it's gone for me

Vancouver has the least affordable housing -- and it's getting worse

How can anybody live here, young home-seeker asks

The Vancouver Sun

Friday, May 19, 2006

By Derrick Penner

Sawmill supervisor Tyler Bartlett has personal experience with the dwindling affordability in Greater Vancouver's housing market.

Bartlett, 21 and a recent graduate of B.C. Institute of Technology, started looking at real estate in November. He's already reduced his expectations from a house or townhouse in Burnaby to condominiums in Surrey or Coquitlam.

He dropped out of the market for a couple of months to watch interest rates, but then jumped in again, only to be beaten out in two successive bidding wars on homes priced in the $300,000 range.

"How are people affording housing today?" Bartlett asked. "That's [the] biggest question I talk about with my friends. I have no idea how anybody in the Lower Mainland is affording the homes that they are."

Derek Holt, assistant chief economist for RBC Financial, whose index report said B.C. recorded the worst deterioration of affordability in Canada in the first quarter of 2006, said the rising cost of home ownership, including mortgage payments, prices and taxes, outstripped income growth for the second quarter in a row.

Holt said dramatically rising prices, combined with rising mortgage rates, were the biggest culprits.

He added B.C. and Alberta surprised forecasters because price appreciation in these provinces remained at double-digit rates in the first quarter, which he characterized as "unsustainable" over the year.

"Over long periods of time, house prices should probably not stray too far from annual income growth," Holt said. He added it is becoming a "less forgiving environment" to adjust mortgages in ways that will allow buyers to carry large principals.

The RBC housing index measures affordability as a percentage of pre-tax income required to carry the costs of owning a home including mortgage payments and taxes.

RBC's index report said B.C. affordability measures lie "at or near their highest points on record in every class except for condos."

The bank's affordability index, which measures the proportion of pre-tax household income needed to service the costs of owning a standard bungalow, found that affordability declined across the country during the winter.

Among major cities, the least affordable was Vancouver, where the carrying costs of a bungalow amounted to 64.4 per cent, or nearly two-thirds of the average income, followed by Toronto 41.7 per cent, Calgary 32.7, Montreal 34.9 and Ottawa 28.9 per cent.

In Greater Vancouver, the affordability index score for detached bungalows was a 10.9-per-cent increase from the fourth quarter of 2005. The score on two-storey homes was up 7.5 per cent to 69.57.

The scores for townhouses and condominiums were much lower at 47.54 per cent and 32.69 per cent respectively but still up 7.9 per cent on townhouses and 9.8 per cent on condominiums.

"It still says that for most people that [two-storey-house] segment is out of reach," Holt added. "It's only relatively well off people, over $100,000 a year in income who can afford to play in that market."

The RBC affordability index is just the latest comment on the financial pressure being put on buyers in the market. TD Bank, for the past year, has warned that price increases that are outpacing income growth make Vancouver the most bubble-like real estate market in the country.

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. analyst Cameron Muir said he wasn't surprised Vancouver's unafordability scores crept up. He added that he is still predicting that 2006 will be the last year of double-digit housing price increases.

"By 2007, we're going to see [unaffordability] reach a point where it begins to have an impact on demand," Muir said.

Tsur Somerville, director of the centre for urban economics at the University of B.C.'s Sauder School of Business, said Vancouver's real estate market will eventually hit a correction, but it is difficult to point to any one statistic, such as RBC's affordability index, as evidence that the correction is about to occur.

"People find things to do," Somerville said, such as put basement suites into their homes to rent out and lower the carrying costs of their mortgages.

"We have a lot more of that [in Vancouver] than they do in Toronto or Calgary. It's one of the ways people have adapted."

Bartlett has now hired realtor Rob Boyes, with Royal LePage Coronation West Realty and is searching for apartments in the $250,000 range.

"For a person starting out with virtually no assets, [and can] maybe come up with about 10-per-cent down, you can't touch the housing market," Bartlett said. "It's gone for me."

kobe should watch and learn

Anti-Kobe, perfect pro

By Gene Wojciechowski, Senior National Columnist for ESPN.com

KBAC-TV Los Angeles

CLEVELAND -- Kobe, this is how you lead a team.

You don't defer to the Bryant-ettes. You don't hide behind "the game plan." You don't enter a witness protection program, take just three second-half shots and score zero field goals in the last 24 minutes of a playoff elimination game.

Instead, you do what LeBron James did Saturday night in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference semifinals: You let the game come to you. And when it gets within arm's reach, you grab it hard by the earlobe, pull it close, and don't let go until it whimpers for mercy.

