Although I hadn’t planned it, my recent return from Mexico resulted in a prolonged stay in southern California, first in LA and then in Palm Springs. I had intended to make brief stops in each to visit old friends but, when I tried to schedule the required COVID test for my return to Canada, discovered they were as scarce as hens’ teeth. And so I ended up spending two weeks in Palm Springs before I could organize the test and a new flight. That stay coincided with the first anniversay of the storming of the Capital Building by the angry mob on January 6 and, not suprisingly, the coverage on mainstream media (Fox doesn’t count) was wall to wall.

For an outside observer it does look like America is in a shambles, one that doesn’t seem to have any easy fix. The former President, ensconced in the belly of his golden beast in Mara Lago, continues to foment lies about the conduct and result of the last Presidential election, lies that are echoed and shared by a substantial majority of the Republican universe all with the goal of fundamentally undermining the Presidency of Joe Biden. In anticipation of the mid term elections this fall, some Republican members of Congress are now saying they will move to impeach President Biden if they gain control of the House of Representatives, although it isn’t at all clear on what charge the impeachment would be based.

Conduct, language and attitudes of some of the more extreme members of the Republican caucus wouldn’t be tolerated in most middle school playgrounds. And yet, here they are acting out and being rewarded for it. Some, one assumes, actually believe the nonsense they are spewing but others surely do not and, instead, in acts of craven cynicism, behave this way to advance their own political careers at whatever cost to their country.

It’s clear now that a significant majority of the Republican Party and its elected representatives are willing to forgo real democracy in exchange for hanging on to power for a shrinking white minority. This will not end well.

And on the other side of the aisle there are the Democrats whose rag tag coalition never looked more fragile, and at a time when it needs to be rock solid. On the left we see a determination to radically change the role of government in American life and to move America dramatically towards a more social democratic model akin to that in Canada or Western Europe. And on the right (for lack of better term) we have members who don’t believe they were given a mandate for radical change when they won both Houses and the White House and who expected President Biden to carefully hold to the centre while protecting the democratic institutions themselves. Thus far, no amount of cajoling by the President, the Democratic Leadership and others has caused either side to move significantly from their initial positions.

Presiding over this toxic stew, President Biden has failed to effectively use his vaunted legislative skills to bridge the gaps between Democrats and Republicans or even between the left and right in his own party. Watching him flailing about, I am reminded that he is a good and decent man but that only goes so far and, thus far, he doesn’t seem to be able to wield the mighty power of the Presidency to bend others to his will or, at a minimum, to reach middle ground. Yes, he does deserve credit for the COVID relief package and the Infrastructure Bill but these have been drowned out by the braying on both sides over the so called “Build Back Better” legislation. At a time when America needs a President with the persuasive skills of a Lyndon Johnston and the empathy of a Bill Clinton, it has neither.

One of the more telling indicators of the impasse in America is the approach to the January 6 assault on the Capital. Although some Republican leaders initially condemned it in appropriate terms they have, with very few exceptions, retreated behind the malevolent shadow of the former President, now arguing it was nothing more than a demonstration or peaceful gathering or, worse, may have been instigated by left wing infiltrators/agitators. The standout exceptions to this revisionist/appeasement are Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois. And they are both under ferocious pressure within the Republican Party. Kinzinger has decided not to run again and Cheney is facing a primary challenge supported by the former President. I know I’m not alone in feeling surprise at how much I admire Representative Cheney, a woman whose political compass is far to the right of my own but who is showing over and over again what it takes to speak truth to power and how to show fidelity to constitutional order and democracy. Even her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, showing up at the House of Representatives on the anniversay of the January 6 assault, caused a tiny tingle of admiration although quickly qualified by my memories of his record in office.

While the Republicans want Americans to basically forget about the assault on the Capital, the Democrats want it seared into the American consciousness with the same intensity as the attack on Pearl Harbour or the attacks of 911. Although the Republicans are way offside on this, I also think the Democrats are overreaching and may, in the process, alienate some independent voters. There is no doubt the attack on January 6 was orchestrated by the former President and his supporters, that he deliberately riled the crowd up and encouraged them to march to the Capital and their intention was to disrupt the formality of registering the electoral votes confirming Joe Biden’s victory. There is also no doubt there were acts of violence and desecration and people were injured and died. But on a scale of the attack on Pearl Harbour or the attacks on 911, not really. No question, it was an outrage and the full force of the law should be brought to bear on all who are responsible but the narrative is getting confused and Democratic overreach isn’t helping.

And while all this is going on, Republican controlled legislatures are creating obstacles to voting and to the fair counting of votes, this on top of gerrymandering that is outrageous even by American historical standards. Position by position, the officials who refused to overturn the election are being replaced by those more compliant to the former President’s message. While, despite their control of Congress, the Democrats seem paralyzed to take even the minimal steps that are necessary to protect free and fair elections.

The first test will be the midterms this November where, if current projections hold, the Republicans will regain control of the Senate and probably gain control of the House, giving them an effective veto over most of what President Biden will want to accomplish. And that is just the opening act. What happens if, in 2024, the former President or one of his proteges “wins” because of Republican legislatures ignoring the clearly expressed will of their voters in particular states? Will the big Democratic states, the ones that provide the economic engine to the country, sit idly by and allow someone to become President who, in their eyes at least, did not win the election? I think that’s unlikely and we all know where that leads, less than two hundred years after the last civil war.

One noteworthy development is the appearance of programs and commentaries asking whether American Democracy can survive? Even a couple of years ago such questions would have seemed so ridiculous as to not be given any serious consideration. And yet here we are. At a place where tens of millions of Americans believe the last election was “stolen”; believe they have a duty and a right to fight for the restoration of the former President; and believe that violence may be necessary to achieve that end. Oh, and need I mention, Americans are armed to the teeth.

I hear plaintive calls for bipartisan leadership; for the emergence of a “Kennedy-like” leader; for a coalition of Biden and Liz Cheney, but they are all whistling in the wind. There is no saviour on the horizon, nor is there likely to be one in time. As Americans talk past each other, as they demonize and dehumanize those who are not like them or who disagree with them, as they scream invective about imagined hurts and injustices, and as they wall themselves off from anything but the most narrrowly conforming orthodoxy, chilling reminders of what has happened to other societies that have gone down this path surface.

As someone trained in the study of English Literature I am bemused by the frequent references to “beasts slouching towards Bethlehem waiting to be born” or to “the centre cannot hold” or “mere anarchy is loosed upon the world” or “The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity” and on and on. But the poets are not going to save us, particularly as their phrases enter pop culture without understanding the terrifying background and aftermath of those words.

If anything will save America it is the American people and what’s left of its vaunted institutions and right now I wouldn’t bet on either. I hope the old saying “you should never bet against America” holds true yet again but this time feels different, chillingly so.

Of course the implications of an America in chaos, beset with civil strife and violence are almost unthinkable to those who are close friends and allies but time is running out and think we must.

Just sayin

G

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Like most sentient beings in North America I have now heard about Kyle Rittenhouse, the then seventeen year old from Illinois who took a semi automatic rifle to a riot in Kenosha Wisconsin and shot three men, killing two and seriously injuring the third. All three of his victims (although I note the judge in his trial explicitly banned the prosecution from referring to them as “victims”) were white although the riots were precipitated by a police shooting of a black man. Last week the jury in his trial acquitted him of all charges, presumably accepting his plea of self defence.

Like most of my liberal friends I was shocked, although not entirely surprised, by the verdict and, with little other thought, put it down to the systematic racism in America, including its judicial system. And then an American friend forwarded me information about the shootings that, shall we say, complicated my black and white view of what had happened. I had to acknowledge that I really knew little about the offenses Rittenhouse was charged with or the court case and yet I had little difficulty rushing to judgement, something I like to think I rarely do. I then shared the information on Facebook with a comment it “might” provide some further perspective on the case. The response was interesting.

With almost no exceptions, my “friends” were clear that their preferred view should prevail regardless of the facts. Several suggested the information I provided was most likely suspect, propaganda put out by Rittenhouse’s defence team and amplified by right wing media and social media sites. And yet no one offered any details for that claim nor attempted to systematically dispute the information I had shared. I should also note that most of the friends who reacted were Canadians despite my having far more American friends on Facebook.

