From the Toronto Sun's Bruce Kirkland, published Sept. 6:

The Toronto International Film Festival is no longer the people's film festival. Co-founder Dusty Cohl would be appalled. His widow, Joan Cohl, is certainly unhappy about this breach of trust.

Dusty, the gruff yet big-hearted conscience of the festival for its first 32 years, would have railed against turning it into an elitist corporate spectacle, as it has now become.

He would have hated the annoying new policy of increasing ticket prices and letting donors go to the head of the line, while heartland people -- cinephiles, working stiffs, the common folk who are the lifeblood of the event -- are treated as rudely as dozens were on opening night, and as thousands have been in the distribution of tickets for the entire festival.

But Dusty is not here to analyze, complain and set things right. He died Jan. 11. So we have to speak up for him.

Here's a piece I did today: Election drama possible in 905 ridings.

Bottom lines:

- There's a reason why Stephen Harper made Mississauga the first GTA stop. Four ridings in thatarea should be considered in play. The Tories won two and the Liberals won two in 2006.

- One of those ridings is Halton, home to Garth Turner, who got punted as a Tory then joined the Liberals.

- Some other spite ridings include Mississauga-Streetsville (Wajid Khan, remember him?) and Newmarket-Aurora, Belinda's old stomping grounds.

- Of the nineteen 905 ridings, 15 are held by the Grits. The Tories hold the rest. The NDP largely hasn't been a factor out there.

Human Rights Watch put out a report Monday that finds civilian deaths from NATO air strikes in Afghanistan nearly tripled from 2006 to 2007 before easing in the past 12 months.

And the Guardian had a story Monday that said there is some cellphone video that shows the gruesome toll of air strikes on Azizabad in western Afghanistan. The death toll looks to be much, much higher than the seven killed claimed by the United States.

A Guardian team led by photojournalist John D. McHugh has done a video-photo report of a U.S. army medevac team operating in Afghanistan.

The blurb:

A US medical evacuation (Medevac) crew chief recounts the most traumatic mission he has ever flown

Please note: this film includes images which some viewers may find distressing

Find it here.

Here's the hub page for the series Six Months in Afghanistan.

The Globe and Mail's Paul Koring explains that our foe in Afghanistan is getting ever more sophisticated. For example, they don't need to "win." They just need us to give up on that goal.