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The AIH Transcript for February 3, 2017

Hosts: Helen Mann and Jeff Douglas

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

HELEN MANN: Hello I'm Helen Mann sitting in for Carol Off.

JEFF DOUGLAS: Good evening, I'm Jeff Douglas. This is As It Happens.

[Music: Theme]

HM: Crossing more than one line. Two members of a polygamous church are found guilty in a B.C. court – after taking a thirteen-year-old girl across the U.S. border to marry a church leader in his forties.

JD: Felonious bunk. To bolster the case for U.S. President Trump's immigration ban, Kellyanne Conway brings up the "Bowling Green Massacre" – which never happened.

HM: If you wanted long-term change, you got short-changed. And our guest is a Liberal MP who shares your pain – and has voted to share his own disappointment that his government bailed on electoral reform.

JD: Art restoration. To raise money to rebuild after a disastrous fire, the Glasgow School of Art sends pieces of the charred ruins to artists – and asks them to make something from the debris.

HM: Let's get something less straight. On British television, a woman admits she voted to leave the EU because she was bent out of shape by a banana whose shape was insufficiently bent.

JD: And...holding pattern. It's called the "pom pom crab" because it's always clutching colourful blobs – but the weird part is, those blobs are sea anemones, and the crabs refuse to let them go. As It Happens, the Friday edition. Radio that keeps its friends close – and its anemones closer.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

Part 1: Polygamy verdict, no electoral reform, pom pom crabs

Polygamy verdict

Guest: Bob Keating

JEFF DOUGLAS: She was 13 years old when they took her to the United States to marry a man in his forties. Brandon and Gail Blackmore are members of a polygamous community in Bountiful, B.C. Earlier today, they were found guilty of removing the girl from Canada to marry sect leader Warren Jeffs. A third person, James Oler, who was accused of bringing another girl across the border, was found not guilty today. CBC reporter Bob Keating was at the courthouse for the decision. We reached him in Cranbrook, British Columbia.

HELEN MANN: Bob, how did the two people found guilty today react to the verdict against them?

BOB KEATING: They did not have much emotion at all. They have not been participating in this case very much. They are members of a breakaway, fundamentalist Mormon sect and they do not really buy into our judicial system. So they sat there quite passively during this. Two of the accused didn't even have lawyers. They refused to have a lawyer in the case so it's hard to know how they react because they just sat passively and then left without comment after the trial was over. We did approach them and ask if they wanted to comment. But there was no comment from the Blackmore's.

HM: Yeah and we talked about the case on the show when the trial opened. Remind us what exactly Brandon Blackmore and Gail Blackmore did to this girl?

BK: The allegation is that Brendan Blackmore and his then wife Gail Blackmore got a call from the prophet, the so-called prophet of the American wing of the sect, Warren Jeffs. This was back in 2004, and in that call, Jeffs told them to bring a 13 year-old-girl from Bountiful, which is here and South-East British Columbia to southern Utah to be married. Jeffs told the couple the Lord spoke to him and said the girl belonged to him and they were to immediately bring the girl down. Jeffs was the prophet of this sect so they did exactly what he said, and within hours they were seen at the border bringing the girl down to Utah.

HM: Warren Jeffs is a familiar name in the news. Some people may remember him in the past but perhaps not why. A little bit more about him maybe, and how old he was, what he was up to generally.

BK: He was 48 at the time, around 60 now. He took over the American wing of the sect after his father died about 15 years ago. He has dozens of wives and is in jail in Texas for marrying girls as young as 12 years old. He's in for sexually assaulting children. But before the Americans caught up with him, he held great sway over many in the Canadian wing of this sect as well. They considered him second only to God. And in 2004, this prophet, this person they consider second to God, phones up to Canada and he ordered Brandon Blackmore to bring this 13 year-old-girl, who was identified as MMB in court, up or down to him down there in Utah. Brian Blackmore and his wife, as I said did not hesitate. They crossed the border and headed down to what's called Short Creek with MMB in tow. And there she married the prophet Warren Jeffs, who was 48 at the time, in a secretive celestial marriage ceremony that the couple were both witnesses to.

HM: Now this is over a decade ago. Given it was secretive, how did it even come to light that the marriage had taken place?

BK: Because Jeffs was a real stickler for writing things down, and even recording ceremonies and rites of passage within the sect. That's what put him in an American jail in Texas for life. He kept what are called priesthood records and a form of this secretive marriage certificate locked away in a vault, a heavily fortified vault, in a compound in Texas. Texas Rangers blasted into that boat years ago and when they did, they found thousands of pages of records that eventually convicted Jeffs and also led to these Canadian charges all these years later, almost 13 years later to the day.

HM: The girls at the center of all of this would be women now. Have any of them spoken about what happened to them?

BK: No. There was one. MMB was in court. She's in her mid to late 20s now. She is still a member of this sect, did not speak to the media, does not speak out against them because, keep in mind, she has been raised to believe this is how they do things. It was seen as being a privilege to be called down to marry the prophet even if you are 13 years old. So she was in court for part of it. She was supposed to testify, for some reason she didn't, and no, she didn't speak to the media.

HM: There was a third person charged, had a different outcome today. What can you tell us about James Olor?

BK: The third person, James Oler, was acquitted as you said. He's a leader in Bountiful, one of the leaders who reported to Warren Jeffs. He was accused of a similar offense, running a 15 year old girl across the border, also to marry, also in 2004. It was about six months after the MMB marriage. On that occasion, there were 18 weddings officiated by Warren Jeffs and Oler himself even got a teenage bride on that day. The judge hearing this case, Judge Pearlman, said he had no doubt these weddings occurred and that Oler himself participated. What he said was not proven beyond reasonable doubt, is that Oler took the girl across the Canadian border. There was no corroborating evidence at all or crossed the border with that girl, who was called CEO in this trial. This all may serve as a warning to the B.C. crown, if they should bring further cases, because there might be further cases, because in Warren Jeffs writings, there is alleged to be dozens of cross-border weddings. But Canadian authorities should know they need some pretty firm proof because James Oler was acquitted even though the judge said “I have no doubt the wedding went on.”

HM: Yeah. So given that they've had trouble authorities bringing charges before, how significant was the verdict today?

BK: It's very significant. The maximum sentence here is 10 years. Our punishment here in Canada is nowhere near what Warren Jeffs got in the States. But this this is pretty serious stuff.

HM: Any idea when the sentencing will take place?

BK: Yeah it's going to take place in the middle of April. And coincidentally, right around that time, there was also a case for polygamy. So two members of Bountiful, James Oler being one of them, one of the people accused today, and Winston Blackmore, who admits to having 27 wives and well over 140 children, have been charged with polygamy in mid-April, right around the same time when the sentencing is to occur. Blackmore will argue this is his constitutional right to have these wives.
Polygamy will not be as serious a charge the actual act of running girls across the border, but it will be a test of Canada's polygamy law. That’s in mid-April as well. So we'll be talking about polygamy a lot more here in southeast B.C. this spring.

HM: OK. We'll all continue to track that too. Thanks very much, Bob.

BK: You're welcome.

