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Finance Minister Jim Flaherty is in New York this afternoon giving a speech there. Most of the speech would be familiar to many Canadian audiences — he spends a lot of time reviewing Canada's success weathering the recession and then highlights his recent budget.

But Flaherty also uses the occasion to deliver what many on this side of the border will see as a warning to U.S. lawmakers, a warning he made to reporters in Ottawa Tuesday. Reuters Louise Egan reports:

Canada urged its top trading partner, the United States, on Tuesday to steer clear of defaulting on its debt to avoid “disruptions” to the global economy.

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty told reporters he had spoken with his U.S. counterparts in Congress and budget officials in the Obama administration to encourage them to “work something out.”

“This is not just a procedural matter. This has some consequences,” Flaherty told reporters when asked about the possibility of the U.S. missing a debt payment.

“We don't need any more disruptions in the world economy these days,” he said.

Flaherty will head to New York on Wednesday to give a speech there.

His comments came as U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and a bipartisan group of lawmakers stepped up negotiations to find a deal that would allow Congress to raise the debt ceiling by an August 2 deadline, when the United States could start defaulting on its obligations.

With that context, here is a bit from the end of Flaherty's speech in New York today that should, I think, be read in context of the above:

It’s essential that we all have a clear strategy in place to ensure markets continue to have confidence in our fiscal plans—and there is no time to waste in doing so.

The health of Canada’s economy—and of the world’s, for that matter—depends greatly on the fiscal decisions being made in this country.

What’s required is a solid plan to eliminate deficits, reduce debt and create a cushion against the next global economic shock, combined with the determination to deliver results on time and as promised.

It’s a tall order, but it’s doable.

I'm with Flaherty on this one. Someone — and it might as well be their biggest trading partner — needs to talk some sense to the Americans. As I wrote after the last American mid-term elections, the elections that brought the Tea Party wave to Washington:

[Sen. Rand] Paul is quite prepared to lead America into bankruptcy rather than let the federal government borrow another nickel. Paul must surely know that that would be a catastrophic disaster for the United States, Canada and the rest of the world.

But he seems to think his principles are more important.

Dragging the world's economy into the dumpster on principle – any principle – is wrong. He would be doing vastly more harm to America if he uses his new responsibilities and privileges as a United States senator to let the country he loves – and we need – go bankrupt.

Ian Frazier has a wonderful opening paragraph as he begins his review of a new memoir by storied New York Times foreign correspondent John Darnton:

An important thing to know about memoirs is that although there are a lot of them already, there will soon be more. Seventy-six million baby boomers are reaching retirement age. Many of us own computers, and we find ourselves fascinating.

 

Gil Scott-Heron, a great poet, musician and one who many call the father of rap music, died last week at the too-young age of 62.

The Associated Press obituary covers all the bases:

Long before Public Enemy urged the need to “Fight the Power” or N.W.A. offered a crude rebuke of the police, Gil-Scott Heron was articulating the rage and the disillusionment of the black masses through song and spoken word.

Scott-Heron, widely considered one of the godfathers of rap with his piercing social and political prose laid against the backdrop of minimalist percussion, flute and other instrumentation, died on Friday at age 62. His was a life full of groundbreaking, revolutionary music and personal turmoil that included a battle with crack cocaine and stints behind bars in his later years . . . [Read the rest]

The folks at Open Culture have curated some decent links and have posted a video of Scott-Heron's “Where Did the Night Go”.

Here's the one that put Scott-Heron on the map: “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”:

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised by mallox

Yesterday, across our chain, I advocated that the federal government ought to preserve — and possibly even enhance — financial support for Canada's cultural economy:

The first — but not best — reason is this kind of spending is good for the country’s bottom line. That’s right: Every dollar spent on the arts is worth many more dollars in economic activity and increased tax revenue for multiple levels of government.

But the second and best reason for a federal government to invest is because this is what great nations do and, if I’ve heard Stephen Harper say it once, I’ve heard him say it a hundred times, he believes Canada is a great nation that can be greater. And funding the arts is one important step on the path to greatness.

