Whew (Technically)

Canada's in a recession. Yep. I think most of us saw that "let's face facts" moment coming.

But, we are relieved to learn, we really don't need to worry--it's only a technical recession, according to the Prime Minister and his Finance Minister. Well. Whew, indeed!

During the recent Canadian election, mere weeks ago, the Prime Minister said, "The fundamentals of the Canadian economy are strong," in that "you're too stupid to breathe" tone he adopted from the Decider-in-Chief to the south.

I suppose that insistence explains why the current recession is only technical.

And we all feel better. Technically.

Sheesh.

Feist Me No More

N.B. The subject line does not refer to the Canadian singer best known south of 49 for pushing iPods. ("One, two, three, four..."--yeah, that one. She's very bendy about the hips, isn't she?)

I want to take a term off the table for the rest of...for the rest of eternity, if I could. For the rest of 2009, for sure. And that term?

Feisty.

It's not just because "feisty" is often paired with "gal" to describe a female who's channelling Debbie Reynolds. (Nothing against Debbie Reynolds--I loved Singin' in the Rain, but c'mon: Molly Brown, Annie Getting Her Gun...could she play anything but feisty?)

It's not even because feisty gals wink at the camera. A LOT.

No. The word is anathema because "feisty" is really a contraction formed by combining "brash" and "ignorant" with "shameless" and hiding the hybrid behind new letters.

And you can even picture why feisty is not a good thing. Simply visualize a room with Palestinians sitting on one side of a table and Israelis on the other. By some miracle, they are actually talking to each other. Now mentally place Feisty Vice President Palin in the room with them. Nuclear weapons, people. Is that really a scenario in which we want some feisty?

Well, OK--maybe the one who sells iPods. But otherwise, no.

Yes, we've seen feisty (brash + ignorant + shameless) in the White House for the past eight years. And we have survived. But we don't know by what skin on whose teeth that has been possible. We can't take any more chances.

A Promotion?

President Bush is at it again. This is from The Progress Report, a daily roundup of news published by The Center for American Progress.

And finally: President Bush "kept up his tradition of informal relations" with world leaders by casually summoning Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, "a rather stiff and shy figure." Footage of a G8 lunch "showed Bush talking to Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua and saying 'Yo Harper! The president of Nigeria,'" Reuters notes. At a 2006 summit, "Bush landed ally Tony Blair in some trouble by calling out 'Yo Blair!'"

Hey, Prime Minister Harper was summoned to the Cool Kids' Table! Canada's in the news in the U.S.!!

But wait--is being treated like Tony Blair a promotion for "Steve"?

Gobsmacked

I would be speechless, but then I wouldn't get to blog about this, would I?

During the Stanley Cup playoffs and finals (Game 5 tonight! It's almost over!), CBC has been running ads for upcoming programs. One of the ads features a comedian from "This Hour Has 22 Minutes," Canada's version of Saturday Night Live or Mad TV or one of those comedy things. This comedian is sitting in the locker room decked out in hockey stuff, doing a "promo" for "an upcoming CBC show." Wink, wink.

This "upcoming show" is called "How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?" It features women from all across the country (world?) competing to be cast as Maria in a production of The Sound of Music. The promo piece shows them pushing each around on a mountainside. The ad includes the line, "It's what you like best about hockey, if what you like is women singing."

Ha ha. Get it? It's Broadway, which is un-hip; it's The Sound of Music, which is much-beloved family entertainment without slapstick or bodily fluids, so doubly unhip.

The idea is mildly amusing. In the vacuum left by American Idol, I've just watched several episodes of "So You Think You Can Dance" and Canadian Idol is gearing up to fill the hockey void. Those shows are also mildly amusing, so this new fake show fits right in. It may not be the MOST amusing idea for a fake reality show, but it's not bad.

Guess what? Hard though it is to type this, the show is also NOT FAKE, though apparently the women don't push each other around physically. See for yourself, here. Andrew Lloyd Webber, the man whose own face was the inspiration for his hit show "Cats," is involved somehow.

Well, there really is little to say after that. Except this looks like a really really good summer to spend time outside, enjoying the summer evenings.

Ooo, Shiny!

More snow this morning--an inch or two of the heavy kind that drags down the branches on all the evergreens and looks quite picturesque. But it has jump-started a dormant yearnin', burnin' in me. That's right, folks--I want something clean and new and shiny.

