US News & World Report is running a story about a new report by a Brussels-based international crisis group that Iraq is sliding towards civil war as moderate voices are waning along with American influence amidst the rumours of a pull-out. The report advises that the international community should "start planning for the contingency that Iraq will fall apart, so as to contain the inevitable fallout of regional stability and security."

And with the precise flair for ingenuity and responsible leadership that we have come to expect from him, President Bush explains to ABC News that American troops will not step in to avoid greater division. "No." "The troops are chasing down terrorists. They're protecting themselves and protecting the people, and -- but a major function is to train the Iraqis so they can do the work. I mean the ultimate success in Iraq -- and I believe we're going to be successful -- is for the Iraqi citizens to continue to demand unity."

Yes, getting rid of Saddam and smashing the country was his job, but building it all back up again is dependent on "Iraqi citizens to continue to demand unity." Now I ask you. How does one demand unity? I suppose you can do it like this: "We demand unity or else we'll blow everybody's heads off," but that doesn't sound very productive when you are trying to avoid a civil war. And how does a democratic electorate do that? Georgie Jr. grew up in a democracy, right?

Way back at the beginning of his first term, Bush said he didn't think America's armed forces should be used for "nation building" but "to fight and win war." It seems now that he meant it in the most extreme manner possible. Is there going to be a civil war in Iraq? Well, that's really none of our business, is it?

Here is a hilarious parody simulating the package design process for a new "Microsoft" iPod. I think you'll love it.

I found it through Digg.com with the comment: "Ever wonder if the brains at Microsoft made the iPod and packaged it. Well this video will give you an idea of the horror."

Microsoft iPod Packaging

The other night I had a dream about my grandmother's house in Tattamangalam, a small town in the Indian state of Kerala, right at the tip of the subcontinent. My father grew up there, and we still have hundreds of relatives in the region. I have been to India three times in the last five years, and built an extensive family tree. You can download one of the nine panels here. This one shows part of my grandmother's side of the family only and is a little old: my apologies to Corrie and Michael, who are now married to Matthew and Jenni respectively. (My name is number 719.)

Kerala is one of the world's breadbaskets. Rice paddies filled with water and bounded by lines of coconut trees stretch from horizon to horizon. Every morning at sunrise fresh milk and vegetables are carted into town. Every evening at dusk, lights are lit to the Hindu deities at temples large and small, which dot the landscape and inhabit every home.

If you use Google Earth you can see just how drenched with water this major farming area is, by downloading and launching this placemark. My grandmother's home is one of the blurry houses near the centre of the screen. The abundance of water was also a major attraction for Coca-Cola, who opened a bottling factory in the area, and this is one of the places where the water table was dropping because it was being mixed with sugar and bottled for sale.

My dream went as many dreams go, sometimes clear and sometimes not. In the dream, my brother and sister were children, like we were when we travelled there as a family 25 years ago. I was off doing something next door when I heard Matthew calling from the front yard that someone had arrived at the gate. I looked out the window and watched as a man wearing a grey suit and a red, black and green hat greeted my grandmother and then sat down at a table in the yard. Apparently, there had just been an election and he was visiting his constituents in the area.

You see, he was the village's new member of parliament. From Hamas.

Cindy Klassen has been chosen as Canada's flagbearer for the closing ceremonies. She will carry the maple leaf as the first female speed skater to win five medals in an Olympics. And as the only Canadian ever to win six medals in total, Cindy Klassen is Canada's greatest Olympian.

The closing ceremonies will include a special Canadian section during which Vancouver 2010 will be introduced. Avril Lavigne is performing.

Barring any compelling news or photographs in the upcoming days, this should be my last posting on the Cindy Klassen Games, I mean, the Torino Winter Olympics. I hope you haven't found them boring. I have discovered myself being glued at some point to all but one Olympic Games since Sarajevo and Los Angeles in 1984. In Sarajevo, Canada won four medals, three of them by speed skater Gaetan Boucher; in Torino we won twenty-four. I rarely go in planning to watch any of the Games, but then something always happens and I get hooked. The only exception was Athens in 2004, when I was living in Italy and didn't have access to decent television or prominent Canadian press. For me, Athens never happened.

Torino began for me back on Day 5 when I noticed the medals. Then the men's hockey team seemed to be all strangers to me--but the Games really got my attention when they took a swan dive against Switzerland.

Of course, close proximity to Switzerland is enough to make anyone lose their mind.

I just have to pay tribute to the great Don Knotts, who passed away yesterday of pulmonary and respiratory complications.

Don Knotts will be remembered by one generation for playing Barney Fife on the Andy Griffith Show, and goofy landlord Mr. Furley on Three's Company by the next. For those of you too young to have seen that sitcom, which ended in 1984, you may remember him as the TV repairman in the movie Pleasantville, with Reese Witherspoon and Tobey Maguire. Most recently, Don Knotts was the voice of Mayor Turkey Lurkey in Chicken Little.

Don Knotts was 81.

Well, not really, but we should. Did you know that Canadians have thirteen (13!) fourth-place finishes at this year's Olympic Winter Games?

Read the CBC story here. Pierre Lueders's fourth in the 4-man bobsled today was number twelve, and Eric Bedard's in the 500m short track was thirteen.

