Would an Obama presidency mean fair trade?

"Free trade" as we have come to know it is largely a mechanism for making the world safer for corporate exploitation, particularly of cheap labour. The admission of China into the World Trade Organization (WTO) serves as an example. The fact that China deprives its workers of fundamental rights, and the resulting cheap labour offers the country a major trade advantage, has not precluded China from membership. Coerced labour offers a trade advantage not only to China but also to global corporations, and that's the whole point.

Barack Obama's talk of renegotiating NAFTA was quickly suppressed but his running mate, Joe Biden, has long been a defender of the American worker and advocate of fair trade. He insists that protection for workers and the environment be part of all future trade deals and has promised to renegotiate NAFTA. In his words, "The idea that we are not willing to take the prime minister of Canada and the president of Mexico to the mat to make this agreement work is just a lack of presidential leadership." Strong words indeed. Maybe Biden will be free to walk where Obama fears to tread, play the bad guy to Obama's good guy in trade deals. The current state of the American economy may certainly prompt a reappraisal of U.S. trade priorities.

Whether or not Biden will stick to his guns should he become vice-president is another matter. He has, after all, been accused of being an erratic pragmatist on foreign policy issues. Supporters of fair trade can only hope his pragmatism, erratic or otherwise, will apply to the interests of workers and the environment, and not to the interests of corporations. as has been the rule to date.

News Flash! The poor get poorer

Working Canadians are a little poorer today than they were a year ago. At least on average. According to Statistics Canada, while average weekly earnings from June, 2007, to June, 2008, rose 2.5 per cent, consumer prices rose 3.1 per cent. In other words, workers' purchasing power dropped 0.6 per cent.

Some industries did better than others. Workers in mining and oil & gas, for example, saw their earnings rise 8.2 per cent to $1,528.79 per week. Workers in retail trade, on the other hand, saw only a 1.6 per cent increase to $491.76. A classic example of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.

Particularly disturbing is that retail trade is Canada's largest employer with almost two million workers. The trend of fewer people getting more and more people getting less seems to continue. If the tide is rising, most boats are sinking.

Carol Huynh saves the nation

Carol Huynh. Remember that name. Etch it in your memory. Carol Huynh is the young woman who saved Canada from terminal petulance.

For the first week of the Olympics, Canadians fretted fearfully that they were to be deprived of gold. Like little boys who didn't get their Christmas toy, we were sulking about the house. Everyone else was getting gold, why not us? It just wasn't fair. Or at least this was the depressing picture offered by our daily press. Things looked very dark indeed.

Then Carol Huynh saved the nation. She won a gold medal in free style wrestling. Of course, few Canadians know what free style wrestling is, and wouldn't walk across the street to watch a match, but no matter, we had won gold. Our national honour would survive. The magnitude of the event was illustrated by leading headlines in our daily papers.

When a nation's honour, or at least when a nation thinks its honour, rests on a woman from Hazelton, B.C., whipping a woman from Japan in a competition that most Canadians normally haven't the slightest interest in, is this not pathetic? Or maybe just silly? Premier Campbell of B.C. would have us spend large sums of money to ensure we win lots of gold thingies in the future. "It's critical he said," as he lauded China for all the medals it has won. The fascist nature of China's sports program, reminiscent of the Soviet Union and East Germany, seems to have escaped his notice. The Olympic Games seem to hold some mystical power to distort normally sensible people's sense of values.

Anyway, thank God (and Carol Huynh et al.) we now have some medals. Canada will not crumble after all.

Great Power politics in the Caucasus

Poor Georgia. An ancient civilization now best known for being the birthplace of Joseph Stalin, it currently finds itself the target of two competing Great Powers while led by a president who recklessly gambles with the welfare of his people.

The American interest once again revolves around that dirty little three-letter word: oil. The U.S.-backed Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, carrying a million barrels of crude a day, runs through Georgia, allowing the West to reduce its reliance on Middle Eastern oil while, of great importance to the Americans, bypassing Russia and Iran. The pipeline carries oil from Azerbaijan's Caspian Sea fields which hold the world's third-largest reserves. The U.S. would very much like to have Georgia accepted into NATO thus obliging Western European countries to defend the pipeline.

Russia, on the other hand, has considered Georgia its property for centuries, under the czars and then under the Communists. Great powers do not yield their empires easily and the hostility of Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili has not helped. Consequently, Russia makes mischief where it can, i.e. in the two separatist-run provinces of Abhkazia and South Ossetia where it still has some influence.

Unfortunately, Russia can justify its muscle-flexing by a precedent the West established. We defended the Kosovars right to divorce themselves from Serbia (and accepted their declaration of independence with unseemly haste), so we can hardly deny the South Ossetians the right to independence from Georgia. So when Saakashvili decided to throw the dice, taking advantage of Putin's presence in Beijing and all the Olympic hoopla to bully South Ossetia back into the fold, Russia had ample justification in hand. As for the Americans' scolding Russia about invading other countries, their bluster lacks all credibility coming from a nation that's waging wars in two foreign lands and threatening a third.

In a perfect world, democracy would determine the status of all regions. People everywhere would determine their own futures whether it be South Ossetia, Chechnya, Kosovo, Tibet or anywhere else. Tragically, however, might is still often right, and the wishes of Great Powers must be taken into account. The future of South Ossetia will depend therefore not only on the wishes of the Ossetians but also on the whims of the Russians.

Georgia has a right to its independence and we should support its democracy, such as it is, but we shouldn't rub Russia's face in it. And that's what the United States has been doing -- using the country as a pipeline corridor, training and equipping its army, promoting its acceptance into NATO, and so on.

As for Georgia, it's going to have to live next door to Russia for a very long time. A tiny country with a giant neighbour, it might be advised to pursue a more astute policy than looking for allies afar and enemies nearby. And the world can well do without its president's provocative foolishness.

Unions unite

The meeting this week of United Steelworkers from locals across Canada and Brazil in Thompson, Manitoba, illustrates what workers must do if they are to have a voice in the global marketplace.

The unions, representing workers employed by the Brazilian-owned Vale Inco, the world's second largest mining company, gathered to support the Thompson local in negotiations with the company. The support stems from an accord signed by Vale unions around the world in Sudbury in 2007. It requires the unions to "work together cooperatively and strategically as global partners, to build the bargaining power of workers." That commitment is being fulfilled this week. “Brazilian Vale workers stand in solidarity with Steelworkers in Thompson,” said Eduardo Pinto, leader of the Sindicato dos Ferroviarios do Maranhoa-MA, CNTT.

Unions represent democracy in the workplace, and if we are to have a fully democratic society, democracy in the workplace is essential. And that applies, of course, to the global society. When workers in China and elsewhere are free to associate with their brothers and sisters in the rest of the world, globalization will start to mean something more than cheap labour for corporations.

Why does the UK have nuclear weapons? or France?

While the nuclear powers, especially the United States, Britain and France, express great concern about Iran developing a nuclear weapon and while they issue threats of sanctions and even darker measures, an obvious question is being overlooked. Why exactly do Great Britain and France have nuclear weapons?

With nuclear neighbours to the north and east, wars being fought by nuclear-armed nations on its eastern and western borders, and its access to the sea prowled by the warships of a hostile, nuclear-equipped power, if any nation can justify a nuclear arsenal, it's Iran. Great Britain and France, on the other hand, are surrounded by friends and the only nuclear neighbours they have are each other.

Nonetheless, Iran claims it isn't developing a weapon and the United States' intelligence agencies concur. If it was, it would be in violation of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty which it has signed. But then all signatories to the treaty are committed to "pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control." We see sparse evidence that Britain and France, or the United States for that matter, are acting "in good faith" to achieve "complete disarmament."

