"I agree. Nut jobs like Byrn Weesel should pack up and move south of the 49th.
Subst..."
Top Canadian Blogs and News Sites
A Canadian view of the best of the web!
General
Can You Go to Canada If You Have a DUI?
Almost 7 years ago, while going through some personal issues, I made a terrible mistake and ended up being convicted of driving under the influence (DUI) in the State of California. It was a dark period in my life, but I have moved on and learned my lesson. This spring, however, my intoxicated driving conviction […]
Comments
comments
9 Movies to Binge Watch on Netflix this Summer!
Posted July 9, 2017 by Anonymous
Looking for movies to entertain yourself this summer? Here are 9 Movies to Binge Watch on Netflix this Summer! – – – – – – Summer is here, and man am I ever happy about it! No more soccer, rugby, exams and car pooling…just free time, sleeping in, camping, beach time and plenty of time to binge watch movies! Summer bliss. While we don’t watch a tonne of TV in the summer, especially during the day because we’re busy, but there’s nothing like sitting down to watch a movie after a full day. It’s one of my favourite ways to wind down after a busy day. So I am pretty happy to see some of my most favourite old movies are on Netflix…I’ve got plenty to watch this summer! The Notebook A classic. This is one of my most favourite love stories of all time…sigh. Legends of the Fall Remember this movie?! A throwback to 1994…and when I really truly fell in love with Brad Pitt. That hair though. Last of the Mohicans This was one of my favourite movies of the 90’s! I can’t wait to watch this one with my teens this summer. Romeo & Juliet (1996) […]
The post 9 Movies to Binge Watch on Netflix this Summer! appeared first on A Pretty Life In The Suburbs.
comments
Nancy Pelosi Is Not a Cocaine Trafficker
Posted July 9, 2017 by Mike Pearl
Please get a grip.
comments
‘Made for Love’ Is a Hilarious Novel About Sex Dolls, Dolphins, and Surveillance
Posted July 9, 2017 by Lincoln Michel
Alissa Nutting’s newest novel is easily one of the funniest books about sex and modern technology you’ll read this year.
comments
Khadr
Posted July 9, 2017 by Dr.Dawg
On one hand, weary recognition that a grievous wrong has been partially righted. On the other, grunts, incoherent babbling, lying, much jabbering, pseudo-intellectual nitpicking, and crass political opportunism. Which side are you on? Seems a fairly easy choice….
comments
Yet Another Koch Cadet Hired to Push Fossil Fuels at Trump’s Energy Department
Posted July 9, 2017 by Ben Jervey
The Koch brothers have landed yet another of their trusted fossil fuel think tank veterans in the Trump administration’s Department of Energy (DOE). Alex Fitzsimmons was Manager of Policy and Public Affairs at the Institute for Energy Research (IER) and its advocacy arm, the American Energy Alliance (AEA), while also working as a “spokesman” and communications director for Fueling US Forward (FUSF), the Koch-funded campaign to bolster public opinion of fossil fuels.
Fitzsimmons will be joining former IER colleagues Daniel Simmons and Travis Fisher at the DOE.
![[Reuse options]](http://web.archive.org./web/20170710052014im_/https://license.icopyright.net/images/icopy-w.png){kind=small}
comments
“How Do You Solve a Problem Like Milo?” A characteristically thoughtful piece by Joseph Bottum
Posted July 9, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
None of this means that Yiannopoulos is wrong in general or even in any of the particular points he makes. It just means he didn’t write the book he maybe could have written and certainly should have written, chastened into seriousness by his strange expulsion from the gardens of media notice and cast out into […]
Kathy Shaidle’s NEW book, Confessions of a Failed Slut, is available HERE.
comments
What I Learned Hanging Out with Corpses Around the World
Posted July 8, 2017 by Anonymous
Author and mortician Caitlin Doughty tells us about her new book, in which she explores funeral rites from across the globe.
comments
Cops Say Repeat Prison Escapee Got Help from a Drone
Posted July 8, 2017 by Anonymous
It was Jimmy Causey’s second escape from a maximum-security prison in 12 years.
comments
Dating Apps for People with STDs Offer a Safe Space
Posted July 8, 2017 by Luke Winkie
“You are with people who have been through exactly what you are going through and know exactly how you feel.”
comments
Facts Versus Feelings Isn’t the Way to Think About Communicating Science
Posted July 8, 2017 by guest
By John Cook, George Mason University and Sander van der Linden, University of Cambridge
In a world where “post-truth” was 2016’s word of the year, many people are starting to doubt the efficacy of facts. Can science make sense of anti-science and post-truthism? More generally, how can we understand what drives people’s beliefs, decisions and behaviors?
