Ponderables
Is there a difference between being the bravest and being the least scared?
Why do so many vegans feel compelled to spend so much time preaching to the rest of us?
Does Ontario Premier Doug Ford take it as a compliment when people compare him to Donald Trump?
If Toronto Blue Jays owner Rogers Communications Inc. can afford a payout of thirty-eight million dollars to Troy Tulowitzki, why can’t it afford to hire more people so that a telephone call to them doesn’t result in being on hold for an hour and a service call doesn’t require a wait of two or three days?
Things I Firmly Believe
Whenever anyone insists on a quick answer it should always be “no.” It’s always easier to change a no to a yes than vice versa.
One of the cruelest things you can do to your family is to die without a will.
More Trudeau Absurdity
Last week I wrote about Prime Minister Trudeau’s absurd insistence on referring to illegal immigrants as “irregular” immigrants. I’ve had another of his linguistic absurdities pointed out to me.
While speaking at the G20 meeting in Argentina a couple of weeks ago, Prime Minister Trudeau said, “Women entrepreneurs tend to make better choices than others.” (Italics added).
What “others?” I guess he didn’t have the guts to say “men.
Correctional Services Canada Just Doesn’t Get It
In 2009, Terri-Lynne McClintic and her boy friend Michael Rafferty, in one of the most heinous crimes in Canadian history, kidnapped, tortured, raped, and murdered eight-year-old Victoria Stafford. In 2012 they were found guilty of first degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. But what is going on with Correctional Services Canada when it comes to these two despicable, sadistic criminals?
Earlier this year it was revealed that Corrections Canada had transferred McClitic to an Indigenous “healing lodge,” which many observers likened to a spa. At the time, both Prime Minister Trudeau and Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale essentially lied by saying there was nothing they could do about it. After a national outcry, Trudeau and Goodale quite rightly reversed themselves and McClintic was returned to prison, but to a medium security facility.
This week it became known that Rafferty was also quietly transferred to a medium security prison last March. When Stafford’s father, upon hearing rumours to this effect last month, asked Corrections Canada whether this was true, he was stonewalled. When questioned in the House of Commons about this latest Corrections Canada travesty, Minister Goodale said he would “examine” the matter. At least this time he didn’t lie.
I’m betting most Canadians think that a medium security facility is far too lenient for these two abhorrent monsters and that they, like Paul Bernardo, should be in a maximum security prison.
Prime Minister Trudeau has famously stated that, when it comes to the treatment of criminals, “We have to look at root causes.” I can’t help but muse about whether his attitude plays a role in Corrections Canada’s unfathomable leniency in these instances. Well, Justin, the root cause in the Stafford case is clear: McClintic and Rafferty are evil people. And, heads should roll at Corrections Canada.
Dealing With Baseball’s Shift Problem
The interest-killing baseball shift is apparently befuddling the game’s deep thinkers. It seems to me there are two simple solutions. 1) Insist that batters either bunt or try to hit to the opposite field. 2) Enact a rule that, when a pitch is being delivered, there must be two infielders on each side of second base and each must have at least one foot on the infield dirt.
The problem is that the first solution would require one-dimensional power hitters to put the team ahead of their own self-interest, which these spoiled, overpaid players are loathe to do, and the second would require co-operation between the owners and the players association, neither of which hide-bound, stubborn baseball traditionalists seem ready to adopt.
Keith Richard’s Announcement
The Rolling Stones’ Keith Richard, who will turn seventy-five next week, announced earlier this week that he has quit drinking, which spurred me to muse that if ever there was a body that should be bequeathed to science it’s his.