It seems like the non-confidence motion againts Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was easily defeated. Likud’s motion, which had accused Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of refusing to quit despite his failures was defeated by a 46 to 33 vote. Then Yisrael Beiteinu (Israel Our Home) proposed a no-confidence motion due to the government’s failure to fight terrorism in Gaza. The measure was once again defeated by a 54 to 26 vote. Olmert's minority government has once again managed to stay in power. I fully understand now how Olmert had managed to do this. Given these facts, I understand why the people of Israel have such a hard time to get rid of the Olmert government. With the support of Olmert's Kadima radical Left, along with Meretz, which Yossi Beilin had announced that it would block all non-confidence votes, along with the support of the Arab parties, Olmert was able to survive the no-confidence votes. So what you have here is an Olmert style "Check-Mate". I understand that Olmert needs to retain 61 seats to remain in power. So that means that if any of the parties such as the Shas, Likud, or Yisrael, leave the Olmert government, it should be enough to bring down the Olmert government. So why is the Olmert government still in power? It seems like Ehud Barak's Labor party will not leave the Olmert government even though he is under enormous and growing pressure from the reservists to fulfill the pledge he made last year to take the Labor party out of the government if the report determines that Olmert failed in his leadership of the 2006 Lebanon war. Unfortunately, Barak today is doing everything he can to back out of that promise. Barak also knows that if Labor leaves the government, the Likud, not Labor, has a good chance to be elected to form the next government. And so Barak would rather stay with Olmert than allow the people to elect Netanyahu. The people of Israel have now only one alternitive to bring the Olmert government down, before Olmert and Bush lock Israel into the Annapolis Peace Plan that will establish a Palestinian terrorists state within the nation of Israel. Anyway, that is their problem they have to deal with.

On the home front, a Jan. 14 Strategic Counsel poll for CTV and The Globe and Mail found party support breaks down as follows: Conservatives: 36 per cent ; Liberals: 30 per cent ; NDP: 14 per cent ;Bloc Quebecois: 11 per cent ;Greens: 10 per cent. Given this poll, the Harper government has little to fear if the Liberals or NDP forces an election soon. None of the parties have anything to offer that will defeat the Harper government.

