The Journal has some dramatic photos of the collapsed brick façade of a triplex in eastern Ville‑Marie.
I don’t have a media link yet, but on Facebook I see from Christine Gosselin that the façade of St‑Esprit church on Masson has become unstable, so emergency work is being done and that section of the street is blocked off to traffic. Posting this partly as relevant to our recent discussion of the state of church buildings in town.
Claude Julien and Kirk Muller have been fired by the Canadiens after a promising start to the short NHL season collapsed in a sequence of losses.
I don’t follow hockey at all, but at this point, as a pro sports fan of other sports, there is something wrong with ownership here, right? They don’t fire him in all the past crap seasons but now just when the team is finally having a good season, they fire him during a very minor hiccup in their momentum?
I think there’s kind of a “last straw” feeling about it, this time around, from the little I’m picking up about it.
This season is so short that once momentum is lost, there isn’t much room to turn it around.
Every team wants to win the cup every year, but with the salary cap in place, there are seasons to load up on superstars and go for it, seasons to rebuild, and seasons that fall somewhere in the middle of all that.
The Habs have 2 superstars on expensive contracts (Price and Weber) who are getting older and their performance is expected to drop. So they have a window to win the cup in the next 1-2 years before they have to restructure part of the team (Price and Weber account for 20% of their total salary cap). It doesn’t mean that they can’t win in 5 years, it just means it won’t happen with whatever plan the GM (Bergevin) put in place.
This season, the GM loaded up some pretty expensive additions (Anderson, Toffoli), so it’s clear he wanted to make a run this year. The season isn’t going poorly, but Julien was a pretty conservative coach and playing a defensive style that I don’t think Bergevin appreciated anymore, not with the new players. Bergevin is also trying to save his job too. He’s been in place in 2012 and at some point, you have to get results.
That’s just my 0.02, put me on RDS. 🙂
Thanks for the analysis, Mark.
Thanks, I appreciate the analysis. The point about the conservative style is particularly helpful.
I have long argued that the Canadiens’s owners view their hockey team as just one part of a well-diversified portfolio that includes promoting concerts, real estate, and more. Putting bums in the seats is more important, especially with long seasons, than putting in the very hard effort to possibly win the Cup. It’s worked well for most of the past 3 decades.
An NHL coach is only as good as his starting goalie, and Carey Price has been a dud this year.
A white man has been named Quebec’s first minister for the fight against racism.
We will never beat racism until every job has rigidly enforced skin color requirements.
Oh, Bill Binns. You dickens! I see the point you’ve made obliquely. But I don’t think it’s too much to ask that the first person in this post have some lived experience in the subject.
“Benoit Charette est actuellement ministre de l’Environnement et de la Lutte contre les changements climatiques” – guess it’s just simpler to have one person responsible for all the files the ruling party doesn’t care about. Maybe they can make him minister for Montreal as well.
>…have some lived experience in the subject
First, do you know he doesn’t? I didn’t RTFA, but for all we know maybe he lived in Asia or elsewhere for a stint and did experience racism. You shouldn’t assume anything about someone’s lived experience just because of their skin colour or sex.
Second, maybe he’s got excellent book-experience. Perhaps he has a PhD or something in race studies.
I think Kate’s summary is quite unfortunate. What’s important is what’s in his brain, what stances he holds, what positions he espouses, etc. You know, the content of his character, not the colour of his skin. Reducing his qualifications (or not) to “white man” is not productive. If we want to reach a world where your skin colour is as irrelevant as your hair colour, this is not how to do it.
If he’s a shit candidate, let’s tar him for the right reasons.
Benoit Charette goes from fighting against change to fighting for change. #WishyWashy /s
Bill Binns, no judgment on you but your reply smacks of racist sentiment and deserves to be called out as such.
Chris, it’s possible to judge the man based on his experience and character while also acknowledging that the selection of someone from the dominant culture to represent minorities is a poor one.
Does his skin colour make Benoit Charette less qualified? That just perpetuates racism imo. We should be beyond that – and that’s where my kids’ generation is at. They (and their classmates) don’t seem to care at all about someone’s skin colour. It’s a non-factor to them, it’s just their “normal”. People have different skin tones, and that’s it. Next subject?
By the way, Benoit Charette’s wife and kids are “visible minorities”, it that stuff is important to you.
@Benoit. using the reverse racism argument actually perpetuates racism.
In some ways, I see Benoit Charette as a step forward for a party such as the CAQ. At least it’s an improvement to appointing a white former cop as the Minister of Indigenous Affairs!
