David Berner - story telling

One of my all time favourite songs is Lyle Lovett’s “If I had a boat”.  It goes ‘If I had a boat I’d go out on the ocean and if I had a pony I’d ride him on my boat.”  I found myself thinking of that song listening to the incredible David Berner tell stories of as many incongruous moments in his fascinating long life.

He told of his helping set up  X-Kalay, recovery house for addicts leaving jail in Winnipeg. That’s the story of his book. “All the Way Home”.   He talked about living in London England doing the most boring job, putting items in a ledger for the Queen. He told of his time with Bob Hunter, later of Greenpeace Fame, in the “Company of Young Canadians”.  Then his work as a famous actor and comedian. He’s so very funny.  

The audience laughed and there were enough in the theatre business there to appreciate his description of his life a ‘between gigs!”  

He wrote for the Province and the Tyee and is known for the David Berner Monologues and the David Berner Show which continus to appears on Shaw Television 

 He worked at CBC having various jobs including interviewing folk from all over the world but mostly in the entertainment industry.  He’d later work as a radio and television interviewer for a variety of stations, including CJOR and CKNW  He reminisced about old leaders in the radio and television journalism world.  

He told wonderful anecdotes of Oscar Award Winnners he knew.  We especially loved hearing  about Shelly Winters,  Ginger Rogers, Carol Channing, and Ray Malan.  But his stories about his Jewish grandmother took the cake. 

He continues to teach and work as a therapist with addicts. I personally knew him from the Drug Prevention Network where he was the Executive Director. He has also been  working at Orchard Alcohol and Drug Treatment Centre doing group therapy. He told moving tales of recovery bringing tears to our eyes with the stories of hope. 

He  talked of his writing and concluded with reading a delightful work of detective fiction. It was a couple of hours of sheer entertainment. My partner Laura loved it all.  

I found myself thinking of Billy Bishop Goes to War, Canada’s most famous one man show.

Almeda, CBC and Fake News

Alameda University and Master of Divinity and Fake News

-William Hay, MD FRCPC CCSAM

I wrote about this some years back but the twisted tale gets even more convoluted. I told Dr. James Houston the former chancellor of Regent College that God had a sense of humor.  Dr. Houston has a great sense of humor and he thought this a funny story indeed.

It’s most recent twist is a request from a CBC news reporter to discuss my Almeda Degree. I’ve been vociferous about CBC Fake News for a year, which is rather disappointing as I’ve been a fan of CBC programs for decades. How sad that CBC News once reliable has gone over to the Dark Side.

I have lots of prestigious “Paper’, a Medical Degree from University of Manitoba, and a Canadian Fellowship in the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons. In addition I had my FLEX, the American Medical Degree, and subspeciality certification in Addiction Medicine, in Canada, the US and Internationally.  I’ve taught at University of Manitoba and the University of British Columbia.  I’ve 30 years of medical and psychiatric clinical experience and am an acknowledged expert in Canadian and American courts.  

I didn’t ‘need’ more paper.  But I’m a Ship’s Captain having sailed solo in winter to Hawaii.  Technically I can ‘marry’ at sea but I wanted a piece of paper. My psychiatrist friend had got a piece of paper on line and married his daughter and I thought such a diploma might come in a handy if I wanted to place a blessing and a curse on some unsuspecting couple. I’m personally divocred and women have aborted my babies suggesting that even the idea of being married by someone such as myself would be suspicious. A fake marriage? 

I also have been studying Spirituality and Christian theology formally for longer than I have been a doctor. At the University of Winnipeg I studied Literature of the Bible with Dr. Carl Ridd back in the 70’s.  I grew up a Christian and have studied the Bible and Christianity all my life, studying all manner of courses in churches and teaching Christianity, prayer and meditation. I published a number of papers on Christianity, religious studies and comparative religions.  The most prestigious was an article I published in the Journal of Science and Religion.  

I also studied Yoga with the Self Realization Fellowship of Paramahansa Yogananda obtaining my diploma from that institute, travelling to Encinadas and later India.  That was back in the 70’s and 80’s before I studied Hypnosis and Self Hypnosis with the Ericksonian Institute.  A long time fan of Dr. Herbert Benson’s Relaxation Response I published a paper on meditation and blood pressure treatment back when I was delivering babies and doing surgery. 

Around that time I was asked to teach a class of young women Hatha yoga and threw out my bag trying to impress these girls with a humble presentation meant to help overcome ego. 

I have never missed an opportunity to study with religious leaders of a variety of religions, spending hours in sweat lodges with indigenous elders, going through various ceremonies, studying Tai Chi and taoism, studying Buddhism with a fellow physician, taking courses in Hinduism, learning from a Sufi, spending time with an Orthodox scholar, dating a Bahi and an aetheist and learning from osmosis. I have learned from Sikhs and Hindus and recently from a Zoroastrian.  I studied the Classics and learned the pagan religions of Greece, Rome and Egypt. I have enjoyed  reading the major texts of world religions.  I read the Torah and discussed Judaism at length with my mensch friend Sam and took guidance from Dr. Rabbi Twerski. I definitely enjoyed meeting the Dalai Lama and Bishop Tutu and have been blessed in countless spiritual encounters with men and women I could only admire and hope perhaps to emulate in some small way.

Though I ‘d been president of Amalgated Baptist Youth groups I would go on to publish a paper on how I was a better doctor than I was a Christian in the Medical Post. .  This was around the time when I had travelled to Israel on pilgrimage and began decades of travel to various spiritual sites, often designated Heritage sites.  One day I hope to write a book of these travels and the meaning they had for me. I’ve blogged them with the photographs I’ve taken and discussed the various followers I’ve talked with along with the spiritual leaders I’ve met.

About 20 years ago I began studying theology in night school formally focussing on Christian Spirituality, taking many courses over the years at Vancouver School of Theology, St. Mark’s Catholic College and Regent College.  I’d also taken church courses like Alpha and studied the Holy Spirit with the Pentecostals. I was meditating with a Benedictine Nun at the time and reading books like neuroscientist’s Mario de Beuregaard’s Spiritual Brain.  I especially liked How the Irish Saved Civilization series too. Though raised Baptist and been a member of the United Church of Canada I was formally baptized Anglican and became a reader at Christ Church Cathedral.  

I was doing readings and discussing ministry with pastors and ministers and thought I’d like a Masters of Divinity in Christian Spirituality or Ecumenical Studies.  This would allow me to marry on my yacht, a dubious matter and would also document this informal aspect of my training which was increasingly a direction I was taking in my addiction medicine clinical work where it was obvious that addiction was conceptualized not just as a disease but also a spiritual malaise.  

When I looked for an institute that would provide such a degree I found that none were indeed ecumenical. I could get a masters in religious studies and having shared with various institutes what I had accomplished was repeatedly told that I could indeed obtain with some extra study what I wanted but nothing was ‘ecumenical’.  Comparative religions yes, religious studies yes, but nothing like Christian Ecumenical Spirituality.  The Baptists have their M Div universities, the United Church theirs , the Catholics theirs, the Hindus and Muslims and Taoist their’s . I found that interesting because it appeared the religions had attempted through actual amalgamation religions like the Bahai’s and perhaps Muslims and  perhaps Mormons to create a religious equivalent of Esperanzo while individually academically  they really were quite divided.  I didn’t want an Anglican Master of Divinity as I really didn’t want a job. I was a Doctor. 

The music director of my church called me, a Christian Psychiatrist, an Oxymoron because Freud had been an aetheist and he considered psychiatrists Priests of Science. I told him that while I was Freudian trained I’d also studied in depth the theist Dr. Carl Jung and been mentored by the great Christian spiritual psychiatrists Dr. White, Dr. Gutowski and Dr. Ney. 

That’s when I came across the idea in California of on line degrees based on experience and review and questions by on line faculty.  I liked the secular nature of Almeda ironically and frankly for $1000 I was pleased to get an Almeda University degree that was backed by the government of California.  The process of finding all the paper that supported the above studies and more, getting the various universities to forward evidence of my attendance, finding copies of publications and answering endless questions in this regards was itself fascinating. Then I got this diploma.  