comments
“A love letter to the lyrics of ‘How Soon Is Now’ by The Smiths”
Posted July 8, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
I’m jealous of Phil Adams (and whoever the other “half” of A Longing Look is). I wish I’d invented the “love letters to lyrics” format… The songs of The Smiths are beautifully orchestrated. The music is uncommonly crisp and keen and acute. Listening to The Smiths is like the heightened sense of lucidity after a […]
Kathy Shaidle’s NEW book, Confessions of a Failed Slut, is available HERE.
comments
Rod Dreher needs to stop trying to make his coinages like “the Cathedral” happen
Posted July 8, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
He had one neologistic semi-success, with “crunchy con,” but now he’s like Pete Townshend trying to make those white boilersuits a thing for 15 years. (via) More from my siteJim Goad provides another reason not to go to New York‘I was surprised,’ I said to my friend afterwards, ‘because they were skinheads.’Muslim Homeland Security advisor […]
comments
Norway’s Beloved ‘Troll Penis’ Rock Is Erect Again
Posted July 7, 2017 by Anonymous
The famed rock formation was vandalized, but quickly reattached thanks to a crowdfunding campaign.
comments
That Time David Gborie Was ‘Deflowered’ on an Acura Bumper
Posted July 7, 2017 by VICE Staff
On Thursday’s episode of ‘PARTY LEGENDS,’ the comedian rehashed the details of what he says was “one of the best nights I’ve ever had.”
comments
You Need to Check Out Haim, ‘A Ghost Story,’ and More This Weekend
Posted July 7, 2017 by VICE Staff
Gritty documentaries, Canadian indie rock reunions, and a little bit of lighthearted TV, too.
comments
I Guess Toronto Police Just Don’t Care About Evidence
Posted July 7, 2017 by Manisha Krishnan
New numbers point to racist weed arrests but why should the cops have to answer for that?
comments
Republicans Are About to Run Out of Time
Posted July 7, 2017 by Mark Hay
Thanks to the harsh realties of the legislative calendar, the GOP’s ambitious agenda is in a lot of trouble.
comments
The year 2017 in two tweets:
Posted July 7, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
More from my siteTweet of the year. Period. It’s over.The history of the last ten years in one tweetTweet of the yearHow stupid is Seymour Hersh?
comments
Ann Coulter names that NYC Nigerian killer/”doctor” as “Immigrant of the Week”
Posted July 7, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
Ann Coulter writes (RTWT): Having misled readers about Bello’s nationality, the NYT professed utter bafflement about the shooter’s motive, saying it was “marked with as many questions as answers.” If the NYT simply reported facts, instead of strategically constructing news stories to protect favored groups, it might have noticed that there have been a LOT […]
comments
It pains me to agree with David Frum, but he’s right
Posted July 7, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
And Steve Sailer is uncharacteristically mistaken. I left a comment, which no regular 5FF reader need bother reading. More from my siteYelling At Each Other About Robin Williams, Ann Coulter, Death and God: My NEW PJMedia postDirt on Snopes: ‘Facebook ‘fact checker’ who will arbitrate ‘fake news’ accused of defrauding website to pay for prostitutes…’Walter […]
comments
Make of this what you will…
Posted July 7, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
More from my siteNick and Artie chat with Adam Carolla about his new booze lineScott Adams: “Now do you see how I could make a climate model that is right every time?”When Millennials make “Good Bad Movies” lists, none of the films are older than they areWhen y’all gonna make a motherf**king series about the […]
comments
“At their best [Hipgnosis] created utterly memorable and oddly moving images”
Posted July 7, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
Review of Vinyl. Album. Cover. Art. Whenever they could, they did something other than litter their work with mugshots of hirsute interchangeables. The images they created were swift, crisp, neat. These are not properties that can be ascribed to most of their patrons. Popular music by the 1970s had bifurcated. Rock bands were as often […]
comments
Help us choose the Fall 2017 Canadian Geographic Travel cover!
Posted July 7, 2017 by Anonymous
Help us choose the cover of our upcoming issue of Canadian Geographic Travel. Vote Now!
And don’t forget to sign up to always be notified by email when covers are being voted on!
comments
The Canadian Press has a “Populism Project.” TheRebel.media has… actual populism.
