Google Earth search leads to discovery of Kamil crater
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 - 0 Comments
Meteorite impact site one of the best-preserved in the world
Some time in the last several thousand years, a rare metallic meteorite smashed into Earth near the borders of what is now known as Egypt, Sudan and Libya. The 10-tonne chunk of iron likely generated a fireball and plume that could be seen over 10,00-km away. “The crater is certainly less than 10,000 years old — and potentially less than a few thousand,” said a scientist researching the crater. “The impact may even have been observed by humans.” The well-preserved site was discovered by mineralogist Vincenzo De Michele, who found the crater on Google Earth in 2008. Since then, his team has organized an expedition to the crater which is deep in the Egyptian desert, where they collected data that can be used, among other things, for risk assessment of small asteroids that approach Earth.
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Opening weekend: Wall Street 2, Never Let Me Go
By Brian D. Johnson - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 12:16 PM - 0 Comments
You can see Carey Mulligan, the Oscar-nominated star of An Education, in two movies opening this weekend: she has a thankless supporting role opposite Shia LaBeouf in Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps and lead role in Never Let Me Go. They’re wildly different, and there’s not question which is the better film. Oliver Stone’s Wall Street sequel is a messy, bombastic spectacle—a morality tale as midway ride. Its chief asset is Michael Douglas, whose remarkably shaded performance somehow survives Stone’s sledgehammer direction. Based on the Kazuo Ishiguro novel, Never Let Me Go is a sublimely measured, achingly beautiful drama, anchored by superb performances from Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Andrew Garfield.
I saw Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps last May in Cannes. The morning after the film’s premiere I joined Stone, Douglas and Mulligan in round-table interviews in a windblown cabana at the opulent Hotel Du Cap. Here’s my video of the gang, who were clearly in morning-after mode, especially Stone:
And here are more candid clips of Carey Mulligan, who seems unsure about the movie after seeing it the night before in Cannes:
There’s a lot of of talented actors onscreen in Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, but they’re defeated by Stone’s heavy-handed script. Aside from Douglas’ shape-shifting reinvention of Gordon Gekko, which is almost worth the price of admission, the other characters are steamrolled into stereotypes, from LaBeouf’s ambitious trader to the Gekko 2.0 tycoon played by Josh Brolin. The brilliant Frank Langella has an incandescent but short-lived role as the old-school mentor to the young trader played by Shia LaBoeuf. Mulligan, cast as Gekko’s estranged daughter—and LaBoeuf’s girfriend—is wasted. That said, even though Stone rivals Michael Moore as a propagandist, and overloads his dialogue with so much aphoristic messaging that it ceases to be credible, he’s a compelling visual showman. And there’s a curious paradox here: Stone’s movie is a putative critique of capitalism gone mad, yet it revels in the opulence of the world it’s trying to tear down. Like a bloodthirsty anti-war movie. That said, there’s some fun to be had in this over-ripe melodrama, and no matter what you think of Money Never Sleeps, at least it’s not dull.
Never Let Me Go
(from left) Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Andrew Garfield in 'Never Let Me Go'
Here is an exotic hybrid. We’ve got Alex Garland, the writer of The Beach, adapting a celebrated dystopian novel by Kazuo Ishiguro. I haven’t read the Ishiguro novel, but those who have are a bit shocked to see that the story’s horrifying premise, which remains mysterious for much of the book, is explained at the end of the first act. I suppose that makes it fair game for plot summaries, but I’m not going to do that here, because I appreciated the jolt of revelation that came early in the film. Let’s just say that the story is set in England, and concerns a love triangle among three former school mates (Carey Mulligan, Keira Knightley and Andrew Garfield) who acquiesce to a grim and preordained destiny. The three leads are superb. Mulligan’s performance doesn’t come as a surprise, but who knew that behind the Pirates of the Caribbean damsel lurked such an intriguing actress. (David Cronenberg, who cast Knightley in his Freud/Jung biopic, A Dangerous Method, has been raving about her, and here you can see why.) As for Garfield, he’s the next Spider-Man, but between his performance in this film and in The Social Network (opening next week), he may be overqualified for franchise work. Never Let Me Go is science fiction that plays as pure realism, with no techno gimmickry, and barely any explanation of the premise. Director Mark Romanek conjures visions of mortality via elegiac images of England’s cozy landscape and haunting architecture. He lets the film unfold as a delicate mood piece, sustaining a tone of aching beauty with remarkable control. This is a film you don’t watch so much as inhabit.
