Round 2

Alright, so we managed to fight our way through the quarter-finals and are now on to the semi's against the Anaheim Ducks (or as Alanah refers to them, Disney gone Bad). Game 1 is tomorrow night at 7pm tomorrow night, and yet again, I'm gonna live-blog this one. It's actually kinda fun, even when you're half-cut. Although, my 1st time was a wee bit rough.

If by any chance you need a reason to build up your hatred of Anaheim, be sure to check out Mike's reasons to hate Anaheim. And of course his live-blogs,(yeah he's a little angry but remember, he has to watch the games on Versus).

Take it easy until tomorrow night, when this heart attack inducing ride starts back up again.

Canucks v. Stars Game 4- Live Blogging Part Deux

Alrighty, so now for my second try at (drunken) live blogging. Hopefully it doesn't turn into a marathon like the last one. 'Cause I don't think my heart/liver can handle it.

Pre-Game Notes:
Off-topic, but on todays like this I love living in Vancouver. Nice temp, blue sky and nothing to do.

The Crazy Canucks crew is gonna be on CTV, awesome to them getting a little more exposure (well outside of Rebecca who's been getting a lot of press lately).

Anyways, time to go and get my food/beer ready for the game.

Was Don Cherry wearing a dark purple velvet suit? Or is it the pre-game beers playing tricks with my eyes?

Josh Green is back tonight! Lets hope he lasts more than a game.

Dallas has a crappy opening song for when the players come out onto the ice. You need a song that starts pulling at your gut and heart from the very first note. That and in the stands there seems to be more people in Texas A&M gear that Stars gear. What's up with that?

1st Period:
18:58 - Seriously, don't people know not to call me during a game?

17:27 - 4-0 for the Rangers?

16:something - Bad penalty there for Naslund. Puts the Stars on their first PP.

14:07 - Good kill and Sedin nearly scores the ensuing rush, good stop by Turco.

13:20 - Sopel makes me nervous, why the hell does he skate right at Luongo?

12:45 - Ok, think everybody except the refs thought that penalty was gonna be on Sedin for tripping.

11:17 - Now that passing play by our PK should be shown to kids learning how to kill penalties.

9:41 - Nice little rush by Bulis (yeah I know weird to say that) and in the resulting Stars panic, they take a penalty giving us our 1st PP. Now lets try and do something with it.

8:22 - Ok, we look like a bag of shite on the PP right now.

8:00 - Uhh ok. Don't really know what happened there with Hagman. But we've got a 4 on 3.

7:35 - Or maybe not, screw it I blame the beer.

6:59 - 2 Stars forwards down so far.

6:45 - Seriously this is bullshit penalty. I hate this stupid delay of game thing. You listening Bettman? Get rid of it!

5:47 - Nice block by Burrows!

4:56 - I love our PK unit. My blood pressure doesn't skyrocket anymore when a penalty gets called.

2:48 - Damn it Sopel! Stay in position.

1:36 - Nice little play there by the Linden line, buts lets try and get a shot form inside the faceoff dots.

1:31 - Ok, now we get another chance. Lets actually get setup this time.

0:05 - Now this is what I'm talking about. Great flurry of shots there. Love watching Salo load up that slap shot.

End of the 1st: Well, not a great 1st period but I'll take it. Need to go and get rid of some rented beer. Don't forget to check out Mike @ Yankee Canuck who is also live-blogging this game.

1st Intermission: Update on other games going on tonight. The Rangers are smacking the Thrashers around 5-0 with 18 minutes left in the 3rd. Ottawa and Pittsburgh are tied up at 1-1 in the 3rd. Anaheim and Minny are getting started momentarily and Detroit will return to the demolition of Calgary in about an hour.

2nd Period:
18:23 - Hansen, Bulis and Morrison(?) getting some good pressure to start the period off.

17:33 - 2-1 for Ottawa, just over 10 minutes to go.

17:04 - Ahh, just some broken glass, thought it was an injury there.

15:44 - Damn, Luongo with some nice stops there. Especially that last one with him 15 ft out of his net.

14:06 - Get Sopel off the ice and get the puck out of your damn zone!

