Pirates? This ain't About Jack Sparrow

Pirates are all in the news this week. In some ways it is a refreshing change from the mounting death toll from our hapless “mission” in Afghanistan, the continuing atrocities in Darfur or the economic meltdown.

Piracy is something North Americans can understand after all weren’t we all raised on books like Treasure Island so; don’t we all have a soft spot for guys like Long John Silver? Why else would we all tolerate the rogue bankers who have plundered our economic system as if it was their own private Spanish Main. But there I go again...back to the real pirates.

These Somali pirates operate very much like Red Beard did in the good old days. There is a friendly “wink, wink ,nod, nod” tolerance by their own government, such as it is. For a change we aren’t dealing with ideology we can’t comprehend. These guys aren’t saying “Death to America.” They just want money. This is all about greed. We North Americans have a pretty good understanding of that motivation. The real question seems to be how do we deal with it?

The western nations are all wringing their hands trying to find ways to stop these guys. Some have sent a token number of war ships but they seem unable or unwilling to move in and stop things. The exception seems to be India whose warship blew one of the pirate vessels out of the water this week. The shipping companies are paying out huge ransoms and the pirates are getting rich and getting used to the lifestyle. The pirates are spreading the wealth around. There is a construction boom in Somalia. It is like a job creation program.

I don’t think the solution is as complex as the international security pundits claim. The area which has to be protected isn’t all that large considering the challenge our nation faced during the Second World War keeping the North Atlantic shipping lanes open.

I propose what seems to me to be an obvious solution.

Nations, depending on keeping the shipping lanes open, must increase their naval complement in the area. A United Nations coordinated naval fleet, large enough to make a difference and willing to take action against pirate mother ships should be established. With the existing sophisticated satellite tracking systems, it can’t be all that difficult to track these guys.

Instead of traveling alone the shipping companies should form the merchant ships and tankers into convoys. Those convoys should travel protected by the increased naval presence.

Once things are stabilized, nations can then begin to help the Somali government re-establish some order on the ground. Without a continued source of new income the piracy game will crumble.

If the UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon wants more advice, he should give me a call.

Why wait for the solstice

Well I think we can stop pretending it is fall. November 20th and the temperature is -19. It is warmer in Yellowknife at -11 for God's sake. Welcome to Saskatchewan Winter.

It must be that I am not a native prairie person. I am just not prepared for this. It catches me up short every year.

My neighbours, prairie people to the core know about this stuff. As soon as Halloween is past the Christmas lights go up. Every year I scoff and snort about it but, they know what they are doing. Those aren't really Christmas lights they are winter decorations. Not there to welcome the festive holiday season but to try and shine some light into those dark winter evenings. What they are saying is not "Happy Holiday" it is "Winter is here and is going to be here for what will seem like a hell of a long time, so get used to it."

I guess I'll plug in my lights.

Secrets and Lies

I watched an interesting, insightful film Saturday evening. Secrets and Lies is by director Mike Leigh and is about a family is forced to confront the personal issues they've all been avoiding for years. Cynthia (Brenda Blethyn)a single mother in middle age, works in a box factory and life's disappointments have made her miserable. Her bitter daughter Roxanne (Claire Rushbrook) sweeps streets for the local council.
Cynthia helped raise her brother, Maurice (Timothy Spall), who is a sucessful photographer, but they seldom see each other. Maurice and his wife have problems of their own. One day, Cynthia receives a phone call from a woman named Hortense (Marianne Jean-Baptiste), who claims to be the daughter Cynthia put up for adoption years ago. Cynthia initially reacts with panic, but she agrees to meet Hortense, a successful and soft-spoken eye doctor. She is also black.
Against all odds the two form a real bond which give Cynthia some meaning in her life.
On Roxanne's birthday, Maurice has a barbecue and things unravel. It forces all of them to confront the lies and secrets that have kept them apart all these years.

T.G.I.F. - Floor Hockey

Friday at last. Even in a short week I am glad to see it arrive. I didn't think I'd care, after all, what is the difference to a retired guy but, I do. The weekend means more people are around the house, it is more social time and, of course, it means that tonight we play floor hockey.

It has been an odd week.

The Conservative Party faithful met this week in Winnipeg, a kind of Republican lite. I am sure that is a fun group...but I digress.

In advance of a world meeting on the state of the economy, Harper aligned himself with the Americans instead of looking at what the European Leaders are saying. No surprise there really but the EU is a huge potential market for trade and we are already feeling the effects of putting too many of our eggs in one basket. Harper should keep our options open.

And in another right wing lovefest the Saskatchewan Party is meeting in Saskatoon. In advance of that, Brad Wall is boasting that he has taken another 80,000 people off the tax rolls. I am not sure what message that sends. Well, I do know it is the wrong one. Is that his constituency?

