I love Lubor Zink

"Some people maintain that Canada's basic and overriding interest is national sovereignty. Others are convinced that what really
matters is economic growth. Still others give basic priority to social justice. There are also those who believe that all
effort should be concentrated on transformation of the UN into a world government. Yet another view holds that the most
urgent problem we must tackle is pollution of natural environments. It is not difficult to find arguments in support of every
one of these positions. But that does not mean that any one of them qualifies as indisputable number one priority.

That place surely must be reserved for the historical priority of free men throughout the ages, namely preservation of freedom.
Without freedom there can be no national sovereignty, no social justice, no economic growth worth working for, no peace
and no enjoyment of life even in the cleanest natural environment. That fact that from time immemorial people have valued
freedom above life itself attests that there is no higher priority in the scale of human values. Doubts on this score can
only come from those who have inherited the blessings of freedom, take them for granted and have no notion what loss of freedom means."








"The intimate spiritual and material bonds between Canada and the US grew out of shared concepts of human life within the
framework of the highest degree of individual and political freedom ever attained anywhere in the world. No one maintains
that the socio-politico-economic system of North America, as practiced with minor variations in Canada and the US, is perfect.
Perfection in the sense of idealistic abstractions is beyond the grasp of human nature. But with all its obvious shortcomings our social
system provinces a flexible structure of unparalleled liberty and unparalleled affluence.

The Soviet system of coercive messianism, spawned by contempt of what Marx called "the miserable individual," and fueled
by organized hate, has produced a rigid totalitarian structure that cannot tolerate any of the expressions of freedom we take
for granted. At the same time, while building and enormous military machine and providing material privileges for the
upper crust of its self-appointed ruling clique, it maintains a low general standard of living in what is in effect an archaic police
state. It takes a peculiar mind to seek cordial relations with the rulers of such a society. And it takes a streak of
perversion (or perhaps, blindness) in that peculiar mind to set as a national goal the same type of intimate relations
with a totalitarian state that we have enjoyed, until recently, with the congenial democracy south of the border.

Mr. Trudeau has such a a peculiar mind. While he was exercising it in the ivory tower of the academe, the harm he could do,
though not negligible, was fairly limited. As Prime Minister, who commands a rubber-stamping majority in Parliament, he is in a position to put the country on collision course
with its vital interests. "

"One of Cromwell's Parliaments proposed burning all state records so that, having effaced all official memory of the past, life could begin afresh. Disavowel of antecedents is the quintessential revolutionary act, as Napoleon, too, understood.

When shown a genealogy of the Bonaparte family, Napoleon brushed it aside, remarking: "Je suis mon propre ancetre" (I am my own ancestor. Considering the scale of Napoleon's vanity, and the nature of that genealogy, his rejection of it was understandable. But his rejection also reflected the modern disdain for history as "the dead hand of the past."

Napoleon is the archetypal modern man of action, a bloody nuisance ricocheting around civilization, making history and orphans. He made so much history because he knew so little. He traveled fast because he traveled little, unencumbered by an educated person's sense of limitations, the sense that is the bittersweet fruit of historical understanding. Such people are tolerable, if you like history as made by Corsican bridgards and other modern world-shakers.

...

Many historians, like many other intellectuals, long to be "relevant" to the specific problems of today. Thy flinch from acknowledging that the most useful lesson of history is highly general. It is: things have not always been as they are, and will not always be as they are. This is an especially important insight for Americans, who take for granted freedom and abundance, both of which are, considered in the sweep of history, rare and shortlived phenomena.

History contains more sadness than gladness, more dreams frustrated than fulfilled. But this means that the study of history is, for many historians, unacceptably unfun and unheroic. Like many other intellectuals, many historians want to believe that they are pregnant with the future. They want to dissolve the distinction between thought and action. They are, they think, deliverers: history will yield highly practical "lessons" that will propel manking to the uplands of happiness.

Many modern intellectuals, like optimists through the ages, recoil from this truth: the best use of history is as an inoculation against radical expectations, and hence against embittering dissapointments.

Optimists as different as Marxists and Americans believe in History- Americans call it Progress- as a linear process leading inexorably to higher stages of life. But if historians and other intellectuals were free from Promethean pretensions, young people at school would learn the unfun, unheroic truth that history is circular, like a maelstrom."

-George Will, "Inoculation by History"

"FDR's New Deal broke with nineteenth-century liberalism (which is what passes for conservatism today) by abandoning the premise that society, as distinguished sharply from government, produces the elements of happiness in life, and that government's role is merely to maintain a framework of order in which people pursue happiness. What was new about the New Deal was the notion that government had a duty to provide people with some, and more and more, of the tangible elements of happiness.

Long and forever gone are the days when it was thought that well-bring, economic and otherwise, should be solely the result of the individual's ability to cope with society, with social forces that government could not or should not regulate. The New Deal changed, irreversibly, Americans' expectations, and the legal and psychic relationship of Americans to their government.

This year some GOP conservatives seem to be trying, again, to turn an election into a referendum on the propriety of those expectations and that relationship. It is unclear how the GOP can benefit from so straight-on a challenge to the settled habits of mind of the American majority, which accepts the Rooseveltian premise that government should supply crucial elements of happiness.

The GOP challenge is a risky tactic against Carter, who calls to mind Disraeli's recommendation: Tory men and Whig measures. Carter is an unmistakably conservative person. The values he obviously cherishes and repeatedly invokes- piety, family, community, continuity, industriousness, discipline- are the soul of conservatism, The appeal of Carter to conservatives is in his aspiration to use government vigorously in the service of conservative values."

-George Will, "Odd Man In"

"Most UN members are police regimes. Many of these regimes rule over ersatz nations. Many use their energies to pound together human elements that lack cultural affinities. To such regimes Israel, a real nation, is either unintelligible or a reproach. Regimes resting on force are bound to find fault with the rich legitimizing sources of Israel's nationhood.

Israel became a nation after the United Nations was born. But in a sense Israel is one of the oldest nations (with Egypt and China) represented there. One hundred years hence, if historians bother to remember the UN at all, they may remember it as a mob of regimes representing force without legitimacy, all power and no authority, venting their rage against one of the few nations truly represented there."

-George Will, "Zionism and Legitimacy," 1975

"As Czechoslovakia, a democratic country, was accused of mistreating the German minority in the Sudeten region, so Israel, also a democratic country, is accused of mistreating the Arab minority within Israel itself and also, of course, in the occupied territories. As the creation of the Czechoslovak state after WW1 was called a mistake by Hitler and Chamberlain, so the creation of the Jewish state after WW2 is called a crime by contemporary totalitarians and their appeasers. The insistence by the Czechs that surrendering the Sudeten regions to Hitler would leave Czechoslovakia hopelessly vulnerable to military assualt was derided, especially on the Left, as a shortsighted reliance on the false security of territory and arms; so a similar insistence by the Israelis with regard to the occupied territories is treated today with lofty disdain by contemporary descendants of those believers in the irrelevance to a nation's security of territorial buffers and arms."

-Norman Podhoretz

"In Cambodia the Communists, running true to form, are concentrating their fury on the ultimate enemy of any Communist regime, the people. The Communists have emptied the cities, driving upwards of four million people- young and old, childing mothers and newborn babies, the healthy, halt and lame- on a forced march to nowhere, deep into the countryside where food is scarce and shelter is scarcer still. Even hospitals have been emptied, operations interrupted at gunpoint, doctors and patients sent packing. The Communists call this the "purification" of Cambodia.

This forced march will leave a trail of corpses, and many more at its destination, wherever that is. But that is, according to the Communists, not an atrocity, it is a stern "necessity."

The Detroit Free Press containted a droll (I hope it was meant to be droll) sub-headline on events in Cambodia: "Reds Decree Rural Society." If one kind of society offends you, decree another. Communism, like its totalitarian sibling, fascism, is the culmination of a modern heresy: people are plastic, infinitely malleable under determined pounding. And society is a tinker toy, its shape being whatever the ruling class decrees.

To create a New (Soviet, Chinese, German, Cambodian) Man- and what totalitarian would aim lower?- you must shatter the old man, ripping him from the community that nourishes him. Send him on a forced march into a forbidding future. He may die. If he survives he will be deracinated, demoralized, pliant.

There is no atrocity so gross that American voices will not pipe up in defense of it. Today they say: it is "cultural arrogance" for Americans to call this forced march an atrocity, when it is just different people pursuing their "vision."

This is the mock cosmopolitianism of the morally obtuse. Such people say: only "ideologically blinkered" Americans mistake stern idealism for an atrocity just because it involves the slaughter of innocents. Such people will never face the fact that most atrocities, and all the large ones, from the Thirty Years War through Biafra, have been acts of idealism.

Of course, one must not discount sheer blood lust, and the joy of bullying. Totalitarian governments rest on dumb philosophy and are sustained by secret police. But they are a bully's delight. Totalitarians have never been without apologists here, people who derice vicarious pleasure from watching- from a safe distance, of course; from the meadow, with ice cream bars, if possible- other people ground up by stern "necessities." Apologists say that totalitarians only want totalitarianism for the sake of the revolution. The apologists, being backward, have got things backward.

-George Will, "Famous Victory"

It's always good to be smacked back to reality by the consummate Tory.

"The theologian may indulge the pleasing task of describing Religion as she descended from Heaven, arrayed in her native purity. A more melancholy duty is imposted on the historian. He must discover the inevitable mixture of error and corruption which she contracted in a long residence upon Earth, among a weak and degenerate race of beings."

-Edward Gibbon, "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, XV"

"In retrospect there is a quality of inevitability about the course he did puruse. But historians insist that the inevitable is inevitable only after man have made it happen."