12:something - Boucher and Smoke mixing it up a little. But of course CBC doesn't give any highlights just cuts to commerical. Never mind its Turco trying to stir shit up.

12:27 - Stupid penalty by Modano there to put us on the 4 on 3.

11:03 - Sopel get the fuck off the ice! Your on the damn powerplay, don't fuck up simple stuff.

10:27 - And we're on the PP again. Now just keep Sopes off the ice and we might have a chance.

9:26 - Never mind, we'll just take ourselves off the PP.

8:48 - Ice looks like crap. Pucks bouncing all over the place. Guess thats what happens when you have the NHL, NBA and Arena Football in the same place.

7:something - Nice play again by Bulis and his pass to Green just out of reach on the 2 on 1.

7:something - And we're on the PP again. Side note: WTF, CBC why does it take you so damn long to get your time ticker back up?

4:28 - And Hanssen with a nice shot. Kid looks good out there in only his 2nd NHL game.

2:24 - Henrik takes a penalty putting Dallas back on the PP. Not that it really make much of difference. Both teams PP have been pretty anemic so far.

0:15 - Jesus or Roberto Luongo, as he's otherwise known, makes a series of ridiculous saves to keep the score even.

End of the 2nd: I've got a bad feeling we're going to OT in this game. And with my luck these guys are gonna try and beat their own OT record. Hope I bought enough beer.

2nd Intermission: Another update on scores. Ottawa beats Pittsburgh 2-1 to go up 3-1 in their series. 7-0 Rangers over Atlanta to go up 3-0 in their series. And a 0-0 tie in Minny against Anaheim.

3rd Period:
20:00 - Over 19 minutes of penalties so far between the 2 teams. Too bad both teams powerplays have been completely useless.

17:34 - From Hughson, not a shot on net so far for Modano in this game.

15:33 - Dallas is starting to look a little desperate in this period. They've get the puck in our zone for most of the period but haven't really had a decent shot yet.

12:30 - Dallas is throwing everything but the kitchen sink into our zone trying to get something. Too bad (for them) that we've got Luongo in net (Thanks Mike Keenan, and yes this is probably the one and only time you'll hear me say that).

10:30 - Finally some decent pressure by the Canucks.

10:02 - OHLY!!!!! And the nucks go up 1-0.

8:22 - Pressure is on Turco now. The time to choke is all his now.

6:something - Damn it. Sydor scores off a screen from Morrow. 1-all

5:31 - And Linden scores to put us back up again. Turco gave a juicy rebound that went off a Stars D-man and right to him.

4:00 - Alright guys lets just hold on. Another goal would be nice though.

3:05 - How long until we see Turco out of his net?

2:something - Mitchell saves one for Luongo. And keeps the score 2-1. Christ that one was damn close.

2:00 - Turco's coming out any second now.

1:25 - Or maybe not, Dallas can't get any decent pressure in our zone.

1:07 - Turco's out.

0:28 - Bulis lays it out to block a nice shot.

0:21 - Luongo makes a great glove save.

0:13 - Daniel just misses the empty net for an icing call.

0:00 - Canucks win 2-1 and open up their lead in the series 3-1.

End of the Game: Alright so now we come back into Vancouver leading 3-1 in the series. Awesome. And the game didn't last 5 1/2 hours, almost as good as them winning.

Anyways, be sure to check out Alanah, JJ, the Crazy Canucks and everybody listed in my sidebar for some more commentary on this game.

Quick Note

Well, we're up 2-1 and Game 4 is tonight. So far, each game has had someone live blog it. Be it me for Game 1, Mike at Yankee Canuck(with his angry drunk-blogging) for Game 2 or Alanah with her semi-live blog for Game 3. Well to keep this up, I plan on live-blogging this game tonight again, although I'm praying for a couple of fewer overtimes. And if Mike hasn't floated away, he is also planning on live-blogging it as well. Bonus, double coverage, probably with me complain about the CBC and Mike about Versus. Anyways, need to prepare, see you later at 5 pm PST.

Canucks v. Stars Game 1- Live Blogging Edition

Alrighty, so here we go. Remember, this is my first time at this so mistakes are bound to pop up.


