Ignatieff tries to get a rise out of voters

By John Geddes - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 9:48 PM - 116 Comments

All through this campaign, Michael Ignatieff has taken the dual risk of speaking without a prepared text and answering many questions that haven’t been scripted from individuals who haven’t been screened and just happened to raise a hand in the crowd that’s turned out to hear him.

But this evening in Sudbury, Ont., he took an even bigger gamble, letting loose at the end of another long question-and-answer session with a Bruce Springsteen-inspired, revival tent-worthy, raspy-throated bid to rouse Canadian voters from their torpor. Some will hear it as impassioned, others as desperate.

Continue…

New transmission link for PEI

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 5:56 PM - 0 Comments

While campaigning in Charlottetown, P.E.I., on April 15, NDP leader Jack Layton promised to provide $45 million for a third power transmission cable for Prince Edward Island.

He says, she says

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 5:12 PM - 111 Comments

When Mr. Harper announced last April that Helena Guergis was the subject of serious allegations, he said that ”pending a resolution, she will sit outside of the Conservative Party caucus.” But though the allegations against Helena Guergus are now confirmed to be those that have already been dismissed, she apparently remains unwelcome.

When asked Friday whether he owed Ms. Guergis an apology – after allegations of drug abuse, wild partying and attempts to secure illegal contracts all proved unfounded – Conservative Leader Stephen Harper was unrepentant. ”There were, as you know well, a range of political problems around this individual,” he told reporters in Thornhill, outside Toronto. “They have been discussed by members of caucus. There is simply no desire to see the return of this individual to caucus…the decision is now in the hands of the riding.”

Ms. Guergis called a news conference today to lay out her version. Continue…

Paul Wells on the latest polls and scandalettes

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 5:00 PM - 0 Comments

State Dept. gives good news to oil sands

By Luiza Ch. Savage - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 4:55 PM - 5 Comments

I have a story in this week’s magazine about why Alberta’s energy minister was wrong when he said Obama should “sign the bloody order” already to permit TransCanada’s proposed  Keystone XL pipeline that would bring oil sands crude from Alberta through the American mid-West to the Gulf Coast.

There is a review process underway by the State Dept. looking at a variety of impacts of the pipeline — and the increase in imports that would accompany it. If Obama were to intervene in the review process, which was legislated by Congress, he would open the final decision up to litigation by environmental groups or other critics — and subject it to unknown delays.

But it seems that Alberta may find some comfort in the massive Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement that the State Dept. issued today.

TransCanada is still reading the report, but environmentalists are already attacking it. An Alberta business professor opines that it is full of good news for the oil sands.

The executive summary suggests that State has not uncovered any major new issues since their previous review, which was judged inadequate by the US Environmental Protection Agency. The executive summary of today’s report says:

Conclusions: The draft EIS provided information on key environmental issues to allow a full understanding of the analysis of environmental effects.  Although DOS received thousands of comments on a wide variety of topics addressed in the draft EIS during the comment period, no new issues of substance emerged from the comments received. DOS nonetheless determined that submitting the portions of the EIS that were revised to address the new and additional information and to address comments on the draft EIS for public and agency review would further the purposes of NEPA and prepared and issued this SDEIS.  However, the information provided in this SDEIS does not alter the conclusions reached in the draft EIS regarding the need for and the potential impacts of the proposed Project.

Also, State did not grant environmental groups that additional 120 days for public hearings that they asked for.

There will be 45 days for public comment, and then State will make a “National Interest Determination”, which will be subject to comment as well. State has said they will make a decision on the permit by the end of the year.

***

On Twitter at luizachsavage

The Constitution: what should have been said

By Martin Patriquin - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 4:31 PM - 32 Comments

My heart warmed a little the other night when the issue of the constitution came up. Having been just a young-un during Meech Lake, I was more obsessed with Nirvana, fireworks, girls and beer than that darling little existential spat. Maybe, just maybe, we’ll get our own kick at the can. One can only pray.

Anyway, you’ll note how all three federalist leaders winced when Gilles Duceppe brought it up the other night. Ignatieff fumbled, Layton too (for a moment; more on this is a sec), and you could practically hear Harper’s spackle makeup crack as he said he wanted nothing to do with it. It’s a classic move ripped out of Jacques Parizeau’s playbook: bring up the fact that Quebec never signed the constitution, compare the Liberal leader to Trudeau, and watch everyone squirm. Mission accomplished!

