Sex Act? ....Say It Ain't So, Jack!

Maybe that's why he's smiling???

Who knows who has been keeping this bombshell under wraps until needed, but make no mistake, it has to be the most powerful political bombshell ever unloaded in a Canadian election.

"What police say happened on Jan. 9, 1996, was recorded in the former cop's notebook, which was reviewed and photocopied by the Toronto Sun.
The former Asian crime unit officer, who requested anonymity, details a prior police raid on the "premise currently ID as a bawdy house" looking for underage Asian hookers and a subsequent follow-up visit to the two-storey brick storefront on Jan. 9.
At first the policemen didn't realize they were interviewing one of the best-known Toronto politicians who was married to Chow, also a Metro councillor and now the incumbent NDP MP for Trinity-Spadina.
The officer's notebook indicates he asked the suspected john: "Did you receive any sexual services?"
He replied: "No sir, I was just getting a shiatsu."
The cop: "Why did you have all your clothes off?"
The suspected john: No answer.
The cop: "Are you aware that there were sex acts being done here?"The suspected john: "No sir."The woman, who was from mainland China, denied masturbating the suspected john but when the question was repeated became nervous and replied, "I don't know I only come to work today," the cop's notes show.

His notes also claim he saw the "female dump wet Kleenex into garbage" LINK

WET KLEENEX!!!!!   
Boy when you start talking about a wet Kleenex, it's bad news.

For Canadians, not into the know, a 'Happy Ending' is a massage parlour session that terminates with an 'hand job' or oral sex act.

Jack's wife is defending her spouse's presence in a 'massage parlour' as legitimate. Ugh!
That's a bit sad.
Ladies reading this blog...would you forgive such behaviour?
Methinks, NO!

The Demonization of Jack Layton

Attention. This man is dangerous.

It isn't easy to attack Jack Layton, he's eminently likeable and comes off as honest and affable, even if he represents some pretty goofy political ideas.
But it matters little to many of his new found supporters, who look to Jack and the Ndp not as a potential government but rather an effective force to counter a Conservative party juggernaut.

In truth, none of his supporters expect victory and so are not particularly invested in Ndp policy.

The Conservatives don't have much to gain by attacking Layton, the chance of a stray Ndp vote coming their way is almost slim to none, but for the Bloc Quebecois, it's a whole different ballgame.

The Bloc has lost up to 25% of its support to the Ndp, a cataclysmic change that has rocked the party and sent a panicked Gilles Duceppe into his war-room to define a new strategy to counter the Layton effect.

There isn't much there politically and even less on a personal level, to disparage, but both the Bloc and it's fawning media supporters are mounting a somewhat desperate effort to take the shine off the Ndp rose.

Jack Layton has been around the block (no pun intended) and these new attacks are unlikely to ruffle his feathers.  The veteran politician deflects criticism better than any other politician in Canada and does so in a charming, modest, self-deprecating  "aw shucks' manner. It'll be hard to score points without being cruel and I'm not sure the voters are interested in seeing a charming, cane toting character beaten up. Things like that often backfire.

But try the Bloc will and try its allies in the media will as well. To do nothing is to admit defeat and so it starts......

In lautjournal. Pierre Dubuc writes;

"Layton makes ​​a pact with the religious right"

We had clear proof on Good Friday, when a television report showed us Jack Layton participating in a march of Forgiveness in Toronto and again on Easter Sunday, while the NDP leader summoned reporters and cameras to witness him attending a church service....

....Clearly, the NDP leader has lamentably capitulated to the religious right....

....The next step is to change the progressive values ​​that characterize Canadian society by the conservative values ​​of the religious right. The Liberals and the NDP are well aware of these issues. But the Liberals and the NDP have capitulated to the religious right, as evidenced by their participation in the  highly publicized Easter  religious ceremonies.

All these 'bon mots' set under a Photoshopped image of Jack Layton wearing a turban. Ouch!

In the Tribune libre de Vigile Michel Gendron has dubbed Layton 'Smiling Jack,' and offered us a less than clever cartoon of Layton (is that Thomas mulcair in the background?)  in a sailor suit over a caption "Cracker Jack Layton"
I was a little surprised by the author's use of the term "CRACKER" and I'm doubtful that the author understands its connotation in English. "CRACKER" is a racial slur against white people, similar to 'nigger' against blacks. Hmmm.....

It seems that the French press is obsessed with showing Layton wearing funny hats, as if it were somehow un-Quebecois.

Even the staid La Presse ran a story that on the surface seemed to be straight reporting, it's subject, Jack Layton attending a Sikh religious day in Toronto took on shades of Layton-bashing.
Showing the Ndp leader with a white-bearded Sikh, plays into the fact that Jack is in favour of reasonable accommodations, a concept on the outs with the majority of francophone voters.

"Women  members of the NDP team attending wore a scarf on their arrival in the park."