Posted July 7, 2017 by Kathy Shaidle
One came to study the other last month. And likely left without learning the most important lesson — which can be summed up precisely in my three sentences, above. More from my siteJeepers, if only I’d gone to college AND studied statistics!In my high school, pretty much ALL we learned about was Indians, […]
comments
Notorious Climate Science Denier Marc Morano Flying to Australia With Misleading Climate Hustle Movie
Posted July 7, 2017 by Graham Readfearn
Marc Morano — one of world’s most notorious climate science deniers — is heading to Australia to push his discredited documentary Climate Hustle.
Morano is the communications director at the mistitled Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) – one among a suite of US-based conservative “free market” groups that helped convince President Donald Trump to pull the country out of the international Paris climate agreement.
Climate Hustle, first screened in late 2015 in Paris, claims human-caused climate change is a scare story and that scientists actually disagree that humans are causing global warming.
In reality, climate scientists and campaigners say the documentary is a rehash of long-debunked talking points, cherry-picked claims and misrepresentations promoted by a “fossil fuel salesman.”
comments
Why are there no stars in the Apollo moon landing pictures?
Posted July 7, 2017 by podcasting@cbc.ca
Dr. Karun Thanjanur answers this week’s Quirks Question.
comments
Working the graveyard shift may trigger cancer
Posted July 7, 2017 by podcasting@cbc.ca
Regular night shift work affects your melatonin cycle, which plays a role in repairing damaged DNA.
comments
Why chimpanzees are stronger than you
Posted July 7, 2017 by podcasting@cbc.ca
Pound for pound, Chimps are stronger than humans. It turns out this is because of the fibers that make up their muscles.
comments
Flying into the heart of a wildfire, for science
Posted July 7, 2017 by podcasting@cbc.ca
Scientists on a bumpy adventure through wildfire plumes discover the blazes can produce up to three times more smoke per amount of fuel burned than previously thought.
comments
City birds use cigarette butts to ward off ticks
Posted July 7, 2017 by podcasting@cbc.ca
A study in Mexico city suggests there might be an upside to building with trash.
comments
Encore: This author tried to learn to sniff like a dog
Posted July 7, 2017 by podcasting@cbc.ca
In her book, Being a Dog, Dr. Alexandra Horowitz explores what makes dogs such great smellers, then attempts to apply those lessons to develop her own sense of smell.
comments
Avoiding "Norsat Like Uncertainty" by Allowing the Chinese to More Easily Buy Advanced Canadian Companies
Posted July 6, 2017 by Chuck Black
By Chuck BlackIt might be news to Canadian high tech and space companies attempting to comply with protective US laws such as the international traffic in arms regulations (ITAR) and the Canadian controlled g…
comments
‘Clean Coal’ Officially Dead in Mississippi as Southern Company Battered by Kemper Fallout
Posted July 6, 2017 by guest
By Dan Zegart, crossposted from Climate Investigations Center.
Clean coal officially died in Mississippi today as state regulators voted unanimously to issue an official order denying further money for the Kemper coal plant and beginning a settlement process with its builder, Southern Company.
The order provides a legal framework for the state Public Service Commission’s June 21st vote proposing the plant continue to operate on natural gas, as it has since August 2014, instead of spend additional money to try to use Kemper’s non-functional multi-billion dollar gasifier to generate power from lignite coal.
“The commission today is taking firm steps towards resolving all substantive matters associated with the Kemper Project,” says the 35-page PSC order.
comments
Part 15: 150 Years of Canadian Aerospace History
Posted July 6, 2017 by Chuck Black
More RADARSAT, More Astronauts, the CSA’s Growing Importance, the “Airbus Affair,” MacDonald Dettwiler & the “Canadarm”
 |
| Graphic c/o CSA. |
By Robert Godwin
Canada’s aerospace raison d’être has always derived from its immense size, its location in the far north as a vast, barely-tracked wilderness of incalculable resources and the logical requirements relating to defence, communications, utilization and exploration which naturally follow from its size and location.
Radarsat-1 would finally be launched in 1995 having consumed a massive budget in the order of hundreds of millions of dollars. The British government had reneged on its promise to participate, so Canada was left to carry most of the burden. However, the gamble paid off and Radarsat would become one of the most successful remote sensing machines in history.
MDA’s technology for processing data from orbit was second to none. The final flight version of Radarsat-1 included a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) antenna that was 15m long by 1.5m wide and it could operate in a half dozen different modes. Somewhat tellingly it still included an X-band antenna similar to that proposed by Kurt Stehling in 1953. The SAR exceeded all expectations and opened up new vistas of research in everything from geology to archaeology.
Between January 1998 and March 1999 an assortment of purchases and sales led to the deconstruction of SPAR Aerospace including the purchase of the robotics division by MDA and with it the Canadarm contracts. That same year Orbital sold its interests in MDA.