With Charette, his wife is of Haitian origin and he has biracial children. Apparently, he won a human rights case where his family was denied rental accommodation because of their skin colour. So at least he has had some direct experience with racial discrimination.
It will be interesting to see how much change Charette can do and I’m curious to hear his personal take on systemic racism in Quebec.
His whiteness doesn’t make him less qualified but it does make him privileged. I imagine there are plenty of qualified people for this job and they chose him.
Just tossing in one of those patented Blork Issue Digests, because it beats workin’
If you appoint a POC to the racism portfolio, it could appear to some that you are essentially (pardon the term, please, but it works) “ghettoizing” the issue. As in, “let the POCs worry about POC problems.”
on the other hand, if you give that portfolio to a white person, then it seems like some kind of neo-colonialism at work. Also, this parallel for perspective: imagine putting a man in charge of the sexism portfolio.
Personally, I think the “lived experience” argument trumps everything else by an order of magnitude.
But then it all comes down to whether or not there is a POC in the government who is qualified for the job. Qualifications being roughly: (1) part of the government, (2) interested in the job, (3) not an idiot — that’s the hardest one when choosing from people who fit qualification number 1. (I admit I have no idea what kind of rainbow we have in government right now… Traditionally it’s been white as snow. Are there many POCs to choose from at the moment?)
So to these eyes, Benoit Charette doesn’t seem like a particularly good candidate, but are there any POCs in the government who want the job? (Considering the “ghettoization” argument can also come from a POC’s point of view, along the lines of “FFS, I want to run [SOME OTHER PORTFOLIO] but why do they always throw the racism job at me?”)
Good thoughts, Blork.
I wasn’t editorializing, by the way. It’s simply a fact that the candidate is a white guy, with the upsides and downsides Blork outlines. I think what they need on this is a committee, with a range of people from different backgrounds, and maybe that will happen.
It’s not skin colour you idiots, it’s culture and background (often indicated by skin colour). Of course it makes a difference if the person is of a race that has been discriminated against. They will have deep experience to help them understand the issue and push for solutions that will help make real change.
Also like maybe since every other position of power is pretty much filled by a white person, one has to wonder why all the sudden freaking out about discrimation pops up now. FOH.
According to Wikipedia, there are five visible minority CAQ members in the current government. Given the small pool to choose from, it’s possible he might actually be the best qualified. They can’t exactly hand pick someone to be an elected member of the government. Agreed that it’s not a great look, but hopefully he will at least consult with different ethnic groups.
Of course the cynical part of me is more in line with what Joey said.
Maybe one of the important things (to Legault anyway) is that this guy denies the existence of systemic racism.
I’m not generally one for singling people out, but… Bill Binns, you’ve got to stop! I read this blog daily and I don’t think you’ve posted since getting spanked with that “chef’s kiss” comment from the Camara case. It’s making you look bad that you just can’t seem to help but make some snide, somewhat racist comment every time the issue of race is discussed.
A man convicted of sexual aggressions against five women was sentenced to a year in prison this week. Patrick Raymond’s thing was to speak to women, then grab their ass and call them names. His lawyer basically says here that Raymond is not crazy, just stupid.
Tons of photos of Camara but they can’t find a single one of this guy where it would be useful information?
With MarcG
The Gazette has a piece about getting the Covid vaccine, when and how. Similarly from CBC, La Presse, and so on.
A weather tracking redditor says we have more snow on the ground now (42 cm) than any winter since 2008, and another redditor is reminding people to clear snow from roofs and balconies before the weekend, which is expected to be mild, with rain.
links?
thanks!
Historical data is available from Environment Canada, per weather station. Number crunching required – https://climate.weather.gc.ca/climate_data/daily_data_e.html?StationID=51157
The coroner’s report on the fiery truck accident on the Met in August 2016 says it was avoidable on two counts. As was reported before by the CNESST, the initial truck that stopped unexpectedly was known to have that problem, but it hadn’t been fixed. But the coroner also found that none of the drivers (a chain of four trucks was involved) was keeping a safe stopping distance, as if they ever do in traffic slowdowns.
One man, Gilbert Prince, died in that crash, and I sometimes wonder how the other driver is doing who was unable to free Prince from his impacted cab before the flames overtook the vehicle.
If a truck keeps a safe stopping distance several cars will immediately be in it. The only way for a truck to keep a safe stopping distance somewhere like the Met is to remain stopped.
