One of those weeks! - off to war with Uncle Sam, Tar Sands and railroad follies redux

           This was an unexpectedly busy week for the Harper government.

           Canada has joined another "coalition of the willing" to fight the Islamic State in Irak and environs. Washington asked us for help. Harper held a not very informative "debate" in parliament. Nobody had much to say: all parties came with scripted presentations. It was all Pro Forma, anyway, for the sake of the media: with their majority, the Conservatives had the vote in the bag!

            One can only surmise why the Islamic State is behaving the way it is. Experts give variable opinions. My suspicion is that they are trying to provoke the West to make a lot of martyrs in the expectation that martyrs will attract warriors from the myriads of disaffected, alienated, frustrated young men in the world today. One recalls the propaganda value of martyrdom for the early Christian churches. The West forgets its own history on this point..

             In a sense, the Harper government, is probably getting off the hook easy. Preparations for war tend to put other pressing issues on the back burner, time during which the public may simply forget about them. War is the Ultimate Hot Button issue hence useful for rulers wishing to pull the wool over the public's eyes. Two thousand years ago, the Romans recognized this utility of war: a good war takes minds off how badly things are going at home. War rallies a divided nation..

            Beneath the preparations for war,Tar Sands "development" continues to scarify the environment of Alberta.

            To kick things off, Alberta's own auditor general found serious faults in a joint provincial - federal - industry tar sands monitoring program. The usual type of thing you see when the Harper government finds itself forced to "regulate" - or appear to regulate - the petrochemical or other extractive industries (mines..) Thus, reports are issued well after appointed deadlines (funny - no one suffers chastisement for these repeated delays. The same does not apply to the individual taxpayer and Revenue Canada on tax deadline day, one notes..) The latest annual report was, despite the delays, badly written, unclear and lacked key pieces of information. In other words, the work of people who don't believe in what they are doing. People payed by the taxpayers but just going through the motions of doing a job for the sake of public relations (and also knowing that the "boys upstairs" don't give a shit about monitoring the oil industry either). So much for industry "self-regulation"..

http://www.mykawartha.com/news-story/4902921-alberta-auditor-finds-oilsands-monitoring-lacking/ 

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-auditor-general-gives-poor-grades-for-long-term-care-oilsands-1.2791249 

                     Industry self-regulation puts the fox in charge of the hen house

             Meanwhile, on the federal level, the Environment Commissioner found serious flaws in monitoring tar sands emissions. Drafted regulations have not been given the force of law hence amount to little more than public relations. Effects of volatile hydrocarbon emissions on human health (cancers..) are not being properly monitored despite the fact that some northern communities are at risk from emission level spikes that far exceed international or Canadian norms.

http://environmentaldefence.ca/blog/environment-commissioner%E2%80%99s-report-canada-failing-its-own-objective-undertake-responsible-energy 

             Finally, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) obtained leaked documents indicating that Transport Canada has been reviewing rail safety in the light of several derailments involving crude oil shipments, including the tragic Lac Mégantic, Québec conflagration which killed 47 last summer.

internal blog links: Key Words: Lac Megantic (8 articles)

            The documents received by the CBC indicate that railways are cutting costs by reducing staff to the minimum, one of the factors already indicted in the Lac Mégantic conflagration. The CBC documents reveal that due to erratic work schedules, most freight train drivers are operating in a highly fatigued state for an unacceptable fraction of their work hours. Some drivers are working in a state of fatigue such that their attention span and reflex speed are equivalent to those of a legally drunk man!

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/rail-companies-fight-new-rules-to-prevent-crew-fatigue-1.2785581

           Once again we encounter the notion of hidden costs or "externalities". During the last 4 decades, Western governments (and Third World states under International Monetary Fund, World Bank tutelage) have cut regulatory mechanisms.  They were, of course, inspired by the (now) increasingly discredited neo-conservative, "Free Market" ideology. We are now beginning to realize, I believe, some of the hidden costs of this ideology: the Lac Mégantic tragedy for example. One of the real problem in assessing the hidden costs of neo-con economic ideology is how to apportion an economic cost to human lives, health, individual and collective well being. How much was each of the 47 lives lost in the avoidable Lac Mégantic tragedy worth? Do we merely assess lost income over the expected work life of the individuals? What about women who work in the home, how is their economic worth assessed? More fundamentally, is it even a valid exercise to attempt to assign an economic value to a human life?

            More evidence of Harper's foot-dragging, stalling, "smoke-and-mirrors" approach to greenhouse gas emissions. Keep the masses confused and dumb while the future of the planet is compromised in the name of international corporations' bottom line..

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/politics/federal-government-wont-meet-climate-change-promises-on-current-path-watchdog-says 



            

Size counts!

            Neoconservative "Free Market" ideology requires cutting all public sector services to the bone (even necessary regulatory functions like railway safety compliance and food inspection!)

            The results, of course, are pretty much what a non-ideologue (pragmatist) might predict: infrastructure falls apart, public safety and security fall are quietly shelved in the interest of international corporations' bottom line, the educational system goes to hell in a handbasket, life becomes less convenient, dumber, cruder..

