Driving You Crazy

The dreadful incident of road rage that resulted in a cyclist's death and the shame and possible end-of-career for an Ontario political star is telling in a hundred ways.

The cyclist was drinking. He had no helmet. He has a small criminal record. he comes from a family with criminal records.

The politician is a driven Type-A Master of the Universe privileged egotist. He was driving the wrong way down a street.

The roads are too small.

Everyone is in a hurry.

Everyone is in their own movie.

If I don't know you, you are not really a real person. You basically don't exist.

I don't know of a law or a public measure that will make the increasingly horrid act of driving in the city any better.

Civility is gone.

Yesterday...

Yesterday, I was entering a traffic circle at Nelson and Jervis. Of course, we live in the only city in the world where people either don't know how to use a traffic circle or they willfully choose to ignore the rules.

I was entering a traffic circle...

A woman was attempting to cross Nelson Street. She was wheeling her baby in a stroller.

I stopped to make sure she could get across safely.

Of course, the Master of the Universe in the black Porsche couldn't have that.

He drove over the zebra lines, directly in front of the baby stroller and when he found my car not moving, he did what any self-respecting sociopath would do, he honked his musical horn many times.

How do I know there is a God?

Because more people aren't killed.

Including the ones who aught to be.

Settle Down, NItwits

If those idiots in federal politics bring down upon our heads a fall election, it will be the fourth in six years.

In a recession.

We need to spend about $500 Million on changing from one ego-centric duffus to another?

I tell you what, Iggy.

How about you and Steve sit down over a Reuben and a cup of chamomile tea and agree to spend that money on something useful like health or education or music or sport or roads.

Harper may or may not be every one's favorite picture of evil these days, but what exactly does Iggy have to offer other than his personal ambition?

What?

He's a nice guy?

He can read?

Slap me with a wet fish

Culture 'no longer a priority,' B.C. arts groups say

Really?

When was it?

THE SILVER BULLET SYNDROME

Everyone wants a Silver Bullet.

The holders of the Silver Bullet Lifetime Achievers Award are, of course, drug addicts and alcoholics.

They live and die by a belief system in which a small dusting of inert white powder or a beer will basically be sufficient, thanks, for all their needs.

We call that encapsulation.

The Runner-Up, however, in this world wide event are perennially Doctors and shrinks and government who find addicts and drunks just so darn pesky that well, it would be so nice if we could just find some QUICK answer.

For the addict, the Silver Bullet is the heroin or crack cocaine or gin.

For the government/shrink.doctor, the Silver Bullet is free needles, free crack pipe kits, free heroin, methadone, pills, places to shoot up and funding for your drug users association.

These quick fixes involve little work, ZERO HUMANITY, and the hope is that these annoying bastards, who are not like us at all, Margaret, will just be quiet for a minute and stop whining and for sure stop breaking into the condo or the Prius.

Today is yet another shining smiley day in the lifeblood of The Silver Bullet Saga.

Witness:

"Landmark B.C. study lets trauma sufferers find relief with ecstasy

Vancouver therapists get green light to use drug in trial to treat post-traumatic stress"

Hahahaha...until I weep.

These sickos just won't stop, will they?

Today's cocktail is X.

Hate to be a party pooper, kids. But let's get real.

Post-traumatic stress is no Sunday picnic. It can in the fullness of time be overcome. But what is needed is ... wait we already said it... Time. And support and friendship and an ear and conversation and walking and swimming and air.

In other words, PTSD requires exactly what addicts require.

It's an old-fashioned concept, folks.

It's called WORK.

But governments and shrinks and doctors, exactly like their addict and PTSD patients, don't want to do the WORK.

They want a Silver Bullet.

Jonathan, who WORKS at a residential treatment centre where people WORK their way out of their misery, adds this:

I was once diagnosed with PTSD...do I still qualify?? Sheesh.

Well, if you keep people dependent, you control them. If you keep them dependent on drugs, they are presumably not as much trouble due to the fact that they become quite predictable...all they want is their next fix.

Creating an addiction that provides a predictable outcome is an easy way of looking socially responsible while assuaging the guilt associated with doing nothing and caring even less. Are they creating an addiction? Sure they are. Instead of spending time with a person and helping them overcome their trauma in a healthy manner, they give them a drug to feel better. And feel better they will...for a time. Unfortunately, instead of learning productive and healthy coping methods, many will continue to seek out the manufactured (illegitimate) good feelings provided by the local doctor/pharmacist of a professional or street professional variety.