The Detroit Pistons aren't exactly whimpering, but they are in a little bit of playoff pain. They had a 2-0 series lead and a 10-point advantage midway through the third quarter of Saturday evening's game against the Cleveland Cavaliers at The Q. But that was before the anti-Kobe stuck a cocktail toothpick in the Pistons' plans for a sweep.

"He does things that most guys can't do," said the Pistons' Chauncey Billups.

If Bryant didn't see King James cut Detroit's series lead in half, then Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson ought to DHL him the game tape as soon as possible. James wrote a baller's how-to manual against the conference's -- and maybe the league's -- best team.

When the Pistons were up by those double digits, James didn't go into a funk (like Kobe did in Game 7 against the Phoenix Suns). He didn't pout (like Kobe did). He didn't play like he was on sedatives (like Kobe did).

He led. He inspired. He willed.

"Honestly, I think this is the best game he's played," said Cavs veteran Donyell Marshall.

LBJ has scored more, thrilled more and dazzled more. But good luck finding a game where James has meant more to the Cavs. He had 21 points, which is nice, but it's still 12 points less than his playoff average and 10 points off his regular-season average. But James also had 10 rebounds and 10 assists for his 10th career triple-double. (And did we mention the four steals and one blocked shot?) He did everything but tape his teammates' ankles.

The King and his Court beat the Pistons 86-77. ABC thought so much of the game that the network skip-passed it to ESPN, from prime time to late-afternoon -- informercial time. Can you blame it? Detroit was up 2-0 and favored by the Vegas smart guys to make it 3-0.

The schedule might have said otherwise, but this was an elimination game. Lose this one and the Cavs could start logging on to Orbitz for their vacation plans. You need to chug Holy Water to come back from an 0-3 series deficit, especially against the heartless Pistons, who have a history of stepping on opponents' throats as if they're cigarette butts.

But James wouldn't let Detroit grind its sneakers into the Cavs. He had only four points at halftime, but he already had five rebounds, seven assists, a steal, and a blocked shot. He was playing the kind of defense you see on instructional videos. And nobody on the floor played every second of every minute of the half as James did.

Kobe had 23 points in the first half of Game 7 against the Suns. The Lakers trailed by 15 -- not good, but not insurmountable. But rather than take control, Bryant stuck to some sort of game plan that apparently called for him to keep force-feeding his teammates. At least, that's what Bryant said after the Suns won by 31 and overcame a 3-1 series deficit.

It was a bogus excuse, the work of a great player having an on-court hissy fit. When the Bryant-ettes couldn't deliver, Kobe did nothing to help them. In essence, he gave up.

James didn't know it, but he delivered the perfect cross-country response to Kobe and the Lakers star's lame reasoning about sticking to "the game plan." Game plans change. They evolve. Sometimes they have to be dumped.

James knows this. Kobe doesn't.

"I don't plan what I'm going to do before the game," James said. "I just react to the game. I get doubled, I get a ball up. It's been my motto all year. It's been my motto all my life.

"But I seen some creases in the fourth quarter and I was able to attack it and give ourselves an opportunity to win the ballgame." He scored 22 of Cleveland's final 33 points, and 15 in the fourth.

James involved his teammates in Game 3. When he was double teamed -- which happened a lot -- he found the open man. Anderson Varejao (think Florida's Joakim Noah) had an unexpected 16 points, thanks in part to James' feeds off screen-and-rolls. Marshall chipped in nine points, including a run-out basket made possible by a James flip pass that somehow covered three-quarters of the court and dropped perfectly into Donyell's hands.

But in the second half, even after missing his first two jumpers ... even after the Pistons were a shot or two from blowing the game wide open ... James remained patient. And when the time was right, he overwhelmed the Pistons.

A jumper. A dunk that made my teeth rattle. A Raisinets-sweet feed to Varejao that put the Cavs ahead 63-62 with 7:22 remaining in the third quarter. A he-didn't-really-do-that-did-he? underhand scoop shot from the baseline. Another feed to Varejao. Another drive past Tayshaun Prince (who just happens to be a second team All-NBA Defensive Team selection) for a lay-in. And another. A stolen pass. A 3-pointer from the wing that stretched Cleveland's lead to seven points with 1:10 left to play. A skip pass to Damon Jones for a trey.

"I had to step up, and it wasn't by scoring," James said. "I didn't have one of my big offensive nights like I can have."

But he had a big night, which is why this series will live for at least five games, maybe longer. Game 4 is Monday evening.

Kobe should watch. And learn.

Gene Wojciechowski is the senior national columnist for ESPN.com. You can contact him at: gene.wojciechowski@espn3.com

kobe or not kobe?