So what's stopping Britain and France from doing their duty by setting an example? Why not adhere to the spirit of the treaty themselves and disarm their nuclear arsenals? We're waiting, Messrs. Brown and Sarkozy.

Someone might go further and ask why anyone has these insane weapons. Good question. One the nuclear powers might be asking themselves, and each other, even while they self-righteously condemn Iran.

Talking to the axis of evil

Throughout George W. Bush's reign as president of the United States, I can think of very little he has done that might be considered progressive. Almost everything in U.S. affairs, whether foreign or domestic, seems worse off than when he was first elected in 2000. He collapsed international respect for his country to its lowest level ever and will leave office with his country bogged down in two wars. Domestically, things are equally bad. The discrepancy between rich and poor has been expanded, individual citizens and government are both hugely in debt, and the economy sinks into recession.

Yet a bright spot appears on the horizon. In a remarkable about-face on foreign policy, the Bush administration seems prepared to talk to Iran. On the heels of their deal with North Korea regarding its nuclear capabilities, the Americans have dispatched William Burns, the under-secretary of state, to meet Iranian representatives in Geneva to discuss Iran's nuclear program. More importantly, the Americans have expressed interest in establishing a diplomatic office in Tehran, the first since the Shah, one of their favourite dictators, was tossed out in 1979. It appears the Cheney faction has been defeated as the U.S. abandons its position that it would only meet with Iran once it had suspended its uranium enrichment. The Pentagon apparently convinced the administration that the regional consequences of an air strike against Iran would outweigh the temporary benefits of delaying Iran's nuclear program. The cavalry to the rescue so to speak. Of course, Iran's recent missile tests may also have been an incentive.

If you want peace, it is said, you don't talk to your friends, you talk to your enemies. Certainly there won't be peace in the Middle East until the United States engages players such as Iran at a high level. A diplomatic mission is a good start. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, commenting on the Iran initiative, observed, "The United States doesn't have any permanent enemies." It might be difficult to convince Cuba of that; nonetheless, recent events elsewhere suggest the statement may hold promise. If so, Bush could end his reign on at least one high note.

Is satire dead?

As someone who has done a little cartooning myself, I feel obliged to comment on the now internationally famous (or infamous) July 21st cover of the New Yorker magazine which depicts Barack Obama and his wife as gun-toting, flag-burning, Islamic terrorists. The cartoon is obviously a satire on the buffoonery that Fox and other networks offer as news commentary on American television. For example, the buffoon who suggested if Obama is elected, the U.S. would have an anti-semitic, terrorist president or the one who suggested the fist-bump is a terrorist greeting. If anything is deserving of satire, it's this parade of idiocy.

Yet many Americans and others seem to have missed the satire entirely and take the cartoon as serious comment. I would have thought every literate person in the English-speaking world would realize how utterly unlikely that is given the editorial position and sophistication of the New Yorker. It is, after all, one of the U.S.'s most well known and respected magazines.

Journalists at least ought to be concerned if not outraged about the way their profession is being debased by Fox and others in the television world. They ought to be debating the object of the New Yorker cover, not the cover itself. But ... maybe the magazine erred in assuming its concern or its sophistication was widely shared. Maybe neither are. Reaction to the cartoon certainly suggests satire is beyond the ken of all too many commentators. And that in itself may indicate the level to which political commentary in the U.S. has sunk, ironically justifying the New Yorker's concern.

The German miracle

What country is the world's leading exporter? China, you say? Wrong -- China is number two. Then it must be the United States? Wrong again -- the U.S. is number three. Actually, it's Germany. This may have surprised you, it certainly surprised me. For a country with only 82 million people, compared to China's 1,325 million and the United States' 301 million, it is impressive indeed.

Yet something else is even more impressive. As Germany has become the world's leading exporter, it has also become a world leader in decreasing its greenhouse gas emissions. Between 1990 and 2006, Germany reduced its emissions by 18 per cent, highest among the G8 nations except for Russia. Russia, however, doesn't really count as its reduction came about largely from the collapse of its manufacturing. Britain was close to Germany with a reduction of 15 per cent. The United states on the other hand, the world's champion polluter, led in the increase of emissions -- up 32 per cent, followed by Canada at 22 per cent.

Germany's performance puts the lie to the argument that environmental responsibility may place the economy at risk, an argument trotted out ad nauseam in North America. Germany has recognized the challenge of global warming and answered it with innovation and conviction. We North Americans, it seems, are lacking in both.

The Catholic Church -- misogyny triumphant

So the Church of England has voted to allow women to be consecrated as bishops. Hallelujah! The heartland of the Anglican community has finally caught up to its brothers and sisters in Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Scotland.

Some 1,300 clergy opposed to the measure had threatened to leave the Church if safeguards they demanded, such as male "super-bishops" to cater for those who opposed the change, weren't implemented. One traditionalist, the Right Reverend John Broadhurst, Bishop of Fulham, declared, "I think a lot of us have made it quite clear if there isn't proper provision for us to live in dignity, inevitably we're driven out." All were disappointed. The women will be bishops equal to men, despite Reverend Broadhurst's dignity problem.

But the remnants of resistance to women's equality in the Church of England were topped by the reaction of the Catholic Church. The Vatican denounced the decision, stating, "Such a decision signifies a breaking away from the apostolic tradition maintained by all of the churches since the first millennium, and is a further obstacle for reconciliation between the Catholic church and the Church of England." Note the reference to "all the churches" -- so much for the Baptists, Presbyterians, United, etc.

The "apostolic tradition" the statement refers to is the notion that only men should be priests because all Christ's apostles were men. But weren't all the apostles also Jewish? So how to justify a German pope? This is nonsense. Women have been largely excluded from all positions of power from biblical times to very recently. The "apostolic tradition" is nothing more than an attempt to use historic prejudice to justify current prejudice.

What is it about women in power that offends, even frightens, priests? After all, it may have taken centuries but they eventually overcame their fear of heliocentricity and evolution. The equality of women shouldn't be that much more difficult. A little soul-searching on the subject might just open up a whole new world of possibilities for them.

Should Canada not be a leader on climate change?

The Harper government has decided to be a follower on global warming, specifically to follow the American tactic of refusing to get serious about the issue until China and India have committed to reduction targets. Our government has, in other words, committed us to following the follower.

Of course, China and India, with their massive economies must eventually agree to limits on greenhouse gas emissions, but why must we wait on them to do the right thing? Since when was what other people do the justification for moral behaviour?

We are one of the most technically advanced and prosperous nations on Earth. And, along with other industrialized nations, we have created most of the pollution and benefited the most from what caused it, so we ought to lead the way in cleaning it up. And there is no better way to lead than by example. As Anthony Cary, Britain's High Commissioner to Canada, has said, "The European Union, for its part, is clear that the best way of galvanizing the whole process is to act. Not only is that in our self-interest, but it is the path best calculated to bring in recalcitrant countries." Well said, High Commissioner.

It is embarrassing, pathetic even, to find Canada waiting upon developing countries to get on board before we take the action necessary to avert the greatest threat civilization has ever faced. We should set the targets scientists recommend and start meeting them. Now.

The times, they are a’changin … and so is Obama

So Barack Obama may "refine" his timeline for withdrawing troops from Iraq. No kidding. The United States now has a major military presence at the centre of the largest conventional oil reserves in the world and they are going to walk away from that? Not likely. It was only a matter of time before someone tactfully explained that little reality to the senator. I suspect if he becomes president he will "revise" the word timeline right out of his vocabulary.

Some Americans are calling Obama a hypocrite, changing his policies for crass political advantage. Others are complimenting him for exercising flexibility, a quality greatly lacking in the current administration.

