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It is hard to believe you are a fan of the BBC and missed its apology by the BBC to Tony Blair over their distortions and allegations of the government lying about the events leading to the war in Iraq. It cost the top two officials of the BBC their jobs.

Globe and Mail. toronto free press

A Canadian court recently ruled that downloading is *not* illegal, I assume because the law is all about distribution and when you download you're not the distibutor.

Despite the fact that this is being interpreted as carte blanche for filesharers in Canada, things aren't so cut and dried.

The Canadian decision really didn't address the issue of downloading rather that the fact of a file being available for download was not proof that infringement was occuring. Justice von Finckenstein's decision denied the Canadian Recording Industry Association's request for information about suspected uploaders and it was only his editorializing which implies that file sharing is legally protected. The actual legal decision was only about the burden of proof needed to establish that copyright infringement was taking place.

Justice von Finckenstein ruled that the CRIA had not met this burden of proof that and ISPs such as Sympatico, Shaw and Rogers did not have to surrender identifying information about alleged infringers.

That this has placed a large hurdle in the path of the CRIA in it's attempt to identify and litigate against file sharers is not the same as saying it legitimizes downloading. The legality of file sharing in Canada hasn't been decided because it hasn't been tested in court yet. Expect the CRIA to muster their forces and try again.

Swapping music files allowed, federal judge rules

They can't, yet.

It's an older story - for recent updates, hit google or check www.canfli.org which seems to be keeping on top of things.

You mean like in abandoned breweries? ... :-)

• proposing laws to strip American suspects of their citizenship,
• imprisoning American citizens arrested on American soil as "enemy combatants" without recourse to civilian courts or legal counsel despite the contrary dictates of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution, and
• sending non-citizens arrested in the U.S. to be tortured in third countries at the whim of U.S. authorities.

• hasn't bothered to reform an FBI that in the days before September 11th intentionally destroyed translated intercepted terrorist conversations, in order to get the FBI budget increased,
• apparently preferred to invade Iraq rather than deal with the more immediate threat of Osama bin Laden after September 11th,
• and now in the ultimate on ironies, while ignoring the Sixth amendment (and the Fourth) is telling us that a top priority should be, not Iraq, not Osama, but passing a Constitutional Amendment to marginalize gays!

US$613 million. Petty cash for M$. According to the Canada Globe and Mail, the market capitalization of Microsoft is approximately $260-billion

We can look to the past as a guide, though. For the past year and a half, Microsoft has produced about $4-billion a quarter in cash flow from operations, on average. It doesn't have to reinvest much -- say, 10 per cent of that amount. To be conservative, we'll say capital expenses are about $500-million, leaving the investor with $3.5-billion a quarter, or $14-billion a year in free cash flow.

The market capitalization of the company, at yesterday's close, is about $260-billion, but that number doesn't reflect the oodles of stock options held by employees, which some day may dilute the existing shareholders. To be on the safe side, you could build in a cushion; say it would take $300-billion to buy the whole company.

It wouldn't really cost that much because Microsoft has a laughably conservative balance sheet, with $53-billion in cash and short-term investments and no debt. But ignore that cash hoard and ask yourself: would you pay $300-billion for a $14-billion annual stream of cash? If you think of it like a bond, it's a free-cash-flow yield of about 4.7 per cent, a nice premium on U.S. Treasuries (the 10-year note currently yields 3.7 per cent). And that assumes the company doesn't grow again, ever. [source]

From The Globe and Mail:

Just imagine the pitch some scriptwriter must have delivered for the new series Century City (CBS, 9 p.m.): "Sexy lawyers in the future! And they're practising law!" It must have seemed a good idea at the time.

Certainly, the network would like the show to become a breakaway ratings hit (not likely), but more likely, it's airing it because it's already spent the money.

The show is set in a high-end L.A. law firm, circa 2030. The company is managed by a few salty old-schoolers, Hector Elizondo among them, and a few young upstarts, including the necessary young idealist (Welsh actor Ioan Gruffudd), best known from several turns as the lead in C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower on A&Eand wildly miscast here.

