Frances Bula has written two very good pieces on the Olympic Village story in this morning's Globe.
One is called "Sun will shine on athletes village, builder says"
The other is "Out of Mud, Olympic Village a showcase of ecology."
The second piece is a tour through the sludge and rain to view first-hand the building progress and it's good clean messy fun.
But the first article is the one with all the real juice.
First we get the Millenium GM chronicling the entire list of hardships and challenges that he has heroically overcome. Hahahaha...It's a riot.
Then, moving on to the thorny issue of What Idiot Signed Off on this Deal, we get one mayor after another disclaiming any part of the guarantees that the City has apparently provided in case of problems.
Why hasn't CBC TV, which specializes these days in sophomoronic humor signed up Owen, Campbell and Sullivan (An Act Funnier than it's Name!!! Tonight at 8!!!) to do a song and dance number called, "I Didn't Do it, Do it, Do it, I Swear."
The photo, by the way, is of the Salt Building (1930), which has been preserved and upgraded and will become a restaurant and pub in the Mark James Group after the Olympics.
"B.C.'s Solicitor-General has ordered his staff to study the possibility of fining outdoor enthusiasts who enter out-of-bounds areas at ski resorts and in backcountry B.C."
Why study?
Why the possibility?
Why doesn't John van Dongen simply do what he should do?
"No new policy would be ready this winter because the idea requires a lot of discussion."
About what?
"Mr. van Dongen said he does not believe in forcing people who break the rules to pay for rescue efforts. "
Why not?
We force people to pay for traffic violations including the horrifying bad taste of parking for 62 minutes rather than the 60 you've paid for.
Of course, no one really ever pays these fines, which is why any city of any size in Canada typically has a backlog of about 300,000 unpaid traffic tickets.
Here's my idea.
The signs that say, "Ski area BOUNDARY, not patrolled," should instead say, "NO RESCUE ZONE. WANT BIG THRILLS? DIE AT YOUR OWN EXPENSE, DUMMY"
Of course,we would never do such a thing. We are a civilized caring society. We rescue almost everyone we can.
If you want to kill yourself with various narcotics, we will rescue you by giving you needles and crack pipes and mouth pieces and places to take your drugs away from the winter winds. If we can get away with it under the guise of "science" or progress or improvement or some such, we will rescue you by giving you your drug of choice or a near facsimile or a new pill or a baby lulu to suck on at the very least.
There are some rare exceptions, of course.
If you are old and cold and starving and living in a cardboard box on the street, we wouldn't want to force you to come in out of the storm. That might violate your human right to die in the cold.
But other than that we are the rescue society.
So keep schussing down those unmarked mountains in the avalanche zones, baby. Never fear, The Rescue Society is near.
It is your god given and charter blessed right to behave like a yahoo and be bailed out by taxpayer dollars and the efforts of men and women who put themselves at risk to save your sorry ass.
