A "gender" budget!!??

What's next, an LGBTQ budget?!?!  A Black Lives Matter budget??!!  Probably.  Whatever happened to budgets about the finances of the country?? 

And don't get me started on child care.  The working women of my generation figured that out more than 40 years ago.  When I had my first baby 42 years ago, I knew I had to hire a "wife" if I wanted to keep working.  So I did.  I hired a very expensive live-in nanny and after six months, went back to work.  But back then, we didn't get a year off.  We got six months and "a" job back, not our own.  And we didn't get our salary, we got unemployment.  It was disconcerting indeed to return to the office to find someone else sitting in yours doing yours.

I also had to deal with two step-children and their care in the face of  their very bitter and hostile mother.  Oh, how much fun was that!  Not. 

But I regret nothing.

As part of the generation that went to the barricades for working mothers, I am appalled when I see well-educated mothers sitting on their asses at home.  These women took up expensive seats in post-secondary institutions, got good degrees and then decided to stay home.  That is not what we fought for.  We fought so new mothers could go back to work and not lose their jobs.  Actually, I take it personally and usually give these women an earful.  "I'm so glad I have the choice to stay home," they say.  Really?  Hey ladies, support yourselves and do something society values in the workforce.  Society still penalizes women for having the biological function of having children, but women have to accept it and keep working.  Them's the facts. 

Even if we lost ground by staying home for a while, we overcame and moved on.  My kids had a myriad of child-care situations -- nannies, daycare, after-school programs, neighbours -- and they prospered.  I didn't wait for "the government" to figure out my choices.  And as I say, that was 42 years ago!
____________________________________________ 

Just have to say a word about Kurt Browning.  If I have to see and listen to him one more time about the "Chip reverse mortgage" program, I am going to scream!  As much as I used to love the guy, I'm about to say I no longer do.  At least they have dropped that sad ad he did with the great Don Jackson.   

What a joke

• Strategic brilliance, with the ability to assess what the future holds,
• The capacity to make decisions, drive performance, build business and create partnerships,
• Significant leadership experience at the CEO level,
• Experience leading complex business transformation,
• blah, blah, blah..............

These are the requirements for the position of president and chief executive officer at Canada Post.  Really?  Who can predict what the future holds?  Right there you have a problem.  This was contained in a full-page ad in 'The Economist' this week.  Imagine what that would have cost?! 

All you need to run Canada Post is the ability to push back on the unions and deliver the ever-diminishing mail Canadians are sending these days.  Welcome to the world of social media.  Period, the end.  You don't have to be a brilliant statistician to deal with the likes of the late Joe Davidson and Jean-Claude Parrot.  Remember those two?  They singlehandedly ruined Canada Post, after which Davidson went back to Scotland with his big, fat pension and promptly died. 

B and I were thinking about who could run the Post Office and we came up with the names of a few ADMs he had dealt with back in the day in Correctional Services; I came up with one name, Louis Huneault -- one of the smartest, toughest DMs I ever had the pleasure of working with. 

To run that mess, you have to be tough and smart -- a hard combination to find.   

Cherry pickers

The natives enthusiastically quote The Indian Act, various treaties and The Constitution when it suits them, but when it comes to lawful, jury verdicts they don't like, they are up-in-arms.  It's called lawlessness and anarchy. 

Both verdicts in the latest cases involving natives were reached fairly within the legal system, but who cares?!  The juries have spoken.  Period, the end.  But who cares?!  If there weren't daily marches, I wouldn't keep writing about this, but it just keeps getting worse.  Marches are being held all across Canada and I'm getting sick of it.  Even 'The Globe and Mail' is chiming in about "justice for Tina".  It's outrageous.  She's had justice, due process and every other legal remedy and that should be that.  Here's an unruly, hysterical mob yesterday.  Wonder if they paid for a permit for the march?  Now there's a rhetorical question! 

 

You can't read it, but the bag in the foreground reads, "People over pipelines."  How dumb.  Where do natives think the billions they are handed comes from?  They're standing on it.  Oil. 

 

 

Here's the witless editorial in 'The Globe' today.  Boy, that once-inspirational newspaper has sunk to the level of a trashy tabloid.  





Still upsets me

"There is the record of your baptism," the priest said to my late Uncle, when they met to plan his funeral.  A proud French Canadian, "R" wanted his funeral held at that same Church, Sacre Coeur in Sandy Hill, and B had gone along to help plan it at the request of my cousin.  They were reading the handwritten notice of his baptism, inscribed more than 90 years earlier.

