Category Archives: Democracy

Oct 17 2015
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Democracy, Politics

The NDP vies for Atlantic touchdown

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Theirs may be a Hail Mary pass, mere days before the federal election, but you’ve got to hand it to the New Democrats: if nothing less, they are determined to go down fighting.

Just as some polls show Justin Trudeau effectively eating Thomas Mulcair’s lunch, last week the NDP announced its platform tailor-made for Atlantic Canada. It included a surprising number of goodies calculated to warm the cockles of regional hearts.

There’s a bit more money for regional development initiatives. There’s a promise to spent $512 million over the next four years on cities and downs for things like road and bridge repairs. Mr. Mulcair, et.al., also want to establish 50,000 childcare spots, costing parents a measly $15 a day. What’s more, the former socialist party intends to retain door-to-door mail delivery – something its arch-nemesis, the Conservative government in Ottawa, has announced it will dismantle across the country.

Whether any of this will actually persuade enough voters in Atlantic Canada to throw their hats into the ring with the NDP is an open question. In recent days, throughout Canada, sentiments have been shifting.

According to a recent CTV news report, “The latest nightly tracking by Nanos Research shows the Liberals emerging with a lead in the national election race, with the Conservatives holding steady and the NDP continuing to slide.”

Apparently, voters were asked, “If a federal election were held today, please rank your top two current local voting preferences.”

The results gave the Grits a squeaker of a head start against the Tories (35.6 per cent support, versus 31 per cent, respectively). At the same time support for the NDP has broadly plunged.

Said the news report: “The NDP have slid by a significant margin in Quebec, from a high of 50 per cent support at the beginning of the campaign, down to 30.1 per cent in the latest poll. The NDP are now in a statistical tie with the Liberals in the province, who registered 28.1 per cent support in the latest tracking.

“The Bloc Quebecois and the Conservatives are also in a statistical tie for third, with the BQ at 20.4 per cent support and the Conservatives at 17.4 per cent in Quebec. Outside Quebec, the latest regional numbers show: The Liberals lead in Atlantic Canada, with 50.2 per cent support; the Conservatives lead in the Prairies, with 46.9 per cent support; the Liberals have 40.9 per cent support in Ontario, while the Conservatives are at 36.5 per cent support; in British Columbia, the Liberals are tracking at 34.7 per cent support, with the NDP at 30.0 per cent support.”

As Nik Nanos observed, “”The Mulcair brand is strong, and it’s very clear from the polling that he’s probably the most well-liked of the three federal leaders. The bad news is, Canadians don’t see him as prime minister.

Of course, this sort of shake up was bound to happen. The NDP, both federally and provincially, have provided Atlantic Canada with some of the region’s best policy ideas – both humane and sensible – in recent decades.

But attitudes about politics and politicians become easily calcified, and it doesn’t take much to undermine a promising showing in popular opinion. Sometimes it takes only a vague notion that, in the end, no amount of good intention, no number of worthy ideas, can eradicate the perception that the NDP has been and shall always be Canada’s “third” party (a rather absurd proposition, given that it was, until the election call, the nation’s Official Opposition).

Still, really, who wants to play on a team whose forwards can’t catch the ball?

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Oct 17 2015
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Democracy, Economy, Politics

New Brunswick’s issues are united

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Word comes down that the residents of Fredericton consider jobs, infrastructure and education as the top three priorities in this slow-motion federal election. All of which raises the inevitable question: Well, duh?

If Monctonians were asked, what would they say? Would their priorities be eating, breathing and sleeping? Would citizens of Miramichi wonder about moose fences, camp bylaws and the funny, little things in the middle of the provincial highway that keep you on the straight and narrow at midnight?

Nope. Likely, they would all say what matters most to them are jobs, infrastructure and education for the obvious reason that without an education you can’t obtain a job and without infrastructure you surely can’t get to one.

Pretty simple, no?

So, why do we make these matters so complicated?

Our provincial governments are determined to divide our province – all 750,000 of us – into “regions” of interests.

There is the north, where life begins and ends on the riparian reaches and harbours of hope nestled against the Gulf.

There is the south, where a great river runs to ensure that tourists enjoy their reversing falls.

There is the east, where a harvest moon beckons to California surfers, looking for a long-board experience on the mighty Petticodiac.

