War of 1812 on Mysteries of Canada

I have begun a multipart series on the War of 1812.  I di not want to take the traditional tract of describing all the battles, so I picked out the parts of the conflict, and what lead up to it, that I find interesting.

I am also trying as much as possible to talk abot people rather than events.  I find that makes it more interesting.




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Learn and Enjoy.

An open letter to BC Premier Christy Clark

Premier Clark,

Congratulations for your stand at the Council of the Federation, better known as the Premier's Conference, on the Northern Gateway pipeline project.  You made a couple of minor errors but the overall message was sound.

It is true that BC will shoulder the majority of consequences and cost should that pipeline ever spring a leak. (Enbridge's track record suggests that the word is when and not if.)  However only a small percentage of the revenue for the pipeline flows to BC.  The federal government's share of the pie is 33% and to date they have not done anything for their money.  Alberta, where the high-paying jobs are and where the wealth is, is the major government winner in the project.

Premier Clark, you cannot argue that a percentage of Alberta's royalties should be given to BC anymore than Alberta can demand a percentage of your stumpage fees collected by BC for lumber shipped from BC to Alberta.  You have to get your money from Enbridge, the company that stands to make more than anyone on the project.

I suggest that you do the following:

1.  Tell Enbridge that they must use the best and most sensitive technology to detect spills along the length of the pipeline and that technology must originate in BC.

2.  Enbridge must establish monitoring stations and fully-equipped rapid response stations every 100 kilometers along the pipeline.  The stations must employ fully qualified and trained BCers and First Nations People.

3.  Enbridge must establish and maintain a minimum $5 billion fund to cover first response to any incident.

4.  Enbridge must agree that they will be 100% responsible for any and all costs for any incident.

5.  BC must be named as prime creditor status in the event of any default proceedings by Enbridge or any of its subsidiaries or partners involved in the pipeline.

What is the results of all this, Premier Clark?  First, you protect BC environments and jobs as best you can without scuttling the project.  Second, you put the costs on the right organization.  And third, you force Enbridge to price all this into its charge to carry the bitumen, and if the price gets too high then the project will not go ahead.

There is nothing wrong with being a Peacekeeping nation

In all the hullabaloo surrounding military deployment, equipment scandals and negative PR, we Canadians have been fed the line that if we talk about the problems then somehow we do not support the military.  I am here to tell you that I support the Canadian military... just not the clowns we have running it.    That includes the politicos who seem to think that the military consists of lead soldiers that they can move around the sand box.  It includes the bureaucratic mandarins who think that the military is just another government department that can be played with.  It includes the senior officers who think that sucking up to the politician-of-the-day will win them some special favours.  It includes all other ranks that seem to think that the military has some special status in Canada so they can do no wrong, even when they do wrong.  And finally it includes you and me, who keep quiet because we don't want to be accused of not supporting the military.

When did peacekeeping become a bad word in Canada?  The two words used to be synonymous.  Since the 1950s, Canadians have been involved in 34 peacekeeping missions around the world.  Since that time over 120 Canadians have lost their lives serving these missions.

Peacekeeping is not the kiddy's table of military involvement.  It is tough, dirty and honourable.  It does not deserve the rap that it has been getting recently.

It is time to rethink the role that our military plays in the world.  We cannot compete with the U.S. or Russian or China when it come to peace-making or waging war, but we can be and have always been strong peacekeepers.

Perils in the North

It has been almost two years since the Russians last threatened to invade Canada.

You remember the period, don't you?  It was July 30, 2010 when a Russian TU-95 long-range bomber flew within 56 km of Canadian air space and were intercepted by Canadian F-18 jets.  The F-18s shadowed the Russians until they, the Russians, gave up and went home.

About a month later, F-18s again intercepted, this time, two TU-95s.  "At no time did the Russian military aircraft enter Canadian or United States sovereign airspace," said NORAD spokesman Lt. Desmond James, a Canadian naval officer. He went on to say... "Both Russia and NORAD routinely exercise their capability to operate in the North. These exercises are important to both NORAD and Russia and are not cause for alarm."

It is possible that the Russians and NATO talk about these "exercises" before hand but DND will not confirm that.

I think it is great that we hold these exercises even if they are focused on practicing for an invasion.  But I can't help thinking back to the 1950s when Canada was developing a Mach 2 high altitude Interceptor designated the CF-105, the AVRO ARROW, the role of which would be to intercept Russian bombers.  The military geniuses at the time were fast coming to the conclusion, based on what facts... we don't know, that future warfare would include intercontinental missiles and not piloted bombers.  Therefore our collected wise-guys talked PM Diefenbaker into cancelling the 105 program in favour of Bomarc missiles, and nuclear-tipped ones at that.

