Category: Uncategorized

Some of the basic skills you look for in reporters is their ability to research, to learn and to explain for readers. It is therefore with regret that we report that David Olive of the Toronto Star is overdue for retirement. If he must insist on writing the same errors in his opinion pieces about Canada’s fossil fuel industry, he is not keeping pace with the needs of his readers.

One of his most egregious errors is to refer to Alberta’s tar sands product as ‘heavy oil.’ If he just once referenced the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) information on that subject, he might learn something. USGS defines oil by its viscosity—how easily it flows. Bitumen from the Athabasca and Cold Lake tar sands does not flow well enough to be called heavy oil. That bitumen has to be mixed with a diluent to send it through pipelines.

And that is why the Gulf Coast refineries in Texas are not interested in Alberta’s bitumen. The Texas refineries can get Venezuelan bitumen—that has a much better viscosity rating than the Canadian product.

The reason to send the Canadian gunk to the Texas ports was to fill the holds of ships that were heading back across the Atlantic empty. There are many other refineries in this world interested in cheap—though highly polluting—sources of oil.

What is really annoying about Mr. Olive’s lack of research is his claim that Canada has never had a national energy strategy. Maybe he was too young in 1980 to remember the National Energy Program introduced by Pierre Trudeau’s liberals. If he had ever been to Alberta, he might have been given an earful on the local reaction to that strategy. It was not well received there.

It does much to explain the reason that Pierre Trudeau’s son bought the TransMountain pipeline and is wasting billions on twinning the pipeline to carry diluted bitumen to an environmentally sensitive shipping point in the Burrard Inlet. It might not impress many Albertans. It certainly does not impress Canadians who care about our environment.

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to:

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You ask where bigotry and intolerance come from. It comes from being different. Does what you are wearing define you? Does your language speak for you? Does your religion demand of you? The simple fact is being different can make you a target for intolerance and acting out.

I was very annoyed with NDP leader Jagmeet Singh the other day when he ranted against the racism he perceives in Canada. Rant against racism sir but do not rant against Canada.

Racism exists. It breeds in ignorance—even in a well-educated society. It is here but it is hardly systemic. It is like a weed on our well-cared for lawn. You dig it out when you find it and another grows in its place. You always have to keep weeding.

It is why we worry about those pitifully small-minded politicians in Quebec who feed off the tribalism of language with such impunity. They think they can deny people their religious symbolism. They are wrong. That is bigotry. Call it what it is.

And do not divide children in religious schools. Children need to feel accepted. They want to play, not hate.

I remember people being called ‘DPs’ after the Second World War. I was a child wondering what was wrong with being a ‘displaced person’? What was wrong with the Italian immigrants whose children had to translate for parents?

One meets racism in many ways, in many forms. It is in bad jokes that people send you. It is in careless terminology. It is in an unfriendly manner. It is the childish and ugly use of spray paint on the local synagogue or on the plinth of a statue. It is also in the type casting of races in movies and television programs. It surrounds us and it holds us back.

All we can do is keep on weeding.

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can now be sent to:

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Is it alright to debase and deface a statue? Are we all given the right to do thousands of dollars in damage to statues of people who are long dead? Does the original mould for Egerton Ryerson’s statue still exist? And surely there is a law against defacing public property in such a manner?

Those callow creeps who tear down statues had better not go up to Mount Pleasant Cemetery in Toronto to disinter the original Egerton Ryerson. There are definitely laws against that.

Frankly, there is little reason to give a damn about the original Egerton Ryerson, neither the man nor as architect of the Ontario school system or the residential school system for aboriginal children. From what there is to be learned growing up in Ontario, about the school system, is that when you start with bad design, band-aid solutions are not the answer. What we have to-day is a mishmash—from pre-school to post-graduate—of a badly planned system. And, in my opinion, religion has no role to play in publicly funded schools. Nor, in a truly egalitarian society, should wealthy parents be allowed to discriminate in their children’s schooling.

My early recollections as a child where in the area of downtown Toronto in what is now called the Garden District. I remember standing at the fence on Victoria Street during the Second World War, watching Royal Air Force specialists, who were trained there, playing cricket. It changed after the war, as the property morphed through being a retraining school,to being a trades school, into a degree-granting adjunct to the University of Toronto and finally a free-standing university.

I always regretted not taking the radio-television arts program at Ryerson but coincidently married a lady who did. She loves to tell of the time her instructor in television equipment only agreed to give her a passing grade if she never, ever got behind the cameras or touched any of the broadcasting equipment.

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

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You are not supposed to snicker when a Trump supporter tells you his hero is going to win the presidency in 2024. Nor are you supposed to sound surprised when you are told that the supreme court might just re-instate him as early as this August. The only good news might be that Trump does not sound as committed as some of his followers.

It is possible that Donald Trump is refraining from making any statements about 2024 because he still thinks he can have the 2020 results upended. He is that delusional.

The man might be evil but he is not stupid. His avenues to publicity these days are fewer. He is under suspension from Facebook and banned from Twitter. And he lacks the patience for rebuilding his popularity on the newer versions of social media. If he really is interested in making a run for the 2024 nomination by the Republican Party, he might have to build his case the old-fashioned way. That means a steady stream of crowed halls and speeches and relying on the traditional media for coverage.

He could have been launching the campaign in North Carolina this past weekend when he spoke for an hour and a half to a hall full of republicans. It was as though he was back on the campaign trail. He said nothing new or surprising. It was pure Trump.