Let me be clear, I abhor vigilantism and think any society that permits or, worse, encourages a seventeen year old or, for that matter, anyone to openly carry a semi automatic rifle along public streets and into a riot is seriously screwed up. As a Canadian I’m aware and proud of the fact that were such behaviour displayed here he would have been surrounded by a swat team and arrested before he knew what hit him. But this didn’t occur in Canada. It occurred in a nation that harbours what most outsiders see as a bizarre view of guns and peoples’ rights to own and use them. And in that context apparently nothing he did prior to the actual shootings was against the law. I know. I know. It’s crazy. But it is what it is.

And without laws prohibiting the display and use of such weapons it’s inevitable that people are going to get shot. I’m in no position to judge the claim of self defence once the right to carry the weapon into the riot is sanctioned and, frankly, neither are all of my liberal friends who have rushed to judgement. I certainly think what he did was profoundly stupid, immoral and should have been against the law. But the inescapable truth is it wasn’t against the law.

Which brings me to the real purpose of this blog and that is to offer some thoughts on how all of us respond to events in this polarized age of twenty four hour news and the bombardment of social media. The simple fact is we have largely lost the ability to do the real work of participating in a civil society. It is so easy to jump to a conclusion consistent with our increasingly deeply held beliefs and biases and then to join the braying pack expressing outrage as we amplify the divisions amongst us. And, ultimately, that will prove fatal to the kind of open, civilized countries we all claim to cherish.

There’s something else I want to comment on too: the creeping Canadian exceptionalism that increasingly seeps into our world view. For much of its over two hundred year history, what is now Canada was mostly defined by not being American. That was especially true of English Canada, the foundations of which were built by refugees from the American War of Independence. Over the decades we have watched with thinly disguised disapproval as our American cousins proclaimed their country the best on earth; the “shining city on the hill”; the only place in human history where an individual could achieve whatever he or she wanted to achieve. Canadians are experts at eye rolling when confronted with these claims but, on the whole, have considered them harmless, a bit like humouring an insecure relative.

And we were always proud that we didn’t behave similarly, relishing our image of the trustworthy, more civil, more democratic, less racist younger cousin or brother (choose you metaphor). The beaver and the maple leaf seemed the perfect antidote to all the chest thumping south of the 49th parallel. But ironically, somewhere back there that very behaviour began to look like a rather Canadian version of American exceptionalism. And it’s not very pretty. God knows, the last couple of years have taught us that our own history is fraught with behaviours by European settlers that, at least by today’s standards, are shameful. While we didn’t have slavery with its subsequent creation of a permanent underclass in Canada, we certainly displaced native populations from their ancestral homes with little regard for their rights. And while we may not have engaged in the types of Indian Wars as our U.S. cousins did, we did remove native children from their homes and families, trying to turn them into miniature Europeans and leaving subsequent generations permanently disadvantaged and disabled.

And let’s be clear, racism is not a uniquely American experience, although given its past as a slaveholding nation, it is certainly more obvious in America than in Canada. But Canadians shouldn’t take too much pride in that given Canada’s history of banning Asian immigration and placing strict quotas on Jews seeking to immigrate, often fleeing terrible repression in Europe. There’s lots of blame to go around including for Canada. And that’s why I find the new Canadian exceptionalism so very, well, un Canadian.

Just sayin

G

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Although much of this blog is going to use the example from my home city, Vancouver, Canada, I suspect similar, if not identical, problems afflict cities across Canada and the United States. In fact, I know they do from first hand experience.

There has been a steady deterioration in the safety of our streets in Vancouver over the past several years to the point it is no longer unusual to hear reports of random violence committed against law abiding citizens simply going about their daily business. Two days ago, a woman leaving a coffee shop on Pender Street was approached and stabbed with a dirty syringe by a stranger. Police subsequently picked up the woman who did the stabbing, reporting she was “known to them”. After an initial court appearance, she is now out on the streets waiting a subsequent appearance. This is only the latest unprovoked attack on innocent people in downtown Vancouver.

Late at night ten days ago someone walked down Davie Street in Vancouver’s West End and smashed the windows of numerous small businesses. This, only a few days after a man walking to work on the same street in the early morning was punched in the face by a stranger and ended up in hospital.

At about the same time and a few blocks north someone went on a crime spree in Gastown, smashing windows and looting stores which was just a continuation of a crime wave that has engulfed that historic neighbourhood making it increasingly unlivable. Since April there have been eighty two violent crimes and two hundred and fifty nine property crimes in Gastown. And those are only the ones that are reported with police acknowledging that many, perhaps most, go unreported.

A few blocks south of Gastown, residents are fleeing Yaletown as its streets become increasingly unsafe at night and all across Vancouver, homeowners and strata councils are having to spend millions of dollars to increase security around their properties (my own complex has just installed “panic buttons” in the garages after residents were accosted by strangers in the garages at night).

And lest Vancouverites who live elsewhere in the city feel they are insulated from these problems, they are not, as disorder spreads outwards along Hastings, Cambie, Main and South Granville. It is only a matter of time before every corner of Vancouver is dealing with the problems of crime and disorder on its streets. It is already manifesting itself in Vancouver’s far eastern suburbs and the adjacent communities.

This is how cities die.

So how did we get to this point? Most would agree the root of the problem is Vancouver’s out of control illicit drug problem that manifests itself most dramatically in the rotten core of the city, the Downtown Eastside (the “DTES”). There should be little debate this is ground zero for the chaos that is metastasizing across Vancouver and, despite decades of attempts to address it, nothing has worked. The city, the province and the federal government have all poured billions of dollars into the DTES in a seemingly patchwork and uncoordinated effort to address its myriad problems. And yet they don’t only persist, they have grown worse and now spill into the rest of the city particularly as the city converts hotels into Single Occupancy Rooms in other neighbourhoods and then fills them with DTES residents.

It’s not clear when the DTES started really spinning out of control. When I was a teenager in the ’60’s it was a bit off the grid, almost certainly already the poorest postal code in the city if not the country but there wasn’t much evidence of wide spread drug use, at least not in public. It had a large population of transient workers, usually foresters, miners or longshoremen who stayed in the inexpensive old hotels in the neighbourhood. They all had beer parlours that were known to be rough but, again, not at all like the chaos we see today. My sense is the widespread use of drugs became more prevalent in the late eighties and the nineties until, eventually, it became the defining characteristic of the neighbourhood. Even then, however, it was mostly confined to the few blocks that make up the DTES.

But somewhere in the aughts, that changed as the chaos, lawlessness and disorder began spreading into adjacent neighbourhoods. First it was Strathcona. Then Gastown. Then the West End and the downtown core. Then Yaletown. And now across the bridges into the neighbourhoods to the south and east of the downtown core of the city. And lest people on the North Shore think Burrard Inlet will insulate them from these problems they should just look at how inadequate False Creek (the smaller harbour) was in doing so.

So why has Vancouver’s approach to this challenge been such a complete failure? There have been many attempts to find a coherent and effective approach but, clearly, none of them has worked. And it isn’t because of lack of resources. As I note above, billions have been poured into the neighbourhood by all three levels of government but, seemingly, to little effect. People who live in Metro Vancouver may be familiar with the term “Four Pillars” which is the catchphrase to describe the approach theoretically being used to address the problems on the DTES. It was championed by the recently deceased Mayor, Phillip Owen, in about 2003/04. It supposedly has four elements: Harm reduction; Prevention; Treatment and Enforcement. Aside from those basics most Vancouverites know little about it and it has become a kind of default phrase that supposedly describes a humane and effective program although the details are very hard to discern and, as the escalating chaos in the neighbourhood attests, whatever those details are they are either insufficient or are just not working.

I have come to believe the reason all our approaches have failed is that our leaders have looked, and continue to look, at the issue through the singular filter of the victim-hood of the drug users. In fact, that narrative has become so compelling that any deviation from it results in charges you are supporting death squads, or some kind of fascist militarization of the area, or, when it comes to moving people out of those neighbourhoods, that most searing of liberal charges: Nimby-ism. And, with rare exceptions, the politicians have cowered and buckled before those attacks.

I accept that the poor and drug addicted in the DTES are victims of many things but not, it seems to me, the only ones nor, necessarily, the ones with first claim on our compassion. It’s likely a claim of victim-hood can be mounted by most perpetrators of crimes, whether coming from a dysfunctional family, being the victim of sexual abuse, experiencing some traumatizing, life altering event, being of native origin or the myriad negative events that can affect a life but, as a society, for the most part, we still maintain a bar for behaviour that is acceptable and unacceptable and, irrespective of the background of those who don’t meet it, impose sanctions on them. Without that core understanding/rule, civilization as we know it would cease to exist. And yet, somewhere back there we decided to give a pass to at least some drug addicts and, most particularly, those in the DTES.

