Canadian Politics Might Never be the Same

Well, it looks like Steven Harper played chicken with the wrong people. He, well the finance minster, put forward a budget update. Which did nothing for the economy, and every thing was political. So what do the opposition parties do? Well they learn how to pull their own wieght.
They have decided that they will cause the current government to fall, and create their own. Yup, not a new election, but a new government. This could make Stephane Dion a legend, he will show that Canadian Politics have turned over a new leaf. This coalition will mark the change, if it happens, where we move from a single party rule to who ever has the most support in the house.
This is a wonderful change, if it happens.

Globe and Mail on the Coalition

A True Black Friday

This Friday was a true 'Black Friday'. Traditionally this day is when, the first time of the year, that store are finally in the black. Which means that they are no longer in the negatives when looking at their finances. But this Friday was different, three lives were lost during the shopping craze.
The first loss of life was at 6 am eastern time, less than one hour after the stores opened. At Walmart, of all places, a worker trying to open the door got trampled to death. He was trying to open it for the costumers waiting. Before he could get out of the way he was down. As other workers where trying to save him, the costumers continued to walk over him; not allowing them to get to his aid. When the store was closed due to the death, some of the costumers were upset because they had been waiting for a long period to get in.
Next event was in California, at Toys 'R' us, there was a shoot out between to costumers. Nobody knows how it exactly happened. Some say that two women started fighting and then 'their' men showed each other their guns. And before most people could react they had killed each other. Hopefully it was not over a product; but there is never a justified death.
What is the underlying issue with these events is the shocking nature at which the American Culture has gotten to. I can not say that I am not apart of it as I am American. People who say that the United States have changed due to the election of Obama, are lying to ourselves. There has been no earthshaking change, the USA is the same today as it was four years ago when we reelected our President.

Walmart Worker Dies, Trampled by Shoppers

My Vote for Pope

Bishop Claude Champagne should be pope some day. Currently Bishop Champagne is currently auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Halifax. His responses to Women in the church, Race relations in Canada, Evangelism and Age of member of the church were outstanding.
Bishop Champagne's stance on women in the Catholic Church is progressive, yet diplomatic. He stated that the church needed every help they could get, but understood that the climate had changed. Did not say that the current climate was anybody's fault. But did say that it needed to change in time when the church was ready.
A question was asked to Bishop Champagne about how immigrants keeping to their non-christian religions were causing Canada to not be such a great nation. Because of course Canada was built by Christians and that is what lead it to be great. Now this was a hard question but he was able to answer it by using the same ideas that the person asked with. The question was asked with a lot of religious references. The answer was based on religious references, papal documents and Mother Teresa. Talking about how the religion does not matter, that we should love everybody no matter what their faiths are. Most importantly he was able to state, through references, that they are doing nothing wrong. He was able to do all of that with out bluntly saying you are completely wrong and a racist.
Bishop Champagne's lecture was about evangelism and social justice, and how the Catholic Church should evangelize. Interesting topic as a non-Catholic some parts were hard to understand. He was asked the question what was his stance on Protestant Evangelism, convert at all costs mentality. He answered this in a way that made me feel catholic. We should help each other no matter what, people do not have to become christian to get help. If they received help they do not have to become christian. We should not judge our work by if we convert but show the love of God through our actions. This is a important point: our relief work, religious or not, should not have any strings attached; we should do it because we know it is the right thing to do. Your goal in christian relief work should be about 'saving' people, but about helping people.
Bishop Champagne showed his ability to speak with respect when people were wrong. Talk about issues at length from his heart. Showed great skill on how to communicate to people who are stuck in their own view on their level. He is a great speaker and thinker but he is also very down to earth, and that is why he should be Pope some day.

Nader Stealing Missouri From Obama

Well the third party did it again, costing the democrats electoral college votes. But not really, the third party did it all over the states, for and against the democrats. North Carolina and Indiana went for Obama, while Missouri went for McCain; mostly due to third party votes.
North Carolina should have gone to McCain if Barr did not steal 25,000 votes away from him. This creates a small lead over Obama, thus McCain should have won North Carolina. The difference in NC was only 14,000 votes, McCain should have had a lead of 11,000.

Indiana also should have gone for McCain, the difference was also less than what Barr was able to get. Barr received 29,000 votes, the difference between the two big ones was just under 29,000. Indiana should have been the next Florida; making us stay up till dawn wondering who had won it.
Now to Missouri where Obama lost by less than 4 thousand votes, Nader won 17,000. So by simple math Obama won. But that is not looking at the bigger realization, the third party is here to stay and will make very small impacts. They may be small but they can change the electoral college.

Fireworks In Dubai

Well it looks like Dubai knows how to through a party. A new hotel opened in Dubai and its opening party was massive, 20 million dollars. The opening was also for the giant Palm island in Dubai. The project cost over 1.5 billion dollars, so 20 million is not that much more. It was a major celebrity event. The links that are provided gives a background on what happened and many different views of the event.

There were reportedly over 100,000 different fireworks that went off, over less than ten minutes. So if we assume that it was 10 minutes long that would be over 10,000 a minute. Over 150 per second. These are huge amounts of fireworks, so much that the clear air that the fireworks started in was filled with smoke.
What about the environmental damages created by the fire works? Well the fireworks' smoke will most likely be able to be track for quite some distance. But compared to the negative affects of the Palm development it is near to nothing. They double the length of the shore line for Dubai, they created a whole new ecosystem on the shore. Not to mention that it is a tourist attraction, so people will be flying there from around the world. Yes they will create many more airborne contaminates then the fire works ever created.
What about the current financial crisis? This fireworks display was not purchased in the last few month; it was purchased before any of the stock markets began to fall. The whole project actually started during the last major downturn in the economy. These fire works only cost 20 million dollars, while a single resort on the palm cost 1.5 billion dollars. That does not even include the costs to build the Island. So this even was a drop in the bucket.
This is just the first of three palms being created in Dubai, and there is a map of the world as well. The next opening is going to be even larger, so that means more fireworks or something else crazy and new. Don't worry the palms are good planning; they have many initiatives that are good planning.

BBC News Video of Dubai Fireworks

CNN Pictures of Dubai Hotel Opening
CNN News Article about Dubai Fireworks

MSNBC Pictures of Dubai Hotel Opening

Youtube Video of the Event
8 Min Youtube Video - homemade

Onion News

While reading numerous news articles from numerous news agencies, there was a feeling that the whole news was not being told to me. This search lead to Onion News, which is one of the best news networks out there. This is not a real news site but it does provide an important second look at some of the issues present in our society. Four videos that have interesting points of view will be focused on here, but there are many other good ones (and bad ones) on the site.

The growing gap between rich and super-rich is play on the classic conversation about the polarization in our society. Many of the points that people bring up about poor and rich in our society are brought up. Though they do show how our opinions and stances on the rich-poor gap are baseless. We really need to adjust how we think of this gap; this video helps the viewer critically examine the situation.

The next video is Eye on Autumn is the classic media hype around an everyday issue. This video examines the effects of a regular autumn week like it is a major news event. The news networks do hype many of the issues that they cover. This one is funny, with the dire predictions of children playing touch football and an increase of squirrel activities.

Should Animals be doing more to Fight for Their Rights is a group panel talking about the animal rights movement, PETA, in a way that is similar to the civil rights movement. This video shows that people say they are against and issue because they don't like one aspect. The part that should be making you think is; are you against and issue because of some small issue or are you against the whole thing and small issues is your excuse. One of the panelists is against water buffalo but for the rights movement, this is an example of using a small reason to be against a bigger idea.

The last video is a examination of the terrible fires that happen each and every year. This video puts a spin on it saying it is an annual tradition that everybody loves and enjoys. The is false, but ever land owner in that area knows the risk of them being there. They are rich and yet buy land that going to be destroyed. Why does the Californian government help these people out, if the problem when into areas that it was not expected that would be another story. These houses were built in an ecosystem that regularly has fire, and thus wild fires will occur.
Though Onion News is not a real news source it does allow the reader to take a second look at the issues present. None of the facts are true but some of the statements will allow the reader to create more realistic opinions on topics.

The Growing Gap between Rich and Super-Rich

Eye on Autumn

Should Animals be doing more to fight for their Rights?

