Month: July 2006

OPPA Tries To Stifle Free Speech

Mulder

OPP union tries to shut down Caledonia website

Lawyers for the union sent a letter to the website’s host service, Bluehost Inc. informing them that “the organization that identifies itself as Caledonia Wake-up Call has and continues to publish on the website words and images that are false and misleading…”

Via Nealenews

Why would an unofficial OPP Union site want to shut down the site that displays information on the Caledonia affair?  Could it be the fact they have photos of the OPP officers who sat by doing nothing while laws were broken?  Could it be that they have a petition to have the head of the OPPA removed for allegedly telling officers to not act on the illegal activites being perpetrated by the Six Nations folks who have burned bridges, Dug up public roads, destroyed a power transformer, beaten on news crews, and tried to run down officers of the law and just about destroyed the chance of any normal person wanting to visit this town?  It’s no wonder that Yellow Bellied McShifty has given a nice advertising contract to friends of the Liberal party to help advertise for the companies losing business because they are in the “war zone”.

Why is the government working on court orders to shut down websites, when they will not act on court orders to get rid of the protesters??

What a freaking mess.  They can shut down a website with some pictures and articles on the destruction the protesters are doing, but they refuse to act on the destruction itself.  McShifty is a farce of a leader who is making Ontario the laughing stock of Canada.

More at OPP Not Playing Nice
More at If You Can’t Close Down An Illegal Barricade
H/T Jack’s Newswatch for the two extra “More” links.

How Council Voted, Who Owns LRT Land And Who Received Construction Oriented Donations

Mulder

The Ottawa Citizen had an article that is reprinted on Nick Vandergragt’s space at OttawaForums which addressed the question of who owns the land that the newly approved Ottawa LRT will travel through.

It is a vast expanse of desolate land in the shadow of the Ottawa airport, a tangle of fields that are now home to wildlife. But what looks like a wasteland in Riverside South, is really a 3,600-acre gold mine, and the people who own it are poised to reap millions in profit….

The people who stand to benefit the most are the owners of Urbandale Corporation and Richcraft Homes, the two major homebuilders who own most of the land through a company called Riverside South Development Corporation. Between them, Urbandale and Richcraft own 70 per cent of the land, or about 2,500 acres. The principal beneficiaries are Lyon Sachs and Herb Nadolny, founders of Urbandale and Krishan Singhal, president of Richcraft.

Unlike Kanata or Barrhaven, where multiple developers own the land, Urbandale and Richcraft have a virtual stranglehold in Riverside South, due largely to shrewd buying going back 40 years.

The remaining 30 per cent of the land is owned by several individuals, families and public institutions such as the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board, the National Capital Commission, RCMP and Parks Canada.

Nick Sala, a developer who has collaborated on projects with Claridge Homes, owns about 86 acres, largely along the rail corridor. Wilfred Carson and his wife, Iva, own 55 acres also along the rail corridor. Luigi Mion owns about 100 acres, while Kenneth Gordon has about 55 acres, both just inside the urban boundary.

There are many small holders clinging to their land in hopes of making money:
Malcolm Champion has owned about four acres along River Road since 1990. Patricia Farrell and Frederick Langevin own about 11 acres, also along River Road, for which they paid $345,000 in 2000, or about $31,000 an acre. Dave Wright Holdings Corporation also own about 11 acres along River Road, for which the company paid $450,000 in 2002. The land was worth $90,000 in 1971.

According to experts, the most coveted land for homes and retail is the portion within walking distance, or 500 to 800 metres, of the train stations. It is why the city is studying the impact on land prices within 500 metres of the stations. The area within 600 metres of the eight train stations is more than 2,000 acres. Riverside South Development Corporation owns about 80 per cent of the land in this high-value zone.

Not that it makes much of a difference, but I have put together a small grid indicating who has voted which way and how much they received from developers, builders and consultants in the last election. You can get a complete breakdown of what these entities donated to each councilor at this link. I do not think there is any direct correlation but the information is here for your perusal.