Despite Hamas’s unrelenting rocket attacks, Israel continues to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, warning the civilian population to stay clear of terrorist sites. Said Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, "Israel has made it clear that we are fighting against terrorism, not the Gazan residents, and the extremists are the ones who are taking advantage of the concern of the humanitarian organizations and the international community as a means of pressuring Israel." [2]
Israel’s Humanitarian Aid to Gaza
396 truckloads of humanitarian aid that have been delivered through Israeli crossings into Gaza since the beginning of Operation Cast Lead, including basic food commodities, medication, medical supplies, blood units and donations by various governments and blood units. [3] 80 truckloads of humanitarian aid expected to arrive in Gaza on Jan. 5 [4] 20 Palestinians evacuated to Israel for medical treatment (including two children) [5] 800,000+ leaflets disseminated by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to Gaza civilians instructing them to stay away from terrorist and weapons storage sites [6] 70+ times the IDF warned populated areas before conducting airstrikes [7] 10,000 tons of aid transported into Gaza at the request of international organizations, the Palestinian Authority and various governments since the beginning of Operation Cast Lead. The World Food Program informed Israel last week that that it would cease shipment of food to Gaza because warehouses are at full capacity, with enough food to last two weeks. [8] 0 wounded Palestinians allowed by Hamas to cross from Gaza into Egypt for treatment. [9]
Iran-backed Hamas Rocket, Mortar Attacks and Nuclear Developments
10,000+ rockets and mortars fired from Gaza since 2001. [10] 3,200+ rockets and mortars fired from Gaza in 2008 alone. [11] 6,500+ rockets and mortars fired from Gaza since Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005. [12] 538+ rockets and mortars fired from Gaza into Israeli territory during the ceasefire from June 19 to Dec. 19, 2008. [13] 480 rockets and mortars fired from Gaza into Israel since Operation Cast Lead began Dec. 27. [14] 28 deaths caused by rockets and mortars fired from Gaza into Israel since 2001. The dead include Israelis, Palestinians and foreign workers. Since the ceasefire ended, Iran-backed Palestinian groups in Gaza fired rockets and mortars that killed an Israeli-Arab construction worker and a mother of four who was seeking shelter in a bus station as a rocket warning siren sounded. [15] 1,000+ people in Israel injured from rockets and mortars fired from Gaza since 2001, including Israelis, Palestinians and foreign workers. Since the start of Israel’s defensive operation in Gaza Dec. 27, 90 Israelis have been injured and at least 244 have been treated for shock. [16] 20,000 Hamas terrorists Israel is targeting as part of its defensive operations [17] 1,000,000 Israeli civilians Hamas is targeting and can reach. [18] 15 seconds Israelis have to get to a bomb shelter once a warning siren has sounded. [19] 8 years Israel has endured rockets and mortar fire from Gaza [20] 3 mosques in Gaza used as weapons, ammunitions and explosives depots that were struck by the Israel Defense Forces during the operation in Gaza. [21] The strikes occurred only at night and never during prayer times, to avoid civilian casualties. 4 UN Security Council resolutions passed since 2006 to try to stop Iran from enriching uranium. [22] 5,000+ number of centrifuges operating in Iran to enrich uranium, the material used to produce a nuclear weapon. [23]
What Israel Gave Up in Hopes of Peace - Gaza Withdrawal Aug. 2005
100% proportion of the Gaza Strip evacuated and handed over to the
Palestinians. [24] 300 square miles of the West Bank evacuated. [25] 21 Israeli settlements uprooted in the Gaza Strip. [26] 4 Israeli settlements uprooted in the West Bank. [27] 48 graves uprooted in Gaza’s former Gush Katif Cemetery, including six graves of area residents murdered by terrorists. [28] 9,000 approximate number of Israelis, including 1,700 families, who lived in Gaza and the northern West Bank. All of them were moved out as part of the withdrawal. [29] 38 synagogues dismantled in the Gaza Strip. [30] 5,000 school-age children who had to find new schools. [31] 42 daycare centers that were closed in the Gaza Strip. [32] 36 kindergartens that were closed in the Gaza Strip. [33] 7 elementary schools that were closed in the Gaza Strip. [34] 3 high schools that were closed in the Gaza Strip. [35] 320 mobile homes, ordered by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, to serve as temporary housing for settlers. [36] 45,000 Israeli soldiers and policemen who participated in the Gaza withdrawal. [37] $1.7 billion the approximate cost to the Israeli government for the withdrawal initiative. [38] 166 Israeli farmers who were moved out of Gaza. [39] 800 cows, which comprised the second largest dairy farm in Israel, moved out of Gaza’s Gush Katif community. [40] $120 million value of flowers and produce exported annually from Gush Katif and lost following the evacuation. [41] 1 zoo, the “Katifari,” that housed hundreds of animals and was moved. [42] 10,000 people who were employed in agriculture and related industries in Gush Katif, including 5,000 Palestinians. [43] 60% proportion of Israel's cherry tomato exports that came from the Gaza Strip. Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza extinguished this economic resource. [44] 3.5 million square meters (almost 1,000 acres) of greenhouses abandoned in Gaza. [45] 70 percentage of Israel's organic produce grown in Gaza – another economic resource lost in the evacuation. [46] 60 percentage of herbs exported from Israel that came from Gush Katif. [47] 15 percentage of Israel agricultural exports that originated in Gaza – exports lost following Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza. [48] $360,000 expected average compensation amount Israel expected to pay to relocate each family. [49] $870 million approximate cost for Israel to facilitate the resettlement of former West Bank and Gaza residents elsewhere in the country. [50] $500 million amount of money Israel's security establishment spent to relocate Israel Defense Forces bases outside the Gaza Strip and build new border crossing facilities. [51]
After Israel’s evacuation from Gaza…
430,000 West Bank Palestinians able to move freely within and between Palestinian-controlled areas. [52] 1 Israeli remaining in Gaza. Staff Sgt. Gilad Shalit was abducted from Israel on June 25, 2006 by Hamas in a bloody cross-border raid in which the terrorists also killed two IDF soldiers and wounded four others. [53] 1.2 million Arabs who remained full and legal citizens of Israel. All Israeli citizens – Christians, Muslims, and Jews – have freedom of speech, religion, press, and the right to vote. [54] 1.3 million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip many of them in Palestinian Authority-controlled refugee camps, who live under their own leaders. [55] 820,000 Jewish refugees forced to flee without their belongings from Arab countries between 1947 and 1949, and who have never been compensated by Arab governments for their losses. [58] 650,000 Arab refugees who left Israel from 1947-1949 and still need Palestinian leaders who will end terrorism and the culture of hate. [57]
The Ontario arm of the Canadian Union of Public Employees announced yesterday it would propose, in a meeting next month, “a ban on Israeli academics doing speaking, teaching or research work at Ontario universities,” if they do not explicitly condemn Israeli action in Gaza.
Let me see if I understand that.
CUPE, in their support of "the Palestinian cause," would ban Israeli academics.
The headline in yesterday's Globe said this:
Proposed ban on Israeli academics sparks bitter debate
How can you debate when you are rendered speechless?
You can read the article yourself and then perhaps you could tell me what country am I living in?
The City of Richmond, one of my all-time favorite places for watching pea-brained politicians and their ego-centric managers fall all over their Velcro-tied loafers, has done it again.
Turns out one of their biggest projects ever may have to be scrapped.
The Sun Tech City project was one of those Gordon Campbell-inspired P3's - public private partnership. Give a developer a ton of goodies and watch him build you a Skytrain station, a small park, a couple of kiddy swings and a fountain. That's the general fantasy.
'Course, life doesn't always play into your hand.
Take that HUGE economic recession/depression. diporama now.
Read the whole gruesome story here, and then contemplate just what level of scepticism you should hold in reserve the next time you hear some gasbag going on about P3's.
These public-private partnerships might even work on occasion if the rubes who are in public office and who have never run so much as a Bingo game weren't creaming their jeans with the excitement of playing with the Big Boys.
The suits in the towers must be bending over in hysterics every time the phone rings from one of these municipal offices with yet another grand scheme to build a highway or a subway line or a bunch of hospitals.
And, by the way, you'll never guess who gets left holding various bags of debt...
UPDATE: Israel enters Gaza to end Hamas rocket threat IDF’s ‘Operation Cast Lead’ splits Strip in two By David Parsons, Editor ICEJ News
Some 18 months after Hamas seized control of Gaza, reluctant Israeli leaders finally decided to take serious military action against the growing rocket threat on its southern towns, launching a week-long aerial campaign on December 27 followed by a ground offensive now in its third day, both of which appear to have taken the Islamist militia by surprise.
