Ai Weiwei all the way home



Say to yourself, ‘I’m here on purpose,
I can accomplish anything I desire,
and I do it by being in harmony
with the all-pervading creative force in the universe.

~Wayne Dyer~

“I’m okay, I’m out, I’m fine now,” he said quietly."  Was the crux of the report in the Globe and Mail this week following news of the release of Ai Weiwei.  What more could he say besides that?

After all, he has been released on bail after 10 weeks of being detained at an undisclosed location on the condition that he not speak of the who's, what's, where's, when's, why's and how's of his kidnapping. There was some talk of unpaid taxes, but we all know how easy it is for any  government to doctor tax records -or anything else for that matter- when looking for justification to silence dissidents.

In Our Creative Nests, I use Ai Weiwei as an example of how the human spirit often flourishes under pressure. What shall I say of him now? Described as, "only a distant echo of his usually bombastic self", can we assume that his creative spirit has succumbed to his oppressors during the mystery of his abduction? We can assume that he's damn glad to be home, and whatever the heck the giant "THEY" did to him, or threatened or tortured him with has been a great tonic for subduing the creative spirit. But I rather like to think of it as a sleeping pill for the creative animal that is curled up and healing now. May we see that animal stretch and rise again with care, and give great love and support for Ai Weiwei as he becomes comfortable with his recently silenced voice again.

So why am I writing to you about this? Why bother reporting the release of a silenced creative powerhouse?  I'm writing to ask who you think is responsible for speaking out against oppression? Is it the job of  courageous artists like Ai Weiwei? Or is it the sole task of  women like Rumana Monzur who was just viciously attacked and blinded by her husband? He gouged her eyes out and bit off half of her nose because she dared to be successful. Or maybe speaking up about oppression and violations of human rights and freedoms is the job of marginalized gay teens or movie stars confessing their addictions?

Does this all sound a bit absurd? Does it seem like perhaps, just maybe, just an eensy weensy teensy bit,  that we sit back in our Adirondack chairs and kinda take for granted that the rest of the world is just able to hang out on the weekends and relax?  Perhaps all of those people in Syria and Libya and Tunisia get a break from the hell they've been enduring on the weekends and get together for pool parties and community yard sales? You know, just to "get away from it all".
We owe it to ourselves and the rest of the world to get a little more involved with what's going on. We owe it to ourselves and the rest of the world to be more discerning in our consumerism and politics.  Even if it simply starts at home. Not just watching the news, but questioning it.  What do you mean the Canadian government, when asked for documentation about whether our soldiers knowingly handed over Afghan prisoners to torture, blacked out much of the information? How come? Why? If this happened, how did it affect our soldiers who were ordered to carry out these actions?

We are blessed to live where we do. Blessed with our freedom and cursed with complacent apathy. We have come to expect our freedom, soothed by the hand of "THEY", and guided without our knowing into a sugared silence. It's time to sit up and pay attention.

As I was hinting at in Our Creative Nests, we owe it to ourselves to let our creative self out of the stall and run for it's life.  Write a letter, paint like it's your last chance, sing, dance, sculpt, let your humanity be exalted so the rest of the world might be freed.

Intuition vs. Quantifiable Stuff

"The only real valuable thing is intuition."
~Albert Einstein~

Will there always be a gullible right-wing-processed-cheese-eating population? Or someday, will there be a euphoric tipping point when the veil of our great-Canadian-political-Oz is unveiled before our very eyes?

The good old Globe and Mail did not disappoint this weekend.  There were a lot of different viewpoints to consider.  Margaret Wente, god love her, had the chutzpah to write about "Health Scares". 

The headline, "If only there were a shot for irrational fears; Vaccination panic is strongest among educational liberal elites - the same demographic that votes green, drives a Prius and eats organic" captures the essence of her article. Great spirit forgive the human race for evolving into beings of consciousness. 

