[PHOTO] Sakura in front of Tim Hortons

After visiting TCAF Sunday and having lunch with a friend at Not Just Noodles, I crossed the intersection of Yonge and Wellesley to buy some coffee at a Tim Hortons. There, I came across two cherry trees in full bloom.

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Charlie Stross at Antipope wonders what subtle techniques could be used to sabotage a modern technology firm.


• Bad Astronomy notes the work that went into determining the origins of a high-energy neutrino.


• blogTO praises the Toronto Islands.


• Imageo shares this unsettling graphic depicting rising global temperatures over time.


• The Map Room notes, using Amazon's controversy over same-day delivery being coincidentally limited largely to areas with non-black populations, the problems involved with being blind about data.


• Marginal Revolution's Tyler Cowen makes the case for Britain staying in the imperfect European Union.


• The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer notes that the new Brazilian government's all-male cabinet required some work, given the presence of women in Brazil's business life.


• Transit Toronto looks at plans for new GO Station construction in the GTA.


• Window on Eurasia looks at Russian coverage of Crimean Tatar Jamala's song "1944" and her victory for Ukraine at Eurovision.

[NEWS] Some Monday links

• Bloomberg notes Canadian-born Bank of England governor Mark Carney's criticism of Brexit, looks at the continuing exodus of Somalis from their homeland, and looks at an unusual crisis with the creditors of Turkey's central bank.


• CBC looks at the human cost of the one-child policy in China, reports on Maxine Bernier's decision to run for the Conservative Party leadership, notes that many cell phones have their FM radio chips turned off, and looks at the undue criticism of Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau for wanting help.


• The Globe and Mail notes the lack of interest among Canadians in radically changing Canadian content rules.


• MacLean's looks at Québec's careful policy on the sharing economy and shares Kathryn Borel's interview with Anne Kingston.


• National Geographic writes about the intelligence of birds.


• The National Post notes a Washington State mall's decision to accept Canadian dollars on par on holiday weekends.


• Universe Today reports on a Japanese 3-D map of galaxies stretching billions of light years that confirms Einstein's theory of relativity.


• The Verge notes the compelling postmodernist fictions written by Google's AI.


• Wired reports about the genesis of Eurekalert.

[URBAN NOTE] "Toronto’s First Baseball Mascot"

In this weekend's Historicist feature, Chris Bateman writes about the baseball mascot of a late 19th century baseball team, the Torontos. Back them, "mascot" was the subject of a good deal of offputting racial fetishization.

“[Mascot,] though so far unacknowledged in Webster’s Unabridged, is in popular use, and mascots are becoming more numerous every day,” reported the Utica Observer in July 1886.

“Players of the national game are the most superstitious of men. ‘In their opinion, skill has little to do with the result of a match,’ says one who has studied the matter. ‘A bird flying over the field, the flag blowing in a certain direction, a little boy picked up by one of the nines, a goat or a dog wandering across the diamond while the game is going on—these are the things which include victory to one side or the other.'”

As the Utica Observer indicated, the trend in the 1880s was to acquire young Black boys to travel with the team and sometimes perform light duties, such as handing out or collecting bats for the players.

The Torontos, one of the city’s first major baseball teams, had Willie Hume,”a very small and very fat coloured boy,” according to the Globe.

Hume’s precise age and origins are unclear. The Globe reported he was “picked up” when the team passed through Syracuse en route to an International League game against Rochester, and he first appeared on the bench during a game against Buffalo during the 1886 season.

[URBAN NOTE] "Creating places for people as we grow": Spacing Toronto on Thriving Places

Spacing Toronto's Jake Tobin Garrett writes about the Thriving Places report, which looks for good patterns of urban development in the Greater Toronto Area.

As municipalities in the Greater Golden Horseshoe shift from building sprawling single-family housing neighbourhoods to denser neighbourhoods filled with a mix of housing—including high-rise towers—we also need to shift the way we plan, design, and engage communities in parks and open spaces.

If we are going to build the “complete communities” envisioned in the Provincial Growth Plan, we’ll need to use new strategies to make sure that everyone has access to public spaces that meet various needs. This becomes even more necessary as the Province has released the proposed new Growth Plan, which includes higher intensification targets.

Thriving Places, the new report released by Park People, showcases different strategies that municipalities in the Greater Golden Horseshoe are using to address this challenge. The report builds on the ideas in Park People’s 2015 report Making Connections, which set out eight guiding principles for planning a network of parks and open spaces in urban neighbourhoods.

Looking to municipalities such as Brampton, Mississauga, Newmarket, Richmond Hill, Vaughan, and Barrie, the report highlights best practices in park planning, design, and community engagement.

[URBAN NOTE] Torontoist on Rokudenashiko at TCAF

In "Why This Artist is Taking Her Pro-pussy Campaign to TCAF", Kate Fane writes about Japanese artist Rokudenashiko, who has gained much fame and notoriety for some of her works.

Rokudenashiko wants to de-problematize the pussy.

Doing so has created some problems.

Her quest has garnered the Japanese artist international fame and local derision, as her pop-art sculptures of manko (“pussy”) have spurred heated discussions around obscenity, artistic expression, and the persistent stigmatization of female genitalia in Japanese culture. It’s also led to her arrest and incarceration. Twice.

Undeterred, this weekend she’s in Toronto for the Toronto Comics Art Festival, where her campaign continues.

On May 9th, a Japanese court determined that while Rokudenashiko’s physical manko sculptures were legally acceptable, she crossed the threshold from art into obscenity when she digitally scanned her vagina and shared the 3D printing plans with supporters of her crowdfunding campaign, and inspired “reckless sexual impulse” in the process. Hardly a stretch to see the parallels between a verdict like that and attitudes around women’s sexuality in general.

