Remembering A 'Superstar'

Well, we arrived back in the early hours of yesterday, having enjoyed a relaxing week in Cuba. Unfortunately, there was no English-speaking Canadian television available, so I feel unprepared to offer any political commentary until I get caught up. Fortuitously, however, my son sent me the following item, which, I hope, you will find of interest.

Is it wrong for me to feel such deep and utter disdain for Jonathan Bernier, who, as you will see in the video below, does nothing to dispel the stereotype of the 'dumb jock.'

Something To Gladden The Heart

This morning's Star editorial cartoon:

Something To Rejuvenate The Human Spirit

I suspect that as a lot of us get older, especially with the context that the years behind us provide, it is difficult not to submit to deep cynicism, even despair. Words that may sound fresh to some are ones that we have heard enough times before to interpret as the platitudes they frequently are. And yet, there is always something or someone that comes along to rescue us from absolute, soul-numbing despair. Nelson Mandela was one such person, and I believe Pope Francis is becoming another such individual.

On this Sunday morning I offer you two letters from today's Star on Mandela's legacy, and an excerpt of a piece by Daniel Baird on the Pope. I hope they provide you, as they did me, a measure of solace.

Africa’s icon of freedom and justice, Editorial Dec. 6

Most exceptional about Mandela’s tenure as president of South Africa was his refusal to punish white South Africans for the power they had unjustly wielded for so many years. For him, reconciliation trumped revenge. A lifelong defender of sovereignty for oppressed peoples and marginalized nations, Mandela used his global stature to defend various independence movements in Africa and around the world. At times, Mandela has also been a severe critic of the United States and the United Kingdom, accusing both of interfering in the affairs of other countries.

He will be remembered as one of the world’s greatest politicians, champion of human rights and one of the most inspiring figures of this century. His death will be mourned for years to come. While the dark clouds of racism, bloody conflicts and violence swell ominously on the horizon today, Mandela’s heartening message is more timely than ever: “No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”

Javed Akbar, Ajax

We are constantly bombarded by reports of the evil deeds of tyrant-dictators, suicide bombers, serial killers, drug lords, etc., so it’s good to be reminded from time to time that there are also great role models like Nelson Mandela for our children to look up to. Mandela could have become a dictator, instead he became a democratically elected president who spread hope instead of despair, forgiveness instead of revenge and love instead of hate. Never have so many Africans, and many non-Africans, owed so much to one man. Nelson Mandela was a great leader for all reasons.

William Bedford, Toronto

Daniel Baird writes of a pope who seems to practice what Christ preached: humility, compassion, and the avoidance of those things that take us from our true humanity and spirituality:

Francis, in his first Apostolic Exhortation, entitled Evangelli Gaudium, issues the following observation and warning:

“To sustain a lifestyle which excludes others, or sustain enthusiasm for that selfish ideal, a globalization of indifference has developed,” he writes. “Almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people’s pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though this were someone else’s responsibility and not our own. The culture of prosperity deadens us.”

Coming from a man who reportedly sneaks out at night in the guise of a regular priest in order to visit Rome's homeless, it is the kind of message I think we can all positively respond to.

Back To Earth

I had planned this to be my first piece post-holiday, but Nelson Mandela's passing yesterday prompted my post about that giant who walked among us. I purposely kept it brief, since thousands upon thousands of words will be written about him in the days to come, a testament not only to his stature throughout the world but also, I suspect, to the rarity of such dignity, integrity, and moral greatness.

On to other matters.

One of the advantages to a week-long sojourn in Cuba, from which we returned late Wednesday night, is the fact that the Internet there is both slow and expensive; although I compulsively check my email at home several times a day, I feel no such urge when on the island nation. Consequently, I tend to catch up on the reading that I never seem to have enough time for while in Canada - retirement seems to impose its own disciplines, demands, and routines.

I always make sure to bring with me The Walrus magazine, a publication that does not shy away from longer forms of journalism. An article from a few months back made for some interesting reading. Entitled Repairing the House, now available online, its author, Andrew Coyne, offers an overview of the dysfunctional and essentially impotent Parliament we are all familiar with, a Parliament where backbenchers are little more than the proverbial trained seals doing the bidding of the party leader. Never has this been more evident than in the Harper administration, where all utterances are tightly scripted, predictable ('The Prime Minister has been very clear...') and limited. One has only to watch the incessant parroting that poses as answers both in Question Period or on shows such as Power and Politics to see this sad truth.

Yet Coyne suggests it needn't be this way.

Here are his observations and ideas for reform:

Prior to the 1919 Liberal national convention that elected Mackenzie King as its leader, party leaders in Canada had been chosen as they are in the classic Westminster model, still in force in Australia, for instance: by a vote of the caucus. It is this model, Coyne observes, that keeps the power of leaders from being overwhelming. It is what enabled, for example, the removal of Margaret Thatcher in Britain and Kevin Rudd and his successor, Julia Gillard, in Australia. If practised in Canada it would, in Coyne's view, make party leaders more attentive to the concerns of ordinary MPs.

