The Public Good

I am regularly accused of being "partisan" - along with a lot of other things that, I suppose, are meant to hurt or offend me. I would like to explain a few things.

Political parties are made up of human beings. Generally, at any given time, one party forms government.

Since parties, and therefore governments, are comprised of human beings, and human beings are fallible, no government is perfect. Someone will always find fault with something.

Governing is hard. There are a lot of moving pieces and even the best-intentioned government can make mistakes, miss doing something someone needed, have to backtrack and tweak programs to make them better. 

This is especially true when a government is having to govern on the fly, under extreme/rapidly changing conditions, like during a pandemic. The CERB came out fast, but then it became clear that this group & that were left out & programs are being developed to address these. 

Some things may be handled well, and others may need significant adjustments. But everything the Liberals have done during this crisis is intended for the public good. To keep Canadians from going hungry, being homeless, getting sick.

If I support and defend them, it is not because they are "Liberals". It is because they are working for the public good. That's what I look for in a party. I want a government in Canada that cares about Canadians and, despite being flawed humans, actually tries to do the right thing. 

I expect any Canadian government to work in the best interests of Canadians. I cannot support any party that seems to actively try to harm some Canadians. Of course, by this, I am referring to Conservative parties post 2003. 

The Harper government did not just pad the pockets of billionaires & self-aggrandize and follow a very exclusive doctrine. They actively engaged in activities that hurt Canadians & others. They cut environmental regulations, bullied charities that were doing important work... 

Cut Veterans' Affairs offices and staff, closed Coast Guard facilities, shut down Status of Women offices, destroyed science libraries, cut funding for health and education, demonized people (the niqab ban/barbaric cultural practices tipline), obstructed harm reduction measures (Insite), ignored Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls, tried to bypass the duty to consult to push pipelines through Indigenous lands, stopped refugees from coming to Canada... 

Cut regulations that allowed events such as the Walkerton e-coli outbreak in 2010, the listeriosis outbreak in 2008, the Lac Megantic explosion in 2013... Sent Canadian men and women to war for American interests...

Refused to allow any Canadian aid going to the developing world to address family planning needs, bought billboards in Hungary telling Roma people they are not welcome in Canada... 

Cut the court challenges program which ensured that groups could raise challenges to infringements of human rights in Canada, raised the age of eligibility for Old Age Security to 67, made it harder to be eligible for EI...

Brought in mandatory minimum sentences (many of which have been deemed unconstitutional), carried out trade negotiations in secret, introduced boutique tax credits that do nothing for those with not enough earnings to pay tax... 

The list goes on. All behaviours of a party that does not have the public good at heart. And fast forward to the present, we can see exactly the same behaviours in provincial conservative parties. 

Kenney and Ford have cut funding and programs for the most vulnerable, while giving big corporations huge tax breaks. They are trying to dismantle public health care and public education. 

In Alberta, one of the first things the UCP did after the election was remove protections from LGBTQ2+ youth. And they celebrated by dancing in the fountain in front of the Legislature. 

Here, in these conservative parties, I see not only imperfect people who might sometimes make mistakes. I actually see animosity towards the public. Callousness and disregard for the public good. We live in a SOCIETY, not an ECONOMY. 

The goal of government should be a healthy, well-educated, and reasonably comfortable population. Economic ratings are secondary to the quality of life enjoyed by the population. 

The conservative parties, federal and provincial, seem to have completely lost sight of this. They are willing to cheat, to lie to the public, to make things up or spin them, in order to gain power. 

And once they gain power, they are happy to view the public as a means to an end. We are just "human capital" to them. Cogs in the capitalist machine that pours wealth into a few special pockets. 

The NDP used to be the conscience of Parliament. I don't really know what they are now. Messaging is garbled. Sometimes they are highly principled, like Matthew Green, MP for Hamilton. Sometimes they side with the CPC in fomenting unrest based on conjecture, spin, rumour... 

The PM bought a swingset and gifted it to one of Canada's official residences. The CPC and NDP and our news media crucified the Prime Minister about this for weeks. That does not suggest a party with anything but power on its mind. 

