Dec. 15: Insanity in Ottawa

This is a hasty blog that I just had to slip into an already overcrowded schedule. I can only hope I finish it by the posted date.

Harper is building an immense monument to the victims of communism around the world. The reason appears to be his usual one. He wants to appeal to the moron vote before the election by doing something that looks big but is actually nothing. So let's look at the faults of this idea by the number.

1. He (like most people) has no idea what the word "communism" means. It does not mean a dictator who owns all the industries and resources of a country. Quite the contrary, Karl Marx was a gentle man, a convert to Christianity who tried to found a system based on Christian principles of caring.

I don't think the system he settled on is a practical one. It would call for a whole society that was selfless, caring only for others, and sharing all political power equally among all people. It's a nice idea. But I can't see it happening.

2. The impossibility of it is shown by the fact that no country in the world has ever been communist. Some have called themselves communist. But we all like to kid ourselves. People in the US and Canada kid themselves that they are democratic and free. They never have been - and both are going in the other direction with secret police, propaganda disguised as news, and all political power in the hands of big business.

The countries that called themselves communist usually featured state ownership of all resources. But, in fact, that's  the opposite of communism. So for Harper to erect a memorial to the victims of communism is simply building on ignorance and old hatreds to justify more hatred.

The ones that called themselves communist were usually dictatorships, too. But dictatorship was never a part of the idea of communism. Anyway, dictatorship is quite as common in what we call capitalist countries. Britain established dictatorships all over the world.  So did France,Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands. Only two parties in the US have the resources to fight an election. Both are pretty much the same. And both are owned by big business. How is that different from a dictatorship. New Brunswick is the same. Indeed, all of Canada is closer to that than we think.

And I don't know of any country that has been capitalist in any real meaning of the world for the last century and more. Capitalism is a system in which private investors take risks in order to make gains. But that only happens with the little ones. The big kids never take risks. They dip into our tax money in many ways such as, for example, to fight wars for them. They avoid paying taxes, use militarized police to back up their power, and exploit the poor all over the world. That's not what capitalism means. But that's how what we call capitalism operates.

3. As for victims, most political and/or economic systems I have ever heard of have produced victims in their millions. Harper points to 100 million victims of what he calls "communism". That's the figure usually attributed to Mao's China and Stalin's Russia. He also calls Putin a communist, which is bizarre since Putin doesn't even pretend to be one. And, of course, he says Putin is "evil". Good word. It means we don't have to think at all, just hate.

But you want victims? Take a count of the victims of sweet, little "capitalist" Belgium which tortured and murdered, enslaved and worked to death and starved Congolese by at least the tens of millions. (Canadian mining investors have now taken over much of the work of killing and looting in the Congo and South America.

Take the western powers led by Britain who murdered and looted China for over a century - with a count for death and starvation that we have never bothered to investigate. Western behaviour in China makes Mao look like a guardian angel.

The US and Canada and Mexico, like Spain and Portugal in South America slaughtered native peoples by the millions to steal their land. The Netherlands butchered and starved uncounted victims in East Asia.

The American slave trade murdered at least 60 million Africans.

Yes. There were victims of "communism". There were also, and probably more, victims of what we call "capitalism". To put up a monument for one group but not for the others is just cheap politics. Worse, it's designed to created hatreds. And we really don't need any more hatreds.

4. The location of the monument in Ottawa is in the heart of an area designated for the "Canadian heritage". that's why it has the Supreme Court, the Canadian archives, Parliament, the memorial for those Canadians who died in war....

Why the hell do we want a memorial to the victims of communism in that region dedicated to our history as a nation? For a Canadian with any patriotism at all, this is outrageously distasteful, cheap, zenophobic, the ultimate distortion and trivialization of Canada's history and place in the world today. And all to get Harper re-elected.

5. The original estimate for this massive exercise in bad taste was 5.5 million. Estimates now run to at least three times that. Is this really a sane use of money in a country in which we're cutting back on vital  services?


Except for all our bigots and hate mongers, that memorial will forever be an embarrassment to Canada. And its only contribution will be to encourage an irrational hatred of a system that never existed, and that is certainly no threat to the world today.

Murder, rape, theft, exploitation have nothing to do with any economic system in particular. All of those arise in all societies, whatever the economic systems might be. It has nothing to do with any economic system in particular. It has to do with human greed and the lust for power.

Putting up such a monument to any one group is both historically wrong and also self-righteous. If Canada is going to put up any such memorial, it should be one dedicated to the victims of Canada - native peoples, African-Canadians, European Jews denied refuge in Canada through the 1930s and until several years AFTER world war two, Japanese-Canadians  whose property was confiscated and who were put in concentration camps in World War Two. and all those refugees that Harper is too bigoted to allow into Canada to this day.

Harper has cheapened Canadian political life as has no other prime minister in the history of this country. I have long felt that if he wins another election, Canada will not survive. As it is, he has plunked us right in the middle of what might well be World War Three. And then we won't need a government of any sort.

Why hasn't this story appeared in the Irving press? I don't think the omission is deliberate. I think it's just that the Irving editors are intellectually lazy and incompetent.

Dec. 14: Back to the Irving press, again....

The Friday, Dec. 12 issue has a front page story has its idea of big news on the front page "Province's beer market continues to evolve". Yeah, I'd been wondering about that. Nice to see a newspaper that tells it like it is. It's actually a big story, if a pointless one, continued inside as one about how New Brunswick could become a "future brewtopia". Sure. The world will come rushing to our new hockey rink just to get a taste of the latest NB brew.

It's a story that's really just a free ad for the brewing industry with no research, no questioning by the reporter, just another example of New Brunswick's nose stuck in its own bellybutton. 

There's another free ad, this one on p. A4 - and a part of the advertising campaign that we've seen on the editorial page, spreading the good word about fracking. "New report says fracking ban hurts economic opportunity". This one is from The Fraser Institute which "describes itself as a non-partisan Canadian think tank..." If it is non-partisan, why not just say so?

 What's this "describes itself" bit? If Celine Dion came to Moncton, would they say she "describes herself" as a singer?

The truth is that The Fraser Institute is a propaganda house sponsored by the very rich to produce "studies" that will make them richer. Like the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies, this is gang of propagandists all tarted up with titles as if they were respected scholars. But this one does make some amazing statements. For example, they agree that fracking poses risks to air and water quality, and could cause more greenhouse gas emissions and earthquakes. But it says those risks are manageable, and not enough studies have been done to justify a fracking ban.

