Sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words

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" Some people have a way with words, other people just...uh...don't have a way, I guess"

So you want to be a writer or an actor or a musician?

Go read THIS. Twice. Commit it to memory. Have it tatooed on your chest if necessary. It is excellent advice.

No, stop reading right now and go back, click the link and read the post. Do the goddamn homework for once, I'll wait.

You've read it?  Good, you may proceed.

Speaking as someone who has wordsmithed in one way or another for a living pretty much non-stop since I got out of school the second time (okay, there was that three or four years teaching ESL in Japan, but trust me, that was a kind of writing/performance art) let me offer some advice: If you can do anything else, do that instead. Sell insurance, be a hairdresser, fix cars, join the army, be a code monkey -- Christ, go to law school or get into the porn industry or politics if you have the lack of gag reflex needed, all are more dignified and more profitable than working as a writer, actor or musician.
Okay, fine, so you can't do anything else. You MUST create. Fine, so create. But since you will also have to eat and probably would prefer to live indoors, learn some skills so you can hold down a day job other than waiting tables, because waiting tables is a cliche and once you get past 30, not much of a career option either with very few exceptions and that maitre'd at the fancy French place is probably too busy memorizing wine pairings and practicing upselling to write a novel. Everyone needs that day job. Because creating art does not pay.
There is no such thing as a mid-list author anymore. Freelance writing is ten percent writing and ninety percent salesmanship. No one will pay you anything for your short stories or your poems.
I'm not suggesting that is a reason not to write short stories or poems or songs or symphonies. Not for an instant, just don't expect to make a living at it.
In many ways, those who hope to make it as professional athletes may have an easier time of it. Pro sports is very much a meritocracy -- those who win, succeed and those who lose do not. If you are not making the Jr. B hockey team when you are  17, you can be pretty sure that you are not headed to the NHL and can resign yourself to simply enjoying the game for its own sake and moving on with your life.
Not so the career of an artist. The performing arts are a lot like sports in some ways. There aren't many people who become pop stars or 50 year old pop idols -- though there are some terrific journeymen actors and musicians who have years of quality work we can all enjoy despite them never having had a hit.  No one decides at age 45 to suddenly quit their job as a marketing manager and pursue their dream of playing centre for the Montreal Canadiens, but an awful lot of people think that when they retire, they are going to write that novel or screenplay. They probably won't won't, but it could happen. The thing is, it is a lot harder to keep score in novel writing than in a hockey game.
As it happens, I haven't written the novel yet. I went into the newspaper business early and stayed there. I work in a room full of writers, most of whom are older and more experienced than I am. Not a one would have traded their career in a dying industry for a ground floor spot in computer programming, investment banking or bio-tech. But the jobs they held no longer exist, so you had better learn another trade. Those jobs that allowed would-be novelists make a living while honing their chops as a reporter or ad copy-writer are drying up fast. Obviously, someone is still writing that copy, but for the most part, they aren't getting paid. They are interns or they are people desperate enough to "get their name out there" that they are writing for free or all the copy is coming from the six people still paid to write boilerplate at head office and it is just getting tweaked for your market.
All of which is to say, create, but find a day job you can do without hating it.
And don't listen to anyone who tells you that getting a day job is selling out. It isn't selling out, it is being a goddamn grownup and paying your own bills. Putting your artistic talents to work in a commercial setting to pay the bills isn't selling out either. It is using your skills to make a living. Selling out is when you produce dishonest crap that you know is dishonest crap and try to sell it as art to people too stupid to know the difference. Selling out is when you purposely set out to make art to please anyone but yourself first. Selling out is when you say to yourself: "Wow, this is some cheesy piece of crap I've created that the rubes will just eat up with a spoon. Show me the money and let's see if I can make more bullshit and sell it as chocolate ice-cream!" That isn't using your skills to pay the bills, that's faking orgasms for the johns or feigning outrage on Fox news over Obama being a secret Muslim.

But I digress.

My point is simple. Creating art must ultimately be its own reward, as any expectation of major  financial reward is most likely to result in disappointment and may very well taint the creation of the art in the first place. If you start doing things a certain way in the hopes of pleasing the critics, the advertisers, the publishers or so the record will sell -- the audience will be able to tell. And nothing smells worse than a desperate need to please.

