So You Say You Want a Revolution?

I realize I can bark my brains out; the caravan has probably already moved on, but could we just stop for 3 seconds and check the safety net before we go off the deep end?  No doubt there are powerful forces crawling across the Middle East and North Africa; all the conditions are right.  Every country in the region has the same set of circumstances: a young population, a growing middle class, a reasonable level of education, a contracting economy, unemployment, rising prices and an old and decrepit leadership.  This is the perfect storm.  It might even be the long-awaited Arab Revolution.  However, before we all hitch up the bandwagon let’s remember this isn’t 1989, no wall has come down, Benghazi isn’t Berlin and democracy is not on the march.  It isn’t even on the crawl.  Let’s quit with the self-congratulations for a minute (like western governments even did anything?) and put down the pom-poms.  Nothing has been accomplished but everything has been set in motion.  Get real.  This is the way it is.

Okay, Hosni Mubarak is gone.  So what?  At this point the army is still in charge.  This is the same bunch of guys who’ve been running the show since Nasser kicked King Farouk out of the country in 1952.  In essence, what happened in Egypt was a really, really weird kind of show-of-hands election and the incumbent (Mubarak) was defeated.  However, he didn’t actually have a challenger.  There is no political organization available to govern after him.  The problem the army faces now is how to hold a semi-free election without giving the country away?  They know that for every young professional in Cairo, dreaming of democracy there are seven guys upriver who think this is a golden opportunity to get the girls back in their bags where they belong.  The military needs to make it look good without letting the Moslem Brotherhood take control of the country.  Egypt depends on foreign aid and foreign tourists to survive; an Islamic revolution — freely elected or not — would ruin everything.

In Bahrain, when the people gathered in Pearl Square in Manama demanding reform, Shaikh Hamad listened for a while.  But absolute rulers don’t have to take that kind of abuse — or so he thought.  He sent in troops with tanks and automatic weapons.  Unfortunately, the western media noticed that they were all stamped “Made in America.”  Within minutes the State Department was in full damage control mode, burning up the Internet, telling the royal family to withdraw the tanks or they weren’t going to get any more.  Suddenly, the troops were gone.  Now, it’s all goodwill and dialogue, but the only tangible change (so far) is the Grand Prix was cancelled.  Personally, I think the king is just waiting ‘til CNN’s not looking.

In Iran, where nobody gives a damn what CNN thinks, anti-government demonstrations are old news.  They’ve been going on, back and forth, ever since the Ahmadinejad government fixed the national elections two years ago.  Invariably, any time people in Iran gather for anything more than a birthday party, the government response is brutal and ruthless – not necessarily in that order.  There will be no democratic reform in Iran in the near future — even though the demonstrations will continue.  The Iranian people are on their own, and they know it.

In Yemen and Algeria the battle for the streets is still going on.   Both governments are trying a combination of economic reforms and ungodly violence to keep control.  In both countries, the people are disorganized, and several factions are scrambling to put together a cohesive movement.  At this point, their only demand is the current regime step aside and hold free elections.  This isn’t going to happen unless – as in Egypt — the military takes control and rewrites the constitution.

Which brings us to Libya and the impending civil war.  The problem with democratic reform in Libya is Muammar Gaddafi himself.  He has been in power since 1969 (longer than anybody except Castro and the Queen.)  The only Libyans who remember a time without Gaddafi are retired now.   For 40 years, there has been no political dialogue in Libya, so it’s doubtful that the people currently shooting at each other are willing to give a try.  They want Gaddafi out;  that’s it.  They may be calling for democracy, but unless they’ve been taking secret courses from The Learning Annex, how do they even know what it looks like?  Besides, Muammar is not one to go quietly.  Nor does he have a room full of generals advising him to leave for the good of the country.  This fight is not over, and believe me, even when it is, it won’t be.

And finally, Tunisia, where the whirlwind all started.  Actually Tunisia has the best chance of surviving the turmoil and bringing true democratic reform to their nation.  Their size, history and population give them some big advantages in the search for reform.  Maybe, if they can solve their problems, the long, hard, old-fashioned way, then other nations in the region can follow their example.

If this is the Arab Revolution, it’s about to hit a snag.  It’s called history.  It teaches us that most revolutions don’t end the way things did in 1989.  Daisies don’t normally grow where the tanks were, and any eventual democratic reform is going to be long and hard — and maybe even bloody.  No amount of wishful thinking is going to change that.  It would be far better if we stopped cheerleading for a while and started dealing with the facts — before the caravan actually does go by and we’re left behind, wondering what happened — again.