Now, there's tortured reasoning if I've ever seen it. More greenhouse gas emissions and earthquakes are manageable? Oh? Tell us all about managing an earthquake. And not enough studies have been done to justify a ban? Doesn't that have it backwards? Aren't you supposed to do the studies first, then decide on what to do?

There is not a single word in this story about what The Fraser Institute or AIMS are really all about, and not a single word about any real scientist who disagrees with them.  This isn't journalist. This is lying.

Norbert writes yet another column in praise of the "experts" from the Canadian Institute for Research on Public Policy and Public Administration. It still is a mystery to me why a person whose degree is in Business Administration should be an expert on shale gas. If a master's  degree in business makes one an expert on shale gas, then my PhD in History should make me even more an expert on it.

Really, Norbert, MBAs are a dime a dozen. George Bush Jr., who cannot speak a coherent sentence or pronounce simple words correctly (he pronounces nuclear as now-cue-ler) got an MBA from the most prestigious university in the US - even though was an alcoholic and druggie the whole time, and didn't meet even the entrance requirements.

Norbert says the whole debate on shale gas has been muddied. Damn right it has. And it's been muddied by all the toadies in the Irving press.

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NewsToday again protects New Brunswickers from learning anything about the the rest of the world - or even about Canada. However, B1 does  have an important story about Ashley Smith, a mentally disturbed girl who strangled herself to death during a long period in solitary. Solitary is torture. Why are we using torture - and using it heavily - in our prison system? Why were we using torture on a mentally disturbed girl?

The short and truthful answer is that we did it because Mr. Harper doesn't give a damn - and neither do most of us. In fact, there are votes in making our prisons into hellholes that actually encourage crime and violence. It appeals to the moron vote. And that's all that counts for Mr. Harper. But the point is it's not just him. It's us.

B3 has a big story about Omar Khadr who is in a Canadian prison  I know. I know. Lots of people don't like Omar Khadr, and they want him to stay in prison. That's understandable. But it's not the way a justice system works in a free country. Picture this.

A Canadian boy, Christian and perhaps a Baptist, is visiting similar friends in New York. Suddenly, a Muslim army attacks them, yelling and shooting. In his terror, the boy throws a grenade, killing a Muslim. Would you be in favour of the Muslim troops putting him in a prison camp? Torturing him? Then imprisoning him on a murder charge?

On the contrary, there would be statues to him, movies, best-seller books....even an honorary American citizenship.

Omar Khadr was a young Canadian visiting Afghanistan when the attack came. It was an illegal attack because the US never bothered to declare war, and has never given a clear reason for the war. He threw a grenade. Very sensible. That's what I'd do if a gang of killers came screaming and shooting at me.

The US put him in prison camp. It's illegal to put children in a prison camp. And it was a camp noted for the use of torture. Then he was put on trial - but not by a civil court. He was tried by a military commission - which bears no resemblance to what anyone would call a fair hearing or justice of any sort. Then they hand him over to Harper. Harper had plenty of room to treat him decently and humanely after his years of illegal and brutalizing treatment by the US. But, of course, he doesn't because his lips are glued too firmly to Obama's rear end.

The Harper government says he belongs in prison. Not according to Canadian law - or American law - or any international law. We are holding him illegally and, like him or not, we have done nothing to change his mind about the brutality of Canada and the United States.

At the top of B4, the US CIA director says that CIA officers were the first to fight and die in Afghanistan. True enough. But that has nothing to do with justifying torture.  And he doesn't say why they were there. In fact, they had been in Afghanistan for years before 9/11. At first, it was to help Afghanistan push back a Russian invasion. Then they stayed on to teach Afghanis how to kill each other, and to kill anybody who didn't approve of  a US presence in their country. Among other things, that was illegal under international law.

The section (mercifully) ends, but with two pages of twelve colour photos of people giving cheques or getting  minor  awards. Some are really ads for companies showing how socially conscious they are. But the photos are all the same - smiling people holding up pieces of paper. Who bloody cares? All of this could have been told by scrapping the photos in favour of a short, news story. These two pages are just cheap fillers to give the impression that Monctonians really care about social needs. No, they don't. If they did, they'd elect governments that would make sure that nobody would have to depend on charity for basic needs. We have many, many people in this city who live below the poverty level, and who eat below any health level. Giving them a turkey once a years and patting ourselves on the back isn't something that shows a hell of a lot of concern. And, no, I don't think Jesus gets a big kick out of this celebration  of his His birthday.

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For Saturday, A3 has a story about the Acadian congress that is coming to New Brunswick. What I like about the Acadian movement is that it's the only language/heritage group I know of that does not see itself as representing some group of people who are morally or otherwise superior to others. It wants to preserve a knowledge of its past and, as much as possible, fit it into the mainstream of the present. But there's no hatred, no condemning of others. And that's as it should be.

There are no people on the face of this earth who are the original settlers of the lands they live in. The British (actually, the Americans) stole the land from the Acadians who had already been taking it from the native peoples - and nations of native peoples had been stealing land from other nations of native peoples for centuries before that.

Nor were the Acadians originally from France. That land and its people are the product of  years of invaders and displacements.  And there are very, very few British who are the descendants of the original settlers of their island. There were kings of England who couldn't even speak English. Richard Lion Heart was one of them.

Hitler didn't invent racism. It was a standard belief at all levels of society in the western world well into the 1920s. Churchill saw the English as a superior race. He often said so - though how one could find a race developing out of that stunning mix of saxons, ancient britons, Scandinavian pirates, Italians, Celts, French is beyond me.

The racist ideologies are still with us. The recent Quebec struggle over language had strong elements of racism on both sides. So I  have a strong liking for the Acadians who can respect their own origins without claiming any sort of superiority.

Norbert has a column bemoaning the failure of New Brunswick ever to elect a government that makes changes to deal with out economic and social problems. Well, Norbert, there's a reason for that. You and your newspaper have never, ever supported a party that spoke of making changes. And I guess Mr. Irving likes it that way because the fundamental change that New Brunswick needs is to get the Irvings and all their corporate friends out of our government.

Gwynne Dyer on op ed is superb on the issue of the CIA and torture. Have you noticed that no staff writer for the Irving press has had the wit or social conscience to write about this subject? - even though we've known about it for years? And nobody has mentioned Canada's role in it.