Most of Canada’s space activity was now firmly centred at the CSA in St Hubert. Bjarni Tryggvason would get to fly aboard the space shuttle in 1997 and a second generation of Canadian astronauts had been recruited several years earlier. This group included Chris Hadfield, Dave Williams and Julie Payette. All three would also enter the vernacular in Canada and fly a multitude of important missions into space.
Many of the flights by Canadian astronauts involved remote sensing of the earth. Robert Thirsk would fly in 1996 followed by Garneau for the second time. Today, four more Canadians have joined the astronaut corps, David Saint-Jacques, Jeremy Hansen, Jennifer Sidey and Joshua Kutryk. At the time of writing, all are still waiting for the next generation of manned spacecraft to be completed.
Also in 1996 Com Dev of Cambridge Ontario would acquire a license to manufacture a vast quantity of their unique microwave multiplexers to place aboard the most visible of all the satellite constellations, Project Iridium.
 |
| The “Airbus Affair,” dogged Brian Mulroney, Canada’s 18th Prime Minister, well after his term of office ended in 1993. For an overview, check out the April 29th, 2010 Globe and Mail post, “The scandal that keeps on flying.” Political cartoon c/o Michael de Adder. |
In July 1997 Boeing and Douglas merged, and when the group didn’t get the orders they anticipated during the highly publicized Airbus fiasco in 2005, Boeing closed the old Avro Malton Plant laying off the last 300 workers.
The development of new tools for remote sensing continued unabated. Alan Carswell’s Lidar had originally been designed to study pollution and air quality, but it would stir headlines across the world when it was deployed on the surface of Mars in 2008 and detected snow falling there. It was the first snow detected on another planet. However, this would not be the first time that Canadian technology had been to the red planet.
There were the reverse-engineered STEM aboard the Soviet’s Mars 3 lander and NASA had used STEMs to deploy the ramps for the Sojourner/Pathfinder rover in July of 1997. The instruments on the end of the massive STEM booms aboard the two Voyager spacecraft, which were now plying their way into interstellar space, and would be the first to discover interstellar weather in 2014.
In 2007 the first Japanese spacecraft to orbit the moon, the SELENE, once again used STEMs. Even the United States Air Force Academy’s Falconsat program used STEMs for a gravity gradient boom.
 |
| Infographic showing statistics on SCISAT, a small Canadian satellite that monitors ozone in the stratosphere and helps scientists improve their understanding of ozone depletion. Graphic c/o CSA. |
Studying the weather was now becoming a critical function of space hardware. Climate change was on the top of every government’s “to do” list. In 2003 Canada contributed the Scisat which was able to study the Earth’s ozone layer. The same year also saw the launch of the MOST space telescope, which was followed up by the MOST space telescope, which was designed to make extremely long duration observations of stars in an attempt to better understand them and perhaps get a better date for the age of the universe.
In 2006 the Mobile Servicing System (MSS), or Canadarm2, was launched to the International Space Station (ISS). The four components of Canadarm 2, including its attendant hand, the special purpose dexterous manipulator (SPDM) also known as DEXTRE, were built by SPAR both before and after it had been purchased by MDA. The system continues to operate aboard the ISS today.
Between 2009 and 2013 several Canadian astronauts lived aboard ISS and used the Canadarm2. These included Julie Payette, Robert Thirsk and most famously Chris Hadfield who managed to cause a media sensation with his regular reports from orbit.
The CSA also helped to fund MDA’s construction of a second Radarsat. Launched in December of that year the Radarsat-2 pushed the technology even further. Although the satellite was lighter than its predecessor it could resolve down to 1m by 3m in its “spotlight” mode which was a marked improvement over Radarsat-1. It could also look both right and left, which effectively doubled the viewing capabilities.
In 2012 MDA purchased a massive US corporation named Loral. This was as a direct result of the Canadian government blocking the sale of MDA to another American company named ATK. MDA was considered too important to Canada’s aerospace industry, and as the benefactor of a large portion of the available funding coming from the CSA, the sale was considered counter-productive to Canadian interests.
