Welch's Gripe Juice

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with Mary Agnes Welch

Motley Screw

Can we dispense with the puritanical tsk-tsking about the couple who were schtupping/lapdancing at the Motley Crue concert? I mean, it's a Motley Crue concert. What do you expect? Hasn't anyone read The Dirt?

Can we also dispense with the low-grade criticism of MTS security for not calling the cops to report an illegal incident of public indecency?

View Full Post | 5/02/2010 12:10 PM | 8
Manitoba a Goth kid?

Everyone keeps saying Manitoba is on the outs with its fellow western provinces – excluded from transportation talks and left out of a recent trade barrier deal. Manitoba keeps getting painted as the sullen Goth kid at the back of the class who gives everyone the silent treatment.

Says who? Where’s this coming from? Is it really true? I thought Manitoba was moderately obsessed with removing trade barriers and doing side deals with other provinces. Seems like some boring press release is issued every few weeks touting such things. I dunno about other reporters, but in the Doer days, a familiar pattern began to develop that involved him talking about trade barriers and worker mobility agreements, me thinking “what the hell ARE those things, exactly?” before my eyes glazed over and I started thinking about why some NDP staffer doesn’t smooth down Chomiak’s hair before he goes on camera.

View Full Post | 3/02/2010 4:27 PM | 4
Wanted: Elections boss with no pride

I know the Tories love to hold up committee meetings with their crazy political theatrics, but it makes no sense for the NDP to ignore those theatrics and hire a new elections boss without the opposition.

It sounds like after the opposition stormed out of last night’s meeting, the NDP just struck their own hiring committee and started the search for Richard Balasko’s successor.

View Full Post | 22/01/2010 5:19 PM | 5
I don't want to pay for you

I totally agreed with the sentiment in this letter from a senior citizens group angry about possible education property tax hikes, especially because most seniors haven't had kids in school for decades.

I don't have kids, so I don't really want to pay school taxes, either. My friends have kids, but that's their problem. Most of them can afford to send their tykes to SJR or Balmoral Hall. It's possible that the crime rate will go up if our schools start to crumble and Canada might get beat worse than it already does in the global knowledge economy, but I can live with that if it means another $800 in my pocket. Nancy, are you listening?

View Full Post | 13/01/2010 9:51 AM | 28
Love shacks and water mains

No gripes today. Kudos, instead.

First, I love love love the love shacks that artists and architects are building along Assiniboine River skating rink. That is exactly the kind of quirky, fun, cheap public thing a city with a fabulous art scene ought to be doing. Way to go, Forks folks. Top that, Ottawa.

View Full Post | 8/01/2010 11:45 AM | 2
Pink Ink Part II

I was thinking a little more about Manitoba's deficit over Christmas while I was in Edmonton. My hometown was all abuzz over the Alberta government's brilliant plans to tackle its $4 billion budget gap.

No more maxi pads for the mentally ill!

View Full Post | 29/12/2009 1:07 PM | 8
Pink Ink

People kept calling the province’s latest financial report “a sea of red ink” yesterday.

Hardly. A little puddle, maybe. A drainage ditch in Charleswood in April.

View Full Post | 23/12/2009 8:14 AM | 2
Do not go gentle, Lil

I know everyone is shaking their heads at the moderately preposterous idea of Lillian Thomas running for mayor. She’s been a councillor for two decades and she holds her seat easily but she’s best known for being marginal and screechy.

She might represent her ward fairly well, but she doesn’t have any new policy ideas, doesn’t do any smart politicking to get stuff done and she’s not nearly as effective as Jenny Gerbasi or Dan Vandal in opposition. Serving on every council subcommittee doesn’t qualify you to be mayor.

View Full Post | 16/12/2009 12:25 PM | 6
Ghettoization

APTN did an in-depth bit last night on the idea of an Aboriginal school division and had a really good interview with Prof. Brock Pitawanakwat from the U of W’s Aboriginal Governance department.

