Ominous rumblings from Zuma

"Is the political discipline in China a recipe for economic success?" So asks South African President Jacob Zuma, currently on an official visit to the Asian nation.

Is Zuma just being polite to his Chinese hosts? Or is he taking advantage of his visit to tweak the West's nose? Certainly African leaders do get tired of the conditions and lectures attached to Western aid compared to the typically unconditional offers from China. So a little teasing of Western donors is understandable. Or is it something more ominous?

South Africa is currently beleaguered by labour strife. Strikes by public service workers are paralyzing the nation's cities and half of the country's young black men are unemployed. The relationship between Zuma's African National Congress (ANC) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), an ally in the anti-apartheid struggle and a kingmaker within the ANC, has sunk to a serious low. Cosatu has threatened to shut down the economy if the government doesn't agree to an 8.6% wage increase and a 1,000 rand ($144) monthly housing allowance.

Is Zuma looking at these troubles and envying the "political discipline" that China applies to its workers? The Chinese government keeps working people in line by depriving them of the freedom to associate and form strong, independent labour unions like those represented by Cosatu. And this clearly provides China with an economic advantage. Perhaps that advantage is looking good to Zuma at the moment.

Let us hope not. The Chinese leaders, despite their predilection for dictatorial discipline, do seem to keep the welfare of their people in mind. African leaders, on the other hand, have a sordid record of using any extraordinary powers they can muster to ruthlessly enhance their own interests at the expense of their people. The last thing South Africa needs is another strongman.

The American Empire: will the sun ever set?

The United State recently announced the departure of its last combat troops from Iraq. Yet 50,000 troops will remain in over 100 bases in an "advisory capacity." That is an occupation by any measure.

At one time it was said that the sun never set on the British Empire. Now Great Britain is the mere poodle of the new Anglo empire, the American version. And on this version the sun truly never sets.

The United States deploys its military on more than 700 bases in over 100 countries around the world. Add to the military the private contractors who do everything from prepare meals to carry out covert operations. And then there's the CIA, largely responsible for secret wars that extend the Empire's reach beyond occupation, including assassinations by the use of drones. These wars have been intensified under the Obama administration to the point where The New York Times recently referred to the CIA becoming a "paramilitary organization."

Much of the Empire's muscle is directed at the Muslim world, with 50,000 troops occupying Iraq, 100,000 fighting an insurgent war in Afghanistan and covert operations in a host of Arab and other countries including Algeria, Somalia, Sudan, Iran, Pakistan and Yemen. The potential for creating Islamic hostility and potentially terror would seem almost infinite. Such is the price of empire.

Perhaps as their country plunges ever further into debt, Americans will eventually begin to question the price. Perhaps they will even begin to recognize that they create the very terror that leaves them in constant fear. But there is little sign of that now. Obama seems as caught up in the web of empire as his predecessors. Iraq is a good example. He "withdraws" but leaves an occupying force of 50,000. Next year he promises to leave Afghanistan. One wonders how many tens of thousands of "advisers" will be left there. And then there's all those possibilities in Iran, Yemen, etc.. No, no sign of the sun setting any time soon.

Earth Overshoot Day arrives a month earlier

Last Saturday, August 21st, was Earth Overshoot Day. Each year, the international think tank Global Footprint Network calculates the day on which we humans have consumed as many of the Earth's natural resources as it can provide in a full year. Every year that day, "the day when humanity begins living beyond its ecological means," falls earlier, this year a full month earlier than last year.

By the Network's calculations, we first went into overshoot in 1986. Until then we were consuming resources and producing waste consistent with what the planet could produce and reabsorb. By 1996, we were using 15 percent more resources per year than the planet could supply. Now, we are using almost 50 per cent more. We are devouring the Earth.

Earth Overshoot Day is a good day to pause and reflect on our profligate ways. Those of us fortunate enough to live in the First World live a life of great indulgence. Unfortunately, our indulgence is imposing an ever-increasing ecological debt on future generations. We are enjoying our way of life largely at the cost of theirs. This reminder from the Global Footprint Network is timely indeed.

To calculate your own ecological footprint, go to http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/calculators/.

Barbaric justice - Iran vs. California

Which is the worst travesty of justice: being stoned to death for adultery or sentenced to 25 years to life for stealing food? Both are barbaric, what is surprising is the countries that impose these sentences. We could easily guess who would practice stoning: Iran, for example, or Afghanistan or Saudi Arabia. But many would be surprised that the country that sentences a man to 25 years to life for stealing food would be the United States, and in the great state of California at that.

Actually, when Gregory Taylor broke into the kitchen of St. Joseph's Church in downtown Los Angeles because he was hungry, he wasn't committing his first offence. Taylor, a homeless man, had been convicted years earlier of a purse-snatching and an unarmed, failed attempt to steal a wallet. As to breaking into the kitchen, the pastor of the church testified on Taylor's behalf saying that he was often given food and allowed to sleep in the church. The priest said he was a peaceful man struggling with homelessness and crack addiction. Nonetheless, trying to pry open the door to St. Joseph's food pantry was a third offence and in California that can get you, as it did Gregory Taylor, 25 years to life.

I don't know what drove Taylor to his "life of crime," but it isn't hard to imagine. The life of another victim of California's three strikes law, Norman Williams, is illustrative. Williams' third strike was stealing a floor jack from a tow truck. His two earlier offences were burglarizing an apartment that was being fumigated and stealing some tools from an art studio. Williams was the eighth of 12 children and was raised by a binge-drinking mother who pimped him and his brothers out to pedophiles for money to buy wine. When he grew up he not surprisingly became addicted to cocaine and lived on the streets.

Both men eventually got a break, if that's the right word. With the help of a Stanford University legal clinic, both Taylor and Williams gained their freedom after serving 13 years.

Thirteen years in prison for petty theft is better than being stoned to death for adultery, but it is barbaric nonetheless. The real crime is that two men so desperately in need of help, and living in a country with more than ample resources and know-how to provide it, were instead cruelly punished for misdemeanors that were nothing more than symptoms of their distress.

Iran is a benighted theocracy; the United States is a modern democracy. Taking that into account, California's three strikes and your out doesn't look that much better than stoning.

Do we really expect refugees to queue up?

As the son of immigrants, I am intrigued by the current situation with the Tamil boat people. My parents arrived legally but, I ask myself, what if they hadn't. What if they had broken the rules? Would I hold it against them? Would I feel any less of a Canadian? The answer is no. I enjoy being a Canadian so much I would be glad they did it. Indeed I might very well feel that sneaking in added to the romance of their adventure. And indeed they may have had to sneak in if they came today. They immigrated in 1929 when anyone from the British Isles pretty well got a free pass. Today, Brits have to meet the same requirements as anyone else and my parents, not being well-educated, may not have had the skills to qualify. I am, therefore, tolerant on the subject of immigrant queue jumpers.

