Climate change denial ... let me count the whys

A prestigious group of the world's leading scientists, all members of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and representing institutions such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, the University of California and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, have written an open letter condemning "the recent escalation of political assaults on scientists in general and on climate scientists in particular." The 255 scientists, including 11 Nobel laureates, while emphasizing that "there is compelling, comprehensive, and consistent objective evidence that humans are changing the climate in ways that threaten our societies and the ecosystems on which we depend," decry the "many recent assaults on climate science and, more disturbingly, on climate scientists by climate change deniers, [that] are typically driven by special interests or dogma, not by an honest effort to provide an alternative theory that credibly satisfies the evidence."

My question is what, specifically, drives these "special interests or dogma"? I can offer more than half a dozen possibilities, operating alone and in combination:

1. Greed. Vested interests, such as oil and coal companies, are determined to defend shareholder value, to say nothing of their own financial interest, against what they perceive as a threat.
2. Power. The governments of jurisdictions in which these companies operate are determined to defend their tax bases.
3. Fear. Working people, often thoroughly indoctrinated by the above two groups and their media allies, are afraid that curbing greenhouse gas emissions may cost them their jobs.
4. Ego. Big ideas, such as heliocentricity, natural selection and climate change, diminish humanity, too much so for many people to accept.
5 Ignorance. Many people don't understand how science works. As long as science has not proven absolutely that anthropogenic climate change is occurring, why worry they ask. But, as the letter says, "There is always some uncertainty associated with scientific conclusions; science never absolutely proves anything. When someone says that society should wait until scientists are absolutely certain before taking any action, it is the same as saying society should never take action."
6. Resentment. Some people consider environmentalists to be part of some kind of liberal elite. Who are they to tell us ordinary folk how to live?
7. Contrarianism. This particularly affects media types. Many columnists and radio and TV pundits get paid to be provocative, particularly toward those imagined liberal elites. Science is not deemed to sell newspapers as effectively as controversy.

When other big ideas brought irrational assaults down on scientists, it mattered rather less. What difference did it make if the masses didn't accept heliocentricity or natural selection? Progress persisted regardless. But it matters very much if the masses don's accept climate change. As the scientists' letter puts it, "Society has two choices: we can ignore the science and hide our heads in the sand and hope we are lucky, or we can act in the public interest to reduce the threat of global climate change quickly and substantively ... delay must not be an option." If the masses don't demand action, the politicians will quite likely delay, and that could mean the end of progress. And worse.

"Freedom of the press belongs to those rich enough to buy one."

American journalist A.J. Liebling's famous observation rings true again as a group of wealthy creditors led by Paul Godfrey, former CEO of Sun Media, buys up the Canwest Global newspaper empire for over a billion dollars. Passing from one group of the very rich to another is a huge chunk of Canada's daily press, including the major dailies in every major city west of Manitoba. The nation's principal public forums are the property of the rich, to be bought and sold as mere commodities, the public interest incidental. The West is particularly deprived, its major centres in three provinces largely dependent upon a press owned by one tiny special interest group.

Healthy democracy needs a broad and balanced range of news, something the Canadian press is ill-equipped to provide, beholden as it is to its capitalist masters. As long as Liebling's aphorism applies, that will not change. Freedom of the press is crippled without equal access to the press. Here lies a critical democratic challenge: the daily press remains our major public forum -- how do we ensure that forum provides equal access for all, including those not blessed by great wealth or corporate favour? Until we meet that challenge, democracy will be obliged to continuing sharing the stage with plutocracy.

My oil is safer than yours

I wasn't surprised to see Premier Ed Stelmach down in Washington tactfully exploiting the Gulf spill to promote the tar sands. I am, however, a little surprised to see our federal environment minister playing the same game. Expressing his horror at the tragedy in the Gulf, Jim Prentice said it put the tar sands into perspective as a less risky alternative to offshore drilling. I guess it all depends on what you are risking.

Trying to make tar sands production look good by comparing it favourably to a deep water blowout is a bit like saying being killed with an axe is better than being shot to death. It's a mark of desperation. And when you are the environment minister, you must be very desperate indeed.

Will Clegg do a Layton?

During the run-up to the 2004 federal election, Jack Layton suggested he would make proportional representation a requirement for co-operation with a Liberal minority government. And well he should have. Nothing would improve the NDP's standing in the House of Commons like PR. In the 2008 election, for example, with PR the NDP would have won 50 per cent more seats. But when the Liberals did find themselves with a minority government and negotiating with the NDP began, Layton seemed to set PR aside.

Will the same thing happen with the current negotiations in the U.K.? The Liberal Democrats have been pushing hard for PR. And well they should, too. If the recent election had been run under PR, they would have increased their representation in the British House of Commons by a startling 160 per cent. That kind of incentive might just drive Liberal Democratic leader Nick Clegg to stick to his guns and demand that PR be part of any arrangement with either the Tories or Labour.

Clegg, unlike Layton, has strong support from the public. A recent survey showed electoral reform was fourth on British voters' priority list, ahead of such things as unemployment, taxation, political sleaze and climate change.

Supporters of a fair voting system for this country will be watching the negotiations in the U.K. closely, crossing their fingers that Nick Clegg will remain loyal to PR.

NAFTA and the Arizona immigration law

"Any intervention in a complex system may or may not have the intended result, but will inevitably create unanticipated and often undesirable outcomes." -- Wikipedia's version of the law of unintended consequences.

One possible unintended consequence of our old friend the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is the new Arizona anti-illegal immigration law, much in the news these days. The  Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act makes it illegal for an alien to be in Arizona without carrying legal documents. It criminalizes illegal immigration and allows police to question and demand papers from anyone who they suspect might be an illegal.

Apparently most Americans support the law; however, critics accuse it of racial profiling and it has lead to mass demonstrations, even calls for a boycott of Arizona. Some police chiefs and mayors have criticized it, concerned about police being bogged down enforcing the law and worried about what it will do to police rapport with the Hispanic community. The entire Phoenix Suns basketball team, currently battling for the NBA Western Conference title, are protesting the law and Major League Baseball may move the 2011 all-star game out of Phoenix.

With its long border with Mexico, Arizona has long been a major destination for Mexican immigrants, illegal and otherwise. Pressure to move north in search of work was greatly intensified by NAFTA. While the trade agreement eliminated tariffs on corn, the Mexican staple, coming into Mexico, it did not reduce the massive subsidies American corn farmers receive from their government. Whereas a U.S. corn grower receives an average annual subsidy of $20,000 a year, a Mexican farmer receives only $100. Without a protective tariff, the Mexican farmer simply cannot compete. As a result, Mexico has been flooded with cheap corn from the U.S. driving thousands of small farmers out of business and costing millions of farm workers their jobs. The vast majority head north.

Such are the unintended consequences of a trade agreement that was loudly proclaimed as win-win-win. For Mexican workers and Arizonans alike it may be rather more lose-lose.

Oh my, now it's the Boy Scouts!

