Blue Like You

Archive for December 9th, 2007

From the annals of Political Correctness “Believe it or not”…

A Kitchener judge doesn’t think it’s appropriate for constables and lawyers to wear poppies in her courtroom - Judge frowns on poppies in courtroom:

“Because however much — and I really probably should have said something to (defence lawyer Richard Prendiville, who was also wearing a poppy) too — but however much you may think that’s a totally acceptable symbol, and that it is totally neutral, that might not be entirely the case for everybody who comes to court,” the judge said.

Woolcott continued: “It represents a symbol of support and I suspect that 99.999 per cent of us happily wear it outside of the courtroom. You probably should not wear anything like that in court.”

Before she excused Haines, Woolcott told him that she might ask him to remove the poppy next time…

Just when you thought things couldn’t possibly get any worse.

This one’s separate post worthy, in spite of my self-imposed commitment to finish Warren Kinsella’s new book, The War Room. (I don’t want to pay a library fine, and I’m too cheap to buy it.)

Just like Trusty Tory, I don’t usually like going after Dippers, but my motives are different - The NDP is the CPC’s best friend for splitting the vote on the left. However, some things just transcend partisanship, and this is one of them.

The Star’s Ottawa Bureau-chief, Bruce Campion-Smith had an article in yesterday’s paper that contains a wakeup call of sorts for Jack Layton (Apology of sorts for ‘porn slur’).

In my opinion, Irene Mathyssen is just not MP material. Perhaps she could function as an Independent, but she has demonstrated that her mouth and her own selfish interests take priority over her sense of working with the team, and even over human decency.

After her (forced) formal apology to James Moore in the House on Friday morning, Mathyssen didn’t have the good sense to keep her big yap shut:

Yesterday, she publicly apologized in the Commons for not raising her concern with Moore privately.

“I recognize that would have been the appropriate step,” Mathyssen said in an interview.

But she maintains such photos have no place in the Commons.

“I think that is a mistake and I’m sure that he has learned that, the importance of prudence,” Mathyssen said. “What I saw was not appropriate.”

When I first read that, I assumed she had said it before the formal apology, but the subtitle in the article says, “Sorry for raising laptop photos publicly, MP tells House, but later calls images inappropriate”. So this was actually said afterwards!!!

Jack Layton has been notably absent from all this embarrassment; instead sending Libby Davies to be the cleanup attendant. I think he’s afraid that some of this dirt might stick to him. He probably wants to distance himself as much as possible from the ongoing train wreck.

So here’s my advice for Jack - Make use of the handyman’s best friend, and place it firmly over Irene’s mouth.

Or bite the bullet and dump her altogether. She’s not a team-player.

Her constituents should do the same come the next election.