Wente refers to a study by Andrew Wakefield published in The Lancet about links between childhood vaccines and autism.  She sites sources that  point to the faults in Wakefield's study. Wente writes, "The public is fed a steady diet of scare stories cooked up by rogue scientists seeking publicity, tort lawyers looking for a payday, environmental groups hungry for both publicity and funding, and gullible media ever eager for a good bad story."

Fascinating. I would say the public is fed a steady diet of highly, but very discreetly cooked up truisms by the powers that be, tort lawyers looking for a payday, environmental groups hungry for the harmony between humans and the planet and their share of the pittance of funding that's just enough to placate a generally apathetic public and pretty-gullible-mainstream-media-turned marionettes by the great governing Oz. To think otherwise might be naive - non?

Ironically this very article is sandwiched between a story about a study by Kevin Milligan and Michael Baker (UBC and U of T respectively), that concluded longer parental leaves did not have a positive impact on child development. They measured temperament, achievement of milestones, motor and social skill development. Isn't that convenient for the government to use in defense of not paying parental leaves?

Now, in the case that was presented in the Globe, I do have to favour the government based on what is written in the article. Two parents taking leave at the same time and expecting to collect social benefits kind of has the stench of greed about it. However, I think that any well-educated liberal/conservative, Prius/Hummer, Anti-vaxer/gullible pharmaceutical zombie will admit that you can find a study that backs any argument.  Data can be skewed, and outcome measurements may be a nice neat dish served on a silver platter to the decision makers in the land of Oz, but we all know in our gut what is bullshit and what is not.

Wente accurately admits that the concern over vaccinations stems from distrust of the very profitable, and therefore influential pharmaceutical industry, or Big Pharma.  Wente says that "anti-vaxers" are hyper parents who are, "...obsessively worried that the world is full of hidden poisons that can harm their kids. They worry about the sun, or lawn spray, or trace amounts of chemicals in plastic toys".   GAWD forbid we care about the environment and how we impact it. What on earth are people thinking being concerned about toxic chemicals coating the shiny little toys that little Billy chomps on as he cuts his teeth?  Fools.

She is critical of this left wing hoo-hoo group who doesn't want their infants crawling around in fields of DDT with no studies to support trusting their intuition.  Somebody please do a study to support that.

Wente's headline - "If only there were a shot for irrational fears." McDish's headline - "If only there were a shot for  greedy goombas"...or something like that.

The headlines in print, on the web and on television were all over the unrest in Egypt this weekend. It all began with a university educated Tunisian whose life ended in protest over unfair governing.  Another headline in the Globe read, " In a span of minutes, a country goes off-line; Government orders Internet service providers to shut down all connections, isolating 80 million people and revolt's leaders."

Hmmm. Yep. If we mindlessly swallow Ms. Wente's simple minded attack on non-vaxers or whatever condescending name she prescribed  to them, we may not be too far behind Egypt in the grand scheme of things.  Money talks sweeties, and Big Pharma didn't get the name Big Pharma because the CEO's wear red plaid lumberjack shirts and stand over 6'3". 

This is my concession; so called Big Pharma does support non-profit work in healthcare, and profit itself is not a dirty word. But greed is.

Money whispers in the ear of our family physicians, our insurance companies, our government policy makers, and even in my ear. I do not profess expertise in vaccine science or autoimmune health issues (I bet there a heck of a lot of studies that link increased autoimmune deficiencies with environmental factors), but it would be truly ignorant to think that we, the general public can see any more than through a tiny crack in the theatre curtain of what is really going on politically.  Check out movies like Wag the Dog or Charlie Wilson's War if you need to get a feel for what I'm talking about.

Don't get me wrong. I'm thankful for the likes of antibiotics, ibuprofen and the pill.  I'm also a big fan of that inner voice we are all blessed with as human beings. That voice, or, I guess you could call it intuition like Ms. Wente does. You know, it's that little thing called a conscience (yah, yah, I get the little lingquistic irony there, just like pen is envy that we all learn in English 101) that tells us what is fundamentally right or wrong in any given situation. 

