February 2007 blogposts

Watching the Grammys

Watching the Grammys tonight, really enjoyed the reunion of The Police, and the trio of John Legend, Corinne Bailey Rae, and John Mayer (image left).  Although I have to wonder at some of the choices for award presenters (Luke Wilson!?).  I just had a good laugh when The Dixie Chicks received the award for best country album.  Natalie Maines took the mike and said "In the immortal words of Simpson - haaaih heh". 

In other words, TAKE THAT, all you Dixie haters who turned on the band because of that comment about George Bush.  Not only did The Dixie Chicks win best album, the song "Not Ready To Make Nice" was awarded Best Song.  Revenge is sooo sweet.

Carrie Underwood for Best Artist?!?  Corinne Bailey Rae was ROBBED, I tells ya!  And Imogen Heap deserves a special award just for her hair :-)

Harper admits he wants to stack Canada's courts

This article is an excellent summary of conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper's mission to remake the courts in his more hard-right image (cloaking the entire process in a "law and order" disguise).  It's so good that I've decided to quote it completely, with bold text marking sections which I think are important to note.

And the Conservatives say "Well, the Liberals have been appointing their left-wing judges for years and years, now it's our turn."  HELLO?!?  What kind of kindergarten logic is that??  Have your mother and father never told you that TWO WRONGS DON'T MAKE A RIGHT?  So make the system stronger and MORE independent rather than try to bend it to fit your own particular brand of politics, you idiots. Of course, a more independent judiciary is exactly NOT what these non-progressive conservatives want. 

This issue is making me angrier by the second.  As said at the very end of this article by the retired Supreme Court justice, "judicial activists" = "judges making decisions you don't agree with".  Harper has no right to politicize the judicial appointment committees and tamper with Canada's tradition of the separation of the executive and the judiciary.

PM says he'll pick judges who are tough on crime: Ignatieff warns Harper comments raise concerns over separation of powers

CAMPBELL CLARK

From Thursday's Globe and Mail

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Stephen Harper said yesterday that he wants judges who will reflect his government's law-and-order agenda, stating matter-of-factly that he will pick judges who will crack down on crime.

The blunt statement in the House of Commons appeared to contradict his own Justice Minister, Rob Nicholson, who one day earlier insisted the government was not trying to change the judiciary.

"We want to make sure we are bringing forward laws to make sure that we crack down on crime, that we make our streets and communities safer. We want to make sure our selection of judges is in correspondence with those objectives," Mr. Harper said in the Commons yesterday.

Liberal deputy leader Michael Ignatieff argued the Prime Minister's response raises concerns about "the separation of powers between the executive and the judiciary."

"This indicates a Prime Minister that essentially wants to use the executive authority of his office to begin to reshape the judiciary, not just in terms of personnel, but in terms of basic philosophy," Mr. Ignatieff said.

"We have seen south of the border the negative consequences that ensue when judicial appointments are overly politicized according to an ideological litmus test. One of the things that Canada has got right has been by and large a competence standard, not an ideological standard."

However, Mr. Harper's admission that he will choose judges who reflect the government's crime agenda does not specifically address a far more controversial topic: whether he will seek to appoint judges with a far more restrictive view of the Charter of Rights, or who have conservative social views.

Many conservatives, including Mr. Harper, have long complained of judicial activists seeking to create social policy from the bench, and some prominent figures in his government have argued for appointing conservative judges to counter what they view as a liberal bias.

Mr. Harper's statements yesterday come as prominent members of the legal community, and now a former Supreme Court of Canada justice, raised fears of an increasing politicization of judicial appointments.

The Globe and Mail reported on Monday that the federal Justice Minister had filled the judicial advisory committees that vet applicants for the bench with conservative partisans, including a former politician, defeated candidates and former aides to Tory ministers.

That news comes just as the government has changed the rules so that Ottawa's representatives have a majority of votes on the committees, which were intended to take politics out of the appointment of judges.

Instead of three members, Ottawa now appoints a fourth drawn from the ranks of police. There are four other members chosen by provincial governments, law societies, the Canadian Bar Association and judges -- but Ottawa has removed the judge's vote, except in a tie.

The Globe found that at least 16 of the 33 non-police members chosen by Ottawa for 12 committees have Tory ties. And many of the non-partisans criticize judicial activism and argue that judges have been too lax on crime or tied the hands of police.

Mr. Harper insisted yesterday that the changes, including the addition of police officers to the committees, are an improvement.

