Openers

Election notebook

Well, I hoped to have a wealth of funnies streaming from the election trail, but it's pretty much the same old story. The Conservatives pledged to revisit same sex marriage, in order to reassure their loyal followers that they remain steadfastly anchored in the last century. The Liberals veered suddenly left into the NDP's health-care platform, down to the precise wording of the slogan. CAW boss Buzz Hargrove has come out of nowhere to become a huge pain in the butt for the left, somehow forgetting that his new friend Paul Martin's Liberal economy has lost 200,000 manufacturing jobs. And Gilles Duceppe sounds like by far the smartest and most sensible English-speaking politician in the country. If he liked Canada at all, he'd be a shoo-in for Prime Minister.

The only bold new idea of the campaign is also the stupidest. Stephen Harper's GST reduction, reflecting the same bogus logic of the whole “tax relief” fad, would reward a ridiculously wealthy person buying a fourth car some 1,000 times more than a hard-working middle-income family buying their weekly groceries. Tellingly, Mr. Harper pronounced this week that he believes “all taxes are bad” – essentially, he is either opposed to having a government at all, or he believes that health care, schools, courts and roads grow in fields in Saskatchewan, and garbage pick-up is done by Santa's little elves when they're not in the shopping malls. Is this what's taught in Masters programs in Economics nowadays?

The best idea I heard all week was Duceppe's musing about a Quebec national hockey team: screw a referendum – let's play a seven-game series for sovereignty. [e]

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Meanwhile, our planet is dying... Hello?

While federal politicians keep busy saving their electoral hides eight weeks before Canadians actually vote, delegates from 188 other countries are busy trying to rally consensus in Montreal around saving Mother Earth from human-induced climate change. One can only wonder how much carbon dioxide – a greenhouse gas largely responsible for trapping the sun's heat close to the surface of the Earth and artificially warming it to eventually cataclysmic levels – will have been generated by the airplane flights taken by delegates, by the electricity and manufacture of resources used at the Conference, and by seemingly endless supply of empty hot air spewed this week.

Canada is at the head of the pack of overachievers if you're a fan of melting ice caps and desertification, producing 24.4% more greenhouse gas in 2003 than in 1990 – worse than even Kyoto nay-sayers Australia (23.3%) and the United States (13.3%). Environment Minister Stéphane Dion said he was personally asked to host the UN Conference on Climate Change this year because Canada is seen as a respected “honest broker” in the world, and close friends with the intransigent U.S. While it could be said that it's far more likely that the world has come to kick Canada in the butt and make the U.S. watch, who are we kidding? Only Europe and Russia have made any appreciable progress under Kyoto. Negotiations are bogged down with the minutia of emissions trading, aka how each country can squirm out of its obligation to take real action.

Meanwhile, the U.S. still argues that reducing their oil consumption would be an 'economic straitjacket': “We got rich off of destroying the planet, but if we stop destroying the planet, how will we get richer?” It's become as annoying as the class bully grabbing your forearm and shoving in your face, asking, “Why are you punching yourself? Why are you punching yourself?” except we haven't yet figured out how to kick the U.S. in the groin.

In short, building on Kyoto beyond 2012 is like using a pile of leaves as a ladder: more words cannot hide the grotesque dearth of courage, leadership and action on climate change.

Canada has tremendous potential to be a leader in the green energy revolution: our innovation, our (dwindling) middle power status, and our wealth compared with the majority of the world make leadership not just an opportunity but a responsibility. The feel-good One Tonne Challenge belies the Liberals' incapacity to stand up against corporate polluters and auto makers who produce the beaver's share of Canada's greenhouse gas. While GM and Ford crumble and bury tens of thousands of Canadian jobs, Canada's leaders look at each other in contorted confusion instead of shifting subsidies from traditional auto manufacture toward green car and energy production and skills retraining programs, creating a surplus of more stable and sustainable jobs.

If federal political parties want to build a better future for Canada, they must start with a sustainable economy based NOT on growth, but on sustainable employment and environment. It will take far more boldness, creativity and willingness to stand up against Big Oil than anyone has shown so far. [e]

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Milestones to avoid unless you're a Republican

Hot on the heels of its milestone 2,000^th lost soldier in Iraq, the United States – beacon of freedom and progress that it is – is just one lethal injection away from its 1,000^th execution since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1977 after John Hicks became #999. “I was always 8^th when they were looking for Caller Number 9 on the radio, too” lamented the double murderer and cocaine addict.