Psychologically at the time I was also somewhat miffed by the general institutional university’s monetary elitism as the costs of study were becoming exorbitant and exclusive for my patients.  I had had scholarlships but the education debts that my patients carried were a form of indentured servitude. Yet their future employment increasingly depended on these diplomas. Also increasingly students from other countries arrived with diplomas which had no real equivalency with Canadian or American or British or European or Indian or South African degrees. I saw an increasing disparity in this and learned around the same time that the University of Toronto had granted medical degrees to students who had been failed by the faculty but by threatening legal action passed by the administration.  In California there were simply not enough positions for the number of people who wanted to study and on line universities were becoming the answer.  I’d studied Aboriginal Studies in distance learning from University of Waterloo in the 80’s and have maintained my medical scholarship in part by constant listening to medical tapes, then discs the USB sticks in my car or truck.

I supported this process and thought there really was a place for experiential equivalency. This came about when I was training nurse practitioners who were doing the work of a general practitioner though not in a hospital setting.  I thought Almeda was a phenomena but clearly institutions have an invested interest in exclusivity and branding.  

I followed the scandal of Almeda and other on line institutions which were increasingly exposed as traditional and conventional universities increasingly replaced these original rogues with their own brands. 

At the time I was asked to be on the board of an off shore medical university by a former ambassador. The whole issue of education changing with some off shore universities being acknowledged as equivalent while others didn’t meet the varying standards.  It was also apparent that much of the certification process at the institutional level depended on whose hand your greased and by how much.  

I’d met doctors from some countries who knew less than first year medical students while some countries graduated doctors superior to myself and classmates. When I was accepted for a position at Stanford I was considered one of the ‘foreign doctors’ and discussed this when I was interviewed at Berkeley and in a Virginia position.  Increasingly much of Continuing Medical Education, which I’ve dutifully completed with honours and excess is highly suspect.

About the same time a beurocratic doctor who to my mind was best described as frankly, stupid, and  received an honary degree causing me to reflect on the whole ‘business’ of education for  cash and influence of the honorary degree. Wasnt the online experiential degree an honourable extension of this existing questionable practice?  

I just learned that the Engineers are adamantly questioning the relevance of professional studies past training since the nature of professional standards is self study and self awareness and task specific. Now i’ve heard that many other professions are questioning the training in their departments and finding that these certifications and recertification amount to little more than a money grab as they’ve been shown increasingly to be scientifically irrelevant.  They have made a very lucrative business of charging students who agreed to pay up front over and over again for the same training which is increasingly irrelevant to the older members in the field. 

My Queen’s Counsel friend shared one night how his legal work is so highly subspecialized that there are only 2 or 3 in Canada doing it. The continuing legal education in his field is generally set by academics at the level of law students with little relevance given the generalities of the knowledge base. I feel the same. Worse in my continuing medical education certified training there are increasing sign in sheets and the didactic lectures are the only thing valued by these low brows in the increasing policing of doctors education by low level political factions intent on making more money as ‘educators’.  The best education I have at conferences is the discussions over coffee with colleagues and rarely in the didactic presentations where we go back to sitting in desks and being obedient students as fun as that is.

So psychologically I was glad to have this On Line Degree and put it up on my wall . I’d a diploma up there also which declared  “I bought the band a drink’.   Indeed it is one of the fancier ones and was only first noticed months after I put it on the wall.  Both degrees allowed me to ask patients what they wanted a degree for and what was education. I've been encouraging patients for ever to get education while bemoaning Canada's tendency to mediocrity. A master's degree is well supported in Canada and repays the effort but my phD friends and medicine specialists versus surgeons feel that the further specialization its not reimbursed as it is in the US and Europe. 

It could be said that I had some ambivalence about the academic institutions especially since a government in my former home province had under funded education with the result that my own Medical Degree, once one of the top three in Canada had been devalued by these thug politicians none of whom had much education at all among themselves.  There was a mediocrity growing in Canada and the education systems were in chaos. My second university had fallen in 'value' whereas my first and third degrees were ''devalued". 

My father used to complain that he had to stop hiring union men because increasingly the carpenters despite their “trade” papers seemed solely to be incestuously related but lacking the the capacity to distinguish hammer from saw. In those contracts he was required to hire union he was hard pressed to complete the job as opposed to other contracts where he could hire individually according to merit.

In Canada the illiteracy rate of high school graduates with the stoppage of national high school proficiency exams became such an issue that universities eventually introduced admission exams because Canadian high school diplomas no longer had currency with institutions of higher learning. Many argued the was a product of liberalism socialist  or communist influence. Everyone was. ‘Entitled’ to a degree rather than being required to ‘earn’ a degree.

It was also easier and cheaper for me to get an American license to practice medicine than to great a Canadian license in another province because of the increasing politicization and Balkanization of education in Canada. It remains the case that Ontario doesn't quite acknowledge medical education from other provinces charging several order more to Canadians to have their training acknowledged than any province charges Ontario in return despite Ontario degrees being the most suspicious in the country given how many are obtained by legal threat.  

Spiritually I was amused at the degree too. One of  my favourite religious teachers had been Brother Lawrence who was the monastery’s kitchen help.  

Then I heard Almeda as an institution died. The folk just closed up shop. This interesting innovator It was presumably beaten down by existing institutions and laws and killed.  I really don't know what they did to bring upon themselves systemic wrath but the there obviously was some back rooms decision to regulate the university degree granting process. 

This was at the time I’d bought a hard bottomed rubber boat which sprung a leak.  When I tried to get parts the company had gone out of business.   This was just capitalism and market forces at work. The same had occurred with the radar I had when it was damaged. I couldn’t get parts. I have a hard drive from a company now defunct and I only learned of it when I found it didn't interface with new software. Interesting exclusive parallels with market forces and centralized regulatory forces competing.

About this time I also finally found years later a university offering Ecumenical degrees in divinity and theology.  This was at Columbia University and the Irony was that the program was started by a psychiatrist with interest in divinity.  I’ve considered taking classes and do hope to continue to study theology in formal didactic classes alongside my ongoing informal study.  The trouble is that increasingly degrees are being issued with a shelf life. I didn't renew an American Certificate I had because the prestigious institution could only vouch for its own diploma for five years. As a learning machine professional I was interested then that these institutions of supposed higher education were unable to produce a training program of the likes of my medical degree which was a life long degree with no shelf life limitation. I don't think i’d stop being a medical doctor if my university stopped paying the rent or defaulted on a loan. My Master of Divinity degree retains inherently the value of equivalence of the citizenship status of a person whose country has been dissolved by war perhaps.

My personal learning includes going to places like Instanbul where I hired a Turkish professor of religion and history and was guided for days through mosques and museums studying Islam as well as visiting the underground churches of Cappadocia.  I have had a number of torture victims as patients who had escaped from Muslim prisons and countries.  At the same time I’d been a presenter in Azerbaijan with a most delightful Muslim physician who answered my religious questions about his religious experience devoutly.  In the last few years because of the horrid ignorance of the Canadian politicians regarding religion I've been reading more extensively about the church development and religion and state interface. Where once I was reading Kierkegaard and Buber I found answers in Karen Armstrong’s Fields of Blood. I'm also reading the history of council and creeds withe the dicussions of orthodoxy and apostasy. At the the of King Lear he says “Lets talk of court things, whose in whose out”. Because the matter of whose in the in crowd as in the high school yard chum circle functions well beyond the school yard. Indeed President Obama gave out medals once reserved for the courageous and brave to comedians as the Queen Knighted Beatles and the Nobel Prize for Literature was given to Bob Dylan. 

The mystery is with everyone shelling out experiential degrees who indeed did Almeda offend, whose hand did they fail to grease and why as a true innovator in the process did they fail. I expect the answer is money. They simply didn't have the resources to muddle on like other similar bodies had through history. Time magazine with its ‘person of the year’ awards survived the probable error of the infamous Hitler choice. Perhaps if Almeda stuck to Divinity degrees no one would have cared but their administration degrees might have been used by too many Canadian Senators resulting in that once august body having shameful ignominy today. I am glad I didn't marry anyone because they might well have overnight joined the ranks of the unmarried without the blessing of the legal system which is making a killing off an institution once principally a source of ecclesiastical revenue.

