Live update on Muslim terrorist hostage taking in Sydney

A robot bomb disposal unit has been deployed to the cafe following a gunfight between police and a Muslim terrorist displaying an Islamic flag who took a number of people hostage in Sydney, Australia. Several hostages were reported wounded.

Background with regular updates HERE

Top 10 Ridiculous Superhero Powers

After sucking on the public teat for her whole adult life, Loony Libby Davies plans to retire

To will suck up more public funds from her golden, publicly funded pensions.

Good riddance to this 9-11 conspiracy promoting loon.

Should We Fear Our Machine Overlords?

This year has brought renewed optimism about the prospects for strong artificial intelligence and new expressions of fear about its dangers. And some prominent people have expressed optimism and fear simultaneously. Stephen Hawking argues that AI is progressing rapidly, possibly leading to the biggest event in human history– the creation of  general machine intelligence that exceeds that of humans. Hawking also argues that creating more intelligent machines might also be the last such event because they will takeover.  Elon Musk, the entrepreneurial creator of Tesla and Space X, sees strong AI as a demon that we will unleash on humanity.

One might dismiss these concerns as the latest manifestation of a fear that goes back to the Romantic Era. It was first represented by Frankenstein’s monster, who symbolized the idea that “all scientific progress is really a disguised form of destruction.” But Hawking and Musk are serious people to whom attention must be paid.

On balance, I think the threat posed by autonomous machine intelligence is overblown.  A basic error in such thinking is the tendency to anthropomorphize AI. Humans, like other animals, are genetically programmed in many instances to regard their welfare (and that of their relatives) as more important than the welfare of any other living thing. But this motivation is rooted in evolution: those animals that put their own welfare first were more likely to succeed in distributing their genes to subsequent generations. Artificial intelligence is not  necessarily the direct product of biological evolution, nor of any process resembling it...

Ted Cruz: "Our Friends No Longer Trust Us and Our Enemies No Longer Fear Us"

On Wednesday afternoon, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) spoke at the 9^th Margaret Thatcher Freedom Lecture at the Heritage Foundation.

Among other things, he discussed the Anglo-American “special relationship,” ways both countries can work together to combat Islamic terrorism, and the numerous foreign policy blunders committed by the current administration.

“We’re gathered here today to talk about one of the greatest resources that America’s traditionally enjoyed, which is the power of friendships across the globe,” he began.

“One of the sad legacies we’ve seen over the last six years is the fraying of friendships and alliances across the world,” he continued. “Today, the consequences of the Obama/Clinton foreign policy is that our friends no longer trust us and our enemies no longer fear us. That is profoundly dangerous for America and is profoundly dangerous for the world.”

Matt Gurney: Ontario Liberals blow another billion, but hey. Life’s complicated, right?

A report released this week by the Ontario Auditor-General, Bonnie Lysyk, has found that the province’s hydro sector is an even bigger disaster than widely believed. The latest debacle: Ms. Lysyk found  — stop me if you’ve heard this one before — that a billion public dollars have been spent while failing to accomplish the goal.

It’s not ehealth records, or even cancelled power plants. This time, it’s smart meters — technology that had to be installed on all Ontario homes to monitor their electricity usage. By introducing lower rates for hydro at times of the day when demand was lower, the province hoped to ease the burden on Ontario’s outdated power grid, while also promising consumers that with a few minor lifestyle tweaks, they could save some money on their (steadily climbing) power bills.

The problem, of course, is that it didn’t work. Smart meters were supposed to cost $1-billion. Ms. Lysyk found the actual cost is closer to $2-billion. They were supposed to reduce consumption. That hasn’t happened, either. And, well … are you really surprised that ratepayers aren’t saving any coin?

Radical guru Noam Chomsky is more of a dishonest asshole than most people realize

As the intellectual fairy godfather of dimwitted, radical western academic loons, Noam Chomsky has been an inspiration for polemical dunces such as Naomi Klein, Chris Hedges, and many of the vacuous drones who traverse the Dantesque chambers of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.  Chomsky is certainly an articulate individual, making him all the more admirable in the eyes of his airhead acolytes.

