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The AIH Transcript for November 29, 2017

Hosts: Carol Off and Jeff Douglas

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

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CAROL OFF: Hello, I'm Carol off.

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

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JD: Tonight…

CO: A belatedly sorry state. Prime Minister Trudeau apologizes for this country's history of persecuting LGBTQ citizens 21 years after the death of the last Canadian who did prison time for being gay.

JD: Losing the plot. The Washington Post reveals it was targeted by a sting operation designed to embarrass the so-called liberal media. But our guest says exposing that threat is no threat to its perpetrator.

CO: With grey powder comes great responsibility. Bali closes its airport and evacuates residents as a volcano disgorges clouds of ash. But our guest is getting photos from what's currently a safe distance.

JD: All's fair in larvae and water. Australian scientists have found a way to rebuild reefs and they're watching the effects of planting the coral larvae they've cultivated with growing optimism.

CO: Space jams. Forty years after NASA sent metal LPs into space in an attempt to reach any alien with a working turntable that plays at exactly the right speed — plus speakers and ears — the sounds on those disks are made available on Earth.

JD: And…Brunch Drunk Love. Hymie Polansky remembers his friend of 70 plus years, the late Hymie Skolnick, whose famous Montreal diner, Beauty’s, served greasy spoon food to hangers out, hangers on and hangers over. As It Happens, the Tuesday edition. Radio that believes his eggs were beyond re-poach.

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Trudeau Apology LGBTQ2, Bali Volcano, Hymie Sckolnick Obit

Archives: Everett Klippert

JD: Prime Minister Trudeau wiped tears from his eyes as he stood in the House of Commons today. Mr. Trudeau was delivering a long-awaited apology to lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer and two-spirited Canadians. He apologized for centuries of persecution and for laws which turned consensual sex into a crime. And then he turned to what he called the ‘Cold War witch hunt’ against the government's own employees.

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PRIME MINISTER JUSTIN TRUDEAU: The thinking of the day was that all non-heterosexual Canadians would automatically be at increased risk of blackmail by our adversaries due to what was called ‘character weakness.’ The public service, the military and the RCMP spied on their own people inside and outside of workplaces. During this time the federal government even dedicated funding to an absurd device known as the ‘fruit machine,’ a failed technology that was supposed to measure homosexual attraction. Canadians were monitored for anything that could be construed as homosexual behaviour with community groups, bars, parks and even people's homes under constant watch. When the government felt that enough evidence had accumulated, some suspects were taken to secret locations in the dark of night to be interrogated. Under the harsh glare of the spotlight people were forced to make an impossible choice — their career or their identity. The very thing Canadian officials feared, blackmail of LGBTQ2 employees, was happening — but it wasn't at the hands of our adversaries, it was at the hands of our own government.

JD: That was part of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's apology today for the government's persecution of LGBTQ2 Canadians. The apology comes just 50 years after a man named George Everett Klippert was declared a dangerous offender simply for being gay. This is how the CBC reported his case in November of 1967.

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REPORTER: A lower court ruling that would make every practicing homosexual in Canada liable to imprisonment for life was upheld today by the Supreme Court of Canada in a 3-2 decision. Details from Tom Earle.

TOM EARLE: The Liberal member for the Northwest Territories, Bud Orange, is extremely upset by the decision.

BUD ORANGE: Well, I think it's absolutely ridiculous that any man in our society today would be put in jail because they are affected by social disease. I think that when two male adults wish to engage in an act, which to me is a most repulsive act, but it's something that they themselves consent to. I think it's their private business and provided they don't interfere with anybody else in society, I think it's their right as citizens of this country to be able to do so.

JD: From the archives, that was the late Liberal MP Bud Orange on CBC News in November of 1967.

Trudeau Apology LGBTQ2

Guest: John Ibbitson

JD: Prime Minister Trudeau apologized today for Canada’s persecution of LGBTQ2 citizens, and he is expunging the criminal records of Everett Klippert and everyone else who suffered a similar fate. It was John Ibbitson who brought Mr. Klippert’s story back into the spotlight with a profile for The Globe and Mail last January. We reached John Ibbitson in Ottawa.

CO: John, when you hear that tape and Bud Orange defending Everett Klippert’s rights, though calling it a social disease and a repulsive act, what goes through your mind?

JOHN IBBITSON: Well, the same thing that went through my mind when I first heard about the case of Everett Klippert. I'd actually been researching for the Globe the origins of Pierre Trudeau's phrase “The state has no place in the bedrooms of the nation.” I checked out on Wikipedia and discovered it referred to a Supreme Court case. A bit later I sat down and read the Supreme Court case and discovered that this man Everett Klippert had been sentenced to life in prison. The Supreme Court had upheld this lifetime conviction as a dangerous sexual offender, simply because he had had sex with the men and refused to lie about it when asked by police. I was astonished and actually angry, even all these decades later, this man had been sent to prison for so long for committing something that should not have been a crime even then.

CO: But again, we're hearing this Bud Orange is saying that he's going to do something about this, but he's at the same time, characterizing it as — the language we forget that that was not so long ago — calling it social disease and repulsive act.

JI: Yeah, Tommy Douglas did the same thing when he was asking that the homosexual acts be decriminalized in the House of Commons. The enlightened position then was that it was a disease, that could be treated with chemicals and with other forms of therapy that George Everett Klippert himself should not have been incarcerated for life, but in fact, should have been put into psychiatric care. That's where you where when you were on the left of this issue. And that's where the society was when Pierre Trudeau as justice minister decided to decriminalize same sex acts.

CO: Why was Everett Klippert declared a dangerous offender?

JI: Everett Klippert was a bus driver. He didn't have a lot of education and he would pick up guys, sometimes he even slip them a couple of bucks for essentially hand jobs to be honest. And the police caught him doing it, got him to confess, sent him to prison for years. Then he left, went to the Northwest Territories. They caught him doing it again and they sentenced him to prison for more years and at that point they said well “If he's going to keep having sex with other men then he must be a dangerous sexual offender.” So they gave him that status and the Supreme Court upheld it.

CO: And then, of course this is when Pierre Trudeau steps in and makes his statement as justice minister. When did Everett Klippert finally get out of jail?