JD: That was CBC reporter Bob Keating in Cranbrook, British Columbia.

[Music]

No Electoral Reform

Guest: Nathaniel Erskine-Smith

JD: Nathaniel Erskine-Smith wants you to know that he is deeply sorry.
Like everyone in his party, the Liberal MP campaigned on a commitment to find a fairer way to elect our next government. But this week, Prime Minister Trudeau scrapped that promise. And he sent a newly minted minister in front of the cameras to announce that electoral reform was no longer in the cards. Then of course came the outrage from the opposition and from voters, who accused Mr. Trudeau of a double-cross.
Now, Mr. Erskine-Smith has published an op-ed apology. We reached the MP for Beaches East-York in Toronto.

HM: Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, what prompted you to write this public apology?

NES: Well it's an issue that I've cared about for a long time, well before entering politics. It's an issue that when I was signing folks up in the nomination process, I was signing them up to tell them that I care about this issue and I would be an advocate for it. And then of course, it was part of our platform promise. And so given we're not moving forward with it, I felt like an apology was necessary.

HM: What have you been hearing from your constituents since the Prime Minister backed down on this promise?

NES: Frustration from a number of constituents that the promise was not to be kept. I think there was a general understanding over the last month and a half in particular when I was back in the constituency, I met with a number of constituents in advance of the decision of the new mandate letter, and I think there was a general understanding that it was going to be a tight timeline and it was maybe unreasonable to push forward with a change before 2019, but I think there is general frustration that we're not continuing the conversation into the future.

HM: So you may be apologising but the Prime Minister isn't. We’d just like to play a bit of tape of him defending his decision in the House of Commons on Wednesday. Here it is.

SOUNDCLIP

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: There is no consensus. There is no clear path forward. It would be irresponsible for us to do something that harms Canada's stability when, in fact, what we need is moving forward on growth for the middle class and support.

HM: So Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, why are you not satisfied with the Prime Minister's explanation that this can't happen because there is no consensus on electoral reform?

NES: Well in the article that I published to sort of give my reasons in the Huffington Post, I agreed that there's no consensus on a specific alternative to first past the post. Though noted that there is significant consensus among experts at the committee, regarding moving towards a more proportional system, there was significant consensus based on the My Democracy survey and our town halls that Canadians want governments that are more co-operative, that work across party lines, and I think there was significant consensus among parties based upon process. So not outcome, but process. And the committee that studied this issue had recommended a referendum. Reasonable people can disagree on the merits of a referendum, but if a referendum at the same time as the next election would give this issue its due, and give Canadians a real opportunity to have their say on it, I think that that would've been a fair compromise for all parties.

HM: Do you believe as the Prime Minister seems to suggest, that further action, a referendum even, would destabilize the country?

NES: I don't. There are reasons to think that having a referendum can be destabilising if you look to our history with referenda with respect to Quebec, if you look to the Brexit vote. But on this particular issue, I don't think it gets tempers flaring quite as much. When we look at P.E.I. that just had a referendum, Quebec and B.C. have gone through referenda on this topic as well, and while the issue did not move forward afterwards, I didn't see the world fall apart as a result of those referenda taking place.

HM: So what do you think your boss means by talking about destabilization of the country?

NES: Well I think, you mentioned Brexit, our history with Quebec, and look to south of the border and I think fundamentally what the prime minister is saying is, in his view and in the government's view, that there are more important issues that we have to really focus on and not distract from.

HM: Yeah but this is not a–

NES: This is an issue that matters a great deal to me, so I respectfully disagree with the theory nonetheless.

HM: Now NDP MP Nathan Cullen told us that the government's support for the idea evaporated when the Prime Minister's preferred option looked like it was not going to happen. The committee rejected that. Do you think that's a fair comment?

NES: Honestly I have no idea. But I would say if you look at the New Zealand solution to a referendum in 1992, they had a two part question. The first question was “Do you want change?” And the second question was, “If yes, what change would you like to see?” And on that option, there was a ranked ballot, there was a mixed member proportional, and there were a single transferable vote and supplementary proportional. So it’s not to say that ranked ballot shouldn't have been an alternative put the Canadians in 2019.

HM: Your criticism sounds in many ways like what we've been hearing from the opposition in the last few days. I'd like to get your sense of what's going on when we talk about this lack of consensus, and we talk about this destabilization. Do you think the Prime Minister is misleading us, as the opposition says?

NES: No I don't think the prime minister is misleading us. The government has a set of priorities and it's focused on, the Prime Minister mentioned the middle class, and continuing to make sure that we fulfill promises that we made to Canadians. This would require significant political capital. The conservatives and NDP both came from different perspectives right at the outset and made this a more difficult file. I think the committee came back with a recommendation for a referendum that the government did not want to move forward with, and reasonable people can disagree. This is an issue that matters a great deal to me. It matters to my constituents, it matters to a lot of Liberals frankly. And so I want to make stood up and said that.

HM: So what kind of response have you had from the Prime Minister and the Minister of Democratic Institutions since you've gone public with your concerns?

NES: Well in my opinion, the Prime Minister has embraced independence in parliament and it's the most significant democratic reform we can have, absent legislation. So I think it's welcome.

HM: And have you heard that directly from the Prime Minister or from the Minister?

NES: Not directly but the very fact that I'm out there saying what I'm saying, that I've been vocal on other issues and no one is taking me to task for doing so, certainly not silence. I've received no indication that I should not be out there representing my constituents. In the first day we had, when I stepped into that caucus. The Prime Minister reiterated that we were to be voices of our constituents in Ottawa and not the other way around. And I take that seriously and continue to do so.

HM: Mr. Erskine-Smith thank you very much for talking with us today.

NES: Thanks very much. Appreciate it.

HM: Okay, bye bye.

JD: Nathaniel Erskine-Smith is the Liberal MP for Beaches East-York. We reached him in Toronto. And if you're wondering whom Mr. Erskine-Smith might have been apologizing, you need look no further than the As It Happens Talkback line. Here are a just of few of the calls that we got after the government backed down on its promise of reform.

SOUNDCLIP

[Sound: Beep tone]

Hi my name is Trish. I live in Peterborough. This is outrageous. This Prime Minister has gone back on his word. I voted for the Liberals because of his attitude on climate change, no more pipelines, and a different voting system that would take into account everybody's vote. I am outraged.

Hi. David Schindler calling from Mackenzie, British Columbia, and the reason I'm calling is because my Prime Minister lied to me. And he lied to every other Canadian who cares. He made the promise and now it's being shelved. We're no longer going to have electoral reform and that to me is a travesty of democracy. You made a big lie and you're not getting in next time there's an election.

[Sound: Beep tone]

Hi. My name is Salvatore Tartamella. I'm from Montreal. I just want to say that I'm very, very, very disappointed. I feel betrayed. Thank you.

JD: Well thank you Trish, David and Salvatore, and everyone who called or wrote to us about the plan. And to have your say about anything you hear on this program, you can write us, at aih@cbc.ca. Also we are on Facebook and the Twitter too. Both those accounts are CBC As It Happens. And you can find more on this story and of course, more ways to get in touch with us, on our website, cbc.ca/aih.