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The gun registry, the vote, the after-party
By Mitchel Raphael - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 11:35 AM - 0 Comments
This week saw the big showdown over the long-gun registry. MPs voted 153-151 in favour of a Liberal motion that kills Conservative MP Candice Hoeppner’s private member’s bill to get rid of the registry. Just before the vote, a small group of young protesters stood in front of the Peace Tower demanding the registry be scrapped.
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Bruce Hyer after the vote. He was one of the few NDP MPs who voted to keep the registry.
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The Liberals held a victory party at D’Arcy McGee’s pub after the vote.
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Radio wars in Afghanistan
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 11:21 AM - 0 Comments
Broadcasts seen as a good vehicle to win hearts and minds
In the Panjwai district of Afghanistan, the Voice of Panjwai is one of five local radio stations broadcasting from Canadian military bases throughout Kandahar province as part of NATO’s psychological war against the Taliban insurgency. “Recently we started doing music requests,” says Lt. Aaron Lesarge, the soldier who acts as the station manager. Given high rates of illiteracy in the country, as well as the limited access to electricity, many Afghans rely on radio for their information. NATO forces have therefore begun using the radio to reach people. These shows are modeled after the radio propaganda of recent wars. Tokyo Rose, for instance, was the name GIs gave to Japanese women who broadcast propaganda aimed at bringing down the Allied Forces in the Pacific during World War II, and in Europe, William Joyce, or Lord Haw-Haw, broadcast Nazi threats and misinformation over the airwaves.
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Police urge U.S. citizens to turn in prescriptions
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 11:16 AM - 0 Comments
U.S. effort aims to reclaim pill bottles in effort to curb addiction
On Saturday, police at over 4,000 locations across the U.S. will oversee a prescription drug take-back program aimed at getting citizens to surrender old bottles of pills like Vicodin, Percocet and Xanax. Opiate painkillers and other prescription drugs are driving addiction and crime at rates never seen, as addicts raid medicine cabinets of the sick and elderly, the New York Times reports. Saturday’s effort will be coordinated by the Drug Enforcement Administration, and is the first of its kind with a national scope. In 17 U.S. states, death from prescription and illegal drugs now exceed those from motor vehicle accidents, and opiate painkillers are mostly to blame. The number of people seeking treatment for painkiller addiction rose 400 per cent from 1998 to 2008, the daily reports.
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One in five gay, bisexual men in major US cities have HIV: report
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 11:14 AM - 0 Comments
And nearly half of them don’t even know it
US health officials are reporting that nearly one in five gay and bisexual men in 21 major cities in the U.S. are infected with HIV—and nearly half of them are unaware of it. Young men and especially young black men are least likely to know they’re infected, a study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found. The study looked at 8,153 men who have sex with men in 21 U.S. cities, and found that 19 per cent of gay men are infected with HIV. Meanwhile, 28 per cent of gay black men are infected with HIV, compared with 18 per cent of Hispanic men and 16 per cent of white men. Black men were also least likely to be aware of their infection in the study: 59 per cent did not know they were infected, compared to 46 per cent of Hispanic men and 26 per cent of white men. The youngest men were especially at risk of being unaware.
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UN warns of looming food crisis
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:39 AM - 0 Comments
Officials meet in Rome to discuss emergency plans
The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization is meeting in Rome today to discuss a major new food crisis caused by environmental disasters and market speculation. The meeting was called last month after a heat wave and wildfires in Russia led to an export ban on wheat, which sparked food riots in Mozambique. Aside from environmental disasters, food pries are also rising because of the pension and hedge funds, sovereign wealth funds, and large banks who speculate on commodity markets. Olivier De Schutter, the UN’s special rapporteur on food, blamed price and the volatility of food commodities on the emergence of a “speculative bubble,” which he traces back to the early 2000s. Food prices are currently on the rise in India and Nepal, as well as in Latin America and China. The emergency meeting in Rome is seen as a warning that there may be another food crisis looming.