WikiWhat?



"The best argument against democracy
is a five-minute conversation
 with the average voter."


~Winston Churchill~



Our news needs some work. A little tweaking and re-prioritizing. You know get out your hammer-saw-and- 95-piece-screwdriver-set-tweaking.

First of all I have to admit to falling off the intellectual band wagon today people.  I succumbed to the convenience of the Toronto Star while picking up a coffee after a rather harrying appointment this morning. My most sincere apologies to the writers, editors and publisher of the greater than great Globe and Mail.

Having worked for a newspaper in the much over-romanticized "objective" (bullcrap) news business, I know that what comes above the fold is the most sensational newsworthy "news" of the day.  Did you know by the way that NEWS is an acronym for NORTH, EAST, WEST and SOUTH?  Yes? No? Well, that's the educational piece of this blog for today.

Anyway since the Toronto Star has pimped it's Saturday edition out to the seventh level of hell advertising Gods, it's become unclear (during the weekends ) what's news, and what's evil consumerism propaganda.  Today I decided that it was news above the fold, or what we have come to expect as news in our latte sipping, apathetic way.  "Diplomatic disaster for U.S." read the headline just below a photo obituary tribute to Leslie Nielson, and Grey Cup shot.  Under the headline (commentary to come regarding the headline), was a colour photo of the election protests in Haiti. 

Welcome to Monday morning Toronto, and enjoy your coffee.

"Diplomatic disaster for U.S." Seriously? Which editing genius came up with this?  Perhaps a more apt and true headline could have read, "Further Diplomatic Disaster for U.S." or "U.S. Still Diplomatic Dunce", or, "U.S. Foreign Policy - LOL".  Please don't think that I'm truly criticizing the editor here. I mean I know what kind of job it is to spin meaningless drivel into news on a regular basis.

WikiLeaks. Honestly.  Have we not yet evolved from our global political adolescence?  Are we really surprised that the U.S., or any other country for that matter is spying on it's neighbours, allies and enemies?  Do we really care that Moammar Gadhafi has a penchant for buxom blondes?  Hell, I might just line up for that free ticket around the world. 

Does it surprise anyone that Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) will twist words about whiskey and lies about U.S. military operations to serve it's own purpose? Come on people!!! This is not news - it's typical human thoughtlessness in speech. Heck, I take more care in my speech to long time friends about my own business than these quasi-Hollywood-world-leaders do in theirs.  Although, I do secretly and arrogantly think that my life is absolutely sensational. 

Four world leaders are pictured on the third page of the equivalent of grade-eleven-he-said-she-said-I-recorded-it-in-the-locker-room-high-school-smut;  Nicolas Sarkozy - named the Emperor with no clothes, but a populous with a centuries long tradition of good old fashioned frenchie-outspokenness-and-crassness-that-only-the french-can-get-away-with-non?  There's the "Risk Aversive" German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin or "Alpha Dog". Alpha What?! Quite.  Alpha Dog only at a club after four of five The Dude/Big Lebowski-White Russians-and-a-spliff. Give. Me. A. Break. Finally there's Hamid Karzai, (whom incidentally I secretly think is uber-sexy, right up there with septuagenarian Leonard Cohen). The Star refers to him as "Driven by Paranoia". Whatever. 

All I have to say is shame on WikiLeaks for even existing. Shame on "us" for allowing them to exist. Right Speech?  "P-e-o-p-le"....as my grade nine science teacher used to drone, "think!". Think hard....speak the truth, speak with compassion, be encouraging and helpful in your speech. We elected these folks, or at least have not opposed their leadership in great numbers. This is our mess too. We suppported it and helped to create and sustain it.

The election in Haiti, and the mass uprising of the populace to right a wrong. This is news. This is news we, as privileged, over-indulged, ignorant CNN sucking North Americans had better perk up and pay attention to.  This is how to affect change.