But the Tamils don't come as immigrants, they come as refugees, and that's quite another thing. Sensibly, one expects them to break the rules. If you were expecting a knock on the door in the middle of the night by the secret police, would you stand patiently in line waiting for a nod from the Canadian embassy? Would you take the time to apply for a passport from the state authorities? Or if you were living in a squalid refugee camp, watching your children suffer constantly from diarrhea and unable to offer them hope for the future, would you be willing to wait for years to get out if you had an alternative? I wouldn't. I'd get the hell out of there anyway I could and as quickly as I could. And I would head for any decent country that would take me in - Australia, the U.S., Canada, wherever, and I would be grateful for the sanctuary.  But queue up? Only as a last resort.

So if these Tamils are genuine refugees, I say welcome and good luck to them. If they aren't, then I expect they will be deported. In any case, I believe I'll withhold judgment until they have been duly processed.

Arabs support a nuclear-armed Iran

The Brookings Institution's annual Arab Public Opinion Poll has shown some remarkable changes in Arab views in the past year. The survey, conducted in late July in six Middle Eastern countries - Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Lebanon, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates - shows, for example, that a positive view of  U.S. President Obama has declined form 45 per cent to 20 per cent while a negative view has increased from 23 per cent to 62 per cent. This echoes the dramatic increase from last year's 15 per cent of Arabs who were "discouraged" by the U.S. administration's Middle East policy to the 63 per cent who are discouraged this year. The number who said they felt "hopeful" shrunk from 51 per cent to 16 per cent.

The survey indicated other shifting currents in the Middle East. For example, for the first time in recent years, more Arabs said they identified as Muslims rather than as citizens of their country. But most surprisingly, and most disturbingly, not only do an increasing majority believe Iran has the right to pursue a nuclear program even if it is seeking weapons, 57 per cent now say that Iran acquiring nuclear weapons would be positive for the Middle East.

As support for Obama has declined, support for Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has soared. The survey indicated he is now the most popular leader in the Arab world. Obama's fall and Erdogan's rise has no doubt been boosted by the Israeli raid on the aid flotilla. Indeed, Palestine remains the great sticking point for improved relations between the U.S. and the Arabs. Of the American policies with which the survey respondents were most disappointed, 61 per cent chose Palestine/Israel. Iraq was a distant second at 27 per cent.

An overwhelming majority of those surveyed said they were prepared for peace with Israel if it was willing to return all the territory it has occupied since the 1967 Six Day War, including East Jerusalem, but most don't believe that will happen for a long time.

It appears that until the United States leans on Israel sufficiently to push it into a fair deal with the Palestinians, American and Arab relations will either stagnate of get worse, an unhealthy situation both for the Middle East and the rest of the world.

Kenya's new constitution - a lesson for us?

Last week, 67 per cent of Kenya's electors voted for a new constitution. By all accounts, voter turnout was large and enthusiastic. Any discussion of the constitution in Canada meets with something less than enthusiasm; nonetheless, there are aspects of Kenya's new constitution that we might think about adding to ours.

Specifically, the new Kenyan constitution contains a Bill of Rights which guarantees a long list of social and economic rights. It says every child has the right to free and compulsory pre-primary, primary and secondary education. It says every person has a right to a high standard of health care, to food of acceptable quality, to clean and safe water in adequate quantities, to accessible and adequate housing and to reasonable standards of sanitation.

It has always seemed odd to me that constitutions provide for certain human rights, such as freedom of speech, religion, assembly, etc., while failing to provide for rights to the most fundamental needs of all: food and shelter. To which we might add, in a modern society, the right to good health care and education appropriate to one's needs and abilities. Rights such as freedom of speech are wonderful but not of much use if you are starving. First things first.

Perhaps we feel that in a country as rich as ours we don't need to guarantee our people access to sufficient nourishment and shelter, or even health and education. But our wealth just makes it that much easier to ensure every one of us has these things, so why not do so? Why not establish the proper foundation of a constitution - basic human needs?

Pomegranates and U.S. foreign policy

The Left is often accused of being anti-American. It does indeed have an anti on its shoulder, but it's often more anti-American foreign policy than anti-American. Most Lefties, and I include myself, greatly admire much about our southern neighbour, particularly when it behaves in accordance with its founding principles.

And there is even much to admire about its foreign policy when it isn't in empire mode. A recent example of this was the trade deal signed between Afghanistan and Pakistan which will allows Afghans to ship their goods across Pakistani territory to India and its vast consumer market. The Americans pushed hard for this deal and were instrumental in its consummation. Appropriately, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton attended the signing.

The Afghan economy, which produces a range of goods from carpets to fruit to fine marble, will receive a huge boost. Of particular importance is its pomegranate crop. An arid area fruit that needs little or no water, foreign development workers have long insisted that it is critical to creating a reasonable alternative for poppy growers. After poppies, pomegranates are Afghanistan's most famous crop, but to get top prices farmers need access to international markets. The opening of the Indian market will be a major step in this direction.

The U.S. deserves full marks for helping to bring this deal about. This is an America the Left can love.

Conservatives and the mistrust of science

The federal government's scrapping of the mandatory long form census has been ascribed to various reasons, from Stephen Harper's selective libertarian philosophy to a sop for the Conservative hard core. Possibly all of these reasons apply to some degree or other, but not to be overlooked is the Conservatives' awkward disconnect between their policies and what science tells us about those policies. Areas of interest that serve as examples include climate change, justice and social health.

That we live on a warming planet has now been firmly established by climate change science. Yet another massive study, this one by U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has established this fact. "Unmistakable" is the word used by Derek Arndt , co-editor of the NOAA report. Nonetheless, the federal government continues to drag its feet in responding to this, the greatest challenge humanity faces. Reports like this must be inconvenient indeed for the foot-draggers, particularly in light of their unequivocal support for tar sands production.

And then there's the justice portfolio. The Conservatives propose a tough law and order regime of longer sentences and bigger prisons. Yet experts in the area tell them this is only marginally useful in keeping the public safe from crime, that there are far more effective and cheaper ways. The data that supports the experts is not welcome in the federal cabinet room.

And then there's the long form census. This presents conservatives with a particularly sticky problem. Analysis of the demographics of  a host of countries increasingly tells us that a more equitable society is a healthier society. Extensive research shows that not only do more equal societies have lower rates of heart disease, crime, drug abuse, obesity, mental illness and other social ills than less equal societies, but the rates are lower for all classes in society, the rich as well as the poor. This is graphically illustrated in the book The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better by epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. Furthermore, Wilkinson and Pickett show that the rates aren't determined by absolute levels of poverty but by relative levels within a society. These statistical relationships are not good news for conservatives. Privilege is, after all, a fundamental tenet of conservative philosophy.

That the Harper government would sabotage the integrity of the long form census is therefore hardly surprising. What political party would want government paying for knowledge that not only undermines its policies but undermines its basic philosophy into the bargain?

