Segacs’s World I Know

The police have arrested five suspects in conjunction with the firebombing at UTT that destroyed the elementary school’s library last month:

“Four males aged between 18 and 20 and one female in her 30s were all apprehended at 6:15 this morning,” Montreal police spokesman Ian Lafrenière said Friday.

[ . . . ]

Lafreniere did not give the nationalities of those arrested, saying there was some information police did not want to reveal so as not to jeopardize the investigation into other possible suspects.

Or perhaps that they’re too politically-correct to provide that information. It’s sure to come out shortly, though – they can’t withhold the information forever.

Went to see the screening of the 2003 Cannes Lions Festival tonight. And while there were some mediocre ads in the mix, there were also moments of sheer brilliance. Like the McDonald’s “transparent” campaign. Or the condom ad with the kid throwing a temper tantrum in the grocery aisle. Or the Honda ad with the domino-like assembly of car parts that was actually filmed in two long takes.

All in all, more laughs than the average comedy feature film. (I wish I could link to them, but the once-wonderful Adcritic.com has become a subscriber-only service. For those of us advertising buffs, that was a real loss.)

All in all, the festival makes you realize that (a) soccer is really really really important in the rest of the world, especially Great Britain, (b) European ads are so much better than ours and (c) advertising can be fun.

But paying? To see ads?

To people who consider advertising an intrusive or even corrupting influence on our lives, they would probably be aghast at the notion.

But advertising is more than just sales. It’s a real art form. And while creative alone won’t always sell the product, at least seeing ads like these inspires those of us in the business to work harder to create something truly great.

Okay, all of you who think advertising is evil can throw rotten fruit at me now…

Learning a lesson from past disasters, Israel has boldly asserted that they will not negotiate with terrorists to recover the bodies of six fallen IDF soldiers in Gaza City currently being held by terrorists:

Israeli officials have ruled out political any negotiations and have vowed that troops will remain in Gaza City’s Zeitun neighborhood and until the remains of six Givati soldiers are recovered.

“They will stay there as long as necessary to bring back the bodies for burial here in Israel,” Gideon Meir, deputy director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry told the Washington Post, calling it “part of the whole Jewish tradition” to preserve and protect a body for interment.

Despite the Israeli position, an agreement has been reached between Egyptian officials and Palestinians holding body parts of six IDF soldiers killed in Tuesday’s explosion of an armored personnel carrier in the Zeitun neighborhood in Gaza, according to Palestinian sources quoted by Army Radio Wednesday afternoon.

The same Egyptian officials who, presumably, have a peace treaty with Israel. Real nice.

The international community is putting a lot of pressure on the PA to return the bodies of the soldiers. But Palestinian Authority instructions to do the same are nonsense. Meryl thinks that Arafat is missing a golden PR opportunity. I disagree. I think Arafat calculated long ago that the value of the PR he’ll get from the Arab world for bodies of dead Jewish soldiers far outweighs the PR he’ll get in the Western press for, well, anything.

Behind door number one, we have the world’s favourite rock-star-cum-politician, with the world’s most recognizable dark classes:

Behind door number two, we have Canada’s most recognizable number-two man who is now acting as number one.

Bono praised Paul Martin for his efforts to fight AIDS on an international scale:

Irish rocker Bono praised Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin for leading the developed world in efforts to combat HIV/AIDS and poverty in the developing world.

A beaming Martin, who is expected to announce in the next 10 days that a general election will be held in June, laughed as Bono quipped: “I am not here to elect Mr. Martin.”

But pressed on political issues, Bono gave Martin a strong endorsement, insisting “this politician has kept his promises to me … so far.”

I know: come election time, let’s all vote for Bono! After all, he’s “Even Better than the Real Thing”.

The Lightning may have swept the Habs… but at least we don’t have to bribe people with beer to get them to buy season tickets.

So the jury’s still out on the new blogger. So far, I’m not impressed. The bubbly pages seem kinda gimmicky and amateurish, and I miss being able to see the preview pane in split-screen.

Oh, I know I should bite the bullet and move to a proper system like Movable Type, but Geocities doesn’t allow cgi scripts (not to mention, I have no idea how to configure them). Being technologically-challenged, I guess I’ll just have to learn to live with this new format.

But if you’re from Blogger and you’re reading this: thumbs-down.

Allison thinks she’s officially seen it all, with the news of the apprehension of a hermaphrodite would-be suicide bomber:

Israeli security forces thwarted a suicide bombing planned for Tel Aviv when they arrested a Palestinian hermaphrodite armed with a 15-kilogram bomb in the West Bank, Palestinian sources said.

Amal Juma’a, 32, is a hermpahrodite who goes by the name Ahmed, Palestinian Authority sources told Army Radio. The report said the terror attack was planned for Monday.

Sign of the times? Possibly.

But more likely, it’s a sign of the culture. It’s difficult enough in supposedly liberal, advanced-thinking areas of the world to have a “different” gender identity. Imagine what it must be like in a society that still treats women like chattel and has honour killings of women who are no longer virgins? Palestinian society isn’t exactly known for its advanced attitudes towards homosexuals, transsexuals, or, well, in this case, hermaphrodites.

There’s one place all the people who feel outcast or alienated can go to feel accepted, powerful, and special: to the terrorists. Groups like Hamas and Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade are only too happy to help the alienated “find purpose” by strapping some C-4 to their chests and going to blow up innocent Jewish children.

In case you’re wondering, this isn’t one of those “excuses for the terrorists” postings. It makes no difference whether a terrorist is a man, woman, hermaphrodite, or a Marilyn Manson-type: a murder is still a murderer.

But it’s a sad fact that the terrorist groups prey on the weak, on the maligned, on the fringes of society. They find their killers among people to whom murder-suicide seems like a career opportunity. There’s no way to tell whether that’s the case here. But it very well could be.

Update: Stefan and Harry are also amused. It wouldn’t have been so amusing had the intended attack actually succeeded.

Congratulations to Canada for winning the gold medal at the World Hockey Championship! Woohoo!

Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms out there!