Not So Cold

Further to my whining posts yesterday, it is no longer colder than crap outside. It is, in fact, not bad. Minus 11, -20 w/ windchill. Better.

Also, better is this second cup of coffee. My first tasted a little too desperate or something. Mmm. Sequel-coffee.

Wednedsday, January 28

Good morning...well, let's make that afternoon. Here are a couple of brief thoughts from my living room the day after production (which we should probably shorten to just "the day after").

-Budget: Iggy's going to allow Harper's budget to pass. Yeah, it's all up to him. the budget isn't going to go ahead because of consensus in Parliament, it's not going to go ahead because it's just too good to vote against, it's going to go ahead because a deeply concerned, brow-furrowed Liberal leader (or is that king? I don't recall the leadership contest) has deemed it the best course at this time. He shall permitit. At this time. With caveats. Thank you, sire.

Also, I wish Jack Layton didn't sound like such a phony. I think he's far less a phoney than a lot of politicians, but he sure sounds over-scripted and soundbite ready. I heard him on CBC this morning and...I dunno. I expect more from the guy and his party. Passion. Honesty. A willingness to say unpopular things when they're the truth, sometimes.

More on the budget here and here and here and here.

An additional point: is anyone else getting offended by the phrase "working families"? First, a lot of Canadians live alone. Are we not citizens too? Second, many Canadians are unemployed. They're not important because they're not "working"? There's more to being a Canadiana than being a couple, having some kids and holding a job. There is more to Canada than "working families".

-The problem with print: far be it from me to put down my chosen medium but sometime it stinks working on an immutable two-week frequency. Case in point: last night as we're fininshing up tomorrow's prairie dog, Gwynne Dyer files a new column. It's great--an analysis of Obama's (supportive) position toward the so-called "War On Terror", in the wake of the new President's first air strike. Of course, I can't run it. We're on deadline (actually, cough, somewhat past deadline, as usual...). Also, we've already got a Dyer column in this issue that we promoted it on the cover. But it sure would've been nice to run a timely article on Obama right after he orders people killed for the first time. deadlines suck. I couldn't find it online but I expect it to show up here in the next 48 hours, for anyone who's interested.

That's all from me for now, I'm desperately due for another cup of coffee. Talk to you later.

It's Still Cold

Environment Canada says it's -18 degrees C, -29 w/windchill. Better, but not much. But here's some good news on a still-frigid Tuesday: global warming is irreversible.

From discovery.com:

"The study's authors said there was "no going back" after the report showed that changes in surface temperature, rainfall and sea level are "largely irreversible for more than 1,000 years after CO2 emissions are completely stopped."

So should we quit all this green-gab and just pack it in? Not so fast, says the study's lead author, Susan Solomon of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association in the Telegraph:

"Climate change is slow, but it is unstoppable - all the more reason to act quickly, so the long-term situation does not get even worse."

More here.

Hooray?

Don't Eat Blowfish Testicles

Or at least make sure your testicle chef has a fugu license. Otherwise, this could happen to you.

Six In The Morning (Deadline Edition)

A half dozen things you need to know about right now. RIGHT...NOW!!!

1.) IT'S COLD! -28.8 degrees C, and completely horrible. Make that -41 with the windchill.

2.) BUDGET DAY The drama explodes like a birthday cake stuffed with dynamite starting at three this afternoon (Eastern, so that's what, two here?). Will Iggy's Grits let Harper and company's budget pass? Will Jack Layton go all Die Hard With A Vengeance in the House of Commons? Will Gilles Duceppe be smugly inscrutable? Follow the excitement here or here or here or here.

3.) IT'S COLD!

4.) IT'S COLD!

5.) DEADLINE DAY It's Tuesday, the day prairie dog goes to press. There's sure a lot of work to do.

6.) IT'S COLD! Cold! Cold! Cold!!!

Council Cancels Condo Conversion

Following up on this post... At last night's meeting, city council voted unanimously to deny the application to convert 2141 Rae Street, the Viva Apartments, into condominiums. Councillors cited the appallingly low vacancy rate (o.5%) as one of the reasons driving their decision. Beyond that, the key factor was likely a petition presented by a Viva resident indicating that 17 residents from the 24-unit building were still opposed to the conversion and felt it would cause them significant hardship.

Council did approve the 15 Coventry Road conversion. However, the building owner, PR Investments, indicated they intended to only convert four of the building's 12 units into condos. The remaining eight would remain as rental suites, with funds raised from the sold suites going into building maintenance. Also, PR Investments indicated that they were offering all of their tenants lifetime tenancy agreements and would continue to rent out their units at below market rates. Coucillors felt that under these particular circumstances -- i.e., that the bulk of the units would remain affordable rental units -- they could in good conscience approve the conversion.

Expect more detail on the condo conversion issue in the next prairie dog.

I Don't Have Time For This

Our press deadline is 5:00 p.m. tomorrow so I need to be editing, not blogging and reading crap online.

