“The code says that LAC staff, which includes Canada’s leading librarians and archivists, who set foot in classrooms, attend conferences or speak up at public meetings on their own time are engaging in “high risk” activities.
Given the dangers, the code says, the department’s staff must clear such “personal” activities with their managers in advance to ensure there are no conflicts or “other risks to LAC.”
The code is already having a “chilling” effect on federal archivists and librarians, who used to be encouraged to actively engage and interact with groups interested in everything from genealogy to preserving historical documents, says archivist Loryl MacDonald at the University of Toronto.“
“There’s nothing much right from Day 1 I could do about the movie [Argo]. I changed a line at the end because the caption at the end was disgraceful. It’s like Tiananmen Square, you are sitting in front of a big tank.” – Ken Taylor
Many people (including me) are predicting Argo will likely win Best Picture in The Oscars tonight. So no time is better than now to set the record straight and urge Mr. Ben Affleck, director/actor of Argo to thank Canada and Canadians in his Oscars acceptance speech. If I may be frank and honest, Mr. Ben “WTF” Affleck, enough is enough. Your drama license to twist history to enhance your story telling makes this and other Canadians angry. What will Americans feel if filmmakers from UK or France rewrite history in a “based on real events” movie and minimize the US effort in World War II? Ben, Man up and thank Canada and Canadians in your Oscars speech tonight. If not, I’ve decided to change your name to Ben “WTF” Affleck!
“The original postscript of the movie said that Taylor received 112 citations and awards for his work in freeing the hostages and suggested Taylor didn’t deserve them because the movie ends with the CIA deciding to let Canada have the credit for helping the Americans escape.
Taylor called the postscript lines “disgraceful and insulting” and said it would have caused outrage in Canada if the lines were not changed. Affleck flew Taylor to Los Angeles after the Toronto debut and allowed him to insert a postscript that gave Canada some credit.
Taylor called it a good movie and said he’s not rooting against it, but said it is far from accurate.
“He’s a good director. It’s got momentum. There’s nothing much right from Day 1 I could do about the movie. I changed a line at the end because the caption at the end was disgraceful. It’s like Tiananmen Square, you are sitting in front of a big tank,” he said.“
“MORGAN: A scene from the Oscar-nominated film, Argo, about a daring rescue during the Iranian hostage crisis. I’m back now with former President Jimmy Carter, who was, of course, in the White House at the time. You’ve seen Argo, I take it? How accurate is it from your memory?
CARTER: Well, let me say first of all, it’s a great drama. And I hope it gets the Academy Award for best film because I think it deserves it. The other thing that I would say was that 90 percent of the contributions to the ideas and the consummation of the plan was Canadian. And the movie gives almost full credit to the American CIA.
And with that exception, the movie is very good.
But Ben Affleck’s character in the film was only — he was only in — stayed in Iran a day and a half. And the main hero, in my opinion, was Ken Taylor, who was the Canadian ambassador who orchestrated the entire process.
I was informed about it the first day. And I was very much involved with the Canadian government because the Canadian government would not legally permit six false passports to be issued. So the Canadian parliament had to go into secret session the first time in history, and they voted to let us use six Canadian passports that were false. [Kempton's note: Lets be clear, I doubt the Americans will issue false US passports to Canadians if our roles were switched. Agree? To me, I am so proud of my government, and the cabinet (?, not the parliament?) in approving the false passports to help our friends in urgent need.]
MORGAN: But when you first heard about this outlandish plan to create a fictitious science fiction movie to get these hostages out, you’re the president of the United States. I mean, if this had gone badly wrong, you would have been an absolute laughing stock. So it’s a bold moment for you, for the presidency, for the country.
CARTER: Well, I don’t deny that, but it was much bolder for the Canadian government to do it because the Canadian government was not involved in the hostage crisis, as you know. They could have been hostages themselves had it been revealed. [Kempton's note: This is absolutely the case! Remember, other countries (I will not shame them here) were asked to help the trapped Americans and they refused. Canada helped. And by helping, "Argo" is how Mr. Ben "WTF" Affleck decided to thank us?! WTF Ben!]
