Faster, Irony! Die! Die!

By Martin Patriquin - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 3:27 PM - 42 Comments

September 2: Prime Minister decries a potential Liberal government “propped up by the socialists and the separatists”.

September 14: Prime Minister’s own government may survive, thanks to the socialists and the separatists.

My, this bile is delicious.

Will EI reform keep election at bay?

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 3:17 PM - 6 Comments

After pressure from opposition parties to reform Employment Insurance, the Conservatives announced today its intention to extend benefits by up to 20 weeks for workers who have been employed for seven of the last 10 years. But it remains to be seen whether the initiative will be sufficient to get the NDP on side, and prevent the Liberals from triggering an election in a hotly anticipated confidence vote, which could prompt an election. Though the party has yet to study the details of the proposal, NDP MP Paul Dewar called it “a first start.”

CBC News

Who’s hit hardest by the recession: young workers or the old?

By Rachel Mendleson - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 2:40 PM - 15 Comments

Teaching has never held the promise of riches, but it’s always been thought of as a safe career choice—and with good reason. Aside from full benefits and an enviable pension, it’s a profession with a built-in foot in the door: the supply list. For young teachers awaiting a long-term contract, substitute teaching is a way to cut your teeth, and pay the bills. Or at least it used to be. These days an influx of retirees on the supply rolls—baby boomers supplementing their pensions with part-time work—means that new grads are increasingly competing with veterans. The invasion of so-called “double-dippers” has created a palpable resentment among new teachers, says Barry Weisleder, spokesman for the Toronto Substitute Teachers’ Action Caucus. “They might get their name on the list, but they’re not going to be called for months, if ever,” he says. In Burnaby, B.C., the teachers’ association president Marianne Neill observed last year that thanks to fewer calls*, “some of our members are living in poverty. But I don’t believe retired teachers are to blame, and I question anyone who would draw that conclusion.”

Their circumstances may be unique, but new teachers are not the only ones with an axe to grind. This summer, average unemployment for students aged 15 to 24 hit nearly 20 per cent—the second-highest rate since 1977, when Statistics Canada first began collecting comparable data. And many of those who managed to obtain entry-level positions before the crash have since been shown the door: this June, the year-over-year increase in the number of youths receiving Employment Insurance reached a staggering 108 per cent. At the same time, those aged 55 and over are entering the workforce with renewed vigour: while the economy bottomed out, these older workers saw an increase in employment of five per cent. And it’s not going to change soon: a recent Pew Research Center study showed that from 2006 to 2016, workers over the age of 55 will account for a stunning 93 per cent of labour force growth in the U.S. And the Center for Work-Life Policy now reports that 47 per cent of American boomers see themselves as being “mid-career.”

Continue…

Honey, does this make me look thin?

By Martin Patriquin - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 2:40 PM - 2 Comments

The wife actually notices it for once. This poor woman, who has seen the behind in question for nearly a decade and is long numbed by its familiarity, looks twice when her better half is getting dressed. She’s a modest type not given to excess adjectives, so they must be coaxed out of her. Round, firm, uplifted? Is that it? “Tighter,” she says finally. “I don’t know. Use your imagination.”

As ordinary-looking as can be, though, “Precision Underwear,” manufactured by Australia-based Equmen and released this month, is a gluteal exclamation point, sucking and pulling and hiding unsightly bits. In an era where teenaged boys wear eyeshadow and grown men wear leggings, perhaps the idea of a girdle for men isn’t that surprising. Equmen, which also produces gut-disguising T-shirts, has a proposition: if men can stand a constant cinching feeling in the rear end (and a $65 price tag), its skivvies will do for them what Spanx’s “slimming intimates” do for women: fool the eye of the beholder into seeing StairMaster rather than a summer’s worth of beer, BBQ and sloth. Oh, and they will also flatter the front porch, thank you.

“We call it subtle support,” says Equmen’s Michael Flint, a B.C. native who has spent much of his career thinking about men’s underwear. The drawers, he says, “give you a perkier bubble butt—an engineered butt.” And what about up front? “We’ve engineered the pouch as well,” he says demurely. “If you make the package look bigger,” he adds, “a gentleman is more confident.”

Continue…

Each man in his own sweater

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 1:31 PM - 16 Comments

Judith Timson wonders how we might better know our leaders.