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Sir Sandford Fleming vs. Sir Frederick Banting and Charles Best
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:18 AM - 0 Comments
Where does insulin rank as an invention compared to standard time?
Sir Sandford Fleming
Why he’s famous: Fleming got everyone working off the same clock with the introduction of standard time.
Why he deserves to win: Like Bell, Fleming was hardly a one-trick pony. After emigrating to Canada from Scotland at the age of 18, Fleming established the Royal Canadian Institute in 1849 and helped design Canada’s very first postage stamp in 1851. He was also a key supporter of the construction of a cross-Canada railway. But while his role in linking Canada’s coasts is impressive, putting the entire world in sync with standard time is even more so.
Sir Frederick Banting and Charles Best
Why they’re famous: Along with Best, a medical student he’d hired, Banting isolated insulin as the hormone which regulates the body’s blood sugar levels.
Why they deserve to win: After reading a paper that suggested diabetes may be caused by a lack of a hormone secreted by islets in the back of the pancreas, he devised a way to isolate the islets by tying off most of the pancreas with ligatures. In 1921, Frederick Banting hired Charles Best and the two removed a dog’s pancreas, which caused blood sugar levels to rise (mimicking diabetics) before injecting the islets back into the dog. The animal lived for several more months, proving they had isolated the blood-sugar regulating hormone insulin. By 1922, the pair were bringing comatose diabetics in Toronto back to life. Diabetics worldwide have lived more normal lives ever since.
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Alexander Graham Bell vs. Sir Frederick Banting and Charles Best
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:05 AM - 0 Comments
In a battle of the innovation heavyweights, insulin goes up against the phone
Alexander Graham Bell
Why he’s famous: He invented the telephone. Duh.
Why he deserves to win: He also invented the metal detector, created an alphabet for the Mohawk language, contributed significantly to aeronautics, and was a founder of the National Geographic Society. A natural inventor, Bell created his first invention at age 12, a de-husking machine that he used to make his part-time flour-milling job easier. But really, what would the last 135 years be like without phones?
Sir Frederick Banting and Charles Best
Why they’re famous: Along with Best, a medical student he’d hired, Banting isolated insulin as the hormone which regulates the body’s blood sugar levels.
Why they deserve to win: After reading a paper that suggested diabetes may be caused by a lack of a hormone secreted by islets in the back of the pancreas, he devised a way to isolate the islets by tying off most of the pancreas with ligatures. In 1921, Frederick Banting hired Charles Best and the two removed a dog’s pancreas, which caused blood sugar levels to rise (mimicking diabetics) before injecting the islets back into the dog. The animal lived for several more months, proving they had isolated the blood-sugar regulating hormone insulin. By 1922, the pair were bringing comatose diabetics in Toronto back to life. Diabetics worldwide have lived more normal lives ever since.
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James Naismith vs. Mike Lazaridis
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:05 AM - 0 Comments
If you could have just one, which would it be—basketball or your BlackBerry?
James Naismith
Why he’s famous: You have heard of basketball, right?
Why he deserves to win: Naismith is widely credited as the inventor of basketball, which he reportedly developed while working as a phys-ed instructor at his local YMCA in Massachusetts. Naismith needed a sport to keep his otherwise unruly charges happy, but didn’t want to indulge their more boisterous tendencies. Soon enough, inspired by a childhood game bearing the unfortunate name of “duck-on-a-rock,” Naismith had them tossing a soccer ball at a peach basket placed at the top of a 10-foot pole. So we have Naismith to thank not just for giving non-hockey players something to do in the winter, but also for the social relevance of Shaq’s Twitter feed.