Next Game Plan May Not Include Kobe

Mark Heisler ON THE NBA

Los Angeles Times / Latimes.com

7:13 PM PDT, May 13, 2006

Kobe or not Kobe?

That's the question, not whether Kobe Bryant "tanked" a game the Lakers trailed by 15 points at halftime ... and by 21 when he took his first shot in the third quarter after the Suns scored on six of their first seven possessions.

Of course, Bryant has been known to stop shooting because he wants to make a point. OK, I threw them the ball, you see what they did with it.

On the other hand, it's hardly tanking if he scores 23 points in the first half and pulls back at the direction of his coach, as Phil Jackson insisted again last week.

"Kobe went out with the game plan in mind," Jackson wrote in an e-mail. "Get the ball inside! Kwame [Brown] couldn't get anything to fall for him.... L.O. [Lamar Odom] the same. [Steve] Nash had banged his knee the first half and we went at him but Smush [Parker] couldn't score.

"Now we're 20 down and I put in [Brian] Cook to get the screen-roll game going and they doubled Kobe and left Cook open ...

"He [Bryant] finally tried to bust through the defense and got called for a charge and committed a turnover. So there you go. We're down by 25 points and things have slipped away."

Unfortunately for all concerned, whether Bryant was trying to make the point, it's not only valid but inescapable.

The Lakers need a lot of help, which they're not likely to get soon whether or not they keep to their 2008 salary cap strategy, which is already Plan B after 2007 free agents Yao Ming and Amare Stoudemire signed extensions.

The question isn't whether they can trust Bryant, who's assuredly as foibled as he is great, but whether they can keep him.

If you think the last two seasons were rough, come back after he leaves to see what Staples Center looks like with 5,000 empty seats. All the Laker hopes depend on Bryant's riding along for two more seasons but for Kobe, that's a long time.

At mid-season he was asked if he could last until 2008 if that was what it took. His answer was Basic Kobe: It wouldn't.

"We're not that far away, one piece, two pieces maybe," he said. "The vision that we have for the team may be a little different than the direction other people see us going in."

The events of Game 7 suggest how devastated he was after they took that 3-1 lead, which seemed to open a path to the Western Conference finals without leaving home if they could beat the Clippers, only to have it taken away.

Bryant, who had always been gracious in defeat, didn't congratulate any Suns. His teammates slinked off too, reportedly at his direction.

Bryant being the lightning rod of our time, the usual firestorm ensued. Charles Barkley ripped him as "selfish" and later said Bryant sent him 20 text messages in protest. Our T.J. Simers wrote that Bryant "tanked," adding, "Amazingly, the media in L.A. gave Bryant nothing but a free ride."

I was part of the L.A. media, not that I'm complaining, having zinged enough writers in my time. We're fair game as much as Frank McCourt, Devean George or the Grocery Bagger, whoever that is.

Bryant's fade was curious and he might have been angrier than he would acknowledge, but, even assuming it was more out of pique than duty, it didn't compare to the most famous disappearances.

The 76ers' Wilt Chamberlain took two shots in the second half of Philadelphia's 100-96 loss to the Boston Celtics in Game 7 of the 1968 East finals, resulting in community-wide outrage and Wilt's demand to be traded that sent him to the Lakers.

Yes, Michael Jordan did it too, in Game 5 of the 1989 East Finals, when the Bulls were tied, 2-2, with the Bad Boy Pistons, who dogged him according to their "Jordan rules."

barkley in his element

Barkley's in his element in a frank forum for TNT Sports

BY ED SHERMAN

The Chicago Tribune

Posted on Sat, May. 13, 2006

ATLANTA - A night with Charles Barkley at TNT's Studio J isn't going to be an ordinary night.

Greeting a visitor, Barkley makes it clear this is not a typical night for the "Inside the NBA" crew. Executives brought in steak and lobster Tuesday night to celebrate the show recently winning an Emmy.

"It's not like this every night," Barkley calls out from across the viewing room. "Tomorrow night we're back to chicken."

The menu might be the only thing that's predictable when Barkley gets together with host Ernie Johnson and fellow analyst Kenny Smith. On Tuesday, Magic Johnson joined them for one of the 12 or so appearances he makes during the season.

They currently are in the midst of TNT's "40 games in 40 nights" coverage of the NBA playoffs. With Smith pushing Barkley's buttons, they put on what is probably the most irreverent and brutally honest studio show in sports television.

Barkley obviously drives the engine with his frank insights and unique perspectives on life in and out of basketball. And what takes place behind the scenes is no less entertaining.