There's a baffling letter to the editor "Tragedy no reason for gun control". Yeah, And if a drunk looses control of his car and kills people, that's no reason to pick on drunk drivers. It says legal owners of guns will use them and store them safely. Really? How does he know that? I was big on guns for many years. My first one was a six barreled revolver dating to the 1840s. (I was nine when it was given to me by a neighbour who was a small time mafia hood.) At one point, I had well over twenty legal guns from .22s to a .455 Webley. I spent many hours with legal, gun nuts. And they did not store them safely or use them safely. That's why I turned mine in to the police.  I don't understand why any honest citizen would see some threat in the police knowing he has a gun.

I could find no reason for anyone to read section B, NewsToday. B7 is a whole page of goofus photos, mostly of people getting awards for doing something or other. Most of them seem to be about private businesses getting awards for giving money to good causes. It would be more useful if they would do their share of paying taxes. Every charity represents a failure of our politicians and voters to carry out their first responsibilities.

The Faith Page on C8 in worse than I though it would be. We're back to "have faith in Jesus". Roughly, the idea is that so long as you believe in God and/or Jesus, you will be in heaven and all will be well. Faith is the magic cure-all.

Look. George Bush Jr. has faith. He's quite public about it. He's also a mass murderer and a torturer. But The Bible is not just about faith. It's about deeds. It's about obligations we have toward others. Why do preachers insist on giving us this pap over and over suggesting that if you have faith, you're covered?

And as I look at the list of church activities for this Christmas period, it's pretty vapid stuff. The one church that seems actually to be doing something is Vision United which is sponsoring a grief therapy group.

The page also has a big, colour photo of St. Bernard Roman Catholic Church. I have no idea why. I suppose it  has something to do with filling an empty space.

And I'll disagree with Isabelle Agnew (C15) on dress codes. Isabelle, this has nothing to do with sexism or anti-feminism. It's because students in school need to learn things they obviously don't learn at home. That's why teachers don't encourage students to fart of belch in class. They don't allow people to run in a hall way.

That's why, when I was running school dances in my high school teaching days, I didn't allow drunks or kids carrying guns to come in. (Believe it or not, some parents allowed all those things.)

And students are, to say the least, permitted a wide latitude in what to wear. As a result, the girls look like hookers who work the cheaper parts of town, and the boys look like sloppy, lazy,  uncaring

 louts. So the school gets stuck with the job of preparing them for the real world.

This has nothing to do with ideology or social prejudice. It's about training people in the ways and expectations of the real world.

Dec. 13: General stuff to catch up on.

I started this on the evening of Dec. 12 because there was so much stuff that needed the commentary we aren't likely to see in Irving press. Tomorrow (Sunday) I'll write the one I would normally have done for today.

1. The Irving press and shale gas. Take a close look at their news stories about shale gas - and their columns about it. What's happening here is a scandal.

If you follow any major advertising campaign, it constantly reinforces the points (usually just two or three points and usually very subtle ones) that sell the product it's shilling for. Take a look at shale gas comment by the columnists columns and in news stories lately lately. They all have much the same message. And that's not a coincidence.

The basic message is what is called a soft sell - the shale gas industry is, just like you, concerned about climate change and the environment And, oh, they recognize they have to deal with it. (Makes me feel warn all over). But - it will take some form of energy to develop replacements for fossil fuels That's why we have to keep developing a healthy fossil fuels industry. It's not to make money for billionaires.  Goodness, no. It's because billionaires care about the environment and climate change.  They really do. But we have to keep developing fossil fuels so we can some day stop climate change.

See? Nothing direct there. No attack on environmentalists. Just nice, soft, and deceptive message that shale gas is really good for you, and your friends in the industry are just doing their bit to save the environment.

That's a pretty subtle message - and I wonder who dreamed it up. It wasn't Norbert - though he has this message in his column. No this is a campaign being directed by a more subtle mind. My guess would be this is all coming from The Canadian Institute for Research on Public Policy and Public Administration and what Norman calls their "experts". It's pretty slick.

A business consultant of no particular qualifications sets up a propaganda front, and calls it an Institute. (There's a trail of money there - lots of it.)  And big money puts muscle on a university to play host to this con game.

What we're watching is a very skillful campaign of  advertising and propaganda. To play along with it is either unethical journalism or ignorant journalism. My money is on unethical. And, yes, to say that is to suggest that the whole editorial staff and the ownership are complicit.

The reality is that we need action on climate change - yesterday. To invest in further oil and gas development (like pipelines and shale gas) is to guarantee that the threat to our climate - and ourselves - will continue to grow for many years to come. So far, our governments (and the big money behind them) have shown no interest whatever in what happens to the environment and to us.

In fairness, it's not just greed that drives them.  It's also stupidity. Greed does that to people.

2. The tone in North American newspapers is that Obama has succeeded in isolating Russia by getting tough over the issue of Ukraine. Of course, it's easy to get away with that line when much of the real news is suppressed.

Yes, of course sanctions have hurt Russia. They hurt tiny and vulnerable Cuba, too. But Cuba has survived sixty years of American sanctions. Some strategy that is. The sanctions on Russia are even a worse strategy because Russia is a major trading partner to the European nations. Already battered by the recession, the Europeans expect even tougher times as the American sanctions on Russia take hold. Western Europe, a collection of dead imperial powers, rides on American coattails because it has to. But that can change very rapidly as they increasingly have to become toadies while at the same time being made poorer by it.

France and Britain and Germany will hold on because they aren't feeling the full pinch of toadyism yet. But there are plenty of signs of social breakdown in other countries - and possibly also in Germany. Hitching rides on American coattails has a high price.

For an example of a country that is tossing off US control, Turkey (a member of NATO) has just signed a huge agreement with Russia to make Turkey a depot for Russian oil bound for Europe. Turkey knows very well that the US does not want this, that it contradicts US policy. But Turkey has done it.

Russia also, and very recently, signed massive oil deals with China and India. In other words, Putin used the widespread dislike and fear of the US to shape alliances with the two, developing economies that are likely to dominate the world in the new future.

The US is almost universally hated in Latin America because of its interference,  threats, murders, destablizations, etc. that our news media almost never report. There was a time, not all that long ago, when no nation in Latin America would have taken a stand against the US. Latin America was the core of the American empire. But those days are gone

Nor can the US be said to be loved in most of Africa or most of the Muslim world.