Mike Lazaridis
Why he’s famous: Putting e-mail on people’s cell phones via the BlackBerry.
Why he deserves to win: Along with co-CEO Jim Balsillie, Lazaridis has built Research in Motion into a tech powerhouse, putting Canada on the map in the wireless device business. Lazaridis has registered more than 30 patents and won dozens of awards for his innovations in software and wireless communications technology, including a 1999 Academy Award for RIM’s role in inventing a digital-barcode reader for film editing.
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Guy Laliberté vs. Norman Bethune
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:05 AM - 0 Comments
Sure, healing battle wounds is a noble pursuit. But is it as entertaining as Cirque du Soleil?
Guy Laliberté
Why he’s famous: For making the circus cool with the Cirque du Soleil
Why he deserves to win: Laliberté didn’t just take out the goofy animal stunts from the circus when he decided to class up the tent a little. He brought in a focus on character-driven narrative to replace them, effectively hybridizing the circus with theatre and opera. Thanks to him, acrobats no longer have to fear being mauled by a lion or bear while on the job.
Norman Bethune
Why he’s famous: Bethune revolutionized battlefield medicine.
Why he deserves to win: During the Spanish Civil War in 1936, Bethune invented a mobile blood transfusion service which could collect blood from donors and deliver it wherever it was needed. His “mobile blood bank” is considered the greatest medical innovation from the war. Later, Bethune would take his battlefield medicine expertise to China, where he became the Red Army’s Medical Chief and taught his techniques to new doctors and nurses. Think of Bethune as the Canadian Florence Nightingale.
Next: Alexander Graham Bell vs. Sir Frederick Banting and Charles Best
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Marshall McLuhan vs. Peter Robertson
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:05 AM - 0 Comments
If the “medium is the message,” Robertson’s message was clear: life’s too short to deal with stripped screws
Marshall McLuhan
Why he’s famous: Most of all, for his famously misunderstood phrase, “the medium is the message.”
Why he deserves to win: As the the father of modern mass media theory and an early philosopher of the electronic age, McLuhan changed the way people relate to information. Best known for coining the expressions “global village” and “the medium is the message” (which meant that the way we acquire information shapes us more than the information itself), his two major books—The Gutenberg Galaxy and Understanding Media—still have a cult following. Though he died before the advent of the Internet, McLuhan seemed to see it coming: he theorized electronic media was creating a global village by exposing people to events on the opposite side of the world which would render books obsolete. Ask Barnes and Noble if he was right.
Peter Robertson
Why he’s famous: He’s the inventor of the Robertson screwdriver—you know, the square-shaped one in your toolbox.
Why he deserves to win: Before Robertson’s invention in 1908, we were stuck with the slip-prone flat bladed driver and slotted-head screw, a combo notorious for causing injuries. Later, when the cross-shaped Phillips screw and driver were invented, Consumer Reports magazine declared the Robertson superior because Phillips’ screws are easily stripped and degrade with wear. As writer Witold Rybcynski put it, “no matter how old, rusty, or painted over, a Robertson screw can always be unscrewed. [It’s] the biggest little invention of the 20th century.”
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The beginning of the end of frosh week
By Julia Belluz and Nicholas Kohler - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:00 AM - 0 Comments
The tragic death of a Queen’s student has renewed calls for a crackdown that is already well under way
Photograph Andrew Tolson/ Pawel Dwulit/CP Images
Natasha Zapanta, a cheery first-year Queen’s University business student in a perfectly manicured first-week outfit, won’t be telling her grandchildren about any Old School-worthy hijinks. Frosh week for this 17-year-old involved scavenger hunts, a video dance party and “Commerce Cares”—random acts of kindness visited upon unsuspecting fellow students by commerce freshmen. “There was nighttime partying,” she admits, “but we just stayed in the residence hall.” Most of her friends are also 17, below Ontario’s legal drinking age and, while alcohol is readily available, they’ve been warned not to indulge.
