French versus English Volume 62

Complaints over Yom Kippur adjournment at Montreal City Hall.

Anie Samson..making mountains out of molehills

Now I'm not going to defend the closing down of the city Montreal council for a day to respect the most important of Jewish holidays, there are those who are for and those against and nobody is a racist based on that opinion.
There are but a few council members who are Jewish, but that being said, it is a tradition in Montreal dating back to Mayor Drapeau, who held that since Christianity is all-encompassing in Quebec, one day of respect for the significant Jewish population of the city was appropriate.
 Readers will remember that back in the day, there weren't many other religions represented in the city. 
Demographically speaking, there were a lot of Catholics, some Protestants and a few Jews.
Every other religion was completely marginal.

At any rate, council doesn't regularly meet on Wednesdays anyway, and Tuesday's session usually wraps up before five PM, so the accommodation not to extend Tuesday's session past sundown wasn't really that big a deal.
It was however too much for one member, Anie Samson of Vision Montreal, who complained that the decision to suspend council meeting for Yom Kippur was wrong because city council is a secular institution that shouldn't be subjected to religious considerations . Link
Asked to comment over the fact that council doesn't meet on Christmas or Easter, she replied that it is another matter completely because those days are statutory holidays.

And that readers is the essential debate over religious accommodation in Quebec and why it's hard to take these secularists seriously.
I'm not even going to insult the intelligence of readers by explaining why.

French receding in Ontario.

"....during this time, English continues to grow, even if immigration has injected a healthy dose of energy to the community. "In Ontario, the rate of anglicization is 40%  and is flirting with the 50% level among young adults, says noted statistician Charles Castonguay, a demographic expert on the Canadian Francophonie. You can open unilingual schools, colleges, and universities, if you want., but it is the  personal attitude that we haven't been successful in changing, unlike in Quebec." Link{Fr}

Note: just for some context, the 'expert' quoted in this article Charles Castonguay is a French language militant, who's work now focuses on the 'sky is falling' theory of French under attack.

Police issue 'BOLO' for serial stop sign defacer

Here is the most bizarre language story of the week.

 "An ardent defender of the French language in the borough of Lennoxville could pay a price for political activism, actions that are deemed criminal, by the police. On Monday, police in Sherbrooke released a photo of the individual who was committing mischief on unilingual anglophone stop signs, that had "STOP" printed on them on Clough and Lennox streets in  the Summer district of the city.

"Capitaine Quebec" affixed stickers bearing the image of a Quebec license plate with the inscription "LOI 101 - Je me Souviens" in a bilingual Sherbrooke district before leaving.  Link{fr}

Incidentally readers, there are two bones to pick with this story, the first being that the Quebec Ministry of Transport recognizes "STOP" as a French word and entirely legal on signs and the second is the creeping use of the word 'Anglophone' to describe signs that are supposedly in English.
For those in the media, I would hope that you needn't be reminded that signs are inanimate objects. 

Quebec Universities begging for students in France

 Francophone universities are so desperate for students that they have taken a road show to France in order to shill for students.

Quebec universities have arrived in Toulouse for the 2nd edition of the special day "Studying in Quebec." Objectives: Inform students applying for international mobility, foster relationships between Toulouse and Quebec universities and increase the two-way number of foreign students in French schools and Quebec.

Organized at the initiative of the Conference of Rectors and Principals of Quebec Universities (CREPUQ), the day will allow candidates to achieve their mobility project and collect all the information needed to continue their education in Quebec:

Which university to choose? How to register? What budget? Link{fr}

Another teen attacked for speaking English.

"A St. Leonard Mother is outraged, after her 17 year old son was viciously attacked because he spoke English.
The family, who wishes to remain anonymous to protect themselves, says last Saturday following supper with visitors, five teenagers, cousins went for a walk.   Around the corner, near a park, a man between 18-20 began hassling them, hurling racist epitaphs their way.
In French that man said, "Ici a Quebec, il faut que tu parles Francais," or something like that, he went up to my son's face and my son just kind of put his hand to his chest and said please move back, in English" Read the story on CJAD

For a more complete version of the story, read Hugo Shebbeare's article, here.

