On the plane ride over to Montreal I finally got around to writing a review of A Brief History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. I hope to write reviews fairly regularly, so here’s a start…
[tags]book review, science, history[/tags]
As the location tracker to my right has ominously highlighted for the past few weeks – I’m off to Montreal and yes, it is for the Liberal Party Convention. I hope to craft a few posts while I’m there and possible even try out posting via email.
In the meantime the frenzy around the leadership continues… Today Ralph Goodale threw his support behind Rae. (Sidebar: Goodale just won the McLean’s/Dominion institute MP of the year award).
Hope to have more news about the Convention, as well as write a post or two on the plane ride over (how’s that for setting expectations?). Look for a few book reviews to be done – I’ve just finished “A Short History of Nearly Everything.”
Barring some dramatic change of heart by one of the main parties it appears the House will pass a resolution acknowledging Quebec as a nation within a nation. Obviously, the news commentary has focused on what this means for the country and its politics. This is clearly a departure from Trudeau’s vision of Canada, but beyond that, it is unclear if anyone understands the implications of this vote. As my friends know, I work as a negotiation consultant, and despite all the discussion surrounding the resolution, from a negotiation perspective, I feel one issue has gone unmentioned.
For many Quebecers this resolution is likely not an affirmation, but a reaffirmation. For declaring Quebec a nation within a nation reaffirms the ‘two’ founding nations vision of Canada. And therein lies the problem. Nationalist Quebecers don’t need Canada to recognize or affirm it as a nation – it already knows it is. The challenge for Quebec nationalists is that they need the rest of Canada to perceive itself as an (English) nation. And yet, most Canadians outside Quebec don’t see themselves as part of any (particularly English) nation. I’m not sure ‘English Canada’ shares a common sense of heritage, destiny, collective identity or any of the other ingredients of nationhood… independent of Quebec. (Sidenote: Some Ontarians who see themselves as part of a nation, might disagree, but I can inform you that Nova Scotians and BCers don’t feel part of the Ontario nation). While this could change, as it stands today ‘English’ Canada appears to possess a largely post-nationalist view of itself. They see their country as composed of 10 provinces and 3 territories that are more or less equal. Shaking them from this view will be neither easy, nor pleasant. Which brings us back to that serious dilemma confronting Quebec nationalists. Specifically, what is the value of being the sole nation in what is supposed to be a bi-national federation? If who you perceive as ‘the other’ doesn’t share this bi-national vision – who do you negotiate with?
Consequently, this resolution doesn’t get to the heart of the matter. It does not reconcile the two competing conceptions of the country (10 equal provinces vs. two founding nations). Instead, the resolution is premised on the assumption that enough soft-nationalist Quebecers will be satisfied with a theoretical reaffirmation of the two founding nation thesis to counterbalance harder nationalist who either want out of the federal structure altogether, or who wish it operationalized and/or re-institutionalized their bi-national view of Canada.
That assumption may be correct – I genuinely don’t know. But is seems to me that, nation or no nation, resolution or no resolution, the real question, and answer, to the issue of Canadian unity remains unchanged: Are ‘English Canadians’ willing to re-cast the federal structure along bi-national lines or do Quebecers believe their national aspirations can be achieved as one of ten provinces within a federated Canada?
[tags]canadian politics, quebec, negotiation[/tags]
Veronica Kitchen, friend, scholar and fellow C25er published this timely editorial on Canada and NATO in the Toronto Star today. Foreign Policy buffs take note!
So I caught the new 007 movie – Casino Royal – this weekend. If you haven’t seen it yet (although box office receipts suggest you have) you definitely should. Why? Because Bond has been thoroughly renewed, remade for those of us living in the 21st century.
By my estimate the Bond series had come to an impasse. Bond was always over the top, a fantasy series with overblown villains bent on world domination, not a true movie of the spy genre driven by suspense and action.
As a result the series seemed to suffer from two problems. First, with each movie the plots, villains and gadgets become increasingly fantastic and the series risked becoming a parody of itself. Maybe Bond could have stayed the course… But when Mike Myers thoroughly dismantled the series – essentially making Austin Powers one running joke of how dramatically out of date Bond had become – it became difficult, even with a perfectly cast Bond like Pierce Brosnan, to take it seriously.