For biochemistry major Connor Forbes, the week was so low-key it threatened to dampen that famous Queen’s school spirit altogether. The gloom extended even to the engineering faculty, where students were this year banned from the school’s ancient move-in day tradition, in which engineers paint themselves purple and taunt incoming freshmen. Engineering society president Victoria Pleavin, citing complaints, sent an email to all engineering students warning them that anyone caught engaged in the practice would be escorted off campus. “Move-in day was really an introduction to the fun of the school and gave you a sense of community,” says Forbes. “The event is gone and we don’t know if it’s coming back. They took it away.”
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Can 'Fox News North' win its next battle?
By John Geddes - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 10:00 AM - 0 Comments
Sun TV’s Canadian-content promise might be its best selling feature
NATHAN DENETTE/CP
When Kory Teneycke announced, back in mid-June, that he would be heading up the proposed Sun TV network, he promised not to be boring. If Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s former communications director meant he wouldn’t stay around long enough to grow stale, he was more than true to his word. Teneycke bowed out last week after just three months, saying his involvement contributed to “vicious and vitriolic” controversy over the proposed news-and-talk channel.
He hasn’t answered questions about his surprisingly fast exit, so precisely what aspect of the heated debate over the project drove him to quit so quickly isn’t yet clear. (The day before his announcement, a left-leaning activist organization called Avaaz said it had asked police to investigate who put fake names on its anti-Sun-TV online petition “Stop Fox News North.” Teneycke had admitted to some inside knowledge of who messed with the petition by signing up under the names of Canadian media personalities and fictional characters like Sesame Street’s Snuffleupagus.) Whatever his exact reason, Quebecor Media Inc. apparently doesn’t see any need to distance its Sun TV project from political players. Pierre Karl Pelédeau, the company’s conservative-minded president and chief executive, replaced Teneycke with Luc Lavoie—former prime minister Brian Mulroney’s long-time spokesman. Unlike Teneycke, Lavoie was a TV journalist before he was a partisan spinner, and he’s also a veteran Quebecor executive. Still, Lavoie’s media credentials from outside politics can’t erase the impression that the Sun TV venture is closely connected to insider Conservative circles.
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History is made
By Aaron Wherry - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 9:54 AM - 0 Comments
Liberal Carolyn Bennett becomes the first member of parliament in the history of our democracy to apologize for something she retweeted.
In the future I promise to be more careful and to make clearer my support or lack of support for the opinions being put forth in the ‘link’. Mea culpa. It has also been pointed out to me that I should be wary of certain publications, authors as an initial screen. I will do better in the future. I learn a great deal using social media tools… The information, the frank feedback are all part of a learning culture and a ‘democracy between elections’ in which citizens and their elected representatives can interact in real time. I take this responsibility seriously. I apologize for today’s error.
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Hey look: Majority vs. majority
By Paul Wells - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 9:53 AM - 0 Comments
I don’t know, when the Prime Minister of Canada tells everyone a hundred times how he anticipates the outcome of the next election, I just can’t resist writing it down. Kinda nutty. Anyway, here’s my column from the print edition, in which I parse Jim Flaherty’s barn-burner speech and some recent Harper remarks to re-ignite — yet again! — the old Conservatives-vs.-coalition debate.
But here’s the fun part: it’s a debate among opponents of the Harper government, who just can’t decide whether a coalition is a silly idea that Harper keeps raising as a red herring, or whether it’s a perfectly natural alignment of Parliamentary forces that nobody should dare criticize. Which cognitive dissonance is, as I admit I’ve written on several occasions, at least as much his opponents’ problem as Stephen Harper’s.
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Harper's election plan, in plain view
By Paul Wells - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 9:00 AM - 0 Comments
WELLS: Harper relishes the thought that the coalition crisis of 2008 will be repeated
Sean Kilpatrick/CP
In April 2007, the Harper government, 15 months into its first mandate, opened a 17,000-sq.-foot campaign headquarters far outside downtown Ottawa. They invited TV crews in and gave reporters a tour.