"I've had people say we should put a camera in there and market the green room," Ernie Johnson says.

Barkley, Smith and Johnson sit in front of a bank of televisions, with the NBA game dominating a large screen in the middle. With his feet up on the table, Barkley has perfected the art of watching several shows at once.

"Uh-oh, `House' is on. Got to watch my show," Barkley says, shifting his attention to the Fox medical drama.

Later that night, Barkley will notice that the Anaheim-Colorado hockey game is going into overtime. "Hey, can we get (the Outdoor Life Network) on in here?" he asks. "There's nothing better than overtime in the playoffs."

Just when you think Barkley has completely ignored Detroit running up a big lead over Cleveland, he throws in a comment that shows he is paying attention.

Noting a LeBron James ad for Nike with the slogan, "We are witness," Barkley shouts, "Yeah, we're witnessing a (butt-kicking)."

Barkley carries the tone into the studio. The crew's only preparation seems to consist of putting on their jackets.

"The fact that there is no rehearsal makes for our chemistry," Ernie Johnson says. "The reactions are genuine. You can't manufacture it."

It helps to have somebody as spontaneous as Barkley. Magic Johnson may have been the floor leader as a player, but in this set-up, he knows he has a secondary role.

"Charles is the star," Magic Johnson says. "He doesn't hold back. A lot of times we all would like to say what Charles says, but that's not our personality. That's why people tune in. They know Charles will tell it his own way."

Barkley's way often sparks controversy. Last week he found himself in the headlines after saying he has lost an estimated $10 million gambling. The subject came up when he was asked about John Daly and his gambling losses.

"I was just trying to help a friend," Barkley says. "I was asked an honest question and I was trying to explain what he was going through. It was something I needed to say."

Saturday of last week, Barkley came down hard on Kobe Bryant for his poor play during the Lakers' loss to Phoenix in Game 7 of their first-round series.

"I think he was being very selfish," Barkley had said after the game. "I think he stopped shooting so he could say, `Those guys didn't help me.'''

The next day, Bryant sent Barkley 20 angry text messages. That upset Barkley because he didn't expect Bryant to take the criticism so personally.

"I like Kobe," Barkley says. "I said for the last year that Kobe is the best basketball player in the world. Now all of the sudden I've got a vendetta against him? I have no vendetta. I said what I saw during the game. I don't know what he was thinking. I was happy with what I said."

Barkley insists he doesn't show up at the studio looking to rip somebody. He says it's about being honest on any and all issues.

One of the reasons Barkley chose TNT over other network offers is its executives offered him the opportunity to veer off sports. The immigration issue has dominated Barkley's thoughts of late.

"Rich people do a really good job of keeping the poor people from liking each other," he says.

Barkley acknowledges that he may not always be right, but don't begrudge him his right to speak out.

"Why should I be treated different just because I'm in the limelight?" he says. "I'm supposed to make a difference, not just be rich and famous."

Basketball, though, is his primary forum. By the time he got off the air at 1:15 a.m., Barkley had criticized Sacramento for firing coach Rick Adelman and implored Shaquille O'Neal's Miami Heat teammates to play better, calling them "slugs," among other knocks.

It was a typical night at the office.

"I have no idea what will happen in the game," Barkley says. "I just promise to be honest and fair. I hope people appreciate and respect that. That's what I do."

barkley on the barbie

Sir Charles too tough on Kobe

BY JASON WHITLOCK

Knight Ridder Newspapers

LOS ANGELES - Man, I figured Charles Barkley could play the dozens, talk a little smack. The way Barkley spent all NBA season blasting Kobe Bryant, I just assumed the Round Mound would know how to respond when someone served him a little bit of what he dishes nightly on TNT's wonderful pre- and postgame show "Inside the NBA."

So I was shocked when I heard Barkley immediately go into fat-joke retorts on the Dan Patrick radio show Wednesday in response to the barbs I slung his way earlier this week on ESPN's "Jim Rome is Burning."

"Dan, it's funny, what's my man, Jabba the Hut, has been killing me the last couple of days," Barkley told Patrick, who was caught totally by surprise.

"Who's Jabba the Hut?" Patrick asked.

"Jason Whitlock," Barkley responded. "He's been killing me all week, like I've got a vendetta against Kobe. It's just funny how people, he said I called Kobe a chicken, and I said that's not exactly what happened. See, and that was really unfair."

Seriously, I was expecting better from Barkley. I've been out in LA all week, surrounded by Lakers and (bandwagon) Clippers fans, so I started paying close attention to the NBA playoffs. The Lakers-Suns series was marvelous. I was on the brink of becoming an authentic, unapologetic Kobe Bryant fan.