Undoubtedly, another observation meant to inflame Quebecois' sensitivity to women's right, is the wearing of religious attire, including the hated veils. LINK{FR}

But there is clearly a danger in attacking Jack Layton on his character as Gérald Larose, the ex-union leader and sovereignist militant found out when he challenged Layton to publicly answer five questions. The questions were clearly loaded and meant to show Layton's federalist bend, and so hopefully for Larose,  embarrassing the NDP leader.
Presumptuously, Mr. Larose demanded an answer to his questions by a prescribed deadline, failing which, according to him, would be clear evidence that Layton was an 'impostor,' 'villainous' and a 'double-crosser'
Mercilessly attacked in the French media for his remarks, Larose beat a hasty retreat and apologized for his exuberance a few hours later. LINK

Such is Layton-mania in Quebec that nothing negative sticks to Jack.
Even when he was forced to explain why one of his 'not a hope in Hell' Quebec candidates, Ruth Ellen Brosseau, was vacationing in Las Vegas during the campaign, the Press laughed it off.  Incredibly, the fact that she was employed in Ottawa and couldn't speak French worth a lick, didn't seem to matter to the Press, in spite of the fact that the riding where she was running was over 97% Francophone! LINK
Had it been any other leader, there would have been Hell to pay.

Why the is the leader of the Ndp getting the 'kid glove' treatment?
Well, perhaps as loud-mouth André Arthur, the independent conservative candidate, running in Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, said;

"We see poor Mr. Layton with his cane, and we pity him, and so, we want to vote for him to console him. Clearly, this man has the sympathy of everyone, including me" LINK

Election Hysteria Grips Media

All of a sudden interest in Canada's federal election seems to have caught fire, after a lacklustre and moribund start that had most Canadians yawning with disinterest.

The story 'du jour' is Jack Layton's ascension in Quebec and media coverage has been hysterical and the frenetic pace of coverage has led to a bunch of stories that should never really have seen the light of day.

First, the polls, which are all over the map, leaving me to believe that we are in that statistical anomaly, the mythical 19th out of 20 polls that the pollsters keep in their back pocket as an excuse for a completely botched prediction.

With supposed margins of error of 3½%, it's hard to understand how two different polls are more than 7% apart, but no matter.

 There's almost a nine point difference between the EKOS and NANO polls and considering that according to the two pollsters own combined self-declared margin of error, there shouldn't be more than a 5.3% difference at worst. Hmmm.....

It reminds me of what our 13th Prime Minister, John Diefenbaker, once said about polls.
"....dogs know best what to do with polls."

Worse than that was the outrageous predictions of projected seat counts. The difference between certain news organizations calls into question whether they have any clue at all.
Here's what Threehundredeight.com predicts. I like this website a lot more than the individual polling firms because it aggregates the lot of them.
This is how they see the actual seat count as of a couple of days ago. Close, but still not a Harper majority.

The Montreal Gazette gets the cake for the stupidest most outlandish prediction of all and one wonders what the editors were thinking when they published this drivel, last Friday.

"According to a mathematical analysis of the poll, the Conservatives' majority could be huge, at 201 seats, the largest majority in the House of Commons since Brian Mulroney's record 211 seats in 1984, and in Quebec, the Bloc Québécois could plunge to the unheard-of depths of four seats." Montreal Gazette

....HaHaHa!!!!

While polls show national and provincial trends, one of the most difficult things is predicting the actual riding by riding impact of polling numbers. In Canada, our federal election is comprised of 308 individual elections and while national numbers are an important key to predicting what will happen, when things are close, as in many ridings, all bets are off as the force and magnetism of the individual candidates does make a difference.

When reviewing polling numbers, mathematics make it easy to spot reporting blunders, but it's more difficult to spot bias. That being said the slant in some news organizations is hard to miss, with two prime examples being Canada's largest web news aggregators,  Bourque and National  Newswatch both of whom have become Liberal party shills during the election.

In Tuesday's National Post, (a huge Conservative booster) a giant front page story tried to paint Michael Ignatieff as a bullshitter, who  changed his story in regards to some old war story
A rather naked and blatant attempt to smear his reputation in the waning days of the campaign.

Read:Ignatieff rewrites an old war story

Or there's always Radio-Canada who got some mileage out of a story that Harper’s communications director, Dimitri Soudas, interfered to shill for Robert Abdallah ­ as a candidate for board chairman at the Montreal port authority. Harper was forced to defend himself against the charge of undue influence

See:Harper defends aide over meddling allegations

Trouble is, the story is TWO YEARS OLD and was dredged up to specifically hurt Harper.
Here's the original story published in 2009! LINK{FR}

Last week, SunTV launched it's news channel which Liberals have sarcastically dubbed FOX NEWS North. The station has predictably taken up the causes near and dear to conservative Canadians, much to the howls of derision from political opponents.

