[caption id="attachment_14681" align="alignnone" width="600"] Spot the Violations[/caption] CBC has a revealing report this morning about how the Department of Community Services and Minister Joanne Bernard conspired to violate several parts of Nova Scotia's Freedom of Information Act, so they could appear to be taking action on reports of violations at day care centres in the province. DCS's behaviour is of a piece with the way it responded to my FOIPOP requests for information about its highhanded treatment of Cape Breton's Talbot House, the addiction treatment centre forced to close for a year after DCS promoted false allegations of abuse on the part of the centre's director, Fr....

22 December, 2014

Buried in the U.S. Senate's scathing report on CIA torture—in footnote 32 on page 43 of the heavily redacted 528-page "summary"—is this chilling detail: Twenty-six of the 119 people subjected to torture by the CIA turned out to be guilty of nothing. These were cases of mistaken identity, being in the wrong place at the wrong time, etc. One such wrongfully held prisoner was Nazar Ali, an intellectually challenged man who was never even suspected of involvement in terrorism. He was imprisoned and tortured only so his "taped crying" could be "used as leverage against a family member." I'm at a loss to know what to...

11 December, 2014

Over the last two days, I've posted letters (here and here) from residents of Isle Madame who complain that media accounts of lobster poacher Philip Boudreau's disappearance tell less than half the story. They portrayed Boudreau, who had a long but mostly non-violent criminal record, as a menacing figure in Petit-de-Grat, travelling the community by night, stealing lobster from licensed fishermen, and threatening violence against any who objected. While not condoning the actions of Twin Maggies' crewmen, they say the fishermen snapped after suffering years of abuse at Boudreau's hands. But Boudreau also has friends and family in Petit-de-Grat, devastated at his killing, determined to defend him. Today...

10 December, 2014

Yesterday's post by a letter writer from Petit-de-Grat touched off  a record day for Contrarian, with more than 60,000 hits, along with thousands of shares on Facebook. My mailbox is full of comments on the tragic events on Isle Madame. I'll post a representative sample over the next few days. (Previous posts on the killing here, here, here, here, and here.) Most of what I have received about this situation arrived anonymously. Many of those who support James Landry, the fisherman convicted of manslaughter last week, say they fear reprisals. Those who do business in the divided community feel especially vulnerable. A reporter I admire who...

09 December, 2014

Several readers from Isle Madame share my disdain for those who falsely depict lobster stealer Philip Boudreau's death as a case of "murder for lobster." Here's a letter from one of them, a life-long Petit-de-Grat resident who withheld his name for obvious reasons. If all you know about Philip Boudreau's death is what you've seen on TV or read in the papers, prepare for an eye opener: I have written this letter to dispute the title of "A Murder for Lobsters." As I reflect on the hundreds of media stories that I've read since this incident on June 1, 2013, I can now see the power of the media and...

07 December, 2014

Today is the United Nations International Day of Persons with Disabilities. The international L'Arche organization is celebrating with an online exhibit of art created by L'Arche core members from 25 of the 38 countries with L'Arche communities. As Jenn Power,* Atlantic Regional Coordinator for L'Arche, noted on Facebook, it's a chance to experience "some of what our folks have to say about life." "Woman," the watercolour at the top of this post, was created by Andrea Frizon, a resident of Mortimer House at L'Arche Toronto. The painting below, "Look at yourself in the mirror," is a collective work by 13 artists from the...

03 December, 2014

You've got to hand it to Steve Drake, prosecutor in the trial of a man charged with killing Isle Madame lobster stealer Philip Boudreau: He knows how to frame a problematic case in a way headline writers will find irresistible. Drake's problem was to persuade a local jury to convict 67-year-old lobster fisherman James Joseph Landry of murdering a man who evoked little sympathy outside his own family. Boudreau had terrorized the tight-knit community for years: stealing lobster at will, taunting the fishermen he stole from, openly selling his ill-gotten wares from a pickup truck parked on the Isle Madame Causeway, routinely threatening mayhem and arson against the families of anyone brave enough to...

01 December, 2014

In the 1950s, the social scientist Gregor Bateson described what he called the Double Bind phenomenon: an emotionally distressing situation in which someone in authority delivers a pair of messages so conflicted that a successful response to one results in a failed response to the other, and the recipient is wrong regardless their response. It's roughly the equivalent of being asked whether you have stopped beating your spouse. Events of the last month in Ottawa show that, where allegations of sexual abuse against two Liberal MPs are concerned, Tom Mulcair's NDP caucus has mastered the double-bind. Here's the latest nugget, courtesy of the Hill Times: The Canadian Press reported last week...

25 November, 2014

The trial of the second boy charged in connection with the #YouKnowHerName case got underway in Halifax this morning. In the Halifax Examiner, Tim Bousquet correctly predicted the defendant would plead guilty, before adding: The first man tried in the case pleaded guilty and was given a light sentence that included no jail time. Since the media long ago convicted both youngsters of rape without benefit of trial, Bousquet and his fellow journocutors would likely consider anything short of a long prison term to be "light." But the boys—they were legally boys at the time of the now infamous incident— haven't been charged with rape. One was charged with making...

24 November, 2014

Here's an aerial photograph taken yesterday of the gorgeous, WSP-designed roundabout taking shape at the northeast corner of the Halifax Commons, in front of the Halifax Armoury. Construction of bike trails and pedestrian walkways on adjacent sections of the Commons will take place over the next two weeks. Construction of a companion roundabout at the right edge of this photo, where North Park St. meets Cogswell, Trollope, Ahern Ave., and Rannie Drive at the foot of Citadel Hill will begin next Spring. Once workers complete that job next year, an underground electrical system will go into service, enabling NS Power to remove utility...

19 November, 2014
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