test 6

While I was out, word was posted that Phil Rizzuto has died at age 89. I knew the Scooter was sick and his passing was imminent, but I'm still so taken aback and saddened. Here is Rizzuto's obituary in the New York Times , and the tribute to him on the Yankees' website . Rizzuto played shortstop for the New York Yankees for 13 years, and helped the team win championships in seven of those. To Yankees fans, his play is legendary; to others, over-rated. I knew the Scooter only as a broadcaster. He was a fixture in the Yankees broadcast booth for 40 years , and was very, shall we say, entertaining. Among the bizarrely hilarious gems Rizzuto was famous for were a "WW" on his scorecard - "wasn't watching" - and an early exit "to beat the traffic over the bridge". And Holy Cow (his signature) could that man make a non-sequitur. Some of his crazy riffs were collected in a book: O Holy Cow!: The Selected Verse of Phil Rizzuto . People hated him, ...

One of the best-known and well-loved New Yorkers has died. Brooke Astor, a remarkable woman, died yesterday at the remarkable age of 105. I don't have time to write anything about her this morning. I'll just link to her obituary in the New York Times . (There's a really nice picture on this obit, from an earlier edition .) Ah, Brooke Astor. Where would New York have been without her.

Tala was bouncing off the walls this morning, so we went to Jack Darling Park , the best dog park in Mississauga. It was very convenient to our old place in Port Credit, now it's a bit of a drive, but the dogs love it, and we do, too. Walking the park's trail loop with a friendly dog-mom, we heard about the famous off-leash area in Wasaga Beach. This made me think we should do that overnight we've been talking about, take the dogs to a cabin (although I guess I have to call it a cottage now) for a day or two. This used to be much more important. Living in New York, our annual week (and once, a month) upstate were very special times. Now, having a backyard, much of what we went upstate for, we have every day. (Wow!) But I still want to enjoy more outdoors time in Ontario, and I want to know more of the province than the GTA. We haven't been doing very well with my resolution to go hiking more often. In fact, we haven't been since our first spring hike in early May...

Following up on my post about Peacekeepers' Day , check out our friend M@ on CTV . While you're at it, think about Canadian peacekeeping, where it's been, where it is now, and where it could be. * * * * On the subject of media bias and gay-bashing hypocrisy, see comments here .

What can possibly be gained from incarcerating this man any longer? Hasn't he paid long enough for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, for being raised by people with beliefs the US feels threatens its hegemony? The last time Lt.-Cmdr. William Kuebler saw his client Omar Khadr, the only things the Guantanamo Bay prisoner wanted were some crayons and paper. It was an insight into the deteriorating, child-like mental state of the 20-year-old Canadian and the only Westerner still locked up at the U.S. naval base in Cuba, who has now spent a quarter of his life incarcerated on terrorism charges, he said. Kuebler, a U.S. military lawyer assigned to Khadr's defence four months ago, was at the Canadian Bar Association conference yesterday to urge the country's largest legal organization to take up Khadr's cause, much as law societies in Australia and Great Britain have done for other Guantanamo detainees. He was met with a standing ovation by members of the organizat...

Before we even moved to Canada, I promised myself I would never read another New York Times Magazine feature by Michael Ignatieff, fake liberal and real apologist for US imperialism. From his Harvard keyboard, Ignatieff told us why people other than him should risk life and limb to kill people and destroy towns in a place he doesn't live. His theoretical justifications made my blood boil. When I heard that Ignatieff recently admitted he was wrong about Iraq , I felt, out of fairness, that I should read the piece. I couldn't get it through it without smoke coming out of my ears. The Globe and Mail 's Rick Salatin explains why. For a moment last Sunday, as I opened Michael Ignatieff's alleged mea culpa - Getting Iraq Wrong - in The New York Times Magazine (heralded in advance by The Globe and Mail and lauded by the Times's resident war critic, Frank Rich), I thought he might have learned something. Then I read his piece. "One thing is clear: The costs of stayin...

Canada will soon have a federal elected official who is married to a same-sex partner. Liberal MP Scott Brison is set to become the first federal politician to tie the knot in a same-sex ceremony since MPs made gay marriage the law of the land just over two years ago. Brison, 40, will marry partner Maxime St. Pierre next Saturday in his Kings-Hants riding, a bucolic corner of Nova Scotia's Annapolis Valley. He follows Ontario cabinet minister George Smitherman in smashing one of elected politics' last social taboos. Smitherman exchanged vows last week with partner Christopher Peloso at a northern Ontario resort. Having a spouse has traditionally been considered an important asset on the hustings — but not one of the same sex. Only in the last decade have many gay and lesbian politicians begun publicly acknowledging their sexual orientation. Brison, a former Progressive Conservative party and Liberal party leadership hopeful, came out in 2002 and became Canada's first openl...