Flexibility, the ability to adapt to changing circumstances, is commendable in a leader. Unless of course he is simply changing his tune to suit his audience which, it seems, is what Obama is doing. One tune for confronting Clinton, another for confronting McCain. One for confronting fellow Democrats, another for confronting the American public. Whatever it takes. McCain is, of course, doing the same thing.

Be that as it may, a switch on Iraq was inevitable. Those Americans who believed otherwise simply weren't recognizing the reality of empire.

Will gas prices defeat our efforts to combat global warming?

In former British PM Tony Blair's report to the G8 Hokkaido summit Breaking the Climate Deadlock, he claims, "Most people no longer need persuading that the changing climate poses a serious risk to humankind. ... There is now agreement that we should shift our economies away from carbon dependence. Again, most people agree that a framework for national and international action is needed to incentivise, encourage and oblige such a radical shift."

Far be it from me to question Tony Blair, but do most people agree action is needed for a "radical shift"? According to a recent Strategic Counsel poll, when asked what the most important issue facing them today is, Canadians rated the environment number three, dropping from number one last year. It is now topped by concern over the economy and, no surprise, gas prices. Only one per cent of Americans named the environment as their most important issue. These numbers suggest that North Americans are willing to sacrifice to combat global warming right up to the point where they have to get out of their cars. And they aren't alone. Europe, which has shown a much more enlightened approach to climate change, has been racked with protests against higher gas prices, as have other parts of the world.

As for our leaders -- not much recognition for the need of a radical shift there. Ed Stelmach, premier of Canada's pollution province, dreams the dream of carbon sequestration while emissions steadily increase. Prime Minister Harper attacks Stephane Dion's plan for a carbon tax entirely on economic terms while coming up with no coherent plan of his own. And in the United States, the world's major polluter, the current president continues to suppress evidence of the crisis.

Our leaders may not even understand the problem. It isn't, as many think, a greenhouse gas effect. It is, as the scientists are trying to tell us, a runaway greenhouse gas effect. Global warming is progressing geometrically, not linearly. As the Earth warms, other phenomena kick in which add to the warming. For example, as the Arctic Ocean ice cover shrinks due to warming, we lose a major reflector. Instead of being reflected back into space, sunlight is absorbed by the darker ocean, warming it further. The same effect occurs on land as the the snow cover declines each year. And warming up the north will melt the permafrost, releasing billions of tonnes of methane, a greenhouse gas over 20 times as potent as carbon dioxide. And so it goes.

Tony Blair says in his report, "If we are not radical enough in altering the nature of our economic growth, we will not avoid potential catastrophe to the climate." Well said. But then he adds, "If we are not realistic enough in setting a framework to get there, we will fail to achieve agreement." I fear our political and business leaders, and perhaps even more importantly a gas price-obsessed population, have a concept of "realistic" that lacks the urgency scientists have recognized. The truth may be, as Al Gore would say, just too inconvenient. After all, business leaders' first priority is profit, political leaders' first priority is winning the next election, and the public's first priority seems to be the price of gas. Only scientists' first priority is the truth. They, however, are not the ones with the power.

Civilization advances with rights for the other great apes

The progress of civilization is largely about the progress of rights. The Spanish parliament has now made a logical next step in that progress. It has passed a resolution that would extend rights to our fellow great apes -- bonobos, chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans. The resolution has cross-party support and is expected to become law. In addition to preventing experimentation on great apes, it will ban their use use in circuses or filming and conditions in zoos will have to be improved substantially.

The measure is inspired by the Great Apes Project, an international group founded in 1993 by philosophers Peter Singer and Paola Cavalieri "to work for the global removal of non-human great apes from the category of mere property, and for their immediate protection through the implementation of basic legal principles designed to provide these amazing creatures with the right to life, the freedom of liberty and protection from torture."

In the past two centuries, we have made many advances in the realm of moral legislation. We have ended slavery, extended the vote to all citizens, recognized women as the equals of men, spared children from exploitive labour, freed minorities from the bonds of prejudice, and rescued homosexuals from the criminal code. It would now seem time to stop treating highly sentient beings other than ourselves as nothing more than property. Science has firmly established the proximity of their sentience to ours.

Morally, we have traditionally divided animals into two groups -- us and the other -- a very high standard for us and a very low standard for them, as if a vast gulf lay between us. Now we know that isn’t true. As the Great Ape Project states, the non-human great apes share with us "a rich emotional and cultural existence in which they experience emotions such as fear, anxiety and happiness." They are deserving, therefore, of similar respect and protections. A sharp dichotomy is no longer justified. Without suggesting they should be our legal equals, they must, on scientific and moral grounds, be drawn more closely to us. The Spanish resolution is an important step in this direction. According to Pedro Pozas, Spanish director of the Great Apes Project, "This is a historic day in the struggle for animal rights and in defence of our evolutionary comrades which will doubtless go down in the history of humanity." Let's hope Mr. Pozas is right. And the idea catches on.

Are Chinese labour practices creeping into Canada?

Everyone knows why China appeals to corporations seeking a site to manufacture their goods -- cheap labour. Coerced labour actually. Chinese workers are spared the burdens of freedom of speech and freedom of association and are, therefore, also spared the burden of forming independent labour unions and negotiating their working conditions. They are at the mercy of their employers. China has labour laws, indeed it introduced a package of new ones this year, but government officials are notoriously susceptible to bribery or indifference so the value of such protection is questionable.

Now it seems the exploitation of Chinese workers has crossed the Pacific and appeared in Alberta. In April, 2007, two temporary foreign workers from China were killed on the job at Canadian Natural Resources Ltd.'s oilsands project north of Fort McMurray. While looking into safety issues, investigators talked to the men's fellow workers and discovered they weren't receiving the money they were earning. The Edmonton Journal followed up and learned from the widows of the men killed they were only getting about 12 per cent of the men's wages.

Apparently the proper amounts were paid into the employees' bank accounts but the money never showed up in China. Coincidentally, the workers' employer, the state-owned Sinopec Shanghai Engineering Company, had signing authority on the workers' accounts.

Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. has since canceled its contract with Sinopec and its 120 workers have returned to China. Whether or not they will ever get their money remains to be seen. David Liu, commercial consul at the Chinese consulate in Calgary, said he will look into the matter and make sure Sinopec is following the law. Let's hope he does because apparently not much can be done at this end. Alberta's minister of employment and immigration, Hector Goudreau, admits "We cannot enforce payments or deduction agreements that are outside our jurisdiction."

The temporary worker program has merit. It provides badly-needed labour for Canadian industries and a chance for foreign workers to earn some real money. It is also ripe for exploitation by unscrupulous employers. We can control exploitation in Canada but, as Minister Goudreau freely admits, we are limited to what we can do about exploitation by foreign employers such as Sinopec who operate out of countries where ripping off workers is standard procedure. Nonetheless, we are obligated to do what we can, like closely monitoring the money trail to ensure workers get what they earn. That Sinopec was allowed to dip into its employees' bank accounts is simply outrageous.

With thousands of temporary foreign workers expected to arrive in Alberta this year, this is no small problem. They are owed fair treatment here regardless of how they are treated at home. A good start would be to mandate they be employed directly by Canadian companies and that they be members of strong, effective unions. It's bad enough Canadian workers can be coerced into accepting lower wages by companies exploiting labour elsewhere, we don't need to bring the exploitation into the country.

Canada joins the Great Game

The Great Game refers to the 19th century rivalry between the British and Russian empires for supremacy in central Asia. The struggle, centered on Afghanistan, continues even though the rivals have changed.

Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India have recently agreed to build a pipeline to carry natural gas from Turkmenistan's huge reserves down through Afghanistan into Pakistan and India. The pipeline would go a long way to serve the needs of energy-starved Pakistan and India. India currently produces only half the natural gas it needs and imports 70 percent of its crude oil.