Continue…

TV: Is It Better To See People You Haven't Seen?

By Jaime Weinman - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 4:03 PM - 3 Comments

This season saw a ridiculous number of “three couples at different stages in their relationships” comedies. Most flopped. Ironically, the first and worst of these comedies, Rules of Engagement, may be the only one to make it to next season (though Happy Endings has a shot if it doesn’t drop too horribly at 10), and I’ve Continue…

Amend the Criminal Code to crack down on elder abuse

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 2:46 PM - 0 Comments

While campaigning in Quebec City on April 15, Prime Minister Stephen Harper promised that a Conservative government would change the Criminal Code by adding vulnerability due to age to the list of aggravating factors to be considered by courts when sentencing criminals who commit offenses against the elderly.

Fukushima Daiichi water only lightly contaminated: report

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 2:34 PM - 2 Comments

Japan’s government issued a report Friday detailing the specifics surrounding the discharge of over 10,000 metric tons of low-level radioactive water into the ocean. Neighbouring countries have expressed concern, and South Korea and China criticized Japan for not providing advance warnings of its plans, citing the potential environmental threats. The nuclear complex at Fukushima Daiichi released a total of 10,393 tons of radioactive water between April 4 to 10, the report says, which was made up of 1,323 tons of groundwater and 9,070 tons of seawater. The water exceeded legal limits by about 100 times, depending on the sample.

Wall Street Journal

Voter engagement (III)

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 2:29 PM - 96 Comments

While clarifying the parameters around special ballot voting, Elections Canada has ruled that the votes cast in Guelph will be counted.

While the initiative at the University of Guelph was not pre-authorized by the Chief Electoral Officer, the Canada Elections Act provides that electors may apply for and vote by special ballot. A special ballot coordinator, appointed by the local returning officer, oversaw the activities at the University of Guelph. All information at our disposal indicates that the votes were cast in a manner that respects the Canada Elections Act and are valid.

Whatever the allegations of attempt ballot box interference, the Conservative campaign says it’s happy the students will not be disenfranchised.

Would-be politicos need holidays, too

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 2:07 PM - 9 Comments

NDP Leader Jack Layton defended his in Ajax-Pickering candidate’s choice to take a mid-campaign Caribbean vacation, saying that fixed election dates would help “working people” plan their lives. Layton noted that Jim Koppens booked the trip a year ago—long before he knew an election would be called. “He’s a meat cutter in a local grocery store and he promised his family to be able to have a break, finally, and he made that choice,” Layton said in Montreal. “He’ll be out there knocking on doors, don’t worry about that.” After winning the 2006 election, one of the Harper government’s first acts was to set fixed dates for elections every four years. In 2008, the prime minister ignored his own law by calling a snap election.

Brandon Sun

This complicated democracy

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 1:35 PM - 36 Comments

Frances Woolley sets out to consider the efficiencies of vote-swapping and ends up considering the nature of our democracy.

The question is the wrong one to ask. If Party A wins three seats, then it can pursue policies that benefit people who do (or potentially might) vote for party A. If parties A, B and C win one seat each, they will pursue policies that benefit a different set of electors, not just those who vote for party A. But will a coalition government pursue policies that benefit a broader section of the electorate?

It’s not obvious. It all depends what happens at the coalition stage, when different parties are attempting to form governments. An interesting working paper by Amedeo Piolatto argues that, in certain circumstances, the power wielded by small parties in the coalition formation process can cause proportional representation systems to lead to political outcomes that are less representative of the interests of the broader population than first past the post type systems.

Harper won the English debate, Duceppe took home the French: poll

By Kate Lunau - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 1:18 PM - 39 Comments

According to a Maclean’s poll, Stephen Harper had the best performance in this week’s English-language leaders’ debate, while the Bloc’s Gilles Duceppe handily won in French. But the real victor may be Jack Layton, who impressed not only his NDP stalwarts, but also Greens, undecided voters, and even Liberals, a scenario pollster Greg Lyle calls “a Liberal nightmare.”

The survey conducted by Innovative Research Group found 43 per cent of respondents thought Harper won Tuesday’s English-language debate, with Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff coming third at 11 per cent. As for the French-language debate, 46 per cent thought Duceppe won, while Ignatieff was best in the eyes of 11 per cent of respondents (Harper, in fourth, won over only seven per cent of respondents). Meanwhile, Layton was a clear second in both English and French, which is “nothing to write home about,” says Lyle, managing director at Innovative Research. “But when you look at how leaders did according to different groups of voters, it’s a dream for the NDP.”