Americans' dogged reluctance to modernize their criminal justice system beyond the 19^th century ensures their continued membership, along with Iran, China and North Korea, in the elusive “Axis of Hammurabi”, named after the Babylonian King who started the “Eye-for-an-Eye Lunatic Club” back in the 18^th century B.C. Mahatma Gandhi's famous observation that such an approach “leaves the whole world blind” resonated with the world's more civilized peoples, but not with the United States, whose conservative Supreme Court ruled against executing minors only last year. If only they would bring back hanging and the guillotine, Fox could launch “Survivor: Death Row”: lethal injection doesn't make good reality TV.

From those who argue that some people are simply born evil, some compassion is warranted. After all, death penalty supporters are merely products of their surroundings – raised on simplistic good guy-bad guy movies in a society that takes no responsibility for poverty, depression or violence. They are socialized from birth to blame the problems they see and experience on nameless others. Their environment is one that demonizes criminals who use violence and celebrates criminals who use tax evasion.

And so, as frontier justice celebrates its 1,000^th victim, let us not look down on the cowboys, but instead take personal and collective responsibility for fixing the depraved conditions that create both the violent criminal and the mentality of the citizen who sees justice in killing. [e]

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The End of the Roman Catholic Church?

In a sign that the Vatican is considering dismantling and closing the Roman Catholic church, Pope Benedict XVI declared that he “cannot admit to the seminary or to holy orders those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called 'gay culture.'” For an institution with a percentage of gay male members second only to the federal office of the NDP, this policy could only mean that the Roman Catholic church will be downsizing at North American auto-maker levels.

The policy is, however, consistent with the Vatican's ongoing campaign to dwindle its global membership down to the five to ten thousand people who still see it as relevant. “We've condemned both communism and capitalism, pre-marital sex and birth control. We've banned women and gays as priests,” bemoaned an imaginary Vatican official. “Not since 16^th century indulgences have we tried so hard to push people away from Catholicism – what else do we have to do?” [e]

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Today's Puzzle – Match the Celebrity Liberal with the Cabinet Post!

The first week of the election campaign was abuzz with high-profile candidates entering the race. The Conservatives have limped in with the irritatingly crotchety Peter Kent and the guy who blew the whistle on the sponsorship program. Inspiring. The NDP, in desperate need of anyone more charming than angry, came up with an economist. Wow.

No, sir, the kings of the cameo remain the Liberals: they are tireless in recruiting the notable and famous to fill Cabinet seats, hoping Canadians will be star-struck and not notice that nothing is getting done. Liza Frulla and Ken Dryden were last year's coups, and this year brings Harvard War Hawk Michael Ignatieff and first Canadian astronaut Marc Garneau, soon to be Ministers of U.S. Butt-Kissing and... Space, maybe?

Word has it the Liberals have more big cameos coming – match the possible celebrity Liberal candidate with the Cabinet post designed just for them!

1. Hockey Night in Canada host Ron Maclean

2. Hockey legend Wayne Gretzky

3. Diva Celine Dion

4. Comedian Mike Myers

5. Toronto Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi

6. Activist Naomi Klein

7. Ed the Sock

8. Tragically Hip singer Gord Downie

9. Comedian Mike Bullard

10. Sloan singer Chris Murphy

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A. Minister of Rock! (requires exclamation mark on all letterhead)

B. Secretary of State: Not Funny

C. Minister of Selling Off Assets and Having a Mediocre Baseball Team for a Decade

D. Sock-retary of State: Hot Tub Girls

E. Minister of Shutting Up Don Cherry

F. Minister of the Pasty Red Grief-Stricken Cod Farmer on Peppermint Peterborough Rhymes

G. Minister of MoJo, Baby, Yeah!

H. Minister of Selling Out to Corporate Advertisers

I. Minister of Everybody Sucks

J. Queen of Québec

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ANSWERS

1 – E (sic him on a similar guy, Conservative MP Jason Kenney)

2 – H (Coke, Ford, Pepsi, next: ads for Québec ad firms)

3 – J (replace Ministerial car with a white carriage)

4 – G (I love Mike Myers)

5 – C (he finally spends some money and it's on a guy who pitches only 50 innings a year)

6 – I (and my father-in-law is Stephen Lewis, so suck it, you corporate jerks)

7 – D (could have been B too)

8 – F (NO ONE knows what he's talking about, but we figure it's brilliant)

9 – B (he'll have to beat out a lot of Canadian comics for this one)

10 – A (Sloan rulez and you know it, doodz!) [e]

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Feature: Where did you go, Peter Gzowski?