JI: The same sex acts were decriminalized in 1969 but he was not released until 1971 on parole. So he spent almost a decade in prison. Again, just because he was having sex with men and didn't deny it and didn't hire a lawyer, didn't have really the education and the smarts to find a way to get off the way people who did have more education and more income and the smarts did get off. So he spent a lot of time in jail for that.

CO: He died in 1996 he was only 69 years old. Did you speak with members of his family about what they remember of him?

JI: Yes, and they loved him. They were very reluctant to dredge up this past because they thought that their uncle had been victimized once and that he might be victimized again. But we talked several times and they agreed to let me sit down and fly out to Calgary and meet with them. They described a man who was their favourite uncle, he was a jovial, he was good hearted, he was generous, he was kind. He didn't ever want to speak about his past. He ended up actually getting married towards the end of his life. He didn't see himself as a pioneer in the gay rights movement. He was just the guy who loved driving trucks, and as it turned out, loved men as well.

CO: But he's now a symbol of this apology and it's Pierre Trudeau’s son who is making this apology — expunging the records of everyone who was wrongfully convicted and imprisoned for homosexuality, also compensating those who were purged from their jobs right into the 1990s. So even though the law changed and it's longer a criminal act, why were public servants still being hounded out right into the 1990s?

JI: Well again, even if you were an enlightened person you probably thought of this as some kind of awful disease. Certainly there was tremendous stigma. The Cold War was on and the theory was that the Soviets would blackmail people in the public service, especially if they were in the military or in a foreign affairs, and turn them into you know reluctant agents. And also it was just a good excuse to purge the public service of people who were thought to be socially undesirable. Even when in the mid-eighties, they began to pull back on this, it wasn't until 1992, under court order, that the military agreed to stop expelling members for being homosexual. It wasn’t until 1996 that it was put into the Human Rights Act that you can't discriminate against people on the basis of their gender. And probably it was not that long ago, and in some cases even still today, that people would keep their sexuality private for fear of not being promoted or not being liked or welcomed on the job.

CO: How many people do you think are like Everett Klippert, who are convicted of homosexuality, who would be eligible to now have their records expunged?

JI: For those who were convicted before 1969 there'll be very few left alive. But the gross indecency law wasn't repealed until 1985. Bathhouses were raided, people were charged in parks. If you were in a group situation that also constituted gross indecency. So there will be some people who will want to have their criminal records expunged but there will be far more people — about two to three thousand we think — who will come forward and ask for compensation for having been turfed from the public service because they were gay.

CO: Just finally John, you launched this understanding and where we are today with this because of your extraordinary coverage, your stories you've dug up, but what does it mean to you personally?

JI: Well, as a journalist and as a gay man, it is pretty thrilling to have realized almost two years later that a court case that you read about online that made you go ‘What the heck are they doing to put this guy in jail?’ would lead — I must say as a result of the stalwart support of The Globe and Mail throughout the entire process — to reports on the whole question of wrongful convictions, on the question of persecution and prosecution in the public service and to speech in the House of Commons by the prime minister saying this was all terribly, terribly wrong and on behalf of all Canadians we are sorry. You know the business that we're both in Carol — this is very cool.

CO: Good work John. And it's quite a statement today and glad to know you were behind it. Thank you so much.

JI: Thank you. Bye now.

JD: John Ibbitson is the Globe and Mail's writer at large. We reached him in Ottawa. And you will find more on this story and the Prime Minister's apology on our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

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Bali Volcano

Guest: Emilio Kuzma-Floyd

JD: As you have likely been hearing on the news people are watching an erupting volcano in Bali called Mount Agung — from a safe distance that is — because recently it has been spewing ash into the air and that forced the closure of the island's major airport this week. 100,000 people have been told to evacuate the area, thousands of tourists are stranded. Emilio Kuzma-Floyd is an Australian photographer who is living in Bali and that is where we reached him earlier today.

CO: Emelio, where are you now in proximity to this volcano?

EMILIO KUZMA-FLOYD: I'm currently in Amed, which is about 15 kilometres southeast of the volcano.

CO: And you shared a dramatic photograph and some video of this volcano. What does it look like?

EKF: It's huge. It's just mind boggling when you stand, especially this close to it, you just look up at it and you just feel so small. And even for us it's pretty scary but I imagine for the locals here it's far more scary.

CO: We’re at a disadvantage on radio in this case but maybe describe what it's doing?

EKF: At the moment it's just a huge plume. I think the last I heard it was about four kilometres high. At night you can see a reflection of the, it's actually the heat from the volcano, you can see that on the plume, so it's got a really strong red colour to it.

CO: And can you can you see the effects of the lava that is coming down the sides of the mountain?

EKF: No, there's no lava yet it's just the cold lava. It's when ash and water mixed together it turns into sometimes like a concrete mixture, a slurry, and that's moving down the mountain. I haven't seen any firsthand yet but I plan to go tomorrow and document with some of the non-profits here and show some of the effects that that's having on the locals .

CO: What does it smell like, what's the air like?

EKF: I actually experienced it for the first time today, where it actually is choking. The wind swung towards us started to blow the ash quite quickly towards us. And you can actually feel it, it sort of stings the eyes. My eyes are still stinging now. After if you ever get dust in your throat or anything like that it feels like that it's, it's not choking but it's there. You can feel it for sure.

CO: You mentioned that it's intimidating for you to look at this but it must be more so for local people. What are they going through?

EKF: At the moment they’ve got a push and pull sort of thing. For them their livelihood relies entirely — for a lot of them — relies entirely on their livestock or their crops. So for them leaving that behind, that's like leaving their livelihood behind. But then if they stay and they continue to took after that that's potentially going the actual life at risk. And that's become a, from what I've heard from the locals that I have talked to, that's been a real struggle. I've actually heard from some of the non-profits here that a lot of the locals will go home during the day and go you halfway back up the mountain and tend to their crops and livestock and then come back down at night or overnight where it's safer.

CO: I heard a woman on BBC this morning, a Balinese woman, who sells flowers to the Hindu gods she's just in centre of town, and she says well she has to make a living, she has to stay selling the flowers, that's what's feeding her family. And they asked her when might you leave? She said that when it gets worse I'll go. But she's trying to figure out when that is. Are people talking about the timing of this, because if this has happened before, there have been eruptions. Do they have a sense of when they must get out?