Last week, a jury in Oregon made the largest award for punitive damages to a single plaintiff in a child abuse case in the history of the United States. And which arm of the Catholic Church was this awarded against, you might well ask. Well none, actually. It was against the Boy Scouts of America. For being repeatedly assaulted by former assistant scoutmaster Timur Dykes in the 1980s, Kerry Lewis was awarded $18.5-million.

And this appears to be only the tip of a very large pedophilic iceberg. The jury in the trial was allowed to see about 1,200 files kept by the Scouts on suspected pedophiles, part of what is to believed to be a cache of up to 6,000 files held at the organization's Texas headquarters. Lewis's lawyer, Kelly Clark, said the jury was shocked by the existence of the "perversion files." The files revealed that the organization removes about 180 of its leaders every year.

Lewis's abuser was treated in a not atypical way by the Scouts. He confessed his behaviour to the local Scout co-ordinator, who also happened to be a Mormon bishop, but was allowed to continue working with the organization. He then molested Lewis, and other children, over the next two years.

The Boy Scouts of America is no stranger to controversy. It has been mired in legal actions for decades, dealing with dozens of out-of-court settlements for victims of sex abuse and defending its ban on atheists and gays. Not that it isn't in a position to defend itself. Like the Catholic Church, despite a declining membership it is rich, with $900-million in assets, including a $45-million art collection and large property holdings.

What is it with these all-male organizations and little boys? It's not that pedophilia creeps in -- it's bound to, there's always a certain amount around -- it's their reaction to it. The denials, the cover-ups, their refusal to honestly recognize its reality and to act responsibly when it occurs, their pretence that their organizations are immune to contamination when their all-male atmospheres may in fact be just the places that attract it. Maybe the scandals will wake them up. Maybe the experience will bring them into a new era of honest recognition of sexuality and how to deal with it in all its forms. Maybe.

If Parliament is paramount, why not let it govern?

"The fundamental role of Parliament is to hold the Government to account." - Peter Milliken
"The parliamentary system means government in Parliament and with Parliament, but not by Parliament." - C.E.S. Franks

Speaker of the House Peter Milliken's ruling for primacy of Parliament over the government seemed somehow inevitable even if it produced a sigh of relief. To rule in favour of the government would have in effect reversed the order of our parliamentary system, placing government above the elected representatives of the people rather than at their pleasure. Or, perhaps more correctly, given the grossly excessive power of the position, placing the Prime Minister above the elected representatives of the people.

Despite this reaffirmation of Parliament's supremacy, as C.E.S. Franks, Professor of Political Studies at Queen's University, reminds us, it does not govern. Its function, in Milliken's words, is rather to hold government to account. This is something that deserves great consideration. Why should the elected representatives of the people not govern, or at least be intimately involved in governing? Why should legislation not emerge from legislative committees rather than from Cabinet? And why should the heads of these committees, elected by their members and approved by the legislature at large, not become the cabinet ministers? And why should the legislature at large not choose the Prime Minister? If we adopted a proportional representation voting system to ensure Canadians were fairly represented, such a system would in effect be involving all Canadians in their governance. What an idea -- a people effectively governing themselves! The democratic ideal achieved.

At this time, one of those rare moments when thoughts of democracy are uppermost in the public mind, it seems appropriate to dream of such things.

Industries gang up on green

That elements of the oil and coal industries oppose Obama's green agenda is not news. The efforts of ExxonMobil, the world's largest oil company and Peabody Energy Corp, America's biggest coal company, to undermine the science of climate change are notorious. The coal industry is leading the campaign to defeat the climate and energy bill currently before Congress and to prevent the Obama administration from using the regulatory powers of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to curb emissions.

Now it appears the chemical industry is joining the battle. A secretive group linked to Solvay Chemicals is joining other corporate groups and their supporters in legal challenges to the EPA's authority to act on greenhouse gas emissions. Solvay produces sulphur hexafluoride, an industrial cleaner that just happens to be an extremely potent greenhouse gas, 23,000 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Last year, the EPA proposed regulating sulphur hexafluoride.

The secrecy of the group is typical of corporate efforts to suppress the regulation of greenhouse gases. Corporations that like to present an environment-friendly face to the public prefer to keep their environment-unfriendly activities private.

Opposition in the U.S. to dealing responsibly with climate change is formidable. It includes members of the above industries and others, the legislatures of oil and coal states, right-wing think tanks, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. They are powerfully organized, filthy rich, and equipped with all the propaganda tools, lawyers and lobbyists money can buy. This raw power, imposed largely out of the public view, seriously undermines the possibility of honest democratic debate on the climate change issue. It does explain the laggard nature of U.S. efforts to deal with the most important challenge facing all of us, a lagging we cannot afford from the world's major emitter of greenhouse gasses.

Tea parties, power to the people, and the illusion of small government

According to a recent New York Times/CBS News poll, one of the three major concerns of members of the U.S. tea party movement is that they are not being fairly represented in Washington. They have a point. Citizens in the United States are not being heard the way they should be. Obama's health care bill, seemingly a focus of their anger, is a good example. Obama dropped the idea of a single-payer system, the most important item in reducing health care costs, to appease the insurance industry, and he dropped the idea of bulk-buying of drugs by government to appease the pharmaceutical industry. It seemed more important to cater to corporations than to cater to the American people.

However, reducing the size of government, which according to the poll is the tea partiers major goal, will not solve their problem. It won't reduce the influence of the plutocrats. Indeed, it will probably increase it. When power is taken away from government, unfortunately it doesn't always equitably redistribute itself among the citizenry. If it did, even socialists might support downsizing government. What tends to happen is something quite different. For example, when successive American governments reduced their power over the financial industry, with less regulation and weaker regulators, that power did not seep out into the general public. To the contrary, it was absorbed by those best-situated to grab it -- the bankers and financiers. And with diminished government oversight, they exploited and trashed the system.

Another major concern of the tea partiers is excessive government spending. A major contributor to this sin in the U.S.,  as well as a major contributor to the size of government, is the largesse lavished on a bloated military, by far the largest single item of discretionary spending in the federal budget. Former President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned against the power of the military-industrial complex, but his warning was ignored and now the military-industrial complex, or more appropriately the military-industrial-congressional complex is a giant leech on the American body politic. It is, however, a leech the tea partiers support.

They fail to recognize their system is as much a plutocracy as a democracy. Consider the issue of climate change. While tea partiers gather in public places, as concerned citizens do, the oil-coal-chemical industrial complex conspires in private to array their lawyers and lobbyists against green legislation and the Environmental Protection Agency. They, not citizens, dominate the debate. Yet this, too, seems not to bother the tea partiers.

Most of them blame Congress, not Wall Street, for the current state of the American economy. If they want their voices to continue to ring out in Washington after the current passion for tea parties fades away, they will have to reset their sights. They will have to present policies that dramatically reduce the power of Wall Street -- the patrons of Congress -- not reduce the size of government.

The Anglican Church ... selling indulgences?