To my eye, the launch hasn't been a rousing success. Short on content and long on moral outrage, viewers won't be satisfied with long-winded rants like that of Ezra Levant who lectured us for much to long on the evils of visiting Cuba.

Aside from Charles Adler, the talking heads collectively seem horribly ill at ease, but hopefully things will improve. First change needed is a decent 6PM newscast, without which the channel is hard to take seriously as a national news force.

SUNTV- Hard to compete with FoxNEWS!

Changes are sure to come. The first time I watched the morning show with Pat Bolland and Alex Pierson, I was not only struck by the  stilted banter and horrifically amateur content, but the off-putting image of the not so perfect bare legs of the otherwise lovely Ms. Pierson.

The next time I tuned into the morning show, the co-hosts were mercifully ensconced behind a desk instead of a couch. PROGRESS!

As for charges in the National Post that the network is home to bimbos wearing sleeveless dresses, all I can say is that the High Def version of the channel is not particularly kind to any of the on-air personnel and so in summation, all I can say is that SUNTV is no Fox NEWS, personality-wise, leg-wise or content-wise.

But I remain hopeful.......

Liberal Fortunes Haven't Really Changed

With most of the press screaming that the sky has fallen for the Liberals, the most cursory look at the numbers tells a much different story.

Here's a graph of voter support comparing this election campaign with a baseline of the 2008 election results. It shows that Liberal and Conservatives support has stayed pretty much the same.

This is the net difference between 2008 and now.

For all the sound and fury, the NDP aren't in line to pick up a ton of seats and the Bloc isn't in line to lose a ton of seats, such is the vagaries of our election system.

Nobody is talking about the incredible nosedive that the Green Party has taken in popularity, dropping in voter preference by almost half. It's hard to see the party surviving under Elizabeth May and with it's taxpayer subsidy set to drop by almost 50%, times will be tough.
Can it be that the environment is a dead issue in Canada? 

By the way...
We've been reminded over and over again that the cost of this federal election is about $300 million dollars.
What isn't considered is the loss in productivity.
If all working voters take just one hour of employer paid time to vote (the law provides up to three) it will cost the country another $200 million in lost productivity. This doesn't even consider the loss of time in classes as hundreds of schools are closed down to become polling stations.

As it stands today, it looks like we are going to have another minority Conservative government and we very well may be back at the polls again within two years. Hooray!

*******************************************************************************

*******************************************************************************

 I'd be remiss in not wishing the Montreal Canadiens good luck in their seventh and deciding game tonight in Boston.

Here's some sweet inspiration!

Let's hope Bruins blow a seventh game four years in a row!

Separatists Hit Panique Button

Easter weekend has not been kind to Gilles Duceppe and the Bloc Quebecois as poll after poll describe the fortunes of the party in a precipitous decline, now trailing the Ndp in popularity, something none of the experts dared predict before the election.

This last weekend has been particularly unnerving to those in the sovereignist movement and since the news dropped that two out of the three major polling firms have placed the Ndp ahead of the Bloc Quebecois, confusion and panic has set in.
Although Duceppe has started to attack Layton, the NDP leader appears to have a latex exterior and so far the political attacks have bounced harmlessly off the dapper politician. Let's be honest, it's hard to demonize Jack Layton.
The Conservatives have taken a much more subtle approach, likening Layton to an affectionate old uncle, loved and appreciated but not to be trusted with the family wallet.

One of the most sacrosanct beliefs held by expert Quebec-watchers is that support for sovereignty and independence has a bedrock base of about 30%.
It has become an accepted fact that this 30% will remain militant sovereignists come hell or high water and will always vote for the sovereignist option, just as it is accepted that about 45% of Quebeckers will always vote for the federalist option, again, no matter what.

Commodity traders describe a 'resistance line', or a 'trading range' to refer to a product like pork bellies or frozen orange juice's traditional price range.

When the product 'breaks out' either above or below this range, it becomes a wildly unpredictable affair and the so-called 'experts' throw up their hands and watch the unfolding scenario, unable to realistically predict the final outcome.
If recent polls are to be believed, support for the Bloc Quebecois has fallen below the critical 30% level, with the EKOS poll and IPSOS-REID poll both putting the Bloc support at 27%. In fairness, a third poll done by NANOS pegs the Bloc support at 32%. LINK

That being said, what is noteworthy, is that all three polls have support for the Bloc falling in this last week of the campaign and if the trend continues, no one can predict with any certainty what the actual results will be in terms of who will be elected..

It is important to note that about 70% of Bloc voters (or former Bloc voters) indicate that the Ndp is their second choice and with the Liberals floundering in Quebec rather helplessly, it's also hard to see a Bloc voter going anywhere else but the Ndp, the Conservatives certainly not an option.

So why the change of heart?
Anyone who claims they have the answer is Monday morning quarterback.

No doubt there is a bandwagon effect going on, similar to the one a couple of years ago that saw the ADQ make a giant provincial election breakthrough, also at the separatist's expense.
But since then, things have fallen back to normal with the Pq and the Liberals holding the majority of support and seats provincially.