Eight Canadians placed fifth.

The Canadian women set records again today, Cindy Klassen with her fifth medal, a bronze, and Clara Hughes with a gold in women's 5000 metre long-track speed skating!

Cindy Klassen is the story of this Olympics, as I have mentioned before. And Clara Hughes is the first person in history to win medals in both the Summer and Winter Olympics. If you remember, she first won two bronze medals in cycling in Atlanta in 1996, a bronze in skating in Salt Lake, and now a silver in Team Pursuit and today's gold in Torino.

After winning two silvers in men's long track today, Canada has 24 medals in total, which shatters the previous record of 17. Twelve of them are courtesy of the speed skaters. We are just one medal behind the Americans for third place overall in this Olympics. Let's see, ten times the population, ten times the money, four percent more medals. Something sounds a little bit wrong there, doesn't it? If there were five or six more events in this Olympics we could have beaten them easily. And if the men's hockey team hadn't sucked so badly, we would have tied.

No wonder ABC News thinks "Canada is emerging as an Olympic powerhouse".
See a related CBC story here with its far less certain, characteristically Canadian title: Canada: Olympic powerhouse?

This reminds me of a joke that is all too true. What is the difference between New York and Toronto? In New York the cabbies say, "Hey! Get off the car!" In Toronto they say, "Get off the car, eh?"

I have a friend who is moving to China in two weeks, and he would love this movie. If you like films with nominal plots consisting of nothing but meaningless violence set in a dark, gangster underworld, you'll like it too.

Running Scared stars Paul Walker as Joey Gazelle, a mob henchman responsible for disposing of a gun that has been used to kill two dirty cops. Unfortunately, his son's Russian friend, Oleg, sees him hide it and disappears after using it to shoot his psychopathic stepfather. He has to find the boy and the gun before his boss, the Russian mafia and the police do, or it's all over.

The warning label for Running Scared doesn't lie: "PERVASIVE STRONG BRUTAL VIOLENCE, AND LANGUAGE, SEXUALITY AND DRUG CONTENT." If you decide to go and see it, prepare to be saturated with everything that makes a movie Restricted. I almost walked out of this one because of the violence against women, but happily that subsided after a few opening scenes.

The last film of this type that I saw was Unleashed, which made my shortlist of the worst films of last year. Had I known what this movie was really going to be like, I probably wouldn't have gone, but some unexpected redeeming qualities saved it.

Compared to Unleashed, these writers have learned what a plot twist is. It is also one of those films that is so outrageously and implausibly violent that you can barely stop laughing all the way through it. Even the mom gets in on the killing, blowing away two serial pedophiles as they stand in the middle of their impressively designed, brightly coloured and generously stocked kiddie playroom that doubles as a movie set and child disposal centre.

There is also some side-splitting dialogue. Here Gazelle is explaining to Oleg in the third person how he was able to resolve things with his own violent and abusive father: "On the morning of his 14th birthday, he walks into his father's room with a baseball bat and Mark McGuires the f---in' s--- out of him." What makes this so embarrassingly hilarious is that we have recently been introduced to an elderly, brain-damaged invalid who keeps dropping his spaghetti into his lap at dinner--and whom Gazelle keeps referring to as "dad".

After icing the pedophile couple, Gazelle's wife speaks to him in a repetitive but heartfelt soliloquy: "I did not marry an evil man. I did not marry an evil man. Shady, sleazy, mixed up with the wrong people, but not evil." And then there is the carefully scripted Mastercard commercial, which I won't ruin for you by discussing it here.

I avoided the film "Birth," with Nicole Kidman, but Oleg is played by Cameron Bright, the kid who shared all those controversial nude scenes with her. I didn't know going in that the movie is based on Frank Miller's graphic novels, which explains all the nifty scene transitions and the distinctive colouring of the film.

Again, were it not for the macabre humour, I wouldn't have survived this one. But if you like this kind of thing, knock yourself out. And when you're done, please come back here and explain to me how this movie could possibly have extracted from me nine whole paragraphs of content!

Have a look at Charlie Teljeur's cartoons of the Canadian Olympic experience, subtitled "Il Giro di gemito" (the whine tour).

Here are some more of my favourites:

Day Thirteen: Janet Consoles Wayne
Day Twelve: Canadian Olympic Logo (revised)
Day Eight (If you know me you'll get it. The policeman is no doubt from Lugano.)

You can find the rest here, courtesy of the CBC.

To win a gold medal! Brad Gushue and his rink from St. John's, Newfoundland, just smashed Finland 10-4 in the gold medal game in men's curling. They scored six points in the sixth end, and you could almost ask what happens when a Newfie botches a wide open last rock draw, which Gushue missed for seven.

It appears that notable movie posters are a new topic for my blog. Here is a newly-released poster from Spider-Man 3, which is due to open in 433 days: 4 May 2007.

I don't know a great deal about Spider-Man, but apparently he wore a black suit for a little while, until he found out it was an alien parasite. He then discarded it and it was taken on by some villain called Venom. So maybe Venom is in this movie? Kirsten Dunst says yes and director Sam Raimi says no.