Pre-game: Got my pizza, lots of Coke and some Gibsons. Should be good to go. Its Hughson(sp?) and Neale doing the call tonight on CBC. Wonder if Team 1040 have synced up the sound? Hope so.

Just waiting on the Anthem now. Better go mix myself a drink.

Love Mark Donnelly when he does the anthem. Gets the crowd into it even more (don't know how thats possible)

1st Period:
20:00 - Is it just me or does the first few bars of "Where the Streets have no name" send a tingle up your spine. Does every time. Christ I feel like a kid on christmas morning.

19:51 - Well that didn't take long, already a stoppage.

19:00 - Kesler's playing?

17:30 - Bieksa just took a puck of his foot and is grimacing on the bench. Lets hope he's ok.

16:46 - Bulis with our 1st big scoring chance.

15:40 - Daniel Sedin scores!!! Looked like it bounced off a Stars Dman.

14:54 - Bieksa takes the 1st penalty of the game.

14:32 - And the Stars convert, Morrow with a redirect past Luongod.

13:something - Now we get our 1st PP, lets hope they can do something with it. And a TV commerical break. Why don't they come out with new ones, kinda like they do for Superbowl.

13:19 - And now we've got a 2 man for 1:42

11:42 - Bieksa not playing very heads up and gets caught by Hagman coming out the penalty box and has to take a stupid hooking call. And Luongo makes a crazy stop with his head!

9:20 - Good kill

8:00 - Hopefully Alain Vigneault talks to the guys in the intermission and calms these guys down.

7:21 - Dallas gets a delay of game penalty after shooting the puck out of play. I hate this penalty.

5:28 - Ohlund nearly caught Turco wandering out of his net.

5:something - Dallas takes another penalty for slashing. Kinda looks like the Stars are trying to push us around.

4:26 - Wish our PP could score.

3:44 - Bieksa takes his 3rd straight penalty.

2:17 - Luongo grabs another one out of thin air. And the Canucks take another penalty (not Bieska this time) and 30 seconds of 2 man for the Stars.

1:02 - Didn't see who it was but one of the Nucks just robbed a Star. Walked up and just took the puck off his stick.

End of the 1st - Hate to echo the CBC guys, but WTF!! Wasn't this supposed to be tight checking, defensive series? Not that I'm complaining mind you. Right now I'm chalking it up to the excitement of the post-season. Oh well, time to take a little break here.

2nd Period:
20:00 - Starting to feel the pre-game drinking a little bit, god its gonna suck going to work tomorrow. At least my sup is a big 'nucks fan so he'll know why I'm so hung-over.

18:30 - Hope that Team 1040 decides to sync their audio to the TV soon.

17:14 - CBC stat: Turco is 0-4 in Game 1's.

15:26 - CBC feed keeps stuttering, rather annoying

14:27 - Looks like McReary was trying to pull off a triple axel or something there.

14:something - Nucks get the 1st PP of the 2nd.

13:32 - Ohly!! Scores a nice one with a one-timer. Might have been deflected by Pyatt

13:04 - Turco takes out Burrows and takes a penalty. Dumb move, silly Turco.

11:48 - Our PP may be a little anemic with the scoring but at least they make it look good with the setup.

10:46 - How the hell does Luongo make some of these saves, he looks like Gumby on some of 'em.

10:00 - Damn, Dallas ties it back up with a shot from Daley that I don't even think Luongo saw with a 2 man screen in front of him.

9:something - Commercial break thankfully. Man this is a lotta work. Don't know how Alanah does this on a regular basis. Don't forget to check out Mike who is also planning on live blogging a couple of games.

8:00 - Watching Turco coming out to play the puck brings back some scary Cloutier memories.

6:50 - What the hell, CBC guys are talking about the Swede's vs. the Fins in this match up

6:10 - Nazzy scores a beaut on Turco. Nice wrister thru the 5 hole. 3-2 Nucks!

5:40 - Cooke takes a tripping penalty to put the Stars up a man. Kinda nice having an awesome PK unit. My heart doesn't stop anymore when we take a penalty.

4:26 - Speaking of the PK unit, man is it great having Kesler back there again.

