VANCOUVER DISAGREEMENT

Confession.

For a guy who claims to know all or much about drug addiction, I didn't really know until today who were the original authors of that spurious document called The Vancouver Agreement.

This thing - which has accomplished just about nothing since its inception almost nine years ago - has long been held in mysterious high regard as the Bible and Koran of urban renewal for the DTES.

Today, reading a very good item by Robert Matas in the Globe, I learn that the original signatories to this high-sounding, low-landing fluff were Philip Owen, then Mayor of Vancouver, Hedy Fry and Jenny Kwan.

'nuff said?

At the time, Fry was unbelievably a federal Liberal cabinet minister and Kwan was a Provincial NDP cabinet minister.

Owen is the only one of the three who, in spite of too often being on the wrong track, was really serious and dedicated about cleaning up the mess and he has continued in his way to try to find improvements.

But he is clearly as frustrated as the rest of us these days.

Recently he tried to engage the federal government.

"But Mr. Owen said he got nowhere. He could not even persuade the federal government to contribute $200,000 to a new drug-treatment centre for boys and girls that opened earlier this year, despite Conservative Party campaign promises to support treatment and prevention over harm reduction."

STAND BACK

Mark O'Meara, one of the best friends of Tiger Woods says that he has been hitting a few balls with Tiger of late.

Tiger has been off his feet after surgery. This was immediately after winning his last major while hobbling about in pain. He may resume play shortly.

O'Meara says that Tiger is looking better than ever.

Ouch!

Tiger is one of those once-in-a-lifetime performers - say, like a Pavarotti - that brings people who have never looked at a golf ball or listened to an opera to not only watch and listen but to become raving fans.

For the sponsors, tournament organizers, broadcasters, writers and Tiger nuts - like me - this is exciting news.

For the other guys with expensive sticks in their hands...

SNAPSHOT

Women in Iran?

Try this thoughtful op-ed piece in this morning's NY Times from Roger Cohen.

The mountain tells all.

'TRANE ANNIVERSARY

SHUT UP OR LES...I mean, OR ELSE!

When John Les was Solicitor-general of the Province of B.C., he threatened small-town Island business owners to be quiet or not do work with the government.

So says a story in this morning's province newspaper.

The article includes transcripts of Les' email to the operators of local liquor outlets.

We have become so placid and inured to injurious behaviour from people in high places that this strike at the heart of democratic government is not even front page material.

In what gulag exactly did Mr. Les think he was living at the time?

Recently I suggested that all men and women elected to office should be given mandatory seminars on democratic principles. Just as a refresher, of course.

Under such tutelege, Les and other of his ILK (Gee, I didn't know it was ILK season already!) would find Lesson Four: Have a Sense of Humor and Remember that Criticism is an Essential Part of a Healthy Society. Do we Have Public Beheadings? No. Therefore, You will Get Dissent From Time to Time. LIVE WITH IT, YOU SISSIE!

HOW CORRUPT WAS IT?

"Halliburton and its former KBR subsidiary have agreed to pay $579 million in fines to settle criminal and regulatory charges of having bribed foreign officials to win billions in construction contracts. There may be some taxpayer comfort in the fact that this scandal was rooted in Nigeria, not Iraq, where the Halliburton megacorporation (you know, the one Dick Cheney ran before he became vice president) reaped multibillions as the Bush administration’s most favored no-bid contractor"

That's the first paragraph of an editorial in this morning's NY Times.

Here's the full article, entitled, "More Annals of Global Greed Inc. "

By the way...

Speaking (as we were only a few days ago) of Dr. Strangelove, many of us have always associated the Peter Sellers character of the same name with Henry Kissinger.

But how hysterical was it to see this era's Strangelove, Cheney, being wheeled into the Obama inauguration in a wheelchair!

Did any of you notice him trying to stop his right arm from saluting?

Jason Mraz

AT LAST!

THE FIX

Today's Globe & Mail has begun a major assessment and profile of the DTES.

It is an excellent piece - actually many pieces by many writers - of journalism.

And while it offers a few choice tidbits, the overall message is something that many of us have been saying for years: fortunes spent, little accomplished.

(The articles are extensive so I suggest you buy today's hard copy or browse the electronic edition.)

The front page gives us the first real taste.

$1.4 Billion spent...no change in the 'hood.

Of the many sections in this undertaking, two in particular caught my eye.

The second is Gary Mason's excellent column, which I'll come to in a moment.