I have heard the arguments that drug abusers are not responsible for their condition; that once hooked they lack the physical and mental ability to come clean; that others, perhaps the large drug conglomerates, are to blame for their condition and position and as such they cannot be held accountable when they act out. There is undoubtedly some truth to this but only some. The simple fact is every drug addict made a choice at some point in time to use drugs and at least some have little interest in getting off them. In her excellent column in the Vancouver Sun on the weekend on the idiotic motion Vancouver City Council unanimously adopted to facilitate access to all kinds of drugs, Daphne Bramham cites several drug users who are accessing the drugs currently being provided by the city and province but who would prefer the unfettered access to all kinds of drugs offered by the organization that Vancouver City Council apparently now supports. The reasons given all fell into the zone of “convenience”, i.e. they didn’t like having to wait in line for their drugs, they didn’t like having to wait fifteen minutes after they’ve injected or ingested to see if they have an adverse reaction, and they didn’t like the quality of the drugs being provided. These don’t strike me as people who are desperately in need of a fix no matter the “inconvenience”.

So, where do we go from here? Well, for starters we elect political leaders with the spine to say and do things that will almost certainly provoke the outrage of the vested interests enabling the chaos on the DTES and everyone else who has bought into the orthodoxy of the victim-hood of the drug users. That means committing resources to the two pillars of the “Four Pillars” that have been largely ignored: treatment and enforcement and linking them. It means being clear that when people commit crimes, big or small, there are consequences and, what’s more, particularly if they are repeat offenders, those consequences involve being separated from society for a long time. It means when you assault someone with a deadly weapon (see the dirty needle attack I referred to earlier) you don’t just get to walk back out onto the streets. It means the so-called “victimless crimes” are prosecuted, whether it’s spraying paint on walls or sidewalks, defecating in public, selling stolen items, breaking windows…the list goes on. Because the simple truth is none of these are truly “victimless” as our city becomes less and less safe and livable for everyone else.

Yesterday the provincial government announced they were asking the federal government to decriminalize possession of small amounts of drugs for personal use in B.C. That announcement was supported by a wide array of leaders including the sainted Dr. Bonnie Henry all of whom seem to focus exclusively on the problems of the addicts, not the problems they cause. I can’t imagine how this is going to make the troubles we are having better. If it’s part of the effort to ensure a safer drug supply that’s only going to work if the government completely takes over the distribution of those drugs and, as the example from Daphne Brahmham’s column shows, even that won’t address the wants of some of the addicts. Moreover, unless the drugs are free, it will do nothing to curtail property crimes motivated by the need to purchase drugs. What it will do is remove one more tool from the enforcement side although, admittedly, that tool has been largely left on the shelf for the past couple of years anyway. This again is looking at the problem through the singular filter of the addict as victim without any regard for all the other victims of this plague. And let’s remember, much of the chaos on Vancouver’s streets relating to the opioid crisis is caused by people who are high, or stoned or badly damaged mentally by their use of drugs. How is facilitating access to those drugs without controls going to do anything but make this all worse?

It’s past time for all residents of metro Vancouver to raise their voices and make it clear to the political and medical leaders that the status quo is not acceptable and steps that will only worsen the current problems are not on.

The next civic election in Vancouver is in October. It’s our opportunity to elect individuals for Mayor and Council who will effectively address these issues by supporting all four of the Four Pillars, especially including treatment and enforcement (and I note that all members of the existing Council, including the Mayor and the alder-person who wants to replace him, voted for the extraordinary motion last week that, if implemented, will make the current problems much, much worse). They will then need to pressure the provincial and federal governments to do likewise.

I have lived in Vancouver for sixty years and on the downtown peninsula for fifty. I love this city and I’m not going let it fail without a fight. How about the rest of you?

Just sayin

G

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Although Canada’s election is still two weeks away I will be out of the country for the duration and thought I would offer some final thoughts on it before I leave. I recognize things could change dramatically between now and September 20 but, in as much as I’ve cast my ballot by mail today, it’s all over for me.

In my initial blog on the election I criticized the Liberal government for calling a completely unnecessary election in the middle of the fourth wave of the pandemic. Nothing since has changed my view on that although as a wedge issue vaccine passports certainly work in the Liberal’s favour, as do the anti vaccine mobs following Prime Minister Trudeau in his campaign, shouting abuse and demanding the right to live free and die. If their objective is to get him re-elected they are doing a good job. Their claim they have an absolute right to not get vaccinated is qualified, in my view, by the fact they are driving this fourth wave, putting vaccinated Canadians at risk and putting strain on the healthcare system that we all pay for. So, when it comes to vaccine passports, I say “bring them on”.

But when it comes to the overall management of the pandemic I’m not persuaded the Conservatives would do any worse than the Liberals. Overall I think the Liberals get a passing grade, although not outstanding and with some pretty obvious failures, but there is little in the Conservative position that concerns me, with the possible exception of vaccine passports, and as provinces with Conservative governments move to implement some form of passport (hello Ontario), it’s not unreasonable to assume a new Conservative government would not be far behind.

Aside from management of the pandemic, there are three issues that ultimately determined how I voted: climate change, management of government finances and relations with The People’s Republic of China. Others like Medical Assistance in Dying and gun control do concern me but aren’t of sufficient weight to move the dial for me.

Policies, or the lack thereof, to respond to climate change were major determinants in my voting choices in the last two federal elections. They are a big reason I voted Liberal in both of those elections although those votes were as much against the then Conservative leaders as for the Liberals. I have no doubt the Liberals will do a better job positioning Canada to fight climate change in the years ahead but I also acknowledge the Conservatives under Erin O’Toole have finally accepted the need to tax carbon emissions and have proposed a plan to do so. That O’Toole was willing to do this against the strong wishes of his base in Alberta and Saskatchewan speaks well for him but it also acknowledges the political reality on the ground elsewhere in the country.

I’m no expert on government actions to combat climate change so it’s difficult to evaluate the two plans although it’s obvious the Conservative plan aims for smaller reductions in emissions than does the Liberal one. But I don’t think that’s the end of the matter. Wthout the active cooperation of Alberta and, to a lesser extent, Saskatchewan, any plan to reduce carbon emissions is going to face a difficult if not impossible road forward. So while the Conservative plan is less ambitious than the Liberal one, it may also have a greater chance of succeeding, not just because the target is lower but because it would be implemented by a government seen as less hostile to those two prairie provinces and their oil industries. That said, I am puzzled by Erin O’Toole’s subsequent announcement he would try to restart the Northern Gateway pipeline, something that seems to undermine his environmental creds, not to mention being very unpopular in the Lower Mainland of B.C. and Vancouver Island, both vote rich areas where the Conservatives need to make gains if they are to win. Also, it isn’t lost on us in B.C. that, while he is prepared to support the Northern Gateway pipeline, he remains opposed to the Energy East pipeline through Quebec which, arguably, is a better option at least from the standpoint of the Canadian economy.

When it comes to managing government finances and getting Canada back living within its means, there should be no contest between the parties. The Liberals long ago eschewed the careful fiscal management of Paul Martin in favour of deficit financing, seemingly forever. And lest people say that’s only because of the pandemic, let’s remember the Liberals were running deficits long before the pandemic struck, deficits that far exceeded those they had campaigned on. At this point no Liberal politician seems willing to acknowledge that could be a problem down the road. Instead, with the zeal of evangelists, they tell us no amount of deficit spending is too much to “build back better”, to radically transform the role of government in Canadian society by, amongst other things, committing to a trillion dollar stimulus despite evidence the Canadian economy is coming back well from the pandemic induced recession. Believers in big government are happy as the sky is apparently now the limit when it comes to what government can provide. But there will come a time when interest rates increase and when the burden of debt weighs increasingly heavily upon Canadians. This is not going to end well.

Even the Conservatives are treading carefully on this issue which may make political sense but provides only faint hope for those who are concerned about government finances. They say they will balance the budget within ten years and without cuts. In other words, they plan to grow the economy out of deficits without Canadians feeling the least bit of pain from cuts in spending or increased taxes, this despite economists noting that plan relies on an annual growth rate that has only been achieved once over the past decade. I do trust the Conservatives more on this issue than the Liberals, but only just.

