Categories: Inside the Queensway
Print
Comment
PreviousBTC: Three days
70 Responses to “BlackBerry Roundtable: By the clicking of our thumbs …”
- Col. Russell Williams' double life? - 68 Comments
- Credibility is what’s really melting - 307 Comments
- Shy Adam Lambert comes to town - 52 Comments
- Our banking rules are smarter, not tighter - 30 Comments
- How Letterman, Leno and Oprah Came Together - 1 Comments
- Creepy, cuddly Olympics
- Google takes on the language barrier
- That’s a shame
- Coyne V. Wells on Jim Prentice, Danny Williams, and sacred cows
- a cynic on Inside the fall of a famed hedge fund
- Janet on Maxime Bernier unplugged
- melanie on Col. Russell Williams’ double life?
- sea_n_mountains on Tories smother release of documents
- D Mitchell on Col. Russell Williams’ double life?
Contrary to popular belief, the ceremonial lighting of the Olympic flame at the Opening Ceremonies is, in fact, a decidedly modern affair. The culmination of the torch relay in a grandiose display at the Opening Ceremonies is a relic of the 1936 Berlin Games—just one of many attempts by the Nazi regime to lend a mythical air to the Games. Still, despite its dubious history, the lighting of the cauldron has evolved into one of the most spectacular and ostentatious displays at the Games. And the secretiveness that surrounds the lead-up to the ceremony only lends to the hype.
When it comes to the 2010 Games, the speculation about who will be selected to light the cauldron has coalesced around whether VANOC will go the traditional route and opt for a former Olympian or take the road less-travelled and pick someone from outside the sports world. Facebook groups have popped up promoting everyone from Terry Fox’s mother, Betty, to former Vancouver Canucks captain Trevor Linden. So far, Vancouver’s Olympic organizers have kept a tight lid on who the potential candidates might be. We’ve assembled a list of the names making the rounds, but feel free to add your own in the poll or in the comments below.
Need to Watch
From Macleans
Canada
Could cows hold the cure for Crohn’s?
A pathogen found in cattle may lead to a cure for Crohn’s disease
Business
Inside the fall of a famed hedge fund
A Bay Street legend, a whiz kid manager and the angry investors
Beyond The Commons
The Commons: Jack Layton doing as Jack Layton does
In all sorts of ways, it’s difficult to imagine him ever stopping
Can't Miss NFL Picks and Other Lies
Super Bowl XLIV: A liveblog, but with naps and long pauses
Eight and a half hours in front of the TV and, finally, kickoff
Colby Cosh
The Wardrobe Malfunction Paradox
Colby Cosh on the current state of the Super Bowl halftime show—and how to fix it
Arts & Culture
Tales of over-the-top Christmas
In a wealthy suburb, a writer discovers people who take celebrating to a whole new level
Newsmakers
Friend in high places, Dog tired and Bubba’s other bombshell
Newsmakers of the week
Jenn,
Thats a fair point. The outsider mentality exists within the Conservative party.
Now apparently Harper and Kevin Lynch, the head of the PCO, have a strong relationship. Appparently Lynch shares some of the distaste for leaks etc, since he wants to get rid of the perceptions, and to some degree reality, of the civil service acting in a partisan manner.
Elections Canada issue, I have no special insight, its one of those issue boiling beneath the surface that I jsut dont really have time to look at. I think it is overblown on both sides.
these things should be lessened since the Cons continue to govern and until there is a legitimate callenge then the civil service knows “who their Daddy is” for the moment.
Mulroney took a broader view, but then again he had a smashing majority to play with and could afford to be magnaminous, the civil service was running scared quite frankly at that time.
Didnt do the Cons a lot of good in their first term , treating the civil service decently, paid off more going into the second term. The fact that the civil service was working on some pretty serious policy stuff I think shut them up…1) intersting work and 2) Idle makes the devils work so to speak, so keep em busy.
I worked for the feds at one time. I saw all the political BS by Lib appointees up close. I also saw favouritism to the east rather than west.
Don’t tell me that I have no evidence. I’m an eye witness.
If you have evidence by all means provide it.
When was that, Jim? 1983?