For some reason it seems we believe we can manufacture happiness and connectedness, instead of realizing it is actually cultivated over long periods – often a lifetime.

Jonathan

This latest "announcement" is static noise. It is destructive, silly nonsense and should be ignored by all reasonable and compassionate people.

It is a resident evil and should be summarily smacked down into the dirt where it belongs.

What They Value

The withdrawal of promised funds from BC Lotto to many, many local arts groups is a double and triple slap up side of the head.

Lotto monies are basically theft. They are a tax on the poor and the stupid and the hopeful. I qualify as I pre-buy a 649 ticket on the Internet perpetually. It costs me $4 a week, or the cost of a double cappuccino with skim milk, please.

More than $150 million is promised annually to symphonies and children's' festivals.

The monies that are now being withheld had already been promised and, in most cases, spent or committed because of that promise. Nice.

The government tells you that yes, you are getting your $47,622.51, so you go ahead and book the hall and have the posters printed, because hey, it's the government and they said so.

Oops! We were just kidding.

No money.

But the deepest cut of all is this.

This scurrilous behaviour speaks to Victoria's values.

In short, (aside from promises are NOT US) it tell us that roads and Olympic Games are important but music and paint and dance are not.

These are just frills, extras that can be indulged when times are good.

This isn't even good archeology, let alone sociology or psychology. It demonstrates a colossal ignorance of the human condition.

We have been painting on the walls and dancing around the fire since time began.

You colorless, soulless, stupid mismanagers.

As We Were Saying...

Sun Aug 30, 10:46 AM

Top of Form

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain agreed to include Lockerbie bomber Abdel Basset al-Megrahi in a prisoner transfer deal with Libya because of "overwhelming interests" shortly before an oil deal was sealed with Tripoli, a newspaper reported on Sunday.

The Sunday Times said leaked letters from Justice Secretary Jack Straw undermined government denials of a link between the former Libyan agent's freedom and British trade interests.

Megrahi, 57, was released from jail on August 20 after Scottish authorities said his terminal cancer gave compassionate grounds for him to return home to die.

The British government has distanced itself from the decision, made by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill, which has angered many relatives of the bombing's victims and the United States government, which lost 189 citizens.

Megrahi was the only person convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie that killed 270 people. His rapturous reception in Tripoli has been criticized by the British and U.S. governments.

The Sunday Times said two letters from Straw, dated five months apart, showed he reversed an original plan to exclude Megrahi from a prisoner transfer agreement that was being discussed with Libya.

The paper said the change of heart appeared to be linked to a stalled $900 million oil and gas exploration deal with Libya for British oil giant BP that was ratified a few weeks later.

BP has always denied any link between the deal and the prisoner agreement.

Straw wrote to MacAskill in July 2007 to say he favored excluding Megrahi from the prisoner transfer, an arrangement desired by the Scottish administration which has autonomous powers over most criminal matters.

But by December 2007 he told MacAskill his position had changed.

"The wider negotiations with the Libyans are reaching a critical stage and, in view of the overwhelming interests for the United Kingdom, I have agreed that in this instance the (prisoner transfer agreement) should be in the standard form and not mention any individual," the Sunday Times quoted Straw as writing.

Straw told BBC radio the alleged link between trade and Megrahi's release was an "absurd confection."

"The suggestion that at any stage there was some kind of backdoor deal done over Mr Megrahi's transfer because of trade is simply untrue," he said

The negotiations on prisoner transfers were part of a "normalization process" with Libya, he said.

London had made clear to Tripoli that Scotland would retain an absolute right to refuse a prisoner transfer, he added,

Straw said the issue was "academic" given that Scotland eventually released Megrahi on compassionate grounds and not under the transfer agreement.

(Reporting by Tim Castle; editing by Robin Pomeroy)

RACISM SPELLED OUT

Sometimes I take short cuts in my writing. I assume that everyone will make the leap with me from one thought to another without my stating the obvious step in between.

This is a mistake on my part. It is bad writing.

Twice in recent days I have spoken here about "racism" in the heartbreaking instances of missing aboriginal women in BC and Manitoba and all across Canada.

The racism which I am suggesting is NOT in the selection by lunatics and murderers of aboriginal women as victims, although that may in fact be an issue.

I am referring to the sluggish reaction of the police.

Let me be clear.

If 20 young blond white women were abducted or murdered or gone missing from Vancouver's west side, all bloody hell would break loose.

One woman was tragically murdered here in recent months and 75 police officers were assigned to the case.