Another aspect of Chomsky's appeal to his fanatical followers is his absolute detestation of the United States, shaping him a hero to both self-loathing American academics and foreigners who share that hatred. His open contempt for the country that gave him all his immense opportunities is such that aside from championing many of America's contemporary enemies, Chomsky has even acted as an apologist for Imperial Japan, its mortal enemy in World War 2 that was responsible for countless atrocities and war crimes.

Nonetheless, Chomsky has a large following among muddleheaded western radical leftists; the types of people who usually fall prey to the personality cults of commissars and gurus. One of the common features of such cultists is that like other religious fundamentalists, they take the word of their messiahs as absolute truth, no matter how transparently false it may be.

One such example is a recent speech Chomsky delivered a couple of months ago in which he claimed capitalism and democracy are incompatible. Leaving aside his inability to show any success that democracy has had under any other economic system, or the consistently repressive, anti-democratic nature of political systems Chomsky and his disciples find so appealing, the Ayatollah of anti-Americanism told some pretty blatant lies that day that his followers probably never picked up on.

When trying to discredit libertarianism and its use of the theories of Adam Smith, the 18th Century Scot who was one of the fathers of political economics, Chomsky made the ridiculous, and patently untrue assertion that Smith's famous "Invisible Hand" theory was an argument against what anti-capitalists call "neoliberal globalization."

Said Chomsky about Smith's Invisible Hand:

"Adam Smith actually did use the term, rarely, but take a look at how he used it. In Wealth of Nations, his major work, it's used once, and if you look at the context, it's an argument against what is now called neoliberal globalization, and what he argued is this, he was concerned with England, of course, he said suppose in England that the merchants and manufacturers invested abroad, and imported from abroad. He said, well, that would be profitable for them, but would be harmful to the people of England. However, they will have enough of a commitment to their own country, to England, what's called a home bias in the literature, they'll have enough of a home bias so that as if by an invisible hand, they'll keep to the less profitable actions and then England will be saved from what we call the ravages of what we call neoliberal globalization."

Chomsky basically goes on to claim that Adam Smith was essentially arguing for government intervention in economies and against the free market.

Which is a mammoth crock of shit that Chomsky's worshipers are too stupid and gullible to challenge when coming from their god.

In fact what Smith wrote in Wealth of Nations in reference to the Invisible Hand was that people, including manufacturers and importers, will unwittingly serve society through the natural course of acting in their own interest.  Chomsky has it ass-backwards when he says Smith was claiming the English would not buy from abroad because of a home bias. That case would only apply if domestic goods were being sold at a comparable price to foreign ones. Smith goes on to argue against high tariffs to maintain nationalistic monopolies for a domestic market, and theorizes that national commerce will adapt to create that which is most efficient and cost-effective.

But don't believe me. Here's what Smith wrote in Wealth of Nations regarding the Invisible Hand  (pay particular attention to the last two paragraphs of Smith's quoted below):

The produce of industry is what it adds to the subject or materials upon which it is employed. In proportion as the value of this produce is great or small, so will likewise be the profits of the employer. But it is only for the sake of profit that any man employs a capital in the support of industry; and he will always, therefore, endeavour to employ it in the support of that industry of which the produce is likely to be of the greatest value, or to exchange for the greatest quantity either of money or of other goods. 

But the annual revenue of every society is always precisely equal to the exchangeable value of the whole annual produce of its industry, or rather is precisely the same thing with that exchangeable value. As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common among merchants, and very few words need be employed in dissuading them from it.

What is the species of domestic industry which his capital can employ, and of which the produce is likely to be of the greatest value, every individual, it is evident, can, in his local situation, judge much better than any statesman or lawgiver can do for him. The statesman who should attempt to direct private people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals would not only load himself with a most unnecessary attention, but assume an authority which could safely be trusted, not only to no single person, but to no council or senate whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man who had folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it. 

To give the monopoly of the home market to the produce of domestic industry, in any particular art or manufacture, is in some measure to direct private people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals, and must, in almost all cases, be either a useless or a hurtful regulation. If the produce of domestic can be brought there as cheap as that of foreign industry, the regulation is evidently useless. If it cannot, it must generally be hurtful. It is the maxim of every prudent master of a family never to attempt to make at home what it will cost him more to make than to buy. The tailor does not attempt to make his own shoes, but buys them of the shoemaker. The shoemaker does not attempt to make his own clothes, but employs a tailor. The farmer attempts to make neither the one nor the other, but employs those different artificers. All of them find it for their interest to employ their whole industry in a way in which they have some advantage over their neighbours, and to purchase with a part of its produce, or what is the same thing, with the price of a part of it, whatever else they have occasion for. 

