Blue Like You

If you have a queasy stomach, don’t bother checking out National Newswatch for a while. The headlines are gruesome.

Paul, if I wanted to know what body parts were found in Li’s pockets, I’m sure I could have found the information.

Unlike many of my fellow conservatives, I’m not a big fan of capital punishment.

However, after hearing that Vincent Li uttered the words "Kill me now" in court today, I’m warming up to the idea.

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Warning: All links on the story are graphic and disturbing.

I think I’m one of many Canadians recovering from the horror of what happened on that Greyhound bus en route to Winnipeg. It’s hard enough to read the details. Just imagine being one of the people who witnessed it.

The whole thing is difficult to process. We struggle to understand how one human being could act in such a savage way, and yet be so emotionally detached from his actions.

Vince Weiguang Li, 40, of Edmonton has now been charged with second degree murder.

There are calls for increased security measures, although the nature of Greyhound Bus transportation makes it difficult to enforce airport-type precautions.

Surely though there must be a way to check for weapons before boarding. I’ve had my backpack searched at Wonderland. You have to go through metal detectors there and at many concerts and sports events these days. Why can’t something be set up to give passengers and staff a chance to ferret out psychopaths with weapons?

We can’t stop a random act of violence, but we should be able to get on a bus knowing that fellow passengers’ bags have been checked for concealed weapons.

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Sunday Update: I highly recommend this column by Lorne Gunter - A random, senseless act (Edmonton Journal).

This is just awful. The body of a Quebec cabinet minister’s assistant, Nancy Michaud, has been found in the basement of an abandoned house.

My heart goes out to her family and especially to her two small children. What kind of animal could do such a thing?

More from CTV .

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Update : Quebec police arrest suspect in Michaud’s death - CTV .

Jeff Allan just stated that he will be sending Attorney General Chris Bentley a copy of today’s show concerning Justice Colin Westman’s recent decision to allow a drug dealer to avoid jail because of his ‘troubled childhood’.

…Justice Colin Westman, however, agreed with defence submissions that Leo should get house arrest, not jail.

“If I had your background, I wouldn’t be sitting here,” Westman said. “I’d probably be doing something along the lines of what you did.”

So if you had a tough childhood, move to Waterloo Region. You are entitled to sell drugs here. Just work on your sob story ahead of time.

And make sure you get Justice Westman.

He didn’t want to be a father:

…After the sentencing, Knapp said Bryan was scared of being a bad father.

“One day he just snapped,” she told the Chronicle Herald. “The only way he could get rid of the baby was to get rid of both of us.”

The child’s mother is completely disabled:

…I cannot work anymore, I can’t walk properly, I lost my son (who) was my future. My mother has had to give up her entire life so she could take care of me, because I can’t take care of myself anymore.”

Please call or write your MP and indicate your support for Ken Epp’s Unborn Victims of Crime Bill, scheduled for a vote on March 5.

Thank you.

Update! The bad news according to MDL is that the Harper government expects to be defeated on the budget March 4. Bob Fife says Dion wants to pull the trigger. Election sometime in April.

Did anyone else see Liberal senator Sharon Carstairs on Mike Duffy Live tonight?

Please! I need to vent.

Related: Tories threaten election over crime bill - CTV

Halls of Macadamia - Hey Steffi…

ChuckerCanuk - Liberal Senate: “Don’t You Raise That Age of Consent!”

Why is it that most of us feel some kind of extra revulsion when a pregnant woman is murdered, but yet the Canadian public is so reluctant to call for additional punishment for the perpetrators?

The Unborn Victims of Crime Bill is still being bogged down by opposition parties and abortion activists who fear it is a slippery slope to the notion of ‘personhood’ for the fetus.

Perish the thought.

In other news, Kiera Tetley, who was only about one month away from being born, was murdered in Winnipeg on Tuesday, along with her mother Joanne Nadine Hoeppner.

Mother and sister now dead:

Tacked on the fridge of the battered green house was an image from a recent ultrasound of Hoeppner’s fetus, showing hair, and a photo of her one-year-old son. Hoeppner wanted to regain custody of him from the foster home where he lives.

Where is your conscience, Canada?

Jeff Allan asks that question this morning.

What do you think?

Has the vicious fatal stabbing of Stephanie Rengel finally made you say, “Enough is enough?”

Joe Warmington thinks so - Enough of this ‘hug-a-thug’ approach.

Now I’ll just sit back and wait for reader Gayle to chime in.

Darcey has a fascinating discussion going on at DMB about so-called ‘Honour Killings’.

Author Ellen R. Sheeley has left a comment that is well worth the read:

Imam Shakir is being disingenuous and playing to the cultural/moral relativists, of which there seem to be plenty.

Aqsa Parvez’s death was an “honor” killing, and “honor” killings will never be properly addressed if people aren’t even willing to admit to what they are. They are a form of domestic violence, but a very specific form, with different roots, different triggers, different modus operandi, and different ways of preventing them…

I am planning to pick up this thread sometime in the near future, since these issues now appear to be affecting Canada.