The blog known as “but what about the plastic animals?” has a wonderfully good panorama shot of Manhattan taken from the author’s doctor’s office looking south. On reflection perhaps it is goodly wonderful. I have been at a loss for words this evening after watching the Haircut 100 reunion show on Much More Music.
Month: November 2004
Water Pumps
I get a kick as you may have gathered about learning about a whole bunch of aspects of the life and the history of the City. This week I go to to walk around this room late on an autumn afternoon with the yellow sunlight coming in low from the west. These are the original two steam pumps from the later 1800s which drew water in from Lake Ontario. Click on the pictures for much larger versions.
Secret Law
Perhaps for no other reason than the irony, perhaps we could all post the link to Secrecy News, a project of the Federation of American Scientists. In one report this week, we learn of a former US Republican Congresswoman learning about secret regulations while undergoing an airport security check:
Chenoweth-Hage, an ultra-conservative former Congresswoman (R-ID), requested a copy of the regulation that authorizes such pat-downs.
“She said she wanted to see the regulation that required the additional procedure for secondary screening and she was told that she couldn’t see it,” local TSA security director Julian Gonzales told the Idaho Statesman (10/10/04). “She refused to go through additional screening [without seeing the regulation], and she was not allowed to fly,” he said. “It’s pretty simple.” Chenoweth-Hage wasn’t seeking disclosure of the internal criteria used for screening passengers, only the legal authorization for passenger pat-downs. Why couldn’t they at least let her see that? asked Statesman commentator Dan Popkey. “Because we don’t have to,” Mr. Gonzales replied crisply. “That is called ‘sensitive security information.’ She’s not allowed to see it, nor is anyone else,” he said.
I suppose the list of secret regulation topics is also secret so we can’t know a head of time when we might trip up.
PEI v. Canada
David v. Goliath? Perhaps, less dramatic – a nuisance suit. It seems that Prince Edward Island, North America’s tiniest jurisdiction, is pulling out the colonial stops and suing the motherland over the issue of fisheries quota and lines in the water. The Government’s press release includes the following:
Premier Pat Binns today confirmed that the provincial government will be commencing legal action against the Government of Canada to seek a resolution to a number of outstanding fisheries disputes. The disputes relate to not only the herring seiner boundary line, but also to the unfair and inequitable allocation of a number of fisheries species including Bluefin tuna, snow crab and gulf and northern shrimp. “The Prince Edward Island government has been actively and aggressively seeking a resolution to these and other fisheries issues and has not received a satisfactory response or rationale from the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans,” said Premier Binns. “We are reluctant to have to take the federal government to court in order to secure justice for Island fishermen, but the failure to resolve these issues through other means leaves us with no options but to seek a legal settlement.”
There are some very interesting aspects to this case:
- For me the political question turns on (what I understand to be from a distance) the province’s opposition party’s allegation that the legal opinion upon which this decision is based actually advises against bringing a law suit. This may be mere puffery but what will the skuttlebutt be if the case were to be taken on and then lost?
- The issue of where provincial boundaries (even watery ones) are located, according to the wise Professor Hogg who writes on Canadian constitutional law, depends on how the province entered Confederation. This raises the prospect that warms any constitutional hobbyist’s heart that we may actually have an airing of the little discussed but fundamental colonial constitutions which continue as a structure underlying the nature of the fact of each province’s government. In the case of PEI, the colonial constitution is largely located in letters to the first Lieutenant-Governor of the then new colony circa 1769 at the time it broke off from Nova Scotia. The best source of comment on the 1769 PEI constitution is that of Georgia, its next nearest neighbour in time in terms of colonial creation. Will the constitutional law professors of Altanta be taking the stand? Will the lawyers in the case not know or care?
- It will be very interesting to witness the determination of the standing a province has in relation to the rights of its residents under an area of Federal law. “Standing” in law is the right to be associated with a claim and therefore bring or be involved in the case. There is here the play of the related matter of the local culture which is, frankly, first provincial and also to a certain degree unitarian in a way that somewhat excludes the idea that a resident there is also (let alone primarily)…umm…Canadian and subject to the Federal law directly as an individual and not as a part of the collective “Islanders”. Not quite the Borg with red pony-tails but perhaps only by extreme of degree. As the regulation of the fishery is a matter properly within the Federal jurisdiction and the complaint of unfair allocation is an allegation of wrong to individual fishery license holders, I am not clear on what role the provincial government might play in the legal question and what gives them the right to sue on behalf of individuals who happen to live there. Could the towns in which the license holders live also have brought the case? I do not know the answer and there may be a provincial-federal agreement at play but it is a very interesting cultural and constitutional nexus.