Quebec Corruption 101

Nothing proves the old adage that a picture (or in this case a video) is worth a thousand words.
On Thursday, Quebecers were riveted by a short video shown at the Charbonneau Commission showing some of Quebec's biggest construction magnates making cash payments to Mafia big shots in a Montreal café, a known meeting place for one of Montreal's biggest crime families.

The video, shot secretly by the RCMP was nothing less than shocking, and served as conclusive proof of the link between the construction industry and the Mafia.

The inference is quite simple.
The Mafia controlled which company would be the lowest bidder and thus receive a government construction contract by fixing the bids, which would ultimately be 30% higher than what would be charged without the scheme.
Construction companies would split these contracts under the auspices and control of the Mafia and kickback money.
Pretty neat!
The video showed some of these construction bosses visiting Café Consenza and handing over wads of cash in a back room, some of which was stuffed into the socks of Nicolo Rizzuto Sr. before he left the building.

"Large amounts of cash — in one case up to $20,000 — were shown being pulled out of bags, counted, then stuffed into Rizzuto Sr.’s socks as the commissioners watched, dumbfounded.
“It must have been the end of the fiscal year,” Vecchio joked as tens of thousands of dollars were poured out onto the table in one tape." Read the story

But here readers is what nobody in the mainstream press, or perhaps even in the police don't understand;

This money is chickenfeed!

The police are all gaga over the 20k they saw being passed over to the Mafiosi, and while the video  is useful because a link is finally made between the mafia and the construction companies, it begs the real question;
Where is the real money?

The various governments, municipal and provincial spend billions on these construction projects and if just a small portion of the contracts are subject to fraud it would run into hundreds of millions of dollars in over payments.
If fact, Jacques Duchesneau, in his testimony before the Charbonneau Commission, testified that his anti-collusion task force had already made an impact to the tune of $347 million in lowered bids as companies dumped the bid-fixing.

So where is all the money, you can't very well stuff tens of millions of dollars down your pant leg?

Once again we are subject to smoke and mirrors. The hoopla over the video is but a distraction, entertaining but really just a sideshow.
The real question as to where the big money goes remains unanswered.

I'll be writing a post about this next week.
Maybe the RCMP should read it, they might learn a thing or two.

Founder of vigile.net dies, leaving legacy of hate

The founder of vigile.net, Bernard Frappier died last week leaving the website in the capable hands of other racists and haters.

While I don't usually comment negatively on the recently departed, the accolades thrown about by his admirers is nothing short of sickening.

Bernard Frappier was a racist who hated Anglophones in general and Jews in particular.
He was a defender of genocidal tyrants like Muammar Gaddafi and supported the murderous regime of Bashar Hafez al-Assad of Syria
My only hope is that his legacy be respected and the website continues to ground out racist garbage which serves only to discredit anything at all, published on the site.

Pauline Marois gets "Unliked' by Facebook

 Recently Facebook started removing bogus "LIKES" added to pages of certain people, companies and organizations which hired companies to use bots to create the phony appearance of being more popular than the truth.

A while back I wrote that Pauline Marois was guilty of just such an offence when she added thousands and thousand of 'likes' in a short period of time.

Here's a graph from Pauline Facebook page that attests to the changes.
Thanks to David, for pointing out the story.

BIXI crashing and burning

Driving downtown last week I couldn't help but notice that the BIXI bicycle stands were largely filled to capacity and that riders were few and far between.
I snapped this picture of a Bixi station near Concordia University which was so full, that one rider attached his bike to a parking meter.
I made a mental note, but forgot about the story until I read a story about the dire financial situation of the company running the system.

Read: Bixi company struggles with deficit
It has become clear the project is a financial disaster and will never come close to breaking even.

The company running the system is depending on foreign sales to prop up its finances which is really just a fancy Ponzi scheme, bringing in new suckers to pay off losses higher up the line.

New York City has put its plans to introduce the system on hold and they'd better redo the math before getting involved with this granola boondoggle.

