Happy Birthday's sad money grab

By Jaime Weinman - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 10:00 AM - 1 Comment

This is a major anniversary for the woman who composed Happy Birthday, but you can’t afford to sing it to her. June 27 marks the 150th birthday of Mildred Hill, who wrote a short song in 1893 with lyrics (originally “Good Morning To All”) by her younger sister Patty. Long after Mildred was dead, the song was registered with new birthday lyrics, and ever since then, the music publisher has collected a licence fee from any movie or TV show that uses Happy Birthday. When it’s sung in a restaurant, you may be hearing the sound of someone who owes money.

Nobody knows who wrote Happy Birthday to Mildred Hill’s tune, and it was sung that way for some time before anyone thought of charging for it. But ever since it was copyrighted in 1935, what sounds like a traditional song became a privately owned cash cow: the song was used in 10 movies in 2008 alone, and Warner Music Group, which now owns the rights, requires a licence fee of approximately $20,000 for singing even one of the song’s four lines. Producers sometimes save money by substituting public-domain songs like For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow in birthday scenes, or even creating original songs; the first home-video release of Leslie Nielsen’s show Police Squad! recorded over Happy Birthday with a song called Something Different. (When the DVD release restored the original version of the episode, some fans complained about the removal of Something Different.)

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Calming down about the economy?

By macleans.ca - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 9:59 AM - 4 Comments

Now that the Conference Board has declared that Canadian consumers feel the economy has bottomed out, perhaps its time to devote some attention to other fears. Just in time to fill the gloom vacuum, the Massachusetts Institutes of Technology’s world-leading climate change model offers some troubling new projections. MIT model’s uniquely takes into account the economy, the atmosphere, the oceans, and life on earth. It’s new forecast indicates a median probability of surface warming of 5.2 degrees by 2100. And that’s up from a median projected warming in the 2003 MIT study of 2.4 degrees.

MIT

Don't mess with Michelle Obama

By Barbara Amiel - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 9:40 AM - 49 Comments

I thought about Michelle Obama on Mother’s Day. No special reason except I was in a West Palm Beach park walking my two dogs (who caught fleas as the town seems to be cutting its pesticide program now that President Obama has said they can’t use his stimulus money to operate the train system) and I passed several Mother’s Day celebrations. Swarms of children and women, but the fathers were, as President Obama puts it, MIA.

Half a dozen Afro-American kiddies came up to me and pointed at the dogs. “Will they bite?” they asked sensibly. “Not if you’re nice to them,” I replied as one little rotter started jabbing a stick menacingly toward the dog’s eyes. Little Maya (115 lb. of dog) did her well-known teeth-baring-and-snarl number known as “Holy S–t” around town. I was all for her taking the horrid child’s arm in her jaw but given my circumstances that’s not too helpful.

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Pawning fine wine to pay the bills

By Patricia Treble - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 9:20 AM - 0 Comments

Cash-strapped Parisians are increasingly turning to the city’s publicly controlled pawnbroker to solve a money crunch. So far this year, 30 per cent more residents have shown up at Crédit Municipal, originally created by Louis XIII in 1637 to give the city a legitimate option to usurious loan sharks. And there have been some surprising items brought in: on May 11 and 12, the non-profit state firm held its first auction of grand cru wines taken from customers who defaulted on their loans.

“It is easier for someone to go into his cellar and bring us some good bottles of wine than to take down the paintings in the dining room or remove his wife’s necklace,” said director Bernard Candiard. In return for the collateral, customers can borrow up to 70 per cent of the value of their goods, paying between four and 14 per cent interest. As long as clients pay the interest, the loans will be extended indefinitely. Today, the vaults hold 900,000 items ranging from paintings, gold and couture clothes to a simple umbrella. In addition to pawnbroking, the state firm also offers debt restructuring, micro-finance for poor clients, and budget advice. As for the original owners of all that fine wine recently sold, they will get any profit from the sale, minus interest and commission, of course.