As writer you might have heard of once put it "To thine own self be true"  or in the more modern parlance, let me quote songwriter Guy Clark: "You gotta sing like you don't need the money."

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from your children's cold dead hands, America

From the "You've got to be fucking kidding me, America" department:

Why try to control the spread of push-button death machines when you can dress you kid kevlar?

From the Guardian:

US schools weigh bulletproof uniforms: 'It's no different than a seatbelt in a car'

Except we require people to take a test and have a licence and insurance before they drive a car and not following the rules of the road will land you in jail, fast. 

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so you think you can play harmonica

Well, not anymore I don't




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Not wishing to speak of ill of the dead is a fine sentiment, unless the dead are horrible villains

"No man is an island. Every man's death diminishes me, for I am a part of mankind. "
--John Donne

"There is no such thing as society"
 -- Maggie Thatcher.

"She created today's housing crisis, she produced the banking crisis...In actual fact, every real problem we face today is the legacy of the fact she was fundamentally wrong"
-- former London Mayor Ken Livingstone

The video above is one of dozens, possibly hundreds or even thousands of pieces of art created during Thatcher's reign condemning her. The sheer number of artists that were moved to create critical works ought to give one pause.
While politicians and pundits across North America and in the conservative press in the UK are almost uniform in their adoration of the Iron Lady for hanging on to a former South Atlantic coaling station as the last vestige of Britain's colonial empire at the cost of hundreds of lives, somehow tag teaming with Ronald Reagan to win the Cold War by sheer force of will and steely-eyed determination, and for 'making Britain great again,' thousands of ordinary working people have taken to the streets across England, Northern Ireland and Scotland to celebrate the death of the woman who brought in poll taxes, tried to outlaw homosexuality, destroyed the trade union movement, put Northern Ireland under martial law and had prisoners tortured.

Every man's diminishes me, for I am a part of mankind, but some deaths diminish me more or less than others.




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A manifesto for the internet age

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What could possibly go wrong?

Arizona gun proponents launch free gun program

By CRISTINA SILVA, Associated Press – 6 hours ago 

TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — A campaign promising free shotguns for people in Tucson's most troubled neighborhoods has divided some residents in a community still reeling from a shooting rampage in 2011 that killed six people, left a congresswoman and several others wounded, and made the city a symbol of gun violence in America.
The nonprofit Armed Citizen Project is part of a national campaign to give shotguns to single women and homeowners in neighborhoods with high-crime rates. The effort comes amid a national debate on gun control after mass shootings in Arizona, Colorado and Connecticut.
While towns in Idaho, Utah, Virginia and Pennsylvania have debated ordinances recommending gun ownership, the gun giveaway effort appears to be the first of its kind.
"If you are not willing to protect the citizens of Tucson, someone is going to do it, why not me? Why not have armed citizens protecting themselves," said Shaun McClusky, a real estate agent who plans to start handing out shotguns by May.



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An early April Fool's Day prank?

Has up been declared down and black become white? How did this Toronto Star editorial end up in the Toronto Sun?

But it would be foolish to pretend the credibility of our police force has not taken a serious hit in recent years, due to repeated examples of wrong-doing by officers in the performance of their duties.Too many used excessive force on civilians during the G20.Too many removed their badges so they could not be identified.Too many have been caught on videotape beating up suspects and then lying about it.Too many have refused to co-operate with the province’s Special Investigations Unit, probing alleged wrongdoing by fellow officers.

That would be the same Toronto Sun that had this, this, this and this to say at the time of the G20 police brutality spree.
Credit where credit is due, Toronto Sun police stenographer Joe Warmington did question the police tactics of kettling people at Queen and Spadina, but seemed more miffed about the "parking enforcement vultures"


(insert blind squirrel/broken clock wisecrack here)

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What to watch when you're not watching TV

What if John Hughes directed Game of Thrones?





And speaking of Game of Thrones....




What if geek troubadours Paul and Storm took over a kids' show?






