Campbell's Chicken Noodle: The Flu Soup

I've had that wicked flu. After vomiting three times the first day and having diarrhea for six days and six nights -- and periods in between when I felt like I was getting better -- I ventured out into the rain storm on Thursday and got to a doctor.

Guess what the doctor ordered? Chicken noodle soup. I told her that I had actually been eating Campbell's Chicken Noodle soup. She said, "Great", "Perfect." I'd had a craving for it and asked my neighbor to pick some up for me. I specified Campbell's because I had tried an even cheaper brander once and it tasted cheaper. "Chicken noodle soup is an easy food to digest," the doctor told me.

Generally, I try not to eat too much canned soup because the salt level in it is not healthy. But it's the salt that makes it good for you when you have diarrhea. "You want salty", the doctor said.

Don't eat vegetables, fruits, or fruit juice, the doctor told me, except apple juice. That made me perk up as I had been craving apple juice on the first day I was sick. My neighbor said he'd pick me up some and I was disappointed when he got orange by mistake. So he went back and got Sunripe Apple which I sipped on for hours. It was nice.

The doctor prescribed me Ipprobrium (sp?) too. And when my tests come back next week, she may prescribe antibiotics, depending on what she discovers.

So along with guzzling large bottles of water, I have been living on apple juice and chicken noodle soup. By the time I'm well again, I may have enough cans to build one of those stacks like Andy Warhol.

Federal Gov't Povertarian Threatens Downtown Eastside Resident

Carol Madsen brings her kids to work. Madsen is the Manager of Pathways, an "Information Center" operated by Industry Canada in the Downtown Eastside poverty industry. Her kids come every day after school and after that point, Madsen does very little work. In fact, the tall, thirty-something woman with dyed blond coiled curls, is often seen taking off out the door well before most government workers get off.

Job searchers who are on the computers writing resumes or other material that requires concentration have been getting peeved by Madsen bringing her children to work. The kids run from one side of the room to the other screeching. Nobody is mad at the kids. But it is disruptive.

Yesterday the situation about Madsen bringing her kids to work came to a head. A woman needed to talk to Madsen about the fact that Madsen had earlier threatened her twice in the computer room. There had been a room full of witnesses, many of whom know each other from the Carnegie Center. The woman had been trying to get her resume finished when a young man came in to wait for a computer and began jokingly yelling at his pal, “Heh, get off that fucking computer!” The resume-typer eventually said “Ssssshh”. The young man said, “Who shooshed me?” She said, “I did.” He got angry, yelling across the room at her that she had no business telling him to shoosh, that this “isn’t a fucking library!”. He called her a “bitch” and made other names – he didn’t have a computer so he had nothing else to do. The resume-typer responded in a loud and clear voice, loud enough that Madsen came into the room, “I don’t have to take abuse from any man here. I’m getting security.” The resume-typer got up but Madsen was there by then.

Madsen told the resume-typer that if she spoke up again, she would be expelled from the facility. She said the same thing to the young man. The resume-typer pointed out that she had the right to speak up when a man was yelling abusive comments at her in a federal government facility. Madson issued the threat a second time, both times, looking directly at the resume-typer. The resume-typer asked Madson for her name. Madsen gave her a card, but was not friendly about it.

Madsen was stepping on a landmine by issuing threats.

Downtown Eastside residents have lost patience with povertarians who get huge government grants claiming they have the ‘skill set’ necessary to work with Downtown Eastside residents, and then take the short cut of expelling people from government-funded facilities instead of working with them. And too often the povertarian executes an expulsion without adequate evidence – in many cases with no evidence – of wrongdoing. “I was so upset about the threats,” says the resumer-typer, “I couldn’t even finish my resume.”

The resume-typer immediately e-mailed a friend and told him what had happened. He passed her e-mail on to the DTES Enquirer, knowing that bloggers have been taking the povertarians to task on these expulsions and threats of expulsions.

