On the growing anger over badly drawn cartoons

Here are the cartoons that have caused quite a stink in the Muslim World.

and

Here is a cartoon that has not caused a stink in the West.

and

Here is Britney Spears trying to create a stink. Perhaps religious fanatics in the West will be led by this to burn her records.

Is there a difference and what is the difference between Judaism, Christianity and Islam that sparks a varied reaction to acts of defacement committed in the name of free speech?

Harper snubbed by 'progressive' summit

Seems like this organization is confusing the Canadian centre-right for the American right. Canadian centre-right is more left than the American left! Tory support for nationalized health care is pretty much the only evidence needed.

"'My understanding is that the invitation wouldn't be extended to Stephen Harper,' he said.

'I think it's fair to say the Conservative party as a whole now operates from a centre-right position. This is a movement designed to bring the centre and left together.'" - From the National Post

Canadian sovereignty over the arctic

Curt words are being exchanged between Stephen Harper and David Wilkins, the American ambassador, over the Arctic. The CBC reports.

Harper is planning to spend $5 billion over the next five years to defend Canada's sovereignty over portion of the arctic with military ice-breaker vessels.

Wilkins response:

"There's no reason to create a problem that doesn't exist."

"We don't recognize Canada's claims to those waters... Most other countries do not recognize their claim."

Harper's stance:

"The United States defends its sovereignty and the Canadian government will defend our sovereignty,"

I'd like to know what people think about this. Is Canadian sovereignty over the arctic important? Why is it worth 5 billion? How ought we to understand Canadian sovereignty?

Who's more into oil, Al Gore?

The self-proclaimed inventor of the internet should maybe browse over to Wikipedia and make a quick comparison of Stephen Harper's career to that of Paul Martin's.

Wikipedia, certainly credible for the inventor of the internet, has this to say on the leader's connections to oil and big business:

Stephen Harper "briefly studied at the University of Toronto before travelling to Edmonton where he found employment in the oil and gas industry of Alberta as a computer programmer in his early twenties." [1]

Paul Martin: "Executive Assistant to Maurice Strong, President of Power Corporation of Canada Vice-President, Power Corporation Vice-President, Consolidated Bathurst Ltd. (A Power Co. subsidiary) Vice-President, Planning and Development for Power Corporation President and later Chief Executive Officer, CSL Group Inc. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Canada Steamship Lines Corporate Director for C.B. Pak Inc, Redpath Industries Ltd., Fednav Ltd., Manufacturers Life Insurance Co., Canadian Shipbuilding & Engineering Ltd. and Imasco Corp..." and much more.

And you know what Power Corporation means? Oil.

... plus a couple of other things, but who cares when your political vision is tunneled and your motivation embittered ...

Now, still using dubious internet techniques to prove a point,
google oil "Stephen Harper"
> 334,000 hits

and then
google oil "Paul Martin"
> 528,000 hits

Then whip on over to The Ethics Comissioner's site and look up Paul Martin in the public registry search find these oil related records:

1995/09/27 - 2002/02/14

Cordex Petroleums Inc. (oil and gas exploration and production) (Alberta)
- 4.6% owned by The CSL Group Inc.

1994/02/24 - 1995/07/12

Argyll Energy Corporation
(inactive, formerly engaged in
oil and gas exploration and
production) - 10%

Cordex Petroleums Inc.(formerly Baca
Petroleum Corporation)(oil & gas
expl. and prod.) - 4.6%

Of course I'd like to see Stephen Harper's public registry entry when it comes available, but for now I think the line "backed by big oil" cannot be backed by a claim that because a man is from oil country, he is ergo oil backed.

update: good point, Mr Anonymous

Unconfirmed outdated law in Calgary

I was just reading the BBC article on outdated laws that were being weeded out of the statute books. Came across this in one of the comments:

[A law] in the city of Calgary ... requires one to have a hitching post outside of their business establishment, or if one is kicked out of the city, the accused is entitled a horse and a day's worth of rations to see them to the next city. Cowboy laws die hard out here.

Can we confirm this?

Martin announces he will step down as leader

Watching Mr Martin's speech. He just announced that he will not be leading the party into the next election.