What is prudence in the conduct of every private family can scarce be folly in that of a great kingdom. If a foreign country can supply us with a commodity cheaper than we ourselves can make it, better buy it of them with some part of the produce of our own industry employed in a way in which we have some advantage. The general industry of the country, being always in proportion to the capital which employs it, will not thereby be diminished, no more than that of the above-mentioned artificers; but only left to find out the way in which it can be employed with the greatest advantage.

So in fact, despite what anyone stupid enough to take Noam Chomsky's word for something may believe, Smith was indeed arguing against government intervention and for what Chomsky calls "neoliberal globalization."

If there is a valuable lesson to be learned from this, it's that radicals and anti-capitalists are not only dishonest, but they rely on the fact that the people who admire them are too stupid to be able to verify what they hear from the Chomskys, Kleins, and Hedges of this world and correctly process information.

Unfortunately, in that final regard, Chomsky and his ilk may not be wrong.

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N.B. If you listen to Chomsky's description later in the video of the use of "Invisible Hand" in Smith's earlier work, Moral Sentiments, and compare it to Smith's actual words, you'll observe that Chomsky's assertion about it is also a big, steaming pile of crap. Chomsky claimed that Smith proposed that a rich landlord would be motivated by sympathy to the poor to provide a socialist-like wealth redistribution. What Smith actually wrote suggests that greedy landlords are motivated by self-interest, innately knowing if they don't keep the poor fed, then there will be no poor to produce goods for the rich, and thus, without intending it as such, provide for the social good. But again, don't take my word for it. Read what Smith wrote in Moral Sentiments for yourself:

It is to no purpose, that the proud and unfeeling landlord views his extensive fields, and without a thought for the wants of his brethren, in imagination consumes himself the whole harvest that grows upon them. The homely and vulgar proverb, that the eye is larger than the belly, never was more fully verified than with regard to him. The capacity of his stomach bears no proportion to the immensity of his desires, and will receive no more than that of the meanest peasant. The rest he is obliged to distribute among those, who prepare, in the nicest manner, that little which he himself makes use of, among those who fit up the palace in which this little is to be consumed, among those who provide and keep in order all the different baubles and trinkets, which are employed in the oeconomy of greatness; all of whom thus derive from his luxury and caprice, that share of the necessaries of life, which they would in vain have expected from his humanity or his justice. The produce of the soil maintains at all times nearly that number of inhabitants which it is capable of maintaining. The rich only select from the heap what is most precious and agreeable. They consume little more than the poor, and in spite of their natural selfishness and rapacity, though they mean only their own conveniency, though the sole end which they propose from the labours of all the thousands whom they employ, be the gratification of their own vain and insatiable desires, they divide with the poor the produce of all their improvements. They are led by an invisible hand to make nearly the same distribution of the necessaries of life, which would have been made, had the earth been divided into equal portions among all its inhabitants, and thus without intending it, without knowing it, advance the interest of the society, and afford means to the multiplication of the species. When Providence divided the earth among a few lordly masters, it neither forgot nor abandoned those who seemed to have been left out in the partition. These last too enjoy their share of all that it produces. In what constitutes the real happiness of human life, they are in no respect inferior to those who would seem so much above them. In ease of body and peace of mind, all the different ranks of life are nearly upon a level, and the beggar, who suns himself by the side of the highway, possesses that security which kings are fighting for.

Winner of Miss Bum Bum 2014 goes under the knife to restore her virginity

You really have to read this to believe it, and even then...


h/t Rick McGinnis

The Torture Song Playlist

I actually like a couple of the songs, Prince's Raspberry Beret and The Bee Gees' Stayin' Alive, on the list that CIA interrogators used to torture terrorist subjects. But I can see how having to listen to the Meow Mix song being played over and over could be cruel and unusual:

Music has been used in American military prisons and on bases to induce sleep deprivation, "prolong capture shock," disorient detainees during interrogations—and also drown out screams. Based on a leaked interrogation log, news reports, and the accounts of soldiers and detainees, here are some of the songs that guards and interrogators chose...