The Prelude to War After unilaterally pulling out of Gaza during Disengagement in August 2005, Israel’s leaders hoped for a quieter border but got instead a four-fold increase in the rate of rocket fire onto neighboring communities, with over six thousand rockets and mortars pounding the western Negev over the past three years alone. Since Hamas seized control of the Strip 18 months ago, the number, range and payload of those rockets have all been on the rise.
Hamas has also built up a paramilitary force of nearly 20,000 trained fighters and honeycombed Gaza with a network of underground fortifications and tunnels, while also smuggling in rockets with extended ranges of over 25 miles, along with anti-tank and anti-aircraft rockets and tons of high-grade explosives.
An unwritten six-month truce brokered by Egypt brought a ‘lull’ in fighting but it effectively ended in early November, and Hamas has been anxious to display its expanded arsenal of weapons with renewed Kassam barrages. Thus Israel’s caretaker government felt it had little choice but to take action, despite its long-standing reticence and the approach of national elections.
Caught Off Guard Now in its second week, the IDF’s “Operation Cast Lead” began just two days after Christmas with a wave of air strikes that targeted Hamas militia commanders, as well as Kassam rocket factories, warehouses and launch sites. Over the next seven days, the Israeli air force expanded its target list to include weapons smuggling tunnels along the border with Sinai, as well as the homes of senior Hamas leaders and even a university building and three mosques known to be used for arms production and storage.
The initial air assault appeared to have caught Hamas off guard, as Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak employed diversionary tactics to hide the fact that a political decision had already been taken to order a large-scale IDF military campaign in Gaza. Although 90 rockets and mortars struck the western Negev on Christmas Day, Barak ordered the Gaza crossings opened the next day a Friday and put out word that a Gaza operation would only be discussed at the weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday. Thus, Hamas was not expecting the IAF bombardment that came on the intervening Saturday also the Jewish Shabbat.
The initial wave of air strikes killed 150 Palestinians, mainly Hamas combatants, including some 70-80 ‘police’ cadets gathered for a graduation ceremony from their training academy. Hamas later admitted it was caught by surprise but claimed that its military wing was already in hiding and had survived largely unscathed. That appears to be the case, although several senior Hamas militia commanders have been killed in targeted air strikes.
In response to the Israeli “aggression,” Hamas began firing longer range Grad rockets supplied by Iran deeper than ever into Israel, killing three civilians. The Chinese-made missiles started raining down on Ashdod and Beersheva, large Israeli cities some 40 kilometers away from Gaza. But the move only seemed to galvanize public support for the IDF operation, which entered phase two this past Saturday with the launching of a ground offensive.
Just before dusk the IDF first laid down an artillery barrage in order to take out mine fields and Hamas fortifications just inside the border. Shrouded by a smoke screen, a column of 150 Israeli tanks and APCs then swept across the border after dark, in search of Hamas forces hopefully staggered by a week of intense airstrikes. Again, the IDF had foiled Hamas plans to inflict heavy casualties at the outset, with only one IDF soldier killed in the opening clashes.
IDF sources said that the immediate goal was to cripple the Hamas terror network and to grab and hold areas in northern Gaza where most of the rocket launch sites are located.
Yesterday, the head of the IDF’s intelligence branch, Maj.-Gen. Amos Yadlin, gave the Israeli cabinet an upbeat assessment of the military campaign so far, claiming that “hundreds of terrorists have been killed and weapons and ammunition stocks have been destroyed, along with tunnels and rocket manufacturing facilities. The Hamas government isn't functioning, and the group's leaders aren't serving the citizens but themselves alone. There is much criticism of Hamas amongst Palestinians for bringing on this situation."
Shades of Lebanon Indeed, the Palestinian terror militias have been bloodied, as over 80 percent of the 500 Palestinian casualties so far have been Hamas combatants, according to Palestinian and UN sources inside Gaza.