But if I did have time to read crap online, I'd be reading this right now. An excerpt:

"Fortunately, Obama clearly gets it. He devoted more of his inaugural address to clean energy and global warming than even the strongest advocate could have imagined, asserting, "We will work tirelessly to ... roll back the specter of a warming planet." More important, he has assembled a team with unmatched knowledge and commitment to solve the climate problem."

More here." (From Salon.)

Recession Hits The Comics

It looks like prairie dog is ahead of its time, again.

Apparently Village Voice Media--the corporation that owns alt weeklies including the Village Voice, Minneapolis' City Paper, Seattle Weekly and many others--has cut way back on comic strips, suspending their publication across the newspaper chain. The Association of Alternative News Weeklies Web site reports syndicated weekly cartoonists Tom Tomorrow (This Modern World) and Matt Bors (Idiot Box) are losing subscribers.

Tom Tomorrow (real name Dan Perkins) says on his blog: "Village Voice Media is hurting in this economy like everyone else, and their corporate response is to “suspend” cartoons and (I think) all other syndicated material across the chain, said suspension to last at least through the rest of the first quarter, and quite possibly beyond."

Of course prairie dog doesn't run any comic strips and never has since I've worked here (although we used to run a one-panel political cartoon by Jack Lefcourt, until he retired it), so once again we're in front of the curve. Arrgh.

Ironically, comics supporters have argued for years that strips are one of the most popular features of newspapers but despite this assertion the daily comic has been in constant decline for, well, most of my life. Remember Bill Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes? Yeah, that's because you're old (I'm old too). You don't see work like that anymore. In fact you don't get much of anything in the dailies, unless it's recycled strips about families or talking pets.

There are a lot of stories behind newspaper comics' decline, but one basic truth: it's a crummy, often unappreciated gig. Over the years comics been allotted less space, they've been subject to censorship (see Doonsbury, The Boondocks) and their creators have been burned out by deadlines and hassles (in Watterson's case, battles with his syndicate over the licensing of his characters, which he was opposed to on principal). The economics almost always stink for cartoonists, the work is time-consuming and labour intensive and it takes years to develop the skills. And the pay is bad.

Basically, nobody in their right mind would ever go into the field--which means there's always a dearth of new cartoonists (not that there isn't first-rate talent out there. There just should be more.)

Anyway, it's a damn shame Voice Media is dumping This Modern World. It's a good strip. Canada needs a comic like it.

This. Is. Bad. (for the Saskatchewan and Alberta oil industry)

Luiza Savage gives a rundown of who's who in the Obama administration as it pertains to Canada. If you're an oil company executive it doesn't look good.

As well, there are two other things to seriously look at.

Obama is planning to increase auto emission and mileage standards -- stories from the Washington Post and the New York Times.

Secondly, Secretary of State Hilary Clinton has appointed a special envoy for climate change. Given that most conservative western Canadian politicians have rejected climate change as an argument for cutting carbon emissions, I think they are going to be pretty lonely people. The sound you're hearing is the sound of Stephen Harper finding out that he has no friends in the world.

Oh yeah, the most eriudite blogger around, James Wolcott of Vanity Fair, takes the urine out of the no-conservative movement's environmental policy with the aid of another of the late William F. Buckley's sons. Go. Read.

Six In The Morning

Yeah, I know I know I'm not actually posting this at six in the morning (you think the people who publish prairie dog get up that early?). Here are six links to news stories you might find interesting, nay, fascinating. Why six? because five seems to obvious and 10 is too much work. (I have a paper to edit for tomorrow!).

1.) TIMES ARE TOUGH AND SO'S YOUR MOTHER Some Regina renters (well, 1000 Regina renters) can look forward to paying more in the new year. The CBC talked to one tenant, who's mad. (CBC)

2.) SEVEN BILLION SMACKERS The Conservatives promise a massive injection of cash for neglected infrastrucuture, including two billion for Canadian universities. If their budget passes. Jeez, if they'd been talking like this all along prairie dog would be bugging readers to vote for these guys. (Toronto Star)

3.) NO FUELIN' After eight years of being run by evil bastards, Obama's U.S.A. says it will bring in new fuel efficiency standards tby 2011 hat will make the country less dependent on foriegn oil. What country is this again? And what's this feeling I have for American politicians...feels like...not incredible, constant, smouldering rage. Weird. (CBC)

4.) TOO IMPARTIAL? The BBC will not broadcast a fundraising appeal for Gaza on the grounds doing so would undermine the broadcaster's journalistic impartiality, and British journalists are apoplectic . The appeal is by the Disasters Emergency Commitee, an umbrella group including the Red Cross and Oxfam. (The Guardian)

5.) ENGINEERING LAYOFFS Alberta's oil patch has lost 2200 jobs in the last two months, apparently. Here's a quote from the Globe's story: "It's very hard. Six months ago, things were so good, and six months later, things fall apart." (Globe And Mail)

6.) RHYMES WITH "BEAGLES" Another classic rock group finds warm wallets, er, audiences, in Saskatchewan. (Star-Phoenix)