The IOC - Such a Happy Little Group

This was forwarded this morning from a friend on Hornby Island, where people read the news very early each day. Thanks, Gary.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Convicted ex-Samsung chairman Lee Kun-hee was
reinstated Sunday as a full member of the International Olympic Committee, a
boost for South Korea's bid to host the 2018 Winter Games.

Lee's rights were restored by the IOC executive board, although the IOC also
gave him a public reprimand for tarnishing the Olympic movement and banned him
from serving on any IOC commissions for five years.

Lee voluntarily gave up his IOC rights after being indicted in 2008 in a
financial and tax evasion case. The South Korean government pardoned Lee last
year, clearing the way for his return to the IOC.

Lee is now free to attend IOC sessions, take part in IOC votes and help South
Korea's latest campaign to host the Winter Games.

The South Korean government has said Lee will be a key figure in the bid from
Pyeongchang, which is competing for the 2018 Games along with Munich and
Annecy, France.

Pyeongchang is bidding for the third straight time after defeats for the 2010
and 2014 Games, which went to Vancouver and Sochi, Russia. The IOC will choose
the 2018 host in 2011.

With Lee's reinstatement, South Korea has two IOC members. The other is Moon
Dae-sung.

"We are delighted to hear the news," said Park Yang-chun, chairman of the
Korean Olympic Committee's international relations commission. "We are very
pleased to hear of his reinstatement."

Park said it was too early to determine Lee's exact role in the Pyeongchang bid.

"One way or another he will join our bid," he said. "There is nothing official
yet. Mr. Lee will decide."

Lee's reinstatement follows the pattern of previous IOC ethics cases. French
member Guy Drut was provisionally suspended in 2005 after being convicted in a
party-financing trial. He was reinstated by the IOC a year later after being
pardoned by then French President Jacques Chirac.

Lee stepped down in April 2008 after 20 years at the helm of the Samsung Group
after being indicted in connection with losses at a Samsung affiliate and for
tax evasion. He later was fined and sentenced to a suspended three-year prison
term.

In Sunday's ruling, the IOC ethics commission said Lee's conduct "has tarnished
the reputation of the Olympic movement" and violated the IOC's ethical
principles.

The IOC issued him with a "reprimand" and a five-year suspension from sitting
on any commissions.

Asked how the committee could bring back a member who had been convicted of
criminal charges, IOC spokesman Mark Adams said: "He has received two of the
three strongest sanctions the IOC can give."

The strongest sanction is expulsion.

That Covers It

DIY Writ Large

The citizens of Colorado Springs, all 380,000 of them, have agreed that their city - just a hike down the road from Denver, doesn't really need or want government...or its questionable services.

In true American libertarian style they have decided to go it alone.

That includes parks, trash, lawns, dogs, you name it.

Outrageous! Madness! You say.

Or is it a sign of things to come and a warning to the idiots who mismanage governments everywhere at all levels - which, roughly means all of them?

This Curiosity Just Arrived

For Immediate Release

February 8, 2010

Vancouver Taxi business “dead” just days before Olympics
Drivers unsure of how they will survive the next 2 months

Vancouver, BC – A combination of factors associated with the Winter Olympic Games have resulted in the slowest period for the taxi industry in the past 15 years, says Amrik Mahil, President of Black Top and Checker Cabs.

“I have never seen it like this, and I am very worried about the lingering effects from two months of this kind of business climate” said Mahil. “While everyone thought that we would have too few cabs for the Olympics, the reality of the situation in this final week before the Games tells a vastly different story.”

There are dozens of temporary licenses that have been issued for the duration of the Games. Taxi operators in the GVRD who cannot usually operate within the City of Vancouver are now able to deploy up to 35% of their fleet to pick up passengers at Olympic sites or anywhere else in the city. The Olympic transportation plan and associated road closures make using taxis within the city to get to and from Olympic events very inconvenient (no right lane stopping, meaning the amount of cab stands is severely reduced during the Games). Finally, the economy is still soft, making cab fares an expense that many individuals and companies have cut back on.

With fixed costs ranging between 80-$120 per shift, many cab drivers are having trouble breaking even. In fact, many drivers are now contemplating a departure from the industry because of an inability to make ends meet.

