Ya think?

"Report says U.S. spy agencies were 'dead wrong' about Iraq"

I wonder if the Bush administration realizes they could have received the same report from a Quebec ad agency for half the price?

Reader mail

I'm relocating to Edmonton for a new job, and that's cut into my posting time, so there's been some lag time on these e-mails I've received. Sorry about that.

First up, alert CBC radio listener Deb W. has noticed the removal of host Don Hill from from Alberta's 1pm phone-in show, Wild Rose Forum. She doesn't explicitly suggest political influence, but points out a couple of curious points:

Don had recently been bringing up some pretty damaging and worrisome information related to Alberta's electrical energy deregulation, and, on his "final" program on Monday, he referenced a Toronto Star article from the fall of 2004 where integration of Canada-U.S. electrical energy was apparently discussed by such "luminaries" [no pun intended] as John Manley, Thomas d'Aquino and...........Jim Dinning.

And as she notes in an e-mail a few days later, the Friday Alberta noon show, "Friday Scrum", began a series of "interviews with influential Albertans". The first guest? Jim Dinning.

Dinning basically outlined his plans for Alberta in the 21st century as a hopeful for the Premier's role. [Friday Scrum host Donna] McElligott mentioned only briefly at the beginning, that Ted Morton was also planning to vie for PC leadership.

This was a blatant, free, political "ad", mostly. Listen to it. You can hear McElligott asking questions as if she were being forced to read from a script. You can also hear the discomfort in her voice.

Readers should draw their own conclusions.

Jonathan Ross was the first to let me know about Medicine Hat MP Monte Solberg's blog, which included this disturbing rant:

Cattle producers should have sent Paul a letter telling him that they just discovered that an open border is a "fundamental human right" that is protected by the Charter. Then Paul Martin Luther King would have had no choice but to at least mention it in his speech and maybe even confront those American cattle segregationists who won't let Canadian cattle drink from the same watering hole as American cattle.

Aiyaa! New-to-me blogger Bruce at Canuck Attitude has been all over this as well.

Keep the cards and letters coming. Well, the e-mails, at any rate - don't be dropping my address in any webforms, SVP.

Disgusting

The polemics came even quicker than I thought, from both the left and right, which saddened me a bit. Only my own desire not to descend into politics in the immediate wake of the killings of the four R.C.M.P. constables has kept me from posting this earlier.

From the Western Standard, this post by Kate McMillian:

And our marijuana decriminalizing legislators would have us believe that the safety of the public depends on arresting hotel owners for smoking violations, getting unhelmeted bicycle riders off our dirt trails and warrentless entry into the homes of dog owners.

Notwithstanding the erroniousness of associating the killings to marijuana cultivation, which, you know, whatever --- to take this tragedy and twist it into a grindstone for some sort of axe about statism was perhaps the most disappointing display of hard-hearted, calculating, manipulative, and cold exploitation I've seen on a Canadian blog. Perhaps I wouldn't be so harsh about it, had she waited to post this until, I don't know - there was some sort of official announcement? Because instead, she elected to post her judgement of this event even as details were emerging in the media.

But lest you think I'm picking on the right as a whole by choosing this example, I'd like to also point out that commentators on the page, so likely right-leaners themselves, shared my disgust:

Your gauche attempt to score political points from this tragic event is disgusting. Shame on you.
...
This pretty much does it for me. Four police officers are killed in the line of duty and we turn it into a political debate. This is exactly what the left does in the U.S. when it comes to U.S. combat deaths.
I think that we are showing a lack of class here, to put it mildly. Sadly, I think that is all too common on the internet... For my part, I'm going to... avoid this website in the future.
...
I have a suggetion.

Why not postpone the political debate until after you've called the local RCMP detachment, offered your condolences, and found out how to contact the detachment of the officers who died today.

I called my local detachment and they said not to contact the local detachment -- it's too early and they're busy with the investigation.

Why not take a little time out of respect for the families nd friends.

Thank you to those Western Standard [former?] readers for reaffirming my faith that most people are basically good and decent, regardless of politics.

Shock and sadness

What can possibly be said about something like this

Four RCMP officers murdered on Alberta farm

We fool ourselves, sometimes, that our communities, especially our smaller communities, are safe places, that we're insulated from the sort of violence that we imagine happens in big American cities. We're not.