My car actually does okay because it sits outside. I do a lot of scraping (and swearing when I forget to allow time to scrape and am late getting into town), but each storm that dumps precipitation leaves the material for a "carwash." When the snow finally melts, presto! clean car. Roy's car, however, gets filthier and filthier from driving and then is parked in the garage, where it is protected from the elements but never gets cleaned.

But between storms, my car gets pretty gross with salt and dirt. So yeah, the urge for shiny started one afternoon when I was sick of trying to avoid even brushing up against the car, because that always leaves a stain on whatever I'm wearing, which means work. I had this momentary desire for a new car, but $anity returned.

Then I saw ads for iPods on sale and thought "Oooo, I want an iPod." They're such great colors, and I don't have all the music around I'm used to having, and replacing it all on CD seems like an expen$ive proposition, but if I got an iPod, I could download just the songs I want...you get the picture. (I'm excellent at rationalization; it's what's allowed me to live this long.)

What actually stopped the iPod purchase was the color choice. I got all hung up trying to decide between a fuschia one and a blue one (orange is OUT but yellow is still on the table, and an aqua one...well, who'd be able to resist that). And then I realized I don't really want one iPod; I want all the colors as displayed because they're cuter all together than separately. So I resisted the urge and turned on the TV.

On the TV, they were advertising this great sale on Blackberrys, and I thought "Oooo, I want a Blackberry."

And then, in a "wow I coulda had a V8" whack to the forehead, sanity prevailed. The last thing in the world I need is a Blackberry. With my father gone, the only person who ever needs to find me is my husband, and he enjoys the short walk downstairs. We have cell phones only because occasionally I drive to town without him and "everyone" needs one to call 911 if there's a problem. It's a miracle when I remember to turn the damn thing on.

Furthermore, I don't want a Blackberry. I don't want to be available 24/7 (though I basically am, even without my cell phone, because regular phones are in most places I am). I have never wanted a Blackberry and have only grudgingly accepted a cell phone. When I found myself wanting a Blackberry, I knew I was possessed by something--my own version of March Madness, Spring Fever, whatever you want to call it.

But I have to admit, I haven't completely ruled out an iPod. I was forcing myself to wait till the first day of Spring to see if I still wanted one. And now, with the new snowfall, it's not so much that I still want one as that I want one again.

Time to check the ads for Future Shop and Staples...

Lions and Tigers and Bribes, Oh My

Lots of stuff happening in the world, mostly in the land of Absurd-istan.

First, Conrad Black went to jail, an event covered breathlessly by the Canadian media. (Sheesh.) Lots of the live coverage included (to kill time) discussion of how an eight-foot cell, shared with a roommate, will be different from sharing a Florida mansion with Barbara Amiel. The media also covered the type and number of DOGS she has there to keep her company.

My opinion: Black will be OK--his ego is big enough to house the rest of him for whatever portion of 6.5 years he actually serves. Barbara too will be OK--she has a column in Maclean's, which Black apparently still owns, in which she writes of buying a new puppy to keep her company.... Yawn.

Then there's this thing that the Clinton campaign is calling "NAFTA-gate," in which Canadian government officials did, or did not, meddle in the U.S. presidential campaign by leaking information that the Obama campaign did, or did not, share with them about both candidates' recent rhetoric about NAFTA. And the Clinton campaign itself did, or did not, also contact Canadians but not through official channels.

My opinion: Tempest in a teapot. Threats to "re-negotiate" the terms of NAFTA were actually aimed at Mexico and immigration reform. Canada just happens to be extremely interested in the U.S. election, since we don't get one up here this spring, so the story got extensive coverage here. Especially because most up here who object to NAFTA feel it's screwing Canadian industry (for example, softwood lumber, in which the U.S. bullied Canada into forking over lots of money) and can't see giving up more ground.

Finally, and most recently, Prime Minister Stephen Harper may, or may not, have known of an offer to buy the vote of what the media always calls "a dying man," Chuck Cadman, back in the heady days of politics when Paul Martin was PM and Harper, as Opposition Leader, was trying to bring down the government. Chuck Cadman did indeed have inoperable cancer; he had left the Conservative party previously and was voting as an independent MP, and, whatever he was or wasn't offered (and he claimed on camera that nothing had been), he voted to maintain the government. He died a few months after this pivotal vote. It has been confirmed that two Conservative party operatives apparently met with him to offer something. His widow, who in a weird twist is now running for a seat as a Conservative, and his daughter and son-in-law all confirm that. But in another weird twist, the widow is sure that Harper didn't know of the bribe, in spite of an audiotape that appears to point to the contrary, because she looked into his eyes and believed him. Shades of Bush and Putin.

