Panglossian Notes

Territorial Leader Paul Okalik reveals his feelings publicly. Finally!

Paul Okalik seems to have finally been caught showing his true colours.

This was going to be a longish note and I'd written quite a bit about Okalik but with likely too many specific details about his behaviour that I've witnessed. None as you may imagine too flattering. I've decided to censor myself and simply say I think Okalik is a "prick" and I'm glad he has finally been caught out in public with his pseudo "big man" act.

I love his excuse, politicians of Okalik's ilk always have an excuse written by some flunky paid to string any old set of sentences together. So for Okalik, mimicking real people, the problem is not that he is a "prick" who has no respect for women, unless, of course they are blonde and a little large in the backside area, it is that the poor boy has been working too too hard. I wonder at what: the golf swing, good pick up lines, etc. . Whatever, eh, eh!

Good for Sally Gunn another potential real leader for the Inuit, and a female - it's striking how many qullunaaqs come out of the Arctic and say "it's the women in the North that are the real leaders. They ask the good questions. They care. They seem to know what they want. And then there are the men, the hunters! A long a dull pause usually follows." .

Sally has annoyed Mr. Okalik because she is pushing, I think rightly, for Nunavut municipalities to have some role in considering development in the territory which is about to explode with the usual potential devastating effects on a basically subsistence society. "Big man" Okalik however will have no one question him, after all he is a lawyer, at least he was called to the bar in the territory, just minutes before he was sworn in as the new territorial leader. He'll actually hang out a shingle and may even take a client or two or appear in court to argue a case sometime in the future maybe. But a lawyer none the less? Oh well, who would know about secret societies like bar associations, I guess it is really just a matter of pay their bar fees and not being caught in some "really" obscene situations to stay in good standing with them. It would never have anything to do with the actual practice of law.

Just a side note: the Globe and Mail reports the actual words the "big man" Okalik used to describe Sally Gunn but some other papers are nervous about his using the "f"-word so they have printed a caution and used the typeset form of blipping to indicate the expression. Pretty funny.

Globe & Mail:

Premier Paul Okalik referred to the head of the Nunavut Association of Municipalities as a "fucking bitch" on Wednesday at a dinner in Goose Bay, Labrador, that was being put on by an Inuit self-government group.

Canada East:

CAUTION: Note graphic contents

Premier Paul Okalik referred to the head of the Nunavut Association of Municipalities as a "f**king bitch" on Wednesday at a dinner in Goose Bay, Labrador, hosted by an Inuit self-government group.

Technorati Tags: Aboriginals, Globe and Mail, Nunavut, Politicians, Shmucks, wow

Assembly of First Nations' day of action

Not too long ago the mnemonic AFN was joked about in the Globe & Mail as standing for the "association of Finnish nudists" and not the Assembly of First Nations.

I think this was during Matthew Coon Come's tenure as National chief and during a time that the AFN was taking a pretty aggressive approach in its interactions with the Canadian federal government. Coon Come had made his name as one of the Northern Quebec Cree leaders who hammered out agreements with the province of Quebec regarding James Bay hydroelectric development, so he was fairly pugnacious so-to-speak.

However the posturing of the AFN under Coon Come went nowhere, as I recall, and the organization went into a bit of a tailspin until Phil Fontaine, the current National chief - he is in his 3rd term, was reelected to head the lobby group.

Fontaine reverted to a more conciliatory tack in dealing with the federal government which, I guess, finally resulted in former Prime Minister Paul Martin's last minute conference in British Columbia and the hurried, but stillborn, Kelowna Accord. [The ministers responsible for Indian & Northern Affairs under Martin's predecessor, Jean Chretien, had been pretty lackluster in handling the portfolio and frankly aboriginal issues were not considered the most pressing National problem when it came to spending lots of additional federal dollars even though, at federal budget time, aboriginal issues normally received some special mention.]

But, under the Harper government of Canada, the AFN, even under the diplomatic and seasoned Fontaine, has been getting no-where-fast with any aboriginal items. Though they seem to like the new Harper announcement regarding a new "specific claims" process. We'll see over time I guess. [Is it just me or has anyone else noticed that Harper does all the announcing. What do cabinet minister do in the Harper government? They appear to be simply ornaments or maybe just props to disguise Harper's dictatorial rule and pronounced megalomania. Oh well!]

Harper's Party, with its "common-sense", rural/small town Reform Party roots, have never been exactly sympathetic to aboringinal problems in this country but neither has it really figured out any real policy positions on most matters, either domestic or foreign, that could effect the country as a whole. In fact Harper's Party seems to be floating and, I guess, waiting for some thoughts which could arrive over the summer and that won't mean it shoots itself in the foot and can't win a majority in the next federal election.

