The quest for a youth pill

By Kate Fillion - Wednesday, July 21, 2010 at 9:00 AM - 0 Comments

Jodi Hilton/Getty Images

Award-winning journalist David Stipp has been writing about science and medicine since 1982, first at the Wall Street Journal and then Fortune magazine. In his new book, The Youth Pill: Scientists at the Brink of an Anti-Aging Revolution, he explains that slowing down aging is no longer a fantasy. After centuries of such anti-aging “remedies” as injecting minced dog testicles, scientists have recently discovered compounds that could dramatically extend human longevity and health.

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'This issue need not provoke an all-or-nothing allegiance'

By Aaron Wherry - Wednesday, July 21, 2010 at 8:49 AM - 0 Comments

In response to last week’s call, the National Citizens Coalition, Stephen Harper’s old haunt, sends along the following from NCC president Peter Coleman.

The long-form census is an antiquated and flawed system that needs to be reformed. While Minister Clement’s actions have stirred up debate, at least he is working to remedy many of the faults in the census system that have received much less fanfare. Great Britain is eliminating its census entirely, stemming from a desire to save money as well as the recognition that governments are able to collect data in more modern ways that avoid extreme redundancy.

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When Conservatives form coalitions

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 10:50 PM - 0 Comments

From John F. Burns, the Canadian-born dean of New York Times foreign correspondents: David Cameron Carves an Identity as Slasher of Government Big Spending.

“After 10 weeks in office… one of the most activist prime ministers in modern times, rivalling… even Margaret Thatcher… a wider effort to break the mold of big government… an economic course of almost savage austerity…an ambitious — and politically risky — bid to dismantle Britain’s sprawling bureaucracy…”

Even Liberals don’t like the Charest government

By Philippe Gohier - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 6:50 PM - 0 Comments

Martin and I spent the morning poring over polling data to sort out whether the vultures circling above Jean Charest are onto something. Here’s what we compiled using data from Léger Marketing’s monthly polls:

Liberal support:

June 2010: 30%
May 2010: 31%
April 2010: 30%
March 2010: 32%
Feb. 2010: 37%
Jan. 2010: 39%

PQ support:

June 2010: 41%
May 2010: 40%
April 2010: 40%
March 2010: 38%
Feb. 2010: 40%
Jan. 2010: 41%

ADQ support:

June 2010: 13%
May 2010: 12%
April 2010: 9%
March 2010: 10%
Feb. 2010: 9%
Jan. 2010: 6%

Government approval rating:

June 2010: 20%
May 2010: 20%
April 2010: 21%
March 2010: 24%
Feb. 2010: 33%
Jan. 2010: 35%

Government disapproval rating:

June 2010: 76%
May 2010: 76%
April 2010: 77%
March 2010: 70%
Feb. 2010: 62%
Jan. 2010: 58%

Charest as best candidate to be premier:

June 2010: 18%
May 2010: 18%
April 2010: 17%
March 2010: 20%
Feb. 2010: 28%
Jan. 2010: 27%

Marois as best candidate to be premier:

June 2010: 25%
May 2010: 26%
April 2010: 27%
March 2010: 24%
Feb. 2010: 24%
Jan. 2010: 26%

Public opinion of Charest (rating in December 2009):

Positive opinion: 24% (40%)
Negative opinion: 68% (48%)

Public opinion of Marois (rating in December 2009):

Positive opinion: 42% (42%)
Negative opinion: 44% (44%)

Here’s what stuck out to me:

(1) The drop in Liberal support has seemingly gone to the ADQ. And yet, I suspect this is a bit of a red herring. The ADQ’s finances are nothing short of a complete mess, as are its membership numbers: donations tumbled to $441,946 in 2009 from $2,078,427 in 2008, and membership fell to 6,120 in 2009 from 12,275 in 2008 and 25,887 in 2007. Liberals might be parking their votes with the ADQ, but Quebec’s right-wing hardly seems on the cusp of a breakthrough as a result.

(2) Charest’s government is now significantly less popular than his party. This is unusual because it means even Liberal voters think the Liberal government is on the wrong track. Furthermore, it suggests virtually no one outside the party supports the government.

(3) While Charest’s personal popularity numbers have jumped off a cliff—the gap between the number of people who like Charest and those who don’t has grown to 44 points from eight points in December 2009—Marois’s ratings are unchanged over the same time period. People have really grown to dislike Charest regardless of the alternative.

