Tag Archives: Christopher Hitchens

Meltdown

An iconic image from the last time we danced this waltz - this was Ceaucescu's downfall; what will Qaddafi's look like?

Today is Wednesday March 16th 2011;

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor may be on the verge of meltdown, according to an American assessment team..

Qaddafi, the lunatic King of Africa, is bombing Benghazi, stronghold of the rebels. Last week the rebels had Qaddafi surrounded and trapped in Tripoli, but because the West sat on its tentacles, Qaddafi’s fighters led the break out, and have pushed the rebels back to square one. The Western Powers debated ‘what does a ‘no-fly-zone’ really mean?’, as if they had the time to get philosophical about the issue. For an excellent critique of the West’s unwillingness to get involved in the Libyan Revolution, click here. The world continues to change dramatically, and the West sits idly by, suddenly caught up with a case of obstinate isolationism – truly an American creed; “it’s not affecting us, so go fuck yourself”. Right now, Chadian and Black Libyans are being cut down and massacred, as are the Shia majority in Bahrain, by US-funded and equipped Saudis no less.

There’s a lot of unconfirmed chatter about a Libyan pilot defecting while en route to bomb the rebels. Apparently he turned around, fired on a Qaddafi palace in Tripoli, and then crashed his jet into the building, a modern-day kamikaze.

The CBC has been playing non-stop since Friday, and I sit here downloading as much information into my skull as it can handle.

It’s time for the 9 o’clock news:

A Canadian medical team has left Japan because they weren’t equipped to work in a potential meltdown zone.
The Red Cross is leaving Benghazi – they don’t have anyone to protect them.
The world’s largest internet-pedophile ring has been destroyed; Operation Rescue was a success.

Two steps back, one step forward – the world somehow marches on.

*** The bit about the kamikaze is unconfirmed and is apparently coming in ‘via twitter’ – I’m suspicious. There are other claims that a Greek registered freighter was intercepted by the rebel navy and found to be carrying large quantities of what’s being described as ‘Israeli military aid’ – the ship was bound for Tripoli.

It’s getting exhausting just trying to keep up with the news developments over the course of any given day; I’m growing paranoid because I’m not seeing many new developments.

I wonder how that reactor’s doing…

A rational society; the Hitch strikes again…

I love watching intelligent people destroy obnoxious blowhards with sound, precise, maddeningly effective logic, cutting like a hot knife through butter. The Hitch delivers in this one, calling Jerry Falwell exactly what he was: a dangerous demagogue.

How lucky to live in a society based, strongly, on Enlightenment principles. How precarious it is, as recent developments in the United States have demonstrated, to hold onto it.

A key issue to understanding Québec society and culture is the near-total control inflicted on it by the Catholic Church, roughly from the time immediately after the Patriotes Rebellion up until the late 1950s. And then, the , a period of profound social change, about as tumultuous and rapid as possible without degenerating into a prolonged riot, though the years were rough by local standards. Of considerable importance, the once dominant Church would lose its position in Québec society, and the state would go secular. This was the Quiet Revolution.

I cannot conceive of a city more Catholic and yet profoundly secular as Montréal. I have no idea how many people here identify with atheism, yet I’m acutely aware of a general consensus that religion has done considerably more harm than good throughout the last few thousand years. It seems that pretty much everyone I know, and meet, are probably thinking the same thing. Again, its part of the local cultural identity. We were oppressed for years, the abuse was rampant. Why do you think it was called ‘le grand noirceur’, the Great Darkness?

Seeing a man like Hitchens emasculate that Confederate worm and his faux-Irish Braheem mouthpiece gives me immense joy.

Anyone up to build a statue of him next to the cross on the mountain?