Boy Scouts Badge now a license to kill

There is nothing I loathe more than the alleged self-righteousness of pacifists towards guns. Someone needs to give this woman a good shake and tell her that we have yet to have a killer shooting up a school because they got a "cool" badge for learning how to shoot and general gun safety in the Boy Scouts.

Bringing home the challah

The Last Amazon has landed her first job. I am so excited for her and now I finally understand why my mother would sit on a bench in the mall directly in front of the Laura Secord candy store where I had my first job and watch me work. Then she would cry. She still has my apron. I have already promised I will not sit in front of the bakery and cry, but I do expect her to bring home the challah tomorrow night.

Sniff, sniff.

One down. Two more to go.

I am willing to draw a line in the sand

I never fail to be amazed at the people who come to this country but fail to grasp the basic premises of our system of our governance. Case in point; this story from the National Post.

TORONTO - The government's practice of requiring new Canadian citizens to swear an oath to an "offshore queen," even if they do it with just "a wink and a nod," may well violate the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, an Ontario judge said yesterday.
In a hearing about a potential class-action lawsuit brought by a Toronto criminal lawyer, the government asked Mr. Justice Edward Belobaba to dismiss the case as frivolous and doomed to fail. But the judge instead grilled the government lawyer, and called the case "a fascinating issue, to say the least," with a clear cause of action and potential for success.

Charles Roach, 73, who was born a British subject in Trinidad and Tobago and is now a permanent Canadian resident, said in an interview that he expects his case will survive until September, when he can apply to certify it as a class action. He argues that the mandatory oath violates the Charter's freedom of conscience provision.

"I feel that we [blacks] were colonized as a people by the British throne, and we were enslaved as a people by the British throne and, to me, taking an oath to the monarch of Great Britain, without any disrespect to the Queen herself as a person, is like asking a Holocaust survivor to take an oath to a descendant of Hitler," he said. Judge Belobaba reserved his decision yesterday.

It’s not like Canadians have been hiding the role of Queen Elizabeth II plays in our country or the role the “crown” plays in our system of government. If Roach really feels the republican style of governance was the best of all possible forms of governance; why didn’t he stay in his native land or immigrate to the United States? If his joining this country demands that we remake our style of governance to accommodate his particular worldviews why do we need him to join our ranks?

Israeli style warmongering

Where else in the Mid-East can you find a group of soldiers passing time at a local bus station singing about peace than in Israel?

They are all so young. It makes me what to take them home and feed them.

h/t: I owe a shoutout to someone but I am not sure who. I found this link on blog last weekend and I thought I saved the link and blog name but discovered this morning I hadn't. So much thanks to ________ for sharing.

The Costs of Things

My children often accuse me of being too pre-occupied with the costs of things. One of them comes home and starts to tell me about the most fabulous 'this and that' but the first words out of my mouth are always, “So what’s is going to cost me?”

To me, being both anal-retentative and a woman with very limited resources, I am psychologically compelled to figure out the cost of literally everything. In that way, I can then determine whether it can be worked into the budget or not. Besides, experience teaches me I am not overtly fond of both financial surprises or being seriously unprepared. When I am financially surprised and unprepared - bad things happen. While this principle guides my life it also has wider applications for governments.

The Israeli government has failed to calculate the true cost of evicting 8,000 plus Jews from their home in the Gaza Strip says the Israeli Comptroller. The Jerusalem Post carries this report on the Comptroller's report:

The government failed to properly debate and calculate the true cost of the evacuation of 25 settlements in Gaza and northern Samaria in August of 2005, according to charges laid out in the 2007 State Comptroller's Report. It noted that original cost estimations for the Disengagement Plan in the winter of 2004 spoke of NIS 4.5 billion, which had doubled and turned into NIS 9 billion by May of 2006.

"Decision makers did not have exact figures about the budgetary needs," and were not properly briefed, the report stated. It blamed the problem largely on both the Ministerial Committee for Disengagement and the forum of directors-general that fed the committee information regarding the plan.

According to the report, which was released for publication Wednesday, the forum should have presented a more general overview with complete financial considerations. At the same time, the ministerial committee should have picked up on the problem and demanded better information. The Treasury should have developed a mechanism to track all the funding as well.