I also included whether or not the LRT is planned to go through their Ward. I tried to map the LRT route accurately through the Wards, and believe I got them correct, but I am willing to be corrected if I am wrong. Please feel free to comment.

(click to enlarge)

I believe that those Wards that will host the LRT have all voted yes which makes sense. Glen Brooks’ Ward is not far from the LRT route but would probably not benefit much from it’s route so his No vote understandable. And should the Barrhaven extension be further extended in the future and bend upwards towards the growing west end, the Ward of Janet Stavinga would stand to gain a quick route to downtown without having to go north and west through a busier section of the city. Doug Thompson’s Yes vote is also understandable since his Ward is now much closer to the LRT than it would have been should the East-West route been chosen. To me this is an indication that most of the council voted by whether or not they would benefit from the LRT and not necessarily on what system and what route is best for the city.

I will be continuing my assessment in future posts as I try to track down personal donations and correlating them to the above names of those who will be profiting from the LRT running through their land. I will point out that the two entities that stand to profit the most (Richcraft and Urbandale) purchased the land over 40 years ago which doesn’t eliminate them from our sites, but it does take the pressure off since both are strong developers across the whole city.

NOTE: This post is in no way an indictment by me of any of our councilors and is strictly meant to be informative. At this time I would also like to commend those councilors who have taken little or no money from developers, builders or consultants. Diane Holmes, Clive Doucet and Doug Thompson on the Yes side. (Bob Monette ran in a bi-election so I will omit his lack of donations for now). I would also like to commend Glen Brooks, Peggy Feltmate and Alex Cullen for their minimal acceptances of construction donations. I have been typically on the opposite end of issues with the latter two and wanted to make it known that I respect them fighting the good fight.

I Am Sick Of The CBC. It's Time To Hit Them In The Pocketbook

Mulder

Stephen Taylor has dug up one hell of a nasty video clip that was produced by the CBC. This clip is so heinous in it’s cropping of politicians statements that it goes beyond the bounds of what a state sponsored television network should be airing.

You have to SEE IT to believe it.

So how do we as citizens end this crap from being produced?

There are two places that would hurt the CBC enough to wake them up and both are financial.

1) Get the government to stop funding this dog of a network.

or

2) Hit the CBC in the pocket book via boycotting their sponsors.

Number 1) is a tough one for the average Joe to have a hand in, but Number 2) is not.

You can speak with your dollars by letting the following companies know you are very dissatisfied with their sponsorship of the CBC. Clicking a company name will take you to a webpage that let’s you submit a comment/complaint to them regarding their choice to sponsor the garbage CBC is producing.

Molson Breweries (Molson, Coors, Rickard’s, Tornade, Pilsner, Carling, Bohemian, Heineken, Corona, Miller, Foster’s, Dave’s, Murphy’s, Caffrey’s and Milwaukee’s Best)

Labatt’s Breweries (Labatt’s, Oland, Schooner, Alexander Keith’s, Columbia, Kokanee, Kootenay, Lucky, Club, Blue Star, Budweiser, Guiness, Stella Artois, Hoegaarden, Leffe Blonde, Belle-Vue Kriek, Bass, Boddington’s, Cristal, Lowenbrau and Beck’s)

I would urge people to switch to Sleeman’s or some other microbrewery in the meantime.

Home Hardware ( a special case since each store is individually owned you need to contact a store near you. Find it by clicking here)

Tim Horton’s (which will be killer on me because I do respect them for honouring the 1% GST cut)

Ford Motor Company

Imperial Oil (Esso)

If anyone has other suggestions, or knows of any other HNIC sponsors, please let me know. I would be glad to add them to the above list.

I know, I know. It sound’s like just another leftist type activist blog post but this is a right wing activist blog post. All you have to do is see the crap the CBC is producing. For other abuses of our tax dollars at work, I urge you to look at any of these links to Proud To Be Canadian’s Extensive list of CBC crap.

The Gay Bush Hating Channel Presents
Canada’s Own l’il Jihad Network

Joel has dozens of examples. Simply scroll down his page and on the left type CBC in the search box.