Dr. Charles Smith faces public inquiry into Pediatric Forensic Pathology in Ontario. Smith was once considered top-notch man in his field of forensic child pathology in 1999. For 24 years, Smith worked at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children. After his initial training at Sick Kids, as the Toronto hospital is known, Smith began conducting child autopsies in 1981. He started with children who had died of accidental and natural causes. By the late '90s, Smith saw more forensic child cases than any other pathologist across the country. He had conducted more than 1,000 child autopsies. But in June of 2005, Dr. Barry McLellan, Ontario's chief coroner, started the review of 45 child autopsies conducted by Smith between 1991 and 2002. The review, released in April 2007, found that Smith had made mistakes in 20 cases involving the deaths of children. The review cast doubt on criminal convictions in 13 of the cases. An Ontario coroner's inquiry reviewed 45 child autopsies in which Smith had concluded the cause of death was either homicide or criminally suspicious. The coroner's review found that Smith made questionable conclusions of foul play in 20 of the cases - 13 of which had resulted in criminal convictions. The people who were falsely accused had spent years in prison on murder charges. After the review's findings were made public in April 2007, Ontario's government ordered a public inquiry into the doctor's practices. "I am very surprised with the overall results of the review, and concerned," McLellan said. "In a number of cases, the reviewers felt that Dr. Smith had provided an opinion regarding the cause of death that was not reasonably supported by the materials available for review". The chief coroner said the results of the review were being shared with defence and Crown attorneys involved in all of the relevant criminal cases. When all this began to come out, I recall that CBC "Fifth Estate" made an investigation on Smith for their documentary. At that time, Smith was very belligerent and showed not an ounce of remorse for sending those poor people to prison based upon his child-death investigations. Instead, Smith had left Sick Kids in 2005, and ran away to Saskatoon and had accepted a pathology position there. He was fired after three months. A tribunal later reinstated him, but without a license, Smith was unable to practice in Canada. Then he went out of the country and practiced his trade as a teacher in pediatric forensic pathology. He taught people his wrongful method to identify a child's death from causes of abuse. During all that time, Smith, a fine Christian that he is had shown no remorse for the harm he had done. Now that he came back to Canada to face his accusers, we find out that the disgraced pathologist had admitted to the public inquiry yesterday, he was biased in favour of the prosecutors and child advocates. Smith had made that surprising revelation while explaining for the first time why he erred in so many child-death investigations. "I honestly believed it was my role to support the Crown attorney. I was there to make a case look good," he acknowledged in his first day of testimony before the Inquiry into Pediatric Forensic Pathology in Ontario. Smith was profusely apologetic for his mistakes, saying "sorry" no fewer than 20 times throughout the day. "I have come to appreciate the mistakes that I made and I am sorry for them," he said. Smith admitted he lacked sufficient training in forensic pathology and that he was "profoundly ignorant" about how to conduct himself as an expert witness in a courtroom. He also said he was disorganized and chronically tardy. As a member of the Christian and Missionary Alliance, Smith says he has been fuelled by his life's purpose, finding out the truth for parents who have lost babies. Finding out the truth he says. He would not know truth if it was slapped right in his face! He should have been seeking the truth about his apostate Baal religion! Can you imagine that this guy had sent so many people to jail based upon his truth! Thank GOD for Dr. Barry McLellan, who had taken the time to review Smith's questionable conclusions of foul play in the 13 cases which had resulted in wrongful criminal convictions. Smith's saying "sorry" does very little to those people who were sent to jail because of this man's falty child-death investigations. Smith no longer practises pathology. I hope the courts have learned something from this inquiry. They had played a big part in those wrongful convictions. It is a hard thing to have to find out that people like Smith, who are Christians, are not so infallible as some people seem to think.

Jan. 28 2008 ; Today was a very mild day which is a relief from the intense cold weather we had for the past week. It was nice to go out with Buddy and enjoy the balmy 2°C / 35°F weather. I want to enjoy this because freezing cold weather is heading our way from the west where it is -40°C in Alberta and -50°C in Saskatchewan. After I got home and while making lunch,

Jan 30th, 2008; This morning it is raining and still very mild. In Vancover, it is a different story. Vancouver normally has very mild winters where it rains a lot during the winter season. Not this time according to CTV News Staff. Night-time temperatures there have turned a snowy day in to an icy night, with drivers being warned to take things slowly if they're out on the roads. After a day that saw up to four centimetres of snow come down on parts of the city and dozens of car accidents slow the morning commute to a crawl, many side streets throughout the city remain unplowed. Snow tires or not, this hasn't stopped drivers, causing many snow-packed roadways to become icy as the mercury drops. A CP train derailment closed the West Coast Express rail system, leaving many commuters struggling for a new way to work. The five West Coast Express trains carry roughly 5,000 passengers into the city each morning, dramatically increasing pressure on the Skytrain service -- where passengers were already facing travel times more than double what they were used to. A spokesperson for CP rail said no one was injured and no environmental damage was caused by the derailment, which occurred just before 2 a.m. Multiple cars and a public bus were involved in a collision on Highway 1, a second bus slid and blocked a main throughfare and many other transit vehicles found themselves at least temporarily stuck in their snowy tracks. No injuries were reported. In Alberta and Saskatchewan, Artic winds blew its frigid temperatures across Alberta and Saskatchewan, prompting extreme weather warnings as wind chills plunged toward a deadly -50 C in some communities. Drivers shivered as they tried to start their vehicles and then spun their tires and fishtailed on snow-covered roads made icy by the deep freeze. In southern Saskatchewan police advised against highway travel altogether. With the wind chills and the bitter temperatures this is the coldest cold snap since last year. The average person has a chance of exposed skin freezing in probably a couple of minutes. The smart thing to do is don't head out if you don't have to. The Prairies are in for it for the next few days. We are suppose to get this type of weather in the next few days. People in our area are use to this type of extreem weather. I have to teach computer skills this morning at the library. Then I plan to take Buddy out for a brisk walk, rain or not. The temperature is suppose to drop later on today and there is a flash freeze warning going out, from the weather forecaster. The roads will be extremely icy and it will be dangerous driving on the roads or walking around for pedestrians. I notice that the barometer had dropped suddenly and is quite low, which tells me that the winter storm front is not far away. We will get the bitter Artic cold, sooner than expected. The Artic blast arrived by 10 AM with strong winds. By 11 o'clock, the wet roads had turned into a sheet of ice. By the time I had finished the computer class, we were back in the deep freeze which made me yearn for global warming. I let Buddy out just long enough to do his toilet, and we went back inside straight away. I spent my time doing some housework and then my laundry. With that done, I browsed the web on my cpmputer for the latest world and local news. I then settled down to read a novel while the Artic storm blast was raging outside my window. I spent a quiet evening with Buddy sleeping at my side.

