Over the last few days western countries have started to enforce a UN mandated no-fly zone over the skies of Libya. French jets fired on Libyan tanks, while over a hundred cruise missiles were launched from British and American warships in the Mediterranean. The offensive was started almost immediately after an emergency summit in France was attended by 22 nations and organizations including: France, the UK, Germany, Italy, Canada, Spain and of course the US…
Category: Politics
Wither the progressive choice in a dispiriting election? Take heart, there is hope!
We are currently on an inexorable march towards a Canadian federal election, which will more than likely take place on May 2 or 9th. Despite the seeming strength of the Harper Conservatives, chinks are beginning to appear in his armour. One revelation of unethical behaviour after another has left Our Glorious Leader facing…
Tuition Increases and the Underfunding Myth: Where Your Education Money is Actually Being Spent
Everyone’s heard about how Montreal universities are underfunded and that the quality of students’ education is suffering. These issues are as established in public dialogue as an aged spaghetti stain, permanent and unforgiving, and monopolizing all the attention. Forgive me for being saucy, but…
A Question of Choice: this Saturday’s Protest Against Charest
Tens of thousands of protesters gathered this past Saturday to send Premier Jean Charest a cautionary warning on the contents of the upcoming budget. After the shocking social cuts that were announced almost a year ago in Charest’s previous budget, social activists came out of winter hibernation to remind Charest that the people of Quebec will not tolerate a repeat.
The roughly 50,000 protesters, comprised of students, union members, women’s groups, les patriotes, the raging grannies and the average pissed-off citizen with baby in tow, gathered at…
Puddles ‘n’ Potholes: from the Mayor’s slush fund to slush on the streets of Montreal
Good evening everybody. I hope all is well. It’s March 14, and a good thaw to you all. My thaw so far has been one of frustrations, particularly where my car is concerned. The other day, I hit a pothole that was hidden by a speed-bump, and was filled with water. My car stalled out on me the next day. After around half an hour, the car started again without a problem…
Japan Battles the Elements; Earth, Water and Fire
The war in Japan has been over for more than sixty-five years, but if you didn’t know any better you might think the war was still going on, judging from some of the images we’ve seen in the last few days. The 8.9 magnitude earthquake on Friday was so powerful that it shifted the entire main island of Japan as much as two meters. And yet…
Sweater-vests make me hurl: Young people and voting – not as boring as you might think!
Do you hate politics? Do attack ads and sweater-vests make you want to cap a bitch? Do you throw up a little in your mouth when you think about an election happening? Well you’re not alone. The trend in recent elections has been a sharp drop in participation, most noticeably among young voters. While seniors vote so often that they’ve been known to write-in the name of their favourite candidate…
Al Jazeera: The News How It Was Intended to be Seen
American Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently cited Al Jazeera for fine news coverage while at the same time criticizing the American media. She claimed that the United States was losing the information war by not reporting the real news, while Al Jazeera was “changing peoples’ minds and attitudes” by reporting on important issues…
Angus scraps plans to expropriate Café Cleopatre, but is the Cleo safe for good?
It looks like the independent burlesque, fetish and drag artists who call the second floor of Café Cleopatre on St-Laurent their artistic home will be able to continue doing so, at least for a while. City-backed developer Angus Development (SDA) told Radio Canada that they have scrapped their plans to expropriate the venue, and now plan to build two 13-storey buildings on either side of Cafe Cleo. This turn of events brings to a temporary end what is probably the biggest local David versus Goliath story to come about in a long while…
Gaddafi: A two week diary of a madman
Following the revolutions to oust Mubarak and Ben Ali, the world has turned its focus on the country sandwiched right between Egypt and Tunisia. On the 15th of February, only four days after the resignation of Mubarak, an uprising began in the western Libyan city of Benghazi. At the onset of the uprising, Libya’s ruler of 41 years…