It's fair to ask if this infatuation with Jack Layton and the Ndp is a one-off thing.

But for the moment, there's no doubt that about one-third of historical Bloc voters are looking for something else. It seems that Jack Layton has struck a cord and for many of the disillusioned, a vote for the Ndp is a well-placed and acceptable protest vote.

For the sovereignists, desperation has set in.
Yesterday morning the Bloc had brought back out of retirement, a frail yet hearty Jacques Parizeau to hit the campaign trail to inspire the troops with warnings of impending doom and gloom.

If they could, separatists would dig up the corpse of Rene Levesque, slap on a new suit and a little makeup and get Andre Philippe Gagnon to mouth his voice in a couple of well-placed TV commercials.

That's how desperate things are..

Whether the trend will hold until election day is the $64,000 question and if it does, what exactly the effect on the actual election will be is an open question. The new Ndp support is so diffused that whether it can make a difference in more than a few ridings is questionable.
It will however, help secure the fortunes of Quebec Tory incumbents who were thought to be in danger due to the arena fiasco. It will undoubtedly, help Conservative independent MP, Andre Arthur save his seat as well as Justin Trudeau.

As for the rest, there aren't more than a half dozen close races and whether the Ndp surge can take more than a projected two seats in Quebec, remains to be seen.

Interestingly, the big Ndp bump seems to be an exclusively Francophone affair and although no hard statistics are available, I don't think Jack Layton's new found strength translates into the English community. If it did, it would be good news for at least two Conservative candidates, Larry Smith and Saulie Zajdel, both who need some help to overcome traditional Liberal support to have any hope of winning.

At the end of the day, whether the Bloc returns to Ottawa with thirty seats or fifty seats is of little consequence if Harper gets his majority government.
That remains the overriding concern for Quebec nationalists who rightfully consider this the overriding matter at hand.


BTW::::

I'm off to the Canadiens game tonight with my son and so I hope readers will wish us LUCK!!!!
To the Vancouver Canucks and their fans, I hope all works out for you guys later tonight!

KEEP THE FAITH!!!!!!!!!!

Campaign Signs We'd Like to See

For more fun, see;

Defaced Election Signs

Have Happy long weekend- back on Tuesday...

Federalists Help Elect Separatists

The new found strength of the Ndp in Quebec doesn't seem to translate into many new seats with the Bloc Quebecois apparently set to hold onto a number of seats by the skin of their teeth due to the federalist vote splitting.
Looking at the numbers tells us that there are several Bloc ridings that could easily be won by a federalist party, should they only combine forces.

In all but a handfull of Quebec ridings in the 2008 election the federalist parties garnered more votes than the Bloc, but because of vote-splitting the Bloc won over two-thirds of the seats with less than 40% of the vote.

As things stand now, they are set to win just about as many seats, but with support down to the 34% level, if the latest polls are to be believed.

André Arthur

Withdrawing a candidate and leaving the field open to a 'favoured' enemy, is a strategy rarely invoked in Canada, but it is not unheard of. In the last election the Conservatives did not run anyone in Portneuf - Jacques-Cartier, allowing independant, André Arthur to squeak in ahead of the Bloc candidate. Once again in this election, the Conservatives are adopting this pragmatic approach, choosing to have an ally outside the party, rather than a Bloc member.

The only problem about withdrawing a candidate in favour of another party is that you must be confident that the votes will go where you want them to go.
This was a no-brainer for the Conservatives in Portneuf-Jacques-Cartier, few of their supporters were apt to vote Liberal and even if some of their supporters bled to the Bloc, the vast majority went to Arthur.

Between the three major federalist parties, withdrawing a candidate in favour of another party's runner makes sense only for the Ndp and Liberals. It is natural that should an Ndp candidate stand down, support would move massively to the Liberals and vice-versa.
It'd be hard to predict where the Conservative support would go should they adopt a stand-down policy and perhaps many Conservatives would choose not to vote rather than vote Liberal or Ndp.

That being said, let's look at some Bloc ridings that would go federalist, would the NDP and Liberals cooperate by pulling one candidate or another. I'm using data from yesterday's projections as reported by Threehundredeight.com.


Here's a look at at ten ridings that could be be taken back from the Bloc by combining the Liberal and NDP vote;

There are another five or six ridings that are close.

While cooperation would seem to be mutually beneficial, it seems that the natural competitiveness makes it hard to put into practice.
In the hotly contested riding of Gatineau the Liberals are accused of trying to smear, Francoise Boivin, the former Liberal MP and now NDP candidate, who is actually leading the incumbent Bloc candidate.

"New Democrat Leader Jack Layton accused the Liberals of playing dirty tricks against one of his star candidates in Quebec and called it a sign of desperation....

