The Gods of the Copybook Headings

As New Glasgow Goes, So Goes the Nation

Keeping us safe from, ahem, something:

The Department of National Defence confirmed Thursday it has donated five six-wheeled armoured vehicles to police agencies since 2007 — a Grizzly armoured personnel carrier to Edmonton police in 2007; two Cougar armoured vehicles to the B.C. RCMP in 2010; and one Cougar each to the New Glasgow and Windsor, Ont., police in 2013.

 [...]

“It’s like insurance,” New Glasgow police spokesman Const. Ken MacDonald said. “Our police force wants to prepare for anything we may encounter.”

New Glasgow, Nova Scotia has a population of 9,500 and is located two hours north of Halifax.  You can pass it on the way to the PEI ferry. It's a town the size of a Toronto office block and it has an armoured personnel carrier sitting in the police station's garage. This begs a somewhat obvious question of the good constable: What exactly are you insuring against? Rowdy Japanese tourists? Islamist Anne of Green Gables fans? Drunken middle aged hockey players?

An APC would be regarded as over kill in Toronto. In Nova Scotia? Seriously? It should be noted that the town has an unusually high crime rate by national standards. New Glasgow has actually been voted the worst place in Canada to live. I take it that the people who reached that conclusion had never visited Hamilton, Ontario. This dubious distinction was likely reached by crunching the StasCan numbers in a particular way. The residents of the town, however, seem pretty upbeat. 

Suffice it to say that the worst city in Canada is still better than most cities anywhere else. We leave the massive urban decay stuff to our older brethren to the south. Which bring up the contrast. There is a vague sort of logic in providing APCs in cities with very high violent crime rates. America's drug wars have generated an escalating arms race between police and drug gangs. If the criminals are walking around with AK-47s then yes, perhaps, the police must up their game too.

But does no one stop at any point and ask, in all seriousness, how the hell do civilians afford such powerful arsenals? That if America was to move toward reduced enforcement, decriminalization and finally legalization that these turf wars would gradually reduce and dissipate. That when it becomes necessary to even consider using military grade weaponry on civilian populations, not as an exception but as a routine act, it's time to start looking at root causes? 

That's not bleeding heart liberalism, it's common sense. When a very similar country immediately to your north can somehow police its streets without warrior cops, the question becomes what the hell is the matter with your basic approach? The violence in Ferguson has deeper causes that incompetent cops and absurd government subsidy programs. 

This brings us back to Canada. If there is a vague logic in having APCs in America's heartland, what logic is there in having them in the Maritimes? Unless New Glasgow is plagued by running gun battles in the streets, then why have them at all? The argument that such weaponry is an insurance policy is risible. Are the police either incapable or unwilling to do a very basic risk assessment? If not then anything goes.

How about an Apache attack helicopter? A nuclear submarine? Perhaps they might need a Leopard II tank? Because you never know what can happen. This is the same logic a paranoid relative once gave me as to why their son couldn't get a driver's license. Because he might get killed! Sure he might. But the chances of dying behind the wheel are way higher than the chances of a small Nova Scotia town needing an APC. Oh. And should the truly unforeseen arrive we have this thing, it's called the military. When they're not killing bad guys overseas they occasional help out during emergencies in Canada. If you ask nicely they'll even shovel the snow for you. 

Monday Night - The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit

Smoke It

So say the pollsters:

A substantial majority of Canadian electors are on the same page as Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau when it comes to legalizing or decriminalizing marijuana, a new Forum Research poll suggests.

The Forum Research survey earlier this week found 66 per cent of voting-age Canadians who responded either support the legalization of marijuana and taxing legal marijuana sales or taking marijuana possession out of the Criminal Code.

That sounds a little high. Even if true it doesn't answer the important political question for 2015: How many people will change their voters simply because of Trudeau's pro-pot stand?

Scenes From The Imperial Capital

Tenth Blogversary

God I'm getting old and so is this blog.

Ten years is a long time in politics. It's an eternity in blogging. What the hell was I thinking?

Well you can stroll through the archives and come to your conclusions. Due to various shift in the blogging template over the years the archives only go back two years. It's something I'll sort out eventually when I have the time. This also explains the occasionally erratic posting schedule. This is not a source of income for me and I must prioritize accordingly. Unlike many blogs there is a fair amount of original content posted at GCH. That makes the process of keeping this site going somewhat more labour intensive than average.

