Category: Federal Politics

Listening to the throne speech reading by the Governor General yesterday was a sad occasion. It reminds you of one of your youngsters who had so much relaxing to do over the summer that he never did get around to that one school assignment. The government prorogued Parliament for an extra month to write this?

It is a desperation document. It is platitudes piled high. You could only feel sorry for David Johnson for having to read all roughly 7000 words. It was overly long and tortuous, winding its way to nowhere. As happens when you are writing things at different times, the end result is no theme, no cohesion, no easy read. It is disjointed and poorly structured. No passing mark for it.

But that does not matter. The truth be understood that this is what this government might do if nothing more interesting comes along. These are suggestions, not promises.

Yup, they say they are going to do something about mobile roaming charges. If you were impressed that your cell phone worked a thousand kilometres from home, why were you not equally impressed with the roaming charges? And if you were dumb and continued using the cell phone, you deserved the consequences. Yet, here is the Governor General sitting there saying something like “My government is also going to help stupid people by lowering roaming charges.” How this will work, we have no idea.

Even more complex is the problem of pandering to consumers by arranging for you to pay just for the television channels you watch on cable or satellite. This has been under discussion with the Canadian Radio-Television Telecommunications Commission for quite a few years. What nobody has solved yet are the pricing problems.

You will notice that none of these generous proposals are going to cost the government. Of course, the government wants to send people to jail forever, which can cost, but luckily, there are fewer criminals to send there.

And, despite the seriousness of the problem, do not hold your breath for the government to solve cyber bullying. If you can even define it clearly enough, how do you police it and bring it to court without threatening our freedoms? Sure, obvious cases have to be stopped but what about the more subtle ones?

If this was the retooling Mr. Harper thinks will spell a continued majority, he is whistling in the wind. He is a lame duck, limping towards the end of his career.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

Dear Mr. Brown:

This is to thank you for sending us the Brown Report, Fall 2013. There is little question that it is from you—in four pages, your picture appears 16 times. It makes one wish that you were a little more photogenic.

What is of concern to us is that nowhere in this report is there mention of any previous or anticipated activities by you on our behalf in Ottawa. The report devotes the most attention to your various public relations activities in Barrie.

We should expect after being elected for a few years now, you would know that the job  of a Member of Parliament is mainly in Ottawa. You are provided with staff, a substantial salary and expenses to do a job for us in Parliament, on parliamentary committees and in addressing the needs and concerns of Canadians. And be assured that the salaries of you and your staff are far in excess of what the City of Barrie might need or want to spend on a fulltime support structure for local charities.

And speaking of your efforts on behalf of some of our local charities, frankly you are probably doing more harm than good. Your hockey night, for example, could be far better run and raise much more money if it was run by the hospital. By politicizing an event of this nature in a city that loves its hockey is hampering our citizens’ ability to really get behind the event and make it the success it could be.

It has been our experience, over many years of working with fund raising for health agencies in Canada and around the world, that nobody really respects the person who advertises their support. Commercial support for charity has become an accepted practice as it reflects the community spirit of the business but it cannot be allowed to become more important than the charity to the long term detriment of the charity.

It is also important when working with charities to be able to provide a very precise accounting for all monies received and dispersed. Establishing and maintaining standards of stewardship in fund raising assists the public in appreciating that their donations are used responsibly.

And, frankly sir, a review of your service as Member of Parliament is also needed.

Sincerely,

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

One of the worst forecasts we ever saw was a Canadian-made, low budget science-fiction movie released in 1979. It was loosely based on H.G. Wells’ book by the same name. What was really wrong with it was that the 1936 version of the movie when the screen play was written by Wells and titled “Things to come” was really much better.

This must seem like a strange thing to go through your mind as you watch Industry Minister James Moore talking on Tom Clark’s West Block show on Global Television this Sunday. What knits everything together is that Moore was using his rapid CBC-trained speaking style telling us what Prime Minister Stephen Harper is going to try to sell us in the Wednesday Throne Speech. Boy, speaking of science fiction!

Would you believe that Moore was trying to convince us that Harper was going to be the saviour of the consumer? He is going to save us from roaming charges on our cell phones. He is going to fix the problems of our having to buy television channels that we do not want. He is going to save consumers from the rapacious telecom giants.

Moore said that the Prime Minister is even going to force Air Canada to treat customers as something other than sheep. He is going to insist that airlines stop overbooking. And the best news of all was that all the costs were going to be borne by the industries involved—at least until they figure out how to recoup the costs.

