A parliamentary crisis, a looming recession, 100,000 stranded tourists in Thailand, terrorist attacks in Mumbai, and Britney Spears is making a comback. There is so much depressing news to comment on.
I listened to a CBC radio debate the other day about whether or not it was one's patriotic duty to go out and spend money to support the collapsing economy. Arguments were made on both sides. Opinions varied from "I owe it to my family not to spend and make our situation worse" to "You might as well spend the money and have something concrete in your hand when the whole country goes down the tube." I eventually formed my own opinion based not so much on any particular view that I had just heard, but the fact that the opinions were so diverse. No one knows what is going to happen in the world economy. The pundits don't have a clue, the politicians are all dithering, we know the financial movers and shakers who started it are obviously devoid of any reliable insight. So without anyone having the slightest idea of how things will turn out, what is it that forms our opinions on what course of action we should take? Fear, of course. Old Franklin Delano Roosevelt was right.
After that occurred to me, I started to become annoyed. Here I was, worried about my income, my property values, my pension, all because that gang of myopic, money grubbing, Wall Street mega-crooks had allowed their own swollen greed to displace not only all moral and ethical values but even all rational thought. They had made me fearful, and I resented it. In the past I have commented on the Americans use of fear as a motivator in elections, in the marketplace and in foreign affairs. The idea that their financial incompetence was now making me fearful, made me angry.
I have decided not to restrict my spending habits. It isn't that I have a particularly rosie view of the future, but I've decided that I 'm not going to be afraid. The idiots who invented the financial instruments that allowed the unrestricted packaging and trading of sub-prime mortgages, they can have my fear of financial loss instead. And while their lifestyles will no doubt hardly suffer at all, one can always hope.
Meanwhile, I will buy my Christmas presents in stores around town, go to the pub a couple of times a month as usual, and accompany my wife to the Christmas craft fairs. It is a good time of year to not be afraid.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Remembrance Day
Remembrance Day makes you think.
Of all human endeavours, war is the most troubling, and the most paradoxical. We despise the death and destruction that are caused by it; we celebrate the heroism and self-sacrifice that arise out of it.
Pundits often say that the victors get to write the history books, and there is some truth in that. The terrible actions of the Axis powers: the invasion of Poland, the bombardment of civilians in Britain, the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, the Long March, the Holocaust, all are the stuff of countless documentaries, books and films with which Canadians, at least of a certain age, are familiar. The fire bombing of Dresden, Germany, however, in February of 1945 which incinerated an estimated 40,000 civilians in three days, is generally ignored by most citizens of the formerly Allied nations or recorded as a justifiable act by Allied historians, and the atomic bomb attacks on the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which caused the death of 200,000 more, are commonly excused as being "necessary." After all, they started it.
I had four uncles who flew in World War II as either bomber pilots or navigators. All miraculously survived countless sorties over Germany. They flew repeated missions into ground and fighter aircraft fire that tore apart their planes and killed their crew members. Their bravery was extraordinary; none actually expected to live through it. Their superiors told them they were targeting military installations, industrial complexes, and suppliers of the German war machine, not people, not women, not children. They tried to believe it.
I came to Canada 40 years ago from Illinois to avoid fighting in a war started for vague reasons by men with little understanding of the people I was supposed to travel 10,000 miles to kill. I was bothered however by the efficiency of my draft board; I knew that they would fill the quota of Rock Island County draftees that month, with me or without me. There is a song called "Veterans' Day" by Tom Russell. It's about Jimmy McGrew, a soldier missing in action in Viet Nam. The chorus goes: "It's Veterans' Day, and the skies are grey/ Leave your uniforms home 'cause there ain't gonna be a parade/But we'll lift up a glass to the ones who didn't make it through/ And put a light in the window tonight for Jimmy McGrew."
I didn't sleep all that well a week ago Tuesday. At about 1:30 in the morning I got up without waking my wife and put a light in one of our windows, not for a fictitious Jimmy McGrew, but for some guy from Rock Island County whose name I will never know.
Remembrance Day makes you think.
Of all human endeavours, war is the most troubling, and the most paradoxical. We despise the death and destruction that are caused by it; we celebrate the heroism and self-sacrifice that arise out of it.
Pundits often say that the victors get to write the history books, and there is some truth in that. The terrible actions of the Axis powers: the invasion of Poland, the bombardment of civilians in Britain, the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, the Long March, the Holocaust, all are the stuff of countless documentaries, books and films with which Canadians, at least of a certain age, are familiar. The fire bombing of Dresden, Germany, however, in February of 1945 which incinerated an estimated 40,000 civilians in three days, is generally ignored by most citizens of the formerly Allied nations or recorded as a justifiable act by Allied historians, and the atomic bomb attacks on the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which caused the death of 200,000 more, are commonly excused as being "necessary." After all, they started it.
I had four uncles who flew in World War II as either bomber pilots or navigators. All miraculously survived countless sorties over Germany. They flew repeated missions into ground and fighter aircraft fire that tore apart their planes and killed their crew members. Their bravery was extraordinary; none actually expected to live through it. Their superiors told them they were targeting military installations, industrial complexes, and suppliers of the German war machine, not people, not women, not children. They tried to believe it.
I came to Canada 40 years ago from Illinois to avoid fighting in a war started for vague reasons by men with little understanding of the people I was supposed to travel 10,000 miles to kill. I was bothered however by the efficiency of my draft board; I knew that they would fill the quota of Rock Island County draftees that month, with me or without me. There is a song called "Veterans' Day" by Tom Russell. It's about Jimmy McGrew, a soldier missing in action in Viet Nam. The chorus goes: "It's Veterans' Day, and the skies are grey/ Leave your uniforms home 'cause there ain't gonna be a parade/But we'll lift up a glass to the ones who didn't make it through/ And put a light in the window tonight for Jimmy McGrew."
I didn't sleep all that well a week ago Tuesday. At about 1:30 in the morning I got up without waking my wife and put a light in one of our windows, not for a fictitious Jimmy McGrew, but for some guy from Rock Island County whose name I will never know.
Remembrance Day makes you think.
A Silver Lining?
