For almost two years now, Hamilton Mayor Larry Di Ianni has been embroiled in controversy about illegal contributions to his successful 2003 campaign. The law allows a maximum of $750 per individual or group of related companies. Dundas bookseller Joanna Chapman took Di Ianni to court and obtained an order for an audit. Di Ianni has returned thousands of dollars in overcontributions.
The case reads like a cheap mystery novel, full of shady characters, and a plot full of deceit. The problem is, this case is no piece of trashy pulp fiction. Real people will be held accountable and in the end that could be Hamilton tax payers to the sum of $100,000 by the time all the lawyers are paid.
Lets look at the story chapter by chapter. First the issue, Should Mayor Larry Di Ianni be forced to answer to a judge for accepting $26,000 in illegal campaign donations he says were honest mistakes?
The players, Mayor Larry Di Ianni: elected in 2003 after more than two decades as a Stoney Creek councillor. Joanna Chapman: a Dundas bookseller and former councillor. John Best: a communications consultant who lost in Ward 3. Marvin Caplan: former Ward 1 councillor defeated in 2003.
The rules, The Municipal Elections Act sets the rules for campaign donations. An individual or company cannot donate more than $750. It also stipulates how contributions must be documented. The act has been widely criticized as confusing and vague. It states council can take legal action if an audit finds possible contraventions.
Now the story, July 2004: Chapman asks council to audit Di Ianni's mayoral campaign expenses after she found possible violations. She also fingers councillors Tom Jackson, Bill Kelly, Terry Whitehead and five failed candidates. Council rejects her request. Chapman announces she is going to court. Di Ianni hires an auditor to examine his books, which are already under review by his team.
December 2004: Complaints against most of the candidates are dropped after they agree to play by the rules. Chapman continues to pursue Di Ianni, John Best and Marvin Caplan, who claim they've done nothing wrong.
May 2005: After months of arguments, Justice Timothy Culver makes history by ordering an audit of Di Ianni's books. Culver says Chapman had reasonable grounds to believe Di Ianni contravened the Municipal Elections Act. The judge chastises council for failing or refusing to exercise its jurisdiction and not considering the merits of Chapman's case.
Di Ianni has returned $19,500 in illegal donations after his own audit and investigation. The violations included companies making multiple donations which put them over the limit. He says any errors were unintentional.
Also, May 2005: Chapman lays charges against 18 companies for overcontributing to Di Ianni's campaign and violating the elections act.
Spokespersons for three of the companies -- J. Voortman and Associates, The Effort Trust Company and St. Lawrence Cement Inc. -- express surprise at the charges but acknowledge overcontributions. All suggest it resulted from simple error.
August 2005: Council hires Ken Froese, a chartered accountant with LECG Canada, to audit the books of Di Ianni, Best and Caplan.
October 2005: Froese's investigation finds five new violations worth $3,300 beyond those uncovered by Di Ianni.
Among the violations are donations from ineligible contributors including a charity, a Quebec-based company, an estate without the supporting will and two unincorporated companies. The auditor noted all contraventions, "were appropriately addressed by the candidate."
He asks to continue his audit to dig deeper. Froese finds three apparent contraventions and one reporting error in Best's books. Caplan can't find his records.
February 2006: Froese reports he's found another $3,100 in illegal donations to Di Ianni. He found three groups of connected companies that exceeded the $750 limit and donations from ineligible companies. In each violation, Froese notes his conclusions, "relied on information not otherwise provided to Di Ianni."
Caplan's audit finds a violation for not keeping his campaign finance records and two reporting errors. The auditor adds two reporting errors to Best's possible violations. Council hires a Kingston lawyer to advise on whether they should charge Di Ianni, Best and Caplan.
The decision, March 7, Larry Di Ianni told to answer to a judge for breaking election financing rules in his quest to be Hamilton's leader. City council made legal history yesterday, voting 12-1 to charge Di Ianni for violating the Municipal Elections Act. The decision came as vindication for citizen activist Joanna Chapman, who has fought for nearly two years to see the election of 2003 scrutinized.
The Mayor says "he will take his lumps". Council also voted to charge failed candidates Marvin Caplan and John Best. The mayor returned nearly $26,000 in illegal donations from his $330,000 mayoral campaign after his own investigation and a court-ordered audit. He says any violations were honest mistakes by a volunteer-driven campaign.
An outside legal opinion, debated by councillors behind closed doors for nearly two hours yesterday, advised there were reasonable grounds to charge Di Ianni. It countered a report by the city's own legal team, which recommended taking no action.
The alleged offences include failing to return illegal donations as soon as possible and poor bookkeeping of donor information. Under election rules, a corporation or individual can not donate more than $750. If found guilty of violating the act, a candidate can be fined up to $5,000 or kicked out of office.
The legal opinion forced the hand of councillors, many who feared taking no action would only lead to judicial review of their decision. Councillor Bill Kelly was the only councillor to vote against charges.
Flamborough Councillor Margaret McCarthy said it'd be "irresponsible" for council to ignore the legal advice.
Di Ianni said he wanted to speak to his lawyer before deciding if he will plead guilty to the charges.
But Best already plans to plead guilty. He has always maintained his errors, which the outside lawyer cited as reporting violations and not refunding an illegal donation in a timely manner were honest mistakes.
"I'm ready for the next round," he said, adding he does plan to seek legal advice about how the city handled his case.
He believes they were negligent in not going ahead with an audit months ago when he asked.
But Caplan, who was cited for not keeping proper election records, said he plans to fight the charges.
"I am not guilty," he said, questioning if it's even fair that Chapman, who does not live in his ward, can pursue him.
Di Ianni has already thrown his hat back in the ring for the fall election.
Voters will be the judge, he said.
The timing of Di Ianni's re-election campaign announcements is "interesting to say the least," said Chapman.
"It just seemed to me like extremely strange timing. I don't think it would have been my choice in his shoes."
Stay tuned for the next chapter in this Steeltown saga.
Final word, Mayor Larry Di Ianni still doesn't get it. He continues to blame Joanna Chapman for his problems and at the same time manipulating the public.
The issue is not about whether the mayor is doing a good job or not. The real issue is that his campaign accepted and deposited to his account dozens of illegal election donations, prohibited by the Municipal Elections Act. This was clear nearly two years ago but the mayor has been trying to avoid the consequences ever since.
And because of the choices he made, we, the taxpayers of Hamilton, have to pay the expenses of an audit and now a court case. Along with Chapman, we law-abiding citizens are the victims of this embarrassing situation.
Hopefully come November, Hamiltonian's will speak loud and clear with their votes and burn Di Ianni's little black book of lies. Furthermore, I hope this saga gives a wake up call to our elected officials downtown, sending them the message that us city folk are sick of the scandals that have plagued our city. Can we have a clean city election?
Later,
Kenaz
Saturday, March 11, 2006
SIU probes death of police prisoner
Hamilton Spectator, February 14,2006
The provincial police watchdog is investigating the death of a 40-year-old man from serious head injuries after his arrest for public intoxication. He was arrested by a Hamilton police officer at the liquor store on Dundurn Street at about 5:10 p.m. on Feb. 10 and taken to police headquarters on King William Street. He was lodged in a cell at about 6 p.m. According to a Special Investigations Unit press release, officers on a "routine check" of the cells could not wake the man at about 11:20 p.m.He was taken to St. Joseph's Hospital and then transferred to Hamilton General with serious head injuries. The man died Sunday. The results of a post-mortem examination conducted yesterday are not being released.
(Feb 15, 2006)The Hamilton Spectator
Ontario's Special Investigations Unit says it is still trying to piece together how and why a Hamilton man died after being taken into police custody late last week.
Darin Fournier, 40, of Hamilton, was arrested for public intoxication at the liquor store on Dundurn Street South on Thursday, Feb. 9.
Fournier spent about five and a half hours that evening in a police station holding cell. He was sent to hospital with serious head injuries after officers were unable to wake him during a routine check around 11:20 p.m. Fournier died Sunday evening in Hamilton General Hospital.
The SIU said he "succumbed to injuries," but would not reveal their nature.
"Considering that the cause of death is very pertinent to what we are investigating, we are not releasing the post- mortem examination results at this time," SIU spokesperson Rose Bliss said yesterday.
Bliss said investigators don't yet have clear answers if Fournier already had head injuries before being taken into custody.
Darin Fournier was laid to rest in his New Brunswick hometown on February 17. The Ontario Special Investigations Unit, which probes cases of civilians suffering serious injury, sexual assault or death in incidents involving police, is still looking into Fournier's death and have not offered any resolution to date.
April 9.2006
Update:Hamilton police have been cleared in the death of a homeless man who died from a head injury received in police custody.
An autopsy concluded Fournier died from blunt trauma to the head, suffered during a fall. While Fournier had fallen in the LCBO parking lot, the SIU determined he died from a head injury suffered in a later fall in a Central Station holding cell during a scuffle with police.
The SIU concluded the skirmish was initiated by Fournier and that police did not intentionally cause his fall. According to the SIU, two officers arrested Fournier Feb. 9 after receiving a complaint from LCBO staff about his behaviour outside the store around 5:15 p.m.
Unable to find an empty spot at a detox centre, the officers brought Fournier to the downtown station. After Fournier refused to get out of the cruiser, two officers pulled him out and dragged him by his arms into the station where he put up another struggle, lost his balance and fell, hitting the back of his head on the floor.
Video surveillance showed Fournier moving around in his cell at around 7:35 p.m. before going back to sleep. Police were unable to rouse Fournier at 11:30 p.m. and called paramedics. He died after spending three days in a coma in hospital.
SIU director James Cornish noted, "The outward signs of his injury were slow to manifest themselves.
"What signs there may have been were masked by his level of intoxication."
Cornish determined officers did not act irresponsibly.
"The force that the police used in that interaction was not unreasonable and certainly was not used with the intention of causing him to fall, let alone to cause him any injury."
I don't where Cornish gets off delivering this most unwise and uneducated deduction. I can remember playing recreational hockey as a kid and once being checked into the boards causing me to bump my head. Completely, minor. The point being, my mother watched me like a hawk for the next day, making sure I didn't sleep for any length of time! Any idiot knows that you don't let a person who has had two sugnificant blows to the head sleep, intoxicated or not.
This is yet another cry out to the city to better educate and train their officers and for the SIU to cross the "thin blue line" and admit their mistakes.
Alcoholic waist to society or not this man didn't deserve to die and his wife and children don't deserve the lies the Hamilton Police department have offered them.
Later,
Kenaz
The provincial police watchdog is investigating the death of a 40-year-old man from serious head injuries after his arrest for public intoxication. He was arrested by a Hamilton police officer at the liquor store on Dundurn Street at about 5:10 p.m. on Feb. 10 and taken to police headquarters on King William Street. He was lodged in a cell at about 6 p.m. According to a Special Investigations Unit press release, officers on a "routine check" of the cells could not wake the man at about 11:20 p.m.He was taken to St. Joseph's Hospital and then transferred to Hamilton General with serious head injuries. The man died Sunday. The results of a post-mortem examination conducted yesterday are not being released.
(Feb 15, 2006)The Hamilton Spectator
Ontario's Special Investigations Unit says it is still trying to piece together how and why a Hamilton man died after being taken into police custody late last week.
Darin Fournier, 40, of Hamilton, was arrested for public intoxication at the liquor store on Dundurn Street South on Thursday, Feb. 9.
Fournier spent about five and a half hours that evening in a police station holding cell. He was sent to hospital with serious head injuries after officers were unable to wake him during a routine check around 11:20 p.m. Fournier died Sunday evening in Hamilton General Hospital.
The SIU said he "succumbed to injuries," but would not reveal their nature.
"Considering that the cause of death is very pertinent to what we are investigating, we are not releasing the post- mortem examination results at this time," SIU spokesperson Rose Bliss said yesterday.
Bliss said investigators don't yet have clear answers if Fournier already had head injuries before being taken into custody.
Darin Fournier was laid to rest in his New Brunswick hometown on February 17. The Ontario Special Investigations Unit, which probes cases of civilians suffering serious injury, sexual assault or death in incidents involving police, is still looking into Fournier's death and have not offered any resolution to date.
April 9.2006
Update:Hamilton police have been cleared in the death of a homeless man who died from a head injury received in police custody.
An autopsy concluded Fournier died from blunt trauma to the head, suffered during a fall. While Fournier had fallen in the LCBO parking lot, the SIU determined he died from a head injury suffered in a later fall in a Central Station holding cell during a scuffle with police.
The SIU concluded the skirmish was initiated by Fournier and that police did not intentionally cause his fall. According to the SIU, two officers arrested Fournier Feb. 9 after receiving a complaint from LCBO staff about his behaviour outside the store around 5:15 p.m.
Unable to find an empty spot at a detox centre, the officers brought Fournier to the downtown station. After Fournier refused to get out of the cruiser, two officers pulled him out and dragged him by his arms into the station where he put up another struggle, lost his balance and fell, hitting the back of his head on the floor.