I reported a fake doctor who had risen in the ranks of our local government concealing his never having obtained a doctorate from the august instition he claimed he had. What fascinated me was that he had appealed so much to the authorities. He was consulting on policy and nor practicing in a physical manner where our Fake surgeon surgeons or Fake pilots show up rather obviously. This fellow merely had the gift for the gab and said what our local government wanted to hear. His recommendations were so alien to the university position I knew that I questioned his credentials. Sure enough he was an imposter. But his policy persists today as abhorrent as it is because the government wanted a stamp of approval on their cost cutting nonsense. The matter which interested me most was his success at fooling literally hundreds if not thousands before I personally called him out as a fake, a liar, a fraud. It was a very dangerous tim. 

It goes to the naming of a thing - godly or ungodly. Are the fruit trees Adam named wrongly named today as we found only later that Adam disobeyed God. Are the names given since the Apple less or more valid. 

Personally I see the future as closer to retirement, some five or 10 years out, with the idea that I’ll see myself studying more religion and theology and spirituality, meditating more and writing and reading more in the area of spirituality. I don’t know if I’ll marry anyone at sea.  I have my ship’s captains papers for that as it is though I believe it would require me being in international waters. I may have to get a new degree if I want to host a dock party wedding and sactifymthe occasion.

But it was fun to have a CBC Fake News journalist call me and ask me about what is now being  called a ‘fake degree’.  I don’t know that it is. It’s a bit like when a country changes its flag.  Like Canada today, increasingly a communist police state with all the assaults on freedom speech and the death of journalism.  I grew up with a journalist mother during the hey day of the Winnipeg Free Press and have watched  journalist friends leave Canada because they say news journalism can’t be done here any more.  I do believe one can be  a sports journalist still but I don’t know any more. Will hockey be as fake as soccer any day soon? 

I think it’s ironic that I get a divinity degree and the institution fails.  If I was grandiose I would think my intrinsic evil nature , that binary gnostic self,  had destroyed this institution.   Perhaps it’s  just a reminder that religious studies is an ongoing , one day at a time, matter.  Like my boat and radar I guess I may have worked my studies so hard that I simply need a new one.  

I laugh too, sure that the young CBC journalist who called was probably given the story by someone who I’ve insulted for being a pot head sharia communist Liberal liar who panders to the shirtless Prime Minister Trudeau who supports the destruction of freedom of speech with anti Semitic Islamaphobia legislation.  I still have the Master of Divinity Certificate from when it was considered ‘good’.  It’s a bit like Canadian Currency though. Since the liberals came into power my dollar is now only 70 cents on an American dollar. I much preferred it a couple of years ago when it was almost par with the American dollar. 

I’m actually thankful because it brought me back to reflect on this journey and how I really must spend more time in my spiritual pursuits having been way laid by political discussions which do not appeal to me nearly as much as talking about Jesus or asking why Christians can’t create a ‘core’ study program like medicine with it’s subspeciality degrees.  I love medicine that way. After a generalist degree in medicine and surgery,  subspecialized in Community Medicine, Psychiatry and Addiction Medicine. I 

think it would be great if there was a 4 years religious studies program and then you  could get  a Christian degree, a Catholic degree, a Judaic degree, Moslem degree, or a Hindu degree etc.  There is initially shallow generalist knowledge and later deeper specialist knowledge.   Thomas Merton was a much deeper student of east and west and I really have a long way to go.  

I believe there is one God. I believe that Jesus was the son of God and that humans are the children of God.  I believe what Jesus said summed up religion as later stated by Hillel, Love God and Love your neighbour as yourself.  I wrote a paper at Vancouver School of Theology on comparing heavens and concluded that Mark Twain’s description of heaven was the one I wanted.  

Yesterday I listened to a Methodist minister share his views on hope.  I hope to get a new Theology degree. I’ve got a new radar and a new boat to replace the previous hard bottomed dinghy.  I have hope that CBC News will one day stop being so Fake and that the present Liberal Government will be replaced by a government less promoting of drugs and impaired consciousness.  It seems fake to me.

But there is a fundamental confusion today about what is truth and what is fake.  I miss the blue on the Canadian flag I grew up with.   I do hope University of Manitoba and University of British Columbia maintain their standards.  Poor socialist Venezuelans today have a country that is unable to feed their people and no doubt their university degrees are becoming like their other paper currencies.  I don’t think I’d like to be operated by a doctor who graduated from Somalia or one who bought his degree with lawyers from University of Toronto. 

I think it’s ironic that my spiritual degree has returned to the little off shore island where it began.   Almeda was the brain child of some academics with an office  on a Caribean Island back when.

Addendum

I just learned that Almeda apparently had been bought in recent years by a Pakistani ‘diploma mill’  I received a call from the CBC News reporter today having written this after the email arrived last week.  

I immediately wondered if this was where Prime Minister Trudeau’s gifts of Canadian tax payer’s millions of dollars  to Pakistan was going.  The plot thickens. What is true and what is fake?

I have agreed to talk with the CBC reporter next week to discuss this. 

My natural paranoia is such that I can’t help but think that CBC News would take an interest in this after I’ve been such an out spoken critic of CBC Fake News.  The reporter denied knowing I was a critic of CBC yet admitted to reading my on line writing.  What is true?   

I’m especially a rather loud critic of the unholy relationship between CBC News and the Liberal government.  The Liberal government has given CBC news more money despite the increasing number of jokes circulating on the internet about CBC reporting. My personal favourite is  “Is it fake news or is it CBC?”   

I am thankful that the email occasioned my reflection on this which I share but I sensed that the motivation might well be an attempt at character assassination since the Liberals have excelled in Ad Hominem and all the CBC News seems mired in innuendo and suggestion.  Fear mongering always and what sells rather than what is true.  

So much of it does come down to the rhetoric “Appeal to Authority”.  Clearly CBC, Pakistan and Almeda today all have issues with Authority "image" .  My ‘spiritual’ authority is questionable as a ‘sinner’ .  My authority is as a doctor.   I do have a diploma which was validated by the California Education system.  But today it is questioned. 

That this was nearly a decade ago when Almeda was as valid as the CBC news of that era makes one question "perception".  What is the 'shelf life' on a story especially a CBC story. I find CBC news tedious because it sounds increasingly so much like Pravda and gives speculation and opinion rather than stating the 'facts' before getting into the talking heads.  Reuters retains some respectability as it continues to focus on fact more than the journalist, not that there is any objectivity since Heissenberg.  

 Tarek Fatah would say Pakistan has had image problems longer than Almeda or CBC so why is Trudeau giving them Canadian  money.  Why is CBC questioning education that originates in this Muslim country. Is this Islamaphobia? Is it news?  Whose paying for this.  What’s my part in it. Why me. Why today.  

Of course as a spiritual person, I ask what does God want me to know from this?  A thrice divorced man, I probably shouldn’t be marrying people?   

Donald Trump, President of the United States of America

I am so happy that Donald Trump has won the presidency of the United States.  I am so dissappointed in our Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau.
 It is so painful still to listen to the media, especially the absolutely horrid CBC news.  CBC has been as biased in this election as CNN, the  Clinton Network News.  Both deserve the Goebbels Press Award for the smost propagandistic new reporting of the year.  We continue to see a whole lot of Hillary Clinton and Obama despite the fact that Trump is the present and the future.  Move Over Hillary and Obama, your day is done and Donald Trump deserves centre stage. This is his time of victory, you stage hogging poor losers. I want to hear and see the new President.  Not yesterdays news!
The media, Trudeau, the Clintons and Obama, to use Obama’s phrase,  are  “on the wrong side of history.”  While I appreciate, given their elitism, privilege and arrogance,  that this is hard for them to comprehend, it is still so painful to watch them clinging desperately to the past.  
The media keeps repeating  out of context scripted sound bites and ad hominems that sounded hollow and hypocritical when first they were spouted but now sound downright sick and pathetic.
Donald Trump simply is not sexist, racist, misogynist or not qualified for the office of the President of the United States.  The media elite,  Hollywood drama queens and all those millions of Saudi and Wall Street dollars did not convince people yesterday. Today they are utter tripe.    Hillary Dumpty fell and all the Corporate dollars and UN horses could not put Hillary together again.
I feel like I’m at V day in WWII.   CBC instead filming the Canadian victorious troops has chosen to talk to the Nazi about their failed  plans for world dominion.   America and Britain have voted for democracy instead of a Kafkaesque beurocratic  dictatorship centred in Brussels.  
There is fresh air flowing into  the room but the stale air clings like old cigar scents and spilt promises.  There is new light in the darkness while the shadows scurry in the corners.
 "The media refused to take Trump seriously but they insisted on taking him literally.” This is the day that Political Correctness died. Unfortunately we will spend years clearing the rotting carcases left soiling our schools and society.  
There was no climate change denial, but there certainly is Donald Trump Denial. Donald Trump is President Elect of the United States of American. Wake up Media!
There’s a new president of the United States of America, Donald Trump.  Finally we can all hope Justin Trudeau will have adult supervision.

