Earlier today:
A pair of Iranian dissidents — a jailed human rights lawyer (above) and a banned filmmaker (below) — were named winners Friday of the European Parliament’s prestigious Sakharov Prize Continue reading Iranian dissidents win esteemed human rights prize
Yesterday in Lima, Peru, Elise Labott of CNN had this exchange with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton:
QUESTION: You say you don’t want to play the blame game, but certainly there’s a blame game going on in Washington. In fact, during the presidential debate, Vice President Biden said, “We didn’t know.” White House officials calling around saying, “Hey, this is a State Department function.” Are they throwing you under the bus?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Oh, of course not. Look, I take responsibility. I’m in charge of the State Department, 60,000-plus people all over the world, 275 posts. The President and the Vice President certainly wouldn’t be knowledgeable about specific decisions that are made by security professionals. They’re the ones who weigh all of the threats and the risks and the needs and make a considered decision.
via Interview With Elise Labott of CNN.
That quickly led to stories like this one from Reuters’ Andrew Quinn: Continue reading New twists on the politics of the Benghazi attack
A couple of years ago, shortly after becoming Sun Media’s National Bureau Chief, I stood in front of Rideau Hall along with a couple of dozen other reporters hopeful of being picked by the PMO press handlers in order that I might put one — just one — question to Prime Minister Stephen Harper about an issue that had made front pages in our chain and that we had been writing about for nearly a week. The issue for us was the use of taxpayer funds to help a theatre festival in Toronto stage a sympathetic portrait of one of the Toronto 18, the would-be terrorists who plotted to blow up a chunk of downtown Toronto. Almost no other news organization was picking up on that story except for theatre critics who took issue with our coverage of the issue. (A blog post at The Torontoist contains a chronological accounting of our coverage of that issue and the fallout that seems pretty accurate to me.)
The big issue for The Globe and Mail‘s reporter that morning Continue reading The week in media ethics at The Globe and Mail
Prime Minister Stephen Harper had a one-on-one meeting with China’s President Hu Jintao here in Vladivostok, Russia on the margins of the annual APEC summit.
The two met for 30 minutes with a bevy of officials on either side.
According to Canadian officials inside the room, there was no specific mention of the following: Continue reading Hu meets Harper: What they did and didn't talk about
The World Economic Forum (WEF) has just released its 2011-2012 Global Competitiveness Index. One datapoint in that index that Prime Minister Stephen Harper and most of the Conservative caucus have clung to like a lifeline over the last few years is this one: Canada is ranked number one in the world when it comest to “Soundness of Banks.” We’ve held that title since 2008 and we’re number one again this year. That guarantees that that talking point will be a highlight of Harper’s speeches abroad and around the country. In fact, he can boast of this statistic once again tomorrow when he speaks at a conference in Vancouver organized by the Bloomberg news service for investors and the like.
The Harper government — along with provincial governments — may also wish to boast over these two other data points: Continue reading Our banks are number one! Our governments, er, not so much
Mike Lake is one of the Conservative MPs from Edmonton and one of the nicest guys you’re likely to meet. His 16-year-old son, Jaden, has autism. So Mike has used his platform as an MP to raise awareness about — as Mike calls it — “this mysterious disorder” and he’s doing so again this week ahead of the September 9th Edmonton Walk Now for Autism. Do click through on that link for information about how you can help raise awareness, chip in a couple of bucks and learn more about Jaden and autism.
One of the most effective ways Continue reading Support Jaden, Mike and autism awareness
Bev Oda, the Minister for International Co-operation announced yesterday that, two weeks ago, she informed the prime minister of her intention to retire as an MP for the Ontario riding of Durham, effective July 31. A collection of related info… Continue reading In the wake of a minister's resignation, some Bev Oda arcana
In my column for Tuesday’s papers I contrast the upgrade instincts of International Development Minister Bev Oda and Industry Canada bureaucrat Helene Yarmuch. You can read about it here. In it, these documents figure prominently: Continue reading Minister Oda vs. Bureaucrat Helene Yarmuch: A different approach to upgrades
Given the recent flare-up of the debate over supply management, I wondered what consumers were paying for milk. So I asked my Twitter followers. Here’s some responses, put into Storify form:
Here’s some tidbits picked up from around the Web and put together using Storify. [Depending on your browser and connection speed, the story pad could take a few seconds to load. Patience!]