We Need to Talk

Dear Tommy, Junior and, you too, Shifty:

We need to talk. While you're busy competing to come out on top in the October 19th election, you're criss-crossing the country meeting the party faithful, feeding pronouncements to the media lapdogs and, generally, trying to reach out to Canadians to persuade them to vote for your party and not the other guy's.

You've been at this for weeks now and, so far, it's been "shopping list" campaigning.  One says he'll increase funding for this, another says he'll restore funding for that, and the third one hints at some major project or another he's just itching to launch without explaining why, since he's been in power over the past decade, he didn't launch it years ago.

The approach you've been taking is actually demeaning. It treats us, the Canadian people, as taxpayers, not citizens. I guess if you all do it, it doesn't seem so bad - except it does. It is bad. Taxes are how we pay to support our nation, how we build our society. They're essential, sure, but you're supposed to govern - for us, the electorate, for those who don't or for various reasons can't vote, and for our future generations.

Our kids and grandkids may not be relevant to you but they're sure as hell relevant to us. We want our grandkids to inherit the best possible Canada we can bequeath to them. That's where you come in. You are the most important instrument we have to achieve that goal. We vest in you the powers to do that on our behalf. We dutifully pour money into your treasury to do that on our behalf. Yet you don't seem to want to do what we need done. Why is that?

There's a story in today's TorStar about a summit underway in the Anchorage to discuss some very important and pressing Arctic issues. Eight countries are in attendance, represented by their foreign ministers.  Our Rob Nicholson is a no show, due to him being tied up campaigning or some other feeble excuse, which drew a subtle rebuke from John Kerry.

"I think anybody running for any high office in any nation in the world should come to Alaska or to any other place where it is happening and inform themselves about this. It is a seismic challenge that is affecting millions of people today.”

Okay, bad Rob, bad Rob, except the opposition can't bitch too much given how hard they've worked during their "shopping list" campaign to avoid really important issues such as climate change, inequality, corporatism, the corporate media cartel and so many other looming threats to Canada, our people, and our democracy. Louise Comeau thinks it comes down to cowardice:

I think the party leaders are afraid to really get into the nub of the matter, which is that we’ve got to confront our energy system and the approach we’ve been taking,” Louise Comeau of the Climate Action Network Canada said in an interview, calling it “a fundamental state of denial we are in as a country.”

“Canada’s silence on this issue is not new,” added Comeau, noting Canada was the chair of the Arctic Council for the past two years where it pushed a northern development agenda “and actually ensured climate change wasn’t discussed.”

I think she's right. You are goddamned cowards, all three of you.