I expect in the next days and weeks the more polemical of us, very possibly including me, will argue for procedural or social or legal changes that could have helped avoid this morning's tragedy. I hope we can defer that.

I offer my deepest condolences to the friends and families of those who lost their lives this morning. There are no words.

John Paul II: 1920 - ... what? Still?

I'm certain producers at various major broadcasters and 24-hour news networks wish nothing but good health and long life to the Pontiff. And yet, his tenacious grip on life is beginning to get expensive:

"It was 1996 that I went to Rome myself to negotiate roof rights," said Marcy McGinnis, senior vice president for news coverage at CBS News. "Every broadcaster in the world has a rooftop or balcony lined up."

Indeed, a case of what broadcasters dubbed "rooftop envy" swept through the Vatican in 1996 when the Pope underwent surgery to have his appendix removed and TV networks swarmed the area, striking exclusive deals with the hotels and private homeowners whose buildings and balconies overlook St. Peters Square, to lock in their live shots.

And it's not just the cost of renting rooftops. Equipment sits ready to go, hotel rooms are rented out of fear that the day the "Big Story" happens, there will be no room at the inn. A decade of people waiting for him to die - that must be very comforting to His Holiness.

All of the major networks have long had their shots lined up and their rooftops secured, but the longevity and surprising vigor of the Pope throughout years of ill health ... have put some of those arrangements in jeopardy.

When CBS News arranged for its rooftop, for instance, it struck a 10-year deal, figuring that would be more than enough time to ensure a spot for the Pope's death and funeral. But that deal is set to expire next year, meaning that if the Pope pulls through his current bout with illness, CBS may be forced to renegotiate the rights at somewhat of a disadvantage, considering that it has already fully prepared the rooftop for broadcasting on the fly.

I'm sure, despite all the money invested, that the networks will show appropriate restraint when the Big Story arrives, and won't intersperse the sombre reflection with attempts to sell me frozen pizza and drugs that allow me to sustain an erection.

Perhaps I've just tapped into the reason that God keeps His Holiness alive - She entertains herself by screwing with broadcasters. Or just likes the building owners in the area:

"Some [broadcasters] have been investing for almost up to 10 years, and have spent hundreds of thousands of euros. One block of flats has earned so much that the owners have been able to restore the building thanks to the proceeds."

Hurry! Harrrrrrd!

For two months every year, the CBC puts aside its regular prime-time programming and offers the NHL playoffs. That won't be happening this year. How fortunate, then, that this marks the first year the CBC has purchased the broadcast rights for the big three curling tournaments - the Scott, the Brier, and the Worlds.

But here they go screwing it up. They're only offering one draw a day live, and a second late at night on tape delay, farming out the morning and evening draw live coverage to The Score (mostly a sports-headline service) and Country Canada (a secondary CBC service with half a million subscribers nationwide - as opposed to the eight million households with access to TSN).

People are pissed. I heard someone from CBC's communications department say they've recieved more calls on the Scott (lack of) coverage than they did on Don Cherry's most recent major gaffe, and as many as they get when they screw with the schedule for Coronation Street. (That is actually not a joke. Apparently, the Corrie fans are hard-freaking-core.)

Honestly, that episode of Marketplace couldn't have waited a week? You couldn't have shuffled each show's schedule forward three weeks over the three tournaments, and allow the new episodes to leak into April? Even Mansbridge normally has to wait for the hockey to finish each night in April and May - are you telling me Rick Mercer can't move his holidays around a little?

Why is the CBC so bad at making lemonade?

I'm not signing anything until I read it or until somebody gives me the gist of it.

Frank McKenna says we've already signed up for US missile defense. Whoops!

The Greatest Canadian. Er, song.

As part of the CBC's current effort to keep us from noticing there are no hockey broadcasts this winter, they've reprised and extended their summer radio success 50 Tracks, this time sticking to exclusively Canadian songs.

If you're not a big CBC radio service listener, allow me to summarize - over the summer, former Moxy Fruvous dude Jian Ghomeshi gathered together panels of musical experts to nominate, by decade, songs that were "essential" in some way. It was a neat little show, at least in part because it was freed of genre restrictions, which comparable lists prepared by commercial radio stations are not. The final list itself was interesting enough in the end, if not exactly the one I would have produced.