The first episode veers between two cases customized and contrived to fit the futuristic format: A scientist (David Paymer) is arrested for cloning, although he was doing it only to save his son's life. A septuagenarian rock star (Anthony Zerbe) is sued by his band mates for refusing to undergo procedures to look young.

Sad to report, the future looks pretty much the same as the present does, except with cleaner air and fancier laptops. There are a few advances: Pre-trial hearings are accomplished via holograms. Characters marvel about cherries without pits. But where are the moving sidewalks, the sassy robot maids and other conveniences promised to us by Alvin Toffler and The Jetsons?

Nothing is exceptional about Century City, neither its concept nor its cast, made up largely of vaguely familiar TV faces, which includes a bit player from Suddenly Susan and a woman from Judging Amy. They are actors at a way station -- on the rebound from one show and on their way to the next.

Ok, So the the federal courts have ruled in favor of these people, this is a Good Thing[TM] IMHO...However, who's to say they can't try to then persue this through ICANN which has its own rather nutty Domain Dispute Policy which has done things like uphold a claim by Molson (beer) to own canadian.biz (which was later overturned in canadian courts...) Who exactly has the ultimate jurisdiction here?

FYI, if he's under 40 or 50, he probably got lots of that when he was dating.

c.f. this article

The Globe and Mail is reporting that the planned re-creation of the Wright brothers' flight was a miserable failure, with the flyer dropping off the end of a wooden track into a mud puddle. Apparently heavy rains were causing a problem.

This really points out that the problem is not 'abundance' per se, but over-use.

Just like cattle overgrazing a field, humans have become more and more of a risk to their own existence. If there were fewer humans, we would have many fewer problems.

I like to think of the American diet as a prime example of the over-use problem. As we continue our way down the path of least resistance, we have become much more sedentary. Then you add a diet designed to produce fat storage and you wind up with a lot of fat people.

Today we are surrounded by an excess of food and the body continues to follow a proven survival strategy -- it stores energy in fat for lean days which no longer arrive.

Given Peter de Jager's mugshot I think he has some authority on the matter.

By the look of Peter... Food isn't scarce at all in his house.

You forgot our free health care and social programs. We are also the only G7 country to be in the black.

Some pictures I found online, some of them are fairly recent while some of them are older under construction pics.

http://skyscraperpage.com/gallery/data/555/1193__2 9031___29255__014.jpg
http://images.theglobeandmail.com/archives/RTGAM/i mages/20031017/wtall1017/1017tall2.jpg
http://skyscraperpage.com/gallery/data/556/1115200 3_07_27two.jpg
http://skyscraperpage.com/gallery/data/556/1115200 3_07_27three.jpg
http://cakili.image.pbase.com/image/19442002.jpg
http://cakili.image.pbase.com/image/19442000.jpg
http://skyscraperpage.com/gallery/data/556/1710dsc f0010.jpg
http://www.mwlin.dhosting-pro.com/taipei101/galler y/albums/userpics/10001/HD030910.jpg

Basically if you want information on skyscrapers, skyscraperpage.com is a good place to start.

Funny you should mention Canada's pot situation:

Health Canada dope stinks, patients say

The Government can 't even grow good dope, something any B.C. Grandma can do!

Speaking of record labels needing to get with it, I noticed this article in the Globe and Mail about Universal Music cutting CD prices.

I hear alot of conversation in this thread about buying ATI or nVidia stock... First off, dont buy Nvidia... not yet atleast... they are still in a bit of a downward spiral.

As to ATI... I already own the stock, I bought it about a month back when it was 13$ on the TSE(tsx.com symbol ATY). You know why I bought it then? ATI ALL BUT CONFIRMED THEY WERE GOING TO BE PRODUCING THE CHIPSET FOR XBOX2!!! When they announced 3rd quarter earnings, they said "a pre-payment of $18.0 million recorded as deferred revenue, associated with a development contract"... hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm now, who exactly would spend 18 million in a lump deferred sum ( as in, pay now, record later ) to a graphics card company?!?! I bought that day... and damn am I happy I did! ;-) You can click here, to read the full 3rd quarter release.

