Canada: A Headless Zombie
I don't know what the political motivations are behind the feds implying they want to regulate automobile emissions after 2010. Frankly, I don't care what drove that little fear-of-God session last night. What is more important here is the weak-kneed response that the rumblings inspired from a few of Canada's most powerful political leaders. The various quotes that hit news outlets last night sounded more like the anxiety and fear you would hear from shaky heroine addicts upon informing them that you are reducing their supply.
On one hand you had Buzz Hargrove - recently divorced from the NDP- frothing at the mouth and defending the flagging auto industry. On the surface, it might have seemed that Buzz left because he could no longer support NDP pro-evironmental protection policy. But appparently, Just Jack Layton supports the right of the gas motor over nature's creatures' right to breathe as well.
Then we had Dalton McGuinty in Ontario and Ralph Klein in Alberta barking back and forth about who was being unjustly "targetted"; Ontario big business or Alberta big business. Wake the fuck up guys! For the Ontario Liberals to frame this argument as one where auto and gas are being pitted against one another is absoutely inane. Everyone knows the 2 evil industries are inextricably linked, like two giant Godzillas that feed each other breakfast every day. One without the other would mean the certain death of both.
So, it is clear from yesterday's panic and chaos that our leaders are obsessed with the status quo, no matter how destructive it is to our health and welfare.
My solution? Ban fossil fuel burning engines. Step up to the fucking plate you pink-handed industry captains and back-boneless poli-chickens. Transform the sectors you love so much if you want them to exist in 20 years. Alberta should be subsidizing R&D for alternative fuels instead of riding the black gusher into hell as it's pressure slowly diminishes. Ontario should be subsidizing R&D for clean engine technology, instead of throwing a couple of million into the wind here and there in acts of corporate welfare every time industry demands it.
Look, people don't give a fuck whether the vehicle they drive is powered by toxic sludge or bio-degradable rice confetti- they just want to drive. Instead of taking the hit and sucking up the inevitable massive reconfiguration/retooling costs for manufacturing hybrids, the auto industry are twiddling their thumbs and simply waiting for the sky to fall. All the while, the unions swim on like giant stupid sharks, consuming wage increases and driving up operating costs every year with absolutely no eye to the future stability of their employ.
The only solution for all parties is sustainability. But with so much blind greed in our world, how is it possible? One thing is for sure, as long as stuffed shirts and fearful minions run our most powerful institutions nothing will change. Maybe one day, tough guys like David Suzuki will stop sanctimoniously preaching to the deaf and dumb and seize the reins of power. It's the only way.
On one hand you had Buzz Hargrove - recently divorced from the NDP- frothing at the mouth and defending the flagging auto industry. On the surface, it might have seemed that Buzz left because he could no longer support NDP pro-evironmental protection policy. But appparently, Just Jack Layton supports the right of the gas motor over nature's creatures' right to breathe as well.
Then we had Dalton McGuinty in Ontario and Ralph Klein in Alberta barking back and forth about who was being unjustly "targetted"; Ontario big business or Alberta big business. Wake the fuck up guys! For the Ontario Liberals to frame this argument as one where auto and gas are being pitted against one another is absoutely inane. Everyone knows the 2 evil industries are inextricably linked, like two giant Godzillas that feed each other breakfast every day. One without the other would mean the certain death of both.
So, it is clear from yesterday's panic and chaos that our leaders are obsessed with the status quo, no matter how destructive it is to our health and welfare.
My solution? Ban fossil fuel burning engines. Step up to the fucking plate you pink-handed industry captains and back-boneless poli-chickens. Transform the sectors you love so much if you want them to exist in 20 years. Alberta should be subsidizing R&D for alternative fuels instead of riding the black gusher into hell as it's pressure slowly diminishes. Ontario should be subsidizing R&D for clean engine technology, instead of throwing a couple of million into the wind here and there in acts of corporate welfare every time industry demands it.
Look, people don't give a fuck whether the vehicle they drive is powered by toxic sludge or bio-degradable rice confetti- they just want to drive. Instead of taking the hit and sucking up the inevitable massive reconfiguration/retooling costs for manufacturing hybrids, the auto industry are twiddling their thumbs and simply waiting for the sky to fall. All the while, the unions swim on like giant stupid sharks, consuming wage increases and driving up operating costs every year with absolutely no eye to the future stability of their employ.
