Chris Hall: So who is to blame for the temporary foreign worker mess?

An email arrived this week from a self-described Conservative of 22 years. He wanted to talk about the increasingly maligned Temporary Foreign Worker Program that's been the hot, no make that the heated topic of debate in the Commons this week.

His main point: no conservative government should meddle in free markets, yet that's exactly what's happening with this program, which encourages employers to bring in non-Canadians to fill vacant jobs in this country.

"This is leading to all kinds of problems, which we are now seeing,'' my correspondent wrote. "Canadians losing their jobs so that TFWs can be hired, creating higher unemployment as more TFWs flood into Canada, keeping wages low in these industries, and reducing the job opportunities for summer students who need the jobs so they can afford to finish their education.

"I don't like the program at all."

It's that last line that neatly sums up the problem faced by Employment Minister Jason Kenney. Critics abound, even among members of the minister's own political base, and these critics insist temporary foreign workers are costing Canadians jobs.

Now, Kenney is one of this government's most capable ministers. In fact, he's often Stephen Harper's Mr. Fixit.

Handed the task of overhauling Canada`s immigration system, he did.

Directed to breathe life into the government's still-born Canada Job Grant Program, designed to address a shortage of skilled workers, he bargained, wheedled, compromised and cajoled reluctant provinces to sign on — using money the feds had previously earmarked to train the least-skilled Canadians.

It was no small feat that, rescuing the cornerstone of the Conservative 2013 budget.

But now Kenney faces the equally daunting task of explaining to Canadians — including Conservative supporters like my correspondent  — why the Temporary Foreign Worker Program is not an evil necessity, let alone a necessary evil.

Guilty parties

This task is going to take every bit of political skill Kenney has.

On Tuesday, New Democrats and Liberals lined up to pillory a program that, as first revealed by CBC News, is being abused by some employers, largely but not exclusively in the food services industry.

Opposition MPs ran through a list of guilty parties on Tuesday: banks, hotels, even strip clubs have applied to bring in workers under the program.

"The Temporary Foreign Worker Program has been open to abuse resulting in the firing of qualified Canadian workers, lower wages and the exploitation of foreign workers," said Jinny Sims, the NDP's employment critic.

Kenney has already banned restaurants from using the TFW program. He is also in the midst of another review to impose further regulations, though his department said he is not able to speak publicly about those plans because they have not been approved by cabinet.

But Kenney is under no such restriction when it comes to attacking the motives of his political opponents, calling NDP and Liberal MPs "hypocrites" who publicly lambaste the program while privately lobbying him on behalf of employers in their ridings who want to bring in, among others, computer game designers, fish plant workers and musicians.

"Do they not find it peculiar that they say one thing in this debate, but something else whenever it comes to an interest group that they favour."

In response to a Liberal question, Kenney waved a letter written by Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau asking the Canadian Embassy in China to reconsider a rejected work permit application for a restaurant in his riding.

It was all too much for Liberal MP John McCallum.

"Why doesn't this minister look in the mirror and admit to Canadians that this mess is a Conservative mess. It's his mess and nobody else's mess," he yelled over hoots and catcalls from both sides of the House.

What to do?

So there you have it. It is Conservative mismanagement that is behind the abuse. Or it's NDP hypocrisy. And, just to even it all off, it's really the Liberals' fault because they brought in the temporary foreign worker program in the first place back in the 1970s.

No matter how you cut it, the TFW program has morphed into something it was never intended to be.

The original intent was to find high-skilled workers to fill jobs when no qualified Canadians could be found. Now it is open to fast-food restaurants that can't find local people to do the jobs.

One of the biggest, and most accepted, users of temporary foreign workers is the agricultural sector, which brings in thousands of workers at harvest times. (Canadian Press)

Kenney argued on Tuesday that the vast majority of temporary foreign workers are not in what the government calls the ''low-skilled stream,'' but are executives, academic researchers and other high-skilled temporary foreign workers who come for a short period of time to work on specific projects.

Some of these are reciprocal programs that allow Canadians the same mobility rights to work in other countries.

But that doesn't address the legitimate concerns that the program is being abused, and that some employers find it more convenient to bring in foreign workers instead of hiring Canadians or permanent residents — an aspect of the TFW program that took off on the Conservative watch.

At least one study, by the non-partisan C.D. Howe Institute, pegged the number of temporary foreign workers in Canada at nearly 340,000 — three times the number from just a decade ago.

At the same time, jobless rates among Canadians remain stubbornly high, especially among young people.

It doesn't take much effort to connect those dots.

More difficult is addressing the underlying conditions that discourage Canadians from taking available, low-skilled jobs.

Conservative MP James Rajotte says a number of small business owners in his Edmonton-area riding can't survive without temporary foreign workers. He says these small business voices are being drowned out by the chorus of criticism.

So what can Kenney do?

Part of the government's response will almost certainly be to force employers to do more to prove that they have done everything possible to fill jobs with Canadians or permanent residents.

Another is to try to work with the provinces to raise the minimum wage to make the job of serving coffee, answering phones or flipping burgers if not more rewarding, at least more lucrative.

Still another would be to put real emphasis on the "temporary" by setting strict time limits on how long TFWs could stay.

It's a complicated problem that defies easy fixes, even for the Harper government's Mr. Fixit.

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Bob Hoskins, Who Framed Roger Rabbit star, dead at 71

British actor Bob Hoskins, whose varied career ranged from noir drama Mona Lisa to animated fantasy Who Framed Roger Rabbit has died aged 71.

A family statement released Wednesday by publicist Clair Dobbs said Hoskins died in a hospital after a bout of pneumonia. He had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 2012.

Bob Hoskins: partial filmography

• The Long Good Friday (1980)
• The Cotton Club (1984)
• Mona Lisa (1986)
• Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
• The Raggedy Rawney (1988)
• Mermaids (1990)
• Hook (1991)
• Nixon (1995)
• Felicia's Journey (1999)
• David Copperfield (2000, TV)
• Enemy at the Gates (2001)
• Vanity Fair (2004)
• The Englishman's Boy (2008, TV)
• Made in Dagenham (2010)
• Neverland (2011, TV)
• Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)

A versatile character actor capable of menace, quiet poignancy and Cockney charm, Hoskins appeared in some of the most acclaimed British films of the past few decades, including gangster classic The Long Good Friday. His Hollywood roles included Mermaids and Hook.

Born in 1942 in eastern England, where his mother had moved to escape wartime bombing, Hoskins was raised in a working-class part of north London.

He left school at 15, worked at odd jobs and claimed he got his break as an actor by accident — while watching an audition, he was handed a script and asked to read.

Hoskins began getting television and film roles in the 1970s, and came to attention in Britain as star of Pennies from Heaven, Dennis Potter's 1978 TV miniseries about a Depression-era salesman whose imagination sprouts elaborate musical numbers. It was later turned into a movie starring Steve Martin.

His movie breakthrough came in 1980 thriller The Long Good Friday, playing an East End gangster hoping to profit from redevelopment of London's docks. It contained one of his most memorable speeches, a Cockney-accented dismissal of American culture: "What I'm looking for is someone who can contribute to what England has given to the world: culture, sophistication, genius. A little bit more than an 'ot dog, know what I mean?"

The film, which also featured Helen Mirren and a young Pierce Brosnan, is ranked 21 in the British Film Institute's list of the top 100 British films of the 20th century.

Hoskins specialized in tough guys with a soft centre, including the ex-con who chaperones Cathy Tyson's escort in Neil Jordan's 1986 film Mona Lisa. Hoskins was nominated for a best-actor Academy Award for the role.

His best-remembered Hollywood role was as a detective investigating cartoon crime in 1988 hit Who Framed Roger Rabbit, one of the first major movies to meld animation and live action.

He worked in films big and small, mainstream and independent. Some were acclaimed (U.K. underdog hit Made in Dagenham), some panned (Spice Girls vehicle Spice World).

He appeared in Francis Ford Coppola's musical The Cotton Club, starred alongside Cher in Mermaids, played pirate Smee in Steven Spielberg's Peter Pan movie Hook and was FBI boss J. Edgar Hoover in Nixon.

In 2012 Hoskins announced that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and was retiring from acting.

His last role was as one of the seven dwarves in Snow White & The Huntsman, starring Kristen Stewart.

"We are devastated by the loss of our beloved Bob," said a statement from wife Linda and children Alex, Sarah, Rosa and Jack.

He is survived by his wife and children.

Actor Bob Hoskins, shown on the set of Canadian miniseries The Englishman's Boy, also appeared in the gangster classic The Long Good Friday. (CBC/Canadian Press)

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The Sterling lifetime suspension and other infamous punishments in sports

The L.A. Clippers' billionaire owner Donald Sterling was slapped with a lifetime ban from the NBA and a $2.5 million US fine for his racist comments, but how does that punishment stack up with those handed down in some of the biggest scandals in professional sport?

Here are some of the biggest fines and longest suspensions passed down by professional sports leagues, from the NBA to Formula One racing, during times of scandal — think of it as a lowlight reel.