Californians Gather to Celebrate Annual Wildfire Tradition

Oh Iceland

The current financial crisis has caused many issues around the world. In North America there has been a fairly large focus on only the United States. But, there is an even larger story of a country in financial trouble, and yes in the developed world. It is Iceland, who would have guest one of the strongest economies in Europe would just colapse.
The situation that Iceland currently is in is dire and should have greater focus. Their currency has lost 2/3 of its value over the last year. The Icelandic Stock Exchange fell over 79% in one morning in October, it did recover over the day. The government has nationalized the 3 major banks, incurring all of their debt. These banks debt is 60 billion, 10% of the USA bail out. But, their GDP is only 20 Billion, so their new debt from the banks is three times the size of their GDP. This could lead to the whole country defaulting and going into bankruptcy. This is less likely because the European Community is now working together to bail them out.
This European bailout has some interesting consequences. The most interesting is that it appears that the mood in Iceland is towards joining the EU, instead of the indifference of the past. As recently as today the Icelandic Independence Party changed the date of their next policy meeting so they can vote on whether they should support joining the EU. In a poll conducted 2 weeks ago had a 80% support for the start of the application process. It is true that this support could change with the amount of time that it would take for the process to go through. But this is remarkable when compared to 2 years ago when support was around 40%. Even if the number does go down, it still does not change the fact that 80% of the population did at one time think that it would be a good idea.
It has been said the EU will not become stronger than the USA until Switzerland, Norway and Iceland join. This might be the first sign that the EU is actually strong, and those countries will join.

Let Kids Be Kids

On another note to the last post, but at the same time similar. Let kids just be kids again. Doing background searching about the issues present with children in the UK this article jumped out. It talked about how playgrounds are becoming too tame and thus causing children to go to other more dangerous places. The conference stated that by making play grounds safer, often overly safe, children would venture to new places to do the same activities.
This is an example about how over protective of our children these days. We as a society protect them from every ill, make sure that they are always having structured play. This is creating kids that do not know how to have fun. It even is showing through what kids play with, studies are showing eating dirt is good for you as a child. This is because it builds your immune system, but what parent would allow their child to eat dirt.

Play Areas should be more fun

The Demonetization of Children

A recent study done by a charity in the United Kingdom found that adults were condemning children. Half of the adults interviewed stated that children should be considered dangerous. A majority also believed that children behaved like 'animals'. Most adults believe that children are responsible for half of the crimes that are committed. In actual fact they only committed 12% of the crimes in the UK. It has gotten so acute that the United Nations stated, there is "general climate of intolerance" towards children, last month. This is a shocking situation.
What is most shocking about this situation is that the adults appear to blame the children for all of these problems. This neglects the parenting and roles models that older individuals are. There is the chance for adults to be positive role models, the demonetization of the this groups has the opposite affect. If the climate of fear changes it needs to be the people in authority that start this change. The people in authority are the adults, adults control almost all aspects of our society. To blame the children for the problems completely disregards the larger picture.

UK Society Condemning Children

How to Make Virginia and North Carolina Democratic

This presidential election was a break through in a many different ways. One of the break throughs was Virginia and North Carolina voting democratic for the first time in a while. This change could become permanent if the democratic leaders help change the demographics of the states for ever.

Now is a great time to increase and rebuild the infrastructure in the States to help rebuild their failing economy. One Infrastructure project that should be undertaken would be highspeed rail into the South. Currently there is highspeed rail from Boston, through New York, to Washington D.C. This should be expanded to Richmond, Virginia and Raleigh and Charlotte North Carolina. This would connect this growing cities with the North East cities rather than other southern cities. The high speed rail could be extended to Greenville, South Carolina; Atlanta, Georgia and Birmingham, Alabama.
These are all important cities in respect to the recent presidential election. Urban areas are usually more democratic and thus connect these cities the democratic base in these states may grown. This could turn them into battle ground states or turn them into safe democratic states. If you look at the recent voting data most of these cities voted for Obama rather than McCain. One notable exception was Greenville which heavily favoured McCain. But what also is important is that only the central city of these communities voted democratic. By changing the demographics then the whole urban area may become more democratic.
If a rail system was put into place it would be important to reduce the divides between the North and South. This would mean that the trains that leave the southern end of the system should continue all the way to Boston. This would allow people to travel the whole lenght with out changing trains or modes of transit. If there was a change than there would be a feeling of disconnect between the two regions. As it would be easy for the train company to have two different trains that both go to Washington. A Northern and a Southern route, which would not have the desired effect.
This high speed rail corridor could have the effect of changing the boundaries of the BosWash. Not ending at Washington but all the way into North Carolina. This new urban Megalopolis would include over 60 million people, or 1/5 of the USA population. Connecting the New South to the Northeast, changing the political landscape of the USA forever. The landscape where Virgina and North Carolina would strong democratic states.

Lest We Forget

The statement 'lest we forget' in relation to the horrors of the first and second war. Now the question that should be posed is haven't we already forgotten. When was the last time that you thought about the lives that were lost on a day that was not in the week before rememberance day. When was the last time that you truly stopped doing everything that is happening around you at 11:11 and thought about those who had died.
We have forgotten what had happened. Every time we let Rwanda, Durfur, DRC, Zimbabwe, Somalia, Burma happen, we forget the past. There are many more situations which we allow as a world community and yet believe that we still remember those wars. We should not allow ourselves to lie and say that we do remember, when we know in our hearts that we have forgotten. To remember would be to react and prevent world suffering, some thing that the west has a terriable track record on.
We have forgotten because we do not remember these things in our daily lifes, only on rememberance day if it is convienent for us.

Fast Food and Corn

Well a few months ago i heard of a place that had replaced all of their plastic water bottles with corn based plastic water bottle. They were excited because they felt they were changing the world. They would be changing the world if they had not been replacing plastic with corn. Corn farming is not a sustainable use of resources, it is over funded by the government and reduces the productivity of the soil.
Today in the news there was a story about how much corn there is in fast food. At Wendy's, for example, if you order a hamburger or chicken burger with fries there is not one item of food that you eat that is not related to corn. The cattle for the hamburgers, or chicken, have been feed only corn products. The bread has corn in it. The fries and chicken are fried in corn oil. They figured this out by testing the products for corn, rather than reading the ingredients. This lead to the findings that 93% of beef from fast food have been raised exclusively on corn. This study did not look at the soft drinks at the restaurants because the sugars added to them are all corn based.
Corn is also used in ethanol. Which is not a solution to anything besides votes in the midwest. With out government subsidies corn would not be grown in places where heavy fertilization is need. Bio fuels currently are a joke because there is more energy need for the production of the fuel than is produced. The government is subsidizing the current production which allows the companies to not produce the most effience bio fuels. There is a movie on the topic, King Corn, that looks interesting, but i have not seen it.
To truly change the way that gas is produced we need to change who we subsidize and what we use for bio fuels, but that is another story.
Corn should be reduced from our food supply. Yes it is good to have corn in some products but we should not be living in a age where almost every product that you by that is prepackaged has corn in it.

News article on CBC

Actual science article in National Academy of Sciences (it is currently free)

Starting Anew

So many months ago now, around 6 months, i stopped writing or thinking about writing posts for this blog. One part was i did not have high speed internet.
So I was talking to the person who in the past told me that my posts were too long. This time the person told me to do the posts again. Not that this person has complete control over what I do, a few people have been asking recently why I had stopped blogging.
So I am back

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7413056.stm

What a Girl Wants

Well I was watching 'What a Girl Wants' yesterday, which I realized a while in I had already seen it. I was taken aback by the main plot line. A girl finds out that her dad is a famous politician, trys to catch up with him during an election. She does not fit his Aristocratic lifestyle, she is American. So yes it is a chickflick made for teenage girls, but what ever I watched it. I was shocked that the daughter felt fine that she could jump into her father's life and make him change into what she wants.
The father is in one of his most stressful moments of his life, he is running for the Prime Minister of the UK. Which would be his life goal, it is what he has been working towards for many years. The Daughter, he did not know existed, comes in and demands that she becomes the center of his life. I would hope that my children would understand that it is a stressful time and that in a month that will have more time to make their relationship work.
I was also taken aback about how it was okay for her to do this. She is the main character and everybody appears to be okay with her forcing her father to change. It is true that her father is not completely happy in his current position but I would never want to put some one in the position of choosing between their goal and me. It is true that he should put his family before his job, but he does he trys to find a balance between both issues. She just demands to have all of his attention, and will not go along and help him during the most important moment of his political career.
She forces him to choose between who he currently is and who she wants him to be. I am pretty sure that would never happen in real life, the Daughter is just too demanding, but does not realize it. I hope that I do not have any kids that I do not know about come jumping into my life when I am running for office (like that would ever happen).

