Another ruined dinner party…

KJIPUKTUK (Halifax) – In Nova Scotia, Thanksgiving is a retail closing day.  That means large supermarkets, big drug stores and many stores in malls have to be closed.

But that doesn’t mean retail staff get paid! No – it’s not a paid holiday, even though you can’t work as the store must be closed.

If there is a silver lining it’s that if your boss wants you to work on Thanksgiving – perhaps stocking shelves — and the store or business is closed, you have the right to refuse to work that day—if you tell the boss 7 days ahead of the Thanksgiving.

However if the business is allowed to be open and this includes small grocery stores, gas bars, hotels, tourism venues, newspapers, theatres, buses and trains, laundromats,  used clothing stores, and confectionery stores—you cannot refuse to work, even though your family is having a big dinner or celebration.

If you are among the nearly 30% of Nova Scotians who is unionized, you most likely get the day off with pay.  Thank your union if you get a paid holiday.

First published in NS Advocate — see other social justice articles at nsadvocate.org

Judy Haiven is on the steering committee of Equity Watch.  See their Facebook page or contact Judy at equitywatchns@gmail.com.

Today at the gym there were 4 older guys and 3 middle-aged women.  Several were on the elliptical machines, two were on the stationary bikes, and one was on the rowing machine.  There were also 8 girls from a university sport team doing sit-ups and calisthenics.

Not one of them was watching, or had earphones plugged into CBC News Network’s “Live” coverage of the US Senate hearing, and the grilling of Dr Christine Blasey Ford.

Blasey Ford is the woman who in July, first wrote a letter to Senator Dianne Feinstein and asked for anonymity.  By early September she had been “outed” and decided to come forward as a truth-teller or, as she prefers to say, to do her “civic duty”.  It was only a couple of weeks ago that she agreed to be interviewed and identified as the woman who was sexually assaulted by Judge Brett Kavanaugh in 1982.

The only thing Ford asked for was “caffeine” after her first introductory remarks.  After that she asked for nothing – she didn’t ask for Kavanaugh to be charged, to be whipped or to be dropped as a nominee for the US Supreme Court.  She simply wanted to tell how he tried to rape her.

Perhaps the most upsetting part of the spectacle was the Republican Senator Chuck Grassley (the Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee). He laid  it on rather thick that Blasey Ford and the Democrats had had all summer to come forward, weeks to bring up all this about Kavanaugh and now somehow time has run out.

What’s the rush is the real question here. The rush is that Grassley’s minders including Pres. Trump have decided to appoint Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court tomorrow—basically whatever happens in testimony today.

The most startling event of the day was when Blasey Ford explained that though the sexual assault happened in 1982, when she was 15 years old, she never told anyone until 2012.  This is consistent with rape victims – the self-blame often makes it impossible to report the assault due to shame, fear and guilt.  She never told her parents, a teacher or even friends.

Dr Blasey Ford, a respected psychology professor, stated that in 2012 she and her husband went to see a marriage counselor.  They were arguing about home renovations;  she had demanded a second front door.  Her husband’s view was that it would make the house look bad and it was totally unnecessary.  Finally she let out that she needed to feel safe, and the story of being sexually assaulted by Kavanaugh surfaced.

If you listen to only one thing, I urge you to listen to Dr Blasey Ford’s evidence: how Kavanaugh tried to rape her but couldn’t easily pull down her once piece bathing suit; how terrified she was that Kavanaugh would kill her—even inadvertently by suffocation –because he clamped his hand over her mouth; how she finally escaped the house.

That is why a second front door became necessary even 30 years later.  And that is why they have two front doors to this day.Not Blasey Ford’s house, but one with two front doors.

I love older British “kitchen sink” films which show class struggles and family tragedy.  Here you’ll see some DVDs you can borrow from  the public library, or download somewhere.

In this category are two by leftist Ken Loach that stand out

Kes is about a working class boy who trains falcons.  Brilliant.  It’s a Free World is about a shady job agency which hires immigrant Poles who live in London.

Just watched this excellent film with Albert Finney.  Tells you a lot about Nottingham in the ’60s, and the miles of factories, pubs and industry in the postwar WWII industrial boom.  .. I have a soft spot for the L-Shaped Room.  The novel is by Lynne Reid Banks.  As a child she was shipped  to Saskatoon Sk for a couple of years to escape the bombing of London during WWII. Also her  series of novels (The Indian in the Cupboard)  for young people gave me the name for my son, Omri.

I think I liked reading John Osborne’s  book, Look Back in Anger, slightly more than I liked the film but of course here are movie stars Richard Burton and Claire Bloom acting up a storm. Mary Ure is very good too.

 And while I’m still on the British jag, here’s a new book worth reading The author takes a number of working class jobs in England and Wales of today. The most interesting chapters are the first three about the Amazon warehouse in Staffordshire and how mind-numbing and depressing being a ‘picker’ really is.  Lots of facts and figures about employment, unemployment and  under employment — A good read.