Those of you who read my blogs know I am concerned about the challenges posed to the West by the rise of communist China. In fact, I believe it represents an existential challenge that needs to be responded to by Western powers with a great deal of skill and realism.

In the past several years China has shed its benign mantle as it asserts its military and economic power across the globe. The most jarring case for Canada is the detention of the two Michaels, held as hostages by Beijing for a thousand days and counting. Any illusions the West had about a moderating China as it modernized and became more affluent have proven disastrously wrong. It’s not just Canada that has miscalculated on this file but, at least with Canada, the way forward is complicated by PRC tentacles in so many areas of Canadian public and private life. Much of that has occurred under the watch of successive Liberal governments and it’s clear conflicts of interest on this issue exist between many of the Liberal Party’s supporters and representatives, conflicts that bedevil the pursuit of a clear sighted, Canada centric policy towards China.

As long as the two Michaels are imprisoned in China few if any Canadian politicians are going to support a more pro China Canadian foreign policy but it’s when the current crisis ends that I worry about. I suspect a Liberal government will want to return to “business as usual” with China as soon as possible and I don’t think that is in Canada’s long term strategic interest. In fact, quite the opposite.

Canada must join with its democratic allies to forge a realistic and effective policy for relations with China. That policy must recognize China for what it is, not what we would like it to be or hope it will become. It must ensure we have the military capability to defend against Chinese aggression and that we lessen our economic dependence on China even if, in the short term, that means slower economic growth than would otherwise occur. And, on this file, I believe the Conservatives will do a better job.

In my previous blog on the election I cited the “Meanness Factor” as one reason I find it difficult to support the Conservatives. What I didn’t state at the time was that Meanness Factor has a Liberal counterpart that I describe as “The Sanctimony Factor”, the assumption the Liberal world view is without question the right and proper one, and those who don’t share it are to be pitied and looked down upon. This, I believe, is one reason the Liberal government keeps getting itself into scandals, most not serious enough to bring down a government but they all illustrate a sense of rectitude, of entitlement, of being allowed because the longer term objectives are just so right. I mean, how many times does Justin Trudeau have to get caught breaching ethical boundaries before he finally gets it? Truth is, I don’t think he ever will.

For over thirty years Canadians have been faced with a choice between the “Perpetual Governing Party”, the Liberals, and a Conservative Party that had become the hostage of social conservatives with roots in Alberta and Saskatchewan. As a result, many of us held our nose and voted Liberal. But this election offers another opportunity and, while it may be a long shot, it’s worth considering. Despite pandering to the conservative/populist wing of his party to get elected Leader, Erin O’Toole has not only led from the centre but has steadily forced his party to follow, whether on issues like climate change, taxation policy, LGBT issues, gun control and even abortion. And that’s not an inconsiderable achievement. I have no doubt that if he fails to do well in the election the knives will be out and he will be gone in a flash, leaving the Conservative Party an unpalatable alternative to the Liberals for most Canadians. On the other hand, if he succeeds (however that is measured), there is a real chance he can move the Conservatives back towards their Tory roots, something that would be enormously good for the health of the Canadian body politic.

Sometimes in an election there is a moment that changes everything. Sometimes it changes the entire trajectory of the campaign, or sometimes it does nothing more than determine my vote. Such a moment occurred two weeks ago when the Liberals posted a doctored video of comments Erin O’Toole made on healthcare on social media, and then followed up with an embarrassing show of faux outrage that they had to know had no basis in fact. The issue concerned the role of private providers in the Canadian healthcare system. Erin O’Toole said he supported a role for those providers within the single payor, univeral access system. That latter is what the Liberals cut out. I then witnessed Justin Trudeau in full rhetorical flourish condemning O”Toole for this outrage particularly “In the middle of a pandemic no less”. The next day I saw Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland attempting the same thing at a rally in Toronto. And I was disgusted. Not just because of the duplicity but because of the underlying belief we, the voters, were so stupid as to fall for it.

As many of you know, I spent a large part of my career working in and around healthcare in B.C. and I am often discouraged by the antics of politicians bent on scoring political points at cost of finding any way forward to a sustainable and effective public healthcare system, on the left always heading for the “third rail” of Americanization/privatization. Private providers have been selling services to the Canadian medicare system since its inception, whether doctors providing their services to patients in private clinics and then billing the system or, more recently, governments of all political stripes including the NDP contracting with private providers for diagnostic, surgical and many other services.

And yet, seeking a short term political gain, Justin Trudeau couldn’t resist playing the card no matter the cost to the system. It was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back for me. Of course it wasn’t that single event. But it was just so typical of his behaviour and that of his government, and I am tired, really tired, of it. I’m tired of the faux empathy, the glib phrases (“because it’s 2015”), the never ending scandals, the willingness to dive into the political gutter at the drop of a hat all the while maintaining their virtue, the strutting across the world stage that is too often wince inducing, and the promises to do things differently when nothing really changes.

But can I trust the Conservatives? That’s the question friends and relatives put to me. I’m never quite sure what lies behind the question although I suspect there’s some inchoate dark fear the Conservatives if they win will become sort of Taliban lite, sweeping away hard fought gains for women, gays and lesbians, pot smokers and those in need of medical assistance in dying. None of which will happen. Even if you doubt Erin O’Toole’s sincerity, and I don’t, Canada’s constiitutional order would protect against those types of excesses. Access to abortion, marriage equality and medical assistance in dying all came about because their previous prohibitions were found to violate Canada’s constitution. Then there’s the political calculus. If the Conservatives win under O’Toole they will know they have to cling to the centre if they are going to be anything other than a one shot wonder. So, yes I can trust them at least as much as I can trust the Liberals who, by the way, have broken many previous campaign promises.

And so, for the first time since Kim Campbell was Prime Minister (and also my MP), I voted Conservative.

Just sayin

G.

A note to my NDP friends: Of course I know there is one other major political party in Canada, the NDP, but I just don’t think it has a snow ball’s hope in hell of winning. However, I am impressed with Jagmeet Singh, both as a politician and as a person, and I hope he is able to pick up some additional seats although I have no idea where they would come from.

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Although he’s out of fashion these days, I can’t help but recall the words from Rudyard Kipling’s “Recessional” written for the Jubilee of Queen Victoria as I watch the messy end to the twenty year involvement by the West in Afghanistan’s civil war. The lines that most resonate with me are “The captains and the kings depart” to the echo of “Lest we forget. Lest we forget.”

America, accompanied by its NATO allies invaded Afghanistan shortly after the attacks of 911 and it had been determined the architects of those attacks had safe haven in Afghanistan. Prior to the invasion the Americans gave the then Taliban government the option of expelling Al Quaeda and avoiding an invasion. The Taliban refused and then faced the combined fury of the Americans and its NATO allies including Canada. America and its allies prevailed after only a few weeks of conflict but failed to capture key figures in Al Quaeda’s or the Taliban’s leadership as they melted away into the northern territories of Pakistan. And so began twenty years of Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.

I believe the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 was justified and, moreover, unavoidable after the 911 attacks. I also believe it was appropriate for NATO allies like Canada to stand with America in that war. I see people saying now the war should never have been started but they seem to have forgotten the trauma of 911 and the very simple fact it was the first shot in the war and it was fired from Afghanistan.

That said, what followed was neither necessary nor wise and spectacularly ignored the lessons of history. It’s not for naught Afghanistan is described as the “Graveyard of Empires”. The last foreign invader who had any sustained success there was Alexander the Great in approximately 330 BC. At the time it was part of the Persian empire that he was at war with. Although he didn’t settle there, he did leave many of his men and their followers who intermingled with the native population and whose descendants form part of the Afghani population to this day. In the intervening twenty four hundred years many foreigners have tried to subdue Afghanistan, including the British Empire and the Soviet Union, and all have failed.