-Teddy White, "The Making of the President, 1964"

"I just want to remind you, ladies and gentleman, of one proven fact in history, because we conservatives are always blamed for wanting to go backwards. That is not true. We just want to take a look at what has happened before we try it again. Because everything that this administration is trying today has been tried not by just our own government, but in other governments of the history of the world, and I remind you, they have never succeeded. A government that is big enough to give everything that you need and want is also big enough to take it all away."

-Barry Goldwater, 1964 campaign

"[Grits are] men...who tremble with anticipation because they have seen the rouged face of power."

-Pierre Trudeau

"But the Liberal Party is the greatest whorehouse in the western world and you know what happens when you try playing piano in the parlor of a place like that. Pretty soon, you're in the thick of the fray upstairs."

-Rene Levesque

"Quebec politicians have never been either Liberal or Conservative. They have always been simply and wholeheartedly French."

-Frank Underhill

"The philosophy of the Liberal Party is very simple- say anything, think anything, or better still, do not think at all, but put us in power because it is we who can govern you best."

-Pierre Trudeau

"The Liberal Party has no dogma. Its creed is unity- national unity and party unity."

-Michael Pitfield

"The Liberal Party is like a high-powered fraternity. It rushes the most promising young men in every generation. And then it demands their absolute loyalty."

-Wilson Parasiuk

""It's the League for Social Reconstruction all over again," they would say. "Those people will get sick of it, always sitting there on the Opposition benches yelling across the floor. There's a limit to altruism. If you can't win, you can't get any policies effected, no matter how high-minded or well-meaning they are.""

-Christina McCall

Antipathy to capitalism is of legendary proportions, especially among the classes whose status is higher under aristocracies and dictatorships: aristocrats, clergy, scholars, artists, and of course government officials. Working people tend to prefer democratic capitalism which, as the Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci pointed out, quickly raises them into the middle class. Thus, even now that Marxism has been discredited as a social ideal, we may expect new forms of anticapitalism to appear. Eric Voegelin once pointed out that Marxism is a species of gnosticism, that is, a perfectionism (“the paradise of the proletariat”) access to which depends upon a privileged form of knowledge (gnosis, in this case “scientific socialism”) that makes a certain elite superior to everybody else. Gnosticism also implies a certain impatience with the human body, with imperfections, with democratic politics and the slow procedures of persuasion, with compromise, and (in short) with the human condition. Now that Marxism is no longer a credible vehicle for this underlying passion, what will replace it?

In 1990, it seems already clear that antimodern passions run high; even a passion for primitivism is again in evidence. Similar signs were present in the Romantic Movement of the nineteenth century, notably in the operas of Richard Wagner. In the origins of totalitarianism, especially in Italy and Germany, the call of the primitive was quite important, including the cult of unspoiled nature. No doubt, the passions of National Socialism are as dead as the passions of communism. But the underlying sensibility is still very much alive. Capable of assuming a great many shapes, perhaps the cult of nature will be put to creative use in the environmental movement. That movement, however, has already shown many signs of hatred for business corporations, industry, property, and even- on a different plane of reality- the idea of “progress.” Its tendency to turn on the power of the state to enforce its own passions is also manifest. One can predict with some certainty that environmentalism is likely to replace Marxism as the main carrier of gnosticism (and anticapitalism) in the near future.

This is not, of course, inevitable. Environmentalists could conclude that the new forms of awareness they are teaching the public can best be served by a free and inventive economy. Whatever the public wants, industry has an incentive to invent a way of supplying. Given the widespread desire for environmental protection now growing in the public mind, a shrewd investor might even anticipate on the part of business corporations an outpouring of new technologies, approaches, products, and processes, around which entire new environmental-minded industries may come into existence. As the public becomes willing to pay for environmental enhancement, ways to achieve it will be swiftly invented. That is already happening. The newer the factory, the cleaner in tends to be; the more recent the product, the more “environment friendly.” Meanwhile, the public as a whole will not wish to abolish the benefits of modernity- the medical benefits especially- even though some extremists might. Environmental activists will want television for their messages and please, and airplanes to carry them to international conferences. An environmentally conscious industry will thus have plenty to do; the question is only whether environmentalists will perceive it as an ally or not.

Many environmentalists are, of course, conservatives quite committed to the capitalist economy, but many others are hostile to capitalism. The latter might wish to consider two points: First, the dire state of environmental protections both in socialist and in traditionalist (third world) countries; and second, the fact that no other system is as likely to produce the wealth necessary for environmental protections as democratic capitalist systems.

Another frequently overlooked source of the anticapiatlist leaning is the ancient and medieval experience of wealth as a zero-sum game: what some gained, others lost. Wealth was then thought to lie solely in land and gold coin and precious objects, and was usually acquired by plunder, conquest, or favor. In this context such aphorisms arose as Radix malorum est cupiditas (“Cupidity is the root of evils”); “Property is theft”; and “The rich get richer, the poor poorer.”

A third strain of this anticapitalist leaning is communicated through illusions about the precapitalist system. Not much has changed in the harsh life of the poor from the time of Christ until the realities of France as described by Victor Hugo in Les Miserables. Similarly, before 1989 critics of capitalism seldom counted the moral and economic costs of socialism; they gave it the benefit of their dreams. Admittedly, the morality of democratic capitalism is low when compared with the supernatural standards of Christianity and other codes of spiritual perfection. But its daily practice in supplying opportunity to the poor is superior to the daily practice of any other historical system, traditional or socialist. It does not pretend to offer a moral paradise, only greater liberties and more flexible supports for moral living than any other system. It brings temptations, but also incredibly high moral possibilities. That is why people migrate in such numbers and with such passion toward it.

A fourth source of anticapitalist leaning is to associate capitalism solely with material things, with commodities, with objects. This is the usage of Karl Marx; it is also the usage adopted by Pope John Paul II in his encyclical Laborem Exercens. To take this approach, however, is to overlook the spirit of capitalism, its dynamic principle, its central commitment to practical intellect: to invention, discovery, reasoned cooperation, and the intellectual and moral virtue of enterprise. Were the impulse of capitalism solely materialistic, the system would have long since fallen into narcissism, hedonism, and death. This was the theory of Marx; namely that the alienation inherent in the system would drive the workers to “narcissism” or, in the current Marxist lingo, “consumerism.” Instead, the spirit of capitalism seems constantly to reinvigorate itself, to work revolution after revolution in technological possibility (mechanical, industrial, and electronic), and to inspire creativity in every sphere of life. It is a system designed to arouse and to liberate, no the body, but the creative soul. It arouses even the high ideals of those who disdain the “consumerism” they think affects others.

Communism taught citizens to respect one moral principle alone: total subjection to the power of party rule. Nothing else mattered, neither truth nor fairness nor competence. However lazy, incompetent, immoral, or even criminal one’s behavior might be judged under other systems, under communism no burden of guilt had to be borne for it, so long as one was recognized as a loyal, obedient follower of the party. The polluting of the natural environment of Eastern Europe, the corruption of the moral ethos, and the relentless spending down of the capital stock of communist countries has left behind a wasteland- except for one thing. Somehow the love for liberty survived. Human nature has asserted itself, like green shoots at the end of winter. How to give moral nurture to those shoots is now on the world’s agenda. A huge moral task lies before us.

-Michael Novak, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism

"We must remember what we have forgotton- for example, the old joke about the man who is being shown the wonderful new Moscow subway, and after a while asks, "But where are the trains?" The Russian answers, "But what about lynching in the South?" It's no joke any longer."

-Nathan Glazer

"The universe is very, very big. It also loves a paradox. For example, it has some extremely strict rules. Rule number one: Nothing lasts forever. Not you or your family or your house or your planet or the sun. It is an absolute rule. Therefore when someone says that their love will never die, it means that their love is not real, for everything that is real dies.

Rule number two: Everything lasts forever. For example, George was made up of billions of atoms, some of which had, at various times, been parts of, among other things, a Tyrannosaurus Rex, a red felt hat, and some porridge. In a staggering coincidence, Claudette had a few atoms of that same bowl of porridge in her system. It had been served to Alexander the Great during his campaign in Afghanistan. He loved porridge.

Perhaps that was the key to the attraction between George and Claudette- their shared porridge molecules. It makes as much sense as anything else that goes on between men and women."

-Craig Ferguson, pg 108 "Between the Bridge and the River"

Spring Things

After finishing out a rather stressful period, I again return to my favourite form of retail therapy- renting out half the damn library. Cheap, literate, and fulfilling. I haven't even finished the last load of books. We have:

White- The Making of the President, 1964
McGinnis- The selling of the president, 1968
Flanagan- Waiting for the wave
Schlesinger- The cycles of american history
Schlesinger- The politics of hope
Clarkson- the big red machine
Davey- the rainmaker
Machiavelli- the prince
Camp- an eclectic eel

I was considering renting Black's Duplessis, but goddamn, that is one massive tome.

Uninhibited Scholasticism

Two more essays from school, about al Qaeda and then the UN.