The only solution for all parties is sustainability. But with so much blind greed in our world, how is it possible? One thing is for sure, as long as stuffed shirts and fearful minions run our most powerful institutions nothing will change. Maybe one day, tough guys like David Suzuki will stop sanctimoniously preaching to the deaf and dumb and seize the reins of power. It's the only way.
Labels: Environment, Politics, Regional
posted by K-Dough at 7:30 AM
56 Comments:
Awesome, heavy, big -horizon-like and far-reaching post K-dough. (And I'm oh-so disappointed I missed out on the fun yesterday.)
No disrespect to all you SUV drivers out there, but I've always viewed the return of heavy gas guzzling 8 cylinder vehicles and the swarming line-ups to purchase them as one of the great steps back in civilization.
Why, just this very morning I observed a young mother, driving alone in a tank throwing a wrapper out the window onto the street. I pulled up beside her to give her a death-look, but she was too busy talking on her cell to notice that there is actually a world out there.
This could be why I'm having a "hate all people" day.
(Just got an unwelcome e from the ex too. When it rains it pours...)
You would not believe the looks I get from associates when I tell them I got rid of my car. Some of them probably have had to seek medical treatment for the whiplash they've suffered when they actually see me standing at the bus stop after work.
Is it really that far fetched to want to spend one's money on things that are more interesting and fulfilling than gas and oil and insurance? Why is that such a foreign concept? Savings, trips, more wine.. maybe even an interest in a business... this is more interesting use of my income than a stupid car. Environmental concerns probably tertiary considerations. I like the extra money!!!
Sheena- you have touched on an important, yet sadly neglected, meta-methodological underpinning of political economy. Just think about how much more drunk and stoned we could all be if we didn't have to pay for gas, insurance, car payments and maintenance. Fuck cars.
Bike+transit=SexPartyHappyPeople!!!
Sheena, I have to drive all over hell's half acre as part of my job, but my little four-cylinder bubble helps keep the costs down. Were it not for the job, I'd give up the bloody thing in a heart-beat. (I can think of way better things to buy with all that friggin' day-care money too. Being a grown-up sometimes sucks.)
Thanks a lot, Leather, for bursting my Bohemian bubble with your responsibility lecture.
I have an SUV BUT it's a 4 cyl., so I can drive through ditches (if I want to) but it's not a gas pig. If I could get away without owning a vehicle, I would. My insurance is through the roof (teen drivers).
K-Dough, responsibility? I beg to differ. Last month I bought 4 new CDs, a pair of kick-ass floor speakers, some new Game-Cube software for my boy, and my daughter got that Goddamned Bratz Genie she's been begging me for. I also stocked up on Liqueur and couldn't resist this slutty stawberry red leather jacket for the missus.....while my little biz lost about $1k.
Yup, when the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.
I take issue here K-Dough.
Alberta is more than willing to do it's fair share to clean up the shitpile. You'll not find anyone, Oil and Gas related or no, who doesn't understand we need to get moving on this.
And contrary to popular belief, there's not 4 or 5 guys controlling all the money out here... there's 6, and all they do is plot to overthrow the nations government.
Just kidding, sort of.
Seriously though, Alberta is pouring money into research and development for cleaner extraction, water management, soil rejuvenation etc... and if Rona says we have to do more, then more is what we will do.
Thats what being a good member of Confederation is all about.
People forget is that the industry is also made up of many mom and pop small players, who will most likely be very damaged by any reforms brought in by Rona.
It doesn't matter in the long run, and most Albertans agree we've got to get the ball rolling on cleaning up the patch.
However, it has to be noted that of the full amount of fossil fuels used in this nation, 80% is purely downstream. That is, fuel used by you and I, while the remaining 20% is actually used to create the fuel in the first place.
Dalton McGuinty was doing the typical political posturing expected of a Premier of Ontario. Luckily for Alberta, there's many an Albertan in the Federal cabinet.
If it was a Liberal government, bent on holding on to power, as Liberals are wont to do, they would cheerfully fuck Alberta to appease the voters in Ontario, at both the expense of the west, and the nation.
The energy sector in Alberta accounts for 30% of the nations GDP, wealth produced by less than 10% of the nations population.