             The urge to cut budgets (and corners) can operate on the micro-level as well as the macro. An interesting case of the perverse effects on neocon idiotology is emerging on Montréal Island, Québec. According to a Canadian Broadcasting Corp news release, speaking about the closing of a local police station:

"The borough of Rivière-des-Prairies—Pointe-aux-Trembles currently has two stations: one in RDP and one in PAT. The stations will be merged into one as a cost-cutting measure.
Community leaders say it's a bad idea."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/rdp-residents-outraged-over-plan-to-close-local-police-station-1.2763929 

             Until 1998, when station 45 was opened in RDP, the ethnically mixed community was prey to street gangs, ethnic tension and petty crime. People were afraid to walk the streets and worried about the kind of environment they were raising their kids in. According to residents interviewed on a morning news program, station 45 changed all that. The police effectively became a unifying force, a respected and admired agent of community cohesion. (Boy, oh boy, when was the last time you heard someone say that about their local cops - Yo!) What I find particularly interesting and which was not addressed in the reportage I heard or read: despite the  substantial rise in community self-confidence and harmony, the actual drop in reported crime was fairly modest, 20%. The suggestion here is that the city got a big, big bang for its buck in installing a police station in an ethnically divided community! (Unfortunately for neocon logic, it's not easy to put a dollar value on things like community spirit and it's long term impact on community development..)

             One of the points stressed by community members was the degree to which having a local police station was critical in establishing a positive rapport between 1- the police and the community and 2- the different ethnic tribes composing the community. The fact that the police were visible and knew people on a face to face basis was considered to be a crucial factor in establishing these positive rapports.

            Here we apparently have a case where the principle "small is beautiful" really works. A smaller, more local, level of organization of police services seems to work better than more integrated, centralized structures (which may be said to fall victim to diseconomies of scale). 

internal blog links: 

keywords: budget cut (13 articles),  deregulation (6 articles)

(There is some overlap between these two groups, some articles are classified under both keywords)
                                      

Lac Mégantic 2: The Sequel

            It's like one of those horror movies where a nightmare repeats itself. One weekend evening this summer a runaway train carrying high volatility petroleum smashed into the town center of Lac Mégantic Québec, overturned, caught fire and exploded, releasing a sea of burning oil over the town center where people were celebrating the end of the work week in pubs, taverns, cafés. 47 were burnt beyond recognition and had to be identified by DNA.

            Now it's happening all over again in Gainford, Alberta. Only, this time they were luckier! No one died but people were evacuated for several days - stressing! - and their land is now contaminated. Long term environmental damage has yet to be assessed. It's still early days..
 
           
internal blog links:

The following link itself contains several backlinks dealing with the blowback from radical, ideologically driven deregulation.

http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2013/08/beating-dead-horse-deregulation-why-it.html
 
              When will we wake up and smell the coffee? Transport of petroleum products by rail has increased "exponentially" over the past decade. Meanwhile, meanwhile.. deregulation (driven by neoconservative ideology, NOT by actual need) has gutted regulatory mechanisms whose function was to maintain public security. In a pathetic attempt to win libertarian, anti-government support by penny pinching at the regulatory level, the rail industry was asked to self-regulate. Is that not a formula for disaster?

report_pins_blame_on_weak_government_regulation.
          

In praise of folly: you get what you pay for.

         There is an old category of wise saying: you get what you pay for. Or as the Romans put it: caveat emptor - let the buyer beware. Or again: don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Our contemporary dominant ideology refuses to admit this wisdom. By cutting "bureaucratic fat" - government services - neoconservative ideologues hope to stimulate the economy by making the rich richer while contributing even less to the common good. The (obviously) self-serving formula is that since "business is more efficient than government" (an unproven premise), real wealth will "trickle down" to the lower levels of society at a lesser cost than inefficient government bureaucracy could provide equivalent services. Also known as The Golden Shower..

          There are many unexamined presuppositions in this bit of neocon ideology: why, for example, how did government end up doing the things neocons want to privatize? Perhaps government ended up providing the service because it 1- was needed (health care, education, prisons, commercial and safety regulations, highways, defense, potable water,..) and 2- private enterprise was found either incapable or unwilling to provide it effectively. In other words, it got dumped on government exactly because the private sector could not do an adequate job. If this historical perspective is indeed still correct we should expect to find more and more private - public initiatives failing to meet the terms of their contracted engagements. Services will be deficient in terms of quality, cost, or availability. And this is exactly the pattern we have seen emerge..

          In some cases, such as education, health care, and safety regulations, we are discovering that the costs incurred after budget cutting are actually greater than the saving obtained by "cutting fat from the bureaucracy". We have become as our grannies used to say, "penny wise and pound foolish". Consider the tragic case of the Lac Mégantic train wreck, for evidence:

http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2013/07/petro-transport-rail-or-pipeline.html

          In recent decades, both Liberal and Conservative governments have set their compasses by the dominant USA inspired Neoconservative or Free Market Ideology. Government deregulated and privatized the railroads, selling off national rail lines and cutting the number of federal rail inspectors. In addition, government began issuing safety "guidelines" to rail companies. In practice, this meant the rail companies were more or less free to implement these guidelines any way they liked. In the deregulated climate of the last three decades this also meant that corners got cut. Profit not service or safety became the number one priority. Meanwhile government, due to the Free Market ideology they embraced, grew compliant and even complacent about the corner cutting. The actual cost of this corner cutting, it now appears, will be a lot steeper than Free Market ideologues foresaw. 

          An early July morning, 2013, Lac Mégantic, Québec: an unmanned freight train carrying crude oil plows into the town center at 1 am in the morning, derailing and engulfing the town center in a river of burning crude oil. The fiery holocaust burned approximately 50 innocent people to death, inflicted hundreds of millions of dollars of economic damage, destroyed sites of historic value and caused immense environmental damage (we are only just starting to find out about that!). It also revealed the intrinsic flaws of an ecologically unsound and now (obviously) failing industrial system of production.

