The Rape of Europa

I just watched a fascinating documentary entitled The Rape of Europa. It focuses on how the Nazis during World War 2 plundered art work from all the countries they conquered throughout Europe. There was a particular focus on Jewish families, from whom much was stolen.

From the film I learned several things which I had previously not known:

• During his teen years Adolf Hitler was an aspiring artist in Austria. He was rejected from entering the prestigious Vienna Academy of Fine Arts and some say that this inflamed his hatred toward Jews, as many artists of the time admitted into this school were Jewish.
  
  
• The American military had a special group of 200 Monument Men, whose sole purpose was to rescue and preserve paintings, sculptures, and architecture.
  
  
• I have been to Pisa, Italy but had no idea that the main attraction used to be the Camposanto, a monumental cemetery, and not the leaning tower. But the Camposanto was so badly damaged during WW2 that it lost all of its world renowned frescoes.
  
  
• Hitler had long planned to build an enormous museum in his honour in Linz, Austria, the town that he referred to as his hometown, even though it really wasn't. This museum was slated to be by far the largest in the world.
  

If you get a chance, do watch this film. It's fascinating.

Canadian Arts Grants Cut . . . Boo Hoo!

Unbeknownst to most Canadians, $4.7 Million per year has been mostly wasted by our federal government on something called the PromArt program. This liberal slush fund has been used for such things as:

• $3,000 given to Holy Fuck, a Toronto rock band, to travel in the U.K.
• $5,000 given to former CBC broadcaster, Avi Lewis, to let the little darling go to film festivals in Australia & Argentina
• $16,500 given to Tal Bachman, a best-selling recording artist, travel to South Africa and Zimbabwe
• $3,000 given to author Gwynne Dyer, to travel to Cuba
• $18,000 given to The North South Institute, a left-wing anti-globalization "think tank", to attend an anti-Western conference in Cuba (Note: I put "think tank" in quotes because isn't a left-wing think tank an oxymoron?)

On a related note, a few years ago I received a detailed summary from a close friend of how the Canadian film industry works vs. the American film industry. Down south, people come up with project ideas and then go to private sources to get funding. But here in Canada, most filmmakers live entirely off of the public trough (that's your money and mine), figuring out assorted ways to get various grants to fund their projects. In most cases, there's absolutely no expectation that there'll ever be much public interest in their finished work, let alone making a profit. This well known con has been going on for decades.

I can only imagine the reaction from those at the CBC, who have stolen wasted consumed more public money than any other group I know of. They'll be decrying this for the next 20 years. IMHO good riddens!!! And realize that this is probably one of hundreds of government programs that are nothing other than a privileged slush fund. If recipients of such funds were to turn into pickpockets tomorrow nothing much would change in their disgusting behaviour.

Bus Stories

Yesterday I took the bus downtown. Just as the bus driver was about to close the doors, a 30-something fellow jumped on and said, "Can I get a ride across the bridge this one time only?" The bus driver (and everyone else within earshot) knew it was complete B.S. but let him on anyhow.

The fellow sat down and then promptly pulled out a cel phone and started text messaging. So he has enough money to own and use a cel phone but has no problem ripping off the public.

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My mom told me about taking the B-Line (a long accordion bus) from downtown. When it reached the middle of the Granville Bridge it deliberately stopped. A fare inspector walked through the bus, fining anyone who was cheating on their fare. He told my mom that there were 40 such people on that bus. That would be a minimum of 25% of the people.

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Is it any wonder why Translink is consistently short of revenues. Has Vancouver become a community of cheats?

BC Lottery Chief: Should He Stay or Should He Go?

After a massive fraud scandal is exposed throughout the machinations of the BC Lottery Corporation, their CEO, Vic Poleschuk, just goes onto the PR circuit to say, "Yeah, we're working on it." Not good enough, sir. One of the reasons you're paid the big salary is to accept the responsibility when such a scandal comes to light.

Japanese politicians commit suicide for much less but here in Canada, no one resigns for anything it seems. If our business and political leaders have no honour and sense of responsibility then why should we be surprised when our children don't either?!