India and Pakistan have also been negotiating with Iran to build a pipeline from Iranian gas fields through Pakistan into India, a cheaper and much safer route, avoiding both Afghanistan and the volatile frontier region of Pakistan. And herein lies a problem. Keen to isolate Iran, the United States opposes this project. For this reason, and also because it wants to reduce Russian influence over energy supplies in the region, it strongly supports the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India proposal. In the 1990s, the Americans were talking with the Taliban about such a pipeline. The U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, Richard Bloucher, has admitted his government has a fundamental strategic interest in Afghanistan that goes well beyond the terrorism issue.

The route of the proposed pipeline takes it squarely through -- now here's a surprise -- Kandahar province. It seems Canadian troops could wind up as pipeline guards.

It appears that, at least as far as the U.S. is concerned, we are not in Afghanistan only to rebuild the country and suppress terrorism. We are there for broader geopolitical reasons. We are involved in the 21st century version of the Great Game. It seems that Canada, unwittingly one hopes, has joined the sport of empires.

Al Jazeera wins prestigious award

As a frequent visitor to Al Jazeera's website (I am forbidden TV access to Al Jazeera), I was pleased to see the broadcaster win Best 24 Hour News Program award at the Monte Carlo Television Festival. Jurors singled out Nour Odeh, Al Jazeera's Gaza correspondent, for her bravery in reporting from the beleaguered territory and commented on her concise and informative reports. Al Jazeera was nominated in every news category at the prestigious event.

Al Jazeera's value to me lies in its presentation of world events from a perspective at variance from most Western media, a perspective with rather more sympathy with Third World sensibilities, sensibilities I often find absent or diminished in Western news reporting.

Our very own CBC was also honoured with The National winning Best TV News Item award for "Gaza Rockets," a piece about a rocket-making factory in Gaza and the Israeli community targeted by the missiles. So kudos to our national broadcaster as well.

Talking to the enemy

In his book The Soviet Ambassador: The Making of the Radical Behind Perestroika, Christopher Shulgan tells an interesting tale about the collapse of the Soviet Union. He suggests Pierre Trudeau may have played an important role, not with any grand gesture but by simply talking to and developing a rapport with the other side. Trudeau made friends with the Russian ambassador Aleksandr Yakovlev, and the two held long discussions about, according to Trudeau, "everything from world peace to the health of [his] grandchildren and of my sons." The two became so close some diplomats were worried Trudeau was being brainwashed. To the contrary, Yakovlev, a bit of a sceptic to begin with, was being seduced by Canadian and values and becoming convinced the Soviet Union had "to move in this direction." He helped arrange a trip to Canada for Mikhail Gorbachev, then the Soviet agricultural secretary. During the visit, he took Gorbachev aside and raised ideas about reforming the Soviet Union. Gorbachev later said, "It was a conversation about the Canadian experience, about using it as an example." When Yakovlev returned to Moscow, he became a member of Gorbachev's inner circle and a major influence in leading the Soviet leader toward perestroika.

This isn't surprising. Western values and ideas about democracy and human rights are powerful. We should not be surprised they can seduce a mind cultured in a closed society but open to different perspectives.

This brings us to the current presidential race in the United States. One candidate, Obama, is open to dialogue with the Americans' current nemesis, Iran; the other, McCain, is not. One cannot help but wonder why McCain won't even talk to his enemy. Does he not appreciate the lure of Western ideals? Or does he simply lack confidence in his ability to convey them? Trudeau was an insatiably curious man, intrigued by how other cultures affected the thinking of those born to them. Perhaps McCain, like George Bush, simply lacks curiosity or imagination. Whatever the case, our hopes must lie with Obama.

Iran's leaders, men like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, exhibit the righteousness and prejudices typical of men who have lived sheltered lives in a closed system, rather like Yakovlev. But, as Trudeau said about his discussions with Yakovlev, "We haven't seen eye to eye on everything, but ... we have found ways to work together to serve the interests of both our countries." Certainly Iran and the United States have powerful common interests: oil, peace in the region, a fair settlement in Palestine, etc. Who knows, dialogue might even lead to the peaceful collapse of Iran's theocracy just as it led to the peaceful collapse of Soviet communism.

Of course the Trudeau/Yakovlev chemistry may have been unique: two exceptionally inquisitive minds meeting at the right time and place. Maybe no similar chemistry exists between Obama and Ahmadinejad. But what can possibly be lost by at least opening a conversation? Or at least encouraging conversation. Two compatible minds might exist on another diplomatic level as with Trudeau and Yakovlev -- a prime minister and an ambassador. Nothing else seems to be available to mitigate the dangerous hostility between the two countries.

Now if Obama wins and can be convinced to open a dialogue with Hamas as well, even the seemingly intractable Palestinian problem might finally be solved.

Why am I apologizing?

In 1492, when Columbus sailed the ocean blue, he brought catastrophe down upon the Native people of the Americas. He introduced greedy and rapacious empires to two unspoiled continents and they took full advantage. The aboriginals were obliterated by disease, their lands were stolen, many were enslaved, others had their children taken from them ... the list of tragedy and abuse is long and sordid. Few peoples have suffered such a cataclysm.

Today, Prime Minister Stephen Harper will apologize on behalf of you and I, and all Canadians, for our country's role in one component of this story: the Canadian Indian residential school policy. This seems like the right thing to do. It seems appropriate, even noble. And yet. And yet ... there is something not quite right about it, something offensive even. Mr. Harper is apologizing on my behalf, but I have done nothing wrong. I didn't elect the governments that established the residential schools and I certainly wouldn't have supported the churches running the schools. I have little use for organized religion and wouldn't put churches in charge of much of anything, certainly not children.

So why am I apologizing, by proxy, for offences I'm not guilty of? I am apologizing for nothing I have done but simply for who I am, i.e. a Canadian. I am guilty only by association.

Yet isn't guilt by association the problem? Isn't this why Japanese-Canadians were taken from their homes in the 1940s and interned in camps? They had committed no crimes, they were guilty simply for being Japanese.

Or as Phil Fontaine, the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations puts it: "We were unjustly wronged as a people over generations simply because of who we were." Exactly. And now Canadians innocent of these wrongs are apologizing not for what they have done but simply because of who they are. The source of the wrongs -- guilt by association -- is being perpetuated.

I am prepared to accept responsibility for my actions. I'll go further than that and, as a citizen of a democracy, accept responsibility for the actions of a government I vote for. But I am not guilty of the wrongs of previous generations and do not deserve to be charged with their sins and will not accept responsibility for them. My responsibility is to the wrongs of the present, the ones I can do something about. Only if I fail there, am I to be apologized for. I will not wallow in misplaced guilt.

As moral beings, we have a responsibility to help the disadvantaged in our society, regardless of why they are disadvantaged, to live a life of dignity. Indeed, why they are disadvantaged is irrelevant, except in helping us understand the challenges they face.

The tragedy of the aboriginal people should be accurately recorded in history and remembered. Understanding the past is essential to understanding the present and thereby to righting those historic wrongs that persist, perhaps in other forms, into the present. But the guilt for those wrongs belongs solely with those who perpetrated them. As for guilt by association, it too should become a thing of the past.

Obama to be Israel's poodle?

There is no better example of the tail wagging the dog than the United States' unequivocal support for Israel. The U.S. complains from time to time about Israeli behaviour, about the continued theft of Palestinian land, about the wall, and so on, but all it takes is a visit to Washington by the Israeli prime minister and all is forgiven. The hope that Barack Obama as president might present a more balanced approach seems to have been extinguished.

