Bud: CNN Program, Ribbons, Corporate Rats Leave Toronto, Throne Speech, The Overrated

Reminder:

CNN Monday 10:00pm -- "Northern border and terrorists"

List of Articles:

* Am I the only one who is tired of the ribbons?

* Are the corporate rats leaving the Good Ship Toronto?

* The Throne Speech--a modest critique

* Let's talk about the overrated--I'm bored and they are part of my problem.


Am I the only one who is tired of the ribbons?

It started with "tie a yellow ribbon around the old oak tree" to commemorate soldiers? some U.S. battle?--Vietnam?--and blossomed from there. Now we have have a coloured ribbon for every cause. Pink for breast cancer -- lavender, for what? AIDS? -- some other colour for the patriarchal massacre of women. The fact that most AIDS occurs through wildly promiscuous sex or that junkies share needles seems to make no difference. We are in fact being asked to subsidize irrational behaviour. In terms of the ribbons for male violence, we are assaulted with the suggestion that one Algerian-Canadian's rampage in Montreal should stick to every Canadian male. Now breast cancer, that is a disease that we can all get behind. But sticking with the "behind" word, we don't have a brown ribbon to help fight colo-rectal cancer which is the next in line for mortality in both women and men. Having survived a few health skirmishes, I want to nominate the next ribbon campaign, the ribbon that has little aneurysm nodules, distreet little nodules, that after wearing the ribbon for a month, burst. I am sure that you good folks can come up with your own ribbons--for carbuncles that you slip on to your big toe, milky-white ones for prostate cancer -- the possibilities are endless.

© Bud Talkinghorn


Are the corporate rats leaving the Good Ship Toronto?

The departure of Imperial Oil for Calgary was only one of 18 other head offices that went elsewhere in the last 20 years. The reason for this exodus is primarily high taxes, but it includes quality of life issues as well. Violent crime is escalating and the cost of downtown entertainment is becoming overly expensive. Then there are the preposterously inflated housing prices. According to a National Post article, "Toronto feeling the strain" by Peter Kuitenbrouwer (Oct. 2, FP1) a standard two story house now costs on average $466,000, up from $277,000 five years ago. The poor ethnic immigrants that flood into Toronto can't even think about buying those homes, so they end up in highrise apartments, or rundown rooming houses, which in some areas reminded me of the ghettoes in Philadelphia. This migration to Toronto is disastrous, as there are practically no new jobs for them. The city has only gained 100 new jobs in the last four years! To make matters worse, the mainly immigrant taxi drivers are being told by city hall to have taxis no older than three years. This will throw the majority out of work, or the taxi fares will have to skyrocket.

I was there on business for several days a few years ago. Luckily, the company gave me a big old New Yorker to ferry me around much of Toronto. I remember thinking how soulless the city was. It was like a giant strip mall, whose blandness was only blotted out on smog days. In the great cities of the world such as Rio, Amsterdam, or Hong Kong there is a spirit that is unique. They appeal to your innate sense of wonder about different lifestyles. It is hard to get bored in them. After my third day in Toronto, it had became a yawnfest. When my stint there was over, I was glad to leave. I do not think I would leave Vancouver to even visit Toronto, let alone actually live there. Hongcouver may have its warts, but it has some distinctiveness. And you don't have to shovel rain, or be blinded by smog.

© Bud Talkinghorn


The Throne Speech--a modest critique

Not having taken notes on it, I speak from memory. First impressions: I found it mildly ironic that the ceremony started off with Governor General Clarkson sitting in the Senate chambers with the ermine-robed Supremes front and center, ironic because the actual law-making politicians can be cowed by the Supremes' rulings. This was a crimson power group, with its two new socially "progressive"--pro-gay "marriage"--Supremes fully bristling with ideas, no doubt, on how to alter our traditional culture beyond recognition. It was duly noted that all the major pronouncements were given in French first. This is apt, as the CBC had previously given a segment on the Frenchification of the Federal Civil Service. It used to be that the civil service gave employees on the job language training; now they demand that fluency before a person even applies for a job. Hello Quebec, goodbye the West. However, this is fitting in a way, as our PM is basically a francophone; vast numbers of key cabinet ministers are francophones, and francophone Quebec will always get the lion's share of federal money. To carry this absurd obsequiousness forward, we have a government that didn't care that their cultural minister, Ms. Frulla--a Quebec MP--has decided that the Quebec cultural minister can represent Canada in international forums.

And what's up with John Ralston Saul's funky jacket? A cynic would suggest political correctness, an I-am-one-with-the-rez statement. But away from fashion and on with the meat of the speech. Aboriginals were the big winners. Their concerns and the billions that would be needed to address their pathologies got a lot of play. Metis and Inuit can now join the government's potlatch ceremony. We will have billions more shovelled their way and . . . their pathologies will disappear. That is the government's rationale anyway. I don't think so. An old statistic has stayed in my head. After the James Bay project's huge pay-off to a few thousand Cree, the natives set up 22 businesses. Within a few years only one was still in operation. Economically, there simply isn't the population base in these small reserves to make a go of it. They are too far from major markets and they have never truely utilized their freebie university opportunities. Then, as I have observed first-hand, there are unbelievable tensions between families on their reserves. If you are the minority power group, the rest will boycott your business. Bingo! You go down in flames. More federal money won't stem the same dismal results is my guess. And now we have the Metis attaching themselves to the federal teat.

