I don't get it.

"Particularly in big cities, we've got people that have grown up in a different culture, and they don't have the same background in terms of the stable communities we had 20, 30 years ago in our cities … and don't have the same respect for authority or people's person or property. Talk to the police. Look at who's committing these crimes. They're not the kid that grew up next door."

- Lee Richardson, MP

Racism is always a topic that always catches my eye, particularly when it involves a publicly elected person in office. I come from a mixed race family, as many of you know. I live in a mixed race culture. My iPhone is loaded with tunes from artists of all colour. I worked in an immigration aid organization for a couple years. I'm down with the whole cultural mosaic thing. Racism sucks. It is not cool. So 1950's.

So, when I noticed this most recent racism charge against an MP, I needed to read the quote for myself. I had to check it out. You can see it above.

Now, as for myself, I don't get it. I guess its all in how you read the word "culture". Sure, culture can mean a particular type of people with similar skin colour from a certain geographic area: African-American culture, Native American culture, Asian culture, etc. But we also toss the word around to mean any sort of common perspective from a group of people: gun culture, culture of fear, digital culture, etc.

Was this MP, who has served publicly since 1988, secretly seething inside with racial animosity, until this quick-witted, much experienced pit-bull reporter from the... what media outlet was that again? ... oh yeah, "Fast Forward Magazine" grilled Richardson, verbally pummelling him causing him to go into a racial rant?

Somehow, I just don't think that "Fast Forward Magazine" got the big scoop here.

But what was Richardson getting at? Was he proposing an inner-city education program to raise a positive profile of the police? Was he offering to propose a law to toughen laws against crimes involving personal property? We need to emphasize our sense of community? What was the discussion about?

I guess we'll never know. The media would rather beat the shit out of him.

Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Work

A weird thing happened on the way to work this morning.

My morning commute ritual happens like so: I hop on my express bus, grab a seat (if available), then pop in my earphones and listen to my iPhone's daily offering of podcasts. In about a half hour or so, I'm downtown. Commute done. Mission accomplished.

However, this morning, before I get a chance to have at my podcasts, a guy stands up to face the throng of seated commuters. "Good morning ladies and gentlemen, could I have your attention please?"

Was this a bus-jacking? Was I going to go down in a hail of bullets? Maybe he's from Calgary Transit. But he's not wearing a uniform! Speak man! Why are you standing in front of the bus talking to us?

The introduces himself and tells us that he's the NDP candidate for our riding. Then I'm thinking that I'm about to be subject to 30 minutes of left-wing propaganda. The hail of bullets is looking mighty good right about now.

He goes on to say that he'd be passing around a clip board, he's collecting signatures so that he can be put on the ballet for the upcoming October 14th General Election. When the clipboard came to me, I thought "Well, your funeral." In the spirit of democracy, I signed it. An NDP guy getting elected in Calgary is about as likely as me being mistake for Tom Cruise (you see, he's quite a a bit shorter than me, so this could never happen).

What about the precedent here? Are commuters on the bus fair game for grandstanding? Should Calgary Transit crack down on speech-makers? My opinion right now, as I sit on my milk crate at work here, is to let 'em.

This may happen again, but I hope the speech maker is prepared for alot of blank stares from people with earphones on.

That's It! Summer Officially Over

"Fall is my favorite season in Los Angeles, watching the birds change color and fall from the trees."
-David Letterman

Hockey try-outs begin the first Saturday in September, like clockwork. It's cool to get to the rink and reacquaint yourself with the other parents that you've lost contact with over the summer. What's not so cool the thing that puts a dagger through the heart of summer: the early morning weekend ice time.

What happens with these try-outs, or "evaluations" (the preferred term, not so scary), is your kid plays in an exhibition game. After the game, before you leave the rink, you pick up your ice time slip for his next session. On Saturday, I grabbed such a slip. The numbers on the slip confused me. I mean, I understood the 7:00 part, but immediately after that there were these two other letters: "AM". What the hell is this? What does this mean? Who is doing this to me?

So, to you all out there who don't have kids in Minor Hockey, I urge you to sleep in like you've never slept in before this weekend. Do this in honour of us. Wake up at 9:00 or 10:00, then pause for a moment of reflection.

Remember us.