I really don't like writing about "silver linings." I much prefer to write a lengthy diatribe describing in overly ripe language one or more of the dark, weighty, rain-filled clouds hanging over us: economic collapse, corporate greed, George Bush or any one of the numerous human frailties that we can so readily observe in society. So many things exist that can provoke me into a lengthy rant.
So when I say that there may be a silver lining to the economic disaster generated by greedy corporate gamblers on Wall Street, I do it reluctantly, especially since the avarice displayed by those soulless sociopaths will indubitably result in the suffering and death of thousands of people in the Third World who as part of the "New World Order" either have come to rely on foreign aid or have been forced to turn their meager self-sustaining farms into producers of cash crops which now no one will buy.
The silver lining may be, however, that we will see an end to the kind of thinking that has manipulated the lives of millions of the poor world-wide. Perhaps as well we will see the end of the idea that those in the G7 countries know what is best, that their vision of a world united under some sort of free-trade, unregulated, corporate hegemony is not in fact the way to universal prosperity, but only another attempt by a few to control and profit from the majority.
In addition, North Americans may be forced to think on a smaller, more local, more affordable, more sustainable scale. Smaller cars, smaller houses, more careful choices and greater appreciation for what we have may be the result of many people losing their big cars, big houses and high paying jobs, though as always the people hurt the most will in fact not be the very wealthy but those who can least afford it.
In the mean time, I would encourage everyone to join me in a rant of your own choice. Your displeasure may have an effect if it is loud enough to be heard by the movers and shakers of society, and if not, well, at least it feels good.
So when I say that there may be a silver lining to the economic disaster generated by greedy corporate gamblers on Wall Street, I do it reluctantly, especially since the avarice displayed by those soulless sociopaths will indubitably result in the suffering and death of thousands of people in the Third World who as part of the "New World Order" either have come to rely on foreign aid or have been forced to turn their meager self-sustaining farms into producers of cash crops which now no one will buy.
The silver lining may be, however, that we will see an end to the kind of thinking that has manipulated the lives of millions of the poor world-wide. Perhaps as well we will see the end of the idea that those in the G7 countries know what is best, that their vision of a world united under some sort of free-trade, unregulated, corporate hegemony is not in fact the way to universal prosperity, but only another attempt by a few to control and profit from the majority.
In addition, North Americans may be forced to think on a smaller, more local, more affordable, more sustainable scale. Smaller cars, smaller houses, more careful choices and greater appreciation for what we have may be the result of many people losing their big cars, big houses and high paying jobs, though as always the people hurt the most will in fact not be the very wealthy but those who can least afford it.
In the mean time, I would encourage everyone to join me in a rant of your own choice. Your displeasure may have an effect if it is loud enough to be heard by the movers and shakers of society, and if not, well, at least it feels good.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Beware the Green Police
I was speaking with Kalyeena Makortoff, the Grand Forks Gazette's youngest reporter, the other day about her experiences during and after a protest she was involved in on the UBC campus a few weeks ago. She discovered the difficulties one can have when confronting "the Man." That's my expression not hers; she would never use a Sixties term like "the Man."
Of course, whenever one confronts the prevailing authority of the day, one can expect to be received with less than kindness. In her case, she was arrested and thrown in the clink over night. In the Sixties in Illinois where I grew up, protesters were hit with clubs, bitten by dogs and then thrown in the clink over night. At least neither Kalyeena nor I were Tasered.
Prevailing authority doesn't have to be the police or government of course. It can consist merely of commonly held beliefs or opinions.
The problem is that when large numbers of people hold similar strong beliefs they reinforce one another's certainty that those beliefs are correct and absolute. The fervor with which those beliefs are held can be astonishing. I am not just referring to the obvious fanatics who blow themselves up for holy causes; one doesn't have to belong to an extreme religious sect to exhibit fervor.
An acquaintance of mine who drives a large diesel pick-up was confronted at a gas station by a young mother in a Smart Car who loudly proclaimed her disgust at his disregard for the planet.
While glancing at a fish display in Overwaitea, I was myself told by a woman in her thirties: "Don't you dare buy farmed salmon; they're killing all the real salmon."
Environmental issues have become rallying points for millions who may or may not really understand the issues but are certain that whatever changes might be taking place are bad and must be stopped because the consequences will be... well, no one is really sure, but they are bound to be disastrous. Terms like "extinction," "extermination," "death of the planet" are used to make sure the significance of potential ecological change is taken seriously.
I don't presume to know any more about the speed or direction of climate change than anyone else. Neither do I object in any way to the measures proposed by those who wish to keep earth as close to its present state as possible. I just hope that the environmentally concerned will not turn into some form of Green Police. I don't want to be beaten with a loaf of locally grown, organic nine-grain bread any more than I did a police baton.
Of course, whenever one confronts the prevailing authority of the day, one can expect to be received with less than kindness. In her case, she was arrested and thrown in the clink over night. In the Sixties in Illinois where I grew up, protesters were hit with clubs, bitten by dogs and then thrown in the clink over night. At least neither Kalyeena nor I were Tasered.
Prevailing authority doesn't have to be the police or government of course. It can consist merely of commonly held beliefs or opinions.
The problem is that when large numbers of people hold similar strong beliefs they reinforce one another's certainty that those beliefs are correct and absolute. The fervor with which those beliefs are held can be astonishing. I am not just referring to the obvious fanatics who blow themselves up for holy causes; one doesn't have to belong to an extreme religious sect to exhibit fervor.
An acquaintance of mine who drives a large diesel pick-up was confronted at a gas station by a young mother in a Smart Car who loudly proclaimed her disgust at his disregard for the planet.
While glancing at a fish display in Overwaitea, I was myself told by a woman in her thirties: "Don't you dare buy farmed salmon; they're killing all the real salmon."
Environmental issues have become rallying points for millions who may or may not really understand the issues but are certain that whatever changes might be taking place are bad and must be stopped because the consequences will be... well, no one is really sure, but they are bound to be disastrous. Terms like "extinction," "extermination," "death of the planet" are used to make sure the significance of potential ecological change is taken seriously.
I don't presume to know any more about the speed or direction of climate change than anyone else. Neither do I object in any way to the measures proposed by those who wish to keep earth as close to its present state as possible. I just hope that the environmentally concerned will not turn into some form of Green Police. I don't want to be beaten with a loaf of locally grown, organic nine-grain bread any more than I did a police baton.