Personally, I found the Canadian Tire flyer way more intriguing than the headlines today. We know the political leaders of the world feed off of some weird narcissistic aphrodisiac, but what the heck do men do with 95 piece screwdriver sets? I mean - really. Do all 95 ever get used? Think about it.

Book Burning, Gender Studies & Canadian Politics

Tommy Douglas
~Two races share today the soil of Canada.
These people had not always been friends.
But I hasten to say it. There is no longer
any family here but the human family.
 It matters not the language people speak,
or the altars at which they kneel.~


Wilfrid Laurier

First things first. You need to know, dear reader, that I have a lot to say in this blog entry. If you get confused, or my writing is too passionate to understand, let me summarize;

1) - Book Burning can be ignorant and inspiring all at the same time

2) - Some people should either be given space to write a properly thought out column in the Globe and Mail, or not be  published at all

3) - Canadians need to get off their bacon-fat, maple-syrupy rumps and vote not for the status quo, but for what is right (you know right - located precisely deep down in that hollow space somewhere between your stomach and transverse colon).

I have this terrible habit of having conversations with my colleague's while leaning on their door frames, my arms and legs casually crossed.  As annoying as my posture must be, when I'm standing like that, often with a cup of tea in hand, I'm paying that colleague a great compliment. My body language is saying, "Tell me more."

Monday morning I had one such conversation with the chaplain who is fortunate enough to have her office located just next to my own. I'm sure you can imagine her unbridled joy at my constant, verbal run-off. We had a great conversation about our weekends (ok, my weekend), baking, films, art, and finally, the hot topic of the week, especially for students of religious studies; the proposed Koran burning in Florida. 

Florida says it all folks. In my opinion the iconic state of overindulgence, consumerism and all things lacking significant thought. Please note the overwhelming presence there of men sporting white pants and white loafers. Ignorant arrogance flaunted in it's highest form. Enough said.

Our Monday morning conversation, and the conversations that I shared during the weekend evolved into conversations about what it means to be Canadian.  The conversations were not so much about Terry Jones the book burning nutso, but what ding-dongs like him can inspire in us - the democratic voting public. I believe if we separate the emotion of religion from the logic of politics, our political conversations can be inspiring and dare I say futuristically ground breaking. 

Historically our great country is in that awkward stage akin to puberty. We've been around long enough to have our own ideas, but we're hesitant to give up the safety of our tested and true politics. Thats exactly what we need to do in order to break away enough to craft the political future of our dreams. It's often the zealots like Jones who say out loud what the bubba's of our nation are silently thinking. In this case it has inspired anyone with a stitch of logical thought to speak up and out. Sometimes we need the Terry Jones's to irritate our apathetic selves into action.

Since I've been old enough to vote, our politicians have done a great job of just pushing the envelope enough to cheese us off, but not enough for our courteous and apathetic nation of voters to protest. No wonder the number of people inspired to come out of their nice cozy-wozy over-priced, over-sized, over-mortgaged homes is plummeting like a paper plane in detention room.  Canada has always been blah blue or retisent red. Liberal or Conservative - go ahead, live on the edge, flip a coin.  Face it -we're stuck.

Currently Canada is poised on the global high diving board with an opportunity to either dazzle everyone, or make a big, humiliating splash.

You all know by now that I love my Saturday Globe and Mail. I start light in the Life Style section and work my way into the heavier, more thought provoking Cover and Focus sections.  One column that I generally skip is Leah McLaren's.  This week her column, "Man, don't feel like a womyn", held my attention until the very end.

I, like McLaren also attended university when women's studies were not just trendy, but a mandatory part of most liberal arts credits.  In the end, McLaren gives a piece of advice that students should, "Steer clear of trendy men's studies courses and stick with the classics. You'll learn more about men and women in one Shakespearean sonnet than you will in a whole feminist-theory program put together." 

Upon graduation I vowed I would never again use the phrase "patriarchal society", but I also carried with me a vision for the future that included considering all points of view. 

