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Moms, all moms
Time magazine's "Mom Enough?" cover would not look out of place with tabloids obsessed with beach body disasters and other incredibly unimportant information (Outrageous – Life, May 10). There are as many types of mothers as there are mothers. That one type should be better or worse is the kind of junk-journalism that sells.
But what is interesting about the cover is the kind of tension it creates. The mother is sexually attractive, and not dressed in the usual mojo-killing mom uniform of sweatpants etc., yet her breast is being used for maternal nutrition, rather than – pardon the pun – the titillation so often seen in lad magazines.
No doubt many men looking at the cover feel uncomfortable with the mixed message and old saw of mother/lust object. For women, and myself as a mother, it's a little old.
I do, however, feel badly for her son. This image will follow him forever. I wonder how he will feel about it as an adult.
Catherine Brennan, Toronto
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Costs and contributions
Herbert Grubel (Let The Job Market Choose Our Immigrants – May 10) argues that immigrants and even their offspring impose a "fiscal burden" on Canadians that will never be repaid, as their lower earnings and higher unemployment mean they cost more than they contribute in taxes.
I wonder if he can suggest a time and place in history where recent immigrants earn more than "natives"? It is well known that it takes time for immigrants to catch up; moreover, research suggests that a key reason for higher unemployment and lower wages among immigrants is job market discrimination, as well as employer uncertainty about immigrant qualifications and experience. There are many good reasons for reform of the immigration system in Canada, but the notion that they owe us more is not one of them.
Arvind Magesan, Department of Economics, University of Calgary
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Picking judges
Congratulations on keeping the issue of judicial appointments in the news (Excellence Is Not Homogeneity – editorial, May 10). The question you should keep putting to politicians is: Why not change the federal appointment system to one like Ontario's, where an independent group identifies a short list of the best candidates and the government chooses one?
There are only two reasons: The party in power does not want to give up its patronage power to reward friends; politicians believe that their friends will make judicial decisions they like.
As a former federal judge of 16 years, I can assure politicians that judges make extremely few decisions on "political issues." Once they are appointed, people of all political stripes are extremely independent and move away from political issues completely. A simple example: I was appointed by a Conservative government and will continue to criticize ours for continuing the patronage system.
Dan Ferguson, Peterborough, Ont.
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Search-warrant logic
Re Why The Jury Didn't Hear Child-Pornography Details (May 10): It appears that evidence found in a shoe box is treated differently under the law than evidence found in a computer.
This suggests that the legal minds that came up with this search-warrant absurdity are organized more like shoeboxes and nothing like computers.
Ken West, Toronto
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Minister's approval
It is entirely inappropriate that Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird's "dear friend" and constituent Rabbi Chaim Mendelson's Chabad Lubavitch flawed "social hall" proposal was awarded $1-million by the federal Human Resources department's Enabling Accessibility Fund (Rejected $1-Million Grant Gets Minister's Personal Approval – May 10).
The project failed to meet the fund's criteria by a whopping 29 points. More deserving applications were denied, but Rabbi Mendelsohn's proposal miraculously made it. This should be referred to the Ethics Commissioner.
The Chabad of Centrepointe website says that "the Chabad is dedicated to bringing Jewish awareness to Parliament Hill." How much influence is Rabbi Mendelsohn and Chabad Lubavitch having on the Harper government's biased pro-Israel policies in the Middle East?
Carey Watt, Fredericton
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Shame all around
While you make some valid points about the B.C. teachers labour dispute, your editorial is too one-sided (Public Sprit Under Pressure – May 10). It does not properly castigate all the involved parties.
Teachers' participation in unpaid extracurricular activities is entirely voluntary. Just as it is inappropriate for the union to demand certain behaviours of its members in their free time, it is also inappropriate for the employer to request that the refusal to engage in extracurricular activities be seen as an illegal strike, and for the government and Opposition to make political hay of the dispute.
They all participated in creating the problem and they should all be equally ashamed at failing the students.
Frank S. Loomer, Victoria
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Oil sands' benefits
NDP leader Thomas Mulcair's blaming Ontario's and Quebec's economic woes on the oil sands is as bizarre as it is inaccurate (Dutch Disease? Hypochondria – May 9). As Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall has stated, it is "very, very divisive."
The energy sector is generating employment in almost every segment of our economy. The oil sands alone are responsible for close to 400,000 direct and indirect jobs right across this country. If you include proposed pipeline projects and increased oil production, the oil sands will support on average some 700,000 jobs every year for the next 25 years. Alberta's oil industry will buy some $65-billion worth of goods and services from companies in Ontario in that same period.
Over the past five years, the oil and gas industry has contributed an average of $22-billion to government coffers – money that helps pay for everything from education to health care to roads and bridges.
Pamela Wallin, Senator (Saskatchewan)
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Time check: 2012
For a moment Friday morning, I had to double check that I hadn't somehow picked up a copy of The Globe from 1912, not 2012. That's because I was reading a letter to the editor from our federal Minister of Public Safety, Vic Toews, extolling the virtues of prisoner punishment as rehabilitation (Prisoners' Treatment – May 10).
I wish this government would stop insulting Canadians by pretending to care about prisoner rehabilitation and admit that, for them, it's really about vengeance. But then, they'd also have to admit they're not really interested in public safety, either. It's pretty clear to most advanced cultures that if punishment is not also accompanied by rehabilitation, all you do is release back into society a whole bunch of angry, disenfranchised people.
John Gaylord, Toronto
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If I see the term "law-abiding" one more time, I'll scream. I hope there is no law against it.
Karl Dilcher, Halifax