Okay, perhaps I am being cynical, but just imagining these two guys trying to talk candidly about themselves, let alone impart any life lessons, makes me realize that we have largely come to know them only by their negatives as defined by each other … So here’s a crazy idea: What would happen if they both publicly told their life stories honestly, without partisan cant or ideology? At least we’d know who they really are. If either of them got up and told the true story of themselves and what they really value, they’d inspire more than students. We might even feel like voting for one of them.

Old friends

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 1:15 PM - 15 Comments

Brian Topp assesses the future of relations between Stephen Harper and Jack Layton, and dishes a bit on the past.

In the winter of 2005, then-opposition leader Stephen Harper met intensively with Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe (“the separatists”) and with Mr. Layton (“the socialists”) to discuss a proposal to defeat the Paul Martin minority government at the first opportunity, and to replace it with a Conservative government supported in the House by the balance of the opposition. Mr. Harper canvassed this proposal with the Governor-General of the day in writing.

Regrettably for Mr. Harper at the time, Mr. Layton does not run with the opposition crowd. Uneasy with the idea of putting Mr. Harper in office, Mr. Layton withdrew from these discussions and negotiated the spring 2005 budget accord instead.

Follow the link for a photo of the trio of Stephen, Jack and Gilles in happier times.

The fall session is off to a fine start

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 1:05 PM - 11 Comments

From Conservative MP Daryl Kramp’s Twitter feed.

darylkrampmust cancel my trade trip to China–environmental technogy due to possible confidence vote by opposition what a load ofzxemxcmekgkly

When the answer was more democracy

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 1:01 PM - 22 Comments

Excerpts from a 1988 pamphlet advertising Reform principles and policies.

Reformers believe that many of our most serious problems as a country can be traced to the apathy and non-involvement of Canadians in public affairs, and to decisions that too frequently ignore the popular will. Governments today assume far too large a role in our lives for us to allow decisions to be made solely by bureaucrats, pressure groups, and political professionals. The vast majority of citizens and taxpayers have a right to be involved. The system must provide the opportunity and the responsibility for us to do so.

Continue…

'It doesn't seem important. It is.'

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:40 PM - 44 Comments

The prepared text of Michael Ignatieff’s speech to the Canadian Club this afternoon.

I’m here today to talk to you about Canada’s place in the world—how we’ve lost it and how we can get it back.

The world is changing, and Canada has to change with it.  Our identity as a people will be defined by the place we find in the world that is taking shape on the other side of this global recession.

Canada was born inside two Empires, the French, the British, and we have matured beside the most powerful nation in history, the United States.

What happens to our identity, our place in the world, when the centre of gravity shifts to Asia? When India and China become the powerhouses of the global economy?

We should have nothing to fear from the rise of these new powers. A new world creates new opportunities for Canada. Opportunities to trade, to learn, and to create the global architecture of security for this emerging new world. But only if we have leadership that seizes these opportunities.

Ce que nous faisons à l’étranger contribue à nous définir. C’est le reflet de notre personnalité. C’est le reflet de ce que nous pouvons apporter au monde pour qu’il soit meilleur. C’est le prolongement de ce que nous sommes comme peuple.

By and large, Canadian politicians scarcely utter a word about Canada in the world on the hustings.  It doesn’t seem important. It is.

Continue…

Darwin movie too evolved for U.S. audiences

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:18 PM - 20 Comments

Creation, the British movie about Charles Darwin that opened the Toronto Film Festival, has been critically acclaimed and sold in almost every territory around the world. Yet the film cannot get distribution in the U.S. because its subject matter is considered “too controversial,” the Telegraph reports. The movie, starring Paul Bettany, details Darwin’s “struggle between faith and reason” as he wrote On The Origin of Species. It also depicts him as a man who loses faith in God following the death of his 10-year-old daughter, Annie. U.S. distributors have resolutely passed on the film, concerned that it would “prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution,” the paper reports. Already the movie has sparked fierce debate. Movieguide.org, a site that reviews films from a Christian perspective, described Darwin as the father of eugenics and denounced him as “a racist, a bigot and an 1800s naturalist whose legacy is mass murder,” contending his “half-baked theory” directly influenced Adolf Hitler. Jeremy Thomas, the movie’s Oscar-winning producer, said he was astonished that such attitudes exist 150 years after On The Origin of Species was published. “That’s what we’re up against. In 2009. It’s amazing,” he said.

