Excited Delirium

In this story , we learn about the latest chapter … chapter 11 that is … in the saga of the Conrad Black affair.

For those policy wonks in Ottawa who are even remotely thinking about extending a penny to the folks at CanWest, this should act as a reminder that this company (and other media companies in this country and the US) were having issues long before the "financial crisis" came along.

I was a little confused by the links provided by this site when I first saw them:

http://coat.ncf.ca/ARMX/cansec/CADSI-DFAIT.htm

After seeing some of the details, it all clicked:  the Cons are paying the defense industry with Canadian tax dollars to finance groups that basically lobby the Cons (and other government stooges) to buy more stuff from the defense industry.

I have to admit:  it’s a nice racket if you can get in on it.  Unfortunately, I’m just some bonehead paying taxes and thinking everything’s hunky dory.

OK … really.  How do we stop this cycle?

More and more people are asking why we should be bailing out any corporation when we have legitimate processes for managing this:  Chapter 11 in the US and Insolvency in Canada .

This story identifies how people are starting to band together , organize proper protests and offer significant opposition to what is happening in the US (and what should start happening in Canada as well).

Here’s a quote:

In his new book, Come Home, America: The Rise and Fall (and Redeeming Promise) of Our Country, William Greider sees the public’s anger as good news for the country – "America the Possible," he calls it.

"We’re at a break point in our history," he said. "And it’s not just the financial system, although that’s front and center. It’s the deteriorated economy, it’s militarism looking out in the world, trying to find the next war. It’s a lot of things coming at us, all at once. I believe, on the other side of all of these adversities, we can become a better country.

But to make that happen, Greider thinks, "People at large, I don’t care whether they’re middle class or upper class or working poor or union, non-union, have to find ways to come together themselves, perhaps in very small groups at first, and talk about their own stuff. Their experiences, their ideas their convictions, their aspirations for the country, themselves, their families, and then broaden out a bit, laterally. And have more people in the discussion. They don’t have to become a giant organization, but they have to convince themselves that they’re citizens…

"That’s kind of the mystery of democracy. People get power if they believe they’re entitled to power."

So how about it Canada?  I propose ‘no bucket days’ (against bailouts), where people rally on a specific day of each month as long as it takes to send the message that we’re no longer interested in keeping close friends of politicians in business while the rest of us suffer.

OK … let the petitioning and Facebook pages begin, but nothing’s going to change until we get rid of the Cons.

Amid several beefs about this situation is the simple fact that the Cons (with the support of the Liberals) are spending billions of OUR DOLLARS on tax cuts and enriching the upper class, but when they promise to create jobs, this is how they respond:  by cutting more jobs.

Here’s a copy/paste from the latest effort of Avaaz.  Please act.

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Dear friends,

Canada’s media networks have all been slammed by the recession. But the government is reportedly considering bailouts for its friends at private companies CTV and CanWest, while forcing the CBC to drastically cut 800 staff and programming.

Our CBC is a national treasure , and a pillar of public-interest journalism in a country whose media is owned by a few large firms. We won’t hear an outcry from their media outlets, and the CBC is too principled to use its megaphone to make the case for itself. We are the only voice the CBC has.

We urgently need a massive public outcry to Save the CBC , click below to sign the petition and forward this email to everyone who might care about this:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/save_the_cbc

The petition will be delivered directly to the government , through Parliament, ads, and spectacular stunts such as an airplane pulling a giant Save the CBC banner over parliament. In each case the number of signatures on the petition will be crucial to the effectiveness of the campaign, so let’s get as many people as possible to sign.

The CBC is facing a budget shortfall that amounts to just $6 per Canadian , but its request to the government for a bridging loan to cover this was denied. The deep cuts the CBC is making will damage the organization across the board, and they will not be the last. If we don’t stand up for the CBC now, it stands to die a death by a thousand cuts. Harper’s minority government is politically vulnerable and falling in the polls – public outrage could turn the government around on this, but it has to happen now. Let’s move quickly.

With hope,

Ricken, Iain, Graziela, Paula, Brett, Alice, Paul, Ben, Milena, Veronique and the whole Avaaz team.

PS – here are some links for more info on this:

The Star reports on how opposition parties accuse Harper of using the recession as an excuse to gut the CBC:
http://www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/608591

Union says Harper government strangling CBC:
http://www.cjad.com/news/565/899819

Ian Morrison: Stephen Harper’s hidden agenda for the CBC:
http://www.straight.com/article-206164/ian-morrison-stephen-harper%3F%3Fs-hidden-agenda-cbc

A crisis of identity – A reader letter to the Globe and Mail:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20090327.COLETTS27-1/TPStory/Comment

I’ve been saying/thinking this for a bit, and I feel a little relief to see someone more ‘mainstream’ voice concerns about the level and intent of bailouts, the intended recipients and the ultimate point of capitalism.