I don’t think of Afghanistan as a country like all others. In fact, it fails the test of nationhood on many fronts. It is a vast territory spanning central and southern Asia and is populated by an astonishing number of separate tribes and peoples, most with their own territory, history, traditions and religions. The largest group are the Pashtuns, who also comprise approximately twenty five percent of the Pakistani population where they are mostly located in the northern tribal areas and the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and northern Balochistan. They are the backbone of the Taliban. But there are also other significant ethnic groups including Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbek, Aimaks, Turkmens, Balochs and others. What has usually united these groups throughout history is a shared antipathy to outsiders trying to occupy their lands. All are Muslims but bitterly divided by sect. The territory of Afghanistan has had the unfortunate fate of crossing the major trade routes between east and west from Asia to Europe, tempting other nations to seek to control the territory. So, warfare has been a way of life for a very long time.

As we watch the sad spectacle of people trying to escape the Taliban many are seeking to assign blame and there is a fair bit to go around, but very little should rest on Joe Biden’s shoulders. The historical record clearly shows he has been consistent in seeking to get America out of a major involvement in Afghanistan, including when he was Vice President and opposed the so called “surges” under the Obama administration. A much greater share of blame should be assigned to George W. Bush and Donald Trump. Having scattered Al Quaeda and overthrown their host government, the Taliban, George Bush and his government set about trying to transform an ethnically and religiously divided country, a country that by most standards hasn’t made it into the twentieth century, into some kind of functioning Jeffersonian democracy. And even if that had been even remotely achievable, he and his government then turned their attention and resources to attack Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussein and, with breathtaking arrogance, try to install a Jeffersonian democracy in that ancient land. As we witness today’s debacle we should never forget that it was the hard core conservatives in America who were so blinded by hubris they failed to even seriously consult the lessons of history as they drove American foreign policy in the region.

Donald Trump on the other hand made getting out of Afghanistan and Iraq central tenets of his foreign policy, one that was motivated above all else by its effect on his image and reputation. He entered into negotiations with the Taliban that effectively sidelined the government of Afghanistan and made agreements that virtually guaranteed the kind of collapse we are witnessing today. His hypocrisy in criticizing President Biden over this would be breathtaking if it wasn’t so typical of him as he places his own needs above those of his country.

Perhaps the final withdrawal could have been handled better, begun earlier, been more orderly, I just don’t know. Part of me believes the chaos we are witnessing now was inevitable and, by the way, we shouldn’t be shortchanging the remarkable efforts that are being made to evacuate Afghanis by the Western nations including Canada. And as for the criticisms of Canada’s efforts to evacuate Canadians and Afghan’s trapped there, maybe it could have been done earlier or more efficiently but, again, I’m not sure that’s the case. Despite the desperate circumstances, I still want Canada to show reasonable caution in deciding who it admits to this country, particularly from that part of the world.

Also, I am puzzled by the criticism of Canada’s efforts that are usually based on some version of “we owe them”. Let me be very clear, I wholeheartedly support bringing Afghan refugees to Canada, particularly those who are at special risk because of the Taliban’s Bronze age view of society, but I don’t do that because I think we “owe it to them” any more than we owe this opportunity to any other downtrodden, oppressed or desperate people in the world. Canada had no “skin in the game” in Afghanistan and yet it committed enormous resources to help the Afghan people in what proved to be the hopeless task of building a modern, pluralistic society. 156 young Canadian men and women died in that conflict and another 2,071 were injured, some terribly. Canada spent billions of dollars on its military and humanitarian roles and yet, by any standard, there was really nothing in it for Canada except we believed it to be the right thing to do, so when I hear “we owe it to them” I wince because, in the way that phrase is being used, I don’t think it’s correct.

Some are lamenting that the West’s defeat in Afghanistan is a big win for its rivals, particulary China, Russia and Iran. But is it really? All three are immediate geographic neighbours of Afghanistan and one, Russia, paid the same price as the West when it tried to subdue and control the country militarily. In fact, I expect all three will experience problems going forward, whether because their own restive Muslim populations are supported by the Taliban or because, in the case of Iran, Islamic rivals of the government in Tehran will use Afghanistan as a base. And as for Pakistan, well it had better watch its own Taliban very carefully. Even if particular threats to each of the countries don’t emerge immediately, the inevitable disorder and chaos in Afghanistan is going to create headaches for its neighbours right away.

There have been many tragedies in Afghanistan in its long and troubled history, this one only the most recent. The West’s first goal in invading was to prevent terrorists using it as a base from which to launch attacks against Western countries. That danger is still there and must now be met through other, less intrusive measures. To the extent it can it should also presssure the new government in Kabul to repect the rights of its people but, of course, that will have a limited effect.

And in a broader sense, the West must learn yet again that military ventures into other people’s territory almost inevitably ends in tears. Lest we forget.

Just sayin

G.

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To absolutely no one’s surprise, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau visited Rideau Hall on August 15 and asked the Governor General to dissolve the current Parliament and call an election for September 20, providing the shortest election period allowed by law. She, of course, granted his request and, by the way, for all those demanding she refuse it, she really had no grounds to do so. And so Canada is plunged into an election just as the fourth wave of COVID 19 is sweeping the country and as ecological disasters hammer the country from the Maritimes to British Columbia.

The justification offered by the Prime Minister for this election is twofold: first, he complained the Opposition was, well, acting like an opposition and slowing down his legislative agenda; and, second, that this is a kind of inflection point for Canada where Canadians should have a direct say in how the country should emerge from the pandemic and, in the words of the Liberals, “build back better”. Of course, both of these are nonsense. Although Prime Minister Trudeau only has a minority government, it is a strong minority and the likelihood of it being toppled by the opposition parties anytime soon is negligible to non existent. And as for the “inflection point” argument, if we’ve learned anything at all about this pandemic it’s that no one knows when or how it will end.

Those of you who follow my blogs will know I objected strongly to Premier John Horgan calling an election in B.C. during the pandemic when his minority government was working well with support from the Greens. Part of my complaint then stands today: “Stop Treating Us Like Children” and be forthright about the motivation for the election call. Anyone who was reasonably informed then, as now, knows the election is being called because the Premier or Prime Minister thinks he can turn his minority into a majority and guarantee another four years in government. There’s nothing particularly wrong about that, but it’s really insulting when the politicians think they can somehow fool us into believing their motivations are otherwise. But, of course, Premier Horgan was successful in gaining a strong majority and, presumably, Prime Minister Trudeau thinks he will be similarly rewarded.

But will he? It seems the Prime Minister and his government are counting on the general satisfaction Canadians feel over their handling of the pandemic although, I should just note, that could change rapidly if disease and death spikes as the fourth wave gains momentum. I suspect that is one of the reasons the campaign will be the shortest allowed by law. That said, they are probably right thinking most Canadians will think it unwise to change generals while we are still in the heat of battle, although yesterday’s defeat of the Liberal government in Nova Scotia may cause some worry for them.

The unfolding disaster in Afghanistan may also come back to bite the government although, generally, foreign affairs don’t decide elections in Canada and, in fact, if the government pulls off what is considered a successful evacuation of Afghan refugees, we may see Cabinet Ministers yet again greeting them at airports to much acclaim. Too cynical you say? We’ll see.

As they come out of the gate it seems the Liberals are ahead in the polls although by less than was the case just a few weeks ago. And the problem for many Canadians like me is finding an acceptable alternative to vote for. I am tired of the scandals, of the government by slogan, of the sense we all need to be “woke” and, most particularly, the view that deficits don’t matter. Once the deficit promise proved successful in the 2015 election, there was no holding the Liberals back. The sensible nostrums of Paul Martin faded like a distant quaint memory and now we are told as part of “build back better” we should re-imagine how Canada is structured, particularly the role of the federal government in all our lives.

I get the pandemic resulted in expenditures necessary to keep Canada and Canadians afloat and that led to mind boggling debt and deficits, but what I don’t get is the belief that, having gone there, the sky is now the limit, that Canada will never have to worry about debt and deficits again which, as any good student of history will tell you, is nonsense. Canada is already coming back from the pandemic induced recession at a speed few if any predicted. Employment levels are approaching pre-pandemic levels and other economic indicators are also responding strongly and yet, never wanting to let a crisis go to waste, Justin Trudeau and his government are proposing we spend billions, maybe more, on stimulus and new programs that will profoundly change Canada’s economic, government and social structure. No one on the Liberal team even wants to commit to a timeline for addressing the deficit, if not the debt. And this should concern us all.