And Obama says that Russia is isolated? The reality is that we are seeing a reshaping of the world. And the most isolated of the major powers in this reshaping is the United States. Turkey, Russia, China, India, much of Latin America are not isolated - and they are  far the majority of this world.

3. The Senate report on CIA torture is one hell of a serious matter. And Canada is up to its ears in it - and so are several dozen countries in the American entourage - Britain, South Africa, Poland.....

This is death sentence stuff. We have hanged people for this - most recently, Saddam Hussein. And it's really cut and dried. The law and the UN convention of 1984 are clear on this. Torture and murder are illegal. It doesn't matter what the reason is. They're illegal. The heads of the CIA are criminals as much as were any of the Nazis that we hanged. Bush is a criminal. So is Obama. So is Cheney. So, almost certainly, is Harper; and, most certainly, so is Tony Blair.

Our side is guilty of the crimes we have self-righteously hanged others for. And this only skims the surface of a rot that runs very deep.

So what will be done about it? Nothing much. A few small players might face the courts, and get minor sentences. But that will be it. The new, Republican Congress will guarantee that, right from the moment of their inauguration when some hypocrite clergyman will bless them, and they'll all clap hands for Jesus.

And the North American news media will never mention it again. Heck, such torture has been going on for over a century in the US military (and the French and the British and the Dutch and the Spanish) and in the US prison system without ever being mentioned. Nor will there be any public outcry here in Canada. After all, the victims of our behaviour, for the most part, are neither white nor Christian.

We are involved in all the murder and torture exploitation and aggression that - every Nov. 11 - we say Canadian soldiers, sailors and airmen died to prevent. And we will all reassure ourselves of how patriotic we are.

Dec. 11: Back to bland.

A3 of the Wednesday paper tells us the price of gas is still falling. But we already know that. Would it be too much to expect a newspaper to find out WHY it's falling? These things rarely happen simply by market forces. There's a game being played here. If there's nobody at Irving press capable of figuring what this is all about, can't they at least buy a story on if from a reputable source?

There's another story on the same topic on A6. It takes 31 paragraphs to say close to nothing and, in the best TandT style, the reporter doesn't ask any question. He just scribbles whatever his sources tell  him.

The editorial is pretty much the usual one - city council and its budget. The editorial writer is obviously a highly specialized person.

Norbert has his usual, confused column today. Again, he quotes Richard Saillant and his article on shale gas, mostly with a pointless story about kerosene in New Brunswick. (Norbert seems to think it  has a deep meaning.)

Norbert - you are presenting him as an expert in a question of science. In fact, if you checked his record, even you would surely notice he is no such thing. His academic credentials in science are zero. He has spent most of this life, including the university part, as an administrator. And even if we forget the science part, his academic credentials are very ordinary, indeed.

Then you treat his collaborator, David Campbell, as if he were a great,  scientific mind, too. In fact, he runs a consulting firm for business. And he's a man of questionable judgement. He admires, for example. "think tanks" like "Atlantic Institute for Market Studies"  and "Fraser Institute". In reality, these are propaganda fronts for the billionaires who finance them.

When people like that run something called Canadian Institute for Public  Policy and Public Administration, you can bet this is a propaganda scam . It's really a continuation of the advertising campaign that our shale gas industry pulled out of some weeks ago.

This is pure propaganda, Norbert. Even you must have figured that out. It's disgraceful that a newspaper should be so obviously in the propaganda business - and I really wonder about the judgement of a university leadership that would allow its name to be used in connection with this.  Of course, such decisions are made by a board of governors which is commonly stacked with toadies for big business.

Here's a hint, Norbert.   Saillant was a management person at the university - and that pays well. Who pays him now as director of CIPPPA? And David Campbell is a professional business consultant. Who's paying him? Be a mensch, Norbert. learn to ask questions.

Alec Bruce goes off into his own fairy land. He says that Harper is lagging terribly on climate change action. So it is.  Bruce's suggestion? Use the oil industry to provide the energy that will make really green energy possible. Uh - duh-h....

Alec, the oil industry uses us; it doesn't get used by us. The big names in the oil industry have become obscenely wealthy - out of oil. They aren't going to lead any movement that would kill their own profits. Hint - they have already led, for years, an expensive campaign to spread propaganda that climate change isn't happening. And they're leading one now to increase the use of oil and gas.  Get real.

Eric Lewis and Brian Cormier present columns so trivial that no respectable editor would ever publish them.
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Section B1 also carries a news story about shale gas. What a coincidence! Again, the reporter mindlessly copies what the "think-tanks" tell him to say. He calls the Atlantic Institute of Market Studies and the Fraser Institute  "independent public policy groups". Yeah. Real independent. The billionaires who finance them let them say whatever they like.

This whole story, like most of the editorial page, is propaganda for shale gas.

B2 has a story that the first wreckage of the passenger plane shot down over Ukraine five months ago has been delivered to The Netherlands for the scientific inspection that is intended to determine how it was shot down and by whom. And it will be months before the inspection can even begin.

Why are they wasting all this time and money? We already know. Obama announced the day after it was shot down that it was shot down by an anti-aircraft missile manned by Russian-speaking Ukrainian rebels. Obviously, Obama is a man who can see around corners. Take advantage of that gift.

And, oh yes, on B5,  the UN is counting on Canada to help resettle the almost four million refugees from the war in Syria, a great many of them children and living and dying in starvation..  Good luck to them. Harper has stepped up to the plate to say our government will accept 200. 200 out of almost 4 million. Of course, it won't happen right away. So far, 163 have been approved. The rest, if we follow our usual pattern, will have to wait, under guard, in prison cells.

God bless you, Mr. Harper.

I don't understand the delays and the obvious reluctance. Canada had thousands of Syrian immigrants in the 1920s and 30s. I went to school and played with many of them. And they turned out pretty well. (The father of one of the boys became the founder of the Dollar Store.)
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The A section for Dec. 11 is the usual collection of trivia. On B4, "Roofwork continues at Riverview school".  Do you care?

The editorial is about some item on our city council budget - again.

And Norbert? More fracking propaganda. He says those who assume he is writing favourably about fracking to boost it are wrong. Come off it, Norbert. You've never said a word against fracking. Never. And you never will. And we all know why.

