Both on here and in my discussions with my friends I've opined about what I think the auditor general would find in Applewood and it's lottery grant. Well, the auditor general found that the Applewood Community Association didn't keep the proper records and that they couldn'd prove that the money went to where it was supposed to go. Armed with that knowledge, the government has ordered the Applewood Community Association to repay $20,000 of the $30,000 it was given.

I get email, who doesn't. Occasionally I get an unspeakable horrors in my mailbox. I recently received an email from someone I know, the contents of which were a bit of a shock. I suspect it is a forward of an email that is making the rounds, so I will not name this individual, however the contents of the message is be here. I originally wasn't even going to dignify this with a response, but you can't keep a political scientist from expressing his opinion.

On my morning commute to the LRT station, I listen to the radio. Thankfully the CBC strike is over and I can get my info fix (Jack FM is great for music, but I missed my morning news and info). Well this morning they had Rod Love on talking about the Gomery Commission. The Gomery Commission is in Alberta looking at recommendations to help prevent the Sponsorship Scandal from happening again. Apparently Mr. Love has been invited to provide a submission to the Commission and CBC was interviewing him this morning.

There was a time in the past when, if you did something bone-headed or wrong, you'd just say that “the devil made you do it”. Well good ol' George W. down in the US of A has come out and stated that the whole “War on Terrorism” and the invasion of Iraq happened because God told him (dubya) to do it.

I have some concerns about the direction our province of Alberta is heading. Though we currently have huge oil revenue surpluses, it would seem that mismanagement of this revenue is robbing our future for short term personal gain. Case in point is the $300 or so “dividend” announced by the premier this past week.

I\'ve been seeing in the news where the United States is revising their nuclear doctrine to make it easier to use their nuclear weapons in a first strike capacity. There are some things that need to be cleared up with this as well as some points for discussion.

It's happening faster than I thought. The American slide into despotism is well on its way, if the statements of a US Justice Department lawyer are taken into account. The lawyer, arguing in the Maher Arar case, has stated that foreigners on US soil have no rights. No right to due process, no rights under the US constitution and certainly no right to not be tortured by the US or any other country. I can see the US tourism adverts now: Come for a week, stay detained for a lifetime without charge.

I like trains. The reason I bring this up is that the precipitating event that caused me to put finger to keyboard in this instance was the editorial article in a copy of Trains Magazine. Now Trains Magazine is aimed at people who like railroads and railroading, railfanning as it\'s called here in North America. What railfans do is seek out places were trains congregate (easy to find, since the trains leave their tracks behind) and watch the trains go by or take pictures of the trains as they go by.

The editorial was mentioning an incident where local law enforcement in the United States was accosting some railfans who were standing on public property, taking photographs of trains. The police accused them of terrorist activities. When the railfans complained that they (the railfans) were merely engaging in their constitutional rights, the police responded that “new legislation has superseded the constitution”.

From what I\'ve seen in the press, it would appear that telephone and internet provider Telus, has entered the censorship game. A little background, Telus is in the midst of a labour dispute. After four years of contract talks, a strike has broken out, and someone has put up a pro-union web site. What Telus has done, is blocked the website from anyone who uses Telus as an internet provider. This poses several nasty questions about Telus.

I see in the papers where the CHR is putting up an objection to the drilling of some sour gas wells just outside of south east Calgary. This after the company that requested the wells was given a smooth ride through the approval process. It\'s amazing that the CHR would raise such an objection, and here\'s why I think that is.