.....Montreal newspaper Le Devoir reported Tuesday that Boivin did not actually leave the party for ideological reasons as she has previously stated, but because she hired a woman to work in her office the Liberals say was her same-sex partner and then refused to acknowledge she had broken the rules." LINK

Look up at the table and you'll see that if in fact Miss Boivin's support drops because of the allegations, it'll be the Bloc candidate who'll be the winner, even if the lost NDP vote goes to the Liberals!

Cooperation? Oh well...... just dreaming.

PQ Convention - Blah...Blah...Blah!

Reading news reports of the events at the PQ convention last weekend I am reminded of that famous New York Yankee baseball manger, Yogi Berra who once said; ""It's déjà vu all over again,"

Each PQ convention seems a clone of the previous, the only question at issue is whether the current leader survives or is cast aside in another cruel act of political fratricide.

Alas, the lovely Pauline was indeed confirmed as the leader, receiving a 93% approval rating,  impressive when one considers that she scores in the mid-twenties with the general public.

The day before her reconfirmation, Marois sat silently by as delegates voted to ban English public signage, holding her tongue, lest she upset the militant dogs ahead of her leadership review.
Readers may remember that this particular clause in Bill 101, among dozens of others, was overturned by the Supreme Court, years ago.
The delegates wanted to re-implement the very same clause and use the famous "Notwithstanding Clause" to opt out of the inevitable court defeat.

In most politcal parties, it is the 'Young Turks' wing of the party that pushes for radical new policies, but in the case of the PQ, it is the old and frustrated who most want to push the envelope, sensing that like Moses or Martin Luther King, they will never see the Promised Land.
"And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!"

Of course Pauline and the other PQ elected members were aghast at the idea of re-implementing the draconian policy that could best be described as lose/lose gambit.

As soon as her leadership was reaffirmed she set forth to scuttle the newly minted motion.

First she sent party bigwigs out to the podium to soften up delegates.
Makko Kotta told delegates then that "...We can reduce, but not outlaw English. We are on a quest for a new nation and this resolution can be potentially divisive"
...How generous!

"PQ language critic Pierre Curzi and former PQ language critic Louise Beaudoin were dispatched to send a message to the hard-liners through the media that the PQ in power would not revisit the sign issue.
"It is a position which could effectively be perceived as radical," Curzi told reporters at a hastily called news conference in the corridor. "We find it does, indeed, send us down a perilous path." LINK

After the delegates had been suitably cowered, Marois hit the stage to put the coup de grace on the proposal by calling for a new vote;

"I have no desire to get embroiled in another legal debate on the question of the language of signs, given that we have lost all the way to the United Nations.

"What I want is for us to put all our energies into winning our battles. I ask you to reject this proposal."

"With that, the party made a stunning flip-flop - agreeing to not touch the existing law: Bill 86, adopted by the Liberal government in 1993, allowing English on signs as long as French is predominant." LINK

It was a cunning piece of strategy, cynical but nonetheless effective. Marois let the militants run wild and then after receiving their blessing, undid the damage.

One thing the party did do was to re-affirm their intention to restrict access to English cegep to those ineligible under the terms of Bill 101, thus rejecting the conclusions of the Quebec's most senior language body, charged with defending the French language, the Conseil supérieur de la language française. In a report published just weeks before the PQ convention, it concluded that "...attendance in English cegep has virtually no effect on language shifts" 

As far as language militants were concerned, this unacceptable conclusion meant that the bloom was off of the rose of this hitherto august body which they attacked mercilessly in the press as a sellout.

LINK

No matter, it wasn't really about defending French, it was more about punishing the English 'colonialists.' 

I daresay that if Rene Levesque and Lionel Groulx popped out of the grave to advise them the same, they would reject the notion as well. 

To delegates, anti-English resolutions are just too delicious to pass up and no convention would be complete without a few nasty proposals, putting Anglos in their place.

One of the proponent's of the ban on English signage told reporters that it is 'normal' to have only one language on commercial signs, after all, he pontificated, when one goes to Italy, one doesn't expect to see English signs.

Hmmm.....No reporter dared to challenge the remarks by reminding him that Quebec is not a country, but rather a province in a predominantly English-speaking country! Ouch!

And so with a renewed sense of purpose and conviction that Quebec would soon be a sovereign state, the delegates left the convention in an upbeat and confident state of mind, oblivious to the reality that they'll be back again next year and the year after that and in ten years as well, ad nauseum.

The broken record continues to play the same tired tune over and over again, with the general public sick of hearing it, while to hardliners, it remains a rhapsodic symphony!

Our Cherished Lost English Schools

What school is this?

Reading some of the comments concerning the closure of English schools in Quebec, I was saddened to read the names of my primary and high school among the casualties of the language war.
For those of use, who are over forty and attended an English public high school or primary school in Quebec, there's a good chance that the school no longer exists.

Sadly as commentors pointed out, there's no history preserved to remind us of our past and the great institutions we attended. They were good times....