            In a backhanded admission that they got things terribly wrong we read that the feds have released six new rules based on "common sense" which, if they had been in place, would have made it very unlikely that the Lac Mégantic disaster would have happened. That's wonderful to know that 6 simple steps - that cost nothing or close to it - could indeed have prevented the loss of about fifty lives and hundreds of millions of dollars in economic loss. But why the hell weren't they in operation the night of terror? Penny wise, pound foolish..

http://o.canada.com/2013/07/24/new-train-safety-rules-common-sense-says-industry/

http://o.canada.com/2013/07/18/federal-officials-question-insurance-coverage-of-mma-railway-following-lac-megantic-disaster/

           Thus, we learn just how lax things have really become in Neocon Lalalotus Land. The government, if I understand correctly, does not actually know for sure (and had to ask!) if Montréal Maine Atlantic rail had insurance sufficient to cover such an event.

           As stated above, "penny wise, pound foolish" is a stupid philosophy to live by when viewed from a utilitarian perspective. It becomes positively immoral, and morally unacceptable, when lives are placed in danger. Once again, the death toll in the Lac Mégantic conflagration is nearly 50, an exceedingly heavy toll in a community of 6,000. What cost do you place on human life..

          According to a recent Montréal Gazette article, 5.7 million litres of crude are still missing and not accounted for: they are in the soil and water of Lac Mégantic and environs. If these figures turn out to be correct this may the biggest oil spill in North America outside of seafloor well blowouts. Decontamination will be a big job, a complex job and a long job which, of course, means a costly job - hence the importance of assuring that rail transporters and rail lines carry adequate insurance, duh..

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/million+litres+spilled+M%C3%A9gantic/8693863/story.html

            Why did we elect these people? That is the question I imagine historians and thesis students in the future scratching their heads in wonderment over.. Why?.. Why, what were those people back then thinking, did they think, were they capable of thinking?..

The future of Canadian Science at stake?

          A plea for fundamental scientific research from Nobel prize winning Canadian chemist, John Polanyi.
 
http://www.cbc.ca/player/Radio/As+It+Happens/ID/2384023775/

           Polanyi is here reacting against another false perception propagated by the neconservative ideology of the present government. This view holds that research is not good if it does not directly aid the business community's bottom line. The problem here is with the world "directly". Fundamental research is often a roulette game. If you hit big you hit BIG! Think about lasers..

           Much fundamental research, though, does not pan out or does not produce knowledge of immediate benefit. But neocon ideologues want immediate results.They can't see beyond the next quarter's profit margin. They seem to suffer from a kind of mental myopia, a short sightedness of vision.. meanwhile human demography, our planet's ecology, the climate, the resource base we live from, all go to hell in a handbasket. 

           The Haper government, true to its ideological roots, has announced a further re-visioning of the goals of Research Canada: science will be the handmaiden of industry. The cart will drive the horse..

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/05/07/national_research_council_open_for_business_conservative_government_says.html

You gets what you pays for..

                Lest we all forget, the Harper Conservative governement was elected on a platform of fiscal responsibility in the wake of the Chrétien Liberals' financing scandals: federal monies were diverted to support the anti-separatist "Non" campaign in Québec, some of that money got further diverted into Liberal election funds and gifts to Liberal supporters. 

              It is therefore a bit surprising - ? shocking ? - to note that the Conservatives have - temporarily at least - lost track of $3.1 Billion earmarked for the "war on terrorism". 

Dang! Now where did those three billion smackeroos go..

                 The synopsis boxes on the right hand side of the above article are interesting reading, too:

"The national search-and-rescue system run by the Canadian Forces and the Canadian Coast Guard is troubled by aging equipment and shortages of pilots and flight engineers. They are doing an adequate job now, but will face sustainability problems in the future."

              Part of the neoconservative ideology inspiring the Harper Conservatives is, of course, the "need" to constantly cut "government" and turn over everything to the private sector. The argument - ideologically, not factually, based - is that "government is inefficient". This argument, like all truisms, obviously has some validity but is overgeneralized to the point of absurdity by neoconservative ideologues to include even those functions and services which generate too low a profit margin when performed by the private sector. This is duh.. why they were put in the public sector in the first place! 

               Such services inevitably degrade in the hands of the private sector or, worse, end up excluding the very people who are most vulnerable and in need (poorer communities or segments of the population). The various attempts around the world to privitize potable water delivery are glaring examples of the failure of privitization to provide adequate essential public services. 

                Here, Canadian search and rescue services, is, perhaps, another example. Either society decides - hopefully democratically - that it wants adequate search and rescue services and then delivers the funding. Or isolated communities and governments are left to do as best they can. One can agree or disagree with either position but they are, at least, honest statements of alternative political positions. Anything "in between" is simply neocon hypocrisy and word-twisting. One the one hand, we praise "our boys and girls" in the military while providing them with inadequate - and therefore risky - equipment and manpower. This is not just hypocritical, it is immoral and criminal. Ideologues refuse to realize there are simply somethings governments do better. This lesson, learned during the 19th century, is now being unlearned by our contemporary "laissez-faire" ideologues. How long before the people wake up to the fact they are being short changed?

