Category: New

Mr. Brown MP preys on the voting ignoramus,

He keeps sending junk to insult the rest of us.

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Mr Harper is supposed to be an economist,

To stimulate you spend, that he does insist,

Spent money on the G20, like a spendthrift,

And now prisons for crimes that don’t exist.

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Harper shook up his cabinet, he isn’t in a panic,

Like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

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It is the season where bloggers, professional writers and even columnists are at a loss what to write. The topics hardly jump at you. Sure, there is the odd laugher—a two liner. What you are looking for is something meaty—at least 500 words. This means you need to cast a wide net.

There is certainly an increasing measure of interest in the mayoralty campaign here in Babel. Being personally involved in that endeavour, I could make some observations.

To comment on an election, it is important to understand the historical patterns in the area. On a cursory look, you would say there are no patterns in Babel but that in itself is a pattern. This is not a community that usually votes for anything. It most often votes against. When the federal Liberal Party once swept the entire province with the exception of one riding it was the riding that included Babel. The local provincial member was recently tossed out of office. He was defeated by a federal member who had herself felt the wrath of the voters and lost while a sitting cabinet minister.

The last three mayors lost their bids for re-election. They were thrown out of office. The current incumbent is said to be working up his nerve to run again. There is little question but that the electorate will want to see how many times he bounces on the way down Mulcaster Street after being turfed from the mayor’s office. There are those giving odds on the proposition that he will take the easy route and not run but there are some financial considerations that say ‘Why not?’ Everyone deserves a final hurrah!

The mayor has a stalking horse in one of the incumbent councillors who suddenly threw his hat into the mayoralty pool this summer. This came as a surprise to many whom he might have told of his plans. He is there to muddy the waters as he has little hope of being able to put together an effective organization nor the legally allowable funds needed to carry out a respectable campaign.

One of the front runners is presumed to be the former provincial member of the legislature. He is insulting the intelligence of Babel voters by building a 1990s style campaign that he learned from former Ontario Premier Mike Harris. His zero property tax growth policies are not only unrealistic but he does not seem to want to tell voters just what he would cut to achieve this wondrous state of affairs. Voters probably remember that the biggest hikes in property taxes in Babel were when the Harris government, most improperly, dumped welfare costs on Ontario’s municipalities.

The ghost in the campaign is the former mayor who has been licking his wounds for the past four years. He is looking for redemption. He could not understand why the voters were so mad at him in the last election. He is back for a recount. The bad news is that the figures are not going to get any better.

Nobody is ever a shoo-in in a municipal election but I like my choice’s chances. He is a very hard worker. He is smart. And he is in it for the long haul. He has already shown that he can do much for his city. He is an economist and while he and I do not always agree on issues, he has made some very good deals for Babel’s taxpayers. He has built a strong and knowledgeable campaign team and they are already showing what they can accomplish. He is earning the support of Babel voters.

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

Our wily Babel Backward is in a capricious mode,

It puffs up the local MP, so his head can explode.

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The doctors of the CMA seem to agree,

They give rotten service to you and me.

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Have we got this is right? Day’s not too bright,

He says we need lots of prisons in these times,

Because of the increases in unreported crimes!

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Every year at this time, Babel salutes the long weekend at the beginning of August with a festival named after an 18^th Century British rear-admiral. Kempenfelt Bay is the jewel around which Babel is wrapped. British Rear Admiral James Kempenfelt is hardly well-known in naval circles let alone a name that rolls off the tongues of school children. It seems appropriate that he was famous for the fact he went down with his ship off Spithead, England where his ship, HMS Royal George, was undergoing repairs.

But they added the word ‘fest’ to make it Kempenfest and people come in the many thousands every year. And, worst luck for Babel, they bring many thousands of automobiles with them. The people are good for business; we could do without their automobiles. One supposes though that the problem is not the automobiles as much as the people not knowing what to do with them.

Parking is something of a problem in Babel at any time. Nobody here knows anything about the art of parking. Parallel parking is a foreign country to Babelites. The family car is only a year old but the experiences of trips for groceries and for essentials at the liquor store have left it already banged and nicked and broken to a current estimate of $2000 in minor body work repairs. We have about reached the point of checking the prices of used tanks to try to withstand the abuses. Now we know why the richer Babelites prefer those big ugly Hummers. Park next to one of those monsters and you are lucky if they do not empty their ashtrays on you.