The most recent news on the situation is that Harper served the leaders of the Liberal party, who understandably pounced on this story, with notice that he will sue them for libel for the language that appeared on their web site describing the incident unless a two-language apology is forthcoming by his deadline.

My opinion, Part A: The whole "buying a vote" thing may come under the heading of "politics as usual" in Canada, as it would in the U.S. In fact, the same time the Conservatives may have been trying to buy Cadman's vote, the Liberal government was successful in luring a Conservative MP into the Liberal party by giving her a cabinet post. However, it shouldn't be politics as usual. Yes, I'm a naive idealist. I'm still right about this.

My opinion, Part B: This issue has at last given Opposition Leader Stephane Dion a backbone. Whether he has a leg to stand on (ha ha) as he calls for an investigation into this matter is something else again. I'm at least pleased to see him and the other Liberal leaders uncowed by threats of being sued.

My opinion, Part C: I'm not a big fan of Stephen Harper. Not only do I disagree with his principles, I detest the condescending smugness with which he propounds them. However, I would be surprised to learn he knew of, and authorized, a bribe for a vote. In other words, I had him pegged as a prig, not as a slimeball.

So that's what's in the news up here. Oh, and March break is next week, so much of my attention has been directed toward keeping snowmobiles off the driveways around here. Wish me luck on that one.

Priorities

My own priority for the last few days, and for the next few as well, is unpacking. I suppose a better umbrella term would be "finishing the move." That includes a thorough cleaning of the apartment, ugh. Not my favo(u)rite thing to do.

Last night, I caught a bit of the CBC Sunday evening news. They end with a wrap-up of stories they want us to be sure to be aware of in the coming week. Here are their top three:

1. Today, the House of Commons starts its debate on the role of Canada's troops in Afghanistan. It looks as if the government won't fall based on any Afghanistan-related action, but things can change in this wacky country.
2. Later in the week, the Finance Minister will release the government's proposed budget. It is another topic that could trigger a federal election.
3. Also, late this week is the deadline for hockey trades. Teams across the country will be looking to improve their chances of winning the Stanley Cup.

I'm actually surprised that hockey was as low as #3.

I had lunch yesterday with three ladies I know from church. After many disclaimers about how little they enjoy watching curling and how they wish something else had been on, they analyzed Saturday's playoffs in excruciating detail. They had even picked their favo(u)rites for yesterday's finals. Or whatever they were.

In any case, last night I was relieved to know two things. First, that apparently nothing of importance happened while I was on a news blackout for the past few days. And second, it's great that the intrepid CBC reporters will be watching the hockey trades. I'm sleeping better already--but that's because I'm back in a wonderful bed, the box spring of which came through the window of the upstairs bedroom. We set up the ladder on the snow-covered deck, tied a rope around the box spring, and shoved while our friend in the bedroom pulled. It was ugly, but it worked.

Meanwhile, last night people who make obscene amounts of money to wear makeup and speak someone else's lines took home gold statues. Speaking of absurd-istan.

Anyone want some fabulous, sturdy boxes?

Scandal, Outrage Part Deux

The whole purpose for this post is this photo, from the Korean War memorial in Washington, DC. I could have exchanged it for the woodpile photo in the previous post but I like that picture, too. So you get to see both.

Anyway, COINS STAIN seems like a pretty good motto for life as a whole. Certainly it's an excellent basic principle for politicians to keep in mind--even politicians other than Brian Mulroney.

It's a Scandal, It's an Outrage

That's part of the woodpile--some of the new wood from this past summer. Over the weekend, three separate storm systems hit Canada. A "pineapple express" from Hawaii dumped snow and rain in BC. A Colorado something-or-other brought central Canada snow and wind. And something else ended up in southern Ontario and Atlantic Canada. "Pineapple express" wins in the naming department, obviously.