But as I said, you know, they did the primary work. And as a matter of fact, the American hostages left Iran and landed in Switzerland and landed before the Iranians ever discovered that they had been there.
When I left office, I ordained that we would not reveal any American’s involvement in the process, but to give the Canadians full credit for the entire heroic episode. And that prevailed for a number of years afterwards. [Kempton's note: This is a right tactical move by President Carter. Totally different from what the movie implied.]
But I think it’s a great film, and it tells a dramatic story. And I think it’s accurate enough. [Kempton's note: President Carter is nice. I am frank with Ben and is hoping I won't have to call him Ben "WTF" Affleck after tonight. Will see.]“
This article is cross posted in examiner.com by me.
After watch this f-bomb ladened debate in the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, Some people may have a point in thinking Lawrence “F-bomb dropping” Ma Yan-kwok (馬恩國) may have single-handedly raised Leung Kwok-hung’s (長毛 Long Hair) approval ratings! Have a watch of this LegCo video recording of the heated exchange and decide for yourself.
Feel free to check out my first documentary Long Hair Revolution (長毛革命) which I’ve finally got it fixed and viewable on YouTube some weeks ago. Enjoy. For more info about Long Hair Revolution (長毛革命), read it here.
Happy belated 102nd Birthday to Nobel Economics Laureate Professor Ronald Coase. Wishing professor Coase good health and all the best in 2013!
In 2009, I took the initiative to spend a few days to download, process, upload, transcribe (small part of), and time-code professor Coase‘s 2003 Coase Lecture (a massive .mov file) to share on YouTube (6 clips in a playlist) to allow interested people from around the world to watch and learn as a way to celebrate professor Coase‘s 99th birthday.
For the last few birthdays of professor Coase, I mainly reshare the above video clips (with a new text interview in 2011). This time around, I’ve taken a new initiative to honour professor Coase‘s 102nd birthday. You see, a few years ago I went to the University of Calgary Law Library to conduct some US patent research for a client. As a bonus/treat for myself, I spent some time to download quite a few academic papers by professor Coase.
To celebrate professor Coase‘s 102nd birthday, I’ve uploaded the following three important papers plus a bonus paper as a special gift to readers of professor Coase‘s ideas.
“The only support I got was from my contemporaries. […] If this tale has any general significance, it is that new ideas are most likely to come from the young who are also the group most likely to recognize the significance of those ideas.”
For me personally, I received these important papers for free from the Law Library. And I see them (Firm, FCC, Lighthouse) deserve to be read by as many people as possible instead of under the messed up limited JSTOR manner. The bottom line, to me, by having these papers available by a single click here is that this save people’s physical travel time to go down to their local university libraries where these papers can be downloaded for free anyway!
It has not escaped my attention and noticed the paradox that The Lighthouse in Economics is a paper that disprove, with facts, the incorrect belief by many people (including my former MBA classmate who has a B.A. degree in Economics) that Lighthouse services cannot be charged thus has to be made freely available by the governments!
*** Concluding thoughts ***
I want to emphasize that I totally agree with the many academics in the #PDFtribute movement and Aaron that it is about time we in Canada and US require academic papers to be made publicly downloadable for FREE in perpetuity if any part (or whole) of their research funding come from any level of government (thus tax payers’ money, our money)!
Alison Klayman, director of Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, was very nice and cool to do her first post-Oscar-shortlist video interview with me on the day after she came back from a Bangkok film festival trip. Here is my video interview with Alison.
I just noticed on the back wall in the following film still, the pictures are the concept drawings that lead to the Remembering (2009), an installation for the Façade of the House of German Art.
Alison and I talked about the middle finger salute in the interview. To me, it is a show of defiance to the powerful, be it the one-party ruled Chinese government or any other governments or powerful institutions.