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Bestsellers

By Brian Bethune - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 9:00 AM - 1 Comment

Top-selling fiction and non-fiction titles (week of May 19th, 2009)

Fiction
1 THE CHILDREN’S BOOK  by A.S. Byatt 2 (5)
2 TEA TIME FOR THETRADITIONALLY BUILT by Alexander McCall Smith   1 (4)
3 THE GUERNSEY LITERARYAND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows 5 (18)
4 BROOKLYN by Colm Tóibín    (1)
5 THE LITTLE STRANGER by Sarah Waters   3 (3)
6 THE WINTER VAULTby Anne Michaels    4 (8)
7 PYGMY by Chuck Palahniuk    7 (1)
8 THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO by Stieg Larsson   10 (33)
9 THE SWEETNESS AT THETHE BOTTOM OF THE PIEby Alan Bradley  6 (14)
10 NOCTURNES by Kazuo Ishiguro  (1)
             
Non-fiction
1 OUTLIERS  by Malcolm Gladwell      2 (25)
2 TRUE PATRIOT LOVE by Michael Ignatieff   1 (5)
3 STEPHEN LEACOCK by Margaret MacMillan  8 (6)
4 ALWAYS LOOKING UP by Michael J. Fox   7 (7)
5 THE CELLO SUITESby Eric Siblin    3 (10)
6 FILTHY LUCRE by Joseph Heath   (1)
7 THE ASCENT OF MONEYby Niall Ferguson    6 (2)
8 HOUSE OF CARDS by William Cohan   4 (9)
9 RAPT  by Winifred Gallagher  (1)
10 NOT YET by Wayson Choy    9 (8)

LAST WEEK (WEEKS ON LIST)

Finns still haunted by Lenin's ghost

By Susan Mohammad - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 9:00 AM - 24 Comments

He’s been dead for 85 years, but Vladimir Lenin is still managing to polarize Finland.

Last month, two activist groups in the industrial city of Tampere (180 km northwest of Helsinki) proposed that the city’s Lenin Museum—the only permanent Lenin museum in the world—should be renamed the “Museum of the Victims of Totalitarianism,” and showcase the crimes of the Soviet regime. The Pro Karelia association and the Artillery Guild citizens groups are also calling into question the museum’s yearly grant of $127,000 from the Finnish state, plus a subsidy for two museum employees’ salaries.

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A vision to behold

By Kate Lunau - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 8:20 AM - 2 Comments

Recovering from back surgery in a hospital bed, Millie Sauer, a self-confessed bookworm, pulled out a novel and began to read. She knew immediately that something was wrong. “Part of the page was grey. That had never happened before,” says Sauer, 69. The hospital did some tests, she says, “and discovered I’d had a stroke.”

Sauer struggled to cope with her partial loss of vision—one the doctors said was permanent. “I’d walk into the wall because I couldn’t see on the left side,” recalls Sauer, a retiree in Bismarck, N.D. Increasingly frustrated, she went online and found Krystel Huxlin, an associate professor at the University of Rochester Eye Institute. “When I got a hold of Krystel, things started looking up,” Sauer says.

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Not recommended if you have cats

By Alex Shimo - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 8:00 AM - 3 Comments

Designers and celebrities have a new eco-sustainable, authentic material to champion: cardboard. Long derided as a “hobo’s IKEA,” it’s being used to make, among other things, furniture, handbags, pianos, even bridges. There are horse-print cardboard wall coverings in the changing rooms of Stella McCartney’s Paris store; English actor Colin Firth’s London-based furniture shop sells corrugated cardboard chairs, and the elite design firm Vitra offers Frank Gehry’s “Easy Edges” cardboard line.

In the upscale Toronto restaurant Mildred’s Temple Kitchen, cardboard stools complement leather sofas with suede and satin pillows. Designed by Vancouver-based Molo, these iconic “Softseating” pieces are now in the permanent collection of New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Installed in the restaurant last November, the stools no longer look new: cardboard tends to look “pretty beaten up” very quickly, says restaurant manager Jane McMahon, which is “apparently part of the appeal.”

