This week's edition is an affectionate homage to the You know what really grinds my gears? segment of a popular cartoon.
This past week a number of things have really ground my gears. While I am trying to be in a reasonably happy mood for the upcoming holiday season, there are a lot of things still trying to bring me down. I like to focus on the positive, but this week I need to exorcise all the things that are weighing on me.
American politics is always sure to make the blood boil, but last week it was Republican presidential nominee hopeful Rick Perry who said in a campaign that he had a problem with gay men and women being permitted to serve openly in American military roles.
How an individual can be so intolerant and backward is unfathomable. This is a man who is expecting to be welcomed into the White House in 2013.
We have gay teens committing suicide, in part because of abuse by their peers, and people who are supposed to be our world leaders, setting an example of our moral code, still have a problem with gay people serving their countries.
Until people with these hang-ups are completely out of power, we are going to gain absolutely no ground in creating a world that is open to and accepting of all. If there's one thing I refuse to tolerate, it's intolerance.
You know what else really grinds my gears?
The Kyoto Protocol and our exit from it. Canada is not usually the first to do anything on the world stage. We take a wait-and-see approach so as not to ruffle too many feathers. In most cases we wait for the United States to make a firm decision and then step in line with them.
We are finally first to make a big move on something, and what is it? We abandon an international pledge to pollute less. That's the whole idea behind climate change or global warming or whatever. It doesn't matter what you call it or whether you think it's just a left-wing scheme to control society. Pollution is a problem, and we should have a strategy to reduce our share of it globally.
We weren't going to meet the targets, partly because it was never a priority of our federal government and partly because the targets were maybe a little unreasonable. We aren't the biggest polluter on the planet, but if we expect to help put pressure on China and India to reduce their share, we need to lead by example and show them how it's done.
We made an agreement to the rest of the world that we would do our part, and then we told everyone else to shove it. For that I feel a little less proud to be a Canadian.
You know what final thing grinds my gears this week?
Tebow Time. The Denver Broncos mediocre prospect quarterback Tim Tebow, who took over starting duty after the team had an embarrassing start, hasn't lost a game yet. Being the primary change up to the team, all the praise for the turnaround has been heaped onto him, even though he's looked terrible, performed poorly and has struggled to do anything. He's thrown 11 touchdowns against two interceptions in eight games, but is completing fewer than 50 per cent of his attempts, has been sacked 23 times and fumbled seven times.
Last Sunday, the Broncos' kicker belted a 59-yard field goal to tie the game against the Bears, then nailed a 51-yard field goal in overtime to win the game. What were the headlines the next day? Tebow does it again!
Tebow didn't do jack and for that he really grinds my gears.