There is the west, where the zip-line of the Grand Falls meets the Maine forests of Paul Bunyan and his Great Blue Ox.

Altogether, and through it all, we crave one thing: clarity from our political leaders, and, more importantly, a sense of unity. That’s what we’ve been missing. That’s what we desperately need. And we’re not getting it.

For years, and more, New Brunswick’s Grits and Tories have been playing a game of musical chairs. Neither party has actually addressed the fundamental issues that commonly affect the people who do all the heavy lifting in this province. Rather, the main political gangs have preferred to castigate each other, ruin each other in the eyes of those who hold the keys to their respective castles: members of the public.

The results have been predictable.

In this province, we now endure an utterly unworkable government – one in which the bureaucracy holds no trust in anyone, and, for that reason alone, cannot be trusted; one the people who elected it are broadly certain they made a terrible mistake one year ago, four years ago, a generation ago.

We have come to the devil’s crossroads, people. The status quo simply won’t do anymore, if it ever did. We either sell our souls to the bond-masters of Wall Street, or we dig our way out by getting involved in the dirty, filthy political process of real change.

Either we remain sheep or we become wolves. Either we remain dopes or we become thinkers. Either we remain dreamers or we become doers.

So, then, if word comes down that the residents of Fredericton consider jobs, infrastructure and education as the top three priorities in this slow-motion federal election, consider the obvious:

It’s the same for all of us in this pretty province; it’s the same for everyone in this frightened region; it’s the same across a nation now terrified of its own shadow, now convinced of its own pernicious character.

We don’t need a political propaganda campaign to tell us what we’ve known in our bones for decades: We have seen the enemy, and we are it.

We have elected these fools. The time, now, is for taking back what we gave away, and to redeem the purchase of our democracy – one job, one student, one good road at a time.

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Oct 17 2015
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Democracy, Politics

Disproportionately misrepresented?

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The problem with Canada’s electoral system can be summed up in four words: “first past the post”.

It means, simply, that those who win a plurality of votes (more than the other guys, but not enough to justify a true majority in any particular constituency) get to rule the rural and urban roosts of this country without further ado.

For our purposes now, in an election cycle, that could mean that 60 per cent of this country will collectively vote for the NDP and the Liberals.

Still, under our peculiar system of government – which we borrowed – that would not be enough weapons-grade determination to defeat the Conservatives, whose 40 per cent showing would almost certainly return their majority government for a fourth, historic time.

As Globe and Mail national affairs columnist Jeffrey Simpson pointed out last May, “Canada’s system is looking increasingly isolated. It’s a system inherited from Britain, but even in that country, the system no longer easily fits with a fractured electorate. It also no longer fits easily in Canada, where three of the last four elections produced minority governments.”

Indeed, Mr. Simpson writes, “In contrast to many other systems, the Canadian provides very few checks and balances on a prime minister with a majority. The unelected Senate is a wet noodle; the government backbenchers are yes-men; the cabinet members are appointed by the top dog. With a couple of exceptions, none would dare stand up to such a domineering leader and his controlling staff.”

In fact, the evolution of western democracies seems to favour some form of proportional representation, and NDP Leader Thomoas Mulcair is not wrong when, in his election platform, he claims, “Democracies such as Germany and New Zealand have embraced proportional representation and realized improvements since moving away from first-past-the-post. In a study that looked at 36 countries with proportional representation, countries that reformed their systems saw increased voter turnout, more women and minorities elected and an overall higher satisfaction with democracy.”

Nova Scotia’s Atlantica Party also makes a good point when it declares in its mission statement, “A party that gets 35 per cent of the vote should not get 60 per cent of the seats in the Legislature. Electoral reform is needed to give fair results while retaining the voter-representative link. Voting systems such as Single Transferable Vote provide this; making it easier for independents to run in elections.”

The party also wants to institute e-voting and “the direct election of the Premier (and of) Nova Scotia’s Senators. Everyone should have a say in picking our leadership. The ruling party should not have the unfair advantage of game-playing the date of an election. Election dates should be fixed every four years and be called Joseph Howe Day.”

What if, in a new mood of enlightened self-interest, local leaders decided to experiment with proportional representation in New Brunswick – indeed, across the Maritimes?

Would that make our democracy stronger, more able to sustain a wider variety of voices and opinions, more wiling to entertain unorthodox, yet workable, solutions to our shared problems?