Morning, Friday, July 24, 2015

I’m awake.  Dreams were a mix.  Walking in shit one moment, being with friends the next.  No feeling of dread on a wakening. But not that deep spiritual peace either. I love those dreams where dogs  I’ve loved joined me or I’ve been with family now passed over. I love the big meeting dreams and the adventure dreams.  I have this recurrent sailing dream associated with a river and a peninsula.  It’s always an adventure and every time I dream that dream I’m further ahead or some aspect of the puzzle is fulfilled.  Last night I slept well too.
I’d watched Jerry Maquire on tv.  I don’t know what’s happened these last months but all these old movies are enjoyable to watch again. Especially loved the Quiet Man with John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara made in 1952. Usually I’m interested in the latest. I’ll see the new Bond movie for sure.  I even like going to the theatre to see a movie on opening night. There’s a buzz that’s happening then like being in the front row at a rock concert.
I used to pray the times of the monks.  I’d wake early and read the Morning Prayer from the Book of Common Prayer.  I’d recite my rosary at those special times. Then I’d know that there were thousands maybe millions of us worshipping together. Prayer is this beyond time and space experience.  I loved going early to church in Saipan with Dr. Willi Gutowski and praying.  Morning prayer is the best.  The birds are wakening and the sun is coming up.  But there’s Compline too.  So many times I’ve enjoyed going to Christ Church Cathedral in Vancouver to listen to the chanting and join in that special time of prayer, Evening prayer.  Now I say the Lords’ prayer on wakening and going to sleep. Sometimes it’s just enough to say please and thank you.  A day in my life has become it’s own life. I try to live as if this is the day.
I’ve been worrying lately about loved ones. Praying hard.  Sometimes crying.  Having conversations with the universe about my will and thy will. Sometimes I feel the burden of the universe is on me.  I feel a failure because I can’t resurrect the dead or walk on water.  Perhaps I can and perhaps I have but this moment I’m moving through molasses, fearing I’m off and missing something.  There’s too many moving parts.  Then it’s okay.
Today it’s raining. I normally walk the dog first thing and he has his dump after I’ve had mine.  He hears the rain and lingers in bed.  Such a suck.  I opened the door and he turned around and went back to bed.  I think it’s Laura’s spoiling him that’s made him such a luxury lover. She rubs his chest and back slowly for ever. Looking at his eyes you can see he’s just melting in side. His tongues lolling to the left.  Totally decadent. Now it’s raining and this tough hunting hound therapy dog goes back to bed.
I’m glad. I’ve had my share of softness in life,as well as the hardness so I’m glad to have my coffee sooner.
I’ve gone through the mail and Facebook.  The political propaganda is filling the pages before the election.
I’ve been fond of posting what our Prime Minister is doing.  Our media only presents partisan critique so I don’t get the first message of what the event or activity was, just constant opinion.  The media presents the country as a civil war yet we’re a democracy and this is our elected.  Had I not signed up for the 24/7 ‘news’ from the PM I’d not know that we’d signed trade agreements with Israel, South America and European countries. I’d not know about the meetings with India and Ukraine and Poland. I read BBC news because it’s a more reliable reporting of Canadian news and tells me what ‘events’ are going on around the world.  I’m tired of these ‘opinion’ pieces masquerading as news.  I’d like the facts.  There are no facts in that old time sense but at least the stating of events.  Like Canada signed a trade agreement with Poland.  Not the evil politician trying to gain votes and wasting taxpayer money ignoring he plight of women and children and especially aboriginals was serving the rich corporate interests on a pleasure jaunt in Poland.  I’m forever left wondering what the hell is going on in my own country because I’m not in on the Ottawa CBC jokes, the sides that their overpaid out of touch, fat cat CEO pushes.  Oh well I can wax poetic about the failure of the news department of our national media to inform citizens of ‘news’.  Their reporting is so utterly unethical that they make any government look saintlike.  The filthy kettle calls all stainless steel pots black.
I’m late.  I’ve got to run.  Shower.  Drive to work. Grab umbrella.
I’m thankful for the day. The rain is a godsend for the forests and firefighters. Hopefully people’s homes will be protected and wildlife will be saved by the rain. I don’t care about lawns. I liked the recent joke, what do you call the guy with the green lawn on a block of brown lawns, “Grasshole”.
Thank you God for this day. Thank you for family and friends. Thank you for work. Thank you for Gilbert. Thank you for the air and the water and this glorious little blue planet.  Thank you for all your blessings. May I serve you and my patients today. Help me do the best I can and be of most use to others this day of Grace.

Canada Day

I’ve grown up singing O’Canada. I’ve been proud to sing God Saves the Queen too.  My dad was RCAF. I was proud he served his country. I’ve been a doctor and as a Canadian served in the north. When I sum up my career I simply say, “I worked in the areas of greatest need.”  Others did too.  Canadians aren’t individual grand standers. Hockey is our game because we believe in the team. There’s hierarchy but also individuality.
Wilderness is important to me. It’s part of what is Canadian.  We have ocean and acts of heroism by adventurers, fisherman and navy on either shore. We have the north.  Then there’s the south.  The Americans don’t like to remember it. I doubt it’s in their history books. But Canadians love to remember when we ‘whooped american ass.’  We pushed them back when they tried to invade. Now we love them as our neighbours. We were a Christian country and the majority still is. Love your enemy is something we take seriously. We work with those who try to hurt us.  We believe more in reformation than revenge. Of course we’ve had Britain and now the US doing the heavy lifting. But we’ve served too.  We are Canadians.
There are fireworks in the distance.  l like that so many participate in this day. I’m reading Colonel Hadfield’s book right now. He’s Canadian. So are Bare Naked Ladies.  We’ve got Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell and Margaret Lawrence.  We’ve even got Captain Kirk.  There’s Emily Carr and the Group of Seven, Glen Gould and Steppenwolf.  So many Canadians are the stuff of the Guess Who and the best of the culture and science and ideas of CBC.  We’re a railway from sea to sea.  We’re a great nation. We’re all about us and we care for the world. We’re green and we have water and energy and ideas. We share and we profit. We’ve taken immigrants and refugees.  We’ve done more for our aboriginals than any people in the world has done for theirs.  We learn together.  We are better each day.
I woke this morning. I slept in late.  I had two cups of coffee on a deck chair, throwing a ball for my cockapoo while reading Jackie Pullingers’ Chasing the Dragon.  Much to my surprise I got showered and shaved and onto my Harley motorcycle.  Gilbert rode in his little box behind me. We played Steppenwolf’s ‘Born to be Free” loud.  I drove us to the boatyard where my sailboat GIRI is up on the hard. The sun was hot and the sky was a beautiful blue.  Not too many clouds at that time.  Later they were a tapestry. I drilled holes in the steel of the zinc straps and mounted these last two to the steel hull.
Then Gilbert and I drove over to the docks where my fast hard bottomed zodiac with 20 hp outboard is chained.  We took her out for a spin.  It was hard getting up on the plane.  I beached her and cleaned barnacles that had attached to the sides since last I had her out only a few weeks back. Major growth in spring.  Gilbert kibitzed ashore with a poodle while I, in the ocean, used a paddle to scrape away the barnacles.  I’ll use a bottom paint on my dinghy when I take her out next.  Gilbert, with his lifejacket on, joined me, reluctantly, when I called him away from play.  Back in the boat, I pushed off the shore, started the engine, then gunned her onto the plane. Much better.
We drove out to English Bay. The water was rough. It was already 5 pm. I’d thought of anchoring off Spanish Banks and going for a swim but instead buzzed by George’s pink palace to take a picture and text it to him.  Then I drove back along the north shore seawall enjoying seeing all the people out on the beach. Lots of boats out in English Bay too. Fishing boats, sailboats, pleasure craft. Others just like me going for a spin.
I used up a tank of gas and had to refuel out in Coal Harbour off Lonsdale Quay.  Then back at the dock I unloaded Gilbert and tied up the boat.
Back home I had BC Wild salmon and watched Robocop.  What a great day.  Canada Day.  Deck chair, boat work, a ride on the motorcycle and a spin on the water. Blue sky and sunshine.  Out with my friend Gilbert. I wouldn’t want to be anything but Canadian and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere but here.  The day had started too with a picture of Eva, Gilbert’s girlfriend, my nephew Allan’s cockapoo.  My nephew Graeme, had taken her picture with a Canada Day scarf and sent it to me.
 

