Now and again my head explodes with the devastation inflicted on our little planet. By the greed for money. And the secrecy behind the money.
Seems like in Harperland (our country's not even recognizable as Canada anymore due to the arrogance and criminality of our prime minister, Stephen Harper) spends $16,000,000 of tax payer funds promoting filthy oil extraction and shaky dangerous pipelines. Oh yeah, he also rigged the voting last election. Prosecution? Are you joking? And bailed out one of our senators, a Mister Mike Duffy, from his false expense reporting. To the tune of $90,000, hiding behind the skirts of the House Speaker. I could go on. You get the picture of our emperor.
Then for good measure I read, from reputable sources - now, what is reputable you might well ask in this shoddy world we've created - that the devastating effects of the Fukushima blowout are being withheld from us simple peasants. 14,000 in North America and Canada already dead, foetal abnormalities and child cancers to come, not to mention the mortality and cancers of the Japanese people. Business as usual, of course.
And do you, like me, wonder if the pensions held in trust by our governments are already plundered and gone, one thread connecting to another in the economic melting pot that our governments dip into like it's the candy jar? And no accountability. I always beware when I hear the word "transparency" tossed around by these yokes. It never, ever is. My friend, R.J. Adams sums it all up quite beautifully in his post.
And that the Koch Brothers, those stellar saintly profiteers, the archest of arch conservatives they, are buying up USian Newspapers, something to do with their own rightwing agendas you think?
I needed to rant. It's good for the gas build-up in my brain needing the release of words. I'm sparing you the 100 other pages of derring-do that nest in my skull. This is enough for now.
As a counter balance to all of that, I bring you the view from my deck this morning, fog lifting like a curtain. All is well, just for today. Tomorrow? Who knows?
Do we still have free speech? Have they redefined "freedoms" while my back was turned? They did? Well, I never....
Several years ago when in Vancouver at some nice shopping area, I looked around me at the affluent Canadians and remarked to my husband, "These people are sitting ducks. They don't have a clue. They think they are safe."
ReplyDeleteWhen I think of the benefits my friends and their kids were getting at that time, people who would be living on the streets in the U.S.A., I knew it couldn't last.
How right I was. Canadians let Harper and friends walk in and take over, comfortable in the assumption that the worst could never happen to them. But no government is ever going to continue to provide a high standard of living to mere ordinary people! I expect that even the social democracies of Scandinavia will cut back, or are cutting back.
I'm in a ranty mood myself today!
Hattie:
ReplyDeleteAnd it will get far worse, as we know, the only dilemma being, how bad and at what cost. We both live on islands so have this illusion of safety but that's all it is.
The world will never be the same, that is if there is anything left. Which I doubt.
Maybe the cockroaches.
XO
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If it helps, we are in equally dismal shape.
ReplyDeleteWe have only that, freedom of speech. The Plutocrats have the rest, the whole jing bang lot. Democracy is a sham.
ReplyDeleteHey there WWW,
ReplyDeleteJust back after a week in Ottawa and I almost could smell the stench of corruption (if it hadn’t been for the head cold). Drove by the Langevin Building and the Parliament Buildings several times and felt extreme disappointment in how low the political process in this country has sunk. The Parliament Buildings and the Prime Minister’s Office which used to represent something “special” for me have lost that, thanks to the current inhabitants.
I used to be one of those perpetually optimistic and naïve Canadians who believed that regardless of how bad things were, there was a silver lining and it was impossible politicians could be as corrupt as they were said to be. Slowly, but surely, that optimism and naiveté has been whittled away and reduced to disbelief and skepticism. For the first time in my history, I don’t believe a thing the current Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, says. The same applies to his cabinet ministers.
Who can forget Defence Minister Peter MacKay’s solemn 2003 pledge after being elected as leader of the Progressive Conservative Party that he would never approve the merger of his party and the Canadian Alliance by Stephen Harper? It happened about three months later.
I’m not a Tory and never would be (actually I am about as apolitical as they come) but that little drama told me all I will ever need to know about Peter MacKay’s integrity, of which I’m convinced there is none. I thought up to that point that lawyers had a code of honour by which they must abide. So much for that misconception.
As for Miss Piggy Mike Duffy and his ilk, I can only hope they will be consigned to the trash heap of history.
You mention Fukushima. We seem to have forgotten Chernobyl except for the brave and/or deformed souls who still live there or the photographers who sneak in every now and then to record the ongoing devastation.
We hear so little of the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez oil spill which was listed as the 54th largest spill in history in 1989 at up to 750,000 barrels. The sea life there will never return to normal despite all the well-financed studies. Or consider the BP oil spill, the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, considered the largest accidental marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry The total discharge is estimated at 4.9 million barrels.
There is reason for hope out there – maybe in the newness of the Ottawa tulips or the anticipation of the first crop of the new peaches & cream corn but it sure as hell isn’t coming from our political elite whose main interest is in feathering their own nests and those of their corporate buddies (Koch Brothers and otherwise).
As for our pensions, two words – bonne chance! VP
A good rant WWW.
ReplyDeleteYes SAW,
ReplyDeleteI see and read that what with fracking and GMOs everywhere and now the threat from Russia about the bees.
Dear Lawd, can we eat money?
XO
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Ramana:
ReplyDeleteAnd for how long will we have that?
XO
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Veep:
ReplyDeleteWelcome back! I did say that there were 100s more pages I could write and you covered a few in your comment :D
It just goes on and on and on and I get so effin' tired of it all.
Canada is no longer Canada, a country I chose and loved.
XO
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Thanks GFB, a special thanks as you have been through so much while my back was turned.
ReplyDeleteGlad to see your fingers working.
XO
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I came across a word for this in Guernica magazine recently: terracide. The conscious destruction of the planet.
ReplyDeleteStan:
ReplyDeleteYes, I saw that too, a very good word.
XO
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