EKF: The problem is that two months ago they had the first one, they had a level four alert. It was about two months ago, and at that period they the government was quite quick to get everyone out of the area. And then as soon as the level went back down again everyone was told that they could go back home. So for them the uncertainty is — for everyone actually — there's so much uncertainty around this.

CO: Another thing this woman said in the BBC interview, she said that he believes the gods will protect them. Do you hear that?

EKF: Yes, the Balinese are quite special here. The thing that I love most about being here is that no matter how much tourism there is here or how much the country progresses with technology or whatnot, religion is still so important. They all still pray every day, they'll still do ceremonies all the time. It's so important to them and I think that it's true what this woman is saying for a lot of them that's their belief is that the gods will help them.

CO: And yourself, you said you're going to want to join with some NGOs and take more pictures and investigate further, but at what point will you get out?

EKF: Good question. At the moment I'm just trying to raise as much awareness as I can for the NGO’s here and the nonprofits, to try and get as as much exposure out there. They really need a lot of help in at the moment, and a lot of rhetoric around tourists and their problems, but realistically at the end of the day really the biggest problem is for the locals here. They're incredibly poor, a lot of them, and they're the ones that need the most help. I'll just continue to keep doing what I can here to help them.

CO: Emilio take care, and I appreciate speaking with you, thank you.

EKF: Thank you, I appreciate it.

JD: Emilio Kuzma-Floyd is an Australian photographer. He is on Bali, we reached him there earlier today. And if you'd like to see some of the photographs he has taken of this volcano visit our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

Hymie Sckolnick Obit

JD: If you have been to Montreal you may have been to Beauty’s. And if you have been out late at night in Montreal you have most probably been to Beauty’s — the city's most famous greasy spoon — the next morning. Hymie Sckolnick opened that brunch spot in 1942 and he ran it proudly for the last 75 years. Mr. Skolnick died at home yesterday. He was 96 years old. Hymie Polansky knew Mr. Sckolnik for 73 of those 96 years. We reached Mr. Polansky in Singer Island, Florida.

CO: Hymie first of all, I'm sorry for the loss of your friend.

HYMIE POLANSKY: Well, thank you. He was really a better friend than I would imagine him now that he's not here.

CO: But you've known him since you were a boy, you were nine years old when he first met Hymie Sckolnick.

HP: That's exactly right. It was in 1944 when I met him, I believe he was 23, and he was a proud, good looking, straight ramrod type of personality.

CO: How did you come to know him?

HP: Well, I went to school next door and his restaurant, of course, was on my way home. He had a big sign up there with milkshakes. I remember going in the first time and finding out it was 10 cents a milkshake and I couldn't afford it. So we used to go across the road because he charged six cents, but Hymie put ice cream and it tasted so much better. So we gravitated to having a milkshake when we could afford it, in his restaurant.

CO: So what did Hymie Sckolnick think of all you kids hanging around his place? Was he open to that?

HP: No he wasn't. We were a thorn in the side of his operations and we were mischievous children, my group. So he had this pinball machine and, of course, if you played it well you got free games. We figured out a way of getting free games illegitimately.

CO: You scallywags.

[LAUGHTER]

CO: And wasn't there, back in the 40s, wasn't there a gambling den in the back room? Did you know about that when you were a kid?

HP: Of course we knew it. I guess that attracted us to see what was going on because he had a door, you didn't have to come into the restaurant to go to the gambling den where all the underworld characters were. There was a door — and I think it still exists to this day, it's boarded up — and that led you to the back room. So you didn't walk through the restaurant. Yeah, of course we knew all about it. Do you know how and why Beauty bought this place and how it all evolved and came to be?

CO: Was it something to do with the gambling?

HP: Yes. Beauty or Hymie worked downtown at one of the textile business in a coffee shop there, and he was approached by a guy who turned out to be — I can tell you the name is — Willie Obront. And if you look up Willie Obront you will know a lot about the underworld in Montreal. William Obront owned this place. He didn't operate the restaurant, but he operated the gambling room in the back and his gamblers got hungry. So they wanted to go out to eat and so it broke up his game. So he said if I can find somebody to run this restaurant, which was closed in the front, then I'll make more money. He found Hymie, and I'm telling you this story as Hymie told me the story, and that's the way it all started.

CO: There are so many stories right of Beauty's diner. Isn't there a story about some customer who ordered 25 hot dogs and 12 Cherry Cokes for himself?

HP: Absolutely, I was there. This guy walked in with a friend of his, and there was some thing about a bet going on. And the next thing I knew it, Beauty's preparing 25 hotdogs, in buns, all dressed, and 12 cherry cokes — I remember it like today. And he brought it all there and of course everybody was craning their necks looking over at this guy eating the stuff. And Beauty was frightened that he's going to get sick. And everyone was standing around and this guy did 12 or 13 hotdogs, and half of the cokes and he couldn't do anymore, he couldn't eat anything.

CO: That's a good thing.

HP: Yeah. And they asked him how could you possibly do that? He said “In Europe I ate half a horse.”

[LAUGHTER]

CO: Now let’s just talk about the food at Beauty’s because it became world-famous didn't it?

HP: It did, absolutely. You know, he had certain signature dishes there. Most of the food was kind of good, but I mean it wasn’t a place if you were a gourmand that you'd go to.

CO: There was something called the mishmash wasn't that Freda, his wife’s specialty?

HP: Actually, I was just I was just going to tell you a story about the mishmash. I have a girlfriend now and she lives in Florida. Anyway we were in the restaurant and she really watches her diet — she loved to have a mishmash. She said to them “I'd love a mishmash but I want it with egg whites please” They said, “Oh we cannot upset our formula.”

CO: But forget the egg yolks, I mean, wasn't it made out of hot dogs?

HP: It was hot dogs, salami, onions, peppers, eggs fried on the grill — and that was it.

CO: Well, the egg yolk is the least of your problems there.

[LAUGHTER]

CO: People say they saw him there just weeks ago.

HP: Absolutely correct, I was with him. Couldn't have been more than three weeks ago, maybe less.