The Rationality of Irrationality:
Analyzing al Qaeda’s Campaign of Suicide Terrorism and its Effectiveness

The terror, fear, and destruction unleashed upon the world by Osama Bin Laden and al Qaeda have shaken the Western nations to their core. The Islamic group has unleashed a campaign of suicide terrorism, led by their rich and charismatic leader , aimed at Western nations and their Middle Eastern supporters. Their campaign rests on the hypothesis, best summarized by Robert A. Pape in his paper “The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism,” that suicide terrorism is driven by a quest for territorial or political concessions from a larger nation to a smaller group, and that it is utterly rational in its effectiveness . Pape organizes suicide actions from 1980-2001 into sixteen separate campaigns . Eleven of these have concluded, with six of them ending up with territorial gains or political concessions from the stronger group to the weaker, a fifty-five percent ‘success’ rate . This is compared to ‘normal’ international actions towards coercion, through military or economic means, that succeed less than one-third of the time . Citing such campaigns as Hamas or Hezbollah versus Israel, Pape displays that a persistent campaign of suicide terrorism can force moderate concessions . Al Qaeda’s campaign has included attacks escalating in scale, from earlier bombings of American embassies and military bases, to a nightclub in Bali, to the 2005 London and 2004 Madrid subway bombings, all culminating in the horrors of 9/11 . Their usual style of large and very visible attacks, often resulting in hundreds dead and thousands injured, is unusual when compared to Pape’s other recognized campaigns, where groups such as the Tamil Tigers or Hezbollah launched numerous smaller attacks. These latter tactics were proven more effective than normal means of coercion and, logically, al Qaeda’s attacks, with their increasing scope, would then bring increased action towards their goals. However, the suicide terrorist campaign of al Qaeda doesn’t help them achieve their goals because of the sheer self-defeating scope of these goals, and the increasing resolve that al Qaeda inspires in its enemies.

Speaking in his 1996 “Declaration of Jihad Against Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Mosques,” Osama Bin Laden outlines his grievances, and the goals of his burgeoning suicide terrorism campaign that would eventually lead to the devastation of 9/11. He speaks of his desire for a Pan-Arabic Nation stretching across the Middle East, ruled by Sharia law and autonomous of Western influences, a goal harkening back to the days of the Ottoman caliphate . These concepts of Islamic nationalism and protectionism are concurrent in his declaration; however, Bin Laden usually comes down to one main theme:

“The latest and the greatest of these aggressions experienced by the Muslims since the death of the Prophet is the occupation of the land of the two Holy Places, the foundation of the House of Islam, the place of the revelation, the sources of the message and the place of the noble Kabah, the Qiblah of all Muslims. ”

American forces established bases in Saudi Arabia during the First Gulf War, to protect American energy interests in the region against the aggression of Saddam Hussein. The “Land of the Two Holy Mosques,” Saudi Arabia, is the holiest site in Islam, as it contains the holy cities of Mecca and Medina . The House of Saud’s complacency with the American government, and with Western energy corporations, allows Bin Laden to tie Islamic fundamentalism into Arab nationalism, making them an intertwined cause. These territorial grievances fit Pape’s theory of suicide terrorism campaigns existing for the sake of forcing geographical and political concessions. Bin Laden’s major motivation is shown to be freeing the Arabian peninsula, with its extreme religious relevance and its more earthly oil reserves, of American military and economic influence over the ruling House of Saud . The difference, though, between Hamas using suicide terrorism to force Israel from the Palestinian territories, and al Qaeda flying planes into buildings in their crusade against America, is the scope of the expected concession. An integral idea in Pape’s work is that:

“Suicide terrorism can coerce states to abandon limited or modest goals, such as withdrawal from territory of low strategic importance or, as in Israel’s case in 1994 and 1995, a temporary and partial withdrawal from a more important one. However, suicide terrorism is unlikely to cause targets to abandon goals central to their wealth or security. ”

Pape and Bin Laden both use as an example the American withdrawal from Lebanon in 1983 after a deadly suicide attack on an American embassy. Bin Laden trumpets it as an example of how the Americans are a “paper tiger,” of how once al Qaeda spills American blood, the Westerners will lose their resolve and leave . Though the Americans did withdraw in 1983, Pape displays that is was a humanitarian mission and success was not critical to their national security . Thus, the more important of a concession that a group are trying to achieve, the less likely it’ll occur. The goals of al Qaeda are ambitions indeed, as they want to end the reign of the House of Saud, end Western energy interests in Arabia, create a Pan-Arabic Islamic state, and force an American military withdrawal from both Arabia and Iraq. Unfortunately for Bin Laden, the House of Saud has endlessly deep pockets to support themselves, the West lives in a culture driven by petroleum where natural energy is central to living a comfortable life, the Middle East seems more interested in Shia-Sunni sectarian violence than unity, and American forces aren’t relenting from their support of Israel, and other friendly regimes in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Egypt, Afghanistan, and Turkey. Al Qaeda’s goals are a far cry from the simple self-determination of a small area that both Hamas and Hezbollah campaign for. Al Qaeda has recognized the scope of their goals, and then increased the scope of their attacks to a visibility and deadliness not yet seen in the history of suicide terrorism, all in the name of forcing these massive concessions, and yet they’re no closer to achieving them than they were in 1996.

A central tenant to Bernard Lewis’ ideas about al Qaeda is that Bin Laden views his struggle as one of the underdog. Lewis theorizes that Bin Laden believes his Mujahedeen’s defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan directly led to its collapse of the Soviet regime. Viewing the Soviet Union as the stronger, both militarily and politically, of the two Cold War superpowers, Bin Laden then believes that he’s knocked off the harder of the two, so the United States wouldn’t stand a chance . However, instead of collapsing like a “paper tiger” after the horrors of 9/11, 7/7, and a myriad of other bombings, the Western world’s resolve has strengthened. The Taliban, al Qaeda’s primary supporting regime, was ousted in a shocking display of American military might. Though the Taliban still exists as a political force in Afghanistan and Pakistan, it has taken grievous losses in leadership, manpower, and influence since 9/11, and its degradation has been reflected in the ruin of al Qaeda. Still acting as an international force and influence, with many attacks carried out in Iraq, and the 7/7 and Madrid bombings claimed to their name, the organization has become more of a figurehead of religious Pan-Arab nationalism. The latter attacks, examples of the increased scope that al Qaeda works with, were carried out by semi-autonomous groups that then claimed to be part of al Qaeda. In that sense, since the logistical hammering it took in Afghanistan, al Qaeda has become more of a ‘brand name’ than a tight terrorist organization. As well, both the United States and the United Kingdom have ramped up domestic security, which Pape theorizes is the best way to combat suicide terrorism .

The effect of this is seen in the absence of domestic terrorism in these countries, since 9/11 and then 7/7, though not due to lack of effort by al Qaeda and other affiliated groups. Since increasing the scale of its suicide activities, al Qaeda has lost its primary home and training grounds in Afghanistan, and has been driven to dwelling in caves in the rugged mountainous frontiers of Pakistan.
Pape displays that suicide terrorism is a rational and often effective means of gaining territorial concessions. Al Qaeda’s goals are vast in scope and ambition, as they work towards achieving Pan-Arabic dominance in the Middle East, and autonomy for their holy Arabian Peninsula. However, their campaign of suicide terrorism hasn’t followed the usual path of such groups as Hamas and Hezbollah, as they have carried out one with more visible and devastating attacks. The reaction to these tactics haven’t been collapse, as Bin Laden believes with his ‘paper tiger’ theory, but have been the strengthening of Western resolve, of domestic security, and of foreign actions against these Islamic aggressors. The unique suicide terrorism campaign of al Qaeda has failed at achieving their ambitious goals, thanks to the very nature and scope of these goals, and the reactionary effects that their enhanced attacks have caused.





Something Rotten in the State of Denmark:
The Crucial Failings of the United Nations

The UN and its Security Council exist as an attempt to hold nation-states accountable to a multilateral, supranational legalistic system. After death and destruction choked the 20th Century world a second time, the UN was produced in 1945 as an attempt to create collective security. Unfortunately, the organization has become dangerously archaic and impotent. In Glennon’s “Why the Security Council Failed,” he writes of how the 2003 Iraq War spelled the doom of the UN, as the unilateral US ignored the Security Council, and thus made a mockery of the idea of firm international law . He argues that the idea of a multilateral council to keep the world secure has been unsuccessful in the face of reality and the power-hungry, self-serving nation-states that multilateralism empowers . The ‘hyperstate’ that is the US could ignore the Security Council and end the attempts at multilateralism that China, Russia, and France were trying to establish through the Council . Glennon’s main theory that the 2003 Iraq situation heralded the death of the Security Council’s usefulness is perhaps rather late, as it could be argued that the UN lost all legitimacy when eight-hundred thousand Rwandans died under UN watch. Tharoor, on the other hand, argues that the UN is still very relevant, and that Glennon didn’t look at the larger scale of things . He states that the 2003 Iraqi situation is only one isolated incident, and that the UN makes an easy scapegoat for the world’s ills . Tharoor emphasis that it does much good in terms of world heath and wellbeing that goes unnoticed, and that the US participates and benefits from inclusion . The core of Tharoor’s argument is that multilateralism is “a means, not an end, ” and that the inclusiveness of the UN gives its decisions and resolutions extra legitimacy. Tharoor, a UN Undersecretary-General, gives an obviously unbiased account of his employer’s uses, and his squealing about positive multilateralism only looks all the more feckless when compared to the killing fields of Kigali, Srebrenica, and Darfur. Given the Security Council’s core mandate of maintaining international peace and security, this essay will argue that the UN loses its legitimacy because of its blind inclusiveness and the failures in international security that ensue. These failures are all the more blatant because hundreds of thousands of people, hypothetically protected by the UN, usually end up in misery or dying as a result.