[Music]

Pom pom crabs

Guest: Yisrael Schyntzer

JD: It looks like the teeniest tiniest cheerleader in the world. And not one you'd want to climb on your shoulders. The pom pom crab gets its name because it always looks like it has pom poms in its claws. You can see a photograph of it on our Twitter feed – @cbcasithappens. But the eye-catching tufts the crab is holding are actually sea anemones.
Scientists have figured out why the crab is always clutching the tiny creatures. But where it gets them has been a mystery.
Yisrael Schyntzer is a marine biologist who studied these crabs and their anemone pom poms. We reached him in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

HM: Mr. Schnitzer can you tell us first of all what these pom pom crabs look like?

YISRAEL SCHYNTZER: So they're about the size of somewhere between a dime and a quarter coin. Little furry crab like creatures. Usually we think of crabs having large robust claws that they use for defense and to gather food. And these guys have evolved tiny little claws which are adapted to holding an anemone in each one.

HM: So they look like they're holding pompoms, thus the name right?

YS: Yes. They look like… they’re called pom pom crabs or boxer crabs because if you put your finger in the aquarium and try to touch one, he will kind of jab out with the anemone towards you.

HM: How large are the anemone?

YS: A few millimeters. The crabs are pretty small so that they've got to be able to carry them around.

HM: So how tightly do they hold onto these anemone?

YS: Their claws are very adapted to what appears to be just holding anemone. So as I said, they're very small and delicate. So when we wanted to remove anemones for the experiment, it took a good hour, hour and a half each time, delicately, under a microscope, to kind of convince the crab to give up the anemone.

HM: So what are they doing with them? They're just waving them around. What's the purpose?

YS: The purpose we suppose is defense. There are many examples of animals which live aside sea anemones like clown fish, you know from the movie Nemo. Anemones the close relatives of jelly fish. We all think that jellyfish in terms of stinging, so anemones are very much the same.

HM: Now as you indicated, they don't want to let go of them. What happens if they do end up losing one?

YS: Well what we saw is that when we removed one anemone from a crab he would proceed to carefully tear the other one into two equal parts. In the second experiment, we took a crab where we removed both of his anemones and put him in an aquarium with a crab with them. They'd proceed to fight. Eventually almost always, the crab without would come away with one anemone. And then both crabs would proceed to split them into two and again each one would have two new anemones.

HM: Have you ever seen this kind of behavior in nature before?

YS: So it's a very very difficult to observe work in the Red Sea, in Elat in Israel. So we only really collected them from the wild, didn't observe them. What we did do in the second half of the study that we published now, is we collected pairs of crabs from the wild and we did a genetic fingerprint analysis on each pair of anemones held by the crabs. And what we saw is that every pair are identical clones.

HM: So they're mastering the growth of another species.

YS: What we've shown in this study is that they're mastering, you could say, the reproduction. In a previous study we conducted we published in 2013, we show that the crab's actually limit the food intake of their anemones and maintain them at a small size that's convenient for them to hold.

HM: This is a horrible life for an anemone.

YS: Well you know the big mystery is that we couldn't find any of these anemones free living. So the real big mystery is how does the crab get them in the first place?

HM: And what we're understanding here is as far as… you have no way of knowing whether a crab could just go and find an anemone. Really it appears that they have to take it from one of the other crabs.

YS: We found a few specimens of crabs, very very small, a millimeter or two in size. Which are probably just metamorphosed from the larval stage. And within a week at most, they already have an anemone. Where they got them during those few days, is the mystery. We're inclined to believe that it's predominantly based on the theft because where we find them is a very small and restricted area. So we don't know.

HM: What's next in the research? What other unanswered questions do you have?

YS: I'd like to try and observe them more in the wild and see what's really going on. We have the tools these days to look further into stuff like that.

HM: Mr. Schyntzer, thank you very much. And it was kind of fun to see these pompom crabs waving these things around.

YS: Great, great.

HM: All right. Thank you very much.

YS: Bye Bye.

HM: Bye bye.

JD: Yisrael Schnitzer has been studying the pompom grab. We reached him in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

[Music]

Lillooet BC hashtag

JD: Back in 2010, the town of Lillooet, B.C. – which is about four hours north-east of Vancouver – began a new era of self-promotion. It was a two-pronged campaign.
One prong was a series of YouTube videos.

SOUNDCLIP

[Music]

Lillooet has it all. Beauty, climate, industry, amenities, and a history. Come join us for life, happiness and prosperity. More and more people are finding Lillooet a great place to live, work, play, and invest.

The potential is really incredible.

JD: The other prong was Twitter. Someone secured the handle @Lillooet-BC – and started creating a social-media profile of the community, 140 characters at a time. From more than a year, Lillooet's feed was a constantly refreshed buffet of small-town delights. Golf tournaments, steak dinners at the Legion, and of course, the annual Apricot Fest – it all made for a Twitter portrait of a community with lots to offer.
But then the tweets slowed down. And finally stopped. Then in August, 2013, Lillooet, BC returned to Twitter with the tweet: "hashtag-Lillooet-BC". This re-introduction was followed, two days later, by the tweet: "hashtag-Lillooet-BC". The day after: "hashtag-Lillooet-BC". And then, to really drive home its bold less-is-more strategy, it tweeted "hashtag-Lillooet-BC" over and over again. Most recently, yesterday, and the day before, and twice on Tuesday.
Now the late "Ma" Murray – the longtime editor of the local newspaper – once wrote, quote, "Government is like your underwear. It smells pretty bad if you don't change it." But I don't think she'd feel the same way about "hashtag-Lillooet-BC". I think she would agree that her town has a bright future, and a rich history – and history repeats itself.

Back To Top »

Part 2: Bowling Green facts, Glasgow Art School fire artist

Bowling Green facts

Guest: Philip Bump

JEFF DOUGLAS: U.S. president Donald Trump's senior adviser Kellyanne Conway says “It was an honest mistake.” Last night in an interview on MSNBC, she referred to a massacre that never happened. Here's the clip.

SOUNDCLIP

KELLYANNE CONWAY: I bet there was very little coverage. I bet it's brand new information to people that President Obama had a six month ban on the Iraqi refugee program after two Iraqis came here to this country were radicalized, and they were the masterminds behind the Bowling Green Massacre. Most people don’t know that because it didn’t get covered.

JD: Now she was right. Most people didn't know that. In fact no one knew that because there was no such thing as the Bowling Green Massacre. Now Ms. Conway claims that what she had meant to say was “Bowling Green terrorists” and she is accusing the Internet of “creating memes and phony outrage.” But the reference of the massacre that never happened wasn't the only thing she got wrong in that interview. Philip Bump is a writer with The Washington Post. We reached him in New York.

HELEN MANN: Philip Bump, what did you think when you first heard Kellyanne Conway refer to the bowling green massacre?

PHILIP BUMP: I mean honestly, I thought it was a mistake. It didn't seem like the sort of thing that would be thrown out there as… you know deliberate lie just because it's so easy to debunk. But I totally understand why most people weren't willing to give her the benefit of the doubt on that simply because she, and more broadly, the administration and the president have so often presented false information as true.

