Today has been a strange day in Canada and the rest of the world. Canada has been put fourth on the UN's new list, Martha Stewart has been sentenced to five months in jail, five months house arrest (or something like it) and two years probation. 80 (or more) children died in a school fire in India, and I, Robot is getting mixed reviews. Whoopi Goldberg has been dropped from the Slim-Fast campaign because of her rude remarks at a Kerry fundraiser last week (it's been speculated that this is because of consumer complaints, as the man in charge of slim-fast is democrat himself, and given lots of money to the party.), and in the item that I wanted to open first (but tortured myself by reading everything ELSE), Michael Moore has broken a Canadian law.
I was a little skeptical at the title. I thought "oh yeah? What'd he do? Speed on the 401?" Then I learned something about Canadian law that I didn't know before. In order to try to sway canadian votes, you have to be a Canadian. Technicality, I thought. As much as I didn't like the fact that he made a statement with nothing supporting it and no reasoning behind it I still figured "well, whatever. What's done is done." And now, today, I find that there are people (university students from Ontario) trying to get elections Canada to charge the filmmaker. Um, okay. I doubt that elections Canada would, or that any charges made would actually stick, or that there would be any sort of serious penalty, but kudos for trying! The story gets weirder.
The mayor of Sarnia, Ontario has stated that he will try to make Michael Moore into an honourary Canadian citizen, to "shelter" him from the charges. Now that annoyed me. I'm fairly certain that nothing will happen to him -- with the fact that like, every major store chain in the world sells his stuff I think he can afford some decent lawyers. And why should he not have to defend himself? He did break a law, even if it was an obscure one. What on earth has Michael Moore done for Canada that warrants us sheltering him from anything? We even produced Bowling For Columbine. Bah. It's not like he'd make movies about us (please, we're little potatoes), but it would send the wrong message. Michael Moore is a big guy. He can take care of himself.
And in a world where Martha Stewart gets convicted? Anything is possible.
I was a little skeptical at the title. I thought "oh yeah? What'd he do? Speed on the 401?" Then I learned something about Canadian law that I didn't know before. In order to try to sway canadian votes, you have to be a Canadian. Technicality, I thought. As much as I didn't like the fact that he made a statement with nothing supporting it and no reasoning behind it I still figured "well, whatever. What's done is done." And now, today, I find that there are people (university students from Ontario) trying to get elections Canada to charge the filmmaker. Um, okay. I doubt that elections Canada would, or that any charges made would actually stick, or that there would be any sort of serious penalty, but kudos for trying! The story gets weirder.
The mayor of Sarnia, Ontario has stated that he will try to make Michael Moore into an honourary Canadian citizen, to "shelter" him from the charges. Now that annoyed me. I'm fairly certain that nothing will happen to him -- with the fact that like, every major store chain in the world sells his stuff I think he can afford some decent lawyers. And why should he not have to defend himself? He did break a law, even if it was an obscure one. What on earth has Michael Moore done for Canada that warrants us sheltering him from anything? We even produced Bowling For Columbine. Bah. It's not like he'd make movies about us (please, we're little potatoes), but it would send the wrong message. Michael Moore is a big guy. He can take care of himself.
And in a world where Martha Stewart gets convicted? Anything is possible.