The root of this issue went all the way back to the late 1960s when governments around the world had been arguing about who controlled the space above sovereign territory. At first the USA had argued that satellites should be allowed to image anything which was beneath them. Other countries objected, including Canada, in part because it was felt that if the control of the data was in US hands before it came into Canadian hands, this might give American corporations an unfair advantage when it came to mineral rights.
 |
| A reminder that international political and business concerns often override other issues. For example, the March 30th, 2001 Globe and Mail post, “Bilateral space causing delays, costing millions,” discussed reasons why the Canadian RADARSAT-2 program, originally expected to be launched on an American rocket from US soil, was being delayed and eventually needed to be launched by Starsem from Kazakhstan’s Baikonur Cosmodrome on December 14th, 2007. The April 10th, 2018 post, “Federal government blocks sale of MDA space division,” delved into how, during that same period, MDA attempted to sell its space technology division to US based Alliant Techsystems (ATK). Four years later, as outlined in the June 27th, 2012 post, “MacDonald Dettwiler buys Space Systems Loral for $875M,” MDA tried another technique to bypass a “Gordian knot” of complex barriers designed to dissuade foreign firm from entering the lucrative US marketplace by purchasing a space company with US roots. And, as outlined most recently in the May 8th, 2017 post, “MDA Restructures For DARPA & Competition, Cuts US Workforce but Anticipates New Orders in Weak Q1 2017 Report” MDA is still attempting to reconfigure itself into a mostly US based firm to come into compliance with US legislation and achieve the anticipated pot of US gold assumed to accrue naturally to US military contractors. Screenshot c/o Globe and Mail. |
Eventually a compromise was reached, in part because of MDA’s ability to draw down the data at speeds unapproachable elsewhere. NASA relented at the beginning of the 1970s and agreed to let Canadian companies like MDA read the data generated above Canada.
Now that Radarsat was able to pull much more detailed and expansive data of Canada’s resources and environment, the need for quick access was even more important. Today MDA is able to compete on a huge range of space projects. It sells high resolution imagery to distributors around the globe, and in early 2017 it was selected to participate in an asteroid discovery mission.
Also in the early spring of 2017 an American and Ukrainian consortium announced plans to build an orbital launch facility in Nova Scotia. With Canada currently purchasing launch services from India and the United States it seems that the political will may have finally arrived to take advantage of the highly skilled aerospace workforce in Canada; albeit using imported hardware. The East Coast launch site was chosen for many of the same reasons originally proposed by Phil Lapp, Kurt Stehling and John Chapman in the 1950s and 60s. The 50th anniversary of the Chapman Report would seem a fitting time to break ground on this new facility.
 |
| Robert Godwin. |
_____________________________________________________________
Robert Godwin is the owner and founder of Apogee Space Books, the Space Curator at the Canadian Air & Space Museum and an American Astronautical Society History Committee Member.
He has written or edited over 100 books including the award winning series “The NASA Mission Reports” and appeared on dozens of radio and television programs in Canada, the USA and England as an expert not only on space exploration but also on music.
His books have been discussed on CNN, the CBC, the BBC and CBS 60 Minutes. He produced the first ever virtual reality panoramas of the Apollo lunar surface photography and the first multi-camera angle movie of the Apollo 11 moonwalk. His latest book was written with the late Frederick I Ordway III and is called “2001 The Heritage and Legacy of the Space Odyssey” about the history of spaceflight at the movies.
Last Week, “Challengers Destruction, the Hubble Space Telescope, a New HQ for the CSA, Spar Flounders & Orbital Sciences Buys MDA,” in part fourteen of “150 Years of Canadian Aerospace History.“
Next Week, The conclusion of “150 Years of Canadian Aerospace History.“
 |
| On sale now, at Apogee Books. |
comments
56 things to do in Metro Vancouver on Friday, July 7
Posted July 6, 2017 by Jennie Ramstad
Keep busy with these events.
comments
Videos capture orca pods near Horseshoe Bay and Whytecliff Park in West Vancouver
Posted July 6, 2017 by Craig Takeuchi
Two local videos uploaded over the Canada Day weekend featuring sightings of orca pods .
comments
Homeless in Vancouver: Takin’ care of bees-ness
Posted July 6, 2017 by Charlie Smith
If it looks to you like a fuzzy bumblebee, blame the poor focus.
comments
The Georgia Straight proudly sponsors Constellations
Posted July 6, 2017 by Jennie Ramstad
On July 15, the Indian Summer Festival presents Constellations at the Vogue Theatre.
comments
New Survey Shows Majority Of Americans Believe Climate Change Is Real And Caused By Human Activity
Posted July 6, 2017 by Farron Cousins
The current leadership in the United States — the U.S. House of Representatives, the Senate, and the White House — have a hostile relationship with climate change science.
comments
Kurt Cobain’s 1988 performance in Aberdeen Radio Shack posted online
Posted July 6, 2017 by Charlie Smith
Music archivist Mike Ziegler has given an Independence Day gift to Nirvana fans.