Algorithm detects Canadian politicians' spin

Stephen Harper: 73
Jack Layton: 88
Paul Martin: 124

According to a new deception-detecting computer algorithm developed at Queen's University, Paul Martin spins the most of the candidates.

Developers define spin as “text or speech where the apparent meaning is not the true belief of the person saying or writing it”.

The program analyzes text for the diminished use of personal pronouns, among other things.

New Scientist has the details on this breaking news.

oh the parodies of the liberal attack ads

and oh how true to form

Check out the scripts from Daimnation!

Edmonton women fined $632 for passing stopped police car

The grace period for the two month old legislation in the province of Alberta that requires drivers to slow down when passing emergency vehicles, tow trucks with flashing lights, or when passing through construction zones has expired.

An Alberta woman discovered the new law when she was fined $632 for passing an unmarked cop car that had pulled over a speeding vehicle. She was driving under the posted speed limit, but over double the limit required by the new legislation. CBC Edmonton has the report.

Observations:

1. This may actually be the best way to run a marketing campaign for new laws. Fine people, let it hit the media, and then have a judge reduce the fine (eliminate it altogether for the lady - I hope).
   
   
2. As for this new law reducing injuries in the case of pulled over cars. I wonder if demanding by law for cars to reduce their speed to 60km/h on Albertan highways of posted limits of 110km/h will not actually cause greater danger to drivers than the previous situation did for police officers.

Kinsella: NDP and Conservative war rooms "so superior" to Liberal's

"On all of the key war room indicators - speed, accuracy, volume, resulting media coverage - the Grit effort is pitiful," says war room vet Warren Kinsella.

Ontario seeks more powers for premier

Ontario community safety minister, Monte Kwinter, is framing his Bill 56 as a precautionary measure in lieu of a potential influenza pandemic.

By way of amending the Emergency Management Act, the Employment Standards Act, and the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, Bill 56 would grant the Premier administrative powers over any district or municipality together with the power to restrict popular moblity, force labour for the premier, close any institutions (including businesses and hospitals), remove private property, and freeze prices of goods.

A state of emergency has several time limits, the provincial cabinet can extend it for 14 days after 14 days have expired and the provincial legislature can extend it after that for another period of time.

Emergency powers and planning for health oriented disasters (in which this Bill is framed, but not to which the Bill is limited) is a dreadfully important task to undertake by local and provincial governments. The experience of New Orleans cannot be over emphasised nor the experience of the 2003 blackout in Ontario ignored.

First, is it necessarily prudent to suppose that the highest level of government in a province is necessarily the most compotent at dealing with a disaster? Can they respond or coordinate a response more effectively than a municipality, or even a non-governmental organization? Giving the premier power to do what is necessary is one thing, that they would be the most efficient and effective at "immediate action to prevent, reduce or mitigate a danger of major proportions" is quite another and should be qualified with this Bill.

Secondly, giving the premier emergency powers over muncipalities could hand the principles that govern a response over to partisan politics. We see this currently happening in New Orleans where, the Washington Post reports, the "nation's response to Katrina is cleaving the public down partisan lines as a domestic issue." In addition to the question "how could this be prevented" it also related to my third point.

Thirdly, centralizing power in a response to a disaster would rather than unify the population at the ground, the people against the disaster, it would have people unload a sense of personal responsibility upon the provincial government of whom they would wait orders. A spokesperson officially representing electrical engineers in Ontario says that during the 2003 power outage his people volunteered to help out in the crisis, they did not need a law to force them to work (reported in a Canoe article). Rather than being inspired by disaster to volunteerism, labourers would be threatened by law.

Governor General Jean's New Year address

Anyone get a chance to watch GG Jean's New Year address?

The computer generated opening of national symbols, the crystal clear, mellow voice providing distinct pronunciation, together with the inspirational music that fulfills the nationalistic ambience - it all reminds me of the Bible on DVD I got for Christmas from a new relative.

I'm glad Canadians have not constitutionally stressed that questionable idea that religion can actually be separated from the state.

Ah, the good old days, when everyone hated the media but had no other news source

Someone at the Ottawa, Citizen is bitter that blogs are ruining their sport.

News stories regularly quote bloggers commenting on the latest political issue -- not just famous bloggers, or those involved in the game, but ordinary guys with blogs, sometimes even anonymous guys making postings on other peoples' blogs. If these ordinary guys were shouting on the street corner, their views would go unmarked...