Of course Liberals took the move as evidence of a plan for an election. “They fully intend to defeat themselves at the first opportune moment,” Liberal MP David McGuinty said. “It’s clear they don’t want to do the job.” There was a lot of that talk going around. I collected money bets from senior colleagues and veteran Liberal strategists who were sure an election was weeks away.
But Stephen Harper often talks about an election to delay an election, not to hurry one along. Whatever his strengths, the Conservative leader is no mind-reader. So when he’s not entirely sure the opposition intends to leave him alone to govern, he assumes they need to be scared away from election plans.
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TIFF Newsmakers
By macleans.ca - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 8:00 AM - 0 Comments
Hilary Swank cleans up for the cameras, the Boss is still working, and the FUBAR guys have some advice for the PM
Sarah Silverman’s amazing week
She was at TIFF promoting Peep Show, but Sarah Silverman has been in town shooting Take This Waltz with director Sarah Polley. “Sarah is so supportive,” she told Maclean’s. “After my first take on my first day, she came up to me and said, ‘That was amazing!’ Then someone brought her a cup of coffee and she said, ‘This coffee is amazing!’ ” As for her Waltz co-star, Seth Rogen, she says, “He’s the least neurotic Jew I’ve ever met.”
Hosers to Harper: live a little
Just when you thought the hoser comedy had reached the end of its evolutionary rope, along comes FUBAR 2. David Lawrence and Paul Spence showed up in character to their red-carpet premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival—as Alberta metalheads Terry and Dean. Michael Dowse’s sequel to his 2002 mockumentary cult hit boasts a fatter budget and a sweeter story—an oil sands bromance that takes the moronic duo to the pipelines and peeler bars of Fort McMurray. Environmental rape and testicular cancer has never been funnier. Talking to Maclean’s, Dean (Spence) said Laureen Harper was an old hunting buddy of his father’s, prompting Terry (Lawrence) to suggest the Prime Minister should “make things cheaper, like 1984,” and “party with Laureen a little more.” -
NFL Picks Week 3: The Bills are who we thought they were
By Scott Feschuk - Friday, September 24, 2010 at 6:36 AM - 0 Comments
(We thought they were terrible)
Scott Feschuk Last week 7-8-1 Season: 17-11-4
Scott Reid Last week 7-8-1 Season: 15-13-4
Welcome to Week 3 at Can’t Miss NFL Picks and Other Lies. We would like to state for the record that despite what you saw last week, we have no intention of crudely luring people into our football-based blog by displaying photographs of random attractive ladies unless their appearance herein holds measurable educational value. Because that would be wrong.
Above: Minka Kelly demonstrates an effective method of avoiding shin splints.
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Tennessee (plus 3) at New York Giants
Reid: Surgeon General’s Warning: watching this game could lead to death from Blood Dulling. This rare but always deadly disorder afflicts those so impassive that their blood simply quits caring – and circulating. Often misdiagnosed, this affliction was jointly recognized by the CMA and AMA last year after a mysterious rash of deaths among Nicholas Sparks readers. Vince Young will start. Or not. Who cares? Giants will run. And gain a yard each play. It will slowly drain your interest and flatten your arteries. Kerry Collins? Are you kidding me? What – Betty White was booked? Pick: New York.
Feschuk: It’s a relief to know my current symptoms could be Blood Dulling brought on by watching last week’s Steelers-Titans game (barely 200 passing yards combined) and not the even deadlier Brain Dulling, brought on by reading Ezra Levant’s Twitter feed. Pick: Tennessee.
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Buffalo (plus 13) at New England
Feschuk: Trent Edwards is out and Continue…
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What you can do with a lot of money
By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, September 23, 2010 at 7:32 PM - 0 Comments
For a billion dollars, this country got to host the G8 and G20 summits. It also got the supplies necessary to organize a pretty kick ass rave.
The highlights include $2.8 million for rental cars for the RCMP; $1.4 million on communications “cabling;” and $439,000 on portable toilets. Then there was $14,000 on glow sticks and $85,000 for accommodation and snacks at Toronto’s swank Hyatt Regency hotel.
The expense reports tabled in the House today can be downloaded in three parts: here, here and here.