Hannah Arendt and CBC Ideas

Last night I listened to CBC Radio Ideas show on Hannah Arendt.  Truly remarkable radio programming as is so common with the brilliant Paul Kennedy's Ideas Not only did we hear clips of Hannah Arendt herself with her amazing passion and force but also we heard several other philosophers discussing her work.
Her most controversial is obviously her discussion of Eichman in Jerusalem.  I read much of her book  when it first appears years back.  Having so enjoyed Jay Lifton’s , the Nazi Doctors, I loved Arendts summation that evil is banal.  There is nothing ‘radical’ about evil.  Her term ‘banality of evil’ derived from this discussion of ‘ordinary’ ‘thoughtless’ men lacking the capacity for true thinking. Her studies on totalitarianism caught my attention years back when I read  Erving Goffman's classic, Asylums. I was a psychiatrist in a major asylum at the time and everything Goffman wrote about this "total institution' was true.  Arendt's philosophical insights dovetailed with Goffman's sociological profundity.
Arendt was mostly interested in freedom. On CBC Ideas, one commenter said she’d be very concerned today about our tendencies to large government with even larger beaurocracies.  It really was the bureaucrats that made Auschwitz so frightening.  Like Kafka’s Castle the people were doing their disconnected tasks.  Everyone was ‘performing’ a job without consideration of the whole.  Today the Matrix movie takes this idea to the natural end.
The point is about morality and Arendt believed that for morality a person had to have the capacity to think.  She saw the horror and cruelty of thoughtlessness as truly disturbing.
Born 1906 she died 1975, a truly extraordinary thinker.
I’m thankful to CBC Ideas for their insights into a subject I’d already taken an interest is so could appreciate how thoughtful the programming had been.  I’d gladly listen to the CBC podcast again.

Portland Hotel Society Scandal

Portland Hotel Society Scandal reminds me of the phoney doctor who worked in a community. He gave all the criminals letters of recommendation. He flew anyone anywhere on tax payer money. He doled out narcotics and benzodiazepines.  He was everyone's friend.
No one got well.  The truly sick people were highly suspicious. Within months there was a realization that what he was doing was extremely, extremely expensive and odd.  He was caught.
Crack pipe dispensers and 3 million dollar a year drug club to shoot up street bought heroin.
Mark Townsend and Liz Evans have made a lot of friends by 'buying them stuff'.   He's given heroin addicts a place to shoot up. He's not interfered with the DTES gangs who haven't had to worry about  losing customers by their getting off heroin.  With all the 'high life' going on while the old heroin users are dying, off the young are stepping up to lead this 'life' or death. The drug dealers have always supported Mark Townsend. They're his biggest fan. All of his programs  promoted a 'culture of addiction'. 
He's even ?'bought'? politicians, though I don't know if that's politically correct to say.  Bought is such a telling word .  However the Canadian media wouldn't think twice about using such language for this sort of thing outside Canada.  In a similar Asian or US scandal , every Canadian reporter would be "asking questions' about  'extortion' and 'kickbacks' because the 'people need to know." .  This would be especially true if "mismanagement" occurred  in the evil 'energy industry'.  But aren't this self proclaimed 'do gooders' even more wrong when they're caught doing serious wrong.
The NDP Jenny Kwan appears before the camera paying back what she says her 'husband', she's 'separated' from 'misinformed' her about. "I never knew" she said.  And all the reporters go, "oh, she never knew. See she's crying. " Yet, only last year for weeks CBC hounded the Prime Minister's office claiming shrilly in every manner that PM Harper must have known what was going on with the Duffy expense 'scandal'.   Did Mulcair know Jenny Kwan was using tax payer money to go to Disneyland?  Now Jenny Kwan is going home to be with her children. Ahhhhh, ooooo.  I'm surprised there wasn't a stuffed animal or a bunny rabbit.
Was the attack on Harper 'racist' or 'gender biased' or the lack of attack on Jenny Kwann, racist or gender biased.?I never can tell anymore with the media so obviously partisan.
It struck me as the most two faced deceitful presentation for a feminist. If Duffy had 'cried' would he have got off more easily? This isn't the age of chivalry, yet there we still accept 'tearful'  presentations by women blaming their husbands  and everyone 'coos'.  Does that mean a man can blame his wife now?
Thank God, Christy Clark doesn't do that silly shit.  Already sick by what this bozo group was  doing  the Kwan pathos nearly made me spew.  I actually could have accepted 'mismanagement' and 'misappropriation' but when this drama queen act came on it really screamed 'cover up'.  With all the conspiracy theories out there, I never take notice until there is an actual cover up. You can't see the conspiracy theories but the cover ups seems to stick out like a sore thumb.
Am I the only one that asks, were any of  these persons connected to the gangs and drug pushers downtown?
Am I watching too many episodes of  Criminal Minds?
The CBC skewered Duffy and the Senate for their 'mismanagement of funds ( ?theft" - I love white collar language. If the rest of us do mismanagement or misappropriation it's called theft)   Martha Stewart and Conrad Black went to jail for that sort of thing but I sure didn't see the media getting all soft and sweet with either of them.  The comedians have however done as good a job with Mark Townsend and Liz Evans as they did with Mayor Ford.
Maybe I listen to CBC going on and on about Ottawa too much.  Then watching Law and Order and CSI and NCSI  I couldn't help but ask, if Jenny Kwann got  $35,000 from one business, were there any other business 'shook down' for money. Oh, sorry, was it possible 'her husband' was 'shaking down' others or, damn, there goes the language problem again.  "Inviting donations', is that the term?   Naturally, the NDP should be with the RCMP looking into the overall finances of Jenny Kwan as a public 'servant' like they did with the senate. Shouldn't they? Will the tax department be looking into Mark Townsend and Liz Evans like they certainly would look into me or you?
But obviously I watch too much tv.  They seem so willing to do 'financial audits' of 'individuals' when those individuals are involved in 'extortion' or "theft" or "kickbacks" or sorry, there's that language problem again.  I can't help but think of thieves thieving.  Mismanagement Mark Townsend.
I just can't figure how you can spend $800 on a hotel room running a supposed 'charity' and 'non profit' business. I asked a few of my profit based "dirty capitalist" friends and none of them had ever spent more than $150 on a hotel room. $800. Wow. That boggles the mind.
So how come we have so much 'mismanagement' in government. This 'unprofessionalism" and lack of 'morality' or even better lack of 'basic ethics' is not tolerated among doctors, accountants or believe it or not, lawyers.  So why should these 'managers' for government funded businesses get a pass on their 'books' when my lawyer and accountant must 'pass' mine.  Is the accountant for the Portland Hotel Society going to be speaking to his professional body about his 'oversight' or 'lack of oversight'.  Is the lawyer for the Portland Hotel Society going to be speaking to the Law Society about his or her 'oversight' or lack of oversight.
Mark Townsend, Liz Evens, Small and Kwan are just a small part of the 'nest' that makes up a 28 million dollar business.
There were doctors involved in the Safeless Injection Site. As a physician I couldn't help but wonder if those physicians will be at very least asked to confirm their 'innoscence' in this thoroughly repugnant scandal. 
Terry Lake, our Health Minister is to be admired for the extraordinary political risk he has taken making sure the provincial audit saw the light of day .  My question is when the RCMP will be tasked to address what really is missing.  Hundreds of thousands or  millions.  We  only got a peak at what the public purse was paying for.
I just can't help but think that the Canadian Tax Department would be all over me if I didn't even keep records as the audit shows over and over again these folks failed to do.
The darkness of the Portland Hotel Society and how far down the management chain the corruption and taint goes is appalling.
 Now that said, the front line workers are awesome. This is what is so sad about the DTES. The workers down here are truly amazing.  The homeless and addicts are also trying very hard to get help in a tough economic climate in a very expensive fast changing city.
And I know with regard to 'all the usual suspects', the Mark Townsends, Jenny Kwans, and Liz Evans, I'm supposed to think, "live and let live". That's why I'm thankful for the Terry Lake.
Thanks to Terry Lake there's more likelihood today the money will get to those who need it most.

