What did I say about the Gazette vs. Projet? Friday, the paper has a happy piece titled The honeymoon’s over for Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante, enumerating various sticky moments throughout 2018 and rejoicing in how Plante’s popularity is down.
Updates from December, 2018 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
Vaudreuil-Dorion is to be the site of a Muslim cemetery if the agricultural zoning of the desired land can be tweaked.
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Kate
We have a freezing rain warning Friday morning. Then we should get ordinary rain before another plunge into the negative numbers Saturday night.
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Kate
A McGill researcher has found that the air at Trudeau airport has dangerous levels of metal nanoparticles, more than any other airport studied.
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Kate
The Order of Canada has been handed out to a selection of notables. Thirty people from Quebec were honoured including Westmount’s Wurtele twins, now 96 years old, who once constituted the entire 1948 Canadian ski team. (Footnote from Wikipedia: Rhona Wurtele is the mother of dancer Margie Gillis.)
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Kate
So folks, the blog is running now, but there have been some technical glitches. A plugin update in mid-December caused a crash, and when the blog was revived with the help of my hosting service whc.ca, it came back with none of the old comments visible.
I have all the comments in the back end and they’re backed up in a few places, but they’re not viewable any more. I’ve tried various things, such as going to WordPress 5 and trying new themes temporarily, but this hasn’t been working.
So later on Thursday we’re going to try restoring the site to where it was in mid-December and then re-add the posts and comments added since that time.
There may be a bit of downtime while this is all done. Please stand by – the blog will be back.
Blork
Oooo, but I see you’ve indented comments. Sweet!
Kate
That bit was easy, Blork. I have not been able to get the old comments reposted.
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Kate
This is why the Gazette’s a pain in the arse, the snarky, sour, fatalistic tone taken in this piece about the new bridge. Reading this, this morning, was like a cold drink of leftover coffee with cat piss in it. Whatever this city needs, this tone is not it.
Tee Owe
Hi Kate
Love your description says it all in so few words – pithy, no If you hate what they wrote maybe don’t link to it? Otherwise they get lotsa clicks.PO
I’ve felt like it has gone up spectacularly fast given the circumstances of weather, weight limits, etc., as well as the coordination of not just erecting the bridge but also remaking the 15 all the way to the Atwater exit.
Im irked at accusations of “mismanagement” that are seemingly unfounded or just seem to be name-calling. No details on The Gazette’s part, just angry bitching. The paper is dying with it’s demographic.
Bill Binns
Huh? Haven’t we all been saying much the same as this article on this blog for years? The article’s central theme of “this was entirely predictable” could not be more true. Nobody that has lived in this town for more than a few years would have bet a dime that this bridge would open on time. I wouldn’t bet on it making the June deadline if you gave me 100/1 odds.
This is an entirely fixable problem that goes unfixed for decade after decade because we have politicians that take vacations on the yachts of construction bosses.
Blork
I think the problem is that the predictability of the predictability claims is becoming too predictable.
Kate
Blork puts it better here than I could.
Tim F
Blork: Meta.
Kevin
It’s tough to tell online, but is this an editorial?
Michael Black
That’s a point, but it was in the paper, andvearly in the section. I didn’t really read it, but I notice the online version does link to stories earlier in the year, right there as part of tge article, none of that computer generated related links. Of course, like most of the content this week, it is year end wrap-up, somethingbtgst can be written ahead of time.
Context can change online, they have some filler on the webpage that never sees the paper edition, but which is internet, immediate and informal. And at least once they shifted an opinion piece from the off-island section to the main section at the top, again something not seen by most readers at home.
I am noticing that they are labeling opinion online, by prefacing the title with “opinion:”, but I haven’t noticed if that’s consistent.
Michael
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Kate
Some Lasalle residents are concerned about a massive pile of dirt that threatens to thaw and slide into their homes from an adjoining condo construction site.
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Kate
A Mascouche man is in a jam: he went to Cuba where he ended up killing a fellow Canadian in a boating mishap. Cuba jailed him, let him out and then recently re‑tried and re‑convicted him and sentenced him to four years.
All the pieces I’ve seen have led strongly with the idea that Toufik Benhamiche is unjustly stuck in Cuba. Julius Grey is representing him and says the Canadian government should be acting to exonerate him. But while I’ve seen cases where a citizen gets stuck in a bad place for no reason – Zahra Kazemi comes to mind – the fact remains Benhamiche mishandled a boat and a woman died. Ingrid Peritz says the man has an apartment and is not in custody while filing a second appeal.
Maybe Benhamiche should be allowed to do his time here in Canada, but it’s not as if he’s the innocent victim of severe injustice.
EmilyG
Eh, I have a hard time taking Julius Grey seriously since he defended someone who wanted to wear a pasta strainer on their head for an official photo.
Chris
What’s wrong with wearing a colander? Aren’t we free in this country to wear whatever funny religious hats we want to? As long as the face is visible and the person identifiable (i.e. the purpose of identification cards), then how does it harm you or others? Who are you to judge the sincerity of a person’s innermost convictions? You’re not a pastafariaphobe are you?