Or would proportional representation only guarantee – as its opponents repeatedly point out – policy gridlock at every turn of the screws of government? You think it’s tough getting anything done now, they argue? Just wait until you add dozens more dissenting voices to the mix. See what happens then to the quicksand of political decision-making?

Still, I’m inclined to ignore “facts” that are not based on evidence. How do we know until we’ve tried?

We certainly know what “first past the post” has done for, and to, our democracy.

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Oct 17 2015
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Democracy, Politics

Couch potatoes for democracy

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The anybody-but-(fill in the blank) voting strategy is a time-honoured tradition in western democracies. In fact, the late, great American comic, Richard Pryor, squeezed a whole movie out of the construct in the 1980s.

In “None of the above”, the actor played a hapless candidate running on a simple platform: No one is good enough, wise enough or strong enough to represent the public, whose interests he or she purports to cherish. So, the message went, vote for “no one”, not even the guy urging the boycott.

As political commentary, the piece was mildly affecting. As movie-making, it was merely ho-hum. As a blueprint for democratic change, it was naïve, at best, and, at worst, oddly seditious to the underpinnings of a society that still embraces the conviction that individuals – no matter how poor – can still make a difference to their various lots in life as long as they exercise the power of their plebiscite honestly.

This species of strategic voting has raised its head in Moncton in recent weeks, as roadside signs urging people to “nullify” their ballots have cropped up overnight.

Elsewhere in New Brunswick, certain social activists have inveighed against what they characterize as a crooked and fossilized system that allows political candidates with a simple plurality to, in effect, hijack entire constituencies in which the majority vote goes against them. The activists ask people to protest with their hindquarters on October 19 and stay home – a sort of “couch potatoes for democracy” gambit.

It’s tempting to fall in line behind this thinking. After all, no form of proportional representation – which would immediately inject more, better and diverse voices into the system – has ever gained traction in a province where political elites of the two major parties (Liberals and Progressive Conservatives) jealously guard their territories. It hardly matters that the New Democrats are gaining ground (at least, until recently), for, as they do, the “machine” transforms them, leveling them, remaking them as “mainstream-light”.

Still, it’s important to understand what we lose by voting against a thing (either by staying home or deliberately scratching a ballot), as opposed to what we gain by voting for a thing (as odious as this may seem to be).

We lose when our disaffection trumps our determination to effect change. Fewer votes automatically concentrate power in the hands of (guess who?) the powerful. The greater concentration of power, the better likelihood there is of abuse of such power.

Imagine a New Brunswick where only wealthy business owners and propertied money-managers have seats at the table where decisions are made. You think you’ve got it bad now; boys and girls, I’m here to tell you ain’t seen nothing yet!

You can forget about “public consultation”. Banish all thoughts of making a positive difference in your lives. No one is listening, precisely because you chose not to be heard.

Politics, like nature, abhors a vacuum. It will fill up the void with the good, the bad and the ugly; it all depends on who’s doing the pouring.

On the other hand, we win when we engage – not because we are voting for a particular candidate or party, but because the weight of our democratic participation cannot be easily dismissed by interests who would rather see us watch political pot-boilers on Netflix than witness our lineups at the ballot box.

Personally, I may not always agree with the “great unwashed” – a company in which I gladly include myself – but I am not prepared to have my mind sanitized by the alternative.

I will vote, looking for the best in a bad crop.

Will you?

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Sep 25 2015
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Democracy, Politics

The seasons of our discontent

Permanent winter for a Moncton events centre?

Summer came in like a lamb, and, for all intents and purposes, it settled for a long slumber from which it has yet to fully awake.

On the first day of autumn, in Moncton, the sky was azure blue, a light southwest wind blew, and the temperature was Bermuda-warm.

In the weeks and months ahead, I will remember that day because, for sanity’s sake, I must.

How else does one survive the winter that is surely to come?

There are no descriptions sufficiently accurate to capture the utter absurdity of last year’s white and woolly season – in fact “white and woolly” doesn’t even scratch the surface.

During the days just before Christmas 2014, a record seven feet of flakes fell on Buffalo, New York. In comparison, we on Canada’s East Coast had gotten off Scot-free. In fact, on December 27, the mercury didn’t dip below 16C. We could have been forgiven for believing that the rest of the winter would be just as mild. Except for the fact that The Almighty was not in a forgiving mood.