The Day The World Will Change

Well I was thinking WHEN will the world change, HOW will it change, and WHY will it change. All of these I was looking at an environmental point of view; sustainability and end of Oil.
Mass consumption of oil will be gone in the next 50 years and will will need something to replace it, but what will replace it? Nothing, we can not replace it. We will be able to adapt, but the world will not be the same. We will not be able to fly, or get fresh food from California, or just in time delivery. Our lifestyle will drastically change, we will still live good lives but they will be no close to the same lifestyle that we live now. We will not be able to travel to Cuba, buy anything we want.
Our world will be filled with many new inventions but none of them will be able to replace oil. Our whole society is based on oil, how can we replace a mismanaged and overused stable.
Every product we touch is made from oil, not to mention the amount of oil it took to make it. There was also oil used to get the natural resources from, transportation of the product. All of our 'western' products are tied to oil and we will never be able to separate all of the products from the need of oil.
What to do then, well we could put restrictions on the amount of oil we can use. That will only come into place when we start when the oil supply decreases. That will cause the restrictions to be put into place for ever and increased restrictions over time. It would cause the economy to go into a tailspin, isn't our economy based on mass consumerism, when that ends so will our economy.
All this reminds me of the song by John Mayer, Waiting on the World to Change. I am waiting for the world to change and realize that our mass consumerism has to stop. We will have to change every aspect of our lives. The song also sheds a light on how are are not seeing the whole story on many issues.

Oh Greece, Why care about that Name?

If there is going to be lasting peace in the Balkans, then Greece will have to make a change in its foreign policy. Greece has vetoed Macedonia's bid at joining NATO and are threating to do the same for the EU. This is not over large issues, it is over the name of Macedonia. Yes Greece is going to stop Macedonia's bid for joining anything because they use the name Macedonia. This could cause a destabilizing affect for the whole Balkan region.

The reason that Greece does not like Macedonia to use the name Macedonia is because some Greek states are called Macedonia as well. This leads Greece to think that Macedonia will try and take some of their territory. Macedonia has stated many times that they are not going to take that action, but that has not appeased the Greek government. This issue almost stop Macedonia from joining the UN but they go by the name of The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM).
It appears that the Greek government finds a name more important then the stability of its neighbours. Macedonia almost went into civil war in the late 1990s but the international community was able to stabilize the country. One of the major ways that they were able to stabilize the country was the promise of joining NATO and EU. They have vetoed the NATO bid and next will come the EU bid. This will remove one of the reasons to keep the peace in Macedonia.
There is also an election in Serbia shortly and the position that Greece has taken is not helping. It appears that the EU members are only out to help themselves and not those who could join. Greece has threatened to use its veto power a lot, it looks they are following the US as a role model.

Pennsylvania Judge making Waves

Well, a judge in the USA has decided to take interesting step in order to solve a problem. What would you do if you had three men who could not speak English and were charged with robbery. Well one judge in the USA has decided that he would give them each conditional sentences which they would need to learn English or they would have to go to jail. This is an interesting idea instead of just punishing them the judge is actually trying to improve their standing in their community. And hopefully fix any future wrongs that could occur.
This comes after the news that there is 1% of the American population in jail and that the Conservative government of Canada is trying to gage the support of putting more Canadians in Jail. I think what this judge is doing is wonderful, and could change the way that Americans think about new immigrants.

The Pine Beetle Epidemic is over in BC

The pine beetle is gone from BC, which is wonderful news, it means that the Pine Beetle is gone forever. NOT. This means that there is only going to be a decrease of pine beetle in BC but growth throughout the rest of the country. The decrease is also caused by the lack of food, yes it means that there are no more trees for these beetles to eat. So the battle is 'won' in BC but not in Canada. The Pine beetle will spread across Canada and could attack the Boreal Forest that stretches all across Canada, destroying all of the pine forests in Canada.
Even though the Pine Beetle will be leaving BC soon the effects of the Epidemic will last for generations, human generations not just beetle generations.

Comoros and France

The African Union did have the support and the power to take action in Comoros. And Yes France did support the AU force with transportation, but that does not mean that they completely support it. The leader that was removed from power, Bacar, escaped to a France controlled island. France now has a important decision ahead of them. Will they support the Comoros government and send Bacar back to face the courts, or will they keep him in there lands and protect him from the law.
France needs to make Bacar face the courts, but this does not mean that they have to send him back to Comoros, there are other options. The option that I would support would to bring Bacar in front of the ICC (international criminal court) in The Hague. This would be a compromise between the two options. It will allow Bacar to face the courts and make sure that he does not loose out to victors justice. It will also bring more importance and precedence to the ICC. France needs to make sure that it does not protect Bacar who is charged with crimes against humanity. If they do protect him it will be very similar to what happened in Rwanda.
France needs to show the world that they can actually be a world leader in the protection of human rights around the world. Not just a country that says that they do but their actions do not support it. If France wants to put pressure on China for their human rights record they need to take positive action in this conflict.

I Wish I Had the Diplomatic Skills of the Pope

I know that I do not agree on certain issues with the current pope, Benedict XVI, but that does not mean I cannot learn lessons from him. In this blog I am not going against the Catholic Church I am just pointing out how I would do things differently if I was pope. I will never be a pope because I am Mennonite and I do not think I would accept the power. The current Pope in my mind needs to learn some lessons about diplomacy, he has taken real steps to bring more understanding between Christians and Muslims. I find that each time that he does one of these actions he takes a few steps back as well.
An example is how the pope called for peace on Easter, calling for an end to the problems in Tibet, Iraq and the Holy Land. Those are all real issues that we should all be working towards, finding real peace in the world should be all of our goals. But the day before he baptized a controversial Muslim journalist, which can be viewed as a slap in the face for the Muslim community. That action appears to show that our Christian faith is better than yours, but we still want to have talks with you. The Pope did not have to do that ceremony, or if he wanted to he did not have to do it publicly and insult the people who he is trying to create peace with. I hope the Muslim world understands that the Pope does not have very good diplomatic skills and do not going into protests like what happened two years ago.

My Easter Family

Well My Easter Family was not your typical easter family. Sure there were inside jokes, singing songs, community, lots of food and a feeling of being at home. But on the other hand there were not of my relatives (close relatives that is). I had easter dinner with around 30 of my close friends, we where the people in res who did not go home for easter. I have to say that we made the most of it, and became like a family, at least in my mind. I have talked before about how if view my family as more than just biological.
I also realized that I will never cook easter dinner for this many people ever again (that is if I do not do it next year, so one more time). One of my friends and I where talking as we were cooking and realized we will never have families this large. I grew up in the states and all of my relatives live at least a days drive away, i doubt i would be cooking for them and they are not in that great numbers. So that leaves out getting all of my relatives to visit me and so I can cook for them. The other option would be to have a large family, no I am not going to have 30 kids. I could 5 kids, who each get married, and have 2 kids each, this seems normal in my mind. That would bring the total to 22 which is still less than I cooked for today.

Killing Wolves is not Bad

Today in class a person stated that 'killing wolves is not bad', which being an environmental studies course everybody viewed as completely wrong. It is true that our over harvesting of apex predators have caused extreme ecosystem damage around the world. This does not mean that it is wrong or bad to kill one of these animals. Each animal death needs to be looked into to find out if there really is environmental damage done. Many animals such as Siberian Tigers, Wolves in the USA, Bears in Europe and Lions or Cheetahs in Asia would have huge impacts on their ecosystems. There are areas in the world where there is enough animals that a sustainable harvest is possible, like wolves in Canada. Yes it is true that there are certain subspecies of wolves that need to be protected, red wolves in Ontario, but other places there are as many wolves as their needs to be. I am sure that people will state that killing one wolf in a pack could cause the pack to fall apart, but there are in many areas enough wolf packs to fill in the gap when one pack disappears.
I am not writing this to suggest that we should go out and kill wolves. I am trying to get across the point that their can be a sustainable harvest of all animals. In the past we have not been sustainable at all, causing the downfall of so many animals.

The AU has teeth afterall

I am sure that the current AU mission for intervention in Africa will be noticed by few. The AU is currently planning an invasion of one of the Islands of Comoros. These islands are off the coast of Africa on the way to Madagascar. They were a former colony of France, which still controls one of the islands. It is a complicated geopolitical issue, as well as a complicated government system in place.
The issue that the AU is presently going to deal with is the removal of a leader of one of the islands. He has a military that is just as strong and as large as the government of Comoros. This caused them to ask for the AU to use their power to over throw the leader. Which the AU has accepted and will do with out assistance from another regional group or the UN. France will be watching and supporting to a degree, but that is because it is happening near their colony. The odd part that I saw was that there will be Sudanese military presence, about a third of the troops present. This appears to be a little weird, they are supporting democracy and protecting people in other countries, but they do not protect their own people in their own territory.