Even now, according to the report which was presented Wednesday to the Knesset, there is not enough information available to calculate the final cost of disengagement. The comptroller blamed a portion of the hike on the government's failure to initially address the resettlement costs not associated with personal reimbursements to the evacuees.

In addition, financial considerations took a back seat to the diplomatic ones. Budgetary considerations should have been an important part of the decision making process when it came to weighing different implementation options, the report stated.

Even when the plan first passed the cabinet in June 2004, according to the report, "the government knew that financing it [disengagement] required a large scale budget... After the government approved the disengagement plan, a high priority should have been given to budgetary considerations when weighing implementation options." This didn't happen.

Decisions were made in a haphazard and piecemeal fashion that led to a budgetary hike of some NIS 2.4b. within half a year for evacuee assistance separate from personal compensation payments. In addition, no proper budgetary framework and limit was developed for all the aspects of the plan involved in taking the evacuees out of Gaza and northern Samaria.

The setting of overall financial limits would have forced a more effective allocation of funds, according to the comptroller. It added that some of the transfer requests to the Prime Minister's Office violated proper financial procedure and made it hard to implement budgetary controls.

While some of the uncalculated budget hike is attributable to military spending, which to date has reached NIS 2.5b., the report focused its attention on the decision making process with respect to additional civilian resettlement costs of NIS 2.4b. Included in this sum was NIS 210 million for hotel rooms where many of the evacuees were initially housed and NIS 775 million for temporary housing where most of the evacuees still live. According to the report, that NIS 2.4b. was the result of decisions made only after the initial disengagement budget passed the Knesset in March 2005. In that period, the focus was on the NIS 4.1b. set aside for personal compensation, of which it was expected that no more than NIS 2.5 to 3b. would actually be needed. While to date only some NIS 2.3b. has been given for personal compensation, it is expected, according to the comptroller's office, that at least the full NIS 4.1b. will be used.

There is more and it’s all dark but I would be remiss if I did not remind readers that full compensation has yet to be paid out, and almost two years later; the prospects for permanent housing for the majority of Gush Katif refugees is still bleak in the short-term.

So the next time anyone has a suggestion or peace plan for the region, let us start with the cost of calculating the "peace" by evicting almost half a million Jews from their homes in the West Bank.

Then we can move on to look at the Rand Corp study which estimated the needed influx of capital to help the Palestinians build a viable state out of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The Rand study is a few years old and was calculated before the rise of Hamas. It also counts on the non-destruction of the greenhouses of the Gaza Strip, as well as allowing for a significant influx of Palestinian labour fully into the Israeli economy which may or may not be allowed to happen. The Rand study, lowball-best-case scenario, starts at US$33 Billion.

Transfer has never looked better or more cost efficient.

Some things are beyond parody

For all the sins of the UN, and there are legions of them, I really find it a stretch to imagine the organization as missionaries Christians spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s hard to take these groups seriously when they come up with these bone-headed statements. Ynet News:

A deadly attack Monday against a United Nations school in the Gaza Strip was carried by an Islamist extremist group, according to a statement faxed to WND which claimed the UN was targeted because the international body was "spreading Christian missionary activity."

"The UN is spreading Christian missionary. We will keep hitting them and trying to kill them. They are trying to convert our Muslims under the cover of an international organization," said the statement, signed by the group Jihadia Salafiya.

Until now, Jihadia Salafiya has operated in Gaza as an Islamic outreach movement seeking to make secular Muslims more religious, but the overall leader of the organization, Abu Saqer, confirmed to WND Tuesday his organization recently opened what it called a "military wing" to target individuals, establishments and groups it claims are "corrupting Islam."

He said, she said, Hamas said - did not.

Yadda, yadda. Hamas is threatening to murder kidnapped soldier Cpl. Gilad Schalitt if Israel launches a defensive operation into the Gaza Strip reports the Jersualem Post:

Hamas's armed wing, Izzadin a-Kassam, has threatened to execute kidnapped IDF soldier Cpl. Gilad Schalit if the army enters Gaza, Israel Radio reported on Tuesday.

In an as-yet-unpublished statement to a Palestinian Web site, the group's spokesman, Abu Obaidah, was quoted as saying that if the IDF carries out a military incursion in Gaza, Schalit's life could be in clear danger, and he may even be killed. "One way or another, it is in the hands of Izzadin Kassam," Obaidah said in the statement. Shortly after the report was released, Hamas sources in Gaza denied that Abu Obaidah had made any such statement.

