I guess I was naïve in thinking that NHL hockey players were genuinely trying to play hockey and that the games weren’t staged spectacles, unlike professional wrestling. Based on a quote from the Leafs’ Frazer McLaren in a CBC article, it seem I was wrong:

McLaren, noting the Leafs had a flat start last time out, said he asked [Ottawa Senator Dave] Dziurzynski to fight.

“I was just trying to get us going early. I asked him [to fight] and he actually said no, so I thought we weren’t going to go and then he ended up dropping his stuff there when the puck dropped,” he said. “He’s a big guy and he actually gave me a few good ones early there.

I can’t recall seeing a quote from an NHL player admitting that the fights were staged before. I think this is why I much prefer watching Olympic hockey games rather than NHL games. At least in the Olympics the hockey players are trying to win the game rather than follow some elaborately choreographed script. (If I’m wrong about this, too, please don’t tell me.)

I happened to see an article on CBC’s site today about the attendance record of Senator Patrick Brazeau, who happens to be the youngest senator. Included in the article was a reference to this tweet from the senator made about a reporter:

https://twitter.com/TheBrazman/status/217704420832591872

The Canadian Press reporter in question happened to be working on a story about his attendance record and had asked Brazeau to comment on his attendance record. He indicated it was poor due to “personal matters”. He made that tweet about an hour after the story was posted.

Since his tweet, he has tweeted a couple of apologies, but the fact remains that he spouted off in public in a manner unbecoming a senator:

http://twitter.com/TheBrazman/status/217728123331035137

http://twitter.com/TheBrazman/status/217729047759831040

Sadly, this guy is going to be a senator for another 38 years and the only way he can be removed is for one of the following reasons:

• Failure to attend two sessions of Parliament;
• Declaration of Bankruptcy;
• Conviction for treason or a felony; and,
• Ceasing to reside or own property in the represented area

He missed 18 of the 72 sittings between June 2011 and April 2012. If he misses 4 more days then he starts being fined $250/day. As well, he missed 65% of the meetings of the aboriginal peoples committee that he sits on and 31% of the human rights committee meetings of which he is deputy chair. Given that he is a former national chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, I think he should be particularly embarrassed.

I understand that one’s priorities should generally be: personal health, family and then work, but if he can’t go to work more often than 75% of the time when the Senate sits less than 100 days a year, he should resign so that someone who is more dedicated to his or her responsibilities can serve.

By now, you’ve probably heard about An Act to enact the Investigating and Preventing Criminal Electronic Communications Act and to amend the Criminal Code and other Acts, otherwise known at Bill C-30, which was put in front of Parliament by the Minister of Public Safety, Vic Toews.

Bill C-30 seeks to, among other things, give the government and law enforcement warrantless powers to invade your privacy. In other words, they’ll be able to ask your ISP for all sorts of personal information about you and your online habits without first obtaining a warrant.

Needless to say, this has made a lot of people very unhappy and resulted in a number of campaigns against it, including the #TellVicEverything hashtag on Twitter.

When questioned about the warrantless access in the House of Commons, the minister basically said that there was nothing about warrantless access in the bill and told people that if they didn’t support the bill they were supporting pedophiles. (Even though the bill makes no reference to pedophiles or pornography.)

And then it appears he actually read the bill he’s endorsing. (more…)

Apparently, an American chain of convenience stores called Maverik  ran a contest called “Joe Schmo to Lambo“:

Apparently the fear of losing their jobs if they lose their cool and blow up at passengers is grounds for threatening a strike, at least according to the president of Local 279 of the Amalgamated Transit Union, which represents OC Transpo bus drivers.

“With the flick of my fingers, we could end up with having the buses not being out on the road” –ATU 279 president Garry Queale

I heard that priceless quote on CBC’s morning show as I was getting ready to head to work this morning and it’s in a story on CBC’s website, too.