Skip to F3....Drew Hayden Taylor's column, "If you really must torch scriptures, why not start with the Bible?", and Stephen Marche's, "When words go up in flames".  Both writers comment about the proposed Koran burning which was inspired by the proposal to build a mosque near ground zero in New York city. 

Skip McLaren and Hayden. Unless the Globe gives McLaren more space to expound on why we don't need men's studies (like for instance we've been studying history written by men for the last, oh, say, 3 000 years), it's not worth the read. This subject deserves way more discussion, and even that snarky little bit I just put in parenthesis can be argued based on the effect of the women's movement during the past century.

And pul-eaze,  Tayor's further example of taking two religions and pitting them against one another like Ali and Foreman takes us back to the Kindergarten of our existence as a civilization here in the western world. Note here that this is not a comment on the state of aboriginal affairs - it's a statement saying we're in way deeper than figuring out how to separate two bullies on the schoolyard. We have a brawl here people. We need more sophisticated systems for peaceable, equal living. Burying our heads in the classics as McLaren suggests or pitting two out of countless viewpoints against another are poorly thought out solutions to any problem.

Pitting one thing against another, in this case Christianity and Islam, or Christianity and Native Spirituality only inflates the ego of the other.  What I'm suggesting is a more inclusive discussion about how,as Canadians we are going to maintain the political stability of secular politics as our population changes to include more and more new citizens from politically less stable countries.

What I suggest as a first step is that in a very un-Canadian way we wallow in the pride we've worked hard for. Don't get me wrong, I'm not waving a flag in pride over the Japanese interment, the horror of our history for Native Americans, or the type of what I like to call, "cock-rubbing" politics we've allowed our parliament to fall into (watch any debate in our legislatures).  I'm talking about taking pride in being able to speak freely, build a church or mosque, or temple, or sweat lodge without fear someone's going to take our lives for our faith. We need to take a more obvious pride in the health care provision that's quietly being taken away from us like a toddler being weened from their blankie and give a big yank back on that blankie.

Listening to City of Toronto mayoral candidate Rocco Rossi talk about his tunnel/traffic idea, I have a feeling we're in for a big disappointment during the next set of elections.  It's our opportunity. We either dream big now, beyond the centuries old automobile and tunnels to an effective, green-clean-mass-transit-future or get gobbled up in the big compost pile of global, "cock-rubbing", wag-the-dog, Charlie-Wilson's-War, you-scratch-my-back-I'll-scratch-yours politics. 

We don't need liberals or conservatives, bloc-quebecois, or even the I-went-out-of-date-in-the-eighties, waffling NDP party.  We need Gandhi's and Mandela's, and maybe even a great Canadian Tommy Douglas again. Stand up. Be proud, and whatever you do, don't fall for this fear-mongering "throw-your-vote-away" crap.  Vote like you're in your grade 12 social issues class. Vote from that space deep down just between your stomach and your transverse colon.

American Politics and Psychiatric Disorders

The Scream - Edvard Munch

I'm a little late commenting on this Saturday's Globe, but the shock is just wearing off now. My headline of choice, from page A18, "McCain remakes himself as a born-again conservative". W-H-A-T?! Even remotely following U.S. politics makes me a little bit crazy.

John McCain, king of the political marital compromise is advertising endorsement from Sarah Palin? If you know me, you can hear my maniacal-I'm-going-to-snap-laugh.......McCain's ability to compromise.....That's why people liked him so much! Now he's seeking the support of (gasp) Sarah Palin? Holy shit and lock up your daughters! This is really all the proof we need folks - the U.S. is no longer the leader of global democracy. The nation is going down like a 58 year old silcone-boob-jobbed-one-time-barbie-bride.

To sum up the most telling paragraph of the full page spread, J.D. Hayworth (Arizona congressman) is rallying to take away John McCain's leadership roll in the fall congressional elections because he compromises with the democrats to make effective change. Bad John! Bad, bad John!!!

