the daily snivel

  Jude 1:2 - Revised

-- From the always hilariously ironic Jesus' General. His biting observations take the logical principle of Reductio ad Absurdum to a whole new level when it comes to highlighting the contradictions of the religious right.

Jesus is, of course, delivering a sermon here on the righteousness of summarily executing wounded insurgents when you were shot at before (a surprisingly popular belief among some of the most bloodthirsty and shortsighted Americans, including those who think the cameraman who shot the damning footage is guilty of treason for releasing it). Of course, if the tables had been turned and we had seen an insurgent shooting a wounded American soldier in the head, the outrage and moralizing and charges of war crimes would be deafening.

But what do I know about values? 

  Should Canada Indict George W. Bush?

A thought-provoking article by Thomas Walkom published on Tuesday, November 16, 2004 in the Toronto Star and reprinted on the Common Dreams Website:

When U.S. President George W. Bush arrives in Ottawa — probably later this year — should he be welcomed? Or should he be charged with war crimes?

It's an interesting question. On the face of it, Bush seems a perfect candidate for prosecution under Canada's Crimes against Humanity and War Crimes Act.

This act was passed in 2000 to bring Canada's ineffectual laws in line with the rules of the new International Criminal Court. While never tested, it lays out sweeping categories under which a foreign leader like Bush could face arrest.

In particular, it holds that anyone who commits a war crime, even outside Canada, may be prosecuted by our courts. What is a war crime? According to the statute, it is any conduct defined as such by "customary international law" or by conventions that Canada has adopted.

War crimes also specifically include any breach of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, such as torture, degradation, wilfully depriving prisoners of war of their rights "to a fair and regular trial," launching attacks "in the knowledge that such attacks will cause incidental loss of life or injury to civilians" and deportation of persons from an area under occupation.

Outside of one well-publicized (and quickly squelched) attempt in Belgium, no one has tried to formally indict Bush. But both Oxfam International and the U.S. group Human Rights Watch have warned that some of the actions undertaken by the U.S. and its allies, particularly in Iraq, may fall under the war crime rubric.

The case for the prosecution looks quite promising. First, there is the fact of the Iraq war itself. After 1945, Allied tribunals in Nuremberg and Tokyo — in an astonishing precedent — ruled that states no longer had the unfettered right to invade other countries and that leaders who started such conflicts could be tried for waging illegal war.

Concurrently, the new United Nations outlawed all aggressive wars except those authorized by its Security Council.

Today, a strong case could be made that Bush violated the Nuremberg principles by invading Iraq. Indeed, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has already labelled that war illegal in terms of the U.N. Charter...

...

For the full article, click here. 

  Oh Hayden!

Last night I went out with my friends Karla and Jenn to see Hayden in concert here in Ottawa. I've seen him twice in concert already over the years, but I'd been looking forward to that night for weeks, and bought our tickets well in advance so as to eliminate any disappointing possibility of the show selling out before we could get in. This is because I've missed Hayden's previous two shows in Ottawa, which both sold out, and I wasn't about to miss a third. Opening up for Hayden was a band called Cuff the Duke, who were very talented and combined an angsty early Radiohead power with a real nice country twang and Weezeresque geek rock. I'm most definitely going to be picking up their CD from Maplemusic.com (since they had, unfortunately, sold all of their CDs due to overwhelming demand long before they ever made it to Ottawa).

Hayden's set was excellent, and he came back for two encores to much applause. Many of his songs came from his latest album, Elk-Lake Serenade, which is certainly one of his finest recordings, but it was hard to think of a favourite that he didn't perform, and I had a fantastic time. I danced happily, drank merrily, and didn't really mind all the shoving and crowding of the dance floor. It took the crowd a bit of time to warm up (this is the first time I've seen a reserved audience at a Hayden show, though those who hail from Toronto scornfully assert that Ottawa is just inherently sleepy that way), but Hayden's excellent music and delightful between-song banter got a lot of feet moving on the floor. Best of all, he played some of his classic older songs like "Skates" and "In September" (which he seems to trot out less and less frequently -- someone suggested he's not as happy with his older songs, especially the ones where has to shout), which made the crowd very happy. A lot of the hard core drunk people superfans, including myself, were crooning along with him for those ones.

I think what I came away with, other than glee, the consumption of a frightful amount of beer and a certain stiffness in the old muscles from shaking my booty into the wee hours after already putting in a long workout at the gym, was the sense that it's time for me to get out to more fun evenings like that. Notwithstanding the fun I had seeing Goldie earlier in the fall, I'd forgotten how swell it was to go out and see a live concert. I'll always make time for Hayden, but Ottawa hosts a number of great performances, and next year I'll be in Toronto, which is not only Hayden's home base, but also the destination (and launching pad) for a huge number of touring artists.

I also decided that it's time I start taking the initiative, and learn to talk to people more readily and express interest if it's there. I saw someone I know randomly start talking to a guy, and they hit it off, and by the end of the evening and all the banter, they seemed to have sparked up a friendship or... well, goodness knows what. But it's something I have to start doing, too.

In fact I'm pretty sure there's a Hayden song almost exactly like that. 

  Never is a promise

One of the reasons I've been quiet lately is that I'm still recovering from the massive head trauma caused by the election results in the United States. For those of you in the United States who aren't sorry -- believe me, you will be. You will be.

[Links -- Spoof sent to werenotsorry.com;
REAL post from werenotsorry.com)]

Another reason I've been quiet lately is that my personal life has just been stupid.

A year ago, I made a promise. I told a friend that I wouldn't bring up dating again, because I could tell it made her uncomfortable. And yes, this is the same wonderful friend who I've had to come to terms with being in love with, and also come to terms with the fact that it will never work out.

Well, a few weeks ago we had some wine, watched a great BBC show called "The Office" on DVD, and had many laughs, and then stupid, lovesick, obviously-knew-better-but-acted-like-a-dink-anyway me decided to ruin the evening by putting my hand on her knee in a clumsy romantic gesture. The offending hand was quickly removed by my friend with an admonishment that I clearly knew better after all this time.

And I did know better. And I apologized, and my friend felt it was better to just move on and forget it happened. She's private and not the sort of person who likes to talk about these things, especially not when they've been talked about before.

I guess all this time I'd been nurturing the false hope that something had changed. That as we'd come closer together, we'd overcome the problems that had gotten in the way of dating before. But it was just wishful thinking, and very childish wishful thinking at that. I saw what I wanted to see, and not what was really there. And in the process I feel I've lost a lot of the trust and respect my friend had for me. And for no reason other than the fact that I couldn't let go of the torch I'd been carrying, which isn't a good reason at all.

Oh, our friendship will endure. We hang out a fair bit and will undoubtedly make an evening out of The Office: Season 2 in the weeks ahead. But I've felt very awkward the past few weeks, and it's only now that I can really talk about it and think of the lessons learned (or do I ever really learn?).

So, here's my vow: No more secret crushes. If I like someone, I say something. If that's the end of it, then that's the end of it. The torch drops here.