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This is a bit of a departure from the usual focus of this blog but I found this and thought it was a really interesting development for the blogging world. A company called Blurb sells software that enables you to reformat your blog as a book and then publishes it for you. I have seen some great bolgs and this company has hit on an incedible way to satisfy the writer who dreams of seeing his or her words in print. Well done Blurb.
Premier Shawn Graham will host the other Atlantic Premiers in Fredericton to discuss how the Atlantic
To help ignorant New Brunswickers get out from under their rocks to bask in the shimmering green glow of the nuclear sunrise, Graham’s liberals have arranged for an indoctrination (sorry information) session, under the auspices of Natural Resource Minister Donald Arseneault. The honourable Arse. has thoughtfully brought mining industry representatives and their scientists to enlighten doom criers about the totally not disastrous reality of mining for radioactive material. Skeptics are assured that these scientists are not at all like the vapid cheerleaders that President George Bush enlisted to fight the war on reason.
My hope is that they will at last unveil the new treatment for Uranium Tailings. Rumor has it that the industry has found a way to dispose of the millions of tons of radon emitting powdered ore left behind after uranium extraction (which contains 85% of the toxic nastiness). In the past this flour like substance has been left to blow with the wind, contaminating soil, plant, animal and water without impunity. Now, however, millions of flitting fairies have been equipped with miniature dust devils and hired to collect the harmful waste and convert it into magic dust for use in Disney theme parks. Oh the splendid miracle that is the free market.
We should count ourselves fortunate here in N.B. since in Ottawa and Wakefield they have to put up 
with the likes of Jim Harding, the former director of research in the School of Human Justice at the University of Regina, who is trying to raise awareness of his new book Canada’s Deadly Secret: Saskatchewan Uranium and the Global Nuclear System.
If you plan on attending one of the two information sessions and would like to get a sense of the hippie horseshit that Sean Graham’s Monkeys (sorry Ministers) will be inoculating you against then you can visit the Community Coalition Against Mining Uranium.
My wife and I are just concluding the purchase of our first home. Despite some sever frustration, and a fair share of anxiety, this is a really exciting time for both of us. The world is not with out its sense of balance however. Just as we are looking forward to moving into our first home, many others in the province are trying to keep their heads above water, literally.
This weekend past we received a call from friends of ours who live in a little spot at the mouth of the Saint John river called Dominion Park. Their house had flooded, they told us. Wanting to be good friends we drove down, but I don’t think either of us was prepared for what we saw. Their backyard was under three feet of water when we arrived at eleven that morning. Throughout the day the water level continued to rise. The same three feet was sloshing about in their basement. We spent hours wading in that ice cold water, trying to recover whatever we could. As is often the case with such things there are layers to the despair. The defeat of watching a brand new washing machine grow increasingly waterlogged is different in kind from the loss you experience when you fish inter-generational heirlooms, soggy and smeared, out of the oily water.
Our friends have lived in this house for thirteen years. You can imagine how much can accumulate in that time. Not all of it was lost, but enough damage was done for this to rank as one of the great tragedies of their lives.
Driving throught the Kingston Peninsula you get a sense of how many others are being effected by this disassterous event. Before the water had crested we saw homes where the river was seeping in through the first floor windows. I have read some Canadians remarks in online forums, saying that because these people chose to live on the flood plain they should deal with the consequences and not expect any help from the government. I am sorry for the person whose heart is so empty that he can look on the suffering of his neighbors with such callous indifference. Although 
the Canadian government doesn’t seem to share this ignorant view, the difference is one of degree not kind. In order to receive government compensation a person will have to come up with a one thousand dollar deductible. Maybe if Stephen Harper had actually been on the ground of the emergency, not flying above it, he might have seen that many of the people who have been worst hit by the flood, are those who can least afford it.
A friend of mine sent me these posts from a golf magazine’s online forum.
Many of your readers are politically conservative and do not appreciate Golf Digest pandering to Al Gore and his climate hysteria. The climate change movement is simply an international socialist conspiracy with the goal of empowering government to control every aspect of Americans’ lives. It is simply a trick designed to get government tentacles into as much of the private sector as possible.
Thank You golfan4. This is a golf magazine and website. Please leave Algore’s money making, socialist scam out of golf. No doubt Golf Digest is under pressure from the rest of the left leaning media to address this subject. Please don’t submit to the pressure. Just keep talking about GOLF.
