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Best of the Web: Canadian man fined $55,000 for calling a male who identified as a woman a male

Michael Brown
The Stream
Thu, 04 Apr 2019 00:00 UTC

We told you this was coming. We warned you it would happen. We were not crying wolf. We were telling you the truth. And now it is here, as a headline announces: "Canadian tribunal fines Bill Whatcott $55,000 for expressing Christian views on 'transgenderism.'" In other words, Whatcott called a biological male (who identifies as a female) a "biological male." That was his crime.

What a miscarriage of justice. What an assault of freedom of speech and expression.

John Carpay, president of the Justice Center for Constitutional Freedom, defended Whatcott, noting in protest that, "The Supreme Court of Canada has long held that freedom of expression is the lifeblood of democracy." But not when it crosses the lines of transgender activism. Freedom halts there.

Carpay added, "Society is full of people with diverse views and the Tribunal's decision undermines the foundational principles of the free society and jeopardizes the health of Canada's democracy."

Best of the Web: How to shoot yourself in the foot: Twitter blocks French govt ad campaign in order to comply with French govt 'fake news' law

RT
Wed, 03 Apr 2019 16:24 UTC

An ad campaign launched by the French government to encourage people to register to vote has hit an embarrassing snag: Twitter won't run the ads, as the company fears they may violate the new French law targeting fake news.

The Elysee hoped to inspire citizens to register to vote in the European elections ahead of the upcoming deadline by paying for sponsored tweets promoting the hashtag #OuiJeVote (Yes, I Vote). But the seemingly innocuous ad campaign faced an unexpected hurdle: France's recently-passed anti-fake-news legislation, which places strict rules on online political campaigns. The law states that all political ads must indicate who paid for them and how much was spent.

Fearing that the ad may violate the law passed by President Emmanuel Macron's own government, Twitter refused to run the ad.

The decision stunned French lawmakers and officials.

Comment: See also:

Best of the Web: Unparalleled EU moment: China has arrived

Patrick Lawrence
Consortium News
Mon, 01 Apr 2019 00:00 UTC

It would be difficult to overstate the importance of Xi Jinping's visits to Rome, Paris and Monaco last week. In bringing his much-remarked Belt and Road Initiative to the center of Europe, the Chinese president has faced the Continent with the most fundamental question it will have to resolve in coming decades: Where does it stand as a trans-Atlantic partner with the U.S. and - as of Xi's European tour - the western flank of the Eurasian landmass? The simplicities of the postwar order, to put the point another way, have just begun to pass into history.

In Rome, the populist government of Premier Giuseppe Conte brought Italy into China's ambitious plan to connect East Asia and Western Europe via a multitude of infrastructure projects stretching from Shanghai to Lisbon and beyond. The memorandum of understanding Xi and Deputy Premier Luigi Di Maio signed calls for joint development of roads, railways, bridges, airports, seaports, energy projects and telecommunications systems. Along with the MoU, Chinese investors signed 29 agreements worth $2.8 billion.

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Best of the Web: The incorrigible hypocrisy of conservatives on US foreign policy

Jacob G. Hornberger
The Future of Freedom Foundation
Mon, 01 Apr 2019 16:20 UTC

Last week a Wall Street Journal editorial revealed the incorrigible hypocrisy with which conservatives have long suffered. Conservatives, of course, have long suffered this malady with respect to domestic policy given their ardent devotion to Social Security, Medicare, foreign aid, and other welfare-state programs even while decrying the left's devotion to socialism. But this particular WSJ editorial revealed the incorrigible conservative hypocrisy with respect to foreign policy.

The editorial was entitled "Putin Pulls a Syria in Venezuela." The opening sentence is comical: "Vladimir Putin has made a career of intervening abroad and seeing if the world lets him get away with it."

Why is that sentence funny? Because it also describes ever single U.S. president for the last 100 years! Every president from Woodrow Wilson through today has made a career of intervening abroad and seeing if the world lets him get away with it. Indeed, the central feature of the U.S. government for the last 100 years has been and continues to be empire and foreign interventionism.

Best of the Web: America will die from politically correct-induced insanity unless universities become free-speech zones once again

Robert Bridge
RT
Tue, 02 Apr 2019 17:48 UTC

America is faced with the grim prospect of the First Amendment being abolished in the places where it should be most vibrant - the schools and universities. Nothing less than the nation's survival is at stake.

Judging by the current PC madness now afflicting America, it looks as though Uncle Sam rolled out of bed one morning, stared at his reflection in the mirror and said to himself, "I no longer identify as a normal nation with long-standing values, conservative ideals and a strong moral foundation. Today I identify as an intolerant and self-indulgent narcissist, ready to lash out and silence anyone who disagrees with my worldview." And then many of the nation's inhabitants quickly followed suit.

Indeed, America seems to have reached the point in its 'progressive' development where those who seem to have literally lost their minds - much like the authority figures in Ken Kesey's masterful 1962 novel, 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' - wish to institutionalize the remainder of the sane population.

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Best of the Web: Theresa May just kicked the Brexit can right into Corbyn's corner: It's a trap

George Galloway
RT
Wed, 03 Apr 2019 15:36 UTC

As Inspector Clouseau once said in the Pink Panther "It's so obvious that it could not possibly be a trap."

Delivered in a Peter Sellers type of French accent with his gormless naivety it was perfectly obvious to the cinema audiences that a trap was exactly what it was.

Theresa May's 11th-hour 55th minute conversion to consulting Jeremy Corbyn on the type of Brexit Britain should finally enjoy is so obvious it must be a trap.

