You know, one of my favorite things about Montreal is the multitude of street artists who use the backdrop of city as a living ever changing canvas. I'm not talking about people who spray paint stuff like "fuck the police" or "vive le Quebec libre"... I'm talking about art, people who spend hours vizualizing the perfect piece for that specific building, for that specific wall.

Sometimes though, street art puzzles me. Like the on this picture. Where, well to be honest, there's a message and it's pretty clear. But did that graffiti make me stop and think? Did it make say wow, that's amazing? Or did it make me stop my car, get out and take a damn picture because it was so retarded?

Well, if you picked the third choice then you're a winner...

Meaningless pollution masked as art? Sorry.... the corner of St-Laurent and Sherbrooke is ugly enough without having someones declaration of love for cheese in it.

/a>

A new look (kind of) , a new post, the same blog...

Well... I've made a new banner, it's not great and it hurts my eyes a little bit... Really it sort of makes them water when I look at it. But well, it's mine and I'm quite happy with it. The new signature at the bottom of the post, I like it as well. The gas mask is an idea I got from my cousin Frank-O who lives out in Vancouver, an artist and a musician that is always apparently on the verge of either breaking the bank or breaking himself.

I've been thinking (since my last post back in April) that the problem with this blog and the problem I had with it, was that I mostly just used it to react to news stories and stuff like that, when in reality it should be a place where I put whatever the hell I wanna put and that should be that.

So screw everything else, I'm just going to write about what I want to write about and you'll all have to live it with or go read something else.

So let me just start by saying welcome back to the NEW Politicophobia...

Also I will begin contributing more to the joint blogging experiment that is Serxy Druck Heo as of... ummm... right now.

Peace out.

The truth is in the numbers.

The Castro Cartel can say whatever it wants about dissidents being paid by foreign oppressors and they can have all the little press releases and columns by Comrade Fidel that they want, print all the propaganda in the world, but the bottom line is: it just doesn’t fucking matter.

I got curious today while I was on lunch, so I decided to do some comparisons of Alexa rankings and compare different sites:

Desdecuba.com/generaciony Global ranking: 73,233 (http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/desdecuba.com)

Granma.ca Global ranking: 107,519 (http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/granma.cu)

So if anyone, anywhere in the world would like to question the power of free expression and the determination of those who want to speak out: the statistics speak for themselves. The global relevance of a state run rag filled with propaganda about commercial accords with Viet Nam, the global importance of the sugar cane and how rosy life is under a never-ending dictatorship, is in effect: null.

An independent blogger, blogging through whatever means she cans reaches a wider global audience than a news website that tries so hard to discredit anyone who doesn’t agree with the official position of the party.

I would really love to add more to this but I think I’ll let the number do the talking from here on in…

73,233 > 107,519

PS: my traffic rank…Mypolicophobia.blogspot.com Global ranking: 27,446,962... that's right baby, TWENTY SEVEN MILLION FOUR HUNDRED AND FORTY SIX THOUSAND NINE HUNDRED AND SIXTY TWO!!! That's like 4 million spots down from last year!

Xenophobia

The Cultural Dictionary (from dictionary.com) defines xenophobia as: "An unreasonable fear, distrust, or hatred of strangers, foreigners, or anything perceived as foreign or different."

Somehow though, I simply don't think that the word is strong enough to describe what the English minority in Quebec has to face when it comes to extremist separatist groups. The latest example of what I call uber-idiocy, a group that calls themselves Le Comité d’action politique pour l’Indépendance nationale, decided that it would be a good idea to protest the building of the
McGill University Health Center (MUHC) by planting 101 wooden crosses and a banner symbolically painted in red.

A statement sent to the press said: “This cemetery of crosses, in the image of cemeteries for soldiers fallen in the two Great Wars, represents the Québecois people who, after centuries of battle, are finally conceding to the English-speaking pressure on the continent. The cemetery is accompanied by a banner claiming high and loud the death of a people, signaling that the MUHC represents nothing less than the death of the Québécois people, and it expresses the people’s rejection of an assimilation like that which they have always resisted until now in a continuous, and perhaps perpetual, struggle.”

I resent the entirety of this statement, the separatists group have no right to even equate themselves to the brave young Canadians who fought in both Great Wars, as Canadians. The also have no right to protest the building of this hospital as there is also a super hospital being built for the Université de Montréal.

