Build Up That Wall …

 

Apologies to the late Ronald Regan.

If I were a megalomaniacal, dictatorial Leader like say Vladimir Putin, I would walk into Ukraine and take it over and then plan my next victim, all in the knowledge that the West will do absolutely zilch to resist.

Putin believes that the capitulation of the USSR in the 1980s was one of the world’s greatest tragedies and he would like nothing better than to head up its re-establishment – walls and all.

In the face of this, Obama is a paper tiger, as I have pointed out since the beginning of his Presidency when he went out of his way to apologize to the Muslim World for the military actions of his home country.  All, despite the effort by the USA, to bring peace and protection to the free world.

His pandering continued until a much more glaring example of Obama’s ineptitude in the case of Syria and his continually drawn ‘Red Lines’ in the sand – allowing Syria to descend in a civil war hell which is ongoing today.

And now Ukraine.

Not only does Obama lack the stomach to do what is needed – comparable I believe to the Young Trudeau, he has also reduced the size of America’s Army to pre-WW 2 levels.

And this dear reader is for two main reasons – other than in regard to his lack of intestinal fortitude:  first, the States, as I continually point out, is flat dead broke; and second, even in the face of bankruptcy, Obama is committed to spending tens of trillions of dollars on ineffective social programs that only serve to make dependents out of more and more Americans.

In view of this, I have said the time has come for NATO and its member countries to pick up the slack and in that regard – it should move its troops into place beside Ukraine’s forces.  This would ensure that Putin would not advance beyond the Black Sea and in so doing would save most of Ukraine from the heel of the dictator.  We have the relatively recent example of when we failed to take such action – Germany invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938.

NATO troops could stay in place until relieved by UN troops with the hope that Russia would eventually pull out its troops from Eastern Ukraine.  

You might well say that this latter scenario is most unlikely, and you would be correct – so NATO stays put for as long as it takes.

But do not hold your breath in anticipation that truth, honour etc will prevail. Europe needs Russian gas and oil and is most unlikely to rock the Russian boat.

So dear Mr. Putin, a clear field to you.  Can’t wait to see where your next wall goes up.

As I see it…

‘K.D. Galagher’

THE INQUISITION.

Last evening I was the victim of a 5 member Inquisition Panel.

The event occurred at a friends’ party, a home where we have frequently been entertained over the past many years.

Two of the panel, a husband and wife, were known to me in passing, the other three I met for the first time last night…another couple and a single female - I will call the single female from here-on-in, as Madame Defarge of French Revolution fame.

My wife and I arrived at the Party at about 6 p.m.  and being on the introverted side, I headed for the living room where there were fewer people and the volume much less.

A fire was blazing in the hearth and two couches faced each other, one contained the 5 member panel, so I took the empty one facing them.

We talked pleasantries as one might expect whereupon Panel Member 3 directed the following question to me:

“I suppose you are a Harper supporter”.

No, I said, I like much of what he stands for and admit he is best of the lot but I have some issues with him so the word ‘supporter’ may be too strong.

Not to be deterred, she followed up with “well then, what do you think of his lack of support for the environment”?   All 10 eyes were upon me.

I could immediately see where this was going so jumped in:

“If you mean his lack of support for the CO2 nonsense, I am all for him.”

Why, you would have thought I just called them all liars and cheats, with Madame Defarge extending a scowl my way which would have withered an oak.

They then fired at my direction, saying it was proven science that CO2 causes Climate Change!

I countered by saying it was nothing of the sort and then reviewed the following history:

First, you guys warned that the ozone layer was disappearing and we’d all burn up from cosmic rays;

When that was proven false, you migrated to Global Cooling, we were all going to freeze in our beds;

With that was debunked you went on to Global Warming and again it came to nought.

And now Climate Change.

“And with that, I am in agreement … climate has been changing since the beginning of time”.

Not to be deterred, they fought back, so you do not see Climate Change originating from the actions of man?

Not particularly, I responded.

You could see their collective blood pressures rise.

I went on, “I am more concerned with pollution generally … in our water, our air and in the food we eat – have you seen the smog affecting the big cities of China – that is not CO2 per se – it is ash, soot, dirt, and a cocktail of chemicals ---that’s what really needs to be cleaned up”.

“To spend $trillions on a colourless, odourless gas seems to be a monumental waste of money – money which could better spent elsewhere”.

They looked at each other in utter disbelief.  Madame Defarge retained her glare.

Then Panel number 1 spoke up.  “You will though, have to agree with us that Monsanto controls the world’s governments”.  Full Stop.

I thought to myself what in the heck does Monsanto have to do with Climate Change but took it in stride and said, “that may be a slight exaggeration”.

Panel member number 1 went on..”don’t tell us that you are not aware of the fact that there are mass protests against Monsanto on a daily basis around the world?”