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Penelope Cruz flees Cannes

By Brian D. Johnson - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 7:50 AM - 0 Comments

Pedro Almodóvar (left) with Penélope Cruz and co-star Lluís Homar promote 'Broken Promises' in Cannes (photo by BDJ)

Penélope Cruz cut short her visit to Cannes in yesterday. She cancelled an entire day of media interviews for Broken Embraces, her new movie with director Pedro Almodóvar, which premiered in competition here Tuesday. On Monday Cruz had cancelled out of a party to promote her upcoming musical, Nine, complaining of food poisoning. By the time she got to the press conference for Broken Embraces the next morning, she had upgraded her condition to the flu—although she hastened to add it was just a “normal flu.” Then yesterday she fled Cannes two days ahead of schedule, which led one industry insider wondering if she might be pregnant. We don’t want to start any unfounded rumours. There has been Internet chatter about her being pregant before—three years ago, when Internet star-watchers detected a “baby bump” in photographs. And last year, Cruz, who’s involved with Vicky Christina Barcelona co-star Javier Bardem, had mused publicly about her desire for a family. So there you have it—a heap of unsubstantiated celebrity gossip. So don’t ever say it’s all high art and film criticism at BDJ Unscreened. . I’m just trying to do my bit.

But it's just starting to get good: Liveblogging the last day of public hearings at the Oliphant Inquiry

By kadyomalley - Thursday, May 21, 2009 at 7:49 AM - 25 Comments

Um, guys? This inquiry that has been the focal point of ITQ’s existence for the last two months? It’s about to be — over. I know. I’m not sure what I’m going to do with the rest of my life either.

Okay, in fairness, it’s not really over, per se. I mean, there’s still a report to be written, which requires conclusions to be arrived at, and the second phase of hearings, which will cover policy recommendations, and get underway in a couple of weeks — oh, and Schreiber still has to show up for a final round of cross-examination by commission counsel, and apparently, there’s also a slight possibility that one of the other parties will pop up today with a motion to subpoena more witnesses. But it’s still the very last day of public hearings according to the schedule, at least, so please excuse your liveblogger if she starts to get a bit maudlin towards the end.

As for today’s hearing, it’s a bit of a mixed bag, as far as the witness list goes: Salpie Stepanian from the PMO correspondence unit; another CRA official, who will testify about the voluntary disclosure program, and Fred Bilt, who was Canada’s Ambassador to China when Mulroney allegedly discussed his United Nations group buy concept with the Chinese leadership, but who was not, according to the former prime minister, actually present during the conversation.

9:19:29 AM
Good morning, Oliphantophiles!
With just a few minutes to go until the last! public! hearing! ever! (okay, not really), we’re all aboggle over the revelation that the government is picking up the tab for Team Mulroney’s legal bills, to the tune of $2 million.

Continue…

PHOTO GALLERY: Candid Cannes

By macleans.ca - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 11:38 PM - 0 Comments

The strange case of the safety deposit box

By Andrew Coyne - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 11:09 PM - 18 Comments

I didn’t get a chance to watch much of the Mulroney testimony today — I was travelling — but I did catch this exchange, faithfully recounted by the incomparable KDO:

10:20:15 AM

Oh, thank goodness — the safety deposit box in New York, which is at least marginally more interesting than Schreiber’s voluminous one-way correspondence; Auger [Schreiber's lawyer] has a letter from the bank confirming that Mulroney hadn’t ‘visited the box’ since 2006 — wait, does that mean the money is still there? — although it does note that it was possible he visited the box on December 13, 1999, when the lock was changed. Wait, who is saying this? Anyway, Mulroney has no recollection of any of that, although as Auger points out, that would coincide with when he determined that the money was income.

10:24:19 AM

Okay, according to the bank, the lock was changed “at Mulroney’s request* — this, despite the fact that he insists that he has no recollection of doing so. Not to mention the serendipitous timing, what with it happening just before the Boxing Day meeting between Doucet and Schreiber.

What? Never mind that he can’t remember changing his own lock. He changed the lock?? Why do you need to change the lock to a safety deposit box to which you alone have access? Or did someone else have a key?