The only thing really standing in my way - besides Kobe's propensity to do very childish things - was the fact that Barkley, my favorite television commentator, constantly bags on Bryant. Well, by game six, after Kobe dropped 50 points in an overtime loss, I'd had enough of Barkley's bashing. Sir Charles said Kobe should've passed the ball to Smush Parker at the end of regulation and said Kobe's 20-of-35 shooting sabotaged the Lakers' chances of beating the Suns.

Absolutely insane. And then on Saturday, I watched Kobe refuse to shoot the ball in the second half of LA's game-seven loss, and I immediately assumed Barkley's criticism had gotten into Kobe's head and was affecting Kobe's decision-making. Kobe wanted to show his critics _Barkley - he could be unselfish.

Barkley, of course, then ripped Kobe for pouting and being "selfish" by not shooting the ball.

I'd heard enough. Yes, I'm a Shaq fan. Yes, I think Barkley is brilliant on television. But what Barkley was doing to Kobe was really unfair. Barkley's opinions on the NBA are the most influential in the game. People laugh at his jokes and self-deprecation, but they also take his opinions (on basketball) very seriously.

Barkley's seasonlong Kobe griping, in my opinion, cost Kobe MVP votes. He finished fourth in the voting and should've finished no worse than second.

So I went on "Rome is Burning" with the intention of serving Barkley a humorous helping of humble pie. I lit into Barkley for being Michael Jordan's Arsenio Hall, the comedian and talk-show host best known for being Eddie Murphy's best friend. I said Charlesenio's NBA commentary is stated with the express purpose of making sure Jordan knows Barkley is a better friend than Jordan's other sidekick, Charles Oakley.

I questioned Barkley's basketball intellect. How could he suggest Kobe pass to Smush Parker - a marginal NBA player at best who was also locked in a horrible shooting slump - for the game-winning shot in a playoff contest?

Barkley's attacks on Kobe seemed personal, a product of Charlesenio's affinity for Jordan, the man Kobe is most often compared to.

Monday night on TNT, Barkley started backpedaling, calling Kobe the league's best player and revealing that Kobe had sent him 20 angry, profanity-laced text messages.

I couldn't ignore this bit of news. So on Tuesday's "Rome is Burning" I tore into Barkley (and Kobe) again. There was no way I could ignore two grown, NBA multimillionaires exchanging angry text messages like high school girls. This was just too much. I figured I'd step in and try to unite Kobe and Barkley by giving them a common enemy.

It worked, to some degree. Barkley is now angry with me, Jabba the Whitlock, and he's now one of Kobe's biggest supporters.

"You know what's really funny?" Barkley asked Patrick on Wednesday. "Man, I've said all year that Kobe Bryant is the best basketball player in the world. I criticize him one time, and people go crazy, but hey, man, I'm gonna say what I gotta say....

"There's no way in good conscience you can leave Kobe Bryant off of your top-five MVP ballots."

And there's no way you can blame Kobe for the Lakers losing to the Suns. Only Barkley could do that. But I guess I'm more surprised that Barkley can't play the dozens, can't handle a little good-natured ribbing. Maybe Charlesenio only lets Michael talk to him that way.

oh what a tangled web

Proposed rule changes would tangle the Web

By Michael Socolow

The Baltimore Sun

May 9, 2006

Congress wants to change the Internet.

This is news to most people because the major news media have not actively pursued the story. Yet both the House and Senate commerce committees are promoting new rules governing the manner by which most Americans receive the Web. Congressional passage of new rules is widely anticipated, as is President Bush's signature. Once this happens, the Internet will change before your eyes.

The proposed House legislation, the Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act (COPE), offers no protections for "network neutrality."

Currently, your Internet provider does not voluntarily censor the Web as it enters your home. This levels the playing field between the tiniest blog and the most popular Web site.

Yet the big telecom companies want to alter this dynamic. AT&T and Verizon have publicly discussed their plans to divide the information superhighway into separate fast and slow lanes. Web sites and services willing to pay a toll will be channeled through the fast lane, while all others will be bottled up in the slower lanes. COPE, and similar telecom legislation offered in the Senate, does nothing to protect the consumer from this transformation of the Internet.

The telecoms are frustrated that commercial Web sites reap unlimited profits while those providing entry to your home for these companies are prevented from fully cashing in. If the new telecom regulations pass without safeguarding net neutrality, the big telecom companies will be able to prioritize the Web for you. They will be free to decide which Web sites get to your computer faster and which ones may take longer - or may not even show up at all.

