First, Take. Then, Give Only politics could be this backwards

Perhaps this is an old political trick.

Or maybe it really is a case of a political team waking up (somewaht) to present realities.

In any case, B.C. Finance Minister has removed a bit of the HST sting today, announcing about $235 Million in relief rebates for schools and hospitals.

Hey, it's a start...

The Photos of Hawaiin Clark Little Speak for Themselves

R.I.P.

Afternoon Blog

I must dash out of the house first thing this morning for two meetings.

Thus, I will post today's blog in the early afternoon.

Stay tuned...

Wrong Investments

No story more clearly illustrates the Campbell government than the one I meant to post yesterday.

Being a 2000-year old man, I got caught up in other matters (The Lady and the Library really had me going...) and I plain forgot.

Here is the story.

Victoria promised money to build a maritime centre in North Vancouver. This would replace the hopelessly inadequate Maritime Museum currently languishing on Kits Point.

For those who continue to live in the Popsicle delusion that this is a city fueled by latter and real estate, surprise.

We are a port.

Potash and compact cars, that's who we are, kids.

So, a multi-purpose centre on the waterfront that celebrates our very nature and offers educational, historical, archival, entertainment, shopping and dining opportunities is a no-brainer.

uh...

That is if you're not putting all of your eggs into a 12 day event in one February, and anything that's left over into a new Teflon roof for your stadium.

With much fanfare, including a 2008 announcement by Premier Gordon Campbell, the province put up $9-million in funding, and was expected to contribute an additional $20-million to $25-million in capital costs for the 110,000-square-foot centre.

The federal government pledged $20-million in funding, contingent on provincial support.

Kiss that goodbye.

“I was afraid something like this would happen, given that it had been taking so long,” said James Delgado, president and CEO of the Institute of Nautical Archaeology based in Bodrum, Turkey.

“[I'm] heartsick, absolutely heartsick.”

Delgado, who was one of the best people we have ever had plying these local waters, left because he saw the handwriting on the wall years ago.

Jim was Executive Director of the Maritime Museum. He was also a wonderful writer, world-famous deep sea diver and relentless booster for Vancouver.

We lost his terrific energy because of this kind of short-sightedness.

Did you know that in the basement of the current Museum are actual relics from the Titanic?

I've seen them, but that's because I've bothered to go down there.

Me and 12 other people in the last 20 years.

So...back to Gorgeous Gord.

The priorities are clear and unmistakable.

Billions for the Big O, which used to mean something else altogether.

But when it comes to the relative lunch money for something that truly speaks of Vancouver and British Columbia heritage, the cupboard is bare.

Let's just rename the fellow Short Stick Gord.

Long-Term Solutions for Haiti

The Haiti disaster is horrifying and the rescue and relief responses are encouraging.

But Haiti has long been a hideous nightmare.

Will the Have Nations now truly do what they can to help lift these poor souls into a new life?

I cannot write any more clearly about this necessity than the editorial writers have today in the Globe, or the guest columnists have in their piece.

Please read both. They are important and spot on.

None Other Than Us

Who is Jean Kavanagh, and where did she study civics?

Oh, that's right.

Sorry, I forgot.

We don't teach civics in Canadian schools.

Why would we want children to know anything about government or power or money or voting or citizens' rights or...hush, now...democracy?

Jean Kavanagh, it turns out, is the marketing and communications manager for VANOC.

And a bang-up job she is doing, alright.

All on her own precious initiative, Kavanagh has sent a memo out to libraries and librarians in Vancouver warning them, no less, that they mustn't display anything with a logo of a company that is not an official Olympic sponsor.

In her advanced state of wisdom, Kavanagh has defended this action by saying it is NOT censorship.

I guess because she says so.

But Alex Youngberg, president of the library union, says the memo is contrary to the spirit of a public library. "There's something in my library to offend everybody," she said. "And that's our job. Our job as library staff is to not ever censor any information."

Here are the remedial steps I recommend.

Fire this fascist fool.

Send all VANOC immediately into a crash course on the real meanings of civic responsibility.

Ask for 500-word essays from everyone on democracy on the street in an actual living community.

If this is Kavanagh's idea of creative marketing and communications, I suggest she will be most comfortable working in a college environment, where I have learned that people have very little idea of these concepts and very little touch with the great expansive outer world.

On the same day, John Furlong, main beater of the VANOC drum, is entreating the good burghers of Vancouver to get with the program and get onside and get happy.