This chronic form of civil liberties abuse in the poverty industry has been brought to international attention through coverage of the barring of a homeless man, William Simpson, from the Carnegie Center, across the street from Pathways. Simpson was told in writing that he was barred for operating a website which “features links” to the Downtown Eastside Enquirer blog (which has exposed Carnegie povertarians for too often locking doors to educational and computer services in mid-day.)

Madsen, the resume-typer believes, issued a threat because it was quick and expedient and didn't require any real negotiation -- another lazy nanny in the Downtown Eastside nanny state. It wasn't as if Madsen was busy with other tasks at the time she resorted to threats of expelling a taxpayer from a service they pay for; she was lounging with her co-workers in a glass-encased office near the computer room, something she and the other povertarians do every afternoon. (I’ve seen it myself.) They would of course claim that they are having a meeting, but people who use the computer room everyday say these bureaucrats look more like they are laying back, shootin' the shit. In fact, the resume-typer points out, while they sat with one another in their little glass bubble, "I was doing their job." It was their job to tell this disruptive guy to shooosh, not hers, she notes.

The resume-typer was pissed off at the way she was treated. Later the same day, she tried to talk to Madsen about it. A male accompanied her when she confronted Madsen – without raising her voice, he says -- but Madsen was passive-aggressive. Madson just said, “Have a nice day” and smiled a mannequin-type smile. Then Madsen said, “Have a nice day” again. What kind of communication skills are those for a government bureaucrat to be using? Shortly afterward, Madson skittered away, into a room she and her children use. This is typical of how casually povertarians take their threats; they act like they are not even obligated to discuss them.

Before she skittered away, Madsen was also given the opportunity to give her side of this story to the blog. She has not done so.

The resume-typer believes that a second reason why Madson wouldn’t address the issue was that she was busy being “Mom” at work. She was holding one kid in her arms and the other was standing beside her. She may not have wanted to be criticized in front of her kids. She was supposed to be available to deal with adults in the workplace, the resume-typer explains, "It was only 3:40 p.m." As Madsen walked away, the resume-typer was exasperated and blurted out, “Maybe you should stop bringing your kids to work”. Madsen responded, “Ooooooooooooooooooooh.” This is the type of communication the public gets from Madson who is paid a salary large enough to leave taxpayers saying, “Oooooooooooooooooooh.”

Madsen’s conduct is typical of the contempt shown for Downtown Eastsiders by povertarians. Once the grant cheque is cashed [Madsen was reportedly involved in getting Pathways off the ground], they often create what Simpson calls a “residential school culture”. Pathways is not as close to that culture as some poverty industry organizations – presumably because they are a new organization in the poverty industry. That culture is more deeply entrenched at the Carnegie Center, where low income people have been barred without cause for 25 years. But the fact that Madsen resorted in such a knee-jerk fashion to threatening to expel a taxpayer for speaking up, suggests that this is not the first time she has used this tactic.

The resume-writer noted that although Madsen skittered away with her kids instead of speaking to her, she did take the time to ask her one question, "What is your name?" The resume-writer wondered if she asked for that information so that she could get her barred.

Industry Canada had better monitor Madsen.

In fact, there are many things that have to be monitored before Pathways has their funding renewed. Why can’t these jokers keep computers running? The computers frequently either go off-line completely or slow to a crawl. There is supposed to be a computer man there. Would that be him lounging in the glass room? Industry Canada must be pumping a million dollars a year or more into that place and the basic service they provide is public-access computers. So why aren't they working optimally?

And why doesn't Pathways give clients washroom access? If you ask to go to the washroom while using a computer, you are told that you will have to go across the street to Carnegie Center. Yet staff -- and their children -- don't seem to be putting on their coats and trotting across a busy intersection to have a tinkle. The building in which Pathways is located at Main & Hastings has housed two banks, first the Bank of Montreal and then the Four Corners Community Bank which went belly up, so obviously it would be equipped with washrooms for staff. So what's the problem? Do they not want to place their precious povertarian bums on the same toilet seat as the poor?

