The Anglosphere Century

In this week’s Maclean’s Magazine Mark Steyn reviews Andrew Roberts’ new book,‘The History of the English Speaking People Since 1900'.

I haven’t read the book yet but Mark’s review brings it to the top of my list. Steyn at his best:

...that's one of the pleasures of Roberts' book: muscular polemical prose
that cheerfully invites an argument about something or other on almost every page.
[...]
The British jacket bears four flags - the Union Jack, the Stars and Stripes, the Southern Cross and the Maple Leaf (surely it should have been the Red Ensign).
[...]
Of the three great global conflicts of the 20th century - the First, Second and Cold Wars - who called it right every time? Germany: one out of three. Italy: two out of three. France: well, let's not even go there.
[...]
...for all our fetishization of multiculturalism, you can't help noticing that when it comes to the notion of a political west - a sustained commitment to individual liberty - the historical record looks a lot more unicultural and indeed.... uniregal.
And in classic Steyn style, Canada gets a realistic assessment:

...it's kinda hard to remember when the principal political party of our own demented Dominion peddles non-stop Canada Day smiley-face banalities about how "we are such a young country" (Paul Martin) - which, aside from being obvious tripe, gives us the faintly creepy air of a professional virgin.
[...]
...Canada is an instructive example: we are a solid presence in the first half of his story, yet all but entirely absent from the second. .....We are a wealthy G7 nation of 30 million people but chose under the cover of Trudeaupian narcissism to embrace global irrelevance.
[...]
...in their present political sensibilities, Canada is semi-French, Britain is
semi-European, and New Zealand is semi-bananas.

Great review!

Gullible Canucks?

Two polls regarding recent archeological ‘findings’:

CNN: Do you believe archeologists have found the remains of Jesus, Mary
Magdalene and their son? 24% Yes, 76% No

Globe and Mail: A new documentary suggests that Jesus may have been buried with a wife and son, do you believe this could be true? 61% Yes, 39% No

These kinds of polls are pretty crude but they suggest that twice as many Canadians as CNN respondents are sucked in by schemes to cash in on loopy theories about Jesus - as in ‘The Da Vinci Code’.

This also seems consistent with people’s willingness to sign on to global warming theory and Kyoto-type scams.

Virgin Airways’ green challenge - What’s in it for Branson?

Recently Virgin Airways tycoon, Sir Richard Branson, offered a $25 million prize for an invention which could efficiently remove CO2 from the atmosphere.

Dutch climate skeptic Prof. Hendrick Tennekes wonders why and does some calculations:

"I am an old-fashioned aeronautical engineer, so I did a few sums. First I had to find some data on the size of Virgin’s fleet. I looked that up with Google, and found these approximate numbers: 15 Boeings 747, 25 Airbus 340, 50 Boeings 737, 50 Boeings 737 New Generation."
[...]
"In my estimate the Virgin Airways fleet pollutes our world with close to 8 million tons of CO2 each year. At current CO2 market prices, that would cost Branson $200 million annually. No wonder he turns green. Can he afford it?"
[...]
Bottom line:
"He surely needs the technological fix he is angling for with his Virgin Airways
Mitigation Prize.

Here’s the whole article.

ATM fees - political micro-meddling

About a buck-and-a-half is the fee for using another bank’s autoteller machine (ATM). If the machine belongs to your own bank there’s no charge. Sounds reasonable to me.

But again this week, NDP leader Jack Layton was in the news demanding banks be legislated into reducing or eliminating ATM user fees. Can’t have those big, successful, profitable banks charging their customers for services! It’s not the commie-Canuck way. And, depressingly, finance minister Jim Flaherty had already felt compelled, by Jack’s previous press coverage, to send the banks a letter requesting they explain their fees.

Advocating this kind of micro-meddling in banks’ affairs borders on the lunatic. A short-list of reasons springs to mind:

- bank machines cost money to own and operate
- using an ATM is strictly voluntary - no one is forced to use them
- using another bank’s ATM is rarely necessary, almost always a convenience
- government micro-management of ‘free’ enterprise is folly, and a very slippery slope

I know Layton and his dopey Dippers just love to play Robin Hood heros to the ‘little-people’. But if he really wanted to help he would campaign to get government’s greasy fingers out of our pockets. Every time I spend $100 of hard-earned, already income-taxed money I get hit with mandatory additional taxes of $6 to $13 (and much more for beer and gas). A fee of, at most, $1.50 (plus tax?) for voluntary use of an ATM is a comparative bargain.

Governments do have a role in regulating banking and ensuring they don’t behave anti-competitively. However, mickey-mouse fiddling with ATM fees is ridiculous. But if the banks do cave in and cut these fees, expect to see fee 'adjutments' elsewhere to compensate.

People who carry guns

During the CBC’s ‘Politics’ show yesterday the press panel was shown a video clip of General Hillier’s "decade of darkness" speech about the devastating effect of Liberal budget cuts on the military. This was followed by a clip showing Liberal reaction and the ensuing discussion was about whether Hillier’s remarks were too political. The Toronto Star’s James Travers wasn’t happy. Then the Star’s Susan Delacourt blurted this weird little bit of Liberal paranoia:

Susan Delacourt [at 48:15]
"Yeah ...it actually segueways with what we were just talking about before too [it doesn’t ] ...and I don’t want to go too far on this for fear of walking out of here [??] (...nervous chuckle). But I do think we’ve got a disturbing thing going on, or it feels like we do, with the RCMP. Whether it’s... it’s people who carry guns getting political and sidling up to the government. Um..I think it makes everybody a little bit nervous, um, certainly makes me nervous..and ...um...yeah...uh."

Later Don Newman tried to bolster Delacourt’s nutty remarks by making reference to Harper’s having visited with RCMP Commisioner Zachardelli shortly after the election ("...they appeared to be new best friends").

Soldiers. With guns. In our cities. In Canada.

“Hack journalism” at the Globe and Mail

No punches are pulled when Bob Tarantino rips apart a recent Globe and Mail story criticizing Conservative appointments to Judicial Advisory Committees (JAC) :

[my bold]
"Canada's worst newspaper once again evidences why it so richly deserves the sobriquet with this piece of hack journalism ..."
[...]
"This is what passes for front-page analysis in reporting on the story..."
[...]
"Once you wade through the lousy reporting...."
[...]
"And you'll note that not only is even the torqued coverage at the Globe able to identify an unqualified appointment..."
[...]
"If you want a brilliant example of the double standards at play..."
[...]
"Here's the challenge for Canada's worst newspaper.....Then, and only then, would there actually be a news story here."

Not only does Tarantino do a terrific job of exposing the Globe story’s many deficiencies, he gives us an excellent tutorial on the JAC process while he’s at it.

Great stuff!

Global warming a myth, Al Gore nuts - Czech President

In a recent interview with a Czech economics daily, Czech President Václav Klaus expressed his views on man-made global warming. Some quotes:

Q: IPCC has released its report and you say that the global warming is a false myth. How did you get this idea, Mr President?

A: It's not my idea. Global warming is a false myth and every serious person and scientist says so.......

Q: Don't you believe that we're ruining our planet?

A: I will pretend that I haven't heard you. Perhaps only Mr Al Gore may be saying something along these lines: a sane person can't.

Read the whole interview.