A Question For Scarborough-Guildwood Candidate Ken Kirupa

Liberals fire back at Ken Kirupa & accuse him of "deliberately misleading" voters about living in Scarborough-Guildwood for “so many years”
— Don Peat (@reporterdonpeat) July 30, 2013

Its been impossible to find a record  of  a K or a Ken Kirupa residing within the riding boundaries. The folks covering his campaign should ask him why that is.

PS. In my building we've had three fliers from Giambrone, gawdknows how many from Mitzie, 0 from Mr. Kirupa.  I am sure, based on signage, that he has his pockets of support.  But there seem to be entire polls that he has surrenedered.

Company Behind Leslie Spit Turbine Project Pretty Low Profile

Of the company behind this, The Star writes:

A little-known renewable energy company claims to be working on a wind project at the base of the spit.

[...]

Sunwincor has little public profile. Its website lists Jafray Hinsen as the only contact. Hinsen has an email address, but the firm lists no phone number or address beyond “Mississauga.”

[...]

There is no record of Sunwincor being incorporated in Ontario, and it is not listed as a member of the Canadian Wind Energy Association.

Almost nothing by way of an Internet trail for Mr. Hinsen, either.  I note Sunwincor also has a project planned for King Township.

Stephen Harper's Message To The Blind

...expressed in American Sign Language.

Turbines For T.O.

Sunwincor International and our partners are actively engaged in planning and developing an exciting and ecologically balanced wind farm. The Leslie Wind Farm will be located on the Outer Harbour East Headland at the base of Leslie Street adjacent to Toronto, Ontario

With the help of the government of Ontario and as directed by the Green Energy Act it is our desire to begin a meaningful conversation with the local community to gain early support for this project.

Well, good luck with that:

From here.

I am a supporter of wind power, and wind power along the shores of Lake Ontario, because of course that's where the wind is.  I am not, however, confident that the provincial government has the stones to stand before the forces of NIMBYism that this project will unleash.  Rob Ford will add it to his list of things to demagogue, and Tim Hudak will see it as a another way to crack the OLP's Toronto Fortress.  On the SunWinCor site they say that the project "will be a tremendous way of showcasing Toronto as a willing host of sustainable, responsible Green Energy".  I wonder if the people of T.O. are up to that challenge.

Fearless

I've been listening to this Pink Floyd tune for years and only found out the name of it a week ago:

Hippies kill punks, forever and always.

Wind Farm Opponents Out Six Figures

A group of landowners who unsuccessfully sued a wind power developer and the farm corporation that leased it land have been ordered to pay legal costs of $107,370.78.

The 21 landowners near Collingwood sued wpd Canada Corp. and Beattie Brothers Farms for more than $17 million over the plans to develop the wind farm, arguing that it had decreased their property values.

Madam Justice S.E. Healey dismissed the action, ruling that while the landowners’ property value may have been diminished, it was not caused by any misconduct by wpd or Beattie Brothers.

Actually this last bit is misleading.  It is fairer to say that the judge offered no opinion on whether the property values may have been diminished, but decided that, regardless, the developer had not engaged in misconduct.  I wrote about the decision at greater length here.

Harper Government's Message To The Blind

First person translates this gets a free ice-cream cone.  But only one scoop, for I am not made out of money.

Inspired by.

Justin On The Herb

Its not the policy itself that might get him in trouble; I suspect that the majority of Canadians support legalizing or a least decriminalizing marijuana, and I suspect that the party brain trust has polled and focus-grouped it and knows as much.  However, its a 2nd or 3rd tier issue at best and on its own won't win too many votes. Furthermore, the Tories, as I've argued before, will try to spin it as the LPC's main or only issue.  Indeed, they are already attempting that maneuver: Justin Trudeau’s Policy Priority – Legalizing Marijuana.  So care will have to be taken to lay out the other more substantive planks in the LPC platform in a timely fashion.  Otherwise, Irie.  Oh, and as for worries about the border:

@kinsellawarren Harder to justify that when two states just voted to legalize.
— Dan Arnold (@calgarygrit) July 25, 2013

PS.  Iggy, if anyone still remembers that guy, was pro-decrim, and he was the farthest you can get from a dirty hippy.

The State Of Surface Temperatures

From Simon Donner, about as clear an explanation I've heard re the "pause" in AGW (which isn't really a "pause" in any case):

Over the past 10-15 years, the global mean surface air temperature did not increase at the rate of the previous decades. The cause of the slowdown is primarily natural variability, variability that is driven by long-term oscillations in the oceans. The planet is still adding heat - we can see in this planetary energy balance data. The difference is for the past few years, more of that heat is gathering in the deep ocean.

In a few years, the yin of deep ocean heating will give way to the yang of surface temperature warming. Among other things, we'll see full El Nino events develop again - there has not been one since the climate shifted in 1998, something my lab is studying - and with that, new global surface temperature records.

