Baird to Torontonians: "They should f--- off." (June 2009)

Today is not the first time that Conservative John Baird has said something nasty about Toronto.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/647684

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2009/06/09/john-baird-drops-the-f-bomb-on-ttc-streetcar-request.aspx

I'm finally on Twitter

I'm still trying to figure out this Twitter thingy.  My address is skinnydippercdn.

Here's a story that I left in the comment section under Norman Spector's blog

Big Bird and Mr. Snuffleupagus were walking down Sesame Street. All of the sudden, they saw a strange character who called himself Kory Teneycke.

Standing in front of Oscar the Grouch's trash can, Big Bird asked, "What is that thing with numbers on a line, and why are you holding it against Oscar's can?"

The Teneycke replied, "It's a measuring tape, and I'm going to build a new TV news station."

Snuffy asked, "Do you want to use Oscar's trash can because your new station will be full of CRAP?"

Big Bird and Mr. Snuffleupagus were so excited to see their new friend, Kory, that they told him to wait so that they could introduce him to their other Sesame Street friends. Away Big Bird and Snuffy went in search of others.

A few minutes later, the Sesame Street gang came back to Oscar's can. Oscar even woke up after a long miserable sleep and popped his head out of his trash can.

"Hey, what's going on?" Oscar grumbled.

Big Bird explained that he and Snuffy saw a new friend named The Teneycke. He wanted to use Oscar's can for a new TV news station. It would be called, "Sun TV News."

Oscar shouted, "I don't like anything that has a sun in it! I don't like that CRAP! There won't be any Sun TV News crap in my trash can! I only accept good crap--not crappy news CRAP!"

Big Bird shouted, "Kory! Where are you? My friends want to meet you!"

The Teneycke didn't appear. Except for Mr. Snuffleupagus, none of Big Bird's Sesame Street friends believed that Big Bird had a new friend. He must have been using his imagination.

Disappointed, Big Bird decided to head to his bird's nest. As he opened the side door, he discovered that his nest was missing. Instead, new arena seats and an ice rink were installed. Would Big Bird's home be the new home of the [new] Quebec Nordiques?

This episode has been brought to you by the letters, K, T, and by the category 2.


The Globe and Mail: Norman Spector: The real deal behind Fox News North

See page 54 of the latest comment section.

Kory Teneycke states that Canadians will not be obliged to pay for "Faux News North"

This what Kory Teneycke mentioned on CBC's News Network Power and Politics (September 3, 2010):

"We are not nor have we even asked for mandatory carriage of this station where Canadians would have to be obliged to pay."

TVA Group Inc. is seeking a Category 2 licence with "an exception to Broadcasting Regulatory Policy 2009-562 by applying for mandatory access."

The applicant argued that Sun TV News requires short-term and time-limited mandatory access by broadcasting distribution undertakings for a maximum period of three years to effectively expose and promote its programming to viewers across Canada.

The applicant stated that it was not seeking mandatory basic distribution, but only to be made available on cable and satellite distribution undertakings, allowing the public to have access to Sun TV News without any obligation to choose it.

As TVA Group Inc. defines mandatory access,  broadcasting distribution undertakings (cable and satellite distribution companies) would be require to carry the SUN TV news channel for a period of three years.  It is my opinion that BDU's would be required to carry it, but they would not be required to have it on their basic services.  They do have to offer SUN TV News to subscribers if they want it.

Kory Teneycke did not mention that when BDU's (cable/satellite companies) distribute broadcast signals, they are obliged to pay a per subscriber rate to each broadcaster of a signal.  If the CRTC accepts the TVA Group Inc.'s proposal, the CRTC will also set the rate that BDU's must pay to TVA Group Inc.  It might be 10, 15, or 25 cents per subscriber per month.  That means that even if we subscribers do not want to have Faux News North on our cable/satellite services, we will be required to pay for it anyway because of TVA Group Inc.'s request for mandatory access.

Under Kory's proposal, BDU's will be required to carry SUN TV News/Faux News North.  Cable/satellite subscribers will not be forced to watch it unless the BDU's decide to offer Faux News North on the basic service, or subscribers decided to order FNN as single channel or part of a package.  However, all subscribers will be forced to pay for Faux News Network for a period of three years whether we like it or not.  I will not like it!

Kory Teneycke is misleading Canadians when he states that Canadians will be obliged to pay for "Faux News North."

Interesting Links:

Broadcasting Notice of Consultation CRTC 2010-649 (Sun TV News licence application notice)

Broadcasting Act (1991, c. 11) 

Note: I could not find in the CRTC glossary any official definition of mandatory access.
 .
UPDATE: Under Broadcasting Notice of Consultation, click 2010-1182.  Save or open file DOCS-1420709-v1-2010-1188-2.  On page 7, one will find the following:

We believe that the appeal of CNN for Canadians comes from its program formats and it’s on air personalities.

Canadians do not watch CNN for hard news, but more for interview style and more opinioned programs like Larry King Live, Anderson Cooper 360 and Campbell Brown. These 3 programs are CNN’s most watched shows in English Canada.