It is kind of hard for me to process that there are people out there that still need convincing about the imanent perils of climate change. Needless to say, it defies comprehension that there are assholes like these two, or like R. Joe Barton, who can keep a straight face as they deny. Sadly this kind of inbred ignorance isn’t limited to some simple southerners. A Canadian author, Lawrence Soloman, who has written The Deniers, a book which makes the claim that there are actually respected scientists out there who refuse to be bullied into all this global warming nonsense. Shame on you Mr. Soloman. Shame.
Anyone who has been reading this blog for awhile has probably figured out that I am vehemently anti Harper and his cronies. The flabby jock John Baird is a particular nemesis of mine. That being said, our home grown industry puppets have nothing on Bush and co. It doesn’t take a lot of looking
before one starts to become convinced that there is a concerted effort being made by politicians who have been bought by big business, to confuse the discussion with false accusations and problematize real solutions. Take Senetor Jim Inhofe for example. The fact that Fox News backs him is reason enough to think he’s a royal asshat. I believe one day we will look back on these obstructions as criminal acts.
I listened to an American woman vent earlier tonight about the state of her nation. ”Lot’s of things are going really bad”, she said. “Everything seems really bad”. She was scared that at 56 she was going to have to retrain for the third time to adapt to a changing job market. She had no faith in any of the candidates who were running for office, and yet she saw no alternative but to be led by one of them. It occurred to me while we were speaking just how far we’ve come from my grandparents generation where the word career was not obsolete. We shared a wish to return to a life in which you could hand a business between generations. A return to a system that sees people as… people, not as eligible workforce, or skilled labour (pick your euphemism for market resource).
So this is what I think. I think the majority of people would actually be happier if we returned to a simpler, more localized way of life. I am not being Utopian here, nor am I necesitating any specific ideological outlook. In my experience, moost people feel like fantastic future the fifties projected, hasn’t worked out like it was planned. More and more I sense in people a real desire to live in a meaningful world again. Why should we let these disingenuous liars manipulate the decision making process so that we’re all left sucking the mop in a big way.
If Canada was a student, our marks in Environmental Studies would read: D – Canada is frequently disruptive in class. Although Canada shows considerable potential, more effort is required to receive a passing grade.
The latest issue of McLean’s Magazine commits a section to articles that illustrate how poorly Canadians are doing at improving their environmental impact. Here are a few facts they cite:
Canada has the highest energy consumption of all G8 nations.
We emitted 747 Million tonnes of greenhouse gasses in 2005.
We rank 28th out of 30 on indicators like energy and water among the countries belonging to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development.
We consume 1,500 cubic meters of water per person per year, more than any other industrialized nation.
The list is considerably longer than this, but suffice it to say that we are not doing very well.
And small wonder. How can we expect to make any significant progress toward environmental sustainability when our Federal Environment Minister, John Baird, won’t even conduct a federal review of the new Irving Oil Refinery. According to an announcement he made in 2007, Baird declined to allow an independent panel to review the environmental impact of the new refinery. 
Such an independent survey is supposed to be guaranteed by the Canadian Environmental AssessmentAct. Baird has shown masterfully that Canadian politicians can be in the pocket of big oil just as deep as any American can. Irving asked in the proposal for the refinery that no federal assessment be performed. Baird has said that there is no need for both federal and provincial agencies to assess the plant. While I haven’t been in the province for a long time, I have been here long enough to know that Graham’s Liberal’s can’t be trusted to take Irving to task. Luckily there are those who will. The Conservation Council of New Brunswick and the Friends of the Earth have enlisted Ecojustice (Sierra Legal Defence Fund) to file a lawsuit against Baird.
It seems to me that the only reason this sort of treasonous 
behavior is tolerated is because there is a general atmosphere, not only in New Brunswick, of fear, that standing up to a powerful corporate entity like Irving Oil will mean job loss. The terror of economic depression leads people not only to tolerate the detestable abuses of industry, but to actively defend them. I am naive enough to think that there is another way. We are capable of providing for ourselves without desecrating the air, water, soil and spirit of our province. To hear the voices of some Maritimers who are not afraid to speak out check out the message board IrvingSucks.