He refers to the Canadian Institute for Research on Public Policy and Public Administration without a word  on what a crock this organization is. He says it presents"reliable facts" by a "different expert" in each chapter.

First, Norbert, the word 'fact' should be used with care. For centuries it was an official "fact" that the sun went around the earth. It was a "fact" until the 1920s (and still is to many people today) that people can be typecast by something called race. It was a "fact" until very recently that women were inferior to men. (It still is a fact to many men.)  Expert opinions almost never are based only on facts. They're also based on assumptions, speculations, prejudices, old ideas.... Anybody (naming no names) who says that any argument is based on pure facts doesn't know what he's talking about.

Then he says the institute's book was written by experts. Norbert, a person who has an MBA in business is not an expert by virtue of that degree. And he is certainly not an expert in science - which is what is at the heart of this discussion. Nor is a business consultant normally an expert on anything except how to help a business with propaganda. None of the authors I've checked on has the credentials to be considered an expert in the subject of this book. Nor can their words be based on "fact" when nobody in the whole world knows fully about the facts in this case.

Norbert's last, seven paragraphs make no sense at all except as a soft sell for using more fossil fuels. He says we need fossil fuels as a bridge to the development of safer forms of energy. Norbert, you twit - as the bridge to what? The Canadian government and the oil industry have shown no interest whatever in developing alternative sources of energy. Why would they? Oil is what they make their money on. They are the ones who routinely sign trade deals that wipe out any possibility of environmental controls. So does the mining industry. Ask your buddies at Barrick Gold or any other Canadian mining company.

On a related note, right now, Monsanto is suing the state of Vermont because it wants to demand labels on food grown with Monsanto chemicals to show what is in the food. And Monsanto may well win because it can make even defending such a lawsuit hopelessly expensive for a small state. (Your paper has not bothered to mention the story.)

Norbert, you are writing on a subject of which you are ignorant. You are also ignorant of the meaning of words like expert and fact. I call you ignorant as a compliment because if your aren't ignorant, then you are simply a cheap flack for a propaganda scam.

Alec Bruce has a good column on early childhood education. But it won't get read by many because it's a hard read. Part of the problem is that is based heavily on Jean-Jaques Rousseau, and his book, Emile. I would guess that few readers are familiar with either; and the heavy prose is no help. Too bad. This is a good article; but it needs simpler language, and more of a relationship to New Brunswick today.

Rod Allen, again, looks in a mirror, and finds it a delightful experience.

Jody Dallaire has a column that shook me. It's a good column but, oh, it was dismaying to look at the economic world our children and grandchildren will be facing - and how little we are doing about it.
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News today doesn't really have any unless you really, really care that McDonald's is going to fiddle with its menu.

There are seven photos of people holding up cheques (the ones that are the size of billboards) for various causes. Some are volunteers, and all thanks to them for our efforts. Some are companies - and that is just advertising. It would be more help if they paid higher taxes, and maybe cut the bonuses for people who already get millions a year.

But there's a bigger question here. How can we tolerate a society that makes it necessary to rely on volunteers for providing basic necessities to its members. We certainly thank the volunteers. But volunteers can never meet the year round need. So how come we can spare millions and even billions for corporation biggies? And how can we allow their incomes to steadily go up while most others have incomes that go down?
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The Thursday paper has no comment on the CIA torture scandal, no comment on a possible Canadian connection, no comment on the implications. no nothing. I didn't expect it would.

Dec. 10: Why the surprise?

I apologize to the TandT. It thought it would give little attention to the CIA torture scandal.. To my surprise, it devoted one of the longest stories I have ever seen in this paper. But I am puzzled by it.

Why does the story display shock and surprise that the CIA has been using torture? It's been well known for over a dozen years. There have been stories about it, pictures of it, videos. There are thousands of web sites from reputable sources that deal with this. Just check google for torture US - and list Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Guatemala, US prisons.....and the list goes on. This story gets a whole page - and says nothing that wasn't general knowledge years ago. And how come this is the first time the Irving press has even mentioned it?

And the report tells us that Bush and Obama were unaware of the scale of it...  Oh, please. Both knew that torture was going on because both approved of it and authorized it. Hey, if I knew about this up here in Moncton, surely the presidents of the United States knew it. The point made in the story that they didn't know how terrible it was is both unbelievable and irrelevant. How terrible it was or wasn't doesn't matter because international law and the UN convention of 1984 both make torture illegal. the law and the convention don't say there's good torture and bad torture. It's all bad.   And it's a war crime. It's what we hanged people on the other side for after World War Two.

The fact that Republicans are disputing the findings - and that many people will agree with the Republicans - is just one more sign of the insanity that grips so many of us. I can hear the excuses now. "It gave us valuable information."  "The other side is worse. It chops heads off."  However, we're supposed to be in these wars to defend our values. In any case, the CIA and the US have been torturing long, long before ISIL was ever heard of.

In the 80s, when the CIA was busy slaughtering Guatemalans (to please the Dole fruit company and various Canadian mining companies, it used torture widely - including on a nun who was there as a teacher. It used torture all over Latin America. The American army used torture when it conquered The Phillipines about 1900. In fact, that's where the torture called "waterboarding" was developed.

(Why would the US invade and conquer The Phillipines? It was then a quite primitive country, and no possible threat to anybody. They conquered it to spread the US control of trade to the Pacific region - the same reason they would later use conquest to establish bases to invade China. Like Guatemala, it was a war to please big business. The lack of any morality whatever in big business has been a major factor in impoverishing much of the world, killing millions of innocent people - and encouraging torture.)

The US military, like its counterparts all of the world ( pretty much all of them), has a long history of torture. The west European imperial powers tortured their colonial conquests for centuries.  This information has been available for years. But, gee, nobody in the news media or our governments knew anything about any of this  until yesterday when the Senate report came out.

Torture is also standard in the US prison system - sometimes for information, sometimes just for fun for the guards. Guards arrange rapes carried out by prisoners on each other - or sometimes with just a baton, sleep deprivation, beatings, confinement in overheated rooms, baths in scalding water - and so it goes. This is routine for the over 6 million prisoners in the world's largest prison system.

Of course, that would never happen in Canada. Or, if it did, we wouldn't be told. So not to worry.

There are several questions to be asked here. What Bush and Obama authorized, even if it was less than was actually done, was illegal. So the directors of the CIA and two presidents should be in court facing war crimes charges. It is almost certain that Britain was involved, and deeply involved. That puts a least a couple of prime ministers on the line.