So there you have it.

Ottawa NDP Candidate Happy To Throw By-Election To Hudak Tories

Spoil factor never sounded so good: http://t.co/fr9YN5ncUR #OttSouth #onpoli
— Bronwyn Funiciello (@BFuniciello) July 24, 2013

One would like to think she's in it to win, but apparently not.

Your Daily Nazi: Nazi Treasure To Remain In Canada

...at least for now.

I've written about Robert McCorkell (or McCorkill) a few times.  He was a  Canadian chemist with White Nationalist leanings, and when he died he bequeathed  $1,000,000 in ancient gold coins and other valuables to the National Alliance, an American hate/terror group.  The collection itself is quite impressive: ancient Libyan, Roman, and Turkish artifacts.  It would be a pity if it wound up helping to refinance American Neo-Nazis.

Behind the scenes, a number of people (including BCLSB fave Richard Warman) have been working to stop this from happening.  And it looks like they've succeeded, at least temporarily. Yesterday afternoon an injunction was obtained blocking any distribution of Robert McCorkill's estate "until further order" from the New Brunswick Court of Queen's Bench.  You can see the whole thing here.  What happens now is anyone's guess.  It would be nice to see an academic institution of one sort or another adopt the collection.

Update:  CBC has a short piece up.  Apparently, the estate is worth about 1/4 of the original estimate (so: $250,000).

Bernie Farber Has Advice

Now that Jason Kenney has left his position as Minister for Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, Bernie makes some suggestions to his successor, Chris Alexander:

Refugees - Remove Hungary and Mexico from the Designated Safe Country list. This can be done immediately and without legislative reform. These designations impact vulnerable communities - ethnic minorities, the LGBTQ community and women facing gender violence. The Minister can also propose an amendment to the law to provide for an expert human rights panel to assess whether a country might be safe, rather than allow designation by statistics. And he can seek to amend the law to provide an automatic periodic review after designation and add appeal rights to persons from designated countries.

I haven't written much about Mexico in this regard.  In the case of Hungary, however, it is quite clear that the country is no longer safe for either its Roma or Jewish minorities.  What is particularly galling is the possibility that these groups are being sacrificed in the name of a Canada-EU Free Trade agreement.

Bernie also suggests:

Health Care - Change the Order in Council to restore the same health care system that has worked well since 1957. No legislative amendment is required, it can be done immediately. Institute a means test as suggested by Canadian Doctors for Refugee Care.

The kind of changes that Bernie wants rolled back were made to the Interim Federal Health Program, I believe.  These recently resulted in a mid-East refugee, who had left home because he had been persecuted for his Christian beliefs, being denied chemotherapy in this country.  As Brad Wall said at the time:

“It’s unbelievable that some of the decisions that have been taken federally are having this impact on people who are clearly the most vulnerable, refugees who are obviously fleeing something quite terrible — that’s why they’re refugees..."

“On the face of it, you just consider the case of this particular gentleman or others who, for example, as it was pointed out … might need prenatal care, this is just common sense. You just do this.

“This is the kind of country we are. You cover it.”

In this case, Saskatchewan eventually picked up the cost of treatment.  So, to prevent the poor fellow from dying, the province paid for a bad federal policy.

And Bernie's last recommendation:

Immigration - Scrap the proposed regulatory amendment to lowering the age of dependency to 18 from 22. This will affect every family applying for permanent residence in Canada. No family believes a 19 year old should be excluded from a family application and left behind.

I am not terribly familiar with these particular changes, I will leave this bit unglossed.

Bernie's  piece, incidentally, is entitled Restoring Canada’s Dignity and Respect, and the entirety of it  lies behind the Globe pay-wall.  Good luck digging it out.

Ontario By-Elections: Scott's Gut

The esteemed Scott Tribe says:

The OLP seems to be holding on a slight lead to the Toronto ridings (Scarborough and Etobicoke). They are probably ahead in Mcguinty’s old riding in Ottawa.

Windsor will go NDP unless every NDP voter down there decides not to bother showing up to the polls

The OLP is in a bit of trouble in London. I suspect the PC’s are in front here.

Scott's gut coincides with mine, at least re Scarborough T.O.  I can't see that riding flipping unless Giambrone siphons off enough votes that the place goes PCPO, and I don't think even NDP hard-cores like Giambrone.  The response I've got going door-to-door is a lot of eye-rolling: "That guy?"  So I don't believe an unexpected result is in the cards.

 Etobicoke OTOH will be interesting--an empirical test of the strength of Ford Nation.   That's the one to watch.