We should welcome this kind of Kavanagh-thinking?

No thanks.

Heroes, Reconsidered

Yesterday, I wrote in this space about the un-necessity of having heroes.

On the other hand...

There is Miep Gies.

She died this week at the age of 100.

She was the last of Anne Frank's four protectors.

She was an ordinary woman who only did what she thought was right.

God willing, may we all be so ordinary.

The Strongman of Coney Island

Joe Rollino died yesterday while taking his daily five mile walk.

He was 104 years old.

He was struck by a van.

He was small, but one of the strongest men who ever lived.

Read this obit from the NY Times and marvel at a real character.

The Old Folks

This lovely photo is part of a large collection of elderly couples in China sent to me by one of my very dearest friends.

I post it as accompaniment to the Jacques Brel song offered below.

Beautiful Brel Song Beautifully Sung

No Heroes Please

I was never a great listener to Talk Radio.

I like music. End of story.

Since leaving the world of Talk Radio, I have listened to almost zero minutes.

I like music.

But, of late, if I am in the car in the morning, I will tune in to The Jim Rome Show or Dan Patrick in the early afternoon.

Last night coming home from dinner at a restaurant, I heard someone else's show. I am sorry but I don't know the fellow's name. He was very good at engaging with callers.

The subject, of course, was the amazing (both of my forked tongues are in all of my cheeks) revelation from Mark McGwire that he set his Major League Baseball records while on...yes, shocking, I know...steroids. AAArrgggghhhhhh.

Yes, Mark. We are all blown away by this confession.

So, a caller calls up the radio show and he does this monologue about heroes.

What is he going to do about his six-year old daughter and her apparent God-given need and right to have heroes?

What, indeed, knucklehead from Tallahassee, Florida.

This conundrum brings to mind the old therapy saw that "we are trying to stop thinking of ourselves in terms of being the giant of our dreams or the monster of our nightmares."

Believing that your six-year old needs or will find heroes in professional sport is as much "stinkin' thinkin'" as embracing the tooth fairy and heroin.

What about you, Dad?

Might you consider being your child's hero? If, in fact, he or she needs one?

Of perhaps you might consider raising your child such that he or she becomes his or her own hero?

Or lives without the fantastical notion of heroes.

Below is a song by Marvin Gaye.

Marvin Gaye's teenage wife says that in their last years together - before he was shot and killed by his own father - that she and Marvin were "seriously addicted to drugs and alcohol."

There is no question that Gaye was a seriously gifted and fascinating man and musician.

Those who knew him well still feel the crush of love and disappointment that came with Gaye's descent into personal and public hell. They still care deeply about this man because of all the good that he brought with him.

But he was entirely a human being...good, bad and all things in between.

Hero?

I don't think so.

Mark Sluggo McGwire? He of the Popeye arms? Bad choice.

Tiger?

We can all learn from Tiger's fierce determination and above all preparation for his golf game. Apply that focus to almost any activity and you should be the better.

Well, almost any activity.

No.

Who am I to speak? Hardly the Father of the Year in any year.

But I say this.

Raise your kids to notice the world around them.

To appreciate and cherish so many things.

To be appalled by the appalling.

To laugh and to disagree and to find their own ways.

Be your own best version of a mother or father as often as you can remember to be.

NBA stars with guns. Rapper with guns. Singers, actors, football players on coke...

Get serious.

Because a guy can tackle another guy and send him to the hospital is hardly reason for your kid to call this one-note johnny a hero.

The paradigm needs some serious shifting.

The Costs of Learning

A friend has asked me to comment on the Harper government's cutting off funding for the Canadian Council on Learning.

I told him that I was yet qualified to offer an opinion because I didn't really have a good clear picture of what the CCL did to earn its $85 Million start-up grant.

Today, the Globe & Mail editorial tries to answer this question.

While I don't know that they've covered all the bases here, I tend to agreeing with their take on the matter.

Do you know anything about the CCL? Has it earned its keep? Will it?

The Title Alone is Worth the Price of Admission

Sshhhh...we're Canadians, Part 9,876,242

Roy MacGregor has tackled the prorogued Parliament story in his morning column in the Globe and he has managed to come up with two new twists:

1. Canadians prorogued Parliament on a permanent basis years ago. We just don't give a beaver's tail.

2. The worst governments we've ever had were the activist meddlers of Trudeau and Ryan Baloney.

The best we've ever had, like Chretien, did nothing.