News Media

I was talking to a friend who suggested that I should read Al Jazeera. I found that Al Jazeera is a wonderful news station and suggest that everyone should look at it. The news that we read in the western world is one that is biased in many ways. It is written by western people who are not in poverty. This means that there are many news stories that are biased that we do not realize because we have been reading them for many a years. There are also issues over the stories that are talked about in the media, western news only focuses on certain stories.

Al Jezeera is not perfect and neither is BBC News or CBC News. I find that each one of these news agencies have issues, some of them are getting to be so much that I will be going to them less and less over time. The CBC for an example is filled with ads, that I do not want to read, it also is looking less and less professional. The BBC is starting to put ads on its website but they do not appear to be as in your face as CBC. It also still has a very professional appearing website. And Al Jezeera has a very professional appearance and does not have any ads. These are both attributes that I enjoy when I read the news. On the other hand they do not put the author of the news article or the agency that they received the information from. From now on I will look at Al Jezeera and BBC News often and when I need Canadian news I will read CBC News, or the Globe and Mail.

Knitting outdoors

I was reading a news article about how people in the USA are going around an knitting random objects around towns. This is something I do not support at all. Yes I can knit a hat in 24 hours, yes I have knitted many scarfs, hats and yes trying a sweater. I do not agree with these actions. People all over the states are doing this, while homeless people are unable to keep themselves warm.
I have a better idea for what to do with their time why do they not pick a colour and knit as many things from the same colour. Every time that someone goes and asks them for money on they street they give the person a different knitted object. These objects can be as simple as scarfs or they could be hats, mitts, sweaters and blankets. This would help people who do not have enough to survive as well as giving us something productive to do with our time.
If a community does not have any 'homelessness' problems then they could sell the products they made to fund raise for other causes. Or look at their communities more closely and realize that there are people in need in their own community, and help them. I am not against knitting, I am against knitting for no reason.

We are Running out of Gas

I read some shocking news last night before I went to bed. There is a gas shortage in western Canada, yes there is a lack of gas in Western Canada. Imperial Oil has a refinery near Edmonton that has been taken off line. So the amount of fuel that they are producing has been reduced and they have started rationing their products, they are going to provide to communities where they are the only providers for first then the rest of us.

If western Canada is running out of oil this is not a good sign, that is where there should be a net exports of oil not imports. It may be just one company that does not have enough gas, but it will have implications through out the industry. There are also estimates that the price of gas will get as high as 1.40 this summer, before this issue became known. So we are running out of gas, does that mean that we have reached the peak oil, and the prices will just continue to increase. Or is it just a series of unfortunate events. With the increase in the price of gas, many things will become more expensive. All items will have a price increase, from food to products from China.

What a Week for the Conservatives

I am sure that the Federal Conservatives are not looking forward any talk of an election this week. This week news has come out about the Conservative party apparently offering bribes and leaking information that affects a foreign election. This is a classic case of what not to do, and what to do instead.

Well if you want and election, and someone is not going to vote for an election that you want, by all means offer to pay them 1 million dollars. Well that is what some people have suggested the conservative party tried to do. So then you wonder why the have not said we did not offer the MP any money. The PM's office will not say that they did not offer the MP money even when prompted. It would be great if they did, or even say we offered him (fill in here) much to do (fill in here) with it. I am sure they would not just give him money just to vote, I am sure they would find another good reason for it.

Then with comments that all the NAFTA talk was just lies was a great idea. For their defense they went against both Hilary and Barack, yes they went after both sides. But those sides are just the Democrats. So yes he did take a side, the Republicans, something that nobody should do if they want to win a majority in Canada. I know that sounds bad but it is true, Canadians generally do not support republican party politics. I do not think there is a good way to get out of this position for the PMO, but I am sure there are ways not to do it. I hope that it does not become and international issue that makes Canada look bad.

These happened after the great Peterborough Train, and a Conservative senator complaining about how useless the senate is. It would help if the senator has actually showed up to say half of the votes, and say at least one committee meeting.

Super Tuesday 2.0

So I was hoping that the First Super Tuesday would be able to tell us who was going to represent the Democrats in the Presidential election. Well one month later we sill have no idea who is going to lead them. Yes I guess we do have an idea, Hilary or Barack, but there is not clear winner. Well we know who two people who are running are: Nader and McCain.

Hilary does not have a complete chance at winning the nomination because she will not be able to win all of the delegates needed to pull ahead of Barack's pledged delegates. This will mean that she will have to win over more super delegates, which she could. She could also gain momentum, being able to win so many of the large, powerful and 'important' states. She is also married to the Comeback Kid from the 1992 primary season, that is a positive point. She is also only 140 in pledged delegates behind Barack, only 100 total. That is less than 3% of the total votes that could be casted at the convention.

Barack has a much better chance at winning the nomination but he could slip and start to show weaknesses which could spell the end of his campaign. If what he said to the Canadian authorities did actually happen than he is no better than any other politician. It could end the honeymoon that he has had with the media, nobody really has taken shots at him. If that starts to happen and he is not able respond well or hold his own, he could loose his lead. There has been some talk about how he has not been a seasoned politician, I hope that does not affect him negatively.

Why are there two 'great' people running for this year to be president for the democrats while 4 years ago there was not really anyone who was good. I know that it was because they were going against a 'great' president. (some people think they are great, but I will let you decide). This has been a less interesting one that the ones of the 1960s and 1970s.

Walking in the Urban Environment

Well the news in New Zealand was interesting a few days ago. There was first a story about how Kids should walk to school, then a story about how Auckland is cutting funding to foot paths. These issues are tied, the affects of one will directly affect the other one, and cutting funding will cause both of them to fail.

It was interesting to read that not only in North America do we have issues of people driving their kids to school. In the last 15 years the number of people driving to school has increased by 66%. It has become such a problem in some areas that there are rush hour like issues of people traveling to the schools. According to the news article 40% of rush-hour traffic is educated related, but who know what educated related means. To get more kids to walk to work they are having famous sport stars and politicians walking with kids to school. That would be so much fun, who would not want to walk with your favorite politician to school.
Most of these ideas are interesting but the issue of the built form of the neighbourhoods would be a better way to address this issue. If a child can not safely walk to their school, why would they walk rather than drive.

At the same time as there are efforts to encourage people to walk more, Auckland is cutting back their footpath redevelopment plan. Auckland has most of the population and wealth of New Zealand, if you are wondering. The city government is also not looking at reducing funding to road improvements in the area. The government should fund both automobile and non-automobile projects at the same rates and force cuts on both of them. I do not know the jurisdictional issues around roads for Auckland so that may be the reason why they are not cutting back on roads.

Oh Stats Can

I was reading the news and came upon the best news article I think I have ever found: Canadian Workforce Greying: StatsCan

This is one of the reasons why I love StatsCan and the news media so much. How is this a news story, or an issue worth researching? Don't we already know that the babyboom is going to start retiring soon, we have know about it since they were born. I am not surprised about it becoming news, just amused.

2016 Olympics: Chicago Has No Chance

I was looking at the Olympic bid cities for 2016 and came to a realization, Chicago has no Chance at winning. Cities that are biding are: Chicago, Prague, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro, Baku, Doha and Madrid. I am personally betting on Doha or Rio de Janeiro, they are both in non developed countries that have never held the Olympics before and in regions that have never held them before as well. The Olympics should not go to Europe or North America, the previous 3 Olympics where held in those regions. It is true that the USA has not held the summer Olympics since 1996, but that does not matter, other countries have never held it.

Doha has a better chance at winning the summer Olympics than most people realize. It is the first bid from the Arab world that has a real chance, that helps a lot. It is also in a location that has never help the games, that should have a large impact. The city has also gained the support from its neighbours, which does not seem that large but will help in the voting process. They have also taken out their possible bids for the games as well. The city has held major regional athletic events in the past few years. And the city and region has a lot of Oil wealth that will not hurt the bid at all.

Rio de Janeiro has a good chance as well. They held the pan-american games and put it together and ran it, it was to be even better than the games in Winnipeg. It is also in a region that has never held the games, though there have been previous attempts.

It is time for the IOC to stop being dominated by Western powers and choose a location by what it can do for the world. I am sure that having the games in a developing world would do more to spread the spirit of the games than if the games were held in a western country. North America has held the games 5 time, Europe has held them 15 times. The games have only been in other areas 5 times. IOC let the rest of the world have the games, just once.