Okay, so no one is sure whether Hamas will murder Cpl. Schalit. Somehow that seems entirely fitting since no reputable third party (like say - the Red Cross) has been able to confirm that Cpl. Schalitt is indeed still counted among living.

Too bad the Olmert has so little creditability left that he cannot take Israel MK Yisrael Katz’s excellent suggestion and advise the Palestinian Authority; if Shalitt is murdered - its open season on the entire Hamas government and have anyone or their grandmother believe he’s is serious.

Scratching my head over this one

The Globe and Mail carries this report of a study showing that 40% of 3 ½ month old babies are already TV watchers.

Three-month-old babies are too little for solid food. They can't sit up by themselves and many can't sleep through the night. But 40 per cent of them are already watching television, according to a study published today.

The University of Washington study, which appears in the May edition of the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, is the first to identify how early in infancy babies are becoming TV viewers. The researchers also found that by the time they're two, a whopping 90 per cent of the soother set are tuning in.

I admit to scratching my head over this one. My, how times and the nature of babies has changed so radically since I last gave birth 12 years ago. At 3 ½ months, I would haven’t gotten any of my babies to sit peacefully and watch television for 5 minutes - let alone 20 minutes at a time.

By 2 years of age, mine were still constantly in motion nor could they have been left unsupervised in front of the television for 5 minutes (even with Barney on) without hostilities and chaos ensuing. I am not sure what to think of this radical change in the nature of babies. The first possible explanation that comes to mind is to question how old do you need to be before a doctor prescribes Ritalin in Kurt Cobain country?

Enough Already

Why can’t they just leave?

Misogyny is as misogyny does, and thy name is Saudi Arabia.

So much for UN Resolution 1701. Maybe it is long past the time to disband the UN.

PA Chairman cannot convince Hamas and other terror groups to accept US peace plan…and Israel is the “unstable” political partner.

Call me only partially engaged

I didn’t blog anything this morning for two reasons. One, I have another project on the go which is taking up a disproportionate amount of my time. Second, the news was only marginally interesting.

So I decided to do a post tonight of things which are only marginally interesting.

An alleged conservative was elected in France. Nicolas Sarkozy may very well be a conservative but two things to keep in mind. This is France and even George W. Bush was presented as an alleged conservative at one time.

The Kadima ruling coalition of the Israeli parliament survives three no-confidence votes in the Knesset. No surprise there and Olmert remains the Prime Minister of Israel.

US Secretary of State has cancelled her planned trip to Israel to help stream-line the peace process due to the uncertain political situation in Israel. I can’t help but find it telling that no matter how unstable the Palestinian Authority is nor how often it fails to live up to the most marginal of obligations in the “peace process” it is never “unstable” enough not to pamper or cater to its every outrageous whim.

Unstable Israeli ruling political coalitions are mother’s milk to Israelis. Just take a look at their history. While most Israelis want Olmert gone there is no political will among Knesset member to bring down his government at this time. Olmert is in power until he resigns or is defeated. The only thing that would cause Olmert to fall is if he commits some outrageous act of political suicide or did some dumb-ass thing like….offer to arm the Palestinian Authority or open the borders to Palestinian (wink, wink) workers. Oops! That is exactly what Rice wants.

The Hebrew University of Jerusalem announces the discovery of the tomb of King Herod. Palestinian denial coming by 11:00pm.

Palestinians are eating their young

Palestinian Authority security officials are claiming that an Al-Qaeda group attacked an UNWRA run elementary school in the Gaza Strip reports the Jerusalem Post:

Palestinian Authority security officials accused supporters of al-Qaida in the Gaza Strip of being behind Sunday's attack on an UNWRA-run school in Rafah in which one person was killed and six other injured. "There is no doubt that al-Qaida is operating in the Gaza Strip," said a senior PA security official. "Today's attack carries the fingerprints of al-Qaida."

Witnesses told The Jerusalem Post that at least 70 Muslim fundamentalists participated in the attack on the Omariya School, where UNRWA and PA officials were attending a celebration. The director of UNRWA operations in the Gaza Strip, John Ging, was inside the school at the time of the attack. He was not hurt as PA policemen whisked him away to a safe location.

