sunshine state

As the state of Florida continues to devolve, Canadian snowbirds are warned to fly low.

You may have heard about Florida's new "shoot first" law, which immunizes anyone who "feels threatened" (nice precise term, eh?) and responds to that feeling with a gun. Florida law has always permitted people to shoot home intruders - or anyone thought to be a home intruder. The new law extends that right outside the home, and allows people to carry a concealed weapon.

In response to this lunacy, The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence launched a public education campaign warning tourists that they now face a greater risk of bodily harm within the state of Florida. Good strategy, considering Florida's dependence on tourism. From the Brady Campaign:

Individuals who are unfamiliar with Florida's roads, traffic regulations and customs, or who speak foreign languages, or look different than Florida residents, may face a higher risk of danger - because they may be more likely to be perceived as threatening by Floridians, and because they are unaware of Florida's new law that says individual who feel their safety is threatened or their possessions are at risk are legally authorized to use deadly force.

"We think people visiting Florida should be aware of this law, and act accordingly," said Sarah Brady, Chair of the Brady Campaign. "Visitors should be very careful about getting into an aggressive argument with anyone during their stay."

The Brady Campaign is placing advertisements to educate these tourists and potential tourists in key U.S. gateway cities feeding tourists to Florida, starting with Chicago, Detroit and Boston, and in selected overseas markets beginning with the United Kingdom beginning Sunday, October 2. Educational materials about the law were shipped to more than 120 leading U.S. and international journalists as well as trade publication editors in the travel industry and editors at consumer travel magazines.

The ads read:

Thinking about a Florida vacation? Please ensure your family is safe. A new law in the Sunshine State authorizes nervous or frightened residents to use deadly force. In Florida, avoid disputes. Use special caution in arguing with motorists on Florida roads. Police and prosecutors are concerned about the potential for unnecessary violence.

You'll soon see these ads in Canadian newspapers: the majority of international visitors to Florida are from Canada. An estimated 1.9 million Canadians visit Florida every winter. Let's hope they don't need directions, especially the ones with brown skin and those funny accents.

happy thanksgiving

I've just been reading about Canadian Thanksgiving, which sounds very similar to Thanksgiving in the US, without the football and the Macy's Day Parade.

I haven't celebrated a traditional Thanksgiving in I don't know how long. Some years Allan and I would serve meals to homeless people, sometimes we'd go to a friend's house, and one year we hosted a big gathering of friends. Mostly we'd get some profitable overtime the night before and the day after, and spend the holiday enjoying some quiet time at home together.

So it's kind of amusing that this year we end up doing the family thing for both the Canadian and US Thanksgivings. My mom's visit is purely coincidental, then we'll go to New Jersey in late November, when all our nieces and nephews will be at their parents' home.

I wish Canadian readers a very happy Thanksgiving. I'm very grateful to be here.

hero

This happened yesterday, too, but it deserves its own post. My sister called to tell us that she had saved someone's life. Seriously. The night before, at a restaurant.

Judy is a registered nurse. Out to dinner for her husband's birthday, she noticed a man at a nearby table, and recognized he had Parkinson's disease. What she didn't know is that the man was also blind. His wife was cutting his food for him.

My sister went to the ladies' room, and when she returned, the room was in chaos. Someone was attempting to perform the Heimlich Maneuver on the man with Parkinson's - but he was already unconscious. Apparently instead of eating the piece of meat his wife had cut for him, he had picked up the big piece she was cutting from - and swallowed it. And no one had the slightest idea what to do.

Judy asked if anyone had called 911 yet. They had. Calm and collected, she laid the man out on the floor, undid his shirt and performed CPR. Everyone was shouting things to her, telling her what to do. Everyone was wrong and she ignored them.

She brought him back.

She worked on the man til EMS arrived. The technicians inserted a long instrument down the man's throat - way longer than any Heimlich could have reached - and brought out what looked like half a roast. They took him to the hospital. He's alive because of Judy.

Is that completely amazing?

My favourite part of the story is Mark, my brother-in-law, saying: I knew you would know what to do. I knew you would come out of the bathroom, take charge of the situation, and help that man.

OK everyone, let's all go get certified in CPR!

hnic

My mother and I had a lovely, ordinary day yesterday. We picked up the shades I had ordered at Home Depot, returned something to Ikea, bought a few things at Ikea and Canadian Tire. (The shades fit! Huge sigh of relief.) Later we all took the dogs for a lakeside stroll, hung out in the backyard, had a terrific Greek dinner in the neighbourhood, looked at some of the beautiful streets and houses nearby.

But the unquestionable Canadian highlight of the day came at 8:00 p.m.: we saw "Hockey Night In Canada" for the first time. More specifically, we saw Don Cherry in action.

Allan and I knew of Don Cherry. We've seen pictures of him, a news clip here and there, and when a HNIC outrage erupts, we see it in the US sports media. But we had never seen him at work, until last night. Whoa.

Let me put it this way. When I saw him spoofed on "Air Farce," I assumed it was exaggerated. But the man himself is a spoof - a walking parody.

Come on, folks. Can this be real?

We didn't actually watch the game - and I understand that Cherry's "Coach's Corner" is often more popular than the game itself. Flipping channels, we noticed an A&E "Biography" about Cherry (obviously timed for the return of HNIC), so we were able to get some background. My favorite bit was a talk show that brought together Cherry and Scott Thompson, a humourous but pointed confrontation that ended with the two cuddling on the couch. Priceless. Another interesting factoid: when Cherry's daughter married, her husband took her last name. Love it.