Rokudenashiko’s newly released graphic memoir What Is Obscenity? The Story of a Good For Nothing Artist and her Pussy , published by Toronto’s Koymaa Press, follows her remarkable yet rocky path to international attention and acclaim—depicting her youthful insecurities around her own manko, her artistic awakening, and her 2014 stint in prison where she was initially ostracized by her fellow inmates after admitting the real reason she was locked up.

Much more, including images, is at Torontoist.

[URBAN NOTE] "Review of Toronto's ward boundaries recommends adding 3 new councillors"

City News reports on a proposal to add more wards to the city of Toronto.

The number of city councillors at Toronto City Hall could soon increase after a report recommended creating three new wards.

In June 2013, city council directed a third-party review of Toronto’s ward boundaries to ensure “effective representation” across Toronto.

Following a a five-step review process, which included public and stakeholder consultation, the Canadian Urban Institute submitted its report, recommending Toronto re-draw it’s ward boundaries, which would result in having three additional councillors.

The report recommended a ward structure of 47 wards with an average population of 61,000 to ensure effective representation given population growth in Toronto over the last fifteen years.

The report is here.

[URBAN NOTE] "Toronto housing market shows signs of cooling: Report"

The Toronto Star carries Alexandra Posadzki's Canadian Press article on what might, or might not, be signs of cooling in the Toronto real estate market.

The number of homes sold in Canada last month hit a record as supply tightened, particularly in the Toronto area, where a fiercely competitive market is dissuading some homeowners from putting their properties up for sale, the Canadian Real Estate Association said Monday.

There were 57,669 homes sold nationwide over the Multiple Listing Service in April, a 10.3 per cent increase from the same month last year, the industry organization said.

The rise in sales came as the number of new homes put up for sale slipped 3.7 per cent from a year ago to 103,028.

That trend was even more pronounced in the Toronto area, where new listings were down 10.3 per cent compared to April 2015.

“While significant home price gains may entice some homeowners in these markets to list their home for sale, the issue for many is that the decision to move means they would also be looking to buy while competition for scarce listings is fierce,” CREA chief economist Gregory Klump said in a statement.

[URBAN NOTE] "Toronto weed dispensary closes doors ahead of looming crackdown"

In a tweet-heavy article, City News notes the pressure on Toronto weed dispensaries. In fairness, I'm not sure what the owners of not-quite-legal businesses were thinking, with their plans to open up on such a large scale when the regulatory and legal frameworks were so vague.

Last weekend, Toronto Mayor John Tory walked into the Kind Supply marijuana dispensary in Kensington Market, seeking to learn more about the burgeoning industry that’s leapfrogged the legalization process.

“I went into one of them and started asking a lot of questions and the one I went into, they of course said that they were following all the rules and it was everybody else that wasn’t,” Tory told reporters. “They helped to educate me a little bit,” he added.

Tory’s trip may have amounted to the Cole’s notes version of a complex issue, but he emerged with a clear directive — it’s time to clamp down.

A few days later Tory penned a letter to Municipal Licensing and Standards urging immediate enforcement, in tandem with police, while the city further studies how to deal with the snowballing situation.

[OBSCURA] On that graffiti showing Putin and Trump kissing in Lithuania

The above wall, this photo taken by the Associated Press' Mindaugas Kulbis, has gone viral. This is a fantastic image that gets right down to the fundamental similarities between Russia's actual and America's potential leaders. Timothy Snyder's NYR Daily post of last month goes into detail about this odd couple, and what attracts them to each other.

It is not hard to see why Trump might choose Putin as his fantasy friend. Putin is the real world version of the person Trump pretends to be on television. Trump’s financial success (such as it is) has been as a New York real estate speculator, a world of private deal-making that can seem rough and tough—until you compare it to the Russia of the 1990s that ultimately produced the Putin regime. Trump presents himself as the maker of a financial empire who is willing to break all the rules, whereas that is what Putin in fact is. Thus far Trump can only verbally abuse his opponents at rallies, whereas Putin’s opponents are assassinated. Thus far Trump can only have his campaign manager rough up journalists he doesn’t like. In Russia some of the best journalists are in fact murdered.

President Putin, who is an intelligent and penetrating judge of men, especially men with masculinity issues, has quickly drawn the correct conclusion. In the past he has done well for himself by recruiting among politicians who exhibit greater vanity than decency, such as Silvio Berlusconi and Gerhard Schröder. The premise of Russian foreign policy to the West is that the rule of law is one big joke; the practice of Russian foreign policy is to find prominent people in the West who agree. Moscow has found such people throughout Europe; until the rise of Trump the idea of an American who would volunteer to be a Kremlin client would have seemed unlikely. Trump represents an unprecedented standard of American servility, and should therefore be cultivated as a future Russian client.

(Needling at least one homophobe is, I think, a bonus.)

The Associated Press carried an article explaining why the Vilnius eatery Keulė Rūkė commissioned this work.

Restaurant owner Dominykas Ceckauskas said Saturday the presumptive U.S. Republican presidential nominee and the Russian president both have huge egos "and they seem to get along pretty well."

He said the image is "an ironic view of what can be expected."

Local artist Mindaugas Bonanu created the wheat paste poster for the eatery in the capital Vilnius on Friday. It's on the outside of the Keule Ruke restaurant— Lithuanian for "Smoking Pig" — along with the text "Make Everything Great Again" — a play on Trump's slogan "Make America Great Again."

Ceckauskas said the poster was a nod to a 1979 photograph of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev kissing East German ally Erich Honecker on the mouth — once a customary greeting between Socialist leaders. The iconic shot was later painted on the Berlin Wall.

The only downside that I can see is that, if Trump actually does get elected, Lithuania could be in for hard times. Offending two narcissists is risky enough when only one actually could have power over your country.