But the Harper Party muddling approach to Canadian policy is an aside.

The AFN will be holding a National Action Day tomorrow, the Friday before Canada's July 1st National birthday party. More aggressive elements in some First Nation tribes in both Ontario and Manitoba seemed to have forced the organization to become more demonstrative in regard to demands that First Nation, as opposed to, aboriginal problems be dealt with a little more expeditiously and it seems the major problem is resolving land claim. The new "specific claim" process may help ease some tension down the line but it won't necessarily help for tomorrow or the holiday weekend.

A good thing is it looks like the hot humid weather of the last week in Southern Ontario will not be around which should go some ways to helping to control tempers if First Nation blockades start to go up on the major 400 type highways through the province. Via Rail has also announced that it is suspending its rail services "between Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal and saying Kingston and Halifax services will be cut or altered as well".

Margaret Wente had, from my perspective, a reasonable column in this morning's Globe & Mail where she at least mentioned some aboriginal dissenters to make her point, with which I'm not completely sure I agree, that individual empowerment will ultimately solve the troubles of the original peoples in all lands settled by Westerns.

She points to the New Zealand Maori writer Alan Duff (see an interview with him in pdf) and Calvin Helin - author of Dances with Dependency - of the Tsinshian Nation in British Columbia as examples of aboriginals that call into question the modern way of dealing with the original peoples. Both focus on the fact that aid and support funding creates dependency on the provider which can undermine those receiving it.

Anyone in government who has had anything to do with an aboriginal file will or should be well aware also of what Wente refers to in her column as the "indian industry". It, in fact, is a variation of the usual Western "development or underdevelopment industry" fixtures: people - with lots of specific, and at times strange, qualifications, and buildings - multi-stories but miles away from any clients so-called. With the "indian industry" she points out:

"We [in Canada] now have a vast Indian industry of chiefs, government bureaucrats, lawyers, consultants and academics ... . Many of these people are well-meaning. They are also the chief obstacles to change, because their remedies make the problems worse."

Margaret Wente
June 28, 2007
Globe & Mail

I'm not sure I agree with her conclusion that everyone involved in aboriginal files makes the problem worse but I do think she is correct in stating that the "indian industry" can be an obstacle to change. But this seems normal to any part of human activity - vested interests protect those interests, don't they? Breaking out is the problem and unless I've miss read history this isn't really easy or clean and without a messy revolution.

I don't expect the national day of action to be a revolution or even the beginning of a revolution. I guess, I also don't think there is any real group solution to aboriginal problems. I hate to say it but any solution, I think, likely will only really come for individuals if they maybe pretend they are immigrants in their own land.

Devastating, heart breaking I know but right now I'm not optimistic there may be any other way to avoid the litany of social awful that exist in some aboriginal communities.

Look to Nunavut if you think a land claims agreement will mean nirvana.

Technorati Tags: Canada, First Nations, Inuit, Metis, puppy

Blair, another case of a fool starting to believe his jumped-up CV

I'm just back from holidays in the UK and France and relaxed and I think calmer than usual so it is really hard to focus on the silliness that masquerades as current affairs particularly in regards to the seemingly endless botch jobs inflected on the Middle East.

However the rumors, that had been circulating even before I went off to bang around on the other side of the Atlantic, about Tony Blair being appointed as the new savior for the Palestine aspect of the Middle East fiasco seem to be coming to pass. If, of course, the Russians can be brow beaten or whatever into accepting him.

Blair as a new Middle East fixer! It is really hard to think of anything much funnier.

I wish old politicians would simply get off the public or semi-public stage when they have been dumped by voters or it is clear they have become a liability for their party. Divisive failed politicians, like Blair, need to simply go away. But I guess that really is asking too much in this increasingly vacuous point in so-called human history.

Blair, now a political celebrity, must continue to impose himself on us poor lower level critters in order to prove himself not the deranged and delusional specimen he seemed to become as his stay at Number 10 (or was it Number 11) Downing Street dragged out.

The "Northern Ireland fixer" bs that Blair and his pals, supporters - god what could they really be - in the Quartet of the EU, UN, USA and Russia is revealed in its true bogus light in an article by Malachi O'Doherty analyzing his "great" contribution to peace.

Technorati Tags: Accountability, Nitwits, Politicians, War criminals

G8, a load of old rubbish?

God is that "G8 plus one" thing over yet? No another day to go!

I guess we can be thankful it isn't like that other international snoozefest the annual APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) meeting. At that noted non-event the goofy chief executives and heads-of-state dress-up in the native costume of the host country for a hilarious photo-op on the last day.