A related reform, lest a potentially rebellious member be subdued, is to the nomination of party candidates. In Canada, as a matter of law, no candidate may run for Parliament under a party banner without the signature of the leader on his or her nomination papers. It is therefore very easy for the leader to veto a nomination by withholding his/her signature. Coyne suggests leaving this process to the riding association.

A concomitant and necessary reform for this to work is in the riding association's nomination process:

It is beyond strange that in Canada, in the twenty-first century, nominations can still be decided by stacking meetings with instant members, hastily recruited for the occasion. A cleaned-up process for selecting candidates—if not formal voter registration, as in the United States, then at least a requirement that voters must have been party members for some decent interval—would seem therefore to be a third part of the solution.

Because of the reality of craven desire for power and advancement among our politicos, a fourth reform is necessary, argues Coyne - reducing the size of cabinet and changing the appointment process for key parliamentary positions.
Because cabinet is bloated at 39 positions (Coyne contrasts that with the U.S. at 16, about the same as Japan and Germany) it means MPs on the government side, if they keep their noses clean, have about a one in four chance of making it to cabinet (compare that to Britain, where the odds are more like one in twenty).

There is much more to the article, which I hope you will take the opportunity to read when time allows, but Coyne's ideas surely offer hope that things can be much better than they currently are, and would perhaps have the effect of renewing some faith in the democratic process and convincing more people to turn out at the polls, although I doubt that is something Harper and his cabal would like to see happen.

And yet some of these ideas may have the potential to be achieved, given that Michael Chong, conspicuous among Conservatives for his integrity, has introduced a private member's bill called the Reform Act. While limited in scope, it is nonetheless an encouraging sign.

So I am back on the political beat, where, regardless of whether I take a short or a long holiday, little ever seems to change for the better.

Rest In Peace

We are all the poorer today. Nelson Mandela has died at the age of 95.

My personal hero, his greatness of soul will not be seen again for a very long time, if ever. He was the antithesis of all that people find repugnant in our 'leaders'.

May the world not quickly forget the hopes for a better world and a better humanity his lifelong example inspired.

Who Will Give Us Hope?

I recently wrote a post on the ailing Nelson Mandela and why he is so important a world figure. Last Friday Gerald Caplan wrote a piece in the Globe entitled The world will be poorer without Nelson Mandela. I hope you will take the time to read his thoughts on the importance of this iconic figure, a man of whom I think it would be appropriate to borrow Hamlet's tribute to his father and say, I shall not look upon his like again.

Caplan's last paragraph, which I am reproducing below for your consideration, sums up for me both the hope Mandela inspires and the despair over the realization that it is unlikely someone of his singular moral force will ever again grace our fractured landscapes:

I suppose it’s too much to hope there can ever be another Mandela. But could we not come just a little bit closer? Is there not one prepared to dedicate her or his life to the eternal struggle for social justice and equality? Is it too much to ask whether some, or even a few, or maybe just one, of today’s leaders might not look at this man and wonder what could be learned from his singular life? Or maybe the truth is that, revere him as we do, we won’t really know how much we have lost until we have to face the world without him.

Why Mandela Is So Important

Although I have only made reference to him three other times in this blog, Nelson Mandela is a person who I revere like no other. And of course, I am hardly alone in that sentiment, attested to by the fact that millions of people, not only in South Africa but around the world, are in a state of anxiety over his latest hospitalization.

But in frail health at the age of 94, hospitalized yet again with a stubborn lung affection many attribute to his 27 years of incarceration, most of it on Robben Island off the coast of Cape Town, where he contracted tuberculosis, it is unlikely that Mandela will be with us much longer.

Why is the world so reluctant to let him go? I can think of no other world figure who will be as mourned upon death as Mandela will be, and for some fairly obvious but crucially important reasons:

He is, without question, a man of outstanding character and deep morality. Not only did he show the courage of his convictions against apartheid by remaining in prison for 27 years (he could have been freed much earlier had he renounced the African National Congress), but upon release, when ordinary people would have been consumed by bitterness over that suffering and the lost years, he went on to become the President of South Africa and led the way to reconciliation with, not revenge against those who had treated him and his fellow blacks so abominably over the decades.

In doing so, Mandela held up a mirror to all of us, showing the potential that resides deep within and discoverable if we are willing to do the work that that entails. He taught us, political and corporate culture notwithstanding, that we are much more than mere fodder for that thing called the economy, that we have an innate dignity and a worth current propaganda would gladly deny.

Mandela showed us that we do not have to defined and circumscribed by our circumstances, that transcendence is possible.