Nov 7th, 2012 Update: After the announced election result from last night, I got my swing state Nevada (Reno) friend DeAno Jackson to talk election result with me.
If you want to know whats happening in the Rumble 2012 debate between Bill O’Reilly v. Jon Stewart (LIVE starting 8pm EST, i.e. 6pm Calgary time) but don’t want to pay the $5 to LIVE stream the video and watch it yourself, this reporter plans to LIVE blog the whole event in this article and share what other people thinks about the debate as it goes. I will try to highlight some of the good bits I enjoy.
*** LIVE Blogging in reverse chronological order (All time in MST) ***
7:34pm Overall, it is an enjoyable debate for me. I am glad that I paid the $5 to watch the show. It was fun. And even taking away the “fun” factor, it was such an engaging and insightful debate that I’ve learned a lot from Jon Stewart and even from Bill O’Reilly in knowing the kind of things he told his Fox News viewers and how some of the claims can be debunked.
My personal thanks to the doctor and medical student who spoke up on our behalf. Shame on our Canadian government. Shame on us Canadians that we are not more aware of this problem. Canadians are BETTER than the actions of our current government in power!
According to the YouTube clip info, the names of the doctor and medical student speaking up are Chris Keefer and Faria Kamal respectively. I applaud Chris and Faria’s brave protest, risking retribution from the Harper government and their hospital administration.
Q: Why the Chinese government can always win in court?
A: The Chinese government can always lock up or magically make your lawyer “unreachable”. In addition, they can send police to block you from attending your own court hearing. And as if these are not enough, the judges will always follow the wishes of the central government to ensure prompt victory by the governments.
As a long time reader (and fan) of Jan Wong‘s (website, twitter) newspaper articles and “Lunch with” columns, it came to me as a total shock when I belatedly discovered the real reason of why Jan is no longer working for the Canadian newspaper Globe and Mail (she was fired from the fallout of one article) and why Jan, a successful books author and highly skilled writer, has to self-publish her memoir Out of the Blue (Amazon) (this is a story in itself).
Disclosure: I own shares of Manulife and I am shocked and angry of Manulife’s unacceptable business practices. Setting personal feelings aside, it is just bad business to deal with legitimate insurance clients like it did with Jan. These kind of unacceptable behaviours can rightfully drive potential future clients away. I may write a separate article about this. Will see.
In Chinese the word “crisis” is “危機”, a word compose of two parts, “危” for danger and “機” for opportunity. I am serious when I asked “Will blind lawyer Chen Guangcheng (陳光誠) break through Chinese dark cloud of lawlessness?” As if by chance (and I don’t believe in “pure chance”), Guangcheng‘s Chinese name is “光誠”, “光” is light and “誠” for frankness. I am keeping my fingers crossed for all parties involved, for Chen and his family members and supporters, for the US and Chinese governments, and for the powerless Chinese citizens that rights lawyers like Chen are trying to help in China!
“He is best known for having been detained by the People’s Republic of China on allegations of spying for Taiwan. He was imprisoned from April 2005 to February 2008, spending more than 1000 days in prison.[1] Human rights advocates and Chinese patriots called for his release saying the charges were groundless. Throughout the process, he was viciously accused, deplorably defamed (falsely accused of having a mistress) and unreasonably imprisoned.”
I remember during Ching‘s groundless and unreasonable imprisonment, the media reports alway emphasize that he is a Chinese patriot and what had the Chinese government became when they put him in prison! This excerpt from “ST journalist recounts ordeal in China prison” really touched me.
“Background Story – BITTERSWEET FAMILY REUNION
I [Ching Cheong] looked around and realised that father was not among the family members present.
At first, I thought that perhaps father had stayed at home as he was weak and had problems moving about. I thought that one of my siblings would be bringing him over when dinner was ready to start.
So I asked: ‘Who is going to get father?’
It was only then that mother told me that father had passed away on May 20, 2006!