It still rather annoys me how often analysts miss the boat... im thinking these people know rather jack shit, for the most part. I would argue that somebody thouroughly entrenched in the IT industry with a mediocum of knowledge on financial matters... could pick stocks better then most analysts do!!!

As an asside though, I wonder what this will do to the future relationship ATI mentions with Nintendo. Personally, I doubt there will be another Nintendo Console... regardless to what they say. There has been a management rift at nintendo over exactly this discussion.

Well, here's one more reason to consider homeschooling my kids. Or at least consider sending them to a private school where such devices can't (or are less likely to be) be eventually required by law.

I already have real reservations about confining my kids for six or more hours a day to a classroom filled only with people their own age, to suffer (mostly) uninspired teaching in regimented fashion, in exchange for dubious literacy. Now I have to worry about them being trained from their earliest years to accept a surveillance society, too.

I can't escape the feeling they could do vastly more productive and useful things with that time on their own. Spider Robinson wrote an excellent piece about this in today's Globe and Mail.

If he didn't intend for anybody else to see it, then how did 4 students that didn't like him get a copy of it to post to the net?

Let me quote TFA:
They say the four stole the video from a school filing cabinet where Ghyslain had stored a video camera he was using for a student project.

Even if this is not true and he just left the tape lying around, or even forgot it in the camera, common decency (who am I kidding? There is no such thing anymore) should have led to any other course of action than posting the clip on the internet.

Okay. Parents file lawsuit over Star Wars video

A brief look at the latest data available to me for both companies suggests that your remarks about the viability of open-source based busienss models are somewhat on the ball. All the uproar about how rich the original owners of RedHat and Caldera is accurate, but it is entirely the fault of investors who didn't know better. There is very little reason for a company that sells a free product (I'm looking at you, RedHat!) to be valued at a price approaching $140/share.

'Nuff said.

I can't say that I agree with your opinion on the quality of open source software, or about credit for the success of the Internet. This was already rebutted pretty well by a few vocal minds.

A brief look at the latest data available to me for both companies suggests that your remarks about the viability of open-source based busienss models are somewhat on the ball. All the uproar about how rich the original owners of RedHat and Caldera is accurate, but it is entirely the fault of investors who didn't know better. There is very little reason for a company that sells a free product (I'm looking at you, RedHat!) to be valued at a price approaching $140/share.

'Nuff said.

I can't say that I agree with your opinion on the quality of open source software, or about credit for the success of the Internet. This was already rebutted pretty well by a few vocal minds.

BTW, anyone else notice the article was actually from The Globe and Mail?

You have some real warped sense of 'self defense.' Or maybe you can provide some evidence of when and where the US was attacked.

The UN has authority in this situation, not the bush administration.

The bush administration has lied about aluminum tubes supposedly acquired for enriching uranium, "the war will take weeks, not months", Iraq was actively trying to acquire uranium, the "coallition of convenience" is made up of nations who support the bush administration's invasion, 35 countries are providing "critical support" in the coallition of convenience, the "coallition of convenience" is larger than the 1991 gulf war, 8000 soldiers of the 51st division surrendered, Umm Qasr was taken on Sunday, er... no, Monday... no, make that Tuesday.9 times Umm Qasr was "taken."
I could go on and on and on, but I know I'm probably just wasting my time.

Since this thread started, you've consistently said, "show me proof" while making outlandish claims about bombs strapped to buildings and misfiring SAM launcers. Since this thread began, you haven't provided a whit of evidence to support your position. Since this thread began, I've consistently provided links. So unless you want to start posting evidence to support your claims, don't bother asking for it anymore.

To me it is folly to tie the health effects of tobacco, good or bad, with public policy.

Individuals should be free to smoke, but be held responsible for the natural consequences. This holds for "good tobacco" or "bad tobacco", as well as other drugs.