The long-term health of the taxi industry in Vancouver is now at risk, according to Mahil.

“We would not be able to withstand a mass exodus of drivers from our company, and yet we cannot even guarantee these individuals a consistent income over the coming months” said Mahil. “VANOC and the Passenger Transportation Board have grossly overestimated the need for taxis during the Games, and now we are all paying the price.”

Black Top is Vancouver’s second largest taxi company with 197 vehicles and over 50 years of service within the city.

Media contact:

Amrik Mahil
President – Black Top and Checker Cabs
(604) 614-3777

Merry Men

As part of TCM’s Oscar month, “The Adventures of Robin Hood played the other night and I was able to catch and to enjoy immensely the last half hour or so.

This 1938 movie starred Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Basil Rathbone and Claude Rains.

I’ll give you a hint.

Rathbone played neither Maid Marian nor Friar Tuck.

What made the movie so much fun was Flynn’s cheeky charm and Olivia’s ethereal beauty.

There was a full and necessary slate of sword fighting and arrows falling we know not where, but the over-all take by director Michael Curtiz was lightness and feather touch.

This is, after all, a kind of fairy tale.

But that is all about to change, children.

Any moment now the new Ridley Scott/Russell Crowe monstrosity, “Robin Hood”, will overwhelm your neighbourhood screens.

Crowe was born to play “brute.”

He specializes in brute force.

Crowe and Scott were the pair who brought you “Gladiator.”

Do you remember anything from this movie? I don’t.

Here’s what the new “Robin Hood” will offer.

Heads hacked in two by axes.

Severed arteries exposed by missing limbs spurting blood in your face.

The intensity and mystery and neuroses of Cate Blanchett.

I can’t wait till this team tackles Sir Galahad.

Then Snow White with Roman Polanski playing all seven dwarfs.

Debasement

A man is kicking a woman in the stomach.

Repeatedly.

On television.

If you saw this, wouldn't you be outraged, furious, spurred to action?

Soon you are on the phone and on the Internet registering your loud and justified complaint about violence towards women.

And you would be right.

But wait.

Every day, you can see exactly this TV advertisement.

Except that a woman is kicking a man in the stomach.

She also punches him several times.

She is oh so funny and he is the Dope.

Ho ho ho.

Isn't that amusing.

That piece of male debasement is the work of a clever and irresponsible ad executive and his/her "creative team," who want to attract women to their client's product or service.

I believe the client in this case is BMO, the Bank of Montreal.

This dreadful unnecessary and socially destructive piece of trash is part of a long tradition in TV programming and advertising, both of which are aimed at the "female consumer."

Because that's what you are, ladies, in the warped minds of advertisers and their clients - consumers.

You USE stuff.

In this oft-repeated scenario, the woman always wins.

She is smarter, stronger, more clever, more resourceful.

The hubby is a colossal nitwit, a loser, an incompetent, who clearly could not function without his far superior partner to drag his sorry ass through life.

And this running sore of a theme helps children and families HOW?

If a man kicked a woman in the stomach in an ad on prime time television, it would be front page news and talk show fodder for weeks.

But having a woman kick a man in the stomach is apparently just funny.

No.

It is not funny.

It is sick.

Boys and girls need and want fathers they can respect and admire.

Women and men need to respect one another.

Ridicule is not the way.

Squirming and Cheering

Pete McMartin, the Sun columnist, wrote an excellent piece yesterday.

The headline pretty much catches the gist of the article:
"Why I loathe the Olympics and why I hope they succeed"

I think he has captured the mix of emotions that many are feeling.

Enlighten Me, Please

Does any one truly understand the "Missionaries Charged with Kidnapping" story?

Because I don't.

Are these people simply stupid or naive, scooping up 33 children and trying to rush them out of Haiti?

Are the deliberately posing as naive?

Are they, in fact, evil maniacs?

I really have no idea.

They keep telling any one who will listen - or bring them bread and water - that this is all simply a misunderstanding and a case of some innocently missing paper work.

It's possible...but...

Please explain your take on this peculiar circumstance.