Both Harper and Duceppe managed to rally their own—78 per cent of Conservatives thought Harper performed best, and 67 per cent of the Bloc gave it to Duceppe—but the same can’t be said of Ignatieff. Only 32 per cent of Liberal voters thought he performed best, while a whopping 21 per cent thought it was Layton.

The NDP leader also won over 33 per cent of Greens and 25 per cent of the undecided, the highest of any leader. “He’s not just solidifying his base. He’s reaching into Liberal, Green and undecided voters,” Lyle says. The Conservatives came second among the undecided, with Harper convincing 17 per cent of them he performed best.

The picture isn’t completely grim for the Liberal leader. When measured against himself in terms of expectations, Ignatieff did best among Quebecers. In fact, 43 per cent of respondents thought Ignatieff performed better than expected in French, while only 4 per cent felt the same about Harper. Still, “he was found wanting in English,” Lyle says, with 25 per cent of people saying he did better than expected, while 38 per cent thought he did worse.

Overall, Lyle says, “Harper and Duceppe did their job, but Layton really won.”

The online survey was conducted on April 13 and 14 after the end of the leaders’ debates among a representative sample of 1,058 Canadians, including 249 in Quebec. The margin of error is plus or minus 2.16 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Guergis accuses PMO of smear campaign

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 1:16 PM - 28 Comments

Helena Guergis is accusing the Prime Minister’s Office of running a smear campaign against her, resulting in her expulsion from the Conservative caucus and cabinet even after she was cleared by the RCMP. During a press conference held in her riding of Simcoe-Grey on Friday, Guergis said there was a deliberate effort on the part of the PMO to spread lies about her alleged criminal behaviour, including drug abuse and attempts to use her public office to secure illegal contracts. Prime Minister Stephen Harper was unapologetic, and reaffirmed his decision to kick Guergis out of the caucus. “There were, as you know well, a range of political problems around this individual,” said Harper. “There is simply no desire to see the return of this individual to caucus.” Guergis says the PMO never explained why she was expelled from the caucus, despite that the allegations leveled against her by the RCMP were dropped. “I pleaded with Mr. Harper to tell [me] what he thought I had done wrong in order to be able to address these allegations head on and to be able to defend myself,” said Guergis. “Unfortunately, he refused.”

The Globe and Mail

Charlie Sheen brings his bizarre act to Toronto

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 1:11 PM - 2 Comments

Human wrecking-ball Charlie Sheen brought his sold-out My Violent Torpedo of Truth/Defeat is not an Option act to Toronto’s Massey Hall on Thursday night, closing the night by toasting the ashes of widow Wendy Newman’s deceased husband. Toronto comedian Russell Peters introduced Sheen to the raucous audience and conversed with the troubled actor and web phenomenon for an hour, until Sheen invited Newman onstage. Newman told the audience that her husband, Paul, died of a heart attack and that she coped with the loss by watching DVD’s of Two and a Half Men. Sheen and Newman then toasted Paul’s ashes. The show then ended abruptly as a video of Snoop Dogg played. Many show-goers were left confused and annoyed. “What the hell was that,” said one audience member. “I don’t know what was going on during that whole show and then it just ends like that?” Sheen will continue his Canadian tour with a show in Vancouver, B.C., on Friday night.

CBC News

YouTube

Newsmakers

By Nancy Macdonald and Maclean's staff - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 12:50 PM - 0 Comments

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Revenge, actually

On screen, Hugh Grant has always excelled at playing the befuddled. But in real life, he’s awfully sharp. Last week, the long-time victim of Britain’s tabloid press turned the tables in an exposé for the New Statesman. After a chance encounter with a former News of the World journalist, Grant secretly taped a pub conversation where the man revealed that executives at the paper, including Andy Coulson, who went on to become David Cameron’s press secretary, knew all about the rampant hacking of celebrities’ voice mails. So did honchos at News Corp., the paper’s Rupert Murdoch-owned parent company, which subsequently issued a grovelling public apology. But the best part might have been the headline on Grant’s article: “The bugger, bugged.”