Stephen harper met with with G.Wyuh. Bush and Mexican President Felipe Calderon at what is termed the Security and Prosperity Partnership Summit. Maybe what they should be trying to negotiate is how the countries are going to disentangle themselves from one another, and re-localize their economies so that the people they were “elected” to represent are empowered to sustain themselves.
Earth Day is here and festivities are about to get underway… somewhere. If you are a Saint John resident you might be asking yourself, “how is my city promoting environmental awareness by joining a global acknowledgment of the Earth’s central and sacred role in our existence”? Or maybe you would just ask, “what’s up?” If you lived in St. Stephen you could attend the Holy Ground Church’s Earth Day service where “an ecumurial service will recognize the earth as God’s holy ground”. If you were in Fredericton you could join the New Brunswick Royal Astronomical Society in their Earth Day “Save Our Skies” efforts to reduce light pollution. In Moncton they have at least scraped together a plan to hold assemblies at throughout the municipal school district. If, like me, you are a humble resident of Saint John then you are on your own.
There is not a single registered event for Earth Day planned for the city of Saint John. Now, you’re probably thinking “Why did’nt you organize something yourself?” You would be right. Somehow between preparing my end of term exams and papers, looking after my 11month old daughter, holding down a full time job, and trying to see my wife now and then, I let organizing for Earth Day slip. I guess I thought that this sort of major world wide event would make it onto the radar of public officals whose job it is to organize large public events. My mistake! Luckily I can let them know what I think of their job performance in an upcomming election.
As for Earth Day, I’ll just have to do better myself next year.
You may have noticed that I haven’t updated the blog for a few days now. Exams and end of term papers have kept me pretty busy (in addition to my already hectic schedule) and I had been feeling generally burnt out with writing. Needless to say, I ‘m back.
Last week my wife got into… a heated discussion about plastic with her mother. While still awaiting my daughter’s arrival my wife and I made the decision to exclude plastics as much as possible from our lives, specifically where my daughter is concerned. We had both read why not to use plastic water bottles or plastic bags (500 billion to a trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide each year). Primarily to do with waste (bottled water creates 1.5 million tons of plastic waste a year, and burns 47 million gallons of oil to produce) there was also some mention of plastic having gender bending properties. We learned enough then (about a year ago now) that we decided to try and rid ourselves of plastic altogether. Easier said than done.
Plastic is pretty much everywhere. It is as insidious as it is ubiquitous. Once our initial fervor wore down, my wife and I grudgingly accepted that plastic would play a role in our lives. So it is perhaps understandable that my mother in law saw no problem buying a fisher price walker for my daughter. 
She had seen us compromise, returning to the fold of the cult of plastic. For her generation plastic was a miracle material, which had made the consumer dreams of millions come true. Except, there is a problem. A number of them actually. Plastic is a derivative of oil (something which is immediately problematic for me), and can be very toxic. Ever throw plastic in a fire? Hint: the thick, black, acrid smoke is not a good thing. The chemicals that make that smoke so nauseating are not only released during combustion. Overtime those toxins leech out of plastic, a process that is sped up by heating it. Think of the warped tupperware container you pull out of the microwave after nuking it too long. Think of the transfer of chemicals into your food. Those same chemicals are in the clear hard plastic sports bottle you take to the gym contaminating your water. Thanks to landfills and litter, the chemicals in plastic are also leaching out into the groundwater, spreading throughout the environment. It’s not the worst of our problems, but it still sucks hard.
The risks involved? Toxins contained in plastic have been shown to interfere with more than 200 genes. They affect breast and prostate tissue and are linked to the development of cancers. They are linked to neurological disorders like down-syndrome, and have been shown to interfere with the reception of insulin leading to diabetes. As I suggested earlier, there are also indications that these toxins could have serious effects on hormones, both in our species and others.
Children are far more susceptible to the toxic chemicals that leach out of plastic than adults are. Their tiny, developing systems react to minor doses with frightening effects. As anyone who has ever seen a child should know, they pretty much have everything in their mouths all the time, meaning the chance that they are exposed to a dose is higher. So it was not without due consideration that my wife looked at the fisher price walker with a bad taste in her mouth.
Yesterday, a few days after the incident, Health Canada has released its report that BPA is not really great for human consumption. Retailers have pulled plastic baby bottles from the shelves. Karma has excellent timing.