                The faulty logic in ideological overgeneralization of the "government is inefficient" argument is appalingly evident: yes, you may indeed save some money at the front end by privitizing a public function but the OVERALL costs to society as a whole, may actually rise exponentially. Programs to give welfare recipients SERIOUS occupational training cost the taxpayer money. But the ex-welfare recipicient who enters the workforce with qualifications is unlikely to fall back on the dole again. During their working life, they are likely to contribute several times, in taxes, the costs of the program that got them off welfare. They are also less likely to be a burden to the community in terms of health problems, substance or alcohol abuse, imprisionment or institutionalization for mental health problems. When one does full cost accounting, one often finds that a public service rendered by a public agent actually ends up costing society less than a privitized one. But such a position is not politically correct today..

The Imperial Prime Minister: wither democracy?

             An interesting half-hour discussion this morning on the state of Canadian democracy, heard on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's morning radio program, "The Current". Recently social conservative backbencers have openly complained that the Prime Minister's Office is stiffling their right to represent their constituents on issues such as abortion law and sex selective abortion of girls reportedly practiced in some ethnic communities. They claim that they have been told that these issues are not welcome on the floor of parliament and will not be debated.

             Brent Rathgeber, a Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) representing Edmonton, Alberta speaks on the first segment of the audio-clip (hit the "Listen" button of the link below). Rathgeber is not himself a social conservative but believes that fundamental principles of democratic governance are being violated by his own party. Conservatives, he claims, have traditionally stood for freedom of speech and freedom of open debate.

Conservative Backbenchers muzzled?

            The last segment, beginning around minute 16, is an interview with conservative pundit Andrew Coyne. Coyne has some interesting points to make about the general state of health of Canadian democracy today. Party discipline, he notes, has grown across all party lines in recent decades. But why? I have asked myself this very question quite a few times lately. Is Canada moving towards an American style presidential system and away from British style adversarial parliament? A recent article by Mr Coyne in which he compares the Canadian and Australian parliaments suggests this might be the case.

http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/03/27/andrew-coyne-backbench-revolt-isnt-pro-life-vs-pro-choice-its-for-the-freedom-of-all-mps/

             Coyne concludes his article with the stirring lines:

"This did not begin with Warawa, in short, and it will not end here. The question is whether opposition MPs will join the fray. The shuttering of Warawa’s motion, after all, was an all-party affair: it was his motion this time, but it could be theirs next. There’s a fight worth having, here, but it isn’t Conservatives vs. Opposition, or pro-life vs. pro-choice. It’s for the freedom of all MPs against the dictates of a system that, as in no other democracy, has vested all power in the party leader."

              The distortions of the democratic process are everywhere if one takes the time and effort to look and see. In this blog we have examined recent efforts on the part of the Harper governement to silence scientific debate relating to the hazards of fossil fuel use (climate change in general and potential biohazards resulting from extracting and refining Alberta tar sands). See the internal blog links at the end of this article for links to these articles.

              In his interview on "The Current", Coyne described the perncious current practice - borrowed from the US? - of utilizing omnibus bills to ram through federal budgets without debate. Listen to the audioclip of the link below, Backbench MPs muzzled?, beginning around minute 16 for the Coyne interview. Obviously "pragmatism" or "efficiency" are invoked to justify this undemocratic practice: modern goverments have simply grown too large, too complex and too interconnected in their functioning to afford the luxury of longwinded debate..

Backbench MPs muzzled?

              The following article, published Easter Sunday in the New York Times by Canadian academic Prof. Thomas Homer-Dixon, sounds an alarm for citizen's on both sides of the border.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/01/opinion/the-tar-sands-disaster.html?_r=1&

              Prof Homer-Dixon in a short, 8 minute, interview on the CBC newsprogram: "As it happens", 2 April, 2013. This spoken statement of his position, I find particularly eloquent.

http://www.cbc.ca/asithappens/features/2013/04/02/thomas-homer-dixon-nyt-editorial-the-tar-sands-disaster/


             My own analysis of the state of democracy in Canada and the world is more "structural" and perhaps more pessimistic than conservative pundit Andrew Coyne's. I perceive the disenfranchisement of the citizen / the disempowerment of civil society as an inevitable byproduct of technocracy. One's actual starting position on the political spectrum appears irrelevant. Technocracy operates it centralizing of power and regulation of information flows whether one begins from the Left - marxist Communism - or from the Right - fascism and its antechamber, the modern corporation controlled State. Wherever one starts from, one ends up in the same place. Chinese taoist philosophy says that the tao (the nature) of water is to seek sealevel. All rivers flow to the sea. I see Fascism as the tao of industrialisation. "Republican values" - in the French revolutionary sense of "republican": liberty, equality, fraternity and representative government arose prior to the industrial reveolution (and technocracy). The Great Historical Question: would such "republican" values have risen if the industrial revolution had occurred in the first half of the 18th century instead of the first half of the 19th century..

              To cut to the chase."Every cloud has a silver lining". Bad things shake people up, forcing them to consider new and better ways of living, of doing things, of making a buck. Consider the New Economy we are entering in this dawn of a new century, the post peak oil economy. Cheap oil is running out. What is left will cost more and more to discover, extract and refine. Environmental impacts will worsen. This all looks bad for our energy junkie lifestyles, certainly. But the New Economy also offers the (potential) promise of reversing the trend toward antidemocratic centralization which industrialisation and technocracy have installed. If we play our cards right we will find within ourselves the wit and wisdom to grasp this opportunity to re-empower our local communities, our families, our lives and to offer our children a future in which hope still lives.
 

internal blog links:

Harper muzzles Conservatives' Right Wing?

Harper muzzles Environmental Science?

This link gives numerous internal blog links 
climate scientists speak out

Experimental Lakes Area: a most curious episode

         A curious episode in the ongoing saga of Canadian environmental science. The Experimental Lakes Area (northern Ontario). This multidecade project is world renowned for providing essential information on the dynamics of freshwater ecosystems and their interaction with air and water borne pollutants: acid rain, mercury, phosphorus runoff..