Video surveillance showed Fournier moving around in his cell at around 7:35 p.m. before going back to sleep. Police were unable to rouse Fournier at 11:30 p.m. and called paramedics. He died after spending three days in a coma in hospital.
SIU director James Cornish noted, "The outward signs of his injury were slow to manifest themselves.
"What signs there may have been were masked by his level of intoxication."
Cornish determined officers did not act irresponsibly.
"The force that the police used in that interaction was not unreasonable and certainly was not used with the intention of causing him to fall, let alone to cause him any injury."
I don't where Cornish gets off delivering this most unwise and uneducated deduction. I can remember playing recreational hockey as a kid and once being checked into the boards causing me to bump my head. Completely, minor. The point being, my mother watched me like a hawk for the next day, making sure I didn't sleep for any length of time! Any idiot knows that you don't let a person who has had two sugnificant blows to the head sleep, intoxicated or not.
This is yet another cry out to the city to better educate and train their officers and for the SIU to cross the "thin blue line" and admit their mistakes.
Alcoholic waist to society or not this man didn't deserve to die and his wife and children don't deserve the lies the Hamilton Police department have offered them.
Later,
Kenaz
Convicted sex offender only gets 2 years less a day
Hagersville's Zach Wobbes is going to prison for rape. But the judge in the case says his parents also bear some responsibility for the crime.
Zach Wobbes grew up in "a poison environment." The convicted sex offender is going to jail for two years less a day for gang raping an 18-year-old girl. That's his punishment.
His parents' punishment is shame and a very public tongue-lashing by a Superior Court Justice. Looking over Zach's bowed head as he wept in the prisoner's box, Justice David Marshall locked his eyes on Andy and Sheila Wobbes as they sat in the first row of the packed courtroom. He has no authority over the couple even though Sheila supplied a bunch of Zach's underage friends from Hagersville High School with booze and beer and Jell-O shots. Even though she was home while the same boys watched pornography. And even though she was in the house when Zach and two friends, 15 and 16, first kissed, groped and shaved the drunk girl and then violated her with bottles while she was unconscious. Five or six other boys watched.
Even though one partygoer, disgusted by the rape, told her she should check on what was happening in her son's room. She didn't. No, Sheila was never charged.
But Marshall was not about to let her, or her husband, off that easily. Moments before handing down his much-anticipated sentence yesterday, the judge took the highly unusual step of addressing the parents.
"Your home was a poison environment that was not a proper or decent place for a teenage boy to grow up," he said.
Andy, a tall, athletic man dressed all in black, gulped loudly, clasped his hands in his lap and looked toward the ceiling. Sheila, wearing a white shirt and black pants, removed her glasses and wiped at the tears that streamed down her cheeks. They have failed as parents. more
Zach rehearsed tears for the court: cellmate
The most dramatic moment in the Zach Wobbes sexual assault court case might not be what it seemed. The moment came Tuesday, at the very end of a long day at the sex offender's sentencing hearing. Zach was given an opportunity to address the court.
He rose, asked the judge's permission to face the father of the young woman he helped to gang rape with beer bottles, then wept as he told the story of his first night at the Hamilton-Wentworth Detention Centre.
He spoke of his cellmate, a big, bald man facing murder charges. Of the inmate ordering him to perform oral sex before going to bed. Of Zach's refusal.
"I think now I know the tiniest, tiniest bit of what she felt," Zach said.
It appeared to be the first time Zach had shown any empathy. Any remorse. A significant turning point that Justice David Marshall cited yesterday as a reason for handing down a sentence of two years less a day to Zach rather than the three or four years the Crown sought.
The problem is, Zach's cellmate says it's a lie. more
HAGERSVILLE IN PAIN
Tight community overcome with sadness, disgust over party rape and the mom's role in providing alcohol. This small community was left wondering yesterday.
Wondering how the grotesque rape of a teenage girl could have happened. Wondering why the prosecution didn't charge the mother of Zach Wobbes for providing teenage boys with alcohol before the rape.
There's no answer to that question. Officials will only say that she wasn't charged. But residents still wonder.
"She should be punished for letting all this happen," said longtime resident Frank Dillon.
He remembers hearing stories right after the incident in June 2004. But people just stopped talking about it after a week or two.
One Hagersville man's voice trembled and his jaw tightened when asked about Zach Wobbes.
"I have a 15-year-old daughter," said Tom, who refused to give his last name. "It could have happened to her."
As a father, Tom would do anything to protect his teenaged daughter, which is the reason he refused to give his last name. His daughter goes to Hagersville Secondary School, where Wobbes went, and he doesn't want her to be connected to his opinion.
"It disgusts me," he said. "Two years is a slap on the wrist and he should have gotten more. He has two years to figure out what he has done. That girl has the rest of her life to suffer." more
What I find even more disgusting than Zach Wobbes is his classmates attitudes. While all of this was going on in Zach's locked and darkened bedroom, there were five or six more Hagersville students watching the rape happen. They watched it the way they viewed the porno movie they had enjoyed earlier in the evening.
Amazingly, the Hagersville High connection doesn't end there. Dozens of students quickly heard about what happened at Zach's party. By the next day, the rumours were rampant. The victim herself heard details of her rape for the first time from students. And yet, all those students who knew the story did nothing. Didn't tell their teachers. Or the police.
Here's one comment from a severely mixed up girl, "even under the influence of alchol, Zach would not take advantage of a female. I strongly believe that he was under peer pressure from hs so called 'friends'. I do not feel that jail time is appropriate for this young man, but house arrest maybe a better idea."
more quotes from the rapists schoolmates.
The Hagersville I new growing was a place full of good people with holsome values, when did it revert back to the time of the caveman full of misogynistic drunken thugs.
Later,
Kenaz
Zach Wobbes grew up in "a poison environment." The convicted sex offender is going to jail for two years less a day for gang raping an 18-year-old girl. That's his punishment.
His parents' punishment is shame and a very public tongue-lashing by a Superior Court Justice. Looking over Zach's bowed head as he wept in the prisoner's box, Justice David Marshall locked his eyes on Andy and Sheila Wobbes as they sat in the first row of the packed courtroom. He has no authority over the couple even though Sheila supplied a bunch of Zach's underage friends from Hagersville High School with booze and beer and Jell-O shots. Even though she was home while the same boys watched pornography. And even though she was in the house when Zach and two friends, 15 and 16, first kissed, groped and shaved the drunk girl and then violated her with bottles while she was unconscious. Five or six other boys watched.
Even though one partygoer, disgusted by the rape, told her she should check on what was happening in her son's room. She didn't. No, Sheila was never charged.
But Marshall was not about to let her, or her husband, off that easily. Moments before handing down his much-anticipated sentence yesterday, the judge took the highly unusual step of addressing the parents.
"Your home was a poison environment that was not a proper or decent place for a teenage boy to grow up," he said.
Andy, a tall, athletic man dressed all in black, gulped loudly, clasped his hands in his lap and looked toward the ceiling. Sheila, wearing a white shirt and black pants, removed her glasses and wiped at the tears that streamed down her cheeks. They have failed as parents. more
Zach rehearsed tears for the court: cellmate
The most dramatic moment in the Zach Wobbes sexual assault court case might not be what it seemed. The moment came Tuesday, at the very end of a long day at the sex offender's sentencing hearing. Zach was given an opportunity to address the court.
He rose, asked the judge's permission to face the father of the young woman he helped to gang rape with beer bottles, then wept as he told the story of his first night at the Hamilton-Wentworth Detention Centre.
He spoke of his cellmate, a big, bald man facing murder charges. Of the inmate ordering him to perform oral sex before going to bed. Of Zach's refusal.
"I think now I know the tiniest, tiniest bit of what she felt," Zach said.
It appeared to be the first time Zach had shown any empathy. Any remorse. A significant turning point that Justice David Marshall cited yesterday as a reason for handing down a sentence of two years less a day to Zach rather than the three or four years the Crown sought.
The problem is, Zach's cellmate says it's a lie. more
HAGERSVILLE IN PAIN
Tight community overcome with sadness, disgust over party rape and the mom's role in providing alcohol. This small community was left wondering yesterday.
Wondering how the grotesque rape of a teenage girl could have happened. Wondering why the prosecution didn't charge the mother of Zach Wobbes for providing teenage boys with alcohol before the rape.
There's no answer to that question. Officials will only say that she wasn't charged. But residents still wonder.
"She should be punished for letting all this happen," said longtime resident Frank Dillon.
He remembers hearing stories right after the incident in June 2004. But people just stopped talking about it after a week or two.
One Hagersville man's voice trembled and his jaw tightened when asked about Zach Wobbes.
"I have a 15-year-old daughter," said Tom, who refused to give his last name. "It could have happened to her."
As a father, Tom would do anything to protect his teenaged daughter, which is the reason he refused to give his last name. His daughter goes to Hagersville Secondary School, where Wobbes went, and he doesn't want her to be connected to his opinion.
"It disgusts me," he said. "Two years is a slap on the wrist and he should have gotten more. He has two years to figure out what he has done. That girl has the rest of her life to suffer." more
What I find even more disgusting than Zach Wobbes is his classmates attitudes. While all of this was going on in Zach's locked and darkened bedroom, there were five or six more Hagersville students watching the rape happen. They watched it the way they viewed the porno movie they had enjoyed earlier in the evening.
Amazingly, the Hagersville High connection doesn't end there. Dozens of students quickly heard about what happened at Zach's party. By the next day, the rumours were rampant. The victim herself heard details of her rape for the first time from students. And yet, all those students who knew the story did nothing. Didn't tell their teachers. Or the police.
Here's one comment from a severely mixed up girl, "even under the influence of alchol, Zach would not take advantage of a female. I strongly believe that he was under peer pressure from hs so called 'friends'. I do not feel that jail time is appropriate for this young man, but house arrest maybe a better idea."
more quotes from the rapists schoolmates.
The Hagersville I new growing was a place full of good people with holsome values, when did it revert back to the time of the caveman full of misogynistic drunken thugs.
Later,
Kenaz
Friday, March 10, 2006
Canadian Tire couple retired
The Canadian Tire couple is no more.When the retailer unveiled its new spring ad campaign yesterday, the bearded handyman Ted and his wife Gloria were nowhere to be seen. The famous pitch-couple had been showing off innovative products for the hardware chain for almost a decade.
Like the chains coupons they where loved by some and hated by many, the couple had transcended advertising into the realm of pop culture, where they were parodied by the likes of Royal Canadian Air Farce and This Hour has 22 Minutes.
Tracy Fellows, a vice president of advertising at Canadian Tire Corp., said the couple's "demo-mercials" were effective. But internal research showed that they were starting to wear on consumers by late last year, the Globe and Mail's online service reported.
"Though those demo-mercials were extremely successful for us over the last eight years, it was time for us to move on," Fellows said.
"And try to build more of an integrated program between the brand spots and the pro-duct spots working closer together."
The new Canadian Tire campaign will make its debut during Saturday's Hockey Night in Canada broadcast. One spot features a couple covetously eyeing their neighbours' back yard. As they imagine the things they could do with their own yard, Canadian Tire signs appear in different parts of the yard, indicating the aisle numbers where different products can be found.
Other ads will continue to highlight specific products, but in a more humorous, less earnest way than the Canadian Tire couple spots.
"We've injected a little more wit, a little personality, a little charm -- something that we felt was missing," said Lance Martin, associate creative director at Taxi Advertising and Design.
The new ads mark the first Canadian Tire campaign for Taxi, which replaced Doner Canada as the retailer's agency last year.
And if I may toss in my $6.50 worth of "Canadian Tire Bucks", I say good riddence. These adds where pretty annoying. Here is what this average Canadian couple would like us to believe.
In last season's summer promotion they went camping. With them they bring a Dome Tent that doesn't require poles ($139.99), and triple duty pumps that will inflate air beds and soccer balls in the blink of a mosquito's eye.
Add to that the generator (they had one from before but it wasn't very portable so they bought a new one) so mom and dad can watch flicks while camping. They ought to be zipped up in the Dome Tent with their brat kid and rolled down a cliff. The kid then gives thanks for said generator, now that he can play his video games instead of swimming in the lake to work off a bit of his pudding.
Then, later in the summer it's time for gardening. The two of them are always shown outside with some gadget or other they've just bough. Which makes the next-door neighbour drool with envy. The neibour is firstly a nosy busy body, secondly if a power washer makes you drool, your an idiot.
Anyway, a quick toting up of their purchases for last summer puts them in hock to Canadian Tire for somewhere around $3,000, minus $300 of coupons- all bargains, and all useful, mind you. But what this couple does for a living is never mentioned. Nor does the kid do anything, come on, how about making use of this slacker. Get him to make use of the brand new $299.99 super duper Simoniz S2000 gas powered pressure washer, to wash the car. And, while his dumb ass is moving how about cleaning the deck, patio and driveway.