What it sounds like, is that Mr. Harper is taking a page from the New Democrat’s play book to save us nickels and dimes. He is also getting aboard the Liberal Party’s voyage of discovery with the middle class. He is not about to let Justin Trudeau win all those middle class votes. Harper can be middle class too.

Mind you, Moore assures us that Harper will remain the astute manager of the Canadian economy that he always tells us he is. We will all be watching on Wednesday to hear exactly how he thinks Finance Minister Jim Flaherty is going to eliminate the deficit in time for a 2015 federal election. There are a lot of earlier promises from Harper that hinge on getting rid of that pesky deficit by that time. Maybe that will also be in the realm of science fiction.

But listening to the fast-talking Moore, you could easily understand why Harper sent him out with a message of hope for Canadians on the long weekend. There is nothing more appealing to news directors who are stuck working than someone taking a stick to their bosses who are enjoying their long weekend off.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

Thanksgiving Day in Canada is a good day to talk about our hopes for renewing our country. To this end, we are taking Justin Trudeau at his word that he wants the Liberal Party of Canada to develop the policies that Canadians want. We have therefore contributed a resolution to the Liberal Party policy development process that can hopefully repair and rebuilt the process and institutions governing this country.

The problem with this type of resolution is that there are far more barriers to addressing these questions than methods for implementing change. In a country that will soon be 150 years old, we are operating with political institutions where some of them are despised, some inoperable in a modern context and a few running out of control. And what concerns constitutional experts is that there are few checks and balances in our system of governance.

It is right and reasonable that these institutions and processes be reviewed. To do that, Canada needs to elect a constitutional assembly and give it time to consider the needs and wants of Canadians. An assembly of this sort needs the power to call expert witnesses and to properly examine needs and alternatives.

Under our present amending formula, the politicians from provinces and territories need to sit down with the federal government to review any proposed changes. And if the assembly has done its job properly, no proposals are going to be dismissed out of hand.

The final authority must be the people of Canada. If we have the ideas, the belief in our future, the determination for change, we will have change

The resolution is as follows:

“Resolution Title: The Rebuilding of Canada

“Whereas: Since Canada was established as a nation in 1867, it has existed with institutions and structures more suited to the 19^th Century. It is now time before Canada reaches 150 years to rebuild, re-arrange and re-organize our nation to reflect the nation Canadians need and want in the 21^st Century.

“And Whereas: Canadians are especially concerned about the growing loss of effectiveness of the Senate as a chamber of competent review and consideration, the lack of effective checks and balances on the power of the Prime Minister in appointments to the judiciary, boards, commissions, military and other government controlled agencies, and the responsibility of elected parliamentarians to meet and discuss the concerns and needs of their constituents in a timely, civilized and thorough manner.

“And Whereas: Canadians are questioning the use of another country’s head of state and need to review the need for a Canadian head of state—by election or other means.

“And Whereas: Canadians are searching for ways to overcome some of the weaknesses to our first-past-the-post electoral process and are seeking a more thorough review.

“Be it resolved that the Liberal Party of Canada: Will work toward the election of a constituent assembly of Canadians from every part of Canada to meet, call witnesses, study and advise the government of a plan for implementation of any proposed changes in Canada’s constitution.

“And be it further resolved that the Liberal Party of Canada: Will call for an open meeting of the Provinces and Territories to discuss and, if agreeable, approve the findings of the assembly.

“And be it further resolved that the Liberal Party of Canada: Will call for a national referendum to seek the approval of all Canadians to the proposals as approved by the Provinces and Territories.”

Babel-on-the-Bay will welcome comment, improvement and support from our Canadian readers on this resolution. Happy Thanksgiving.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

If the Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC) was supposed to be secret, they forgot to tell us. After more than 30 years of relaxed access to most aspects of government in Canada, the recent revelations about Canada’s spying are no surprise to this writer. As head of public affairs for a large computer company that did hundreds of millions of dollars of business with the government, the job was simple. You gain little by talking. If you want to learn, you listen.

Life in those years seemed to be an endless series of idle conversations. You could go to the old CSEC facility on Heron and pose an idea to some of the people there. It was their questions that told you what they were doing and where they were going. And watching the shift of Bell Northern Research to Nortel and listening to those conversations was fascinating. And it was international too: there was an intriguing chat with the CIA station chief in Quebec City and other chance meetings in Washington. And there are hundreds of international visitors; a casual chat with a vice-premier of China at a Royal Bank reception turned out to be a highly memorable event—and very good for business.