If there was one thing about the church of his day that really ticked off Martin Luther it was the sale of indulgences. For a price, you could reduce your time spent in purgatory. It was apparently in reaction to the indulgence-peddling friar Johann Tetzel that Luther wrote his "Ninety-Five Theses on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences" and triggered the Reformation.

So has the Anglican Church revised indulgence-selling in a new form? It is inviting corporations to sponsor its national convention, offering everything from corporate logos on documents to a showcase booth at the convention. As other sources of revenue dry up, the fastest-declining Christian denomination in the country has appealed to Mammon for salvation. It may be harder for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God than for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, but for $30,000 he can enjoy a private luncheon with Archbishop Fred Hiltz of the Anglican Church. And that must at least be close to the Kingdom.

I wonder if Luther could have done 95 theses on the power and efficacy of corporate sponsorship.

Women cause earthquakes -- wouldn't you know it

With the excess of faux pas coming out of the Vatican these days, it's time to give another religion a chance to display its ignorance. Enter senior Iranian cleric Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi. According to Sedighi,  "Many women who do not dress modestly ... lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which increases earthquakes." So there you go, seismologists, put your silly instruments away and dress your wives and daughters up in burqas. You will be way ahead of predicting earthquakes, you will be preventing them.

I'm curious, though, Mr. Sedighi. Why is it just the women? Don't men ever lead young women astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society? And what about all the wars men start? Doesn't that shake the Earth a little?

And why is Iran so much more earthquake-prone than Canada? We've got a lot more women "who do not dress modestly" than Iran does. The walls in Canadian cities ought to be tumbling down.

So homosexuality causes Catholic priests to diddle little boys, and women in short skirts cause earthquakes in Iran. Ah religion. The wisdom of the ages.

Thank you, Paul Martin

According to Statistics Canada, the recent global recession was "less severe and shorter in Canada." While our southern neighbour suffered its worst economic decline since the Great Depression, ours was shorter and milder than the recessions of 1981-82 and 1991-92 . Exports and corporate profits fell sharply but, a report released Thursday states, "domestic spending was sustained by strong balance sheets and savings built up in previous years and a financial system that emerged largely unscathed from the crisis in the U.S. and Europe."

And who do we have to thank for that sound financial system? Why, no one else but perhaps the best Finance Minister we ever had, Paul Martin. At the heart of the failure in the U.S. was deregulation of their banking system. For years, they pressured us to follow their lead. According to Mr. Martin, "You couldn't go to a G7 meeting or IMF meeting without it coming up. ... We were under tremendous pressure to 'loosen up Canada.'" Martin just said no, and for that we owe him a great debt of gratitude. He saved our bacon.

The irony is that Stephen Harper gets the credit. He can now roam the world boasting of our superior economic performance backed up by the stability of our financial system, the best in the world according to the World Economic Forum. Indeed, there's a double irony. If Mr. Harper, the small-government man, the champion of free market economics, had had a majority government during that period, he would have likely embraced deregulation -- get the government off the backs of the banks and all that. And we would have been well on our way toward a U.S. style financial collapse.

Of course, Harper caught a break, too. If he had got a majority in 2006, freeing him to institute the failed policies of the U.S., he would have had to take the fall for the results. As it turned out, he has only had minority governments, confining him to moderate measures, and now he gets to walk tall on the world stage as the leader of the country with the model banking system. He was, you might say, saved from his own folly.

As were we. Looking good because of the astute Mr. Martin. I thank you, sir.

Mexico -- drug war or civil war?

What is usually described as Mexico's drug war is beginning to look like something rather more serious. Despite the deployment of 50,000 troops and the detention of 121,000 drug suspects, the situation worsens. Since 2006 when President Felipe Calderon launched a government crackdown on drug gangs, almost 23,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence. In Ciudad Juarez, a centre of drug violence, 10,000 businesses have closed down in the last 18 months with over 100,000 jobs lost.

Now the violence has taken on an even deadlier turn. Three of the cartels have joined forces to fight the infamous Zetas. The Zetas are former members of elite military units in the Mexican and Guatemalan armies who went rogue to work as enforcers and hit men for the Gulf cartel. With members who received training from American, French and Israeli counterinsurgency experts and the recruitment of federal, state, and local police officers, they are considered the most technologically advanced, sophisticated and violent paramilitary group in Mexico. Their victims include the police chiefs of three Mexican cities and the Secretary of Public Safety. After killing the police chief of Nuevo Laredo, they told his replacement they would kill more and more people until he stepped down. After personally discovering three bodies on the side of a city street, he resigned.

Earlier this year, the Zetas decided to set up shop on their own and have become arch rivals of their former employers. Now, as their range expands, they have become a threat to all the cartels. They have established a presence in the U.S., contacts with the 'Ndrangheta in Italy and training camps in Guatemala. The cartels, normally deadly enemies, are collaborating to deal with the threat. Banners have appeared in the border state of Tamaulipas, announcing the unity of the cartels against the common enemy, one going so far as to urge Mexico's army to get out of the way and let the cartels exterminate the Zetas.

Aside from the Zetas, President Calderon's military approach seems to be failing. Most Mexicans believe the cartels are winning and the army is now contributing to public insecurity rather reducing it. Many are demanding he focus more on crime generally and less on the drug trade which they see as primarily an American problem. The Zetas, picking up on this, have boasted they will eliminate petty crime if left alone to conduct their business to the north. Nor is Calderon immune to the public mood. In Ciudad Juarez, for example, he announced a shift toward investing in social programs and job creation to address the underlying causes of crime. He seems to be shifting focus, and well he might ... before his country is torn apart.

Liberating the barbers

Does it start with the barbers? The Cuban government is turning over hundreds of state-run barber shops and beauty salons to employees in what may be the start of an overhaul of state retail services. Instead of receiving a wage, the barbers and hairdressers will be able to rent their space and pay a fee based on the revenue they generate. They will be required to pay for their own water, electricity and supplies but will be free to charge whatever the market will bear.

This is the first time since they were nationalized in 1968 that state-run, retail-level establishments have been handed over to employees. The action is long overdue for a sector notorious for poor service.

One Cuba-watcher, Phil Peters of the Lexington Institute, suggests that although this is but a small step, it has considerable potential if more broadly applied. "If carried out fully," he stated, "it would convert small state enterprises into leasing arrangements and urban co-operatives." The idea of an abundance of co-operatives sounds very progressive indeed and could set an example for other countries, including ours, something for our governments to consider when they privatize things like liquor retailing.

If this small taste of free enterprise doesn't prove too much for the Castros, it might even lead to larger freedoms for the Cuban people.

Spanking kids: apparently violence does indeed beget violence

According to an article published this week in the journal Pediatrics, if you want children who are defiant, get frustrated easily, demand immediate attention of their wants, lash out physically at others, hurt animals and refuse to share, one thing that will help is spanking them. Social work and public health researchers at three American universities studied 2,500 parents over seven years and discovered that those who were spanking their three-year-olds produced kids that were much more aggressive at age five than unspanked kids. The study accounted for a number of factors including the children's level of natural aggression, parental maltreatment and neglect, family violence, stress, depression and substance abuse.