On the other hand, the Conservatives have largely abandoned their traditional fiscal conservatism, probably sensing it would not be well received by Canadians at this point in the pandemic. They are, at least, providing a ten year horizon for eliminating the deficit and if that were the sole issue in the election, it would be enough to secure my vote. But it isn’t. We are in the middle of an environmental disaster brought on by human activity. Those of us in British Columbia are particularly aware of this as our forests burn and whole communities are wiped off the map by wildfires. And yet, when asked to support a simple statement that “Climate change is real” at their convention, Conservative delegates voted it down. What the…? Yes, Erin O’Toole has moved the party on the issue and I applaud him for that but, given his backbench and core supporters, do I really think his government would take real, meaningful action to address climate change? I do not.

The same thing can be said on management of the pandemic where the Liberals cleverly boxed him in on vaccine passports and mandatory vaccines in the first few hours of the campaign. And he fell for it. But perhaps he really had no choice because, again, his core supporters in Alberta and Saskatchewan are having no part of vaccine passports or mandatory vaccines even though the overwhelming majority of Canadians feel otherwise according to the latest polls.

And not to be forgotten, the Conservatives oppose medical assistance in dying and stronger gun control measures.

Yes, Erin O’Toole is saying all the right things on access to abortion and the rights of gays and lesbians and banning conversion therapy for them, and I believe him, but what concerns me is his backbench, not to mention his base.

Which brings me to an intangible about the Conservatives, what I call “the mean factor”. Almost without fail and no matter the issue, the Conservative spokespeople (okay, probably excluding Erin O’Toole himself), are angry, juvenile and just plain mean in so many of their comments. As if to illustrate this point just look at the attack ad they launched against Prime Minister Trudeau in the opening minutes of the campaign (I believe it has now been discontinued).

And then there’s the perennial bridesmaid, the New Democrats. Even if I thought they had the faintest hope of forming a government, I certainly wouldn’t trust them with the nation’s finances at this point, if ever.

The Greens? Enough said.

So, what do we do? I’ll certainly be watching the campaign but, at this point, I think the best outcome would be another Liberal minority government but my enthusiasm for that begins to wane when I think of “the tax and spend” Liberals supported by the “tax and spend more” NDP. Still it would be a delicious comeuppance for Prime Minister Trudeau to end up basically where he left off, after wasting god knows how many millions of dollars on a completely unnecessary election.

Just sayin

G

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It started with the end of the Second World War. The western democracies had triumphed over facism and Nazism in Europe and Asia, liberating the western half of the European continent from years of darkness and tyranny, and for much of Asia, from Japanese occupation and oppression. Of course those European countries unfortunate enough to be captured by the Russians and incorporated into the Soviet Union didn’t celebrate their liberation for long before Stalin’s tentacles locked them into a new kind of tyranny and darkness. But for the West it was a time of perhaps unparalleled optimism.

What followed was an attempt to create a new world order with supra national institutions designed to prevent the kind of slide into darkness that had characterized the first half of the twentieth century. These institutions, whether the U.N., the W.H.O, the World Bank or several others were imbued with Western ideals and values.

The very idea of the West seemed validated by its triumph and many assumed that triumph would soon envelope the rest of the world that would, in turn, adopt a western model of democratic government. This was based on certain assumptions about humanity, assumptions that liberal freedom and ideas would triumph once they were understood outside the democratic west. And with rarest exceptions, that was wrong.

But, despite decades of Cold War with the Soviet Union and poorly conceived, and often anti democratic and illegal interventions by the major Western powers in smaller countries, the belief in the ultimate ascendancy of the West persisted, no more so than in the United States that saw itself as “A shining city upon a hill” that all others wished to emulate. There were moments of doubt precipitated by particular failures like the intervention in Vietnam, but, despite them, the West’s belief in itself remained remarkably intact. With the benefit of hindsight it’s hard to understand how the lessons of those failures did not lead to a more fundamental evaluation of the world and the West’s place in it, but they didn’t.

And then the Soviet Union imploded, laying waste to the communist idea, particularly as the recently freed satelites of the Soviet Union rushed to embrace the West and democracy. The absolute triumph of democracy, free enterprise and capitalism seemed assured. In fact, the words “The end of history” entered the lexicon as if the Western democratic triumph would be forever preserved in amber as all other historical impulses and movements stopped. Again with hindsight, how that idea could dominate without serious question is a mystery as it ignores all the history of mankind.

I’m not sure at what point it finally became obvious the West’s triumphalism was seriously blinded by hubris and a failure to understand humanity. It may have started when it overreached and ignored the commitments it gave to President Gorbachev by expanding NATO eastwards towards Russia igniting it’s well founded historical paranoia about invasion from the west. It may have been when American outrage at the attacks of September 11 caused it to cast aside caution and enter seemingly endless wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It may have been when the “Arab Spring” gave rise to optimism the ancient nations and tribes of the Arab world would transform themselves into western style democracies but, instead, substituted one form of tyranny for another, or worse, fractured into warring factions and, in the case of Syria, all out civil war. Or, closer to home, it may have been not so subtle stirrings of chauvanism and nativism in the western democracies themselves, whether the National Front in France, BREXIT in the United Kingdom or, ultimately, MAGA and Donald Trump in America.

And as each of these seismic shifts occurred, countries on the periphery of the democratic West, countries that, in their dash away from communism had rushed towards democracy and the affluence of the West, began to show how shallow their commitments to the Western idea was. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic all began to founder on the inherent conflict between their ancient beliefs and prejudices and the liberal openness demanded by the West. And in all cases the flashpoint for these countries was the treatment of gays and lesbians, something already presaged by Russia. Ultimately, these countries wanted the affluence of the West without its core values whether on human rights, freedom of the press and respect for minorities in democratic societies. And now, at least in the case of Hungary, they, having received the economic benefits of their involvement with the west, are openly proclaiming their wish to disengage from the institutions that provided those benefits.

We assume, I believe correctly, that it is not possible to decouple the economic prosperity from the values that create an open and dynamic society, whether expressed through human rights or economic freedoms. If, or more likely when, countries like Hungary either leave the EU or are booted out, we will see if that is the case. As China amply demonstrates, it is possible to achieve economic prosperity without democracy and freedom but that model may not be transferrable to ancient western countries.

It seems that the Western idea is in retreat as it confronts authoritarian dictatorships or at least quasi dictatorships from China to Brazil to Russia. How did this happen?

For starters, as I said earlier, the belief in Western triumphalism ignores the lessons of history and the nature of mankind. It is not enough to set up a democratic structure and assume it will prosper, at least as we in the West understand. And even the most robust democracies are vulnerable to abuse where the core communal understandings of a population fracture. The best illustration of this today is America where Donald Trump and his legions nearly overthrew what was supposed to be the strongest democracy in the world. And if it could nearly happen in America what should we expect in Russia, or China or any of the other countries that have not experienced the slow, incremental accumulation of civil understandings, trust and belief that are the bedrock of democracy? The simple truth is there are relatively few countries in the world whose civil and political history is sufficient to maintain a stable and healthy democracy. And that is a lesson the West never seems to have learned.

Those of us who live in the West must accept that different peoples are going to organize their societies differently and, at times, those differences will be profoundly offensive to those of us who believe in democracy, freedom and human rights. But that’s the world we’re in and the sooner our leaders acknowledge that and stop governing by aphorism the better.

And then we have climate change.

Like many I suspect, I have long understood climate change is a major threat to humanity that needs to be taken seriously but that threat was somehow in the distant future, ignoring the more strident voices calling for radical change to address it now. As I write this in British Columbia we are entering the third heat wave of the summer when it is relatively uncommon for us to have even one. This began with the unprecedented “heat dome” that enveloped the province in mid June causing hundreds of deaths. One of the worst wildfire seasons ever to hit this province is blackening forests, destroying whole communities and filling our air with harmful smoke. And if any further evidence of the urgency of the crisis is needed, just look around the world. Much of the Mediterranean is experiencing wildfires every bit as damaging as those in B.C., as is the entire west coast of America. Drought, the like of which hasn’t been seen since the “dirty thirties”, is baking Canada’s bread basket on the prairies while much of the American southwest is running out of water. Tornadoes are touching down in parts of Canada where previously they were virtually unknown. Hurricane Harvey stalled over the American southeast, dumping 27 trillion gallons of rain on Texas alone. And this summer torrential rains are causing catastrophic flooding in parts of Germany while wildfires rage across Siberia. These are only the most obvious effects and lead to one inescapable conclusion: the world is rapidly approaching a tipping point beyond which it is hard to forecast how, where and indeed, if, humanity can survive.