MOREOVER: The whole safety deposit box thing, I have to say, is a bit of a puzzle. If I have Mulroney’s story straight, he went down to New York in December of 1994 knowing nothing about any further payment from Schreiber, then took the $75,000 in cash he received from him at their Pierre Hotel meeting and stowed it in his safety deposit box — which he had set up months before at a branch of the Chemical Bank, of which he was a director. It was to hold “sensitive documents,” he said, related to some business he was doing for another client.

I was talking this over with a colleague today, and we were both stumped by that last bit. Why do you need a safety deposit box in New York to hold these documents? Can’t you take them home with you and put them in your safe there? Or, if you must, in a safety deposit box in Montreal? They’re so sensitive you can’t even get on a plane with them? What am I missing here?

STILLMOREOVER: So maybe he made this part up? But why? Why do you need a cover story to explain why you happen to have a safety deposit box on hand in which to stow your sudden and unexpected windfall? So you have a safety deposit box in New York: so what? Or suppose that’s a lie: you arranged for the safety deposit box only after Schreiber gave you the cash. Again: so what?

American Idol: Kris Allen? Really?

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 10:28 PM - 26 Comments

Having made it through an hour last night, we’re back for two more. It’s the American Idol season finale. And only the very soul of the last global empire hangs in the balance.

8:00pm. And we’re off. Cue the dramatic opening montage. “The final battle… the biggest moment of their lives… their lives have been changed forever.” You know, on that last point, the same could be said of almost everything that happens to you everyday. Think about it.

8:02pm. Ryan Seacrest says phone lines were jammed last night, but still just under 100-million votes were registered. Apparently this is some sort of record. The American dream is alive and well.

8:03pm. Randy Jackson is wearing a large, maroon-velvet bowtie. See last night’s comment about Sesame Street.

8:06pm. Ryan introduces “the two guys who have captured the hearts of the nation.” It is, at this point, necessary to report that last night’s finale was the lowest rated in Idol history. Continue…

The Most Important Question After IDOL…

By Jaime Weinman - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 10:13 PM - 0 Comments

…Who will be the first U.S. pundit tomorrow claiming that the victory of Kris (red-state, good ol’ boy Kris) signals the revolt of the Silent Majority and a sign of a turnaround for the Republican Party? My money’s on one or more of the Fox and Friends. Or would be, if anybody had any money left after betting it all on Adam.

Gross Generalizations

By Andrew Potter - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 9:16 PM - 37 Comments

I spent the better part of yesterday morning trying — fruitlessly — to make a minor change to my cellphone plan. My carrier of choice offered two ways of doing it, in theory: I could make the change in my account online, or call their handy 1800 number. Online quickly ran into a dead-end, since the plans that were advertised on the main Choose a Plan page bore absolutely no relation to the plans I was given the option of switching to. So I called the 1800 number, and got bounced around through voice mail hell until an agent finally answered, only to tell me that I had reached residential service, not wireless. So he transferred me, and after 10 minutes more on hold I was disconnected. This happened three more times until I finally gave up, but only after swearing profusely at a miserable and innocent young man named Brett. (Sorry Brett!). 

So what’s the point? Well, the whole episode reminded me of Robert Conquest’s Third Law of Politics: “The simplest way to explain the behaviour of any bureaucratic organization is to assume that it is controlled by a cabal of its enemies.”

Which in turn reminded me that I’ve been meaning to write something about these kind of laws. I love them, and Conquest’s are three of the best. His other two:

1. Everyone is a reactionary about what he knows best.
2. Any organization not explicitly right-wing sooner or later becomes left wing.

Conquest’s laws are clearly those formulated by a historian: they speak to a breadth and depth of reading and experience that allows him to say, basically, this is how the world works. 

A similar, more resigned instance is Sturgeon’s Adage: “Ninety percent of everything is crap.”

I’ve wanted to come up with a theorem or law or lemma of my own, but I’m pretty sure it isn’t the sort of thing you can conjure up deliberately.  The closest I came, maybe, was a line in my thesis that said “philosophy abhors a consensus”, which is little more than a mild witticism. The Rebel Sell contains a number of handy memes (“the Pink Floyd theory of education”) and rules of thumb (“What if everyone did that?”)  but there aren’t any statements that would qualify as a a social or political law on a par with Conquest. 