The point is business means access and access means business. Other writers seek fame and fortune writing about black ops and drug money but the reality is embassies and consulates are there around the world to further business interests. And so is CSEC.

CSEC had its roots in the England’s Bletchley Park and the Hydra radio centre on Lake Ontario in the early days of the Second World War. Bletchley’s deciphering algorithms became child’s play as more and more powerful computers came into use. And then the lead establishment was not in England but in Ottawa. The early interest was in transoceanic radio and cable traffic. There is far more business traffic of interest than drug deals. All the snoopers had to do was set the computers to listen for key words in a range of languages. When you ultimately let the U.S., U.K., Australia and New Zealand in on what you are doing, you can stop worrying about listening to your own nationals. Someone else is doing it for you.

And if the Brazilian’s get angry at intrusive business espionage, so be it. You can always blame the Americans, if you need to.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his hair and his hairdresser are travelling the world, an uptight salesman for Canada. He is selling resources first and manufactured goods second. He is setting up opportunities. It looked at one point that he was too busy selling bad economics but thankfully the G8 leaders have learned to ignore him on that subject. His best sales tool is having CSEC help him. Just think what he could do if he was a more likeable salesman—or cared about us.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

Here he has his own Airbus A310, his own hairdresser, a plane full of lackeys to do his bidding and Prime Minister Stephen Harper still gives the back of his hand to simple diplomacy. This guy manages to look stiff and stunned in a Balinese shirt and surrounded by beautiful Balinese women. He is certainly not doing Canada’s world-wide reputation the least bit of good.

And now he wants to piss off his best friend Queen Elizabeth II. Can you imagine? Here Prime Minister Harper cosies up to the royals for years and now he is needlessly throwing crap at their favourite photo-op: the Commonwealth. He thinks he is going to have some kind of influence on Sri Lanka’s leaders by boycotting a Commonwealth meeting there next month.

Maybe Harper figures he does not need to be there because Prince Charles is standing in for his mother. He figures nobody will criticize him for ignoring Charles.

But this is not diplomacy. This is childish. Stephen Harper and his hairdresser will stay home for a change. Nobody is going to disagree that the long-ago Commonwealth solidarity behind England has become something of a joke. It is just that any and all forums for nations to talk can be of value. It is good for trade. It is good for democracy. And it is good for furthering human rights. You only insult a country when you want to go to war with it.

Neither Stephen Harper nor his foolish Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird appear to have a clue about what is involved in diplomacy. They are so busy destroying Canada’s reputation around the world that it will take many years for the country to recover its former prestige and respect.

It is as though John Baird is taking diplomacy lessons from New York City taxi drivers. The last time he was at the United Nations. Baird was reported to have made singularly undiplomatic remarks to the Maldives foreign minister about the current elections in that country. That is really brave of Baird to insult a small island nation in the Indian Ocean.

And how would Baird like it if the foreign minister for the Maldives asked him if the courts in Canada are going to hang Mr. Harper’s former parliamentary assistant MP Dean Del Mastro for election fraud? Even John Baird would know that whether Mr. Del Mastro is hung or not should only be a matter of interest to his close friends.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

Federal New Democrat Leader Thomas Mulcair has taken a shine to tar sands economics. He has joined with Stephen Harper’s Conservatives who seem titillated with the sexual suggestiveness of having big pipelines lacing our country. Tommy thinks that there is a compromise if we just refine all this potential oil in Canada. As the old song goes; Tommy is looking for love in all the wrong places.

Meanwhile MP Peter Julian, the New Democrat’s energy critic has been busy learning all about renewable energy in Denmark. He was also looking in the wrong places. He would have learned more about the reality of renewable energy if he had done his fact finding here in Ontario.

But Tommy has directed his energy critic to come up with a policy for the party that will include refining tar sands bitumen in Canada without increasing pollution. And if you thought Hercules of mythology had it tough in the Augean Stables with what was an impossible task, Julian is in far more deep do-do than that.

What he will find if he checks it out is that the pollution starts with the extraction of the bitumen from the tar sands. The tar sands companies use hot water to literally wash the sand out of the bitumen. Along with the sand, the water becomes a soup of obnoxious chemicals and it is destroying the fragile environment of the Athabasca.

No matter where you refine it, processing bitumen to synthetic oil leaves a huge residue of carbon. What carbon you do not pump into our atmosphere creates endless piles of a carbon slag that can be burned but sends out more pollution into the air we breathe.