The Telegraph

The next Osama

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:16 PM - 0 Comments

He isn’t a household name. Not yet, at least. But Sheikh Abu Yahya al-Libi has certainly caught the attention of counterterrorism experts—not to mention the next generation of wannabe jihadis. Young, media-savvy, ideologically extreme, and an expert at justifying violence in the name of Islam, Abu Yahya is considered the heir apparent to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda throne. His story is already the stuff of extremist lore. Captured in 2002, he managed to escape from Bagram air base by picking his cell lock and posing as a U.S. soldier moving furniture. He has spent the ensuing years sharpening his extremist image, releasing feature-length videos, articles and even a photo shoot. Says one terrorism author: “Abu Yahya’s goal is nothing short of remaking Islam from the inside out, and he does so in a candid, compelling, and inherently populist fashion. In other words, what we know about how al Qaeda does business is about to completely change.”

Foreign Policy

Vancouver's Olympic ad drought

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:15 PM - 5 Comments

The Olympics are normally an easy sell for companies looking to advertise their brand and stick the five rings on their products. The potential audience is massive. The Beijing Olympics, for instance, lured nearly five billion TV viewers (about 70 per cent of the world population). But things have not been easy for the Vancouver Games, which are still struggling to land big advertisers just months before the opening ceremony. Names like GM and Home Depot have already dropped out as sponsors of the U.S. team. The recession is largely to blame. But experts say there are other challenges looming, like the fact that much-coveted younger viewers are straying from TV and the Winter Games in favour of the web and extreme sports featured in the X Games. One sports marketing expert suggests the IOC itself is largely to blame for having taken major sponsors for granted in past Olympics.

Reuters

Three weeks in the life of Jack Layton

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:15 PM - 14 Comments

August 25. After a face-to-face meeting with Harper in Ottawa last week, Layton told reporters the NDP would be the “least likely” of political parties to support the Conservatives in office “because we have very fundamental differences with the direction that they’re taking the country.”

Today. The NDP signalled today that it might be willing to prop up the Harper government and avert a fall election.

Oil sands emit more than entire countries

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:14 PM - 0 Comments

Just days after the premiers of British Columbia, Alberta and Saskatchewan agreed in Calgary to join forces on carbon capture and storage technology, appears journalist Andrew Nikiforuk’s Greenpeace-commissioned report, “Dirty: How the Tarsands Are Fuelling Global Climate Change.” Its findings are stunning: that the oil sands produce more greenhouse gases than some European countries, and that they will produce more than the world’s volcanoes combined in 11 years should development continue apace.

CBC News

Author/punk Jim Carroll dead at age 60

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:13 PM - 1 Comment

Jim Carroll, the silver-spooned wastrel, who resurrected himself as an author and punk rocker, has died of a heart attack. Best known for The Basketball Diaries, the harrowing chronicle of his descent from private school athlete to trick-turning smack addict. Carroll and his band, Jim Carroll Band, also turned out what is sometimes called the “last great punk album.” And he got to see Leonardo Di Caprio play him on film.

The New York Times

Meanwhile, back at the castle …

By kadyomalley - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 12:00 PM - 66 Comments

… okay, fine, it’s a chateau — the Chateau Laurier, to be precise — but ITQ is enjoying the fairy tale motif that has woven itself through today’s events. Jack and his beanstalk, Ignatieff’s castle-storming — all we need now is a dragon.

Anyway, Michael Ignatieff is back from Narnia just in time to kick off the fall session with a speech to the Canadian Club of Ottawa on “Canada’s place in a changing world.” Does that mean a super-extended-remix of last week’s smash hit English language ad ‘Worldview’? If so, will his musings on matters internationalist at least be accompanied by that jaunty-yet-pensive and vaguely Celtic-ish-sounding background score? I guess we’ll find out at 12:25 or so, so be sure to check back for full ITQ coverage.

12:16:46 PM
Oh my gosh, you guys, so sorry for my very nearly belated appearance in this liveblog; one of those stomach-churning connectivity glitches hit the ITQberry right as she took her seat in the Chateau ballroom, and was only resolved after a desperate prayer to the patron saint of livebloggers and a judicious battery pull. Oh, instant journalism. You do keep life interesting, don’t you?

Anyway, as a result, I missed the introduction of the head table, although I recognize the red-tie-festooned gentleman to the immediate right of the host; he is, of course, the keynote speaker of today’s event. (I did manage to catch a reference to the Chinese Ambassador to Canada, who is *also* at the head table, as are a few other sadly unidentified types.