Mark Cuban and the player formerly known as Ron Artest

If outspoken Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban still owns the Dallas Mavericks when he's Sterling's age, he'll likely pay far more than the $2.5 million in fines Sterling now owes the league.

Cuban's outbursts about referees and rival players, coupled with his general inability to avoid controversial statements, have cost the Mavs owner over $1.8 million since he bought the team in 2000.

According to BleacherReport.com, which pored over Cuban's troubled history, he accounts for 10 per cent of all fines paid to the NBA since 2000.

In 2002, Cuban was fined $500,000 for blasting the NBA's director of officials by saying, "Ed Rush might have been a great ref, but I wouldn't hire him to manage a Dairy Queen."

To his credit, Cuban is a good sport about the fines. The Mavericks owner says he matches his fines with donations to charities.

Ron Artest, who now goes by Metta World Peace, served an 85-game suspension after getting into a brawl with fans in Detroit in 2004. (Duane Burleson/AP)

Suspension-wise, Sterling's lifetime ban brings back memories of another NBA crisis.

During a 2004 game in Detroit, the Indiana Pacers' Ron Artest (who now goes by Metta World Peace and plays for the Lakers) charged into the crowd to fight with a fan.

A slew of players were suspended and fined for their involvement in the brawl, but Artest, who led the charge into the stands, was dealt the most severe punishment: a suspension that totalled 85 games, the longest in NBA history.

Devil of a deal

The New Jersey Devils shocked the hockey world in the summer of 2010 when the team announced it had signed potent Russian scorer Ilya Kovalchuk to a 17-year, $102-million contract.

The NHL was furious with the deal (which was lowered somewhat to $100 million over 15 years). NHL officials said the contract, an incredibly front-loaded deal, violated its collective bargaining agreement.

The NHL fined the Devils $3 million, and took away several of the team's upcoming draft picks.

Kovalchuk, it turned out, wasn't worth the hassle for the Devils. He would only play 195 games for the team — scoring 89 times — before retiring from the NHL and moving back to Russia to play.

Steinbrenner's suspensions

The late George Steinbrenner served two lengthy suspensions during his 37-year reign as owner of the New York Yankees. (Gene J. Puskar/AP)

The New York Yankees, arguably the biggest team in Major League Baseball, are no strangers to controversial billionaire owners.

George Steinbrenner, the team's longest-serving owner, was first suspended in 1974 after pleading guilty to making an illegal contribution to Richard Nixon's presidential re-election campaign.

Bowie Kuhn, baseball's commissioner at the time, told the New York Times that Steinbrenner's actions off the field had tarnished baseball.

"An essential element of a professional team sport … is the public's confidence in its integrity," Kuhn said.

"If the public does not believe that a sport is honest, it would be impossible for the sport to succeed."

Steinbrenner was again banned from managing the team in 1990 after he paid a gambler $40,000 to dig up dirt on his star outfielder Dave Winfield, who he thought was underperforming.

Steinbrenner was later re-instated, and would own and manage the Yankees until his two sons succeeded him in 2006. He died in 2010.

F1's big bust

In 2007, Formula One racing was rocked by news that the McLaren team had been spying on its rival Ferrari in an effort to get ahead.

The World Motor Sports Council fined McLaren $100 million US, and the British racing team lost its chance at winning the coveted constructors' championship.

The scandal broke when a McLaren engineer was found to have a 780-page technical dossier about rival Ferrari's cars, which was slipped to him by a mechanic.

Lance Armstrong's new reality

Lance Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles for doping, and could lose millions as former sponsors and race organizers try to claw back money they said he won fraudulently. (Wolfgang Rattay/Reuters)

Lance Armstrong, once seen as the brave cancer-conquering American who defeated Europe's elite cyclists at their own game, is now regarded as a villain on two wheels.

Last year, Armstrong admitted to a lengthy history of doping that helped him capture a record seven Tour de France titles. Armstrong, who took home millions in endorsement money from the likes of Nike, Oakley and Trek, not to mention the prize money from all those races, is now facing a pile of lawsuits from parties trying to get that money back.

Armstrong was once estimated to be worth over $100 million. Today, the disgraced Texas cyclist is at risk of losing almost all of his money, recent profiles have revealed.

Suspension-wise, it's safe to say Armstrong will never again ride in the Tour de France.

"Lance Armstrong has no place in cycling and he deserves to be forgotten in cycling," said Pat McQuaid, president of the International Cycling Union on the day Armstrong was stripped of his titles.

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Mennonite ties to Mexican drug cartels years in the making

Canadian and American authorities are concerned about Alberta Mennonites bringing Mexican cartel drugs into Canada.

Cocaine worth millions of dollars has crossed over the border and violence associated with the criminal activity is likely to ramp up, according to Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent Jim Schrant in Colorado.

"Because of the lucrative nature of the drug trade, and to make sure that people pay on time and to make sure that people aren't being double crossed, it's a very violent enterprise," he said.

Schrant is quick to point out most of the Mennonite community members are hard-working, law-abiding citizens — but, like in every group, he says there are a few bad seeds.

Cocaine is costly in Canada, and Schrant says its value increases with every border it crosses. 

"At the end of the day, the drug business, as vile and poisonous as it is, is a business," said Schrant. "And what they're going to look at is the most successful business model that they can and when you have high demand for a product, in this case cocaine, the further you get away from source of origin, the higher the prices go up."

Strong ties with Mexico

Members of Canada's Mennonite communities began migrating to Mexico in the first few decades of the 1900s. 

Several factors influenced the exodus: Canadian laws required children to attend school, keeping key farm hands out of the fields, and at the same time the Mexican government was trying to ramp up agricultural production in Mexico.

"They offered large land grants to farmers in North America," said Schrant. "Some of the finest farmers in the world are [from] the Mennonite community, so around the turn of the century there was a large immigration from the U.S. and Canada into northern Mexico, particularly the state of Chihuahua."

Schrant says eventually the cartels cozied up to their Mennonite neighbours, forming an alliance with some. But social problems, economic hardship and violence have driven hundreds back to the Canadian Prairies over the last two to three years.

With connections already generations deep, the cartels now have trusted allies in the north.

Farmer caught with cocaine

Several recent cases highlight the problem.

Jacob Fehr was sentenced last week to seven years in prison for bringing cartel cocaine from his former home in Chihuahua, Mexico, to Calgary. 

Fehr moved to Peace River in 2007, but he was caught smuggling the drug at the Coutts border crossing in January 2011.

The 38-year-old testified in his own defence, telling the judge armed cartel members threatened his family. He said it was his third trip to Alberta, which would have completed his commitment to the cartel, when he was caught with two kilograms packed into his SUV. His wife and four daughters were in the vehicle at the time. 

"Cocaine is considered a pernicious drug and the effects on society are extremely detrimental," said Crown prosecutor Frank Polak after Fehr was sentenced. "It is not indigenous to Canada, so it has to be brought in, so the importation charge is particularly concerning."

Polak is in the middle of another drug trial involving two defendants in Lethbridge.

Authorities charged Abram Klassen and Jacob Dyck with importing cocaine, possessing cocaine for the purposes of trafficking, and conspiracy to import cocaine after they seized 16 kilograms of pure cocaine at Coutts and Great Falls border crossings. 

The seizures and charges were the result of a 15-month, cross-border investigation.

Seven people were charged last year after U.S. officials seized thousands of kilograms of cocaine headed for the small southern Alberta town of Grassy Lake where about 600 people, mostly Mennonites, live.

Manslaughter guilty plea

Luis Alfonso Ochoa-Gamez will also be sentenced in the fall after pleading guilty to manslaughter for the killing of Mauro Hernanzez-Renteria after a drug deal went wrong.

Both Ochoa-Gamez and Hernanzez-Renteria are from Mexico and the crime is connected to one of southern Alberta's Mennonite communities.

In a statement, Canadian Border Services officials wrote that they recognize "the importance of proactive intelligence-based approaches to monitor the cross-border movement [of] contraband, including narcotics, and to enhance interdiction support."

"Regardless of a method of concealment, whether in a traveller's suitcase, the load of a commercial shipment or in the dashboard of an automobile, by using contraband detection equipment, training and experience, CBSA officers are able to locate drugs and other contraband even when the most unusual and sophisticated concealment methods are used."

The DEA works closely with RCMP, Canadian Border Services and other local police agencies, but Schrant acknowledges tackling the problem in Alberta means tracing the criminal organization to its violent and well-established network back in Mexico. 

"It's like eating a horse, you do it one bite at a time," he said. "It's important work. You look at the violence that's spread throughout Mexico as a result of these cartel activities, the violence that we've experienced here in the United States in this case and others some of the drug-related violence that's extended to Canada and it's the motivation for maintaining this fight."

Seven people were charged last year after U.S. officials seized cocaine headed for the small southern Alberta town of Grassy Lake where about 600 people, mostly Mennonites, live. (Allison Dempster/CBC)

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TV at 75: How HBO and Netflix are forcing networks to evolve

With people increasingly turning to mobile devices and video-streaming services to catch up on their favourite shows, many have forecast a bleak future for the traditional TV industry.