Don Cherry memories and opinions welcome.

porous

Alan With One L sent me this excellent editorial from the New York Times. As B.W. Ventril says:

The New York Times doesn’t yet seem to have had a post-Katrina spinedectomy. In fact, their editorial today tears Bush yet another new asshole. The President is becoming. . . porous. Read it, anyway. It will brighten up your day. Though it will also make you wonder why the Times wasn’t doing this sort of thing, say, two years ago.

I suppose the brief appearance of a spine on the Times' pages is to be lauded, even though we know it's a rental. The editorial ends thusly:

The president's inability to grow beyond his big moment in 2001 is unnerving. But the fact that his handlers continue to encourage him to milk 9/11 is infuriating. For most of us, the memories are fresh and painful. We mourn the people who died on Sept. 11, as we mourn Daniel Pearl and other Americans, not to mention innocents from other countries, who were murdered by terrorists. The administration's penchant for using them as political cover is offensive. It threatens to turn our wounds, and our current fears, into cynical and desperate spin.

Read it, it's good.

mom visit

My mom (CK) arrived safe and sound yesterday. Allan and I ran around the airport a bit - Pearson could use some better signage for arrivals and terminals. But now we know that all flights from the US come in to Terminal 2, Zone A, and by the time CK cleared customs we were waiting for her. It was so good to see her!

We saw a little bit of the neighbourhood, did the house tour and had dinner at our favorite Irish pub, the one with the story we never get tired of telling, and a brief stroll along the lake. We watched a frustrating ball game, and CK got to see the baseball-loving branch of her family in action. I think she was quite bemused by the spectacle.

I don't think I'll have much to report, as we're not planning anything exciting. Just enjoying each other's company.

My mother does have a lot of questions about life in Canada, so if I stumble on any revelations, no matter how trivial, I'll report back. No observation too small for wmtc!

Hey, this morning, for the first time, I could have used gloves while I was walking the dogs. At 7:00 a.m. on the lakefront, it was more than brisk - it was downright chilly. Nice.

swept

How many days til spring training?

Now, about those Maple Leafs...

speaking in code

Making up for lost time, I bring you the esteemed Bob Herbert on the Bill Bennett travesty - a historical view.

Impossible, Ridiculous, Repugnant
By BOB HERBERT

A lot of people are upset over comments made on the radio by the former education secretary and guardian of all things virtuous, Bill Bennett.

A Republican who served in the Reagan cabinet, Mr. Bennett told his listeners: "I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could - if that were your sole purpose - you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down."

After making the point that exterminating blacks would be a most effective crime-fighting tool, he quickly added, "That would be an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down."

When I first heard about Mr. Bennett's comments, I wondered why anyone was surprised. I've come to expect racial effrontery from big shots in the Republican Party. The G.O.P. has happily replaced the Democratic Party as a safe haven for bigotry, racially divisive tactics and strategies and outright anti-black policies. That someone who's been a stalwart of that outfit might muse publicly about the potential benefits of exterminating blacks is not surprising to me at all.

Listen to the late Lee Atwater in a 1981 interview explaining the evolution of the G.O.P.'s Southern strategy:

"You start out in 1954 by saying, 'Nigger, nigger, nigger.' By 1968 you can't say 'nigger' - that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like forced busing, states' rights and all that stuff. You're getting so abstract now [that] you're talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you're talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is [that] blacks get hurt worse than whites.

"And subconsciously maybe that is part of it. I'm not saying that. But I'm saying that if it is getting that abstract, and that coded, that we are doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. You follow me - because obviously sitting around saying, 'We want to cut this,' is much more abstract than even the busing thing, and a hell of a lot more abstract than 'Nigger, nigger.' "

Atwater, who would manage George H. W. Bush's successful run for the presidency in 1988 (the Willie Horton campaign) and then serve as national party chairman, was talking with Alexander P. Lamis, a political-science professor at Case Western Reserve University. Mr. Lamis quoted Atwater in the book "Southern Politics in the 1990's."

The truth is that there was very little that was subconscious about the G.O.P.'s relentless appeal to racist whites. Tired of losing elections, it saw an opportunity to renew itself by opening its arms wide to white voters who could never forgive the Democratic Party for its support of civil rights and voting rights for blacks.

The payoff has been huge. Just as the Democratic Party would have been crippled in the old days without the support of the segregationist South, today's Republicans would have only a fraction of their current political power without the near-solid support of voters who are hostile to blacks.

When Democrats revolted against racism, the G.O.P. rallied to its banner.

Ronald Reagan, the G.O.P.'s biggest hero, opposed both the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act of the mid-1960's. And he began his general election campaign in 1980 with a powerfully symbolic appearance in Philadelphia, Miss., where three young civil rights workers were murdered in the summer of 1964. He drove the crowd wild when he declared: "I believe in states' rights."

Bill Bennett's musings about the extermination of blacks in America (it would be "impossible, ridiculous ... morally reprehensible") is all of a piece with a Republican Party philosophy that is endlessly insulting to black people and overwhelmingly hostile to their interests.

But that white racist vote, once so important to the Democrats and now so important to the G.O.P., has been steadily shrinking. The U.S. is less prejudiced than it was 20 or 30 or 40 years ago, which is why George W. Bush had to try so hard to disenfranchise black voters in Florida in 2000; and why Jeb Bush had to call out the state police to try to intimidate black voters in Orlando, Fla., in 2004; and why Republicans in Georgia have come up with the equivalent of a poll tax (requiring people without a driver's license to pay $20 for a voter identification card), which will hurt poor, black and elderly voters.

Bill Bennett's twisted fantasies are a malignant outgrowth of our polarized past. Our job is to keep them from spreading into the future.

This is a brilliant column. I'm going to save it for future reference.

birthday and visit

Happy Birthday to Mark! Mark is one of my oldest friends, and now my brother-in-law. I believe he is also an occasional reader of wmtc. Have a great day, I hope it's a happy one.

