The Epistle of Q — Chapter 135

Oh no, not another political rant…Should I run for a House of Commons Seat?

There are election winds blowing again and Elections Canada already is starting to recruit people to work on the next federal election. Three premiers have rolled the dice during the pandemic and won, so the temptation is out there for the Prime Minister no doubt.

And it is interesting to note that it is projected he will win if he calls an election soon enough. Never mind that he has led a scandal-plagued government, broken countless election promises and has violated his own avowed ethical standards at least three times. And people are surprised that Trump got as many votes as he did against Biden? And then look at Great Britain and the struggles of the PM there to get a deal with the European Union after promising he would easily conclude such negotiations. For those who wonder if democracy is in peril, I’m not sure that I can mount a significant counter-argument.

Yesterday the PM announced that a renewed emphasis on raising the Carbon Tax was being implemented (after constantly claiming the Conservatives were wrong during the election – the only thing they were wrong about was they predicted a smaller increase!!). It’s going to go to $170/tonne by 2030, which is only nine years away. And while some of that will be given back to individual taxpayers, a considerable amount will be ploughed into more subsidies for things the PM and his cohort believe are good for us including Electric Cars. (A sidebar here: not all electric and plug-in electrics are treated the same – I found out in the midst of attempting to buy one that because it was deemed to be a car only bought by people who are wealthy – note to self, don’t tell my banker or she might succumb to a heart attack – that actually certain vehicles get hit with a luxury tax, not a discount!)

Now it’s not that I am opposed to seeing more electric cars including plug-in electrics, although it is strange that the plug-in electric model of the SUV I drive actually wouldn’t give as good a fuel average as my eight year old diesel which due to government regulations is no longer available in Canada. (Perhaps I digress because the new roadster would have improved significantly on the V8 powered Cabriolet currently in the garage – although with the luxury tax, the fuel savings liked were wiped out – but we will never know as I didn’t get it and the older Cabriolet is still churning good driving moments). But my point is that any vehicle should be put on the road at a price that ensures it is profitable without government handouts. Furthermore, for a vehicle to be a sustaining market presence it must be aesthetically pleasing, comfortable and safe to drive (in all seasons), as well as cost efficient to the owner. If it does all that, it should be competitive, although judging by some makes and models, reputations can sour and then hurt sales (e.g. Volvo & SAAB no longer have a big presence even though they come from the idyllic land of Sweden, Pontiac and Oldsmobile, Mercury and Meteor, Plymouth and Desoto have disappeared altogether – not to mention the demise of Packard, Hudson, Rambler, Studebaker, all in my driving lifetime).

So if conventional cars (and some trucks too) have been unable to stand the test of time, why should we now start subsidizing new cars that are not yet, by their very nature, validated as long-term people-haulers. Let them be produced, marketed and put on car lots and see if the buyer will go for them. If not, too bad. That’s the democratic, free market at work. Similarly, why are there all kinds of subsidies being funneled into house upgrades – if these upgrades are reducing the energy consumption, why do they need additional tax-payer monies? In any event, the point of all this is to once again ask – what has this country got against fossil fuels that individual action couldn’t impact? If you want to reduce your carbon footprint, go forward — buy your electric car, stop using plastic products (including cell phones), dramatically alter your life-style. This isn’t a pandemic, it’s about your conviction that you can change the cosmic forces that basically determine our seasons, our years, our climate. So move forward and show us that your choices are economically and socially and psychologically and physically better, and being rational folk we will surely come around. Besides why do we need government’s heavy hands dealing with resources, when it couldn’t handle something that is of vital relevance to the public good – the Covid-19 issue?

So let me be specific. For the foreseeable future we will need gas and oil and plastics and other aspects of our economic and social cultures that come from hydrocarbons. Moreover, we need to get as much revenue as we can in order to help overcome the horrific federal debt we are now carrying. We are a raw-resource based economy and to extract these resources is an exercise that requires considerable energy, much of it depending on fossil fuels (and unless solar, wind, and other such sources can be tapped without government subsidies they should not be touted as the be-all and end-all of our survival). One resource that will require a slow changeover to alternate fuel/energy sources is agriculture. The investments that the average farm, ranch, orchard or vineyard has in equipment that use fossil fuels are such that no quick and easy change will come – so think carefully about your food security or more importantly your food accessibility.

