Opinion

Nothing better than carving out sovereignty

eejoseph

Here is incontrovertible evidence that an Alberta Conservative politician can bamboozle Albertans with legislation defining hypothetical fights with the government of Canada. Launching a sovereignty shield is pure thumb-twiddling that takes the place of real work for citizens.

Sovereignty act segways to chaos

Don’t Canadians see, in bright letters,  where the pride and passion of sovereignty ends?  How many sleepless nights are Albertans going to endure to have this Quixotic shield against the Federal government up and functional? I am pretty sure that every regional leader in Canada, with a vanguard of lawyers at their disposal, knows exactly where the lines of federal, territorial and provincial authority intersect, and I am no lawyer.

A smidgen of humility

eejoseph

Along with distancing herself from her predecessor’s contribution to Alberta’s progress the premier of the province is drumming up dissension in Canada with talk about provincial sovereignty. Is she jealous of the treasonous Bloc Quebecoiss? Is she angry that Canada’s First Nations are enjoying a new season of sovereignty over their lands? Every Canadiwn should hear the word sovereignty and shudder because of what Canadian sovereignty, exercised from the birth of the nation, has done. Canadian approaches to exercising sovereignty must have a healthy dose of caution and humility.

Sovereigns of industry and business

If a Conservative party is going to drive in the lanes of grievance, empowerment of business and small government Canadians need to be very afraid. That combination of policy or plan does not end well for the party or the people it claims to want to govern.

He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

Micah 6:8

Votes for incoherence and money-numb jokers

eejoseph

If the people of Georgia can make sense of the slurred speeches of Herschel Walker they deserve a Nobel Prize for humanity. Let us hope that before that completely unhinged choice of almost 2 million Georgians says another word to sink his own boat that a few courageous voters will tell the world how employers have been leaning on them to vote GOP. Georgia’s reputation as a place great musicians reject as a destination is not cooked up. What else can explain people voting for trumpettes?

If the people of the United States can see intelligence in the flip flops and criminal behavior of the super rich there is redemption in the world turning to a diet of locusts and honey. What kind of society survives turning a blind eye to rising abuses of labourers cheered on by prosperity seeking religious people? None. People’s lives are hanging in the balance, and difference between Rev. Warnock and Republican Georgia might well come down to the reputation for finding votes after the people have voted.

Opting out of the Canadian Charter

eejoseph

Let the politicians talk about how patriotic they are and swear how much they are committed to people’s safety and welfare, but when, even once, they seek exemptions from the  Canadian Charter of Rights, we know what hypocrites they are.  Remember when the federal conservatives railed against samesex marriage!  The leader had to be cornered by the press to accept that Canadian law accepts homosexuals as people. Ford opts out twice.

Ford government criminalizes the right to strike

Small government conservatives, guardians of fiscal integrity and diabolical separatists and insurrectionists seem to have few solutions that are not punitive legislation.  The view that business drives the engine of human life is about to be seen again as completely false.  In recent years we have seen how pestilence and weather can cripple business and leave people untouched.   So let the conservatives slander and accuse; their crimes will again be exposed.   The right to choose the size of government and the right to strike may not be popular in conservative and separatist circles, but people will not side with the government against education workers.

October 2022 is a month like any other

People in power like to call upon extraordinary circumstances because they want to do extraordinary things. Extraordinary people and things arise out of ordinary circumstances. How else can they be recognized? The most influential person who ever lived came from a town out of which his contemporaries said nothing good could come. The education minister balances the pandic and economic crises against stripping the rights of labourers saying that these are not ordinary times. The businesses to whom the conservative politicians hope to hand all the switches of power are not to be compared to people. The threat of fines for acting in accordance with Canadian law is despicable and shows the cruelty of conservative concern for valuable people whose wages have fallen by the wayside. Who does the government blame for all the broken services and trust? The same conservatives have been in power for the last four years. Canadian Law ought to be followed by provincial officers.

Freedom convoy mask lifted

eejoseph

How many more Canadians are ready to assault federal politicians using raw and unvarnished statements, obscenities, and physical intimidation is anyone’s guess.  Those politicians who have been careful to distance themselves from the freedom convoy approach to protest must be recognized as prudent.  The slippery slope of separatist sentiment and intemperate opposition appeared first in the Conservative leader Scheer calling his debate opponent, the then prime minister “a fraud”.  After the conservative-leaning mob’s siege of Ottawa, the face of wrong-headed freedom and opposition fighters is on display.

