Nuclear proliferation

The Bush administration in Washington reaped its biggest fruit yet of its reckless declaration of war on Iraq: Monday morning, 11:39 local time, North Korea successfully tested its first nuclear detonation.

By dismissing world opinion, insulting the institution of the United Nations, and unleashing unmatched military power over powerless nations—laying waste to cities and killing uncounted thousands of civilians in the process—the United States virtually begged North Korea to deter the rogue global power with a nuclear defence. After being named one of three countries in an “axis of evil” in Bush’s 2002 State of the Union address, the others being Iraq and Iran, the North Koreans can hardly be blamed for choosing this course. The nation has been the victim of unrelenting abuse by the Bush White House, and plans for war on the tiny impoverished country are well known.

It is conceivable North Korea would not have pursued a nuclear defence if the US had not waged unprovoked war in Iraq and had not threatened North Korea with the same treatment.

The test is sure to set off another round of self-destruction in US policy circles. Now mired in over three years of a vicious insurgency in Iraq after chasing non-existent nuclear weapons-development labs there, the US was completely unable to do anything about North Korea’s open and transparent acquisition of the Bomb.

Global warming

What’s an intelligent, engaged citizenry to do? On one day, the Globe and Mail’s senior columnist Jeffrey Simpson points out that the nation’s “debate over whether Canada will meet its Kyoto commitments is a false one, because it’s over. Those targets will not—cannot—be met.” The next day, a group of eminent climatology scientists (yet another one) point out that drastic climate change caused by greenhouse gases will not and cannot be avoided without drastic reductions in emissions. Simpson elaborated with a doom-and-gloom scenario about what reductions in emissions would look like, economically, to the country; the scientists elaborated with their own (albeit more frightening) doom-and-gloom scenario about what the world would look like, environmentally, without reductions.

But even Simpson hints at a resolution: in his closing sentence, he writes: “Every sign points to this country’s emissions continuing to rise for years, short of an upsurge in public concern and the application of sustained political will.” And so, once again, the leaders are proposed as the followers, this time with the blessings of feeble senior columnists at the nation’s most august national paper.

Cast forward in time and presume the country did reduce it’s greenhouse gas emissions to the degree necessary to halt global warming, along with other nations in the world. What would “an upsurge in public concern” have looked like, if it were sufficient to have brought about the necessary “application of sustained political will” to have created those massive changes in Canadian corporate behavior we know are needed? I’m thinking it would have been pretty radical, given the rigidity of corporate behavior in reply to what we have meekly put up so far in terms of “an upsurge in public concern.”

Canada

The debate in Canada over its military deployment to Afghanistan is losing its decorum and taking on dangerous overtones, with none other than The Globe and Mail leading the way into the muck. “Critics of Canada’s mission,” a recent Globe and Mail editorial board essay shrilled about a majority of Canadians, “are perpetuating a lie.” The lie that the lying liars perpetuate, says the Globe, is to “imply that it is reasonable to expect Canada to deploy regiments of civil engineers and social workers, with soldiers playing a support role as sort of community patrol officers, chatting with shopkeepers and dispensing candy to children.”

The Republic is fairly familiar with most prevalent arguments against Canada’s deployment to Afghanistan. We can’t recall one critic making an argument remotely resembling the one the Globe characterized the entire body of critics with, above.

The Republic here formally requests The Globe and Mail to please refrain from devolving the necessary debate over the Afghan mission into a vicious spitting match with allegations of lying flying around. There are reasonable arguments against Canada’s continued military deployment to Afghanistan, many carried in this very paper, arguments favoured by a majority of Canadian citizens. If you can’t defeat the real arguments that are out there, say so, instead of making up false ones to try defeating. Shame on you, Globe and Mail. And cut it out with the ad hominen attacks, it’s beneath you.

America

It’s turning into a free-for-all as everyone piles onto the Republicans who certainly look like they are in a headless plunge down a road called Fate ahead of crucial and close November elections. The sea is frothing with the bodies of rats jumping ship.

But the essential problem that confronts America is not a partisan one, it was not caused by accidentally electing Republicans instead of Democrats. The American economy is fatally dependent on foreign-sourced resources and foreign markets, necessitating secure access and shipping, which dictates that the nation must deploy a globally projected and undeniably effective military force capable of regional power in every resource region.

But the winds of historic change have made resource monopolizing no longer possible. There is nothing for it. East Hastings once hosted over 100 blacksmith and horseshoe shops, some of whom must have been operated by very diligent, smart, and resourceful business people, and all of whom, without exception, went quickly out of business when the winds of change—the internal combustion engine—blew through.

America’s business plan is just as finished. Just look at what is happening in US leadership circles. Republican Douglas Frith, a leading neo-con close to the White House regime, recently suggested it might be time to talk to the Taliban, given the failure of US military projection into that gas field and pipeline route. The response of the Democrats? They invoked the spectre of appeasement to terrorists bent on destroying the free world because they hate freedom, and bashed Frith for daring to suggest any negotiations with the enemy.

It may be different-coloured horses running in the races, but the jockeys driving them all come out of the same locker room and they steer them all down the same track.

Woodwards

Until the cloud of dust engulfed fleeing spectators, not many people knew the plan on East Hastings called for the near total demolition of the beloved and historic Woodwards building. Only the corner remains. Sure, there were official announcements, but the last time anyone sought to publicize the Woodwards plan, it was all about retaining the original building. Evidently, plans had evolved since last there was public attention drawn to the building.

The demolition didn’t quite go as planned either. All the windows on a neighbouring building were completely blown out, sending a shock wave and an inch of dust into several artists’ studios. And the fleeing spectators? They may have been across police lines, but what kind of security is that, in this post-9/11 world of toxic demolition dust?