Essentially, SUN TV News will be a news/entertainment channel where conservative shock jocks will spew their pro-Harper and pro-Conservative CRAP.  If one lives in Toronto and listens to CFRB radio (1010 AM), one can hear the news shock jocks spew their garbage.  SUN TV is not going to have news journalists; it is going to have news entertainers who will interpret the news so that the channel can entertain Canadians, but not inform them.

Sarah Palin's "I have a dream" speech (Satire)

From the word's of Sarah Palin's mouth:

I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five years ago, a great American by the name of George W. Bush, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed some document. This momentous degree came as a great flashlight of hope to millions of African American who had been burnt in the flames of some kind of injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the African American still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the African American is still sadly crippled by the manicures of segregation and the necklaces of discrimination. One hundred years later, the African American lives on a lonely island of Hawaii in the midst of a vast ocean of a lot of things. One hundred years later, the African American is still eating linguini in the corners of American society and finds himself an Excel in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shampoo conditioner.

In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote big words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promise keeper note to which every American was to fall here. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men...you know, those African American men... as well as white men and women, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happyness." I saw that movie.  It was really great!  It is obvious today that America has defaulted on that note, on a sofa as her citizens of color (you know black people—I mean those Africans) are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the African people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."  I’m not sure what that means, but it seems pretty bad.

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.  I think this sounds pretty good!

We have also come to this hollowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the bad drug of slowism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desso-late valley of splitting people apart to the sunlit path of Rachel justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of Rachel injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the African American's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. These are big words!  Twenty-ten is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that those Africans needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. And there will be neither rest nor trankwilly in America until the African is granted his citizenship rights. The tornados of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice E-merges.  I like computer talk.

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice—I think it’s Wal-Mart: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of Starbucks coffee. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of niceness and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence like the Muslims are doing—not all of them, just the bad ones. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with sole force.

The marvellous new militancy which has engulfed the African community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. And they have come to realize that their freedom is inextr... bound to our freedom. 

We cannot walk alone.

And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead.

We cannot turn black.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the African American is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of bad brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the African's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating: "For Whites Only." We cannot be satisfied as long as a African in Alaska cannot vote and a African in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until "justice rolls down like waters, and to the right of us like a mighty stream."

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations.  I love those tribbles on Star Trek.  Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. And some of you have come from areas where your quest -- quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of bad brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Alaska, go back to those other places, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. 

Let us not swallow in the valley of this pair, I say to you today, my friends.

And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal”—unless they are gay.  I have gay friends.  They’re great so long as they don’t want to get married because I am for traditional marriage between a man and a woman.

I have a dream that one day on those hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.  IKEA has great tables!

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with a lot of heat, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my poor little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. 

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vick-see us racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with those sex words “intercourse” and “Nelly f*ckation”-- one day right there in Alabama little African boys and African girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers just as long as the boys don’t hold hands with each other.  Same with the girls.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be extra salted, and every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the gay places will be made straight; "and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together."

This is our hope, and this is the faith that I go back to the South of Alaska with.

With this faith, we will be able to hoe out of the mountain of the pair of stones of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling of the cords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to Alaska together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And this will be the day -- this will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

My country 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim's pride,

From every mountainside, let freedom ring! 

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the big hilltops of New Hampshire.

Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.

Let freedom ring from the heightening Alphaghettis of Pennsylvania.

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.

Let freedom ring from the bikini slopes of California.

But not only that:

Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, African men and white men, Jews and good Muslims, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old African American song:

                Free at last! Free at last!

                Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

Persichilli: Prime Minister aims to give his caucus more influence

...or less.

Prime Minister Harper wants to have six Conservative MPs and three senators assigned to each cabinet minister for consultations on future bills.  While this may appear to be an improvement in democracy, this takes away from each cabinet minister and Conservative MP to consult with each other.  Under Harper's proposal, I will assume that Harper will appoint the MPs and senators to sit on each committee.  Essentially, a Conservative expert on the environment (sounds like an oxymoron) may be appointed by Harper to work under a cabinet minister responsible for transport or veterans affairs.  That MP or senator won't be able to consult with any cabinet minister of his or her choice.  I also wonder if this is a way to lessen any influence of parliamentary committees by having Conservative only consultative bodies which will probably be a one-way monologue from the Prime Minster to the cabinet ministers and then to the Conservative MPs and senators.

Toronto Star: Persichilli: Prime Minister aims to give his caucus more influence

Stephen Harper and his Conservatives support nudists

Stephen Harper and his merry Conservatives are returning to their progressive roots. I, Skinny Dipper, am very proud that the prime minister and his Conservative government are spending Canadian taxpayers' money on the bare-essentials such as providing a great recreational environment for the nudists of Canada.  I strongly believe that Canadians including fellow skinny dippers like myself who support nudists going au naturel should vote for Stephen Harper's Conservatives in the next federal election.  This is all thanks to Stephen Harper's Canada's Economic Action Plan!  See photos (G rated).