Maybe this couple can find work hocking "Ikea" put it together yourself furniture, god I really need Ted to show me more uses for the "12 piece interchangable screwdriver drill bit set at $39.99"
Later,
Kenaz
Thursday, March 09, 2006
The province and Hamilton police shut down crack house
The Ontario Attorney General has seized an infamous downtown Hamilton landmark, scene of every type of crime from drug dealing to murder. The seizure yesterday is the first step to freeze and forfeit to the Crown the property at 193 King St. E., which includes the defunct Sandbar tavern and five apartments above it.
Chief Brian Mullan says the police department plans to use the Civil Remedies Act as a weapon to move against trouble spots across the city. Police now have an officer specializing in applications of the legislation. He promised to use it against booze cans selling illegal alcohol, marijuana grow operations and prostitution.
Mullan said this is the first time the conspiracy section of the Remedies for Organized Crime and Other Unlawful Activities Act (Civil Remedies Act) has been applied in a seizure.
Ontario Attorney General Michael Bryant came to Hamilton yesterday to stand in front of the old Sandbar and promise a safe community.
"This crack house of horrors is out of business."
Ontario Attorney General Michael Bryant, right, with police Chief Brian Mullan, centre, and Hamilton Police Services Board Chair Bernie Morelli, announces the seizure of the tavern.
The property manager of the King Street East building was not available for comment yesterday. The building's owner, Ruth Ricca, was quoted after a homicide in the building in 2003 that she had nothing to do with how the building was run. She was not available for comment.
The Sandbar closed in 1999 when the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario revoked its licence, charging that drugs were sold, stolen property was fenced and violence was common. There have been two murders in the apartments upstairs since. In 2001, Jackie McLean, 35, was beaten to death in an unoccupied apartment. Two years later Jim McAllister was stabbed to death there.
The province and police are invoking rarely used powers to implement the five-year old Civil Remedies Act. Under this legislation, the court can take over private property suspected of housing criminal activity.
Mullan -- whose own office window faces the backside of a building he calls "a blight" across a parking lot -- says police have answered calls to the site almost every day for years and have spent millions of dollars in policing this one address. In the past 10 years, two crack-cocaine related murders, numerous stabbings and illegal drug trafficking have all taken place inside.
Three weeks ago, police armed with search warrants for each of the five apartments arrested a number of people on charges involving crack cocaine and seized closed circuit video equipment which had been used to monitor the entrance and the stairs leading to the apartments.
Police now have to show the extent of criminal activity within and that means boxes and boxes of incident reports had to be submitted. A hearing will be held in about a month to determine whether the seizure will be made permanent. At that hearing police will have to demonstrate that "criminal enterprise was being undertaken at the location with the knowledge of the landlord."
Mullan said the ministry was prepared to move ahead some months ago but decided to hold off until the trial of McLean's killer finished a few weeks ago. If the final hearing is successful, use of the conspiracy section of the legislation will become "a benchmark case that will be precedent-setting and will allow other police services to take advantage of the legislation in this way, in partnership with the ministry."
Area residents breathed a sigh of relief as they watched lock smiths and city workers board up the den of hell. A police officer will guard the boarded up building 24 hours a day until the courts allow the province to sell it.
Since being created five years ago, the Civil Remedies Act has been used to seize half a dozen properties in Hamilton and more than 100 in Ontario. The province has accumulated more than $2.2 million from the sale of these properties.
Civil asset forfeiture, as used in the Sandbar case, focuses solely on the connection between property and unlawful activity whereas criminal asset forfeiture permits forfeiture of assets obtained by or used in the commission of an offence following conviction of an individual.
Later,
Kenaz
Chief Brian Mullan says the police department plans to use the Civil Remedies Act as a weapon to move against trouble spots across the city. Police now have an officer specializing in applications of the legislation. He promised to use it against booze cans selling illegal alcohol, marijuana grow operations and prostitution.
Mullan said this is the first time the conspiracy section of the Remedies for Organized Crime and Other Unlawful Activities Act (Civil Remedies Act) has been applied in a seizure.
Ontario Attorney General Michael Bryant came to Hamilton yesterday to stand in front of the old Sandbar and promise a safe community.
"This crack house of horrors is out of business."
Ontario Attorney General Michael Bryant, right, with police Chief Brian Mullan, centre, and Hamilton Police Services Board Chair Bernie Morelli, announces the seizure of the tavern.
The property manager of the King Street East building was not available for comment yesterday. The building's owner, Ruth Ricca, was quoted after a homicide in the building in 2003 that she had nothing to do with how the building was run. She was not available for comment.
The Sandbar closed in 1999 when the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario revoked its licence, charging that drugs were sold, stolen property was fenced and violence was common. There have been two murders in the apartments upstairs since. In 2001, Jackie McLean, 35, was beaten to death in an unoccupied apartment. Two years later Jim McAllister was stabbed to death there.
The province and police are invoking rarely used powers to implement the five-year old Civil Remedies Act. Under this legislation, the court can take over private property suspected of housing criminal activity.
Mullan -- whose own office window faces the backside of a building he calls "a blight" across a parking lot -- says police have answered calls to the site almost every day for years and have spent millions of dollars in policing this one address. In the past 10 years, two crack-cocaine related murders, numerous stabbings and illegal drug trafficking have all taken place inside.
Three weeks ago, police armed with search warrants for each of the five apartments arrested a number of people on charges involving crack cocaine and seized closed circuit video equipment which had been used to monitor the entrance and the stairs leading to the apartments.
Police now have to show the extent of criminal activity within and that means boxes and boxes of incident reports had to be submitted. A hearing will be held in about a month to determine whether the seizure will be made permanent. At that hearing police will have to demonstrate that "criminal enterprise was being undertaken at the location with the knowledge of the landlord."
Mullan said the ministry was prepared to move ahead some months ago but decided to hold off until the trial of McLean's killer finished a few weeks ago. If the final hearing is successful, use of the conspiracy section of the legislation will become "a benchmark case that will be precedent-setting and will allow other police services to take advantage of the legislation in this way, in partnership with the ministry."
Area residents breathed a sigh of relief as they watched lock smiths and city workers board up the den of hell. A police officer will guard the boarded up building 24 hours a day until the courts allow the province to sell it.
Since being created five years ago, the Civil Remedies Act has been used to seize half a dozen properties in Hamilton and more than 100 in Ontario. The province has accumulated more than $2.2 million from the sale of these properties.
Civil asset forfeiture, as used in the Sandbar case, focuses solely on the connection between property and unlawful activity whereas criminal asset forfeiture permits forfeiture of assets obtained by or used in the commission of an offence following conviction of an individual.
Later,
Kenaz
$28,700 cup brew-ha-ha!
Luck struck two St. Jerome, Quebec (near Montreal) girls when they discovered a winning Tim Hortons coffee cup yesterday, but now their families are fighting over who gets the prize. The dispute began after a 10-year-old girl named Marilou found the cup in the garbage bin of her primary school. Remembering the doughnut chain's popular contest, she tried to roll up the rim. Her small fingers were unable to loosen the tough cardboard, so she enlisted the help of a 12-year-old schoolmate. The other girl rolled up the rim and found it was a winner, entitlement to a Toyota RAV4 SUV - base price $28,700 - one of 30 automobiles being given away as prizes.
"They took the cup to the school's daycare service, and a teacher called both parents," said Nathalie Prevost, mother of the 12-year-old girl. Prevost would not reveal her daughter's name.
"The first parent to arrive there was Marilou's father, so he took the cup."
Prevost thought her daughter's helping hand deserved some recognition, however, so she phoned a local radio station to ask for legal advice.
"I wanted the name of a lawyer who could tell me if my daughter is entitled some of the prize," Prevost said.
That's when the story became a media sensation.
Marilou's father, who remained anonymous, said in a televised broadcast he wanted to give some money from the sale of the car to Prevost's family.
"But this morning they said (on the radio) they wanted everything, so now they'll lose it all because they went too far," he said.
Prevost countered she's not seeking a specific amount.
"It's not for me, it's for my daughter's education," she said.
"I never wanted this to blow up the way it has."
Tim Hortons spokesperson Greg Skinner could not confirm the cup was a winner, because the prize had not been claimed.
But he said the winner of the prize is whoever submits the cup's tab.
"If I buy you a coffee and you get a winning cup, it's your car," Skinner said. "I might be mad at you as your best friend, but you're the winner."
Because the girls are minors, he noted, neither of them can claim the RAV4 as a prize. Prevost said she doesn't plan to go to court but hopes the other family will find it in their hearts to recognize her daughter's part in their luck.
"At least I hope the parents save the money for their daughter's education and don't spend it themselves," she said.
As for the girls, they had a bit of a spat at school, but their teachers got them on speaking terms again, Prevost said.
"They weren't very close friends to begin with," she said.
(yeesh! people it's not macro-science, sell the goddam SUV and split the proceeds 50/50. The only problem I've ever had is feeling ripped off when the free tea biscuit I won was much smaller than the regular ones.)
Update: the situation could get more complicated.
CBC-TV's The National reported last night that a staff member who may have thrown the cup away is said to be considering legal action.
But it would a tough battle.
"The person who threw out that coffee cup, they gave up on it. It's gone, you cannot find who it was," a lawyer said.
Later,
Kenaz
"They took the cup to the school's daycare service, and a teacher called both parents," said Nathalie Prevost, mother of the 12-year-old girl. Prevost would not reveal her daughter's name.
"The first parent to arrive there was Marilou's father, so he took the cup."
Prevost thought her daughter's helping hand deserved some recognition, however, so she phoned a local radio station to ask for legal advice.
"I wanted the name of a lawyer who could tell me if my daughter is entitled some of the prize," Prevost said.
That's when the story became a media sensation.
Marilou's father, who remained anonymous, said in a televised broadcast he wanted to give some money from the sale of the car to Prevost's family.
"But this morning they said (on the radio) they wanted everything, so now they'll lose it all because they went too far," he said.
Prevost countered she's not seeking a specific amount.
"It's not for me, it's for my daughter's education," she said.
"I never wanted this to blow up the way it has."
Tim Hortons spokesperson Greg Skinner could not confirm the cup was a winner, because the prize had not been claimed.
But he said the winner of the prize is whoever submits the cup's tab.
"If I buy you a coffee and you get a winning cup, it's your car," Skinner said. "I might be mad at you as your best friend, but you're the winner."
Because the girls are minors, he noted, neither of them can claim the RAV4 as a prize. Prevost said she doesn't plan to go to court but hopes the other family will find it in their hearts to recognize her daughter's part in their luck.
"At least I hope the parents save the money for their daughter's education and don't spend it themselves," she said.
As for the girls, they had a bit of a spat at school, but their teachers got them on speaking terms again, Prevost said.
"They weren't very close friends to begin with," she said.
(yeesh! people it's not macro-science, sell the goddam SUV and split the proceeds 50/50. The only problem I've ever had is feeling ripped off when the free tea biscuit I won was much smaller than the regular ones.)
Update: the situation could get more complicated.
CBC-TV's The National reported last night that a staff member who may have thrown the cup away is said to be considering legal action.
But it would a tough battle.
"The person who threw out that coffee cup, they gave up on it. It's gone, you cannot find who it was," a lawyer said.
Later,
Kenaz
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Canadian strips archaeology bare
Simcha Jocobovici is the host of a great new documentary series called "The Naked Archaeologist". The series airs on Canada's "Vision Channel" each Tuesday at 9:30pm and 1:30 a.m. ET, and repeats on Tuesdays, at 10:30 p.m. ET.
Jocobovici is a two-time Emmy Award winning producer and director and his show looks at Biblical archaeology in a fresh light. Shot on location in Israel, Egypt and Greece this Canadian Indiana Jones dances, raps and clambers under barbed wire and over fences in search of the most extraordinary archaeological finds from the ancient Middle East, and isn't affraid to clash swords with some of the world’s foremost archaeologists, historians and scientists over the perceptions of the acient world that we have grown to believe.
Fast, funny and irreverent Jacobovici asks the questions we all want to know the answers to: Was Jezebel really that sexy? What do you do when you find a 2,000-year-old palace under your house? And where do you stop for a good falafel when you’re on your way to find the real Mount Sinai?
In one episode Jacobovici fearlessly probes one of the most controversial new theories in Biblical archaeology: Does arecently discovered Bronze Age ceramic penises explain why Delilah fell for Samson?
This series is a completely fresh way of looking at archaeology and history. Simcha takes the viewer to places most of us will never have access to and reveals what archaeology can – and cannot – tell us about history and the Bible all in a fun way.
The show also helps us to see that the ancient past is still with us. Only The Naked Archaeologist could relate a history of the alphabet that brings together ancient inscriptions, the Biblical story of Exodus and the ‘tags’ of modern-day graffiti artists.