Opinions not Wanted in Games Canada

An American reporter, who doesn't like The Games, has been turned back and not allowed into Canada by Canadian customs.

We have no information that this man is dangerous or violent or disruptive in any way.

But he does have an opinion.

Shame on him.

Can't he just buckle down and sing, "I believe?"

Victor is Mercerless

Not a week goes by without a half-page foto of Officially Annointed Comedian of Canada, Rick Mercer, being thrown out of a plane or some such running in full-color in every newspaper in Canada. And this costs the taxpayer how much? Our friend, Victor, has even found Mercer in his Shark's Fin Soup!


Last night we sat in a Chinese restaurant, surrounded by Chinese
patrons, eating glorious spicy fish while watching Rick Mercer on a
54 inch screen , mercifully with no sound. Surreal .

As virtually the only white person in the place, sitting among a
couple of hundred taxpaying Chinese Canadians who were ignoring the
mugging dork on the TV, I asked myself " Why do we have this guy"? I
also wondered what he is paid, how big is the budget that takes him
around the country and how large is his obscenely bloated CBC staff?

We have an Auditor General, a Governor General but do we need a
Comedian General? Paid for by taxpayers? Didn't syphilitic kings in
ancient times hire a court fool out of the public purse for the same
purpose? Aren't we beyond that?

I realize that I am out of sync with those Canadians who think his
painfully contrived skits, camera-hogging juvenility and gratuitous
anti-Americanism are are uproariously funny. But if he's that good,
why can't he get a sponsor to fund his efforts?

Then again, I am out of sync with all those Canadians who think that
the mere possession of a Newfoundland accent, applied to the most
puerile skits, is high comedy.

VANOC on the Buses

An elderly woman is seated on a city transit bus the other day.

She has her groceries on the seat beside her.

The bus is half empty.

Let me repeat.

The bus is half empty.

A young woman with VANOC marked all over her perfect self gets on, heads straight to the seated woman, and declares, "I want to sit there."

Not, "Excuse me, ma-am, but may I sit in that seat? Could you move those parcels please..." and anything like this.

And why there?

The bus is half empty.

Did I mention that?

The rude, privileged demand is hardly out of her mouth than the entire remaining passengers begin angrily and loudly chanting, "OFF VANOC! OFF VANOC! OFF VANOC!"

My friend, Donna, who told me this story yesterday, sees this incident as a clear and strong evidence of how so many Vancouverites are feeling about the arrogance of the VANOC Class.

I told her about a first year University professor I had about a thousand years ago, who came into class one bright winter morning and wrote in huge letters across the entire width of the blackboard, "CREDIT IS A SACRED TRUST."

He told us he had just seen this obscenity on a billboard in downtown Winnipeg.

He then ranted for an hour about the abuse of language, about putting spin on usury to make it holy.

This is how both Donna and I feel about "I believe."

Exactly what is it that Donald Sutherland and Bill Goo and all those other stooges believe?

I believe in God?

I believe in the divine right of Vancouver to host the Games?

I believe in free tickets? Little Upchuck? Red Mitties?

Pure shmarm.

Show me an athlete skiing or skating. Don't spend the entire budget to do it. Don't shut down social, health and education programs to pay for it. Don't declare yourself a "world class city." Don't raise Groupthink to Orwellian proportions.

Show me an athlete.

Keep it simple.

A Desparate Man

And detestable, as well.

Iggy Pop, languishing right there at the very bottom of all the polls, in an act of sheer hysteria has raised the spectre of an abortion discussion.

This is supposed to be the new conscience of the nation?

What cynicism.

What over-calculated drama queen idiocy.

What ever happened to the presentation of policy?

Next!

Sweating it Out

I have a new radio talk show on the way.

It's called "Sauna Talk."

Which is a bit misleading because all of the conversation and interviews actually take place in the whirlpool at the Vancouver Aquatic Centre on Beach Avenue.

The inspiration came yesterday.

Five men of various shapes and sizes were shvitzing at the far end of the giant tub.

Each one looked and sounded dumber than the last.

But, boy, did they know everything about everything!

Gordon Campbell, George Bush, Afghanistan, Obama, interest rates, mortgages, property assessments, Drew Brees, the Saints...

