionally works cookies into his balanced diet. Jonah Goldberg protests.The whole point of the Cookie Monster character was to have a character who was silly because he ate so…

You can watch the old man beg for his emperor privledges back here.

Oh, and this is done on the new BlogMatrix Sparks! website just put up this morning. You can create and account and upload videos and podcasts for free without having to download anything. Give it a try.

• Paul Martin disolves parliment, declares martial law. The RCMP is ordered to round “state enemies”. Warren Kinsella flees the country.
• Posters on BlogsCanada E-Group are wary about Martin’s intentions but declare that “it’s a good thing Stephen Harper wasn’t elected, because he has a secret agenda and would have put Canadian troops in Iraq”
• CBC runs man on the street inteviews, most of which state that it doesn’t matter which party is in power, because they all declare martial law.
• The Toronto Star runs an editorial on Pope Benedict XVI advising him to get with the times.

Man, this is new pope is soooo cool. As has been noted around the blogosphere, he’s gotta be good because he’s pissing off all the right people. My favorite reaction has to be Andrew Sullivan‘s, who was apparently hoping for Pope Kumbaya I who’d be totally groovy with strap-on lesbian couples as long as they did in a loving Christian environment.

So anyway, what’s this all about:

For American Catholics, I foresee an accelerating exodus.

This is the kind of context-free tripe that passes for analysis among columists that’s really starting to piss me off. Why are they going to leave? It seems to me that the most successful religions are the ones that are strict, that claim to speak for something eternal, not the ones pushing flavour of the week beliefs (Rowan Williamson, I’m looking at you)

And in case you haven’t noticed, Catholics the world around have been quite capable of adjusting official Church theology to the needs of their personal lives. How many Catholic families do you see running around with 16 kids these days anyway?

My aquarium lost its first fish: one of three Clown Loaches. The problem with these little buggers is that they like to pretend to be dead all the time so I never noticed this one being particularly ill. I tried my best to get him well today but it never really looked that hopeful.

Ah, Vienna. Sigh. God knows how many Egg + Potato Omelets I had at the Kleines Cafe when I was there.

link and link.

With all these points, excepting #3 upon which I neither have an opinion nor am I qualified to have one. With regards to #1, double ditto to the liberal Chinese point; I posit that China will lose when they try it. My liberal Chinese friends, often quoting their local papers, believe that Americans are mentally weak and materially overstretched — that is, they don’t have the guts or the wherewithal for a fight; this is the same bet numerous nations have made and lost in the last two and change centuries.

One of the minor reasons I’m opposed to hate speech laws is I think it’s best we get who believes what in the open so we know what we’re dealing with. My belief was that hate speech laws would just drive things underground to fester. Well, I may have to revist that as the David Ahenakew trial is really dredging up some interesting characters:

A First Nations chief in Manitoba says media coverage of David Ahenakew’s hate trial will increase aboriginals’ hatred of Jews and make the former leader of the Assembly of First Nations a martyr.

[...] But [Roseau River Reserve Chief Terrance Nelson] claims Jews control Canadian media and ignore First Nations issues. In the letter, Nelson singled out CanWest Global Communications; its owners, Winnipeg’s Asper family; and their newspaper, the National Post as “the voice of Jews.”

Boy, these folks are going to start giving backwoods hicks a bad name.

Confidential to Dave Asper: how’s that decades of pushing Liberal progressive politics working out for you?

This article is a placeholder for something about Dr. Who. Liked it; had no expectations as I knew nothing about it. Read this about Christopher Eccelston leaving the show re: BBC screw up.

Who new that setting up a company would be so much work!

If you’re interested in hearing some informed comentary on Gomery et al., Little Tobacco [and here] has been doing a number of podcasts on the subject. Each is only 3 to 5 minutes and they’re really worth listening to if you have a few free moments.

If you’re interested in doing your own podcast, or just listening to one, give BlogMatrix Sparks! a spin.

Aug. 27 — Bloggers have been busy as hell today. Have I mentioned how hot it is? Paul has I want McCallum’s head stuffed and mounted on my wall, Thank God for the RCMP which is a necessary read for…