Fuck with us, and you fuck with yourself.
Alberta contributed $500 million more in transfers to the nation than it did in royalties from Oil and Gas, approximately $9.5 billion. That is after you account for any federal transfer payments. Albertan’s are the highest paying contributors to Confederation, despite the myth machine called the Star and the Globe.
So to the short of it, for the first time we have a Government who will nail everybody equally, and that’s fine with Alberta. We don't mind sharing the burden. For the first time, Ontario can't blackmail a government into letting it slip through the cracks, because as long as Harper has the west, all he has to do is put forward a strong plan, which doesn't impact to heavily on Quebec, and the French will cheerfully watch Ontario get fucked between the eyes by voting Tory.
All the screaming in the world from the Liberals isn't going to help Ontario this time. All the pandering, ass-kissing Liberals, who have been playing footloose and fancy free with the nation to Ontario's benefit, all for votes, won't be able to stop the wheels this time.
That’s all we ask for in Alberta, is that everyone take part, not just a few for the many. We’ve been browbeaten, fucked over, and generally poorly used for over 100 years, and this time the shoe is on the other foot.
Alberta will not allow itself to be treated like second class citizens anymore, and woe to the Politician that thinks they can.
With this Government it is being shoved down the throat of Ontario. It has to be. Any perception out west that Alberta, and BC, are being unduly targeted over the east and Central Canada, is just another straw on the Camels back. Ontario, and the rest of Canada, need to realize clearly and without ambiguity that Alberta and BC don’t need the rest of the nation. We choose to be here, we like to be Canadians, it’s in our hearts to be patriotic. The flag won’t help if the governments east of the Manitoba border decide to try and fuck us again. There is absolutely nothing of a fiscal nature that we can’t write a cheque out and buy for ourselves, in fact the money we would save by not being part of Canada begins to twist the mind. So that leaves our good will as the reason we are Canadian.
If Jackass’ in the Liberal Party, or the idiots of the world like Dalton McGuinty, want to test that goodwill, they do so at the peril of the people they purport to represent.
We just want equality, we just want to be treated fairly. We seek nothing more, but we will accept nothing less, and the environment is the perfect place to begin to show the west that Canada actually does believe in the principles it purports to uphold to the rest of the world.
JC- my point wasn't to castigate Alberta for anything. My point is that there is no fucking leadership in this country on reigning in big business for altruistic puropses like SAVING OUR PLANET.
Respectfully, I'm not really interested in spread sheets, GDP, transfer payments or Alberta's inferiority/persecution complex.
I care about my daughter developing worse asthma than I have and her kids having to wear oxygen tanks to get to school in 30 years.
Oh and - once again- respectfully -the NEP was 30 years ago. Can we move on? The historical context has completely changed...
No K-Dough, we can't move on... we will never forget, because it's only one of a list of greviences, and you cannot disregard the spreadsheets K, they are what go into making sure you daughter has a life after we start the process.
What good is cleaning up the environment, if you destroy everything that helps you survive.
If you don't want your daughter rubbing sticks together to light a fire, living in a tent, you'd best start paying attention to the numbers, and the way the Country is designed.
It's the design flaws that make everything so difficult to achieve.
There are no more free rides for anyone.
Oh, one other thing, the historical context of the NEP has never been more present than it is today.
Learn the lesson, because this time if we don't, the country is at stake, and all the green intention in the world won't mean much if we are mired in poverty created by dissolution.
I rather just get along myself... :) We could all have cookie cutter treehouses.
Scaremongering isn't going to get you anywhere JC. If Alberta fell off the map I could care less. We'd still have the internet to keep dialogue between you and I going anyways.
But seriously, the so-called design flaws you speak of are not static and immovable you know. A state is a living, breathing (choking lately)thing. But also a state is merely a heuristic symbol of the institutional existence of a certain bunch of people. It's the people that animate it, not hewn-in-rock designs.
Canada is a fluid entity. Drawing lines in the sand over regional resources we covet gets us absolutely nowhere.
But why is it that you are so quick to issue ultimatums on separation just because someone disagrees with you?
A drunk analyst told me once that kind of overreaction is all about fear of abandonment...