The series offers up 26 halh hour episodes ranging from a debate over the autheticity of the James Ossuary to an enlightning discovery at the Church of St. John. He finds out the Baptist features a painting by a Canadian artist, complete with carved beavers on the frame. Complete episode guide
Here's a video:
The Naked Archaeologist
Here are two reviews of the show,
"...Archeologist is ‘naked’ and in your face", The Globe and Mail
"...the naked truth-he's out there looking for the truth in the bible..." The Toronto Star
I know this series is airing in Britain but I'm not sure about the U.S and I checked Amazon and the DVD's are not yet available.
Later,
Kenaz
Here are two reviews of the show,
"...Archeologist is ‘naked’ and in your face", The Globe and Mail
"...the naked truth-he's out there looking for the truth in the bible..." The Toronto Star
I know this series is airing in Britain but I'm not sure about the U.S and I checked Amazon and the DVD's are not yet available.
Later,
Kenaz
New playlist uploaded at The Eternal Kenaz
Firstly, I would like to wish all the women out there a happy Women's Day, in honour I offer this playlist over at my Live365 site. Some of the old time radio shows and songs feature many strong women or are about them. I'm sorry but some of the songs are about a different type of women. Never the less enjoy.
I dedicate this day to my mom, Bernice.
Authors Playhouse - Southern Exposure - 44-09-15
The Blue Jays - White Cliffs Of Dover - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4)
Irma Thomas - Cheater Man - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12)
Ellery Queen - TheAdventureOfTheMischiefMaker - 44-01-13 34:22
JOHN COLTRANE - Witches' pit - The Prestige Recordings CD 04
Myles & Dupont - Loud Mouth Annie - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8)
CBS Radio Mystery Theater - Loser Take All
Lou Josie - Vacation's Over - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8)
The Tuneweavers - Happy Happy Birthday Baby - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part One) (Disc 7)
Bob Hope, Glenn Miller - GI Journal
For more great Old Time Radio classics and great blues and jazz click on the title link.
later,
Kenaz
I dedicate this day to my mom, Bernice.
Authors Playhouse - Southern Exposure - 44-09-15
The Blue Jays - White Cliffs Of Dover - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4)
Irma Thomas - Cheater Man - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12)
Ellery Queen - TheAdventureOfTheMischiefMaker - 44-01-13 34:22
JOHN COLTRANE - Witches' pit - The Prestige Recordings CD 04
Myles & Dupont - Loud Mouth Annie - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8)
CBS Radio Mystery Theater - Loser Take All
Lou Josie - Vacation's Over - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8)
The Tuneweavers - Happy Happy Birthday Baby - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part One) (Disc 7)
Bob Hope, Glenn Miller - GI Journal
For more great Old Time Radio classics and great blues and jazz click on the title link.
later,
Kenaz
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
South Dakota legislature's bill an insult to women
A direct attack on Roe v. Wade is coming from the South Dakota legislature. The new bill, which outlaws abortion, makes no exceptions, not for a pregnancy caused by incest or rape. It would only be legal—the only exception if it would save the pregnant woman's life.
Doctors who perform abortions could face up to five years in prison. The bill passed the State Senate 23-12. It's expected to pass the House again and then go to Governor Mike Rounds' desk. The bill's sponsor says he thinks the antiabortion movement has momentum on its side and a—quote—“change in national policy on abortion is going to come in the not-too-distant future.”
To read an excerpt from their conversation, click on this link
In his opening statement DAN ABRAMS, HOST, ‘ABRAMS REPORT' states:
Dan has it right, I may be a Canadian liberal, small l. But attacking a womens right to not have to live with the stigmatisms that the world would impose on her if she was forced into bringing a child into the world that was the result of a rape or god forbid incest, is as sick as the act it self.
Roe v Wade is a world wide cornerstone of justice and for a handful of South Dakota extremist politicians to even conceive such a bill proves that their is something seriously wrong with our elected officials.
Here in this country our Canadian women found themselves in a similar fight for respect.
On May 29, 1990, the House of Commons passed Bill C-43. This bill would have put abortion back into the Criminal Code, while exempting from penalty those abortions deemed necessary by a physician for health reasons. Bill C-43 was awaiting only Senate approval to become Canada’s new abortion law when, suddenly, two cases of clandestine illegal abortion reappeared in Canada. In June of 1990, a sixteen-year-old girl from Kitchener, Ontario, sustained physical injury from a botched abortion performed in a man’s home. Less than two weeks later, a Toronto woman died from a self-induced coat-hanger abortion, apparently the first such death in well over a decade.
When Bill C-43 was introduced, at least sixty doctors, fearful of possible criminal prosecution, stopped performing abortions. A 1990 survey done by the Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada found that 275 of the 460 specialists then performing abortions would stop if the bill became law. The legal possibility of criminal charges for performing an abortion was simply a greater price than most doctors could afford to pay.
Bill C-43 was defeated by the Senate on January 31, 1991, in a dramatic tie vote. Since then, there have been no new attempts by the federal government to return abortion to the Criminal Code. Abortion in Canada has remained a private medical matter between a woman and her doctor since 1988.
Later,
Kenaz
Doctors who perform abortions could face up to five years in prison. The bill passed the State Senate 23-12. It's expected to pass the House again and then go to Governor Mike Rounds' desk. The bill's sponsor says he thinks the antiabortion movement has momentum on its side and a—quote—“change in national policy on abortion is going to come in the not-too-distant future.”
To read an excerpt from their conversation, click on this link
In his opening statement DAN ABRAMS, HOST, ‘ABRAMS REPORT' states:
"My Take” is that the state lawmakers have got to know this bill effectively spits in the face of the U.S. Supreme Court precedent. Not just because of Roe v. Wade, because the high court reaffirmed Roe when it revisited the abortion issue in 1992 in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. A majority agreed that women have the right to have an abortion before the fetus is viable and to obtain an abortion without undue interference from the state.
So whatever you think of abortion, this law is almost an insult to the court. Governor, I know you've made it perfectly clear you support many abortion restrictions, but this is not an abortion restriction. This is outlawing it. I assume you've got to know that this wouldn't pass the court's test.
Dan has it right, I may be a Canadian liberal, small l. But attacking a womens right to not have to live with the stigmatisms that the world would impose on her if she was forced into bringing a child into the world that was the result of a rape or god forbid incest, is as sick as the act it self.
Roe v Wade is a world wide cornerstone of justice and for a handful of South Dakota extremist politicians to even conceive such a bill proves that their is something seriously wrong with our elected officials.
Here in this country our Canadian women found themselves in a similar fight for respect.
On May 29, 1990, the House of Commons passed Bill C-43. This bill would have put abortion back into the Criminal Code, while exempting from penalty those abortions deemed necessary by a physician for health reasons. Bill C-43 was awaiting only Senate approval to become Canada’s new abortion law when, suddenly, two cases of clandestine illegal abortion reappeared in Canada. In June of 1990, a sixteen-year-old girl from Kitchener, Ontario, sustained physical injury from a botched abortion performed in a man’s home. Less than two weeks later, a Toronto woman died from a self-induced coat-hanger abortion, apparently the first such death in well over a decade.
When Bill C-43 was introduced, at least sixty doctors, fearful of possible criminal prosecution, stopped performing abortions. A 1990 survey done by the Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada found that 275 of the 460 specialists then performing abortions would stop if the bill became law. The legal possibility of criminal charges for performing an abortion was simply a greater price than most doctors could afford to pay.
Bill C-43 was defeated by the Senate on January 31, 1991, in a dramatic tie vote. Since then, there have been no new attempts by the federal government to return abortion to the Criminal Code. Abortion in Canada has remained a private medical matter between a woman and her doctor since 1988.
Later,
Kenaz
Man of steel's super wife passed away
Dana Reeve, who became a champion of spinal cord research after the death of her husband, actor Christopher Reeve, has died of lung cancer in Memorial Sloan- Kettering Cancer Center in New York. She was 44.
Reeve, who was diagnosed with the disease in August, died yesterday, said Maggie Goldberg, spokeswoman for the Christopher Reeve Foundation. Reeve was chairwoman of the foundation and founder of the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Resource Center.
Christopher Reeve, best known for his portrayal of ``Superman'' in four movies, was paralyzed from the neck down after he fell from a horse in 1995. The couple started the paralysis research, treatment and support organization as he learned to live as a quadriplegic.
Christopher Reeve died at age 52 in 2004. The foundation named for him has awarded more than $55 million in grants for neuroscience research.
Reeve, an actor and singer who did not smoke, lived in Westchester County, New York. She announced the lung cancer diagnosis two days after ABC News anchor Peter Jennings died of the disease at age 67.
Reeve is survived by her son, Will, 13, and two stepchildren, Matthew and Alexandra; as well as her father, Dr. Charles Morosini, sisters Deborah Morosini and Adrienne Morosini Heilman.
For more about this courageous women and the work her and Christopher accomplished vistit the "Christopher Reeve Foundation" website.
Later,
Kenaz
Postcards from the Hammer
I found this great photo site put together by Janet Forjan-Freedman the 43-year-old historical interpreter at Dundurn Castle has a personal collection of more than 1,500 cards from the 1890s until the 1950s. And the great part is they're all about Hamilton.
The assortment -- which can be seen online at www.hamiltonpostcards.com -- offers a fascinating glimpse at the city's personality.
Through the collection you can see how civic pride has evolved over the years, whether the pictures expound the virtues of Gore Park, the Royal Connaught Hotel, area waterfalls or the Beach Strip.
Local history author Margaret Houghton had an interesting take on the popularity of collections like this for Hamiltonian's. She had an idea for a book. But she couldn't get any publishers interested in it. She wanted to write about Hamilton landmarks and icons that have been torn down or disappeared such as the bathrooms in Gore Park, Paddy Green's and "Shorty Green" water fountains.
"Why would anyone want to buy a depressing book like that?" one publisher asked.
"You don't understand people in Hamilton," Houghton replied. "They love this stuff."
And you know what? Houghton was right. She eventually found someone to put out Vanished Hamilton and it's been "flying off the shelves." The book has been so successful that a second printing was ordered within weeks of the book launch. A Vanished Hamilton II and III are also planned.
Hamiltonians love to glorify the past and they like to get angry at people who change things for the sake of change. The interest in the book is also a reflection of the passion for local history in the city.
There are apparently only three places in Canada where an author has any hope of selling books on local history -- Halifax, Vancouver and Hamilton.
"And of those three, Hamilton is the best," Houghton says.
Why is that?
"It's because Hamilton is the biggest small town in Canada," she says.
Later,
Kenaz
The assortment -- which can be seen online at www.hamiltonpostcards.com -- offers a fascinating glimpse at the city's personality.
Through the collection you can see how civic pride has evolved over the years, whether the pictures expound the virtues of Gore Park, the Royal Connaught Hotel, area waterfalls or the Beach Strip.
Local history author Margaret Houghton had an interesting take on the popularity of collections like this for Hamiltonian's. She had an idea for a book. But she couldn't get any publishers interested in it. She wanted to write about Hamilton landmarks and icons that have been torn down or disappeared such as the bathrooms in Gore Park, Paddy Green's and "Shorty Green" water fountains.
"Why would anyone want to buy a depressing book like that?" one publisher asked.
"You don't understand people in Hamilton," Houghton replied. "They love this stuff."
And you know what? Houghton was right. She eventually found someone to put out Vanished Hamilton and it's been "flying off the shelves." The book has been so successful that a second printing was ordered within weeks of the book launch. A Vanished Hamilton II and III are also planned.
Hamiltonians love to glorify the past and they like to get angry at people who change things for the sake of change. The interest in the book is also a reflection of the passion for local history in the city.
There are apparently only three places in Canada where an author has any hope of selling books on local history -- Halifax, Vancouver and Hamilton.
"And of those three, Hamilton is the best," Houghton says.
Why is that?
"It's because Hamilton is the biggest small town in Canada," she says.
Later,
Kenaz
A Canadian takes top honours at the Oscars
Congrats to London, Ontario born Paul Haggis who was still floating on cloud nine Monday morning after winning the best picture Oscar for his film Crash on Sunday night.
Haggis and producer Cathy Schulman accepted the Best Picture Award from screen ledgend Jack Nicholson.
Coming from directly from Hollywood celebrations and hobnobbing with the biggest stars, and still without a wink of sleep, Haggis told reporters it was "pretty darn cool" getting an award from Jack Nicholson. "It was an amazing feeling," he said.
The film was the directorial debut for Haggis, who also won the Academy Award for best original screenplay with co-writer Bobby Moresco. Crash beat out the heavily favoured Brokeback Mountain for the top Oscar.
In typical Canadian humbleness, Haggis heartily laughed off suggestions the awards, plus a nomination last year for Million Dollar Baby script, had made him Hollywood's top dog.
"That's a pretty scary thought," he said. "I don't think so."
Haggis says he never believed either Crash or Million Dollar Baby would make it to the silver screen because his topics were offbeat and even slightly depressing.
"When I wrote Million Dollar Baby and [Crash], I didn't believe either one of them would ever get made. Crash – I figured no one would ever make it. It had all these characters. It was about race relations and fear and intolerance. Who'd want to see that?