So here we are in 2012.  The Bomarcs were decommissioned years ago and never replaced as a defensive asset and Russian piloted bombers are still testing our defenses.

It is enough to make you cry.

Can this banking story be real???

I screwed up last evening when paying bills online from my bank account.  I meant to make a payment to Rogers and put the entry into the Citizen box instead.  We have not taken the Citizen for a month but I never deleted them from my pay list.  I realized the mistake this morning so I called the Citizen to ask that they send the money back to me.  They claimed that they had not yet received it.  Fair enough, it was early in the day.  So then I went to my bank who looked it up and behold, they claimed that the Citizen already received the money.  OK, the transaction took place in the hour between my Citizen call and the bank visit.

So how, I asked, do I get the money back?  Here's where it gets unreal!

The bank branch has talked with their Investigations Unit who will arrange the return from the Citizen.  But it will take TWO to THREE WEEKS!!!!!!!!!!!

Two to three flipping weeks.  Everything is apparently electronic and transparent.  Trillions of dollars travels across the world ever minute, but the bank can't find and retrieve $168.28 in less than two weeks?

Unreal.

How the stock market works

Once upon a time in a place overrun with monkeys, a man appeared and announced to the villagers that he would buy monkeys for $10 each. The villagers, seeing that there were many monkeys around, went out to the forest, and started catching them.

The man bought thousands at $10 and as supply started to diminish, they became harder to catch, so the villagers stopped their effort.

The man then announced that he would now pay $20 for each one. This renewed the efforts of the villagers and they started catching monkeys again. But soon the supply diminished even further and they were ever harder to catch, so people started going back to their farms and forgot about monkey catching.

The man increased his price to $25 each and the supply of monkeys became so sparse that it was an effort to even see a monkey, much less catch one.

The man now announced that he would buy monkeys for $50! However, since he had to go to the city on some business, his assistant would now buy on his behalf.

While the man was away the assistant told the villagers. 'Look at all these monkeys in the big cage that the man has bought. I will sell them to you at $35 each and when the man returns from the city, you can sell them to him for $50 each.'

The villagers rounded up all their savings and bought all the monkeys. They never saw the man nor his assistant again and, once again, monkeys weren't worth anything.

Now you have a better understanding of how the stock market works.

(I do not know who first wrote this but it is wonderful.)

Changing Canada

In my 2002 book, The Provinces Must Go... An Idea to Cure the Malaise of Canada, I set out my belief that the Canadian Constitution is an archaic document that does not reflect the Canada of this new millennium.  I believed it then and I believe it now.

A modern Canada would reflect the FACT that, in the governance of Canada and Canadians, provincial governments are merely middle men/women/persons between the real parties that do the heavy lifting - the federal government that looks after the welfare of the country and the municipalities who look after the welfare of the people.

In the debate over Supply Management, people are beginning to recognize that there is a middle man/woman/person between the farmers and the consumers and while they have little effect on quality or selection, they suck up a large part of the resources.  The same goes for provincial governments.   They have little direct effect on the country and little direct effect on the people.  Oh sure, they pass laws, run departments and spend money that affects the quality of life but who actually delivers the goods to the people.  I can guess that no bureaucrat could find his/her way from the emergency room to the cafeteria in any major hospital, or tell you how many days little Johnny missed classes last week, or what the insulation (R) value is on the walls of a home in Attawapiskat - but someone can.  The knowledge lies with the teacher, the nurse or the local tradesperson, so why not let the teacher or the nurse or the local tradesperson make decisions, rather than some faceless bureaucrat in Halifax or Quebec City or Edmonton.

Bring real government closer to the people.  That is where you get your biggest bang for the buck!

And for you cheapies, I am testing out some e-book technology and you can read The Province Must Go online, free of charge, at: http://www.mysteriesofcanada.com/e-books/e_books.htm.

Time to Fix Canada

"I am a Canadian. Canada is the inspiration of my life. I have had before me as a pillar of fire by night and a pillar of cloud by day a policy of true Canadianism, of moderation, of conciliation." - Sir Wilfred Laurier.

Boy, those were the days.  Eloquent politicians with a message of hope, of direction and commitment to the betterment of Canada and Canadians.  Let's compare that to what we have today.