Pharmaceutical Representative Lunch

I was feeling pretty good driving to work this morning, till I turned on CBC radio.  I sometimes feel like a crack addict must feel at the moment I press the FM 88.1 button and leave the safety and serenity of classical or inspirational music.
Anna Marie Tremonte in that screechingly judgemental supercilious, out of touch with reality, voice she can adopt was talking to a group of angry men making a living off of attacking doctors. 
This weeks condemnation of my profession took the twist that we were unduly influenced by pharmaceutical representatives. 
Some doctors, very few, extremely few indeed, apparently make as much as $500,000 working as speakers for pharmaceutical industry. I was once paid $100 to talk to a group of doctors about a drug  I was using with patietns and knew to be extremely beneficial so was happy to tell my colleagues. I was not going to do this if someone didn't pay me as I'd rather sit at home and read a good book but when offered a meal in a fine restaurant, time to be with colleagues, I took the $100 and ate the meal and told the family physicians why I, a specialist, recommended this drug.
Because Anna Marie Tremonte doesn't live on this planet but is a bubble girl , she doesn't know that there is somebody doing just this sort of thing in every industry in the world.  It's called 'education' and it's done by those who are most knowledgeable. 
I listened to a presentation on RV's by an RV owner on which RV's they recommend. I listened to a fellow talk about motorcycles. I know nurses get paid lunches to listen to different representatives discuss uniform clothing materials.
The greatest corruption in hospitals, if they are anything like the military, happens in supplies. CBC did mention that since buying doctors lunch was out the pharmaceutical industry had shifted to buying lunches for the beaurocrats who decide which drugs appear on the hospital pharmacy lists. Pharmacists, we learned last year, were getting 'kickbacks' from industry to the tune of millions of dollars.
So I normally don't have lunch. I'm too busy. As a doctor I am tasked to do 90 minutes of activities in every 15 minutes of time spent with a patient, and I'm only paid for by my time. Even if I do all this right, and am the most perfect doctor, I can lose my license because I'm 'unpopular'.  I don't even have kill or maim people, I just have to be politically incorrect.  So, like most doctors, who on average work 80 hours (the equivalent of two government jobs, and maybe 3 CBC jobs - senior management in CBC do make half million in perks and benefits at least, don't they? I'm not sure what rock star reporters make but I do know that every band is approached by someone in industry hawking their amps and guitars). 
So this person offers to buy me lunch and tell me about the latest product from their company whose products I already use, Eli Lilly, for instance, (think Mother Earth Magazine, Danier Leather, Ford Cars, IBM, Apple, Angelina Jolie).  That's what I think when I think Merk, Eli Lilly and such folk because their products have saved the lives of my patients.  I've been up in the middle of the night and some scientific wizard in some amazing lab has created a product that has stopped my patient dying in the wee dark hours of the morning and I look and see Hoffman Laroche has made this godsend that has just saved a life.  I am a front line worker. 
When I listen to Anna Marie Tremonte I think she's somewhere safe dressed in white silk and sitting on a soft sedan looking at her painted nails and berkenstocks sometimes soundly pleasantly sane other times sounding seriously daft.  Think of me as a crack addict with CBC, a love hate relationship. 
So yes, I'm influenced by someone offering to take me for lunch, or coffee even.  It's the lever to get me out of the office.  Now when this person makes their pitch, I'm influenced just like I was influenced when I heard this one guy, a motorcycle mechanic, talk about the pros of and cons of synthetic versus natural oils.  I ask questions and I reason and I eat lunch.  I have noticed that the people that the pharmaceutical industry sends around are bright attractive people.  They're in sales.
Only government funded agencies like CBC, sometimes called Communist Broadcasting Corporation, knock sales routinely. Salesmen and sales are not dirty.  I 'sell' life. I try to convince my patients daily to give up killing themselves. I'm not laying life out there like an 'option'. I'm not miles from reality in a radio studio talking about it in the abstract. I'm selling my soul out to keep an adolescent girl from killing herself because she's overwhelmed.  I love 'sales'. I love 'salesmen'.  Sales to me is like any communication system.  Hitler was a brilliant media person but used that media for ill. 
Anna Maria Tremonte and the CBC are too often hack journalists and propagandists rather than unbiased reporters.  Where's the 'balance'.
I'm now feeling guilty about having that lunch.  I spent a third of my life in free time studying to be the best doctor I could be and out of sheer curiosity, all post graduate, and no body was buying me lunch.  I don't have a pension. I think my hourly wage is now about minimum wage but then I started the workforce 12 years after my neighbours who bought a house while I was training and now are retired early and spending their winters in Cancun. 
Yes, there are bad doctors. Yes, there are bad media people, but why the broad brush and why the Watergate Scandal over somebody buying me lunch who wants to tell me about something in my field when this is 'normal' business.  It's 'normal' Anna Maria Tremonte. Somebody in your CBC got a lunch to discuss which microphone you used today. 
And as for free samples, you get them at the cosmetic store.  You can't tell me you never ate a 'free sample' of food at Christmas time walking through the shopping mall.
I take free samples of medications I'm going to prescribe. I take these because I can give this sample to my patient. I do this not to 'push' drugs like heroin industry. I don't even do this like the guys at the car mall who let me drive around the block my Miata Sports Car.  I love my Miata Sports Car. It's been 35 years of 7 day a week work and today I'm able to affor a car that has heated seats that help my back and I don't want to feel guilty because last I looked doctors individually and collectively weren't the really rich people in this country.  Oprah makes 2.6 million dollars. How much does Anna Marie Tremonte make and how many perks is she given.
What's wrong with making money, doing good.   To listen to CBC making money is evil, collectively. (except perhaps if you are an athlete and why did it take CBC so long to catch the government officials in Quebec stealing outright millions of dollars and seeing no wrong in in it. And why did that 'Scandal of the Year', get so little play when the Senate red herring that cost us all only $500, 000)
I ask for samples so I can give my patient a sample so if they get a side effect, most likely in the first week of use, they won't fill the prescription which would cost them $100 and they'd lose the money because you can't take back antibiotics or medications for psychosis, or any medications and we counsell everyone not to use their neighbours medications.  So rather than have a rash and lose $100 I am so thankful the Pharmaceutical Industry, these greats who have extended the lives of my HIV patients by 30 years and saved my Diabetes and allowed my schizophrenic patients to lead relatively normal lives, well I'm thankful they let me save my patients some money. 
My patients usually aren't rich supercilious news casters like Anna Maria Tremonte.  Because they're sick their income has been affected and they appreciate any help the doctor can provide. 
I liked test driving my luxury sports car.  I am by CBC standards a 'dirty capitalist pig' even though I can't remember not working and so much of my activity overlaps with my work and I don't own a house, don't have time to gamble on the stock market and don't have pensions and haven't really given money the thought I've given to 'curing' or 'comforting' the person who has come to me sick and suffering.
And frankly, I'm really thankful for the Pharmaceutical Industry because they've given me the tools that have helped me do my job and I get tired of academics and monday morning quarterbacks hawking their books.
Yes, I know, a department head at a university could be bought for $50,000 and there were those who were unduly influenced just as everyone is in 'big business' and there's a need for accountability.  But somehow Anna Marie Tremonte and the CBC do more 'carping' than reporting.
Influence pedalling happens in every nook and cranny of existence and every item in our day to day lives is a product of sales so please, wake up.  And I will be more impressed if you first tell me whose paying you off and how influence affected which soft seat you sat in and how you refused to let the car company get you to test drive their car and how you really are 'above' it all.  Because you do sound very high and mighty and judgemental in a most obsequious way and I guess I'm returning the same. 
So I'll pray and forgive and hope tomorrow I can resist turning on CBC.   