Although I’m glad to see that the government is stepping up and doing something about the problem, I can’t help noticing that their doing it in a typically timid beaurocratic fashion. If they have evidence that would lead them to classify BPA, whcih is the largest commercially produced plastic in North America, then why not ban it outright? Why? because it is the largest commercially produced plastic. And that means cancelling it would hurt the profit margins of big business interests. So we will continue to be exposed through canned foods (many of which are lined with BPA), through paper milk cartons (also lined with BPA), and a myriad other consumer products (ubiquitos and insidous).
It occurs to me that a lot of this stems from the pace of our society. By which I mean that, if we slowed down and allowed really adequate time for testing before unleashing products onto the public, then we might avoid this catastrophic learning curve. It is not coincidence that cancer and heart disease, and all sorts of bad shit have multiplied since the advent of our technologically driven emachine age. Maybe I sound like a neo-luddite here. Who knows, maybe I am a luddite trying to smash the machine out of fear and loathing. But it doesn’t feel to me like the end of the world to slow down a little. In fact, you might say it feels like the beginning.
“I realize that something that was growing inside of me for some time… has matured: and it is the hate of civilization, the absurd image of people moving like locos to the rhythm of that tremendous noise that seems to me like the hateful antithesis of peace.” – Ernesto “Che” Guevara.
Jesse Ventura has apparently been busy down in Mexico learning how to wage a revolution. That’s the topic of his new book “Don’t Start the Revolution Without Me“. I have not read the book, nor do I really know much about Ventura (Other than that he was a pro-wrestler turned state governor), so this is not necessarily an endorsement of either. I’m mentioning “The Body” because I agree with what I’ve heard him say publicly. America needs a revolution!
I try not to get to involved in US politics. I am Canadian after all. But, it is nearly impossible to avoid completely. Especially during election season! The big reason I ignore US politics is the alternating waves of nausea and indignation that wash over me after any prolonged exposure. It’s a similar feeling to what you might experience if you were forced to sit in a bathtub full of nuclear waste while watching, powerless, as fat men ate cheese burgers in front of doe eyed starving orphans. Needles to say, I don’t like it. But, as mentioned above, it is impossible to avoid. So, why does America need a revolution?
The two party system of U.S. politics amounts to a elitist dictatorship. I know that everyone wants to believe that Barack Obama will change things. Maybe he will. I may be overly cynical, but from what I can tell you don’t get to be commander in chief of America if your ideas are significantly different from the status quo. Consider Ralph Nader. His candidacy for president is hamstrung by the media’s domination of the electoral process. Because he is hostile to big business, and big business owns the mainstream media, he is marginalized and silenced to the vast majority of Americans.
What’s wrong with the status quo? Well, that’s a good question… pretty much everything. The U.S. is now nine trillion dollars in debt, and they are still fighting an old school Imperialist War of Occupation. John McCain has said that their troops will stay for a hundred years if they have to. Seriously John, if countries like America don’t stop flagrantly disregarding the sovereignty of other nations in order to access resources like oil, for the profit of the wealthy minority, mankind may not see a hundred years.
Ventura said in an interview with Larry King that a justified war is one in which you are willing to send your own son. I don’t think it’s a stretch to state categorically that none of the candidates have children who stand to spend time in Iraq.
The great irony of it all is that the American ethos is strongly individualistic. The dream of America is of the self made man, which implies a cultural reverence of the individual. Once Rip Van Winkle comes down off the mountain, however, he finds the world drastically different than it was when he went to sleep. I’m inclined to say that the reality of contemporary America is closer to what Ventura says, “a nation of lemmings”.
If you are an American, that should make you mad. Good, get mad. There is a lot to be angry about. Your country was forged on revolutionary principals. The vocabulary of liberty and fraternity has become a hollow rhetorical device. Freedom of the individual was never meant to enable a privileged class to dominate and exploit unhindered by social conscience. Your founding fathers were flawed in many ways, but the future they envisioned was meant to be free from the tyranny that reins today in corporate America.
There are alternatives.
Take back your culture.
America Needs A Revolution!
Exploration continues north of Moncton despite repeated public outcry. According to a report by the CBC, one potential driller has found enough deposits of the toxic mineral to progress its exploration to the next phase. To the best of my understanding, this exploration started last summer and immediatly met criticism from the public. One major concern is that uranium mining will contaminate the Turtle Creek watershed, which provides water to Dieppe, Moncton, and Riverview.