Ok, we Canadians don't get too keyed up about all of the American-gun-shooting elect everyone down to your local crossing guard business, but this is significant. The sociological divide widens not only along democratic and republican party lines, but between ourselves and our American neighbours. Like a fat, bald, wanna-be-a-young-guy, the U.S.A (previously most cool on the world stage) is wearing 32" jeans when clearly 38" would fit much better. It's time to age gracefully good neighbour. Quit clawing at misinterpreted declarations that were signed before men could legally look at a woman's ankle.

Sarah Palin is doing John McCain a favour by endorsing him?! I mean, who wouldn't agree that Ms. Palin, in her deep wisdom would not have some morsels of shazam-like zen knowledge to pass on to a retired navy pilot and former prisoner of war. Shoe shopping sure is inspiring, but not to the extent that it would connect good ol'Sarah to that being, and connectedness we all know as the greater human good.

Of the Arizona citizens that back this move further to the right by the Republican party, the article quotes Judy Hoelscher, a homeowner who owes more on her mortgage than the value of her home. She doesn't take the blame for not knowing what the heck her own financial situation is. She doesn't even take responsibility for the money she owes. She blames the Democrats who imposed regulations on financial institutions, that "forced" her to buy a home her family could not afford. To quote the great Jimmy Buffett, a great Democrat (I'm sure he is), "Math Sucks" Ms. Hoelscher.

Yes, as Canadians we see how difficult our economy has been because of restrictions placed on our financial institutions. It was evident in a recent front page headline of the Toronto Star....not only is our economy recovering...it's thriving. What say you to that? I say greed gets you nowhere, and to vote for more greed, gunpowder and over mortgaged houses is just plain stupid.

The Republican stance on the new health care reform is that the Democrats "poisoned the well". Someone slap me on the back to stop me from choking. Please direct me to the person who can tell me how universal health care is bad for the general public. When you fall on your ass it's nice to know that you live within a nation of people who actually care about what happens to their fellow man. Sure, it might chop into someone's 2 billion dollar bonus-fund-mad-money account, but what the hell? The law is the lowest ethical standard we can refer to when things get out of hand. I don't know about you, but creating a society that lives just a smidgen above that lowest expectation gives me the warm fuzzies. Me and the great philosophers who lived pre-B.C.E. Hopefully our neighbours to the south catch up one day.

I would recommend that Mr.McCain remain as he has been; someone who worked to find compromise and actually better his country. John old boy, pour yourself a cold beer, and sit back on the front porch (unless you're going to take the high road and cross the floor).

If a babe in a leather jacket, who can shoot a gun, skin dead things while wearing a short skirt and bad glasses was ever going to lead a country, they'd already be calling me Ms. Prime Minister.

Disclaimer; No, I don't think all Americans are doughheads. My friends in the U.S. may argue against me, but it doesn't mean they're bad people, just a little over medicated by their HMO's and substitute prescriptions.

The Saturday Globe and Mail

I am so grateful for the ink residue left on my fingertips after I read the Saturday edition of the Globe and Mail. That we live in a country with (relatively) free press is a huge freedom for which we, as Canadians should be more acutely aware and grateful. The newspaper business is dying an agonal death. We’ve turned inward to our computers and hand held devices to take in the narrow band news that interests us personally. On the train, the subway, the bus, we plug in, and disconnect from the rest of the world. My thoughts are echoed by Stuart McLean and a great piece in his weekly CBC Vinyl Cafe stories. He weaves a great memoir about what we lose as a society, as individuals move away from the newsprinted page and disengage with one another debating the issues of the day.

I must confess, I generally read the paper section by section, and I look forward to the Globe Life Style section the most, with Lucy Waverman’s recipes inspiring me to cook and entertain. The rest of the paper inspires the conversation that seasons the food and wine at the table. What would Saturday morning be without the cantankerous, Don Cherry-like in icon status, Christie Blatchford? I mean really, the woman is unrepentant with well-thought out arguments. I don’t always agree, but I certainly admire her chutzpah (and the love she has for her pooch).