Ya see, JC? If you try to turn this into Chucker's Blog it ain't gonna work. This is bizarro blog-world. That's why I live here. It's an equal opportunity love/hate fest. We can acknowledge that humanity is but a tiny blip on the giant history of the planet, and still admit that Rona gives us a Bone-a. It's all anti-relative.
..that said Leather, let us do no injustice to the great Chucker.
I will always think of that conservative bastard with love in my heart. Well, maybe not love- but respect and extreme like.
I beg your pardon, leather. Rona does nothing for me. Okay, well, maybe a LITTLE, but I'm sure it's just the wine, okay?
Oh, never mind!
Agreed K-Dough. Chucker's a sweetie. I visit him all the time. I'm just not ready for a sleep-over yet.
Sounds like Pam is though- and in the middle of the afternoon no less!
Pam, again with the small glimpses of same-sex dabbling. You really know how to get us all going, don't you? Stop it dammit...
I have the solution. Viral decimation. Cut the troops by 10%.
We release an influenza virus to reduce the Canadian population by one tenth.
That leaves more air for the rest of us... or those of us who make it.
(Cough)
Pam: Rona looks hot in the house today actually. If you can make it over to the hill by the end of Question Period you might be able to rope her into a few after-house drinks...
She'd probably be into it too, judging from those strong, prominent jaw and cheek bones of hers.
Harding: You are an absolute nutcase. I love you.
K-Dough, can I borrow you to argue on my behalf at chuckers where people love Ontario bashing and thinking of screwing Ontario?
see, your comments to joe were really good. May be I should take classes from you.
I've been having sleep overs at Charles' and some of the other kids have been ... touching me in the wrong way...
Sheena, I don't drive. I don't mean "no car" I mean "no license". I told a guy that in the Patagonia store in Santa Monica and I swear he swooned... he'd never heard of such a thing.
"I don't bother becoming embroiled in senseless, repetitive province bashing anymore. It's tiresome, pointless and counterproductive to real debate."
Amen, brother, amen.
Over a decade ago a similar mock-debate started when hydrogen began to lead the pack in alternative fuel options. At that time car companies, oil conglomerates and governments were embroiled in the who's on first debate. The debate, at the time, did not revolve around whether or not changes should be made (ten years ago there appeared to be more acceptance of the notion that oil was being depleted and that alternative sources needed to be found) but who should make them.
Out of that came the idea of the hydrogen highway(s) -- two corridors, one in BC and between Montreal and Toronto, where most of the automotive transportation industry travels, were suggested. The hydrogen highways would be the infrastructure that would support the fueling and maintenance of hydrogen powered vehicles.
Five years later, little, if any progress was made. Why? Because of this useless debate of who is responsible.
K-dough, who said is succinctly (and bluntly, god love ya): all industries involved in transportation and quality of life are affected by this issue -- and as a result all have to work towards resolution. To continue to debate these issues simply creates a false impasse and allows all players an opportunity to NOT deal with the issue -- thereby prolonging hard decisions and shareholder/constituency anger.
Grab a set of balls ladies and gents...the decisions have to be made.
While construction did start on both hydrogen corridors, niether produced the extensive level of support that would be necessary for consumer use.
As a result we are not a full decade into the oil bell-curve. And as a former oil-man's daugher I can say with assurity that we ARE on the down slope of that bell curve, regardless of what national leader or what industry professional says in their talking heads speeches.
Finally, K-dough makes another valid point: consumers could not care if we burned stuffed teddybears for warmth -- as long as our coffee makers, microwaves, computers and TVs work, we don't care what we use as fuel.
Now, I have to go. My car needs a tire rotation and oil change.
Cam - and why do you think you are so smart? For exactly that reason. If you had spent your entire youth driving around the suburbs cruising for chicks you;d never fuck and eating cheeseburgers in the McParking lot, you would have never picked up a book.
Me too. Believe it or not- I just got my licence just over a year ago. Never had a reason. Of course, now I have a 25 pound reason...
holy tamole!
who ever said Leatherhands was invited to my place for the night? he just assumes he can crash because he once was in a rock band and had a die-job for a hair cut? such arrogance! don't go rippin' that Liberal membership card up yet, Leather. It becomes you!
and for Cameron's baseless accusations of being fondled at a sleep-over --- what does he expect when I've hired him to dance for the local Lacrosse team?
oh, I'm burning mad now. smoke break.