CO: And he was still sitting in his same perch watching the door?

HP: Same thing. I mean, this was his life. Without that restaurant he would have gone a long time ago.

CO: What's it going to be like to go to Beauty’s and not see Hymie, not have Jaime there?

HP: Absolutely not the same place anymore — it's over. He was, you know, he was the heart and soul of this place, there's no question about it. It'll never be the same — never.

CO: What a great guy. Hymie, I appreciate so much you talking about your friend with us. Thank you.

HP: You're welcome.

CO: Take care.

JD: Hymie Polansky is a long-time customer of Beauty's diner in Montreal. He was in Singer Island, Florida. The owner of Beauty’s and Mr. Polansky's friend Hymie Skcolnick died yesterday at home. He was 96 years old.

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Royal Wedding Embargo

JD: The word embargo comes from the Spanish verb embargar, meaning to impede or to obstruct. We had time to look that up today during a dramatic six minutes between the arrival of an embargoed news story and the lifting of said embargo. The time was 10:24 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. And a story came over the wires about the upcoming royal wedding, accompanied by a note ‘embargoed for another six minutes’ meaning that we could not share anything, anything in that story, until 10:30 a.m. That was challenging because, as you can imagine, there before us were astonishing details vis-a-vis actor Meghan Markle and Prince Harry as revealed at a press briefing at Buckingham Palace. Presumably the couple's spokesperson had laid down the embargo and, frankly, it was easy to see why — because the stuff was dynamite. By now, hours after the embargo was lifted, you know what we know — that the two will marry in May 2018 in St. George's Chapel in Windsor. That the Queen will attend the wedding, that the engagement portrait has not yet been taken, but would be quote “likely around Christmas but nothing firm” unquote. And then the real scoops about the couple, as absolutely as stunning now as they were at 10:24 a.m. this morning. Yesterday the spokesperson admitted was quote “an incredibly happy day for them. And furthermore the wedding will reflect the couple's personalities.”And then the bombshell regarding Ms. Markel's dogs — the one named Guy is in London but the other, Bogart, is living in an unconfirmed city with one of Ms. Markel's friends. We whispered is that temporary, that must be temporary but no the spokesperson told us quote “It is a permanent situation.” Every second of that six minutes was an eternity. Still, we are responsible journalists and we observe that embargo because in this case every dog didn't simply have its day, it had its precise minute.

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Project Veritas: Watcher, Coral Study

Washington Post Interview

Guest: Matt Gertz

JD: Roy Moore in Alabama. I might know something but I need to keep myself safe. How do we do this? That was the e-mail sent to a Washington Post reporter earlier this month in the hours after an explosive story about sexual impropriety on the part of the Alabama judge and Senate candidate Roy Moore. Reporters followed up with the woman, whose name is Jamie Phillips. Her story however, did not add up. And then the reporters found a comment she had made online back in May. Quote “I've accepted a job to work in the conservative media movement to combat the lies and deceit of the Liberal MSM — mainstream media. Here is a sound from a video in which Washington Post reporter Stephanie McCrummen confronted Ms. Phillips.

SOUNDCLIP

STEPHANIE MCCRUMMEN: Well, since you, you know, since you contacted us, you reached out to us we went ahead and did some background information — background checking, you know what I mean, on some of the things that you had told Beth about your story. And so this came up, and so I just want to understand what that's about. And I'm also, you know, frankly want to know who you might be working for now.

JAMIE PHILLIPS: I work — I still do mortgage work.

SM: There’s a little bit of an issue there, and I just want to ask you to explain it, because when we called the company that you said that you worked for, they said they didn't have — that you didn't work there.

JD: That’s earlier this week Washington Post reporters saw Ms. Phillips walk into the office of Project Veritas.

Project Veritas: Watcher

Project Veritas is a right-wing group known for setting up ‘stings’ against news outlets and progressive organizations like Planned Parenthood. Matt Gertz is a senior fellow with the liberal watchdog group Media Matters. He has been following Project Veritas since 2009. We reached Matt Gertz in Washington D.C.

CO: Mr. Gertz, what did you think when you saw the Washington Post story about Jamie Phillips and Project Veritas?

MATT GERTZ: Well, my first impression was definitely glee. I've been following James O'Keefe for quite some time. He is someone who acts deceptively, and so at first watching this fairly incredible face plant I have to say I was pretty joyful.

CO: And James O'Keefe is the founder and an operator of Project Veritas, which is the organization you speak of. And so after you got over the glee, what were your other feelings after that?

MG: After that I got a little bit depressed. The Washington Post story about the sting operation that James O'Keefe’s organization attempted on them did a really good job of showing just how deceptive his organization is. You had one of his operatives claiming to these Washington Post reporters that decades ago she, as a 15-year-old girl, had a sexual relationship with the Republican Senate candidate that led to an abortion and The Post did a good job of explaining exactly why they had been suspicious of this, why they had not published these claims. The problem is that James O'Keefe supporters will never read The Washington Post story. There is a sort of closed off, conservative media bubble that shields a lot of his fans from these sorts of truths, and instead they're going to get his version of the story. They're going to hear him explaining to them that he got them just as good as they got him, that the post is liberal and biased and wrong, facts won't enter into the discussion.

CO: Why would Project Veritas and James O'Keefe, why would they send a woman into the Washington Post with this with a made up story about a sexual assault and blaming Roy Moore?

MG: The Post for the last several weeks has been reporting on women who have come forward to their reporters explaining how when they were young Mr. Moore attempted to assault them or attempted to be romantically involved with them. But the idea is to discredit all these allegations by showing that The Post is just out to get Roy Moore. They'll take any story no matter how farfetched it is and they'll just publish it. The idea was to both discredit the women who have come forward to say that they were abused by Moore and to discredit the Washington Post itself.

CO: And what is it that led the reporters at Washington Post to suspect that Jamie Phillips — it's an awkward and difficult thing to do isn't it — to suddenly say to someone who's come forward with this story saying look I’m going to tell you what happened to me, I was sexually assaulted, this horrible situation, I was compelled to get abortion when I was a teenager, all of this — and then to have the reporters say, well I'm not sure if I believe you. What led the Washington Post reporters suspect that the story wasn't true?

