Webloggin » Nothing New at the Royal York Hotel

So I headed down to the Royal York hotel this morning to catch the Law Is Cool kids’ press conference.

Faisal Joseph (dressed a little like Huggybear in his gold accoutrements, yet looking a lot like a 10th grade English teacher that offers the girls “extra credit”), counsel for the Canadian Islamic Congress, sat amid the all-but-silent Law Is Cool students, who are known to be Mohammed El Masry’s fresh-faced sock puppets.

The CIC (absent Dr. El Masry, who I’m sure was off legitimately plotting to kill Jews over the age of 18) and the Law is Coolers called this press conference to announce that they wanted to make a “deal” with Maclean’s magazine, and to advise that they would drop the HRC complaints if their “deal” was accepted.

Well, I don’t know how winning these students will be at law, but if their career aim is politics, they’re off to a great start: the new deal is exactly the same as the old deal. Publish their rebuttal to Steyn’s “The Future Belongs to Islam”, or they’ll carry on with their suit.

Frankly, this isn’t news. They could have stayed home, I could have slept in, and nothing could have been said, and everything would have proceeded apace. After all, that was exactly what they proposed last year, and Ken Whyte - publisher of Maclean’s - said he’d “rather go bankrupt” than be extorted and have his publication hijacked.

Anyway, that was the body of the press conference. Aren’t you glad you stayed home? For your delight and delectation, here’s some observations about the whole thing.

Faisal Joseph (Huggybear) went on and on about “support from party leaders”, then proceeded to hand out a press pack with one letter of government support - from Jack Layton(!). Not so surprisingly, there were also letters from labor unions. Where Taliban Jack goes, the unions follow.

The letters from OPSEU and the Alliance of Concerned Jewish Canadians that were included in the press pack were marked “DRAFT” - I cannot at this time confirm that they are final documents that were meant for release.

Mr. Joseph mentioned that threats had been made against the Osgoode students for having filed the claim against Maclean’s (they didn’t file the claim, by the way - only the CIC is listed on the actual complaint, but why let a little thing like the truth get in the way?). When a reporter for the National Post asked if these threats were being taken seriously and investigated, Mr. Joseph quickly changed the subject without answering the question. In fact, he then went on to scold the young reporter for the Post for taking up too much time and asking too many questions (at a press conference - oh the nerve of him!). If Mr. Joseph was trying to win friends in the press, he was going about it the wrong way. And what of those death threats?

The basis of the entire complaint is supposedly about having an “equal voice”. As many have said, why not start your own damn magazine and leave ours alone? But nay, they want ours. It’s part of the growing phenomenon of Sharia Creep. The darlings have been published in the Toronto Star with a Saturday circulation nearing 450,000 and a weekday circulation of just under 400,000. Maclean’s, on the other hand, has a weekly circulation of about 350,000. So, who got the better deal? So much for the “equal voice” argument.

You can read Kathy’s meltdown here. She was with me, frothing at the mouth, and is now bruised on one side where I kept elbowing her to behave. Five Feet of Fury, indeed. I found it amusing, but then again, I still have both clitoris and humor intact - unlike some religions I could mention.

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