         In an interview on the CBC radio program, "As it happens", Prof Britt Hall, an earth science researcher claimed that the federal government gave her the run around when pressed for reasons for cutting funding to the Experimental Lakes Area (ELA) project. Successive "reasons" provided:

1- Budget. This is BS for several reasons. Firstly, ELA costs a measly $2 Million (that is "Million" with an "m", not billion with an "b"). In return, not only does ELA provide info essential for assessing environmental risks, remediating them and drafting legislation but ELA puts science Canada on the world map. As one scientists puts it succinctly: "ELA is Canada's Hadron Collider". The services ELA provided in the long term study of freshwater ecosystem dynamics were, in fact, unique in the world. And all this for a measly $2 million (with an "m", remember). Secondly, most of the $2 million in funding were internal federal expenditures for the salaries of federal government employed scientists. Thus even if the feds chose to withdraw their participation in the scientific side of the project, there is no reason for physically closing it down. At present, full staff maintenance of the facility costs a mere $600,000. Maintaining a skelton maintenance staff for externally funded university and private industry researchers would cost "much less" than $600,000 (Prof Hall in the 18 march"As it happens" interview). We are now getting down into the $100,000 range which is chicken feed even for provincial governments! No, budget is not a legitimate excuse for shutting down ELA.

2- The second phony "reason" the feds tried to get Prof Hall to swallow: "not our mandate". But ELA reasearch does actually relate to the environment in Canada, duhhh.. (Who then should be responsible for the Canadian environment - the Vietnamese environmental agency, maybe??)

3- The last pathetic excuse for a rationale for killing ELA: redundancy - work done at ELA overlaps that covered by other federally funded projects. Problem: one can't find 'em when one looks for 'em.. More BS..

               When pressed by the "As it happens" interviewer for a plausible reason for the cuts, Prof Hall said simply, the only conclusion one could draw is that the feds don't want research on air pollution / fresh water ecosystem quality to continue. Aside: Prof Hall is a soft spoken woman and does not come across as an ideological firebrand of the confrontational environmental Left. She is an academic.

                 After the jaw drop provoked by this astounding interview, comes the obvious question: but WHY?? Why the hell cut a high prestige, world class long term science project of great potential value which, moreover, operates on a shoestring budget? What have the feds got for brains??!! What is Steven Harper and his friends dropping or smoking?

               Perhaps research on air quality bothers Harper's friends / supporters in the Oil Patch. This is the closest to a rational motive I could find. Anybody got better?

Podcast of "As it happens", CBC, monday, 18 march, 2013. To quickly access the  interview with Prof Britt Hall advance the cursor one third.

http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/asithappens_20130318_13749.mp3

                 The CBC deserves a bit of credit (not much, but a little) for sticking with this story a bit longer than usual. The day following the interview with Prof Hall, Prof Moss, a limnologist (studies terrestrial water systems) registrered his astonishment at  Canada's  recent "loss of good sense": gagging scientists, restricting access to research results, radical - and apparently strategic - budget cuts to scientific projects of long term proven value. Prof Moss particularly lamented the loss of the long term data base provided by ELA's 45 years of continuous monitoring and research.

                  Access to the interview with Prof Moss is easy, first interview on clip:

http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/asithappens_20130320_36132.mp3

Internal blog links (gives numerous internal links): 

http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2013/02/climate-scientists-speak-out.html  

                  

The right hand knows not what the left hand does..

           According to conventional neoconservative, Free Market ideology, reducing the size of government and eliminating regulatory mechanisms leads to increased efficiency (government is defined to be inefficient as an axiom of the belief system whether or not, in any given instance, it actually is).

           Like many "common sense" propositions, "cutting fat to improve efficiency" is, at best, only partly true, of limited (though real) applicability. Like all good, but limited, ideas, carrying it to illogical limits leads to destructive, counterproductive blowback (unintended consequences). 

           A good example of the such blowback was revealed in the Charbonneau Commission's investigation into corruption in the construction industry in the Province of Québec.

Wiki: Charbonneau Commission

            Budget cuts can lead to increased expenses in the long run, if they are not judiciously implemented and monitored to optimize the benefit to cost ratio of services provided to the public sector (that is, if cuts are implemented in a hamfisted, ideologically driven fashion). 

            One of the witnesses being grilled before the Charbonneau Commission into construction industry corruption in the city of Montréal observed that staff reductions in the Montréal Public Works Dept meant that oversight of public work contracts was reduced. The reduced oversight had the perverse, counterproductive effect of making it easier to inflate cost estimates and pay off corrupted officials. For example, cost overruns on projects would be inflated or simply invented with a kickback payed to a corrupted civil engineer so he would approve the additional billing. In addition, with oversight delegated to private sector consulting firms, the city lost the inhouse competency to carry out its own monitoring. This lead to increased costs for oversight and / or to reduced capacity. So the net effect of ideologically inspired budget cutting is to save a few bucks with the right hand while the left hand picks the right hand's pocket. Hidden costs - economists call them "externalities"..

internal blog link: http://transparencycanada.blogspot.ca/2012/10/charbonneau-commission-when.html

In praise of folly: budget cuts cost more than saving

         This is folly, of course: budget cuts for ideological reasons that end up costing more than they saved! Yet the Harper government may have arrived at this point of absurdity. Except that there is now a moral issue concerned: human lives may be put at risk so that Harper can grandstand to his populist - reactionary hardcore.. which is starting to get a bit scary.. this is no longer "just" a question of political buffoonery but of human safety and wellbeing.

