The LAF is historically respected by all citizens. It
is considered as the red line of national security.
OK, the soldiers of the Dear LAF are not eating meat anymore because of the tough economic times.
OK, the Hizbullah is a MUCH stronger militia force than the LAF.
OK, the LAF had its sad times during civil war when it got divided, more than once.
However, despite all the above, the LAF survived and somehow managed to keep its unity and respect by all. Bravo to all the soldiers serving their country and assisting citizens!
Bravo to an army that has removed its mandatory service a few years after civil war. This is not that common in the Middle East.
An army that is as diverse as Lebanon… and yet united, as mentioned above.
Now, back to the story of censorship that happened at yesterday’s virtual concert.
The latter was meant to celebrate the LAF’s 75 years of existence (occurring on Saturday, August 1st, 2020). Due to the pandemic, there was neither a parade nor a performance. However, a certain NGO organized a virtual concert to honour the LAF. This so-called NGO is ironically called “Lebanese and proud”…. well, proud except of the one censored sentence, as you can see below. Proud BUT not of its revolution against the mafia-like government.
Bambi has posted about the song for Beirut that was the object of the stupid censorship in a few of its most powerful lyrics (of a famous poem): the sentence “For revolution is born from the womb of misery”got replaced by… “lalalalala” (you can see this earlier post at very end of this one).
Should we laugh or cry about this stupidity?
Do they really think that the Lebanese people are that stupid (mmm, maybe *bébé lalala*, as they say in Québec… Hence their lalalalala melody :))?
VERY seriously now, does this make any sense?
How can anyone think that not reminding the people of Lebanon that their revolution (against the corrupt political elite) was born from the womb of their CRYING misery is not necessary?
How can anyone think that just because the truth is silenced that it will stop existing all of a sudden?
Below, you can see a recent statement by the MTV, which covered the event and remember further below Bambi’s earlier post with a link to the beautiful song:
“MTV issues statement on the event that took place on Army Day”
“Following the reactions and comments that were made regarding the
replacement of a phrase from a song that includes a reference to the
“revolution”, which happened during the live coverage of
“Kermelak Ya Watan” concert on Army Day, MTV has decided to confirm
the following:
The TV station, which assumed the live coverage of the protests and never
hesitated to spread the people’s voice as they protested against the political
class, is against all forms of suppression of the freedom of speech and has
paid, and still is paying, a hefty price for it.
MTV was in charge of the productive aspect of the above-mentioned
concert, which includes filming and directing. In addition to other related tasks,
such as the reports and the content of the presentation, which Tony Baroud was
in charge of, without interfering with the technical aspects of the artistic
and musical program, and the selection of songs. Therefore, the TV station had
nothing to do with the changes that were made for one of the songs.
The TV station would like to stress that the Lebanese Army Day is a national and inclusive occasion, and the concert was held yesterday to express this unity, which is the result of the joint work and the distribution of roles between the army, the organizers and MTV, in addition to the valuable contribution of the artists, the orchestra and the choir.”
In Arabic, they say: “The causes of death are numerous,
but death remains the same”.
There is surely something ironic that your dad did not die because of the coronavirus or of an armed conflict or a revolution.
Bambi hopes that this fatal pedestrian-car accident happened too fast for your dad to suffer.
She just lit a candle for him/you: May he rest in
peace. May you find comfort with each other, along with inner peace… Bless you
for your care and visits to see him.
Safe travels please… Be well. Be strong Paul, Paula,
Valérie, and Sandra.
Too bad there is a pandemic in life… Even deer cannot jump neither to Montreal nor to Beirut to be by your side. All they can do is to share their love across the miles!
First, here is a serious article about the finances of Canada before the pandemic: https://financialpost.com/opinion/economic-recovery-requires-ottawa-to-change-direction . Food for thought, even for Bambi who voted for this government the first time (like most of her voting life). However, she did not do so the second time. Contrary to many Canadian human beings, Bambi does learn from history sometimes ?. She is saying so without even thinking if the other alternatives to Mr. Trudeau would be better or not. Perhaps the same. Perhaps worse (although hard to believe). It all comes down to the personal responsibility of each politician (or citizen in life), regardless of his/her party, to be decent.
Now, the following post is meant for Bambi’s pure pleasure. It is mainly made of jokes to have fun on this sunny last day of the month of July that she usually likes particularly.