[Read the whole column]

I was pleased to see a surprising number of e-mails from our readers endorsing this view. Here's two:

I just wanted to send you a note to thank you for your recent article on “great countries are art smart”. It was very clear and in my opinion a very accurate portrait of the importance and effect art has for a country.  I don't normally agree with Sun Media commentaries but in this case I was surprised and please to see the arguments in support of art described in the language and context that conservative thinkers can readily understand.  It has taught me to alter my comments when talking to people that see art as a luxury we can I'll afford at anytime but especially during a down turn in the economy (there is always an economic downturn or crisis somewhere that make we Canadians think twice about economic support to our country)

I live in Winnipeg and right now there is a vital art scene here with many high profile art being produced and sold internationally.  Not only with known artists but with very talented minor artists that are finally finding their way and finding some economic success.  I think this development in Winnipeg has a direct correlation with the steady economic growth of our city. When people come here, they are always surprised to see such growth and prosperity which I think has a lot to do with the development of the arts culture here. Even during slower growth the arts community keeps on dragging our mainly conservative population and businesses, encouraging innovation and showing the way to cultural and economic prosperity.

Your article captured what is currently happening in Winnipeg and the message needs to be repeated till all Canadians understand the connection between culture and prosperity.

and:

Thank you SO much for this editorial.  Our city, Woodstock, is right now in a bitter conflict over our art gallery.  The federal and provincial government DID do the right thing and provide us with grant money to build a new gallery, but our mayor, who was previously on council and voted against the project, is now trying to stop it.

The gallery building has been renovated and is now a state of the art gallery and 2 weeks before art was to be transferred, he offered the building to Fanshawe College as a satellite campus.  He is letting the building sit empty and is willing to leave it that way until Fanshawe and the governments make a decision.  There are 2 problems here.  Fanshawe already has a campus in town (its main campus is in London) and their grant request to expand last year was refused at the provincial level.  The second problem is the existing gallery is not fully accessible, not climate controlled, not big enough for the programs and classes they want to give, and is unable to accept donations from patrons because of lack of space.  We have an impressive collection of Florence Carlyle paintings – she is from Woodstock – that is gaining value now, with inappropriate conditions to maintain its integrity.

The mayor is attempting to have the grant money transferred from culture to education.  So here is an example of the right thing being done, and a short sighted municipal government making every attempt possible to stop it.  If you have any ideas as to what action gallery supporters can take to get the new building open, I'd love to hear from you.

I'd also like to photocopy your editorial and flood the city with it if I may.

Thanks again for your inadvertent support!

An interesting piece from Leslie Gelb, a former New York Times correspondent and currently the President Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, on the speech President Barack Obama gave last week and the reaction to that speech:

Entwined within this Gordian knot is a truth so terrible as to be rarely spoken. It is that Arabs hate two peoples, not one—the Jews, of course, and also, shockingly, the Palestinians. Yes, the Arabs incessantly demand justice for Palestinians, but the words belie a historical pattern of using Israel as a whipping boy to deflect attention from Arab injustices. Thus, their Arab champions allow Palestinians to fester in refugee camps throughout the region, make no effort to integrate them into their own societies, and provide them with only the most modest economic assistance. Arab leaders and intellectuals say this is necessary to sustain pressure on Israel to take Palestinian refugees back. Yet, they know full well this will never happen. Arabs themselves keep the Palestinians segregated, perhaps because they do not like or trust them, perhaps because they see Palestinians as an inferior tribe or a superior one, perhaps as too demanding, perhaps as too much like the Jews who sprang from the same Abrahamic loins. And Palestinians have often returned these same unkind sentiments in kind, as when they sought to overthrow King Hussein of Jordan in the 1960s and cheered as Saddam Hussein's Iraq troops conquered Kuwait in 1991 . . .

Obama ran open-eyed into the Palestinian-Israeli buzz saw….

Experts and negotiators will declaim over the bowl full of details in Obama's Thursday speech. But its heart is this: Israel would accept a Palestinian state outlined by 1967 borders with land swaps to accommodate Israeli settlers on the West Bank, while Palestinians would recognize a Jewish state of Israel and agree that its state be demilitarized. In other words, Palestinians would receive statehood, and Israelis would have their security. The equally volatile issues of Jerusalem and the right of Palestinians to return to Israel were to be set aside for later determination. Suffice it to say, the Israeli government went bonkers, and the Palestinians weren't happy either…

U.S. President Barack Obama sketched out some new and, apparently, controversial proposals Thursday for a new framework for mideast peace talks involving Israel and Palestine. Here's the chief controversial bit in Obama's speech:

The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine.  We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.  The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their full potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

Today, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's communications director, Dimitri Soudas, and other government officials were asked about their response to this idea of using the 1967 border as a basis for peace talks and, by and large, they avoided any comment on it, saying only that Canada supports a negotiated two-state solution and that it was up to the negotiating parties as to any starting frameworks.

The PMO also issued the following talking points to its MPs in case any of them get asked about it. Here, courtesy of the PMO Info-Alert-Bot, are those TPs:

Position on Israel-Palestine Borders

Yesterday, President Obama outlined his position on peace in the Middle East. The Minister of Foreign Affairs is the spokesperson on this matter.

