Julian Assange's 'creepy, lovesick' emails

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 1:03 PM - 11 Comments

WikiLeaks boss Julian Assange has some more embarrassing leaked documents of his own to contend with. A string of emails detailing his ‘stalkery courtship’ of a teenager—two years before he founded his notorious website—were published under the headline ‘The creepy, lovesick emails of Julian Assange’ on the gossip website Gawker. The article reproduces emails to Elizabeth (not her real name), a teen he met one night in April 2004. Before parting ways, Assange gave her his card with and Elizabeth gave Assange her email address in return. Shortly thereafter, Elizabeth began getting emails from him. “Our intimacy seems like the memory of a strange dream to me,” begins one. When his attempts to woo her began to fail, another note says, “Your reaction to my phone call lacked dignity and has stung me.” Elizabeth wasn’t threatened by him, but thought him socially awkward.

Daily Mail

Gawker

You see kids? Fear works

By Martin Patriquin - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 12:36 PM - 66 Comments

So I was all set to go out and buy for my poor, young Justin Bieber-afflicted cousin last week when I thought, ‘Hey! Why don’t I just take a quick looksie at the Conservative Party of Canada website before I go out. Who knows? Maybe I’ll finally get to see Jason Kenney arms deep in a bucket of eggnog.’ Alas, there was no such thing (such a prude, that Jason), but I found something much scarier: THE IPOD TAX.

Yuletide cheer apparently hasn’t gotten the better of the Conservative Party. Just the opposite: it seems the Christmas season is an ideal time for the kind of minor-key, hardtack fear campaign one misses so much between elections. Have a listen to this if you feel like laughing and/or vomiting.

Michael Ignatieff, Jack Layton, Gilles Duceppe, They all back the coalition, and now they all back an iPod tax. That’s right! An iPod tax: a brand new tax that will have you paying up to $75 more for iPods, smart phones, personal video recorders, MP3 players, and just about anything with a hard drive. The iPod tax: it’s just the beginning of the coalition’s high tax agenda.

That’s right, kids: Not even your iPod is safe from the  socialist-pinko-crypto-sovereigntist coalition, the very one that will keep criminals out of jail, legislate the flowing of free drugs into the veins of addicts and force you to register your guns with the government. The streets will flow with blood of innocents. Your cousin will be Bieber-less at Christmas. Want to avoid all this? Vote Conservative. You’re welcome.

Never mind that the iPod thingy is hogwash, or that labelling the Libs-Dipps-Bloc parties as a coalition is equally as dubious. What’s fascinating about this commercial is that it is indicative of a government that believes no issue is too small, no target is too lowly for fear-mongering. And you know what? It’s been working all along.

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Stalemate

By Paul Wells - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 12:06 PM - 86 Comments

A year’s polling shows an extraordinarily stable electorate. The Conservatives seem better positioned now than in January, especially because the Liberals have lost ground in places where they would rather not lose (Ontario, Quebec) and gained in places where gains don’t translate into many seats (the Atlantic provinces) or any (Alberta). Remember the orange line the next time Brian Topp writes 1,200 words about his leader’s momentum. Continue…

"I cannot say no because I am still alive"

By Paul Wells - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 11:49 AM - 8 Comments

Brazil’s president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is barred by the country’s constitution from serving as president for three consecutive terms. So at the new year, he’ll hand off to his hand-picked successor. But will he run again later when a third term wouldn’t be consecutive? He might.

He leaves office (for now) as the most popular president in his country’s history, thanks to smart fiscal policies that have put Brazil on a durable growth trajectory.

Digging for dirt on the CBC

By Martin Patriquin - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 11:20 AM - 83 Comments

Photograph by Blair Gable; Pawel Dwulit/CP

Michel Drapeau considers himself an equal-opportunity provocateur. Since 1994, the lawyer and retired colonel has filed over 5,000 access to information requests to just about every single ministry, agency and authority within the federal government, from the Royal Mint to National Defence, for hundreds of clients—including nearly every federal political party in the country. His work helped uncover some of the more gruesome details of Canada’s mission in Somalia, which ultimately saw the disbanding of the Canadian Airborne Regiment. He is also the reason former chief of defence staff and ambassador John de Chastelain’s penchant for $285 bottles of wine is a matter of public record.

Today, Drapeau’s knack for writing access to information requests is testing the exclusion that allows the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to withhold sensitive and potentially compromising information concerning many of its core endeavours, including how its spends much of its $1-billion yearly allotment from the federal government. As well, his probe into the CBC—a “forensic examination,” as the 77-year-old calls it—is apparently fuelling a feud between the public broadcaster and Quebecor, one of the country’s largest media companies and the CBC’s chief French-language competitor.