On hearing this, I knelt before mother and cried: ‘Father, I have let you down! Mother, I have let you down!’
I asked mother: ‘Did father blame me?’
She said: ‘No, of course not. Rather, your father comforted me, telling me not to worry. He said, ‘Don’t we know what our son is like?”
When I heard this, my tears fell uncontrollably. This is the greatest trust that a father can place in a child; this is the most precious legacy that he has left me.
Now, whenever I recall his words, I would still cry uncontrollably.“
I was amazed when Mr. Ching told us he received full financial and legal support from The Straits Times, including full salary for the three years he was in prison and also fighting the Chinese government to give him proper legal representation. Unimaginable to westerns accustomed to a fair judicial system, his first Beijing based lawyer backed out the case because of government pressure and he was unable to hire another Beijing lawyer.
Note: As an aside because of the recentescape of Chinese rights activist and blind lawyer Chen Guangcheng (陳光誠), a friend was wearing a set Chen free t-shirt he got previously.
I have been watching these jokes for the last few years now. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do. I can’t stop laughing after watching the first two minutes of Jimmy Kimmel’s beeping and blurring humour! Have fun.
The following is a partial list of questions I asked Sarah Hill in the interview talking about the LIVE broadcast last night from her perspective.
How did the LIVE broadcast come about? How did Sarah know Jean Francois (i.e. the vetting)? What other uses of the G+ Hangout On Air technology can already be used for today? Was there any Hangout On Air technical problems during the broadcast?
I was also able to talk to Jean Francois via G+ message and he was kind to share the setup he used last night and some technical issues he had. Here is my summary of his main setup.
- An old dual core portable computer with 4GB of RAM and a 1394 Firewire port (Firewire 400)
- a Sony HVR camera that was hooked up to the computer with a 1394 wire
According to Jean Francois, the above setup worked well until he had to run after the demonstration. He ended up walking 3-5 km in total and ran into some technical issues. I’ve listed the issues here in Jean Francois’ words. My hope is by sharing the issues, others can have a better LIVE reporting experiences.
“1- [As there wasn't time to organize and tape everything together] The wires kept unhooking themselves
2- The portable kept shutting down as soon as I closed the lid – even if we went in the control panel and set the parameters so it doesn’t turn off.
3- When there is a large crowd sometimes getting the connection is very difficult. I lost a good 45 min trying to [regain connection].
4- The battery of the portable was a major issue. We could have had a power pack but we needed to convert the current, so we needed a “transfo”- It was already too heavy so that option was out of the question.
5- If I had more time I would have loved to be able to have somebody with a hand-held mic but we had an issue bringing the sound from the cam and into the mic headset. I need to do more R&D on this.
6- Also, as I learned from past experience, good streaming means a lot of light. So the more light you have the better the quality of the image will be. [Kempton: I suggest a battery powered LED light panel]
7- And there is a need for a feature to know if you are still on air. I kept asking Sarah if I was still on air because I was not able to see the computer.”
By the way, Sarah plans to do a LIVE hangout tonight (Sat Apr 28) at 10pm EST to talk about the issues re the student demonstrations. If you live in Montreal or in Quebec, watch out for Sarah’s Hangout or invite.
Again, special thanks to Sarah and JeanJean Francois for the amazing and ground breaking coverage last night!
Note: Apologies for the audio echo in my questions. Fortunately, the echo doesn’t affect Sarah’s answers.
Yesterday, City of Edmontonannounced it “will become the first major municipal government in Canada to use Google email and other office technology apps for all City employees“. Google Enterprise stated, “While Edmonton may be the first city in Canada to go Google, it’s in great company with other city governments in North America ─ like Pittsburgh, Orlando and Zapopan, Mexico─ that have already made the move.” It is only natural for people in Calgary, Toronto, and other cities to ask and find out if there are anything we can learn from Edmonton?