But ten years is a very long time. A decade ago the Iraq war was still in its early and mostly hopeful stages. John Kerry was the Democratic Presidential nominee. Paul Martin was beginning his suppose decades long reign as the Greatest Prime Minister in All of Canadian History. Stephen Harper was a marginal Right-leaning figure whose Reform Party connections would doom him to political irrelevance. Rob Ford was a somewhat obscure city councillor. David Miller was the mayor of Toronto. Kathleen Wynne was a parliamentary assistant to Gerard Kennedy. Justin Trudeau was dropping of engineering school. Dalton McGuinty had broken less than two dozen promises.

That's the details stuff. The historical minutiae that future generations will forget, save for desperate graduate students seeking a thesis topic. The big tech stuff has still been fairly big over the last decade.

In 2004 cell phones were used for calling people and occasionally texting. Virtually none of them had cameras and their internet capabilities were limited or non-existent. Netflix's primary business model centered around mailing DVDs. Blu-Rays were still a very new and very pricey technology with players selling for thousands of dollars. People bought desktops and with them printers. The printers cost more than the ink. The idea of making a living online was considered fanciful. No one had ever heard of Facebook, Twitter, You Tube or Instagram. People still bought and read physical newspapers.

For those of a certain age, say who remember the Apollo missions, this all seems like so much gadgetry. Communications technology has improved exponentially over the last ten years. But so what? We still generate electricity, manufacture cars, treat the sick and run our governments in much the same way we did forty years ago. We've had technical improvements here and there, and those have had a significant cumulative impact, but there has been no Big Bang that will take your breath away.

Watch or re-watch the film The Right Stuff and ask yourself if the cultural universe in which that film was made, much less its historical setting, still exists. Could anyone make a movie like that today? Would it make sense to a generation that gets excited over a phone app that is slightly more efficient at doing nothing in particular. A generation that is not only the antithesis of Chuck Yeager and the Mercury 7 but likely wouldn't even grasp their importance.

This blog was started with a feeling that the culture of the West was, a few upticks aside, on a long down trajectory. A decade later I have little reason to revise that assessment. The gadgets get smarter but the people seem to get dumber. A growing political problem in a stagnant economy where only the most skilled seem to have a decent and stable living standard. That is until those industries get technologically disrupted as well.

That which does not change dies. But that tells us nothing about the nature of change or our ability to cope. A nation of self reliant individualists, reared on the stories of Horatio Alger, can cope with change far better that an overcredentialized and under challenged populace. Real change isn't mastering the latest gadget, it's figuring out how to walk off a cliff and not fall. That's a talent for survival and improvisation that previous generations had, as a matter of necessity, in abundance. The soft-wrapped creatures I encounter in my daily life, eager not to offend and terrified of defying social norms, are not the sort that encourage much hope. 

Kate McMillian, who has been blogging only slightly longer than I have, has a wonderful saying:

The Children Are Our Future: And that's why I'm repainting the Astrovan in camo.

She's got about a thousand variants. They're funny because they're true. I have no idea how much actual social decay she sees out in Saskatchewan, but here in the Imperial Capital it's an object lesson every day. The punchline gets less funny when you deal with this nonsense on a daily basis, when it passes from internet meme into a living physical problem standing in your way.

The reams of entirely pointless government regulations. Young workers who lack basic numeracy and literacy skills as well as anything resembling a work ethic. The triumph of office politics over even marginal competency. Even the sheer obliviousness of people walking down the street. And that's just the ones not glued to their bloody phones. Working in downtown Toronto is like doing an obstacle course with the added bonus of filing your lungs with pollution. Virtually everyone I know past thirty-five, no matter what line of work or education, is just trying to survive long enough to pay-off the mortgage and cover their kid's education. They have no ambition or dreams beyond that. The cynical idiocy of daily life had beaten it out of them.

My father, who grew up without running water and electricity, does not envy the youth of today. They have every material advantage he lacked, but they seem to lack everything he took for granted. Not all change is for the better. He has seen Toronto go from an efficient WASPish town into a disorganized multicultural bazaar. This isn't obvious to the WASPish elite that still runs this town because most of them don't live in Etobicoke or Scarborough. Those are places they drive through on their way to Montreal or Niagara-on-the-Lake. They enjoy the restaurants and the exotic dresses that dot the downtown. They miss the subsidized housing projects where black veiled women are ubiquitous. If the menfolk work its seems improbable they bring in enough to support their large families. That's what I deal with because my daddy didn't buy me a condo on Queen's Quay. 

