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From the London Free Press , by Tarek Loubani: As a member of London's medical and Muslim communities, I was surprised to read the news that Dr. Khurram Sher was arrested Thursday along with two others, accused in a terrorism-related plot. I was also surprised -- and became increasingly concerned -- as more information was published regarding the allegations. Our system of justice is built on the zealous presumption of innocence, yet this man and the Muslim community around him have already been judged. In the absence of evidence, Sher is being tried in the court of public opinion. Public Safety Minister Vic Toews' spokesperson already found Sher guilty in comments to The Toronto Star. Even The London Free Press's headline of Byron terror bust left little room for the presumption of innocence. The effects are chilling for all, and leave Muslims and non-Muslims feeling tense and unsafe in the rush to accept arrests as guilty verdicts. It is the same disturbing pattern we sa...

My mom comes in today for her annual visit, staying until Friday morning. I would have ordered last week's weather - cool, dry and autumnal - rather than this week's heat and oppressive humidity, but no one had the courtesy to ask. I hope the heat won't be prohibitive, as we have a much better time if we are out doing things. This year the plan is Mississauga and St. Jacobs. There are a few cultural and historical things to do in Mississauga - which proves that there's culture everywhere - and I thought we might drive around and do them all in one day, plus maybe a park or a lakeshore stroll. St. Jacobs is not for the outlet stores or the cutesy factor, but for quilts and glassware. My mom loves handwork of all kinds, especially glass, and St. Jacobs has a quilt museum and several glass studios. (Last year we went to the Textile Museum of Canada ; we both loved it.) We'll probably hang out in St. Jacobs, or perhaps in nearby Elora , for dinner and miss the traffic...

Our comments in this post morphed - predictably, I think - into a conversation about the insanity taking place in the US against the planned Muslim cultural centre in lower Manhattan. In a recent column, Haroon Siddiqui pointed out that: This theme has emerged in opposition to mosque projects in California, Connecticut, Kentucky, Michigan, New York state, Texas and Tennessee. but concludes: These groups are noisy but marginal. This is the opposite of Europe, where Islamophobia has gone mainstream. In North America, it is still held in disdain. From what I gather, Islamophobia is much deadlier and more virulent in Europe, but I think Siddiqui is misreading the situation in the US, perhaps confusing it with the more mild forms of Islamophobia we see in Canada. (I'm using "mild" as a relative term here, not to excuse or explain away.) Islamophobia is indeed held in disdain by many good people in the US, but in a country founded and built on racism, any bigoted movement can...

Also five years on: Ontario's discriminatory anti-pit-bull law. Many thanks to the organizers and attendees of yesterday's rally in Toronto, and to MPP Cheri DiNovo for everything she's done. In the Star : Dog owners want same laws for all breeds . One law for all. Is that too much to ask? Stop K9 Profiling

The fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina is also the fifth anniversary of the day we moved to Canada. It's a poignant anniversary, as two members of that family are gone now. Cody was in a den of boxes at the far back of the World Fullest Mini Van™. She had no grey fur yet! Buster was in the front, between us, touching me in some way for the entire trip. We had a cooler full of special food and medication for him. So much has changed since then. Allan often says that his day-to-day life has changed little since moving to Canada, but I feel that mine has changed drastically. Suburban life, our friends here, the war resisters campaign, grad school - all new. I'm not writing professionally; I'm looking towards a new career. Five years doesn't seem that long, but it's a lifetime of sorts.

I found three items in my inbox, seemingly unrelated, but in reality, inextricably connected. Think of their implications, on the people of the US and on the world. First we have The Real News' Paul Jay speaking with author Eric Margolis. The former head of the MI5, the British equivalent of the FBI or the RCMP, admits that the Iraq War was based on lies and deception - but consumers of mainstream US news never hear this. More at The Real News Next we have Glenn Greenwald musing on the The Washington Post 's revelations of a secret US government , spying on nearly everyone - certainly including its own citizens. Jeremy Scahill, writing in The Nation , points out that this has all been known and reported on before , but a major corporate media report should at least raise an eyebrow. But no one makes a peep. Greenwald: This all "amounts to an alternative geography of the United States, a Top Secret America hidden from public view and lacking in thorough oversight." ...

