blogovich

Random thoughts on everything...

Real fast random thoughts on everything as I catch up after not blogging for a bit -- as usual. And it's been so long, Typepad, our blogging software, has changed some things and everything looks different.

But somebody here in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, Canada told me today he wants to subscribe to my blog feed so at least one person is depending on me to write. Thank you, Eric.

Hey, here’s the deal, if you care. Contrary to blogosphere collective wisdom which states one should blog multiple times a day (try doing that when you’re an editor with other responsibilities), I’m going to blog when I have something to say. Relatively coherent, or stream of consciousness, or not. Today’s post I would suggest is, er, a stream of...

So:

• Catching up on the Canadian election: Unfortunate about Liberal leader Stephane Dion, a politician seemingly above reproach (which we all claim we want), a true leader -- unlike Prime Minister Stephen Harper -- in terms of trying to sell something, the Green Shift, few understand or that he could sell. A man before his time, time will show. Leadership is not bullying, plagiarizing, appropriating others’ ideas (see Harper immediately after the election talking economic reforms after accusing Dion of panicking for doing so in the debates). Are we in Canada so shallow as to denigrating Dion’s efforts over the language issue? People, he wasn’t difficult to understand in English. Let’s ask Quebecers how difficult Harper is to understand in French. Walk a mile in a person’s shoes.

• Anyone else getting sick of The Sports Network’s endless use of the former Hockey Night In Canada theme music as a thinly-disguised dig at the CBC -- which by the way, has been TSN’s Olympic coverage (junior) partner so shouldn’t they just get along? I would suggest TSN stop it and get serious. Because only an idiot tunes in to a sports event for its theme music. We’re interested in the game, not the music. Or should be.

• Still with hockey, an old rant: Someone, please, shut Pierre McGuire up. My son used to hate him, then saw him on TSN’s Michael Landsberg-hosted Off The Record and told me “you know, dad, he’s OK.” And I agree. As a person. Most people are. But why does he feel he has to talk so much, have a "schtick" and invent phrases? Let your hockey knowledge speak. Invented phrases like “puck management,” which sticks out from a recent broadcast, ought to go. Stop trying to turn hockey into football or nuclear physics. As Ken Dryden used to say, it is essentially somewhat controlled chaos. The best-laid plans are often foiled by an errantly-bouncing puck. 

Plus, as we all know, McGuire interrupts far too much. Leave the play by play to the play by play man. On a recent Anaheim-Toronto telecast, McGuire interrupted play by play man Gord Miller to explain why a 2-on-1 happened. Shut up, Pierre, Analyze it later. Funny thing was, McGuire himself got cut off as Miller continued the play-by-play. It turned into a good Keystone Kops routine.

• Anyone else sick of the sports trend to throwback uniforms? I am. Yes, it's all about marketing and making $$ off jersey sales, but . . . Tuned in to the New York Giants-Pittsburgh Steelers NFL game Sunday anticipating a great "uniform" game and there were the Steelers, wearing those ugly throwbacks. Pretty much enough for me to tune out. Same thing with the New York Jets, who keep wearing those ugly old AFL New York Titans unis. Look, have a throwback weekend. But not all the time. I want the current looks.

• Mats Sundin. Look, buddy. I liked you and respected you as a player. Now, I don't. Play or don't play. Come out of retirement or whatever it is you are doing, or don't. Just stop bothering us. We don't care anymore. 

Nobody told her you had to bring ID to vote? Surely, she jests

This just in from The Canadian Press, via Halifax. According to the national wire service, many voters, at least down east, forgot that you had to bring ID to vote today.

One student, Kristin Sinel of Dalhousie, was miffed because, while she had some ID, she had nothing that indicated her address.

"This is ridiculous," Sinel told the CBC. "If they wanted this information from me, they should have asked for it ahead of time."

Uh, hate to break it to you, Kristin, but "they" did. It's only been mentioned multiple times in the media and in various forms of advertising ever since the campaign began.

Stephen Harper and a majority government

The opposition, particularly the Greens and the Bloc Quebecois, are talking about strategic voting to prevent a Stephen Harper majority Conservative government, which seems -- according to polls -- to be the only thing left to decide in the Canadian federal election.

Quick aside: I read a story today that suggested that at least one poll, the Nanos survey, had the Tories clinging to a 35-30 percentage lead over the Liberals. And there is that wild card about polling today, much of which is done on landlines when so many people use cells. So results may be skewed.

But back to Harper and his pursuit of a majority. First, it's obvious I'm not a Harper supporter, though I have voted Conservative or, rather, Progressive Conservative, a few times, going back and forth between the Liberals and Tories. I consider myself, like most people, liberal on some issues, conservative on others. Politically, I would say I lean centre-left. As I believe most Canadians lean.

Except Harper, who seems to want to take us towards U.S.-style conservatism. I think he misreads Canada and our character and is trying to force us to become something -- except perhaps in Alberta (and I've lived in that wonderful yet monolithically-governed province) -- we don't want to be.

So here's my theory. Say Harper wins his majority. It might in fact, if he indeed does have a hidden neo-con agenda, be a blessing in disguise or at least short-term pain for long-term gain. Say he does implement a hard neo-con agenda by using his majority (or as majorities are in Canada, essentially a dictatorship).

He'd be outta there next election anyway. Because I don't think Canadians would stand for it. The next government would be left with a repair job to take us back towards the centre, but it would be do-able.

The alternative is another Conservative minority, perhaps an interminable number of them, and more of what we've seen the last few years -- a slow but sure, long-term move to a neo-con led state.

Maybe it might be better to give the guy what he wants, let him wreck the place if he's going to, boot him out once and for all, and then fix it later.

Stephen Harper and plagiarism

Canadian Prime Minister and Conservative leader Stephen Harper today scoffed at the notion that he has plagiarized another speech.

Am I the only person in this country who disagrees with him? Who thinks this is damn serious stuff? And it does reflect a pattern -- a pattern of simply shrugging at anything negative that is raised about Harper or his party. Sure, this latest one seems less serious than the complete rip-off of the Australian speech. And the Tories are saying the Liberals are desperate, and likely they are, but it's rich that the Conservatives would be suggesting untoward activities when they're the ones who have been trashing Liberal leader Stephane Dion for two years. All's fair in love, war, and politics, no?

Plagiarism is a serious thing. It is dishonest. It is lazy and shows a lack of original thought. It is untrustworthy -- for if we cannot trust Harper and/or his staff to write their own speeches, how can we trust them on anything else? It is indicative of one's character.

And for someone, Harper, who is running on a platform of leadership, it shows a lack of leadership. Mr. Control Freak can't even control his own speechwriters, one of whom resigned.

Yet he scoffs at the notion he or the party he leads has done anything wrong. What he is doing is scoffing at the Canadian people. I scoff in return.