Second, and interrelated, is that audiences moved on. Bond’s treatment of women and, let’s face it, anyone non-western, belonged to another era. But above all, Bond’s villains were out of date. During the 60’s and 70’s, in the shadow of the cold war, megalomaniac enemies that could outwit the superpowers had their charm. Moreover, competing (and even at times, cooperating) with our allies or ‘real’ enemies against these megalomaniacs was at worst fun, and at best uplifting. Unfortunately, the reason this was fun was, in large part, because the idea of megalomaniacs bent on global domination and/or destruction were so laughable. Today we actually have megalomaniacs bent on destroying the world (or at least dramatically reshaping it). Somehow imagining a traditional 007 like Sean Connery or Pierce Brosnan taking on religious fundamentalists doesn’t seem like a winning script.
So Bond had to change. Specifically, the series had to import the ideas and values it could from the original idea, update into the 21st century what couldn’t be imported wholesale, and jettison the rest. This is (more or less) what they’ve done. The result is a much grittier Bond, although still flush with fantastic action sequences, interesting villains and beautiful women. Alas, I don’t think we’ll be seeing a female 007 anytime soon (imagine that!) but at least we once again have a Bond grounded in fantasy reflective of today’s world.
It was all a fantastic risk, and good on them, because it worked.
… has been tested.
I love my city. I love the people here. Obviously I’m biased – but I think Vancouverites are among the friendliest people in the world. Sadly, this has been a rough week. Not because of the storms or excessive rain (we can tough that out). No, I’m talking about the frenzy a handful of my fellow citizens have worked themselves into over the issue of turbid water.
For those not in the know, the excessive rain has caused increased ‘turbidity’ (or sediment) in the water supply. This hasn’t made the water anymore dangerous but, to be safe, the local government has advised that people drink only boiled or bottled water. As this Sun article points out, city health officials are stressing that no harmful bacteria have been found and there are no reports of illnesses caused by the water.
So let’s be clear, for the household user, there is no water shortage (god knows that is hard to imagine in Vancouver). We still have virtually limitless water, it just needs to be boiled. Indeed, given the rain, putting a bucket outside would probably yield a fair amount of clean water in short order…
So it is crushing to read a story like this. Fistfights over bottled water? This would be at best childish, and worst sad, if it weren’t for the fact that Vancouver can expect to be hit by a major earthquake. Yes, it is only a handful of people, but if we react like this to what, at worst, is an inconvenience, how will we react when confronted with a real crisis?
I still have faith my city won’t turn into a bad post-apocalyptic American TV show… but I’m not longer confidently wandering around believing ‘it could never happen here.’
Went to the Liberal Party homepage today to join the online dialogue on Liberal Party Reform with Liberal Party President Michael Eizenga and National Director Steven MacKinnon. The good news: this was a great example of how the party can reach out to members to discuss basic issues, like reforming the constitution. The bad news: the party still doesn’t understand the internet. Nowhere on the dialogue webpage, or on the press release announcing it, was there a link to the proposed constitution or the Red Ribbon report. After some brief searching I found the Red Ribbon Report but the proposed constitution remains elusive…
I seized on the dialogue to grind my favourite axe: internal party elections.
Me: “One issue that turns people off political parties is the selection process for party officials and candidates. Anytime an organization elects officials it risk creating a conflict of interest (real or perceived) that those currently elected will use their influence to ensure they, or their allies, are (re)elected. One need only look at the BC executive elections (which seem to be held in obscure locations and at awkward times) or the Vancouver-Kingsway nomination process (which has damaged the party’s reputation in that riding and across the city) to see how this issue has negatively impacted the party.
Why not have third party outsiders, such as a Deloitte or Elections Canada, monitor our internal elections. Numerous organizations – Mountain Equipment Co-op, the Canadian Wheat Board, and many large companies – do just this. Why not the Liberal Party?”
Eizenga: It is often true that some of the toughest election battles can occur within any organization – but especially a political body. Supporters on all sides bring all their campaign experience to bear, and give it their best volunteer effort. Importantly, most will always look to bringing people together after an internal election and ensuring that we are together to fight other political parties come a general election or by-election.