My mom arrives today, staying until Tuesday morning. We're not planning on doing the tourist thing in Toronto. This visit is to see our house, the neighbourhood, the town, do some shopping, lots of gabbing. Just to hang out together. She'll be forced to watch baseball, of course, but hopefully she won't be too bored.

I think I'll still be able to blog in the morning, but I won't be hanging around to reply to comments.

be very afraid

I wish I could get the transcript of last night's "Daily Show". Jon Stewart summed this all up so perfectly, but I can't find a video clip of the bit I need, so I'll write my own, with a nod to our hero Mr Stewart.

You knew it was coming. The war in Iraq is dragging on with no resolution in sight, and no strategy to find one. The US government's response to the Katrina disaster - and their hand in causing it - has been a public relations disaster. Tom DeLay has been indicted again. So what's right around the corner...? You can set your clock by it. The terror threats are back.

I normally don't blog about W's bogus scaremongering. I make it a point to never listen to his speeches and am sometimes only dimly aware that he gave one. This one, however, caught my attention, as Moron specifically mentioned my home town.

As if life isn't hard enough in New York City, New Yorkers now have to live with new "specific yet noncredible" threats, based on information of "doubtful credibility." This time the terrorists are going to use briefcases, baby strollers and packages. Add that to the backpacks already being searched, and every one of the seven million people who ride the New York City subway every day is under suspicion and subject to possible search.

The New York Times reports that most riders are carrying on as usual. Of course. Like they have a choice.

I know if I were still in the city, I'd shrug it off, too. But I'm fuming at the gall of these people. (And I'm glad to know my anger hasn't been completely replaced by cynicism after all.) If the goal of terrorism is to foster fear and insecurity, BushCo are the most effective terrorists on the planet. We already know they are excellent at terrorism's more obvious goal, the slaughter of innocent people.

This also relates to something being discussed in comments here. (Just ignore the ongoing family feud.) One thing that makes life in Canada sweeter than life in the US is the absence of this fearmongering.

Imagine living in a country where the government is constantly telling you that you are under threat of attack. The attack could take myriad forms, from the food you eat and the air you breathe to your dark-skinned neighbour with the foreign-sounding name. There's little you can do to protect yourself against these threats, except to "be alert". Now you are both afraid, and helpless.

Then imagine your government uses the fear and helplessness they've planted as an excuse to make war abroad and curtail basic freedoms at home.

Perhaps you are lucky (or stupid) enough to be able to ignore the war. But the fear still effects you. You pass through security checkpoints several times a day. Your neighbour has been visited by the FBI because he attended a peace meeting. A young man in your town was arrested for wearing a t-shirt that said Peace. A sign in your public library warns you that your browsing habits may be reported to the government. The airline you used last month has admitted to sharing their customer database at the government's request, against their stated policy.

If you speak out against these injustices, you are accused of being unpatriotic, even of supporting the terrorists themselves.

In New York City, I used to wander into office buildings that have beautiful lobbies, with interesting architecture or art, or public plazas. Can't do it anymore. Can't bring a backpack into Yankee Stadium. If you carry a backpack (and now a stroller or a briefcase) on the subway, you might be searched.

On any given day, these indignities might not add up to much. But taken together, they must take a toll. And we can imagine what that toll might be. It might start out as stress and fear, but no one can live in a permanent state of heightened anxiety. Stress gives way to acceptance, fear yields to helplessness. Even our righteous anger gives way to cynicism if we aren't careful.

Now imagine living without all that.

home improvements

The house is really coming along. This week Allan replaced the hideous 1950s fake-chandelier light fixtures with some sleek, simple fixtures we picked up at Ikea. This was no easy job in an old house, where fixtures have been in place for more than 50 years. But our budding Mr Fix-it got the job done. We've also replaced all the gaudy and painted-over switch plates and outlet plates with simple white ones.

Last week we custom-ordered shades for the upstairs rooms (our bedroom and my office). They were really expensive and I'll feel a lot better once they're in and I see that our measurements were accurate.

We're already having trouble keeping the cream-colored carpet clean, despite using the back door for dog walks (so you enter the house on basement-type indoor-outdoor carpet), and wiping the dogs' paws after every walk. And this is before snow, mud and slush. We bought a big plastic runner to use during the winter, but knowing how dirty dogs get in winter, I'm skeptical.

Outside, I'm working on pruning the massive amount of dead branches in the backyard shrubbery. There's a lot of it and I'm doing some every weekend. I told Allan that all I need is the governorship of an execution-happy, oil-rich state, and I'm qualified to be president! He reminded me that I'll never do enough cocaine in my lifetime to qualify.

Starting next week, the leaf vacuum truck comes around! Our area of Mississauga, full of old, large trees, has this great leaf-pickup service. Everyone rakes their leaves into the street and a truck with a giant vacuum comes around the sucks them up. Cool, eh? I'm still not sure how we'll get the backyard leaves out to the curb. Our neighbours told us they rake their leaves onto a big tarp, then drag the tarp to the curb to dump them. I guess we have to buy a tarp.

Today we're cleaning, as my mother arrives on Friday morning. I can't wait to see her! She stays until Tuesday morning. The Thanksgiving timing is purely coincidental; we didn't even realize it was Thanksgiving here when we booked the flight.

what i'm watching: everyday people

On the off-night before the playoffs started, we saw a really good movie: "Everyday People". The story takes place at an old-fashioned Jewish deli, whose future is in doubt as its Brooklyn neighbourhood is gentrified. (Those who know the area will recognize a place like Juniors and the downtown neighbourhood around Borough Hall.) We meet some of the people who work there, the owner and the developer - a glimpse behind the headline when a local institution closes.