So there you have it – hot constitutional law issues arising in the land of the spud. Just the thing as the long winter starts with its promise of stormstays a plenty.
Historic Ales of Scotland
I buy this four 330 ml bottle boxed set every Christmas at the LCBO for no doubt an exorbitant price given all the fancy packaging. What I do not understand is why the beers in this promotional package are not otherwise available as singles. What exactly is being promoted? Anyway, the best thing is that these are all good beers and worth comparing even if each is more or less a unique style on its own.
These beers are made by Heather Ale Ltd. which also brews a full range of cask ales under the “Craigmill Brewery” brand and bottles Craigmill Swallow IPA. It is located in a 18th Century water mill on the river Avon, near Glasgow, in Strathaven, Lanarkshire. The web site for the brewery has a shop for readers in the UK to try and does indicate that single-brand cases can be bought, including cases of Kelpie, a seaweed beer, which is not included in the fourpack. Here is what I think of the four brews that are:
Alba Pine Ale: The label tells me that:Alba is a “triple” style ale, brewed to a traditional Highland recipe using the sprigs of spruce and pine collected in May 1998. This complex rich tawny ale is best drunk at room temperature from a wine goblet. Ingredients: malted barley bree, scots pine and spruce sprigs.I remember thinking before I had tried this ale that I had better brace for something resembling a 1960s institutional floor cleaning liquid. Nothing of the kind. This brew is very well structured with a big malt and sweet pine green front end. It is pretty apparent that there are no hops leaving any bitter edge. Rather the spruce and pine leaves a slight astringency and aromatic heat in the mouth that serves the same function as hops, cutting the cloy of the malt. While the brewer uses the word triple, implying a form of strong Belgian ale, I think that the malty and herbal taste at 7.5% is more analogous to a Belgian dubble.The beer is reddish brown with a very nice tan head that faded quickly unsupported by the low carbination leaving just a rich rim inside the glass. There is lots of woodsy fruit in the glass as well as some whiskey, perhaps smokey notes. At the Beer Advocate, all but 5% of 105 reviewers give it a thumbs up, something I would not have expected for such a unique ale. The finish is orange peel, butterscotch, some heat yet a fresh juiciness quality that would make this rather more-ish if it were available-ish from the LCBO-ish.
Ebulum Elderberry Black Ale: black ale this beer calls itself. It is really an oatmeal stout with fruit flavouring but that is besides the point – the point being that this is very good stout. Elderberry is an ornamental plant here in Canada which grannies grow on their front lawns and make jelly from in the autumn. It is a lovely small fruit bush and, when mature, very productive providing masses of the tart, woodsy, dark grapey berries. It is not that far off a blackberry or what some call a thimble berry but , unlike those, is not shaped like a dark raspberry. It is the perfect compliment to the roastiness and silkiness of an oatmeal stout. The bottle says:It is a rich black ale with fruit aroma, soft texture, roasted grain and red wine flavour, with a gentle finish. Ingredients: malted barley bree, elderberries, roasted oats & barley and hops.It is interesting to note that there is no style called a “black ale” though there is a central European one called Schwartzbeer – but it is a lager. Beer advocatonians pick up the red wine comment and compare to port. Given the truly vineous nature of lambics and other soured beers, I think this is a bit of a red herring but it is not devoid of merit. Again, it is utterly beyond me why the LCBO does not stock the 500 ml bottles as a standing order when it brings this boxed set in each Yule.
I am confused as to the use of “barley-bree” on the lable as I understand this to reference a finished ale, implying I think incorrectly that the other ingredients are infused into that finished ale. I do not think that is the process being employed here given that roasted oats, unmalted, would create a problem with stability if it were merely infused.