            When Newfoundland fisher Shang Rideout's father took ill at sea, he called the Coast Guard. Unfortunately, Harper's budget-cutters had previously passed and, in the interest of "saving money",  medical emergency calls formerly handled by a regional (Atlantic Canada) company are now handled by CIRM Roma, an ITALIAN company. As might be expected, this resulted in a few hiccups: ideological budget cutters, like all ideologues, are not at all interested in practical details like efficiency, competence, relevance, safety or even - curiously!- cost. The person handling Rideout's call could hardly understand English, for starters. They did not know where Newfoundland was or with what country it is affiliated, either. Definitely not a good start for a medical emergency.. not..

              A former employee of an axed Marine Rescue Sub-centre, Merv Wiseman said "We thought we would see things fall through the cracks. We just didn't think it would happen this quickly." "Just didn't think it would happen so quickly"! Indeed, Mr Wiseman, life is barrel of surprises with the Harperite ideologues, ain't it now? LOL, what NEXT??

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/story/2012/05/09/nl-marine-medical-rome-509.html

              Frustrated with the lack of communication or useful medical assistance, Rideout decided to return to shore to seek medical assistance for his father, a trip that took 10 hours. A similar emergency six years ago happened to the Rideout crew. Then a medical chopper was sent out to ferry the sick person ashore. Fortunately, this time, the patient survived the 10 hour trip by boat. (Lucky for him)

Harper's anti-keynesean cuts CREATE JOBS

"Mr. Corbett, whose union represents more than 57,000 professionals and scientists in the public service, is warning Ottawa against cutting staff in the safety and security fields, such as food inspectors, scientists and financial auditors."

From the Globe and Mail:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/just-days-after-harpers-budget-the-axe-begins-to-fall/article2388765/ 

            Mr. Corbett being a union rep - and thus a Lefty - does not really get the Big Pic. He, undoubtedly believes that in times of recession governments should increase spending on infrastructure and services in an attempt to create jobs, stimulate the economy and build infrastructure for future development. He does not see that Steven Harper's anti-Keynesean federal government budget cuts should actually CREATE JOBS in the long run. Here's why.

            How can cutting the number of, say, federal slaughter house inspectors increase jobs, you say? Let's walk through the economic logic step by step..

            What will the effects of such cuts be, in statistical, epidemiological, terms?

            Well, for starters, more food borne diseases like listeriosis and salmonella. Which will, of course, through the famous "Multiplier Effect", spread economic activity throughout the economy. Think of the employment created for 9-11 call centers, ambulance drivers, hospital emergency room doctors, nurses, gastroenteric specialists, lab technicians, funeral home employees, morgue attendants, grave diggers and embalmers. What do you say to THAT, Mr. Corbett? Are Harper's cuts really job killers or job creators? Time for a moment of reflection here, Mr. Corbett. Learn to step back and see the Big Pic. Learn what the REALLY important priorities are in a Free Market Economy..

RIP: 29 March, 2012

Rest in peace: 29 march 2012

- Katimavik, Canada's "domestic Peace Corps". Katimavik, after a feisty start, a turbulent adolescence and a promising early entry into maturity, fell victim to the Harper government's 2012 annual budget's cuts. 

http://www.katimavik.org/our-history


1977 — Genesis and ideals
Katimavik (which means “meeting place” in the Inuktitut language) is founded. The initial driving impulse was to educate youth and spur lifelong civic engagement through community service. In its first year, Katimavik mobilized 1,000 volunteers, who worked on projects in more than 80 communities.
1977-1986 — Maturity and growth
In its first glory years, many Canadians discovered other regions of Canada for the first time. They learned languages and acquired skills, while growing in body and mind.
In 1985 — Katimavik honoured
As its alumni ranks swelled to 15,000, Katimavik’s influence also grew. During International Youth Year, the United Nations honoured Katimavik with an award for its environmental involvement.
By 1986 — Over 17 000 volunteers
Katimavik contributed to the education of over 17 000 young Canadians by engaging them in volunteer service, community involvement, cultural discovery, the practicing of Canada’s official languages and environmental protection.
1986-1994 — The difficult years
Katimavik’s federal funding was interrupted. The program survived, much diminished, as an outdoor recreational and training centre in the Montréal suburb of Île-Perrot.
1994 — Rebirth
Katimavik’s budget was reinstated, and in 1994, 66 participants from Ontario, Québec and New Brunswick took on projects in six communities. Annual participation has since grown to over 1,000 yearly in some 90 communities.
1999 — International recognition
Katimavik took part in the IANYS conference in El Paso. A five year strategic plan was being deployed and to help guide Katimavik into the new millennium and the first Meet Your MP events were held on Parliament Hill.
2000-2001 — Two new leadership programs established: Leader 16-19 and Leader Plus 22-26.
2004 — Katimavik participated in the International Association of National Youth Service (IANYS) international conference in Accra, Ghana. Katimavik signed a partnership with Vancouver Island University that provided university credits for our volunteers.
2005 — University credits
Capilano College in North Vancouver, British Columbia, recognized the Katimavik program by awarding credits to students who successfully complete the program.
2006 — ROI proven
Katimavik was able to report that each dollar spent by the Katimavik program generates a return of $2.20 in each of the communities that work with our volunteers.
2007-2008 — Program modernized
Several modifications were made to the learning program. The objective is to allow Katimavik to more efficiently and scientifically measure the progression of each youth’s personal development progress.
2008-2009 — Competency model adopted
Katimavik restructured the learning program for volunteers. Instead of focusing solely on improving skill-sets, the new model favours the development of our volunteers’ personal, social and professional competencies.
2009-2010 — 6 month programs introduced
Starting in September 2009, Katimavik offered the following programs: “Eco-citizenship and Active Living”, “Second Language and Cultural Identity” and “Cultural Discovery and Civic-Engagement”.
2009-2010 — Post-secondary credit
Cégep Marie-Victorin (QC, 2009) and George Brown College (ON, 2010) recognized the Katimavik program by awarding credits to students that complete the program.
2010-2011 — A renewed focus on community impact
The communities that host Katimavik groups are selected based on criteria that reflect the areas of impact targeted by Katimavik: social services, poverty reduction, formal & non-formal education (focus on literacy), arts, culture & heritage, sports and leisure, environment & sustainable development - media & communications and social justice .