Not that Corbyn had any choice but to accept the prime minister's invitation to negotiate with her in the name of "national unity." Britain IS in a jam, but not one of the famously horticultural allotment-tending leader of the opposition's making. Just days away from the bumpy exit which, even its supporters (like me), cannot deny a WTO departure from the European Union would be, a terror (no exaggeration). Having to hold European Parliamentary elections (in which I would be a candidate), the Brexit camp would sweep with a huge majority, adding a new complication to the prime minister (and the leader of the opposition's) pickle. This, and an increasingly belligerent Brussels elite shrilly insulting us, something had to be done.

Comment: "May is done..." and yet, she's still PM.

Best of the Web: Reality check: CNN's claim that Trump has been unwilling to confront Putin is total bulls**t

Bryan MacDonald
RT
Tue, 02 Apr 2019 19:57 UTC

Fareed Zakaria is a veteran Putin conspiracy theorist. And you can assume he feels this obsession has helped further his career, especially at CNN.

Back in 2017, he made a pseudo-documentary on Russia's president, titled "The most powerful man in the world," which was widely pilloried. Indeed, the Kremlin labeled it "hysterical" and "odious," and dismissed it as "often complete fiction."

Russia expert Dominic Basulto summed it up as "what slick propaganda for the masses looks like in the digital era." Further pointing out how Zakaria failed to disclose his own "Russian collusion" as a host at the 2016 St Petersburg Economic Forum. An appearance which didn't go very well for the CNN anchor.

Over the past couple of years, Zakaria has been one of the loudest voices pushing the "Trump/Russia" hoax. But, instead of accepting reality after Robert Mueller's report kiboshed the yarn, he doubled down. And his latest video is unhinged.

Best of the Web: Pepe Escobar: The Pentagon's obsession with China, and Putin's strategy

Pepe Escobar
Strategic Culture
Mon, 01 Apr 2019 12:00 UTC

Chinese nuclear bombers. Chinese hypersonic missiles. Chinese carrier killer missiles. Chinese cyberattacks. Chinese anti-satellite weaponry. Chinese militarization of the South China Sea. Chinese Huawei spying.

So many Chinese "malign intentions". And we're not even talking about Russia.

Few people around the world are aware that the Pentagon for the moment is led by a mere "acting" Defense Secretary, Patrick Shanahan.

That did not prevent "acting" Secretary to shine in the red carpet when presenting the Trump administration's 2020 Pentagon budget proposal - at $718 billion - to the Senate Armed Services Committee: the top US national security threat is, in his own (repeated) words, "China, China, China".

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Best of the Web: Can the EU survive its own censorship?

Tom Luongo
Gold, Goats 'n Guns
Wed, 27 Mar 2019 00:01 UTC

The EU's new, comprehensive new Copyright Directive passed the European Parliament ensuring the way we use the Internet will change in the future.

And not for the better.

The controversial parts are Articles 11 and 13, the "link tax" and the "upload filter" requirements. For a good run down of how terrible these new rules are look anywhere on the internet but this article at Gizmodo (who I hope doesn't charge me a link tax for doing so!) will do.

Comment: Very good point! What is abundantly clear is that these EU bureaucrats really have no clue what they're doing and are simply lashing out in an attempt to regain control of a beast that fled the pen ages ago. Their flailing, as the above article illustrates, makes evident they really haven't thought this thing through.

See also:

Best of the Web: 'UK is most deeply flawed democracy in the West' - Ken Livingstone on chaos in Parliament

Ken Livingstone
RT
Mon, 01 Apr 2019 17:16 UTC

For two and a half years, the British people were promised that we were leaving the European Union on March 29. But we're still there.

Theresa May's government suffered another humiliating defeat last Friday when for the third time Parliament rejected her deeply flawed exit deal with the EU.

In all my life I have never seen our Parliament in such a state of chaos. Every single proposal about leaving the EU has been rejected by the majority of MPs, not just Theresa May's deal, but all the alternatives that were put forward last week. The only majority in the House of Commons is for not leaving without a deal, but MPs can't agree on what the deal should be.

Britain could leave in just under two weeks without a deal, but the EU may grant an extension of our remaining until the end of June or even into next year. Nobody knows and Theresa May is flying off to meet the other 27 EU governments to try and sort this out next week.

A tempest in a teapot. Who cares ? But hey, it's the NYP ...

codis

Surely nanny states are not the way. But hey, here we are: Name a country that does not have this in some form or another.

Ectomorph

'They Are The Dark; We Are the Light' The more we know, the closer we are to the end of tyranny by ELIZABETH NICKSON APR 28, 2024 [Link] . "This...

parzival

Both should be fired, but Jean-Pierre definitely. She is arrogant , ill-informed , and rude to reporters.

eulogical

"Look him in the Eyes.....Nonsense. . how do I read that ? I read it as it written, as if it said, "look him in the eyes and tell him you really...

Shangri

Best of the Web:

Best of the Web: Canadian man fined $55,000 for calling a male who identified as a woman a male

Best of the Web: How to shoot yourself in the foot: Twitter blocks French govt ad campaign in order to comply with French govt 'fake news' law

Best of the Web: Unparalleled EU moment: China has arrived

Best of the Web: The incorrigible hypocrisy of conservatives on US foreign policy

Best of the Web: America will die from politically correct-induced insanity unless universities become free-speech zones once again

Best of the Web: Theresa May just kicked the Brexit can right into Corbyn's corner: It's a trap

Best of the Web: Reality check: CNN's claim that Trump has been unwilling to confront Putin is total bulls**t

Best of the Web: Pepe Escobar: The Pentagon's obsession with China, and Putin's strategy

Best of the Web: Can the EU survive its own censorship?

Best of the Web: 'UK is most deeply flawed democracy in the West' - Ken Livingstone on chaos in Parliament

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