Is This the End of Canada? (open letter)

One of the things I have learned is the integrity of our First Nations people. It has been the voice of the land for centuries and has not become tainted with the propaganda that money will fix everything.

My European mind was raised on the power of wealth. I came to Canada as a young woman filled with dreams of being a success: a good job, education and ability to reason. But it became apparent, that individual success could not be attained alone. My desire for success was really a need to belong.

From informed and conscientious people I  learned economics is not just the stock market, jobs and profit margins. The current notions broadcast by right-wing interests insist its either business at any cost or nothing.  Unless we say “how high” when trans-national power order us to jump, we will starve to death. 

This neoliberal view offers no value to human dignity and without dignity and respect, we become nothing more than “consumers”. We cut ourselves off from the language of community, the land, the air and the water. We cease to be complex humans and rush to win (at any cost) the next game.

Kinder Morgan’s pipeline and its tankers not only risk our land, our air and our water (says Coast Protectors), it makes human nature redundant. We retreat to the reptilian urgency of either/or. 

Right now I suspect we are bullied by bigger corporations.  This is not free trade. This is submission without question even though our government may be looking for the best deal, even though jobs are essential and we need money, we must not overlook the threat of corporate fascism and the atomization of community.

The lesson we must learn from those who have paid a terrible price in the past, is that people who are left powerless become mass murderers, and the only public discourse is expressed in hate.

I am inspired by the aboriginal people of this land, who in spite of the trauma they endured, through policies of genocide, still offer hope in their dedication to something larger than their individual wealth: the care of this earth and all that sustains us.

Many may believe this is naive because centuries of abusive power has made us cynical and potentially homeless. Now we are threatened with extinction. 

This is our Othello moment. We change our priorities or believe the lies and kill the thing we love most.

Oil versus Life

Notley versus Horgan or Oil versus Humanity?

The power of oil is absolute.  It's based on money. If you have enough money to buy lawyers and politicians the outcome is predictable.

If the social climate is indifferent to injustice and to the environment, if we are unable to care about what sustains and what threatens and we are simply in awe of new gadgets and fashions we have traded our family for novelty.

If we are unable to see the dire prediction we are in we are addicted to diversion wherever we may find it. The Olympics, TV dramas, Netflix, gambling, alcohol, sex and drugs.

News headlines may present different arguments for saving the economy or saving the environment, from different experts, and may run to mass shootings, bombings, cruelty and evil deeds, but it all comes down to the same thing: do we care enough to be engaged.

Do we care if so many bad news stories indicate the madness of our so-called leaders versus the vulnerability of courageous minds attempting to defend justice?

Would we rather sound clever, knowledgeable, powerful, in our conversations rather than admit to our vulnerability?  Would we rather laugh and cheer on the bully that cannot lose rather than admit we are part of his/her dinner?

Council of Canadians has offered changes to the NAFTA agreement that doesn't protect the rights of the oil industry over and above the rights of the people who live near the pipelines. Here's your own toolkit https://canadians.org/nafta.

When Will The Conqueror Know He Has Won

• How many Palestinians must be killed before Israel feels safe? 
• How many Arab states must submit to American demands before the deal is made? 
• How many threats must Notley direct towards BC before the people of Alberta recognize her efforts for the oil industry? 
• How many Canadian tax dollars must be awarded to Kinder Morgan before they are satisfied?
• How many Aboriginal people must die of poverty, poison, suicide, and murder before Canada provides the services they need? 
• How many African Americans must be incarcerated before white people feel supreme?
• How many populist movements must win before the little guy realizes he was lied to?
• How many scape-goats must be punished before we realize they were never to blame?
• How many democracies must crumble into fascism before we realize what has been lost?
• How many decades of 'free trade' will it take before we understand it was only free for the corporations, not for the people?
• How many wars must be fought before the strategists are satisfied they have emptied the earth of the common people?
• How many hours of our lives will it take to convince the system that it cannot thrive without justice and a clean environment?