(4) Amazingly enough, these aren’t even the worst numbers Charest and the Liberals have posted since coming to power: in April 2005, the Liberals were running at 21% and 78% of people disapproved of the government.

(5) Unless Charest somehow manages to drive his government’s reputation even further into the ground, the Liberals may be bottoming out at 30% in the polls, which really isn’t so bad considering the staggering number of scandals they’re fighting off. If that’s true, with Mario Dumont gone from the ADQ and Marois entrenched as PQ leader, this might be as polarized as the electorate gets in Quebec these days.

Rights and Democracy: We now return to our regularly-scheduled delay

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 5:55 PM - 0 Comments

And now an update for followers of this blog’s relentless chronicling of the Deloitte audit at Rights and Democracy. (A considerable library of previous posts and print columns on the Montreal quasi-governmental agency can be found here.)

The first we heard of an outside audit at R&D was from a news release from the new board majority in February. That release promised the audit would take three weeks. Months later, in April, members of the board testified before the Commons foreign-affairs committee and couldn’t say when they would be able to produce the audit. In late May, Gérard Latulippe wrote to the committee and said the audit would be public sometime in June. (The odd thing is that the only people who now periodically demand the release of the audit are the critics of the same board majority who took it into their heads to commission the audit in the first place, and who, as of April, had spent more than $120,000 on it.)

Anyway. By half-past July I decided it was time to check in on the February audit that was due in March and had not been delivered in June. On July 13 I wrote to an R&D press officer:

My name is Paul Wells and I’m the Senior Columnist at Maclean’s magazine.

It’s now five months since M. Gauthier announced, on behalf of the R&D board, that the Deloitte audit would be released in three weeks. And it’s now mid-July; M. Latulippe told the Commons foreign-affairs committee, who like to receive reliable information, that the audit would be released “sometime in June.”

So, depending which account one trusted, the audit is now between two weeks and four months overdue.

Given the considerable public interest in this audit; the truly impressive sums of taxpayer money that had already been spent on it by April, with Heaven only knows how much more has been spent since then ; and M. Gauthier’s own words, when he announced the audit in February, that “Rights and Democrcy must be accountable for the way our funds are spent;” I have some specific questions which I would like you to pass along to M. Latulippe and/or the board, and reply with specific answers as soon as possible:

- when, precisely, will the Deloitte audit be made public?

- will it be released in its entirety, along with certification from Deloitte that no part of their work has been redacted?

- how can you explain the series of delays in this audit’s release?

- how much more money has been spent on this audit since April?

I look forward to an early reply. In the interest of transparency, I intend to publish this email to you, and any final reply from you or other representatives of Rights and Democracy, verbatim and in whole, either in Maclean’s or electronically on my weblog.

The R&D staffer wrote back immediately saying Gérard Latulippe, the organization’s new president, was traveling but would respond soon. And indeed today I received this reply from Latulippe, which you are welcome to discuss in the comments.

Dear Mr. Wells, Continue…

Music: It's like Bluesfest but with batons

By Paul Wells - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 5:40 PM - 0 Comments

A few blocks west of Parliament Hill in the nation’s capital is a mysterious site called LeBreton Flats, which Ottawa’s city fathers somehow forgot to develop. It is now nearly the last pristine piece of grassland in central Ottawa. Well, “pristine.” “Trampled” is more like it. Ottawa’s Bluesfest just wrapped up, with 350,000 people enjoying such much-loved blues bands as the Arcade Fire, Flaming Lips, Santana, Metric and Stars.

Now comes the quieter component of the summer’s activity. The National Arts Centre used to play host to a summertime Great Composers Festival inside Southam Hall at cut-rate prices, but even then ticket sales were soft. So in recent years they’ve preferred to put on free concerts at LeBreton Flats. Repertoire is resolutely crowd-pleasing, the evening sky is clear (knock on wood) and the price is right: all four concerts are free.

The NAC Orchestra carries the bulk of the workload, with concerts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday under guest conductor Edwin Outwater (his NAC debut; I wrote about him here). Friday they’ll play opera highlights, Saturday they’ll welcome tiny perfect singer Nikki Yanofsky, and on Sunday they’ll play Gershwin.

I’ll catch at least one of Outwater’s concerts, but I’ll also definitely be on hand Thursday when the Orchestre de la Francophonie canadienne performs under its founding music director, young conductor Jean-Philippe Tremblay.

