Category: Uncategorized

Rachel Dolezal’s black brother asks her to come back to the family she has denied. Ms. Dolezal resigned as the head of the Spokane NAACP after her parents publicly said she is not black.

Keith White was a tall man, maybe six foot two inches or more from his appearance in a family photo above. White, on the left, was also large and muscular across his shoulders and in his upper arms. Investigators can only wonder how high the 34-year-old man had to lift himself with those strong arms on the second-deck railing of the Northern Spirit cruise ship Saturday night to lose his balance. Witnesses say he flipped over it, then lost his grip and fell two storeys to the lake below. Some have said not enough was done to rescue Mr. White and that may be true. But it is also true that falling off of a large passenger vessel at any kind of speed is an almost certain death sentence. Throwing a life ring at those distances is almost always futile. The shipping line, Mariposa Cruises, said it took some time to turn the boat around. In fact, Toronto police summoned by 9-1-1, were able to get to the scene before security staff had lowered a rescue boat.

L to r: Ali Omar Ader, Amanda Lindhout, RCMP assistant commissioner James Malizia

The arrest of Ali Omar Ader in Ottawa for the 2008 kidnapping of a Canadian woman in Somalia reveals a long and tricky arm of the RCMP.  Ader was the “main negotiator”” according to the victim, Amanda Lindhout, for the nasty band that kidnapped, raped and abused her during a year-long ordeal in Mogadishu. Mountie deputy commissioner James Malizia would only say the case was “complex.” No doubt. The Mounties had operatives in Somalia and they won’t even say if the Mogadishu government knew about it. How did they get Ader to come to Ottawa where it was no doubt a stunning surprise to him when he was arrested? Did we say tricky?  Ader was taken into custody on June 11 by the RCMP’s Integrated National Security Enforcement Team right in the capital.  He is charged with kidnapping and hostage-taking and appeared in court by video link Friday.  CBC.

There is work to do, but this expert suggests South Korean authorities are getting their act together to end this outbreak of a disease which originates in camels in the mideast.

The Toronto City government appears to be slowly waking up to the arrival of community mailboxes. An Ontario court concluded last week that Canada Post can put the boxes just about anywhere it likes.. That decision came from the valiant effort by Hamilton to get control over the march of these boxes, some of them the size of bus shelters. Whatever unchallenged right Canada Post has had to put boxes anywhere dates from the 19th Century. Community mailboxes will occupy an amount of land that was completely unanticipated by the government when the post office was formed. It represents a huge task to make sure these installations are safe and well-maintained. The City is now going to tell Canada Post about these concerns but it has been slow to wake up to the march of the community mailboxes. Canada Post says it intends to end door to door delivery in South Bayview in 2017. There’s also what appears to be clear departure from fair and equal treatment of all Canadians required by the constitution as the Post Office says it will continue door to door-to-door delivery in perpetuity to downtown neighbourhoods. How nice for them.