"I thought my grandchildren would read these scripts and go, 'Oh look, grandpa tried to get into the movies. Isn't that cute?' "
Haggis' next project is a film entitled Flags of Our Fathers. It is based on the story of six men who raised the U.S. flag on Iwo Jima during the Second World War. Haggis wrote the script.
IMDb mini-bio: Paul Haggis
Later,
Kenaz
Baseball ledgend Kirby Puckett dead at 45
Hall of Fame outfielder Kirby Puckett died Monday after a stroke. He was 45. Puckett was admitted to intensive care at Phoenix's St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center and listed in critical condition following surgery for a stroke suffered Sunday morning at his home in Scottsdale, Ariz.
Kirby Puckett died Monday at age 45. Puckett underwent the surgery at Scottsdale Healthcare Osborn before being transferred to St. Joseph's, where he passed away Monday afternoon.
Puckett debuted in the majors in 1984 and retired in 1995, his career cut short by glaucoma which left him blind in his right eye. Of equal concern was Puckett's excessive weight gain upon retiring.
"It's a tough thing to see a guy go through something like that and come to this extent," admitted former Twins first baseman Kent Hrbek.
"That's what really hurt him bad, when he was forced out of the game. I don't know if he ever recovered from it."
Puckett was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame with former teammate Dave Winfield in 2001. He was 40 years old at the time, making him the third-youngest inductee behind Lou Gehrig (36) and Sandy Koufax (37).
... Kirby was taken from us much too soon and too quickly."MLB commissioner Bud Selig.
Later,
Kenaz
New tape of Canadian hostages shown on Al-Jazeera
James Loney and Harmeet SoodenHostages held in Iraq
The CBC has reported that Arab television channel Al-Jazeera broadcast a brief videotape on Tuesday reportedly showing three of four peace activists, including two Canadians, taken hostage in Iraq last fall.
Canadians, James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Sooden, 32, of the Christian Peacemaker Teams, were shown in the 25-second video. Their colleague, 74-year-old Briton Norman Kember, was also seen. The tape, which had no sound, carried a time-stamp of Feb. 28.
The mens families say the tape offers great hope for their return. No speculation or reasons have been given for American Tom Fox's absense from the tape.
The CBC has reported that Arab television channel Al-Jazeera broadcast a brief videotape on Tuesday reportedly showing three of four peace activists, including two Canadians, taken hostage in Iraq last fall.
Canadians, James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Sooden, 32, of the Christian Peacemaker Teams, were shown in the 25-second video. Their colleague, 74-year-old Briton Norman Kember, was also seen. The tape, which had no sound, carried a time-stamp of Feb. 28.
The mens families say the tape offers great hope for their return. No speculation or reasons have been given for American Tom Fox's absense from the tape.
Monday, March 06, 2006
Rune Reading For The Week Of March 6-March 12, 2006
Introduction to Rune Readings
Rune readings are arrangements of the 24 runes (letters) of the old Futhark alphabet. The layout of the runes is known as a spread, and determines what each rune refers to. For example, in the Three Norns spread, the first rune represents the past, the second the present, and the third the future.
Sets: In addition to each rune having a meaning, the material in which the runes are carved can color the reading. Most people consistently use runes made of ceramic, stone, or wood. In order to broaden your experience, we offer readings with Gold Runes (for questions about business, career, and property), Jade Runes (for questions about love, friendship, and relationships), Ice Runes (for questions about struggle, conflict, and achievement), Spirit Runes (for questions about mysticism, spirituality, and religion), and Stone Runes (for questions about the natural world and things beyond human control).
The question will remain the same: "Will this week be a successful one?"
Rune Alphabet
Spread:Cross(in order of reading)
The Cross spread is used to plot the arc of your life and the forces acting on it. It is the most popular spread, giving a very complete view of the situation. Ice Runes are most commonly used for questions about struggle, conflict, and achievement.
Here is the Reading Using the Ice Set.
1.
The left rune represents an important element of the past. Dagez means daylight, and represents divine light. This rune generally refers to dawn (the initial sparking of energy) or to midday (the climax of energy). Both dawn and midday are symbolic of change, but unlike the changes in the perpetual circle of the year which are slow and subtle, the changes over a day are much faster and more dramatic. The breaking of a new day is symbolic of the rapid illumination of dismal circumstances, and is suggestive of Satori. Be careful - although this rune generally suggests a positive change, the symbology of a peaking point suggests that there must be a change downward as well. Fortunately for some, this rune is cyclic and irreversible, and so permanence is not promised - the only thing you can be sure of is an exciting ride.
2.
The middle rune represents a deciding element of the present. Sowelu is a strong symbol, for it represents the sun. Unlike equatorial cultures who may see the sun as a harsh and imperial force capable of causing droughts, in the cold north the sun is a purely feminine force that gives life and allows crops to grow. In dark times, this rune represents clarity of sight and the victory of good over evil. Sowelu is irreversible, as the cycles of the sun and seasons are perpetual.
3.
The right rune represents the critical element of the future, at the core of the final outcome. Kenaz is the rune of light and knowledge. The rune is shown reversed representing a state of darkness or ignorance. Either you are unable to obtain information that you need, or the information is being withheld from you. In darkness there is fear, but remember that darkness does not mean isolation. Friendship and comfort can still be available, although they are not immediately visible.
4.
The top rune represents a force that works for you. Algiz can be easily recognized as the antlers of the elk that it represents. The elk can represent victory, but is much more appropriately associated with the thrill of the hunt itself. This rune therefore can portend vigor and success in active endeavors. Also, this rune seems symbolic of a hand with outstretched fingers - a protective hand. This hand may suggest that you will be shielded from things negative - the problems still exist, you are spared the brunt of their force.
5.
The bottom Rune represents a force that works against you. Ehwaz is representative of the eight-legged horse ridden by the god Odin. As such, this is the rune of controlled movement and travel, including the pursuit of an objective or station in life. Since some older sources show Odin not as a man riding a horse but as a centaur-like being, this rune can also represent the union of man and nature, or the fusion of two entities in perfect harmony. As this rune is reversed, this could bode poorly for travel or for the vehicle involved. In the more spiritual sense, this rune could represent difficulties in self-improvement or other attempts at advancement. Finally, it may represent a splitting of two or the inability of two to act as one.
If you are further interested in Rune stones, please check out a script I wrote about three years ago. The story tells of a women's chance encounter with the towns rune reader and physcic. Her reading leads to a terrible discovery about her ex-husband.Click here to read 'Evil Of A Different Kind'
Later,
Kenaz
Rune readings are arrangements of the 24 runes (letters) of the old Futhark alphabet. The layout of the runes is known as a spread, and determines what each rune refers to. For example, in the Three Norns spread, the first rune represents the past, the second the present, and the third the future.
Sets: In addition to each rune having a meaning, the material in which the runes are carved can color the reading. Most people consistently use runes made of ceramic, stone, or wood. In order to broaden your experience, we offer readings with Gold Runes (for questions about business, career, and property), Jade Runes (for questions about love, friendship, and relationships), Ice Runes (for questions about struggle, conflict, and achievement), Spirit Runes (for questions about mysticism, spirituality, and religion), and Stone Runes (for questions about the natural world and things beyond human control).
The question will remain the same: "Will this week be a successful one?"
Rune Alphabet
Spread:Cross(in order of reading)
The Cross spread is used to plot the arc of your life and the forces acting on it. It is the most popular spread, giving a very complete view of the situation. Ice Runes are most commonly used for questions about struggle, conflict, and achievement.
Here is the Reading Using the Ice Set.
1.
The left rune represents an important element of the past. Dagez means daylight, and represents divine light. This rune generally refers to dawn (the initial sparking of energy) or to midday (the climax of energy). Both dawn and midday are symbolic of change, but unlike the changes in the perpetual circle of the year which are slow and subtle, the changes over a day are much faster and more dramatic. The breaking of a new day is symbolic of the rapid illumination of dismal circumstances, and is suggestive of Satori. Be careful - although this rune generally suggests a positive change, the symbology of a peaking point suggests that there must be a change downward as well. Fortunately for some, this rune is cyclic and irreversible, and so permanence is not promised - the only thing you can be sure of is an exciting ride.
2.
The middle rune represents a deciding element of the present. Sowelu is a strong symbol, for it represents the sun. Unlike equatorial cultures who may see the sun as a harsh and imperial force capable of causing droughts, in the cold north the sun is a purely feminine force that gives life and allows crops to grow. In dark times, this rune represents clarity of sight and the victory of good over evil. Sowelu is irreversible, as the cycles of the sun and seasons are perpetual.
3.
The right rune represents the critical element of the future, at the core of the final outcome. Kenaz is the rune of light and knowledge. The rune is shown reversed representing a state of darkness or ignorance. Either you are unable to obtain information that you need, or the information is being withheld from you. In darkness there is fear, but remember that darkness does not mean isolation. Friendship and comfort can still be available, although they are not immediately visible.
4.
The top rune represents a force that works for you. Algiz can be easily recognized as the antlers of the elk that it represents. The elk can represent victory, but is much more appropriately associated with the thrill of the hunt itself. This rune therefore can portend vigor and success in active endeavors. Also, this rune seems symbolic of a hand with outstretched fingers - a protective hand. This hand may suggest that you will be shielded from things negative - the problems still exist, you are spared the brunt of their force.
5.
The bottom Rune represents a force that works against you. Ehwaz is representative of the eight-legged horse ridden by the god Odin. As such, this is the rune of controlled movement and travel, including the pursuit of an objective or station in life. Since some older sources show Odin not as a man riding a horse but as a centaur-like being, this rune can also represent the union of man and nature, or the fusion of two entities in perfect harmony. As this rune is reversed, this could bode poorly for travel or for the vehicle involved. In the more spiritual sense, this rune could represent difficulties in self-improvement or other attempts at advancement. Finally, it may represent a splitting of two or the inability of two to act as one.
If you are further interested in Rune stones, please check out a script I wrote about three years ago. The story tells of a women's chance encounter with the towns rune reader and physcic. Her reading leads to a terrible discovery about her ex-husband.Click here to read 'Evil Of A Different Kind'
Later,
Kenaz
And the winner was....
Back on February 2 I made my predictions for tonight's 78th Academy Awards here is the complete list of nominees. For each category I have indicated my picks, if different, the winners are highlighted in CAPITALS.
As you will see I did okay with the big awards, but got creamed else where. I guess you can I got my back broke by an ape who crashed the party. And for the record who picked "It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp" for song? Anywho, I've had enough, almost 3.5 hours is way to long! Here's how it all shook down.
Results:
From Yahoo Movies
Breakdown:Overall
Experts Picks:18/23
Users Picks:12/23
Me:7/21
Top 6 Catagories:Best and Supporting Actor,Actress,Director,Picture
Experts:5/6
Me:3/6
Users:3/6
Performance by an actor in a leading role
PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN in “Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
Terrence Howard in “Hustle & Flow” (Paramount Classics, MTV Films and New Deal Entertainment)
Heath Ledger in “Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
Joaquin Phoenix in “Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
David Strathairn in “Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Performance by an actor in a supporting role
GEORGE CLOONEY in “Syriana” (Warner Bros.)
Matt Dillon in “Crash” (Lions Gate)
Paul Giamatti in “Cinderella Man” (Universal and Miramax) (my pick)
Jake Gyllenhaal in “Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
William Hurt in “A History of Violence” (New Line)
Performance by an actress in a leading role
Judi Dench in “Mrs. Henderson Presents” (The Weinstein Company)
Felicity Huffman in “Transamerica” (The Weinstein Company and IFC Films)
Keira Knightley in “Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features)
Charlize Theron in “North Country” (Warner Bros.)
REESE WITHERSPOON in “Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Performance by an actress in a supporting role
Amy Adams in “Junebug” (Sony Pictures Classics)
Catherine Keener in “Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)(my pick)
Frances McDormand in “North Country” (Warner Bros.)
RACHEL WEISZ in “The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features)
Michelle Williams in “Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
Best animated feature film of the year
“Howl’s Moving Castle” (Buena Vista)
Hayao Miyazaki
“Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride” (Warner Bros.)
Mike Johnson and Tim Burton(my pick)
“WALLACE & GROMIT IN THE CURSE OF THE WERE-RABBIT” (DreamWorks Animation SKG)
Nick Park and Steve Box
Achievement in art direction
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Art Direction: Jim Bissell
Set Decoration: Jan Pascale
“Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” (Warner Bros.)
Art Direction: Stuart Craig
Set Decoration: Stephenie McMillan
“King Kong” (Universal)
Art Direction: Grant Major
Set Decoration: Dan Hennah and Simon Bright
“MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA” (Sony Pictures Releasing)
Art Direction: John Myhre
Set Decoration: Gretchen Rau
“Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features)
Art Direction: Sarah Greenwood
Set Decoration: Katie Spencer
Achievement in cinematography
“Batman Begins” (Warner Bros.)