Although there have been problems, these really are exceptions and in most cases, I can say that our party officials conduct themselves in a neutral and highly competent fashion. For the current leadership process as well as the election readiness process, for example, we have required all party officials to sign declarations of neutrality.
I would be concerned about the cost of outsiders running our processes (keeping in mind that increasingly Elections Canada is involved by virtue of its rules now applying to certain aspects of nomination races) and would hope that the party itself could address any abuses.
I do know that we have some very good volunteers who are always there to assist in our internal election processes. We need only to look to Sukh Dhaliwal’s nomination in Newton North Delta, where over 6,000 people voted on the day, to know we have capacity to do the job ourselves.
I’m still digesting this response. I recognize the costs may be prohibitive, particularly if it were run by elections Canada. However, I’m not advocating that we involve third parties in every internal election, it might be ideal to limit it to Provincial Executive and Party Leadership elections. Nor does the fact that the problem is the exception and not the rule minimize its importance – it only takes one or two bad experiences to turn members, not to mention the public, off of a party. Food for thought nonetheless. Any volunteer driven entity, be it an open-source community, charity or political party, needs to constantly renew the trust of its members, otherwise they will leave. I’m increasingly certain that complete transparency is the most important prerequisite to maintaining that trust. I’m open to the possibility that third party elections are not the way forward, but any alternative must achieve this bar of greater transparency. If not, people will walk.
Does anyone under 35 still ‘watch’ the news? It was refreshing to see after a 10 year hiatus. There was a fantastic piece on Iraqis moving to Syria – a half-million Iraqis now live in Damascus with 1500 more arriving everyday. Unfortunately a piece on Afghanistan served as a reminder of why to stick to print and on-line media.
The CBC report focused on the disparity over the accounting around the Afghan mission. It did so by citing a Polaris Institute study that placed the cost at $4.146B – more than double the government’s estimate. Although the CBC noted the report’s flaws, I’m forced to ask: why even cite something that uses such dubious accounting methods?
So what drove the higher costs in the Polaris’ report? They factored in soldiers salaries and operational costs for ships and other equipment. Even I, armed with the knowledge of Econ 110 course I took 10 years ago understand that many of these items are fixed costs – costs the Canadian tax payer must pay regardless of whether our military is operating in Afghanistan or not.
Still more disappointing was a brief Michael Byers interview where he highlights the high cost of replacing ammunition, arguing that the costs (like these) would be lower if Canada was involved in more ‘traditional’ peacekeeping. I know and like Michael – he’s been very supportive of Canada25 and of me personally. Moreover I know he would prefer that we were in Darfur – but he is misleading the public on two fronts: First, as virtually every military expert has pointed out there are very few ‘traditional’ peacekeeping missions out there. Moreover, Darfur, in particular, is not the mission I would choose if I was looking for a safe ‘traditional’ mission. It could get quite ugly, especially given how the Sudanese has government expressed, quite explicitly, that they don’t want us there. Second, the costs of placing Canadian troops in Darfur will not necessarily be dramatically cheaper then having them in Afghanistan.
Both Polaris and Michael Byers suggest we are paying an opportunity cost by being in Afghanistan. Specifically, that we could be doing cheaper, safer work elsewhere. This premise should be questioned. Stationing our troops elsewhere may not be dramatically cheaper. And, while it would likely be safer, it would not be the ‘safe’ peacekeeping of days of old. These missions, which tended to be ceasefire monitoring missions between state actors – simply no longer exist. If are willing to use our military to better the world (as both Michael and Polaris suggest they are) then there are no shortage of missions we could engage in… but we should not fail to commit to one because it means we can’t commit to the next one. This logical conclusion of this argument will leave us at home every time, waiting for the next ‘perfect’ mission. The opportunity cost Polaris and Michael refer to needs to be balanced against performing a mission where we have a national interest at stake. Given it was in Afghanistan where forces organized a deadly strike on the civilian population of our largest ally it seems to me that there is, at the very least, a plausible case for why Canada may have an interest in restoring order to that country.