But as the industry marks the 75th anniversary today of the first television broadcast in North America, rumours of the imminent demise of networks may be greatly exaggerated.

TV analysts say that while innovations such as YouTube and Netflix have changed the way we watch and think about television, networks such as CBS and Fox have actually gone to great lengths to adapt to the new landscape.

"I'm seeing a change when it comes to what a television network is," says Greg David, a longtime television critic at TVGuide.ca.

"It used to be that they would broadcast on a television set. Now, they're going online and doing extra programming" in addition to their traditional TV offerings, he says.

It was 75 years ago today that Americans got their first glimpse of a television broadcast. It had been previously demonstrated in Britain and at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin but made its North American debut three years later at the World's Fair in New York City. 

Set in the U.S. in the tumultuous '60s, Mad Men follows the exploits of philandering ad man Don Draper (Jon Hamm, right). (Michael Yarish/AMC/Associated Press)

By the mid-1940s, TV had become a commercial venture dominated by a handful of national networks in the U.S. Canadians living near the border received U.S. signals in the late '40s and early '50s, but in 1952, the CBC became the first network to broadcast television within Canada.

For many decades, big networks such as CBS and NBC were king, controlling the production and distribution of TV content, in the process commanding large advertising revenues.

But the rise of high-quality dramas from cable networks such as HBO and Showtime in the last 15 years, along with the advent of online video-streaming, have changed the game dramatically.

Thanks to cable offerings such as The Sopranos and Mad Men, viewers have become accustomed to better-quality television, while the proliferation of streaming services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime and Google Chromecast has set an expectation that you can watch good TV relatively cheaply and on demand.

Not only that, but people are moving away from the conventional television monitor as their prime viewing mechanism. According to a study released in March by research firm Millward Brown, Americans now spend more time on average on their smartphones (151 minutes per day) than in front of their TVs (147 minutes).

"TV networks today have to reinvent themselves and accept the changes which are happening due to technology, but also due to the expectations and desired experiences of the different audiences," says Irina Mihalache, a professor of museum studies at the University of Toronto who has done extensive research on television.

David, who has been with TV Guide since the early '90s, when it was a print publication, says many network executives were originally resistant to putting shows on the web, believing it to be a passing fancy that would harm viewership and ad sales.

Not only have they embraced it, he says, but they've also discovered that online streaming has unique benefits for them.

"If you tune in to an episode of MasterChef Canada, you're going to see ads online as well as on television," says David, adding with a laugh, "and you can't fast-forward through the ones on your computer — you have to sit through those."

One of the most critically acclaimed TV series in the last year is HBO's gritty drama True Detective, which stars Matthew McConaughey, right, and Woody Harrelson. (Jim Bridges/HBO)

Not only that, but networks have tapped into the appetite online for shorter videos and DVD-style extras, which extend the reach for shows, says David.

Bill Brioux, another Canadian TV critic, says the modus operandi for many networks has largely remained the same.

"If you look at CBS, they're the No. 1 network in the U.S. and they still really operate the same old-fashioned way: they launch six shows in the fall, they launch three more in January and a couple in the summer, and their biggest draws are still shows like NCIS and Survivor," he says.

Watching when you want

The difference, he says, is that viewers aren't necessarily tuning in at the same time anymore — an increasing number are streaming shows on network websites at their leisure.

He cites the example of The Big Bang Theory, another CBS title, which garners four million viewers in Canada every week, making it the most-watched show in the country.

"About 20 per cent of that audience don't watch it on Thursday at 8 [p.m.] — they watch it up to seven days later."

As a result, TV measurement company Neilsen "is just counting differently."

In a bid to reduce production costs and improve the quality of content, some networks have taken a page out of the cable playbook by cutting the number of episodes they produce for shows each season.

It used to be a given that the big networks would produce upwards of 20 episodes per season, but some have been moving closer to the cable model of 13 or fewer episodes. David points out that Fox is airing a new, abridged season of the thriller 24 starting in May, bringing it back, he says, as "a 10-episode 'event.' "

"They're broadcasting it as an event rather than a season, and I think that's really interesting," says David. Screenwriters he's spoken to say that 10 episodes is "kind of a sweet spot. You can just tighten your storylines and make them better."

Given the popularity of video streaming, there has been much talk in recent years of "cord-cutting" — people cancelling their cable subscriptions in favour of better-quality, non-conventional TV options. David doesn't think it's an either-or proposition.

"I'm not really sure how many people are actually cutting the cord and not watching cable TV," he says.

Set in a women's prison, the comedy-drama Orange is the New Black has solidified Netflix's position as a purveyor of challenging original content. (Netflix/Associated Press)

In its 2014 outlook, Deloitte found that by year's end, more than 2.5 million Canadian households will actually have multiple TV subscriptions. Furthermore, it said the number of households paying for a second source of TV content will be more than 100 times greater than the number of households that cancelled their cable subscription in 2013.

The cable-vs.-Netflix rivalry becomes even less relevant after Netflix signed an agreement last week making its vast library of shows and movies available to about 700,000 U.S. cable subscribers.

Extra programming helps

Part of the appeal of Netflix is its growing stable of original series, such as the Emmy-winning House of Cards and Orange Is the New Black. Like HBO before it, Netflix has evolved from a video-delivery mechanism to a celebrated producer of content. But that comes with its own problems, says Michael McGuire, a media analyst with U.S. consulting firm Gartner.

Netflix will have to "come to grips with the reality that our friends in the cable and broadcast industries and the studios have known for decades: it's really hard to keep pumping out hits," McGuire says.

"Don't forget: the [networks] have a lot of extra programming, like live [events] and reality TV. Those guys have had those other revenue streams."

Brioux says that while the traditional networks aren't producing critically acclaimed shows such as Game of Thrones and True Detective, they continue to garner big ratings.

As a result, the networks still do huge business with "up-fronts," which is the money that advertisers pledge to spend when a network first presents its new season every spring.

With "the up-fronts in the U.S., you're still looking at nine or 10 billion dollars every May," Brioux says. "While that money is on the table, it's going to keep going this way."

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'Basement, now!': Death toll from U.S. tornadoes rises

A dangerous storm system that spawned a chain of deadly tornadoes over three days flattened homes and businesses, forced frightened residents in more than half a dozen states to take cover and left tens of thousands in the dark Tuesday morning.

As the storm hopscotched across a large swatch of the U.S., the overall death toll was at least 28, with 11 killed in the South on Monday and 17 in the central U.S. on Sunday.

On Tuesday morning, many woke to sirens, tornado warnings, damaged property and downed trees. Forecasts showed Georgia as the next likely target, with 89 counties under a tornado watch until 11 a.m. Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee were hit with the brunt of the storm Monday.

Convenience store owner Francis Gonzalez, centre back, and her three children stand in front of their heavily damaged business on Monday in Tupelo, Miss. Gonzalez and her kids ran into a cooler in the back of a convenience store, which also houses a Mexican restaurant, as a tornado approached. (Adrian Sainz/The Associated Press)

In Mississippi, Republican state Sen. Giles Ward huddled in a bathroom with his wife, four other family members and their dog Monday as a tornado destroyed his two-story brick house and flipped his son-in-law's SUV upside down onto the patio in Louisville.

"For about 30 seconds, it was unbelievable," Ward said. "It's about as awful as anything we've gone through."

The dangerous weather jangled nerves a day after the three-year anniversary of a historic outbreak of more than 60 tornadoes that killed more than 250 people across Alabama on April 27, 2011.

The storm even sent staff at a TV news station running for cover. NBC affiliate WTVA-TV chief meteorologist Matt Laubhan in Tupelo, Miss., was reporting live on the weather around 3 p.m. when he realized the twister was coming close enough that maybe he and his staff should abandon the television studio.

Meteorologist: 'On the ground. Right now'

"This is a tornado ripping through the city of Tupelo as we speak. And this could be deadly," he said in a video widely tweeted and broadcast on YouTube.

Moments later he adds, "A damaging tornado. On the ground. Right now."

The video then shows Laubhan peeking in from the side to see if he is still live on the air before yelling to staff off-camera to get down in the basement. "Basement, now!" he yells, before disappearing off camera himself.

Later, the station tweeted, "We are safe here."

Weather satellites showed tumultuous clouds arcing across much of the South over the course of the day Monday.

The storm system is the latest onslaught of severe weather a day after an 800-metre-wide tornado carved a 128-kilometre path of destruction through the suburbs of Little Rock, Arkansas, killing at least 15. Tornadoes or severe storms also killed one person each in Oklahoma and Iowa on Sunday.

Six people died in Winston County, Miss., on Monday, including a woman who perished in the day care centre she owned in Louisville, county Coroner Scott Gregory told The Associated Press late Monday. Louisville is the county seat and home to about 6,600 people.

It was unclear if any children were in the day care centre at the time, said William McCully, acting spokesman for the Winston County Emergency Management Agency.

Earlier Monday, emergency officials attending a news conference with Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant said seven people had been killed statewide. State Director of Health Protection Jim Craig said officials were working with coroners to confirm the total. It was unclear if the deaths in Winston County were included in that tally.

