Today being Earth Day, what better time to screen The End of Suburbia, presented at 7 p.m. at the Bloor Theatre by the International Citizens' Inquiry into 9/11.

Barrie Zwicker, who hosted the film, and producer Barry Silverthorne will be present for a Q-and-A after the screening.

I blogged about this extensively after seeing the film back in the winter of 2005.

You have to live in T.O. (or somewhere else where it is showing), but check out Blackballed: The Bobby Dukes Story, featuring Rob Corddry of The Daily Show.

Lots o' amusing Canadian references! I especially snickered at the white gangster-rapper-paintballers from PEI!

Eye Weekly has an article on Corddry, and the Star did a q-and-a with him. The Globe's Stephen Cole wasn't crazy about the flick. 

However, he doesn't mention that if there isn't much character development, that's because there was no script. Corddry comes out of comedy improv. The whole film is him and his improv buddies riffing off each other. No dialogue was written in advance (jazz comedy!). That's part of the fun, and accounts for  some of the weakness too.

That being said, the Now review did make that observation and came to much the same conclusion.

But people in the theatre laughed throughout and applauded at the end. So go figure.

Haji Omar is the amir (chief) of Pakistan's Taliban, which controls South Waziristan in Pakistan and will likely do the same in North Waziristan (those territories adjoin the Afghanistan border; however, they are north of where Canadian troops are currently operating). He has some chilling things to say.

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This coming April 26 (Wednesday) is the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. Mikhael Gorbachev had been Russia's president for 13 months by that point. He looks back on the world's worst nuclear accident in an interview with Green Cross International, but carried by the BBC.

While the EU's anti-terror chief can't find proof of any secret CIA prisons on European soil, the CIA turfed a staffer who they think leaked evidence of those prisons to the Washington Post last November.

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While there's strong circumstantial evidence they exist, there's no proof the CIA has secret prisons in eastern Europe that it uses for renditioning, say Europe's antiterror chief. Some critics are calling 'whitewash' on that.

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I just noticed my watch is in almost perfect sync with the National Research Council time signal.

Pat Quinn is no longer the Toronto Maple Leafs' coach.

To that, I say "good." When you have a crappy season like the Leafs just did, somebody has to pay.

I don't think he's a good coach for the new NHL (although arguments could be made about whether John Ferguson is a good GM for the new NHL, or Richard Peddie is a good MLSE exec for the new NHL).

Clearly something has to change in Leafs Nation, and since the first puck was dropped, tradition holds that it's the coach who goes first.

Hopefully the Leafs bring in someone who understands modern hockey and who likes younger players.

CBC editorial supremo Tony Burman offers a conventional opinion on the new world of media.

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Filmmaker David Zeiger has made a doc looking back at the dissent movement within the U.S. armed forces of the 1960s and 1970s.

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This NYT article might help (unkind people might say that's why they visit this blog. :) )

OTOH, no late-night booze or caffeine? What kind of advice is that?!?! :)

Journalist Robert Scheer lays out how he thinks Dubya has boxed himself in when it comes to dealing with Iran by his bad calls on Iraq and Pakistan.

His conclusion:

There you have it - Hussein, who did not have a nuclear-weapons program and was fundamentally at odds with Bin Laden, now sits in prison, while the dictator of nukes-'R'-us Pakistan and the theocrats of Iran have had their power immeasurably strengthened by Bush's policies. Go figure. Actually, it would appear the public already has, which explains why our fearless leader has fallen so far in the polls.

Full story at the San Francisco Chronicle or at truthout.

Press Secretary Scott McLellan leaves to pursue other ventures and resident psychopath Karl Rove gets bumped from planning a New Conservative Order to focusing on this fall's mid-term elections. This Washington Post analysis suggests the Bushies see an iceberg on the horizon.

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About a half-dozen families who lost loved ones on 9-11 testified on behalf of al-Qaeda operative Zacarias Moussaoui, who is facing a possible death penalty. In the meantime, the court heard more about his paranoid schizophrenia.

Here's the NYT story.

The more detailed AP story can be found on CTV.ca.

And because good things come in threes, here's the Washington Post one.

And it wasn't just the Taliban or Hezb-i-Islami; al Qaeda sent a representative of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi to a recent meeting just inside Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan. Heck, even two unidentified Iranians showed up, reports the BBC:

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NYT columnist David Carr talks about the Minneapolis Star-Tribune's decision to make employees pay for copies of the printed newspaper (the digital version is available to them for free).

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This NYT op-ed piece looks at how people form judgments and how easily our minds allows themselves to be swayed.

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The four major U.S. television networks plus the Hearst-Argyle chain of TV stations want to fight back against some nasty penalties imposed by the Federal Communications Commission.

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The NYT's Neil Lewis notes that the prosecutor has accused a defence lawyer of badgering Moussaoui when the two were arguing last week. In case you missed the irony, the prosecution is trying to have Moussaoui put to death for his role in 9-11.