Finally, the weather has changed the news cycle. All we've been hearing recently is allegations from a soon-to-be-deported German national that he has information to spill about former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. Apparently Mr. Mulroney is bribe-able, to the tune of $300,000 (down from the original deal for $500,000 when Mr. Mulroney didn't deliver on his promise). Furthermore, it was delivered in cash in restaurants--the very stuff of movies. And Mr. Mulroney won a $2 million libel lawsuit a few years ago when similar allegations surfaced but couldn't be proven--and the government paid him that $2 million.

Pretty nifty, getting money from foreign business interests to influence policy AND from the government when they said so but couldn't prove it.

So there's been a lot of yapping back and forth about these allegations and what should happen about this potential deportee. Friday was a big meeting: the House of Commons ethics committee interviewed this German national, who bears an unfortunate resemblance to Colonel Klink but has a lot more media savvy. According to the Maclean's National Editor, Andrew Coyne, Friday's session produced some interesting allegations.

However, a few weeks ago, Coyne, in an opinion piece in the print version of the magazine that I can't find online (sorry), also said that if a former U.S. President were alleged to have accepted a bribe, an thorough investigation into the matter would have been launched.

I had to laugh. Investigations are important south of 49 only to pursue the public's prurient interest in cigars (in the 1990s) and secret identities of agents (in this millennium). When the nation's leaders send troops to kill people, based on lies insisted upon and promulgated by a sitting president, nobody cares.

Maybe Andrew Coyne should move south of the border and try to interest the public in that story. Certainly this scandal--and I'm not making light of it, though I don't think it involves the current government and Prime Minister as much as the Liberal opposition wishes it did--is getting plenty of coverage. Is it a candidate for Absurd-istan? Not yet. (Again: it's my world; I get to decide.)

Still: Thank God for La Nina and the Pineapple Express!!

Does Moving North Mean Moving On?

Warning: If you're not interested in The West Wing (WW), you won't be much interested in this.

By the way, we're back to our usual 2.5 channels. However, during our recent hiatus from junk TV, I dug out The West Wing Season 7. We're through two disks now. It's surprisingly difficult for me to watch!

Part of the problem, of course, is that my father and I talked about WW a lot. Generally speaking, he and I had only a little in common, aside from family and being basically the same kind of person. However, part of that "little" was an interest in politics, particularly as expressed through WW. One of our joint Tucson visits several years ago coincided with a WW marathon on Bravo, and he got hooked.

The Bartlet Presidency was a miniature Eden for most Democrats, beyond my father and me. There (in the pilot episode no less), the Commander in Chief gave the religious right What-For. Walked right into the room and smacked 'em down! BUT--there was way more there there.

Appealing characters held conflicting (and conflicted) perspectives on the Democratic Party's platform. The occasional Republican characters often held thoughtful, nuanced perspectives (and that, at least, still holds true in Season 7). The discourse was very different from the rancor and vying-to-be-the-biggest-victim rhetoric going on in the "real" U.S. during the earlier years of this millennium.

On the other hand, viewers saw plenty of sausage being made. Every character had to compromise on something important, and everyone wrestled with her conscience while she did it. Characters left (some actors purportedly in a snit), as did the creative force. But the world Sorkin created was bigger than Rob Lowe's Sam Seaborn, as it eventually proved to be bigger than his own talented self. I personally can think of about six characters that I either want to be, think I am, or have been at some point in my career. (In real life, I've mostly been one of the interchangeable grunts, Ed and Larry, in a very much smaller fishpond, but I like to imagine that I've been considered a crusty, Toby-like influence. And who doesn't want to be CJ?)

But missing my father isn't the only thing going on with me and the WW World. I hate to admit this, but I think I've moved on (and not in the MoveOn.org way).

In the most recent episode we saw, Jimmy Smits and Alan Alda, in character, held a mostly scripted "debate." Originally, the episode was broadcast live. I had actually seen it while I was visiting my father, but we saw the East Coast version, while the DVD has the West Coast version. Whatever.

This time around, the episode is different. Truthfully, it hardly held my interest. The philosophies themselves aren't interesting to me anymore. The arguments, by which I mean "series of reasoned statements," seem like a recycled rehash of real life (does "Education President" sound familiar to anyone from Arkansas?) and various sentiments put forth in earlier episodes by the Barlet Administration. "They always" raise taxes, cut taxes, spend, run a deficit, build a debt, allow guns to run loose in the country, prevent citizens from defending their own property, act like a soft Mommy, act like a mean Daddy, blah blah blah. "They always." Pff.

