Two weeks ago I wrote about the CBC's inadequate coverage of the ongoing developments in the struggle to expose the 9/11 false flag operation. While Canada's national broadcaster was my target of choice, one could easily substitute any other media giant for an examination of this phenomenon.

The story bears updating because 2008 has begun with some major developments that most people are not aware of. The big story is what took place in the Japanese Diet on January 11 of this year. The house was debating whether or not to continue to support the US-led "war on terror". Japan's contribution is in the form of a refueling mission, the renewal of which was up for discussion.

Yukihisa Fujita of the Democratic Party argued for thirty minutes that the mission could no longer be supported until it is established who the actual terrorists are. In the words of Mr. Fujita:

"So far the only thing the government has said is that we think (9/11) was caused by Al Qaeda because President ...

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February 9th 2008 was "Hockey Day in Canada" - twelve hours of CBC programming about our national pastime. Playing host this year was the small town of Winkler Manitoba. We were treated to an NHL triple-header and lots of stories about ourselves.

On December 13, 2007 the CBC recorded its year-end "At Issue" panel in front of a live Canadian audience.

These regular panelists are familiar faces to viewers of the CBC's flagship nightly newscast, "The National". They are Andrew Coyne, national affairs editor for MacLeans, pollster Alan Gregg, and Chantal Hebert who writes for the Toronto Star. For this particular installment we also saw the managing editor for the Vancouver Sun, Kirk Lapointe. The venue was the beautiful Chan Center at the University of British Columbia with the whole affair presided over by Canada's most beloved of news anchors, Peter Mannsbridge.

Canadians watch the CBC to catch a glimpse of themselves. This particular taping of The National illustrated to me ...

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I live in a city patrolled by a police force parading war propaganda. If we as citizens fail to understand how inappropriate this is, then we are in deep trouble.

Vancouver police chief Jamie Graham has maintained that the yellow ribbons plastered to Vancouver police cars are not intended to convey a political statement. In his view, this is about "supporting the safe return of Canadians fighting in Afghanistan".

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2007/08/10/4408665-cp.html

This contention is ludicrous on numerous levels. For starters, the best way to guarantee the safe return of Canadian troops would be to bring them home immediately. Yet this is clearly not the policy advocated by the police department or anyone else who chooses to display the ribbons.

Few would argue that political slogans are a good fit for police cars. If the police are to start advertising their bias, it will call into question their ability to be impartial and fair. Therefore, in order to ...

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In my city transit sucks. As our civic planners are about to bestow their latest round of gifts upon us, it is useful to ask ourselves why Vancouver's transit infrastructure continues to be so deplorable.

In 1985 there was the gift of SkyTrain. This elevated train is not without limitations. The cars are small and the ride is relatively slow because there’s no express. I would prefer a train that did not have to stop at every station. But the main issue with SkyTrain is that the elevated track is expensive to build. Therefore, rather than getting many intersecting lines servicing a large area, we were stuck with only one line of track for 17 years.

Finally, in 2002, we were given the "Milleninum Line". The problem with this new loop is its shape. Who wants to travel in circles? The path seems to have been chosen for minimum ridership. As with the older “Expo Line” the track is again elevated so as not to impede the cars on the ground. This is a familiar pattern in my city ...

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Is Iran developing nuclear weapons capabilities?

Maybe. At this time, there is no proof that this is the case: the US National Intelligence Estimate on nuclear capabilities in Iran has judged that Iran has halted its nuclear weapons program (PDF document); and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has reported that there is no evidence of diversion of nuclear material to a nuclear weapons program (PDF document) in Iran. However, the lack of evidence does not mean that Iran isn't now or won't soon be developing nuclear weapons.

Iran has stated that the nuclear development program is for peaceful purposes only. This might be true for the moment. But you have to ask the question: Why wouldn't they work towards developing nuclear weapons? In the world today and in the foreseeable future, nuclear weapons (or the threat of developing them) dramatically increases the power and influence of a country on the world stage. Compare the members of the nuclear club to ...

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According to the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), "(piracy) is no different from stealing a person's shoes or stereo". At the risk of stating the obvious: When you knick somebody's shoes, you're depriving the rightful owner of her footwear. But when you're downloading a piece of software or a song, you're creating a brand new copy for yourself. This is a crucial difference, if ever there was such a thing.

If I had access to a bread duplicator that could copy a baguette with the same ease with which one can replicate a digital file, would the MPAA argue that using this technology to feed the hungry is in some way damaging to the creator of the original? How much energy would they invest in the quest for a copy-protected baguette?

Why does virtually everyone I know share music? How can undiscovered digital artists afford to run expensive software such as Photoshop or Final Cut Pro on their machines? Are we all criminals by nature? Is ...

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The other day I ran into an old friend. Like so many university educated Canadians of my generation, Angela had spent time teaching English in Japan. I myself had spent my “working holiday” there in the mid nineties, so we began talking about our common experience. What she told me blew my mind.

But first about me. I found myself without relevant experience, in Kyoto, when I was hired by the rapidly expanding NOVA empire. At that time there seemed to be a school near every major train station with new branches opening daily. Ekimae Ryugaku was the slogan - study abroad near the station.

The experience of “teaching” English conversation was more than a little surreal. The Nova system was something that would probably have induced seizures in a real teacher. Not being one myself, I adapted quickly to the concept.

For the uninitiated, it went something like this: Students would buy lesson tickets in sizable batches. They were encouraged, of course, to ...

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This report was written on a brand new MacBook Pro, purchased in Canada.

Canadian newscasters love stories about the strong Canadian dollar. Parity with the US counterpart provides fodder for accounts of intrepid bargain hunters heading south for a better deal. I recently caught one such story on CBC's flagship newscast, "The National".

A decent summary of the story can be found here
http://origin.www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2007/10/17/bombardier-sales.html

More and more, on those occasions when I do watch mainstream news, I find myself thinking that the reporter did not bother to ask any of the questions that I would have asked in that situation. Consider the oddness of this statement: "Bargain-hunting consumers crossing the border to find deals on Bombardier snowmobiles are frustrated by a company policy that prevents U.S. dealers from selling to Canadians."

The most obvious question here, and one which did not escape the CBC's production ...

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