(Full disclosure: Non-smoker. Ex-smoker, but not against smoking where permitted by property owners.)

This movie (as well as much of Moore's other output) has been discredited time and time again, even by writers on the left who agree with his basic opinions. By all reports it is staged, manipulated, and completely worthless as far as getting unbiased data about the gun-control debate.

See:
From Spinsanity
From LA Weekly
From the National Post
From the Weekly Standard
From The Globe and Mail

The Globe and Mail (Saturday October 19, 2002) has a related article (with the title given in the subject line) in print and online.

They even have an "AQ" test to see where you are on the "autism spectrum".

I'm not sure I share the enthusiasm some of the quoted experts have for the idea that a number of talented people are having children with "good genes", which is causing this recent increase in autistic behaviour. Even assuming that exteme talent implies retarded social skills, I find it hard to believe that the basic talent it takes to write code, train users and invent documentation is extreme enough to warrant this kind of musing.

Add to that the skepticism I have for anything as complex as social interaction and family having a measurable genetic quality...

Good read nonetheless.

The Globe and Mail (Saturday October 19, 2002) has a related article (with the title given in the subject line) in print and online.

They even have an "AQ" test to see where you are on the "autism spectrum".

I'm not sure I share the enthusiasm some of the quoted experts have for the idea that a number of talented people are having children with "good genes", which is causing this recent increase in autistic behaviour. Even assuming that exteme talent implies retarded social skills, I find it hard to believe that the basic talent it takes to write code, train users and invent documentation is extreme enough to warrant this kind of musing.

Add to that the skepticism I have for anything as complex as social interaction and family having a measurable genetic quality...

Good read nonetheless.

Many reporters have highlighted Wan's work in raising awareness about HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, - and also Gay & Lesbian rights in China. CPJ also highlight Wan's role as a webmaster - and as a leading critic of Beijing's neo-fascist Information enviroment, and cult-like Pledge of Self-Discipline Yahoo!

CPJ concerned about safety of Web publisher

Wan Yanhai is a courageous man - our thoughts are with him, Su Zhaosheng - his wife, and his family.

Read: The Great Firewall of China, by Xiao Qiang, Executive Director, HRIC - and CPJ's Asia Research Associate Sophie Beach, from the L.A. Times of August 25, 2002....

http://www.aizhi.org/ [aizhi.org]

Starting testing...

Stage one testing complete.
Stage two testing complete.

Testing complete for http://www.aizhi.org/.
Result:

Reported as accessible in China

Tested at request of Greg Walton,
China's Golden Shield, Corporate complicity in the development of surveillance technology in China Le bouclier d'or de la Chine

Open Source Intelligence

Http://go.openflows.org [openflows.org]

Related stories:

Where is Wan Yanhai?
China's most prominent AIDS activist has been "disappeared" - believed to have been detained by the police, relatives and human rights groups said yesterday.

China Net Spies

...there was recent evidence that state censors had removed the blocks on some banned Web sites to see who tried to access them. "The reverse-trace route monitoring we do on a regular basis shows a surprising number of interesting sites that were once blocked are now going through, but with anomalous traffic signatures, suggesting some systematic surveillance of sensitive sites. Perhaps the PSB [Public Security Bureau] is trying to learn more about surfing habits," he said.

The "Great Firewall" is failing
Beyond the Great Firewall - from censorship to surveillance
Gartner: China's Internet Strategy: Struggling to Maintain the "Great Firewall"
China, Nortel, and the Net

or Ethan Gutmann's Who Lost China's Internet?

if you're still interested.....Chapter Two of the private RAND study published Tuesday, "You've got dissent"offers an authoritative analysis of the evolving, multi-layered counter-netwar strategies deployed in the PRC -> increasingly redistributing the focus of the so-called "Great Firewall" from the International Gateways, through the ISPs and out to the cybercafes [;-)cracked versions of these filters available], the possibility of .cn ISPs setting policy on individuals' firewalls in offices and homes

Endnotes: Zi Xiang Mao Dun

P2P geektivists could note a parallel decentralisation of resources in the Future Trends section, in Chapter One for more on innovation at the Edge of the network:

"Dissidents, Falungong practitioners, and other activists in the PRC and abroad may increasingly turn to emerging peer-to-peer technology to exchange information."

