Good for him

CBC anchor Travis Dhanraj nailed it when he resigned.  He slammed the CBC for its culture of controlling journalists and editorials -- but mostly for being shameful Liberal backers.  He claims his attempts to interview Conservatives were routinely overruled and prevented him from practicing objective journalism, but he really let them have it and it's about time.

The taxpayers fund the Mother Corp to the tune of $1.2 billion per year and Carney just handed it another $205 million!!!!  The latter went a long way towards boosting free PR for the Liberals in the last election campaign.  Imagine handing the CBC more funding while it was covering an election you're running in!  

What do I always say about the odious Rosemary Barton?  David Cochrane?  Adrienne Arsenault?  Dhanraj doesn't mention any names, but we all know who he's talking about.  Ya, those three.

And then there's ex-president Catherine Tait -- she of the orange hair and smug, arrogant mien.  As I have blogged, I babysat her when she was a toddler and she was a spoiled brat back then. 

Arriving for her swaggering appearance at a Parliamentary hearing into CBC's out-of-control finances.

The CBC needs to cut the obscene bonuses its executives hand themselves.  Tait herself makes $520,000 a year, or $43,000 a month.  $43,000 a month!$%@#!!!  Under her are two exec vp's who make about $400,000 each and three ordinary vp's who pocket about $350,000!!!!!  Last year, just to top it all off, they handed themselves $16 million in bonuses!!!!!

But Dhanraj outed the whole bunch and kudos to him.  Now lawsuits are flying and it will be delicious to watch Tait, et al, squirm and face the music in court.  I can't wait!  An MP has called for a parliamentary committee investigation into the mess.  As I said, it'll be fun to watch!

__________________________

The latest incomprehensible move is that net-zero-green-lunatic Carney has come out publicly and said there's a "good chance" a pipeline will be built.  Just as he vowed Canada would become, "An energy powerhouse," he's weaseling his words again with "good chance".  A "powerhouse", but in what kind of energy?  A good chance smells like no chance to me.  

You'll notice it's not guaranteed.  The fact that Carney has kept Bill bill C48, aka the Tanker Ban in place off the coast of B.C. -- thank you David Eby -- means that any oil getting out of Alberta will not get past the West Coast.  Duh!

People need to wake up and realize the guy's a charlatan.  It's been revealed that he has major financial holdings in at least a 100 companies that could put him in a conflict of interest as PM, so he will have to recuse himself from debates on a myriad of files.  

It's not a good sign for the country if he continues to vote on issues that will influence the personal finances of this multi-millionaire.  As I said, if you voted for this fraud, you were had.

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A word about Canada's doctor shortage:  I dearly wanted to go to medical school, but didn't have the math marks required at the time, so I lost out on my dream.  Frankly, why do you need math to practice medicine?  I have no clue!?  

Ironically, when I recently found my birth family, I discovered two of my five sisters are physicians.  I guess it's in the genes.

____________________________

Another word:  Wimbledon.  Spotting the great Stephan Edberg in the Royal Box, I long for the days of serve-and-volley magnificence; he and Martina were beautiful to watch.  Now it's all pound, pound, pound from the baseline until someone hits it out, or into the net. 

(Note: Alcaraz is the exception; he has all the shots.) 

The other thing is if you play hard-court tennis on grass, you'll fall on your ass, as so many players are doing.  Today's players don't practice on grass, so they're in trouble a lot of the time.  

The magnificent Edberg, my all-time favourite.

Ah, call me old-fashioned.....

I love Shania

...but she has had way too much work done on her once-beautiful face, in my opinion.  She was parade marshal here for the Stampede and then headlined the grandstand show.  I bet she was fabulous, but she no longer looks like herself.  I know she's battled Lime Disease, but that does not affect the face; she should have left it alone.

Shania today.

 

The original Shania

Anyone who's local, including us, does not go to the Stampede.  Outside of the Rodeo and the Chucks, it's just another garish side show and midway.  And the prices!  $30 for a hot dog and a beer!  Insanity!  We watch the rodeo on YouTube and it's fabulous!  

We're also watching Wimbledon.  If I have to listen to Aryna Sabalenka screaming on every shot, I'm going to scream louder!  Who permitted this freak show in the first place!?  It was Monica Seles who started it all and it has only become worse.  That's not tennis, in my old-fashioned world.  It's more like wrestling, or fighting in the parking lot fighting after last call.