Of course Pakistan entertains the Taliban

WikiLeaks has, you might say, put the cat among the pigeons. One of the more disturbing elements to the powers involved in the Afghan war is the suggestion of a cozy relationship between the Pakistan military and the Taliban. This suggestion is not new of course, but it is a confirmation that is doing a pretty good job of cranking up tensions between the U.S., Afghanistan and Pakistan.

What surprises me is not that Pakistan is maintaining a rapport with the Taliban but that anybody would expect them not to. After all, back when the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were supporting the Mujaheddin in their insurgency against the Soviet Union, extremist elements were favoured because of their virulent anti-communism. And among these extremists were the future Taliban. That ties were maintained is hardly surprising.

But more to the point, Pakistan has to consider its own interests. We can wreak our havoc in Afghanistan and then go home, like the U.S. did in Vietnam. But Pakistan is at home, it has nowhere else to go. It is stuck with a rather large neighbour along a highly contentious border, and it's going to be stuck with that neighbour for a very long time. If it doesn't want to be facing a hostile government across that border, it has to prepare itself for any winner of the current civil war. And the Taliban might win. Of course, entertaining the Taliban will in turn offend Afghan President Karzai, who might also win, but the odds for the "Mayor of Kabul" don't look too good at the moment.

The rest of us are not amused. Our motives in Afghanistan are so pure, how can Pakistan not surrender itself unequivocally to our goals? Furthermore we, particularly the United States, have given billions to Pakistan and we expect loyalty in return. Haven't we paid full measure for it? Unfortunately, our expectations are simply unrealistic.

The Pakistanis have a lot of balls to juggle. Dealing with the various forces in Afghanistan, managing their own rebellious tribesmen, countering the influence of India in the region, and placating the Americans while keeping in mind the rampant hostility toward the United States among their people. They will juggle these balls to satisfy their own interests, not the Afghans', and certainly not ours. If we don't recognize this, we will set ourselves up for ever more grief.

Bull-y for Catalonia

We Calgarians have a long history of tormenting animals for entertainment. Once a year we endure the ritual of rodeo at the Calgary Stampede. Progress toward ending this primitive "sport" is glacial. I was greatly pleased therefore to read that Catalonia, a semi-autonomous region of Spain, has banned bullfighting. The Catalonia parliament voted 68 to 55 to become the first region of mainland Spain to outlaw the spectacle.

The popularity of bullfighting in Catalonia has been in decline for years. Only one bull ring remains - in the capital, Barcelona. It stages only 15 fights a year and they rarely sell out. Nonetheless, the ban is a signal victory for both animal rights and human decency.

Like rodeo, bullfighting is often defended on the basis of tradition. But tradition should never justify cruelty. According to centre-right politician Josep Rull, most Catalans agree. "The suffering and death of a living being," he said, "cannot be turned into a public spectacle."

If only we could convince Calgarians of that.

China rates the world

In yet another sign of China's emergence as an economic powerhouse, the top China-based credit rating agency, Dagong International Credit Rating Company, is challenging the dominance of the big three - Fitch, Moody's and Standard and Poor's. According to Dagong CEO Guan Jianzhong, “Intrinsically, the reason [for] the global financial crisis and debt crisis in Europe is that the current international credit rating system does not correctly reveal the debtor's repayment ability and provides the wrong credit rating information to the world." Chinese president Hu Jintao has expressed similar concerns.

Reflecting this criticism, Dagong has concluded that certain leading Western nations are no longer worthy of AAA ratings and has brought them down a peg. In its rating of 50 countries that make up 90 per cent of the world's economy, Germany has been downgraded to AA+, The United States to AA, and Britain and France to AA-. Dagong limits the top rating of AAA to Norway, Denmark, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand. Canada rates AA+, along with the Netherlands, China and Germany.

Given the failures of Western agencies in the run-up to the recent financial collapse, the Chinese seem justified in their concerns. Time will tell whether Dagong will do any better. In any case, the odds are good that it and other China-based agencies will be increasingly influential.

Whoa, Mr. Prentice, I'm not oblliged to shill for the tar sands

Recently the American organization Corporate Ethics International admitted to an embarrassing error in an anti-tar sands video they had made. The video claimed that tar sands development in Alberta was destroying an area twice the size of England. That, to put it mildly, was an exaggeration. They insisted they had meant to say just the size of England, not twice the size, although that too may be a bit of a stretch.

Naturally, and quite reasonably, federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice took umbrage. "I think they're unfair," he said, "They're disappointing, and as all other Albertans and Canadians, I'm angry about them."

Fair enough to a point but he really shouldn't presume to speak for "all other Albertans and Canadians." He then went on to say, "All Canadians really have an obligation to speak up about this and point out that we are an environmentally responsible producer of the resource." Now there he went too far. All Canadians are not obliged to defend tar sands production and a great many don't. In fact, I suspect a great many are more favourably disposed to Corporate Ethics International, despite its faux pas, than they are to tar sands producers. As an Albertan and a Canadian, that's where my sympathies lie.

I shouldn't be too harsh on Mr. Prentice. Politicians generally are all to fond of the editorial "we," but on matters affecting the future of our planet, I would prefer to speak for myself.

U.S. military spending: ensuring security or threatening it?

The U.S. defence budget for 2010 is $680-billion, an amount almost equal to the rest of the world's military spending combined. And this doesn't include such items as nuclear weapons research, pensions for military retirees and their families, interest on debt incurred in past wars, or financing of foreign arms sales. But does lavishing all these billions on armaments help to ensure Americans' security or does it undermine it?

It is hard to believe that any other nation is so threatening to the United States that this kind of muscle is justified. The only country that might be considered a great power competitor is China, and its military budget is one-ninth as large. Indeed, the major threats to the U.S. don't come from other nations, but rather from extremists groups and dealing with them doesn't require massive armaments. 9/11 didn't happen because the Americans were insufficiently armed, it happened because of a lack of intelligence. The best weapon against terrorism is good intelligence - and good police work. In fact, most of the terrorist threat against the U.S. would fade away if the Americans minded their own business a little more and interfered in other peoples' affairs a little less. There is clearly room for dramatic cuts in U.S. military spending without compromising American security.

A more important concern is the threat this excessive spending poses to the country domestically, particularly the threat to Americans' security when ill, or aging, or unemployed, or when poverty strikes. Congressman Barney Frank nicely expressed this concern when he recently said, "If we do not make reductions approximating 25 percent of the military budget ... it will be impossible to continue to fund an adequate level of domestic activity ... [American] well-being is far more endangered by a proposal for substantial reductions in Medicare, Social Security or other important domestic areas than it would be by canceling weapons systems that have no justification from any threat we are likely to face."