All this augurs a mighty struggle deep indside China's networks in the coming years, but with China sending dissidents to mental hospitals a culture of self-censorship is probably the gravest challenge to free experssion.

Note to CowBoyNeal,language barrier: this installation has problems with Chinese charcters - there'd probably be people out there who have modified SLASHcode to handle Chinese UNICODE, and perhaps publish automatically to USENET, Freenet etc.

they'd probably also find time to translate this thread.

i'd like to go on, but some government employed s'kripty in Yunan's is busy thinking he can backdoor my network - its not an ethical thing - its the aesthetics i've got a problem with...so crude, juvenile. I'll leave you with a final link

Do Cathloic priests do the same as muslim clerics and convince children they should go blow up a bus full of families, because they don't believe in the same faith?

Of course, we all know that catholic priests are very good with childrens...

Priest who said "abortion is worse than molesting" accused of molesting (8/24/2002)

Is there a way for the winners of the disputes to recoup their legal expenses?
Otherwise, I think most private people would rather hand over their domains at the first sign of trouble.

Important point. Thankfully, there's a good answer!

According to the Globe & Mail, the legal costs of going up against a large corporation were a major concern for the eventual victor. But, happily:

"Molson was also ordered to pay Mr. Black's legal fees."

I hope this included all legal costs related to the arbitration phase as well as his appeal. I'm not sure, but Mr. Black might have been eligible for damages as well, but since his website plans were probably still too conceptual he probably couldn't argue any loss of revenue. However, awarding legal fees probably does open the door for damages and penalties, depending on the circumstances of future domain hijicking cases.

I wonder why someone went to all the trouble to fake the photo and leak phony specs? It could have been part of a plan to manipulate ATI's stock price. Look at the hourly stock price chart for ATI today. ATI (ATY on TSE) opened this morning at $10.70cdn and by 10:30 am was down slightly to $10.60. The story came out on slashdot at 10:30 and within an hour had risen to its daily high of $11.08 but then closed down .23 at $10.52. Not a big spike but someone could have made money on this.

Here's a story about William Tutte who also worked at Bletchley, but he worked on breaking FISH. I went to what was probably his last lecture, about three months ago.

USA: 2.0
Canada: 1.6
Germany: 1.4
Italy: 1.2

Current world population: 6,220,000,000
Arable land area in the US: 1,740,000 km^2

First of all: I do not believe this is actually true. Antinori really isn't better at cloning then the Roslin Institute, and they usually have a few hundred miscarriages for every successful pregnancy. Presuming Antinori did not have a few hundred women standing by to be impregnated, he really is very lucky to have a 100% success rate.

But anyway: Let's just assume this is an actual clone. Evidence is now coming through showing that dolly isn't quite as healty as we first expected.
Apparently she ages a lot faster, and has a number of diseases. Now imagine that, when the baby is born ('prototype clone'), (s)he starts getting all types of horrible diseases, limbs missing and what have you. That is when Joe Schmoe will understand you just can't copy people like you can copy a CD. Too bad someone has to suffer for it.

How timely, the Globe and Mail reports today of a Canadian on trial in Philidelphia for "trading with the enemy" (Cuba).
The article tells of a Canadian citizen, charged in the United States for acts committed in Canada that are not crimes in Canada. Quotes the prosecutor as having conceded that the defendant was "technically not subject to jurisdiction." Nonetheless, the charade continues.
Hmm, how does that work? US idealogy should apply everywhere, regardless of boundaries and quaint local customs like laws and treaties.?

