The State of the World

Strippers not out of woods yet
The City of Windsor isn't giving up on license fees for exotic dancers. After the practice was ruled discriminatory by the Ontario Court of Appeal last week, city council has hired an Ottawa lawyer [to the tune of $10,000] to ask the court for a leave of appeal. If granted, someone from the city's legal department will argue on its behalf.

Mayor Eddie says since the fees were first suspended in 2005 when the matter went before the courts, the city has lost about $150,000 in revenues.

Who knew strippers gave that much to the city?

High ranking ministers preaching the word in China
International Trade Minister David Emerson and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty are in Beijing this week to play nice with China after a tense autumn with harsh words from both Canada and China over each others' human rights records. Emerson is looking to improve tourism from China in Canada, as well as ensuring protection for Canadain investors in China.

Obama pondering presidency
The distinguished gentleman from Illinois, Democratic Senator Barack Obama, has officially announced he's forming a 'Presidential Exploratory Committee'. While not officially declaring a candidacy, it is widely considered the first step before doing so.

We like Barack. But we like him purely on charisma, and not based on anything he says, because he says the same things lots of other Democrats say. He needs to develop his own political identity away from the party line to even think he might have a hope in hell of winning over middle America. Or of withstanding the tank that is Clinton.

But if he wins, will he play this in the Oval Office?

Briefly
Told you someone would get canned for it: radio station responsible for water drinking contest that killed a Sacramento woman fires 10 employees.

How many Starbuckses is too many Starbuckses? And seriously, what the hell is the plural of that? People commonly use the same for both singular and plural. So Starbucks is like moose or deer? Weird.

Black recognized as hip colour this season. You mean there was a time when it wasn't?

So you saw Happy Feet, and now you're worried about the penguins, what with all this global warming and whatnot? Don't worry, they'll be fine.