Parliament Hill Quiz

On a horse, of course

We were in Ottawa earlier this week and after breakfast we joined the hordes of tourists wandering around Parliament Hill. At some point we noticed that several of them had little blue quiz sheets to help them track down things of interest.

We heard several people say, "Now what about this one. Can you find Elizabeth II and what is she on?

I thought, at her age probably high blood pressure medication but my partner suggested it was probably hallucinogenics considering that "She actually thinks she is the Queen"

I think the correct answer was "A horse"

I Always Liked Ottawa

People like to slag Ottawa but I like to think they are just wrong about it, pushed into that mindset by their disdain for Stephen Harper or for the whole process of government. I like the place.

It is the sort of city you can walk in and if you ride a bike, even better, you can bike your heart out for days without repeating your route. Even downtown streets have dedicated bike lanes.

There are plenty of places to walk but, I love the walk along the river below the Parliament buildings ending at the stair step lock on the Rideau Canal. I can spend days exploring the museums and it is a photographer's dream.

I can't think of another Canadian city with a whitewater kayak course, a stone's throw from downtown.

After years of offering less than spectacular dining the restaurant scene is getting better and better. The Whalesbone is a favorite and this time we ate at Aroma a little Mediterranean mezes place. Quite good although their Retsina  only comes in 500 ml bottles.

Give the city a try. Get out of the conference rooms, walk around a bit, get beyond the Byward Market and enjoy what the place has to offer. You won't be sorry.

The CRTC Meets to Look at Internet Billing

Konrad von Finckenstein, looking interested

Anyone who reads this blog knows that the CRTC is not my favourite group of regulators. Not that I have anything against regulators in general, in fact I think we need more of them here in Canada, or at the very least, at least we could use regulators who actually do their jobs.

In Ottawa this week the CRTC is hearing submissions from Canada’s internet giants who are trying to gouge even more than they already charge us for the service. Canadians we are reminded, already pay more for internet service that most other people in the world.

The CRTC, if things run true to form, will try to find a way to give the big guys what they want. Screw the consumer.

I note that at the hearings, Open Media’s Steve Anderson, got a rough ride from the commissioners. First CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein - no, no that is really his name – got annoyed with Anderson who was trying to point out that internet costs were already prohibitive for some who live with within lower income brackets. Finckenstien pushed Anderson saying that he as well beyond the scope of the hearing. To be fair, Anderson most likely be unfamiliar with the finer points of the CRTC tango, a dance perfected by broadcasters, communications companies and the CRTC commissioners.

Then Vice Chair for telecommunications, Len Katz, started to push Mr. Anderson about Open Media’s “non-partisan” status in light what he saw as links to union groups. He also asked how many members it had, and who was funding it.

Katz who has a strong background with the industry giants Anderson is fighting against and one could easily assume is not pro-union, seemed to find fault with the fact that a couple of unions support Open Media. In fact the list of supporters is quite broad and includes 500,000 Canadian citizens.

The vice-chair of broadcasting, Tom Pentefountas, quoted Open Media as saying in the past that Bell’s position in the hearing is “self-serving,”. Pentefountas who seems to have missed the point of these hearings took Anderson to task for referring to Bell Canadian those terms said “Your interest is just as self-serving, is it not?”.

A Montreal lawyer and friend of Stephen Harper’s former communications director Dimitri Soudas, Pentefountas was named vice-chair of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission in a storm of controversy earlier this year. He is startlingly unqualified for the job. I have more credentials than he does.

It was advocacy by Open Media that led to the public outrage over Internet pricing and download limits that prompted the hearings in the first place.

The commissioners would rather not be there.

Here is a Question for you Jack

So here we are. The election is over, Ottawa has a new, but not necessarily better look to it and many of the 60% or so of Canadians who didn’t vote for the Blue Man Group are wondering what happened. More and more are asking themselves, “Isn’t it time we took a hard look at our electoral system.” The first-past-the post system just doesn’t cut it.

All that considered I think that Fair Vote Canada has a great suggestion for Jack Layton’s first Question in the new Parliament. They are nudging the new Leader of the Opposition to ask:

Mr. Speaker, in 1996, when the right was divided and we seemed to be faced with the prospect of “Liberal government forever”, the current prime minister, who was then out of elected office, co-authored and published with Tom Flanagan a remarkable article entitled “Our Benign Dictatorship”. In this thoughtful and well researched article, they decried the way that our first-past-the-post voting system creates one-party rule “beset by the factionalism, regionalism and cronyism that accompany any such system.” They said, and I quote, “For Canadian democracy to mature, Canadian citizens must face these facts, as citizens in other countries have, and update our political structures to reflect the diverse political aspirations of our diverse communities.”