Jan. 31st, 2008; A 12-year-old Ontario boy, from Amherstburg, remains in critical condition after being run over by a snow-grooming machine while on a school ski trip with his parents. They were at the Mount Brighton Ski Area on Wednesday when the boy lost control and skied in front of the machine as it was grooming the snow. The snow-grooming machine dragged the boy for 40 to 60 metres before the operator realized what had happened. It took about an hour to free the injured boy from the machine.

There are more problems in East Africa according to Ben Curtis of Associated Press. Violence in Kenya's Rift Valley was aimed at pushing people out of the region, which was an organized effort to push out people from the Rift Valley. The Rift Valley was the scene of the worst violence anybody had ever seen. Thousands of people had set homes ablaze, smashed shop windows to loot goods and set up blazing roadblocks where they hunted for rival tribespeople. The cycle of retaliation has gone too far and has become more dangerous. Violence in Kenya has flared since the results of a disputed presidential election were announced on Dec. 27, sending the incumbent Mwai Kibaki back to office. Supporters of his rival, Raila Odinga, claim that he had won the vote. Jendayi Frazer who is the U.S. envoy to the east African country called this incident "ethnic cleansing which had been an organized effort to push out people from the Rift Valley. The original aim was not to kill, it was to cleanse people out of the region. This situation, said Frazer, "It is clearly ethnic cleansing. I don't consider it genocide." Thank you for making that distinction. I did not know there was a difference between ethnic cleansing and genocide. Hummmmm; Maby the Jewish people over in Israel should do a little "ethnic cleansing" of their own.