It used to be that people like the resume-typer had little recourse when threatened with expulsion from a poverty industry organizations. Blogging has changed that. Bloggers are blogging on the Downtown Eastside. And povertarian, we are blogging about you.

CUPE's Back: Blocks Poor From Computers at Carnegie

CUPE came back. The inside CUPE 15 workers returned to work today at Carnegie Center in Vancouver. But they are not allowing the poor to return to work. CUPE members are blocking the poor from the public access computers inside Carnegie.

There are public access computers in Carnegie in the following locations: three in the basement Seniors Lounge, eight in the third floor computer room, 6 in the third floor Learning Center, and two in the Vancouver Public Libary branch on the first floor (although those inside the library branch are primarily for looking up titles of books and other library materials.) Of course the doors of the small Carnegie branch of the Vancouver Public Library remain locked since the VPL workers voted not to accept this week's contract offer by mediator, Brian Foley -- so nobody expected to get into the library to use those computers. But what about the computers elsewhere in the building? The poor who want to use them have been told to take a hike.

The poor have been told that the reason the computers in the building are off limits to them is that they are run by the Vancouver Public Library. Indeed, the VPL logo is on the desk tops on the screens of these computers.

Only three computers are accessible to the public in the Carnegie building. They are three of the six in the 3rd floor Learning Center. That's because those three are operated by the Vancouver Community Net, not the VPL.

So what are well-paid CUPE members who have returned to work going to be doing with their time. A primary job of Colleen Gorrie is to work to keep volunteers in the areas in the building where there are computers. The volunteers keep an eye on the computers and get people to sign-in before using them. So what is she doing now? Twiddling her thumbs?

Maybe she could use her free time to answer questions about the WCB/WorkSafe claim she made. She claimed that a blog about Carnegie was making her feel "unsafe". A man who doesn't even blog, Bill Simpson, got scapegoated and barred from the Carnegie Center as a result of this claim. (Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty revealed this reason after the barring, although the official written reason given to Simpson in a letter on City letterhead was that he "links" to the blog in question.) Now that Gorrie and some other CUPE members, like Assistant Director Dan Tetrault who delivered the barring letter to Simpson along with Whitty, will have time on their hands, it would be a perfect time to launch an investigation into the legitimacy of this WCB claim. As Carnegie Board member Grant Chancey, a pro-union guy, pointed out, there was nothing threatening whatsoever on the blog in question. "And I've looked and I've looked and I've looked." When it comes to this claim, the opinion of several bloggers is that WCB, CUPE, and a few individuals in the City legal department have some splainin' to do.

Vancouver Rookie Cop Enters Women's Washroom With Gun Pulled

Over the weekend, a guy got stabbed in the leg in front of Carnegie Center, where a swarm of people sell drugs or just hang out. The guy appeared to have been stabbed in a major artery.

A Carnegie Security guard, a tall guy with white hair, was helping the paramedic by holding the torque on the injured man’s leg.

Then a rookie Vancouver Police officer comes along. He tells the plain clothes security guard to back off. But the Security guard was preventing the guy from bleeding to death, so he tells the cop that he works on security.

The cop asks where the guy was stabbed. The security guard told him that it was by the women’s washroom, although the trail of blood made it obvious where he had been stabbed. There is an underground women’s washroom near the Carnegie front steps; women say it’s a clean washroom and a City worker sits down there to make certain nobody shoots up or causes trouble.

"The cop pulls out his gun," said a Carnegie regular in amazement,"and goes down to the women’s washroom." As if anybody would get away with hiding in the women's washroom with so many people standing around, he added.

Another guy from the neighborhood said, “That cop has been watching too much tv.”

Power of Carnegie Newsletter Editor Curbed

There has been a shake-up at the Carnegie newsletter, a left-wing, newsletter that has been published on a shoestring in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside for over 20 years. For 21 years, Paul Taylor (photo above), a Downtown Eastside resident and American ex-patriot in his fifties, has been editing the newsletter. Many Carnegie members at tonight's meeting wanted his power curbed.