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Draft dodging and Facebook don't mix

By macleans.ca - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 10:20 AM - 5 Comments

Nir Kafri/backyard/Redux

Drunken Facebook photos have spoiled the chances of job candidates all over the world. In Israel, though, much-too-revealing profile updates are spelling even more serious trouble. The Israel Defense Forces announced last week they used the social networking site to spot around 1,000 female draft dodgers who appear to have falsely declared themselves to be religious in order to avoid the country’s mandatory military service. Tip-offs, an IDF officer said, included pictures of the women in skimpy clothing, eating at non-kosher restaurants, and posting updates on the Sabbath, when Orthodox Jews aren’t allowed to use equipment such as cameras and computers.

Military service, which lasts two years for women, is compulsory for Israelis from the age of 18, but observant Jews can opt out of it by signing a declaration stating that they follow a strictly religious lifestyle. Many Israelis suspected this rule created an easy loophole for secular women to avoid joining the army. According to IDF figures, 42 per cent of women avoid the draft, and 35 per cent do so on religious grounds. Facebook is the latest tool the IDF has resorted to in order to unmask false claims of piety. Those who’ve been caught will now have to “rephrase their religious declarations,” and may be charged with committing a criminal offence, though it’s unlikely that they will be convicted, sources said.

Aung San Suu Kyi in conversation

By Nancy Macdonald - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 9:00 AM - 5 Comments

Mother and son: Suu Kyi and Kim Aris in Rangoon | AP; Soe Zeya Tun/Reuters

On Nov. 13, Aung San Suu Kyi, the world’s most famous political prisoner, walked free from house arrest in Burma. Her crumbling white villa on Rangoon’s Inya Lake had, for most of the past two decades, been her prison. She was first detained in 1989, a year before her National League for Democracy party took 82 per cent of the seats in nationwide elections. Those results were famously tossed out by the military regime that has ruled Burma since 1962 and threw the NLD leadership, Suu Kyi included, behind bars. Late last month, Suu Kyi was reunited with her youngest son, Kim Aris, 33, named for the Rudyard Kipling hero, after a decade-long separation. The 65-year-old Nobel laureate and democratic icon spoke to Maclean’s from Rangoon.

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Raise taxes now, cut them later

By Andrew Coyne - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 6:00 AM - 24 Comments

Carolyn Kaster/AP

Announcing he had reached a deal with the Republicans to extend the tax cuts enacted under his predecessor, President Barack Obama extolled the virtues of compromise.

Yes, he had agreed to hold taxes at current levels, not only for those earning less than $200,000 ($250,000 for couples), as he had previously vowed, but for everyone, as the Republicans had insisted. But in return, he had obtained GOP agreement to extend eligibility for unemployment insurance for another 13 months to those whose benefits would otherwise have run out.

Or in other words, the two sides agreed that, in exchange for taking in less revenue, they would spend more of it. The cost of the agreement: an estimated $900 billion over two years, “to be financed,” as the New York Times reported, “entirely by adding to the national debt.” Amazing what can be done by people of goodwill, provided you leave the people who will actually pay for it all out of the negotiations.

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Searching for the Next Corner Gas

By Jaime Weinman - Monday, December 20, 2010 at 12:01 AM - 4 Comments

This article in the Globe and Mail deals with the increased emphasis on half-hour comedy in the Canadian TV industry, and why there hasn’t yet been a hit comparable to Corner Gas. Many of the quotes in the article, from Brent Butt, Kevin White, and others, have useful things to say; I just wanted to add a few observations of my own:

- I think too much can be made of why there hasn’t been another Corner Gas yet. It’s still pretty early in the process of this re-investment in half-hour comedy, and hits are hard to come by. Last year CTV unveiled two comedies from former Corner Gas people, one that turned out quite good (Dan for Mayor) and another that hasn’t really been working so far (Hiccups), and that’s really not a bad batting average at all. But it’s harder to come up with a hit when you don’t have the infrastructure in place to develop hits — which means, among other things, consistent scheduling and a strong promotional apparatus. (One of the reasons Big Bang Theory is the most-watched show in Canada is that CTV has been promoting it aggressively, and expensively. Promotion won’t turn a flop into a hit, but it can certainly make a difference.) In the absence of a system for creating, scheduling and promoting shows, hits are going to be fluke occurrences, even more than they already are. But as White says in the article, one of the reasons there aren’t a lot of hit shows in Canada is that “there just aren’t that many shows made in Canada.” You have to make a lot of failures in order to come up with one hit.

