You have to see it for yourself…. trust me… you have to see this!

It is entitled A spot in the sun

(It is not lewd or anything like that.  It is a picture of the space shuttle and space station) …

A interesting story at Ryerson University.  Ryerson University has censored, banned, and pulled down a McDonald’s ad.  Not because they have concerns about McDonald’s effect on society or anything leftist like that, no they have pulled it …. because …. wait for it …. because

“This stereotype of the passed out male student is offensive,”

This reported originally by the Ryersonian at Ryerson University to have been by Mike Verticchio, executive director of operations and services, Ryerson Ancillary Services. 

What stereotype is he referring to?  The ad in question depicts a students in a bathtub with his arm hanging over the side.  In the hand of this arm, he is griping a McDonald’s bag.  The tag underneath says: “Buy your friend breakfast in bed”. 

That is all I will say cause the The Eyeopener at Ryerson says it all in their editorial this week: Hypersensitive douchebags …

Today, we lose a young soldier who served their country well.  I am saddened to learn of this and the soldier’s family, friends, unit, and others are in my prayers.

My thoughts also go out to Cpl. James Miller of Hamilton who was wounded today.  May he quickly recover.

CTVNews Reports …

The recent SFSS situation at Simon Fraser University marks a new era of student governance.  Not only at SFSS, but across all of Canada.

What do I mean?

I mean that this is the first true example of a students’ union being held to account by students in a meaningful way since, well, I do not know but it has probably been awhile. 

Why does it matter?

It matters because students easily pay over one hundred million dollars into students’ unions each year.  For the kind of money that students’ union have, they have little accountability to go with it.  This is primarily because so many student union executive are cliques of friends, they are only short-term, students’ tend to be secretive, and it is hard for someone to try to hold them accountable.  Basically, Student Union fees are one of the larger expenses for students especially when a student has to pay into a Health and/or Dental plan. 

(aside: there is an interesting discussion about the CFS run Health Plan which is the largest student health plan in Canada in the comments thread of a StudentUnion.ca post here: http://www.studentunion.ca/2006/09/update-on-sfu-health-plan-politics.html#comments) (aside two: No one knows how much profit the MSU Dental Plan made for the private company that runs it, but it is likely very high.  The MSU has stated that it is not in the best interests of students to have a dental office on campus…… ummmm… cause we may use our dental plan decreasing profits for the private company that won the gift-laced bid for the contract?)

One of the common things that occurs at Students’ Union especially B.C. …

The McGill Daily reports that the Quebec Young Liberals are pushing for the tuition freeze in Quebec to come to an end.  I find this interesting.  I do agree with there basic premise that financial aid must increase with tuition.  This year tuition is up in Ontario and I am paying more.  I am also not getting any increase in my financial aid.  That annoys me.  Anyway, here is a snippet of the article and the link here:

The youth wing of Quebec’s Liberal Party is campaigning to lift the province-wide tuition freeze that has been in effect since 1996.
According to the Youth-Commission of the Parti libéral du Québec, the tuition freeze benefits the upper class at all Quebec universities by offering them a cheap ticket they do not need. They suggest regulated tuition increases along with more financial aid.
“Our position is an increase in Quebec tuition and a congruent increase in financial aid,” said Julien Morissette, Policy Coordinator for the Quebec Liberal Youth.

This is definitely a developing story that I hope to learn more on. …

Last Night on the Colbert Report, Stephen played this video:
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SFSS DN! is liveblogging as students are taking back the SFSS.
http://blog.sfssdemocracynow.ca/2006/09/27/renegade-forum-meeting-in-progress/

Renegade Forum Meeting in progress
As I type this, a renegade Forum meeting is in progress.
Attended by five or six current Board of Directors members, and enough current Forum members to make fifteen members in attendance (one more than the required quorum) the Forum is meeting.
The rest of the Board, including the Group of Seven, are not in attendance. A staff member, whose job it is to take minutes at Forum, was instructed not to attend. He was told that if he attended, he would be disciplined.
On the agenda is a motion to call a special general meeting of the Society, and a motion of censure in the seven BoD members who unjustly terminated a longtime staff member this summer.
More on this as it happens – the students are taking their society back!

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The SFSS “G7″ has cancelled a Student Forum where students could have spoke to the issues going on at SFSS.
Wow, I do not know the local fruit in B.C. (okay, maybe I should use the local plant, but I am not going there) cause I would replace the word banana with that.
Democracy, such an annoyance eh?
SFSS Democracy Now! Reports:

Another strike at democracy: Forum meeting cancelled
This just in:

Hey everyone,
Please be advised that unfortunately Forum will not be able to meet tomorrow, Wednesday Sept.27th due to lack of quorum. The next scheduled meeting will be Wednesday Oct.26th at 4:30pm. Please circle this date on your calendar.
Thanks,
Glyn Lewis
Member Services Officer
Simon Fraser Student Society
Canadian Federation of Students Local 23
p:604-268-6564 f:604-291-5843

Glyn Lewis, MSO for the Society, has cancelled the September Forum meeting. The Forum did not meet in August, nor will it meet in September. One wonders how quourm cannot be met if the meeting cannot be held.
Some current rumours indicate that Forum was about to discuss some things that the Board didn’t like – such as a call for a Special General Meeting and a motion of censure – so they cancelled it. Is that fair? Why not let Forum decide?
For those of you who don’t know, Forum is the place where Departmental Student Unions and consituency groups have their say at the SFSS. In days gone by, it was the highest decision making body in the Society. However, today, it appears to have outlived the Board’s pleasure.