This is no surprise. Parents are, after all, kids' primary role models. Children learn principally from their parents and principally from example. They model themselves after mommy and daddy. If their parents teach them violence is acceptable, they absorb the lesson. Furthermore, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics, corporal punishment becomes less effective with repeated use and also makes discipline more difficult as the child ages. Investing time earlier on to instruct a child why its behaviour is wrong may result in a young person that is more self-aware and in-control later.

Unfortunately, corporal punishment of children is still legal in Canada, upheld by the Supreme Court in 2004. The Court did at least insist that the person administering the punishment must be a parent or legal guardian, the force must be used as a correction which the child must be capable of benefiting from, and the force must be reasonable. Slaps to the head were deemed off limits.

Many countries, including Germany, Israel, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden, Ukraine and Venezuela, have banned the striking of children. A host of institutions in spanking countries state it is associated with negative outcomes and recommend against it. These include the Canadian Pediatrics Society, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Australian Psychological Society, The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and the Royal College of Psychiatrists in the U.K., and The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

In light of all this expertise, capped by the most recent study, a particularly convincing one, it's time Canada took one more step toward a fully civilized society and joined the ranks of the non-spankers.

Ecocide -- an international crime?

The International Criminal Court (ICC) has jurisdiction over four crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression. British lawyer/campaigner Polly Higgins would like to add a fifth: the crime of ecocide.

My Oxford dictionary defines ecocide as "destruction of the natural environment, especially when willfully done." Ms. Higgins would like to define it, for the purposes of international law, as "The extensive destruction, damage to or loss of ecosystem(s) of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants of that territory has been severely diminished." The inhabitants she refers to are any species, not just Homo sapiens.

Ms. Higgins justifies adding ecocide to crimes under the jurisdiction of the ICC by claiming it is essentially a crime against peace. "Ecocide is in essence the very antithesis of life," she says. "It leads to resource depletion, and where there is escalation of resource depletion, war comes chasing behind." Her argument has considerable merit. Sir David King, Great Britain's former chief scientist, predicts a century of "resource wars," and a report on resource conflicts entitled Lessons UNlearned by the group Global Witness has convinced many skeptics of the threat of resource depletion.

Higgins has already achieved success in her environmental efforts. In 2008, she launched a campaign for a Universal Declaration for Planetary Rights, modeled on the human rights declaration, and the Bolivian government plans to propose a full members' vote on the idea in the United Nations.

Her proposed ecocide law has support in the United Nations and the European Union, among climate scientists, and among environmental lawyers and organizations. If successful, it would have a major effect on energy, farming, mining, forestry and chemical industries. The effect almost seems to overwhelm Higgins herself when she says, "I'm only just beginning to get to terms with how enormous that change will be."

But it's an idea whose time has surely come. Our offences against nature are so immensely destructive, it seems perverse not to call them crimes when offences against members of our own species that are trivial by comparison are subjected to severe criminal prosecution.

Anyone with a desire for justice toward our fellow species will wish Higgins success in her mission. You can follow her campaign at http://www.thisisecocide.com/.

Sad news from Ward 9

I was sorry to hear Alderman Joe Ceci announce his decision yesterday not to run for reelection in this fall's Calgary civic elections. Alderman Ceci's moderate, progressive approach has been a credit to politics and leadership in this city for 15 years. He doesn't represent my ward but, no matter, he has represented my views on how a city ought to function. I will, therefore, genuinely feel I've lost a representative after October 18th.

Alderman Ceci rejected the law and order mantra that has captivated too many Calgary politicians in recent years in favour of creating a more compassionate and equitable city, the best antidote to crime. His has been a strong voice in favour of affordable housing and sound social infrastructure. He has served Calgary well at the local, provincial and national levels, acting as the city's representative on the Federation of Canadian Municipalities for a number of years.

Ceci insists he doesn't intend to run for mayor but will support fellow alderman Bob Hawkesworth if that worthy gentleman decides to seek the job. Supporting the popular and progressive Hawkesworth is yet another wise decision.

In any case, Ward 9 will be the poorer.

Religion and dysfunctional society

"Irish Catholics are in a dysfunctional relationship with an abusive organization." So says Irish singer and activist Sinead O'Connor, who describes herself as a "Catholic by birth and culture [who] would be the first at the church door if the Vatican offered sincere reconciliation."

That the Irish are plagued by a dysfunctional relationship with their religion is hardly surprising at a time when the Catholic Church sinks deeper into pedophilic scandal. The larger question is whether religion brings dysfunction to society generally. Evidence suggests it does.

A paper by Gregory Paul in the Journal of Evolutionary Psychology, entitled The Chronic Dependence of Popular Religiosity upon Dysfunctional Psychosociological Conditions, shows a powerful correlation between the strength of organized religion and social dysfunction. Paul constructed a "Successful Societies Scale," a broad-based measure of socioeconomic conditions, from 25 indicators and applied it against various measures of religiosity and secularism for a number of First World democracies. The Scale included such indicators as homicide, incarceration, lifespan, venereal disease, teenage births, suicide, divorce, life satisfaction, alcohol consumption, income disparity, poverty and employment. The results showed a strong and consistent relationship between the dysfunction of a society and its religiosity. The relationship between social dysfunction and a strong belief in God is shown on the attached graph. Dysfunction increases (social success declines) as the proportion of the population who hold a strong belief in God increases. The "U" toward the lower right represents the United States. This was a typical result.

But correlation is not causation. Perhaps other factors are at work here. Paul discusses other possible causes of the dysfunction, including immigration, population diversity, frontier heritage and the media, and concludes they could not explain the relationship. It would seem religion and dysfunction are indeed cause and effect. But which is the cause and which the effect?

It seems to work both ways. A highly stressed society tends to seek sanctuary in religion, while religion in turn tends to create stress in society. The United States, both the most dysfunctional and the most religious of the Western nations, serves as a good example. The unusually high rates of mental illness in the United States are indicative of high levels of stress and anxiety, caused by such factors as a lack of universal health care, high income disparity and an excessively competitive economic environment. Poorer social infrastructure, a result of Americans' greater preference for faith-based charity over secular government programs for improving social conditions, creates greater poverty and in turn greater social dislocation and crime. Problems such as venereal disease and teenage pregnancy are aggravated by religious opposition to sex education. The United States is caught up in a circular dance of conservative religiosity, stress and social dysfunction.

Ms. O'Connor is certainly right about Ireland being in a dysfunctional relationship with an abusive organization, but that would seem to be the norm for societies and their religions, at least those of a conservative variety.

Women's rights under attack -- as usual

"Eternal vigilance," it has been famously said, "is the price of liberty." That is certainly true for women. In the past month, various items in the news have revealed just how true.

