bradm

For a minute there, I thought that Local 765 of CALM (Canadian Alliance of Large Marges) had voted in favour of job action. Aloha, Brad

I saw a bit on one of the evening network newscasts today, talking about the big three auto companies in comparison to the American arms of the foreign companies. It pointed out how a US Hyundai plant that was making SUVs simply switched to making sedans when SUV sales plummeted. In fact, as a plant employee pointed out, they could switch over the type of vehicles the plant produced in a matter of hours. At a GM plant, a similar switch would take weeks. In other words, the foreign auto makers don't just make better vehicles, they're bettter at making vehicles. In fact, there are several (three, I think) new auto plants being opened in the Southern US...all by foreign manufacturers. (One other striking difference: GM has something like 32,000 retired workers that it's supporting with things like health benefits. Hyundai has exactly zero retired workers.) Aloha, Brad

I'm hoping for a reunion of Bob Loblaw, and not just a one-off thing; I want them to be an ongoing concern, doing gigs throughout the year(s). Aloha, Brad

7:00?!?! WHEEL OF FORTUUU... zzzzzt ..... Good evening fellow Canadians ... CityTV runs Law & Order: SVU weeknights at 7pm, so assuming they don't pre-empt for Harper's address, you can choose between a) lurid descriptions of horrific sex crimes against innocent members of the public, and a police drama. Aloha, Brad

Forgot all about that! For others who may have forgotten, or people who hadn't heard about it, check out http://www.jambands.ca/sanctuary/showtopic.php?tid/249416 Aloha, Brad

Audacity. Check out its list of features here. Aloha, Brad

I'm also trying to figure out if Dave is doing the usual (last three years) Dusty Owl Chocholate House. The schedule has but there's no mention of Dave. Aloha, Brad

What's your source for this? (I could certainly believe he was advised that way, but I haven't seen any reports that he was.) Aloha, Brad

The party funding part is what I can't figure out. As Accordion Guy points out I could believe that Harper put the party funding (and three-year public-service strike ban) in the economic update as "sacrificial lambs", bad ideas that were never actually intended to be part of the final, passed bill, because neither of them make sense (especially the strike ban) for a minority government to try. By taking them out, he'd appear to be cooperative and appeasing. His goof was in underestimating how the opposition parties would react. I finder it harder (but not impossible) to believe he goofed in thinking that he could get the economic update passed as it was originally written. Aloha, Brad

At this point, I think pretty much any Canadian would be more than willing to provide some rope to help decide who was to govern the country... Aloha, Brad

I heard he left you a msg in his will..I think it was "Calm down" or something like that... "Get out of my hearse." Aloha, Brad

Is it just Chivas and Glenfiddich? Could we get a full inventory? Aloha, Brad

Correct. Unlike wine, spirits (whiskies, brandies, etc.; stuff that's been through a still) stop aging when they're bottled. (I sometimes wonder if leaving a half-empty bottle of Scotch on the shelf, even when sealed properly, might result in the taste getting degraded due to oxidation from the half-bottle of air on top of it, but that's not the same kind of change you get from the usual way whisky is aged.) Aloha, Brad

I had some last night. The 28-year-old Bruiccladdich I have is nice, too. Aloha, Brad

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=10546093 Aloha, Brad

I figured it out. It all makes sense now. Consider: Royal Canadian Air Farce is ending this fall. I speculate that this whole economic-update-leading-to-a-coalition business was cooked up by the RCAF as a country-wide prank, with the politicians on board from the git-go; I expect it all to go on and on, and get weirder and weirder, with RCAF providing "colour commentary" on the goings-on, and a feedback loop between the Air Farce's series-fade-out antics and actual happenings on Parliament Hill, only to have the whole lot of them appear on on RCAF's finale show on NYE to shout, "Suprise!" and give us the finger all at once. Aloha, Brad

Band/song name claimed. Aloha, Brad

Obviously, IANAL, but it would seem to boil down to interception (yes or no), consent to intercept, express or implied (yes or no) Thanks for that, d_jango. I also wonder if it'll boil down to whether a conference call counts as a private communication. Aloha, Brad

From http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/12/01/ndp-tapes.html My understanding of Canadian law is that, aside from the police acting with a warrant, all that's needed to record a call is permission of at least one of the parties involved in the call*. The law, however, doesn't (as far as I know) make any mention of becoming a party to a call "inadvertently." And while recording the conference call may have been against internal NDP "conference call" rules, that doesn't make it illegal, any more than it would make it illegal for one of the party members who advertently was in on the call to have recorded it. Aloha, Brad * The law in some states in the USA is different, requiring permission of both parties. This came up during the Monica Lewinsky thing, when there was a call recorded that had one party in a state that had a one-party rule, and the other party in a state that had a two-party rule. I can't remember how it was resolved. At least in Canada, it's a cross-country federal thing.

No, "taping" is the usual spelling. Aloha, Brad

Everest is the other opening act. Aloha, Brad

Miles Perkin is SL's bass player, and he lists the gig, saying it's "opening for karkwa". Karkwa also lists the gig, but doesn't mention Super Little. Super Little doesn't list the gig, or list it yet, but it looks like SL hasn't logged in to MySpace since mid-November. If this is happening, I may show up for it. The ticket info (which doesn't list an opening act) says it's an all-ages show, with the doors at 6:30pm and the show at 8:00pm. Aloha, Brad

Sounds like you guys had a ball. Aloha, Brad

Here's yet another nice article I found via Fark: http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/09/04/060904ta_talk_surowiecki Aloha, Brad

Live Grace Potter recordings are available at: http://www.archive.org/details/GracePotterandtheNocturnals including jahdawg's recording of them in Montreal back in September. Aloha, Brad