When Old Man Winter finally descended sometime in mid-January, he arrived for the duration – kicking up his feet, daily belching snow and ice, until, under some of the coldest temperatures on record, he had deposited as much as 500 centimeters (16.4 feet) on my West-end neighbourhood of the Hub City, by early April. Even the old-timers where astonished.

At some point in late June, the last of the once-incredible snow dump, adjacent to the Shopper’s Drug Mart on Vaughan-Harvey Blvd., had finally melted to the ground, leaving only the standards and flags intrepid mountaineers had planted on its peak.

Then, mercifully, came summer – one of the finest and longest on record in this corner of the Canadian Steppe.

Also, rather rudely, came Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s election call on August 6, reminding us all that October 19 is just around the corner, vaulting us all into the shoulder season that prefaces the arrival of winter, once again.

There ought to be a law, in this country, that proscribes warm-weather political campaigns – one that prohibits stern-faced candidates from invoking the certainty that our cold, dark, worried hearts are as inevitable as a February Nor’easter.

Leave that to the shovel season, when those who want to vote for “one-of-the-above” or “none-of-the-above” must work to get out of their driveways and exercise their democratic rights, come rain, sleet, ice, and snow.

As it is, signs urging voters to nullify their ballots have been showing up all over Moncton’s downtown in recent days – the lazy, hazy consequence, perhaps, of a glorious summer, interrupted by the same, old politics of division, easy partisanship, and cynical vote pandering.

Try erecting those road-sign messages (any messages) in the middle of a blizzard; see how far you get.

Still, we persevere; looking for a main chance, searching for a man or woman who will speak the truth, for once, to power, tracking the Great Dear of democracy through the September of our expectations, the snows of the impossible winters of our frozen minds, the frigid springs of our disbelief, and, finally, the summer seasons of our discontent.

As for me, I will take the last of this beatific time of the year to reflect, under the blue sky and baking temperatures, on the fleeting nature of pure joy: When the lambs and lions of the political world might finally lie down together, and contemplate building this province, this region, this country together.

After all, then, and only then, will we fully awake.

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Sep 23 2015
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Democracy, Politics

The crowns of our careers

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When I was 33, I was schlepping phone books, on temporary assignment in the back end of Halifax’s Fairview neighbourhood.

When Brian Gallant was 33, he was ending the first year of his inaugural term as premier of New Brunswick.

Who, I wonder, had the better deal?

In my case, all I had to do was forget the fact that the publisher of the magazine that had employed my wife and me as editors and production managers had gone bankrupt, concentrate on the then and now, and pick up enough loose change to fill the gas tank and deliver the yellow pages to gulags of apartment complexes.

In Mr. Gallant’s circumstances, all he had to do was reconcile a provincial budget that ran hundreds-of-millions of dollars into the red with the fulsome expectation of a jurisdiction, hosting 750,000 people, which would clamor, loudly, for its regular, reliable entitlements – including, perhaps, why it was no longer getting free phone books every April 1.

This is one of the reasons why, when I have been asked by various political parties over the years to run as a candidate on their tickets, I have politely, but firmly, stated: “I would rather be road kill on the Trans-Canada, stuck in the grill of a RAM ProMaster van, than live to answer questions from people like me, over and over again.”

This is, of course, why Brian Gallant is a better citizen of this province than I. So are David Alward, Shawn Graham, Bernard Lord, Camille Theriault, and even Frank McKenna, who doesn’t even live here anymore.

Each of them chose to run for, and succeed to, public office, knowing the costs to their personal lives and well being, knowing how fully ridiculed and hated they would become. Each of them, in their own ways, made peace with that inevitability.

This is not to say that those who aren’t inclined to throw their hats into the political ring should let those who are off the hook. This is, after all, our remnant of democracy.

So, to Mr. Gallant, on the anniversary of his first year as premier of New Brunswick, I say: Good start.

You’ve managed to get just about every constituency angry: Seniors, public servants, educators, health-care professionals, and ambulance drivers.

In fact, that’s what a first-term premier is supposed to do – level the playing field, shake out the winter carpets, prepare for political springtime. People don’t pay attention to the condition of their own lives until they are well peeved.