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On April 16, 1986, I walked into the Fort Saskatchewan Record to start actually earning a living as a journalist. Not only am I still doing it, I still want to!

NOTE: It's in progress and will be for a while (updated Fri. night).

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I got a ride from one of my colleagues to the Lawrence Station on the Yonge line subway, so I rode down to College to catch a streetcar home.

At Spadina, a guy with an African-style drum gets on (I don't know the drum's name, but it was hourglass-shaped). He giddily thrusts his transfer right in the operator's face.

"Why did do you do that?" sputtered the operator.

"Because I love you, bruddah!" said the drummer man as he walked back, a big, sloppy grin on his face and a carefree spring in his step.

At the back, he starts to drum near the Borden St. stop adjacent to Amato's Pizza on College.

"No drumming or I'm kicking you off," said the very stern-sounding operator.

About three seconds past the next stop at Bathurst, there's a few more beats. "Oops, sorry," giggled the drummer.

At Euclid, there was no one waiting for the streetcar, and no one had rang for a stop, yet the streetcar jolted to a halt.

"Off," the operator told the drummer man.

"You're kicking me off, but that's OK -- I still love you, bruddah!" giggled the drummer man as he exited the back doors.

Much exchanging of raised-eyebrow looks amongst the other passengers at this seemingly draconian response.

Molly the deli mouser survived her two-week ordeal, trapped in the wall of the Greenwich Village Delicatessen, her rescue completed Friday night.

"She appeared calm in front of the media, which have followed her plight intensely," reported the BBC.

No word yet on book or movie deals -- or an Oprah appearance.

 

The White House spoke up for U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld as more retired generals call for Rummy's resignation.

For the record, former FEMA head Michael Brown was told he was "doin' a heckofa job" by Dubya, but Rummy gets a mere "fine."

Whatever could it mean? :)

Not even a cat therapist (?!?!) has been able to lure poor Molly out from in between the walls of a New York delicatessan where she's been residing/trapped for two weeks.

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An NYT editorial thinks the marvel of a McDonald's drive-through call centre is that it's not in Bangalore. Way to be on the side of the little people, NYT.

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Overheard at the Monarch Tavern:

"Our parents and grandparents sacrificed to come here from Italy and Portugal so we don't have to."

Thank God that sacrifice stuff ended with the last generation, I say! :)

Here's the NYT's list of suggested blogs.

Here's globeandmail.com's.

I like the Globe's list better.

Lower ad revenue and higher newsprint costs -- plus lots o' spending on buyouts -- meant U.S. newspapers in the NYT, Tribune and McLatchy groups generally had a lousy first quarter even though their Internet properties are doing fairly well.

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The Village Voice has turfed long-time investigative reporter James Ridgeway -- yet another aftershock from the merger of the Voice with New Times Media that became official on Feb. 1.

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Big Bro in China has told local TV stations they can't use foreign TV footage in news bulletins.

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Since Comedy Central wouldn't let them use an image of the Prophet Muhammad, South Park's creators decided to bite the hand that feeds them.

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Treasury Board President John Baird told The Globe and Mail's editorial board that federal civil servants should honour the spirit of the Access to Information Act -- not scramble to restrict access to government records....   more »

NYT executive editor Bill Keller tackled readers' questions ranging from diversity to bias to anonymous sources to Judith Miller and beyond.

Read it here.

Keller cracked a wry joke here in talking about the most e-mailed articles:

Q. With the recent redesign of NYTimes.com, the top 10 Most E-Mailed articles are now listed on every page -- expanded from the top 5 of the past. I can only imagine that this reflects the popularity of this feature; indeed, every reader of NYTimes.com that I know utilizes the list. What effect has this feature had on the reporting and editing of the newspaper? How have you endeavored to maximize and/or minimize the impact of such a direct reflection of your readership's interests? And please do not claim that you do not follow the Most E-Mailed list, for nobody will believe you!

-- Ted Liao, New York

A. Not read it? Are you kidding? I've been checking every hour in hopes this Q&A will make the list. Fat chance.

I admit that I started out somewhat prudish about the Most-E-Mailed list. I worried that important, original, in-depth work that happened not to be buzzy would become wallflowers at the prom, that popularity would become a substitute for quality. I've lightened up a little. The list is still not the ultimate measure of good journalism, but it's fun. I think it sometimes directs people to great stories they might otherwise have missed. And -- perhaps in a reflection of the seriously curious readers of this paper -- a lot of important work, including long investigative projects, makes the list.

Are you a well-estabished, global-brand newspaper with extensive archives but a poor system for making them accessible to website visitors? Read on!

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If the long-term price of oil is set at $50 per barrel, Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez says yes. You know who agrees with him? The U.S. Dept. of Energy.

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The New Yorker's Seymour Hersh on why his article about Pentagon plans for attacks on Iran is more than just "wild speculation," as Dubya put it. Hersh spoke with Democracy Now!

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The Canadian Newspaper Association and the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation jointly accused the Conservative government of playing "bait and switch" with proposed changes to the Access to Information Act.

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