test blog #10

These doctors and medical students are so inspiring! They are taking action not on their own behalf, but for the vulnerable, voiceless people they serve. Several doctors released statements on Friday opposing the cuts. "Why is minister Kenney persisting with interim federal health program cuts in the face of near-uniform opposition from national health organizations and now the governments of Ontario and Quebec?" Dr. Philip Berger, head of family medicine at St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto, wrote in a statement. The changes "have nothing to do with equity and only to do with hurting refugees including pregnant women and their babies," he added. Berger said opponents of the cuts plan to continue to dog government MPs across the country to show their opposition. "The interventions at Conservative MP events across Canada will continue indefinitely." Excellent photos of some of the 2,000 health care workers who protested the changes to the Interim Federa...

My disgust at Jason Kenney reached new heights today, and that is really saying something. It's not enough to destroy the Federal Interim Health Program, leaving thousands of vulnerable people without health insurance in a country that claims to have universal health care. When Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews wrote a letter to Kenney and Federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq protesting the budget cut, Kenney responded by admonishing the provinces for even caring about it. (How dare anyone care about someone who is not a Canadian citizen?!) Kenney really showed his star-spangled cards when he referred to refugee claimants as illegal immigrants . Really, Jason? Illegal immigrants? People fleeing death, destruction, torture, starvation? People leaving their homes with only the clothes on their back, struggling through desperation that most of us can only begin to imagine? These are illegal immigrants ? It was bad enough repeatedly referring to certain people as "bogus refu...

Friends, if this post sounds like a conversation we've had, please don't take it personally. I've had the same or similar conversations with many people. This is a subject that seems to arise periodically - here, on Allan's blog, on Facebook, in any forum I frequent. That's why I thought it was time to gather my thoughts and put them in a post. The conversation is about the illness known as depression - also called clinical depression - and the treatment of that illness with anti-depressant medications. Every so often, an athlete or an artist will go public about their struggles with depression, or a new study about either the good or evil of anti-depressants will appear, and I find myself having this familiar conversation. Often, I agree with many of the arguments, but disagree with the conclusion. I don't use anti-depressants myself, but many people I love do. I've seen anti-depressants, especially the class of drugs known as Selective Serotonin Re-uptake ...

Someone check the calendar. What century is this again? Are queer men still denied the right and responsibility of blood donation in 2012? Do we think a response on a questionnaire is adequate protection against the HIV virus entering the blood supply? Of course not. All the damn blood has to be tested anyway. Do we think that any man who has sex with a man is HIV-positive? Of course not. Do think that only queer men get HIV? Of course not. So there's really only one thing to say. WTF? Uri Horesh decided to say something more useful. He decided to nonviolently challenge the blood donation restriction. For this, he was arrested and suspended from his job. I hope you'll read, sign, and share this petition. Uri Horesh is a friend of my friend David Heap , but more importantly, he's a man who is being punished for resisting injustice, so he needs support. From Change.org: Uri is a graduate student who until recently worked at Indiana University. On June 20, 2012, he was leavin...

It's not a huge sample size, but the results are pretty clear. Eighteen of 27 respondants (this includes three from the "other" category) voted for avoidance. Avoidance is definitely the line of least resistance, easiest on both the avoider and the avoided. I'm assuming the eff-off response was a troll, so other than that, a direct "we won't see each other" and a bite-the-bullet dinner came in about equal. For me, the "it won't kill you" dinner could produce some unintended sticky results. The acquaintance will get the wrong idea, thinking I actually want to be friends, while I'll end up even more entrenched in my dislike, having wasted a free evening. Or I'll make plans and end up cancelling because I can't force myself to go. Thanks for taking the survey! New list post coming soon.

I am SO happy! My own domain name, wmtc.ca, is once again working with the Blogger platform. URLs for this blog will now show the wmtc.ca address, as they did many years ago, and I (again) have blogspot out of the blog's URL. I registered wmtc.ca in 2006, before Blogger really supported custom domain names, and used a cumbersome FTP transfer to get Blogger and wmtc.ca to communicate. It worked, but not well. Page-specific URLs (permalinks) wouldn't publish with the wmtc.ca domain; every page showed as wmtc.ca. You could get the permalink by right-clicking, but of course no one ever did that. So when readers shared my posts, they would only link to the home page. Then, after a time, Blogger stopped supporting the FTP transfer altogether. For a while I tried switching to WordPress, but that didn't work for me for a variety of reasons (all documented under the "meta" tag ). Eventually I stopped banging my head against the wall and set wmtc.ca to forward to wmtc.blog...

