Opinions
underprivileged internationally; they tolerate appropriate government intervention in social and economic activity and promote respect for individuals at all times. This is a broad-based silent majority which sometimes includes those from the extremes depending on issues.
Liberals made a mistake when they discarded Stephane Dion perhaps because he was far too "intellectual" for party officials; they used his remediable frailty with English against him, when they should have rallied around him. The sponsorship scandal had eroded support which Paul Martin aggravated with stern fiscal measures - good accounting but lousy politics, especially since we're back at the 1997 debt level of roughly $563 billion.
The Liberals have four years to regroup and shed the deplorable images created in the past years that Harper viciously exploited. But they must come down to earth!
We can expect Harper to trash public funding of election campaigns, the abortion bill, the gun registry, expand environmentally-damaging tar sands projects, privatise healthcare and reduce taxes to corporations. He will try to abolish the Vancouver Insite project that has shown heartening results in preventing serious and costly infections in drug addicts; his government lost two court challenges in British Columbia aiming to scrap the program, and has appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada. Harper would probably fill two current vacancies there with friendly judges in time for a ruling on the case. He will replace Sheila Fraser, out-going Auditor General with someone bland. Harper and several senior ministers, notably Tony Clement, would be delighted to see her go, especially as during the campaign they barely escaped scrutiny of their alleged profligate spending for the 2010 G8/20 meetings. Her concern for long-range planning - especially ecological issues, the aging population and poorly maintained infrastructure - is a bee in CPC bonnets.
Harper's promise to balance the budget by 2013 and erase the deficit by 2014 is unlikely without either raising non-corporate taxes for the rest of us or reducing services - perhaps a bit of both.
Another irony is that Harper, in opposition 12 years ago, had asked for PM Chretien's agenda book; now he's made it clear that changing the law to achieve transparency in his office is not going to happen! Inch by inch this horrible man will convert Canada into a nation of rednecks.
Jack Layton has blossomed with so much euphoria that one might think that the NDP had won the elections! He will oppose with bittersweet attempts to persuade the leopard to change his spots for the common good.
The Green Party's focus on the environment is still belittled but at least Elizabeth May might say a few things in the House, if only for Hansard.
With Harper's majority Jack Layton has no hope in hell of keeping any of his measures in check. The difference between 166 and 103 is large. Nevertheless I wish him well.
"Democracy" means rule by the masses, commonly through representatives. Democracy in Canada fails in one major particular in that the Party with its national agenda has smothered the role of individual representatives who no longer campaign on local issues. This inevitably promotes focus on Party and Leaders, and risk dictatorships. Harper is undoubtedly there. With 60% of voters rejecting the CPC, it won a majority of ridings, which shows the inequality in the value of a vote across ridings. To bring more balance to Parties, seats should be distributed in proportion to votes cast. If so, the CPC would have received 40% of seats or 123, not 166; the NDP 92, not 103; the Liberals 62, not 34; the Bloc Québecois 19, not 4; the Green Party 12 instead of one! This is the will of the people, and what they ask is that leadership learn government by the people and for the people, not an oligarchy of privilege secured by seizing the flawed first-past-the-post (FPP) system in use. This skewing of results has occurred in several past elections and frustrates voters especially those who promote the newer more eco-friendly issues that big business tends to reject and by financing can hijack FPP elections quite easily.
It's time to change!
A water bearer walks among the stars
I would like to share an extract from one of my latest stories. It is about a young boy Santosh, who is helping his father make a "boley". These were made from the round fruit from the calabash tree. It was "picked" from the trunk, and put a far distance away so the insides rotted.
Two holes were drilled on the top and the rotted seeds and insides removed. It was a challenge because of the stink. The story picks up from this point.
'They washed the insides of the gourds with a solution of water, coarse blue soap, and a mix of sand and gravel. It was left out in the sun
to cure. The handles went on last. For this, Singh watched Santosh's careful but focused hands cut four dried sticks from a dead branch on the guava tree; two were about six inches, the other two half the length. He noted with approval the thoroughness in the boy's hands as he removed the bark and rounded off the edges. Wire was tied to the shorter stick, and this inserted into the hole at the top of the container. Singh gave Santosh a rusted pair of pliers and watched as he coiled the extended wire onto the six-inch stick to finish the handle.
'They were done as evening fell. The handles were within the threshold of sturdiness when father and son pulled together to simulate the weight of water. And since it was not too late, they made a dry run to the well. They set out together, each with a container, Santosh tall at his father's side. Their shadows raced ahead, the water gourds swinging like trophies from a head hunt. Santosh stood tall over the well's raised circle of stones. The father watched the boy's face become a picture of intent reflection on the surface of the water. And then Santosh dipped a container. In the moment before ripples distorted the child's face, Singh saw his own face. He was a boy, looking into the future with similar gravitas. It was the same face, one marked with emerging lines of intelligence and promise. But even as he saw this, Singh felt a growing unease within. It was the feeling that this face was looking out from the depths of the well, from a place where hope had drowned. The moment passed when Santosh triumphantly lifted the filled water containers. They were perfectly made – the gourd a polished, wet sheen, the handles capably handling the weight of water, the miniature tendons raised with strain in his son's wrists.
'Nightfall came down from the sky. Fireflies leapt out of the grass ahead of their footfalls as flickering, phosphorous clicks. Darkness became complete. The fireflies fought the night with frenzy, impacting the darkening world with waves of incandescent pinpricks. But in the battle of light over dark each burst was quickly absorbed, the blackness quickly resealed in the self-healing night.
'Millions of stars came out. Father and son rested, their backs on the summit of the hill, eyes reflecting the splendid reach of the Milky Way. Singh looked to the face of his son to see it illuminated with starlight.
'"If you draw lines through these stars, you get the shape of people and animals. I hear them talking that a set of stars over the village is a cup with a long handle that dips water from this well," Singh said.
'"That is how you and Cabido and the rest of the gang talk in the rumshop," the boy replied. '"You always talking and crying. I hear you when Ma send me alone in the dark to get you on Friday when you too drunk to walk home."
'"What we talk about in the rumshop is the honest truth. It is not rum talking. We talk with sadness because our lives turn out hard. We all born with promise inside, but here where we live there is nowhere for it to go. Now we have nothing left inside now but to drink in the rumshop and try to forget. We all turn out like Cabido's donkey. The rum we drink is the same stake Cabido tie his donkey to every evening. Maybe when you older you will understand," Singh said. 'Now the child's eyes were filled with stars.
'"It have another set of stars that make up a man carrying two 'boley' like yours. People who know about these things say he is the water bearer. I want you to be a water bearer. I want you to be just like up in the sky. There is something out there for you that bigger and better. Tomorrow you will start bringing water to the field. Sell it to the workers who thirsty and have money to buy. Give the money to your mother to save for your education. I want you to rise – for you, the sky is the limit. I don't want you to turn out a rum-drinking donkey like me."
'"Ma say you talk plenty rubbish when the rum soak your head," Santosh replied.'