And then there's Ben Shelton's wife-beater shirt.  What's that all about?!  When did Wimbledon start to permit sleeveless monstrosities like this?  They have also begun to permit the ladies to wear colour underwear.  It's a slippery slope, folks,  until full colour dress sneaks in and Wimbledon -- the last vestige of civilized tennis -- becomes just another tacky tournament.  

I am disappointed.  We were there a number of years ago to watch Federer defeat Andy Roddick in the men's final.  It was thrilling and no one wore coloured underwear. 

________________

On a personal note, chatting on the phone with an old friend of mine, she said, "Poor so-and-so, she had four kids!"  Really?!  I was supposed to feel sorry for this woman!!??  Her husband was a successful architect and mayor of Rockcliffe, for Gawd's sake.  How tough could it have been?  She didn't work outside the home, so I'm not getting out the crying towels.

I had two kids and two step kids, of whom I had custody.  I also worked fulltime, travelled and had to navigate B's ex, who was a nasty obstacle at every turn.  So don't tell me to be sympathetic to a rich woman who had four kids and stayed home.  Not gonna happen.

I have always worked.  I remember when I first got married (may Bob rest in peace) and said to myself, "There is no way I am going to ask a man for $2 for nylons."  I have never lived on a man's money and never will -- unlike Gloria Steinem, who had a rich guy finance her various projects.  

Yep, the Queen of Women's Lib was underwritten and supported by a man!  You could not make that up.  So, next time she's blabbing on about liberation and empowerment, remember who's paying for it.

   

 

Just puttin' it out there. Again.

Once again, my wicked step-daughter, Sarah Leslie, is bringing her mother to our cottage -- our sacred place, the place the six of us enjoyed as a blended family for 25 years.  It's so wrong.  She first pulled this evil stunt seven years ago; I haven't spoken to her since.  It's gotta be about money, I reckon 'cause the mother will be paying.  

B's divorce was of the classic "From Hell' variety.  Even though it's been 45 years, I wince every time it crosses my mind, which is never unless something triggers the nightmare -- like inviting Madame Darth to our hitherto, happy, blessed place.

"Please don't make this ugly," B pleaded.  "It's war!" she shrieked in reply.

So it wasn't like he and the ex parted amicably.  She argued over every toss, every cookie crumb.  "I don't want to be Mrs. Marley-Clarke, but I'm keeping your name."  Huh?!

"You have to read 'The Woman's Room' to understand how liberated I am and what a feminist I've become, but I want your money and your name."  Huh?!

"I want full custody and you can see the kids when it suits me."  Really?!  To drive that one home, she changed the locks and left with the kids one afternoon when B was scheduled to pick them up.   

It was the last one that killed her off.  The psychologist who interviewed all of us decided her fate.  He wrote, "Diana Marley-Clarke sees the world in two colours, black and white, with her holding the latter colour.  I have confidence that Brian Marley-Clarke would share custody, but I don't have the same confidence in Diana Marley-Clarke.  Hence, it is majority custody to the husband."

Thank you Dr. L.  She ended up with two nights a week and every third weekend, so that didn't turn out too well for Mrs. "Me Me Me".  So, as I say, it was never friendly and cuddly after that.  Frankly, I deserved a Mother's Day card from her for raising her kids, hahaha!  (Note, even though we had majority custody, we still had to pay her a fortune.  WTF?!)

To say the arrangement was strained would be a breathtaking understatement.  Her lawyer even wanted us to quit the club and cancel our summer vacations so she could get more money.  So, yes, when Sarah invites her to that place, I see red because I see it as a defilement.  As an added bonus, she even tried to go after my money and my parents'!

So, you bet it angers me when she goes up to our cottage.  By the way, it is a private club and step daughter is not a member, thus has to mouch off of a member --  usually a childhood friend whose family has been there for generations.  This means that one of the scarce and highly-sought-after cottages is not available to an actual member for the three weeks she plants her a-s there.  

