Author: wdfyfe

Before WD called himself a writer, he worked at a number of different jobs from stacking lumber to interior design. He studied English at UBC and creative writing at ASU where one of his teachers, Rita Dove, taught him the importance of the tale. He has written for radio, magazines and newspapers, but never television. He’s published both fiction and nonfiction in Great Britain and the US. He reads French passably and speaks enough Spanish to get from A to B and find the toilet. He has interviewed John Cleese, Peter Ustinov, Margaret Drabble, Kenneth Branagh and enough other famous people to make him a hopeless name dropper. His not-so-secret passions are history and trivia, and he has never lost a game of Trivial Pursuit — although he did come 4th one drunken Quiz Night at the Uxbridge in Notting Hill. He lives on the Pacific Ocean, although, not close enough to see, so he spends his days looking at a computer screen. It’s a wonderful life and he has only one regret: he can’t type faster.

Sarah Palin vs Kim Jong-il

Sarah Palin is so furious with the North Koreans right now, she can’t think straight, and if she ever does get to be president, Kim Jong-il better find himself a rock to crawl under.  Our girl holds a grudge, and Kimmy is going to be Numero Uno on her whip-ass list.  You betcha!  So what did Kim do that was so terrible, aside from that whole nuclear weapons thing?  He stole Sarah’s headlines.   On Tuesday, Sarah Palin was all set up to launch her book, America by Heart, and her 2012 presidential campaign when along came Kim and started pumping artillery shells into South Korea.  Suddenly, the cameras were pointed east and Sarah was drinking tea by herself.  It was all a bunch of Jong-il bluster and “You’re not the boss of me” bull, but the damage was done and Palin is pissed – and so are a lot of other people.  This is the crux of what Sarah Palin is all about.  She represents a whole pile of angry people who are looking for answers – when nobody is listening to their questions.

In 2008, Barack Obama promised Hope and Change to just about every mammal on this planet (I’m sure some dolphins voted for the guy) and he hasn’t delivered.  History is going to write volumes on the wherefore and the why of that, but unless you’re keeping score, it was a pretty tall order in the first place.  Honestly, anybody without a halo was going to fall short on that one.  Two years later, voters from Codstomper, Maine to Extraflaky, California told him — point blank — “Shape up!” but so far it doesn’t look like he’s listening.  The Obama message is still the same with a “but” added as an explanation and a “you don’t understand” thrown in as an excuse.  Meanwhile, the Republican alternatives are so low profile you’d think they’d all just made the rude noise in the elevator.  Ordinary Americans, who’ve been taking a knee to the groin for a while now, are desperate to find a flicker at the end of the tunnel.  Enter Sarah Palin.

Like her or not, Palin is just saying the same thing a lot of people have been thinking for a long time (long before Obama, actually.)  “Hold it!  There’s something wrong here.”  The American middle class is just about fed up with getting kicked around.  They’re sick of being called names and told they don’t know what they’re doing.  They’re tired of working their asses off and then getting handed the bill.  They see themselves as used and abused and at the mercy of every wild-eyed committee with a cause and an outstretched palm.  They think special interest groups have kidnapped their government, and they’re the ones who have to pay the ransom.  They see their accumulated wealth being turned into diminishing returns, and they no longer see their tax dollars as a good investment.  (Does any of this sound familiar, by the way?)  The other thing that Palin is saying that a lot of people, including myself, agree with, is — “Hey!  How hard can this be?” Palin might not be the sharpest pencil in the box, but she’s captured the mood of the mob insofar as they speak with one voice.

Which brings us around to the essential question: how big is that voice, and can it turn 2012 into a circus?  Maybe.  America by Heart is Palin’s political manifesto.  In it she takes some healthy swings at Obama and the Democrats, but she also lays some right jabs into the Republicans, as well.  This isn’t just Tea Party propaganda.  She’s trying to reshape the political landscape.  You heard it here first.  The Republican Party can do a lot of things between now and the 2012 primaries — including finding a candidate who isn’t camera shy — but the one thing they’d better not do is ignore Sarah Palin.  She’s served notice that there’s a new kid on the block who’s not going to play by the rules.   Up to this point, she hasn’t had to because, for the last two plus years, she’s worked really really hard at doing absolutely everything wrong, but still nobody gets more media time than Sarah Palin.  Just think about it — it took a belligerent act of aggression by a maverick nuclear power to knock her out off the front page.  And speaking of Kim Jong-il, quite a few people around the world wouldn’t mind seeing Palin, or somebody like her, go Maggie Thatcher on his ass and beat the crap out of that little punk.