The resignation of Olmert himself does not appear to be on the horizon, based on statements his aides have made since the release of the Winograd report. Interior Minister Roni Bar-On, who is a close friend of Olmert and the most outspoken Kadima spokesman regarding the Winograd Report, was asked why Olmert should not take responsibility and resign, he responded by saying that; "Taking responsibility doesn't always mean quitting; sometimes it means remaining in order to repair, as the Winograd Report implies as well." Israeli people, including Barak, need to consider that Olmert had lied about his direct input and interference with IDF Generals and their plans during the 2nd Lebanon War. The Winograd Report unfairly put all the blame on the IDF, concerning the stated goals and the authorized modes of actions which led to the failures of the 2nd Lebanon War. The IDF Generals were trying to minimize the casualties and deaths of their troops, as any good army heads would do by sending its jet's to bomd the enemy encampments. Frankly, we did not need this Winograd report to tell people that Olmert had handeled the situation very poorly and clearly shows he is not a suitable Prime Minister for Israel, given that he is ever so ready to give up large chunks of Israeli lands which will put the nation of Israel in great jeopardy, with that so-call "Annapolis Peace Plan" which President George W. Bush lays out a vision for a ridiculous “peaceful” future between Israel and those Arab "Palestinian" terrorists with the creation of a Palestinian terrorist state within the land which rightfully belong to Israel. There is no doubt that some mistakes were made on the part of the IDF, but the Winograd report itself tells much about how it concluded its findings which had shifted all or most of the blame on the IDF, in which decisions were made which resulted in the failure of the 2nd Lebanon War. Regarding Barak, the report as stated, gives Barak ample excuses on which to decide to remain with what the majority of the Israeli people consider the present Olmert government as being corrupt and inept. Personally, I am not surprise that the Winograd report had little effect upon the Olmert government, given the understanding of how the government system is set up in Israel. From what I have been able to learn, it is not what I would call a true democratic government, given what previous and present Israeli governments are allowed to do or are able to get away with. Such as presenting a party platform, and then when elected in power, make a complete 180 degree reversal of its policies which they had run their electoral campaign upon. Such a thing would never be tolerated in our Canadian parliamentary system. Another thing I notice about the present Israel government system is that the ruling parties are not accountable to those who had placed them in office or to the general population. They do not necessarily reflect the concerns of its Israeli citizens, but are rather more concerned in how other nations perceive their policies or actions even though it may not be in the best self interest to the nation of Israel or of its people. Frankly, their political or governmental system do not reflect the intelligence the Israeli people truly possess. Which in itself seem to be in contradiction to their potential. It is a sad situation. Update; Ehud Barak has decided to stay in the Olmert government, reneging on a campaign promise he made during Labor's primary elections last year and outraging fellow Labor Knesset Members. Barak heads the second-largest party in the coalition, made the announcement Sunday morning, thereby securing the continuence of the Olmert government in the wake of the Winograd report. Barak's decision to break that promise was met with fierce condemnation. Such is the political state in Israel.

Well, that Artic fridgid blast did not last long in our locality. For today we have a clear sunny day and it is only -19 °C / -2 °F . I have always maintained that this area is a little part of GOD's country. We were hardly efected by this latest winter storm blast which had swept across Canada. I see that P.E.I. (Prince Edward Island) on the East Coast of Canada did not fare so well after that severe winter ice storm had swept through that area. Roughly 22,000 homes , representing a third of the Islanders, are still without power as the province continues to feel the effects of that icy winter storm that hit the Island. Defence Minister Peter MacKay has offered P.E.I. the services of the Canadian Armed Forces to help the residents who were effected by the ice storm. With traffic lights out for three hours on Wednesday afternoon, traffic in the city of Charlottetown was a snarly mess. Sault Ste. Marie had also been affected by Wednesday's windy winter weather. The storm halted city buses, stalled mail delivery and cut power to 3,500 of its residents. Violent winds and whiteouts had paralyze the city and highways were forced to be closed. It was one of the worst snowstorms they have seen. "With so many agencies and businesses closing down and such wild conditions, this is the most (closures) I've seen in years," said police officer, Sgt. Lisa Kenopic of the Sault Ste. Marie police office.