Our own Paul Wells, of course, has earned widespread fame for his Two Rules of Canadian politics:

Rule 1: For any given situation, Canadian politics will tend toward the least exciting possible outcome.

Rule 2: If everyone in Ottawa knows something, it’s not true.

They are both good, though I think the first one is close to genius (see: The Madness).  I asked around, and Andrew Coyne chipped in with these:

1. The closer the government , the less accountable it is. 

2. Public support for any monopoly is the square of its decrepitude.   

3. Any law passed by a unanimous vote of Parliament is always a bad idea.

4. The bigger the issue, the less likely it is to decide an election.

I’m sure there are plenty more out there. Which ones do you like? Do you have any of your own?

Unusual Music Scoring In TV

By Jaime Weinman - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 8:12 PM - 1 Comment

[vodpod id=Groupvideo.2565819&w=560&h=340&fv=%26rel%3D0%26border%3D0%26]

One more thing about Glee: I don’t know how long they’ll be able to keep up the gimmick of having a vocal music score (often consisting of vocal versions of familiar music like “Soul Bossa Nova” and Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony). That’s the sort of gimmick that’s the first thing to go after the first 13 episodes. But it kind of works, not only because it fits the tone of the show but because it prevents this show from being as over-scored as most network hour-long shows. Shows with orchestral scores these days tend to smother every scene in soundtrack music; this show can’t do that, because vocal music doesn’t fade into the background as easily — you notice it, so they have to reserve it for moments when it’s okay to notice the musical scoring.

I also kind of like the idea of doing something a little different with the musical score. There are so many cliches associated with TV scoring these days that the happy, sad, funny and suspenseful cues all seem to sound exactly the same from show to show.

Other shows that have experimented with vocal music scores include the cartoon A Pup Named Scooby-Doo (where the producer sang his ideas for doo-wop tunes into a tape recorder, and the composer transcribed them and turned them into a Little Shop Of Horrors-style score) and the first few seasons of Happy Days scored by Pete King and Frank Comstock, though they alternated between vocal and orchestral cues. And Seinfeld, obviously, had a sound that was unusual for TV at the time, though it soon became a cliche. (Interestingly, the composer experimented with adding wordless vocals to that show, too, but Seinfeld and David stopped him after one episode.)

What are some shows that you think had an unusual or original approach to the musical scoring?

So why is that the first thing mentioned in each ad?

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 7:31 PM - 42 Comments

Ryan Sparrow explains the Conservative attack ads.

“The issue is not that Ignatieff worked outside the country.”

'We are left with hundreds of questions'

By Michael Friscolanti - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 5:59 PM - 2 Comments

The search for eight-year-old Victoria Stafford has turned into a search for her dead body. Exactly six weeks after “Tori” vanished—last seen in a grainy surveillance video, leaving school hand-in-hand with an unidentified woman—police have charged two people in connection with her abduction and murder, extinguishing all hope that the little girl will be found alive. “We all wanted Tori back safe and sound,” said Det.-Insp. William Renton, announcing the charges at a packed press conference this afternoon. “Unfortunately, two other individuals had different agendas.”

Earlier in the day, both suspects—a 28-year-old man and an 18-year-old woman—made a brief court appearance in Woodstock, Ont., where they were formally arraigned. Michael Thomas Rafferty, who pulled his golf shirt over his face as he was escorted into the building, is charged with abduction and murder. His alleged accomplice, Terri-Lynne McClintic, faces charges of abduction and accessory to murder after the fact. A brief synopsis submitted by the Crown also reveals that Tori was murdered “on or about” April 8—the same day she went missing.

Despite the arrests, many questions remain unanswered—including the location of Tori’s remains. Renton said officers are searching in multiple locations, but would not reveal whether the suspects are co-operating with that effort. “This case is now before the courts, and it goes without saying that there is much we cannot comment on at this time,” he said. “Our focus is to examine the evidence, follow it, and allow it to take us to where Victoria is.” When asked how murder charges could be laid without a body—or even a crime scene—Renton responded this way: “Based on the information we’ve confirmed, the substance of the murder charge is valid.”