MG: Well, there seem to have been a number of different factors including that the world was unwilling to provide documentary evidence of it. But the sort of main crucial factor was when a researcher looking into the woman's background discovered a GoFundMe post saying that she was going to go work for this conservative organization and they discovered that she was living in Connecticut, only a few miles away from Veritas’ headquarters in New York. They were able to observe her going into the office and then questioned James O'Keefe about whether she was affiliated with this organization.

CO: So I don't want to call it a sting of a sting, but they counter stinged her and found out this is what was going on?

MG: Yes, they turned the tables on her pretty well.

CO: So the film of this, there’s actually tape and the Washington Post taped it themselves. If the whole idea was to somehow out the Washington Post and this, what has James O'Keefe and what's done with its video?

MG: Well, as is typically the case with James O'Keefe operations, no matter how ridiculous things get he is declaring victory. So he put out a video of the same interactions that the Post did, as far as the exchange in the parking lot, except his video removed several minutes where the Post reporters were questioning him about whether Phelps was affiliated with his group. So he is trying to claim, despite all the evidence that's been presented, that The Post is still dangerous and that they're the ones who lie all the time. Meanwhile it's become quite obvious that he has completely failed in this particular endeavor.

CO: How can he point to this as being a triumph?

MG: Since all of this happened the conservative media outlets that have long been aligned with James O'Keefe, ones like Breitbart and the Gateway Pundit Blog, these are very popular conservative news sites. They have all been very supportive of O'Keefe defending his reputation. And so that suggests to me that he will maintain his credibility with those particular outlets.

CO: Would it not be the case the people who will follow this and say James O'Keefe did a good job even if they didn't catch the Washington Post this time — that those people would believe it anyway, that there’s no new recruits, there's no new ground gained here. So what progress have they made?

MG: Well, what concerns me most is that it seems to be almost impossible to break that right-wing media bubble. But that large group of supporters of James O'Keefe will virtually, regardless of the facts, continue to insist on this worldview in which the media is dangerous and evil and cannot be trusted. This is an argument that is surely very lucrative for them. James O'Keefe’s organization brought in five million dollars last year, but it's not something that's good for the body politic at large. Getting to a point where groups like this are completely ignored will be incredibly difficult and take quite a long time. There is a long and well supported argument among conservatives that the media cannot be trusted. Only the conservative media can be believed, only conservative politicians can be trusted and that is something that is very, very hard to walk back once it's been established.

CO: Mr. Gertz, I appreciate speaking with you, thank you.

MG: Thanks so much for having me.

JD: Matt Gertz is a senior fellow with the liberal watchdog group Media Matters. We reached him in Washington D.C. And for more on this story and more on Project Veritas go to our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

[Music: Upbeat 90s Pop]

Coral Study

Guest: Peter Harrison

JD: I think it's pretty safe to say it may just be the world's largest IVF procedure. No humans however are involved in this particular fertility treatment. During the full moons of late summer, stony corals on Australia's Great Barrier Reef simultaneously release millions of eggs and sperm into the water. But only some of those fertilized eggs become larvae that then land on the sea floor and then grow into new coral. Well now, the scientist who discovered the phenomenon of mass coral spawning back in the early 80s, has found a way to give coral a bit of a helping hand reproductively speaking. Peter Harrison is a marine biologist at Southern Cross University. We reached him in Lismore, Australia.

CO: Mr. Harrison, why does coral need your help to reproduce?

PETER HARRISON: That's a really good question. In natural circumstances coral populations produce so many eggs and sperm during mass spawning events that literally millions and millions of larvae are produced and even though a very, very small proportion of those larvae actually settle successfully and grows into a new coral, in natural circumstances there is enough to replenish the coral communities naturally. What's happening on most reefs around the world, unfortunately, is that the coral communities are declining so substantially that fewer and fewer sexually produced larvae are available to cause the recruitment processes that underpin the natural resilience of these populations. And therefore, in some of these reef systems we have to actively intervene to provide substantially more larvae than are currently occurring.

CO: Now I'll get to what you're doing and how are doing in a moment. Just tell us about coral sex. How does coral reproduce?

PH: Most of those species produce both eggs and sperm within each of these polyps during the year. So they hermaphrodites, and on a few magical nights each year many of the different corals of a particular species, and in fact many different species, spawn together in mass sporting events. So the eggs and sperm are released from the polyp, they float up to the sea surface and sperm from other colonies fertilized the eggs of some of those colonies and you get cross-fertilisation and the production of millions and millions of larvae. They become mature enough to stop looking for a reef site to settle on and some of those are successful at settling, and then of those settled lobby very few grow into juvenile and then adult corals.

CO: OK, enter you and your team. What are you actually doing in order to help coral reproduce?

PH: The recent research that we've been doing on the Great Barrier Reef is to raise millions of coral larvae from these mass spawning events and then we're transferring those larvae across into large enclosures on the reef that have fine mesh curtains around them to retain the larvae on the areas that we want to settle them on. What happens in nature is that these larvae that are produced naturally from spawning events tend to disperse off the reef systems so very few of them are actually available to support recruitment on the reef. This process we’re trailing now is much larger than it's ever been tried before, but it’s still relatively small scale in terms of making this an effective management tool.

CO: But have you actually seen some results at this point?

PH: Yes. So what we've had over the last week is some initial indication of some larvae settling on some patches of these reef systems. And what we need to do is monitor the survival and the growth of these individual recruits and that is a slow process, so we will be monitoring them during various periods next yrear and for years to come, to look at the rates of growth and eventually when they become sexually reproductive. And one of the things that's really exciting about the other work that underpins this, which I've been doing with Ph.D. student Dexter Dela Cruz in the Philippines, is there we've gone from microscopic coral larvae, less than a millimetre in diameter, up to dinner plate sized corals that are sexually reproductive, and that's happening within only three years. And that's what we're trying to do on the Great Barrier Reef now.

CO: This is this Heron Island that you're talking about?

PH: Yes. So the work that we've been doing recently on the Great Barrier Reef is at two locations in the southern Great Barrier Reef, at Heron Island, and One Tree Island, a reef patch that's located quite close to Heron Island. And what we're looking at is the patterns of recruitment from these coral larvae and then been able to compare between locations.

