Musings on Greenwood

I have a bit of time between my two big commitments today to comment on events of the past week.

First, Dwight Duncan. Ontario’s Finance Minister recently said he’s convinced that Ontario won’t be the next Greece or Spain because of our exploding debt.

http://swo.ctv.ca/servlet/an/local/CTVNews/20110401/duncan-ontario-debt-110401/20110401/?hub=SWOHome

If you boil down his logic, it’s as follows:

Ontario won’t be the next Greece or Spain because our bonds continue to sell out on the international market and the government has in place a seven year plan to balance the books which international investors are aware of.

There’s two problems with this statement.

One, this exact claim could have been made by the Greek and Spanish finance ministers right up to the day before their melt down.

and

Two, in essence, Duncan is saying that our bonds will continue to sellout on the international market because they’re selling out on the international market.

Do I even need to deconstruct this logical fallacy?

It’s akin to some 80-year-old, fat-ass, chain smoking, drunkard saying he will never have a heart attack because he’s never had a heart attack.

That’s Ontario.

Under McGuinty we have become lazy, shabby and weak but we assume a cloak of invincibility because of bygone greatness.

In short; Dwight Duncan is either a fool or a liar. I vote for the latter. He’s hoping to keep this house of cards together until after the next provincial election.

When Hudak tosses this gaggle of misfits out, he’ll be left to pick up the pieces. I don’t know if he’s tough enough to do what needs to be done but he may not even have a choice in the matter.

The province is broke.

Changing topics entirely;

The Qu’ran burning pastor Terry Jones went ahead and torched the Muslim holy book on March 20th.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/02/pastor-terry-jones-burning-koran

As a result, a group of extremists attacked and killed UN workers in Afghanistan.

Jones is an irrelevant bigot. He leads a church of 50 people yet his act of burning a Qu’ran has garnered more revulsion than the murder of the UN workers.

If these same radical Muslims burned an American flag, would Americans be allowed to attack the Afghan embassy in Washington and kill the workers?

We don’t have to like Terry Jones. I don’t like him and I think pretty much everyone in the civilized world sees him for the crackpot that he is but he has as much right to burn a Qu’ran as a protester has to burn a flag.

His circus stunt act is completely protected by free speech and free expression. His behaviour is despicable but lawful.

We should express far more outrage over the murder of innocent UN workers at the hands of fanatics who objected to the completely legal actions of an obscure American citizen.

This is the Danish Cartoon controversy all over again.

And once again, the West has cowered to the violence of the Islamic extremists.

Ethan Rabidoux