Feb. 2nd; 2008; Well, Irene and Woody are taking a two month vacation and are heading south like a couple of snowbirds. It is the first extended vacation Irene and Woody had ever made. I wish them well and hope they will have a safe journey in their motor home as they head south to Arizona, USA. May they have happy trails. It seems that the same snow storm which had swept through our area had caused more than 500 accidents in southern Ontario. That snow storm had also pounded Quebec pretty hard, making life difficult for drivers and cancelling flights due to blowing snow which had reduced visibilities to nearly zero. Catching up with news around the world, China has been hit hard from three weeks of crippling snowstorms which swept across China. The winter storms have inflicted $7.5 billion in damages. The government of China announced a $700 million relief fund for farmers who had been effected by the winter storms. Given all the winter storms and freezing temperatures people are experiencing around the world, I really need to be reminded how quickly Global Warming is heating up the planet. There was a bomb which tore through a packed bus carrying civilians on Saturday in central Sri Lanka, killing 20 people and wounding 50 others. Violence has intensified on the island of Sri Lanka after the government had withdrew from a ceasefire with the Tamil rebels last month. The bus attack came a day after government troops attacked rebel bunkers along the front lines on the island embattled north, triggering a battle that killed 10 guerrillas and two soldiers, the military said. I see that Muslims are up to their old tricks again. This time they had used two mentally challenged women, who were strapped with remote-control explosives, as unwitting suicide bombers. The blasts brought carnage at two pet bazaars, killing at least 73 people and twice as many people were severely injured in the deadliest attack since Washington had flooded the capital of Iraq with extra troops last spring. The coordinated blasts, coming 20 minutes apart in different parts of the city, in a predominantly Shiite area in southeastern Baghdad was perpetuated by al Qaeda. Iraqi insurgents are constantly shifting their strategies and do not care who they use in their attempts to unravel recent security gains around the country. Women have been used in ever greater frequency in suicide bomb attacks lately. Rae Muhsin, a 21-year-old owner of a cell phone store, said; "I ran toward the bird market and saw charred pieces of flesh, small spots of blood and several damaged cars. I thought that we had achieved real security in Baghdad, but it turned out that we were wrong." This is the face of Islam, be it Shuni or Shiite, that people in Iraq and Afghanistan adhere to. And they claim to represent GOD. What a sick, demented joke, that is! Islam had brought death and destruction to the world.

Feb. 4th/ 2008; Nearly five years after being taken into custody by U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Canadian citizen Omar Khadr was charged for the second time on April 24, 2007 with five counts including conspiracy, murder and supplying material support to terrorism. All charges were dismissed by the military commission judge at a subsequent arraignment hearing on June 4. While the U.S. government appeals the ruling, Omar Khadr remains in detention at Guantánamo Bay. Amnesty International is concerned that Omar Khadr – now 20 years of age that his fundamental human rights continue to be denied. I read in the CTV News that Omar Khadr's lawyer says he will argue today to have his client designated as a child soldier and will challenge virtually all of the charges against the 21-year-old being held in Guantanamo Bay. Essentially, he is challenging all the various indictments against Omar Khadr. Omar Khadr is accused of the murder of U.S. medic Sgt. First Class Christopher J. Speer. Khadr is also charged with spying, conspiracy and supporting terrorism. Omar Khadr's lawyer is challenging the definition of terrorism, particularly that Omar Khadr is being detained as a terrorist. Omar Khadr was in fact found to be in the company with the al-Qaeda terrorist group. Khadr, who is a Canadian, was 15 years old, who's family had moved back to Afghanistan, when he was captured by U.S. forces in 2002, and was transferred from Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan to the detention facilities at Guantánamo Bay. But according to recent news, an eyewitness is claiming that a second enemy fighter was alive inside the compound when he had entered it, casting doubt on the government's conclusion that Khadr was the person who had hurled the grenade. Depending on the credibility of the witness, that alone should raise questions as to who had thrown the grenade which had killed U.S. medic Sgt. First Class Christopher J. Speer. This witness account was included in motions handed out to reporters at a pretrial hearing for Khadr, whose case is on track to become the first to go to trial at Guantanamo Bay. Given that there is some doubt about who had in fact killed U.S. medic Sgt. First Class Christopher J. Speer, Omar Khadr should be entitled to a civil trial at an American court of law in the USA, where he can be defended properly, rather than in a closed military trial without adequate access to counsel, without the presumption of innocence or even proof of guilt beyond reasonable doubt, and without the right to appeal. But to claim that Khadr is a child is absurd. This guy was fifteen years old, well into an age of accountability. He was found with a terrorist group and was taught how to use hand granades and guns to kill just as effectively as any adult terrorist. It is not as if he were 7-9 years old where he may not have any sense of what was going on. Please do not try to insult my intelligence and try to convince me that a 15 year old do not know the difference between what is right or wrong or that he did not know that he was hanging out with terrorist. Omar Khadr faces serious charges and, if convicted, could face up to life in prison. According to a Jan. 12th. 2006, CTV and other News report, Omar Khadr is born to Arab parents who emigrated to Canada from Egypt in 1977, the six Khadr children grew up mostly in Afghanistan and Pakistan during the 1980s and 1990s. They were reared in an atmosphere of religious and political extremism that was hostile to Western values. Omar was brought up to believe there is only one way, the Muslim way, and that the dream of every young man should be getting to paradise by dying as a martyr. Omar Khadr's father was on a U.N. list of those associated with terrorism. Omar Khadr fervently believed that Afghanistan should be a Muslim state and that the United States was the enemy of Islam. After the 9/11 event, Omar claimed he didn’t feel sorry about that. , Islam attacked the enemy. It was Islam taking revenge against the United States. As a family, they reportedly once spent a month living in Osama bin Laden's Afghan compound and the al Qaeda mastermind even attended eldest daughter Zaynab Khadr's wedding. The four sons also attended al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan. After the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, the Khadr family fled Afghanistan when U.S. forces invaded. Omar Khadr father, Ahmed Said Khadr, was a reputed al Qaeda financier and friend of bin Laden. He was killed in a gun battle in Pakistan in 2003. The youngest son, Karim, was paralysed in the same attack that killed his father. He returned to Canada with his mother in April 2004 to get medical treatment. Another son, Abdurahman, spent more than a year in U.S. custody before being allowed to return to live in Canada. Both Khadr daughters live in Toronto. Can anyone explain how a family like the Khadrs, who has a long history with Islamic terrorists, was ever allowed entry into Canada, and allowed to continue to live in this country?