The Tatooted Man - there's one in every whirlpool - even had a life-size Mickey Mouse on his chest.

Whatever is really "life-size" for The Mick...who knows?

I thought as I hobbled back to the locker room, "The Globe, the New York Times - what do I read this trash for? I've got the experts right here in sloppy hanging Hawaiian bathing suits."

There must be some station in town who really needs something different...

Listen closely over the coming weeks...but, Puleeeeze, brng your own towel!

Golden Oldie

The video below shows the fascinating and complex structuring of a sequence in the 1946 movie, “The Jolson Story.”

This may be the first movie I ever saw.

It is certainly the first one I remember.

And it had a profound effect on me.

To this day, I still have a VHS copy of the film, and the sequel, “Jolson Sings Again.”

The story has been made and remade a dozen times under various guises, beginning with the very first “talkie,” “The Jazz Singer,” starring Al Jolson himself.

“The Jazz Singer” has been remade first with Danny Thomas and then with Neil Diamond.

“Funny Girl,” although a bio of Fanny Brice, follows the same trajectory and themes – the great performer who lays so much out there on the stage for his/her love affair with the audience that he/she can’t possibly have a reasonable or successful personal life. Think Bette Davis – 75 different addresses and 4, I believe, husbands.

In the movie below, Larry Parks is playing Jolson, who, of course recorded all the music tracks.

Jolson was such an egotist that he wanted to play the part himself.

He was dissuaded, but you can see him from a distance – shot from the theatre balcony – in the “Swanee River” number later in the film.

Larry Parks was nominated for Best Actor, but lost to Fredrick March for his role in “The Best Years of our Lives.”

Parks’ career was destroyed shortly thereafter by the McCarthy hearings. He survived by doing Broadway and live theatre around the country.

We didn’t really see him again in the movies until 1962 in “Freud.”

Watch the Process - See the Great Payoff

The Universal Marketplace

Yesterday, in commenting about The Games, I pointed out the lovely and imaginative Canada Pavilion was made by a Chicago company.

I mention such things as part of my ongoing and long-running complaint about how we love to shoot ourselves in the food - usually with an imported weapon.

Whether it is stamps or flags or movies or packing boxes (disguised as pavilions), we seem to embrace a self-destructive impulse to favor off-shore suppliers.

God forbid, anyone in Canada could actually make or build or sew or weave or assemble anything that we might use, anything that might employ, you know like, I think you call them, uh, Canadians, eh?

However...

My perpetual kvetch on this score may be, like so many of my quaint notions, simply not in tune with the real world.

Imagine.

Today, newspapers across the land announced with great fanfare that we Canuckleheads can now return to bidding on American contracts. US protectionism has been declared dead.

"Canadian companies can now bid on U.S. infrastructure projects financed under their $787-billion economic stimulus package ending the year-long Buy America dispute."

The local press pretty much greeted this development as the Second Coming. It actually knocked a certain Event off the front pages.

So far, so good.

But just a border minute, now.

What this really means is that all bets are off.

All companies in North America (with a few restrictions) can bid for all deals in Dallas or Kapuskasing.

In udder woids, boys & girls, yes, we get the opening to those VAAAST yanqui markets, but our friends south of the 49th have equal access to ours.

In addition, the EU is negotiating for similar reciprocates with us.

For so many years, suppliers and workers in Saskatchewan couldn't bid on jobs in Manitoba or BC, and Quebec and Ontario might as well have had high stone walls separating their attempts at commerce.

Much of that has gone the way of elk meat.

And now, trade barriers are melting into the Arctic seas on a daily basis.

At first blush, that is a bad thing for us under-producing, latte-sucking urban elite geeks in Canada.

But now, I think the message is clear.

Work harder.

Work smarter.

Support and encourage local manufacturing wherever possible.

If you think times have been a bit tough of late, hang onto your hats.

They will get tougher.

Are we up to the challenge?

Games Update

Just in case, I haven't been clear about this.

I do not believe.

Like most people, I love sport.

I am thrilled to see people running and jumping and diving and swimming and riding and skating and doing all manner of astonishing great things at super-human levels.