Mann Vs. Steyn: Mann Takes A Round

In October of last year, climate scientist Michael Mann filed suit against Mark Steyn and the National Review for a piece Steyn wrote in that publication, and against  the Competitive Enterprise Institute for a  piece that appeared earlier on its blog.  The articles in question described Mann's hockey stick graph, his reconstruction of pre-instrument  temperature records, as "fraudulent" and his work in general as "bogus", so Mann's angry response isn't surprising.

The NR and the CEI filed motions to dismiss on the grounds that their statements are protected speech under the First Amendment, mere “opinion,” “rhetorical hyperbole,” or “fair comment.”.  They also argued that Mann's action was a SLAPP suit.  At the time I wrote:

Frankly, I know of nowhere that a reader, be they careful or careless, could interpret the term "fraudulent" when applied to a scientist's work as implying anything less than that they were guilty of scientific misconduct (the kind of thing they discuss here) or straight out fraud.  I am unaware of any place the term has been used  merely to state that the scientist's work is incorrect. This is quite a bit different than the situation with "blackmail", where there is an established colloquial sense that is weaker than the more precise legal sense (the colloquial sense does not entail criminality where the more legal sense does). 

The court has now ruled that the Mann action did not constitute a SLAPP suit; these are typically launched by large corporate entities against individuals, and this case did not fit that description.  And they rejected the First Amendment arguments for reasons that echo my earlier remarks:

“Given the dictionary definition as well as the common readers’ thought about the use of these words (fraud and fraudulent) the Court finds that these statement taken in context must be viewed as more than honest commentary—particularly when investigations have found otherwise. Considering the numerous articles that characterize Plaintiff’s work as fraudulent, combined with the assertions of fraud and data manipulation, the CEI Defendants have essentially made conclusions based on facts.” [at 15]

The definition of “bogus” in the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, inter alia, is “not genuine . . . sham.” BOGUS, MERRIAM-WEBSTER: ONLINE DICTIONARY AND THESAURUS, http://www.merriam-webster.dictionary/bogus.com/  In Plaintiff’s line of work, such an accusation is serious. To call his work a sham or to question his intellect and reasoning is tantamount to an accusation of fraud (taken in the context and knowing that Plaintiff’s work has been investigated and substantiated on numerous occasions).”

So the NR and CEI articles were not opinion, but (mis)statements of fact.  Mann's suits can go forward.

Although they are far from won.  The court docs note, in regards to the National Review case, how difficult actual malice can be to prove under U.S. law. Nevertheless

Some ways to go, then, but a real possibility that Steyn and NR will be out a pantsful of money when this is all over.  A fate richly deserved, IMHO.  And in the case of the CEI, the judge's ruling (not quoted above) suggests that Mann probably will be able to show actual malice.  So they are in even deeper trouble.

PS.  As usual, the court docs are easier to read when you click on the image.

Your Daily Nazi: Son Of Stormfront

Derek Black, son of Don Black,  the former Alabama Klan leader who now runs the largest racist Web forum (Stormfront)  in the world, has renounced white nationalism.  When Don retires, Derek plans to turn the forum into an interracial dating site.  Just kidding.  But good on Derek.  I've written about Stormfront many times due to its role in stories related to the Canadian Human Rights Commision and the adventures of Richard Warman.  Here is some background for anyone who cares.

Meanwhile, Warman's court date with Connie and Mark and the anonymous posters at Free Dominon grows near.  I am informed that several anonies (Klinxx and SaskBigPicture) have thrown in the towel and settled.  The others appear to be comfortable fighting  a defamation case over statements that have been proven to be false on multiple occasions years ago.  Fools and their money, and all that.

Administering Colonial Science: Nutrition Research And Human Biomedical Experimentation In Aboriginal Communities And Residential Schools, 1942–1952

The full-text of the paper that everyone is talking about can be found here.  The researchers do not come off as being quite as reprehensible as they seem in media reports.  For example, there appears to have been some effort to use their research to refute common stereotypes:

It is not unlikely that many characteristics, such as shiftlessness, indolence, improvidence and inertia, so long regarded as inherent or hereditary traits in the Indian race may, at the root, be really the manifestations of malnutrition. Furthermore, it is highly probable that their great susceptibility to many diseases, paramount amongst which is tuberculosis, may be directly attributable to their high degree of malnutrition arising from lack of proper foods.

But there is also little question that these scientists found that having a handy group of malnourished people around was a good way of advancing their own research goals.  For example:

It was in this context that, starting in 1947, [Lionel Bradley] Pett began planning an ambitious research project using Aboriginal students as experimental subjects. Before he became the director of the Nutrition Services Division in 1941, Pett was already a well-respected scientific researcher and was the co-author of a pioneering nutritional survey of low-income families in Edmonton. He was therefore not simply aware of the divisive postwar debates among Canada’s leading nutrition experts and scientists concerning human nutritional requirements but was, in fact, a key player in these debates.52 To this end, the seemingly intractable situation in Canada’s residential schools provided Pett with an unprecedented scientific and professional opportunity. Without necessary changes to the per capita funding formula for the schools, there was little likelihood that the students’ nutritional status would improve in any meaningful way. This meant that the schools had become, through decades of neglect by Indian Affairs, a possible laboratory for studying human requirements for a range of nutrients as well as the effects of dietary interventions on a group of malnourished children.