This threat to American well-being is already showing up in various areas. For example, maternal mortality in the U.S. is higher than in 40 other countries, and has been increasing for 20 years. The U.S. also has the highest infant mortality rate among Western nations.

Cash-strapped states such as California, threatened with mass layoffs of police, teachers and other public workers, could be greatly assisted by federal funding but enabling legislation is held up by a Senate reluctant to inflate federal debt. A bill to extend unemployment benefits is also stalled, even though the number of American workers who have gone without a job for six months or more is the highest since WWII. Defence spending rarely encounters such thrift.

Despite the deteriorating domestic scene, military spending increased this year to its highest level in 50 years. Meanwhile, from women seeking secure childbirth to people seeking a secure job, the situation worsens. If a large chunk of that defence budget were switched to domestic programs, Americans' security just might be considerably enhanced.

The clothing issue - bikini or burka?

With the French National Assembly voting 335 to 1 to deny people the right to cover their faces in public, and rumours of something similar in Quebec, the issue of appropriate dress for public appearance arises.

Personally, I don't really care what anyone wears - or doesn't wear. If someone wants to walk naked down the high street, I have no objection. The law does, however. Section 174 (1) (a) of the Criminal Code reads, "Every one who, without lawful excuse, is nude in a public place ... is guilty of an offence." Apparently the courts are tolerant in interpreting this section, however, excluding for example sunbathing at nude beaches.

One might reasonably say that Canada is quite tolerant at this end, the naked end, of the spectrum. You can't wear nothing at all, but you can wear very little. At the other end, we are even more tolerant. You can cover everything up. So is it reasonable to forbid covering everything up? Once again, I don't much care. If someone wants to walk down the high street covered in a black tent on a sweltering hot day, that's her (I must assume it's a her) burden, not mine. I just hope for her sake she's taking vitamin D supplements.

However, I don't think it's unreasonable to ban the burka. After all, if it were disallowed in Canada, we would still have an impressive range of tolerance, from almost everything uncovered to almost everything covered.

The argument of course gets all philosophical, one side saying veiled faces may be a religious imperative, the other side saying they are a symbol of the oppression of women. The latter is a strong argument, the former not so much - I suspect that, like female genital mutilation, wearing the veil is more tribal than religious. But so few women wear it that, as long as it is genuinely their choice, then what the hell, live and let live. Making a law to target a few harmless women seems like bullying to me. So although banning the burka isn't entirely unreasonable, I say let the ladies in black do their thing. And if somebody wants to stroll naked down the high street ... well, them too.

Why do we need a veterans affairs department at all?

Apparently the federal government is considering downsizing the Department of Veterans Affairs as more veterans die off and their numbers shrink. One wonders why we need such a department at all.

The usual justification is well presented by Brian Lee Cowley of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute for Public Policy, who says, "If there is one group to whom the country owes an undeniable debt of gratitude that should be manifested in solicitous attention to their needs, it would be those who risked their lives on behalf of the country." Interesting point, but the "one group" that risk their lives on behalf of the country includes more than soldiers, sailors and airmen. Many others risk their lives in the service of Canada. For example, dozens of construction workers die on the job every year, and they are literally building the future of our country. Are their lives worth less? If they are disabled on the job, as many are, do they deserve less care?

If we are a compassionate society, we should take good care of all those in need. If someone is handicapped, it shouldn't matter whether they were injured in war or when hit by a bus, the degree of support they receive should be generous and it should be equal. If an old person needs assistance, that assistance should be the same whether the recipient served in war or simply spent her entire adult life as a housewife.

Favouring war veterans over other Canadians is yet another salute to militarism, to the macho culture of warrior-worship. In an age when military toys include nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, it's time to get beyond the warrior ethos and treat all citizens equally.

A new noise bylaw for Calgary ... finally!

Finally, Calgary City Council is considering a new noise bylaw. As an inner-city resident, living on the very busy 25th Avenue SW, I am very familiar with urban noise. I accept almost all of it as part of the hustle and bustle of inner city life, the life I enjoy. Trucks can be noisy but they are engaged in the commerce of the city and, therefore, are generally tolerable. Construction can be annoying, but it too is an essential part of city life and, in any case, is generally limited to working hours. My only beef is with motorcycles.

The noise generated by motorcycles is uniquely offensive. It is exceptionally loud, particularly harsh and threatening, and often explodes with heart-stopping suddenness. And, as if all this wasn’t enough, it is completely unnecessary. Motorcycles can be effectively muffled, just as cars and trucks can. Unmuffled motorcycle noise constitutes nothing less than an assault - and should be treated as such.

I go out almost every day for lunch or coffee, most often to the cafes and pubs along 17th Avenue SW. I particularly enjoy the patios in the summer. Or at least I do until the motorcycles show up. Their ear-shattering noise ruins the patio atmosphere for everyone and almost has an older person like me worrying about a heart attack.

When Edmonton brought in a new noise bylaw, bikers complained of discrimination because it specifically mentioned motorcycles. And so it should have. If bikers don’t want to be singled out, they simply have to muffle their machines. Don't want to pay the fine, don't do the crime. Indeed I wonder if Calgary wouldn’t do better to enact a muffler bylaw rather than a new noise bylaw. Any vehicle without an appropriate muffler would be ticketed and severely fined. This would, I expect, be easier to enforce.

Many men love big, noisy machines but most seem to retain some respect for the rest of society. Those that don't make up one of society's most obnoxious minorities, a minority that deserves to be discriminated against for gratuitously inflicting their obnoxious racket on others: motorcycle racket on urbanites trying to enjoy the street life, power boat racket on cottagers trying to enjoy their lake, and snowmobile racket on hikers trying to walk peacefully in the woods. When confronted about their behaviour, as they were with the Edmonton noise bylaw, they whine that they have a right to enjoy the street, or the lake, or the woods, as much as anyone else. And of course they do, but the right to wreck everyone else's pleasure at the same time isn't necessarily included.

But I'm digressing - back to motorcycles in Calgary. I strongly support Council's initiative and encourage them to develop an effective bylaw with punitive measures sufficient to maintain 17th Avenue as the enjoyable people place it ought to be.

Omar Khadr - why is our government deaf to the truth?

"I will not willingly let the U.S. government use me to fulfill its goal. I have been used too many times when I was a child, and that's why I'm here - taking blame for things I didn't have a choice in doing, but was forced to do by elders."

With those words, Omar Khadr described his situation precisely. He was indoctrinated by his elders, by his own parents, from the time he was born, into an extremist ideology and then sent at the age of 14 to Afghanistan and placed in the hands of the Taliban. There he had no choice but to do their bidding. He is, in other words, a classic example of a child soldier. And it is because of this sordid exploitation of children's total vulnerability that civilized people do not punish child soldiers. We rehabilitate them.

I am saddened that our government refuses to recognize this truth and defend Omar's rights as a child soldier and, of course, as a Canadian. Why are they so determined to see this young man suffer? Is it to placate the Americans? Or do they share the Americans' blood lust for revenge?