Friday, April 25, 2008
Savng the planet through guilt
The Green Movement, the 100 Mile Diet, Save The Planet, Carbon Credits: it turns out that determining the best way to go about putting environmental concerns into action just isn't that clear or easy. Take shopping at the grocery store for example. Do you want to help the impoverished grape pickers of Chile eke out a meager existence and have the bunker fuel burning cargo ship's pollution on your conscience, or do you want to buy those somewhat more local Fraser Valley blueberries and subsidize the destruction of valuable disappearing wetlands? Do you want corn on the cob in January brought in the tens of tons by train from California, or are you willing to wait until August when Jerome drives three bushels over from Midway in his rusting out '73 Ford pick-up? Which is more eco friendly? And then of course we still have to bag it. Paper or plastic? Do you want to pillage the green treed slopes of Beaverdell, or ravage the oil sands of Alberta? Normally I'd say Alberta, but you can't even joke about this anymore; it's become just too serious.
Power generation is another area that poses a dilemma for the environmentally concerned. Recently in the Vancouver Sun, former Socred minister Dr. Pat McGeer ranted against the move to small privately-funded power projects. Instead he wished for a return to mega-dams, the Site C project south of Fort St. John in particular. If built, such a dam would indeed provide great amounts of power, 900 megawatts, but flood 80 km. of the Peace River Valley. The small run-of-river power generating projects on the other hand flood nothing. Instead they divert water around waterfalls and rapids that are enjoyed by outdoor enthusiasts and require the construction of access roads and power lines through often environmentally-sensitive areas.
When I was growing up, the issues people faced were local or perhaps just family related. Now we are expected to think regionally, nationally, and globally.
The guilt we are supposed to feel about our actions or inaction has now expanded to embrace the rapidly expanding deserts of Africa to the dwindling ice caps of both Poles.
I can't allow myself to become depressed, however; the medication I would then have to purchase would merely support the irresponsible policies of the avaricious multinational drug monopolies. At my age, any more guilt might kill me.
Power generation is another area that poses a dilemma for the environmentally concerned. Recently in the Vancouver Sun, former Socred minister Dr. Pat McGeer ranted against the move to small privately-funded power projects. Instead he wished for a return to mega-dams, the Site C project south of Fort St. John in particular. If built, such a dam would indeed provide great amounts of power, 900 megawatts, but flood 80 km. of the Peace River Valley. The small run-of-river power generating projects on the other hand flood nothing. Instead they divert water around waterfalls and rapids that are enjoyed by outdoor enthusiasts and require the construction of access roads and power lines through often environmentally-sensitive areas.
When I was growing up, the issues people faced were local or perhaps just family related. Now we are expected to think regionally, nationally, and globally.
The guilt we are supposed to feel about our actions or inaction has now expanded to embrace the rapidly expanding deserts of Africa to the dwindling ice caps of both Poles.
I can't allow myself to become depressed, however; the medication I would then have to purchase would merely support the irresponsible policies of the avaricious multinational drug monopolies. At my age, any more guilt might kill me.
Celebrating Christmas
For some reason, memories of Christmas seem particularly clear and unusually plentiful. I can’t remember what I ate for breakfast, but I can tell you what I got for Christmas when I was 11: a World Book encyclopedia in twenty four volumes. I had wanted a set of swim fins, a mask and snorkel and a rubber band powered spear gun. Okay, I knew my parents wouldn’t get me the spear gun, but an encyclopedia? What a let down. That’s the other thing about Christmas: our memories of the holiday cover such a wide range of feeling. Joy and sadness, elation and disappointment, togetherness and loneliness, Christmas has a way of heightening every emotion and magnifying every perception.
I missed Christmas entirely when I was eight, brought low by a bout with some bug that rendered me comatose from Christmas Eve Day until Boxing Day. Actually, my mother might have knocked me out with one of her Scottish Highland medications designed to stop coughing, clear sinuses and aid sleep, and which as an adult, I began to suspect contained some quantity of whiskey. At any rate, I missed everything: the playing with my cousins, my Uncle Pete’s fabulous animated outdoor Christmas displays, my grandfather’s sweet smelling Swedish “glüg” distilling slowly on the kitchen stove, and the laughter. Everyone’s laughter. It wasn’t that my own family didn’t laugh, but it was different at Christmas. The petty concerns of being a kid were momentarily forgotten. You didn’t have to worry if your parents were still mad at you for breaking your glasses – again, or be jealous of your older brother’s 26 inch bicycle, or plot how you were going to catch your younger brother stealing from your piggy bank. You could just be happy and laugh. When I was eight, I missed all that laughter: the tittering of the other kids at silly knock-knock jokes and comic books, my grandmother’s warm, quiet chuckle, the sudden grinning outburst from my father, my Aunt Betty’s ironic comments muttered out of the side of her mouth, and most of all, the laughter that welled up and resounded from my Uncle Ray. Uncle Ray wasn’t a big man, but he had a deep, warm laugh that filled the room and enveloped everyone in it. The laughter that came from him was slow and rich and conveyed a sense of pleasant well-being that I don’t believe I have experienced since. I loved to hear Uncle Ray laugh.
We opened our presents with my cousins at their house on Christmas Eve, in the Swedish tradition, the tradition of my father’s family. After a few years, a clever child could predict what the presents would probably be: clothes mostly. A sweater from my grandparents, a shirt from each of my aunts, practical things, with a box of chocolates thrown in for fun. The main presents from Santa, the bikes or trains (or encyclopedias) would be delivered the next morning at home. I welcomed the clothes though, mainly because my other relatives had different taste than my mother and I could expect to receive something that had a little flair, a little chic, a little colour, and that didn’t always itch. Like the paisley shirt my Aunt Betty once bought for me, or the cowboy belt with imitation silver buckle and end tip that my Grandmother gave me. My grandmother’s sense of humour carried over into her gifts. When I was in my early teens she began a tradition of bringing a box of neckties to the Christmas Eve celebrations to be given away to all the men. The ties came from the closet of a wealthy friend who had passed away without any heirs, leaving a multitude of clothing items behind. The eight males in the family would draw numbers that determined the order of tie selection and then pick their favorites until all the ties were gone. Then we would offer a Christmas toast to the late Mr. Forsinger. For years the most valuable clothing items I owned were a half dozen of those Italian silk neckties; I still have one.