So we are spared seeing the current group of leaders dressed up in lederhosen swelling huge mugs of good beer, I guess? I suppose you have to be thankful for small mercies.

But it's too bad some seem to have missed out on even a small glass of beer ( I count only 4 plus one leaders in the picture) because, as usual, extremely little has so far actually gone on in the German seaside resort. A glass of beer would have been a treat, even for these characters.

These meetings are mainly an exercise in patience for "officials" who must endlessly craft and re-craft the language of "decisions" in such a way that everyone agrees. This means, of course, that the words the leader-types get to pontificate about have little or no real meaning.

Poor Angela Merkel, having hoped for adoption of her sensible global-warming initiative, but not having counted on the likes of Bush and buddy Harper, is stuck saying emptiness like this:

"The agreement that binding goals on reducing emissions were necessary was an important signal."

Such is life in the heady realm of international stuff.

I see Reuters is now characterizing Stevie Harper as wooden:

"Harper, a somewhat wooden figure regularly mocked for his lack of flair ...",

And because, our Stevie was just completely run off his little feet at really, really important big persons problem things, eh, so he couldn't meet Bono. Besides, Paul Martin had met with Bono so the Harpinator couldn't be seen with a "tainted" celebrity now could he.

Ya, Steve I really believe you, but maybe it will impress your reformer party supporters.

Sorry the guy, Harper, is simply an a-hole.

My favourite shot so far from the gathering has not been the leaders, in the worlds largest wicker beach chair, but this one, on the right, of them crossing the lawn in front of the resort.

Notice everyone moving away from our Steve, even Bush is drifting to the right. My, just short of pre-senile, mind immediately wondered: " Has Steve passed gas, again?". I hope not. He is embarrassing enough, I think.

Technorati Tags: Canada, G8 1, Much to do about nothing, Politicians

Canada adopts "church lady's" line as its G8 climate strategy!

Remember church lady, of course you do. Well the Harper Party government of Canada seems to have adopted her number 1 catch-line as its overall approach to be taken at the G8 meeting over in Germany.

Feds to present Canada to G8 as 'special' country:

Canada has a message for world leaders who will gather next week in Germany for the annual G8 summit: when it comes to climate change, we're "special."

Canadian officials are working to ensure any global climate-change solution discussed at the summit takes into account Canada's growing economy, surging population and booming energy sector, according to a senior government official.

National Post
June 2, 2007

I particularly like it that the Harper Party government seems to be a bit fixated on that word "surge". I wonder where they might have picked-up a taste for that particular intransitive verb, hmm. I'm wondering if the spin and bumphinator boys and girls in the PMO had a specific definition of the verb in mine when they chose to use it in their pre-G8 briefings

Definitions of surge on the Web:

1. billow: rise and move, as in waves or billows; "The army surged forward"
2. soar: rise rapidly; "the dollar soared against the yen"
3. rush: a sudden forceful flow
4. tide: rise or move forward; "surging waves"
5. a sudden or abrupt strong increase; "stimulated a surge of speculation"; "an upsurge of emotion"; "an upsurge in violent crime"
6. scend: rise or heave upward under the influence of a natural force such as a wave; "the boats surged"
7. billow: a large sea wave
8. see one's performance improve; "He leveled the score and then surged ahead"

Could they have meant number 2 "soar" or do they know something none of us poor citizens maybe entitled to know and have meant number 5 - i.e. there' s a shock coming that only the Harper Party government can see?

It is probably just a word some communication hack picked out of the air because they thought it might have some humph related to it after the Bushies and neo-con middle-East "surging" dreams.

But using it to describe our population growth? Come on give me a break. In terms of "surging" in that area we are certainly better than New Zealand but behind the U.S., Indian of course, and even Australia. Statistic Canada estimates that our net population (births - deaths + net immigration) is growing by about 3 tenths of a percentage point annually. Head spinning right?

If adding one net person to the existing Canadian hordes every 144 seconds is surging it just doesn't seem to fit with any of the definitions listed above. [the U.S. adds 1 every 10 seconds, India 1 every 2 seconds, Australia 1 every 130 seconds and New Zealand 1 every 1,176 seconds].

Technorati Tags: Canada, Global Warming, Harper Party government of Canada

The Canadian Military at Work?

I think this is just new today, a massive banner hanging from the South wing of the Defence Department Headquarters building in downtown Ottawa (YOW).

I wonder how the expenditure on this will be allocated in Ricky Hillier's budget. All in a "good" cause, right?