The looming issues in real life--the war in Iraq, the all-but-abandoned war in Afghanistan, the contracting economy--loom too large for a made-up debate to seem relevant anymore. It's a good thing this season aired two years ago; if it aired today, the show might lose even more of its audience.

But I think the real problem for me is that my sense of impending doom is kicking in. The Bartlet Presidency as a whole, in Season 7, is winding down. I sense that I'll have to let go of these people someday.

The characters themselves are certainly moving on--the exodus during Season 6 to support Democratic primary candidates was just the start. At some point during Season 6, Josh and Toby had a fight and stopped speaking, thereby depriving viewers of the chance to watch two excellent minds thinking aloud about policies and politics. In Season 7, Toby has been sent off-camera to be spanked for his infamous leak, while Josh is campaigning. Even if the writers had wanted to, they'd have had a hard time getting the two into the same storyline. Even on the phone.

This "moving on" theme is likely real for any administration, and it certainly mirrors real life. For me, watching Canadian politics has apparently replaced watching West Wing. We're in the middle of a provincial election, and there are rumblings about a federal election sometime this winter. I don't get to vote, which seems like a raw deal given all the taxes I pay. What happens in Toronto (for the province) or Ottawa (for the country) is more interesting than what happens in the Bartlet Presidency.

Still, I'll finish the season. My loyalty to Toby, CJ, and Donna (among others) forces me to see how their stories arc, how their lives turn out to this point, how their characters accommodate, compromise, grow.

Plus, I know my father would have wanted me to follow through to the end of the story. And then, he too would want me to move on.

Why Is This Man Smiling?

Did OJ Simpson break into a Las Vegas hotel room, with or without a gun, ringleader or follower, and take sports memorabilia?

Who cares? If he were anyone else, this wouldn't be front-page news. And we wouldn't have to see his smiling face and hear him say, yet again, that the cops are out to get him. People: He loves the attention. Don't give it to him.

Well, I foresee another stretch in which I won't have to watch the "news."

Absurd-istan: Wha?

Absurd-istan, in my world, is anything or anyone who receives an inordinate amount of media attention. For some people (any "starlet" of either gender misbehaving), any media attention is an absurd amount. In other cases, a topic enters the realm of Absurd-istan when I get sick of hearing about it. (Hey, it's my world.)

Case in point: Conrad Black. Canada apparently can't get enough of Conrad Black. Sometimes the folks up here report the stories with a bit of pissiness, possibly because he gave up his Canadian citizenship to buy a title in England. Or maybe they're envious of his success as a media mogul. Recently, Maclean's has published stories that show pity for him because those nasty Americans are persecuting him unfairly and the gazillionaire can't seem to buy a good lawyer.

Whatever, enough already. News flash: The laws apply to everyone. There. That's Conrad Black.

At Last...

It's been quite the week on the home front of the war in Afghanistan.

Troops are rotating in from Quebec, where support for the war is weakest.

Two opinion polls, described in the Christian Science Monitor (http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0719/p99s01-duts.html), give new snapshots of how Canadians view their military and this current deployment.

A report commissioned by the UK House of Commons says that Britain and Canada are bearing a disproportionate load in the supposedly all-NATO mission.

And the July 23 issue of Maclean's (Canada's version of Time) has a couple of articles about Afghanistan.

The first, a column by Andrew Potter, is all about "supporting the troops." Potter says people have two "intellectually and morally" honest ways to support the troops: demand that they be brought home or demand that they be given the resources--human, financial, and political--to win.

Meanwhile, a feature by Sean Maloney claims that the two years of effort in Afghanistan are paying off. He says that "the only way the Taliban can win is to generate doubt and fear in Canada." To do that, their strategy is, in part, to attack troops in such a way that produces mass casualties.

I'm no expert. I'm by no means qualified to evaluate Maloney's statements, the methodology of the public opinion polls, or the accuracy of the reporting of their results. I'm just thrilled that Canadians are finally talking about Afghanistan.

Oh--there's also a report from the front I think of as Absurd-istan. This Maclean's also contains a whine by Barbara Amiel, wife of now-convicted felon Conrad Black (who owns Maclean's) about having to move. You see, the four-month lease on their posh digs ran out, and they didn't expect the trial to take this long, and now she has to, like, find another place to live.

Obviously, her column was written before the conviction. In any case, I'm sure the soldiers and civilians being killed in Afghanistan feel her pain.