Tuesday, June 19, 2012

The day democracy died

In a year that celebrates the 30th anniversary of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, we may have also seen the demolition of the very foundation of the democracy that document protects.  While other countries look to Canada as an example of how to protect the rights and freedoms of individuals, our own government has taken the initiative to trample on the trust we place in elected officials and have eroded effective government at it's core.  On Monday, June 18th, 2012 the sitting Conservative government voted to pass the "2012 Budget Bill" against public outcry and opposition protests.

If you are not aware, Bill C-38 also known as "An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 29, 2012 and other measures", is a 451 page doorstop of legalese that I am sure no one has actually consumed entirely. You can read the full document here if you have a few days to burn and a law degree to decipher it.  There are so many things wrong with this whole situation, it is hard to know where to start.  Maybe we should begin with the fact that only a portion of this is actually even related to the actual budget handed down by the Minister Jim Flaherty. The rest of the document is additional items that can be considered tangential at best to the actual budget.

Maybe we should just consider the fact that this is a 450+ page document that was expected to be processed in the same manner as the normal 10 to 20 page documents are in the commons.  The average size of a bill passed in the 1990s was a dozen pages.  Even during the current sitting, Bill C-38 can be considered outrageously huge.  Consider Bill C-2 amending the Criminal code at only 16 pages, or even bill C-10 which itself was considered abnormally large at 114 pages.  The full list of bills presenting in the commons in this sitting is available here.

Let's forget the fact that it is huge and unreadable, which in itself undermines government, this bill is also not what it was represented to be.  Canadians were expecting this bill to be about the budget, about "Jobs, Growth and long term prosperity" to quote Minister Jim Flaherty.  They were not expecting completely new acts to be introduced that affect the Environment, or changes to the Nuclear Regulatory Act to be included in a "Budget Bill".  They were not expecting alterations to the Oil and Gas Operations Act, or alterations to the Fisheries Act.  I really doubt that most Canadians were expecting a "Budget Bill" to include releasing entire sections of the First Nations Fiscal and Statistical Management Act.  Add to this alterations to old age security, unemployment insurance, modifications to the parole board, reductions in libraries archives and R&D programs, the list goes on.

So not only has the government blatantly lied to the Canadian public by the gross misrepresentation of bill C-38, they have used their overwhelming majority in the commons to pass the bill against the protests of the official opposition.  The elected representatives who are supposed to be representing the public interest have completely ignored the calls of the vast majority of the Canadian public to break down the bill into smaller components and as a result have destroyed the very concept of representative government.

Congratulations Mr. Harper, you have killed democracy.

Well, the press, including a plethora of bloggers will not be forgetting about this soon and neither should you.  There is really nothing you can do about it - that is the scary thing here.  Your elected representatives have pushed this through Parliament and it will now pass though Senate to become law by the end of the week.  Such is the way of corrupt governments.  What you can do is remember this and when you do get the opportunity to vote (because this really is still a democracy) you can exercise your right to remove the Conservative government from power.  If this government continues to completely disregard their responsibility to fairly represent the populace, then that may be they only democratic right you have still intact.

Be Awesome - Change the world.


Monday, June 18, 2012

The "beautiful is good" effect


 I had the pleasure of spending the past week with three beautiful women on a beach in Mexico.  I know - tough life, right?  Yes, one of them was my wife, and two friends came along for the ride.  I learned two important things from this experience -
    1) SPF 15 is completely useless under the June sun in Cancun
    2) Men are universally predictable around beautiful women

I am accustomed to getting preferential treatment when I travel with my incredibly beautiful wife.  When we go out for dinner, waiters will always treat us (well my wife, actually) with more preference than other tables.  I started noticing this a while ago when we would go to a place that I also tended to visit alone or with male friends - the attention was always better when I took my wife. Apparently there is also a multiplying effect.

This past week I was vacationing in the Mayan Riviera with my wife and two attractive friends when I realized I was experiencing something called "the beautiful is good effect" and it does indeed seem to have a multiplying effect.  The bar tenders at the resort pool treated me like a king with my own harem.  One of them was offering service of some kind every 15 minutes with complimentary drinks, food service, you name it.  The beach crew even came by and offered a selection of activities (para-sailing, scuba, etc).  While these are normally available to anyone, you normally have to go to them for the service, not simply lay there on a deck chair waiting.  We seem to have proven empirically that the "beautiful is good" effect is very real.

It's not fair, and it sucks for not-so-attractive people, but this remnant of our evolutionary path does serve a purpose.  It is completely logical that more attractive people are likely to be healthier mates, better for breeding and propagation of the species.  It also makes sense, in an evolutionary way, for the attraction to be stronger in groups - strength in numbers and all that.

It got even better on Friday when two more beautiful women joined us for a day on the beach in Playa Del Carmen.  Different location, different environment, different service staff, but same effect.  The server came short of offering us complimentary foot rubs, but I am sure they would have been provided if asked. Needless to say, I highly recommend traveling with beautiful people.  I am sure if Hugh Hefner walked into a New York hotel alone and unannounced people would barely recognize him, but when he appears with five bunnies in his entourage, people say "hey, there's Hugh Hefner… with his harem".

I found it fascinating to watch and it stirred a desire to read more on sociology and anthropology in the future.  OK, maybe that is just the Margarita talking :-)











Be Awesome - Change the world.