The filmmaker, Jim Mackay, is known for working with largely unknown actors, and holding improvisation workshops to develop the script from people's experiences. The results are characters with subtlety and depth, instead of the stock-character types often seen in ensemble scripts. Mackay presents questions, but he doesn't point the viewer to easy answers.

Mackay's previous film, "Our Song", was about a marching band in a low-income Brooklyn high school. It was excellent - and so was "Everyday People". Here's a story about Mackay and the making of Everyday People, and an interview with him after the release of Our Song.

Two poignant and subtle urban movies, worth adding to your list.

oh and two

The Red Sox blew a 4-0 lead last night, and lost 5-4. They're down two games to none to the White Sox.

Several teams have come back from 0-2 to win a best-of-five series. The ones I immediately remember are the 2001 Yankees, who won three straight to beat the A's, and the 1995 Yankees, who lost three straight to the Mariners. So I won't despair.

The way this Red Sox team is playing right now, I wouldn't pick them to win three straight. But I'm prepared to be surprised.

two good reads

I still haven't subscribed to the New York Times's latest revenue-raising pitch, but a thoughtful wmtc reader has been emailing me columns by Paul Krugman, Bob Herbert and Frank Rich. Unfortunately, I can't share them, as they're in pdf form, but the most recent columns were so good that I took out yet another free trial. (Now I have to cancel free trial subscriptions on three different newspapers before I get billed.)

So now I have to paste in the full text, and not provide working links. Poor blogosphere etiquette, but that's the Times's fault.

For No Good Reason
by Bob Herbert

"You can keep the flowers blooming on their graves forever. It won't change the fact that they died for nothing." - antiwar protester, circa 1969

It's finally becoming clear on Capitol Hill, and maybe even in the White House, that the United States cannot win the war in Iraq. The only question still to be decided is how many more American lives will be wasted in George W. Bush's grand debacle.

The wheels have fallen off the cart in Iraq, and only those in the farthest reaches of denial are hanging on to the illusion of an American triumph over the insurgency.

Air Force General Richard Myers, who retired Friday as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was publicly chastised at an Armed Services Committee hearing last week by Senator John McCain of Arizona, who has always been a strong proponent of the war.

Senator McCain bluntly declared that "things have not gone as we had planned or expected, nor as we were told by you, General Myers."

The general replied, "I don't think this committee or the American public has ever heard me say that things are going very well in Iraq."

The gruesome events throughout Iraq over the past month or so were understandably overshadowed in the American media by the obliteration of New Orleans and other matters connected to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. An apocalyptic tone was set on Aug. 31 when nearly 1,000 people were killed in a stampede on a bridge in northern Baghdad. The stampede was provoked by rumors of a suicide bomber.

Another two dozen Iraqis were killed in attacks by insurgents on Sept. 3. A few days later a taxi blew up outside a crowded restaurant in Basra, killing 16. That attack came just hours after four American contractors in Basra were killed by a bomb that was detonated next to their convoy.

The violence would continue without respite. Nearly 200 Iraqis were killed in just 48 hours in a series of suicide bombings in Baghdad on Sept. 14 and 15.

On the evening of Sept. 17, a Saturday, insurgents used a remote control device to detonate a car bomb in a crowded marketplace on the outskirts of Baghdad. At least 30 people were killed. A dozen Americans, including a State Department aide and eight soldiers, were killed in a series of attacks from the 19th through the 23rd of September.

And so on.

The president who slept through the early days of the agony in New Orleans is sleepwalking through the never-ending agony in Iraq. During an appearance at a naval base in California, Mr. Bush characterized the war that he started in Iraq as the moral equivalent of America's struggle against the Nazis and the Japanese in World War II.

If that's true, the entire nation should be mobilized. But, of course, it's not true. This is a reckless, indefensible war that has been avoided like the plague by the children of the privileged classes.

Even the most diehard defenders of this debacle are coming to the realization that it is doomed. So the party line now is that the Iraqis at some point will have to bear the burden of Mr. Bush's war alone.

Talk about a cruel joke. On the same day that Senator McCain faced off with General Myers, more than 100 people were killed in a series of car bombs in a town north of Baghdad; five U.S. soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in Ramadi; and the American general in charge of U.S. forces in Iraq, George Casey, admitted before the Armed Services Committee that only 1 of the Iraqi Army's 86 battalions was capable of fighting the insurgency without American help.

The American death toll in Iraq is fast approaching 2,000. If the public could see the carnage close up, the way it saw the horror of New Orleans, the outrage would be beyond belief.

You never want to say that brave troops died for the mindless fantasies spun by a gang of dissembling, inept politicians. But what else did they die for?

And what about all those men and women, some of them barely out of childhood, who are lying awake nights, hardly able to move their broken, burned and paralyzed bodies? What do we tell them as they lie there, unable to curb the pain or fight off the depression, or even begin to understand the terrible thing that has happened to them?

What do we tell them about this war that their country inflicted on them for no good reason whatsoever?

Anyone wondering what's going on with the victims of Hurricane Katrina? Or should I say, some W victims on the mainland.

Miserable By Design
by Paul Krugman

Federal aid to victims of Hurricane Katrina is already faltering on two crucial fronts: health care and housing. Incompetence is part of the problem, but deeper political issues also play a crucial role.

Start with health care, where conservative senators, generally believed to be acting on behalf of the White House, have blocked bipartisan legislation that would provide all low-income victims of Katrina with health coverage under Medicaid.

In a letter urging Senate leaders to reject the bill, Mike Leavitt, the secretary of Health and Human Services, warned that it would create "a new Medicaid entitlement." He asserted that victims can be taken care of by Medicaid "waivers," which basically amount to giving refugees the health benefits, if any, that they would have been entitled to in their home states - and no more.