So is this a black and white photo or is Spidey wearing a black suit? To make you wonder more deeply, here is the opening page at the Spider-Man 3 web site. What do you think?

In case you are one of those people who believes everything they read in the newspaper, remember the one thing we know for sure. J. Jonah Jameson would have no problem discrediting our hero by running a story that a black Spider-Man was about when he knew very well it was one of the bad guys.

Thanks goes, once again, to Gary Susman at Entertainment Weekly's PopWatch where I got the poster and most of my Spider-Man information. It's a really good blog: you should take a look.

White panoramas of Antarctica marry an uplifting opening score, and you know from the very beginning that Eight Below is going to be a wonderful film.

Based on actual events, the film tells the story of eight huskies who have to be left behind in Antarctica after an accident forces an immediate evacuation of a science outpost. Jerry, played by Paul Walker, does everything he can to retrieve the dogs but is forced to give up hope as the months tick by. For six months the dogs have to fend for themselves. But if you think that this Disney movie is just for kids, think again. In case you don't believe me, there's a warning on the film that it's not for small children.

Eight Below has no shortage of tragedy, such as when Old Jack can't break free of his shackles, and in spite of desperate encouragement from Maya, gives up and chooses to end his long life.

Maya, the Cassie Campbell of the team, is also the Garbo of the picture. She commandeers the film's quintessential shot: a lonely close-up as she stands to the left and gazes off longingly into the distance, contemplating the task of leadership ahead of her.

Eight Below is a coming of age story, too. Max is the blue-eyed baby of the group. He botches a hunt attempt, gets separated and then spends the rest of the film learning what it means to be a hero. He overcomes his grief at Dewey's upsetting death, faces a dragon, and saves the day at the very end.

Eight Below really does have something for everyone, such as the Jaws moment which almost ends things for Max, right before Gandalf and the Rohirrim appear on the cliffs above Helm's Deep to take on the sea monster.

Believe it or not, this movie also has one of the most devastating put-downs I have ever seen in film. Waking up after the evacuation, Jerry discovers that they have not returned for the dogs. Katie, the pilot and his one-time girlfriend with whom he is trying to reunite, had promised to return but was prevented: "Jerry, I'm really sorry. I know you're disappointed in me." Jerry replies, "No. Sometimes you've just got to lower your expectations."

Katie is played by newcomer Moon Bloodgood, who descends from heaven and very nearly steals the picture from the dogs! Mirror, mirror on the wall, indeed.

(The rest of the dogs, from left to right here, are Buck, Shadow, Truman, Max and Shorty. I can't find a picture of Dewey, but he is the splitting image of Truman with a cut over his left eye. You see, when they first met Truman bit him there, and they have never been apart since.)

Cindy Klassen is the hero of our Games, now with a gold medal in 1,500 metre long-track speed skating. She has won a Canadian-record four medals in Torino – gold in the 1,500, silvers in the 1,000 and team pursuit, and bronze in the 3,000. And she still has one more race to go, the 5,000 on Saturday.

It's a toss-up between Cindy, who has earned just under a quarter of Canada's total medals so far, and the women's hockey team for flag-bearer at the closing ceremonies.

Would you trade Cindy Klassen's superhuman feat for a men's hockey medal? I don't think so. Just call her Shannon, or Mark, or Larissa, or Takashi, or Matt, or Carl, or Jesse, or Nikolai. (You figure it out.)

It's over. Thirty seconds ago Canada lost 2-0 to Russia in a quarter-final game in which they couldn't even score.

"They just weren't as good a team as their opponents," said Kelly Hrudey, once a goalie now a commentator. And that's the truth. In fact they played lousy, went 3-3, losing all three games 2-0 in the same arena. I knew I was right to be worried.

So, what went wrong? Oh, just about everything. Who was checking Ovechkin on that goal? Is everybody blind? What were those stupid penalties about? Interference, please! On the powerplay nobody drove to the net, they kept tip-toeing around the boards. How could NHL all-stars keep losing the puck on routine passes in the neutral zone? How could you miss all those scoring chances?!

The picture at left shows Simon Gagné giving the most accurate impersonation to date of the entire Canadian men's hockey team during this Olympics. See him a few seconds earlier, getting absolutely decked by Darius Kasparaitis.

If you ask me, I think Wayne should arrange for Cassie Campbell to give them a lecture series on what it takes to win. They have a thing or two to learn from the women. And what, just what, was Mario Lemieux thinking by retiring before the Olympics?

If you have ever wondered why Great Britain never fields an ice hockey team in the Winter Olympics, just read this Olympic event guide on ice hockey by the BBC.

Here are some of the highlights:

"When 12 players come together on the ice and attempt to hit a small rubber object into a small metal cage, the results can be pretty spectacular."

"The object of the game is simple - score more goals than the opposition."

". . . referees are tough on illegal body contact, which is punishable by a penalty and time in the sin-bin."

According to the article, penalties are sometimes given for "Roughness and fisticuffs."

Here's a PDF file of the article, for when the Olympics are over or whenever you find yourself in the sin-bin.

Italian Olympic skier Giuseppe Michielli competing today in the Nordic Combined Large Hill event. Courtesy of Gary Susman over at Entertainment Weekly's PopWatch.