              En passant, the actual rationale - aside from ideology - for Katimavik's demise is not evident since "each dollar spent by the Katimavik program generates a return of $2.20 in each of the communities that work with our volunteers". Thus the $15 million program produced $33 million through economic stimulation in the communities served. Cutting it "saved" the Harper government a NEGATIVE sum of $15 minus $33 million for a net LOSS of $18 million. Quite impressive for a penny pinching government.

               One suspects ideology played a role in the Harper government's decision. Katimavik supported initiatives in "environment and sustainable development.. and social justice".

- Rights and Democracy (né Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development). Founded in 1988 by the Conservative Mulroney government, Rights and Democracy was an internationally recognized and appreciated independent agency of the Canadian federal government that monitored human rights and promoted democracy abroad. As an "independent agency", Rights and Democracy reported directly to Parliament and not to the Government of the day. In recent years, the Harper government succeeded in planting its moles within the organization either to mold it to the Conservatives' foreign policy agenda or to sow discord in its midst thereby providing Harper an excuse for delivering the final coup de grâce. The Harper government, for example, disapproved of the Centre's moderate, middle-of-the-road stance with respect to Israel, preferring instead to take sides and issue the current Likud government a carte blanche on its Palestinian policy. Members of Rights and Democracy have been inaccurately accused of "frequenting" members of the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas. Such behavior at first appears rather naughty and partisan until one stops to note that the "frequenting" occurred at public meetings involving hundreds of participants of all political stripes. Such accusations are a bit like saying that Rick Santorin is gay because members of a gay organization attended some of his speeches! Maybe they just came just to hear what he was saying about them..

                  Ed Broadbent, former NDP leader, recently spoke on CBC Radio about the killing of Rights and Democracy. Listen to the 6 minute audioclip.
 
http://www.cbc.ca/homerun/2012/04/03/rights-and-democracy/ 

The Decline and Fall of Canadian Science

          At the American Association for the Advancement of Science's annual conference Feb. 16 to 20 in Vancouver, one of the panel discussions was titled "the muzzling of Canada's federal scientists." 

http://www.embassymag.ca/page/printpage/scientist-02-29-2012 

           Many of the participants appeared openly surprised, puzzled or worried by recent modifications in protocols relating to Federally employed or supported scientists' media access. In the past Canada was often seen as a model of governmental transparency. We find these recent changes a bit ironical, not to say hypocritical, given the fact that the Harper government was elected on a platform of "law and order, transparency and responsible government". Ironic, too, since Canada is headed in the direction the US followed under the Administration of George Bush, jr when climate science supporting the global warming hypothesis was ignored or devaluated. Today, under the Obama Administration, the US has become more open, while Canada, traditionally the more liberal and open society, is becoming more closed, controled, defensive.

            Dr. Francesca Grifo, one of the panelists on "The muzzling of Canada's federal scientists" discussion and senior scientist and director of the Scientific Integrity Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists warned that re-establishing open communicatons will be an ardurous process. "The longer that this [restricted access] goes on, the more deeply embedded it becomes in the culture in the agencies, and the harder it is to turn back," she said. "You don't want a situation where a scientist is scared to open their mouths when something is desperately wrong, that can hurt lives in a very direct way." Dr. Grifo's warning needs to be taken very seriously, we feel. In the turbulent times ahead, it will be essential that we have confidence in our officials and leaders. We will be facing, in the next few decades, several critical transitions: from our current cheap oil economy to the "post peak" oil economy, the divisive challenges of climate change adaptation, global demographic pressures on dwindling non-renewable resources.. Failing an abiding confidence in our leaders, we will only face a future of political and social chaos..

                Here is a link to the full panel discussion at which Dr Grifo spoke:

http://hosting.desire2learncapture.com/StellarJay/4/watch/28.aspx 

                 It is interesting to note that, while the government was invited to participate in the panel, all invited participants declined (!!) Very telling piece of behavior that..

                Now what does Harperite "transparency" look like in practice, the transparency they promised us before they were elected? Well, in the past, reporters could call up an Environment Canada scientist, chat, and arrange an interview. Now calls are required to pass through a "filter" called "Media Relations". Good Lord, shades of the former Soviet Union, wouldn't you believe it! This is Canada we're talking about folks.. The idea seems to be: "no news is good news", "what the public doesn't know won't hurt them" (it will hurt them, of course, but we are dealing here with ideologues, no different - in reality - from those who oversaw the decline and fall of the Soviet Union). 