Here is the story: For some entertainment (even is she has never watched any Netflix movie in her life yet, even during this pandemic), Bambi took the time to carefully listen to our PM and his Chief staff, Ms. Katie Telford, when they testified before the House of Commons finance committee. Of course, she equipped herself with a fresh coffee and a piece of cake before ?:
First, it was amazing to observe all the hard work of
everyone involved.
Bambi found herself interested in the human side of our MPs. The pandemic has allowed us to see the humanity in official meetings (e.g., dogs barking, cats or kids jumping, etc.). We did not see any pet, make no mistake. This is too serious. However, we could see that some MPs had guitars in their offices. Others had pictures of their kids, etc. Mr. Trudeau seems to have status of knights on horses.
This being said, Bambi appreciated the GREAT
questions. Perhaps the BEST ones came from Mr. Pierre Poilièvre. The more she
observes him, the more she finds him competent. Well, too bad he is neither our
PM nor the Leader of his party ?.
As a PM, he would be perhaps competent and he is perfectly bilingual, Bambi fantasized
whilst listening to his spicy interactions with Mr. Trudeau. Seriously now,
Bambi appreciates his clear AND short questions. He even makes the job easier on
the PM by literally telling him what is expected in the answer, simply yes or
no ?.
Furthermore, Bambi liked the questions and comments of ALL the other members from ALL parties, including the Liberal Party (of course biased toward Mr. Trudeau… and we are not just talking about “unconscious bias” here ?). For instance, there were good questions and comments from Mr. Fortier, Mr. Angus, Mr. Cooper, Ms. May (who asked one and only but great question). Bambi cannot recall the names of every person. She just remembers that the Chair’s name may be Mr. Wayne Easter (Liberal party, one must say, which seems odd to her but perhaps this is how it is usually done). Anyhow, he seemed fair to Bambi with regard to time management. He seems to be a pleasant politician too. He was even funny at times despite the seriousness of this exercise of democracy and justice. Bambi enjoyed the teasing moments with Mr. Poilievre. The latter can be funny too.
At one point, something odd happened (or not too funny
given the touchy moment): Mr. Easter went offline. Power outage at his end
(thunderstorm, it seems). Bambi could not help not to joke in her mind saying: Too
bad this Chair is not located in Lebanon, he would have had a UPS for his computer
or a generator ?
(seriously, this is how Lebanese families have done it during and post-civil
war). Anyhow, the Vice-Chair took over and did a good job, not wasting more
time (Mr. Trudeau stayed for perhaps about 90 minutes only).
Despite all the great DIRECT questions, Mr. Trudeau was as vague as ever. He wants us to believe him that he did not know at which hotel his spouse stayed in London in March, 2020. His own mother was with her. Didn’t he have any conversation about the trip with her neither? Come on (both were at a WE Day in London when the pandemic was beginning to tour the world. For the record, Canada was still in denial back then, especially at its airports).
OK, assuming the Trudeau family truly does not have the
time to communicate, our PM knew he was coming to a committee inquiring about
dollar figures and dates. Yet, he did not do his math homework ahead of the exam.
Not very impressive, to say the least. Mr. Blanchet had a funnier way to describe
this testimony on ICI RDI. He referred to it as “a tasteless tofu”
?. OK, except for a date him and his
Chief Staff seems to agree on (May, 8), we did not get much information from
Mr. Trudeau. However, this May 8 date does not make any sense with the other
dates about this program (contradictions). Who launches a program before
approving it? Very weird all this.
One more thing about Mr. Trudeau, he wants Bambi and her fellow human Canadians to believe that he did not know the Kielberger brothers (the WE charity Bosses). He has never seen them in person (only on stages of WE days), he insisted. OK maybe this one is part of the truth, even if Bambi found an old picture online taken in a school (see further below. It is followed by a video of him calling those two brothers “our friends” in front of thousands of youth (1:44 minutes from the start )…but this does not mean anything. Perhaps he meant it as an Arab guy calling a pure stranger encountered on the street “habibi” (= my love or lover) ?. Sometimes, strangers may get mad at each other (e.g., traffic or other). Then, they call each other “habibi” with a friendly tap on the shoulder (pre-pandemic times, for sure).