A Two Ring Political Circus

Politics is a serious business.  When it’s done right, it can be beautiful to behold.  Unfortunately, mostly, it isn’t, and when it isn’t, it’s really, really boring.  That’s why it’s always magical when the politicians in British Columbia come out to play.  These folks could teach Barnum and Bailey a few tricks, and, for the most part, they’re the reason the rest of Canada thinks people in B.C. are all wandering around, stoned.

For the uninitiated, here’s a brief history of politics in Lotus Land.  Originally, British Columbia was not so much a province of Canada as a private duchy, ruled by an oligarchy from Kelowna.  This regime was briefly overthrown in 1972, by a 60s group called Dave Barrett and the Socialist Horde.  But the oligarchy quickly reclaimed power and governed until Billy VanderZalm finally messed it up — for good — in 1991.  What followed was a prolonged period of anarchy.  In a political free-for-all brawl that lasted 10 years, whole parties were wiped out and resurrected, the Socreds died, the Liberals were born and the NDP died and were born again (There’s a bit of irony there.)  Two premiers were, shall we say, “tainted,” and both had to resign.  And in one astounding turn of events, Gordon Wilson went from Leader of the Opposition in the Liberal party to Minister of Finance in the NDP government that he was originally opposed to — after stopping briefly to form the Mom and Pop PDA party with Judi Tyabji.  All in all, those were heady days.  The period ended when Strongman Gordon Campbell hijacked the shiny new Liberal Party and restored order.

During the Campbell era, BC used the American two-party system (with limited success) and a number of smaller political groups gained prominence, including the Green Party.  For the last couple of years, British Columbia has had 2 ½ legitimate political parties and about 3 wannabes.  There’s the Liberal Party (which isn’t Liberal, and never was) the NDP (who are the natural successors to the two “tainted” premiers) and NDP-X (Extreme) a rebel alliance within the NDP who are one harsh word away from packing their bags full of votes and forming their own party.  In the midst of this, Gordon Campbell’s popularity was dropping faster than Lindsay Lohan on a play date over the basic issue of taxation without representation.  It looked like the NDP would, once again, form a government.

All this came to a screaming halt on November 3rd, 2010, when Campbell resigned.  Within a month, NDP-X shot everybody in the foot when they staged a bloodless insurrection which forced NDP leader Carole James to step down.  Without a viable leader in either party, the gates of anarchy came right off their hinges.  Suddenly anybody with $15,000 and a lot of chutzpah had a crack at the crown in the Duchy of BC.  Let the games begin!

The Liberals were first off the mark, with a number of candidates for leader — including two women: one who didn’t have a hope, and one who’s been looking for an opportunity ever since she quit the government the first time.  The NDP, however, were severely hampered when they discovered that, under their gender rules, at least one of the three top jobs in the party had to be filled by a woman!  Obviously, they’d just trashcanned the only female they had, so now men were effectively banned from party leadership.  Undeterred, a couple of guys announced their candidacy, anyway.  However, at this point, nobody wants to change the rules and neither of the two boys (Moe Sihota and Bob Smits) already on the job, seems willing to go under the knife.  Therefore, it looks like — eventually — someone else is going to have to get thrown under the bus, like Carole James, to make room for the incoming testosterone.

Meanwhile, the Liberals did change their rules from the traditional one person/one vote system (which has been around in BC since before Pattullo was a bridge) to a winner-take-nothing formula of second and third choices that looks like Bohr’s Theory of the Structure of Matter and is just about as complicated.

Of course, the secret to success in both parties is signing up new members (who vote for the candidate who brought them.)  However, that old “Onesy, twosy, would you like to join my party?” method was way too slow for some candidates.  In typical BC fashion, they just cranked up the Xerox machine and went wholesale on the application forms, and then showed up at party headquarters with bags of $10 bills to complete the huge number of transactions.   Of course, this is just an unsubstantiated rumour.  On the other side of the political spectrum, somebody questioned the wisdom of limiting party membership to humans and signed up a cat.

NDP Candidate?

Then, in one of the strangest moves to come out of these leadership races — and perhaps in all political history — both parties decided to run the same guy as leader.  Oddly enough, nobody has detected this.

Liberal Candidate?