In fact, I have been pleasantly surprised by a number of really excellent photgraphs from the Olympics this year. Here are a few of them that I hope you enjoy.

Pierre Lueders's Canada 1 bobsleigh hurtling down the track (Michael Sohn/AP)

Team Canada captain Cassie Campbell with her gold medal (Julie Jacobson/AP)

The first day of snow at the Olympics (Bernard Weil/Toronto Star)

Italian Armin Zoeggler before his luge run (Herbert Knosowski/AP)

And then there's this one, which isn't a particularly great photo but certainly illustrates one of the big issues with this games. In case you get confused, the Canadian gentleman is the one wearing white.

Last month the BBC broadcasted a documentary on the climate phenomenon known as "global dimming". Essentially, global dimming is a feedback reaction to the activities that create global warming. While pollution generates greenhouse gases, it also gives off chemical by-products that reflect sunlight away from the Earth, thereby reducing the overall energy entering the atmosphere and dampening the effects of global warming.

Although this sounds like it could be a good thing, it is not. It means that the true extent of global warming is being masked by a largely cosmetic phenomenon. As nations start reducing their emissions and taking serious action to fight global warming, the "dimming" effect will quickly disappear and unleash the full, runaway reality of global warming upon us.

Complex systems often act in counterintuitive ways like this. One of my relatives several years ago decided to stop smoking. But instead of improving this person's health, it destroyed it. Why? Simply because the effect of all those chemicals in her body was to obscure a number of serious health problems that went undetected. When her smoking stopped, her thyroid crashed.

Here is an interesting weblog article that provides a brief but comprehensive overview of global dimming.

The online version of the Khaleej Times is running an opinion column on the Persian Sufi mystic poet Jalálu’d-Dín Rúmí that is welcome refreshment from the clatter of right-wing rhetoric we now expect in the press and the outrage that it has recently provoked.

The writer offers a gentle appreciation and short history of the great poet in a mild and tempered tone, which is one of my favourite aspects of much Muslim writing; it differs markedly from the noise we often hear from the small minority of power elites, political manipulators, religious radicals and popular press -- in both Islamic countries and here in the "civilized" West.

You may find the article here: Sufi poet, mystic and a planetary healer, by Matein Khalid

The Kaleej Times is a leading Dubai-based English language newspaper covering the UAE with an Indian and Pakistani flavour.

Samuel L. Jackson and Julianne Moore deliver the first Oscar-worthy performances of the year in Freedomland, a kidnapping drama that is a boiling cauldron of emotions.

Moore is Brenda Martin, a mother whose son is inadvertently kidnapped when she is carjacked while driving through a park one night in Armstrong, a black New Jersey neighbourhood. By the time she walks into a nearby hospital, she has almost lost her mind. She reports her son's kidnapping to Detective Lorenzo Council, played by Jackson, who must find the child, handle a psychologically destroyed mother, and manage his own fragile mental stability at the same time.

To make matters worse, Brenda's unlikable brother (Ron Eldard) also happens to be a detective in neighbouring white Gannon. When the Gannon police blockade the projects in Armstrong, Council has to struggle even more to keep the lid on a smouldering racial situation that is dangerously escalating.

Jackson has played this kind of noble, moral yet emotionally wrecked kind of hero before, but I have never witnessed him do it with such abandon. For both of the leads, making this film must have been exhausting. If Denzel Washington can win Best Actor for playing a corrupt cop in Training Day, then Jackson should win two for this role.

I first remember watching Julianne Moore in Nine Months, the most memorable scene of which showed Hugh Grant pounding the hell out of a big green Barney in a toy store. With her recent films I have found myself taking a dislike to her as an actress. As I reflect on it, though, I think much of that has to do with her role in The Forgotten, which was one of the most disappointing movies I have ever seen. Perhaps I projected those feelings retroactively on her previous work, or maybe it is just that her performances can be so eerily emotional that they have scared me away. From what I have just seen in Freedomland, that appears to be a very good explanation. I love it when I find good reasons to give movie stars another chance.

Freedomland is Crash on steroids. Although it doesn't have the same level of subtlety as Crash, the raw performances emit a seething intensity. If this film had not been released until November, Samuel L. Jackson and Julianne Moore would be definite Oscar contenders for next year. But it may be too early in the year for Freedomland to command that kind of influence come awards season.

[This post reveals plot points from the 17 February 2006 episode of Battlestar Galactica, "The Captain's Hand" (Season 2, Episode 17). Although it doesn't really spoil the episode, if you haven't watched it yet you may wish to avoid this article.]

In this week's episode of Battlestar Galactica, "The Captain's Hand", a young girl from Geminon stows away in some cargo containers in order to make it to Galactica to have an abortion. You see, among the deeply religious Geminese abortion is an abomination, even though it is legal in the Twelve Colonies. President Roslin is faced with a tough decision whether to allow the abortion or not, and I won't spoil it for you by sharing the outcome.

But in a conversation with the council member for Geminon, who has threatened to withdraw that colony's support from Roslin's campaign unless they get their way on this issue, the President says, "You have your pound of flesh, and I suggest you take your victory and you move on."