I suspect that current rulers, both domestic and international, would like us to ignore those glimpses of our better angels that Mandela's life has afforded us. Those glimpses might lead to other things, like an expectation that those we elect put the people and their dignity before the exultation of corporate forces. They might demand that government not move in lockstep with those forces who see, not human dignity but only human fodder, mere fungible commodities to feed the machine in its quest for never-ending growth.

People might also begin to expect character from those they elect, not the subterfuge, not the opacity, not the arrant greed which have been mainstays of so many so-called democracies, not the least of all our own in Canada. They might demand real integrity, not a manufactured image, to define those who ask for our trust. They might demand real accountability.

I suspect our rulers would like us to ignore the lessons in life and humanity that Mandela's example has given us. Better for them if we continue upon our frightened and frequently insensate path, either disciplined by the ever-present fear of job loss or anodized by the latest in reality programming that invites us to mock our fellow human beings, the latest fashions, the latest technological marvels.

We are, of course, free as in the many opportunities that life presents to either ponder and learn from or ignore the truths that the long existence of Nelson Mandela has provided us with.


I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.

Nelson Mandela

Exploiting Mandela

In an age when everyone feels entitled to their own reality series because, well, because they are 'special' and entitled, I suppose I shouldn't be appalled that that icon of integrity and reconciliation, Nelson Mandela, a man I revere, is now in the unfortunate position of seeing two of his granddaughters trading on that integrity.

A story in the Hamilton Spectator today reports the following:

Being Mandela, a new series premiering Sunday on COZI TV, invites U.S. audiences into the lives of Zaziwe Dlamini-Manaway and Swati Dlamini, the fashionable, 30-something granddaughters of Mandela and Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.

The sisters, along with two brothers, also become the latest famous names to launch a fashion line, called “Long Walk to Freedom” in honour of their grandfather’s autobiography. Their lives are special and glamorous and they know it. They hope that U.S. audiences — COZI TV is a new network launched by NBC Owned Television Stations — will see a vibrant and modern side of South Africa through their eyes.

No doubt this shameless ploy to make a buck will, as they say, be done 'tastefully.' One can only hope that potential viewers show some discretion in their channel choices.

A Tale of Two Men

No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.

- NELSON MANDELA, Autobiography

“I’ll never apologize for the United States of America. Ever. I don’t care what the facts are.”

- George H.W. Bush in 1988, after the United States shot down Flight 655, an Iranian passenger airliner, over the Strait of Hormuz, killing all 290 civilians aboard.

Both men were recently sidelined with serious health problems, George Bush Sr. still in hospital.

Both Mandela and Bush are of advanced years; when their time comes, who will the world mourn, the man who showed the world the power of forgiveness and reconciliation, or the unrepentant and hubristic warrior?

Here There Be Heroes

No matter what age we may attain, I doubt that we ever lose our need for heroes. Certainly, as we grow up, the definition of hero must mature, changing from someone with superpowers who fights evil and injustice, to someone who looks very much like we do, has no special abilities affording protection from the negative vicissitudes of life but who, when put to the test, show all of us what humanity is ultimately capable of.

Who may be considered a hero depends to a large extent on personal points of view and values; from my perspective, a hero is someone who takes actions while aware that those actions will likely lead to real problems and suffering in his or her life. The one true hero in my life is Nelson Mandala, a moral giant whose story needs no retelling here, but whose life is a testament to integrity, courage, and, for me, the existence of the transcendent.

Although perhaps not of the magnitude of Mandela, I do believe that we have heroes among us in Canada today, people for whom integrity is paramount. I have written in the past about Munir Sheik, the former head of Statistics Canada who resigned that position rather than to go along with the Harper-perpetrated lie that the elimination of the mandatory census was just fine with the statisticians.

Currently, another person showing all of us the stuff he is made of is Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page, a man appointed by the Harper government but who has already incurred its anger exposing lies that government has pedaled to the public. His latest foray into fortitude is reported on in today's Star, which outlines how Harper's acolytes are breaking the law by refusing to provide details of the government’s spending cuts to Page.

Rather than 'going along to get along,' Page said his last recourse is go to Federal Court to seek disclosure of the information though he added that “nobody wins” under that scenario.

“That said, we have to draw a line in the sand with respect to the Act of the Parliament and the provision of information,” he said.

The very existence of the aforementioned individuals must be an affront to our craven politicians, the ones who, for example, have aided and abetted the Harper omnibus budget, Bill C-38, forsaking their duty to their constituents and their country in the hopes of promotion within the government, something worth about 30 pieces of silver by my measure.

Given that the Harper mandate doesn't end until 2015, Kevin Page will likely lose his job in the near future, something I'm sure he is very much aware of. Yet despite my very cynical nature, it is the people like him walking among us who keep me from ever making a final submission to absolute despair.