Near War in Latin America

Ahh yes I am commenting on one of the less pleasant aspects of our world. I understand that I am doing what I do not want the media to do.

So Columbia tried to stop FARC from continuing their actions in Ecuador this week, and of course this meant going beyond their borders and attacking FARC in Ecuador. This event has been viewed as a bad idea, and most governments stated that it was not a good idea. I say most because the USA supports their action. The incursion caused Ecuador and Venezuela to cut all diplomatic ties with the Columbia. They have in the past said that Columbia is a pawn of the USA, hence why the USA did the wrong thing again. Why did the USA not support Columbia so much, causing their insults to become more true.

FARC: I find that this organization has lost almost all of their support for the actions that they do. I think the that USA has too much power in Latin America but I do not support kidnapping people and selling drugs. It will be really hard for them to stop their actions but I feel they should rebuild and be reborn as another more peaceful organization.

Peterborough Train

The train to Peterborough from Toronto is one of the best public transportation decisions that the federal government has done in years, NOT. Come to think about it, it may be true. What has this federal government done for public transit, next to nothing. So if they are willing to put money into public transit then it would be a good change of heart. But the choice, could they be more wrong.

To begin with the train that went to Peterborough would not even fit with most people's standards of trains. They were cars that were self propelled, yes the train was around 3 cars long max. This means that only a few people were taking it when it was still in place, and VIA does not even really use that type of train anymore, it is not worth the investment. Along with that GO transit looked into if they should run trains, or even buses, to Peterborough. The study showed that they would not even make the money back if they only used buses. Did the federal government even look at the reasons why there were no trains going to Peterborough.

That gets me to my next point: it was political decision, nothing else. The minister of Finance just happens to live and run in one of the ridings that the train would go through. Why would the minister not support the local community by wasting tons of money. As well destroy people's positive view of public transit. This reminds me of the O-Train, another minister destroyed a real, viable public transit development because the minister did not like the local politicians. Why will the federal government stop interfering in the lives of the cities and instead help them, by funding and support.

Translink

While studying a started to look into the planning decisions of Vancouver. It was not a subject that would be tested on but it would have been knowledge that would be helpful in making informed answers. There were two issues that took me by surprise: Translink's Evergreen line and BC governments control issues.

To begin with Translink is the company that runs the public transportation system in the greater Vancouver area. It is in charge of the buses, seabus and the skytrain. They are currently in the stages of rapid growth, which is not completely under their control. The skytrain system is currently being expanded to the Vancouver Airport (Canada Line), mostly because of the Olympics. This is a needed improvement because over 500,000 people take that route daily. The Evergreen line is going to be a new skytrain route that goes to the Port Moody area. This route was going to be part of an earlier expansion but was too expensive, and was not done. Then recently there was talk of creating a LRT line, like street cars, to the area instead of expensive skytrain development. This was approved but then the provincial government decided to step in and change the plans. The route will now be skytrain and will start to be built after the Canada line is finished, this moves back the opening day by years. It causes the route to be in competition with the West Coast Express, commuter rail.

The provincial government is trying to control translink a little bit to much. If the company has gone through studies and realize that one way is going to work best, let them do it. The province of BC is trying to be a little too green and not realize that development should take time. They are also suggesting a skytrain that will go to UBC, currently only buses go through out much of that area. Translink is also going to have street cars that go through downtown Vancouver, which will be a interesting idea. Instead of that why not make a new link to the north shore that is only for public transit, it will make a bigger difference I am sure.

Don't get me wrong I like investment in Public transportation, money and development that is thought out. I think that some of these decisions will be looked back as a mistake. Costs will increase, prices will have to go up, ridership will go down, the system will suffer.

Lunar Eclipse

The Lunar Eclipse that was a few weeks ago now got me thinking, when was the last time that I sat and looked up at the sky and wondered what it was all about. During the summer time it is easy to take time to look at the sky, it is warm. The Lunar Eclipse was a chance for all of us to look at the moon and realize that we are not the only things on this world. The world functioned long before we existed and will function, maybe not perfectly, after we are gone.
I know that I wrote about this before when there was a beautiful full moon a few months ago. At the same time am sure that it should be discusses more. Our culture does not respect what is around us and how best to live our lives in it. Every time that I look at the night sky, the sky would work but the sky during the day is sort of boring, I realize how small we are. How we are destroying everything, that though comes through in cities where the stars are hidden.
One of my favorite experiences from traveling to New Zealand was when we sat in a parking lot, with no unnatural light around. The sky was filled with more stars can thought was possible. There are so few places in the world where you can do that, and they are all getting destroyed.

New Gas Tax

The BC government has just announced their budget for 2008 and it has a surprise, at least to me. The government is putting in place a carbon tax, which will be placed on fuel or cars and heating. The price will increase over 4 years to be around 8 cents per liter of gas. I guess BC does care about the environment and will give California a run for its money.
I think the tax is a wonderful idea, it will hurt people who use too much gas while allow people who have less get a benefit. The Government will reduce overall income tax because of the carbon tax. I am sure that there are people who are going to be very against it, and I understand and agree with some of them. Taxi drivers and private transit companies are going to be hurt the most and these people should be exempt from the tax. They are reducing the carbon foot print of the nation because each person does not need travel by themselves. One side that will be against it that I do not think has a valid reason is truck drivers. There is many cases where truck could be replaced by other modes of transportation, such as rail. I know that our economy is not set-up for the use of rail any more, but I think it is time to start to change.

The City of London in England has also done a similar measure recently to increase taxes on polluting cars. Cars that enter the center part of London have to pay a congestion tax. As of October 2008 cars the are very fuel efficient will not have to pay the tax, while those that are not fuel efficient will have to pay double the tax.

Both these measures will add another reason to by more fuel efficient vehicles. That and the price of oil went above 100 dollars again today. I personally think that fuel efficiently is good enough reason for me, but what ever...

Elections in Pakistan

Pakistan voted in their parliamentary elections and it appears that the current president is under pressure to change his ways. Pakistan has many issues and most of them are no fault of their own but due to the colonization of the West. In the current election the two opposition leaders have both one over twice the amount of the President's party. This may give them enough political power to even impeach the president, a move I do not expect. The Question is did the death of Bhutto have any major affect on the election, beside not having her as a possible prime minister.

Pakistan, just like most of the countries in Africa, still is influenced by European colonization. The Country of Pakistan is not based on one ethnic group like countries in Europe but based on a common religion. But with in that common religion there are many different beliefs. The border between Afghanistan and Pakistan is based on how much of Afghanistan the British could control before they had to give up. This causes the some areas to have beliefs more similar to the Middle East while other areas are closer to the Sub Continent of India.
The USA has also had their influence as well. Pakistan is one of the major allies on the 'War on Terror'. This means that the USA wants the current Pres. to stay in power so they are able to continue the world saving friendship. This has caused the US to over look issues that if they occurred in other countries they would be complaining about. This has happened in Azerbaijan, Morocco and Turkey as well.

I believe that the death of the former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has not had a big impact on the election. But I think this election is happening in a timewill be a turning point for Pakistan, the assassination also occurred in this time of change.

Castro Out, Castro In

Fidel Castro has retired after 50 years in office, sure he was a dictator but 50 years is still a long time to be in office. Many people view him as a only negative person but I believe that he has done many things that make him a positive figure. He has created a health care system and a education system that is unique in the Developing world. Fidel has also protected his countries culture from becoming to American, and when you travel to Cuba there are few Americans that is aways a plus. He will most likely be replaced by his brother Raul who has been in power for over a year now.
The education system that is put into place is going to affect all Cubans when the embargo ends, which will not be soon. Many of the citizens of Cuba have higher education and have supplied the developing world with doctors. Cuba trades doctors for oil and other supplies with Venezuela. When the borders to the USA become open the richer American Cubans will return, but they are less educated so they will not be able to live the lifestyle that they would like. The opening of the borders will cause the American Cubans to lose all of their political power as well. They will stop being political refugees and become unwanted (but needed) illegal immigrants, they will be grouped will all of the other Latinos.
There is not going to be major change in Cuba for awhile, and in turn the USA policies towards it. This means that the retirement of Fidel will be a major event in his life but not in the time line of Cuba. If we want to really change the way that Cubans live on a daily basis we need to change the way that we live and stop using up more resources that we really need. A change in leadership will not fix the larger problem of inequality in the world.