Wally Pfister
“Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
Rodrigo Prieto
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Robert Elswit
“MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA” (Sony Pictures Releasing)Dion Beebe
“The New World” (New Line)
Emmanuel Lubezki
Achievement in costume design
“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” (Warner Bros.)
Gabriella Pescucci
“MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA” (Sony Pictures Releasing)
Colleen Atwood
“Mrs. Henderson Presents” (The Weinstein Company)
Sandy Powell
“Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features)
Jacqueline Durran
“Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Arianne Phillips
Achievement in directing
“BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN” (Focus Features)
Ang Lee
“Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
Bennett Miller
“Crash” (Lions Gate)
Paul Haggis
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
George Clooney
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
Steven Spielberg
Best documentary feature
“Darwin’s Nightmare” (International Film Circuit)
A Mille et Une Production
Hubert Sauper
“Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” (Magnolia Pictures)
An HDNet Films Production
Alex Gibney and Jason Kliot
“MARCH OF THE PENGUINS” (Warner Independent Pictures)
A Bonne Pioche Production
Luc Jacquet and Yves Darondeau
“Murderball” (THINKFilm)
An Eat Films Production
Henry-Alex Rubin and Dana Adam Shapiro(my pick)
“Street Fight”
A Marshall Curry Production
Marshall Curry
Best documentary short subject
“The Death of Kevin Carter: Casualty of the Bang Bang Club”
A Dan Krauss Production
Dan Krauss (my pick)
“God Sleeps in Rwanda”
An Acquaro/Sherman Production
Kimberlee Acquaro and Stacy Sherman
“The Mushroom Club”
A Farallon Films Production
Steven Okazaki
“A NOTE OF TRIUMPH: THE GOLDEN AGE OF NORMAN CORWIN”
A NomaFilms Production
Corinne Marrinan and Eric Simonson
Achievement in film editing
“Cinderella Man” (Universal and Miramax)
Mike Hill and Dan Hanley(my pick)
“The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features)
Claire Simpson
“CRASH” (Lions Gate)
Hughes Winborne
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
Michael Kahn
“Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Michael McCusker
Best foreign language film of the year
“Don’t Tell”
A Cattleya/Rai Cinema Production
Italy
“Joyeux Noël”
A Nord-Ouest Production
France
“Paradise Now”
An Augustus Film Production
Palestine (my pick)
“Sophie Scholl - The Final Days”
A Goldkind Filmproduktion and Broth Film Production
Germany
“TSOTSI”
A Moviworld Production
South Africa
Achievement in makeup
“THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE”
(Buena Vista)
Howard Berger and Tami Lane
“Cinderella Man”
(Universal and Miramax)
David Leroy Anderson and Lance Anderson
“Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith”
(20th Century Fox)
Dave Elsey and Nikki Gooley (my pick)
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score)
“BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN” (Focus Features) Gustavo Santaolalla
“The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features) Alberto Iglesias
“Memoirs of a Geisha” (Sony Pictures Releasing) John Williams(my pick)
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks) John Williams
“Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features) Dario Marianelli
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song)
“In the Deep” from “Crash” (Lions Gate)
Music by Kathleen “Bird” York and Michael Becker
Lyric by Kathleen “Bird” York (my pick)
“IT'S HARD OUT HERE FOR A PIMP” from“Hustle & Flow” (Paramount Classics, MTV Films and New Deal Entertainment)
Music and Lyric by Jordan Houston, Cedric Coleman and Paul Beauregard
“Travelin’ Thru” from “Transamerica” (The Weinstein Company and IFC Films)
Music and Lyric by Dolly Parton
Best motion picture of the year
“Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
A River Road Entertainment Production
Diana Ossana and James Schamus, Producers (my pick)
“Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
An A-Line Pictures/Cooper’s Town/ Infinity Media Production
Caroline Baron, William Vince and Michael Ohoven, Producers
“CRASH” (Lions Gate)
A Bob Yari/DEJ/Blackfriar’s Bridge/ Harris Company/ApolloProscreen GmbH & Co./Bull’s Eye Entertainment Production
Paul Haggis and Cathy Schulman, Producers
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
A Good Night Good Luck LLC Production
Grant Heslov, Producer
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
A Universal Pictures/DreamWorks Pictures Production
Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spielberg and Barry Mendel, Producers
Best animated short film (I have no clue)
“Badgered”
A National Film and Television School Production
Sharon Colman
“THE MOON AND THE SON: AN IMAGINED CONVERSATION”
A John Canemaker Production
John Canemaker and Peggy Stern
“The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello” (Monster Distributes)
A 3D Films Production
Anthony Lucas
“9”
A Shane Acker Production
Shane Acker
“One Man Band”
A Pixar Animation Studios Production
Andrew Jimenez and Mark Andrews
Best live action short film (Again I have no clue)
“Ausreisser (The Runaway)”
A Hamburg Media School, Filmwerkstatt Production
Ulrike Grote
“Cashback” (The British Film Institute)
A Left Turn Films Production
Sean Ellis and Lene Bausager
“The Last Farm”
A Zik Zak Filmworks Production
Rúnar Rúnarsson and Thor S. Sigurjónsson
“OUR TIME IS UP”
A Station B Production
Rob Pearlstein and Pia Clemente
“Six Shooter” (Sundance Film Channel)
A Missing in Action Films and Funny Farm Films Production
Martin McDonagh
Achievement in sound editing
“KING KONG”(Universal) Mike Hopkins and Ethan Van der Ryn
“Memoirs of a Geisha” (Sony Pictures Releasing) Wylie Stateman (my pick)
“War of the Worlds” (Paramount and DreamWorks) Richard King
Achievement in sound mixing
“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” (Buena Vista)
Terry Porter, Dean A. Zupancic and Tony Johnson
“KING KONG” (Universal)
Christopher Boyes, Michael Semanick, Michael Hedges and Hammond Peek
“Memoirs of a Geisha” (Sony Pictures Releasing) (my pick)
Kevin O’Connell, Greg P. Russell, Rick Kline and John Pritchett
“Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Paul Massey, D.M. Hemphill and Peter F. Kurland
“War of the Worlds” (Paramount and DreamWorks)
Andy Nelson, Anna Behlmer and Ronald Judkins
Achievement in visual effects
“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” (Buena Vista) (my pick)
Dean Wright, Bill Westenhofer, Jim Berney and Scott Farrar
“KING KONG” (Universal)
Joe Letteri, Brian Van’t Hul, Christian Rivers and Richard Taylor
“War of the Worlds” (Paramount and DreamWorks)
Dennis Muren, Pablo Helman, Randal M. Dutra and Daniel Sudick
Adapted screenplay
“BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN” (Focus Features)
Screenplay by Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
“Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
Screenplay by Dan Futterman
“The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features)
Screenplay by Jeffrey Caine
“A History of Violence” (New Line)
Screenplay by Josh Olson
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
Screenplay by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth
Original screenplay
“CRASH” (Lions Gate)
Screenplay by Paul Haggis & Bobby Moresco
Story by Paul Haggis
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Screenplay by George Clooney & Grant Heslov (my pick)
“Match Point” (DreamWorks)
Written by Woody Allen
“The Squid and the Whale” (Samuel Goldwyn Films and Sony Pictures Releasing)
Written by Noah Baumbach
“Syriana” (Warner Bros.)
Written by Stephen Gaghan
Later,
Kenaz
As you will see I did okay with the big awards, but got creamed else where. I guess you can I got my back broke by an ape who crashed the party. And for the record who picked "It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp" for song? Anywho, I've had enough, almost 3.5 hours is way to long! Here's how it all shook down.
Results:
From Yahoo Movies
Breakdown:Overall
Experts Picks:18/23
Users Picks:12/23
Me:7/21
Top 6 Catagories:Best and Supporting Actor,Actress,Director,Picture
Experts:5/6
Me:3/6
Users:3/6
Performance by an actor in a leading role
PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN in “Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
Terrence Howard in “Hustle & Flow” (Paramount Classics, MTV Films and New Deal Entertainment)
Heath Ledger in “Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
Joaquin Phoenix in “Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
David Strathairn in “Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Performance by an actor in a supporting role
GEORGE CLOONEY in “Syriana” (Warner Bros.)
Matt Dillon in “Crash” (Lions Gate)
Paul Giamatti in “Cinderella Man” (Universal and Miramax) (my pick)
Jake Gyllenhaal in “Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
William Hurt in “A History of Violence” (New Line)
Performance by an actress in a leading role
Judi Dench in “Mrs. Henderson Presents” (The Weinstein Company)
Felicity Huffman in “Transamerica” (The Weinstein Company and IFC Films)
Keira Knightley in “Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features)
Charlize Theron in “North Country” (Warner Bros.)
REESE WITHERSPOON in “Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Performance by an actress in a supporting role
Amy Adams in “Junebug” (Sony Pictures Classics)
Catherine Keener in “Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)(my pick)
Frances McDormand in “North Country” (Warner Bros.)
RACHEL WEISZ in “The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features)
Michelle Williams in “Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
Best animated feature film of the year
“Howl’s Moving Castle” (Buena Vista)
Hayao Miyazaki
“Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride” (Warner Bros.)
Mike Johnson and Tim Burton(my pick)
“WALLACE & GROMIT IN THE CURSE OF THE WERE-RABBIT” (DreamWorks Animation SKG)
Nick Park and Steve Box
Achievement in art direction
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Art Direction: Jim Bissell
Set Decoration: Jan Pascale
“Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” (Warner Bros.)
Art Direction: Stuart Craig
Set Decoration: Stephenie McMillan
“King Kong” (Universal)
Art Direction: Grant Major
Set Decoration: Dan Hennah and Simon Bright
“MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA” (Sony Pictures Releasing)
Art Direction: John Myhre
Set Decoration: Gretchen Rau
“Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features)
Art Direction: Sarah Greenwood
Set Decoration: Katie Spencer
Achievement in cinematography
“Batman Begins” (Warner Bros.)
Wally Pfister
“Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
Rodrigo Prieto
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Robert Elswit
“MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA” (Sony Pictures Releasing)Dion Beebe
“The New World” (New Line)
Emmanuel Lubezki
Achievement in costume design
“Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” (Warner Bros.)