In a video interview with Chris Moore, Chief Information Officier of City of Edmonton, Moore said all 6 departments, 31 branches, 10,000+ people, will move to use Google Apps for Government. The press release states, “The change will be phased in over the next few years with Google email and calendar put in place in late 2012, into 2013 and the other apps available for employees to use late next year.“
In fact, Moore told me a few hundred employees are already in pilot projects using Google Apps. (note: While the police services will stay on their separate system, the city’s fire services, parks & recreations, waste management/day-to-day garbage pickup, tax department, etc are part of this move.) In a phone interview with Dr. Jonathan Schaeffer, University of Alberta Vice Provost and Associate Vice President (Information Technology) responsible for moving the university to Google Apps for Education, he said U of A has successfully transition 125,000 people and have 3,000 people to go in a phased migration. The U of A project started in March 2011 and is expected to be completed in early fall 2012.
According to city of Edmonton manager Simon Farbrother, “This move supports our City Vision, The Way Ahead, to use the most innovative technologies available. We will now have a more inclusive work environment where all employees will have access and be able to share and collaborate in real time on the same document whenever they want, in any location, and on any device such as smartphones and laptops.“
By going to a cloud-based solution, Moore explained the city is moving away from the old model of software licenses installed on desktops and laptops, with upgrades every year or every other year, to the concept of iterative changes which people have already experiencing in their use of technologies at home.
According to Moore, 3.2 million dollars is the estimated up front cost for moving to Google Apps (e.g. implementation, training, documentation, etc). The cost savings over five years is about 9.2 million dollars, Read the rest of this entry »
I’ve previously shared my views re child soldiers in my #Kony2012 post which I stated the focus should be less on the hunt for one bad man but instead addressing the much deeper and meaningful challenge of the demobilization and rehabilitation of child soldiers.
I’ve both books on my desk and will be spending more time on “They Fight Like Soldiers” to start.
Question 2) Do you find the violence in The Hunger Games so stylized that you forget that these are children being killed?
When I watched The Hunger Games yesterday, there were two young teens, probably less than 13, 14 years old, plus their mom sitting besides me. If I were a better reporter, I would have asked them after the film how they felt about it. During the show, the kids were already asking the mom questions and I would be interested to know if the mom explain or talk much afterwards and at at dinner time. I found this timely clip about the movie posted by Emory University.
Now, in a calculated stark contrast, David Cronenberg‘s A History of Violence is a film that has been designed to put violence front and center, strip away any stylization or pretence, and force us to face our guilt when “enjoying” the violence. Rolling Stone’s Travers put it this way,
“Cronenberg knows violence is wired into our DNA. His film showed how we secretly crave what we publicly condemn.“
Lets not forget, The Hunger Games depicts a reality TV show where children aged 12-18 have been fighting to death for 74 years in a row! It just seems to me the movie lets the audience (yes “us”, as it you and me) get away free without any guilt. I agree with what EW writer Darren Franich wrote in his “‘The Hunger Games’: What the movie missed about the book“
“But there is one important aspect of the original novel [by Suzanne Collins] that is almost entirely absent from the movie: The darkly funny way in which Collins directly accuses the audience. As in, us. Weirdly, by turning the book into such a fan-baiting crowdpleaser, the movie version of Hunger Games seems to oddly miss the point of its own source material.”
Note re question 1: I haven’t forgotten the shameful ways the US and Canadian governments have acted in the handling of one particular case of child soldier prosecution as I wrote in my #Kony2012 post.
RT @emmgryner: OMG just got off the phone w @Cmdr_Hadfield who signed off saying "see ya when I get back to Earth"...and I got chills 6 days ago
RT @WilliamShatner: I watch @Cmdr_Hadfield 's Space Oddity video last night and I have 2 words for him: "SHOW OFF!" I'd even look good floa… 6 days ago
RT @emmgryner: I am going to bed blown away by all the feedback and love re @Cmdr_Hadfield's Space Oddity. So proud to be a part of it. Wow… 6 days ago
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