Segacs’s World I Know

The lockout drags on with no progress whatsoever. And I’m starting to miss it. A dinnertime conversation about what baseball team to root for in the World Series underscored that, cause none of us would even be paying cursory attention to baseball if there was hockey to talk about.

Hey players union: get over yoursleves and agree to a damn salary cap already so we can get on with our lives.

The Concordia administration has answered back with their side of the whole Ehud Barak mess:

Let’s be fair and truthful. We have not compromised freedom of speech by our decision regarding Mr. Barak. We simply do not have the facilities that allow us to hold this particular event in a safe environment without disrupting the normal academic activities on-campus or those of our neighbors whom we consider an important part of our community. Nevertheless, freedom of speech remains alive at Concordia University as does our responsibility for the security of the community.

To support that claim, they point to a number of “controversial Jewish and Arab speakers” who have been hosted on campus.

Sadly, they have once again missed the point. It’s not enough to claim that a few controversial speakers equals freedom of speech. True freedom doesn’t exist selectively. Hosting speakers who the rioters find “acceptable” and calling that freedom is, de facto, allowing the rioters to dictate what speech is allowed and what speech is not allowed.

Concordia made a bad choice, and now they’re trying to defend it with faulty logic.

Or so it seems according to the latest Reuters poll that is now giving him a 4-point lead over Kerry, after being virtually neck-and-neck beforehand.

This is an amazing feat for a President who has stumbled his way through these debates, doing a convincing job of making it look like he was being fed the answers from offstage. The wide-eyed surprise, the long pauses, the stumbles… sure, that’ll win him a debate.

But it has. Because Kerry has fought this entire campaign on the basis that people should elect him because he’s not Bush. That’s been fine and dandy for attracting the “we’d rather vote for Hitler than Bush” crowd… but hasn’t done much to sway the undecideds.

I’m no particular fan of Bush, but it’s looking a lot like four more years are coming up. In this, an election that the Democratic candidate should have won in a cakewalk. The Democrats will have nobody to blame for a loss but themselves.

Iranian bloggers have been arrested for dissent for having “illegal internet sites”:

Six online journalists and webloggers have been arrested in Iran recently in a crackdown on dissent on the internet.

“People charged for having illegal internet sites… will be put on trial soon,” said a judiciary spokesman.

The trials would be “open” and charges included “acting against national security, disturbing the public mind and insulting sanctities”.

Web journals flourish in Iran where the youthful, reform-hungry population has gone online for news and entertainment.

The popularity of the internet has grown as hardline judges closed about 100 printed publications since 2000.

These six will probably be held up as examples and handed some frightening sentence… all for the crime of speaking freely against the repressions of the government.

But of course, everyone knows that it’s Israel that is the real problem in the Middle East…

(Via Damian Penny, who astutely describes this as “thoughtcrime”).

Kerry: “Bush keeps giving tax cuts to the wealthiest 1% of Americans… yadda yadda yadda.”

Bush: “Kerry’s a liberal senator from Massachusetts… yadda yadda yadda.”

Yawn.

Too busy with work to blog at the moment. Posting should resume soon.

A non-Jewish friend asked me why it was that we don’t really celebrate Thanksgiving. After all, it’s not a religious holiday.

I had to answer that I wasn’t really sure. Thanksgiving isn’t all that big a deal here – it’s not like it is in the US, for example – but most people still get together for a family meal or something. And yes, plenty of Jewish people do so as well. But upon reflection I realized she was right; the vast majority of my Jewish friends and relatives just treat Thanksgiving like a convenient legal holiday.

The best I can figure, it’s because we’re all holidayed out. After Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Succot… by the time Thanksgiving rolls around, we’ve had more than enough of big family meals and holidays for a while.

However you spent your Thanksgiving weekend, hope it was a good one.

Yesterday’s terrorist attacks in a Sinai resort have left at least 30 dead, including 14 Israelis and hundreds more wounded:

Two car bombs exploded at the entrance to the Hilton Taba Hotel and a suicide bomber blew up at the hotel’s beach front, an area designated for children maritime activities.

According to Israel Police estimations the cars contained no less than 100 Kg of explosives. One of the cars’ engine was found in the ruined lobby of the hotel.

Almost simultaneously, a combined bomb and shooting attack took place in two restaurants usually frequented by Israelis in Ras Al-Satan. Two Israelis were killed in this attack.

Hours later, details are still emerging, because the Egyptian authorities are being somewhat less than forthcoming.

The sad thing is, there is likely a large portion of the Egyptian population that doesn’t care how many of their own compatriots were killed, but instead is rejoicing that at least some Israelis are among the dead. IsraelInsider reports big celebrations in Gaza (via LGF).

Some Israeli bloggers, like Allison and Imshin expressed a bit of surprise that so many Israelis had ignored persistent warnings not to travel to the Egyptian side of Sinai. But these warnings had been going on for so long without incident, probably most people felt that it was at least as safe as going to a crowded Tel Aviv café, if not more so. After all, Israel has a peace treaty with Egypt. Why shouldn’t Israelis head there on holiday?

Well, now we know why. Oddly enough, when I was in Israel in July, a group of people I was travelling with tried to persuade me to go with them to Eilat for a couple of days, and to head to Egypt for a day or so. I had alternate plans so I didn’t go with them, but even then, despite everyone telling me it was perfectly safe – and even despite my Canadian passport and citizenship – the idea made me uneasy. I can’t explain it. Maybe it’s the sense that if something were to go wrong (as it can anywhere), I’d sooner be in a country with a friendly government as opposed to one with a hostile one. (And despite the frosty peace between Israel and Egypt, I don’t think anyone can call the Egyptian government – whose state-sponsored television spews antisemitism on a daily basis – friendly).

Yes, it can happen anywhere. And it’s horrible that so many people are dead, of all nationalities. But this attack was designed to single out Israelis. Unfortunately, it succeeded all too well.

It looks like the NDP will vote with the Liberals for the throne speech, and the Tories and the Bloc will vote against. That would cause a tie – 153 votes for, 153 against. Leaving the fate of the government up to Independent MP Chuck Cadman:

Independent MP Chuck Cadman’s single seat could give a Tory-BQ voting bloc enough votes to overcome a Liberal-NDP partnership. On Tuesday, he told reporters that he is “pretty well neutral” on the issue of bringing down the government at the moment.

No pressure, eh?

Of course, there’s still some horse-trading going on before that point is reached. I sincerely doubt that the government will fall today… if only because any party who causes it to collapse will pay the price dearly in the next election. The Liberals will probably make enough promises to the Conservatives to get them to come on board for the time being.

Still, these alliances are indicative of things to come. It could be a rocky few months.