• Canada is committed to a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East, whereby two states live side by side in peace and security.

• Canada supports a negotiated solution involving both Israel and the Palestinian authority.

• Canada notes President Obama’s speech with interest.

• Prime Minister Harper looks forward to joining G8 leaders for discussions on the current situation in the Middle East and North Africa next week in Deauville.

Historian István Deák casts a gimlet eye on the relatively new political administration in Hungary, the land of his birth, in a recent essay in The New York Review. I was struck by the threat Prime Minister's Viktor Orban's government is posing to a free press and to free speech rights:

Now attention is here [in Hungary] again, although only temporarily and mainly in  Europe, and it has much to do with Hungary’s assumption of the presidency of the Council of the European Union against a backdrop of  recently enacted domestic policies that are said to violate the  principles and practices of the European Union. Among other things, Hungary’s right-wing government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, has set up a National Media and Communications Authority consisting of five members of Orbán’s party, Fidesz, with the authority to fine journalists and media organizations up to $1 million for “immoral reporting.”
…
Public criticism of the Orbán government took an astonishing turn during the introduction in Strasbourg, on January 19, 2011, of Viktor Orbán as president of the European Union’s second legislative body, the European Parliament…some deputies sat with Band-Aids covering their mouths in protest against the new Hungarian media law. Others held up blank issues of  potentially censored Hungarian dailies. The leaders of the liberal and socialist groups of deputies declared Orbán unworthy of the presidency, and the leader of the Greens, the former student anarchist Daniel Cohn-Bendit, shouted that Orbán was turning Hungary into a “Communist
surveillance dictatorship.”
…
One of the more serious international attempts to publicly denounce Orbán’s politics in Hungary has been an “Appeal to the European Institutions” by European intellectuals and leaders, dated January 7, 2011, in which the authors deplore the development of “a full-fledged illiberal democracy” and the dismantling of “democracy’s checks and balances” in Hungary. They demand that the European governments and parties “build clear standards of compliance with the values of democracy” and that violators of these standards be punished.
…
For the last few months, the government and its absolute parliamentary majority have been feverishly active, already bringing about substantial changes in politics and society. The most famous and most controversial of the innovations is the already mentioned media law giving extensive powers to the five Fidesz members who run the media authority. Appointed for nine years, they can impose a heavy fine on journalists and media outlets for reporting considered “immoral” or “unbalanced.”

Still, at the moment the media remain entirely free, and in view of the publication of the far right’s hysterical calls for violence against the Roma and the Jewish population, one might even argue that some of the media in Hungary are a little too free. Also, on February 16, 2011, the Hungarian government agreed to amend the media law to comply with changes proposed by the European Commission. The right-of-center coalition in the European Parliament has declared its satisfaction with the technical changes in the law but, in a recent development, the European Parliament as a whole called for more changes. The problem is less with the law than with the chilling effect that the rumor of censorship has had on some journalists and writers, and with the haste of some publishers and other media bosses to exercise self-censorship in order to please the new leaders of Hungary.

…

No less serious is the government’s systematic weakening of the powers of the Constitutional Court, the National Elections Commission, the National Bank, and the independent Fiscal Council while also putting party loyalists in the top position of each body. The government has already expressed its right to control the Hungarian Telegraph Agency, government-owned television and radio, some state-owned theaters and museums, and a few research institutions. The government, moreover, has the newly enacted right to dismiss public servants without cause.

Jane Perlez reports from Islamabad, Pakistan:

In some Pakistani quarters, the failure of the army and intelligence agencies to detect Bin Laden, or to do anything about him if indeed his presence was known, prompted calls for an overhaul of the nation’s strategic policies.

“Instead of making more India-specific nuclear-capable missiles, the funds and the energy should be directed to eliminating the terrorists,” said an editorial in the newspaper Pakistan Today.

The editor, Arif Nizami, said the American raid made a mockery of the Pakistani military’s bravura that its fighter jets could shoot down American drones. “You talk of taking out drones, and you can’t even take out helicopters,” Mr. Nizami said.

Some Pakistanis said they were more concerned about the fact that known terrorists were living in their midst than the violation of sovereignty by the Americans.

“The terrorists’ being on our soil is the biggest violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty,” said Athar Minallah, a prominent lawyer. “If Osama bin Laden lives in Abbottabad, there could be a terrorist in my neighborhood.”

Liberal Party President Alfred Apps issued the following statement this evening:

On behalf of Liberals everywhere, I first want to thank and congratulate our leader, Michael Ignatieff, for waging a spirited national campaign. Mr. Ignatieff won the affection of all those who rallied to his side. He has earned the admiration and respect of all Canadians.