So, the show was successful enough to have earned another go (and a television audience as well), but since you can't keep arguing about the same songs, the rules had to change - now, Jian and panellists are trying to isolate the fifty essential Canadian tracks. Not entirely surprisingly, more of the list is being back ended to the 70s and forward, because Canadian content regulations have been so successful in promoting Canadian music since then.

Enough background. This week, the first of two for the 1980s, has selected the top, most essential, greatest Canadian song of that decade. F'n North-West Passage, by Stan Rogers.

How appropriate - when I hear the song, it's inexorably linked via the soundtrack of my life. I can remember high school dances, the sting of rejection, the nearly equal sting of my first tastes of rye whiskey... it wouldn't be the same without the deejay spinning Stan's memorable dirge. And influential? I can rememeber just as I was graduating high school, when the early-'80s wave of Canadian hair bands gave way to old men singing sea shanties in four-part harmony. In fact, our grad theme song was Barrett's Privateers.

Look, I'm not saying the song is bad. It just feels like one of those artifical efforts to create a national identity, when in fact our identity is probably more accurately wrapped up in (and I say this with no pride) Loverboy and April Wine.

It doesn't fit. If Anne Murray's Snowbird doesn't qualify as an essential Canadian track (and it did not), there's no way Stan Rogers should be there, leaving "I'm an Adult Now" out in the cold along with "Rockin' in the Free World".

Daily Show shout-outs

Last night, Jon Stewart was good enough to spend the first several minutes speaking directly to me. It included a long and clever story about blogging, which you can find discussed a few different places, including sites specifically mentioned.

More importantly, it began with words of condolence to Canadians who would be missing hockey. Not that Jon cares, he declares - he watches more curling. "Do NOT cancel curling."

Here-effin'-here!

Update, Friday morning: Another shout-out, this one not so friendly. Presented with the knowledge that there's three trillion barrels of oil in Athabasca, Jon wondered why they didn't invade here. "Wassup, Calgary? You want a piece?"

Jon's right, the invasion would be even easier than Iraq - after all, the roads are better. But I don't think the US would care for the insurrection. We've got no hockey on television, so finding people with nothing to live for won't be as hard as Jon might think.

Dammit - I was going to quit fireworks for Lent



Today marks Ash Wednesday and Chinese New Year. I'd like to remind readers of Bear's holiday proposal last year.



Gung Hei Fat Choi, everyone!



Update, shortly thereafter: I see he hasn't forgotten it, either.

Some fun for Friday



Wild Rose Forum at 1pm on CBC radio will be asking, again, if the problem in the gay marriage debate is really just one of language.



Guess what, Don. It's not. Pretending it is allows people motivated by bigotry and fear to have a socially acceptable out.



If you happen to have some time between one and two this afternoon, feel encouraged to call or email the show and share your views. The number is 1-866-468-4422. E-mailing is best done threough the webform on the show's main page.

The island of Progressive Conservatism



Sometimes, I really miss living near downtown Calgary, quite aside from missing a walkabout by Kevin Smith a block from my old apartment. There's something about the place that seperates it from most of Calgary, with its car-addicted suburbanites living in oversized houses on undersized lots. It's not so seperate that it votes other than Tory, in various forms, but they still get something different from their MPs.



When I lived there, back in 1993, there was an important gay rights vote before the House. My Reform Party MP, Jim Silye, was the only Reformer to vote in favour of the bill. Years later, the Tory MP, Joe Clark, rode as the Grand Marshall of Calgary's Pride parade. And now, the MP for the slightly realligned riding of Calgary Centre-North, Jim Prentice, stands to be one of only two Alberta MPs to vote in favour of the Civil Marriage Act, and the other, Anne McLellan, is compelled to vote in favour by being in cabinet.



Good for you, Jim Prentice. It takes a certain amount of bravery to stand against your leader, even in a free vote.

More heat than light



It was and is easy for me to pick sides in the gay marriage debate, given what a vehicle for homophobia the debate has become. And, no, I'm not claiming that all opponents of gay marriage are homophobic, just that the homophobes seem to be the loudest voices among the "no" side.