I did some quick looking around into the potential dangers of uranium.
The following information is provided by the B.C. Medical Association.
The present average allowable exposure to the public [ of 0.02 WL of radon exposure ] could result in 200-300 extra cases of lung cancer per 10,000 people per lifetime. In light of current knowledge, this might be considered tantamount to allowing an industrially induced and publicly sanctioned epidemic of cancer.
Radon contamination of ground water may be a health risk in pincushion drilling typical of advanced exploration, yet under present AECB regulations, a couple of hundred drill holes can be made without obtaining a license. AECB admitted to having no scientific data to show this is safe; the regulation was based on an arbitrary administrative decision.
The BCMA calls for an Emergency Task Force into tightening the present radiation standards. Review by the AECB or by its Committees is unacceptable; the Task Force should be under the Advisory Council on Occupational Health and Safety or the Science Council of Canada
How desperate are we for jobs? New Brunswick will not profit from Uranium mining. Inevitably what will happen is that some major companies will reap huge rewards and the people of southeastern NB will get lung cancer. We don’t have to put up with this. The news out of Saskatchewan is that their economy is booming. What we’re not being told is that there are hundreds of millions of tons of uranium mine waste that are going to be left to poison the future. In an article published in the Edmonton Journal, a mine that has cost 500 million to bring into production could not prevent major flooding. Industry and government would like to maintain the illusion that they can control and contain these hazardous materials. The truth is that total control is impossible. Abstinance is the only way to make sure that you don’t get fucked. All it takes to stop this from happening is for us to stand up and be counted.
In addition to the immediate environmental and health concerns there are the ethical considerations inherent to the uses that uranium is put to.
One of the most disquieting things I’ve ever come across is the birth defects and abhorrent effects of 
Depleted Uranium rounds. Most of the images I have seen come out of Iraq.
Anyone who wants to make the argument that uranium mining is good for the economy, take a good long look at this child and try to imagine the pain in your heart you’d feel if that child were yours.
I think this is great:
To the citizens of the United States of America:
In light of your failure to nominate competent candidates for
President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give
notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately.
Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical
duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas
, which she does not fancy).
Your new prime minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a governor for
America without the need for further elections.
Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.
A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any
of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following
rules are introduced with immediate effect:
You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary.
1. Then look up aluminium, and check the pronunciation guide. You
will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.
2. The letter ‘U’ will be reinstated in words such as ‘favour’ and
‘neighbour.’ Likewise, you will learn to spell ‘doughnut’ without
skipping half the letters, and the suffix-ize will be replaced by the
suffix-ise.
Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to
acceptable levels. (look up ‘vocabulary’).
3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises
such as “like” and “you know” is an unacceptable and inefficient form
of communication.
There is no such thing as US English. We will let Microsoft know on
your behalf. The Microsoft spell- checker will be adjusted to take
account of the reinstated letter ‘u’ and the elimination of -ize. You
will relearn your original national anthem, God Save The Queen.
4. July 4th will no lon ger be celebrated as a holiday.
5. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns,
lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and
therapists shows that you’re not adult enough to be independent.
Guns should only be handled by adults. If you’re not adult enough to
sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then
you’re not grown up enough to handle a gun.
6. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything
more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if
you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.
7. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for
your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.
8. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will
start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time,
you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of
conversion tables.
Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British
sense of humour.
9. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been
calling gasoline)-roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it.
10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French
fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling
potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut,
fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.
11. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not
actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be
referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted
provenance will be referred to as Lager.
South African beer is also acceptable as they are pound for pound the
greatest sporting Nation on earth and it can only be due to the beer.
They are also part of British Commonwealth – see what it did for them.
12. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as
good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to
play English characters.
Watching Andie McDowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and
a Funeral was an experience akin to having one’s ears removed with a
cheese grater.
13. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind
of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough
will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities
to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every
twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of
nancies). Don’t try Rugby – the South Africans and Kiwis will thrash
you, like they regularly thrash us.
14. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to
host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played
outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a
world beyond your borders , your error is understandable. You will
learn cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first to
take the sting out of their deliveries.
15. You must tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us mad.
16. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty’s
Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all
monies due (backdated to 1776).
17. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, never
mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; strawberries in season.
God save the Queen.
Only He can.
John Cleese
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