(I say this tongue in cheek of course, making a parallel with what someone would reply if you had said ‘niqab’ instead of ‘pasta strainer’.)
But really, the colander only seems silly to you because it’s so new. Give it time. Scientology is only a few decades old, and they don’t have to pay property taxes. JWs are just over a century old, and they are taken as a proper religion. It’s only because they are so old that Islam and Christianity aren’t laughed at in the same way.
Also, a good lawyer will take cases even when he doesn’t personally agree with the client, because some really do believe in the right to representation/defense. They also believe in paycheques I imagine. 🙂
Bill Binns
I don’t like Julius Grey but I don’t remember why. Now that Emily has let us know he defended the rights of a citizen to wear the religious signifier of their choice I will have to have another look at the man.
I truly wish I could be one of the brave souls that shows up at the DMV with their colander. Alas, my wife doesn’t ask me for much but she really wants me to stay out of the news.
Kate
Anyone who thinks the colander business makes some sort of profound gotcha about religion is essentially missing the whole point. Sorry, Chris.
Chris
What ‘whole point’ is that?
Kate
Chris, you think that a joke religion with a nonsense premise reduces all world religions to that level. You’re forgetting the massive presence of religion as part of world culture, literature and art, as well as human psychology and community.
EmilyG
The colander thing isn’t religious, but making fun of religion.
But I know I’ve had this argument before, and I don’t feel like going there again.Bill Binns
Please explain the difference between a “joke religion” and any religions you feel are not jokes. Please attempt to do so without using the word “established”. Every religion has to start somewhere. Think a religion that describes the afterlife as having “stripper factories” and “beer volcanoes is too ridiculous to be taken seriously? Let me tell you a story about a pregnant virgin and her improbably naive husband. We could also talk about the many millions of adults who, in 2018 will insist that the sun sets into a muddy pond every night, that ants can talk and that 50 year old dudes marrying 9 year old girls is just fine. We haven’t even gotten to Zenu yet. ALL religions are jokes but it’s too hurtful to say out loud for some reason.
The colander thing is a lot of trouble to go through to “mock religion” especially considering that mocking is easily accomplished with a lot less effort then fighting all the way to the supreme court.
This is about people exercising their rights that are supposed to be equally applied to all. Not much different from sitting down at a lunch counter where you are not wanted and insisting to be served.
Kate
Bill Binns, you feel hard done by because the homeless get help and the religious get breaks (minor breaks, like not being ticketed when they park near a synagogue on Saturday, but breaks nonetheless).
Can’t you see that, even for a nonbeliever, the big religions have been a growth medium for art, music, architecture and literature, even while carrying the seeds of corruption? You can’t see that a proposition like Pastafarianism overlooks how these systems give millions, if not billions of people some external community structure and internal emotional structure that allows them to face their own life and mortality?
Studies have shown that religious people are often happier than non. Yes, it’s a kind of placebo effect. But we’re frail and life is short, would you really deny this to so many?
Chris
Kate, no, I don’t think that “a joke religion with a nonsense premise _reduces_ all world religions to that level”. There is no causal link. The other religions were on ‘that level’ before FSM was even concocted. They all have a ‘nonsense premise’.
I’m also not “forgetting the massive presence of religion as part of world culture, literature and art, as well as human psychology.” I acknowledge that. What of it? It’s not mutually exclusive to being based on a ‘nonsense premise’.
But I’m not trying to debate religion in general…
Mormonism was started by Joseph Smith, a literal fraudster. Scientology was invented by a science fiction writer. Despite this history, they all have genuine followers, that truly believe. They did not at first. FSM could well have some true believers now, and more in the future. You can’t know what someone truly believes in their heart. Even if only a single human on Earth genuinely believes in the FSM, why deny them wearing a colander if other ‘funny hats’ are allowed? Because you doubt the sincerity of their belief? Because you personally believe it silly? Because the other hats have longer history? Why?
Kate
Chris, the FSM was launched purely as satire and to make a point about religious nonsense. It’s a point, but it’s a thin point and I continue to maintain it misses 90% of the purpose of religion in most cases.
You do make a case about Mormonism, based on a really bad 19th-century pastiche of the King James bible, and Scientology, but even the latter was not entirely launched as a satire, which Pastafarianism was.
Chris
FSM was launched by an activist trying to keep “intelligent design” out of science class.
Scientology wasn’t a satire at all. It was started as a tax evasion scheme.
Anyway, I’d still love to understand EmilyG’s original viewpoint: why shouldn’t someone be allowed to wear a colander in an official photo? The best I can understand from this thread is: ‘official’ religion is a valid reason for exemption from regular rules, but unofficial religions are not, and altogether different reasons are not either. i.e. Wearing a baseball cap ‘because fashion’ shouldn’t get you an exemption. Wearing a colander ‘because FSM’ shouldn’t get you an exemption. But wearing a hijab ‘because Allah’ should get you an exemption. Is that about right? I’d genuinely like to understand, because it seems illogical to me. I can understand accepting all 3, and rejecting all 3, but the line drawn in the middle is baffling.
