The terrible situation in Attawapiskat is, by now, known to many.

Families, children, living in tents and plywood shacks. No running water, no electricity, buckets serving as toilets. Sickness, despair, disease. Mould coating the walls of homes, and winter setting in.

The 1,800 Cree who reside in the remote northern Ontario community are Canadians, but their reserve doesn’t look much like Canada. It looks like something out of medieval times, when life was brutish and short. It shames all of us, in every part of Canada, that children live in conditions like that.

Over the years, I have advised many native bands. I have worked in communities almost as bad as Attawapiskat found in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. I have advised successive governments — Jean Chretien’s, Paul Martin’s and Stephen Harper’s — about dealing with problems which are quite similar to Attawapiskat.

As the father to an aboriginal daughter, I was so proud to do that work, but I cannot tell you that I ever succeeded in what I tried to do.

I was a failure.

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Read this story:

“Communications lines drafted by the bureaucracy about the government’s plan to establish an Office of Religious Freedom reveal a deep-seated nervousness about how the venture will be perceived by the public.

…But documents obtained through access to information laws suggest the government is worried about the perception that the office would be used to curry favour with religious and ethnic groups in Canada. And it shows nervousness about the office being seen as an attempt to blur the line between church and state.”

Whose religion? Whose “freedom”?

I wrote in The Walrus that these social conservative lunatics wanted to eliminate the wall between Church and State.

Now that they have their majority, they’re doing just that.

Welcome to the new Canada.

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Obit:

Robert Spiegel of Kensington, CT was born in Brooklyn, NY on May 2, 1934, lived and subsequently died. Most of his noteworthy accomplishments happened in said middle part. A Professor Emeritus in the English department at Central Connecticut State University, Robert had the rare distinction in his career of receiving five grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Over the course of 43 years of teaching, he introduced countless neophytes to the wonders of the well-written word, passionately teaching the likes of Dostoyevsky, Vonnegut, Gogol, Gibson and virtually everyone in between. The final, and an immensely popular course he taught, was that of the literature of baseball. This was thinly veiled therapy to alleviate the trauma he sustained from coaching arguably the worst little league team in recorded (or unrecorded) history and from the sufferings he endured from 40 years as a devout Mets fan.

Story:

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Robert Spiegel’s passion for Russian literature, the New York Mets, ethnic cooking and beagles endeared him to generations of students and colleagues at Central Connecticut State University. Now, through the power of social media, the 77-year-old former English professor’s obituary is charming strangers, as well. Spiegel, a resident of the Hartford suburb of Berlin and a native of New York City, died Wednesday after a struggle with cardiac disease and dementia. He was eulogized in a quirky obituary written by his son that appeared Friday in central Connecticut newspapers. It quickly started spreading on strangers’ Facebook pages and Twitter feeds, usually accompanied by the readers’ admissions they did not know him — but wished they had, based on the richly detailed obituary.

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The “C” stands for Conservative, as in a de facto arm of the governing party.  That organization, once carefully and proudly non-partisan, is a Conservative Party branch plant operation.

Their position on section 13, then, makes sense. If the Harper regime likes something, their “CEO” will, too.  Just watch.

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I’m 7 friends away from the not-so-magic 5,000 friends limit.

When I get there, I have heard that the possibilities are:

1. I won’t be allowed to accept any more friends;
2. I get punted off of Facebook for being a machine, because it’s not possible that an actual human being can have that many friends; or
3. My head will explode.

If the head-exploding thing doesn’t happen, non-friends can continue to follow my exploits, such as they are, on my “fan” page, which is here.

God bless and keep Mark Zuckerberg.

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The best columnists, my friend and big brother Angelo Persichilli once advised me, “are never, ever predictable.”

By that standard, Kelly McParland is becoming one of the best columnists around.  See here and here, and that’s just this week.  Not something I’d expect in the Post, and therefore impressive.

(He’s not perfect, however. Let’s not get carried away.)

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Ford Official portrait.  Go to it, investigative reporters!

If a progressive administration did this to a conservative media outlet – the Post or Sun News or what have you – the media organization would (rightly) have grounds to be outraged.

The Star, I think, is being too meek in its response. If Toronto’s Chief Troglodyte wants to declare war on a paper, I’d return the favour, times ten. Get Kevin Donovan’s investigative team to go through every inch of both Ford’s lives. Make ’em cry like the babies they’ve revealed themselves to be.

There’s a lot there, for a reporter prepared to look.

A lot.

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Hope she has a staff to handle the CVs.

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Quote:

OTTAWA — The Conservatives have confirmed they are behind a rash of phone calls to Liberal MP Irwin Cotler’s Montreal-riding over the past couple of weeks in which constituents allegedly were told of Cotler’s resignation and a pending byelection.

But while the party says it was not breaking any rules, political scientists feel the tactic crosses a line and will harm not only voters’ trust in the system, but perhaps even the Conservatives themselves.

“It’s disgusting,” said Queen’s University professor Ned Franks. “Politics is a blood sport but that doesn’t mean you have to resort to dirty blows.”

The “political scientists” – who, in my experience, are neither – are wrong.  It’s much more than “crossing a line.” This is a corrupt practice and against the law.  In fact, if electors were provided with false information, inside or outside of the writ, laws were indeed broken.  That’s particularly true if any aspect of the Conservatives’ conspiracy took place in or near Ontario.

Quote:

96.2 (1)  A person who, inside or outside Ontario, prevents another person from voting or impedes or otherwise interferes with the person’s exercise of the vote is guilty of an offence and on conviction is liable to a fine of not more than $5,000.

Party to offence

(2)  A person who, inside or outside Ontario, does anything for the purpose of aiding another person to commit the offence described in subsection (1), abets another person in committing it, or counsels or procures another person to commit it is a party to the offence.

Quebec has similar, and tougher, laws. This morning, the Harper Conservatives have admitted they’ve broken the law.  If I were Irwin Cotler – a man who I and others admire very much, and whose integrity is beyond reproach – I would get on the line to the police right now.

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…below. Very nice to receive.

Meanwhile, assorted media – at the Globe, Gazette, Huffington Post and elsewhere –  continue to falsely propagate the notion that there was a religious sanction for “honour killings.”  Not helpful.

**

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