Whatever their motives, they shame this country. They implicate all Canadians in this egregious injustice. And, worst of all, they unnecessarily extend the suffering of Omar Khadr.

Germany - king of green

Germany just keeps impressing. First, it reaches the semi-finals of the World Cup. Then we read in The Globe and Mail that its economy is roaring back from the recession with BMW announcing 5,000 new jobs and Daimler-Mercedes and Siemens adding thousands more. On Friday the Guardian carried a story about Germany's pace-setting progress in going green, saying it will probably "become the world's first major industrial nation to kick the fossil-fuel habit."

Jochen Flasbarth, president of the country's Federal Environment Agency claims, "A complete conversion to renewable energy by 2050 is possible from a technical and ecological point of view." Germany plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 40 per cent between 1990 and 2020, and by 80-85 per cent by 2050. The European Union as a whole has only committed to 20 per cent reduction from 1990 to 2020 but even that is far greater than our pathetic 17 per cent from 2005 to 2020.

Commitments are fine, but it's achievement that counts, and Germany is achieving, leading the world in sustainable energy. From 1990 to the end of 2007, it had already reduced its greenhouse gas emissions by over 20 per cent. It has tripled the amount of electricity it gets from wind, solar and other renewable sources over the past 15 years, and in the last decade has created 300,000 renewable energy jobs.

We insist on taking our cue from our southern neighbour when it comes to greening our energy use. We should be looking to Europe.

Vandalism justified

The mindless vandalism engaged in by "anarchists" at the G20 Summit raises the question of violence against property ever being justified as a means of protest. This question arose at a recent trial in the U.K.

In January, 2009, during the Israeli invasion of Gaza, a group of British peace activists gained entry to the EDO MBM arms factory in Brighton and systematically destroyed records and smashed computers and machinery, causing £180,000 worth of damage. They then lay down on the floor and waited to be arrested. Prior to the attack, the activists had recorded their justification on video.

At their recent trial, they were all found not guilty, acquitted on the basis of "lawful excuse." Under British law, damaging property is lawful if carried out in an honest belief that it is preventing even greater damage. The activists argued - successfully - that they had a "lawful excuse" to smash up the factory because it was manufacturing military equipment for Israel which was illegally killing Palestinian civilians, including children. In activist Chris Osmond's words, "During Operation Cast Lead 1,400 people were killed, 350 of which were children. The international community appeared to be completely helpless. The UN could not even protect its own compounds. The only light at the end of the tunnel for the people of Palestine is if ordinary people like us take direct action on their behalf."

The method of these activists was fundamentally different from that of the G20 Summit vandals. They had a specific, appropriate target and a clearly moral objective. They didn't hide behind masks or run away. Like adults, they stood accountable for their actions. And further, as it turns out, they were supported by the law, specifically by Section 5 of Britain's Criminal Damage Act.

Perhaps most importantly they acted on a moral imperative that ordinary people can understand. Decent people are appalled by the killing of civilians, particularly children, and can therefore easily sympathize with those who take action against it. (Given the behaviour of our leading politicians during the Gaza invasion, one might question this, but I take it to be true nonetheless.) Random vandalism, on the other hand, tends to be treated with contempt even by many who may support the cause, whatever the cause of the G20 Summit vandals may have been.

When all is said and done, this is critical. A cause will not progress unless its proponents can convince their fellow citizens of its validity. The activists who wrecked the EDO MBM arms factory were able to convince a jury of ordinary British people that their actions were just. I suspect the G20 vandals would have trouble convincing a jury of their fellow protesters.

The Israel tail once again wags the American dog

The routine seems almost choreographed. The Israelis do something outrageous to the Palestinians. The Americans huff and puff. The Israeli prime minister visits Washington (it took two visits this time), tactfully reminds the president that the Israeli Lobby has more influence on Congress than he does, and all is forgiven. Once again, the tail successfully wags the dog. As for the Palestinians ... well, they don't have much influence in Congress.

Benjamin Netanyahu's little chat with Barack Obama yesterday has been declared an unqualified success for the Israeli prime minister. He is reported to have gotten everything he wanted from the president, including turning a blind eye to Israel's nuclear weapons while opposing Iran's possession of same and forgiveness for the entrenchment of settlements on Palestinian land. With Congressional elections coming up in November, no one should be surprised at Obama's subservience.

But, as the American military has pointed out, this continued servility toward Israel may not be healthy for American interests. It undermines American relationships with Arab countries while fueling support for those who resort to violence against the great power that unequivocally supports the Palestinians' oppressor. In short, it puts American lives at risk, both civilian and military. But that's long term and there are elections to be won in the short term. Security is a huge issue in the U.S., but this apparently is one area where it can safely be sacrificed for political gain. And that in itself testifies to the power of the Israeli tail.

Obama's financial reform bill and how democracy doesn't work

U.S. President Barack Obama had hoped to get his financial reform legislation passed before the G20 meeting in order to impress the world with American leadership on the troublesome economic front. Didn't happen. Both the House of Representatives and the Senate have produced bills but reconciliation of the two is not going well.

Not only the politicians have gone over the proposed bills with great care. The financial industry is watching closely and squeezing hard. It expects to be well served by those whose election campaigns it finances and whose districts it enriches. Senator Dick Durbin admits, "Hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created [that they] are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place." Economist Simon Johnson of MIT suggests that Obama is in fact doing Wall Street's bidding while claiming the opposite. He says that after signing off on "the most generous and least conditional bailout in world financial history," the President is scrambling for political cover but the cover is without substance.

Insiders claim the proposed independent Consumer Protection Agency will be buried in the Federal Reserve Bank, the too big to fail provisions are gone, tough rules on derivatives are threatened by New York liberals who fear the banks will move business overseas, exemptions are being made for mutual funds, and so on and on. The teeth are being pulled.

The financial industry has 25 lobbyists for every member of Congress, scrupulously supervising with expert eyes the behaviour of each. This is an influence the American public, with its limited knowledge of the arcane world of finance, can't begin to match. Americans will simply have to accept the financial reform the industry, and politicians heavily dependent on that industry, give them. Their interests are subordinated to those of the bankers. I suspect President Obama would have it otherwise, but he too is a victim of the capitalist system and must tailor his goals accordingly.

Reflections on the G20 shenanigans: anarchist flakes, dumb cops and isolated politicians

We might make allowances for the vandals in black who performed their now clichéd window-smashing gig at the G20 Summit. They are, after all, young and may eventually grow up and leave their macho tomfoolery behind. The police aren't so easy to forgive. They are adults and adults with a very special responsibility.

The "anarchists" show up at every conference of international leaders and run out the same stupid routine: don face masks, smash property, hide in the crowd. And they do all this in front of hundreds of officers. Yet every time it seems the police are surprised. Are they incapable of learning?