Diversity is fun when you meet the smart, intelligent well educated cream of the crop. Where I work the Indians, Chinese, Jamaicans and Latin Americans are by far the best workers. They seem to blend the best of their traditional cultures with an ambition that is mostly lacking in the WASP working and middle classes. But how many are like this? For every civilized man and woman how many peasants who refuse to accept even the basics of assimilation? The Cult of Multicult has taken a few sharp shocks in recent years but it is not dead. Those who could speak refuse to out of fear. Those who want to speak are ignored, excluded or marginalized.

Where there's life, said a pastor to me many years ago, there's hope. True enough. But that same pastor also taught that God helps those who help themselves. That kind of old time religion is in very short supply. I'm not quite ready to Enjoy the Decline but I don't see much of an alternative.

Here's to another ten years. Hopefully less bleak than the last. 

 

Thursday Night - Citizen Kane

And we are done...

Reason:

A whopping 83 percent of Americans think there should be a law that prohibits kids 9 and under from playing at the park unsupervised, despite the fact that most of them no doubt grew up doing just that.

What's more: 62 percent feel the same way about 12-year-olds. They would like to criminalize all pre-teenagers playing outside on their own (and, I guess, arrest their no-good parents).

It was a nice civilization while it lasted. Really it was. 

Scenes From The Imperial Capital

Lucy & Giles

The realist...

Bouchard hopes he won't see a third referendum in his lifetime because he says he thinks it will be unsuccessful.

"It's clear. I hope I won't see it because we'll lose a third one. There's no way we can expose ourselves to losing a third one.

"Later on, I don't know."

...the fool.

If the Bloc disappears, Duceppe warned that democracy in Canada would be weakened as a result.

“If you don’t have any choice for sovereigntists in Ottawa, then that means a lack of democracy,” he said.

Right. Because having 20% of the population holding the other 80% to ransom is a model of democratic legitimacy. For most self-proclaimed democrats the sad truth is that democracy is only democracy when the people are voting your way. The people of Quebec, however, have spoken and the Bloc is deader than Rene Levesque.

I bring up these two stories not because of their importance, the Quebecois game of high stakes blackmail is over now, but because of their value as a political lesson. Both Bouchard and Duceppe have failed. Their careers, after a few brilliant successes, have ended in a sort of stilted ignominy.

The former was the great champion who swept into the 1995 Referendum like an avenging angel. Massive crowds greeted the former Tory minister as he made a kind of royal progress through La Belle Province. The man who betrayed Brian Mulroney with a savage though rationalized coldness. But that mattered for very little then. Bouchard was to be the father of a new nation.

Instead he became a mediocre premier rather than a heroic first President. He saw his political career end amidst bitter fighting with his own backbench and the province's powerful government unions. A sort of conservative by the bizarre standards of Quebec politics he was, and remains, essentially alienated from the mainstream of the province he once lead. I remember seeing his resignation announcement in 2001. He was a bitter man then and has changed little since.

Then there is Giles Duceppe. If not exactly a happy warrior he emitted a kind of mechanical charm during his long stint in Ottawa. He could yelp, whine and threaten with the best of them. For nearly two decades he delivered a stream of awkward histrionics at each Question Period. Clouseau done on the cheap. There was always something second-hand in the performance. An understudy with the audience keenly missing the absent master. The Bloc was suppose to be a one-trick pony: Pave the way toward independence. Once independence ceased being a practical option what remained? Something far more solid and infinitely more reliable: The sweet comfort of a government salary.

The Bloc existed for same reason most government bureaucracies exist: To provide employment for the unemployable and patronage for the easily patronized. Watching the Bloc MPs in those latter question periods even going through the motions seemed like too much work. Up they would go, trying vainly to muster up some anger at the Tory frontbench. Even by the low standards of Question Period the feigned outraged at the most trivial of imagined slights was near comical.

This is how most political movements begin, survive and then finally die. At first they are lead by passionate crusaders fired by some sacred vision. Once the vision becomes elusive the rationalizations begin. Winning conditions. Incremental reform. Then there is the steady drift into seeking power for its own sake. At last the desire becomes a vulgar instinct. You want it because you've had it so long. The name on the door. The official car. The expense account. It's a way of life with the grand vision of old receding into a guilty memory. When the voters at last see that there is nothing to see it all goes away with a terrifying speed. The cardboard boxes and the awkwardly hailed taxis are often the only epilogue. The more senior figures spend the next few months trying to flog their memoirs. 

This is how Quebec sovereignty ends: Not with the bang of independence but with the whimper of a federally financed retirement.

 

 

Wednesday Night - Captains Courageous

Your Tax Dollars at Work

Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to subsidize it:

The Honourable Shelly Glover, Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, today announced funding of $330,000 over three years under the Youth Take Charge program for the Young Citizens project.