A business that succeeds at many small things, such as keeping its employers well stocked with staplers and fun HR games, but fails at balancing its budget and making a profit, will go down in infamy as a doomed venture. Keeping roads well-maintained and schools open are all positive things for a government to work on. However, if the government then proceeds to ruin the economy, harm millions of citizens fiscally in the process, and thus fail at its main mandate, then the government won’t be kept in office. Why should the UN be treated any differently? Glennon argues that the 2003 Iraqi situation spells the death knell of the Security Council’s usefulness; however, using just recent examples, Iraq is seen as just one in a long list of spectacular, and often bloody, failures of international security. The crucial faults are obvious to any idiot with five minutes to spare watching the news. The failings of the UN to provide security aren’t really the fault of hard-working diplomats, but exist within the very structure of the Council’s mandate. A Security Council exists where countries have permanent vetoes on issues that they themselves are perpetuating. A slow genocide exists in Darfur, yet another in what appears a wearying storm of dying central Africans (how dare that they keep dying and taking TV time away from American Idol); however, because the UN values state sovereignty above all, the Council needs the consent of either the Sudanese government to peace keep in Sudan, or of the permanent Council members so as to halt the genocide with the stricter measures enabled by Chapter XII of the Charter. The problem then is that the Sudanese government is the main backer of the genocidal militias in Darfur, and that because China has extensive interests in Darfur’s natural energy sector, they’ll support the Sudanese government. Tharoor’s glorification of inclusive multilateralism that supposedly gives Security Council resolutions legitimacy is fine until that very multilateralism starts to work against the people of the nations it represents. If a member of the Security Council is the backer or perpetrator of a gross violation of human security, then Tharoor’s multilateralism legitimizes genocidal thugs. This is the fundamental problem of credibility that the UN faces- if they can’t stop the worst human rights violations, what justifies their existence? Tharoor states that we shouldn’t radically reform the international security structure because “One would not close down the Senate (or even the Texas legislature) because its members failed to agree on one bill .” The essential difference that Tharoor misses is that eight-hundred thousand Tutsis aren’t butchered in the streets of Houston when the Texas legislature fails to pass a bill. He also states that “When the UN Security Council passes a resolution, it is seen as speaking for (and in the interests of) humanity as a whole .” That is fine and all, but the resolutions that really matter aren’t the ones passed, but the ones not being passed because of the selfish interests of individual states. These missed resolutions are the ones that result in a copious amount of human beings dead and a massive blemish on the face of the Security Council. Tharoor manages to make a number of good points in favour of the UN, though; of the humanitarian works done through such organizations as the WHO, and of how there is a long streak of peacekeeping successes . However, with multilateral programs concerning food and disease, there’s not much use vaccinating and feeding a Rwandan if he’s then going to be hacked to death with a machete a few years later. No person or organization is perfect, but when you’re dealing with the lives of millions, you’d better be damn close to perfection. The very inclusiveness that Tharoor trumpets is the major factor in the collapse of the UN in its ability to act as an effective security force in the world.

The failure of the Security Council to fulfill its mandate then leaves a vacuum for security, one that is now filled by ‘hyperstates’ in a unilateral system. The Westphalian system of clearly defined nation-state sovereignty, and multilateral internationalism that was further modeled at the Congress of Vienna, is an obsolete system. Glennon speaks of how each singular nation will use its own available options to further its goals . The US will use unilateral force to further theirs, and because France doesn’t have anywhere near as much hard power as the US, it’ll use the available methods- it’s archaic spot as a permanent member on the Security Council. France’s opposition of the US had nothing to do with ideology or ‘right and wrong,’ and everything to do with exerting long-lost influence, and propping up a fascist Iraqi regime that helpfully gobbled up French arms and weaponry. Another view on Glennon is the historical one. Europe, of all continents, has faced the horrors that unabashed nation-statism has created, of balances of power, arms races, and eventually world wars. Logically, Europe would’ve then learned from these experiences and then moved on to the view that a supranational organization such as the European Union is the best way forward for European peace. So far, it looks like they’re correct, as France and Germany seem far more interested in bashing Americans than squabbling over Alsace-Lorraine. However, these examples of supranational continental organizations aren’t rare, as we see the success stories of NATO, NAFTA, the EU, the burgeoning AU, and others. The problem that Glennon and this essay then face is how to create a successful supranational organization dedicated to true global security? When the UN Human Rights Council contains such benevolent purveyors of human rights as Iran, China, Saudi Arabia, Russia, and Venezuela, then it isn’t hard to see the main issue with a truly inclusive organization . Perhaps dangling a large carrot on a stick in front of nations, the carrot being inclusion to the UN, bringing all the smaller benefits that Tharoor trumpets, in exchange for acceptable human right levels, might create positive change. If being ostracized from the UN, and the international community, is what is necessary to force China to stop its harvesting of Falun Gong member’s organs, Russia’s regime to stop murdering journalists, Iran to stop stoning women to death for being raped, and Saudi Arabia to recognize that women deserve a better societal status than camels, then ostracizing is what is called for. There are many benefits to being included in the UN, as Tharoor helpfully points out, and those benefits are the best way to force change in regimes. There’s no point in inclusiveness for the sake of security if those included are the ones shattering the security. China is supporting genocidal regimes in the Sudan and Zimbabwe (hey, highest inflation and lowest life-expectancy in the world), with economic and political measures, and yet China has a voice on the Security Council equal or greater to many other nations that manage to have a basic inkling towards the inherent right’s of mankind. This kind of multilateralism, pandering to feckless thugs, brutal theocrats, and incoherent communists, and allowing them an equal voice to nations that give a fig for human rights, is contradictory to everything the UN mandate sets out to achieve. Tharoor’s idea of inclusiveness breeding legitimacy is ultimately self-defeating, as history has proven again and again, upon some dry Central African plain, or in the midst of an Asian jungle, as preventable conflicts turn into burning orgies of human despair, while the organization that tasks itself with stopping these horrors is sustained by bowing to purveyors of the same terror and fear.

Glennon’s article is a sounding for reform in the bureaucratic nightmare of the UN. Unfortunately, this call is a bit too late for a number of Africans and Europeans who have already been butchered in the name of racism, abject nationalism, and plain old rage, while the UN stands idly by. As stated before, the Security Council didn’t become outdated when a blithe US skipped by and invaded Iraq in 2003, it lost all meaning when eight-hundred thousand Rwandans were hacked to bits while Americans (paging Madeleine Albright) spent their time “ducking and pressuring others to duck, as the death toll leapt from thousands to tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands. ” No nation in this world is innocent of harming international security to some extent; however, this malaise of cultural relativism has led the UN and the international community to believe that an entirely corrupt and depraved regime in China is the better of numerous Western nations that have spent their political capital desperately furthering the cause of human rights. Entrance to a supranational organization that brings benefits and true legitimacy to its members must be accountable, so that Americans ignoring the Geneva Convention in secret CIA prisons, and Chinese harvesting the organs of political minorities, are both held to a universal standard of human rights and belonging. Only through offering a large enough stick to shake, in terms of soft power and humanitarian benefit, can the UN become truly legitimate. Otherwise, more time will continue to be spent sitting back and watching the latest African crisis on CNN.

And, the Budget

The budget was, as any reasonable person was expecting, a solid one to stave off or be carried into an election. Very smart political budget with specific targetting of the "Tim Horton's/Canadian Tire" crowd, with all eyes on rural Quebec and suburban Ontario. Terrible economic budget, of course, but it's a minority parliament, what were ideologues expecting? It wasn't a budget of ideology, but politics, the PM was allowed to get away with an ideological budget in 2006 because it was immediately after an election. Just because this wasn't as fiscally conservative as the first doesn't mean it's the new fiscal direction of this government. It's pure politics, nothing more, trying to make the CPC seem more "compassionate," and trying to get Canada used to the idea of a CPC majority. Do I like all the spending? Of course not, but any idiot could see the political uses of this budget, and how it could be relevant towards building a sustainable Conservative coalition. Think long-term.

I wasn't expecting an election from the budget, as I correctly assumed that at least one of the opposition leaders would put their political career ahead of partisan opposition to a Conservative budget that was intentionally made so hard to oppose. No parties wanted an election, and Duceppe gave the other two opposition parties a great rhetorical advantage by giving them this chance to oppose the CPC with no serious repercussions. As an aside, I'm assuming that the PMO was saving universal Income Splitting for a possible campaign, as a prime platform pillar, as it's a slam-dunk one.

The most interesting repercussions here are for Quebec, and its elections. They are, of course, going to be pivotal to the political health of federal Canada. If Boisclair wins, then Dion insantly gains 10x more credibility, and it will be seen as a repudiation of the PM's soft federalism. If the best possible solution, a Charest minority with Dumont opposition, comes about, this reverberates back to Ottawa as well. It's a huge blow to the morale of the PQ/BQ campaign machine, and a sign that there are federal seats to be had for the CPC in ADQ country. Things are only going to get more interesting.

On Israel

The defining moment that drew me to the Conservative Party was last summer, in the midst of the Israel/Hezbollah war. The PM's firm support of Israel was brilliant, gutsy, and a politically wise move. One in a series of moves devoted to splitting the LPC caucus and driving them further to the left, thus exacerbating the fatal divide in the left. One of a series of moves that, though perhaps only 40% (a somewhat random number, mind you, but pertinent) of Canadians support it, it's that 40% that'll elect you a majority in a FPTP system. More importantly, it was the morally correct move. Israel is seven million surrounded by hundreds of millions that are pledged and devoted to driving those seven million into the sea, not just an independant Palestine, but pure annihilation of both a Jewish state and the Jewish race, and the establishment of a fundamentalist Islamic theocracy stretching across all the Middle East.

Israel is a bulwark of democratic rights in the name of this theocratic plague. Is it perfect? Of course not, Israel has its human rights problems and should be held accountable for them, but is Israel a helluva lot better than the alternative? Of course. The PM firmly standing for Israel was absolutely the correct move.

Especially at the micro-level of the Israel/Hezbollah war. Compare these two sides:

One which was founded on the mandate of ending an Israeli occupation, succeeded at this task, but still existing with a sub-state independant military force which commits terrorist actions. One that started the conflict by invading Israeli sovereignty and attacking their army, one that ignores UN resolutions, and one that fires missiles indiscriminantly into Israeli urban areas, hitting schools or houses, either is fine because Jews aren't people, right? Finally, one side that is primarily funded by one of the worst and most abusive theocratic regimes in the world.