Seriously, Mr. Trudeau seemed to want us to believe
that he saw the conflict of interest and “tried to push back” but it was
like the fault of the public servants. “They picked the WE Charity. It was a
binary choice: WE or nothing”. Wow. Very logical ?.
Bambi is sure that he did not mean it that way but… still, he seemed ungrateful to the HARD/devoted work of our public servants. He said so instead of taking responsibility for his third violation of the same Conflict of Interest Act (Mr. Poilièvre challenged him well on this with some sarcastic humour even ?). He apologized but this time no tear was shed.
If Mr. Trudeau ends up resigning (as the Bloc Québécois is asking and as they should, him and Mr. Morneau), perhaps he can aim for a career in psychology ?. Indeed, he kept using terms like “perception” (of corruption or cronyism?) and “appearance of favouritism”. Of course, all this without providing us with evidence-based data (numbers, dates, content) to correct this misconception.
Seriously, pandemic or not, it is hard to understand all the relationships of WE Charity with our government and many of our industries (now breaking ties with it). Did the WE group contribute to build Mr. Trudeau’s “cool” image over the years, making him more appealing to younger ones (https://ipolitics.ca/2020/07/03/timeline-trudeaus-ties-to-we-are-as-old-as-his-political-career/)?
Does Mr. Trudeau feel the need to help them because they helped him. What are friends for?
How could both Mr. Morneau and Mr. Trudeau be so careless
with public funds by choosing an apparently bankrupt (or shell to use a term
used the MPs) stakeholder to manage the program? Does that make any sense? Is
this fair to taxpayers and to youth (so dear to Mr. Trudeau’s heart)?
Plus, Bambi is still confused: what is the real final value of the program? $912 millions? Just $550 millions? Or $300 millions? Too bad this was not addressed, unless Bambi missed it.
Mr. Angus (NDP Party) seems to be offended by
the less than minimum wage payment to student volunteers… but since when we pay
volunteers? All this does not make sense to Bambi’s mind, in all honesty.
This being said, bravo and thank you to Ms. Telford
for her courage and efforts of telling the truth. Despite being limited in what
she wanted to say (or could say?), she has been much clearer, and more
collaborative than Mr. Trudeau’s “tasteless tofu” (luckily Bambi is a
meat lover ?).
Seriously, Ms. Telford also seems to be a hard worker. Not easy to do her job
in a pandemic and now with another ethical saga.
After the committee, we learned that Mr. Poilièvre’s
motion to get to the bottom of the needed information passed. This happened
despite the Liberal MPs vote against it.
To conclude this post by linking it to its title, you may wonder what is the Caesar Act? This is a US legislation that imposes sanctions on Mr. Assad’s extended family members and friends (wife, cousins, now 18-year-old son, friends in Syria and eventually in Lebanon, companies, etc.), supposedly to protect Syrian civilians from corruption (https://www.state.gov/syria-caesar-act-designations/ and https://sg.news.yahoo.com/us-imposes-sanctions-teenage-son-syrian-leader-assad-153450051.html). At the end of Mr. Trudeau’s testimony, Bambi had a funny thought in her mind: How about a Canadian version of the Caesar Act ?? Of course, he is not Mr. Assad and we are not Syria, thank goodness… but perhaps a Canadian Cesar Act can help the House Finance Committee get to the bottom of this story and stop the conflict of interest ?. Obviously, as per this post’s title, that was a joke, hoping you have a deer’s sense of humour!
“Take one of those countries that is typically called a banana republic.
In this kind of country, the head of state does what he wants.
He places his family members in important positions even if they have no obvious skills.
He appoints whomever he wants, fires whomever he wants, gives money to whomever he wants, receives lavish gifts, etc.
Royalty
He does it with impunity, without being accountable, without suffering consequences, without giving a damn about what those below think.
The potentate does not differentiate between state coffers and his own.
The potentate considers the country to be his own playground.
The scandal is permanent, except that it is not a scandal in the eyes of the potentate and his court, who believe that they are entitled to it … because they make the law.
Usually this lasts until the fall of the potentate.
Conversely, in genuinely democratic regimes, when a scandal becomes too large, those responsible are forced to resign.
There are consequences, there is a price to pay for turpitude.
Clearly, Canada is a democratic, serious country, enough anyways to consider itself to be very good and to set an example of virtue around the world.