- Like most discussions of half-hour comedy, including some of mine, this article doesn’t really mention the sitcoms aimed at kids (or families), so this comment is well taken. The Family Channel and YTV, like Disney and Nickelodeon, Continue…

King of the Hill Revisited: "Luanne's Saga" and "Hank's Unmentionable Problem"

By Jaime Weinman - Sunday, December 19, 2010 at 11:36 PM - 4 Comments

Continuing my retrospective review-caps of the first season of “King of the Hill,” with “Luanne’s Saga” (fourth in production order but fifth to air) and “Hank’s Unmentionable Problem” (the seventh in production order but sixth to air).

“Luanne’s Saga”

First things first: this episode features the debut of that most memorable of recurring characters, Chuck Mangione. Getting him as the Mega Lo Mart spokesman is a joke on the tendency of stores to use washed-up celebrities in their commercials, and maybe even to a certain extent a joke on the whole “special guest voice” concept. This was the first episode in production order to use a celebrity guest (“Hank’s Got the Willies” was done after this one) and the first guest is… the “Feels So Good” guy? (The actual “Feels So Good” recording is also used as the music for an instructional video elsewhere in the episode, part of a multi-season running gag about Mangione’s one hit turning up everywhere in Arlen.) Though KotH would use lots of celebrity guests — particularly in seasons 2 through 8, when they were able to attract many big names — this is like a subtle statement that they’re going to have a quirkier approach to star cameos than The Simpsons did.

This is the first episode written by Paul Lieberstein: Toby Flenderson, Greg Daniels’ brother-in-law, and one of a Continue…

This week has three sketches

By Aaron Wherry - Sunday, December 19, 2010 at 10:36 AM - 25 Comments

Our weekly look back at all we saw and heard.

Monday. Would you let this man fly your plane?
Wednesday. One thing he can say for sure
Thursday. They are but humans

How we talk about the government's collecting of money

By Aaron Wherry - Saturday, December 18, 2010 at 10:37 AM - 78 Comments

Followers of the English language may note that if, in the government’s estimation, there is no difference between a “copyright levy“—collected by the government from those who make a specific purchase for use toward to a specific purpose—and a “tax,” there would seem consequently to be even less room to claim a difference between an “airport user fee” and a “tax.”

Sidney Crosby vs. BP

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 5:41 PM - 2 Comments

Sidney Crosby

He’s the man behind the brilliant, blindingly quick goal that sent this country into a paroxysm of joy at the 2010 Olympic Games. It was, without overstating, the goal that defined the Games themselves, so vivid is its memory, and so deep its impression on the national psyche. As challenging as 2010 has been—with its wars, natural disasters and political upheavals—“the Goal” resides on a higher plane, dwarfing among other things Sidney Crosby’s other achievements, which include a Stanley Cup and a host of personal awards.

BP

Former CEO Tony Hayward—the man tasked with explaining the world’s largest-ever oil spill—climbed to the top of oil giant BP as a reformer who stated, after a 2005 refinery explosion, that his company’s leadership “doesn’t listen sufficiently well.” But after the Deepwater Horizon spill, Hayward, 53, didn’t seem to have absorbed his own lessons. He told reporters he “wanted his life back,” refused to answer queries from congressmen, and attended a yacht race while one of the worst environmental catastrophes on record slowly unfolded.

Canadian political parties in a rut: pollster

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 5:24 PM - 29 Comments

An end-of-year poll shows the Tories with 32 per cent support, the Liberals with 26.5 per cent, and the NDP with 17.1 per cent. Meanwhile, the Greens are at 10.9 percent and the Bloc Québécois at 10.6 per cent. “This is a bad poll for Stephen Harper’s Conservatives,” said pollster Frank Graves. “It is a downright awful poll for Michael Ignatieff and it’s a pretty indifferent poll for Jack Layton’s NDP.” The EKOS poll further shows that women and under-40 voters are restlessly casting around for anyone but the Conservatives, and that there is no majority government in sight. “Canadian federal politics is clearly in a rut,” Graves said.

The Globe and Mail

Vancouver Games come in on budget

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 5:21 PM - 48 Comments

If last year’s Winter Games had you worried about a looming Olympic-sized bill to pay, rest assured that won’t be the case. VANOC CEO John Furlong confirmed on Friday the Vancouver Games had broken even in spite of the financial difficulties that came with hosting them during a dicey economic climate. ”We chopped hundreds of millions of dollars over the life of the project,” Furlong said, noting corporate sponsorships dried up as the economy stalled. “It was very hard on morale for the team, but we did what we had to.” In the end, the provincial and federal governments ended up contributing about $187 million to the $1.9 billion operating budget, not including the cost of building the venues, the Olympic Village, transportation projects and security, which they also covered. Government studies show the Games created 45,000 jobs and generated about $2 billion in real gross domestic product.