As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities points out, many needy victims won't qualify for aid. For example, Medicaid doesn't cover childless adults of working age. In fact, surveys show that many destitute survivors of Katrina are being denied Medicaid, and some are going without medicines they need.

Local hospitals and doctors will often treat Katrina victims even if they can't pay. But this means that communities that have welcomed Katrina refugees will, in effect, be financially punished for their generosity - something local officials will remember in future crises. (The administration has offered vague, unconvincing assurances that it will do something to compensate medical caregivers. It has offered much more concrete assurances that it will reimburse religious groups that provide aid.)

What about housing? These days, both conservatives and liberals agree that public housing projects are a bad idea, and that housing vouchers - which help the poor pay rent - are much better. In the aftermath of the 1994 Northridge earthquake, special housing vouchers issued to victims worked very well.

But the administration has chosen, instead, to focus its efforts on the creation of public housing in the form of trailer parks, which have been slow to take shape, will almost surely be more expensive than a voucher program and may create long-term refugee ghettoes. Even Newt Gingrich calls this "extraordinarily bad policy" that "violates every conservative principle."

What's going on here? The crucial point is that President Bush has been forced by events into short-term actions that conflict with his long-term goals. His mission in office is to dismantle or at least shrink the federal social safety net, yet he must, as a matter of political necessity, provide aid to Katrina's victims. His problem is how to do that without legitimizing the very role of government he opposes.

This dilemma explains the administration's opposition to Medicaid coverage for all Katrina refugees. How can it provide that coverage without undermining its ongoing efforts to reduce the Medicaid rolls? More broadly, if it accepts the principle that all hurricane victims are entitled to medical care, people might start asking why the same isn't true of all American citizens - a line of thought that points toward a system of universal health insurance, which is anathema to conservatives.

As for the administration's odd insistence on providing public housing instead of relying on the market, The Los Angeles Times reports that Department of Housing and Urban Development officials initially announced plans to issue rent vouchers, then backed off after meeting with White House aides. As the article notes, the administration has "repeatedly sought to cut or limit" the existing housing voucher program.

This suggests that what administration officials fear isn't that housing vouchers would fail, but that they would succeed - and that this success would undermine the administration's ongoing efforts to cut back housing aid.

So here's the key to understanding post-Katrina policy: Mr. Bush can't avoid helping Katrina's victims, but he doesn't want to legitimize institutions that help the needy, like the housing voucher program. As a result, his administration refuses to use those institutions, even when they are the best way to provide victims with aid. More generally, the administration is trying to treat Katrina's victims as harshly as the political realities allow, so as not to create a precedent for other aid efforts.

As the misery of the hurricane's survivors goes on, remember this: to a large extent, they are miserable by design.

Two great columns, about two sides of the same coin.

vancouver number one

Certain New Jersey residents, take note.

Longtime wmtc reader RobfromAlberta pointed out that, once again, Vancouver has been rated the world's most liveable city. From the CNN story:

Vancouver is the world's most desirable place to live, according to a new survey, while Papua New Guinea's Port Moresby is at the other end of the scale.

The Canadian city, nestled on the Pacific coast, was one of four locations in that country to rank at the top of the Economist Intelligence Unit's livability survey, which looked at conditions in 127 cities.

The other top-ranking Canadian cities were Toronto, Calgary and Montreal.

Australia also fared well in the survey by the London-based group, with Melbourne, Perth, Adelaide and Sydney scoring high marks along with Vienna, Austria, and Geneva and Zurich in Switzerland.

The EIU study assessed nearly 40 indicators in five broad categories -- stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education and infrastructure.

ALPF supplied me with a link to the EIU itself, which goes into greater detail about how cities are ranked. About Canada and its neighbour to the south, it says:

With low crime, little threat from instability or terrorism and a highly developed infrastructure, Canada has the most liveable destinations in the world. With a rating of just 1% (as a result of a small threat from petty crime) Vancouver is the highest ranked city of all 127 surveyed. A further two Canadian cities (Montreal and Toronto) feature in the top five with ratings of just 3%. All 4 cities surveyed score well in all respects.

Although higher crime rates and a greater threat of terror puts US cities below those of Canada, US cities are still among the world's most liveable. Cleveland and Pittsburgh are the joint best scoring cities in the United States (7%), in joint 26th place in the global ranking. A lack of availability of recreational activities and certain infrastructural shortfalls put Lexington as the least liveable US city surveyed, in 56th place - although its rating of 13% is still low.

So according to this ranking, three of the top five most liveable cities in the world are in Canada.

what i'm watching: canadian comedy

We have digital cable, which brings us a ridiculous number of channels that I'll never watch. But you need digital cable in order to get the Major League Baseball package, so there it is.

I don't know what most of the channels are yet. There are Canadian networks I've never heard of, plus several channels from Buffalo, Detroit and elsewhere.

One thing I've noticed, though: at any time of day or night, there are at least three episodes of The Simpsons on. At the times of day when I feel like vegging out with a little comedy, I can see any or all of Kids In The Hall, Red Green (which I really like), Air Farce, Family Guy, Seinfeld or The Simpsons. If I liked Everybody Loves Raymond or Friends (which I don't), I could watch one of these eight shows at any hour, round the clock.

It's complete overkill, but on the other hand, if I watch a half-hour of TV a day (excluding baseball), at least I'll always enjoy it.

I also caught an episode of Corner Gas, which Rob mentioned. I liked it! It's great to see a sitcom without a laugh track, big points for that. (Trivia note: Larry David wanted Seinfeld to be produced without a laugh track, and fought like hell for it, but the networks wouldn't do it. Note that Curb Your Enthusiasm doesn't have one.)