In a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Council, possibly the most powerful lobby group in the U.S., Obama laid out a policy unconditionally pro-Israel. He even upped the ante by not only pledging support for Jerusalem remaining as Israel's capital but as an "undivided" capital, an idea that will pre-empt most road maps to peace currently on the table. And he persisted in the foolishness of refusing to talk to Hamas unless they accept the usual self-defeating preconditions.

As for Iran, Israel's nemesis, he threatened to do "everything" -- "and I mean everything" to prevent that country getting nuclear weapons. One must assume "everything" includes war, possibly even nuclear war. His words were ominously familiar: "It [Iran] pursues a nuclear capability that could spark a dangerous arms race and raise the prospect of a transfer of nuclear know-how to terrorists." This could have come straight out of George W. Bush's mouth when he was justifying the Iraq war.

If Obama means what he says, peace in the Middle East will remain a dream and the hostilities there will continue to spread their toxic influences around the world. The Americans' Israel uber alles policy will never bring peace to the region or security to Israel.

But let's be optimistic. After all, this guy is supposed to be about change and hope and all that good stuff. Maybe his tough talk is just swagger to counter the foreign policy assault John McCain is launching against him. After all, he did say he would talk to the Iranians at least, something McCain won't do. And sucking up to the powerful Israeli lobby is mandatory for presidential candidates. If he wins the election, perhaps he will adopt a more rational approach.

We can only hope, while keeping firmly in mind the alternative is the frighteningly belligerent John McCain.

Welcome, Nepal, to the world of democracy

Nepal fired their king yesterday. The country's newly-elected Assembly voted overwhelmingly to abolish the monarchy and establish a republic. Ex-king Gyanendra has been given 15 days to pack his bags and vacate the palace. That may seem like short notice but he wasn't paying rent, so he can't complain. Losing his $3.1-million annual allowance will probably hurt a lot more, to say nothing of seeing his face disappear from the national currency.

In any case, we don't have to worry about his ex-majesty's future. Apparently, he is quite wealthy with interests in a number of industries. I wish him a long, happy life, but much more importantly, I wish Nepal great success in its democratic adventure. The hard work starts now.

What the hell is Gary Doer up to?

The NDP has consistently supported abolishing the Senate. The Manitoba NDP government is on record as agreeing. And yet they are planning on conducting province-wide hearings on how senators should be elected. Is this goofy or what? If they believe the Senate should be put out of its misery, why on earth are they acting to rejuvenate it?

The only argument with any merit in support of the Senate is that it equitably represents the regions. But equitable representation of the regions can be achieved with a proportional representation voting system and democracy greatly improved in the process. And the NDP claims to be a strong supporter of proportional representation. So why is Premier Doer pursuing the Conservative agenda of senate reform rather than the NDP agenda of proportional representation? He owes party members across the country an explanation.

Why would the Israelis want an agreement with the Palestinians?

In the Bible, when the Israelites wanted someone else's land, they did an ethnic cleansing. It was easy to justify -- God made them do it. According to the Old Testament, Numbers 33:

And the LORD spake unto Moses ... saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye are passed over Jordan into the land of Canaan; Then ye shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you. And ye shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land, and dwell therein: for I have given you the land to possess it.

God warned them that the cleansing had to be thorough:

But if ye will not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you; then it shall come to pass, that those which ye let remain of them shall be pricks in your eyes, and thorns in your sides, and shall vex you in the land wherein ye dwell.

God issued these instructions a few millennia ago, but they could have been issued in 1948, when the modern Israelites ethnically cleansed 750.000 Arabs from Palestine and created the nation of Israel. But, failing to heed God's warning, they allowed a substantial population of Arabs to remain. This population has pricked their eyes, been a thorn in their sides and vexes them to this very day.

The ideal for Israel would be to possess a Palestine bereft of Arabs. The international community, on the other hand, has consistently proposed two states, side by side. It continues to push for that solution, with various "road maps" having been proposed over the years. But does Israel have any real interest in this solution? Or does it find the current situation a quite acceptable second best?

One could argue that Israel has the best of both worlds. It has the West Bank available for increased Jewish settlement while keeping the Arabs nicely segregated. It expands its control of the best land and most of the water, destroying Arab assets in the process, while having little responsibility for the Arabs, who have no right to citizenship, welfare, or indeed much of anything. Almost 40 per cent of the West Bank is taken up with Israeli infrastructure which ties the settlements together while separating and isolating the Palestinians. It might be called ethnic cleansing by stealth.

And Israel is under no great pressure to allow an Arab state. It has the most powerful army in the region, nuclear weapons, and the unequivocal support of the most powerful nation in the world. It can do pretty much whatever it wants and the U.S. will back it up.

The only real threat to the Israelis is demographic. It can't incorporate the West Bank and Gaza into Israel because that would add millions more Arabs to Israel's population, gravely diluting its ethnic purity, thus defeating the very purpose of Israel which is its existence as a Jewish state. This is why leaders like Prime Minister Olmert occasionally seem amenable to the two-state solution, albeit reluctantly.

And the demographic threat increases as the Arabs outbreed the Jews. Even within Israel, the Arab portion of the population, already at 20 per cent, steadily grows. The situation is repeated in the West Bank and Gaza. And lurking in the background is the Palestinian diaspora.

But in the meantime, Israel is secure behind its wall, its military and its unequivocal American support while it increases its grip on Jerusalem and its expansion into the West Bank. The longer it delays any agreement, the more leverage it has. And a two-state solution won't solve the demographic problem, the ultimate threat, anyway. So what, from Israel's perspective, is the point of offering the Palestinians anything?

The Globe and the Post: Canada's Pravda and Izvestia

Some wit once compared Canada's two national newspapers, The Globe and Mail and the National Post, to those infamous Soviet twins Pravda and Izvestia. The idea was that just as the Russian twins were both voices of the Communist Party, the Canadian twins are both voices of the corporate sector. The comparison is unfair, of course ... but, not without a kernel of truth.

The Globe is only moderately conservative while the Post is rabidly so; nonetheless they are both conservative and corporate with similar agendas:

• Both insist that taxes must come down in order to maximize our economic success. This is a lie, totally disproven by countries such as Sweden, Denmark and Norway. These countries have both the world's highest taxes and the world's most prosperous economies. And, as an aside, the world's highest standards of social justice.
• Needless to say, both papers are content with a small special interest group controlling the mass media. Plutocratic control of the public forums is naturally quite amenable to the plutocrats. The only independent mass medium, and the only democratic mass medium, we have, at least at the national level, is the CBC, and the National Post would like to privatize that.
  
• Both papers have dragged their heels on global warming. While the Globe offers a disproportionate amount of column inches on global warming to know-nothing skeptics like Margaret Wente, the Post seems reluctant to recognize the crisis exists at all. The greatest fear of the corporate sector is that people may decide it's necessary to consume less, and when your major source of revenue comes from trying to convince people to consume more, i.e. from advertising, the idea is particularly frightening. That consuming less may be the only answer to global warming is an idea that must be buried at all costs.
• Both support NAFTA, the WTO and globalization on corporate terms generally. China is welcomed into the WTO even though it enjoys an unfair trade advantage through its use of coerced labour. But cheap labour is advantageous to corporations and is therefore quite acceptable to our two national dailies. If the corporate ox was being gored, that would be a different matter.
  
• On the Middle east, both papers, but particularly the Post, incline toward Israel, dismissing Hamas and Hezbollah -- both critical to the peace process -- as terrorists.
  

And so it goes. The Globe is generally more moderate, but this is a matter of degree rather than difference. Here in Calgary, I can buy one of four daily papers, two national, two local -- all conservative. The choice is rather like Henry Ford's famous offer on Model Ts: ""You can have it any colour you like, as long as it's black." The free market in Calgary offers any newspaper philosophy you like ... as long as it's conservative.

