WTF: The rest of the week in news

Looks a little like Tupac, no? Photo via Flickr

Free Willy! Uh, Willies? Free willies?! OK, scratch that — a pod of 12 killer whales has been “conditionally released” from their icy prison after getting trapped under thick ice off the coast of northern Quebec. The dozen orcas had been sharing a relatively small hole in the ice for at least a few days and were fading fast — until strong winds busted open the ice Thursday morning, allowing them to swim away. God must be a whale.

Canada’s Governor General David Johnston has had a change of heart since Tuesday, when it was announced he would not be attending the meeting between Chief Theresa Spence of the Idle No More movement, First Nations leaders and Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Then Chief Spence refused to come out of her teepee unless Johnston made an appearance. Joanna Smith of the Toronto Star now reports that he will now participate in a ceremonial meeting after the working meeting, which Spence says isn’t good enough (but which First Nations national chief Shawn Atleo says is). These are the days of our lives.

In judge-not-lest-ye-be-judged news, two judges in this fine province of ours have been suspended while police look into allegations that they bought coke from a dude who turned out to be a snitch. The wielders of the gavel in question are Quebec Superior Court justice Michel Girouard and Court of Quebec judge Marc E. Grimard, both of whom preside over courtrooms in Abitibi. If two such accomplished individuals can’t trust a coke dealer who was arrested in a major bust, who can they trust?

Hey, remember Jean Charest? He was the guy who led Quebec during that whole Printemps érable thing and was eventually voted out. We’re not sure we’d call him eminently employable, but to the surprise of exactly no one, he has taken a job at a Montreal law firm — McCarthy Tétrault, to be precise. The power to boss around articling fresh-out-of-school newbies is one of the many perks of the high-octane job.

It was confirmed yesterday that Lachine Hospital has been removed from the MUHC mega-hospital network and has been transferred back to the CSSS Dorval-Lachine-LaSalle because of language. Yes. Language. Because this is Quebec, assholes. “It appears the McGill University Health Centre will lose its jurisdiction over the Lachine Hospital because the Parti Québécois government is concerned about the language used by those running the institution,” CTV Montreal reports.

And in this week’s (other) WTF moment, a weed-guarding alligator in northern California, Mr. Teeth has died. The alligator’s owner said he got Mr. Teeth in memory of Tupac, who was gunned down in 1996. ■