I won't even mention yesterday's playoff game. I will just move on.

another ex-pat view

Kyle_From_Ottawa (should I link to you? are you blogging anymore?) sent me an interesting essay written by an American now living in Australia.

The writer lives in Tasmania, about as far from the United States as you can get, and he writes about visiting the US after an absence of many years. His daughter and his elderly mother still live there, but I guess that's not worth overcoming his loathing for a visit.

He writes mainly of the "security" measures he encountered traveling to and from Los Angeles.

And this thought occurs to me: if, and I say here in capital letters, IF, there were any real terrorists out there who are not CIA plants, and if they wanted to bring the USA to a virtual halt, there would be no need whatsoever to get explosives or weapons on to an aircraft. Not at all. Suppose a suicide bomber, or a mind-controlled slave, came into the international check-in area of LAX with two large suitcases packed solid with explosives surrounded by small metal bits, giant Claymore mines, and when in the midst of all those thousands of people queueing up, detonated them.

I mean, how could air transport occur if a person couldn't even take their bags into a terminal? What a waste all this illusion of security is making! If a half-assed writer from Tasmania can think up such atrocities over a beer, what could someone dedicated to creating chaos come up with?

Since these things aren't happening, maybe despite DU [depleted uranium] and all the other atrocities committed by the criminals in Washington, D.C., maybe there aren't any real terrorists out there.

With a mind spinning with thoughts like this, I got on the Qantas jet and I confess, that the moment the cabin crew closed the hatch, a palpable sense of relief went through me, as though somehow the crew had created a bit of magic, made the plane into Australian national territory while still on the ground at LAX. I was on my way home.

And I made a vow: I would not return to the USA until there had been a genuine regime change, and by that I did not mean the Democratic party.

I can relate to that sense of relief at not being part of the US anymore. I feel it daily. But I chose Toronto over, say, New Zealand, for a reason, and I'll be traveling to the US regularly. In fact, I've already booked my first trip to New York. We'll probably vacation in the US sometimes, too, as there are many national parks - and baseball parks - we've yet to visit.

Speaking of which: playoff games at 1:00, 4:00 and 8:00 today. We don't watch every game during the Division Series - there are just too many. We'll be exhausted just following both the Red Sox and Yankees series.

the new year

If I hadn't spoken to my mother yesterday, and read this nice comment from wmtc friend B.W. Ventril, I would have completely forgotten that it's Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. You can never forget the Jewish high holy days in New York, no matter what your religion. Schools are closed, parking rules are suspended, large groups of people in suits are walking about, on their way to or from synagogue.

Our old neighbourhood had a large orthodox community, so I was always reminded both of the holidays and of my non-observant status. Every year at this time, uniformed police officers would appear on our sidewalks, a practice begun by one Rudy Giuliani to sew up more Jewish votes. (To my knowledge, there had never been anti-Semetic violence in Washington Heights.)

No such reminders here in Port Credit. Maybe if I lived in Toronto or Montreal I'd see more Jewishness?

In today's Globe And Mail, there's a column about the state of anti-Semitism in Canada. I have a brief free trial subscription which lets me read their columnists online, so I can bring it to you here. The writer is honorary legal counsel of the League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith Canada.

Is the glass half full or half empty for Canada's Jews?
by Marvin Kurz

As Canadian Jews file into synagogues this week to celebrate the Jewish New Year, they are being met by the scrutiny of security guards. What's happened to make us feel insecure in our places of worship?

For years, the main threat to Canadian Jews came from the extreme right. But the Heritage Front and its ilk have been largely neutralized. Ernst Zundel languishes in a German jail. Shouldn't Canadian Jews be resting easy? Not according to B'nai Brith's annual audit of anti-Semitic incidents that shows a marked increased in each of the past few years. Incidents include the fire bombing of a Jewish school in Montreal, suspicious fires in a number of Canadian synagogues, numerous cemetery desecrations, as well as the spray painting of anti-Semitic graffiti on synagogues, Jewish schools and homes. We have even seen a murder motivated in part by anti-Semitic rage.

All of this flies in the face of a post-Holocaust atmosphere in which anti-Semitic sentiment in Canada was widely denounced, and Canadian Jews moved from the margins to become an integral part of mainstream society. Over the past year, however, many prominent Jews have attracted attention for more than their achievements.

In December, the Supreme Court heard the appeal of Rwandan war criminal Leon Mugesera. His lawyer, Guy Bertrand, argued that Mr. Mugesera, accused of war crimes against other Africans, was the victim of a Jewish conspiracy. He argued that Canada's Justice Minister, Irwin Cotler, a Jew, spurred on by a lobby of prominent Jews, appointed a Jewish judge, Rosalie Abella, to the court just to decide this case. (In fact, Judge Abella had already withdrawn from the case.) In rejecting these offensive claims, the Supreme Court reprimanded Mr. Bertrand, who claimed, in response, he had been "crucified."

More recently, Mr. Cotler was attacked by marijuana crusader Marc Emery, whose website described the Justice Minister as a "Jew-Nazi" and a "Nazi-Jew." When this was discovered in August, Mr. Emery amended the site to brand Mr. Cotler a kapo (a Jewish concentration camp inmate who assisted the Nazis). This was more than personal. The slur singled out the Minister for his religion, and posited an equivalence between Jews and the perpetrators of the Holocaust.