Serbia's Divorce

Today the divorce is starting to have the affects that will shape European foreign policy for years. The EU is divided, there are riots, the USA and Russia are disagreeing, the EU may falter and crumble. The UN could show once again how it does not have any teeth due to countries like the USA/Russia/China.
The EU is unable to create a common stance when dealing with the 'new' country of Kosovo. The was a meeting where the leaders of the EU came together to talk about what should be done. And there was no common strategy agreement and every country will choose if they will recognize the new country. This is a bad omen because there was the general agreement that this kind of strategy did not work in the 1990s when thousands of people lost their lives in ethnic conflicts. There is a EU force being put into place in 120 days but will it be able to stop all of the conflict.
There is a divide through out the EU, it is not one region against another. This is a good sign because it means that the EU not breaking into its regions. It make take a while but it will grow back together and be stronger, but it will lose some of it's image.
Russia and the USA are using trying to divide Europe like during the cold war. Taking different sides on an issues and fighting for them even though this destroys most of the solutions. They appear to not realize that they have reduced amount of control and influence in Europe. Since the end of the cold war Europe is becoming more able to solve their own problems. If Russia and the USA continue to fight about the solution and the EU can find a solution then they are truly have no power in Europe.
Any solution that could be found can all be vetoed by certain countries at the UN. The UN is not perfect in most ways but this is one of the issues that may never be solved. The USA will support Kosovo independence at almost all costs. Russia will not support it because Serbia is Slavic and it could cause Russia to fall apart. China is worried about it because of the implication on Tibet and Taiwan.

On a side note: Turkey is so for their independence but they refuse to support a Kurdish state in their own country.

Public Transport is Good For You

So I was reading the news and found a wonderful article about public transit. A women accepted a bet to kiss the next person who got on the bus for 40 dollars. So she did and the fell in love and got married recently.
So I would suggest anyone who would like to meet the love of their lifes they should go and take the nearest bus and kiss and attractive person on it. Just think you could reduce your carbon footprint and tie the knot all the same time.

http://www.cbc.ca/cp/Oddities/080216/K021604AU.html

Best Family Day Ever

Today was the best family day ever, yes it may be the best family day in the history of family day. It would be not that hard to be the best ever because it is the first, it is also the worst ever as well. This day has allowed me to think about the meaning of family, since I am not with my biological family. I think that some times family can go beyond just the biology, to close friends.

Thinking of my family outside of the regular box started when I went to New Zealand for 1 1/2 months. It was not the experience, but a tv show that made me think about it. They were talking about the average Kiwi (person from New Zealand) and that they viewed their close friends as family.
I personally think that your family is more than just biological, they are people who that are close to you. I have many people who I consider family are close to friends, but it think of them more that just friends. I am not saying this because I hate my own family, I love them with all of my heart, even if we do not agree on everything. It may be influenced by the distance that my family is from me. My closest relative in distance is in Iowa, it takes two days to drive there. So I did not see them as often as some people, people at my church have filled the void of not seeing them throughout the year.

Always Reporting the Worst

I have read and believed for a long time that newspapers and the media are constantly reporting all of the bad thing that happen. This issue was realized for me when I was reading the KW record yesterday. I was looking at what they said about the recent approval of a 1 dollar fee to support a refugee. They only had around one line about it, but they had a whole article about how the radio station lost their funding. This I find shocking, why not report the feel good story about how university students are going to support refugee students. The story about the radio station is second in my mind.
This issue also ties into the issue about always reporting about deaths, even if the families don't really want it. There was a recent school shooting and the story is once again spread through out the media. Why do we only care about the bad things in life, is it inherent or are we conditioned to only care about those issues.

EU: Divorce and Rekindling Love

The European Union is going to be tested and hopefully come out stronger due to the issues of Divorce and Rekindling relationships this year. Yes, I am talking about Kosovo and Cyprus. Kosovo and Serbia have continued their divorce, some would say started. Cyprus on the other hand could be ending their separation that has been around since the 1970s.

Kosovo recently unilaterally declared their independence from Serbia. This act was not a surprise, since there has been no real control from the Serbian government since the 1990s. Serbia is the last part of the Former Yugoslavia, everything else has left. Their country has gotten smaller by 25% in the last 2 years. This would not seem to be a big lost but there is more than just the land. Montenegro was the last part of the former Yugoslavia connected to Serbia, which left in 2006. This meant that the nation for the Slavs in the Balkans was over and there was nothing left of the former nation. When Kosovo declared independence went much deeper, it is the historical homeland of the Serbian People. Their most important historical event happened in a land that has now declared their independence.
This is an important issue of the EU because it is happening in the 'backyard'. I would suggest the term in the living room/kitchen would be more appropriate. Serbia is almost surrounded on all sides by the EU, and will be completely surrounded with in 20 years. The EU is also putting in a fairly large peacekeeping group into Kosovo. They have also suggested that they would give advanced membership to Serbia because of all of the land that it has lost. The EU-Russian relationship is also going to be strained over the actions that they do. There are also countries with in the EU that do not want other countries to separate because then they could fall apart as well (Spain is an example).

The Rekindling Love of Cyprus, the Greek South and the Turkish North, could be a great story for 2008. In past decades it has been the North that have been holding back, then it was the Greeks in the 2000s but now it could be neither. The Greek Cypriots are holding a presidential election where all of the leaders are in agreement that there should be reunification of Cyprus. The current president who was the hard liner among the three front runners is now out of the race. This is a election that will go down in the history books as an exciting one, 3 candidates each getting 1/3 of the vote. The winner got 33.51 %, second place got 33.29 % and the third place got 31.79%, why do we not have election that good in Canada.
In the runoff both of the presidential candidates are compromising on the issue of reunification. This would be a positive note in Europe if reunification could occur, ending one of the longest peacekeeping missions the UN has ever been on. There is still the issue in my mind of the UK's military bases, but that is a whole other story.

Infrastructure

The Federal Liberal leader recently suggested that the surplus of money that that federal government has should be spent on issues rather than used for tax rebates. I think this is a wonderful idea, it was also suggested that the money would be going to infrastructure and the debt. Which is even better, why have then not done this already.

If the government had put all of the money that they gave to tax cuts in the last year to reducing the debt, there would be a significantly reduced. I wonder why the current conservative government has not done that, it would be a great way to show the liberals how they are better at managing money.
There are many layers of infrastructure, which all need to be improved. The issues about infrastructure that I think needs to resolved is if public transit or private car use will be the most important. I believe that the time of private car use being the most important way to travel is coming to an end. The lifestyle of using a car all the time has a huge price on infrastructure.
Many of the subdivisions that we live in are draining public money away from other projects, such as bridges and major roads. This is because of the increased roads that are put into place and managed in suburbia. There is also an increase in distance of utilities that have to be put in for each of these houses.

Pictures of Movies

I was watching the Astronaut Farmer, and I was taken aback by the beautiful images. I would have to say that those images of the beautiful landscape made the movie. With out them I would have not enjoyed the movie as much. I think that movies should focus on the beauty that is here on earth rather than making fake scenery. Our western culture is becoming to fake, when was the last time that you stopped while on the way to some where and just looked that the world around you.
If really enjoy movies where that plot line and the dialog become part of the background and the scenery and the cinematography takes your mind off of every thing else. A few movies have done this to me, the Astronaut Farmer for the wonderful landscape scenes. The director made a point of making some of the scene more beautiful than other films.
Lord of the rings, Narnia and Harry Potter have given me that experience too but it was different. For those movies it was not when they were made up scenes but just the natural beauty of the area. I am sure that they could have edited it but it still took me away. The scenes were also not the ones where they focused on showing off the scenery. Harry Potter it was when you saw the scenery that was around not of the school. Lord of the Rings it was not the lighting of the post through the mountains. Narnia it was not when they were in the snow looking out over the whole world. The moments where when plot was happening in front of the true beauty of the film and that the beauty is just the background.

Polarization of Society

When was the last time that you saw someone support a mix use development, or affordable housing. We are starting to not care about each other, we only care about ourselves. I know that I say starting but it is not starting it has been happening for a long time. Why do we not go back to the days that when we see someone in need we go and help them to the best of our abilities. I find that we are not even really helping our friends the extent that we should. I know that I do this too and I am part of the solution, and the problem.

I was reading a paper for one of my classes that stated that since we did not see people with different socio-economic levels we did not respect them for who they were. This was one of the reasons why the Left does better in downtown areas, support for the left was at every income level. There is an increase in population in the downtown core but they are in gated communities that do not really interact with the rest of the society. Will we become more like the USA where we are segregated by our income and social values, or will we follow the example of Northern Europe where they try to break the segregation.