Gabriella Pescucci
“MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA” (Sony Pictures Releasing)
Colleen Atwood
“Mrs. Henderson Presents” (The Weinstein Company)
Sandy Powell
“Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features)
Jacqueline Durran
“Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Arianne Phillips
Achievement in directing
“BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN” (Focus Features)
Ang Lee
“Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
Bennett Miller
“Crash” (Lions Gate)
Paul Haggis
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
George Clooney
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
Steven Spielberg
Best documentary feature
“Darwin’s Nightmare” (International Film Circuit)
A Mille et Une Production
Hubert Sauper
“Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room” (Magnolia Pictures)
An HDNet Films Production
Alex Gibney and Jason Kliot
“MARCH OF THE PENGUINS” (Warner Independent Pictures)
A Bonne Pioche Production
Luc Jacquet and Yves Darondeau
“Murderball” (THINKFilm)
An Eat Films Production
Henry-Alex Rubin and Dana Adam Shapiro(my pick)
“Street Fight”
A Marshall Curry Production
Marshall Curry
Best documentary short subject
“The Death of Kevin Carter: Casualty of the Bang Bang Club”
A Dan Krauss Production
Dan Krauss (my pick)
“God Sleeps in Rwanda”
An Acquaro/Sherman Production
Kimberlee Acquaro and Stacy Sherman
“The Mushroom Club”
A Farallon Films Production
Steven Okazaki
“A NOTE OF TRIUMPH: THE GOLDEN AGE OF NORMAN CORWIN”
A NomaFilms Production
Corinne Marrinan and Eric Simonson
Achievement in film editing
“Cinderella Man” (Universal and Miramax)
Mike Hill and Dan Hanley(my pick)
“The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features)
Claire Simpson
“CRASH” (Lions Gate)
Hughes Winborne
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
Michael Kahn
“Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Michael McCusker
Best foreign language film of the year
“Don’t Tell”
A Cattleya/Rai Cinema Production
Italy
“Joyeux Noël”
A Nord-Ouest Production
France
“Paradise Now”
An Augustus Film Production
Palestine (my pick)
“Sophie Scholl - The Final Days”
A Goldkind Filmproduktion and Broth Film Production
Germany
“TSOTSI”
A Moviworld Production
South Africa
Achievement in makeup
“THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE”
(Buena Vista)
Howard Berger and Tami Lane
“Cinderella Man”
(Universal and Miramax)
David Leroy Anderson and Lance Anderson
“Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith”
(20th Century Fox)
Dave Elsey and Nikki Gooley (my pick)
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score)
“BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN” (Focus Features) Gustavo Santaolalla
“The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features) Alberto Iglesias
“Memoirs of a Geisha” (Sony Pictures Releasing) John Williams(my pick)
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks) John Williams
“Pride & Prejudice” (Focus Features) Dario Marianelli
Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song)
“In the Deep” from “Crash” (Lions Gate)
Music by Kathleen “Bird” York and Michael Becker
Lyric by Kathleen “Bird” York (my pick)
“IT'S HARD OUT HERE FOR A PIMP” from“Hustle & Flow” (Paramount Classics, MTV Films and New Deal Entertainment)
Music and Lyric by Jordan Houston, Cedric Coleman and Paul Beauregard
“Travelin’ Thru” from “Transamerica” (The Weinstein Company and IFC Films)
Music and Lyric by Dolly Parton
Best motion picture of the year
“Brokeback Mountain” (Focus Features)
A River Road Entertainment Production
Diana Ossana and James Schamus, Producers (my pick)
“Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
An A-Line Pictures/Cooper’s Town/ Infinity Media Production
Caroline Baron, William Vince and Michael Ohoven, Producers
“CRASH” (Lions Gate)
A Bob Yari/DEJ/Blackfriar’s Bridge/ Harris Company/ApolloProscreen GmbH & Co./Bull’s Eye Entertainment Production
Paul Haggis and Cathy Schulman, Producers
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
A Good Night Good Luck LLC Production
Grant Heslov, Producer
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
A Universal Pictures/DreamWorks Pictures Production
Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spielberg and Barry Mendel, Producers
Best animated short film (I have no clue)
“Badgered”
A National Film and Television School Production
Sharon Colman
“THE MOON AND THE SON: AN IMAGINED CONVERSATION”
A John Canemaker Production
John Canemaker and Peggy Stern
“The Mysterious Geographic Explorations of Jasper Morello” (Monster Distributes)
A 3D Films Production
Anthony Lucas
“9”
A Shane Acker Production
Shane Acker
“One Man Band”
A Pixar Animation Studios Production
Andrew Jimenez and Mark Andrews
Best live action short film (Again I have no clue)
“Ausreisser (The Runaway)”
A Hamburg Media School, Filmwerkstatt Production
Ulrike Grote
“Cashback” (The British Film Institute)
A Left Turn Films Production
Sean Ellis and Lene Bausager
“The Last Farm”
A Zik Zak Filmworks Production
Rúnar Rúnarsson and Thor S. Sigurjónsson
“OUR TIME IS UP”
A Station B Production
Rob Pearlstein and Pia Clemente
“Six Shooter” (Sundance Film Channel)
A Missing in Action Films and Funny Farm Films Production
Martin McDonagh
Achievement in sound editing
“KING KONG”(Universal) Mike Hopkins and Ethan Van der Ryn
“Memoirs of a Geisha” (Sony Pictures Releasing) Wylie Stateman (my pick)
“War of the Worlds” (Paramount and DreamWorks) Richard King
Achievement in sound mixing
“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” (Buena Vista)
Terry Porter, Dean A. Zupancic and Tony Johnson
“KING KONG” (Universal)
Christopher Boyes, Michael Semanick, Michael Hedges and Hammond Peek
“Memoirs of a Geisha” (Sony Pictures Releasing) (my pick)
Kevin O’Connell, Greg P. Russell, Rick Kline and John Pritchett
“Walk the Line” (20th Century Fox)
Paul Massey, D.M. Hemphill and Peter F. Kurland
“War of the Worlds” (Paramount and DreamWorks)
Andy Nelson, Anna Behlmer and Ronald Judkins
Achievement in visual effects
“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” (Buena Vista) (my pick)
Dean Wright, Bill Westenhofer, Jim Berney and Scott Farrar
“KING KONG” (Universal)
Joe Letteri, Brian Van’t Hul, Christian Rivers and Richard Taylor
“War of the Worlds” (Paramount and DreamWorks)
Dennis Muren, Pablo Helman, Randal M. Dutra and Daniel Sudick
Adapted screenplay
“BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN” (Focus Features)
Screenplay by Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana
“Capote” (UA/Sony Pictures Classics)
Screenplay by Dan Futterman
“The Constant Gardener” (Focus Features)
Screenplay by Jeffrey Caine
“A History of Violence” (New Line)
Screenplay by Josh Olson
“Munich” (Universal and DreamWorks)
Screenplay by Tony Kushner and Eric Roth
Original screenplay
“CRASH” (Lions Gate)
Screenplay by Paul Haggis & Bobby Moresco
Story by Paul Haggis
“Good Night, and Good Luck.” (Warner Independent Pictures)
Screenplay by George Clooney & Grant Heslov (my pick)
“Match Point” (DreamWorks)
Written by Woody Allen
“The Squid and the Whale” (Samuel Goldwyn Films and Sony Pictures Releasing)
Written by Noah Baumbach
“Syriana” (Warner Bros.)
Written by Stephen Gaghan
Later,
Kenaz
Sunday, March 05, 2006
New Playlist Uploaded Over at Kenaz's Old Time Radio
Here's the track list in alphabetical order. Click on the highlighted links to read about the terrific blues and jazz artists as well as the old time radio programs that my station plays. Be sure to check out my station info by clicking on the highlighted title link.
Authors Playhouse - Minstrels of the Mist - 44 08 04 32/44/sc 28:54
Billy Miranda - Go Ahead - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part One) (Disc 7) 32/44/sc 1:49
Chuck Berry - Roll Over Beethoven - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part Two) (Disc 6) 32/44/sc 2:25
Chuck Berry - Almost Grown - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:21
Dale Hawkins - La-Do-Dada - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:35
Danny Gatton - Sky King - Cruisin' Deuces 14:06:56 6:41
Danny Overbea - Forty Cups Of Coffee - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part One) (Disc 3) 32/44/sc 3:11
Dave Baby Cortez - Rinky Dink - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 2:53
Danger with Granger FBI - Scientist - 19xx crime 32/44/sc 24:21
Eddie Bo - Oh-Oh - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:27
Ellery Queen - The Three Frogs - 48-04-29
otr 32/44/sc 28:51
Etta James - All I Could Do Was Cry - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1960-1961) (Disc 9) 32/44/sc 2:57
Etta James - Stop The Wedding - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 2:54
Hound Dog Taylor - Sitting Home Alone - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 3:46
Inner Sanctum - Detour to Terror - Old Time Radio 32/44/sc 28:42
JOHN COLTRANE - Cat walk - The Prestige Recordings CD 04 32/44/sc 6:28
JOHN COLTRANE - Cattin' - The Prestige Recordings CD 05 32/44/sc 7:23
Johnny Fuller - You Got Me Whistlin' - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:10
Larry Liggett - That Man Is Walking - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 2:47
Laura Lee - Dirty Man - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 2:54
Little Joe Blue - Dirty Work Goin' On - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1965-1966) (Disc 11) 32/44/sc 2:49
Little Johnny Jones - Big Town Playboy - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1947-1950) (Disc 1) 32/44/sc 2:56
Little Walter - You're So Fine - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 3:06
Little Walter - My Baby - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 2:42
Little Walter - Just Your Fool - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1960-1961) (Disc 9) 32/44/sc 2:25
Lowell Fulson - Reconsider Baby - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 3:11
Mamie Galore - It Ain't Necessary - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 2:13
Marshall Chess Interview - Marshall Chess Interview - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (Interview) (Disc 14) 32/44/sc 1:10
Muddy Waters - Mad Love (I Want You To Love Me) - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 3:04
Muddy Waters - Mannish Boy - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 2:58
Muddy Waters - Can't Get No Grindin' - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1969-1975) (Disc 13) 32/44/sc 2:48
Old Time Radio - Ellery Queen - 1944 13:35:48 32/44/sc 25:44
Old time radio - Bloopers 2 Of 3 - otr comedy 32/44/sc 11:31
Otis Rush - All Your Love - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1960-1961) (Disc 9) 32/44/sc 2:56
Lights Out- The Sea -32/44/sc 22:12
Pigmeat Markham - Here Comes The Judge - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 2:43
Rosco Gordon - Booted - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1950-1951) (Disc 2)32/44/sc 3:05
Sonny Boy Williamson - Don't Start Me Talkin' - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 2:36
Sonny Boy Williamson - Fattenin' Frogs For Snakes - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part One) (Disc 7) 32/44/sc 2:21
Sonny Boy Williamson - Help Me - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 3:10
Suspense - Lost Ship 32/44/sc 16:33
Suspense - Report from a Dead Planet - Old Time Radio 32/44/sc 19:57
The Creaking Door - Anna - 02.45.49. 32/44/sc 31:00
The Dells - There Is - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 3:35
The Flamingos - Would I Be Crying (If I Were Lying To You) - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part Two) (Disc 6) 32/44/sc 3:02
The Jaynettes - Sally Go Round The Roses - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 3:01
The Moonglows - We Go Together - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part Two) (Disc 6) 32/44/sc 2:46
Whistler - The Go-Between - OTR 32/44/sc 26:51
Wilie Dixon - Walking The Blues - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 3:04
X Minus One - To the Future - 12/14/55 32/44/sc 28:50
total hours of programming 7:15
Later,
Kenaz
Authors Playhouse - Minstrels of the Mist - 44 08 04 32/44/sc 28:54
Billy Miranda - Go Ahead - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part One) (Disc 7) 32/44/sc 1:49
Chuck Berry - Roll Over Beethoven - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part Two) (Disc 6) 32/44/sc 2:25
Chuck Berry - Almost Grown - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:21
Dale Hawkins - La-Do-Dada - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:35
Danny Gatton - Sky King - Cruisin' Deuces 14:06:56 6:41
Danny Overbea - Forty Cups Of Coffee - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part One) (Disc 3) 32/44/sc 3:11
Dave Baby Cortez - Rinky Dink - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 2:53
Danger with Granger FBI - Scientist - 19xx crime 32/44/sc 24:21
Eddie Bo - Oh-Oh - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:27
Ellery Queen - The Three Frogs - 48-04-29
otr 32/44/sc 28:51
Etta James - All I Could Do Was Cry - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1960-1961) (Disc 9) 32/44/sc 2:57
Etta James - Stop The Wedding - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 2:54
Hound Dog Taylor - Sitting Home Alone - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 3:46
Inner Sanctum - Detour to Terror - Old Time Radio 32/44/sc 28:42
JOHN COLTRANE - Cat walk - The Prestige Recordings CD 04 32/44/sc 6:28
JOHN COLTRANE - Cattin' - The Prestige Recordings CD 05 32/44/sc 7:23
Johnny Fuller - You Got Me Whistlin' - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part Two) (Disc 8) 32/44/sc 2:10
Larry Liggett - That Man Is Walking - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 2:47
Laura Lee - Dirty Man - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 2:54
Little Joe Blue - Dirty Work Goin' On - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1965-1966) (Disc 11) 32/44/sc 2:49
Little Johnny Jones - Big Town Playboy - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1947-1950) (Disc 1) 32/44/sc 2:56
Little Walter - You're So Fine - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 3:06
Little Walter - My Baby - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 2:42
Little Walter - Just Your Fool - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1960-1961) (Disc 9) 32/44/sc 2:25
Lowell Fulson - Reconsider Baby - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 3:11
Mamie Galore - It Ain't Necessary - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 2:13
Marshall Chess Interview - Marshall Chess Interview - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (Interview) (Disc 14) 32/44/sc 1:10
Muddy Waters - Mad Love (I Want You To Love Me) - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1952-1954 Part Two) (Disc 4) 32/44/sc 3:04
Muddy Waters - Mannish Boy - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 2:58
Muddy Waters - Can't Get No Grindin' - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1969-1975) (Disc 13) 32/44/sc 2:48
Old Time Radio - Ellery Queen - 1944 13:35:48 32/44/sc 25:44
Old time radio - Bloopers 2 Of 3 - otr comedy 32/44/sc 11:31
Otis Rush - All Your Love - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1960-1961) (Disc 9) 32/44/sc 2:56
Lights Out- The Sea -32/44/sc 22:12
Pigmeat Markham - Here Comes The Judge - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 2:43
Rosco Gordon - Booted - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1950-1951) (Disc 2)32/44/sc 3:05
Sonny Boy Williamson - Don't Start Me Talkin' - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 2:36
Sonny Boy Williamson - Fattenin' Frogs For Snakes - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1957-1959 Part One) (Disc 7) 32/44/sc 2:21
Sonny Boy Williamson - Help Me - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 3:10
Suspense - Lost Ship 32/44/sc 16:33
Suspense - Report from a Dead Planet - Old Time Radio 32/44/sc 19:57
The Creaking Door - Anna - 02.45.49. 32/44/sc 31:00
The Dells - There Is - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1967-1968) (Disc 12) 32/44/sc 3:35
The Flamingos - Would I Be Crying (If I Were Lying To You) - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part Two) (Disc 6) 32/44/sc 3:02
The Jaynettes - Sally Go Round The Roses - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1962-1964) (Disc 10) 32/44/sc 3:01
The Moonglows - We Go Together - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part Two) (Disc 6) 32/44/sc 2:46
Whistler - The Go-Between - OTR 32/44/sc 26:51
Wilie Dixon - Walking The Blues - The Chess Story 1947-1975 (1955-1956 Part One) (Disc 5) 32/44/sc 3:04
X Minus One - To the Future - 12/14/55 32/44/sc 28:50
total hours of programming 7:15
Later,
Kenaz
Saturday, March 04, 2006
Reality TV Gone Wrong
Victoria Gotti is star of the A&E reality TV show "Growing Up Gotti." Personally, I don't think much of the program or Gotti and her three irritating sons. This show is "reality" tv gone wrong, what's next "Diner and a Chat With Charles Manson" or "Loving Art With John Gacey". When it comes to watching the Gottis squabble I prefer a colonoscopy. In lew of, I prefer to watch these clips taken from surveillance videotapes made during a two-day family visit to the Illinois penitentiary John Gotti called home (prison officials recorded all visits to the Gambino family boss). I found all them on The Smoking Gun. During the January 1998 sitdown, an irritable Gotti meets with his brother Peter, Victoria, and her son John, who was 10 at the time and not yet addicted to hair gel. The prison videotapes are so entertaining I had to share. If you view these videos using "Mozilla Firefox", for what ever reason they all will autoplay even though I have this feature disabled.