Mohammed Elmasry, the president of the Canadian Islamic Congress who was denounced last fall for claiming that all Israeli adults are fair game for attacks, recently made another offensive remark. He claimed that two Jewish policy advisers in senior Ottawa positions should be fired because of their support for Israel. He argued this support rendered them unable to impartially advise the two cabinet ministers who appointed them. A similar allegation was recently levelled against Monte Kwinter, the Ontario Minister of Community Safety. Mr. Kwinter, a Jew, joined a group of police chiefs who met their Israeli counterparts to discuss security issues. Despite the fact that the group also met their Palestinian counterparts, one pro-Palestinian group reportedly labelled Mr. Kwinter "an agent of a foreign country."

Of course, these brazen verbal attacks are not the reason that Jews need security guards at their synagogues. But both are manifestations of an atmosphere in which Canadian Jews are increasingly feeling under attack. This distress is spurred by campaigns from the elements of the left and of the Muslim and Arab worlds to vilify Israel, the Jewish state, as the Jew among nations. Last year's arson at a Jewish elementary school in Montreal was the clearest example: The perpetrators attempted to justify their crime against Jewish schoolchildren by their anger at the Israeli government.

Almost three years ago, I wrote in these pages that it's "still great to be a Jew in Canada," that the scale of recent persecution experienced in Europe and elsewhere was not to be found here. Since then, we've seen further appointments of Jews to high office, but we've also witnessed invective against those very people and other acts of anti-Semitism.

So, is the glass half full or half empty for Jews in Canada? The answer may be found in an old joke. A group of elderly Jewish men met weekly for a bagel and a gloomy chat about world affairs. One day, the dour Max surprised his friends by announcing that upon reflection, he's an optimist after all. Sam observes his friend's still sullen demeanour and asks, "If you're such an optimist, why are you still looking so worried?" Max replied: "Do you think it's easy being an optimist?"

Like Max, I refuse to be pessimistic about a wonderful land like Canada. However, as a guard checks my bags at synagogue this high holiday, I'll have to work a bit harder to retain my optimism.

L'Shana tovah tikatavu, may you be inscribed in the book of life.

what i missed

This is a report on the recent anti-war actions in Washington, written by United For Peace and Justice, the organizers.

THREE DAYS IN SEPTEMBER

What an amazing three days it was!

The Sept. 24 - 26th actions in Washington, DC offered a broad cross section of people many ways to express their opposition to the war on Iraq. The mobilization turned up the heat on the Bush administration and Congress while making connections between the war and other pressing issues of the day. We are proud to report on the tremendous success of these three days. As we return to organizing in our communities, schools, religious centers, and workplaces, our movement is stronger. Hundreds of thousands of people are re-energized for the work ahead, and Congress and the White House now recognize our movement as a force to reckon with.

The events and activities that took place these three days could not have happened without the direct involvement of scores of UFPJ member groups and hundreds of volunteers. If you helped get the word out, sold bus tickets, organized or participated in a contingent, helped plan any of the activities, distributed posters or leaflets, or made a financial contribution, then you helped to make history! Thank you, to each and every one who helped bring this ambitious three day program to life!

In the report below we have tried to capture some of the spirit and energy of the Sept. 24 - 26th antiwar mobilization organized by United for Peace and Justice. This is only a snap shot of what happened during these 3 days and we hope to bring you more detailed reports in the coming weeks. To see photos from these days, visit dianelent.com/s24mobe1.htm.

On Saturday, Sept. 24th hundreds of thousands of people - our estimate is at least 300,000 - marched in front of the White House and through the streets of Washington, DC in a powerful, unified statement of opposition to the war in Iraq and for justice for the people of the Gulf Coast. The call was clear: it is time to end this war and to bring the troops home! People poured into the nation's capital from every corner of the country, from all walks of life and many different communities. As impressive as the numbers were, the creativity and commitment of this massive number of people was what made the day so energizing.

The day began with a rally on the Ellipse, with the White House in the backdrop. Some of the speakers included: Rep. Cynthia McKinney, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Cindy Sheehan, Curtis Muhammad (organizer from New Orleans), UFPJ National Coordinator Leslie Cagan, and Damu Smith from Black Voices for Peace. But the crowds out on the streets were so large that most people never made it to the Ellipse. By 12:30 people were in motion, determined to have their voices heard. And for the next four and a half hours the march unfolded with contingents of military families and veterans, labor, students, religious communities, women, people of color groups, counter-recruitment activists, the nuclear disarmament movement, the lgbt/queer community, seniors, professional organization, state-wide delegations, and so many more all marching to end the war on Iraq. United for Peace and Justice and other coalitions and organizations had distributed many signs and posters, but people's home made signs told the world where they had come from and what they felt most deeply. The streets of Washington are wide (we marched on roads that were 6 or 8 lanes) and there was hardly a gap as this incredible sea of humanity carried its message of peace and justice.

By the time the march took off, the two day Peace and Justice Festival organized by UFPJ was already up and running on the Washington Monument grounds. Throughout the weekend, thousands of people visited the 17 tents we had set up where groups working on common issues offered information, interactive displays, ways to get involved, and much more. More than 150 member groups of UFPJ participated in the booths covering a range of issues: Iraq, Counter-Recruitment, The Wars at Home, Real Support for the Troops, Global Justice, Legislative Action, Clergy and Laity Concerned About Iraq, Palestine, Nuclear Abolition, Stop Global Warming, Preventing the Next War, Local Costs of War, Youth and Students, and Grassroots Organizing (UFPJ Member Groups).