Yes, we’re at that moment where it’s now time to wonder if we’re entering a game-changing period era (not month, year or couple of days like the Cons might want you to believe).

If that’s the case, why the f**k are we giving a penny to a group of companies and ‘captains of industry’ who don’t know their asses from a hole in my wallet unless, of course, it’s all intentional?

The Rolling Stone piece titled "The Big Takeover" is long, but well worth the read.  The conclusions helped me and my limited attention span:

As complex as all the finances are, the politics aren’t hard to follow. By creating an urgent crisis that can only be solved by those fluent in a language too complex for ordinary people to understand, the Wall Street crowd has turned the vast majority of Americans into non-participants in their own political future. There is a reason it used to be a crime in the Confederate states to teach a slave to read: Literacy is power. In the age of the CDS and CDO, most of us are financial illiterates. By making an already too-complex economy even more complex, Wall Street has used the crisis to effect a historic, revolutionary change in our political system — transforming a democracy into a two-tiered state, one with plugged-in financial bureaucrats above and clueless customers below.

The most galling thing about this financial crisis is that so many Wall Street types think they actually deserve not only their huge bonuses and lavish lifestyles but the awesome political power their own mistakes have left them in possession of. When challenged, they talk about how hard they work, the 90-hour weeks, the stress, the failed marriages, the hemorrhoids and gallstones they all get before they hit 40.

"But wait a minute," you say to them. "No one ever asked you to stay up all night eight days a week trying to get filthy rich shorting what’s left of the American auto industry or selling $600 billion in toxic, irredeemable mortgages to ex-strippers on work release and Taco Bell clerks. Actually, come to think of it, why are we even giving taxpayer money to you people? Why are we not throwing your ass in jail instead?" (ED Editor:  I added the bold)

But before you even finish saying that, they’re rolling their eyes, because You Don’t Get It. These people were never about anything except turning money into money, in order to get more money; valueswise they’re on par with crack addicts, or obsessive sexual deviants who burgle homes to steal panties. Yet these are the people in whose hands our entire political future now rests.

Good luck with that, America. And enjoy tax season.

If you’re into something a little shorter that has pretty much the same point, check out this piece from Salon .

A spin on what they advise: all the Facebook pages in the world won’t save us from this gluttony. It’s time for action.

I was going to title this piece "Failure of CanWest = Failure of Conservatives = Failure of Capitalism", but that was too long.  And … given that the Cons are still in control of this country, the focus should instead be on the level of ripe corruption that is really annoying me.

Before I go on, follow this link, express your ‘regrets’ with this call and spread the word that this is unacceptable .

OK. Where to begin?  I guess now that CBC has finally made the cuts to its personnel and programming , it’s only a matter of time before we have ads on public radio, repeat programming and other lame tactics to discourage Canadians from watching and listening to quality Canadian content compare to American imports of programming and product placement that we get from our other media conglomerates.

And because the CBC is limited in terms of its ability to raise funds, cuts are the only option when you’re up against a bunch of folks who won’t give you a percent of a percent when it comes to the MASSIVE federal deficit that Deficit Jim, Harper and Iggy created just a month ago.

But don’t let that stop senior executives from collecting ‘well earned bonuses’.  No way indeed.  I mean, firing and deconstructing and absolute failure are central themes when it comes to progress and promotion, right?  And why are public officers receiving bonuses anyways?

And don’t let that stop our friends at CONWest and other media shops from pandering to the Cons for handouts.  They and at least 2-3 other companies are waiting in line for cold hard cash from the Harper Regime, partially, I suppose as just rewards for treating them so nicely in the run-up to the last election, but also because, well, capitalism is a failure too, isn’t it?  I mean, if it wasn’t, they would just go to the public markets and RAISE SOME DAMN CASH LIKE ALL OTHER COMPETENT PRIVATE ENTERPRISE DOES.

But then, why would they do that when they and other comglomerates in this country already receive billions a year for programs like the Canadian Federal Film and Video Tax Credit so they can run "Red Dawn" on the History Channel and call it "Canadian Content"?

I’ll tell you this:  if they do get extra public money, the public will not be pleased.  Folks in this country may not appreciate what’s happening to their beloved ‘mother ship’, but they’re smart enough to smell a rotten deal when they see one.