They went on to decry the hugely distorted election results in the 1993 election, in which the Reform party won 52 seats with 19% of the votes, but the Progressive Conservatives, with 16% of the votes, won only two seats, while the Bloc Quebecois, with only 14% of the votes, won 54 seats and formed Her Majesty's “Loyal” Opposition.

“Imposing a first-past-the-post voting system upon a society with deep ethno linguistic and regional cleavages,” they said, “inevitably fragments Canadian conservatism,” adding that, ”Our system has similarly fragmented social democrats.”

They encouraged the Reform and Progressive Conservative parties to advocate electoral reform, and suggested the NDP would vote for it too.

“No one who cares seriously about ideas,” they said, “whether conservative, liberal or socialist, should be happy with the thought of prolonged one-party rule,” because, they pointed out, it leads to cronyism, corruption, cynicism and chaos.” The absence of effective competition,” they said, “is just as bad in politics as it is in economics.”

“Voters on the left,” they pointed out, “are as much entitled as voters on the right to effective representation.”

They went on to point out that, “In today’s democratic societies, organizations share power. Corporations, churches, universities, hospitals, even public sector bureaucracies make decisions through consultation, committees and consensus-building techniques. Only in politics do we still entrust power to a single faction expected to prevail every time over the opposition by sheer force of numbers. Even more anachronistically, we persist in structuring the governing team like a military regiment under a single commander with almost total power to appoint, discipline and expel subordinates.”

They conclude by saying, “Many of Canada’s problems stem from a winner-take-all style of politics that allows governments in Ottawa to impose measures abhorred by large areas of the country,” and “Modernizing Canadian politics would not only be good for conservatism, it might be the key to Canada’s survival as a nation.”

Mr Speaker, we on this side of the House couldn’t agree more with all of that, so my question to the Prime Minister is this: Now that you have won a majority government on the basis of having received less than forty percent of the votes cast in the election, do you still believe in proportional representation?

Then Fair Vote suggests that Jack follow up with the following supplementary.

Mr. Speaker, historically, up to 80% of votes cast for the NDP federally have been wasted votes—they did not help to elect anyone, and our party has always had about half as many seats in this place as we should have won based on the number of votes we received. That has changed, Mr. Speaker, and today, the New Democratic Party is actually slightly over-represented in this House.

But Mr. Speaker, we are willing to put the interests of the country ahead of the interests of our party, and we call on the governing party to do the same.

We do still support proportional representation, Mr. Speaker, and my supplementary question to the Prime Minister is this: When will his government put forward amendments to the Canada Elections Act to give Canadians a modern, fair, proportional voting system, so that every Canadian can have a vote that makes a difference? When they do, Mr. Speaker, we will vote for it.

I don't know if Jack reads what Fair Vote writes about the issue but I hope he does. That question would get people's attention. Let him know this is a great idea.

If you are in Ottawa, Eat at the Whalebone

I have been in Ottawa the last few days visiting Morgan. It  has been almost 14 years since we moved west but I have been back more than a few times. I like this place.

Try Some Oysters

This evening Morgan suggested grabbing a bite at The Whalebone. It is easy to find on Bank Street. I'd never been before but, for certain, I'm going back.

It  is long and narrow and kind of hip and  funky. It was a Monday night so we didn't bother making reservations. We were offered a seat at the bar. I hesitated. I had hoped for a quiet tablet but, next time, I may ask for the bar as my first choice. The bar is where the action is.

The best thing about this restaurant, outside of the atmosphere and the staff, is the food. Whenever possible they use local produce and they follow the Vancouver Aquarium Ocean Wise program.

That program trys to remind us about the threat of that overfishing our oceans brings. The fact is, the world's marine life is quickly being depleted. They suggest  that the only solution is to turn back from the brink, and to begin consuming seafood in a sustainable manner. To help we all should buy species that are caught or farmed in a way that ensures the long-term health and stability of that species, as well as the greater marine ecosystem.

More and more good restaurants are signing on and the Whalebone is one of them.

Their menu changes depending on availablity. Tonight they had west coast oysters from Cortez Island and the east coast oysters came from New Brunswick. We has a couple of each and they were supurb.

I had the PEI farmed Halibut, thinly sliced potatoes cooked in duck fat with fennel, orange and celery on the side. Morgan tried the Quebec rainbow trout with Gallo mussels, Jersusalem artichoke, greens and mushroom. Both meals were a delight.

Next time I'm trying the octopus starter or perhaps the plate of 18 oysters.