The memories of Christmas that Canadians have differ significantly one from another; our families are so very different. Our traditions are wonderfully varied as well, garnered from the many lands and cultures around the world where the Christmas story is celebrated. They shift and refocus over time, as families change and grow and new memories are added.
My Uncle Ray died last week. He was 89. I hadn’t seen him in 10 years, or more than four times in the last 40. Circumstances and geography got in the way. But as I celebrate Christmas this year with my own children and grandchildren I will think of him and my other relatives who are no longer with us. Those memories will make the holiday even richer. And at some point, in the midst of the celebration, above the sound of children and Christmas music, I know that I will smile to hear in the background a certain familiar, deep, resonant laugh. I always do. I always will.
I missed Christmas entirely when I was eight, brought low by a bout with some bug that rendered me comatose from Christmas Eve Day until Boxing Day. Actually, my mother might have knocked me out with one of her Scottish Highland medications designed to stop coughing, clear sinuses and aid sleep, and which as an adult, I began to suspect contained some quantity of whiskey. At any rate, I missed everything: the playing with my cousins, my Uncle Pete’s fabulous animated outdoor Christmas displays, my grandfather’s sweet smelling Swedish “glüg” distilling slowly on the kitchen stove, and the laughter. Everyone’s laughter. It wasn’t that my own family didn’t laugh, but it was different at Christmas. The petty concerns of being a kid were momentarily forgotten. You didn’t have to worry if your parents were still mad at you for breaking your glasses – again, or be jealous of your older brother’s 26 inch bicycle, or plot how you were going to catch your younger brother stealing from your piggy bank. You could just be happy and laugh. When I was eight, I missed all that laughter: the tittering of the other kids at silly knock-knock jokes and comic books, my grandmother’s warm, quiet chuckle, the sudden grinning outburst from my father, my Aunt Betty’s ironic comments muttered out of the side of her mouth, and most of all, the laughter that welled up and resounded from my Uncle Ray. Uncle Ray wasn’t a big man, but he had a deep, warm laugh that filled the room and enveloped everyone in it. The laughter that came from him was slow and rich and conveyed a sense of pleasant well-being that I don’t believe I have experienced since. I loved to hear Uncle Ray laugh.
We opened our presents with my cousins at their house on Christmas Eve, in the Swedish tradition, the tradition of my father’s family. After a few years, a clever child could predict what the presents would probably be: clothes mostly. A sweater from my grandparents, a shirt from each of my aunts, practical things, with a box of chocolates thrown in for fun. The main presents from Santa, the bikes or trains (or encyclopedias) would be delivered the next morning at home. I welcomed the clothes though, mainly because my other relatives had different taste than my mother and I could expect to receive something that had a little flair, a little chic, a little colour, and that didn’t always itch. Like the paisley shirt my Aunt Betty once bought for me, or the cowboy belt with imitation silver buckle and end tip that my Grandmother gave me. My grandmother’s sense of humour carried over into her gifts. When I was in my early teens she began a tradition of bringing a box of neckties to the Christmas Eve celebrations to be given away to all the men. The ties came from the closet of a wealthy friend who had passed away without any heirs, leaving a multitude of clothing items behind. The eight males in the family would draw numbers that determined the order of tie selection and then pick their favorites until all the ties were gone. Then we would offer a Christmas toast to the late Mr. Forsinger. For years the most valuable clothing items I owned were a half dozen of those Italian silk neckties; I still have one.
The memories of Christmas that Canadians have differ significantly one from another; our families are so very different. Our traditions are wonderfully varied as well, garnered from the many lands and cultures around the world where the Christmas story is celebrated. They shift and refocus over time, as families change and grow and new memories are added.
My Uncle Ray died last week. He was 89. I hadn’t seen him in 10 years, or more than four times in the last 40. Circumstances and geography got in the way. But as I celebrate Christmas this year with my own children and grandchildren I will think of him and my other relatives who are no longer with us. Those memories will make the holiday even richer. And at some point, in the midst of the celebration, above the sound of children and Christmas music, I know that I will smile to hear in the background a certain familiar, deep, resonant laugh. I always do. I always will.
New Year's Resolutions
Everyone at lest considers making New Year’s resolutions, and some actually do – about 30%. Of those, only 10 % really keep them. In a town the size of Grand Forks, that amounts to about 17 people. Those 17 are easily identifiable. They are the high profile, Type A personalities that are constantly busy achieving things. That’s why they are able to keep their New Year’s resolutions while the rest of us fail miserably; they are used to reaching their goals. Formerly, they all had multi-paged, leather bound Day Planners; now they have little hand held computer/phone devices that they constantly type their schedules into. That’s another thing the lucky 17 have in common: schedules that they actually adhere to, broken down into fifteen minute parcels of time. The rest of us are somewhat vague about time. We usually have four parcels: morning, afternoon, evening and night. Some only have two: day and night, or awake and asleep.
I count myself among the 30% that make but rarely keep their New Year’s resolutions. It isn’t that I don’t have good intentions, but after all these years I am realistic. I have tried to trick myself into keeping the resolutions by offering myself rewards: a new table saw for losing 20 pounds, a big flat screen TV for going regularly to yoga class, etc. For some reason, however, I end up double-tricking (sort of like double-daring) myself into collecting the rewards without actually keeping the resolution. (I lost five pounds so I will get the table saw and lose the other fifteen before the VISA bill has to be paid, or yesterday I signed up for the yoga class and therefore will immediately buy the big screen TV which will allow me to practice in the comfort of my living room)
I am not really fooling myself, of course, and as a result I have lately altered my approach. This year as last year I am making my resolutions in three categories: Sure To Keep, Likely To Keep, and Are You Kidding? Last year the third category was more optimistically labeled: Might Possibly Keep. Of the four resolutions in that category, I almost came close to keeping one. I never really had a chance at the other three (Learn to SCUBA dive, write a novel and bench press my body weight). I blame that in part on my brother’s failed retirement plans. He was going to move to a property on the beach in Costa Rica – he had pictures – and was going to allow me to live there in a cozy cabana for three months. The real estate promoter absconded with his down payment, however – no pictures of him – and in disappointment my brother and I started eating pastry. My body weight soared to the point that Hulk Hogan in his prime couldn’t have bench pressed it. The last Might Possibly Keep resolution was to bungy jump. I was all set to go to Nanaimo and jump off the famous bungy jumping bridge there when my father reminded me of the family history of detached retinas. Suddenly the thought of deceleraing upside down at the end of a giant elastic lost whatever slight appeal it had in the first place and I gave up on keeping that resolution as well.
