BBC
It seems we are stuck in a topic rut and not only in terms of frequency, quantity and quality of snowfall. The news appears to be same old - same old, with one outstanding exception (see below).
There are the U.S. economy (tanking) and the markets, which are looking for any excuse to rejoice and seem to have found one temporarily today:
U.S. Stocks Advance Most in Five Years on Fed’s Liquidity Plans
(Bloomberg) — U.S. stocks rallied the most in five years after the Federal Reserve said it will pump $200 billion into the financial system to shore up banks battered by mortgage- related losses. And FP reports “The Bank of Canada and other central banks on Tuesday teamed up to get hundreds of billions in fresh funds to cash-starved credit markets, allowing financial firms to use home mortgages as collateral, and Toronto stocks soar on central bank move. We are counting on Peter Perkins to interpret and prognosticate.
There is the never-ending and increasingly nasty race for the Democratic nomination which sometimes takes labyrinthian turns. Now it is the (Governor) Spitzer scandal that could cost Hillary a super delegate or two, not to mention some other headaches. The only prediction we dare make is that until the Convention we will be watching the news and political blogs every day. Meantime, NAFTA-gate continues to elicit commentary from Canadian observers
On the home front and one of our recurring topics, the government has released its Climate Change Plan with much prior harrumphing by Mr. Baird about how tough it would be. It seems NOT. We note the lead story in the National Post that the “U.S. May Protect Oilsands” - seems that Canadian Ambassador Wilson scared off the legislators who were about to cause headaches for U.S. investors, not to mention U.S. government customers.
While we are pleased to see increased serious coverage of the Arctic as a potential flashpoint for international squabbling, we can only hope that policy wonks will somehow convince their political masters that sooner rather than later the Canadian government must grasp this (briney) nettle and start to seriously consider strategic alliances to protect our security, economy, and energy sources.
In international news, aside from the regrettably frequent news of bombings in Pakistan, Iraq and Israel-Palestine, a BBC report recalls the exceptionally interesting evening with Mark Kruger: “China’s inflation hit 8.7% in February, the highest rate in over 11 years … Soaring food prices were driving inflation, up 23.3% in February against the previous year, In recent months inflation has continued to rise despite higher interest rates and other measures by Beijing to keep the economy from overheating. This is a serious concern for the government, which fears higher food prices could trigger social unrest” which, as Mark pointed out, the government certainly does not want to see during the Olympics. Jaime Webbe has just returned from Bejing and will have more to say on issues of environment and climate change, provided she has recovered from jet lag and smog.
In the category of good news/bad news is the overwhelming vote of confidence given to Premier Charest by the Quebec Liberals this past weekend. As the Quebec budget is to be tabled Thursday and the opposition parties have threatened to bring down the government over it, plunging us into another unwanted election, we join Mr. Charest in wondering what impact the confidence vote will have on the opposition. We can only agree with the Gazette editorial “For a party saved from irrelevancy in the last election by anglophone and allophone votes, the Liberals seem amazingly careless of those constituencies … the new party president can’t even speak English. The message to anglophones and allophones from the Liberal Party these days is crystal clear: Lie back, think of the economy, and vote for us.”
Finally, a Gazette editorialist outdoes the best of the spin doctors advising that “This is no time to quit. We know you’re tired of all the digging, the fouled traffic, the delayed trains, the blocked streets, the cancelled school days (well, parents are tired of those, anyway) and of course the bank-account numbing heating bills. But Montreal is so close to making history that, in a perverse way, it would be a shame to stop now. If we can just hang in there for another month or so and a couple more good-sized blizzards, we can set a record. After all, we need just another 36 centimetres - a mere 13.17 inches, or just a little over a foot for those of you who still think imperially. And then we’ll match the record 383 centimetres that fell on Montreal in the dark distant winter of 1970-71.
So, you were wondering about the good news? Beryl Wajsman is launching a new weekly bilingual publication of opinion, The MetropolitaIn. He tells us that he has already lined up an impressive roster of writers and thinkers and will be with us this Wednesday to elaborate.
Diana & David Nicholson THE SINGER, THE GOVERNOR, AND HIS WIFE For the sake of the Eliot Spitzer’s mental health,
MediaScout hopes that the disgraced New York governor is not a reader of
F. Scott Fitzgerald, who wrote, “There are no second acts in
American lives.” Three days after it was revealed that he had
engaged in a bank-breaking,
career-destroying dalliance with a high-priced prostitute, the man formerly
known as “Mr. Clean” announced yesterday that he will not
carry on as governor of the Empire State. Spitzer had been under
pressure from Republican opponents and other enemies earned during his
days as a crusading attorney general to step down after the salacious
details of his alleged extra-marital, extra-legal sexual encounter
surfaced on Monday. Again accompanied by his stoic wife, Spitzer publicly
abased
himself for the second time in three days, apologizing to his family
and his supporters and promising that “the remorse I feel will
always be with me.” Whether or not that remorse will be sufficient
penance for his transgression remains to be seen, as CTV
News reports that US law enforcement is playing coy on the subject of a
possible prosecution of the former prosecutor. Regardless, Big Seven
sources agree that the likelihood of a second act to Spitzer’s
political career is almost nil.
Wed 5 Mar 2008 To day NYT Podcast | Menu
Wednesday Night #1356 Wed 1357 soon come
dtnicholson@wednesdaynight.net
Tel: +1 (514) 934-0023
by Jordan
Himelfarb
March 13, 2008
Without much information left for exposition, today’s Big Seven
sources delve into deeper studies of the saga’s supporting
characters; namely, the successor, the wife and the prostitute. The Star goes inside with
a profile of Spitzer’s replacement, David Paterson, a well-respected,
mild-mannered politician, set to become the first black governor of New
York and the first legally blind head of any state in the union. CTV News
and Zosia
Bielski in the Post continue the work begun in previous days by the
Globe’s Margaret Wente and Christie Blatchford, situating the
governor’s wife, Silda Wall Spitzer, as part of a tradition of
faithful spouses of unfaithful politicians. Meanwhile, the Star
fronts a lengthy look at Ashley Alexandra Dupre, the call girl in
question, whose identity was revealed yesterday. Dupre, who is beginning
to emerge as the story’s big winner, has the potential to disprove
Fitzgerald’s maxim: From a broken New Jersey home to the front pages
of today’s Big Seven sources, “Double A Dee,” an aspiring
R&B singer (for musical influences, see the Star), is getting the kind
of star-making exposure you can’t buy—even on her salary.
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