@JohnB, are you saying the Met wasn’t designed for the current capacity for trucks AND cars?
@steph I think that what John B is saying is that if a vehicle, any vehicle, tries to maintain the stopping distance recommended by drivers’ ed on the Met that gap will be constantly filled by people pulling in front of you from the adjacent lane in a bid to get ahead. The best you can do is keep a gap not quite large enough for that to happen and be hyper aware at all times.
Francine Pelletier does an admirable number on Yves Francœur vs. Valérie Plante and finds where the “ideology” is hiding.
The city is promising a plan that will ensure the role and exemplary nature of the French language for the city. This puzzles me, because the city does everything in French already, so what else can they do?
Reduce their use of English, I suppose, because then it will look like they’re more determined about it.
I saw that story on my ipad this morning and went to find it to post, and when you look up the words “Montreal français” here are the headlines:
Joly et le français: on nous raconte des histoires (Mathieu Bock-Côté. The stories are not good.)
«Le français dégringole à une vitesse jamais vue»
Protection du français: est-il trop tard?
Le français au Québec: une langue sans pays – Denise Bombardier
And now, from Radio-Canada, Défense de la langue française : qu’en pensent les trentenaires? Here’s a cite: “Sentent-ils que la langue française est menacée? « Non! Je n’ai pas l’impression que ça va mal pour la langue. On a aussi une vision vraiment montréalocentriste, parce qu’on vit à Montréal, mais si on regarde à la grandeur du Québec, non! »
I was struck recently by this letter to the editor in Le Devoir, where the writer speaks about le virus linguistique anglophone, an evil to be stamped out for sure. (It’s delightful to feel that your language, the language you speak and in which your life is expressed, is seen as a disease. An unearned thrill of wickedness!) Pierre Lincourt writes angrily from Chicoutimi – where I’m guessing he never hears a word of the langue de Shakespeare spoken from one year’s end to the next – of terms he hears on the media and presumably reads on the internet.
These usages have nothing to do with local anglos and how we live our lives, but we’re the ones who have to do penance for the virus we carry. Has anyone got a face mask that will stop English words from getting through?
Most of the vitriol is coming from Quebecor, which is doing a Fox News number on Quebec. Not just on language issues but with anything that strays from the pro-business, right-wing nationalism of PKP. It’s a dangerous game.
When is this blog going to be in french? /s quick, go register mtlvilleblog.com
I once dared another anglo blogger to post in French once a week, so there was a period when I did all my blogging in French on Fridays, before realizing the other guy didn’t give a shit and I was only succeeding in annoying my readers. I can write in French but not with the insouciant grace I can bring to English on a good day.
chiche! 😎
Insouciant Grace will be the title of my next novel.
I liked the French Fridays. Feels like that was a long time ago!
It was, CE. And it takes me longer to think and write in French, so I’m not going to go back to it.
An urbanist professor writes against urban sprawl in Le Devoir.
Mario Girard praises the plan for the renovation of Phillips Square.
City hall has plans to pedestrianize ten commercial streets this summer.
They couldn’t find a single photo where people were masked up?
Why would they be masked up? They’re outside 🙂
Looking forward to seeing the details. Last summer was a mixed bag, which is to be expected when everything was improvised in the space of a few weeks, but the successes were truly successful. Mont-Royal was amazing and so was Wellington.
The city has rejected the poor rating issued last week for its flood preparations, saying it learned a lot in 2019 and is ready to act if the river rises.
TVA says two architect firms have walked out in a refusal to help design an elevated train that will cut along René-Lévesque.
Oh I had missed this before. I could imagine this kind of went down like this:
Rem: make this elevated concrete structure pretty, errr, acceptable so we can sell this
Consultant: ok here is a proposal, it costs 200Mio extra
Rem: too expensive. Make it cheaper
Consultant: i can’t make it cheaper while still producing something that is acceptable
Rem: just make it cheaper but sell it as the best thing there is, It´s been working for us for five years!
Consultant:….
Workers trying to fix the REM tunneling machine working under the Technoparc wetlands near the airport caused a subsidence of the ground that has had to be fixed somehow. This thing is also tunneling under the airport runways, an idea I now find a little alarming.
This cannot bode well. On any level. The deeper you dig in that area, the more trouble you’ll find.
As noted in Auger article from yesterday, they’ve got a blank cheque, The taxpayers will foot the bill.
Of course the Caisse will take the responsibility for any risks, thats why theyre entitled to most of the profits of the profits of this scheme
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