Tremblay likes to work this summertime young-professional orchestra hard, simulating the pace of a real professional career for his young charges, and at the end of short, bustling summer tours he sets ambitious recording projects for them. Really ambitious. Last year’s orchestra recorded all nine Beethoven symphonies, to respectful reviews. Later this summer they’ll record Schumann’s four symphonies in concert. At LeBreton Flats they’ll play one of the Schumanns, plus a Beethoven piano concerto and a newly-commissioned piece from composer Andrew Staniland. It would be one of the concert highlights of the summer even if it happened under a roof.

Canadian soldier killed by IED in Afghanistan

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 5:34 PM - 0 Comments

An improvised explosive device has claimed another Canadian life in Afghanistan. Canadian soldier Sapper Brian Collier died Tuesday after a blast went off about 15 kilometres west of Kandahar City. The 24-year-old Collier, a member of the 1 Combat Engineer Regiment based at CFB Edmonton, was on his first deployment to the war-torn country. He is the first Canadian to die in Afghanistan in nearly one month and his death brings to 151 the total number of Canadian soldiers who have died as part of the Afghan mission since it began in 2002.

CBC News

In other news

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 4:25 PM - 0 Comments

A week into his summer tour, Michael Ignatieff is more or less on the record about the Cornwall border crossing, flooding in Manitoba, farm insurance, Louis Riel, firefighters, the census, the proposed Pickering airport, Afghanistan, Richard Fadden, foreign investment, affordable housing, contraband cigarettes, fighter jets, a Peterborough rail link, election timing, overseas travel, our politics and prison farms.

The unparalleled cat lover

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 3:28 PM - 0 Comments

Under Swedish law, a family can have a maximum of nine cats. But in a suburb of Stockholm, a 60-year-old woman and her family have been living with 191 cats. Stockholm’s social services were alerted to the case, and said the home was in an appalling condition, with cats everywhere. Many of the animals were sick or injured, and about 173 cats had to be put down, while the remaining 18 were sent to animal shelters. Though unusual, these cases are not unique: another Stockholm woman was discovered in 2007 living with 11 swans in a one-room apartment, and a man in central Sweden was found to be living with 21 dogs in a three-room flat.

Vancouver Sun

Romper stomper, bomper boo

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 3:02 PM - 0 Comments

Apparently if you write to Tony Clement to express your support for his decision to change the census, he will personally thank you on Twitter. So far he sees Leo and Julius and Adam and Patrick.

Middle-aged anarchists

By Nicholas Köhler and Stephanie Findlay - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 3:00 PM - 0 Comments

JAYME POISSON/Toronto Star

Back in the summer of 2002, a quiet, middle-aged Ottawa public servant named Roger Clément began offering the use of his shower to a group of young squatters occupying a derelict Tudor home not far from his modest flat in the city’s occasionally gritty Centretown district. To Marc Sauriol, who owned Clément’s building, the gesture was yet another aggravating display of his tenant’s anti-establishment bent. “I always thought it was ironic that he worked for the federal government,” says Sauriol, who asked Clément to stop inviting squatters in to use the water. “He was always protesting it.”

Those squatters, half Clément’s age, had set up camp at 246 Gilmour St. as part of a protest timed to coincide with the G8 summit in Kananaskis, Alta. The occupation, shut down by police a week later, was designed to highlight what the group argued was a lack of affordable housing in Ottawa, and it targeted a building that had sat vacant for seven years—hence the group’s name: the Seven-Year Squatters. Over the course of that week, 20 or so protesters unfurled banners from the Tudor home’s roof, planted a garden and reinforced the building’s sagging floors. Later, in the raid that evicted them, police broke a back window and hurled canisters of tear gas into the building.

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Ontario halts eco fees program

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 2:30 PM - 0 Comments

Environment Minister for Ontario John Gerretsen will announce today that the government is halting the program that would add “eco fees” to thousands of household products, such as aerosols, cleaning products and other potentially toxic items. The program has faced growing backlash from retailers and consumer groups who say the rollout has been unclear and confusing, and that it lacked transparency and accountability. “It’s confusing to our customers,” said Mike Arnett, the president of Canadian Tire Retail. “[Customers] have questions we’re just not able to answer.” So just under three weeks after their introduction, the eco fees will be shelved.

