A couple of years ago, a friend and I travelled to Inverness for a celebration honoring the wonderful author and columnist, Frank MacDonald. On the off-chance alcohol might be consumed, we sought lodging at one of the town's two motels. Our choices were Grim and Grimmer. Inverness had many charms — spectacular setting, fascinating history, unique culture, magnificent beach — but no economic engine since its coal mines shut down in the 1960s. Boarded up storefronts and seedy hand-painted signs for the few surviving businesses offered silent testimony to the community's entrenched gloom. Into this sad civic concoction came Ben Cowan-Dewer and Allie...

15 July, 2012

Toronto Star movie critic Peter Howell is a 2001: A Space Odyssey fanatic who claims to have seen the 1968 Stanley Kubrick sci-fi classic more than 40 times. For the second holiday season in a row, Bell Lightbox, the Toronto International Film Festival's modernistic movie showcase, is featuring a 70MM version of the film. Critic Howell marked last year's screenings with a column titled, "21 cool things about 2001: A Spacey Odyssey." He reprised the column yesterday with "21 more cool things." In this year's instalment, Howell reports that when Kubrick was editing Space Odyssey, the comedian and filmmaker Jerry Lewis was...

23 December, 2011

The unprecedented rise in support for the NDP is provoking a lot of reaction from various thoughtful observers. Here's a compendium. From Frank Graves of Ekos Research, author of yesterday's dramatic poll putting the NDP in second place nationally with a projected 100 seats, in a live chat this morning at ipolitics.ca: Nothing is absolutely ruled out. But I think the public is answering Mr. Harper's request for a majority with a pretty clear "No." The intricacies of vote splitting might confuse this as late campaign shifts, but at slightly under 34 points, the Conservatives are well short of a majority. In...

26 April, 2011

Growing discomfort with the military commission trial of Canadian child soldier Omar Khadr, the only western national still held in the US detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, has apparently propelled the US government to seek a plea bargain in the case. The presiding military judge delayed the trial this week in anticipation of a possible deal. Why now? The Toronto Star's Michelle Sheppard reported Thursday that Omar Khadr's pending trial "has caused discomfort among some of Obama’s advisers, who are concerned about the fact that he was 15 at the time of the alleged offence." Friday's edition of the New York Times,...

14 October, 2010

The clarity and detail of the rebuttal Richard Colvin filed with the House of Commons this morning stand in stark contrast to the government's flimsy response. With devastating thoroughness, Colvin documented factual errors and faulty logic underlying the testimony of government witnesses who tried to explain away Ottawa's studied indifference to the likely torture of prisoners our soldiers handed over to Afghan authorities. Download his statement—it's well worth the read—or check out Kady O'Malley's summary and the Toronto Star's account. In response, the best Dan Dugas, spokesman for Defense Minister Peter MacKay, could offer was another jingoistic attempt to portray criticism of government...

17 December, 2009

Here is a roundup of newspaper editorials about Richard Colvin's tesimony about Canadian military and civilian complicity in torture. Globe and Mail: If his account is correct, the federal government was so determined to turn a blind eye to the treatment of the detainees by the Afghan National Directorate of Security and police that it discouraged record-keeping and other documentation – highly uncharacteristic behaviour in any bureaucracy. On this, Mr. Colvin gave evidence from his own direct experience, not hearsay. The word “cover-up,” which evokes the Watergate scandal and a concealment of wrongdoing within an institution, or even obstruction of justice, may be...

20 November, 2009

Tories knock off Bloc in eastern Quebec - Gazette Tories, NDP make gains in by-elections - Star Tories retake former Nova Scotia stronghold - Globe and Mail Byelection win will boost Tories in Quebec: MP - CBC This is likely a losing battle, but could the national press corp please stop calling the Harper Conservatives "Tories?" The Conservative Party of Canada is not simply a renamed Progressive Conservative Party. It was borne of a hostile takeover by the Reform Party, thinly disguised as a merry merger. Headline writers need short substitutes for party names — Grits, NDP, Bloc, etc. — but that's no excuse for...

10 November, 2009

In yet another sign of dire straits in the newspaper industry,  Toronto Star Publisher John Cruickshank today offered newsroom staff voluntary severance packages in advance of probable layoffs. In a memo to staff, Cruickshank said the paper is "seriously considering" contracting out core editorial and advertising functions. Moneyquote: [W]e are exploring the contracting out of some or all copy editing and pagination work, and the scope again may expand to include other editorial production and related activities.  The scope of these and related outsourcing initiatives may well extend to work groups in other divisions of the Star. Hat tip:  DMC...

03 November, 2009