My lack of success has caused me this year to place only one preposterous resolution in the third category: I resolve to eat no red meat. I can tell you right now that at the first whiff of any roasting/broiling/grilling beef I will abandon that resolution faster than the Conservatives ditched Reform, but that is okay, because I have some very achievable resolutions in my other two categories. In the Likely To Keep category I have 1) will compose a haiku, 2) will learn Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star on the harmonica, and 3) will stride manfully to the mailbox at least once a month. Just in case those prove too difficult I have included a couple of sure-fire resolutions in the Sure To Keep category: 1) will avoid using Brylcreem on my hair, 2) will not greet any woman over fifty by calling out “Yo, Momma,” and 3) will gratefully accept a seat on a bus from a teenager, if one is ever offered, if I ever take a bus.
I have a good feeling about keeping my resolutions this year. At least a couple of them.
I count myself among the 30% that make but rarely keep their New Year’s resolutions. It isn’t that I don’t have good intentions, but after all these years I am realistic. I have tried to trick myself into keeping the resolutions by offering myself rewards: a new table saw for losing 20 pounds, a big flat screen TV for going regularly to yoga class, etc. For some reason, however, I end up double-tricking (sort of like double-daring) myself into collecting the rewards without actually keeping the resolution. (I lost five pounds so I will get the table saw and lose the other fifteen before the VISA bill has to be paid, or yesterday I signed up for the yoga class and therefore will immediately buy the big screen TV which will allow me to practice in the comfort of my living room)
I am not really fooling myself, of course, and as a result I have lately altered my approach. This year as last year I am making my resolutions in three categories: Sure To Keep, Likely To Keep, and Are You Kidding? Last year the third category was more optimistically labeled: Might Possibly Keep. Of the four resolutions in that category, I almost came close to keeping one. I never really had a chance at the other three (Learn to SCUBA dive, write a novel and bench press my body weight). I blame that in part on my brother’s failed retirement plans. He was going to move to a property on the beach in Costa Rica – he had pictures – and was going to allow me to live there in a cozy cabana for three months. The real estate promoter absconded with his down payment, however – no pictures of him – and in disappointment my brother and I started eating pastry. My body weight soared to the point that Hulk Hogan in his prime couldn’t have bench pressed it. The last Might Possibly Keep resolution was to bungy jump. I was all set to go to Nanaimo and jump off the famous bungy jumping bridge there when my father reminded me of the family history of detached retinas. Suddenly the thought of deceleraing upside down at the end of a giant elastic lost whatever slight appeal it had in the first place and I gave up on keeping that resolution as well.
My lack of success has caused me this year to place only one preposterous resolution in the third category: I resolve to eat no red meat. I can tell you right now that at the first whiff of any roasting/broiling/grilling beef I will abandon that resolution faster than the Conservatives ditched Reform, but that is okay, because I have some very achievable resolutions in my other two categories. In the Likely To Keep category I have 1) will compose a haiku, 2) will learn Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star on the harmonica, and 3) will stride manfully to the mailbox at least once a month. Just in case those prove too difficult I have included a couple of sure-fire resolutions in the Sure To Keep category: 1) will avoid using Brylcreem on my hair, 2) will not greet any woman over fifty by calling out “Yo, Momma,” and 3) will gratefully accept a seat on a bus from a teenager, if one is ever offered, if I ever take a bus.
I have a good feeling about keeping my resolutions this year. At least a couple of them.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Conrad Black and Nature Boy
Conrad Black was in the news again at the end of the year, this time for being one of the Big Events of 2007. Lord Black’s conviction on fraud charges in a United States court was the Big Event. It seems as though every Canadian radio and television news personality has offered an opinion on Conrad’s state of affairs and a judgement on his misdeeds. Countless comparisons have been drawn between him and other convicted fraudsters who headed major corporations and were caught misusing company funds. Every scandal from Bre-X to Enron has been dredged up repeatedly, and, if that weren’t enough the proud Lord of Crossharbour has been personally compared to not only gangsters, con men, mountebanks and extravagant ne’er-do-wells, but compared as well to the idle potentates and arrogant aristocrats of Europe and the Middle East, a Canadian born cross between Louis XV and King Farouk with a hint of Czar Nicholas thrown in.
I believe those comparisons miss the mark. Instead, I would compare Lord Black to the late Paul Desnoyers, formerly of Winfield, B.C. I wrote about Paul twenty years ago, the week he passed away, in a column for the Winfield Calander. I am not sure that Lord Black wouldn’t prefer to be compared to King Farouk than to Paul, who in the ‘70s and ‘80s was known locally as Nature Boy. Both Paul and Conrad came from wealthy, Eastern establishment families. Both were intelligent and well educated and valued the fine arts. I don’t know how well Conrad plays the piano, but I interrupted Paul late one afternoon at the keys of the old upright that stood back stage in the auditorium of the high school where I taught. He was playing Chopin dressed in his usual attire: baggy cut off khaki shorts, a tattered wool sweater, wool socks and running shoes overlaid with rubber galoshes tied on with twine. I suppose his clothing is an indication that here were a few differences between himself and Lord Black.
Like Conrad, Paul marched to his own drummer. He didn’t care what anyone thought of him; he chose to follow principles that he believed were correct; he was his own man. I admired him for that. When he died, I wrote that the world was a better place because of men like Paul who provided proof that it is possible to live a life free of the constraints of day to day life that often seem oppressive to all of us. Conrad in his own way demonstrated the same proof. Others may live lives of monotonous drudgery and repetition, but Conrad existed in world of dazzling extravagance and brilliant wit, a rarified atmosphere where the great and mighty wielded fortunes and power in an unending display of ego and will.