Globe and Mail

American tourist settles with Qantas over screaming child

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 2:27 PM - 0 Comments

An American tourist was on her dream holiday down-under when a three-year-old boy on a flight from Alice Springs to Darwin screamed in her face. Jean Barnard, 67, says that her eardrum was ruptured resulting in loss
of hearing and it was the flight crew’s fault for not stopping the child. Barnard’s lawyer accused Qantas Airlines of “failure to take all the necessary precautions to prevent the accident.” Lawyers for Qantas argued that there was no way flight attendants could predict the child was about to scream and therefore no way for them to prevent the injury. The parties came to a confidential settlement this week.

New Zealand Herald

Scenes from a 70-year career

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 1:25 PM - 0 Comments

Over her 70-year career, Canadian artist Doris McCarthy produced some 7,000 works. Landscape—from the Alberta badlands to the West Irish coastline—was her constant subject. Her rendering of it, however, evolved with the years—her representational studies of the ’30s, ’40s and ’50s that reflected her studies with Group of Seven painters gave way to experimentation with hard-edge abstractions of the ’60s and early ’70s. All paved way to the ambitious large-scale paintings that she embarked on after her 1972 retirement from teaching. Her final canvas, Pink Iceberg with Floes, was completed in 2005 at age 95.

Seeking logic

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 1:18 PM - 0 Comments

Mike Moffatt poses one logical argument: If the part of the problem is the threat of prison, why is the short form still mandatory?

Tasha Kheiridden arrives at another: If the problem is specific queries, why not simply eliminate those questions?

Abbotsford, B.C. is Canada’s murder capital, again

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 1:11 PM - 54 Comments

Abbotsford, B.C. had renewed its title as the murder capital of Canada, recording more homicides per capita than any other city in 2009. The Abbotsford-Mission CMA, with a population of 160,000, recorded nine murders in 2009. Most other cities in western Canada—including Regina, Saskatoon, Winnipeg and Edmonton—had much higher counts of violent crimes, but fewer murders per capita. Abbotsford’s high murder rate is likely due to its popularity with gang leaders who have been engaged in a murderous turf war in recent years, The Province reports. Regina had the highest level of violent crime overall, with Saskatoon and Winnipeg trailing not far behind. Guelph, Ont. had the lowest level of violent crime, followed by Québec City and Toronto. According to the index, Canada’s overall crime rate has fallen 4% from 2008.

Statistics Canada
The Province

Did Ottawa give a grant to edit pornographic films?

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 1:02 PM - 0 Comments

Did the Conservative government give a grant to a Montreal film company to train people to edit pornographic films? The Globe and Mail’s Ottawa Notebook is questioning whether the same government that tried a year ago to prevent money from flowing to movies they considered obscene is actually offering such a grant, as ads on Kijiji and another classified website claim. The ads call for a “Final Cut Video Editor” who is under 30 years old, is a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, has a university degree and graduated within the previous semester. Why? The ad explains, “The Canadian Government is sponsoring this job position.” The ad also says: “This job is in the Adult industry. If you are not comfortable with this, please do not apply.” When the Globe e-mailed the address listed in the ad, the respondent refused to identify the name of the company or the grant program from which they received funding. After getting the runaround from the Human Resources and Skills Development and Heritage departments, the Globe tracked down the Montreal address and found a company called Hot G Vibe that sells adult sex equipment online. Hot G Vibe said they don’t make pornographic films, but they do make “exclusive videos” to demonstrate the use of their products. As of now, there is no actual proof that a government grant was awarded. Although both Heritage and HRSDC disclose the names of grant recipients, the most recent disclosures are for the period ending on April 30, so the Globe will have to wait for the next round.

Globe and Mail

The cult of Doris

By Anne Kingston - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 1:00 PM - 0 Comments

TANNIS TOOHEY/CP (Click for image gallery)

Doris McCarthy turned 100 last week—an achievement the artist’s many friends attribute to the same steely determination that has animated her life. Over those 10 decades, McCarthy has touched thousands as a painter, teacher and mentor of generations of artists. Her greatest life lessons, however, have been through intrepid example: in showing how life can be lived with verve throughout a lifetime and how creativity ripens with age.

Known for her insightful, quick wit and no-nonsense ways, McCarthy is very frail now, confined to bed at Fool’s Paradise, the home she built on five hectares overlooking Lake Ontario near the Scarborough bluffs. “It’s a miracle she made it to 100,” says artist Wendy Wacko, McCarthy’s former student and the producer of the 1983 docudrama Doris McCarthy: Heart of a Painter. “I swear she was holding on just for that.”