CBC - Cancer Broadcasting Company

Last year while Canadian soldiers fought and died in Kundahar, CBC ran a month long anti government campaign trying to convince us that Canadian soldiers were wrong to hand over their prisoners to the local authorities even though this was the 'law' of engagement and NATO.  While this "news' was taking place, so that driving to work prime time or returning from work prime time I got to hear the likes of Anna Marie Tremonte go out of their way to create a 'scandal' in hope of blemishing the government.
I remember when the same was done to Paul Martin.  Both Paul Martin, a liberal Prime Minister, and Steven Harper, a conservative Prime Minister, were fiscally responsible and concerned about jobs and the economy.
Now we've heard day in day out about a 'scandal' of Senate's inappropriate spending when this is de rigour for Bureaucrats and Government the world over. It's called 'perks' and thankfully we're addressing the sordid likes of Duffy who is like other senators embarrassing to the government and their constituents.  But it's not the real 'news'.
The real news is the European Trade Agreement.  This is likely to be the most important economic achievement of the decade and CBC, in it's continued anti government, anti free trade, anti economy, anti jobs for Canadians, privileged, entitled skullduggery gives it a foot note.
CBC has a billion dollar tax payer paid budget.  It has unfair advantage over alternative media.  It's programs are some of the finest and for the sake of the programs, like Vinyl Cafe, Tapestry, Spark, the Debaters, Vinyl Tap, White Coat/Black Art I want to forgive the petty stupid propaganda of it's daily news. The Current is sickening regularly.  I heard a story and look it up only to find it's been given this communist spin or some sentimental twist that simply doesn't match the facts.
Then when things really big happen, like the biggest news of the year, a Euro Canadian trade agreement, it's pushed aside because it would only show that in contrast to the wasteful CBC the government is thinking about Canadians out of work and wanting to ensure a future economic well being.
Listening to the arrogance of CBC news I'd believe that Canada's foremost leaders and ministers aren't the extraordinary men and women they are. I write to these leaders and ask about matters of state and find out that in contrast to what CBC says the government is doing it's job.  The debates in parliament and the bureaucrats that supply the ministers are highly intelligent, impressively informed individuals.
CBC news is hurting Canada and if the only way to save the country from ignorance is to slash the CBC budget then that's a must do.  I'd rather keep the pearls and get rid of the pig shit programming of news.  BBC seems to be able to report stories without the obsessive propagandistic communist jingoism day after day as if the journalists really think they're some kind of Woodwards on every matter.
Canada is one of the greatest countries in the world.  We have all manner of strengths.  When our soldiers are fighting overseas Canadians like me want to hear the news not reporter ignorance.  I was in Italy and the news there reported the location and movement of the troops serving in NATO. The country had a moment of silence for the start of their campaign.  A couple of weeks in the US I heard 'both sides' of the discussion on the news, not a cleverly disguised and sold one sided propaganda pitch masquerading as 'balanced ' reporting.
CBC News needs to grow up. it's fat on daddy tax payer support and continues to bite the hand the feeds.  Our governments are democratically elected. It's not the job of the national government funded media to 'pull down' the government whether it's under fiscally responsible, mature Paul Martin or economically wise and responsible Steven Harper.
I don't want my tax payer money going to CBC news.  i love the CBC programs but when I drive to work and return from work, in the prime time listening, I'm thoroughly tired of hearing anti government propaganda.  Even Mulcair is portrayed by CBC poorly.  The only favourite they seem to have is Troudeau and frankly, I fear, they don't like him for his merits but only because they're smoking up.  It sure sounds like the Currents is stuck in bell bottom pants with daddy issues.  CBC news hates the majority of Canadians, that's for sure, and we pay for this perversion of reporting.
Grow up CBC news.  Or  get out and make your own money. I'm tired of supporting such biased stupidity with my hard earned money.  I'm tired of hearing Canadians insulted.

American-Canadian Relations

I am Canadian and I'm a big fan of the United States. I've known and admired many Americans as friends, lovers and colleagues.  I know individual Americans as I know individual Canadians.  We are a great people.
I appreciate that both Canada and the United States are wrought with partisan politics and special interest groups.  Regardless of the internal divisions in my country I believe fully that it is in the best interest of Canada to work together with America.  I know we are their Allies today but to be an ally is like being being anything from a fellow journeyman on a glorious quest to being a pouting adolescent being dragged along by an obvious parent.  Even Troudeau knew America as an Elephant to us as a mouse.  While we know that Quebec has held Canada hostage for many years internally this is not a strategy that works well internationally. Canada can not ignore Quebec but much to the chagrin of boastful Mackenzie King, the world could ignore Canada.
So our strength is in cooperation.
Next the question is with which 'party' in the US do we cooperate best..  We do not want to as a country support their "opposition'.  With cooperation we would do best to cooperate with stength not weakness.
To this end we really need to review the last 20 years of US/Canadian politics and ask simply under which American government, Republican or Democrat, did we as Canadians most prosper.  If Canada made more money and had greater concessions under the Republicans then we can only hope for a Republican America. If on the other hand we did best under the American Democratic position then that's who we should favour.
As a liberal I might well support liberalism in my country but liberalism may serve caring first for my own people whereas supporting liberalism in a trading partner would be harmful for my own cause. If I support conservatism in my own country this may not make Republican in the US better unless the US under republicans have increased the well being of Canada as a whole.  In Canada the NDP and Liberals are one in the same, akin to Democrats in the US whereas the Conservative Party is like the right slice of the Democrats and the left slice of the Republicans.  We have no real Right Wing Republicans in Canada to speak of. Canada on the world stage has always been centrist or left of centre.  You really need a monarchy or an empire to make for true Right wing representation. Despite the Quebec Separatist movement now relatively defunk Canadians have lacked that tendency to saber rattling and strutting that characterized Europe before WWI.
It's real politic also to realize that America is our principal trade partner. It's fine to look for alternative sources of income and expand our resources but not by biting the hand that feeds.  It's a dream to have Chinese and European wealth flowing into Canada in competition with American but the fact is that's only a possible and imagined future.  Today America remains our best bet.
How can we get Obama to improve trade with Canada?  That's the only real 'use' we can have for Obama?  Self interest is the cornerstone of internationalism.  Idealism must first be proven on the home front before it's a very profitable export.  Canadian's haven't done well on idealism in the last couple of decades.  Where once we were the country providing the booze to the US, we're now a principal source of illicit drugs.  At home we can be 'morally superior' but to the average American we offer little more morally than any of the European or Caribean countries.  Americans have their Bob Dylans and James Taylors, peace marches, art and idealism.  Canada to the average American unfortunately is not Joni Mitchell or William Shatner but raw resources. And as to that they might simply prefer our clean water to our dirty oil but they don't particularly respect our politics or even our health care.  If anything Americans are more likely to look at Canada to see what not to do rather than look at Canada to see what to do.
Canadians need to be realistic in regards to dealing with Americans. The diversity and choices available to Americans are far ranging given the independence of the States as opposed to their federation. Canadians are fairly homogenous provincially and federally. We compare to an American less as country than as another state.  An American might well consider, do you think we should do this the Canadian way or the Wyoming way.  We are 25 million to their 100's of millions.
It's something the CBC forgets in it's propaganda to the Canadian people.  Yes I am proud to be a Canadian and small is beautiful and I am superior as a highland Canadian to a lowland American.  That doesn't change that to the American elephant I'm still just a cute mouse, albeit with incredible sharp teeth and the capacity to scurry up an elephants legs and bite his balls hard.  I might even induce gangrene and destroy the elephants capacity for future generation but realistically I'd be crushed in the end and likely well before the elephant died of my no doubt glorious and deviously inflicted wounds.
Admiring the Americans as much as I do I'd like Canadians to maximize the relationship and to this end our think tanks seriously have to ask with which party has Canada gained most. The next question then is with which candidate for a political party will Canada benefit. I hear the republican leadership hopefuls every day talking or being talked about on CBC but frankly I've not heard one of them say anything about Canada.  It's why I find the CBC news at times farsical. I know that CBC is the news agency of Toronto and Montreal but laugh when it purports to represent the country.  To the best of my knowledge CBC has not reported what Romney for instance will do for Canada.  It's the only question I want to know about that leadership race.  What is Gingrich going to do for Canada?
Now that Obama is in power if I had the time I'd like to look back and see what Obama said would benefit Canada.  Surely there's the 'trickle down' effect that Americans both Democrat and Republican like towards the rest of the world as compared to their Mount Olympus.  That said what more can we expect?  And I don't want Platitudes either. There are very specific treaties regarding trade and the NATO and various things of this nature that would make the Republican leadership race very interesting for me.
When Obama interfered with Canada's pipe line I wasn't interested in the spotted owls I was however interested in how much the Democratic decision would lose Canada economically and in terms of jobs.  I appreciate the concerns of a northern BC pipeline as to our land but frankly I was not as understanding of Obama putting some state's concern for it's greenery over the billions to be made by Albertans if a pipeline went through to America. It's that way of looking at things rather than the vague and touchy feeling kind of politically correct thinking that somehow, for me, misses the point.
First and foremost I'm a Canadian.  Next I'm a global citizen.  As such I'm most appreciative of the American's overall management of a whole lot of things that Canadians don't generally like to have to deal with.  Just to note a couple of these, I'd say the Chinese Military and radical muslim suicide bombers.  I strongly believe that without the US Canada would be the slave state of another power. I certainly prefer Obama more than any of the North Korean family leadership.  To date America has been the best ally Canada has had and is today our very best ally and neighbour.  So how can we make the most of this relationship?

