Some journalists think the Star has an “agenda,” and is trying to get Toronto’s mayor.

Some journalists think it’s a legitimate story and should be pursued.

Personally, I objected to the CBC’s stunt, and wrote that they should have never gone to the house where his children live. On this one, however, I think that it’s a legitimate story. If the most powerful municipal politician in the country is under police investigation for anything, people are entitled to know about that. There’s no claim to privacy in criminal law, and for good reason.

Moreover, I don’t think conservatives’ insistence that this is all about politics is accurate. Out here in Vancouver yesterday, the progressive mayor was all over the front pages with a criminal matter involving his foster son. I didn’t see any progressives saying that conservative media were out to get him.

What do you think, readers? This is a big, big story in Toronto, and lots of folks are talking about it. Should the Star have published on this?

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None of us are surprised in the slightest, of course. But some of us are going to make him wear it.

Promise.

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We’re not BFFs – he’s said I’m a “gadfly” and I’ve called him a “boring old fart” – but I admire Simpson, a lot, for his annual mea culpa column. If only more members of the commentariat did likewise.

So, I plan to! Being back in BC, I’ve been doing some understandably Western-focused columnizing this week, the results of which show up in the Sun papers over the next few days. Once that’s done, I plan to write up all of my pundit face-plants from 2011.

If you remember any that particularly rankled you, send ’em along. It’s time to ‘fess up!

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Live from Vancouver!
A W@AL report on the coming B.C. election, and what’ll happen with a B.C. Liberal and B.C. Conservative vote-split – and the Dix Democrats coming up the middle! Shocking footage shows what’ll happen after that!

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This is a photo I snapped last night with my phone. It is a picture of a child being carried out of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by what is presumably his father. He wasn’t the only child at the Cineplex movie theatre, last night. There were others.

When I saw them, I went out to get the manager, and said that young children had been brought in to see an 18+ film. She initially refused to do anything. When I told her I was a writer and planned to document her response, she went in and talked to one group, who eventually left with a girl of about 11 or 12. The other group, with the boy above, was allowed to stay.

As far as I know, Onex owns Cineplex. I would like to let Gerry Schwartz know about what happened last night (I’d tell his deputy, too, but Nigel Wright is now Chief of Staff to the family-values Prime Minister of Canada). Reviews have universally made mention of how truly graphic and violent this film is.

So why does Cineplex, and some “parents,” think it is acceptable for a child to see such things?

It’s a cliche to observe that the world is a sick place. But it’s true, sometimes, just the same.

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…heading to Vancouver this morning to see the sibs. Flying WestJet, so this should be interesting.

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She should try out a veil.

Over her mouth, so no one can hear her anymore.

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If 2011 was Canada’s year for election, then 2012 looks to be the year for friction.

Federal-provincial friction, that is.

This past year, as you will recall, witnessed a remarkable number of provincial electoral contests, from east to west.
In Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and the Yukon, incumbent governments were re-elected handily.

In a year where most of them had been written off by the pundits, that’s pretty remarkable.

Recessionary times, scandals and an appetite for “change” should have have meant disaster for the Manitoba New Democrats and the Ontario Liberals, where both parties had been heading toward political oblivion. But they, and the others, were all handily re-elected.

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I’d add it to the list.  It’s what I call the inability of people – usually teenagers, but also Paulina Gretzky – to discern, and understand, that whatever they put online (a) is seen by a potential audience of millions (b) is forever and (c) has unhelpful consequences.

Got any examples of Online Agnosia you’d like to pass along?

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It’s year end! Well, almost.

It’s close enough, however. And, as such, it’s that time of year when members of the commentariat come up with lists of who won, who lost, what was best, what wasn’t, blah blah blah. Lacking an imagination, as I do, herewith is my list of Top Five Really Important Political Stuff in 2011.

(It’s the same list I rolled out on Krista Erickson’s much-watched Sun News show and she liked it so much, I offer it to y’all, here.) In reverse order:

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