CO: We've done a number of stories, we've interviewed many people about the devastation to the Great Barrier Reef and corals in general, and just the fight they're up against, I mean, the battle against climate change and against all the other things that are degrading these reefs is just extraordinary. So do you think it's possible? I mean, do you think you can turn the tide, so to speak, and actually recover these coral reefs?

PH: At the moment this research is experimental and therefore it's necessarily small scale. So we can't claim, in any sense, that the work we're doing now will help coral reefs recover rapidly. But what it does provide is another tool in the toolbox for management of coral reef systems in future. Then management authority such as the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and other reef management authorities around the world, can consider using this larval enhancement technique as part of the various tools they can use to try and improve coral communities and more rapidly recover them. The Great Barrier Reef is immense, there are more than 3000 reefs stretching along more than 2000 kilometre of the Queensland coastline. That's an enormous scale and the damage to the northern and central Great Barrier Reef from the recent bleaching events is extreme. So at the moment we can't rapidly recover those systems.

CO: Do you ever worry as a scientist that, I mean, as encouraging as it is that you find ways of dealing with things like bleaching events and the erosion and degradation from climate change, that people will then turn to you and say well good see we're hoping you scientists could reverse the damage. We don't need to worry about fixing things, science will find ways of correcting the damage that's being created. Do you worry about that?

PH: Yes, I do worry about that. And one of the problems with talking about the fact that we might be able to intervene is the inevitable incorrect conclusion that some people may draw, that we really don't have to worry. We have to be extremely worried and we're now so desperate, in terms of trying to recover coral communities, that we're considering quite radical approaches, including things such as active intervention with larval restoration to try and kickstart the recovery of reefs. That might provide a glimmer of hope that we have a lot of work to do to actually make it meaningful in terms of a management process.

CO: Mr. Harrison, I appreciate speaking with you. Thank you.

PH: You're very welcome.

JD: Peter Harrison is a marine biologist at Southern Cross University. He recently discovered a way to help reproduce coral on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. We reached Mr. Harrison in Lismore, Australia.

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Europe Radioactivity, Delia Derbyshire PhD

Question Period: Terror Travellers

JD: Tempers flared in question period today as conservative leader Andrew Scheer asked Prime Minister Trudeau what the government was doing about returning ISIS fighters. Last week the Public Safety Minister told the House about 60 jihadis had returned to Canada. Some experts believe there are more. Here is Andrew Scheer speaking earlier today in the House of Commons.

SOUNDCLIP

ANDREW SCHEER: CSIS warned the Liberal government all the way back in 2015 that returning ISIS fighters were a continuing and real threat to Canada. They warned that Canadian citizens were recruited by ISIS “not because they needed more foot soldiers, but because they want to teach the westerners to take the struggle into every neighbourhood and subway back home.” So why is the prime minister so focused on reintegration services and not putting these people in jail?

[APPLAUSE]

PRIME MINISTER JUSTIN TRUDEAU: This government, like all governments, takes extremely seriously the safety of Canadians and that's why everything we do is focused on keeping Canadians safe. And we know that a society that is safe is one in which we are using a broad range of tools to keep Canadians safe. Yes, we have enforcement, surveillance and national security tools that we use to a significant degree, but we also have methods of the deemphasizing or deprogramming people who want to harm our society and that's the things we have to move…

AS: Mr. Speaker the prime minister's deemphasizing Canadian security and Canadians are tired of it.

[APPLAUSE]

AS: It was conservatives who amended the criminal code to make it an offense to leave Canada to fight for ISIS. It was conservatives who are focused on giving our law enforcement new tools to prosecute ISIS fighters. This prime minister is using a broad spectrum that includes poetry and podcasts and all kinds of counseling and group hug sessions. Mr. Speaker, when the prime minister take the security of Canadians seriously and look for ways to put these ISIS fighters in jail.

[APPLAUSE]

JT: Mr. Speaker, the Conservative Party learnt nothing from the last election and the lessons Canadians taught them. They ran an election on snitch lines against Muslims. They ran an election on Islamophobia and division, and still they played the same games trying to scare Canadians. The fact is we always focus on the security of Canadians and we always will and they play politics of fear and Canadians reject that.

[APPLAUSE]

JD: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau responding to conservative leader Andrew Scheer in question period this afternoon.

[Music: Lo-fi Hip Hop]

Europe Radioactivity

Guest: Sven Nielsen

JD: Detectors across Europe began to light up last month. They had detected a huge cloud of radioactivity wafting over the continent. The radiation was from an isotope called Ruthenium-106. And researchers were quick to reassure the public that the concentrations were not enough to cause harm. And yet a cloud of mystery hangs over that cloud of apparently harmless radiation. Where did it come from? And could it be a sign of a larger unreported nuclear accident? Sven Nielsen is a researcher at Denmark's Center for Nuclear Technology. We reached him in Copenhagen.

CO: Mr. Nielsen, are we any closer to figuring out where this radioactive cloud came from?

SVEN NIELSEN: Well, first there were indications that the source might be located somewhere east of Moscow in Russia. And recently we had reports, actually from Russia, which were new. And they claim that they observed the same isotope Ruthenium-106 at high concentrations at locations in the Ural region in the Chelyabinsk region.

CO: And this is in the mountains, the Ural mountains. So what might be there? What might be the source in those mountains?

SN: Well, there is a nuclear facility there called Mayak and they actually are handling nuclear technologies and perhaps also spent nuclear fuel, which might be the source for this release of ruthenium. But the thing is actually that we have had a denial from this Mayak Enterprise, where they say they are not the source, so the mystery remains.

CO: This factory, the Mayak factory, it does produce radioactive isotopes this Ruthenium-106 is that believed to be one of its products?

SN: They claim no, not any more. So what can we say? When they say they are not the source then we don't know.

CO: But it can't —could it be naturally occurring? Is that possible?

SN: No, no this is completely out of the question. Ruthenium-106 is a fission product, with a one year radioactive half-life and it can only be released alone if chemical separation has been applied to the fission products from the spent nuclear fuel.

CO: Does it pose a health risk to people in the region?