And then, when we use the refined gasoline and other fuels, the pollution cycle continues. At a time when we are becoming far more conscious of the destruction of our environment, the demand for these highly polluting fuels continues to grow.

What Peter Julian is going to have to report back to his Leader Thomas Mulcair is that there is no technological solution today that provides a pollution free use of Alberta’s tar sands. The Harper Conservatives gave it their best shot by trying to ship it to countries that do not care about pollution. Too bad, Tommy, Canada cares.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

This takes some analysis. TransCanada Pipelines is delaying the application for its Energy East Pipeline until next year. This is a major delay for the company. Even if TransCanada does nothing pro-active on the file for the year, it means costs are accumulating. And we are talking many millions.

The plan is for TransCanada to get National Energy Board permission to convert its major west to east natural gas pipeline to run bitumen slurry and to extend the line 1400 kilometres to Quebec City and then south to Saint John, New Brunswick. With a major terminal to be built at Saint John, the line is to bring 1.1 million barrels a day of bitumen slurry to the terminal to be put on tankers for world customers.

Consumers have suffered through the incessant television advertising and the full-page newspaper propaganda of TransCanada’s NewThink that tells us bitumen is good for you. Mind you, they think we are stupid so they call it heavy crude oil. They infer that it is good for the environment and will create thousands of jobs and neither statement could further from the truth. TransCanada has been spending millions of dollars to get you to love Big Brother Bitumen.

But what has happened? What is causing this delay, this change of heart? Are they so confident of U.S. President Barack Obama’s approval of TransCanada’s Keystone XL Pipeline through the American Midwest? Is TransCanada a one-trick pony and now has no need for this Energy East fiasco?

Or is it that they think the Enbridge proposal to reverse Line 9B through southern Ontario has the fix in with the National Energy Board? Betcha the entire board knows it is going to get fired if it does not approve that one. The Harper Conservatives greased that slide more than a year ago when it stopped Canadians from appearing willy-nilly in front of the board members and embarrassing them with the truth. Just wait for the hearings in Toronto soon. That event is going to be a zoo. They will probably not even let this writer in the door. Oh well, it used to be a democratic country!

Maybe TransCanada thinks that Premier Christy Clark in British Columbia can be persuaded to approve both the Enbridge Northern Gateway and the new Kinder Morgan pipelines to the Pacific coast to handle the Chinese markets.

The tar sands exploiters are so desperate that there is even serious talk now of sending rail tanker cars to Churchill, Manitoba on Hudson’s Bay. At least in the summers, bitumen can be shipped from there to world markets. It is just that the citizens of Churchill are in shock. It is too soon after the Lac-Mégantic disaster.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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

For the first time in over a year, Babel-on-the-Bay skipped posting for one day last week. Readership plummeted. There was a technical problem. It was solved with the purchase of a new monitor. It seems those things die after eight or nine years. A computer nerd was also enticed (with money) to come and clean up the computer. It needed a grease job. This did not mean we had nothing to do but it did cause some introspection. We thought some more about what the hell we are doing here.

This blog has become a demanding hobby. It is still fun. It is only a personal penchant for good spelling, grammar and clarity that we spend the time we do. There are also some wonderful readers who delight in pointing out any errors.

But one reader got to your writer last week: “Why are you so angry?” she wanted to know. That was serious. Here we are having fun and we are told that we are coming across as angry. She is also getting bored with bitumen. She likes it when we are funny.

If you felt as lonely as we have felt in discussing bitumen, you would understand. Only in the past week have the mainstream media in Eastern Canada started to realize the dangers of having bitumen slurry piped through eastern cities on its way to seaports. The Toronto Star had its first alarmist headline just the other day. Previously it had restricted the coverage on the reversal of Enbridge’s Line 9B to puff pieces in the business section.

It is nice to know that others are as appalled as you at the prospect of a disaster in Toronto’s Yonge Street Subway or to our fresh drinking water. We sent our concerns to the National Energy Board in Calgary in August but we have no Google Analytics on that posting to tell us if anyone is reading it.  You have to realize that there are hundreds of millions of dollars (and the resources of the federal government) behind the push to get that Alberta bitumen to seaports and one lousy little blog is not much of a finger in that dike.

Mind you, we are very pleased with our readership for Babel-on-the-Bay. Out of hundreds of millions of blogs on the world-wide web, only a very few are knowledgeable, readable, erudite or worthy of a few minutes of your time. We are honoured you chose to visit us. Thank you.

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Copyright 2013 © Peter Lowry

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