But the IDF’s claims of success, however, have reminded some of the Second Lebanon War, which most Israelis consider a draw at best. When hostilities erupted in July 2007, there was an initial euphoria amid IDF boasts that it had inflicted major damage to Hizbullah through air strikes, while ensuing ground operations were limited to short probes that repeatedly captured and lost the same territory several times over.
But Israeli security forces appear to have implemented the lessons of that conflict this time around with a swift and determined ground thrust, while Israel’s political echelon is trying to do a more credible job than in the Lebanon conflict at defining the goals of the operation and the ultimate exit strategy from Gaza.
The stated aim is not to re-occupy the Gaza Strip, thereby providing Hamas with static targets for its terror cells. Rather, Barak has stated that the operation is meant to change the “strategic equation” in terms of Hamas having a base to smuggle in heavier weapons and establish a permanent threat to Israel’s southern half.
In this regard, it is clear that Israel is trying to keep Hamas from building itself into as large a threat as Hizbullah now poses to the North, with its rebuilt arsenals now exceeding 40,000 rockets, including longer range missiles capable of striking most of Israel.
But the Israeli cabinet is apparently split over whether to simply stop the rocket attacks and leave a weakened Hamas in power, or whether the end-game is to cripple Hamas to the point that Fatah can regain control of the Gaza Strip, perhaps backed by international or NATO troops.
The Battle for World Opinion Meanwhile on the diplomatic front, the UN Security Council has tried several times to pass Arab-sponsored resolutions that denounce Israel and demand an immediate ceasefire. But the US has blocked the drafts so far, with Washington insisting the language must condemn Hamas as a terrorist organization that seized power in Gaza from the legitimate Palestinian Authority.
The outgoing Bush Administration has also called for a “durable” and “sustainable” ceasefire that would be “respected” by Hamas, and not just some temporary truce that allows the Islamist terror militia to continue arming itself with longer range rockets.
The Arab League met last Wednesday at the foreign minister level and condemned Israel’s actions. But several Arab leaders also were critical of Hamas for giving Israel the pretext to attack due to its “irresponsible” Kassam rocket fire, as well as its blocking of efforts at Palestinian unity by wrecking reconciliation talks with Fatah.
Egyptian officials in particular have been scathing in their response to disparaging comments from Syria and Iran, and were especially livid when Hizbullah sheikh Hassan Nasrallah urged Egyptians to take to the streets and basically topple the Mubarak regime.
Meantime, anti-Israel protests have spread from Arab to European capitals, but they seem to have misread the lack of sympathy for Hamas among world leaders. Not only is there widespread concern about the group’s totalitarian and Islamist agenda for Gaza, but also its close ties to Iran, which is racing for the nuclear threshold in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions.
By the Numbers On Dec. 27, Israel began "Operation Cast Lead" to stop Iran-backed Hamas in Gaza from continuing its decade-long campaign of attacking Israeli civilians with thousands of rockets, missiles and mortars:
8 years of rocket terror from Gaza
10,000 rockets and mortars fired
1,000 Israelis injured
750,000 civilians now at risk
Yesterday, I managed to see two separate television coverages of the current Gaza conflict. One was BBC and the other CNN. In both instances, a young woman anchor asked an Israeli representative in the most sympathetic yet pointed way, "How do you feel about the deaths and hardships being brought on the Palestinian civilians in Gaza now?" In both cases, the young woman anchor fairly dripped with sincerity and humanitarian concern and barely disguised personal condemnation and outrage.
It was amazing to see virtual clones on two networks separated by an ocean ask the identical question in exactly the identical manner and tone.
Of course, as soon as you hear an interviewer ask anyone about anything with the "How do you feeeeel..?" rubric, you know you're in trouble. Tell me, Mrs. Smith, how do you feel knowing that your three-year old daughter was hit by a runaway truck and smashed into a million pieces?
Where have these two young know-it-alls been the past year while Hamas rockets have maintained a steady rain on Israeli towns?
When did these "journalists" ask Hamas leaders when they plan to stop hiding under women's skirts?