My first memory of kindergarten was my teacher calling  the us over to the windows to take a gander at what might have been the last horse-drawn milk wagon in the city. As we strained to peak out over the window sills, (we were little tykes) I will never forget a tired old horse bedecked with the obligatory blinkers covering its eyes to filter out those peripheral distractions,  pulling a  J.J Joubert milk wagon. It's over 50 years and I remember it like yesterday....really.

Kindergarten is where I made a small clay imprint of my right hand, which I molded and then  painted by myself. I still keep it proudly displayed on my desk and it is my oldest possession.

Grade one was where I first met Dick, Jane and Spot. In Grade Two or Three it was 'Bunga' the jungle boy and Eric and Ingor from Sweden, among others.
It's funny what we remember.

In primary school I remember the tears flowing down my teacher's face as she announced the murder of John F. Kennedy.

In high school I remember students protesting the Viet Nam war, cafeteria food that sucked and nerdy Prefects in white cardigans who patrolled the halls like Capos in a concentration camp.
I remember all the high schools with whom we competed in basketball and with which we had the occasional brawl.
Outremont, Northmount, Wager, Westhill, Lasalle Protestant, Chomedy Protestant, Montreal high, Montreal West High School, and perhaps Montreal's most infamous high school, Baron Bing,  all sadly gone. I'm sure readers can help me fill out the list.

Its hard to believe that this world is gone and unremembered.

I would like to put together a post or a series of posts,that includes your fondest memories of primary and high school as a salute to our disappearing schools.
Your teachers, your school, you classmates, whatever you'd like to say.
Please share with the readers a personal account of your school and your experience.

You don't have to include your name, but if you'd like to, please mention it specifically. The default is pseudonym only. That being said, your school name and its location is important.
I'll print everything that is reasonable (under 1500 words.)

You might even get your very own post!

I think readers would be interested in your personal experience, so now's your chance to get out your Ernest Hemingway..

I'll put together a post or posts and publish in the near future.

Send submissions to anglomontreal@gmail.com. DO NOT use the Comments section.
I look forward to your submissions.

Too Many 'French' Stores in English Shopping Centre

I don't imagine a newspaper story with the above storyline, would go over big in the Montreal Gazette, wherein the writer complains that there are too many stores with French names in the Fairview Mall, in the decidedly English-speaking town of Pointe Claire, a suburb of Montreal.

I think it would be fair to say that the spectre of racism would be raised rather quickly by readers who would rightfully wonder as to what kind of twisted mind would write such a story and what rag of a newspaper would print it.
No, the Montreal Gazette would not print such a story, but transpose the word  'English' with 'French' and yesiree, the Journal de Montreal has no problem printing that very same story, written by Quebec's most renowned Anglophobe journalist Gilles Proulx. LINK 

"Walking through the Champlain Mall, the 2011 version, with a plethora of stores with English names, I've seen the Quebec of the future. And yes, Greater Montreal will end up a giant West Island (Montreal's anglophone bastion-ed.)
(En me promenant dans le Mail Champlain mouture 2011 avec sa pléthore de raisons sociales anglaises, j'ai vu le Québec de demain. Eh oui, le Grand Montréal finira par devenir un immense West Island.) LINK 

Ever since the death of Pierre Falardeau, Gilles Proulx acceded to the position as Quebec's most vocal Anglophobe, but unlike Mr. Falardeau, who in spite of his Anglophobia, was a likeable and talented artist, with a rakish sense of humour and an impish smile, Mr. Proulx has no such redeeming characteristics.
Proulx is a nasty sort, who on an ongoing basis, launches into  the most hysterical rants casting Francophones as the sad and unfortunate victims of the evil Anglo colonizers.

When Mr. Proulx gets into the subject of the English or Canada, his voice rises an octave or two, into a annoyingly high pitched screech that  mocks and denigrates, which he uses to underline his visceral hated of the English.

The facts are not particularly useful to Mr. Proulx, his sarcastic portrayal of Anglos is based on outdated stereotypes, false impressions interspersed with outright falsehoods.

In a recent rant on television, during which he used the perjoritive "Têtes carrée" to decribe the English  he  accused English high school students of being unable to carry on a conversation in French, an outrageous falsehood.

In a typical rant, Mr. Proulx complains that on a recent visit to a shopping mall in the the Montreal suburb of Brossard, he noticed that too many stores names had English names and concludes that Quebec is on the way to Anglicization.

"David's Tea, Jugo Juice, Foot Locker, USA, Only, Naturalizer,  Children's Place, President Stone, Foxy, Trade Secrets, Game Buzz, Style Exchange, Faces, Little Burgundy, Key West, Payless Shoe store, Access, Urban Planet,  D-tox, RW Co, Jones and Sweet Factory...
...And I'm not mentioning  Stokes, Starbucks' Coffee, Bentley, or all the other  Italian names followed by an 'S' . No doubt its no longer necessary to impose Bill 101."