3:30 - Damn, nice hit by Bulis.

2:59 - Luongo makes another great stop with his toe. He uses every part of his body to make a stop.

1:46 - Further evidence of what J.J. was talking about in his "rant" on Nazzy. Markus makes a great defensive play with knocking the puck away from a Star and stops their rush dead.

0:04 - Another CBC stat: when leading after 2, the 'Nucks are 30-1-5 (doesn't sound quite right but who knows)

End of the 2nd - Well, we're heading into the 3rd with a 1 goal lead, who would have expected that? In this series, I'd be surprised to see either team get up by more than a goal, maaaybe by 2. Alright bathroom/smoke break before the 3rd.

2nd Intermission - I hate the CBC. Just listened to Hrudey talking about how Naslund had a "horrible" season. BS.

3rd Period:
19:18 - Cooke hasn't come back since coming off the ice late in 2nd with an injury after a knee on knee hit he made on a Dallas player.

18:17 - Barnes takes a tripping penalty to put the Canucks on a PP early in the 3rd.

16:17 - Another fruitless power play. 1 for 7 so far.

15:29 - Nazzy is skating like a fiend tonight.

14:14 - Luongo with a couple of great saves. He makes them look almost ordinary somehow.

13:29 - Morrow misfires on near point blank one-timer.

12:24 - Smoke scores!!! Off a rebound from the glass behind the net. 4-2 Nucks!

11:29 - Miettinen scores for the Stars to bring it to 4-3. Caught Luongo slightly out of position after he made a save. Rare rebound given up by Roberto.

9:08 - Crowds chanting "Turco" then "You suck". Wonder what its gonna be like if this goes to 7.

6:14 - Nagy squeaks one past Luongo to tie it up 4-4

5:05 - The "Brabarian" just misses on nice shot on Turco and breaks his stick. That reminds me, check this episode from the Crazy Canucks for little tidbit on how the legend began.

3:26 - Scary bit there, Nucks couldn't get the puck out their zone. Need a change pretty badly.

2:37 - Shots are 14-2 for Dallas in the 3rd (38-21 overall)

0:35 - Good lord, get the puck out your damn zone.

0:04 - Nazzy sends a puck off of Turco's head.

End of the 3rd - Good lord we're going to overtime. This game might just kill me, and as Mike said, it's only game 1.

Well I've been complaining about the CBC crew, maybe I should count myself lucky. Mike is ready to kill the entire Versus crew. That got me to thinking "Who is worse, the CBC or Versus?". Well I just checked out Versus and the panel they had up? Who the hell are those guys?

Update on some of the other games tonight. Ottawa took down Crosby and the Penguins 6-3. Minny and the Ducks are tied @ 1 in the 3rd. And San Jose beat the Predators 5-4 in the 2nd overtime period (god I hope this doesn't go that long).

1st Overtime:
19:39 - CBC is reporting Cooke has a groin sprain, no word on exactly how long he'll be out.

18:18 - Maybe I'm overstating the fact, but hell its my blog, it sure is nice to see Kesler back out there.

17:11 - Shots are 40-23 for Dallas right now. All of you should bow down and thank the hockey gods we have Luongo in net for us. (Its become a near nightly ritual for me)

16:19 - Nice hustle from Bieksa to cut off a scoring chance for the Stars.

14:49 - Anyone else getting tired of the relentless media info about how alike these 2 teams are?

13:49 - Where has this Bulis been all year?

13:01 - This game is gonna kill me. Another great save by Luongo.

11:17 - Bulis f#@'s up with a bad back pass, then makes up for by coming back and helping out Mitchell to clear it out of our zone.

9:16 - Beautiful hit by Cowan.

8:something - Robidas takes a slashing penalty and puts the Nucks on thePP

7:42 - Turco makes a nice save, drops it and manages to tap it out of their zone.

6:49 - Surprise, surprise, we didn't score on the PP.

6:14 - And Cowan with another great hit.

5:47 - Seriously, where has this Bulis been all season?

4:37 - Nice shot by Morrison and Turco makes the save, don't think he even knew where the puck was.