This was hanging in the kitchen when I came home from work. It wasn't there when I left this morning!

If Eri Yoshida doesn't break baseball's gender barrier, maybe Chelsea Baker will. This is the kind of story I used to go after when I wrote for kids' magazines. So if you know any kids, send them this link. The original on ESPN.com has video, plus a sidebar about women in profressional baseball. In a league of her own By Ben Houser PLANT CITY, Fla. -- She registered another perfect pitching record this year, 12-0, for her Little League team. She threw her second perfect game -- and predicted this one just hours before she did it. Her fastball hits the mid-60s, and she can send opponents to the bench in tears, embarrassing them with a knuckleball she learned from former major league knuckleball legend Joe Niekro. Meet Chelsea Baker, a girl pitcher in a boys' league. Heads are turning in Plant City, where Chelsea hasn't lost a sanctioned Little League game in four seasons. Although it is a little early to call the 13-year-old the next big thing in baseball, she'...

My classes don't start until September 13, but next week my mother is here, so my time is suddenly very limited. As my last days of relative freedom tick away, I'm combing through some very old email in my inbox, to see what I can read, post and/or dispose of. I found a neat juxtaposition between two links sent by two of my main link-senders. First, Kevin Drum, writing in Mother Jones , makes a dead-on assessment of the Obama administration. Thanks to James. Here's the good news: this record of progressive accomplishment officially makes Obama the most successful domestic Democratic president of the last 40 years. And here's the bad news: this shoddy collection of centrist, watered down, corporatist sellout legislation was all it took to make Obama the most successful domestic Democratic president of the last 40 years. Take your pick. Widening the lens, Glenn Greenwald dissects the greatest hoax perpetrated in my lifetime: "The Liberal Media". This one is lo...

I hope you will read this excellent Op-Ed by Seth Klein, director of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives ' BC office, writing in The Province : What's happened to Canada's compassion? If the 492 Tamil asylum-seekers who recently arrived by boat on B.C.'s shores are "queue-jumpers," then I guess my parents were too. They came as Vietnam War draft dodgers from the U.S. in 1967. Like a couple of the Tamil women who just arrived, my mom was pregnant with me. My parents did not seek advance permission from Ottawa to immigrate. They did not fill out any paperwork before arriving. And they could no more seek permission to leave from their home government than these Tamils could, for what they were doing, as far as the U.S. was concerned, was illegal and would result in my father's arrest. Of course that's the thing about being an asylum-seeker — you don't get into a queue. When you've got to go, you've got to go. My folks didn't even ...

Keith Richards - rock icon, guitar legend, wizened senior spirit of rock, soul survivor, hero to millions and the first interest Allan and I discovered we had in common - wanted to be a librarian. It’s only books ’n’ shelves but I like it SHHH! Keith Richards, the grizzled veteran of rock’n’roll excess, has confessed to a secret longing: to be a librarian. After decades spent partying in a haze of alcohol and drugs, Richards will tell in his forthcoming autobiography that he has been quietly nurturing his inner bookworm. He has even considered “professional training” to manage thousands of books at his homes in Sussex and Connecticut, according to publishing sources familiar with the outline of Richards’s autobiography, which is due out this autumn. He has received a reported advance of $7.3m (£4.8m) for it. The guitarist started to arrange the volumes, including rare histories of early American rock music and the second world war, by the librarian’s standard Dewey Decimal classificati...