How timely, the Globe and Mail reports today of a Canadian on trial in Philidelphia for "trading with the enemy" (Cuba).
The article tells of a Canadian citizen, charged in the United States for acts committed in Canada that are not crimes in Canada. Quotes the prosecutor as having conceded that the defendant was "technically not subject to jurisdiction." Nonetheless, the charade continues.
Hmm, how does that work? US idealogy should apply everywhere, regardless of boundaries and quaint local customs like laws and treaties.?

No shit. For good laughs, cut-and-paste the text of a news article into a text editor, then save the HTML and compare the difference.

I believe the current record for lowest S/N ratio (ignoring tomshardware.com's practice of putting one sentence per page ;-) for a mainstream news site is http://www.theglobeandmail.com.

Ad-laden CNN serves 22,700 bytes of HTML for a 1400-byte story.

The Globe and Mail delivers a staggering 90,587 bytes of HTML for a 3082-byte story.

Those numbers are for surfers who surf with images off, by the way. The bloat is Javashit, banners, towers, stock quotes, polls, and navigation to every section of the newspaper. I don't even want to think about what it'd be like with graphics on.

And these jerkwads wonder why their bandwidth bills are so high.

Try a new browser, smokey. Looks fine here. Here is the correct quote:

> The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that a citizen has the right to express dissatifaction with the products or services of a company; in this case, an insurance company.

... good news for Canada

From a site that seems to be working well:

World Leaders react -- "The following are reactions from around the world to the disasters at New York's World Trade Centre and the Pentagon."

Related Links -- US Gov't, US Military, NYC, Airlines, and Anti-Terrorism Resources.

Who Dunnit -- the BBC "Within minutes of the horrific chain of events unfolding at the World Trade Center, information began emerging suggesting it was not a terrible accident but a terrorist attack."

World Shock -- BBC "The attacks on New York and Washington have brought swift reactions of horror and condemnation from around the world."

Notable quotable: "But Iraqi television played a patriotic song that begins "Down with America!" as it showed the World Trade Center's towers falling, The Associated Press news agency reported."

America has made a permanent enemy of Iraq. I can't imagine how that will ever be changed. :-(

Also worth noting that many mid-East leaders of all stripes and colours are denouncing this terrorist act.

Don't paint all the mid-East with one brush. This terrorist attack was the action of a very, very small radical group that is roundly despised by many mid-East civilians.

The more I watch this on television, the less real it becomes. Repetition = numb.

From a site that seems to be working well:

World Leaders react -- "The following are reactions from around the world to the disasters at New York's World Trade Centre and the Pentagon."

Related Links -- US Gov't, US Military, NYC, Airlines, and Anti-Terrorism Resources.

Who Dunnit -- the BBC "Within minutes of the horrific chain of events unfolding at the World Trade Center, information began emerging suggesting it was not a terrible accident but a terrorist attack."

World Shock -- BBC "The attacks on New York and Washington have brought swift reactions of horror and condemnation from around the world."

Notable quotable: "But Iraqi television played a patriotic song that begins "Down with America!" as it showed the World Trade Center's towers falling, The Associated Press news agency reported."

America has made a permanent enemy of Iraq. I can't imagine how that will ever be changed. :-(

Also worth noting that many mid-East leaders of all stripes and colours are denouncing this terrorist act.

Don't paint all the mid-East with one brush. This terrorist attack was the action of a very, very small radical group that is roundly despised by many mid-East civilians.

The more I watch this on television, the less real it becomes. Repetition = numb.

From a site that seems to be working well:

World Leaders react -- "The following are reactions from around the world to the disasters at New York's World Trade Centre and the Pentagon."

Related Links -- US Gov't, US Military, NYC, Airlines, and Anti-Terrorism Resources.

Also worth noting that many mid-East leaders of all stripes and colours are denouncing this terrorist act.

Don't paint all the mid-East with one brush. This terrorist attack was the action of a very, very small radical group that is roundly despised by many mid-East civilians.

From a site that seems to be working well:

World Leaders react -- "The following are reactions from around the world to the disasters at New York's World Trade Centre and the Pentagon."