A lot of my friends and acquaintances nod their head in agreement when someone moans about depressing news stories, how sensationalized everything is, blah, blah, blah. Well, it’s true sometimes. But, and a big but it is, what the heck do we Canadians really have to report as traumatic, sensational, population-annihilating news? Usually what we count as real news; atrocious natural disasters with astronomical death tolls, and the injustice of corrupt governments don’t make our national news. I mean, come on people, we do a great job of covering up the pathetic nature of our federal government like a Baptist newlywed covers up her knees for goodness sake.

Page A5 of this Saturday’s Globe and Mail includes a quarter-page article by Gloria Galloway about the recent “Tequila Tantrum” had by our federal conservative Veteran’s Affairs Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn. What a joke. We call this government? We elected these people for a second time?! What the heck are we thinking about?! The whole government is a joke, a bunch of self-important idiots who have latched onto the teet of “almost” stardom and won’t let go. See the article next to this Tequila debacle about Ralph Klein becoming the star of a new game show, as evidence of this goofy politician cum pseudo star phenomenon.

Does it really matter whether your tie is red or blue, or even orange anymore? There seems to be a self indulgent pulse running through our political system, fuelled by bloated expense accounts, zero accountability, a not-so-much-as-apathetic-but-lazy public and a Prime Minister who has learned how to call time-out (recently we have been reminded of the definition of proroguing) whenever there may actually be an intelligent argument coming to light about what the hell is really going on with our U.S. worshipping boys in Ottawa. Really Mr. Harper, just because you have come to be known for crotch-scratching-hockey-game betting, calling national, political time outs is not really that cool.

So, Mr. Blackburn, who according to the article included a $68,000.00 receipt on his 2007 expense report for aircraft rentals, had a hissy fit for not being able to take a big ol’ bottle of booze on a flight. Classy. Mr. Blackburn, less than a year ago announced that our Canadian government was going to spend $358.7 million (MILLION) to tighten up Canadian airport security. Maybe if he weren’t so attached to his booze, he would remember that it’s been a few years since they’ve allowed any liquid over 100ml on board a plane. Oh. Well, my oversight. Not privately hired planes. That’s right, he’s had little experience flying commercial like us lowly, brainwashed Wal-Mart shoppers. Silly me, what was I thinking criticizing this inspiring Canadian (elected) leader?

After the ever present “they” confiscated his tequila, the Minister (OUR ELECTED minister) demanded that security empty the bottle in front of him. What’s wrong Mr. Blackburn? If you can’t party on Canada’s watch and dime, no one else can either? What was he planning, doing body shots off Her Excellency, the Right Honourable Michaelle Jean, Governor General during the next proroguation while she winks across the room at that bad boy Stevie Harper? I hope they confiscated the contraband lemons and salt from his carry on too. Ok, so now I'm getting silly, but it's a reflection of the language and behaviour that we have come to expect and (regretfully) accept from our elected leaders.

So people, as I am ever vigilant in voicing every time we have an election – think really darn hard about for whom you vote. Think about not the type of country you can settle for living in, but about the type of country you are proud to call home. Are we a nation who just votes “so the other party doesn’t get in”, or do we have the fortitude to vote for the change we really want to see? So far, we’ve remained the apathetic blue or red voters we have always historically been. Vote for what you believe in....VOTE – VOTE-VOTE, so we can come out from underneath all of this adolescent political cock rubbing ( see page A9 photo of our Prime Minister accepting a case of beer from the President of the grand old U.S. of A. In payment for a bet they made on a hockey game)that only results in an embarrassing exchange of personal insults across the floor of a very spoiled parliament.

On that note, don’t even get me started about the second article on page A11, “Anglicans accept Pope’s invitation to join Catholic church”, but do go out and buy a newspaper. Get your hands dirty, and engage someone in an intelligent conversation about what is going on in the world. Talk leads to action, and action to the change we want to see in the world.

Read, love, and scatter peace.