CBC News

Taxes, both real and imaginary

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 5:05 PM - 41 Comments

David Akin explores the tenuous reasoning behind the government’s latest radio spots.

They point to a report that came out of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage. Part of that report considered the idea of extending the levy Canadian consumers now pay on blank digital media like CDs to MP3 players. Indeed, the Heritage Committee voted on March 16 in favour of extending that levy with all Conservative members of that committee voting against and the two Liberals, two Bloc Quebecois, and one NDP MP voting in favour. Notably, as an NDP staffer pointed out to me today, the chairman of the committee, Conservative Gary Schellenberger did not vote with his Conservative colleagues, choosing to break a 5-5 tie at the committee by voting with the opposition.

The Canadian Private Copying Collective has apparently advised that an extension of the law would involve a levy of between $5 and $25 per unit. The NDP’s Charlie Angus has pegged it at $5. The Bloc’s Carole Lavellee has said it would be between $2 and $25. The Liberals have proposed amendments to the government’s copyright legislation, while categorically rejecting the idea of extending the copyright levy to iPods.

Perhaps interestingly, while the Conservative government says it is resolutely opposed to a levy on iPods, I am told by Minister James Moore’s office that the government has no plans to remove the levy that is already applied to blank CDs and audio cassettes.

Rights and Democracy: "We have been denied an important opportunity to shed light"

By Paul Wells - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 3:56 PM - 80 Comments

A news release from Gérard Latulippe, the president of Rights and Democracy, reacting to yesterday’s events:

Julian Assange's bizarre lovelorn emails

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 3:29 PM - 37 Comments

Gossip website Gawker has obtained emails allegedly sent to a 19-year-old girl by the then-33-year-old WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. The two are said to have met in a bar in Australia six years ago, or two years before he founded the now-infamous WikiLeaks site. After swapping emails, Assange pursued the young woman and became increasingly upset when she rejected his advances. In one email exchange, Assange scolded her for her cool reaction to his advances, saying her response “lacked dignity” and that “it saddens me to have misjudged you.” Later, he laments that she is “hard above the neck; voice salted and typical of your class when not trying to impress.”

Gawker

Mozhdah: The Oprah of Afghanistan

By Nancy Macdonald - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 3:20 PM - 9 Comments

For her safety, Mozhdah seldom leaves her house. When she does, she’s mobbed by fans. | Andrea Bruce/Getty Images

On the face of it, the taping of the The Mozhdah Show looks like that of any other U.S. talk show. Green lights dim as the house band—Afghanistan’s only known rock group—starts up. A white spotlight sweeps the audience. Whistles and cheers erupt as the host, Mozhdah Jamalzadah, emerges, hopping gracefully onto the bright-pink set. “Salaam!” says the charismatic, Canadian-raised star, whose nine-month-old TV program has taken Afghanistan by storm. “Salaam!” she says again, smiling, her adoring crowd refusing to return to their seats.

Mozhdah, who like Beyoncé is known by her first name, and is mobbed whenever she leaves her Kabul home, has been labelled the Oprah of Afghanistan. The comparison is of course imperfect. Oprah doesn’t sleep with a gun. She doesn’t ride in bulletproof cars or travel with guards armed with AK-47s. Death threats don’t flood her inbox. Mozhdah, whose first thought on entering a new building is how she might escape, is gutsy in a way Oprah doesn’t need to be. Her black leather leggings, six-inch heels and silver hoop earrings wouldn’t get a second glance in Vancouver, where she’s spent all but five of her 26 years, but this is Afghanistan. Until a few years ago, the bare ankles alone could have earned her a public whipping.

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PETA slams Trudeau family Christmas card

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 3:11 PM - 19 Comments

PETA is taking Liberal MP Justin Trudeau to task over his annual Christmas card, in which he and his family are decked out in coyote fur. The card features Trudeau, his wife, Sophie Grégoire and his two children wearing fur parkas and smiling under a fur blanket. PETA has called the card “lurid.” Says Lucas Soloway, a member of PETA and co-president of the Concordia University Animal Rights Association: “I was shocked and upset to see it. I think it was disturbing, especially at this time of year in a greeting card. Where is the cheer in wearing the skins of animals?”

