The sad tale of PC MPP nobody Rick Nicholls’ idiocy is now well-known.  He made an offensive statement, and was called to account for it by the Ontario NDP’s Gilles Bisson, the Legislature’s Speaker and his hometown media.

Last night, however, I finally got to see the video record, below.  In it, Nicholls can be seen (around the two-minute mark) clearly reading from a prepared statement.  He didn’t just say “squeeze” – he was told to say it.  This morning, meanwhile, it’s been confirmed to me by two of the growing number of Ontario Tory Hudak-haters that their leader’s office instructed the hapless Nicholls to say what he said.

After Bisson’s intervention, Nicholls apologized.  Will Hudak now do likewise?

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There is an excellent chance that nobody cares, but — for fun, if nothing else — let’s handicap the rumoured candidates for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada, shall we?

I know, I know. They’re in a distant third place, and have been for a year. You need a magnifying glass to locate their caucus in the House of Commons. Even against a dud like interim NDP Leader Nycole Turmel, they couldn’t improve their circumstances. Why, you not unreasonably ask, should anyone care about the Grits anymore?

Well, because politics is unpredictable, that’s why. Weird things happen.

Everyone (except Your Humble Narrator, naturally) thought Wildrose would form a big, honkin’ majority government in Alberta, and they didn’t.
Everyone (except, er, me) didn’t foresee Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty climbing back from a double-digit polling deficit to win big last fall. Everyone (except, um, you know who) failed to prognosticate the NDP becoming Her Majesty’s official opposition in last year’s general election.

And so on, and so on. Every pundit and pollster else gets it wrong, all the time. Immodestly, I think you folks should listen only to ME.

Herewith, my Grit Hit List:

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Heh.

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One dictionary: Complimentary or flattering to an excessive degree: “they are almost embarrassingly fulsome in their appreciation.” It also means “copious.” 

That’s probably not what she meant in her memo.  But when the boss to the writers doesn’t know what a word means, it perhaps indicates the wrong people are getting the hook.

Quote unquote:

In a memo to Postmedia Network, Phyllise Gelfand explained that news organization will instead rely on the Canadian Press (CP) for international and breaking news content. “Owning an in-house, full-service newswire business and managing the production and distribution of commodity news no longer supports our strategy,” she explained. “We will continue to operate an Ottawa Bureau with national beat writers providing content to our publications. Our Ottawa Bureau will no longer be focused on the commodity pieces (committee meetings, day to day happenings) but allow for more fulsome reporting and commentary on national politics.”

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I like obits better than just about anything else in newspapers, most days, so it wasn’t unusual that I read about the passing of Goober.  This part I read, then re-read:

In a statement released through the funeral home, Griffith, 85, called Lindsey his friend and said that they would often talk on the phone, most recently a few days before the actor’s death.

‘I am happy to say that as we found ourselves in our eighties, we were not afraid to say, `I love you,’’ Griffith went on to say. ‘That was the last thing George and I had to say to each other. `I love you.’’

Every straight man loves other men – their fathers and brothers, their grandfathers, and so on – and sometimes can even say so.  But it’s hard.  To the consternation of women, who are smarter about these things, we are socialized to never, ever say what Andy Griffiths said.  We are taught that it is against our nature.  That it’s weak.

That’s absurd, of course, and we know it.  But we still do it.  For instance, as I type this, I am wrestling with whether I should tell you if I have ever done what Andy Griffith did, so plainly, with his now-departed friend.

As many of my female friends will tell you, I believe that the vast majority of men are emotional cripples.  We’re messed up.  And, perhaps, our inability to be honest about our feelings is what lands us in trouble so frequently.

What say you, O Wise Readers?  And, for the male ones, have any of you said what Andy Griffiths has said, recently?

 

 

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The Harper Cons aren’t truthful. They’re truthy. You know, with them, something doesn’t have to be true – just somewhat plausible. It’s the Harper way!

Pollsters who measured voter opinion in Alberta’s election have now adopted the same approach: we don’t have to tell you the truth anymore – we just have to be plausible!  That’s truthiness in action.

UPDATED: Someone famous agrees with me!

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Let the sons stay up late to see it. Was so big and bright, it made us squint when we looked at it.

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Jammed my finger under the cabin fixing a pipe, feels like it’s broken. Dog was lost for hours, Son Two inconsolate; she eventually returned. Blackflies are back with a vengeance.

But that moon was so big and close, last night, all of that was forgotten.

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Sent along by a Lib friend in Ottawa. Ouch!

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Spare a thought, if you will, for a sad Stephen Harper, last week contemplating his first full year of majority governance. It is almost enough to feel some sympathy for him.

Almost.

It’s been a year and a few days, now, since Harper’s Party — because, let’s be clear, the Conservative Party would not exist and would not be where it is without Harper — celebrated their big victory on May 2, 2011. The Cons vanquished their much-detested enemy, the Liberals, and reduced them to a rump in the House of Commons.

They received a clear mandate to kill the long-gun registry, and the Canadian Wheat Board, too.

They elected MPs in every province, including Ontario, where voters have long spurned the advances of Conservative candidates. And they did all this despite the hearty dislike that Quebec voters, and many media folks, feel for them.

But a year later, and despite the upside, all is not well with the Harper Party.

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