4:04 - Burrows got slammed into the boards, his head bounced pretty nastily there. Couldn't get to his feet that well either. CBC noted Bernstein walked him back to the training room but appeared to be walking a little better.

2:06 - And the linesman damn near scores for the Stars, before Lou flopped out to stop the puck.

0:55 - Pyatt with another nice shot on Turco, who gloves it down. Looks like we're going to a 2nd OT period here.

End of the 1st OT - Oh goody, another OT period.

Update on the other game tonight. Anaheim takes the 1st game of their series beating Minny 2-1.

2nd Overtime:
20:00 - Burrows isn't on the bench to start this period. Not good.

19:something - Luongo holds off a quick flurry of shots to keep us in this game.

18:09 - Great save, Luongo. Nothing against Shorty but that does sound nice from Hughson.

17:49 - Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it a lot easier to score when the puck isn't in your end?

16:46 - Shots 51-30 for Dallas, and Bieksa gets another penalty for high-sticking.

15:46 - Couple of nice blocked shots there by Smoke.

15:21 - Krajicek takes a high-sticking penalty to put us down 2 men for 40 seconds.

14:43 - Killed the 2 man advantage

13:19 - Don't really know how, but we've killed the penalty and the fans are going nuts with the towels a spinnin'

12:22 - Henrik loses his helmet and stick and of course no penalty is called.

11:46 - Turco almost gets caught out of his net and a bit of a scramble in front of the Star's nets. Unfortunately nothing comes out of it.

8:55 - Luongo gloves it down to slow the game down a little. Would somebody please shut Neale up?

7:39 - Another snag by Roberto

7:12 - Turco stops a shot from Daniel Sedin, resulting in a faceoff with another shot from Morrison. Again a great stop by Turco.

5:49 - This is gonna be a long series.

3:04 - At this point you can start to tell how long the game has been going on. All the players are starting to look a little sluggish.

1:02 - Shots are 57-32 now.

0:24 - Barnes sends a shot sailing of the crossbar.

End of the 2nd Overtime - You know it, yet another overtime. I'm gonna run out of booze if this goes on much longer.

For anybody that lives in the GVRD, good luck in getting anything done tomorrow.

3rd Overtime:
19:24 - Why does it take CBC so long to get their time banner up? Seems to take a least a minute or 2 every period until it shows up.

17:56 - Somehow it seems that Cowan still has some energy. Not sure if anyone else does anymore.

15:27 - Pyatt has a great chance but can't pull the trigger to end it.

14:38 - Another nice shot by Cowan.

1301 - So who likes sloppy hockey? The longer this goes on, the worse both sides get.

12:08 - Krajicek with a nice shot on net that Turco stops.

11:33 - Turco grabs another one out of the air to stop play again.

9:11 - Sedin's get a good cycle going, unfortunately nothing comes out of it.

7:18 - Hughson note - "It's been nearly 2 and 1/2 hours since the last goal". Please don't remind me.

6:52 - Crowd looks to be thinning a bit. Guess somebody is actually planning on going to work tomorrow.

4:50 - Please, for the love of god, somebody please score (of coures, I'm only talking to the Canucks players)

2:11 - The ice looks like sh*t right now. Puck is bouncing all over the place. Although that could be coming from fatigue on the part of the players.

0:40 - Turco makes another stop. Looks like we're going to a 4th OT. Let me remind you. THIS IS ONLY GAME ONE!!!!!! Lord help us if this goes to 7.

End of the 3rd OT - Sweet Jesus. Why did I say I would live blog this game? I'm starting to have trouble focusing on the screen right now.

If this game goes much longer, we might see Cooke or Burrows back on the ice.

4th Overtime:
18:55 - I really don't know anymore, 3 Stars forwards with at least 38 minutes of ice time so far. CBC hasn't put up any stats for the Nucks yet.

14:47 - Nobody is really creating much of anything. If anything happens now, its gonna come from a mistake. And that mistake will be due solely to fatigue, nothing else.

12:49 - Well, we've made the top 10 in terms of longest playoff games ever.

10:26 - Are they even hitting anymore? Some of these hits look like they just don't have the energy to stop, so they just keep going.