The Carnegie newsletter gets read. And it plays a role in keeping the majority of poor people on the Downtwon Eastside, Canada's poorest postal code, leaning to the left. The newsletter (masthead pictured below) accepts submissions from readers, many of whom are on welfare. There are persistent themes in the plain-english Carnegie newsletter: raise welfare rates by 50%, the 2010 Winter Olympics are a curse on the poor and an engine of gentrification, left-wing politicians like Libby Davies (who personally donates money to the newsletter) deserve to be re-elected. The best of the newsletter has been turned into a book, "The Heart of the City".

The Carnegie Board had to decide at tonight's meeting whether to accept a recommendation to set up an Editorial Board to oversee the newsletter and take some of the power out of the hands of Taylor.

A key issue that prompted the campaign to have an Editorial Board set up to oversee the newsletter was “libelous commentary” Taylor acknowledged writing in the newsletter about a homeless man, William Simpson. Simpson was barred from the Carnegie Learning Center after being suspected of contributing to the Downtown Eastside Enquirer blog which has been critical of Carnegie and accused it of being part of a poverty industry which disempowers the poor on the Downtown Eastside. After Simpson fought back by getting himself elected to the Carnegie Board of Directors, Carnegie Executive Director Ethel Whitty delivered him a letter on Vancouver City Hall letterhead barring him from the entire Center. Whitty told him that he was also stripped of his ability to attend Board meetings inside the Center. Members who had voted for Simpson were outraged. Tonight, Board member and aboriginal activist, Stephen Lytton, echoed their feelings when he said, "We can't continue with this Bill Simpson situation as he hasn't been proven guilty or otherwise.” Lytton was told he was off topic. "This is the topic," he responded.

In response to outrage about Simpson’s barring, Taylor wrote a column in the newsletter this summer claiming that Simpson had gotten elected essentially through fraud, lying specifically, and that Simpson had been writing “sadistic” commentary on the blog. Taylor later retracted these and other statements he had published about Simpson, acknowledging in writing that this was “libelous commentary”. Taylor also retracted commentary he had published about another new Board member, Rachel Davis, who had fallen out of favor with the Carnegie establishment after speaking out against the barring of Simpson.

Davis, a thin woman in her late 30’s with blond-brown, shoulder-length hair, has been a prime mover in the effort to have Taylor’s power curbed through the setting up of an Editorial Board. She told the crowd tonight that this is “nothing personal” against Taylor, but simply an effort to have policy respected. She argued that Taylor was using the Carnegie Newsletter as “his own personal, political newsletter.” She echoed criticisms of him that have been commonly heard at Carnegie over the years: people making submissions to the Carnegie newsletter sometimes find them rejected outright, not even looked at, or edited without their consent. “There are policies being violated,” Davis said, “and they are being violated over and over again despite the editor being asked [by the Board] to stop violating them.”

Sophia Friegang, who resigned as a Carnegie Board member last month over the Simpson barring, echoed Davis in saying that "there are certain policy guidelines that have been violated" here," so an oversight body was needed. "Nobody has the right to sole power as the editor for 20 years and it's ridiculous that anybody would have that right for 20 years." Friegang said that Taylor had "done some great work obviously" and that she wasn't suggesting that he no longer be involved in the newsletter. But she did not think the paper would fall apart under an Editorial Board. "Things need to be done by democracy. . . ."

Wilf Reimer, a tall, thin, man with short hair and glasses in his forties who has recently become a member of Carnegie, stated that he had been tagged with an “enemy” label at Carnegie after speaking up against the barring of William Simpson. Reimer claimed that he had received written notification from Taylor that his submission to the newsletter had been rejected “considering the source”. He asked how many people may have had similar experiences "and have just not bothered to contribute anymore because they just can't deal with the power that's there, that's in Paul's hands, and he's supported by Security, and the rest of the Board, and Ethel...." Reimer raised his voice at one point, walked up to Chair Gena Thompson who was flanked by two male Board members, and told them he did not like the way they treated people.