Macleans has really hit rock bottom. I thought it happened with the cover photo of a drunk topless girl in a Girls Gone Wild video to promote an article about the self-objectification of young women. It may have been achieved with the mindless drivel of the “Pass the Weed, Dad” cover story. The bottom should have been the “Age of the Wuss” cover story bemoaning the loss of machismo amongst modern men with such exquisite journalism as an all-out dismantling of the Canadian Tire Guy. And I was sure my toes felt rock when the annual university ranking issue had a multi-page centrefold called “Axe U,” shamelessly plugging the man-spray with shots of girls in bars and a dude unfastening his friend's bra.

Okay, so the Axe U spread was the bottom. But Macleans' conversion to an extension of the Sun newspaper chain was finalized by its “new look” – aiming for hip but landing in the 1980s. It tried to look cool but missed by so much that Stephen Harper begins to blend with Bono.

Its new editorial slant, however, is most lamentable and indicative of Macleans' descent into irrelevance. Again reflective of the Sun chain, its simplistic conservatism undershoots even its target lowest common denominator.

The journalistic bottom came this week when the once-venerable mag ignored the cardinal common sense rule of journalism: don't let a business writer do anything outside of business.* Somehow, the editor let business writer Steve Maich – known by some as the apologist for the corporate executive who recently argued that women can't get ahead because “they don't deserve to” – write a cover story on the global water crisis, in which he offered two lone options for Canada: begin selling our water to the U.S. and others, or wait for the U.S. to invade us and take it by force. Maich's myopia can only come from never leaving the Economics and Commerce building on his university campus. He dismisses those who believe that water is a human right out of hand, and doesn't even begin to acknowledge – let alone address – the myriad problems inherent with the commodification of the most fundamental element crucial to human life. Just like oil, he says. “Wake up to the business opportunity, Canada! There's coin to be made from... people's... misery.” Go back to the business page, my friend, and don't come out until you've taken an elective outside the department.

Now, for the next three weeks, Macleans is letting Big Business' Boy Wonder loose on three progressive icons: David Suzuki, Stephen Lewis and Bono. To be sure, the issues of climate change, AIDS and global poverty should remain open to serious debate. But Maich is clearly auditioning for the role of Rush Limbaugh in the Canadian version of “Don't Let Liberals Make You Grow a Conscience” with his simplistic “Wrong, Wrong, Wrong” approach, helpful only to assuage the guilty conscience of people who would rather ignore these problems rather than constructively solve them. This week, he conjures up the spirit of long-discredited “Skeptical Environmentalist” Bjorn Lomborg to question the Kyoto Protocol, and will likely try the same trick in the next two issues: it's not really a problem, at least not as big as people would have you believe. So sit back, Canada, feel no responsibility for the world's troubles, and don't let people who care make you feel bad. Next week, we will reveal the hidden agendas of Cookie Monster, Superman and Jesus.

* Except host morning shows – see CBC's Harry Forestell, a quite charming fellow.[e]

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Action Items:

E-Mail:

(1) Macleans – refute Steve Maich's simplistic conservatism: we're not buying it, and we're not buying Macleans until you get serious again.

Vote with your choices:

(1) Take the One Tonne Challenge to do your part to fight climate change! It's the least we Canadians can do as the worst greenhouse gas producers per capita in the world.

Vote with your... vote!

(1) Tell your local candidates that you've taken the One Tonne Challenge, and you insist on legislative measures to ensure that your hard efforts are ruined by corporate polluters and lax auto emissions standards. [e]

Good News Story of the Week

(1) A 20 year-old Canadian woman spearheaded a campaign against child sex tourism – the industry that lures pedophiles from North America and Europe to developing countries for sex vacations with child prostitutes. Her tireless work has led to a youth-developed Public Service Announcement being played aboard all Air Canada flights warning any sex tourists about the moral and legal consequences of their actions: jail time when they get home. Check the Toronto Star article and the group's web site: www.one-child.ca

(2) “Buy Nothing Christmas” carolers made some noise and raised awareness about the gross commercialization of a sacred Christian holiday across Canada this week. In a display of the true meaning of the season as it has come to be, mall cops evicted the peaceful singers in Winnipeg, and police arrested a woman in front of Halifax City Hall. “Some people don't understand the profound spiritual link between the birth of the saviour and the success of North America's retail economy,” lamented a make-believe Gap manager. Retorted Jesus: “Dude, awful lotta gifts being bought for other people on MY birthday. That's so NOT in Corinthians.” [e]

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