That exact information remains a heavily guarded secret. Because a trial now looms, and because the investigation is still active, police are hesitant to release even the most basic facts. Renton did say that McClintic, the female suspect, “may be familiar” with Tori’s mother, Tara McDonald, but he refused to provide further details. The veteran investigator also would not discuss how the accused are connected, how they first became suspects, or what specific evidence triggered last night’s arrests. As for what would possibly motivate someone to kidnap and murder the innocent girl, Renton was equally tight-lipped. “I cannot speak to motive,” he said. “We’re satisfied, at this point, that we have the persons responsible and we do not anticipate any other arrests at this point.”

Today’s disturbing developments signaled a tragic conclusion to a case that has gripped not only the town of Woodstock, but the entire country. For weeks, the locals—including, presumably, the two suspects—have been staring at Tori’s smiling face from the “missing person” posters plastered across the region. Her blue eyes and blond hair have been displayed on telephone poles, on storefront windows, and on car windshields, all in the hope that someone would come forward with information leading to her safe return.

Tori’s estranged parents, Rodney Stafford and Tara McDonald, were equally determined to keep the case in the spotlight—although their eagerness to face the cameras raised more than a few eyebrows. Every afternoon at 1 p.m., McDonald held a press conference in her yard, updating the media on the latest developments (some dubbed it “The Tara Show”).

McDonald has not spoken publicly since the arrests were announced. While the suspects were led into court in handcuffs, Stafford was in another part of town, dressed in a T-shirt with a picture of Tori that read: Daddy’s Little Girl. “I don’t know where to go from here,” he said.

Ron Fraser, Chief of the Oxford Community Police Service, addressed reporters before Det.-Insp. Renton. “This is certainly not the end anyone was hoping for,” he said. “There are no consoling words to offer or profound words of wisdom that can make this news easy for anyone to accept or convey. We are left with hundreds of questions that hopefully one day will be answered in our courts of law. Perhaps once we get some answers to help us figure out why someone would take the life of a beautiful young lady, we will be able to begin to rationalize or find some way to put all of this into some type of perspective. For the time being, perhaps there is some solace in knowing that because of Victoria Stafford, every child in this city—and for that matter, this entire country—will be a little safer due to the heightened awareness of the need to better protect our children.”

For now, little is known about the suspects. Michael Rafferty’s neighbours said he either lived with his mother or his parents, and people in the surrounding houses told reporters they didn’t know him well. Aaron Mabey, 20, lives next door and told The Canadian Press he saw several police officers outside the house Tuesday night around 11 p.m. He helped search for Tori in the early days after her disappearance, and said it makes him feel physically ill to know the suspect lived right next door. “When I was told, I just felt so sick.”

The London Free Press reports that Terry-Lynne McClintic is the daughter of a stripper—and was later adopted by another stripper. The information comes from McClintic’s estranged adopted father, Rob, who explains the twisted story this way: “I was living in Woodstock at the time and Carol [his wife] was a stripper. A stripper friend of hers was going to have a baby but wanted to get rid of it. Carol said she wanted the baby. So, they put my name down as the birth father and we took the baby. But I wasn’t even there for the conception or the birth.” Rob McClintic says he hasn’t seen Carol or Terry-Lynne in at least 12 years. “This is just blowing me away,” he said. “It just appalls me to hear of anyone doing anything like that to a child. My heart goes out to that little girl’s parents.”

Oh sure, it's all kiss 'n' hug now…

By Andrew Coyne - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 5:45 PM - 6 Comments

At the close of his testimony, Mulroney was the picture of graciousness.

“Mr. Mulroney, you’ve been on the stand for I think the longest of any witness I have either been involved in as a lawyer or in 24 years as a judge,” Justice Jeffrey Oliphant told Mulroney at the inquiry in Ottawa.

“I want to assure myself before you leave, sir, that you feel, despite probing questions that may have been asked, that you leave here feeling that you’ve been treated fairly and with respect.”

Mulroney said he believed he was treated “very fairly and with great respect.”

