[Perturbed]

Here's another 2 page article from the same web site. Keep in mind the governor general is supposed to keep out of Canadian politics, is she not?<br /> <br /> Slave honoured after 272 years<br /> 'The RACISM of today is an extension of the lingering racism of yesterday. If we forget this, then we risk perpetuating an unacceptable situation,' governor-general says<br /> <br /> JEFF HEINRICH, The Gazette<br /> Published: Saturday, April 08, 2006 <br /> June 21, 1734: Found guilty of setting a fire that destroyed a hospital and 45 houses in the French colonial city of Montreal, a young black slave woman from Portugal named Marie-Josephe Angelique is tortured and then hanged in the street. Her body is thrown into a bonfire and burned.<br /> <br /> April 7, 2006: Canada's first black governor-general, Michaelle Jean, herself a Montreal immigrant descended from slaves in Haiti, lays a bouquet of Easter lilies beneath a plaque in Angelique's memory, tours the sites in Old Montreal where she lived and died, and inaugurates an educational website detailing her case.<br /> <br /> "I think today is sweet revenge," Jean told dignitaries and other invitees at the Centre historique de Montreal after taking a symbolic walk through the rainy streets of the old city in the footsteps of Angelique, whose crime may not have been arson but simply the colour of her skin.<br /> <br /> Contrasting yesterday's commemoration with "that other gathering, the day of her execution, when she died under a hail of angry, contemptuous shouts and insults," Jean said Angelique was a proud black woman whose tragic story is a symbol of the Canadian dream of freedom and equality for all.<br /> <br /> "Every time the story of Marie-Josephe Angelique is told to me, I'm filled with emotion, as we all are," Jean said, recalling how Angelique maintained her innocence until tortured into confessing.<br /> <br /> "I can't help but think this woman, in the prime of her life, would have had a completely different fate if she had been of a different race or if she'd been free," Jean said. "She was treated that way<br /> <br /> because she was black."<br /> <br /> Almost 272 years later, it's important to understand that slavery was "the source of the prejudice that continues to contaminate, even poison, the way in which we deal with one another," Jean added.<br /> <br /> "Racism has a history that we must never forget. The racism of today is an extension of the lingering racism of yesterday. If we forget this, then we risk perpetuating an unacceptable situation."<br /> <br /> As if the present mimicked the past, yesterday's commemoration was almost marred by fire at the Maison Parent-Roback, a women's centre based in a heritage stone house around the corner from St. Paul St., where the original blaze broke out on April 10, 1734, and where Angelique was executed 10 weeks later.<br /> <br /> After her speech, Jean laid a bouquet under a commemorative plaque on a wall outside the Ste. Therese St. building. She then walked in the drizzle with her entourage under black umbrellas a short block down Vaudreuil St. to the corner of St. Paul, where historian and author Denyse Beauregard-Champagne pointed out the site where Angelique, 29, was executed.<br /> <br /> The procession - including Mayor Gerald Tremblay and Quebec Immigration Minister Lise Theriault - then headed west along St. Paul, past the scene of the 1734 fire, to St. Sulpice St., where Angelique lived with her owner, the widow Madame de Francheville.<br /> <br /> Then it was on to the Centre historique, where Jean clicked a computer mouse on a projection screen, opening a new website about Canadian "multicultural mysteries" like Angelique's.<br /> <br /> <a href="http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=a459864a-d19b-4d5f-a4ac-82cff1c9251a">here</a><br /> <br /> <br /> The symbolism of Jean's walk in the slave woman's footsteps struck home.<br /> <br /> "It's not only an important moment, it's a great moment," said Beauregard-Champagne, whose 2004 book Le proces de Marie-Josephe Angelique is considered the authoritative text on the subject. "We are finally acknowledging that this slave, Marie-Joseph Angelique, did walk these same streets. It really happened, right here in our own city."<br /> <br /> From all the evidence, Beauregard Champagne believes, Angelique was innocent. "I don't think she set the fire, but Canadians can make up their own minds. The archives are now here for everyone to read (online) and decide if she was guilty or not," she said.<br /> <br /> "We have to talk about slavery. It's part of Canadian history. ... People just don't know about it. And the more they know, the more they want to find out about it."<br /> <br /> For more on Marie-Josephe Angelique, go to the new bilingual website, www.canadianmysteries.ca. As well, a special exhibition on her life will run from Oct. 12 to March 25 at the Chateau Ramezay in Old Montreal.<br /> <br /> [email protected]<br /> <br /> © The Gazette (Montreal) 2006<br /> <br /> <br /> <a href="http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=a459864a-d19b-4d5f-a4ac-82cff1c9251a&p=2">here</a>

[Perturbed]

Anyone who wants to view the news clip from CBC can do it here:<br /> <br /> <a href="http://http://media.putfile.com/mikjean">here</a>

[h.f. wolff]

Maybe Montreal/Quebec could erect a huge statue to honour the arsonist for the impetus she gave to "urban renewal and beautification"!<br /> <br /> The intellectual ability of the GG must be stretched to the limit if she has to go back 270 odd years to find some factoid to make political hay.<br /> <br /> Egad, Where DO they find these people?<br /> <br /> H.F. Wolff