The first is a piece called "AN EXPENSIVE DRUG COURT THAT DOESN'T WORK."

The article reveals that the much-touted drug court has cost $17 Million to build and operate since 2001, and that the results are abysmal. Only 14% of those convicted "finish their treatment."

Well, duh!

You have to examine what the so-called treatment is.

Here's what it is.

A 265-hour treatment program.

Is my math correct? That comes out to 11 days of so-called treatment.

Hahahahahaha...

Be a dope fiend for five or 10 years and then in 11 days find salvation.

Hahahahaha...

These losers were compared with 166 other offenders with addiction problems who fared no better or worse than the lucky souls who found their way into this new panacea.

Let's be clear.

An 11-day miracle cure is no cure at all.

Who are the wizards who devised this torture and waste of public funds?

Where is the real treatment to support this drug court?

I will tell you where.

It is on the moon or up some one's ass.

It doesn't exist.

The Drug Court is window dressing. On its own it is less than nothing. Married to real treatment it has a chance of helping this misery. Wake me up and let me know when that happens.

All of us who actually know what is at stake here predicted all of this eight years ago.

It doesn't please us to say, "We told you so."

Let's move to Gary Mason's column.

Mason argues convincingly that what the DTES needs is One Good Man to take charge and make things happen.

If that were all he said, his opinion wouldn't be worth very much.

But, showing that he has real grasp of the issues at hand, Mason goes on to argue that such a leader would need tremendous fortitude to resist the tide of bullshit from all the invested poverty pimps who have been thriving down there for ages.

" You see, fixing the DTES ultimately means engaging in some kind of showdown with the collection of social agencies, poverty groups, activists of all stripes who have consistently opposed changes that upset the status quo.

Consensus on a future for the area among this group is unachievable.

It's amazing the power it wields. Many of the city's business and political elite cower in the presence of its representatives. For years now it has sold and we have bought the specious notion that any attempt to dilute the neighbourhood of its concentration of poor, addicted and mentally ill is an attack on the most vulnerable."

Mason's quote from Geoff Plant, who spent the past 18 months wearing the uneasy crown of Civil City Commissioner, is likewise on point:

"Sometimes the wall of protection that is built around the Downtown Eastside by well-intentioned advocates has the effect of shutting the rest of us out in a way that encourages an isolationism that sooner or later turns the place into the ghetto that it is and shouldn't be."

The column also points out that without complete cooperation from three levels of government - read money and balls - nothing will ever change.

In the coming weeks, the Globe threatens to bring us solutions from "experts."

Oh, boy.

FALL SCHEDULE

The CRTC (the Canadian Radio-Television & Telecommunications Commission) has said that they are considering a major overhaul of regulations guiding Canadian TV.

Here's what they are looking at.

For every dollar that Global, CTV, CITY and others spend on buying Los Angeles product, they would have to spend the same amount on Canadian programming.

(Curiously, the CBC is not in this sandbox, which raises again the question of why CBC needs or wants to show Jeopardy and why my tax dollars should pay to broadcast American fluff 'n stuff that I can see or avoid on a hundred other channels.)

Australia, being plunked "Down Under," a zillion miles from everybody else has had the wonderful and necessary luxury of creating much of its own culture, including some marvelous films and TV programs.

But here in what is still pathetically, annoyingly called "Hollywood North," we are a tiny and insignificant branch plant of the Santa Monica mafia.

Let's be clear.

Global - now reeling on its last heels from the world economic tsunami and bad family management and trading at pennies - made its original fortune out of Barber Greene by being simply the best buyers of American TV schlock.

There is only one small problem with this model.

Do not actors and writers and cameramen and makeup artists and costumers and carpenters and cooks not have the same right to a livelihood as other Canadians, who have invested time and money in study and training for their chosen professions?

At the moment, the average income for a Canadian actor is just over $20,000 a year.

Nice.

Now, I don't really believe that the CRTC will actually demand of CTV, Global and the rest that they match dollar-for-dollar spending on Canadian production with Yanqui acquisition. The TV folk will scream bloody murder.

And given the other realities of the Internet, DVD's, the iPhone, downloads and so on, this demand would probably break the back of the local industry before it helped your starving artists.

Nevertheless...

If Canada - the B-movie - ever hopes to have some pride of accomplishment in these areas, the time was yesterday, or at the latest, today.

Stand back and pull up the popcorn for...



CSI - CORNERBROOK.