Go ahead: touch my junk

Recently an airline passenger didn’t feel it was necessary to be groped by airport security and he told them so — in no uncertain terms.  I think what he said was “If you touch my junk I’ll charge you with sexual assault,” or something like that.  Suddenly, the whole security/rights debate was on again.  Let me make a couple of things perfectly clear concerning air travel.  I do not want to get blown up at 30 thousand feet, and I want my government to protect me up there.  Therefore, I am willing to help them do it.  For example, I think it is reasonable to identify yourself before you get on an airplane.  I also think it is reasonable that sharp objects and things that go boom are prohibited from airplanes.  I think it is reasonable to go through a metal detector and/or be searched before boarding an airplane.  I think these are just prudent precautions that everyone should take before getting into an oversized, airtight aluminum tube with a bunch of strangers.  I have nothing against my fellow passengers, but when I’m speeding through the sky, I think trust is an overrated concept.  Having said that, I would also like to know what sorry sack of stupid is in charge of airport security.

I love the art of travel.  Everything about it breathes adventure.  If I ever won the lottery, I would walk into British Airways with a stack of 20s and say, “Just tell me when it’s gone.”

However, at the risk of stating the obvious, air travel is really not as pleasant as it used to be.  There’s nothing wrong with the friendly skies or the airlines that fly in them.  They’re pretty much the same as they always were — average movies, mystery food and a complimentary crying baby – all part of the experience.   It’s the train wreck (oops!) they’re calling security that’s ruining it for me.

First of all, I don’t feel safe.  The last time I went through security at YVR (Vancouver) I thought I was watching an amateur theatrical troupe performing The Bourne Identity.  The person at the baggage scanner looked like she was checking groceries at Safeway.  The woman snooping through my backpack didn’t have her glasses on, and the roly-poly guy with the gun couldn’t have caught Betty White in a footrace (no offence, Betty.)  If it wasn’t so serious, it would have been funny.

Unfortunately, it is serious.  There are people out there trying to kill me.  I can theorize and chatter all day about why, but does it really matter?  I have paid huge dinero in taxes, and I don’t think it’s too much to ask that my government return the favour and at least give me the illusion of safety when I decide to fling myself through the stratosphere.  Or better still: why not actually make it safe?

 The problem is the people in charge of security are acting like a bunch of nomadic tribesmen chasing the rain.  Every time they see a cloud, they run to it. Every new avenue of attack produces yet another set of procedures, restrictions and devices.  We can’t go on like this indefinitely.  Eventually, we’re all going to be getting on the plane naked.  Personally, I don’t care.  If somebody wants to feel my junk, let him go ahead.  I would even submit to a cavity search if there was an ironclad guarantee that my cavity and I would arrive at our destination intact.  But there is no guarantee, so keep your hands to yourself.  By the way, you might want to change those little blue gloves every once in a while: I don’t know where they’ve been.  I wouldn’t mind getting pinched, poked and prodded by teams of semi-trained farmers, so much, if it did any good.  It doesn’t.

Airport security and their minions are hunting the wrong thing.  They’re searching for weapons when they should be looking for terrorists — who are a hell of a lot easier to find.  I’ll grant you that keeping guns, knives and explosive devices off airplanes is a #1 priority.  However, until terrorists perfect a Star Trek style transporter, somebody’s got to be carrying that crap around with them.  That person — whoever he or she is — is going to be stuck in the airport for the same length of time as I am.  They are going to have to go through ever-narrowing gates to get to my plane, just like I do.  And each of those gates is going to have a variety of personnel gawking at them.  There are always going to be new and better devices that can kill me, but people haven’t changed that much since Eve discovered the recipe for applesauce.  Technology is a wonderful friend, but security is a people business.  We need to concentrate on finding the people who wish to do me harm, not the things they bring with them.

Let me make a couple of suggestions on how to do that.  We need to get some people who are willing to conduct themselves in a professional manner.  We need to train them to be more than just junk feelers.    We need to motivate them: after all, they’re on the frontline of the War on Terror.  We need to give them tons of professional help.  Finally we need to pay them as professionals – minimum wage plus tips doesn’t cut it.  In the end, they won’t be running around looking for a needle in a haystack; they’ll be preventing the guy from putting the needle there in the first place.