“The probing questions I thought were appropriate and didn’t either bother me or offend me in any way. So the answer to the question is very much in the affirmative. And I thank you sir for your kindness.”

Well, isn’t that nice? All civility and respect. Except I remember how Mulroney closed his testimony to the Ethics Committee, back in December ’07:

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Mulroney.

Clearly there are some discrepancies between the testimony that we have received from two witnesses. It would appear that there will be more questions of interest and we likely will be asking you, once again, to come back some time in February or later, and we hope that you will be able to come back to further clarify, if necessary, any outstanding matters and I share with you the extension of the wish to all, a very Merry Christmas.

Right Hon. Brian Mulroney: I thank you, Mr. Chairman, in particular for your courtesy.

The Chair: Thank you, sir.

And we all know how that ended up: Mulroney refused to obey the committee’s summons to reappear, and has since taking to slamming the committee and its chairman. In his Oliphant testimony, he called it a “national disgrace” and a “kangaroo court,” while Paul Szabo, the chairman he was so careful to thank before, was now referred to, witheringly, as its “distinguished chairman.”

Still, it was smart of the commissioner to get him on the record. Makes it harder to launch the inevitable legal challenge. Not impossible, but harder.

H1N1 virus still going strong, UN takes action

By macleans.ca - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 5:23 PM - 0 Comments

The United Nations and world officials are raising new red flags as the worldwide number of swine flu infections reaches almost 10,000. The warnings are made more severe since drug companies announced that the progress in making a vaccine is moving slowly; a vaccine was supposed to be available in May, but now will not be ready until mid-July. Regular flu vaccine offers no protection. Because trade and travel bans are considered frivolous, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is asking countries to avoid such bans, instead emphasizing cooperation by sharing drug and virus data to help create a vaccine quickly. Representatives from the UN and World Health Organization also met with drug companies to ensure that when a vaccine is created, it will be available to poor as well as rich countries.

Forbes

How to become Barack's BFF

By Luiza Ch. Savage - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 5:02 PM - 8 Comments

Okay, I’m guessing here, but I imagine that if some country called the White House tomorrow and said, hey buddy, I’ll take those Gitmo guys off your hands — they’d get more than a handwritten thank you note.

One of Obama’s first acts as president was to issue an executive order on closing the US detention facility at Guantanamo within a year. Trouble is, he hasn’t been ably to convince allies to take many of the 240 detainees– and now it appears that nobody in the US wants them either.

Lawmakers from both parties are having a severe case of Not in My Back Yard. Today the Senate voted overwhelmingly to strip funding for the Gitmo closure from a war funding bill and said no money would be authorized until Obama comes up with a plan for dealing with the detainees.  TPM has an interesting analysis of howTeam Obama screwed this one up.

It’s hard for the White House to ask other countries to take in the detainees  if the US doesn’t take any itself. And he has already disappointed supporters by saying he will carry out modified military commissions rather than criminal trials for the detainees.

The opposition by lawmakers, which was blamed in some quarters on Republican fear-mongering, got new credence today when Obama’s own FBI director Robert Mueller piled on, saying the FBI has concerns about bringing detainees to the US — even in supermax prisons — because they could radicalize others or orchestrate attacks from their cells.

Obama is planning a speech tomorrow on national security and is expected to address the issue. Meanwhile, Dick Cheney is planning his own speech tomorrow about how Barack Obama is screwing up.

Can Saudi Arabia come to the rescue? And if so, what do they get in return?

Coyne v Wells: You can go home again, only don't expect us to be waiting up

By Andrew Coyne - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 4:57 PM - 3 Comments

In which we agonize about Count Iggy and the Tory badads. We agree that attack ads are out of bounds unless they aren’t, and that Iggy’s absence is an issue but not that way.

We're just visiting, and it's all about us

By Paul Wells - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 4:02 PM - 18 Comments

Last week’s Coyne v. Wells arrives a few days late, which means if you’re very, very good, you might get two of these things this week! This week, me and the smart guy bat around those Tory Truth Ads about Count Michael.

And now a word from the leader of the opposition

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, May 20, 2009 at 3:33 PM - 81 Comments