Here are some additional links to this very important story:

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/090318/national/tories_tv_help

http://impolitical.blogspot.com/2009/03/harper-government-looking-to-help.html

http://www.desmogblog.com/harper-handout-friends-natinoal-post

Funding of CBC:  http://impolitical.blogspot.com/2009/03/james-moore-claiming-he-didnt-know-cbc.html

http://www.hilltimes.com/html/index.php?display=story&full_path=2009/march/23/canwest/&c=2 (Maybe I’ve read this wrong, but I can’t believe that Charlie Angus is expressing anguish about CanWest pubs failing)

http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5irva0_ZTubOLDWe_eqv2gZVUJU8A

http://westerngrit.blogspot.com/2009/03/time-to-let-media-conglomerates-fail.html

http://farnwide.blogspot.com/2009/03/you-scratch-my-back.html

http://www.acreativerevolution.ca/node/1730

http://act.friends.ca/ea-campaign/clientcampaign.do?ea.client.id=33&ea.campaign.id=2971

Original story here .

In time, everyone will be calling for a more international approach to pricing everyting, including commodities, goods and services and maybe even US securities.

This doesn’t bode well, of course, for the world’s largest printing press and the state of borrowing in the US.

Potential outcomes:  a big drop in the value of the US currency on the global stage, a big rise in international prices and a huge hike in interest rates in the US in order to keep attracting lenders.

In other words, the world is going to have to pay for the American economic sins.

anada is again being mentioned in international headlines as a superstitious backwater.
Here .

Here .

And even the Globe had something to say about this.

The RCMP response can be found here (PDF).

The good news is that no one knew about George Galloway a few weeks ago and now he’s top of the list for most Canadians that care about why we would limit a democratically elected official from the UK and yet we would allow someone who stole an election to come to speak to the folks in the oil patch.

That’s right:  enemy number X of the UN George Bush, wanted for crimes against humanity, came into the country to talk to the Albertans.  No arrests were made, despite our obligation to abide by international agreements related to war criminals.

Unfortunately for all of us, Canada has entered a new era of fascist stupidity.

It’s about time:  folks at the UN are recommending that the world ditch the US dollar in favour of a shared reserve currency.

Original Reuters story here .

For years (arguably, decades), the US has dominated the world economic scene because they’ve been very effective in having everything trade in US dollars, including commodities, treasuries and other securities.

The commodity shock that the world felt in 2007 / early 2008 was due to the plunging value of the US dollar.  This will happen again and put a lot of people around the world in poor houses, force them out of business and increase their cost of living all so that more McMansions and SUVs can be sold and driven in the US.

This is what I call ‘interflation’.  It’s the internationalization of price increases to suit a specific audience, in this case, the Americans.

However, the small sign from the UN is a show of something bigger and more promising:  the US economy is about to face a massive readjustment.  We know that the reality is that the US will continue to print money.  Obama doesn’t have a choice.  The challenge now is that if settlements and other transactions are done using a basket of currencies instead of just the US dollar, there’s no one to demand US dollars, resulting in a massive devaluation of the US dollar.

Research credit:  Cryptogon.com

As it stands, the Canadian economy and democratic institutions are in a state of paralysis.

Iggy is now courting the evangelicals.  He is silent on issues related to Bush being a war criminal and slush funds created for the benefit of the Cons and people that support them.

Harper is … well, Harper.  There have been many articles posted here and by other bloggers (most in the ProgBlog realm) that have clearly (and easily) identified the foibles and wretchedness of this man’s government.  He and his party are currently reaching up to touch bottom.

And what are the alternatives?

The NDP is plunging in the polls and the Green Party will likely never get a seat, despite their rising popularity.  Instead, the Greens will only shred all hope of any of the other parties from gaining a majority.

I’ve backed away from supporting politicians because none of them have offered the kind of inspiration, consistency in position and reliability as leaders.

That said, I can’t help but to provide policy recommendations.  I guess it’s in my blood.

In the following weeks, I’ll post a number of articles devoted to the topic "How to Win a Canadian Election".  I invite all of you to provide comments and your ideas as well, partly because I trust your opinion, but also because I think we might have a serious crack at creating ‘the ultimate progressive handbook’ or for anyone that wants to abide by it.  I don’t there’s much of a point in creating a new party, mainly because it’ll just force another split down the left, but I haven’t closed that door either.

My goal will be to keep things simple and I’ll do my best to provide additional research when necessary.

In most cases, I’ll also do my best to identify two elements:

1. Policy:  What is the specific action that I’m recommending
2. Strategy:  what is the intended outcome of this idea, chiefly from a campaign tactical perspective

Again, if you have feedback or ideas to share on this, please post comments and get the dialogue rolling.