Did Canada cooperate in any way? Did it deliver prisoners it knew would be tortured? That's illegal, too. Will Harper launch an investigation to find out the truth? Not bloody likely. But Canada has a least a share of the guilt. It frequently handed over prisoners in Afghanistan to the US. It's illegal to hand over prisoners to a country that is likely to use torture.  (But, oh, gee, Harper didn't know the US was torturing. He was too busy at the time using his secret police to spy on environmentalists.)

Expect a story from John McCain about how the Vietnamese tortured him. He's built a career on that story; but there's considerable evidence it isn't true. He was shot down over Vietnam, crashed into a lake,  breaking both legs. He was drowning when one of the Vietnamese peasants he had been bombing risked his life to swim out to save him. Then, Vietnamese doctors saved his life again by repairing the serious damage he suffered in the crash.

Did the Vietnamese practice torture? No doubt - just as the US did. But most of the evidence suggests McCain was not tortured. He was too valuable as the son of a leading American naval officer. Indeed, his prison guard visited him at his Senate office - hardly the act of a man who had tortured him.

For all its length, there is nothing new in this report. The Irving press had plenty of time for one of its columnists or editors to write an opinion about it - to raise questions, to explain the law.... nobody did. Is there no person in that whole press system who knows enough to ask at least the basic questions about the report?

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On a more general note, this story is a reminder of the utter collapse of any morality there might have been in foreign affairs. As a rule, foreign policies are decided on the basis of economic interests - which, in most of the western world means the interests of the very wealthy. In the west, we say these interests are capitalist; but it's not a whole lot different in Russia or China or any other country I can think of. And whether that economic interest is called capitalism or some other vague word doesn't matter. They all operate on pure greed with no concern whatever for moral values of any sort.

That's why the very wealthy cannot be allowed to govern. But they do. And the result is societies in which the needs of most of the population are ignored, and why practices like torture and mass murder are accepted. Call it what you will, any economic system has to be regulated and controlled - and kept out of government. This is a moral issue, but not JUST a moral issue. The whole future of our society rests on it. That's why every society in history has developed religion and morality. (And none of them have meant attending the Irving Chapel to hear the "special music".)

This is what the Saturday Faith page sermonette should be about. The Senate report on torture is profoundly about a collapse in moral values. But we won't get that, will we? No. It'll probably be another beddie-bye story about how the morning dew on the flowers is really fairy urine.

Dec. 9: News that isn't

I'm afraid there's  nothing to say about Section A in Monday's paper, not even on the editorial and op ed pages. It's mostly boring and/or irrelevant. Alec Bruce produces his usual argument that fracking is so good and so safe that the very idea of having a moratorium on it boggles the mind. He must have a mind that's easily boggled. (I'll return to this later.)

Craig Babstock has a a column so self-righteous that he really should have his own church. He criticizes protesters who interfered with reporters at an anti-fracking demonstration, saying that papers have a right to speak freely just as protesters do. Well.. yeah...but..

...When reporters (the Irving press springs to mind) abuse their right to report by showing bias, partisanship, propaganda, and outright lying. they are not practicing a right of free speech and free dissemination of information. And at that point, the major difference between reporters and the protesters is that reporters don't have to face a line of police in riot gear backed up by snipers.
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In a world that could be on the edge of global war, Section B has only one story that isn't from North America.  It's about an Ottawa man who has joined ISIL, and who appeared in a video advocating attacks on Canadians. His name is John Macguire, and he's a convert.  Yes, this has a touch of sensation about it. But the only reason it makes the news is that he's a Canadian and his name is Maguire. Beyond that, there's nothing unusual in an Islamic militant calling for attacks on Canadians - unless, of course, you think Canadians are entitled to bomb other countries without getting bombed back.

B1 also has a big, big story that says nothing whatever. "New Brunswickers enjoy falling gas prices". Now, a headline is supposed to tell us the point of a story. Is that the whole point of the story? Do we need to buy a newspaper to find out we enjoy falling gas prices? Do we need it even to tell us that gas prices are falling?
Hey! I have a certificate in grade four math.  I can do perdition and extractions with the best of them. I know $1.11 is less that $1.32. This is like one of those big stories (with pictures) that tell us it snowed yesterday.

There there are opinions from people in the industry making guesses on where this is going. But these are pure guesses.The big question is - why are prices dropping? Who started the price-cutting? Could it possibly be an oil state that wants to put a lid on shale gas competition? Could it be a Saudi Arabia that hopes to cut Russia out of the European market? Usually, prices drop when the product is not selling well. But oil is selling quite well. This looks like a planned event. If so, who planned it? And why?

We don't need news stories about the price. We can see that every time we pass a gas station. We need to know why this is happening.

But the whole Monday paper is pretty much a dead loss.
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For Tuesday, B1 has "Public urged to support turkey drive, food box program". Now - get this opening sentence. 'In typical Moncton fashion, the community is rallying behind an annual Christmas campaign, but so far, it's going at a snail's pace.'   (We shall slip lightly over the comma that should be a semi-colon between campaign and but.  The editor should have caught that.)

Look at that statement. We're rallying behind a campaign----it's going at a snail's pace. Sorry. You can't have it both ways. Either we're rallying behind a campaign (which would mean it is doing well). Or it's not doing well (which would mean we aren't rallying behind it.

Or - you can include the opening phrase so the meaning of he whole sentence is that 'the whole thing is a mess; but that's typical of Moncton.'

A5 has a story about pampering kids by building hockey rinks in the back yard. That's all wrong. In the Montreal that used to be, we played hockey on the street which gave us a chance to hook onto the bumper of a passing car, and slip past the defence. The street in those days also supplied us with lots of free pucks in the form of frozen droppings from horses. Hey, it was good enough for Dickie Moore.
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In editorial and op ed pages, it's pretty much a zero. Patricia Graham, the ombudswoman lays down some rules for letters to the editor. Well, okay. But she's here as the person who fields complaints about the quality of the newspaper. How come we  have yet to see any report of anything the newspaper has done wrong? Have there been complaints? Has the paper ever been found to be wrong? How come we don't know anything about it?

There's a routine letter to the editor about how abortion is wrong because the Bible says so. (Actually, that's not quite what it says. What it says is "Thou shalt not kill.") We kill lots of people. We kill them with weapons. We starve them to death. Our ancestors killed people to settle here. We're killing some now in Iraq. The US kills them by the million. And all with the blessing of the churches. So shouldn't we just revise The Bible?