What an utter crock!
Mr. Proulx complains he found about 50 examples of stores with English appellations.
According to the shopping centre's own website there are 137 and restaurants stores in the mall.
Here's a list, with the stores with clearly English names highlighted by myself.

1850   A&W   Access   Aldo  Amir   Amnesia   Archambault   Ardène   Atmosphère   Banque Scotia   Bell   Bentley   Bijouterie Sirène   Bikini Village   Bizou   Bleu Lavande    Bowring    Brûlerie St-Denis (Les Ailes)   Café Dépôt   Caleçons vos goûts  Calin Caline   Caroline Néron   Cazza Petite   Centre du Rasoir   Clair de Lune    Claire France    Mode 14+   Clinique Dentaire Champlain   Colori   Comneuf    Le fil Enchanté   D-Tox   Dans un Jardin   David's Tea   De Neuville Coiffure et Spa    Diamants Élinor    Doucet    Dynamite     Ecco    Emotions    Ernest   F.X. LaSalle    Faces  Fido  Foot Locker   Foxy   Freedom   Fruits & Passion   Gaby  Game Buzz    GNC Bien Vivre   Gourmet Santé   Greiche & Scaff    H&M   Hallmark   Hugo Boss   Jack & Jones    Jacob   Joshua Perets   Jugo Juice    Key West    Kojax    Koodo Mobile    La Baie  La Bonbonnière   La Capsule Sportive    La Crémière   La Forfaiterie    La Senza   La Source par Circuit City   La Vie en Rose   Laura Secord   Lavigueur   Le Château   Le Naturiste   Le Tambourin   Les Ailes de la Mode  Les Gaufres    Les Montres Ramnik   Limité   Little Burgundy  Locale   Loto Québec   Venise  Magenta Studio Photo   Manteaux Manteaux   Marie-Claire  Masako Sushi    Monaco   Naturalizer  Panda   Paris Coiffure Elle et Lui   Payless Shoesource    Pik Nik  Place Tevere  Polar Ice  President Stone RBC Banque Royale Reitmans    Restaurant L'Académie   Ribelle   Rinascimento   Roger Roy   Rogers Sans Fil   Rudsak  RW & Co.  SAQ Classique   Sears   Sirens    Sports Experts   Spring    Starbucks    Stokes   Stylexchange   Subway  Sul Posto   Suzy Shier   Swarovski  Tabagie Champlain    Taylor    Télus    Mobilité   Tendances Chaussures     Teriyaki   Terra Nostra    Thaï Express    The Children's Place  Zara   Tiki Ming   Toxik    Trade Secrets    Tristan     U.S.A.    Urban Planet  Van Houtte Café   Vidéotron    Virgin Mobile    XXI Forever  Yves Rocher 

All of a sudden the English predominance doesn't seem so high when compared to the total. Now by my count, there' only about 20-25 stores with English names, about half what Mr. Proulx claims.
Typical.
I haven't included proper names like Stokes or Bentley, as Mr. Proulx must have, to arrive at his figure. To do so is pure unadulterated racism. Under his scenario, F.X Lasalle and Van Houtte are kosher while Stokes and Bentley are offensive.  Bah!
By the way, a bunch of those stores with the offending English names are owned by Quebec francophones!

Now it would be easy to cite the current trend of globalization and the American retail invasion of Canada as an answer as to why there are more English stores, but that would be to admit that Mr.
Proulx's premise is true, which it is not.

Mr. Proulx intimates that the overall collective of stores is getting more and more English when in fact it is getting more and more French!


As an old retailer, I can tell you that forty years ago, there was hardly a French name in the retail game.
Mr. Proulx has either a very short or selective memory.

Eaton's, Morgan's, Direct Film, Fith Avenue, Sam the Record Man, Discus, Martinizing, Sweet Jeans, Steinberg, Dominion, A&P, Miracle Mart, Wise, to name just a very few.
There are literally dozens and dozens of English chains, big and small,  that have disappeared, to be replaced by up and coming francophone retailers.

Mr. Proulx uses the same false argument that says Montreal signage is becoming more bilingual. Hogwash.
When I was a kid, there wasn't a commercial, traffic or government sign that wasn't bilingual.

It's tired and false, but repeated often enough, well...............

