The Strait-Richmond Regional School Board cancelled classes in all schools today. Apparently there's a wicked storm underway. Thank God the children are safe. Not to mention the teachers and board administrators, union members all, right up to the superintendent. To be fair, there is snow visible in half of these highway cam images from the school board's catchment area, just none on the actual roads beings monitored. In case you missed Jim Meek's column on this subject in Saturday's Herald, you can find it here. Said Meek: My idea of hell is [CBC weather dude Peter] Coade broadcasting the weather forecast in an...

The reliably sage Jim Meek comes a cropper this morning with a column plucking nits off Canada's medical marijuana policy. The occasional Herald columnist, Nova Scotia's best, professes shock that the number of Canadians with federal permission to smoke dope for medicinal purposes has swelled to 10,000. Well, that's 0.03 percent of Canada's population, or about the number who support Elvis for Prime Minister—not exactly a blown floodgate. Nor is the other number Meek decries, the 1,400 Canadians who received permission to grow the drug after Ottawa proved incompetent to deliver reliable quality. Along the way, Meek finds one grower who...

Herald columnist Jim Meek takes a shot at CBC reporter Susan Ormiston: In one story, the viewer was treated to moving pictures of CBC-TV reporter Susan Ormiston, who held the hand of a small Haitian child as they walked through a devastated, crowded neighbourhood. Ms. Ormiston later collected the tired child into her own tender arms, and on they marched. The made-for-TV pictures provided proof of Ms. Ormiston’s compassion, and I did wonder for a moment if the reporter or the youngster’s family was the intended focus of the story. I didn't see the piece in question, and I winced to see Ormiston...

CBRM Mayor John Morgan has convinced Jim Meek of the Chronicle-Herald, Wendy Bergfeldt of CBC-Cape Breton, and Gillian Cormier of AllNovaScotia.com that the Nova Scotia Barristers' Society is trying to punish him for criticizing a judicial decision. Nonsense. Anyone can criticize a judicial decision. Lawyers do it all the time. Even the most cursory review of Morgan's comments makes it clear that his offense was not criticizing a decision but impugning the impartiality of Nova Scotia judges in general, and Supreme Justice John Murphy in particular. Morgan's comments came in an interview with CBC-Cape Breton's Information Morning host Steve Sutherland on April...