"The protesters surrounded the school and began chanting slogans denouncing the event as immoral," said one witness. "Their main argument was that girls and boys were asked to dance together in violation of Islamic teachings. This is a false claim because I didn't see a mixed gathering." Another witness said the protesters hurled a number of hand grenades and opened fire from automatic rifles as participants prepared to leave the school premises. "It was a big and organized attack on the elementary school," he said. "This is something unprecedented. It's only a miracle that many people were not killed."

The dead man was identified as Suleiman Al-Shaer, a bodyguard for Fatah legislator Majed Abu Shamalah, who was one of the guest speakers at the celebration. According to a third witness, the protesters also opened fire at a vehicle belonging to UNRWA as it left the scene. He said at least two of the assailants were later captured by PA policemen. Five Palestinian journalists who were covering the event were wounded after being beaten by masked gunmen, according to the witness.

Local residents and PA security officials said the attackers belonged to a new Al-Qaida identified with Salafism - a school of thought that takes the pious ancestors [Salaf] of the patristic period of early Islam as exemplary models.

While it is not out of the realm of possibilities for another separate terrorist group to set up shop in the Gaza Strip; I just find it a tad unlikely that a new separate terrorist group is operating this openly against fellow Palestinians because the Gaza Strip is run under a clan-gang system. Keep in mind the Gaza Strip is a small area less than the size of the City of Toronto. It is also a place where either everyone knows everyone or is related to someone who knows someone who knows someone. (Read this excellent report from Ha’aretz called As Gaza Burns for background.)

To accept the thesis of Palestinian security officials is also to accept that an “al-Qaeda” like group prefers to target fellow Muslims when there are approximately 7.5 million Jews surrounding the Gaza Strip on 3 sides. I also find it very suspicious that this group made a point of deliberately targeting five journalists who were at the school covering the celebrations. Sounds like Fatah/Hamas/Islamic Jihad to me. And wasn’t it just last week a Hamas official and acting Speaker of the Palestinian Legislature Council was opening preaching in a mosque and calling for the death of Americans & Jews to the “very last one’?

As far as the attack on an elementary school being unprecedented in Palestinian society I must take issue. Long before Beslan; there was Ma’alot. And while one could say Ma’alot represented an attack on “Jewish” school children; hence the difference. I would suggest once a culture crosses this kind of psychological boundary, it is only a matter of time before that same pathology is used against one’s own children.

Hamas gives new meaning to the term "Blood Sports"

These Hamas guys just won’t take No for an answer. Ynet News Online is carrying a report that the Minister of Youth & Sports for the Palestinian Authority has been denied entry to the Netherlands. In fact, the Dutch authorities wouldn’t even let him off the plane when it landed.

Belgian police held a Palestinian minister on board his plane on Friday after Dutch authorities withdrew his visa to attend a conference in the Netherlands, Dutch authorities and conference organizers said. Youth and Sports Minister Bassem Naim, a Hamas member, arrived in Brussels on a flight from Egypt after being granted a visa by Dutch authorities in Tel Aviv. But he was prevented from disembarking by 10 Belgian police, said Majed al-Zeer, director of the London-based Palestinian Return Center and one of the organizers of Saturday's conference on Palestinian refugees.

"What happened on the flight was the humiliation of the Palestinian people," Al-Zeer told The Associated Press. "He was not even allowed to go to the toilet." Dutch Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmed Dadou said Naim had been granted a visa but that it was withdrawn on Thursday after checks revealed his Hamas affiliation. Dadou said Dutch authorities contacted Naim and made it clear he would not pass through Dutch immigration control. "We told him his visa was canceled from that moment ... and for that reason there was no way he would be able to get into the Netherlands by legal means," Dadou said. Naim tried to board an Amsterdam-bound flight Thursday night but was turned away, Dadou said. He then managed to get on an Egyptian plane from Cairo to Brussels on Friday. "Now he will be sent back with the first flight available," Dadou said.

Wow. The Palestinian Authority has a ministerial portfolio for Youth & Sports. Get your head around that idea. Of course, depending on how you define “youth, sport and Palestinian Authority” - will determine whether the idea of the Minister of Youth & Sports lecturing at a conference on the plight of Palestinian Refugees as downright bizarre or not.