And:

From the perspective of Tisdall, Kruse, and the other nutrition experts involved in the study, it was clear that the levels of malnutrition witnessed at Norway House, Cross Lake, and other communities visited in 1942 were a tragedy, but also an unprecedented research opportunity. This was because, even as late as the 1940s, nutrition was still a relatively young area of scientific inquiry. Scientists only really began to understand the function of vitamins and minerals during the interwar period, and most experts readily admitted that much of  their understanding of human nutrition was based upon animal studies and had not been put to the test on human subjects in any rigorous or controlled manner.20 The late 1930s and early 1940s were also the formative period for Canada’s nutrition professions. The Canadian Council on Nutrition (CCN), an advisory body made up of the nation’s leading nutrition experts, was formed in 1938, and the Nutrition Services Division of the Department of Pensions and National Health was created in 1941 under the leadership of biochemist and medical doctor Lionel Bradley Pett, largely in response to public warnings by the CCN that upwards of 60 per cent of Canadians were suffering from some form of vitamin or mineral deficiency. While such dramatic claims brought nutrition experts into the public spotlight during the war, scientists readily admitted – to one another, at least – that they still knew very little about the relative effectiveness of vitamin and mineral supplements on malnourished populations, let alone the precise vita-min and mineral requirements of human beings. Debates over this latter issue, in particular, would lead to major internal divisions within the profession by the late 1940s and meant that experts like Tisdall and Pett were eager to test their theories on actual human subjects.


There are a number of indications that these kinds of scientific questions, more than humanitarian concerns, played a key role in defining the response to the nutritional deficiencies in Aboriginal populations encountered by the researchers. 

[...]

The experiment therefore seems to have been driven, at least in part, by the nutrition experts’ desire to test their theories on a ready-made “laboratory” populated with already malnourished human “experimental subjects.”

It is perhaps unsurprising that the settlement of Attawapiskat bulks large in the research.  That poor little town can't catch a break, and apparently never could.

Dean Blundell Show Sanctioned For Advocating Violence

Ottawa, July 17, 2013 - The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) today released its decision concerning a conversation broadcast on the Dean Blundell Show on CFNY-FM (102.1 The Edge, Toronto).  The conversation was about a fist-fight that had broken out at the Toronto Remembrance Day ceremony.  The program hosts commended a man who had beaten up a protestor.  The CBSC found that the comments sanctioned violence, contrary to the Canadian Association of Broadcasters’ (CAB) Code of Ethics.

The decision itself says that Blundell's response to the attacker's story "glamorized" violence.

Rob Ford On Subways

He made these things up in his head.  Then he repeated them to himself in a loud voice, and became somehow persuaded that they had been told to him by a well-informed stranger, and then he believed them and told them to everybody he met....  A singular man truly, and as I do think the only thoroughly happy person in our city.

-J. Stephens

Freedom Cruise Update!

With not much happening in Ottawa these days, I thought I'd check in on the state of Ezra Levant's Freedom Cruise.  And the news is...its still sucking.  But in a slightly different way:

Wildrose leader Danielle Smith has also scraped [sic] her original summer plans, including a weeklong Alaska “Freedom Cruise” organized by Sun News host Ezra Levant, to focus on the disaster recovery in High River, part of her Highwood constituency.

No worries though, true believers, the Universe remains in balance.  For while the leader of Alberta's official opposition and possible one day premier is out, she has been replaced by...some guy that used to be an MP!  Yes, Monte Solberg, once "ranked...as one of the top three best speakers and most effective questioners in the House of Commons".  No doubt he'll speak of the day he left Paul Martin speechless, though in fact it turned out Martin had left his speech in the glove-box of his car.

Fun times!

Quebec Mayor Stephane Gendron Hates Israel, Hippies, And Kittens

This time around its his cat hate getting him into trouble:

According to reports, Huntingdon, Que., Mayor Stephane Gendron said that he tries to kill stray cats while driving his pick-up truck.

The SPCA is on his ass the way Meir was when he bad-mouthed Israel.  That protest set Stephane all a-grovel.  Apparently this one has him apologizing too (can't find the link, though), although it remains unclear whether he really spends his free time running over cats.

PS.  So far it looks like slagging Hippies (student protesters) gets you in less trouble than Israel bashing or cat murder when you're in Quebec.  The CBSC decision against Gendron got him off clean on that charge. Don't know if that is comforting or otherwise.