I allowed that I was not aware of such – and queried where today’s demonstration had occurred. Number 1 was silent.  Or for that matter, where did one occur within the last week.  More silence.

I told number 1 that I read 3 newspapers per day and listen to the daily news and for the life of me, could not recall a Monsanto protest within the last year. Could he?

More silence.  At that point, panel member number 1 got up and left the room never to return.

Panel Member Number 4 then entered the fray…”Then I suppose you are not aware of what Monsanto did in India?”

Visions of dead people lying in the streets ran through my mind – stricken by genetically modified carrots.  But in for a penny …”No I am not aware of this, what happened?”

Well the farmers in India were having trouble with their crop productivity and invited Monsanto to provide them with GM seeds. 

“So what happened”, I asked, fearing the worse.

“They had bumper crops”.

Bumper Crops?

Yeah, bumper crops.

And that’s bad?

Well no, but the following year Monsanto made the farmers buy their seeds from them again.

And that’s, wrong?

Of course it is, the farmers should have been able to keep their left-over seeds and grow them themselves.

What about all the Research and Development that Monsanto put in to its seed development?  Should it not get a decent return on its investment?

Where were these folks from …Mars?

So let me get this straight, farmers in India were having trouble growing their crops, Monsanto sold them seeds which gave them an abundance and then wanted the farmers to buy seeds from them in the future i.e. from the profits realized on the sale of their produce.

Is that not what Capitalism is all about?

Apparently not for this crew.

This had gone on for over an hour at which point Anne came in to the room – Anne being more extroverted than me and said she had heard I was causing all sorts of trouble. 

The Inquisition was over.

On the way home I said, you know Anne, that was fun, let’s go to that party again next year.

I then chuckled, why I even called Panel Member Number 4 the ‘Chief Flat Head’.

You did what?

It was only after he led off his first question by calling my the ‘Head Flat Earther’.

Oh well, in that case you did the right thing.

I just smiled.

People can be funny.

As I see it…

‘K.D. Galagher’

 

The Olde Adage …

 

Those who cannot remember the Past are Condemned to Repeat it.

And the latest to fall into that trap is none other than our one and only Lord Black of Crossharbour.

Those longer time readers of this Blog will know that I have on several occasions come to the defence of Conrad Black; I see him as a very capable, if not tragic figure, hard done by.

That does not mean that I agree with Mr. Black in all instances… take his column in today’s National Post, where he states that Justin Trudeau is Quebec’s last chance to “resume the great role they played in the whole country from Lafontaine to Jean Chretien”.

Moreover he sees Young Trudeau as being the “last train leaving the station for the double majority of French and English in the whole of the country..”

Black holds himself out as a student of history but it appears to me that he missed a couple of chapters on Quebec’s Quiet Revolution beginning with the 1960 election of Premier Jean Lesage and carrying on to this very day.

Let’s review some vital facts that he has so conveniently overlooked:

• I mentioned the Quiet Revolution kick-off in 1960, this marked the beginning of Quebec’s modern era of discontent with the Rest of Canada;
• Young Trudeau’s daddy, Pierre Elliot, was elected in 1968 by the English, ‘to put Quebec separatism in its place’… I am old enough to remember it well;
• And this, in turn, led in 1976 to the first separatist government in Quebec’s history led by Rene Levesque;
• It was followed by a Referendum on Separation in 1980, in both instances, Trudeau senior was in the chair federally;
• Pierre Trudeau’s contributions, other than failing to stop separation, was to introduce official bilingualism which made second class citizens out of 85% of Canadian citizens.  He also fathered the great Contribution Payments to the have-not Province of Quebec, while allowing it to exclude its great Hydro Electric Resources from the Contribution equation. (Talk about tough??)
• And then came Brian Mulroney…another Quebecer who promised to get a handle on Quebec’s separatist aspirations.  Meech Lake and the Charlottetown Accords followed under his tutorship and both failures deepened the angst among Quebecers;
• It also led to the creation of the Federal ‘Bloc’ Separatist Party under the leadership of Mulroney’s former treacherous friend and colleague, Lucien Bouchard;
• Are you still with me?
• And then came Referendum 2 in 1995 which came within a whisker of success.  The then Prime Minister, Jean Chretien, who also got elected on the basis that he could handle Quebec, virtually had a nervous breakdown as poll after poll came out in advance of Referendum Day depicting a strong Separatist victory.  Had it not been for a last minute federalist rally in Montreal and organized outside of Quebec, Chretien’s worst fears would have been realized;
• Today, we see the Separatists back in power in Quebec and on the verge of calling an election which will likely see them back in majority status if the polls are to be believed. Another Referendum would most likely follow.

But dear reader, the futileness of seducing Quebec back into the fold is probably best described in the following numbers:

• English made up nearly 14% of Quebec’s population in 1951;  today it stands little more than half – 7.6%.
• At the start of the Independence Movement in the 1970s until the 2011 census, some 200,000 Anglos had fled the province.