By giving the telecoms the ability to harness your Web surfing, the government will empower them to shake down the most profitable Web companies. These companies will sell access to you, to Amazon.com, Travelocity.com and even BaltimoreSun.com, etc. What if these companies elect not to pay? Then, when you type in "amazon.com," you might be redirected to barnesandnoble.com, or your lightning-quick DSL Internet service might suddenly move at horse-and-buggy speed.

It might appear that the direct ramifications of this bill are somewhat obscure. Why should you care, if your Internet fee isn't altered? Or if your Web surfing will (possibly) be only minimally disrupted? (The telecoms understand that completely barring access to certain sites - especially the most popular ones - would be counterproductive.)

You should care because any corporate restriction on information gathering directly counters the original purpose of the World Wide Web.

"Universality is essential to the Web," says its inventor, Tim Berners-Lee. "It loses its power if there are certain types of things to which you can't link."

If calling up the Web site of your favorite political commentator takes far longer than surfing to a commercial site, the new laws will have a direct impact on the Web's democratic utility. The proposed laws also facilitate future steps toward corporate censorship. Do you think that the telecoms, under the proposed regulations, would make it easy to visit the Web sites of their disgruntled - or possibly striking - employees?

The proposed new rules have received surprisingly sparse media coverage. The new laws have economic, political and social ramifications. There are several explanations for the silence.

The most probable is simply that because the laws have strong bipartisan support in both houses of Congress, they do not appear particularly newsworthy. COPE has been promoted vigorously in the House by both Texas Republican Joe L. Barton and Illinois Democrat Bobby L. Rush. While a few legislators are attempting to preserve net neutrality - most notably Democratic Rep. Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts and Republican Sen. Olympia J. Snowe of Maine - they are clearly outnumbered.

The history of American telecommunications regulation does not offer a promising model for the future of net neutrality. In the late 1800s, Congress approved of Western Union, America's telegraph monopoly, censoring the Associated Press. The 1934 Communications Act resulted in political discussion over the national airwaves being tightly moderated by CBS and NBC.

Most telecom laws are sold to the public as the "natural evolution" of communications technology. Yet there is no truly natural evolution to our telecommunications laws. Only very rarely is regulation completely ordained by physics or technological limits. More commonly, it emerges from the political process. This is news to many Americans unaware of their own media history.

Many people believe the Internet's decentralized structure guarantees that no company or oligopoly could control it. Internet censorship - whether by corporate or state interests - simply sounds impossible. Yet not only is it theoretically possible, but the history of telecommunications regulation tells us it is probable. By the time the telecoms start changing what you see on your screen, it will be too late to complain.

-30-

Michael Socolow is an assistant professor of communication and journalism at the University of Maine. His e-mail is michael.socolow@umit.maine.edu

holy guacamole!

Mexico to Allow Use of Drugs

Fox will sign the bill, one of the world's most permissive policies, in a bid to curb trafficking. U.S. officials say it will lead to more addiction.

By Sam Enriquez, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

May 3, 2006

MEXICO CITY — Mexican President Vicente Fox will sign a bill that would legalize the use of nearly every drug and narcotic sold by the same Mexican cartels he's vowed to fight during his five years in office, a spokesman said Tuesday.

The list of illegal drugs approved for personal consumption by Mexico's Congress last week is enough to make one dizzy — or worse.

Cocaine. Heroin. LSD. Marijuana. PCP. Opium. Synthetic opiates. Mescaline. Peyote. Psilocybin mushrooms. Amphetamines. Methamphetamines.

And the per-person amounts approved for possession by anyone 18 or older could easily turn any college party into an all-nighter: half a gram of coke, a couple of Ecstasy pills, several doses of LSD, a few marijuana joints, a spoonful of heroin, 5 grams of opium and more than 2 pounds of peyote, the hallucinogenic cactus.

The law would be among the most permissive in the world, putting Mexico in the company of the Netherlands. Critics, including U.S. drug policy officials, already are worrying that it will spur a domestic addiction problem and make Mexico a narco-tourism destination.

Even the Netherlands, famous for coffeehouses that sell small quantities of potent marijuana and hashish, forbids the possession and sale of narcotics. Colombia allows personal use of marijuana, cocaine and heroin, but not LSD or PCP.

Selling drugs or using them in public still would be a crime in Mexico. Anyone possessing drugs still could be held for questioning by police, and each state could impose fines even on the permitted quantities, the bill stipulates. But it includes no imprisonment penalties.