So, the Liberals are not perfect, nor are they my natural choice. I expect they will make mistakes. They are only human, like the rest of us. But of all the parties right now, they seem the one most able and inclined to work for the good of Canada and Canadians. 

And so, you can call me names and suggest I am "stuuupid" and talk about koolaid all you want. I want a Canada that is good for all of us. Even you who troll my posts and spew insults. 

The Lessons of History

I get it. Our society has a short memory. The older people who lived through things are becoming fewer and fewer. Maybe they didn't pass down their wisdom, or maybe the younger generations were too busy with all the amazing new technology to listen.

People have forgotten what it was like before vaccines. They don't remember and were never told how almost everyone knew a family who had lost a child to now-preventable diseases like smallpox, polio, whooping cough, measles, diptheria, influenza... 

Scarlet fever, tuberculosis, chicken pox... Whole families were decimated sometimes. And when vaccines became available, mothers lined their children up to wait for hours to be vaccinated, because they didn't want them to die. 

But people have forgotten. And now we have widespread anti-vaxxers. And now we have children dying of those same old horrors, even though they don't need to because we can protect them... 
cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-g…

And people have forgotten about the Nazis. They have forgotten the scourge that was fascism. Some even deny the Holocaust happened. There are so few alive now who were there and saw it with their own eyes... 

People have forgotten, to the extent that now neo-nazi white supremacists are called "very fine people" by the American president. And the American public did not rise up and drag him from the White House. 

Trump Defends White-Nationalist Protesters: 'Some Very Fine People on Both Sides'The president backtracked from his remarks on Charlottesville just a day earlier.https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/08/trump-defends-white-nationalist-protesters-some-very-fine-people-on-both-sides/537012/

And now... now we have the US president and conservative leaders around the world declaring "antifa" (literally anti-fascists) a terrorist organization. 
washingtonpost.com/national-secur…

Fascists. That's Nazis. You do know that, right? And antifa, or antifascists, are opposed to Nazis/fascists. What does it tell you when political parties try to declare what isn't even a real organisation a "terrorist organisation"? 

When a political party tells you that anti-fascists are the enemy... It is a clear sign that they are pro-fascist. See how that works? It's not vague or ambiguous. But people have short memories. Society has a short memory. 

There were people in the UK, Canada, the US, and in Europe in the 1930s who thought fascism was a good idea. It was all about nationalism and jobs, after all. Until it wasn't. Until it became all about death and oppression and persecution and war. 

But, our society seems to have forgotten that. Our journalists cheerily talk about "antifa" the way they would talk about the IRA or ISIS. Except, it's different. Anti-fascists are regular people, those who have not forgotten. And they are reacting to an existential threat. 

Anti-fascists are not looking to take over anything. They want to prevent a take-over. There is a big difference. The reason this gets any traction at all is there are an awful lot of honest-to-goodness fascists out there in high political positions. 

Trump, Bolsonaro, Orban... The list goes on. And don't forget right wing political parties not in power. 

But our society has forgotten. We have not learned the lessons of history. I fervently hope we will all come to our senses and not be forced to repeat them. 

BLM: Watching America From North of the Border

Like many Canadians, I am watching in horror as our neighbour falls into chaos and disorder. And, after reading so many Tweets and news posts about what is going on down there, I feel moved to ponder the situation.  

What I am seeing is a country built on slave labour, that fought a brutal and bloody civil war before slavery could be abolished. And even with the abolition of slavery, many continued to treat people of colour as inferior. 

Then there was a civil rights movement, which demanded that people, black and white (and brown) be treated equally under the law. And some changes were made to the laws. But legal changes alone do not change the way people think. 

And there are other levers of power besides the law. Under-funding certain schools, suppressing some people's votes, not having the political will to ensure all people have access to a living wage and health care and housing... 

Combined with a police force that started out as slave-catchers and, in many places, continued that culture within their ranks, all encouraged by a wealthy class that holds the lion's share of political power in the country... 

This has led to gross inequality, and discrimination. And instead of progressing from the victories of the Civil Rights Movement, the US has slid back, in temperament and outlook. There are laws to protect black citizens, but they are not observed. 