On the other side, though nowhere near shining and perfect, you have a side that was retaliating to initial attacks. One that left Lebanon and listened to UN mandates. One who mainly struck infrastructure targets and structures where prior missiles had been launched from into Israel. One who left goddamn pamphlets laying around saying "Next up, we're invading this region. It's most likely in your best interest to leave the area." It was the most humane military campaign fought in years, due to media attention, which partially contributed to how ineffective it was. Did they commit atrocities and human rights violations? Of course, and those actions are reprehensible, but find me a conflict, throughout history, that has NEVER had violations of basic human rights. It's a sad fact about the nature of war, but it's the reality you face with human conflict. So it comes down to a matter of which side is more morally correct in the conflict and tries to be more humane? Which side supports basic Enlightment ideals? Which side listens to intergovernmental organizations? The answer is, of course, Israel.

Best move you've made yet, PM Harper.

American Stylings

Now we have Elizabeth May running in Central Nova- Mackay country. To quote myself:

"This is quite possibly the stupidest thing ever. The Greens don't need more publicity, the environment is the flavour of the month, by far. The Greens need to prove that their support isn't a paper-tiger- that they can get 10% if the popular vote, win a seat, and prove they're a legitimate party- instead of being a "protest" vote for people to stick their polling numbers in, where all that support will melt away to real parties in an election. May choosing this ridiculous strategy does nothing to move the Green party forward.

This isn't good for the CPC either. A strong Green party splits the left, steals votes from the LPC and NDP, and could help the CPC slip in and win a few close ridings. The PMO needs to do everything possible to empower the Greens, while May is just shooting herself in the foot here."

Now, to American politics! It's roughly a year and three-quarters to the election, and the better part of a year before primaries are starting, so predictions seem to be fairly useless. It'll be interesting to watch, though, assuming we don't all get sick of the drama. Now, my intelligent picks right now are Gore/Obama vs Romney/Guiliani, not because I like them the best, but because I think it's more likely to end up like that. Ask me a few months ago for the GOP ticket and I'd have said McCain/Huckabee, but I've changed my mind. Let's go over a few things and then to the seperate parties:

-I've always supported Governors for President. Being El Presidente is an administrative job, not a legislative one, and you can have all the positions in the world and be an amazing Senate leader, but that doesn't guarentee you'll run an effective government. Governors (and generals) have the prior administrative experience to do this. History proves this all, as well, as Governors historically beat the hell out of Senators both in terms of winning elections, and in effectively governing, especially towards foreign policy. There's abberations to this, of course, but it's a good general rule of thumb to go with.

-This is the weakest GOP crop in years. If Jeb Bush's last name wasn't Bush, he'd be a slam-dunk candidate, but that's not the case, so it's a moot point. The primaries are going to be very interesting in terms of the Republican soul. It's going to be a brutal and dirty fight between the social conservative wing and the old-style Goldwater Republicans, and the former are going to win out, because they have the clout and the machinery to succeed. That's why the big three (Romney, Guiliani, and McCain) are going to be desperately pandering to the social conservatives, the old flip-flop, and it's going to be sickening. The winner in the primaries will be the one that's the most convincing at pandering to the religious right, however, more on that later.

The Democrats:

-Clinton doesn't have a chance in hell. She inherited all of her husbands's fame, money, and political machinery, which guarentees her the old college try, and she wouldn't make a bad president, either, she's smart and rather competent. However, there's a lot of smart and competent people within the Beltway and that doesn't make them good presidential candidates. She has no charisma, everything she says is entirely focus-grouped, she rubs people the wrong way, and when it gets down and dirty versus charismatic Obama and Edwards, she'll be exposed. That, and another Clinton or Bush in the White House would make me puke. The Clinton political machine won't win this one.

-Obama's a perfect VP candidate. He has the charisma of JFK, and he'll make waves. However, he's a senator, which is a major strike against him, and he has no experience. My main problem with him is that, in the Illinois legislature, he abstained on every major issue. This is smart politics, as it allows him to define himself on his own choosing when the time comes, but it's dirty and rather manipulative. Personally, he's just not a man I want running the West Wing, because he has no foreign policy experience, and there's no guarentees he'll run a well-oiled White House like a Governor can. Give him VP and let him spend four years charming people's pants off and gaining executive experience. As well, he could be key in winning the Industrial Northeast and its electoral college dominance.

-Edwards is charismatic, but that won't get him far with Obama in the running, and he didn't carry the South as his VP nomination was intended to do. He has no use if he can't bring in Democratic votes in the South, and I just don't see him getting very far against the big names.

-Richardson is my favourite candidate from both sides. The man has cabinet experience (in Energy, a relevant position for sure), UN experience, tonnes of foreign policy experience, and the administrative experience from being a Governor. He'd make the best president out of all of them, and is the perfect darkhorse. I can only see his support build as more attention is placed on finding a competent president and less on personal charisma (a reactionary movement after eight years of folksy bumbling) . He'd carry the Hispanic vote, too.

-Gore is my pick for the candidacy. He'll let Clinton and Obama beat the hell out of each other for a few months, wasting money and political capital, and he'll swoop in as the avenging environmentalist angel. There'll be a hot, dry summer, the environmental hysteria will get worse and worse, the cult will build, and Gore will take it. He has the experience that Obama doesn't, both in terms of winning presidential elections and in being part of the executive wing, he has the charisma that Clinton doesn't, and he has hordes of environmentalists that'd fight to the death for him. Put money on it.

-I like Vilsack and Dodd because they spend time on the Daily Show. Vilsack/Obama in '12!

The Republicans:

-Romney will take it. It comes down to which of the big names can pander most effectively to the socon base, and he'll do it. If the Mormonism comes up, he can do what JFK did in West Virginia with Catholicism, make it an issue of bigotry. Paint people who vote against him as bigots, voting against his personal religious beliefs, and demonize them. That, and he's still on his first wife...He was a good governor, and has the charisma and presidential "aura."

-Awww, I still feel bad for McCain. He won my love in 2000 and still hasn't lost most of it. But he just looks tired, he's lost the drive and appeal that carried him in 2000, and his pandering just isn't convincing. He's running on name right now and it won't last. The support of the Iraq war will cost him, and I just don't think he has the energy to beat out a driven Romney. I'm sure he'll be savaged in the primaries by the socon attack machine, as well, history simply repeating itself.

-Speaking of being savaged in the primaries....You can bet good money that Guiliani will never recover from South Carolina. The videos of him saying abortions should be subsidized, of him in drag being kissed by Donald Trump...he's not going to be able to "trump" this all with his tough on crime/security message. GOP politics are just too dirty for an urban New Yorker with a socially liberal past to get through, no matter how hard on terror or crime he may be. Which is a pity, he'd have great influence in carrying parts of the Industrial Northeast.

-Gingrich will be making a run for it. Won't get anywhere, but why the hell else would he randomly tell everyone about his infidelities? So that it doesn't become a possible election issue...

I'd personally like to see Richardson/Obama vs McCain/Guiliani. But it won't happen, and Al Gore is going to be the next president of the United States.

Reading is fun!

My last few weeks of reading, just finished and about to be checked back into the library:

Goldberg, Robert Alan- Barry Goldwater
Goldwater, Barry M.- With no apologies : the personal and political memoirs of United States Senator Barry M. Goldwater
Gourevitch, Philip- We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families : stories from Rwanda
White, Theodore- The making of the President, 1960
Perlstein, Rick- Before the storm : Barry Goldwater and the unmaking of the American consensus
Kinsella, Warren- Kicking ass in Canadian politics
Newman, Peter C.- The secret Mulroney tapes : unguarded confessions of a prime minister
Gratton, Michel- "So, what are the boys saying?" : an inside look at Brian Mulroney in power
Flanagan, Thomas- Game theory and Canadian politics

The books I just checked out, to be devoured in the upcoming weeks:

Michel Gratton- Still the Boss
Jeffrey Simpson- The Friendly Dictatorship
Dalton Camp- Whose Country is this Anyway?
Charles Taylor- Radical Tories
Michael Oakeshott- Rationalism in Politics
Hugh Segal- No Surrender
Jeffrey Simpson- Discipline of Power
Friedrich Hayek- The Constitution of Liberty

A few of the many books that I own and really need to get around to reading:

Craig Ferguson- Between the bridge and the river
Kurt Vonnegut- Galapagos
Barry Goldwater- The Conscience of a Conservative
Truman Capote- In Cold Blood
Eddie Goldenberg- Inside Ottawa
Bernard Lewis- The Crisis of Islam

An Assortment

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6IPHmJWmDk

a link to the 1st part of an 8 part series made by the BBC (all 8 parts are on youtube), making the case for global warming skepticism. The video's been tossed around all the Tory blogs to an extent, but I want to save it for future reference. It's the antithesis to An Inconvenient Truth, and makes just as compelling and convincing an argument as Gore did, even moreso in my opinion, because the side of skepticism is usually the one I favour. But watch it, even if you're a terribly concerned environmentalist, because the "truth" has little meaning if you're not exposed to both sides of an argument.

I'm glad to see all this attention paid to Zimbabwe. Mugabe made a big mistake when he started beating down his opposition, in a rather visible matter, rather than keeping his genocide quiet. I'm still of the opinion that it'll take Mugabe's natural death for any reforms or changes to come about(much like Castro in Cuba), but increased awareness is always swell.

5-minute social engineering for the win:

-raise the minimum wage for corporations
-slash corporate taxes
-slash the welfare system

You help the working poor out of the cycle of poverty with the min. wage, you off-set the increased wages with lower taxes, so that prices aren't increased, and you can try to attract more capital and job-creation in Canada, much like Ireland, while not hurting small business. Yea...