Quebecers a happy bunch

 The happiest Canadians are 12 to 19 years old and Quebeckers, while the least satisfied are seniors, according to the report, based on an analysis of Statistics Canada data from 2003 to 2011.
Among the report’s other key findings:

• Canadian teens are the most satisfied (96.9 per cent) and seniors, the least (89.1 per cent) – a growing gap that suggests a problem for policy makers, Mr. Sharpe said.
• The happiest Canadians are in the Yukon, Quebec, Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick, while the least satisfied are in Manitoba, Northwest Territories, Ontario and Nunavut.
• The largest increases in satisfaction levels between 2003 and 2011 were in Quebec and the Yukon.
• Four of the five happiest cities are in Quebec – Quebec City, Gatineau, Trois-Rivières and Montreal.
• Rural dwellers are generally happier than city dwellers.

Read the rest of the story

Quebec police strike again

"In what human rights activists are calling a landmark ruling, a south shore man has been cleared of the ticket he got in a case of "driving while black."
Brossard resident Joel Debellefeuille says he can't forget the day he was pulled over by two Longueuil police officers back in July 2009. On that day while driving with his wife and kids in his BMW in Greenfield Park, two officers pulled Debellefeuille over because they thought it was odd that a black man was driving a car registered to someone with a Québecois family name." Read the rest of the story

In another story, funny if not so sad, our Keystone Kops are also being sued for 42k by a Montrealer who was arrested last May during the students riots.
It seems that the Montreal police had cornered students demonstrating illegally and corralled them down a street with no escape.
Some of the demonstrators jumped onto a restaurant terrace and were followed by police who arrested everyone who was not seated at a table.
One of the arrested, Dominique Dion, proclaimed his innocence to no avail and ended up in  jail with everyone else.
Who was the poor shlub? The owner of the restaurant! Link{fr}

English taking over?

The foundation of the CHUM, Montreal's new French super hospital announced an ambitious fundraising campaign which even included an English section to the web site. I guess when these organizations want Anglo money, bilingualism is no longer an issue.
That being said, I can't say I'm impressed with the English translation of patient testimonial.
I dunno, you be the judge. 

Louis Saint-Pierre

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Aenean quis nunc sapien, quis eleifend libero. Aenean imperdiet mauris ut nisi pellentesque blandit. Nunc lobortis ligula at augue sodales sed ornare nibh interdum. Praesent tincidunt scelerisque ante, ut ultrices purus viverra ac. Donec non magna quis odio euismod tincidunt a sit amet dolor. Donec blandit sem eget velit sagittis non hendrerit arcu fringilla. Nullam velit leo, condimentum vitae, eleifend sed velit.

Sophie Fauteux

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Aenean quis nunc sapien, quis eleifend libero. Aenean imperdiet mauris ut nisi pellentesque blandit. Nunc lobortis ligula at augue sodales sed ornare nibh interdum. Praesent tincidunt scelerisque ante, ut ultrices purus viverra ac. Donec non magna quis odio euismod tincidunt a sit amet dolor. Donec blandit sem eget velit sagittis non hendrerit arcu fringilla. Nullam velit leo, condimentum vitae, eleifend sed velit. Link

Here's another embarrassment, the utter uselessness of some on-air French taking heads who cannot pronounce nary a word in English. Yech!......

And now to finish off the week with a little foolishness;

One of our readers sent in this pic,which he snapped close to home;

Here's a good yuck....

BTW, Note to readers;
I've been told reliably that the CAQ is in the hole for 400k after the election, so despite all the posturing, they aren't in a position to fight a new election.
That being said, the PQ is also broke, but not the Liberals.... go figure!

Anyways,  sometimes, just sometimes, even I have to admit that unilingual English signs can be offensive.
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For your reading pleasure;

One of our readers, Kevin Duska (I publish his name only because it is attached to the story) sent me a link to a story he wrote for Rabble.ca, not exactly one of my favourite websites.

That being said, it's a good weekend read and I'm happy to oblige with a plug.

Read:
When a spade is truly a spade: The PQ's xenophobia in a throwaway election for progressive federalists

Here's another;
Susan Schwartz: Try as I might, the language barrier is perplexing



To all the Frenchies and têtes carrées, please have a good weekend!!!