CBC News

Oil industry monitoring body hides blinky the three-eyed fish

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 3:04 PM - 64 Comments

The Regional Aquatics Monitoring Program (RAMP), the organization in charge of monitoring waterways running through Alberta oil sands developments, has found hundreds of examples of deformed fish, but has failed to notify the public or the government. A report by the RAMP says 915 fish with deformities, growths or other abnormalities have been found in the Athabasca river since 1987, a number greater then what the organization has indicated in its annual reports to the Alberta government. The organization has been widely criticized for being overly secretive and for selectively releasing information. “That is the problem. To get the actual data, you need the raw data,” not just annual reports, said Kevin Timoney, an Alberta ecologist and oil sands researcher. “They release just enough so they can say that they did, but they don’t give you enough to see what’s really going on.” The RAMP is currently under three reviews, one of which was ordered by former environment minister Jim Prentice after he was shown photos of mutated fish.

The Globe and Mail

Too many unnecessary surgeries in Canada?

By macleans.ca - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 2:57 PM - 32 Comments

An annual report by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) found that Canada could save up to $180 million a year if doctors consistently offered the most appropriate and most cost-effective procedures to their patients, and put fewer people under the knife by reducing the number of potentially unnecessary surgeries done in the country each year. The report found discrepancies in the number of caesarian sections and hysterectomies performed in Canada, suggesting some of those procedures are not needed. For example, last year, Ontario’s rate of first-time caesarian sections was 19.6 per cent of all deliveries; if that rate could be lowered to match Manitoba’s rate of 14 per cent, the lowest in Canada, Ontario would do 7,200 fewer surgeries and save $16.2 million. The report also showed that too many procedures are still being done despite evidence that indicates they don’t help patients, such as surgery for knee pain.

Toronto Star

Hypothetical math

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 2:44 PM - 66 Comments

Eric Grenier considers Stephen Harper’s hopes for a majority.

The Conservatives may have hit their ceiling under the leadership of Stephen Harper. Targeting specific groups with individual pieces of legislation and policy may net the party a few more seats here and there, but it will take a flawless campaign for the Tories to keep the seats they currently have and turn those piecemeal gains into a slim majority.

The Insane Death of 'Til Death, Continued

By Jaime Weinman - Friday, December 17, 2010 at 2:29 PM - 4 Comments

Remember Todd VDW’s famous piece on the lunatic, surreal final season of ‘Til Death, where new showrunner Don Reo decided that since the show was almost totally unwatched, he should just deconstruct the show and the entire sitcom genre? Well, it turns out Don Reo himself responded in comments a few months ago, but his comment wasn’t noticed until recently. (There’s no direct link to comments on the AV Club’s site, but the comment is on page 2, time-stamped July 4, 2010.) Reo, whose résumé includes a lot of shows that have seemingly nothing in common with each other — he’s creator of Blossom, Wizards & Warriors, My Wife & Kids and The John Larroquette Show and showrunner of Action and Everybody Loves Chris among others — offers some more insights about what he was trying to do that year and mentions some story ideas he had that never made it onto the show, either because the network said no or because the show was canceled. Some excerpts:

A lot of what you saw was in our minds from the get go. Why not have a little fun since there was no way to damage the shows ratings? There were no ratings. Nobody was watching this thing.

We wrote an episode earlier that had Doug meeting Timm Sharp in the waiting room. Timm plays a failed actor who smokes a lot of dope and has never recovered from what he calls “The whole Til Death debacle.” He is now seeing Mayim because he has come to believe he is trapped in an episode of “Freaks and Geeks.” I think that one made it to a table read and died there.

We also wanted to do an episode where the wonderful Martin Mull dies during an auto-erotic asphyxiation session. We planned to do the funeral, the whole bit and then bring him back the following week and not mention the fact that he was dead. Never. Would’ve been delightful.

We did get to do some pretty cool things though. We had the legendary Ron Zimmerman in a gunfight with a midget. We had Martin in a French sailor suit being tortured by Kathleen to get him to admit that Brad had a small penis. How often do you get a chance to do such a thing?

The “Til Death”music in year four is bad on purpose. We spent a lot of time screwing up the cues to make sure they contained mistakes. It amused every musician who watched it. Chuck E Weiss is the only musician who watched it.

Strange, strange stuff, and while it’s not unheard of for a show to go completely insane when nobody’s watching (this used to happen on the WB network sitcoms in the ’90s, like Unhappily Ever After, a show whose writers were much better than the show itself and therefore decided to make the whole show about their contempt for themselves, the network and the audience), but it may not happen again for a while, unless networks start putting comedies on Friday night again and then not paying attention to them. Reo himself is currently consulting on Two and a Half Men, but given the nature of the writing credits on that show I have no idea what his contribution is.