And, of course, she rents it using her maiden name of "Marley-Clarke".  That's because B was on the board for nine years and president for two.  In fact, he was the guy who saved the club from financial ruin and his name and reputation remain highly-regarded up there.  So hey, why not dine out on the moniker at club dinners and take advantage of the reverence in which he is still held!?  What a good look that will be when the daughter of a former president is seen lurking behind the clubhouse sneaking a smoke.

Oh, did I forget to mention she is a heavy smoker?  Can you imagine smoking while you're pregnant?!  Rhetorical.  

Anyway, that's off my chest.  However, it needed to be said because step-daughter needs to be outed as the wicked sociopath she really is, devoid of any shred of integrity.  All I can say is the apple doesn't fall far..............

____________________

p.s.  I asked B's permission to post this.  At first he worried it might destroy his relationship with his daughter.  What relationship, I asked?!  She NEVER EVER calls you!  EVER!  So, he agreed because he knows how used and abused we have been by an ingrate.  Just read it to him and he said, "Good."   

 

50 years...

....after the report on the Status of Women, we are still penalized for the biological function of bearing children.  It's appalling!

This was the headline today.

Despite being against the law and the labour code to fire a woman while she is pregnant or on maternity leave, it's still happening!  It happened to me 50 years ago, when I was pregnant with my first child.  I was up for a job at the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. and came first in the competition.  But when they discovered I was pregnant, what did they do?  They cancelled the competition.  Cancelled it!

Cutely, while I was on maternity leave -- called unemployment leave back then -- they reinstated the competition and hired the guy who had placed second.

I kid you not!

I complained to the department of labour (how ironic) which sent a knuckle-wrapping letter to the president.  He did nothing.  Nothing changed.

Pregnant with my second, I was in another job and permitted six months' unemployment leave -- not maternity leave -- with a substantially reduced salary.  When I returned, I discovered someone else sitting in my office doing my job.  I was given another and that was that. Again, nothing done.

Because I'm me, I clawed my way back up the ladder and ended up doing very well.  But my male colleagues had passed me by and were earning considerably more.  I don't think I ever caught up.

I remember being offered a job in the Privy Council, but had to turn it down because with young children, I knew I could not put in the 12-hour days required.  Even if you weren't doing much, you still had to be there from seven to seven.  And even though I had a live-in nanny, I had to be home by six so she could sign off.  Yep, another opportunity missed.

To the generations of women who came after me and for whom conditions are much improved, I say you can thank my cohort for paving the way, for going to the barricades so you could enjoy slightly better outcomes.  Sadly, according to the stats, it appears they are still falling far short.

A survey from 'Moms at Work', a community and advocacy organization for working mothers, found 15 percent of Canadian women who take maternity leave are dismissed, laid off, or have contracts not renewed during pregnancy, leave, or upon return to work.  

That adds up to 25,000 women losing their jobs every year, three times the layoff rate of the general population!!!!  25,000!!!!

Yes, women are still heavily penalized for having children -- both while pregnant and after.

To "You've come a long way, baby", I say, pshaw!  

Don't take it from me

Take it from veteran columnist and financial writer Diane Francis.  

"At a moment when Canada most needed to tread carefully, we've managed to score a classic goal on our own net," she writes.  She is talking about Carney's latest gaffe in cancelling the Digital Services Tax (DST) on American tech companies, passed a year ago.  

"The decision to start collecting the DST while we were engaged in delicate trade and security talks with the US has put us on the defensive and handed President Trump a convenient stick to beat us with," agreed former Chamber of Commerce CEO Perrin Beatty.  

In negotiations, contentious issues should be negotiated between the two parties -- not unilaterally imposed by one nation just before talks begin.  Duh!  Why didn't Carney understand this?  At least he should have kept the tax in abeyance as a bargaining chip, but not implemented, while negotiations were underway.

But Carney is a global banker -- not a negotiator and certainly not a politician.  Trump, of course, is a master of both.  Carney is used to dealing with "yes men" from the top down.  Politics only succeeds from the bottom up.

So, having won the election with his "elbows up" refrain, he has now switched to "knee down".  What a joke.  What a disappointment for all those who voted for him.  They were duped.

And to add insult to injury, he has not heeded the first rule of negotiations, which is that you do not put up a "D" team against an "A" team.  But sure enough, he has appointed his "D" team to lead the charge:  Kristin Hillman, a career civil servant and diplomat, most recently ambassador to the US, and Dominic LeBlanc, a professional Liberal politician, well-known tippler and bosom buddy of the hapless disaster Justin Trudeau.  Neither has any experience in business, trade, investment, entrepreneurship, technology or finance.  