But Kempenfest brings out the worst in all drivers:

“This looks like a good spot Mabel. Grab the kids and let’s go.”

“Harry, you’re in the middle of the road.”

“Yeh, but I can’t get no closer. C’mon.”

Call it creative parking. If they would just build lighter cars, we would find them parked on top of each other. From the vantage point of our aerie, the helter-skelter masses of abandoned cars looks like a movie set for “The Night of the Car-Crazed Zombies.” Retrieving an automobile from the set of this movie would require that everyone leave the keys in the vehicle and you just take the first one you find able to break free from the Gordian Knot. And this is assuming that nobody takes their best car to an event that can get you a year’s worth of dings and dents all in one afternoon on the Lakeshore.

Welcome to Kempenfest. And happy Simcoe Day.

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

It’s Kempenfest in Babel, the merchants all get rich,

But parking down at the waterfront really is a bitch.

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It is insidious. You want to trust Ma Bell. Ma has done much for Canada over many years. She ran copper wire through our wilderness to create a nation. She brought forth trustworthy technology to connect our peoples. She took over Northern Electric to create the wonder of Nortel. She gave thousands and thousands of people purpose and careers jacking us into the rest of the world. She was the widows’ and orphans’ shares that brought stability to retirement and leisure living. “I work for Bell,” was a strong social statement. Ma Bell was known. Ma Bell was trusted.

But no more! Ma has fallen on bad times. She has been raped and abused by business predators. Without the stabilizing hand of Bell, Nortel withered and died. Ma’s managers have divested reliable earners such as the yellow pages, off-loaded the installers, contracted out knowledgeable sales people to low-bid call centres and continues to out-source facilities, technologies and people at an alarming rate. Ma Bell is a poor shadow of the once robust company that was the succour of widows and orphans.

Ma has become desperate in hard times. Like an aged crone pitifully working the streets, she entices with promises, blandishments, free samples and simple deceit for the unwary. Those of us who knew her in her glory days still want to trust her.

But you cannot. Until recently, in this household, there was peace. Despite repeated calls from people with strange accents, Ma Bell’s many promises were ignored. The household was generally satisfied with the reliable billings of Yak Communications and much dissatisfied with the rapacious attitude of Rogers Cable.

It was when Ma Bell introduced satellite television service that the house of cards was shaken. As much as Ma Bell was no longer trusted, Mr. Rogers’ people were less loved. Have you ever tried to talk to someone at Rogers? Call centres are the only acceptable form of communication to them. Ask them something they do not understand and you lose. They never call back. Do not take them from the prepared route of their script. It confuses them. And do not forget, they can lose the tenuous connection with you in an instant (too bad).

You can flip a coin. Does Ma Bell or Rogers annoy you the most? It’s a toss-up.

But when Ma Bell offered the panacea of satellite service in this condominium, the owners beat a path to her door. To no longer have to deal with those autocratic no-names at Rogers was the appeal. The word ‘free,’ so freely used, certainly helped you along.

The deal was too good to be true. And, of course, it was not true.

Being of sound mind though, this householder held out for a written offer. There was some waffling at the written stipulation but your intrepid, knowledgeable householder held out. A deal was struck for the first year: Ma Bell would supply home telephone, six megabit DSL Internet service and high definition television with personal video recorder for a grand total of $71.90 plus tax each month. The key to this was that all miscellaneous fees such as the 24 cents for 911-service were included. No modems, touch tone fees, network charges or other extraneous charges were to be added.

Would it surprise you to learn that after a month of trying to get everything working, the first bill arrived from Ma Bell. While no person outside Bell employ could ever explain the details of that bill, it is also most likely that no two Bell employees could explain it the same way. It is a creative task. Suffice to say, the bill was for approximately three times the quoted figure. You can hardly blame Premier McGinty’s harmonized taxes for that kind of screw-up.

Next week, this contrite householder is returning to the nice people at Yak Communications and to the arms of the greedy cable guys at Rogers. As for Ma Bell, one can only hope that her minions will sic the small claims court on us. That is one place where written contracts are still likely to be honoured.

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