Once again, the extremists of this province have given my people a black eye on both the Canadian and the world stage.

To the rest of the country we're already strange enough and every week I talk to people in Toronto, 5 hours up the 401 highway and they have no idea that people in Montreal speak English as well as French.

If idiots like this group keep grabbing headlines, what hope does Quebec ever have of attracting foreign investments, preventing a brain drain and of being taken seriously on the national stage?

Just food for thought.

(quotes from Montreal Gazette)

Call To Release Iran's 'Blogfather' For Norouz

The mother of a controversial, well-known blogger, Hossein Derakhshan, who is often described as Iran's "blogfather" because he helped popularize blogging in Iran, has called on the head of Iran's judiciary to release her son for the Iranian New Year, or Norouz, marked on March 21.

Derakhshan, a dual Iranian-Canadian citizen, has been in jail in Iran since November 2008.

Derakhshan is reportedly facing security charges, including espionage. But his mother says in her open letter to the head of the judiciary that the family hasn't been informed of the official charges against him.

"Hossein has been in your prison for more than 500 days. And we have been waiting for him outside the prison every day," she writes.

Derakhshan's mother says that the judiciary should release Derakhshan for the New Year, as it has done in the case of a number of postelection detainees who have been allowed to go on prison leave.

"It's been eight months that you've said in all media that you have arrested those who were attempting to overthrow the establishment. On the eve of the New Year, you release all of those who had been described as the leaders of sedition. Why in your view doesn't Hossein deserve to be released?" she asked.

The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran has said that his case is "typical of the lack of justice and due process in Iran's judiciary."

(Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/Call_To_Release_Irans_Blogfather_For_Norouz/1987475.html)

"Going off the rails on the Crazy Train"

Originally I wanted to used this post to bitch and complain about Ann Coulter. Now I also have to use it to bitch at the people that staged a protest outside the university of Ottawa yesterday.

First let's start with Ann Coulter:
For those of you who don't know her, she's an author who is best known for her controversial comments. Here are some of the quote-worthy ones:
-

"They'd better hope the United States doesn't roll over one night and crush them. They are lucky we allow them to exist on the same continent," when talking about Canada.
-On the same show she was asked why she felt the need to make fun of Canadians and she answered: "because they speak French."
-After 9/11 she suggested all Muslims should be banned from airplanes and suggested they take Flying carpets.
-At her speaking engagement in London, On. a Muslim challenged the remark and Ms. Coulter suggested that instead of the flying carpet, she take a camel.

And the list goes on and on and on...

Now the University of Ottawa is no better... An email was sent to Ms. Coulter (which was leaked to the National Post) advising her to educate herself on Canada's hate speech laws. Because here it is a criminal offense to promote hate or violence against any specific identifiable group.

Ms Coulter, who lives off of comments like this, said the university of Ottawa was promoting hate and violence against her and as such she hired a lawyer to file a complaint with the Human Rights Commission.

The protesters who didn't want her speaking? Well, they're the idiots because that gave Ms Coulter an excuse to cancel the speech stating that she was afraid the protest would turn violent. So, in effect, the University of Ottawa is screwed because the protester just proved Ms Coulter's case...

While I firmly believe that Ms Coulter is an uber-bitch and is thoroughly ignorant in her remarks, I also believe that she is entitled to speak her mind. If she makes remarks that are considered to be promoting hatred and violence while in Canada we should have charged her accordingly, instead of letting her turn our own laws against us.

In conclusion:
-Thumbs down to Ms Coulter for giving Conservatives a bad name.
-Thumbs down to the University of Ottawa and its protesters for being idiots.

-Thumbs up to Ozzy Osbourne for providing me with such a catchy title.

UFO or Missile?

The video's not really important, but i decided to put it anyways just for kicks.
Here's the latest development: Defense Minister Peter MacKay said: "We [the Canadian government] will provide money to build a landing strip for UFOs at Harbour Mille."

Of course he was joking, but what's not a joke is that a bunch of residents saw 3 things that looked like missiles being launched from the ocean, that they took pictures of said missile shaped objects and that no one in the government or law enforcement has any sort of statement to give the public.

Now most people won't think it's aliens... I certainly don't. But what I do think is that this is most likely a missile or rocket of some kind.

I just want to the government to say: "We know what it was, you don't need to be worried, it's all good." Instead of patronizing frightened citizens and refusing to speak to the press.