8:26 - Another play just kinda fades out with a decent scoring chance developing.
6th longest game ever

7:33 - Shots are 75-53 (or something like that, I don't quite remember what was flashed up on the screen)

5:56 - Luongo makes another great save with a tip only about 5 ft in front of him.

4:03 - Another great cycle by the Sedins. And it seemed to be in slo-mo (just like the rest of the players) so you can actually see what they're doing.

1:54 - Its over, Henrik scores on a pass from his brother to end this marathon. 5-4 for the Nucks. One down, 3 to go (15 in total).

After game notes: Who the hell amI kidding? We f*&king won. I don't really care about anything else right now. Other than the fact that it took us 130 minutes to win. Damn right with CBC picking Roberto as the 1st star. Be sure to check out J.J., Zanstrom and Alanah for more post game reactions. And they'll probably be much more coherent than anything I could produce right now.


Now, if you'll excuse me, think I'm gonna go pass out now. Enjoy the rest of the series and I will hopefuly be able to live-blog another one of their games coming up. So keep an eye out for an announcement regarding the next torture session I'll be part of.

Coupla quick tidbits

Ahh, Glorious time of year. It has finally stopped raining everyday here in Vancouver (now its just every other day) and the NHL playoffs are about to begin. As I mentioned in my last post, I was planning on (drunken) live-blogging at least a few of the playoff games. Looks like Game 1 tomorrow of the Nucks-Stars series is gonna be my first. Feel free to stop and leave a comment (drunken or otherwise).

In other goings on in Canuck fandom:

The Yankee Canuck has a couple of great posts/ideas for the upcoming series. I especially like his Gettin' Ornery for Humanity ideas. Including the awesome idea he had to donate to a particular charity in the opposing teams city for every win the Nuck's get against them. Don't forget to check out his list of reasons to hate Texas to get your blood up before the game.

Zanstrom over at Waiting for Stanley, Alanah @ Canucks and Beyond, and JJ from Canucks Hockey Blog have a bunch of commentary on the upcoming series (read that as much more informed than my musings).

And last but not least, don't forget to check out the crew over at the Crazy Canucks podcast for some great discussions as well as a ton of laughs. I'm hoping to throw one of their button linkie things up on my sidebar but HTML coding makes absolutely no sense to me (give me a proper language like C++ or hell BASIC even) so it might be a while.

Tags: Canucks, Stars, NHL, playoffs

We're In !!!!!!!!!!

Sweet, the Canucks have just clinched a playoff spot. And we did it over the goddamn Avalanche! After the pain that Colorado has caused us in the past, this is freaking great. Calgary did us a favour too, by beating Minnesota, putting us back into 1st in the North West.

To cap this off, it would be freaking great if the game on April 5th against the Av's ended up being a must win for Colorado. And then having us beat them, eliminating them from the playoffs. Ahh, one can dream can't they? :)


For some of my regular readers, posting will be a little light for the next week or two. I am, however, hoping to try one of these (drunken) live-blogging thingies, hopefully during one of the Canucks playoff games in the 1st round. Once I've figured out the date, I'll post further details.

UPDATE:
Didn''t know this:
From NHL.com - The win by Vigneault matched him with Pat Quinn (1992-93) for Vancouver's most coaching wins in a season with 46.

Tags: Canucks, Avalanche, NHL Playoffs

Rock 101's Luongo Song

Another one of their (mostly) great Twisted Tunes.

Your guess is as good as mine

No real theme to my post today.

I'm not gonna apologize again for the lack of posting. Suffice it to say, working 40 hours a week, watching hockey and trying to spend a minimum of 2 hours a day away from my computer makes it a little difficult to post.


Speaking of hockey, I've noticed that most of my visits in the last while have come from various searches for the Luongo Song. Well, I finally found a copy of it, you can find it here. Hat tip to Zanstrom over at Waiting for Stanley for posting it. It's actually the clip I heard as well, with Don Taylor and Dave Pratt offering their views of it while it's playing. In the post below this one, you can find Rock 101's Luongo Song as well.


Continuing in the hockey vein. Alanah has done some serious work on a project over at Kukla's Korner. The result, the World Wide Web of Hockey, is whole bunch of links to anything and (almost) everything related to hockey on the net. It's quite impressive, so go and check it out. Next thing that would be cool to see is a hockey blog aggregator.