EmilyG
Because actual religions don’t exist just to make fun of other religions? Unlike Pastafarianism and wearing a colander on your head?
I don’t think religion should be exempt from criticism or satire – I just think that the colander thing is ridiculous.
Hmm, didn’t mean to sidetrack the comments section of this blog post for something not really related to the original post. Sorry, Kate.
Chris
So it’s merely because “the colander thing is ridiculous” that one ought not be allowed to wear one in photo id? Many other people think the hijab is ridiculous, is that likewise reason enough to disallow it?
You know, one can simultaneously think something ridiculous and support the right of others to be ridiculous. This, I suspect, is where Julius Grey is coming from.
Kate
Chris, we have to trust intention. A person’s motive for insisting on wearing a colander is not the same as for wearing a hijab or a kippa. You can argue till you turn blue that you actually believe in the FSM and have to wear a colander and I am never going to believe you.
Kevin
Chris
“Whereas Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law:”There is your legal starting point.
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Kate
There’s a growing number of homeless people and the headline here says nobody has a simple explanation why. The index used here is simply the people requesting shelter beds. A spokesman in the article suggest it’s poor services for the mentally ill that sends people into the streets; unemployment numbers have been low all year, although the cost of living keeps rising relative to minimum wage, making it harder all the time to get off the street once you’re there.
La Presse looks at how many armed forces vets end up on the streets.
CBC talks to a veterinarian who regularly looks after the pets of street people.
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Kate
Linda Gyulai says the city’s case against Michael Applebaum in an attempt to wrest back some ill‑gotten gains will open next year while Frank Zampino is still finding ways to edge away from a court date.
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Kate
This CBC piece talks as if the rule that buildings can’t be taller than Mount Royal is old and obsolete, but I know the rule has been reconfirmed by the city within the last few years.
Bill Binns
I had heard that this rule was meant to preserve views of the mountain from the city. If so, it has been a resounding failure. Even if I have it wrong and the rule was meant to preserve views of the city from the mountain it appears there were frequent exceptions made. The big round high rise that belongs to McGill on Pine and the 40 story Port Royal condo building on Sherbrooke come to mind.
Max
I’m more concerned about the south-looking sightlines from downtown these days. It seems every other month some piece of crap glass and concrete tower goes up in Griffintown ruining yet another vista onto the sud-ouest and the river.
Vazken
That article was click batey at best. I read the article then watched the video and I didn’t learn anything new. I had to look up myself if the law was still in the books (it is) and if any new planned buildings will be taller than the mountain (there aren’t)
JoeB
That pimple isn’t a mountain.
Also it was based on the religious belief that this “mountain” brought man closer to God.
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Kate
The main section of the Sun Life building was completed a century ago although it was enlarged several times afterwards, and for a time was the tallest building in the British Empire.
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Kate
Montreal hopes to have a ban on heating oil by 2021. It’s damaging stuff, far worse than natural gas.
(“Mazout” is a weird word. It’s from Arabic via Russian but how it then got into French I do not know. This wiktionary entry also says it’s the name of two different mixed drinks in France and Belgium.)
Ephraim
Just to be clear… a ban on heating oil in the city’s buildings, not citywide. They want to encourage people to move from home heating oil too, but that will take longer and will need money.. because you can’t remove the oil tanks as easily and it’s much more difficult to heat with electricity than with oil or natural gaz.
For example a 60 gallon tank on natural gaz may be sufficient to provide hot water for 10 people…. with electricity you would likely need 2 60 gallon tanks to do that. Heating large homes on electricity would require rewiring a home not only inside, but at the central connection as a 200 AMP connection might not be sufficient. And Hydro needs to build backup systems… you can’t have heating go down for too long in the winter without creating a disaster… frozen pipes and all.
dwgs
Gaz Met (or whatever they’re calling themselves these days) often offers an incentive program to switch from oil, we did it almost 20 years ago. They offer reasonable financing and their contractors handle the whole thing, I was impressed with the program. Removing the 2 huge oil tanks from the basement was quite the process, involving several large dirty men, a Sawzall, and more kitty litter than you can imagine.
A.
I switched from oil to electricity this summer (radiator heat, semi-detached two story house). It took half a day to make the change. It probably won’t be cheaper, but I feel much better being off oil. I wish I’d done it years ago. And oil heating goes off when the electricity is off, unless you have a backup generator. It’s good to see the city moving towards cleaner energy.
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Kate
A man died after going skating on Lac-St-Louis off Baie d’Urfé on Tuesday. Not a lot of detail but it appears he didn’t fall through the ice, nor do police think there’s anything suspicious about the death.
Bill Binns 13:11 on 2018-12-28 Permalink
I thought I remembered seeing the same article in the Gazette written about Coderre but not quite. He had a “long honeymoon”.
https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/montreal-mayor-denis-coderre-enjoying-a-long-honeymoon
This article also proclaims that Coderre had “a keen instinct for political survival” lol. This piece did not age well.