The corollary to this is, of course, to generate one, truly magnificent idea around which to rally a disaffected and disengaged public – not three, not two, just one good, durable notion that will catalyze a productive, prosperous society.

You might begin this way:

Talk more, in the next year, about giving back to New Brunswick not the trinkets and baubles the federal government sometimes allows, but the power and capital local communities require to collaborate and thrive together.

Build a true consensus across county and municipal lines for common social and economic needs in our hospitals, clinics and schools.

Ensure that every kid in this province learns to read, write and speak both English and French to an international standard. Deliberately remodel New Brunswick as a center of excellence in math, science and literature.

Finally, lay the foundation for civil discourse in this province; make facts rule the public conversation.

You, Mr. Gallant, are only 33. Your whole life is ahead of you. And, from my perspective, at age 55, you have the better deal.

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Sep 21 2015
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Democracy, Employment, Politics

Leveling the playing field

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Speaking truth to power doesn’t guarantee that the ears of the privileged among us will open. But they will almost always burn – and in a delightful reddish hue, no less.

Charles Murray’s job is, thank goodness, to afflict the comfortable. In fact, as New Brunswick’s Ombudsman, he gets paid to swing away at provincial Crown corporations like WorkSafeNB, which is precisely what he did last week in a closed-door meeting with a blue-chip panel of experts which is reviewing the legislation that covers the Worker’s Compensation Act.

Specifically, according to Mr. Murray’s official website, “The Ombudsman is an independent officer of the Legislative Assembly who investigates complaints from the public about New Brunswick government services. Ombudsman offices are present throughout the Canadian provinces and their services are free”.

Indeed, “The New Brunswick Ombudsma’s Office has one central mission: to ensure that all New Brunswick citizens are treated with administrative fairness by government and its agencies. The Office strives to guarantee that individuals are served in a consistent, fair and reasonable manner by provincial governmental organizations.”

As for WorkSafe, Mr. Murray is blunt. “In a rather fundamental way,” he said in his presentation, which is posted to his website, “it is our strong impression that WorkSafe’s present calibration, if I may use that word, is proving less equitable to injured workers than it should.”

He elaborates: “For the worker, the injury represents a deep, life-changing, and fundamental challenge to their ability to live the sort of life any of us would wish, both for them and their families. It touches them very deeply. The injury is a blow to financial and emotional security for them and their loved ones. It also may, at the very time of this challenge, diminish their mobility, their ability to perform their daily tasks and hence their available time. The injury itself, the medication needed to treat it, and the stress and trauma of the accident and the uncertain future may also compromise their mental health.”

On the other hand, the company that employs the injured worker “faces no such existential crisis. Its challenge in finding a replacement worker or in reallocating duties may be more accurately described in terms of degrees of inconvenience.”

How has equity and fairness drifted over the years? Mr. Murray invites his audience to “look at the imbalance another way. Any government agency which interacts regularly with powerful, articulate and monied interests in the private sector risks over time being persuaded to shift its perspective towards that interest.”

In fact, he warns, “If regular self-examination is not conducted, agencies may find themselves what is termed ‘captured.’ They become so used to seeing the world in a certain manner that they lose the ability to see the invisible ways in which they are favouring one side of the balance they are tasked with ensuring.”

Naturally, WorkSafe’s president, Gerard Adams, is buying none of what Mr. Murray is selling. In a statement, reported by the Telegraph-Journal, he expressed his surprise and disappointment with the Ombudsman’s statements.

Still, is it dramatically difficult to believe that institutional inertia does, over time, favour the status quo, which, in turn, favours the powerful and the privileged?

This is not necessarily a deliberate attempt by individuals to favour one party over another. In a sense, the problem would be easier to fix if it were engineered that way.

This is the way of the organizational world; the banality of evil is, sadly and all too often, bureaucracy.

That’s why guys like Charles Murray still have jobs afflicting the comfortable.

Thank goodness.

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Sep 20 2015
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Business, Democracy, Economy, Politics

What’s wrong with this picture?

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As a resident of this fair province, New Brunswick, it’s a hopeless comfort to know that while the rest of Canada slips quietly into recession, I may expect to keep my head above water and even thrive during the two minutes it takes me to attach the absurdity filter to the worn and threadbare spectacles I use to read the morning headlines.