He’s a fairly young guy and he made a compelling argument for a separate school board. He also took Aboriginal Affairs Minister Eric Robinson to task for worrying that an Aboriginal school division would ghettoize Native kids and kind of harken back to the residential schools era. Pitawanakwat called Robinson’s comments “disingenuous.”

View Full Post | 8/12/2009 3:15 PM | 8
Whistlebungle

If I was a whistleblower sitting on explosive evidence of government mismanagement, I would just pull the covers over my head and go into eternal hibernation.

Why would anyone come forward with information in the public’s interest after the mess the province has made of the Manitoba Hydro whistleblower’s disclosure?

View Full Post | 25/11/2009 9:44 AM | 11
Just say yes, Mr. Schroeder

Sometimes Tory Leader Hugh McFadyen gets a little too lawyerly at committee hearings, wasting time trying to get obvious stuff on the public record, like he’s deposing someone for a civil suit.

But that habit made for some good theatre at Monday night’s Crown corporations committee meeting where Hydro boss Bob Brennan and Hydro board chairman Vic Schroeder were on the hot seat.

View Full Post | 19/11/2009 12:29 PM | 4
Cranky town

We all just got the program for the Association of Manitoba Municipalities’ annual convention in Brandon later this month. That sounds fairly routine and usually is, except when the towns debate a new deal-style sales tax like they did last time.

But in the back of the program, there’s a big list of resolutions proposed by all the towns and RMs. Some of them are pretty crabby.

View Full Post | 12/11/2009 10:54 AM | 2
Concordia scuttlebutt

Add a guy named Jagdev Buttar to the list of rumoured candidates for Gary Doer’s old seat in Concordia.

Buttar was a Steve Ashton supporter and a member of the city’s powerful Indo-Canadian community that came out in force for Ashton during the leadership race. Ashton’s courting of the ethnic vote sparked an unattractive backlash from some longtime party members.

View Full Post | 10/11/2009 10:31 AM | 1
Tiny defence of the WRHA

I can’t argue with a single word Policy Frog says about the confused way the WRHA has communicated and delivered its H1N1 vaccination program.

But, I will note that it could have been way, way worse. We didn’t secretly vaccinate the Moose or the Bombers like they did with the Calgary Flames. As far as I know, our auditor general is not launching an investigation of the program like the Alberta AG might. We didn’t have to call in the cops or security guards to keep order at our clinics like they did at several sites in the greater Toronto area last week.

View Full Post | 5/11/2009 12:19 PM | 4
Tiny bit more cabinet spec

Yellow Snow has made some very reasonable cabinet shuffle predictions. I specifically agree that Stan Struthers would be a good fit in Ag and Nancy Allan in edumacation.

I’d also like to amend my slightly less specific predictions by suggesting Steve Ashton would make a good energy and mines minister, with added responsibility for Manitoba Hydro. I should have thought of that last weekend, but someone smarter than me mentioned the idea to me recently.

View Full Post | 23/10/2009 11:55 AM | 4
That didn't take long

About an hour after Greg Selinger was voted the new leader of the NDP, the Tories issued an e-mail blast slagging the guy.

They accused Selinger of being untrustworthy. He all about knew about Crocus, the 1999 election rebate scheme and he’s going to harmonize the HST, which will cost us more on consumer goods.

View Full Post | 19/10/2009 7:53 AM | 14
Delegate debacle

This quote from the Selinger camp in
Bruce and Larry’s story
caught my attention this morning:

View Full Post | 16/10/2009 11:35 AM | 18
Peep at the lameness

The Doer government just issued a press release about how it’s got a new program to fund peepholes for seniors.

Wow. Way to use the levers of government to reform society and battle injustice.

View Full Post | 7/10/2009 3:48 PM | 3
MYND

Last night’s Manitoba Young New Democrats delegate selection meeting in the bowels of the U of W was pretty neat, if only because the meeting actually started on time, the votes were counted before midnight and there was some yelling.