French versus English - Volume 25

Jewish Star of David 'Offensive'

Thanks to Mitchel S. for this story about a Montreal food market that was asked by head office to remove three very prominent Stars of David hanging from the ceiling, over a section of seasonal Kosher food offered before the Jewish holiday of Passover, when Jews celebrate the Exodus from Egypt by eating unleavened bread.
A customer complained that the display was overly religious and the head office immediately ordered the store to take down the offending signs.
After a barrage of counter-complaints, the company reacted quickly to repair the damage and at least one Star of Davis is up once again.
The question remains. What kind of Grinch would complain?  LINK

Dangerous Anglo invasion in Laval

Impératif français, a militant French language group has sounded the alarm over the disturbing development that too many Anglos are moving to Laval. The separatist group has discerned a booby prize to the Mayor of Laval and city councillors for doing nothing to stop this barbarian invasion.
Exactly what steps the city should take to keep the Anglos out, wasn't suggested.
Link{FR}
By the way, if you go to the original article, check out the comments!
Jean-Paul Perreault, the president of the organization, also offered another 'booby prize' to Line Beauchamp, the minister of education for her efforts to teach English starting in Grade one, another dangerous idea! LINK{FR}

Quebec's first Veiled Robbers

You just knew it would happen.

A group of seven people, five women and two men robbed a depaneur. The women were veiled, but it didn't seem to help, the robbers were apprehended a short time later. Rather than coming from Arab countries, the crooks appeared to come from Eastern Europe and were just using the veils as a disguise. Link{FR}

PQ's Marois Wants Ottawa to pay for bridge

PQ leader Pauline thinks its a peachy idea for the federal government to provide a replacement for the Champlain bridge, Canada's busiest bridge, connecting the island of Montreal to the south shore. The Champlain is crumbling and the scheduled patch-up job isn't satisfying anyone including the separatist leader.
 The replacement bridge is estimated to cost in the neighborhood of six billion dollars, too rich for the provincial government and the fact that these bridges, fall under federal jurisdiction didn't seem to bother Madame Marois........Or did it?
Her suggestion is that Ottawa build the bridge and THEN transfer it to provincial jurisdiction, a neat solution! Link{FR}

Ontario to allow vanity plates in French

"Starting Monday, Franco-Ontarians will have a chance to turn their licence plates into showy, self-referential inside jokes in their own language.
The province says it will begin accepting applications for French vanity plates on that date. The new plates will also feature an optional embossed French language provincial slogan - "Tant À Découvrir" instead of "Yours to Discover". Link

If you think about it, the the program offers a great bilingual, English/French dynamic, as in my amateur example to the right.

Quebec cancer registry delayed

 Quebec is the last province to get a provincial cancer registry where data will be collected from 70 centres to give physicians and health care planners a better tool to organize their work.
But Nathalie Rodigue a spokeswoman for the Coalition Priorite Cancer told a Montreal television interviewer that only 22 centres have the necessary software to transmit the information, even though the software is readily available elsewhere, including other Canadian provinces, the US and France. Quebec has decided to write a new home-grown Quebec version of the software, which will delay the implementation. When asked about this, Quebec's Health Minister, Yves Bolduc advised the reporter that;
"We should stop to compare with other provinces. Instead we should work together." Argh!......

Air Transat cancels French lessons.

The Montreal charter airline that flies to the south in the winter and to Europe in the summer, is taking some flak for offering some specialized Quebecois French lessons on its website for European tourists flying to Montreal,  unfamiliar with Quebec's particular version of French.
The examples that the airline provided were actually quite funny, first offering a phrase in Parisian French and then in a Quebecois version.
Of course this displeased many, who demanded that the airline cease these 'insulting lessons' and so, alas, they have disappeared from the website.
You can read the story in French HERE
 If you speak French, you can listen to an audio file of the lessons HERE.

Quebec press council cites Maclean's

On the same day that the massive ongoing corruption scandal at Montreal City Hall escalated even further, with the announcement that the city was spying on a senior politician who was then asked to step aside, the Quebec Press Council announced that it had found Maclean's magazine guilty of bad journalism for the story that called Quebec the most corrupt Canadian province.
Responding to a complaint from radical separatist Gilles Rheame, the watchdog organization claimed that Maclean's had not made its case. LINK

The magazine, fearing that the conclusion was foregone, didn't even bother to defend itself.
Incidentally, it is being reported that the ex-chief of police  of Montreal, Yvan Delorme was also under investigation for his dealing with a local security firm which has since gone bankrupt. Eyebrows were raised when Mr. Delorme resigned abruptly, shortly after signing a new deal with the city to extend his term. LINK 

Quebec the most corrupt province? ...never!

Quebec reducing French Arab immigration

"The new policy of immigration to Quebec will lead to a decrease in the number Africans - especially the citizens of North Africa - admitted in the province.
By 2015, Quebec says it wants to re-balance gradually the proportion that each of the (four) major  geographical basins of immigrant origin.

basins

 Thus, the proportion will be limited to a maximum of 30% for each basin.
In 2010, the proportion of Africans was 36.8% for the total number of immigrants admitted to Quebec. The new government target will therefore reduce the de facto number and proportion.
Moroccans and Algerians formed the two largest contingents of immigrants to Quebec last year."

Link{FR}

Word Cloud highlights differences

 A word cloud representing the most frequently used words in the leaders debates highlights the differences in the English and French debate (translated

English

French

Further reading  French versus English -Volume 24