In this democracy/plutocracy of ours we should be holding thorough debates on the proper level of taxation, media control, the environment, and other issues of substance, but with the agenda set by the corporate sector the debates are either truncated or hardly occur at all. That, I suppose, is the inevitable result of allowing plutocratic control to trump democratic control of the "public" forums.

Drugs: worth the risk?

We are a drug-dependent society. From tranquilizing our kids with Ritalin to reinvigorating our old men with Viagra, we are a cradle-to-grave drug culture. In between birth and death we almost all rely on drugs at one time or another to mitigate or cure disease, relieve pain, or simply to enjoy ourselves. Good stuff, but always there are side effects. Always we must balance the benefit against the harm. We must deal with risk.

Unfortunately, we often aren't aware of what the risk is. A spate of lawsuits against the pharmaceutical giant Merck & Co. illustrates just that. In 2004, Merck pulled its top-selling pain-reliever Vioxx from the market when research indicated it increased the risk of strokes and heart attacks and may have contributed to thousands of deaths. Furthermore, recent studies allege that Merck manipulated public and professional opinion in order to promote the medication. Arthur Schafer, director of the Centre for Professional and Applied Ethics at the University of Manitoba says, "... all of modern medicine is floating on a sea of drug company money and the result has been utterly corrosive."

So even the medical use of drugs is often much riskier than the user might reasonably expect. What about recreational drug use then? These products range from those which have been used extensively, and studied extensively, to those relatively new. We are quite knowledgeable about the commonly-used drugs nicotine, alcohol and marijuana, yet oddly we have legalized the first two but not the latter. Particularly odd considering it is less harmful than the others.

And so what if a recreational drug is risky? Does that justify criminalizing it? Everything is risky. Driving your car is risky. Sports are risky. Every year people maim or kill themselves skiing, mountain climbing, sky-diving, etc., but we don't demand criminalization. It's their life, we say. So why isn't it "their life" if they want to smoke, drink, toke, snort or shoot up? If it's legal to take a big risk skiing down a mountain, why is it not legal to take a small risk smoking a joint?

How then does the public decide what risks it will allow individuals to take? One approach is to evaluate the risk to society. If a behaviour has little effect on the general public but only on those engaged in it, why should they be deprived of their pleasure?

But are we not our brother's keeper? If we see individuals doing harm to themselves are we not morally obliged to help them? The answer lies in the state of their knowledge and the state of their mind. If they are acting in ignorance, they deserve advice; if they are mentally disturbed, they deserve medical assistance. If they are mentally sound and refuse help, they are on their own. If they are mentally incapacitated and refuse help, we may have the right to interfere. And of course if they are harming others we have the right to restrain them.

Consider marijuana use. Does the relatively minor harm caused to the individual and society justify restraint? Does it justify the enormous cost of policing, trying and incarcerating people for marijuana infractions? To the contrary, it seems grossly disproportionate. Oddly, the biggest risks -- harm to the user and expense to the public -- are caused not by the act but by its illegality. Legalize it and most of the risk vanishes. The answer here would seem to be obvious.

Or consider an example outside the realm of drug use -- driving a car for pleasure. This carries a not insignificant risk. Automobile accidents are a major cause of injury and death, and we all pay the price. If someone out for a Sunday drive is seriously injured, we all pay the medical bills. And, through our insurance, we all pay for the property damage. And we all pay for the policing. And of course we all pay for the pollution the car emits. And so on. It's an expensive pleasure. Yet we don't even consider making it illegal. Perhaps we should. It's certainly more expensive, to the individual and to the public, than smoking marijuana (except of course for the cost society has imposed upon itself by making marijuana illegal).

Our approach to drugs is irrational. Two that are guilty of broad social harm, tobacco and alcohol, we legalize. One that is more innocuous, marijuana, we don't. And many recreational drugs are no more harmful to the individual or society than a host of other activities we never consider criminalizing. Obviously deep prejudices are at work. Alcohol for some reason, perhaps because it has become intricately involved in our habits and traditions, has reached a plateau of respectability. Marijuana, perhaps because of its association with the socially marginalized, remains an outcast.

Our attitude to recreational drug use should sensibly depend upon risk analysis, drug by drug, including comparison to other behaviours. Only then will we escape mischievous biases and develop rational responses.

Tar sands: the "baby seal" issue of the 21st century?

An iconic environmental issue of the 20th century for Canada was baby seals. Environmental activists gained international attention and created international revulsion about the clubbing of big-eyed seal pups. That effort continues, but another issue is now creeping into the international consciousness that could darken Canada's reputation even more than seal slaughter. That of course is the Alberta tar sands.

It's a dirty business. Producing a tar sands barrel of oil results in at least three times more greenhouse gases than producing a conventional barrel. Production requires huge volumes of water and results in veritable lakes of contaminated fluids. It also devours large quantities of natural gas, the cleanest hydrocarbon fuel -- some wit once likened it to transmuting gold into lead.

The international opposition to tar sands development is growing. Alberta deputy premier Ron Stevens, on a five-day mission to Washington to peddle the oil sands brand, is being met by protesters and a full-page ad in the congressional newspaper claiming oil sands production is a major contributor to global warming.

With $100-billion of projects in the pipeline so to speak, the Alberta government is desperate to convince Americans, the people who buy the stuff, that the province is committed to "environmentally sustainable development of the oil sands." It plans to spend 25 million taxpayer dollars on the effort. Even that may not be enough to give this dirty business a clean face.

From killing baby seals in the East to producing the world's dirtiest oil in the West, it seems that environmentally we are not winning hearts and minds.

Hillary goes nuclear

Not being an American I will be spared the responsibility of voting for the next president of the United States; however, if I was I would have been delighted earlier in the game to vote for Hillary Clinton. Not any more. Her pandering has become almost embarrassing. As John Doyle of the Globe observed, in the recent Pennsylvania primary he half expected her to be wearing a pinafore and going around saying "aw, shucks." All politicians pander of course. One of the rules of public speaking is to tailor your speech to your audience, and politicians excel at it. Clinton just seems to consistently overdo it.

Asked what she would do if the Iranians attacked Israel with nuclear weapons, she replied she would "obliterate them." For a politician who flaunts her experience, this is the reply of an amateur. An experienced politician would know the mature answer is that in the first place, Iran doesn't have nuclear weapons, and in the second place the best American intelligence says they aren't acquiring them, so the question is no more than hypothetical mischief.

Her Strangelovian response may be recognition of the need to pander to the powerful Israel lobby, but that doesn't justify proposing Armageddon.

Maybe she feels that as a woman she has to strut her credentials as a tough guy. Show she's got the cojones, so to speak. After all, she supported both the war in Iraq and George Bush's misinformed belligerence toward Iran. She has also advertised herself as "the only candidate who isn't just talking about cracking down on China ... I have a specific plan ...." One hopes she's only referring to trade; nonetheless, her swagger caused China expert Richard Baum, her adviser on east Asia, to resign over the "grossly misguided accusations."

All this may be election hype which she would quickly bury if she became president, yet one has to wonder. If she feels she has to prove how tough she is to the electorate, will she not feel the same need when she's dealing with foreign powers, to say nothing of her own military? Let's hope that after the November election the world doesn't end up with George W. Bush lite.

The real price of gas

Oil prices surge again -- a barrel fetching close to $120 this morning. Gas prices are following suit. A national survey last week found the average price for regular was $1.19 a litre, the second highest on record. Public concern rises with the price. A Gandalf Group survey showed that Canadians believe the price of gasoline is the country's greatest challenge second only to the state of the healthcare system.