And speaking of naughty puppets...





and speaking of Nathan Fillion and Neil Patrick Harris and musicals about supervillians...




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I'm sure I'm not the only one...

Admit it, when you saw this picture on the front of the Globe and Mail yesterday, you too were thinking the caption should have been "Despite her busy schedule, Laureen Harper still cooks her husband's favorite for breakfast every morning. "

Especially when I got to this part of the article:

 "upward of 200 foster kittens have cycled through the residence under her watch"

I predict yet another sweater-vest offensive from the PM's image consultants. Expect to see him at a hockey game or playing piano or walking the kids to school sometime soon on TV.


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jack would be proud

Another good reason to vote NDP -- can you picture Stephen Harper leading the Tory caucus in song? I mean something other than "Deutchland, Deutchland, Uber Alles"?


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Dignity, always dignity

Take a good look at this photo of the soon-to-be-former mayor of Toronto. I don't think the Rob Ford bluster is going to be sufficient teflon this time. It isn't every day that the chief executive of the Canada's largest city gets hammered and starts grabbing ladies asses. I suspect you will be hearing a lot more about this in the coming days.


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A proud Canadian

RIP Stompin' Tom Connors






This commercial was filmed entirely in Port Dover, Ontario in 1989 or 1990. I happened to be a young reporter at the Port Dover Maple Leaf at the time and was lucky enough to be informed of the filming in the Norfolk Tavern one night. (I'm there in the bar on the right hand side of the screen at 0:06 and 0:10, blink and you'll miss me) They spent an hour dressing the bar with open packs of cigarettes, bag of chip and plenty of glasses of draft beer. Then in comes Tom. He stood around looking stern and soulful at the bar while they shot every angle. Then in came a production assistant with his guitar and sheet of plywood. He did a half a dozen songs and then visited every table in the place for at least long enough to sit and ask everyone's names. He parked himself at table with me and the bar manager and a few guys from the local folk and blues club I set up in town, slugging back Molson's Golden and smoking and telling stories. He claimed to have written a song about just about every city in the country, at least all the one's he'd visited. Most of them, he said, would get him run out of those towns on a rail had they ever been performed in public. The ones on the records were the "nice" ones, the "clean" ones, he told us.

Incidentally, my first full-time professional newspapering job started in December 1988 in Ingersoll, Ontario, working all the hours that there were for $220 a week and all the newsprint I could eat. The editorial staff consisted of the editor - a guy about two years older than I was just out of journalism school - and me. Between us we covered all the events, wrote all the copy, took all the pictures, processed all the film, did all the dark room work and occasionally sold or created an ad. I even delivered the damn thing in the snow one week when the kid on the route I lived on called in sick in blizzard. To top it all off, every week we had to drive across snowy backroads to a central office where all the little weekly papers in the chain were laid out using hot wax, a linotype machine, xacto knives and border tape. It usually took about 14 hours to get it all done.

That central office was in Tilsonburg. And my back still aches when I hear that word.





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At least that's what the unredacted part said

Harper government touts record on openess

By Dean Beeby, The Canadian Press

The Harper government is dismissing a report that ranks it 55th in the world for upholding freedom of information, saying it has a sterling record for openness.

But a four-page document outlining the federal rebuttal took five months to release after a request under the Access to Information Act.

A human-rights group based in Halifax has issued three report cards since 2011 on Canada's anemic standing in the world with regard to so-called right-to-know legislation.

The Centre for Law and Democracy used a 61-point tool to measure Canada's legislation against that of other countries, in co-operation with Madrid-based Access Info Europe.

Canada's standing in September 2011 was 40th of 89 countries, fell to 51st in June last year, then to 55th of 93 countries last September, after Mongolia and Colombia.

"While standards around the world have advanced, Canada's access laws have stagnated and sometimes even regressed," the centre concluded.

Canada's information commissioner, Suzanne Legault, said "the analysis that this group has done is going to be a really useful tool."

But an internal memo last summer to Treasury Board President Tony Clement cites the report's "weaknesses," saying the methodology "does not allow for an accurate comparison of the openness of a society and of its government."