(As an aside, our many successive Language Commissioners were silent on the treatment the English received in the once Belle Province but when out of their collective ways to criticize the English in the remaining 9 Provinces for the way in which the Francophone minority was treated – i.e. not being able to order a chocolate bar en francais).

Pathetic.

So much for effectiveness of Prime Ministers from Quebec!!

And now with have Mr. Black suggesting once again that Canada / Quebec’s salvation rests with another francophone leader… this time, Justin Trudeau.

I know one thing from all of this and that is if Justin Trudeau is successful in winning the Prime Ministership next year – as well he might be, his tenure will not have any positive effect on Quebec’s place in Canada.

If you think otherwise, you simply do not know your history.

 As I see it …

‘K.D. Galagher’

Hudak For Premier

 

In spite of the fact I think Tim Hudak has been a disaster as the Provincial Progressive Conservative Leader, I am going to vote for him.

In fact, I would rather vote for a dead dog rather than vote for either Tweedle Dum or Tweedle Dee.

Dum and Dee aka Wynne and Horwath (along with their God Father - Dalton McGuinty) have collectively pulled off the greatest fraud on us taxpayers.

I will not get into reciting the various scandals and frauds since, unless you are Rip Van Winkle, by now you must know the infamous list by heart.

From his actions to date, Hudak has shown time and again that he is not the sharpest knife in the drawer and I would even go so far as to say both Horwath and especially Wynne are much sharper than he.  Neither though are clever since clever people would not have dumped Ontario into the mess it finds itself today.

Simply stated, Ontario is the basket case of all North America.  Clever people would not have allowed that to happen.

Hudak does have an attributes that the others appear to lack; he comes across as both a decent, and honest person, albeit he is most naive and politically left footed.

Tim Hudak will have my vote come Election Day.

As I see it…

‘K.D. Galagher’

 

Reports or Rumours of His Death …

 

Are Greatly Exaggerated.

My apologizes to the late Samuel Langhorne Clemens – aka Mark Twain.

The His in this instance is of course our aloof and oft times rather dour Prime Minister Stephen Joseph Harper.

Media and Pundits are united in their belief that Young Trudeau is on a roll and is destined to become the next Prime Minister of Canada.

Indeed, Polls are showing YT with an up to 10% lead over the star crossed Harper.

With their policy convention closing this weekend in Montreal, those numbers should and likely will, rise even more.

But, as Yogi Berra is famous for saying, “it ain’t over til it’s over” and dear reader, it is a long way from being over.

All one had to do was listen to YT speak on Saturday night – why the young fellow said he stands for a ‘stronger economy and more jobs’.  Who’d have thought – though the same can be said for the Tories as well as the NDP and let’s throw in the Greens and the Bloc’ers too.  I was beginning to think Trudeau was going to come out next in support of  ‘apple pie’ but of course, that would be an Americanism … but still.

Bottom-line, the guy is deep ….as in a 1 inch lake.

The one area where he has made a bit of a splash is with respect to the debt / deficit.  He wants to make them greater.  What a thinker.  Does he not realize that such a policy is a job killer …. what was I thinking …of course he is not aware of that.

But beyond this, are a host of other ‘wedge issues’* upon which Harper can distinguish his party from the nipper’s:

• marijuana;
• climate change;
• tough on crime;
• abortion / euthanasia;
• provincial demands;
• Quebec’s continued demands;
• native demands;
• the pipelines;
• taxes.

* Wedge issues, for the uninformed, are those that split the opposition and allow a party to come down the middle successfully even if it lacks the support of the majority.  Brian Mulroney did this with free trade in 2008 – the majority of Canadians voted for other parties but Mulroney was able to secure a plurality to secure victory.

The list goes on and on. There is much ammunition for a guy like Harper to use against Young Justin without having to turn to negative personal attacks, which if he does that, runs the danger of turning off voters who might otherwise have voted Tory. 

Let’s hope Harper et al have moved on from such negativity. 

The other problem I have with YT is in trying to visualize him as PM dealing with world leaders who are less naive and inexperienced than he – the Putins, the Ayatollahs, the Chinese leadership, and such.  They would eat the poor lad for lunch and not even burb.

So dear folks, it is long from over. But that is not to say that in the end I trust the voter to do the right thing …after all, once upon a time they elected his father PM and Canada has never been the same.

Pity.

As I see it …

‘K.D. Galagher’

 

Are you beginning to think like me …

 

That God Is A Liberal ?

How else does one explain that every time an Ontario Election approaches we Conservatives shoot ourselves in the foot?

I say this because I do believe God’s Hand is evident in much of our history – such as Hitler’s foolish foray into Russia before he had consolidated the Western Front and Robert E. Lee’s suicidal attack on the third and final day of the Battle of Gettysburg?