When will they ask Hamas and other Arab leaders when they plan to accept the right of 7 million people to live in a sovereign state called Israel? Or when will they stop teaching their children that Jews are rats and vermin, that must be exterminated from the earth?
Israel is under siege. It has been for a long time. It will continue to be as long as the hundred million people who surround it hate everything about it and everyone in it.
The Gaza attacks from Israel show, if anything, amazing restraint.
Yes, people are being killed and yes, that is horrible. And no, I don't dismiss these deaths and injuries casually.
But what is Israel to do? Sit there and bless the Hamas rockets as they fall on their heads?
Thank the Arab world for continuing to preach hatred?
Israel knows full well that Hamas will not go away, will not be "defeated." We all know that, in addition to its role as Terrorist, Hamas has other faces. Hamas is deeply involved in positive ways in building communities with schools, food, and health care.
All Israel hopes to gain by this latest military initiative is to get Hamas and others to stop attacking Israel and to meet with some reasonableness at a bargaining table.
The condemnation of most of the world press - arrogant and ignorant at best - and the condemnation of the United (Arab) Nations is of no help and disgusting at the most basic level.
The family of Stellar jays is back and they are busy. So are the little juncos, all flitting back and forth from one bush to another, finding morsels where the human eye sees only a stem.
And directly at the foot of my glass patio doors off the kitchen lies a small cache of peanuts, shells, nuts, the whole works.
The only question is: squirrels or raccoons?
I've considered sitting in the dark on a wooden chair in the middle of the kitchen at 2 or 3 am just to learn who the peanut visitors are.
There are optimists and religionists among you who like to repeat the mantra, "God only gives us what we can handle."
Mmmm...
Tell that to people who are tortured or who lose a limb in battle or at work or who lose a child.
Not that I should compare my current misery to such tragedies.
BUT I DO!
All my coordinates are gone.
The car hasn't seen the inside of my Bat Cave in almost 10 days. It is parked in various snow banks somewhere in a three block radius. Sometimes I just go by to say, "Hello, Little Mazda. how the hell are you doing?"
And it pleads right back to me, "Please, David, brush the snow from my roof and my windows and turn over that engine. If possible run the heater and the defroster for a while."
This morning was the first in over a week that the Globe & Mail actually arrived at my home. I have phoned their fabulous "Customer Care Service" every morning for about eight days now to have my little chat with Electronic Man. He tells me the kinds of things I can say (Like, "This is a delivery problem.") and I respond like the perfect Pavlovian Samoyed that I am. Nobody at Customer Care could tell me when they expected delivery service to resume or what the problem is or why a store 2 blocks away has its paper, but I don't have mine.
Now, rumours on the street have it that our new Mayor, Gregor Robertson is in Mexico at the moment on a holiday.
Is this true?
Why isn't he here, digging and shovelling like the rest of us?
Better yet, why isn't he here leading the clean-up and dig-out?
The same rumours have it that Mayor Robertson has actually instructed the works yard to NOT send out battalions of snowplows and other clean-up equipment.
As the story goes, Robertson feels that all those trucks would add negatively to the city's "carbon footprint."
Is this true? Is it just a rumour started by grumpy NPA folk?
If it is true that Mayor G. is in Mexico and that he has ordered the trucks to not move when businesses already battered by a disastrous economy, have now been completely shell-shocked by weather that leaves most shoppers huddling at home...if this is true, we are really in for a scary three years, kids.
Your comments and confirmations of rumours will be appreciated.
I know a man who lives in a little cottage on Vancouver Park Board property.
His job is to look after the lawn and any amenities that may be there.
I've know this man for over 20 years now.
He told me yesterday that recently he almost lost his home, and that if he did ever lose his home, he would be...that's right, homeless.
"Why did you almost lose your home?"
"Well, I found a bunch of guys shooting up heroin in the washrooms, so I locked them out."
"You mean the Park Board almost threw you out because there were guys shooting dope in your washrooms?"