I am in Ottawa for two days, and here’s a rather typical streetscape downtown. Glass street walls — something ugly and gargantuan and to be avoided. But not only in Ottawa. Street walls mean building come right up to the sidewalk and and glass and concrete rim to the street. Not a tree or green verge to see.   I walked out of the public library on Metcalfe St. at closing time Saturday. This  couple with shopping bags and wearing packs walked out ahead of me;  clearly they live on the streets.  At 5 pm Saturday, it was 33 degrees Celsius outside.  Clearly not a day for a parka and winter boots

A wonderful visit to the brand new Ottawa Art Gallery  — it’s lovely, human size and free.  Open to all 9 to 9!!! And a nice cafe and tapas bar. Perfect. Just opened weeks ago. Delightful.  Above:  Maurice Cullen on the left, and on the right the prairie scene is by  Winnipeg artist LL Fitzgerald. This brilliant culpture hangs from the ceiling.  It reveals all the countries which belong to the UN — the biggest geographically (Russia) at the top and it goes down from there.  Made of mixed media! Artist: Jason St-Laurent from Moncton!

Nice painting a farm landscape by Holgate.  Here is a life size canoe made out of cereal boxes! 

The Christian Labour Association of Canada (CLAC)– a right-wing union centre based in Ontario,  advertised on the back of several city buses. Sign says Better Workers, Better Lives: Join a Modern Union.  See https://www.clac.ca/About-us/Who-we-are for more info.

The new Holocaust memorial in Ottawa == too much concrete, too many angles but good photos on concrete by Ed Burtynsky. The sign ‘Christians only’ was from the ’30s, in Toronto.

Closet in the Lord Elgin hotel. Between the ironing board and my red dress, just above my shoes is the decal that shows where to place boots and skates. How Canadian!

Here I am with Jane Maxwell a good friend and activist who lives in Ottawa. We’re having a drink at the Chateau Laurier bar.

Craig Murray was an experienced British diplomat.  Around the time of 9/11 he was sent to Uzbekistan — not a great posting. But he learned Russian, studied business and was all set for an adventure — but what he got was more than he had bargained for.  First he didn’t need Russian because Uzbekistan was being “uzbekistanised” by then President Karimov.  Karimov ruled for 25 years and one day.  Karimov decreed everyone had to speak and read in Uzbek — though as Murray points out there were fewer than 200 books ever written in the language.  Karimov was infamous for boiling his enemies to death and other forms of torture.  Almost everyone was considered an enemy. Murray exposed many of the evils of the regime and in so doing fell afoul of the Brits and the Americans who saw Uzbekistan as a bulwark against Islamic “terror”.  This book is clever and even humorous (in bits).  Well worth reading as Murray has a great sense of humour and also refuses to sit on a pedestal.   

Larry Derfner was a rather a-political writer who pushed and pulled his way through journalism school in California.  In his 30s– in the mid-80s –he decided to go to Israel for an adventure — and stayed. This book told me a lot about Israel, its right wing (and vaguely left) politicians and the situation leftists in Israel are in.  Derfner (who also writes for the blog 972) is no hero, and he’s no activist.  But the book is very much worth reading– if only because he started out hostile to Palestinians and Palestine and he’s been forced to do  a 180. 

I’m not sure if I ever reviewed Gilmour’s book Extraordinary.  It’s a short novel.  It’s brilliant.  It is a gem. I can’t tell you the story, except that it is in the first person and the feelings and knowledge imparted will unsettle and not leave you. 

I should have put Lisa Halliday first in this list.  She’s a young  American novelist who at one point had an affair with the late Philip Roth. In the first half of the novel, the protagonist becomes the muse of an older and successful American novelist. The second half of the novel takes off — with politics, race relations, and a wonderful plot which seems to have nothing to do with the first half.  But you must read it and see for yourself.

I don’t like to diss Canadian writers but I’d stay far away from Will Ferguson’s 419.  It won the Giller in 2012 but don’t let that influence you. Here’s an author who never set foot in Africa, let alone Nigeria — yet this thriller is about scammers  in Nigeria.  These are men who post pleading internet messages about how if you only send them a small fortune they will repay with a larger fortune.  I found the book racist, supercilious and totally unknowing.  The cover says it all 

Journalists around the western world have praised the late John McCain for his gentlemanly ways, his support for democracy and –most recently– his support for “enduring American principles.” 

Really? Let’s have a look. 

Do those principles include his spouting a hawkish rhyme “Bomb bomb bomb– bomb bomb Iran.”  McCain pushed for the total bombing and destruction of Iran.  In the 70s, he was captured during  his 23rd mission of dropping bombs on North Viet Nam.  Hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese were killed, maimed, napalmed or terrorized by bombings  which were  part of the US’s  immoral and illegal war. 

McCain backed then-President Nixon’s bombing of Cambodia, plus the more recent US bombings of Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Pakistan.  He also supported the invasion and occupation of Iraq.  McCain was a good friend of the Saudi royal family; he lauded the current Saudi bombing of Yemen—which we see today has created a humanitarian disaster.  

In 2015, McCain called people who protested war, specifically Henry Kissinger’s role in bombing Laos and Cambodia, “low-life scum” and vowed to remove them from a public meeting.  

According to Mehdi Hasan, a British journalist and reporter for The Intercept, McCain  “mocked Chelsea Clinton as ugly. He made jokes about rape and spousal abuse. He famously called his Vietnamese captors “gooks” and said, “I won’t apologize for that.” He used the C-word against his wife in public.” 

And what of the fact that since January 2017, McCain voted 83% of the time in line with Trump’s positions?

If you would like sources for any of these facts, or to know more — please contact me.

We had a great contingent for today’s Labour Day, we leafleted and sold lots of EW t-shirts. Thanks to all — we make a difference and thanks esp to Liane Tessier who gave a great speech today.