SN: Well of course, if the concentrations are high enough then any radioactive elements or isotopes would be a health risk. At the source location the concentration or the amounts of radioactivity have been sufficiently high to cause a health risk depending on the circumstances. But in Europe where the ruthenium was oberved at first, the levels were so low so that they didn't pose a health risk to anybody.

CO: Do you know if Russian authorities have warned people in the Mayak region or in the Ural mountain area where this cloud is coming from. Have they been warned about health risks?

SN: No, I haven't seen any reports of that.

CO: What do you make of that?

SN: Well, it's strange, it's strange. I mean, all the observations which have been used by methodologists to run backwards calculations indicate that the source location should be somewhere in the Chelyabinsk region around the Ural Mountains. But the Mayak enterprise, they claim they are not the source. So we simply don't know.

CO: Has the Russian government recorded its own high levels of this radiation?

SN: Yes, there have been some reports saying that they actually saw high levels in this region I mentioned. The authorities, as such, have not made any statement as to the source and the location of the radioactivity.

CO: But something doesn't add up does it? I mean, you have identified, or it’s been identified that this radioactive cloud is in this Ural mountain area around Mayak. There is a factory that produces radioisotopes there. And the Russians say they have detected the same radiation but everyone denies it it's coming from the one place where it would appear to be the logical source.

SN: Yeah. The most likely explanation is that that Mayak Enterprise would be the source of the release. But since they claim they are not the source then we don't know anything more than that.

CO: Has there ever been a problem with the Mayak factory before?

SN: Oh, but the Mayak factory is this the place where the Russians back in time produced the nuclear material for weapons, for nuclear weapons. So it's, I suppose, this was a very secret area back in time until the Soviet Union broke down. Perhaps they retained some of this these secret attitudes even today.

CO: There was once an explosion in that factory was there not?

SN: Yeah, nearby they suffered an accident which was scattering a lot of radioactive material around, forcing evacuation of local cities. So it's notorious for mishandling nuclear materials in an improper way back in time.

CO: Well stories about the Russians perhaps not disclosing some accident in a nuclear facility brings to mind Chernobyl does it not?

SN: Yeah, it sounds like a similar story today but I cannot really understand why they wouldn't admit if something happened there and that they were the source of the release, but it's hard to understand.

CO: But we know what happened going back to Chernobyl, that they did nuclear accident, itwas the Soviet government at that time. They wouldn't acknowledge this problem but that it seems to make sure that the local population wasn't alerted that, it was to contain the information. Do you think it is because of international pressure or because they don't want the local people to know that there's been an accident?

SN: I mean, the Chernobyl accident happened at the collapse of the Soviet Union so there were major societal changes occurring at that time. But this is not the case today so I don't know why they would keep it secret if it really happened. So it's really a mystery.

CO: All right we'll leave it there, Mr. Nielsen, thank you.

SN: OK. You're welcome.

JD: Sven Nielsen is a researcher at Denmark's Center for Nuclear Technology. We reached him in Copenhagen.

[Music: Industrial Pop]

Text Periods

JD: Scientists have developed a new algorithm that explains what the word algorithm means. The process involved — sorry just a second, I'm getting a text from Carol here. She just stepped out of the studio so I texted her to ask her to bring in a space heater because this janitor's closet that we've converted into a studio, it's surprisingly drafty and she just texted back. OK. So that's good. All right I'll just try to keep going here with the — I'm sorry I can't concentrate. Why is Carol so mad at me? What did I do to deserve this —this OK, period. OK, with a period after it. I mean, I know texts can be difficult to interpret right? And as a new study points out quote “in contrast with face to face conversations text messages lack extra linguistic cues such as tone of voice and gestures” unquote. And so we infer a tone don't we? From the little things, things like word choice, emojis and punctuation. And from an earlier study we know that people who get a short text ending with a period perceive it as less sincere than the same text without the period. And now researchers from Binghamton University’s Department of Psychology have built on these findings, and it turns out that we don't just find texts that read yeah, period, maybe period, or OK period, insincere — we find them negative, period. This is all very disturbing, so I've just texted Carol back here to see if she's angry with me and I'm just waiting for her. OK, here she is. No, good. What a relief. Awesome. Wait a minute. This is no period Oh no. Period.

[Music: Brass Band]

Morneau Shares

JD: Finance Minister Bill Morneau has been on the defensive for weeks now. But today he took a swing at conservative finance critic Pierre Poilievre and threatened legal action. This week Mr. Poilievre suggested that the Finance Minister had insider knowledge back in 2015. That fall the minister sold 10 million dollars’ worth of shares in his family business and soon after that the minister introduced a bill on raising income taxes for high earners. That Mr. Poilievre says, is when the stock market dropped — including Morneau Shepell’s share price. Well now Minister Morneau is challenging Mr. Poilievre to make those comments again outside the House of Commons where he does not enjoy the same legal immunity. Here's part of what the minister said today to reporters in Toronto.

SOUNDCLIP

FINANCE MINISTER BILL MORNEAU: A couple of weeks ago people were saying that I should have sold shares, shares that I held, that were held with the knowledge of the ethics commissioner. Of course I went ahead and sold those shares. And now yesterday I'm hearing that shares that I sold after I got into office, around the time I got into office, was somehow something inappropriate. So you can't make this stuff up. I mean, what we're hearing now is the, in my mind, absolutely crazy idea of something that we campaigned on, that we talked to 36 million Canadians about, which was a rise in taxes in the top one per cent, was somehow knowledge that was only my knowledge — makes absolutely no sense. Yet we go further to hear that I had some future understanding of what the stock market might do. So all I can say is you literally cannot make this up. It is absolutely absurd. The opposition clearly has no idea how the stock market works. If they'd like a lesson how the stock market works, of course, I'm happy to give that to them. But I can say with absolute certainty if they want a lesson in how the legal system works they need to take those allegations outside the house and I'll give it to them.

JD: Finance Minister Bill Morneau speaking to reporters in Toronto today.