12:19:53 PM
After a gracious introduction, Ignatieff takes the lectern, and earns a standing – well, partially standing — ovation from the crowd. There are a *lot* of Liberals in attendance, by the way. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

12:20:57 PM
I’m going to get straight to the speech with no colour — at least, unless and until he starts boring me — so, to start, he asks: Why does Michael Ignatieff run for office? He is, he says, his father’s son — his father, an immigrant to Canada, who served his adopted country as a public servant. He’s the son of that man, and that’s why he wants to be part of the team that will give back to Canada, and the world.

Continue…

Are employment insurance reforms worth fighting an election over?

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 11:55 AM - 31 Comments

This week's travel news

By Bruce Parkinson, Takeoffeh.com - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 11:45 AM - 1 Comment

This Week’s Take offers you a capsule summary of the high and low lights of TakeOffeh.com’s Daily Dispatches from the past seven days.

Back To Front?
When you pull back the curtain dividing economy from premium seats on many planes these days, you’ll find a lot of those big, comfy seats masquerading as passengers. Or you’ll find a bunch of passengers masquerading as premium-paying flyers. As the Globe and Mail’s Brent Jang reported this week, the big question for airlines is whether there will ever be a return to the days of business class travellers subsidizing mass air travel by paying up to 10 times as much as economy passengers. The big airlines – referred to as ‘legacy carriers’ — have relied heavily on premium revenues.  As well as being hammered by corporate travel cutbacks, they’re also being pecked to death by low-cost carriers. “The legacy carriers are in deep trouble,” Kevin Mitchell, chairman of the U.S.-based Business Travel Coalition, told Jang. “God forbid that we get another huge run-up in oil prices. It’s going to be disastrous. The sustainability of the global airline industry is going down, down, down.” Those are sobering words for a troubled industry, and they’re reflected across the pond too. U.K.-based Air & Business Travel News says in an analysis piece that it is unlikely high flying lawyers, bankers and the like will settle for the back of the bus when the economy improves, but mid-level execs might have to.

You Can Keep Your Shoes On
If you hate taking your shoes off when going through Canadian airport security, just say no. Actually, you shouldn’t even have to say no, because airport screeners are being told not to ask. Canadian Press reported this week that the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority(CATSA) has issued a bulletin to front-line security officers instructing them not to ask passengers to doff their footwear before boarding domestic or international flights. (The exception is for passengers heading to the U.S.)  Interestingly, Canadian Press had to use the Access to Information Act to access the bulletin, which suggests that CATSA doesn’t really want the rules advertised. Further confusing the issue, a CATSA spokesperson said the bulletin is nothing new, just a reaffirmation of existing policy. Then why did the bulletin state that the shoe directive was “effective immediately?” Footwear became a security focus when hapless would-be bomber Richard Reid tried to ignite explosives hidden in his shoe on an American Airlines flight. Let’s just all be thankful he didn’t hide a bomb in his Jockeys. Continue…

Obama to politically minded kids: beware of Facebook

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 11:36 AM - 0 Comments

When asked for advice about how to get into politics, Obama told a Grade 9 student at a roundtable discussion in Arlington, Va.: “I want everybody here to be careful about what you post on Facebook, because in the YouTube age, whatever you do, it will be pulled up again later somewhere in your life.” The tip comes after his speechwriter Jon Favreau was mired in controversy when a photo of him, groping a cutout of then-Sen. Hillary Clinton appeared on a friend’s Facebook page last year. In that case, Favreau admitted his error and apologized, which, say experts, is the right approach for those than find themselves in a similar situation.

ABC News

Depression ups risk of cancer death

By macleans.ca - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 11:34 AM - 1 Comment

Doctors must carefully monitor cancer patients for signs of psychological distress, according to a team of researchers from the University of British Columbia, who found that depression hurts a cancer patient’s chance of survival. According to the study, a review of 26 separate studies including 9,417 patients, death rates were up to 25 per cent higher in patients showing symptoms of depression. In patients who were diagnosed with major or minor depression, death rates were up to 39 per cent higher. In fact, animal research has suggested that stress can impact tumour growth and cancer spread, maybe because of its affect on hormones and the immune system, or certain behaviours that might make them less likely to comply with treatment regimes, for example. Even so, researchers stressed that the increased risk of dying from cancer due to depression is small, so patients shouldn’t stress about maintaining a positive attitude. Researchers found no solid evidence to show that depression impacted disease progression. “It is quite remarkable that the presence of depressive symptoms or a diagnosis of a depressive disorder can predict mortality in cancer patients. But it should be kept in mind that the increased risk is quite small,” lead researcher Jillian Satin told the BBC. “Cancer patients need not panic if they are experiencing depressive symptoms, but it is certainly reasonable to talk to their physicians about their mental health.”