So, when he died in 2014 and I went to Ottawa for the funeral, I was dismayed to see it was not being held at Sacre Coeur, but rather at an English parish a couple of blocks away -- one in which Uncle R had not set foot.  I suspect it was my cousin's wife who orchestrated this manoeuver, because that's the sort of thing she does, but I didn't say anything at the time -- very uncharacteristic indeed.  Why she could not have honoured her father-in-law's final wishes and had him buried out of his childhood parish I do not understand?

(Since she has basically turned my cousin against me, I have no problem finally saying what I have been thinking about this bait-and-switch operation for a number of years.  It was mean-spirited and selfish.) 

Here is the last picture of us.  He was the last of my parent's generation and I still miss him terribly. 

 

 

 

Am I the only one?

The entire front page of today's Globe and Mail was given over to a drawing of Tina Fontaine, the native girl found dead in Winnipeg a few years ago.  The man charged with having killed her was found not guilty a couple of days ago and people have gone insane. 

Am I the only one who reports on the actual facts of this case?  Apparently.  I have yet to read or hear anything that covers what really happened, that she was in the care of her mother at the time, who didn't notice she was missing for a week.  A week!  This is the same mother deemed unfit to raise her from the time she had been born.

But the capper was CTV's interview yesterday of Perry Bellegarde, chief of the AFN.  Not answering a single question, all he did was rail against the system.  "We need more indigenous lawyers.  We need more indigenous judges and jurors.  We need more indigenous crown prosecutors!" he ranted.

Really?  Where are you going to find them?  Certainly not on the remote reserves, where you insist they remain so you can get money.  Living in Upper Rubber Boot Saskatchewan, the only jobs open aren't doctor or lawyer -- just Indian chief, as the rhyme goes. 

Today's journalists are a very unprofessional bunch.  They are lazy and don't bother to get the whole story.  To think that 'The Globe and Mail' is part of this crowd is outrageous.  Man, have they slipped.     

What a knob

I refer to that sanctimonious hypocrite David Suzuki.  'The Globe and Mail' has a regular feature entitled "20 Questions"; this week they interviewed perhaps the most egomaniacal phoney in the public thoroughfare. 

What is the greatest issue facing Vancouver?

"Like every city in the world -- climate change."

I have a bulletin for him:  Lil' old mankind cannot really affect climate change.  Natural warming and cooling of the earth has happened for millenia and whatever we do -- or don't -- doesn't make any difference.  Back a few centuries, they were growing wine in Scotland, it was so temperate, so car exhaust wasn't the problem. 

Least favourite holiday?

"Victoria Day."

That response is so obvious it's ridiculous.  Another bulletin:  Canada is part of the Commonwealth, of which The Queen is head, and we celebrate Victoria Day to honour our heritage.  Guess he doesn't realize in which country he resides.  Must still feel downtrodden and oppressed, poor thing.

What is Vancouver's greatest park?

"It's not a park, but it should be.  Namely, the entire shoreline."

So unrealistic it's laughable.  Someone needs to stop this guy before he corrupts more gullibles than he already has!

If, thanks to a time machine, you travelled back to 1975 and had the floor at a city council meeting, what advice would you offer?

"Give all Crown land back to Indigenous people of the area."

OMG!  I certainly hope he follows through and donates his own house and land to the Indigenous people it was "stolen" from.  And by the way, how many Indigenous people have served in the Canadian Parliament?  I can't think of one who has bothered. 

And my favourite.......

If you had $1 million to give to charity, what cause would you select?

"People working to find an alternative to capitalism."

Sorry to say "OMG" again, but OMG!  This guy's entire life has been built around capitalism.  How does he think he gets to travel around and promote climate change?  His foundation relies on capitalism and the people who make money and donate to it.  In a breathtaking admission, he said the money he was given for winning an environment award from Monaco he spent on a lavish vacation to French Polynesia!  "I decided not to give it to my foundation," he actually said, without realizing how ridiculous it was.  I guess he'd rather let other evil capitalists donate to his foundation instead. 

Can't decide if he's worse than Neil Young, or at par when it comes to hypocrisy.  Probably a toss up.  On principle, whenever 'The Nature of Things' appears on TV, I switch channels.   
.


 

I don't like to....

...speak ill of the dead, but reading about the death of Sonia Bata, I relived many negative memories of having worked with her.  In 1975, I was in charge of the "Vincent Massey Awards for Excellence in the Urban Environment."  Sponsored by The Canada Council, The Massey Foundation and Canada Mortgage and Housing, the award had a luminous group of judges; Sonia was one of them.