Feb. 6th/ 2008; I read today in the news that Tornadoes had ripped through sections of Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi in which at least 58 people were killed and hundreds were injured in Southern U.S.A. The tornadoes ripped through the southern U.S.A, tossing vehicles like if they were dinky toys and tearing through homes. Isn't that area known as the "bible" belt? These poor people had encountered their own privet hell, that these people are always talking about. These people can expect more of the same in the future, I am sad to say. That same winter storm system has moved northward and is hammering southern Ontario as commuters are facing a wet, sloppy drive this morning. The Ontario Provincial Police say they are receiving crash reports every 3.5 minutes. All the main highways have been plowed, but Toronto's city streets are in very bad shape. "We want people to slow down," Toronto Police Const. Mig Roberts told CTV Toronto. Winter storm and freezing rain warnings were in effect from Windsor to Kingston as the storm slowly tracked northeast with its combination of snow, rain and freezing rain. The snow has largely stopped, with 16 centimetres on the ground at Pearson International Airport. Pearson is reporting many flight delays and cancellations, with passengers being advised to check on flight status before heading out to the airport. More snow fell in areas west of Toronto. The north shore of Lake Erie has received about 25 millimetres of rain and freezing rain. but it could be worse today around noon when a second round of snow is expected to be dumped on the area. The system, coming in from the U.S., is expected to hit Ottawa by Wednesday evening before moving east to Montreal then over Fredericton and Halifax by Thursday. southern Ontario is bracing for the second wallop in this complex storm which packs a double whammy, Environment Canada says. The first front which had hit southern Ontario overnight, dumped heavy snow, with a mix of ice pellets, rain or freezing rain Much of the region could see an added 15 centimetres of snow from the second winter storm front that will hit southern Ontario by this afternoon or evening.In our own area at Temiskaming Shores, we just got a little bit of snow along with average winter tempatures that is quite common for our area.