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The plight of picky eating adults

By Julia Belluz - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 12:59 PM - 0 Comments

Rhonda West’s picky eating began during breastfeeding. “I couldn’t have my mother’s milk, so they put me on cow’s milk, but I was allergic, so then they put me on soy,” she says. “When it came time for solid foods, I didn’t want any part of that.” In fact, most foods made her want to gag.

Now, 41 years later, West is a picky eating adult. She survives on toast, waffles, pancakes, simply cooked meats, and French fries. (Oddly, almost all adult “selective eaters” include French fries in their limited food repertoire). “I don’t like foods that are mixed-up together,” says West, who lives in the Washington, D.C.-area and is currently looking for work. No vegetables, few fruits, and absolutely nothing that’s too soft or squishy. “I equate eating pasta with eating a plate of worms.”

For picky eaters, most meals are unbearable, and nearly all foods make them nauseous. Failed relationships, lost work opportunities, and anxiety caused by the very thing others derive great pleasure from.

While childhood picky eating is commonly recognized, little has been done to understand people like West—until now. In July, Duke University and the University of Pittsburgh launched the first national public registry of picky eaters, known as the Finicky Eating in Adults study (eatingdisorders.mc.duke.edu). People can log in and complete a survey about their relationship with food and eating habits. It’s still early stages, but this study is designed to help researchers better understand “avoidant, restrictive food intake disorder”—which is currently under consideration as an officially recognized eating disorder, like bulimia or anorexia.

Marsha D. Marcus, chief of the Behavioral Medicine Program at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and one of the lead investigators on the study says, picky eaters tend to fall into one of three groups: those with taste issues, those who have never had a real interest in food, and a third group who have had traumatic or aversive experiences with food.

Marcus says it’s too early to tell how many suffer from this disorder, but she’s heard of cases where one’s eating restrictions are so acute they survive by a feeding tube. Others avoid vacations, business meetings, dinner parties, and weddings—any event that brings them into contact with unknown food. Indeed, one American sufferer said that Thanksgiving is known among picky eaters as “Black Thursday”.

However, Marcus is careful to distinguish adult picky eaters from people with the food quirks most everybody lives with. “We’re not trying to pathologize people’s preferences,” she says. “We’re looking for people whose food restrictions are a source of impairment or distress or have led to a health problem.”

One interesting theory the researchers will explore is whether picky eating is genetic. “There might be a group of people who have different ways of tasting, so the food that tastes good to you or me tastes awful to them,” says Marcus.

According to picky eater West, this is a distinct possibility. “Picky eating is nature not nurture,” West says. “People are light, sound, smell, touch, skin sensitive—why not taste?” In fact, West insists that if she could change her palate, she would. “It’s high anxiety when you’re going to meet new people, especially for a job, and you have to explain why you’re not eating anything on the menu,” she says. When she summons the courage to go to a restaurant, she usually requests plain grilled chicken.

T.J. Haselden, a computer salesman living in Montreal, refers to himself as “the pickiest eater in Canada.” Of the disorder, the part-time comedian says, “I have learned to laugh about it, but the truth is that I’m really getting fed-up.”

Haselden eats only six foods: hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken, turkey, bacon, and French fries. He gags at the thought of tasting anything new, and also claims that this disorder began in childhood. “Everybody tries to say it’s my mom’s fault for not treating it the right way. I always say the only thing I can blame my mom for is that she was too accommodating.”

When he was a teenager living with roommates, Haselden would stay away from the kitchen. When friends ordered pizza, he’d tell them he was allergic to tomatoes to avoid confrontation. Now 30, he lives with his wife, Chantal, and has realized that his picky eating infringes on her life, too. “She can’t explore her taste buds the way she would want to.” For example, when she eats something as simple as pasta—a dish he abhors—the two have to sit at opposite ends of the dinner table. “I can smell the pasta so much I feel like I could taste it and it makes me want to gag.”

Haselden is undertaking a film project in the hopes that he can broaden his palate. He’ll document a 30-day journey of new tastes, attempting to try every food he’s been afraid of. “I want to use the power of the camera to overcome my fear and make people laugh.”

But can he and other picky eaters change their ways? Nancy Zucker, the director of the Duke Center for Eating Disorders who is leading the study with Marcus, says she hopes so. Her goal is to come up with effective coping strategies and treatment, and to distinguish selective eating from other eating disorders.

“People have a tough time having empathy for those who taste things differently,” she observes. “Even more profoundly, imagine you had an experience and you tasted something and thought, ‘this tastes like cardboard’ and people were mad at you for that, saying that you’re not experiencing what you’re experiencing. That’s what these people go through everyday. It’s time we explore and recognize what’s going on here.”