Forty-nine at the time, Mrs. Bata was quite frankly a bi-ch -- especially with me, a 28-year-old, fairly good-looking woman.  She was haughty, dismissive, rude, over-bearing and opinionated.  She didn't like me, that was clear.  In fact, she didn't like women in general.  However, I was solicitous of her and treated her with respect because that was my job. 

Looking back, I wonder how I got this job?  I think it was my private-sector experience in Toronto with IBM, Maclean-Hunter and Dupont of Canada, where I had to work with a myriad of people from all over Canada and the world.  Weekly meetings about the award program's progress were held with Humphrey Carver, Ian McLennan and Hart Massey, during which I was grilled.  Hart Massey was also a nasty guy who never gave me one word of encouragement.  Instead, he criticized everything I did. 

Happily, the program went off without a hitch and we had the award presented by then-Governor General Ray Hnatyshyn at Rideau Hall.  Luckily, I was able to avoid Mrs. Bata. 

RIP anyway.         

More disrespect

During an eight-day trip, Trudeau is spending about a half day on business -- trumped up though it is.  This whole trip is to repeat his visit with Pierre with his kids.  Every day he disrespects Hindus and Sikhs by dressing up in their sacred cultural and religious garb.  What is wrong with his staff?  Do they not brief him?  When I worked for ministers, they were fully-briefed and anyone meeting them was carefully vetted.  One photo in 'The Globe and Mail' today shows the vacant Sophie, posing with a convicted Sikh terrorist!

B was born, spent his early years in India and was schooled by his very strict grandparents on the "do's and don'ts" of dealing with the Indians.  He used to be invited to the local Maharajah's son's birthday parties and would never, ever wear their ceremonial dress.  It would have been an insult.  What's wrong with these people?

Last time I checked, he was Catholic.  What are they doing praying in front of the Holy Temple in Amritsar dressed like clowns? 

The editorial cartoon in 'The Globe and Mail' today.  Perfect. 

 

Same old, same old

About four years ago, I wrote a letter to the editor of 'The Calgary Herald', saying pipelines will never get built.  Yesterday, Margaret Wente of  'The Globe and Mail' wrote a column saying exactly the same thing.  There is too much emotional, non-scientific objection to pipelines by too many people and it's very sad because wither Alberta, wither the Canadian economy and wither jobs. 

It's ludicrous.  And will Trudeau "lite" do anything?  No.  To get past those throwing themselves in front of bulldozers he will have to do what his father did:  Declare the War Measures Act and call in the army.  But he doesn't have the nuts.

Yesterday there was a great opinion piece in 'The Globe', written by a former Playboy Bunny.  "Why I became a Playboy Bunny" was penned by a former Bunny who worked for Hefner in London, England, in the sixties.  When Hefner died, I wrote about what a feminist I thought he had been (see "I thought he was a feminist", 28/09/17) and I stand by that piece -- especially after having read the first-person account of this woman whose life was turned around by having been one.

"The strict regimental training was brutal and quickly whittled out the less stalwart," writes Mary Sharina, a.k.a. "Bunny Zoe".  She became a croupier -- a skill that took her around the world and made her lots of money.  "Playboy club management realized that most of their Bunnies had disapproving parents, so they invited parents for a tour of the club, a reassuring talk and a complimentary dinner.  Once wined and dined -- it was the first time my parents had dined on haute cuisine -- my dad was a convert," she says.

Zoe was able to buy her parents a telephone, vacuum cleaner, colour TV and washing machine -- all of which transformed their lives of drudgery.  "I regret nothing.  It gave me my financial freedom, enough money to help my family and plenty of opportunities to travel.  My skill as a croupier would eventually take me around the world.  I felt empowered, not demeaned, and I look back over the years feeling privileged and proud to have been a part of something so iconic.  How many women can say the same?" she writes. 

Amen to that.     

The epitome of insulting

The ludicrous editor of Vogue, Anna Wintour, has delivered a huge insult to The Queen by sitting beside her with sunglasses on!  Who does she think she is?  You don't greet The Queen with sunglasses! 

 

And here's our embarrassment of a PM playing "Mr. Dressup" again in India and trotting out his entire family looking like they're ready for Halloween!  Another international insult to the host country. 

He is neither a Hindu, nor a Sikh and should not be wearing such garb.  It would be like his being invited to an NHL event and showing up in a hockey uniform.  Insanity.

No wonder he is being snubbed as he stumbles around from one horror show event to another.  Just as with pipelines, you can't play both sides with Sikh separatists and Indians in Canada.  I predict this country will be more divided than ever when he is finally turfed out of office.