HM: So what does that say to you? That people are just automatically tending to assume that they're making stuff up?

PB: Well I think that when people hear information from this administration that they're not familiar with, their instinct is not to necessarily say “OK that's the case then.” The president in particular has so many times demonstrated that he's willing to lie or willing to stretch the truth in service of whatever he's trying to do politically, that I think people are not willing to give people the benefit of the doubt even in a situation that seems so obviously like just a slip of the tongue or a mistake as this one.

HM: Now you believe she was actually referring, as you indicated, to the Bowling Green terrorists. Remind us who they were or are.

PB: Sure. So there were, in 2011 the government arrested two Iraqi refugee men who were living in Bowling Green, Kentucky. They were caught on surveillance tape stockpiling weapons that they planned to send to Iraq, along with money to aid Al Quaida in their fight against American troops at the time. They themselves had actually participated in planting IEDs apparently. While they were in Iraq, they were arrested, they confessed the crime and they were sentenced to prison.

HM: Did anyone die as a result of what happened in Bowling Green?

PB: No happily the Bowling Green massacre was casualty free.

HM: Or as some people said, had yet had yet to occur.

PB: Yeah, right.

HM: Now the reason Ms. Conway brought these folks up was in the context of President Obama purportedly banning Iraqi refugees as a result of this incident. Did that happen? Is that true?

PB: No. And this is a critical point. That was actually… there were two falsehoods, two untrue things that were said in that sentence. The other one being that Barack Obama did institute a six month ban on Iraqi refugees. That didn't happen. The administration did slow down the process after that to make sure that they were going over the people who were applying to be refugees before they got into the United States even more closely. But there was no ban. The Trump administration has repeatedly mentioned the idea that there was a ban because they tend to do this sort of well, what about what Obama did, and that sort of thing when they're defending their own policies. And this is another example of how they're trying to point to something Obama did to justify what they themselves are doing.

HM: So there was a lot of talk about this so-called massacre today. A lot of opponents of Mr. Trump, Ms. Conway had a lot of fun with it as a matter of fact on social media. But very little about the debunked claims she made about that so-called ban. So what do you think of that? Are people going after the wrong errors? The wrong lies?

PB: Well I think that with anything that is going on with public policy, there's always a level of complexity to it that makes it somewhat hard to comprehend the full scope of what's going on. This alleged ban that the Obama administration put into place, I mean our fact checkers looked into it and it required someone from the administration, the Obama administration, clarifying what had happened before they really got the full scope of what had happened in that incident. This however, this Bowling Green massacre, is easily accessible to anybody. Clearly it didn't happen. Clearly it's a fairly outrageous claim to make, and I think that's part of the reason people ran with it. But again, this all stems from the fact that Kellyanne Conway and the Trump administration are not getting the benefit of the doubt, in large part because they have so frequently demonstrated a willingness to be dishonest in what they're saying.

HM: So the media takes this material, takes these lies or these errors, and talks about them a lot. Is there a different way that the media should be handling this to make it easier for consumers to understand what's really going on?

PB: Well this is a this is a broad question that the media is facing right now, is how you deal with someone who is unchastened by the fact that he's being called out on being inaccurate. Or a group of people that are unchastened in that regard.
It has always been the case that politicians have said untrue things, often they said untrue things intentionally. But when they are called out on it, they will stop saying the untrue thing, or they will do their best to not say untrue things. That simply isn't how Donald Trump works. And so the media has sort of been scrambling for the past 18 months or so to figure out how do you convey information to people to help them understand what's going on in the world. At the same time, not totally inundating them with fact checks on every single thing the President says. I don't know we figured out a good way to do it, but we don't really have any choice when the President of the United States or one of his top aides says something that's clearly untrue, it's incumbent upon us to say “Hey, that's not true.” Even if we have to do it multiple times a day, every day that week.

HM: So what do you make of how Kellyanne Conway handled the backlash today?

PB: Well I appreciate the fact that she admitted that she had misspoken. That’s sort of where we are now, is that that by itself is something of a victory. But I mean, I also think that she essentially gave the impression that she was acting in a classy manner by owning the fact that she had made this mistake and tried to present it as though the administration broadly had acted classy in situations like this.
I mean we're so far down the rabbit hole of antagonism between media and the administration at this point that even little things like this only serve to heighten the tension between them.

HM: And we're what? Less than two weeks in. Are you tired?

PB: Yeah. The pace of what's happening, there have been so many stories. And there were probably 15 major stories that happened this week that any other administration would be days-long stories but they just happen in such a rapid clip that we’re constantly playing catch up. But to answer your question, yes I think we're all a little tired at this point.

HM: Mr. Bump, thanks very much for talking to us.

PB: My pleasure.

JD: Philip Bump is a writer with The Washington Post. We reached him in New York.

[Music]

Benoit Aubin Obit

JD: "I am not saying this to make myself interesting." That was from a column that Benoit Aubin wrote two years ago about his fight with lung disease. Mr. Aubin was a veteran Quebec journalist who spent his 40-year career reporting on countless topics – most frequently, politics. And being interesting wasn't an effort for him– it seemed to come naturally. Benoit Aubin died on January 25^th. He was 68 years old.
In February of 1994, Mr. Aubin spoke with former As It Happens host Michael Enright. At the time, he was the managing editor at Le Devoir in Montreal. The federal government had just decided to cut taxes on cigarettes, to fight smuggling and organized crime, mostly in Quebec.
And Monsieur Aubin told us what he thought about that. This is from our archives.

SOUNDCLIP

MICHAEL ENRIGHT: Benoit, did Quebec, as some people are suggesting, set the agenda in Ottawa with this initiative to reduce taxes?

BENOIT AUBIN: Well you know, how do you define Quebec? The leader of the opposition is the one who hammered the issue in the House of Commons. But I think it's wrong to see it as a Quebec issue. It's definitely is a national or even an international problem plaguing the country right now. The thing that it happens on most acutely, on Quebec territory does not make it a Quebec problem in my view. It has very little to do with Quebec laws. You know it's a problem that has to do with national borders and international trade and the Federal Police and the federal forces and how the they control the border and how to control smuggling. And it also has to do with a nation of people, the Iroquois, the Mohawks, who claim sovereignty and who claim to bear arms and who have actually never surrendered to the white people. They just say were invaded and they were claiming sovereignty on their territory. And furthermore, they had a federal dispense of tax and duties on their territory. So there is very little Quebecois component in this problem except for location.

ME: Is it going to play into the hands… or maybe I should put it another way. To what degree will it play into the hands of people who say “Well there goes back Quebec again, and there goes Ottawa giving into Quebec, and Quebec gets what it wants and all of that traditional anti-Quebec backlash.

BA: Well I'm not exactly familiar with these people living here in Quebec.

ME: I wasn't suggesting you–

BA: Let’s just say in the short term–

ME: No you don’t correspond with them. I wasn't suggesting that. But no.

BA: I don't know how far they can go you know pushing that line without becoming red in the face.