The answer seems to be no. So allow a mere layman to offer a suggestion or two. To begin with, they might rethink the whole idea of erecting barricades, decking themselves out in armour, and arraying themselves in serried ranks against the people. In other words, they might behave more like police and less like military. They should have officers in conventional police uniforms - without the guns - mixing with the crowds. Let the demonstrators and the police look each other in the eye and recognize each other as fellow humans and fellow citizens. Have a chat, for heaven's sake, get in the spirit of peaceful protest.

With police in the crowd, vandals would have nowhere to hide. How awkward for them. Indeed, if the police and the demonstrators had some rapport going, some demonstrators at least might feel inclined to help a policeman who was wrestling with a juvenile delinquent in black. There is certainly no incentive to help when the police display themselves as an alien force, a force intent on intimidation.

The politicians could do their bit as well. Instead of hiding behind the barricades, they might try mixing with the crowds a little. They might also try mediating between the police and the demonstrators before the event to try for a civilized atmosphere. That would include a discussion about how to handle the miscreants whose mode of expression is smashing things. And then of course they might use good sense and not hold an event like this in the middle of a large city.

And let's not excuse the demonstrators from responsibility. Can they not at least shame the strutting, black-clad fools in their midst into a semblance of mature behaviour? The legitimate messages of the constructive majority are being seriously undermined by the mindlessly violent actions of a very few, so they have a great deal to gain by leashing them. Or just turning them over to the cops.

The arranging of this G20 was a fiasco. Terrible choice of location. Ridiculously expensive. Simple-minded approach to security. South Korea can hardly do worse in November.

Crime, prisons and enlightened Tories

Although it may seem a little surprising to Canadians, not all conservatives want to throw ever more people into prison. Britain's Conservative secretary of state for justice, Kenneth Clarke, has strongly criticized the "Victorian bang 'em up" approach to incarceration that has prevailed in the U.K. for the past 20 years. In contradiction to his party's orthodoxy, he argues that, "In our worst prisons, it produces tougher criminals," and, "Many a man has gone into prison without a drug problem and come out drug dependent." And all this, he insists, without leaving the public any safer.

Clarke was in charge of prisons as home secretary in the early nineties, and finds the doubling of the prison population since then astonishing, saying he would have dismissed it "as an impossible and ridiculous prediction if it had been put to me in a forecast in 1992." He is particularly concerned about the 60,000 prisoners serving short sentences and their 60 per cent and rising recidivism rate. "Many of them end up losing their jobs, their homes and their families during their short time inside," he observed.

He suggests a far more constructive approach would be to make prisons places of education, hard work and change, and to provide rigorously enforced community sentences that get offenders off drugs and alcohol and into jobs. To achieve this, he supports Conservative plans for a "rehabilitation revolution" which would involve the non-profit and private sectors in programs to change offenders inside and outside prison, and paying them for results.

Given that Britain has the largest prison-building program in Europe at a time when his government is budget-cutting, Clarke may be principally concerned about saving money. Nonetheless, his concern should lead to a greater emphasis on restorative justice. Now if only our government will take a cue from its Conservative brother.

The value of a vote in Alberta

I can't complain. The value of my vote, under the constituency boundaries recommended by the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission, will be close to average. At least for now. According to the Commission, the average population per electoral division in the province is 40,880. The population of my proposed new constituency, Calgary-Buffalo, is 40,381. I did much better than, say Calgary-Hawkwood, which will have a population of 47,686, yet much worse than the rural constituency of West Yellowhead which will have a population of only 31,338 privileged citizens, if the Commission's report is accepted by the Alberta Legislature.

How democratic is this? Well, not very. Democracy means political equality, but a citizen in West Yellowhead has a vote worth 50 per cent more than that of a citizen in Calgary-Hawkwood. Actually, it's even worse. The population of Dunvegan-Central Peace, considered a special case because of its vast area, is only 24,584. A vote in that "special case" has almost double the value of a vote in Calgary-Hawkwood.

And that is now. This distortion will be greater by the time the next boundary review takes place. The trend is for rural ridings to decrease in population while urban ridings increase. Considering this trend is now a century old, it is long past the time boundary commissions took it into account.

Sadly, the rural/urban perversion of democracy has been sanctioned by no less an authority than the Supreme Court. In a 1991 decision, Madame Justice Beverley McLachlin stated: “the purpose of the right to vote enshrined in s. 3 of the Charter is not equality of voting power per se, but the right to ‘effective representation’.” She went on to say, "Factors like geography, community history, community interests and minority representation may need to be taken into account to ensure that our legislative assemblies effectively represent the diversity of our social mosaic. These are but examples of considerations which may justify departure from absolute voter parity in the pursuit of more effective representation; the list is not closed."

Unfortunately, in practice the list is closed. The discrepancies allowed are generally based on area and sparsity of population, thus advantaging rural voters over urban ones. In an inner city riding, an MLA or MP may face an additional challenge of dealing with many citizens for whom English is a second language. This would seem to fit into Madame Justice's "community interests" or "minority representation," but are the populations of such ridings ever reduced to compensate for the greater challenge of representation? I think not.

At one time, we might have been able to make an argument for offering rural areas special consideration because of the distances their representatives had to travel. Even then, however, reducing the democracy of urban citizens to compensate was never justified. It should have been dealt with by providing appropriate assistance to the representative such as a greater travel allowance or more aides. And it certainly isn't justified in an age of instant communication. It matters not at all to me where my MLA is if I want to contact him. I can do so instantaneously by email or phone, and even snail mail takes only a couple of days.

Madame Justice McLachlin's definition of the right to vote is arbitrary and undemocratic. Democracy rejects her "effective representation." It demands equal representation. Saskatchewan most closely approaches equality, restricting deviations from the average population of only plus or minus 5 per cent (except for two special cases of its own). Alberta still allows the grossly excessive 25 per cent. Our votes are discounted enough by our archaic first-past-the-post voting system; we don't need persistent gerrymandering in favour of rural constituencies.

Headline of the day

 

Wednesday's prize for headline of the day has to go to to an article by Nick Spicer in Al Jazeera online:

Does McChrystal play for France?

A perfect splicing of sports, politics and international affairs. And, of course, humour. Give this headline writer a medal!

How is the U.S. not a banana republic?

Last week Jon Stewart of the Daily Show had a bit of fun with Texas Representative Joe Barton. (He put him on the cover of Disdainful A**hole Magazine.) Barton, at a Congress hearing, apologized to oil giant BP for agreeing, after conferring with the President, to provide a $20-billion fund to compensate victims of the Gulf oil spill. Barton referred to the agreement as a "shakedown." He was soon brought to task by his Republican colleagues and apologized for his apology.