Don’t tell me that I have no evidence. I’m an eye witness.
You have no evidence.
I saw what I saw, heard what I heard.
The Liberals have had a lot of time to stack the deck.
Some Liberals are really worried they can’t shuffle the cards awhile.
Too bad.
Problem is, Jim, we have no idea what you saw, so we can’t verify that you saw what you saw, or even that your name is Jim, or pretty much anything about your absurd BS.
Jack, you get to have your opinions based on your experiences, and so do I.
Opinions, now? A few minutes ago it was incontestable fact…
Nice try Mike.
I worked for the federal govt at one time and know how the Liberals operated.
The people I know that continued to work in the federal govt told me frequently that it was the same old BS.
Some of you don’t like hearing it, but too bad.
You had your run, maybe you’ll have another.
Kevin Lynch is a right wing con who threw sharp elbows around the Finance Dept. for years.
I don’t doubt that he and Our Leader see eye to eye on any number of things.
He didn’t appear at PCO out of thin air.
He was appointed to the post by Harper.
The news would be that Our Leader appointed some one who didn’t agree with him. But then, we know what happens to those who dare disagree.
comment by Jim on Sunday, October 19, 2008 at 11:25 pm:
Nice try Mike.
Some of you don’t like hearing it, but too bad.
***
Hearing what? You haven’t said a single thing.
“Hearing what? You haven’t said a single thing.”
Basically I’m saying that the Libs have stacked things for a very long time, and anyone who says different has blinders on.
“Basically I’m saying that the Libs have stacked things for a very long time, and anyone who says different has blinders on.”
Basically you’re saying that you don’t have a shred of non-anecdotal evidence and presuming that anybody who says different doesn’t have a shred of evidence either.
May I just say, Thank God you are no longer working for the Public Service.
comment by Jim on Sunday, October 19, 2008 at 11:47 pm:
“Hearing what? You haven’t said a single thing.”
Basically I’m saying that the Libs have stacked things for a very long time, and anyone who says different has blinders on.
***
Which, without any verifiable documentation of the practices you describe, isn’t a single thing.
It’s a public blog. You post what you want, I post what I want.
Unlike others, I don’t resort to personal attacks.
What else is there to attack?
It’s so effortless for right wingers/”Conservatives”…absence of contrary evidence means the evidence for what you support has got to be there…somewhere.
This isn’t joke. This is really how they think.
Sisyphus,
Ok so who is engaging in character assisnation and choice by ideology now?
All reports I have read about Lynch are that he is an excelllent Chief Bureaucrat. I hav enever heard it uttered one way or another what his political leanings are, other than they arent obviously Liberal. All shoudl cheer this.
All other reports I have read indicate he is hardly a sycophant to Harper and that Lynch is one of the people whose dissent Harper strongly respects. In other words the guy probably is able to muster an facts to make an argument.
Once agian, the tradition of the Civil Service was that it was nuetral and independent. This is ultimately the source of its power, since it stays while masters change. Compromising its neutrality weakens it and its power in the medium and long term, since people stop believing it and set up alternatives, like Earnscliffe.
I have been disappointed that Lynch hasnt come down harder on some of the clearer affronts on nuetrality, but like any bureacrat I suspect that the price is paid over time by the offenders, lack of promotion, assignments to Inuvik, loss of junkets, demotion to an office without a window…yada yada.
So once again….the fact that Lynch is might be conservative/Conservative disqualifies him from being Chief of the PCO? Thats just as partisan, maybe more so than what we have been discussing in Kady’s original post.
Kady, a hardened political hack like Scott Reid had to admonish you to have a heart regarding Rahim Jaffer. That has to hurt. :-)
Sometimes, though, it takes a person who has worked inside “the system”, as Scott has, to understand what elected officials go through, and just how difficult it is to suffer a defeat. Although my political leanings are right, I feel badly on a personal level for the incumbent Liberal MPs who lost their seats last week. I worked for an MP who lost an election, and I can tell you that it plainly sucks. These defeated MPs are good people who sacrificed a great deal to serve the people in Canada’s Parliament. While a seat in Parliament is certainly not anyone’s God given right, the adjustment period for people coming out of public life is difficult.