In the last week there have been there have been at least three incidents where OC Transpo drivers have behaved completely unprofessionally towards passengers and at least two of them have had repercussions for the drivers:

• a driver was fired for swearing at and threatening a teen,
• a driver abandoned his bus at the Rideau Centre after a passenger complained about him being 40 minutes late (I wrote about this yesterday), and
• a driver apparently decided he was done driving his route and kicked his passengers (mostly senior citizen) off the bus in the middle of nowhere (no report as to what action is being taken against the driver as a result).

Most people would probably agree that bus drivers don’t have the easiest of jobs. While they are well-paid, they take the brunt of the complaints and abuse from passengers unhappy with the service for whatever reason, even if it’s beyond the driver’s control, such as the recent changes to the bus routes in Ottawa. Even with this, many bus drivers put up with it and strive to provide good customer service so they can take pride in their work. But this doesn’t seem to be true for every bus driver, as evidenced by the list above.

Contract negotiations between ATU 279 and OC Transpo are scheduled to start December 8th. ATU 279 reportedly is interested in improving workplace conditions instead of salary, but the fact that they’re already threatening to strike suggests that perhaps the union’s negotiation strategy is based on threats and intimidation rather than genuine negotiation. Someone should remind them how that worked out for the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organizaton (PATCO) in 1981 when they tried something like this. (Hint: On August 5th, 1981 unemployment in the US  increased by 11,345 people.)

There have been three high-profile incidents involving bus drivers in the last week or so. One that CBC reported on yesterday involves a passenger who asked a driver why he was 40 minutes late and after a short back and forth between the two of them the driver got off the bus. The ATU 279 has responded by supporting the driver saying he did the right thing in extricating himself from a conflict situation with a passenger. In the video attached to the story on the CBC site, the union is reported as saying that all their drivers should report conflict situations to their controller, pull over and put the four-way flashers on and wait for someone to show up and that if this means that buses are pulling over on the 417 “so be it”.

It concerns me is that this could result in buses stopping at the side of the 417, a highway where there’s often not a lot of clearance at the sides of the road, particularly downtown, meaning that any vehicle at the side of the road is at risk of being hit. In the case of a bus where there could be 30 or 40 people on board, that’s putting an awful lot of people on the bus at risk, not to mention passing drivers. I hope that drivers will be more responsible and leave the 417 and pull over at the side of the road after they’ve left the high-speed highway where it will be safer to stop.

As for the passenger in yesterday’s incident who demanded to know why the bus was 40 minutes late and upon not being told why encouraged his fellow passengers to complain, too, I think he needs to remember that the drivers are accountable to their employer (i.e. OC Transpo) for their job performance and not directly to the passengers. There can be circumstances beyond the driver’s control, such as being called in to replace a bus that broke down or heavy traffic that can cause a bus to be legitimately late. One shouldn’t automatically assume that it’s the driver’s fault that he or she is late. Even if it is the driver’s fault, there’s no need to be a jerk about it and take it out on the driver — call customer relations at 613-842-3600 or file a complaint online at http://www.octranspo1.com/about-octranspo/customer_service.

A Canadian Press story on CTV’s website today caught my eye. You may be familiar with the $50 million slush stimulus fund ostensibly for last year’s G8 summit that basically allowed Tony Clement to funnel a huge amount of money into his riding of Parry Sound-Muskoka. A large volume of emails between him and Claude Doughty, the mayor of Huntsville, reveals that Tony Clement was micromanaging the fund.

The revelation of these emails by the NDP who dug them up has embarrassed the mayor to the extent that next time he does business with a federal minister he’ll be careful not to leave a “reproducable [sic]” email trail of such discussions – he’s going to do everything by telephone. So, basically, if there’s ever a dispute over what was agreed it’s going to be a your word vs. mine situation, which I don’t see him winning. Yikes!

Maybe he’ll take a leaf from Richard Nixon’s book and start recording all his conversations.