ADDENDUM: I have sent all my emails off to the above mentioned sponsors (except Home Hardware who has no stores in my neighbourhood). I urge you all to do the same.

City Of Ottawa Spends $780 Million (Of Mostly Federal Taxes) Moving People The Wrong Way

Mulder

The City of Ottawa with a jampacked East-West traffic thoroughfare has chosen to blow almost a billion dollars of Federal money on a North-South light rapid transit that is, in effect, a streetcar. The route will be fully electric meaning overhead wires, and despite the belief it will be a train system, it will, in effect, be a streetcar style which will:

A) put enormous stress on the already burdened power grid,
B) open up the possibility to a power failure stranding thousands of people, including the possibility of being stuck under Dow’s Lake.
C) take more power which comes from coal fired and nuclear produced electricity costing $20M per km of track when the diesel electric option would have cost $4M per km.

The city forged ahead with this plan despite the countless calls to radio shows and to councillor offices which did change the mind of a few councillors. But not enough to have the system reassessed after this falls municipal election.

The booming and growing East-West regions of Kanata and Orleans which are outpacing any other areas in the city when it comes to growth, are left in the cold at this time. So why is the transit way moving North-South? Many are wondering but I can tell you that the Mayor of Ottawa is a staunch Liberal and has made his opinion very clear when helping campaign for provincial and federal Liberals who include the McGuinty Brothers. And guess where the McGuinty brothers got elected?
Ottawa South.

Guess which directions of traffic are voting Conservative these days? Yup. East-West. Guess what part of Ottawa has jumped from 35,000 people to close to 100,000 in less than ten years? The west end of Kanata-Stittsville.
To give you an idea I have included a small map of the city. The thick red line indicates the route of the streetcar (and that’s all it really is, a glorified streetcar). The white area represents the provincial and federal ridings of Ottawa South.

(click to enlarge)

Something is REALLY fishy on this one. REALLY fishy. For those who may think that that extension across the south end of the city should discount this argument, I must point out that the majority of that extension was an afterthought when they realized how many people live in the Barrhaven area of southwest Ottawa.

Ironically, for most Barrhaven residents the bus that runs downtown will, more than likely, be eliminated and the streetcar LRT will take 15 extra minutes to reach the downtown core. When you take into account most residents of Barrhaven will need to head south via bus or car to the LRT station, the trip that used to take many 30 minutes will now take an hour. How many will just drive and save the time?

This North-South route, according to the Mayor’s own admission, is to prevent the need for a huge highway running East-West as the 401 does in Toronto,which implies that his move is to FORCE the city to grow southward and buck the trend of almost every major urban area in the world. The typical growth path for almost every city in North America is westward. This is a fact. Yet the Mayor has chosen to piss off every resident in Kanata and Stittsville by FORCING them to move east or South to avoid the long drives downtown in the jammed 417. Simple stupidity.

The legacy he thinks he is building will go down in infamy as the hated Chiarelli Streetcar. Mark my words.

OfficiallyScrewed … again.

The Tao Of Steve (Harper)

Mulder

Stephen Harper and the whole “Steve” thing got quite a bit of play last week and I think my view on this counts somewhat since my name is Steve.

Now I must add, my legal name is Steve. (not Stephen or Steven) and every conversation with an administrator who took information inevitably ended up like this.

Admin: First name?
Me: Steve
Admin: Is that with a V or a PH?
Me: I said Steve, not Stephen

And I would then proceed to receive a dirty look. That was the only negative.

Positive Number 1

There is this Indie movie called The Tao Of Steve which an old co-worker told me about.

The “Steve” whose philosophy is espoused in Jenniphr Goodman’s indie film is every studly Steve who ever lived in movies, Steve McQueen being the prime example.

These are the men who never seemed to care about getting the girl, but who always got them anyway. “Steve is the prototypical cool American male,” says Dex (Donal Logue), the film’s protagonist and chief advocate of the Tao of Steve.

It’s a really good feel good movie for the average guy and worth a rental.

Positive Number 2

Then there is the whole one syllable angle. One syllable names just sound “cooler” (in general). In multicultural Canada, only Stefano might be slightly cooler.