I could go on to talk about mining and forestry but let me conclude this before I am into a full rant. The reason I am even reflecting on all this the day after the announced new and vigorous carbon tax increase has been announced, is that recently it was somewhat strongly suggested to me that I should make myself available to stand for election in this next federal vote and that I should run under the banner of the Maverick Party which is now emerging as a potential political force on the prairies and maybe in the interior of B.C. The people making this suggestion are not deplorables or political ignoramuses, but thoughtful well-educated individuals. They have pledged organizational and monetary support. They don’t even think my age is a deterrent. In fact, they believe in the early days of the Maverick Party it might help to have some people with considerable experience with life in Canada over the years.

Here’s the thing though. I was never a big fan of Reform, even though I went to university with Preston Manning and appreciated his political perspectives. I wasn’t sure that even if successful whether the West would necessarily be let in without strong support from other parts of the country. The emergence of the reconfigured Conservative Party under Stephen Harper did seem to hold out some hope – but people in the East seemed to prefer style over substance and they found him to be too cold, too focused on the job of governing (as opposed to ruling) and after the economy got back on its feet and the budget balanced the temper of the time went in another direction. And now we are in the worst financial, economic, political and even mental/emotional state we have been since at least the Second World War (our mental wellness index has dropped 24% meaning that over half the population now is affected by mental health problems since the pandemic started)… so the Reform and PC’s experiment, generally failed – certainly when Rona Ambrose couldn’t be persuaded to run for the Conservative leadership this past year, I didn’t see a big resurgence in the conservative thinking leadership world.

My view of the Confederation has slowly shifted in the past couple of years. I no longer see as much hope for the West. And after the recent election in BC, I don’t have any hope for the reconciliation of the two solitudes in this province, even with a couple of NDP’ers elected east of Hope. What is to be done? Maybe it is time to have some serious conversations about a new look to the space we have called Canada. With the change in ice conditions, perhaps the Port of Churchill and the MacKenzie Delta are reasonably good coastal locations to give the West adequate access to oceans (especially should Prince Rupert stay within the controls of anti-oil). And perhaps a Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Yukon and NWT merger into the old Hudson’s Bay tract/territory could just work fine. For one thing, Irving Oil could start receiving Western Crude by ships coming out of Hudson’s Bay and down the eastern seaboard – in fact, even Quebec might accept such shipments coming up the St. Lawrence as replacements for Middle Eastern Oil that currently comes by tanker. Yes autos are build elsewhere, but Ontario would likely be quite willing to enter into trade agreements as would many of the States in the USA – moreover Japan, Germany, South Korea and Great Britain would no doubt be quite happy to continue to ship their products. And there are already many facilities in the West that could (and in some cases already do) produce agricultural, mining & forestry machinery. As for food – the West produces enough grain to trade with other countries for other food stuffs and with the progress being made in hot houses and other year-round vegetable producing systems, the Prairies could quickly develop more self-sufficiency. And with the interior of BC on board, fruit and wine is assured.

The more I think about this, the more I want to dig deeper and research the viability. Who knows, down the road maybe Montana, Idaho, Oregon & Washington states might want to strike up some form of economic association (not to mention, Utah, Wyoming & Colorado along with the Dakotas and Arizona). So then the question circles back: should I at least start the conversation by talking with the Maverick Party about being vetted as a candidate for the local riding? Do I want to put my family through the wringer, because we know the media will be ruthless in looking at any candidate that isn’t politically correct? Is having the debate more important than the constant surveillance? Would it be possible to bring back some magic and enthusiasm for change that propelled me to the top in student government elections at the University of Alberta, or has that ship sailed into wondrous historical memories?

Well, stay tuned because this conversation is just getting started. And it could get lively, or it may simply float into the ether…

By the way, celebrate Advent…

As always,
g.w.