Free-for-all

There’s been an awful lot of chatter lately about Freedom of Speech, or lack of it, in Canada.  And it’s gotten fierce since Christie Blatchford was prevented, by some pretty vocal opposition, from speaking, at the University of Waterloo.  It’s a complicated case, but the quick and dirty version is this: Ms. Blatchford was invited to speak at the University of Waterloo.  Some people associated with the University didn’t want her to speak and they commandeered the podium.  They voiced their opposition to Ms. Blatchford by loudly chanting “Racist!” among other things.   Ms. Blatchford was told her safety could not be guaranteed and the event was cancelled.  There are a lot of other facts and blather about it, but really — who cares?  The real question is this: should we have free debate in Canada or not?

Most people get this question confused.  They think that freedom of speech is a Canadian right that cannot — or at least should not — be abrogated, especially at our universities.  This is not true.  Freedom of Speech is an American concept, and its relationship to Canada is in direct proportion to how much American TV you watch.  Ms. Blatchford does not have any absolute “right” in Canadian law to speak or be heard. 

This is where Canadians run into trouble because — once again — we are fighting the wrong battle.   It’s not whether we’re losing our ability to have open and reasonable discussion: it’s whether open and reasonable discussion should be allowed in the first place.  There are lots of very large, very influential groups in Canada who don’t want debate or anything even remotely resembling it.  This is not a wicked plot.  It’s just that they see their ideas as the ultimate moral truth, and they see no reason to discuss it any further.  They also see themselves as enlightened individuals on the frontlines of a battle against ignorance and intolerance.  They even call themselves “progressive.”

You don’t have to look much beyond our universities, which are the largest forums of thought (notice I didn’t say “free thought”) in our country, to see these “progressives” in action.  Our universities have been under mob rule for quite some time now.  There’s a litany of examples, but here are some of the most visible highlights.  In 2002, Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech at Concordia University was violently disrupted (before he ever opened his mouth) and his appearance was cancelled.  In March, 2010, Ann Coulter, America’s resident nutbar, was threatened with legal action before she even arrived at the University of Ottawa and was shouted down once she got there – again, before she had uttered a word.  Her appearance was also cancelled.  We’ve already seen what happened to Christie Blatchford at Waterloo.  Similarly, over the last decade or so, Pro-Life (anti-abortion) groups and clubs have been either banned or had their message severely restricted on several university campuses — notably Victoria, Calgary, York and, most recently, Carleton University.  In November, 2008 Queens University actually instituted “dialogue facilitators,” students hired to patrol the campus, hunting out conversations which they deemed “offensive” and “educating” the perpetrators on more appropriate speech.

This stifling of public discussion on university campuses didn’t come out of nowhere.  It has a precedent in the highest shrine of public debate in Canada — Parliament.  In 1987, MP Svend Robinson and other members of the NDP took it upon themselves to heckle a speech by then President of the US, Ronald Reagan.  This was a small thing but it had a big impact because it made out-shouting one’s opponent a legitimate feature of the free exchange of ideas.  The NDP were so convinced Ronald Reagan was so wrong that they did not believe that Parliament or Canada was entitled to hear an uninterrupted speech by him — this brings us to the core of the problem.  Is free and open debate a Canadian right or not?  In 1987, Svend Robinson and the NDP did not think so.  Today, many groups agree with the NDP.  They believe that opinion and expression in Canada should be strictly regulated.  They also believe that certain points of view should not be expressed at all.  Ms. Blatchford’s experience at Waterloo is a perfect example of this.  These are not just fringe fascists or student groups using the mob to get their way.  There are large segments of our society who believe restrictions on opinion are of great benefit to us, and they are willing to use Canadian law to achieve these benefits. 

In Canada, freedom of speech may be a long standing and well guarded tradition, but it has no absolute guarantee in law.  The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that there can be limits placed on free speech in a free and democratic society.  Unfortunately, most ordinary people and free speech advocates are still labouring under the mistaken assumption that they have an inherent right called “freedom of speech” and that they need to defend it.  They are fighting the wrong battle.  We need to protect open debate first.  We need to stop the mob from closing off discussion, whether it be in the streets or in the courtroom.  Without that, we can never hope to elevate the discussion about freedom of speech beyond intimidation and resident Brown Shirts shouting “Racist!” until we all just get tired and go home.