The blah, blah about regional programs kept echoing in my head as Quebec, Quebec. Kyoto was given lip service, but will have to be delayed (indefinitely) to implement the other big ticket items like universal daycare. On the health problem, the main thing I saw was a desire to recognize foreign doctors. I have seen first-hand the incredible corruption that exists in the university systems of the Third World. If you are wealthy enough and need to, you just buy your degree. Do we want these people poking knives into us? It is not that all immigrant doctors are inept, it is our government that is inept and will not spot the incompetent ones. I noticed that Martin's "asymmetrical" health agreement with Quebec did not get honourable mention in the speech. Maybe the entire speech was best summed up by a National Citizen's Coalition spokesman who called it "A love letter from the Liberals to the NDP."

© Bud Talkinghorn


Let's talk about the overrated--I'm bored and they are part of my problem.

The National Post is running a series on the overrated. Unfortunately, bloggers were worthy of a long companion piece. This piece claimed we bloggers think we are the zeitgeist of all that is journalistically worthwhile. It is worth remembering that this critique was written by a print journalist--a little fear factor popping up per chance? The major complaint is that we use the traditional media for most of our information. Damn right we do. They get paid, we don't. The fact that we continue to post, despite no remuneration, shows that we speak from the heart and mind. I don't have any editorial constraint (Well my partner weighs in occasionally). When I write about an issue, that is my opinion and it doesn't get sanded-down to some 'sensitive' message that will get more readers. The media have their advertisers to think of, as well as every activist lobby group. Bloggers don't.

Leaving the print media aside, we bloggers fill in the blanks that TV "news" gives us--cue the bombing scene. Or in the case of the CBC, all the news that they suppress or distort--because they think they are the rightful arbiters of what is politically correct to report. I used to try to stay on message and review the headline stories, until it dawned on me that there was a whole subtext to these happenings. Why did the world stand impotent while the millions died in the Congo and Darfur? Why do we allow the CBC to spend a billion to feed us social engineering? We dare tackle issues that the mainstream press wouldn't touch without a bank of lawyers at their side -- for instance, showing how Kosovo and Bosnia have degenerated into lawlessmess and a major recruiting ground for al-Queda. Do we really doubt that Milosovich saw the same development arising and made an American-style pre-emptive strike? Try floating that perspective in the traditional media. So, we are free from the tyranny of censorship, at least temporarily. The writer of the piece compared us to the phone-in callers to radio. Yes, but the blogger does not have a one minute limit to state his views. We can spin it out the way we want and with no deadline.

Enough about our overrated bloggerati, let's get down to what is really overrated.

I can't beat one writer who nominated John Ralston Saul and his literary hackery. I confess I once read one of his books. If I had had my trusty rubber stamp from a previous life, I would have stamped the book with "Stupifying rubbish!". I honestly cannot even remember the book's title. The contents were straight from a leftie's hallucinations. So John wins the prize, but other notable candidates are in the race. Shania Twain has to rank up there in the overhyped. I enjoy some country music; however, I can't help but see her as a symbol of country-lite. Is the woman beautiful? Without question, and I loved how her detractors maintained that she had stagefright and wouldn't perform live. To their chagrin, she did start touring and totally blew away her competition. But one still wishes that Shania had met and wed Waylon Jennings, or Willy Nelson. If she wanted to be picky, she could have married Kris Kristofferen. Then there is Andy Warhol, who predicted that everyone would get his 15 minutes of fame. The joke there is that Andy, who only deserved 15 mimutes got 15 years of publicity. Bring out the hook and drag this guy's corpse off the stage. Please!

There is also the entire contingent of poseurs that the media pushes forward as the "new" Dylan, or The Stones, or The Beatles. I accept my own personal prejudices are not God-given--The Dillards anyone?-- nevertheless, these guys could all move your feet. Music that you wanted to do the dishes to. I gave Beck, Radiohead, and even Avril Lavigne--forgive me father, for I have sinned--a chance. A sorry lot indeed.

Just to change the topic for a moment, the National Post should run a sequel of the underappreciated. While the Beatles were sheer geniouses, so were Simon and Garfunkel--with heavy emphasis on Simon. Every live Central Park concert proclaims Simon's on-going musical brilliance. He practically invented world music. When he sings Rhythm of the Saints, I am right on the sidewalks of Copacabana, listening to the dynamite passando samba trios. It has that raw energy of the street bands. I sense I am getting carried away here, the list being endless. Therefore, I shall limit myself to the newly-designated role of lowly blogger scribe. A short list of the undeserving with a bit of thanksgiving thrown in:

* Madonna-- Either join Paris Hilton in porno or get off the stage. Your shtick is getting old, already.

* Donald Trump--You're fired!

* Senator John Edwards--Thanks for the hefty increase in medical insurance

* Jean Chretien--Thank you for restoring my faith in the democratic system by fulfilling your promise to clean up government

* The CBC--Thanks for teaching me the "right" way of thinking

* The UN --for once again showing how useless you are

* All the individual Beatles--who never lived up to Ringo's role in continuing the rock'n'roll tradition

* The 'universal health care system'--The jammed waiting rooms in the ER says it all.

* The Liberals' supposed monetary financing for endless fixings of our social problems. FDR had it right when he promised a "chicken in every pot". Don't get too fancy.

* Chistmas--Let's just power down on the shrimp in cream with exotic liqueurs at home and skip the enforced pleasantries with hated members of the family over the turkey. As the one of the new Supremes quipped "Friends are God's apology for giving us family"--or something to that effect.

© Bud Talkinghorn--I leave on that up-beat note. Up the bloggeratti!