My first real Chick tract

I tend to collect any evangelical Christian tracts that I find lying around or that are handed out on the street, but usually I just get Living Waters tracts, which invariably end with the 10 commandments test.

Today, however, while shopping for a new coat at Southgate Mall in Edmonton, I came across my first authentic Jack T. Chick brand tract!

This specific version is the “Titanic” where the evil atheist Chester who rejects his aunt’s preaching, and then upon finding a note from her in his suitcase declares his eternal hatred for her and “her Jesus” and wishes she was dead. The Titanic then sinks and Chester at the Pearly Gates discovers that he’s not in The Book of Life and goes to hell.

Are you “sexually broken?”

Then Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron’s Crocoduck Ministry can help. And luckily, they are actually in Canada (I passed their storefront on Hastings St. today in Vancouver).

From their website:

Living Water is a community-based, Christ-centred discipleship program that deals specifically with relational and sexual brokenness

I’m pretty sure they’ve invented a pill for “sexual brokenness.”

There’s a few places you might know these guys from.

Kirk Cameron was on growing pains
The banana argument (banana ergo God)

The Crocoduck argument against evolution

Their upcoming ploy to give away free copies, at a University near you, of the Origin of Species, complete with an introduction [pdf] that blames the Holocaust on Darwin.

Dipperspam and Pics from the Layton Rally

Not counting the newsletter that I got from Linda Duncan a few weeks ago (which is justifiably considered as legitimate MP-constituent communication materials), I have until today only received spam-like 10%-ers from the Conservatives and Liberals.

There’s a few notable differences with this new Dipperspam though.

It’s from MY MP and not some random person several hundred to thousand kilometres away.
It’s a third of a page (of cardstock) rather than a full page.
It leaves a quarter of the total space available to comments (as opposed to one or two lines in a corner).
The address goes to Linda’s office here in Edmonton-Strathcona rather than some dark office on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.

So here it is:

And now for some pictures from the joint Edmonton East/Centre federal riding nominations where Ray Martin and Lewis Cardinall were acclaimed with Jack Layton present.

Highlights of the night:

Linda Duncan likes my shoes (essentially these:)

I didn’t realize Lewis Cardinall’s brother Lorne was Davis from Corner Gas

Jack Layton, Lewis and Lorne Cardinall, Linda Duncan, Brian Mason and a host of Dippers crashed Avenue Pizza near campus for beers. It’s great when I can go to the same bar with work, school, and politics.
Jack Layton randomly talked to just about everyone in the entire bar. Now that’s connecting with “Joe Six-Pack.”

Canada Day Fireworks from Edmonton

Courtesy of Ryan Jackman at the Edmonton Journal, here’s the time lapse (although he pointed too low to see the two 16″ beasts that were set off).

Apparently Ignatieff is too right wing for some Albertans

The following was taken after the Silly Summer Canada Day Parade on Whyte Avenue that Michael Ignatieff was rumoured to show up in, but didn’t end up making an appearance (local NDP representatives Rachel Notley and Linda Duncan sported hockey sticks and cheered to the crowd).

This follows a Liberal 10%er that I promise to upload in the next few days.

Update: As mentioned by Daveberta in the comments and seen on the Edmonton Journal’s photo gallery, Ignatieff was in the parade.

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Alberta+election+rules+report/1749282/story.html

(un)Inspiring Education, or using social media to give the illusion of input

With the exception of Bill 44, a great buzz and hope has been over the blogosphere that Minister Hancock’s “Inspiring Education” plan would generate some meaningful input from the Albertan public into the future of education in this province.

With a mission statement to:

What are your hopes, dreams and aspirations? For your children and grandchildren? If we are to be successful individually and collectively as a province, we need to consider how to help all Albertans realize their potential. Inspiring Education: A Dialogue with Albertans is an opportunity to shape the future of education in Alberta and we want to hear your perspective. Tell us your story. Share your opinions. Join the conversation!

The discussions will be based on five key values – opportunity, fairness, citizenship, choice and diversity – which are critical to the success of Alberta’s education system. Inspiring Education seeks ideas, suggestions and points of view from all parts of our province, from large cities to remote and rural communities; from inner-city neighbourhoods to expanding suburbs; from towns and cities experiencing the pressures of rapid growth to those dealing with the challenges of declining population.

Inspiring Education is different from a public consultation. It’s a dialogue – an exchange of ideas to change each other’s thinking about what education is and what education means. It’s about looking to the future and deciding what education in Alberta should be in twenty years. No matter who you are or where you live in Alberta, we invite you to listen and contribute to the conversation. One of the primary goals is to reach a clear understanding of what it will mean to be an educated Albertan 20 years from now. To reach that goal we need everyone’s voice.

Sounds exciting right? Who doesn’t want to have a say in the next 20 years of education in this province.

With a website of videos and media, a blog, and a twitter account, the only thing missing for a full “Web 2.0” presence is Facebook. In the community they’re holding forums at each major city.

Clearly, this must be a meaningful dialogue that can only result in substantial policy documents.