In southern Tennessee, two people were killed in a home when a suspected tornado hit Monday night, Lincoln County Emergency Management Director Mike Hall said. The winds destroyed several other homes as well as a middle school in the county that borders Alabama, Hall said.

Along Mississippi Highway 397 on the eastern edge of Louisville early Tuesday, firefighters could be seen picking through the remains of an unidentified number of pulverized mobile homes. Lt. Brian Arnett of the Starkville Fire Department said they were searching for three people who were unaccounted for.

About 100 yards away, 20 firefighters linked hands and waded through an area where woodframe homes had been heavily damaged.

Trees in Louisville had been snapped in half and stripped of their branches, while sheet metal had twisted itself around road signs and tree trunks. Rescue workers stepped gingerly over downed power lines.

The tornado in Louisville also caused water damage and carved holes in the roof of the Winston Medical Center, according to an Associated Press reporter at the center. There were about 15 patients in hospital rooms and eight or nine in the emergency room, where evacuations were underway.

"We thought we were going to be OK then a guy came in and said, `It's here right now,"' said Dr. Michael Henry, head of the emergency room. "Then boom … it blew through."

Deaths in Alabama

One of the deaths in Mississippi involved a woman who was killed when her car either hydroplaned or was blown off a road during the storm in Verona, south of Tupelo, said Lee County Coroner Carolyn Gillentine Green.

In northern Alabama, the coroner's office confirmed two deaths Monday in a twister that caused extensive damage west of the city of Athens, said Limestone County Emergency Director Rita White. White said more victims could be trapped in the wreckage of damaged buildings, but rescuers could not reach some areas because of downed power lines.

Separately, Limestone Commissioner Bill Latimer said he received reports of four deaths in the county from one of his workers. Neither the governor's office nor state emergency officials could immediately confirm those deaths.

Numerous watches and warnings were still active in Alabama, with forecasters warning the severe weather could continue all night.

In Tupelo, Miss., a community of about 35,000 in northeastern Mississippi, every building in a two-block area south of U.S. Highway 78 suffered damage, officials told a reporter on the scene. Some buildings had their roofs sheared off, while power lines had been knocked down completely or bent at 45-degree angles. Road crews were using heavy machinery to clear off other streets.

State of emergency

The Northeast Mississippi Medical Center in Tupelo had received 30 patients as of Monday night, four of whom were being admitted with non-life-threatening injuries, said spokeswoman Deborah Pugh. She said the other 26 patients were treated for minor injuries and released.

Bryant declared a state of emergency Monday in advance of the storms, which sent emergency officials rushing to put plans in place.

With the wind howling outside and rain blowing sideways, Monica Foster rode out a tornado warning with her two daughters, ages 10 and 12, inside a gas station near Fayette, Ala. One of the girls cried as the three huddled with a station employee in a storage area beside a walk-in cooler.

Foster, who was returning home to Lynn on rural roads after a funeral in Tuscaloosa, said she typically would have kept driving through the deluge.

"I wouldn't have pulled in if I didn't have the two girls," she said.

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Sailor charged with desertion was harassed, wife claims

The wife of a Royal Canadian Navy officer accused of leaving his post during a military operation is speaking out ahead of his court martial, and says her husband left his ship because of an intolerable atmosphere of harassment on board.

Lt. Derek de Jong left HMCS Preserver in September 2012 while it was docked in Key West, Fla., and was subsequently charged with being absent without leave. On that same trip there was an investigation into widespread drunkenness.

Then a military prosecutor handling the case bumped the charge to desertion — one of the most serious charges in the military. A conviction carries the possibility of imprisonment, demotion, a $10,000 fine or dismissal from the military.

De Jong's court martial begins next week.

Maria de Jong, his wife, told CBC News she's going public with her husband's story because he can't.

"He can't speak. The military would not allow him to speak," she said Monday.

"It's against the rules for him to come outright and tell you all these things."

De Jong said her husband suffered harassment at work, while serving as a logistics officer aboard the supply ship HMCS Preserver. 

One incident involved a drunk female officer who allegedly urinated on the floor of de Jong's cabin.

Maria de Jong said her husband became the butt of jokes after that incident. One superior officer, according to de Jong, told him, "Some men have to pay for that kind of service."

'I was flabbergasted'

She said someone posted a sign on his cabin door saying, 'Women's Head' — the nautical term for bathrooms.

"It's like, really? When Derek told me this I was flabbergasted," said de Jong.

She said her husband felt micromanaged and belittled by a superior officer. She said he also felt pressured to look the other way when financial accounting rules were not being followed. De Jong declined to provide any details about those allegations. 

Maria de Jong says her husband, Lt. Derek de Jong, left his ship because of an intolerable atmosphere of harassment on board HMCS Preserver. (CBC)

De Jong told CBC News her husband complained to his superiors on board, but nothing changed. She said he flew home from the ship to take his complaints up the chain of command and turned himself in as soon as he returned to Halifax.

"Derek said, 'You know what, we need to go straight to the base so I can report to the MP [military police] shack,'" she recalled.

De Jong said in the year and a half since her husband left HMCS Preserver, he has been working at CFB Halifax and has been praised for his work.

She said his complaints of harassment — as well as a letter she sent to the chief of defence staff — have been ignored.

The Department of National Defence told CBC News it won't comment while a case is before the military justice system.

'He's being made a scapegoat'

"They know what type of man he is, they know what kind of ethics he has. His work is impeccable," said de Jong.

"But those that can do something have basically put their head in the sand and said, 'Yup, let this happen. Just let it happen. Let's hang one man.'"

De Jong said her husband had a chance to plead guilty to the charge of being absent without leave in an informal summary process before the commander of CFB Halifax.

He was told his punishment could be as minor as a $1 fine.

De Jong said her husband was warned that if he chose a court martial, military prosecutors could pursue a stricter charge — such as desertion.

She said her husband elected a court martial so he could air his complaints in public.

"He's being made a scapegoat. What message are you really sending out by doing this then? On the one hand you're saying, 'Yes, report, report, report. We want to know. We want to change it, we want to change the culture of the navy,'" said de Jong.

"Yet when somebody does, this is what you do to them."

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The slow public death of affirmative action in the U.S.: Neil Macdonald

Affirmative action was a feel-good term concocted to sell remedial social engineering in the civil rights era; today, it's dying, precisely because of what the euphemism was meant to obscure.

Put bluntly, the original idea of affirmative action was to correct two centuries of institutional discrimination against blacks by temporarily imposing some reverse discrimination against whites.

Given the black-and-white reality of this nation 50 years ago, there was probably no other practical solution.

But in modern America, the affirmative action of the '60s has led to some uncomfortable distortions, favouring a well-to-do minority student over a poor white, for example. Or setting one minority group over another.

That is what's happening right now in California, where there is a nasty racial fight going on that has nothing to do with racist white ranchers or vile old white basketball tycoons.

In fact, it doesn't have much to do with white voters at all. Because whites are no longer the majority in California. Hispanics are, albeit by a slight margin.

Hispanics are also sadly under-represented in the state's prestigious public university system (UCLA, UC Berkeley, etc.) As are black Californians.

That is often because they attend high schools in poorer neighbourhoods, where academic scores are lower.

The single largest ethnic group in the state university system, meanwhile, is Asian-Americans, particularly students of Chinese descent who are vastly over-represented in the university system there, given their tiny share of California's population.

The reason is awkward — it's most unfashionable to attribute any general characteristic to any ethnic group. But it's not even debatable: Asians achieve higher marks in school these days than any other ethnic group in America.

And California is one of the few states that has repudiated affirmative action — its voters prohibited consideration of race in state university admissions 18 years ago.

When the ban went into effect, Hispanic and black enrolment dropped sharply. Asian enrolment soared.

Enter the Supreme Court

Understandably enough, Hispanic and black voters in California now favour affirmative action, and want the ban revisited. They easily have the votes to overturn it.

Equally understandably, the Asian-American population is opposed.

A Democratic bill that would hold another California referendum on affirmative action, seeking to reinstate it, has trigged a powerful backlash where Asian legislators are clashing with black and Hispanic ones.

The state's governing Democratic party, in which minority groups are important constituencies, has been so shaken by the push-back it is now reconsidering the whole idea.

California, as usual, is simply ahead of the curve, though the U.S. Supreme Court is also taking note. 

The nation's demographics are changing rapidly. Since the '60s, a black middle class has arisen. Hispanics are now the fastest-growing demographic. Mixed-race students (such as Barack Obama, not so long ago) are much more common.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, during a speech at Yale University in February. A product of affirmative action herself, Sotomayor grew up poor in the Bronx and wrote a lengthy and passionate dissent from last week's judgement. (Jessica Hill / Associated Press)

For all those reasons, the Supreme Court has been increasingly antagonistic to race-based admissions, a change from its earlier policy of upholding them.

"In a society in which those lines are becoming more blurred, the attempt to define race-based categories also raises serious questions of its own," wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy last week, as the court dealt affirmative action yet another setback.

"Government action that classifies individuals on the basis of race is inherently suspect, and carries the danger of perpetuating the very racial divisions the polity seeks to transcend."