So it was the other day when I came across this marvelous series of proclamations from New Brunswick’s finance minister, dutifully reported in the pages of provincial newspapers:

“Nationally, we’re in a recession and Stats Canada has confirmed it,” Roger Melanson said some days ago. “So we will continue to monitor the situation on a quarterly basis. That’s why we have quarterly updates. It’s the tool we have in terms of making the information public so New Brunswickers are fully aware of the state of our economy.”

Yet, his finance department boldly predicts an annualized growth rate in the province of between 1.5 and 1.7 per cent next year. Why? Because the economic auguries say so? Because the entrails of road kill on the Trans-Canada are aligned just so? Because the tea leaves in the lunchtime cups left on the cafeteria tops at Freddy Beach suggest better times ahead?

How bluntly irrelevant Minister Melanson’s claim is – especially when you consider that most New Brunswickers are already fully aware of the state of their economy. Indeed, as the nation dips into recession, this province has never managed to crawl out of a long, agonizingly slow one.

The essential quandary is: Do we care?

Go back into history see the same ludicrous patterns repeating today: A province whose economy is bifurcated by rural and semi-urban sensibilities; an institutional sector that will protect its turf at the expense of the students, professionals, patients, and citizens it purports to represent; a political culture whose last, good idea for meaningful change died when the New Brunswick inventor of kerosene did.

The agony that Mr. Melanson does not address when he talks of scraps of GDP improvement in this province in this year is the long, slow dissolution of self-reliance, self-improvement, and enthusiasm in this province.

Where are the monumental projects of imagination?

Who will build the next generation of entrepreneurs willing and ready to break the molds crafted by their forbears?

What new cohort of young people, coupled to older folks, stands to step up in this province to usher a renaissance of economic, social and political principals and priorities?

These are the questions that political leadership in this province should pose. Instead, Mr. Melanson seems content to rely on the predictions of statisticians and economic actuaries to spin a wobbly tale of good news about New Brunswick’s prospects.

“It’s important to note,” he says, “that every province, including us, have adjusted their GDP projection based on growth. . .(With the exception of Prince Edward Island) we’ve all brought it down because of the national situation economically. But we still have to keep in mind that there are sectors of our economy in our province where we have seen positives.”

T’was ever thus, perhaps. But our present condition demands sterner stuff from our elected representatives, appointed bureaucrats and, in the end, us.

Our future cries out for it.

Canada’s national recession may be a lamentable circumstance; ours, in New Brunswick, is a state of mind.

We have, in this province, only two avenues: becoming or calcifying.

We either fossilize or shunt the ties that bind and live in hope.

Through my threadbare spectacles, I choose hope.

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Aug 29 2015
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Culture, Democracy, Government

Our ignorance is their bliss

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Knowing what we know today, is it likely we’ll forget it all by tomorrow?

Human nature inveighs against the better angels of our civilized character. Memory doesn’t so much serve us, as pester us.

Consider, for example, higher education in New Brunswick.

For decades, we assumed that a broad, liberal course of study – in the undergraduate years – would prepare students in this province to take their places in the productive working world. They might go on to specialize in any number of disciplines: law, medicine, business management, architecture, theatre, even (gasp!) journalism.

Now, we require them to choose their paths in society before they even know their own minds – to, in effect, forget their youthful passions in the service of actuarial accounts that determine who will be useful, and who will not, to the common weal. Memory is the sentimental enemy of the current political good; so get with the program, kids.

Similarly, we imagine that life for New Brunswickers aboard the good ship Stephen Harper has been either uniformly splendid, or utterly awful. Again, our capacity for accurate recollection fails us.

Once, not so very long ago, the prime minister toured these environs and declared, in so many words, that Atlantic Canada must fight its culture of “defeatism”. We screamed and cried, as we are wont to do. But was he entirely wrong in his sentiments? We said he was.

On the other hand, within scant years, Mr. Harper made it perfectly clear to New Brunswick that Ottawa would guarantee a culture of defeatism here by eviscerating social programs, capping health-care transfers and knee-capping local MPs in his own party if they dared speak truth to power. Was he entirely right? We said he was.

Does memory serve, or merely pester?

Why have we forgotten about the enormous potential of renewable energy technologies in this province? What happened to wind, tidal and biomass, fading into our collective memory of hope and grace? What about early childhood education, universally accessible to all in New Brunswick? Was it just a dream, a faint memory of a better future, idly conjured in the past?

