Pick of the Day: Cairo Time

A homegrown hit at this September's Toronto International Film Festival, Cairo Time is directed by Ruba Nadda and stars Patricia Clarkson as magazine editor named Juliette [insert reference to Shakespeare's most famous female star-crossed lover here] who journeys to Cairo to meet her husband Mark who works as a UN official in Gaza. When he's unexpectedly delayed, she seeks out the company of a former UN associate of her husband's named Tareq (Alexander Siddig) who now runs a coffeeshop in Cairo. Together, they explore the ancient and modern wonders of this teeming, and exquisitely beautiful, Egyptian city of 15 million.

Cairo Time screens tonight at the RPL theatre at 9 p.m. Here's the trailer. (YouTube) And if you're in the mood for a double-bill, The Burning Plain runs at 7 p.m. Directed by Guillermo Arriaga (who was nominated for an Academy Award for his screenplay for Babel) it stars Charlize Theron as a beautiful but aloof restaurant manager who must confront her sexually charged past when visited by a young stranger from Mexico. Here's the trailer for it. (YouTube)

Brush With Celebrity

I sat in for Stephen Whitworth Friday afternoon at his weekly CBC Radio gig. After Chris Kirkland (editor of Planet S up in Saskatoon) and I had done our segment with the host of the Afternoon Edition Michelle Hugli I had a chance meeting with a prominent CBC on-air personality who was in town for the day from Toronto and was also a guest on the show. Anyone care to take a guess as to who it might have been?



If you're having trouble guessing, here's a hint (YouTube)

Climate Denier Crooks Attempt Another Computer Break-In

Okay, this is insanity. Desmog Blog is reporting that earlier this week two "technicians" showed up at the Canadian Centre for Climate Modeling and Analysis at the University of Victoria and attempted to gain access to the computers there. When their identities were questioned the two "technicians" vanished.

The story's been verified by a UVic spokesman in an interview with the National Post.

Okay... let me get this straight.... climate deniers from Rex Murphy to Rush Limbaugh are crowing about how some emails hacked a few weeks ago show that there's "collusion" among scientists to squash debate about climate science. "It's an environmentalist conspiracy!" they're squawking.

Meanwhile, these same scientists' emails were hacked, their offices have been broken into, and now mysterious, undercover agents are showing up attempting to break into their computers. Doesn't this pretty clearly suggest that there is ACTUAL COLLUSION among climate deniers and ACTUAL CRIMINAL ACTIVITY by climate deniers going on to discredit legitimate climate science?!?!?!

That all this stuff is exploding in the news right now -- in the lead up to the Copenhagen Conference on Climate Change -- just goes to prove that what James Hoggan and the climate science community have been saying all along is true: there is an organized effort taking place among climate liars, deniers, hacks and morons to derail any action on climate change.

And... as Hoggan ably proves in Climate Cover-Up, support and funding for the activities of these deniers and cranks is coming from the fossil fuel industry.

Call me crazy, but if it squawks like a conspiracy, and slinks around in the shadows pretending to be a computer technician like a conspiracy, maybe it's a conspiracy. I'm just saying....

Regardless, whatever paranoid behaviour the CRU scientists exhibited in those emails is looking entirely justified right about now.

This is outrageous. My fury is boundless.

Saturday Morning Cartoon

I was flipping through some back issue bins in the comic book store and I came across an old Gold Key comic featuring Hanna-Barbera cartoons from the 1960's. It was one of those spotlight comics that featured a variety of characters. And one of them was something called the Mighty Mightor. The picture that accompanied it was a drawing of a barbarian looking guy with a goofy looking horned hat. For whatever reason the name Mighty Mightor made me laugh - it's just lame.

A quick search of the internet and I discovered that the character was created by comic book legend Alex Toth and aired from 1967-1969 along with another cartoon called Moby Dick. It was the Moby Dick and Mighty Mightor show. Mightor was about a young caveman named Tor who helps an old man. The old man gives Tor a magic club that when held in the air transforms Tor into the Mighty Mightor! Classic! Now why does this super powered tranformation sound familiar? By the power of Grayskull - I just don't know. Oh, there is also a redheaded woman called Sheera in the show.

The second part of the show was about the adventures of a whale called Moby Dick that had nothing to do with Herman Melville's novel. Imagine all the disappointed kids when they started reading the book.

Pick of the Day: Pats Vs. Wheat Kings

After going 4-2 on their recent nine-day road trip out west that included a 7-1 drubbing of the U.S. Division-leading Tri-City Americans, the Pats are tied for fourth in the tightly-bunched East Division with a 15-13-3-0 record. As I noted in a late October post on the team, they face a difficult month ahead. First, they are destined to lose forward Jordan Eberle and defenceman Colten Teubert to the Canadian Junior team when the selection camp opens in Regina on Dec. 11. Then following a three game home-stand, which begins tonight with a tilt at Brandt Centre against the Brandon Wheat Kings, the Pats will embark on an eight game road trip to accommodate the World Junior tournament that runs in Regina and Saskatoon from Dec. 26-Jan. 5.

