I’ll take slow and boring over pitchforks, thanks
This week I’ll keep the roundup a little shorter. I’m hanging out most unwelcomingly at the Conservative Party Convention in Quebec City and writing a longer piece about that. I will endeavour to make it entertaining and perhaps even funny but fair warning, some of this stuff is pretty grim. It’s hard to laugh at institutional vandalism and the thrashing of human rights.
Speaking of which, in my Ottawa Citizen column I urge readers to take comfort in the fact that a long, boring and underwhelming criminal trial for convoy leaders Tamara Lich and Chris Barber is a good thing. It’s our institutions working as intended. Accountability will come, we just have to wait a little longer for it.
In the same paper I also have a Q&A with legendary (even though he’s not old) Ottawa entrepreneur Adam Miron.
And unrelated to anything else, I like this story about what inmates in Canadian prisons order from Amazon.
Viva Montréal
Middle Child turned 15 and to celebrate we went to Montréal because — I don’t need a reason beyond “it’s right there and way less uncool than Bytown,” do I. My teen wanted to explore the Biodôme and the bug place, both of which were excellent. We had some extra time and wound up at Parc Jean-Drapeau to check out the Biosphère before enjoying a lovely meal in the Vieux-Port.
I especially appreciated the bean beds at the Biosphère theatre. What a great human-friendly thing to have, so you can lie down (nap, too!) and watch educational films in comfort. There are chairs at the back for those who prefer that option, maybe because they worry they wouldn’t be able to get back up from the floor. After a full day of driving and walking and oohing and aahing that almost included me, not gonna lie.
I also discovered that sheep are being used to keep the grass down in Parc Maisonneuve and I may have squealed with joy a little.
En français
D’aucuns se demandent si c’est une bonne idée de criminaliser le contrôle coercitif. En particulier parce que les tribunaux sont déjà engorgés alors voilà, finalement, ça va-tu vraiment faire une difference?
Excusez-moi, il faut que j’aille ramasser les bras qui m’en sont tombés.
Laissez-moi vous poser la question autrement: La criminalisation du meurtre ne sert en rien à prévenir les homicides, ça ne ressuscite personne et en plus ça contribue grandement à l’engorgement des tribunaux dont au sujet duquel on causait il y a à peine 12 secondes. Ça vaut-il la peine de continuer à criminaliser le meurtre?