The Asian American Legal Foundation argues exactly that: "At some universities, four out of five positions awarded to 'minorities' under affirmative action programs would otherwise have gone to Asian-American students," says its website.

Last week's Supreme Court decision, which followed years of litigation, affirmed that voters do indeed have the right to ban affirmative action.

"It is demeaning to the democratic process," wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy for the 6-2 majority, "to presume that voters are not capable of deciding an issue of this sensitivity on decent and rational grounds."

Make class the criteria

On the face of it, there is a serious flaw in that sort of thinking.

As the activist lawyer Joyce Schon put it to me, "It is not legitimate or fair to put a minority's civil rights and equality before the electorate for a vote. If that were the case, we'd still have slavery."

Schon flatly labeled the ruling racist — an attempt to return America to the Jim Crow laws of the segregated South.

One suspects, though, that the Supremes are keenly aware of the difference between constitutional democracy and majoritarianism.

What's more, the court is not saying nothing can be done about the huge social and economic inequalities that remain in America.

The way to do that, clearly, is to take socioeconomic status (or class or poverty, call it what you will) into consideration instead of race. In many cases, the result would be the same.

Automatic acceptance of the highest-scoring students from every high school would be one way of doing it. That would guarantee admittance to graduates from Latino and black neighbourhoods. A means test is less palatable, but would achieve the same end. 

Inevitably, that would mean  favouring, say, poor whites from Appalachia over black or Latino students from well-off families. Would that be wrong?

Americans, in fact, tell pollsters they favour corrective action. They still endorse affirmative action as a concept. It's when the policy is described as favouring any racial group over any other that people vote overwhelmingly to ban it.

Now, more such votes are probably inevitable in other states, especially after last week's ruling.

Affirmative action was always supposed to be a temporary measure. It implicitly involves violating the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution.

As Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in 2007: "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."

Activists like Joyce Schon regard that as trite conservative tautology that demeans minorities and can provide cover for racism.

Schon does make an excellent point, though, when she says the moneyed elite is determined to maintain its university privileges.

If race-based admissions are flawed, so-called "legacy admissions," which basically ensure Junior gets in if Daddy's an alumnus (and likely a donor) are even more so.

And just because someone can throw a football the length of a stadium is no reason to admit him to a sought after university spot if he can't put a sentence together.

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Struggling students seek 'sugar daddies' online to pay debts

Some Canadian university and college students are paying their way through school with the help of a website featuring "sugar daddies" willing to help pay their bills and loans in exchange for dates.

Seeking Arrangement touts itself as "Canada's No. 1 sugar daddy dating website" and claims to have 130,000 Canadian members who declare themselves as students or graduates trying to pay off their post-secondary debts.

The website involves "sugar babies" making agreements with interested older "sugar daddies" or "sugar mommies."

'It's just nice to be treated to something different and to feel like you're a princess.'- 'Kelly,' Winnipeg college student

An estimated 6,200 of the site's student members are from Manitoba, including a 23-year-old Winnipeg college student who says it linked her with a married man in his 40s who gives her $300 every time they go on a date.

They meet once a week or once every two weeks, she said, adding that some of their dates have been private but many are in public.

"There's places we can go that, like, a 24-year-old guy can't afford," she said in an interview.

"It's just nice to be treated to something different and to feel like you're a princess."

CBC News has agreed to identify the woman as Kelly — not her real name — and not show her face.

'Kelly,' a 23-year-old college student in Winnipeg, is one of 6,200 Manitobans who have registered with Seeking Arrangement as students or graduates trying to pay off their post-secondary debts. CBC News has agreed not to identify Kelly by her real name. (CBC)

Kelly said she was asked by Seeking Arrangement if she wanted to talk to CBC News about her experience, but she said she was not offered any remuneration by the company.

She said she agreed to be interviewed because she believes the website is a good option for other students who are struggling financially.

"I pay for my tuition myself. I took out a student line of credit. My mom is not able to help me at all. My dad helps sometimes, but he also isn't really able to help me," she explained.

"I worked really hard this summer — like, two jobs. I was working like 8:30 to 4:30 and then I was working five to midnight all summer, so that I could save up money for school."

'Wasn't going to sugar-coat it'

Kelly said she learned about the website on the American TV show Dr. Phil, but she didn't think much about it until her boyfriend — a man close to her own age — broke up with her in February.

Forced to start over financially while juggling schoolwork, she went to the website and created a profile.

'Young women really do have to question what these men are about.'- Marian Morry, University of Manitoba

As part of her profile, she had to include a photograph of herself and state her expectations, including how much financial support she'd want from a prospective partner.

"I put down that I was looking for somebody that I could have fun with … somebody that I could find a connection with, but also somebody who is also able to help me out a little bit when I needed it," she said.

"[I] wasn't going to sugar-coat it. I'm not going to be like, 'Oh, I'm looking for fun and nothing.' It's like I'm on this because I need a little bit of support. And the guys on there know that, too, and they want to help you."

Kelly said she listed her monetary expectations as "negotiable."

Other students on Seeking Arrangement have requested amounts ranging from $1,000 to $10,000 from their sugar daddies, in exchange for other mutually agreed-upon expectations.

Brook Urick, speaking for Seeking Arrangement and its sister websites, says the online dating service is about 'mutually beneficial' relationships. (CBC)

"Most sugar babies are very optimistic in their lists of what kind of allowances and things they want. Most of the guys on the site aren't going to be forking over $3,000 a month to a sugar baby," Brook Urick, a spokesperson for Seeking Arrangement and its sister websites, told CBC News.

"But there are the girls that, you know, need to pay for college, and they meet someone on the site who's willing to sponsor them and finance that, and they're graduating debt-free."

Urick said the website has far more people seeking financial support than members wanting to provide support. The average age of someone seeking a "sugar daddy" is 26, she added.

The company offers free premium memberships to members who can prove they are a student, while a "sugar daddy" pays a standard membership of about $60 a month, she added.

Manitoba professor shocked

Marian Morry, a psychology professor at the University of Manitoba, said she was shocked to learn some students at the university are seeking sugar daddies.

"The fact that these are men claiming they have lots of money and willing to pay for a date — young women really do have to question what these men are about," she said.

Urick said Seeking Arrangement is about "mutually beneficial" relationships.

It's difficult to accurately determine how many students on Seeking Arrangement come from Manitoba's three largest post-secondary institutions.

Figures provided by the website show that of the 6,200 student members from Manitoba, a small number use current email addresses from the following schools:

• University of Manitoba: 142.
• Red River College: 97.
• University of Winnipeg: 24.

"Basically it's about meeting one another's needs. So the guys on the site are generous, successful businessmen and they don't want to be texting for 24 hours a day and messaging back and forth forever. They just want to have a nice dinner with a nice girl and make it happen quickly," Urick said.

At the same time, she said, "Everyone's always thinking it's some kind of, like, 'pay for play' exchange, and that's definitely not the case. These are romantic relationships, and people are getting involved on an emotional level."

When asked if sex is an expectation during her dates, Kelly replied, "It's not an expectation. It's all about having a connection."

Kelly said she has not told her parents about the website.

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Couple says boat-sinking survivor showed up at cabin, 'screaming' for husband

An elderly man and his wife who live on Texada Island off B.C.'s Sunshine Coast say they were shocked when the sole survivor of a weekend boating accident showed up at the door of their remote cabin on Sunday afternoon. 

Ramona and Toni Kappmeier, 88 and 89, respectively, told CBC News they were startled to find a woman soaking wet, dirty and in obvious distress when they answered the door of their cabin, about 100 kilometres northwest of Vancouver.

Toni Kappmeier called 911, while his wife sat the woman down.

"She couldn't even stand anymore. Her legs gave out," Ramona Kappmeier said. "She was completely in shock and tired... and crying, screaming for her husband."

A B.C. woman managed to survive after the small boat she was in sank off Texada Island on Saturday evening. Texada Island is about 100 kilometres north of Vancouver, between B.C.'s Sunshine Coast and the east coast of Vancouver Island. (CBC)

They gave the woman dry clothes and hot tea, then waited until the woman told them her story.

"We couldn't understand her in the beginning, because she mumbled, and she screamed and she cried. She was completely out of control," Ramona said.

The Kappmeiers discovered the woman and her husband had left Sechelt the day before to go fishing off Texada Island, but as the afternoon wore on, conditions got rough.

The woman, whose identity has not been released by police, and her husband Jordan Patrick Beaudoin, 38,  tried to wait out the storm at Jedediah Island, near the southern tip of Texada, but eventually made a dash for the mainland. On the way, the boat began to sink.

"She said that the boat got water, and it goes so fast. In about three minutes, the boat was going [under] and her husband wants to keep the boat afloat.. and she said, she can't do that: 'C'mon, we swim to the shore, the shore can't be far enough away,'" Ramona Kappmeier said.

The woman told the couple that she had tried in vain to get her partner to safety.

"But he was always swimming in circles already, he didn't know anymore. He was maybe in shock too, you know... then she held onto him, and tried to keep him... but then all of a sudden she woke up and she was on a beach," Ramona Kappmeier said.