Don't believe me?



Just before Christmas, Wild Rose Forum hosted a discussion on the place of religious language in public discourse. At least, that's what they claimed the discussion was about - what it was really about was that the guests that day didn't care for gay people.



This jewel of a sentence has colonized my brain: "The gay lifestyle is one I don't agree with." Huh. Well, first of all, since being gay isn't a declarative statement initiating a debate, I'm going to assume that "agree with" means "approve of." I'm more concerned with the subordinate clause - "the gay lifestyle." What exactly is that? What does "the gay lifestyle" involve? Does the preacher who said it object to the frequency and quality of touring former Broadway musicals? He probably objects to the sodomy, but I don't think it's the form of the sexual activity per se that he's talking about when he's "disagreeing" with the "gay lifestyle". (If it is, tough luck, buddy. It's been forty years since then Justice Minister Pierre Trudeau decriminalized sexual activities between or among consenting adults, and we're not going back.)



This preacher was objecting to something else. There is a word being studiously avoided by both sides of the gay marriage debate. It's a word that man probably finds interchangable with "the gay lifestyle". I hadn't given much thought to it myself, but researching this post has led me directly to it. The subtext rapidly became text.



The word is "promiscuity."



Why does Stephen Harper risk making the new Conservative Party look like the old Reform Party, with weird declarations about polygamy? It makes perfect sense if you follow the unnamed logic - since gay men are by their very nature promiscuous, doesn't it follow that if you approve of gay marriage, you approve of non-monogamy? Won't we eventually have to acknowledge that choice in law by recognizing relationships that are polyamorous?



Solid logic built on a foundation of a crazy-sounding assumption. So why doesn't the gay community bring this assumption to the surface, so they can dispute it head-on? Well, because the assumption has a kernel of truth, and gay-marriage advocates don't particularly want to talk about it.



I knew about the assumption, but I always thought it was nonsense - like making assumptions about how two billion Asians drive because of the one who cut you off on Deerfoot Trail. Among my friends, gay couples seem as long-term (or not) as the straights among us, and if their relationships are sexually open, they aren't talking about that part to me.



Then I started reading for the post that stood in this place earlier today. I wasn't reading anti-gay tracts, and I wasn't reading clucking disapproval. Here's an excellent example:

Why then do present-day gay men believe that promiscuity is so central to who they are? - the answer is historical and ideological.



...



...Gay Lib and the gay rights movement which emerged in the 1970s were deeply distrustful of authority. In particular, gay men and lesbians had come to hate, with good reason, those who argued for any restrictions on sexual freedom.



...



...instead of following the traditional, hetero, monogamous model, gay men invented a new one, it which it was both our right and our duty to have sex with as many of our fellows as possible.

No wonder some people feel that gay marriage is an attack on old-timey marriage, which relies on sexual and emotional fidelity as a cornerstone of stability. Those are the relationships we prefer to see children raised within... that's the institution people want protected and encouraged as a building-block of our social arrangements.



Marriage or not, civil union or not, no one is asking for my approval of their sexual relationships, either in style or number. However, the more accepted and absorbed a subculture is by the larger culture, the less differentiated the subculture becomes. The Civil Marriage Act marks the beginning of the end of the closeted exclusion which feeds that subculture. True supporters of traditional relationships should become advocates for gay marriage, because there may be no faster way to encourage the alignment of the subcultural mores to those traditional values. At the same time, the radical gay and lesbian movement, the people who want to tear down the rotted institutions and rebuild everything from the ground up, should probably be loudly opposing the Civil Marriage Act.



Funny enough, if this became the actual split point in the debate, I'd still find myself on the side of gay marriage.

And we took "under God" out of the company anthem.



Wal-Mart has decided to recognize same-sex partners as immediate family. That would be great news for the partners of Wal-Mart employees, if Wal-Mart actually offered any benefits. As it is, it just means those partners are described within the Wal-Mart ethics code, which:

bar[s] employees from ... approaching Wal-Mart's suppliers about jobs for immediate family members, the company said.

So, as an employee of Wal-Mart, I can't arrange for a job for my partner, same- or opposite-sex, to manufacture shoes in China for twelve cents an hour? Bastards!



