If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
The Blog
Walking the streets of a big city, you begin to notice how there is a lack of common sense around you. Or maybe it's the lack of everyday respect and kindest in our modern world. I'm not a bitter person but there are some things that have really begun to irritate me. I've noticed a significant decline in people's kindness and respect for others.
For some politicians, smearing an opponent and telling lies is just another day at the office. Until the Canadian public declares that this kind of cheap and gutter politics is unworthy of those that offer to stand for office, it will continue. There is something that we need to do, and it's up to us, not politicians, to enact this change.
Even those who are sick of the subject have difficulty escaping the regurgitations of last year's G20 demonstrations that went horribly wrong. Mistakes were made, force was over-used and misdirected, blah, blah, blah. Get over it. Everyone in authority has acknowledged error, and (one hopes) lessons have been learned; the same mistakes will not be repeated next time.
The events around the world of the past month, affirming gay rights, have demonstrated the power of evolution. They demonstrate what is possible when people finally realize that at the core of human existence there is no hierarchy of being, only an equality of one.
Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, who had sent his regrets earlier, literally surprised the guests as well as the media when he showed up to read the city's proclamation at the rainbow flag raising at City Hall earlier this week. His small gesture was a great mayoralty civic obligation that needed to be fulfilled.
David Miller is one of the more well-known people I have taken out for lunch. It is a bit strange when everyone in the restaurant recognizes the person you are lunching with. But I was lucky enough to get him to sit down with me to chat about the "Future of Cities," and the TTC.
Would you ever hesitate to tell your boss the reason that you have a runny nose is because you have the flu? The obvious answer to that question is, no. Then why do we hesitate to talk to our employer about mental illness? My dream is that anybody living with mental illness can have the same dialogue with their employers that I currently enjoy.
As tough as it is to face, the truth is that too many of the Toronto's policies targeting guns and gang violence have been of little more than symbolic value, and of minimal effect in the communities most closely affected by this urban scourge. Rob Ford is running a Toronto where shootings for 2012 are now reported to be up more than 54.7 per cent over since the same period in 2011.
Show business was an odd career aspiration given that little Tamara was, by her own admission, really shy. "I was an only child and my mom threw me into some modeling classes to get me out of my shell," she says.
Over the years I have handled publicity assignments for some of Canada's best known artists, authors, and, now and then, photographers. Although one shouldn't make sweeping generalizations about the personality traits of red hot artists, when it come to photographers, the best cliché is "Mum's the Word".
For teenage boys and lonely men everywhere it's the answer to the nag: "Why don't you stop playing all those damn video games and actually learn something by watching the news instead?"
Tightly shared heritage, values, and pride can obviously drive a solid sense of alignment, and common identity in a community. And those types of cohesive civic societies can be dynamic, creative, and very powerful sources of leadership, and innovation for our world.
The first weekend in May has quickly become known as Jane's Walk weekend in cities the world over -- named for Jane Jacobs, the late author, activist and urban theorist who died in Toronto in 2006.
The Ontario Government has announced they will review how the police respond to the mentally ill. This latest concern about an age-old problem has resulted from a number of fatal shootings involving the police and people with mental illness in Toronto. The police are not mental health professionals and they should not be expected to spend as much time as they do dealing with sick people.
Conventional wisdom is that this is the market at work. This is not the market at work. This is manipulation of a government system of open-ended mortgage insurance that is poorly supervised. What is going on here is a deluge of hot money from abroad that is creating an artificial, and potentially dangerous real estate bubble.
For a book with "Solitude" in its title, it sure has lots of characters! After recently reading One Hundred Years of Solitude, I've been thinking about whether novels are better with large casts or small casts.