CTV News has learned that Prime Minister Stephen Harper has warned Liberal Leader Stephane Dion that the Conservative government is prepared to go to the electorate as early as next week to seek a mandate to extend the military mission in Afghanistan. Sources say Harper told the Liberal leader the government will give notice on Thursday to present a confidence motion on extending the military mission in Afghanistan. That motion could be debated and possibly voted on as early as next week. The government could fall if the Liberals do not support it, since the NDP and Bloc Quebecois are against Canada's extension of the NATO mission.

Frankly, I doubt that if Stephane Dion forces an election at this point in time over the issue of extending the military mission in Afghanistan, Stephen Harper will win the election despite that it is time for Canada to pull out of Afghanistan. Canada is facing a no win situation in Afghanistan as long as that UN and American corrupt puppet on a string, President Hamid Karzai, remains in power in Afghanistan. Which by the way, is officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (Persian). In the meantime, a roadside bomb hit a U.S.-led coalition vehicle in volatile Helmand province in southern Afghanistan, killing one soldier and wounding two others. The coalition troops were conducting a joint security patrol with Afghan forces on Tuesday when their vehicle hit a mine planted on a road along the Helmand River, the coalition said in a statement. It did not give further details of the nationalities of the victims, but most of the soldiers in the province are British. Other soldiers in the patrol discovered and neutralized two additional roadside bombs in the area. Helmand has been the front line of the bloodiest battles between foreign troops and insurgents in the past few years. It is also the world's top opium poppy-producing region. Two Canadian soldiers in neighbouring Kandahar province were injured by a roadside bomb on Tuesday. Canada has roughly 2,500 soldiers in the violent province. Seventy-eight soldiers and one diplomat have been killed since the mission started in 2002.

Do anyone remember the French authors Jean-Charles Brisard and Guillaume Dasquie who had published a book in November 2001, titled; Bin Laden: The Forbidden Truth? According to the two men, one a former French secret service agent, the other an investigative journalist, the U.S. viewed the Taliban before August 2001 “as a source of stability in Central Asia that would enable the construction of an oil pipeline across Central Asia.” A Taliban representative opened negotiations with the freshly installed George W. Bush by taking an expensive Afghan carpet to Washington in February 2001, but U.S.-Afghan talks went poorly. At one point during the negotiations, the U.S. representatives told the Taliban official, "either you accept our offer of a carpet of gold, or we bury you under a carpet of bombs". That threat alone gives evidence that an Afghan invasion was in the cards irrespective of September 11. But that is exactly what happened. After 9/11 had taken place, the U.S. demanded bin Laden’s extradition; they refused it. The bombs began falling before mid-October. And a “transitional government of "moderate" Afghans was installed after a November meeting in Bonn, Germany. This reflects the reality of a standard two-pronged UN/American policy on the Taliban. That of coddling and financing on the one hand, while simultaneously working to destabilize them. So even while negotiations continued between the Taliban and the U.S. government on the trans-Afghan pipeline, commandos were training and arming anti-Taliban tribes to act in the event that the discussions failed. With the benefit of hindsight, the following is quite evident: Before September 9/11, American officials still hoped to work with the Taliban on a trans-Afghan pipeline, the reduction of opium cultivation and other issues. American-Taliban negotiations on a pipeline were held during 2001, but failed to result in an agreement. By July or August 2001, U.S. officials, “disgusted” with the Taliban, were leaning towards military action. September 11, 2001 provided the very pretext they needed to carry out a military action that had already been planned to a significant extent. Osama bin Laden was their key allie in this plot. That was the pretext for the invasion of Afghanistan, was to capture Osama bin Laden. If you had not already noticed by now, was never captured. A secondary pretext for the invasion of Afghanistan was to get rid of the Taliban and stabilize the country. The trans-Afghan pipeline was planned and announced right at the beginning of the war. This trans-Afghan pipeline has been a top Bush Administration priority from October 2001 right up to the present day. In reality, George W. Bush attacked Afghanistan to get a pipeline built rather than to avenge 9-11. The Bush administration “disgust” with the Taliban, after all, stemmed almost exclusively from a failure to come to terms on a pipeline deal with them. Had that deal been successfully concluded before 9-11, the attacks of that day would not have likely led to Operation Enduring Freedom against a cooperative, if not exactly friendly, government. Conversely, the absence of a pipeline motivation for talking to the Taliban would likely have led the Bush Administration, or Bill Clinton beforehand, to one of two courses of action -- either the total isolation of Afghanistan, or military action based on the capture of Osama bin Laden or some other pretext, like the oppression of Muslem women. September 11 served as a convenient excuse for a war designed to install a friendly Afghan regime to safeguard a trans-Afghan pipeline. The American Bush government did it to line the pockets of themselves and their friends, to gain political and economic advantage for a tiny coterie of influential people. In doing so, they endangered the rest of us. They took advantage of the people's ignorance about Islam, Caspian Sea oil and remote Central Asia. As to the status of Afghan women prior to September 11, 2001. The truth is that the U.S. government had no interest in liberating Afghan women from Taliban control. Feminist groups in the U.S. found both Clinton and Bush unresponsive to their pleas for action against the Taliban. The mere suggestion that an American war would have been conducted against Afghanistan in order to liberate women is ridiculous. It was the building of that oil pipeline that is the real reason that our Canadian men and women are dieing for in Afghanistan in which Stephen Harper is so anxious to extend the Canadian military mission in Afghanistan.