He feels for himself

Giving up a dictatorship is apparently not all roses and unicorns. Hosni Mubarak has issued his first, unrelentingly self-pitying statement since being forced from office two months ago. “I have been pained, and am still in pain because of what I have been subjected to,” the deposed Egyptian president begins, “from unjust campaigns and false allegations aimed at hurting my reputation and questioning my integrity, stances and military and political history . . . ” Mubarak, who went on to deny stashing money in foreign countries—a fortune rumoured to be in the billions—taped the five-minute remarks from his weekend home on the Red Sea, where he reportedly suffered a heart attack Tuesday before facing questioning by prosecutors over allegations of corruption and abuse.

Know when to fold ’em

Sometimes a backup goalie just gets bored, and Marty Turco broke up the monotony last week by wagering with a fan seated next to him in Montreal’s Bell Centre, as Turco’s Chicago Blackhawks took on the Canadiens. Season ticketholder Robert Walter says he egged Turco into taking a $5 bet that the Hawks wouldn’t score on the Canadiens. When they did, Walter wrote “Habs Rule” on a fin and dutifully passed it through the glass separating them while a friend photographed the transaction for posterity. Later, in the third, Walter persuaded the Hawks netminder to take 5-1 odds on the Habs winning in overtime and—wouldn’t you know it—the Canadiens came through. Turco reportedly sent several fives back through the barrier, but not before editing the original note to read: “Turco Rules.” Alas, the only “rules” that matter are NHL ones forbidding players from wagering on games. The league is investigating.

Continue…

This serious business

By Aaron Wherry - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 12:35 PM - 12 Comments

Rick Mercer talks to Steve Paikin about politics and satire.

Rob "Eraserman" Ford, hold your fire! All graffiti is not evil!

By Brian D. Johnson - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 12:03 PM - 20 Comments

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford attacks graffiti with a power washer. Photo: Tara Walton/Toronto Star

If I can step off the film beat for a moment, I like to take a look at a local blockbuster superhero: Eraserman. I’m talking about Rob Ford and his recent foray into performance art. Last week, the Toronto mayor hit the street with a high-pressure spray gun to deface graffiti for the cameras. With this stunt, worthy of a Gotham comic book, Ford is painting himself as a boots-on-the-ground crusader out to purge our  abused walls of graphic crime. All that’s missing is the cape.

For a politician, graffiti is as easy target. A lot of it is ugly, offensive or simply banal. But hey, that’s also true of a lot of art, even the pricey stuff that hangs in corporate boardrooms. To tar all graffiti with one brush, or nozzle, is bone-headed. There are all kinds of graffiti, ranging from puerile vandalism to high art. Taking spray cans to the street is one of most dynamic movements to hit modern art in years, producing stars from Basquiat to Banksy. It’s also public art of the most democratic kind. Free, chaotic and ever-changing, it’s urban cave painting, a zoo of individual gestures that form a fluid collage of  collective expression.  Whether or not graffiti should be erased by public officials is not a black-and-white issue. Whether it should survive depends what it’s like, where it is and the spirit in which it’s created.

It’s one thing to recklessly deface a tidy piece of public or private property.  Any artist who’s into that kind of mischief has to know he’s an outlaw working in a highly impermanent medium. But it’s something else to lavish some spray paint on a derelict alley wall, a strip of industrial wasteland—or a bridge abutment in a ravine.

I’ve been photographing graffiti in Toronto’s ravines for years. Bisected by highways, rail lines, bridges and industrial blight, these are wild urban spaces. The lyrical tags adorning slabs of concrete and rusting steel connect these  structures to the tangle of nature that surrounds them. It roots them in the landscape. Like the forests and wetlands in the ravines, this art is in constant metamorphosis. It’s a jungle of molting paint. Some of it is ugly; some is beautiful. But it definitely seems to belong. To wipe it all clean would be an act of industrial vandalism. It would also be pointless. The war on graffiti, like the war on drugs, is unwinnable.

Eraserman, no matter how long and hard you clean, in the end all you’re doing is preparing a fresh canvas.

Click on any of the below thumbnails to view a gallery of my graffiti photos:

Continue…

CanCon rules for Netflix? Here are some other bright ideas.

By Jesse Brown - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 11:56 AM - 28 Comments

Canada’s television networks are pressuring the CRTC to regulate Netflix,  the emerging online subscription-based video service. Netflix is cheap, easy to use, and lets Canadians watch the content they want, regardless of where it was made. Clearly this cannot be tolerated in Canada.

If our legacy broadcasters are successful, Netflix will have to stock a set percentage of Canadian videos and kick back a chunk of their profits to the Canadian Television Fund and the Canadian Media Fund, who will use the money to produce Canadian Content, or CanCon.