Vancouver Police and Police Dogs

I was disheartened to hear CBC news going on and on about some poor fellow who was bit by a police dog.  To hear the story I was left with the impression that Saint Theresaa and Queen Elizabeth  had been attacked by a police dog while having tea in a church somewhere.  Typical of CBC left wing politically correct yellow bleeding heart liberal journalism they had the story all wrong.
It turns out a young man, not a child, or a little boy or girl, but a man had been bashing a street bus with his skateboard threatening the driver and others about..  He'd been doing this not once but umpteen times.  He was told repeatedly to stop his angry bullying aggressive destructive behaviour.  He did not listen to authority or reason. He was a law unto himself. Clearly he had never till this time been socialized. He is likely the kind of person who pees on toilets seats and shits in the kitchen. His behaviour was by all intents and purposes feral and barbaric.  The police arrived and told him to stop and he fled.  The police dog followed him.  Note a police man running or a police car is least likely to catch a man on a skateboard.  However this punk, this thug, this bully, this mean little shit, didn't anticipate the police dog.  He didn't think. He might well have been high on drugs and impaired. Likely this was the time he was caught and there were many other times that he was not caught. His arrogance speaks to that scenario.
The police dog caught him.  Police dogs are trained to stop a person and bring them down.  If the person attacks the police dog the police dog defends himself and holds on.  Police dogs don't have guns or tazers. They have teeth. One dog against one human and the human has the distinct advantage.  Dogs need a pack to be effective. Police dogs alone against a man with a skateboard are in lifethreatening situations. One whack with a skateboard can kill a dog.  Indeed a skateboard is a deadly weapon against a police man. It's a bit like that weapon the Klingons used in Star treck.  It's a lethal weapon.  If a policeman or a police dog is faced with a belligerent aggressive angry hostile man with a skateboard then the dog or the police man is at high risk.
Now this police dog bit this criminal who had committed a crime, put others at risk, whoever was in the bus, those around him, some man going wild and apeshit with a skateboard defying the police and trying to hurt a police dog, a domesticated loyal animal in the midst of a busy street with all manner of innocent people about who didn't want to be drawn into this bullies personal drama who just wanted to get on with their business.  They had to witness this horrible situation of a man with a skakeboard trying to kill a dog and the dog just doing it's duty.  The man wanted to kill the dog.  He would claim he was solely interested in his self defence.  But the fact remains he wanted to kill a police dog after he'd tried unsuccessfully to kill  bus.
He was taken to hospital by the police. His hospital care was paid for by us, the citizens who he had harmed.  CBC seems to be a law unto itself.  It doesn't realize that we as tax payers pay for it's journalists and it's coverage of the news.  We pay for city buses. And we pay the high cost of having police dogs and the high costs of having police.  The Vancouver Police Dog contingent is world reknowned.  We have the best trainers and the most humane practices.  Our police dogs are the best in the world. This man tried to destroy a bus and  would have killed a  police dog.  I would have been delighted if the CBC reported the story as a success for a dog that survived and a success for the police who stopped public damage and the man trying to harm the dog so he could get away scot free..  The CBC doesn't seem to remember that hooligans like this man destroyed the city after a silly Vancouver Canucks game. We're still waiting collectively for justice to be done in that case.
Now the best part.  This man is suing the city of Vancouver, which is us, and the CBC people who live in Vancouver too, claiming that the police should have sent a gerbil after him.  Maybe a gold fish should have been sent by the police. Maybe a chihuahua.  Anything but a german shepherd so this man could have killed a little dog and made his escape to destroy people's livelihood and threaten bus drivers, bus passengers, and police men trying to protect us from this kind of dangerous sociopathic behaviour.  I personally would suggest that the Vancouver Police get pitbulls, great danes and rottweilers rather than the toy poodles criminals would have the police have.
We still haven't seen the Canuck rioters go to jail and jail in Canada is better than what the elderly who worked all their lives often get too, even without the new jails promised.
I think CBC should be ashamed of itself.  I think it's tragic when a person gets hurt but the age old message to criminals and taking a skateboard and attacking a bus and bus driver and passengers and tax bought city property is criminal, well, 'if you can't do the time, don't do the crime'.
Hopefully this fellow will learn something from his running amok. Maybe not to do it again. Maybe others who think they should be able to destroy whenever they please will also learn that the police will stop them.  This isn't an airport incident with a man having difficulty with language and understanding and threatening three armed policemen with a paper clip holder. This is a man with a skateboard weapon swinging it about with extreme violence and prejudcie and then defying police and wanting to escape to do more destruction another day. This is the story of Lassie coming to the rescue of the police, the bus driver, the City of Vancouver and all the people who live and work here without destructiveness.
Now in a sane world this man would go to court and the judge would find that this suit was more 'mischief' and he would be required to do more time or pay more cost for continuing to defy society and believe that he has the right to destroy people's livelihood and threaten us with his skateboard.  Then use the courts for his own criminal gain. My fear is that the judge, judges not riding in buses or walking about the streets of Vancouver where normal people live in fear of dangerous men high on drugs weilding skateboard weapons or whatever else they can get their hands on.  Judges like the CBC are too often uncaring about the rest of us who walk the streets of Vancouver or don't because we are afraid of the hooligans.  We depend on the police but increasingly feel they are muzzled like this sociopathic criminal would have the dog muzzled so he could have bludgeoned the poor dog to death with his skateboard and made his escape to go on to bludgeon a police man next time.
I am hopeful for the courts.  The lawyer who took this case must be hard up for work and embarrassed.  I can only hope a judge who has walked downtown recently takes the case.  I am thankful for the Vancouver Police and the Vancouver Police Dog contingent.   I would prefer that criminals hurt in the pursuit of crimes have to pay for their healthcare.  I don't think I should have to pay for health care and know that guys who attack the police and get hurt get their health care paid for.  They could at least get a bill for the damages they do. I've been hoping to hear that the Canucks rioters will have their incomes garnisheed for the next 5 years at least to pay for some of the damages businesses and tax payers and volunteers have had to pay.
CBC stopped being silly and stupid.  The vast majority of us are not criminals and we are the ones that are paying your salary.  Stop smoking BC Bud and report the news straight.   CBC stop supporting the violence and hooligans because your cheerleader is going to policemen and citizens killed.  A note should go out if the police are called up upon to help the CBC they should bring only goldfish, gerbils and toy poodles as back up. Better too, muzzle the goldfish.