The decline of women's rights in Iraq, for instance. After the Personal Status Law was enacted in 1958, when the British-installed monarchy was overthrown, Iraqi women enjoyed many of the same rights as Western women. But the statutes covering the status of women have been replaced by Iraq's new Constitution which states, "No law can be passed that contradicts the undisputed rules of Islam." The undisputed rules of Islam will, of course, be interpreted by religious leaders, all of whom are men. According to Maha Sabria, professor of political science at Al-Nahrain University, "Iraqi women are struggling with oppression and denial of all their rights, more than ever before." She adds, "The real ruler in Iraq now is the rule of old traditions and tribal, backward laws."

"Tribal" and "backward" is also an apt description of Ukraine's new government. The new pro-Russian prime minister, Mykola Azarov, head of an all-male cabinet, has stated the country's economic problems are too difficult for women to handle. "Conducting reforms," Azarov observed, "is not women's business." The man who appointed Azarov, President Viktor Yanukovych, declared during February's election campaign that his opponent, Yulia Tymoshenko, should "go to the kitchen." A right pair of boors.

When it comes to achieving equality, or even respect, the line from the old folk rhyme is certainly true, "A woman's work is never done."

Democracy, labour unions and a healthy economy

Former governor of New York Alfred E. Smith once said, "All the ills of democracy can be cured by more democracy," and I'm generally inclined to agree. Certainly more democracy in the work place -- a commonly overlooked place when it comes to thoughts of democracy -- would help to cure some of our economic ills.

A recent article in Harper's Magazine describes how greater participation of workers and labour unions in German companies has helped make that country the world's leading exporter second only to China. As the article reports, "even as the Germans outsell the United States, they manage to take six weeks of vacation every year. They’re beating us with one hand tied behind their back." Indeed, the fact that Germany, an industrialized nation of 82-million people can out-export an industrialized nation of 308 million people is truly extraordinary.

The article suggests one of the reasons is that German workers have more control over the means of production than any other country in the world. "Because German workers are at the table when the big decisions are made, and elect people who still watch and sometimes check the businessmen," author Thomas Geoghegan writes, "they have been able to hang on to their manufacturing sector. They have kept a tool-making, engineering culture, which our own entrepreneurs, dreamily buried in their Ayn Rand novels, have gutted." He goes on to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the German model, ultimately concluding, "German companies will lead the next industrial revolution, the 'green' one, while we in the United States will merely watch."

The German experience indicates that more workplace democracy leads to sounder economic decision-making. It can also help preclude problems in the economy. The recent financial collapse in the United States which eventually affected all of us was triggered largely by American workers going excessively into debt particularly by buying homes they couldn't afford. One reason they couldn't afford them is that the dramatic weakening of unions steadily eroded the ability of workers to obtain good wages and benefits, with many of the well-paid, blue collar, union jobs being shipped offshore. Accordingly, the United States has sacrificed much of its "tool-making, engineering culture" to the corporate pursuit of cheap labour. Unlike in Germany, American workers have not been able to do much about it.

More workplace democracy could have aided in both preventing the financial collapse in the U.S. and contributing to the country's economic recovery. We Canadians might keep this in mind for our own economic well-being. Just last week, Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney warned once again that Canadian business's failure to reinvest in their companies is seriously hampering Canadian productivity. One suspects that if workers and unions had more say in Canadian companies, they would be much more likely to invest in worker productivity. We have not seen our union sector weakened to the extent it has been in the U.S., but its membership as a per cent of the labour force is declining. This is not a wise direction to take.

Incarceration: The high price of easy answers

At a time of budget-cutting in Ottawa, Corrections Canada is scheduled for an increase of a whopping 27 per cent over the next three years. Now why might this be? Is crime getting out of control? Well, no, crime rates are actually falling. Are prison populations rising at nine per cent a year? Well, no, actually they've been rising at less than four per cent over the past five years. Ah, but will more incarceration lead to greater protection for the public? Well, no again. Criminologists seem to be in general agreement that longer sentences don't reduce crime rates. So why in heaven's name are we expanding the prison system at nine per cent a year?

The quick answer is that getting "tough on crime" is politically popular. And the underlying reason for that is an aging population. Crime is a young man's game, so as the proportion of young men in the population declines, as it has been doing, the incidence of crime declines accordingly. But of course as the proportion of young people declines, the proportion of old people increases, and older people tend to be more afraid of crime. The result is an inverse relationship: as the crime rate goes down, concern about crime goes up.

The easy political response is to lengthen sentences and build prisons. The responsible political response is to mitigate the concern by educating the public to the facts, i.e. crime rates are falling, we are becoming safer every day, and stuffing offenders in prison for longer periods won't make us any safer. Unfortunately, it appears this is not what our current government has in mind. Their lack of leadership is going to waste a lot of our money.

Are we missing the point on global warming?

The key point about global warming is simple: we can't take the chance. 

What are the odds we are causing climate change? Well, the great majority of scientists say we are, so the odds must be very high. But what if only a handful of scientists was concerned? Then, presumably, the odds would be low. So in that case would we be acting responsibly if we carried on with business as usual, not doing anything significant until the proof is undeniable? Only if we were suicidal. 

What would we be risking with our lack of action? Well, what scientists are warning us about now is not so much a greenhouse gas effect but a runaway greenhouse gas effect. Global warming is reaching a point where we can no longer control it and threatens to  escalate into catastrophe. The risk is the collapse of civilization as we know it and possibly worse. Only fools would unnecessarily risk such a loss. Even if only one qualified scientist insisted we are causing the Earth to warm up, we would be foolish not to act as if he was right. It is simple risk analysis: the risk we can afford to take decreases as the value of what we are risking increases.

Allow me a simple analogy. Let's assume you are at the beach and your child wants to go in for a swim. Unfortunately, the local fishermen think there are man-eating sharks just off the beach and they are hungry. Do you let your child go in? Of course not. But what if only one old fisherman is concerned, the others aren't sure, then do you let her go in? Or how about letting her go in slowly and tell her to come out when she sees a fin? OK? I doubt you would relent. We are not willing to unnecessarily risk something so precious. As with civilization, the only acceptable risk is the lowest one we can humanly achieve.

The skeptics have it precisely backwards. They insist we must have absolute proof of climate change before we take dramatic action. But given what we risk, good sense demands we take dramatic action until the skeptics can prove climate change is not a problem.

This of course they cannot do. The scientific consensus on climate change is solid and the proof increases daily. But even if it weren't, even if great doubt remained in the scientific community, we would be bound by reason to act and to act boldly. Unfortunately, all too many of us are missing this critical point.

Shooting the finance guys

Last November, North Korea revalued its currency, the won, apparently to reduce the financial influence of the country's growing merchant class and reassert state control over the economy. North Koreans were obliged to exchange old notes for new ones at a rate of 100 to one. Confusion about the policy led to hoarding, in turn driving prices up and the new currency plummeted in value. People found it increasingly difficult to buy food and fears arose that the famines of the 1990s were about to return. A cap on the amount that could be changed reduced some people's savings to piles of worthless notes. Social unrest grew, highly unusual in that rigid dictatorship. In short, the reform was a disaster.