Now here's the thing. In Battlestar Galactica, the Twelve Colonies were separated from the settlers of Earth when they left Kobol in prehistoric times, and have had no contact since. So why is Roslin quoting The Merchant of Venice for rhetorical emphasis in this week's episode?

A "pound of flesh" is what Shylock demands from Antonio when the latter's ships fail and he can't pay back his loan.

There are a number of intriguing things that we can learn about our past by watching Battlestar Galactica. For instance, did you know that the Japanese culture was transported here intact from Kobol? We know this because Adama is of Japanese descent: he follows Japanese traditions and he eats Japanese food in his quarters, complete with teacups and chopsticks. One thing that I can't figure out for the life of me, though, is how one of Shakespeare's plays made it all the way to Caprica!

One of the blogs that I have become deeply attached to during the past few weeks is How the World Works by Andrew Leonard at Salon.com. I don't read very many of them, but this one I couldn't recommend highly enough; I find it difficult to sleep unless I know that I have read everything he has written. It is an enriching exploration of ideas and topics broadly related to globalization, and since it is intended for a general audience it is both readable and non-intimidating. Andrew Leonard is informative, intriguing and in depth, yet brief enough that he can accommodate even the very shortest attention span. He offers one of the most insightful ongoing commentaries on important issues I have discovered in a long time, and since you can read or subscribe to How the World Works for free you really have no legitimate excuse not to read it, do you?

On Thursday in a piece titled No race to the bottom, Leonard reported on new research about the reasons companies decide to off-shore research and development work:

A new study released today on why U.S. and European corporations are offshoring their research and development efforts is trumpeting a supposedly new insight: In contrast to the assumptions embedded in long-standing media coverage, say researchers Marie and Jerry Thursby, cost is not the preeminent consideration encouraging multinationals to set up R & D labs in China or India. Factors such as proximity to universities and local markets, and access to top scientists and engineers, play equally important roles.

...

So what does this mean? One of the authors of the report is quoted in the New York Times as saying, "You have to have an environment that fosters the development of a high-quality work force and productive collaboration between corporations and universities if America wants to maintain a competitive advantage in research and development."

Let's put aside the problem that in some ways, industry and academia are already a little too close for comfort in the United States. The larger issue is the question of strategy: How are such "environments" created and nurtured? As the global economy matures, governmental priorities -- education, funding for research, infrastructural support for high-tech industries -- will play a significant role in determining the flow of investment and the location of jobs. It's not a race to the bottom -- it's a race to the best deal. And if you think that's a call for a more aggressive industrial policy, then you win a prize.

In a previous article from 25 January (Industrial policy: Don't call it a comeback) that he references here, Leonard discusses Industrial Policy, which broadly comprises the law, regulations and adjustments governments make to strengthen their economies:

Conservative economists decry "industrial policy" as state interventionism just one step removed from socialist command planning. But my own experience living in Taiwan, where the government brilliantly succeeded in helping direct Taiwan's economic growth into the high tech powerhouse that it is today, turned me into an industrial policy geek long ago. It seemed self-evident that the right mix of incentives, government assistance, and smart policy choices could help a nation thrive.

The reason I have shared these items with you as an introduction to Andrew Leonard's weblog is that I am currently re-reading Nobel-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz (The Roaring Nineties), and I am learning how aggressive import trade liberalization and deregulating financial markets is NOT the right course of action for developing countries, although they are often forced into it by us, the financial powers.

I am becoming more and more interested in the positive role government can play in economic affairs if its interventions are wisely designed and can navigate the special interests' political minefield. I will have some reflections on the book to share before too long, but for now read How the World Works and learn something new.

Italian minister quits over Prophet T-shirt

"Italian cabinet minister Roberto Calderoli resigned on Saturday after wearing a T-shirt printed with cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad."

Switzerland stuns Canadian men 2-0

Of all the godforsaken places you can lose to, Switzerland is the most godforsaken. I have often thought they should build walls and an odour barrier around Switzerland and use it as the world's landfill, and now this proves it.

One night in 2002, I was one of the hundred thousand or more Torontonians dancing up and down Yonge Street after the Canadian Men's Hockey Team beat the U.S.A. and took the gold medal at the Salt Lake City Olympics. Such cheering and collective triumph was the defining moment of my five years on Bay Street.

Shortly thereafter, I moved to Europe and became isolated from hockey. When I came back it was the strike, and I haven't been able to catch up yet. But now I need your help because it is four years later, another shot for gold is upon us, I find I am anxious about the Canadian Men's Hockey Team, and I don't know anything. My worry is simply this: the people who aren't playing.

It could be said about our team that won in Salt Lake City that it was the best Olympic hockey team ever assembled. It was made out of legends of the game including Mario Lemieux, Paul Kariya, Theoren Fleury, Steve Yzerman, Brendan Shanahan, Eric Lindros, Joe Nieuwendyk, Al MacInnis and Curtis Joseph.

The problem is that none of those players are returning to this Olympics. Some have returned: Iginla, Sakic, Foote, Blake, Ryan Smyth, Chris Pronger, Simon Gagné. Jovanowski and Niedermeyer are on the roster but are injured. They're great: no problems here. But who is replacing the part of the pantheon that retired to Olympus after Salt Lake City?