People we will never hear of again, some of them anonymous or pseudonymous, got their vicious little ideas into the paper. If they had written letters to the editor and tried to use a pen name, the letters would not have been printed.

...

A decade ago, the most inconsequential opinions and events regularly become news because they were on the Internet. The Internet was new to us then, and everything about it was exciting. So now are the views of Mike from Mississauga and his cousins in cyberspace. It is less a question of what is said than how it is said.

'Bloody hell, who let the plebs into the club?'

As with anything new, there will probably be a maturation process that would take place with the discovery of blogs as a medium of the active populace in deliberating issues or even setting the agenda toward a nation's elections.

I wonder how unique the Canadian electorate is in their use of the blog?

Equal rights for all sexual orientations?

And on the subject of sex by a group of consenting adults, there is an interesting cover article by the Weekly Standard on a recent dutch trio who sealed their "cohabitation contract" with a wedding ceremony.

National Unity and Hockey.

"We watch our hockey team competing for gold medals and often winning. We probably wouldn't win if we had a Canada team and a Quebec team … We would be both of us irreversibly diminished if this country were to be divided." –Stephen Harper, English Debate, Dec 16th, 05

Stephen Harper's comment to Duceppe about hockey in the December 16th English debate is missing from the CBC transcript and on the CTV transcript.

I was going to make some comment on the subject of diversity and Canadian national unity, but I think Mr Mugford puts it well in the context of the debate.

Ontario passes law to fix election dates

My first thought upon discovery of the news was that this is good news - just a little more time and the feds will follow suite, heeding the prophets in the parl who speak for the end of arbitrary election dates. And it has the favor of the plebs too. Popular support for fixed election dates have risen from 54% in 2000 to 81% in 2004.

But as the article by Don Dessord points out, fixed-elections dates challenge the fundamental principle of responsible government in Canada. As an essential feature of the American Congressional system which relies on the principle of the separation and balance of powers, fixed-election can be confused perhaps as importable into Canada to help level the field for fair competition.

But features of responsible government that would be compromised by fixed-election dates would include votes of non-confidence and the role of the Governor General.

So why is the notion of fixed elections appealing? I think Dessord has a good answer and some interesting suggestions:

I believe what the public really objects to is not the fact that election calls are unpredictable, but that the party in power holds an unfair advantage and some elections are not fair contests. Therefore, measures that improve the competitive nature of elections would go a long way towards alleviating public dissatisfaction.

There are many ways to do this, though a full discussion is beyond the scope of this paper. Some form of proportional representation, for example, would help. So would allowing more free votes in Parliament. More free votes might convince citizens their MPs matter, and so they might think elections matter more too. There are many other problems with our parliamentary system that need to be addressed as well, as people like Donald Savoie have so well identified. But the convolutions necessary to fix election dates strike me as requiring far too much effort for far too little improvement, and may very well make things much worse.

'He's homeless, just forget it.'

This is what Christine Wellstead was told yesterday in Vancouver when she asked for help to quench the flames of a homeless man on fire. I wonder what Christine Wellstead's opinion about immigrants are. CanWest has details...

Teachers versus Priests

Like the State versus the Church in attrocities committed against humanity, the Church seems to be the one that gets more flack. While people will question the idea of the Church and perhaps calling it fundamentally into question, the idea of the State seems to carry on quite fine. At least this is my perception.

I wonder what one would find if one were to compare attitudes towards priests in child abuse cases to teachers in child abuse cases?

Refreshments, like beer and popcorn... and victory dancing

"Don't give people $25 a day to blow on beer and popcorn." said Scott Reid, the communications director for Paul Martin, in response to Stephen Harper's proposed "choice in child care" plan which would have parents receive about $25 a week for children under 6.

As Stephen Taylor points out, Scott Reid buys a lot of "refreshments" with tax dollars from establishments that specialize in booze. Here is just the beginning of the list posted on Taylor's site and populated with public information available from the Privy Council Office.

Scott Reid's hospitality expenses for 2005 (Jan 1 - Jun 15)...

