Police brutality in Montreal – especially killings at the hands of police officers – is a year-round issue, a point yesterday’s demonstration was attempting to make. The lack of sustained political pressure and media coverage is clearing the path for a controversial police brutality bill currently under debate in the Quebec National Assembly…

In the 1942 classic Casablanca, a scene early in the film pits Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) against Nazi Major Heinrich Strasser in a test of Blaine’s cynical neutrality. Strasser asks Blaine if he can imagine the German army in New York, to which Blaine cooly answers: “Well there are certain sections of New York, Major, that I wouldn’t advise you to try to invade.” The same could now be said of Montreal, only instead of territorial New Yorkers, German Panzer divisions would have to navigate the Montreal’s rapidly eroding streets…

That’s how the British tend to think of monarchy, myself included. Instead of thinking about how one person comes to be one of the wealthiest in the world by virtue of the hereditary ownership of roughly $600 million of land and other assets (still less than J.K. Rowling), we think, “Oh bollocks, should I swallow these cherry seeds or spit them out onto my plate in front of the Queen?” The fact is, the Queen – and the monarchy as a whole – just sort of exist in Britain. Especially since the recession, they’ve kept a low profile…