On Facebook : We at the 59 Cents Campaign find the Canadian Government's decision to cut portions of refugee healthcare by means of the Ministerial Order of Hon. Jason Kenney, published April 25, 2012 to be unacceptable. We believe that if Canadians stop to consider the effect which these changes will have on the most vulnerable portion of our global society, that our country's annual savings of 59 cents per person to keep the Federal Interim Health Program open for refugees will be seen as insignificant. The changes are set to take effect June 30, 2012, therefore, we have put together the 59 cent campaign in which we are asking all Canadians to place 59 cents in an envelope and send it to the Prime Minister's office to let him know that we will not stand for these cuts. In 2011 Canada was proudly a place of hope and healing to 25,000 refugees; this is a fact in which we take pride and wish to take pride in for generations to come. As soon as I click "publish," I...

In a recent post , I summarized the Conservatives' arguments in Federal Court, as they attempted to have the case against their illegal election practices dismissed before any evidence had been heard. I was just paraphrasing, of course. But now I have a real quote, thanks to an email sent today by the Council of Canadians. "Voter suppression is as old as the hills". -- Arthur Hamilton, CPC lawyer Hey, fraudulent elections, voter intimidation, and dictatorships are the norm all over the world. Why should Canada be any different?

Quick, get a dictionary and look up megalomaniac . See if it shows Stephen Harper's picture. Then again, maybe Harper had none to spare. I missed it when Kady O'Malley and Elizabeth May broke this story, so I'm glad I saw this in the Ottawa Citizen . Emphasis mine. Harper gallery leaves MPs speechless Citizens who really want a national portrait gallery in Ottawa can rest easy. The government already has one. All you need to get in is a Commons security pass, a Conservative party membership and a keen desire to view exclusive pictures of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, exclusively. Conservative MPs confirmed yesterday what Green party leader Elizabeth May and Macleans.ca blogger Kady O'Malley reported on their cyberspace sites. Photographs of Mr. Harper in various poses, at various sites, are hung throughout the private and cosy government lobby of the House of Commons. Ms. May and Ms. O'Malley were surprised and a bit speechless when they saw the exhibit recently as...

Survey time! Please choose the answer closest to what you would actually do. More information: 1. The acquaintance does not read this blog. 2. After answering the question, please feel free to discuss in comments. Thanks!

Help a war resister adopt a service dog! So far we have raised $3,030 of the $8,000 needed. (The ChipIn page shows the amount donated online, but does not include cheques mailed in.) Every donation brings us closer to our goal. If you can spare only $10, it will be greatly appreciated. For more information, see this wmtc post , and read a message from Jeremy Brockway on the ChipIn page.

Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky, Glenn Greenwald, Naomi Wolf, Bill Maher, Michael Moore, and Oliver Stone were among the prominent USians who signed a letter urging Ecuador to grant asylum to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Guardian story here. If you're confused about this situation - and if you've been reading about it in the mainstream media, then you are - this will help: Dissecting the Smears: Assange's asylum bid . The most important takeaway: Assange applied for asylum because of the threat of extradition to the US, not to avoid prosecution in Sweden.

In Federal Court:* Council of Canadians: There was vote supression in the 2011 election. Conservative Party of Canada: Maude Barlow hates us. Council of Canadians: There was vote supression in the 2011 election. Conservative Party of Canada: Maude Barlow is a radical. Council of Canadians: There was vote supression in the 2011 election. Conservative Party of Canada: They filed their motion too late. Council of Canadians: There was vote supression in the 2011 election. Conservative Party of Canada: There's no proof that people didn't vote because of these phone calls. Council of Canadians: There was vote supression in the 2011 election. Conservative Party of Canada: This is a frivolous lawsuit. Council of Canadians: There was vote supression in the 2011 election. * Not actual transcript

Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page's quest to force the Harper Government TM to release details of its budget cuts escalated over the weekend, when Page said that the government's secrecy could lay the groundwork for a future economic crisis . Page, of course, has laid the groundwork for a court battle that may force Harper's hand. Andrew Coyne, ethical conservative: The reality is that the PBO has been given anything but the "free and timely access" that Parliament demanded. Time and time again, rather, he has been given the back of the government's hand — stonewalled by the bureaucrats, ridiculed by the politicians, and lied to by both. When, for example, the Department of National Defence at last consented to share the cost of the F-35 fighter jet purchase with the PBO, it provided only the most rudimentary figures, without any indication of how they were arrived at. These figures, on which the last election was fought, were later shown to understate...

Seen at San Francisco Pride Parade, June 24, 2012

This must be a huge Skip It! for most readers, but I write this blog for myself as much as anyone else, and I must have a record of all my travels. And so... This trip had a dual purpose - friends and baseball - and both came off brilliantly. Monday June 18 On Monday we had a good day's drive to Boston, with a bit of excitement (read: tension) as our dogsitter got her days mixed up and was unreachable for a few hours. Once that was settled, it was clear sailing, including at the border. Our niece Cassie, my sister's daughter, is in law school in Boston. (Yay, new excuse to go to Fenway!) We hadn't seen Cassie for two years, and the last time was a family wedding in California, not the best way to catch up. Lucky for us, she's on light duty right now with a part-time internship, so we were able to spend lots of time together. As soon as we got in, Cassie met us at our hotel, and we walked off to find a good place to eat. Practically the first restaurant we saw was the s...