Nothing would be further from the truth than associating Canada with a banana republic, right?
We might say, it’s still funny…
Justin Trudeau was snowboarding in Whistler and teaching high school drama.
He is catapulted as prime minister only because his name is Trudeau, rather than Tremblay or Trépanier.
His skills for the job? He doesn’t even know the meaning of the word.
His family is taking advantage of the largesse offered by all the regime’s courtiers who want to be well looked after by him, such as the Kielburger brothers or the Aga Khan.
The former pays his family, the latter lends him his private island for small family vacations.
The regime’s number two, Bill Morneau, takes trips unrelated to his job, half paid for by the agency where his children worked.
And all these beautiful people seem to consider that this is due to them quite naturally.
They are almost outraged that one dares to question them.
The Kielburger brothers claim to be victims and blame the bad media.
Justin tells us: what do you mean, I have the cause of young people so much at heart that I did not realize that WE Charity was paying my family.
Morneau took out his personal checkbook.
Resignation
Justin Trudeau will be questioned by MPs today.
He’ll probably apologize and maybe shed a little tear.
In the banana republics, when you need a scapegoat, you throw an insignificant under the wheels of the bus, never the real culprits.
If Trudeau or Morneau save their heads after that, it will mean that between Canada and Santa Banana, there isn’t much of a difference in the end”.
No matter the source of external or internal funding, no matter any guilt feeling we may have for the sins of earlier generations (in Canada or elsewhere), no matter the apparent beauty of the cause… the whole BLM movement is not as innocent as you may want to think.
Thus, Dearest New Brunswick along with all its esteemed politicians, PLEASE be mindful of the following:
Bambi urges you not to fall into the trap of caving in to BLM‘s demands, as they will keep asking for more and more (e.g., see what happened in other cities in Canada). Indeed, this movement seems to function like any other radical group, including Islamism (Bambi did not say the Muslim religion, mind you, and she knows what she is talking about here). Groups like BLM usually intimidate to get what they want. They infiltrate existing entities/organizations, and… brains! They do not stop. They just push and push. Even if at times they may deceive you by hiding their real agenda, they do not hesitate to use means that you and Bambi would never resort to.
This is why, please do not let Black Lives Matter (BLM) do to NB what Islamists have done to Bambi’s birth country and to its neighbourhood… or what they do to us in the Western’s world, including Canada. Here is a story from last week:
Bambi feels sad for all the well-meaning people (i.e., especially young people) who will fall into this potentially dangerous ideological trap.
Once again, who is funding this movement and why don’t they leave our beautiful NB alone?
We are far from being perfect FOR SURE. Like any other place, there is room for much improvement… but one thing is clear in Bambi’s mind: We do not deserve such toxic radicalism.
Sadly, we just learned that the University of New Brunswick (UNB) in Fredericton has partnered with BLM Federicton (with funding from we do not know where):
If you do not believe Bambi, please take a look at what BLM Frederecton recently added to their Facebook page (this was not there in the earlier post reported further below). Please look specifically at how BLM Fredericton is putting pressure on our government, provincial and municipal (see the message in red). Is this a good method, even if their demand was 100 percent logical?
As you can see, they are well organized. They have a template of a letter to harass each of our MLAs to push their (freaky) agenda forward, including their # 1 call (for now) to defend our police services:
Is this what we want for our NB? Is this what we want for our Canada?
If we do not wake up now, we can eventually easily destroy our beautiful young country.
Reasonable countries need their police and army to protect their citizens. This is the least in any country of the world, not just in Canada and in NB. This being said, of course, we must keep improving our police services whilst always saying NO to power abuse by the police!
Bambi will stop here, concluding with her earlier post on this topic:
Although this song is 20 years old, Bambi just discovered it recently :).
Thanks to the internet radio she listens to whilst working, she now knows this beautiful song’s title and history.
In Lebanese Arabic, it means “At the dawn of the third millennium“.
This song was composed for Ms. Carole Samaha by Mr. Osama Al Rahbani, a musician and composer (son of the famous musician and poet, Mr. Mansour Rahbani).
Bambi would like to attract your attention to the following words at the end of his statement:
“I am committed to leading an open, honest government that is accountable to Canadians, lives up to the highest ethical standards, brings our country together, and applies the utmost care and prudence in the handling of public funds“.