The only problem is that whatever success he has in building his case for 2024 will build an equal and opposite reaction from his enemies—of which he has more than a few. The New York prosecutors have convened a grand jury to examine the business dealings of Trump before he got into the White House.

Renewed interest in Trump’s financials will not be as easy to brush aside this time around. We all know the man is a liar and that he constantly whines about losing the 2020 election.

But this is also the man who called for an insurrection on January 6, 2021 and we watched in horror as his ignorant followers stormed the American capitol. Just think of what could have happened if they had a real leader?

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to a new e-mail:

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The new look for Babel-on-the-Bay was not intended. Moving an 11-year-old website to a new server proved more difficult than expected. It took some very good computer professionals to get the job done. All I have to say is that we have come a long way from that first DOS computer in the early 1980s.

There were not many incidents in politics worth noting when I was off the air. It comes back to the old adage that all politics is local. The pandemic here in Ontario has been a roller coaster ride. What has been open or closed here in Babel has been a matter of guesswork. The competence of our politicians remains questionable. The bluster of Premier Ford has left citizens confused and angry. All I know is that there are more than 8000 people dead from Covid-19 in Ontario and the disgust many of us feel for those idiots running around without masks saying it’s fake.

But maybe that feeling of anger has therapeutic value. The worst thing we can do is take out our frustrations on those close. By venting on politicians and deniers, we are creating an escape mechanism for that frustration. There is no way of saying what the outcome of both federal and provincial elections will be in the next year. My Ouija board is probably no better than yours but I think there is a sense of change in my electoral district.

Here in Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, provincial riding, there is no sympathy for that carpetbagger from Severn that Doug Ford dumped on us in the last election. All I know is that there are many of us who despise the job Doug Downey has done as attorney general and will do whatever it takes to see him defeated. Anyone who would work to prevent us from suing incompetent long-term care home owners is not going to get our votes.

And as for the nebbish who represents us in this federal electoral district, whomever he might be, he is in just as much trouble. He can blame it on his party’s lack of leadership, as much as he wants, but we have been paying his expenses and more than $150,000 per year for the past three years and he has done nothing useful.

I won’t say anything about the prime minister at this time but will be paying attention to what he will be doing and saying in the United Kingdom and Europe in the next week and will likely have a few comments.

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to a new e-mail:

[email protected]

Why would that message pop up on your computer? You know, and I know, there is no such thing as free! It little matters whether the message was from Microsoft, Google or Apple. These companies all do it. In this case it was Microsoft. The company is the most arrogant of all computer companies.

I remember years ago at a Microsoft-hosted conference in Seattle and the company was making its pitch to gain control of a new market. There were some 2000 computer people in that vast auditorium but I managed to grab a microphone first. I told the audience the name of my Toronto company and all I added was that while I spoke with a Canadian accent, when it came to Microsoft’s promises, I was from Missouri. The audience had a good laugh at Bill Gates’ company.

If you even think you are calling Microsoft today, you might get one of those small companies licenced to sell Microsoft products and services. They are like Remora fish that attach themselves to larger sharks and whales and reportedly feast on their feces.

What galls me most about the modern Microsoft is that the company still releases product before it is finished. It seems to rely on its customers to encounter, and help fix, the errors in its programs. How often have I wondered what little additions have been added to those updates, they ask you to accept?

Add to that the obvious paranoia of the company. I can get into my bank accounts easier than into a computer. Have you ever counted the number of names and passwords you need to start your computer and even get to the Microsoft Store? It is so bad that you have to keep a book of passwords beside the computer—which defeats the purpose of passwords.

And they all do it. My wife has two I-Pads. One of our grandsons set up the first one for her and figured she would remember the passwords. She didn’t. Neither did he. We took it to Apple and they were no help at all. I had to get her a new I-Pad and she now uses a handy book for all her codes.

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to  [email protected]

The one point that the Netflix series The Crown showed early and clearly was the terrible ignorance of English royalty. It is the lack of street smarts, the inability to draw on experience. And no wonder they find their lives so boring. There is too much they do not know.

We also saw some of that naivete in Prince Harry during that callow interview with Oprah Winfrey. It was not something I would normally bother to watch but I was hoping it would give us a rationale for what he planned to do with his life. There is only so much time can be devoted to be on the ‘A’ list for parties in Los Angeles.

But today is Victoria Day in Canada and I always like to see where the royals are at. The old Duke is gone and his Queen soldiers on. The Prince of Wales and his ‘lovely wife Camilla’ await their turn on the throne while the British odds-makers wonder if the Queen could outlive her eldest son. The betting is that William and Kate might be the saviours of the British royalty for one last jolly go-around.

But they will probably have to do it without the Scots who want to rejoin the European Union and, maybe, without the Northern Irish who like their back door into the European Union through Dublin.

It is generally conceded that Canada no longer needs a governor General. All the chores involved for the GG seem to be well handled by Canada’s Chief Justice.

It seems appropriate for Canada to be celebrating Victoria at this time as it was Victoria who helped saddle us with the awkward and elitist constitution that is so seriously in need of change.

Mind you, when Quebec politicians think they can change the constitution without reference to the rest of Canada, it does not make sense.

I have long been an advocate of an elected constitutional assembly that could work up a new, more practical constitution to present to the Canadian people for ratification. It is the time.

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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry

Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to  [email protected]