Astute baseball fans might recognize this as Fenway Park, seen from behind the outfield. This would be totally unremarkable... if I hadn't taken it five minutes ago from my hotel room. We are in Boston for a quick - although highly anticipated - mini-vacation. We drove down yesterday, driving back on Thursday, and in between seeing two games and lots of friends - several friends from Joy of Sox *, plus a niece who is in law school in this city. Before last night, we hadn't seen each other in two years. On our last trip to Boston, in 2009, we discovered the Hotel Buckminster , a historic hotel, and a great bargain in an amazing location, steps away from Fenway. Now we'll never stay anywhere else. For anyone keeping track, we crossed the border in about 10 seconds. * By that I mean originally from Joy of Sox. They are actual friends, no qualification needed.

As usual, the mainstream media foams at the mouth about a possible snap election in Ontario, but barely reports on what's in the budget itself. If it weren't for the Council of Canadians and the Ontario Health Coalition, I wouldn't have known that Dalton McGuinty's budget contains a stealth attempt to privatization Ontario's public services with virtually no oversight. Scroll down for information on how to take action. From The Council of Canadians: The Ontario government is trying to quietly push through an Act [on Tuesday, June 12] that will allow the privatization of public services without any public consultation or legislative debate. Schedule 28 is a small section of Ontario’s omnibus budget bill. It calls for a new privatization minister who will have the authority to override all other ministers to choose what services – health care, water, hydro, education, and others – will be contracted out, sold or folded into public-private partnerships. There will be n...

In light of the horror show taking place in Ottawa, this would be the perfect time to post notes from " Can We Stop the Harper Agenda ," the big panel discussion at Marxism 2012. However, I'm waiting to get an audio file of the talk, which will greatly improve the post. While I wait for that, I'll try my hand at two other pieces I've been thinking about for a long time. * * * * I recently wrote about two books - What Is the What and A Long Way Gone - that I recommended with warnings. Both are excellent and well worth reading, and both deal with highly disturbing subjects, including graphic depictions of atrocities and other violence. This led me to think about the choice to read or watch that kind of disturbing, difficult material - and the choice not to. In the past, I've had no patience for people who refuse to deal with anything that might be upsetting or disturbing, people who seem to live in ignorance and denial, who steadfastly avoid anything that migh...

A friend noted a certain absence on wmtc and wondered if perhaps I'm not thrilled about turning 51. I do usually announce my birthday here! I didn't this year because (a) it seemed inappropriate to put up a celebratory post on the very day the Harper Government codified its Ruin Canada agenda , and (b) so many people were wishing me HBD on Facebook that it felt gluttonous to announce it here, too. However, I did celebrate, relax, and thoroughly enjoy my day. As always, I'm glad to be alive on this planet for another year. I'm happy to be here. Keith fans can fill in the rest.

In case you haven't done so already, please read and sign this petition from Amnesty International, about Canadian Hamid Ghassemi-Shall. It's a terrible story, and we may not be able to save Ghassemi-Shall's life, but we can try. Please read and sign.

I've just finished reading Too Many People? Population, Immigration, and the Environmental Crisis by Ian Angus and Simon Butler. Co-author Angus spoke at the 2012 Marxism conference; I wasn't able to attend his talk, but Allan did, and afterwards bought the book for me. The clarity of the authors' arguments, their unassailable reasoning, their thorough research, the full transparency of their worldview, and the readability of their writing, make this one of the best nonfiction books I've read. If you care about both the environment and reproductive justice, this book is a must-read. If you, like so many well-intentioned people, subscribe to - or wonder about - the notion that population control and curtailed immigration are even partial solutions to the environmental crisis, I hope you will read this book. Here, I'll try to summarize Angus and Butler's principal points. The populationists Throughout the history of the modern environmental movement, there has a...

This week, all political eyes in Canada will be focused on the C-38, the massive "budget" bill through which the Harper Government seeks to remake Canada. The Opposition in the House of Commons will be stalling, and the opposition on the ground will be supporting them, and pressing Conservative MPs to break ranks. ( That campaign is here. ) But another terrible bill also continues its way into law today. This bill will directly affect fewer Canadians, and fewer people are resisting it, but the bill will bring profound changes to Canadian culture - and will irreparably harm the most vulnerable people among us. I refer to Bill C31, through which Stephen Harper and Jason Kenney want to dismantle Canada's refugee system. Under the guise of cost-saving measures, this bill targets the world's most vulnerable people, and gives the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration unprecedented power to decide who is allowed to stay in Canada. Bill C-31 may have third reading as early ...