A Timely Reminder

Young Tim Hudak, the leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party, probably commands much more press coverage than he deserves. He certainly has been the object of more than one of my own blog posts, in part because of the fascinating window he opens into the mind of that segment of the electorate which believes his retrograde polices have merit. Indeed, it is never wise to underestimate people's capacity to buy into disproven bromides as they indulge in that peculiar form of magical thinking that suggests taxes can be cut, jobs created, and society advanced through no personal pain or sacrifice.

Recently, The Star's Bob Hepburn wrote a piece entitled Is Tim Hudak on the far-right road to victory? In it, he made the following observation about the far-right agenda Hudak is embracing:

His simple message: slash taxes, cut public service jobs, crack down on welfare recipients, beat up on labour unions, privatize government agencies, get tough on crime and create thousands of new jobs.

Hudak calls his proposals “bold, transformative ideas to fire up job creation and balance the books.”

Sound familiar? Indeed, Hudak is now fully embracing the controversial 1994 policies of Mike Harris, his old boss.

By doing so, though, he is gambling his entire political future on his belief that the Harris era is now just a faded memory for many Ontario voters and that the time is once again perfect to champion far-right policies.

The lead letter in today's Star suggests that Hudak's hopes for collective amnesia about the Harris era's depradations may be misplaced, as Steve McCahon of Toronto writes:

Bob Hepburn’s column was both well-reasoned, and insightful. However, several other points should be considered when analyzing the Progressive Conservative Party’s far-right shift in Ontario and the next provincial election.

The success of Ford Nation in Toronto, and the “breakthrough” of the federal Conservative party in the Greater Toronto Area, which gave Stephen Harper a majority government, should serve to concern political parties with more moderate, middle to left-leaning perspectives.

The “Red” Tory party led by Premier William Davis no longer exists. Michael Harris helped to redefine the party in the 1990s. The Common Sense Revolution was neither common sensie, nor revolutionary. It featured slash and burn politics. It took a funding of school boards out of the hands of local municipalities through the property tax-mill rate system.

The government saddled municipalities with funding of general welfare, ambulance services and subsidized housing. It introduced education policy that gutted arts funding, library and guidance functions in the local schools, and a system that has led to the closure of hundreds of local schools over the past 15 years.

I mention these specific changes brought about by Harris with regard to the effect upon the poor and middle class as a cautionary note. The Great Blue Wave that swept over Ontario in the 1990s threatens to re-emerge.

Mr. Hepburn’s comparison to the recent American election is appropriate; however, it fails to take into consideration how Ontarians have tended to vote in response to more recent provincial electoral campaigns.

Premier David Peterson’s snap election resulted in “political suicide.” The electorate punished the perceived arrogance of the Liberal party. During Premier Dalton McGuinty’s second election campaign, which led to a majority government, it was the issue of extending public funding to faith-based schools that destroyed John Tory’s campaign.

The next provincial election is likely to be fought on the basis of a single lightning-rod issue rather than on a broad policy platform. Ontarians are not likely to forget the vilification of “beer drinking single moms on welfare,” and huge slashes to the public service: primarily in the areas of the amalgamation of Toronto and health care leading to the reduction of 6,000 nurses and 11,000 hospital beds.

Premier Mike Harris came to power with the promise of fiscal responsibility and left as an ideologue who was out of touch with Ontarians. Similarly, is Tim Hudak the leader of the Tea Party of Ontario, the promoter of the Common Sense Revolution Part Deux, or Stephen Harper’s lapdog?

One can only speculate as to the “issue” that will dominate the next provincial election. Mr. Hudak has been touting his law and order agenda, while, he is promoting liberalization of the distribution of alcohol in Ontario. Teen smoking, drinking and driving, and gas station attendant violence are all serious criminal and societal matters.

Privatizing the LCBO and introducing the distribution of wine, beer, and/or alcohol at local convenience stores with the potential of “liquor store” holdups and further under-age drinking may very well be one issue that is worthy of focus.

Ontario does not require a hard-right political shift to create jobs, manage its fiscal house, reduce crime, and create better government. Ontarians should reject Tea Party politics, and its inherent divisiveness, despite the pretty packaging and bow in which Tim Hudak wraps it.

One can only hope that Steve McCahon's timely reminder finds purchase amongst the Ontario electorate.

'Paying' For Their Crimes?

It doesn't take a cynic to realize that justice can be anything other than even-handed. We all know, for example, that there is a disproportionate percentage of people populating North American jails who are from the underclass, both white and non-white. The ability to 'buy' justice by engaging high-priced counsel is reserved for only a certain segment of our civilian population.

In his column today, The Star's Richard Gwyn turns his sights on a segment of our society, our corporate overlords, who have often been described as both 'too big to fail' and 'too big to jail.' Amongst those who fit that bill, predictably are the big banks:

- Just a month ago, Bank of America agreed to pay $11.6 billion (all figures U.S.) for making mortgage loans it knew its clients could never repay and for breaking the foreclosure rules so it could seize the houses of clients behind in their payments.