Grozet Gooseberry Lager: This deep straw coloured lager pours out quite still, the white head diffusing immediately. The berry flavour is much more forward than in the Ebulum giving a very tangy prominant overtone. It is citrusy – a combination of lemon/orange/lime. The bottle tell us that the ingredients include malted barley bree, wheat, gooseberies, hops, bogmyrtle and meadowsweet – the last two being traditional Scots wild herbs used before hops came to the UK in the 16th century. Unhappy beer advocatonians do not appreciate the goosebeery flavour but as the best dessert I ever ate was a gooseberry-pear pie, I am not worried. The gooseberry matches the tang of the wheat very nicely.
Fraoch Heather Ale: Heather is a lovely thing and, being a Scottish immigrants kid who grew up in New Scotland, a pretty pervasive symbol in my life. Unlike hops, which is a robust annual vine that can grow to hundreds of feet, heather is a low bush that grows in pretty marginal rough places. It has both a sweetness like clover, twigginess and floral blossom aspects. This comes out in the ale, which is otherwise a fairly neutral low-medium pale ale. There is some fruit in the grain which joins with the sweetness of the heather nicely. There is an lavender-orangey thing to it but woodsy rather than fine. The finish is just off-dry and flavourful. Beer advocation is positive. From the brewery’s website, this interesting technique to infuse the beer is explained:
Into the boiling bree of malted barley, sweet gale and flowering heather are added, then after cooling slightly the hot ale is poured into a vat of fresh heather flowers where it infuses for an hour before being fermented.
For me, that is a better use of the infusion description. This one would be a very good every day ale if it were actually for sale here…every day.
So all in all an interesting four pack worthy as an introduction to this interesting brewery. People thinking to make things interesting.
Nova Scotia Snow
First reports are coming out about the crushing wet snow that hit my old home of Nova Scotia with electrical pylon crushing force. Arthur tells us how the storm kind of snuck up on the province. Mike is still shovelling and has yet to post on it. Reports? It’ll be plus ten here in the tropical upper upper-ty-est part of the St. Lawrence Valley today.
Here is the report from Nova Scotia Power.
Another Internet and Defamation Decision
I was very surprised to read this article in Satuday’s Globe and Mail as I had not heard this ruling about slander by email was coming down the pipeline. Madam Justice Wailan Low of the Ontario Superior Court held against a person who did not appear in court to defend a case of slander by email and awarded damages against him which were acknowledged to likely be the person’s entire worldly wealth. The article canvasses the ruling, quoting from the text farily fully but as the text of the ruling is not on the usual web sites for court reports, I can’t tell of the report covers all the content. From the report, it appears that the email at the heart of the slander was one of those that say:
Please forword [sic] this to as many people and list as possible…
The email accused the Plaintiff, a pre-historic archeologist affilliated with Wilfred Laurier, of being a “grave robber”. The email created a chain reaction in which the false allegations were passed along to persons involved with the field of study.
What the article notes but does not really inquire about is the nature of the damages which were awarded which were acknowledged by the Court to be “equivalent to all or a significant portion of the defendant’s assets”. No other measure of the appropriateness of the damages were discussed in the article other than to note an equal amount – $125,000.00 – was awarded against a homeless person in June for defaming Barrick Gold Corp. That ruling is on the internet and was discussed here when it came out. It is unclear to me why the Globe and Mail describes the defendant as “homeless” when the Court of Appeal ruling describes him as follows:
Mr. Lopehandia is a businessman who resides in North Vancouver, British Columbia. He is an officer and director, and the directing mind of the defendant Chile Mineral Fields Canada Ltd., a British Columbia corporation with head offices in Vancouver and purporting to deal in precious-base metals and strategic minerals. It is a deemed fact in this case that the actions of Mr. Lopehandia at issue in the proceeding were undertaken by him in his personal capacity and in his capacity as an officer, director and representative of CMFCL.
Could it be that the court order and fighting the case has left him destitute? Will the same fate not arise from the ruling in this more recent case reported yesterday by the Globe? I suppose that the implication for now is that this stuff ought to be taken very seriously and sending out a slagging email should be low on each of our priorities. It is interesting to note that I am one a list of recipients of one of these circulating emails for a reason I cannot make out. The person who is sending them has a name identical to an old acquaintance but I have confirmed it is not him. Clearly, a dangerous practice.
All in all, good reason to remember your manners.
Two Maps To Consider
From the very bowels of the beast, from the heart of darkness in the main stream media comes a graphical comparative description of information that the suits were too scared to print! OK, it’s just a couple of maps…but they were secreted to this publication. Any comments?