So here we are on the verge of a Liberal Party vote for leader and the NDP will hold their vote in April.  Since this time last year, the Premier has resigned, the Leader of the Opposition has resigned, several Ministers have resigned and their opposition critics have resigned.  There’s nobody left to run the show in Victoria because every politician west of the Great Divide is jockeying for a position in the New World Order.  The government hasn`t even been is session for over 6 months but nobody’s noticed and nobody gives a damn.  Honestly, the politicians of British Columbia had better be careful.  The circus might be entertaining, but people are beginning to think, “We`re better off when these clowns don’t go to work every day.”

Fat Kids and the Lost World

About a month ago, StatsCan released a study that stated categorically only 20% of Canadians were getting enough exercise.  I don’t know how they came up with this figure since I didn’t see anybody peeking in my window or counting the Doritos bags in my garbage, but I’m going to assume it’s true.  It sounds about right.  In the same vein, a couple of days ago, the Society for Exercise Physiology (whoever they are) came out with a study which shows Canadian kids spend about 60% of their time lying around.  Once again, I have no idea how they came up with this figure.  I assume they either asked the kids or watched them, but I suppose it, too, is true.   After all, we’ve been picking on the fat kids since before the time of Moses.  Either way, I doubt if more than 18 people have actually seen these studies, but I’m sure every media outlet between here and Halifax has got the gist of them from the press releases.  At this point, then, it’s only a matter of time before the Society for the Prevention of Ignoring the Obvious issues a statement that says we have got to do something – literally.  The problem is what are we going to do?

The prevailing wisdom is that 20, 30, (100?) years ago, we never had this problem.  Canadian children weren’t tubby because they actually bestirred themselves, once in a while.  Back in the day, kids played games that featured kicking and throwing and running and such.  They walked to school and to other places.  The 4 channel universe was controlled by a dial and a parent.   Hamburgers and soda pop were confined to backyard barbeques, and hanging out with friends involved a lot more than just twitching your thumb. These are all considered good things.  In fact, just about every expert on the subject of childhood chubby agrees that if Canadians just kicked their kids off the sofa, it would be a simple solution to our problem.  Unfortunately, this would involve time travel, and ScienceCanada hasn’t perfected that yet.

Invariably, when we adults do glance over our bulging bellies and take a look at our fat kids, we start reciting from the Book of Nostalgia.  “Why, when I was a child….”  Yeah, yeah, when we were children we didn’t spend all our time, sitting around playing video games.  But here’s a newsflash: Space Invaders was lame.  If you remember, however, we still played it.  Have you seen the video games kids are playing now?  Wow!  It’s the same with Facebook.  When we were kids, we went to the playground (in my case, it was actually a vacant lot.)  We didn’t go there to run around; we went there because that’s where the other kids were.  Games started because we were bored.  (You can only torture insects for so long.)  Today, kids go to Facebook because that’s where the other kids are, and the friendships, jokes, gossip and games are built in.  Like it or don’t, that’s where they play — just like we did.  And there is a 1,000 channel universe out there.  It exists; there’s no sense moaning about it.  Besides, ask anybody over 30 who He-Man was, (or the Care Bears or Danger Mouse) and you’ll get an answer.  People watch TV.  They always have.  Get used to it.  It’s easy for us to casually tell our kids to just unplug their entire world and go out and have some fun, but just exactly where are they supposed to do that, and why?  That place doesn’t exist anymore.  It hasn’t since before they were born.

Yes, we’re getting lardy.  It’s a fact, and our kids don’t stand a chance because our only solution — “turn-back-the-clock” — is stupid.  When we were kids, the world was different.  We can’t expect our children to return to those thrilling days of yesteryear and play Run, Sheep, Run! and Frozen Tag.  First of all, Tag is illegal in half the schoolyards in Canada.  Secondly, they aren’t allowed to go outside by themselves, anyway.  This, of course, is the other problem: our watchdog society demands 24/7 adult supervision – with good reason.  In reality, this means that when our kids actually do want to go outside and play, they have to drag mom or dad with them.  If you recall, one of the reasons we went to the playground in the first place was to get away from the parents and their weirdo rules.  No wonder kids hide themselves behind usernames and passwords, these days;  it’s the only place they can be by themselves.  That’s got to be a major attraction.

We are a sedentary society, and it’s not good for us.  However, if we don’t start looking beyond the Good Old Days as a solution we’re doomed.  We either have to get creative, or just suck in our gut and buy a bigger size.  There is no third choice.