Lawmakers who voted for decriminalization, some of whom have expressed surprise over the details of the bill, said it would for the first time empower local police to make drug arrests and allow law enforcement in general to focus on intercepting large drug shipments and major traffickers. The bill also would stiffen penalties for selling drugs near schools and authorize state and local police to detain users to check whether amounts were over the legal limit.

"The law constitutes an important step forward by the Mexican state in its battle against drug dealing," said Eduardo Medina Mora, secretary of public security and Mexico's top law enforcement officer.

Presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar said Tuesday that Fox would sign the measure, calling it an important tool in the fight against drug trafficking. Fox has avoided public comments on the bill and did not attend a news conference about it Tuesday.

Since the vote by Congress last week, lawmakers have said they are unsure who amended the bill, originally aimed at legalizing possession of small quantities of drugs among addicts, to make it apply to all "consumers."

The Bush administration is refraining from public criticism of Mexico. But in private meetings Monday with Mexican officials in Washington, U.S. officials tried to discourage passage of the law, U.S. Embassy officials here said.

"Any country that embarks on policies that encourage drug use will get more drug use and more drug addiction," said Tom Riley, a spokesman for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

"Many countries, including the U.S. and Mexico, see the drug problem as a trafficking problem," he said. "But the real problem isn't trafficking, it's drug use. The costs of drug addiction are staggering."

Mexico has for years blamed Americans for fueling the multibillion-dollar illegal drug trade with their $10, $50 and $100 drug purchases. One cartoon here showed Uncle Sam kneeling over a map of the United States and Mexico, snorting a giant line of cocaine piled along the border.

News of the pending Mexican law spread quickly over the Internet, reaching the website of High Times, a glossy monthly magazine that features photo spreads of marijuana from around the world.

"I know I'll be booking my trip as soon as I hear the OK!" wrote "Beefy" to general agreement among his cyber peers.

Drug use by Mexicans grew as smugglers began receiving payments in drugs rather than cash from Colombian suppliers, experts say. The drug surplus triggered more local sales and use.

"There's been a big increase in addiction in recent years," said Mago Marchina of Clinica Nuevo Ser, a Tijuana drug treatment center.

Reliable figures on how many Mexicans are addicted to drugs are hard to come by, but Mexico's National Council Against Addictions has said that more than half of addicts use cocaine, and a third report hard-core marijuana use.

A growing war among rival drug gangs in Mexico — primarily the so-called Gulf and Sinaloa cartels — has ushered in a new era of brutality, with torture routine and bodies burned and dismembered.

More than 1,000 people have been killed in the last 18 months in fighting over smuggling routes to the United States, mostly in border cities, Acapulco and the capital. Automatic weapons and explosives are common tools; police and journalists are increasingly frequent targets.

Fox, whose term ends in December and who is barred by law from seeking reelection, has been considered a strong ally of the U.S. anti-drug effort. He has said the current drug war was triggered when he began arresting top leaders, including Osiel Cardenas, who allegedly runs the Gulf cartel from prison.

In the last year, Fox has called in the army to patrol the border city of Nuevo Laredo when it became clear that local police were in league with traffickers. And he has promised to extradite drug smugglers facing trial in the U.S.

Consequently, many U.S. officials, and Mexicans, are scratching their heads over the new law.

Mexican Sen. Jorge Zermeno, a member of Fox's National Action Party, spoke twice in support of decriminalization before the Senate's 53-26 vote Friday shortly after midnight.

He said the legislation, which Fox first proposed in 2004, was intended to allow drug possession for bona fide addicts, who would be sent to drug treatment instead of jail. But the word "consumer" was attached to the bill and won approval, broadening it to include all adults, he said.

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Cecilia Sanchez and Carlos Martinez in The Times' Mexico City Bureau contributed to this report.

the truthiness hurts

The truthiness hurts

Stephen Colbert's brilliant performance unplugged the Bush myth machine -- and left the clueless D.C. press corps gaping.

By Michael Scherer

May. 01, 2006 Salon Magazine

Make no mistake, Stephen Colbert is a dangerous man -- a bomb thrower, an assassin, a terrorist with boring hair and rimless glasses. It's a wonder the Secret Service let him so close to the president of the United States.

But there he was Saturday night, keynoting the year's most fawning celebration of the self-importance of the D.C. press corps, the White House Correspondents' Association dinner. Before he took the podium, the master of ceremonies ominously announced, "Tonight, no one is safe."