And, even in the midst of this crisis, the world’s leaders fail to lead. Climate change deniers still hold a significant place in American political culture and it’s unclear whether the leaders of countries like China or India are willing to take the political risks of rapidly shifting their economies away from fossil fuels. Of course it’s not fair to ask third and second world countries to make such dramatic shifts now but, without them, climate change is unstoppable. And so the world burns.

And then there’s disease.

The COVID 19 pandemic has shaken the world’s optimism to its core. Everything we were raised to believe about the triumph of medical science over the diseases of the past has been called into question by the emergence of a microscopic, simple organism that spreads disease, disability and death in its wake while bringing economies to their knees and destabling already weakened countries. It is reasonable to expect some countries will not survive the pandemic, that they will fracture irreparably along class, economic and tribal lines leaving in their wake uncontrolled swathes of land that, ultimately, will pose a threat to us all. This is not the soil in which to nurture liberal democracies and we should expect increased numbers of authoritarian rulers promising security to their people which, in the circumstances, will eclipse any other interest or need. It is already happening.

So, is this the end of times? I’m not sure but at the very moment the world needs trans-national institutions that can bring nations together to take decisive and effective action those created after the Second World War are failing whether because of the duplicity of countries like China as it joined them or because of the so called populist revolts roiling so many previously stable and reliable nations. The bitter irony is the more disruption occurs, the more populations seek simple solutions that pander to their basest instincts and push their leaders away from engagement towards isolation. Compounding this is the ease with which snake oil salesmen, grifters and completely unprincipled opportunists move into leadership positions.

While we may be witnessing nothing more than an inflection point in the millennia long struggle between democracy and tyranny, with democracies diminishing for what one hopes is not a new dark age, given the exigencies of climate change and pandemic, that inflection point could prove fatal to civilization as we know it or perhaps even to the survival of the human race.

Although written at another time fraught with danger and uncertainty, the words of William Butler Yeats hold a fearful relevance today:

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.”

(“The Second Coming” First stanza)

Just sayin

G

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As soon as the Canadian government permitted fully vaccinated Canadians to return to Canada without undergoing a fourteen day quarantine I booked a flight to New York for a six day visit. As those of you who follow my blogs know, New York holds a special place in my heart having visited it several times a year for the past fifty years until the pandemic intervened. Watching from the west coast as the pandemic ravaged the city, I was anxious to see what had survived. And what I found was encouraging. But first, the trip itself.

I have travelled a great deal in my life and have had some bad travel experiences but none, absolutely none, prepared me for the seventeen hour marathon it took to get from Manhattan to my home in Vancouver. The trip to New York was characterized by lineups and mask wearing and a certain level of discomfort but, compared the return, it was pure luxury.

The first sign of trouble appeared the night before my departure when I tried to check in online. I was ticketed with American Airlines through Seattle but, unbeknownst to me, American had contracted the flight to a discount airline called Jet Blue. The next morning I made my way to JFK, fully masked and ready for some difficulty until the plane took off. I was deposited at Terminal Five which, it seems, is occupied entirely by Jet Blue and, if they were seeking to create the perfect petri dish for virus transmission, succeeded magnificently. Although only six a.m., the terminal was absolutely packed with tens of thousands of people moving cheek by jowl as I tried to find how to check in and get rid of my luggage. There were long lineups everywhere. The check in kiosk wouldn’t let me check in so I joined a line which, eventually, led me to a real person who checked me in and sent me to another line where, after waiting, I left my checked luggage. Then I lined up for security and, just when I thought I was home free, had to stand in another long line just to purchase a cup of coffee.

My flight was two hours late and packed, and when I arrived in Seattle it was technically too late to catch my Vancouver connection. Fortunately, an Alaska agent took pity on me and somehow got me to the gate and on the plane. Arriving in Vancouver, I stood in three, very slow moving lines. The first one was to talk to a customs agent. The second, to register for a test. The third was to actually get the test and finally I was free to stand in another line waiting for a taxi on a hot summer night. As I said, seventeen hours after I left my hotel in Manhattan I walked into my home in Vancouver (I could exaggerate and say I dropped to my knees and kissed the floor, but you get the picture).

My point in telling this (and believe me, I have left out many, many aggravating events that added to the discomfort), is to offer a cautionary tale to my friends who are contemplating breaking out of quarantine and exploring the world. It just may not be worth it.

As for New York however, it was great to see the city again, damaged, quieter, but still New York. There are boarded store fronts but not as many as I feared. A number of restaurants have disappeared but all those I regularly patronize had somehow managed to survive and were very welcoming when I walked back through their doors. My friend Linda took me on a tour of the Frick Madison which, as expected, was beautiful, and MOMA continued to delight as did the Whitney. Unfortunately my attempt to see a show at the Metropolitan was thwarted by it only currently open Thursday though Sunday. All the museums required timed reservations and of course, that heart of New York, Broadway, remains mostly dark. Even there though, there are signs of life as plans are being announced for shows in the fall. So, as I never really doubted, New York is coming back, maybe not the same, but still New York.

One thing about being in America that I did not enjoy was being re-submerged in the putrid swamp of today’s American politics. Since Donald Trump was defeated in the 2020 election I have mostly tuned out American news, if only to maintain my sanity. But when you’re there it is unavoidable. The current flash point concerns vaccinations or, more precisely, the refusal of millions of Americans to get vaccinated against COVID 19 despite the country being awash in effective and safe vaccines that the rest of the world is desperate for. A fourth wave of the un-vaccinated is gaining steam across the populations of red states that strongly supported Donald Trump and, presumably in an attempt to make life difficult for the Biden administration, are now refusing to get vaccinated. CNN interviewed several people in Missouri who were refusing to get vaccinated and offering excuses like: “I don’t trust the government”, to “COVID is no worse than the flu”, to my favourite of all spat out by a man in his sixties “I’m not a guinea pig” (I couldn’t help but think a more appropriate animal might be a lemming). And now hospitals and ICU’s are filling up, death rates are climbing and break-through infections are appearing amongst the vaccinated. At this rate, we are only a few mutations away from a variant that can avoid the current vaccines and those mutations are being fuelled by the un-vaccinated. Even in New York, that most liberal of American cities, there are significant pockets of un-vaccinated, led by Staten Island and parts of the Bronx. In the latter case, that’s probably a result of justifiable distrust of government by Black and Latino Americans but it only further complicates the task of achieving a sufficiently high level of vaccination to contain the virus.

As those of you who know me well can attest, I have long been a supporter of America, its ideals, its achievements, its focus on freedom and free enterprise, this despite its flaws and failures. But now I genuinely wonder if the idea of America can survive the current divisions, said to be worse than at any time since the Civil War. The challenge of the pandemic may well be its breaking point. And then god help the rest of the world’s democracies.

just sayin

G

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The effort to vaccinate Americans against COVID 19 is stalling out and, with the arrival of the “Delta Variant”, a new epidemic of COVID 19 is breaking out amongst the un-vaccinated across America. President Biden’s goal of achieving independence from the pandemic by Independence Day, with at least 70% of eligible Americans vaccinated, has failed, the number stalling out somewhere in the mid to high sixties. Rates of infection are rising in every state in the union with the most alarming rises occurring in states that are conservative strongholds of the Republican Party and with low rates of vaccination.

Canada also has anti-vaxers” but it seems a much smaller proportion of the population than in the U.S. and the vaccination program continues apace, approaching 80% of the eligible population with at least one shot of one of the vaccines. That still means approximately 20% of the eligible population is yet to be vaccinated but polls show that, of that group, approximately only 3% say they will definitely not get a vaccine. And so the longed for goal of “herd immunity” is within reach north of the 49th parallel.

Although there are obvious differences between the two countries (at least to Canadians), it never would have occurred to anybody that there would be a difference on such an elemental health question as whether or not to get vaccinated against a deadly virus that has already killed more than 600 thousand Americans. But here we are with American states discarding unused vaccines while the rest of the world is begging for them. A recent poll showed that 47% of Republicans say they will not get vaccinated. I don’t know whether that is of registered Republicans, self identified Republicans, or the seventy five million Americans who voted for Donald Trump but, any way, it is a very large group of people.