 





Here's the deal

Did some research on the Colton Boushie case and this is what I uncovered:

• The kids in the car were related to the last five chiefs of the Red Pheasant Reserve;
• The kids were:
• Kiora Wuttenee-Campbell, daughter of Sheldon Wuttunee
• Eric Meechance, son of Charles Meechance
• Colton Boushie, nephew of Stewart Baptiste
• Cassidy Cross, related to Wuttunee
• Each chief had been indicted many times, i.e., drunk driving, assault, poaching, fraud, rape and corruption, while in office, and dismissed;
• Red Pheasant has had to spend a substantial percentage of its budget defending these chiefs in court since 2009, draining the band's resources.

Before they vandalized and tried to steal Stanley's vehicle, they had entered another farmer's land, smashed up and tried to steal his.  Unsuccessful, they invaded Stanley's yard, where the shooting happened.  While obviously not committing a death penalty crime, these people were engaging in very risky behaviour in a province where all farmers are armed and anything can happen when strangers enter private property.  Farmers have a lot of expensive assets to protect. 

It now appears Boushie was a welcome distraction which took the spotlight off the mess these band leaders were in, so the band jumped on it.  The whole bunch are linked to the "Native Syndicate", an aboriginal gang formed in 1994 and still active.  You'd think the Minister of Justice would have been able to have found out what I did in a few swaps on the internet!  Her behavioural interventions are illegal in this matter.  And as for the PM.....well.......!!  

I have also learned there were 10 potential native jurors out of 100 in the pool.  That's 10% and in the general population their numbers at 0.3%.  Most recused themselves and those remaining answered questions in a manner that caused the defense to reject them; the prosecution did not exercise its right to reject any jurors.  So folks, this is the reality that journalists fail to report.  Journalists today are unprofessional and lazy -- take it from one who toiled pre-internet, when it was actually difficult digging for the truth.      

When a journalist, I was under scrutiny by ruthless and demanding editors to properly research any topic on which I wrote.  You have to get the "who, what, when, where, why and how" of every story you cover.  That's what professionalism is all about.    

Here's what I don't get?

Why are no natives standing up for the verdict in the Colten Boushie trial?  Do all natives think they have to speak with one voice and have only one group opinion?  I know a few status Indians who read this blog and not one has said, "A jury verdict is a jury verdict, even if some of us don't like it."  The reality is natives do not identify as "Canadian".  Sad, but a fact.  They also don't want to get involved in the justice system, so it is problematic to get people who don't feel Canadian to participate. 

Had there been natives on the jury, it would have been very difficult -- if not impossible -- to get an objective verdict.  And we all know, from the universal outrage on reserves across Canada, that that would have been the case.  It would have resulted in a hung jury, not a good idea.  The accused always has the right to be tried by a jury of his peers and Stanley was not a native.  Period, the end.

And as the always-dead-on Don Martin asked the Minister of Justice yesterday, "What's next?  Will Asian-Canadians have to be tried by a jury of Asian-Canadians?"  Where does it end?  How do you manage it.  You can't. 

And I am still outraged by Trudeau and Wilson-Raybould actually having the unconstitutional gall to meet with the family and say nonsense like, "We can and should do better."  What does that mean?  That so far, juries have been useless and their verdicts wrong?  Some know-it-all wrote in response to a letter I had about this in 'The Calgary Herald' yesterday, saying that juries aren't always fair and objective.  Having been a foreman on one, I can tell you we tried our damndest to get it right, based on the admissible evidence presented.  In fact, we knew the accused was guilty, but the evidence just wasn't there, so we had no choice but to find the guy "not guilty".  The Crown had not done it's job. Yes, juries can get it wrong, but not on purpose and not because they have biases and prejudices.  Canadians just aren't like that.

For the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister to crap on a jury is unconscionable. 

Were I Andrew Scheer, my next move would be to hold a press conference, flanked by a couple of seasoned criminal lawyers, and have them give the press and public a clinic on the Canadian justice system and severely embarrass Trudeau and Wilson-Raybould for their ignorance and interference in the process.  But Scheer won't take a position.  Does the guy not know he's in politics?  I've said it before and I'll say it again:  he will not beat Trudeau because he doesn't have "it".  It's a sad fact, but outside of Brampton, ON, and Richmond, B.C., neither will the NDP leader.  Canadians just aren't going to vote for a Sikh.  Not yet, anyway.   

Someone should put dunce hats on their heads, sit the two in the corner and make them memorize The Constitution Act of 1982.  It's all there. 