Nobody begrudges the dedicated and thorough response that this shocking incident enjoyed.

But it does point up a dreadful double standard.

Three years before Robert Picton was even suspected of anything, three years before the police launched the final concerted effort that would end at Picton's farm, I had an aboriginal woman and a female Vancouver police officer on my radio show. We were talking about the native woman's missing sister. We were all suggesting that there was an awful pattern here, that some serious investigating needed to begin.

Both the woman and her sister had lived in my house with my wife and son and their two brothers many years ago when I was running a treatment centre. They were all children at the time, the children of a very wonderful woman who had spent many horrible years drunk.

Some of those children developed into citizens as adults. But one of the girls ended up on the street - a prostitute and addict.

While officials ignored the obvious, more women disappeared. They were murdered.

We are encouraged to learn from history.

But the Highway of Tears shows that we have not.

Justice delayed is justice denied.

But investigation delayed is murder.

And racism.

YOU CAN'T COME IN MY HOUSE

My recent employer of record, Langara College, is in the soup.

That's OK. Getting in the news is good for them.

The College offers many course in the so-called "Alternative Healing Arts and Practices."

Do you know anyone who has died from shiatsu, touch therapy, massage or music?

Maybe once a year somewhere on this bouncing ball we call Earth a frightened soul runs off to some ashram or other to find a "better" way to deal with cancer and makes an early exit.

But who has just about the biggest Territorial Imperative known to humankind?

The medical profession, of course.

So now the BC Medical Association, which represents doctors, is criticizing Vancouver's Langara College for training the public in therapies that are "medically useless" and potentially harmful.

Hahaha...

Isn't one of the primary dedications of medical practice "Do No Harm?"

Can the BCMA claim as clean a track record as the many happy (possibly deluded) people who practice these sundry and colorful voodoos?

Hasn't it been demonstrated over and over again that if you believe a treatment is helping you, then it often does.

The study of "energy healing" and like courses is very much in demand. So is the practice. Patients are lining up at store fronts everywhere to partake. Herbal medicines sell in the billions of dollars world-wide.

That doesn't make it right or good science, but show me the person whose toe has fallen off after acupuncture.

The BCMA desperately needs to take a Big Pill and mind its own business.

Water Fight

$2.49 for 24 bottles of water?

Yes, kids, that's the going price in some American discount stores. Even national brands such as Aquafina are flying off the shelves for a song.

The love of bottled water is disappearing fast, as cities and other governments are cancelling their contracts and encouraging employees to drink from the tap.

Well, at least we won't have to watch one-day stubbled CEO's carrying their ubiquitous bottles to press conferences.

I still have giant bottles of water delivered to my house every month. Some of my friends point to this idiosyncrasy as one of the many signs of my oddness. So be it.

I have bottled water in the car and I take bottled water to the tennis court.

I recycle the bottles.

Am I poisoning myself? Am I poisoning the famous environment?

Search me.

And pass the bottle, will ya?

This comment deserves ttention

David,

This comment relates to both of your files today. First, a little disclosure on my part. 30-odd years ago while still living in Winnipeg we adopted our second child, a boy born to a teenage aboriginal mother. We were aware that there were complications during the delivery, a result of a lack of any prenatal care by the mother, but not until many years later did we discover that the mother had a lengthy history of alcohol abuse.

The combination of these factors resulted in years of frustration for our son and ourselves. Eventually, a diagnosis of ADD confirmed our worst fears. To make a long story short, a biography of our son would read like that of many young delinquents. In the 70's there was little help available for children like our son and today he still struggles with his addictive behaviour, but is finally making attempts at recovery.

While today it is commonplace to see ads warning women about the danger of drinking during a pregnancy, not that long ago the effects of alcohol and drugs on a fetus were not well understood. As I now understand it, the first trimester is particularly important in the brain development of a fetus. Impulse control, general intellectual development, and a tendency toward addictive behaviour seem to be a lifelong legacy of maternal substance use, not only substance abuse.

I firmly believe that the societal cost of this legacy is staggering, not only in financial terms but in the human misery and suffering associated with it. A national problem like this requires multiple interventions. But one that I have long believed would be worth considering is a voluntary prenatal programme that would provide financial incentives for women who abstain from alcohol and drugs during their pregnancy. Such an endeavour might even include residential supports of various kinds to enable some women to escape toxic social environments.

I realize that there are many public health initiatives intended to deal with this problem, but to the best of my knowledge, there is not a programme which offers women (particularly women with limited financial resources) financial incentives to protect their unborn children. Money talks.