[tags]public policy, Afghanistan, canadian politics[/tags]
Over the last two weeks I’ve had a chance to see a number of the candidates in action and thought I share this analysis on the leadership race. I was also prompted by this fun link Rikia S sent me which outlines the current betting odds on the candidates. Of course, before beginning, my standard disclaimer on the Leadership race applies: Anything can happen and predicting this thing, even remotely, is an impossibility. But isn’t that what makes it fun to observer and participate in?
First let’s look at Kennedy, with whom I’ve come to like more and more. I first ran into Kennedy at the Public Policy Forum Banquet in Toronto back on April 6th and he seemed almost shy (to be fair it was a big night for Bob Rae). However, I recently saw him speak, along with Martha Hall Findlay, at the Progressive North Forum and was struck by his (and Martha’s) passion for party renewal. He was also receptive towards the current bee in my bonnet: getting the party to solicit neutral outsiders such as Deloitte or Elections Canada to run internal elections (more on this in the future). Obviously, Kennedy’s key challenge is his inability to communicate with sufficient effectiveness in French. A lot of Liberals are worried about our prospects in Quebec so I imagine that for many delegates, no matter how attractive Kennedy is, this issue is a dealbreaker. That makes Kennedy a long shot.
Of the remaining viable candidates, I confess knowing the least about Dion. However, if there is going to be a dark horse, it is going to be Dion (something confirmed in my mind by today’s EKOS poll cited in the Toronto Star). If he can deliver a rousing speech at the conference then Dion may capture delegates nervous about Rae and Ignatieff. The problem for Dion is that he’s got to capture A LOT of delegates. Still more problematically, delegates don’t follow leaders the way they used to, so even if Kennedy threw his support behind Rae, he still has a big hill to climb.
(For full disclosure I’ve done some policy work on the Ignatieff campaign). Ignatieff delegates number puts him in a strong position. But he has taken a serious pounding in the press of late. The good part of this is that, based on some of the speeches he’s given, he appears to have learned a lot from the process – exactly what a leadership race should do. Prospective Iggy delegates are going to ask themselves two questions: has he learned enough that he is ready to lead, and do I like enough of what he says (on the environment, foreign policy, rural-urban divide, nation in a nation) to counterbalance that which I don’t like (foreign policy, nation in a nation). The bad news for Ignatieff is that he may have to work harder then some of the other candidates to grow. The good news is that he comes into the convention with a lead and so needs to grow less. As Paul Wells pointed out quite some time ago, Ignatieff only has to siphon off 1 in 4 delegates from other candidates to win. That may be harder for him to accomplish today then when Well’s wrote it, but it is not impossible. This is still a race between Ignatieff and Rae.
At that same conference I mentioned above I also shared a panel with Bob Rae. I’ve seen Rae give speeches before but this was first time I’ve observed and engaged him in conversation. The man is clearly the most polished politician among the contenders. His capacity to absorb, dissect and pick apart an argument is everything it is cracked up to be. Regardless of the outcome I’m glad he’s onboard, minds like his can only make the party stronger. Indeed, hanging out with Andrew M. yesterday reminded me of how much crow I’m having to eat about Rae. Given Rae’s history I thought he would be a tough sell in Ontario (he still has a lot of work to do) and that members would be more likely to opt for someone else. It looks like I could not have been more wrong. Rae has avoided the pounding in the press Ignatieff’s received (indeed the G&M’s critical Editorial of him was basically laudatory) but has not been ignored (like Kennedy or Dion). Consequently, for the other candidate, Rae may now be the man to beat – his baggage does not (so far) seem to be weighing him down, he’s fluently bilingual, he’s the most polished and he’s working from a good base.
All this means that the convention will be a rip roaring good time… and that the speeches between ballots will be hyper-important. You will have throngs of delegates looking to be inspired and persuaded – the candidate able to capture that energy is going to have a decisive advantage.
[tags]canadian politics, liberal leadership[/tags]
Many of you have said how my starting a blog is either prompting you or renewing your energy to start a blog. Just want to let you know that the barriers to entry are indeed low… even for the technically unrefined. That said, drop me a note if you want some help, setting this thing up has generated a lot of lessons learned that I’m happy to share.
eaves.ca 