Craps on the Canadian justice system

That's what the dim-witted Trudeau did today when he commented on the verdict in the Colton Boushie verdict.  "We have to continue the conversation and question our relationship with indigenous people," he opined after learning the accused had been found not guilty. 

Really?

The evidence just wasn't there to convict the guy.  Were it, he would have been.  But it wasn't, so he wasn't.  Listening to a number of legal experts, it was clear they could not convict, but Trudeau in effect called into question the entire rule of law by commenting nebulously on the verdict.  I have been a jury foreman and it's a pain in the a--.  You have to be sequestered for a long time and it's no fun.  They did their best and came to their verdict, just as we did 25 years ago when I went through it.   

But, who cares?!  It wasn't the verdict the natives wanted, so they screamed foul.

Boushie's family wailed and screamed when it was read.  It was all "racism and injustice" for these people.  Here's what had happened:  Drunk, Boushie and his friends were trying to steal a car from the accused's property.  They were bashing in the doors and windows and the owner fired a few shots; one killed Boushie.  Sad, but they had no business being and doing where and what they were.  And will they pay for the cars they wrecked? 

The fact that we have a prime minister who thumbs his nose at the justice system is a disgrace.  Whatever he thinks, he should have stood up for the jury and the system.  Instead, he pandered to the natives.  But what do we expect from a pot-smoking hippie from B.C? 

Outrageous. 

   

$600 a night

That's what you can expect to drop at the Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise.  We just spent $2K in three days.  But what I would not put up with was a dirty toilet.  Seriously!  When we checked into our room, I noticed the toilet had what looked like turd in the bottom of the bowl.  It was a turd look-alike, but turned out it was just permanently stained. 

So I called the desk to have someone come and clean it.  They couldn't.  We were then moved to another room and guess what?!  Yep, another turded toilet!  The guy who moved us hadn't even bothered to check!  Even were it a 'Motel 6' or 'Holiday Inn', I would still not have expected that, but at $600 a night!!  Forget about it.  Finally, they put us in a suite with two bathrooms and the concierge had finally actually checked the bowls first.  All good, but seriously, how can the Chateau Lake Louise have old, soiled toilets!!??!! 

The rest of the mini-vacation was lovely, but true to form, I did not take one step outside in this winter-wonderland.  The bars and restaurants were perfect for me, as I sat and watched Asians stumbling around the lobby in ski boots and poles.  That's right, they walked around digging ski poles into beautiful carpet!  They even kept their helmets on!  OMG!  "So, do you think they do that at their own homes?" I asked a server.  "Probably not," he replied, "But we can't say anything to them." 

Obviously, I could never work there.

And eat!  The Brits are the worst.  It's back-to-the-breakfast-buffet countless times and really quite disgusting.  I guess they figure that at $32 a pop, they better load up. 

Anyway, it's God's Country and quite breathtaking. 

      

OMG!

So now, "emotional support" animals are not just dogs or cats.  The other day, some woman tried to bring a peacock onto an airplane.  A peacock!  People also try to board with chickens, turkeys, snakes and other bogus "support animals", so United and a couple of other airlines are developing guidelines to bring a little sanity to the scam.

And by the way, what's the difference between an "emotional support animal" and a regular house pet?  My dog used to give us all emotional support, but he still had to travel in the cargo section.  It's all complete b-llsh-t. 

People need to get over themselves.     

Poor Edward

Now the natives in Halifax have succeeded in having the statue of the city's founding father, Edward Cornwallis, removed.  It's an outrage and a disgrace that city council acquiesced to this ludicrous demand.  They did it, they claim, to have better relations with the M'kmaq.  Here's a bulletin:  Halifax will never have better relations with the M'Kmaq no matter what they try. 

And neither will any other city, town, province or country.  There is no meeting of the minds with natives.  Ever.  On anything.  Oh yes, sorry, they will agree to more money, but that's it.  I'm so sick of Canadian history being dismembered and diminished.  Next we'll have to re-name Cornwall and call Montreal "Hochelaga".  It's insane. 
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And here's another bulletin:  The Canadian Constitution gives permission for the federal government to carry out projects in the national interest.  Provincial governments can stop neither pipelines, nor railroads.  That's just a fact and that's how Canada came into being.  The national railway brought Canada together -- thank God. 

So, B.C. can whistle Dixie about trying to block a pipeline.  The sad thing is it will take a protracted legal fight all the way to the Supreme Court to make it happen and I wonder if Notley or Trudeau have the guts to push it.  The sooner Jason Kenney gets into power the better.