Last year at this time, the Pats were in roughly the same position as this year. But after the Christmas break the wheels fell off for the team and they ended up finishing out of the playoffs. If they post Ws in the next three games, they'll be 7-2 in their last nine games, with plenty of momentum heading into what will truly be a gruelling road trip. In January, the Pats play eight of eleven games at home. If they can survive December they will be in a good position to make a run at the playoffs. If they go into a tailspin, though, they'll have a hard time bouncing back.

And if hockey isn't your thing, also on tap for tonight is a gig at the Exchange by a trio of local bands: Kleins96, Cricket and Tomorrow Starts Today.

Geez, It's Gorgeous

What a good looking day! And not stuck up like all those other days!

Friday Afternoon Kitty: Big Cat, Little Cat

Here are a couple of vids my fellow prairie doggers sent me this week. First, there's this from Carle Steel, freelancer, heroine and infrequent (though sometimes) Dog Blog contributor.



Makes me want to run out and get a huge white cat to go with my huge black cat. Next up, there's this from Alex, our designer. It's cute. Not just cute, but "squeeeeeeeeee!!!".



Yep. Squeeeee!

James Hoggan on Climate Change Denial Industry

The CRU e-mail scandal broke while I was working on that climate change article in the latest issue. It kind of ended up hijacking everything I was writing. Not necessarily a bad thing. It's a complete gong show, sure, which the media has -- as usual -- completely bungled. But, the hacked e-mails are a perfect example of the ridiculous extremes to which the denier crowd is willing to go to discredit climate science. It became a nice little case study in how the denial industry works.

Unfortunately, though, I wound up not using nearly as much interview material as I would've liked. For instance, my interview with James Hoggan was awesome but I only ended up taking a couple quotes from it. So, here for all to read, is a transcript of my interview with him. It's very good (because of Jim's answers, not my questions). Here's a sample....

prairie dog: Your book gives a good overview of the state of climate denial in Canada. But I came away feeling like Canada is a real hotbed for denial. Are we really the centre of the denial industry?
James Hoggan: No. The Americans are by far. They’re the ones who set up the echo chambers. In the States, you see it working much better than it does in Canada where you have more of a loose connection. But in the United States, you have this powerful combination of the extreme right religious movement, the libertarians, basically just contrarians, vested interests, then you have this extreme right-wing media, and en masse you have massive numbers of Glen Becks and Fox News and the list just goes on and on. Those are the extreme right-wing guys, then you have these libertarians who are in the media as well. So the echo chamber down there is really very impressive. And for some reason, a lot of these libertarians and extreme right-wing groups have joined forces with the anti-science interests that are working for business. And I think it’s because they’re just anti-government. We have those kind of people in Canada but not in the organized way they do in the States.

James Hoggan, by the way, is the author of Climate Cover-Up, which details how the fossil fuel industry supports a massive, decentralized climate-change denial industry. It's a scary but important book. By day, Hoggan is a public relations consultant and he is also one of the founders of DeSmog Blog, an essential source for those who want to track the misdeeds of the deniers.

Read the full James Hoggan interview.

Open House on Nuclear Waste

We'll have more on this in our Dec. 17 print issue, but on Dec. 7 from 2-9 p.m. the Nuclear Waste Management Organization is hosting an open house at the Delta Hotel in Regina to review a protocol that's been created to facilitate any "informed and willing community" that wishes to host "a deep geological repository for the safe containment and isolation of Canada's used nuclear fuel."

If you recall, one of the recommendations that the Uranium Development Partnership made in its March 2009 report was that the provincial government support any community that expressed a willingness to be the site of such a repository. The NWMO is an industry-based association, so expect them to put forward a best-case scenario for the idea of burying radioactive waste in the Canadian Shield. Critics not only reject the idea that this material, which will remain toxic for tens of thousands of years, can be safely stored for any significant length of time, they are also alarmed at the danger posed by the transport via truck or rail through heavily populated areas of radioactive waste from nuclear facilities (that stretch as far east as New Brunswick) to the dump site. As well, once established, would the American government, which has failed repeatedly in its attempts to establish its own storage site, pressure Canada to accept its nuclear waste?

For more info on the NWMO position, visit their website at http://www.nwmo.ca/

Other open houses will be held Dec. 8 at the Art Hauser Centre in Prince Albert from 2-9 p.m. and at the Delta Bessborough Hotel in Saskatoon Dec. 9 from 2-9 p.m.

New Dog!

The new prairie dog is out as of yesterday and it's my favourite issue of 2009. On the eve of the Copenhagen conference on climate change, we have a huuuge feature written by Paul Dechene, Stephen LaRose, Greg Beatty and special guest-activist Jeh Custer on the debate around climate change. Of course, there isn't any real debate on climate change--there's just a massive, decentralized effort by vested interests, egomaniacs, ideologues andlunatics to derail climate negotiations. Meanwhile the planet keeps heating up. We're sick of the crap. This is prairie dog's pissed off, tell it like it is manifesto.

We've also got a good piece by Carle Steel on coyotes and their poor little paws, a fire and brimstone effort by John Conway (and it's sure nice having him back) and maybe the best band interview we've ever run--Chris Morin's conversation with Gwar's Oderus Urungous.

Plus News Quirks, Dining (The Hotel Sask brunch), Queen City Confidential, Top 6s galore, David Suzuki, News Briefs, street Wear, a film review, CD reviews and more. Good issue, pick it up! It's worth going out for.