That he would be contrite is not a surprise. He is in line for chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee (he is currently the GOP's ranking member) if the Republicans win big in November, so he is eager to keep the party bosses happy. But it isn't surprising that he would defend BP either. He is the major beneficiary of oil industry campaign contributions since 1990, receiving over $100,000 in the last year and a half alone.

The obvious question here is how the American people can possibly believe that a man taking money from the oil industry for years will manage the House Energy and Commerce Committee in their best interests, keeping in mind that if the Republicans were in power this is the guy who would be in charge of BP. His electoral dependency may be legal but it's also corrupt -- he's bought and paid for. Democracy has been traded in for dollars and American energy and environmental policy may well be the loser.

Nellie McClung returns to Manitoba Legislature

Nellie McClung, perhaps Canada's leading figure in the fight for women's rights, returned to the Manitoba Legislature this week, to the same building where 96 years ago she began her campaign to convince the government that women should be allowed to vote. She returned, not in the flesh, but commemorated in bronze. A statue of Nellie and the rest of the Famous Five was unveiled at the legislative building on Friday. It was here in Manitoba in 1916 that Canadian women, largely because of Nellie, first received the franchise. The federal government followed Manitoba's lead shortly thereafter. 

The Famous Five were the women who successfully petitioned for women's inclusion as persons in the British North American Act, making them equal to men in the eyes of the law. The statue at the legislature depicts the signing of the petition.

Nellie's interests went well beyond political rights. She campaigned for dental and medical care for school children, property rights for married women, mothers' allowances, factory safety legislation and many other causes. She was also a writer of note, author of much non-fiction and a number of novels, one of which, Sowing Seeds In Danny, became for a time the best-selling novel in Canadian history.

An accomplished and committed lady. A true hero, well-deserving of the honour Manitoba has bestowed.

War as a prosecutable offence: This is a big f.... deal

War has, throughout the ages, almost been a sacrament for men. This was how men became men, by becoming warriors. In the last century, this began to change, perhaps because of the massive, horrifying and utterly pointless deaths of millions of men in the First World War -- a slaughter of unprecedented proportions. In any case, it began to lose its cachet.

The International Military Tribunal at Nuremburg described aggressive wars as a "supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole." The Nuremburg tribunal, and others since, have prosecuted those "other war crimes" but not the crime of aggressive war itself. It may have been a crime, but it was a crime above the law.

No longer. Last Saturday, at a conference in Kampala, the member states of the International Criminal Court gave waging aggressive war a precise meaning and made it a prosecutable crime in international law. The states made a resolution that criminalizes the use of force against another country in violation of the Charter of the United Nations and gives the Court the power to prosecute political and military leaders who plan, prepare, initiate or execute illegal wars.

The resolution also establishes the conditions under which the Court can exercise jurisdiction. Although the UN Security Council is the principal body that can classify an action as a crime of aggression, thus initiating judicial proceedings, if the Council doesn't act within six months, the Court can proceed on its own. This ensures that if the Security Council -- a political organ -- doesn't act, the Court is not hindered in its duty.

There are various restrictions. For example, the crime won't apply directly to non-member states (111 countries are members) and unfortunately this includes major powers such as China and the U.S. Nonetheless, including the crime of aggression as a prosecutable offence under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court fundamentally changes the ancient macho practice of warfare as "politics by other means."

History has been made. As Vice-president Joe Biden of the United States might say, "This is a big fucking deal."

The Canadian Index of Wellbeing makes the front page

I have mentioned the Canadian Index of Wellbeing (CIW) in previous posts as an alternative to the GDP for measuring society's economic and social health. Unlike the GDP, the CIW measures more than how much stuff we consume. Produced by the nonpartisan, nonprofit CIW Institute, the index "takes into account the full range of social, health, environmental and economic concerns of citizens." It evaluates our quality of life overall and specifically in areas such as health, quality of the environment, education and skill levels, the use of time, the vitality of communities, participation in the democratic process, and the state of our arts, culture and recreation.

Unfortunately, the media focuses on the GDP to evaluate societies' quality of life. Other, more meaningful, yardsticks tend to be ignored. I was, therefore, both surprised and delighted to see a report by the CIW featured on the front page of Tuesday's Globe and Mail.

The report, Caught in the Time Crunch, finds that more of us are working non-standard hours and looking after children and seniors, while fewer of us are able to participate in social activities. The result is poorer physical and mental health and less satisfaction with the quality of our lives. The report offers a number of public policy suggestions for improving our work-life balance.

The publicity the report and the index have received is a healthy sign that Canadians are looking for better ways of measuring our quality of life than the one-dimensional GDP. Roy Romanow, chairman of the advisory board of the CIW, says he hopes this report and others in the series will complement the GDP in measuring Canadians' well-being. I hope the CIW will do much more than that. I hope it will relegate the GDP to nothing more than the measurement of national income it was originally intended to be.

As the inventor of the GDP, Nobel Prize winning economist Simon Kuznets, warned, “Distinctions must be kept in mind between quantity and quality of growth, between its costs and return, and between the short and the long run. Goals for ‘more’ growth should specify more growth of what and for what.” The GDP cannot make those critical distinctions. The CIW does.

The Calgary civic election and the corruption of democracy

With a civic election coming up in October, local developers and home builders in Calgary are preparing to campaign heavily for their agenda, which essentially means campaigning for growth and sprawl. The campaign, including a website to be launched this month, is supported by the Canadian Home Builders Association, Calgary region, and the Urban Development Institute Calgary. "With the mayor's seat and a number of wards up for grabs, it's time to engage and mobilize our industry," says Jay Westman, CEO of Jayman MasterBuilt.

Calgarians who believe in a sensibly-sized, compact city are highly disadvantaged in the debate, lacking the deep pockets of the development industry. City planners, who understand the financial and environmental costs of sprawling cities, are, because of their status as civil servants, banned from partisan participation in the political process. Developers, traditionally the biggest donors to municipal election campaigns, have their way open to elect aldermen amenable to their interests.

What particularly annoys democrats about this is that the money to fund the propaganda comes out of citizens' pockets. We all need a home, to rent or buy, so we all put our dollars into the hands of developers who then use it for whatever purposes they choose, including lobbying, public relations and electing amenable politicians. We are propagandized with our own money.

And paying for the propaganda isn't the end of it. Sprawling cities may be the developers' ideal, but they are costly cities. More sprawl means more roads, sewers, water lines, etc. to maintain. Citizens pay for this either with higher taxes or poorer services. The cost to the environment is also greater with more green space paved over and more pollution.

Democracy, to say nothing of sensible urban development, requires rules that confine the electoral process to citizens, and to citizens equally. That, after all, is what democracy is: political equality. When the plutocrats are allowed to intrude and undermine that equality with their money, democracy is corrupted to serve their interests. Voters do not get a balanced picture of the issues and the alternatives. But that, I'm afraid, is going to be the story of the 2010 Calgary civic election.

