This just up on Reuters.  Small Currency Exchange shops are turning away American tourists looking to exchange US dollars for Euros.  

The shops complain that the dollar is falling so fast that they won't recoup their Euros when they manage to cash in the US dollars they've taken in.  Tourists are having to go to central banks in downtown Amsterdam to exchange their dollars.

Yesterday, John Edwards came back to New Orleans.  He announced that he is suspending his race for the White House, but he remains a committed anti-poverty activist.  Well, New Orleans needs John Edwards more than John Edwards needs a backdrop for a campaign stop.  

Video of John thanking his Daily Kos supporters, and lots of photos of the event, below the fold.  No pootie pics this time, but I do have New Orleans cemetery and Mardi Gras pics.

And, of course, I answer the question: What does John Edwards carry around in his tool belt when working on a Habitat for Humanity housing project?

I'm feeling very biblical tonight.  I thought I might try to put some things in some sort of perspective.  I do have a point, but if I drink a few beers while writing this I might very well forget what that point is.  

You be the judge.

Also: This is a New and Improved diary, with free pootie pics!  Just because.  

Do you think the recent Pentagon 'proof' of Iranian involvement in Iraq stinks?  Do you smell bullshit?

Do you think that ordinary shells and mortar rounds stencilled in English, with a March 2006 date (in English) don't add up to proof of Iran's supplying weapons to 'insurgents' in Iraq (never mind the whole question of which insurgents Iran is supplying)?

So, yesterday I posted a poor excuse for a diary titled: How do you say "March 2006" in Farsi?

Then something interesting happened.... (below)

I can't believe I'm going to write a diary on this.  I feel like slamming my head on a desk, repeatedly.  Heck, I have slammed my head on my desk, often, in the last couple of days.

We've been shown proof that the bombs are coming from Iran.  Incontrovertible proof, impeccable logic, so much so that the people presenting the proof don't want to be named.  What proof, exactly?

Below...

OK, I promised you Saddam photos, they are below.  In technicolor.  OK, Dell flatscreen 16-bit color (at my end), I don't know what you're using.  OK, I'll shut up now, and just post the photos.

Staring at me on the front page of today's newspaper (Metro, in Montreal, not online): ELECTRONIC VOTING IS A FIASCO

A bit of history: Quebec decided to try electronic voting in a municipal election in November, 2005. The machines used were supplied by the contractor PG Elections, officials of which have refused to identify the US vendor that supplied the actual voting machines (think: Diebold).

The election was characterized in the press as a debacle (pdf alert). A moratorium was instated on e-voting in the Province of Quebec, and the Director-General of Elections Quebec (DGEQ) did an exhaustive study of the incident. The 360-page report was released yesterday (link below).

Stephen Harper, Bush's little brother to the north, has decided (he's Canada's own Decider, so he has decided) to Americanize Canada.  Apparently, this is what's wrong with Canada, we're not Americans.  So says Canada's decider.  Well, he doesn't come right out and say that, because he's leading a minority government which can be brought down any day now (I hope) by a motion of No Confidence, forcing the dissolution of Parliament and new elections.

So what does Canada's own Decider decide to do?  He makes a decision, that's what. He decides that Canada will hold elections every four years, just like in the USA.

More below...  and poll!

I recently had the occasion to listen to a public lecture at McGill University by Dr. Brian Alters, the only Canadian expert witness called in the Dover, PA Intelligent Design trial.  Dr. Alters holds the Tomlinson Chair in Science Education at McGill, he is the author of several books on biology and education, and he holds an appointment at Harvard University, where he once debated IDer Ken Ham.  

Dr. Alters commented on the outcome of the Dover Monkey Trial by saying the decision was "a major defeat for the proponents of a religious concept that attempts to introduce supernatural causation into science, where it simply doesn't belong."

So why do I care?

The Canadian Parliament will hold a 6-our debate beginning at 3:00 PM this afternoon, following which they will hold a vote on extending Canada's mission in Afghanistan until 2009.  Opposition MPs are furious, as the move seems designed to force them to go on the record as for or against the mission, without any meaningful debate, with no criteria for success or even a well-defined purpose for the mission, certainly with no exit strategy, and no chance to talk to their constituents before the vote.  Furthermore, there is no real advantage to be gained by extending the mission for such a long time, outside of Mr. Harper's radical political agenda.

Link (Reuters)

And this is not the only Harper move that is copied, word-for-word, from Bush and Rove's play-book.

More below the fold.

Ever heard of Maher Arar?  A Syrian-born Canadian citizen, he was returning to Canada from a vacation in Tunisia, on Septembre 26, 2002, when his plane made a stop-over in New York.  Arar was removed from the plane and detained by US Immigration officials, handed over to the CIA, flown to Syria on a rendition flight, held in solitary confinement and tortured for 1 year until he was returned to Canada by the Syrians in October, 2003.  

Arar sued the US, in what was the first real legal challenge to the US policy of Extraordinary Rendition.  Today, in New York, Federal judge David Trager, in an 88-page ruling, dismissed the case.

Basically, they're telling people . . . if you're ever wronged by our politicians or intelligence people, you are on your own. Good luck.

The gist of the comments on dKos about the unholy alliance between the GOP and Christian fundies seems to be that the fundies are too stupid to know that they're being lied to and manipulated by Bushco, who are said to be not True Christians.   True Christians give to the poor, following Jesus' lead when he said "those who would be first will be last."  But as a student of religion and the psychology of religion, this argument rings hollow with me.  I am not a historian, but in this diary I'm going to give a historical comparison, and my take on the unholy alliance between Bushco and those who would make us all Christians.

More below the fold...

Citing security concerns.  No, not on Mars.  In Montreal.  Montreal's largest Catholic Church,  St-Joseph's Oratory, which attracts more than 2 million visitors yearly, had eagerly embraced a budding pro-life movement in Quebec, and promised the participation of  Cardinal Edouard Gagnon, Msgr. Adam Exner, and Msgr. Jude Saint-Antoine, all heavy hitters in the Canadian Catholic hierarchy.  Other speakers were to include Rabbi Reuven Bulka (writer), Bruce Clemenger (Evangelical Fellowship of Canada), and Stockwell Day (Conservative Asshat of Canada), for what shaped up to be a truly ecumenical anti-abortion conference in Canada.

More below the fold...

How can you raise your very own little suicide bomber?  Here are 10 easy steps:

Below the fold.

Edited to add: So this sank like a stone, and people told me to keep my day job. And I don't even have a day job. That's OK, I can take the heat.

I'll just sit up hear admiring the view, as I watch the fall of an Empire. But if it was my Empire, I woulnd't let it go without a fight. --Jody

Start:
I'm no Zbigniew Brzezinski, but I'm going to give this a shot.  The US has a natural enemy.  China.  Not Al-Qaeda.  The Chinese have always seen themselves as the legitimate rulers of the world, the pure race, the One Great Civilization.  Western military power may have curtailed Chinese imperialism for much of the last two centuries, but the Chinese have a virtue America does not: patience.   China is now set to challenge American oil hegemony in much of the world, and they have patiently built their economy, manufacturing base and engineering to be in a position to do so.

More below the fold...

Well, I'm an atheist. I can't say what I will believe 30 years from today, but I can't imagine how this will ever change. The word 'god', the concepts 'god' and 'worship' are absolutely, completely, unequivocally meaningless to me.

More below, and no, I'm not trashing Religion.