We're in deep trouble with Carney

They will be eaten alive by Trump's team, headed by US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick, a successful entrepreneur, self-made billionaire, technology expert and philanthropist who was named "One of the world's 100 most influential people."  Hillman, hitherto familiar with only diplomacy and playing nice, will end up battered, bruised and bloodied after Lutnick gets finished with her across a table.   

Wow, way to go!

I have said from the get-go that Carney would be a calamitous prime minister.  So far, I have been proven right.    

Still at it

When I was DG of Communications for Fisheries and Oceans (DFO), we were continually dealing with the Indigenous, who ignored and contravened every regulation designed to support the fishery and prevent over-fishing that would decimate species.

Naturally, the natives thought our scientists were inferior to their elders and just continued to flout the law, with predictably devastating results.  They're still at it.

The Globe carried a feature on the illegal harvesting of baby eels (elvers) in Halifax by local Indigenous.  While non-Indigenous fishers obey the laws and regulations, local natives believe they are above them.  A much sought-after delicacy for sushi around the world, one kilogram is worth about $5,000, so the battle's on.

The sticking point is the 1999 "Marshall ruling" that determined First Nations had treaty rights to fish and hunt to earn a "moderate livelihood".  Those last two words are the problem.  What's a "modest livelihood"?  A second decision was supposed to clarify that all harvesting were to be subject to federal regulations to ensure conservation.  That second decision is also being ignored.

People like the chief of the Millbrook First Nation told DFO that his community won't abide by federal regulations that limit the catch of elvers and is instead asserting his right to earn a "modest livelihood" from his harvest.  Who does he think he is?  And how dumb to risk species decimation?  

The scientists I worked with were frustrated and I assume they still are.  "Even though it's been 25 years, we are still trying to figure out the scope and nature of the right as it's actually implemented on the ground," said UNB law professor Nicole O'Byrne.  "People have different interpretations of how broad that should be, how it should be regulated and in whose interest."

Said another ignorant law-breaker, "It's our right to fish." 

Non-Indigenous fishers have been trying in vain to get Minister Joanne Thompson to step up and curb the illegal fishing.  She hasn't.  Could that be because she's a dyed-in-the-wool Newfoundlander and committed environmentalist who can't see the forest for the elvers?

If you want to know how the Indigenous are treating their pristine, protected environment, here's a picture worth a thousand words:

A member of the Pictou Landing First Nation with his harvest on the "pristine" Millbrook First Nation.

And so, the insanity continues.

   

Really??!!

If you can believe it, Calgary City Council spent two days debating and trying to figure out what its "core" civic responsibilities were!

Because they obviously have no clue!!!!  They had to actually put forward a motion to clarify the responsibilities of the three levels of government, i.e., federal, provincial and municipal.  If they had a clue they'd realize that the cities are creatures of the province and don't need to exist at all.  This is what Britain has, just two levels.  

Of course, this is all about money and who pays for what.  But, there's only one taxpayer and we pay for every, wasteful cent at every level.  

Just to make everything "crystal", as Jack Nicholson retorted to Tom Cruise in 'A Few Good Men', it was City Solicitor Jill Floen who came to the rescue.  "The Municipal Government Act (MGA) outlines what cities are legally obligated to carry out, but does not define what constitutes a core civic service," she intoned.

Huh??!!  If the Act defines what cities are legally obligated to undertake, then those are obviously "core" responsibilities.  How could Ms. Floen say they're not defined??!!  Probably because she's a lawyer and specializes in counting the number of angels dancing on every pin she meets.

City council at work!

"Everything we're doing right now is a core responsibility based on those basic premises," she added.  Well then, so those are core responsibilities are they not?

I could go on, but at the end of the day, councilors could not agree on what their jobs were.  I suggest they take a drive down any Calgary street and weave around a few sink-hole-sized potholes to find at least one core responsibility.  They might also take a gander at all the dead and dying trees screaming for help on city property.  THOSE ARE JUST TWO OF YOUR CORE RESPONSIBILITIES!!!!  GET BUSY!!!!!   

It's so insane!!!!!