Happy Valentine's Day

Pure Genius

Accused in bus beheading had major illness: psychiatrists

Celebrate

Write Your Own Photo Caption

POSTER BOY/POSTER JUDGE FOR INJUSTICE

Everyone in Canada from your neighbourhood green grocer to your chief of police decries the failure of our courts to provide public protection from lunatics and bad guys.

This, of course, stems from the central (Canada) belief that there are no bad guys - only the severely misunderstood. Even the worst amongst us, the fuzzy-headed thinking goes, can rise from their slightly naughty behaviour to become...well, why not Senators?

Here today is the classic textbook case for how our criminal injustice system is entirely out of synch with the real world.

Omar Bulphred has done a few things lately.

Here's what he's done.

He firebombed a Jewish Community Centre in Montreal. He's not very good at what he does. No one -baruch hashem (God be praised) - was hurt.

He had plans to firebomb the Montreal Stock Exchange.

He had plans to randomly kidnap and perhaps cut the throat of a gay man - any gay man - "like a chicken."

He had plans to bomb a nuclear plant and a military base.

He threw one of his fizzling useless bombs at a Jewish Boys School.

O.K.

Got the picture?

Now, here's his punishment, consequences, reward.

Quebec Court Judge Louise Boudreau - a genius among geniuses - gave Omar a sentence of seven years.

PLUS...credit for time served, leaving The Mad Incompetent Bomber a remaining sentence of 40 months.

For the chronically slow, that's a little over 3 years and a couple of spring blossoms.

Soon, Omar, the Universal Hater, will be back on St. Catherine's Street looking for more copies of "Bombing for Dummies."

Is it dreadfully unfair to ask why this #$%^&*@ hasn't been confined to a tiny metal box for life?

REDEFINED

Public life often effects language in interesting ways.

Here's a quote from a young Vancouverite about recent gunfire in his neighbourhood. To be more precise, a shooting yesterday that led to the discovery of a 23-year old man dead from gunshot wounds in a nearby basement suite last night.

The quote:

"The area is pretty safe, although it's not unusual to hear gunshots maybe once every couple of months."

- What the heck was that, Barney? - Nothing to worry your pretty little head about, Helen. It's April 16th. Just your regular right as rain gunfire, Sweetie. Now, give me some more of those precious apple dumplings of yours.

OVER THE RAINBOW

City Manager, Penny Ballem, has hired Bruce Tidball to oversee the completion of the Olympic Village project.

This is a good move, and the Ballem and City Council are to be congratulated for the simple practical wisdom in this hire.

It occurred to me yesterday afternoon as I was wheeling around the area and seeing the site that in time this will be a finished development and we will all enjoy walking and cycling by it along False Creek.

The only question that will linger is the final cost to Vancouver citizens.

TORCH

There is much in life that I don't understand.

Arson is right at the top of the list.

I think firebugs are completely crazy insane dogs who should be tied up with ropes and masking tape and left on chairs for life.

All of Australia is reeling from the horrifying fires in Victoria around Melbourne. To date, the death toll is 181 and counting.

In the midst of this tragedy we learn that someone or some several have deliberately set fires.

Honestly this kind of behaviour leaves me slack-jawed.

Read the details and see the videos from news.com.au here.

Vancouver Story?

An old Italian lived alone in New Jersey .. He wanted to plant his annual tomato garden, but it was very difficult work, as the ground was hard.

His only son, Vincent, who used to help him, was in prison. The old man wrote a letter to his son and described his predicament:
---
Dear Vincent,

I am feeling pretty sad, because it looks like I won't be able to plant my tomato garden this year. I'm just getting too old to be digging up a garden plot. I know if you were here my troubles would be over. I know you would be happy to dig the plot for me, like in the old days.

Love, Papa
A few days later he received a letter from his son.
---
Dear Pop,

Don't dig up that garden. That's where the bodies are buried.

Love, Vinnie
---

At 4 a. m. the next morning, FBI agents and local police arrived and dug up the entire area without finding any bodies. They apologized to the old man and left.

That same day the old man received another letter from his son.
--
Dear Pop,
Go ahead and plant the tomatoes now. That's the best I could do under the circumstances.
Love you, Vinnie

Small and welcome Truths

Vancouver Police Chief, Jim Chu, refuses to join the rose-colored sunglasses set.

He freely admits that the DTES will remain essentially a drug-addled hell-hole during and after the famous Games.

Read this story and at the least be thankful that there is one official who is not selling more fairy dust.