If you live in Ottawa or close to the city or, if you are going to visit put the Whalebone on your list of places to eat. You will love the staff and the food is great. Tell your friends. I don't think you can go wrong.

Sit at the bar.

What About This Election Idea?

As election talk increases our newspapers are full of opinions by political pundits telling us that Canadians don’t want an election. They think that Ottawa should simply get down to work even if it means letting Little Stevie run roughshod over our already bruised Canadian psyche.

As much as Stephen Harper drones on about his legitimately elected government, only about 30% of Canadians voted for those guys in the last election. A majority of Canadians don’t want this Harper government in power. That much has been clear from the outset.

I used to support the idea of minority governments. Historically, they have worked but in this age of fuck you politics, they are an appalling failure.

So ask yourself, what have we got?

• We have a bullying style of leadership from the Prime Minister, a style of leadership so mean spirited that it undermines respect for the office he holds.
  
• We have a right-wing government that is bit by bit changing what it means to be a Canadian for the rest of us.

The result is that as a people, Canadians who have a reputation for finding the workable compromise, are being led by a “my way or the highway” government. It is a situation few of us are comfortable with.

The real question is do we want to exchange a Conservative lead government for Liberal government with the same lackluster support now held by Harper and his gang? Why bother.

In the short term what we need is a real coalition government that can team up together and make parliament work. Not some temporary soft Conservative/Bloc/NDP coalition like we are working with now in the short term, but a formal Liberal/NDP deal. Any reasonable government with a social conscious would be supported by the Bloc. A good coalition would easily go full term.

The only thing standing in the way of that happening is hubris and there are few things more powerful.

In the long term, Canadians have to begin to realize that democracy as we know it in this country is a sham.

• When 30% can bring any party to power in Ottawa.
  
• When 40% support can win a government a majority.
  
• When Mulroney’s 50.03% win in 1984 is being described as a landslide

We need to change the electoral system.

Canada is one of the few remaining major democracies still using the “first past the post” system. Most major democracies scrapped this "winner take all" system some time ago. Winner take all systems subvert the core principles of representative democracy.

So, wake up Canada and reclaim your country while you can still recognize it.

Good to be Home

After almost three weeks in the road and 8230 km later it is good to be back in Regina. I am a bit tired from all the driving but I feel rejuvenated as well. I look forward to getting back to what I enjoy about this blog. Focusing on the ironic, political stupidity and what ever controversy grabs my attention

Ottawa is moving into the silly season, the Liberals want an election desperately, Harper has moved into a soft coalition with the people he so recently described as Separatists and Socialists and the American public seems to have lost their collective minds.

It looks like it is going to be a good fall for bloggers. I look forward to it.

Too Bad Obama Won't Get to Skate on the Canal

Well the saviour of the Western World is visiting Ottawa this week in his first state visit, if we can actually call a seven hour touch down a state visit. It is kind of State visit lite. He's not even here yet and already, I have had it up to here with this Obamarama.

Don't get me wrong. After two terms of what was possibly the worst administration in American history, suspicion of the United States' motives, particularly in the area of foreign policy had made many Canadians very wary of the USA. Barrack Obama is a breath of fresh air. His administration is welcomed by most Canadians if not by our prime Minister, who must see this new guy as a threat to his own very conservative policies. If Obama accomplishes a fraction of what the American people, and the World expect, it will be a great step forward.

Nevertheless, I am a bit put off to see the media clamoring to outdo each other with fawning displays of articles, opinion, photographs and route maps. I never quite get it. These trips are to a very large degree tightly scripted ceremonial events anyway. To be frank, I am just about Obamaed out before he even arrives.

The very least, what it does do however, is to start to pull us out of the political doldrums that have settled over Ottawa. After our brief flirtation with the idea of a coalition government was kiboshed when the Governor general put the boots to the idea, things have been pretty dull in our nation's capital. These are trying times for political junkies like me. Hopefully things will start to pick up. This week we are starting to see shades of the old Harper style re-emerging from its brief hiatus;

• The PMO refused to say what cabinet ministers might be meeting with US officials even though the Americans had already released some of the detail
• Harper's people very tersely told reporters that if any one of them had the temerity to shout out a question at the press conference, scheduled in the PMO, the event would be shut down immediately.
• It typical Harper style, the Leader of the Opposition's meeting with the US President has been relegated to an old hanger at the airport. All fifteen minutes of it.
• The Governor General will be kept well away from any television cameras. And she thought Stevie was her new best friend.

This visit is all Harper, all the time.

So, welcome to Canada Barrack Obama. Too bad you won't get a chance to skate on the Rideau Canal. Perhaps the Secret Service can't skate.