Good news on the bad news front

The worst news humanity has ever received is that we are changing the climate of our planet, and if we don't stop we will quite likely wreck our civilization. Or worse. As this wasn't bad enough, recently we have heard that many people are losing interest in climate change, the greatest challenge we have ever faced. And worst of all, that decline in interest seemed most prevalent in the United States. If Americans don't care -- the people who produce 20 per cent of the world's greenhouse gasses -- we are in dire trouble indeed.

But now some good news. A survey released this week found that 61 per cent of Americans believe global warming is occurring, up from 57 per cent in January, and 50 per cent believe it's caused by people, up from 47 per cent. Sixty-three per cent believe it will affect them personally. The survey also found strong support for doing something about it, with 77 per cent supporting the regulation of carbon dioxide as a pollutant and 87 per cent wanting more funding for research into renewable energy sources. 

Maybe there is a silver lining to B.P.'s catastrophic Gulf spill after all. When Americans see the destruction just one offshore oil well can do, one of many thousands, they may realize that all the activities of humanity accumulated might just be capable of changing the climate. The sight of innocent birds trapped in the smothering grip of oil can in itself jog our conscience about our treatment of the Earth.

Fifty per cent of Americans now coming to terms with the well-established scientific evidence is progress, but it almost certainly won't be enough. Convincing politicians who are under the spell of oil, coal and chemical industries will take more. Nonetheless, if the trend continues, it may be strong enough to affect the November elections, and that would be healthy progress indeed.

Are the Palestinians a lesser race?

Are the Palestinians a lesser race? Winston Churchill thought so. At the Peel Commission on the future of Palestine in 1937, he responded to concern for the Palestinians if a Jewish state was established in the region, a cause he strongly supported, by replying, "I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race to put it that way, has come in and taken their place." So there you have it, in the words of the great man himself, the higher-grade races replace the lower-grade races, and that presumably is the proper order of things.
 
So do Canadians, as the "higher-grade" race that took the place of the "Red Indians," believe what Churchill did about Jews displacing Arabs? The Conservatives certainly seem to. They support whatever Israel decides is in its best interests, regardless of the suffering this may inflict on the Palestinians. And well they might as the philosophical descendants of Mr. Churchill, their greatest hero and inspiration. But then the Liberals are hardly less committed to unequivocal support for Israel, nor for that matter is our daily press.

This unquestioning support for Israel infers a cavalier, even contemptuous, attitude toward the Palestinians. How can this be explained except by a belief they are less worthy? How else can you explain the indifference to the ethnic cleansing, collective punishment, terror, segregation and relentless land theft they have suffered and continue to suffer? How else can you explain our Prime Minister's Orwellian justification of Israel's assault on Gaza which included the slaughter of 400 children -- 400 children! -- as a "measured response"?

Canadians generally, despite the urgings of their politicians and their daily press, remain decidedly less enthusiastic about Israel's colonial project and much more compassionate toward the Palestinians. But for the powers that be, it seems the assessment of Churchill, the champion of empire, remains their guide -- brothers and sisters in Manifest Destiny.

The billion-dollar meetings

Conservatives have whined incessantly about the billion-dollar gun registry, ignoring concerns from those Canadians who consider guns a threat to their security. But when it comes to putting on a show, it seems a billion dollars isn't such a big deal after all. They spent $898-million on the Olympic games for security and now they are about to spend $933-million for the G8 and G20 meetings. It almost seems they are more concerned about the security of strangers than about the security of Canadians.

Not that I think we shouldn't keep our visitors safe and sound and snug in their beds, but a billion dollars for two meetings? Are these guys, even collectively, worth that much? 

And what are we going to get for our billion? Workable regulation of the world economy? Serious attention to climate change? A just agreement in Palestine? Concrete measures to alleviate world poverty? If there is significant progress on any of these fronts, I will curb my criticism, but I am not optimistic. I doubt they will achieve anything that couldn't just as easily been negotiated by their flunkies at minimal taxpayer expense.

At this price, there is no way we should hold these meetings. Let's leave that to nations who are a lot more desperate for attention than we need to be.

The imams aren't laughing

When the now infamous Danish cartoons created a raging response among certain elements in the Muslim community, I admit to siding entirely with the cartoonists. Partly because I believe in free speech; partly because religions deserve at least as much criticism as other institutions, being the influential and troublesome institutions they are; partly because I have done a fair amount of cartooning myself in my time; and partly because some of the cartoons were pretty damn good.

Now another cartoon featuring Mohammad has caused a bit of a scandal. This time in South Africa. And once again I support it for the same reasons. The Mail and Guardian, a leading South African tabloid, critic of Apartheid and the first colour-blind newspaper in the country, published "a gentle and irreverent poke" at the furor over the hysteria generated by Facebook's "Everybody Draw Muhammad Day." The cartoon, drawn by the award-winning Zapiro, aka Jonathan Shapiro, has created a certain amount of hysteria itself, with the Council of Muslim Theologians taking the newspaper to court to prevent it publishing the cartoon. They failed, but added ominously that while they wouldn't advocate violence, they couldn't guarantee there wouldn't be any.

The Mail and Guardian's editor-in-chief, Nic Dawes, responded, "My view is no cartoon is as insulting to Islam as the assumption Muslims will react with violence." Touché. Nicely said.

With their ridiculous overreaction, the Council of Muslim Theologians not only confirmed the cartoon's point about a lack of humour among Muslims, they insulted the humour and tolerance of Muslims generally. Ironically, the  editor-in-chief of the newspaper shows more respect for ordinary Muslims than they do.

Are liberals masochists?

The United States presidential election of 2004 presented two candidates with sharply contrasting war records. John Kerry had served honourably in Vietnam, done his duty so to speak. George W. Bush had used his family connections to duck the draft and spend the war flying jets around Texas. He ran away, so to speak. Yet during the election, the Republicans attacked Kerry on his war record, putting him on the defensive, and he let them do it. He had an extraordinary opportunity to imply his opponent was a coward and reap the benefits, but he was too much of a gentleman -- or something -- to do it. And of course he lost the election.

Now here in Canada, the Conservatives are doing a job on Ignatieff, claiming his erudition and lengthy sojourn out of the country make him suspect as a Canadian, and it too seems to be working. He admits they have "done a number" on him. Yet, as with Kerry, what an opportunity to retaliate. "Firewall" Harper has on more than one occasion shown his contempt for this country. He has made a speech in the United States ridiculing us. Yet the Liberals let it pass. They could be running ads asking why a man wants to be prime minister of a country he doesn't much like, but they are too much the gentlemen ... or something. Like Kerry, they are allowing the opposition to take one of its weaknesses and turn it into a strength. Ignatieff just takes the punches and doesn't swing back.

But what do I know. Politics isn't my game. Maybe the Liberal strategy will be seen as honourable in the long run and receive its just reward, and God knows politics could use more people with principles. Just ask John Kerry.