….It was such a nice day. And I had to pick up my daughter after a dance and I didn’t get to bed until after midnight and I sat up and read till one or so and I slept until noon. More accurately, I was semi-concious until noon. Then I
Continue readingAuthor: Graeme Decarie
The Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 18: Credit where credit is due….
Today’s Faith Page came as a pleasant surprise. It didn’t take on the rich and powerful – as the Pope’s letter did. But it did break away from the mindless and pointless bilge that usually appears in the sermonette. It’s about sex. (No, don’t go ripping through the pages hoping
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 17: editorial and op ed pages are for OPINION – dammit
On the op ed page of today’s Times and Transcript, there is a note from the President of Crandall University, apologizing (sort of) for having offended lesbians, gays, bisexuals and the transgendered. Below it is a response from the President of the LGBT community organization. That’s nice. I’m glad they’re
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 16: Sorry to be late, today. I fell asleep….
…while reading section A of the Times and Transcript. Seriously. I mean, how long can one read a section whose front page, feature photo is of a man cutting the grass under the headline, “It’s lawn-mowing season again.” But brighter things were in store. The Newstoday section is, as usual,
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 15: Bugs and blah…
News media are the first line of defence for democracy. That should be the first lecture in any Journalism 101 course. Without a supply of unbiased and relevant information from our news media, we cannot make the decision that the electorate in a democracy must make. That’s not being preachy.
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 14: The story you won’t see in the Times and Transcript.
I am beginning this blog on the evening of May 13 because I’m confident the big story will not appear (ever) in the Times and Transcript. The President of Guatemala (who was almost certainly involved in the genocide of Guatemala native peoples that ran up a death toll of a quarter million)
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 13: What’s a tout?
Important question…but, first, lets look at a story the editorial elves at the Moncton TandT didn’t notice. An American government air-testing station, one that sets the standard for the world, has just measured carbon-dioxide in the air (from coal, gasoline, etc.) at 400 parts per million. Not much? Well, the
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 12: 1000 women in Bangladesh…
1000 women in Bangladesh buried alive. They had been locked into a ramshackle building to ensure they would stay for their full, long work hours to ensure they really earned their $38 a month. And it collapsed. That should not have suprised anybody. Women have been abused, overworked, underpaid, crippled, killed
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 11:
The toll of dead women in the collapse of a clothing factory in Bangladesh has now reached a thousand. The corporations who bought their clothing are, of course, shocked. Gee. They didn’t know these women were working in deathtraps for $38 a month. Sure. Those same corporations moved their work
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 10: Let’s start with booze….and then see why New Brunswickers are passive….
There’s a popular belief in Canada and the US that heavy drinking of alcohol actually began with the passage of prohibition. Not true. Canadians and Americans were heavy drinkers up to 1840. Then they turned against it. By the 1870s, no respectable person would admit to even thinking of tasting
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 8: The story that isn’t there
It seems there are two kilometres of pipeline with oil residue in it running through St. John. It’s an Irving line that that went out of use over forty years ago – Irving forgot it was there. There is also no record of it in city files. When asked if
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 8: Break out our best, vintage beer….
For the first time in my experience, The Moncton Times and Transcript has a front page story that really is a front page story. It’s about a big bush fire that has been burning just a twenty minute drive from Moncton. Now, that deserves first page. In fact, it almost
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 7: Perhaps a short blog, today…
I’m late starting because I’m at that point when one’s social life consists of seeing doctors – and it was a full morning of yakking it up over blood tests, bathroom frequency and other gay banter. And I have yet to plan for the Current Events Group at Moncton library
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 6: Poor Loblaw’s…it didn’t know…
…that women supplying it with clothes were working under deadly conditions for a dollar fifty a day. How could they know that conditions were so bad and pay so terrible? And now over 600 women are dead. How could Loblaw’s know? IWell, it’s only happened many times before in American
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 5: Brian Mulroney (and us)…..
…and those hundreds of women burned to death in Bangladesh. There can’t be the slightest doubt about it. The owners of garment factories in Bangladesh knew that the chances of a disatrous fire in which hundreds of their workers would die were almost a sure thing. So did the Canadian and US
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 4: another cranky night with this opening to the May 4 blog….
I’m writing this part of the blog on the night of May 3. I have just been looking over the CBC story that Irving has been awarded 228 million dollars to design a naval patrol ship. 228 million dollars, -just for the design. Ships similar to it have been built in
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 3: A cranky start…
I’m actually beginning late on the night of May 2. I’d really much rather look at old movies on my IPad. But sometimes I get so damn mad, I just have to write.1. I received a media advisory today that a group in St.-Louis de Kent is giving instructions on non-violent
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 2: ???????
It’s a big story, right up there on page 1 with the biggest, blackest headline of the page, “Doctors urged to oppose lawsuit”. To story arises because New Brunswick’s doctors are suing the New Brunswick government over its budget cuts affecting health. They are suing because Health Minister Fleming has been so loutish,
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: May 1: Let’s start by being nice….
Yesterday, there was a gatehering of people who represented 50,000 New Brunswickers opposed to shale gas exploration. The story in the Times and Transcript (A4) was unbiased, well-written, and included a listed of all the organizations that had signed the letter of protest it was presenting to shale gas exploration
Continue readingThe Moncton Times@Transcript - Good and Bad: April 30: General…
I am writing this on April 29 because on April 30 in the morning, I shall be busy exercising my right of free speech to express my views on shale gas; and in the afternoon, I shall be busy looking at a doctor examining various parts of me, and shaking her
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