Related Links -- US Gov't, US Military, NYC, Airlines, and Anti-Terrorism Resources.

Also worth noting that many mid-East leaders of all stripes and colours are denouncing this terrorist act.

Don't paint all the mid-East with one brush. This terrorist attack was the action of a very, very small radical group that is roundly despised by many mid-East civilians.

Hmmm... don't let the Canadian astonomers know about it, the record may not be recognized because the precedent has been set for moons to be unappreciated and even punnished.

;)

I'm so fucking sick and tired of Slashdot "editors" making blatant political statements when they're supposedly reporting the news. To add insult to injury, the statements are quite often false or misleading. Let's dissect this story's editorial comments:

protect us from all those ballistic missiles that foreign nations don't have

China has 20 or so CSS-4 ICBMs targeted at US cities. Don't think they'd use them? This is the same government that has executed more people in the past three months than the rest of the world has in the past three years (yes, that includes Texas, save your lame jokes). Then there's Tiananmen Square, Tibet, Falun Gong, and a whole host of other human rights breaches in China.

Then there's North Korea, which is quite close to developing the ICBM technology to hit the US with nukes or biological or chemical warfare.

Then there's Iran and Iraq, with weapons programs of their own, and possibly also an interest in buying from North Korea, China, or Russia.

when you can just drive down from Canada with a suitcase nuke

First of all, you have to get a suitcase nuke. They're not exactly easy to make (remember how big the first atomic bombs were?), and only a few countries in the world can make them (Russia, US). In other words, you probably have to buy one from Russia.

Second, you have to get it in to Canada. While we do have huge unguarded borders up north, you're going to have a hell of a time getting it from the Yukon or wherever to the 49th parallel. Also, the US is pushing for increased Canadian border security and unified policies on security and entry into North America. I think they're aware of the issue.

Third, you have to cross the US border. While I don't know for sure, I would bet there are hidden radiation detectors at all the border crossings. Liquid scintillator column-style detectors are incredibly sensitive, and it would be nearly impossible to shield the near-critical fissionable material in a bomb from the detectors (the gamma rays produced have too much penetrating power). I happen to work at a particle accelerator with just such detectors on the shipping gates (to prevent accidental removal of contaminated material), and you wouldn't know they're there if there weren't signs. They just look like part of the fence posts. Of course, it would be silly for the government to make the existence of such detectors public knowledge, because that would mostly defeat the purpose, which is to catch terrorists.

Finally, suitcase nukes are low-yield (as in around one kiloton). The man-with-the-briefcase approach also doesn't have the same political or military effectiveness that a working ICBM has. Rogue Country X has to actually use a suitcase nuke to convince the world that they have the capability, and then they'll get blown to smithereens by the US. Not much is accomplished besides killing a few hundred thousand Americans (worst-case), and getting Country X's population reduced to single digits. On the other hand, if it becomes known that X has ICBMs in hardened silos, then they're suddently part of the Nuclear Club, and they get to play with the big boys. After all, look how nice the world is being to China, what with giving them the Olympics and all (worked really well in Berlin in 1936, didn't it?).

Sunday Morning on CBC Radio, Michael Enright of CBC's This Morning program conducted an interview with Jimmy Carter regarding the softwood lumber dispute between Canada and the USA. He got really snippy quickly, and told Mr Carter to hurry up his answers, and called him a "washed-up peanut farmer from Hicksville". Mr Carter shot back that Enright himself was washed up, as he was once on the radio five days a week, not just on Sundays. Carter also expressed fear that "subsidized Canadian lumber producers will use two-by-fours to pound into submission U.S. border guards."

Of course, the whole thing was a joke, and Mr Carter's part was played by an actor. It was not really very funny. However, this little bit slipped past BOTH of Canada's national newspapers, and they reported it as real front-page news this Monday morning.

Now, THAT'S the mark of a successful April Fool's joke.

I don't seem to be able to load the Globe's article from their website, but I am not sure why.

It seems to have disappeared from their website while I was typing up this comment. Hmmm...