Beware, Canada, the ides of civic fracture have come

The increase of discriminatory and intolerant behavior sometimes posing as the indifferent expression of free speech will result in a spokesperson arising who will launch a campaign of purifying civic life.  Of highest value will be unity, even when that unity rises from the ashes of tribal and nationalist  strongholds. Conservatives will never convince their constituents that an honourable partnership between individuals (their voting constituents) and corporations is possible.  Corporate interests will always seek bigger barns at the expense of hardworking citizens.

Insurrectionist Canucks?

They will have an even more difficult time covering up their willingness to unseat the Canadian government by means other than the ballot box.  Going for the fall of the government from the first day of parliament is nothing short of disrespect for the Canadian electorate. Heck! Even the iconic conman, Jacob-Israel, has a change of mind and an action plan that reflects his humility and grasp of grace as a global need. Is it too much to ask opposition politicians to take off the mask of “freedom fighter” and help Canadians to enjoy their government? Nobody wants a devoted satan (killer, thief, destroyer) in their house. Sheesh, man, or shush man!

A sacred vote? Really?

eejoseph

I do not know how many Toms, Dicks, and Harrys in Canada are talking about the divided country, but the news broadcasters allow pundits and simple news readers to jump in and give the impression that something strange is happening because diverse opinions and violently opposed residents can be shown in audio and video clips.  It makes one think that all the talk about friendly debate is just malicious window dressing.   We are certain to hear more than a few experts claim to have predicted the unhinged passion that ends in bloody confrontations and civil war.  If when we say we agree to disagree it is a matter of high principle then are not divided legislatures a good thing to be treasured?  We keep plodding along with division as normal but we disrespect Canadians who deliver a minority government.  The thing that makes democracy worthwhile and sacred is not the name of the winner or the loser.  It is the privacy of the ballot.

Who a person chooses to vote for is a private matter for a noble reason.

Abhorrent political interference with my vote

During the last election in Ontario the corporation behind the Ford campaign sent me an SMS asking me if the PC party could count on my vote. I chose not to dignify that intrusion with a reply.

The win by Ford was the outcome of an appeal to people’s emotions with traditional empty slogans. The current (July 2022) outbreak of covid19 variants, the gouging of consumers by oil and gas companies, the continuing shortage of firstrate health-care, are evidence of the government surrendering people’s health to business interests. We are not that blind. People have thrived in Ontario before there were truckers, large corporations and anarchists.

Politics is not warfare and governments represent all the people

The price we will pay by supporting big and small business over people, single or families, will be a slave economy which will fail the test like ancient Israel did. The perennially tempestuous relationship between government and labour is part of the DNA that has made Canada the latest confirmed genocidal beast.

Who gets my vote is a private matter

I say ban public displays of political persuasion. Debates should only identify the candidates. The audience should be polled anonymously. Division, as we can see from the American quagmire, is neither funny, inspiring, nor helpful for a nation that wants to keep bloodshed and deceit out of the public and private life.

Senator’s job

eejoseph

Lindsey Graham does not remember being all in with insurrection and mayhem on January 6, 2021, but he ran like hell’s freezing with “Count me out” on January 7th when the brave police officers had kept the Republican homicidal patriots from bullying VP Mike Pence into rejecting the votes of the American people which put the freaky 45th in his place.

Let’s be sure: one can only be counted out when one was in

Law and order Republicans? Ha! Ha! Blunder thunder! What is that job he and his partisan siblings want to be left alone to do?

Emancipation Day

eejoseph

The day the British Empire announced the end of slavery has come and gone 188 times and the descendants of both slavers and slaves seem not to have committed themselves to a realistic new arrangement. The Brits have kept their grip on the lives of the emancipated with the consent of succeeding generations by means of a snail-paced empowerment, leading many of us in the emancipated progeny to utterly reject the French, Canadian, American and British imagination of freedom. The creative spirit and process have provided valuable sustenance for the unfinished journey into a dignified liberation, against the conservative values of yesterday’s greatness.

Making music from steel
Inspiring generations

The British government gave my ancestors neither hoe, cutlass, bucket or land when they proclaimed emancipation. A few brave women and men knew it and have been the inspiration for alternate forms of civic society. People who are just waking up in Barbados and Jamaica to weak-kneed parliamentary democracy are not much of a role model for the generation that will lead Black people into their own just, pluralistic and indigenous communities.

Waiting for others to define our future is a waste of time. It is the reason that Black people are still divided, inspired by the leaders of the same kind of government that enslaved us in the first place. Luminaries of the struggle in North America and in the islands of the Caribbean over more than 40 generations may look like flickering candles in an age when the Holy See travels to Canada to apologize for its role in a horribly immoral colonial enterprise. May the lamps surviving among us change the course of education and empowerment.