As Toronto has grown, the share of Toronto-born-and-bred residents of the city is ever smaller. As part of that diminishing minority, I’ve noticed that many people who move to the city later in life are blissfully ignorant of the significance of being from one part of the city or another. Overall, this is a goodcontinue reading
Dalton48 Archives
May the years stretch ever longer in a Better Canada
It’s amazing what Strong Leadership can do. For example, it can apparently extend the number of days in a year in a previously unheard-of fashion: “During the last session our crime bills were held up by Opposition-controlled House committees or the Liberal majority in the Senate for a total of 976 days,” Prime Minister Harpercontinue reading
Canada’s never-to-be majority government strikes again
Still not sure what the Harperites are calling themselves since they decided that, with a fresh session of parliament, it was time to drop the “new”. Given this photo, though, I’m confident my own personal name for them is correct. Here they all are, having a good laugh at Stephane Dion, his slightly less torturedcontinue reading
The loneliness of 20,000 long distance runners
(Crowds line marathon route, somewhere else.) Though you may not have noticed, today was the day of Toronto’s second fall marathon, the Toronto Marathon. As one might expect, Yonge Street and University Avenue were lined with spectators, and residents of neighbourhoods the marathon went through, such as Forest Hill and Rosedale, were outside with handmadecontinue reading
Bland still works
Election 2007: It seems like a lot of trouble to go to to have what is in effect a cabinet shuffle, doesn’t it? Some high, or low, lights: – The Tory campaign couldn’t change the channel, as we all know. One of the big problems, it seems, is that they didn’t have anything to changecontinue reading
Happy (derivative) Thanksgiving
As a first-generation American Canadian, nothing makes me prouder than seeing Canadians embrace an American holiday in their own unique way. (What specifically Canadian tweaks have been made to the holiday here, besides the October date, is still unclear to me. But I’m sure that there are some extremely important, if for all practical purposescontinue reading
The brave bloggers of Burma
In 1989, I was glued to the television for weeks watching the pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square make their peaceful case for democracy. The entire world could watch because of the footage that was broadcast. In Burma, foreign journalists are banned. In 1988 information about the junta’s crackdown was limited, and verbal. But thanks tocontinue reading
Fight the Power
Would-be car buyers launch a class action suit claiming sticker prices on Canadian cars are illegal. One analyst points out that when the C$ was at US$0.65 — not so very long ago — prices here were actually lower and no one was complaining. What the plaintiffs ignore is that Canada is a different countrycontinue reading
Dollar daze part 2: don’t blame the bookseller
More from the frontlines of C$ surge, aka the US$ collapse: – I have to question the Star’s dollar headline on its front page today (check your local Star copy or box as it does not appear online). The story is fine, but it’s topped by the ubiquitous pic of a loonie and, in somethingcontinue reading
Dollar daze*
Woo-hoo! Parity at last! Where were you in 1976? Etc. Except: we live in Ontario consumer prices aren’t budging plus, don’t know if you’d noticed, but housing and food prices, which represent a sizeable part of the average household budget, are rising. Core inflation is actually a bit softer — you know, the type that doesn’t includecontinue reading