Remember when I was doing a rundown of days stories for a while? Well, I found a bunch of the stories I had emailed to myself that seem to have gotten caught up in a spam filter, which I personally found odd. You'd think I'd be on my own whitelist. Anyways, here it goes:
From January 24th, a misloaded change machine pays out thousands at a Regina casino: and the casino is trying to track down the people who improperly got the money. This is one of the most underhanded things in casinos: if they make a mistake at the cash cage and short you $1500 or something, there's a big sign there that says the casino is not responsible for errors once you walk away from the window. If you discover it 5 minutes too late, you're out the money. However, if you're at the cash cage and they overpay you, they record your photo and the next time you're in you either return the money or are banned from the establishment. What kind of deal is that?
A reminder that even the "federalists" in Quebec are underhanded and not to be trusted, it turns out Jean Charest (is he still alive?) buried a study which showed that the French population in Montreal was decreasing.
A guard at the Matsqui Correctional Facility was threatened with discipline in November of last year for reporting to Children's Services about a stroller testing positive for cocaine. This story starts to get confusing:
She was reacting to a news conference here by the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers, at which a guard from Matsqui Institution said he was threatened with discipline for calling the children's ministry about a baby whose stroller had tested positive for cocaine last November.The story eventually mentions what any interested reader might wanted to have known: have there been any confirmed cases of baby-fencings? And there was, a woman in Quebec in October of 2006 had 32 grams of heroin on an infant.
Terry Leger, who is also the Matsqui union president, told reporters that for the safety of the child, he felt obligated to alert the children's helpline to the fact the test done when the baby visited Nov. 11 indicated close contact with drugs.
"The concern right from the get-go was this child's safety," said Leger. "I think we have an onus to protect children."
But when the ministry contacted Matsqui for more information, Leger was called in by his supervisors and threatened with an investigation for allegedly breaching the prisoners' privacy, he said.
Leger said he felt intimidated and discouraged from doing what he is obligated to do under the law -- report any suspected abuse of a child.
Hey, remember back on the 28th of January when it was -30 in Edmonton? Well the premiers stupidly decided to pick that week to demand Albertans sacrifice more at the alter of global warming. Nice try, bub.
Speaking of global warming, you know that the pine beetles were sure wishing it was true!
Back from January 31st, in the runup to Valentine's Day, Happy Bunny was causing quite the controversy in Thunder Bay.
Ms. Dale said she ordered the cards from a flyer that her daughter, Emily, brought home from school and had no idea they would contain such dark humour.Good to see public school teachers are still known for their due diligence, eh?
"I just assumed that anything she could order in that book order was all right. I didn't know I had to look for PG- or R-rated."
After receiving complaints from Ms. Dale and others, Scholastic decided to stopselling the cards.
"We take the concerns of our parent, child and teacher customers seriously and, therefore, we have removed this item from this offer, effective immediately," the company said in a statement.
But the company also said the flyer is meant to be distributed to children in Grades 4 to 8 and that the Happy Bunny cards were "clearly identified" as appropriate for pupils in Grade 7 and up.
Hey baby, can I check you for diabetes?
In late January, Guy Lafleur had a warrant out for his arrest. The hockey great turned himself in a couple of days later. Hey, can anybody do this? If I've got a warrant, can I read about it in the paper and just turn myself in, rather than have corrupt EPS officers burst down my door and break my furniture to take me down in the middle of the night? (this never happened to me, but did happen to someone I know)
A couple months ago there was a major push to have flu vaccinations given out across Alberta. Now it turns out we're all going to die anyways.
Now that the Hollywood writers strike is over, I wonder if US stations are still gung-ho to pick up Canadian series? Shaftesbury Films CEO Christina Jennings said "There seems to be a new pattern emerging at American TV networks, which have lately become more open to working with production companies outside the U.S." back on February 4th. Let's see if that trend continues, shall we?
Back in 2002/2003, France was (and is) bitterly opposed to war in Iraq. War in Chad? How could you possibly think to compare the two? Oh, here's some other random war stories from that same day in the news:
- Sri Lanka jets bomb rebels, no end in sight
- "Hard" Kenya Crisis talks resume
- Israel Beefs up Security after Suicide Bombing
- Ex-Ally to fight Mugabe in poll (which you know is going to end violently)
- Afghanistan may become failed state as insurgency spreads: study And leftists treat Iraq like its the only war in the world, eh?
First they do weird things to kids toys en route to North America. Now its possible that the Chinese are deliberately poisoning Japanese consumers. Add in the Tibet debacle currently underway, and this Olympics looks a lot like the 1980 Moscow Games. Or the 1936 Berlin Games.
Jewish groups protested, but a dancing Hitler float still proceeded for Carnivale in Brazil last month.