New Year's "Dinner meeting" at D'Arcy McGee's: $22.71
January 3rd "Dinner Meeting" at Heart & Crown: $33.13
January 10th "Dinner Meeting" at Lieutenant's Pump: $33.10
February 1st "Dinner Meeting" at The Works: $53.00
February 4th "Dinner Meeting" at Royal Oak: $93.70
February 8th "Dinner Meeting" at Brixton's British Pub: $28.39
cont'd...

Perhaps Scott Reid doesn't trust parents, because he doesn't trust himself.

And now someone's spotted that one of these expenses listed as a "Dinner meeting to discuss media briefing" at Suite 34, a bar lounge in Ottawa, on May 19 2005 was the same day the budget vote passed, the same week when Belinda Stronach crossed the aisle, and the same night that she and Tim Murphy, the Prime Minister's Chief of Staff could be found dancing atop a speaker at... Suite 34. The The Toronto Star has the details for that evening. Scott Reid appears to have been the only person to have claimed that evening as an expense (see 1).

Worth investigation:

1. Did anyone else expense the evening?
2. What are Canadian attitudes towards the expenses claimed by government officials? What are the norms in other countries?
   
3. Do Canadians trust themselves and do they believe that the government should trust the people?
   

The significance:

1. If there isn't much reaction to Mr Reid's comments about parents, I may form the opinion that Canadians either do not care for the extra $25, think the government would spend it better than themselves, apathetic towards those with small children, and/or that Canadians have a tendency to believe that the government is more trustworthy than families.
2. The triumphalism of people who barely just win a vote of confidence is fascinating. Almost as if it is the last days on earth. Like the night Al Gore after conceding the 2000 election "stomped and gyrated" past the midnight hour, the image of the sweat showing through his shirt spurs on my contemplation of the end and the dance. As I imagine what Stronach and Murphy dance on the speakers and Reid looks on, I wonder if in their minds tonight was the future.

On Tolerance, Crime and Immigration in Canada as compared with Japan

According to a new CP report, Canada will rank 43rd in a count of countries that have female representatives as a percentage of the elected representatives. Under 21 percent of parliament is expected to be female after the upcoming elections. That puts Canada behind Ethiopia. Not to say that Canada has anything over Ethiopia, but Canadians do seem to pride themselves in thinking they live in the most equitable place on the planet.

This news relates to the previous post, in which my colleague raises a provocative, yet valid question. Is there a relationship between immigration and violent crime in a country? A question he ties back into a thought on the broader theme of tolerance and the cult that follows it and keeps it sacred.

The number 43 challenges those who think god is in the precious box. My colleague says tolerance hinders the proper assessment of problems, which for him evidently begin by conducting a more comprehensive census. The number 43, however, suggests tolerance is nothing.

As for the relationship of crime to immigration, Japan makes for an interesting comparison to Canada. First, there are critics of the close relationship between the police and the media and their reporting of violent crime (see: 1, 2 - 'the crime of crime reporting' in Japan). While there is evidence to support the argument that aliens tend to comprise much of the crime (see 3), in the context of the media-police relationship this may make the criminals as much as the victims of domestic policy on immigrants as the victims are victims.

Second, Japanese intolerance only gives it short-term security in a globalized world. The Japanese workforce is shrinking and the number of people that will need to be employed to service the grey market increasing. By 2030, there is predicted to be 2 people in the workforce per retiree in the country with the population heading back under the 100 million mark from 127 million people (see 4, 5). And while awareness of the problem has drawn attention to immigration, the reality of a backlash against foreigners is considered very possible (see 6).

The complaint against Japan culminates in drawing out a similarity between it and Canada and not so much in contrasting the two. Both share in their lack of tolerance - though certainly not to the same extent, but emphasizing similarities in intolerance may help Canadians ask hard questions of themselves rather than point the finger at immigrants.

And though women may not be tolerated (or encouraged or want to be) in parliament, and though the Prime Minister goes for banning handguns over listening to the affected (see 7), and though separatism is still alive and well despite what the new Gov Gen says in her investiture speech; almost 80 percent of Canadians like immigrants (see 8) and that's a warm feeling for an immigrant like myself. Tolerance isn't the problem. A shallow tolerance is. Tolerance deepened through greater personal and collective introspection and hospitality is worth pursuing. There's even security in it.