At 2:30 the Operation Ceasefire concert kicked off at the Washington Monument grounds. This amazing event included performances by Joan Baez, the Machetres, Living Things, Wayne Kramer and the Bellrays, Steve Earle, The Coup, Sweet Honey in the Rock, The Evens, Ted Leo + Pharmacists, Head Roc, Thievery Corporation, Bouncing Souls, Le Tigre, and Fort Knox Five DJ Set. Interspersed between the music were dynamic speeches by Julian Bond, Rev. Al Sharpton, Representatives Maxine Waters, Lynn Woolsey, Barbara Lee and Raul Grijalva, Ann Wright, Jim Hightower, Medea Benjamin, representatives of Military Families Speak Out, Gold Star Families for Peace, and others. One of the high points of the event - which went to 1:30 in the morning with 40,000 still in attendance - was when Etan Thomas, the professional basketball player with the Washington Wizards, read his poetry and brought it all together.

On Sunday, Sept. 25th smaller but vitally important events took place. The Peace and Justice Festival continued throughout the day, and trainings for both the day of Congressional Lobbying and the Nonviolent Civil Disobedience action at the White House took place. In addition, the Sylvan Theatre on the Washington Monument grounds was used for a day-long concert and the Counter-Recruitment Working Group of UFPJ had an afternoon gathering that brought together people from around the country doing this work. The day closed out with what has been described as the one of the most moving Interfaith Religious Services people had ever been to. Using several of the tents that had been set up for the Peace and Justice Festival, and building on the practice of tent revivals, leaders from major religious traditions were joined by upwards of 500 people in articulating an ethical critique of the war. Clergy and Laity Concerned about Iraq (which is housed within UFPJ) organized this inspiring gathering.

On Monday, Sept. 26th two events unfolded throughout the day: the Congressional Lobby Day on Capital Hill and the Nonviolent Civil Disobedience action at the White House. Organized by working groups of UFPJ, the success of these two events represented significant growth for our coalition.

The Lobby Day took our antiwar message to the halls of Congress, where at least 800 (and possibly as many as 1000) people representing more than 40 states met with the offices of over 300 senators and representatives in the largest-ever pro-peace lobby day. We urged our representatives to take every action to stop this war, cut off funding for the occupation, support existing legislation that moves towards bringing the troops home, stop building permanent bases in Iraq, provides funds as compensation for the damage caused by the war, and forbid schools from sharing student information with military recruiters without parental permission. The September 26 Lobby Day was just the beginning of our efforts to create a coordinated grassroots legislative action network to increase the pressure on Congress to stop funding the war and to bring the troops home now! The lobby visits should continue so visit http://www.unitedforpeace.org/article.php?id=3074 to download UFPJ's legislative priorities, our legislative asks and talking points.

The civil resistance action at the White House drew over 1,000 people with upwards of 400 people risking arrest. A small delegation that included religious leaders and Gold Star families approached the gate to the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue and asked to meet with the president. As was expected, they were denied such a meeting and they proceeded to sit on the sidewalk in front of the White House, soon to be joined by the others. It took some time, but by late afternoon over 370 people had been arrested in what is probably one of the largest civil resistance actions ever carried out at the White House. This work will also continue and plans for other activities around the country will be announced in the coming weeks.

In the coming days and weeks we will be sharing more details about what happened and certainly new ideas about where we go from here. But in the meantime, we hope those of you were in Washington, DC will share your experiences with others who couldn't make it. The energy we felt in the streets for those three days needs to be carried out to every corner of this country – and you are the people to make that happen.

We also hope you will continue to generously lend your financial support to United for Peace and Justice. Our work is far from over and we need your support as much as ever before! Thanks for whatever you can do!!

august wilson

A great writer is gone.

August Wilson, one of the great American playwrights, died yesterday at the too-young age of 60. Allan and I saw several of his plays on Broadway; we both loved his work.

Most of Wilson's plays were part of an overall theatrical cycle that chronicled the African American experience. From the New York Times obituary:

Each of the plays in the cycle was set in a different decade of the 20th century, and all but "Ma Rainey" took place in the impoverished but vibrant African-American Hill District of Pittsburgh, where Mr. Wilson was born. In 1978, before he had become a successful writer, Mr. Wilson moved to St. Paul, and in 1994 he settled in Seattle, where he died. But his spiritual home remained the rough streets of the Hill District, where as a young man he sat in thrall to the voices of African-American working men and women. Years later, he would discern in their stories, their jokes and their squabbles the raw material for an art that would celebrate the sustaining richness of the black American experience, bruising as it often was.

In his work, Mr. Wilson depicted the struggles of black Americans with uncommon lyrical richness, theatrical density and emotional heft, in plays that gave vivid voices to people on the frayed margins of life: cabdrivers and maids, garbagemen and side men and petty criminals. In bringing to the popular American stage the gritty specifics of the lives of his poor, trouble-plagued and sometimes powerfully embittered black characters, Mr. Wilson also described universal truths about the struggle for dignity, love, security and happiness in the face of often overwhelming obstacles.

In dialogue that married the complexity of jazz to the emotional power of the blues, he also argued eloquently for the importance of black Americans' honoring the pain and passion in their history, not burying it to smooth the road to assimilation. For Mr. Wilson, it was imperative for black Americans to draw upon the moral and spiritual nobility of their ancestors' struggles to inspire their own ongoing fight against the legacies of white racism.

In an article about his cycle for The Times in 2000, Mr. Wilson wrote, "I wanted to place this culture onstage in all its richness and fullness and to demonstrate its ability to sustain us in all areas of human life and endeavor and through profound moments of our history in which the larger society has thought less of us than we have thought of ourselves."

Although we saw many of Wilson's plays, none would ever affect us as deeply as the first: Fences, which starred James Earl Jones, back when he was still an actor. It was the kind of emotional experience that can leave me in awe of the potential power of theatre.

Here's a little NPR item which talks about the connection between Wilson's plays and the blues. There are links to other stories about him, and audio clips of Bessie Smith, among others.

I was so sad to hear Wilson died so young. I will miss him.