Tag Archives: Canada

Podcasts

The Roundtable Podcast 64

March 30, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

• Week of 23.03.2014

suffragists

Video shows Rob Ford inhaling from pipe, new documents reveal | Malaysia Airlines MH370 search: No actual sighting from satellite image | Sister Cristina Scuccia on the Voice | New Music: The Internet, “Dontcha” | Alison Redford resignation: Did sexism play a role in her demise? | Ban Bossy | My Little Pony | Feminism | A Guy’s “Ideal Day” Would Include 4 Hours and 19 Minutes of Sex | Sharia to be enshrined in British legal system as lawyers get guidelines on drawing up documents according to Islamic rules

Download entire podcast (320 kbps mp3) | Visit The Roundtable on Facebook.

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Canada, First Nations

Notes Toward a Candid Conversation About Genocide in Canada

March 27, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

gen

AS THE TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION Commission of Canada hosts its national event this week, in Edmonton, the topic of genocide is once again surfacing. Usually the topic is posed as a question: is Canada “guilty of genocide”? Over the years, I’ve had many conversations that began with this question, and I’ve done a fair amount of reading and thinking. Here are my notes toward an informed conversation about Canada and genocide.

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Canada, First Nations

The Sixties Scoop

March 26, 2014 Wayne K. Spear 2 Comments

Sixties Scoop

WINNIPEG FREE PRESS reported this week that Manitoba Aboriginal Affairs Minister Eric Robinson will host a two-day roundtable with twenty people who were part of something now known as the “Sixties Scoop.” For some of you this will be a new and unfamiliar phrase, and you’ll wonder why adopted aboriginal children are calling for an apology from the federal government of Canada. This essay will attempt to inform you on these and other points.

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Toronto

In Praise of Toronto

March 24, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

toronto

I‘M AWARE THAT my readers come from all over the world (thank-you for that) and that you’re not a parochial bunch. And so I beg excuse for the opportunity I’m going to take today to praise the city in which I live: Toronto.

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First Nations

We Are Better than Blockades

March 19, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

blockade

GREETINGS, PEOPLE. This is one of my regularly scheduled posts in which I address something happening in Indian Country. I encourage all of you to stick around, but let me be clear: I’m speaking to Onkwehonwe here, and only Onkwehonwe, and only on my own behalf. More specifically, I’m talking to Kanien’keha:ka, the People of the Flint, better known by some of you as the Mohawks. I am Kanien’keha:ka, of the Haudenosaunee – the People of the Longhouse, aka Iroquois, the name given to us by our longtime Huron enemies.

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Personal Essay

Second Thoughts About the Word Bullying

March 15, 2014 Wayne K. Spear 1 Comment

TODAY I LOOKED UP the word bullying in the English As It Is Actually Used Dictionary:

Bullying, vbl. n. [bʊlɪɪŋ]: A word that by 2014 was being used by some adults to describe what all the adults were doing to all the other adults, everywhere.

On any day in any news source, there are articles about adult bullying, as well as commentaries and anecdotes and calls to put an end to it, wherever it happens, which according to some people is everywhere.

Politics

Is Pierre Karl Péladeau the PQ’s Winning Asset?

March 11, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

pierre-karl-peladeau

THE QUEBEC ELECTION campaign became a bit more interesting this week with the entry of Pierre Karl Péladeau, of Quebecor Inc., Quebecor Media Inc. and Sun Media Corporation. Mr. Péladeau is well-known as the owner of a global telecommunications empire that includes many assets, both within and without Quebec. Now he wishes to be known, goodness knows why, as an aspiring Parti Québécois politician. He’s considered an aggressive and iron-fisted businessman, and no one doubts the nature of his new ambition, to become the President of the Nation of Quebec, as well as the king of Quebec media.