Have a look at the CBC's coverage of the roster announcement from a few weeks back and compare the two rosters from 2002 and 2006 below:
cbc.ca - Canada's Olympic men's hockey team unveiled
Canada 2002 Salt Lake City Olympic Men's Hockey Team
Canada 2006 Torino Olympic Men's Hockey Team

My question is, are these guys good enough? Can Todd Bertuzzi skate like Theo? Can Shane Doan measure up to Kariya, Nieuwendyk, or Lindros? Is Wade Redden capable of stepping into MacInnis's shoes? When you say it like that, doesn't it worry you too?

In other words, please explain to me what makes this team as good as the last, and why they are going to win. Thank you.

Please leave comments.

I don't know how this is possible, but the man whom Dick Cheney shot has just apologized to him.

No, you read it correctly. Harry Whittington, who was mistaken by Cheney for a quail and pumped full of birdshot, who suffered a heart attack when one of the pellets entered his heart, has apologized for the incident.

"My family and I are deeply sorry for all that Vice President Cheney and his family have had to go through this week," Whittington said.

Does this sound right to you? It reminds me of back when I heard the Vietnamese apologizing to America for causing them so much trouble in the 1960s and 1970s:

"Please accept our apologies for adding so many hours to the work week of thousands of diligent labourers in the military-industrial complex. In particular, we, the remainder of the Vietnamese people, wish to express our profound thanks to America for shouldering the high cost of producing so many tons of napalm with which to correct our population explosion, cleanse our villages and protect us from Communism."

"In order to be purified gold must be tempered in a furnace. That we are now much more shiny is something truly to be grateful for, since our newly-reflective skin is superior in resisting the harmful cosmic rays which, surely through no fault of anyone, now beat down daily upon our heads."

. . . Alright, I know. I suppose that's enough for now.

Have a look at these incredible posters from X-Men: the Last Stand.

Opening day is 26 May.

There are six of them in all, including one for Beast. See all of the posters here.

NBC reports that Joey is returning on 7 March with a new episode.

This is just great news. I lamented his seeming disappearance in a posting from last month. But don't get your hopes up, since Andrea Anders, who plays Alex, has already signed on to a pilot for a new series called The Class.

Even though it seems that there are at least five more episodes to come it is possible that they are just running out the clock on Joey, but at least we get some more time with my favourite Friend.

Just a note to inform you that over the next two weeks I plan to try re-designing these page templates. I have to do it in Movable Type, the software that runs this blog, so it might be a drawn-out process.

I will keep everything up, but sometimes things might look a little weird and some colours might clash for a few days, although I promise not to mess up the pages in any way that interferes with your reading.

Many Thanks,

Jonathan

A tennis ball flies back and forth across a net.

"People are afraid to face how great a part of life is dependent on luck. It's scary to think so much is out of one's control. There are moments in a match when the ball hits the top of the net, and for a split second it can either go forward or fall back. With a little luck, it goes forward and you win. Or maybe it doesn't, and you lose."

So begins Match Point, a thoroughly brilliant suspense-thriller starring Scarlett Johansson and Jonathan Rhys Meyers, that is proof positive for why Woody Allen should stay out of his own films.

Chris Wilton (Rhys Meyers) is a failed tennis star who lands an instructor's job at an ultra-exclusive tennis club in London. He is soon befriended by Tom Hewett, heir to a business empire, attracts the attention of his sister Chloe and is adopted by their ultra-rich family. His prospects soar.

But there's a catch: he also meets Nola Rice (Johansson) at the ping-pong table. And that would be that, except that Nola happens to be Tom's fiancée. They take one step over the edge, but survive it, and the danger passes. In the event, Chris allows Chloe's parents to complete the purchase: new career and expense account, new car and driver, new wife and impossibly expensive new flat overlooking the Thames.

Nola and Tom break up, she disappears, and everything seems fine. But then Chris sees her one day in the street, and the ride begins again. After breathless twists and turns, Chris finally decides to leave his marriage, but he has so much to lose and can't find the courage to carry it out. When his delaying backfires, he chooses the rational, most self-interested course of action.

Woody Allen's screenplay and directing are fantastic, and although the events may sound familiar, he makes you feel that you haven't, in fact, been here ever before. Contrary to the narrative speed of most films which I would call thrillers, he drags this story out and the deliberate, measured, infuriating pace is electrifying. (So is Scarlett Johansson, but that's an entirely different matter.) The tension mounts in irregular pounding heartbeats: danger passes, danger returns, danger grows, watch out!, danger passes, danger grows. The pace forces you to second-guess the plot before it has unfolded, and to do so again and again, but you never know which of the dozen possibilities is going to materialize. The movie is a constant fountain of distress, and in spite of Chris's insulation within a blanket of financial and social stability, Rhys Meyers really makes you believe that he is about to collapse under the pressure at any moment.

Not everything in the movie is entirely realistic, but it never intrudes into the experience. Other than a meddling matriarch, there are no indications of deep unease or uncontrollable mortgages in the family. In real life, people that rich just aren't as carefree as the Hewetts appear to be. But Woody Allen doesn't demand too much from us, unlike Spielberg this year, whose ridiculous détente in the double-booked safe house positively lampoons Munich.

