Swearing, scenes of nudity, Gitanes

Smoking to play role in movie rating decisions: "Smoking will be a bigger factor in determining film ratings, the Motion Picture Association of America said Thursday, but critics said the move does not go far enough to discourage teens from taking up the habit..."

Smoking will be a bigger factor in determining film ratings, the Motion Picture Association of America said Thursday, but critics said the move does not go far enough to discourage teens from taking up the habit.

MPAA Chairman Dan Glickman said his group's ratings board, which previously had considered underage smoking in assigning film ratings, now will take into account smoking by adults, as well.

That adds smoking to a list of such factors as sex, violence and language in determining the MPAA's G, PG, PG-13, R and NC-17 ratings.

Partisan? Embittered? Do I look partisan and embittered?

You can't make this stuff up:

"The spectacle of my arrest, the subsequent RCMP press release, and the prepared statements from Environment Canada, including minister Baird, have been crafted to bully public servants whom they, in a paranoid fit, believe are partisan and embittered," Monaghan told a news conference....

You can't make this stuff up:

"The spectacle of my arrest, the subsequent RCMP press release, and the prepared statements from Environment Canada, including minister Baird, have been crafted to bully public servants whom they, in a paranoid fit, believe are partisan and embittered," Monaghan told a news conference.

He never admitted to the leak, but made it clear that he was profoundly opposed to the government's handling of the climate-change file. For four years he had worked on contract at Environment Canada, reading media articles and writing analyses of what they contained.

At the same time, Monaghan was helping to open an anarchist bookstore in downtown Ottawa that lists as its beliefs "egalitarianism, co-operation and a collective struggle against abuses of power."

UPDATE: More non-partisan, unembittered public servants:

Monaghan is a member of a collective that recently opened an anarchist bookstore in downtown Ottawa. He's also a drummer with the punk band The Suicide Pilots, which has an album called Rock Against Harper.

The band webpage on MySpace depicts a plane flying into the Peace Tower on Ottawa's Parliament Hill.

And still more:

Patty Ducharme, of the Public Service Alliance of Canada, said she could not endorse Monaghan's actions because she did not know enough about the alleged leak. However, she criticized the government for taking such aggressive action against him.

"What we can do is recognize that what the government has done to this worker is extremely heavy handed," she told CTV's Mike Duffy Live. "It sort of speaks to the whole tone of this government and their value of public service workers."...

Get off my dime

Leave aside the partisan mud-slinging, in either direction -- this is very good news:

Political candidates will no longer be able to rely on big loans from wealthy individuals, unions or corporations to finance their campaigns under legislation introduced Tuesday by the Conservative government...

Political candidates will no longer be able to rely on big loans from wealthy individuals, unions or corporations to finance their campaigns under legislation introduced Tuesday by the Conservative government.

Peter Van Loan, the government House leader, said proposed amendments to the Canada Elections Act will make political financing more open and transparent and "eliminate once and for all the influence of rich, wealthy individuals from the political process...

Since 2004, donations to political parties and candidates have been strictly limited. With further reforms brought in by the Harper government, individuals are now limited to giving $1,100 per year and all corporate and union donations are banned.

However, Van Loan said last year's Liberal leadership race exposed a loophole that allowed contestants to do an end run around the donation limits. Contenders took big loans from wealthy family, friends, supporters and even themselves which, if they are not repaid within 18 months, can be written off, becoming defacto donations.

But what happened to the Tories' 2004 campaign promise to abolish the parties' publicly-funded "allowance"? Talk about big money.

I was forced out by money and the ethnic vote

"I'm profoundly convinced that this francophone nation in North America will one day choose liberty. I wish them courage." -- André Boisclair, on resigning as PQ leader. You mean it's not a civic nation after all? You have to be a francophone? I'm so disillusioned.

Sarkozy extraordinaire

I wonder if I am right in thinking how extraordinary the election of Nicolas Sarkozy really is. He is, to begin, the first president of France whose parents were not both born in France -- that is, he is the first child of an immigrant to become president.

But he is also, I believe, the first first-generation immigrant to be elected head of government of any major developed country, certainly since World War II....

I can't think of a German chancellor who was not of German origin -- excepting the Austrian colonel corporal. I can find no British prime minister who was not of British origin, no Italian PM who was not ethnically Italian, no Japanese who was not Japanese.

There have been, I think, no presidents of the United States who were born to immigrants, and only one VP: Spiro Agnew. (Michael Dukakis is the only first-generation immigrant even to be nominated for president that I can think of.) Ditto prime ministers of Canada, at least since Laurier (Macdonald and Mackenzie were both immigrant children, but in those days so were many English-speaking Canadians, if not most.)

Perhaps I've missed someone. Have any first-generation immigrants risen to head of government in any other major industrialized country? (The only one I can think of in any country, off the top of my head, is Alberto Fujimori of Peru, though there must surely be others.) Or is Sarkozy unique? And in France, of all places!

UPDATE: A couple of good catches in the comments. John Turner was indeed born in England to a British father, then emigrated with his Canadian-born mother (his father having died) back to Canada. And Bonar Law was born in Canada, then accompanied his Scottish aunt (his mother having died) on her return to Scotland. Both of these were arguably more in the nature of repatriations than immigration. UPPERDATE: And of course, Turner was never elected!

QS adds some good info as well, before wandering off into fantasyland...