Favorite Books

Well I have two favorite books, and one that comes in book form. These are not all of my favorite books, but they are still important books. They are the Giving Tree, the Lorax and Calvin and Hobbes. As usual they all come into mind because of a common theme. These all have a theme about the environment, yes even Calvin and Hobbes.

The Lorax if you have not read it is about a man who warns the world that they are destroying it. But nobody pays attention to him and they destroy the forest they need to use to survive. The very last seed goes to a little child who then has the responsibility to rebuild the forest.

The Giving Tree is completely different. It is a great story about unconditional love, but the tree dies by giving everything to the child and gets nothing back. I like to rewrite the story that the boy only takes a what he needs and the tree survives.

Yes Calvin and Hobbes has many environmental issues that are talked about in it. Garbage in Nature, how cold a building is, that feet are only present to use a gas pedal. These are all issues that are brought up in a funny manner. They are all issues that we have to deal with as well.

I would suggest that each and everyone of you read these stories, they should be in ever good library around the world

Being White, Rich and Male

I am a rich white male, I have so much privilege and don’t ever use it for good, or really acknowledge. I go through out my life never having to explain why I would want or do something. I do not have to worry about people being racist or having opportunities. I have so many options that I do not realize on a daily basis and that many people in the world around me will never be able to do.
I did not choose to be white or male, but that is how I was born. I know I do not make sense to some of my friends. As a white person I never have to worry about racism. I will never have some one not hire me because of my race. I will not be rejected as an applicant or an apartment because of the colour of my skin. I also will not feel scared in many situations that other will feel. I am a talk male who could fend of an attack that others would not be able to. I do not feel fear when I walk through a park or on a street by myself.
I am not rich by North American Standards; I would be apart of the middle class. In world standards I am wealthy beyond wealthy. I have the luxury to travel to BC to visit my sister, without having to really having to give something up to save for the trip. I am able to go to university, and not worry about my financial situation. I was able to get most of the things that I wanted as a child (not toy guns). I never had to really worry about having food on the table, not having enough to eat. The hungriest I have ever gotten was doing 40 hour famine, that would be a walk in the park for some people in Canada, not to mention the world.
I do not go around my life looking at all the ways in which I am privileged, I do some times…

Where I Want to go in the World

Well I want to go everywhere in the World, quite literally, but I know that a person could not do that and that there would be huge environmental impacts of that kind of travel. And there would also be mega costs involved. So I will describe three places where I would like to travel. The mud volcano near Sidoarjo Indonesia, Centralia and Palmerston Pennsylvania. If you do a quick search for these three things you will find a common characteristic. They were all 'natural' disasters that where created by us humans.

The mud volcano was created when an oil company was drilling for oil and made a little mistake. Well there was no oil but water and the pipe was not casted in steel the whole way down. This caused the water to mix with the mudstone and explode to the surface. This little volcano has destroyed an area the size of Central Park. And you can see it using Google Maps, although it is not quite up to date. This volcano has enough water that some say it will be going for quite a while. There have been no engineering solutions either.

Centralia used to be a community but now it is down to just a few. Most of them have gone away because the ground is literally on fire. Yup the ground is on fire. Centralia is located in an area where the ground is filled with coal, which caught fire and continues to burn. The ground is falling away because there is no longer the coal to support the ground. The fire has been going on for 45 years, and it will keep on going. Both of these incidents are because our society needs so many fossil fuels to keep it alive.

The last place I want to visit is Palmerston, Pennsylvania. It sounds like a wonderful community, but some areas of the hill will not grow anything at all. You can see it on Google Maps, it is just a grey area to the south-east. This was created with the pollution from a Zinc Plant. There has been many government funds given to the area to fix the after math but it is still present. There are two sides fighting over what they should do for the town; one says it is just fine the, other side says that the ground should be replaced. To make it more interesting people are moving there because it is a cheep location close to major markets.

Yes I know that these places do not make the beauty of the natural world, or mark how great humans can be. But we should always remind ourselves that we can destroy the world with out even really realizing it. Also we have destroyed certain areas so we can not even use them any more. National Geographic and A Walk in the Wood by Bill Bryson inspired me to write about this.

First Nations

The situation of the first nations in Canada needs to be addressed. I know that any idea that I put forward for a solution would be wrong, why because I am white. I know this is hard for white people to understand, but being white has many privileges and we do not recognize them ever. Every day we are put in a place of privilege because of the way that we look
Even though I can’t give unbiased solutions to the issue of how first nations fit into Canadian society, I will still give some ideas. Should we take all of the money that we spend on them away, keep the status quo or change drastically?
We should not take the money that we given them away, how would they survive on nothing. Yes we do give them money, but where would they find jobs with out help. They are unable to really raise funds because many reserves they do not own their land. This means that they cannot sell there house or use it as collateral.
Should we keep the status quo, no this is a terrible idea but it appears that is what our governments are doing. Not doing anything is making everybody mad, the first nations and others as well. How many protests does it have to take before the government takes action.
So that leaves the option take action on the first nations issue. There are many solutions out there which works for both everybody. Sure they are not perfect, can you ever really have a perfect world? But I am sure that if we put in place agreements with the first nations we will go a long way to helping our cultures to coexist peacefully.

First Nation Self Government

Of course these are my Western White ideas. Because I am not an overt racist but none of us can be completely void of any biases. The first nations need new agreements all across the country, there have been some positive ones occurring. The Tswwassen and Maa-nulth final agreements have all happened in the last year. There is also the Nisga’a agreement, Nunavut and ones in Labrador. These have all created controversy, mostly from people who do not understand the situation fully.
One of the examples that I believe should be spread through out Canada, is self government. This would create first nation governments through out Canada. They would have a few more powers than the local municipalities, they would enfranchise them and give them self determination. There would be controversy because only first nations would be able to vote in elections for these governments. If you would let everybody who wanted to vote for the government it would not be a government that would truly represent the local first nations.
I think this is the way that all future agreements should go. The first nations should be able to have control over a wide range of issues that they deal with locally. Health care, environment, schooling, culture, language are all examples. The first nations should also not get all of these powers at once; this would allow a smooth transition, allowing all of the governments phase into the new order.

First Nation Representation in Federal Government

As most of you know the only representation that first nations is through regular MPs or MPPs who represent a whole riding that they are apart of. This means that they do not have people to represent their issues. It is true that they have more representation in a democratic society, but it is still not a large amount of control. I am not focusing on local government representation because I have talked about that elsewhere. I think Canada needs to follow the example of New Zealand, which has Maori MPs in government. Maori vote in the election of local candidates as well as Maori seats which only they can vote for.
I know this goes against many peoples belief that we are all have the same amount of voice in what direction the country goes. I feel that the first nations need a large voice because they are one of the founding nations of Canada. The French already have lots of input into the direction of Canada because they have many seats in Parliament.
If Canada gets around to fixing the senate, why not add some seat for the first nations. If you follow the basic frame work of the attempted changes in the 1990s each of the provinces would have 10 seat and the territories could have 3 each. The first nations could have three senate seats where they could only vote for. There could be one for each of the different ‘groups’; Inuit, First Nations and Métis. Some would say that three seats would not do a whole lot, but I would contradict. If there was a common first nations party which would win each of those seats, and won at least one in each of the territories. This would allow them to have 6 votes out of 112 votes in the house, over 5% of the vote.
This would not drastically change the political landscape; the part would vote on issues as a bloc and would work with whatever party was in power. It would allow them to have a great voice in the country that they helped create.

Looking Up

When was the last time that you looked up at the sky and wondered where our place in the world is? For me it was the second week of class and I was walking to my night class. It was a beautiful night, not completely clear but almost; the bright yellow moon was rising full through the trees. The snow on the ground glowed and the clouds left in the sky looked white.
Nights like that make me wonder what is our purpose in the universe. I know on this planet we are the ones ‘in charge’. What is out in the beautiful universe, will it some day change our mind, our own lives that are so small.

Stave Churches, My Heritage

Well I have gotten a comment from a close friend who said that my posts where too long and used too much brain power to read. I told her that I did not really care but I will try to put posts that don't make you think too much from time.
This post is about my heritage, my family is from Norway and Northern Europe. My relatives that are from Norway are from Hallingdal, which is near Olso. There traditions still are alive in the generations of my family even though we have been in North America for many years.
Taking one of my classes I learned that I was homesick, or nostalgic, for Norway. The class is wonderful and I learn a lot about myself each week. That week we were talking about our place in the world, and I realized that being Norwegian was an important part of who I am. One of my other friends said that you should always have a place where you want to go but never get there. I understand what she meant by that. If I went to Norway I do not think I would feel the same when I got back.
Stave Churches are very Norwegian and Hallingdal has some excellent examples of them. The Torpo and Gol stave churches. These churches are not build large out of stone but smaller out of wood. They are the cathedrals of the Nordic Nations, but they are not massive but beautifully small (in my view).