Remarkably, the prime minister apologized for "causing pain among the people" and promised to improve the food supply. But this wasn't enough. The reform had not only caused economic chaos, it had undermined Dear Leader Kim Jong-il's plans to transfer power to his son, Kim Jong-un. A scapegoat had to be found, and the obvious choice was the regime's financial chief, Pak Nam-gi. Last week they shot the poor bastard.

Putting a finance minister in front of a firing squad seems a rather over the top response to failed economic policy. Although when one looks at the results of American administrations deregulating their banks, one's trigger finger does itch a bit. And if we could line the bankers up along the wall with them .... well.

Bully for U.S. Anglicans

I was sort of an Anglican myself at one time. I say sort of because, while I was baptized and confirmed in the Faith, I don't remember ever believing any of the dogma, particularly the God part. Nonetheless, that doesn't stop me from giving the Church its due when it deserves it. And it does from time to time. This week, the Episcopal Church (the Anglican body in the U.S.) approved Mary Glasspool as its second gay bishop. The Reverend Glasspool is also the second woman bishop in the diocese of Los Angeles.

The first gay bishop approved was V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire in 2003, and the first woman approved in the Los Angeles diocese was Diane Bruce earlier this year. Reverends Glasspool and Bruce will be consecrated by the head of the Episcopal Church, Presiding Bishop Katharine Schori, on May 15th in Los Angeles.

The usual grumbling was heard of course. The head of the international church, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, warned the American church that Glasspool's election "raised very serious questions not just for the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion, but for the Communion as a whole." Well, deal with it, Archbishop. And you go, Mary.

Eureka! American top brass make the Israel/Palestine/terrorism connection

General David Petraeus, head of the United States Central Command and perhaps the most influential member of the American armed forces, has solved a simple equation. Earlier this week, in testimony before the Senate armed services committee, the general declared that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict posed a threat to American interests. He said it "foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favouritism for Israel" and that "anger over the Palestinian question" aided al-Qaida and other jihadist groups to recruit supporters.

This follows a briefing of the top brass at the Pentagon by senior officers of U.S. Central Command that Israeli intransigence was damaging American standing in the region, and that Arab leaders now considered the U.S. too weak to stand up to Israeli.

The only question is what took these guys so long to figure out the obvious. Survey after survey of the Arab people has shown an overwhelming antipathy toward Israel and its treatment of the Palestinians. Indeed, if the Americans had listened to the Arab street, they would never have blundered into Iraq. Or they could listen to the terrorists themselves. Every time Islamic extremists justify their violence, at the top of the list is the suffering of the Palestinians.

And how could it be otherwise? How could the Arab people be anything but furious at the treatment of their Palestinian brothers and sisters at the hands of the Israelis? And how could they not be angry at the United States for its massive support of the oppressor?

The toxicity of the Palestine problem has spread throughout the world, reaching New York on September 11th, 2001. The American military may be primarily concerned about the cost building Greater Israel brings to American soldiers in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, but American civilians have also paid a heavy price. The military, largely immune to the pressure of the Israel lobby, are free to say so. Now if only the politicians will listen.

Yemen and the security question

When Yemen makes the news, the focus tends to be on Western security, particularly concerning the presence of al-Qaeda in that country. The security of Yemenis seems to be of little interest even though it is under a vastly greater threat than the West's.

Thousands of Yemenis have been displaced by the fighting in the north while refugees flood in from Somalia fleeing the war there. The country suffers from the third highest rate of malnutrition in the world with millions spending a third of their income on bread. Many are illiterate and their children are not attending school. Some 300,000 college-educated Yemenis are out of work. Of those children who do go to school, many attend Saudi Arabia-supported religious schools, learning religious rigour and little else. Thus the security of ordinary Yemenis is compromised now and for future generations.

The World Food Programme needs $105-million in the next two years to feed more than three million of the poorest Yemenis, including refugees created by the violence. Yet the agency's accounts are barely breaking even. If new donations do not arrive shortly, it will be unable to continue feeding the refugees.

Security is about something more fundamental for Yemenis than it is for the West; it is about simply getting enough to eat. Yet the best way for the West to address its security is to address the Yemenis' security. Ensure the basic needs of their most vulnerable people are met, assist them in developing a stable economy and stable institutions, and build schools for their children that offer comprehensive education rather than religious indoctrination. Do these things and the West will do much more to create a secure Yemen than it will by helping Yemenis kill each other.

Canadians could lead in all this if we weren't spending four times as much on military might as we are on foreign aid. If we reversed our priorities, we might have something more substantial to offer both the West's security and the Yemeni's.

Can it be happening? Peace -- and democracy -- in Sudan?

The list is impressive:

• Last month, the Sudanese government signed a preliminary peace treaty with the Justice and Equality Movement, Darfur's largest armed rebel group.
• The government of southern Sudan, created under the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, is moving towards a mutually agreed upon independence referendum next year.
• The Sudanese will go to the polls next month to elect a president, a national legislature, regional governors, and the leadership of the semi-autonomous south.
• Sudan has normalized relations with Chad, its western neighbour with which it has long shared hostility.

All this is fragile and could come unstuck, but it is remarkable progress nonetheless. An optimist could reasonably see peace in Darfur, an elected government for Sudan, the south peacefully deciding on its future, and good relations between Chad and Sudan.

This represents much good work by the Sudanese government. It deserves acknowledgement and support.

The oil industry whips Stelmach into shape

When Peter Lougheed was premier of Alberta, the government defended the province's interests against all comers, against the feds and the oil industry alike. Indeed, at times the industry found Lougheed more difficult than Ottawa did. When Lougheed left, so did the will to challenge the corporate sector. Under Don Getty, then Ralph Klein, Alberta essentially ceded the boss's job to the oil and gas industry.

Then Ed Stelmach arrived on the scene, talking tough. Having apparently read Our Fair Share, the Alberta Royalty Review Panel report which baldly stated, "Albertans do not receive their fair share from energy development. The royalty rates and formulas have not kept pace with changes in the resource base and world energy markets," he promised to bring in a new royalty regime. This he did in 2009, significantly increasing Albertans' share of their resource.

The industry didn't like it and they proceeded to punish Ed and his Conservatives. They began to shift their very generous political spending to the Wildrose Alliance Party, until then a non-entity. They reached into their deep pockets to propel the charismatic Danielle Smith to the leadership and overnight created a strong rival to the Conservatives. When the energy minister, Ron Liepert, gave a breakfast speech in Calgary about “the Future of Alberta Energy,” for the first time in history not a single oil and gas company paid for one of the $850 tables.

Ed got the message. Last week he announced that royalties would be dramatically reduced. He has recognized who is the boss in his province, and it ain't him.