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I listen to many radio show by downloading them on demand. Today, I happened across the Brian Lehrer Show which is a show on WYNC in New York City.
I have listen to the first ten minutes of a segment on Friday’s show. It is about the Pope’s recent speech in Germany which used a 14th Century quote about Islam. It has sparked outrage in the Middle East. I have been hard pressed to find a decent in-depth discussion about the context of the statement. I was impressed with the background given into why the Pope may have said what he did.
You can listen to it here:
http://www.wnyc.org/stream/ram?file=/bl/bl092206d.mp3 …

From SFSS Democracy Now:

SFSS BoD Ignores 2,425 of its Members
Tepidly breaking news tonight – and what everyone was expecting – Students for a Democratic University is reporting that the SFSS BoD is rejecting the petition of 2,424 students calling for a special general meeting.
The SFSS claims this is because the Society Act of BC sets out a 10% threshold of ‘requisitioners’ who must call for an SGM. This in despite of the fact that the Act also states that a Society must listen to its bylaws (here, the SFSS Bylaws state a threshold of 5%) and the fact that personnel in the Ministry of Finance (Registrar of Societies) agree that the 5% is sufficient.
The most heartbreaking of all this, aside from the fact that the SFSS and SDU are now going to court, which will cost us all more money? The SDU had 9.8% of the membership. 0.2% away from the SFSS’s illegally high threshold.

This is definitely not good. This is definitely going to the courts by the sounds of things.
Now, what started this all? Read this edition of The Peak from the end of the summer to find out.
July 31st 2006 Edition …

It is called Dark Room. Basically, it is a minimal text writing program. It go full screen and it is just me, the keyboard and the screen. NO DISTRACTIONS. I find that my notetaking in class and productivity outside of class as very much improved using it.
Here is a screenshot:

It is a free program, go get it here:
http://they.misled.us/dark-room …

Two Updates at Bottom of Post
The “Group of 7″ has launched their own website that appears to be an official SFSS website.
There is no disclaimer or anything else on the site to indicate that it is not an official SFSS website.
At the very least, they are openly using the resources (their SFSS emails and offices) of the SFSS to fight against the various student movements that have sprung up demanding answers about the acts they engaged in during the summer. These groups are now (for the most part) calling for the impeachment of the “Group of 7″. You can see the new “G7″ website at: www.yoursfss.org
SFSS Democracy Now has a good post pointing out the dizzying spin of the new website here.
I decided to look into this website and see who is behind it in light of the question raised on SFSS DN! about possible violations of the collective agreement between SFSS and CUPE. What I found raises even more questions.
A Whois search of this domain brings up the following information:

Registrant:
davidsmind inc.
1270 East 16th
Basement
vancouver, British Columbia V5T 2w5
Canada
Registered through: GoDaddy.com, Inc. (http://www.godaddy.com)
Domain Name: YOURSFSS.ORG
Created on: 22-Sep-06
Expires on: 22-Sep-07
Last Updated on: 22-Sep-06
Administrative Contact:
mattatall, david davidsmind@davidsmind.com
davidsmind inc.
1270 East 16th
Basement
vancouver, British Columbia V5T 2w5
Canada
(604) 875-9958
Technical Contact:
mattatall, david davidsmind@davidsmind.com
davidsmind inc.
1270 East 16th
Basement
vancouver, British Columbia V5T 2w5
Canada
(604) 875-9958
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.SOHOSKYWAY.NET
NS2.SOHOSKYWAY.NET

I went to www.davidsmind.com. …

It appears, if this comment on SFSS Democracy Now is true, that the Executive of the SFSS is getting desperate. They claim they cannot talk about “the issue” because of employee confidentiality, which is correct to a point. Some of the actions that occurred such as the taking of private information to an off-campus apartment are outside of this confidentality. Basically, one must give some leadway on hiding behind confidentiality to the SFSS Executive.
Now, this comment (if true) would mean that the SFSS Executive is not longer using that pretext and are just going out and talking about why they fired an employee starting this issue.
In terms of what they are saying, I have not heard so much spin in a long time. SFSS Democracy Now and Students for a Democratic University are not corrupt. They are not trying to bring back corruption. They are trying to get rid of it. I am shocked by the extend of dirty politics and lying that this SFSS clique is engaging in. Student Politics sure is not pretty.
Read the Comment here:
http://blog.sfssdemocracynow.ca/2006/09/21/classroom-speaking-tours-from-the-bod/#comment-157 …

The Eyeopener at Ryerson now offers a weekly podcast.
Head over to their site and take a listen:
http://www.theeyeopener.com/ …

Reading my Student Newspapers online this morning. When I went to the website of The Lance at University of Windsor, I was greeted by a YouTube box. I figured lets see what they found on YouTube, turns out I should have figured lets see what they created on YouTube.
Here it is:
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