Although the remix version would have been worse:

Here's a "shock" - Auditor General says Ontarians are getting colossally screwed over by Kathleen Wynne for electricity costs

TORONTO -- People in Ontario are paying billions of dollars extra for electricity thanks to a flawed smart meter program and the above-market rates the province pays most power generators, Ontario's auditor general reported Tuesday. 

Ratepayers will pay $50 billion between 2006 and 2015 because of an extra charge on their electricity bills that covers the gap between guaranteed prices paid to contracted power generators and the market price, auditor general Bonnie Lysyk wrote in her annual report.

plus more on Ontario's Wynnecompitent government  HERE

Last night's episode of Coronation Street

The difference between real journalism and Russia Today

"...Young journalists are already finding that a spell at RT is a handicap in getting jobs elsewhere. And though lying sometimes works, repeated lying — however darkly brilliant — is a recipe for lost viewers and listeners..."

The dog did it!

Man uses home-cam to find out how his dog has been raiding the fridge and freezer:

John Maguire - another Canadian convert to Islam who became a terrorist

More on Canadian Jihadist Maguire HERE

Israel strike on Syrian airport reportedly targetted Hezbollah arms cache

Two Hezbollah militants were killed during the airstrikes near Damascus that were alleged to have been carried out by Israeli warplanes, Al Arabiya reported Monday.

According to the report, among the dead is a senior military official.

Syrian opposition sources told Arab media on Monday that the airstrikes destroyed a storage facility housing anti-aircraft missiles and drones belonging to Hezbollah, and cut off the power supply from Damascus International Airport.

While the Lebanese Shi’ite group has yet to officially comment on the attack, Channel 2 is citing a report in the Hezbollah-affiliated newspaper Al-Akhbar which said that “the Israeli action was intended to preserve the rules of the game.”

The newspaper claimed that the IAF struck weapons caches “that belonged to Hezbollah.” These arms are considered to be “capable of tilting the strategic balance,” namely threaten Israel’s ability to act freely in the skies above Lebanon.

The IAF has struck Syria several times since the start of the three-year conflict, mostly destroying weaponry such as missiles that Israeli officials said were destined for their longtime foe Hezbollah in neighboring Lebanon.

An IDF spokesman said he would not comment on “foreign reports.”

Barbara Kay: I offer for consideration #JewHatePrivilege

...while expressed hatred for any minority identity groups is normally considered repulsive, and even subject to punitive measures, expression of hatred for Jews is an anomaly. It is not only permitted, it is virtually protected speech. Actually, #JewHatePrivilege is not specific enough, because the privilege takes two distinct forms. There is #MuslimJewHatePrivilege and there is #WesternJewHatePrivilege.

We saw an example of #MuslimJewHatePrivilege in demonstrations this summer throughout Europe, in which Muslims screamed Judeophobic curses, like “Hamas, Hamas, Jews to the gas,” and “Kill the Jews,” at which nobody batted an eye...

More HERE 

Andrew Coyne: Maybe there is a reason why Stephen Harper seems leery of meeting with Kathleen Wynne

...You can see the premier’s dilemma. Here she is with a clear, focused agenda — described at various times in recent weeks as involving pensions, infrastructure funding, federal-provincial transfers, internal trade, a possible Chinese currency trading hub in Toronto, the Ring of Fire mining project, Employment Insurance, and violence against aboriginal women — and yet the prime minister refuses to meet in person with her. I know what you’re thinking: Why doesn’t she just pick up the phone and call him? But then how would she be able to tell if he was smirking?

That, you’ll recall, was the upshot of their last meeting, a year ago this week. The premier had demanded the prime minister sign on to her pet project of an expanded Canada Pension Plan, a proposal that would force a great many people of modest means who already have satisfactory pension arrangements to put aside money they can ill do without, in order to fix a problem affecting a small number of under-savers, mostly upper income — or, as in the case of her proposed provincial variant, to finance her as-yet-unfunded public works plans.

To which he allegedly “kind of smirked.” How do we know what went on in a private meeting? Because the premier blabbed it all over Ontario, that’s why, in the course of an election campaign that in its early days was heavily focused on attacking the federal government in general, and the prime minister in particular. The premier was bent on depicting her pension proposal, not as a forced saving plan, but as a benevolent gift of government — which obliged the prime minister to play the part of heartless smirker.