This is a profoundly difficult moment for our party.

Monday’s defeat was a deeply personal experience – for each of our hard-working candidates, for our tireless volunteers and for our many longtime and loyal supporters. Despite the outcome, Liberals everywhere can be proud of the battle that we waged together, as well as the tremendous team and the positive platform we offered to Canadians. Throughout this campaign, we have stood fast for democratic principle and for the kind of Canada that all Liberals believe in – progressive, compassionate, responsible – a Canada of hope for all Canadians.

But there is no avoiding the fact that we now face an historically unprecedented challenge. Our future as a party will depend, more than ever, on preserving our unity, broadening our vision and keeping clear and cool heads over the coming weeks and months about what we need to do.

As we reflect soberly and respectfully over the coming days on the democratic judgment of Canadians, we need to recognize that our party’s remarkable contribution to Canadian history was never a guarantee of its future health and success. We can only earn back the confidence of Canadians by rediscovering our confidence in ourselves and in the continuing relevance of our values.

It will take some time and it will not be easy.

In the wake of our defeat, we Liberals will have to reach out more broadly than we have in half a century to find a new generation of activists – to Canadians who love their country and are ready and able to fight for a new agenda of reform, to Canadians who care about equality of opportunity and are prepared to make serious personal sacrifices for the good of their fellow citizens, to Canadians who want to make a difference and are willing to demonstrate the courage of their convictions against all odds and come what may. We need to build a party that is a beacon for the Canada of tomorrow, rather than an echo of bygone glories – a party whose diversity truly reflects the Canada we are becoming.

Rather than wringing hands or assigning blame, we need to move forward to a reasonable period of constructive stability and collective reflection. My hope is that all Liberals will stand back, take the long view of our challenges and prepare themselves for the work ahead. While we all have to accept and learn from defeat, it does not mean that Liberalism is dead in Canada or that liberal values are suddenly misguided, or out of place or out of date.  Far from it.

Our commitment as Liberals remains to a resolutely centrist political party, to a program that blends and balances fiscal responsibility with social compassion, to a philosophy that understands the potential of a mixed market economy but believes in the power of government to achieve good, not only for individuals but also for the nation as a whole. We have always been a proudly pragmatic party, united around a broad and moderate consensus and a vision of Canada as more than the sum of its parts. We must not now surrender to tired ideologies, whether of the right or the left, in search of what can work in the real world to make the lives of Canadians better.

When Canadians are ready again for that kind of leadership – and they will be – we have to be ready to lead.

When a new Canadian consensus begins to emerge – as it will – Liberals need to be there to help shape it.

This is not the time for making rash judgments or drawing speedy conclusions. This is not the time for Liberals to be seduced by political expediency or parliamentary convenience.

This is a time for wide open debate, for moving forward together, for the broadest possible participation from Liberals in the major decisions that lie ahead. And all of us who occupy party offices across the land at every level of our organization need to steel our resolve and renew our commitment!

This is also the time for all Liberals to practice in our own home what we always preach to others – respect. As we move to rebuild, we must genuinely respect the honestly held viewpoints of each party member, including all in our deliberations. We must respect the bedrock principles of democratic process and ensure open debate on all major questions affecting our party’s future. Above all, we must ensure that the only agenda on the table is one that puts the Liberal Party first in the service of Canada and Canadians.

We can undertake the reform and rebuilding our party in a way that puts respect for people, for democracy and for our party first. If we do, I am confident that the legendary resilience and resourcefulness of ordinary Liberals will soon carry us all through to a brighter day for our party and for our country. The sheer enormity of the challenge ought to serve as an inspiration to us all.

Rebuilding and renewal starts with every Liberal but this is no time for the faint-hearted. We need Liberals with the energy and commitment who are ready to dust themselves off and get the job done. Please let us know how you want to help.

The title for this blog post seemed to be the best way I could convince you to click through so that I could point you to what I think is a tremendous piece of long-form journalism by Ira Glass of the radio program This American Life. Earlier this year, Glass aired a major investigative piece into the “drug court” of Superior Court Judge Amanda Williams (left) in Glyn County, Georgia.

I don' think we have “drug courts” in Canada (please, reader, enlighten me if we do though We have them here in Canada too, readers write to tellme, and they are experimenting with them in the UK) but the premise here is that those accused of drug offences can choose to go through the system the old-fashioned way where they have to post a bond to get out of jail while awaiting their trial and then they face peril of being sentenced to a prison term if they are convicted. Of course, they have a chance at a “not guilty” verdict and have built-in appeals processes and the U.S. Constitution which, presumably helps with a fair trial. The “old-fashioned way” also does not provide built-in help for the offender with addiction, education, mental health and so on.