All of which raises the question: If we know what we know today, is it inevitable that we’ll forget it all by tomorrow?

If human nature inveighs against the better angels of our civilized character, shouldn’t we conjure stronger angels to shepherd our finest instincts? If memory doesn’t so much serve us, as pester us, oughtn’t we banish the tyranny that accompanies habitually following those who desperately want to erase that which we would otherwise remember? (Spoiler alert: the babies we elect to high office).

In fact, I adore the memories that pester me. I love remembering when a boy or girl could expect a straight shot at a decent job for life, thanks to a tax-payer-funded training program.

I relish thinking about my own (non-tax-payer-funded) apprenticeships at Canadian Press, CFDR Radio in Dartmouth, and Atlantic Insight Magazine in Halifax. These are images from my life, lessons I have learned, cherished recollections of a society that – while not perfect, by any measure – embraced the ever-spinning wheel of history; past, present and future.

I grew up at a time when Tommy Douglas’ words still resonated: “Courage, my friends; ’tis not too late to build a better world.”

Indeed, we are made of sterner stuff than the current basket of expectations that Ottawa and Fredericton retails daily: Believe what we tell you, try not to think too much; your ignorance is our bliss.

Blow it to bits, friends; and never forget.

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Aug 29 2015
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Democracy, Politics

Our dwindling democracy

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Some who reside in the Greater Moncton area don’t give a chocolate-coated fiddlehead about the Mike Duffy affair.

According to one straw poll I conducted by cell phone between the hours of 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. on a recent Saturday afternoon, as I careened out of town for a weekend of fun in the sun at an undisclosed Maritime location, which is, I hasten to add, not my primary residence.

I should also say that the five people I interviewed comprise a statistically meaningful sample of Canada’s voting public exactly zero times out of 20, with a plus-or-minus margin of error of precisely 100 per cent (in other words, about average for national pollsters in recent elections).

I posed only one question, providing survey respondents with the opportunity to rank their five main issues from one to five, in descending order:

“What would you say is your most pressing concern in this absurdly long, already tedious, election cycle? Is it (a) Duffygate; (b) unemployment; (c) the economy; (d) global warming and Canada’s reaction to it; and (e) the weapons-grade stupidity evinced by all but the tiniest fraction of politicians of every stripe in the soon-to-be-again Great White North?”

The results were compelling, if not especially unexpected.

All five respondents declared unequivocally that political stupidity was their most urgent worry. Comments ranged in tone and perspicuity from, “I hate them, I hate them, I hate them. . .did I mention that I hate them?” to, “you know, it’s probably not their (politicians’) fault; inbreeding causes a lot of problems elsewhere in society too.”

Coming in a close second was the economy. One respondent observed: “So, here we have in the Harper government a regime that once insisted the best thing it could do was to stay out of the private sector’s way, and yet it now runs on a platform extolling the virtues of its economic hegemony.”

Third on the hit parade of grievances was unemployment – or rather, underemployment. “I came to this province on the promise of green fields of opportunity,” said one interviewee. “I figured my advanced degree would make me a fine candidate for good-paid work in New Brunswick. Now, I drive a cab in Moncton.”

Fourth was global warming.

Assorted remarks included: “I went to a beach in New Brunswick and I almost froze my feet off”, “I went to a beach in New Brunswick and I almost had heat stroke”, “Oh. . .wait, I think I see an asteroid about to destroy all of us. . .Funny how it looks just like Mike Duffy.”

In Ottawa, far away from what matters to most people down here, the Senate moils and roils to reclaim its significance, the trials of important others proceed apace.

The world here now begins with irrelevance, marches towards false gravitas and ends in self-importance. The regions of this country do not matter; neither do the cities or towns we call home. And the Mike Duffy affair, which should concern us, simply doesn’t rise to the occasion.

We are, all of us, victims of our own distractions, our own obsessions, our own grievances. There is almost nothing left in the collective piggy bank of charity, forgiveness and grace; nothing with which to rebuild the world we so recently broke.

But should we, in our minds, with our hands and hearts so easily abandon the struggle to understand what goes horribly wrong in the National Capital Region?

To our abiding shame, we have begun to care nothing about the condition of our own democracy, with a margin of error of exactly zero.

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