Finally, the national tragedy of so many murdered and missing aboriginal women does speak to the frightening presence of murderous men in our society. While racial explanations might explain some of this phenomenon, it seems to me that substance abuse and poverty in all its forms may also be a major factor. How can we tolerate child poverty to the extent that we do in BC and elsewhere and not expect tragic consequences. As the automotive ads so clearly put it, "Pay me now or pay me later".

Dave C.

Race - It's Murderous

18 young women missing from Kerrisdale.

Imagine such a headline.

The world such as we know it would go mad.

But 18 young women have been missing or determined to be homicides near Prince George for many years now. All but one is/was aboriginal.

Only now, the RCMP have a serious suspect. His name is Leyland Switzer and everyone who knows him had him as "the guy" years ago.

Today the RCMP and their dogs are sniffing around the property and digging up old wells that smell of oil fires.

No doubt in the fullness of bureaucratic time, Switzer's name will join Picton's and others in the Gallery of Monstrous Ghouls.

But as I reported here the other day, 75 aboriginal women missing in Manitoba, over 500 in Canada.

Is there a quiet and bland and uninterested racism in Canada in the year 2009?

Yes.

The Aboriginal File

There must be something in the air.

Only yesterday, writing about the extraordinary number of aboriginal women who are "missing" across Canada, I mentioned Northern BC's infamous Highway of Tears.

Today, we learn that a huge contingent of RCMP has appeared in the vicinity of Prince George, with a special interest in a local property. Conjecture is that this is directly related to the disappearance of a young woman from the area in 2002.

There is much more to this nasty story and we should all follow it closely.

In a related item, the Winnipeg Free Press reported yesterday that the Chief of the Norway House Cree Nation has proposed by-laws that demand that residents involved in illegal or destructive behaviour either seek treatment or get out.

This is a most welcome instance of Canadian aboriginals seizing the day, showing real pride in themselves and fighting for positive change.

The official response?

INAC (Indian and Northern Affairs Canada) has said that the group has no jurisdiction over such matters and their local bylaws will be meaningless and unenforceable.

On the other hand...

This week I am visiting the St. Norbert and Selkirk, Manitoba installations of the Behavioural Health Foundation, Canada's oldest, first and foremost residential treatment centre for addicts, alcoholics and others.

The resident clients of these facilities, old and young, are eighty per cent aboriginal.

It is a truly beautiful thing to behold.

Over one hundred kindred soul working together, maintaining sobriety and building for the future.

Why people feel they have to go to Italy or further afield to study the Therapeutic Community model is mystifying when it has been operating here so successfully in Winnipeg for so many years now.

Full disclosure.

I was the founder of this program forty years ago in Vancouver.

I retired from this work in 1976.

To see how the next generations have hauled this idea so much further up the mountain is inspiring.

The more programs like this are welcomed and funded, the fewer Highways of Tears.

What Have We learned?

It took more than three years of complaints and cries for action from citizens and family members and then the media for the police in and around Vancouver to finally acknowledge that someone was murdering and "disappearing" native women prostitutes.

Ultimately, the result was the arrest and conviction of Robert Pickton.

How many women died while the police twiddled?

In Northern BC, we still have the Highway of Tears.

Now Manitoba is experiencing the identical phenomenon.

Native prostitutes are disappearing or being found murdered in creek beds.

At least count, there are 75 aboriginal women missing in Manitoba.

That's the same number of police officers assigned to the case of Peter Ladner's murdered sister.

There are 522 aboriginal women missing nation-wide.

Yesterday, the Manitoba provincial government announced the creation of a "task force." It will be in place in a month.

Do we have at least two systems of justice and at least two auto-responses from police forces in this country?

That is, one for white folk and one for natives?

Yes, we do.

In the Manitoba cases, the link seems to be about crack cocaine and the Vietnamese drug dealers in Winnipeg, although nothing has yet to be proved or even on the docket.

While we read our papers, real women are being killed.

In Canada.

Nomenclutter

Fifty years ago, an Olympic official proposed that in the case of black women, “the International Olympic Committee should create a special category of competition for them – the unfairly advantaged ‘hermaphrodites.' ”

The official's name?

Norman Cox.

You cannot write material like this.

Life. What a comic!

Pictured herein is Caster Semenya, who won the 800 metre final in the world competition last week. Her gender is being questioned.

Journalism & Community Values

DRUNKS BACK FREE BARS ON EVERY CORNER

Now, there's a headline.