JD: From our archives that was Quebec journalist Benoit Aubin, then editor of the Montreal newspaper Le Devoir. He was in conversation with former As It Happens host Michel Enright. That's from February of 1994.
For the last 10 years Monsieur Aubin worked as a columnist at Le Journal in Montreal, his last stop in a very long career that included work in print and on television. Benoit Aubin died January 25th. He was 60 years old.

Glasgow fire artist

Guest: Cornelia Parker

JD: Three years ago, it was ravaged by fire. Now, the Glasgow School of Art is asking artists to help it rebuild – by turning that destruction into creation.
School officials sent charred bits of the damaged building to twenty-five artists, and asked them to make art from the ruins.
Cornelia Parker is one of them. She’s taking part in this project. We reached her in London.

HM: Ms. Parker, each of the artists taking part in this project was given a piece of debris to work with along with the note. What item were you working with?

CORNELIA PARKER: I was working with part of a bookshelf from the Rennie Mackintosh Library so it was, you know, turn of the century bookshelf, so its original part of the architecture.

HM: How large was the piece you were given?

CP: You’re not metric are you?

HM: Yup, were metric.

CP: Oh you are. OK. So what is that in centimeters… 38 centimeters tall, and five across. So it was a beautiful object. It just looks like a little… almost like a mountain peak. You know, it's got a pointy tip. And I decided it was such a beautiful object, I didn't really want to destroy it. I thought of grinding it up and you know, making pigment which I've done many times of various things, but I thought I'd combine it with other elements. I mean in the past I've made these large scale installations using charcoal from say a church struck by lightning or a church that’s been arsoned and I’ve made large suspended works. And I've also used chalk from Beachy Head and from the White Cliffs of Dover, as large installations too. So the idea of having chalk and charcoal together seemed to be quite attractive.

HM: And was it completely charred when you got it?

CP: Yes, the pieces. It was all blackened and charred and so I decided to use it as it is, as a material, as an object. And then combine it with a piece of chalk from Beachy Head. And these two objects pin down are drawing, a chalk and charcoal drawing made in the 1920s which I bought at an antique market. And the drawing shows a man or a pair of skis and he's going down a snowy sort of hill. And I like the chalk and the charcoal. You know, the three elements together really worked well. It's almost like the drawing had been made out of these two elements although it hasn't. And it's called “A slippery slope between chalk and charcoal.”

HM: And I'm assuming that chalk is white, so you've got a juxtaposition in colors there?

CP: Yeah, so it’s black and white and a black and white drawing in between.

HM: Now, what did the note that accompanied the piece of wood you were given say?

CP: It just hoped that I might make something interesting out of it or make it into an art work. So almost like cast magic on it.

HM: Now you're happy with the result?

CP: Yes I am very happy with it. I enjoy it as a piece and it took me to some different places. I mean the drawing, you know, is very evocative, and I am not a technical the wonderful draftswoman. Perhaps I could have a drawing of my own but I like the idea of story was 100 years… almost is 100 years old. The piece… the chalk which is eons old because it's been part of a cliff face, and the wood, obviously was a raw material for a long time and then it became a famous piece of architecture. So they’d all got these different prominences. You’ve got a piece of nature and a piece of culture and something in between which perhaps art is.

HM: Tell us about some of the other pieces that other artists created for this project.

CP: I've only seen one or two. Greyson Perry, he made a funerary urn with an epitaph on it, which it's, and I think contains the piece of charcoal. So that's a very nice kind of idea, because he makes a lot of pots so it's very in keeping with his oeuvre. And then there was a couple of… I saw one that had been used in a painting as a pigment, and the other one had been used in a drawing of two faces. I don't know who those artists are. I couldn't see the captions on those but it's quite a nice roster of artists.

HM: Now you taught at the Glasgow School of Art. It's a magnificent building. I was able to see it a couple of times before the fire. How did you respond when the library was so damaged?

CP: I felt very upset really because I'd stayed in the Rennie Macintosh suite where they put people up overnight, so you know I knew the building intimately and I really was you know quite shocked. Somebody on my street, his daughter was an art student there at the time and lost her degree show. She lost all her work in the fire. And even in London, as you know, you know people whose work were lost in the fire. It's very sad.

HM: For those who might not know why this is such an important piece of architecture in Glasgow, can you just maybe explain the connections, the Macintosh background and why that's so significant?

CP: Well he is a local Scottish architect. I think he made it when he was very young, designed the art school. I mean it must be the most beautiful art school in the world really. You know and everything about it is it is kind of geared towards it being a place to make art. You know I mean I think people were drawn to applying to that school from all over the world because of the architecture. So I think it is a very tragic loss.

HM: The art show in which you're taking a part, is supposed to be part of the efforts to rebuild that library. What can you tell us about the fundraising that's going on?

CP: Well there’s a number of artists who have made to work, and they're going to auction them at Christie's. And you know, hopefully that will regain enough publicity for the event, it should be able to raise some sizable funds.

HM: Next year is the 150th anniversary of Charles Rennie Macintosh’s birth. I know the city of Glasgow is planning a big celebration. Any chance some of the restoration will have been done by then?

CP: I hope so. I think it's happening as we speak. You know the workers, you know it's under way. And I don't know exactly when it will be completed, but I bet they would love to complete it by then.

HM: What does that mean to you to be part of that?

CP: Oh it's great. I mean I was very drawn to the material. I mean I don't I don't want to feel like an ambulance chaser but very often, you know, when I hear about a fire, my first instinct is to make a piece of art out of it. So in a way, in this case, I mean in past works I’ve used large quantities of charcoal, but this piece I only had a very small piece, so, to make that work. So that was great to have those limitations. But no, we've all made a small contribution to a bigger hole.

HM: Well Ms. Parker, it's a pleasure to talk with you. Thank you very much.

CP: Thank you. Bye. Nice to speak with you.

HM: Bye bye.

JD: Cornelia Parker is an award winning British artist. We reached her in London. Her piece called “A slippery slope between chalk and charcoal” was created with charred remains from a Glasgow School of Art. The school was badly damaged by a fire in May of 2015. Ms. Parker's Piece will be auctioned off in March to raise money for the school.

[Music]

Brexit bananas

JD: When it came to bananas, she was firmly behind the curve.
Last night, on the BBC-TV program "Question Time" – a long-running political debate show – the subject of Brexit came up. And one audience member raised her hand to share the last-minute epiphany that changed her vote.

SOUNDCLIP

WOMAN: Yes, I was voting “remain”, and at the very last minute I changed my decision and I went to “leave”. And the reason because of that is because I go to a supermarket and a banana is straight. I’m just sick of the silly rules that come out of Europe. And…

DAVID DIMBLBY: And the banana’s changed?

WOMAN: If you go to [unintelligible] they’re a bit bent.

DAVID DIMBLBY: It was bananas what did it was it for you?

WOMAN: It was more than bananas. It's the fact that there’s opportunities out there that I feel that we need to seize the country–

DD: And you’re optimistic now? You’re pleased the way you voted?

WOMAN: I am pleased the way I voted.

JD: OK, well in case you didn't quite hear her, or even if you heard her perfectly, let us let her repeat whole reason for changing her vote from “Remain” to “Leave.”

SOUNDCLIP

I go to a supermarket and a banana is straight.