To read more on that Afghan pipeline, check out the BBC News report which was published on Thursday, December 4, 1997. Another web site which deal with this pipeline is by World Press web site. Another web site is the Global Reasearch on Globalisation web site. For more background information on Canada's role in Afghanistan, here is a report (PDF file) from the Canadian Peace Alliance. The document report is titled; Canada in Afghanistan. The Truth about Canada in Afghanistan. The Canadian mainstream media has been promoting our role in Afghanistan, with almost no critical voices, despite polling that indicates between 48% to 62% of Canadians not only question but oppose our engagement of troops in this war-torn country (Ipsos-Reid, Mar. 4/06; Strategic Counsel/Globe and Mail, Feb. 24/06).

February 7, 2008; The Tory-designed Bill C-2, the crime bill, was passed by almost all MPs in the House of Commons in November, but still needs Senate approval to become law. The Conservatives Government now threatens to call for an election over BILL C-2 if the Senate doesn't pass their crime bill by March 1. 2008. That ultimatum came today, when the Conservatives announced they had tabled a confidence motion in the House of Commons demanding the March 1 deadline be issued to the Senate. Bill C-2 is presently being held up by the Liberal-dominated Senate. If the senators don't obey the motion, which is expected to pass, House leader Peter Van Loan suggested the Tories could approach Gov. Gen. Michaëlle Jean and have an election called because all levels of government are not able to move forward together on this issue. Van Loan said at the press conference with Justice Minister Rob Nicholson in Ottawa, "At that point there would be a clear impasse between the House of Commons and the Senate". Here is a direct link to BILL C-2:
THE ACT TO AMEND THE CRIMINAL CODE (PROTECTION OF CHILDREN AND OTHER VULNERABLE PERSONS) AND THE CANADA EVIDENCE ACT.

I think that Bill C-2, the crime bill, is long overdue. The entire judicial system needs this bill to pass as part of its much meeded overhaul plan. I think that the majority of Canadians, be they Conservative, Liberal, NDP or otherwise, want to see Bill C-2 pass through the Senate. I hope the Senate will let this bill pass in order to better protect innocent children and victims of crime. I hardly think it wise for the Senate to hold up Bill C-2 when Canadians do not want to see an election called on account of a bill being held up that most Canadians want to have it pass through. Holding up this bill by the Senate would not bode well for the Liberals.

There is always the off-chance that the Governor General may not necessarily agree to dissolve the government.