Thou shalt not kill unless the victim is out of the womb. Kill cripples, elderly, women, children, all foreigners, but nobody who hasn't been born yet. Or maybe they should go to the heart of the problem. Make it illegal to  have, you know, the cause of the problem, like Adam and Eve. Of course, to make sure, we'd also have to ban apples.
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In fairness, section B (NewsToday) had stories I didn't expect it to cover.

B4 has "Soldiers to train Ukrainian military  police". This means Canadian soldiers -  in addition to our sending of ships and a couple of fighter planes to Ukraine for military exercises. But everything in this story is so vague as to be beyond comprehension. Isn't it odd to conduct war exercises in such an uncontrolled situation? Exercises that could lead to a war that nobody in this world can afford to fight?

What agreements do we have with Ukraine for a military role? How come some stories say that our military police are going there not just to train, but to serve in fighting zones with troops from western Ukraine? Are we committed to taking part in a Ukraine war that could very well turn into a Russian war? If not, why are we taking part in war exercises?

A suggestion at the end of the story offers a credible explanation. Harper is making these gestures to win the Ukrainian-Canadian vote. This is his usual style - to talk big and do little. But that carries one hell of a risk for our troops and for all of us if the balloon goes up while we're involved.

Then there's "U.S. embassies prepare for release of torture report". That's a U.S. Senate report which says that the torture did not produce any useful information. The story is a short one - and it's not at all clear on why the report should provoke attacks on U.S. embassies. After all, the report has been heavily trimmed to one-twelfth of its original size. So you can bet none of the really gruesome stuff is there. So why should embassies be in danger?

Because, unlike us, people on other continents know the full scale of brutality involved in what was and still is the biggest torture system in history. No matter what the report says, those people will react to it with anger and hatred. And our news media will tell us how terrible those people are.

Then there's "Syria, Iran condemn Israeli airstrikes near Damascus. Actually, Israel has been attacking Syria for some time, usually by air. Its motive is that, like the U.S., it wants the destruction of the Syrian nation. In Israel's case, the reason it that it wants to be the dominant state in the region. To do that, it wants a Greater Israel to be created by taking over arab countries. That's why the attacks in Syria have been aimed at the elected government, not at the so-called 'rebels' or their good friends in ISIL (which owes much to Israel for its weaponry). As well, Israel has an interest in expelling arabs from Gaza and from Lebanon. It's very confusing because the US and Israel are playing games. The US, Israel and Saudi Arabia all had a hand in creating ISIL - and supplying it and training it. They still do - even as the US (and Canada) attack ISIL. The real target is Syria. Meanwhile, Iran is rightly concerned about a possible attack from Israel.

While all this destruction is  happening, millions of Syrians are refugees with no western power  ( and certainly not Canada) offering any significant help. Turkey carries a huge burden as home to over a million of the refugees. Meanwhile, countries like France, Italy, Britain which have done little to help are already suffering riots against those few refugees who do get in.

In short, the Middle East is suffering unspeakable horrors that will continue beyond the lives of those living there -  perhaps even centuries if the world lasts that long.

Oh, B4 has a story "Afghanistan war mission officially ends". In the manner of our western news media, it begins with a piece of propaganda presented as fact, that the US invaded Afghanistan thirteen years ago because it harboured the terrorists responsible for 9/11. That's a lie. For a start, there is not the slightest evidence that the Taliban government did any such thing. And the FBI has said that publicly many times. In fact, the invasion of Afghanistan was planned several years BEFORE 9/11. It was part of the plan for The New American Century - partly for its minerals, partly its strategic position in relation to Pakistan and Iran.

It has been an utter failure as a war. But Obama can't say that. And he really can't get out without it being obvious it was a failure. That's why the war is officially ending - but American troops will be increased and will be fighting for at least two, more years.
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Some stories weren't important enough for big time papers like the Irving press. The US has been using drones all over the world for years to kill selected targets. They've killed thousands - though no official figures have ever been released. But it is known that a very high proportion of those killed aren't terrorists at all. They're anybody in the area - women, children, bystanders. Estimates are that 28 innocent people are killed for each person on the U.S. enemy list that is killed.

And in all its warmaking, the west has completely ignored the UN. It has completely ignored international law. It has completely ignored all war crimes legislation - and has supported Israel in doing to, too. There's a reason why so much of the world intensely dislikes our governments. And, increasingly, those who dislike our governments are also to be found in the European Union.
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A reader sent me the site for Strategic Culture Foundation. This is a sort of journal of commentary, mostly on Asia and Europe. Its use of adjectives suggests bias; and it clearly dislikes the role the US government is playing in the world. I found that grating but----

....it is, unlike those who write for the Irving press, knowledgeable. So - be on your guard; but take it seriously. It seems very well informed.

The address is    www.strategic-culture.org
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Finally, a thought about Alec Bruce's column on fracking.....

He says that fracking has been proven safe. Actually, it hasn't. But that's not the point. Let's agree you can drink and bathe in the stuff, and you can keep healthy goldfish in the wastewater even before it's treated.

Mr. Bruce, read carefully, digest, think. NONE OF WHAT YOU ARE WRITING ABOUT MATTERS.

When you frack or built pipelines, you are committing yourself to the heavy use of fossil fuels for decades to come. Just building a pipeline takes five or so years. Then you need years to recoup the cost. We're looking at a total of fifty years - at least - of heavy use of fossil fuels.

Now, Mr. Bruce, do you agree there is such a thing as climate change? The evidence is pretty compelling. Many experts in the field  (no, that does not include oil company CEOs, but people almost as smart as them) say that we have already passed the point of no return - or soon will. And you are going to go on encouraging climate change for at least another fifty years?








                                      

Dec.6: Put your rubber boots on - they're piling it up - again....

Dec. 6, page B 3 "New book says province may be sitting on gas-deposit gold mine."

Or you can call it the hard sell is on again, or the propaganda is on again, or the universities are damn fools to lend their names to this, or they may be utterly without principal. Or you could call it  our propaganda news media are back in full form. Or this is one hell of a corrupted society.