The IDF takes on the Maccabees

The war on religious Jews continues in the IDF. Ynet News carries this report.

Hesder Yeshivas have long since been considered one of the strongest core groups within the IDF. Hesder, or arrangement, is a unique Israeli creation that allows religious young men to pursue Talmudic studies and later serve in the armed forces.

But their contribution is not without preconditions, and they so far have been allowed to serve in homogenous units comprised of only their fellow yeshiva recruits. Now Human Resources Directorate chief Maj. Gen. Elazar Stern, himself one of the army's top religious officers, aims to put an end to the practice.

New orders issued by Stern will bar hesder yeshiva students from joining the Golani and Paratrooper brigades, two of the most popular combat choices for religious recruits. The army will also change the manner in which it accepts hesder students to elite units.

Yeshiva educators accused Stern of having a vendetta against the program. Stern has spoken out against homogenous units in the past. The IDF denied the allegations and said that the hesder recruits "have received preferential treatment for many years and from time to time there are changes that stem from the army's changing needs."

A key thought to keep in mind concerning the “homogenous” units for Hesder yeshiva students means that these soldiers would not be serving directly along side women; as it violates religious rules. One has to stop and look at the motivation behind the IDF’s decision to actively terminate a key program which has produced some of Israel’s most motivated and dedicated combat soldiers.

It is not so much about “integration” as a way of actively discouraging religious Jews from participating in the IDF; hence, the outright ban on Hesher students/soldiers from joining the Golani and paratrooper brigades.

Their active participation in the IDF presents a two-fold problem. For those who believe Israeli security can best be maintained by pursuing an Auschwitz border policy - it leaves the IDF vulnerable to potential conflict when the government of Israel starts using soldiers to act as a bailiff’s in order to evict Jews from their homes.

Furthermore, it potentially trains “settlers” as combat soldiers. No current Israeli government, who is committed to Auschwitz border policies, wants the IDF to face the possibility of having to fight against settlers who are not only trained and forged in combat, but are trained to know how to actively plan a fight. It’s ironic that two millenniums later and in the Jewish state of all places; the idea of religious Jews fighting is an ideal which is too scary to fully realize.

Go Home

All the Israeli dailies are carrying reports of the protest in Rabin Square against the Olmert and the Kadima coalition government. Estimates of the crowds vary from 100,000 to 200,000 people have arrived to protest. Here’s the Jerusalem Post’s account:

Buoyed by what they said was a crowd of more than 200,000 Israelis from across the political spectrum who gathered in Kikar Rabin on Thursday night to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, rally organizers said they were planning a series of events with the same goal and would not stop until the prime minister had gone. Police put the crowd at 150,000.

The event's main organizer, Maj.-Gen. (res.) Uzi Dayan, told the crowd that "Democracy is in danger." The very committee that the prime minister established, Dayan said, had "stood before him and bravely said, 'Mr. Olmert, you have failed.'"

What is significant about the protest is not an exclusive leftwing-rightwing, religious-secular demonstration. For once, almost all the diverse segments that make up the Land of Israel have crossed their separate solitudes to be united under one idea – Olmert Go Home.

Update: I should point out that there was one group of Israelis who did not get behind the demonstration at Rabin Square. Peace Now.

Israeli Blond Ambition

Oh, my, my, Livni your ambition is showing. The Jerusalem Post is reporting that Kadima Foreign Minister Livni has publicly called for Olmert’s resignation in light of the Winograd interim report:

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni called upon Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to resign Wednesday, but the move appeared to backfire as the rebellion inside their Kadima Party appeared to peter out. When Olmert convened the Kadima faction at the Knesset, only three Kadima MKs came out against him: Livni, MK Marina Solodkin and coalition chairman Avigdor Yitzhaki. At the start of the meeting, Yitzhaki tendered his resignation and he was replaced by Olmert loyalist MK Tzahi Hanegbi.

Olmert's opponents said some lawmakers who had intended to criticize the prime minister decided at the last minute to remain silent. A defiant premier vowed to quash all attempts to force him to leave the Prime Minister's Office. "I am not in the most comfortable situation, but I am older than 60, I've seen a lot in my life and I've learned not to run from responsibility in any situation or condition," Olmert told the lawmakers.

