Sunday May 22, 2011
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Conservative Party - Green Streets - Measha Brueggergosman
Conservative Party - After more than five years of nagging frustration, obvious and persistent impatience and simmering anger at his opponents, Stephen Harper at last has it all; a majority government, MPs from across the country and a Conservative Senate.
He also has four years in which to impose a new agenda for the country and, in the imposing, perhaps a new political narrative for Canada.
Mr. Harper will delight in reducing the Liberals to unprecedented depths but what will he offer in terms of big ideas and big policies?
Will he ---or has he already----polarized our politics into radical right and progressive left?
Will the country move gradually from left of center to right of center; and what are the implications of that shift?
As we looked at the fate of the Liberals two weeks ago, this morning we shift our sights to the Conservatives. That's in Hour One.
Read more about hour one here
Green Streets - In our Middle Hour, David Miller and the greening of our cities.
In his two terms as Mayor of Toronto, Mr. Miller was a vocal advocate of the need to govern our large urban areas with an eye keenly fixed on the environmental impact of our political actions.
This morning, he travels to New York and in conversation with Mayor Michael Bloomberg, talks about the challenges facing cities in the 21st century.
David Miller and Green Streets in Hour Two.
Read more about hour two here
Measha Brueggergosman - In our final hour, the return to our studio of the great Canadian soprano Measha Brueggergosman.
When she first appeared on our show, she was very young, very nervous and obviously very talented.
This time she returns as one of the great international super-star voices of grand opera.
She has fully recovered from a physical crisis which almost killed her a couple of years ago.
She'll tell us what drives and delights her and also why she loves to sing bare-footed. That's in Hour Three.
Read more about hour three here
Elsewhere in the program: thoughts on chickens and eggs, the agony of bathing suit buying and reinventing your life.
Michael's Essay
In this week's essay, Michael's thoughts on chickens and eggs.Conservative Party
On Wednesday, the Governor General swore in Stephen Harper's new cabinet, all 38 of them. And on June 2, the prime minister and his colleagues will meet the House of Commons as a Majority Government.
His victory after three tries is truly historic. He is the first non-Quebecker to lead a Conservative majority government since John Diefenbaker in the Fifties.
His is no longer a Western regional party of angry reformers; it is truly national. In fact he has more seats in Ontario than in the four Western provinces combined.
After having to govern for almost five year as if every day was the last, what will four years of majority government be like.
And how much will those four years change the country?
Has our politics become polarized between right wing conservatives and a left wing opposition?
Two weeks ago we looked at the state of the Liberal Party of Canada and its future. Now we turn our attentions to the Conservative Party.
To try to sort out all the implications of the Conservative victory, I am joined by Tom Flanagan, author, columnist, former adviser to Stephen Harper and professor of political science; he was in Calgary.
Neil Reynolds, one of this country's most celebrated editors and a columnist for the Globe and Mail, was in Saint John.
Lisa Samson was in Ottawa. She's a principal with the government relations firm Strategy Corp and a political science graduate from the University of Calgary. She went to Ottawa in 1993 with the first Reform Party MPs.
Personal Essay - Second Life
Put in the nicest possible light, you can think of it as a second debut. A second wind. A second chance. And who doesn't need a bit of resurrection in their lives?
But cast in another light, starting over - reinventing a life - is hard work, no matter what the rewards.
Ken Dafoe knows. This is his essay: Second Life.
Swimsuits
It's a rite of spring - shedding our coats and sweaters and digging out the swimwear for the sunny days ahead. That's fine if you have a bathing suit that still fits, and that hasn't begun to shred from too much chlorine or faded from too much sun.
Otherwise, what's in store is a ritual that some people dread: swimsuit shopping.
For many - especially those of us of a certain age - the prospect of entering a cubicle, stripping down to nothing and exposing oneself to oneself is not exactly one of life's pleasures.I have been told this experience is even worse for women than for men. But I have my doubts.
Here's what the Sunday Editon's Talin Vartanian found when she visited a Bikini Village in Toronto.
Green Streets
In the months since Toronto Mayor David Miller stepped down from his old job in this city, he's been a busy man.
He's back at a big downtown Toronto law firm. He's an advisor on urban and environmental issues to international organizations like the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development - the OECD. And to the C40 - an organization of big cities around the world that are focussed on fighting climate change.
He's just been appointed a Global Fellow on the Future of Cities at New York University.
But he has NOT been too busy to prepare a special full hour report for The Sunday Edition.
Mr. Miller has spent a lot of time in New York lately. That city has been called the Big Apple for decades . But more and more these days , its being called the Big Green Apple.
Here's David Miller.
Measha Brueggergosman
It has been said she has a voluptuous voice and a sovereign stage presence. Said one critic, she is one of the great voices of the 20th century.
Canadian soprano Measha Brueggergosman began her vocal career performing at funerals and bar mitzvahs in Fredericton and, if not for her parents' influence, she might never have left her hometown.
They prevailed ... and she has since performed in some of the world's most prestigious venues: Carnegie Hall, Wigmore Hall in London, and the Theatre des Champs-Elysees in Paris.
She has given a Command Performance for the Queen and sung to more than three billion people watching the opening of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
AND she has lost 150 pounds and become a yoga devotee.
Not much slows down this 33-year-old soprano superstar.
Not much, except a near fatal heart condition that almost killed her in 2009. She had a split-aorta, which was misdiagnosed at least once, and required emergency open-heart surgery.
Thanks to a vigilant GP she got the care she needed. But still, as she's said, she went from a platinum card to a black card in a matter of hours.
Obviously...she has survived and thrived.
Almost two years later, Measha Bruegerrgosman has just starred in Mozart's La Clemenza di Tito, a production of the baroque opera company, Opera Atelier.
Measha Brueggergosman was back in our studio in Toronto.
Mail: Baseball and Libya
Last week, Michael had the great pleasure of speaking with Jerry Howarth. That very talented play by play announcer has been the voice of the Blue Jays Baseball team for thirty years now.
That conversation brought these e-mails. And we also got some feedback about our interview with Libya's asipring new Finance Minister, Ali Tarhouni.
Personal Essay - Wrestling With The Weight of Earthly Goods
Stuff. There's too much of it. Everywhere. My desk is overflowing.
I'm no hoarder. In fact I think of myself as the opposite. Nonetheless, every surface, every cupboard in my house is cluttered. There are too many books. Too many chatchkes. Too many pieces of furniture - half of them tumbling down.
There's simply too much. Too much of EVERYTHING. So why not just chuck it all? Or at least give it a fierce cull?
If only it were that simple.
Here's Antonia Morton with her essay "Wrestling With The Weight of Earthly Goods."
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