How's that for a headline? Please join us on Wednesday, September 8, at Toronto's Bloor Cinema, for a screening of " You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train : A Memoir of Howard Zinn". Naomi Klein will introduce the movie , and filmmakers Deb Ellis and Denis Mueller will be on hand to take questions. War resister Jeremy Hinzman will speak, and war resister Chuck Wiley will emcee the evening. Tickets are only $10 and all proceeds support the War Resisters Support Campaign and our fight to pass Bill C-440 , the private member's bill that would Let Them Stay. WHEN: September 8, 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. Box Office opens 6:30. WHERE: Bloor Cinema, 506 Bloor Street West, Toronto, ON TICKETS: $10 Event on Facebook

On Sunday, August 29, join people who love dogs and hate bigotry for Ontario's largest anti-breed-specific-legislation (BSL) rally ever. August 29 is the five-year anniversary of the day Ontario's unjust, ignorant BSL law went into effect. It is also the day before the five-year anniversary of our move to Canada. Because of that timing, our Buster was a criminal before his paws ever touched Ontario land, simply because of who his parents were and what he looked like. See this old post: "why bigoted breed-specific laws must be repealed, or how ontario laws almost ruined my life" . If you are in the area and love dogs, come to Toronto's Coronation Park and hear how you can help repeal this awful law. WHEN: Sunday, August 29, 12:00 noon WHERE: Coronation Park, Lakeshore Boulevard west of Bathurst, Toronto WHAT: SAVE ONTARIO'S DOGS! A day of entertainment, information and education in support of Hershey's Law . Come learn more about what Hershey's Law ...

First and last, thank you to everyone who posted here and/or on Facebook, or sent supportive emails, texts and anything else. Your support and understanding really means a lot to us. Many people have been asking about us and about Tala, so I thought I should post an update. We are sad, but fine. This was what professionals call " a good death ," meaning the person or creature died with dignity, not in pain, surrounded by love, and at peace. For a dog, I think it also means that the people were comfortable and at peace with the decision to let the dog go. Allan and I have lost animals suddenly, and young. We were knocked out by grief: inconsolable. We have friends who went through that recently, and it's a nightmare. Losing Cody was nothing like that. I miss Cody, and my heart aches for her. But I am comforted knowing that she lived her full lifespan. It's never long enough, but for a larger dog and a rescue, 13 years old is a good showing. I mean that most sincerely a...

Cody Brown April 19, 1999 (adopted) - August 24, 2010 Goodbye, sweet girl. We love you.

Q: If the war is over, why are soldiers still deploying to Iraq? A: Because the war is not over. The following is from Matthis Chiroux , a war resister activist in the US. * * * * War Veterans/Military Family Members Successfully Blockade Fort Hood Deployment to Iraq. by Matthis Chiroux on Monday, August 23, 2010 at 9:54am Aug. 23, 2010 (KILLEEN, TX) - Five peace activists successfully blockaded six buses carrying Fort Hood Soldiers deploying to Iraq outside Fort Hood's Clarke gate this morning at around 4 a.m. While the activists took the width of Clarke Rd. and slowed the buses to a halt, police made no arrests, but instead beat the activists out of the streets using automatic weapons and police dogs so the deploying Soldiers could proceed. Among those blockading were three veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and one military spouse. (See attached bios) The action, organized by a group calling themselves "Fort Hood Disobeys," was aimed at preventing the deploym...

As wmtc readers know, I have a problem with advertising . My problem stems more from quantity - from volume - than anything else. Our visual and aural landscape has been taken over by corporate advertising. Trying to escape from constant exhortations to buy, buy, buy informs much of what I do. Nowhere does advertising saturation bother me more than when I watch baseball. It makes sense: baseball is my greatest escape and relaxation, and it is more heavily polluted by corporate advertising than any other venue I see. Fenway Park, Boston, 1942 Ads have always been a part of baseball - in old photographs of ballparks, there are always ads on the outfield wall - but in the last couple of decades, following the trends in the larger culture, baseball has become thoroughly permeated with advertising. I explored this in one of my better posts, "invasion of the brain snatchers" , and again in a brief follow-up, "i tried to watch some advertising and a baseball game broke out...