This whole business with General Pace, on the Joint Chiefs, talking about how homosexuality is "immoral" is another large black-eye for the White House. Not because of his views, but because he expressed them while in uniform, breaking a number of army regulations. This is one of the top officers breaking regulations that are there to ensure a secular and non-political military. So glad to see the "conservative" Republican government continue to blur the line between church and state that their founding fathers layed out.

http://www.ifeminists.net/introduction/editorials/2005/0112roberts.html

A very interesting editorial on the myth of the wage gap, i.e. the '70 cents to a dollar!' argument that's always thrown around as proof of how the job market is inherently discriminatory and sexist. Now, I'm not saying there isn't any sexism, because I'm sure there are a number of misogynistic examples (and against men, in the Public Sector), and those are, of course, a entirely negative thing. However, this sexism isn't an institutionalized aspect of the job market. If every single job was 50/50 men and women, sure, it'd be institutionalized and there'd be a wage gap, but since most jobs are predominantly gender biased in terms of numbers, the article shows that men and women are generally paid equally for equal work, with a number of examples:

-men work 3 hours per week, on average, more than women. As well, they're twice as likely to work at least 50 hours a week.
-men gravitate towards higher-paying, if less socially "rewarding" jobs, such as engineering, tax law, and computer programming. Teaching, nursing, and social work all pay less, and are predominantly made up of female workers.
-The worst jobs are largely held by males, and they're paid more for it. Not a tonne of little girls who grow up wanting to be lumberjacks or ironworkers.
-Men represent 92% of all occupational deaths, because men largely work the most dangerous jobs (mining, construction, etc), and are paid more for it.

Interesting stuff

Now, to electoral nerdiness! Canada is, of course, fundamentally flawed. It has a dinosaur of a bi-cameral house, with an appointed senate, and a parliament where large disparities occur between the popular vote and the parliamentary representation. As well, several provinces (BC, AB, Ontario) are largely screwed in the proverbial electoral ass, as a vote in PEI is worth four times that of a vote in urban Vancouver. Urban areas and the fast growing West have votes that count for little in comparison to the Maritimes and rural areas. You can thank the nature of First-Past-The-Post for all this, as regional parties such as the Bloc have far more power in parliament than national parties such as the NDP, or the old PC. And you get ridings such as Gulf Islands-Saanich, where the riding is predominantly left-wing, but the leftist parties split the vote, allowing a Conservative minister (Gary Lunn) to sneak in, where he represents the viewpoint of a fraction of his riding's vote. That's FPTP for ya.

I've always liked Australia's government and electoral system. It has a PR Triple-E Senate, styled after the American one, and a IRV Lower House, with ridings that are close in average size. The only downside is that plain IRV tends to elect more partisan leaders, and hurts centrist candidates. A reform such as the Borda Count (ranking the candidates, and they get a numerical value (i.e. 1st gets 40, 2nd gets 20, 3rd gets 10) would make it even better, however, Borda has only been tried in Slovenia (IIRC), so there's not a lot of good examples of how practical an awesome electoral system it is. I'm also a fan of MPP, which is far better than PR or FPTP, and it's also more likely to be possibly implemented in Canada than IRV is, being a variation on our existing system. I just don't want constant minority governments and expensive elections every year, as the trend seems to be going with a resurgent CPC, because then there's no real point winning. Parties spend their time politicking, which is fine and all, but not when you're trying to run a government. IRV, like the American system, ensures at least 4 years of actual governing for the best interests of the country.

However, I'm absolutely goddamn sick of the constant Scandanavian comparisons that are brought up for Canada. The constant "why can't we be more like Sweden!" attempts to justify a welfare state/democratic socialist state. The problem is that Canada isn't Sweden. A much more viable comparison is Sweden and Ontario. Canada is much, much larger than Sweden in terms of size, population, and regional difference. Sweden doesn't have a Quebec hanging over it, messing around every election because a majority can only be bought through pandering to Quebec, it doesn't have an aboriginal problem to deal with, it doesn't have many primary industries and a commuter lifestyle. The best comparison for modelling the future of Canada is Australia (both in terms of size, scale, current problems, similarities, shared history, and other aspects), and the Aussies best us in every area. You can thank a long-standing populist Conservative PM (go go John Howard!) for all that.

Now, the fundamental problem with Canadian governing is our fucked up federalism. It clouds every aspect of governing, making everything ten times more difficult. It basically boils down to how the Premiers have far too much power, and too little responsibility. They ignore their constitutional responsibilities (health care, education, etc) because it's much easier to whine to the feds for money than raise provincial taxes to pay for things, and then use blackmail because Premiers can easily rally support in a province against the feds. This leads to the Feds having to spend tax dollars on provincial responsibilities, messing around with their Federal responsibilities, and having to concern themselves with imaginary "fiscal imbalances." Imaginary because the provinces have the same damn tax base the Feds do for their population's health care and education, it's just MUCH easier to whine to the Feds for money than raise provincial taxes to pay for provincial measures, and thus be really accountable to the population that elected them. This situation has denegrated to the extent that Albertans and Ontarians end up paying for Quebec's failing welfare state with their federal tax dollars. Then again, 25% of our population isn't even signed on to our modern, patriated constitution, so....we've got a few problems here.

The next week is like Christmas for political nerds. A budget, a possible election (still placing money against a spring election), and a Quebec election?! It's all rather magical.

The NHL and Mutually Assured Destruction

An essay for a scholarship that I wrote in two hours under examination conditions:

Q: Even though the NHL is trying to curb fighting, sportscasters have criticized the Pittsburg Penguins for not having an on-ice body guard for Sidney Crosby. As hockey organizations at different levels attempt to reduce incidents of violence, is this an unsportsmanlike and contradictory criticism?

Fighting has been an integral aspect of the NHL game since the first puck was dropped. Recently, however, as NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman tries to expand the NHL game to new markets in the United States, fighting and rough play have come under fire as a negative aspect of the game, one to be eliminated. Hockey gets few highlights shown on American television, as it isn’t a headline game, and the few highlights that are shown are usually the most spectacular of the prior night’s games. These highlights likely include fighting, as it is a thrilling exhibition, and the ESPN audience is supposedly reduced to viewing hockey as a brutal game of fisticuffs. In the hopes of drawing a new crowd, one that watches hockey for the sake of its great speed and skill, fighting has been frowned upon by the NHL head-office, as a matter of increasing positive public relations for the game. This leads to the Pittsburgh Penguins, the home of new superstar Sidney Crosby, widely seen as the best hockey player since the magnificent Wayne Gretzky. Gretzky had enforcers such as Dave Semenko, hockey players whose sole role was to make sure that nobody injured the team’s star player. They’d do this by intimidation, by being such feared fighters that no opponent would dare to touch Gretzky. Things have changed since Gretzky’s 1980s, however, as the instigator rule came about in the hopes of discouraging fighting. This rule gives out a minor penalty to the instigator of a fight, meaning that if you start a fight, you put your team down shorthanded for two minutes, making it disadvantageous to the team to fight or have enforcers. Its relevance to Sidney Crosby is that Crosby is in the same position as Gretzky was; teams go after him and try to hurt him as the best way to stop him, as he’s just too good of a player to be stopped otherwise. This then leads to the main point of having an enforcer for Sidney Crosby. In the age of cracking down and discouraging fighting, announcers are still commenting that Crosby needs an enforcer, a fighter to intimidate others and make sure Crosby stays unharmed, so that he can wreak havoc on other teams. These comments could be then seen as unsportsmanlike or contradictory to the main message that the NHL is trying to send: Don’t Fight. However, the lack of an on-ice body guard for Sidney Crosby, though perhaps a contradictory criticism, is also a very accurate and necessary criticism, because of the lack of accountability in the modern NHL, the idea of star-players as valuable financial investments to be protected, and the erroneous logic of the NHL towards discouraging fighting.

The most basic and common repercussion of the instigator penalty has been that the number of fights are lowering. However, a very negative consequence has arisen in that there is a complete lack of accountability in the game. Players know that they can take harmful cheap-shots at star players and not be beaten to a pulp by a Dave Semenko, because the enforcers don’t want to put their team down shorthanded. This is how the NHL wants it, as they’d prefer that punishment for harmful activity comes from the NHL front office and its disciplinary committee, headed by Colin Campbell, rather than at the end of a fist. A position such as this is seen as more professional and civil, as the NHL tries to market itself as a skills game and not one of brutality. Unfortunately, the disciplinary actions of the NHL have failed at being meaningful and harsh punishments, and are seen by players, fans, and officials as quite the joke. This means that there is no real deterrence to players going after the stars of the game; they can’t be physically beaten, as it used to be, and they won’t get an effective punishment from the NHL. The ineffectual actions of the NHL mean that, hypothetically, a player could go after Sidney Crosby, injure him for a couple weeks with a cheap-shot, and then only be suspended for a few games. With Crosby as an utterly integral part of their team, the Penguins will then go on to struggle for a few weeks, harming their chances at the playoffs, while the opposing team will miss some cheap goon for only a few games. This is why commentators are concerned about the lack of an enforcer for Sidney Crosby, as the NHL’s discipline has proved again and again that is simply not an effective deterrent. With an enforcer, the Penguins could have that intimidation factor that would keep opposing goons from injuring their star. Though these comments about needing an enforcer are perhaps contradictory to the message the NHL is trying to send, the League has dug its own hole in this matter by legislating out on-ice accountability in the form of a flurry of fists. This means that the NHL has to ask themselves, do they want to have their marketable star players injured because of the lack of accountability, or do they want to lower the brutality of the game in the hopes of attracting a market portion? In this case, the brutality of the game is absolutely necessary to keep its goons honest and accountable, and its star players such as Sidney Crosby healthy. The bottom line is that the NHL can’t market itself as a skills game if its skilled players are constantly being bullied and injured by its thuggish cheap players. If the NHL continues pressing the matter of discouraging fighting, this issue will only exacerbate itself in a cycle of unfortunate violence towards its stars, and not towards its goons. Thus, the criticism of the commentators towards Crosby’s lack of an enforcer is absolutely necessary as it sends a message to the NHL about their failed disciplinary methods.