Doug, a tall, thin, forty-something man, with shoulder length brown wavy hair, said he has been a journalist for 30 years. He said he told Taylor that he "would have been fired" if he'd conducted himself as he had. [Taylor is a volunteer editor.] Doug said he had been involved in shaping the recommendation of an Editorial Board, a recommendation that he now heard being misrepresented. "I never talked about a Board that was in on every decision; I talked about a working Board that would meet once a month and help and support the editor ...It is not there to edit; it is there to talk about the direction...." He added, "This man has really brought shame on my profession as a journalist."

"Out of order!", Michael Read, the Secretary, called out. These were "personal attacks" on Taylor said Read, who had been the first at the meeting to announce that he supported the establishment of an Editorial Board.

But there were members at tonight's meeting who opposed setting up an Editorial Board to share power with Taylor, believing that it could ultimately kill the newsletter. John Dunnings, a Carnegie Security guard and CUPE member, said he thought this "bureaucratic mechanism" would ultimately "strangle the paper." He pointed out that the Gathering Place, a downtown community center where Carnegie security guards also work, has an Editorial Board and has managed to publish only two newsletters in 2 years.

Lisa, a Downtown Eastside resident, said of the Carnegie Newsletter, "We can not afford to lose it." She went on to say,"There are many developers and politicians who would love to see the end of the Carnegie newsletter because it has proven to be such an effective tool for spreading the word about what is really happening in the Downtown Eastside." Then she let the critics have it: "Based on what I have seen and heard, there is a small group of people who are in a big snit over something Paul Taylor reported in the Carnegie newsletter. This group has decided to actively seek revenge by launching a personal attack against Paul." She left out one thing: she is Paul's wife.

Tom, a retired man with grey hair and a 40 yr. background in the union movement, volunteers collating, stapling, and delivering the newsletter. He noted that at a recent work bee only two people showed up and one was Taylor. "To think that you're going to have something like an editorial board that's going to oversee and do the job of getting this thing out, this news letter out, is just not going to happen." Tom said that with a 40-yr. history in the union movement, he had seen all this before. "[T]he game plan here is not people's bruised sensibilities not being addressed properly, it's, I can tell by the verbiage that's being used in this meeting, it's being couched in pious platitudes about democracy and all this other stuff, fair play; what is being played out here is to try and destroy the Carnegie newsletter so that it will never be published again."

Delaney, a thin, middle-aged poet with neck-length, light brown, curly hair, emphasized that she was “suspicious” of the efforts to have an Editorial Committee curb Taylor’s power. “Somebody wants the Carnegie newsletter shut down”, was what she suspected. Delaney admitted having “huge fights” with Taylor when he altered material she submitted but gave him credit for the fact that every two weeks, "the newsletter comes out." The Carnegie Newsletter gets read on the Downtown Eastside, Delaney said, because it is the only publication worth reading. "There's no news in the Sun, there's no news in the Province, there's no news in the Georgia Straight or the West Ender."

After hearing roughly ten passionate speakers and some yelling, the Board voted to accept the recommendation to have an Editorial Committee oversee the publication of the Carnegie newsletter.

Taylor was not present for the verdict but his wife, Lisa, was. She cried.

The Insite Report: the one that disappeared

This week the Harper government did not give Insite, the supervised drug injection site, the 3 yr. extension they had asked for. They gave them 6 months, claiming that more research needed to be done.

The cash-addicts who operate Insite had been doing some 11th hour parading in front of media cameras, talking about how Insite must be saved. When I see them, I think, "What about that report?" That long awaited report produced by Insite based on statistics collected by its own staff during the first year of operation. I remember Larry Campbell, the Mayor of Vancouver at the time, repeatedly telling reporters to wait for that report in response to questions about whether Insite was saving lives.

The report came out. I recall Campbell telling the media that he was disappointed that the results weren't more dramatic. The report revealed that Insite staff had saved just one life. And Campbell admitted to reporters that there is a possibility that even that one person may have survived without intervention.

So now we hear the povertarians in the media sounding alarms that people will be dying in droves if Insite isn't saved. What drug are they on?