If Ricky, his NATO buddies and their spinmeisters, could get maybe a little focused - I do know they are burning up grey matter like crazy trying to actually get a PLAN for adventure Afghanistan - they might even have figured out that some are starting to call the ribbon thing-me-bob something else.

Ah, Mr. Fish not exactly the coffee shop type of peccadillo being offered up by the "support the troops" gang here in YOW. But, we up here, as compared to you down there in the "states", are sort of new to the rally round the troops gig, unless there has actually been an "official" declaration of war. And we haven't had one of those since 1939.

Besides we are a little light on casualties - the fatal type - just now.
To date we have had 56 killed in Afghanistan, that's about 1.7 deaths per million of Canadian population. Pretty small when you consider that traffic accidents kill about 90 of us per million a year.

But we do have you, in the "states" beat on the per death ratio in Afghanistan. You only have 1.3 dead per million of US population in that place.

Now, however, if we add in those killed in Iraq you guys beat us.

You have combined Iraq and Afghanistan deaths today of 3,872, that's about 12.9 deaths per million. You do have a long way to go to get to the Vietnam numbers though. In that adventure you had about 287 deaths per million but you beat us right now.

For us to get to your 12.9 deaths per million rate we need another 365 fatal casualties.

Boy, if we got 421 deaths (56 right now + 365 extra to be equivalent to the US death rate per million) those little yellow ribbons would be cock rings here to but they'd be around the current Prime Minister's pudgy neck and Ricky Hillier would likely be discovering the joy of a hockey stick but it would be virtually certain it would be in a place that the sun has never shone.

Technorati Tags: Afghanistan, Canada, Military, USA

It's Friday and I can't wear red again!

[In response to the hypothetical question: do you "support the troops"? My response is "do I have a choice?". Not really I think, I'm subject to income taxes being withheld at source and must pay income tax installments on contract & investment income. Tax revenues are the key to supporting our Afghanistan adventure and I always pay my share. Oh, also, I don't want any Canadians killed there be they: military, civil servants, NGO personel, reporters or simply the curious.]

Another Friday and I'm avoiding wearing any item of red clothing.

"Avoiding" is likely too mild a word. I've packed away all my clothing that could even be considered to have the slightest red hue by those who may be red-green colour blind and likely won't pull anything out for sometime. So it would be better to say I won't be wearing any item coloured red whether it's Friday or not.

Why have I decided to do this?

Because I don't want to be even remotely confused as someone who props up the "support the troops" gang here in Canada.

This lobby group has appropriated red shirts etc. worn on Fridays as a symbol of its cause.

What's the groups cause?: who would really know.

Like some so-called grass-roots movements this one I hope started out based on "good intentions": local pep rallies to cheer-up the poor military in Afghanistan.

The thing has however quickly morphed into maudlin patriotic and schmaltz gatherings with talk of the "mission", "the fallen", and "heros" bandied about. Even worse, in my way of thinking, is "support the troops" has, either willingly or not, been conned into being a platform for incompetent and befuddled politicians who have been caught in details with a strong potential to discredit the "troops".

So, no red for me on Fridays or any other days of the week until we can get back to being just slightly more sensible.

For a start I'd like some of the questions, wonderings and speculation that Afghanistan activists keep posing responded to. For example:

1.

Shukriya Barakzai, ... wants to know just what the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) thinks it is doing in Afghanistan.

"They are too worried about getting shot themselves," the Parliament member says. "Just who are they here to protect - the Afghan people or themselves?"

2.

Rory Stewart, a former British diplomat in Iraq and the director of the Turquoise Mountain Foundation, a non-governmental organization helping to develop Kabul's crumbling inner city [wonders].

"By talking so much about democracy and propping up warlords without delivering serious progress, we have managed to discredit a lot of our basic notions in the eyes of the Afghans."

3.

Afghans themselves also question how Western governments and their carefully chosen Afghan partners have managed to spend billions of dollars in development assistance with little other than several unsafe highways to show for it.

4.

Saad Mohseni, an Afghan-Australian director of a large media conglomerate in Kabul says "Afghans are asking what has happened to this money."

5.

Rory Stewart speculates:

Until NATO and the United States decide what their real mission is, ... perplexed Afghans are bound to grow increasingly bitter toward foreign occupation.

"Right now, NATO soldiers are flying 10,000 miles to maneuver through Afghan villages in full body armor and a tank," he says. "Villagers just think, 'Yes. And the Taliban are trying to kill you, and you are insisting that you are just here to build a girl's school?'"

Missions impossible: NATO's Afghan dilemma
Philip Smucker
The Asian Times
June 1, 2007

Technorati Tags: Afghanistan, Canada, Military