I loved this letter in yesterday's Toronto Star . Lots of room for everybody I have again realized Canada is a great big place with nobody in it, having just returned from a “skate” through Atlantic Canada and a visit to the Pacific coast. We need to foster immigration to fill in the gaps, not inhibit it! Immigrants, rather than being a drain, very quickly create greater wealth for everyone. Witness the English, the Irish, the Ukrainians, following the French. Witness the Italians, East and South Asians — thriving, all. Witness the culture added by the Haitians in Montreal and the Islanders everywhere. Witness more recently the entrepreneurship of the Persians, Russians, Bosnians and Afghanis (do, please, fly your kites). Welcome all. Our economy grows after every wave. Canada, don't be worried and don’t listen to Mr. Harper and his baying dogs, evidently taking their script from the fear-mongering, talking-T-bags. We have nothing to lose but a few, mostly empty acres and every...

Wmtc5 was a great success, despite the rain. Or perhaps partly because of it. J&L came with a pop-up canopy, and M&C came with a beach umbrella and a tent tarp, and people set about rigging up shelter. Folks huddled their chairs under the makeshift tent, and crowded into the kitchen, and I managed to convince a few people to make use of the nice dry living room. There were about 30 people, seven dogs, one sleeping baby and an abundance of good food. And a lot of water. That's the good news. The bad news, which I was waiting until after the party to announce, is that Cody is not doing well. We don't know if it's a recurrence of the cancer, or something new, but her quality of life has taken a downturn. She is clearly unhappy. The details are new in my experience with dogs. She has developed a condition that is affecting the skin wherever there is no fur - her nose, around her eyes, and on her paw pads. The skin is cracked and crusts form from fluids that ooze out. At...

There's an long article in the Toronto Star today about US Iraq War resisters in Canada, and the differences between their experience and that of Vietnam War resisters. Many thanks to immigration writer Nicholas Keung for taking the time to interview, investigate and write such an in-depth and thoughtful piece. Daring to object: Iraq war resisters, though often veterans themselves, have been met with a cool reception, much different from the draft dodgers of the 1960s by Nicholas Keung It was the dead of winter when a buddy from Cornell University drove war deserter Dick Cotterill through the Maine-New Brunswick border for a new life of freedom and peace in Canada. At the border station near St. Stephen, N.B., a Canadian official hassled the young Marine officer but within minutes let him in as a permanent resident, with the papers of a job offer from a beef farm. That was March 1972, on the eve of Cotterill’s deployment to the Vietnam War. “The Canadian government and people welc...

I have blogged about Eri Yoshida a few times , a young pitcher making a bid to be the first female to play Major League Baseball. And guess what? There's a Canadian connection! (There always is.) Here's a terrific story about women in professional baseball in BC , by Tom Hawthorn in The Tyee . Thanks to JoS .

Further to my thoughts on the not-over war in Iraq , in the car yesterday, I happened to catch the news on Jazz FM . The reporter said that the last 50,000 "combat troops" had been moved from Iraq to Kuwait, thereby ending the war (and inspiring last night's post). After the report, the host said, "It's been a long haul for the US in Iraq, and a dangerous one. I can't imagine how those guys and gals must be feeling to be going home." You might have thought he was talking about World War II. And I thought, this is it, then. This is the spin - the rebranding - the load of crap - that the mainstream is buying. The guys and gays are going home. Except 50,000 of those "guys and gals" - properly called men and women - and another 75,000 or more private mercenaries aren't. And another few-hundred-thousand are in Afghanistan. And tens of thousands are still being stop-lossed, forced to serve their second, third or fourth tour. The occupation of Ira...

Answer: When it is not the end of the war. I am absolutely, utterly, totally and completely floored to learn that otherwise intelligent people actually believe that the US occupation of Iraq is over. The US has been lying about this war since a year before the invasion. They have been lying, deceiving, bullshitting, spinning, inventing, embellishing, covering-up - what else you got? go get a thesaurus - from day one . Why would they suddenly start telling the truth now? After this so-called withdrawal, more than 50,000 US troops will remain in Iraq, and that number again in private mercenaries, funded by US taxpayers, will be there, too. People, you can't seriously believe this constitutes the end of the war, can you? And why would the US pull out? Has an unlimited cache of oil just been found on the moon? "We have always been at war with Eastasia."