So what does the dialogue look like? We can use their convenient “Community Conversation Kit” and a story (I received by email, but was given permission to republish) from Dr. Jim Linville, who frustratingly sat through an entire session in Lethbridge (his relevant quotes on each session will be in bold).

So let’s analyze the basic structure of the “3-hour model”:

Introductions by Facilitator (10 min)

This portion is supposed to outline the goals of InspiringEd, and emphasizes the following rules:

Everyone has wisdom.

We need everyone’s wisdom for the wisest result.

There are no wrong answers.

The whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

Everyone will hear others and be heard.

This included the usual greetings and BS and a video “Welcome” from the minister of education. And a video of some Japanese (actually mostly white folk) drum group from Edmonton playing some thing called “Harmony”. On drums. I wonder if the irony was noticed by anyone else. Anyway, the guy introduced the video with a 10 minute BS spiel about drums, heartbeats, healing, spirituality, and associated touchy feeling crap. After the video everyone (but me) applauded.
The Outcomes of the whole process was to be: 1) The awareness of the importance of education, especially for a prosperous society. 2) Development of a long term vision for education, 3) And the development of a policy framework governing the goals for the delivery of education.
Sounds pretty specific and good, eh? Well, then they showed another fucking video with more tear-jerking kids are our future crap.

Table Introductions (10 minutes)

Then we had to talk to our neighbor for 10 minutes and then introduce him/her to the rest of the people at the table.

Table Activity: Picture Activity on Past and Future Learning (20 minutes)

Then we had a section called “Past Learning–Its place in our lives” Now, this was NOT a discussion on the history of education or education policy in Alberta. No, not even close. It was “all about us”. So, the facilitator got a big chart and had us talk about “how” and “where” we learned what we know. Did you know that some people have learned things in classrooms? And from the news? And that some people have learned from their mistakes. Wow.
All of these things were put on the big chart by the facilitator and duly noted by the note taker.

Then there was the section called “The Beginning of the Story for Your Hopes, Dreams and Aspirations for the Next 20 Years”.
OK, at this point we get to say what we thing students need to know, right? WRONGO! WE GOT TO LOOK AT BIG 8×10 GLOSSY PHOTOGRAPHS WITH NUMBERS AND TITLES ON THE BACK OF EACH ONE, AND TELL THE GROUP HOW THESE MADE US FEEL ABOUT EDUCATION.

That is right, kiddies, we had to sort through a whole pile of photos: Everyone got to pick 2, that told the “story” of our own education… but some people picked 3 (bastards). Let’s see, there was a picture of a flower, a boy playing a guitar, 2 kids on a beach, kids finger painting on a wall. A group of people fixing dinner, a newly hatched baby chicken, pyramids, that kind of thing. No slinky babes (bastards).

The jargon, “accomplishment”, “hopes” “achieving”, “leadership” “victory” “dreams” etc etc were bandied about.

Table Activity (Optional): Creating and Sharing Collective Stories about Learning (10-20 minutes)

After coffee, we had to make a synthesis out of all the selected pictures, to make, as the agenda said, “Your Hopes, Dreams and Aspirations – A Collective Story”. ??? Of course, by this time, the whole affair was reduced to finding the right abstract buzzwords that could link the different pictures. I’ll bet you didn’t know that a picture of baby chicken with the remains of its egg nearby represents the same frickin’ thing as the frinkin’ pyramids, did you. Bet you didn’t want to know. And I bet you didn’t want to know your tax money was going to pay to find out.

Then we got to see the pictures 2 other tables had and then compare buzzwords (they were much the same).

Dr. Jim’s group then broke for lunch, and while I assume he followed a similar format to the rest of the 3-hour model, he describes it fairly bleakly:

We were promised that after lunch more detailed and practical discussion would take place, which is the only reason I went back, but the facilitator made sure this didn’t happen. There was another videos and this actually had some promise but nothing was made of it. In the video, a U of C education prof linked the old school system to the need to mass produce people for a newly industrialized society. Rather than just give information, education today must help students evaluate mass produced information. Very interesting. But nothing came of it. Another guy said we have to rethink the meritocracy of the old system (new forms of assessing learning etc). Again, lots of fodder for thought, but again, the fascilitator kept everyone well away from specifics (which may have ended up criticizing the government, I was beginning to suspect). The third person on the video was a big advocate of NGOs sharing the burden of education. Lots for me to get pissed off about this, as she would have had every half brained self-interest group being equally involved in public education. Again nothing happened.

Final words from Dr. Jim:

At some point the facilitator/obstacle-ator) wanted to know what we missed talking about, and I mentioned curriculum, but no one wanted to talk about that and we were shepherded away from that anyway.

Looking through the InspiringEd website, it’s easy to be impressed at first. But digging through, with some actual effort, I have to ask: Where is the substance? Where is the actual commitment to look at anything beyond the bare minimum in buzz words?

And so it starts to dawn on me: Social media, while supposedly powerful (other than supposedly electing Obama in the USA, what public policy has social media actually influenced), may in fact be more likely yet another tool that can be used by powers that be to convince the populace it has input in governance.

Think about it: if Alberta Education gave a shit about your opinion for anything that matters, wouldn’t you have heard about Bill 44’s controversial provisions before they were put before the Legislature (or any number of other controversial bills that this provincial government has put forward)?