Another reality of the modern NHL is that the players are million-dollar business investments. Though perhaps a callous view, placing dollar figures on the lives of individual human beings, it is also an actuality. How much business sense does it make for a business, the Pittsburg Penguins, to open itself up to the opportunity for its main investment, Sidney Crosby, to be damaged? Though not being paid millions of dollars now, because of rookie contract stipulations, it is sure that Crosby will be paid tens of millions over a number of years, very soon. His value is even bigger than that, as Crosby’s presence and amazing talents draw thousands of fans to watch him, bringing in more revenue for both the NHL and the Penguins in the form of selling tickets and merchandise. He has even greater value as a key advertising figure, as a ‘big-name’ player, Crosby can bring more attention to the NHL through public promotions. With all this value, Crosby still has no protection and badly needs an enforcer, despite the NHL’s campaign of pacifism. The NHL again has to ask itself, which is a more valuable marketable asset, an amazing talent, or a lack of fisticuffs? Both the Penguins and the NHL would be devastated if, hypothetically, Crosby took a cheap-shot from a goon player and his career was derailed or ended, such as what happened to Eric Lindros. Lindros was a future superstar of the League, but a long trail of hits that resulted in concussions ruined his talents. This is why the Penguins need a physical intimidator, an assurance of on-ice mutually assured destruction, and why the NHL needs to back-down from its pacifist stance. Again, the commentators who are asking about the lack of an enforcer for Crosby aren’t unsportsmanlike in the least; they are displaying an important message, both to the League, and to its fans. It is indeed sportsmanlike, not unsportsmanlike, to support the protection of the NHL’s star players. Keeping them healthy and thus driving the game forward on their skillful backs is a far more positive viewpoint than campaigning against meaningful and needed violence in the game. Sidney Crosby is far too valuable a monetary and public asset for the risk of his injury to come about, and with the current stance of the NHL and its instigator rule, the failure of NHL discipline to act as a deterrent, and the lack of an enforcer and the accountability that one brings, Crosby is in grave danger of being put at risk by an opposing team. His injury would be a much larger crisis, by far, to the NHL than a few highlights of fighting shown on EPSN.

This issue of supposedly contradictory criticism leads to an even bigger one, of whether or not the NHL’s stance on fighting is a logical one. It is, after all, because of this stance that the issue of Crosby’s safety is a significant question. The NHL’s stance on fighting, discouraging it and emphasizing the skill of the game, is decidedly flawed and based on fallacious logic. This stance is that, to market itself to a larger and supposedly more pacifist audience, the NHL needs to discourage fighting. The League wants to stop hockey being typecast as a fighting game instead of as a skill one. However, how can the NHL place an emphasis on the skill of its players if the best ones are constantly being injured by unaccountable goons? Hockey skills and fighting work side by side, in a symbiotic relationship that has created the greatest game on ice. These facts seem apparent to the base Canadian market of the NHL; however, the League seems bent on sticking its head in the sand and changing these facts for the sake of supposed marketability. However, the logic behind this marketability of a more pacifist NHL in the United States leaves something to be desired. If Americans were so turned off by violence, then the brutally violent game of football, and the even more graphically violent performance of professional wrestling, wouldn’t be popular in the United States. However, both of these activities are so massively popular that their fans reach the point of near religious fanaticism. As well, a hockey fight has the ability to thrill and to excite fans. In any hockey arena, in Canada or the United States, every single fan in the arena will be on their feet to watch a fight, and most of them will be wildly cheering. The fact that Americans enjoy violent sports, and the thrill of hockey fights, seems to contradict the basic logic of the NHL. The League also seems scared of negative publicity in the United States, however, which is worse publicity, a clip of a fight, or the incessantly replayed image of Todd Bertuzzi smashing a player into the ice with a cheap-shot? That cheap-shot from Bertuzzi was directly caused by the players’ lack of ability to take their frustrations out on the ice in the form of fighting. Instead, the tensions and anger between the players simmered, and then exploded in inglorious shame for the NHL with Bertuzzi’s punch. The basic issue isn’t that the comments about Crosby’s lack of protection are contradictory to the NHL’s message, but that they’re contradicting entirely fallacious logic. Seemingly willing to increase the risk of their biggest asset’s ruin for the sake of erroneous reasoning, the NHL is lacking in basic sense and judgment, and that is where this valuable commentary about Crosby comes in. It isn’t a matter of unsportsmanlike criticism; it’s a matter of criticizing the NHL’s lack of accountability and protection for its best players.

The act of on-ice fighting has always served an integral purpose in the NHL. Though fighting is perhaps a brutal display upon first glance, it also thrills crowds and allows valuable star players to be protected. Mutually assured destruction in the form of intimidation and fighting served the NHL well for the vast majority of its history, keeping such superstars as Wayne Gretzky safe and productive. With the advent of Sidney Crosby’s reign of dominance in the League, the NHL has created a conflict through its campaign to discourage fighting, and its methods such as the instigator penalty. With Crosby being a multi-million dollar asset, in terms of marketing, merchandising, and attracting viewers, his safety should be an integral goal of the NHL. Unfortunately, the League’s head office seems bent on chasing an imaginary boogieman, hunting down the fighters that would protect Crosby, all in the name of supposedly attracting American viewers. This becomes a problem when their logic is examined and proved entirely fallacious. The ‘unsportsmanlike and contradictory’ criticism of commentators towards Crosby’s lack of protection brings up a much greater issue in the game of hockey, an issue of faulty logic by the NHL, and of how the fighting tradition of the League has served its star players very well in the past. Though the logic behind on-ice fighting’s constructive purpose might seem brutal to some, it does serve to protect star players. When the NHL impedes this process, star players begin to get injured and lose their effectiveness. The League’s intent in replacing the on-ice discipline of the fist with off-ice disciplinary measures has miserably failed, and goons now chase after the marketable assets of the NHL with abandon. While discouraging fighting in the name of chasing an imaginary market, the NHL has created a crisis, where the costs of key injuries far outweigh the supposed benefits of curbing fighting.

On ATMs

Why the whole ATM fee hullaballoo is ridiculous.

1) the banks are providing a convenience for the customer that costs them money to upkeep, thus, you pay a fee for that service.

2) banks aren't there to help and serve their customers. Customers, to banks, are the same as a natural resource like lumber, a way to make money by providing a needed service. Banks are accountable to and serving their shareholders, so profit is good, the only reason to offer good customer service is because it makes more money for their shareholders. It's callous, but it's how banks work. Tough.

3) Join a credit union or walk to your own damn bank, lazy whiners. There would be a problem if NO options were available to consumers, but options exist.

basically, we learn that people don't like fees of any kind and they don't like it when companies they don't have stock in make a profit. Amazing insight here, Taliban Jack, really adding to the Canadian parliamentary discource. Fucking lazy, whiny socialists. I think 4 bucks for a latte at starbucks is a ridiculous prize, but do I have the right to dictate to private companies how they do their business? It's called consumer choice and a market economy, such amazing concepts, both.

Since when did it become illegal to make large profits? The banks are accountable to their shareholders, who also make a profit, not to whiny customers and half-bit socialist assholes with moustaches.

Though kudos to Flaherty for "considering" the issue, and taking away what is most likely a key populist election issue of Layton's. How do you fix the control of a few banks over the market? Perhaps, foreign competition?

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2007/03/07/lords-reform.html

The British House of Commons passes a bill to have a House of Lords that's elected. This is significant for electoral nerds like me, and very good news. I'm pretty much the biggest proponent of a Triple-E senate, modelled after Australia, as it's the first step to then reforming the lower house, which is pretty damn undemocratic in a number of areas. A healthy bi-cameral House can only strengthen Canada.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/03/08/canada-minorities.html

And the UN tells us to stop using the horribly racist term, 'visible minorities.' I'm glad that our most significant intergovernmental organization is busy with such significant matters, instead of, perhaps, STOPPING A FUCKING GENOCIDE.

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2007/03/08/3714945-cp.html

Lastly, we have a Bloc candidate who, in his words says:

"In none of my writings have I denied that there were mass killings, some even of an ethnic character. However, I categorically reject the abusive use of the expression 'genocide,' ” Mr. Philpot wrote, for example, in a 2004 comment piece to Le Devoir.
In an interview earlier this week with La Presse, he was quoted as saying: ”One cannot say there was a genocide in Rwanda the way there was a genocide against the Jews"

Forcing Boisclair to come up with this thrilling and risque statement: "It's clear to me there was a genocide." Stunning.

So why isn't this guy being deported like Ernst Zundel?

Kyoto and African Genocide, perhaps interrelated, perhaps not

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w070305&s=kirchick030807

Genocide in Zimbabwe. Even slower than Darfur, so it gets less airtime. That, and starving Africans are just sooo played out on CNN, Anna Nicole Smith is where it's at. Compromise: Feed her body to the Zimbabweans? Zimbabwe's story is perhaps one of the most tragic in Africa. Genocide, racism, famine, the ruining of Africa's breadbasket. Massive material wealth, but one of the lowest life expectancies in the world. The worst inflation in the world. If we can't seem to do anything in Darfur, with a feckless, emasculated U.N, an immoral China and their veto, a meager but brave AU force, and a government actively supporting a genocide that's spreading to neighbouring nations, using the exact same excuses the Genocidaire used in Rwanda, what's going to happen to Zimbabwe?