Since there's now volumes of case law in Canada recognizing the equality of common-law relationships gay and straight (gay marriage or not), and since even the hard right position in this country now seems to be some sort of domestic partnership recognition for same-sex couples, Wal-Mart's decision is no big deal here. It speaks to the American gay and lesbian experience that this is considered a great victory.



(An aside - I'm reminded of a Frank Magazine three-frame "Foto Funny": Preston Manning in a Parliament Hill scrum: "Of course I'm in favour of same-sex equality. After all, Sandra and I have been having the same sex for years." I miss Frank Magazine.)

And now, in sports...

Curler Mitchell Marks was suspended for two years for refusing to submit to a drug test, the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency said Thursday.

For those of you who don't follow the sport, the technical term for a drug test in curling is "breathalyser". Of course, how large quantities of rye whiskey can be in any way described as "performance-enhancing" is beyond my comprehension.



Honestly, are drug tests in cases like these actually meant to identify cheaters? What constitutes "performance-enhancing" in a sport that requires almost no strength or physical endurance, that's about strategy and precision?



I did a little poking around on the USADA website, and discovered that testosterone, at least, is a prohibited substance for curlers. I guess I can understand that - it'd be a real shame if the Olympic curling teams looked like, you know, athletes.

Metablogging



Yesterday, Blogger was broken. Today, my comments tool is broken. Plus, no props from the Canadian blogging awards for this very attractive loud but thematic design. Is it time to rebuild this page?

Diplomacy



People are expressing concern about Frank McKenna's appointment as ambassador to the United States. According to the radio, some believe he's too much of a "blue Liberal", too conservative.



Wait a minute. That's exactly the sort of person I want telling the Bush administration things they don't want to hear. The ambassador doesn't set policy, he communicates it. Think about it... why did we hate Paul Cellucci so much? I think it was because he kept telling Canadians our business, without having any sign that he understood anything about us.



If McKenna's appointment is a sign that Martin wants to fold up on every issue where we disagree with the USA, we have trouble. I'm willing to give the Prime Minister a little more credit than that. I think this might be part of a strategy to give Canada the flexibility to tell the American administration to get bent when we feel like it.



The old joke says diplomacy is the ability to tell a person to go to hell in such a way that they look forward to the trip. I think the tide has turned sufficiently on missile defense that Martin is in a corner - he's going to have to say "go to hell" to Dubya. I don't resent him every chance to convince the Americans not to take it out on us via softwood lumber and cattle imports.

We now return to your regularly-scheduled blogging. At least, that's the plan.



If you haven't figured out how to help the people of south-east Asia recover from the devastation to homes, communities, and livelihoods in the wake of the tsunami, you just aren't trying. Nonetheless, here's a list of the charities approved for Canadian government matching funds.

Happy holidays, everyone!



I'm clearly already on mine. Sorry. Regular blogging will resume soon. Captain Flynn at Against All Flags has posted some holiday music links for... well, pleasure isn't entirely the right word.



In the meantime, don't forget to nominate --- well, not so much me, for my rather unassuming 2004 performance --- don't forget to nominate some of Canada's best blogs, several of whom I've listed to the immediate right, for Canada's blog awards.

It's What's For Dinner



White House press briefing, Monday, November 29, 2004:

Q The beef dispute, do you see it getting resolved tomorrow?



MR. McCLELLAN: Right, and I expect that's something that they will talk about. There's a rule-making process that we have in place. They touched on it in their most recent meeting. I expect they'll talk about it a little more in Canada. But we have a rule-making process that we're following. Obviously, our first and most important priority is to make sure that our food supply is safe for the American people.



Q The Canadians are going to serve the President Canadian beef for dinner. Is he eating it? (Laughter.)



MR. McCLELLAN: I haven't seen -- no, I understand. I have not seen the menu for the social dinner. But the President looks forward to going there and looks forward to participating in the dinner with Prime Minister Martin. Again, I haven't seen the menu, so I couldn't confirm that that's accurate or not.

Scott, the question wasn't "Will he be served Canadian beef?" It was "will he be eating it?" Let me spell it out for you, Scott: tonight, we're going to discover that Canadian beef is good enough for the President. Why isn't it good enough for other Americans?



I'll keep you posted on any follow-up in the briefing today.