There is a new book out "Shale Gas in New Brunswick". It should be subtitled, wow! wow! we're all going to be rich! And it won't cause any problems at all! The book comes from the  grandly-titled Canadian Institute for Research on Public Policy and Public Administration. (And it's right here in Moncton.) The news story says the book is a collection of essays by economists, geologists and other academics. And that's just a little bit of a lie. Well, it's a lot of a lie.


One of the authors, for example, is David Campbell who is head of a local economic consulting firm. That does not fit any meaning of academic I have ever heard of. Nor is there anything wonderful about his academic credentials. Campbell is also a columnist for the Telegraph-Journal  (God bless you, Mr. Irving You always put people first.) His only university experience (at U de Moncton) was dealing as an administrator for human resources for a short time.

I know the Campbell type well. I was approached by one of the breed in my early teaching days. He told me about how all the oil bosses were misunderstood. They were really all sweethearts; and they would pay me well if I would be good enough to write and speak about how nice they really were.

Another prominent member is Richard Saillant, by coincidence the author of Falling of the Cliff? - another book that found favour with the great thinkers of the Irving Press and, one can assume, with the man who throws them doggie biscuits..

The woods are full of these outfits with fancy names and hired propagandists pretending to be "think tanks" of various sorts, but most of them really propaganda outfits backed by big money.

Check their website. You'll find it very light on information. Who are its financial donors? You'll find nothing there.

The institute is based at U de Moncton.  What the hell are our universities thinking of in associating their names with these hack outfits?  Universities have always been willing to kiss rear ends for big donations. But this degree of cooperation with hookers dressed as nuns is really overdoing it.

The reporter, as usual, doesn't seem have had done any research or asked any questions He just wrote what he was told to write. This "news" report could have been written by the institute itself. Maybe it was.
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Norbert offers his usual insights into education and teaching. He thinks our public schools should encourage curiosity and logical thinking. I quite agree.  (And I think our universities SHOULD be doing it, too.) But if they ever did so, many parents and the Norberts of this world would be furious at where curiosity and logic took them. And, they'd never, never get a job with the Irving press.

Excellent column by Alec Bruce on the Harper government's obsession with control, and it's utter contempt for scientists and others who try to warn them about where they are leading us.
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The December 6 edition goes for pure sensationalism as it spends close to three pages on court documents concerning a young man who killed three police in Moncton, and wounded two. Then there's a half-page sob-story report by Brent Mazerolle on how his parents hoped he'd become a teacher.

The editorial page is taken up mostly by Bill Belliveau and Norbert Cunningham kissing every bare rump in the shale gas industry, and just wetting their pants with  excitement about  that new book on shale gas. Well, that was to be expected. This is the start of the big push.
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Section B, NewsToday, tells us the usual nothing. So let's take a look at a few developments the Irving editors didn't notice.

The US House of Representatives passed a bill which gives the president the power to take any steps, including military, to stop Russian "aggression".  Yessirree. American governments hate aggression - unless it's American aggressions.  As I've said, Obama wants a war with Russia. This sort of bill gives him the power to move troops right up to the Russian border, and even to invade without a declaration of war. In fact, the movement of troops is already planned, and will begin just as soon as the Senate adds its approval to the bill.

We are not talking cold war, here. This is a hot one. A very, very hot one. And Canada, bless its innocent, little heart, is right in the middle.  It's insane; but big business in the US wants this war. There's big money in wars. I know that wars kill millions - and that this one could set a new record - but big business has never given a damn how many get killed or starved or crippled.

This is real, so real that countries in the European union are getting very, very worried about it. Of course. They're right in the path of it. But the TandT had no room for the story. It needed the space on B1 for a really big story, the leader of the provincial Conservatives says he doesn't like the provincial Liberal government.

Then there are the refugees in Syria - some 9 million of them who have had to flee their homes. They now live, if at all, in vast tent cities, having lost all their possessions. There is no medical help for them. Nor is their food, or any money for food from anybody. Nine million people are starving to death.

Harper, never big on helping refugees, had agreed to accept 1300 Syrian refugees. Clap, clap, clap. But, so far, only 457 have met his rigid standards for admittance. (Turkey is bursting at the seams with three million.)
Here is a civil war largely created and financed by the US and Saudi Arabia. Without them, it would not have happened. The purpose of the war is to destroy Syria and to kill its elected leader so that American business can fully dominate the region. Onward Christian soldiers.

The US and Saudi Arabia sponsored ISIL when the Syrian "rebels" couldn't do the job. Now, Canadian aircraft have joined the killing and the refugee-making, for now in Iraq but with Syria sure to follow. That means that next Nov. 11, we'll hear talks about how they fought to  protect Canadian democracy - just like those who died fighting all those Afghanis who were going to attack Canada, and make us all smoke with hookahs.

Russia has signed a deal with Turkey to make that country the distribution centre for its natural gas to Europe. Now, Turkey is a member of NATO - and this is a remarkable break for a NATO country to make with the US. It may well be that Turkey, like other European NATO members, is more than a little concerned about the insane US dash to war with Russia, and the catastrophic mess of its foreign policy in the middle east.

Finally, check www.scientificamerican.com/article/california-s-drought-may-be-worst-in-a-millenium.
Scientific studies reveal that the current California drought may be the worst in over a thousand years, and made still worse by rising temperatures. (That refers to the climate change that our oil industry insists isn't happening.)

Why should we care? Well, as climate changes, there will be a move by suffering US states like California, to tap into Canadian fresh water - by force if necessary. It may also lead to US annexation of the sources for Canadian fresh water.

Couldn't happen? It's almost  certain to. The War of 1812 was fought for a very similar reason. So was the expulsion of the Acadians which was NOT carried out by the British. It was carried out by the colonial government of Massachusetts, acting on his own, and using his own colonial militia.  But Americans are our friends? Yes. Individual Americans are our friends. But individual Americans don't make these decisions. Governments do. And there's no such thing as friends between governments.

More subtly, there's a powerful religious belief that goes way back in the US - the believe that it is God's will (Manifest Destiny) for the US to rule the world. It was a major force for the wars against native peoples and the theft of their land, for the invasions of Canada and Mexico and Cuba and Puerto Rico, Haiti, The Phillipines....Every president for well of a century has believed in Manifest Destiny.In 1904, it took us close to another American invasion. Today, it's usually called American Exceptionalism, and both Bush and Obama have publicly professed allegiance to it.  It's really the same, old imperialism of western Europe - but gone even madder.

But you'll never read any of this in the Irving press.