Now, found guilty by a jury of his peers in Chicago (unfortunately it wasn’t a jury of his Peers in London), it will be interesting to see how Conrad reacts to his incarceration. I believe it will be with the same elan as the French count at the time of the Revolution who tidied himself fastidiously as he was being carted off to the guillotine by a screaming mob. What difference, another, younger nobleman asked, did he think any of those pathetic efforts of grooming made in the face of certain death? “Ah, my friend,” he replied, “when death is all there is, how one dies makes all the difference.” Conrad will manage to serve his time like the self-made nobleman he is, barely bothering to acknowledge the rabble who trundle him off to his prison cell. He has crafted his life to his own design and will see it through to the end, just like Paul did.
When the RCMP found Paul one November morning he was wrapped up in his sleeping bag beneath his favorite grove of trees. They said he had a smile on his face. I will be curious to see if Lord Black will be able to maintain his smile.
copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
I believe those comparisons miss the mark. Instead, I would compare Lord Black to the late Paul Desnoyers, formerly of Winfield, B.C. I wrote about Paul twenty years ago, the week he passed away, in a column for the Winfield Calander. I am not sure that Lord Black wouldn’t prefer to be compared to King Farouk than to Paul, who in the ‘70s and ‘80s was known locally as Nature Boy. Both Paul and Conrad came from wealthy, Eastern establishment families. Both were intelligent and well educated and valued the fine arts. I don’t know how well Conrad plays the piano, but I interrupted Paul late one afternoon at the keys of the old upright that stood back stage in the auditorium of the high school where I taught. He was playing Chopin dressed in his usual attire: baggy cut off khaki shorts, a tattered wool sweater, wool socks and running shoes overlaid with rubber galoshes tied on with twine. I suppose his clothing is an indication that here were a few differences between himself and Lord Black.
Like Conrad, Paul marched to his own drummer. He didn’t care what anyone thought of him; he chose to follow principles that he believed were correct; he was his own man. I admired him for that. When he died, I wrote that the world was a better place because of men like Paul who provided proof that it is possible to live a life free of the constraints of day to day life that often seem oppressive to all of us. Conrad in his own way demonstrated the same proof. Others may live lives of monotonous drudgery and repetition, but Conrad existed in world of dazzling extravagance and brilliant wit, a rarified atmosphere where the great and mighty wielded fortunes and power in an unending display of ego and will.
Now, found guilty by a jury of his peers in Chicago (unfortunately it wasn’t a jury of his Peers in London), it will be interesting to see how Conrad reacts to his incarceration. I believe it will be with the same elan as the French count at the time of the Revolution who tidied himself fastidiously as he was being carted off to the guillotine by a screaming mob. What difference, another, younger nobleman asked, did he think any of those pathetic efforts of grooming made in the face of certain death? “Ah, my friend,” he replied, “when death is all there is, how one dies makes all the difference.” Conrad will manage to serve his time like the self-made nobleman he is, barely bothering to acknowledge the rabble who trundle him off to his prison cell. He has crafted his life to his own design and will see it through to the end, just like Paul did.
When the RCMP found Paul one November morning he was wrapped up in his sleeping bag beneath his favorite grove of trees. They said he had a smile on his face. I will be curious to see if Lord Black will be able to maintain his smile.
copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
Foundations Skills Assessment tests: a useless exercise
The Boundary District and British Columbia Teachers Associations’ opposition to the Fundamental Skills Assessment (FSA) scheduled to test all Grade 4 and Grade 7 students in February may seem puzzling. What, after all is wrong with testing children to determine the level of their basic literacy and numeracy skills.
The problem many teachers see with the FSA is not the test itself, but how the test results are used. The FSA is a typical standardized test, that is a test administered to a large number of students that compares their individual performances to a pre-established standard. Important information about individual students can be ascertained from such a test by comparing a particular student’s achievement to the entire target group, in this case, about 40,000 students in each of the two grades.
The FSA test results, however, are not primarily used in that way. Instead, conclusions are being drawn from those results, not about individual students, but about subgroups, the 15 or 50 or 100 students that form a particular class or attend a particular school. Such a use of test results is not valid. That is because no small group possesses the same full range of ability that the target group of 40,000 does. Small groups are always anomalies, containing a higher percentage of low achieving or high achieving students than the target group. Therefore, when the statistical analysis of the small group’s performance is generated, the numbers rarely match those of the huge target population. Yet the assumption made by those who do the small group analyses is that the small group numbers should mirror the target population. If they don’t, if the average success rate of a small group are lower, then the assumption is that the teacher or the school must be doing something wrong. If they are higher, the assumption is that the programs of practices of the school or teacher must be unusually good. Neither is necessarily true.
Making those assumptions is analogous to a teacher who analyzes a class’s test results row by row expecting each row to contain the same mix of students and therefore have the same rate of success as every other row. Then having determined which rows have the lowest rates, the teacher berates them for not working as hard or paying as much attention as the other rows, or better yet, blames him/herself for not teaching that row as well as the others.
Our schools, like those rows, reflect subgroups that vary greatly from one another based on socio-economic factors like wealth and poverty, ethnic background and immigrant status, family educational background and so on. From one part of the province to another, or one part of Metro Vancouver to another, those great variations in socio-economic factors have an impact on achievement in schools and on standardized tests. The differences are particularly evident when private schools, which admit only high achieving students in the first place, are compared to public schools that, of course, welcome students of all abilities.
Teachers and administrators are completely aware of the level of achievement of their students without being reminded by a standardized test. The irony is that after spending vast sums of money on these tests and their marking and analysis and hiring expensive Superintendents of Achievement to oversee the process, the Ministry will eventually realize that it is a fruitless exercise. Most jurisdictions in North America already have realized it (Google standardized testing for more information). The average scores generated by individual classes and schools will fluctuate from year to year by a couple of percentage points depending on the abilities of the student population for that year. For example in the last five years, the Boundary District success rate (percentage of students “meeting or exceeding expectations”) on the Grade 7 Reading Comprehension portion of the FSA has varied considerably: 79% in 2003, to 80% in 2004, 76% in 2005, 85% in 2006 and back to 79% in 2007. If one were to accept the Ministry’s rationale for the validity of these tests, those results would point to a serious failure of teachers and schools in 2005 and a remarkable improvement in the same schools and teachers in 2006. Such conclusions are obviously illogical and point out the clear weaknesses in using test results like these as a basis for evaluating school performance. The average scores for the entire province also vary because try as they might, the people making up the tests can never make them of equal difficulty.