The Young Citizens project provides 150 young Canadians aged 10 to 16 with the opportunity to record a journalistic-style video based on a presentation done for the Heritage Fairs program. The videos are then shared online in a national contest in which all Canadians are invited to vote for their favourites.

I'm sure all the cool kids will love it. 

Scenes From The Imperial Capital

Rob vs The Raccoons

Even when trying to make a valid point...

He says he's had some "standoffs" with raccoons outside his home, and that his children and wife refuse to take out the trash because they're scared of the animals.

Ford says he has been scared by raccoons in some of his "run-ins" with the animals while dealing with garbage in his yard at night.

He says "you could yell and scream at them but they just look at you."

What must be going through the minds of Etobicoke's raccoons? Rummaging through garbage, stealing the odd scrap of food and then, suddenly, the mayor appears in all his splendor. There he stands, yelling at you as if you were a common reporter! Though in fairness reporters tend not to have the same ethical standards as raccoons. There are certain things a raccoon would never touch.

Speaking of things that are irritating and mildly dangerous let's move onto Justin Trudeau. As long time readers are aware everything in Canada, yes including your life and mine, hang upon the words and deeds of the Once and Future Prime Minister. He is in our thoughts and in our hearts daily. At least if you're working in the Press Gallery which has, since the elevation of the Princeling, surrendered itself to the spin of the Trudeau Camp. So when Justin says something very stupid he is quite naturally ignored. 

Let us give a moment of thanks to the Sun News Network. Yes their pursuit of Justin can be a tad too determined but, as the saying goes, someone really has to do it.

Over the last year, as Rob Ford's stock has fallen and Justin Trudeau's has soared to new media driven heights, your humble correspondent has been fascinated. These men are not, as they seem, polar opposites. They are in fact quite similar. It's only the surface features that are different. Let's review:

Neither man is especially bright.  Ford has a BA in political science from Carleton which is, only technically, a university. Trudeau did, in fairness, attempt an engineering degree so we'll give him the edge when it comes to smarts. Perhaps he is one of those men who is cleverer with numbers than with words. Whatever their actual differences in raw intellectual power both men are surprisingly inarticulate.

This is obvious with Rob Ford who treats the English language like a sailor treats a Marseilles whore. With Justin it's a bit harder to detect because he doesn't actually sound dumb, he merely says dumb things. It's a clever trick managed by many practiced politician; the ability to sound more intelligent than you are while disclosing nothing in particular. He speaks mostly in platitudes and when he is forced off the Buy the World a Coke routine he fumbles badly. This suggests that he has been well rehearsed. By whom is a matter of debate. 

Then there is the vision thing, to borrow from the Elder Bush. Rob Ford's vision is to stop the Gravy Train. What is the Gravy Train? As far as can be made out it's over the top spending at Toronto's City Hall. This he has mostly accomplished. Beyond the Gravy Train we get a little lost. There is little in the way of a comprehensive program of reform. It's a kind of inarticulate rage at government that never coalesces into a clear goal. Once the minor privatizations and ritual sackings are done with, what's next? What is Rob Ford vision for Toronto? Subways are nice but a big city needs more than tunnels to Scarborough. 

If Rob Ford is angry at something he can't really explain, Justin is optimistic about something he has no clue about. This is one of their few real differences. Rob Rages and Justin Soothes. Neither is saying much of anything, but the latter sounds very nice while doing so. The former rants about Fat Cats and the latter about how cute kittens can save the country. Both men are, in sense, speaking in platitudes. The questions is what kind of platitudes do you prefer? Angry or vapid?

Many on the Right have rallied around Ford because he seems to be the least worst option. For many on the Left the attraction of Justin is not Justin, it's that Justin seems smooth enough that he might glide past Stephen Harper and into 24 Sussex. They are mascots for a petty partisan war that will dominate the news for the next few years. 

You'll be missing Paul Martin in no time.  

Friday Night - The Right Stuff

Hannan On The Bard

The Telegraph:

Richard II, the only play written wholly in verse, offers the loveliest poetry in this or any language. Henry IV Parts One and Two contain – if anything can be said to contain him – Jack Falstaff, the most limitless character in the canon, whom an awed W.H. Auden likened to Jesus. Henry V, that peerless disquisition on war and peace, shines an uncomfortably penetrating beam onto our national character, which leaves English audiences cheering patriotically even as they flinch. Taken together – and they are best when taken together – the four plays comprise the finest work on politics ever written, better than anything you’ll find in a library’s history or political science sections.