But, despite his genuflection, he isn't out of the woods yet. Albertans aren't entirely thrilled with his new policy. An Environics survey conducted for The Calgary Herald found that a solid majority of Albertans believe royalty rates should either remain as they are or be increased. Only about a quarter think they should be lowered. And then there's the revitalized Wildrose Alliance. The industry now has two conservative parties it can play off against each other.

Ed has learned his lesson but he may have to continue paying penance for some time.

On banning salt

Felix Ortiz, a Democratic member of the New York City legislative assembly has introduced Bill A10129, a bill that would ban the use of salt in restaurant kitchens. The city's chefs would not be allowed to add salt to any of their recipes. Ortiz says it would allow consumers to choose whether they wanted to salt their meal.

The measure seems terribly nannyish, yet I must admit that as a geezer who eats out a lot and needs to watch his blood pressure, I would definitely prefer to salt my own food. Or not. I also trust my own taste better than the chef's whim when it comes this particular condiment. And, dammit, if food producers continue to deny us Mr. Otiz's choice, it's something I can readily support. For a bachelor, tinned soups, chili con carnes, stews, etc. can be a meal-time blessing, but for an old bachelor their salt content precludes them from my shopping cart. When you're watching your blood pressure, salt can become a poison.

My supermarket stocks few low-sodium products and very few salt-free products. Why is this? Aren't food manufacturers aware of the dangers of salt in an overfed society? Do they not read a daily newspaper? And why do they have to add salt anyway? Do they think consumers are incapable of managing a salt shaker? Of managing just this one item to flavour their food the way they like it? Apparently so.

If they don't catch on soon and start offering a wide range of salt-free products, legislators like Mr. Ortiz may have to decide for them. It wouldn't be the first time politicians have had to step in where business fears to tread. The health of the nation, to say nothing of the cost of Medicare, may demand it. And I'd like to try some of those soups and stews.

Canada: A good place to get ahead

The OECD has released its latest Going for Growth report and it has some good things to say about Canada. For example, we have one of the highest social mobilities in the developed world. According to the report, "Mobility in earnings across pairs of fathers and sons is particularly low in France, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States, while mobility is higher in the Nordic countries, Australia and Canada."


In Canada, less than 20 per cent of the economic advantage that high-earning fathers have over low-earning fathers is passed on to their sons. In Britain, which showed the strongest link between an individual's and their parents' earnings, 50 per cent of the economic advantage is passed on. In other words, like father, like son is much less likely in this country than in Britain, or, for that matter, in the U.S.

Not surprisingly, the study found that "Education is a key driver of intergenerational persistence in wages." Parents' social and economic background has a considerable influence on whether or not young people go on to higher education. The influence of background is particularly strong in Belgium, France and the United States, and relatively low in some Nordic countries, as well as in Canada and Korea. The Canadian education system seems to be doing a much better job of boosting poor kids' prospects than these other countries' systems.

The surprise in all this is not that social mobility is relatively high in Canada, or that it is much higher here than in Britain, but that it is so low in the United States. So much for Horatio Alger.

Israel colonizes, the U.S. dithers

Israel is apparently quite apologetic about embarrassing U.S. Vice-president Joe Biden. The VP is visiting the Middle East on yet another peace-making mission. Hardly had he arrived, when his hosts announced plans to expand a Jewish neighbourhood on occupied Palestinian land in East Jerusalem.

An Israeli cabinet minister apologised for what he termed "real embarrassment" caused to Biden and a senior official reported, "Messages have been sent to Biden and the Americans that there was no intention to undermine him," adding, "We were genuinely surprised, just as surprised as the Americans." Apparently even the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, was blindsided by the project's announcement, made by the interior ministry. The ministry is run by Shas, an ultraorthodox nationalist party and a key member of Netanyahu's governing coalition.

Biden chastised Israel saying, "It is incumbent on all parties to grow an atmosphere of support for the negotations and not to complicate. Yesterday, the decision by the Israeli government to advance planning for new planning units in east Jerusalem undermines that very trust." The Israelis and the Americans, and of course the Palestinians, know Biden's comments are just talk -- an obligatory response to a little faux pas among friends.

The important point in all this is that the Israeli apology was not for colonizing more Palestinian land but simply for the timing of the announcement. The project of Greater Israel will continue. After all, it isn't stealing when God commands it.

And the God-fearing Americans will acquiesce. It's essentially a routine. The Israelis commit another outrage, the Americans complain, the Israelis sweet-talk them, the Americans quietly accept the new status quo. And of course the Palestinians continue to suffer and the toxicity generated by Israeli behaviour continues to waft around the world, poisoning the West's relationship with the Arabs and recruiting Muslim extremists.

Until the United States gets serious with its little Middle Eastern friend and demands it settle honourably with the Palestinians, this part of the world will continue to fester to the detriment of all of us.

Forget a gender-neutral anthem, we need a gender-neutral Parliament

India is currently engaged in a bold exercise in improving the status of women. The upper house of India's parliament passed a bill yesterday that would reserve a third of legislative seats for women. The bill now goes to the lower house where it is also expected to pass. It will then have to be approved by 15 of India's 28 states.

The measure would represent substantial progress in a country where women currently make up only 11 per cent of the lower house, the Lok Sabha, and 9 per cent of the upper house, the Rajya Sabha. It would, however, be far short of equality.

And that is something we should concern ourselves with as well. Women are better represented here than in India but still make up only 22 per cent of the House and 34 per cent of the Senate. This is better than our neighbour to the south (17 per cent in the House and 15 per cent in the Senate) but well short of Sweden's near ideal representation, where women make up 46 per cent of the Riksdag.

The reason women are so poorly represented is not hard to find. Politics was invented by men for men. It is relentlessly competitive, aggressive to the point of macho, an enterprise in which most women (and many men for that matter) are uncomfortable. Macho women -- Margaret Thatcher comes to mind -- thrive, but most women do not. Former Reform MP Jan Brown once described politics as “an unnatural and combative setting that does not support positive relationships.” “A place,” she added, “where power and gamesmanship determine the rules.”

We could overcome the "unnatural and combative setting" of politics by gradual reforming its institutions and behaviours, but this would almost certainly take a very long time. It took half a century after Confederation just for women to gain the right to vote. Better to simply mandate that 50 per cent of the House and Senate must be women and let the system reform itself which, with a critical mass of women, it most likely would.

So let's put this gender-neutral anthem business aside and concentrate on a gender-neutral Parliament, a 50/50 Parliament. Not only would this be thoroughly democratic -- 50 per cent representation for 50 per cent of the population -- it would lead to a more feminine, i.e. more civilized, politics.

The federal budget and foreign aid: more guns, less butter

The recent federal budget illustrates more than one disturbing trend in Canadian policies. One of the worst is the increasing disparity between our commitment to the military and our commitment to foreign aid. We already spend four times as much on defence as we do on aid, and the budget will aggravate this unfortunate priority.