Authorities believe the woman, who was wearing a lifejacket, spent several hours in the ocean. The beach where she woke up is roughly 20 kilometres up the east side from the southern tip of Texada.

Police said Tuesday she may have made some attempts to find her husband but, when that wasn't successful, she hiked at least five kilometres up through steep, rocky terrain before she happened upon the Kappmeiers' home.

"She had quite a climb up from the beach," Toni said.

"It goes steep down to the ocean and she climbed up there, I can't imagine how," Ramona Kappmeier said. "She must have been tired the whole night."

Jordan Beaudoin, 38, was identified by the B.C. Coroners Service as the man who died in Saturday's boating accident off Texada Island. (Facebook)

Searchers found the body of Jordan Beaudoin, just before 6 p.m. PT Sunday. He had washed up onto a beach about seven kilometres further north up the island from where his wife landed.

Police are not releasing the name of the woman, but said she was suffering from hypothermia and was taken to hospital.

She returned home to the Sechelt area after being released Monday morning.

Police said foul play is not suspected in the death of her husband.

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Pit bull that bit most of year-old girl's nose off to be put down

The pit bull that bit a baby girl's face in west Ottawa yesterday is in bylaw department custody and on a list to be euthanized, police say.

One-year-old Cali Leclair, pictured above, was bitten by a pit bull at a home in west Ottawa on Sunday morning. (Facebook)

Emergency crews responded to the 90 block of Draffin Court at about 9:10 a.m. ET Sunday, where they found a baby girl — Cali Leclair — with "multiple severe lacerations" to her face.

Paramedics took her to hospital for surgery. She was listed in serious but stable condition at the time.

The baby lost most of her nose and her breathing could be affected for the rest of her life, paramedics said.

The Ottawa police sexual assault and child abuse unit is assisting the Children's Aid Society with its investigation. The City of Ottawa's bylaw department, which took the pit bull into their custody, is also investigating.

Police said the child was bitten on the nose while the family was playing with the pit bull inside their home. Neighbours say the dog, named Boss, had bitten a child before.

The attack happened inside this west Ottawa home. (CBC)

​Neighbour Beatrice Mushanga said the baby's family, which has two other dogs, had taken the pit bull from a friend who was unable to train it. The dog was undergoing rehabilitation.

The parents of the child could face a charge of up to $10,000, and possibly six months in jail, if they knew the dog had a history of attacks.

In Ontario, it's illegal to own, import or breed a pit bull, which is one of several breeds, including the Staffordshire bull terrier, American pit bull terrier, American Staffordshire terrier, pit bull terrier, or any mix thereof.

People who owned pit bulls before the ban was put in place in August 2005 were allowed to keep their animals, but owners are ordered to ensure the dogs are spayed or neutered.

The dogs also have to be muzzled and leashed in public.

The law gives judges the right to put down the animals if they've been involved in an attack.

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• On mobile? Click here to find out where the attack happened.

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Mayor of Ukraine's second-largest city shot in the back

The mayor of Ukraine's second-largest city was shot in the back and pro-Russia insurgents seized more government buildings Monday as the U.S. hit Russia with more sanctions for allegedly fomenting the unrest in eastern Ukraine.

Armed insurgents tacitly backed by Moscow are seeking more autonomy in the region — possibly even independence or annexation with Russia.

Ukraine's acting government and the West have accused Russia of orchestrating the unrest, which they fear Moscow could use as a pretext for an invasion. Last month, Russia annexed Crimea weeks after seizing control of the Black Sea peninsula.

In a bid to ratchet up the pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin, U.S. President Barack Obama's government levied new sanctions on seven Russian officials and 17 companies with links to Putin's inner circle. The U.S. is also revoking licenses for high-tech items that could be used by the Russian military.

The European Union is also planning more sanctions against Russia, with ambassadors from the bloc's 28 members meeting Monday in Brussels.

Mayor 'fighting for his life'

A pro-Russian man guards outside city hall in Kostyantynivka in eastern Ukraine. The country's acting government and the West have accused Russia of orchestrating the unrest. (Sergei Grits/Associated Press)

Hennady Kernes, the mayor of Kharkiv, was shot in the back Monday morning, underwent surgery and "doctors are fighting for his life," city hall said.

Kharkiv city hall spokesman Yuri Sydorenko told the Interfax news agency Kernes was shot while cycling on the outskirts of the city. Officials have not commented on who could be behind the attack.

Interfax quoted Valery Boiko, a Kharkiv surgeon who operated on Kernes, said the mayor's life is still under threat.

Kernes was a staunch opponent of the pro-West Maidan movement that toppled President Viktor Yanukovych in February and was widely viewed as the organizer of activists sent to Kyiv from eastern Ukraine to harass those demonstrators.

But he has since softened his stance toward the new Kyiv government. At a meeting of eastern Ukrainian leaders and acting Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk earlier this month, Kernes insisted he does not support the pro-Russia insurgents and backed a united Ukraine.

Kharkiv is in eastern Ukraine, where pro-Russia gunmen have seized government buildings and police stations, set up roadblocks or staged protests to demand greater autonomy or outright annexation by Russia. But unlike the neighbouring Donetsk region, Kharkiv has been largely unaffected by the insurgency and Kernes has been credited for this. Its regional administration building was briefly seized earlier this month but promptly cleared of pro-Russia protesters.

On Monday, masked militants with automatic weapons seized another city hall building and a police station in eastern Ukraine, this time in Kostyantynivka, 160 kilometres from the Russian border. The city is 35 kilometres south of Slovyansk, a major city that has been in insurgents' hands for more than three weeks now.

After the seizure, about 15 armed men guarded the city hall building. Some posed for pictures with residents while others distributed St. George's ribbons, the symbol of the pro-Russia movement.

Russia announced new military exercises along its border with Ukraine last week, unnerving Ukraine and the West. NATO has said Russia has up to 40,000 troops stationed in regions along the border.

On Monday, Moscow turned down Kyiv's request to visit the military exercises. Russia's foreign ministry said the Geneva accord that Ukraine and Russia signed earlier this month do not contain any restrictions of what the Russian army can do on its own territory.

Insurgency turns to kidnapping

Meanwhile, the increasingly ruthless pro-Russia insurgency is turning to an ominous new tactic: kidnapping. About 40 people are being held hostage in makeshift jails in Slovyansk — including journalists, pro-Ukraine activists and seven military observers from the Organization of Security and Co-operation in Europe, Ukraine's Security Service said Monday.

The German government on Monday decried the seizure of the European military observers and called for their immediate release. Eight observers, including three German officers, were detained Friday on allegations they were spying for NATO. One Swedish officer among them was released Sunday.

Pro-Russia militants in camouflage and black balaclavas paraded some of the captive military observers before the media on Sunday. They also showed three Ukrainian security guards bloodied, blindfolded, stripped of their trousers and shoes, their arms bound with packing tape.

German captive Col. Axel Schneider spoke at Sunday's news conference — under armed guard — saying they were on an OSCE diplomatic mission and were not spies.

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Hate spin? Blame the internet and 24/7 news: Andrew MacDougall

The CBC's Neil Macdonald last week posted a piece bemoaning the lack of clarity in today's communications, whether it be political or academic. It got me thinking about my own views on political reporting and communication.

In my old life as director of communications to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, I would often quip that I would love to have had my job in the days before smartphones and the internet. With 700 to 800 emails and dozens of calls a day, the life of a modern political communicator is full-on, to say the least.

What must it have been like in the leisurely age of teletype, radio, the nightly broadcast and the next day's paper? No wonder hacks and flacks would get drunk together in the afternoon — they didn't have to worry about Twitter, Facebook, some crank's blog or filling up their website with reams of copy. And if people were behaving badly at the bar, or dipping their pens into each other's company ink, no one had access to the instant canvas of the internet to gossip about it.

In the pre-digital era, the days had a rhythm and the news had a cycle. Reporters had one broadcast or a set number of column inches. There were one or two wire services, and they — and only they — had the responsibility of banging out a quick blast on the latest news. The rest of the reporting world could take their time, read the material, make a few inquiries and interview a few people, knowing that most punters wouldn't have a chance to watch, listen or read their work until that night or the next morning.

Nowadays, every reporter is a wire service and it's everyone's job to rush out copy the second news breaks. It's equally everyone's job to do it when no news breaks at an event. After all, you wouldn't want a competitor's news site to have a story that you don't have, right?

The internet and 24/7 "news" channels, married with the decline in revenues at news organizations, have too often turned reporting — and especially political reporting — into a demented auction where over-worked and under-resourced reporters bark at competing political parties for reaction all day, updating their stories at each bid. It has also turned political communications staff into email dispensers of talking points.

Spin cycle

In my opinion, the worst job in journalism in the modern era are the poor souls who have to go on TV a minute after something has just happened to "explain" what the hell just happened, and why it's important. Just once, I wish the talking head would say "how the hell would I know, IT JUST HAPPENED! Come back to me in an hour after I've read the freaking press release!"