Early in the film, Chris is reading Dostoevsky, and Match Point is largely concerned with Dostoevskian themes: the mental forces that drive a person to action, the motives behind a crime, choosing freedom vs. security, and absolute despair. Woody Allen previously explored these ideas in his 1989 film Crimes and Misdemeanours, a movie which I know only by reputation. After the murders, Chris is assaulted by intense guilt--it's a very good thing that he meets up with Chloe at a tearful opera immediately afterwards or the game might have been up. As his situation spirals out of control, you get the sense that he may never personally get past what he has done.

His fate is determined. But not until the very end of this pins-and-needles nail-biter do you realize just how poignant that opening scene was.

Is it just me, or do you notice anything strange about the Torino 2006 Olympic medals?

Winning at the Olympics entitles you to 500 FREE HOURS on AOL. They're keeping the Timbits for the winners of the Special Winter Olympics. They are trying to get ready for Beijing in 2008 but they haven't figured out how to cut a square hole. Until a few days ago, the centre of each medal depicted unique illustrations from prominent Danish artists. Goodyear couldn't get official Olympic sponsorship, but that wasn't a problem since this is Italy, so they bribed a few Milanese jewellers instead. It is a contemporary European postmodern commentary on what the Olympics have become...and all that we have lost. Iran has entered a last-minute Olympic hockey team, because if each player brings home one medal, they will be able to complete their uranium centrifuge by the end of next month. After so many centuries of wishing Euclid hadn't been Greek, the Italians got tired of waiting for Archimedes to come up with a workable, pronounceable shape. Since wax rings must be so expensive in Norway, just like milk and bread and everything else, medal-winning athletes will not only improve national pride but household sanitation. The new Winter Olympic demonstration sport must be snow-golf. Since the IOC is an international humanitarian organization they decided to set an example for the world by preparing for peak gold, peak silver and peak bronze. Each new medal has to earn its place as a biathlon target, but used as a viewfinder it can also help half-blind hunters who are in over their heads to distinguish between a quail and a man. Winning athletes over the age of 30 with the right analog home stereo equipment can listen to a single song on the B-side of each one of these things in order to raise money for African famine relief. If you run the song backwards it says, "Carl Lewis is dead."

This is a live blog entry on Lauren Graham's visit to the Ellen DeGeneres show this morning. You know, play-by-play like they do at the Oscars, elections and the like.

"I don't know why Cupid is a symbol for love," says Ellen. "He's an angry naked baby with a crossbow. Nothing says love like a toddler with a harpoon." Oh, here comes the one-minute groove. Oh my goodness! She is giving every member of the audience a diamond ring! I thought she was joking. I mean can't you think of a punch line for that joke? You're on the wrong show, I'm not a billionaire like that girl up in Chicago. And a choice of three different styles!

You see, this is the Valentine's Day show, and Lauren is apparently single. What! Well, I heard that she works too much. On Celebrity Poker Showdown last year she said that the show has such long hours that her cat ran away. And then Maura Tierney laughed!--can you believe that? In fact, they say that Gilmore Girls is one of the toughest shows to act in, since the script is so demanding and the hours are so long.

Now Ellen's doing film re-enactments for Oscar season. She's talking about documentaries and I think there are penguins coming--nope, it's Grizzly Man, the not Academy Award nominated documentary. OK everyone, get ready. We are on the commercial break before Lauren comes out. Go and get something to drink.

And we're back! Oh, Roy has just given Kay flowers for Valentine's Day. They have been married 58 years and have four children. He still loves to see the gleam in her eye when he brings flowers in from out in the garden.

"Please welcome back Lauren Graham!" Now imagine everybody cheering to "What a Girl Wants."

"Well, I'm no George and Catherine (she means Roy and Kay). I don't have a date for Valentine's Day, Ellen." "Yes, I'm sad about it."

But she says that if she did have a date she would probably be running late because she's here with Ellen. And although it's pretty early still, as Ellen mentions, she would probably be dating a lame guy, she says, like most of the guys she dates, and he wouldn't have remembered to make a reservation until yesterday and would only be able to get one at 5:30 and so she would be late. (I suppose they tape these the day before, because right now it's 10:00 in the morning). She has to be careful what name she uses because she's dated so many guys. "So' I'm late for my imaginary date with, um, let's call him Pimothy...." (No typo there, that's what she really said.)

"What if I had a date with, like, George Clooney--it's possible! Because he's, like, a stone cold fox. Can you argue with me? He's a stone cold fox." Ellen: "No, I'm just wondering what century we're in." Lauren: "I want to say that I stuck by George in the fat, hairy times. Since that's what you have to do to win an Oscar, get all fat and hairy. Let's imagine that he's my Valentine's Day date. Wouldn't that be great?"

Actually, it wouldn't, she says, because although it would help with getting good restaurant reservations, they would be getting photographed all the time. And she would have to change because we have already seen her on the show with this dress on and everyone will be wondering, "Why's he going out with her?" And in the car the phone would be ringing all the time because of all the Oscar stuff. And then she would say "George, I just need a little of your time." "Back off, I'm George Clooney."