Olmert decided against firing Livni on Wednesday, preferring to punish her by letting her fate remain undetermined. But the prime minister was angered by her behavior and he told her in a one-on-one meeting that she could not threaten him and expect to remain his No. 2. In a slap at Livni, Olmert told the cabinet, "Anyone who is impatient to use the Winograd Report for political gain will have to wait."

Some Olmert advisers warned him not to fire Livni because it could aid her campaign for the Kadima leadership, while others said her behavior warranted immediate dismissal. Tal Zilberstein, Olmert's strategic adviser, condemned Livni as an "unethical coward." He said Olmert had no choice but to fire her, because "in the business world, any No. 2 who says the No. 1 should go and she should stay would be fired."

Possible replacements for Livni include Transportation Minister Shaul Mofaz and former justice minister Haim Ramon, but Olmert could decide to keep Livni as foreign minister while removing her title of vice premier. Livni told reporters at her press conference that she intended to seek the Kadima leadership. If Olmert were to resign, the 25,000 Kadima members would elect a new chairman within two months.

"Kadima should elect its leader democratically in a primary, and when the time comes, I will be a candidate," Livni said. "A leader must be chosen whom the party and the public can trust." She told Olmert that resigning was "the right thing for him to do." Livni said she was not trying to topple him but to convince him that he should quit on his own volition.

Whether Olmert resigning is the right thing for him to do or not there is something unseemly with this Israeli version of a Belinda-lite suggesting he should resign while she should keep her position in cabinet and possibly assume the Prime Minister’s office chair. If she had any real convictions she would have resigned when Olmert didn’t.

Of course, Livni is typical of so-called blond ambition who wants it all but not the working for it part. Ynet News carried this little nugget from her press conference:

Livni warned however that she would not back no-confidence motions in the Knesset by opposition parties seeking to push Israel for new elections, saying that Kadima was the right platform to elect a new prime minister. "There were rumors that I was working to oust the prime minister. This never happened. That is a decision that he should take," Livni said.

"I believe that Kadima should stay and run the State of Israel. When the time comes, I will announce my candidacy for the party's leadership," she said. "I believe general elections would be a mistake as the State of Israel needs stability. If the prime minister decides to resign, I believe the Knesset can put a government together."

Here’s the real deal. If Livni had to face the Israeli electorate as leader of Kadima tomorrow; the party would go to 9-10 seats in the Knesset and the prime minister’s office would be nothing more than a dream and she knows it. She’d be eating Shas dust. Her best chance is to try to oust Olmert in a coup while Kadima remains the government.

But you know what I find strange. How come the Man most likely never to win an election has yet to stake out a claim?

Oh yeah, right. Blame me.

The Globe and Mail is carrying a report called "The New Sex Talk" and leads with this quote below the heading:

Kids are getting away with risky behaviours online because parents are afraid to ask about their Internet use

Oh yeah. Now you blame me.

I guess it's the downright preachiness of this article laced with the sinister undertone of 'blame the parents' which sticks in my craw. Let me tell you something, I have been trying to raise moral children for the last 16 years and it's been an uphill battle all the way. The clash hasn't been so much with my children themselves but the schools, the teachers, the child & youth care workers, the advertising & marketing agencies, the media, children's television etc.

Why I even have a provincial government which sees absolutely nothing wrong in attempting to indoctrinate behaviour patterns in my children by using an advertising campaign geared to "pre-teens/teens" which utilizes vulgarity and coarse language.

I have a school system which demands the right to teach my children about all manner of human sexuality, without morality or judgement, and there is very little I can do about. I am lucky if I even know what days sex education is taught in the elementary school classroom. My daughter, the Last Amazon, was only 10 when she came home to enlighten me on the various positions males take with other males during sex. Lucky for us, the public health nurse took the time to illustrate on the blackboard using stick men. I can object till the cows come home or I turn blue in the face but what is done is done and cannot be undone.

I have had an alleged Child & Youth Care Worker attempt to brow-beat me in front of my daughter because in my home, a 12 year daughter does not attend dances or go to school dances escorted by a 12 year old boy on a “date”. And no, I don’t care how I have negatively narrowed her socially development as a human being. As far as I am concerned - she has her whole life to grow out of it.