JD: So she went into the supermarket thinking that she would vote for the UK remain in the EU. She emerged from the supermarket knowing that she would vote for the UK to leave the EU. The deciding factor: a banana that was too straight. But the Brexiteers’ ballyhoo over the belligerence of Belgian bureaucrats regarding banana bends is a load of… another word starting with ‘B’. You see throughout the campaign, people like Boris Johnson accused the EU of Orwellian overreaching, and one of their favorite examples was the claim that these out of touch functionaries had banned curved bananas. Mr. Johnson once said, and I quote, “It is absolutely crazy that the EU is telling us how powerful our vacuum cleaners have got to be, what shape our bananas have got to be, and all that kind of thing.”
The EU does have rules about fruit quality. It has no rules about banana curvature. That was one of several myths repeated by “Leave” campaigners, and apparently it worked, because instead of voting to stay that one voter opted for a banana split.

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Part 3: Thunder Bay woman injured, Ukraine fighting, AI Philippines report

Thunder Bay woman injured

Guest: Melissa Kentner

JEFF DOUGLAS: Barbara Kentner is recovering in a Thunder Bay hospital this week from just a disturbing attack. The Indigenous woman was walking down the street when she was hit hard in the stomach by a heavy trailer hitch. Someone threw it out of a car window, yelled something, and then sped away. No one has been arrested. The Thunder Bay police are investigating the incident as an assault with a weapon. Ms. Kentner’s family want it considered a hate crime. Melissa Kentner was with her sister Barbara when the attack happened. We reached Melissa in Thunder Bay.

HELEN MANN: Melissa, first of all, how's your sister Barbara doing right now?

MELISSA KENTNER: Right now she's doing much better. She's talking, she's more alert and everything.

HM: What kind of injuries did she sustain?

MK: She sustained a ruptured small intestine.

HM: It sounds pretty serious.

MK: Yeah it was pretty serious.

HM: And she had to have surgery for that.

MK: Yes she did. They got her in at 10:00 p.m. that evening. They said it was only going to take about an hour to four hours. And then she didn't get out of there till about quarter after 3:00 that morning.

HM: Can you take us back to last Saturday. You were with your sister walking down the road when this happened. Where were you going at the time?

MK: Yeah, it was early Sunday morning. It was about 1:14 in the morning. We were leaving my sister's house and we were heading to my son's house just the next block over.

HM: What kind of road is this?

MK: This road is where there's a lot of hookers and everything that walk up and down the streets late at night. We were we were walking along there. I seen the car when we got onto Dease street. I seen him, like he looked like he was going to go straight. But then he turned onto McKenzie street towards us. We were already walking on the other side was where there's no sidewalk because we're going towards my son's house. So we're walking on the side there, and that guy was hanging like half way out the window. And then I could see his, him like his whole half his body was sitting outside the window and I didn't really think nothing of it. And then I heard him. He swore and said “Oh, I've got one of them and then he starts laughing and then I turned back and I look and I see my sister bent over and she's like “Miss, I got hit with something. She goes “Look, see what it is.” So I walked back real fast and then I look on the ground and there's a trailer hitch.

HM: Describe this hitch.

MK: It's black. It's kind of rusty. The ball… it’s rusty. It was the hitch and the ball.

HM: It was pretty heavy.

MK: Yes. I say about between 20 and 30 pounds.

HM: Wow. So your sister… what was happening to her in that moment?

MK: In that moment, she was still bent over and in a lot of pain and she wanted to drop right then and there. And she's like “I want to lay down. I want to lay down.” And I was like “No,” I said, “let's just go over to my son’s house.” But she only made it to the door and she like laid down on the ground for a while.

HM: Were there any witnesses to what happened?

MK: No. A lot of people have said that there’s cameras at the church where he turned off on.

HM: And have you heard whether police have been able to get any footage from the cameras?

MK: No I haven't heard anything. He called me yesterday asking if my sister was able to sign a release of her hospital report. I mean he said he had several leads and he's looking into them.

HM: What do you think the man meant when he said “I got one?”

MK: Look, the majority of the people that do walk down that street are native. You know I mean, I hate to say it, but white people that walk down that street, they either walk on May St. or Simpson St. because McKenzie Street is pretty dark. It's not a well-lit street.

HM: So did you think that he meant that he was targeting Indigenous people or an Indigenous person?

MK: I think he was just wanting to hit somebody. But majority of the people that do walk down there are native. And that's more or less all the people that I see that get targeted in the city, is all natives. It’s not very often you hear of somebody that’s white that's getting hit with something. I know quite a few people that have been hit with water bottles, and eggs, and everything else, and yet they have called the police and the police haven't did nothing.

HM: You have since filed a police report. Can you maybe take us through a little bit what the police have told you about their investigation?

MK: They haven't even told me anything yet. I was just hearing everything on APTN last night.

HM: So have you talked to them?

MK: Not since. They haven’t said they’ve made any arrests or anything yet.

HM: Do you think that they're going to have a chance to catch whoever did this?

MK: I believe that they will but I believe that, know what, I think more or less they’re going to get charged with assault.

HM: And what would you like to see them charged with?

MK: I'd rather see them charged with attempted murder. The passenger and driver. Because the driver drove him, knew what he was doing intentionally. And, you know what? It could have hit my sister in the head. What if my sister was pregnant?

HM: They indicated that they're not investigating the incident as a hate crime. Do you think they should be?

MK: Yes they should be. I think it is a hate crime because they've done it before. This summer, like I hate to say it, yeah I was drinking at a bar, and they drove by throwing hard boiled eggs at us. It’s the same vehicle. But nobody phoned the police that day because the police will just look at as weird because you know what, yeah sure. We are drinking we're making wrong decisions. But the fact is, you know what I mean? They did throw it.

HM: And you think they threw it because you're a native person.

MK: Yes because there's mostly natives that hang around at the bar.

HM: Why is it important for you to be sharing your sister’s story with people?

MK: Why? Because you know what, this is the first time that this has happened to natives that was so bad. You know, sure a lot of people get hit with water bottles, eggs, you know I mean? But you know, I could have lost my sister. I lost both my parents. I don't want to be burying my sister. Throwing something like that intentionally at a person, that's not no assault and stuff like that. You know he did it intentionally. He wanted to hurt somebody.

HM: Melissa Kentner , thank you for talking with us. We appreciate it. And I hope your sister recovers quickly.

MK: OK. Thank you. Bye.

HM: Thank you very much.

JD: Melissa Kentner’s sister Barbara sustained injuries after someone threw a trailer hitch at her from a moving vehicle last weekend. We reached Melissa Kentner in Thunder Bay.

[Music]

Quebec funeral

JD: In Quebec City today, thousands lined up in the cold to attend a public funeral for the remaining three victims of Sunday's mosque attack in that city.
The Prime Minister spoke, as did the Premier, and Quebec City's mayor. But when Jamil Dhaouadi addressed the crowd, he did so as a member of the community that prayed at the Quebec Islamic cultural centre. And he had a message for everyone there.