Don't get me wrong, I loved talking to these reporters. After all, "Andrew, what is the prime minister going to say, I need to do a hit right after the announcement" was a license for me to fill their ears with spin that would then faithfully appear on screen. Who wouldn't want to shoot fish in a barrel?

This isn't to suggest there is anything wrong with spin. It's a fact of life and we all do it. Spin has been around at least as long as the first caveman was pooped on by a bird in front of a friend and was smart enough to call it a sign of good luck.

But spin runs wild in the 24/7 news environment. As the comedian Dennis Miller once quipped: "politicians used to speak in sound bites, now they think in them."

'It would help if we could all recognize that news isn't meant to be a gas that expands to fill any container — at some point it stops being news and just becomes gas'

Which bring us to the talking point. Twenty-four hour news might not have invented the talking point, but it has made it the No. 1 weapon of choice in modern political communication.

It makes sense. If you're being asked for reaction all day, every day, on every issue, at a moment's notice and with tight deadlines, you'd dig deep in your bag of rhetoric to come up with something, anything, to say.

Because if you're not in that first story with a reaction, any reaction, there's a greater chance your phone will melt down as the legions of lemmings try to match the story that's just been slapped onto the web.

The worst part is, the pace of digital news and communication too often results in talking points being dispensed for "legit" stories. The need to say something quickly invariably wins out of the need to wait, gather the facts, produce an explanation and communicate it.

Add to that the feeling that the barrier for reporting has dropped perilously low, and you have the recipe for a fatuous political environment.

The internet's limitless canvas

It used to be that a politician would say something dumb and people would titter, call him a "moron" and move on. Now reporters, opposing flacks, or a random passerby tweets it for all to see. And then people retweet it. Then it's officially a thing.

It used to be a reporter would have to make the case to his or her editor why valuable inches in the paper or minutes in the broadcast were needed for this brain-dead comment. Now, with the limitless web and social media, no editor needs to make that call. Everything goes.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper speaks to reporters at UN headquarters in New York in 2011. The pressure on reporters to produce stories is one reason politicians and their staff rely so much on talking points, Harper's former chief spokesman says. (Jessica Rinaldi/Reuters)

The internet's limitless canvas also happens to be the primary reason for talking points. In the cluttered communications environment, messages have to be repeated endlessly before they punch through (to be clear, it was ever thus but is even more so now) and with everything now being reportable, no matter how inconsequential, sticking to script is essential.

Knowing that every gaffe, no matter how trivial, will be endlessly circulated and discussed, the instinct is to hunker down, say little and not add fuel to the fire. This leads to lack of candour and increasing frustration on both sides of the hack/flack divide.

I don't envy flacks or reporters. The strain on PM trips was evident: reporters needed to wake up with news, have more news at noon, a tidbit for mid-afternoon and then a main course by supper time. Equally, people in my position had to have something to say multiple times a day even if there was no substance to underpin it. No wonder we tried to make news off the same announcement three or four times a year.

Where will this environment lead us? I haven't a clue, but I'm not hugely optimistic. It would help if we could all recognize that news isn't meant to be a gas that expands to fill any container — at some point it stops being news and just becomes gas. Smelly, unedifying gas.

Too often, the premium for reporting is set on speed, not analysis and context. This inevitably leads to the quick sugar-rush of process coverage: who's in, who's out, who's up and who's down.

That said, the internet is toothpaste out of the tube and news organizations aren't going to figure out their resourcing issues anytime soon, if ever. No one has the luxury of time anymore and we're not going to find a way to buy more.

What I can guarantee you is that whichever government succeeds the Harper government, be it the Glorious Haired One or the Angry Bearded One, in 2015 or 2020, it won't change this new approach to political communication. The 24/7 communications environment won't allow it.

Andrew MacDougall is a former director of communications to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He is now the Senior Executive Consultant at MSLGROUP London. Follow him @agmacdougall

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'There's just really nothing there anymore': Deadly tornadoes strike U.S.

Emergency officials on Monday began searching through the debris left by a powerful tornado that carved a 129-kilometre path of destruction through suburban Little Rock, Ark., killing at least 16 people.

The tornado that slammed into Vilonia, about 16 km west of the state capital, on Sunday evening grew to about half a mile wide and was among a rash of tornadoes and heavy storms that rumbled across the central and southern U.S. overnight.

The tornado risk today remained high, shifting slightly to the east, from Louisiana north to Iowa and east to North and South Carolina, CBC meteorologist Jay Scotland reported Monday. "The highest risk for tornadoes today runs from Mississippi and Alabama north through Tennessee to Kentucky," Scotland said.

The U.S. National Weather Service warned that the destructive storms — including more tornadoes, damaging winds and very large hail — would continue to strike in parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and Louisiana on Monday.

Brandon Morris, spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Emergency Management, said crews were sifting through the rubble Monday in the hope of uncovering survivors and to assess the full extent of the destruction.
"Right now, the main focus is life safety," Morris said. "We're trying to make sure everyone is accounted for."

Among the ruins on Monday was a new $14 million intermediate school that was set to open this fall.

"There's just really nothing there anymore. We're probably going to have to start all over again," Vilonia Schools Superintendent Frank Mitchell said after surveying what was left of the building.

The tornado was the largest of several produced by a powerful storm system that rumbled through the central and southern U.S. Another twister killed a person in Quapaw, Okla., before crossing into Kansas to the north and destroying 60 to 70 homes and injuring 25 people in the city of Baxter Springs, according to authorities in Kansas.

A death was reported in Baxter Springs, but it wasn't yet known if it was caused by the tornado, making the Oklahoma death the only confirmed death from Sunday's storms outside of Arkansas. A suspected tornado struck near Plain Dealing in northwest Louisiana.

Tornado formed at night

The overall death toll stood at 17 early Monday.

The tornado that hit Arkansas didn't form until night was setting in, so the full extent of the damage wouldn't be known until after sunrise on Monday.

'We have a storm shelter, thank the Lord.'- Laurie Bogle Jones, Arkansas resident

The National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center said more storms were expected Monday in the South and Mississippi Valley.

The Arkansas twister shredded cars, trucks and 18-wheelers stuck along Interstate 40 north of Little Rock. After the storm passed, tractor-trailer rigs tried to navigate through the damage to continue their journeys, while gawkers held smartphones to their windows to offer a grim glimpse of the destruction.

State troopers went vehicle-to-vehicle to check on motorists and found — with genuine surprise — that no one was killed.

"About 30 vehicles — large trucks, sedans, pickup trucks — were going through there when the funnel cloud passed over," said Bill Sadler, a spokesman for the Arkansas State Police.

Laurie Bogle Jones, a resident of Vilonia, Ark., told CBC's Heather Hiscox in a phone interview today that she and her family lost half their house when a tornado hit on April 25, 2011. This time, the whole house was destroyed.

"We have a storm shelter, thank the Lord," she said.

Enclosed in that 1.2 metre by two metre space, she said, "it felt as if we were going to be sucked out of there … as though we were going to be sucked up through a straw."

Her kids heard a roar, a "faraway-train type of sound."

Though their house was lost, the family survived. They have no property insurance, however, Jones said.

Karla Ault, a Vilonia High School volleyball coach, said she sheltered in the school gymnasium as the storm approached. After it passed, her husband told her their home had been reduced to the slab on which it had sat.

Relative lull

"I'm just kind of numb. It's just shock that you lost everything. You don't understand everything you have until you realize that all I've got now is just what I have on," Ault said.

Motorists check out a tractor trailer that was blown over by high winds from a severe thunderstorm that passed near Rich Hill, Mo., on Sunday. (Orlin Wagner/Associated Press)

The country had enjoyed a relative lull in violent weather and didn't record the first tornado death until Sunday, when a North Carolina infant who was injured by a twister Friday died at a hospital. But the system that moved through the Plains, Midwest and South on Sunday produced tornadoes that struck several states, including also Missouri, Nebraska and Iowa.

The weather service's North Little Rock office said it was virtually certain that the Mayflower and Vilonia storm would be rated as the nation's strongest twister to date this year.

"It has the potential to be EF3 or greater," said meteorologist Jeff Hood. EF3 storms have winds greater than 219 km/h. "Based on some of the footage we've seen from Mayflower and where it crossed Interstate 40, things were wrecked in a very significant way."

From communities west of Little Rock to others well north of the capital, emergency workers and volunteers were going door-to-door checking for victims.

'Gone completely'

"It turned pitch black," said Mark Ausbrooks, who was at his parents' home in Mayflower when the storm arrived. "I ran and got pillows to put over our heads and … all hell broke loose."

"My parents' home, it's gone completely," he said.

Becky Naylor, of Mayflower, said she and her family went to their storm cellar after hearing that tornado debris was falling in nearby Morgan. Naylor, 57, said there were between 20 and 22 people "packed like sardines" in the cellar.

"People were pulling off the highways and were just running in," she said.

Men held the cellar doors shut while the tornado's winds tried to rip them apart.

"It sounded like a constant rolling, roaring sound," she said. "Trees were really bending and the light poles were actually shaking and moving. That's before we shut the door and we've only shut the door to the storm cellar two times."

