What with his job of having to monitor Fox News Channel and all the others and now Al Jazeera? Wow! He’ll have to hire more staff and possibly more fantastic “spokesmen” like his Dan Dugas.
LET’S RECAP!
In March, the last time we heard from the Minister of What We Watch On TV, (and Defense Minister) Peter MacKay about the proper TV-watching paradigms for good Canadian behavior, as prescribed by The Government of Kanuckistan, we were told by him and the Conservative Party’s brilliant “strategist”, Geoff (Elmer Fudd) Norquay, that we should stop watching Fox News Channel and cancel our subscriptions to that channel. (I’ve written it up here, and negatively so, several 
times. Therefore I imagine he is as dismissive of me as he is of Fox News Channel, and I’m still waiting for him to tell Canadians to stop visiting this web site and for Canadians to stop sending me money.)
Of course as a normal freedom-loving Canadian (and an actual conservative!) who detests nanny-state government intrusion into every last facet of what’s left of our private lives and who don’t need the finger-wagging know-it-alls in government like MacKay or any other liberals or leftists to tell me to stop watching the only conservative-tolerant channel on TV, that was when I instead stopped “subscribing” to… the Conservative Party. Even if they formally apologize for their idiotic, nanny-state, intrusive government meddling and Hugo Chavez —type behavior. Which they won’t.*
The team MacKay/Fudd’s irrational, knee-jerk dictate was spawned by… a comedian (!) on Fox News Channel, who, during his 3 AM comedy show last March, uttered a joke about our military needing a rest break in 2011 after fighting in Afghanistan. Of course the really funny part — and the part that MacKay (and other uptight liberal nannies at newspapers who can’t wait to strike a pose for liberals) were too highfalutin and busy appeasing their liberal constituencies to digest, was that the comedian was mocking us because it was apparently true. The joke was based on the serious comments that one of our top Generals had made —in public, yet. Lieutenant-General Andrew Leslie, chief of the land staff, said,
Beginning in July of 2011, we will have to explore the possibility of taking a short operational break, that is well organized and synchronized, of at least one year.
When I heard him say that, my exact reaction was this, which I said out loud: “You. Must. Be. Joking. Saying. Things. Like. That. During. A. Time. Of. War.” Followed by, “What an idiot,” and finally “No wonder we’re losing this thing.” And the thought that stewed in my mind the longest was that Al Jazeera would be broadcasting those remarks —the Lieutenant-General’s, not the comedian’s — all over the Islamic world for al-Qaeda savages to digest whole, which will of course help them plan accordingly.
I don’t think MacKay fired Lieutenant-General Andrew Leslie, or told his armies to stop listening to him. Possibly because he wasn’t joking, which is apparently the prerequisite for MacKay’s high dudgeon.
*Unlike the Conservative ninny, the funny Fox comedian formally apologized. I wouldn’t have. As those of us who actually watch Fox News Channel already know, Fox News Channel is the only reliably and ardently and consistently and overtly and positively pro-military (by which I, and they, mean any country’s military, as long as they’re on our side), and which most honors our militaries and their families in every conceivable way, and which also most openly honors the 
heroic sacrifices the soldiers and their families have made and continue to make fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan, and anywhere else, and which is also the most pro-American (ahhh!…what a relief!), and pro-freedom channel on television today. And which is actually on our side. Sort of like a breath of fresh, non-CBC air. So this idiotic nanny-state dictate by Fudd and MacKay was hideous on its face. Of course, you have to be fully informed to even know that, which they obviously aren’t, otherwise, they’d have apologized.
What those of us on our side (by which I mean Canada’s. and conservatives’) also already know, is that liberals in Canada are literally sitting behind their often federally-funded or in some way taxpayer-subsidized or federally-protected desks, waiting for what they perceive as good excuses to yank more conservatism out of the mainstream, and hurl it into the ditch where they think it belongs. Team MacKay/Fudd’s dictate of idiocy finally gave the liberals at Shaw Direct (formerly Star Choice) satellite service exactly that opportunity, and what they perceived as an excuse to change their subscription offerings, suddenly making Fox News Channel an “opt-in” channel — even for those of us who’s Shaw digital TV subscription packages—or “theme packs” — already included it. And for those news channel “theme pack” subscribers at Shaw who wanted the one that hitherto included Fox News Channel — well they too would have to take the additional step of “opting-in”, separately, to Fox News Channel. It is the only channel in their buffet of normal news or information channels that Canadians are forced to “opt-in” to if they want it. It remains thus today.
By the way, I also canceled my subscription to Shaw’s lousy satellite service, and moved to Bell satellite service (see item 3 in my NewsQuips), where Fox News Channel is not an “opt-in” channel —it’s merely a part of a theme pack.
But now with news from The Government and the liberals’ CRTC division that Al Jazeera (English) will be given a license to broadcast in Canada, Nanny MacKay (and Shaw, I guess) will have to carefully monitor that one too! I do believe they’ll be a little busier with that one! Just as our own Lieutenant-General Andrew Leslie was serious when he said what he said, Al Jazeera is not known for their funny Arab comedians making anti-American or anti-Western or terrorist-aiding jokes about anything, as they prefer to be serious about it. So maybe Al Jazeera will be safe on that basis alone.
So far I have heard nothing—from Shaw or the Defense Ministry — about having to “opt-in” to Al Jazeera. Or, for that matter, having to “opt-in” to the far-left, state-owned, socialism-reliant CBC division of the government. In fact, the CBC isn’t an option or something for which we must “opt-in”. It’s actually made mandatory by Canadian liberals’ laws. We MUST, by law, be provided with the CBC’s left-wing and arguably anti-American, anti-war, anti-conservative, take-no-sides—not-even ours, channels. Fudd and MacKay are totally cool with that Iranian-style fascism.
We still do have some choices left: About what we buy, and about who we support, and who we vote for. And you hear reminders of exactly those kinds of virtues and values inherent in our free, democratic, western life, being happily celebrated all the time on Fox News Channel, for which they are always sure to give credit to all our freedom-loving nations’ fighting men and women; but you won’t ever hear any of that on Al Jazeera.
So move forward as you wish based on all the information; make good consumer choices; and most importantly, vote responsibly and intelligently at the next opportunity.
And Fudd and MacKay: Allahu Akbar.
Edited, updated, April 13, 2022
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
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