Meanwhile the Ministry requires principals and teachers to chase after additional percentage points on their schools’ average FSA scores in order to create the illusion that steady progress is being made. Teachers know that this takes time away from the many other tasks that they are required to perform, most of which are of far greater importance.
That’s why teachers all over the province are opposed to the FSA.
Copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
The problem many teachers see with the FSA is not the test itself, but how the test results are used. The FSA is a typical standardized test, that is a test administered to a large number of students that compares their individual performances to a pre-established standard. Important information about individual students can be ascertained from such a test by comparing a particular student’s achievement to the entire target group, in this case, about 40,000 students in each of the two grades.
The FSA test results, however, are not primarily used in that way. Instead, conclusions are being drawn from those results, not about individual students, but about subgroups, the 15 or 50 or 100 students that form a particular class or attend a particular school. Such a use of test results is not valid. That is because no small group possesses the same full range of ability that the target group of 40,000 does. Small groups are always anomalies, containing a higher percentage of low achieving or high achieving students than the target group. Therefore, when the statistical analysis of the small group’s performance is generated, the numbers rarely match those of the huge target population. Yet the assumption made by those who do the small group analyses is that the small group numbers should mirror the target population. If they don’t, if the average success rate of a small group are lower, then the assumption is that the teacher or the school must be doing something wrong. If they are higher, the assumption is that the programs of practices of the school or teacher must be unusually good. Neither is necessarily true.
Making those assumptions is analogous to a teacher who analyzes a class’s test results row by row expecting each row to contain the same mix of students and therefore have the same rate of success as every other row. Then having determined which rows have the lowest rates, the teacher berates them for not working as hard or paying as much attention as the other rows, or better yet, blames him/herself for not teaching that row as well as the others.
Our schools, like those rows, reflect subgroups that vary greatly from one another based on socio-economic factors like wealth and poverty, ethnic background and immigrant status, family educational background and so on. From one part of the province to another, or one part of Metro Vancouver to another, those great variations in socio-economic factors have an impact on achievement in schools and on standardized tests. The differences are particularly evident when private schools, which admit only high achieving students in the first place, are compared to public schools that, of course, welcome students of all abilities.
Teachers and administrators are completely aware of the level of achievement of their students without being reminded by a standardized test. The irony is that after spending vast sums of money on these tests and their marking and analysis and hiring expensive Superintendents of Achievement to oversee the process, the Ministry will eventually realize that it is a fruitless exercise. Most jurisdictions in North America already have realized it (Google standardized testing for more information). The average scores generated by individual classes and schools will fluctuate from year to year by a couple of percentage points depending on the abilities of the student population for that year. For example in the last five years, the Boundary District success rate (percentage of students “meeting or exceeding expectations”) on the Grade 7 Reading Comprehension portion of the FSA has varied considerably: 79% in 2003, to 80% in 2004, 76% in 2005, 85% in 2006 and back to 79% in 2007. If one were to accept the Ministry’s rationale for the validity of these tests, those results would point to a serious failure of teachers and schools in 2005 and a remarkable improvement in the same schools and teachers in 2006. Such conclusions are obviously illogical and point out the clear weaknesses in using test results like these as a basis for evaluating school performance. The average scores for the entire province also vary because try as they might, the people making up the tests can never make them of equal difficulty.
Meanwhile the Ministry requires principals and teachers to chase after additional percentage points on their schools’ average FSA scores in order to create the illusion that steady progress is being made. Teachers know that this takes time away from the many other tasks that they are required to perform, most of which are of far greater importance.
That’s why teachers all over the province are opposed to the FSA.
Copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Cognitive Dissonance
Occasionally, a relationship between seemingly unrelated things makes itself known. In the course of a few hours the other day just such a relationship popped up. I was drinking my morning coffee watching Global News and getting an ear full of the latest blood and gore in metro Toronto and Vancouver: two innocent by-standers gunned down over the course of the week in the former city, and two gangsters dispatched to their just reward in the latter. Following the news brief about the actual murders came the chorus of condemnation by an assortment of politicians and social activists. Calls for a total ban on hand guns were repeated and blame was heaped on the court system, lax laws and even laxer judges. I have to admit that, despite being a life-long left leaning liberal (also occasionally characterized as a bleeding heart liberal or socialist sympathizer), I do find myself favouring the law and order posture of the conservative crowd whenever my morning coffee experience is tainted by these stories of gangland violence. At such moments strange musings about vigilante justice even occur to me. Like most people, however, I merely fume for a few moments until the next news story comes on the screen about a cuddly new polar bear cub or charity fund-raiser and let the dark thoughts fade away.
On this particular day, I picked up yesterdays unopened mail and discovered something that changed my mood completely, that annual mailbox miracle, one of the world’s most blessed time-passers, the Vesey Spring Seed Catalogue! Is there anything better than idling away the hours envisioning what fabulous abundance of vegetables one is going to nurture in the coming year? Or picturing the amazing blanket of colour that will blossom around the back porch, by the front steps, or beyond the tiny footbridge and fountain that surely one will have time to build this year in the back yard? The Vesey Catalogue! There may be a foot of snow still on the ground but with that precious book in hand spring has to be just around the corner.
The problem was that for once not even the volume from Vesey could completely eliminate the miserable echoes of violence brought on by the morning news. Then CBC radio came to the rescue. Not that the program I tuned to made me feel that much better, but at least it explained my problem. I was experiencing cognitive dissonance I learned, a condition in which the brain is forced to consider two ideas that are mutually exclusive.
The brain doesn’t like that. It wrestles with the ideas until one becomes dominant. A con artist knows stealing is wrong, but wants to steal so he convinces himself that anyone dumb enough to fall for the con deserves to lose his money. The cognitive dissonance is resolved and he can steal the money without feeling guilty.
In my case, it was hard that morning to reconcile a world in which some people feel comfortable shooting others to death in the street while most would prefer to grow plants from seeds and watch them either blossom or bear fruit. But that annoying cognitive dissonance insisted that I resolve the conflict one way or another. I thought of adding my voice to the many who express their dismay continually with the legal and law enforcement systems, but in the end decided on a greener approach to the problem.
