Monthly Archives: March 2011

Consider, Federal

Ethics, Libya and Mr Harper

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In sending Canadian war planes to Libya Steven Harper is at least being ethically consistent. Of course consistency is not really a good thing for Canada or Canadians when it is UNethical behaviour that is the constant.

From the Conservatives ‘moral superiority’ on MP’s golden pensions (which quickly disappeared when it was time to put their money where their ‘moral superiority’ was as all the Conservative MPs bellied up to the trough to pig out on taxpayer funded golden pensions) to Mr. Harper’s promises and ‘moral superiority’ on appointments to the Senate (until it was convenient to Mr. Harper to appoint Conservative Senators and control the Senate) to International Cooperation Minister Bev Oda’s changing a document and then lying about it to a parliamentary committee and the in-and-out illegal election spending (done to get around the law on election spending limits) both of which Mr. Harper has indicated he sees no problem with – Mr. Harper and the Conservatives have been consistent in not letting ethics interfere with how they behave.

There was no reason for Canadians to expect Mr. Harper to let questions of ethics interfere with an opportunity to curry favour with the Americans by sending warplanes off to join in another war.

And Mr. Harper did not disappoint – rushing to get his increasingly brown nose firmly and deeply affixed betwixt the checks of the American heinie.

Yes I know that those who are engaged in blowing the *bleep* out of Libya have laid claim to ‘moral superiority’ (why is it that those who claim ‘moral superiority’ so often behave without ethics?) citing Mr. Gaddafi for shooting civilians.

Of course these civilians were armed, attacking and capturing cities. Which sounds remarkably like a rebellion and civil war, not peaceful demonstrations…….as long as you are a friend of the USA. If you are someone the USA would like to see gone…….well the armed rebels are freedom fighters and must be protected.

Ethically based behaviour has a consistency that behaviour based on self interest lacks.

If the actions against Libya had been a matter of ethics……

At the time the aggressor nations began blowing the *bleep* out of Libya, in Bahrain Saudi Arabian troops were shooting unarmed demonstrators. Where is the outrage for those actions, the military action to protect unarmed civilians who were peacefully demonstrating? Of course Bahrain is considered a friend of the US and the Saudis have lobbyists and over the years have spent billions buying the US government.

At the same time the Iranian government was cracking down and killing its own unarmed demonstrators. Where is the outrage for those actions, the military action to protect unarmed civilians who were peacefully demonstrating? Nowhere – the Iranians, as much as the US would no doubt like to be bombing the *bleep* out of Iran, can shoot back.

Even if you overlooked the evidence that that what is occurring in Libya is a matter of convenience rather than ethics and believed that enforcing a no-fly zone was the right thing to do….

Shouldn’t Libya have been violating the no-fly zone before the invading force attacked? Instead the attackers pounded Libya with cruise missiles and followed that up with attacks using aircraft.

News reports were full of the film as Canadian jets hit munitions stores. Hopefully none of the Canadians in Libya become ‘collateral damage’ of the Canadian planes.

What the news didn’t have is any report of the no fly zone being violated. Yet the pounding of the portions of people of Libya loyal to Gaddafi continues unabated.

Among the targets hit in ‘enforcing the no-fly zone’ were tanks. I know the modern tank is a piece of advanced technology but I hadn’t realized they could fly.

The actions in Libya are not about enforcing a no-fly zone. If one wants to know what it is all about one merely needs to read reports of what is taking place in Libya:

“Libyan rebels backed by allied air raids say they have seized control of the frontline oil town of Ajdabiya from Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s forces.”

We are pounding Libya with ordinance and supporting rebel attacks on Libyan cities. Actions that kill civilians. It seems that Mr. Harper is going to protect Libyan civilians from Mr. Gaddafi – even if he has to kill them to ‘save’ them from Mr. Gaddafi.

Canada and Canadians were once respect and listened to by the world community because we were a voice of reason and balance.

Now we behave just like any other bullying warmonger. Not surprising since Canada has a head of state who has repeatedly demonstrated his disdain for letting ethics interfere in any way with his or the party’s behaviour.

Mr Harper has tarnished Canada to the point where we should be ashamed. Not of being Canadian or of Canada but that Mr. Harper was not been handed his walking papers.

Consider, Federal, Municipal, Provincial

The Fault Lies Not in Our Stars but in Ourselves

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” What’s the matter with all of our elected officials? Obviously, health care is not your top priority. Taxing us to death seems to be at the top of your list.”

What is the matter with our elected officials Ms Whiteford? You and the majority of other citizens, along with reporters, pundits, the media and opposition politicians.

Where do you suggest the government get the funds to build more hospitals or pay more medical staff? Perhaps capture Rumplestiltskin, imprison him in the basement of the Legislature and have him spin straw into the tons of gold required to pay for the multi-billion dollar demands of yourself and others?

Billions of dollars in demands for new infrastructure and services that everybody demands and refuses to pay for – ” Taxing us to death…” Citizens behave as if the provincial government did have Rumplestiltskin in the Legislature basement generating an unending supply of gold from straw.

That may seem, may well be, a little snarky but – people demand to keep underutilized schools open, build new schools, smaller class sizes, more hospitals and hospital beds, more medical staff, more expensive medical treatments and drugs, they want to spend billions more to build and staff prisons to lock more people up for longer periods of time, they want……they want……they want……..

They want everything NOW and they want it for FREE – or at least they don’t want it to cost them any money or to raise their taxes.

You want more schools and hospital beds? Then that is what you should have been demanding the government spend its money on rather than spending billions on the two week blowout that was the Winter Olympics. The money being spent on replacing the stadium roof in Vancouver would pay for St. Paul’s hospital to be renovated.

We want it all without having to pay for it; the size of government debt bears witness that for years we have been consuming more government services that we were paying for – whipping out the credit card and running up a huge debt to pay for our lavish lifestyle; we don’t want to set priorities and make the tough choices; we behave like two year olds with no acknowledgment of reality, no economic sense or view for anything beyond the now, certainly no thought to the future.

And as happens in the real world our spendthrift ways are catching up to us. The cost of the services government provides are climbing – medical costs are increasing exponentially. Without an increase in revenue to offset these spiking costs we are going to be getting less services across the board – forget about more services.

Will we have a discussion about our priorities, about the costs of programs, about what we can afford and what we cannot, about what is – rather than what we believe or want to be, acknowledge we cannot have everything we want and discuss what we are willing to pay and what services the dollars we are willing to pay will purchase?

No, people will support the party that tells them what they want to hear – that there is no problem and to party on.

Then people will complain that the politicians lied to them. Ignoring the fact that lying to them is what voters reward politicians for doing.

Could the government be run in a more cost effective manner – yes;, could the money be spent more wisely – yes; could the future financial health of the province be much improved – yes. Will it? Well…..

Should anyone make the mistake of talking about acting in a fiscally responsible manner, of paying for what services we use rather than saddling our children and their children and their children with debt because we ‘put it on the provincial (or federal) credit card’, of setting priorities……

They will be sent home with their tails between their legs for not telling the people the lies they want to hear.

Pointing fingers at others, blaming others will not improve the financial reality of provincial (federal, municipal) finances. If people want to see the root cause – and where the solution lies – to our current (and increasing) political, social and economic woes they need only look in a mirror.