Police who kill are seldom sanctioned. Fear of the "other" has grown, not receded. Black people are killed almost every day in the US by police. And the number of cases of black people being killed while doing nothing wrong grows and grows. 

And the media helpfully feed the notion that, well, if he or she wasn't doing anything wrong this time, they probably did something in the past... It seems like any past transgression can be turned into a crime punishable by death, if it happens the person is black 

Which has led to the "........ while black" - it could be grocery shopping, or talking on the phone, driving a car, sleeping in your own home. It is a terrible, sick way to treat a segment of your population. And this has been going on and growing for a long time. 

It is no wonder people are taking to the streets in protest of this (yet another) innocent man killed for being black in America. 

And now it seems a lot of the violence, the property damage, that is happening when peaceful protest turns violent, is being instigated by people not involved with Black Lives Matter. It has been suggested that white supremacists are involved. 

This makes some sense. What would white supremacists, like Proud Boys and the KKK want to accomplish? Well, if they can gin up a lot of violence around these protests, they can get regular Americans to turn against BLM, and begin to adopt more racist views. 

They can begin to discredit black Americans whenever they try to organize or push for greater fairness and equality. They could get more supporters, gain more sympathy from legislative bodies. 

And then there is the theory that undercover police are also instigating violence, masquerading as protestors. And what could they possibly gain? Well, proof that their Blue brethren were right to be treated as above the law, because look how dangerous BLM is? 

And who else has something to gain? Well, Trump tweeted that he is going to make "Antifa" an illegal terrorist organisation. Because, he says, Antifa is behind the violence and any outside agitators. 

It doesn't matter that "Antifa" is not an organisation, just a concept, a movement, a loosely connected scattering of like-minded people who do not want to see totalitarianism take over. Antifa, after all, just means anti-fascist. Which should be everyone's default state. 

This could give the GOP-controlled government the power to crack down on any and all protests. To make being anti-fascist illegal, makes it impossible to criticise anything the government does. Because, clearly, the GOP has distinctly fascist tendencies. 

And, as the police break heads and shoot at protesters, and target journalists and medics working with the injured, the President is contemplating making himself secure, and enabling his administration to do anything, anything they want. 

I read that the only reason there are not heavy tanks in the streets of most American cities right now is that they would damage the roads. Not that innocent people could be killed. No. Simply because infrastructure could be damaged. That speaks volumes. 

I want to be very clear about all this. I am not saying this because I think Canada has no racism. Canada does have racists. Many of them are supporters of the GOP's little brother party, the CPC. 

While we watch America burn, we in Canada should be taking this as a lesson. Racism is a powerful tool that can be exploited by the far right. It can be used to create conflict and then justify draconian measures to suppress that conflict.

Measures that can be used to suppress any and all dissent. Measures that can mark an end to democracy. 

As the US teeters on the brink of totalitarianism, we in Canada must think deeply about what kind of future we want for our country. We must take care not to let the door open to the kind of inequality, injustice, and unbridled brutality we are seeing unfolding in the US. 

We must take care to not let parties who foment hatred of the other, who try to make us mistrust and hate, form government. There is no room for "barbaric cultural practices" tip-lines, or racially motivated crime in our society.

We must stand on guard for Canada, now more than ever, and not let our country go down to darkness as we are seeing our neighbour do. It's time for Canadians to speak out about racism, to stand up to it. For all our children, and our children's children. 

Silencing dissent

Jason Kenney has people on the payroll whose job it is to intimidate and silence criticism of the UCP government. Albertans are, through their provincial taxes, paying for people whose job it is to silence any criticism of the government. Issues managers, spokespeople, the War Room, even some MLAs... And this doesn't begin to cover the trolls, pardon me, communications officers, that flood Twitter and Facebook when people dare to question what the government is doing.

We are literally paying people to tell us to shut up and F*ck off. That doesn't seem very democratic. In fact, it seems, well, fascist, to be honest. 

The wrecking ball that is the UCP is on a rampage in this province. Kenney has a job to do and he is getting it done while suppressing any dissent. 