Makes as much good sense as the real one:

Drug users back proposed needle exchange in Victoria

Moammar This

Al-Megrahi may or may not be guilty of being the Lockerbie Bomber.

He was found guilty by a court of law and imprisoned for the crime until the other day when he was sent home to Libya.

There he was received as a hero and hugged by the well-known madman Gaddafi.

Mr. Gaddafi, by the way, is on his way to New York to address the Untied Nations. His request to pitch a tent in Central park was declined, so now he's moving into a mansion In Jersey next door to a Rabbi. You can't write material like this. It can only be reported.

Meanwhile, back at the Lockerbie nightmare, there are many who believe that Al Megrahi is innocent.

Here is one writer who believes this, and her thoughts are certainly worth the read.

In the end, however, whether this man is the bomber or not (and I am not saying that is unimportant), what remains is that his release stinks of politics and money and that the reason given for his release is not credible.

FORE! play

APPARENTLY all of America is suffering from L.D.S.

That would be your Limp Dick Syndrome.

Cialis is not only the main broadcast sponsor for the entire PGA Tour this year, and that includes the majors, but now it is practically the banner and title sponsor for the 6 o’clock NBC News.

What is this telling us about life in the land of opportunity?

I wither at the thought.

Well, it says that Big Pharma never went broke underestimating the gullibility or sex drive of the average Yanqui He-Man.

It says that golfers are even stranger than I always suspected. (“Where’s my effing ball???")

And that NBC News will sleep with just about anybody for a buck.

I await your pithy conclusions.

Le HST - Pulp Friction

I was Wrong and Naive

Let's re-visit Lockerbie.

The man found guilty of blowing up a plane in 1988 that resulted in many, many deaths has been sent home from a Scottish prison to Libya.

The public story is that he was released on compassionate grounds because he is dying of prostate cancer.

Like you, I took this nonsense at face value.

I argued about whether or not his prostate cancer was a good enough reason to free someone this evil.

I took all of this cover story seriously.

Until yesterday, that is.

What changed?

I had my hair cut.

And my Libyan barber gave me the proverbial ear full.

"See if this murderer is still alive three months from now, or even a year," my barber asked.

Here is the real story, according to my scissors-brandishing source.

Libya is on the upswing.

Hell, it is flying high. One of the world's largest suppliers of oil and swimming in construction and new enterprise.

Last month, British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, who has remained curiously silent on this release fiasco, was drinking tea with

Muammar al-Gaddafi

Scotland is one of the few countries in Europe to not have benefited from Libya's current successes. France, Germany, Italy, almost everyone else has been cashing in. Put your ear to the stones at Peggy's Cove and Kashing! Kashing! you can hear the registers ringing.

So now, Abdel baset Al-Megrahi, the mass-murderer, is released from a poor Scots jail and greeted in Libya with a hero's welcome.

"He will now be a very, very rich man. He will write books and be treated like royalty," my source assured me, as he held a hand mirror to the nape of my neck.

Soon, haggis will be served at every cafe in Tripoli. Amidst the desert heat, locals will wrap themselves in Scottish woolens.

I avoided my own best rule for news - follow the money.

Prostate cancer - my butt!

What was I thinking?

Don't Even Read It

Sometimes the question is the wrong question.

Sometimes the statement is oxymoronic, or just plain dumb.

Take this headline...please.

"Quebec's landmark heroin study in jeopardy

$600,000 funding cut would endanger research into whether it's more effective to give recovering addicts heroin than methadone"

This is a perfect example of an article in the daily news that I don't even read. Reality show contestants murdering their model girlfriends falls into this category as well. Not to mention how many drugs Michael Jackson's doctor may have given him the night, etc...

Let's look at this headline a little more closely.

"Landmark study"

Oh? By whose standards. It will prove what? And what useful action will follow?

Landmark, indeed.

'whether it's more effective to give recovering addicts heroin than methadone"

Hahahaha...

How about whether it is more effective to shoot people with bullets or hack them to little bits with machetes? Now there's a study worthy of a government grant.

"Recovering addicts?"

If they are being given heroin or methadone, what exactly is it that they are recovering from?

And how are they "recovering?"

They are being maintained on their insidious soul-destroying community-ravishing habits by a ghoulish and mistaken government.

Finally...

Why do papers publish this nonsense unquestioned?

Is it not the role of the Fifth Estate to ask questions? I mean, real questions?

Asking if it is better to give Poison #1 or Poison # 2 to an already poisoned person is not really a healthy line of enquiry.