"No, not at all. They almost threw me out because I locked the doors to keep these guys out, and the Park Board wants the bathrooms open at all times."
"So why don't they provide police or surveillance or something to keep the addicts out?"
"Search me. I had to confront a violent drunk also and the Park Board was mad at me."
Lovely.
Talking to this fellow yesterday, reminded me that in the main floor bathroom at the Vancouver Aquatic Centre, there is a prominently displayed container in which I am encouraged to deposit my dirty and used hypodermic needles.
A friend tells me that such handy dandy containers are to be found in washrooms all over the downtown core.
As I spend as little time as possible in the cesspool known as the Vancouver Downtown core, I wasn't aware of that. (Living in Victoria for 2 weeks in November was a similar experience. The Downtown has been abandoned to the Ugly and Stupid People. Something approximating civil life can only be found in the neighbourhoods and suburbs. Yah, I know. You're going to write me and tell me that you live at Richards and Drake and it's the most wonderful place on earth. Good luck to you.)
Talking to this fellow yesterday, also reminded me that David Eby is the new Executive Director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association.
One of the first things Eby did after taking office was give an award to what he feels is one of the best and most progressive and most helpful groups in town, VANDU.
VANDU is the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users.
Several of us have suggested over the years that this group rename itself to VANDA, the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Abusers.
This so-called group is a loose collective of drug addicts, trying to behave like a labour union.
Let's recall for just a moment that, in the days of John L. Lewis, the focus of labour unions was to save nine-year-old boys from being send down mine shafts in Pennsylvania to look for lumps of coal. Forgive me for bringing something as distasteful as history into this matter. I appreciate that I am sublimely out of touch.
Mr. Eby of the BC Civil Liberties has said that VANDU - using dope fiends who argue that it is their right and entitlement to proudly use dope and that we the taxpayer should do everything we can to help them do just that - deserve recognition for their staunch (or was it stoned?) support of Insite, the so-called safe injection room.
Jean Vanier, writing in this morning's Globe, talks about the mission to create a world "where every person is seen as valuable and helped to find a fullness of life, through and in a place of belonging."
A fullness of life.
Do we value people by giving them the very thing they must escape?
Can there be a fullness of life in injecting heroin?
Is a sterile room with little shooting booths a place of belonging?
Mr. Eby, now the boss of the BC Civil Liberties Association, comes from the Portland Hotel Society, which runs Insite.
He has, in effect given himself an award for the work he has just left.
He was a curious and questionable choice for this new assignment.
BC Civil Liberties may not always have had your approval rating on some issues, but they have in the past had a deserved reputation for reasonableness and clear thinking.
Just in case you were wondering about the state of our criminal justice system...
Let's check in on the famous Liberal Sponsorship Scandal, in which a few minor players were given jail sentences and none of the real mechanics behind this theft of public money have even been suggested as being culpable.
Here are some pieces taken from a Globe report this morning on the parole of Chuck Guite:
It is not often you learn something about any element of Canadian society asking anyone to be repsonsible about anything.
Imagine my surprise and elight when I read the following from Ian Bailey in this morning's Globe:
"Friday afternoon, three skiers and a snowboarder ducked under a boundary-area rope at the Grouse Mountain ski area, and entered an avalanche-prone area, ignoring orders from the mountain's safety patrol to get out.
Before long, the RCMP and North Shore Rescue Team were on the scene, and a helicopter search tracked down the four B.C. men – two 25-year-olds and two 24-year-olds. They have been banned for life from Grouse Mountain, and will be billed for all costs, now being tallied, related to the incident. Their names will also be circulated to all ski resorts in British Columbia."
In December, Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, the B.C. Representative for Children & Youth, published an update on the provincial government's "progress" in implementing recommendations from the (Ted) Hughes report in 2006.
Of 15 key recommendations she reviewed, she found none were completely implemented.
None.
Take another foto op with you and a Bantam hockey player, Gord.