SOUNDCLIP

JAMIL DHAOUADI: On the evening of January 30th I was supposed to be at the Great Mosque of Quebec. I had just gotten my haircut and was on my way. At the very last second, I decided to go home, since I had work to correct for my students. I could have easily found myself inside the mosque during the attack. My hairdresser however was among the people that were shot.
The reason why six members of our Muslim community died on the evening of January 30th was in large part due to the discriminatory rhetoric that Quebec elites, some Quebec elites, politicians, and mass media have towards the Muslim community. This had the effect of enabling people on social networks to justify their hate towards Muslims. As a result, they are indirectly responsible for the killings of our members of our community.
Let us not forget. That certain political parties sow division among the ranks of Quebeckers know that to pass off their bill.
As Canadian Muslims, we are equal citizens and not second class citizens. as certain distorted people wish to think. In Quebec we have to learn to accept our differences and learn to live and let live.
Our thoughts go out to all the families that have lost a loved one, all that 17 children that will be fatherless, and all the wounded at the Enfant-Jésus hospital. Let us not forget that three community members and hard-working fathers are also fighting for their lives inside the intensive care unit as we speak.
A final plea of the Muslim community. Please stop. Please stop telling us that we do not integrate. Treat us as equals. Listen to what we have to say. And please, do not listen to what others have to say about us. Come and speak to us. So we can dispel some of the stereotypes that still exist about our faith. You have my promise. You will not be turned away. As Canadians, let us conquer hate with love. Ignorance with knowledge, exclusion with inclusion, and evil with goodness.

JD: Jamil Dhaouadi is a member of the Quebec Islamic cultural centre. He was speaking at the funeral held today in Quebec City for the remaining three men who were killed as they prayed at the mosque last Sunday night.

[Music]

Ukraine Fighting

Guest: Philip Warwick

JD: In eastern Ukraine civilians are being caught in the crossfire once again. There’s supposed to be a ceasefire right now. But in recent days the battle between government forces and Russian backed separatists has heated up. Apartment blocks have taken direct hits from shelling as the two sides move closer together. At least 33 people have been killed. Many more are injured.
Philip Warwick is a freelance journalist who covers eastern Ukraine. We reached him today in Kiev.

HM: Philip Warwick, give us an idea of what civilians are going through right now in eastern Ukraine?

PHILIP WARWICK: Well in the town of Avdiivka, which has been the hot spot over the last couple of days, there are about 16,000 people there without electricity, water, and heaters there are intermittent. But you have temperatures falling down to as low as minus 20 in the last couple of days. You have the regional government and volunteers that have set up a makeshift humanitarian tents, and have also opened a soup kitchen to provide relief to residents from the freezing cold. So for example several hundreds of people a day have been lining up to get tea, soup and bread.
With regard to heat that I mentioned, the Avdiivka coking plant, which is the largest in Europe, provides the town’s heating and is now operating at only 20 percent capacity, so that's why there are these issues with heating. With the intense fighting of the last couple of days, there hasn't been a humanitarian window to provide aid and supplies into the town.

HM: OK well maybe we can get started to describe that fighting for us. First of all, how close are the two sides to each other and just how heated is the exchange last Tuesday?

PW: Last Tuesday, that is three days ago, over 10,300 explosions were reported. And that is the highest number of explosions recorded by the OSCE to date. And over 9200 of them in this hot spot of Avdiivka. And there has been instances where this fighting has been so intense that OSCE was not able… said that it could not properly count all of the explosions all along the frontline. On Wednesday, this has now dropped to 5000, 5600 explosions, and further reports are yet to be published by the OSCE.

HM: Where is the escalation said to have taken place? Who's done more firing?

PW: Both sides continue to accuse each other of ceasefire inhalations and the OSCE has actually followed… from their report, the same observation, that ceasefire violations continue from both sides.

HM: U.S. Senator John McCain has said this escalation may be President Putin testing Donald Trump. Is there any way of knowing if there's a direct relationship?

PW: Well actually, with regard to that point, there are two explanations. One, in terms of what sparked the current escalation. First of all, Ukraine's military has acknowledged that its troops have gained some ground back in December. And that could be seen as a provocation for the pro-Russian separatists to engage in the ceasefire violations because the fact, since they gained ground, that means that the front line is now closer. Both sides are closer, which increases tension levels between both sides. And that can spark off fighting and cease fire violations.
But also, as you mentioned, the current intensity may also be a way, is maybe also be a test from the Kremlin to see who notices what is permissible now in eastern Ukraine, vis-a-vis with the international community.

HM: Very briefly, in the short term, is there any chance that the fighting has stopped long enough to restore electricity and water to all of these civilians who are coping with this terrible winter?

PW: At the end of the day, you have hundreds of thousands of people in the hundreds of villages along the frontline that don't have access to basic needs. Now when we're talking about fighting for the hearts and minds of the population, each day that goes by that the local population doesn't have access to say, basic utilities, it makes them look to the other side and think that the grass is greener on the other side.
Bear in mind that those who have electricity on the frontline do watch Russian television and Russian news and they have, and that information is provided to them, and it does influence them, how they see the current conflict on the ground in 2017.
But it's also… one thing is actually getting teams in. But it also is providing them safety guarantees so that it's guaranteed that there will be no intermittent shooting or shelling when the repairs do take place and there have been on many occasions, instances, where you've heard teams go in there. Not every single company goes out there and is happy to go there because of the thought that yes they might come under fire. And at the end of the day someone might die or lose their life.

HM: Philip Warwick, thank you for talking with us.

PW: Thank you very much. All right goodbye.

JD: Philip Warwick is a freelance journalist who covers eastern Ukraine. We reached him today in Kiev.

[Music]

Philippines report

Guest: Rawya Regeh

KG: He said he would wipe out crime in the Philippines, and help people living in poverty. But the results of President Rodrigo Duterte's so-called "war on drugs" have been chaotic – and they have been catastrophic.
At least 7000 people have been killed since the president declared that war on drugs, shortly after taking office in June of last year. It's unclear how many of those people actually had anything to do with drugs. But it has become extremely clearer that the police involved in those killings were corrupt.
Now, President Duterte has told the police to stand down. From now on, his war will be led by federal drug agency officers, and the army.
A new report from Amnesty International takes a closer look at the horrors of President Duterte's project. The report is called "'If you are poor, you are killed: Extrajudicial Executions in the Philippines' 'War on Drugs'". Rawya Regeh is one of the authors. We reached her in Tunis.

HM: Ms. Regeh, President Duterte ordered that police in the Philippines stop all anti-drug operations. Do you think that that might make a difference when it comes to these illegal killings?

RAWYA REGEH: Well what we have are two different sets of statements. Essentially the president transferring the responsibility of the drug operations to the Philippine drug enforcement agency and the head of the police saying that they're disbanding the anti-illegal drugs unit. But in the same breath, President Duterte also made it very clear that his campaign against drugs will continue until his last day in office. So essentially five more years, not just the six months he was talking about. So until we see this transfer of leadership coupled with an actual change of approach, then we could possibly be talking about any breakthrough. And more importantly we are not hearing anything about justice and accountability for the more than 7000 murders that have already taking place over the past seven months.