But Netflix is only one web service among millions. Once the CRTC starts regulating the Internet, they’ll have much more work to do. Here’s what should come next:

CanCon regulations for YouTube:

If one commercial U.S. video service is to be regulated in Canada, why not another? Why not go for the big one?

From now on, if YouTube wants to compete with our own beloved television networks, distracting Canadian viewers from their own cultural heritage (i.e. MuchMusic’s Pants Off Dance Off), then surely YouTube must give something back and pay into the CanCon funding regime. But what should we make with the money we tax from YouTube? It doesn’t seem appropriate to fund TV shows with web video money. If Canadian creators are to thrive in this new space, then our production community must evolve with the times.

I suggest the establishment of a Canadian Viral Video Fund. A percentage of every dollar YouTube makes in Canada by streaming videos of cats on skateboards will be used to produce our own YouTube videos of cats on skateboards. But the cats will be ACTRA members, the skateboards snowboards, the videos shot by unionized crews, and the resulting product enriching to our sense of place and heritage (suggestion: narration by Donald Sutherland).

CanCon Internet Memes:

If the CRTC doesn’t act now to regulate Canadian Content in Internet jokes, fads and memes, we will soon be awash in slick American memes with no hope of establishing our own national identity of animated gifs and ridiculous 4chan pics. Why should Canadians be ‘RickRolled’ when they could be ‘HartHoled‘?

CanCon Spam:

Why must it always be a Nigerian prince who needs $100,000 to untangle his vast petroleum fortune? Why not a Canadian prince, say Ben Mulroney, in need of $736 to get his SUV out of the shop?

Tories want U of Guelph votes discounted

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 11:46 AM - 43 Comments

The Conservative party is challenging the votes cast during a “vote mob” at the University of Guelph, saying they should be discarded because the voting session violated the Canada Elections Act. The party has requested that Elections Canada rule the polling station was illegal and that partisan election material was distributed during voting. Approximately 700 students cast their vote at a polling station on the main floor of U of G’s University Centre. Several students claim Michael Sona, the communications director for Guelph Conservative candidate Marty Burke, approached the polling station claiming the process was illegal, and at one point may have tried to remove the ballot box, although his presence at the station has not yet been confirmed.

UPDATE: Elections Canada has validated the contested “vote mob” and released this statement: “All information at our disposal indicates that the votes were cast in a manner that respects the Elections Canada Act and are valid.”

Guelph Mercury

Globe and Mail

Suicide rate in work force tied to economy, study shows

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 11:42 AM - 2 Comments

According to a new U.S. government analysis, the suicide rate increased 3 per cent during the 2001 recession and has followed the economy since the Great Depression, going up in bad times and down in good ones. Researchers have argued that economic difficulties can boost the likelihood of suicide among the vulnerable, like those with mental illness, but research results haven’t yet found link, and some studies actually suggest the suicide rate goes down in periods of high unemployment. Using more comprehensive data, this new study found a clear correlation between suicide rates and the business cycle among young and middle-age adults. The study looks at suicide rates per 100,000 Americans for every year from 1928 to 2007, and appears in the American Journal of Public Health.

New York Times

Croatian military leaders convicted of war crimes

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 11:40 AM - 94 Comments

The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugolsavia in The Hague has convicted two Croatian military leaders for war crimes committed during the Croatian War of Independence in 1995. Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markac were sentenced to 24 years and 18 years respectively for their role in the murder and persecution of the Serb civilian population in Croatia’s Krajina region. About 200,000 ethnic Serbs were driven from Croatia in 1995, and at least 150 were killed. “The Croatian military committed acts of murder, cruel treatment, inhumane acts, plunder, persecution and deportation,” said presiding Judge Alphons Orie in his ruling. The court found that Gotovina and Markac had a prominent role in overseeing the anti-Serb campaign. A crowd gathered in Zagreb to watch the hearing, and booed when the judge announced the guilty verdicts. Many Croatians regard the two men as heroes.

BBC News

Review: Jesse Eisenberg as a believable nerd bird in 'Rio'

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 11:24 AM - 0 Comments

Shot and edited by Tom Henheffer
Produced by Claire Ward

Paul Wells: If you thought this campaign was nasty, you haven't seen anything yet

By macleans.ca - Friday, April 15, 2011 at 10:49 AM - 58 Comments