"Grace" is her favourite restaurant in L.A. but they couldn't go there because she has just said it on the show and so people might like to stop by, like they do, to say things like, "Hey George, I loved you on ER." And "George is like, this is really crappy because you told everyone." So he would suggest they go to their house in Lake Como--oops! she says, his house, you see how real this is for her!--and she would say, "George I have to work tomorrow." And so they would break up and that would be her Valentine's Day, breaking up with George Clooney. So, she's glad she doesn't have a date.

"It's so weird you're single," says Ellen.

Well you didn't think you were going to get just a single posting on this story, did you?

USA Today has a great story on the Cheney jokes that surfaced on Monday. My favourite is from Jon Stewart who mentioned that the last person to be shot by a vice president was Alexander Hamilton:

"Hamilton, of course, shot in a duel with Aaron Burr over issues of honor, integrity and political maneuvering. Whittington? Mistaken for a bird."

The January doldrums are over and February, March, and April films are starting to raise their heads in theatres with openings, trailers, and posters. Here are some of the films I would like to see over the next two months. Of course, I won't see half of them, but this is what I will be choosing from before the summer torrent gets into gear.

Why We Fight
A documentary that won at Sundance in 2005 about the American war machine and the in and outs of why Americans fight.
Opened 10 February, but might be hard to find

Freedomland
A kidnapping drama. I'll put up with Julianne Moore in order to see Samuel L. Jackson any day.
Opens 17 February

Eight Below
Paul Walker tries to save eight huskies who have to be abandoned in Antarctica after an accident.
Opens 17 February

Date Movie
Alyson Hannigan in a spoof from two of the writers of the Scary Movie films.
Opens 17 February

Running Scared
Paul Walker again, this time in a mob movie about a man who has to find a gun used in a recent hit or lose his family.
Opens 24 February

Ultraviolet
Milla Jovovich as a super soldier in an Aeon-Flux-like sci-fi action movie.
Opens 3 March

16 Blocks
Bruce Willis has to transport a witness 16 blocks in 118 minutes amidst a sea of opponents, including cops, who don't want him to arrive.
Opens 3 March

V for Vendetta
Natalie Portman stars with shaved head in this futuristic thriller by the creators of The Matrix.
Opens 17 March

Thank You For Smoking
A comedy about the campaign for big tobacco, starring Aaron Eckhart, Maria Bello, Rob Lowe and Katie Holmes.
Opens 17 March

American Gun
Donald Sutherland and Forest Whitaker in a series of stories about gun proliferation in America and its effect on people's lives.
Opens 22 March

Inside Man
Denzel, Jodie Foster, Clive Owen and a bank heist.
Opens 24 March

Basic Instinct 2
I don't think I am actually going to bother with this one, but it opens 31 March.

Take the Lead
The lives of a group of inner-city kids are changed forever, all because Antonio Banderas teaches them ballroom dancing.
Opens 7 April

Scary Movie 4
More of the same. The tag line is "the scariest movie you ever sawed." Please.
Opens 14 April

American Dreamz
Randy Quaid and Hugh Grant star in this comedy about a President who one day picks up a newspaper for the first time in four years and starts rethinking his views on the world, leading to a guest spot on a reality-TV show.
Opens 21 April

The Sentinel
An amazing looking action and spy thriller about a traitor in the government who is trying to kill the President. What's so special about this? Only Michael Douglas, Kiefer Sutherland, and Eva Longoria. What else do you need to know?
Opens 21 April

The Rocket
A feature film biography of Maurice 'The Rocket' Richard.
Opens 21 April

Apocalypto
A mythic, Mel Gibson action-adventure epic about the fall of the Mayan civilization.
Opens 28 April

CNN and NBC are just now reporting that in a live re-enactment of the Iraq war that is certain to end the news cycle for those offending cartoons, Vice President Dick Cheney has just made gun control a 2006 mid-term election issue by shooting a member of his hunting party by accident, a 78-year-old attorney friend named Harry Whittington.

You see, this was a quail hunt.

Quail.

Now everything makes sense. A man is approximately six feet tall; a quail, approximately six inches. If you can miss a quail and hit a man by mistake, it largely explains why Iraq is in flames while bin Laden is still at large. It's all in the wrist.

The last Vice President to shoot someone was Aaron Burr, who was in office in 1804 when he killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel. It ended Burr's career, to say nothing of Hamilton's. But those were the enlightened days of the Founding Fathers, back when moral principles ruled public life and civic responsibility counted for something, so I doubt this incident will have much effect on Cheney. Back then they had a Constitution too.

See the CNN story here.

In Firewall, Harrison Ford is Jack Stanfield, vice president of Security at a small Seattle-based bank in the midst of merger talks, whose identity is stolen and family kidnapped one day as part of a plan to force him to rob his own bank.

Now, Lisa Schwarzbaum over at Entertainment Weekly has given Firewall a triumphant D- grade. She thinks the film is witless and derivative. The thing is, everything she says about why it's so bad is everything that I think makes it so much fun.

Ford reprises his role as Hollywood's most rapidly healing star. You may be able to think of one movie where he isn't bashed up by the end, but I'll bet you can't name three. Even his tame fi