Mmm… That was less than five years ago only.
Of note, that was before our PM’s three consecutive ethical deviations (i.e., the Aga Khan vacation, the SNC-Lavalin story, and the current WE Charity saga). The third scandal is definitely the largest… It is like the sponsorship scandal (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sponsorship_scandal), although larger. For a description, see Bambi’s earlier post further below.
Mr. Trudeau, if she may, Bambi would like to ask you the following:
1. What happened to your beautiful promise above?
1a. Did you just “forget” about it (for the third time :))?
OR…
1b. Are you just good in talking the talk. So who cares about walking the walk?
Mr. Trudeau, can you try to remember your beautiful promise when you go to sleep the night before Thursday, that is when you will testify before the House committee?
Your own beautiful words (assuming they were written by yourself) may help inspire you to have the right mindset to answer all the questions (contrary to the WE Charity bosses today).
We, as tax payers, deserve to hear the truth, Mr. Trudeau.
A picture taken from the Journal de Montréal showing PM Justin Trudeau and his spouse, Ms. Sophie Grégoire, on the stage of WE Day UN at the Madison Square Garden in New York (Septembre 2017)
The talented Ms. Emmanuelle Latraverse is not any
journalist in Canada. She is a high-calibre journalist who worked for RDI (or Radio-CanadaInternational). She has covered the Parliament of Canada. She was also
the host of “Les Coulisses du pouvoir” (2011-2017). She was also the lead
reporter for the French CBC Newscasts (“Téléjournal”) with Ms. Céline
Galipeau.
Below is a quick translation of her powerful article, which was published on Sunday July 27, 2020, in the Journal de Montréal and entitled: “When will we see real inquiries on WE Charity”? [“À quand de vraies enquêtessur WE Charity?”].
There were those of Justin Trudeau and Bill Morneau for forgetting that the Conflict of Interest Act applies to them too. Then the finance minister’s surreal act of contrition for forgetting to reimburse $41,000 for travel expenses.
Beyond the spectre of cronyism worthy of the sponsorship scandal surrounding this matter, it is for the flippancy and negligence in the administration of public funds that the entire Trudeau government should apologize.
Rounded corners…
We understand today that WE Charity is not a charity like any other.
Transfers of funds to sister company ME to WE, a large pool of real estate in Toronto, all ensuring a comfortable income for brothers Craig and Marc Kielburger.
Already, governance doubts have prompted many of the most generous donors to step down in recent days.
Bye bye the millions of Telus, Virgin and many others [Royal Bank of Canada today, Bambi adds].
But these important questions about the governance of WE, it seems that no one has asked them in government. Neither officials nor cabinet members, according to the Clerk of the Privy Council.
Yet the Canada Revenue Agency should have questions about WE Charity‘s financial tricks. Will it, in turn, open an investigation?
And what about the allegations that WE Charity has passed the data on its participants in the Liberal Party.
Imagine the rest…
Moral of the story, once again the pandemic has a broad back.
The government has turned corners on the pretext of helping students, giving WE Charity a big boost in the detour.
But the question arises: how many other pandemic programs have been launched and administered so carelessly?
That the government has chosen to impose few controls to save families from bankruptcy under the Canada Emergency Benefit is one thing.
But we must not forget that, in total, 315 billion of public funds were spent in a few months.
How many other party friends have had privileged access to the government’s billions?
How many other contracts have been so neglected?
Faced with the daily revelations in this matter, it’s hard not to fear that WE Charity is just the tip of the iceberg.”
Bambi would like to begin by sharing a tweet of her favourite journalist in Lebanon, Ms. Roula Douglas:
Here is a quick translation:
“It is surrealistic what is happening. When we think we have more or less *adjusted* to a new reality in Lebanon, another one, even worse than the precedent sets in”.
Bambi would like to thank her friend Aline for sharing this thoughtful video.
As Mr. Salaudeen elegantly and wisely said, ” we live relative comfortably compared to our grandparents who were born back in 1900. They endured much more difficult challenges, including deadly pandemics. So following simple health protocols such as wearing a mask should not be seen as a hassle and inconvenient. Please help other people and yourself“.
Let’s take care of both ourselves and others. Everyone’s life is precious!