- That same month, Standard Chartered paid out $327 million after admitting it had broken American sanction laws against Iran, Burma, Sudan and Libya.

- By no means are the culprits only American institutions. Germany’s Deutsche Bank is trying to deal with charges that it hid $12 billion in paper losses to avoid a government bailout.

- The Swiss bank, Wegelin, small but with 272 years of history behind it, has just shut down after admitting it helped American customers escape taxes on $1.2 billion in assets.

- The truly humungous case is that of some 20 banks — American, British, German, Swiss, French — that for years have been fiddling a key international interest rate known as Libor to suit their corporate interests. The first to take the hit, Britain’s Barclays, has settled for $450 million. It all looks encouraging. The villains are being called to account.

True, many have had to pay substantial financial penalties for their crimes, but Gwyn places a couple of huge asterisks beside those 'penalties':

No one has done time for any of these misdeeds. No one has even had to endure the humiliation of a court appearance.

But it gets worse, as the very penalties these corporate malefactors pay are in fact heavily subsidized by the taxpayer:

Most of these grandiose settlements are a lot smaller than they seem because the institution can write off the costs as a business expense. The best, and worst, example is not a bank but British Petroleum, which earned a $10 billion tax windfall by writing off all its cleanup costs in the Gulf of Mexico.

Not in an entirely pessimistic frame of mind, Gwy points to a faint light in the distance:

At present, when banks pay penalties, a key part of their settlements is that they are not required to admit to any wrongdoing. A New York state attorney, Preet Bharara, though, now requires an admission of past guilt as part of any settlement. “We have a responsibility to speak the truth, to get at what actually happened,” he says.

Principle and integrity finding its way into the public arena? Only an inveterate cynic could question the prospect.

Hooray for Free Speech!

Unless, of course, that freedom is used to criticize Israel.

Medical Marijuana - Part 2

The other day I wrote a post suggesting that policy formulation in the Harper government is conducted not in the measured and studied way most governments employ, but rather more than anything else from a knee-jerk ideological orientation. This is apparent most recently in Health Canada's decision to license private farms to grow medical marijuana, thereby ending the legal right of current licensed users to grow and buy their own. It turns out that the cost of purchasing the product from these private farms, beginning in March of next year, will be more than many can afford.

A discerning reader, Glenda Allard Barr, from Lantzville, B.C., writes the following in this morning's Star:

New pot rules sting ailing users, Column, Feb. 1

Thank you for printing this outstanding glimpse into the world of ailing Canadians who are terrified that they will lose the quality of life they have gained by having access to an extremely effective plant medicine. Serious health problems often result in an inability to earn a good living, and the new medical cannabis program proposed by Health Canada would serve to line the pockets of business people while depriving the sick of their medicine.

Anyone with a heart should be able to see the difficulties faced by these patients, and the benefits they gain from using a plant that is safer than most, if not all, pharmaceuticals. The ability to grow one's own medicine or to find a compassionate person to grow for them can be a life saver for some seriously ill individuals.

The black market also stands to gain from this proposal as purchasing cannabis from commercial sources is beyond the financial reach of patients, and will introduce new problems, such as having to wait for an order, delivery problems, specific strain availability, possible chemical contamination and irradiation. Some patients may turn to crime to fund their medicine.

Health Canada needs to fulfill its mandate to protect the health of Canadians. It is time to trash this preposterous proposal, take another look at past commissions studying cannabis use, and approach the issue in an enlightened and compassionate manner. In my mind, that solution is legalizing and regulating this useful plant.

Wouldn't It Be Nice?

I have a confession to make: I am a lifelong Beach Boys' fan. Their harmonies and their idyllic representation of the West Coast lifestyle captivated me as a youth, and still have a hold on me today. One of their signature songs, and certainly one of my favorites, is Wouldn't It Be Nice. Composed by Brian Wilson, it tells the story of a hoped-for future in which young love works out, and they live 'happily ever after.' As such, of course, it bears little relation to reality.

And yet, even so many years later, I cling to the hope that things can get better, that a measure of harmony can be established in our social, economic, and political systems so that we recognize common goals and common humanity and that we work together for the greater good. Wouldn't it be nice?

Such seems to be the theme of two pieces I recently read in The Toronto Star. One, a letter from reader Tina Agrell of Oakville, makes the following observations:

In Ontario we have a chance to do something new in politics and be trendsetters for Canada.

She points out that the last Ontario election did not return a majority government:

We voted for all of those MPPs and we wanted them all to work in Parliament and represent us — expressing their different views but coming to a consensus on how to run the province.

Urging an end to the poisonous partisanship that renders the public deeply cynical, she implores our legislators to work together in the upcoming session, and ends her missive with the following indisputable truth and plea:

Ontario is faced with massive debt, economic decline and labour unrest. No political party wants to face those problems alone while fighting off other parties engaged in savagely attacking their flanks.

The only way forward is by collaborating, by working as a united team. What a role model Ontario could be for Canada if our MPPs could achieve that.