Yet gas remains a great bargain at the pump. The pump price is the market price, and markets lie through their teeth. You may pay $1.19 a litre, but you are only paying a fraction of the real cost.

To begin with, the pump price excludes the costs of the pollution that burning gasoline creates, including its contribution to global warming. There's the cost of policing roads and health costs incurred from road accidents. There's the tax subsidies to the oil industry through items such as the depletion allowance. All these are magnified by urban sprawl -- an urban design imposed by cheap gas. The International Center for Technology Assessment calculates that when all costs are included, the real price of a litre of gas is five to 15 times the pump price.

Economists call these excluded items negative externalities. External they may be, but they are real costs that have to be paid by all of us, whether we drive a little, a lot, or not at all. If drivers had to pay the full cost of a litre of gas, the world would change. Cities would be designed much more efficiently, and the environment would be a great deal cleaner and less at risk. We might keep all this in mind when we complain about the price at the pump. It may seem high, but it is in fact a remarkable, if highly deceptive, bargain.

Jose Zapatero, Prime Minister and feminist

Kudos for Spanish Prime Minister Jose Zapatero. Following his success over his conservative opponents in the recent election, he has appointed a new cabinet and, for the first time in Spanish history, it has a majority of women. Zapataro's cabinet is consistent with his promise to make women's issues his priority in this term. The new spirit was illustrated in mass media around the world with a photograph of a magnificently pregnant Defence Minister Carme Chacon inspecting her troops.

Prime Minister Zapatero, who proudly refers to himself as a feminist, is following the precedent of gender reforms set in his first term when his government legalized same-sex marriage, brought in fast-track divorces and passed laws to tackle domestic violence and promote gender equality, including a bill that required some companies to employ 40 per cent women in top positions.

Who would have thought a very macho Mediterranean country would become a leader in bringing equality to women. With the Canadian federal cabinet including a measly 22 per cent women, Spain clearly has something to teach us.

U.S. Supreme Court opts for cruel and unusual punishment

About the only thing crueler than killing someone is torturing them when you do it. Despite the Eighth Amendment to the American Constitution which expressly forbids "cruel and unusual punishment," the United States Supreme Court has approved execution by lethal injection which may inflict exactly that.

Lethal injection typically involves three drugs: first sodium thiopental (an anesthetic), then pancuronium bromide (causes muscle paralysis) and finally potassium chloride (stops the heart). The dose of each drug is supposedly sufficient to cause death.

The pancuronium bromide is not administered to make death easier for the prisoner, but to make it easier for the spectators. When the heart-stopping drug potassium chloride hits, it tends to cause spasms which detract from the image of a painless death. Pancuronium bromide, by relaxing the muscles, precludes the spasms thus offering a calmer spectacle. It is entirely unnecessary for the killing.

Unfortunately, the regimen doesn't always go according to plan. Doctors and nurses are forbidden by their organizations from participating in executions, so they are often carried out by incompetent personnel. Dr. Mark Heath, a professor of clinical anesthesia at Columbia University, observes, "There are significant risks that the inmate in Texas' lethal injection procedure will not be rendered unconscious by the sodium thiopental and will therefore experience the psychologically horrific effects of pancuronium bromide." The drug has been condemned by the American Veterinary Medical Association for use in euthanizing animals.

Potassium chloride is reputed to cause excruciating pain. If the prisoner receives insufficient doses of the drugs, when the potassium chloride hits he may be in agony but unable to cry out because his muscles are paralyzed by the pancuronium bromide. He dies an exquisitely painful death.

This appears to be what happened in Florida in 2006 to convicted murderer Angel Diaz. He took over half an hour to die and only then after a second series of injections. After the first series, witnesses reported he seemed to squint and grimace, and attempted to mouth words. Remaining conscious, he would have felt he was being smothered as the pancuronium bromide collapsed his diaphragm and lungs, and then he would have felt the potassium chloride like fire in his veins.

All hope is not lost, however, with the Supreme Court decision. Justice John Paul Stevens, although agreeing that the evidence presented in this case failed to show unconstitutionality, he admitted that for the first time he believes the death penalty itself may be unconstitutional. So the United States may yet depart the company of countries such as China, Iran and Saudi Arabia and join the civilized world in its views on capital punishment.

Are we playing fair with China?

China-bashing is all the rage these days and, make no mistake about it, considering their behaviour in Tibet and Sudan, the Chinese deserve it. Nonetheless, I have this uneasy feeling the self-righteousness that accompanies the criticism is somehow excessive.

China is saturating Tibet with Han Chinese in order to inextricably link the two culturally and ethnically. They will brook no resistance from the Tibetans. This strategy is not unfamiliar to us. It is, after all, exactly what we did. We saturated North America with immigrants, overwhelming the native peoples as we stole their land. At least the Chinese have not, to my knowledge, bundled the Tibetans off to reserves or kidnapped their children for indoctrination. Of course we do better now, we respect the civil rights of the Natives, but this is from the vantage point of having secured our country. Once the Chinese have secured Tibet, they too may improve their behaviour.

As for China's cozy relationship with Sudan, despite the Darfur situation, our criticism is pure hypocrisy. Sudan has oil and oil absolves all sins. The United States and Great Britain are tight with Saudi Arabia, a notoriously repressive and misogynistic dictatorship, to an extent that makes a mockery of their claims to be champions of democracy and human rights, all because of the magic substance, oil. Only weeks ago, President George Bush was shamelessly peddling hi-tech weaponry to the Saudis, and one of Tony Blair's last acts as PM was to quash an investigation into bribery between British arms dealers and Saudi officials. Criticism of the Chinese for consorting with brutal dictators while we do it ourselves is cringe-inducing.

So should we lay off the Chinese? Of course not. China's repressive practices go well beyond Tibet and Sudan, and we are morally obliged to respond to violations of people's human rights anywhere. The world has become a small place. And we are after all a signatory of the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I am simply suggesting that when we criticize we do so with a little humility, keeping in mind our own behaviour both past and present.

Will the rule of law triumph in the UK?

Last year, before Tony Blair stepped down as British PM, one of his last acts was to terminate an investigation into allegations of corruption between BAE Systems, a British arms manufacturer, and the Saudi Arabian government. BAE was alleged to have had a huge slush fund for buying the support of Saudi officials. Blair insisted that allowing Britain's Serious Fraud Office (SFO) to pursue an investigation would threaten -- what else? -- national security.

Two private organizations, the Corner House Research Group and the Campaign Against Arms Trade, challenged the decision, claiming serious bribery of senior Saudi officials had occurred. British judges have now ruled in favour of the challenge, stating they were not convinced the SFO had done its utmost to uphold the rule of law and had, therefore, acted illegally in ending the investigation. Lord Justice Moses declared,"No one, whether within this country or outside, is entitled to interfere with the course of our justice."

Sadly, Gordon Brown is proving no better than his predecessor. Only weeks before the judges handed down their decision, his government introduced draft legislation that would allow the attorney general to halt prosecutions on the basis of national security. Such decisions would be strictly in the hands of cabinet with judicial reviews virtually impossible. The attorney general would not be obligated to provide information to parliament that affects national security or international relations. George W. Bush must be proud of his British colleague.

Nonetheless, the investigation into the grubby BAE/Saudi affair may have to be reopened. The rule of law in the UK may yet triumph over Tony Blair, commercial interests and Britain's collaboration with one of the world's more sordid dictatorships.

Carter to chat with Hamas

Jimmy Carter, once again manifesting a refreshing, if rather un-American, approach to Palestine, will meet with Hamas chief Khaled Meshal in Damascus next week. His government disapproves of the company he is keeping as it conflicts with their attempt to put Hamas beyond the pale. Carter's visit is, however, consistent with the views expressed in his book "Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid."