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The Commons: Who is to blame for supporting the troops?
By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, September 23, 2010 at 6:29 PM - 0 Comments
The Scene. “Canadian families are in debt,” Michael Ignatieff informed the House. “They are trying to save and they expect the government to do the same.” And in that regard, he explained, Canadian families are confused—befuddled by the billions their elected government has committed to fighter jets, international summitry and corporate tax cuts. How, Mr. Ignatieff wondered, could said government explain said expenses?With the Prime Minister away, it was John Baird’s turn then to stand with the smile that now seems to be permanently affixed to his face and say the word “jobs” not once, not twice, but thrice. And with that quota filled, Mr. Baird turned then to the question of the warplanes.
“We do believe we also have an important responsibility to our men and women in uniform,” he asserted. “These planes that are being purchased will replace planes that will be more than 30 years old. These planes will last to 2040. That is why we are taking a different approach. We actually strongly support our men and women in uniform and want to equip them with the very best.”
So there. Support the troops, salute the flag, keep calm and carry on with nothing to fear but the surety that the opposition parties are, as we speak, conspiring to overthrow the government and burn this country to the ground. Continue…
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Week in Pictures: September 17th – 23rd 2010
By macleans.ca - Thursday, September 23, 2010 at 5:06 PM - 5 Comments
The week’s best photography
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Arlo Jacob Raim | 1943-2010
By Jen Cutts - Thursday, September 23, 2010 at 5:00 PM - 0 Comments
Birds were his life’s passion. In a station wagon specially equipped with an antenna, he logged thousands of miles tracking them all over North America
Illustration by Taylor Shute
Arlo Jacob Raim was born on July 14, 1943, on a farm in West Union, Iowa, to Emil and Hazel Raim. Arlo and his older brother Lorence spent mornings and evenings helping Emil milk the cows, feed the chickens and anything else that needed doing. Hazel was a teacher who worked her way from a one-room schoolhouse to a master’s in education, so good grades were a “foregone conclusion,” says Lorence. Arlo was a quiet boy, always looking to the sky for the birds he loved (though he believed every living creature deserved a chance, so he didn’t know who to root for when the barn cats caught a bird). When Arlo was five, he was in a car accident with his grandfather. His jaw was seriously injured, and he “spent three months drinking ice cream malts,” says Lorence. He never spoke the same after, and was left with scarring on his face that he covered up with a beard as soon as he could grow one.
After high school, Arlo studied biology at a college about an hour away from the farm, graduating in 1965. Soon after, he began a master’s in avian ecology at Western Michigan University. Bill Cochran, a wildlife biologist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who had designed a radio transmitter light enough for small birds, got a letter from Arlo in 1970 as he was finishing up his degree. “It essentially read,” says Bill, laughing, “ ‘I want to track cowbirds. I have batteries. What else do I need?’ ” So Bill invited Arlo to the school and taught him what he knew about attaching transmitters and tuning in to the faint signals that the birds’ movement and songs generated.
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Which party came out on top of the long-gun registry debate?
By macleans.ca - Thursday, September 23, 2010 at 4:12 PM - 0 Comments
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Let us now celebrate the losers
By Scott Feschuk - Thursday, September 23, 2010 at 4:00 PM - 0 Comments
We owe a debt to failures, to those creative ideas that flamed out or gloriously flopped
Getty Images/ iStock/ Illustration by Taylor Shute
As humans, we come up with a lot of ideas. Most of them are terrible. Just ask the people who listen to pitches all day, like venture capitalists or bigwigs who run movie studios. Or any of the countless people throughout history who have come up with the idea of marrying Larry King.
But we keep devising new ideas because we want to progress as a civilization and achieve our potential, and also because we’re tired of vacuuming and couldn’t maybe a robot do that?
The result is an era of relentless innovation. New products seem to appear every day—and many of these gadgets are terrific. For instance, recent advances in smartphone technology have in just a few short years rendered obsolete a number of antiquated relics, such as the Yellow Pages and basic human courtesy.