Now, to Kyoto. First of all, I'm opposed to cap and trade systems in principle. It's the commoditization of resources essential to human life (the same people who decry bottled and privatized water all seem to support Kyoto, funny enough, however, I can see their use. Cap and trade systems were used in the campaign against sulphur dioxide to give lagging companies time to eventually catch up and they worked. However, a plan based solely around cap and trade, like Kyoto, is plain ridiculous and simple waste of time to spend government time thinking about. Cap and trade policies are most effective when acting as a complementary part of a larger policy.

1) It's unenforceable, 2) it favours third-world and ex-soviet bloc countries, in terms of targets, not because they're especially green, but because they don't have polluting industries, or their polluting industries had collapsed after the fall of the Berlin wall, 3) the nations it needs to affect aren’t even signed on (everyone's darling on the left, Clinton, laughed at Kyoto and didn't even consider it), 4) a cap and trade system is in its death knells in Europe, 5) I could go on...

To meet our Kyoto emission targets would cripple the economy. There's no arguing that, it'd destroy thousands of jobs and bring on a recession the scale of which hasn't been seen in decades. Did I mention how China would replace our emissions in a matter of months, making our economic collapse a futile exercise? So we move on to trading for credits, the financial punishment for not meeting our quotas. The figures bandied about have been anywhere from 10-25 billion dollars in credits we'd have to buy, most likely from a nation like Russia, which continues to build polluting industry, but nicely has credits to sell, thanks Kyoto. So we spend 20 billion dollars over a few years, and on what? The environment hasn’t physically been helped by these actions, no money has gone towards changing our industry for the environment, and we’ve simply funneled money into Putin's pocket. Which comes back to my main thesis, of how if you support Kyoto in Canada, you're against the environment. That's 20 billion dollars sent to Russia that could be used, IN CANADA, to help the environment, I repeat, IN CANADA. Now, people will say, we should spend the billions to send a message, of how we'll be a leader on the world stage in the fight against global warming, etc. That's a rather expensive message, with no rational return. If China won't let our consular officials see a Canadian citizen being held in some godforsaken prison, what makes anybody think they'll magically jump in line after we spend billions of dollars in the name of the environment? I repeat, the war for the global environment will be fought in China, India, and Brazil, not in Canada. And especially not with Kyoto.

Which moves me on to the political side of things in Canada, concerning Kyoto. My theory is that a majority of people support Kyoto because they don't know anything about it. The more that people learn about the details of meeting our Kyoto targets, the more people are turned off to the goddamn treaty. Dion's taken the treaty on as an adopted child, all his apparent plans are to make it the major issue in his platform in a potential spring campaign. Which is why he'll get annihilated. Pablo Rodriguez's private member bill required what, giving the government 60 days to make a plan to meet the targets (read: plan, not action, a plan). By my calculations, that'll place the revealing of this plan in the middle of a spring election. In the midst of an election, with Dion ranting and raving about Kyoto, the CPC can break out a campaign showing people exactly what Kyoto entails, what the plan is. Jobs lost, taxes raised, funding for favourite programs, cut, all to pay for Kyoto. More and more companies leaving Canada, less 'fiscal imbalance' money, it goes on and on...Dion's hung himself on this, he's given the PM the chance to define Kyoto in the midst of a Kyoto election, where people don't actually know a thing about Kyoto, and then bludgeon Dion to death with the plan, in all the key swing areas. The CPC feigned defeat over the private member's bill, but you know that the PM had to be doing a little joyful dance in private. People still want some massive government solution, they want to sit back in their SUVs and let the government fix everything. When the PM shows Canadians what Kyoto will actually cost them, personally, Dion's doomed.

Every poll shows that the environment is the new biggest issue among Canadians, the new health care. But since when was an election decided on health care? It's decided on issues, not policy. The PM will make Dion's leadership an issue, and it'll be a killer for him. Dion will respond with policy on the environment, while the PM's entire environmental strategy isn't to help the environment. He tried that with the CAA and was pilloried for it. His strategy is to nullify the LPC advantage on the environment, sticking an attack dog in the Cabinet chair, coming out with old liberal policies, tossing money around, it all isn't to help the environment, it's to make it look like the CPC care, to have, at least, a defendable position. And it'll work.

But hey, I still don't even think there'll be a spring election.

The Environment pt.1, and Steady Eddie

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070307.waltathrone0307/BNStory/National/home

So if Stelmach is coming out with intensity-based greenhouse gas reduction targets, and so is the federal government, what happens and which targets do the companies shoot for?
Now, on to the environment!

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=156df7e6-d490-41c9-8b1f-106fef8763c6&k=0http://www.fcpp.org/main/publication_detail.php?PubID=1601http://www.torontosun.ca/News/Columnists/Goldstein_Lorrie/2007/02/18/3642612-sun.html

and from the Globe:

"Economists have calculated that countries begin to clamp down on sulphur dioxide when per capita GDP reaches $9,000 a year, on particulate pollution when per capita GDP reaches $15,000 a year — a variation on the “Kuznets Curve,” which holds that you have to get dirty before you get rich, and you have to get rich before you get clean. China will get much dirtier. Its per capita GDP reached $1,000 last year. The producer of 18 per cent of the world's GHG emissions, China is gaining fast on Europe (22 per cent) and the United States (21 per cent). The International Energy Agency says China will expand GHG emissions by 120 per cent in the next 20 years, averaging 6 per cent a year, far surpassing Europe and the U.S. For a small-population country such as Canada, with 2 per cent of global emissions, one might ask: Why bother with Kyoto? What difference will it make? Canada produces 160 million tonnes a year of the world's eight billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions. Were Canada to eliminate all of its GHG emissions, China's increases would replace them — every last ounce — in 18 months. Were Canada to eliminate 10 per cent of its emissions, China's increases would replace them all in 60 days. As noble as self-sacrifice can occasionally be, it must have — somewhere — a rational purpose."

Let's talk global warming. First of all, I believe it exists, but I also believe that it's part of a larger, global trend that's a long-term historical one, and that I believe humans are exacerbating it, not causing it. Secondly, the environmentalist religion scares the fuck out of me. They've thrown all moderation aside, politicized the issue to the point of demonizing all those with a contrary opinion, and turned it into one of mass paranoia and partisanship. Moderation and conservative steps have to be taken, and we can't denounce and discount a single scientific opinion, however contrary, in this mess of partisanship. As John Stuart Mill told us all:

"If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind"

Anyways, back to global warming and climate change. Thirdly, I also happen to be utterly pessimistic about the whole situation. From the blind climate partisanship to the hypocrites with "go green!" bumper stickers on their SUVs, but especially towards China. From my perspective, I just find it hard to get in arms about climate change, considering that China would replace ALL of Canada's emissions in 18 months. It's going to get a lot worse before it gets any better, there's no stopping it. There's not much we can do in Canada but adapt, work on bettering environmental issues we can affect, such as pollution in our cities. Beyond that, I can only see the environmental through politico eyes, how each party can best campaign with it, etc. Perhaps I'm some horrid, pessimistic political nerd with a hard-on for pretentious latin, so sue me, I'm also quite right on the issue. The war for global climate change isn't going to be fought in Canada, it's going to be fought in China, India, and Brazil, so the most we can do is sit back and adapt to live with it. The futility over ruining our economy and standard of living for NO gains in the "war" on emissions in the long-term, global scale, is utterly obvious.

Our major focus in Canada must be on adaptation (it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better) and on local issues, aka the original Climate Change act. The air in the cities is ridiculous and it's harming kids, who are the ones growing up with new cases of asthma. Going from small-town Nova Scotia back to Calgary, and the air quality amazes me, it's terrible on the lungs there, I don't even want to imagine how bad it is in the GTA.

We also all need to realize that the environment today has NEVER been better. We can yearn for the good old days, but of what, the London Fog and acid rain? As well, who the hell are we, rich, spoiled Westerners, to tell Chinese or Indian people that they arn't allowed to get rich and prosperous like us. To industrialize and splurge and consume. We got their first, we managed to ruin the environment first, or so they say, so you're not allowed to share in the privileges of the modern age. How callous and pompous can we be? What makes anyone think that they'll take our environmental cults seriously?

Kyoto will be talked about soon. Otherwise, let's all laugh at Al Gore's massive emitting mansion, and his zero-sum emission credit game, credits bought from a company that he owns. Practice what you preach?

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/03/a_whig_or_a_tor.html
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/03/a_political_kat.html
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2007/03/faggots.html

A serious of rather excellent, and right on target, posts by Andrew Sullivan. He’s been on fire in the last few days.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/prince-edward-island/story/2007/03/07/mcguire-retires.html

Another veteran Liberal won’t be running again. Milliken’s joining the ranks of the retired as well. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Wappel doesn't run again either. After all the ruckus about how Dion was going to whip his caucus for the security provision vote, and how Wappel opposed him, I imagine his "private" punishment will be the end of his incumbency. All these retiring can only be good news for the CPC, as it puts the Grit's balls to the fire in terms of finding new candidates, which they already seem to be having trouble doing. As well, funny story, remember Dion’s sexist campaign where he announced that he’s only allowing women to run in some ridings, to even it up and all? Well, there are females contesting for the Liberal candidacy in both Papineau and Toronto Center. Standing up for women everywhere, the Grits are parachuting in Trudeau and Rae into those two ridings, who both seem to have a penis (well, at least in Rae’s case). Oh, and remember that story about how Dion tried to court some NDP women, like Dawn Black, and they rejected and mocked him in the media? Yea, he seems to be a real lady’s man.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070307.wcheckages0307/BNStory/Technology/
http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=99036982-acd3-4af5-9ff0-55948e2a22fb&k=0

BC is banning the advertisement of cigarettes, and and smokes won't be able to be on display in stores, you have to ask the cashier specifically for them. Connecticut, on the other hand, is requiring minors to have parental consent and legal ID before making a profile on a social-networking site. Hooray for the nanny state. What ever happened to responsible parenting and consumer choice?