Gotti VideosEpisode 1: Grandpa Blows A Gasket
Despite grandpa's suggestion that he pursue a legal career, little John says he'd rather be an athlete. The Dapper Don, however, doesn't want anyone in his family leading the degenerate life of a baseball or basketball player. Bristling, the lil' wiseguy announces that he'll instead opt for a less glamorous career. That sass doesn't sit well with the incarcerated hoodlum, who threatens the kid with bodily harm and tosses him from the visiting room. Raging at the child's bad attitude, Gotti blames his own wife Victoria: "That shit comes from your fucking mother, not from me," he tells his daughter.
Despite grandpa's suggestion that he pursue a legal career, little John says he'd rather be an athlete. The Dapper Don, however, doesn't want anyone in his family leading the degenerate life of a baseball or basketball player. Bristling, the lil' wiseguy announces that he'll instead opt for a less glamorous career. That sass doesn't sit well with the incarcerated hoodlum, who threatens the kid with bodily harm and tosses him from the visiting room. Raging at the child's bad attitude, Gotti blames his own wife Victoria: "That shit comes from your fucking mother, not from me," he tells his daughter.
Gotti VideosEpisode 2: Parenting, Gotti Style
John Gotti criticizes daughter Victoria's handling of a problem her son encountered at school. Seems that after a classmate slurred Little John--accusing the kid (imagine!) of being a tyro wiseguy--Victoria had a polite conversation with the kid's mother to express her displeasure. Which was the wrong way to handle things, according to the imprisoned killer, who equates such civility to acting like a "rat" or a Jew. Instead, Gotti tells his daughter she should have instilled fear into the young troublemaker's mother by invoking her notorious daddy and threatening to--at least--cut the boy's tongue out. Along the way we are reminded, "Being a nigger is embarrassment, being John Gotti's grandson is an honor."
John Gotti criticizes daughter Victoria's handling of a problem her son encountered at school. Seems that after a classmate slurred Little John--accusing the kid (imagine!) of being a tyro wiseguy--Victoria had a polite conversation with the kid's mother to express her displeasure. Which was the wrong way to handle things, according to the imprisoned killer, who equates such civility to acting like a "rat" or a Jew. Instead, Gotti tells his daughter she should have instilled fear into the young troublemaker's mother by invoking her notorious daddy and threatening to--at least--cut the boy's tongue out. Along the way we are reminded, "Being a nigger is embarrassment, being John Gotti's grandson is an honor."
Gotti VideosEpisode 3: Growing Up Agnello
"We're not animals," Victoria declares, recalling how then-husband Carmine Agnello--who's now serving nine years for racketeering--behaved like one when dealing with a kindergarten matter involving son Frank. The Dapper Don says his daughter and grandsons could avoid the hassles associated with being a Gotti by using Carmine's last name. "You should stay off television. You should stay off the book covers. You should use Victoria Agnello and they won't know who the kids are and they won't be forced with this problem." Yeah, right.
"We're not animals," Victoria declares, recalling how then-husband Carmine Agnello--who's now serving nine years for racketeering--behaved like one when dealing with a kindergarten matter involving son Frank. The Dapper Don says his daughter and grandsons could avoid the hassles associated with being a Gotti by using Carmine's last name. "You should stay off television. You should stay off the book covers. You should use Victoria Agnello and they won't know who the kids are and they won't be forced with this problem." Yeah, right.
Gotti Videos Episode 4: Gotti Blood
John Gotti goes off on a wild ramble after Victoria tells daddy she's his "biggest fan." The caged Godfather says his real fans are people like that girl from Idaho who wrote that he is "what America was meant to be." Noting the decline of civilization (kids "imitating all these coons...imitate niggers...your president's a piece of crap"), Gotti explains why his family is a bunch of morons: "I took garbage Gotti blood and contaminated it with DiGiorgio (his wife Victoria's maiden name) blood."
In the final installment of Blowing Up Gotti, Victoria gets a scolding for failing to send a Christmas photograph to her incarcerated dad. When the Dapper Daughter tries to blame brother John, Jr. and his wife for bumbling the group picture project, the Gambino crime boss rails at his disrespectful family: "I'm not your father or John's father or these kids's grandfather." Soon, a fidgety Victoria gets up and leaves, and Gotti explains to brother Peter how visitors like his daughter are cramping his lifestyle in the federal pen: "I told you I didn't want you to bring these people no more...I laugh all day. I'm in a good frame of mind 'til I see them...fuck you, fuck you, and fuck them."
Later,
Kenaz
John Gotti goes off on a wild ramble after Victoria tells daddy she's his "biggest fan." The caged Godfather says his real fans are people like that girl from Idaho who wrote that he is "what America was meant to be." Noting the decline of civilization (kids "imitating all these coons...imitate niggers...your president's a piece of crap"), Gotti explains why his family is a bunch of morons: "I took garbage Gotti blood and contaminated it with DiGiorgio (his wife Victoria's maiden name) blood."
Gotti Videos from The Smoking Gun.com
Episode 5: I Got Nothin'In the final installment of Blowing Up Gotti, Victoria gets a scolding for failing to send a Christmas photograph to her incarcerated dad. When the Dapper Daughter tries to blame brother John, Jr. and his wife for bumbling the group picture project, the Gambino crime boss rails at his disrespectful family: "I'm not your father or John's father or these kids's grandfather." Soon, a fidgety Victoria gets up and leaves, and Gotti explains to brother Peter how visitors like his daughter are cramping his lifestyle in the federal pen: "I told you I didn't want you to bring these people no more...I laugh all day. I'm in a good frame of mind 'til I see them...fuck you, fuck you, and fuck them."
Later,
Kenaz
Friday, March 03, 2006
Hamilton set to go boom!
An extraordinary $117 million in new development is set to transform the heart of Hamilton. Thanks in part to $14 million from the city's downtown residential loan program, 14 new projects will bring 700 residential units to the core.
A landmark car dealership will become a high-end hotel.
Historic buildings, such as the prized Foster-McKay building and Victoria Hall at 66, 68 King Street East, will be restored.
And infamous eyesores, like the Spallacci building east of Denningers, will no longer make you sick as you enter through the eastern archway. It will be burried and become affordable housing units.
Mayor Larry Di Ianni was grinning just as wide about the development boom on Hamilton's horizon. He used to tell people they wouldn't recognize the downtown in seven to 10 years. Now he's down to five.
This is vindication for the city's downtown loans program. Allegations of wrongdoing led to an internal investigation, outside audit and OPP investigation. The program was cleared on all fronts, letting staff focus on their original goals, said Ron Marini, the city's director of downtown renewal.
This is just the latest round of loans for the program which has already invested more than $18 million since its start in 2002. Some of its original projects are built and occupied with all or part of their city loans paid back. The first 14 projects added 952 residential units to the downtown.
The latest round of development is significant, said Marini, because it marks the first time developers are willing to not just renovate existing structures but build from the ground up. The biggest loan of $3.6 million will see a half block on King William Street, bound by Jarvis Street and Ferguson Avenue, converted into a massive 11-storey building, including retail space, four floors of parking and 198 condos.
Hamilton Motor Products, which closed this fall at the corner of Main Street West and Bay Street, will become a long-term stay Hilton Homewood Suites. The 10-storey hotel takes a stab at the city's shortage of quality rooms desperately needed to attract big conventions and tourists. Its location and proximity to nearby facilities will be a huge boost, said David Adames, executive director of Tourism Hamilton.
The city also gave a $1.6-million loan for redevelopment of the Royal Connaught. The bankrupt hotel will reopen to visitors, while also offering retail space and new residential units.
Councillors also moved ahead yesterday with a new loan program to encourage residential development in business improvement areas beyond the downtown. The program, worth $2.3 million, will provide development loans for smaller commercial cores like Barton Village. Projects like, the General hospital expansion which is already underway on the old Stelco Wellington Works property. Production of the mill stopped in 1984, since then it's been an abandon building and numerous fires. Demolition happened last the summer and currently their doing clean up.
This property will become a parking lot as the General hospital is expanding and will use their current parking lot as the Regional Rehabilitation Centre.
Further along Barton St there's a very important and historical property called the Smart-Turner building. It's a 129-year-old stone structure and an example of early industrial heritage in Hamilton. The plan is to convert the place into an adult version of a Ronald McDonald House an affordable place for families of critical care and cancer patients called the Mark Preece Family House. The project could derail if it is found that the site's soil is to contaminated.
Here are the rest of the projects.
At 119 King East, four units will come into the upper three floors of this building. Some work has already begun and, with the massive windows overlooking King, I suspect these will be sharp units in a very cool, slender building.
Not to get lost in the mix is the very important project announced by Hamilton Housing a couple of months ago of a new five storey apartment building geared to Mac students to be built just east of John on the north side of King.
The new 14 storey condo planned for 221 York Boulevard at Hess, the former sight of Premier Fitness. This project at Hess could be a catalyst to start transforming Hamilton's main downtown entrance into the vibrant, mixed-use neighbourhood it deserves.
The building at 4, 8, 14 Forest Avenue and James Street was purchased approximately one year ago and contains mixed-use buildings with a total of 12 residential rental units. The majority of the units are currently vacant and in disrepair. The intent is to renovate the buildings and create 25 residential rental units. The property is listed on the City’s Inventory of Buildings of Architectural and/or Historical Interest.
189 King William Street
This property is owned and operated by a not-for-profit
company known as the Children’s Learning Centre. The property is a semidetached
two storey retail building. The renovation will enhance the second floor
to accommodate one 1,000 square foot unit. The renovation will complete both
sides of the semi-detached buildings. The property is listed on the City’s Inventory
of Buildings of Architectural and/or Historical Interest.
53 King Street East: The developer plans to create 24 rental apartment units in
the vacant 3 upper stories. The ground floor commercial units are to remain (My
Convenience Store & The Salvation Army Thrift Store). The property is listed on
the City’s Inventory of Buildings of Architectural and/or Historical Interest.
12 Ferguson Avenue: The developer plans to convert the entire 3 storey building
to 12 apartment units. Presently, the ground floor is used as a pub known as
“AFB” and the upper floors are used as office space.
119 King Street East: This building will be converted to house 4 dwelling units on
the upper 3 floors of this existing 4 storey building. The ground floor will remain as a commercial use. The property is listed on the City’s Inventory of Buildings of
Architectural and/or Historical Interest.
267 King Street East: The 2 upper floors of this vacant building are being
renovated to contain 7 live-work dwelling units in loft style. The ground floor is
being renovated to contain an artist’s studio and a café.
275 King Street East: This property’s main floor has been renovated and is
currently owner/occupied by Brownie’s Downtown. The second and third floors are
currently vacant and in need of repair. Three units have been proposed which will
bring a positive effect to King Street East. The property is listed on the City’s
Inventory of Buildings of Architectural and/or Historical Interest.
Add these to the projects already in progress like the Downtown Arts Centre that will be at the corner of Rebecca and Hughson Street, the former Salvation Army building. Here is an artists rendering of the project,
A three storey addition is being built onto an old printing factory at King William and Mary. It will be residential space once complete.
Else where in Hamilton, back in January McMaster University unveiled a draft vision for its research park on the old Camco site, which is to become an eco-friendly community for scientists. The plan is to house labs, offices and classrooms for public and private research in eight to 10 buildings on the brownfield site straddling Longwood Road north of Aberdeen Avenue. The park will be 40 metres wide and 350 metres long.
If this wasn't enough downtown Hamilton is set to get a department store again. It’s called Hart’s, a name that means nothing in Ontario. But this Montreal based chain has been around since 1960 and now has more than 70 outlets in small towns across Quebec and the Maritimes. Now they’re pushing into this province. They’ve locked up close to 40,000 square feet — about half the space of a full-size Zellers — in the old Eaton’s Centre, right by the entrance to Jackson Square. The store opens this fall.
Later,
Kenaz
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