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CAROLAN: Politics wafts in end-of-summer air

Isn't "procrustean" the very definition of government? - Albert Saijo Indian summer: we're heading into autumn and already politics is in the air.

Isn't "procrustean" the very definition of government?

- Albert Saijo

Indian summer: we're heading into autumn and already politics is in the air.

Provincially we're hogtied with the corporate payback-to-friends-in-bigbusiness scheme posing as something called "the Liberals." Count your blessings that you don't live near a big campaign-donor mine around Quesnel.

Federally there's actually a promise of change in the wind. The heavy-handed Bonapartism practised by Harper is falling out of fashion quicker than the independent thought Conservatives fear like Ebola virus, especially if it concerns ecological progress.

As Green Party leader Elizabeth May reminded us lately, when Harper became prime minister he cancelled all climate programs, repudiated our Kyoto targets, chose far weaker targets, weakened them again, legally withdrew from the Kyoto Protocol, and then failed to meet the weaker targets. These are not Brian Mulroney's Tories, whom you may recall May used to work for.

As a result, Canada's international reputation has been severely damaged. Eighty per cent of Canadians want climate action and 80 per cent continue to be concerned about tackling the climate crisis. But energy money talks big in politics.

Enbridge Gateway gets a soft wave from Ottawa and Kinder Morgan isn't floating its $5.4 billion pipeline-twinning proposal in expectation of a thumbsdown from the National Energy Board. We know the way these things stand at present doesn't smell right.

In Oregon, our southern neighbours just told big government and big energy "No", they won't have a major coal export facility rammed down their throats, citing community health fears. Yet in Metro Vancouver we've just offered to do the dirty work for them with another coal terminal on the Fraser River approved with nary a squawk.

Procrustes was the mythical Greek monster who stretched people's limbs or chopped off hands and feet to suit his one-sizefits-all mattress philosophy. Kinda like our three levels of government thinking these days.

How did this happen? Coast to coast we're known as the big boasters from B.C. who can't stop crowing about how sweet life is here. But the plot-line tells a different story. Views of those beautiful mountains are fading quickly as more and higher towers get in the way; there's increasing reliance on international student enrolments to pay the bills in our schools, when they're not on strike; property taxes just get higher.

Aren't the gangs twisting our arms for more big condo projects, more heavy industrial oil and LNG export terminals, and more dirty coal heaps simply in it for their personal financial benefit?

The only booming economic sector you hear about any more is in municipal service executive salaries where averagequality administrators earn more than Premier Clark and she only runs the entire province. Her salary? Reasonable at $178,000, last look.

Meantime, without a vision except selling grungy fossil fuels to China, the federal Conservatives (don't laugh) are thinking of legalizing pot. Wow! Only 43 years after Ottawa's LeDain Commission recommended the repeal of harsh laws against possession of a little grass for personal use, Peter MacKay, the Tory Elmer Fudd wannabee tells us they're still "studying the issue."

Instead, maybe they could study the urgent need for serious parliamentary debate about physician-assisted end of life care.

The courageous story of Bowen Island's Gillian Bennett and her family has brought attention again to the quality of life issue in an age when we're living way longer than ever before, frequently in ignoble situations. The report from the Canadian Medical Association announcing that 91 per cent of its members support debate on this issue says it all.

On the upside, the District of North Vancouver now has two confirmed challengers for council in November.

Blueridge lawyer Jim Hanson, who showed superior qualifications for office in an unsuccessful provincial bid last year, brings some desperately needed brainpower and ethical backbone to the campaign. And Glenn MacKenzie, a leader of the No High-Rises in Lynn Valley campaign, has also declared his interest.

Already this one is revving up.

Fortunately, creative life is percolating in North Vancouver. Last week at Café Artigiano's cheerful patio in Edgemont Village, I enjoyed an illuminating conversation with North Shore UBC scholar Thomas Salumets. With the current turmoil in Ukraine, his new book on writer Jaan Kaplinski from the small Baltic state of Estonia is suddenly timely. Kaplinski has visited here several times, and his friend the current Estonian President Toomas Ilves lived and worked in Vancouver in the 1980s. Unforced Flourishing; Understanding Jaan Kaplinski is published by McGill Queen's University Press.

At the Save the Salish Sea Festival a fortnight back where golden age rockers Chilliwack helped Vancouver find its old soul again, former North Shore News staffer and Greenpeace International co-founder Rex Weyler released his new Catch The Light CD recording. His "Bounty Hunter" tune is soulful to the max.

And how about a friendly chat with that elderly neighbour as we move into fall? Thanks to French-Canadian George at the bus stop for reminding me there's no story like a good old story!

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