Hahahaha...

It's an excellent read.

Not Quite Toscana

Economic realities are based on the exploitation of low-cost foreign labour, living in sub-human conditions without human rights.

What ugly evil regime is described in that first sentence?

Sorry to say that it is the lovely, sun-drenched buon giorno of Italy.

Millions of African workers pick that fresh fruit and vegetables everyone enjoys.

After weekend riots, thousands of these real human beings were jailed.

That may or may not be better living conditions than they already have in make-shift camps.

Meanwhile, Berlusconi's wife is looking for about $68 million in her divorce.

Guest Blogger, Victor, Takes on Sammy Kahn

Two questions come to mind as the notion that Canada's airports should
hire elite investigative observers instead of investing in scanning
technology gains momentum.

First, where would we find these people? After all, we're told by the
same media critics that the RCMP is hopelessly corrupt, our military
is in collusion with dark forces among the Afghanistan government and
CSIS was manipulated by Homeland Security in the Mahar Harar affair.
So if we are so hapless in creating competent, corruption free
investigative agencies, what makes us think we can do it in this case?

Second, will the Elite Investigative Observers spend equal time
peering into the eyes and smelling the sweat of all passengers?
Remember, this is multi-culty Canada and if these security officers
spend a nano second more peering into the eyes of a turbaned passenger
than they do checking out the 60 year old white Anglican grandmother,
the CBC and the usual quote monkeys from the Civil Liberties industry
will go into full dudgeon.

The whole concept of Canada creating an effective corps of Elite
Investigative Observers is in keeping with our propensity to wallow in
our own fables. Which prompts a song:

SONG FOR ELITE INVESTIGATIVE OBSERVERS (EIO)

Transport Canada trained some guys
Ei Ei O
To rudely peer in travelers' eyes
Ei Ei O
With a stare stare here
And a leer leer there
Here a stare there a leer
Equal leering have no fear
Transport Canada trained some guys
Ei Ei O (shit)

Not to be Obsessive, But...

And the National Post carried this thorough examination of the wrong-headed airport security games:

"This is a stupid game and we should stop doing it."

Look in Their Eyes

Yesterday, I posted a news story ("The Other Way") about the Israeli approach to airport security.

Here is a follow-up article which confirms that we are headed in the wrong direction on this front:

