Bourbon & Bullets

Here we are a little over a week out from election day, the end to one of the most contentious U.S presidential elections ever, and the polls tell us that... well we're not entirely sure what the polls tell us? If we believe Nate Silver of 538 fame, it's been over since Sept, the Donald has at best, a 1/5 chance at winning the presidency. And we were to believe the NY Times the election was over in August, no reason for Trump to even bother campaigning. A week ago an ABC poll gave Clinton a 12 point lead nationally over Trump, a good six points above the next highest poll estimating Hillary's lead. Today (Oct 31) that poll is down to Clinton +1, a pretty major swing, and not all of it was due to the new FBI investigation  of Hillary's emails, Trump was showing momentum in all polls even previous to that. All except one. The IDP poll has consistently, for weeks, only shown at most a three point spread between Clinton and Trump, the same day of the ABC poll showing +12...

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The biggest question from the predictable liberal media yesterday (Oct 28) was not what had Hillary done now, but why would Comey reopen the investigation now? Before it was confirmed the new emails of interest came from an unrelated investigation into the sexual antics of Anthony 'Can't Keep it in his Pants' Weiner, most observers felt the renewed investigation was the result of an internal revolt at the FBI. Dozens and dozens of agents spent over a year investigating Hillary's private (and illegal) email server, confirmed that she was in violation of U.S. national security laws, the same laws that saw (as just one example) General Petraeus convicted of offences regarding the leaking of classified information to a girlfriend. Obviously it was without the intent to commit treason, but the law is the law... unless you are Hillary Clinton. With that in mind (the General Petraeus part) one can imagine the outrage from aforementioned dozens and dozens of FBI agents, when...

Canada is not seen by the wider world as a corrupt place to do business. It is in fact probably one of the most corrupt of the western industrialized democracies, and all the more so because no one doing business with Canadian companies or government expect it. Sweetheart deals for local companies at the local government level is perhaps par for the course wherever you are in the world, at any rate it is certainly the norm, from what I've seen, in Canada. I have also witnessed the illegal collusion of business and government at the provincial level (state level for U.S readers) and therefore see no reason to believe this magically stops at the federal level. In fact it is all too clear such corruption is rampant in Ottawa. The National Shipbuilding Strategy is a prime example. Shipbuilding companies the world over scratch their heads at Canada's approach to procuring new naval vessels, the head of French shipbuilding giant DCNS going so far to say publicly that Canada ...

It all started a few weeks back with Globe and Mail columnist Lawrence Martin bemoaning the state of print media in Canada. Then Martin who never saw a government spending solution in search of a problem he didn't like followed with a suggestion that newspapers should be subsidized by the government. This was followed by the CBC's announcement they were getting into the news publishing business (online) and its condemnation from the gang over at the Rebel Media (born out of the ashes of Sun TV) crying foul over CBC's move into the (digital) newspaper game. Brian Lilley recorded a monologue about Canada's heavily subsidized broadcaster muscling in on the private enterprise, and supposedly at-arms-length from government, newspaper business.  Except its not true, not even remotely. Canada's newspaper media has the most monopolistic ownership of any industrialized democracy... okay, we're about on par with Venezuela, wonderful, how proud we should all be in...

Should we build the Avro Arrow (or a modified version called the Super Arrow) instead of buying the beleaguered F-35? The short answer is no. Yes the cancellation of the Avro Arrow in 1959 by blockhead prime minister Diefenbaker  was a tragedy for the Canadian aerospace industry. Avro was a Canadian cutting edge industrial giant, they had some of the best aerospace engineers and designers in the world working for them, when the Arrow was cancelled many of them left to work on the U.S space program and helped put the first man on the moon. Now Bourdeau Industries (we assume of Quebec, they don't publish their address) wants Canadian aerospace to go back to the future. They have managed to convince (ret) General Lewis McKenzie (not an airforce general) to be a spokesman for their cause. McKenzie has dutifully made the rounds of Canadian media, who, we should note, are only too happy to jump on stories criticizing military procurement and the Tories. McKenzie, in at least o...

The Tory government in Ottawa may have restored 'Royal' to the Royal Canadian Navy, in recognition of its proud heritage, but sadly they've done little else to support our once significant navy. Yes Canada's navy has been in terminal decline since Trudeau Sr's years. Starting with the demoralizing Unification of the armed forces in 1968, the mothballing and eventual sell off (just two years after an expensive refit) of the aircraft carrier Bonaventure, the scrapping of a cutting edge Canadian built hydrofoil, to the purchase of the (supposedly) bargain basement Upholder subs, which have proven to be anything but a bargain, the Liberal Party has long had a hand in sinking the Royal Canadian Navy. However with the election in 2006 of a new Conservative government (not Joe Clarke's NDP in disguise PCs) there was the promise of restored prestige and capability to Canada's armed forces with the navy receiving (having borne most of the previous gene...