He is not entirely alone among his countrymen in recognizing the common sense of at least talking to a major force in the region, particularly one that just happened to win the last Palestinian election. Increasingly, other Americans are beginning to see the wisdom in a dialogue with Hamas. Eminent persons such as former national security advisers Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft have stated the obvious, that it's better to talk to them than isolate them. And even the Bush Administration may not be quite as opposed as it seems. Apparently Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been in private discussions with Arab diplomats about the possibility of Egypt acting as an intermediary with Hamas.

Peace in Palestine depends heavily on Israel's protector, the United States, listening to all sides, not just Israel and tame Palestinians. And, given that Hamas is the elected representative of the Palestinian people, talking to them may even suggest the Americans take democracy seriously, not selectively.

Homeland Security uber alles

As if Michael Chertoff, the U.S. Homeland Security czar, didn't have enough power, Congress granted him even more. In 2005, they gave him the right to void any federal law that might interfere with construction of a fence his department is building between the United States and Mexico. Any law at all. And if that wasn't enough, they also forbade the courts from interfering. Mr. Chertoff's word is final. Long live the czar.

Mr. Chertoff hasn't been reluctant to exercise his powers. He has issued waivers suspending dozens of laws, including laws that protect the environment, endangered species, farmland, Native burial sites and religious freedom. He is doing all this in the name of -- what else? -- national security, but one wonders what the fence has to do with security. In truth, it's really about keeping Mexicans out of the country, and they aren't crossing the border to explode bombs; they're looking for work, for heaven's sake. This is an immigration matter, not a security matter.

It is more than a little sad to see Congress voluntarily giving up its powers to the Administration, particularly an administration that abuses such powers as eagerly as it seeks them, but unfortunately that is the United States today. Not all Americans are mutely accepting this state of affairs, however. Two environmental groups have launched a constitutional challenge of one of Mr. Chertoff's waivers before the Supreme Court, their last resort. A number of Democratic congressmen support the suit and have called on the Court to overturn the 2005 law. Good luck to them. Placing unelected civil servants above the law is a practice any democracy can well do without. Paranoia is not an excuse.

Bashing Beijing (and Olympic glory)

As the Olympics approach, and the torch relay wends its weary way toward Beijing for the Games opening August 8th, we will continue to hear about human rights protests over China's treatment of Tibet. For an institution that is supposed to bring the world together, the Olympics seems to serve as a lightning rod for division.

The Games put host countries front and centre on the world stage, and that of course is why they want them, for the prestige, to show their credentials as nations to be taken seriously. Olympic spokespeople insist it's all about sports, but of course it isn't. The athletes are merely the instruments. Host cities don't expound on the joys of fencing and shot-putting, they talk about putting themselves on the map. And surely no one believes the Chinese politburo is spending those billions of yuan because they are in love with sport. Dictatorships from Nazi Germany to Communist China have taken full advantage of Olympic glory to establish the legitimacy of their regimes.

So what are human rights advocates to do when an influential international organization assists a brutal tyranny in promoting itself? Sit idly by? Quite naturally, and quite rightly, they are going to take advantage of centre stage themselves. They will do what they can to shame the tyrant into behaving as a responsible member of the human community. Trouble-makers they may be, but the Olympics and their despotic friends richly deserve them.

Nonetheless, The athletes have been promised their day in the sun. The Games must go on. And so must the protests.

Our troops in Afghanistan: part of the solution, or part of the problem?

In view of Prime Minister Harper's statement to NATO re the Afghanistan mission that, "We all underestimated the task and we've been compensating ever since," one is inclined to ask why. Why the underestimation? One rather obvious answer is that Afghan resistance has been reinvigorated by the presence of foreign soldiers in the country. Our troops, in other words, may be the fuel that is feeding the insurgency.

The back of the Taliban was broken by the invasion following 9/11. Perhaps if the foreigners had packed their bags then, it would have remained broken, but there is nothing like a foreign occupation to kindle the passions of patriots. This is particularly true when the locals see the foreigners not only as alien but also as a threat to the One True Faith (to say nothing of a lucrative drug business). Now we may be trapped in a classic vicious circle. The occupation provokes resistance, more troops are required to fight the resistance, more locals are killed, the resistance intensifies, more troops are required, and so on, and on. Shades of Vietnam.

Harper shows a streak of realism at least by admitting NATO cannot hope to increase troop levels to the point where it can "snuff out the resistance." He insists Canada's goal is simply to train Afghanistan's army to the point where it can take over the job. If that means NATO then leaves, the departure of foreigners may do even more to deplete the resistance than training the Afghan army.

McCain's mad pastor

With all the noise the media has made about Barack Obama's pastor Jeremiah Wright and his anti-American sermons, they seem to have overlooked ranting Rod Parsley, bosom buddy of John McCain. Parsley is senior pastor of World Harvest Church, a not inconsiderable outfit that includes 12,000 members, 400 staff, a bible college and a television studio. He has recently endorsed John McCain for president, to which McCain gratefully responded by referring to Parsley as "one of the truly great leaders in America, a moral compass, a spiritual guide."

One of the hobbyhorses of this moral compass and spiritual guide is a war against Islam. In one of his books he declares, "I do not believe our country can truly fulfill its divine purpose until we understand our historical conflict with Islam. ... The fact is that America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed." He claims that Islam is an "anti-Christ religion," predicated on "deception," and the Prophet Muhammad "received revelations from demons and not from the true God."

Whereas Obama took pains to publicly distance himself from Wright's radical comments, McCain makes no such effort in dealing with Parsley. Although McCain is only addressing extreme Islam, he nonetheless seems to take off on Parsley's militant musings when he claims, "We face the transcendent challenge of the 21st century. That is the threat of radical Islamic extremism. My friends, I know you know that this is an evil of transcendent and unbelievable magnitude. You can see other times when our nation and our way of life was threatened, but this ranks among the greatest."

Demagogues need, above all, an enemy. It seems that Islam is serving the purpose for both Parsley and McCain. Parsley we can pass off as just another flaky preacher, albeit an influential one, but McCain may become president of the United States. His war-mongering cannot so easily be dismissed.

When Pastor Wright raved against the United States, he was expressing black rage, an understandable emotion considering the centuries of persecution his people have suffered in their native land. And, in any case, all that is strictly an American issue. Parsley's cry for war against Islam, on the other hand, is not only religious hate-mongering but it has international implications. Why, therefore, is the American mass media not making an even bigger issue out of McCain and Parsley's friendship than they did out of Obama and Wright's? Have they become too inured to war? Or is Muslim-baiting not that big an issue?

bin Laden's puppets

Listening to U.S. presidential candidate John McCain reminds me once again how remarkably successful al-Qaeda was with their bombings of 9/11. Far be it from me to try to get into the heads of people who fly planes into tall buildings, but I suspect their first goal was to trigger a war between Islam and the West. And secondly, to undermine Western values. They succeeded at both, but only because the Bush administration played beautifully into their hands. They wanted a war, Bush gave them one, and now the U.S. is bogged down in it and has reinvigorated al-Qaeda in the bargain. As for undermining Western values, the Americans performed on cue here as well, with everything from torturing foreigners to massive spying on their own people.

Furthermore, the U.S. and its allies have created over four million refugees in Iraq. It takes little imagination to realize that included among those millions are tens of thousands of unemployed, uneducated and angry young men -- a host of potential recruits for the next generation of jihadists.

Now we have McCain, possibly the next president, insisting if elected he will carry on the war for 100 years if necessary. Bin Laden's eyes must light up like candles when he hears that. Who would have thought a guy hiding in a cave in Pakistan or wherever would have the leaders of the world's most powerful nation dancing at his fingertips?