Since elementary school, I have my moral authority as a parent under constant attack by principals and teachers who respectively who fill my children’s head with their “alleged rights” but never take the time to advise the children under their care what their responsibilities are as decent moral human beings.

How do you think I feel after all these years of attempting to teach my sons not to objectify women as sexual objects, and then find myself with the boys at the streetcar stop only to have the street car pull up with a larger than life ad on the side showing; a teenage model pretending to be a grown woman, caught in a series of suggestive poses, dressed only in her panties and with her breasts practically falling out of her bra? Gee, well, thanks a lot Calvin Klein. Ask yourself why thongs need to be manufactured in little girl’s sizes and training bras now come in push-up styles. Ask yourself why, in this marketing savvy society - there are no stores selling age appropriate clothing for teenage girls or boys?

And if a group of concerned parents attempt to make a stand in public; who in the MSM stands up and says - you know they may have a point? Instead, the parents are demonized in the media at large for attempting to limit Suzie and Johnny’s right to explore and discover their sexuality before they develop any real sense of personal responsibility.

How is that if you suggest the age of sexual consent be raised from 14 to at least 16 years of age – you’re sexually repressed but everyone seems to be in agreement that 14 is far too young to raise a child or die from AIDS. Actually, so is 16, but don’t you know - age ain’t nothing but a number. So just who is responsible for the sexualization of our children?

It’s not me, and I am a tough old bird, but like I said, it’s an uphill battle. I understand how it is that other parents can fall by the wayside as the pressure to conform is beyond tremendous and your moral authority as parents usually lies in tatters by the time your children hit their prime teenage years. How much worse is it for our children when almost every teen movie/program (which has been produced specifically for their age) is heavily sexualized - just think Degrassi High for starters.

Is it any wonder that some of our children are behaving inappropriately online when the messages in the media celebrate vulgarity, coarseness and camp and our schools have spent years indoctrinating our children in human sexuality without the context of ethics or morals? But take heart, all is not lost, as our schools do teach one great moral lesson - to pass judgement on another is a sin.

A thought on kinder, gentler war and the jihad

I currently have around 75 books lying around the house unread and another 25 only partially read. I don’t know if I will ever finish at the rate I am going. Every week I seem to find another book I really must have, and so the piles grow and grow.

One of the books I have only partially read is called Samson Blinded: A Machiavellian Perspective on the Middle East Conflict by Obadiah Shoher. I am not prepared to give an opinion on Shoher’s ideas until I have finished reading the book and had a little time to mull it over, but I came to this paragraph today and it struck a cord in light of our own national dialogue and the role of Canadian Forces in Afghanistan:

Israel’s failure in Lebanon and the Soviet Union’s in Afghanistan, the two cases of successful defensive jihad after centuries of Muslim impotence have the same cause: the unwillingness of the stronger power to wage normal war, which let defenders hide among the civilians and strike at leisure. The only way to fight a war is brutally. The choice is not between humaneness and cruelty but between waging war and surrender. Starting a war without being prepared to fight it is a recipe for failure, emboldening jihadi.

I have no doubts that our armed forces can carry out the mission but are we, as a nation and a people, prepared to let them do what needs to be done to win? I think not. We are still far too busy trying to remake and sanitize the nature of war.

Quite the feat when you think about it

It never fails to amaze how Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert consistently makes US president George W. Bush’s poll numbers look outstandingly good.

Tunnel Vision Commissions

Caroline Glick’s latest column suggests the terms of focus for the Winograd Commission are far too narrow and she does have a point:

ONE COULD console oneself by saying that at least there is a commission for the Second Lebanon War. Three greater strategic failures that all devastated Israel's defensive posture have gone without any scrutiny whatsoever.

First, Barak's precipitous surrender of southern Lebanon to Hizbullah has avoided scrutiny not only by the Winograd Commission but by all other official bodies.
The second failure also played an important role in the Second Lebanon War, but has escaped examination. This is the Sharon government's decision to hand over the Gaza Strip in its entirety to Hamas and Fatah while expelling 10,000 Jews from their homes. This not only ensconced a Hamas-Fatah jihadist army within striking range of Israel's major population centers and cemented the belief that Palestinian terrorism would bring about Israel's national collapse through the gradual handover of all Israeli territory to terrorists; it also provided a safe base of operations for terrorists to conduct operations like the kidnapping of IDF Cpl. Gilad Schalit.