Backs against the wall are the hard way to be made to do things... no doubt of that. Besides which, I'm not threatening K-Dough, I'm warning. I like my Canada, and I don't want to lose it. Anyway, it's after 12pm, and my workload is being done by others... I must now do my part and empty a bottle or 6 so there's something to recycle.
Romana- stuffed teddybears eh? Hmm, that inspires something in me. What if we could burn all the fucking stuffed animals that people have bought my daughter for fuel. They will eventually end up decaying verrrrrrrrry slowly in some solid waste landfill.
Naww that won't work. I think the half life of an Elmo doll is like 123 years. So I guess we would have to start building stuffed animals out of wood and save the forestry industry? I'm confused.
Anybody?
Cameron does table dancing? Hairy scotsman legs... yuck.
Hey back to work- errr drinking on the job JC.
jc - you were there. your the one who did the touching!
I've never been invited to a sleepover at Chuckers.
That's why I'm not ready for a sleep-over! Put a bunch of neokons in a room with attractive lefties, and the touching starts.
A sleepover at K-Dough's Disgraceland (tm) estate makes a night at the Playboy mansion look like a bowling excursion with Ward and June Clever.
Especially, during a drunken round of Pin the Turkey Baster on the Midget Nymphette.
Not bloody likely Chucker... I'm too in touch (no pun intended) with my own hairy legs... wouldn't waste the money on someone elses... besides, the Booze shop hours in Quebec suck...
I'm always the one in washroom jerking off while yelling "What the hell's going on out there?!"
I used to sleep in the bathroom at work... motion sensitive lights. Don't move, they go out, you go to sleep until someone opens the door to the john. Brillant invention. Washrooms and motion lights I mean.
I'm always the one banging on the door, crossing my legs and dancing, yelling "What the hell are you doing in there, jerking off?"
Ha... now you know, the answer was "yes".
Yup, that's the sign of a good party....a lot of yelling and jerking off...
JC- I thought you had an exec washroom?
Pam/Leather- that coincidental circumstance could make for one of K-Dough's patented faux-shocked- bathroom-occupier-meets-sexy-drunk-human-water-gun fetish moments. Of course, you'd also need the shaved Vietnamese pot-bellied pig, the well-hung santa's elf, the thumbtacks, the caulking gun filled with jello and the Chinese Communist Party boardroom set to roundout the experience. Oh yeah, and the oven mitts (of course) and splints and bandages.
That's all well and good until diarrhea is involved. That's when I'm outta there.
You had me at water-gun, K-dough.
ooooooo - pam, if you and Sheena would like to come over for a sleep over, I promise to sneak your minties into the freezer for giggles.
i make great microwave popcorn, too.
I'll come if Sheena brings wine, but I won't come on a Tuesday because I know you'll make us watch Mercer.
Charles, you're projecting again, that was you up on the table...
leatherhands, I was just looking at your 10:16, that kind of thing puts me in a mood as well.
It appears that people believe that there is a place called "away"... you know "I threw it away"....
Yup Cameron, litter bugs make me crazy, and it seems to be getting worse. I remember a "stop littering" commercial when I was a kid that portrayed an old Native Indian in full headdress crying at the side of a highway after a bunch of yahoos throw litter out of a passing car....made a lifelong impression on me. Maybe it's time to bring that ad back.
My memories of crying natives involve slightly different circumstances: a really drunk sound man on an arena tour of northern Ontario in '85, a bottle of tequila, an all night diner after a gig and several young impressionable female "music fans".
I, of course, had nothing to do with that romantic incident.
uhh, leather, sorry for getting haughty. as it happens, Sheena and Pam are coming over tomorrow night and we're going to watch The Office while Sheena walks us through the best reds from the Niagara.
I am a neokon, so you know the menage a trois concept is morally repugnant to me. If you want in, there's room for one more.
Cameron,
oh yeah... that explains why I woke up with all those loonies jingling in me boxers.
"Believe it or not- I just got my licence just over a year ago. Never had a reason. Of course, now I have a 25 pound reason..."
K-Dough, does that mean that your unit is so big now that you can't ride your bike anymore?
Leather- I contracted a nasty case of penile gigantism a few years back. It's gotten so bad, I'm currently building an addition on to the house-a new cock port.
The cool thing is that Bob Vila is filming he whole thing.
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