In a province of about 1 million people how many people don't pay tax if "another 80,000 people" recently joined those ranks. How do people who pay no tax at all, feel that they are a productive part of our society.

Surely, as Brad goes on and on about the Saskatchewan boom the real question is, why can't we find good paying jobs for these people? Why are he and his business friends flying to Ontario looking for workers if so many people here make so little that they don't pay taxes. Boasting about the number of people in the province that don't pay taxes is something I don't ever remember any premier in this country say before.

I always thought the Sask Party's thinking was a bit skewed.

Today in the news

Today was the day for weird stories in the papers. The Edmonton Journal had this one.

EDMONTON: A burning body discovered by hunters near Lac La Biche on Tuesday

The two hunters called police around 7 a.m. when they spotted a fire in the bush near Secondary Highway 858, about 25 kilometres north of Lac La Biche.Police saw the burning body in the woods and quickly put the fire out. RCMP are considering the case a suspicious death.

I think even if the person had spontaneously combusted, the death would be considered suspicious, by the RCMP, don’t you?

RICHMOND, B.C. — A couple walking their dogs along the banks of British Columbia's Fraser River made the latest in what's become a series of gruesome discoveries of a running shoe with a severed foot encased inside.It's the seventh such find inside a shoe along the West Coast from Georgia Strait to the northwestern tip of Washington State since August 2007.

Ken Johnson and his wife spotted the shoe while walking their dogs Tuesday along the Fraser River in the Vancouver suburb of Richmond.

When these stories first started to appear the police thought they might be gangland related. Now I think the informed thought is that the way running shoes are made in recent years makes them more buoyant and as a result when the bodies decompose the feet, in the shoes float to the surface.

And CNBC says this:

The United States may be on course to lose its 'AAA' rating due to the large amount of debt it has accumulated, according to Martin Hennecke, senior manager of private clients at Tyche. "The U.S. might really have to look at a default on the bankruptcy reorganization of the present financial system" and the bankruptcy of the government is not out of the realm of possibility, Hennecke said.

Do you think? The American economy was self destructing and everyone but the US Government and the financial community knew it was coming. Now we are all suffering for their incompetence.

Goldfish

I have a fishpond which of course works very nicely in the summer but as fall hits, we always have a heck of a time getting the goldfish rounded up so we can transferred them indoors to the aquarium. Every winter the pond freezes solid, right to the bottom. Saskatchewan winters show no mercy.

I was quite proud of myself this year. I got them all in at least a month ago, or so I thought.

This afternoon I was back having a look around the yard and there and behold was a solitary goldfish, swimming beneath about an inch and a half of ice. We grabbed a hammer, broke the ice, and Chris managed to scoop him up on his second try.

Perhaps I should count them this year.

It Must be Fall

There is something about geese. There is a kind of ordered disorder about them. I remember as a small boy growing up in Quebec, hearing the noise they make, disturbing the stillness of a crisp fall morning. That perfect V of Canada Geese across a deep blue sky.
I heard them again the other afternoon while I was working in my back yard, snow geese. Except in Saskatchewan it seems that there are seldom orderly flocks of 30 or 40 but huge formations of them. No formal pattern for these guys. Still flying in a rough V form but more spread out, more free form, kind of like anarchist geese. Raising a ruckus as they flew over my house.
Out on the prairie this time of year, in fields and sloughs, huge masses of snow geese pause to gorge themselves before starting on that long journey south. Thousands upon thousands of them gather, sometimes turning the whole field white in the sun.
There is something about geese.

My Podcast Request

Before I retired I decided that my first major goal in retirement was going to be walking the old pilgrimage route, the Camino de Santiago de Compestolla in Spain. It is no mean feat, My plan is to start at St Jean Pied de Port in France and to walk to Santiago, a trek of almost 800 km them, if I have the energy, to walk on to the sea at Finisterre.

In doing research about the walk I bought a book by Paul Boers called The Way is Made by Walking. It is the tale of his journey along the Camino from both a physical and spirtual perspective.

A few months ago I heard the tail end of an interview with Boers on a CBC Radion program called Tapestry. I requested that the show be re-run on the podcast, Listener's Choice. They made the program available today and you can hear it by following this link

Working Out

I started exercising today. So why put that small detail of your personal life in your blog, some might ask? Simple, The more people that know, the more humiliating it would be to quit. I need every incentive possible to encourage me to hang in. Walking in circles in Regina's Fieldhouse isn't exactly inspiring but I have to start somewhere.

I was walking quite a bit in the spring and early summer but, I injured my heel and I had to cut back considerably. Unable to get out and about like I was, I started to lose the toning I had started to build up.

I plan to walk the Camino de Santiago in Spain this year or next and a 800 km walk isn't like a stroll in the park. I clearly need to get into better shape.

No time like the present.