And he repeated the allegations once levelled by the Liberals' former Quebec director, Benoit Corbeil -- who admitted to the Gomery inquiry on the sponsorship scandal that he took part in electoral-finance abuses -- that "for all intents and purposes, judgeships were available to those who gave the most money to the Liberal Party."

The Canadian Bar Association has already expressed concerns that judicial appointments may be politicized, and that the presence of police on the committees might create a perception they are seeking judges who will apply lax oversight to the extraordinary powers of police when asked to approve warrants, for example.

Yesterday, former Supreme Court justice Claire L'Heureux-Dubé waded in with criticism that the Conservative government's moves are a "pernicious" politicization.

"It is indeed worrisome that the independence of the judiciary could be compromised by judicial nominations committees' political and, more pernicious still, ideological choices," she wrote in an e-mail. "This is contrary to our tradition and the danger is that it would erode the confidence in our justice system not only in Canada but all over the world where our judiciary is held as a model precisely because of its total independence.

"Judicial activism, which seems to have motivated this quantum leap in the composition of the nominations committees, is a myth as has been proven many times and, more recently, by Justice [Stephen] Breyer of the Supreme Court of the United States. It is applied to judges whose decisions one does not agree with."

Everything the Harper government has done lately (with the exception of standing up to China on its human-rights abuses) just reeks of slime.

Here's the comments thread on the Globe & Mail story.

Fantasy And Reality

I actually feel a little sorry for Britney Spears.  Apparently she checked into rehab in Antigua, checked herself out after less than 24 hours, flew back to the U.S., shaved her head and got a couple of tattoos.  The linked report also states that Britney landed up at L.A.'s Cedars-Sinai hospital emergency room early Saturday morning, but was discharged.

What's magnifying the situation and making it worse, is that she's a celebrity and plays out her life (and her troubles) in front of the paparazzi's cameras.   That's why I highlighted that particular, poignant quote from the gossip coverage.  Fame is a double-edged sword. 

And I wonder how long Elizabeth Arden will continue to market Britney's Midnight Fantasy, especially when the fantasy has come apart at the seams.

Out On Stage

Now this article in New York Magazine (also available here) really hits the nail on the head, putting into print (or pixels) something I had been thinking about for a long time.

You see, I am one of those people who are profiled here: someone who lets it all* hang out online.  *well, OK, not all, but a lot.

But the one big difference between me and the people profiled is this: I'm a whole generation older than they are.  I'm 43, but online I have more in common with these 23 year olds than I do with my fellow fortysomethings. 

In fact, I've given up on trying to interest my cohort in social networking services like Flickr or Digg.  They could care less; most of them don't see any point in participating.  "Why would you want to share your photos with other people?", they ask.

And I see a few (not many, but a small percentage) of people in my generation (e.g. the Boomers and those born in the decade after the Baby Boom) participating in this grand experiment in self-disclosure.  But we are vastly, VASTLY, outnumbered by the crowd born after 1980, the teens and early-twentysomethings.  They have taken to heart one of the things that their elders still don't (or won't) see:  VERY LITTLE ABOUT YOUR LIFE IS PRIVATE ANYWAYS.

Let me explain.  Most of the facts of your life, if you think about it, are available to anyone who has the resources and connections to find them.  Whole businesses are devoted to the task of building and sharing databases filled with information about you: your credit history, your driving record, your shopping habits (Air Miles, Safeway card, etc.), what courses you flunked out of in college, pretty much everything.  That, uhh, "novelty" you picked up at that adult store?  There's a sales record.  That regular rendezvous you're carrying on, that you think your spouse doesn't know about?  Don't count on it staying a secret for very long.  How do you think private investigators stay in business?   

The big difference between the generations is how they respond to this lack of privacy.  Most fortysomethings are uncomfortable, even horrified, about it.  Many of them don't even want to think about it.  But the post-1980 crowd TREATS THAT LACK OF PRIVACY AS A GIVEN, and thinks: "Well, if I'm going to be public anyways, then I may as well enjoy my time on stage and grab a little spotlight."  In other words, the younger generation doesn't see our modern data-mining, lack-of-privacy culture as a problem, but as an opportunity.  Not something to be feared or escaped from (as if you could!), but something to be embraced, a way for them to say "Hey, this is me.  This is what I like and don't like, these are my friends, here are my photos and what I think about that new CD that just came out, and here's my dating profile on LavaLife, and..."

Like I said, most older people don't get it, shake their heads over it, are afraid of it even.  And I find myself in a weird situation of being from an older generation, but living in the mindset of a younger one.