BBC News

Which cruise is right for you? Part 3: Luxury Cruising

By Bruce Parkinson, Takeoffeh.com - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 11:26 AM - 0 Comments

TakeOffeh.com presents Part 3 in our Guide to Cruising. Previous installments have examined Mainstream and Premium Cruising. This week we’re diving into the cream of the crop: luxury cruising. Next week we will round out the series with River & Specialty Cruising.

Overview:
Is there nothing you hate more than packing and unpacking? No problem; let the butler do it. Feel like having dinner à deux this evening, gazing out at the sea from your private verandah? Simply summon a steward, and a 5 course gourmet meal will be brought to you, course by course.

There’s no doubt about it: luxury cruises are exceptional in every way, and offer a stylish, sophisticated level of pampering rarely replicated on land. Your fellow passengers will be a much smaller group than those carried on today’s contemporary megaships, certainly less than a thousand, and often not much more than one hundred. There will likely be almost as many crew as there are guests, and they will know you by name. Continue…

Michael Ignatieff v. Our idea of what Michael Ignatieff should be

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 10:55 AM - 26 Comments

Adam Radwanski adds several hundred more words to the debate over Michael Ignatieff’s relative existence.

Perhaps Canadians aren’t looking for a prime minister who’s going to try to find deeper meaning in federal policies. But if that’s the case, then Ignatieff’s pretty well out of luck. He’ll never be a terrific retail politician, in the mould of a Jean Chretien; even Stephen Harper, awkward though he can be, will always be better at delivering a simple message. If the Liberals were just looking for a guy who could deliver an effective sound bite, they could surely have found someone else.

Ignatieff’s promise has always been in his (potential) ability to rise above the fray, and to challenge us a little … adapting needn’t mean abandoning what impressed people about you in the first place.

Suck it up (II)

By Aaron Wherry - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 10:49 AM - 5 Comments

Eric, of the refreshingly quantitative threehundredeight.com, ventures an endorsement of democracy.

As a political observer, it’s true that I enjoy elections in part because I find them fascinating and exciting. But as a democrat, I strongly believe in the importance of participating in our democratic system and giving every election the attention and self-reflection it deserves. An election is not a burden, it is an opportunity to tell those who represent us what we think of them, and what we want them to do. Being able to participate in our democracy, to re-evaluate the decisions we’ve made in the past, is a privilege and exceedingly important.

How Kanye West Became Defined By Trey Parker

By Jaime Weinman - Monday, September 14, 2009 at 10:46 AM - 0 Comments

I didn’t even think the South Park “Fishsticks” episode was one of their best, but it was an example of Trey Parker’s continuing ability to write jokes that somehow stick with you, and that you just can’t help quoting. (Some shows lose this ability; The Simpsons, even in the Mike Scully years, produced tons of lines that entered the culture, like “Save me, Jeebus!”, but it hasn’t done a lot of that lately. Or if there have been a bunch of compulsively-quotable Simpsons bits from the last few years, I’ve missed most of them.) Last night, even before Kanye West’s “Beyonce should have won and everybody should care what I think” incident, the Kanye West episode of South Park – and the term “gay fish” — was being quoted literally every half-minute on Twitter, and frequently on blogs.

It’s not like the satirical point of the episode, or any South Park episode, was particularly deep or elightening. The point was that Kanye has no sense of humour and is really conceited; we knew that going in. But South Park hasn’t lasted this long because it’s some kind of brilliant intellectual take on the modern world (every so often, like after the movie, people will argue that, but it never lasts long, because Parker always winds up demonstrating that his understanding of issues never goes beyond what he reads on somebody’s website). It’s lasted because it has the ability to take a joke, or combine two or more jokes — Kanye’s humourlessness and the “fishsticks” joke — and come up with comedy bits that never get out of your head.

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