The other time was in 2011, during an EF-2 tornado that followed nearly the same path.

"This storm was much stronger," Vilonia Mayor James Firestone told ABC's "Good Morning America" early Monday. "The devastation was just tremendous."

Obama vows to help

The Arkansas Department of Emergency Management raised the number of Arkansas deaths to 16 early Monday — 10 in Faulkner County, five in Pulaski County and one in White County.

At a news conference in the Philippines, President Barack Obama sent his condolences and promised the government would help in the recovery.

"Your country will be there to help you recover and rebuild as long as it takes," Obama said.

Storm ratings for Sunday's twisters were not immediately available. Before Sunday, the country had not had a tornado rated EF3 or higher since Nov. 17, a streak of 160 days, the fourth-longest on record. This also would be the latest date for a storm rated EF3 or higher. The previous latest big storm for a year was March 31, 2002.

Sunday was the third anniversary of a 122-tornado day, which struck parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia and killed 316 people.

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South Korea ferry: Video shows captain boarding boat

Video

CBC News Posted: Apr 28, 2014 9:20 AM ET Last Updated: Apr 28, 2014 10:39 AM ET

The South Korean Coast Guard has released video footage showing the captain and crew of the capsized Sewol ferry boarding lifeboats as the ferry sank.

More than 300 people, most of them high school students, were left dead or missing after the sinking.

Watch the coast guard video in the player above.

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John Paul II, John XXIII become Roman Catholic saints

Pope Francis declared his two predecessors John XXIII and John Paul II saints on Sunday before hundreds of thousands of people in St. Peter's Square, an unprecedented ceremony made even more historic by the presence of retired Pope Benedict XVI.

Never before has a reigning and retired pope celebrated Mass together in public, much less at an event honouring two of their most famous predecessors.

Benedict's presence was a reflection of the balancing act that Francis envisioned when he decided to canonize John and John Paul together, showing the unity of the Catholic Church by honouring popes beloved to conservatives and progressives alike.

A tapestry with the image of Pope John Paul II hangs from the facade of St. Peter's Basilica during Sunday's celebration, led by Pope Francis. (Alessandra Tarantino/Associated Press)

Francis took a deep breath and paused for a moment before reciting the saint-making formula in Latin, as if moved by the history he was about to make.

He said that after deliberating, consulting and praying for divine assistance "we declare and define Blessed John XXIII and John Paul II be saints and we enrol them among the saints, decreeing that they are to be venerated as such by the whole church."

Applause broke out from a crowd that stretched from St. Peter's to the Tiber River and beyond.

Benedict was sitting off to the side of the altar with other cardinals. He had arrived in the square on his own to cheers and applause, wearing white vestments and white bishops' miter. He stood to greet Italy's president and later Francis when he arrived, and sang along during the hymns that followed the canonization rite.

Italy's interior ministry predicted 1 million people would watch the Mass from the square, the streets surrounding it and nearby piazzas where giant TV screens were set up to accommodate the crowds eager to follow along.

By the time the ceremony began, Via della Conciliazione, the main boulevard leading from the square, nearby streets and the bridges across the Tiber were packed.

Polish pilgrims carrying the red and white flags of John Paul's beloved homeland had been among the first to push into the square well before sunrise, as the human chains of neon-vested civil protection workers trying to maintain order finally gave up and let them in.

"Four popes in one ceremony is a fantastic thing to see and to be at, because it is history being written in our sight," marvelled one of the visiting Poles, David Halfar. "It is wonderful to be a part in this and to live all of this."

Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued a statement calling John Paul II "an icon of faith and a defender of the truth about man's dignity and freedom."

"John XXIII came to be known worldwide for his humble leadership, attentive pastoral guidance and concern for the poor. He is especially known for convening the Second Vatican Council in 1961, which marked a significant development in the Catholic Church's pastoral approach to the modern world," Harper said.

Most of those who arrived first at St. Peter's had camped out overnight nearby on air mattresses and sleeping pads. Others hadn't slept at all and took part in the all-night prayer vigils hosted at a dozen churches in downtown Rome.

By mid-morning, the scene in the square was quiet and subdued — perhaps due to the chilly grey skies and cumulative lack of sleep — unlike the rollicking party atmosphere of John Paul's May 2011 beatification when bands of young people sang and danced in the hours before the Mass.

Benedict had promised to remain "hidden from the world" after resigning last year, but Francis has coaxed him out of retirement and urged him to take part in the public life of the church.

In a dress rehearsal of sorts, Benedict attended the February ceremony in which Francis installed 19 new cardinals. But celebrating Mass together with Francis was something else entirely, a first for the 2,000-year-old institution and a reflection of Francis' desire to show the continuity in the papacy, despite different personalities, priorities and politics.

Pope John XXIII, who reigned from 1958-1963, is a hero to liberal Catholics for having convened the Second Vatican Council. The meetings brought the church into the modern era by allowing Mass to be celebrated in local languages rather than Latin and by encouraging greater dialogue with people of other faiths, particularly Jews.

During his quarter-century papacy from 1978-2005, John Paul II helped topple communism through his support of Poland's Solidarity movement. His globe-trotting papacy and launch of the wildly popular World Youth Days invigorated a new generation of Catholics, while his defence of core church teaching heartened conservatives after the turbulent 1960s.

"John Paul was our pope," said Therese Andjoua, a 49-year-old nurse who travelled from Libreville, Gabon, with some 300 other pilgrims to attend. She sported a traditional African dress bearing the images of the two new saints.

"In 1982 he came to Gabon and when he arrived he kissed the ground and told us to `Get up, go forward and be not afraid,"' she recalled as she rested against a pallet of water bottles. "When we heard he was going to be canonized, we got up."

Kings, queens, presidents and prime ministers from more than 90 countries attended. Some 20 Jewish leaders from the U.S., Israel, Italy, Francis' native Argentina and Poland were also taking part, in a clear sign of their appreciation for the great strides made in Catholic-Jewish relations under John, John Paul — and their successors celebrating their sainthood.

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Mahmoud Abbas calls Holocaust 'most heinous crime' against humanity

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called the Nazi Holocaust "the most heinous crime" against humanity in modern times in a statement released on Sunday, an apparent bid to build bridges with Israel days after troubled peace talks collapsed.

Abbas has condemned the mass killings of Jews in the Second World War before and challenged allegations, stemming from a 1983 book he authored, that he is a Holocaust denier.

'What happened to the Jews in the Holocaust is the most heinous crime to have occurred against humanity in the modern era.'- Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas

But the timing of the publication of his latest comments gave them extra significance, a day after he signalled he remained committed to the peace talks and said a future Palestinian unity government would recognize Israel.

The message, in Arabic and English, coincided with Israel's annual remembrance day for the six million Jews killed in the Holocaust, and included an expression of sympathy for the families of the victims.

Israel suspended U.S.-sponsored peace talks with the Palestinians on Thursday in response to Abbas's unexpected unity pact with the rival Islamist group Hamas — a movement which has vowed to destroy Israel.

On Sunday, Israeli leaders showed little interest in responding to Abbas' apparent olive branch.

Abbas, according to the official Palestinian news agency, Wafa, made the comments at a meeting with an American rabbi last week.

"What happened to the Jews in the Holocaust is the most heinous crime to have occurred against humanity in the modern era," Abbas told Rabbi Marc Schneir, president of the New York-based Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, which promotes relations between racial and ethnic communities.

The Palestinian people, he added, "are the first to demand to lift the injustice and racism that befell other peoples subjected to such crimes."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, while not referring directly to Abbas's statement, accused the Palestinian leader of forging a partnership with Holocaust deniers.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accused the Palestinian leader of partnering with Holocaust deniers. (Gali Tibbon/Reuters)

"Hamas denies the Holocaust while trying to create another Holocaust by destroying Israel," Netanyahu said in public remarks at the weekly meeting of his cabinet. "It is with this Hamas that Abu Mazen chose to create an alliance last week."

A spokesman said Netanyahu's comments were not a direct response to Abbas's statement but the Israeli leader was aware of what the Palestinian president had said.

Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), an Israeli monitoring group, says both Hamas and Abbas's Fatah movement have engaged in Holocaust denial. On its website, PMW cites a Hamas TV documentary which it said alleged Jewish leaders planned the Holocaust to eliminate the "disabled and handicapped."

But the website also mentions a statement issued by Abbas's Palestinian Authority in January condemning the Holocaust and the targeting of Jews.

Abbas has long been accused by some Israeli politicians of being a Holocaust denier over his book, The Other Side: the Secret Relationship Between Nazism and Zionism, which was based on his doctoral dissertation where he questioned the number of Jewish Holocaust victims.

In an interview with Israel's Haaretz newspaper in 2003, Abbas said he had quoted an argument between historians in which various numbers of casualties were mentioned.

"One wrote there were 12 million victims and another wrote there were 800,000," he said in the interview.

"I have no desire to argue with the figures. The Holocaust was a terrible, unforgivable crime against the Jewish nation, a crime against humanity that cannot be accepted by humankind," he told Haaretz.

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