If there was a way to see these things without so much bullshit and groupthink and public monies being wasted, I'd be a much happier camper.

But, alas, that is not the way of the world.

I suppose I should just grow up and dummy up and love every corrupt moment.

Maybe not.

Here is the latest:

1. The Canada Pavilion at the Games, a square boxed pre-fab tent with no food or entertainment, cost $10.4 Million and, in a great act of patriotism (right up there with Danny William's surgery), was built by a Chicago company.

It is a hideous embarrassment.

Second only to the fake dark brown teepee that was the Canada Pavilion at an international exhibition I saw in Venice, Italy a few years ago.

2. VANOC - in spite of receiving millions of tax payers dollars - is not an extension of the government and therefore it is not bound to disclose a damn thing about how it spends money.

Many Games employees will be given substantial bonuses when the shouting dies down.

We, the paying public, will never know who and why and what and how much.

3. CTV makes all its money from an ancient ruling of the CRTC called "simulcasting."

The network shows us programs basically "stolen" or piggy-backed from ABC, CBS and NBC.

Inevitably, there are three second or ten-second delays. If it is a golf game, for example, we usually return from commercial just on time to see Tiger or Phil staring into the fog, trying to see where the little white dimpled thing went.

Nevertheless, CTV and other Canadian vampire networks have the gall to go on and on about how "Local TV Matters."

Hahahaha...

They hire pleasant stooges who look like nice people to tell us how important local TV is, even though CTV and Global and the others give us less local TV every day.

Last night I taped an American program and watched it a bit later.

That way I can zip through the commercials.

About 90 times, till I was ready to heave, I zipped through all those pudgy faced Canadians telling me "I believe."

They asked me even in fast motion if "I believe?"

Well, Steve Nash and Sarah and Sasha and cute little kids, here is my answer.

No.

I don't believe in jumping on your bandwagon.

If this is something you will enjoy, I champion your right to that enjoyment.

I'll read a book.

Or...wait...

Maybe I'll go to Italy...

Hm...there's an idea...

Honor Up

"I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens."

Who said this?

A rabid "gay agenda" lobbyist?

No.

Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said this speaking to the Senate armed services committee.

I did not know, until I read the editorial this morning in the Globe, that Canada has had same-sex weddings on military bases.

Gays and lesbians are completely integrated into the Canadian Armed Forces.

As they should be in America.

It is not time for further studies and discussions.

It is time for the U.S. to honor all people who serve, regardless of race, color, religion, and sexual orientation.

Next!

To Quote every Idiot Waiter in Town - "Enjoy!"

I have seen the face of the Olympics and it isn't a pretty sight.

Yesterday morning, I was walking to my car, which was parked deep in the heart of the West End. Beside me was my friend, who is elderly and infirm and riding his electric cart.

At a residential intersection, we paused. My friend headed his cart towards the wheel-chair accessible curb.

Along came Lady Day.

Blond-haired, blue-eyed, 45ish and driving a huge white expensive late-model SUV.

The signage on the doors proudly proclaimed : "Official vehicle of...etc."

Adorable little Upchuck was there in all his Stonehenge glory.

Of course, Lady Day was far too important, far too burdened with a mission far too urgent, to consider for even a moment stopping to let an old man in a wheelchair go by.

She drove on.

My happy, healthy series of thoughts went something like, "Whose cousin is she? What is she being payed, $120,000? For what enormous task? How did she get this gig? Was it advertised?"

My friend and I said our goodbyes and we parted.

A few moments later, I was heading down Nelson Street towards the Cambie Bridge. Georgia would have been a better route, but given the Event that looms ahead I didn't dare risk it.

Just as this morning I will go all the way over to the Second Narrows to get to Lonsdale because I fear the potential gridlock in the Park.

Anyway...Nelson Street.

Look!

All these lovely new red leather hoods on the parking meters.

Also on the parking meters on East Broadway.

Whose cousin got the contract for these things?

Over lunch my son told me that when the meters are working again they will all be in effect to 10 pm, not 8, as they have been for so many years.

As I write this, Vietnam is being replayed overhead.

A helicopter hovers.

Can they see me in my pajamas?

Face