                En passant, it is interesting to note that the "muzzling" / "filtering" process imposed by the Harper government actually succeeds in introducing several new levels of beauracracy to science communication -  and this from a rabidly anti-beauracracy government so keen to cut services to the most disadvantaged members of society! Will wonders never cease? What the hell is going on with these guys? Did they never heard the words "consistency" or "integrity"..

                  Canada has recently lost its "PEARL" of arctic science research, the world renowned Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory. Once again, one wonders about the possible motivations for the irrational destruction of critically important data gathering infrastructure: "no news is good news?", "what the public doesn't know won't hurt them"..

http://forums.canadiancontent.net/news/104697-feds-cut-funding-key-science.html

"This loss comes at a highly significant time when Arctic conditions are changing rapidly: Witness the recent rapid loss of permafrost, the appearance of the first large Arctic ozone depletion last year and many other harbingers of significant Arctic change," the researchers said in a statement Tuesday.

"Without PEARL there will be no continuous active measurements in the High Arctic of many atmospheric quantities scientists believe greatly affect both our Arctic and the whole planet."

                    Public ethics is in deep water, folks, and sinking fast.

internal blog link: sep 19, 2011 http://transparencycanada.blogspot.com/2011/09/environmental-transparency-what-you.html
                  

              

Budget Cutting: Cutting off your nose to spite your face

         Harping against the Harperites. Well, they are at it again, it seems. Breaking campaign promises. What is it this time?

          "Responsable government" - like they do what they say and what they do is relatively clean, honest, efficient, comptetent. Those are nice guide lines for responsable government.

            Does the current Conservative government in Ottawa live up to this definition?
  
             There is reason to believe the answer to this question is "no". A recent article from Canadians for Accountability points to a number of glaring inconsistencies in the Feds recent proposals to "reduce fat" in the bureaucracy.

http://canadians4accountability.org/blog/2011/09/26/the-real-problem-with-the-90000-per-diem/

               They propose paying a private accounting firm $20 million ($90,000 per day or the salary of about 45 people) to save money. On the surface it makes "sense", appealing to kneejerk populist anti-government sentiments. But, the author argues, does it really make sense, in either a financial, managerial or moral sense?

                 Firstly, private firms like Deloitte and Touche are, in reality, likely to be less responsible than the corps of professional bureaucrats who will have to live with the consequences of their policy choices. Outside "privateers" are more like to play the tune they know their clients expect and want to hear. They are therefore less likely to be objective and efficiency oriented than a duly delegated working group of  bureaucrats would be. 

"So why this expensive exercise? The most likely answer is the desire to give a veneer of validity, independence and authority to the findings... The government wants to be able to say, “Look, we don’t want to cut all these jobs. We don’t want to axe these programs. But the report says we have to."" 

                    In other words, "you gets what you pays for". Attempting to slough off what are essentially governmental functions on the private sector does not necessarily result in "efficiency", "savings", "performance" and the rest. Such decisions these days are - let's be honest - ideologically driven, not performance driven. We are being sold a used clunker with false papers that's been in a bad accident. Would you buy a used car from this man..
 

Environmental Transparency: what you don't see, can't hurt you!

                  Oh dear! The Harperites are at it again, it seems. Defaulting on their campaign promises. What this time..?

                   Remember the promises about "responsable government"? A government is responsable when it informs citizens of common dangers. This is so because, technically speaking, the government is supposed to be acting - in democracies anyway - as the agent of the people. You do not expect your banker to be rifling your accounts or your grocer to be short changing on the weight of the veggies you buy.

                 So too with governments. One of their functions is national defense. "Defense" - in the large sense - includes warning people of dangers, for example, a radioactive cloud arriving on the Pacific cost from damaged Japanese reactors. If the government failed to do so, the public would, in fact, be justified in calling the government to account for its failure to inform. We all know damn well this is true.

                 Now, since we accept the consensus opinion of the scientific community on the risks posed by climate change, we consider it totally unacceptable that the Harper government would suppress reasearch and  monitoring programs relating to anthropogenic climate change. This however is exactly what the Harperites have done!

                  Incredible! Do these guys have no shame? Or are they so brain-washed by the propaganda machine of the oil industry they serve that they really feel such programs and research are "a waste of time and money" in a time of budget restriction? Although, even here, given the way the economy is behaving lately, it is arguable that the feds should actually be spending money in strategic areas - renewable energies, energy conservation, public transport.. - even if this means going into deeper debt for a while.

                 The consequences of further budget cuts to Environment Canada will be long reaching and unpredictable. For those who reject the scientific consensus on the reality of anthropogenic climate change but who do believe in the threat of ozone eating CFC gases, consider the following:

"... the Canadian cuts also threaten to erode the Montreal Protocol, an international agreement that obliges Arctic countries to monitor the ozone layer and maintain scientific ozone research.
Closing down Canada's ozone stations and the Toronto data archive "would clearly be seen as eroding the regulations of the Montreal protocol,"... "Once such an erosion process starts other countries can follow and may start to question other parts of the regulations under the Protocol.""

 http://www.canada.com/technology/Harper+government+cutting+vital+climate+science+Critics/5402767/story.html

                   We are treading on very thin ice here! Global problems, like Ozone Layer Depletion which could reduce crop outputs and further destabalize the third world, need to be faced multilaterally, that  is, "internationally". Harper and his gang, in a move to gain cheap votes from their right wing core - populism, in other words - are dismantling multilateral structures and institutions, the destruction of which will entail unknowable - but extremely heavy - long term consequences.

internal blog link: mar 6, 2012 http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=8403090612918247270#editor/target=post;postID=7082523677780259320