The 250-or-so students had a little good-natured shout-off after Selinger and Ashton finished speaking, hoisting their signs and chanting each candidate’s name.

View Full Post | 7/10/2009 11:47 AM | 2
Indo Outrage

Here’s an interesting update on last night’s big NDP delegate selection meeting in Inkster: Despite his barn-burner of a speech, subtly accusing some NDPers of, at best, being snotty toward new members and, at worst, being a bit racist, leadership hopeful Steve Ashton didn’t actually pick up many delegates.

Early morning numbers suggest Greg Selinger got 61 of the 71 delegates up for grabs. Ashton got most of the rest, despite a focused strategy of appealing to the Indo-Canadian community and a rallying cry of speech last night.

View Full Post | 1/10/2009 10:31 AM | 3
Ride the Pony

Doer is widely expected to attend tonight's delegate selection meeting in Concordia, one of the 13 Super Thursday meetings that might give us a better snapshot of each candidate's support. The Concordia meeting will be the first of many Doer love-ins, I bet. How do I know? The event is being catered by the Pony Corral.

Anyone who follows Doer knows how hilariously fitting this is. As my colleague Mia Rabson just joked, the Pony might go bankrupt when Doer goes to DC.

View Full Post | 24/09/2009 9:17 AM | 0
Shrink-ocracy

Yellow Snow made some interesting observations about the fatness of NDP party rolls. Recently, a longtime NDPer was telling me about memberships in the Schreyer/Pawley years – 25,000, and the unwritten rule was that no general election would be called unless the membership list topped that. Same in Saskatchewan’s NDP. No vote unless there were 35,000 members.

Compare that to now, where NDP membership has for years hovered around 5,000 or 6,000 and everyone’s all wide-eyed with glee that suddenly the rolls have more than doubled. As one Tuxedo NDPer joked the other night, they’re having riding association meetings is real halls rather than just her and her mom in her living room.

View Full Post | 23/09/2009 9:59 AM | 3
Swan's song

Amid the bedlam of last night's delegate selection meeting, there were a couple of neat things. At first, one neat thing was the informality of it all. It was kind of earthy and grassrootsy -- which can degenerate into anarchy pretty fast.

Another surprise was Andrew Swan -- he gave the best speech of the three leadership contenders. He was focused and practical and upbeat and he didn't sweat at all, unlike his campaign kick-off press conference. How did he not pick up a single delegate? The room certainly was Selinger's, who had a gaggle of staffers busy pulling the vote and milling about looking well-organized. But in ridings like Tuxedo and Charleswood that tend to be a bit more conservative, you'd think there would be at least a little love for a more centrist embodiment of the NDP like Swan.

View Full Post | 21/09/2009 4:10 PM | 3
Thoughts on Gay-gate

Stu Murray, the former head of the provincial Tories and the new boss of the Canadian Human Rights Museum is having a rough start in his new job. He's come under fire from gay and lesbian groups for voting against extending adoption rights back in the day, and not having a particularly well-prepared explanation for how that jibes with being an international advocate for human rights. In a speedy bit of damage control, it sounds like Murray and the human rights museum folks are meeting ASAP with anyone remotely gay to smooth things over, as well they should.

I think Murray made it pretty clear then and now that he personally supports gay rights -- though, in a nifty interview by CBC Radio's Margaux Watt the other day, he refused to say how he'd vote if he had the chance again today. But the whole episode makes me think three things:
1. Oswald for Preem
  
  Enlarge Image
  
  Manitoba Health Minister Theresa Oswald (in red) answers a question from the media at a meeting of provincial, territorial and federal health ministers in Winnipeg today. (MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS)
  
  What the heck happened to Health Minister Theresa Oswald? She’s always been a fairly smart and capable minister, but she often comes across a little tentative and jargon-y in scrums and in Question Period.
  
  I wasn’t really sure why there was such a fuss to get her to run for the NDP leadership earlier this month, beyond the fact that it would be nice to have one woman in the race.
  
  View Full Post | 17/09/2009 5:06 PM | 7