Positive Number 3

Moving from a 7 letter name to a 5 letter name means less paper so it is more environmentally friendly. (ok, that one’s stretching it)

Syd Barrett Dead At 60

Mulder

I am a big fan of Pink Floyd. I mean how can you go wrong with a song titled “Several species of small furry animals gathered in a cave and grooving with a pict”?? One of my favourite song titles of all time and a song I fell in love with when I used to stare at the glow in the dark stars on the ceiling of my bedroom in college!!

Actually, I think Syd was gone by the time that song came out, but he did help get the band rolling.

I think it’s funny that on CBC tonight this story followed one on a study on the virtues of magic mushrooms!!

Syd Barret dead at 60

Tainted Blood Victims To Be Compensated – Conservatives Get It Right

Mulder

I have a special vested interest in this news. My dad was one of those who received tainted blood that gave him hepatitis C. With this being such a personal issue, I have never spoken about it on my blog because of a deep seated resentment. You see, the Hep C flareups my dad had during his battle with a beatable cancer made his condition very hard to handle for the oncologists.

He was in his late 50’s. He had several years of work left in a good paying job that would have made life in their retirement much easier than it has been for my mom. The proposed payment should make life a bit easier for her in the coming years. Knowing my mom, she will probably outlive me so this is in no way tied to any greed on my part. I just don’t want her worrying about the monthly bills in her gardening years.

My dad taught me so many things that I can only mention a few. He taught me to play backgammon on an old board he had. I have been teaching Cookie on the same board and everytime I roll the dice I think of him. He taught me how to kick soccer balls and every one of T-Bone’s soccer games, I think of him. He taught me my love for hockey, which for a Greek immigrant was a major feat and every game I think of those Wednesday and Saturday nights watching Borje Salming and Darryl Sittler. He taught me to respect my elders which I still do to this day although more and more I notice that the number of people older than me is dwindling. He taught me how to work hard for what I earn and he taught me how to care for my possessions, which I think about everytime I spend a dollar or get something fixed on my truck. He taught me to tease, something Cookie reminds me of everytime she says “daaaad, quit being so sarcastic” which she has been saying since she was 6.

But most of all he taught me to joke and laugh as much as possible. I am reminded of this every bad joke my wife rolls her eyes at. (but I see the sides of her lips curling up a bit in a smile everytime.)

I miss you Pops. You can stop worrying about mom now. Stephen Harper is making things right.

The Best Toilet In The World

Mulder

Considering there has been much talk lately about the “wizkids“, many blogs continue to write about urination and the forces of nature that make people go in public.

I have a great solution, but it would require investment, and a few laws being changed depending on the province.

Why am I suggesting this you might ask? Well three or four years ago, I too was down at the Canada Day festivities and my bladder started calling. So me and my family went into the Tim Horton’s not far from the Hill. There was a huge lineup and when I took my turn and walked into the single toilet bathroom (no stalls), I was gagging. The toilet bowl was full to the brim with a filthy brown water. The reek was immense.

And as is pointed out in a post by Proud To Be Canadian, many places around the country have issues with bathrooms. Be it a lack of them, or bars/restaurants having rules stating the facilities are to be only used by patrons, or as I experienced, during busy events, some bathrooms just cannot be cleaned frequently enough.

Here is the solution. I would suggest putting these all over cities in the heart of the bar districts, wherever events are held, and in various tourist attraction areas.

Self Cleaning Toilet

I came across this very bathroom while walking along the Piers in San Francisco. The bathroom is a pay bathroom with a grated floor. It is stainless steel and after each usage, the door closes, and the bathroom starts churning away as it “self cleans”. After waiting in line behind a couple of people I took my turn. The water was still dripping off the grates when I entered but the toilet was spotless and dry. The sink was spotless and dry. And it was the best money I ever spent.

The only drawback was the time it took to do the cleaning. But if you supplement them with a few portapottys, or allow a cleaning bypass for families lined up together, they could prove to be the answer to the problems plagued by drunk youth and those with weak bladders.