The great besmirchment

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 11:31 AM - 0 Comments

In an op-ed for the Sun, Tony Clement manages to twice cite the fact that the long form census includes a question about the number of bedrooms in one’s dwelling. It’s not clear if this is more or less an intrusion than the 1871 census (which asked if you could read or write) or the 1881 census (which asked if anyone in the dwelling was blind, deaf or of unsound mind), but here is StatsCan’s official explanation for its questions on housing arrangements.

Questions H1 to H8 provide information for government planners and private developers to develop housing communities and projects. This information contributes to many programs administered under the National Housing Act and the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation Act.

Information on the number of rooms and bedrooms in homes and on housing costs is combined with data on the number of persons in households to assess the economic situation of families in different regions. Provincial and municipal governments use this information to measure levels of crowding within households and to develop appropriate housing programs.

Information on the age of dwellings and their need for repairs is used by municipalities to develop neighbourhood improvement programs.

Stephen Gordon offers a simple rejoinder.

Small world

By Aaron Wherry - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 11:13 AM - 0 Comments

Here, from last week’s edition of the magazine, is a profile of Ray Novak, the Prime Minister’s largely unknown, but decidedly important, right-hand man.

A decade ago, Ray was a fastidious young student politician at Western. At approximately the same time, I was becoming an overly serious young student journalist for The Gazette. I would have, if memory serves, peripherally covered his campaign for student council president. The Gazette editorial board—of which I was a member—endorsed his campaign (overly earnest headline: ‘Winds of change’), our considerable influence apparently just enough to help Ray to a second-place finish.

Of those who would covered that campaign closely, one (John Intini) is a senior editor at this magazine, another (Nina Chiarelli) is now director of communications for Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl. Here is the story from election night—Ray is pictured at top, hiding his disappointment behind a garish shirt. The student to his left, Paul Hong, is now director of policy for Lawrence Cannon.

Spain to consider burqa ban

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 11:06 AM - 0 Comments

Following in the footsteps of France and Belgium, Spain could become the third European country to ban women from wearing the burqa in public. Europe’s growing anti-burqa sentiment has already reached Catalonia and Andalusia, where Spain’s Muslim population is concentrated. Not all head-covering veils would be included in the ban because they form part of traditional Spanish dress, with women often covering their heads with a “mantilla” during religious festivals. A debate on the possible ban is scheduled to start on Tuesday in Spain’s Congress. A vote by Spain’s lower house is planned following the debate but may be delayed until after the month-long summer recess, which begins next week. Spain has around 1 million Muslim immigrants among its 47 million population, but the public sightings of the burqa are scarce, the Telegraph reports.

Telegraph

Man arrested at Mexico City airport with 18 monkeys under his shirt

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 11:01 AM - 0 Comments

A man traveling from Lima, Peru to Mexico City was found with 18 monkeys hidden under his clothes during an airport search. Investigators grew suspicious after they noticed a bulge under Roberto Sol Cabrera Zavaleta’ shirt and he became “markedly nervous” when asked what he was transporting, Mexico’s Pubic Safety Department said. Two of the 18 monkeys he was carrying on him were dead, and Cabrera has been detained as authorities continue their investigation, a statement from the department said. Cabrera told authorities he purchased the “pets” for $30 each, and moved them from a suitcase to under his shirt so the animals would not be harmed by X-ray machines at the airport. Titi monkeys are protected endangered species requiring a permit for possession, police said.

CNN

Oakland, Calif. to decide on marijuana “factory farms”

By macleans.ca - Tuesday, July 20, 2010 at 10:56 AM - 0 Comments

City Council in Oakland, Calif. will decide today on a proposal by local entrepreneurs to build four large marijuana farms. Proponents argue that current operations are a safety hazard because they’re not inspected by fire officials. They also say current grow-ops cause violent crime that could be avoided with regulated operations. Under the proposal, the City of Oakland would be paid a fee in the first year to cover the cost of inspecting operations for safety. The businesses would also be expected to pay taxes. One of the potential growers has accounted for $1.5-million in taxes for the first year. At least one councillor say the goal of the bylaw is financial. “I do want to encourage a few large growers because I think that’s where the industry’s going,” councillor Jean Quan told the LA Times. While the Obama administration’s policy is to allow states to decide on marijuana what is legal and what’s not, it’s unclear whether the federal Drug Enforcement Agency would raid the operations.

LA Times