That's about it for now. Hopefully I'll have a new post a little sooner next time.

Tags: NHL, Luongo, Hockey

One Fan's Opinion

For a bit of a change, I'm gonna talk about my beloved Canucks today. I'll warn you ahead of time, I'm not gonna offer anything about their play or personnel. For that, check out Alanah and the rest of The Crazy Canucks for some excellent (and usually pretty friggin' hilarious) commentary. Actually the idea for this post was triggered by one of J.J.'s comments on their podcasts and from some talk from the guys on Team 1040.


As many of you may already know, the NHL, in partnership with Reebok, launched new uniforms at the beginning of the All-Star break. This has started up talk amongst various commentators about some teams changing their uniforms, including logos. One of the big things I've been hearing lately is about the Canuck's going back to their old logo, ie. the "stick in a rink" design. And I've gotta say I'm for it, but with a few conditions. First off, just like Rebecca from the podcast, I don't want anything to happen to Fin, just 'cause he's a pretty cool mascot and what the hell would we replace him with? Pac Man (what else would look like the stick in rink logo?) And I wouldn't want them to get rid of the Orca C design entirely. I don't know, when they first came out with it, I wasn't so sure but its kinda grown on me and I'd be sorry to see it go. If they did something similar to the current uni's, with one logo on the shoulder and a different one on the chest. except obviously switching the logo positions I think I'd be pretty happy with that. Hell, who am I kidding, if the hockey god's were to guarantee perfect health for Luongo for the next 6 years I could live with the old flying V's sweaters.

Finally, speaking of Luongo, did anybody else hear the new "Luongo" song on the Team yesterday? I've been trying to find a copy but have been so far unsuccessful in my hunt and any tips would be appreciated.

Tags: Vancouver Canucks, NHL, RBK, Reebok, Roberto Luongo

PM or King?

Well, as promised here is the first of (hopefully) many posts I'll be writing on the different issues/concerns I have with the federal government and the way it is run. An important note, both political parties,unless explicitly mentioned, are guilty of most of these things (IMHO,anyways). Another note, the problem I'm discussing here relates to majority governments, minorty governments have been so rare I don't have the time or enough information to discuss that situation with much confidence. Now to begin.


Perhaps the biggest problem I have with the Federal government lies with the power that our PM has. Or to be more specific, how much power the PM (& PMO) has managed to concentrate in one place. Perhaps the only other position that can claim a similar level of power is the Minister of Finance, and even then the PM wins out.

It starts with the control the PM exercises over his/her party. Being able to prevent candidates from running for your party or on the other hand "parachuting" candidates into different ridings is just the start. The different patronage powers allows one to reward those that helped you out or to offer as a prize for being loyal. With regards to the party MP's, the PM can promise Cabinet and Parliamentary Secretary positions to reward loyal MP's. And the you have the Cabinet, where most(if not all) the important policy is decided upon, and who is the head of the cabinet? Who decides what Cabinet consensus is?

And to control all of this it only takes 3 people, the PM and two deputies: the Minister of Finance and the party whip. The whip takes care of the back-benchers and makes sure they follow the party's (read the PM's) line. The Minister of Finance keeps the Cabinet in line just by being in control of the purse strings, he (or she) can either allow each minister's projects to go forward or to impede them by denying funding. Finally you have the PM (and the PMO) as the ringmaster, who with his two "lieutenants" becomes the "captain" of this little ship we like to call Canada, pretty much free to do as he wants (at least until the next election).

Guess this reason this bugs me so much is goes against the idea of responsible government in Canada, best defined in this quote from one of my old poli sci textbooks:

A regime in which legislative and executive power are fused together in a cabinet which is accountable to an assembly of the peoples elected representatives

In other words, our cabinet should ultimately have to answer to the House. But ultimately, who makes the final decision in Cabinet? The PM. And who can control the way the House votes (at least his party)? The PM.

We have a system that follows the letter but not the spirit of responsible government. And increasingly, we have one man (or woman) in a position to control all of the levers of power.

Tags: PM, MP, government, Prime Minister