Colbert is not just another comedian with barbed punch lines and a racy vocabulary. He is a guerrilla fighter, a master of the old-world art of irony. For Colbert, the punch line is just the addendum. The joke is in the setup. The meat of his act is not in his barbs but his character -- the dry idiot, "Stephen Colbert," God-fearing pitchman, patriotic American, red-blooded pundit and champion of "truthiness." "I'm a simple man with a simple mind," the deadpan Colbert announced at the dinner. "I hold a simple set of beliefs that I live by. Number one, I believe in America. I believe it exists. My gut tells me I live there."

Then he turned to the president of the United States, who sat tight-lipped just a few feet away. "I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message, that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound -- with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world."

It was Colbert's crowning moment. His imitation of the quintessential GOP talking head -- Bill O'Reilly meets Scott McClellan -- uncovered the inner workings of the ever-cheapening discourse that passes for political debate. He reversed and flattened the meaning of the words he spoke. It's a tactic that cultural critic Greil Marcus once called the "critical negation that would make it self-evident to everyone that the world is not as it seems." Colbert's jokes attacked not just Bush's policies, but the whole drama and language of American politics, the phony demonstration of strength, unity and vision. "The greatest thing about this man is he's steady," Colbert continued, in a nod to George W. Bush. "You know where he stands. He believes the same thing Wednesday that he believed on Monday, no matter what happened Tuesday."

It's not just that Colbert's jokes were hitting their mark. We already know that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, that the generals hate Rumsfeld or that Fox News lists to the right. Those cracks are old and boring. What Colbert did was expose the whole official, patriotic, right-wing, press-bashing discourse as a sham, as more "truthiness" than truth.

Obviously, Colbert is not the first ironic warrior to train his sights on the powerful. What the insurgent culture jammers at Adbusters did for Madison Avenue, and the Barbie Liberation Organization did for children's toys, and Seinfeld did for the sitcom, and the Onion did for the small-town newspaper, Jon Stewart discovered he could do for television news. Now Colbert, Stewart's spawn, has taken on the right-wing message machine.

In the late 1960s, the Situationists in France called such ironic mockery "détournement," a word that roughly translates to "abduction" or "embezzlement." It was considered a revolutionary act, helping to channel the frustration of the Paris student riots of 1968. They co-opted and altered famous paintings, newspapers, books and documentary films, seeking subversive ideas in the found objects of popular culture. "Plagiarism is necessary," wrote Guy Debord, the famed Situationist, referring to his strategy of mockery and semiotic inversion. "Progress demands it. Staying close to an author's phrasing, plagiarism exploits his expressions, erases false ideas, replaces them with correct ideas."

But nearly half a century later, the ideas of the French, as evidenced by our "freedom fries," have not found a welcome reception in Washington. The city is still not ready for Colbert. The depth of his attack caused bewilderment on the face of the president and some of the press, who, like myopic fish, are used to ignoring the water that sustains them. Laura Bush did not shake his hand.

Political Washington is accustomed to more direct attacks that follow the rules. We tend to like the bland buffoonery of Jay Leno or insider jokes that drop lots of names and enforce everyone's clubby self-satisfaction. (Did you hear the one about John Boehner at the tanning salon or Duke Cunningham playing poker at the Watergate?) Similarly, White House spinmeisters are used to frontal assaults on their policies, which can be rebutted with a similar set of talking points. But there is no easy answer for the ironist. "Irony, entertaining as it is, serves an almost exclusively negative function," wrote David Foster Wallace, in his seminal 1993 essay "E Unibus Pluram." "It's critical and destructive, a ground clearing."

So it's no wonder that those journalists at the dinner seemed so uneasy in their seats. They had put on their tuxes to rub shoulders with the president. They were looking forward to spotting Valerie Plame and "American Idol's" Ace Young at the Bloomberg party. They invited Colbert to speak for levity, not because they wanted to be criticized. As a tribe, we journalists are all, at heart, creatures of this silly conversation. We trade in talking points and consultant-speak. We too often depend on empty language for our daily bread, and -- worse -- we sometimes mistake it for reality. Colbert was attacking us as well.

A day after he exploded his bomb at the correspondents dinner, Colbert appeared on CBS's "60 Minutes," this time as himself, an actor, a suburban dad, a man without a red and blue tie. The real Colbert admitted that he does not let his children watch his Comedy Central show. "Kids can't understand irony or sarcasm, and I don't want them to perceive me as insincere," Colbert explained. "Because one night, I'll be putting them to bed and I'll say ... 'I love you, honey.' And they'll say, 'I get it. Very dry, Dad. That's good stuff.'"

His point was spot-on. Irony is dangerous and must be handled with care. But America can rest assured that for the moment its powers are in good hands. Stephen Colbert, the current grandmaster of the art, knows exactly what he was doing.

Just don't expect him to be invited back to the correspondents dinner.