Read more: http://www.thestarphoenix.com/news/Feds+tout+record+openness/8010725/story.html#ixzz2LwVLFOl0



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An old favourite

Some things just never get old. I first posted links to this little video back in 2005 (yes, I have been blogging since the internet was a series of strings and tin cans). But this CBC story and a subsequent twitter conversation about CSIS agents and the Jehovah's Witnesses brought it back to mind.



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all with two fingers

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"This self-delusion is more than ideology"

Not much of a surprise that University of Calgary political scientist and nut bar Barry Cooper brags about his friendship with Tom Flannagan,  Why do I call him a nut bar? Well, this is Professor Coopers take on the First Nations in Canada and presumably aboriginal people anywhere else that white Europeans decided they want to live. At first I thought the subhead was some editor's warning about the content of this op-ed piece.

Aboriginals have no claim to sovereignty

Opinion: This self-delusion is more than ideology
BY BARRY COOPER, POSTMEDIA NEWS

The behaviour of Indian leaders and the gestures of the Idle No More movement are expressions of the same pathologies found on so many reserves in Canada. Political pathology is more than the well-known corruption of so-called chiefs. Almost the entire discussion between Indians and the government is based on complaints, assumptions and assertions that have no basis in reality. They are projections of the imagination. Participants in the discussions, however, take them to be the self-evident structure of the common sense world.
Such self-delusion is more than ideology, because it combines the lowest emotions — guilt, fear and resentment — with the most exalted aspirations to rectify injustice and fulfil the wishes of God, the Creator. To put this problem into perspective, recall a classic study published in 2000 by my longtime colleague and even longer-time friend, Tom Flanagan, called First Nations? Second Thoughts.
The fantasy devoutly believed in by many aboriginals, bureaucrats and lawyers, both on the bench and at the bar, as well as by numerous academics, journalists and intellectuals, goes as follows: (1) Aboriginals are privileged because they were here first; (2) there are no significant differences between European and Indian civilizations so that (3) Indians are sovereign nations; accordingly (4) treaties were nation-to-nation agreements that (5) affirmed aboriginal sovereignty and ownership of the land. And finally, when Canadians acknowledge all the above, Indians will prosper. http://www.canada.com/news/Aboriginals+have+claim+sovereignty/7874774/story.html#ixzz2JCzxr2Tg

You'll want to read the whole thing to really get a taste for how completely idiotic and racist the piece is, but if you are short on time or have a weak stomach, let Eddie Izzard give you the "shorter"





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(hat tip to Alison at Creekside for reminding my of the Izzard bit)

trophies

One assumes that Stephen Maher is out shopping for a frame for this press release from the PMO. I'm sure, in time, it will look lovely hanging on the wall next to Dean Del Mastro's scalp. Glen McGregor must be so jealous.
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Shameless

So let me get this straight: Unless the government steps in and order private companies to pay money a service that no one wants, SUN-TV will be unable to keep up its brave, principled fight against socialism, over-regulation and government interference in private enterprise. Sounds like Ezra Levant's previous adventure in publishing, The Western Standard, which despite accepting massive federal postal subsidies while decrying wasteful government spending and socialism, eventual went out of business as a print magazine whose main function seemed to be to foot Levant's legal bills whenever he got sued for acting like a loudmouth douchebag or wanted to sue someone for pointing out that he was a loudmouth douchebag.
On the plus side, if SUN-TV continues to lose $17 million a year, eventually Pierre Karl Peladeau will run out of money to run his horrible chain of  right-wing scandal sheets. After all, even crazy reactionary wingnuts like Levant, Sue Ann Levy and Peter Worthington aren't going to work for free.Even grifters gotta eat.


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Shocked!

I'm shocked to learn that there is payola gambling going on at FOX NEWS in this establishment



Your winnings Capt. Renault 

"The arrangement was simply FreedomWorks paid Glenn Beck money and Glenn Beck said nice things about FreedomWorks on the air," Armey, the former House majority leader, told Media Matters Friday. "I saw that a million dollars went to Beck this past year, that was the annual expenditure."
Armey, who left the organization this past fall after a dispute over its internal operations, said a similar arrangement was also in place with Rush Limbaugh, but did not know the exact financial details.

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