I assume that most of the people refusing to be vaccinated participated in childhood vaccination programs, at least some of which were mandatory. I’m of an age that I remember the terror of polio and the miraculous relief that the polio vaccine delivered. We were also vaccinated for several other things, like small pox and measles, and I’m pretty sure the same thing occurred in America. And because of that, these childhood diseases are no longer a threat. But now, when a new, deadly disease comes along, many Americans refuse to be vaccinated against it.

The speedy development of effective vaccines against COVID 19 is nothing short of a medical miracle. I understand that some who are hesitating are waiting for the regular authorization from the Food and Drug Administration instead of the current emergency authorizations but this is likely to be only a small fraction of those refusing to be vaccinated. America has always had a loud anti-vaccination lobby and, lest we think it is just restricted to Republicans, I should note that Robert Kennedy Jr. is probably the loudest voice in that lobby today. That said, we are still confronted with polls showing 80-90% of Democrats getting vaccinated or planning to and, as noted above, more than 40% of Republicans refusing.

I get that America is terribly divided politically and that a large number of Republicans believe the last election was somehow stolen from them despite all evidence to the contrary. And, right along with that, I understand millions of Americans think Donald Trump behaved suitably as President although, as I’ve said before, that is simply incomprehensible to me. But I also operate under the assumption that people will act to protect themselves and those they care about when confronted with a mortal threat. And yet, despite over 600,000 Americans already dead from COVID 19 and counting, despite the many months of disruptions to daily life, despite the alarming scenes of Emergency Departments and whole hospitals on the verge of collapse during the pandemic, millions still refuse to take the one easy step that will protect them and those around them. How can that be?

I have friends and family who are Republicans and who voted for Donald Trump. I don’t know the vaccination status of most of them. I hope and pray they are doing the sensible thing and getting vaccinated. But, in some ways, they are typical of many Americans who supported Trump so I really don’t know if they are. These, by the way, are well educated, middle class Americans who certainly benefited from childhood vaccination programs and generally respect science.

Is the divide in America now so great that nearly half of the country participates in delusional thinking about vaccines and science generally? It’s beginning to look that way even as all of us benefit from the progress that has been made based on facts and science over the last several centuries.

And then there’s the question: Why do I care? Well, for starters, I care about these people but even if that were not the case, their actions are affecting everyone else. Even if the next “waves” are limited to the unvaccinated, it is likely restrictions on the daily lives of all of us will have to be brought back or even strengthened. Also, even for the fully vaccinated, there is risk. Risk that we get a “breakthrough” infection, risk to those who are unable to be vaccinated, risk to those, particularly the elderly, whose bodies don’t mount a strong response to the vaccines and, most fearful of all, risk that the quickly mutating virus will use the petri dish of the unvaccinated to evolve to a point that it can evade the vaccines.

So what the people refusing to get vaccinated are doing is not just foolish, it’s selfish.

And yet they continue. As is pretty obvious now, I find it utterly baffling to the point I seriously ask “are we even the same species?”

just sayin

G

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July 1st was Canada Day, the annual celebration of this country that we mark as founded one hundred and fifty four years ago. It was unlike any Canada Day I’ve experienced. Western Canada, and particularly British Columbia, endured the hottest weather ever recorded here; weather that led to lightning strikes and fires, one of which decimated the town of Lytton which, for the previous three days, had surpassed the all time Canadian heat record, culminating on Tuesday at 49.7 degrees Centigrade or, for those of you who use the Fahrenheit scale, approximately 122 degrees. As I write this it is unclear how many lives were lost in the heat and fire. It seems the consequences of climate change are affecting us faster and more dramatically than most had expected.

Even without the weather, fires and loss though, there was something else about this Canada Day that made it stand apart: it came just as the country was coming to terms with the “discovery” of unmarked graves adjacent to Indian Residential Schools. There is little doubt more such graves will be discovered in the weeks and months ahead, forcing Canadians to confront a dark chapter in our history: the forced removal of indigenous children from their families and their placement in Indian Residential Schools where they were often neglected and mistreated.

Not surprisingly, there is almost universal shock at these discoveries in the non-native population, as it begins to understand the legacy of those schools and their role in the treatment of native Canadians throughout Canada’s history. They also begin to explain the seeming breakdown of aboriginal communities in Canada. And with that shock came a predictable call to “cancel” Canada Day. Many municipalities did cancel Canada Day celebrations out of concern for their effect on native Canadians in light of these recent developments although, given the native Canadians have been aware of these burial sites for years, it’s unclear to me how that would have happened.

What struck me most during these events is the reaction of some non natives who have become the fiercest advocates for cancelling and who, on social media, respond to any celebration of Canada with cries of “genocide” or “racist nation” which is in stark contrast to the messages of native leaders who, instead of demanding vengeance, have been remarkably restrained in their comments, generally calling for reflection and understanding and hoping this moment will speed the work of reconciliation. I wonder what inspires such fury and blindness to all that is good in Canada in these non native Canadians?

And then there are the criminal responses to the discoveries: burning churches, desecrating public spaces and destroying monuments to men and women who played a central part in the creation of Canada. As I noted in a previous blog, while the Catholic Church played the largest role in operating the Indian Residential Schools, other denominations also operated schools. But while the Catholic Church, thus far, has refused to apologize or fully cooperate with those investigating the schools, both the Anglican and the United churches have and have paid some restitution. That hasn’t stopped arsonists from attacking them too as churches across the country are being torched.

Mobs have also attacked, defaced and destroyed statues of Captain James Cook, Queen Victoria, Queen Elizabeth II, Sir John A. MacDonald and Egerton Ryerson. Some cheer them on but for most Canadians this is deeply offensive and an attack on our history. That’s recognized by leaders of the aboriginal communities who are asking whomever is behind these attacks to stop, fearing an angry reaction by non native Canadians, with this opportunity to advance reconciliation lost.

I have no difficulty with people expressing their views peacefully and, in fact, many Canada Day parades were replaced by marches and protests that were appropriate, but the criminal behaviours are profoundly un-Canadian. By that I mean they go against the strong ethos for negotiation, compromise and accommodation that is central to the Canadian experience. Without it, this country wouldn’t have come into existence, let alone survived for over one hundred and fifty years. It’s what compels Canada to seek reconciliation with its native population when almost no other country in the world does. Weakening it is dangerous and short sighted, and drives us into opposing silos that are much more typical of our American cousins than of us.

Also, if we cancel Canada because of past behaviour and decisions, why stop at the the treatment of native Canadians? Why not turn our backs on Canada for all its misdeeds throughout history? There are other people in Canada with grievances that arguably rival those of native Canadians. And yes, I’m from one of those groups:

What about Chinese Canadians who were systematically and statutorily discriminated against and excluded until well into the twentieth century?

What about the discrimination against Ukrainian immigrants to Canada up until late in the twentieth century, including their internment during the First World War?

What about Japanese Canadians who were interred in camps and had their belongings stolen by this country during the Second World War?

What about Canada’s attitudes towards Jews for most of its history, attitudes that led to discriminatory treatment and hard limits on Jewish immigration, not to mention refusing entry to Jewish refugees on the MS St. Louis in 1939, forcing them back to Nazi Europe where two hundred and fifty perished in concentration camps?

What about discrimination against south Asians and, particularly, the Komagata Maru episode where Canada refused entry to refugees from British India and forced them to return to Calcutta?

And what about Canada’s treatment of gays and lesbians through most of its history, treatment that saw us harassed, imprisoned, fired from the civil service, expelled from the military and actively discriminated against in almost all areas of our lives?

Like every other country, Canada’s history includes actions and attitudes that most condemn today. But, and this is a very big “but”, Canada is almost alone (with a nod to New Zealand) in trying to right those wrongs, at least in so far as events in the past can be righted. And that’s because of who we are as a people, a people who have succeeded against all odds to create a modern, wealthy, successful, multi cultural and multi ethnic country in terrain that is mostly hostile to human habitation. We continue that tradition as we welcome the downtrodden and oppressed from around the world.

The world is a better place because Canada is in it and that has been so for well over one hundred years. I’m not going to list the many good things Canada has done or is doing. Any reasonably informed Canadian knows that list as well as I. From its very beginning Canada required compromise and accommodation, a willingness to acknowledge mistakes and change course, correcting what was wrong and constantly reinforcing our vision of a tolerant and welcoming society for the future.

And that’s what it means to be a Canadian today.

just sayin

G

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Some of you may have received an earlier, incomplete version of this blog. I’m not sure what happened but it falls into the category of technological error.