New Energy From Body Heat

There are two new and exciting sources of energy I think you would like to know about. Both of the new sources of energy deal with energy that humans create. The first one is using the heat from one building to heat another. While the other one can recharge your cell phones as you walk. I am really excited to see both of them in the real world if they get there.

The heating of another building is being put into place right now in Sweden, they are cutting edge on the environment. The central train station in Stockholm is too hot in the winter time and they have to cool the building in order to make the travelers comfortable. They have enough left over heat to heat 15% of a new office building next to the station. If it works it will be the first building in the world that heats another building. I think that this is a very interesting idea, it expands on the idea of having many buildings being heated by one central plant. If all of the building in Stockholm could be built sharing there heat they could reduce their costs.
Sweden also has trains running on cow manure, a subdivision that collects urine for farm fertilizers and apparently has a fairly good planning policy for 'suburban' growth.

The other interesting idea was created by Canadians what powers electronics from walking. (the team is 1/3 or less Canadian, cbc skews the facts). The device attaches to your knee and when you walk to moves back and forth to create energy. The process transfers 100% of the energy put in to the device into what ever is charging. The part that they do not mention is that it is really heavy and that it take a lot of energy to walk with it anywhere. This is a product that will most likely not be but into the market place for a really long time.
This product does not appear to help make our lifestyle more sustainable. How much energy is being put into making each of these products and is more that energy being kept into the grid because the person does not have to charge their phone the normal way. Sometimes I feel that people just look at the end product and what it can do but not what it takes to make that end product. I remember having discussions with somebody about building a new building with recycled materials and make it have a zero carbon foot print. Then we went on talking and we figured out that there was already a building nearby that did all of the uses that they wanted the new building to do. We realized to reduce the carbon impacts of the activities they should not build the new building but just use the original one.
Building sustainable is always an interesting thought, if you build a new building on a greenfield (nothing has been there before), than you are causing urban spreading (sprawl is uncontrolled). On the other hand if you tear down a building to make a sustainable building, then you are destroying a building that you could use. This makes it hard to figure out how to actually develop in the most environmentally friendly way.

I like the idea of new ways to produce power that is not based on oil and gas but at the same time we have to look at these new systems and think what use of them really are?? I also found out that the University of Waterloo has an institute for sustainable energy.

Availability New Species

I have been wanting to talk about all of the New Species that are found, but I found that I had enough other stuff to talk about. Maybe to much stuff to talk about. There have been few new species that have been found recently even though I thought that most have been found, or there are no new ones. The two that made new this week where about an Elephant Shrew and a Warbler.
The Elephant shrew was found in Eastern Africa, and is about the size of a cat. Elephant shrews are not really shrew, they are more closely related to elephant but look like shrews. So I guess the name actually fits. Eastern Africa is not a unique place to find new animals last year there was a new genus of primate discovered in the region. This is also a region where there is land that has not been looked by scientific eyes, which means that science may never know about them. I am sure that people have seen them, even if the world never knows about them. There is major threats to the natural spaces in this area of Africa, oddly enough wars can actually protect these places. When there was talk about peace in DRC there was fears that the wilderness areas may become developed, sadly enough there has been a war there for many years.
The warbler the was found has a different story. It was found in Nepal inside of a already conserved location. It is the missing link between two other subspecies of warbler, these to other ones were on opposite sides of India. The new Warbler is geographically in between these two other populations. It was found in an already protected location which gives the possibility that the new species will not be destroyed by us. Protected areas around the world do not have the same standards. It is no fault to many developing countries if they are not able to truly protect their parks. Why would a country be able to protect game animals when it can not feed their own population. It is very unlikely that people will purposely go out and kill these birds, but they may destroy the environment that they rely on.
This issue of developing countries having to protect our environment reminded me when I was looking at charities one day. The charity is called African Conservation Foundation, which is raising money to help conservation in Africa. It was commended by the Dalai Lama in 2002 for the work that they have done. I do not think that this is a bad idea, but I am afraid that people will say that they are helping nature in Africa and they can destroy it over here.
They also have products that you can buy which the money will go to the charity. And I really like this painting, too bad it costs a little more that I can afford at this time. The painting is of an elephant and all the money goes to elephant causes. One of the programs is actually mitigation of the damages that elephants can cause on rural communities.

http://www.africanconservation.org/component/option,com_ezcatalog/task,detail/id,6/Itemid,4/

Oh How I Hope Airbus is Wrong

Airbus recently came out with their predictions over what the air industry will be like in the next 20 years. They are projecting a 5% growth in the industry each and every year from now until ever (maybe not). This growth in my view is not going to happen due to a few issues. These issues are climate change, end of cheap oil, airbus being optimistic (because they want people to by their planes).

Yes Climate Change is happening, I use the term climate change because global warming does not make sense as a term. The world is not just getting on average warmer, there are also changes in the weather and seasons. This means the impacts go beyond just warming up. It also should be noted that Europe will get colder due to climate change. The world climate is changing not necessarily just warming up.
So how climate change will affect the air industry is through peoples knowledge about how bad it is to fly. I know that flying is a great way to visit people and travel to places you have never been, I do it too. I think that the culture will change that we do not have the right to fly but the luxury to travel around the world when ever we would like. I can also see countries putting restrictions on travel, I have mention the European ones. If people, including myself, start to change the way they live because of new respect of the environment then all of these predictions will be thrown out the window. It is true that the planes that they are making are more efficient than the average car. But cars to not travel across oceans.

The good old end of cheap oil, if you have not heard of this term it will become more important as time goes on. This idea is that oil is in a finite amount and that we are using it to fast so supply will go down and prices will go through the roof. This would have a huge impact on the airline and most other industries. How could the airline industries continue to fly around the world in the price of oil is very high. They can pass it on to the customer, but they will already be paying higher prices for heating, food and most other products. There are questions about when the end of cheap oil will occur. Will it happen in the next few years, has it already happen?? I thought the end of cheap oil had occurred when the price of oil when over 100 dollars but then it went right back down (well not all the way). There also are not alternatives that are viable, ethonal is a joke. The produce of the alternatives usually take about the same amount of energy going into it as you get out of it.
When the price of oil goes up only certain people while be able to fly, maybe the person who bought an A380 for personal use. Don't worry he also has a 747 as a backup. I feel that the airbus report is view the world through the eyes that it will stay the same, not that oil will go up.

The airbus report is optimistic, I think this is because they are the ones who are making the planes. I would doubt that they would say that the airline industry is going to die next year and we are not going to make any money and go bankrupt (this is not going to happen, an example).

There is also the issue of urban area extending their airport facilities, Queenstown NZ is expanding their airport. This is to bring it up to international standards, that is for large planes. They can already take smaller planes at that location but they want to expand it, it will take two years to move all of the supplies that they need for it. For background Queenstown is a tourist town that needs many tourists to survive, also one of the tourist traps in NZ. They should be looking at alternatives if the price of flying is to increase.
They could put the AGV in place, it would only take 1 hour from Dunedin, and take 2 hours from Christchurch. I am sure this is not going to happen but it would be good to increase the rail service in NZ.

I hope that Airbus is wrong because then our western lifestyles would have changed and the rest of the world would have not gone down our path. Our lifestyle is one of selfcenteredness, wanting everything we can get at the expense of other. The good old 'tragedy of the commons'.

Spain and International Law

Well Spain is doing it again, trying to make their court system to enforce international law. Spain in the past has charged former dictators from other countries, Pinochet is an example. Pinochet was never put on trial for the crimes that were done during his time in power, the British decided that he was too old and sick to be put on trial. This time the Spanish government is putting some of the current Rwandan government officials on trial, over their actions after the genocide had occurred.
I find it interesting that they will charge the people who stopped the genocide and not as well charge the people who did the genocide. It appears like they only care when the actions go against their citizens. Also the Spanish were not even in Rwanda during the civil war and genocide, this begs the question could people in Rwanda sue the Spanish government over their lack of action in Rwanda. Or even better a western country charge them with crimes, just like what they are doing now.
This whole issue could be diluted if there was an international court of justice. Which would be able to look at these conflicts without one government charging another one. It would hopefully try to take the politics out of the situation. This court of course was undermined by the Lovely government of George 'W' Bush. One of the many good legacies of that administration.