From cutting off aid to Albertans he/the UCP/the CPC/the IDU consider liabilities (i.e. not contributing to corporate coffers) and justifying letting some of these people die to restoke the capitalist money machine, to paving the way for private education and health care 

I expect Jason's real bosses are fairly pleased with his progress. He is the steam roller and Albertans are the pavement. In another couple of years, there will be no universal health care, no harm reduction, no environmental protection... 

Coal mines all over the place, people with disabilities will have died or left, public education will be in tatters, and health care will only be available to the rich. It will be open season on LGBTQ and POC, and people will be desperate for any sort of job, at any rate of pay.

And people on the right, led by the UCP and their supporters, will convince people that they have a right to pay for healthcare themselves. And they have a right to work for peanuts. And... 

Another Rant About Canadian Journalism

I can no longer bear to watch Vassy Kapelos on CBC's Power and Politics . The show was once a source of, at the very least, an understanding of who was saying what. 

It seems to have turned into a "bash the Liberal government" free-for-all. This is not journalism. This is more of a blood-sport. Where the aggressors have traps, lures, and telephoto infra-red sights. 

I would like to point out that responsible journalism is not simply attacking the sitting government. It is not just giving everyone a podium to bash the sitting government. 

Journalistic integrity is based on some pretty solid principles.
- Is it TRUE?
- Is it verifiable?
- Is publishing it in the public good?

Journalism is meant to hold the sitting government to account, yes. But it should also hold those who would form government to account. This means not just letting opposition parties trash the government and, sometimes, even make stuff up, unchallenged. 

Journalists fail when they do not hold those who would like to form government to as high a standard as they hold the sitting government. It is not in the public good to give one party a pass, to not fact check both sides.  

And, speaking of both sides... This current trend to try to give both sides equal weight and time, regardless of their validity, is complete garbage. 

I mean, if you get a government minister of health, or civil servant on talking about the importance of vaccinations, then, in the interest of "balance" you allow an anti-vaxxer to spout off nonsense & only challenge the government person, that is irresponsible journalism. 

Sometimes, one side of the argument does not deserve the air time because it is complete balderdash. We need our journalists to recognize when this is happening and to react appropriately. 

This "good people on both sides" nonsense is fairly new. Perhaps not as new as the Trump regime, but pretty close. It is irresponsible journalism. No. Sometimes one side is correct and the other is nuts/evil/a threat to the public good. 

So it completely abandons journalistic principles to treat both as equally valid. You are supposed to be fact-checking, arbiters of messaging. And it is fine to question government officials. They are not sacrosanct. But to just attack and nitpick is choosing sides. 

And to have panels where all participants just want to bash the government is abhorrent. Not all governments are bad. Thus far, overall, the Liberals have been doing a damn sight better job for Canadians than their predecessors. 

To anguish over nothing-burgers like a swingset the PM paid for, or renovations the National Capital Commission (which looks after Canada's official residences and buildings) has been planning for a decade, is completely disingenuous. That is being a mouthpiece for the opposition and not acting in the public good. 

I realise that the CBC has suffered sever budget cuts for decades. Which means they have to compete for eyeballs and clicks against sensationalist corporate-run and right-leaning media outlets.

I like to think that if the CBC was fully funded & not dependent on advertising revenue, and if the culture created by Harper appointments was purged, our national broadcaster could do much to educate the public about how our government works and about issues of the day in a non-partisan manner. 

Perhaps that is naive. But I believe there are some real journalists out there capable of adhering to journalistic principles and who actually care about educating the public.  

So many Canadians seem to not really understand how government works, how responsibility is divided between provincial and federal governments. When your guests say blatantly untrue things about how things actually work, it is your job to counter the misinformation.  

To give air time to people who are making sh*t up is not only not in the public good, it is a disgrace to the journalistic tradition and directly counter to the public good. When I was watching, I often thought, "My God. What are these journalists thinking letting this go?"

So, I am sorry if this offends Ms Kapelos . But I am not alone in feeling this show is failing in bringing facts to the table. It feels like a love-in for the CPC. This is not in the public good. 

Any party that aspires to form government need to be put under the same microscope as the sitting government. People in a democracy need to see who they are voting for, warts and all. On all sides.