I sent an e-mail to the Attorney General encouraging the prison system to allow inmates to plant window gardens and suggested that he ask Vesey to send a thousand seed catalogues. Then I placed my own order. It was even larger than last year, and though I know that I will have seeds left over and will end up begging neighbours to take some of my pole beans and squash, I can see the corn stalks sprouting and taste the tomatoes already.
Copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
On this particular day, I picked up yesterdays unopened mail and discovered something that changed my mood completely, that annual mailbox miracle, one of the world’s most blessed time-passers, the Vesey Spring Seed Catalogue! Is there anything better than idling away the hours envisioning what fabulous abundance of vegetables one is going to nurture in the coming year? Or picturing the amazing blanket of colour that will blossom around the back porch, by the front steps, or beyond the tiny footbridge and fountain that surely one will have time to build this year in the back yard? The Vesey Catalogue! There may be a foot of snow still on the ground but with that precious book in hand spring has to be just around the corner.
The problem was that for once not even the volume from Vesey could completely eliminate the miserable echoes of violence brought on by the morning news. Then CBC radio came to the rescue. Not that the program I tuned to made me feel that much better, but at least it explained my problem. I was experiencing cognitive dissonance I learned, a condition in which the brain is forced to consider two ideas that are mutually exclusive.
The brain doesn’t like that. It wrestles with the ideas until one becomes dominant. A con artist knows stealing is wrong, but wants to steal so he convinces himself that anyone dumb enough to fall for the con deserves to lose his money. The cognitive dissonance is resolved and he can steal the money without feeling guilty.
In my case, it was hard that morning to reconcile a world in which some people feel comfortable shooting others to death in the street while most would prefer to grow plants from seeds and watch them either blossom or bear fruit. But that annoying cognitive dissonance insisted that I resolve the conflict one way or another. I thought of adding my voice to the many who express their dismay continually with the legal and law enforcement systems, but in the end decided on a greener approach to the problem.
I sent an e-mail to the Attorney General encouraging the prison system to allow inmates to plant window gardens and suggested that he ask Vesey to send a thousand seed catalogues. Then I placed my own order. It was even larger than last year, and though I know that I will have seeds left over and will end up begging neighbours to take some of my pole beans and squash, I can see the corn stalks sprouting and taste the tomatoes already.
Copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
The Sub Prime Fiasco
Another global economic crisis. Every time the engines of capitalism cough, sputter or stall I think back to a conversation I had at university with a bow-tied economics graduate student who insisted that his academic discipline was a science. New economic theories, he claimed, made forecasting of profit and loss as predictable as anything that physics or chemistry could offer. Amazing.
Yet recently we have come to learn that every major financial institution in the western world and half of the far east all somehow failed to grasp the idea that if you loan money out at a rate of return lower than you yourself borrowed the money, you might end up in a bit of trouble. The economic gurus with advanced business degrees and enormous salaries somehow missed the same crucial point that the poor sods who borrowed the money did: When the sub-prime grace period on the loan expires and the interest rate goes up to normal levels, the poor borrower will no longer be able to afford it! That’s why he hadn’t borrowed the money at the regular rate in the first place! Then when the economic downturn that everyone has been predicting for four years occurs and those borderline borrowers are laid off…oops! One begins to see long rows of For Sale signs on houses that are now worth less than they were purchased for. The bubble bursts; panic ensues; and, like rats from a sinking ship, investors try to abandon the market.
It appears that every bank from the First National Bank of Ottumwa, Iowa, to Citibank, Chase Manhattan, and RBC neglected to predict the obvious. These fiscal visionaries missed what my neighbours Carl, Walt and Larry had been forecasting for months. My barber talked about it with me last March, and my 92 year old father had, as early as 2006 shaken his head ruefully at what he knew would be inescapable financial havoc.
Listening to the same economists, gurus and sooth-sayers now, provides one with a typical grab-bag of doublespeak and learned bafflegab. It was, they say, a completely unpredictable combination of various economic elements, an unusual configuration of unfathomable indicators, a perfect storm of coincidental world-wide negative factors.
Horse hockey!
The only thing worse than believing that they should have known but didn’t is believing that they knew and didn’t care, that greed and ambition made the movers and shakers lower rates to absurd levels in order to keep the economic engines running as long as possible in order to wring out as much profit as they could for as long as they could. But believing that would be just too cynical. Still, I wonder if there are any CEOs of banks or investment firms losing their houses. I can’t help but think probably not.
Copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
Yet recently we have come to learn that every major financial institution in the western world and half of the far east all somehow failed to grasp the idea that if you loan money out at a rate of return lower than you yourself borrowed the money, you might end up in a bit of trouble. The economic gurus with advanced business degrees and enormous salaries somehow missed the same crucial point that the poor sods who borrowed the money did: When the sub-prime grace period on the loan expires and the interest rate goes up to normal levels, the poor borrower will no longer be able to afford it! That’s why he hadn’t borrowed the money at the regular rate in the first place! Then when the economic downturn that everyone has been predicting for four years occurs and those borderline borrowers are laid off…oops! One begins to see long rows of For Sale signs on houses that are now worth less than they were purchased for. The bubble bursts; panic ensues; and, like rats from a sinking ship, investors try to abandon the market.
It appears that every bank from the First National Bank of Ottumwa, Iowa, to Citibank, Chase Manhattan, and RBC neglected to predict the obvious. These fiscal visionaries missed what my neighbours Carl, Walt and Larry had been forecasting for months. My barber talked about it with me last March, and my 92 year old father had, as early as 2006 shaken his head ruefully at what he knew would be inescapable financial havoc.
Listening to the same economists, gurus and sooth-sayers now, provides one with a typical grab-bag of doublespeak and learned bafflegab. It was, they say, a completely unpredictable combination of various economic elements, an unusual configuration of unfathomable indicators, a perfect storm of coincidental world-wide negative factors.
Horse hockey!
The only thing worse than believing that they should have known but didn’t is believing that they knew and didn’t care, that greed and ambition made the movers and shakers lower rates to absurd levels in order to keep the economic engines running as long as possible in order to wring out as much profit as they could for as long as they could. But believing that would be just too cynical. Still, I wonder if there are any CEOs of banks or investment firms losing their houses. I can’t help but think probably not.
Copywrite Grand Forks Gazette 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)