HM: But do you think it's possible that having the drug agency officers and possibly the Philippine army continue the war on drugs might mean that the extra judicial killings stop?

RR: We have no indication so far based on which we can make a judgment call. What we need to see is the president immediately cease his incitement rhetoric,and what we have seen in response to our reports right away for example, are remarks from the Department of Justice saying as you've read in our report, we were saying that these killings appear to be deliberate, widespread, and systematic and therefore may amount to crimes against humanity. And the response we are hearing from the Department of Justice is that those cannot amount to crimes against humanity because we are talking about the killings of people who use drugs and people who sell drugs. In other words reiterating its position that people who use and sell drugs are subhuman.

HM: What did you learn in preparing this report from the people that you spoke with about how the police in the Philippines behaved towards them in fighting this war?

RR: What we have seen transpire over our research is a very clear picture of the police acting with absolute impunity. They have been acting on orders from the very top. We've heard their repeated incitement coming from the president and other members of his administration and that has really permeated and translated into direct actions by the police. We have seen repeatedly accounts indicating that the police planted evidence in some cases, that they have shot at people even as they were attempting to surrender, that they have falsified reports. In fact, in an interview we conducted with a police officer from that anti-drugs unit, he admitted that they have been planting evidence and not abiding by their rules because in his own words, you cannot have a case if you stick to the rules.
Another really grim picture emerged in accounts that showed that the police was running a racket with funeral homes, increasing funeral costs on these already impoverished people by essentially taking bodies to more expensive funeral homes and taking a cut from these funeral homes for every body that they deliver.

HM: Is there any particular group that is being targeted by police?

RR: What President Duterte calls a “war on drugs” that has been in essence a war on the poor. Time and time again we've seen the police and those unknown killers, those unknown shooters specifically target people who are really struggling to make ends meet. The people we've interviewed, those families affected, live in really harsh and rough slums in impoverished and remote parts all across the country. What makes things worse is family telling us that the police have been even stealing from them. Cash, jewelry, wedding rings that they never see come back. Police walking out they said with bags of stuff that weren't necessarily evidence. In one case, a mother told us the police took shoes that they bought for their daughter as a birthday gift in a floating slum in Cebu province, for example. So the poorest of the poor where they didn't have next to nothing to be taken from them.

HM: Remind us how this drug war came about and the role that President Duterte has been playing in it?

RR: Well this is a direct campaign promise by President Duterte. He essentially campaigned on a platform of security and he really tapped into something among the population and it explains that widespread popularity he had. He tapped into that sense of insecurity and fear and that explains why we see large segments of the population supporting his actions and as a result, what we are seeing is that instead of these the streets that he vowed to rid of crime, are being littered with bodies.

HM: Well given that continued popularity among those people he's counting on for support, do you have any reason to think things will change?

RR: The one thing that would really affect his popularity is if we continue seeing those being targeted, that specific impoverished segment of the society, the title of the report “If you're poor you're killed” comes directly from the quote of one of the family member’s sister whose brother was killed on Halloween day. If this policy continues, many civil society members and members of the community told us that this would be the ultimate undoing of this popularity. In fact, some of the people we interviewed who told us that they had started out supportive of the war on drugs. One woman told us “I supported his slogan change but no Filipino wanted to see bodies littering the street and for police killing people to become the norm.”

HM: Would pressure from outside to make any difference? Is there a role for international players here in putting pressure on the President?

RR: In reality we've seen the Philippines government lash out against international criticism and change would come really internally from within the Philippines and that's what we'd like to see. We'd like to see the Department of Justice form a task force to oversee investigations into the killings by the police. We'd like to see accountability and justice take place within the Philippines itself.

HM: Ms. Regeh, thank you very much.

RR: Thanks for having me.

JD: Rawya Regeh is one of the authors of a new Amnesty International report by the name of, "'If you are poor you are killed': Extrajudicial Executions in the Philippines' 'War on Drugs'". We reached Ms. Regeh in Tunis.

[Music]

Spark Promo

JD: U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order banning immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries has caused confusion, fear and turmoil for those affected – including many people in the tech industry.
Murtadha al-Tameemi is one of them. He's an Iraqi software engineer for Facebook in Seattle. Most weekends, Mr. al-Tameemi drives to Vancouver to visit his mom and his brothers, who have settled there as refugees. But now, even though he has a work visa, he's been advised by immigration lawyers not to leave the U.S.
Nora Young, host of CBC Radio's "Spark", spoke with Murtadha al-Tameemi. Here's part of what he had to say.

SOUNDCLIP

NORA YOUNG: You said that “The country I saw this week doesn't look like the America I know and love.” Can you expand on that?

MURTADHA AL-TAMEEMI: You know, I came here 10 years ago and I came here in an exchange program. I was 15 years old at the time. Straight out of Baghdad. I knew very little about the U.S. and I didn't speak very good English and I was placed with a host family in Minnesota and I lived with that family for a year and then I got to know quite a lot of people in my community. And this was in 2007 when the Iraq war has been, you know very very widely reported upon and discussed in the media. So the experience I had here as a student was remarkable. My interactions with people who were nothing but ones that reminded me of the kindness and generosity of the American people. You know I came here and I was in high school and I was looking for ways to explore post-secondary education after my year of high school. And people started supporting me in college applications to the point where people that I had never met, and they would send me checks, and they say “Here, use this to pay for this fee or that test.” And that's, you know that's the only reason really that I have been able to stay here and continue my education and be able to get a job at a company as prestigious as Facebook. So I have these people to thank for that. And that's what I meant when I said what's happening now doesn't seem to reflect the welcoming nature and the generosity of the American people I knew when I first came here.

JD: That was Murtadha al-Tameemi on the CBC Radio's Spark. You can get the whole story by heading over to cbc.ca/spark. You can also hear "Spark" on CBC Radio One on Sunday at 1 p.m.

[Music]

JD: We find ourselves at the end of As It Happens for this Friday, February 3rd.

HM: The show was produced this week by Jeanne Armstrong, Imogen Birchard, Karen Chen, Katie Geleff, Chris Harbord, Samantha Lui, John McGill…

JD: Kevin Robertson, Pedro Sanchez, Earvin Solitario and Kate Swoger. Our technician was Reynold Gonsalves. The show director is Kevin Ball. Chris Howden is our writer. And our intern is Sarah Jackson.

HM: John Perry is the Senior Producer. And the Executive Producer of As It Happens is Robin Smythe.

JD: We'd also like to thank some other people who helped us out this week: Jack Julian in Halifax, Kristin Nelson in Ottawa, Keith Hart, Naheed Mustafa, Jess Shane and Luke Williams – all in Toronto; Jody Porter in Thunder Bay, Suzanne Dufresne in Winnipeg, Michael O'Halloran in Calgary, and Anne Penman in Vancouver.

HM: And a special thank you to Susan McKenzie in Montreal, along with Peter Tardiff in Quebec City and all our colleagues in Quebec who have worked so hard to help us to cover this difficult news out of that province this week. As It Happens will be back again on Monday. I'm Helen Mann. Goodnight.

JD: I'm Jeff Douglas. Have a good weekend.

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Feb 3, 2017 episode transcript

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