Ask Mr. 500 Words

Faithful Blog Reader: Gee, Mr. 500 Words, there sure seems to be a lot of news coming from our government these days, and some of it's got me real confused. Can you help?

Mr. 500 Words: Specify the parameters of your mystification.

FBR: Well, for starters, there's Public Safety Minister Vic Toews. He's been pretty busy the past week and he has me a little worried. He says if we object to Conservative plans to let police snoop on our computers we're on the side of child pornographers, but then he kills off the long gun registry because he says it invades the privacy of law-abiding gun owners. Oh, and he says he's in favour of torture, too.

Mr. 500 Words: First, despite what various ex-wives and mistresses may think, I say Vic is a swell guy and damn good looking, too (I also want to say, in case you're listening, that Mr. 500 Words has a very low pain threshold). See, what you have to understand is that guns don't kill people, computers do. To sum up: rubber fetish, bad; gun fetish, good. Next question.

FBR: Well, then, what about Stephen Harper and Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver saying environmentalists who oppose the tar sands pipeline through the Rockies are controlled by "foreign special interests"? Aren't most of the oil companies in the tar sands foreign? Isn't the oil going to China, which is a foreign country?

Mr. 500 Words: Environmentalists aren't Conservatives and are therefore child pornographers. You can ask Vic Toews.

FBR: Um, yeah. So, what's with all this talk coming from Harper and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty about making folks wait for their Old Age Pensions until they're 67. That's got me worried.

Mr. 500 Words: You can stop worrying: Stephen Harper and Jim Flaherty will get gold-plated MP pensions worth hundreds of thousands a year as soon as they leave politics and start flying to board meetings in corporate jets. And they'll still probably be only in their 50's.

FBR: That's not what I meant. What about ordinary Canadians? Say the person who loses his job when he's 62 or whose health means he has to stop working before he's 67.

Mr. 500 Words: 60% of these people didn't vote Conservative. So he's probably a child pornographer.

FBR: Well, thanks, Mr. 500 Words. I think.

Mr. 500 Words: No need to thank me. It's what I do.

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