Just because the internet is flashy doesn’t mean you shouldn’t question it.

RIP Gilbert Bouchard

Gilbert Bouchard, who I knew as a local Unitarian and Edmonton Journal writer, had been missing for a few weeks after being depressed, and now his body has turned up in the North Saskatchewan River.

Gilbert wrote the first article about the UofA Atheists and Agnostics for the Edmonton Journal’s online “Ed” magazine, which quickly became one of their most lively discussions and was subsequently published in the print Journal.

Gilbert touched many lives in Edmonton, as witnessed by the over 700 members who’ve joined the memorial Facebook group dedicated to him.

Services honouring his life will take place at the Unitarian Church of Edmonton in the near future.

Gilbert will be missed by all who knew him.

Successful health care rally

The Friends of Medicare held a huge rally today at the Legislature with “nearly a thousand people” in attendance (source: iNews 880).

The rally featured NDP leader Brian Mason and Liberal MLA Hugh MacDonald.

While I doubt Stelmach and Liepert are going to listen, the first 14,000 signatures of the Friends of Medicare petition to stop the attack on Medicare were presented to Mason and MacDonald to present in the legislature.

Democratic Renewal Project stalemates in Edmonton-Mill Creek

Tonight was the first meeting of the 2009 AGM of the NDP constituency association for Edmonton – Mill Creek.

As I predicted, this riding had some noise come up. Alvin Finkel, a paid NDP member in the riding, brought his friends from his Democratic Renewal Project (of which I had access to the forum, but am no longer registered for…) out, and contested the presidency of the board.

Alvin himself didn’t run (likely to save face and appear non-partisan as the chair of the DRP) for the position, but had an associate of his, I believe the name was Earl Chowedry (don’t quote my spelling), run.

Barney Chanyi, a union leader from Edmonton Strathcona (provincially) contested the DRP nomination and strongly favoured a pro-NDP, anti-Liberal collaboration platform.

After brief and confusing speeches, including Earl mentioning his support for pre-election agreements and that he believed such an agreement would result in an NDP candidate for Mill Creek (although the past few elections would call him a liar, based on Aman Gill coming in a much closer second than the distant NDP candidates), the votes came in.

We had a tie.

After much deliberation, it was decided that we would re-vote as there may be changes in votes or moves from abstention to either side.

Nevertheless we had a second tie.

Several motions failed to resolve the issue, including one from Alvin and the “Democratic” Renewal Project that boiled down to flipping a coin for the winner (and giving the loser the Vice-Presidency) and having the chair, former candidate but non-Mill Creek resident Stephen Anderson, cast the deciding ballot.

Any attempt to offer co-presidencies was turned down, likely due to the fact both candidates had vastly different agendas for the direction of the party in Mill Creek (with one not wanting to run a candidate, and the other not wanting to see the NDP die in the province).

In the end, we followed the idea I threw out to adjourn the meeting and try again in a few weeks.

While the Alberta NDP constitution requires a minimum of 14 days notice for an AGM, the next one may not be until the week of June 8-12 and may require a larger venue, since tonights meeting already packed the Buddha Bowl on Whyte Ave (at 75 St).

So, until a few weeks from now, we’ll have peace in the riding, but both factions will definitely be actively recruiting and voicing their opinions regarding their preferred vision for opposition parties in the province.

Conservaspam…yet again

Today (meaning yesterday for me and last week for everyone not living in a condo) Edmonton Strathcona was blanketed, yet again, by taxpayer-supported Conservative Party spam.

This edition features very broad talk about lowering taxes and paying down the debt (which was more Chretien/Martin’s doing) and yet more “Stand up for Canada” badgering.

Interestingly, they do take this opportunity to remind us how “certain members of the opposition parties were plotting their undemocratic Coalition power-grab” while the Conservatives were clearly trying to fix the economy they didn’t think was broken using ultra-partisan attacks on women and worker’s rights (some of which made it into the budget anyway, and gained the more Conservative supportive Ignatieff’s votes).

The final bit of note from this piece of trash is that it comes not from Stephen Harper or Laurie Hawn, but from the wife of now unemployed (actually still a student) Rahim Jaffer, Ms. Helena Guergis, of the riding Simcoe-Grey in Southern Ontario (a long way from Edmonton).

Anyways, here’s the images for those interested:

Not entirely sure what I’ll write on this one, perhaps I’ll ask how ol’ Jaffer’s doing and if he thinks he can win the nod with the new competition.

Update: Here’s the message I squeezed into the few lines they give (and the PS below Harper’s mugshot):

Please do not mail me, you are not my MP. The Coalition was the first chance at DEMOCRACY* in Canada in a long time, so please refrain from lies & scare tactics.

P.S. How is Rahim enjoying retirement? You can keep him.

*By democracy, I refer to what the majority of Canadians want, which is not Mr. Harper.

In our system pro-roguing parliament without the confidence of the House is undemocratic.

And of course I checked Jack Layton, despite the nice arrow hinting at the “preferred” choice (does that really work on anyone?).