Delia Derbyshire PhD

Guest: Mark Ayres

SOUNDCLIP

[Music: Doctor Who Theme]

JD: A true Whovian would recognize that music anywhere. It is one of the most memorable and haunting pieces of television music ever created — the theme to Doctor Who. Back in 1963 it was the first piece of purely electronic music many people had ever heard. It was written by composer Ron Grainer and with music created by Delia Derbyshire at the BBC's Radiophonic Workshop. The workshop specialized in unusual sound effects and Derbyshire’s haunting soundscape served as the theme music until 1980 when a new version was made using synthesizers. Delia Derbyshire was an unsung hero of electronic music. And although she died in 2001, her reputation is still growing. Last Monday she received a posthumous Ph.D. from Coventry University in her hometown. Mark Ayres was there to accept that honour on her behalf. Mr. Ayres is a composer and a sound designer at the Radiophonic Workshop. We reached him in London.

CO: Mark, how did it feel to collect this award for Delia Derbyshire?

MARK AYRES: Amazing and a long time coming. Delia has been an inspiration to me all my life and to many people in the UK who are interested in electronic music. We grew up listening to her work and the work of her colleagues at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. They did music, obviously for Doctor Who, which is the most famous creation. We really were brought up with this stuff, it stuck with a lot of us.

CO: And just the thing is is that she had so little credit for it during her lifetime didn't she? Because you mentioned we played some of the music for Doctor Who, but the score was written by Ron Grainer and that's the name that's been on it. Why wasn't she recognised for her contribution to that theme?

MA: There's two things. One, she was as much as she could be. She was a BBC employee, she was a BBC studio manager as part of the BBC Radiophonic workshop. And at that time there wasn't that much credit given to individual people who were employees of the BBC. Credits were even worse than they are now, you know, they flashed by very quickly and there weren't that many people listed, so they didn't get individual credit. But I have to say, to say that she wasn't recognized — you know, I knew as a teenager in about 1970-71 — I knew that Delia Derbyshire made the recording. So those who were interested certainly knew and could certainly find out. I mean, Delia said to me in later life that the best thing her parents had given her was her name. Delia Derbyshire was it kind of slips off the tongue. And I remember hearing this name when I was 10 or 11 years old and thinking ‘Who is this is this lady and what does she do?’ I love what I love the sounds. Only really with the benefit of hindsight, I think we can see quite how ground-breaking it was and how special all that stuff was.

CO: And I want to get to how ground-breaking is but just to stay on this for a moment about her recognition because she struggled. It wasn't just that she had difficulty in the industry, it was impossible to work in this industry and in some studios Decca Records where she tried to work did not employ women — it was policy.

MA: No she applied to Decca Records before she applied to BBC in the late 50s. And they said “no we don't employ women engineers.” And that was awful of course, but I have to say it wasn't normal. I mean, the BBC was always a prolific employer of women and quite rightly so. And Delia always said that she was in a post-feminist before feminism was invented. She certainly didn't feel that as a women she was held back at all.

CO: Now to get to the ground-breaking sounds that she created and this is before modern synthesizers and machines. Let’s talk about the Doctor Who theme because that's the most familiar to people. How did she create that sound?

MA: Well there were no synthesizers back then. This is way before anyone had really thought of them, they came in a few years later. So the way they were getting their sounds was by using Musique concrète techniques. Musique concrète being a French expression that means, music from the sounds around you, music from found sounds. So the way they would work is they would find sounds from strictly non-musical sources. So the bass line of the Doctor Who theme is a recording of a single plucked string on a piece of tape. They then played the tape back at various speeds to get the different pitches. They would then cut all the notes they needed out and they cut them to right length with razor blade, and then join them all together with splicing tape in the right order. And that's the way they worked. And they did that on every line. The melody was created again no sympathizers. But what they did was test tone oscillators, it was test equipment and it was used for testing electronic circuits, but they had it marked in musical notes she did that with by literally turning the dial on the test equipment to create that melody, recorded it again on a piece of tape. Did that for all the different lines of the melody then join them together. And then because there were no multi-track tape machines, they had to bass line, the second bass line, the rhythm line, the melody line on separate pieces of tape. And they would they were set up on tape recorders next to one another in the room and then they go three, two, one and start all the tape recorders playing at once.

CO: And that's the sound that we heard back in the 1960s and has that theme has been reengineered since then I would imagine?

MA: Yes, Delia altered it a bit during her lifetime. They created the original master then they tampered with it a bit before it went on air. And then in 1967 she overdubbed some additional sounds onto it. In 1970 and 71 they did the same again, more new bits and pieces added but always treating the original mix.

CO: That was when that cliff-hanger scream was updated right?

MA: Yes, absolutely. But before that they used to literally start the theme and then fade it out when the episode started and then just fade it up at the end of the episode, and then fade out when the credits is finished. But the new producer who came in, Barry Letts, in the early 70s wanted something far more specific. They introduced this screaming sound, which was the cliff-hanger at the end of every episode. And that was created by playing the very beginning of the theme where we join it, backwards through an echo chamber. Speeding the tape up and then adding a synthesizer sound over the top of it, and then playing it back the right way round again and cutting it back on to the beginning of the master tape. I mean, just extraordinary.

CO: Now what do you think that Delia Derbyshire would think of Doctor Who now being a woman — the 13th Time Lord is female. What would she think of that do you think?

MA: I think she'd love it, I think she would be very impressed. I think she'd think thank heavens we we've all come a long way at long last. But I mean, unfortunately, in some ways we haven't. So but I think that doctor becoming a woman, I think it's a fantastic idea and I think Delia would have heartily approved.

CO: How do you think she would feel if she could see this award for her that you collected?

MA: Well, Doctor Who is now a women Delia is now Dr. Delia — I think it's entirely fitting. It's been 17 years since she died. She is getting more recognition now than she ever did, that's something we've been very keen to promote her legacy. And it's great at long last that it’s getting the recognition I think it so justly deserves.

CO: Mark, thank you for telling us about Delia Derbyshire.

MA: You’re very welcome.

CO: Mark Ayres is a composer and a sound designer at the BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop, where the late Delia Derbyshire created the famous Doctor Who theme music. Last week, Ms. Derbyshire received a posthumous Ph.D. from Coventry University. Mr. Ayres collected it on her behalf. We reached Mark Ayres in London. That story is on our website: www.cbc.ca/aih.

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November 28, 2017 episode transcript

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