But there's another option in many U.S. counties: The drug court. There are more than 2,500 in the U.S. Here, the defendant essentially admits right off the top to being guilty and signs away rights of appeal in exchange for, the offenders hope, avoiding jail. Judges are given tremendous power and leeway all in the name of trying to rehabilitate or cure the offender of any addiction. Offenders must submit to mandatory drug testing and the court often insists the offender use all sorts of social services while in “drug court”. The approach is one supported by both parties in the U.S. and, apparently, has become an effective way to rehabilitate drug offenders and is a whole lot cheaper than incarceration.

But, as Glass reports, in Judge Williams drug court, the absence of any checks or balances on the judge's power over an offender can lead to some terrible travesties:

We hear the story of Lindsey Dills, who forges two checks on her parents' checking account when she's 17, one for $40 and one for $60, and ends up in drug court for five and a half years, including 14 months behind bars, and then she serves another five years after that—six months of it in Arrendale State Prison, the other four and a half on probation. The average drug court program in the U.S. lasts 15 months. But one main way that Judge Williams' drug court is different from most is how punitive it is. Such long jail sentences are contrary to the philosophy of drug court, as well as the guidelines of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals. For violating drug court rules, Lindsey not only does jail terms of 51 days, 90 days and 104 days, Judge Williams sends her on what she calls an “indefinite sentence,” where she did not specify when Lindsey would get out.

And then there's the case of 22-year-old Brandi Byrd. She got caught by police with two Darvoset pills, a painkiller. She told police they were her mother's and that her mother had given them to her because, without health insurance, Byrd could not afford any painkillers after she had an operation to remove some pre-cancerous cells that could have turned into cervical cancer. She was charged with two felony counts – one for each pill. Darvoset is a schedule four drug under Georgia law. It's her first offense. After spending six days in jail before, Byrd is ready for her first appearance before a judge – Judge Williams.  Byrd is told by the public defender and by the drug court's drug counsellors that she will likely be sentenced to between one and five years in prison — for holding two pills — or she can sign her rights away and go into the “drug court” program Williams runs where she'll be out on the street but required to attend counselling and behave according to a strict court-supervised code of conduct. She picks drug court, finds the program a farce, violates its rules — and gets sentenced to two years in jail. Remember: Her original offence was being caught with two painkiller pills. Glass quotes one defense attorney: “I would say in most courtrooms that that would be dismissed either through an affidavit or testimony of the mother saying she gave it to the daughter.” Glass talks to a district attorney about Byrd's case: “if the person didn’t go into drug court, then it would probably be a probation case.” Judge Williams put her in the can for two years.

While you can click through to read the transcript, I encourage you to throw it on the iPod or find someway to listen to it — you need to hear Lindsey Dills, Brandi Byrd and Judge Williams in their own voices.

And even if you're part of the “tough on crime” crowd, I think you might find Judge Williams to be a little too tough on crime.

Judge Williams didn't think so, though. (And she's got a recent re-election in her county to back her claim up.) So the judge, despite repeated requests for interviews and information from Glass while he researched the story, fired off a 14-page letter [pdf] and a press release [pdf] accusing Glass of engaging in “libel masquerading as journalism.”

The judge, though her lawyer, also makes the claim that:

“Glass [left] is an admitted character assassin who’s not above using his national radio platform for partisan political purposes in the national debate about drug courts, meanwhile trashing a local official whose major offense was to succeed at helping people to get off of drugs, keep off drugs, and survive.”

It's a ridiculous claim as anyone who is a fan of Glass' show knows. His whole schtick is to be the very opposite of a character assassin. He's quiet, sympathetic and bends over backwards to avoid being judgemental. There is a certainly a narrative or a through-line to his pieces which often lead a listener to make some conclusions or judgements but the hallmark of the stories on This American Life is that there is enough those stories that you and I might reach different conclusions — and be able to have a good discussion about them based on those stories. It's precisely the reason This American Life is so widely well-regarded

So Glass writes:

Let me state here unequivocally: I do not admit to being a character assassin. Also: I am not a character assassin. Further: I have no idea what “partisan political purposes” would be in the national debate over drug courts since, as I point out in my story, both major parties support drug courts.

I point all this out in the hope that you'll take the time to first, to listen to Glass' report and then watch the rather remarkable and rare counter-attack by a sitting judge on a journalist. Glass' initial response to that attack is here.