And, of course, the grandest of all Israeli failures was the Rabin-Peres government's decision to recognize the PLO and give it arms, land and legitimacy, ushering in the most deadly period of terrorism in Israel's history. This decision too, has never been scrutinized by a commission.

But, truly, the great pity is not that no commissions were formed to investigate these failures, as the Winograd Commission was formed to investigate the Second Lebanon War. The great pity is that Israeli society has yet to find the means to conduct a true public debate of our failures that could enable learning and corrective action.

If the Winograd report is to have any positive impact at all, it should be in beginning, not blocking the necessary public debate into the real sources of the failures last summer, and into the strategic failures of the Oslo process, and the withdrawals from Lebanon and Gaza. All of these call out for our attention and correction

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And never let it be said that no one warned the Barak government that the pull-out from Lebanon would not one day lead to the events of last summer:

Over the weekend, Ma'ariv reported protocols of cabinet meetings in the weeks which preceded the 2000 withdrawal where then IDF chief of staff Shaul Mofaz and then IDF OC Northern Command Gabi Ashkenazi begged Barak not to go through with the withdrawal precisely because the Hizbullah buildup and aggression were so predictable.

The withdrawal from south Lebanon was fomented by the Left with the propaganda support of the Israeli media and the financial support of the EU. Together, they worked to destroy the public consensus regarding the need to protect the North from Hizbullah and Iran. They propagated the lies that unilateral withdrawal would create an "invisible wall of international legitimacy" that would protect Israel from Hizbullah better than the IDF could, and that if Israel withdrew to the international border Hizbullah would abandon jihad and become a regular Lebanese political party. But the Winograd report will not discuss such things, because it conveniently decided to begin its inquiry with the period after the IDF had already surrendered southern Lebanon to Hizbullah.

A long time ago I gave up thinking the “land for peace” formula was a foundation for peace. If it had been, the Palestinians would have accepted their state when it was originally offered in 1948, or again in 2000. The intrinsic problem with the two state solution, and consequently; the current Road Map for Peace is that it’s designed on a premise that is innately false, which is why the Road Map leads precisely nowhere fast and will continue to do so.

The conflict has never been about the Palestinians receiving a separate state of their own but their inability to accept the creation of an Israeli one. I’d even go one step further and argue it was a long-term strategic mistake for Menachem Begin and the state of Israel to exchange the Sinai for the appearance of a peace treaty with the Egypt but that is a blog post for another time.

Olmert's Theme Song - I will survive

I came home from work and decided I’d better check in with Ynet News, in the off chance, I would have to publicly eat crow mixed in with mucho grande portions of humble pie concerning the state of politicking in Israel in light of the interim Winograd report:

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he would hold a special cabinet meeting to discuss the conclusions of the Winograd report on the failures during the Second Lebanon War. In a special TV address Olmert stressed that he would not resign, and said he planned to appoint a team devoted to "swiftly learning the report and implementing the lessons it requires."

At a meeting of Kadima ministers earlier, Olmert said, "The report is indeed harsh, but I have no intention of resigning. "I have no doubt that lessons must be learned," continued Olmert, "But Israelis have a tendency of not letting people correct their mistakes. There will be no possibility of drawing conclusions if we enter a political crisis. I intend to continue drawing these conclusions with you."

The atmosphere at the meeting was tense, especially after the first cracks appeared in the party's support for Olmert. Most of the ministers stood by Olmert, while Vice Premier and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni remained silent.

Apparently, Israel Our Home party (Yisrael Beiteinu) has resolved to remain part of the Kadima coalition and Ha’artez carried this comment from Labour MK Matan Vilnai:

Labor MK Matan Vilnai also cautioned against infighting. "Now is not the time for political battles," he said. "The future of the political figures will be determined by the public."

And this from a spokesman Shas:

Infrastructure Minister Eli Yishai of Shas said that it is imperative to implement the report rather than making it into an internal battle.

Yes, well there is that but… how is it one can now teach old dogs new tricks? I betcha Olmerts knows all the words to Gloria Gaynor’s ‘I will survive’ and is busy humming it now. I, on the other hand, will feast on grilled steak, salad and green beans.

Ynet News carries excerpts from the Winograd report here.