Apply that to the situation to Ontario where we have experienced the worst government in our history beginning in 2003 with the election of Dalton McGuinty followed by two other victories by this same misguided man in 2007 and 2011.

And yet they continue to win.

Why so?

We continually give them the ammunition to take the focus off themselves.

First, John Tory when he came out for Faith Based School Funding when all around him were worried about Islamic Imams radicalizing their young parishioners.  Dumb.

Then in 2011 Hudak proposes financial help for immigrant workers when all about him are losing their jobs.  Dumb.

And now, dear Mr. Hudak wants to cancel the Rand Formula which would neuter organized labour. All the while when organized labour has been propping up McGunity and their ilk.  Good going, Hudak, how to reinvigorate your foe but more importantly, you have given the Ruling Liberals something to clobber you with during the upcoming campaign. I know that you are now desperately trying to backtrack from your promise …but you are simply too late.

My question to you is who the hell is advising you?

All John Tory and now Hudak had to do was focus on the mess the Liberals have created for our once great Province.

Here is how an intelligent Leader would have handled these past and future campaigns: ‘Mr. Conservative Leader what would you do if elected Premier of Ontario?:

• I would put a stop to companies / individuals receiving upwards of .82 cents per kwh, for power we do not need and indeed are forced to pay neighbouring jurisdictions to take off our hands.
• “Anything else?”  Glad you asked, I would stop giving companies 20 year contracts not to produce power?
• “More?”  I would lower hydro costs to a level that both homeowners and businesses could afford, and finally,
• I would call for judicial inquiries into all the scandals the Grits have inflicted on us over their 10 year reign of terror.

Let the media put that in their collective pipes and smoke it.

And my guess is that a lot of Unions folks would be similarly appalled and just might vote for us.

But no, Hudak has to tick them off so the outcome of this Spring’s Election is now in question. 

The Province simply cannot afford another Liberal Government but I can console myself in the thought that it might be too late to bail this sinking Province out in any event.  Maybe the Grits deserve to get elected once again.

Having said, perhaps God has a master plan for our forlorn Ontario which we humble servants are not aware of.  I despair of our politicians or even our electorate doing something creative about it.

As I see it…

‘K.D. Galagher’

 

Yes Sir, No Sir, Three Bags Full Sir.

 

Meaning you are in the Army now and yours is to follow orders whether you are a Buck Private or a top General.

So that brings me to General Andrew Leslie and his infamous move from one Rockcliffe home to another smaller one…at taxpayers’ expense.

Many are up in arms (pun?) especially the Government in Power who see this as a blatant waste of money.

But I submit to you that this is not the main issue here.

That said, what I do find strange is that the person focused on – General Leslie (ret’d) – is a Liberal and not a Conservative since most of these types of stories relate to the latter…thanks to the left leaning media.  But in that I have digressed.

There are two other issues of more importance.

First relates to the policy itself:

The policy is designed to move military personnel once they retire – should the military person wish to move that is. When you and I think of this we think of some poor soldier based in Victoria whereas he grew up and joined the military in Halifax.  So the policy is designed to return this chap home after his military career comes to an end.

We do not think of this occurring in the same town – as in Leslie case, where he took his last move to move from one home to another home virtually down the street, at a cost of some $72 grand.

But Leslie, like many other in the military, had many moves throughout his career – indeed some 18 moves.  He had no choice in that since he was military and went where ordered.  And I submit he would have the same mindset re each of those 18 moves – that is to say, they were not a permanent move and that and the end of his days, he would make a decision as to where he wanted to live out his days.  Indeed his move, although just down the road, was a down size move to a smaller home more in keeping with retirement.

Ergo – if there is a problem here, it is with the policy – it was and continues to be the Government’s responsibility to reform it.  For instance, cut out ‘in town moves’,… if that is their wish.  (For me, I would leave it alone for my reasons given).

Therefore the fact that General Leslie and countless others followed the policy is really not the issue.

To me, the most important issue here is that this is just one more ‘got u’ moment.  Our politics, I submit, has sadly descended into this.  Politicians of all stripes and all media seem to relish in catching folks out in what I would call misdemeanours while the real issues go unresolved or are left to the Courts and / or to the Auditors General etc. to deal with. I have come to believe that this is just a ruse for them to ignore having to do anything of importance to the electorate.

To me this is what is transpiring with General Leslie  – another piddling issue to distract the masses.  When are we going to demand better from our leadership – be they Tory, Grit, Dippers, Green, White of Purple?

No wonder less and less get out to vote.  It is all the same old.

Switzerland makes great use of Referenda.  Maybe the time has come for us to do likewise and show Parliament, the Courts, the Quasi Courts, the Officers of Parliament…who really is in charge.

As I see it…

‘K.D. Galagher’