I can’t imagine why this breach of confidence-cum-personal attack would have made him leery of meeting with her...

The thought occurs that the premier seems less interested in actually meeting with the prime minister than in complaining about being unable to meet with him. It can’t be entirely coincidental that the worse the province’s finances have got, the louder the din has become, culminating in that stagey release of letters between them (private correspondence being about as confidential, it appears, as private meetings) in the same week as her finance minister was confessing — well, pretending otherwise, to be precise — that the province was nowhere near to balancing the budget or even meeting its own leisurely schedule for deficit reduction.

Perhaps the smart thing for the prime minister would be to meet with her, just to take away a squawking point. But you know what would happen. The week prior to the meeting would be taken up with media speculation over whether the prime minister would “deliver” on whatever preposterous demand the premier thought to bring with her that week: Lately it’s about shovelling more money at General Motors to “save” the jobs that were supposed to have been saved by the $10-billion bailout...

Spot the camoflauged animals!

Check out some of these well hidden critters HERE

Let's see if Elizabeth May is telling the truth about submitting petitions she doesn't agree with to Parliament

The Canadian Green Party's leader and sole MP Elizabeth May caught flack for introducing a 9-11 conspiracy theory petition in the House of Commons earlier this week. It was only after people pointed out how batshit crazy the petition she read out was that she has been saying that she didn't agree with it, but was only doing her duty as a parliamentarian to provide representation for different viewpoints.

This isn't time an MP introduced an insane 9-11 conspiracy petition in Parliament. In 2008, the NDP's Deputy Leader, "Loony" Libby Davies introduced much the same thing. But in Davies' case, she  didn't deny that she disagreed with it and her introduction to the petition, and her consistent idiocy suggests she could indeed be a "9-11 Troofer."

But May isn't quite the extremist that Davies is, at least not consistently, and is aware of the need to maintain some credibility.

@jonkay I present any petition that has been screened by the House as appropriate. This one was. I do NOT agree with the petition.
— Elizabeth May MP (@ElizabethMay) December 6, 2014

Oddly enough, I haven't heard of any pro-Keystone or Line 9 pipeline petitions introduced by May, but let's leave that aside for now and test May's assertion.  I've created a petition, much more reasonable than the insane 9-11 conspiracy one she read in Parliament, calling for a change to the Canada Elections Act to allow cats to serve as Members of Parliament.

@KlagsbrunTO @jonkay I did not support it in presenting it. Minimal description. Check out what I say when I support petitions.
— Elizabeth May MP (@ElizabethMay) December 6, 2014

If we get to the signature threshold, I'll send it to Ms May and we'll see what happens then.

You can sign the petition HERE

@ElizabethMay @jonkay Great! I look forward to you introducing this petition I created soon https://t.co/dFyOKnMG3H #CDNpoli
— Richard Klagsbrun (@KlagsbrunTO) December 6, 2014

What The UVA Rape Case Tells Us About a Victim Culture Gone Mad

So as I understand it, Atticus Finch is now the bad guy in "To Kill A Mockingbird," because he doubted a story about rape.
— Instapundit.com (@instapundit) December 2, 2014

Rolling Stone’s admission that its UVA rape story contained ‘discrepancies’ shows how victim-centric our culture has become—to the exclusion of asking vital questions.

When Rolling Stone first published its explosive story detailing UVA student Jackie’s alleged gang-rape by seven fraternity brothers, few in the mainstream media doubted its veracity.

But, much worse, Rolling Stone reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely seemed determined to tell a gang-rape victim’s sensational story—more dramatic lede means more clicks—that she did not do due diligence as a journalist, neglecting to contact Jackie’s alleged assailants in deference to the rape victim.

And by giving blind faith to Jackie’s story, Erdely obfuscated some of the truth, leading Rolling Stone to acknowledge “discrepancies in Jackie’s account” on Friday.

“We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account,” Rolling Stone managing editor Will Dana wrote in a statement.

And therein lies the problem: in valorizing Jackie’s trauma as a victim of rape (never mind that she was and remains an alleged victim), Rolling Stone ignored glaring holes in a story that was too good to check...