In a similar vein, Martin Regg Cohn writes today about the prospects of co-operation between Kathleen Wynne's Liberals and Andrea Horwath's NDP:

They have much in common. Both come across as authentic, progressive politicians — direct, disarming, dismissive of testosterone tactics, with longtime friends in the union movement and among NGO activists.

Yet for all their commonality, they seem reluctant to make common cause just yet — for fear of undermining their rival power bases. Liberals and New Democrats both want to change the world, they just want to remake it in their own image, on their own terms.

Ever the realist, Cohn is, at best, only guardedly optimistic about the chances, always aware that the thirst for power is the greatest impediment to collaborative government. And young Tim Hudak, Leader of the Progressive Conservatives, seems to be left out of the equation entirely:

At a news conference last week, he seemed out of step with his own rhetoric — railing repeatedly against McGuinty’s abuse prorogation as a delaying tactic, but then insisting it be left intact. Hmmm.

Will Hudak once again find himself the odd man out?

It has often been posited that having more women in positions of political power increases the chances of co-operation and collaboration. Ontario politics in the next little while will certainly be the appropriate crucible in which to test that thesis.

Harper and Medical Marijuana

As my policy-analyst son has made abundantly clear to me, government policy formulation does not take place in a vacuum. Much time and deliberation goes into the devising of new policies or the revising of old ones. Like the butterfly effect, every change or innovation brings with it both anticipated and unanticipated results. The job of government bureaucrats is to minimize the latter.

However, I do have to wonder how much deliberation and due diligence comprise policy-making in the Harper government. We are told, for example, in pronouncements that smack more of ideology than of measured cogitation, that 'get tough on crime' legislation is both demanded by and essential for the Canadian populace. We are told of the necessity of building new superprisons. We are told that danger lurks everywhere within our midst, all of this within the larger context of falling crime rates and an aging populations. But, as journalist H.L Menken once observed.

“No one in this world, so far as I know — and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”

Unfortunately, the scant attention to pesky details and the preoccupation with demagogic manipulation characteristic of our current federal regime do have some unfortunate consequences, most especially experienced by those with the least power in our society. In his column today, The Star's Joe Fiorito, a man of uncommon empathy, profiles three people, all of whom are licensed to use medical marijuana for their rather dire conditions but who, thanks to pending changes in federal regulations, will no longer be able to grow the drug nor access it except through a series of big private farms to grow and sell weed to all those Canadians who require it for medical reasons.

While those of a puritanical mindset may be dubious of medical marijuana claims, there is much anecdotal evidence attesting to its efficacy. Fiorito profiles three such beneficiaries:

- Erin broke her back twice in separate injuries and she lives in constant pain; she is licensed to possess and to grow; she uses marijuana as a pain reliever.

- Stu — he has significant arthritis, and has banged himself up pretty badly over the years on his motorcycle, or rather, off it — is a designated grower and a medical marijuana user.

- Jim has AIDS. He was diagnosed 30 years ago and takes the modern daily cocktail of pills and drugs to stay alive; the only way he can keep his appetite up is with marijuana; he, too, is a licensed user.

Each of the above uses very a high daily dose of the herb to treat their conditions, and none of the above will be able to afford the much higher costs that will be incurred through the purchase of their product from the private farms slated to come on stream in March 2014, the same time the previous permissions attending those who currently hold licenses are rendered invalid.

Just another example, I suspect, of people falling through the cracks owing to a government concerned more with the pursuit of ideology than it is with the well-being of the public it claims to serve.

Reflections from Cuba - Ebooks and Libraries

I wrote the following on January 14, while vacationing in Cuba:

While I consider myself to be a cynical man, one deeply suspicious of the corporate agenda, my wife, a woman of sunnier disposition, recently suggested something that shocked even me.

We were reading poolside in Cuba, me with an e-reader lent to me by her sister, she with her physical book, when I questioned why two publishers, Simon and Shuster and Macmillan, do not sell their ebooks to libraries, and Penguin is only just beginning a test project with the New York City system,. Her theory took me aback, namely that the two publishers have the goal of weakening and ultimately destroying public libraries.

Initially I dismissed her speculation as cynically paranoid even by my own standards, asking her if this were true, why do they continue to sell their physical products to lending institutions? Her answer both surprised and unsettled me.

Arguing that ebooks are growing increasingly popular, Janice, a former librarian, suggested that the withholding of their virtual products is part of a long-term business plan to starve libraries of their resources and thus of their relevance to the tax-paying public. She posits that the reason they haven't removed their physical products from free public access is that such a move would be too obvious and provoke outrage from people who hold ready and equitable access to information to be a sacred trust, part of the social contract that underpins any democracy worthy of the name. Hence, like the slow boil of the frog, first comes the withholding of the ebooks, ever-growing in popularity, the aforementioned goal waiting to be realized in a not-too-distant future.

Is my wife correct in her dire prognostication? I obviously have no way of knowing. However, given that she is a woman of uncommon discernment, one whose judgement and advice I rely on and trust more than anyone else's, I am now very troubled by the prospect she has raised.

For further reading on this provocative subject, and to learn about the restrictions other publishers place on libraries' use of their ebooks, click here, here, and here.