Toronto

If the Ford Brothers Win

February 20, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

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THE FORD BROTHERS seem confident of an autumn electoral victory, and they’ve good reasons. Rob Ford has admitted to lying to the public, and his lack of self control and dignity have become matters of non-controversy: yet he remains in office and enjoys a healthy approval rating, as well as a credible prospect of a second term. His powers and office budget have been reduced, yet the Fords are as bombastic and arrogant as ever. Both Doug and Rob are uninterested in – indeed, hostile towards – public policy and the workings of government. Their contempt of politicians and the political process constitutes a good portion of the duo’s appeal. After all that has transpired, it is difficult to imagine the scandal that might end their political careers. Could it be that there is no such scandal? The Ford brothers behave exactly as people who believe that it could.

First Nations

Even Tobacco is Better than Stephen Harper’s Law and Order

February 19, 2014 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

Contraband Tobacco

Much of the Indian Country coffee-shop chat in southern Ontario these days concerns Ottawa’s Bill C-10, “Tackling Contraband Tobacco Act,” introduced by the Canadian Government in November 2013. Vocal champions of this bill (apart from the government) include the Canadian Convenience Stores Association and the Retail Council of Canada. So a more plainly descriptive title for this legislation might be “A Bill to Prevent the Mohawks from Cutting Into Our Business.”

First Nations

Give the First Nations Education Act a Chance

February 10, 2014 Wayne K. Spear 1 Comment

aboriginal-education

THE ISRAELI DIPLOMAT, orator and polyglot, Abba Eban, is today memorialized in the truism that men and nations behave wisely only once they have exhausted all the other alternatives. In the case of Canada’s exhausted Indian Act policies, the alternatives to a wiser course have been many as well as durable, as we all know. Thus it is with surprise, and enthusiasm even, that the Assembly of First Nations is this week absorbing Canada’s late acceptance of the five “Conditions for the Success of First Nations Education,” enunciated in the AFN’s December 2013 unanimous resolution and enshrined in Finance Minister Flaherty’s 2014 budget. These conditions are as follows:

First Nations

Face It: Indian Residential Schools Were Bad

January 13, 2014 Wayne K. Spear 20 Comments

Indian Residential Schools
LAST WEEK, Paul Russell (the letters editor at the National Post) ran a piece entitled Could it be that residential schools weren’t so bad?:

The National Post has carried many stories about [Indian residential schools] before and since that apology. And every time we do, it is interesting to see that most of the letters we receive argue that the schools have been unfairly portrayed in the media. That phenomenon was on display again this week, following the publication of last Saturday’s story, “4,000 Children died in residential schools; Truth commission.”

Podcasts

The Roundtable Podcast 57

December 15, 2013 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

• Week of 14.12.2013

Mandela

Nelson Mandela: July 18, 1918 – December 5, 2013 | Josh Matlow urges council to hit pause on Scarborough subway | Top Ten List: How to celebrate Canada’s 150th anniversary in 2017 | Game: Finish the Headline | Beyoncé | Featured Article: The End of the College Essay, An essay | Police In Thailand Lay Down Vests and Barricades In Solidarity With Protestors | Music: Greg Ashley, “True Love Leaves No Traces” | Google is now funding numerous Tea Party groups | Bots now ‘account for 61% of web traffic’ | Public-health advocates pushing for graphic, cigarette-style health warnings on wine, beer and liquor containers

Download entire podcast (320 kbps mp3) | Visit The Roundtable on Facebook.

Toronto

So Rob Ford Wants a War? Let’s Make Sure He Gets It

November 18, 2013 Wayne K. Spear Leave a comment

ROB FORD, henceforth the pro forma Mayor of Toronto, delivered a short statement just before Toronto city council moved to deplete his staff, privileges, budget and authority. After a brief introductory flourish, congratulating the Hamilton Tiger-Cats for their recent victory, came a patchwork of personal anecdote, Bible verse and self-justification lumped together in an effort to discredit Ford’s fellow municipal councillors. His closing was of special note, striking as is so often the case with a Ford self-defence that irritating mixture of self-pity and belligerent menace:

Podcasts