Our current defence budget of $19-billion will receive previously planned increases for another two years, and two per cent per year after that when every other area of government will get nothing. The foreign aid budget, on the other hand, will get one more year of increase to $5.2-billion and will then be frozen. Foreign aid will be a major contributor to the government's deficit-cutting plan. Our aid commitment will shrink steadily from the current 0.32 per cent of GDP, already our lowest ranking yet as a major donor -- 18th place out of 22 -- and a long way from the United Nations' target of 0.7 per cent. If we cut the defence budget in half and doubled the foreign aid budget, the two would be equal, a much more humane and sensible ratio, and in the bargain we would meet the United Nations' target.

Aside from further eroding Canada's image in the world, spending ever more on guns and ever less on butter doesn't seem a sensible way to create a more peaceful and prosperous world.

Anthem notes

All together now, let your voices ring:

O Canada! Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North, strong and free!
From far and wide, O Canada,
We stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free !
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.

Not being a patriot, I confess our national anthem doesn't do much for me. My opinion hardly ranges beyond finding it a nuisance before baseball games. Beer and peanuts down, stand up, hat off, etc. And if my team, the Calgary Vipers, are playing an American team, we have to suffer through two of them.

So if Parliament is going to debate the wording, as the Throne Speech suggested, I won't be following too closely. It will be a nice break from the serious stuff for the parliamentarians, however, and it could do with a rewrite.

For example, something really should be done about "all thy sons command," a terribly dated and sexist phrase. And then there's the bit about God keeping our land. Not that I ever actually sing the anthem but an old atheist like me is bound to choke on that.

I would sing an anthem if it had some real bounce to it. The Canadian version of Woody Guthrie's This Land is Your Land would do very nicely. Now that's a tune that gets your toe tapping. We might be accused of stealing it, but what the hell, he lifted the melody from an old hymn, so I see no reason why we couldn't plagiarize his lyrics. The Americans had their chance.

So, all together now:

This land is your land, this land is my land,
From Bonavista to the Vancouver Island,
From the Arctic Ocean to the Great Lake Waters
This land was made for you and me.


As I went walking ..........

Anti-Semitism is out, but anti-Islamism ... well, have we got a nice job for you

From witch-hunting in Canada to unequivocal support for Israel abroad, the Harper government is obsessed with proving its anti anti-Semitism credentials. Anti-Islamism, on the other hand, is apparently not such a great sin. In appointing Gerard Latulippe to, of all things, the human-rights organization Rights and Democracy, it seems quite  oblivious to some of the inflammatory remarks this gentleman has made about Muslims.

In a brief to the Bouchard-Taylor commission, struck by the Quebec government in 2007 amid the heated debate about integrating minorities, Latulippe argued that the concentration of increasing numbers of immigrants from Muslim countries in Montreal undermined “the proper functioning of Quebec society.” He went on to express his concern that if Quebec didn't change the way it selected immigrants, it faced an “unnecessary risk of fostering domestic terrorism.”

He also had something to say about symbolism. He insisted that the public display of Catholic symbols, such as the crucifix in the provincial legislature, reflected Quebec's national identity and should be preserved, whereas the Muslim headscarf should be confined to the private sphere.

The government's appointment showed an unfortunate insensitivity to the Muslim community. Ihsaan Gardee of the Council on American-Islamic Relations Canada stated, “In our opinion this promotes an unfounded fear of Muslims and of Muslim immigration in Canada.” Indeed it does, however it appears that in the eyes of our government not all Canadian communities are worthy of the same respect.

Kenney rewrites history -- this is a surprise?

So Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney excised any mention of gay rights from the new citizenship guide Discover Canada. This should surprise us? Hardly. History belongs to those in power and the Conservatives are in power, so Canadian history becomes conservative history. An excellent article on how this affected the guide appeared in The Tyee.

The guide discusses our wars ad nauseam but includes only one sentence on peace-keeping and nothing at all about our peaceful contributions to the international community. Medicare, which many Canadians believe to be our most defining institution, is never mentioned. Nor is Tommy Douglas, the man most responsible for it, once voted the greatest Canadian of all time. And on and on it goes, a conservative, militaristic document.

The guide serves to illustrate why teaching history in schools is problematic. Rather than being taught as a tool to help children understand humanity, its triumphs and its tragedies, its strengths and its weaknesses, and thus help them improve the human condition, it is used to promote tribal myths.

Nonetheless, it has been suggested that the guide be used in our schools. A disturbing thought -- indoctrinating children in militaristic mythology -- although it would serve nicely to show the younger generation how history becomes an instrument of those in power, an important lesson to learn. Jason Kenney's censorship could then turn out to be quite instructive.

Israeli apartheid: When political correctness triumphs over truth

With Israeli Apartheid Week underway and politicians responding with panicky political correctness, it seems an appropriate time to ask whether Israel does in fact practice apartheid. First, we must ask just what exactly apartheid is.

My Oxford Canadian Dictionary provides two definitions: 1. the South African policy of segregation and discrimination against non-whites, and  2. segregation or discrimination in other contexts. My ITP Nelson is somewhat looser but generally agrees. Palestine isn't South Africa and Israel doesn't discriminate against non-whites, so we can dismiss the first definition. The second is, however, another matter. Israel does indeed do a lot of segregating and discriminating in other contexts.

For example, a hundred thousand Palestinian refugees are incarcerated in Gaza, victims of ethnic cleansing, denied by Israel their moral and legal right to return home. They are denied that right solely because they are of the wrong race and religion. If they were Jews, no matter where they lived in the world and no matter if their ancestors hadn't seen Palestine in two thousand years, they would be welcomed with open arms. But an old Palestinian in Gaza, who holds in his hand the key to the house he was born and grew up in, that his father was born and grew up in, and his grandfather before that, is denied his right to return to his village. If this isn't apartheid, it's segregation and discrimination by another name. Indeed Gaza and the West Bank, exclusive of Israeli colonization, are little more than bantustans. A comparison to South Africa is not without justification.

But don't take my word for it. Ask someone who knows a great deal more about apartheid than I or anyone else in this country -- the Most Reverend Desmond Tutu. Reverend Tutu, a black South African who spent most of his life living under that hateful system and most of his life fighting it, understands apartheid in his soul. When the Nobel peace laureate visited Palestine in 2002, he observed, "It reminded me so much of what happened to us black people in South Africa." He asked of his "Jewish sisters and brothers," "Have they turned their backs on their profound and noble religious traditions?"

When the evidence is so clear, and supported by a most expert witness, we must conclude yes, Israel practices apartheid. An uncomfortable truth, certainly, but a truth demanding discussion.

It is always awkward when a friend does bad things, when a democracy violates human rights, but it happens, and you do your friend no favour attempting to delegitimize criticism of that behaviour. Quite the contrary. You do your friend a favour when you open that behaviour to discussion, as the participants in Israeli Apartheid week are doing. Censoring that discussion, as the Ontario legislature has done and as Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff has done, and engaging in the sleazy trick of labeling anyone who participates in the discussion as anti-Semitic, is allowing political correctness to triumph over truth. And that does no one a favour, not us, not Israel, and most importantly not the Palestinians, the victims of Israeli apartheid.