Native Knowledge

Anthropologist Wade Davis, now at the University of British Columbia, refers to the constellation of the world’s cultures as the “ethnosphere,” or “the sum total of all thoughts and dreams, myths, ideas, inspirations, intuitions, brought into being by human imagination since the dawn of consciousness. It’s a symbol of all that we are, and all that we can be, as an astonishingly inquisitive species.” Native Knowledge: What Ecologists Are Learning from Indigenous People. Jim Robbins. Yale Environment 360.

However, our national government seem to be babysitters saving this land for the profit of other nations.

350.org warns: “Let’s be clear – today’s announcement was a pledge to write a blank cheque, backed by public money, to a Texas oil company in a desperate play to bailout a pipeline that violates Justin Trudeau’s own promises on climate change and Indigenous rights. It’s desperate, dangerous and delusional, and it ignores the fact that opposition to this pipeline, in the courts, in the streets and all across Canada, is only going to grow. There’s no indemnity against that.”
“Desperate, dangerous, delusional” – 350.org Responds to Morneau Kinder Morgan Announcement

I believe our future depends on our ability to throw away centuries of European hegemonic ideology and open up to the wise voices of those who are defending the planet.

Petty Cruelty in the World's Greatest Country?

"No, this is about petty cruelty turned into a principle of government. It’s about privileged people who look at the less fortunate and don’t think, “There but for the grace of God go I”; they just see a bunch of losers. They don’t want to help the less fortunate; in fact, they get angry at the very idea of public aid that makes those losers a bit less miserable.

And these are the people now running America." Paul Krugman. NYTimes.

This is a clear article to read, but I wonder why anyone wants to see people starve and suffer?  What values have generated in such a social climate that the Republicans and Trump supporters are for this. Are people generally this cruel or is the state simply manufacturing consent? How does this benefit the American nation?

This is Our Othello Moment

History has concocted a pattern of heroism, leadership and charisma.  Movies love to portray  personalities of great men -  superhuman, godlike - from Jesus to Lenin to Churchill, to Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela, and many others.

Shakespeare's Othello explores the tragic flaw in humanity's relationship to the hero who exemplifies the very best in human nature.  Insight, intelligence, diligence in the search for what is true, courage and beauty. 

Iago represents the anti-hero - the ego who allows small-mindedness, jealousy and bigotry to control his ambitions. The anti-hero relentlessly offers false claims, fake news, to destroy the hero rather than look for ways he could challenge himself and seek the better person within.

My imagination and desire seeks the Othello in myself but has stooped to Iago at times. Right now it is so easy to become cynical, and wallow in all the bad news that fills our media. If it bleeds it leads. Corporate media loves to fill its front pages with the mindless quotes of our modern Iagos while the gullible public believes the lies they are fed.

We read, write and speak of the reprehensible in public life, as if celebrity equals leadership. We know its bad news and it is scary that politics is driven by the lowest common denominator, but we fill the air with this until it becomes very difficult to trust in the power we all have to build better worlds.  When love turns to hate, community turns to war.

In the end Othello the hero, murders Desdemona the young beautiful wife whose counsel was loving, calm and wise. His reputation was one of honour,  integrity, and good judgement until he allowed Iago's lies to  corrupt him.

After Othello sees  what he has destroyed  he then kills himself.

When we are aware of the evil that mobilizes political power our awareness begins to silence the calm, inner voice of wisdom of love. When we become cynical we look for strongmen rather than good men (or women) to lead us. But they can't because their capacity like Iago is invested in chicanery. They only know how to destroy civil society and replace it with their own narcissistic mirror.

This is happening to democracies all over the world.  Can we save our inner Othello before  Iago destroys us?

Desmog Reports 10 Handy Facts About Canadian Energy

James Wilt reported in Desmog Canada a brief list of facts from a larger report by David Hughes. Here are the brief facts:

1. Canada uses a massive amount of energy
2. There’s an incredible amount of hydro power in this country
3. But we kind of suck at non-hydro renewables
4. Industry uses most of the energy in Canada
5. Western Canada is littered with an unbelievable number of old wells
6. The oilsands still produces some of the highest carbon oil in the world
7. Alberta is receiving astonishingly little return on its oil
8. Fossil fuel jobs are also surprisingly low
9. Meeting climate targets is going to be nearly impossible with oilsands expansion
10. We need to rely on facts to guide us forward