We have self-serving governments who see their fiefdoms as separate from the whole.  We have opposition parties who do not see any value in separating criticism from opposition.  We have a polarized media who are sanctimonious in their editorial.  We have an electorate who is apathetic and, at the same time, ignorant of about that which they are apathetic.  We have a financial system out of control, a healthcare system in decline, a justice system that looks like Swiss cheese and an educational system that has trouble with its raison d'etre.

There are so many problems in Canada that any single and simple fix is like putting a band-aid on a grenade wound.  We have complex problems that require complex solutions.  The first solution?  Our constitution.

The Constitution Act, as amended in 1982 but still reflecting the BNA from 1867, is so far out of keeping with the 21st century Canada that it is almost laughable.  Our country has changed since confederation.  Our population has grown and moved.  We have many cities more populous than some of our provinces.  More people live in cities than in rural environments.  Health care delivery grows more complex every day.  The disparity between rich and poor is a widening gap.  Our tax system has more loopholes than a Turkish rug.  We do not know why we need a military with all the toys... we just know we need one.  Lobbyists and special interests are running our policy making.  We have governments who couldn't care less about the electorate or democracy, just so long as their brand of policy prevails.  We have governments who pontificate their purity at the time of elections then break their promises once elected - all because they have not the guts to tell us the truth.  In truth our politicians are managers... not LEADERS.

You want to change Canada for the better?  Forget tinkering with healthcare or the justice system or transfer payment to provinces.  Bite the bullet.  Change the Constitution to reflect a modern Canada.  And do it soon.

Manipulating the EI truth

I have a certain affinity to the people of the maritime provinces.  They are wonderful folks, on the whole, who live in a wonderful place with a great history.  No wonder that, when they leave to find work, they long to go back HOME.

The Harper government has made a lot of hay recently accusing maritimers, and others, of being too lazy to take jobs that are going unfilled in their regions or to move to areas of Canada that jobs are available.  They are making it rougher to collect EI benefits to force one to move away or to pump coffee at Timmy's.  If that is not social engineering, something that the Cons decrie, then I do not understand the term.

But is there anything in the political history of this country that may have contributed to the problems in the maritime provinces?  Let's take the Miramichi region as an example.  Since before confederation the Miramichi had been an economic powerhouse in Canada.  Shipping had been plying the Miramichi for decades before the Intercolonial Railway reached the region in 1875, shortly followed by the Northern and Western Railway (later the Canada Eastern Railway).  Fish plants, sawmills and pulp mills provided jobs and wealth to the area.  Until...

In the 1960s, the government of Louis Robichaud decided to build a new port at neighbouring Belledune.  Belledune took over the industries and jobs that were once in the Miramichi.  Then the federal government put the nail in the coffin by stopping regular dredging operations of the Miramichi River thus closing off the area to major shipping.  Miramichi, a jewel of Canada, was laid waste.  In June of 2011, the unemployment rate of the Campellton-Miramichi area was 16.8%... fully double that of Canada as a whole.  That means, according to Harper and his minions, that there are over 62,600 lazy people in the region... or has government had any role in the problem?

When are politicians going to learn when to shut up!

I am not a great fan of ACOA, the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, so I was not too disappointed when the government announced a cut back in its funding.  My problems with ACOA is that it is excessively partisan, blind to outside help and staffed with people who can count money but can't account for it.

There is no doubt that ACOA, some of the folks anyway, can and have been a help to entrepreneurs in getting their businesses off the drawing board.  A case in point is the Ocean Nutrition Canada plant in Mulgrave, Nova Scotia, which produces high quality fish oil products which are exported across the world.  It is also true that ACOA has had some major disasters!

All that aside, let's explore how the federal Minister responsible for ACOA handles the cut back.

"A careful reading of [ACOA's] annual reports will give people a fair idea of what they do, which I don't dismiss as useless, but what I question is the bang for the buck of taxpayers' dollars."

So far, so good.  Minister Valcourt makes a valid point and justifies his decision.  So why didn't he then shut up?  As is the habit of so many holier-than-thou politicians, he just couldn't stop from making a jab in the groin.  And that jab blew the crux of his argument.

Valcourt continued, "I have yet to meet an entrepreneur or business who tells me that the reason for their start up or expansion or trading around the world is because what a regional economic development agency did. Quite to the contrary, it's fully attributable to the entrepreneurial spirit of the individual and the company and the federal or provincial programs in place."

So much for his previous statement "...I don't dismiss [ACOA] as useless...!  If a regional development agency's help is never the reason for business success, then don't just give the agencies a hair cut, chop them up and spit them out.  And that includes the agencies in western Canada, Ontario , Quebec and the Maritimes.