Israeli Security vs American/Canadian Security

Juval Aviv was the Israeli Agent upon whom the movie ' Munich ' was based. He was Golda Meir's bodyguard -- she appointed him to track down and bring to justice the Palestinian terrorists who took the Israeli athletes hostage and killed them during the Munich Olympic Games. In a lecture in New York City a few weeks ago, he shared information that EVERY American needs to know -- but that our government has not yet shared with us. He predicted the London subway bombing on the Bill O'Reilly show on Fox News stating publicly that it would happen within a week. At the time, O'Reilly laughed and mocked him saying that in a week he wanted him back on the show. But, unfortunately, within a week the terrorist attack had occurred. Juval Aviv gave intelligence (via what he had gathered in Israel and the Middle East ) to the Bush Administration about 9/11 a month before it occurred. His report specifically said they would use planes as bombs and target high profile buildings and monuments. Congress has since hired him as a security consultant. Now for his future predictions. He predicts the next terrorist attack on the U.S. will occur within the next few months. Forget hijacking airplanes, because he says terrorists will NEVER try and hijack a plane again as they know the people onboard will never go down quietly again. Aviv believes our airport security is a joke -- that we have been reactionary rather than proactive in developing strategies that are truly effective. For example: 1) Our airport technology is outdated. We look for metal, and the new explosives are made of plastic. 2) He talked about how some idiot tried to light his shoe on fire. Because of that, now everyone has to take off their shoes. A group of idiots tried to bring aboard liquid explosives.. Now we can't bring liquids on board. He says he's waiting for some suicidal maniac to pour liquid explosive on his underwear; at which point, security will have us all traveling naked! Every strategy we have is reactionary. 3) We only focus on security when people are heading to the gates. Aviv says that if a terrorist attack targets airports in the future, they will target busy times on the front end of the airport when/where people are checking in. It would be easy for someone to take two suitcases of explosives, walk up to a busy check-in line, ask a person next to them to watch their bags for a minute while they run to the restroom or get a drink, and then detonate the bags BEFORE security even gets involved. In Israel , security checks bags BEFORE people can even ENTER the airport. Aviv says the next terrorist attack here in America will involve suicide bombers and non-suicide bombers in places where large groups of people congregate. (I. E., Disneyland, Las Vegas casinos, big cities ( New York , San Francisco , Chicago , etc...) and that it will also include shopping malls, subways in rush hour, train stations, etc., as well as rural America this time ( Wyoming , Montana , etc.). The attack will be characterized by simultaneous detonations around the country (terrorists like big impact), involving at least 5-8 cities, including rural areas. Aviv says terrorists won't need to use suicide bombers in many of the larger cities, because at places like the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, they can simply valet park a car loaded with explosives and walk away. Aviv says all of the above is well known in intelligence circles, but that our U. S. Government does not want to 'alarm American citizens' with the facts. The world is quickly going to become 'a different place', and issues like 'global warming' and political correctness will become totally irrelevant. On an encouraging note, he says that Americans don't have to be concerned about being nuked. Aviv says the terrorists who want to destroy America will not use sophisticated weapons. They like to use suicide as a front-line approach. It's cheap, it's easy, it's effective; and they have an infinite abundance of young militants more than willing to 'meet their destiny'. He also says the next level of terrorists, over which America should be most concerned, will not be coming from abroad. But will be, instead, homegrown' -- having attended and been educated in our own schools and universities right here in the U.. S. He says to look for 'students' who frequently travel back and forth to the Middle East. These young terrorists will be most dangerous because they will know our language and will fully understand the habits of Americans; but that we Americans won't know/understand a thing about them. Aviv says that, as a people, Americans are unaware and uneducated about the terrorist threats we will, inevitably, face. America still has only a handful of Arabic and Farsi speaking people in our intelligence networks, and Aviv says it is critical that we change that fact SOON. So, what can be done to protect oneself? From an intelligence perspective, Aviv says the U.S. needs to stop relying on satellites and technology for intelligence. We need to, instead, follow Israel 's, Ireland 's and England 's hands-on examples of human intelligence, both from an infiltration perspective as well as to trust 'aware' citizens to help. We need to engage and educate ourselves as citizens; however, our U. S. government continues to treat us, its citizens, 'like babies'. Our government thinks we 'can't handle the truth' and are concerned that we'll panic if we understand the realities of terrorism. Aviv says this is a deadly mistake. Aviv recently created/executed a security test for our Congress, by placing an empty briefcase in five well-traveled spots in five major cities. The results? Not one person called 911 or sought a policeman to check it out. In fact, in Chicago, someone tried to steal the briefcase! In comparison, Aviv says that citizens of Israel are so well 'trained' that an unattended bag or package would be reported in seconds by citizen(s) who know to publicly shout, 'Unattended Bag!' The area would be quickly & calmly cleared by the citizens themselves. But, unfortunately, America hasn't been yet 'hurt enough' by terrorism for their government to fully understand the need to educate its citizens or for the government to understand that it's their citizens who are, inevitably, the best first-line of defense against terrorism. Aviv also was concerned about the high number of children here in America who were in preschool and kindergarten after 9/11, who were 'lost' without parents being able to pick them up, and about our schools that had no plan in place to best care for the students until parents could get there. (In New York City, this was days, in some cases!) He stresses the importance of having a plan, that's agreed upon within your family, to respond to in the event of a terrorist emergency. He urges parents to contact their children's schools and demand that the schools, too, develop plans of actions, as they do in Israel . Does your family know what to do if you can't contact one another by phone? Where would you gather in an emergency? He says we should all have a plan that is easy enough for even our youngest children to remember and follow.. Aviv says that the U. S. government has in force a plan that, in the event of another terrorist attack, will immediately cut-off EVERYONE's ability to use cell phones, blackberries, etc., as this is the preferred communication source used by terrorists and is often the way that their bombs are detonated... How will you communicate with your loved ones in the event you cannot speak? You need to have a plan... If you believe what you have just read, then you must feel compelled to send to every concerned parent or guardian, grandparents, uncles, aunts, whatever and whomever. Nothing will happen if you choose not to do so, but in the event it does happen, this particular email will haunt you...."I should have sent this to..... ", but I didn't believe it and just deleted it as so much trash from old Bill Jones!!!

Getting it All Wrong, Part 973

The absurdity of the ass-backwards approach to airport security was illustrated the other day at the Ottawa airport.

Read this story and try to explain why the geniuses would choose for a randon pat-down an 85-year old white woman who weighs 90 pounds.